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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/13182-0.txt b/13182-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4d2cdb7 --- /dev/null +++ b/13182-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,16804 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13182 *** + +[Illustration: _Hippolyte Adolphe Taine From the etching by Asher B. +Durand_] + +THE HARVARD CLASSICS EDITED BY CHARLES W. ELIOT LL.D. + + +PREFACES AND PROLOGUES TO FAMOUS BOOKS + +WITH INTRODUCTIONS, NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS + +[Illustration] + +"DR. ELIOT'S FIVE-FOOT SHELF OF BOOKS" + + +P.F. COLLIER & SON + +NEW YORK + +1909 BY LITTLE BROWN & COMPANY + +1910 BY P.F. COLLIER & SON + + + + +CONTENTS + + + TITLE, PROLOGUE AND EPILOGUES TO THE RECUYELL OF THE + HISTORIES OF TROY WILLIAM CAXTON + + EPILOGUE TO DICTES AND SAYINGS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS + WILLIAM CAXTON + + PROLOGUE TO GOLDEN LEGEND WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO CATON WILLIAM CAXTON + EPILOGUE TO AESOP WILLIAM CAXTON + PROEM TO CHAUCER'S CANTERBURY TALES WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO MALORY'S KING ARTHUR WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO VIRGIL'S ENEYDOS WILLIAM CAXTON + + DEDICATION OF THE INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION + JOHN CALVIN + TRANSLATED BY JOHN ALLEN + + DEDICATION OF THE REVOLUTIONS OF THE HEAVENLY BODIES + NICOLAUS COPERNICUS + + PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION IN SCOTLAND + JOHN KNOX + + PREFATORY LETTER TO SIR WALTER RALEIGH ON THE FAERIE + QUEENE EDMUND SPENSER + + PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD SIR WALTER RALEIGH + + PROOEMIUM, EPISTLE DEDICATORY, PREFACE, AND PLAN OF THE + INSTAURATIO MAGNA, ETC. FRANCIS BACON + TRANSLATION EDITED BY J. SPEDDING + + PREFACE TO THE NOVUM ORGANUM FRANCIS BACON + + PREFACE TO THE FIRST FOLIO EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE'S + PLAYS HEMINGE AND CONDELL + + PREFACE TO THE PHILOSOPHIAE NATURALIS PRINCIPIA + MATHEMATICA SIR ISAAC NEWTON + TRANSLATED BY ANDREW MOTTE + + PREFACE TO FABLES, ANCIENT AND MODERN + JOHN DRYDEN + + PREFACE TO JOSEPH ANDREWS HENRY FIELDING + PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH DICTIONARY SAMUEL JOHNSON + PREFACE TO SHAKESPEARE SAMUEL JOHNSON + INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPYLÄEN J.W. VON GOETHE + + PREFACES TO VARIOUS VOLUMES OF POEMS + WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO PREFACE WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + + PREFACE TO CROMWELL VICTOR HUGO + PREFACE TO LEAVES OF GRASS WALT WHITMAN + INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE + H.A. TAINE + + + + +_INTRODUCTORY NOTE_ + + +_No part of a book is so intimate as the Preface. Here, after the long +labor of the work is over, the author descends from his platform, and +speaks with his reader as man to man, disclosing his hopes and fears, +seeking sympathy for his difficulties, offering defence or defiance, +according to his temper, against the criticisms which he anticipates. +It thus happens that a personality which has been veiled by a formal +method throughout many chapters, is suddenly seen face to face in the +Preface; and this alone, if there were no other reason, would justify +a volume of Prefaces. + +But there are other reasons why a Preface may be presented apart from +its parent work, and may, indeed, be expected sometimes to survive +it. The Prologues and Epilogues of Caxton were chiefly prefixed to +translations which have long been superseded; but the comments of this +frank and enthusiastic pioneer of the art of printing in England +not only tell us of his personal tastes, but are in a high degree +illuminative of the literary habits and standards of western Europe +in the fifteenth century. Again, modern research has long ago put +Raleigh's "History of the World" out of date; but his eloquent Preface +still gives us a rare picture of the attitude of an intelligent +Elizabethan, of the generation which colonised America, toward the +past, the present, and the future worlds. Bacon's "Great Restoration" +is no longer a guide to scientific method; but his prefatory +statements as to his objects and hopes still offer a lofty +inspiration. + +And so with the documents here drawn from the folios of Copernicus and +Calvin, with the criticism of Dryden and Wordsworth and Hugo, with +Dr. Johnson's Preface to his great Dictionary, with the astounding +manifesto of a new poetry from Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass"--each +of them has a value and significance independent now of the work which +it originally introduced, and each of them presents to us a man._ + + + + +PREFACES AND EPILOGUES + +BY WILLIAM CAXTON[A] + + + + +THE RECUYELL OF THE HISTORIES OF TROY + +TITLE AND PROLOGUE TO BOOK I + + +Here beginneth the volume entitled and named the Recuyell of the +Histories of Troy, composed and drawn out of divers books of Latin +into French by the right venerable person and worshipful man, Raoul le +Feure, priest and chaplain unto the right noble, glorious, and mighty +prince in his time, Philip, Duke of Burgundy, of Brabant, etc. in the +year of the Incarnation of our Lord God a thousand four hundred sixty +and four, and translated and drawn out of French into English by +William Caxton, mercer, of the city of London, at the commandment of +the right high, mighty, and virtuous Princess, his redoubted Lady, +Margaret, by the grace of God Duchess of Burgundy, of Lotrylk, of +Brabant, etc.; which said translation and work was begun in Bruges +in the County of Flanders, the first day of March, the year of the +Incarnation of our said Lord God a thousand four hundred sixty and +eight, and ended and finished in the holy city of Cologne the 19th day +of September, the year of our said Lord God a thousand four hundred +sixty and eleven, etc. + +And on that other side of this leaf followeth the prologue. + +When I remember that every man is bounden by the commandment and +counsel of the wise man to eschew sloth and idleness, which is +mother and nourisher of vices, and ought to put myself unto virtuous +occupation and business, then I, having no great charge of occupation, +following the said counsel took a French book, and read therein many +strange and marvellous histories, wherein I had great pleasure and +delight, as well for the novelty of the same as for the fair language +of French, which was in prose so well and compendiously set and +written, which methought I understood the sentence and substance of +every matter. And for so much as this book was new and late made and +drawn into French, and never had seen it in our English tongue, I +thought in myself it should be a good business to translate it into +our English, to the end that it might be had as well in the royaume +of England as in other lands, and also for to pass therewith the time, +and thus concluded in myself to begin this said work. And forthwith +took pen and ink, and began boldly to run forth as blind Bayard +in this present work, which is named "The Recuyell of the Trojan +Histories." And afterward when I remembered myself of my simpleness +and unperfectness that I had in both languages, that is to wit in +French and in English, for in France was I never, and was born and +learned my English in Kent, in the Weald, where I doubt not is +spoken as broad and rude English as in any place of England; and have +continued by the space of 30 years for the most part in the countries +of Brabant, Flanders, Holland, and Zealand. And thus when all these +things came before me, after that I had made and written five or six +quires I fell in despair of this work, and purposed no more to have +continued therein, and those quires laid apart, and in two years after +laboured no more in this work, and was fully in will to have left it, +till on a time it fortuned that the right high, excellent, and right +virtuous princess, my right redoubted Lady, my Lady Margaret, by +the grace of God sister unto the King of England and of France, +my sovereign lord, Duchess of Burgundy, of Lotryk, of Brabant, of +Limburg, and of Luxembourg, Countess of Flanders, of Artois, and of +Burgundy, Palatine of Hainault, of Holland, of Zealand and of Namur, +Marquesse of the Holy Empire, Lady of Frisia, of Salins and of +Mechlin, sent for me to speak with her good Grace of divers matters, +among the which I let her Highness have knowledge of the foresaid +beginning of this work, which anon commanded me to show the said five +or six quires to her said Grace; and when she had seen them anon she +found a default in my English, which she commanded me to amend, and +moreover commanded me straitly to continue and make an end of the +residue then not translated; whose dreadful commandment I durst in no +wise disobey, because I am a servant unto her said Grace and receive +of her yearly fee and other many good and great benefits, (and also +hope many more to receive of her Highness), but forthwith went and +laboured in the said translation after my simple and poor cunning, +also nigh as I can following my author, meekly beseeching the +bounteous Highness of my said Lady that of her benevolence list to +accept and take in gree this simple and rude work here following; and +if there be anything written or said to her pleasure, I shall think my +labour well employed, and whereas there is default that she arette it +to the simpleness of my cunning which is full small in this behalf; +and require and pray all them that shall read this said work to +correct it, and to hold me excused of the rude and simple translation. + +And thus I end my prologue. + +[Footnote A: William Caxton (1422?-1491), merchant and translator, +learned the art of printing on the Continent, probably at Bruges or +Cologne. He translated "The Recuyell of the Histories of Troy" between +1469 and 1471, and, on account of the great demand for copies, was led +to have it printed--the first English book to be reproduced by this +means. The date was about 1474; the place, probably Bruges. In +1476, Caxton came back to England, and set up a press of his own at +Westminster. In 1477, he issued the first book known to have been +printed in England, "The Dictes and Sayings of the Philosophers." +The following Prefaces and Epilogues from Caxton's own pen show his +attitude towards some of the more important of the works that issued +from his press.] + + + + +EPILOGUE TO BOOK II + + +Thus endeth the second book of the Recule of the Histories of Troy. +Which bookes were late translated into French out of Latin by the +labour of the venerable person Raoul le Feure, priest, as afore +is said; and by me indigne and unworthy, translated into this rude +English by the commandment of my said redoubted Lady, Duchess of +Burgundy. And for as much as I suppose the said two books be not had +before this time in our English language, therefore I had the better +will to accomplish this said work; which work was begun in Bruges +and continued in Ghent and finished in Cologne, in the time of the +troublous world, and of the great divisions being and reigning, as +well in the royaumes of England and France as in all other places +universally through the world; that is to wit the year of our Lord a +thousand four hundred seventy one. And as for the third book, which +treateth of the general and last destruction of Troy, it needeth +not to translate it into English, for as much as that worshipful and +religious man, Dan John Lidgate, monk of Bury, did translate it but +late; after whose work I fear to take upon me, that am not worthy to +bear his penner and ink-horn after him, to meddle me in that work. +But yet for as much as I am bound to contemplate my said Lady's good +grace, and also that his work is in rhyme and as far as I know it is +not had in prose in our tongue, and also, peradventure, he translated +after some other author than this is; and yet for as much as divers +men be of divers desires, some to read in rhyme and metre and some +in prose; and also because that I have now good leisure, being in +Cologne, and have none other thing to do at this time; in eschewing +of idleness, mother of all vices, I have delibered in myself for the +contemplation of my said redoubted lady to take this labour in hand, +by the sufferance and help of Almighty God; whom I meekly supplye to +give me grace to accomplish it to the pleasure of her that is causer +thereof, and that she receive it in gree of me, her faithful, true, +and most humble servant etc. + + + + +EPILOGUE TO BOOK III + + +Thus end I this book, which I have translated after mine Author as +nigh as God hath given me cunning, to whom be given the laud and +praising. And for as much as in the writing of the same my pen is +worn, my hand weary and not steadfast, mine eyne dimmed with overmuch +looking on the white paper, and my courage not so prone and ready to +labour as it hath been, and that age creepeth on me daily and feebleth +all the body, and also because I have promised to divers gentlemen and +to my friends to address to them as hastily as I might this said book, +therefore I have practised and learned at my great charge and dispense +to ordain this said book in print, after the manner and form as ye may +here see, and is not written with pen and ink as other books be, to +the end that every man may have them at once. For all the books of +this story, named "The Recule of the Histories of Troy" thus imprinted +as ye here see, were begun in one day and also finished in one day, +which book I have presented to my said redoubted Lady, as afore +is said. And she hath well accepted it, and largely rewarded me, +wherefore I beseech Almighty God to reward her everlasting bliss after +this life, praying her said Grace and all them that shall read this +book not to disdain the simple and rude work, neither to reply against +the saying of the matters touched in this book, though it accord not +unto the translation of others which have written it. For divers men +have made divers books which in all points accord not, as Dictes, +Dares, and Homer. For Dictes and Homer, as Greeks, say and write +favorably for the Greeks, and give to them more worship than to the +Trojans; and Dares writeth otherwise than they do. And also as for the +proper names, it is no wonder that they accord not, for some one name +in these days have divers equivocations after the countries that they +dwell in; but all accord in conclusion the general destruction of that +noble city of Troy, and the death of so many noble princes, as +kings, dukes, earls, barons, knights, and common people, and the ruin +irreparable of that city that never since was re-edified; which may be +example to all men during the world how dreadful and jeopardous it is +to begin a war and what harms, losses, and death followeth. Therefore +the Apostle saith: "All that is written is written to our doctrine," +which doctrine for the common weal I beseech God may be taken in such +place and time as shall be most needful in increasing of peace, +love, and charity; which grant us He that suffered for the same to be +crucified on the rood tree. And say we all Amen for charity! + + + + +DICTES AND SAYINGS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS + +FIRST EDITION (1477). EPILOGUE + + +Here endeth the book named _The Dictes or Sayings of the +Philosophers_, imprinted by me, William Caxton, at Westminster, the +year of our Lord 1477. Which book is late translated out of French +into English by the noble and puissant Lord Lord Antony, Earl of +Rivers, Lord of Scales and of the Isle of Wight, defender and director +of the siege apostolic for our holy father the Pope in this royaume of +England, and governor of my Lord Prince of Wales. And it is so that at +such time as he had accomplished this said work, it liked him to send +it to me in certain quires to oversee, which forthwith I saw, +and found therein many great, notable, and wise sayings of the +philosophers, according unto the books made in French which I had +often before read; but certainly I had seen none in English until that +time. And so afterward I came unto my said Lord, and told him how I +had read and seen his book, and that he had done a meritorious deed in +the labour of the translation thereof into our English tongue, wherein +he had deserved a singular laud and thanks, &c. Then my said Lord +desired me to oversee it, and where I should find fault to correct it; +whereon I answered unto his Lordship that I could not amend it, but +if I should so presume I might apaire it, for it was right well +and cunningly made and translated into right good and fair English. +Notwithstanding, he willed me to oversee it, and shewed me divers +things, which, as seemed to him, might be left out, as divers letters, +missives sent from Alexander to Darius and Aristotle, and each to +other, which letters were little appertinent unto dictes and sayings +aforesaid, forasmuch as they specify of other matters. And also +desired me, that done, to put the said book in imprint. And thus +obeying his request and commandment, I have put me in devoir to +oversee this his said book, and behold as nigh as I could how it +accordeth with the original, being in French. And I find nothing +discordant therein, save only in the dictes and sayings of Socrates, +wherein I find that my said Lord hath left out certain and divers +conclusions touching women. Whereof I marvel that my Lord hath not +written them, ne what hath moved him so to do, ne what cause he had at +that time; but I suppose that some fair lady hath desired him to leave +it out of his book; or else he was amorous on some noble lady, for +whose love he would not set it in his book; or else for the very +affection, love, and good will that he hath unto all ladies and +gentlewomen, he thought that Socrates spared the sooth and wrote of +women more than truth; which I cannot think that so true a man and so +noble a philosopher as Socrates was should write otherwise than truth. +For if he had made fault in writing of women, he ought not, ne should +not, be believed in his other dictes and sayings. But I perceive that +my said Lord knoweth verily that such defaults be not had ne found in +the women born and dwelling in these parts ne regions of the world. +Socrates was a Greek, born in a far country from hence, which country +is all of other conditions than this is, and men and women of +other nature than they be here in this country. For I wot well, of +whatsoever condition women be in Greece, the women of this country be +right good, wise, pleasant, humble, discreet, sober, chaste, obedient +to their husbands, true, secret, steadfast, ever busy, and never idle, +attemperate in speaking, and virtuous in all their works--or at least +should be so. For which causes so evident my said Lord, as I suppose, +thought it was not of necessity to set in his book the sayings of his +author Socrates touching women. But forasmuch as I had commandment of +my said Lord to correct and amend where I should find fault, and other +find I none save that he hath left out these dictes and sayings of the +women of Greece, therefore in accomplishing his commandment--forasmuch +as I am not certain whether it was in my Lord's copy or not, or else, +peradventure, that the wind had blown over the leaf at the time of +translation of his book--I purpose to write those same sayings of that +Greek Socrates, which wrote of the women of Greece and nothing of them +of this royaume, whom, I suppose, he never knew; for if he had, I dare +plainly say that he would have reserved them specially in his said +dictes. Always not presuming to put and set them in my said Lord's +book but in the end apart in the rehearsal of the works, humbly +requiring all them that shall read this little rehearsal, that if they +find any fault to arette it to Socrates, and not to me, which writeth +as hereafter followeth. + +Socrates said that women be the apparels to catch men, but they take +none but them that will be poor or else them that know them not. +And he said that there is none so great empechement unto a man as +ignorance and women. And he saw a woman that bare fire, of whom he +said that the hotter bore the colder. And he saw a woman sick, of whom +he said that the evil resteth and dwelleth with the evil. And he saw +a woman brought to the justice, and many other women followed her +weeping, of whom he said the evil be sorry and angry because the evil +shall perish. And he saw a young maid that learned to write, of whom +he said that men multiplied evil upon evil. And he said that the +ignorance of a man is known in three things, that is to wit, when he +hath no thought to use reason; when he cannot refrain his covetise; +and when he is governed by the counsel of women, in that he knoweth +that they know not. And he said unto his disciples: "Will ye that I +enseign and teach you how ye shall now escape from all evil?" And they +answered, "Yea." And then he said to them, "For whatsoever thing that +it be, keep you and be well ware that ye obey not women." Who answered +to him again, "And what sayest thou by our good mothers, and of our +sisters?" He said to them, "Suffice you with that I have said to you, +for all be semblable in malice." And he said, "Whosoever will acquire +and get science, let him never put him in the governance of a woman." +And he saw a woman that made her fresh and gay, to whom he said, "Thou +resemblest the fire; for the more wood is laid to the fire the more +will it burn, and the greater is the heat." And on a time one asked +him what him semed of women; he answered that the women resemble a +tree called Edelfla, which is the fairest tree to behold and see +that may be, but within it is full of venom. And they said to him and +demanded wherefore he blamed so women? and that he himself had +not come into this world, ne none other men also, without them. He +answered, "The woman is like unto a tree named Chassoygnet, on which +tree there be many things sharp and pricking, which hurt and prick +them that approach unto it; and yet, nevertheless, that same tree +bringeth forth good dates and sweet." And they demanded him why he +fled from the women? And he answered, "Forasmuch as I see them flee +and eschew the good and commonly do evil." And a woman said to him, +"Wilt thou have any other woman than me?" And he answered to her, "Art +not ashamed to offer thyself to him that demandeth nor desireth thee +not?" + +So, these be the dictes and sayings of the philosopher Socrates, which +he wrote in his book; and certainly he wrote no worse than afore +is rehearsed. And forasmuch as it is accordant that his dictes and +sayings should be had as well as others', therefore I have set it in +the end of this book. And also some persons, peradventure, that have +read this book in French would have arette a great default in me that +I had not done my devoir in visiting and overseeing of my Lord's +book according to his desire. And some other also, haply, might have +supposed that Socrates had written much more ill of women than here +afore is specified, wherefore in satisfying of all parties, and also +for excuse of the said Socrates, I have set these said dictes and +sayings apart in the end of this book, to the intent that if my said +lord or any other person, whatsoever he or she be that shall read or +hear it, that if they be not well pleased withal, that they with a pen +race it out, or else rend the leaf out of the book. Humbly requiring +and beseeching my said lord to take no displeasure on me so presuming, +but to pardon whereas he shall find fault; and that it please him to +take the labour of the imprinting in gree and thanks, which gladly +have done my diligence in the accomplishing of his desire and +commandment; in which I am bounden so to do for the good reward that +I have received of his said lordship; whom I beseech Almighty God to +increase and to continue in his virtuous disposition in this world, +and after this life to live everlastingly in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +GOLDEN LEGEND. + +FIRST EDITION (1483). PROLOGUE + + +The Holy and blessed doctor Saint Jerome saith this authority, "Do +always some good work to the end that the devil find thee not Idle." +And the holy doctor Saint Austin saith in the book of the labour of +monks, that no man strong or mighty to labour ought to be idle; for +which cause when I had performed and accomplished divers works and +histories translated out of French into English at the request of +certain lords, ladies, and gentlemen, as the Recuyel of the History of +Troy, the Book of the Chess, the History of Jason, the history of +the Mirror of the World, the 15 books of Metamorphoses in which be +contained the fables of Ovid, and the History of Godfrey of Boulogne +in the conquest of Jerusalem, with other divers works and books, I +ne wist what work to begin and put forth after the said works to-fore +made. And forasmuch as idleness is so much blamed, as saith Saint +Bernard, the mellifluous doctor, that she is mother of lies and +step-dame of virtues, and it is she that overthroweth strong men into +sin, quencheth virtue, nourisheth pride, and maketh the way ready to +go to hell; and John Cassiodorus saith that the thought of him that is +idle thinketh on none other thing but on licorous meats and viands for +his belly; and the holy Saint Bernard aforesaid saith in an epistle, +when the time shall come that it shall behove us to render and give +accounts of our idle time, what reason may we render or what answer +shall we give when in idleness is none excuse; and Prosper saith that +whosoever liveth in idleness liveth in manner of a dumb beast. And +because I have seen the authorities that blame and despise so much +idleness, and also know well that it is one of the capital and deadly +sins much hateful unto God, therefore I have concluded and firmly +purposed in myself no more to be idle, but will apply myself to labour +and such occupation as I have been accustomed to do. And forasmuch as +Saint Austin aforesaid saith upon a psalm that good work ought not to +be done for fear of pain, but for the love of righteousness, and that +it be of very and sovereign franchise, and because me-seemeth to be +a sovereign weal to incite and exhort men and women to keep them from +sloth and idleness, and to let to be understood to such people as be +not lettered the nativities, the lives, the passions, the miracles, +and the death of the holy saints, and also some other notorious deeds +and acts of times past, I have submised myself to translate into +English the legend of Saints, which is called _Legenda Aurea_ in +Latin, that is to say, the _Golden Legend_; for in like wise as gold +is most noble above all other metals, in like wise is this legend +holden most noble above all other works. Against me here might some +persons say that this legend hath been translated before, and truth it +is; but forasmuch as I had by me a legend in French, another in Latin, +and the third in English, which varied in many and divers places, and +also many histories were comprised in the two other books which were +not in the English books; and therefore I have written one out of the +said three books, which I have ordered otherwise than the said English +legend is, which was so to-fore made, beseeching all them that shall +see or hear it read to pardon me where I have erred or made fault, +which, if any be, is of ignorance and against my will; and submit it +wholly of such as can and may, to correct it, humbly beseeching them +so to do, and in so doing they shall deserve a singular laud and +merit; and I shall pray for them unto Almighty God that He of His +benign grace reward them, etc., and that it profit to all them that +shall read or hear it read, and may increase in them virtue, and +expel vice and sin, that by the example of the holy saints amend their +living here in this short life, that by their merits they and I may +come to everlasting life and bliss in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +CATON (1483) + +PROLOGUE + + +Here beginneth the prologue of proem of the book called _Caton_, which +book hath been translated into English by Master Benet Burgh, +late Archdeacon of Cochester, and high canon of St. Stephen's at +Westminster, which ful craftily hath made it in ballad royal for the +erudition of my lord Bousher, son and heir at that time to my lord the +Earl of Essex. And because of late came to my hand a book of the said +Cato in French, which rehearseth many a fair learning and notable +examples, I have translated it out of French into English, as all +along hereafter shall appear, which I present unto the city of London. + +Unto the noble, ancient, and renowned city, the city of London, in +England, I, William Caxton, citizen and conjury of the same, and of +the fraternity and fellowship of the mercery, owe of right my service +and good will, and of very duty am bounden naturally to assist, aid, +and counsel, as far forth as I can to my power, as to my mother of +whom I have received my nurture and living, and shall pray for the +good prosperity and policy of the same during my life. For, as me +seemeth, it is of great need, because I have known it in my young age +much more wealthy, prosperous, and richer, than it is at this day. And +the cause is that there is almost none that intendeth to the common +weal, but only every man for his singular profit Oh! when I remember +the noble Romans, that for the common weal of the city of Rome they +spent not only their moveable goods but they put their bodies and +lives in jeopardy and to the death, as by many a noble example we may +see in the acts of Romans, as of the two noble Scipios, African and +Asian, Actilius, and many others. And among all others the noble Cato, +author and maker of this book, which he hath left for to remain ever +to all the people for to learn in it and to know how every man ought +to rule and govern him in this life, as well for the life temporal as +for the life spiritual. And as in my judgement it is the best book for +to be taught to young children in school, and also to people of every +age, it is full convenient if it be well understood And because I +see that the children that be born within the said city increase, and +profit not like their fathers and elders, but for the most part after +that they be come to their perfect years of discretion and ripeness of +age, how well that their fathers have left to them great quantity of +goods yet scarcely among ten two thrive, [whereas] I have seen and +know in other lands in divers cities that of one name and lineage +successively have endured prosperously many heirs, yea, a five or six +hundred years, and some a thousand; and in this noble city of +London it can unneth continue unto the third heir or scarcely to the +second,--O blessed Lord, when I remember this I am all abashed; I +cannot judge the cause, but fairer ne wiser ne better spoken children +in their youth be nowhere than there be in London, but