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ENGLISH HUMOURISTS

EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.

THE

ENGLISH HUMOURISTS

OF THE

EIGHTEENTH CENTURY,

^ Series of ILectures,

DELIVERED IN ENGLAND, SCOTLAND, AND THE UNITED STATES OF

AMERICA.

BY

W. M. THACKERAY,

Author of "Esmond," "Pendeiinis," "Vanity Fair,"&c.

LONDON:
SMITH, ELDER, & CO. 65, CORNHILL.

BOMBAY : SMITH, TAYLOR, & CO.

1853.

I27ie author of this vjork reserves to himself the right of authorising
a trandation of ii.]

LONDON :
EKADBORY AND EVANS, PRINTERS, "WHITEFRIARH.

CONTENTS.

-4-

Lecture the First.

Page
SWIFT 1

Lecture the Second.
CONGREVE AND ADDISON 5

Lecture the Third.

STEELE 105

Lecture the Fourth.

PRIOR, GAT, AND POPE 160

Lecture the Fifth.

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING .219

Lecture the Sixth.

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH 269

ERRATA.

— ♦ —

Page 56, last line but tliree,/o/- "an empire," rea.d "or empire."
„ 83, line 11 ; for "Peggott," read " Doggett."
,, 115, last line but four; for "detestable," read "delectable."
,, 117, line 7; for "physic," read "physics."

,, 150, line 14 ; for "the instinct we desire," read "the instinctive desire.
,, 171, line 9 ; for "It was so kind," read "He was so kind."
,, 177, line 11 ; for "deary idyllic," read "dreary idyllic."
,, 196, line 5 ; for "a Hardy," read "or Hardy,"
,, 218, line 2 ; for "transcendant," read "transcendent."
,, 226, line 20 ; for " as the clerk," read " and the clerk."
„ 228, line 3; for "1800," read "1847."
,, 250, line 4 ; for "wild," read "Welsh."
,, 255, line 3 ; for "wine-stained," read "wine. Stained."
,, 258, line 14; for "him," read "them."
,, 28.3, line 18 ; for "point," read " paint."
,, 294, line 15 ; for "of necessity," read " and necessity."
,, 298, last line but one of text; for "dependants," read "dependents."

THE ENGLISH HUMOURISTS

OF THE

EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.

LECTURE THE FIRST.

SWIFT.
In treating of the English humourists of the i^ast
age, it is of the men and of their lives, rather than of
their books, that I ask permission to speak to you ;
and in doing so, you are aware that I cannot hope to
entertain you with a merely humourous or facetious
story. Harlequin without his mask is known to
present a very sober countenance, and was himself,
the story goes, the melancholy patient whom the
Doctor advised to go and see Harlequin ' — a man full
of cares and perplexities like the rest of us, whose Self
must always be serious to him, under whatever mask,
or disguise, or uniform he presents it to the public.
And as all of you here must needs be grave when you

^ The anecdote is fi-equently told of our performer, Rich.

B

ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

think of 3^our own past and present, you will not look
to find, in tlie histories of those whose lives and feelings
I am going to try and describe to you, a story that is
otherwise than serious, and often very sad. If Humour
only meant laughter, you would scarcely feel more
interest about humourous writers than about the private
life of poor Harlequin just mentioned, who possesses
in common with these the power of making you laugh.
But the men regarding whose lives and stories your
kind presence here shows that you have curiosity
and sympathy, appeal to a great number of our other
faculties, besides our mere sense of ridicule. The
humourous writer professes to awaken and direct your
love, your pity, your kindness — your scorn for untruth,
pretension, imposture — your tenderness for the weak,
the poor, the oppressed, the unhappy. To the best of
his means and ability he comments on all the ordinary
actions and passions of life almost. He takes upon
himself to be the week-day preacher, so to speak.
According^, as he finds, and speaks, and feels the truth
best, we regard him, esteem him — sometimes love him.
And, as his business is to mark other people's lives and
peculiarities, we moralise upon his life when he is gone
— and yesterday's preacher becomes the text for to-day's
sermon.

Of English parents, and of a good English family of
clergymen,* Swift was born in Dublin in 1G67, seven

^ He was from a younger branch of the Swifts of Yorkshire. His

SWIFT. 3

months after tlie death of his father, who had come to
practise there as a lawyer. The boy went to school at
Kilkenny, and afterwards to Trinity College, Dublin,
where he got a degree with difficulty, and was wild, and
witty, and poor. In 1688, by the recommendation of
his mother. Swift was received into the family of Sir
AVilliam Temple, who had known Mrs. Swift in Ireland.
He left his patron in 1693, and the next year took
orders in Dublin. But he threw up the small Irish
preferment which he got, and returned to Temple, in
whose family he remained until Sk William's death in
1699. His hopes of advancement in England failing,
Swift returned to Ireland, and took the living of
Laracor. Hither he invited Hester Johnson,* Temple's

gi'andfather, the Rev. Thomas Swift, Vicar of Goodrich, in Hereford-
shire, suffered for his loyalty in Charles I.'s time. That gentleman
married Elizabeth Dryden, a member of the family of the poet. Sir
Walter Scott gives, with his characteristic minuteness in such points,
the exact relationship between these famous men. Swift was " the son
of Dryden's second cousin." Swift, too, was the enemy of Dryden's
reputation. Witness the " Battle of the Books :" — " The difference was
greatest among the horse," says he of the moderns, "where every
private trooper pretended to the command, from Tasso and Milton to
Dryden and Withers." And in '* Poetry, a Rhapsody," he advises the
poetaster to —

" Read all the Prefaces of Dryden,
For these our critics much confide in,
Though merely writ, at first, for filling.
To raise the volume's price a shilling."

** Cousin Swift, you will never be a poet/' was the phrase of Dryden to
his kinsman, which remained alive in a memory tenacious of such matters.
^ " Miss Hetty" she was called in the family — where her face, and
her dress, and Sir William's treatment of her, — all made the real fact
about her birth plain enough. Sir William left her a thousand pounds.

B 2

ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

natural daugiiter, -with whom he had contracted a
tender friendship, while they were both dependants of
Temple's. And with an occasional visit to England,
Swift now passed nine years at home.

In 1709 he came to England, and, with a brief visit
to Ireland, dming which he took possession of his
deanery of St. Patrick, he now passed five years in
England, taking the most distinguished part in the poli-
tical transactions which terminated with the death of
Queen Ainie. After her death, his party disgraced, and
his hopes of ambition over, Swift returned to Dublin,
where he remained twelve years. In this time he
wrote the famous "Drapier's Letters" and "Gulliver's
Travels." He married Hester Johnson, Stella, and
buried Esther Vanhomrigh, Vanessa, who had followed
him to Ireland from London, where she had contracted
a violent passion for him. In 1726 and 1727 Swift was
in England, which he quitted for the last time on
hearing of his wife's ilhiess. Stella died in January,
1728, and Swift not until 1745, ha^dng passed the last
five of the seventy-eight years of his life, with an
impaired intellect and keepers to watch him.*

^ Sometimes, during his mental affliction, lie continued walking
about the house foi^ many consecutive hours ; sometimes he remained
in a kind of torpor. At times, he would seem to struggle to bring into
distinct consciousness and shape into expression, the intellect that lay-
smothering under gloomy obstruction in him. A pier-glass falling by
accident, nearly fell on him. He said, lie wished it had ! He once
repeated, slowly, several times, " I am what I am." The last thing he
wrote was an epigiam on the building of a magazine for arms and

SWIFT. 5

You know, of course, that Swift lias had many
biographers ; his hfe has been told by the Idndest and
most good-natured of men, Scott, who admires but can't
bring himself to love him ; and by stout old Johnson,*
who, forced to admit him into the company of poets,
receives the famous Irishman, and takes off his hat to
him with a bow of surly recognition, scans him from
head to foot, and passes over to the other side of the
street. Dr. Wilde of Dublin,^ who has written a most

stores, which was pointed out to him as he went abroad during his
mental disease : —

^ Behold a proof of Irish sense :

Here Irish wit is seen ;
When nothing's left that's worth defence,
They build a magazine !

^ Besides these famous books of Scott's and Johnson's, there is a
copious " Life " by Thomas Sheridan (Dr. Johnson's " Sherry "), father
of Richard Brinsley, and son of that good-natured, clever, Irish, Dr.
Thomas Sheridan, Swift's intimate, who lost his chaplaincy by so
unluckily choosing for a text on the king's birthday, "Sufficient for
the day is the evil thereof ! " Not to mention less important works,
there is also the *' Remarks on the Life and Writings of Dr. Jonathan
Swift," by that polite and dignified writer, the Earl of Orrery. His
lordship is said to have striven for literary renown, chiefly that he
might make up for the slight passed on him by his father, who left his
library away from him. It is to be feared that the ink he used to
wash out that stain only made it look bigger. He had, however, known
Swift, and corresponded with people who knew him. His work (which
appeared in 1751) provoked a good deal of controversy, calling out,
among other Irochures, the interesting " Observations on Lord Oi-rery's
Remarks," &c. of Dr. Delany.

- Dr. Wilde's book was written on the occasion of the remains of
Swift and Stella being brought to the light of day — a thing which
happened in 1835, when certain works going on in St. Patrick's
Cathedral, Dublin, afforded an opportunity of their being examined.

6 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

interesting volume on the closing years of Swift's life,
calls Johnson " the most malignant of his biographers : "
it is not easy for an English critic to please Irishmen
— perhaps to try and please them. And yet Johnson
truly admires Swift : Johnson does not quarrel with
Swift's change of politics, or doubt his sincerity of
religion : about the famous Stella and Vanessa contro-
versy the Doctor does not bear very hardly on Swift.
But he could not give the Dean that honest hand of his ;
the stout old man puts it into his breast, and moves off
from him.*

Would we have lilted to live with him ? That is a
question which, in dealing with these people's w^orks,
and thinking of their lives and peculiarities, every
reader of biographies must put to himself. Would you
have liked to be a friend of the great Dean ? I should
like to have been Shakspeare's shoeblack — ^just to have
lived in his house, just to have worshipped liim — to
have run on his errands, and seen that sweet serene

One hears with surprise of these skulls "going the rounds " of houses,
and being made the objects of dilettante curiosity. The larynx of
Swift was actually carried off ! Phrenologists had a low opinion of his
intellect, from the observations they took.

Dr. Wilde traces the symptoms of ill-health in Swift, as detailed in
his writings from time to time. He observes, likewise, that the skull
gave evidence of " diseased action " of the brain during life — such as
would be produced by an increasing tendency to '' cerebral congestion."

^ " He [Dr. Johnson] seemed to mc to have an unaccountable preju-
dice against Swift ; for I once took the liberty to ask him if S^vift had
personally offended him, and he told me he had not." — Boswell's Tour
to the Hebrides.

SWIFT. 7

face. I should like, as a j^oung man, to have lived on
Fielding's stair-case in the Temple, and after helping
him up to bed perhaps, and opening his door with his
latch-key, to have shaken hands with him in the
morning, and heard him talk and crack jokes over his
breakfast and his mug of small beer. Who would not
give something to pass a night at the club with
Johnson, and Goldsmith, and James Boswell, Esq., of
Auchinleck ? The charm of Addison's companion-
ship and conversation has passed to us by fond
tradition— — but Swift ? If you had been his in-
ferior in parts (and that, with a great respect for
all persons present, I fear is only very likely),
his equal in mere social station, he would have
bullied, scorned, and insulted you ; if, undeterred by
his great reputation, you had met him like a man, he
would have quailed before you,^ and not had the pluck
to reply, and gone home, and years after written a foul
epigTam about you — watched for you in a sewer, and
come out to assail you with a coward's blow and a dirty

^ Few men, to be sure, dared this experiment, but yet their success
was encouraging. One gentleman made a point of asking the Dean,
whether his uncle Godwin had not given him his education. Swift,
who hated that subject cordially, and, indeed, cared little for his
kindred, said, sternly, " Yes ; he gave me the education of a dog."
" Then, sir," cried the other, striking his fist on the table, " you have
not the gratitude of a dog ! "

Other occasions there were when a bold face gave the Dean pause,
even after his Irish almost-royal position was established. But he
brought himself into greater danger on a certain occasion and the

8 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

bludgeon. If you had been a lord with a blue riband,
wlio flattered his vanity, or could help his ambition, he
would have been the most delightful company in the
world. He would have been so manly, so sarcastic, so
bright, odd, and original, that you might think he had
no object in view but the indulgence of his humour,
and that he was the most reckless, simple creature in
the world. How he would have torn your enemies to
pieces for you ! and made fun of the Opposition ! His
servility was so boisterous that it looked like inde-
pendence ; ^ he would have done your errands, but with
the air of patronising you, and after fighting your
battles masked in the street or the press, would have

amusing circumstances may be once more repeated here. He had
unsparingly lashed the notable Dublin lawyer, Mr. Serjeant Bettes-
worth —

" So, at the bar, the booby Bettesworth,

Though half-a-crown out-pays his sweat's worth,

Who knows in law nor text nor margent,

Calls Singleton his brother-serjeant ! "

The Serjeant, it is said, swore to have his life. He presented himself
at the deanery. The Dean asked his name. *'Sir, I am Serjeant
Bett-es-worth."

" In what regiment, pray ? " asked Swift.

A guard of volunteers formed themselves to defend the Dean this
time.

^ '' But, my Hamilton, I will never hide the freedom of my senti-
ments from you. I am much inclined to believe that the temper of my
friend Swift might occasion his English friends to wish him happily
and properly promoted at a distance. His spirit, for I would give it
the proper name, was ever untractable. The motions of his genius
were often irregular. He assumed more the air of a patron than of a
friend. He affected rather to dictate than advise." — Orrehy.

SWIFT. 9

kept on liis hat before your wife and dangliters in the
drawing-room, content to take that sort of pay for his
tremendous services as a bravo/

He says as much himself in one of his letters to
Bohngbroke : — " All my endeavours to distinguish
myself were only for want of a gTeat title and fortune,
that I might be used like a lord by those who have an
opmion of my parts ; whether right or wrong is no
great matter. And so the reputation of wit and great
learniug does the office of a blue riband or a coach
and six." ^

^ . . . . "An anecdote which, though only told by Mrs. Pilkington,
is well attested, bears, that the last time he was in London he went
to dine with the Earl of Bui'lington, who was but newly married.
The Earl, it is supposed, being willing to have a little diversion, did
not introduce him to his lady, nor mention his name. After dinner,
said the Dean, ' Lady Burlington, I hear you can sing ; sing me a
song.' The lady looked on this unceremonious manner of asking
a favour with distaste, and positively refused. He said ' She should
sing, or he would make her. Why, madam, I suppose you take me
for one of your poor English hedge-parsons; sing when I bid you.'
As the Earl did nothing but laugh at this freedom, the lady was so
vexed that she burst into tears and retu-ed. His first compliment to
her when he saw her again was, ' Pray, madam, are you as proud and
ill-natured now as when I saw you last ] ' To which she answered with
great good-humour, ' No, Mr. Dean, I'll sing for you if you please.'
From which time he conceived a great esteem for her." — Scott's Life.

.... " He had not the least tincture of vanity in his conversation.
He was, perhaps, as he said himself, too proud to be vain. WTien he
was polite, it was in a manner entirely his own. In his friendships he
was constant and undisguised. He was the same in his enmities.''—-
Orrery.

^ "I make no figure but at court, where I afiect to turn from a lord
to the meanest of my acquaintances." — Journal to Stella.

" 1 am plagued with bad authors, verse and prose, who send me

10 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

Could there be a greater candour ? It is an outlaw,
who says, " These are my brains ; with these I'll win
titles and compete with fortune. These are my bullets ;
these I'll turn into gold ; " and he hears the sound of
coaches and six, takes the road like Macheath, and
makes society stand and deliver. They are all on their
knees before him. Down go my lord bishop's apron,
and his Grace's blue riband, and my lady's brocade
petticoat in the mud. He eases the one of a living, the
other of a patent place, the third of a little snug post
about the Court, and gives them over to followers of
his own. The great prize has not come yet. The coach
with the mitre and crosier in it, which he intends to
have for his share, has been delayed on the way from
St. James's; and he waits and waits until nightfall,
when his runners come and tell him that the coach
has taken a different road, and escaped him. So he
fires his pistols into the air with a curse, and rides
away into his own country.*

their books and poems, the vilest I ever saw ; but I have given their
names to my man, never to let them see me." — Journal to Stella.

The following curious paragraph illustrates the life of a courtier : —
" Did I ever tell you that the Lord Treasurer hears ill with the left

ear just as I do ? I dare not tell him that I am so, sir ; for

fear he should think that I counterfeited to make my court f" — Journal to
Stella.

^ The war of pamphlets was carried on fiercely on one side and the
other : and the "Whig attacks made the ministry Swift served very
sore. Bolingbroke laid hold of several of the Opposition pamphleteers,
and bewails their " factiousness " in the following letter :

SWIFT. 11

Swift's seems to me to be as good a name to point a
moral or adorn a tale of ambition, as any hero's that
ever lived and failed. But we must remember that the

"BOLINGBBOKE TO THE EaRL OF StRAFFORD.

" Whitehall, July 2Srd, 1712.

" It is a melancholy consideration that the laws of our country are too
weak to punish effectually those factious scribblers, who presume to
blacken the brightest characters, and to give even scurrilous language
to those who are in the first degrees of honour. This, my lord, among
others, is a symptom of the decayed condition of our government, and
serves to show how fatally we mistake licentiousness for liberty. All
I could do was to take up Hart, the printer, to send him to Newgate,
and to bind him over upon bail to be prosecuted ; this I have done,
and if I can arrive at legal proof against the author Ridpath, he shall
have the same treatment."

Swift was not behind his illustrious friend in this virtuous indigna-
tion. In the history of the four last years of the Queen, the Dean
speaks in the most edifying manner of the licentiousness of the press
and the abusive language of the other party :

" It must be acknowledged that the bad practices of printers have
been such as to deserve the severest animadversion from the public.

The adverse party, full of rage and leisure since their fall,

and unanimous in their cause, employ a set of writers by subscription
who are w^ell versed in all the topics of defamation and have a style and

genius levelled to the generality of their readers However,

the mischiefs of the press were too exorbitant to be cured by such a
remedy as a tax upon small papers, and a bill for a much more
effectual regulation of it was brought into the House of Commons,
but so late in the session that there was no time to pass it, for there
always appeared an unwillingness to cramp overmuch the liberty of
the press."

But to a clause in the proposed bill, that the names of authors
should be set to every printed book, pamphlet, or paper, his reverence
objects altogether, for, says he, "beside the objection to this clause
from the practice of pious men, who, in publishing excellent writings
for the service of religion, have chosen, out of an humble Christian
■spirit, to conceal their names j it is certain that all persons of true genius

]a ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

morality was lax, — that other gentlemen besides him-
self took the road in his day, — that public society was
in a strange disordered condition, and the State was
ravaged by other condottieri. The Boyne was bemg
fought and won, and lost — the bells rung in Wilham's
victory, in the very same tone with which they would
have pealed for James's. Men were loose upon politics,
and to shift for themselves. They, as well as old

or knowledge have an invincible modesty and suspicion of themselves
upon their first sending their thoughts into the world."

This "invincible modesty" was no doubt the sole reason which
induced the Dean to keep the secret of the "Drapier's Letters," and a
hundred humble Christian works of which he was the author. As for
the Opposition, the Doctor was for dealing severely with them: he writes
to Stella :—

Journal. Letter XIX.

" London, March 25th, 1710-11.

" "We have let Guiscard be buried at last, after showing

him pickled in a trough this fortnight for twopence a piece ; and the

fellow that showed would point to his body and say, ' See, gentlemen,

this is the wound that was given him by his Grace the Duke of

Ormond ; ' and, * This is the wound,' &c, ; and then the show was

over, and another set of rabble came in. 'Tis hard that our laws

would not suffer us to hang his body in chains, because he was not

tried ; and in the eye of the law every man is innocent till then."
******

Journal. Letter XXVII.

''London, Jidy 25th, 1711.
" I was this afternoon with Mr. Secretary at his office, and helped to
hinder a man of his pardon, who is condemned for a rape. The Under
Secretary was willing to save him ; but I told the Secretary he could
not pardon him without a favourable report from the Judge ; besides,
he was a fiddler, and conseqviently a rogue, and deserved hanging for
something else, and so he shall swing."

SWIFT. 13

beliefs and institutions, had lost tlieii' moorings and
gone adrift in the storm. As in the South Sea Bubble
almost everybody gambled ; as in the Railway mania
— not many centuries ago — almost every one took his
unlucky share ; a man of that time, of the vast talents
and ambition of Swift, could scarce do otherwise than
grasp at his prize, and make his spring at his oppor-
tunity. His bitterness, his scorn, his rage, his
subsequent misanthropy, are ascribed by some pane-
gyrists to a deliberate conviction of mankind's unworthi-
ness, and a desire to amend them by castigating. His
youth was bitter, as that of a great genius bound down
by ignoble ties, and powerless in a mean dependence ;
his age was bitter,* like that of a great genius that had
fought the battle and nearly won it, and lost it, and
thought of it afterwards writhing in a lonely exile. A
man may attribute to the gods, if he likes, what is
caused by his own fury, or disappointment, or self-will.
What public man — what statesman projecting a coup —
w^hat king determined on an invasion of his neighbour —
what satirist meditating an onslaught on society or an
individual, can't give a pretext for his move ? There
was a French general the other day who proposed to
march into this country and put it to sack and pillage,
in revenge for humanity outraged by our conduct at
Copenhagen, — there is always some excuse for men of

1 It was tis constant pi-actice to keep his birth-day as a day of
mourning.

14 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

the aggressive turn. They are of their nature warlike,
predatory, eager for fight, pkmder, dominion.'

As fierce a heak and talon as ever struck — as strong
a wing as ever beat, belonged to Swift. I am glad, for
one, that fate wrested the prey out of liis claws, and
cut his wings and chained him. One can gaze, and
not without awe and pity, at the lonely eagle chained
behind the bars.

That Swift was born at No. 7, Hoey's-court, Dublin,
on the 30th November, 1G67, is a certain fact, of which
nobody will deny the sister island the honour and
glory ; but, it seems to me, he was no more an Irish-
man than a man born of English parents at Calcutta
is a Hindoo.* Goldsmith was an Irishman and always

^ " These devils of Gi-ub-street rogues, that write the Flying-Post
and Medley in one paper, will not be quiet. They are always mauling
Lord Treasurer, Lord Bolingbroke, and me. We have the dog under
prosecution, but Bolingbroke is not active enough: but I hope to
swinge him. He is a Scotch rogue, one Ridpath. They get out upon
bail, and write on. We take them again, and get fresh bail ; so it goes
round." — Jownal to Stella.

2 Swift was by no means inclined to forget such considerations ; and
his English birth makes its mark, strikingly enough, every now and
then in his writings. Thus in a letter to Pope (Scott's Swift, vol. xix.
p. 97), he says —

"We have had your volume of letters .... Some of those who
highly value you, and a few who knew you personally, are grieved to
find you make no distinction between the English gentry of this
kingdom, and the savage old Irish (who are only the vulgar, and some
gentlemen who live in the Irish pai'ts of the kingdom) ; but the
English colonies, who are three parts in four, are much more civilized
than many counties in England, and speak better English, and are much
better bred."

SWIFT. 15

an Irishman : Steele was an Irishman, and always an
Irishman: Swift's heart was EngHsh and in England,
liis habits English, his logic eminently Enghsh; liis
statement is elaborately simple ; he shuns tropes and
metaphors, and uses his ideas and words with a wise
tlnift and economy, as he used his money ; with which
he could be generous and splendid upon great occasions,
but which he husbanded when there was no need to
spend it. He never indulges in needless extravagance
of rhetoric, lavish epithets, profuse imagery. He lays
his opinion before you with a grave simpHcity and a
j)erfect neatness.^ Dreading ridicule too, as a man of

And again, in the fourth Drapier's Letter, we have the following : —

"A short paper, printed at Bristol, and reprinted here, reports
Mr. Wood to say ' that he wonders at the impudence and insolence of
the Irish, in refusing his coin.' "When by the way, it is the true
English people of Ireland who refiise it, although we take it for gi'anted
that the Irish will do so too whenever they are asked." — Scott's Swift,
vol. iv. p. 143.

He goes fui-ther, in a good-humoured satirical paper, " On Barbarous
Denominations in Ireland," where (after abusing, as he was wont, the
Scotch cadence, as well as expression) he advances to the "Irish brogue"
and speaking of the " censure " which it brings down, says : —

*'And what is yet worse, it is too well known that the bad
consequence of this opinion affects those among vis who are not the
least liable to such reproaches farther than the misfortune of being
born in Ireland, although of English parents, and whose education has
been chiefly in that kingdom." — Ihid, vol. vii. p. 149.

But, indeed, if we are to make anything of Race at all, we must call
that man an Englishman whose father comes from an old Yorkshire
family, and his mother from an old Leicestershire one !

^ " The style of his conversation was very much of a piece with that
of his writings, concise and clear and strong. Being one day at a
Sheriff's feast, who amongst other toasts called out to him, * Mr. Dean,

16 EN'GLISH HUMOURISTS.

his humour — above all an Englishman of his humour —
certainly would, he is afraid to use the poetical power
wliich he really possessed ; one often fancies in reading
him that he dares not be eloquent when he might ;
that he does not speak above his voice, as it were, and
the tone of society.

His initiation into politics, his knowledge of business,
his knowledge of pohte Hfe, his acquaintance with
literature even, which he could not have pursued very
sedulously during that reckless career at Dublin,
Swift got under the roof of Sir William Temple. He
was fond of telHng in after life what quantities of
books he devoured there, and how King William taught
him to cut asparagus in the Dutch fashion. It was at
Shene and at Moor Park, with a salary of twenty
pounds and a dinner at the upper servants' table, that
this great and lonely Swift passed a ten years' appren-
ticeship— wore a cassock that was only not a livery —
bent down a knee as proud as Lucifer's to supplicate

The trade of Ireland ! ' He answered quick : ' Sir, I drink no
memories ! '

" Happening to be in company with a petulant young man who prided
himself on saying pert things . . . and who cried out — 'You must
know, Mr, Dean, that I set up for a wit ? ' 'Do you so,' says the Dean,
' take my advice, and sit down again ! '

" At another time, being in company, where a lady whisking her long
train [long trains were then in fashion] swept down a fine fiddle and
broke it ; Swift cried out —

" Mantua v£e miserse nimium vicina Cremona) ! "
— Dr. Del ANT. Observations ui^on Lord Orrery's " EemarJcs, cCr." in
Swift. London, 1754.

SWIFT. 17

my lady's good graces, or run on his honour's errands/
It was here, as he was writing at Temple's table, or
following his patron's walk, that he saw and heard the
men who had governed the great world — measured
himself with them, looking up from his silent corner,
gauged their brains, weighed their wits, turned
them, and tried them, and marked them. Ah !
what platitudes he must have heard ! what feeble
jokes ! what pompous commonplaces ! what small
men they must have seemed under those enormous
periwigs, to the swarthy, uncouth, silent Irish secre-
tary. I wonder whether it ever struck Temple that
that Irishman was his master ? I suppose that dismal
conviction did not present itself under the ambrosial
wig, or Temple could never have lived with Swift.
Swift sickened, rebelled, left the service, — ate humble
pie and came back again ; and so for ten years went
on, gathering learning, swallowing scorn, and submit-
ting with a stealthy rage to his fortune.

Temple's style is the perfection of practised and
easy good-breeding. If he does not penetrate very
deeply into a subject, he professes a very gentlemanly
acquaintance with it ; if he makes rather a parade of
Latin, it was the custom of his day, as it was the

^ " Don't you remember how I used to be in pain when Sir William
Temple would look cold and out of humour for three or four days,
and I used to suspect a hundred reasons? I have plucked up my
spirits since then, faith; he spoiled a fine gentleman." — Journal
to Stella.

c

18 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

custom for a gentleman to envelope liis head in a peri-
wig and liis hands in lace ruffles. If he wears buckles
and square-toed shoes, he steps in them with a con-
summate grace, and you never hear their creak, or
find them treading upon any lady's train or any rival's
heels in the Court crowd. When that gTows too hot
or too agitated for him, he politely leaves it. He
retires to his retreat of Shene or Moor Park ; and lets
the King's party, and the Prince of Orange's party
battle it out among themselves. He reveres the
sovereign, (and no man perhaps ever testified to his
loyalty by so elegant a bow :) he admires the Prince
of Orange ; but there is one person whose ease and
comfort he loves more than all the princes in Chris-
tendom, and that valuable member of society Is
himself, Gulielmus Temple, Baronettus. One sees him
in his retreat; between his study -chair and his tuHp
beds,* chpping his apricots and prmimg his essays, —

^ . . . " The Epicureans were more intelligible in their notion, and
fortunate in their expression, when they placed a man's happiness
in the tranquillity of his mind and indolence of body; for while
we are composed of both, I doubt both must have a share in the
good or ill we feel. As men of several languages say the same things
in very different words, so in several ages, countries, constitutions of
laws and religion, the same thing seems to be meant by very different
expressions ; what is called by the Stoics apathy, or dispassion ; by the
sceptics, indisturbance ; by the Moliuists, quietism ; by common men,
peace of conscience, — seems all to mean but great. For this reason
Epicurus passed his life wholly in his garden : there he studied, there
he exercised, there he taught his philosophy; and, indeed, no other
sort of abode seems to contribute so much to both the tranquillity of

SWIFT. 19

the statesman, the ambassador no more ; but the philo-
sopher, the Epicurean, the fine gentleman and courtier
at St. James's as at Shene ; where in place of kings and
fair ladies, he pays his court to the Ciceronian majesty ;
or walks a minuet with the Epic Muse ; or dallies by the
south wall with the ruddy nymph of gardens.

Temple seems to have received and exacted a
prodigious deal of veneration from his household, and
to have been coaxed, and warmed, and cuddled by the
people round about him, as delicately as any of the
plants which he loved. ^Vlien he fell ill in 1693,
the household was aghast at his indisposition; mild

mind and indolence of body, whicli he made Lis chief ends. The
sweetness of the air, the pleasantness of smell, the verdure of plants,
the cleanness and lightness of food, the exercise of working or walking;
but, above all, the exemption from cares and solicitude, seem equally
to favoiir and improve both contemplation and health, the enjoyment
of sense and imagination, and thereby the quiet and ease both of the

body and mind Where Paradise was has been much debated,

and little agreed ; but what sort of place is meant by it may perhaps
easier be conjectured. It seems to have been a Persian word, since
Xenophon and other Greek authors mention it, as what was much in
use and delight among the kings of those eastern countries. Strabo
describing Jericho : * Ibi est palmetum, cui immixtae sunt etiam alise
stirpes hortense?, locus ferax palmis abundans, spatio stadioitim centum,
totus irriguus, ibi est Regis Balsami paradisus.' " — Essay on Gardens.

In the same famous essay Temple speaks of a friend, whose conduct
and prudence he characteristically admires.

. ..." I thought it very prudent in a gentleman of my friends in
Staffordshire, who is a great lover of his garden, to pretend no higher,
though his soil be good enough, than to the perfection of plums ; and
in these (by bestowing south walls upon them) he has very well suc-
ceeded, which he could never have done in attempts iipon peaches and
grapes ; and a good ]()lum is certainly better than an ill 2^each."

c 2

20 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Dorothea liis wife, the best companion of the best of
men —

" Mild Dorothea, peaceful, wise, and great.
Trembling beheld the doubtful hand of fate."

As for Dorinda, his sister, —

" Those who would grief describe, might come and trace
Its watery footsteps in Dorinda's face.
To see her weep, joy every face forsook,
And grief flung sables on each menial look.
The humble tribe mourned for the quickening soul,
That furnished life and spirit through the whole."

Isn't that line in which grief is described as putting
the menials into a mourning livery, a fine image ? One
of the menials wrote it, who did not like that Temple
livery nor those twenty-pound wages. Cannot one
fancy the uncouth young servitor, with downcast eyes,
books and papers in hand, following at his Honour's
heels in the garden walk; or taking his Honour's orders
as he stands by the great chair, where Sir William has
the gout, and his feet all blistered with moxa ? When
Sir Wilham has the gout or scolds it must be hard
work at the second table ; ^ the Irish secretary owned

^ Swift's Thoughts on Hanging.

[Directions to Servants.)

" To grow old in the office of a footman, is the highest of all indig-
nities ; therefore, when you find years coming on without hopes of a
place at court, a command in the army, a succession to the stewardship,
an employment in the revenue (which two last you cannot obtain
without reading and writing), or running away with your master's
niece or daughter, I directly advise you to go upon the road, which is
the only post of honour left you : there you will meet many of your

SWIFT. 21

as mucli afterwards : and wlien he came to dinner, how
he must have lashed and growled and torn the house-
hold with his gibes and scorn ! What would the
steward say about the pride of them Irish schollards
— and this one had got no great credit even at his Irish
college, if the truth were known — and what a contempt
his excellency's own gentleman must have had for
Parson Teague from Dublin. (The valets and chaplains
were always at war. It is hard to say which Swift
thought the more contemptible.) And what must have

old comrades, and live a short life and a merry one, and making a
figure at your exit, wherein I will give you some instructions.

" The last advice I give you relates to your behaviour when you are
going to be hanged ; which, either for robbing your master, for house-
breaking, or going upon the highway, or in a drunken quarrel by
killing the first man you meet, may very probably be your lot, and is
owing to one of these three qualities : either a love of good fellowship,
a generosity of mind, or too much vivacity of spirits. Your good
behaviour on this article will concern your whole community : deny
the fact with all solemnity of imprecations : a hundred of your
brethren, if they can be admitted, will attend about the bar, and
be ready upon demand to give you a character before the Court ;
let nothing prevail on you to confess, but the promise of a pardon for
discovering your comrades : but I suppose all this to be in vain ; for
if you escape now, your fate will be the same another day. Get a
speech to be written by the best author of Xewgate : some of your
kind wenches will provide you with a holland shirt and white cap,
crowned with a crimson or black libbon : take leave cheerfully of all
your friends in Newgate : mount the cart with covn-age ; fall on your
knees ; lift up your eyes ; hold a book in your hands, although you
cannot read a word ; deny the fact at the gallows ; kiss and forgive the
hangman, and so farewell ; you shall be buried in pomp at the charge
of the fraternity : the surgeon shall not touch a limb of you ; and your
fame shall continue imtil a successor of equal renown succeeds in your
place "

ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

been the sadness, tlie sadness and terror, of the house-
keeper's little daughter with the curling black ringlets
and the sweet smiling face, when the secretary who
teaches her to read and write, and whom she loves and
reverences above all things — above mother, above mild
Dorotliea, above that tremendous Sir WilHam in his
square-toes and periwig, — when Air. Swift comes
down from his master with rage in his heart, and has
not a Idnd word even for little Hester Johnson ?

Perhaps for the Irish secretary, his Excellency's
condescension was even more cruel than his frowns.
Sir William ivould perpetually quote Latin and the
ancient classics a proi:>os of his gardens and his Dutch
statues and 'plates hancles, and talk about Epicurus and
Diogenes Laertius, Julius Csesar, Semiramis, and the
gardens of the Hesperides, Maecenas, Strabo describing
Jericho, and the Assyrian kings. A j)ro2Jos of beans,
he would mention Pythagoras's precept to abstain from
beans, and that this precept probably meant that wise
men should abstain from public affairs. He is a placid
Epicurean ; he is a Pythagorean philosopher ; he is a
wise man — that is the deduction. Does not Swift thmk
so ? One can imagine the downcast eyes lifted up for a
moment, and the flash of scorn which they emit. Swift's
eyes were as azure as the heavens ; Pope says nobly
(as everything Pope said and thought of his friend
was good and noble), " His eyes are as azure as the
heavens, and have a charming archness in them." And

SWIFT. 23

one person in that household, that pompous stately
kindly Moor Park, saw heaven no where else.

But the Temple amenities and solemnities did not
agree with Swift. He was half-killed with a surfeit of
Shene pippins ; and in a garden-seat which he devised for
himself at Moor Park, and where he devoured greedily
the stock of books within his reach, he caught a vertigo
and deafness which punished and tormented him through
life. He could not bear the place or the servitude.
Even in that poem of courtly condolence, from which
we have quoted a few lines of mock melancholy, he
breaks out of the funereal procession with a mad shriek,
as it were, and rushes away crying his own grief,
cursing his own fate, foreboding madness, and forsaken
by fortune, and even hope.

I don't know anything more melancholy than the
letter to Temple, in which, after having broke from
his bondage, the poor wretch crouches piteously towards
his cage again, and deprecates his master's anger. He
asks for testimonials for orders. " The particulars
required of me are what relate to morals and learning;
and the reasons of quitting your Honour's family — that
is whether the last was occasioned by any ill action.
They are left entirely to your Honour's mercy, though
in the first I think I cannot reproach myself for any-
thing further than for infirmities. This is all I dare at
present beg from your Honour, under cii'cumstances of
life not worth your regard : what is left me to wish

24 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

(next to the liealtli and prosperity of your Honour and
family) is that Heaven would one day allow me the
opportunity of leaving my acknowledgments at jour
feet. I beg my most humble duty and service be
presented to my ladies, your Honour's lady and
sister." — Can prostration fall deeper ? could a slave
bow lower ? *

Twenty years afterwards Bishop Kennet, describing

* " He continued in Sir William Temple's house till the death of
that great man." — Anecdotes of the Family of Swift, by the Dean.

'' It has since pleased God to take this great and good person to
himself." — Preface to Temple's Worlcs.

On all public occasions, Swift speaks of Sir William in the same
tone. But the reader will better understand how acutely he
remembered the indignities he suffered in his household, from the
subjoined extracts from the Journal to Stella: —

" I called at Mr. Secretary the other day, to see what the d

ailed him on Sunday ; I made him a very proper speech ; told him I
observed he was much out of temper, that I did not expect he would
tell me the cause, but would be glad to see he was in better ; and
one thing I warned him of — never to appear cold to me, for I would
not be treated like a schoolboy ; that I had felt too much of that in my
life already" {meaning Sir William Temple), &c. &c. — Journal to Stella.

" I am thinking what a veneration we used to have for Sir William
Temple because he might have been secretary of state at fifty; and
here is a young fellow hardly thirty in that employment." — Ibid.

" The Secretary is as easy with me as Mr. Addison was. I have
often thought what a splutter Sir William Temple makes about being
Secretary of State." — Ibid.

" Lord Treasurer has had an ugly fit of the rheumatism, but is now
quite well. I was playing at one-and-thirty with him and his family
the other night. He gave us all twelvepence apiece to begin with : it
put me in mind of Sir William Temple." — Ibid.

"I thought I saw Jack Temple [nephew to Sir William,'] and his
wife pass by me to-day in their coach ; but I took no notice of them,
I am glad I have wholly shaken oflf that family." — S. to S., Se2'>t. 1710.

SWIFT. 25

the same man, says, " Dr. Swift came into the coffee-
house and had a bow from everybody but me. When I
came to the antechamber [at Court] to wait before
prayers. Dr. Swift was the principal man of talk and
business. He was sohciting the Earl of AiTan to speak
to his brother, the Duke of Ormond, to get a place for
a clergyman. He was promising Mr. Thorold to under-
take, with my Lord Treasurer, that he should obtain a
salary of 2001. per annum as member of the English
Chm'ch at Eotterdam. He stopped F. Gwynne, Esq.,
going in to the Queen with the red bag, and told him
aloud, he had something to say to him from my Lord
Treasurer. He took out liis gold watch, and telling the
time of day, complained that it was very late. A
gentleman said he was too fast. ' How can I help
it,' says the doctor, ' if the courtiers give me a watch
that won't go right ? ' Then he instructed a young
nobleman, that the best poet in England was Mr, Pope
(a Papist), who had begun a translation of Homer into
Enghsh, for which he would have them all subscribe ;
' For,' says he, ' he shall not begin to i^rint till I have
a thousand guineas for him.' ' Lord Treasurer, after

1 " Swift must be allowed," says Dr. Johnson, " for a time, to have
dictated the political opinions of the English nation."

A conversation on the Dean's pamphlets excited one of the Doctor's
liveliest sallies. " One, in particular, praised his ' Conduct of the Allies.'
— Johnson : * Sir, his ' Conduct of the Allies ' is a performance of very-
little ability Why, sir, Tom Davies might have written the

' Conduct of the Allies ! ' " — Boswell's Life of Johnson.

26 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

leaving tlie Queen, came through the room beckoning
Dr. Swift to follow him, — both went off just before
prayers." There's a little malice in the Bishop's "just
before prayers."

This picture of the great Dean seems a true one, and
is harsh, though not altogether unpleasant. He was
doing good, and to deserving men too, in the midst of
these intrigues and triumphs. His journals and a
thousand anecdotes of him relate his kind acts and
rough manners. His hand was constantly stretched
out to relieve an honest man — he was cautious about
his money, but ready. — If you were in a strait would
you lilce such a benefactor ? I think I would rather
have had a potato and a friendly word from Goldsmith
than have been beholden to the Dean for a guinea and
a dinner.* He insulted a man as he served him, made
women cry, guests look foohsh, bullied unlucky friends,
and flung his benefactions into poor men's faces. No ;

^ *' Whenever he fell into the company of any person for the first
time, it was his custom to try their tempers and disposition by some
abrupt question that bore the appearance of rudeness. If tiiis were
well taken, and answered with good humour, he afterwards made
amends by his civilities. But if he saw any marks of resentment,
from alarmed pride, vanity, or conceit, he dropped all further inter-
course with the party. This will be illustrated by an anecdote of that
sort related by Mrs. Pilkington. After supper, the Dean having decanted
a bottle of wine, poured what remained into a glass, and seeing it was
muddy, presented it to Mr. Pilkington to drink it. * For, ' said he,
* I always keep some poor parson to drink the foul wine for me.' Mr.
Pilkington, entering into his humoui', thanked him, and told him ' he
did not know the difference, but was glad to get a glass at any rate.'

SWIFT. 27

the Dean was no Irisliman — no Irishman ever gave
but with a kind word and a kind heart.

It is tokl, as if it were to Swift's credit, that the
Dean of St. Patrick's performed his family devotions
every morning regularly, but with such secresy, that
the guests in his house were never in the least aware of
the ceremony. There was no need surely why a church
dignitary should assemble his family privily in a crjrpt,
and as if he was afraid of heathen persecution. But I
thinli: the world was right, and the bishops who advised
Queen Anne, when they counselled her not to appoint
the author of the " Tale of a Tub " to a bishopric, gave
perfectly good advice. The man who wrote the argu-
ments and illustrations in that wild book, could not but
be aware what must be the sequel of the propositions
which he laid down. The boon companion of Pope
and Bolingbroke, who chose these as the friends of his
life, and the recipients of his confidence and affection,
must have heard many an argument, and joined in
many a conversation over Pope's port, or St. John's
Burgundy, which would not bear to be repeated at
other men's boards.

* why then,' said the Dean, ' you shan't, for I'll drink it myself. Why,

take you, you are wiser than a paltry curate whom I asked to

dine with me a few days ago ; for upon my making the same speech
to him, he said, he did not understand such usage, and so walked off
without his diunei\ By the same token, I told the gentleman who
recommended him to me, that the fellow was a blockhead, and I had
done with him." — Sheridan's Life of Sivift.

28 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

I know of few things more conclusive as to the sin-
cerity of Swift's religion than his advice to poor John
Gay to turn clergyman, and look out for a seat on the
Bench. Gay, the author of the " Beggar's Opera " —
Gay, the wildest of the wits about town — it was this
man that Jonathan Swift advised to take orders — to
invest in a cassock and bands — just as he advised him
to husband his shillings and put his thousand pounds
out at interest.* The Queen, and the bishops, and

^ FROM THE ARCHBISHOP OF CASHELL.

"Cashell^MayZlst, 1735.
"Dear Sir^, —

" I have been so unfortunate in all my contests of late, that I
am. resolved to have no more, especially v^here I am likely to be
overmatched ; and as I have some reason to hope what is past will be
forgotten, I confess I did endeavour in my last to put the best colour
I could think of upon a very bad cause. My friends judge right of
my idleness ; but, in reality, it has hitherto proceeded from a hurry
and confusion, arising fi'om a thousand unlucky unforeseen accidents
rather than mere sloth. I have but one troublesome affair now upon
my hands, which, by the help of the prime serjeant, I hope soon to get
rid of; and then you shall see me a true Irish bishop. Sir James
Ware has made a very useful collection of the memorable actions of
my predecessors. He tells me, they were born in such a town of
England or Ireland ; were consecrated siich a year ; and, if not trans-
lated, were buried in the Cathedral church, either on the north or
south side. Whence I conclude, that a good bishop has nothing more
to do than to eat, drink, grow fat, rich, and die; which laudable
example I propose for the remainder of my life to follow ; for to tell
you the truth, I have for these four or five years past met with so
much treachery, baseness, and ingratitude among mankind, that I can
hardly think it incumbent on any man to endeavour to do good to so
perverse a generation.

" I am truly concerned at the account you give me of your health.
Without doubt a southern ramble will prove the best remedy you can

SWIFT. 29

the world, were right in mistrusting the religion of
that man.

I am not here, of course, to speak of any man's
religious views, except in so far as they influence his
literary character, his Hfe, his humour. The most
notorious sinners of all those fellow-mortals whom it is
our business to discuss — Harry Fielding and Dick
Steele, were especially loud, and I believe really
fervent, in their expressions of belief ; they belaboured
freethinkers, and stoned imaginary atheists on all sorts
of occasions, going out of their way to bawl their own

take to recover your flesh ; and I do not know, except in one stage,
where you can choose a road so suited to your circumstances, as from
Dublin hither. You have to Kilkenny a turnpike and good inns, at
every ten or twelve miles end. From Kilkenny hither is twenty long
miles, bad road, and no inns at all : but I have an expedient for you.
At the foot of a very high hill, just midway, there lives in a neat
thatched cabin, a parson, who is not poor ; his wife is allowed to be
the best little woman in the world. Her chickens are the fattest, and
her ale the best in all the country. Besides, the parson has a little
cellar of his own, of which he keeps the key, where he always has a
hogshead of the best wine that can be got, in bottles well corked, upon
their side ; and he cleans, and pulls out the cork better, I think, than
Robin. Here I design to meet you with a coach ; if you be tired, you
shall stay all night ; if not, after dinner we will set out about four, and
be at Cashell by nine ; and by going through fields and by-ways, which
the parson will show us, we shall escape all the rocky and stony roads
that lie between this place and that, which are certainly very bad. I
hope you will be so kind as to let me know a post or two before you
set out, the very day you will be at Kilkenny, that I may have all
things prepared for you. It may be, if you ask him. Cope will come :
he will do nothing for me. Therefore, depending upon your positive
promise, I shall add no more arguments to persuade you, and am, with
the greatest truth, your most faithful and obedient servant,

*'Theo. Cashell."

30 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

creed, and persecute their neighbour's, and if thej^
sinned and stumbled, as they constantly did with debt,
with drink, with all sorts of bad behaviour, they got up
on their knees, and cried " Peccavi " with a most sono-
rous orthodoxy. Yes ; poor Harry Fielding and poor
Dick Steele were trusty and undoubting Church of
England men ; they abhorred Popery, Atheism, and
wooden shoes, and idolatries in general; and hiccupped
Church and State with fervour.

But Swift ? His mind had had a different schooling,
and possessed a very different logical power. He was
not bred up in a tipsy guard-room, and did not learn
to reason in a Covent Garden tavern. He could con-
duct an argument from beginning to end. He could
see forward with a fatal clearness. In his old age,
looking at the " Tale of a Tub," when he said, " Good
God, what a genius I had when I wrote that book ! " I
think he was admiring not the genius, but the conse-
quences to which the genius had brought him — a vast
genius, a magnificent genius, a genius wonderfully
bright, and dazzlmg, and strong, — to seize, to know,
to see, to flash upon falsehood and scorch it into per-
dition, to penetrate into the hidden motives, and
expose the black thoughts of men, — an awful, an evil
spirit.

Ah, man ! you, educated in Epicurean Temple's
library, you whose friends were Pope and St. John —
what made you to swear to fatal vows, and bind your-

SWIFT. 31

self to a life -long hypocrisy before the Heaven which
you adored with such real wonder, humility, and
reverence ? For Swift's was a reverent, was a pious
spiiit — for Swift could love and could pray. Through
the storms and tempests of his furious mind, the stars
of religion and love break out in the blue, shinmg
serenely, though hidden by the driving clouds and the
maddened huiTicane of his life.

It is my behef that he suffered frightfully from the
consciousness of his own scepticism, and that he had
bent his pride so far down as to put his apostasy out to
hire.' The paper left behind him, called " Thoughts
on Eeligion," is merely a set of excuses for not pro-
fessing disbelief. He says of his sermons that he
preached pamphlets : they have scarce a Christian
characteristic ; they might be preached from the steps
of a synagogue, or the floor of a mosque, or the box of
a coffee-house almost. There is little or no cant — he
is too gTeat and too proud for that ; and, in so far as
the badness of his sermons goes, he is honest. But
having put that cassock on, it poisoned him : he was
strangled in his bands. He goes through life, tearing,
like a man possessed with a devil. Like Abudah in
the Arabian story, he is always looking out for the

1 " Mr. Swift lived with liim [Sir William Temple] some time, but
resolving to settle himself in some way of living, was inclined to take
orders. However, although his fortune was veiy small, he had a
scruple of entering into the Church merely for support." — Anecdotes of
the Family of Swift, by the Dean.

3:2 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Fury, and knows that the night will come and the
inevitable hag with it. What a night, my God, it
was! what a lonely rage and long agony — what a
vidture that tore the heart of that giant ! * It is
awful to think of the great suffermgs of this great man.
Through life he always seems alone, somehow.
Goethe was so. I can't fancy Shakspeare otherwise.
The giants must live apart. The kings can have no
company. But this man suffered so ; and deserved so
to suffer. One hardly reads anywhere of such a pain.
The " sseva indignatio" of which he spoke as
lacerating his heart, and wdiich he dares to inscribe
on his tombstone — as if the wretch who lay under
that stone waiting God's judgment had a right to be
angry — breaks out from him in a thousand pages of
his writing, and tears and rends him. Agamst men
in office, he having been overthrown ; against men
in England, he having lost his chance of preferment
there, the furious exile never fails to rage and
curse. Is it fair to call the famous "Drapier's Letters"
patriotism ? They are master-pieces of dreadful
humour and invective : they are reasoned logically
enough too, but the proposition is as monstrous and
fabulous as the Lilliputian island. It is not that the

1 " Dr. Swift had a natural severity of face, which even his smiles
could never soften, or his utmost gaiety render placid and serene ; but
when that sternness of visage was increased by rage, it is scarce possible
to imagine looks or features that carried in them more terror and
austerity." — Orrery.

SWIFT. 33

grievance is so great, but there is liis enemy — tlie
assault is wonderful for its activity and terrible rage.
It is Samson, with a bone in his hand, rushing on his
enemies and felling them : one admu'es not the cause
so much as the strength, the anger, the fury of the
champion. As is the case with madmen, certain
subjects provoke him, and awaken his fits of wrath.
Marriage is one of these ; in a hundred passages in his
writings he rages against it ; rages against children
— an object of constant satii'e, even more contemptible
in his eyes than a lord's chaplain, is a poor curate with
a large family. The idea of this luckless paternity
never fails to bring down from him gibes and foul
language. Could Dick Steele, or Goldsmith, or Fielding,
in his most reckless moment of satire, have written
anything like the Dean's famous " modest proposal "
for eating children ? Not one of these but melts at
the thoughts of childhood, fondles and caresses it.
Mr. Dean has no such softness, and enters the nursery
with the tread and gaiety of an ogre.* " I have been
assured," says he in the " Modest Proposal," " by a
very knowing American of my acquaintance in London,
that a young healthy child, well-nursed, is, at a year

1 "London, April 10th, 1713.

" Lady Masham's eldest boy is very ill : I doubt he will not live,

and she stays at Kensiiogton to nurse him, which vexes us all. She is

so excessively fond, it makes me mad. She should never leave the

Queen, but leave everything, to stick to what is so much the interest

of the public, as well as her own." — Journal.

D

34 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

old, a most delicious, nourisliiiig, and wholesome
food, wlietlier stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and
I make, no doubt it will equally serve in a ragout.'*
And taking up this pretty joke, as his way is, he
argues it with perfect gravity and logic. He turns
and twists this subject in a score of different
ways : he hashes it; and he serves it up cold ; and
he garnishes it ; and relishes it always. He describes
the little animal as " dropped from its dam," advising
that the mother should let it suck plentifully in
the last month, so as to render it plump and fat for
a good table! "A child," says his reverence, "will
make two dishes at an entertainment for friends ; and
when the family dines alone, the fore or hind-quarter
will make a reasonable dish," and so on; and, the
subject being so delightful that he can't leave it — he
proceeds to recommend, in place of venison for squires'
tables, "the bodies of young lads and maidens not
exceeding fourteen nor under twelve." Amiable
humourist ! laughing castigator of morals ! There was
a process well known and practised in the Dean's gay
days : when a lout entered the coffee-house, the wags
proceeded to what they called " roasting " him. This
is roasting a subject with a vengeance. The Dean had
a native genius for it. As the " Almanach des
Gourmands " says. On nait rotisseur.

And it was not merely by the sarcastic method that
Swift exposed the unreasonableness of loving and

SWIFT. 35

having cliildren. In Gulliver, the folly of love and
marriage is urged by graver arguments and advice. In
the famous Lilliputian kingdom, Swift speaks with
approval of the practice of instantly removing children
from their parents and educating them by the State ;
and amongst his favourite horses, a pair of foals are
stated to be the very utmost a well-regulated equine
couple would permit themselves. In fact, our great
satirist was of opinion that conjugal love was unad-
visable, and illustrated the theory by his own practice
and example — God help him — which made him about
the most wretched being in God's world.'

The grave and logical conduct of an absurd propo-
sition, as exemplified in the cannibal proposal just
mentioned, is our author's constant method through
all his works of humour. Given a country of people
six inches or sixty feet high, and by the mere process
of the logic, a thousand wonderful absurdities are
evolved, at so many stages of the calculation. Turning
to the first minister who waited behind him with a wliite
staff near as tall as the mainmast of the " Royal
Sovereign," the king of Brobdingnag observes how
contemptible a thing human grandeur is, as represented
by such a contemptible little creature as Gulliver.
" The Emperor of Lilliput's features are strong and
masculine (what a surprising humour there is in this

1 " My liealtli is somewhat mended, but at best I have an ill head
and an aching heart." — In May, 1719.

36 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

description !) — the Emperor's features," Gulliver says,
" are strong and masculine, with an Austrian lip, an
arched nose, his complexion olive, his countenance
erect, his body and limbs well-proportioned, and his
deportment majestic- He is taller hy the breadth of
my nail than any of his court, which alone is enough
to strike an awe into beholders."

What a surprising humour there is in these descrip-
tions ! How noble the satire is here ! how just and
honest ! How perfect the image ! Mr. Macaulay has
quoted the charming lines of the poet, where the king
of the pigmies is measured by the same standard. We
have all read in Milton of the spear that was like " the
mast of some tall amiral," but these images are
surely likely to come to the comic poet originally.
The subject is before him. He is turning it in a
thousand ways. He is full of it. The figure suggests
itself naturally to him, and comes out of his subject,
as in that wonderful passage, when Gulliver's box
having been dropped by the eagle into the sea, and
Gulliver having been received into the ship's cabin,
he calls upon the crew to bring the box into the
cabin, and put it on the table, the cabin being only
a quarter the size of the box. It is the veracity of
the blunder which is so admirable. Had a man come
from such a country as Brobdingnag he would have
blundered so.

But the best stroke of humour, if there be a best

SWIFT. 37

in that abounding book, is tbat where Gulliver, in

the unpronounceable country describes his parting

from his master the horse.* "I took," he says, " a

^ Perhaps the most melancholy satu*e in the whole of the dreadful book,
is the description of the very old people in the Voyage to Laputa. At
Lugnag, Gulliver hears of some persons who never die, called the
Struldbrugs, and expressing a wish to become acquainted with men who
mvist have so much learning and experience, his colloquist describes
the Struldbrugs to him.

" He said, They commonly acted like mortals, till about thirty years
old, after which, by degrees, they grew melancholy and dejected,
increasing in both till they came to fourscore. This he learned from their
own confession : for otherwise there not being above two or three of that
species born in an age, they were too few to form a general observation
by. When they come to fourscore years, which is reckoned the
extremity of living in this country, they had not only all the follies and
infirmities of other old men, but many more, which arose from the
prospect of never dying. They were not only opinionative, peevish,
covetous, morose, vain, talkative, but incapable of friendship, and dead
to all natural affection, which never descended below their grand-
children. Envy and impotent desires are their prevailing passions.
But those objects against which their envy seems principally directed,
are the vices of the younger sort and the deaths of the old. By
reflecting on the former, they find themselves cut off from all possibility
of pleasure ; and whenever they see a funeral, they lament and repent
that others are gone to a harbour of rest, to which they themselves
never can hope to arrive. They have no remembrance of anything but
what they learned and observed in tlieir youth and middle age, and
even tbat is very imperfect. And for the truth or particulars of any
fact, it is safer to depend on common tradition than upon their best
recollections. The least miserable among them appear to be those
who turn to dotage, and entirely lose their memories ; these meet with
more pity and assistance, because they want many bad qualities which
abound in others.

" If a Struldbrug happened to marry one of his own kind, the marriage
is dissolved of course, by the courtesy of the kingdom, as soon as the
younger of the two comes to be fourscore. For the law thinks it to
be a reasonable indulgence that those who are condemned, without any

38 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

second leave of my master, but as I was going to pros-
trate myself to kiss liis lioof, he did me the honour to

fault of their own, to a perpetual continuance in the world, should not
have their misery doubled by the load of a wife.

"As soon as they have completed the term of eighty years, they are
looked on as dead in law ; their heirs immediately succeed to their
estates, only a small pittance is reserved for their support ; and the
poor ones are maintained at tlie public charge. After that period, they
are held incapable of any employment of trust or profit, they cannot
purchase lands or take leases, neither are they allowed to be witnesses
in any cause, either civil or criminal, not even for the decision of meers
and bounds.

"■ At ninety they lose their teeth and hair ; they have at that age
no distinction of taste, but eat and drink whatever they can get without
relish or appetite. The diseases they were subject to still continue,
without increasing or diminishing. In talking, they forget the common
appellation of things, and the names of persons, even of those who are
their nearest friends and relatives. For the same reason, they can never
amuse themselves with reading, because their memory will not serve to
carry them from the beginning of a sentence to the end ; and by this
defect they are deprived of the only entertainment whereof they might
otherwise be capable.

" The language of this country being always on the flux, the Struld-
brugs of one age do not understand those of another ; neither are they
able, after two hundred years, to hold any conversation (further than
by a few general words) with their neighbours, the mortals ; and thus
they lie vmder the disadvantage of living like foreigners in their own
country.

" This was the account given me of the Struldbrugs, as near as I can
remember. I afterwards saw five or six of different ages, the youngest
not above two hundred years old, who were brought to me several
times by some of my friends ; but although they were told ' that I was
a great traveller, and had seen all the world,' they had not the least
curiosity to ask me a single question ; only desired I would give them
slumskudask, or a token of remembrance ; which is a modest way of
begging, to avoid the law that strictly forbids it, because they are
provided for by the public, although indeed with a very scanty
allowance.

" They are despised and hated by all sorts of people ; when one of

SWIFT. 39

raise it gently to my mouth. I am not ignorant how
much I have been censured for mentioning this last
particular. Detractors are pleased to think it impro-
bable that so illustrious a person should descend to
give so great a mark of distinction to a creature so
mferior as I. Neither am I ignorant how apt some
travellers are to boast of extraordinary favours they
have received. But if these censurers were better
acquainted with the noble and courteous disposition
of the Houyhnhnms they would soon change their
opinion."

The surprise here, the audacity of circumstantial
evidence, the astounding gravity of the speaker, who is
not ignorant how much he has been censured, the
nature of the favour conferred, and the respectful
exultation at the receipt of it, are surely complete ; it is
truth topsy-turvy, entirely logical and absurd.

them is born, it is reckoned ominous, and their birth is recorded very
particularly ; so that you may know their age by consulting the register,
which, however, has not been kept above a thousand years past, or at
least has been destroyed by time or public disturbances. But the usual
way of computing how old they are, is, by asking them what kings or
great persons they can remember, and then consulting history ; for
infallibly the last prince in their mind did not begin his reign after they
were fourscore years old.

" They were the most mortifying sight I ever beheld, and the
women more horrible than the men ; besides the usual deformities in
extreme old age, they acquired an additional ghastliness, in propoi'tion
to their number of years, which is not to be described ; and among
half a dozen, I soon distinguished which was the eldest, although
thei'e was not above a century or two between them." — Gulliver's
Travels.

