Sidor som bilder
PDF
ePub

18221

Lives of the Poets.—Oliver Goldsmith.

pile a History of England, in four octavo volumes, for the sum of five hundred pounds, in the space of two years; before the expiration of which period, he made a compact with the same bookseller for an abridgment of the Roman History, which he had before published. The History of Greece, which has appeared since his death, cannot with certainty be ascribed to his pen.

In 1771, he wrote the Life of Bolingbroke, prefixed to the Dissertation on Parties.

The reception which his former play had met did not discourage him from trying his fate with a second. But it was not till after much solicitation, that Colman was prevailed on to allow The Mistakes of a Night, or She Stoops to Couquer, to be acted at Covent Garden, on the 15th of March, 1773. A large party of zealous friends, with Johnson at their head, attended to witness the representation and to lead the plaudits of the House; a scheme which Mr. Cumberland describes to have been preconcerted with much method, but to have been near failing in consequence of some mistakes in the execution of the manœuvres, which aroused the displeasure of the audience. That the piece is enlivened by such droll incidents, as to be nearly allied to farce, Johnson with justice observed, declaring, however, that he knew of no comedy for many years that had so much exhilarated an audience; that had so much answered the great end of comedy, that of making an audience merry."doz birin

[ocr errors]

The History of the Earth and Ani mated Nature, in eight volumes, closed the labours of Goldsmith. This compilation, however recommended by the agreeableness of style usual to its author, is but little prized for its accuracy. In a summary of past events, which are often diffe rently related by writers of authority and credit nearly equal, it is in vain to look for certainty. But when we are presented with a description of natural objects that required only to be looked at in order to be known, we are neither amused nor instructed without some degree of precision. History partakes of the nature of romance. Physiology is more closely connected with science. In the one we must often rest contented with

probability. In the other we know that truth is generally to be attained, and therefore expect to find it.

Goldsmith had been for some time subject to attacks of strangury; and having before experienced relief from James's powders, had again recourse to that popular medicine. His medical attendants are said to have remonstrated with him on its unfitness in the stage to which his disorder had reached; but he persevered; and his fever increasing, and some secret distress of mind, under which he owned to Doctor Turton that he laboured, aggravating his bodily complaint, he expired on the 4th of April in his forty-fifth year.

1

He was privately interred in the Temple burying ground. A monument is erected to his memory in Westminster Abbey, with the following epitaph by Johnson, written at the solicitation of their common friends. Olivarii Goldsmith,

Poeta, Physici, Historici, and
Qui nullum fere scribendi genus
Non tetigit,

Nullum quod tetigit non ornavit:
Seu risus essent movendi,
Sive lacrymte,

Affectuum potens at lenis dominator:
Ingenio sublimis, vividus, versatilis,
Oratione grandis, nitidus, venustas
Hoe monumento memoriam coluit
Sodalium amor,

Amicorum fides, ond

Lectorum veneratio.

Natus in Hibernia, Fornia Longfordiensis, In loco cui nomen Pallas.

J

Nov. XXIX, MDCCXXXL to Eblane literis institutus;

Obiit Londini,

01

April. IV, MDCCLXXIV. ››

[ocr errors][ocr errors]

It has been questioned whether there is any authority for using the word " tetigit" as it is here employed. I have heard it observed by one, whose opinion on such subjects is decisive, that" contigit" would have better expressed the writer's meaning, med 9764,802 and of neprobio

Another epitaph composed by Johnson in Greek, deserves notice, as it shows how strongly his mind was impressed by Goldsmith's abili ties. pinber

Τὸν τάφον εἰσοράας τὸν Ολιβάριοιο, κονίην

Αφροσι μὴ σεμνήν, ξεινε, πόδεσσι πάτει Οἴσι μέμηλε φύσις, μέτρων χάρις, ἔργα παλαιών, Κλαίετε ποιήτην, ἱστόρικον, φυσικόν.

"Thou beholdest the tomb of Oliver; press not, O stranger, with the foot of folly, the venerable dust. Ye who care for nature, for the charms of song, for the deeds of ancient days, weep for the Historian, the Naturalist, the Poet."

Goldsmith's stature was below the

8

middle height; his limbs, sturdy; his forehead, more prominent than is usual; and his face, almost round, pallid, and marked with the smallpox.