at their full +ripening there is no kernel ne good corn found, but chaff for the most +part. I wot well there be many noble and wise, and prove well and be +better and richer than ever were their fathers. And to the end that +many might come to honour and worship, I intend to translate this +said book of Cato, in which I doubt not, and if they will read it and +understand they shall much the better con rule themselves thereby; for +among all other books this is a singular book, and may well be called +the regiment or governance of the body and soul. + +There was a noble clerk named Pogius of Florence, and was secretary +to Pope Eugene and also to Pope Nicholas, which had in the city of +Florence a noble and well-stuffed library which all noble strangers +coming to Florence desired to see; and therein they found many noble +and rare books. And when they had asked of him which was the best book +of them all, and that he reputed for best, he said that he held Cato +glosed for the best book of his library. Then since that he that was +so noble a clerk held this book for the best, doubtless it must follow +that this is a noble book and a virtuous, and such one that a man may +eschew all vices and ensue virtue. Then to the end that this said book +may profit unto the hearers of it, I beseech Almighty God that I +may achieve and accomplish it unto his laud and glory, and to the +erudition and learning of them that be ignorant, that they may thereby +profit and be the better. And I require and beseech all such that find +fault or error, that of their charity they correct and amend it, and I +shall heartily pray for them to Almighty God, that he reward them. + + + + +AESOP. (1483) + +EPILOGUE + + +Now then I will finish all these fables with this tale that followeth, +which a worshipful priest and a parson told me lately. He said that +there were dwelling in Oxford two priests, both masters of art, of +whom that one was quick and could put himself forth, and that other +was a good simple priest. And so it happened that the master that was +pert and quick, was anon promoted to a benefice or twain, and after +to prebends and for to be a dean of a great prince's chapel, supposing +and weening that his fellow the simple priest should never have been +promoted, but be alway an Annual, or at the most a parish priest. So +after long time that this worshipful man, this dean, came riding into +a good parish with a ten or twelve horses, like a prelate, and came +into the church of the said parish, and found there this good simple +man sometime his fellow, which came and welcomed him lowly; and that +other bade him "good morrow, master John," and took him slightly by +the hand, and asked him where he dwelt. And the good man said, "In +this parish." "How," said he, "are ye here a soul priest or a parish +priest?" "Nay, sir," said he, "for lack of a better, though I be not +able ne worthy, I am parson and curate of this parish." And then that +other availed his bonnet and said, "Master parson, I pray you to be +not displeased; I had supposed ye had not been beneficed; but master," +said he, "I pray you what is this benefice worth to you a year?" +"Forsooth," said the good simple man, "I wot never, for I make never +accounts thereof how well I have had it four or five years." "And know +ye not," said he, "what it is worth? it should seem a good benefice." +"No, forsooth," said he, "but I wot well what it shall be worth to +me." "Why," said he, "what shall it be worth?" "Forsooth," said he, +"if I do my true diligence in the cure of my parishioners in preaching +and teaching, and do my part longing to my cure, I shall have heaven +therefore; and if their souls be lost, or any of them by my default, I +shall be punished therefore, and hereof am I sure." And with that word +the rich dean was abashed, and thought he should do the better and +take more heed to his cures and benefices than he had done. This was +a good answer of a good priest and an honest. And herewith I +finished this book, translated and printed by me, William Caxton, at +Westminster in the Abbey, and finished the 26th day of March, the year +of our Lord 1484, and the first year of the reign of King Richard the +Third. + + + + +CHAUCER'S CANTERBURY TALES + +Second Edition. (1484) + +PROEM + + +Great thanks, laud, and honour ought to be given unto the clerks, +poets, and historiographs that have written many noble books of +wisedom of the lives, passions, and miracles of holy saints, of +histories of noble and famous acts and faites, and of the chronicles +since the beginning of the creation of the world unto this present +time, by which we be daily informed and have knowledge of many things +of whom we should not have known if they had not left to us their +monuments written. Among whom and in especial before all others, we +ought to give a singular laud unto that noble and great philosopher +Geoffrey Chaucer, the which for his ornate writing in our tongue may +well have the name of a laureate poet. For to-fore that he by labour +embellished, ornated, and made fair our English, in this realm was had +rude speech and incongruous, as yet it appeareth by old books, which +at this day ought not to have place ne be compared among, ne to, his +beauteous volumes and ornate writings, of whom he made many books and +treatises of many a noble history, as well in metre as in rhyme and +prose; and them so craftily made that he comprehended his matters in +short, quick, and high sentences, eschewing prolixity, casting away +the chaff of superfluity, and shewing the picked grain of sentence +uttered by crafty and sugared eloquence; of whom among all others of +his books I purpose to print, by the grace of God, the book of the +tales of Canterbury, in which I find many a noble history of every +state and degree; first rehearsing the conditions and the array of +each of them as properly as possible is to be said. And after their +tales which be of nobleness, wisdom, gentleness, mirth and also of +very holiness and virtue, wherein he finisheth this said book, which +book I have diligently overseen and duly examined, to that end it be +made according unto his own making. For I find many of the said books +which writers have abridged it, and many things left out; and in some +place have set certain verses that he never made ne set in his book; +of which books so incorrect was one brought to me, 6 years past, which +I supposed had been very true and correct; and according to the same I +did so imprint a certain number of them, which anon were sold to many +and divers gentlemen, of whom one gentleman came to me and said that +this book was not according in many place unto the book that Geoffrey +Chaucer had made. To whom I answered that I had made it according to +my copy, and by me was nothing added ne minished. Then he said he knew +a book which his father had and much loved, that was very true and +according unto his own first book by him made; and said more, if +I would imprint it again he would get me the same book for a copy, +howbeit he wist well that his father would not gladly depart from it. +To whom I said, in case that he could get me such a book, true and +correct, yet I would once endeavour me to imprint it again for to +satisfy the author, whereas before by ignorance I erred in hurting and +defaming his book in divers places, in setting in some things that he +never said ne made, and leaving out many things that he made which +be requisite to be set in it. And thus we fell at accord, and he full +gently got of his father the said book and delivered it to me, by +which I have corrected my book, as hereafter, all along by the aid of +Almighty God, shall follow; whom I humbly beseech to give me grace and +aid to achieve and accomplish to his laud, honour, and glory; and +that all ye that shall in this book read or hear, will of your charity +among your deeds of mercy remember the soul of the said Geoffrey +Chaucer, first author and maker of this book. And also that all we +that shall see and read therein may so take and understand the good +and virtuous tales, that it may so profit unto the health of our souls +that after this short and transitory life we may come to everlasting +life in Heaven. Amen. + +BY WILLIAM CAXTON + + + + +MALORY'S KING ARTHUR. (1485) + +PROLOGUE + + +After that I had accomplished and finished divers histories, as well +of contemplation as of other historical and worldly acts of great +conquerors and princes, and also certain books of ensamples and +doctrine, many noble and divers gentlemen of this realm of England +came and demanded me many and oft times wherefore that I have not done +made and printed the noble history of the Saint Graal, and of the most +renowned Christian King, first and chief of the three best Christian +and worthy, Arthur, which ought most to be remembered among us +Englishmen before all other Christian Kings. For it is notoyrly known +through the universal world that there be nine worthy and the best +that ever were; that is to wit three Paynims, three Jews, and three +Christian men. As for the Paynims, they were to-fore the Incarnation +of Christ, which were named--the first, Hector of Troy, of whom the +history is come both in ballad and in prose--the second, Alexander +the Great; and the third, Julius Cæsar, Emperor of Rome, of whom the +histories be well known and had. And as for the three Jews, which also +were before the Incarnation of our Lord of whom the first was Duke +Joshua, which brought the children of Israel into the land of behest; +the second, David, King of Jerusalem; and the third Judas Maccabaeus; +of these three the Bible rehearseth all their noble histories and +acts. And since the said Incarnation have been three noble Christian +men, installed and admitted through the universal world into the +number of the nine best and worthy, of whom was first the noble +Arthur, whose noble acts I purpose to write in this present book here +following. The second was Charlemagne, or Charles the Great, of whom +the history is had in many places both in French and English; and the +third and last was Godfrey of Boulogne, of whose acts and life I made +a book unto the excellent prince and king of noble memory, King Edward +the Fourth. The said noble gentlemen instantly required me to print +the history of the said noble king and conqueror, King Arthur, and of +his knights, with the history of the Saint Graal, and of the death and +ending of the said Arthur, affirming that I ought rather to print his +acts and noble feats than of Godfrey of Boulogne or any of the other +eight, considering that he was a man born within this realm, and king +and emperor of the same; and that there be in French divers and many +noble volumes of his acts, and also of his knights. To whom I answered +that divers men hold opinion that there was no such Arthur, and that +all such books as be made of him be but feigned and fables, because +that some chronicles make of him no mention, ne remember him nothing +ne of his knights; whereto they answered, and one in special said, +that in him that should say or think that there was never such a king +called Arthur, might well be aretted great folly and blindness; for he +said that there were many evidences of the contrary. First ye may +see his sepulchre in the monastery of Glastonbury; and also in +'Polychronicon,' in the fifth book, the sixth chapter, and in the +seventh book, the twenty-third chapter, where his body was buried, and +after found and translated into the said monastery. Ye shall see also +in the history of Boccaccio, in his book 'De casu principum,' part +of his noble acts and also of his fall. Also Galfridus in his British +book recounteth his life, and in divers places of England many +remembrances be yet of him, and shall remain perpetually, and also +of his knights. First in the Abbey of Westminster at Saint Edward's +shrine remaineth the print of his seal in red wax closed in beryl, +in which is written 'Patricius Arthurus, Britanniae Galliae Germaniae +Daciae Imperator.' Item, in the castle of Dover ye may see Gawain's +skull and Caradoc's mantle; at Winchester the round table; in other +places Lancelot's sword, and many other things. Then all these things +considered, there can no man reasonably gainsay but here was a king of +this land named Arthur; for in all places, Christian and heathen, he +is reputed and taken for one of the nine worthy, and the first of the +three Christian men. And also he is more spoken of beyond the sea; +more books made of his noble acts than there be in England, as well +in Dutch, Italian, Spanish, and Greek as in French; and yet of record +remain in witness of him in Wales in the town of Camelot the great +stones and marvellous works of iron lying under the ground, and royal +vaults, which divers now living hath seen. Wherefore it is a marvel +why he is no more renowned in his own country, save only it accordeth +to the word of God, which saith that no man is accepted for a prophet +in his own country. Then all these things aforesaid alleged, I could +not well deny but that there was such a noble king named Arthur, and +reputed one of the nine worthy, and first and chief of the Christian +men; and many noble volumes be made of him and of his noble knights in +French, which I have seen and read beyond the sea, which be not had +in our maternal tongue, but in Welsh be many, and also in French, and +some in English, but nowhere nigh all. Wherefore such as have lately +been drawn out briefly into English, I have, after the simple cunning +that God hath sent to me, under the favour and correction of all noble +lords and gentlemen, emprised to imprint a book of the noble histories +of the said King Arthur and of certain of his knights, after a copy +unto me delivered, which copy Sir Thomas Mallory did take out of +certain books of French and reduced it into English. And I according +to my copy have down set it in print, to the intent that noble men +may see and learn the noble acts of chivalry, the gentle and virtuous +deeds that some knights used in those days, by which they came to +honour, and how they that were vicious were punished and oft put to +shame and rebuke; humbly beseeching all noble lords and ladies and all +other estates, of what estate or degree they be of, that shall see and +read in this said book and work, that they take the good and honest +acts in their remembrance and to follow the same, wherein they shall +find many joyous and pleasant histories and noble and renowned acts +of humanity, gentleness, and chivalry. For herein may be seen +noble chivalry, courtesy, humanity, friendliness, hardyhood, love, +friendship, cowardice, murder, hate, virtue and sin. Do after the good +and leave the evil, and it shall bring you to good fame and renown. +And for to pass the time this book shall be pleasant to read in; +but for to give faith and believe that all is true that is contained +herein, ye be at your liberty. But all is written for our doctrine, +and for to beware that we fall not to vice ne sin, but to exercise and +follow virtue, by which we may come and attain to good fame and renown +in this life, and after this short and transitory life to come unto +everlasting bliss in heaven; the which He grant us that reigneth in +Heaven, the Blessed Trinity. Amen. + +Then to proceed forth in this said book which I direct unto all noble +princes, lords and ladies, gentlemen or gentlewomen, that desire +to read or hear read of the noble and joyous history of the great +conqueror and excellent king, King Arthur, sometime King of this noble +realm then called Britain, I, William Caxton, simple person, present +this book following which I have emprised to imprint. And treateth +of the noble acts, feats of arms, of chivalry, prowess, hardihood, +humanity, love, courtesy, and very gentleness, with many wonderful +histories and adventures. And for to understand briefly the contents +of this volume, I have divided it into 21 books, and every book +chaptered, as hereafter shall by God's grace follow. The first book +shall treat how Uther Pendragon begat the noble conqueror, King +Arthur, and containeth 28 chapters. The second book treateth of Balyn +the noble knight, and containeth 19 chapters. The third book treateth +of the marriage of King Arthur to Queen Guinevere, with other matters, +and containeth 15 chapters. The fourth book how Merlin was assotted, +and of war made to King Arthur, and containeth 29 chapters. The fifth +book treateth of the conquest of Lucius the emperor, and containeth 12 +chapters. The sixth book treateth of Sir Lancelot and Sir Lionel, and +marvellous adventures, and containeth 18 chapters. The seventh book +treateth of a noble knight called Sir Gareth, and named by Sir Kay +'Beaumains,' and containeth 36 chapters. The eighth book treateth +of the birth of Sir Tristram the noble knight, and of his acts, and +containeth 41 chapters. The ninth book treateth of a knight named +by Sir Kay, 'Le cote mal tailié,' and also of Sir Tristram, and +containeth 44 chapters. The tenth book treateth of Sir Tristram, and +other marvellous adventures, and containeth 83 chapters. The eleventh +book treateth of Sir Lancelot and Sir Galahad, and containeth 14 +chapters. The twelfth book treateth of Sir Lancelot and his madness, +and containeth 14 chapters. The thirteenth book treateth how Galahad +came first to King Arthur's court, and the quest how the Sangreal was +begun, and containeth 20 chapters. The fourteenth book treateth of the +quest of the Sangreal, and containeth 10 chapters. The fifteenth book +treateth of Sir Lancelot, and containeth 6 chapters. The sixteenth +book treateth of Sir Boris and Sir Lionel his brother, and containeth +17 chapters. The seventeenth book treateth of the Sangreal, and +containeth 23 chapters. The eighteenth book treateth of Sir Lancelot +and the Queen, and containeth 25 chapters. The nineteenth book +treateth of Queen Guinevere, and Lancelot, and containeth 13 chapters. +The twentieth book treateth of the piteous death of Arthur, and +containeth 22 chapters. The twenty-first book treateth of his last +departing, and how Sir Lancelot came to revenge his death, and +containeth 13 chapters. The sum is 21 books, which contain the sum +of five hundred and seven chapters, as more plainly shall follow +hereafter. + + + + +ENEYDOS (1490) + +PROLOGUE + + +After divers work made, translated, and achieved, having no work in +hand, I sitting in my study whereas lay many divers pamphlets and +books, happened that to my hand came a little book in French, which +lately was translated out of Latin by some noble clerk of France, +which book is named _Aeneidos_, made in Latin by that noble poet and +great clerk, Virgil Which book I saw over, and read therein how, after +the general destruction of the great Troy, Aeneas departed, bearing +his old father Anchises upon his shoulders, his little son Iulus +on his hand, his wife with much other people following, and how he +shipped and departed, with all the history of his adventures that he +had ere he came to the achievement of his conquest of Italy, as all +along shall be shewed in his present book. In which book I had great +pleasure because of the fair and honest terms and words in French; +which I never saw before like, ne none so pleasant ne so well ordered; +which book as seemed to me should be much requisite to noble men to +see, as well for the eloquence as the histories. How well that many +hundred years past was the said book of _Aeneidos_, with other works, +made and learned daily in schools, especially in Italy and other +places; which history the said Virgil made in metre. And when I had +advised me in this said book, I delibered and concluded to translate +it into English; and forthwith took a pen and ink and wrote a leaf or +twain, which I oversaw again to correct it. And when I saw the fair +and strange terms therein, I doubted that it should not please some +gentlemen which late blamed me, saying that in my translations I had +over curious terms, which could not be understood of common people, +and desired me to use old and homely terms in my translations. And +fain would I satisfy every man, and so to do took an old book and read +therein, and certainly the English was so rude and broad that I could +not well understood it. And also my Lord Abbot of Westminster did do +show to me lately certain evidences written in old English, for to +reduce it into our English now used. And certainly it was written in +such wise that it was more like to Dutch than English, I could not +reduce ne bring it to be understood. And certainly our language now +used varieth far from that which was used and spoken when I was born. +For we Englishmen be born under the domination of the moon, which is +never steadfast but ever wavering, waxing one season and waneth and +decreaseth another season. And that common English that is spoken in +one shire varieth from another, insomuch that in my days happened that +certain merchants were in a ship in Thames for to have sailed over the +sea into Zealand, and for lack of wind they tarried at Foreland, and +went to land for to refresh them. And one of them named Sheffield, a +mercer, came into a house and asked for meat, and especially he asked +after eggs; and the good wife answered that she could speak no French, +and the merchant was angry, for he also could speak no French, but +would have had eggs, and she understood him not. And then at last +another said, that he would have "eyren"; then the goodwife said +that she understood him well. Lo, what should a man in these days now +write, eggs or eyren? Certainly it is hard to please every man because +of diversity and change of language. For in these days every man that +is in any reputation in his country will utter his communication and +matters in such manners and terms that few men shall understand them. +And some honest and great clerks have been with me and desired me +to write the most curious terms that I could find; and thus between +plain, rude and curious I stand abashed. But in my judgment the common +terms that be daily used be lighter to be understood than the old and +ancient English. And forasmuch as this present book is not for a rude +uplandish man to labour therein ne read it, but only for a clerk and +a noble gentleman that feeleth and understandeth in feats of arms, in +love and in noble chivalry. Therefore in a mean between both I have +reduced and translated this said book into our English, not over-rude +ne curious; but in such terms as shall be understood, by God's grace, +according to my copy. And if any man will intermit in reading of it, +and findeth such terms that he cannot understand, let him go read +and learn Virgil of the pistles of Ovid, and there he shall see and +understand lightly all, if he have a good reader and informer. For +this book is not for every rude and uncunning man to see, but to +clerks and very gentlemen that understand gentleness and science. Then +I pray all them that shall read in this little treatise to hold me for +excused for the translating of it, for I acknowledge myself ignorant +of cunning to emprise on me so high and noble a work. But I pray +Master John Skelton, late created poet laureate in the University of +Oxenford, to oversee and correct this said book, and to address and +expound, wherever shall be found fault, to them that shall require it. + +For him I know for sufficient to expound and English every difficulty +that is therein; for he hath lately translated the Epistles of Tully, +and the book of Diodorus Siculus, and divers other works out of Latin +into English, not in rude and old language, but in polished and ornate +terms craftily, as he that hath read Virgil, Ovid, Tully, and all the +other noble poets and orators to me unknown. And also he hath read +the nine Muses, and understands their musical sciences, and to whom +of them each, science is appropred. I suppose he hath drunken of +Helicon's well. Then I pray him and such others to correct, add, or +minish whereas he or they shall find fault; for I have but followed my +copy in French as nigh as to me is possible. And if any word be said +therein well, I am glad; and if otherwise, I submit my said book +to their correction. Which book I present unto the high born, my +to-coming natural and sovereign lord Arthur, by the grace of God +Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall and Earl of Chester, first-begotten +son and heir unto our most dread natural and sovereign lord and most +Christian King, Henry the VII., by the grace of God King of England +and of France, and lord of Ireland; beseeching his noble Grace to +receive it in thank of me his most humble subject and servant. And I +shall pray unto Almighty God for his prosperous increasing in virtue, +wisedom, and humanity, that he may be equal with the most renowned of +all his noble progenitors; and so to live in this present life that +after this transitory life he and we all may come to everlasting life +in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +DEDICATION OF THE INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION + +BY JOHN CALVIN (1536)[A] + +To His Most Christian Majesty, FRANCIS, King of the French, and his +Sovereign, John Calvin wisheth peace and salvation in Christ. + + +When I began this work, Sire, nothing was further from my thoughts +than writing a book which would afterwards be presented to your +Majesty. My intention was only to lay down some elementary principles, +by which inquirers on the subject of religion might be instructed in +the nature of true piety. And this labour I undertook chiefly for +my countrymen, the French, of whom I apprehended multitudes to be +hungering and thirsting after Christ, but saw very few possessing any +real knowledge of him. That this was my design, the book itself proves +by its simple method and unadorned composition. But when I perceived +that the fury of certain wicked men in your kingdom had grown to +such a height, as to leave no room in the land for sound doctrine, I +thought I should be usefully employed, if in the same work I delivered +my instructions to them, and exhibited my confession to you, that +you may know the nature of that doctrine, which is the object of such +unbounded rage to those madmen who are now disturbing the country with +fire and sword. For I shall not be afraid to acknowledge, that this +treatise contains a summary of that very doctrine, which, according to +their clamours, deserves to be punished with imprisonment, banishment, +proscription, and flames, and to be exterminated from the face of the +earth. I well know with what atrocious insinuations your ears have +been filled by them, in order to render our cause most odious in +your esteem; but your clemency should lead you to consider that, if +accusation be accounted a sufficient evidence of guilt, there will be +an end of all innocence in words and actions. If any one, indeed, with +a view to bring odium upon the doctrine which I am endeavouring to +defend, should allege that it has long ago been condemned by the +general consent, and suppressed by many judicial decisions, this will +be only equivalent to saying, that it has been sometimes violently +rejected through the influence and power of its adversaries, and +sometimes insidiously and fraudulently oppressed by falsehoods, +artifices, and calumnies. Violence is displayed, when sanguinary +sentences are passed against it without the cause being heard; and +fraud, when it is unjustly accused of sedition and mischief. Lest +any one should suppose that these our complaints are unfounded, you +yourself, Sire, can bear witness of the false calumnies with which +you hear it daily traduced; that its only tendency is to wrest the +sceptres of kings out of their hands, to overturn all the tribunals +and judicial proceedings, to subvert all order and governments, to +disturb the peace and tranquillity of the people, to abrogate all +laws, to scatter all properties and possessions, and, in a word, to +involve every thing in total confusion. And yet you hear the smallest +portion of what is alleged against it; for such horrible things are +circulated amongst the vulgar, that, if they were true, the whole +world would justly pronounce it and its abettors worthy of a thousand +fires and gibbets. Who, then, will wonder at its becoming the object +of public odium, where credit is given to such most iniquitous +accusations? This is the cause of the general consent and conspiracy +to condemn us and our doctrine. Hurried away with this impulse, +those who sit in judgment pronounce for sentences the prejudices they +brought from home with them; and think their duty fully discharged if +they condemn none to be punished but such as are convicted by their +own confession, or by sufficient proofs. Convicted of what crime? +Of this condemned doctrine, they say. But with what justice is it +condemned? Now, the ground of defence was not to abjure the doctrine +itself, but to maintain its truth. On this subject, however, not a +word is allowed to be uttered. + +Wherefore I beseech you, Sire,--and surely it is not an unreasonable +request,--to take upon yourself the entire cognizance of this cause, +which has hitherto been confusedly and carelessly agitated, without +any order of law, and with outrageous passion rather than judicial +gravity. Think not that I am now meditating my own individual defence, +in order to effect a safe return to my native country; for, though I +feel the affection which every man ought to feel for it, yet, under +the existing circumstances, I regret not my removal from it. But I +plead the cause of all the godly, and consequently of Christ himself, +which, having been in these times persecuted and trampled on in all +ways in your kingdom, now lies in a most deplorable state; and this +indeed rather through the tyranny of certain Pharisees, than with your +knowledge. How this comes to pass is foreign to my present purpose to +say; but it certainly lies in a most afflicted state. For the +ungodly have gone to such lengths, that the truth of Christ, if not +vanquished, dissipated, and entirely destroyed, is buried, as it +were, in ignoble obscurity, while the poor, despised church is either +destroyed by cruel massacres, or driven away into banishment, or +menaced and terrified into total silence. And still they continue +their wonted madness and ferocity, pushing violently against the wall +already bent, and finishing the ruin they have begun. In the meantime, +no one comes forward to plead the cause against such furies. If there +be any persons desirous of appearing most favourable to the truth, +they only venture an opinion, that forgiveness should be extended to +the error and imprudence of ignorant people. For this is the language +of these moderate men, calling that error and imprudence which they +know to be the certain truth of God, and those ignorant people, whose +understanding they perceive not to have been so despicable to Christ, +but that he has favoured them with the mysteries of his heavenly +wisdom. Thus all are ashamed of the Gospel. But it shall be yours, +Sire, not to turn away your ears or thoughts from so just a defence, +especially in a cause of such importance as the maintenance of God's +glory unimpaired in the world, the preservation of the honor of divine +truth, and the continuance of the kingdom of Christ uninjured +among us. This is a cause worthy of your attention, worthy of your +cognizance, worthy of your throne. This consideration constitutes true +royalty, to acknowledge yourself in the government of your kingdom to +be the minister of God. For where the glory of God is not made the +end of the government, it is not a legitimate sovereignty, but a +usurpation. And he is deceived who expects lasting prosperity in that +kingdom which is not ruled by the sceptre of God, that is, his holy +word; for that heavenly oracle cannot fail, which declares that "where +there is no vision, the people perish,"[1] Nor should you be seduced +from this pursuit by a contempt of our meanness. We are fully +conscious to ourselves how very mean and abject we are, being +miserable sinners before God, and accounted most despicable by men; +being, (if you please) the refuse of the world, deserving of the +vilest appellations that can be found; so that nothing remains for +us to glory in before God, but his mercy alone, by which, without any +merit of ours, we have been admitted to the hope of eternal salvation, +and before men nothing but our weakness, the slightest confession of +which is esteemed by them as the greatest disgrace. But our doctrine +must stand, exalted above all the glory, and invincible by all the +power of the world; because it is not ours, but the doctrine of the +living God, and of his Christ, whom the Father hath constituted King, +that he may have dominion from sea to sea, and from the river even to +the ends of the earth, and that he may rule in such a manner, that the +whole earth, with its strength of iron and with its splendour of gold +and silver, smitten by the rod of his mouth, may be broken to pieces +like a potter's vessel;[2] for thus do the prophets foretell the +magnificence of his kingdom. + +Our adversaries reply, that our pleading the word of God is a false +pretence, and that we are nefarious corrupters of it. But that this is +not only a malicious calumny, but egregious impudence, by reading our +confession, you will, in your wisdom, be able to judge. Yet something +further is necessary to be said, to excite your attention, or at least +to prepare your mind for this perusal. Paul's direction, that every +prophecy be framed "according to the analogy of faith,"[3] has fixed +an invariable standard by which all interpretation of Scripture ought +to be tried. If our principles be examined by this rule of faith, +the victory is ours. For what is more consistent with faith than to +acknowledge ourselves naked of all virtue, that we may be clothed by +God; empty of all good, that we may be filled by him; slaves to sin, +that we may be liberated by him; blind, that we may be enlightened by +him; lame, that we may be guided; weak, that we may be supported by +him; to divest ourselves of all ground of glorying, that he alone may +be eminently glorious, and that we may glory in him? When we advance +these and similar sentiments, they interrupt us with complaints that +this is the way to overturn, I know not what blind light of nature, +pretended preparations, free will, and works meritorious of eternal +salvation, together with all their supererogations; because they +cannot bear that the praise and glory of all goodness, strength, +righteousness, and wisdom, should remain entirely with God. But we +read of none being reproved for having drawn too freely from the +fountain of living waters; on the contrary, they are severely +upbraided who have "hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can +hold no water."