40 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

As for the humour and conduct of this famous fable,
I suppose there is no person who reads but must
admire ; as for the moral, I think it horrible, shameful,
unmanly, blasphemous ; and giant and great as this Dean
is, I say we should hoot him. Some of this audience
majai't have read the last part of Gulliver, and to such
I would recal the advice of the venerable Mr. Punch
to persons about to marry, and say " Don't."
"When Gulliver first lands among the Yahoos, the
naked howling wretches clamber up trees and assault
him, and he describes himself as " almost stifled with
the filth which fell about him." The reader of the
fourth part of Gulliver's Travels is hke the hero him-
self in this instance. It is Yahoo language ; a monster
gibbering shrieks, and gnashing imprecations against
mankind, — tearing down all shreds of modesty, past all
sense of manliness and shame; filthy in. word, filthy
in thought, furious, raging, obscene.

And dreadful it is to think that Swift knew the
tendency of his creed — the fatal rocks towards which
his logic desperately drifted. That last part of
Gulliver is only a consequence of what has gone
before; and the worthlessness of all mankind, the
pettiness, cruelty, pride, imbecility, the general vanitj^,
the foolish pretension, the mock greatness, tlie
I)ompous dulness, the mean aims, the base suc-
cesses,— all these were present to him ; it was with
the din of these curses of the world, blasphemies

SWIFT. 41

against Heaven, shrieking in liis ears, that he began to
\vTite his dreadful allegorj^, — of which the meaning is that
man is utterly wicked, desperate, and imbecile, and his
passions are so monstrous, and his boasted powers so
mean, that he is and deserves to be the slave of brutes,
and ignorance is better than his vaunted reason. What
had this man done ? Avhat secret remorse was rank-
ling at his heart ? what fever was boiling in him, that
he should see all the world blood-shot ? AVe view the
world with our own eyes, each of us ; and we make
from within us the world we see. A weary heart gets
no gladness out of sunshine ; a selfish man is sceptical
about friendship, as a man with no ear doesn't care for
music. A friaiitful self-consciousness it must have

o

been, which looked on mankind so darkly through those
keen eyes of Swift.

A remarkable story is told by Scott, of Delany, who
interrupted Archbishop King and Swift in a conversa-
tion which left tlie prelate in tears, and from which
Swift rushed away with marks of strong terror and
agitation in his countenance, upon which the arch-
bishop said to Delany, "You have just met the most
unhappy man on earth; but on the subject of his
wretchedness you must never ask a question."

The most unhappy man on earth ; — Miserrimus —
what a character of him ! And at this time all the
great wits of England had been at his feet. All
Ireland had shouted after him, and worshipped as a

42 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

liberator, a saviour, the greatest Irish patriot and
citizen. Dean Drapier Bickerstaff Gulliver — the most
famous statesmen, and the greatest poets of his day,
had applauded him, and done him homage, and at this
time writing over to Bolingbroke, from Ireland, he
sajs, " It is time for me to have done with the world,
and so I would if I could get into a better before I
was called into the best, and not to die here in a rage,
like a poisoned rat in a hole.''

We have spoken about the men, and Swift's behaviour
to them ; and now it behoves us not to forget that
there are certain other persons in the creation who had
rather intimate relations with the great Dean.' Tw^o
women whom he loved and injured are known by every

^ The name of Varina has been thrown into the shade by those of
the famous Stella and "Vanessa ; but she had a story of her own to
tell about the blue eyes of young Jonathan. One may say that the
book of Swift's Life opens at places kept by these blighted flowers !
Varina must have a paragraph.

She was a Miss Jane Waryng, sister to a college chum of his. In
1696, when Swift was nineteen years old, we find him writing a love-
letter to her, beginning, " Impatience is the most inseparable quality of
a lover." But absence made a great difference in his feelings ; so, four
years afterwards, the tone is changed. He writes again, a very curious
letter, offering to marry her, and putting the offer in such a way that
nobody could possibly accept it.

After dwelling on his poverty, &c., he says, conditionally, " I shall
be blessed to have you in my arms, without regarding whether your
person be beautiful, or your fortune large. Cleanliness in the first, and
competency in the second, is all I ask for ! "

The editors do not tell us what became of Varina in life. One
would be glad to know that she met with some worthy partner, and
lived long enough to see her little boys laughing over Lilliput, without
any arriere jpensee of a sad character about the great Dean !

SWIFT. 43

reader of books so familiarly that if we had seen them,
or if they had been relatives of our own, we scarcely
could have known them better. Who hasn't in his
mind an image of Stella ? AVho does not love her ?
Fair and tender creature : pure and affectionate heart !
Boots it to you now that you have been at rest for a
hundred and twenty years, not divided in death from
the cold heart which caused j^ours, whilst it beat, such
faithful pangs of love and grief — boots it to jou now,
that the whole world loves and deplores jon ? Scarce
any man, I believe, ever thought of that grave, that
did not cast a flower of pity on it, and write over it a
sweet epitaph. Gentle lady ! — so lovely, so loving,
so unhappy. You have had countless champions,
millions of manly hearts mourning for you. From
generation to generation we take up the fond tradition
of your beauty ; we watch and follow your tragedy,
your bright morning love and purity, your constancy,
your grief, your sweet martyrdom. We know your
legend by heart. You are one of the saints of
English story.

And if Stella's love and innocence is charming to
contemplate, I will say that in spite of ill-usage, in
spite of drawbacks, in spite of mysterious separation
and union, of hope delayed and sickened heart — in the
teeth of Vanessa, and that little episodical aberration
which plunged Swift into such woeful pitfalls and
quagmires of amorous perplexity — in spite of the

44 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

verdicts of most women, I believe, who, as far as my
experience and conversation goes, generally take
Vanessa's part in the controversy — in spite of the tears
which Swift caused Stella to shed, and the rocks and
barriers which fate and temper interposed, and which
prevented the pure course of that true love from run-
ning smoothly ; the brightest part of Swift's story, the
pure star in that dark and tempestuous life of Swift's,
is his love for Hester Johnson. It has been my busi-
ness, professionally of course, to go through- a deal of
sentimental reading in my time, and to acquaint thj-
self with love-making, as it has been described in
various languages, and at various ages of the world ;
and I know of nothing more manly, more tender, more
exquisitely touching, than some of these brief notes,
written in what Swift calls " his little language " in his
journal to Stella.' He writes to her night and morning
often. He never sends away a letter to her but he
begins a new one on the same daj. He can't bear to

^ A sentimental Champollion might find a good deal of matter for
his art, in expounding the symbols of the " Little Language." Usually,
Stella is " M.D.," but sometimes her companion, Mrs. Dingley, is
included in it. Swift is "Presto;" also P.D.F.R. We have *' Good-
night, M.D. ; Night, M.D. ; Little M.D. ; Stelhikins ; Pretty Stella;
Dear roguish, impudent, pretty M.D. ! " Every now and then he breaks
into rhyme, as —

" I wish you both a merry new yeai".
Roast beef, minced-pies, and good strong beer,
And me a share of your good cheer,
That I was there, as you were here,
And you are a little saucy dear."

SWIFT. 45

let go lier kind little hand as it were. He knows that
she is thinking of him, and longing for him far away
in Dublin yonder. He takes her letters from under
his i)illow and talks to them, familiarly, paternally,
with fond epithets and pretty caresses — as he would to
the sweet and artless creature who loved him. " Stay,"
he writes one morning — it is the 1-lth of December,
1710 — " Stay, I will answer some of your letter this
morning in bed — let me see. Come and appear little
letter ! Here I am says he, and what say you to Stella
this mornmg fresh and fasting ? And can Stella read
tliis writing without hurting her dear eyes ? " he goes
on, after more kind prattle and fond whispering. The
dear eyes shine clearly upon him then — the good angel
of his life is with him and blessing him. Ah, it was a
hard fate that wrung from them so many tears, and
stabbed pitilessly that pure and tender bosom. A
hard fate : but would she have changed it ? I have
heard a woman say that she would have taken Swift's
cruelty to have had his tenderness. He had a sort of
worship for her whilst he wounded her. He speaks of
her after she is gone ; of her^ wit, of her kindness, of
her grace, of her beauty, with a simple love and
reverence that are indescribably touching; in con-
templation of her goodness his hard heart melts into
pathos : liis cold rhyme kindles and glows into poetry,
and he falls down on his knees, so to speak, before the
angel, whose life he had embittered, confesses his own

46 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

wretchedness and unwortliiness, and adores her with
cries of remorse and love : —

" When on my sickly couch I lay,
Impatient both of night and day,
And groaning in unmanly strains,
Called every power to ease my pains,
Then Stella ran to my relief,
With cheerful face and inward grief,
And though by Heaven's severe decree
She suffers hourly more than me,
No cruel master could require
From slaves employed for daily hire,
What Stella, by her friendship warmed.
With vigour and delight performed.
Now, with a soft and silent tread.
Unheard she moves about my bed :
My sinking spirits now supplies
With cordials in her hands and eyes.
Best pattern of true friends ! beware ;
You pay too dearly for your care
If, while your tenderness secures
My life, it must endanger yours :
For such a fool was never found
Who pulled a palace to the ground,
Only to have the ruins made
Materials for a house decayed."

One little triumph Stella had in her life — one dear
little piece of injustice was performed in her favour, for
which I confess, for my part, I can't help thanking
fate and the Dean. That other person was sacrificed
to her — that — that young woman, who lived five doors
from Dr. Swift's lodgings in Bmy-street, and who
flattered him, and made love to him in such an
outrageous manner — Vanessa was thrown over.

Swift did not keep Stella's letters to him in reply to

SWIFT. 47

those lie wrote to her/ He kept BoUngbroke's, and
Pope's, and Harley's, and Peterborough's : but Stella,
"very carefully," the Lives say, kept Swift's. Of

^ The following passages are from a paper begun by Swift on the
evening of the day of her death, Jan. 28, 1727-8 :

" She was sickly from her childhood, until about the age of fifteen ;
but then she grew into perfect health, and was looked upon as one of
the most beautiful, graceful, and agreeable young women in London —
only a little too fat. Her hair was blacker than a raven, and every
feature of her face in perfection.

.... "Properly speaking" — he goes on with a calmness which,
under the. circumstances, is terrible — "she has been dying six
months!"

" Never was any of her sex born with better gifts of the mind, or

who more improved them by reading and conversation All of

us who had the happiness of her friendship agreed unanimously that
in an afternoon's or evening's conversation she never failed before we
parted of delivering the best thing that was said in the company.
Some of us have written down several of her sayings, or what the
French call bons mots, wherein she excelled beyond belief"

The specimens on record, however, in the Dean's paper called
"Bons Mots de Stella," scarcely bear out this last part of the pane-
gyric. But the following prove her wit :

" A gentleman, who had been very silly and pei't in her company, at
last began to grieve at remembering the loss of a child lately dead. A
bishop sitting by comforted him — that he should be easy, because
* the child was gone to heaven.' ' No, my lord,' said she ; ' that is it
which most grieves him, because he is sure never to see his child
there.'

" When she was extremely ill, her physician said, ' Madam, you are
near the bottom of the hill, but we will endeavour to get you up
again.' She answered, ' Doctor, I fear I shall be out of breath before
I get up to the top.'

"A very dirty clergyman of her acquaintance, who affected smart-
ness and repartees, was asked by some of the company how his nails
came to be so dir-ty. He was at a loss ; but she solved the difficulty,
by saying, ' the Doctor's nails grew dirty by scratching himself.'

" A quaker apothecary sent her a vial, corked ; it had a broad

48 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

course : that is tlie way of the world : and so we cannot
tell what her stjde was, or of what sort were the little
letters which the Doctor placed there at night, and
bade to appear from under his pillow of a morning.
But in Letter IV. of that famous collection he describes
his lodging in Bury-street, where he has the first
floor, a dining-room and bed-chamber, at eight shillings
a-week ; and in Letter VI. he says " he has visited a
lady just come to town," whose name somehow is not
mentioned ; and in Letter VIII. he enters a query of
Stella's — " What do you mean ' that boards near me,
that I dine with now and then ? ' What the deuce !
You know whom I have dined with every day since I
left you, better than I do." Of course she does. Of
course Swift has not the slightest idea of what she
means. But in a few letters more it turns out that the
Doctor has been to dine " gravely " with a Mrs.
Vanhomrigh : then that he has been to " his neigh-
bour : " then that he has been unwell, and means to
dine for the whole week with his neighbour ! Stella
was quite right in her previsions. She saw from the
very first hint what was going to happen ; and scented
Vanessa in the air.^ The rival is at the Dean's feet.

brim, and a label of paper about its neck. 'What is that ' — said she —
' my apothecary's son !' The ridiculous resemblance, and the sudden-
ness of the question, set us all a-laughiug," — Swift's Wo7'hs, Scott's Ed,
vol. ix. 295-6.

1 '* I am so hot and lazy after my morning's walk, that I loitered at
Mrs. Vanhomrigh's, where my best gown and periwig was, and out of

SWIFT. 49

The pupil and teacher are reading together, and
drinkmg tea together, and going to prayers together,
and learning Latin together, and conjugating amo,
amas, amavi together. The little language is over
for poor Stella. By the rule of grammar and the course
of conjugation, doesn't amavi come after amo and avias ?
The loves of Cadenus and Vanessa' jou may peruse
in Cadenus's o^^ti poem on the subject, and in poor
Vanessa's vehement expostulatory verses and letters to
him, she adores him, implores him, admires him, thinks
liim something god-like, and onlj prays to be admitted
to lie at his feet.^ As they are bringmg him home

mere listlessness dine therCf very often; so I did to-day." — Journal to
Stella.

Mrs, Vanliomrigh, " Vanessa's " mother, was the widow of a Dutch
merchant who held lucrative appointments in King William's time.
The family settled in London in 1709, and had a house in Bury-street,
St, James's — a street made notable by such residents as Swift and
Steele ; and, in our own time, Moore and Crabbe,

^ '' Vanessa was excessively vain. The character given of her by
Cadenus is fine painting, but in general fictitious. She was fond of
dress ; impatient to be admired ; very romantic in her turn of mind ;
sviperior, in her own opinion, to all her sex ; full of pertness, gaiety,
and pride ; not without some agreeable accomplishments, but far from

being either beautiful or genteel; happy in the thoughts of

being reported Swift's concubine, but still aiming and intending to be
his wife," — Lord Orrery.

- " You bid me be easy, and you would see me as often as you could.
You had better have said, as often as you can get the better of your
inclinations so much ; or as often as you remember there was such
a one in the world. If you continue to treat me as you do, you will
not be made uneasy by me long. It is impossible to describe what I
have suffered since I saw you last : I am siu-e I could have borne the
rack much better than those killing, kilhng words of yours. Some-

E

50 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

from cliurcli, those divine feet of Dr. Swift's are
found pretty often in Vanessa's parlour. He likes
to be admired and adored. He finds Miss Van-
liomrigli to be a woman of great taste and spirit,
and beauty and wit, and a fortune too. He sees
her every day; he does not tell Stella about the
business : until the impetuous Vanessa becomes too
fond of him, until the doctor is quite frightened by the
young woman's ardour, and confounded by her warmth.
He wanted to marry neither of them — that I believe
was the truth; but if he had not married Stella, Vanessa
would have had him in spite of himself. When he
went back to Ireland, his Ariadne, not content to
remain in her isle, pursued the fugitive Dean. In vain
he protested, he vowed, he soothed and bullied ; the
news of the Dean's marriage with Stella at last came
to her, and it killed her — she died of that passion.^

times I have resolved to die without seeing you more; but those
resolves, to your misfortune, did not last long; for there is something
in human nature that prompts one so to find relief in this world I
must give way to it, and beg you would see me, and speak kindly to me;
for I am sure you'd not condemn any one to suffer what I have done,
could you but know it. The reason I write to you is, because I
cannot tell it to you, should I see you ; for when I begin to complain,
then you are angry, and there is something in your looks so awful
that it strikes me dumb. Oh that you may have but so much regard
for me left that this complamt may touch your soul with pity. I say
as little as ever I can ; did you but know what I thought, I am sure
it would move you to forgive me ; and believe I cannot help telling
you this and live." — Vanessa. (M. 1714.)

1 " If we consider Swift's behaviour, so far only as it relates to

SWIFT. 5 1

And when she died, and Stella heard that Swift
had written beautifullj^ regarding her, "that doesn't

women, we shall find that he looked upon them rather as busts than
as whole figures." — Orrery.

" You must have smiled to have found his house a constant
seraglio of very virtuous women, who attended him from morning to
night." — Orrery.

A correspondent of Sir "Walter Scott's furnished him with the
materials on which to found the following interesting passage about
Vanessa — after she had retired to cherish her passion in retreat: —

" Marley Abbey, near Celbridge, where Miss Vanhomrigh resided, is
built much in the form of a real cloister, especially in its external
appearance. An aged man (upwards of ninety, by his own account)
showed the grounds to my correspondent. He was the son of Mrs.
Vanhomrigh's gardener, and used to work with his father in the
garden while a boy. He remembered the unfortunate Vanessa well ;
and his accoimt of her corresponded with the usual description of her
person, especially as to her embonpoint. He said she went seldom
abroad, and saw little company : her constant amusement was reading,

or walking in the garden She avoided company, and was

always melancholy, save when Dean Swift was there, and then she
seemed happy. The garden was to an uncommon degree crowded
with laurels. The old man said that when Miss Vanhomrigh expected
the Dean she always planted with her own hand a laurel or two
against his arrival. He showed her favourite seat, still called
'Vanessa's bower.' Three or four trees and some laurels indicate

the spot There were two seats and a rude table within the

bower, the opening of which commanded a view of the Lifiey

In this sequestered spot, according to the old gardener's account, the
Dean and Vanessa used often to sit, with books and writing materials
on the table before them." — Scott's Swift, vol. i. pp. 246-7.

.... "But Miss Vanhomrigh, irritated at the situation in which
she found herself, determined on bringing to a crisis those expectations
of a union with the object of her affections — to the hope of which
she had clung amid every vicissitude of his conduct towards her.
The most probable bar was his undefined connection with Mrs.
Johnson, which, as it must have been perfectly known to her, had,
doubtless, long elicited her secret jealousy, although only a single

E 2

52 EI^GLISH HUMOUKISTS.

surprise me," said Mrs. Stella, " for we all know the
Dean could write beautifully about a broomstick." A
woman — a true woman ! Would you have had one of
them forgive the other ?

In a note in his biography, Scott says that his friend
Dr. Tuke, of Dublin, has a lock of Stella's hair,
enclosed in a paper by Swift, on which are written in

hint to that purpose is to be found in their correspondence, and that
so early as 1713, when she writes to him — then in Ireland — 'If you
are very happy, it is ill-natured of you not to tell me so, except 'tis
what is inconsistent with mine.' Her silence and patience under this
state of imcertainty for no less than eight years, must have been
partly owing to her awe for Swift, and partly, perhaps, to the weak
state of her rival's health, which, from year to year, seemed to
announce speedy dissolution. At length, however, Vanessa's impa-
tience prevailed, and she ventured on the decisive step of writing to
Mrs. Johnson herself, requesting to know the nature of that connec-
tion. Stella, in reply, informed her of her marriage with the Dean ;
and full of the highest resentment against Swift for having given
another female such a right in him as Miss Vanhomrigh's inquiries
implied, she sent to him her i-ival's letter of interrogatories, and,
without seeing him, or awaiting his reply, retired to the house of
Mr. Ford, near Dublin. Every reader knows the consequence.
Swift, in one of those paroxysms of fury to which he was liable,
both from temper and disease, rode instantly to Marley Abbey. As
he entered the apartment, the sternness of his countenance, which
was peculiarly formed to express the fiercer passions, struck the
unfortunate Vanessa with such terror that she could scarce ask
whether he would not sit down. He answered by flinging a letter
on the table, and, instantly leaving the house, remounted his horse,
and returned to Dublin. When Vanessa opened the packet, she only
found her own letter to Stella. It was her death warrant. She sunk
at once under the disappointment of the delayed, yet cherished
hopes which had so long sickened her heart, and beneath the
unrestrained wrath of him for whose sake she had indulged them.
How long she survived the last interview is uncertain, but the time
does not seem to have exceeded a few weeks." — Scott.

SWIFT. 53

tlie Dean's hand, the words : " Only a icomaiis hairy
An instance, says Scott, of the Dean's desire to veil
his feelings under the mask of cjmical mdiiference.

See the various notions of critics ! Do those words
indicate indifference or an attempt to hide feeling?
Did you ever hear or read four words more pathetic ?
Only a woman's haii', only love, only fidelity, only
purity, innocence, beauty ; only the tenderest heart in
the world stricken and wounded, and passed awa}^
now out of reach of pangs of hope deferred, love
insulted, and pitiless desertion ; — only that lock of hair
left : and memory and remorse, for the guilty, lonely
wretch, shuddering over the grave of his victim.

And yet to have had so much love, he must have given
some. Treasures of wit and wisdom and tenderness,
too, must that man have had locked up in the caverns
of his gloomy heart, and shown fitfully to one or two
whom he took in there. But it was not good to visit
that place. People did not remain there long, and
suffered for having been there. ^ He shrank away from
all affections sooner or later. Stella and Vanessa both
died near liim, and away from him. He had not heart

^ "M. Swift est Eabelais dans son bon sens, et vivant en bonne
compagnie. II n'a pas, ^ la verite, la gaite du premier, mais il a toute
la finesse, la raison, le chois, le bon gout qui manquent b; notre cui-e de
Meudon. Ses vers sont d'un gout singulier, et presque inimitable ; la
bonne plaisanterie est son partage en vers et en prose ; mais pour le
bien en tendre il faut faii'e un petit voyage dans son pays." — Voltaire,
Lettres sur les Anglais. Let. 22.

54 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

enough to see them die. He broke from his fastest
friend, Sheridan ; he shmk away from his fondest
admirer, Pope. His laugh jars on one's ear after seven
score years. He was always alone — alone and gnash-
ing in the darkness, except when Stella's sweet smile
came and shone upon him. When that went, silence
and utter night closed over him. An immense genius :
an awful downfall and ruin. So great a man he seems
to me, that thinldng of him is like thinkmg of an
empire falhng. We have other great names to mention
— none I think, however, so great or so gloomy.

LECTURE THE SECOND.

CON'GREVE AND ADDISON".

A GREAT number of years ago, before the passing of
the Reform Bill, there existed at Cambridge a certain
debating club, called the " Union," and I remember that
there was a tradition amongst the undergraduates who
frequented that renowned school of oratory, that the
great leaders of the Opposition and Government had
their eyes upon the University Debating Club, and that
if a man distinguished himself there he ran some
chance of being returned to Parliament as a great
nobleman's nominee. So Jones of John's, or Thomson
of Trinity, would rise in their might, and draping them-
selves in their gowns, rally^ round the monarchy, or
hurl defiance at priests and kings with the majesty of
Pitt or the fire of Mirabeau, fancying all the while that
the great nobleman's emissary was Hstening to the
debate from the back benches, where he was sitting
with the family seat in his pocket. Indeed, the legend
said that one or two young Cambridge -men, orators of

56 EI^GLISH HUMOUKISTS.

the Union, were actually caught up thence, and carried
down to Cornwall or old Sarum, and so into Parliament.
And many a young fellow deserted the jogtrot Uni-
versity curriculum, to hang on in the dust behind the
fervid wheels of the parliamentary chariot.

Where, I have often wondered, were the sons of peers
and members of Parliament in Anne's and George's
time ? Were they all in the army, or hunting in the
country, or boxing the watch ? How was it that the
young gentlemen from the University got such a pro-
digious number of places ? A lad composed a neat
copy of verses at Christchurch or Trinity, in which the
death of a great personage was bemoaned, the French
king assailed, the Dutch or Prince Eugene compli-
mented, or the reverse ; and the party in power was
presently to provide for the young poet ; and a com-
missionership, or a post in the Stamps, or the secretary-
ship of an embassy, or a clerkship in the Treasury,
came into the bard's possession. A wonderful fruit-
bearing rod was that of Busby's. What have men of
letters got in our time ? Think, not only of Swift, a
king fit to rule in any time an empire — but Addison,
Steele, Prior, Tickell, Congreve, John Gay, John
Dennis, and many others who got pubhc employment,
and pretty little i^ickings out of the public purse.* The

^ The following is a conspectus of them : —
Addison. — Commissioner of Appeals ; Under Secretary of State ;
Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland; Keeper

co:n'greve and addisox. 57

wits of whose names we shall treat in this lecture and
two following, all (save one) touched the King's coin,
and had, at some period of their lives, a happy quarter-
day coming round for them.

They all began at school or college in the regular
way, producing panegyrics upon public characters, what
were called odes upon public events, battles, sieges,
court marriages and deaths, in which the gods of
Olympus and the tragic muse were fatigued with invo-
cations, according to the fashion of the time in France
and in England. Aid us Mars, Bacchus, Apollo, cried
Addison, or Congreve, singing of William or Marl-
borough. "Accourez, chastes nyinphes de Permesse,'' says
Boileau, celebrating the Grand Monarch. " Des sons

of the Records in Ireland ; Lord of Trade ; and one of
the Principal Secretaries of State, successively.

Steele. — Commissioner of the Stamp Office ; Surveyor of the Royal
Stables at Hampton Coui-t ; and Governor of the Royal
Company of Comedians ; Commissioner of " Forfeited
Estates in Scotland."

Prior. — Secretary to the Embassy at the Hague ; Gentleman of the
Bedchamber to King William ; Secretary to the Embassy
in France ; Under Secretary of State ; Ambassador to
France.

TiCKELL. — Under Secretary of State"; Secretary to the Lords Justices
of Ireland.

Congreve. — Commissioner for licensing Hackney Coaches ; Commis-
sioner for Wine Licenses ; Place in the Pipe Office ; post
in the Custom House ; Secretary of Jamaica,

Gay. — Secretary to the Earl of Clarendon (when Ambassador to
Hanover.)

John Dennis. — A place in the Custom House.

"En Angleterre les lettres sent plus en honneur qu'ici."

— Voltaire, Lettres sw les Anglais, Let. 20.

58 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

que ma lyre enfante, marquez en bien la cadence, et vous,
vents, faites silence ! je vais parler cle Louis /" School-
boys' themes and foundation-exercises are the only
relics left now of this scholastic fashion. The Olym-
pians are left quite undisturbed in their mountain.
What man of note, what contributor to the poetry of a
country newspaper, would now think of writing a con-
gratulatory ode on the birth of the heir to a dukedom,
or the marriage of a nobleman ? In the xDast century
the young gentlemen of the Universities all exercised
themselves at these queer compositions ; and some got
fame, and some gained patrons and places for life, and
many more took nothing by these efforts of what they
were pleased to call their muses.

WilHam Congreve's ' Pindaric Odes are still to be
found m " Johnson's Poets," that now unfrequented
poet's corner, in which so many forgotten big- wigs have
a niche — but though he was also voted to be one of the
greatest tragic poets of any day, it was Congreve's wit
and humour which first recommended him to courtly
fortune. And it is recorded, that his first play, the
" Old Bachelor," brought our author to the notice of
that great patron of the English muses, Charles
Montague Lord Halifax, who being desirous to place
so eminent a wit in a state of ease and tranquillity,

1 He was the son of Colonel William Congreve, and grandson of
Richard Congreve, Esq., of Congreve and Stretton in Staffordshire — a
very ancient family.

CONGEEVE AND ADDISON. 59

instantly made liim one of the commissioners for
licensing hackney-coaches, bestowed on him soon after
a place in the Pipe-office, and likewise a post in the
Custom-house of the value of 600Z.

A commissionership of hackney-coaches — a post m
the Custom-house — a place in the Pipe-office, and all
for writing a comedy ! Doesn't it sound like a fable,
that place m the Pipe -office ? ^ Ah, I'heureux temps
que celui de ces fables ! Men of letters there still be :
but I doubt whether any pipe-offices are left. The
public has smoked them long ago.

Words, like men, pass current for a while mth the
pubhc, and being known everywhere abroad, at length
take their places in society ; so even the most secluded
and refined ladies here present will have heard the
phrase from their sons or brothers at school, and will

^ " Pipe, — Pipe, in law, is a roll in the Exchequer, called also the
great roll.

" 'PiFE-Office is an ofi&ce in which a person called the Clerk of the Pipe
makes out leases of crown lands, by warrant, from the Lord-Treasurer,
or Commissioners of the Treasury, or Chancellor of the Exchequer.

" Clerk of the Pipe makes up all accounts of sheriffs, &c." — Rees.
Cyclopcecl. Art. Pipe.

*' PiPE-Q/^ce. — Spelman thinks so called because the papers were kept
in a large pipe or cask."

" These be at last brought into that office of Her Majesty's Exchequer,

which we, by a metaphor, do call the pii^e because the whole

receipt is finally conveyed into it by means of divers small pipes or
quills." — Bacon. The Office of Alienations.

[We are indebted to Richardson's Dictionary for this fragment of
erudition. But a modern man-of-letters can know little on these
points, by — experience.]

60 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

permit me to call William Congreve, Esquire, the most
eminent literary " swell " of his age. In my copy of
" Johnson's Lives " Congreve's wig is the tallest, and
put on with the jauntiest air of all the laurelled
worthies. " I am the great Mr. Congreve," he seems
to say, looking out from his voluminous curls. People
called him the great Mr. Congreve.' From the begin-
ning of his career until the end everybody admired himc
Having got his education in Ireland, at the same school
and college with Swift ; he came to live m the Middle
Temple, London, where he luckily bestowed no atten-
tion to the law ; but splendidly frequented the coffee-
houses and theatres, and appeared in the side-box, the
tavern, the Piazza and the Mall, brilliant, beautiful,
and victorious from the first. Everybody acknowledged
the young chieftain. The great Mr. Dryden ' declared

^ " It has been observed that no change of ministers affected bim in
the least, nor was he ever removed from any post that was given to
him, except to a better. His place in the Custom-House, and his office
of Secretary in Jamaica, are said to have brought him in upwards of
twelve hundred a year." — Biog. Brit., Art. Congreve.

2 Dryden addressed his " twelfth epistle " to " My dear friend Mr.
Congreve," on hia comedy called the " Double Dealer," in which he
says —

" Great Jonson did by strength of judgment please;

Yet, doubling Fletcher's force, he wants his ease.

In differing talents both adorn'd their age ;

One for the study, t'other for the stage.

But both to Congreve justly shall submit,

One match'd in judgment, both o'ermatched in wit.

In him all beauties of this age we see," &c., &c.

The "Double Dealer," however, was not so palpable a hit as the

CONGREVE A^T) ADDISOK 61

that he was equal to Shakspeare, and bequeathed to
hhn his own undisputed poetical crown, and writes of
him, " Mr. Congreve has done me the favour to review
the *^neis,' and compare my version with the origmal.
I shall never be ashamed to own that this excellent
young man has showed me many faults wliich I have
endeavoured to correct."

The "excellent young man" was but three or four-
and-twenty when the great Dryden thus spoke of him :
the greatest literary chief in England, the veteran
field-marshal of letters, himself the marked man of all
Europe, and the centre of a school of wits, who daily
gathered round his chair and tobacco-pipe at Wills'.
Pope dedicated his "Iliad" to him; ' Swift, Addison,

" Old Bachelor," but, at first, met with opposition. The critics having
fallen foul of it, our "Swell " applied the scourge to that presumj^tuous
body, in the "Epistle Dedicatory" to the " Right Honourable Charles
Montague."

" I was conscious," said he, " where a true critic might have put me

upon my defence. I was prepared for the attack, but I have

not heard anything said sufficient to provoke an answer." He goes on —

" But there is one thing at which I am more concerned than all the
false criticisms that are made upon me ; and that is, some of the ladies
are offended. I am heartily sorry for it ; for I declai'e, I would rather
disoblige all the critics in the world than one of the fair sex. They
are concerned that I have represented some women vicious and
affected. How can I help it 1 It is the business of a comic poet to

paint the vices and follies of human kind I should be very

glad of an opportunity to make my compliments to those ladies who
are offended. But they can no more expect it in a comedy, than to be
tickled by a surgeon when he is letting their blood."

' " Instead of endeavouring to raise a vain monument to myself, let
me leave behind me a memorial of my friendship, with one of the most

62 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Steele, all acknowledge Congreve's rank, and lavish
compliments upon him. Voltaire went to wait upon
him as on one of the Eepresentatives of Literature —
and the man who scarce praises any other living person,
who flung abuse at Pope, and Swift, and Steele, and
Addison, — the Grub-street Timon, old John Dennis,*
was hat in hand to Mr. Congreve ; and said, that when
he retired from the stage, Comedy went with him.

Nor was he less victorious elsewhere. He was admired
in the drawing-rooms as well as the coffee-houses ; as
much beloved in the side-box as on the stage. He
loved, and conquered, and jilted the beautiful Brace-
girdle,^ the heroine of all his plays, the favourite of all
the town of her day — and the Duchess of Marlborough,

valuable men as well as finest writers of my age and country — one who
has tried, and knows by his own experience, how hard an undertaking
it is to do justice to Homer — and one who, I am sure, seriously
rejoices with me at the period of my labours. To him, therefore,
having brought this long work to a conclusion, I desire to dedicate it,
and to have the honour and satisfaction of placing together in this
manner the names of Mr. Congreve and of — A. Pope." Postscript to
Translation of the Iliad of Homer. Mar. 25, 1720.

^ "When asked why he listened to the praises of Dennis, he said, he
had much rather be flattered than abused. Swift had a particular
friendship for our author, and generally took him under his protec-
tion in his high authoritative manner." — Thos, Davies. Dramatic
Miscellanies,

2 " Congreve was very intimate for years with Mrs. Bracegirdlc, and
lived in the same street, his house very near hers, until his acquaint-
ance with the young Duchess of Marlborough. He then quitted that
house. The Duchess showed us a diamond necklace (which Lady Di.
used afterwards to wear) that cost seven thousand pounds, and was
purchased with the money Congreve left her. How much better

CONGREVE AN^D ADDISON". 63

Marlborough's daughter, had such an admiration of him,
that when he died she had an ivory figure made to imi-
tate him,^ and a large wax doll with gouty feet to be
dressed just as the great Congreve's gouty feet were
dressed in his great lifetime. He saved some money
by his Pipe-office, and his Custom-house office, and
his Hackney-coach office, and nobly left it, not to
Bracegirdle, who wanted it," but to the Duchess of
Marlborough, who didn't.'

would it liave been to have given it to poor Mrs. Bracegirdle." — Dr.
Young, Spences A necclotes.

1 "A glass was put in the hand of the statue, which was supposed to
bow to her Grace and to nod in approbation of what she spoke to it." —
Thos. Davies. Dramatic Miscellanies.

2 The sum Congreve left her was 200Z., as is said in the " Dramatic
Miscellanies" of Tom Davies; where are some particulars about this
charming actress and beautiful woman.

She had a "lively aspect," says Tom, on the authority of Gibber,
and ''such a glow of health and cheerfulness in her countenance, as
inspired eveiybod}^ with desire." "Scarce an audience saw her that
were not half of them her lovers."

Congreve and Rowe courted her in the persons of their lovers. " In

Tamerlane, Rowe courted her Selima, in the person of Axalla ;

Congreve insinuated his addresses in his Valentine to her Angelica, in
his 'Love for Love;' in his Osmyn to lier Almena, in the 'Mourning
Bride;' and, lastly, in his Mirabel to her Millamant, in the 'Way of
the World.' Mirabel, the fine gentleman of the play, is, I believe, not
veiy distant from the real character of Congreve." — Dramatic Mis-
cellanies, vol. iii. 1784.

She retired from the stage when Mrs. Oldfield began to be the public
favourite. She died in 1748, in the eighty-fifth year of her age.

3 Johnson calls his legacy the "accumulation of attentive parsi-
mony, which," he continues, " though to her (the Duchess) superfluous
and useless, might have given great assistance to the ancient family
from which he descended, at that time, by the imprudence of his
relation, reduced to difficulties and distress." — Lives of the Poets.

64 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

How can I introduce to you that merry and shame-
less Comic Muse who won him such a reputation ? Nell
Gwynn's servant fought the other footmen for having
called his mistress a bad name ; and in like manner,
and with pretty like epithets, Jeremy Collier attacked
that godless, reckless Jezebel, the English comedy of
his time, and called her what Nell Gwynn's man's
fellow- servants called Nell Gwynn's man's mistress.
The servants of the theatre, Dryden, Congreve,' and
others, defended themselves with the same success, and
for the same cause which set Nell's lackey fighting. She
was a disreputable, daring, laughing, painted French
baggage, that Comic Muse. She came over from the
continent with Charles (who chose many more of his

^ He replied to Colliei*, in the pamplilet called "Amendments of
Mr. Collier's False aud Imperfect Citations," &c. A specimen or two
are subjoined : —

" The greater part of these examples which he has produced, are
only demonstrations of his own impurity : they only savour of his
utterance, and were sweet enough till tainted by his breath.

" Where the expression is unblameable in its own pure and genuine
signification, he enters into it, himself, like the evil spirit ; he possesses
the innocent phrase, aud makes it bellow forth his own blasphemies.

" If I do not return him civilities in calling him names, it is because

I am not very well versed in his nomenclatures I will only

call him Mr. Collier, and that I will call him as often as I think he
shall deserve it,

" The corruption of a rotten divine is the generation of a sour
critic."

"Congreve," says Dr. Johnson, "a very young man, elated with
success, and impatient of censure, assumed an air of confidence and

security The dispute was protracted through two years ; but

at last Comedy grew more modest, and Collier lived to see the reward
of his labours in the reformation of the theatre." — Life of Couyreve.

CON'GEEVE AND ADDISOI^. 65

female friends there) at the Eestoration — a wild,
dishevelled Lais, with eyes bright with wit and wine —
a saucy court -favourite that sate at the King's knees,
and laughed in his face, and when she showed her bold
cheeks at her chariot-window, had some of the noblest
and most famous people of the land bowing round her
wheel. She was kind and popular enough, that daring
Comedy, that audacious poor Nell — she was gay and
generous, kind, frank, as such people can afford to be :
and the men who lived with her and laughed with her,
took her pay and drank her mne, turned out when the
Puritans hooted her, to fight and defend her. But the
jade was indefensible, and it is pretty certain her
servants knew it.

There is life and death going on in every thing:
truth and lies always at battle. Pleasure is always
warring against self-restraint. Doubt is always crying
Psha, and sneering. A man in life^ a humourist in
writing about life, sways over to one prmciple or the
other, and laughs with the reverence for right and the
love of truth in his heart, or laughs at these from the
other side. Didn't I tell you that dancing was a serious
business to Harlequin ? I have read two or three of
Congreve's plays over before speaking of him ; and my
feehngs were rather like those, which I daresay most
of us here have had, at Pompeii, looking at Sallust's
house and the rehcs of an orgy, a dried wine -jar or
two, a charred supper -table, the breast of a dancing

66 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

girl pressed against the ashes, the laughing skuU of a
jester, a perfect stillness round ahout, as the Cicerone
twangs his moral, and the hlue sky shines calmly over
the ruin. The Congreve muse is dead, and her song
choked in Time's ashes. Vi'e gaze at the skeleton,
and wonder at the life which once revelled in its mad
veins. We take the skull up, and muse over the frolic
and dai'ing, the wit, scorn, passion, hope, desii'e, with
which that empty howl once fermented. We think of
the glances that allui'ed, the teai's that melted, of
the hright eyes that shone in those vacant sockets ;
and of lips whispeiing love, and cheeks dimpling with
smiles, that once covered yon ghastly yellow frame-
work. They used to call those teeth pearls once.
See ! there's the cup she di'ank fi'om, the gold-chain
she wore on her neck, the vase which held the rouge
for her cheeks, her looking-glass, and the hai'p she
used to dance to. Instead of a feast we find a gi*ave-
stone, and in place of a misti'ess, a few bones !

Reading in these plays now, is like shuttiug your
eai's and looking at people dancing. "VMiat does it
mean ? the measiu'es, the gi'imaces, the bowing,
shuffling and retreating, the cavaher seul advancing
upon those ladies — those ladies and men twii'ling
round at the end in a mad galop, after which ever^'body
bows and the quaint rite is celebrated. Without the
music we can't understand that comic dance of the
last centmy — its strange gi-avity and gaiety, its deconim

COXGREYE AND ADDISON. 67

or its indecorum. It has a jargon of its own quite
unlilvG life ; a sort of moral of its own quite unlike life
too. I'm afraid it's a Heathen mystery, symbohsmg a
Pagan doctrine ; protesting, as the Pompeians very
likely were, assembled at their theatre and laughing
at theii' games — as Sallust and his friends, and their
mistresses protested — crowned with flowers, with cups
in theii* hands, against the new, hard, ascetic pleasure -
hatmg doctrine, whose gaunt disciples, lately passed
over from the Asian shores of the Mediterranean were
for breaking the fair images of "Venus, and flinging the
altars of Bacchus down.

I fancy poor CongTeve's theatre is a temple of Pagan
dehghts, and mysteries not permitted except among
heathens. I fear the theatre carries down that ancient
tradition and worsliip, as masons have carried their
secret signs and rites from temple to temple, \\lien
the libertine hero carries off the beauty in the play, and
the dotard is laughed to scorn for ha'sdng the young wife :
in the ballad, when the poet bid his mistress to gather
roses while she may, and warns her that old Time is still
a-fl3ing : in the ballet, when honest Corj-don com'ts
Phillis under the treillage of the pasteboard cottage,
and leers at her over the head of grandpapa in red
stockings, who is opportunely asleep ; and when
seduced by the invitations of the rosy youth she comes
forward to the foothghts, and they perform on each
other's tiptoes that pas which you all know and which

F 2

68 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

is only interrupted by old grandpapa awaking from his
doze at the pasteboard chalet (whither he returns to
take another nap in case the young people get an
encore) : when Harlequin, splendid in youth, strength
and agility, arrayed in gold and a thousand colours,
springs over the heads of countless perils, leaps down
the throat of bewildered giants, and, dauntless and
splendid, dances danger down : when Mr. Punch, that
godless old rebel, breaks every law and laughs at it
with odious triumph, outwits his lawyer, bullies the
beadle, knocks his wife about the head, and hangs the
hangman, — don't you see in the comedy, in the song,
in the dance, in the ragged little Punch's puppet-show,
— the Pagan protest ? Doesn't it seem as if Life puts
in its plea and sings its comment ? Look how the
lovers walk and hold each other's hands and whisper !
Sings the chorus — "There is nothing like love, there is
nothing like youth, there is nothing like beauty of
your spring time. Look ! how old age tries to meddle
with merry sport ! Beat him with his own crutch, the
wrinkled old dotard ! There is nothing like j^outh,
there is nothing like beauty, there is nothing like
strength. Strength and valour win beauty and youth.
Be brave and conquer. Be young and happy. Enjoy,
enjoy, enjoy ! Would you know the Segreto per esser
felice ? Here it is, in a smiling mistress and a cup of
Falernian." As the boy tosses the cup and sings his
song. Hark ! what is that chaunt coming nearer and

CONGEEVE AND ADDISON". 69

nearer ? What is tliat dirge which will disturb us ?
The lights of the festival burn dim — the cheeks turn
pale — ^the voice quavers — and the cup drops on the
floor. AVho's there ? Death and Fate are at the gate,
and they icill come in.

Congreve's comic feast flares with lights, and round
the table, emptying their flaming bowls of drink, and
exchanging the wildest jests and ribaldry, sit men and
women, waited on by rascally valets and attendants as dis-
solute as their mistresses — perhaps the very worst com-
pany in the world. There doesn't seem to be a pretence
of morals. At the head of the table sits Mii^abel or
Belmour (dressed in the French fashion and waited on
by Enghsh imitators of Scapin and Frontin). Their
calling is to be irresistible, and to conquer everywhere.
Like the heroes of the chivahy story, whose long-winded
loves and combats they were sending out of fasliion ;
they are always splendid and triumphant — overcome
all dangers, vanquish all enemies, and win the beauty
at the end. Fathers, husbands, usurers are the foes
these champions contend with. They are merciless in
old age, invariably, and an old man plays the part in
the dramas, which the wicked enchanter or the great
blundering giant performs in the chivalry tales, who
threatens and grumbles and resists — a huge stupid
obstacle always overcome by the knight. It is an old
man with a money-box : Sir Behnour his son or nephew
spends his money and laughs at him. It is an old man

70 EJNGLISH HU MO HEISTS.

with a young wife whom he locks up : Sir Mirabel robs
him of his wife, trips up his gouty old heels and leaves
the old hunx — the old fool what business has he to
hoard his money, or to lock up blushing eighteen ?
Money is for youth, love is for youth, away with the
old peoi)le. When Millamant is sixty, having of course
divorced the first Lady Millamant, and married his
friend Doricourt's grand- daughter out of the nursery —
it will be his turn; and young Belmour will make a fool
of him. All this pretty morality you have in the
comedies of William Congreve, Esq. They are full of
wit. Such manners as he observes, he observes with
great humour ; but ah ! it's a weary feast that banquet
of wit were no love is. It palls very soon ; sad indi-
gestions follow it and lonely blank headaches in the
morning.

I can't pretend to quote scenes from the splendid
Congreve's plays * — which are undeniably bright, witty,

1 The scene of Valentine's pretended madness in *' Love for Love," is
a splendid specimen of Congreve's daring manner : —

Scandal. — And have you given your master a hint of their plot
upon him ?

Jeremy. — Yes, Sir; he says he'll favour it, and mistake her for
Angelica.

Scandal. — It may make us sport.

ForedgJit. — Mercy on us !

Valentine. — Husht — interrupt me not — I'll whisper predictions to
thee, and thou shalt prophesie ; — I am truth, and can teach thy tongue
a new trick, — I have told thee what's passed, — now I'll tell what's to
come : — Dost thou know what will happen to-morrow ? Answer me
not — for I will tell thee. To-morrow knaves will thrive thro' craft, and

CON-GREVE AND ADDISON. 71

and daring, — any more than I could ask you to hear
the dialogue of a witty bargeman and a brilliant fish-

fools thro' foi^tune ; and honesty will go as it did, frost-nipt in a summer
suit. Ask me questions concerning to-morrow.

Scandal. — Ask him, Mr. Foresight.

Foresight — Pray what will be done at Court ?

Valentine. — Scandal will tell you ; — I am truth, I never come there.

Foresight. — In the city ?

Valentine. — Oh, prayers will be said in empty churches at the usual
hours. Yet you will see such zealous faces behind counters, as if
religion were to be sold in every shop. Oh, things will go methodically
in the city, the clocks will strike twelve at noon, and the horn'd herd
buz in the Exchange at two. Husbands and wives will drive distinct
trades, and care and pleasure separately occupy the family. Coffee-
houses will be full of smoke and stratagem. And the cropt prentice
that sweeps his master's shop in the morning, may, ten to one, dirty his
sheets before night. But there are two things, that you will see very
strange ; which are, wanton wives with their legs at liberty, and tame
cuckolds with chains about their necks. But hold, I must examine you
before I go further; you look suspiciously. Are you a husband 1

Foresight. — I am married.

Valentine. — Poor creatui*e ! Is your wife of Covent-garden Parish ?

Foresight. — No ; St. Martin's-in-the-Fields.

Valentine. — Alas, poor man ! his eyes are sixnk, and his hands
shrivelled ; his leggs dwindled, and his back bow'd. Pray, pray, for
a metamorphosis — change thy shape, and shake off age; get the
Medea's kettle and be boiled anew ; come forth with lab'i-ing callous
hands, and chine of steel, and Atlas' shoulders. Let Taliacotius trim
the calves of twenty chairmen, and make the pedestals to stand erect
upon, and look matrimony in the face. Ha, ha, ha ! That a man should
have a stomach to a wedding supper, when the pidgeons ought rather
to be laid to his feet ! ha, ha, ha !

Foresight. — His frenzy is very high now, Mr. Scandal.

Scandal. — I believe it is a spring-tide.

Foresight. — Very likely — truly ; you understand these matters. Mr.
Scandal, I shall be very glad to confer with you about these things
he has uttered. His sayings are very mysterious and hieroglyphical .

Valentine. — Oh ! why would Angelica be absent from my eyes
so long?

72 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

woman exchanging compliments at Billingsgate; but
some of his verses, — they were amongst the most famous

Jeremy. — She's here, Sir.

Mrs. Foresight. — Now, Sister !

Mrs. Frail. — 0 Lord ! what must I say ?

Scandal. — Humour him, Madam, by all means.

Valentine. — Where is she ] Oh ! I see her ; she comes, like Riches,
Health, and Liberty at once, to a despairing, starving, and abandoned
wretch. Oh — welcome, welcome !

Mrs. Frail. — How d'ye. Sir ] Can I serve you 1

Valeoitine. — Hark'ee — I have a secret to tell you, Endymion and
the moon shall meet as on Mount Latmos, and we'll be married in the
dead of night. But say not a word. Hymen shall put his torch
into a dark lanthorn, that it may be secret ; and Juno shall give
her peacock poppy-water, that he may fold his ogling tail; and
Argus's hundred eyes be shut — ha ! Nobody shall know, but Jeremy.

Mrs. Frail. — No, no ; we'll keep it secret; it shall be done presently.
Valentine. — The sooner the better. Jeremy, come hither — closer —
that none may overhear us. Jeremy, I can tell you news; Angelica
is turned nun, and I am turning friar, and yet we'll marry one
another in spite of the Pope. Get me a cowl and beads, that I may
play my part; for she'll meet me two hours hence in black and
white, and a long veil to cover the project, and we won't see one
another's faces 'till we have done something to be ashamed of, and
then we'll blush once for all

Enter Tattle.

Tattle. — Do you know me, Valentine ?

Valentine. — You ! — who are you 1 No ; I hope not.

Tattle. — I am JacJc Tattle, your friend.

Valentine. — My friend ! What to do ] I am no married man,
and thou canst not lye with my wife; I am very poor, and thou
canst not borrow money of me. Then, what employment have I
for a friend ]

Tattle. — Hah ! A good open speaker, and not to be trusted with
a secret.

Angelica. — Do you know me, Valentine!

Valentine. — Oh, very well.

Angelica. — Who am 1%

CON'GEEVE AND ADDISON". 73

lyrics of the time, and pronounced equal to Horace
by liis contemporaries, — may give an idea of his power,

Valentine. — You're a woman; one to whom Heaven gave beauty
when it gi'afted roses on a brier. You are the reflection of Heaven
in a pond; and he that leaps at you is sunk. You are all white —
a sheet of spotless paper — when you first are born ; but you are to
be scrawled and blotted by every goose's quill. I know you ; for
I loved a woman, and loved her so long that I found out a strange
thing : I found out what a woman was good for.

Tattle. — Ay ! pr'ythee, what's that 1

Valentine. — Why, to keep a secret.

Tattle.— 0 Lord !

Valentine. — 0, exceeding good to keep a secret; for, though she
shoul'd tell, yet she is not to be believed.

Tattle. — Hah ! Good again, faith.

Valentine. — I would have musick. Sing me the song that I like.
— Congee VE. " Love for Love."

There is a Mrs. Niclclehy, of the year 1700, in Cougreve's Comedy
of "The Double Dealer," in whose character the author introduces
some wonderful traits of roguish satii'e. She is practised on by the
gallants of the play, and no more knows how to resist them than any of
the ladies above quoted could resist Congreve.

Lady Plyant. — 0 ! reflect upon the honour of your conduct !
Offering to pervert me [the joke is that the gentleman is pressing the
lady for her daughter's hand, not for her own] — perverting me from
the road of virtue, in which I have trod thus long, and never made one
trip — not one faux pas ; 0, consider it ; what would you have to
answer for-, if you should provoke me to frailty ! Alas ! humanity is
feeble, Heaven knows ! Very feeble,, and unable to support itself.

Mellefont. — Where am 11 Is it day ? and am I awake ? Madam —

Lady Plyant. — 0 Lord, ask me the question ! I'll swear I'll deny
it — ^therefore don't ask me ; nay, you shan't ask me ; I swear I'll deny
it. 0 Gemini, you have brought all the blood into my face ; I wai'rant
I am as red as a turkey-cock ; 0 fie, cousin Mellefont !

Mellefont.- — Nay, madam, hear me ; I mean

Lady Plyant. — Hear you 1 No, no ; I'll deny you first, and hear you
afterwards. For one does not know how one's mind may change upon
hearing — hearing is one of the senses, and all the senses are fallible. I

74 EN'GLTSH HUMOUEISTS.

of liis grace, of his daring manner, his magnificence in
comphment, and his polished sarcasm. He writes as
if he was so accustomed to conquer, that he has a poor
opinion of his victims. Nothing's new except their
faces, says he, " Every woman is the same." He says
this in his first comedy, which he -wTote languidly' in

won't trust my honour, I assure you ; my honour is infallible and
uncomatable.

Mellefont. — For Heaven's sake, madam

Lady Plyant. — 0, name it no more. Bless me, how can you talk of
heaven, and have so much wickedness in your heart ? May be, you
dosn't think it a sin. They say some of you gentlemen don't think it a

sin ; but still, my honour, if it were no sin . But, then, to marry

my daughter for the convenience of frequent opportunities, — I'll never
consent to that : as sure as can be, I'll break the match.

Mellefont. — Death and amazement ! Madam, upon my knees

Lady Plyant. — Nay, nay, rise up ; come, you shall see my good-
nature. I know love is powerful, and nobody can help his passion.
'Tis not your fault ; nor I swear, it is not mine. How can I help it, if
I have charms ? And how can you help it, if you are made a captive ?
I swear it is pity it should be a fault ; but, my honom-. "Well, but
your honour, too — but the sin ! Well, but the necessity. 0 Lord,
here's somebody coming, I dare not stay. Well, you must consider
of your crime ; and strive as much as can be against it — strive, be
sure ; but don't be melancholick — don't despair ; but never think that
I'll grant you anything. 0 Lord, no ; but be sure you lay all thoughts
aside of the marriage, for though I know you don't love Cynthia, only
as a blind for your passion to me ; yet it will make me jealous. 0
Lord, what did I say? Jealous ! No, I can't be jealous; for I must
not love you; therefore don't hope; but don't despair neither.
They're coming ; I must ^j.—The Double Dealer. Act 2nd, scene v.
page 156.

^ " There seems to be a strange affectation in authors of appearing to
have done everything by chance. The Old Bachelor was written for
amusement in the languor of convalescence. Yet it is apparently
composed with great elaborateness of dialogue, and incessant ambition
of wit." — Johnson. Lives of the Poets.

COXGREYE AN"D ADDISOl!^. 75

illness, when lie was an " excellent young man." Eiche-
lieu at eighty could have hardly said a more excellent
thing.

When he advances to make one of his conquests it
is with a splendid gallantry, in full uniform and with
the fiddles playing, like Grammont's French dandies
attacking the breach of Lerida.

"Cease, cease to ask her name," he writes of a young
lady at the Wells at Tunbridge, whom he salutes with
a magnificent compliment —

" Cease, cease to ask her name,
The crowned Muse's noblest theme,
Whose glory by immortal fame

Shall only sounded be.
But if you long to know,
Then look round yonder dazzling row.
Who most does like an angel show

You may be sure 'tis she."

Here are Hues about another beauty, who perhaps
was not so well pleased at the poet's manner of cele-
brating her —

" When Lesbia first I saw, so heavenly fair,
With eyes so bright and with that awful air,
I thought my heart would durst so high aspire
As bold as his who snatched celestial fire.
But soon as e'er the beauteous idiot spoke.
Forth fi'om her coral lips such folly broke ;
Like balm the trickling nonsense heal'd my wound.
And what her eyes enthralled, her tongue unbound."

Amoret is a cleverer woman than the lovely Lesbia,
but the poet does not seem to respect one much more

76 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

than tlie other ; and describes both with exquisite
satirical humour —

" Fair Amoret is gone astray,

Pursue aud seek her every lover ;
I'll tell the signs by which you may
The wandering shepherdess discover.

Coquet and coy at once her air,

Both studied, though both seem neglected ;

Careless she is with artful care,
Affecting to be unaffected.

With skill her eyes dart every glance,

Yet change so soon you'd ne'er suspect them ;

For she'd persuade they wound by chance,
Though certain aim and art direct them.

She likes herself, yet others hates

For that which in herself she prizes ;
And, while she laughs at them, forgets

She is the thing which she despises."

What could Amoret have done to bring down such
shafts of ridicule upon her ? Could she have resisted
the irresistible Mr. Congreve ? Could anybody ? Could
Sabina, when she woke and heard such a bard singing
under her window. See, he writes —

" See ! see, she wakes — Sabina wakes !

And now the sun begins to rise :
Less glorious is the morn, that breaks

From his bright beams, than her fair eyes.
With light united day they give ;

But different fates ere night fulfil :
How many by his warmth will live !

How many will her coldness kill ! "

Are you melted ? Don't jou think him a divine

co:n'GREve and addisok. 77

man ? If not toucliecl by tlie brilliant Sabina, hear
the devout Selinda : —

" Pious Selinda goes to prayers,

If I but ask her favour ;
And yet the silly fool 's in tears,

If she believes I'll leave her.
"Would I were free from this restraint.

Or else had hopes to win her :
"Would she could make of me a saint.

Or I of her a sinner ! "

"What a conquering air there is about these ! What
an irresistible Mr. Congreve it is ! Sinner ! of course
he will be a sinner, the delightful rascal ! Win her ;
of course he will win her, the victorious rogue ! He
knows he will : he must — with such a grace, with such
a fashion, with such a splendid embroidered suit — you
see him with red-heeled shoes deliciously turned out,
passing a fair jewelled hand through his dishevelled
periwig and dehvering a killing ogle along with his
scented billet. And Sabina? What a comparison
that is between the nymph and the sun ! The sun gives
Sabina the pas, and does not venture to rise before her
ladyship : the morn's bright beams are less glorious
than her fair eyes : but before night everybody will be
frozen by her glances : everybody but one lucky rogue
who shall be nameless : Louis Quatorze in all his glory
is hardly more splendid than our Phoebus Apollo of the
Mall and Spring Garden.*

'Among those by whom it ('Wills's') was frequented, Southeme

78 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

When Voltake came to visit tlie great Congreve, the
latter rather affected to despise his literary reputation,
and in this perhaps the great Congreve was not far
wrong.^ A touch of Steele's tenderness is worth all his
finery — a flash of Swift's lightning — a beam of Addison's
pure sunshme, and his tawdry play-house taper is
invisible. But the ladies loved him and he was
undoubtedly a pretty fellow.'

and Congreve were principally distinguished by Dryden's friendship.

But Congreve seems to have gained yet farther than Southerne

upon Dryden's friendship. He was introduced to him by his first
play, the celebrated * Old Bachelor ' being put into the poet's hands to
be revised. Dryden, after making a few alterations to fit it for the
stage, returned it to the author with the high and just commendation,
that it was the best first play he had ever seen." — Scott's I>ryden,
vol. i. p. 370.

^ It was in Surrey-street, Strand (where he afterwards died), that
Voltaire visited him, in the decline of his life.

The anecdote in the text, relating to his saying that he wished " to
be visited on no other footing than as a gentleman who led a life of
plainness and simplicity," is common to all writers on the subject of
Congreve, and appears in the English version of Voltaire's Letters
concerning the English nation, published in London, 1733, as also in
Goldsmith's " Memoir of Voltaii'e." But it is worthy of remark, that it
does not appear in the text of the same Letters in the edition of
Voltaire's CEuvres Completes in the Pantheon Litteraire. Vol. v. of his
works. (Paris, 1837.)

" Celm de tons les Anglais qui a portd le plus loin la gloire du
thedtre comique est feu M. Congreve. II n'a fait que peu de pieces,
mais toutes sont excellentes dans leur genre Vous y voyez par-
tout le langage des honnetes gens avec des actions de fripon ; ce qui
prouve qu'il connaissait bien son monde, et qu'il vivait dans ce qu'on
appelle la bonne compagnie." — Voltaike. Lettres sur les Anglais,
Let. 19.

" On the death of Queen Mary, he published a Pastoral — " The

COJfGREVE AND ADDISOX. 79

We have seen in Swift a humourous philosopher,
whose truth frightens one, and whose laughter
makes one melancholy. We have had in Congreve a

Mourning Muse of Alexis." Alexis and Menalcas sing alternately in
the orthodox way. The Queen is called Pastora.

" I mourn Pastora dead, let Albion mourn,
And sable clouds her chalky cliffs adorn,"

says Alexis. Among other phenomena, we learn that —

" With their sharp nails themselves the Satyrs wound,
And tug their shaggy beards, and bite with grief the ground," —

(a degree of sensibility not always found in the Satyrs of that
period !).... It continues —

"Lord of these woods and wide extended plains,

Stretch'd on the ground and close to earth his face,

Scalding with tears the already faded grass.
*****

To dust must all that Heavenly beauty come ?