The simpleness, almost approaching to fatuity, of his outward deportment, combined with the power which there was within, brings to our recollection some part of the character of La Fontaine, whom a French lady wittily called the Fable Tree, from his apparent unconsciousness, or rather want of mental responsibility for the admirable productions which he was continually supplying. His propriety and clear ness when he expresses his thoughts with his pen, and his confusion and inability to impart them in conversation, well illustrated the observation of Cicero, that it is very possible for a man to think rightly on any subject, and yet to want the power of conveying his sentiments by speech in fit and becoming language to others."Fieri potest ut recte quis sentiat, sed id quod sentit polite eloqui non possit." Yet Mr. Cumberland, who was one of his associates, has informed us, "that he had gleams of eloquence."

Johnson said of him that he was not a social man; he never exchanged mind with you. His prevailing foible was a desire of shining in those exterior accomplishments which nature had denied him. Vanity and benevolence had conspired to make him an easy prey to adulation and imposture.

His complaints of the envy by which he found his mind tormented, and especially on the occasion of Johnson's being honoured by an interview with the King, must have made those who heard him lose all sense of the evil passion, in their amusement at a confession so novel and so pleasant.

[ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]

to serve them as friends; for they were such as could scarcely fail to assist in appeasing malevolence and conciliating kindness. Be this as it will, he must, with all his weaknesses, be considered as one of the chief ornaments of the age in which he lived.

Comparisons have been made between the situation of the men eminent for literature in Queen Anne's time and at the commencement of the reign of George the Third. In the former, beginning to be disengaged from the court, where they were more at home during the reign of the Charleses, they were falling under the influence of the nobility, amongst whom they generally found their patrons, and often their associates. In the latter, they had been insensibly shaken off alike by the court and the nobles, and were come into the hands of the people and the booksellers. I know not whether they were much the worse for this change. If in the one instance they were rendered more studious of elegance and smartness; in the other, they attained more freedom and force. In the former, they were oftener imitators of the French. In the latter, they followed the dictates of a better sense, and trusted more to their own resources. They lost, indeed, the character of wits, but they aspired to that of instructors. Yet in one respect, and that a material one, it must be owned, that they were sufferers by this alteration in affairs. For the quantity of their labours having become more important under their new masters than it was under their old ones, they had less care of selection, and their originality was weakened by diffusiveness. They indulged themselves but sparingly in the luxury of composing verse, which was too thriftless an occupation to be continued long. They used it, perhaps, as the means of attracting notice to themselves at their first entrance on the world, but not as the staple on which they were afterwards to depend. When the song had drawn a band of hearers around them, it had done its duty. The

crowd was to be detained and encreased, by expectations of advantage rather than of pleasure. A writer consulted Goldsmith on what subjects he might employ his pen with most

The poem of The Deserted Village took its origin from the circumstance of General Robert Napper (the grandfather of the gentleman who now lives in the house within half a mile of Lissoy, and built by the General), having purchased an extensive tract of the country surrounding Lissoy, or Auburn; in consequence of which, many families, here called cottiers, were removed to make room for the intended improvements of what was now to become the wide domain of a rich man, warm with the idea of changing the face of his new acquisition; and were forced "with fainting steps," to go in search of "torrid tracts" and "distant climes."

profit to himself. "It will be better," said the author of The Traveller and The Deserted Village, laughing indeed, but in good earnest, "to relinquish the draggle-tail muses. For my part, I have found productions in prose more sought after and better paid for." This is, no doubt, the reason that his verse bears so small a proportion to his other writings. Yet it is by the former, added to the few works of imagination which he has left besides, that he will be known to posterity. His histories will probably be superseded by more skilful or more accurate compilations; as they are now read by few who can obtain information nearer to its original sources.

In the natural manner of telling a short and humorous story, he is perhaps surpassed by no writer of prose except Addison. In his Essays, the style preserves a middle way between the gravity of Johnson and the light ness of Chesterfield; but it may often be objected to them, as to the moral writings of Johnson, that they present life to us under a gloomy aspect, and leave an impression of despond ence on the mind of the reader.

In his poetry there is nothing ideal. It pleases chiefly by an exhibition of nature in her most homely and familiar views. But from these he selects his objects with due discretion, and omits to represent whatever would occasion unmingled pain or disgust.