[4] Again, what is more consistent with faith, than +to assure ourselves of God being a propitious Father, where Christ is +acknowledged as a brother and Mediator? than securely to expect all +prosperity and happiness from Him, whose unspeakable love towards us +went so far, that "he spared not his own Son, but delivered him up +for us?"[5] than to rest in the certain expectation of salvation and +eternal life, when we reflect upon the Father's gift of Christ, in +whom such treasures are hidden? Here they oppose us, and complain +that this certainty of confidence is chargeable with arrogance and +presumption. But as we ought to presume nothing of ourselves, so we +should presume every thing of God; nor are we divested of vain glory +for any other reason than that we may learn to glory in the Lord. +What shall I say more? Review, Sire, all the parts of our cause, +and consider us worse than the most abandoned of mankind, unless you +clearly discover that we thus "both labor and suffer reproach, because +we trust in the living God,"[6] because we believe that "this is life +eternal, to know the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he hath +sent."[7] For this hope some of us are bound in chains, others are +lashed with scourges, others are carried about as laughing-stocks, +others are outlawed, others are cruelly tortured, others escape by +flight; but we are all reduced to extreme perplexities, execrated +with dreadful curses, cruelly slandered and treated with the greatest +indignities. Now, look at our adversaries, (I speak of the order +of priests, at whose will and directions others carry on these +hostilities against us,) and consider a little with me by what +principles they are actuated. The true religion, which is taught in +the Scriptures, and ought to be universally maintained, they readily +permit both themselves and others to be ignorant of, and to treat with +neglect and contempt. They think it unimportant what any one holds or +denies concerning God and Christ, provided he submits his mind with +an implicit faith (as they call it) to the judgment of the Church. +Nor are they much affected, if the glory of God happens to be violated +with open blasphemies, provided no one lift a finger against the +primacy of the Apostolic See, and the authority of their holy Mother +Church. Why, therefore, do they contend with such extreme bitterness +and cruelty for the mass, purgatory, pilgrimages, and similar trifles, +and deny that any piety can be maintained without a most explicit +faith, so to speak, in these things; whereas they prove none of them +from the word of God? Why, but because their belly is their God, their +kitchen is their religion; deprived of which they consider themselves +no longer as Christians, or even as men. For though some feast +themselves in splendour, and others subsist on slender fare, yet all +live on the same pot, which, without this fuel, would not only cool, +but completely freeze. Every one of them, therefore, who is most +solicitous for his belly, is found to be a most strenuous champion +for their faith. Indeed, they universally exert themselves for the +preservation of their kingdom, and the repletion of their bellies; but +not one of them discovers the least indication of sincere zeal. + +Nor do their attacks on our doctrine cease here; they urge every topic +of accusation and abuse to render it an object of hatred or suspicion. +They call it novel, and of recent origin,--they cavil at it as +doubtful and uncertain,--they inquire by what miracles it is +confirmed,--they ask whether it is right for it to be received +contrary to the consent of so many holy fathers, and the custom of the +highest antiquity,--they urge us to confess that it is schismatical +in stirring up opposition against the Church, or that the Church +was wholly extinct for many ages, during which no such thing was +known.--Lastly, they say all arguments are unnecessary; for that its +nature may be determined by its fruits, since it has produced such +a multitude of sects, so many factious tumults, and such great +licentiousness of vices. It is indeed very easy for them to insult a +deserted cause with the credulous and ignorant multitude; but, if we +had also the liberty of speaking in our turn, this acrimony, +which they now discover in violently foaming against us with equal +licentiousness and impunity, would presently cool. + +In the first place, their calling it novel is highly injurious to God, +whose holy word deserves not to be accused of novelty. I have no doubt +of its being new to them, to whom Jesus Christ and the Gospel are +equally new. But those who know the antiquity of this preaching of +Paul, "that Jesus Christ died for our sins, and rose again for our +justification,"[8] will find no novelty among us. That it has long +been concealed, buried, and unknown, is the crime of human impiety. +Now that the goodness of God has restored it to us, it ought at least +to be allowed its just claim of antiquity. + +From the same source of ignorance springs the notion of its being +doubtful and uncertain. This is the very thing which the Lord +complains of by his prophet; that "the ox knoweth his owner, and +the ass his master's crib,"[9] but that his people know not him. But +however they may laugh at its uncertainty, if they were called to seal +their own doctrine with their blood and lives, it would appear how +much they value it. Very different is our confidence, which dreads +neither the terrors of death, nor even the tribunal of God. + +Their requiring miracles of us is altogether unreasonable; for +we forge no new Gospel, but retain the very same whose truth was +confirmed by all the miracles ever wrought by Christ and the apostles. +But they have this peculiar advantage above us, that they can confirm +their faith by continual miracles even to this day. But the truth is, +they allege miracles which are calculated to unsettle a mind otherwise +well established, they are so frivolous and ridiculous, or vain and +false. Nor, if they were ever so preternatural, ought they to have any +weight in opposition to the truth of God, since the name of God ought +to be sanctified in all places and at all times, whether by miraculous +events, or by the common order of nature. This fallacy might +perhaps be more specious, if the Scripture did not apprize us of the +legitimate end and use of miracles. For Mark informs us, that the +miracles which followed the preaching of the apostles were wrought +in confirmation[10] of it, and Luke tells us, that[11] "the Lord gave +testimony to the word of his grace," when "signs and wonders" were +"done by the hands" of the apostles. Very similar to which is the +assertion of the apostle, that "salvation was confirmed" by the +preaching of the Gospel, "God also bearing witness with signs, and +wonders, and divers miracles."[12] But those things which we are told +were seals of the Gospel, shall we pervert to undermine the faith of +the Gospel? Those things which were designed to be testimonials of the +truth, shall we accommodate to the confirmation of falsehood? It +is right, therefore, that the doctrine, which, according to the +evangelist, claims the first attention, be examined and tried in +the first place; and if it be approved, then it ought to derive +confirmation from miracles. But it is the characteristic of sound +doctrine, given by Christ, that it tends to promote, not the glory of +men, but the glory of God.[13] Christ having laid down this proof of +a doctrine, it is wrong to esteem those as miracles which are directed +to any other end than the glorification of the name of God alone. And +we should remember that Satan has his wonders, which, though they +are juggling tricks rather than real miracles, are such as delude the +ignorant and inexperienced. Magicians and enchanters have always +been famous for miracles; idolatry has been supported by astonishing +miracles; and yet we admit them not as proofs of the superstition of +magicians or idolaters. With this engine also the simplicity of +the vulgar was anciently assailed by the Donatists, who abounded in +miracles. We therefore give the same answer now to our adversaries as +Augustine[14] gave to the Donatists, that our Lord hath cautioned us +against these miracle-mongers by his prediction, that there should +arise false prophets, who, by various signs and lying wonders, "should +deceive (if possible) the very elect."[15] And Paul has told us, that +the kingdom of Antichrist would be "with all power, and signs, and +lying wonders."[16] But these miracles (they say) are wrought, not by +idols, or sorcerers, or false prophets, but by saints; as if we were +ignorant, that it is a stratagem of Satan to "transform" himself "into +an angel of light."[17] At the tomb of Jeremiah,[18] who was buried +in Egypt, the Egyptians formerly offered sacrifices and other divine +honours. Was not this abusing God's holy prophet to the purposes of +idolatry? Yet they supposed this veneration of his sepulchre to be +rewarded with a cure for the bite of serpents. What shall we say, but +that it has been, and ever will be, the most righteous vengeance +of God to "send those who receive not the love of the truth strong +delusions, that they should believe a lie?"[19] We are by no means +without miracles, and such as are certain, and not liable to cavils. +But those under which they shelter themselves are mere illusions of +Satan, seducing the people from the true worship of God to vanity. + +Another calumny is their charging us with opposition to the +fathers,--I mean the writers of the earlier and purer ages,--as if +those writers were abettors of their impiety; whereas, if the contest +were to be terminated by this authority, the victory in most parts of +the controversy--to speak in the most modest terms--would be on our +side. But though the writings of those fathers contain many wise and +excellent things, yet in some respects they have suffered the common +fate of mankind; these very dutiful children reverence only their +errors and mistakes, but their excellences they either overlook, or +conceal, or corrupt; so that it may truly be said to be their only +study to collect dross from the midst of gold. Then they overwhelm us +with senseless clamours, as despisers and enemies of the fathers. But +we do not hold them in such contempt, but that, if it were consistent +with my present design, I could easily support by their suffrages most +of the sentiments that we now maintain. But while we make use of their +writings, we always remember that "all things are ours," to serve us, +not to have dominion over us, and that "we are Christ's"[20] alone, +and owe him universal obedience. He who neglects this distinction will +have nothing decided in religion; since those holy men were ignorant +of many things, frequently at variance with each other, and sometimes +even inconsistent with themselves. There is great reason, they say, +for the admonition of Solomon, "not to transgress or remove the +ancient landmarks, which our fathers have set."[21] But the same rule +is not applicable to the bounding of fields, and to the obedience +of faith, which ought to be ready to "forget her own people and her +father's house."[22] But if they are so fond of allegorizing, why do +they not explain the apostles, rather than any others, to be those +fathers, whose appointed landmarks it is so unlawful to remove? For +this is the interpretation of Jerome, whose works they have received +into their canons. But if they insist on preserving the landmarks of +those whom they understand to be intended, why do they at pleasure so +freely transgress them themselves? There were two fathers,[23] of whom +one said, that our God neither eats nor drinks, and therefore needs +neither cups nor dishes; the other, that sacred things require +no gold, and that gold is no recommendation of that which Is not +purchased with gold. This landmark therefore is transgressed by those +who in sacred things are so much delighted with gold, silver, ivory, +marble, jewels, and silks, and suppose that God is not rightly +worshipped, unless all things abound in exquisite splendour, or rather +extravagant profusion. There was a father[24] who said he freely +partook of flesh on a day when others abstained from it, because he +was a Christian. They transgress the landmarks therefore when they +curse the soul that tastes flesh in Lent. There were two fathers,[25] +of whom one said, that a monk who labors not with his hands is on a +level with a cheat or a robber; and the other, that it is unlawful +for monks to live on what is not their own, notwithstanding their +assiduity in contemplations, studies, and prayers; and they have +transgressed this landmark by placing the idle and distended carcasses +of monks in cells and brothels, to be pampered on the substance of +others. There was a father[26] who said, that to see a painted image +of Christ, or of any other saint, in the temples of Christians, is +a dreadful abomination. Nor was this merely the sentence of an +individual; it was also decreed by an ecclesiastical council, that +the object of worship should not be painted on the walls. They are far +from confining themselves within these landmarks, for every corner is +filled with images. Another father[27] has advised that, after having +discharged the office of humanity towards the dead by the rites of +sepulture, we should leave them to their repose. They break through +these landmarks by inculcating a constant solicitude for the dead. +There was one of the fathers[28] who asserted that the substance of +bread and wine in the eucharist ceases not, but remains, just as the +substance of the human nature remains in the Lord Christ united with +the divine. They transgress this landmark therefore by pretending +that, on the words of the Lord being recited, the substance of bread +and wine ceases, and is transubstantiated into his body and blood. +There were fathers[29] who, while they exhibited to the universal +Church only one eucharist, and forbade all scandalous and immoral +persons to approach it, at the same time severely censured all who, +when present, did not partake of it. How far have they removed these +landmarks, when they fill not only the churches, but even private +houses, with their masses, admit all who choose to be spectators of +them, and every one the more readily in proportion to the magnitude +of his contribution, however chargeable with impurity and wickedness! +They invite none to faith in Christ and a faithful participation of +the sacraments; but rather for purposes of gain bring forward their +own work instead of the grace and merit of Christ. There were two +fathers,[30] of whom one contended that the use of Christ's sacred +supper should be wholly forbidden to those who, content with +partaking of one kind, abstained from the other; the other strenuously +maintained that Christian people ought not to be refused the blood of +their Lord, for the confession of whom they are required to shed their +own. These landmarks also they have removed, in appointing, by +an inviolable law, that very thing which the former punished +with excommunication, and the latter gave a powerful reason for +disapproving. There was a father[31] who asserted the temerity of +deciding on either side of an obscure subject, without clear and +evident testimonies of Scripture. This landmark they forgot when +they made so many constitutions, canons, and judicial determinations, +without any authority from the word of God. There was a father[32] who +upbraided Montanus with having, among other heresies, been the first +imposer of laws for the observance of fasts. They have gone far beyond +this landmark also, in establishing fasts by the strictest laws. There +was a father[33] who denied that marriage ought to be forbidden to the +ministers of the Church, and pronounced cohabitation with a wife to +be real chastity; and there were fathers who assented to his judgment. +They have transgressed these landmarks by enjoining on their priests +the strictest celibacy. There was a father who thought that attention +should be paid to Christ only, of whom it is said, "Hear ye him," and +that no regard should be had to what others before us have either said +or done, only to what has been commanded by Christ, who is preeminent +over all. This landmark they neither prescribe to themselves, nor +permit to be observed by others, when they set up over themselves +and others any masters rather than Christ. There was a father[34] +who contended that the Church ought not to take precedence of Christ, +because his judgment is always according to truth; but ecclesiastical +judges, like other men, may generally be deceived. Breaking down this +landmark also, they scruple not to assert, that all the authority of +the Scripture depends on the decision of the Church. All the fathers, +with one heart and voice, have declared it execrable and detestable +for the holy word of God to be contaminated with the subtleties of +sophists, and perplexed by the wrangles of logicians. Do they confine +themselves within these landmarks, when the whole business of their +lives is to involve the simplicity of the Scripture in endless +controversies, and worse than sophistical wrangles? so that if the +fathers were now restored to life, and heard this art of wrangling, +which they call speculative divinity, they would not suspect the +dispute to have the least reference to God. But if I would enumerate +all the instances in which the authority of the fathers is insolently +rejected by those who would be thought their dutiful children, my +address would exceed all reasonable bounds. Months and years would be +insufficient for me. And yet such is their consummate and incorrigible +impudence, they dare to censure us for presuming to transgress the +ancient landmarks. + +Nor can they gain any advantage against us by their argument from +custom; for, if we were compelled to submit to custom, we should have +to complain of the greatest injustice. Indeed, if the judgments of men +were correct, custom should be sought among the good. But the fact +is often very different. What appears to be practiced by many soon +obtains the force of a custom. And human affairs have scarcely ever +been in so good a state as for the majority to be pleased with things +of real excellence. From the private vices of multitudes, therefore, +has arisen public error, or rather a common agreement of vices, which +these good men would now have to be received as law. It is evident to +all who can see, that the world is inundated with more than an ocean +of evils, that it is overrun with numerous destructive pests, that +every thing is fast verging to ruin, so that we must altogether +despair of human affairs, or vigorously and even violently oppose such +immense evils. And the remedy is rejected for no other reason, but +because we have been accustomed to the evils so long. But let public +error be tolerated in human society; in the kingdom of God nothing but +his eternal truth should he heard and regarded, which no succession of +years, no custom, no confederacy, can circumscribe. Thus Isaiah once +taught the chosen people of God: "Say ye not, A confederacy, to all to +whom this people shall say, A confederacy:" that is, that they should +not unite in the wicked consent of the people; "nor fear their fear, +nor be afraid," but rather "sanctify the Lord of hosts," that he might +"be their fear and their dread."[35] Now, therefore, let them, if +they please, object against us past ages and present examples; if +we "sanctify the Lord of hosts," we shall not be much afraid. For, +whether many ages agree in similar impiety, he is mighty to take +vengeance on the third and fourth generation; or whether the whole +world combine in the same iniquity, he has given an example of the +fatal end of those who sin with a multitude, by destroying all men +with a deluge, and preserving Noah and his small family, in order that +his individual faith might condemn the whole world. Lastly, a corrupt +custom is nothing but an epidemical pestilence, which is equally fatal +to its objects, though they fall with a multitude. Besides, they ought +to consider a remark, somewhere made by Cyprian,[36] that persons who +sin through ignorance, though they cannot be wholly exculpated, may +yet be considered in some degree excusable; but those who obstinately +reject the truth offered by the Divine goodness, are without any +excuse at all. + +Nor are we so embarrassed by their dilemma as to be obliged to +confess, either that the Church was for some time extinct, or that +we have now a controversy with the Church. The Church of Christ has +lived, and will continue to live, as long as Christ shall reign at +the right hand of the Father, by whose hand she is sustained, by whose +protection she is defended, by whose power she is preserved in safety. +For he will undoubtedly perform what he once promised, to be with his +people "even to the end of the world."[37] We have no quarrel against +the Church, for with one consent we unite with all the company of the +faithful in worshipping and adoring the one God and Christ the Lord, +as he has been adored by all the pious in all ages. But our opponents +deviate widely from the truth when they acknowledge no Church but what +is visible to the corporeal eye, and endeavour to circumscribe it +by those limits within which it is far from being included. Our +controversy turns on the two following points:--first, they contend +that the form of the Church is always apparent and visible; secondly, +they place that form in the see of the Roman Church and her order of +prelates. We assert, on the contrary, first, that the Church may exist +without any visible form; secondly, that its form is not contained +in that external splendour which they foolishly admire, but is +distinguished by a very different criterion, _viz_, the pure preaching +of God's word, and the legitimate administration of the sacraments. +They are not satisfied unless the Church can always be pointed out +with the finger. But how often among the Jewish people was it so +disorganized, as to have no visible form left? What splendid form +do we suppose could be seen, when Elias deplored his being left +alone?[38] How long, after the coming of Christ, did it remain without +any external form? How often, since that time, have wars, seditions, +and heresies, oppressed and totally obscured it? If they had lived +at that period, would they have believed that any Church existed? Yet +Elias was informed that there were "left seven thousand" who had "not +bowed the knee to Baal." Nor should we entertain any doubt of Christ's +having always reigned on earth ever since his ascension to heaven. But +if the pious at such periods had sought for any form evident to their +senses, must not their hearts have been quite discouraged? Indeed it +was already considered by Hilary in his day as a grievous error, that +people were absorbed in foolish admiration of the episcopal dignity, +and did not perceive the dreadful mischiefs concealed under +that disguise. For this is his language:[39] "One thing I advise +you--beware of Antichrist, for you have an improper attachment to +walls; your veneration for the Church of God is misplaced on houses +and buildings; you wrongly introduce under them the name of peace. +Is there any doubt that they will be seats of Antichrist? I think +mountains, woods, and lakes, prisons and whirlpools, less dangerous; +for these were the scenes of retirement or banishment in which the +prophets prophesied." But what excites the veneration of the multitude +in the present day for their horned bishops, but the supposition that +those are the holy prelates of religion whom they see presiding over +great cities? Away, then, with such stupid admiration. Let us rather +leave it to the Lord, since he alone "knoweth them that are his,"[40] +sometimes to remove from human observation all external knowledge +of his Church. I admit this to be a dreadful judgment of God on the +earth; but if it be deserved by the impiety of men, why do we attempt +to resist the righteous vengeance of God? Thus the Lord punished +the ingratitude of men in former ages; for, in consequence of their +resistance to his truth, and extinction of the light he had given +them, he permitted them to be blinded by sense, deluded by absurd +falsehoods, and immerged in profound darkness, so that there was no +appearance of the true Church left; yet, at the same time, in the +midst of darkness and errors, he preserved his scattered and concealed +people from total destruction. Nor is this to be wondered at; for he +knew how to save in all the confusion of Babylon, and the flame of +the fiery furnace. But how dangerous it is to estimate the form of the +Church by I know not what vain pomp, which they contend for; I shall +rather briefly suggest than state at large, lest I should protract +this discourse to an excessive length. The Pope, they say, who holds +the Apostolic see, and the bishops anointed and consecrated by him, +provided they are equipped with mitres and crosiers, represent the +Church, and ought to be considered as the Church. Therefore they +cannot err. How is this?--Because they are pastors of the Church, and +consecrated to the Lord. And did not the pastoral character belong to +Aaron, and the other rulers of Israel? Yet Aaron and his sons, after +their designation to the priesthood, fell into error when they made +the golden calf.[41] According to this mode of reasoning, why should +not the four hundred prophets, who lied to Ahab, have represented the +Church?[42] But the Church remained on the side of Micaiah, solitary +and despised as he was, and out of his mouth proceeded the truth. Did +not those prophets exhibit both the name and appearance of the Church, +who with united violence rose up against Jeremiah, and threatened and +boasted, "the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from +the wise, nor the word from the prophet?"[48] Jeremiah is sent singly +against the whole multitude of prophets, with a denunciation from the +Lord, that the "law shall perish from the priest, counsel from the +wise, and the word from the prophet."[44] And was there not the like +external respectability in the council convened by the chief priests, +scribes, and Pharisees, to consult about putting Christ to death?