And must Pastora moulder in the tomb ?

Ah Death ! more fierce and unrelenting far.

Than wildest wolves and savage tigers are ;

With lambs and sheep their hunger is appeased.

But ravenous Death the shepherdess has seized."

This statement that a wolf eats but a sheep, whilst Death eats a
shepherdess; that figure of the " Great Shepherd," lying speechless on
his stomach, in a state of despair which neither winds nor floods nor
air can exhibit, are to be remembered in poetry surely, and this style
was admired in its time by the admirers of the great Congi'eve !

In the " Teai-s of Amaryllis for Amyntas " (the young Lord Blandford,
the great Duke of Marlborough's only son), Amaryllis represents
Sarah Duchess !

The tigers and wolves, nature and motion, rivers and echoes, come in
to work here again. At the sight of her grief —

" Tigers and wolves their wonted rage forego.
And dumb distress and new compassion show.
Nature herself attentive silence kept,
And motion seemed sics^pended ivhile she wcjjt /" —

80 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

humourous observer of another school to whom the
world seems to have no moral at all, and whose ghastly
doctrine seems to be that we should eat, drink, and be
merry when we can, and go to the deuce (if there be
a deuce) when the time comes. We come now to a
humour that flows from quite a different heart and

And Pope dedicated the Iliad to the author of these lines — and Dryden
wrote to him in his great hand :

" Time, place, and action may with pains be wrought,
But Genius must be born and never can be taught.
This is your portion, this your native store ;
Heaven, that but once was prodigal before,
To Shakspeare gave as much she could not give him more.

Maintain your Post : that's all the Fame you need,
For 'tis impossible you should proceed;
Already I am worn with cares and age,
And just abandoning th' ungrateful Stage :
Unprofitably kept at Heaven's expence,
I live a Rent-charge upon Providence :
But you whom every Muse and Grace adorn,
Whom I foresee to better fortune born,
.Be kind to my remains, and oh defend
Against your Judgment your departed Friend !
Let not the insulting Foe my Fame pursue ;
But shade those Lawrels which descend to You :
And take for Tribute what these Lines express;
You merit more, nor could my Love do less,"

This is a very different manner of welcome to that of our own day.
In Shadwell, Higgons, Congreve, and the comic authors of their time,
when gentlemen meet they fall into each other's arms, with "Jack,
Jack, I must buss thee ;" or " Fore George, Harry, I must kiss thee, lad."
And in a similar manner the poets saluted their brethren. Literary
gentlemen do not kiss now ; I wonder if they love each other better,

Steele calls Congreve " Great Sir " and " Great Author; " says, " Well-
dressed barbarians knew his awful name," and addresses him as if he
were a prince ; and speaks of " Pastora " as one of the most famous
tragic compositions.

CONGREVE AND ADDISON". 81

spirit — a wit that makes us laugh and leaves us good
and happy ; to one of the kindest benefactors that
society has ever had, and I believe you have divined
already that I am about to mention Addison's honoured
name.

From reading over his writings, and the biographies
which w^e have of him, amongst which the famous
aj;ticle in the Edinburgh Eeview ^ may be cited as a
magnificent statue of the great writer and morahst of
the last age, raised by the love and the marvellous
skill and genius of one of the most illustrious artists of
our own ; looking at that calm, fair face, and clear
countenance — those chiselled features pure and cold, I
can't but fanc}^ that this great man, in this respect,
like him of wdiom we spoke in the last lecture, was also
one of the lonely ones of the world. Such men have
very few equals, and they don't herd with those. It is

^ " To Addison himself we are bound by a sentiment as much like
affection as any sentiment can be which is inspired by one who has
been sleeping a hundred and twenty years in Westminster Abbey. . . "
. . . "After full inquiry and impartial reflection we have long been
convinced that he deserved as much love and esteem as can justly be
claimed by any of our infirm and erring race." — Macaulat.

'' Many who praise virtue do no more than praise it. Yet it is
reasonable to believe that Addison's profession and practice were at no
great variance ; since, amidst that storm of faction in which most of his
life was passed, though his station made him conspicuous, and his
activity made him formidable, the character given him by his fi'iends
was never contradicted by his enemies. Of those with whom interest
or opinion united him, he had not only the esteem but the kindness ;
and of others, whom the violence of opposition drove against him,
though he might lose the love, he retained the reverence." — Johnson.

G

82 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

in the nature of such lords of intellect to he sohtary —
they are in the world hut not of it ; and our minor
struggles, hrawls, successes, pass under them.

Kind, just, serene, impartial, his fortitude not tried
heyond easy endurance, his affections not much used,
for his hooks were his family, and his society was in
puhlic ; admirably wiser, wittier, calmer, and more
instructed than almost every man with whom he met,
how could Addison suffer, desire, admire, feel much ?
I may expect a child to admii'e me for heing taller or
writing more cleverly than she ; hut how can I ask my
superior to say that I am a wonder wdien he knows
better than I ? In Addison's days you could scarcety
show him a literary performance, a sermon, or a poem,
or a piece of literary criticism, but he felt he could do
better. His justice must have made him indifferent. He
didn't praise, because he measured his compeers by a
liigher standard than common people have.* How was
he who was so tall to look up to any but the loftiest
genius ? He must have stooped to put himself on a
level with most men. By that profusion of gTaciousness
and smiles, with which Goethe or Scott, for instance,
greeted almost every literary beginner, every small
literary adventurer who came to his court and went

^ "Addison was perfect good company with intimates, and had
something more charming in his conversation than I ever knew in any
other man ; but with any mixture of strangers, and sometimes only
with one, he seemed to preserve his dignity much, with a stiff sort of
silence." — Pope. {S^ence's Anecdotes).

COIn^GREYE and ADDISON". 83

away charmed from the great king's audience, and
cuddling to his heart the compliment which his
literary majesty had paid him — each of the two good-
natured potentates of letters brought their star and
riband into discredit. Everybody had his Majesty's
orders. Everybody had liis Majesty's cheap j)ortrait,
on a box surrounded with diamonds worth twopence a
piece. A very great and just and wise man ought not
to praise indiscriminately, but give his idea of the
truth. Addison praises the ingenious Mr. Pinkethman :
Addison praises the ingenious Mr. Peggott the actor,
whose benefit is coming off that night : Addison
praises Don Saltero : Addison praises Milton with all
his heart, bends liis knee and frankly pays homage to
that imperial genius.^ But between those degrees of
his men his praise is very scanty. I don't think the
great Mr. Addison liked young Mr. Pope, the Papist,
much; I don't think he abused him. But when Mr.

^ "Milton's cliief talent, and indeed his distinguisliing excellence
lies in the sublimity of his thoughts. There are others of the modem,
who rival him in every other part of poetiy ; but in the greatness of
his sentiments he triumphs over all tha poets, both modem and ancient,
Homer alone excepted. It is impossible for the imagination of man to
distvu'b itself with greater ideas than those which he has laid together
in his first, second, and sixth books." — Spectator, No 279.

" If I were to name a poet that is a perfect master in all these arts of
working on the imagination, I think Milton may pass for one." — Ibid.
No. 417.

These famous papers appeared in each Saturday's Spectator, from
January 19th to May 3rd, 1712. Besides his services to Milton, we may
place those he did to Sacred Music.

G 2

84 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Addison's men abused Mr. Pope, I don't think Addison
took liis pipe out of liis mouth to contradict them.*

Addison's father was a clergyman of good repute in
Wiltshire, and rose in the church.^ His famous son
never lost his clerical training and scholastic gravity,
and was called " a parson in a tye-wig " ^ in London
afterwards at a time when tye-wigs were only worn by
the laity, and the fathers of theology did not think it

^ "Addison was very kind to me at first, but my bitter enemy
afterwards." — Pope {Spence's Anecdotes).

" ' Leave him as soon as you can/ said Addison to me, speaking of
Pope; 'he will certainly play you some devilish trick else : he has an
appetite to satire.'" — Lady Wortlet Montagu {Spence's Anecdotes).

2 Lancelot Addison, his father, was the son of another Lancelot
Addison, a clergyman in Westmoreland. He became Dean of Lichfield
and Archdeacon of Coventry.

^ " The remark of Mandeville, who, when he had passed an evening
in his company, declared that he was 'a parson in a tye-wig,' can
detract little from his character. He was always reserved to strangers
and was not incited to uncommon freedom by a character like that of
Mandeville." — Johnson {Lives of the Poets.)

"■ Old Jacob Tonson did not like Mr. Addison : he had a quarrel
with him, and, after his quitting the secretaryship, used frequently
to say of him — ' One day or other you'll see that man a bishop — I'm
sure he looks that way ; and indeed I ever thought him a priest in
his heart.'" — Pope {Spence's Anecdotes).

" Mr. Addison staid above a year at Blois. He 'would rise as early
as between two and three in the height of summer, and lie a bed till
between eleven and twelve in the depth of ^vinter. He was untalkative
whilst here, and often thoughtful : sometimes so lost in thought, that
I have come into his room and staid five minutes there before he has
known anything of it. He had his masters generally at supper with
him ; kept very little company beside ; and had no amour whilst too,
that I know of ; and I think I should have known it, if he had had
any." — Abbe Philippeaux of Blois {Spence's Anecdotes).

CONGREYE AND ADDISON. 85

decent to appear except in a full bottom. Having been
at school at Salisbury, and the Charterhouse, in 1687,
when he was fifteen years old he went to Queen's
College, Oxford, where he speedily began to distinguish
himself by the making of Latin verses. The beautiful
and fanciful j)oem of " The Pigmies and the Cranes "
is still read by lovers of that sort of exercise, and
verses are extant in honour of King AYilliam by which
it appears that it was the loyal youth's custom to toast
that sovereign in bumpers of purple Lyseus ; and many
more works are in the Collection, includmg one on the
-peace of Ryswick, in 1697, which was so good that
Montague got him a pension of 300L a year, on which
Addison set out on his travels.

During his ten years at Oxford, Addison had deeply
imbued himself with the Latin poetical literature, and
had these poets at his fingers' ends when he travelled
in Italy.* His patron went out of office, and his pension
was unpaid : and hearing that this great scholar, now
eminent and known to the literati of Europe (the great
Boileau,'' upon perusal of Mr. Addison's elegant
hexameters, was first made aware that England was
not altogether a barbarous nation) — hearing that the

^ " His knowledge of the Latin poets, from Lucretius and Catullus,
down to Claudian and Prudentius, was singularly exact and profound."
— Macaulay.

2 " Our country owes it to him, that the famous Monsieur Boileau
first conceived an opinion of the English genius for poetry, by perusing
the present he made him of the Musce Angllcance." — Tickell {Preface
to Addison's Woi-ks).

86 ENGLISH HTJMOUPJSTS.

celebrated Mr. Addison, of Oxford, proposed to travel
as governor to a young gentleman on the grand tour,
the great Duke of Somerset proposed to Mr. Addison
to accompany his son, Lord Hartford,

Mr. Addison was delighted to be of use to his Grace
and his lordship, his Grace's son, and expressed him-
self ready to set forth.

His Grace the Duke of Somerset now announced to
one of the most famous scholars of Oxford and Europe
that it was his gracious intention to allow my Lord
Hartford's tutor one hundred guineas per annum. Mr.
Addison wrote back that his services were his Grace's,
but he by no means found his account in the recompense
for them. The negotiation was broken off. They
parted with a profusion of congees on one side and the
other.

Addison remained abroad for some time, living in
the best society of Europe. How could he do otherwise ?
He must have been one of the finest gentlemen the world
ever saw : at all moments of life serene and courteous,
cheerful and calm.* He could scarcely ever have had a
degrading thought. He might have omitted a vii'tue
or two, or many, but could not have had many
faults committed for which he need blush or turn pale.

^ "It was my fate to be much with the wits; my father was
acquainted with all of them. Addison was the best company in the
world. I never knew anybody that had so much wit as Cougreve." —
Lady Wortlet Montaou {Spence's Anecdotes).

CONGKEVE AND ADDISOK 87

When warmed into confidence, his conversation appears
to have been so delightful that the greatest wits sate
wrapt and charmed to listen to him. No man bore
poverty and narrow fortune with a more lofty cheerful-
ness. His letters to his friends at this period of his
life when he had lost his government pension, and given
up his college chances, are full of courage and a gay
confidence and philosophy: and they are none the
worse in my eyes, and I hope not in those of his last
and greatest biogi^apher (though Mr. Macaulay is bound
to own and lament a certain weakness for wine, which
the great and good Joseph Addison notoriously pos-
sessed, in common with countless gentlemen of his
time), because some of the letters are written when his
honest hand was shaking a little in the morning after
libations to purple Lyseus over-night. He was fond of
drinking the healths of his friends : he writes to Wyche,'

^ mr, addison to me. wyche.
"Dear Sir,

" My hand at present begins to grow steady enough for a letter,
BO the properest use I can put it to is to thank ye honest gentleman
that set it a shaking. I have had this morning a desperate design in
my head to attack you in verse, which I should certainly have done
could I have found out a rhyme to rummer. But though you have
escaped for ye present, you are not yet out of danger, if I can a little
recover my talent at Crambo. I am sure, in whatever way I write to
you, it will be impossible for me to express ye deep sense I have
of ye many favours you have lately shown me. I shall only tell
you that Hambourg has been the pleasantest stage I have met with in
my travails. If any of my friends wonder at me for living so long
in that place, I dare say it will be thought a very good excuse when

88 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

of Hamburgh, gratefully remembering Wyche's " hoc."
" I have been drinking your health to-day with Sir
Richard Shirley," he writes to Bathurst. " I have
lately had the honour to meet my Lord Effingham at
Amsterdam, where we have drunk Mr. Wood's health
a hundred times in excellent champagne," he writes
again. Swift * describes him over his cups, when Joseph

I tell him Mr. Wycbe was there. As your company made our stay

at Hambourg agreeable, your wine has given us all ye satisfaction

that we have found in our journey through Westphalia. If drinking

your health will do you any good, you may expect to be as long lived

as Methusaleh, or, to use a more familiar instance, as ye oldest hoc

in ye cellar, I hope ye two pair of legs that was left a swelling

behind us are by this time come to their shapes again. I can't forbear

troubling you with my hearty respects to ye ownei'S of them, and

desiring you to believe me always,

" Dear Sir,

" Yours, &c.

" To Mr. Wyche, His Majesty's Resident at Hambourg,

"May, 1703."

— From the " Life of Addison,'" by Miss Aikin. Vol, i. p. 146.

^ It is pleasing to remember, that the relation between Swift and
Addison was, on the whole, satisfactory, from first to last. The value
of Swift's testimony, when nothing personal inflamed his vision or
warped his judgment, can be doubted by nobody.

"Sept. 10, 1710. — I sat till ten in the evening with Addison and
Steele.

'* 11. — Mr. Addison and I dined together at his lodgings, and I sat
with him part of this evening.

" 18. — To-day I dined with Mr. Stratford at Mr. Addison's retire-
ment near Chelsea I will get what good offices I can from

Mr. Addison.

" 27. — To-day all our company dined at WillFrankland's, with Steele
and Addison, too.

" 29. —I dined with Mr. Addison, fee." — Journal to Stella.

Addison inscribed a presentation copy of his Travels '' To Dr.

CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 89

yielded to a temptation wliicli Jonathan resisted.
Joseph was of a cold nature, and needed perhaps the
fire of wine to warm his hlood. If he was a parson :
he wore a tye-wig, recollect, A better and more
Christian man scarcely ever breathed than Joseph
Addison. If he had not that little weakness for wine
— why, we could scarcely have found a fault with him,
and could not have liked him as we do.^

At thirty-three years of age, this most distinguished
wit, scholar, and gentleman was without a profession
and an income. His book of " Travels " had failed : his
" Dialogues on Medals " had had no particular success :
his Latin verses, even though reported the best since
Virgil, or Statins at any rate, had not brought him a

Jonathan Swift, the most agreeable companion, the truest friend, and
the greatest genius of his age." — (Scott. From the information of
Mr. Theophilus Swift.)

" Mr. Addison, who goes over first secretary, is a most excellent
person ; and being my most intimate friend, I shall use all my credit
to set him right in his notions of persons and things." — Letters.

" I examine my heart, and can find no other reason why I write to
you now, besides that great love and esteem I have always had for you.
I have nothing to ask you either for my friend or for myself." — Swift
to Addison (1717). Scott's Swift. Yol. xix. p. 274.

Political differences only dulled for a while their friendly commvmi-
cations. Time renewed them ; and Tickell enjoyed Swift's friendship
as a legacy from the man with whose memory his is so honourably
connected.

^ " Addison usually studied all the morning ; then met his party at
Button's ; dined there, and stayed five or six houi-s, and sometimes far
into the night. I was of the company for about a year, but found it
too much for me : it hurt my health, and so I quitted it." — Pope
{SpeTic^s Anecdotes).

90 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Government-place, and Addison was living up two
shabby pair of stairs in the Haymarket (in a poverty
over which old Samuel Johnson rather chuckles),
when in these shabby rooms, an emissary from
Government and Fortune came and found him.* A
poem was wanted about the Duke of Marlborough's
victory of Blenheim. Would Mr. Addison write one ?
Mr. Boyle, afterwards Lord Carleton, took back the
reply to the Lord Treasurer Godolphin, that Mr.
Addison would. When the poem had reached a certain
stage, it was carried to Godolphin ; and the last lines
which he read were these : —

*' But 0, my muse ! wliat numbers wilt thou find
To sing the furious trqops in battle join'd?
Methinks I hear the drum's tumultouuf? sound,
The victor's shouts and dying groans confound ;
The dreadful burst of cannon rend the skies,
And all the thunders of the battle rise.
'Twas then great Marlborough's mighty soul was proved,
That, in the shock of charging hosts unmoved,
Amidst confusion, horror, and despair,
Examined all the dreadful scenes of war :
In peaceful thought the field of death surveyed,
To fainting squadrons lent the timely aid,
Inspired repulsed battalions to engage.
And taught the doubtful battle where to rage.
So when an angel by divine command.
With rising tempests shakes a guilty land
(Such as of late o'er pale Bi'itannia passed).
Calm and serene he dxives the furious blast ;
And, pleased the Almighty's orders to perform.
Bides on the whirlwind and directs the storm."

"When he returned to England (in 1702), with a meanness of

CONGREVE AXD ADDIS0:N". 91

Addison left off at a good moment. That simile
was pronounced to be of the greatest ever produced
in poetry. That angel, that good angel, flew off with
Mr. Addison, and landed him in the place of Commis-
sioner of Appeals — vice Mr. Locke providentially
promoted. In the follomng year, Mr. Addison went
to Hanover with Lord Halifax, and the year after was
made Under-Secretary of State. 0 angel visits ! you
come " few and far between " to literary gentlemen's
lodgings ! Your wings seldom quiver at second-floor
windows now !

You laugh ? You think it is in the power of few
writers now-a-days to call up such an angel ? Well
perhaps not; but permit us to comfort ourselves by
pointing out that there are in the poem of the
" Campaign" some as bad lines as heart can desire : and
to hint that Mr. Addison did very wisely in not going-
further with my Lord Godolphin than that angelical
simile. Do allow me, just for a little harmless mischief,
to read you some of the lines which follow. Here is
the interview between the Duke and the King of the
Romans after the battle : —

" Austria's young monarch, whose imperial sway
Sceptres and thrones are destined to obey,

appearance which gave testimony of the difficulties to which he had
been reduced, he found his old patrons out of power, and was, there-
fore, for a time, at full leisure for the cultivation of his mind." —
Johnson {Lives of the Poets).

92 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

Whose boasted ancestry so higli extends
That in the pagan Gods his lineage ends,
Comes from afar, in gratitude to own
The great supporter of his father's throne.
What tides of glory to his bosom ran
Clasped in th' embraces of the godlike man !
How were his eyes with pleasing wonder fixt,
To see such fire with so much sweetness mixt !
Such easy greatness, such a graceful port,
So learned and finished for the camp or court I "

How many fourtli-form boys at Mr. Addison's school
of Charter-house could write as well as that now ? The
" Campaign " has blunders, triumphant as it was ; and
weak points like all campaigns.'

In the year 1718 " Cato " came out. Swift has left a
description of the first night of the performance. All
the laurels of Europe were scarcely sufficient for the
author of this prodigious poem.^ Laudations of Whig

^ " Mr. Addison wrote very fluently ; but he was sometimes very
slow and scrupulous in correcting. He would show his verses to
several friends ; and would alter almost everything that any of them
hinted at as wrong. He seemed to be too diffident of himself; and
too much concerned about his character as a poet ; or (as he worded
it), too solicitous for that kind of praise, which, God knows, is but a
very little matter after all !" — Pope {Spence's Anecdotes).

2 "As to poetical affairs," says Pope, in 1713, "lam content at

present to be a bare looker-on Cato was not so much the

wonder of Eome in his days, as he is of Britain in ours ; and though
all the foolish industry possible has been used to make it thought a
party play, yet what the author once said of another may the most
properly in the world be applied to him on this occasion :

"'Envy itself is dumb — in wonder lost;

And factions strive who shall applaud him most.'

''The numerous and violent claps of the Whig party on the one

CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 93

and Tory chiefs, popular ovations, complimentary
garlands from literary men, translations in all
languages, delight and homage from all — save from
John Dennis in a minority of one — Mr. Addison was
called the " great Mr. Addison" after this. The Coffee-
house Senate saluted him Divus : it was heresy to
question that decree.

Meanwhile he was writing political i)a]3ers and

side of the theatre were echoed back by the Tories on the other ;
while the author sweated behind the scenes with concern to find

their applause proceeding more from the hands than the head

I believe you have heard that, after all the applauses of the opposite
faction, my Lord Bolingbroke sent for Booth, who played Cato, into
the box, and presented him with fifty guineas in acknowledgment
(as he expressed it) for defending the cause of liberty so well against
a perpetual dictator." — Pope's Letter to Sir W. Trumbull.

Cato ran for thirty-five nights without interruption. Pope wrote
the Prologue, and Garth the Epilogue.

It is worth noticing how many things in Cato keep their ground as
habitual quotations, e. g, : — ■

" . . . . big with the fate
Of Cato and of Rome."

*' Tis not in mortals to command success,
But we'll do more, Sempronius, we'll deserve it."

" Blesses his stars, and thinks it luxury."

" 1 think the Romans call it Stoicism."

" My voice is still for war."

" When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway,

The post of honour is a private station."

Not to mention —

" The woman who deliberates is lost."

And the eternal —

" Plato, thou reasonest well,"

which avenges, perhaps, on the public their neglect of the play !

94 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

advancing in the political profession. He went Secretary
to Ireland. He was appointed Secretary of State in
1717. And letters of liis are extant, bearing date some
year or two before, and written to young Lord Warwick,
in which he addresses him as " my dearest lord," and
asks affectionately about his studies, and writes very
prettily about nightingales, and birds' -nests, which he
has found at Fulham for his lordship. Those nightin-
gales were intended to warble in the ear of Lord
Warwick's mamma. Addison married her ladyship in
1716 ; and died at Holland House three years after
that splendid but dismal union. ^

^ " The lady was persuaded to marry him on terms much like
those on which a Turkish princess is espoused, — to whom the Sultan
is reported to pronounce, * Daughter, I give thee this man for thy
slave.' The marriage, if uncontradicted report can be credited,
made no addition to his happiness ; it neither found them, nor made

them, equal Rowe's ballad of 'The Despairing Shepherd' is

said to have been written, either before or after marriage, upon this
memorable pair." — Dr. Johnson.

" I received the news of Mr. Addison's being declared Secretary of
State with the less surprise, in that I knew that post was almost
offered to him before. At that time he declined it, and I really believe
that he would have done well to have declined it now. Such a post as
that, and such a wife as the Countess, do not seem to be, in prudence,
eligible for a man that is asthmatic, and we may see the day when he
will be heartily glad to resign them both." — Lady Wortlet Montagu
TO Pope. Woi-Jcs, Lord Wharncliffe's edit., vol. ii. p. 111.

The issue of this marriage was a daughter, Charlotte Addison, who
inherited, on her mother's death, the estate of Bilton, near Rugby,
which her father had purchased, and died, unmarried, at an advanced
age. She was of weak intellect.

Rowe appears to have been faithful to Addison during his
courtship, for his Collection contains * Stanzas to Lady Warwick, on

CONGEE YE AIN'D ADDISON". 95

But it is not for liis reputation as the great author of
"Cato" and the " Campaign," or for his merits as Secre-
tary of State, or for his rank and high distinction as my
Lady AVarwick's husband, or for his eminence as an
Examiner of political questions on the Whig side, or a
Guardian of British liberties, that we admire Joseph
Addison. It is as a Tatler of small talk and a Sj^ec-
tator of mankind, that we cherish and love him, and
owe as much pleasure to him as to any human being
that ever wrote. He came in that artificial age, and
began to speak with his noble, natural voice. He came,
the gentle satirist, who hit no unfair blow ; the kind
judge who castigated only in smilmg. While Swift
went about, hanging and ruthless — a literary Jeffries —
in Addison's kind court only minor cases were tried :
only peccadilloes and small sins against society : only a

Mr. Addison's going to Ireland,' in which her ladyship is called
' Chloe,' and Joseph Addison, ' Lycidas ; ' besides the ballad mentioned
by the Doctor, and which is entitled ' Colin's Complaint.' But not
even the interest attached to the name of Addison could induce the
reader to peruse this composition, though one stanza may serve as a
specimen : —

"What though I have skill to complain —
Though the Muses my temples have crowned ;
What though, when they hear my sweet strain,
The Muses sit weeping aroimd.

" Ah, Colin ! thy hopes are in vain ;
Thy pipe and thy laurel resign ;
Thy false one inclines to a swain
Whose music is sweeter than thine."

96 ENGLISH HUMOITRISTS.

dangerous libertinism in tuckers and lioops ; * or a
nuisance in the abuse of beaux' canes and snuff-boxes.

1 One of the most humorous of these is the paper on Hoops, which,
the "Spectator" tells us, particularly pleased his friend Sir Roger.

"Mr. Spectator,

"You have diverted the town almost a whole month at the
expense of the country ; it is now high time that you should give the
country their revenge. Since your withdrawing from this place, the
fair sex are run into great extravagancies. Their petticoats, which
began to heave and swell before you left us, are now blown up into a
most enormous concave, and rise every day more and more ; in short,
Sir, since our women knew themselves to be out of the eye of the
Spectator, they will be kept within no compass. You praised them a
little too soon, for the modesty of their head-dresses ; for as the
humour of a sick person is often driven out of one limb into another,
their superfluity of ornaments, instead of being entirely banished,
seems only fallen from their heads upon their lower parts. What
they have lost in height they make up in breadth, and, contrary to all
rules of architecture, widen the foundations at the same time that they
shorten the superstructure.

" The women give out, in defence of these wide bottoms, that they
are very airy and very proper for the season ; but this I look upon to
be only a pretence and a piece of art, for it is well known we have not
had a more moderate summer these many years, so that it is certain
the heat they complain of cannot be in the weather ; besides, I would
fain ask these tender-constitutioned ladies, why they should require
more cooling than their mothers before them 1

" I find several speculative persons are of opinion that our sex has
of late years been very saucy, and that the hoop-petticoat is made use
of to keep us at a distance. It is most certain that a woman's honour
cannot be better entrenched than after this manner, in circle within
circle, amidst such a variety of out-works and lines of circumvallation.
A female who is thus invested in whale-bone is sufficiently secured
against the approaches of an ill-bred fellow, who might as well think of
Sir George Etlieridge's way of making love in a tub as in the midst
of so many hoops.

"Among these various conjectures, there are men of superstitious
tempers who look upon the hoop -petticoat as a kind of prodigy. Some

CONGEE VE AND ADDISON. 97

It may be a lady is tried for breaking the peace of
our sovereign lady Queen Anne, and ogling too danger-
ously from the side-box : or a Templar for beating the
watch, or breaking Priscian's head : or a citizen's wife
for caring too much for the puppet-show, and too Httle
for her husband and children : every one of the little
sinners brought before him is amusmg, and he dis-
misses each with the pleasantest penalties and the
most charming words of admonition.

Addison wrote his papers as gaily as if he was going
out for a hoHday. "When Steele's " Tatler " first began
his prattle, Addison, then in Ireland, caught at his
friend's notion, poured in paper after paper, and con-
tributed the stores of his mind, the sweet fruits of his
reading, the delightful gleanmgs of his daily observa-
tion, with a wonderful profusion, and as it seemed an
almost endless fecundity. He was six-and-thii'ty years
old: full and ripe. He had not worked crop after
crop from his brain, manurmg hastily, subsoiling indif-
ferently, cutting and sowing and cutting agam, like
other luckless cultivators of letters. He had not done
much as yet ; a few Latin poems — graceful prolusions ;

will have it that it portends the downfall of the French king, and
observes, that the farthingale appeared in England a little before
the ruin of the Spanish monarchy. Others are of opinion that it
foretells battle and blood-shed, and believe it of the same prognosti-
cation as the tail of a blazing star. For my part, I am apt to think
that it is a sign that multitudes are coming into the world rather than
going out of it," &c. kc— Spectator, No. 127.

H

98 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

a polite book of travels ; a dissertation on medals, not
very deep ; four acts of a tragedy, a great classical
exercise ; and the " Campaign," a large prize poem
that won an enormous prize. But with his friend's
discovery of the " Tatler," Addison's calling was found,
and the most delightful tallver in the world began to
speak. He does not go very deep : let gentlemen of a
profound genius, critics accustomed to the plunge of the
bathos, console themselves by thinking that he couldn't
go very deep. There are no traces of suffering in his
writing. He was so good, so honest, so healthy, so
cheerfully selfish, if I must use the word. There is no
deep sentiment. I doubt, until after his marriage,
perhaps, whether he ever lost his night's rest or his
day's tranquillity about any woman in his life : * whereas
poor Dick Steele had capacity enough to melt, and to
languish, and to sigh, and to cry his honest old ejes
out, for a dozen. His writmgs do not show insight
into or reverence for the love of women, which I take to
be, one the consequence of the other. He walks about
the world watchmg their pretty humours, fashions,
follies, flirtations, rivalries ; and noting them with the
most charming archness. He sees them in public, in the
theatre, or the assembly, or the puppet-show; or at
the toy- shop higgling for gloves and lace ; or at the

^ " Mr. Addison has not liad one epitbalamium that I can hear of,
and must even be reduced, like a poorer and a better poet, Spenser,
to make his own." — Pope's Letters.

CONGREVE AND ADDISON. 99

auction, battling together over a blue porcelain dragon,
or a darling monster in Japan ; or at church, eyeing
the width of their rivals' hoops, or the breadth of their
laces, as they sweep down the aisles. Or he looks out of
liis window at the Garter in St. James's Street, at
Ardeha's coach, as she blazes to the dra-wdng-room with
her coronet and six footmen ; and remembering that
her father was a Turkey merchant in the city, cal-
culates how many sponges went to purchase her earring,
and how many drums of figs to build her coach-box ;
or he demurely watches behind a tree in Spring
Garden as Saccharissa (whom he knows under her
mask) trips out of her chair to the alley where Sir
Fopling is waiting. He sees only the public life of
women. Addison was one of the most resolute club-
men of his day. He passed many hours daily in those
haunts. Besides drinking, which alas ! is past praj^mg
for ; you must know it, he owned, too, ladies, that he
indulged in that odious practice of smoking. Poor
fellow ! He was a man's man, remember. The only
woman he did know, he didn't write about. I take it
there would not have been much humour in that story.
He lilves to go and sit in the smoking-room at the
Grecian, or the Devil; to pace 'Change and the Mair —
to mingle in that great club of the world — sitting alone

^ " I have observed that a reader seldom peruses a book with
pleasure till he knows whether the writer of it be a black or a fair
man, of a mild or a choleric disposition, married or a bachelor; with

H 2

100 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

in it somehow: having good-will and kindness for
every single man and woman in it — having need of

otlier particulars of the like nature, that conduce very much to the
right understanding of an author. To gratify this curiosity, which
is so natural to a reader, I design this paper and my next as
prefatory discourses to my following writings ; and shall give some
account in them of the persons that are engaged in this work. As
the chief trouble of compiling, digesting, and correcting will fall to
my share, I must do myself the justice to open the work with my

own history There runs a story in the family, that when

my mother was gone with child of me about three months, she
dreamt that she was brought to bed of a judge. Whether this might
proceed from a lawsuit which was then depending in the family,
or my father's being a justice of the peace, I cannot determine ; for
I am not so vain as to think it presaged any dignity that I should
arrive at in my future life, though that was the interpretation which
the neighbourhood put upon it. The gravity of my behaviour at
my very first appearance in the world, and all the time that I sucked,
seemed to favour my mother's dream ; for, as she has often told me, I
threw away my rattle before I was two months old, and would not
make use of my coral till they had taken away the bells from it.
"As for the rest of my infancy, there being nothing in it remarkable
shall pass it over in silence. I find that during my nonage I had
the reputation of a very sullen youth, but was always the favourite
of my schoolmastei', who used to say that my parts xoere solid and
would wear icell. I had not been long at the university before I
distinguished myself by a most profound silence ; for during the
space of eight years, excepting in the public exercises of the college,
I scarce uttered the quantity of an hundred words ; and indeed, I do
not remember that I ever spoke three sentences together in my whole

life

" I have passed my latter years in this city, where I am frequently
seen in most public places, though there are not more than half-a-dozen

of my select friends that know me There is no place of general

resort wherein I do not often make my appearance ; sometimes I am
seen thrusting my head into a round of politicians at Wills', and
listening with great attention to the narratives that are made in these
little circular audiences. Sometimes I smoke a pipe at Child's, and
whilst I seem attentive to nothing but the Postman, overhear the

CONGREVE AND ADDISON". 101

some habit and custom binding him to some few ;
never doing any man a wrong (unless it be a wrong to
hint a little doubt about a man's parts, and to damn
him with faint praise) ; and so he looks on the world
and plays with the ceaseless humours of all of us —
laughs the kindest laugh — points our neighbour's foible
or eccentricity out to us with the most good-natured,
smiling confidence ; and then, turning over his shoulder,
whispers our foibles to our neighbour. What would Sir
Roger de Coverley be without his follies and his charming
little brain-cracks ? * If the good knight did not call
out to the iDeople sleeping in church, and say " Amen "

conversation of every table in the room. I appear on Tuesday night
at St, James's Coffee-house; and sometimes join the little committee
of politics in the inner room, as one who comes to hear and improve.
My face is likewise very well known at the Grecian, the Cocoa-tree,
and in the theatres both of Drury-lane and the Haymarket. I have
been taken for a merchant upon the Exchange for above these two
years ; and sometimes pass for a Jew in the assembly of stock-jobbers
at Jonathan's. In short, whei-ever I see a cluster of people, I mix
with them, though I never open my lips but in my own club.

" Thus I live in the world rather as a ' Spectator'' of mankind than
as one of the species ; by which means I have made myself a specu-
lative statesman, soldier, merchant, and artizan, without ever meddling
in any practical part in life. I am very well versed in the theory of a
husband or a father, and can discern the errors in the economy,
business, and diversions of others, better than those who are engaged
in them — as standers-by discover blots which are apt to escape those

who are in the game In short, I have acted, in all the parts

of my life, as a looker-on, which is the character I intend to preserve
in this paper." — Spectator, No. 1.

^ " So effectually, indeed, did he retort on vice the mockery which
had recently been directed against virtue, that, since his time, the open
violation of decency has always been considered, amongst us, the sure
mark of a fool." — Macau lay.

102 E:t^GLISH HUMOURISTS.

with sucli a delightful pomposity : if he did not make
a speech in the assize-court apropos cle hottes, and
merely to show his dignity to Mr. Spectator : * if
he did not mistake Madam Doll Tearsheet for a
lady of quality in Temple Garden : if he were
wiser than he is : if he had not his humour to salt
his life, and were but a mere English gentleman
and game -preserver — of what worth were he to us ?
We love him for his vanities as much as his virtues.
What is ridiculous is delightful in him : we are so fond
of him because we laugh at him so. And out of that
laughter, and out of that sweet weakness, and out of
those harmless eccentricities and follies, and out of
that touched brain, and out of that honest manhood and

^ " The Court was sat before Sir Roger came ; but, notwithstanding
all the justices had taken their places upon the bench, they made
room for the old knight at the head of them ; who for his reputation
in the country took occasion to whisper in the judge's ear that he was
glad hu lordship had met icith so much good weather in his circuit. I
was listening to the proceedings of the Court with much attention, and
infinitelj^ pleased with that great appearance and solemnity which so
properly accompanies such a public administration of our laws ; when,
after about an hour's sitting, I observe to my great surprise, in the
midst of a trial, that my friend Sir Roger was getting i;p to speak.
I was in some pain for him, till I found he had acquitted himself of
two or three sentences, with a look of much business and great
intrepidity,

" Upon his first rising the Court was hushed, and a general whisper
ran among the country people that Sir Roger was up. The speech he
made was so little to the purpose, that I shall not trouble my readers
with an account of it, and I believe was not so much designed by the
knight himself to inform the Court, as to give him a figure in my eyes,
and to keep up his credit in the country." — Spectator, No. 122.

CONGEE VE AND ADDISON. 103

simplicity — we get a result of happiness, goodness,
tenderness, pity, piety; such as, if my audience will
think their reading and hearing over, doctors and
divines but seldom have the fortune to inspire. And
why not ? Is the glory of Heaven to be sung only by
gentlemen in black coats ? Must the truth be only
expounded in gown and surplice, and out of those two
vestments can nobody preach it ? Commend me to
this dear preacher without orders — this parson in the
tye-wig. When this man looks from the world whose
weaknesses he describes so benevolently, up to the
Heaven which shines over us all, I can hardly fancy
a human face lighted up with a more serene rapture : a
human intellect thrilhng with a purer love and adora-
tion than Joseph Addison's. Listen to him : from
your childhood you have known the verses : but who
can hear their sacred music without love and awe ?

" Soon as the evening shades prevail,
The moon takes up the wondrous tale,
And nightly to the listening earth,
Repeats the story of her birth ;
And all the stars that round her burn,
And all the planets in their turn,
Confirm the tidings as they roll.
And spread the truth from pole to pole.
What though, in solemn silence, all
Move round this dark terrestrial ball ;
What though no real voice nor sound,
Among their radiant orbs be found ;
In reason's ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious voice,
For ever singing as they shine.
The hand that made us is divine."

104 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

It seems to me those verses shine like the stars.
They shine out of a great deep cahn. When he turns
to Heaven, a Sabbath comes over that man's mind :
and his face lights up from it with a glory of thanks
and praj^er. His sense of religion stirs through his
whole being. In the fields, in the town : looking at the
birds in the trees : at the children in the streets : in
the morning or in the moonlight : over his books in
his own room : in a happy party at a country merry-
making or a town assembly, good-will and peace to
God's creatures, and love and awe of Him who made
them, fill his pure heart and shine from his kind face.
If Swift's life was the most wretched, I think Addison's
was one of the most enviable. A life prosperous and
beautiful — a calm death — an immense fame and affec-
tion afterwards for his happy and spotless name.^

^ " Garth sent to Addison (of whom he had a very high opinion) on
his death-bed, to ask him whether the Christian religion was true." —
Dr. Young {Spence's Anecdotes).

" I have always preferred cheerfulness to mirth. The latter I con-
sider as an act, the former as an habit of the mind. Mirth is short and
transient, cheerfulness fixed and permanent. Those are often raised
into the greatest transports of mirth who are subject to the greatest
depression of melancholy : on the contrary, cheerfulness, though it
does not give the mind such an exquisite gladnesss, prevents us
from falling into any depths of sorrow. Mirth is like a flash of light-
ning that breaks throvigh a gloom of clouds, and glitters for a moment ;
cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, and fills it with
a steady and perpetual serenity." — Addison {Spectator, p. 381.)

LECTURE THE THIRD.

STEELE.

"What do we look for in studying the history of a
past age ? Is it to learn the political transactions and
characters of the leading public men ? is it to make
ourselves acquainted with the life and being of the
time ? If we set out with the former grave purpose,
where is the truth, and who believes that he has it
entke ? What character of what great man is known
to you ? You can but make guesses as to character
more or less happy. In common life don't you often
judge and misjudge a man's whole conduct, setting out
from a wrong impression ? The tone of a voice, a word
said in joke, or a trifle in behaviour — the cut of his
hair or the tie of his neckcloth may disfigure him in your
eyes, or poison your good opinion ; or at the end of
years of intimacy it may be your closest friend sajs
something, reveals something which had previously
been a secret, which alters all your views about him,
and shows that he has been acting on quite a different

106 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

motive to that Avliich 3^011 fancied you knew. And if it
is so with those you know, how much more with those
you don't know ? Say, for example, that I want to
understand the character of the Duke of Marlborough.
I read Swift's history of the times in which he took a
part ; the shrewdest of observers and initiated, one
would think, into the politics of the age — he hints to
me that Marlborough was a coward, and even of doubt-
ful military capacity : he speaks of Walpole as a
contemptible boor, and scarcely mentions, except to
flout it, the great intrigue of the Queen's latter days,
which was to have ended in bringing back the Pre-
tender. Again, I read Marlborough's life by a copious
archdeacon, who has the command of immense papers,
of sonorous language, of what is called the best infor-
mation ; and I get little or no insight into this secret
motive which I believe influenced the whole of Marl-
borough's career, which caused his turnings and wind-
ings, his opportune fidelity and treason, stopped his
army almost at Paris gate, and landed him finally on
the Hanoverian side — the winning side ; I get, I say,
no truth or only a portion of it in the narrative of
either writer, and believe that Cox's portrait or Swift's
portrait is quite unlike the real Churchill. I take this
as a single instance, prepared to be as sceptical about
any other, and say to the Muse of History, " 0 vener-
able daughter of Mnemosyne, I doubt every single
statement you ever made since j^our ladyship was a

STEELE. 107

Muse ! For all your grave airs and high pretensions,
you are not a whit more trustworthy than some of your
lighter sisters on whom your partisans look down.
You bid me listen to a general's oration to his soldiers.
Nonsense ! He no more made it than Turpin made his
dying speech at Newgate. You pronounce a panegyric
of a hero ; I doubt it, and say you flatter outrageously.
You utter the condemnation of a loose character ; I
doubt it, and think you are prejudiced and take the
side of the Dons. You offer me an autobiography ; I
doubt all autobiographies I ever read except those,
perhaps, of Mr. Eobinson Crusoe, Mariner, and writers
of his class. These have no object in setting them-
selves right with the public or their own consciences,
these have no motive for concealment or half truths,
these call for no more confidence than I can cheerfully
give, and do not force me to tax my credulity or
to fortify it by evidence. I take up a volume of
Dr. Smollett, or a volume of the " Spectator," and say
the fiction carries a greater amount of truth in solution
than the volume which purports to be all true. Out of
the fictitious book I get the expression of the life of the
time ; of the manners, of the movement, the dress, the
pleasures, the laughter, the ridicules of societ}' — the
old times live again, and I travel in the old country of
England. Can the heaviest historian do more for
me ?

As we read in these delightful volumes of the " Tatler"

108 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

and " Spectator," the past age returns, the England of
our ancestors is revivified. The May- pole rises in the
Strand again in London ; the churches are thronged
with daily worshippers ; the beaux are gathering in the
coffee-houses — the gentry are going to the Drawing-
room — the ladies are thronging to the toy- shops — the
chairmen are jostling in the streets — the footmen are
running with links before the chariots, or fighting round
the theatre doors. In the country I see the young
Squire riding to Eton with his servants behind him,
and Will Wimble, the friend of the family, to see him
safe. To make that journey from the Squire's and
back. Will is a week on horseback. The coach takes
five days between London and the Bath. The judges and
the bar ride the circuit. If my lady comes to town in
her post- chariot, her people carry pistols to fire a
salute on Captain Macheath if he should appear, and
her couriers ride a-head to prepare apartments for her
at the great caravanserais on the road ; Boniface
receives her under the creaking sign of the Bell or the
Ram, and he and his chamberlains bow her up the
great stair to the state -apartments, whilst her carriage
rumbles into the court-yard, where the Exeter Fly is
housed that performs the journey in eight days God
willing, having achieved its daily flight of twenty miles,
and landed its passengers for supper and sleep. The
curate is taking his pipe in the kitchen, where the
Captain's man — having hung up his master's half pike

STEELE. 109

— is at his bacon and eggs, bragging of Ramillies and
Malplaquet to the town's -folk, who have their chib in
the chimney-corner. The Captain is ogling the
chambermaid in the wooden gallery, or bribing her to
know who is the pretty young mistress that has come
in the coach ? The pack-horses are in the great stable,
and the drivers and ostlers carousing in the tap. And in
Mrs. Landlady's bar, over a glass of strong waters, sits
a gentleman of military appearance who travels with
pistols, as all the rest of the world does, and has a rattling
grey mare in the stables which will be saddled and
away with its owner half-an-hour before the " Fly "
sets out on its last day's flight. And some five miles
on the road, as the Exeter Fly comes jingling and
creaking onwards, it will suddenly be brought to a halt
by a gentleman on a grey mare, with a black vizard on
his face, who thrusts a long pistol into the coach-
window, and bids the company to hand out their purses.
... It must have been no small pleasure even to sit
in the gTeat kitchen in those days and see the tide of
human kind pass by. We arrive at places now, but
we travel no more. Addison talks jocularly of a
difference of manner and costume being quite per-
ceivable at Staines, where there passed a young fellow
" with a very tolerable periwig," though to be sure his
hat was out of fashion, and had a Eamillies cock. I
would have liked to travel in those days (being of that
class of travellers who are proverbially pretty easy

110 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

coram latro7iibus) and have seen my friend with the grey
mare and the hlack vizard. Alas ! there always came
a da}^ in the life of that warrior when it was the fashion
to accompany him as he passed — without his black
mask, and with a nosegay in his hand, accompanied by
halberdiers and attended by the sheriff, — in a carriage
without springs, and a clergyman jolting beside him
to a spot close by Cumberland-gate and the Marble
Arch, where a stone still records that here Tybm-n
turnpike stood. What a change in a century ; in a few
years ! Within a few yards of that gate the fields
began : the fields of his exploits, behind the hedges of
which he lurked and robbed. A great and wealthy
city has grown over those meadows. Were a man
brought to die there now, the windows would be closed
and the inhabitants keep theii' houses in sickening
horror. A hundred years back, people crowded to see
that last act of a highwayman's Hfe, and make jokes on
it. Swift laughed at him, grimly advising him to pro-
vide a Holland shirt and white cap crowned with a
crimson or black ribbon for his exit, to mount the
cart cheerfully — shake hands with the hangman, and
so — farewell. Gay wrote the most delightful ballads
and made merry over the same hero. Contrast these
with the writings of our present humourists ! Compare
those morals and ours — those manners and ours !

We can't tell — you would not bear to be told the
whole truth regarding those men and manners. You

STEELE. Ill

could no more suffer iii a British drawing-room, under
the reign of Queen Victoria, a fine gentleman or fine
lady of Queen Anne's time, or hear what they heard
and said, than you would receive an ancient Briton.
It is as one reads about savages, that one contemplates
the wild ways, the barbarous feasts, the terrific pas-
times, of the men of pleasure of that age. AVe have
our fine gentlemen, and our "fast men;" permit me
to give you an idea of one particularly fast nobleman
of Queen Anne's days, whose biography has been
preserved to us by the law reporters.

In 1691, when Steele was a boy at school, my Lord
Mohun was tried by his peers for the mui'der of
William Mountford, comedian. In "Howell's State-
Trials," the reader will find not only an edifying
account of this exceedingly fast nobleman, but of the
times and manners of those days. My lord's friend, a
Captain Hill, smitten -^ith the charms of the beautiful
Mrs. Bracegirdle, and anxious to marry her at all
hazards, determined to carry her off, and for this
purpose hired a hackney-coach with six horses, and a
half-dozen of soldiers, to aid him in the storm. The
coach with a pair of horses (the four leaders being in
waitmg elsewhere) took its station opposite my Lord
Craven's house in Drury-lane, by which door Mrs.
Bracegirdle was to pass on her way from the theatre.
As she passed in company of her mamma and a friend,
Mr. Page, the Captam seized her by the hand, the

112 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

soldiers hustled Mr. Page and attacked liim sword in
hand, and Captain Hill and his noble friend endea-
voured to force Madam Bracegirdle into the coach.
Mr, Page called for help : the population of Drury-lane
rose : it was impossible to effect the capture ; and
bidding the soldiers go about their business, and the
coach to drive off. Hill let go of his prey sulkily, and he
waited for other opportunities of revenge. The man of
whom he was most jealous was Will Mountford, the come-
dian ; Will removed, he thought Mrs. Bracegirdle might
be his : and accordingly the Captain and his lordship lay
that night in wait for Will, and as he was coming out
of a house in Norfolk Street, while Mohun engaged
him in talk. Hill, in the words of the Attorney- General,
made a pass and run him clean through the body.

Sixty-one of my lord's peers finding him not guilty
of murder, while but fourteen found him guilty, this
very fast nobleman was discharged : and made his
appearance seven years after in another trial for
murder — when he, my Lord Warwick, and three gentle-
men of the military profession were concerned in the
fight which ended in the death of Captain Coote.

This jolly company were drinking together at
Lockit's in Charing Cross, when angry words arose
between Captain Coote and Captain French; whom
my Lord Mohun and my lord the Earl of Warwick ^ and

1 The husband of the Lady Warwick, who married Addison, and the
father of the young Earl, who was brought to his step -father's bed to

STEELE. 1 1 3

Holland endeavoured to pacify. My Lord "Warwick
was a dear friend of Captain Coote, lent him a hundred
pound to buy his commission in the Guards ; once
when the captain was arrested for 13L by his tailor, my
lord lent him five guineas, often paid his reckoning for
him, and showed him other offices of friendship. On
this evening the disputants, French and Coote, being
separated whilst the}^ were upstairs, unluckily stopped
to drink ale again at the bar of Locket's. The row
began afresh — Coote lunged at French over the bar,
and at last all six called for chairs, and went to
Liecester-fields, where they fell to. Their lordships
engaged on the side of Captain Coote. My Lord of
Warwick was severely wounded in the hand, Mr.
French also was stabbed, but honest Captain Coote
got a couple of wounds — one especialty, " a wound m
the left side just under the short ribs, and piercing
through the diaphragma," which did for Captain Coote.

see '•'how a Christian could die." He was amongst the wildest of the
nobility of that day ; and in the curious collection of Chap-Books at
the British Museum, I have seen more than one anecdote of the freaks
of the gay Lord. He was popular in London, as such daring spirits
have been in our time. The anecdofcists speak very kindly of his
practical jokes. Mohun was scarcely out of prison for his second
homicide, when he went on Lord Macclesfield's embassy to the elector
of Hanover, when Queen Anne sent the garter to H. E. Highness.
The chronicler of the expedition speaks of his lordship as an amiable
young man, who had been in bad company, but was quite repentant
and reformed. He and Macartney afterwards murdered the Duke of
Hamilton between them, in which act Lord Mohun died. This amiable
baron's name was Charles, and not Henry, as a recent novelist has
christened him.

I

114 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Hence the trial of my Lords Warwick and Mohun :
hence the assemblage of peers, the report of the trans-
action, in which these defunct fast men still live for the
observation of the curious. My Lord of Warwick is
brought to the bar by the Deputy Governor of the
Tower of London, having the axe carried before him
by the gentleman gaoler, who stood with it at the bar
at the right hand of the prisoner, turning the edge from
him ; the prisoner, at his approach, making three bows,
one to his Grace the Lord High- Steward, the other to
the peers on each hand ; and his Grace and the peers
return the salute. And besides these great personages,
august in periwigs, and nodding to the right and left,
a host of the small come up out of the past and pass
before us — the jolly captains brawhng in the tavern and
laughing and cursing over their cups — the drawer that
serves, the bar-girl that waits, the bailiff on the prowl,
the chairmen trudging through the black lampless
streets, and smoking their pipes by the railings,
whilst swords are clashing in the garden within.
" Help there ! a gentleman is hurt : " the chairmen put
up their pipes, and help the gentleman over the railings,
and carry him, ghastly and bleeding, to the Bagnio
in Long Acre, where they knock up the surgeon — a
pretty tall gentleman — but that wound under the short
ribs has done for him. Surgeon, lords, captains,
bailiffs, chairmen, and gentleman gaoler with your axe,
w4iere be you now ? The gentleman axeman's head is

STEELE. ] 15

off his o\Yn slioulclers ; the lords and judges can wag
theirs no longer ; the hailiff's writs have ceased to run ;
the honest chau*men's pipes are put out, and with their
brawny calves they have walked away into Hades —
all as irrecoverably done for as Will Mountford or
Captain Coote. The subject of our night's lecture
saw all these people — rode in Captain Coote's company
of the Guards very probably — wrote and sighed for
Bracegirdle, went home tipsy in many a chair, after
many a bottle, in many a tavern — fled from many a
baihff.

In 1709, when the publication of the " Tatler" began,
our great-great-grandfathers must have seized upon
that new and delightful paper, with much such eager-
ness as lovers of Hght literature in a later day
exhibited when the Waverley novels appeared, upon
which the public rushed, forsaking that feeble enter-
tainment of which the Miss Porters, the Anne of
Swanseas, and worthy Mrs. Eadcliffe herself, with her
dreary castles, and exploded old ghosts, had had
pretty much the monopoly. I have looked over many
of the comic books mth which our ancestors amused
themselves, from the novels of Swift's coadjutrix,
Mrs. Manley, the detestable author of the " New
Atlantis," to the facetious productions of Tom Dm-fey
and Tom Brown, and Ned Ward, writer of the " London
Spy," and several other volumes of ribaldry. The

slang of the taverns and ordinaries, the wit of the

I 2

116 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

Bagnios, form the strongest part of the farrago of
which these lihels are composed. In the excellent
newspaper collection at the British Museum, you may
see besides the " Craftsmen" and " Postboy" specimens,
and queer specimens they are, of the higher literature
of Queen Anne's time. Here is an abstract from a
notable journal bearing date, Wednesday, October 13th,
1708, and entitled "The British Apollo; or, curious
amusements for the ingenious, by a society of gentle-
men." The British Apollo invited and professed to
answer questions upon all subjects of wit, morality,
science, and even religion ; and two out of its four
pages are filled with queries and replies much like
some of the oracular pennj^-prints of the present time.
One of the first querists, referring to the passage
that a bishop should be thehusbandof one wife, argues
that potygamy is justifiable in the laity. The society
of gentlemen conducting the " British Apollo " are
posed by this casuist, and promise to give him an
answer. Celinda then wishes to know from " the
gentlemen," concerning the souls of the dead, whether
they shall have the satisfaction to know those whom
they most valued in this transitory life. The gentle-
men of the Apollo give but cold comfort to poor
Celinda. They are inclined to think not : for snj they,
since every inhabitant of those regions will be infinitely
dearer than here are our nearest relatives — what have
we to do with a partial friendship in that happy place ?

STEELE. 117

Poor Celinda ! it may have been a child or a lover
whom she had lost, and was pining after, when the
oracle of " British Apollo " gave her this dismal
answ^er. She has solved the question for herself by
this time, and knows quite as well as the society of
gentlemen.

From theology we come to physic, and Q. asks,
" Why does hot water freeze sooner than cold ? "
Apollo replies, " Hot water cannot be said to freeze
sooner than cold, but water once heated and cold, may
be subject to freeze by the evaporation of the spirituous
parts of the water, which renders it less able to withstand
the power of frosty weather."

The next query is rather a delicate one. " You, Mr.
Apollo, who are said to be the God of wisdom, pray
give us the reason why kissing is so much in fashion :
what benefit one receives by it, and who was the
inventor, and you will oblige Corinna." To this queer
demand the lips of Phoebus, smiling, answer : " Pretty
innocent Corinna ! Apollo owns that he was a little
surprised by your kissing question, particularly at that
part of it where you desire to know the benefit you
receive by it. Ah ! madam, had you a lover, you would
not come to ApoUo for a solution ; since there is no
dispute but the kisses of mutual lovers give infinite
satisfaction. As to its invention 'tis certain nature
was its author, and it began with the first courtship."

After a column more of questions, follow nearly two

lis ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

pages of poems, signed by Pliilancler, Armenia, and the
like, and chiefly on the tender passion ; and the paper
wound up with a letter from Leghorn, an account of the
Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene before Lille,
and proposals for pubhshing two sheets on the present
state of Ethiopia, by Mr. Hill ; all of which is printed
for the authors by J. Mayo, at the Printing Press
against Water Lane in Fleet Street, What a change
it must have been — how Apollo's oracles must have
been struck dumb, when the " Tatler" appeared, and
scholars, gentlemen, men of the world, men of genius,
began to speak !

Shortly before the Boyne was fought, and young
Swift had begun to make acquaintance with English
court manners and English servitude, in Sir William
Temple's family, another Irish youth was brought to
learn his humanities at the old school of Charterhouse,
near Smithiield; to which foundation he had been
appointed by James Duke of Ormond, a governor of
the House, and a patron of the lad's family. The boy
was an orphan, and described, twenty years after, with
a sweet pathos and simplicity, some of the earhest
recollections of a life which was destined to be chequered
by a strange variety of good and evil fortune.

I am afraid no good report could be given by his
masters and ushers of that thick-set, square-faced,
black-eyed, soft-hearted little Irish boy. He was very
idle. He was whipped deservedly a great number of

STEELE. 119

times. Though he had very good parts of his own, he
got other boys to do his lessons for him, and only took
just as much trouble as should enable him to scuffle
through his exercises, and by good fortune escape the
flogging block. One hundred and fifty years after, I have
myself inspected, but only as an amateur, that instru-
ment of righteous torture still existing, and in occa-
sional use, in a secluded private apartment of the old
Charterhouse School ; and have no doubt it is the
very counterpart, if not the ancient and interesting
machine itself, at which poor Dick Steele submitted
himself to the tormentors.

Besides being very kind, lazy, and good-natured, this
boy went invariably into debt with the tart-woman ;
ran out of bounds, and entered into pecuniary, or
rather promissory engagements with the neighbouring
lollipop -vendors and piemen- — exliibited an early fond-
ness and capacity for drinking mum and sack, and
borrowed from all his comrades who had money to
lend. I have no sort of authority for the statements
here made of Steele's early life; but if the child is
father of the man, the father af young Steele of Merton,
who left Oxford without taking a degree and entered the
Life Guards — the father of Captain Steele of Lucas's
Fusiliers, who got his company through the patronage
of my Lord Cutts — the father of Mr. Steele the com-
missioner of Stamps, the editor of the *' Gazette," the
*' Tatler," and " Spectator," the expelled member of

120 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

parliament, and the author of the *' Tender Husband"
and the " Conscious Lovers; " if man and boy resembled
each other, Dick Steele the schoolboy must have been
one of the most generous, good-for-nothing, amiable
little creatures that ever conjugated the verb tupto I
beat, tuptomai I am whipped, in any school in Great
Britain.

Almost every gentleman who does me the honour
to hear me will remember that the very greatest cha-
racter which he has seen in the course of his life, and
the person to whom he has looked up with the greatest
wonder and reverence, was the head boy at his school.
The schoolmaster himself hardly inspires such an
awe. The head boy construes as well as the school-
master himself. When he begins to speak the hall is
hushed, and every little boy listens. He writes off
copies of Latin verses as melodiously as Virgil. He is
good-natured, and, his own master-pieces achieved,
pours out other copies of verses for other boys with
an astonishing ease and fluency ; the idle ones only
trembling lest they should be discovered on giving in
their exercises, and whipped because their poems were
too good. I have seen great men in my time, but
never such a great one as that head-boy of my child-
hood : we all thought he must be Prime Minister, and
I was disappointed on meeting him in after life to find
he was no more than six feet high.

Dick Steele, the Charterhouse gownboy, contracted

STEELE. 121

such an admiration in the years of his childhood, and
retained it faithfully through his life. Through the
school and through the world, whithersoever his strange
fortune led this erring, wayward, affectionate crea-
ture, Josej^h Addison was always his head boy.
Addison wrote his exercises. Addison did his best
themes. He ran on Addison's messages : fagged for
liim and blacked his shoes : to be in Joe's company
was Dick's greatest pleasure ; and he took a sermon
or a caning from his monitor with the most boundless
reverence, acquiescence, and affection.*

Steele found Addison a stately college Don at Oxford,
and himself did not make much figure at this place.
He wrote a comedy, which, by the advice of a friend,
the humble fellow burned there ; and some verses which
I dare say are as sublime as other gentlemen's compo-
sitions at that age ; but being smitten with a sudden
love for military glory, he threw up the cap and gown
for the saddle and bridle, and rode privately in the
Horse Guards, in the Duke of Ormond's troop — the
second — and, probably, with the rest of the gentlemen
of his troop, " all mounted on black horses with white
feathers in their hats, and scarlet coats richly laced ;"

^ "Steele had the greatest veneration for Addison, and used to show
it, in all companies, in a particular manner. Addison, now and then,
used to play a little upon them ; but he always took it well." — Pope
(Spence's Anecdotes.)