His couplets have the same slow and stately march as Johnson's; and if we can suppose similar images of rural and domestic life to have arrested the attention of that writer, we can scarcely conceive that he would have expressed them in different language.

Some of the lines in The Deserted Village are said to be closely copied from a poem by Welsted, called the Oikoypapia; but I do not think he will be found to have levied larger contributions on it, than most poets have supposed themselves justified in making on the neglected works of their predecessors.

The following particulars relating to this poem, which I have extracted from the letter of Dr. Strean before referred to, cannot fail to gratify that numerous class of readers with whom it has been a favourite from their ear

liest years.

This fact alone might be sufficient to establish the seat of the poem; but there cannot remain a doubt in any unprejudiced mind, when the following are added; viz. the above-named Henry, (the brother of that the character of the village-preacher, the poet,) is copied from nature. He is described exactly as he lived; and his "modest mansion" as it existed. Burn, the name of the village-master, and the site of his school-house, and Catherine Giraghty, a lonely widow;

The wretched matron forced in age for bread To strip the brook with mantling cresses spread;

(and to this day the brook and ditches, near the spot where her cabin stood, abound with cresses) still remain in the memory of the inhabitants, and Catherine's children live in the neighbourhood. The pool, the busy mill, the house where "nut-brown draughts inspired,"are still visited as the poetic scene; and the "hawthorn-bush" growing in an open space in front of the house, which I knew to have three trunks, is now reduced to one; the other two having been cut, from time to time, by persons carrying pieces of it away to be made into toys, &c. in honour of the bard, and of the celebrity of his poem. All these contribute to the same proof; and the "decent church," which I attended for upwards of eighteen years, and which "tops the neighbouring hill," is exactly described as seen from Lissoy, the residence of the preacher.

I should have observed, that Elizabeth Delap, who was a parishioner of mine, and died at the age of about ninety, often told me she was the first who put a book into Goldsmith's hand; by which she meant, that she taught him his letters: she was allied to him, and kept a little school.

The Hermit is a pleasing little tale, told with that simplicity which appears so easy, and is in fact so difficult, to be attained. It is imitated from the Ballad of a Friar of Orders Grey, in Percy's Reliques of English Poetry.

His Traveller was, it is said, pronounced by Mr. Fox to be one of the

finest pieces in the English language. Perhaps this sentence was delivered by that great man with some qualification, which was either forgotten or omitted by the reporter of it; otherwise such praise was surely disproportioned to its object.

In this poem, he professes to compare the good and evil which fall to the share of those different nations whose lot he contemplates. His design at setting out is to show that, whether we consider the blessings to be derived from art or from nature, we shall discover "an equal portion dealt to all mankind." And the conclusion which he draws at the end of the poem would be perfectly just, if these premises were allowed him.

In every government though terrors reign, Though tyrant kings or tyrant laws restrain,

How small, of all that human hearts endure, That part which laws or kings can cause or

cure!

[merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

That it matters little or nothing to the happiness of men whether they are governed well or ill, whether they live under fixed and known laws, or at the will of an arbitrary tyrant, is a paradox, the fallacy of which is happily too apparent to need any refutation. Nor is his inference warranted by those particular observations which he makes for the pur✓pose of establishing it. When of Italy he tells us, "that sensual bliss is all this nation knows," how is Italy to be compared either with itself when it was prompted by those "nobler aims," of which he speaks, or with that country where he sees

The lords of human kind pass by

Intent on high designs, a thoughtful band,
By forms unfashion'd, fresh from nature's
hand,

Fierce in their native hardiness of soul,
True to imagined right, above controul;

While e'en the peasant learns these rights

to scan,

And learns to venerate himself as man?

That good is every where balanced by some evil, none will deny. But that no effort of human courage or prudence can make one scale preponderate over the other, and that a decree of fate has fixed them in eternal equipoise, is an opinion which, if it were seriously entertained, must bind men to a tame and spiritless acquiescence in whatever disadvantages or inconveniences they may chance to find themselves involved, and leave to them the exercise of no other public virtue than that of a blind submission. His poetry is happily better than his argument. He discriminates with much skill the manners of the several countries that pass in review before him; the illustrations, with which he relieves and varies his main subject, are judiciously interspersed; and as he never raises his tone too far beyond his pitch at the first starting, so he seldom sinks much below it. The thought at the beginning appears to have pleased him; for he has repeated it in the Citizen of the World:" Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see, My heart untravel'd fondly turns to thee; Still to my brother turns with ceaseless pain, And drags at each remove a lengthening chain.