[45] +Now, let them go and adhere to the external appearance, and thereby +make Christ and all the prophets schismatics, and, on the other hand, +make the ministers of Satan instruments of the Holy Spirit. But if +they speak their real sentiments, let them answer me sincerely, what +nation or place they consider as the seat of the Church, from the time +when, by a decree of the council of Basil, Eugenius was deposed and +degraded from the pontificate, and Amadeus substituted in his place. +They cannot deny that the council, as far as relates to external +forms, was a lawful one, and summoned not only by one pope, but by +two. There Eugenius was pronounced guilty of schism, rebellion, and +obstinacy, together with all the host of cardinals and bishops who had +joined him in attempting a dissolution of the council. Yet afterwards, +assisted by the favour of princes, he regained the quiet possession of +his former dignity. That election of Amadeus, though formally made by +the authority of a general and holy synod, vanished into smoke; and he +was appeased with a cardinal's hat, like a barking dog with a morsel. +From the bosom of those heretics and rebels have proceeded all the +popes, cardinals, bishops, abbots, and priests ever since. Here they +must stop. For to which party will they give the title of the Church? +Will they deny that this was a general council, which wanted nothing +to complete its external majesty, being solemnly convened by two papal +bulls, consecrated by a presiding legate of the Roman see, and well +regulated in every point of order, and invariably preserving the +same dignity to the last? Will they acknowledge Eugenius to be +a schismatic, with all his adherents, by whom they have all been +consecrated? Either, therefore, let them give a different definition +of the form of the Church, or, whatever be their number, we shall +account them all schismatics, as having been knowingly and voluntarily +ordained by heretics. But if it had never been ascertained before, +that the Church is not confined to external pomps they would +themselves afford us abundant proof of it, who have so long +superciliously exhibited themselves to the world under the title of +the Church, though they were at the same time the deadly plagues of +it. I speak not of their morals, and those tragical exploits with +which all their lives abound, since they profess themselves to be +Pharisees, who are to be heard and not imitated. I refer to the very +doctrine itself, on which they found their claim to be considered +as the Church. If you devote a portion of your leisure, Sire, to the +perusal of our writings, you will clearly discover that doctrine to be +a fatal pestilence of souls, the firebrand, ruin, and destruction of +the Church. + +Finally, they betray great want of candour, by invidiously repeating +what great commotions, tumults, and contentions, have attended the +preaching of our doctrine, and what effects it produces in many +persons. For it is unfair to charge it with those evils which ought to +be attributed to the malice of Satan. It is the native property of the +Divine word, never to make its appearance without disturbing Satan, +and rousing his opposition. This is a most certain and unequivocal +criterion by which it is distinguished from false doctrines, which +are easily broached when they are heard with general attention, and +received with applauses by the world. Thus, in some ages, when all +things were immerged in profound darkness, the prince of this world +amused and diverted himself with the generality of mankind, and, like +another Sardanapalus, gave himself up to his ease and pleasures in +perfect peace; for what would he do but amuse and divert himself, +in the quiet and undisturbed possession of his kingdom? But when the +light shining from above dissipated a portion of his darkness--when +that Mighty One alarmed and assaulted his kingdom--then he began +to shake off his wonted torpor, and to hurry on his armour. First, +indeed, he stirred up the power of men to suppress the truth by +violence at its first appearance; and when this proved ineffectual, he +had recourse to subtlety. He made the Catabaptists, and other infamous +characters, the instruments of exciting dissensions and doctrinal +controversies, with a view to obscure and finally to extinguish it. +And now he continues to attack it both ways; for he endeavours to root +up this genuine seed by means of human force, and at the same time +tries every effort to choke it with his tares, that it may not grow +and produce fruit. But all his attempts will be vain, if we attend to +the admonitions of the Lord, who hath long ago made us acquainted +with his devices, that we might not be caught by him unawares, and has +armed us with sufficient means of defence against all his assaults. +But to charge the word of God with the odium of seditions, excited +against it by wicked and rebellious men, or of sects raised by +imposters,--is not this extreme malignity? Yet it is not without +example in former times. Elias was asked whether it was not he "that +troubled Israel."[46] Christ was represented by the Jews as guilty +of sedition.[47] The apostles were accused of stirring up popular +commotions.[48] Wherein does this differ from the conduct of those +who, at the present day, impute to us all the disturbances, tumults, +and contentions, that break out against us? But the proper answer to +such accusations has been taught us by Elias, that the dissemination +of errors and the raising of tumults is not chargeable on us, but on +those who are resisting the power of God. But as this one reply is +sufficient to repress their temerity, so, on the other hand, we must +meet the weakness of some persons, who are frequently disturbed with +such offences, and become unsettled and wavering in their minds. +Now, that they may not stumble and fall amidst this agitation and +perplexity, let them know that the apostles in their day experienced +the same things that now befall us. There were "unlearned and +unstable" men, Peter says, who "wrested" the inspired writings of Paul +"to their own destruction."[49] There were despisers of God, who, +when they heard that "where sin abounded grace did much more abound," +immediately concluded, Let us "continue in sin, that grace may +abound." When they heard that the faithful were "not under the law," +they immediately croaked, "We will sin, because we are not under +the law, but under grace."[50] There were some who accused him as +an encourager of sin. Many false apostles crept in, to destroy the +churches he had raised. "Some preached" the gospel "of envy and +strife, not in sincerity," maliciously "supposing to add affliction +to his bonds."[51] In some places the Gospel was attended with +little benefit. "All were seeking their own, not the things of Jesus +Christ."[52] Others returned "like dogs to their vomit, and like swine +to their wallowing in the mire."[53] Many perverted the liberty of +the spirit into the licentiousness of the flesh. Many insinuated +themselves as brethren, who afterwards brought the pious into dangers. +Various contentions were excited among the brethren themselves. What +was to be done by the apostles in such circumstances? Should they not +have dissembled for a time, or rather have rejected and deserted that +Gospel which appeared to be the nursery of so many disputes, the cause +of so many dangers, the occasion of so many offences? But in such +difficulties as these, their minds were relieved by this reflection +that Christ is the "stone of stumbling and rock of offence,"[54] "set +for the fall and rising again of many, and for a sign which shall be +spoken against;"[55] and armed with this confidence, they proceeded +boldly through all the dangers of tumults and offences. The same +consideration should support us, since Paul declares it to be the +perpetual character of the Gospel, that it is a "savour of death unto +death in them that perish,"[56] although it was rather given us to +be the "savour of life unto life," and "the power of God to" the +"salvation" of the faithful;[57] which we also should certainly +experience it to be, if we did not corrupt this eminent gift of God +by our ingratitude, and prevert to our destruction what ought to be a +principal instrument of our salvation. + +But I return to you, Sire. Let not your Majesty be at all moved by +those groundless accusations with which our adversaries endeavour +to terrify you; as that the sole tendency and design of this new +Gospel--for so they call it--is to furnish a pretext for seditions, +and to gain impunity for all crimes. "For God is not the author of +confusion, but of peace;"[58] nor is "the Son of God," who came to +"destroy the works of the devil, the minister of sin."[59] And it is +unjust to charge us with such motives and designs, of which we have +never given cause for the least suspicion. Is it probable that we are +meditating the subversion of kingdoms?--we, who were never heard to +utter a factious word, whose lives were ever known to be peaceable and +honest while We lived under your government, and who, even now in our +exile, cease not to pray for all prosperity to attend yourself and +your kingdom! Is it probable that we are seeking an unlimited license +to commit crimes with impunity? in whose conduct, though many things +may be blamed, yet there is nothing worthy of such severe reproach! +Nor have we, by Divine Grace, profited so little in the Gospel, +but that our life may be an example to our detractors of chastity, +liberality, mercy, temperance, patience, modesty, and every other +virtue. It is an undeniable fact, that we sincerely fear and worship +God, whose name we desire to be sanctified both by our life and by +our death; and envy itself is constrained to bear testimony to the +innocence and civil integrity of some of us, who have suffered the +punishment of death for that very thing which ought to be accounted +their highest praise. But if the Gospel be made a pretext for tumults, +which has not yet happened in your kingdom; if any persons make the +liberty of divine grace an excuse for the licentiousness of their +vices, of whom I have known many,--there are laws and legal penalties, +by which they may be punished according to their deserts; only let not +the Gospel of God be reproached for the crimes of wicked men. You have +now, Sire, the virulent iniquity of our calumniators laid before you +in a sufficient number of instances, that you may not receive their +accusations with too credulous an ear.--I fear I have gone too much +into the detail, as this preface already approaches the size of a full +apology; whereas I intended it not to contain our defence, but only to +prepare your mind to attend to the pleading of our cause; for, though +you are now averse and alienated from us, and even inflamed against +us, we despair not of regaining your favour, if you will only once +read with calmness and composure this our confession, which we intend +as our defence before your Majesty. But, on the contrary, if your ears +are so preoccupied with the whispers of the malevolent, as to leave +no opportunity for the accused to speak for themselves, and if those +outrageous furies, with your connivance, continue to persecute with +imprisonments, scourges, tortures, confiscations, and flames, we +shall indeed, like sheep destined to the slaughter, be reduced to the +greatest extremities. Yet shall we in patience possess our souls, and +wait for the mighty hand of the Lord, which undoubtedly will in time +appear, and show itself armed for the deliverance of the poor from +their affliction, and for the punishment of their despisers, who +now exult in such perfect security. May the Lord, the King of kings, +establish your throne with righteousness, and your kingdom with +equity. _Basil, 1st August, 1536._ + + +[Footnote A: John Calvin was born at Noyon, Picardy, France, in 1509, +and died at Geneva in 1564. He joined the Reformation about 1528, +and, having been banished from Paris, took refuge in Switzerland. +The "Institutes," published at Basle in 1536, contain a comprehensive +statement of the beliefs of that school of Protestant theology which +bears Calvin's name; and in this "Dedication" we have Calvin's own +summing up of the essentials of his creed.] + +[Footnote 1: Prov. xxix. 18.] + +[Footnote 2: Daniel ii. 34. Isaiah xi. 4. Psalm ii. 9.] + +[Footnote 3 Rom. xii. 6.] + +[Footnote 4: Jer. ii. 13.] + +[Footnote 5: Rom. viii. 32.] + +[Footnote 6: I Tim. iv. 10.] + +[Footnote 7: John xvii, 3.] + +[Footnote 8: Rom, iv. 25. I Cor. xv. 3, 17.] + +[Footnote 9: Isaiah i. 3.] + +[Footnote 10: Mark xvi. 20.] + +[Footnote 11: Acts xiv. 3.] + +[Footnote 12: Heb. ii. 3-4.] + +[Footnote 13: John vii. 18, viii. 50.] + +[Footnote 14: In Joan, tract. 13.] + +[Footnote 15: Matt. xxiv. 24.] + +[Footnote 16: 2 Thess. ii. 9.] + +[Footnote 17: 2 Cor. xi. 14.] + +[Footnote 18: Hierom. in praef. Jerem.] + +[Footnote 19: 2 Thess. ii. 10, 11.] + +[Footnote 20: i Cor. iii. 21, 23] + +[Footnote 21: Prov xxii. 28.] + +[Footnote 22: Psalm xlv. 10.] + +[Footnote 23: Acat. in lib. II, cap. 16. Trip. Hist. Amb. lib. 2, de +Off. c. 28.] + +[Footnote 24: Spiridion. Trip. Hist. lib. 1, c. 10.] + +[Footnote 25: Trip. Hist. lib. 8, c. 1. August. de Opere Mon. c. 17.] + +[Footnote 26: Epiph. Epist. ab Hier. vers. Con. Eliber. c. 36.] + +[Footnote 27: Amb de Abra. lib 1, c. 7.] + +[Footnote 28: Gelas. Pap in Conc. Rom.] + +[Footnote 29: Chrys. in 1 Cap. Ephes. Calix. Papa de Cons. dist. 2.] + +[Footnote 30: Gelas. can. Comperimus de Cons. dist. 2. Cypr. Epist. 2, +lib. 1, de Laps.] + +[Footnote 31: August. lib. 2, de Pec. Mer. cap. ult.] + +[Footnote 32: Apollon de quo Eccl. Hist. lib. 5, cap. 11, 12.] + +[Footnote 33: Paphnut. Trip. Hist. lib. 2, c. 14. Cypr. Epist. 2, lib. +2.] + +[Footnote 34: Aug. cap. 2, contr. Cresc. Grammatic.] + +[Footnote 35: Isaiah viii. 12, 13.] + +[Footnote 36: Epist. 3, lib. 2, et in Epist. ad. Julian, de Haeret. +baptiz.] + +[Footnote 37: Matt, xxvlii. 20.] + +[Footnote 38: i Kings xix. 14, 18.] + +[Footnote 39: Contr. Auxent.] + +[Footnote 40: 2 Tim. ii. 19.] + +[Footnote 41: Exod. xxxii. 4.] + +[Footnote 42: i Kings xxii. 6, 11-23.] + +[Footnote 43: Jer. xviii. 18.] + +[Footnote 44: Jer. iv. 9.] + +[Footnote 45: Matt. xxvi. 3, 4.] + +[Footnote 46: 1 Kings xviii. 17.] + +[Footnote 47: Luke xxiii. 2, 5.] + +[Footnote 48: Acts xvii. 6, xxiv. 5.] + +[Footnote 49: 2 Pet. iii. 16.] + +[Footnote 50: Rom. v. 20, vi. 1, 14, 15.] + +[Footnote 51: Phil. i. 15, 16.] + +[Footnote 52: Phil. ii. 21.] + +[Footnote 53: 2 Pet. ii. 22.] + +[Footnote 54: 1 Pet. ii. 8.] + +[Footnote 55: Luke ii. 34.] + +[Footnote 56: 2 Cor. ii. 15, 16.] + +[Footnote 57: Rom. i. 16.] + +[Footnote 58: 1 Cor. xiv. 33.] + +[Footnote 59: 1 John iii. 8. Gal. ii. 17.] + + + + +GENERAL SYLLABUS + + +The design of the Author in these Christian Institutes is twofold, +relating, First to the knowledge of God, as the way to attain a +blessed immortality; and, in connection with and subservience to this, +Secondly, to the knowledge of ourselves. + +In the prosecution of this design, he strictly follows the method of +the Apostles' Creed, as being most familiar to all Christians. For +as the Creed consists of four parts, the first relating to God the +Father, the second to the Son, the third to the Holy Spirit, the +fourth to the Church; so the Author distributes the whole of this work +into Four Books, corresponding respectively to the four parts of the +Creed; as will clearly appear from the following detail:-- + +I. The first article of the Creed relates to God the Father, and to +the creation, conservation, and government of all things, which are +included in his omnipotence. + +So the first book is on the knowledge of God, considered as the +Creator, Preserver, and Governor of the universe at large, and every +thing contained in it. It shows both the nature and tendency of +the true knowledge of the Creator--that this is not learned in the +schools, but that every man from his birth is self-taught it--Yet that +the depravity of men is so great as to corrupt and extinguish this +knowledge, partly by ignorance, partly by wickedness; so that it +neither leads him to glorify God as he ought, nor conducts him to +the attainment of happiness--And though this internal knowledge is +assisted by all the creatures around, which serve as a mirror to +display the Divine perfections, yet that man does not profit by +it--Therefore, that to those, whom it is God's will to bring to an +intimate and saving knowledge of himself, he gives his written word; +which introduces observations on the sacred Scripture--That he has +therein revealed himself; that not the Father only, but the Father, +Son, and Holy Spirit, united, is the Creator of heaven and earth; whom +neither the knowledge innate by nature, nor the very beautiful mirror +displayed to us in the world, can, in consequence of our depravity, +teach us to know so as to glorify him. This gives occasion for +treating of the revelation of God in the Scripture, of the unity of +the Divine Essence, and the trinity of Persons.--To prevent man from +attributing to God the blame of his own voluntary blindness, the +Author shows the state of man at his creation, and treats of the +image of God, freewill, and the primative integrity of nature.--Having +finished the subject of creation, he proceeds to the conservation +and government of all things, concluding the first book with a full +discussion of the doctrine of divine providence. + +II. But since man is fallen by sin from the state in which he was +created, it is necessary to come to Christ. Therefore it follows in +the Creed, "And in Jesus Christ, his only Son our Lord," &c. + +So in the second book of the Institutes our Author treats of the +knowledge of God as the Redeemer in Christ; and having shown the fall +of man, leads him to Christ the Mediator. Here he states the doctrine +of original sin--that man possesses no inherent strength to enable him +to deliver himself from sin and the impending curse, but that, on the +contrary, nothing can proceed from him, antecedently to reconciliation +and renovation, but what is deserving of condemnation--Therefore, +that, man being utterly lost in himself, and incapable of conceiving +even a good thought by which he may restore himself, or perform +actions acceptable to God, he must seek redemption out of himself, in +Christ--That the Law was given for this purpose, not to confine +its observers to itself, but to conduct them to Christ; which gives +occasion to introduce an exposition of the Moral Law--That he was +known, as the Author of salvation, to the Jews under the Law, but more +fully under the Gospel, in which he is manifested to the world.--Hence +follows the doctrine of the similarity and difference of the Old and +New Testament, of the Law and Gospel.--It is next stated, that, in +order to the complete accomplishment of salvation, it was necessary +for the eternal Son of God to become man, and that he actually +assumed a real human nature:--it is also shown how these two natures +constitute one person--That the office of Christ, appointed for the +acquisition and application of complete salvation by his merit and +efficacy, is sacerdotal, regal, and prophetical--Next follows the +manner in which Christ executed his office, or actually performed the +part of a Mediator, being an exposition of the Articles respecting +his death, resurrection, and ascension to heaven.--Lastly, the Author +shows the truth and propriety of affirming that Christ merited the +grace of God and salvation for us. + +III. As long as Christ is separate from us, he profits us nothing. +Hence the necessity of our being ingrafted into him, as branches into +a vine. Therefore the doctrine concerning Christ is followed, in +the third part of the Creed, by this clause, "I believe in the Holy +Spirit," as being the bond of union between us and Christ. + +So in the third book our Author treats of the Holy Spirit, who unites +us to Christ--and consequently of faith, by which we embrace Christ, +with his twofold benefit, free righteousness, which he imputes to +us, and regeneration, which he commences within us, by bestowing +repentance upon us.--And to show that we have not the least room to +glory in such faith as is unconnected with the pursuit of repentance, +before proceeding to the full discussion of justification, he treats +at large of repentance and the continual exercise of it, which Christ, +apprehended by faith, produces in us by his Spirit--He next fully +discusses the first and chief benefit of Christ when united to us by +the Holy Spirit that is, justification--and then treats of prayer, +which resembles the hand that actually receives those blessings to be +enjoyed, which faith knows, from the word of promise, to be laid up +with God for our use.--But as all men are not united to Christ, +the sole Author of salvation, by the Holy Spirit, who creates and +preserves faith in us, he treats of God's eternal election; which is +the cause that we, in whom he foresaw no good but what he intended +freely to bestow, have been favored with the gift of Christ, and +united to God by the effectual call of the Gospel.--Lastly, he treats +of complete regeneration, and the fruition of happiness; that is, the +final resurrection, towards which our eyes must be directed, since in +this world the felicity of the pious, in respect of enjoyment, is only +begun. + +IV. But as the Holy Spirit does not unite all men to Christ, or make +them partakers of faith, and on those to whom he imparts it he does +not ordinarily bestow it without means, but employs for this purpose +the preaching of the Gospel and the use of the sacraments, with the +administration of all discipline, therefore it follows in the Creed, +"I believe in the Holy Catholic Church," whom, although involved in +eternal death, yet, in pursuance of the gratuitous election, God has +freely reconciled to himself in Christ, and made partakers of the Holy +Spirit, that, being ingrafted into Christ, they may have communion +with him as their head, whence flows a perpetual remission of sins, +and a full restoration to eternal life. + +So in the fourth book our Author treats of the Church--then of the +means used by the Holy Spirit in effectually calling from spiritual +death, and preserving the church--the word and sacraments--baptism +and the Lord's supper--which are as it were Christ's regal sceptre, by +which he commences his spiritual reign in the Church by the energy of +his Spirit, and carries it forwards from day to day during the present +life, after the close of which he perfects it without those means. + +And as political institutions are the asylums of the Church in this +life, though civil government is distinct from the spiritual kingdom +of Christ, our Author instructs us respecting it as a signal blessing +of God, which the Church ought to acknowledge with gratitude of +heart, till we are called out of this transitory state to the heavenly +inheritance, where God will be all in all. + +This is the plan of the Institutes, which may be comprised in the +following brief summary:-- + +Man, created originally upright, being afterwards ruined, not +partially, but totally, finds salvation out of himself, wholly in +Christ; to whom being united by the Holy Spirit, freely bestowed, +without any regard of future works, he enjoys in him a twofold +benefit, the perfect imputation of righteousness, which attends him +to the grave, and the commencement of sanctification, which he daily +increases, till at length he completes it at the day of regeneration +or resurrection of the body, so that in eternal life and the heavenly +inheritance his praises are celebrated for such stupendous mercy. + + + + +DEDICATION OF THE REVOLUTIONS OF THE HEAVENLY BODIES + +BY NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (1543)[A] + +TO POPE PAUL III + + +I can easily conceive, most Holy Father, that as soon as some +people learn that in this book which I have written concerning the +revolutions of the heavenly bodies, I ascribe certain motions to +the Earth, they will cry out at once that I and my theory should be +rejected. For I am not so much in love with my conclusions as not to +weigh what others will think about them, and although I know that the +meditations of a philosopher are far removed from the judgment of the +laity, because his endeavor is to seek out the truth in all things, so +far as this is permitted by God to the human reason, I still believe +that one must avoid theories altogether foreign to orthodoxy. +Accordingly, when I considered in my own mind how absurd a performance +it must seem to those who know that the judgment of many centuries has +approved the view that the Earth remains fixed as center in the midst +of the heavens, if I should, on the contrary, assert that the Earth +moves; I was for a long time at a loss to know whether I should +publish the commentaries which I have written in proof of its +motion, or whether it were not better to follow the example of the +Pythagoreans and of some others, who were accustomed to transmit the +secrets of Philosophy not in writing but orally, and only to their +relatives and friends, as the letter from Lysis to Hipparchus bears +witness. They did this, it seems to me, not as some think, because of +a certain selfish reluctance to give their views to the world, but +in order that the noblest truths, worked out by the careful study of +great men, should not be despised by those who are vexed at the idea +of taking great pains with any forms of literature except such as +would be profitable, or by those who, if they are driven to the study +of Philosophy for its own sake by the admonitions and the example +of others, nevertheless, on account of their stupidity, hold a place +among philosophers similar to that of drones among bees. Therefore, +when I considered this carefully, the contempt which I had to fear +because of the novelty and apparent absurdity of my view, nearly +induced me to abandon utterly the work I had begun. + +My friends, however, in spite of long delay and even resistance on my +part, withheld me from this decision. First among these was Nicolaus +Schonberg, Cardinal of Capua, distinguished in all branches of +learning. Next to him comes my very dear friend, Tidemann Giese, +Bishop of Culm, a most earnest student, as he is, of sacred and, +indeed, of all good learning. The latter has often urged me, at times +even spurring me on with reproaches, to publish and at last bring to +the light the book which had lain in my study not nine years merely, +but already going on four times nine. Not a few other very eminent and +scholarly men made the same request, urging that I should no longer +through fear refuse to give out my work for the common benefit of +students of Mathematics. They said I should find that the more absurd +most men now thought this theory of mine concerning the motion of the +Earth, the more admiration and gratitude it would command after +they saw in the publication of my commentaries the mist of absurdity +cleared away by most transparent proofs. So, influenced by these +advisors and this hope, I have at length allowed my friends to publish +the work, as they had long besought me to do. + +But perhaps Your Holiness will not so much wonder that I have ventured +to publish these studies of mine, after having taken such pains in +elaborating them that I have not hesitated to commit to writing my +views of the motion of the Earth, as you will be curious to hear +how it occurred to me to venture, contrary to the accepted view of +mathematicians, and well-nigh contrary to common sense, to form a +conception of any terrestrial motion whatsoever. Therefore I would not +have it unknown to Your Holiness, that the only thing which induced +me to look for another way of reckoning the movements of the heavenly +bodies was that I knew that mathematicians by no means agree in their +investigations thereof. For, in the first place, they are so much in +doubt concerning the motion of the sun and the moon, that they can +not even demonstrate and prove by observation the constant length of +a complete year; and in the second place, in determining the motions +both of these and of the five other planets, they fail to employ +consistently one set of first principles and hypotheses, but use +methods of proof based only upon the apparent revolutions and motions. +For some employ concentric circles only; others, eccentric circles and +epicycles; and even by these means they do not completely attain the +desired end. For, although those who have depended upon concentric +circles have shown that certain diverse motions can be deduced from +these, yet they have not succeeded thereby in laying down any sure +principle, corresponding indisputably to the phenomena. These, on the +other hand, who have devised systems of eccentric circles, although +they seem in great part to have solved the apparent movements +by calculations which by these eccentrics are made to fit, have +nevertheless introduced many things which seem to contradict the first +principles of the uniformity of motion. Nor have they been able to +discover or calculate from these the main point, which is the shape of +the world and the fixed symmetry of its parts; but their procedure +has been as if someone were to collect hands, feet, a head, and other +members from various places, all very fine in themselves, but not +proportionate to one body, and no single one corresponding in its turn +to the others, so that a monster rather than a man would be formed +from them. Thus in their process of demonstration which they term a +"method," they are found to have omitted something essential, or to +have included something foreign and not pertaining to the matter in +hand. This certainly would never have happened to them if they had +followed fixed principles; for if the hypotheses they assumed were +not false, all that resulted therefrom would be verified indubitably. +Those things which I am saying now may be obscure, yet they will be +made clearer in their proper place. + +Therefore, having turned over in my mind for a long time this +uncertainty of the traditional mathematical methods of calculating +the motions of the celestial bodies, I began to grow disgusted that +no more consistent scheme of the movements of the mechanism of the +universe, set up for our benefit by that best and most law abiding +Architect of all things, was agreed upon by philosophers who otherwise +investigate so carefully the most minute details of this world. +Wherefore I undertook the task of rereading the books of all the +philosophers I could get access to, to see whether any one ever was of +the opinion that the motions of the celestial bodies were other than +those postulated by the men who taught mathematics in the schools. And +I found first, indeed, in Cicero, that Niceta perceived that the Earth +moved; and afterward in Plutarch I found that some others were of this +opinion, whose words I have seen fit to quote here, that they may be +accessible to all:-- + +"Some maintain that the Earth is stationary, but Philolaus the +Pythagorean says that it revolves in a circle about the fire of the +ecliptic, like the sun and moon. Heraklides of Pontus and Ekphantus +the Pythagorean make the Earth move, not changing its position, +however, confined in its falling and rising around its own center in +the manner of a wheel." + +Taking this as a starting point, I began to consider the mobility of +the Earth; and although the idea seemed absurd, yet because I knew +that the liberty had been granted to others before me to postulate all +sorts of little circles for explaining the phenomena of the stars, I +thought I also might easily be permitted to try whether by postulating +some motion of the Earth, more reliable conclusions could be reached +regarding the revolution of the heavenly bodies, than those of my +predecessors. + +And so, after postulating movements, which, farther on in the book, I +ascribe to the Earth, I have found by many and long observations that +if the movements of the other planets are assumed for the circular +motion of the Earth and are substituted for the revolution of each +star, not only do their phenomena follow logically therefrom, but +the relative positions and magnitudes both of the stars and all their +orbits, and of the heavens themselves, become so closely related that +in none of its parts can anything be changed without causing confusion +in the other parts and in the whole universe. Therefore, in the course +of the work I have followed this plan: I describe in the first book +all the positions of the orbits together with the movements which I +ascribe to the Earth, in order that this book might contain, as it +were, the general scheme of the universe. Thereafter in the remaining +books, I set forth the motions of the other stars and of all their +orbits together with the movement of the Earth, in order that one +may see from this to what extent the movements and appearances of the +other stars and their orbits can be saved, if they are transferred to +the movement of the Earth. Nor do I doubt that ingenious and learned +mathematicians will sustain me, if they are willing to recognize and +weigh, not superficially, but with that thoroughness which Philosophy +demands above all things, those matters which have been adduced by me +in this work to demonstrate these theories. In order, however, that +both the learned and the unlearned equally may see that I do not avoid +anyone's judgment, I have preferred to dedicate these lucubrations of +mine to Your Holiness rather than to any other, because, even in this +remote corner of the world where I live, you are considered to be the +most eminent man in dignity of rank and in love of all learning and +even of mathematics, so that by your authority and judgment you can +easily suppress the bites of slanderers, albeit the proverb hath it +that there is no remedy for the bite of a sycophant. If perchance +there shall be idle talkers, who, though they are ignorant of all +mathematical sciences, nevertheless assume the right to pass judgment +on these things, and if they should dare to criticise and attack this +theory of mine because of some passage of scripture which they have +falsely distorted for their own purpose, I care not at all; I will +even despise their judgment as foolish. For it is not unknown that +Lactantius, otherwise a famous writer but a poor mathematician, speaks +most childishly of the shape of the Earth when he makes fun of those +who said that the Earth has the form of a sphere. It should not seem +strange then to zealous students, if some such people shall ridicule +us also. Mathematics are written for mathematicians, to whom, if +my opinion does not deceive me, our labors will seem to contribute +something to the ecclesiastical state whose chief office Your Holiness +now occupies; for when not so very long ago, under Leo X, in the +Lateran Council the question of revising the ecclesiastical calendar +was discussed, it then remained unsettled, simply because the length +of the years and months, and the motions of the sun and moon were held +to have been not yet sufficiently determined. Since that time, I have +given my attention to observing these more accurately, urged on by a +very distinguished man, Paul, Bishop of Fossombrone, who at that time +had charge of the matter. But what I may have accomplished herein I +leave to the judgment of Your Holiness in particular, and to that of +all other learned mathematicians; and lest I seem to Your Holiness to +promise more regarding the usefulness of the work than I can perform, +I now pass to the work itself. + + +[Footnote A: Nicolaus Copernicus was born in 1473 at Thorn in West +Prussia, of a Polish father and a German mother. He attended +the university of Cracow and Bologna, lectured on astronomy and +mathematics at Rome, and later studied medicine at Padua and canon law +at Ferrara. He was appointed canon of the cathedral of Frauenburg, and +in this town he died in 1543, having devoted the latter part of his +life largely to astronomy. + +The book which was introduced by this dedication laid the foundations +of modern astronomy. At the time when it was written, the earth was +believed by all to be the fixed centre of the universe; and although +many of the arguments used by Copernicus were invalid and absurd, he +was the first modern to put forth the heliocentric theory as "a +better explanation." It remained for Kepler, Galileo, and Newton, to +establish the theory on firm grounds.