" Sir Richard Steele was the best-natured creature in the world :
even in his worst state of health, he seemed to desire nothing but to
please and be pleased." — Dr. Young (Spence's Anecdotes.)

122 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

marcliecl by King William, iii Hyde Park, in November,
1699, and a great show of the nobility, besides twenty
thousand people, and above a thousand coaches.
" The Guards had just got their new clothes," the
" London Post" said : " they are extraordinary grand
and thought to be the finest body of horse in the world."
But Steele could hardly have seen any actual service.
He who wrote about himself, his mother, his wife, his
loves, his debts, his friends, and the wine he drank,
would have told us of his battles if he had seen any.
His old patron, Ormond, probably got him his cornetcy
in the Guards, from which he was promoted to be a
captain in Lucas's Fusiliers, getting his company
through the patronage of Lord Cutts, whose secretary
he was, and to whom he dedicated his work called the
" Christian Hero." As for Dick, whilst writing this
ardent devotional work, he was deep in debt, in drink,
and in all the folhes of the town ; it is related that all
the officers of Lucas's, and the gentlemen of the Guards,
laughed at Dick.* And in truth a theologian in liquor

^ The gaiety of liis dramatic tone may be seen in this little scene
between two brilliant sisters, from his comedy, The Funeral, or Grief a
la Mode. Dick wrote this, he said, from *' a necessity of enlivening his
character," which it seemed, the " Christian Hero " had a tendency to
make too decorous, gi-ave, and respectable, in the eyes of readers of
that pious piece.

\_" Scene draxos, and discovers Lady Charlotte, reading at a tahle, —
Lady Harriet, playing at a glass, to and fro, and viewing herself]

" L. Ha. — Nay, good sister, you may as well talk to me, [looking at

STEELE. 123

is not a respectable object, and a hermit though he
may be out at elbows must not be in debt to the tailor.

herself as she sj^ealcs'] as sit staring at a book which I know you can't
attend. — Good Dr. Lucas may have writ there what he pleases, but
there's no putting Francis, Lord Hardy, now Earl of Brumpton, out of
your head, or making him absent from your eyes. Do but look on me,
now, and deny it if you can.

" L. Ch. — You are the maddest girl [smiling.']

" L. Ha. — Look ye, I knew you could not say it and forbear laughing
— \loolcing over Charlotte.'] — Oh! I see his name as plain as you do —
F — r — a — n, Fran, — c — i — s, cis, Francis, 'tis in every line of the book.

"i. Cli. — [Rising], It's in vain, I see, to mind anything in such
impertinent company — but granting t'were as you say, as to my Lord
Hardy — t'is more excusable to admire another, than oneself.

" L. Ha. — No, I think not — yes, I grant you, than really to be vain of
one's person, but I don't admire myself — Pish ! I don't believe my eyes
to have that softness. [Looking in the glass.] They an't so piercing :
no t'is only stuff, the men will be talking. — Some people are such
admu'ers of teeth — Lord, what signifies teeth ! {Shotving her teeth.) A
very black-a-moor has as white a set of teeth as I — No, sister, I don't
admire myself, but I've a spirit of contradiction in me : I don't know
I'm in love with myself, only to rival the men,

" L. Ch. — Ay, but Mr. Campley will gain ground ev'n of that rival of
his, your dear self.

" L. Ha. — Oh, what have I done to you, that you should name that
insolent intruder ? A confident opinionative fop. — No indeed, if I am,
as a poetical lover of mine sighed and sung of both sexes.

The public envy and the public care,

I shan't be so easily catched— I thank him — I want but to be sure, I
should heartily torment him by banishing him, and then consider
whether he should depart this life or not.

" L. Ch. — Indeed, sister, to be serious with you, this vanity in your
humour does not at all become you.

" L. Ha. — Vanity ! All the matter is, we gay people are more sincere
than you wise folks : all your life's an art. — Speak you real. — Look you
there. — [Hauling her to the glass.] Are you not struck with a secret
pleasure when yoii view that bloom in your look, that harmony in your
shape, that promptitude in your mien ?

124 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Steele says of himself that he was always sinning and
repenting. He beat his breast and cried most piteously
when he did repent : but as soon as crying had made
him thirsty, he fell to sinning again. In that charming
paper in the " Tatler," in which he records his father's
death, his mother's griefs, his own most solemn and
tender emotions, he says he is interrupted by the
arrival of a hamper of wine, " the same as is to be sold
at Garraway's, next week," upon the receipt of which
he sends for three friends, and they fall to instantly,
"drinking two bottles a-piece, with great benefit to
themselves, and not separating till two o'clock in the
morning."

His life was so. Jack the drawer was always inter-
rupting it, bringing him a bottle from the " Rose," or
inviting him over to a bout there with Sir Plume and
Mr. Diver ; and Dick wiped his eyes, which were whim-
pering over his papers, took down his laced hat, put on

" L. Ch. — Well, simpleton, if I am at first so simple as to be a little
taken with myself, I know it a fault, and take pains to correct it.

" L. iTa.— Phsaw ! Plisaw ! Talk this musty tale to old Mrs.
Fardingale, 'tis tiresome for me to think at that rate.

" L. Ch. — They that think it too soon to understand themselves will
very soon find it too late. — But tell me honestly, don't you like Campley 1

" L. ZTa.— The fellow is not to be abhorred, if the forward thing did
not think of getting me so easily. — Oh I hate a heart I can't break when
I please. — What makes the value of dear china, but that 'tis so brittle]
— were it not for that, you might as well have stone mugs in your
closet. — The Funeral, Oct. 2nd.

*' We knew the obligations the stage had to his writings [Steele's] ;
there being scarcely a comedian of merit in our whole company whom
his " Tatlers " had not made better by his recommendation of them." —

ClBBER.

STEELE. 125

his sword and wig, kissed his wife and children, told
them a lie about pressing business, and went off to the
" Rose " to the jolly fellows.

While Mr. Addison was abroad, and after he came
home in rather a dismal way to wait upon Providence
in his shabby lodging in the Haymarket, young Captain
Steele was cutting a much smarter figure than that of
his classical friend of Charterhouse Cloister, and
Maudlin Walk. Could not some painter give an inter-
view between the gallant captain of Lucas's, with his
hat cocked, and his lace, and his face too, a trifle tar-
nished with drink, and that poet, that philosopher, pale,
proud, and poor, his friend and monitor of school days,
of all days ? How Dick must have bragged about his
chances and his hopes, and the fine company he kept,
and the charms of the reigning toasts and popular
actresses, and the number of bottles that he and my
lord and some other pretty fellows had cracked over
night at the " Devil," or the " Garter ! " Cannot one
fancy Joseph Addison's calm smile and cold grey eyes
following Dick for an instant, as he struts down the
Mall, to dine with the Guard, at St. James's, before he
turns, with his sober pace and thread-bare suit, to walk
back to his lodgings up the two pair of stairs ? Steele's
name was down for promotion, Dick alwaj^s said
himself, in the glorious, pious, and immortal William's
last table-book. Jonathan Swift's name had been
written there by the same hand too.

126 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

Our worthy friend, the author of the " Christian
Hero," continued to make no small figure about town
by the use of his wits.' He was appointed Gazetteer :
he wrote, in 1703, " The Tender Husband," his second
j)lay, in which there is some delightful farcical writing,
and of which he fondly owned in after-hfe, and when
Addison was no more, that there were " many applauded
strokes " from Addison's beloved hand.'* Is it not a
pleasant partnership to remember ? Can't one fancy
Steele, full of spirits and youth, leaving his gay
company to go to Addison's lodging, where his friend
sits in the shabby sitting-room, quite serene, and
cheerful, and poor? In 1704 Steele came on the

^ " There is not now in his sight that excellent man whom Heaven
made his friend and superior to be at a certain place in pain for what
he should say or do. I will go on in his further encouragement. The
best woman that ever man had cannot now lament and pine at his
neglect of himself."— Steele [of himself]. The Theatre. No. 12,
Feb. 1719-20.

2 "The Funeral" supplies an admirable stroke of humour, — one
which Sydney Smith has used as an illustration of the faculty in his
Lectures.

The undertaker is talking to his employh about their duty.

Salle. — " Ha, you ! — A little more upon the dismal [forming their
countenances] ; this fellow has a good mortal look, — place him near the
corpse : that wainscot- face must be o' top of the stairs ; that fellow's
almost in a fright (that looks as if he were full of some strange misery)
at the end of the hall. So — But I'll fix you all myself. Let's have no
laughing now on any provocation. Look yonder, — that hale, well-
looking puppy ! You ungrateful scoundrel, did not I pity you, take
you out of a great man's service, and show you the pleasui-e of receiv-
ing wages ? Did not I give you ten, then fifteen^ and tiventy shillings
a week to he sorrowful ? — and the more I give you, I think the gladder you
are/"

STEELE. 127

town with another comedy, and behold, it was so
moral and religious, as poor Dick insisted, so dull
the town thought, that the " Lying Lover " was
damned.

Addison's hour of success now came, and he was
able to help our friend, the " Christian Hero," in such
a way, that, if there had been any chance of keeping
that poor tipsy champion upon his legs, his fortune
was safe, and his competence assured. Steele pro-
cured the place of Commissioner of Stamps : he wrote
so richly, so gracefully often, so kindly always, with
such a pleasant wit and easy frankness, with such a
gush of good spirits and good humour, that his early
papers may be compared to Addison's own, and are to
be read, by a male reader at least, with quite an equal
pleasure.'

1 ^'Froni my oivn Apartment, Nov. 16.

" There are several persons who have many pleasures and entertain-
ments in their possession, which they do not enjoy ; it is, therefore,
a kind and good office to acquaint them with their own happiness, and
turn their attention to such instances of their good fortune as they
are apt to overlook. Persons in the married state often want such a
monitor; and pine away their days by looking upon the same condition
in anguish and murmuring which carries with it, in the opinion of
others, a comj)lication of all the pleasures of life, and a retreat from
its inqviietudes,

" I am led into this thought by a visit I made to an old friend
who was formerly my school-fellow. He came to town last week,
with his family, for the winter ; and yesterday morning sent me word
his wife expected me to dinnex\ I am, as it were, at home at that
house, and every member of it knows me for their well-wisher. I
cannot, indeed, express the pleasure it is to be met by the children
with so much joy as I am when I go thither. The boys and girls

128 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

After the " Tatler," in 1711, the famous "Spectator"
made its appearance, and this was followed, at various

strive who shall come first, -when they think it is I that am
knocking at the door ; and that child which loses the race to me runs
back again to tell the father it is Mr. BickerstafF. This day I was led
in by a pretty girl that we all thought must have forgot me ; for the
family has been out of town these two years. Her knowing me again
was a mighty subject with us, and took up our discourse at the first
entrance ; after which, tliey begun to rally me upon a thousand little
stories they heard in the country, about my marriage to one of my
neighbours' daughters ; upon which, the gentleman, my friend, said,
'Nay, if Mr. Bickerstaff marries a child of any of his old companions,
I hope mine shall have the preference : there is Mrs. Mary is now
sixteen, and would make him as fine a widow as the best of them.
But I know him too well ; he is so enamoured viith the very memoiy
of those who floui'ished in our youth, that he will not so much as
look upon the modern beauties. I remember, old gentleman, how
often you went home in a day to refresh your countenance and dress
when Teraminta reigned in yoiir heart. As we came up in the coach,
I repeated to my \rife some of your verses on her.' With such
reflections on little passages which happened long ago, we passed
our time during a cheerful and elegant meal. After dinner his lady
left the room, as did also the children. As soon as we were alone, he
took me by the hand : ' Well, my good friend,' says he, ' I am heartily
glad to see thee; I was afraid you would never have seen all the
company that dined with you to-day again. Do not you think the
good woman of the house a little altered since you followed her from
the playhouse to find out who she was for me ]' I perceived a tear
fall down his cheek as he spoke, which moved me not a little. But,
to turn the discourse, I said, 'She is not, indeed, that creature she
was when she i-eturned me the letter I carried from you, and told me,
"She hoped, as I was a gentleman, I would be employed no more to
trouble her, who had never ofi"ended me ; but would be so much the
gentleman's friend as to dissuade him from a pursuit which he could
never succeed in." You may remember I thought her in earnest, and
you were forced to employ 3-our cousin Will, who made his sister get
acquainted with her for you. You cannot expect her to be for ever
fifteen.' 'Fifteen!' replied my good friend. 'Ah! you little inider-
stand — you, that have lived a bachelor — how givat, how exquisite a

STEELE. 129

intervals, by many periodicals under the same editor —
the " Guardian "—the " Englishman "—the " Lover,"

pleasure there is in being really beloved ! It is impossible that the
most beauteous face in nature should raise in me such pleasing ideas
as when I look upon that excellent woman. That fading in her
countenance is chiefly caused by her watching with me in my fever.
This was followed by a fit of sickness, which had like to have carried
me off" last winter. I tell you, sincerely, I have so many obligAticns to
her that I cannot, with any sort of moderation, think of her present
state of health. But, as to what you say of fifteen, she gives me
every day pleasure beyond what I ever knew in the possession of her
beauty when I was in the vigour of youth. Every moment of her
life brings me fresh instances of her complacency to my inclina-
tions, and, her pi'udence in regard to my fortune. Her face is to me
much more beautiful than when I first saw it ; there is no decay in
any feature which I cannot trace from the very instant it was occasioned
by some anxious concern for my welfare and interests. Thus, at the
same time, me thinks, the love I conceived towards her for what she
was, is heightened by my gratitude for what she is. The love of a
wife is as much above the idle passion commonly called by that name,
as the loud laughter of buffoons is inferior to the elegant mirth of
gentlemen. Oh ! she is an inestimable jewel ! In her examination of
her household affairs, she shows a certain fearfulness to find a fault,
which makes her servants obey her like children ; and the meanest we
have has an ingenuous shame for an offence not always to be seen in
children in other families. I speak freely to you, my old friend ; ever
since her sickness, things that gave me the quickest joy before turn
now to a certain anxiety. As the children play in the next room, I
know the poor things by their steps, and am considering what they
must do should they lose their mother in their tender years. The
pleasure I used to take in telling my boy stories of battles, and asking
my girl questions about the disposal of her baby, and the gossipping
of it, is turned into inward reflection and melancholy.'

" He would have gone on in this tender way, when the good lady
entered, and, with an inexpressible sweetness in her countenance, told
us * she had been searching her closet for something very good, to
treat such an old frieud as I was.' Her husband's eyes sparkled with
pleasure at the cheerfulness of her countenance ; and I saw all his
fears vanish in an instant. The lady observing something in our looks

E

130 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

whose love was rather insipid — the "Eeader," of whom
the public saw no more after his second appearance —

which showed we had been more serious than ordinary, and seeing her
husband receive her with gi-eat concern under a forced cheerfulness,
immediately guessed at what we had been talking of; and applying
herself to me, said, with a smile, 'Mr. Bickerstaff, do not believe a
word of what he tells you ; I shall still live to have you for my second,
as I have often promised you, unless he takes more care of himself
than he has done since his coming to town. You must know he tells
me, that he finds London is a much more healthy place than the
country ; for he sees several of his old acquaintances and school-
fellows are here — young fellows tvith fair, full-bottomed j^enwigs. I could
scarce keep him this morning from going out open-breasted.' My friend,
who is always extremely delighted with her agreeable humour, made
her sit down with us. She did it with that easiness which is peculiar
to women of sense ; and to keep up the good humour she hjid brought
in with her, turned her raillery upon me. 'Mr. Bickerstaff, you
remember you followed me one night from the playhouse; suppose
you should carry me thither to-morrow night, and lead me in the front
box.' This put us into a long field of discourse about the beauties
who were the mothers to the present, and shined in the boxes twenty
years ago. I told her, ' I was glad she had transferred so many of her
charms, and I did not question but her eldest daughter was within
half-a-year of being a toast.'

" We were pleasing ourselves with this fantastical preferment of the
young lady when, on a sudden, we were alarmed with the noise of a
drum, and immediately entered my little godson to give me a point of
war. His mother, between laughing and chiding, would have put him
out of the room ; but I would not part with him so. I found, upon
conversation with him, though he was a little noisy in his mirth, that
the child had excellent parts, and was a great master of all the learning
on the other side of eight years old. I perceived him a very great
historian in ' -^sop's Fables ; ' but he frankly declared to me his mind,
' that he did not delight in that learning, because he did not believe
they were true ; ' for which reason I found he had very much turned
his studies, for about a twelvemonth past, into the lives of Don Bel-
lianis of Greece, Guy of Warwick, ' the Seven Champions,' and other
historians of that age. I could not but observe the satisfaction the
father took in the forwardness of his son, and that these diversions

STEELE. 131

the " Theatre," under the pseudonym of Sir John
Edgar, which Steele wrote, w^iile Governor of the
Eoyal Company of Comedians, to which post, and to
that of Surveyor of the Royal Stables at Hampton
Court, and to the Commission of the Peace for
Middlesex, and to the honour of knighthood, Steele
had been preferred soon after the accession of George I.,
whose cause honest Dick had nobly fought, through
disgrace and danger, against the most formidable
enemies, against traitors and buihes, against Boling-
broke and Swift, in the last reign. With the arrival of
the King, that splendid conspiracy broke up ; and a
golden opportunity came to Dick Steele, whose hand,
alas, was too careless to gripe it.

miglit turn to some profit. I found the boy had made remarks, which
might be of sei'vice to him during the course of his whole life. He
would tell you the mismanagement of John Hickerthrift, find fault
with the passionate temper in Bevis of Southampton, and loved St.
George for being the champion of England ; and by this means had
his thoughts insensibly moulded into the notions of discretion, virtue,
and honour. I was extolling his accomplisViments when his mother
told me, ' that the little girl who led me in this morning was, in her
way, a better scholar than he. Betty,' said she, ' deals chiefly in fairies
and sprights ; and sometimes in a winter night will terrify the maids
with her accounts, until they are afraid to go u.p to bed.'

" I sat with them until it was very late, sometimes in merry, some-
times in serious discourse, with this particular pleasure, which gives
the only true relish to all conversation, a sense that every one of us
liked each other. I went home, considering the different conditions
of a married life and that of a bachelor ; and I must confess it struck
me with a secret concern, to reflect, that whenever I go ofi" I shall
leave no traces behind me. In this pensive mood I return to my
family ; that is to say, to my maid, my dog, mj^ cat, who only can be
the better or worse for what happens to me." — The Tatler.

K 2

132 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Steele married twice ; and outlived liis places, his
schemes, his wife, his income, his health, and almost
everything but his kind heart. That ceased to trouble
him in 1729, when he died, worn out and almost
forgotten by his contemporaries in Wales, where he had
the remnant of a property.

Posterity has been kinder to this amiable creature ;
all women especially are bound to be grateful to Steele,
as he was the first of our waiters who really seemed to
admire and respect them. Congreve the Great, who
alludes to the low estimation in which women were
held in Elizabeth's time, as a reason why the women
of Shakspeare make so small a figure in the poet's
dialogues, though he can himself pay splendid com-
pliments to women, j^et looks on them as mere
instruments of gallantry, and destined, like the most
consummate fortifications, to fall, after a certain time,
before the arts and bravery of the besieger, man.
There is a letter of Swift's, entitled " Advice to a very
Young Married Lady," wdiich shows the Dean's opinion
of the female society of his day, and that if he despised
man he utterly scorned women too. No lad}^ of our
time could be treated by any man, were he ever so
much a wit or Dean, in such a tone of insolent patronage
and vulgar protection. In this performance. Swift
hardly takes pains to hide his opinion that a woman is
a fool : tells her to read books, as if reading was a
novel accomplishment ; and informs her that " not one

STEELE. 133

gentleman's daughter in a thousand has been brought
to read or understand her own natural tongue."
Addison laughs at women equally; but, with the
gentleness and x^oliteness of his nature, smiles at
them and watches them, as if they were harmless,
half-witted, amusing, pretty creatures, only made to be
men's playthings. It was Steele who first began to
pay a manly homage to their goodness and under-
standing, as well as to their tenderness and beauty.'
In his comedies, the heroes do not rant and rave
about the divine beauties of Gloriana or Statira, as
the characters were made to do in the chivalry
romances and the high-flown dramas just going out of
vogue, but Steele admu^es women's virtue, acknow-
ledges their sense, and adores their purity and beauty,
with an ardour and strength which should win the
good will of all women to their hearty and respect-
ful champion. It is this ardour, this respect, this

^ " As to the pursioits after affection and esteem, the fair sex are
happy in this particular, that with them the one is much more nearly-
related to the other than in men. The love of a woman is inseparable
from some esteem of her ; and as she is naturally the object of affec-
tion, the woman who has your esteem has also some degree of your
love. A man that dotes on a woman for her beauty, will whisper
his friend, ' that creature has a great deal of wit when you are well
acquainted with her.' And if you examine the bottom of your esteem
for a woman, you will find you have a greater opinion of her beauty
than anybody else. As to us men, I design to pass most of my time
with the facetious Harry Bickerstaff; but William Bickerstaff, the
most prudent man of our family, shall be my executor." — Tatler,
No. 206.

134 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

manliness, which makes his comedies so pleasant and
their heroes such fine gentlemen. He paid the finest
compliment to a woman that perhaps ever was offered.
Of one woman, whom Congreve had also admired and
celebrated, Steele says, that "to have loved her was
a liberal education." " How often," he says, dedicating
a volume to his wife, " how often has your tenderness
removed pain from my sick head, how often anguish
from my afflicted heart ! If there are such beings as
guardian angels, they are thus employed. I cannot
believe one of them to be more good in inclination, or
more charming in form than my wife." His breast
seems to warm and his eyes to kindle when he meets
with a good and beautiful woman, and it is with his
heart as well as with his hat that he salutes her.
About children, and all that relates to home, he is not
less tender, and more than once speaks in apology of
what he calls his softness. He would have been
nothing without that delightful weakness. It is that
which gives his works theii' worth and his style its
charm. It, like his life, is full of faults and careless
blunders ; and redeemed, Hke that, by his sweet and
compassionate nature.

We possess of poor Steele's wild and chequered life
some of the most curious memoranda that ever were
left of a man's biography.' Most men's letters, from

^ The Correspondence of Steele passed after his death into the
possession of his daughter Elizabeth, by his second wife, Miss Scurlock, of

STEELE. 135

Cicero down to Walpole, or clown to the great men of
oiu' own time, if you will, are doctored compositions,

Carmarthensliire. She married the Hon. John, afterwards third Lord
Trevor. At her death, part of the letters passed to Mr. Thomas, a
grandson of a natural daughter of Steele's ; and part to Lady Trevor's
next of kin, Mr. Scurlock. — They were published by the learned
Nichols — from whose later edition of them, in 1809, our specimens are
quoted.

Here we have him, in his courtship — which was not a very long one.

''Aug. 30,1707.
to mrs. scurlock.
" Madam, —

" I beg pardon that my paper is not finer, but I am forced to
write from a cofiee-bouse, where I am attending about business. There
is a dirty crowd of busy faces all around me, talking of money ; while
all my ambition, all my wealth is love ! Love which animates my
heart, sweetens my humour, enlarges my soul, and afiects every action
of my life. It is to my lovely charmer I owe, that many noble ideas
are continually affixed to my words and actions ; it is the natural eff"ect
of that generous passion to create in the admirer, some similitude of
the object admired. Thus, my dear, am I every day to improve from
so sweet a companion. Look up, my fair one, to that Heaven which
made thee such ; and join with me to implore its influence on our
tender innocent hours, and beseech the author of love to bless the rites
he has ordained — and mingle with our happiness a just sense of our
transient condition, and a resignation to His will, which only can
regulate our minds to a steady endeavour to please Him and each
other.

"I am for ever your faithful servant,

"Rich. Steele."

Some few hours afterwards, apparently, Mistress Scurlock received
the next one — obviously written later in the day !

"Saturday night {Aug. 30, 1707.)
"Dear, Lovely, Mrs. Scurlock, —

" I have been in very good company, where your health, under
the character of the woman I loved best, has been often drunk ; so that
I may say that I am dead drunk for your sake, which is more than / die
for you. "Rich. Steele."

136 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

and written with an eye suspicious towards posterity.
That dedication of Steele's to his wife is an artificial

TO MRS. SCURLOCK.

" Sept. 1, 1707.
"Madam, —

" It is the hardest thing in the world to be in love, and yet

attend business. As for me, all who speak to me find me out, and I

must lock myself up, or other people will do it for me.

"A gentleman asked me this morning, 'what news from Lisbon?'

and I answered 'she is exquisitely handsome.' Another desii-ed to

know ' when I had last been at Hampton Court ? ' I replied, 'it will be

on Tuesday come se'nnnight.' Pry'thee allow me at least to kiss your

hand before that day, that my mind may be in some composure. Oh

Love !

" A thousand torments dwell about thee,

Yet who could live, to live without thee ? "

" Methinks I could write a volume to you ; but all the language on
earth would fail in saying how much, and with what disinterested
passion, " I am ever your's,

"Rich. Steele."'

Two days after this, he is found expounding his circumstances and
prospects to the young lady's mamma. He dates from " Lord Sunder-
land's office, Whitehall ; " and states his clear income at 1025^. per
annum. " I promise myself," says he, "the pleasure of an industrious
and virtuous life, in studying to do things agreeable to you."

They were married, according to the most probable conjectures,
about the 7th inst. There are traces of a tiff about the middle of the
next month ; she being prudish and fidgetty, as he was impassioned and
reckless. General progress, however, may be seen from the following
notes. The "house in Bury-street, St. James's," was now taken.

TO MRS. STEELE.

" Oct. 16, 1707.
"Dearest Being on Earth, —

" Pardon me if you do not see me till eleven o'clock, having met
a school-fellow from India, by whom I am to be informed on things this
night which expressly concerns your obedient husband,

"Rich. Steele."

STEELE. 137

performance, possibly ; at least, it is written with tiiat
degree of artifice which an orator uses in arranging a

TO MRS. STEELE.

"Eifjht o'clod; Fountain Tavern, Oct. 22, 1707.
"My Dear, —

"I beg of you not to be uneasy ; for I have done agi'eat deal of

business to-day very successfully, and wait an hour or two about my

" Gazette."

"Dec. 22, 1707.
" My dear, dear Wife, —

" I write to let you know I do not come home to dinner, being

obliged to attend some business abroad, of which I shall give you an

account (when I see you in the evening), as becomes your dutiful and

obedient husband."

" Devil Tavern, Temple-bar,

"Jan. 3, 1707-8.
" Dear Prue, —

" I have partly succeeded in my business to-day, and inclose

two guineas as earnest of more. Dear Prue, I cannot come home to

dinner. I languish for your welfare, and will never be a moment

careless more.

" Yovir faithful husband," &c.

"Jan. 14, 1707-8.
" Dear Wife, —

" Mr. Edgecomb, Ned Ask, and Mr. Lumley have desired me to

sit an hour with them at the George, in Pall-mall, for which I desire

your patience till twelve o'clock, and that you will go to bed," &c.

" Gray's-inn, Feb. 3, 1708.
"Dear Prue, —

" If the man who has my shoemaker's bill calls, let him be

answered that I shall call on him as I come home. I stay here in

order to get Jonson to discount a bill for me, and shall dine with him

for that end. He is expected at home every minute.

" Your most humble obedient servant," &c.

" Ttnnis-court Coffee-house, 31 ay 5, 1708.
" Dear Wife, —

" I hope I have done this day what will be pleasing to you ; in

the meantime shall lie this night at a baker's, one Leg, over against

the Devil Tavern, at Charing-cross. I shall be able to confi'ont the

138 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

statement for the House, or a poet emploj^s in x)reparing
a sentiment in verse or for the stage. But there are
some 400 letters of Dick Steele's to his wife, which
that thrifty woman preserved accurately, and which
could have been written but for her and her alone.
They contain details of the business, pleasures, quar-
rels, reconciliations of the pair; they have all the
genuineness of conversation ; they are as artless as a
child's prattle, and as confidential as a curtain-lecture.
Some are written from the printing-office, where he is
waiting for the proof sheets of his " Gazette," or his
" Tatler ; " some are written from the tavern, whence
he promises to come to his wife " witliin a pint of

fools who wish me uneasy, and shall have the satisfaction to see thee
cheerful and at ease.

" If the printer's boy be at home, send him hither ; and let Mrs.
Todd send by the boy my night-gown, slippers, and clean linen. You
shall hear from me early in the morning," &c.

Dozens of similar letters follow, with occasional guineas, little
parcels of tea, or walnuts, &c. In 1709 the "Tatler" made its appear-
ance. The following curious note dates April 7th, 1710: —

" I inclose to you [' Dear Prue '] a receipt for the saucepan and
spoon, and a note of 231. of Lewis's, which will make up the 501.
I promised for your ensuing occasion.

" I know no happiness in this life in any degree comparable to the
pleasure I have in your person and society. I only beg of you to add
to your other charms a fearfulness to see a man that loves you in pain
and uneasiness, to make me as happy as it is possible to be in this
life. Eising a little in a morning, and being disposed to a cheerfulness
would not be amiss."

In another, he is found excusing his coming home, being "invited
to supper to Mr. Boyle's." " Dear Prue," he says on this occasion,
" do not send after me, for I shall be ridiculous."

STEELE. 139

wine," and where he has given a rendezvous to a
friend, or a money-lender: some are composed in a
high state of vinous excitement, when his head is
flustered with Burgundy, and his heart abounds with
amorous warmth for his darhng Prue : some are under
the influence of the dismal headache and repentance
next morning : some, alas, are from the lock-up house,
where the lawyers have impounded him, and where he
is waiting for bail. You trace many years of the poor
fellow's career in these letters. In September, 1707,
from wliieh day she began to save the letters, he mar-
ried the beautiful ^listress Scurlock. You have his
passionate protestations to the lady ; his respectful
proposals to her mamma; his private prayer to
Heaven when the union so ardently desii'ed was com-
pleted ; his fond professions of contrition and promises
of amendment, when, immediately after his marriage,
there began to be just cause for the one and need for
the other.

Captain Steele took a house for his lady upon their
marriage, " the thii'd door from Germain-street, left
hand of Berry-street," and the next year he j)resented
his wife with a countr}^ house at Hampton. It appears
she had a chariot and i^au', and sometimes four
horses : he himself enjoyed a little horse for his own
riding. He paid, or promised to pay, his barber fifty
pounds a year, and always went abroad in a laced
coat and a large black-buclded periwig, that must have

140 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

cost somebody fifty guineas. He was rather a well-to-
do gentleman, Captain Steele, with the proceeds of his
estates in Barbadoes (left to him by his first wife), his
income as writer of the " Gazette," and his office of
gentleman waiter to his Royal Highness Prince George.
His second wife brought him a fortune too. But it is
melancholy to relate that with these houses and chariots
and horses and income, the Captain was constantly in
want of money, for which his beloved bride was asldng
as constantly. In the course of a few pages we begin
to find the shoemaker calling for money, and some
directions from the Captain, who has not thirty pounds
to spare. He sends his wife, " the beautifullest object
in the world," as he calls her, and evidently in reply
to applications of her own, which have gone the way of
all waste paper, and lighted Dick's pipes, which were
smoked a hundred and forty years ago — he sends his
wife now a guinea, then a half- guinea, then a couple of
guineas, then half a pound of tea ; and again no money
and no tea at all, but a promise that his darling Prue
shall have some in a day or two ; or a request, perhaps,
that she will send over his night-gown and shaving-
plate to the temporary lodging where the nomadic
captain is l3'ing, hidden from the bailiffs. Oh that a
Christian hero and late captain in Lucas's should be
afraid of a dirty sheriff's officer ! That the pink and
pride of chivalry sliould turn pale before a writ ! It
stands to record in poor Dick's own handwriting ; the

STEELE. 141

queer collection is preserved at the British Museum to
this present clay ; that the rent of the nuptial house
in Jermyn- street, sacred to unutterable tenderness
and Prue, and three doors from Bury-street, was not
paid until after the landlord had put in an execution
on Captain Steele's furniture. Addison sold the house
and furniture at Hampton, and, after deducting the sum
in which his incorrigible friend was indebted to him,
handed over the residue of the proceeds of the sale
to poor Dick, who wasn't in the least angry at
Addison's summary proceeding, and I dare say was
very glad of any sale or execution, the result of which
was to give him a little ready money. Having a small
house in Jermyn-street for which he couldn't pay, and
a country house at Hampton on which he had borrowed
money, nothing must content Captain Dick but the
taking, in 1712, a much finer, larger, and grander
house, in Bloomsbury-square ; where his unhappy
landlord got no better satisfaction than his friend in
St. James's, and where it is recorded that Dick, giving
a gTand entertainment, had a half-dozen queer-looking
fellows in livery to wait upon his noble guests, and con-
fessed that his servants were baihffs to a man. " I
fared like a distressed prince," the Idndly j^rodigal
writes, generously complimenting Addison for his
assistance in the " Tatler," — " I fared lilve a distressed
prince, who calls in a powerful neighbour to his aid.
I was undone by my auxiliary ; when I had once called

142 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

him in, I could not subsist without dependence on
him." Poor, needy Prince of Bloomsbury ! think of
him in his palace, with his allies from Chancery-lane
ominously guarding him.

All sorts of stories are told indicative of his reck-
lessness and his good humour. One narrated by Dr.
Hoadly is exceedingly characteristic ; it shows the life
of the time : and our poor friend very weak, but very
kind both in and out of his cups.

" My father," (says Dr. John Hoadly, the Bishop's
son) — "when Bishop of Bangor, was by invitation,
present at one of the Whig meetings, held at the
Trumpet, in Shoe Lane, when Sir Richard, in
his zeal, rather exposed himself, having the double
duty of the day upon him, as well to celebrate the
immortal memory of King Wilham, it being the 4th
November, as to drink his friend Addison up to con-
versation-pitch, whose phlegmatic constitution was
hardly warmed for society by that time. Steele was
not fit for it. Two remarkable circumstances happened.
John Sly, the hatter of facetious memory, was m the
house ; and John, pretty mellow, took it into his head
to come into the company on his knees, with a tankard
of ale in his hand to drink oif to the immortal memory,
and to return in the same manner. Steele sitting next
my father, whispered him — Do laugh. It is humanity
to laugh. Sir Bichard, in the evening, being too much
in the same condition, was put into a chair, and sent

STEELE. 143

home. Nothing wonkl serve him hut heing carried to
the Bishop of Bangor's, late as it was. However, the
chairmen carried him home, and got him up stairs,
when his great complaisance would wait on them down
stairs, which he did, and then was got quietly to hed." '
There is another amusing story which I believe
that renowned collector, Mr. Joseph Miller, or his
successors, have incorporated into their work. Sir
Richard Steele, at a time when he was much occupied
with theatrical affairs, built himself a pretty private
theatre, and, before it was opened to his friends and
guests, was anxious to try whether the hall was well
adapted for hearing. Accordingly he placed himself
in the most remote part of the gallery, and begged the
carpenter who had built the house to speak up from
the stage. The man at first said that he was unaccus-
tomed to pubhc speaking, and did not know what to
say to his honour ; but the good-natured knight called
out to him to say whatever was uppermost ; and after
a moment the carpenter began, in a voice perfectly
audible: "Sir Bichard Steele!" he said, "for three
months past me and my men has been a working in
this theatre, and we've never seen the colour of your
honour's money: we will be very much obliged if
you'll pay it directly, for until you do we won't drive

^ Of this famous Bishop, Steele wrote, —

" Vu'tue with so much ease on Bangor sits,
All faults he pardons, though he none commits."

144 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

in another nail." Sir Richard said that his friend's
elocution was perfect, but that he didn't like his
subject much.

The great charm of Steele's writing is its naturalness.
He wrote so quickly and carelessly, that he was forced
to make the reader his confidant, and had not the
time to deceive him. He had a small share of book-
learning, but a vast acquaintance with the world. He
had known men and taverns. He had lived with
gownsmen, with troopers, with gentlemen ushers of
the Court, with men and women of fashion ; with
authors and wits, with the inmates of the spunging
houses, and with the frequenters of all the clubs and
coffee houses in the town. He was liked in all com-
pany because he liked it; and you like to see his
enjoyment as jou like to see the glee of a box full of
children at the pantomime. He was not of those
lonely ones of the earth whose greatness obliged them
to be solitary; on the contrar}^, he admired, I think,
more than any man who ever wrote ; and full of hearty
applause and sympathy, wins upon you by calling you
to share his delight and good humour. His laugh
rings through the whole house. He must have been
invaluable at a traged}^ and have cried as much as the
most tender young lady in the boxes. He has a relish
for beaut}^ and goodness wherever he meets it. He
admired Shakspeare affectionately, and more than any
man of his time; and, according to his generous

STEELE. 145

expansive nature, called upon all his company to like
what lie liked himself. He did not damn with faint
praise : he was in the world and of it ; and his enjoy-
ment of life presents the strangest contrast to Swift's
savage indignation, and Addison's lonely serenity.'

^ Here we have some of his later letters : —

TO LADY STEELE.

''Hampton Court, March 16, 1716-17.
" Dear Prue,

" If you have written anything to me which I should have received
last night, I beg your pardon that I cannot answer till the next post.

Your son at the present writing is mighty well employed in

tumbling on the floor of the room and sweeping the sand with a feather.
He grows a most delightful child, and very full of play and spirit. He
is also a very great scholar : he can read his Primer ; and I have
brought down my Virgil. He makes most shrewd remarks about the
pictures. We are very intimate friends and playfellows. He begins
to be very ragged ; and I hope I shall be pardoned if I equip him with
new clothes and frocks, or what Mrs. Evans and I shall think for his
service."

TO LADY STEELE.

[Undated.]
" You tell me you want a little flattery from me. I assure you I
know no one who deserves so much commendation as yourself, and to
whom saying the best things would be so little like flattery. The
thing speaks itself, considering you as a very handsome woman that
loves retirement — one who does not want wit, and yet is extremely
sincere ; and so I could go through all the vices which attend the good
qualities of other people, of which you are exempt. But, indeed,
though you have every perfection, you have an extravagant fault,
which almost frustrates the good in you to me ; and that is, that you
do not love to dress, to appear, to shine out, even at my request, and
to make me proud of you, or rather to indulge the pride I have that

you are mine

" Your most affectionate, obsequious husband,

"Eicn. Steele.

" A quarter of Molly's schooling is paid. The children are perfectly

well."

L

146 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Permit me to read to 3^011 a x^assage from each writer,
curiously indicative of liis peculiar humour : the subject
is the same, and the mood the very gravest. We have
said that upon all the actions of man, the most trifling
and the most solemn, the humourist takes upon him-
seK to comment. All readers of our old masters know
the terrible lines of Swift, in which he hints at liis
philosophy and describes the end of mankind : — '

" Amazed, confused, its fate unknown,
The world stood trembling at Jove's throne ;
^Yhile each pale sinner lumg his head,
Jove, nodding, shook the heavens and said :

' Offending race of human kind,
By nature, reason, learning, blind ;
You who through frailty stepped aside,
And you who never err'd through pride ;

TO LADY STEELE.

"March 26, mr.
"My dearest Prue,

" I have received yours, wherein you give me the sensible

affliction of telling me enow of the continual pain in your head. ....

When I lay in your place, and on your pillow, I assure you I fell into

tears last night, to think that my charming little insolent might be

then awake and in pain ; and took it to be a sin to go to sleep.

"For this tender passion towards you, I must be contented that

your Prueship will condescend to call yourself my well-wisher "

At the tim3 when the above later letters were written, Lady Steele
was in Wales, looking after her estate there. Steele, about this time,
was much occupied with a project for conveying fish alive, by which,
as he constantly assures his wife, he firmly believed he should make
his fortune. It did not succeed, however.

Lady Steele died in December of the succeeding year. She lies
buried in Westminster Abbey.

* Lord Chesterfield sends these verses to Voltaire in a characteristic
letter.

STEELE. 147

You who in diflferent sects were shamm'd,
And come to see each other damn'd ;
(So some folk told you, but they knew
.No more of Jove's designs than you.)
The world's mad business now is o'er,
And I resent your freaks no more ;
I to svich blockheads set my wit,
I damn such fools — go, go, you're bit ! ' "

Addison, speaking on the very same theme, but with
how different a voice, says, in his famous paper on West-
minster Abbey (" Spectator," No. 26) : — " For my own
part, though I am always serious, I do not know what
it is to be melanchol}^, and can therefore take a view
of nature in her deep and solemn scenes with the same
pleasure as in her most gay and delightful ones.
AVhen I look upon the tombs of the great, every
emotion of envy dies within me ; when I read the
epitaphs of the beautiful, everj'' inordinate desu'e goes
out; when I meet with the grief of parents on a tomb-
stone, my heart melts with compassion; when I see
the tomb of the parents themselves, I consider the
vanity of grieving for those we must quickly follow."
(I have owned that I do not think Addison's heart
melted very much, or that he indulged very inordi-
nately in the " vanity of grieving.") " When," he goes
on, "when I see kings Ij'ing by those who deposed
them : when I consider rival wits placed side by side, or
the holy men that divided the world with their contests
and disputes, — I reflect with sorrow and astonishment
on the little competitions, factions, and debates of

L 2

148 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

mankind. And, when I read the several dates on the
tombs of some that died j^esterday and some 600
years ago, I consider that Great Day when we shall
all of us be contemporaries, and make our appearance
together."

Our third humourist comes to speak upon the same
subject. You will have observed in the previous
extracts the characteristic humour of each writer — the
subject and the contrast — the fact of Death, and the
play of individual thought, by which each comments
on it, and now hear the third writer — death, sorrow,
and the grave, being for the moment also his theme.
" The first sense of sorrow I ever knew," Steele says
in the " Tatler," " was upon the death of my father,
at which time I was not quite five years of age : but
was rather amazed at what all the house meant, than
possessed of a real understanding why nobody would
play with us. I remember I went into the room where
his body lay, and my mother sate weeping alone by it.
I had my battledore in my hand, and fell a beating
the cofiin, and calling papa; for, I know not how, I
had some idea that he was locked up there. My mother
caught me in her arms, and, transported bej^ond all
patience of the silent grief she was before in, she
almost smothered me in her embraces, and told me in
a flood of tears, ' Papa could not hear me, and would
play with me no more : for they were going to put him
imder ground, whence he would never come to us again.'

STEELE. 149

She was a very beautiful woman, of a noble spirit, and
there was a dignity in her grief amidst all the wildness
of her transport, which methought struck me with an
instinct of sorrow that, before I was sensible what it
was to grieve, seized my very soul, and has made pity
the weakness of my heart ever since."

Can there be three more characteristic moods of
minds and men ? " Fools, do you know anything of
this mystery ? " says Swift, stamping on a grave and
carrying his scorn for mankind actually beyond it.
Miserable, purblind wretches, how dare you to pretend
to comprehend the Inscrutable, and how can your dim
eyes pierce the unfathomable depths of yonder bound-
less heaven ? Addison, in a much kinder language
and gentler voice, utters much the same sentiment :
and speaks of the rivalry of wits, and the contests of
holy men, with the same sceptic placidity. " Look
what a little vain dust we are ; " he says, smiling
over the tombstones, and catching, as is his wont,
quite a divine effulgence as he looks heavenward, he
speaks in words of inspiration almost, of " the Great
Day, w^hen we shall all of us be contemporaries, and
make our appearance together."

The third, whose theme is Death, too, and who will
speak his word of moral as Heaven teaches him, leads
you up to his father's coffin, and shows j^ou his beau-
tiful mother weeping, and himself an unconscious Httle
boy wondering at her side. His own natural tears flow

150 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

as lie takes your hand and confidingly asks your sym-
pathy. " See how good and innocent and beautiful
women are," he says, " how tender little children ! "
Let us love these and one another, brother — God knows
we have need of love and pardon. So it is each man
looks with his own eyes, speaks with his own voice, and
prays his own prayer.

When Steele asks your sympathy for the actors in that
charming scene of Love and Grief and Death, who can
refuse it ? One yields to it as to the frank advance of a
child, or to the appeal of a woman. A man is seldom
more manly than when he is what you call unmanned —
the source of his emotion is championship, pity, and
courage; the instinctive desire to cherish those who
are innocent and unhappy, and defend those who are
tender and weak. If Steele is not our friend he is
nothing. He is by no means the most brilliant of wits
nor the deepest of thinkers : but he is our friend : we
love him, as children love their love with an A.
because he is amiable. Who likes a man best because
he is the cleverest or the wisest of mankind ; or a woman
because she is the most virtuous, or talks French ; or
plays thie piano better than the rest of her sex ? I own
to liking Dick Steele the man, and Dick Steele the
author, much better than much better men and much
better authors.

The misfortune regarding Steele is, that most part
of the company here present must take his amiability

STEELE. 151

upon hearsay, and certainly can't make liis intimate
acquaintance. Not that Steele was worse than his
time ; on the contrary, a far better, truer, and
higher-hearted man than most who lived in it. But
things were done in that society, and names were
named, which would make you shudder now. What
would be the sensation of a polite youth of the present
day, if at a ball he saw the young object of his affec-
tions taking a box out of her pocket and a pinch of
snuff: or if at dinner, by the charmer's side, she
deliberately put her knife into her mouth ? If she cut
her mother's throat ^\ith it mamma would scarcely be
more shocked. I allude to these peculiarities of by*gone
times as an excuse for my favourite, Steele, who was
not worse, and often much more delicate than his
neighbours.

There exists a curious document descriptive of the
manners of the last age, which describes most minutely
the amusements and occupations of persons of fashion
in London at the time of which we are speaking ; the
time of Swift, and Addison, and Steele.

When Lord Sparkish, Tom Neverout, and Colonel
Atwit, the immortal personages of Swift's pohte con-
versation, came to breakfast with my Lady Smart, at
eleven o'clock in the morning, my Lord Smart was
absent at the levee, His lordship was at home to
dinner at three o'clock to receive his guests ; and we
may sit down to this meal, like the Barmecide's, and

152 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

see tlie fops of the last century before us. Seven of
them sate down at dinner, and were joined by a
country baronet, who told them they kept court hours.
These persons of fashion began their dinner with
a sii'loin of beef, fish, a shoulder of veal, and a tongue.
My Lady Smart carved the sii-loin, my Lady Answerall
helped the fish, and the gallant Colonel cut the shoulder
of veal. All made a considerable inroad on the sirloin
and the shoulder of veal with the exception of Sir John,
who had no appetite, having already partaken of a
beefsteak and two mugs of ale, besides a taiikard of
March beer as soon as he got out of bed. They drank
claret, which the master of the house said should
always be drunk after fish; and my Lord Smart
X)articularly recommended some excellent cider to
my Lord Sparldsh, which occasioned some briUiant
remarks from that nobleman. AVhen the host
called for wine, he nodded to one or other of his
guests, and said, " Tom Neverout, my service to
you."

After the first course came almond pudding, fritters,
which the Colonel took with his hands out of the dish,
in order to help the brilliant Miss Notable ; chickens,
black puddings, and soup ; and Lady Smart, the
elegant mistress of the mansion, finding a skewer in
a dish, placed it in her plate with directions that it
should be carried dovm to the cook and dressed for
the cook's own dinner. AVine and small beer were

STEELE. 158

diimk during this second coiu'se ; and Tvhen the
Colonel called for beer., he called the butler, Friend,
and asked whether the beer was good. Various jocular
remarks passed from the gentlefolks to the servants ;
at breakfast several persons had a word and a joke for
Mrs. Betty, my lady's maid, who wanned the cream
and had chai'ge of the canister (the tea cost thirty
shillings a pound in those days). "\Mien my Lady
Sparkish sent her footman out to my Lady Match to
come at six o'clock and play at quadrille, her ladyship
warned the man to follow his nose, and if he fell by
the way not to stay to get up again. And when the
gentlemen asked the hall-porter if his lady was at
home, that fimctionar}- replied, with manly waggishness,
"She was at home just now, but she's not gone out
yet"

After the puddings, sweet and black, the fritters
and soup, came the thii'd course, of which the chief
dish was a hot venison pasty, which was put before
Lord Smart, and cai-ved by that nobleman. Besides
the pasty, there was a hare, a rabbit, some pigeons,
pai*tridges, a goose, and a ham. Beer and wine were
freely imbibed dm'ing tliis course, the gentlemen
always pledging somebody with every glass which they
drank; and by this time the conversation between
Tom Xeverout and Miss Notable had gi-own so brisk
and lively, that the Derby shii'e baronet began to think
the young gentlewoman was Tom's sweetheart ; on

154 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

which Miss remarked, that she loved Tom "like pie."
After the goose, some of the gentlemen took a dram of
brandy, which " was very good for the wholesomes,"
Sir John said ; and now having had a tolerably sub-
stantial dinner, honest Lord Smart bade the butler
bring up the great tankard full of October to Sir John.
The great tankard was passed from hand to hand and
mouth to mouth, but when pressed by the noble host
upon the gallant Tom Neverout, he said, " No faith,
my lord, I like your wine, and won't put a churl upon
a gentleman. Your honour's claret is good enough for
me." And so, the dinner over, the host said, " Hang
saving, bring us up a ha'porth of cheese."

The cloth was now taken away, and a bottle of
Burgundy was set down, of which the ladies were
invited to partake before they went to their tea. When
they withdrew the gentlemen promised to join them
in an hour ; fresh bottles were brought, the " dead
men," meaning the empty bottles, removed ; and
" d'you hear, John ? bring clean glasses," my Lord
Smart said. On which the gallant Colonel Alwit said,
" I'll keep my glass ; for wine is the best liquor to
wash glasses in."

After an hour the gentlemen joined the ladies,
and then they all sate and played quadrille until
three o'clock in the morning, when the chairs and
the flambeaux came, and this noble company went
to bed.

STEELE. 155

Such were manners six or seven score years ago.
I draw no inference from this queer picture — let all
moralists here present deduce their own. Fancy the
moral condition of that society in which a lady of
fashion joked with a footman, and carved a great
shoulder of veal, and provided besides a sirloin, a
goose, hare, rabbit, chickens, partridges, black-pud-
dings, and a ham for a dinner for eight Christians.
What — what could have been the condition of that
polite world in which people openly ate goose after
almond pudding, and took their soup in the middle of
dinner ? Fancy a colonel in the Guards putting his
hand into a dish of beignets d'ahricot, and helping his
neighbour, a young lady du monde ! Fancy a noble
lord calling out to the servants, before the ladies at his
table, " Hang expense, bring us a ha'porth of cheese !"
Such were the ladies of Saint James's — such were the
frequenters of White's Chocolate House, when Swift
used to visit it, and Steele described it as the centre
of pleasure, gallantry and entertainment, a hundred
and forty years ago !

Dennis who ran a muck at the literary society of his
day, falls foul of poor Steele, and thus depicts him, — ■

" Sir John Edgar, of the Comity of in Ireland is

of a middle stature, broad shoulders, thick legs, a
shape like the picture of somebody over a farmer's
chimney — a short chin, a short nose, a short forehead
a broad, flat face, and a dusky countenance. Yet with

156 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

such a face and such a shape, he discovered at sixty
that he took himself for a beauty, and appeared to be
more mortified at being told that he was ugly, than he
was by any reflection made upon his honour or
understanding.

" He is a gentleman born, witness himself, of very
honourable family ; certainly of a very ancient one, for
his ancestors flourished in Tipperary long before the
Enghsh ever set foot in Ireland. He has testimony
of this more authentic than tlie Heralds' Oflice, or any
human testimony. For God has marked him more
abundantly than he did Cain, and stamped his native
country on his face, his understanding, his writings,
his actions, his passions, and above all his vanity.
The Hibernian brogue is still upon all these, though
long habit and length of days have worn it off liis
tongue.'"

^ Steele replied to Dennis in an " Answer to a Whimsical Pamphlet,
called the Character of Sir John Edgar." What Steele had to say
against the cross-grained old Critic discovers a great deal of humour :

" Thou never did'st let the sun into thy garret, for fear he should
bring a bailiff along with him

" Your years are about sixty-five, an ugly vinegar face, that if you
had any command you would be obeyed out of fear, from your ill-nature
pictured there ; not from any other motive. Your height is about
some five feet five inches. You see I can give your exact measure as
well as if I had taken your dimension with a good cudgel, which I
promise you to do as soon as ever I have the good fortune to meet
you

" Your doughty paunch stands before you like a firkin of butter, and
your duck-legs seem to be cast for carrying burdens.

"Thy works ai'e libels upon others, and satires upon thyself; and

STEELE. 157

Altliougii this portrait is the work of a man who
was neither the friend of Steele, nor of any other man
alive ; yet there is a dreadful resemblance to the
original, in the savage and exaggerated traits of the
caricature, and every body who knows him must
recognise Dick Steele. Dick set about almost all the
midertakings of his life with inadequate means, and,
as he took and furnished a house with the most
generous intentions towards his friends, the most ten-
der gallantry towards his wife, and with this only
drawback, that he had not wherewithal to pay the
rent when Quarter-day came, — so, in his life he pro-
posed to himself the most magnificent schemes of

while they bark at men of sense call him knave and fool that wrote
them. Thou hast a great antipathy to thy own species ; and hatest the
sight of a fool, but in thy glass."

Steele had been kind to Dennis, and once got arrested on account of
a pecuniary service which he did him. When John heard of the fact
— "S'death!" cries John; "why did not he keep out of the way as
I did?"

The '' Answer " concludes by mentioning that Gibber had offered Ten
Pounds for the discovery of the authorship of Dennis's pamphlet ; on
which, says Steele —

" I am only sorry he has offered so much, because the ttcentieth part
would have over-valued his whole carcase. But I know the fellow that
he keeps to give answers to his creditors will betray him ; for he gave
me his word to bring officers on the top of the house that should make
a hole through the ceiling of his garret, and so bring him to the
punishment he deserves. Some people think this expedient out of the
way, and that he would make his escape upon hearing the least noise.
I say so too ; but it takes him up half an hour every night to fortify
himself with his old hair trunk, two or three joint stools, and some
other lumber, which he ties together with cords so fast that it takes
him up the same time in the morning to release himself."

158 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

virtue, forbearance, public and private good, and the
advancement of his own and the national religion ; but
when he had to pay for these articles — so difficult to
purchase and so costly to maintain — poor Dick's
money was not forthcoming : and when Virtue called
with her little bill, Dick made a shuffling excuse that
he could not see her that morning, having a headache
from being tipsy over night; or when stern Duty
rapped at the door with his account, Dick was absent
and not ready to pay. He was shirking at the tavern;
or had some particular business (of somebody's else)
at the ordinary : or he was in hiding, or worse than
in hiding, in the lock-up house. What a situation for
a man ! — for a philanthropist — for a lover of right and
truth — for a magnificent designer and schemer ! Not
to dare to look in the face the Beligion which he
adored and which he had offended : to have to shirk
down back lanes and alleys, so as to avoid the friend
whom he loved and who had trusted him — to have the
house which he had intended for his wife, whom he
loved passionately, and for her ladyship's company
which he wished to entertain splendidly, in the posses-
sion of a bailiff's man, with a crowd of little creditors,
— grocers, butchers, and small-coal men, Imgering
round the door with their bills and jeering at him.
Alas ! for poor Dick Steele ! For nobody else of
course. There is no man or woman in our time who
makes fine projects and gives them up from idleness

STEELE. 159

or want of means. When Duty calls upon us, we no
doubt are always at home and ready to pay that grim
tax-gatherer. When we are stricken with remorse and
promise reform, we keep our promise, and are never
angry, or idle, or extravagant any more. There are
no chambers in our hearts, destined for family friends
and affections, and now occupied by some Sin's
emissary and bailiff in possession. There are no Kttle
sins, shabby peccadilloes, importunate remembrances,
or disappointed holders of our promises to reform,
hovering at our steps, or knocking at our door ! Of
course not. We are living in the nineteenth century,
and poor Dick Steele stumbled and got up again,
and got into jail and out again, and sinned and
repented ; and loved and suffered ; and lived and died
scores of years ago. Peace be with him ! Let us
think gently of one who v/as so gentle : let us speak
kindly of one whose own breast exuberated with
human kindness.

LECTURE THE EOURTH.

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE.

Matthew Prior was one of those famous and lucky-
wits of the auspicious reign of Queen Anne, whose
name it behoves us not to pass over. Mat was a
world-philosopher of no small genius, good nature, and
acumen/ He loved, he drank, he sang. He describes
himself, in one of his lyrics, "in a little Dutch chaise

^ Gay calls him — " Dear Prior .... beloved by every muse." — Mr.
Popes Welcome from Greece.

Swift and Prior were very intimate, and he is frequently mentioned
in the ''Journal to Stella." "Mr. Prior," says Swift, "walks to make

himself fat, and I to keep myself down We often walk round

the park together."

In Swift's works there is a curious tract called " Remarks on the
Characters of the Court of Queen Anne" [Scott's edition, vol. xii.]
The "Remarks" are not by the Dean ; but at the end of each is an
addition in italics from his hand, and these are always characteristic.
Thus, to the Duke of Marlborough, he adds, " Detestably Covetous" &c.
Prior is thus noticed —

"Matthew Prior, Esq., Commissioner of Trade.

" On the Queen's accession to the throne, he was continued in his
office ; is very well at court with the ministry, and is an entire creature
of my Lord Jersey's, whom he supports by his advice ; is one of the

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 161

on a Saturday niglit ; on his left hand his Horace, and
a friend on his right," going out of town from the
Hague to pass that evening and the ensuing Sunday,
boozing at a Spiel-haus with his companions, perhaps
bobbing for perch in a Dutch canal, and noting down,
in a strain and with a grace not unworthy of his
Epicurean master, the charms of his idleness, his
retreat, and his Batavian Chloe. A vintner's son in
Whitehall, and a distinguished pupil of Busby of the
Eod, Prior attracted some notice by writing verses at
St. John's CoUege, Cambridge, and, coming up to town,
aided Montague ' in an attack on the noble old English

best poets in England, but very factious in conversation. A thin,
hollow-looked man, turned of 40 years old. This is near the truths

" Yet counting as far as to fifty his years,

His virtues and vices were as other men's are.
High hopes he conceived and he smothered great fears,
In a life party-coloured — half pleasure, half care.

Not to business a drudge, nor to faction a slave,
He strove to make interest and freedom agree ;

In public employments industrious and grave.

And alone with his friends, Lord, how merry was be !

Now in equipage stately, now humbly on foot.

Both fortunes he tried, but to neither would trust ;
And whirled in the roimd as the wheel turned about,

He found riches had wings, and knew man was but dust."

Prior's Poems. [For my own monument.]
1 " They joined to produce a parody, entitled the ' Town and Country
Mouse," part of which Mr. Bayes is supposed to gratify his old friends
Smart and Johnson, by repeating to them. The piece is therefore
founded upon the twice-told jest of the ' Rehearsal.' . . . There is
nothing new or original in the idea ... In this piece, Prior, though
the younger man, seems to have had by far the largest shai'e." — Scott's

Dryden^ vol. i. p. 330.

M

162 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

lion Jolm Dryclen, in ridicule of whose work, " The
Hind and the Panther," he hrought out that remark-
able and famous burlesque, " The Town and Country
Mouse." Aren't you all acquainted with it? Have
you not all got it by heart ? What ! have you never
heard of it ? See what fame is made of ! The
wonderful part of the satire was, that, as a natural
consequence of " The Town and Country Mouse,"
Matthew Prior was made Secretary of Embassy at the
Hague ! I believe it is dancing, rather than singing,
which distinguishes the j^oung English diplomatists of
the present day ; and have seen them in various parts
perform that part of their duty very finely. In Prior's
time it appears a different accomplishment led to
preferment. Could you write a copy of Alcaics ? that
was the question. Could you turn out a neat epigi'am
or two ? Could you compose " The Town and Country
Mouse ? " It is manifest that, hj the possession of
this facult}^ the most difficult treaties, the laws of
foreign nations, and the interests of our own, are
easily understood. Prior rose in the diplomatic ser-
vice, and said good things that proved his sense and
his spirit. When the apartments at Versailles were
shown to him, with the victories of Louis XIV. painted
on the walls, and Prior was asked whether the palace
of the king of England had any such decorations,
" The monuments of my master's actions," Mat said,
of William, whom he cordially revered, *' are to be

PRIOE, GAY, AXD POPE. 163

seen everwhere except in liis ovra house." Bravo,
Mat! Prior rose to be full ambassador at Paris/
where he somehow was cheated out of his ambassa-
dorial plate ; and m a heroic poem, addressed by him
to her late lamented majesty Queen Anne, Mat makes
some magnificent allusions to these dishes and spoons,
of wliich Fate had deprived him. All that he wants,
he says, is her Majesty's picture; without that he can't
be happy.