"The further I travel, I feel the pain of separation with stronger force; those ties that bind me to my native country and you are still unbroken. By every remove I only drag a greater length of chain."

To the poetical compositions of Goldsmith in general, may be applied with justice that temperate commendation which he has given to the works of Parnell in his life of that Poet.

"At the end of his course the reader regrets that his way has been so short; he wonders that it gave him so little trouble; and so resolves to go the journey over again." There is much to solace fatigue and even to excite pleasure, but nothing to call plate and enjoy the objects on our forth rapture. We stay to contemroad; but we feel that it is on this earth we have been traveling, and that the author is either not willing or not able to raise us above it.

1

ON THE POETICAL USE OF THE HEATHEN MYTHOLOGY.
These were immortal stories, Barry Cornwall.

THE present is, doubtless, an æra of restorations and revivals, political and poetical. The Bourbons have returned to the throne of France, and the Gods and Goddesses of classic fame, with all the noblesse of Fauns and Satyrs, Dryads and Hamadryads, are beginning to re-occupy, with limited sway, their ancient places in poetry.

Keats, Cornwall, and Shelley, have breathed a new life into the dry bones of old mythology; and even Mr. Wordsworth, notwithstanding his avowed preference for the merely and familiarly natural, has not only done ample justice, in one of the finest passages of the Excursion, to the creating spirit of ancient fable, but has shown a fondness, of late, for classical tales and images.

We cannot help thinking, however, that the immortal emigrants have acquired new manners, and almost new faces, in their exile. They seem to rely less on their antiquity, and more on their beauty and accomplishments. They are far less obtrusive and assuming; but at the same time, they have lost somewhat of that strength and manliness which distinguished them in the best periods of Greece and Rome, and are become refined and delicate, almost finical. They are invested with an exquisite tenderness; a soft and melting radiance; a close and affectionate affinity to the gentler parts of nature; but they have no longer that stern and venerable simplicity with which they appeared in nations where they were the objects of adoration. A similar change took place in the later times of Roman, and even of Grecian literature, particularly among the Sicilian and Alexandrian, writers. Bion, and Moschus, and Theocritus represent their deities as most delightfully pretty and feminine, except they introduce them expressly as objects of terror. Indeed Claudian and Statius occasionally dilate, with such elaborate and brilliant minuteness, on the smallest beauties of form or hue, that their descriptions con

vey no more feeling of substance, than the prismatic colours on a sheet of paper. But this sort of frigid Dutch painting is seldom to be found in the Greeks, whose Gods are generally tangible as well as visible. But when physical strength ceases to be regarded with esteem, it is very difficult to impart awe or reverence to finite forms. The gradual decay of polytheism may very perceptibly be traced from Homer to the last profane writers of the lower empire. In fact, the Romans had ceased to be a religious, before they became in any degree a poetical people. Even while they were so famed for devoutness, it is more than probable that their theological system had very little of the imaginative character of the Grecian. It was more simple, more serious, more political, more connected with temporary institutions, and less with general nature and metaphysical speculation. The Latin poets imitated the Greeks in mythology as in all other things, but

not

They ways with equal judgment.
now and then drop hints of a
graver philosophy, sometimes even
of tenets altogether at variance with
the popular belief. Their divinities
are often half real, and half allegori-
cal; sometimes mere personified ab-
stractions, and sometimes, especial- -
lý as above stated, in the later wri-
ters, mere shapes, gratuitous com-
binations of the fancy. All these
inconsistencies indicate that the true
spirit of pagan theology had evapo-
rated. There is no sincerity in the
religion of Roman writers. They
are not in earnest. They employ
their fanciful wits and elegant inven-
tion to give a gay image of what
they know to be an airy nothing.
The strongest exception to these ob-
servations is the Atys of Catullus,
a poem truly Grecian in its feeling,
if not in its origin. But of their ge-
neral truth it is not difficult to select
instances, though their force is ra-
ther to be gathered from the pervad-
ing spirit of the authors, than from
isolated passages. Horace, an Epi-

t

« FöregåendeFortsätt »