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION IN SCOTLAND + +BY JOHN KNOX (C. 1566)[A] + +To the gentill readar, grace and peace from God the Father of our Lord +Jesus Christ, with the perpetuall encrease of the Holy Spreit. + + +It is not unknowen, Christeane Reader, that the same clud of +ignorance, that long hath darkened many realmes under this accurssed +kingdome of that Romane Antichrist, hath also owercovered this poore +Realme; that idolatrie hath bein manteined, the bloode of innocentis +hath bene sched, and Christ Jesus his eternall treuth hath bene +abhorred, detested, and blasphemed. But that same God that caused +light to schyne out of darknes, in the multitud of his mercyes, hath +of long tyme opened the eis of some evin within this Realme, to see +the vanitie of that which then was universally embrased for trew +religioun; and hes gevin unto them strenth to oppone[1] thame selfis +unto the same: and now, into these our last and moist[2] corrupt +dayis, hath maid his treuth so to triumphs amonges us, that, in +despyte of Sathan, hipochrisye is disclosed, and the trew wyrshipping +of God is manifested to all the inhabitantis of this realme who +eis Sathan blyndis not, eyther by thair fylthy lustes, or ellis by +ambitioun, and insatiable covetousness, which mack them repung to[3] +the power of God working by his worde. + +And becaus we ar not ignorant what diverse bruittis[4] war dispersed +of us, the professoures of Jesus Christ within this realme, in +the begynnyng of our interprise, ordour was tackin, that all our +proceidingis should be committed to register; as that thei war, by +such as then paynfullie travailled boith by toung and pen; and so was +collected a just volume, (as after will appeir,) conteanyng thingis +done frome the fyftie-awght[5] year of God, till the arrivall of the +Quenis Majestic[6] furth of France, with the which the Collectour and +Writtar for that tyme was content, and never mynded[7] further to have +travailled in that kynd of writting. But, after invocatioun of the +name of God, and after consultatioun with some faythfull, what was +thought by thame expedient to advance Goddis glorie, and to edifie +this present generatioun, and the posteritie to come, it was +concluded, that faythfull rehersall should be maid of such personages +as God had maid instruments of his glorie, by opponyng of thame selfis +to manifest abuses, superstitioun, and idolatrie; and albeit thare be +no great nomber, yet ar thei mo then the Collectour wold have looked +for at the begynnyng, and thairfoir is the volume somewhat enlarged +abuif his expectatioun: And yit, in the begynnyng, mon[8] we crave +of all the gentill Readaris, not to look[9] of us such ane History +as shall expresse all thingis that have occurred within this Realme, +during the tyme of this terrible conflict that lies bene betuix the +sanctes[10] of God and these bloody wolves who clame to thame selves +the titill of clargie, and to have authentic ower the saules of men; +for, with the Pollicey,[11] mynd we to meddill no further then it hath +Religioun mixed with it. And thairfoir albeit that many thingis which +wer don be omitted, yit, yf we invent no leys,[12] we think our selves +blamless in that behalf. Of one other (thing) we mon[8] foirwarne +the discreat Readaris, which is, that thei be not offended that the +sempill treuth be spokin without partialitie; for seing that of men we +neyther hunt for reward, nor yitt for vane glorie, we litill pass +by the approbatioun of such as seldome judge weill of God and of his +workis. Lett not thairfoar the Readir wonder, albeit that our style +vary and speik diverslie of men, according as thei have declared +thameselves sometymes ennemymes and sometymes freindis, sometymes +fervent, sometymes cold, sometymes constant, and sometymes changeable +in the cause of God and of his holy religioun: for, in this our +simplicitie, we suppoise that the Godlie shall espy our purpose, which +is, that God may be praised for his mercy schawin,[13] this present +age may be admonished to be thankfull for Goddis benefittis offerred, +and the posteritie to cum may be instructed how wonderouslie hath the +light of Christ Jesus prevailled against darkness in this last and +most corrupted age. + + +[Footnote A: John Knox (1505-1571), the leader of the Scottish +Reformation and its historian, was educated at Glasgow University; was +pastor to English congregations at Frankfort-on-Maine and at Geneva, +where he met Calvin; returned to Scotland in 1559; and from that time +till his death was active in the establishment of the Presbyterian +organization, through which his powerful personality has continued +to influence the Scottish national character to the present day. His +preface, which is printed here in the original Scottish spelling, +gives some indication of the sternness, not to say virulence, of his +temper towards the Roman Church.] + +[Footnote 1: Oppose] + +[Footnote 2: Most] + +[Footnote 3: Resist.] + +[Footnote 4: Rumors.] + +[Footnote 5: I.e. 1558.] + +[Footnote 6: Mary, Queen of Scots, arrived in Scotland, Aug. 19, +1562.] + +[Footnote 7: Intended.] + +[Footnote 8: Must.] + +[Footnote 9: Expect.] + +[Footnote 10: Saints.] + +[Footnote 11: Civil or State politics.] + +[Footnote 12: Lies.] + +[Footnote 13: Shown.] + + + + +PREFATORY LETTER TO SIR WALTER RALEIGH ON THE FAERIE QUEENE + +BY EDMUND SPENSER (1589)[A] + +A LETTER OF THE AUTHORS EXPOUNDING HIS WHOLE INTENTION IN THE COURSE +OF THIS WORKE: WHICH FOR THAT IT GIVETH GREAT LIGHT TO THE READER, FOR +THE BETTER UNDERSTANDING IS HEREUNTO ANNEXED + +To the Right Noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Raleigh, Knight, Lord +Wardein of the Stanneryes, and Her Majesties Liefetenaunt of the +County of Cornewayll + + +Sir, knowing how doubtfully all allegories may be construed, and this +booke of mine, which I have entituled the _Faery Queene_, being a +continued allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good, as well for +avoyding of gealous opinions and misconstructions, as also for your +better light in reading thereof, (being so by you commanded,) to +discover unto you the general intention and meaning, which in the +whole course thereof I have fashioned, without expressing of any +particular purposes or by accidents therein occasioned. The generall +end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble +person in vertuous and gentle discipline: which for that I conceived +shoulde be most plausible and pleasing, being coloured with an +historicall fiction, the which the most part of men delight to read, +rather for variety of matter then for profile of the ensample, I chose +the historye of King Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of +his person, being made famous by many mens former workes, and also +furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of present time. In +which I have followed all the antique poets historicall: first Homere, +who in the persons of Agamemnon and Ulysses hath ensampled a good +governour and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his +Odysseis; then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in the person +of Æneas; after him Ariosto comprised them both in his Orlando; and +lately Tasso dissevered them againe, and formed both parts in two +persons, namely that part which they in philosophy call Ethice, or +vertues of a private man, coloured in his Rinaldo; the other named +Politice in his Godfredo. By ensample of which excellente poets, I +labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king, the image of +a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as +Aristotle hath devised, the which is the purpose of these first +twelve bookes: which if I finde to be well accepted, I may be perhaps +encoraged to frame the other part of polliticke vertues in his person, +after that hee came to be king. To some, I know, this methode will +seeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline delivered +plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large, as they use, then +thus clowdily enwrapped in allegoricall devises. But such, me seeme, +should be satisfide with the use of these dayes, seeing all things +accounted by their showes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not +delightfull and pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon +preferred before Plato, for that the one, in the exquisite depth of +his judgement, formed a commune welth such as it should be, but the +other in the person of Cyrus and the Persians fashioned a governement, +such as might best be: so much more profitable and gratious is +doctrine by ensample, then by rule. So have I laboured to doe in +the person of Arthure: whome I conceive, after his long education by +Timon, to whom he was by Merlin delivered to be brought up, so soone +as he was borne of the Lady Igrayne, to have seene in a dream or +vision the Faery Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he +awaking resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin armed, and +by Timon throughly instructed, he went to seeke her forth in Faerye +Land. In that Faery Queene I meane glory in my generall intention, but +in my particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of +our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery Land. And yet, +in some places els, I doe otherwise shadow her. For considering she +beareth two persons, the one of a most royall queene or empresse, the +other of a most vertuous and beautifull lady, this latter part in some +places I doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name according to +your owne excellent conceipt of Cynthia, (Phæbe and Cynthia being +both names of Diana.) So in the person of Prince Arthure I sette +forth magnificence in particular, which vertue, for that (according +to Aristotle and the rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and +conteineth in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention the +deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue which I write of in that +booke. But of the xii. other vertues I make xii. other knights the +patrones, for the more variety of the history: of which these three +bookes contayn three. The first of the Knight of the Redcrosse, in +whome I expresse holynes: The seconde of Sir Guyon, in whome I sette +forth temperaunce: The third of Britomartis, a lady knight, in whome I +picture chastity. But because the beginning of the whole worke seemeth +abrupte and as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye +know the occasion of these three knights severall adventures. For the +methode of a poet historical is not such as of an historiographer. For +an historiographer discourseth of affayres orderly as they were donne, +accounting as well the times as the actions; but a poet thrusteth into +the middest, even where it most concerneth him, and there recoursing +to the thinges forepaste, and divining of thinges to come, maketh a +pleasing analysis of all. + +The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an +historiographer, should be the twelfth booke, which is the last; where +I devise that the Faery Queene kept her annuall feaste xii. dayes, +uppon which xii. severall dayes, the occasions of the xii. several +adventures hapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights, +are in these xii. books severally handled and discoursed. The first +was this. In the beginning of the feast, there presented him selfe +a tall clownish younge man, who, falling before the Queen of Faries, +desired a boone (as the manner then was) which during that feast she +might not refuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement of +any adventure, which during that feaste should happen: that being +graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitte through his rusticity +for a better place. Soone after entred a faire ladye in mourning +weedes, riding on a white asse, with a dwarfe behind her leading a +warlike steed, that bore the armes of a knight, and his speare in the +dwarfes hand. Shee, falling before the Queene of Faeries, complayned +that her father and mother, an ancient king and queene, had bene by an +huge dragon many years shut up in a brasen castle, who thence suffred +them not to yssew: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to assygne +her some one of her knights to take on him that exployt. Presently +that clownish person, upstarting, desired that adventure: whereat the +Queene much wondering, and the lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly +importuned his desire. In the end the lady told him, that unlesse that +armour which she brought would serve him (that is, the armour of a +Christian man specified by Saint Paul, vi. Ephes.), that he could not +succeed in that enterprise: which being forthwith put upon him with +dewe furnitures thereunto, he seemed the goodliest man in al that +company, and was well liked of the lady. And eftesoones taking on him +knighthood, and mounting on that straunge courser, he went forth with +her on that adventure: where beginneth the first booke vz. + + A gentle knight was pricking on the playne, &c. + +The second day ther came in a palmer bearing an infant with +bloody hands, whose parents he complained to have bene slayn by +an enchaunteresse called Acrasia: and therfore craved of the Faery +Queene, to appoint him some knight to performe that adventure; which +being assigned to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that same +palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke and the whole +subject thereof. The third day there came in a groome, who complained +before the Faery Queene, that a vile enchaunter, called Busirane, +had in hand a most faire lady, called Amoretta, whom he kept in most +grievous torment, because she would not yield him the pleasure of her +body. Whereupon Sir Scudamour, the lover of that lady, presently tooke +on him that adventure. But being unable to performe it by reason +of the hard enchauntments, after long sorrow, in the end met with +Britomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love. + +But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are intermedled, but +rather as accidents then intendments: as the love of Britomart, the +overthrow of Marinell, the misery of Florimell, the vertuousnes of +Belphoebe, the lasciviousnes of Hellenora, and many the like. + +Thus much, Sir, I have briefly overronne, to direct your understanding +to the wel-head of the history, that from thence gathering the whole +intention of the conceit, ye may, as in a handfull, gripe al the +discourse, which otherwise may happily seeme tedious and confused. So +humbly craving the continuance of your honourable favour towards me, +and th' eternall establishment of your happines, I humbly take leave. + +23. January, 1589. Yours most humbly affectionate, Ed. Spenser. + + +[Footnote A: Edmund Spenser was born in London about 1552, and died +there in 1599. He was the greatest of the non-dramatic poets of the +age of Elizabeth; and the "Faerie Queene" is the longest and most +famous of his works. The first three books were published in 1590, the +second three in 1596; of the remaining six which he had planned some +fragments were issued after his death. The poem is a combination of +allegory and romance; and in this prefatory letter to Raleigh the +poet himself explains the plan of the work and its main allegorical +signification.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD + +BY SIR WALTER RALEIGH (1614)[A] + + +How unfit and how unworthy a choice I have made of myself, to +undertake a work of this mixture, mine own reason, though exceeding +weak, hath sufficiently resolved me. For had it been begotten then +with my first dawn of day, when the light of common knowledge began to +open itself to my younger years, and before any wound received either +from Fortune or Time, I might yet well have doubted that the darkness +of Age and Death would have covered over both It and Me, long before +the performance. For, beginning with the Creation, I have proceeded +with the History of the World; and lastly purposed (some few sallies +excepted) to confine my discourse with this our renowned Island of +Great Britain. I confess that it had better sorted with my disability, +the better part of whose times are run out in other travails, to have +set together (as I could) the unjointed and scattered frame of our +English affairs, than of the universal in whom, had there been no +other defect (who am all defect) than the time of the day, it were +enough, the day of a tempestuous life, drawn on to the very evening +ere I began. But those inmost and soul-piercing wounds, which are ever +aching while uncured; with the desire to satisfy those few friends, +which I have tried by the fire of adversity, the former enforcing, +the latter persuading; have caused me to make my thoughts legible, and +myself the subject of every opinion, wise or weak. + +To the world I present them, to which I am nothing indebted: neither +have others that were, (Fortune changing) sped much better in any +age. For prosperity and adversity have evermore tied and untied vulgar +affections. And as we see it in experience, that dogs do always bark +at those they know not, and that it is their nature to accompany one +another in those clamors: so it is with the inconsiderate multitude; +who wanting that virtue which we call honesty in all men, and that +especial gift of God which we call charity in Christian men, condemn +without hearing, and wound without offence given: led thereunto by +uncertain report only; which his Majesty truly acknowledged for the +author of all lies. "Blame no man," saith Siracides, "before thou have +inquired the matter: understand first, and then reform righteously. +'Rumor, res sine teste, sine judice, maligna, fallax'; Rumor is +without witness, without judge, malicious and deceivable." This vanity +of vulgar opinion it was, that gave St. Augustine argument to affirm, +that he feared the praise of good men, and detested that of the evil. +And herein no man hath given a better rule, than this of Seneca; +"Conscientiæ satisfaciamus: nihil in famam laboremus, sequatur vel +mala, dum bene merearis." "Let us satisfy our own consciences, and not +trouble ourselves with fame: be it never so ill, it is to be despised +so we deserve well." + +For myself, if I have in anything served my Country, and prized it +before my private, the general acceptation can yield me no other +profit at this time, than doth a fair sunshine day to a sea-man after +shipwreck; and the contrary no other harm, than an outrageous tempest +after the port attained. I know that I lost the love of many, for my +fidelity towards Her,[1] whom I must still honor in the dust; though +further than the defence of her excellent person, I never persecuted +any man. Of those that did it, and by what device they did it, He that +is the Supreme Judge of all the world, hath taken the account: so as +for this kind of suffering, I must say With Seneca, "Mala opinio, bene +parta, delectat."[2] As for other men; if there be any that have made +themselves fathers of that fame which hath been begotten for them, I +can neither envy at such their purchased glory, nor much lament mine +own mishap in that kind; but content myself to say with Virgil, "Sic +vos non vobis,"[3] in many particulars. To labor other satisfaction, +were an effect of frenzy, not of hope, seeing it is not truth, but +opinion, that can travel the world without a passport. For were it +otherwise; and were there not as many internal forms of the mind, as +there are external figures of men; there were then some possibility to +persuade by the mouth of one advocate, even equity alone. + +But such is the multiplying and extensive virtue of dead earth, and +of that breath-giving life which God hath cast upon time and dust, as +that among those that were, of whom we read and hear; and among those +that are, whom we see and converse with; everyone hath received a +several picture of face, and everyone a diverse picture of mind; +everyone a form apart, everyone a fancy and cogitation differing: +there being nothing wherein Nature so much triumpheth as in +dissimilitude. From whence it cometh that there is found so great +diversity of opinions; so strong a contrariety of inclinations; +so many natural and unnatural; wise, foolish, manly, and childish +affections and passions in mortal men. For it is not the visible +fashion and shape of plants, and of reasonable creatures, that makes +the difference of working in the one, and of condition in the other; +but the form internal. + +And though it hath pleased God to reserve the art of reading men's +thoughts to himself: yet, as the fruit tells the name of the tree; so +do the outward works of men (so far as their cogitations are acted) +give us whereof to guess at the rest. Nay, it were not hard to express +the one by the other, very near the life, did not craft in many, +fear in the most, and the world's love in all, teach every capacity, +according to the compass it hath, to qualify and make over their +inward deformities for a time. Though it be also true, "Nemo potest +diu personam ferre fictam: cito in naturam suam residunt, quibus +veritas non subest": "No man can long continue masked in a counterfeit +behavior: the things that are forced for pretences having no ground of +truth, cannot long dissemble their own natures." Neither can any +man (saith Plutarch) so change himself, but that his heart may be +sometimes seen at his tongue's end. + +In this great discord and dissimilitude of reasonable creatures, if we +direct ourselves to the multitude; "omnis honestæ rei malus judex +est vulgus": "The common people are evil judges of honest things, and +whose wisdom (saith Ecclesiastes) is to be despised": if to the better +sort, every understanding hath a peculiar judgment, by which it both +censureth other men, and valueth itself. And therefore unto me it will +not seem strange, though I find these my worthless papers torn with +rats: seeing the slothful censurers of all ages have not spared to tax +the Reverend Fathers of the Church, with ambition; the severest men +to themselves, with hypocrisy; the greatest lovers of justice, +with popularity; and those of the truest valor and fortitude, with +vain-glory. But of these natures which lee in wait to find fault, and +to turn good into evil, seeing Solomon complained long since: and +that the very age of the world renders it every day after other +more malicious; I must leave the professors to their easy ways of +reprehension, than which there is nothing of more facility. + +To me it belongs in the first part of this Preface, following the +common and approved custom of those who have left the memories of +time past to after ages, to give, as near as I can, the same right to +history which they have done. Yet seeing therein I should but borrow +other men's words, I will not trouble the Reader with the repetition. +True it is that among many other benefits for which it hath been +honored, in this one it triumpheth over all human knowledge, that it +hath given us life in our understanding, since the world itself had +life and beginning, even to this day: yea, it hath triumphed over +time, which besides it nothing but eternity hath triumphed over: for +it hath carried our knowledge over the vast and devouring space of +many thousands of years, and given so fair and piercing eyes to our +mind; that we plainly behold living now (as if we had lived then) that +great world, "Magni Dei sapiens opus," "The wise work (saith Hermes) +of a great God," as it was then, when but new to itself. By it (I say) +it is, that we live in the very time when it was created: we behold +how it was governed: how it was covered with waters, and again +repeopled: how kings and kingdoms have flourished and fallen, and +for what virtue and piety God made prosperous; and for what vice and +deformity he made wretched, both the one and the other. And it is +not the least debt which we owe unto history, that it hath made us +acquainted with our dead ancestors; and, out of the depth and darkness +of the earth, delivered us their memory and fame. In a word, we may +gather out of history a policy no less wise than eternal; by the +comparison and application of other men's fore-passed miseries with +our own like errors and ill deservings. But it is neither of examples +the most lively instruction, nor the words of the wisest men, nor the +terror of future torments, that hath yet so wrought in our blind and +stupified minds, as to make us remember, that the infinite eye and +wisdom of God doth pierce through all our pretences; as to make us +remember, that the justice of God doth require none other accuser than +our own consciences: which neither the false beauty of our apparent +actions, nor all the formality, which (to pacify the opinions of men) +we put on, can in any, or the least kind, cover from his knowledge. +And so much did that heathen wisdom confess, no way as yet qualified +by the knowledge of a true God. If any (saith Euripides) "having +in his life committed wickedness, thinks he can hide it from the +everlasting gods, he thinks not well." + +To repeat God's judgments in particular, upon those of all degrees, +which have played with his mercies would require a volume apart: for +the sea of examples hath no bottom. The marks, set on private men, +are with their bodies cast into the earth; and their fortunes, written +only in the memories of those that lived with them: so as they who +succeed, and have not seen the fall of others, do not fear their own +faults. God's judgments upon the greater and greatest have been left +to posterity; first, by those happy hands which the Holy Ghost hath +guided; and secondly, by their virtue, who have gathered the acts and +ends of men mighty and remarkable in the world. Now to point far off, +and to speak of the conversion of angels into devils; for ambition: or +of the greatest and most glorious kings, who have gnawn the grass of +the earth with beasts for pride and ingratitude towards God: or of +that wise working of Pharaoh, when he slew the infants of Israel, +ere they had recovered their cradles: or of the policy of Jezebel, in +covering the murder of Naboth by a trial of the Elders, according to +the Law, with many thousands of the like: what were it other, than to +make an hopeless proof, that far-off examples would not be left to the +same far-off