" Thee, gracious Anne, tliee present I adore :
Thee, Queen of Peace, if Time and Fate have power
Higher to raise the glories of thy reign,
In words sublimer and a nobler strain.
May future bards the mighty theme rehearse.
Here, Stator Jove, and Phoebus, king of Verse,
The votive tablet I suspend."

"With that word the poem stops abrui)tly. The votive
tablet is suspended for ever like Mahomet's cofiin.
News came that the Queen was dead. Stator Jove,
and Phoebus, king of verse, were left there, hovering to
this day, over the votive tablet. The picture was never

^ " He was to have been in the same commission with the Duke of
Shrewsbury, but that that nobleman," says Johnson, " refused to be
associated with one so meanly born. Prior therefore continued to act
without a title till the Duke's return next year to England, and then he
assumed the style and dignity of embassador."

He had been thinking of slights of this sort when he wrote his
Epitaph : —

" Nobles and heralds by your leave,

Here Kes what once was Matthew Piior,
The son of Adam and of Eve ;

Can Bourbon or Nassau claim higher V

But, in this case, the old prejudice got the better of the old joke.

M 2

164 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

got any more than the spoons and dishes — the inspira-
tion ceased — the verses were not wanted — the ambas-
sador wasn't wanted. Poor Mat was re-called from his
embassy, suffered disgrace along mth his patrons,
Hved under a sort of cloud ever after, and disappeared
in Essex. When deprived of all his pensions and
emoluments, the hearty and generous Oxford pensioned
him. They played for gallant stakes — the bold men of
those days — and lived and gave splendidly.

Johnson quotes from Spence a legend, that Prior,
after spending an evening with Harley, St. John, Pope,
and Swift, would go off and smoke a pipe with a couple
of friends of his, a soldier and his wife, in Long Acre.
Those who have not read his late excellency's poems
should be warned that they smack not a httle of the
conversation of his Long Acre friends. Johnson speaks
shghtingiy of his lyrics ; but with due deference to the
great Samuel, Prior's seem to me amongst the easiest,
the richest, the most charmingly humourous of English
lyrical poems. Horace is always in his mind, and his
song, and his philosophy, his good sense, his happy
easy turns and melody, his loves, and his epicureanism,

' His epigrams have the genuine sparkle :

The Remedy worse than the Disease.

" I sent for Radcliflf; was so ill,

That other doctors gave me over :
He felt my pulse, prescribed a pill,
And I was likely to recover.

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 165

bear a great resemblance to that most delightful and
accomplished master. In reading his works, one is
struck with their modern air, as well as by their happy
similarity to the songs of the charming owner of the
Sabine farm. In his verses addressed to Halifax, he
says, writing of that endless theme to poets, the vanity
of human wishes —

" So when in fevered dreams we sink,
And, waking, taste what we desire.
The real draught but feeds the fire,
The dream is better than the drink.

" Our hopes like towering falcons aim
At objects in an airy height :
To stand aloof and view the flight,
Is all the pleasure of the game."

Would not you fancy that a poet of our own days

" But when the wit began to wheeze,

And wine had warmed the politician,
Cured yesterday of my disease,
I died last night of my physician."

" Yes, every poet is a fool ;

By demonstration Ned can show it ;
Happy could Ned's inverted rule
Prove every fool tabe a poet."

On his death-bed poor Lubin lies,

His spouse is in despair ;
With frequent sobs and mutual sighs.

They both express their care.

A different cause says Parson Sly,
The same effect may give ;

Poor Lubin fears that he shall die.
His wife that he may live."

166 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

was singing ? and, in the verses of Chloe weeping and
reproaching him for his inconstancy, where he says — •

" The God of us verse-men, you know, child, the Sun,
How after his journey, he set up his rest.
If at morning o'er earth 'tis his fancy to run,
At night he declines on his Thetis's breast.

" So, when I am wearied with wandering all day.
To thee, my delight, in the evening I come :
No matter what beauties I saw in my way ;

They were but my visits, but thou art my home 1

" Then finish, dear Cloe, this pastoral wai".
And let us like Horace and Lydia agree ;
For thou art a girl as much brighter than her.
As he was a poet sublimer than me."

If Prior read Horace, did not Thomas Moore study
Prior? Love and pleasure find singers in all days.
Roses are always blowing and fading — to-day as in that
pretty time when Prior sang of them, and of Chloe
lamenting their decay —

" She sighed, she smiled, and to the flowers
Pointing, the lovely moralist said ;
See, friend, in some few leisure hours,
See yonder what a change is made I

" Ah, me ! the blooming pride of May,
And that of Beauty are but one :
At morn both flourisht bright and gay,
Both fade at evening, pale and gone.

" At dawn poor Stella danced and sung,
The amorous youth around her bowed.
At night her fatal knell was rung ;
I saw, and kissed her in her shroud.

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 167

" Such as she is who died to day,
Such I, alas, may be to-morrow :
Go, Damon, bid the Muse display
The justice of thy Cloe's sorrow."

Damon's knell was rung in 1721. May his turf lie
lightly on him ! Deus sitpropitius huicpotatori as Walter
de Maj)es sang.' Perhaps Samuel Johnson, who spoke

^ PRIOR TO SIR THOMAS HANMER.

"Aug.i, 1709.
" Dear Sir,

" Friendship may live, I grant you, without being fed and
cherished by correspondence ; but with that additional benefit I am
of opinion it will look more cheerful and thrive better : for in this
case, as in love, though a man is sure of his own constancy, yet his
happiness depends a good deal upon the sentiments of another, and
while you and Chloe are alive, 'tis not enough that I love you both
except I am sure you both love me again ; and as one of her scrawls
fortifies my mind more against aflfliction than all Epictetus, with
Simplicius's comments into the bargain, so your single letter gave

me more real pleasure than all the works of Plato I must

return my answer to your very kind question concerning my health.
The Bath waters have done a good deal towards the recovery of it,
and the great specific, Caj^e Cahallum, will, I think, confirm it. Upon
this head I must tell you that my mare Betty grows blind, and may
one day, by breaking my neck, perfect my cure : if at Rixham fail-
any pretty nagg tliat is between thirteen and fourteen hands pre-
sented himself, and you would be pleased to pm^chase him for me,
one of your servants might ride him to Euston, and I might receive
him there. This, sir, is just as such, a thing happens. If you hear,
too, of a Welch widow, with a good joincture, that has her goings
and is not very skittish, pray be pleased to cast your eye on her for me,
too. You see, sir, the great trust I repose in your skill and honour,

when I dare put two such commissions in your hand " —

The Hcmmer Correspondence, p. 120,

FROM MR, PRIOR,

" Paris, 1st— 12th May, 1714.
"My dear Lord and Friend,

" Matthew never had so gi*eat occasion to write a word to Henry

168 ENGLISH HUMOUKISTS.

slightingly of Prior's verses, enjoyed tliem more than
he was willing to own. The old moralist had studied

as now : it is noised liere that I am soon to return. The question that
I wish I could answer to the many that ask, and to our friend Colbert
de Torcy (to whom I made your compliments in the manner you com-
manded) is, what is done for me; and to what I am recalled] It
may look like a bagatelle, what is to become of a philosopher like
me ? but it is not such : what is to become of a person who had the
honour to be chosen, and sent hither as intrusted, in the midst of a
war, with what the queen designed should make the peace ; returning
with the Lord Bolingbroke, one of the greatest men in England, and
one of the finest heads in Europe (as they say here, if true or not,
oi'impoiie) ; having been left by him in the greatest character (that of
Her Majesty's Plenipotentiary), exercising that power conjointly with
the Duke of Shrewsbury, and solely after his departure ; having here
received more distinguished honour than any ministei', except an
Ambassador, ever did, and some which were never given to any, but
who had that character; having had all the success that could be
expected, having (God be thanked !) spared no pains, at a time when
at home the peace is voted safe and honourable — at a time when the
Earl of Oxford is Lord Treasurer and Lord Bolingbroke First Seci-etary
of State ? This unfortunate person, I say, neglected, forgot, unnamed
to anything that may speak the queen satisfied with his services, or
his friends concerned as to his fortune.

" Mr. de Torcy put me quite out of countenance, the other day, by
a pity that wounded me deeper than ever did the cruelty of the late
Lord Godolphin. He said he would write to Eobin and Harry about
me. God forbid, my lord, that I should need any foreign intercession,
or owe the least to any Frenchman living, besides the decency of
behaviour and the returns of common civility. Some say I am to go
to Baden, others that I am to be added to the Commissioners for
settling the commerce. In all cases I am ready, but in the mean
time, die aliquid de tribus capellis. Neither of these two are, I presume,
honours or rewards ; neither of them (let me say to my dear Lord
Bolingbroke, and let him not be angry with me,) are what Drift may
aspire to, and what Mr. Whitworth, Avho was his fellow clerk, has or
may possess. I am far from desiiiug to lessen the great merit of the
gentleman I named, for I heartily esteem and love him ; but in this
trade of ours, my Lord, in which you are the general, as in that of

PEIOR, GAY, AXD POPE. 169

them as well as Mr. Thomas Moore, and defended
them, and showed that he remembered them very well
too, on an occasion when their morality was called in
question by that noted puritan, James Boswell, Esq.,
of Auchinleck.^

the soldiery, there is a certain right acquired by time and long service.
You wovild do anything for your Queen's service, but you would not
be contented to descend, and be degraded to a charge, no way pro-
portioned to that of Secretary of State, any more than Mr. Ross,
though he would charge a party with a halbard in his hand, would
be content all his life after to be Serjeant. Was my Lord Dartmouth,
from Secretary, returned again to be Commissioner of Trade, or from
Secretary of War, would Frank Gwin think himself kindly used to be
returned again to be Commissioner 1 In short, my lord, you have put
me above myself, and if I am to return to myself, I shall return to
something very discontented and uneasy. I am sure, my lord, you
will make the best use you can of this hint for my good. If I am
to have anything it will certainly be for Her Majesty's service, and the
credit of my friends in the Ministry, that it be done before I am
recalled from home, lest the world may think either that I have
merited to be disgraced, or that ye dare not stand by me. If nothing
is to be done, fiat voluntas Dei. I have writ to Lord Treasurer upon
this subject, and having implored your kind intercession, I promise
you it is the last remonstrance of this kind that I will ever make.
Adieu, my lord ; all honour, health, and pleasure to you.

" Yours ever,

" Matt.

" P.S. Lady Jersey is just gone from me. We drank your healths
together in Usquebaugh after our tea : we are the greatest friends
alive. Once more adieu. There is no svich thing as the 'Book of
Travels ' you mentioned ; if there be let friend Tilson send us more
particular account of them, for neither I nor Jacob Tonson can find
them. Pray send Barton back to me, I hope with some comfortable
tidings." — BoliiKjlroTce s Letters.

^ " I asked whether Prior's poems were to be printed entire ;
Johnson said they were. I mentioned Lord Hales' censure of Prior in
his preface to a collection of sacred poems, by varioxis hands, published

170 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

In the gTeat society of the wits, John Gay deserved
to be a favourite, and to have a good place. ^ In his set
all were fond of him. His success offended nobody.
He missed a fortune once or twice. He was talked of
for court favour, and hoped to win it ; but the court
favour jilted him. Craggs gave him some South-Sea
Stock ; and at one time Gay had very nearly made his
fortune. But Fortune shook her swift wings and jilted
him too : and so his friends, instead of being angry with

by him at Edinburgh a great many years ago, where he mentions ' these
impure tales, which will be the eternal opprobium of their ingenious
author.' Johnson : ' Sir, Lord Hales has forgot. There is nothing in
Prior that will excite to lewdness. If Lord Hales thinks there is, he
must be more combustible than other people.' I instanced the tale of
' Paulo Purganti and his wife.' Johnson : ' Sir, there is nothing there
but that his wife wanted to be kissed, when poor Paulo was out of
pocket. No sir. Prior is a lady's book. No lady is ashamed to have it
standing in her library.' " — Boswell's Life of Johnson.

^ Gay was of an old Devonshire family, but his pecuniary prospects
not being great, was placed in his youth in the house of a silk-mercer
in Loudon. He was born in 1688 — Pope's year, and in 1712 the
Duchess of Monmouth made him her secretaiy. Next year he
published his ''Eural Sports," which he dedicated to Pope, and so
made an acquaintance, which became a memorable friendship.

" Gay," says Pope, ''was quite a natural man, — wholly without art or
design, and spoke just what he thought and as he thought it. He dangled
for twenty years about a court, and at last was offered to be made
usher to the young princess. Secretary Cx'aggs made Gay a present
of stock in the South-Sea year ; and he was once worth 20,000^., but
lost it all again. He got about 500^. by the first Beggar's Opera, and
llOOZ. or 120UZ. by the second. He was negligent and a bad manager.
Latterly, the Duke of Queeusberry took his money into his keeping,
and let him only have what was necessary out of it, and, as he lived
with them, he could not have occasion for much. He died worth
upwards of 3000^." — Pope {Spence's Anecdotes).

PEIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 171

him, and jealous of him, were kind and fond of honest
Gay. In the portraits of the Hterary worthies of the
early part of the last century, Gay's face is the
pleasantest perhaps of all. It appears adorned with
neither perimg nor night-cap (the full dress and
negligee of learning, without which the painters of those
days scarcely ever pourtrayed wits), and he laughs at
you over his shoulder with an honest boyish glee — an
artless sweet humour. It was so kind, so gentle, so
jocular, so delightfully brisk at times, so dismally
woe-begone at others, such a natural good-creature,
that the Giants loved him. The great Swift was
gentle and sportive with him,' as the enormous Brob-
dingnag maids of honour were with little Gulliver. He
could frisk and fondle round Pope,^ and sport, and bark,

^ '* Mr. Gay is, in all regards, as honest and sincere a man as ever I
knew." — Swift, to Lady Betty Germaine, Jan. 1733.
- " Of manners gentle, of affections mild ;
In wit a man ; simplicity, a child ;
With native humom- tem'pring virtuous rage,
Fox'm'd to delight at once and lash the age ;
Above temptation in a low estate.
And uncorrupted e'en among the great :
A safe companion, and an easy fx'iend,
Unblamed through life, lamented in the end.
These are thy honours ! not that here thy bust
Is mix'd with heroes, or with kings thy dust ;
But that the worthy and the good shall say,
Striking their pensive bosoms, 'Here lies Gay.' "

Pope's Epitaph on Gay.
" A hare who, in a civil way,
Comply'd with everything, like Gay."

Fables, " The Bare and many Friends."

172 ENGLISH HUMOUKISTS.

and caper without offending the most thin-skinned of
poets and men ; and when he was jilted in that little
court affair of which we have spoken, his warm-hearted
patrons the Duke and Duchess of Queensberry/ (the

1 " I can give you no account of Gay," says Pope, curiously, " since
he was raffled for, and won back by his Duchess."— Works, Roscoeh Ed.,
vol. ix. p. 392.

Here is the letter Pope wrote to him when the death of Queen Anne
brought back Lord Clarendon from Hanover, and lost him the Secretary-
ship of that nobleman, of which he had had but a short tenure.

Gay's court prospects were never happy from this time. — His dedica-
tion of the " Shepherd's Week," to Bolingbroke, Swift used to call the
*' original sin," which had hurt him with the house of Hanover.

"Sept. 23,1714.

*'Dear Mr. Gat, —

" Welcome to your native soil ! welcome to your friends ! thrice
welcome to me ! whether returned in glory, blest with court
interest, the love and familiarity of the great, and filled with agreeable
hopes ; or melancholy with dejection, contemplative of the changes of
fortune, and doubtful for the future ; whether returned a triumphant
Whig or a depending Tory, equally all hail ! equally beloved and
welcome to me ! If happy, I am to partake of your elevation ; if
unhappy you have still a warm corner in my heart, and a retreat at
Benfield in the worst of times at your service. If you are a Tory, or
thought so by any man, I know it can proceed from nothiug but your
gratitude to a few people who endeavoured to serve you, and whose
politics were never your concern. If you are a Whig, as I rather hope,
and as I think your principles and mine (as brother poets) had ever a
bias to the side of liberty, I know you will be an honest man and an
inoffensive one. Upon the whole, I know you are incapable of being so
much of either party as to be good for nothing. Therefore, once more,
whatever you are or in whatever state you are, all hail !

" One or two of your own friends complained they had nothing from
you since the Queen's death ; I told them no man living loved Mr. Gay
better than I, yet I had not once wiitten to him in all his voyage. This
I thought a convincing proof, but truly one may be a friend to another
without telling him so every month. But they had reasons, too, them-

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 173

' Kitty, beautiful and young,' of Prior) pleaded bis cause
witb indignation, and quitted tbe court in a buff.

selves to allege in your excuse, as men who really value one
another will never want such as make their friends and themselves easy.
The late universal concern in public affairs threw us all into a hurry of
spirits : even I, who am more a philosopher than to expect anything
from any reign, was borne away with the current, and full of the expecta-
tion of the successor. During your journeys, I knew not whither to
aim a letter after you; that was a sort of shooting flying : add to this
the demand Homer had upon me, to write fifty verses a day, besides
learned notes, all of which are at a conclusion for this year. Rejoice
with me, 0 my friend ! that my labour is over ; come and make merry
with me in much feasting. We will feed among the lilies (by the lilies
I mean the ladies.) Are not the Rosalindas of Britain, as charming as
the Blousalindas of the Hague 1 or have the two great Pastoral poets of
our own nation renounced love at the same time 1 for Phillips, unnatural
Phillips, hath deserted it, yea, and in a rustic manner kicked his
Rosalind. Dr. Parnell and I have been inseparable ever since you went.
We are now at the Bath, where (if you are not, as I heartily hope,
better engaged) your company would be the greatest pleasure to us in
the world. Talk not of expenses : Homer shall support his children.
I beg a line from you, directed to the Post-house in Bath. Poor
Parnell is in an ill state of health.

" Pardon me if I add a word of advice in the poetical way. Write
something on the king, or prince, or princess. On whatsoever foot
you may be with the court, this can do no harm. I shall never
know where to end, and am confounded in the many things I have
to say to you, though they all amount but to this, that I am, entirely,
as ever,

"Your," &c.

Gay took the advice "in the poetical way," and published "An
Epistle to a Lady, occasioned by the arrival of her Royal Highness the
Princess of Wales." But, though this brought him access to Court,
and the attendance of the Prince and Princess at his farce of the
" What d'ye call it," it did not bring him a place. On the accession
of George II., he was oflfei'ed the situation of Gentleman Usher to the
Princess Louisa (her Highness being then two years old) ; but " by
this offer," says Johnson, "he thought himself insulted."

174 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

canning off with tliem into tlieir retirement their
kind, gentle, protege. With these kind, lordly folks, a
real Duke and Duchess, as delightful as those who har-
boured Don Quixotte, and loved that dear old Sancho,
Gay lived, and was lapped in cotton, and had his plate
of chicken, and his saucer of cream, and frisked, and
barked, and wheezed, and grew fat, and so ended.' He
became very melancholy, and lazy, sadly plethoric, and
only occasionally diverting in his latter days. But
everybody loved him, and the remembrance of his
pretty little tricks; and the raging old Dean of
St. Patrick's, chafing in his banishment, was afraid to
open the letter which Pope wrote him, announcing the
sad news of the death of Gay.''

' " Gay was a great eater. — ' As the French philosopher used to
prove his existence by cogito, ergo sum, the greatest proof of Gay's
existence is, edit, ergo est."

CoNGREVE, in a Letter to Pope {Spence's Anecdotes).

- Swift indorsed the letter — " On my dear friend Mr. Gay's death ;
received Dec. 1 5, but not read till the 20th, by an impulse foreboding
some misfortune."

" It was by Swift's interest that Gay was made known to Lord
Boliugbroke, and obtained his patronage." — Scott's Siolft, vol. i, p. 156.

Pope wrote on the occasion of Gay's death, to Swift, thus : —

" IDcc. 5, 1732.]

. . . " Oue of the nearest and longest ties I have ever had is
broken all on a sudden by the unfortunate death of poor Mr. Gay. An
inflammatory fever carried him out of this life in three days. . . .
He asked of you a few hours before when in acute torment by the
inflammation in his bowels and breast. . . . His sisters, we suppose,
will be his heirs, who are two widows. . . . Good God ! how often
are we to die before we go quite off this stage 1 In every fiiend
we lose a part of ourselves, and the best part. God keep those we
have left ! Few are worth praying for, and one's self the least of all."

PRIOE, GAY, AND POPE. 175

Swift's letters to him are beautiful ; and having no
purpose but kindness in writing to him, no party aim
to advocate, or slight or anger to wreak, every word
the Dean says to his favourite is natural, trustworthj'-,
and kindly. His admiration for Gay's parts and
honesty, and his laughter at his weaknesses, were alike
just and genuine. He paints his character in wonder-
ful pleasant traits of jocular satire. " I writ lately to
Mr. Pope," Swift says, writing to Gay ; " I wish you
had a little villakin in liis neighbourhood ; but you are
yet too volatile, and any lady with a coach and six horses
would carry you to Japan." "If your ramble," says Smft,
in another letter, "was on horseback, I am glad of it, on
account of your health ; but I know your arts of pack-
ing up a journey between stage-coaches and friends'
coaches — for you are as arrant a cockney as any hosier
in Cheapside. I have often had it in my head to put
it into yours, that you ought to have some great work
in scheme, which may take up seven years to finish,
besides two or three under-ones that may add another
thousand pounds to your stock, and then I shall be in
less pain about you. I know you can find dinners, but
3^ou love twelve-penny coaches too well, without con-
sidering that the interest of a whole thousand pounds
brings you but half-a-crown a day:" and then Swift
goes off from Gay to pay some grand compliments to
Her Grace the Duchess of Queensberry, in whose
sunshine Mr. Gay was basking, and in whose

176 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

radiance the Dean would have liked to warm him-
self too.

But we have Gay here before us, in these letters, —
lazy, kindly, uncommonly idle ; rather slovenly, I'm
afraid ; for ever eating and saying good things ; a little,
round, French abbe of a man, sleek, soft-handed, and
soft-hearted.

Our object in these lectures is rather to describe
the men than their works ; or to deal with the latter
only in as far as they seem to illustrate the character
of their writers. Mr. Gay's " Fables/' which were
written to benefit that amiable Prince, the Duke of
Cumberland, the warrior of Dettingen and Culloden,
I have not, I own, been able to peruse since a period
of very early youth ; and it must be confessed that
they did not effect much benefit upon the illustrious
young Prince, whose manners they were intended to
mollify, and whose natural ferocity our gentle -hearted
Satirist perhaps proposed to restrain. But the six
pastorals called the '^ Shepherd's Week," and the
burlesque poem of " Trivia," any man fond of lazy
literature will find delightful, at the present day, and
must read from beginning to end with pleasure. They
are to poetry what charming little Dresden china
figures are to sculpture : graceful, minikin, fantastic ;
with a certain beauty always accompanying them.
The pretty little i^ersonages of the pastoral, with gold
clocks to their stockmgs, and fresh satin ribbons to

PRIOR, GAY, Al!TD POPE. 177

their crooks and waistcoats and boddices, dance their

loves to a minuet-tune played on a bird-organ,

approach the charmer, or rush from the false one

damtily on their red-heeled tiptoes, and die of despair

or raptiu'e, with the most pathetic little grins and ogles ;

or repose, simpermg at each other, under an arbour of

pea- green crockery ; or piping to pretty flocks that

have just been washed with the best Naples in a stream

of Bergamot. Gay's gay plan seems to me far

pleasanter than that of Phillips — his rival and Pope's

— a serious and deary idylUc cockney ; not that Gay's

" Bumkinets and Hobnelias " are a whit more natural

than the would-be serious characters of the other

posture -master ; but the quality of this true humourist

was to laugh and make laugh, though always with a

secret Idndness and tenderness, to perform the drollest

little antics and capers, but always with a certain grace,

and to sweet music, — as you may have seen a Savoj^ard

boy abroad, with a hurdy-gurdy and a monkey, tm'ning

over head and heels, or clattering and pirouetting in a

pair of wooden shoes, yet always with a look of love and

appeal in his bright eyes, and a smile that asks and

wins affection and protection. Happy they who have

that sweet gift of nature ! It was this which made

the great folks and court ladies free and friendly

with John Gay — which made Pope and Arbuthnot

love him — which melted the savage heart of S\vift

when he thought of him — and drove away, for a

178 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

moment or two, tlie dark frenzies which obsciu*ed the
lonely tyi'ant's brain, as he heai'd Gay's voice with
its simple melody and artless linging laughter.

AVhat used to be said about Rubini, quil avait des
larmes dans la voivy may be said of Gay/ and of one
other humomist of whom we shall have to speak. In
almost every ballad of his, however slight ; ^ in the

^ " Gay, like Goldsmith, had a musical talent. ' He could play on
the flute,' says Malone, ' and was, therefore, enabled to adapt so
happUy some of the airs in the Beggat^s Opera.' " — Notes to Spenck.

- •' T'was when the se<a3 were roaring

With hollow blasts of wind,
A damsel lay deploi-ing

All on a rock reclinecL
Wide o'er the foaming billows

She cast a wistful look ;
Her head was crown'd with willows

That trembled o'er the brook.

" * Twelve months are gone and over,

And nine long tedious days ;
Why didst thou, venturous lover, —

"NMiy didbt thou tnist the seas ?
Cease, cease, thou cruel Ocean,

And let my lover rest ;
Ah ! what's thy troubled motion

To that within my breast ?

The merchant robb'd of pleasure,

Sees tempests in despair;
But what's the loss of treas\ire

To losing of my dear ]
Should you some coast be laid on,

Where gold and ditimonds grow.
You'd find a richer maiden,

But none that loves you so.

rmOK, C!AY, ANO VOVK. 170

" IV'ggjir's OiHM'M." ' mul ill its wi^irisinnc couliuuMiion
(whore i\\c wvscx nvc lo \\\c full as pic^tty as in llu>

" ' How i;ui tlu-y «:<>' (luit. Naliut>

ll:is iiotliini; mail*' in vain ;
^Vhy tluMi hiMioath tho wator

SluniKl liiiUnnis roi'ks riMnain ?
No oyos tlu> riU'Us tlisiH)vor

Tliul. link hiMUMith tho iloop.
To w ivi'k tlii> waiuloritij; lovoi*,

And Iravo tho maid to woop?'

•■ All ini>lani-lioly lyini:;,

Tims wailM sho for hor dear :
UopayM oarli Mast with Hij^hinj?,

Kiu'h biUow with a ttMO" ;
When o'cv tlu> whito wavo stooping,

His float in;;- rorpso sho spy'd ;
TluMi, liko a lily drooping,

Sho how'd luM' luNvd, and diod."

.1 luillaif. front the " W/iaf-iri/c call it."

"What can bo pvottitM* lluui Uay's ballad, ov rathor Swift's.
Arlnitlmot'H, Popo's. and (lay's, in tho 'What d'yo mil it.' "T'was
wluMi the scaa wovo roaring f* I have l)i>t>n well inroriu(>d, (ha( tlu>y all
oontrih\it,cd." — Cowprr to Univin, 17S;?.

' " l>i- Swift had boon obsorvini^ onco to Mr. (Jay. what an odd protty
siM-f. of (hm;^ a Nowgato Pastoral nii;;ht: makiv (Jay was iiuliut'd to
try at sm-h a thing, for somo titno, but alU'rwards thought it would bo
bottcM' to writo a oonunly on tho saino ]Wan. This was what gavo riso
to tho 'Beggar's OptM'a." Il«> began on it, and wIumi ho lirst nuMilionod
it to Swift, tho Dortor did not nmeh liko tho i>roioot. As ho cariied it
on, ho showotl what ho wrote to both of »is ; and we now and t lu>n ga\ f
a eoiTcetien. or a word or two of advice : but it was wholly of his own
M riling. \\'luMi it. was done*, ncitlu>r oi' ns thought it. wouhl sueei>ed.
Wo showed it to (\)ngreve. who, aftiM* readii\g it ovtM-. said. ' if. wo\dd
cither tak(> greatly or be «lanin(>d eiHifoundediy.' \\'e \\i'r(> all at. tho
fu*st night of it, in great uneertainty of the evt>nt ; till we were very
unu'h eneoiu'aged by overheai'ing the I>id;e of Argyle. who sat in tho
next, box to US, any. * it. will Ao it. must i\y) ! I sei> it. in tlu> I'yes of
them ! ■ This was a gooil \vliili> before tlu' lirst aet was over, and so

N 2

180 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

first piece, however), there is a peculiar, hinted,
pathetic sweetness and melody. It charms and melts
you. It's mdefinahle, hut it exists ; and is the pro-
perty of John Gay's and Ohver Goldsmith's best verse,
as fragrance is of a violet, or freshness of a rose.

Let me read a piece from one of his letters, which is
so famous that most people here are no doubt familiar
with it, but so delightful that it is always pleasant to
hear : —

"I have just passed part of this summer at an old romantic
seat of my Lord Harcourt's, which he lent me. It overlooks a
common hayfield, where, under the shade of a haycock, sat two
lovers — as constant as ever were found in romance — beneath a
spreading bush. The name of the one (let it sound as it will) was
John Hewet ; of the other, Sarah Drew. John was a well-set man,
about five and twenty ; Sarah, a brave woman of eighteen. John had
for several months borne the labour of the day in the same field with
Sarah ; when she milked, it was his morning and evening charge to
bring the cows to her pails. Their love was the talk, but not the
scandal, of the whole neighbourhood, for all they aimed at was the
blameless possession of each other in marriage. It was but this very
morning that he had obtained her parents' consent, and it was but till
the next week that they were to wait to be happy. Perhaps this
very day, in the intervals of their work, they were talking of their
wedding clothes; and John was now matching several kinds of
poppies and field-flowers, to make her a present of knots for the day.
While they were thus employed (it was on the last of July), a terrible
storm of thunder and lightning arose, that drove the labourei-s to
what shelter the trees or hedges afforded. Sarah, frightened and out

gave us ease soon ; for the Duke [besides his own good taste] has a
more particular research than any one now living, in discovering
the taste of the public. He was quite right in this as usual ; the
good nature of the audience appeared stronger and stronger every
act, and ended in a clamour of applause." — Pope {Spences Anecdotes.)

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 181

of breath, sunk on a haycock ; and John (who never sepai-ated from
her) sat by her side, having raked two or three heaps together, to
secure her. Immediately, there was heard so loud a crash, as if
heaven had burst asunder. The labourers, all solicitous for each
other's safety, called to one another : those that were nearest our lovers,
hearing no answer, stepped to the place where they lay : they first
saw a little smoke, and after, this faithful pair — John, with one arm
about his Sarah's neck, and the other held over her face, as if to screen
her from the lightning. They were struck dead, and already grown
stiff and cold in this tender posture. There was no mark or dis-
colouring on their bodies — only that Sarah's eyebrow was a little
singed, and a small spot between her breasts. They were buried the
next day in one grave ! "

And tlie proof that this description is delightful and
beautiful is, that the great Mr. Pope admired it so much
that he thought proper to steal it and to send it off to
a certain lady and wit, with whom he pretended to be
in love in those days — my Lord Duke of Kingston's
daughter, and married to Mr. Wortley Montagu, then
his Majesty's Ambassador at Constantinople.

We are now come to the greatest name on our list —
the highest among the poets, the highest among the
English wits and humourists with whom we have to
rank him. If the author of the " Dunciad " be not a
humourist, if the poet of the " Rape of the Lock " be
not a wit, who deserves to be called so ? Besides that
brilliant genius, and immense fame, for both of which
we should respect liim, men of letters should admii'e
him as being the greatest literary artist that England
has seen. He poKshed, he refined, he thought ; he
took thoughts from other works to adorn and complete
his own ; borrowing an idea or a cadence from another

183 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

poet as he would a figure or a simile from a flower, or
a river, stream, or any object which struck him in his
walk, or contemplation of Nature. He began to
imitate at an early age;' and taught himself to write
by copying printed books. Then he passed into the
hands of the priests, and from his first clerical master,
who came to him when he was eight years old, he went
to a school at Twyford, and another school at Hyde
Park, at which places he unlearned all that he had

1 " Waller, Spenser, and Dryden were Mr. Pope's great favourites, in
the order they are named in his first reading, till he was about twelve
years old." — Pope {Spence's Anecdotes).

" Mr. Pope's father (who was an honest merchant and dealt in
Hollands, wholesale,) was no poet, but he used to set him to make
English verses when very young. He was pretty difficult in being
pleased ; and used often to send him back to new turn them. ' These
are not good rhimes ; ' for that was my husband's word for verses. —
Pope's Mother {Spence).

'' I wrote things. I'm ashamed to say how soon. Part of an Epic
Poem when about twelve. Tlie scene of it lay at Rhodes, and some of
the neighbouring islands ; and the poem opened under water with a
description of the Court of Neptune." — Pope (Ibid).

*' His perpetual application (after he set to study, of himself,)
reduced him in four years' time to so bad a state of health, that, after
trying physicians for a good while in vain, he resolved to give way to
his distemper ; and sat down calmly in a full expectation of death in a
short time. Under this thought, he wrote letters to take a last
farewell of some of his more particular friends, and among the rest
one to the Abbd South cote. The Abbe was extremely concerned, both
for his very ill state of health and the resolution he said he had taken.
He thought there might yet be hope, and went immediately to Dr.
RadcliflFe, with whom he was well acquainted, told him Mr. Pope's
case, got full directions from him, and carried them down to Pope in
Windsor Forest. The chief thing the doctor ordered him was to apply
less, and to ride every day. The following his advice soon restored
him to his health." — Pope (Ibid).

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 183

got from liis first instructor. At twelve years old, he
went with his father into Windsor Forest, and there
learned for a few months under a fourth priest. " And
this was all the teaching I ever had," he said, " and
God knows it extended a very little way."

When he had done with his priests he took to
reading hy liimself, for which he had a very great
eagerness and enthusiasm, especially for poetry. He
learned versification from Dryden, he said. In his
youthful poem of " Alcander," he imitated every poet,
Cowley, Milton, Spenser, Statius, Homer, Virgil. In
a few years he had dipped into a great number of the
EngUsh, French, Itahan, Latin, and Greek poets.
" This I did," he says, " without any design except to
amuse myself; and got the languages hy hunting after
the stories in the several poets I read, rather than read
the books to get the languages. I followed everj^where
as my fancy led me, and was like a boy gathering flowers
in the fields and woods, just as they fell in his way.
These five or six years I looked upon as the happiest
in my life." Is not here a beautiful hohday pictm^e?
The forest and the fairy story-book — the boy speUing
Ariosto or Virgil under the trees, batthng with the Cid
for the love of Chimene, or dreaming of Armida's
garden — peace and sunshine romid about — the kindest
love and tenderness waiting for him at his quiet home
yonder — and Genius throbbing in his young heart, and
whispering to him, " You shall be great ; you shaU be

184 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

famous ; you, too, sliall love and sing ; you will sing her
so nobly that some kmd heart shall forget you are weak
and ill-formed. Every poet had a love. Fate must give
one to you too," — and day by day he wallas the forest,
very hkely looking out for that charmer. " They were
the happiest days of his life," he says, when he was
only dreaming of his fame : when he had gained that
mistress she was no consoler.

That charmer made her appearance, it would seem,
about the year 1705, when Pope was seventeen.
Letters of his are extant, addressed to a certain Lady

M , whom the youth courted, and to w^hom he

expressed his ardour in language, to say no worse of
it, that is entirely pert, odious, and affected. He
imitated love compositions as he had been imitating
love poems just before — it was a sham mistress he
courted, and a sham passion, expressed as became it.
These unlucky letters found their way into print years
afterwards, and were sold to the congenial Mr, Curll.
If any of my hearers, as I hope they may, should take
a fancy to look at Pope's correspondence, let them j)ass
over that first part of it; over, perhaps, almost all
Pope's letters to women ; in which there is a tone of
not pleasant gallantry, and, amidst a profusion of com-
pliments and politenesses, a something which makes
one distrust the little pert, prurient bard. There is
very little indeed to say about his loves, and that little
not edifying. He wrote flames and raptures and

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 185

elaborate verse and prose for Lady Mary Wortley
Montagu ; but that passion probably came to a climax
in an impertinence and was extinguished by a box on
the ear, or some such rebuff, and he began on a sudden
to hate her with a fervour much more genuine than that
of his love had been. It was a feeble, puny grimace of
love, and paltering with passion. After Mr. Pope had
sent off one of his fine compositions to Lady Mary, he
made a second draft from the rough copy, and favoured
some other friend with it. He was so charmed with
the letter of Gay's, that I have just quoted, that he
had copied that and amended it, and sent it to Lady
Mary as his own. A gentleman who writes letters a
deux fins, and after having poured out his heart to the
beloved, serves up the same dish rechauffe to a friend,
is not very much in earnest about his loves, however
much he may be in his piques and vanities when his
impertinence gets its due.

But, save that unlucky part of the Pope Corres-
pondence, I do not know, in the range of our literature,
volumes more delightful.* You live in them in the

^ MR, POPE TO THE REV. MR. BROOME, PULHAM, NORFOLK.

"Aug. 29th, 1730.
"Dear Sir, —

" I intended to write to you on this melancholy subject, the

death of Mr. Fenton, before yours came, but stayed to have informed

myself and you of the circumstances of it. All I hear is, that he felt

a gradual decay, though so early in life, and was declining for five or

six months. It was not, as I apprehended, the gout in his stomach,

but, I believe, rather a complication fii'st of gross humours, as he was

186 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

finest company in the world. A little stately, perhaps ;
a little apprete and conscious that they are speaking to

naturally corpulent, not discharging themselves as he used no sort of
exercise. No man better bore the approaches of his dissolution {as I
am told), or with less ostentation yielded up his being. The gi*eat
modesty which you know was natural to him, and the great contempt
he had for all sorts of vanity and parade, never appeared more than
in his last moments : he had a conscious satisfaction (no doubt) in
acting right, in feeling himself honest, true, and unpretending to more
than his own. So he died as he lived, with that secret, yet sufficient
contentment.

" As to any papers left behind him, I dare say they can be but few ;
for this reason, he never wrote out of vanity, or thought much of the
applause of men. I know an instance when he did his utmost to
conceal his own merit that way; and if we join to this his natural
love of ease, I fancy we must expect little of this sort : at least, I have
heard of none, except some few farther remarks on Waller (which his
cautious integrity made him leave an order to be given to Mr. Tonson),
and perhaps, though it is many years since I saw it, a translation of
the first book of 'Oppian.' He had begun a tragedy of Dion, but
made small progress in it.

" As to his other affairs, he died poor but honest, leaving no debts
or legacies, except of a few pounds to Mr. Trumball and my lady, in
token of respect, gratefulness, and mutual esteem.

" I shall, with pleasure, take upon me to draw this amiable, quiet,
deserving, unpretending, Chx-istian, unphilosophical character in his
epitaph. There truth may be spoken in a few woi'ds ; as for flourish,
and oratory, and poetry, I leave them to younger and more lively
writers, such as love writing for writing sake, and would rather show
their own fine parts than report the valuable ones of any other man.
So the elegy I renounce.

" I condole with you from my heart on the loss of so worthy a man,
and a friend to us both

" Adieu ; let us love his memory, and profit by his example. Am
veiy sincerely, dear sir,

" Your affectionate and real servant."

TO THE EARL OF BURLINGTON.

"August, 1714.
"My Lord,

" If your mare could speak she would give you an account of

PKIOE, GAY, AND POPE. 187

whole generations who are listening ; but in the tone of
their voices — pitched, as no doubt they are, beyond the

what extraordinaiy company she had on the road, which, since she
cannot do, I will.

" It was the enterprising Mr. Lin tot, the redoubtable rival of Mr
Tonson, who, mounted on a stone-horse, overtook me in Windsor
Forest. He said he heard I designed for Oxford, the seat of the Muses,
and would, as my bookseller, by all means accompany me thither.

" I asked him where he got his horse ? He answered he got it of his
publisher ; ' for that rogue, my printer (said he), disappointed me.' I
hoped to put him in good humour by a treat at the tavern of a brown
fricassee of rabbits, which cost ten shillings, with two quax'ts of wine,
besides my conversation. I thought mj-self cock-sure of his horse,
which he readily promised me, but said that Mr. Tonson had just such
another design of going to Cambridge, expecting there the copy of a

new kind of Horace from Dr. ; and if Mr. Tonson went, he was

pre-engaged to attend him, being to have the printing of the said copy.
So, in short, I borrowed this stone-horse of my pviblisher, which he
had of Mr. Oldmixon for a debt. He lent me, too, the pretty boy you
see after me. He was a smutty dog yestex'day, and cost me more than
two hours to wash the ink off his face; but the devil is a fair-
conditioned devil, and very forward in his catechism. If you have any
more bags he shall carry them.'

" I thought Mr. Lintot's civility not to be neglected, so gave the boy
a small bag containing three shirts and an Elzevir Virgil, and, mounting
in an instant, proceeded on the road, with my man before, my courteous
stationer beside, and the aforesaid devil behind.

" Mr. Lintot began in this manner : ' Kow, damn them ! "What if
they should put it into the newspaper how you and I went together to
Oxford 1 What would I care 1 If I should go down into Sussex they
would say I was gone to the Speaker ; but what of that 1 If my son
were but big enough to go on with tbe business, by G — d, I Vv'ould
keep as good company as old Jacob.'

" Hereupon, I inquired of his son. ' The lad (says he) has fine parts,
but is somewhat sickly, much as you are. I spare for nothing in his
education at Westminster. Pray, don't you think Westminster to be
the best school in England ? Most of the late Ministiy came out of it ;
so did many of this Ministry. I hope the boy will make his fortune.'

" * Don't you design to let him pass a year at Oxford V 'To what

188 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

mere conversation key — in the expression of tlieir
thoughts, their various views and natures, there is

purpose? (said he.) The Universities do but make pedants, and I
intend to breed him a man of business.'

" As Mr. Lintot was talking I observed he sat uneasy on his saddle,
for which I expressed some solicitude. ' Nothing (says he). I can
bear it well enough ; but, since we have the day before us, methinks it
would be very pleasant for you to rest awhile under the woods.'
When we were alighted, * See, here, what a mighty pretty Horace I
have in my pocket ! What, if you amused yourself in turning an ode
till we mount again 1 Lord ! if you pleased. What a clever miscel-
lany might you make at leisure hours ! ' ' Perhaps I may,' said I, * if
we ride on ; the motion is an aid to my fancy ; a round trot very
much awakens my spirits; then jog on apace, and I'll think as hard as
I can.'

" Silence ensued for a full hour ; after which Mr. Lintot lugged the
reins, stopped short, and broke out, ' Well, sir, how far have you gone 1 *
I answered, seven miles. * Z — ds, sir,' said Lintot, ' I thought you had
done seven stanzas. Oldsworth, in a ramble rovind Wimbleton-hill,
would translate a whole ode in half this time. I'll say that for Olds-
worth [though I lost by his Timothy's] he translates an ode of Horace
the quickest of any man in England. I remember Dr. King would wx'ite
verses in a tavern, three hours after he could not speak : and there is
Sir Richard, in that rumbling old chariot of his, between Fleet-ditch
and St. Giles's pound, shall make you half a Job.'

"' Pi-ay, Mr. Lintot,' (said I) ' now you talk of translators, what is your
method of managing them 1 ' Sir ' [replied he] ' these are the saddest
pack of rogues in the world : in a hungry fit, they'll swear they under-
stand all the languages in the universe. I have known one of them
take down a Greek book upon my counter, and cry, '* Ah, this is Hebrew,"
and must read it from the latter end. By G — d, I can never be sure in
these fellows, for I neither understand Greek, Latin, French, nor
Italian myself. But this is my way ; I agree with them for ten shillings
per sheet, with a proviso that, I will have their doings corrected with
whom I please ; so by one or the other they are led at last to the true
sense of an author; my judgment giving the negative to all my trans-
lators.' ' Then how are you sux-e these correctors may not impose upon
youl' 'Why I get any civil gentleman (especially any Scotchman) that
comes into my shop, to read the original to me in English ; by this I

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 189

something generous, and cheering, and ennobling.
You are in the society of men who have filled the

know whetlier my first translator be deficient, and whether my corrector
merits his money or not.

" 'I'll tell you what happened to me last month. I bargained with

S for a new version of " Lucretius," to publish against Tonson's,

agreeing to pay the author so many shillings at his producing so many
lines. He made a great progress in a very short time, and I gave it to
the corrector to compare with the Latin; but he went directly to
Creech's translation, and found it the same, word for word, all but the
first page. Now, what d'ye think I did ? I arrested the translator for
a cheat ; nay, and I stopped the corrector's pay, too, upon the proof
that he had made use of Creech instead of the original.'

" * Pray tell me next how you deal with the critics 1 ' ' Sir,' said he,
* nothing moi^e easy. I can silence the most formidable of them :
the rich ones for a sheet a-piece of the blotted manuscript, which cost me
nothing ; they'll go about with it to their acquaintance, and pretend they
had it from the author, who submitted it to their correction : this has
given some of them such an air, that in time they come to be consulted
with and dedicated to as the tip-top critics of the town. — As for the poor
critics, I'll give you one instance of my management, by which you may
guess the rest : a lean man, that looked like a very good scholar, came
to me, t'other day ; he turned over your Homer, shook his head,
shrugged up his shoulders, and pish'd at every line of it. " One would
wonder," (says he) "at the strange presumption of some men; Homer is no
such easy task as every sti'ipling, every versifier" — he was going on, when
my wife called to dinner ; " sir," said I, " will you please to eat a piece of
beef with me ? "Mr. Lintot," said he, "I am veiy sorry you should be at
the expense of this gi-eat book, I am really concerned on your account."
*' Sir, I am much obliged to you : if you can dine upon a piece of beef
together with a slice of pudding ] " — " Mr. Lintot, I do not say but Mr.
Pope, if he would condescend to advise with men of learning." — " Sir,
the pudding is upon the table, if you please to go in." My critic com-
plies ; he comes to a taste of your'poetry, and tells me in the same breath,
that the book is commendable, and the poetry excellent.

" ' Now, sii-,' continued Mr. Lintot, ' in return to the frankness I have
shown, pray tell me, is it the opinion of your friends at Court that my
Lord Lansdowne will be brought to the bar or not ]' I told him I
heard he would not, and I hoped it, my Lord being one I had parti-

190 ENGLISH HUMOUKISTS.

greatest parts in the world's story — you are with
St. John the statesman ; Peterborough the conqueror ;

cular obligations to. — ' That may be/ replied Mr. Lintot ; ' but by G —
if be is not, I shall lose the printing of a very good trial.'

" These, my Lord, are a few traits with which you discern the genius
of Mr. Lintot, which I have chosen for the subject of a letter. I
dropped him as soon as I got to Oxford, and paid a visit to my Lord

Carleton, at Middleton

" I am," &c.

DR. SWIFT TO MR. POPE.

"-Sfepi. 29, 1725.

" I am now returning to the noble scene of Dublin — into the grand
monde — for fear of burying my parts ; to signalize myself among
curates and vicars, and correct all corruptions crept in relating to the
weight of bread-and-butter through those dominions where I govern.
I have employed my time (besides ditching) in finishing, correcting,
amending, and transcribing my travels [Gulliver's], in four parts
complete, newly augmented, and intended for the press when the
world shall deserve them, or rather, when a printer shall be found
brave enough to venture his ears. I like the scheme of our meeting
after distresses and dissensions ; but the chief end I propose to
myself in all my labours is to vex the world rather than divert it ; and
if could I compass that design without hurting my own person or
fortune, I would be the most indefatigable writer you have ever seen,
without reading. I am exceedingly pleased that you have done with
translations ; Lord Treasurer Oxford often lamented that a i-ascally
world should lay you under a necessity of misemploying your
genius for so long a time ; but since you will now be so much
better employed, when you think of the world, give it one lash the
more at my request. I have ever hated all societies, professions, and
communities ; and all my love is towards individuals, — for instance, I
hate the tribe of lawyers, but I love Counsellor Such-a-one and Judge
Such-a-one : it is so with physicians (I will not speak of my own trade),
soldiers, English, Scotch, French, and the rest. But principally I hate
and detest that animal called man — although I heartily love John,
Peter, Thomas, and so on.

. ..." I have got materials towards a treatise proving the falsity of
that definition animal rationale, and to show it should be only rationis
capax The matter is so clear that it will admit of no

PRIOR, GAY, Al^D POPE. 191

Swift, the greatest wit of all times ; Gay, the kindliest
laugher — it is a privilege to sit in that company.

dispute — nay, I will hold a hundred pounds that you and I agree in

the point

" Dr. Lewis sent me an account of Dr. Arbuthnot's illness, which is
a very sensible affliction to me, who, by living so long out of the
world, have lost that hardness of heart contracted by years and
general conversation. I am daily losing friends, and neither seeking
nor getting others. Oh if the world had but a dozen of Arbuthnots
in it, I would burn my * Travels !'"

MR. POPE TO DR. SWIFT.

" Octoler 15, 1725.

''I am wonderfully pleased with the suddenness of your kind
answer. It makes me hope you are coming towards us, and that you

incline more and more to your old friends Here is one [Lord

Bolingbroke] who was once a powerful planet, but has now (after long
experience of all that comes of shining) learned to be content with
returning to his first point without the thought or ambition of shining
at all. Here is another [Edward, Earl of Oxford], who thinks one of
the greatest glories of his father was to have distingtiished and loved
you, and who loves you hereditarily. Here is Arbuthnot, recovered
from the jaws of death, and more pleased with the hope of seeing you.
again than of reviewing a world, every part of which he has long
despised but what is made up of a few men like yourself. ....

" Our friend Gay is used as the friends of Tories are by Whigs — and
generally by Tories too. Because he had humour, he was supposed to
have dealt with Dr. Swift, in like manner as when anyone had learning
foi'merly, he was thought to have dealt with the devil

" Lord Bolingbroke had not the least harm by his fall ; I wish he had
received no more by his other fall. But Lord Bolingbroke is the most
improved mind since you saw him, that ever was improved without
shifting into a new body, or being paullo minus ah angelis. I have
often imagined to myself, that if ever all of us meet again, after so
many varieties and changes, after so much of the old world and of the
old man in each of us has been altered, that scarce a single thought of
the one, any more than a single action of the other, remains just the
same ; I have fancied, I say, that we should meet like the righteous in
the millennium, quite at peace, divested of all our former passions,

192 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Deliglitful and generous banquet ! with a little faith
and a little fancy any one of us here may enjoy it, and
conjure up those great figures out of the past, and
listen to their wit and wisdom. Mind that there is
always a certain cachet about great men — they may be
as mean on many points as you or I, but they carry
their great air — they speak of common life more
largely and generously than common men do — they
regard the world with a manlier countenance, and see
its real features more fairly than the timid shufflers
who only dare to look up at life through blinkers, or
to have an opinion when there is a crowd to back it.
He who reads these noble records of a past age,
salutes and reverences the great spirits who adorn it.
You may go home now and talk with St. John ; you
may take a volume from your hbrary and listen to
Swift and Pope.

Might I give counsel to any young hearer, I would
say to him, try to frequent the company of your betters.
In books and life that is the most wholesome society ;
learn to admire rightly ; the great pleasure of life is that.
Note what the great men admired ; they admired great
things : narrow spirits admire basely, and worship

smiling at our past follies, and content to enjoy the kingdom of
the just in tranquillity.

******
" I designed to have left the following page for Dr. Arbuthnot to fill,
but he is so touched with the period in yours to me, concerning him,
that he intends to answer it by a whole letter." * * *

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 193

meanly. I know nothing in any story more gallant
and cheering, than the love and friendship which this
company of famous men bore towards one another.
There never has been a society of men more friendly,
as there never was one more illustrious. Who dares
quarrel with Mr. Pope, great and famous himself, for
liking the society of men great and famous ? and for
lildng them for the qualities which made them so ? A
mere pretty fellow from "White's could not have written
the " Patriot King," and would very likely have
despised little Mr. Pope, tlie decrepit Papist, whom
the great St. John held to be one of the best and
greatest of men : a mere nobleman of the Court could
no more have won Barcelona, than he could have written
Peterborough's letters to Pope,* which are as witty as

1 Of the Earl of Peterborough, Walpole says :— " He was one of
those men of careless wit, and negligent grace, who scatter a thousand
bons mots and idle verses, which we painful compilers gather and hoard,
till the authors stare to find themselves authors. Such was this Lord,
of an advantageous figure, and enterprising spirit ; as gallant as Amadis
and as brave ; but a little more expeditious in his journeys ; for he is
said to have seen more kings and more postilions than any man in
Europe. ... He was a man, as his friend said, who would neither
live nor die like any other mortal."

FROM THE EARL OP PETERBOROUGH TO POPE.

" You must receive my letter with a just impartiality, and give grains
of allowance for a gloomy or rainy day ; I sink grievously with the
weather-glass, and am quite spiritless when oppressed with the thoughts
of a birthday or a return.

" Dutiful alFection was bringing me to town, but uudutiful laziness,
and being much out of order keep me in the country: however, if

alive I must make my appearance at the birthday

o

194 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

Congreve : a mere Irish Dean could not liave written
" Gulliver ; " and all these men loved Pope, and Pope
loved all these men. To name his friends is to name
the best men of his time. Addison had a senate ; Pope
reverenced his equals. He spoke of Swift with respect
and admiration always. His admiration for Boling-
broke was so great, that when some one said of his
friend, " There is something in that great man which
looks as if he was placed here by mistake," " Yes,"
Pope answered, " and when the comet appeared to us
a month or two ago, I had sometimes an imagination
that it might possibly be come to carry him home, as
a coach comes to one's door for visitors." So these
great spirits spoke of one another. Show me six of the
dullest middle-aged gentlemen that ever dawdled round
a club -table, so faithful and so friendly.

We have said before that the chief wits of this time,

" You seem to think it vexatious that I shall allow you but one
woman at a time either to praise or love. If I dispute with you on this
point, I doubt, every fairy will gfve a verdict against me. So sir, with a
Mahometan indulgence, I allow you pluralities, the favouiite privileges
of our church.

'' I find you don't mend upon correction ; again I tell you you must

not think of women in a reasonable way : you know we always make

Goddesses of those we adore upon earth ; and do not all the good

men tell us we must lay aside reason in what relates to the Deity ?

. . . I should have been glad of anything of Swift's. Pray when

you write to him next, tell him I expect him with impatience, in a place

as odd and as out of the way as himself.

« Tour's."

Peterborough married Mrs. Anastasia Robinson, the celebrated singer.

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 195

witli the exception of Congreve, were wliat we should now
call men's men. They spent many hours of the four-
and-twenty, a fourth part of each day nearly, in ckibs,
and coffee-houses, where they dined, drank, and smoked.
Wit and news went by word of mouth; a journal of
1710 contained the very smallest portion of one or the
other. The chiefs spoke, the faithful habitues sate
around ; strangers came to wonder and listen. Old
Dryden had his head-quarters at Will's, in EusseU-
street, at the corner of Bow-street, at which place Pope
saw him when he was twelve years old. The company
used to assemble on the first floor — what was called
the dining-room floor in those days — and sate at various
tables smoking their pipes. It is recorded that the beaux
of the day thought it a great honour to be allowed to
take a pinch out of Dryden' s snuff-box. When Addison
began to reign, he with a certam crafty propriety — a
policy let us call it — which belonged to his nature, set
up his court, and appointed the officers of his royal
house. His palace was Button's, opposite Will's.* A

^ " Button had been a servant in the^ Countess of Warwick's family,
who, under the patronage of Addison, kept a coffee-house on the south
side of Russell-street, about two doors from Covent Garden. Here it
was that the wits of that time used to assemble. It is said that
when Addison had suffered any vexation from the Countess, he with-
drew the company from Button's house,

" From the coffee-house he went again to a tavern, where he often
sat late and drank too much wine." — Dr. Johnson.

Will's coffee-house was on the west side of Bow-street, and " comer
of Russell-street." See " Handbook of London."

o 2

196 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

quiet opposition, a silent assertion of empire, distin-
guished this great man. Addison's ministers were
Budgell, Tickeil, Philips, Carey ; his master of the
horse, honest Dick Steele, who was what Duroc was
to Napoleon, a Hardy to Nelson ; the man who per-
formed his master's bidding, and would have cheerfully
died in his quarrel. Addison lived with these people
for seven or eight hours every day. The male society
passed over their punch-bowls and tobacco-pipes, about
as much time as ladies of that age spent over Spadille
and Manille.

For a brief space, upon coming up to town. Pope
formed part of King Joseph's court, and was his rather
too eager and obsequious humble servant.' Dick Steele,
the editor of the " Tatler," Mr. Addison's man, and his
own man too, — a person of no little figure in the world
of letters, patronised the young poet ; and set him a
task or two. Young Mr. Pope did the tasks very
quickly and smartly (he had been at the feet quite as

^ " My acquaintance with Mr. Addison commenced in 1712 : I liked
him then as well as I liked any man, and was very fond of his
conversation. It was very soon after that Mr. Addison advised me
'not to be content with the applause of half the nation.' He used
to talk much and often to me, of moderation in parties : and used
to blame his dear friend Steele for being too much of a pai-ty man.
He encouraged me in my design of translating the * Iliad,' which
was begvm that year, and finished in 1718."— Pope (Spence's Anecdotes.)

"Addison had Budgell, and I think Phillips, in the house with
him. — Gay, they would call one of my eleves. — They were angry with me
for keeping so much with Dr. Swift, and some of the late ministry." —
Pope [S^ence's Anecdotes.)

PRIOK, GAY, AND POPE. 197

a boy of AVj^clierle^^'s ' decrepit reputation, and propped
up for a year that doting old wit) : he was anxious
to be well with the men of letters, to get a footing
and a recognition. He thought it an honour to be
admitted into their company ; to have the confidence of

^ " TO MR. ALCOURT.

"/cm. 21, 1715-16.

" I know of nothing that will be so interesting to you at present as
some circumstances of the last act of that eminent comic poet and
our friend, Wycherley. He had often told me, and I doubt not he did
all his acquaintance, that he would marry as soon as his life was
despaired of Accordingly, a few days before his death, he underwent
the ceremony, and joined together those two sacraments which wise
men say we should be the last to receive ; for, if you observe,
matrimony is placed after extreme unction in our catechism, as a kind
of hint of the order of time in which they are to be taken. The old
man then lay down, satisfied in the consciousness of having, by this
one act, obliged a woman who (he was told) had merit, and shown an
heroic i-esentment of the ill-usage of his next heir. Some hundred
pounds which he had with the lady, discharged his debts ; a jointure
of 5001. a year made her a recompense ; and the nephew was left to
comfort himself as well as he could with the miserable remains of a
mortgaged estate. I saw our friend twice after this was done — less
peevish in his sickness than he used to be in his health ; neither much
afraid of dying, nor (which in him had been more likely) much
ashamed of marrying. The evening before he expired, he called his
young wife to the bedside, and earnestly entreated her not to deny
him one request — the last he should make. Upon her assurances of
consenting to it, he told her : ' My dear, it is only this — that you
will never marry an old man again.' I cannot help remarking that
sickness, which often destroys both wit and wisdom, yet seldom has
power to remove that talent which we call humour. Mr. Wycherley
showed his even in his last compliment ; though I think his request a
little hard, for why should he bar her from doubling her jointure on
the same easy terms 1

"So trivial as these circumstances are, I should not be displeased
myself to know such trifles when they concern or characterize any
eminent person. The wisest and wittiest of men arc seldom wiser or

198 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Mr. Addison's friend, Captain Steele. His eminent parts
obtained for him the honour of heralding Addison's
triumph of " Cato," with his admirable prologue, and
heading the victorious procession as it were. Not
content with this act of homage and admiration, he
wanted to distinguish himself, by assaulting Addison's
enemies, and attacked John Dennis with a prose lam-
poon, which highly offended his lofty patron. Mr.
Steele was instructed to write to Mr. Dennis and inform
him, that Mr. Pope's pamphlet against him was written
quite without Mr. Addison's approval.^ Indeed, " The
Narrative of Dr. Robert Norris on the phrenzy of
J. D.," is a vulgar and mean satire, and such a blow
as the magnificent Addison could never desire to see
any partisan of his strike, in any literary quarrel.
Pope was closely allied with Swift when he wrote this
pamphlet. It is so dirty that it has been printed in
Swift's works, too. It bears the foul marks of the
master hand. Swift admired and enjoyed with all his
heart the prodigious genius of the young Papist lad

wittier than others in these sober moments ; at least, our friend
ended much in the same character he had lived in ; and Horace's
rule for play may as well be applied to him as a playwright : —

" ' Servetvir ad imum,
Qualis ab incepto processerit et sibi constet.'

«' I am," &c.

1 ''Addison, who was no stranger to the world, probably saw the
selfishness of Pope's friendship; and, resolving that he should have
the consequences of his officiousness to himself, informed Dennis by
Steele that he was sorry for the insult." — Johnson {Life of Addison).