respects, as heretofore? For who hath not observed, what +labor, practice, peril, bloodshed, and cruelty, the kings and princes +of the world have undergone, exercised, taken on them, and committed; +to make themselves and their issues masters of the world? And yet +hath Babylon, Persia, Syria, Macedon, Carthage, Rome, and the rest, +no fruit, no flower, grass, nor leaf, springing upon the face of +the earth, of those seeds: no, their very roots and ruins do hardly +remain. "Omnia quae manu hominum facta sunt, vel manu hominum +evertuntur, vel stando et durando deficiunt": "All that the hand of +man can make, is either overturned by the hand of man, or at length +by standing and continuing consumed." The reasons of whose ruins, are +diversely given by those that ground their opinions on second causes. +All kingdoms and states have fallen (say the politicians) by outward +and foreign force, or by inward negligence and dissension, or by a +third cause arising from both. Others observe, that the greatest have +sunk down under their own weight; of which Livy hath a touch: "eo +crevit, ut magnitudine laboret sua":[4] Others, That the divine +providence (which Cratippus objected to Pompey) hath set _down_ the +date and period of every estate, before their first foundation and +erection. But hereof I will give myself a day over to resolve. + +For seeing the first hooks of the following story, have undertaken the +discourse of the first kings and kingdoms: and that it is impossible +for the short life of a Preface, to travel after, and overtake far-off +antiquity, and to judge of it; I will, for the present, examine +what profit hath been gathered by our own Kings, and their neighbour +princes: who having beheld, both in divine and human letters, the +success of infidelity, injustice, and cruelty; have (notwithstanding) +planted after the same pattern. + +True it is, that the judgments of all men are not agreeable; nor +(which is more strange) the affection of any one man stirred up alike +with examples of like nature: but every one is touched most, with that +which most nearly seemeth to touch his own private, or otherwise best +suiteth with his apprehension. But the judgments of God are forever +unchangeable: neither is He wearied by the long process of time, and +won to give His blessing in one age, to that which He hath cursed in +another. Wherefor those that are wise, or whose wisdom if it be not +great, yet is true and well grounded, will be able to discern the +bitter fruits of irreligious policy, as well among those examples that +are found in ages removed far from the present, as in those of latter +times. And that it may no less appear by evident proof, than by +asseveration, that ill doing hath always been attended with ill +success; I will here, by way of preface, run over some examples, which +the work ensuing hath not reached. + +Among our kings of the Norman race, we have no sooner passed over the +violence of the Norman Conquest, than we encounter with a singular and +most remarkable example of God's justice, upon the children of Henry +the First. For that King, when both by force, craft, and cruelty, he +had dispossessed, overreached, and lastly made blind and destroyed his +elder brother Robert Duke of Normandy, to make his own sons lords +of this land: God cast them all, male and female, nephews and nieces +(Maud excepted) into the bottom of the sea, with above a hundred and +fifty others that attended them; whereof a great many were noble and +of the King dearly beloved. + +To pass over the rest, till we come to Edward the Second; it is +certain, that after the murder of that King, the issue of blood then +made, though it had some times of stay and stopping, did again break +out, and that so often and in such abundance, as all our princes of +the masculine race (very few excepted) died of the same disease. And +although the young years of Edward the Third made his knowledge of +that horrible fact no more than suspicious; yet in that he afterwards +caused his own uncle, the Earl of Kent, to die, for no other offence +than the desire of his brother's redemption, whom the Earl as then +supposed to be living; the King making that to be treated in +his uncle, which was indeed treason in himself, (had his uncle's +intelligence been true) this I say made it manifest, that he was +not ignorant of what had past, nor greatly desirous to have had it +otherwise, though he caused Mortimer to die for the same. + +This cruelty the secret and unsearchable judgment of God revenged on +the grandchild of Edward the Third: and so it fell out, even to the +last of that line, that in the second or third descent they were all +buried under the ruins of those buildings, of which the mortar had +been tempered with innocent blood. For Richard the Second, who saw +both his Treasurers, his Chancellor, and his Steward, with divers +others of his counsellors, some of them slaughtered by the people, +others in his absence executed by his enemies, yet he always +took himself for over-wise to be taught by examples. The Earls of +Huntingdon and Kent, Montagu and Spencer, who thought themselves as +great politicians in those days as others have done in these: hoping +to please the King, and to secure themselves, by the murder of +Gloucester; died soon after, with many other their adherents, by the +like violent hands; and far more shamefully than did that duke. And +as for the King himself (who in regard of many deeds, unworthy of his +greatness, cannot be excused, as the disavowing himself by breach of +faith, charters, pardons, and patents): he was in the prime of his +youth deposed, and murdered by his cousin-german and vassal, Henry of +Lancaster, afterwards Henry the Fourth. + +This King, whose title was weak, and his obtaining the Crown +traitorous; who brake faith with the lords at his landing, protesting +to intend only the recovery of his proper inheritance, brake faith +with Richard himself; and brake faith with all the kingdom in +Parliament, to whom he swore that the deposed King should live. After +that he had enjoyed this realm some few years, and in that time +had been set upon all sides by his subjects, and never free from +conspiracies and rebellions: he saw (if souls immortal see and discern +anythings after the bodies' death) his grandchild Henry the Sixth, +and his son the Prince, suddenly and without mercy, murdered; the +possession of the Crown (for which he had caused so much blood to +be poured out) transferred from his race, and by the issues of +his enemies worn and enjoyed: enemies, whom by his own practice he +supposed that he had left no less powerless, than the succession of +the Kingdom questionless; by entailing the same upon his own issues +by Parliament. And out of doubt, human reason could have judged no +otherwise, but that these cautious provisions of the father, seconded +by the valor and signal victories of his son Henry the Fifth, had +buried the hopes of every competitor, under the despair of all +reconquest and recovery. I say, that human reason might so have +judged, were not this passage of Casaubon also true; "Dies, hora, +momentum, evertendis dominationibus sufficit, quae adamantinis +credebantur radicibus esse fundatae:" "A day, an hour, a moment, is +enough to overturn the things, that seemed to have been founded and +rooted in adamant." + +Now for Henry the Sixth, upon whom the great storm of his +grandfather's grievous faults fell, as it formerly had done upon +Richard the grandchild of Edward: although he was generally esteemed +for a gentle and innocent prince, yet as he refused the daughter of +Armagnac, of the House of Navarre, the greatest of the Princes +of France, to whom he was affianced (by which match he might have +defended his inheritance in France) and married the daughter of Anjou, +(by which he lost all that he had in France) so in condescending to +the unworthy death of his uncle of Gloucester, the main and strong +pillar of the House of Lancaster; he drew on himself and this kingdom +the greatest joint-loss and dishonor, that ever it sustained since the +Norman Conquest. Of whom it may truly be said which a counsellor of +his own spake of Henry the Third of France, "Qu'il estait tme fort +gentile Prince; mais son reigne est advenu en une fort mauvais +temps:" "He was a very gentle Prince; but his reign happened in a very +unfortunate season." + +It is true that Buckingham and Suffolk were the practicers and +contrivers of the Duke's death: Buckingham and Suffolk, because the +Duke gave instructions to their authority, which otherwise under the +Queen had been absolute; the Queen in respect of her personal wound, +"spretaeque injuria formae,"[5] because Gloucester dissuaded her +marriage. But the fruit was answerable to the seed; the success to +the counsel. For after the cutting down of Gloucester, York grew up so +fast, as he dared to dispute his right both by arguments and arms; +in which quarrel, Suffolk and Buckingham, with the greatest number of +their adherents, were dissolved. And although for his breach of oath +by sacrament, it pleased God to strike down York: yet his son the Earl +of March, following the plain path which his father had trodden out, +despoiled Henry the father, and Edward the son, both of their lives +and kingdom. And what was the end now of that politic lady the Queen, +other than this, that she lived to behold the wretched ends of all her +partakers: that she lived to look on, while her husband the King, and +her only son the Prince, were hewn in sunder; while the Crown was set +on his head that did it. She lived to see herself despoiled of her +estate, and of her moveables: and lastly, her father, by rendering up +to the Crown of France the Earldom of Provence and other places, for +the payment of fifty thousand crowns for her ransom, to become a +stark beggar. And this was the end of that subtility, which Siracides +calleth "fine" but "unrighteous:" for other fruit hath it never +yielded since the world was. + +And now it came to Edward the Fourth's turn (though after many +difficulties) to triumph. For all the plants of Lancaster were rooted +up, one only Earl of Richmond excepted: whom also he had once bought +of the Duke of Brittany, but could not hold him. And yet was not +this of Edward such a plantation, as could any way promise itself +stability. For this Edward the King (to omit more than many of his +other cruelties) beheld and allowed the slaughter which Gloucester, +Dorset, Hastings, and others, made of Edward the Prince in his own +presence; of which tragical actors, there was not one that escaped the +judgment of God in the same kind And he, which (besides the execution +of his brother Clarence, for none other offence than he himself had +formed in his own imagination) instructed Gloucester to kill Henry the +Sixth, his predecessor; taught him also by the same art to kill his +own sons and successors, Edward and Richard. For those kings which +have sold the blood of others at a low rate; have but made the market +for their own enemies, to buy of theirs at the same price. + +To Edward the Fourth succeeded Richard the Third, the greatest master +in mischief of all that fore-went him: who although, for the necessity +of his tragedy, he had more parts to play, and more to perform in his +own person, than all the rest; yet he so well fitted every affection +that played with him, as if each of them had but acted his own +interest. For he wrought so cunningly upon the affections of Hastings +and Buckingham, enemies to the Queen and to all her kindred, as he +easily allured them to condescend, that Rivers and Grey, the King's +maternal uncle and half brother, should (for the first) be severed +from him: secondly, he wrought their consent to have them imprisoned: +and lastly (for the avoiding of future inconvenience) to have their +heads severed from their bodies. And having now brought those his +chief instruments to exercise that common precept which the Devil hath +written on every post, namely, to depress those whom they had grieved, +and destroy those whom they had depressed; he urged that argument +so far and so forcibly, as nothing but the death of the young King +himself, and of his brother, could fashion the conclusion. For he +caused it to be hammered into Buckingham's head, that, whensoever the +King or his brother should have able years to exercise their power, +they would take a most severe revenge of that cureless wrong, offered +to their uncle and brother, Rivers and Grey. + +But this was not his manner of reasoning with Hastings, whose fidelity +to his master's sons was without suspect: and yet the Devil, who never +dissuades by impossibility, taught him to try him. And so he did. But +when he found by Catesby, who sounded him, that he was not fordable; +he first resolved to kill him sitting in council: wherein having +failed with his sword, he set the hangman upon him, with a weapon +of more weight. And because nothing else could move his appetite, +he caused his head to be stricken off, before he ate his dinner. A +greater judgment of God than this upon Hastings, I have never observed +in any story. For the selfsame day that the Earl Rivers, Grey, and +others, were (without trial of law, of offence given) by Hastings' +advice executed at Pomfret: I say Hastings himself in the same day, +and (as I take it) in the same hour, in the same lawless manner had +his head stricken off in the Tower of London. But Buckingham lived a +while longer; and with an eloquent oration persuaded the Londoners +to elect Richard for their king. And having received the Earldom of +Hereford for reward, besides the high hope of marrying his daughter +to the King's only son; after many grievous vexations of mind, and +unfortunate attempts, being in the end betrayed and delivered up +by his trustiest servant; he had his head severed from his body at +Salisbury, without the trouble of any of his Peers. And what success +had Richard himself after all these mischiefs and murders, policies, +and counter-policies to Christian religion: and after such time +as with a most merciless hand he had pressed out the breath of his +nephews and natural lords; other than the prosperity of so short a +life, as it took end, ere himself could well look over and discern +it? The great outcry of innocent blood, obtained at God's hands the +effusion of his; who became a spectacle of shame and dishonor, both to +his friends and enemies. + +This cruel King, Henry the Seventh cut off; and was therein (no doubt) +the immediate instrument of God's justice. A politic Prince he was if +ever there were any, who by the engine of his wisdom, beat down and +overturned as many strong oppositions both before and after he wore +the Crown, as ever King of England did: I say by his wisdom, because +as he ever left the reins of his affections in the hands of his +profit, so he always weighed his undertakings by his abilities, +leaving nothing more to hazard than so much as cannot be denied it in +all human actions. He had well observed the proceedings of Louis the +Eleventh, whom he followed in all that was royal or royal-like, but +he was far more just, and begun not their processes whom he hated or +feared by the execution, as Louis did. + +He could never endure any mediation in rewarding his servants, and +therein exceeding wise; for whatsoever himself gave, he himself +received back the thanks and the love, knowing it well that the +affections of men (purchased by nothing so readily as by benefits) +were trains that better became great kings, than great subjects. On +the contrary, in whatsoever he grieved his subjects, he wisely put it +off on those, that he found fit ministers for such actions. Howsoever +the taking off of Stanley's head, who set the Crown on his, and the +death of the young Earl of Warwick, son to George, Duke of Clarence, +shows, as the success also did, that he held somewhat of the errors +of his ancestors; for his possession in the first line ended in his +grandchildren, as that of Edward the Third and Henry the Fourth had +done. + +Now for King Henry the Eighth; if all the pictures and patterns of +a merciless prince were lost in the world, they might all again be +painted to the life, out of the story of this king. For how many +servants did he advance in haste (but for what virtue no man could +suspect) and with the change of his fancy ruined again; no man knowing +for what offence? To how many others of more desert gave he abundant +flowers from whence to gather honey, and in the end of harvest burnt +them in the hive? How many wives did he cut off, and cast off, as his +fancy and affection changed? How many princes of the blood (whereof +some of them for age could hardly crawl towards the block) with a +world of others of all degrees (of whom our common chronicles have +kept the account) did he execute? Yea, in his very death-bed, and when +he was at the point to have given his account to God for the abundance +of blood already spilt, he imprisoned the Duke of Norfolk the father; +and executed the Earl of Surrey the son; the one, whose deservings he +knew not how to value, having never omitted anything that concerned +his own honor, and the King's service; the other never having +committed anything worthy of his least displeasure: the one exceeding +valiant and advised; the other no less valiant than learned, and +of excellent hope. But besides the sorrows which he heaped upon +the fatherless and widows at home: and besides the vain enterprises +abroad, wherein it is thought that he consumed more treasure than all +our victorious kings did in their several conquests; what causeless +and cruel wars did he make upon his own nephew King James the First? +What laws and wills did he devise to cut off, and cut down those +branches, which sprang from the same root that himself did? And in +the end (notwithstanding these his so many irreligious provisions) it +pleased God to take away all his own, without increase; though, for +themselves in their several kinds, all princes of eminent virtue. +For these words of Samuel to Agag King of the Amalekites, have +been verified upon many others: "As thy sword hath made other women +childless, so shall thy mother be childless among other women." And +that blood which the same King Henry affirmed, that the cold air of +Scotland had frozen up in the North, God hath diffused by the sunshine +of his grace: from whence his Majesty now living, and long to live, is +descended. Of whom I may say it truly, "That if all the malice of the +world were infused into one eye: yet could it not discern in his +life, even to this day, any one of these foul spots, by which the +consciences of all the forenamed princes (in effect) have been +defiled; nor any drop of that innocent blood on the sword of his +justice, with which the most that fore-went him have stained both +their hands and fame." And for this Crown of England; it may truly he +avowed: that he hath received it even from the hand of God, and hath +stayed the time of putting it on, howsoever he were provoked to hasten +it: that he never took revenge of any man, that sought to put him +beside it: that he refused the assistance of Her enemies, that wore +it long, with as great glory as ever princess did: that his Majesty +entered not by a breach, nor by blood; but by the ordinary gate, +which his own right set open; and into which, by a general love and +obedience, he was received. And howsoever his Majesty's preceding +title to this Kingdom was preferred by many princes (witness the +Treaty at Cambray in the year 1559) yet he never pleased to dispute +it, during the life of that renowned lady his predecessor; no, +notwithstanding the injury of not being declared heir, in all the time +of her long reign. + +Neither ought we to forget, or neglect our thankfulness to God for +the uniting of the northern parts of Britain to the south, to wit, +of Scotland to England, which though they were severed but by small +brooks and banks, yet by reason of the long continued war, and the +cruelties exercised upon each other, in the affections of the nations, +they were infinitely severed. This I say is not the least of God's +blessings which his Majesty hath brought with him unto this land: +no, put all our petty grievances together, and heap them up to their +height, they will appear but as a molehill compared with the +mountain of this concord. And if all the historians since then have +acknowledged the uniting of the Red Rose, and the White, for the +greatest happiness (Christian Religion excepted), that ever this +kingdom received from God, certainly the peace between the two lions +of gold and gules, and the making them one, doth by many degrees +exceed the former; for by it, besides the sparing of our British +blood, heretofore and during the difference, so often and abundantly +shed, the state of England is more assured, the kingdom more +enabled to recover her ancient honor and rights, and by it made more +invincible, than by all our former alliances, practises, policies, and +conquests. It is true that hereof we do not yet find the effect. +But had the Duke of Parma in the year 1588, joined the army which he +commanded, with that of Spain, and landed it on the south coast; and +had his Majesty at the same time declared himself against us in the +North: it is easy to divine what had become of the liberty of England, +certainly we would then without murmur have bought this union at far +greater price than it hath since cost us. It is true, that there was +never any common weal or kingdom in the world, wherein no man had +cause to lament. Kings live in the world, and not above it. They are +not infinite to examine every man's cause, or to relieve every man's +wants. And yet in the latter (though to his own prejudice), his +Majesty hath had more comparison of other men's necessities, than of +his own coffers. Of whom it may he said, as of Solomon,[6] "Dedit Deus +Solomon! latitudinem cordis": Which if other men do not understand +with Pineda, to be meant by liberality, but by "latitude of +knowledge"; yet may it be better spoken of His Majesty, than of +any king that ever England had; who as well in divine, as human +understanding, hath exceeded all that fore-went him, by many degrees. + +I could say much more of the King's majesty, without flattery: did I +not fear the imputation of presumption, and withal suspect, that it +might befall these papers of mine (though the loss were little) as +it did the pictures of Queen Elizabeth, made by unskilful and common +painters, which by her own commandment were knocked in pieces and +cast into the fire. For ill artists, in setting out the beauty of the +external; and weak writers, in describing the virtues of the internal; +do often leave to posterity, of well formed faces a deformed +memory; and of the most perfect and princely minds, a most defective +representation. It may suffice, and there needs no other discourse; if +the honest reader but compare the cruel and turbulent passages of our +former kings, and of other their neighbor-princes (of whom for that +purpose I have inserted this brief discourse) with his Majesty's +temperate, revengeless and liberal disposition: I say, that if the +honest reader weigh them justly, and with an even hand; and withal but +bestow every deformed child on his true parent; he shall find, that +there is no man that hath so just cause to complain, as the King +himself hath. Now as we have told the success of the trumperies and +cruelties of our own kings, and other great personages: so we find, +that God is everywhere the same God. And as it pleased him to punish +the usurpation, and unnatural cruelty of Henry the First, and of our +third Edward, in their children for many generations: so dealt He +with the sons of Louis Debonnaire, the son of Charles the Great, or +Charlemagne. For after such time as Debonnaire of France, had torn +out the eyes of Bernard his nephew, the son of Pepin the eldest son +of Charlemagne, and heir of the Empire, and then caused him to die in +prison, as did our Henry to Robert his eldest brother: there followed +nothing but murders upon murders, poisoning, imprisonments, and civil +war; till the whole race of that famous Emperor was extinguished. And +though Debonnaire, after he had rid himself of his nephew by a violent +death; and of his bastard brothers by a civil death (having inclosed +them with sure guard, all the days of their lives, within a monastery) +held himself secure from all opposition: yet God raised up against him +(which he suspected not) his own sons, to vex him, to invade him, +to take him prisoner, and to depose him; his own sons, with whom +(to satisfy their ambition) he had shared his estate, and given them +crowns to wear, and kingdoms to govern, during his own life. Yea his +eldest son, Lothair (for he had four, three by his first wife, and one +by his second; to wit, Lothair, Pepin, Louis, and Charles), made it +the cause of his deposition, that he had used violence towards his +brothers and kinsmen; and that he had suffered his nephew (whom he +might have delivered) to be slain. "Eo quod," saith the text,[7] +"fratribus, et propinquis violentiam intulerit, et nepotem suum, +quern ipse liberate poterat, interfici permiserit": "Because he used +violence to his brothers and kinsmen, and suffered his nephew to be +slain whom he might have delivered." + +Yet did he that which few kings do; namely, repent him of his cruelty. +For, among many other things which he performed in the General +Assembly of the States, it follows: "Post haec autem palam se errasse +confessus, et imitatus Imperatoris Theodosii exemplum, poenitentiam +spontaneam suscepit, tarn de his, quam quae in Bernardum proprium +nepotem gesserat": "After this he did openly confess himself to +have erred, and following the example of the Emperor Theodosius, he +underwent voluntary penance, as well for his other offences, as for +that which he had done against Bernard his own nephew." + +This he did; and it was praise-worthy. But the blood that is unjustly +spilt, is not again gathered up from the ground by repentance. These +medicines, ministered to the dead, have but dead rewards. + +This king, as I have said, had four sons. To Lothair his eldest he +gave the Kingdom of Italy; as Charlemagne, his father, had done to +Pepin, the father of Bernard, who was to succeed him in the Empire. To +Pepin the second son he gave the Kingdom of Aquitaine: to Louis, +the Kingdom of Bavaria: and to Charles, whom he had by a second wife +called Judith, the remainder of the Kingdom of France. But this second +wife, being a mother-in-law[8] to the rest, persuaded Debonnaire +to cast his son Pepin out of Aquitaine, thereby to greaten Charles, +which, after the death of his son Pepin, he prosecuted to effect, +against his grandchild bearing the same name. In the meanwhile, being +invaded by his son Louis of Bavaria, he dies for grief. + +Debonnaire dead, Louis of Bavaria, and Charles afterwards called the +Bald, and their nephew Pepin, of Aquitaine, join in league against the +Emperor Lothair their eldest brother. They fight near to Auxerre the +most bloody battle that ever was stroken in France: in which, the +marvellous loss of nobility, and men of war, gave courage to the +Saracens to invade Italy; to the Huns to fall upon Almaine; and the +Danes to enter upon Normandy. Charles the Bald by treason seizeth upon +his nephew Pepin, kills him in a cloister: Carloman rebels against +his father Charles the Bald, the father burns out the eyes of his son +Carloman; Bavaria invades the Emperor Lothair his brother, Lothair +quits the Empire, he is assailed and wounded to the heart by his own +conscience, for his rebellion against his father, and for his other +cruelties, and dies in a monastery. Charles the Bald, the uncle, +oppresseth his nephews the sons of Lothair, he usurpeth the Empire to +the prejudice of Louis of Bavaria his elder brother; Bavaria's armies +and his son Carloman are beaten, he dies of grief, and the usurper +Charles is poisoned by Zedechias a Jew, his physician, his son Louis +le Bègue dies of the same drink. Bègue had Charles the Simple and two +bastards, Louis and Carloman; they rebel against their brother, but +the eldest breaks his neck, the younger is slain by a wild boar; the +son of Bavaria had the same ill destiny, and brake his neck by a fall +out of a window in sporting with his companions. Charles the Gross +becomes lord of all that the sons of Debonnaire held in Germany; +wherewith not contented, he invades Charles the Simple: but +being-forsaken of his nobility, of his wife, and of his understanding, +he dies a distracted beggar. Charles the Simple is held in wardship by +Eudes, Mayor of the Palace, then by Robert the brother of Eudes: and +lastly, being taken by the Earl of Vermandois; he is forced to die in +the prison of Peron, Louis the son of Charles the Simple breaks his +neck in chasing a wolf, and of the two sons of this Louis, the one +dies of poison, the other dies in the prison of Orleans; after whom +Hugh Capet, of another race, and a stranger to the French, makes +himself king. + +These miserable ends had the issues of Debonnaire, who after he had +once apparelled injustice with authority, his sons and successors took +up the fashion, and wore that garment so long without other provision, +as when the same was torn from their shoulders, every man despised +them as miserable and naked beggars. The wretched success they had +(saith a learned Frenchman) shows, "que en ceste mort il y avait plus +du fait des homines que de Pieu, ou de la justice": "that in the death +of that Prince, to wit, of Bernard the son of Pepin, the true heir of +Charlemagne, men had more meddling than either God or justice had." + +But to come nearer home; it is certain that Francis the First, one of +the worthiest kings (except for that fact) that ever Frenchmen had, +did never enjoy himself, after he had commended the destruction of the +Protestants of Mirandol and Cabrieres, to the Parliament of Provence, +which poor people were thereupon burnt and murdered; men, women, and +children. It is true that the said King Francis repented himself of +the fact, and gave charge to Henry his son, to do justice upon the +murderers, threatening his son with God's judgments, if he neglected +it. But this unseasonable care of his, God was not pleased to accept +for payment. For after Henry himself was slain in sport by Montgomery, +we all may remember what became of his four sons, Francis, Charles, +Henry, and Hercules. Of which although three of them became kings, +and were married to beautiful and virtuous ladies: yet were they, +one after another, cast out of the world, without stock or seed. And +notwithstanding their subtility, and breach of faith; with all their +massacres upon those of the religion,[9] and great effusion of blood, +the crown was set on his head, whom they all labored to dissolve; the +Protestants remain more in number than ever they were, and hold to +this day more strong cities than ever they had. + +Let us now see if God be not the same God in Spain, as in England and +France. Towards whom we will look no further back than to Don Pedro +of Castile: in respect of which Prince, all the tyrants of Sicil, our +Richard the Third, and the great Ivan Vasilowich of Moscow, were but +petty ones: this Castilian, of all Christian and heathen kings, having +been the most merciless. For, besides those of his own blood and +nobility, which he caused to be slain in his own court and chamber, +as Sancho Ruis, the great master of Calatrava, Ruis Gonsales, Alphonso +Tello, and Don John of Arragon, whom he cut in pieces and cast into +the streets, denying him Christian burial: I say, besides these, and +the slaughter of Gomes Mauriques, Diego Peres, Alphonso Gomes, and the +great commander of Castile; he made away the two infants of Arragon +his cousin germans, his brother Don Frederick, Don John de la Cerde, +Albuquergues, Nugnes de Guzman, Cornel, Cabrera, Tenorio, Mendes de +Toledo, Guttiere his great treasurer and all his kindred; and a world +of others. Neither did he spare his two youngest brothers, innocent +princes: whom after he had kept in close prison from their cradles, +till one of them had lived sixteen years, and the other fourteen, he +murdered them there. Nay, he spared not his mother, nor his wife +the Lady Blanche of Bourbon. Lastly, as he caused the Archbishop of +Toledo, and the Dean to be killed of purpose to enjoy their treasures; +so did he put to death Mahomet Aben Alhamar, King of Barbary, with +thirty-seven of his nobility, that came unto him for succor, with a +great sum of money, to levy (by his favor) some companies of soldiers +to return withal. Yea, he would needs assist the hangman with his +own hand, in the execution of the old king; in so much as Pope Urban +declareth him an enemy both to God and man. But what was his end? +Having been formerly beaten out of his kingdom, and reestablished by +the valor of the English nation, led by the famous Duke of Lancaster: +he was stabbed to death by his younger brother the Earl of Astramara, +who dispossessed all his children of their inheritance; which, but for +the father's injustice and cruelty, had never been in danger of any +such thing. + +If we can parallel any man with this king, it must be Duke John of +Burgogne, who, after his traitorous murder of the Duke of Orleans, +caused the Constable of Armagnac, the Chancellor of France, the +Bishops of Constance, Bayeux, Eureux, Senlis, Saintes, and other +religious and reverend Churchmen, the Earl of Gran Pre, Hector of +Chartres, and (in effect) all the officers of justice, of the Chamber +of Accounts, Treasury, and Request, (with sixteen hundred others to +accompany them) to be suddenly and violently slain. Hereby, while he +hoped to govern, and to have mastered France, he was soon after struck +with an axe in the face, in the presence of the Dauphin; and, without +any leisure to repent his misdeeds, presently[10] slain. _These were +the lovers of other men's miseries: and misery found them out_. + +Now for the kings of Spain, which lived both with Henry the Seventh, +Henry the Eighth, Queen Mary, and Queen Elizabeth; Ferdinand of +Arragon was the first: and the first that laid the foundation of the +present Austrian greatness. For this King did not content himself +to hold Arragon by the usurpation of his ancestor; and to fasten +thereunto the Kingdom of Castile and Leon, which Isabel his wife held +by strong hand, and his assistance, from her own niece the daughter +of the last Henry: but most cruelly and craftily, without all color +or pretence of right, he also cast his own niece out of the Kingdom +of Navarre, and, contrary to faith, and the promise that he made to +restore it, fortified the best places, and so wasted the rest, as +there was no means left for any army to invade it. This King, I say, +that betrayed also Ferdinand and Frederick, Kings of Naples, princes +of his own blood, and by double alliance tied unto him; sold them +to the French: and with the same army, sent for their succor under +Gonsalvo, cast them out; and shared their kingdom with the French, +whom afterwards he most shamefully betrayed. + +This wise and politic King, who sold Heaven and his own honor, to make +his son, the Prince of Spain, the greatest monarch of the world; saw +him die in the flower of his years; and his wife great with child, +with her untimely birth, at once and together buried. His eldest +daughter married unto Don Alphonso, Prince of Portugal, beheld her +first husband break his neck in her presence; and being with child +by her second, died with it. A just judgment of God upon the race of +John, father to Alphonso, now wholly extinguished; who had not only +left many disconsolate mothers in Portugal, by the slaughter of their +children; but had formerly slain with his own hand, the son and only +comfort of his aunt the Lady Beatrix, Duchess of Viseo. + +The second daughter of Ferdinand, married to the Arch-Duke Philip, +turned fool, and died mad and deprived.[11] His third daughter, +bestowed on King Henry the Eighth, he saw cast off by the King: the +mother of many troubles in England; and the mother of a daughter, that +in her unhappy zeal shed a world of innocent blood; lost Calais to the +French; and died heartbroken without increase. To conclude, all those +kingdoms of Ferdinand have masters of a new name; and by a strange +family are governed and possessed. + +Charles the Fifth, son to the Arch-Duke Philip, in whose vain +enterprises upon the French, upon the Almains, and other princes +and states, so many multitudes of Christian soldiers, and renowned +captains were consumed; who gave the while a most perilous entrance to +the Turks, and suffered Rhodes, the Key of Christendom, to be taken; +was in conclusion chased out of France, and in a sort out of Germany; +and left to the French, Mentz, Toule, and Verdun, places belonging +to the Empire, stole away from Inspurg; and scaled the Alps by +torchlight, pursued by Duke Maurice; having hoped to swallow up all +those dominions wherein he concocted nothing save his own disgraces. +And having, after the slaughter of so many millions of men, no one +foot of ground in either: he crept into a cloister, and made himself +a pensioner of an hundred thousand ducats by the year, to his son +Philip, from whom he very slowly received his mean and ordinary +maintenance. + +His son again King Philip the Second, not satisfied to hold Holland +and Zeeland, (wrested by his ancestors from Jacqueline their lawful +Princess) and to possess in peace many other provinces of the +Netherlands: persuaded by that mischievous Cardinal of Granvile, and +other Romish tyrants; not only forgot the most remarkable services +done to his father the Emperor by the nobilities of those countries, +not only forgot the present made him upon his entry, of forty millions +of florins, called the "Novaile aide"; nor only forgot that he had +twice most solemnly sworn to the General States, to maintain and +preserve their ancient rights, privileges, and customs, which they +had enjoyed under their thirty and five earls before him, Conditional +Princes of those provinces: but beginning first to constrain them, and +enthrall them by the Spanish Inquisition, and then to impoverish them +by many new devised and intolerable impositions; he lastly, by strong +hand and main force, attempted to make himself not only an absolute +monarch over them, like unto the kings and sovereigns of England and +France; but Turk-like to tread under his feet all their natural and +fundamental laws, privileges, and ancient rights. To effect which, +after he had easily obtained from the Pope a dispensation of his +former oaths (which dispensation was the true cause of the war and +bloodshed since then;) and after he had tried what he could perform, +by dividing of their own nobility, under the government of his base +sister Margaret of Austria, and the Cardinal Granvile; he employed +that most merciless Spaniard Don Ferdinand Alvarez of Toledo, Duke +of Alva, followed with a powerful army of strange nations: by whom he +first slaughtered that renowned captain, the Earl of Egmont, Prince of +Gavare: and Philip Montmorency, Earl of Horn: made away Montigue, +and the Marquis of Bergues, and cut off in those six years (that Alva +governed) of gentlemen and others, eighteen thousand and six hundred, +by the hands of the hangman, besides all his other barbarous murders +and massacres. By whose ministry when he could not yet bring his +affairs to their wished ends, having it in his hope to work that +by subtility, which he had failed to perform by force; he sent for +governor his bastard brother Don John of Austria, a prince of great +hope, and very gracious to those people. But he, using the same papal +advantage that his predecessors had done, made no scruple to take oath +upon the Holy Evangelists, to observe the treaty made with the General +States; and to discharge the Low Countries of all Spaniards, and other +strangers therein garrisoned: towards whose pay and passport, the +Netherlands strained themselves to make payment of six hundred +thousand pounds. Which monies received, he suddenly surprised the +citadels of Antwerp and Nemours: not doubting (being unsuspected by +the states) to have possessed himself of all the mastering places +of those provinces. For whatsoever he overtly pretended, he held +in secret a contrary counsel with the Secretary Escovedo, Rhodus, +Barlemont, and others, ministers of the Spanish tyranny, formerly +practised, and now again intended. But let us now see the effect and +end of this perjury and of all other the Duke's cruelties. First, for +himself, after he had murdered so many of the nobility; executed (as +aforesaid) eighteen thousand and six hundred in six years, and most +cruelly slain man, woman, and child, in Mechlin, Zutphen, Naerden, +and other places: notwithstanding his Spanish vaunt, that he would +suffocate the Hollanders in their own butter-barrels, and milk-tubs; +he departed the country no otherwise accompanied, than with the curse +and detestation of the whole nation; leaving his master's affairs in a +tenfold worse estate, than he found them at his first arrival. For +Don John, whose haughty conceit of himself overcame the greatest +difficulties; though his judgment were over-weak to manage the least: +what wonders did his fearful breach of faith bring forth, other than +the King his brother's jealousy and distrust, with the untimely death +that seized him, even in the flower of his youth? And for Escovedo his +sharp-witted secretary, who in his own imagination had conquered for +his master both England and the Netherlands; being sent into Spain +upon some new project, he was at the first arrival, and before any +access to the King, by certain ruffians appointed by Anthony Peres +(though by better warrant than his) rudely murdered in his own +lodging. Lastly, if we consider the King of Spain's carriage, his +counsel and success in this business, there is nothing left to the +memory of man more remarkable. For he hath paid above an hundred +millions, and the lives of above four hundred thousand Christians, +for the loss of all those countries; which, for beauty, gave place to +none; and for revenue, did equal his West Indies: for the loss of a +nation which most willingly obeyed him; and who at this day, after +forty years war, are in despite of all his forces become a free +estate, and far more rich and powerful than they were, when he first +began to impoverish and oppress them. + +Oh, by what plots, by what forswearings, betrayings, oppressions, +imprisonments, tortures, poisonings, and under what reasons of state, +and politic subtlety, have these fore-named kings, both strangers, +and of our own nation, pulled the vengeance of God upon themselves, +upon theirs, and upon their prudent ministers! and in the end have +brought those things to pass for their enemies, and seen an effect so +directly contrary to all their own counsels and cruelties; as the +one could never have hoped for themselves; and the other never have +succeeded; if no such opposition had ever been made. God hath said it +and performed it ever: "Perdam sapientiam sapientum"; "I will destroy +the wisdom of the wise." + +But what of all this? and to what end do we lay before the eyes of +the living, the fall and fortunes of the dead: seeing the world is +the same that it hath been; and the children of the present time, will +still obey their parents? It is in the present time that all the wits +of the world are exercised. To hold the times we have, we hold all +things lawful: and either we hope to hold them forever; or at least we +hope that there is nothing after them to be hoped for. For as we are +content to forget our own experience, and to counterfeit the ignorance +of our own knowledge, in all things that concern ourselves; or +persuade ourselves, that God hath given us letters patents to pursue +all our irreligious affections, with a "non obstante"[12] so we +neither look behind us what hath been, nor before us what shall be. It +is true, that the quantity which we have, is of the body: we are by +it joined to the earth: we are compounded of earth; and we inhabit +it. The Heavens are high, far off, and unsearchable: we have sense and +feeling of corporal things; and of eternal grace, but by revelation. +No marvel then that our thoughts are also earthly: and it is less to +be wondered at, that the words of worthless men can not cleanse them: +seeing their doctrine and instruction, whose understanding the Holy +Ghost vouchsafed to inhabit, have not performed it. For as the Prophet +Isaiah cried out long ago, "Lord, who hath believed our reports?" And +out of doubt, as Isaiah complained then for himself and others: so are +they less believed, every day after other. For although religion, and +the truth thereof be in every man's mouth, yea, in the discourse of +every woman, who for the greatest number are but idols of vanity: what +is it other than an universal dissimulation? We profess that we know +God: but by works we deny him. For beatitude doth not consist in the +knowledge of divine things, but in a divine life: for the Devils know +them better than men. "Beatitudo non est divinorum cognitio, sed vita +divina." And certainly there is nothing more to be admired, and more +to be lamented, than the private contention, the passionate dispute, +the personal hatred, and the perpetual war, massacres, and murders for +religion among Christians: the discourse whereof hath so occupied the +world, as it hath well near driven the practice thereof out of the +world. Who would not soon resolve, that took knowledge but of the +religious disputations among men, and not of their lives which +dispute, that there were no other thing in their desires, than the +purchase of Heaven; and that the world itself were but used as it +ought, and as an inn or place, wherein to repose ourselves in passing +on towards our celestial habitation? when on the contrary, besides the +discourse and outward profession, the soul hath nothing but hypocrisy. +We are all (in effect) become comedians in religion: and while we act +in gesture and voice, divine virtues, in all the course of our lives +we renounce our persons, and the parts we play. For Charity, Justice, +and Truth have but their being _in terms_, like the philosopher's +_Materia prima_. + +Neither is it that wisdom, which Solomon defineth to be the +"Schoolmistress of the knowledge of God," that hath valuation in the +world: it is enough that we give it our good word: but the same which is +altogether exercised in the service of the world as the gathering of +riches chiefly, by which we purchase and obtain honor, with the many +respects which attend it. These indeed be the marks, which (when we have +bent our consciences to the highest) we all shoot at. For the obtaining +whereof it is true, that the care is our own; the care our own in this +life, the peril our own in the future: and yet when we have gathered the +greatest abundance, we ourselves enjoy no more thereof, than so much as +belongs to one man. For the rest, he that had the greatest wisdom and +the greatest ability that ever man had, hath told us that this is the +use: "When goods increase (saith Solomon) they also increase that eat +them; and what good cometh to the owners, but the beholding thereof with +their eyes?" As for those that devour the rest, and follow us in fair +weather: they again forsake us in the first tempest of misfortune, and +steer away before the sea and wind; leaving us to the malice of our +destinies. Of these, among a thousand examples, I will take but one out +of Master Danner, and use his own words: "Whilest the Emperor Charles +the Fifth, after the resignation of his estates, stayed at Flushing for +wind, to carry him his last journey into Spain; he conferred on a time +with Seldius, his brother Ferdinand's Ambassador, till the deep of the +night. And when Seldius should depart, the Emperor calling for some of +his servants, and nobody answering him (for those that attended upon +him, were some gone to their lodgings, and all the rest asleep), the +Emperor took up the candle himself, and went before Seldius to light him +down the stairs; and so did, notwithstanding all the resistance that +Seldius could make. And when he was come to the stair's foot, he said +thus unto him: "Seldius, remember this of Charles the Emperor, when he +shall be dead and gone, that him, whom thou hast known in thy time +environed with so many mighty armies and guards of soldiers, thou hast +also seen alone, abandoned, and forsaken, yea even of his own domestical +servants, &c. I acknowledge this change of Fortune to proceed from the +mighty hand of God, which I will by no means go about to withstand." + +But you will say, that there are some things else, and of greater +regard than the former. The first is the reverend respect that is held +of great men, and the honor done unto them by all sorts of people. And +it is true indeed: provided, that an inward love for their justice and +piety accompany the outward worship given to their places and power; +without which what is the applause of the multitude, but as the outcry +of an herd of animals, who without the knowledge of any true cause, +please themselves with the noise they make? For seeing it is a thing +exceeding rare, to distinguish Virtue and Fortune: the most impious +(if prosperous) have ever been applauded; the most virtuous (if +unprosperous) have ever been despised. For as Fortune's man rides the +horse, so Fortune herself rides the man; who when he is descended and +on foot, the man taken from his beast, and Fortune from the man, a +base groom beats the one, and a bitter contempt spurns at the other, +with equal liberty. + +The second is the greatening of our posterity, and the contemplation +of their glory whom we leave behind us. Certainly, of those which +conceive that their souls departed take any comfort therein, it may +be truly said of them, which Lactantius spake of certain heathen +philosophers, "quod sapientes sunt in re stulta."[13] For when our +spirits immortal shall be once separate from our mortal bodies, +and disposed by God; there remaineth in them no other joy of their +posterity which succeed, than there doth of pride in that stone, which +sleepeth in the wall of the king's palace; nor any other sorrow for +their poverty, than there doth of shame in that, which beareth up a +beggar's cottage. "Nesciunt mortui, etiam sancti, quid agunt +vivi, etiam eorum filii, quia animae mortuorum rebus viventium non +intersunt": "The dead, though holy, know nothing of the living, no, +not of their own children: for the souls of those departed, are not +conversant with their affairs that remain."[14] And if we doubt of St. +Augustine, we can not of Job; who tells us, "That we know not if our +sons shall be honorable: neither shall we understand concerning +them, whether they shall be of low degree." Which Ecclesiastes also +confirmeth: "Man walketh in a shadow, and disquieteth himself in vain: +he heapeth up riches, and can not tell who shall gather them. The +living (saith he) know that they shall die, but the dead know nothing +at all: for who can show unto man what shall be after him under the +sun?" He therefore accounteth it among the rest of worldly vanities, +to labor and travail in the world; not knowing after death whether +a fool or a wise man should enjoy the fruits thereof: "which made me +(saith he) endeavor even to abhor mine own labor." And what can other +men hope, whose blessed or sorrowful estates after death God hath +reserved? man's knowledge lying but in his hope, seeing the Prophet +Isaiah confesseth of the elect, "That Abraham is ignorant of us, and +Israel knows us not." But hereof we are assured, that the long and +dark night of death (of whose following day we shall never behold the +dawn till his return that hath triumphed over it), shall cover us +over till the world be no more. After which, and when we shall again +receive organs glorified and incorruptible, the seats of angelical +affections, in so great admiration shall the souls of the blessed be +exercised, as they can not admit the mixture of any second or less +joy; nor any return of foregone and mortal affection towards friends, +kindred, or children. Of whom whether we shall retain any particular +knowledge, or in any sort distinguish them, no man can assure us; and +the wisest men doubt. But on the contrary, if a divine life retain any +of those faculties which the soul exercised in a mortal body, we shall +not at that time so divide the joys of Heaven, as to cast any part +thereof on the memory of their felicities which remain in the world. +No, be their estates greater than ever the world gave, we shall (by +the difference known unto us) even detest their consideration. And +whatsoever comfort shall remain of all forepast, the same will consist +in the charity which we exercised living; and in that piety, justice, +and firm faith, for which it pleased the infinite mercy of God to +accept of us, and receive us. Shall we therefore value honor and +riches at nothing? and neglect them, as unnecessary and vain? +Certainly no. For that infinite wisdom of God, which hath +distinguished his angels by degrees; which hath given greater and +less light and beauty to heavenly bodies; which hath made differences +between beasts and birds; created the eagle and the fly, the cedar and +the shrub; and among stones, given the fairest tincture to the ruby, +and the quickest light to the diamond; hath also ordained kings, +dukes, or leaders of the people, magistrates, judges, and other +degrees among men. And as honor is left to posterity, for a mark and +ensign of the virtue and understanding of their ancestors: so (seeing +Siracides preferreth death before beggary: and that titles, without +proportionable estates, fall under the miserable succor of other men's +pity) I account it foolishness to condemn such a care: provided, that +worldly goods be well gotten, and that we raise not our own buildings +out of other men's ruins. For, as Plato doth first prefer the +perfection of bodily health; secondly, the form and beauty; and +thirdly, "Divitias nulla fraude quaesitas":[15] so Jeremiah cries, +"Woe unto them that erect their houses by unrighteousness, and their +chambers without equity": and Isaiah the same, "Woe to those that +spoil and were not spoiled." And it was out of the true wisdom of +Solomon, that he commandeth us, "not to drink the wine of violence; +not to lie in wait for blood, and not to swallow them up alive, whose +riches we covet: for such are the ways (saith he) of everyone that is +greedy of gain." + +And if we could afford ourselves but so much leisure as to consider, +that he which hath most in the world, hath, in respect of the world, +nothing in it: and that he which hath the longest time lent him to +live in it, hath yet no proportion at all therein, setting it either +by that which is past, when we were not, or by that time which is to +come, in which we shall abide forever: I say, if both, to wit, our +proportion in the world, and our time in the world, differ not +much from that which is nothing; it is not out of any excellency of +understanding, that we so much prize the one, which hath (in effect) +no being: and so much neglect the other, which hath no ending: +coveting those mortal things of the world, as if our souls were +therein immortal; and neglecting those things which are immortal, as +if ourselves after the world were but mortal. + +But let every man value his own wisdom, as he pleaseth. Let the rich +man think all fools, that cannot equal his abundance: the revenger +esteem all negligent, that have not trodden down their opposites; the +politician, all gross that cannot merchandise their faith: yet when we +once come in sight of the port of death, to which all winds drive us, +and when by letting fall that fatal anchor, which can never be weighed +again, the navigation of this life takes end; then it is, I say, that +our own cogitations (those sad and severe cogitations, formerly beaten +from us by our health and felicity) return again, and pay us to the +uttermost for all the pleasing passages of our lives past. It is then +that we cry out to God for mercy; then when our selves can no longer +exercise cruelty to others; and it is only then, that we are strucken +through the soul with this terrible sentence, "That God will not be +mocked." For if according to St. Peter, "The righteous scarcely be +saved: and that God spared not his angels"; where shall those appear, +who, having served their appetites all their lives, presume to think, +that the severe commandments of the all-powerful God were given but +in sport; and that the short breath, which we draw when death presseth +us, if we can but fashion it to the sound of mercy (without any kind +of satisfaction or amends) is sufficient? "O quam multi," saith +a reverend father, "cum hac spe ad aeternos labores et bella +descendunt!"[16] I confess that it is a great comfort to our friends, +to have it said, that we ended well; for we all desire (as Balaam +did) "to die the death of the righteous." But what shall we call a +disesteeming, an opposing, or (indeed) a mocking of God: if those men +do not oppose Him, disesteem Him, and mock Him, that think it enough +for God, to ask Him forgiveness at leisure, with the remainder and +last drawing of a malicious breath? For what do they otherwise, +that die this kind of well-dying, but say unto God as followeth? +"We beseech Thee, O God, that all the falsehoods, forswearings, and +treacheries of our lives past, may be pleasing unto Thee; that Thou +wilt for our sakes (that have had no leisure to do anything for Thine) +change Thy nature (though impossible,) and forget to be a just God; +that Thou wilt love injuries and oppressions, call ambition wisdom, +and charity foolishness. For I shall prejudice my son (which I am +resolved not to do) if I make restitution; and confess myself to have +been unjust (which I am too proud to do) if I deliver the oppressed." +Certainly, these wise worldlings have either found out a new God, +or made one: and in all likelihood such a leaden one, as Louis the +Eleventh wore in his cap; which when he had caused any that he feared, +or hated, to be killed, he would take it from his head and kiss it: +beseeching it to pardon him this one evil act more, and it should be +the last; which (as at other times) he did, when by the practice of a +cardinal and a falsified sacrament, he caused the Earl of Armagnac to +be stabbed to death: mockeries indeed fit to be used towards a leaden, +but not towards the ever-living God. But of this composition are all +devout lovers of the world, that they fear all that is dureless[17] +and ridiculous: they fear the plots and practises of their +opposites,[18] and their very whisperings: they fear the opinions +of men, which beat but upon shadows: they flatter and forsake the +prosperous and unprosperous, be they friends or kings: yea they dive +under water, like ducks, at every pebblestone, that is but thrown +toward them by a powerful hand: and on the contrary, they show an +obstinate and giant-like valor, against the terrible judgments of +the all-powerful God, yea they show themselves gods against God, and +slaves towards men; towards men whose bodies and consciences are alike +rotten. + +Now for the rest: If we truly examine the difference of both +conditions; to wit, of the rich and mighty, whom we call fortunate; +and of the poor and oppressed, whom we account wretched we shall find +the happiness of the one, and the miserable estate of the other, so +tied by God to the very instant, and both so subject to interchange +(witness the sudden downfall of the greatest princes, and the speedy +uprising of the meanest persons) as the one hath nothing so certain, +whereof to boast; nor the other so uncertain, whereof to bewail +itself. For there is no man so assured of his honor, of his riches, +health, or life; but that he may be deprived of either, or all, the +very next hour or day to come. "Quid vesper vehat, incertum est," +"What the evening will bring with it, it is uncertain." "And yet ye +cannot tell (saith St. James) what shall be tomorrow. Today he is set +up, and tomorrow he shall not be found; for he is turned into dust, +and his purpose perisheth." And although the air which compasseth +adversity be very obscure; yet therein we better discern God, than in +that shining light which environeth worldly glory; through which, for +the clearness thereof, there is no vanity which escapeth our sight. +And let adversity seem what it will; to happy men ridiculous, who make +themselves merry at other men's misfortunes; and to those under the +cross, grievous: yet this is true, that for all that is past, to the +very instant, the portions remaining are equal to either. For be it +that we have lived many years, "and (according to Solomon) in them all +we have rejoiced;" or be it that we have measured the same length of +days and therein have evermore sorrowed: yet looking back from our +present being, we find both the one and the other, to wit, the joy and +the woe, sailed out of sight; and death, which doth pursue us and hold +us in chase, from our infancy, hath gathered it. "Quicquid aetatis +retro est, mors tenet:" "Whatsoever of our age is past, death holds +it." So as whosoever he be, to whom Fortune hath been a servant, and +the Time a friend; let him but take the account of his memory (for we +have no other keeper of our pleasures past), and truly examine what it +hath reserved either beauty and youth, or foregone delights; what +it hath saved, that it might last, of his dearest affections, or of +whatever else the amorous springtime gave his thoughts of contentment, +then unvaluable; and he shall find that all the art which his elder +years have, can draw no other vapor out of these dissolutions, than +heavy, secret, and sad sighs. He shall find nothing remaining, but +those sorrows, which grow up after our fast-springing youth; overtake +it, when it is at a stand; and overtopped it utterly, when it begins +to wither: in so much as looking back from the very instant time, and +from our now being, the poor, diseased, and captive creature, hath as +little sense of all his former miseries and pains, as he, that is +most blessed in common opinions, hath of his fore-passed pleasure and +delights. For whatsoever is cast behind us, is just nothing: and what +is to come, deceitful hope hath it: "Omnia quae eventura sunt, in +incerto jacent."