PEIOE, GAY, AND POPE. 199

out of Windsor Forest, who liacl never seen a University
in his life, and came and conquered the Dons and the
doctors with his wit. He applauded, and loved him, too:
and protected him, and taught him mischief, I wish
Addison could have loved him better. The best satire
that ever has been penned would never have been
written then ; and one of the best characters the world
ever knew, would have been without a flaw. But he
who had so few equals could not bear one, and Pope
was more than that. When Pope, trying for himself,
and soaring on his immortal young wings, found
that his, too, was a genius, which no pinion of
that age could follow, he rose and left Addison's
company, settling on his own eminence, and singing
his own song.

It was not possible that Pope should remain a
retainer of Mr. Addison; nor likely that after escaping
from his vassalage and assuming an independent
crown, the sovereign whose allegiance he quitted should
view him amicably.' They did not do wrong to mislike
each other. They but followed the impulse of nature, and

^ '' AVhile I was heated with what I had heard, I wrote a letter to
Mr. Addison, to let him know ' that I was not unacquainted with this
behaviour of his ; that if I was to speak of him severely in return for
it, it should not be in such a dirty way ; that I should rather tell him
himself fairly of his faults, and allow his good qualities ; and that it
should be something in the following manner.' I then subjoined the
first sketch of what has since been called my satire on Addison. He
used me very civilly ever after ; and never did me any injustice, that
I know of, from that time to his death, which was about three year«
after." — Pope {Spence's Anecdotes).

200 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

the consequence of position. Wlien Bernadotte became
heir to a throne, the Prince Royal of Sweden was
naturally Napoleon's enemy. " There are many
passions and tempers of mankind," says Mr. Addison
in the " Spectator," speaking a couple of j^ears before
their little differences between him and Mr. Pope took
place, " w^hich naturally dispose us to depress and vilify
the merit of one rising in the esteem of mankind. All
those who made their entrance into the world with the
same advantages, and w^ere once looked on as his equals,
are apt to think the fame of his merits a reflection on
their own deserts. Those, who were once his equals, envy
and defame him, because they now see him the superior ;
and those who were once his superiors, because they
look uj)on him as their equal." Did Mr. Addison,
justly perhaps thinking, that as young Mr. Pope had
not had the benefit of a university education, he
couldn't know Greek, therefore he couldn't translate
Homer, encourage his young friend, Mr. Tickell, of
Queen's, to translate that poet, and aid him with his
own know^n scholarship and skill ? ' It was natural that
Mr. Addison should doubt of the learning of an
amateur Grecian ; should have a high opinion of
Mr. Tickell, of Queen's ; and should help that ingenious

^ " That Tickell slioiild have been guilty of a villainy seems to us
highly improbable ; that Addison should have been guilty of a villainy
seems to us highly improbable ; but that these two men should have
conspired together to commit a villainy, seems, to us, improbable in a
tenfold degree." — Macaulay.

PKIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 201

youiig man. It was natural, on tlie other hand, that
Mr. Pope and Mr. Pope's friends should believe that
this counter-translation, suddenly advertised and so
long written, though Tickell's college friends had
never heard of it — though when Pope first wrote to
Addison regarding his scheme, Mr. Addison knew
nothing of the similar project of Tickell, of Queen's —
it was natural that Mr. Pope and his friends, having
interests, pensions, and prejudices of his own, should
believe that Tickell's translation was but an act of
opposition against Pope, and that they should call
Mr. Tickell's emulation Mr. Addison's envy — if envy it
were.

'* Aud were there one whose fires
True genius kindles and fair fame inspires,
Blest 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, for 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 i-eserved to blame as to commend,
A timorous foe and a suspicious friend ;
Dreading even fools, by flatterers besieged.
And so obliging that he ne'er obliged ;
Like Cato give his little senate laws.
And sit 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 ? "

202 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

"I sent tlie verses to Mr. Addison," said Pope, "and
he used me very civilly ever after." No wonder lie did.
It was sliame very likely more than fear that silenced
him. Johnson recounts an interview between Pope and
Addison after their quarrel, in which Pope was angry,
and Addison tried to be contemptuous and calm. Such
a weapon as Pope's must have pierced any scorn. It
flashes for ever, and quivers in Addison's memor}^ His
great figure looks out on us from the past — stainless
but for that — pale, calm, and beautiful: it bleeds
from that black wound. . He should be drawn, like
St. Sebastian, with that arrow in his side. As he sent
to Gay and asked his pardon, as he bade his step-son
come and see his death, be sure he had forgiven Pope,
when he made ready to show how a Christian could die.

Pope then formed part of the Addisonian court for a
short time, and describes himself in his letters as
sitting with that coterie until two o'clock in the
morning over punch and Burgundy amidst the fumes
of tobacco. To use an expression of the present day,
the "pace" of those viveurs of the former age was
awful. Peterborough lived into the very jaws of death ;
Godolphin laboured all day and gambled at night ;
Bolingbroke, ' writing to Swift, from Dawle}^, in his

1 LORD BOLINGBROKE TO THE THREE YAHOOS OF TWICKENHAM.

''July 23, 1726.
"Jonathan, Alexander, John, most excellent Triumvirs op
Parnassus, —

" Though you are probably very indiflferent where I am, or what

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 203

retirement, dating his letter at six o'clock in the
morning, and rising, as he says, refreshed, serene, and
calm, calls to mind the time of his London Hfe ; when
about that hour he used to be going to bed, surfeited
with pleasure, and jaded with business; his head often
full of schemes, and his heart as often full of anxiety.
It was too hard, too coarse a life for the sensitive,
sickly Pope. He was the only wit of the day, a friend
writes to me, who wasn't fat.^ Swift was fat ; Addison
was fat ; Steele was fat ; Gay and Thomson w^ere pre-
posterously fat — all that fuddling and punch-drinking,
that club and coffee-house boozing, shortened the lives
and enlarged the waistcoats of the men of that age.
Pope withdrew in a great measure from this boisterous
London company, and being put into an independence
by the gallant exertions of Swift ^ and his private friends,

I am doing, yet I resolve to believe the contrary. I persuade myself
that you have sent, at least fifteen times within this fortnight to
Dawley farm, and that you are extremely mortified at mj' long silence.
To relieve you, therefore, from this great anxiety of miud, I can do no
less than write a few lines to you ; and I please myself beforehand with
the vast pleasure which this epistle must needs give you. That I may
add to this pleasure, and give further ^proofs of my beneficent temper,
I will likewise inform you, that I shall be in your neighbourhood
again, by the end of next week : by which time I hope that Jonathan's
imagination of business will be succeeded by some imagination more
becoming a professor of that divine science, la bagatelle. Adieu.
Jonathan, Alexander, John, mirth be with you ! "

^ Prior must be excepted from this observation. " He was lank and
lean."

2 Swift exerted himself, very much, in promoting the " Iliad " sub-
scription ; and also introduced Pope to Harley and Bolingbroke. — Pope
realised by the " Iliad " upwards of 5000^,, which he laid out partly in

204 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

and by the enthusiastic national admiration which
justly rewarded his great achievement of the Iliad,
purchased that famous villa of Twickenham which his
song and life celebrated; duteously bringing his old
parents to live and die there, entertaining his friends
there, and making occasional visits to London in his
little chariot, in which Atterbury compared him to
" Homer in a nutshell."

"Mr. Dryden was not a genteel man," Pope quaintly
said to Spence, speaking of the manners and habits of
the famous old patriarch of Will's. With regard to
Pope's own manners, we have the best contemporary
authority that they were singularly refined and
polished. With his extraordinary sensibility, with his
known tastes, with his delicate frame, with his power
and dread of ridicule, Pope could have been no other
than what we call a highly-bred person.' His closest
friends, with the exception of Swift, were among the
delights and ornaments of the polished society of their
age. Garth,^ the accomplished and benevolent, whom

annuities, and partly in the purchase of his famous villa. Johnson
remaiks that " it would be hard to find a man so well entitled to notice
by his wit, that ever delighted so much in talking of his money."

^ "His (Pope's) voice in commoa conversation was so naturally
musical, that I remember honest Tom Southerne used always to call
him * the little nightingale,' " — Orreky.

2 Garth, whom Dryden calls "generous as his Muse," was a York-
shireman. He graduated at Cambridge, and was made M.D. in 1691.
He soon distinguished himself in his profession, by his poem of the
" Dispensary," and in society, and pronounced Dryden's funeral oration.
He was a strict Whig, a notable member of the Kit-Kat, and a

PRIOE, GAY, AND POPE. 205

Steele has described so charmingly, of whom Codring-
ton said that his character was " all beauty," and
whom Pope himself called the best of Christians with-
out knowing it ; Arbuthnot,' one of the wisest, wittiest,

friendly, convivial, able man. He was knighted by George I., with
the Duke of Marlborough's sword. He died in 1718.

^ " Arbuthnot was the son of an episcopal clergj^man in Scotland,
and belonged to an ancient and distinguished Scotch family. He was
educated at Aberdeen ; and, coming up to London — according to a
Scotch practice often enough alluded to — to make his fortune, first
made himself known by " an examination of Dr. Woodward's account
of the Deluge." He became physician, successively, to Prince George
of Denmark and to Queen Anne. He is usually allowed to have been
the most learned, as well as one of the most witty and humorous
members of the Scriblerus Club. The opinion entertained of him by
the humourists of the day is abundantly evidenced in their correspond-
ence. "When he found himself in his last illness, he wrote thus, from
his retreat at Hampstead, to Swift :

" Ea7n2)stead, Oct. 4, 1734.
" My dear and worthy Friend, —

" You have no reason to put me among the rest of your

forgetful friends, for I wrote two long letters to you, to which I never

received one word of answer. The first was about your health ; the

last I sent a great while ago, by one De la Mar. I can assure you with

great truth that none of your friends or acquaintance has a more

warm heart towards you than myself. I am going out of this

troublesome world, and you, among the rest of my friends, shall have

my last prayers and good wishes.

. ..." I came out to this place so reduced by a dropsy and an

asthma that I could neither sleep, breathe, eat nor move. I most

earnestly desired and begged of God that he would take me. Contraiy

to my expectation, upon venturing to ride (which I had forborne for

some years), I recovered my strength to a pretty considerable degree,

slept, and had my stomach again What I did, I can assure

you was not for life, but ease ; for I am at present in the case of a

man that was almost in harbour, and then blown back to sea — who

has a reasonable hope of going to a good place, and an absolute

certainty of leaving a very bad one. Not that I have any particular

206 ENGLISH HUMOUPvISTS.

most accomplished, gentlest of mankind ; Bolingbroke,
the Alcibiades of his age; the generous Oxford; the

disgust at tlie world ; for I have as great comfort in my own family
and from the kindness of my friends as any man ; but the world, in
the main, displeases me, and I have too true a presentiment of
calamities that are to befal my country. However, if I should have
the happiness to see you before I die, you will find that I enjoy the
comforts of life with my usual cheerfulness. I cannot imagine why
you are frightened from a journey to England : the reasons you assign
are not sufficient — the journey I am sure would do you good. In
general, I recommend riding, of which I have always had a good
opinion, and can now confirm it from my own experience.

'' My family give you their love and service. The great loss I
sustained in one of them gave me my first shock, and the trouble I
have with the rest to bring them to a right temper to bear the loss of
a father who loves them, and whom they love, is really a most
sensible affliction to me. I am afraid, my dear friend, we shall never
see one another more in this world. I shall, to the last moment,
preserve my love and esteem for you, being well assured you will
never leave the paths of virtue and honour ; for all that is in this
world is not worth the least deviation from the way. It will be great
pleasure to me zo hear from you sometimes ; for none are with more
sincerity than I am, my dear friend, your most faithful friend and
humble servant."

" Arbuthnot," Johnson says, " was a man of great comprehension,
skilful in his profession, versed in the sciences, acquainted with ancient
literature, and able to animate his mass of knowledge by a bright and
active imagination ; a scholar with great brilliance of wit ; a wit who
in the crowd of life, retained and discovered a noble ardour of religious
zeal."

Dugald Stewart has testified to Arbuthnot's ability in a department
of which he was particularly qualified to judge : " Let me add, that
in the list of philosophical reformers, the authors of * Martinus
Scriblei-us ' ought not to be overlooked. Their happy ridicule of the
scholastic logic and metaphysics is universally known; but few are
aware of the acuteness and sagacity displayed in their allusions to
some of the most vulnerable passages in Locke's Essay. In this part of
the work it is commonly understood that Arbuthnot had the principal
share." — See Preliminary Dissertation to Encyclo^cedia Britannica, note to
p. 242, and also note B. b. b. p. 285.

PRIOR, GAY, AN'D POPE. 207

magnificent, the witty, the famous, and chivah^ous
Peterborough : these were the fast and faithful friends of
Poi)e, the most brilliant company of friends, let us
repeat, that the world has ever seen. The favourite
recreation of his leisure hours was the society of
painters, whose art he practised. In his correspondence
are letters between him and Jervas, whose j^upil he
loved to be — Richardson, a celebrated artist of his
time, and who painted for him a portrait of his old
mother, and for whose picture he asked and thanked
Jervas in one of the most delightful letters that ever
was penned,* — and the wonderful Kneller, who bragged
more, spelt worse, and painted better than any artist of
his daj.^

^ TO MR, RICHARDSON.

" TwicJcenham, June 10, 1733.

" As I know you and I mutually desire to see one another, I hope
that this day our wishes would have met, and brought you hither.
And tliis for the very reason, which possibly might hinder you coming,
that my poor mother is dead. I thank God, her death was as easy as
her life was innocent ; and as it cost her not a groan, or even a sigh,
there is yet ujDon her covintenance such an expression of tranquillity,
nay, almost of pleasure, that it is even amiable to behold it. It would
afford the finest image of a saint expired that ever painter drew ; and
it would be the greatest obligation which even that obliging art could
ever bestow on a friend, if you could come and sketch" it for me. I
am sure, if there be no very precedent obstacle, you will leave any
common business to do this ; and I hope to see you this evening, or
to-morrow morning as early, before this winter flower is faded. I will
defer her interment till to-morrow night. I know you love me, or I
could not have written this — I could not (at this time) have written at
all. Adieu ! May you die as happy !

" Yours, &c."

2 "Mr. Pope was with Sir Godfrey Kneller one day, when his

208 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

It is affecting to note, through Pope's correspondence,
the marked way in which his friends, the greatest, the
most famous, and wittiest men of the time — generals
and statesmen, philosophers and divines, — all have a
kind word, and a kind thought for the good simple old
mother, whom Pope tended so affectionately. Those
men would have scarcely valued her, but that they
knew how much he loved her and that they pleased
him by thinking of her. If his early letters to women
are affected and insincere, whenever he speaks about
this one, it is with a childish tenderness and an almost
sacred simplicity. In 1713, when j^oung Mr. Pope
had, by a series of the most astonishing victories and
dazzling achievements, seized the crown of poetry;
and the town was in an uproar of admiration, or
hostihty, for the young chief; when Pope was issuing
his famous decrees for the translation of the Iliad;
when Dennis and the lower critics were hooting
and assailing him ; when Addison and the gentlemen
of his court were sneering with sickening hearts at the
prodigious triumphs of the young conqueror ; when
Pope, in a fever of victory, and genius, and hope, and
anger, was struggling through the crowd of shouting

nephew, a Guinea trader, came in. 'Nephew,' said Sir Godfrey, 'you
have the honour of seeing the two greatest men in the world.' — *I
don't know how great you may be,' said the Guinea man, ' but I don't
like your looks : I have often bought a man, much better than both
of you together, all muscles and bones, for ten guineas.'" — Dr.
Warburton {Spences Anecdotes).

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 209

friends and furious detractors to his temple of Fame,
his old mother writes from the country, " My deare,"
says she, "my deare, there's Mr. Blount, of Mapel
Durom, dead the same day that Mr. Ingiefield died.
Your sister is well ; hut your hrother is sick. My
service to Mrs. Blount, and all that ask of me. I
hope to hear from 3'ou, and that you are well, which is
my daily pra3'er; and this with my blessing." The
triumph marches by, and the car of the young con-
queror, the hero of a hundred brilliant victories — the
fond mother sits in the quiet cottage at home, and says,
" I send you my daity prayers, and I bless you, m}^
deare."

In our estimate of Pope's character, let us always
take into account that constant tenderness and fidelity
of affection, which pervaded and sanctified his life,
and never forget that maternal benediction.' It accom-
panied him always : his life seems purified b}^ those
artless and heartfelt prayers. And he seems to have
received and deserved the fond attachment of the
other members of his family. It is not a little touching
to read in Spence of the enthusiastic admiration with

^ Swift's mention of him as one,

" ■ whose filial piety excells,

Whatever Grecian story tells,"

is well known. And a sneer of Walpole's may be put to a better use
than he ever intended it for, apropos of this subject. — He charitably
sneers, in one of his letters, at Spence's " fondling an old mother — in
imitation of Pope ! "

p

210 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

whicli his half sister regarded him, and the simple
anecdote by which she illustrates her love. "I think
no man was ever so little fond of money." Mrs.
Rackett says about her brother, " I think my brother
when he was young read more books than any man in
the world ;" and she falls to telling stories of his school
days, and the manner in which his master at Twj^ford
ill used him. "I don't think my brother knew what
fear was," she continues ; and the accounts of Pope's
friends bear out this character for courage. When he
had exasperated the dunces, and threats of violence
and personal assault were brought to him, the daunt-
less little champion never for one instant allowed fear
to disturb him, or condescended to take any guard in
his daily walks, except occasionally his faithful dog to
bear him company. "I had rather die at once," said
the gallant little cripple, " than live in fear of those
rascals."

As for his death, it was what the noble Arbuthnot
asked and enjoyed for himself — a euthanasia — a beautiful
end. A perfect benevolence, affection, serenity, hal-
lowed the departure of that high soul. Even in the
very hallucinations of his brain, and weaknesses of his
delirium, there was something almost sacred. Spence
describes him in his last days, looking up, and with a
wrapt gaze as if something had suddenly passed before
him. He said to me " What's that ? " pointing into the
air with a very steady regard, and then looked down and

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 211

said with a smile of the greatest softness, " 'twas a
vision ? " He laughed scarcely ever, but his com-
panions describe his countenance as often illuminated
by a peculiar sweet smile.

" When," said Spence,' the kind anecdotist whom
Johnson despised, "when I was telling Lord Boling-
broke that Mr. Pope, on every catching and recovery of
his mind, was always saying something kindly of his
present or absent friends ; and that this was so sur-
prising, as it seemed to me as if humanity had out-
lasted understanding,' Lord Bolingbroke said, 'It
has so,' and then added, ^ I never in my life knew a
man who had so tender a heart for his particular
friends, or a more general friendship for mankind. I
have known him these thirty years, and value myself

more for that man's love than' Here," Spence

says, " St. John sunk his head, and lost his voice in
tears." The sob which finishes the epitaph is finer
than words. It is the cloak thrown over the father's
face in the famous Greek picture which hides the grief
and heightens it.

In Johnson's " Life of Pope," you will find described

* Joseph Spence was the son of a clergyman, near Winchester. He
was a short time at Eton, and afterwards became a Fellow of New
College, Oxford, a clergyman and professor of poetry. He was a friend
of Thomson's, whose reputation he aided. He published an " Essay on
the Odyssey" in 1726, which introduced him to Pope. Everybody
liked him. His "Anecdotes" were placed, while still in MS., at
the service of Johnson and also of Malone. They were published by
Mr. Singer in 1820,

p 2

212 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

with rather a malicious minuteness some of the personal
habits and infirmities of the great little Pope. His
body was crooked, he was so short that it was necessary
to raise his chair in order to place him on a level with
other people at table.* He was sewed up in a buckram
suit every morning and required a nurse like a child.
His contemporaries reviled these misfortunes with a
strange acrimony, and made his poor deformed person
the butt for many a bolt of heavy wit. The facetious
Mr. Dennis, in speaking of him, saj^s, " If you take
the first letter of Mr. Alexander Pope's Christian name,
and the first and last letters of his surname, you have
A. P. E." Pope catalogues, at the end of the Dunciad,
with a rueful precision, other pretty names, besides
Ape, which Dennis called him. That great critic
pronounced Mr. Pope was a little ass, a fool, a coward,
a Papist, and therefore a hater of scripture, and so
forth. It must be remembered that the pillory was a
flourishing and popular institution in those days.
Authors stood in it in the bod}^ sometimes : and dragged
their enemies thither morally, hooted them with foul
abuse, and assailed them with garbage of the gutter.

^ He speaks of Arbuthnot's having helped him through " that long
disease, my life." But not only was he so feeble as is implied in his
use of the "buckram," but" it now appears," says Mr. Peter Cunning-
ham, " from his unpublished letters, that, like Lord Hei'vey, he had
recourse to ass's-milk for the preservation of his health." It is to his
lordship's use of that simple beverage that he alludes when he says —

" Let Sporus tremble ! — A. What, that thing of silk,
Sporus, that mere white-curd of ass's milk 1 "

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 213

Poor Pope's figure was an easy one for tliose clumsy
caricaturists to draw. Any stupid hand could draw a
hunchback, and write Pope underneath. They did.
A libel was j)ublished against Pope, with such a fron-
tispiece. This kind of rude jesting was an evidence
not only of an ill nature, but a dull one. When a child
makes a pun, or a lout breaks out into a laugh, it is
some very obvious combination of words, or discrepancy
of objects, which provokes the infantine satirist, or
tickles the boorish wag ; and many of Pope's revilers
laughed, not so much because they were wicked, as
because they knew no better.

Without the utmost sensibiHty, Pope could not have
been the jDoet he was ; and through his life, however
much he protested that he disregarded their abuse, the
coarse ridicule of his opponents stung and tore him.
One of Gibber's j)amphlets coming into Pope's hands,
whilst Eichardson the painter was with him, Pope
turned round and said, " These things are my diver-
sions : " and Richardson, sitting by whilst Pope perused
the hbel, said he saw his features " writhing with
anguish." How little human nature changes ! Can't
one see that Uttle figure? Can't one fancy one is
readmg Horace? Can't one fancy one is speaking of
to-day ?

The tastes and sensibilities of Pope, which led him
to cultivate the society of persons of fine manners, or
wit, or taste, or beaut}^, caused him to shrink equally

214 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

from that shabby and boisterous crew which formed
the rank and file of literature in his time : and he
was as unjust to these men as they to him. The
delicate little creature sickened at habits and com-
pany which were quite tolerable to robuster men : and
in the famous feud between Pope and the Dunces, and
without attributing any pecuhar wrong to either, one
can quite understand how the two parties should so
hate each other. As I fancy, it was a sort of necessity
that when Pope's triumph passed, Mr. Addison and
his men should look rather contemptuously down on it
from their balcony ; so it was natural for Dennis and
Tibbaldj and Webster and Cibber^ and the worn and
hungry press-men in the crowd below^ to howl at him and
assail liim. And Pope was more savage to Grub-street,
than Grub-street was to Pope. The thong with wliich
he lashed them was dreadful; he fired upon that
howling crew such shafts of flame, and poison, he slew
and wounded so fiercely, that in reading the " Dunciad"
and the prose lampoons of Popej one feels disposed to
side against the ruthless little tyrant, at least to pity
those wretched folks upon whom he was so unmerciful.
It was Pope, and Swift to aid him^ who estabhshed
among us the Grub-street tradition. He revels in
base descriptions of poor men's want ; he gloats over
poor Dennis's garret, and flannel night-cap, and red
stockings ; he gives instructions how to find Curll's
authors, the historian at the tallow-chandler's under the

PRIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 215

blind arch in Petty France, the two translators in bed
together, the poet in the cock-loft in Budge Row, whose
landlady keeps the ladder. It was Pope, I fear, who
contributed, more than any man who ever lived, to
depreciate the literary calHng. It was not an unpros-
perous one before that time, as we have seen ; at least
there were great prizes in the profession which had
made Addison a minister, and Prior an ambassador,
and Steele a commissioner, and Swift all but a bishop.
The profession of letters was ruined by that libel of the
" Dunciad." If authors were wTetched and poor before,
if some of them lived in haylofts, of which theii' land-
ladies kept the ladders, at least nobod}^ came to disturb
them in their straw ; if three of them had but one coat
between them, the two remained invisible in the garret,
the third, at any rate, appeared decently at the coffee-
house, and paid his twopence like a gentleman. It
was Pope that dragged into light all this poverty and
meanness, and held up those wretched shifts and rags
to pubHc ridicule. It was Pope that has made gene-
rations of the reading world (dehghted with the
mischief, as who would not be that reads it ?) believe
that author and wretch, author and rags, author and
dirt, author and drink, gin, cow-heel, tripe, poverty,
duns, bailiffs, squalling children, and clamorous land-
ladies, were always associated together. The condition
of authorship began to fall from the days of the
"Dunciad : " and I believe in my heart that much of

216 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

tliat obloquy which has smce pursued our calling was
occasioned by Pope's libels and wicked wit. Everybody
read those. Everybody was familiarised with the idea
of the poor devil, the author. The manner is so capti-
vating, that young authors practise it, and begin
their career with satire. It is so easy to write, and so
pleasant to read ! to fire a shot that makes a giant
wince, j)erhaps; and fancy one's self his conqueror.
It is easy to shoot — but not as Pope did — the shafts
of his satire rise subhmely : no poet's verse ever
mounted higher than that wonderful flight with which
the " Dunciad " concludes : ' —

'* She comes, she comes ! the sable throue behold !
Of night primeval aud of Chaos old ;
Before her, Fancy's gilded clouds decay,
And all its varying i-ainbows die away ;
Wit shoots in vain its momentary fires,
The meteor drops, and in a flash expii'es.
As, one by one, at dread Medea's stz'uin
The sick'ning stars fade off tlie ethereal plain ;
As Argus' eyes, by Hermes' wand oppress'd,
Closed one by one to everlasting rest ; —
Thus, at her fell approach and secret might,
Art after Art goes out, and all is night.
See skulking Faith to her old cavern fled,
Mountains of casuistiy heaped o'er her head;
Philosophy, that leaned on Heaven before,
Shrinks to her second cause and is no more.
Religion, blushing, veils her sacred fires.
And unawares Morality expires.
Nor public flame, nor private, dares to shine,
Nor human spark is left, nor glimpse divine.

^ " He (Johnson) repeated to us, in his forcible melodious manner,
the concluding lines of the ' Dunciad.' " — Boswell.

PKIOR, GAY, AND POPE. 217

Lo ! thy dread empire, Chaos, is restored,
Light dies before thy ixncreating word ;
Thy hand, great Anarch, lets the curtaiu fall,
And universal darkness buries all." ^

In these astonisliing lines Pope reaches, I think, to
the very greatest height which his sublime art has
attained, and shows himself the equal of all poets of all
times. It is the brightest ardour, the loftiest assertion
of truth, the most generous A\isdom, illustrated by the
noblest poetic figure, and spoken in words the aptest,
grandest, and most harmonious. It is heroic courage
speaking : a splendid declaration of righteous wrath
and war. It is the gage flung down, and the silver
trumpet ringing defiance to falsehood and tyranny
deceit, dulness, superstition. It is Truth, the cham-
pion^ shining and intrepid, and fronting the great
world-tyrant with armies of slaves at his back. It is a
wonderful and victorious single combat, in that great
battle, which has always been waging since society
began.

In speaking of a Vv'ork of consummate art one does
not try to show what it actually is, for tliat were vain ;
but what it is like, and what are the sensations pro-
duced in the mind of him who views it. And in consi-
dering Poise's admirable career, I am forced into

^ " Mr. Langton informed me that he once related to Johnson (on
the authority of Spence), that Pope himself admu'ed these lines so
much that when he repeated them his voice faltered, ' And well it
might, sir,' said Johnson, ' for they are noble lines.' " — J. Boswell,
junior.

218 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

similitudes drawn from other courage and greatness,
and into comparing him with those who achieved
triumphs in actual war. I think of the works of young
Pope as I do of the actions of young Bonaparte or
young Nelson. In their common life you will find
frailties and meannesses, as great as the vices and
follies of the meanest men. But in the presence of
the great occasion, the great soul flashes out, and con-
quers transcendant. In thinking of the splendour of
Pope's young victories, of his merit, unequalled as his
renown, I hail and salute the achieving genius, and do
homage to the pen of a hero.

LECTURE THE FIFTH.

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING,

I SUPPOSE as long as novels last and authors aim at
interesting their public, there must always be in the
story a virtuous and gallant hero, a wicked monster his
opposite, and a pretty girl who finds a champion ;
bravery and virtue conquer beauty : and vice, after
seeming to triumph through a certain number of pages,
is sure to be discomfited in tlie last volume, when
justice overtakes him and honest folks come by their
own. There never was perhaps a greatly poj)ular
story but this simple plot was earned through it :
mere satiric wit is addressed to a class of readers and
thinkers quite different to those simple souls W'ho
laugh and weep over the novel. I fancy very few ladies
indeed, for instance, could be brought to like " Gulliver "
heartily, and (putting the coarseness and difference of
manners out of the question) to relish the wonderful
satire of "Jonathan Wild." In that strange apologue, the
author takes for a hero the greatest rascal, coward^

220 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

traitor, tyrant, hypocrite, that his wit and experience,
both large in this matter, could enable him to devise or
depict; he accompanies this villain through all the
actions of his life, with a grinning deference and a
wonderful mock respect : and doesn't leave him, till he
is dangling at the gallows, when the satirist makes him
a low bow and wishes the scoundrel good day.

It was not by satire of this sort, or by scorn and
contempt, that Hogarth achieved his vast popularity
and acquired his reputation.* His art is quite simple,^

^ Coleridge speaks of the " beautiful female faces " in Hogarth's
pictures, " in whom," he says, '* the satirist never extinguished that love
of beauty which belonged to him as a poet." — The Friend.

- " I was pleased with the reply of a gentleman, who, being asked
which book he esteemed most in his hbrary, answered ' Shakspeare :
being asked which he esteemed next best, replied 'Hogarth.' His
graphic representations are indeed books : they have the teeming,
fruitful, suggestive meaning of words. Other pictures we look at — his
prints we read

" The quantity of thought which Hogarth crowds into every picture
would almost uuvulgarise every subject which he might choose. . . . .

"I say not that all the ridiculotis subjects of Hogarth have neces.
Barily something in them to make us like them ; some are indifferent to
us, some in their nature repulsive, and only made interesting by the
wonderful skill and truth to nature in the painter; but I contend that
there is in most of them that sprinkling of the better nature, which,
like holy water, chases away and disperses the contagion of the bad.
They have this in them, besides, that they bring us acquainted with the
every-day human face, — they give us skill to detect those gradations of
sense and virtue (which escape the careless or fastidious observer) in
the circumstances of the world about us ; and prevent that disgust at
common life, that tcedium quotidianarum formarum, which an un-
restricted passion for ideal forms and beauties is in danger of producing.
In this, as in many other thing?, they are analogous to the best novels
of Smollett and Fielding." — Charles Lamb.

" It has been observed that Hogarth's pictures are exceedingly unlike

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, Als^D FIELDING. 221

he speaks popular parables to interest sirople hearts
and to inspire them with pleasure or pity or warning and
terror. Not one of his tales but is as easy as " Goody
Two Shoes ; " it is the moral of Tommj'-was a naughty
boy and the master flogged him, and Jacky was a good
boy and had plum cake, which pervades the whole works
of the homely and famous English moralist. And if
the moral is written in rather too large letters after the

any other representations of the same kind of subjects — that they form
a class, and have a character, peculiar to themselves. It may be worth
while to consider in what this general distinction consists.

" In the first place, they are, in the strictest sense, historical pictures ;
and if what Fielding says be true, that his novel of ' Tom Jones ' ought
to be regarded as an epic prose-poem, because it contained a regular
development of fable, manners, character, and passion, the compositions
of Hogarth, will, in like manner, be found to have a higher claim to the
title of epic pictures than many which have of late arrogated that de
nomination to themselves. When we say that Hogarth treated his
subjects historically, we mean that his works represent the manners
and humours of mankind in action, and their characters by varied
expression. Everything in his pictures has life and motion in it. Not
only does the business of the scene never stand still, but every feature
and muscle is put into full play ; the exact feeling of the moment is
brought out, and carried to its utmost height, and then instantly seized
and stamped on the canvass for ever. The expression is always taken
en 'passant, in a state of progress or change, and, as it were, at the salient

point His figures are not like the back-ground on which they

are painted : even the pictures on the wall have a peculiar look of their
own. Again, with the rapidity, variety, and scope of history, Hogarth's
heads have all the reality and correctness of portraits. He gives the
extremes of character and expression, but he gives them with perfect
truth and accuracy. This is, in fact, what distinguishes his composi-
tions from all others of the same kind, that they are equally remote

from caricature, and from mere still life His faces go to

the very verge of caricature, and yet never (we believe in any single
instance) go beyond it." — Hazlitt.

222 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

fable, we must remember how simple the scholars and
schoolmaster both were, and like neither the less because
they are so artless and honest. " It was a maxim of
Dr. Harrison's," Fielding says in " Amelia," speaking
of the benevolent divine and philosopher who represents
the good principle in that novel — " that no man can
descend below himself, in doing any act which may
contribute to protect an innocent person, or to bring a
rogue to the gallows ^ The moralists of that age had
no compunction you see ; they had not begun to be
sceptical about the theory of punishment, and thought
that the hanging of a thief was a spectacle for edifica-
tion. Masters sent their apprentices, fathers took
their children, to see Jack Sheppard or Jonathan Wild
hanged, and it was as undoubting subscribers to this
moral law, that Fielding wrote and Hogarth painted.
Except in one instance, where in the mad-house scene
in the " Rake's Progress," the girl whom he has ruined
is represented as still tending and weeping over liim in
his insanity, a glimpse of pity for his rogues never
seems to enter honest Hogarth's mind. There's not
the slightest doubt in the breast of the jolly Draco.

The famous set of pictures called " Marriage a la
Mode," and which are exhibited at Marlborough House,
in London, contains the most important and highly
wrought of the Hogarth comedies. The care and
method with which the moral grounds of these pictures
are laid is as remarkable as the wit and sldll of the

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 223

observing and dexterous artist. He has to describe the
negotiations for a marriage pending between the
daughter of a rich citizen Alderman and young Lord
Viscount Squanderfield, the dissipated son of a gouty
old Earl. Pride and pomposity appear in every accessory
surrounding the Earl. He sits in gold lace and velvet —
as how should such an Earl wear anything but velvet
and gold lace ? His coronet is everywhere : on his
footstool on which reposes one gouty toe turned out ;
on the sconces and looking-glasses ; on the dogs ;
on his lordship's very crutches ; on his great chair
of state and the great baldaquin behind him; under
which he sits pointing majestically to his pedigree,
which shows that his race is sprung from the loins of
William the Conqueror, and confronting the old
Alderman from the City, who has mounted his sword
for the occasion, and wears his Alderman's chain,
and has brought a bag full of money, mortgage deeds,
and thousand pound notes, for the arrangement of the
transaction pendmg between them. Whilst the steward
(a methodist, therefore a hypocrite and cheat, for
Hogarth scorned a pajoist and a dissenter,) is negotiating
betAveen the old couple, their children sit together,
united but apart. My lord is admiring his countenance
in the glass, while his bride is twiddling her marriage
ring on her pocket handkerchief; and listening with
rueful countenance to Counsellor Silvertongue, who
has been drawing the settlements. The girl is pretty,

224 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

but the painter, with a curious watchfulness, has taken
care to give her a likeness to her father, as in the young
Viscount's face you see a resemblance to the Earl, his
noble sire. The sense of the coronet pervades the
picture, as it is supposed to do the mind of its wearer.
The pictures round the room are sly hints indicating
the situation of the parties about to marry. A martyr
is led to the fire ; Andromeda is offered to sacrifice ;
Judith is going to slay Holofernes. There is the
ancestor of the house (in the picture it is the Earl
himself as a young man), with a comet over his head,
indicatmg that the career of the famil}^ is to be brilliant
and brief. In the second picture, the old Lord must
be dead, for Madam has now the Countess's coronet
over her bed and toilet-glass, and sits listening to that
dangerous Counsellor Silvertongue, whose portrait
now actualty hangs up in her room, whilst the counsellor
takes his ease on the sofa by her side, evidently the
familiar of the house, and the confidant of the mistress.
My lord takes his pleasure elsewhere than at home,
whither he returns jaded and tipsy from the Eose, to
find his wife yawning in her drawing-room, her whist-
party over, and the daylight streaming in ; or he
amuses himself with the very worst company abroad,
whilst his wife sits at home listening to foreign singers,
or wastes her money at auctions, or, worse still, seeks
amusement at masquerades. The dismal end is known.
My lord draws upon the counsellor, who kills him.

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 225

and is apprehended whilst endeavouring to escape. My
lady goes back perforce to the Alderman in the City,
and faints upon reading Counsellor Silvertongue's
dying speech at Tj^burn, where the counsellor has been
executed for sending his lordship out of the word.
Moral : — Don't listen to evil silver-tongued counsellors :
don't marry a man for his rank, or a woman for her
money : don't frequent foolish auctions and masquerade
balls unknown to your husband : don't have wicked
companions abroad and neglect your wife, otherwise you
will be run through the body, and ruin will ensue, and
disgrace, and Tyburn. The people are all naughty, and
Bogey carries them all off. In the " Rake's Progress,"
a loose life is ended by a similar sad catastrophe. It is
the spendthrift coming into possession of the wealth
of the paternal miser; the prodigal smTounded by
flatterers, and wasting his substance on the very
worst company ; the bailiffs, the gambling-house, and
Bedlam for an end. In the famous story of Industry
and Idleness, the moral is pointed in a manner similarly
clear. Fair-haired Frank Goodchild smiles at his
work, whilst naughty Tom Idle snores over his loom.
Frank reads the edifying ballads of Whittington and
the London 'Prentice. Whilst that reprobate Tom
Idle prefers Moll Flanders, and drinks hugely of beer,
Frank goes to church of a Sunday, and warbles hymns
from the gallery; while Tom Hes on a tomb-stone
outside playing at halfpenny-under-the-hat, with street

226 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

blackguards, and deservedly caned by the beadle,
Frank is made overseer of the business, whilst Tom
is sent to sea. Frank is taken into partnership and
marries his master's daughter, sends out broken
victuals to the poor, and listens in his night-cap and
gown with the lovely Mrs. Goodchild by his side, to
the nuptial music of the City bands and the marrow-
bones and cleavers ; whilst idle Tom, returned from
sea, shudders in a garret lest the officers are coming
to take him for picking pockets. The Worshipful
Francis Goodchild, Esq., becomes Sheriff of London,
and partakes of the most splendid dinners which
money can purchase or Alderman devour ; whilst poor
Tom is taken up in a night cellar, with that one-eyed
and disreputable accomplice who first taught him to
play chuck-farthing on a Sunday. What happens
next? Tom is brought up before the justice of his
country, in the person of Mr. Alderman Goodchild,
who weeps as he recognises his old brother 'prentice,
as Tom's one-eyed friend peaches on him, as the clerk
makes out the poor rogue's ticket for Newgate. Then
the end comes. Tom goes to Tyburn in a cart with a
coffin in it ; whilst the Eight Honourable Francis
Goodchild, Lord Mayor of London, proceeds to his
Mansion House, in his gilt coach with four footmen
and a sword-bearer, whilst the Companies of London
march in the august procession, whilst the train bands
of the City fire their pieces and get drunk in his

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, AXD FIELDING. 227

honour ; and oli cro^Yning delight and glory of all,
whilst his Majesty the King looks out from his royal
balcony, with his ribbon on his breast, and his Queen
and his star by his side, at the corner house of St.
Paul's Chui'ch-yard, where the toy-shop is now.

How the times have changed ! The new Post-of&ce
now not disadvantage ously occupies that spot where
the scaffolding is in the picture, where the tipsy train-
band-man is lurching against the post, with his wig
over one eye, and the 'prentice-boy is tr}Tng to kiss
the pretty girl in the gallery. Past away prentice -boy
and pretty girl ! Past away tipsy trainband-man with
wig and bandolier I On the spot where Tom Idle
(for whom I have an unaffected pity) made his exit
from this wicked world, and where you see the hang-
man smoking his pipe as he rechnes on the gibbet
and views the hills of Harrow or Hampstead beyond —
a splendid marble arch, a vast and modern city —
clean, airy, painted drab, populous with nursery-
maids and children, the abodes of wealth and
comfort — the elegant, the prosperous, the polite
Tyburnia rises, the most respectable district in tlie
habitable globe !

In that last plate of the London Apprentices, in
which the apotheosis of the Right Honourable Francis
Goodchild is drawn, a ragged fellow is represented in
the corner of the simple kindly piece, offering for sale
a broadside, purporting to contain an account of the

Q 2

228 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

appearance of the gliost of Tom Idle, executed at
Tyburn. Could Tom's ghost have made its appear-
ance in 1800, and not in 1747, what changes would
have been remarked by that astonished escaped
criminal ! Over that road which the hangman used
to travel constantly, and the Oxford stage twice a
week, go ten thousand carriages every day : over
yonder road, by which Dick Turj^in fled to Windsor,
and Squire Western journeyed into town, when he
came to take uj) his quarters at the Hercules Pillars
on the outsku'ts of London, what a rush of civilisation
and order flows now ! What armies of gentlemen
with umbrellas march to banks, and chambers, and
counting-houses ! What regiments of nursery-maids
and pretty infantry ; what peaceful processions of
policemen, what light broughams and what gay
carriages, what swarms of busy apprentices and
artificers, riding on omnibus-roofs, pass daily and
hourly ! Tom Idle's times are quite changed : many
of the institutions gone into disuse which were
admired in his day. There's more pity and kindness
and a better chance for poor Tom's successors now
than at that simpler period when Fielding hanged
him and Hogarth drew him.

To the student of history, these admirable works
must be invaluable, as they give us the most complete
and truthful picture of the manners, and even the
thoughts, of the past century. We look, and see pass

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 229

before us the England of a liundred years ago — the
peer in his drawing-room, the lady of fashion in her
apartraent, foreign singers surrounding her, and the
chamber filled with gew-gaws in the mode of that
day; the church, with its quaint florid architecture
and singing congregation ; the parson with his great
wig, and the beadle with his cane : all these are
represented before us, and we are sure of the truth
of the portrait. We see how the Lord Mayor dines
in state ; how the prodigal drinks and sports at the
bagnio; how the poor giii beats hemp in Bridewell;
how the tliief divides his booty and drinks his punch
at the night-cellar, and how he finishes his career at
the gibbet. We may depend upon the perfect accuracy
of these strange and varied portraits of the bygone
generation : we see one of Walpole's members of
Parliament cheered after his election, and the Heges
celebrating the event, and drinking confusion to the
Pretender : we see the grenadiers and trainbands of
the City marching out to meet the enemy ; and have
before us, with sword and firelock, and white Hano-
verian horse embroidered on the cap, the very figures
of the men who ran away with Johnny Cope, and who
conquered at CuUoden. The Yorkshire waggon rolls
into the inn-yard ; the country parson, in his jack-
boots, and his bands and short cassock, comes trotting
into town, and we fancy it is Parson Adams, with his
sermons in his j)ocket. The Salisbury fly sets forth

230 ENGLISH HFMOUKISTS.

from the old Angel — you see the imssengers entering
the great heavy vehicle, up the wooden steps, their
hats tied down with handkerchiefs over their faces,
and under their arms, sword, hanger, and case -bottle ;
the landlady — apoplectic with the liquors in her own
bar — is tugging at the bell ; the hunchbacked postillion
— he may have ridden the leaders to Humphry
Clinker — is begging a gratuity; the miser is grumbling
at the bill ; Jack of the Centurion lies on the top
of the clumsy vehicle, with a soldier by his side — it
may be SmoUet's Jack Hatchway — it has a likeness
to Lismahago. You see the suburban fair and the
strolling company of actors ; the pretty milkmaid
singing under the windows of the enraged French
musician — it is such a girl as Steele charmingly
described in the " Guardian," a few years before this
date, singing under Mr. Ironside's window in Shire-
lane, her pleasant carol of a May morning. You
see noblemen and blacklegs bawling and betting in
the Cockpit ; you see Garrick as he was arrayed in
King Richard; Macheath and Polly in the dresses
which they wore when they charmed our ancestors,
and when noblemen in blue ribbons sat on the stage
and listened to their delightful music. You see the
ragged French soldiery, in their white coats and
cockades, at Calais Gate — they are of the regiment,
very likely, which friend Koderick Kandom joined
before he was rescued by his preserver Monsieur de

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 231

Strap, mth whom he fought on the famous day of
Dettiiigen. You see the judges on the bench ; the
audience laughing in the pit ; the student in the
Oxford theatre ; the citizen on his country walk ; you
see Broughton the boxer, Sarah Malcolm the
murderess, Simon Lovat the traitor, John Wilkes
the demagogue, leering at you with that squint which
has become historical, and with that face which,
ugly as it was, he said he could make as captivating
to woman as the countenance of the handsomest beau
in town. All these sights and people are with
you. After looking in the " Kake's Progress" at
Hogarth's picture of St. James's Palace-gate, you
may people the street, but little altered within these
hundred years, with the gilded carriages and thronging
chairmen that bore the courtiers your ancestors to
Queen Caroline's drawing-room more than a hundred
years ago.

^Miat manner of man* was he who executed these

^ Hogarth (whose family name was Hogart) was the grandson of
a Westmoreland yeoman. His father, came to London, and wag an
author and schoolmaster. William was born in 1698 (according to
the most probable conjecture) in the parish of St. Martin, Ludgate.
He was early apprenticed to an engraver of arms on plate. The following
touches are from his Anecdotes of Himself (Edition of 1833.)

" As I had naturally a good eye, and a fondness for drawing, shows
of all sorts gave me uncommon pleasure when an infant ; and mimicry,
common to all children, was remarkable in me. An early access to a
neighbouring painter drew my attention from play ; and I was, at every
possible opportunity, employed in making drawings. I picked up an
acquaintance of the same turn, and soon learnt to draw the alphabet

232 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

portraits — so various, so faithful, and so admirable ?
In the London National Gallerj^ most of us have

with great correctness. My exercises, wheu at school, were more
remarkable for the oi'naments which adorned them, than for the exer-
cise itself. In the former, I soon found that blockheads with better
memories could much surpass me ; but for the latter I was particularly
distinguished. . . .

"I thought it still more unlikely that by pursuing the common
method, and copying old drawings, I could ever attain the power of
making nexo designs, which was my first and greatest ambition. I there-
fore endeavoured to habituate myself to the exercise of a sort of tech-
nical memory ; and by repeating in my own mind, the parts of which
objects were composed, I could by degrees combine and put them down
with my pencil. Thus, with all the drawbacks wliich resulted from the
circumstances I have mentioned, I had one material advantage over
my competitors, viz., the early habit I thus acquired of retaining in my
mind's eye, without coldly copying it on the spot, what ever I intended
to imitate.

" The instant I became master of my own time, I determined to qualify
myself for engraving on copper. In this I readily got employment;
and frontispieces to books, such as prints to ' Hudibras,' in twelves, &c.
soon brought me into the way. But the tribe of booksellers remained
as my father had left them .... which put me upon publishing on
my own account. But here again I had to encoimter a monopoly of
printsellers, equally mean and destructive to the ingenious ; for the first
plate I published, called 'The Taste of the Town,' in which the reigning
follies were lashed, had no sooner begun to take a run, than I found
copies of it in the print-shops, vending at half-price, while the original
prints were returned to me again, and I was thus obliged to sell the
plate for whatever these pirates pleased to give me, as there was no
place of sale but at their shops. Owing to this, and other circumstances,
by engraving, until I was near thirty, I could do little more than
maintain myself; but even then, I ivas a punctual paymaster.

*' I then married, and

[But William is going too fast here. He made 'a stolen union ' on
March 23, 1729, with Jane, daughter of Sir James Thornhill, serjeant-
painter. For some time Sir James kept his heart and his purse-strings
close, but ' soon after became both reconciled and generous to the young
couple.' — Hogarth's Works, by Nichols and Steevens, vol. i. p. 44.]

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDIKG. 233

seen the best and most carefully finished series of
his comic paintings, and the portrait of his own

" — commenced painter of small Conversation Pieces, from twelve to
fifteen inches high. This being a novelty, succeeded for a few
years."

(About this time Hogarth had summer-lodgings at South Lambeth,
and did all kinds of work, "embellishing" the "Spring Gardens" at
" Vauxhall," and the like. In 1731, he published a satirical plate against
Pope, founded on the well-known imputation against him of his having
satirised the Duke of Chandos under the name of Timon, in his poem on
Taste. The plate represented a view of Burlington House with Pope
whitewashing it, and bespattering the Duke of Chandos's coach. Pope
made no retort, and has never mentioned Hogarth.)

" Before I had done anything of much consequence in this walk, I
entertained some hopes of succeeding in what the puffers in books call
The Great Style of History Painting ; so that without having had a stroke
of this grand business before, I quitted small portraits and familiar con-
versations, and with a smile at my own temerity, commenced history-
painter, and on a great staircase at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, painted
two Scripture stories, the ' Pool of Bethesda ' and the ' Good Samaritan,'
with features seven feet high. . . . But as religion, the great pro-
moter of this style in other countries, rejected it in England, I was
unwilling to sink into a portrait mam(,facturer ; and still ambitious of
being singular, dropped all expectations of advantage from that source,
and returned to the pursuit of my former dealings with the public at
large.

" As to poi-trait-painting, the chief branch of the art by which a
painter can procure himself a tolerable livelihood, and the only one by
which a lover of money can get a fortune ; a man of veiy moderate
talents may have great success in it, as the artifice and address of a
mercer is infinitely more useful than the abilities of a painter. By the
manner in which the present race of professors in England conduct it,
that also becomes still life."

******

*' By this inundation of folly and puff" {he has been speaMng of the suc-
cess of Vanloo, who came over here in 1737), "I must confess I was much
disgusted, and determined to try if by any means I could stem the torrent,
and by opposing end it, I laughed at the pretensions of these quacks in
colouring, ridiculed their productions as feeble and contemptible, and

234^ ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

honest face, of which the bright bkie eyes shine out
from the canvass and give you an idea of that keen

asserted that it required neither taste nor talents to excel their most
popular performances. This interference excited much enmity, because,
as my opponents told me, my studies were in another way. You talk,
added they, with ineffable contempt of portrait-painting ; if it is so easy
a task, why do not you convince the world, b}?- painting a portrait your-
self] Provoked at this language, I, one day at the Academy in St.
Martin's Lane, put the following question : Supposing any man, at this
time, were to paint a portrait as well as Vandyke, would it be seen or
acknowledged, and could the artist enjoy the benefit or acquire the
reputation due to his performance 1

" They asked me in reply, If I could paint one as well 1 and I frankly
answered, I believed I could. . . .

" Of the mighty talents said to be requisite for portrait-painting, I
had not the most exalted opinion."

Let us now hear him on the question of the Academy : —

" To pester the three great estates of the empire, about twenty or
thirty students drawing after a man or a horse, appears, as must be
acknowledged, foolish enough : but the real motive is, that a few
bustling characters, who have access to people of rank, think they can
thus get a superiority over their brethren, be appointed to places, and
have salaries as in France, for telling a lad when a leg or an arm is too
long or too short. . . .

"France, ever aping the magnificence of other nations, has in its turn
assumed a foppish kind of splendour sufficient to dazzle the eyes of the
neighbouring states, and draw vast sums of money from this country. . . .

" To return to our Royal Academy ; I am told that one of their leading
objects will be, sending young men abroad to study the antique statues,
for such kind of studies may sometimes improve an exalted genius, but
they will not create it; and whatever has been the cause, this same
ti-avelling to Italy has, in several instances that I have seen, reduced
the student from nature, and led him to paint marble figures, in which
he has availed himself of the great works of antiquity, as a coward does
when he puts on the armour of an Alexander ; for, with similar pre-
tensions and similar vanity, the painter supposes he shall be adored as
a second Raphael Urbino."

We must now hear him on his " Sigismunda : " —

"As the most violent and virulent abuse thrown on * Sigismunda'

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 235

and brave look with which William Hogarth regarded
the world. No man was ever less of a hero ; you

was from a set of miscreants, with whom I am proud of having been
ever at war, I mean the expounders of the mysteries of old pictures, I
have been r.ometimes told they were beneath my notice. This is true of
them individually, but as they have access to people of rank, who seem
as happy in being cheated as these m.erchants are in cheating them, they
have a power of doing much mischief to a modern artist. However
mean the vendor of poisons the mineral is destructive : — to me its ope-
ration was troublesome enough. Ill nature spread so fast that now
was the time for every little dog in the profession to bark ! "

Next comes a characteristic account of his controversy with Wilkes
and Churchill.

" The stagnation rendered it necessary that I should do some timed
thing, to recover my lost time, and stop a gap in my income. This drew
forth my print of ' The Times,' a subject which tended to the I'estoration
of peace and unanimity, and put the opposers of these humane objects
in a light which gave great offence to those who were trying to foment
disaffection in the minds of the populace. One of the most notorious of
them, till now my friend and flatterer, attacked me in a ' North Briton,'
in so infamous and malign a style, that he himself, when pushed even
by his best friends, was driven to so poor an excuse as to say he was
drunk when he wrote it. . . .

*' This renowned patriot's portrait, drawn like as I could as to features,
and marked with some indications of his mind, fully answered my pur-
pose. The ridiculous was apparent to every eye ! A Brutus ! A saviour
of his country with such an aspect — was so arrant a fai*ce, that though
it gave rise to much laughter in the lookers-on, galled both him and his
adherents to the bone. ...

" Churchill, Wilkes's toad-echo, put the ' North Briton ' into verse,
in an Epistle to Hogarth; but as the abuse was precisely the same,
except a little poetical heightening, which goes for nothing, it made no
impression. . . . However, having an old plate by me, with some
parts ready, such as the back-ground and a dog, I began to consider how
I could turn so much work laid aside to some account, and so patched up
a print of Master Churchill in the character of a Bear. The pleasure and
pecuniary advantage which I derived from these two engravings, toge-
ther with occasionally i-iding on horseback, restored me to as much
health as can be expected at my time of life."

236 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

see him before you, and can fancy what he was — a
jovial, honest, London citizen, stout and sturdy; a
hearty, plain-spoken man,* loving his laugh, his
friends, his glass, his roast-beef of Old England, and
having a proper bourgeois scorn for French frogs, for
mounseers, and wooden shoes in general, for foreign
fiddlers, foreign singers, and, above all, for foreign
painters, whom he held in the most amusing
contempt.

It must have been great fun to hear him rage against
Correggio and the Carracci; to watch him thump the
table and snap his fingers and say, " Historical painters
be hanged ; here's the man that will paint against any

^ " It happened in the early part of Hogarth's life, that a nobleman
who was uncommonly ugly and deformed came to sit to him for his
picture. It was executed with a skill that did honour to the artist's
abilities ; but the likeness was rigidly observed, without even the neces-
sary attention to compliment or flattery. The peer, disgusted at this
counterpart of himself, never once thought of paying for a reflection that
would only disgust him with his deformities. Some time was suffered
to elapse before the artist applied for his money ; but afterwards many
applications wex-e made by him (who had then no need of a banker) for
payment, without success. The painter, however, at last hit upon an
expedient. ... It was couched in the following card : —

" ' Mr, Hogarth's dutiful respects to Lord . Finding that he does

not mean to have the picture which was drawn for him, is informed
again of Mr, Hogarth's necessity for the money. If, therefore, his Lord-
ship does not send for it, in three days, it will be disposed of, with the
addition of a tail, and some other little appendages, to Mr. Hare, the
famous wild beast man : Mr. Hogarth having given that gentleman a
conditional promise of it, for an exhibition-picture, on his Lordship's
refusal,'

"This intimation had the desired effect." — Works by Nichols and
Stcevens, vol. i. p. 25.

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 237

of them for a Imndrecl pounds. Correggio's * Sigis-
munda ! ' Look at Bill Hogarth's ' Sigismunda ;
look at my altar-piece at St. Mary Redcliffe, Bristol ;
look at my ' Paul before Felix,' and see whether I'm
not as good as the best of them." *

Posterity has not quite confirmed honest Hogarth's
opinion about his talents for the sublime. Although
Swift could not see the difference between tweedle-dee
and tweedle-dum, posterity has not shared the Dean's
contempt for Handel; the world has discovered a
difference between tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum, and
given a hearty applause and admiration to Hogarth,
too, but not exactly as a painter of scriptural subjects,
or as a rival of Correggio. It does not take away from
one's liking for the man, or from the moral of his

1 " Garrick himself was not more ductile to flattery. A word in favour
of 'Sigismunda' might have commanded, a proof-print or forced an
original print out of our artist's hands." . . ,

'• The following authenticated story of our artist (furnished by the
late Mr. Belchier, F.R.S., a surgeon of eminence) will also serve to show
how much more easy it is to detect ill-placed or hyperbolical adulation
respecting others, than when applied to ourselves. Hogarth, being at
dinner with the great Cheselden and some other company, was told that
Mr. John Freke, surgeon of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, a few evenings
before at Dick's Coffee-house, had asserted that Greene was as eminent in
composiition as Handel. ' That fellow Freke,' replied Hogarth, * is always
shooting his bolt absurdly, one way or another. Handel is a giant in
music ; Greene only a light Florimel kind of a composer.' ' Ay,' says
our artist's informant, 'but at the same time Mr. Freke declared
you were as good a portrait-painter as Vandyck.' ' There he was

right,' adds Hogarth, ' and so, by G , I am, give me my time and

let me choose my subject." — Worlcs by Nichols and Steevens, vol. i. pp.
236, 237.

238 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

story, or the humour of it, from one's admiration for
the prodigious merit of his performances, to rememher
that he persisted to the last in helieving that the world
was in a conspiracy against him with respect to his
talents as an historical painter, and that a set of mis-
creants, as he called them, were employed to run his
genius down. They say it was Liston's firm belief,
that he was a great and neglected tragic actor; they
say that every one of us believes in his heart, or would
like to have others believe, that he is something which
he is not. One of the most notorious of the " mis-
creants," Hogarth says, was Wilkes, who assailed
him in the " North Briton ; " the other was Churchill,
who put the " North Briton" attack into heroic verse,
and published his "Epistle to Hogarth." Hogarth
replied by that caricature of "Wilkes, in which the
patriot still figures before us, with his Satanic grin and
squint, and by a caricature of Churchill, in which he is
represented as a bear with a staff, on which, lie the
first, lie the second, lie the tenth, is engraved in unmis-
takeable letters. There is very little mistake about
honest Hogarth's satire : if he has to paint a man with
his throat cut, he draws him with his head almost off;
and he tried to do the same for his enemies in this
little controversy. " Having an old plate by me," says
he, " with some parts ready, such as the background,
and a dog, I began to consider how I could turn so
much work laid aside to some account, and so patched

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 239

up a print of Master Churchill, in the character of a
bear ; the pleasure and pecuniary advantage which I
derived from these two engravings, together with occa-
sionally riding on horseback, restored me to as much
health as I can expect at my time of life."

And so he concludes his queer little book of Anec-
dotes, " I have gone through the circumstances of
a life which till lately passed pretty much to my own
satisfaction, and I hope in no respect injurious to any
other man. This I may safely assert, that I have done
my best to make those about me tolerably happy, and
my greatest enemy cannot say I ever did an intentional
injury. What may follow, God knows."

A queer account still exists of a holiday jaunt taken
by Hogarth and four friends of his, who set out, like
the redoubted Mr. Pickwick and his companions, but
just a hundred years before those heroes ; and made
an excursion to Gravesend, Bochester, Sheerness, and
adjacent places.* One of the gentlemen noted down
the proceedings of the journey, for which Hogarth and
a brother artist made drawings. The book is chiefly
curious at this moment from showing the citizen life
of those days, and the rough, jolly style of merriment,
not of the five companions merely, but of thousands of
jolly fellows of their time. Hogarth and his friends

1 He made this excursion in 1732, his companions being John
Thornhill (son of Sir James), Scott the landscape-painter, Tothall, and
Forrest.

240 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

quitting the Bedford Arms, Covent Garden, with a
song, took water to Billingsgate, exchanging com-
pliments with the bargemen as they went down the
river. At Billingsgate, Hogarth made " a caracatura "
of a facetious porter, called the Duke of Puddledock,
who agreeably entertained the party with the humours
of the place. Hence they took a Gravesend boat for
themselves ; had straw to lie upon, and a tilt over their
heads, they say, and went down the river at night,
sleeping and singing jolly choruses.

They arrived at Gravesend at six, when they washed
their faces and hands, and had their wigs powdered.
Then they sallied forth for Rochester on foot, and
drank by the way three pots of ale. At one o'clock
they went to dinner with excellent port, and a quan-
tity more beer, and afterwards Hogarth and Scott
played at hopscotch in the town hall. It would
appear that they slept most of them in one room, and
the chronicler of the party describes them all as waking
at seven o'clock, and telling each other their dreams.
You have rough sketches by Hogarth of the incidents
of this holiday excursion. The sturdy little painter is
seen sprawling over a plank to a boat at Gravesend ;
the whole company are represented in one design, in a
fisherman's room, where they had all passed the night.
One gentleman in a night-cap is shaving himself ;
another is being shaved by the fisherman ; a thii'd,
with a handkerchief over his bald pate, is taking

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 241

liis breakfast ; and Hogarth is sketching the whole
scene.

They describe at night how they returned to their
quarters, drank to their friends, as usual, emptied
several cans of good flip, all singing merrily.

It is a jolly party of tradesmen engaged at highjinks.
These were the manners and pleasures of Hogarth, of
his time verylikeh^, of men not very refined, but honest
and merry. It is a brave London citizen, with John
Bull habits, prejudices, and pleasures.^

' " Dr. Johnson made four lines once, on the death of poor Hogarth,
which were equally true and pleasing : I know not why Garrick's were
preferred to them : —

" * The hand of him here torpid lies,
That drew th' essential forms of grace ;
Here closed in death, th' attentive eyes,
That saw the manners in the face.'

" Mr. Hogarth, among the variety of kindnesses shown to me when
I was too young to have a proper sense of them, was used to be very
earnest that I should obtain the acquaintance, and if possible, the friend-
ship of Dr. Johnson ; whose conversation was, to the talk of other men,
like Titian's painting compared to Hudson's, he said : ' but don't you tell
people now that I say so (continued he) for the connoisseurs and I are
at war, you know ; and because I hate them, they think I hate Titian —
and let them ! ... Of Dr. Johnson, when my father and he were
talking about him one day, 'That man (says Hogarth) is not contented
with believing the Bible ; but he fairly resolves, I think, to believe
nothing hut the Bible. Johnson (added he), though so wise a fellow, is
more like King David than King Solomon, for he says in his haste, all
men are liars.' " — Mrs. Piozzi.

Hogarth died on the 26th of October, 1764. The day before his
death, he was removed from his villa at Chiswick to Leicester Fields,
"in a very weak condition, yet remarkably cheerful." He had just
received an agreeable letter from Franklin. He lies buried at Chiswick.

243 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Of Smollett's associates, and manner of life, the
author of the admirable " Humphrey Clinker," has
given us an interesting account, in that most amusing
of novels/

^ TO SIR WATKIN PHILLIPS, BART., OF JESUS COLLEGE, OXON.

"Dear Phillips, — In my last, I mentioned my having spent an
evening with a society of authors, who seemed to be jealous and afraid
of one another. My uncle was not at all surprised to hear me say I was
disappointed in their conversation. ' A man may be very entertaining
and instructive upon paper,' said he, * and exceedingly dull in common
discourse, I have observed, that those who shine most in private com-
pany, are but secondary stars in the constellation of genius. A small
stock of ideas is more easily managed, and sooner displayed, than a
great quantity crowded together. There is very seldom anything exti-a-
ordinary in the appearance and address of a good writer ; whereas a
dull author generally distinguishes himself by some oddity or extra-
vagance. For this reason I fancy that an assembly of Grubs must be
very diverting.'

" My curiosity being excited by this hint, I consulted my friend Dick
Ivy, who undertook to gratify it the veiy next day, which was Sunday
last. He carried me to dine with S — , whom you and I have long
known by his writings. He lives in the skirts of the town ; and eveiy
Sunday his house is open to all unfortunate brothers of the quill, whom
he treats with beef, pudding, and potatoes, port, punch, and Calvert's
entire butt beer. He has fixed upon the first day of the week for the
exercise of his hospitality, because some of his guests could not enjoy
it on any other, for reasons that I need not explain. I was civilly
received in a plain, yet decent habitation, which opened backwards into
a very pleasant garden, kept in excellent order ; and, indeed, I saw none
of the outward signs of authorship either in the house or the landlord,
who is one of those few writers of the age that stand upon their own
foundation, without patronage, and above dependence. If there was
nothing characteristic in the entertainer, the company made ample
amends for his want of singularity.

"At two in the afternoon, I found myself one of ten messmates
seated at table ; and I question if the whole kingdom could produce
such another assemblage of originals. Among their peculiarities, I do
not mention those of dress, which may be purely accidental. What

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 243

I have no doubt that the above picture is as faithful
a one as an}^ from the pencil of his kindred humourist,
Hogarth.

struck me were oddities originally produced by affectation, and after-
wards confirmed by habit. One of them wore spectacles at dinner, and
another his hat flapped ; though (as Ivy told me) the fii-st was noted
for having a seaman's eye, when a bailiff was in the wind ; and the other
was never known to labour imder any weakness or defect of vision,
except about five years ago, when he was complimented with a couple
of black eyes by a player, with whom he had quarrelled in his drink.
A third wore a laced stocking, and made use of crutches, because, once
in his life, he had been laid up with a broken leg, though no man could
leap over a stick with more agility. A fourth had contracted such an
antipathy to the country, that he insisted upon sitting with his back
towards the window that looked into the garden ; and when a dish of
cauliflower was set upon the table, he snuffed up volatile salts to keep
him from fainting ; yet this delicate person was the son of a cottager,
born under a hedge, and had many years run wild among asses on a
common. A fifth affected distraction : when spoke to, he always
answered from the purpose. Sometimes he suddenly started up, and
rapped out a dreadful oath ; sometimes he burst out a laughing ; then
he folded his arms, and sighed ; and then he hissed like fifty serpents.
" At first, I really thought he was mad ; and, as he sat near me, began
to be under some apprehensions for my own safety ; when our landloi'd,
perceiving me alarmed, assured me aloud that I had nothing to fear.

* The gentleman,' said he, ' is trying to act a part for which he is by no
means qualified : if he had all the inclination in the woi'ld, it is not in
his power to be mad ; his spirits are too flat to be kindled into phrenzy.

* 'Tis no bad p-p-puff, how-owe ver,' observed a person in a tarnished laced
coat : ' aff-ffected m-madness w-will p-pass for w-wit w-with nine-ninet-
teeu out of t-twenty.' ' And affected stuttering for humour,' replied
our landlord ; * though, God knows ! there is no affinity betwixt them.'
It seems, this wag, after having made some abortive attempts in plain
speaking, had recourse to this defect, by means of which he frequently
extorted the laugh of the company, without the least expense of genius ;
and that imperfection, which he had at first counterfeited, was now
become so habitual, that he could not lay it aside.

"A certain winking genius, who wore yellow gloves at dinner, had, on
his first introduction, taken such offence at S — , because he looked and

R 2

244 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

We have before us, and painted by his own
hand, Tobias Smollett, the manly, kindly, honest and

talked, and ate and drank, like any other man, that he spoke con-
temptuously of his understanding ever after, and never would repeat
his visit, until he had exhibited the following proof of his caprice. Wat
Wyvil, the poet, having made some unsuccessful advances towards an
intimacy with S — , at last gave him to understand, by a third person,
that he had written a poem in his praise, and a satire against his person :
that if he would admit him to his house, the first should be immedi-
ately sent to press ; but that if he persisted in declining his friendship,
he would publish the satire without delay. S — replied, that he looked
upon Wyvil's panegyric as, in effect, a species of infamy, and would
resent it accordingly with a good cudgel ; but if he published the satire,
he might deserve his compassion, and had nothing to fear from his
revenge, Wyvil having considered the alternative, resolved to mortify
S — by printing the panegyric, for which he received a sound drubbing.
Then he swore the peace against the aggressor, who, in order to avoid
a prosecution at law, admitted him to his good graces. It was the
singularity in S — 's conduct, on this occasion, that reconciled him to
the yellow-gloved philosopher, who owned he had some genius ; and
from that period cultivated his acquaintance.

" Curious to know upon what subjects the several talents of my fellow-
guests were employed, I applied to my communicative friend Dick Ivy,
who gave me to understand, that most of them were, or had been,
understrappers, or journeymen, to more creditable authors, for whom
they translated, collated, and compiled, in the business of book-
making ; and that all of them had, at different times, laboured in the
service of our landlord, though they had now set up for themselves in
various departments of literature. Not only their talents, but also
their nations and dialects, were so various, that our conversation
resembled the confusion of tongues at Babel. We had the Irish brogue,
the Scotch accent, and foreign idiom, twanged off by the most discordant
vociferation ; for as they all spoke together, no man had any chance to
be heard, unless he could bawl louder than his fellows. It must be
owned, however, there was nothing pedantic in their discourse ; they
carefully avoided all learned disquisitions, and endeavoured to be
facetious : nor did their endeavours always miscarry ; some droll
repartee passed, and much laughter was excited ; and if any individual

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AKD FIELDIKG. 245

ii'ascible ; worn and battered, but still brave and full
of heart, after a long struggle against a bard fortune.

lost his tempei- so far as to transgress tlie bounds of decorum, he was
effectually checked by the master of the feast, who exerted a sort of
paternal authority over this irritable tribe.

" The most learned philosopher of the whole collection, who had been
expelled the university for atheism, has made great progress in a refu-
tation of Lord Bolingbroke's metaphysical works, which is said to be
equally ingenious and orthodox : but, in the mean time, he has been
presented to the grand jury as a public nuisance for having blasphemed
in an alehouse on the Lord's-day. The Scotchman gives lectures on the
pronunciation of the English language, which he is now publishing by
subscription.

" The Irishman is a political writer, and goes by the name of My Lord
Potatoe, He wrote a pamphlet in vindication of a minister, hoping his
zeal would be rewarded with some place or pension ; but finding
himself neglected in that quarter, he whispered about that the
pamphlet was written by the minister himself, and he pviblished an
answer to his own production. In this he addressed the author under
the title of ' your lordship,' with such solemnity, that the public
swallowed the deceit, and bought up the whole impression. The wise
politicians of the metropolis declared they were both masterly per-
formances, and chuckled over the flimsy reveries of an ignorant
garretteer, as the profound speculations of a veteran statesman,
acquainted with all the secrets of the cabinet. The imposture was
detected in the sequel, and our Hibernian pamphleteer retains no
part of his assumed importance but the bare title of * my lord,' and
the upper part of the table at the potatoe-ordinary in Shoe-lane.

" Opposite to me sat a Piedmontese^ who had obliged the public with
a humorous satire, entitled ' The Balance of the English Poets ; ' a
performance which evinced the great modesty and taste of the author,
and, in particular, his intimacy with the elegancies of the English
language. The sage, who laboured under the aypo(po^ia, or 'horror
of green fields,' had just finished a treatise on practical agriculture,
though, in fact, he had never seen corn growing in his life, and was
so ignorant of grain, that our entertainer, in the face of the whole
company, made him own that a plate of hominy was the best rice-pudding
he had ever eat.

246 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

His brain liad been busied with a hundred different
schemes ; he had been reviewer and historian, critic,
medical writer, poet, pamphleteer. He had fought

"The stutterer had almost finished his travels through Em*ope and
part of Asia, without ever budging beyond the liberties of the Kiug's-
bench, except in term-time, with a tipstaff for his companion : and as
for little Tim Cropdale, the most facetious member of the whole
society, he had happily wound up the catastrophe of a virgin tragedy,
from the exhibition of which he promised himself a lai'ge fund of
profit and reputation. Tim had made shift to live many years by
writing novels, at the rate of five pounds a volume ; but that branch
of business is now engrossed by female authors, who publish merely
for the propagation of virtue, with so much ease, and spirit, and
delicacy, and knowledge of the human heart, and all in the serene
tranquillity of high life, that the reader is not only enchanted by their
genius, but reformed by their morality.

''After dinner, we adjourned into the garden, where I observed
Mr. S — give a short separate audience to every individual in a small
remote filbert-walk, from whence most of them dropped off one after
another, without further ceremony."

Smollett's house was in Lawrence -lane, Chelsea, and is now destroyed.
See Handbook of London, p. 115.

" The person of Smollett was eminently handsome, his features pre-
possessing, and, by the joint testimony of all his surviving friends,
his conversation, in the highest degree, instructive and amusing. Of
his disposition, those who have read his works (and who has not 1) may
form a very accurate estimate; for in each of them he has presented,
and sometimes, under various points of view, the leading features of
his own chai'acter without disguising the most uufavoui'able of

them When unseduced by his satirical propensities, he

was kind, generous, and humane to others ; bold, upright, and inde-
pendent in his own character ; stooped to no patron, sued for no
favour, but honestly and honourably maintained himself on his literary
labours He was a doating father, and an affectionate hus-
band ; and the warm zeal Avith which his memory was cherished by his
surviving friends, showed clearly the reliance which they placed upon
his regard." — Sir "Walter Scott.

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 247

endless literary battles ; and braved and ^Yielded for
years the cudgels of controversy. It was a bard and
savage fight in those days, and a niggard pay. He
was oppressed by ilhiess, age, narrow fortune ; but his
spirit was still resolute, and his courage steady ; the
battle over, he could do justice to the enemy with
whom he had been so fiercely engaged, and give a not
unfriendly grasp to the hand that had mauled him. He
is like one of those Scotch cadets, of whom history gives
us so many examples, and whom, with a national fidelity,
the great Scotch novehst has painted so charmingly.
Of gentle birth' and narrow means, going out from his

1 Smollett of Bonhill, in Dumbartonshire. Arms, az. "a bend, or

between a lion rampant, ppr, holding in his paw a banner, arg

and a bugle-horn, also ppr. Crest, an oak-tree, ppr. Motto, Viresco."

Smollett's father, Archibald, was the fourth son of Sir James
Smollett of Bonhill, a Scotch judge and member of Parliament, and
one of the commissioners for framing the Union with England. Ai'chi-
bald married, without the old gentleman's consent, and died early,
leaving his children dependent on then* grandfather, Tobias, the
second son, was born in 1721, in the old hovxse of Dalquharn in the
valley of Leven ; and all his life loved and admired that valley and
Loch Lomond beyond all the valleys and lakes in Europe. He learned
the " rudiments " at Dumbarton Grammar-school, and studied at
Glasgow.

But when he w^as only eighteen, his grandfather died, and left him
without provision (figuring as the old judge in " Roderick Random" in
consequence, accor ling to Sir Walter). Tobias, armed with the
" Regicide," a tragedy — a provision precisely similar to that with which
Dr. Johnson had started, just before — came up to London. The
" Regicide " came to no good, though at first patronised by Lord
Lyttleton (" one of those little fellows who are sometimes called great
men," Smollett says) ; and Smollett embarked as " surgeon's mate " on

248 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

northern home to win his fortune in the world, and to
fight his way, armed with courage, hunger, and keen
wits. His crest is a shattered oak tree, with green
leaves yet springing from it. On his ancient coat-of-
arms there is a lion and a horn ; this shield of his was
battered and dinted in a hundred fights and brawls,^
through wliich the stout Scotchman bore it courage -

board a line-of-battle ship, and served in the Carthagena expedition, in
1741. He left the service in the West Indies, and, after residing some
time in Jamaica, returned to England in 1746.

He was now unsuccessful as a physician, to begin with ; published
the satires, "Advice " and "Reproof" — without any luck ; and (1747)
married the "beautiful and accomplished Miss Lascelles."

In 1748 he brought out his "Roderick Random," which at once
made a " hit." The subsequent events of his life may be presented,
chronologically, in a bird's-eye view : — ■

1750. Made a tour to Paris, where he chiefly wrote "Peregrine
Pickle."

1751. Published " Peregrine Pickle."

1753. Published " Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom."

1755. Published version of " Don Quixote."

1756. Began the " Critical Review."
1758. Pubhshed his " History of England."

1763 — 1766. Travelling in France and Italy; published his
" Travels."

1769. Published "Adventures of an Atom."

1770. Set out for Italy; died at Leghorn 21st of Oct., 1771, in the
fifty-first year of his age.

^ A good specimen of the old " slashing " style of writing is presented
by the paragraph on Admiral Knowles, which subjected Smollett to
prosecution and imprisonment. The admiral's defence on the occasion
of the failure of the Rochfort expedition came to be examined before
the tribunal of the " Critical Review."

" He is," said our author, " an admiral without conduct, an engineer
without knowledge, an officer without resolution, and a man without
veracity ! "

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 249

ously. You see somehow that he is a gentleman,
through all his battling and struggling, his poverty,
his harcl-fought successes, and his defeats. His novels
are recollections of his own adventures; his characters
drawn, as I should think, from personages with
whom he became acquainted in his own career of
life. Strange companions he must have had ; queer
acquaintances he made in the Glasgow College — in
the country apothecary's shop ; in the gun-room of
the man-of-war where he served as surgeon, and in
the hard hfe on shore, where the sturdy adventurer
struggled for fortune. He did not invent much, as
I fancy, but had the keenest perceptive faculty, and

Three months' imprisonment in the Kiog's Bench avenged this
stinging paragraph.

But the " Critical " was to Smollett a perpetual fountain of " hot
water." Among less important controversies may be mentioned that
with Grainger, the translator of " Tibullus." Grainger replied in a
pamphlet ; and in the nest number of the " Eeview " we find him
threatened with " castigation," as an " owl that has broken from his
m.ew ! "

In Dr. Moore's biography of him, is a pleasant anecdote. After
publishing the '' Don Quixote," he returned to Scotland to pay a visit
to his mother : —

" On Smollett's arrival; he was introduced to his mother with the
connivance of Mrs. Telfer (her daughter), as a gentleman from the
West Indies, who was intimately acquainted with her son. The better
to support his assumed character, he endeavoured to preserve a serious
countenance, approaching to a frown ; but while his mother's eyes
were riveted on his countenance, he could not refrain from smiling :
she immediately sprung from her chair, and throwing her arms round
his neck, exclaimed, ' Ah, my son ! my son ! I have found you at last ! '

" She afterwards told him, that if he had kept his austere looks and

250 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

described what he saw with wonderful relish and
delightful broad humour. I think Uncle Bowling, in
" Roderick Bandom," is as good a character as Squke
Western himself; and Mr. Morgan, the wild apothe-
cary, is as pleasant as Dr. Caius. What man who
has made his inestimable acquaintance — what novel
reader who loves Don Quixote and Major Dalgetty —
will refuse his most cordial acknowledgments to the
admirable Lieutenant Lismahago. The novel of
" Humphrey Clinker " is, I do think, the most
laughable story that has ever been written since
the goodly art of novel- writing began. Winifred
Jenkins and Tabitha Bramble must keep Englishmen
on the grin for ages yet to come ; and in their letters
and the story of their loves there is a perpetual
fomit of sparkling laughtel", as inexhaustible as
Bladud's well.

continued to gloom, he might have escaped detection some time longer,
but ' your old roguish smile,' added she, ' beti"ayed you at once.' "

*' Shortly after the publication of ' The Adventures of an Atom,
disease again attacked Smollett w^ith redoubled violence. At-
tempts being vainly made to obtain for him the office of Consul, in
some part of the Mediterranean, he was compelled to seek a warmer
climate, without better means of provision than his own precarious
finances could afford. The kindness of his distinguished friend and
countryman, Dr, Armstrong (then abi^oad), procured for T>i\ and Mrs.
Smollett a house at Monte Nero, a village situated on the side of a
mountain overlooking the sea, in the neighbourhood of Leghorn, a
romantic and salutary abode, where he prepared for the press, the last,
and like music * sweetest in the close,' the most pleasing of his compo-
sitions, ' The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker.' This delightful work
was published in 1771." — Sir Walter Scott.

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, A:N^D FIELDING. 251

Fielding, too, has described, though with a greater
hand, the characters and scenes which he knew and
saw. He had more than ordinary opportunities for
becoming acquainted with life. His family and
education, first — his fortunes and misfortunes after-
wards, brought him into the society of every rank
and condition of man. He is himself the hero of his
books: he is wild Tom Jones, he is wild Captain
Booth, less wild, I am glad to think, than his pre-
decessor, at least heartily conscious of demerit, and
anxious to amend.

When Fielding first came upon the town in 1727,
the recollection of the great wits was still fresh in
the coffee-houses and assemblies, and the judges
there declared that j'oung Harr}^ Fielding had more
spirits and wit than CongTeve or any of his brilliant
successors. His figure was tall and stalwart ; his
face handsome, manly, and noble-looking ; to the
very last days of his life he retained a grandeur of
air, and, although worn down by disease, his aspect
and presence imposed respect upon the people round
about him.

A dispute took place between Mr. Fielding and the
captain' of the ship in which he was making his last
voyage, and Fielding relates how the man finally
went down on his knees and begged his passenger's

^ The dispute with the captain arose from the wish of that functionary
to intrude on his right to his cabin, for which he had paid thirty pounds.

252 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

pardon. He was living up to the last clays of his
life, and his spirit never gave in. His vital power
must have been immensely strong. Lady Mary
Wortley Montagu^ prettily characterises Fielding and
this capacity for happiness which he possessed, in a
little notice of his death, when she compares him

After recounting the circumstances of the apology, he characteristically
adds : —

" And here, that I may not be thought the sly trumpeter of my own
praises, I do utterly disclaim all praise on the occasion. Neither did
the greatness of my mind dictate, nor the force of my Chxistianity exact
this forgiveness. To speak truth, I forgave him from a motive which
make men much more forgiving, if they were much wiser than they are ;
because it was convenient for me so to do."

^ Lady Mary was his second cousin — their respective grandfathers
being sons of George Fielding, Earl of Desmond, son of William, Earl
of Denbigh.

In a letter dated just a week before his death, she says, —

" H. Fielding has given a true picture of himself and his first wife in
the characters of Mr. and Mrs. Booth, some compliments to his own
figui-e excepted ; and I am persuaded, several of the incidents he men-
tions are real matters of fact. I wonder he does not perceive Tom
Jones and Mr. Booth are sorry scoundrels. . . . Fielding has really
a fluid of true humour, and was to be pitied at his first entrance into
the world, having no choice, as he said himself, but to be a hackney
writer or a hackney coachman. His genius desexwed a better fate; but
I cannot help blaming that continued indiscretion, to give it the softest
name, that has run through his life, and I am afraid still remains.
. . . Since I was born no original has appeared excepting Congreve,
and Fielding, who would, I believe, have approached nearer to his excel-
lencies, if not forced by his necessities to pviblish without correction,
and throw many productions into the world he would have thrown into
the fii^e, if meat could have been got without money, or money without
scribbling. ... I am sorry not to see any more of Peregrine
Pickle's performances; I wish you would tell me his name." — Letters
and Works (Lord Whai-ncMe's Ed.) vol. ill. p. 93, 94.

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 253

to Steele, wlio was as improvident and as happy as he
was, and says that both should have gone on living
for ever. One can fancy the eagerness and gusto
with which a man of Fielding's frame, with his vast
health and robust appetite, his ardent spirits, his
joyful humour, and his keen and hearty relish for
life, must have seized and drunk that cup of pleasure
which the town offered to him. Can any of my
hearers remember the j^outhful feats of a college
breakfast — the meats devoured and the cups quaffed
in that Homeric feast ? I can call to mind some
of the heroes of those youthful banquets, and fancy
young Fielding from Leyden rushing upon the feast,
with liis great laugh and immense healthy j^oung
appetite, eager and vigorous to enjoy. The young man's
wit and manners made him friends everywhere : he
lived with the grand Man's society of those days ; he
was courted by peers and men of wealth and fashion.
As he had a paternal allowance from his father.
General Fielding, which, to use Henry's own phrase,
any man might pay who would ; as he liked good
wine, good clothes, and good company, which are all
expensive articles to purchase, Harry Fielding began
to run into debt, and borrow money in that easy
manner in which Captain Booth borrows money in
the novel : was in nowise particular in accepting a
few pieces from the purses of his rich friends, and
bore down upon more than one of them, as Walpole

254 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

tells us only too truly, for a dinner or a guinea. To
supply himself with the latter, he began to write
theatrical pieces, having already, no doubt, a con-
siderable acquaintance amongst the Oldfields and
Bracegirdles behind the scenes. He laughed at
these pieces and scorned them. Wlien the audience
upon one occasion began to hiss a scene which he was
too lazy to correct, and regarding which, when Garrick
remonstrated with him, he said that the public was
too stupid to find out the badness of his work ; — when
the audience began to hiss, Fielding said, with charac-
teristic coolness — " they have found it out, have
they?" He did not prepare his novels in this way,
and mth a very different care and interest laid the
foundations and built up the edifices of his future
fame.

Time and showier have very Httle damaged those.
The fashion and ornaments are, perhaps, of the
architecture of that age ; but the buildings remain
strong and lofty, and of admirable proportions —
masterpieces of genius and monuments of workman-
like skill.

I cannot offer or hope to make a hero of Harry
Fielding. Why liide his faults ? Why conceal his
weaknesses in a cloud of periphrasis ? AMiy not
show him, like him as he is, not robed in a marble
toga, and draped and polished in a heroic attitude,
but with inked ruffles, and claret stams on his

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDIXCI. 25 0

tarnisiied laced coat, and on his manly face the marks
of good fellowship, of illness, of kindness, of care :
and wine-stained as you see him, and worn by care
and dissipation, that man retains some of the most
precious and splendid human qualities and endow-
ments. He has an admii'able natui-al love of truth, the
keenest instinctive antipathy to hypocrisy, the happiest
satuical gift of laughing it to scorn. His "wit is
wonderfully wise and detective ; it flashes upon a
rogue and lightens up a rascal like a pohceman's
lantern. He is one of the manliest and kindliest of
human beings : in the midst of all his imperfections,
he respects female innocence and infantine tenderness,
as you would suppose such a great-hearted, courageous
soul would respect and care for them. He could not
be so brave, generous, truth-telling as he is, were he
not mfinitely merciful, pitiful, and tender. He will
give any man his x^urse — he can't help kindness and
profusion. He may have low tastes, but not a mean
mind ; he admires with all his heart good and virtuous
men, stoops to no flatter}^ bears no rancour, disdains
all disloyal arts, does his pubhc duty uprightly, is
fondly loved by his family, and dies at his work.^

If that theory be — and I have no doubt it is — the
right and safe one, that human nature is always

^ He sailed for Lisbon, from Gravesend, on Sunday morning, Jiine
30th, 1754 ; and began the "Journal of a Voyage " during the passage.
He died at Lisbon, in the beginning of October of the same year. He

256 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

pleased with the spectacle of mnocence rescued by
fidelity, purity, and courage ; I suppose that of the
heroes of Fielding's three novels, we should like
honest Joseph Andrews the best, and Captain Booth
the second, and Tom Jones the third.*

Joseph Andrews, though he wears Lady Booby's
cast-off livery, is, I think, to the full as polite as
Tom Jones in his fustian-suit, or Captain Booth in
regimentals. He has, like those heroes, large calves,
broad shoulders, a high courage, and a handsome
face. The accounts of Joseph's bravery and good
qualities ; his voice, too musical to halloo to the
dogs ; his bravery in riding races for the gentlemen
of the county, and his constancy in refusing bribes
and temptation, have something affecting in their
naivete and freshness, and prepossess one in favour
of that handsome J^oung hero. The rustic bloom of
Fanny, and the delightful simplicity of Parson Adams
are described with a friendliness which wins the reader
of their story : we part with them with more regret
than from Booth and Jones.

lies buried there, in tlie English Protestant church-yard, near the
Estrella Church, with this inscription over him : —

"HENRICUS FIELDING,

LUGET BRITANNIA GREMIO NON DATUM

FOVERE NATUM."

^ Fielding himself is said by Dr. Warton to have preferred "Joseph

Andrews " to his other writings.

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 257

Fielding, no doubt, began to write this novel in
ridicule of "Pamela," for which work one can under-
stand the hearty contempt and antipathy which such
an athletic and boisterous genius as Fielding's must
have entertained. He couldn't do otherwise than laugh
at the puny, cockney bookseller, pouring out endless
volumes of sentimental twaddle, and hold him up to
scorn as a moll-coddle and a milksop. His genius
had been nursed on sack-posset, and not on dishes
of tea. His muse had sung the loudest in tavern
choruses, had seen the daylight streaming in over
thousands of emptied bowls, and reeled home
to chambers on the shoulders of the watchman.
Richardson's goddess was attended by old maids and
dowagers, and fed on muf&ns and bohea. "Milksop!"
roars Harry Fielding, clattering at the timid shop-
shutters. "Wretch! Monster! Mohock!" shrieks the
sentimental author of "Pamela ; " ' and all the ladies
of his court cackle out an affrighted chorus. Fielding
proposes to write a book in ridicule of the author,
whom he disliked and utterly scorned and laughed

^ " Richardson," says worthy Mrs. Barbavild, in her Memoir of him,
prefixed to his Correspondence, "was exceedingly hurt at this (' Joseph
Andrews '), the more so as they had been on good terms, and he was very-
intimate with Fielding's two sisters. He never appears cordially to have
forgiven it (perhaps it was not in human nature he should), and he
always speaks in his letters with a great deal of asperity of ' Tom Jones,'
more indeed than was quite graceful in a rival author. No doubt he
himself thought his indignation was solely excited by the loose morality
of the work and of its author, but he could tolerate Gibber."

S

258 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

at; but lie is himself of so generous, jovial, and
kindly a turn tliat he begins to like the characters
which he invents, can't help making them manly and
pleasant as well as ridiculous, and before he has
done with them all loves them heartily every one.

Richardson's sickening antipathy for Harry Fielding
is quite as natural as the other's laughter and con-
tempt at the sentimentalist. I have not learned that
these likings and dishkings have ceased in the present
day: and every author must lay his account not only
to misrepresentation but to honest enmity among
critics, and to being hated and abused for good as well as
for bad reasons. Richardson dishked Fielding's works
quite honestly : Walpole quite honestly spoke of him
as vulgar and stupid. Their squeamish stomachs
sickened at the rough fare and the rough guests
assembled at Fielding's jolly revel. Indeed the cloth
might have been cleaner : and the dinner and the com-
pany were scarce such as suited a dandy. The kind
and wise old Johnson would not sit down with him.*
But a greater scholar than Johnson could afford to
admire that astonishing genius of Harry Fielding :
and we all know the lofty panegyric which Gibbon
wrote of him, and which remains a towering monument

^ It must always be borne in mind, that besides that the Doctor
covildn't be expected to like Fielding's wild life (to say nothing of the
fact, that they were of opposite sides in politics), Richardson was one
of his earliest and kindest friends. Yet Johnson too (as Boswell tells
us) read "Amelia" through without "stopping."

HOGAETH, SMOLLETT, A:N^D FIELDmG. 259

to the great novelist's memory. " Our immortal
Fielding," Gibbon writes, " was of the younger
branch of the Earls of Denbigh, who drew their
origin from the Counts of Hapsburgh. The suc-
cessors 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 Escmial and the Imperial Eagle
of Austria."

There can be no gainsaying the sentence of this
great judge. To have your name mentioned by Gibbon,
is like having it written on the dome of St. Peter's.
Pilgrims from all the world admire and behold it.

As a picture of manners the novel of " Tom Jones "
is indeed exquisite : as a work of construction quite a
wonder : the by-play of wisdom ; the power of ob-
servation; the multiplied felicitous turns and thoughts;
the varied character of the great Comic Ej^ic ; keep the
reader in a perpetual admu-ation and curiosity.' But

^ " Manners change from generation to generation, and with manners
morals appear to change, — actually change with some, but appear to
change with all but the abandoned, A young man of the present day
who should act as Tom Jones is supposed to act at Upton, with Lady
Bellaston, &c.. would not be a Tom Jones ; and a Tom Jones of the
present day, without perhaps being in the gi'oimd a better man, would
have perished rather than submit to be kept by a harridan of fortune.
Therefore, this novel is, and indeed, pretends to be, no example of con-
duct. But, notwithstanding all this, I do loathe the cant which can
recomm.end "Pamela" and " Clarissa Harlowe" as strictly moral, although
they poison the imagination of the young vsdth continued doses of tincf.
lyttce, while Tom Jones is prohibited as loose. I do not speak of young

s 2

260 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

against Mr. Thomas Jones himself we have a right to
put in a protest, and quarrel with the esteem the author
evidently has for that character. Charles Lamb says
finely of Jones, that a single hearty laugh from him
" clears the air " — hut then it is in a certain state of
the atmosphere. It might clear the au' when such
personages as Blifil or Lady Bellaston poison it. But
I fear very much that (except until the very last scene
of the story,) when Mr. Jones enters Sophia's drawing-
room^ the pure air there is rather tainted with the
young gentleman's tobacco-pipe and punch. I can't
say that I think Mr. Jones a vu^tuous character; I can't
say but that I think Fielding's evident liking and
admiration for Mr. Jones, shows that the great humour-
ist's moral sense was blunted by his life, and that here
in Art and Etliics, there is a great error. If it is right
to have a hero, whom we may admire, let us at least
take care that he is admirable : if, as is the j)lan of
some authors (a plan decidedly against their interests,
be it said), it is x^ropounded that there exists in life no
such being, and therefore that in novels, the picture of
life, there should appear no such character; then Mr.
Thomas Jones becomes an admissible person, and we
examine his defects and good qualities, as we do those

women ; but a young man whose heart or feelings can be injured, or
even his passions excited by this novel, is already thoroughly corrupt.
There is a cheerful, sunshiny, breezy spirit, that prevails everywhere,
strongly contrasted with the close, hot, day-dreamy continuity of
Richardson." — Coleridge, Literary Remains, vol. ii. p. 374.

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDmG. 261

of Parson Tliwackum, or Miss Seagrim. But a hero
with a flawed reputation ; a hero spunging for a guinea;
a hero who can't pay his landlady, and is obliged to let
his honour out to hire, is absurd, and his claim to
heroic rank untenable. I protest against Mr. Thomas
Jones holding such rank at all. I protest even
against his being considered a more than ordinary
young fellow, ruddy-cheeked, broad-shouldered, and
fond of wine and pleasure. He would not rob a church,
but that is all; and a pretty long argument may be
debated, as to which of these old types, the spendthrift,
the hypocrite, Jones and Blifil, Charles and Joseph
Surface, — is the worst member of society and the
most deserving of censm^e. The prodigal Captain
Booth is a better man than his predecessor Mr. Jones,
in so far as he thinks much more humbly of himself
than Jones did : goes down on his knees, and owns
his weaknesses, and cries out "Not for my sake, but
for the sake of my pure and sweet and beautiful wife
Amelia, I pray you, 0 critical reader, to forgive me."
That stern moralist regards him from the bench (the
judge's practice out of court is not here the question),
and says, " Captain Booth, it is perfectly true that your
life has been disreputable, and that on many occasions
you have shown yourseK to be no better than a scamp
— you have been tippling at the tavern, when the
kindest and sweetest lady in the world has cooked your
little supper of boiled mutton and awaited j^ou all the

262 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

night ; you have spoilt the little dish of boiled mutton
thereby, and caused pangs and pains to Amelia's
tender heart/ You have got into debt without the
means of paying it. You have gambled the money
with which you ought to have paid your rent. You
have spent in drink or in worse amusements the sums
which your poor wife has raised upon her Httle home
treasures, her own ornaments, and the toys of her

' " Nor was she (Lady Mary Wortley Montagu) a stranger to that
beloved first wife, whose picture he drew in his ' Amelia,' when, as she
said, even the glowing language he knew how to employ, did not do more
than justice to the amiable qualities of the original, or to her beauty,
although this had sufiered a little from the accident related in the novel,
— a frightful overturn, which destroyed the gristle of her nose. He
loved her passionately, and she returned his affection. . . .

" His biographers seem to have been shy of disclosing that after the
death of this charming woman, he married her maid. And yet the act
was not so discreditable to his character as it may sound. The maid had
few personal charms, but was an excellent creature, devotedly attached
to her mistress, and almost broken-hearted for her loss. In the first
agonies of his own grief, which approached to frenzy, he found no relief
but from weeping along with her ; nor solace when a degree calmer, but
in talking to her of the angel they mutually regretted. This made her his
habitual confidential associate, and in process of time he began to think
he could not give his children a tenderer mother, or secure for himself
a' more faithful housekeeper and nurse. At least, this was what he told
his friends ; and it is certaia that her conduct as his wife confirmed it,
and fully justified his good opinion." — Letters and Works of Lady
Mary Wortley Montagu. Edited by Lord Wharncliffe. Jntrodioctory
Anecdotes, vol. i. p. 80, 81.

Fielding's first wife was Miss Craddock, a young lady from Salisbury,
with a fortune of 1500/., whom he married in 1736. About the same
time he succeeded, himself, to an estate of 200/. per annum, and on the
joint amount he lived for some time as a splendid country gentleman
in Derbyshire. Three years brought him to the end of his fortune ;
when he returned to London, and became a student of law.

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 263

children. But, jou rascal ! you own humbly that you
are no better than you should be ; you never for one
moment pretend that you are anything but a miserable
weak-minded rogue. You do in your heart adore that
angelic woman, your wife, and for her sake, sirrah, you
shall have your discharge. Lucky for you and for
others like you, that in spite of your faihngs and imper-
fections, pure hearts pity and love you. For your
wife's sake you are permitted to go hence without a
remand, and I beg you, by the way, to carry to that
angelical lady the expression of the cordial respect and
admii-ation of this court." Amelia pleads for her
husband Will Booth : Amelia pleads for her reckless
kindly old father, Harry Fielding. To have invented
that character, is not only a triumph of art, but it is a
good action. They say it was in his own home that
Fielding knew her and loved her : and from his own
wife that he drew the most charming character in
English fiction — Fiction ! why fiction ? why not history ?
I know Amelia just as w^ell as Lady Mary Wortley
Montagu. I believe in Colonel Bath almost as much
as in Colonel Gardiner or the Duke of Cumberland.
I admire the author of " Amelia," and thank the kmd
master who introduced me to that sweet and delightful
companion and friend. Ameha perhaps is not a better
story than " Tom Jones," but it has the better ethics ;
the prodigal repents at least, before forgiveness, —
whereas that odious broad-backed Mr. Jones, carries off

264 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

his beauty with scarce an interval of remorse for
his manifokl errors and short-comings ; and is not
half punished enough before the great prize of fortune
and love falls to his share. I am angry with Jones.
Too much of the plum-cake and rewards of life fall to
that boisterous, swaggering young scapegrace. Sophia
actually surrenders without a proper sense of decorum ;
the fond, foolish, palpitating little creature, — " Indeed,
Mr. Jones," she says, — "it rests with you to appoint
the day." I suppose Sophia is drawn from life as well
as Ameha, and many a young fellow, no better than
Mr. Thomas Jones, has carried by a coup de main the
heart of many a Idnd girl who was a great deal too
good for him.

What a wonderful art ! "What an admirable gift of
nature, was it by which the author of these tales was
endowed, and which enabled him to fix our interest,
to waken our sympathy, to seize upon our credulity,
so that we believe in his people — speculate gravely
upon their faults or their excellencies, prefer this
one or that, deplore Jones's fondness for drink and
play, Booth's fondness for play and drink, and the
unfortunate position of the wives of both gentlemen —
love and admire those ladies with all our hearts, and
talk about them as faithfully as if we had breakfasted
with them this morning in their actual drawing-rooms,
or should meet them this afternoon in the Park!
What a genius ! what a vigour ! what a bright- eyed

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AN"D FIELDmO. 265

intelligence and observation ! what a wholesome hatred
for meanness and knavery ! what a vast sympathy !
what a cheerfulness ! what a manly relish of life !
what a love of human kind ! what a poet is here ! —
watching, meditating, brooding, creating ! What
multitudes of truths has that man left behind him !
"What generations he has taught to laugh wisely and
fairly ! What scholars he has formed and accustomed
to the exercise of thoughtful humour and the manly
play of wit ! What a courage he had ! ^ What a
dauntless and constant cheerfuhiess of intellect, that
burned bright and steady through all the storms of
his life, and never deserted its last wreck ! It is
wonderful to think of the pains and misery which

^ In the " Gentleman's Magazine" for 1786, an anecdote is related of
Harry Fielding, "in whom," says the correspondent, "good-nature and
philanthropy in their extreme degree were known to be the prominent
features," It seems that "some parochial taxes" for his house in
Beaufort Buildings had long been demanded by the collector. " At last,
Harry went off to Johnson, and obtained by a process of literary mort-
gage the needful sum. He was returning with it, when he met an old
college chum whom he had not seen for many years. He asked the
chum to dinner with him at a neighbouring tavern ; and learning that
he was in difficulties, emptied the contents of his pocket into his. On
returning home he was informed that the collector had been twice for
the money. * Friendship has called for the money and had it,' said
Fielding, ' let the collector call again.' "

It is elsewhere told of him, that being in company with the Earl
of Denbigh, his kinsman, and the conversation turning upon their rela-
tionship, the Earl asked him how it was that he spelled his name
" Fielding," and not " Feilding," like the head of the house 1 " I cannot
tell, my lord," said he, " except it be that my branch of the family were
the first that knew how to spell."

266 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

the man suffered ; the pressure of want, illness,
remorse which he endui'ed; and that the writer was
neither malignant nor melancholy, his view of truth
never warped, and his generous human kindness never
surrendered/

^ In 1749, he was made Justice of the Peace for Westminster and
Middlesex, an office then paid by fees, and very laborious, without being
particularly reputable. It may be seen from his own words, in the
Introduction to the " Voyage," what kind of work devolved upon him
and in what a state he was, during these last years; and still more
clearly, how he comported himself through all.

" Whilst I was preparing for my journey, and when I was almost
fatigued to death with several long examinations, relating to five dif-
ferent murders, all committed within the space of a week, by different
gangs of street-robbers, I received a message from his Grace the Duke
of Newcastle, by Mr. Carrington, the King's messenger, to attend his
Grace the next morning in Lincoln's Inn Fields, upon some business of
importance : but I excused myself from complying with the message, as
besides being lame, I was very ill with the great fatigues I had lately
undergone, added to my distemper.

"His Grace, however, sent Mr. Carrington the very next morning,
with another summons ; with which, though in the utmost distress, I
immediately complied ; but the Duke happening, unfortunately for me,
to be then particularly engaged, after I had waited some time, sent a
gentleman to discourse with me on the best plan which could be
invented for these murders and robberies, which were every day com-
mitted in the streets ; upon which I promised to ti'ansmit my opinion,
in writing, to his Grace, who, as the gentleman informed me, intended
to lay it before the Privy Council.

" Though this visit cost me a severe cold, I, notwithstanding, set myself
down to work, and in about four days sent the Duke as regular a plan
as I could form, with all the reasons and arguments I could bring to
support it, drawn out on several sheets of paper ; and soon received a
message from the Duke, by Mr. Carrington, acquainting me that my
plan was highly approved of, and that all the terms of it would be
complied with.

" The principal and most material of these terms was the immediately

HOGARTH, SMOLLETT, AND FIELDING. 267

In the quarrel mentioned before, whicli happened on
Fieldmg's last voyage to Lisbon, and when the stout
captain of the ship fell down on his knees and asked
the sick man's pardon — " I did not suffer," Fielding
says, in his hearty, manly way, his eyes hghting
up as it were with their old fire — " I did not suffer a
brave man and an old man to remain a moment in
that j)osture, but immediately forgave him." Indeed,
I think, with his noble spirit and unconquerable
generosity. Fielding reminds one of those brave men

depositing 600Z. in my hands; at which small charge I undertook to
demolish the then reigning gangs, and to put the civil policy into such
order, that no such gangs should ever be able for the futui-e, to form
themselves into bodies, or at least to remain any time formidable to
the public.

"I had delayed my Bath journey for some time, contrary to the
repeated advice of my physical acquaintances, and the ardent desire of
my warmest fxnends, though my distemper was now turned to a deep
jaundice; in which case the Bath-waters are generally reputed to be
almost infallible. But I had the most eager desire to demolish this
gang of villains and cut-throats. . . .

"After some weeks the money was paid at the Treasury, and within
a few days, after 2001. of it had come to my hands, the whole gang of
cut-throats was entirely dispersed." , . .

Further on, he says, —

" I will confess that my private affairs at the beginning of the winter
had but a gloomy aspect ; for I had not plundered the public or the
poor of those sums, which men who are always ready to plunder both
as much as they can, have been pleased to suspect me of taking ; on the
contrary, by composing, instead of inflaming, the quarrels of porters and
beggars (which I blush when I say hath not been universally practised),
and by refusing to take a shilling from a man who most undoubtedly
would not have had another left, I had reduced an income of about
600?, a year of the dirtiest money upon earth, to little more than 300Z.,
a considerable portion of which remained with my clerk."

268 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

of whom one reads in stories 'of English shipwrecks
and disasters — of the officer on the African shore,
when disease has destroyed the crew, and he himself
is seized by fever, who throws the lead with a death-
stricken hand, takes the soundings, carries the ship
out of the river or off the dangerous coast, and dies
in the manly endeavour — of the wounded captain,
when the vessel founders, who never loses his heart,
who eyes the danger steadily, and has a cheery word
for all, until the inevitable fate overwhelms him,
and the gallant ship goes down. Such a brave and
gentle heart, such an intrepid and courageous spirit,
I love to recognise in the manly, the English Harry
Fielding.

LECTURE THE SIXTH.

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH.

Roger Sterne, Sterne's father, was the second son
of a numerous race, descendants of Richard Sterne,
Archbishop of York, in the reign of James II. ; and
children of Simon Sterne and Mary Jaques, his wife,
heiress of Elvington, near York.* Roger was a lieut-
enant in Handiside's regiments, and engaged in Flanders,
in Queen Anne's wars. He married the daughter of a
noted suttler, "N.B., he was in debt to him," his son
writes, pursuing the paternal biography, and marched
through the world with this companion, following the
regiment and bringing many children to poor Roger
Sterne. The captain was an irascible but kind and simple
Httle man, Sterne says, and informs us that his sire was
run tlirough the body at Gibraltar, by a brother officer,
in a duel, which arose out of a dispute about a goose.
Roger never entirely recovered from the effects of this

^ He came of a Suffolk family — one of whom settled in Nottingham-
shii'e. The famous *' starling " was actually the family ci'est.

270 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

rencontre, but died presently at Jamaica, whither he
had followed the drum.

Lawrence, his second child, was borne at Clonmel,
in Ireland, in 1713, and travelled for the first ten years
of his life, on his father's march, from barrack to
transport, from Ireland to England.'

One relative of his mother's took her and her family
under shelter for ten months at Mullingar : another
collateral descendant of the Archbishop's housed them
for a year at his castle near Carrickfergus. Larry Sterne
was put to school at Halifax in England, finally was
adopted by his kinsman of Elvington, and parted com-
pany with his father, the Captain, who marched on his
path of life till he met the fatal goose, which closed his
career. The most picturesque and delightful parts of
Lawrence Sterne's writings, we owe to his recollections
of the military life. Trim's montero cap, and Le Fevre's
sword, and dear Uncle Toby's roquelaure, are doubtless
remmiscences of the boy, who had lived with the
followers of William and Marlborough, and had beat
time with his little feet to the fifes of Ramillies in
Dublin barrack-yard, or played with the torn flags and
halberds of Malplaquet on the parade ground at
Clonmel.

^ " It was in this parish (of Animo, in Wicklow), during our stay,
that I had that wonderful escape in falling through a mill-race, whilst
the mill was going, and of being taken up unhurt ; the story is incre-
dible, but known for truth in all that part of Ireland, Avhere hundreds of
the common people flocked to see me." — Sterne.

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 271

Lawrence remained at Halifax school till he was
eighteen years old. His wit and cleverness appear to
have acquired the respect of his master here : for when
the usher whipped Lawrence for writing his name
on the newl}' white-washed school-room ceiling, the
pedagogue in chief rebuked the under-strapper, and
said that the name should never be effaced, for Sterne
was a boy of genius, and would come to preferment.

His cousin, the Squii'e of Elvington, sent Sterne to
Jesus College, Cambridge, where he remained five
years, and taking orders, got, through his uncle's
interest, the living of Sutton and the Prebendary of York.
Through his wife's connexions, he got the hving of
Stillington. He married her in 1741 ; having ardentlj^
courted the young lady for some years previously. It
was not until the young lady fancied herself dying,
that she made Sterne acquainted with the extent of her
liking for him. One evening when he was sitting with
her, with an almost broken heart to see her so ill (the
Bev. Mr. Sterne's heart was a good deal broken in the
course of his life,) she said — " My dear Laurey, I never
can be yours, for I verily believe I have not long to
live, but I have left you eyerj shilling of my fortune,"
a generosity which overpowered Sterne : she recovered :
and so they were married, and grew heartily tired of
each other before many years were over. '' Nescio quid
est materia cum me," Sterne writes to one of his
friends (in dog Latin, and very sad-dog Latin too) " sed

272 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

sum fatigatus et segrotus de me a uxore plus quam
unquam," which means, I am sorry to say, "I don't
know what is the matter with me : but I am more tired
and sick of my wife than ever." '

This to be sure was five-and-twenty years after
Laurey had been overcome by her generosity and she
by Laurey's love. Then he wrote to her of the delights
of marriage, saying — " We will be as merry and as
innocent as our first parents in Paradise : before the
arch fiend entered that indescribable scene. The
kindest affections will have room to expand in our
retirement — let the human tempest and hurricane rage
at a distance, the desolation is beyond the horizon of
peace. My L. has seen a polyanthus blow in December ?
— Some friendly wall has sheltered it from the biting
wind — no planetary influence shall reach us, but that
wliich presides and cherishes the sweetest flowers.
The gloomy family of care and distrust shall be banished
from our dwelling, guarded by thy Idnd and tutelar
deity, — we will sing our choral songs of gratitude and
rejoice to the end of our pilgrimage. Adieu, my L.
Eeturn to one who languishes for thy society ! — As I
take up my pen, my poor pulse quickens, my pale face

1 " My wife returns to Toulouse, and proposes to pass the summer at
Bigna^res — I, on the contrary, go and visit my wife, the church, in Yoi'k-
shire. We all live the longer, at least the happier, for having things
our own way ; this is my conjugal maxim. I own 'tis not the best of
maxims, but I maintain 'tis not the worst."— Stehne's Letters, 20th
January, 1764.

STERNE AXD GOLDSMITH. 273

glows, and tears are triclding down on my paper as I
trace the word L."

And it is about this woman, with whom he finds no
fault, but that she bores him, that our philanthropist
writes, " Sum fatigatus et £egrotus" — Sum mortaliter
in amore with somebodj^ else ! That fine flower
of love, that polyanthus over which Sterne snivelled
so many tears, could not last for a quarter of a
centur}^ !

Or rather it could not be expected that a gentleman
with such a fountain at command, should keep it to
arroser one homety old lady, when a score of j^ounger
and prettier people might be refreshed from the same
gushing source.' It was in December, 1767, that the

1 In a collection of "Seven Letters by Sterne and his friends,"
(printed for private circulation), in 1844, is a letter of M. ToUot, who
was in France with Sterne and his family in 1764. Here is a
paragraph : —

" Nous ai-riv4mes le lendemain k Montpellier, ou nous trouvdmes
notre ami Mr. Sterne, sa femme, sa fille, Mr. Huet et quelques autres
Anglaises ; j'eus, je vous I'avoue, beaucoup de plaisir en revoyant le bon
et agreable Tristram II avait ete assez longtemps a Tou-
louse, oil il se serait amuse sans sa femme, qui le poursuivit partout,
et qui voulait etre de tout. Ces dispositions dans cette bonne dame,
lui ont fait passer d'assez mauvais momens ; il supporte tons ces
d^sagremens avec une patience d'ange."

About four months after this very characteristic letter, Sterne wrote
to the same gentleman to whom Tollot had written ; and from his letter
we may extract a companion paragraph : —

" All which being premised, I have been for eight weeks

smitten with the tenderest passion that ever tender wight underwent.
I wish, dear cousin, thou couldst conceive (perhaps thou canst with-
out my wishing it) how deliciously I cantei"'d away with it the first

T

274 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Rev. Lawrence Sterne, the famous Sliandean, the
charming Yorick, the delight of the fashionable world,
the delicious divine, for whose sermons the whole
polite world was subscribing,' the occupier of Rabelais's

month, two np, two down, always upon my hanches along the streets
from my hotel to hers, at first once — then twice, then three times a
day, till at length I was within an ace of setting up my hobby-horse
in her stable for good and all. I might as well, considering how the
enemies of the Lord have blasphemed thereupon. The last three weeks
we were every hour upon the doleful ditty of parting — and thou
may est conceive, dear cousin, how it altered my gait and air — for I
went and came like any louden'd carl, and did nothing but jauer des
sentiynens Avith her from sun-rising even to the setting of the same ;
and now she is gone to the south of France ; and to finish the comedie,
I fell ill, and broke a vessel in my lungs, and half bled to death.
Voilk mon histoire ! "

Whether husband or wife had most of the "patience cVange " may be
uncertain ; but there can be no doubt which needed it most !

1 K I Tristram Shandy ' is still a greater object of admiration, the man
as well as the book ; one is invited to dinner, when he dines, a fort-
night before. As to the volumes yet published, there is much good fun
in them, and humour sometimes hit and sometimes missed. Have you
read his 'Sermons,' with his own comick figure, from a painting by
Reynolds, at the head of them ? They are in the style I think most
proper for the pulpit, and show a strong imagination and a sensible
heart ; but you see him often tottering on the verge of laughter, and
ready to throw his periwig in the face of the audience." — Gray's
Letters, June 22nd, 1760.

" It having been observed that there was little hospitality in Lon -
don — Johnson : * Nay, Sir, any man who has a name, or who has the
power of pleasing, will be very generally invited in London. The man,
Sterne, I have been told, has had engagements for three months.'
Goldsmith : ' And a very dull fellow.' Johnson : * Why, no, Sir.' " —
Boswell's Life of Johnson.

" Her [Miss Monckton's] vivacity enchanted the sage, and they used
to talk together with all imaginable ease. A singular instance happened
one evening, when she insisted that some of Sterne's writings were very
pathetic. Johnson bluntly denied it. 'lam sure/ said she, 'they

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 275

easy cliair, only fresh stuffed and more elegant than
when in possession of the cynical old curate of Meudon,*

have affected me.' ' Why/ said Johnson, smiling, and rolling himself
about — 'that is, because, dearest, you're a dunce.' When she some time
afterwards mentioned this to him, he said with equal truth and polite-
ness, 'Madam, if I had thought so, I certainly should not have said it.' "
— Ibid.

^ A passage or two from Sterne's " Sermons " may not be without
interest here. Is not the following, levelled against the cruelties of
the Church of Rome, stamped with the autograph of the author of the
" Sentimental Journey ? " —

" To be convinced of this, go with me for a moment into the prisons
of the Inquisition — behold religion with mercy and justice chained down
tmder her feet, — there, sitting ghastly upon a black tribunal, propped
up with racks, and instruments of torment. — Hark ! — what a piteous
groan ! — See the melancholy wretch who uttered it, just brought forth
to undergo the anguish of a mock-trial, and endure the utmost pain that
a studied system of religious cruelty has been able to invent. Behold
this helpless victim delivered vip to his tormentors. His hody so loasted
with sorrow and long confinement, you'll see every nerve and muscle as it
suffers. — Observe the last movement of that horrid engine, — What con-
vulsions it has thrown him into ! Consider the nature of the posture
in which he now lies stretched. — What exquisite torture he endures by
it. — 'Tis all nature can bear. — Good God ! see how it keeps his weary
soul hanging upon his trembling lips, willing to take its leave, but not
suffered to depart. Behold the unhappy wretch led back to his cell,
— dragg'd out of it again to meet the flames — and the insults in his last
agonies, which this principle — this principle, that there can be religion
without morality — has prepared for him." — Sermon 27th.

The nest extract is preached on a text to be found in Judges xix. ver.
1, 2, 3, concei'ning a " certain Levite : " —

'' Such a one the Levite wanted to share his solitude and fill up that
uncomfortable blank in the heart in such a situation; for, notwith-
standing all we meet with in books, in many of which, no doubt, there
are a good many handsome things said upon the secrets of retirement,
&c. . . . yet still, 'it is not good for man to he alone : ' nor can all
which the cold-hearted pedant stuns our ears with upon the subject, ever
give one answer of satisfaction to the mind ; in the midst of the loudest
vauntings of philosophy, nature will have her yearnings for society and

T 2

276 ExVOLISH HUMOUEISTS.

— the more than rival of the Dean of St. Patrick's,
wrote the above quoted respectable letter to his friend
in London ; and it was in April of the same year, that
he was pouring out his fond heart to Mrs. Ehzabeth
Draper, wdfe of " Daniel Draper, Esq., Counsellor of
Bombay, and, in 1775, chief of the factory of Surat —
a gentleman very much respected in that quarter of the
globe."

" I got thy letter last night, Eliza," Sterne writes,
" on my return from Lord Bathurst's, where I dined —
(the letter has this merit in it that it contains a pleasant
reminiscence of better men than Sterne, and introduces
us to a portrait of a kind old gentleman) — I got thy
letter last night, Eliza, on my return from Lord
Bathurst's; and w^here I was heard — as I talked of thee
an hour without intermission — with so much pleasui'e

friendship ; — a good heart wants some object to be kind to — and the
best parts of our blood, and the purest of our spirits, suffer most under
the destitution.

"Let the torpid monk seek Heaven comfortless and alone. God
speed him ! For my own part, I fear I should never so find the way ;
let me he wise and religious, hiht let me he Man ; wherever thy Providence
places me, or whatever be the road I take to Thee, give me some com-
panion in my journey, be it only to remark to, 'How our shadows
lengthen as our sun goes down ; ' — to whom I may say, ' How fresh is
the face of Nature ! how sweet the :Sowers of the field ! how delicious
are these fruits ! '" — Sermon \^th.

The first of these passages gives us another drawing of the
famous " Captive." The second shows that the same reflection was
suggested to the Eev. Lawrence, by a text in Judges, as by the fille-de-
chavihre.

Sterne's Sermons were published as those of " Mr. Yorick."

STERNE A^T> GOLDSMITH. 277

and attention, that the good old Lord toasted your
health three different times ; and now he is in his 85th
year, says he hopes to live long enough to be introduced
as a friend to my fair Indian disciple, and to see her
eclipse all other Nabobesses as much in wealth, as she
does already in exterior, and what is far better (for
Sterne is nothing without his morahty), and what is far
better, m interior merit. This nobleman is an old
friend of mine. You know he was always the pro-
tector of men of wit and genius, and has had those of
the last century, Addison, Steele, Pope, Swift, Prior,
&c., always at his table. The manner in which his
notice began of me was as singular as it was polite.
He came up to me one day as I was at the Princess of
Wales's court, and said, ' I want to know you, Mr.
Sterne, but it is fit you also should know who it is that
wishes this pleasure. You have heard of an old Lord
Bathurst, of whom your Popes and Swifts have sung
and spoken so much ? I have lived my Ufe with geniuses
of that cast ; but have survived them ; and, despairing
ever to find their equals, it is some years since I have
shut up my books and closed my accounts ; but you
have kindled a desire in me of opening them once
more before I die so : which I now do : so go
home and dine with me.' This nobleman, I say, is
a prodigy, for he has all the wit and promptness
of a man of thirty ; a disposition to be pleased, and
a power to please others, beyond whatever I knew:

278 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

added to which a man of learmng, courtes}^ and
feeling."

" He heard me talk of thee, Eliza, with uncommon
satisfaction — for there was only a third person, and of
sensibility, with us : and a most sentimental afternoon
till nine o'clock have we passed ! ^ But thou, Eliza ! wert
the star that conducted and enlivened the discourse !
And when I talked not of thee, still didst thou fill my
mind, and warm every thought I uttered, for I am not
ashamed to acknowledge I greatly miss thee. Best of
all good girls ! — the sufferings I have sustained all
night in consequence of thine, Eliza, are beyond the
power of words. . . . And so thou hast fixed thy
Bramin's portrait over thy writing desk, and will consult
it in all doubts and difficulties ? — Grateful and good
girl ! Yorick smiles contentedly over all thou dost :

^ " I am glad that you are in love — 'twill cure you at least of the
spleen, which has a bad effect on both man and woman — I myself must
even have some Dulcinea in my head, it harmonises the soul ; and in
these cases I first endeavour to make the lady believe so, or rather, I
begin first to make myself believe that I am in love — but I carry on my
affairs quite in the French way, sentimentally — I'amour (say they) u'est
rien sans sentiment. Now, notwithstanding they make such a pother
about the xvord, they have no precise idea annexed to it. And so much
for that same subject called love." — Sterne's Letters, May 23, 1765.

" P.S. — My ' Sentimental Journey ' will please Mrs. J and my

Lydia [his daughter, afterwards Mrs. Medalle] — I can answer for those
two. It is a subject which works well, and suits the frame of mind I
have been in for some time past. I told you my design in it was to
teach us to love the world and our fellow-creatures better than we do —
so it runs most upon those gentler passions and affections which aid so
much to it"— Letters [1767].

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 279

liis picture does not do justice to his own complacency.
I am glad your shipmates are friendly beings (Eliza
was at Deal going back to the Counsellor at Bombay,
and indeed it was high time she should be off.) You
could least dispense with what is contrary to your own
nature, which is soft and gentle, Eliza; it would civilise
savages — though pity were it thou shouldest be tainted
with the office. Write to me, my child, thy delicious
letters. Let them speak the easy carelessness of a
heart that opens itself anyhow, every how, such Eliza
I write to thee! (the artless rogue, of course he
did !) ' And so I should ever love thee, most art-
lessly, most affectionately if Providence permitted
thy residence in the same section of the globe : for I
am all that honour and affection can make me ' Thy
Bramin.' "

The Bramin continues addressing Mrs. Draper
until the departure of the Earl of Chatham, India-
man, from Deal, on the 2nd of April, 1767. He is
amiably anxious about the fresh paint for Eliza's
cabin; he is uncommonly solicitous about her com-
panions on board : " I fear the best of yom' shipmates
are only genteel by comparison with the contrasted
crew with which thou beholdest them. So was —
you know who — from the same fallacy which was
put upon your judgment when — but I will not
mortify you !"

" You know who " was, of course, Daniel Draper.

280 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

Esq., of Bombay — a gentleman very mucli respected in
that quarter of the globe, and about whose probable
health our vrorthy Bramin writes with delightful candour.

" I honour you, Eliza, for keeping secret some
things which, if explained, had been a panegyric on
yourself. There is a dignity in venerable affliction
which will not allow it to appeal to the world for
pity or redress. Well have you supported that
character, my amiable, my philosophic friend ! And
indeed, I begin to think you have as many virtues
as my Uncle Toby's widow. Talking of widows —
pray, Eliza, if ever you are such, do not think of
giving yourself to some wealthy Nabob, because I
design to marry you myself. My wife cannot live
long, and I know not the woman I should like so
well for her substitute as yourself. 'Tis true I am
ninety-five in constitution, and you but twenty-five ;
but what I want in youth, I will make up in wit
and good-humour. Not Swift so loved his Stella,
Scarron his Maintenon, or Waller his Saccharissa.
Tell me, in answer to this, that you approve and
honour the proposal."

Approve and honour the proposal ! The coward
was writing gay letters to his friends this while,
with sneering allusions to this poor foohsh Bramine.
Her ship was not out of the Downs, and the charming
Sterne was at the Mount Cofi'eehouse, with a
sheet of gilt-edged paper before him, offering that

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 281

precious treasure liis heart to Lady P , asking

whether it gave her pleasure to see him unhappy ?
whether it ackled to her triumph that her eyes and
lips had turned a man into a fool ? — quoting the
Lord's Prayer, with a horrible baseness of blasphemy,
as a proof that he had desired not to be led into
temptation, and swearing himself the most tender and
sincere fool in the world. It was from his home at
Coxwould that he wrote the Latin letter, which, I
suppose, he was ashamed to put into English. I find
in my copy of the Letters, that there is a note of
I can't call it admiration, at letter 112, which seems
to announce that there was a No. 3 to whom the
wretched worn-out old scamp was paying his addresses ;^

1 TO MRS, H .

"Coxwould, Nov. 15, 1767.
" Now be a good dear woman, my H , and execute tliose com-
missions well, and when I see you I will give you a kiss — there's for
you ! But I have something else for you which I am fabricating at a
great rate, and that is my ' Sentimental Journey,' which shall make you
cry as much as it has affected me, or I will give up the business of
sentimental writing. ... I am yours, &c. &c.,

"T. Shandy."

TO THE EARL OF .

" Coxioould, Nov. 28, 1767.
" Mt Lord, — 'Tis with the greatest pleasure I take my pen to thank
your Lordship for your letter of inquiry about Yorick — he was worn
out, both his spirits and body, with the ' Sentimental Journey ; ' 'tis
true, then, an author must feel himself, or his reader will not — ^but I
have torn my whole frame into pieces by my feelings — I believe the
brain stands as much in need of recruiting as the body ; therefore I
shall set out for town the twentieth of next month, after having
recruited myself a week at York. I might indeed solace myself with

282 E^^GLISH HUMOURISTS.

and the year after, having come back to his lodgings
in Bond-street, with his "Sentimental Journej^" to
launch upon the town, eager as ever for praise and
pleasure ; as vain, as wicked, as witty, as false as
he had ever been, death at length seized the feeble
wretch, and, on the 18th of March, 1768, that "bale
of cadaverous goods," as he calls his body, was con-
signed to Pluto/ In his last letter there is one sign
of grace — the real affection with which he entreats a
friend to be a guardian to his daughter Lydia.' All
his letters to her are artless, kind, affectionate, and

my wife (who is come from France), but in fact, I have long been a
sentimental being, whatever your Lordship may think to the contrary."

^ " It is known that Sterne died in hired lodgings, and I have been
told that his attendants robbed him even of his gold sleeve-buttons
while he was expiring." — Dr. Ferriar.

He died at No. 41 (now a cheesemonger's), on the west side of Old
Bond Street. — Handhooh of London.

2 '^in February, 1768, Lawrence Sterne, his frame exhausted by
long debilitating illness, expired at his lodgings in Bond-street, Lon-
don. There was something in the manner of his death singularly
resembling the particulars detailed by Mrs QuicJdy, as attending that of
Falstaff, the compeer of Yorick for infinite jest, however unlike in
other particulars. As he lay on his bed totally exhausted, he com-
plained that his feet were cold, and requested the female attendant to
chafe them. She did so, and it seemed to relieve him. He com-
plained that the cold came up higher; and whilst the assistant was in
the act of chafing his ancles and legs, he expired without a groan. It
was also remarkable that his death took place much in the manner
which he himself had wished ; and that the last offices were rendered
him, not in his own house, or by the hand of kindred affection, but in
an inn, and by strangers.

" We are well acquainted with Sterne's features and personal appear-
ance, to which he himself frequently alludes. He was tall and thin,
with a hectic and consumptive appearance." — Sir Walter Scott.

STEENE AND GOLDSMITH. 283

not sentimental ; as a hundred pages in his ^\Titings
are beautiful, and full, not of surprising humour
merely, but of genuine love and kindness. A perilous
trade, indeed, is that of a man who has to bring his
tears and laughter, his recollections, his personal
griefs and joys, his private thoughts and feelings to
market, to write them on paper, and sell them
for money. Does he exaggerate his grief, so as to
get his reader's pity for a false sensibility — feign
indignation, so as to establish a character for
virtue? elaborate repartees, so that he may pass
for a wit ? steal from other authors, and put down
the theft to the credit side of his own reputation
for ingenuity and learning ? feign originality ? affect
benevolence or misanthropy ? appeal to the gallery
gods with claptraps and vulgar baits to catch
applause ?

How much of the point and emphasis is necessary
for the fair business of the stage, and how much of
the rant and rouge is put on for the vanity of the
actor. His audience trusts him: can he trust him-
self? How much was deliberate calculation and
imposture — how much was false sensibility — and how
much true feeling ? Where did the lie begin, and
did he know where ? and where did the truth end
in the art and scheme of this man of genius, this
actor, this quack ? Some time since I was in the
company of a French actor, who began after dinner,

284 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

and at liis own request, to sing French songs of the
sort called des chansons grivoises, and which he per-
formed admirably, and to the dissatisfaction of most
persons present. Having finished these, he com-
menced a sentimental ballad — it was so charmingly
sung that it touched all persons present, and especially
the singer himself, whose voice trembled, whose eyes
filled witli emotion, and who was snivelling and
weeping quite genuine tears by the time his own
ditty was over. I suppose Sterne had this artistical
sensibility ; he used to blubber perpetually in his
study, and finding his tears mfectious, and that they
brought him a great popularity, he exercised the
lucrative gift of weeping, he utilised it, and cried on
every occasion. I own that I don't value or respect
much the cheap dribble of those fountains. He
fatigues me with his perpetual disquiet and his
uneasy appeals to my risible or sentimental faculties.
He is always looking in my face, watching his effect,
uncertain whether I think him an impostor or not ;
posture -making, coaxing*, and imploring me. " See
what sensibihty I have — own now that I'm very
clever — do cry now, you can't resist this." The
humour of Swift and Eabelais, whom he pretended
to succeed, poured from them as naturally as song
does from a bird ; they lose no manly dignity with
it, but laugh their hearty great laugh out of their
broad chests as nature bade them. But this man —

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 285

wlio can make you laugh, who can make jou cry,
too — never lets his reader alone, or will permit his
audience repose : when you are quiet, he fancies he
must rouse you, and turns over head and heels, or
sidles up and whispers a nasty story. The man is
a great jester, not a great humourist. He goes to
work systematically and of cold Wood; paints his
face, puts on his ruff and motley clothes, and lays
down his carpet and tumbles on it.

For instance, take the " Sentimental Journey," and
see in the writer the deliberate propensity to make
pomts and seek applause. He gets to Dessein's
Hotel, he wants a carriage to travel to Paris, he goes
to the inn-yard and begins what the actors call
"business" at once. There is that little carriage the
desohUgeant. " Four months had elapsed since it
had finished its career of Europe in the corner of
Monsieur Dessein's courtyard, and having sallied out
thence but a vamped-up business at first, though it
had been twice taken to pieces on Mount Sennis,
it had not profited much by its adventures, but by
none so little as the standing so many months unpitied
in the corner of Monsieur Dessein's coach-j^ard.
Much, indeed, was not to be said for it — but some-
thing might — and when a few words will rescue
misery out of her distress, I hate the man who can
be a churl of them."

Le tour est fait ! Paillasse has tumbled ! Paillasse

286 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

lias jumped over tlie desohligeant, cleared it, hood
and all, and bows to tlie noble company. Does
anybody believe that this is a real Sentiment ? that
this luxury of generosity, this gallant rescue of Misery
— out of an old cab, is genuine feeling? It is as
genuine as the virtuous oratory of Joseph Surface
when he begins, " The man who," &c. &c., and
wishes to pass off for a saint with his credulous,
good-humoured dupes.

Our friend purchases the carriage — after turning
that notorious old monk to good account, and effecting
(like a soft and good-natured Paillasse as he was,
and very free with his money when he had it) an
exchange of snuff-boxes with the old Franciscan, jogs
out of Calais ; sets down in immense figures on the
credit side of his account the sous he gives away
to the Montreuil beggars ; and, at Nampont, gets
out of the chaise and whimpers over that famous
dead donkey, for which any sentimentalist may cry
who will. It is agreeably and skilfully done — that
dead jackass ; lilve M. de Soubise's cook, on the
campaign, Sterne dresses it, and serves it up quite
tender and with a very piquante sauce. But tears,
and fine feelings, and a white pocket-handkerchief,
and a funeral sermon, and horses and feathers, and
a procession of mutes, and a hearse with a dead
donkey inside ! Psha ! Mountebank ! I'll not give
thee one penny more for that trick, donkey and all !

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 287

This donkey had appeared once before with signal
effect. In 1765, three years before the j)ublication of
the " Sentimental Journey," the seventh and eighth
volumes of " Tristram Shandy" were given to the
world, and the famous Lyons donkey makes his
entry in those volumes (pp. 315, 316) : —

" ' Twas by a poor ass, with a couple of large
panniers at his back, who had just turned in to
collect eleemos}Tiary turnip-tops and cabbage-leaves ;
and stood dubious, with his two fore -feet at the
inside of the threshold, and with his two hinder
feet towards the street, as not knowing very well
whether he was to go in or no.

" Now 'tis an animal (be in what hurry I may) I
cannot bear to strike ; there is a patient endurance
of suffering wrote so unaffectedly in his looks and
carriage which pleads so mightily for him, that it
always disarms me, and to that degree that I do not
Kke to speak unkindly to him : on the contrary,
meet him where I will, whether in town or country,
in cart or mider panniers, whether in liberty or
bondage, I have ever something civil to say to him on
my part ; and, as one word begets another (if he has
as little to do as I), I generally fall into conversation
with him; and surely never is my imagination so
busy as in framing responses from the etcliings of
his countenance ; and where those carry me not deep
enough, in flying from my own heart into his, and

288 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

seeing what is natural for an ass to think — as well
as a man, upon the occasion. In truth, it is the
only creature of all the classes of beings below me

with whom I can do tliis With an ass I can

commune for ever.

" ' Come, Honesty,' said I, seeing it was imprac-
ticable to pass betwixt him and the gate, ' art thou
for coming in or going out ? '

" The ass twisted his head round to look up the
street.

" ' Well ! ' replied I, ' we'll wait a minute for thy
driver.'

" He turned his head thoughtful about, and
looked wistfully the opposite way.

" ' I understand thee perfectly," answered I : ' if
thou takest a wrong step in this affair, he will cudgel
thee to death. Well ! a minute is but a minute ;
and if it saves a fellow-creature a drubbing, it shall
not be set down as ill spent.'

" He was eatmg the stem of an artichoke as this
discourse went on, and, in the little peevish con-
tentions between hunger and unsavouriness, had
dropped it out of his mouth half-a-dozen times, and
had picked it up again. ' God help thee. Jack ! ' said I,
* thou hast a bitter breakfast on't — and many a bitter
day's labour, and many a bitter blow, I fear, for its
wages ! 'Tis all, all bitterness to thee — whatever life
is to others ! And now thy mouth, if one knew the

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 289

truth of it, is as bitter, I dare say, as soot (for
he had cast aside the stem), and thou hast not a
friend perhaps in all this world that will give thee
a macaroon.' In saying this, I pulled out a paper
of 'em, which I had just bought, and gave him one ; —
and, at this moment that I am telling it, my heart
smites me that there was more of pleasantry in the
conceit of seemg Jioiv an ass would eat a macaroon
than of benevolence in giving him one, which pre-
sided in the act.

" When the ass had eaten his macaroon, I pressed
him to come in. The poor beast was heavy loaded —
his legs seemed to tremble under him — he hung
rather backwards, and, as I pulled at his halter, it
broke in my hand. He looked up pensive in my
face : ' Don't thrash me with it ; but if you will you
may.' ' If I do,' said I, ' I'll be d .' "

A critic who refuses to see in this charming
description wit, humour, pathos, a kind nature
speaking, and a real sentiment, must be hard indeed
to move and to please. A page or two farther we
come to a description not less beautiful — a landscape
and figures, dehciously painted by one who had the
keenest enjoyment and the most tremulous sen-
sibility : —

" 'Twas in the road between Nismes and Lunel,
where is the best Muscatto wine in all France : the
sun was set, they had done their work ; the nymphs

290 ENGLISH HUMO HEISTS.

had tied up their hair afresh, and the swains were
preparing for a carousal. My mule made a dead
point. ' ' Tis the pipe and tamhourine,' said I — I
never will argue a point with one of your family as
long as I live ; ' so leaping off his back, and kicking
off one boot into this ditch and t'other into that,
' I'll take a dance,' said I, * so stay you here.'

" A sun-burnt daughter of labour rose up from
the group to meet me as I advanced towards them ;
her hair, which was of a dark chesnut approaching
to a black, was tied up in a knot, all but a single
tress.

"'We want a cavalier,' said she, holding out both
her hands, as if to offer them. * And a cavaher you
shall have,' said I, taking hold of both of them. ' We
could not have done without you,' said she, letting
go one hand, with self-taught politeness, and leading
me up with the other.

" A lame youth, whom Apollo had recompensed
with a pipe, and to which he had added a tambourine
of his own accord, ran sweetly over the prelude,
as he sat upon the bank. 'Tie me up this tress,
instantly,' said Nannette, putting a piece of string
into my hand. It taught me to forget I was a
stranger. The whole knot fell down — we had been
seven years acquainted. The youth struck the note
upon the tambourine, his pipe followed,, and off we
bounded.

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 291

" The sister of tlie yoiitli — who had stolen her voice
from Heaven — sang alternately with her brother.
'Twas a Gascoigne roundelay. * Viva la joia, fidon
la tristessa ;' — the nymphs joined in unison, and their
swains an octave below them.

" Viva la joia was in Nannette's lips, viva la joia
in her eyes. A transient spark of amity shot across
the space betwixt us. She looked amiable. AVhy
could I not live and end my daj^s thus ? ' Just
Disposer of oiu' joys and sorrows ! ' cried I, ' why
could not a man sit down in the lap of content
here, and dance, and sing, and say his prayers,
and go to Heaven with this nut-brown maid?'
Capriciously did she bend her head on one side,
and dance up insidious. 'Then 'tis time to dance
off,' quoth I."

And with tliis pretty dance and chorus, the volume
artfully concludes. Even here one can't give the
whole description. There is not a page in Sterne's
writing but has something that were better away,
a latent corruption — a liint, as of an impure
presence.'

^ " "With regard to Sterne, and the charge of licentiousness which
presses so seriously upon his character as a writer, I would remark that
there is a sort of knowingness, the wit of which depends, 1st, on the
modesty it gives pain to ; or, 2ndly, on the innocence and innocent
ignorance over which it triiimphs; or, 3rdly, on a certain oscillation
in the individual's own mind between the remaining good and the
encroaching evil of his nature — a sort of dallying with the devil — a
fluxionary art of combining courage and cowardice, as when a man

U 2

292 e:n^glish humourists.

Some of that dreary double entendre may be
attributed to freer times and manners than ours,
but not all. The foul Satyr's eyes leer out of the
leaves constantly : the last words the famous author
wrote were bad and wicked — the last lines the poor
stricken wretch penned were for pity and pardon.
I think of these past writers and of one who lives
amongst us now, and am grateful for the innocent
laughter and the sweet and unsullied page which
the author of " Da^dd Copperfield " gives to my
children.

snuffs a candle with his fingers for the first time, or better still, per-
haps, like that trembling daring with which a child touches a hot tea-
urn, because it has been forbidden ; so that the mind has its own white
and black angel ; the same or similar amusement as may be supposed
to take place between an old debauchee and a prude, — the feeling
resentment, on the one hand, from a prudential anxiety to preserve
appearances and have a character ; and, on the other, an inward sym-
pathy with the enemy. We have only to suppose society innocent, and
then nine-tenths of this sort of wit would be like a stone that falls in
snow, making no sound, because exciting no resistance ; the remainder
rests on its being an offence against the good manners of human nature
itself.

*' This source, unworthy as it is, may doubtless be combined with
wit, drollery, fancy, and even humour ; and we have only to regret the
misalliance ; but that the latter are quite distinct from the former,
may be made evident by abstracting in our imagination the morality
of the characters of Mr. Shandy, my Uncle Toby, and Trim, which are
all antagonists to this spurious sort of wit, from the rest of * Tristram
Shandy,' and by supposing, instead of them, the presence of two or three
callous debauchees. The result will be pure disgust. Sterne cannot
be too severely censured for thus using the best dispositions of our
nature as the panders and condiments for the basest." — Coleridge.
Literary Bemains, vol. i. p. 141, 142.

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 293

" Jet^ sur cette boule,
Laid, clietif et souffrant;
Etouffd dans la foule,
Faute d'etre assez grand ;

" Une plainte touchante
De ma bouche sortit ;
Le bon Dieu me dit : Chante,
Chante, pauvre petit !

" Chanter, ou je m'abuse,
Est ma t^che ici bas.
Tons ceux qu'ainsij 'amuse,
Ne m'aimeront ils pas?"

In those charming lines of Beranger, one may fancy
described the career, the sufferings, the genius, the
gentle nature of Goldsmith, and the esteem in which
we hold him. Who, of the millions whom he has
amused, doesn't love him ? To be the most beloved of
English writers, what a title that is for a man ! ^ A
wild youth, wayward but full of tenderness and affection,
quits the country village where his boyhood has been
passed in happy musing, in idle shelter, in fond longing

1 "He was a friend to virtue, and in his most playful pages never
forgets what is due to it. A gentleness, delicacy, and purity of feeling
distinguishes whatever he wrote, and bears a correspondence to the
generosity of a disposition which knew no bounds but his last
guinea

" The admirable ease and grace of the narrative, as well as the
pleasing truth ^s'ith which the principal characters are designed, make
the ' Vicar of Wakefield ' one of the most delicious morsels of fictitious
composition on which the human mind was ever employed.

. . . . " We read the * Vicar of Wakefield ' in youth and in age — we
ret\irn to it again and again, and bless the memory of an author who
contrives so well to reconcile us to human nature." — Sir Walter
Scott.

294 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

to see the great world out of doors, and achieve name and
fortune — and after years of dire struggle, and neglect
and poverty, his heart turning back as fondly to his
native place, as it had longed eagerly for change when
sheltered there, he writes a book and a poem, full of
the recollections and feelings of home — he paints the
friends and scenes of his youth, and peoples Auburn
and Wakefield, with remembrances of Lissoy. Wander
he must, but he carries away a home-relic with him,
and dies with it on his breast. His nature is truant ;
in repose it longs for change : as on the journey it looks
back for friends and quiet. He passes to-day in
building an air castle . for to-morrow, or in writing
yesterday's elegy; and he would flyaway this hour;
but that a cage of necessity keeps him. What is the
charm of his verse, of his style, and humoui' ? His
sweet regrets, his delicate compassion, his soft smile,
his tremulous sympathy, the weakness which he owns ?
Your love for him is half pity. You come hot and
tired from the day's battle, and this sweet minstrel
sings to you. Who could harm the kind vagrant
harper ? Whom did he ever hurt ? He carries no
weapon — save the harp on which he plays to you ; and
with which he delights great and humble, young and
old, the Captains in the tents, or the soldiers round the
fire, or the women and children in the villages, at whose
porches he stops and sings his simple songs of love
and beauty. With that sweet story of the "Yicar of

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 295

Wakefield," ' lie has found entry into every castle and
every hamlet in Eui'ope. Not one of us, however busy

^ *'' Now Herder came," says Goethe in his Autobiography, relating
his first acquaintance with Goldsmith's masterpiece, " and together
with his great knowledge brought many other aids, and the later pub-
lications besides. Among these he announced to us the * Vicar of
"Wakefield ' as an excellent work, with the German translation of which
he would make us acquaiated by reading it aloud to us himself. . . .

"A Protestant coxintiy clergyman is perhaps the most beautiful
subject for a modem idyl; he appears like Melchizedeck, as priest and
king ui one person. To the most innocent situation which can be ima-
gined on earth, to that of a husbandman, he is, for the most part
united by similarity of occupation as well as by equality in family
relationships ; he is a father, a master of a family, an agriculturist, and
thus perfectly a member of the community. On this pure, beautiful,
earthly foundation rests his higher calling ; to him is it given to guide
men through life, to take care of their spiritual education, to bless
them at all the leading epochs of then- existence, to instruct, to
strengthen, to console them, and if consolation is not sufficient for the
present, to call up and guarantee the hope of a happier future. ImagLue
such a man with pure human sentiments, strong enough not to deviate
from them under any circumstances, and by this already elevated
above the multitude of whom one cannot expect purity and firnmess ;
give him the learning necessary for his office, as well as a cheerful
equable activity, which is even passionate, as it neglects no moment to
do good — and you will have him well endowed. But at the same time
add the necessary limitation, so that he must not only pause in a small
circle, but may also perchance pass over to a smaller ; grant him good-
nature, placability, resolution, and everything else praiseworthy that
springs from a decided character, and over all this a cheerful spirit of
compliance, and a smiling toleration of his own failings and those of
others, — then you will have put together pretty well the image of our
excellent Wakefield.

"The delineation of this character on his course of life through joys
and sorrows, the ever-increasing interest of the story, by the combina-
tion of the entirely natural with the strange and the singular, make
this novel one of the best which has ever been written ; besides this, it
has the great advantage that it is quite moral, nay, in a pure sense.
Christian — represents the reward of a good-will and perseverance in

296 EliTGLISH HUMOURISTS.

or hard, but once or twice in our lives, has passed an
evening with him, and undergone the charm of his
delightful music.

the right, strengthens an unconditional confidence in God, and attests
the final triumph of good over evil ; and all this without a trace of
cant or pedantry. The author was preserved from both of these by an
elocution of mind that shows itself throughout in' the form of irony, by
which this little work must appear to us as wise as it is amiable. The
author, Dr. Goldsmith, has without question, a great insight into the
moral world, into its strength and its infirmities ; but at the same time
he can thankfully acknowledge that he is an Englishman, and reckon
highly the advantages which his country and his nation afford him.
The family, with the delineation of which he occupies himself, stands
upon one of the last steps of citizen comfort, and yet comes in contact
with the highest ; its narrow circle, which becomes still more contracted,
touches upon the great world through the natural and civil course of
things ; this little skiff floats on the agitated waves of English life, and
in weal or woe it has to expect injury or help from the vast fleet which
sails around it.

"I may suppose that my readers know this work, and have it in
memory ; whoever hears it named for the first time here, as well as he
who is induced to read it again, will thank me." — Goethe. Truth and
Poetry ; from my own Life. (English translation, vol. i. pp. 378, 9.)

" He seems from infancy to have been compounded of two natures,
one bright, the other blundering ; or to have had fairy gifts laid in his
cradle by the * good people ' who haunted this birth-place, the old
goblin mansion, on the banks of the Inny.

" He carries with him the wayward elfin spirit, if we may so term it,
throughout his career. His fairy gifts are of no avail at school,
academy, or college : they unfit him for close study and practical science,
and render him heedless of everything that does not address itself to
his poetical imagination, and genial and festive feelings ; they dispose
him to break away from restraint, to stroll about hedges, green lanes,
and haunted streams, to revel with jovial companions, or to rove the
country like a gipsy in quest of odd adventures. . . .

" Though his circumstances often compelled him to associate with
the poor, they never could betray him into companionship with the
depraved. His relish for humour, and for the study of character, as
we have before observed, brought him often into convivial company of

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 297

Goldsmitli's father was no doubt the good Doctor
Primrose, whom we all of us know,* Swift was yet
alive, when the httle Oliver was horn at Pallas, or
Pallasmore, in the county of Longford, in Ireland. In
1730, two years after the child's bii-th, Charles Gold-
smith removed his family to Lissoy, in the coimty
Westmeath, that sweet " Auburn," which every person
who hears me has seen in fancy. Here the kind parson ^

a vulgar kind ; but he discriminated between their vrilgarity and their
amusing qualities, or rather wrought from the whole store familiar
features of life which form the staple of his most popular writings." —
Washington Irving.

1 " The family of Goldsmith, Goldsmyth, or as it was occasionally
written Gouldsmith, is of considerable standing in Ireland, and seems
always to have held a respectable station in society. Its origin is Eng-
lish, supposed to be derived from that which was long settled at
Crayford in Kent," — Prior's Life of Goldsmith.

Oliver's father, great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather were
clergymen ; and two of them married clergymen's daughtei's.

" " At church with meek and unaffected grace.
His looks adorn'd the venerable place ;
Truth from his lips prevail'd with double sway.
And fools who came to scoff remain'd to pray.
The service past, arovmd the pious man,
With steady zeal each honest ..rustic mn;
E'en children follow'd with endearing wile,
And pluck'd his gown to share the good man's smile.
His ready smile a parent's warmth exprest,
Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distrest ;
To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given,
But all his serious thoughts had rest in Heaven,
As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form,
Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm,
Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread.
Eternal simshine settles on its head." — The Deserted Village,

298 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

brought up his eight children ; and loving all the
world, as his son says, fancied all the world loved him.
He had a crowd of poor dependants besides those
liungTy children. He kept an open table ; round which
sate flatterers and poor friends, who laughed at the
honest rector's many jokes, and ate the produce of his
seventy acres of farm. Those who have seen an Irish
house in the present day, can fancy that one of Lissoy.
The old beggar still has his allotted corner by the
kitchen turf; the maimed old soldier still gets his
potatoes and butter-milk ; the poor cottier still asks his
honour's charity, and prays God bless his Eeverence for
the sixpence : the ragged pensioner still takes his place
by right and sufferance. There's still a crowd in the
kitchen, and a crowd round the parlour -table, profusion,
confusion, kindness, poverty. If an Irishman comes
to London to make his fortune, he has a half dozen of
Irish dependants who take a per centage of liis earnings.
The good Charles Goldsmith^ left but little provision

1 "In May this year (1768), he lost his brother, the Rev. Henry
Goldsmith, for whom he had been unable to obtain preferment in the
church

. ..." To the curacy of Kilkenny West, the moderate stipend of
which, forty pounds a-year, is sufficiently celebrated by his brother's
lines. It has been stated that Mr. Goldsmith added a school, which,
after having been held at more than one place in the vicinity, Avas finally
fixed at Lissoy. Here his talents and industry gave it celebrity, and
under his care the sons of many of the neighbouring gentry received
their education. A fever breaking out among the boys about 1765,
they dispersed for a time, but re-assembling at Athlone, he continued
his scholastic labours there until the time of his death, which happened,

STERN'E AK^D GOLDSMITH. 299

for liis hungry race when death summoned him :
and, one of his daughters being engaged to a Squire
of rather superior dignity, Charles Goklsmith im-
poverished the rest of his family to provide the gui
with a dowry.

The small-pox, which scourged all Europe at that
time, and ravaged the roses off the cheeks of half the
world, fell foul of poor little OHver's face, when the
child was eight years old, and left him scarred and
disfigured for his life. An old woman in his father's
village taught him his letters, and pronounced him a
dunce : Paddy Byrne, the hedge-schoolmaster, took him
in hand ; and from Paddy Byrne, he was transmitted
to a clergyman at Elphm. When a cliild was sent to
school in those days, the classic phrase was that he
was placed under Mr. So and So's ferule. Poor little
ancestors ! It is hard to think how ruthlessly you were
birched ; and how much of needless whipping and
tears our small forefathers had to undergo ! A relative,
kind uncle Contarine, took the main charge of little
Noll; who went through his school days righteously

like that of his brother, about the forty -fifth year of his age. He was a
man of an excellent heart and an amiable disposition." — Prior's
Goldsmith.

" Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see,
My heart, untravell'd, fondly turns to thee :
Still to my brother turns with ceaseless pain.
And drags at each remove a lengthening chain."

The Traveller.

300 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

doing as little work as lie could : robbing orchards,
playing at ball, and making his pocket money fly about
whenever fortune sent it to him. Everybody knows
the story of that famous " Mistake of a Night," when
the young schoolboy, provided with a guinea and a nag,
rode up to the " best house " in Ardagli, called for the
landlord's company over a bottle of wine at supper, and
for a hot cake for breakfast in the morning ; and found
when he asked for the bill, that the best house was
Squire Featherstone's, and not the inn for which he
mistook it. Who does not know every story about
Goldsmith ? That is a delightful and fantastic picture
of the child dancing and capering about in the kitchen
at home, when the old fiddler gibed at him for liis
ugliness — and called him ^sop, and little Noll made
his repartee of " Heralds proclaim aloud this saying —
see ^jsop dancing and his monkey plapng." One
can fancy a queer pitiful look of humour and appeal
upon that little scarred face — the funny little dancing
figure, the funny little brogue. In his life, and his
writings which are the honest expression of it, he is
constantly bewaihng that homely face and person ; anon
he surveys them in the glass ruefully; and presently
assumes the most comical dignity. He likes to deck
out his little person in splendour and fine colours. He
presented himself to be examined for ordination in a
pair of scarlet breeches, and said honestly that he did
not like to go into the church because he was fond of

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 301

coloured clothes. When he tried to X3ractise as a doctor,
he got by hook or by crook a black-velvet suit, and
looked as big and grand as he coidd, and kept his hat
over a patch on the old coat : in better days he bloomed
out in plum-colour, in blue silk, and in new velvet. For
some of those splendours the heks and assignees of
Mr. Filby, the tailor, have never been i)aid to this day ;
perhaps the kind tailor and his creditor have met and
settled the little account in Hades.^

They showed until lately a window at Trinity College,
Dublin, on which the name of O. Goldsmith was
engraved with a diamond. AVhose diamond was it?
Not the young Sizar's who made but a poor figure in
that place of learning. He was idle, penniless, and
fond of pleasure : ^ he learned his way early to the
pawnbroker's shop. He wrote ballads they say for the
street singers, who paid him a crown for a poem : and
his pleasure was to steal out at night and hear his verses
sung. He was chastised by his tutor for giving a dance
in his rooms, and took the box on the ear so much to
heart, that he packed up his all, pawned his books and

^ " "When Goldsmith died, half the unpaid bill he owed to Mr. William
Filby (amounting in all to 791.) was for clothes supplied to this nephew
Hodson." — Forster's Goldsmith, p. 520.

As this nephew Hodson ended his days (see the same page) " a pros-
perous Irish gentleman," it is not unreasonable to wish that he had
cleared off Mr. Filby's bill.

- " Poor fellow ! He hardly knew an ass from a mule, nor a turkey
from a goose, but when he saw it on the table." — Cumberland's
Memoirs.

303 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

little property, and disappeared from college and
family. He said lie intended to go to America, but
when his money was spent, the young prodigal came
home ruefully, and the good folks there killed their
calf — it was but a lean one — and welcomed him back.

After College, he hung about his mother's house,
and lived for some years the life of a buckeen —
passed a month with this relation and that, a year
with one patron, a great deal of time at the public -
house.* Tired of this life, it was resolved that he
should go to London, and study at the Temple ; but
he got no farther on the road to London and the
woolsack than Dublin, where he gambled away the
fifty pound given him for his outfit, and whence he
returned to the indefatigable forgiveness of home.
Then he determined to be a doctor, and Uncle
Contarme helped him to a couple of years at
Edinburgh. Then from Edinburgh he felt that he
ought to hear the famous professors of Leyden and
Paris, and wrote most amusing pompous letters to
his uncle about the great Farheim, Du Petit, and
Duhamel du Monceau, whose lectures he proposed

^ " These youthful follies, like the fermentation of liquors, often dis-
turb the mind only in order to its future refinement : a life spent in
phlegmatic apathy resembles those liquors which never ferment, and
are consequently always muddy." — Goldsmith. Memoir of Voltaire.

" He [Johnson] said ' Goldsmith was a plant that flowered late.'
There appeared nothing remarkable about him when he was young."

— BOSWELL.

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 303

to follow. If Uncle Contarine believed those letters —
if Oliver's mother believed that story which the
youth related of his going to Cork, with the purpose
of embarking for America, of his having paid his
passage-money, and having sent his kit on board ; of
the anonymous captain sailing away with Oliver's
valuable luggage, in a nameless ship, never to return ;
if Uncle Contarine and the mother at Ballymahon
believed his stories, they must have been a very
simple pair; as it was a very simple rogue indeed
who cheated them. When the lad, after failing in
his clerical examination, after failing in his plan for
studying the law, took leave of these projects and of
his parents, and set out for Edinburgh, he saw
mother, and uncle, and lazy Ballymahon, and green
native turf, and sparkling river for the last time.
He was never to look on old Ireland more, and only
in fancy revisit her.

" But me not destined snch delights to share,
My prime of life in wandering spent and care,
Impelled, with step unceasing, to pursue
Some fleeting good that mocks me with the view ;
That like the circle bounding earth and skies
Allures from far, yet, as I follow, flies :
My fortune leads to traverse realms unknown,
And find no spot of all the world my own."

I spoke in a former lecture of that high courage
which enabled Fielding, in spite of disease, remorse,
and poverty, always to retain a cheerful spirit and to
keep his manly benevolence and love of truth intact,

304 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

as if these treasures had been confided to him for
the pubHc benefit, and he was accountable to
posterity for their honourable employ; and a con-
stancy equally happy and admirable I think was
shown by Goldsmith, whose sweet and friendly
nature bloomed kindly always in the midst of a life's
storm, and rain, and bitter weather.' The poor
fellow was never so friendless but he could befriend
some one; never so pinched and wretched but he
could give of his crust, and speak his word of
compassion. If he had but his flute left, he could
give that, and make the children happy in the dreary
London court. He could give the coals in that queer
coal-scuttle we read of to his poor neighbour : he
could give away his blankets in college to the poor
widow, and warm himself as he best might in the
feathers : he could pawn his coat to save liis land-
lord from gaol: when he was a school-usher, he spent
his earnings in treats for the boys, and the good-
natured schoolmaster's wife said justly that she ought
to keep Mr. Goldsmith's money as well as the young
gentlemen's. When he met his pupils in later Kfe,

^ " An * inspired idiot,' Goldsmith, hangs strangely about him

[Johnson] Yet, on the whole, there is no evil in the

* goosebeiTy-fool/ but rather much good ; of a finer, if of a weaker sort
than Johnson's ; and all the more genuine that he himself could never
become conscious of it, — though unhappily never cease attempting to
become so : the author of the genuine * Vicar of Wakefield,' nill he
will he, must needs fly towards such a mass of genuine manhood." —
Carltle's Essays (2nd ed.), vol. iv. p. 91.

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 305

nothing would satisfy the Doctor but he must treat
them still. " Have you seen the print of me after
Sir Joshua Kej^nolds ? ^' he asked of one of his old
pupils. " Not seen it ? not bought it ? Sure, Jack,
if your picture had been published, I'd not have
been without it half-an-hour." His purse and his
heart were everybody's, and his friends' as much as
his own. When he was at the height of his repu-
tation, and the Earl of Northumberland, going as
Lord-Lieutenant to L'eland, asked if he could be of
any service to Dr. Goldsmith ? Goldsmith recom-
mended his brother, and not himself, to the great
man. " My patrons," he gallantly said, " are the book-
sellers, and I want no others." ^ Hard patrons they
were, and hard work he did ; but he did not complain

1 " At present, the few poets of England no longer depend on the
gi'eat for subsistence ; they have now no other patrons but the public,
and the public, collectively considered, is a good and a generous
master. It is indeed too frequently mistaken as to the merits of every
candidate for favour ; but to make amends it is never mistaken long.
A performance indeed may be forced for a time into reputation, but,
destitute of real merit, it soon sinks ; time, the touchstone of what is
truly valuable, will soon discover the fraud, and an author should never
arrogate to himself any share of success till his works have been read
at least ten years with satisfaction.

" A man of letters at present, whose works are valuable, is perfectly
sensible of their value. Every polite member of the community by
buying what he writes, contributes to reward him. The ridicule, there-
fore, of living in a garret might have been wit in the last age, but con-
tinues such no longer, because no longer true. A writer of real merit
now, may easily be rich, if his heart be set only on fortune : and for
those who have no merit, it is but fit that such should remain in
merited obscurity." — Goldsmith. Citizen of the World, Let, 84.

306 EITGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

much : if in his early writings some bitter words
escaped him, some allusions to neglect and poverty,
he withdrew these expressions when his works were
republished, and better days seemed to open for him ;
and he did not care to complain that printer or
publisher had overlooked his merit, or left him poor.
The Court face was turned from honest Oliver, the
Court patronised Beattie ; the fashion did not shine
on him — fashion adored Sterne.* Fashion pronounced
Kelly to be the great wiiter of comedy of his day.
A little — not ill-humour, but plaintiveness — a little
betrayal of wounded pride which he showed render

^ Goldsmith attacked Sterne, obviously enough, censuring his inde-
cency, and slighting his wit, and ridiculing his manner, in the 53rd
letter in the " Citizen of the World."

" As in common conversation," says he, " the best way to make the
audience laugh is by first laughing yourself; so in writing, the pro-
perest manner is to show an attempt at humour, which will pass upon
most for human in reality. To effect this, readers must be treated with
the most perfect familiarity ; in one page the author is to make them a
low bow, and in the next to pull them by the nose; he must talk
in riddles, and then send them to bed in order to dream for the
solution," &c.

Sterne's humourous mot on the subject of the gravest part of the
charges, then, as now, made against him, may perhaps be quoted here,
from the excellent, the respectable Sir Walter Scott.

" Soon after ' Tristram ' had appeared, Sterne asked a Yorkshire lady
of fortune and condition, whether she had read his book. ' I have not,
Mr. Sterne,' was the answer ; * and to be plain with you, I am informed
it is not proper for female perusal.' ' My dear good lady,' replied the
author, ' do not be gulled by such stories ; the book is like your young
heir there, (pointing to a child of three years old, who was rolling on
the carpet in his white tunics), he shows at times a good deal that is
usually concealed, but it is all in perfect innocence.' "

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 307

him not the less amiable. The author of the " Vicar
of Wakefield " had a right to protest when Newbery
kept back the MS. for two years : had a right to be
a little peevish with Sterne ; a little angry when
Colman's actors decUned their parts in his delightful
comedy, when the manager refused to have a scene
painted for it, and pronounced its damnation before
hearing. He had not the great public with him;
but he had the noble Johnson, and the admii'able
Reynolds, and the great Gibbon, and the great Burke,
and the great Fox — friends and admu'ers illustrious
indeed, as famous as those who, fifty years before,
sate round Pope's table.

Nobody knows, and I dare say Goldsmith's buoyant
temper kept no account of all the pains which he
endured during the early period of his literary
career. Should any man of letters in our day have
to bear up against such. Heaven grant he may come
out of the period of misfortune with such a pure
kind heart as that which Goldsmith obstinately bore
in his breast. The insults to ivhich he had to submit
are shocking to read of, — slander, contumely, vulgar
satire, brutal malignity pervertmg liis commonest
motives and actions : he had his share of these, and
one's anger is roused at reading of them, as it is at
seeing a woman insulted or a child assaulted, at the
notion that a creature so very gentle and weak, and
full of love, should have had to suffer so. And he

X 2

308 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

had worse tlian insult to undergo — to own to fault,
and deprecate the anger of ruffians. There is a
letter of his extant to one Griffiths, a bookseller, in
which poor Goldsmith is forced to confess that
certain books sent by Griffiths are in the hands of
a friend from whom Goldsmith had been forced to
borrow money. " He was wild, sir," Johnson said,
speaking of Goldsmith to Boswell, with his great,
wise benevolence and noble mercifulness of heart,
*' Dr. Goldsmith was wild, sir ; but he is so no
more." Ah ! if we pity the good and weak man who
suffers undeservedly, let us deal very gently with him
from whom misery extorts not only tears, but shame ;
let us think humbly and charitably of the human
nature that suffers so sadly and falls so low. Whose
turn may it be to-morrow ? What weak heart, confi-
dent before trial, may not succumb under temptation
invincible ? Cover the good man who has been
vanquished — cover his face and pass on.

For the last half dozen years of his life, Goldsmith
was far removed from the pressure of any ignoble
necessity : and in the receipt, indeed, of a pretty large
income from the booksellers, his patrons. Had he
lived but a few years more, his pubhc fame would have
been as great as his private reputation, and he might
have enjoyed alive a part of that esteem which his
country has ever since paid to the vivid and versatile
genius who has touched on almost every subject of

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 309

literature, and touched nothing that he did not adorn.
Except in rare instances a man is known in our pro-
fession, and esteemed as a skilful worlanan, years
before the lucky hit, which trebles his usual gams,
and stamps him a popular author. In the strength of
his age, and the dawn of his reputation, having for
backers and friends the most illustrious literary men of
his time, ^ fame and prosperity might have been in store
for Goldsmith, had fate so willed ; and, at forty-six,
had not sudden disease carried him off. I say pros-
perity rather than competence, for it is probable that
no sum could have put order into his affairs or sufficed
for his irreclaimable habits of dissipation. It must be
remembered that he owed 2000L when he died. " Was
ever poet," Johnson asked, " so trusted before ? " As
has been the case with many another good fellow of his
nation, his hfe was tracked and his substance wasted
by crowds of hungry beggars and lazy dependants. If
they came at a lucky time, (and be sure they knew his
affairs better than he did himself, and watched his pay

1 " Goldsmith told us that he was now busy in w^'iting a Natural
History ; and that he might have full leisure for it, he had taken
lodgings at a farmer's house, near to the six-mile stone in the Edgeware
Road, and had cari'ied down his books ia two returned post-chaises.
He said he believed the farmer's family thought him an odd character,
similar to that in which the Spectator appeared to his landlady and her
children; he was The Gentletnan. Mi-, IVIickle, the translator of the
* Lusiad,' and I, went to visit him at this place a few days afterwards.
He was not at home ; but having a curiosity to see his apartment, we
went in, and found curious scraps of descriptions of animals scrawled
upon the wall with a blacklead pencil." — Boswell.

310 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

day) he gave tliem of liis money : if they begged on
empty-purse days he gave them his promissory bills :
or he treated them to a tavern where he had credit ; or
he obliged them with an order upon honest Mr. Filby
for coats, for which he paid as long as he could earn,
and until the shears of Filby were to cut for him no
more. Staggering under a load of debt and labour,
tracked by bailiffs and reproachful creditors, running
from a hundred poor dependants, whose appealmg looks
were perhaps the hardest of all pains for him to bear^
devising fevered plans for the morrow, new histories,
new comedies, all sorts of new literary schemes, flying
from all these into seclusion, and out of seclusion into
pleasure — at last, at five and forty, death seized him
and closed his career.* I have been many a time in the
Chambers in the Temple which were his, and passed
up the stair- case, which Johnson, and Burke, and
Reynolds trod to see their friend, their poet, their kind
Goldsmith — the stair on which the poor women sate
weeping bitterly when they heard that greatest and

^ " When Goldsmith was dying, Dr. Turton said to him, * Your pulse
is in greater disorder than it should be, from the degree of fever which
you have ; is your mind at ease ? ' Goldsmith answered it was not." —
Dr. Johnson {in Bosioell).

"Chambers, you find, is gone far, and poor Goldsmith is gone
much further. He died of a fever, exasperated, as I believe, by the
fear of distress. He had raised money and squandered it, by every
artifice of acquisition and folly of expense. But let not his failings
be remembered ; he was a very great man." — Dr. Johnson to Bo&wellt
July 5th, 1774.

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 311

most generous of all men was dead within the black
oak door.* Ah, it was a different lot from that for
which the poor fellow sighed, when he wrote with heart
yearning for home those most charming of all fond
verses, in which he fancies he revisits Aubm'n —

*' Here as I take my solitary rounds,
Amidst thy tangled walks and ruined grounds,
And, many a year elapsed, return to view
Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn gi'ew,
Remembrance wakes, with all her busy train,
Swells at my heart, and turns the past to pain.

In all my wanderings round this world of care.
In all my griefs — and God has given my share,
I still had hopes my latest hours to crown,
Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down ;
To husband out life's taper at the close.
And keep the flame from wasting by repose ;
I still had hopes — for pride attends us still —
Amidst the swains to show my book-learned skill,
Aroimd my fire an evening group to di'aw,
And tell of all I felt and all I saw ;
And, as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue,

1 *•' When Burke was told [of Goldsmith's death] he bm'st into tears.
Reynolds was in his painting-room when the messenger went to him ;
but at once he laid his pencil aside, which in times of great family-
distress he had not been known to do..; left his painting-room, and did
not re-enter it that day. . . .

"The stair-case of Brick Coui't is said to have been filled with
mourners, the reverse of domestic ; women without a home, without
domesticity of any kind, with no friend but him they had come to weep
for ; outcasts of that great, solitary, wicked city, to whom he had never
forgotten to be kind and charitable. And he had domestic mourners,
too. His cofifi.n was re-opened at the request of Miss Horneck and her
sister (such was the regard he was known to have for them !) that a lock
might be cut from his hair. It was in Mrs. Gwyn's possession when she
died, after nearly seventy years." — Fokster's Goldsmith.

812 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

Pants to the place from whence at first she flew —
I still had hopes — my long vexations past,
Here to return, and die at home at last.

0 blest retirement, friend to life's decline !
Retreats from care that never must be mine —
How blest is he who crowns in shades like these,
A youth of labour with an age of ease ;
Who quits a world where strong temptations try.
And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly !
For him no wretches born to work and weep
Explore the mine or tempt the dangerous deep ;
No surly porter stands in guilty state
To spurn imploring famine from his gate :
But on he moves to meet his latter end,
Angels around befriending virtue's friend ;
Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay.
Whilst resignation gently slopes the way ;
And all his prospects brightening at the last.
His heaven commences ere the world be past."

In these verses, I need not say with what melody,
with what touching truth, with what exquisite beauty
of comparison — as indeed in hundi'eds more pages of
the writings of this honest soul — the whole character
of the man is told — his humble confession of faults
and weakness ; his pleasant little vanity, and desire
that his village should admire him ; his simple scheme
of good in which everybody was to be happy — no
beggar was to be refused his dinner — nobody in fact
was to work much, and he to be the harmless chief
of the Utopia, and the monarch of the Irish Yvetot.
He would have told again, and without fear of their
failing, those famous jokes ' which had hung fire in

^ ''Goldsmith's incessant desire of being conspicuous in company

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 313

London ; lie would have talked of his great friends
of the Club — of my Lord Clare and my Lord Bishop,

was the occasion of his sometimes appearing to such disadvantage,
as one should hardly have supposed possible in a man of his genius.
When his literary reputation had risen deservedly high, and his
society was much courted, he became very jealous of the extra-
ordinary attention which was everywhere paid to Johnson. One
evening, in a circle of wits, he found fault wdth me for talking
of Johnson as entitled to the honour of unquestionable superiority.
'Sir,' said be, 'you are for making a monarchy of what should
be a republic'

"He was still more mortified, when, talking in a company with
fluent vivacity, and, as he flattered himself, to the admiration of all
present, a German who sat next him, and perceived Johnson rolling
himself as if about to speak, suddenly stopped him, saying ' Stay, stay — •
Toctor Shonsou is going to zay zomethmg.' This was no doubt veiy
provoking, especially to one so irritable as Goldsmith, who frequently
mentioned it with strong expressions of indignation.

" It may also be observed that Goldsmith was sometimes content to
be treated with an easy familiarity, but upon occasions would be conse-
quential and important. An instance of this occurred in a small
particular. Johnson had a way of contracting the names of his friends,

as Beauclerk, Beau. ; Boswell, Bozzy I remember one day,

when Tom Davies was telling that Dr*. Johnson said — ' We are all in
labour for a name to Qoldy's play,' Goldsmith seemed displeased that
such a liberty should be taken with his name, and said, * I have often
desired him not to call me Goldy' "

This is one of several of Boswell's depreciatory mentions of Gold-
smith— which may well irritate biogi-aphers and admirers — and also
those who take that more kindly and more profound view of Boswell's
own character, which was opened up by Mr. Carlyle's famous article on
his book. No wonder that Mr. Irving calls Boswell an " incarnation
of toadyism." And the worst of it is, that Johnson himself has suSered
from this habit of the Laird of Auchenleck's. People ai-e apt to forget
under what Boswellian stimulus the great Doctor uttered many hasty
things : — things no more indicative of the nature of the depths of his
character than the phosphoric gleaming of the sea, when. struck at
night, is indicative of radical corruption of nature ! In truth, it is clear
enough on the whole that both Johnson and Goldsmith appreciated each

314 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

my Lord Nugent — sure he knew them intimately, and
was hand and glove with some of the best men in
town — and he would have spoken of Johnson and
of Burke, from Cork, and of Sir Joshua who had
painted him — and he would have told wonderful sly
stories of Eanelagh and the Pantheon, and the mas-
querades at Madame Comely' s : and he would have
toasted, with a sigh, the Jessamy Bride — the lovely
Mary Horneck.

The figure of that charming young lady forms one
of the prettiest recollections of Goldsmith's life. She
and her beautiful sister, who married Bunbury, the
graceful and humourous amateur artist of those days,
when Gilray had but just begun to try his powers,
were among the Idndest and dearest of Goldsmith's
many friends ; cheered and pitied him, travelled abroad
with him, made him welcome at their home, and gave

other, and that they mutually knew it. They were — as it were, tripped
up and flung against each other, occasionally, by the blundering and
silly gambolling of people in company.

Something must be allowed for Boswell's "rivalry for Johnson's
good graces" with Oliver (as Sir Walter Scott has remarked), for
Oliver was intimate with the Doctor before his biographer was, — and
as we all remember, marched off with him to " take tea with Mrs.
Williams " before Boswell had advanced to that honourable degree of
intimacy. But, in truth, Boswell — thovxgh he perhaps showed moi'e
talent in his delineation of the Doctor than is generally ascribed to
him — had not faculty to take a fair view of two great men at a time.
Besides, as Mr, Forster justly remarks, " he was impatient of Gold-
smith from the first hour of their acquaintance." — Life and Adventures^
p. 292.

STEKNE AND GOLDSMITH. 315

him many a pleasant holiday. He bought his finest
clothes to figure at their country house at Barton — he
wi'ote them droll verses. They loved him, laughed at
him, played him tricks and made him happy. He
asked for a loan from Garrick, and Garrick Idndly
supplied him, to enable him to go to Barton — but there
were to be no more holidays, and only one brief struggle
more for poor Goldsmith — a lock of his hair was taken
from the coffin and given to the Jessamy Bride. She
lived quite mto our time. Hazlitt saw her an old lady,
but beautiful still, in Northcote's painting room, who
told the eager critic how proud she always was that
Goldsmith had admhed her. The younger Colman
has left a touching reminiscence of him. Vol. i.
63, 64.

" I was only five years old," he says, "when Goldsmith
took me on his knee one evening whilst he was drinking
coffee with my father, and began to play with me,
which amiable act I returned, with the ingratitude
of a peevish brat, by giving him a very smart slap
on the face : it must have been a tingier, for it left
tlie marks of my si3iteful paw on his cheek. This
infantile outrage was followed by summary justice,
and I was locked up by my indignant father in an
adjoining room to undergo soHtary imprisonment in
the dark. Here I began to howl and scream most
abomiuably, which was no bad step towards my
liberation, since those who were not inclraed to pity

316 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

me miglit be likely to set me free for the purpose
of abating a nuisance.

" At length a generous friend appeared to extricate
me from jeopardy, and that generous friend was no
other than the man I had so wantonly molested by
assault and battery — it was the tender-hearted Doctor
himself, with a lighted candle in his hand, and
a smile upon his countenance, which was still
partially red from the effects of my petulance. I
skulked and sobbed as he fondled and soothed,
till I began to brighten. Goldsmith seized the pro-
pitious moment of returnmg good-humour, when he
put down the candle and began to conjure. He
placed three hats, which happened to be in the room,
and a shilling under each. The shillings he told
me were England, France, and Spain. ' Hey presto
cockalorum ! ' cried the Doctor, and lo, on uncovering
the shillings, which had been dispersed each beneath
a separate hat, they were all found congregated under
one. I was no politician at five years old, and
therefore might not have wondered at the sudden
revolution which brought England, France, and
Spain all under one crown; but, as also I was no

conjuror, it amazed me beyond measure From

that time, whenever the Doctor came to visit my
father, ' I plucked his gown to share the good man's
smile ; ' a game at romps constantly ensued, and
we were always cordial friends and merry play-

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 317

fellows. Our unequal companionship varied somewhat
as to sports as I grew older ; but it did not last
long : my senior plaj^mate died in his forty-fifth year,

when I had attained my eleventh In all

the numerous accounts of his virtues and foibles, his
genius and absurdities, his knowledge of nature and
ignorance of the world, his * compassion for another's
woe ' was always predominant ; and my trivial
story of his humourmg a froward child weighs
but as a feather in the recorded scale of liis bene-
volence."

Think of him reckless, thriftless, vain if you like —
but merciful, gentle, generous, full of love and pity.
He passes out of our life, and goes to render his account
beyond it. Think of the poor pensioners weeping at
his grave ; think of the noble spirits that admired and
deplored him; think of the righteous pen that wrote
his epitaph — and of the wonderful and unanimous
response of affection with which the world has paid
back the love he gave it. His humour delighting us
still; his song fresh and beautiful as when first he
charmed with it : his words in all our mouths : liis very
weaknesses beloved and familiar — his benevolent spirit
seems still to smile upon us : to do gentle kindnesses :
to succour with sweet charit}^ : to soothe, caress, and
forgive : to plead with the fortunate for the unhappy
and the poor.

His name is the last in the list of those men of

318 ENGLISH HUMOURISTS.

humour wlio have formed the themes of the discourses
which you have heard so kindly.

Long hefore I had ever hoped for such an audience,
or dreamed of the possibility of the good fortune which
has brought me so many many friends, I was at issue
with some of my literary brethren upon a point — which
they held from tradition I think rather than experience
— that our profession was neglected in this country;
and that men of letters were ill-received and held in
slight esteem. It would hardly be grateful of me now
to alter my old opinion that we do meet with goodwill
and kindness, with generous helping hands in the time
of our necessity, with cordial and friendly recognition.
What claim had any one of these of whom I have been
speaking, but genius ? What return of gratitude,
fame, affection, did it not bring to all ?

Wliat punishment befel those who were unfortunate
among them, but that which follows reckless habits
and careless lives ? For these faults a wit must
suffer hke the dullest prodigal that ever ran in debt.
He must pay the tailor if he wears the coat ; his
children must go in rags if he spends his money at
the tavern; he can't come to London and be made
Lord Chancellor if he stops on the road and gambles
away his last shilling at Dublin. And he must pay
the social penalty of these follies too, and expect that
the world will shun the man of bad habits, that

STEENE A:N"D GOLDSMITH. 319

women will avoid the man of loose life, that prudent
follvs will close their doors as a precaution, and
before a demand should be made on their pockets
by the needy prodigal. With what difficulty had
any one of these men to contend, save that eternal
and mechanical one of want of means and lack of
capital, and of which thousands of young lawyers,
young doctors, young soldiers and sailors, of inven-
tors, manufacturers, shopkeepers, have to complain ?
Hearts as brave and resolute as ever beat in the
breast of any wit or poet, sicken and break daily in
the vain endeavour and unavailing struggle against
life's difficulty. Don't we see daily ruined inventors,
grey-haired midshipmen, balked heroes, bhghted
cm^ates, barristers pining a hungry life out in
chambers, the attorneys never mounting to their
garrets, whilst scores of them are rapping at the
door of the successful quack below ? If these suffer,
who is the author, that he should be exempt ? Let
us bear our ills with the same constancy with which
others endure them, accept our manly part in Ufe,
hold our own, and ask no more. I can conceive of
no kings or laws causing or curing Goldsmith's
improvidence, or Fielding's fatal love of pleasure,
or Dick Steele's mania for running races with the
constable. You never can outrun that sure-footed
officer — not by any swiftness or by dodges devised by
any genius, however gTeat ; and he carries off the

320 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

Tatler to the spimging-liouse, or taps the Citizen of
the World on the shoulder as he would any other
mortal.

Does society look down on a man because he
is an author? I suppose if people want a buffoon
they tolerate liim only in so far as he is amusing ;
it can hardly be expected that they should respect
him as an equal. Is there to be a guard of honour
provided for the author of the last new novel or
poem ? how long is he to reign, and keep other
potentates out of possession ? He retires, grumbles,
and prints a lamentation that literature is despised.
If Captain A. is left out of Lady B.'s j)arties he
does not state that the army is despised : if Lord C.
no longer asks Counsellor D. to dinner, Counsellor D.
does not announce that the bar is insulted. He is
not fair to society if he enters it with this suspicion
hankering about him; if he is doubtful about his
reception, how hold up his head honestly, and look
frankly in the face that world about which he is
full of suspicion? Is he place -hunting, and thinking
in his mind that he ought to be made an Ambassador,
like Prior, or a Secretary of State, like Addison ?
his pretence of equality falls to the ground at once :
he is scheming for a patron, not shaking the hand
of a friend, when he meets the world. Treat such
a man as he deserves; laugh at his buffoonery, and
give him a dinner and a honjour ; laugh at his self-

STERNE AND GOLDSMITH. 321

sufficiency and absurd assumptions of superiority,
and his equally ludicrous airs of martyrdom : laugh
at his flattery and his scheming, and buy it, if it's
worth the having. Let the wag have his dinner and
the hireling his pay, if you want him, and make a
profound bow to the grand homme incompris, and the
boisterous martyr, and show him the door. The
great world, the great aggregate experience, has its
good sense, as it has its good-humour. It detects a
pretender, as it trusts a loyal heart. It is kind in
the main : how should it be otherwise than kind,
when it is so wise and clear-headed ? To any
literary man who says, " It despises my profession,"
I say, with all my might — no, no, no. It may pass
over your individual case — how many a brave fellow
has failed in the race, and perished unknown in the
struggle ! — but it treats you as you merit in the main.
If you serve it, it is not unthankful ; if you please,
it is pleased ; if you cringe to it, it detects you,
and scorns you if jo\x are mean : it returns your
cheerfulness with its good-humom- ; it deals not
ungenerously with your weaknesses ; it recognises
most kindly your merits ; it gives you a fair place
and fair play. To any one of those men of whom
we have spoken was it in the main ungrateful ? A
king might refuse Goldsmith a pension, as a pub-
lisher might keep his master-piece and the deUght
of all the world in his desk for two years ; but it

322 ENGLISH HUMOUEISTS.

was mistake, and not ill-will. Noble and illustrious
names of Swift, and Pope, and Addison ! dear and
honoured memories of Goldsmith and Fielding !
kind friends, teachers, benefactors ! who shall say
that our country, wliich continues to bring you such
an unceasing tribute of applause, admkation, love,
sympathy, does not do honour to the literary calling
in the honour which it bestows upon you 1

THE END.

BRADBUBY AND EVANS, PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS.

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