[19] Only those few black swans, I must except: who +having had the grace to value worldly vanities at no more than their +own price; do, by retaining the comfortable memory of a well acted +life, behold death without dread, and the grave without fear; and +embrace both, as necessary guides to endless glory. + +For myself, this is my consolation, and all that I can offer to +others, that the sorrows of this life are but of two sorts: whereof +the one hath respect to God, the other, to the world. In the first we +complain to God against ourselves, for our offences against Him; and +confess, "Et Tu Justus es in omnibus quae venerunt super nos." "And +Thou, O Lord, are just in all that hath befallen us." In the second we +complain to ourselves against God: as if he had done us wrong, either +in not giving us worldly goods and honors, answering our appetites: or +for taking them again from us having had them; forgetting that humble +and just acknowledgment of Job, "the Lord hath given, and the Lord +hath taken." To the first of which St. Paul hath promised blessedness; +to the second, death. And out of doubt he is either a fool, or +ungrateful to God, or both, that doth not acknowledge, how mean soever +his estate be, that the same is yet far greater than that which God +oweth him: or doth not acknowledge, how sharp soever his afflictions +be, that the same are yet far less, than those which are due unto +him. And if an heathen wise man call the adversities of the world +but "tributa vivendi," "the tributes of living;" a wise Christian man +ought to know them, and bear them, but as the tributes of offending. +He ought to bear them manlike, and resolvedly; and not as those +whining soldiers do, "qui gementes sequuntur imperatorem."[20] + +For seeing God, who is the author of all our tragedies, hath written +out for us and appointed us all the parts we are to play: and hath +not, in their distribution, been partial to the most mighty princes of +the world: that gave unto Darius the part of the greatest emperor, and +the part of the most miserable beggar, a beggar begging water of an +enemy, to quench the great drought of death: that appointed Bajazet +to play the Grand Signior of the Turks in the morning, and in the same +day the footstool of Tamerlane (both which parts Valerian had also +played, being taken by Sapores): that made Belisarius play the most +victorious captain, and lastly the part of a blind beggar: of which +examples many thousands may be produced: why should other men, who are +but as the least worms, complain of wrong? Certainly there is no other +account to be made of this ridiculous world, than to resolve, that +the change of fortune on the great theatre, is but as the change of +garments on the less. For when on the one and the other, every man +wears but his own skin, the players are all alike. Now, if any man +out of weakness prize the passages of this world otherwise (for saith +Petrarch, "Magni ingenii est revocare mentem a sensibus"[21]) it is by +reason of that unhappy phantasy of ours, which forgeth in the brains +of man all the miseries (the corporal excepted) whereunto he is +subject. Therein it is, that misfortunes and adversity work all that +they work. For seeing Death, in the end of the play, takes from all +whatsoever Fortune or Force takes from any one; it were a foolish +madness in the shipwreck of worldly things, where all sinks but the +sorrow, to save it. That were, as Seneca saith, "Fortunae succumbere, +quod tristius est omni fato:" "To fall under Fortune, of all other the +most miserable destiny." + +But it is now time to sound a retreat; and to desire to be excused of +this long pursuit: and withal, that the good intent, which hath moved +me to draw the picture of time past (which we call History) in so +large a table, may also be accepted in place of a better reason. + +The examples of divine providence, everywhere found (the first divine +histories being nothing else but a continuation of such examples) have +persuaded me to fetch my beginning from the beginning of all things: +to wit, Creation. For though these two glorious actions of the +Almighty be so near, and (as it were) linked together, that the one +necessarily implieth the other: Creation inferring Providence (for +what father forsaketh the child that he hath begotten?) and Providence +pre-supposing Creation: yet many of those that have seemed to excel in +worldly wisdom, have gone about to disjoin this coherence; the epicure +denying both Creation and Providence, but granting the world had a +beginning; the Aristotelian granting Providence, but denying both the +creation and the beginning. + +Now although this doctrine of faith, touching the creation in time +(for by faith we understand, that the world was made by the word of +God), be too weighty a work for Aristotle's rotten ground to bear +up, upon which he hath (notwithstanding) founded the defences and +fortresses of all his verbal doctrine: yet that the necessity of +infinite power, and the world's beginning, and the impossibility +of the contrary even in the judgment of natural reason, wherein he +believed, had not better informed him; it is greatly to be marvelled +at. And it is no less strange, that those men which are desirous of +knowledge (seeing Aristotle hath failed in this main point; and taught +little other than terms in the rest) have so retrenched their +minds from the following and overtaking of truth, and so absolutely +subjected themselves to the law of those philosophical principles; +as all contrary kind of teaching, in the search of causes, they have +condemned either for phantastical, or curious. Both doth it follow, +that the positions of heathen philosophers are undoubted grounds and +principles indeed, because so called? Or that _ipsi dixerunt_, doth +make them to be such? Certainly no. But this is true, that where +natural reason hath built anything so strong against itself, as the +same reason can hardly assail it, much less batter it down: the same +in every question of nature, and infinite power, may be approved for +a fundamental law of human knowledge. For saith Charron in his book of +wisdom, "Toute proposition humaine a autant d'authorite quel'autre, +si la raison n'on fait la difference;" "Every human proposition hath +equal authority, if reason make not the difference," the rest being +but the fables of principles. But hereof how shall the upright and +impartial judgment of man give a sentence, where opposition and +examination are not admitted to give in evidence? And to this purpose +it was well said of Lactantius, "Sapientiam sibi adimunt, qui sine +ullo judicio inventa maiorum probant, et ab aliis pecudum more +ducuntur:" "They neglect their own wisdom, who without any judgment +approve the invention of those that forewent them; and suffer +themselves after the manner of beasts, to be led by them;" by the +advantage of which sloth and dullness, ignorance is now become so +powerful a tyrant, as it hath set true philosophy, physics, and +divinity in a pillory; and written over the first, "Contra negantem +principia;"[22] over the second, "Virtus specifica;"[23] over the +third, "Ecclesta Romana."[24] + +But for myself, I shall never be persuaded, that God hath shut up all +light of learning within the lanthorn of Aristotle's brains: or that +it was ever said unto him, as unto Esdras, "_Accendam in corde tuo +Lucernam intellectus_";[25] that God hath given invention but to the +heathen, and that they only invaded nature, and found the strength +and bottom thereof; the same nature having consumed all her store, +and left nothing of price to after-ages. That these and these be +the causes of these and these effects, time hath taught us; and not +reason: and so hath experience without art. The cheese-wife knoweth it +as well as the philosopher, that sour rennet doth coagulate her milk +into a curd. But if we ask a reason of this cause, why the sourness +doth it? whereby it doth it? and the manner how? I think that there +is nothing to be found in vulgar philosophy, to satisfy this and many +other like vulgar questions. But man to cover his ignorance in the +least things, who can not give a true reason for the grass under his +feet, why it should be green rather than red, or of any other color; +that could never yet discover the way and reason of nature's working, +in those which are far less noble creatures than himself; who is far +more noble than the heavens themselves: "Man (saith Solomon) that +can hardly discern the things that are upon the earth, and with great +labor find out the things that are before us"; that hath so short a +time in the world, as he no sooner begins to learn, than to die; +that hath in his memory but borrowed knowledge; in his understanding, +nothing truly; that is ignorant of the essence of his own soul, and +which the wisest of the naturalists (if Aristotle be he) could never +so much as define, but by the action and effect, telling us what it +works (which all men knew as well as he) but not what it is, which +neither he, nor any else, doth know, but God that created it; ("For +though I were perfect, yet I know not my soul," saith Job). Man, I +say, that is but an idiot in the next cause of his own life, and in +the cause of all actions of his life, will (notwithstanding) examine +the art of God in creating the world; of God, who (saith Job) "is so +excellent as we know him not"; and examine the beginning of the work, +which had end before mankind had a beginning of being. He will disable +God's power to make a world, without matter to make it of. He will +rather give the motes of the air for a cause; cast the work on +necessity or chance; bestow the honor thereof on nature; make two +powers, the one to be the author of the matter, the other of the +form; and lastly, for want of a workman, have it eternal: which latter +opinion Aristotle, to make himself the author of a new doctrine, +brought into the world: and his Sectators[26] have maintained it; +"parati ac conjurati, quos sequuntur, philosophorum animis invictis +opiniones tueri."[27] For Hermes, who lived at once with, or +soon after Moses, Zoroaster, Musaeus, Orpheus, Linus, Anaximenes, +Anaxagoras, Empedocles, Melissus, Pherecydes, Thales, Cleanthes, +Pythagoras, Plato, and many other (whose opinions are exquisitely +gathered by Steuchius Eugubinus) found in the necessity of invincible +reason, "One eternal and infinite Being," to be the parent of the +universal. "Horum omnium sententia quamvis sit incerta, eodem tamen +spectat, ut Providentiam unam esse consentiant: sive enim natura, sive +aether, sive ratio, sive mens, sive fatalis necessitas, sive divina +lex; idem est quod a nobis dicitur Deus": "All these men's opinions +(saith Lactantius) though uncertain, come to this; That they agree +upon one Providence; whether the same be nature, or light, or reason, +or understanding, or destiny, or divine ordinance, that it is the same +which we call God." Certainly, as all the rivers in the world, though +they have divers risings, and divers runnings; though they sometimes +hide themselves for a while under ground, and seem to be lost in +sea-like lakes; do at last find, and fall into the great ocean: +so after all the searches that human capacity hath, and after all +philosophical contemplation and curiosity; in the necessity of this +infinite power, all the reason of man ends and dissolves itself. + +As for the others; the first touching those which conceive the matter +of the world to have been eternal, and that God did not create +the world "Exnihilo,"[28] but "ex materia praeexistente":[29] the +supposition is so weak, as is hardly worth the answering. For +(saith Eusebius) "Mihi videntur qui hoc dicunt, fortunam quoque Deo +annectere," "They seem unto me, which affirm this, to give part of the +work to God, and part to Fortune"; insomuch as if God had not found +this first matter by chance, He had neither been author nor father, +nor creator, nor lord of the universal. For were the matter or chaos +eternal, it then follows, that either this supposed matter did fit +itself to God, or God accommodate Himself to the matter. For the +first, it is impossible, that things without sense could proportion +themselves to the workman's will. For the second: it were horrible to +conceive of God, that as an artificer He applied himself, according to +the proportion of matter which He lighted upon. + +But let it be supposed, that this matter hath been made by any power, +not omnipotent, and infinitely wise; I would gladly learn how it came +to pass, that the same was proportionable to his intention, that was +omnipotent and infinitely wise; and no more, nor no less, than served +to receive the form of the universal. For, had it wanted anything of +what was sufficient; then must it be granted, that God created out of +nothing so much new matter, as served to finish the work of the world: +or had there been more of this matter than sufficed, then God did +dissolve and annihilate whatsoever remained and was superfluous. And +this must every reasonable soul confess, that it is the same work of +God alone, to create anything out of nothing, and by the same art +and power, and by none other, can those things, or any part of that +eternal matter, be again changed into nothing; by which those things, +that once were nothing, obtained a beginning of being. + +Again, to say that this matter was the cause of itself; this, of all +other, were the greatest idiotism. For, if it were the cause of itself +at any time; then there was also a time when itself was not: at +which time of not being, it is easy enough to conceive, that it could +neither procure itself, nor anything else. For to be, and not to be, +at once, is impossible. "Nihil autem seipsum praecedit, neque; seipsum +componit corpus": "There is nothing that doth precede itself, neither +do bodies compound themselves." + +For the rest, those that feign this matter to be eternal, must of +necessity confess, that infinite cannot be separate from eternity. And +then had infinite matter left no place for infinite form, but that +the first matter was finite, the form which it received proves it. For +conclusion of this part, whosoever will make choice, rather to believe +in eternal deformity, or in eternal dead matter, than in eternal light +and eternal life: let eternal death be his reward. For it is a madness +of that kind, as wanteth terms to express it. For what reason of man +(whom the curse of presumption hath not stupefied) hath doubted, that +infinite power (of which we can comprehend but a kind of shadow, "quia +comprehensio est intra terminos, qui infinito repugnant"[30]) hath +anything wanting in itself, either for matter of form; yea for as many +worlds (if such had been God's will) as the sea hath sands? For where +the power is without limitation, the work hath no other limitation, +than the workman's will. Yea reason itself finds it more easy for +infinite power to deliver from itself a finite world, without the help +of matter prepared; than for a finite man, a fool and dust, to change +the form of matter made to his hands. They are Dionysius his words, +"Deus in una existentia omnia praehabet"[31] and again, "Esse omnium +est ipsa divinitas, omne quod vides, et quod non vides",[32] to wit, +"causaliter",[33] or in better terms, "non tanquam forma, sed tanquam +causa universalis"[34] Neither hath the world universal closed up all +of God "For the most part of his works (saith Siracides) are hid". +Neither can the depth of his wisdom be opened, by the glorious work of +the world, which never brought to knowledge all it can, for then were +his infinite power bounded and made finite. And hereof it comes, That +we seldom entitle God the all-showing, or the all-willing, but the +Almighty, that is, infinitely able. + +But now for those, who from that ground, "that out of nothing, nothing +is made," infer the world's eternity, and yet not so savage therein, +as those are, which give an eternal being to dead matter, it is true +if the word (nothing) be taken in the affirmative, and the making, +imposed upon natural agents and finite power; that out of nothing, +nothing is made. But seeing their great doctor Aristotle himself +confesseth, "quod omnes antiqui decreverunt quasi quodam return +principium, ipsumque infinitum" "That all the ancient decree a kind +of beginning, and the same to be infinite"; and a little after, more +largely and plainly, "Principium eius est nullum, sed ipsum omnium +cernitur esse principium, ac omnia complecti ac regere",[35] it is +strange that this philosopher, with his followers, should rather make +choice out of falsehood, to conclude falsely, than out of truth, to +resolve truly. For if we compare the world universal, and all the +unmeasureable orbs of Heaven, and those marvellous bodies of the sun, +moon, and stars, with "ipsum infinitum": it may truly be said of them +all, which himself affirms of his imaginary "Materia prima,"[36] that +they are neither "quid, quale," nor "quantum "; and therefore to bring +finite (which hath no proportion with infinite) out of infinite ("qui +destruit omnem proportionem"[37]) is no wonder in God's power. And +therefore Anaximander, Melissus, and Empedocles, call the world +universal, but "particulam universitatis" and "infinitatis," a parcel +of that which is the universality and the infinity inself; and Plato, +but a shadow of God. But the other to prove the world's eternity, +urgeth this maxim, "that, a sufficient and effectual cause being +granted, an answerable effect thereof is also granted": inferring that +God being forever a sufficient and effectual cause of the world, the +effect of the cause should also have been forever; to wit, the world +universal. But what a strange mockery is this in so great a master, +to confess a sufficient and effectual cause of the world, (to wit, +an almighty God) in his antecedent; and the same God to be a God +restrained in his conclusion; to make God free in power, and bound in +will; able to effect, unable to determine; able to make all things, +and yet unable to make choice of the time when? For this were +impiously to resolve of God, as of natural necessity; which hath +neither choice, nor will, nor understanding; which cannot but work +matter being present: as fire, to burn things combustible. Again he +thus disputeth, that every agent which can work, and doth not work, +if it afterward work, it is either thereto moved by itself, or by +somewhat else: and so it passeth from power to act. But God (saith he) +is immovable, and is neither moved by himself, nor by any other: but +being always the same, doth always work. Whence he concludeth, if the +world were caused by God, that he was forever the cause thereof: and +therefore eternal. The answer to this is very easy, for that God's +performing in due time that which he ever determined at length to +perform, doth not argue any alteration or change, but rather constancy +in him. For the same action of his will, which made the world forever, +did also withhold the effect to the time ordained. To this answer, in +itself sufficient, others add further, that the pattern or image +of the world may be said to be eternal: which the Platonics call +"spiritualem mundum"[38] and do in this sort distinguish the idea +and creation in time. "Spiritualis ille mundus, mundi huius exemplar, +primumque Dei opus, vita aequali est architecto, fuit semper cum illo, +eritque semper. Mundus autem corporalis, quod secundum opus est Dei, +decedit iam ab opifice ex parte una, quia non fuit semper: retinet +alteram, quia sit semper futurus": "That representative, or the +intentional world (say they) the sampler of this visible world, the +first work of God, was equally ancient with the architect; for it was +forever with him, and ever shall be. This material world, the second +work or creature of God, doth differ from the worker in this, that it +was not from everlasting, and in this it doth agree, that it shall +be forever to come." The first point, that it was not forever, all +Christians confess: the other they understand no otherwise, than that +after the consummation of this world, there shall be a new Heaven and +a new earth, without any new creation of matter. But of these things +we need not here stand to argue; though such opinions be not unworthy +the propounding, in this consideration, of an eternal and unchangeable +cause, producing a changeable and temporal effect. Touching which +point Proclus the Platonist disputeth, that the compounded essence of +the world (and because compounded, therefore dissipable) is continued, +and knit to the Divine Being, by an individual and inseparable power, +flowing from Divine unity; and that the world's natural appetite of +God showeth, that the same proceedeth from a good and understanding +divine; and that this virtue, by which the world is continued and knit +together, must be infinite, that it may infinitely and everlastingly +continue and preserve the same. Which infinite virtue, the finite +world (saith he) is not capable of, but receiveth it from the divine +infinite, according to the temporal nature it hath, successively every +moment by little and little; even as the whole material world is not +altogether: but the abolished parts are departed by small degrees, and +the parts yet to come, do by the same small degrees succeed; as the +shadow of a tree in a river seemeth to have continued the same a long +time in the water, but it is perpetually renewed, in the continual +ebbing and flowing thereof. + +But to return to them, which denying that ever the world had any +beginning, withal deny that ever it shall have any end, and to this +purpose affirm, that it was never heard, never read, never seen, +no not by any reason perceived, that the heavens have ever suffered +corruption; or that they appear any way the older by continuance; or +in any sort otherwise than they were; which had they been subject to +final corruption, some change would have been discerned in so long a +time. To this it is answered, that the little change as yet perceived, +doth rather prove their newness, and that they have not continued +so long; than that they will continue forever as they are. And if +conjectural arguments may receive answer by conjectures; it then +seemeth that some alteration may be found. For either Aristotle, +Pliny, Strabo, Beda, Aquinas, and others, were grossly mistaken; or +else those parts of the world lying within the burnt zone, were not in +elder times habitable, by reason of the sun's heat, neither were the +seas, under the equinoctial, navigable. But we know by experience, +that those regions, so situate, are filled with people, and exceeding +temperate; and the sea, over which we navigate, passable enough. We +read also many histories of deluges: and how in the time of Phaeton, +divers places in the world were burnt up, by the sun's violent heat. + +But in a word, this observation is exceeding feeble. For we know it +for certain, that stone walls, of matter mouldering and friable, have +stood two, or three thousand years; that many things have been digged +up out of the earth, of that depth, as supposed to have been buried +by the general flood; without any alteration either of substance or +figure: yea it is believed, and it is very probable, that the gold +which is daily found in mines, and rocks, under ground, was created +together with the earth. + +And if bodies elementary, and compounded, the eldest times have not +invaded and corrupted: what great alteration should we look for in +celestial and quint-essential bodies? And yet we have reason to think, +that the sun, by whose help all creatures are generate, doth not +in these latter ages assist nature, as heretofore. We have neither +giants, such as the eldest world had; nor mighty men, such as the +elder world had; but all things in general are reputed of less virtue +which from the heavens receive virtue. Whence, if the nature of a +preface would permit a larger discourse, we might easily fetch store +of proof; as that this world shall at length have end, as that once it +had beginning. + +And I see no good answer that can be made to this objection: if the +world were eternal, why not all things in the world eternal? If there +were no first, no cause, no father, no creator, no incomprehensible +wisdom, but that every nature had been alike eternal; and man more +rational than every other nature: why had not the eternal reason of +man provided for his eternal being in the world? For if all were +equal why not equal conditions to all? Why should heavenly bodies live +forever; and the bodies of men rot and die? + +Again, who was it that appointed the earth to keep the center, and +gave order that it should hang in the air: that the sun should travel +between the tropics, and never exceed those bounds, nor fail to +perform that progress once in every year: the moon to live by borrowed +light; the fixed stars (according to common opinion) to be fastened +like nails in a cartwheel; and the planets to wander at their +pleasure? Or if none of these had power over other: was it out of +charity and love, that the sun by his perpetual travel within these +two circles, hath visited, given light unto, and relieved all parts +of the earth, and the creatures therein, by turns and times? Out +of doubt, if the sun have of his own accord kept this course in all +eternity, he may justly be called eternal charity and everlasting +love. The same may be said of all the stars; who being all of them +most large and clear fountains of virtue and operation, may also, be +called eternal virtues: the earth may be called eternal patience; the +moon, an eternal borrower and beggar; and man of all other the most +miserable, eternally mortal. And what were this, but to believe again +in the old play of the gods? Yea in more gods by millions, than ever +Hesiodus dreamed of. But instead of this mad folly, we see it well +enough with our feeble and mortal eyes; and the eyes of our reason +discern it better; that the sun, moon, stars, and the earth, are +limited bounded, and constrained: themselves they have not constrained +nor could. "Omne determinatum causam habet aliquam efficientem, quae +illud determinaverit:" "Everything bounded hath some efficient cause, +by which it is bounded." + +Now for Nature; as by the ambiguity of this name, the school of +Aristotle hath both commended many errors unto us, and sought also +thereby to obscure the glory of the high moderator of all things, +shining in the creation, and in the governing of the world: so if the +best definition be taken out of the second of Aristotle's "Physics," +or "primo de Coelo," or out of the fifth of his "Metaphysics"; I +say that the best is but nominal, and serving only to difference the +beginning of natural motion from artificial: which yet the Academics +open better, when they call it "a seminary strength, infused into +matter by the soul of the world": who give the first place to +Providence, the second to Fate, and but the third to Nature. +"Providentia" (by which they understand God) "dux et caput; Fatum, +medium ex providentia prodiens; Natura postremum"[39] But be it what +he will, or be it any of these (God excepted) or participating of all: +yet that it hath choice or understanding (both which are necessarily +in the cause of all things) no man hath avowed. For this is +unanswerable of Lactantius, "Is autem facit aliquid, qui aut +voluntatem faciendi habet, aut scientiam:" "He only can be said to be +the doer of a thing, that hath either will or knowledge in the doing +it." + +But the will and science of Nature, are in these words truly expressed +by Ficinus: "Potest ubique Natura, vel per diversa media, vel ex +diversis materiis, diversa facere: sublata vero mediorum materiatumque +diversitate, vel unicum, vel similimum operatur, neque potest +quando adest materia non operari"; "It is the power of Nature by the +diversity of means, or out of diversity of matter, to produce divers +things: but taking away the diversity of means, and the diversity of +matter, it then works but one or the like work; neither can it but +work, matter being present." Now if Nature made choice of diversity of +matter, to work all these variable works of heaven and earth, it had +then both understanding and will; it had counsel to begin; reason to +dispose; virtue and knowledge to finish, and power to govern: without +which all things had been but one and the same: all of the matter of +heaven; or all of the matter of earth. And if we grant Nature this +will, and this understanding, this course, reason, and power: "Cur +Natura potius quam Deus nominetur?" "Why should we then call such a +cause rather Nature, than God?" "God, of whom all men have notion, +and give the first and highest place to divine power": "Omnes homines +notionem deorum habent, omnesque summun locum divino cuidam numini +assignant." And this I say in short; that it is a true effect of true +reason in man (were there no authority more binding than reason) +to acknowledge and adore the first and most sublime power. "Vera +philosophia, est ascensus ab his quae fluunt, et oriuntur, et +occidunt, ad ea quae vera sunt, et semper eadem": "True philosophy, is +an ascending from the things which flow, and arise, and fall, to the +things that are forever the same." + +For the rest; I do also account it not the meanest, but an impiety +monstrous, to confound God and Nature; be it but in terms. For it is +God, that only disposeth of all things according to His own will, and +maketh of one earth, vessels of honor and dishonor. It is Nature +that can dispose of nothing, but according to the will of the matter +wherein it worketh. It is God that commandeth all: it is Nature that +is obedient to all: it is God that doth good unto all, knowing and +loving the good He doth: It is Nature, that secondarily doth also +good, but it neither knoweth nor loveth the good it doth. It is God, +that hath all things in Himself: Nature, nothing in itself. It is God, +which is the Father, and hath begotten all things: it is Nature, which +is begotten by all things, in which it liveth and laboreth; for by +itself it existeth not. For shall we say, that it is out of affection +to the earth, that heavy things fall towards it? Shall we call it +reason, which doth conduct every river into the salt sea? Shall +we term it knowledge in fire, that makes it to consume combustible +matter? If it be affection, reason, and knowledge in these; by the +same affection, reason, and knowledge it is, that Nature worketh. +And therefore seeing all things work as they do, (call it by Form, or +Nature, or by what you please) yet because they work by an impulsion, +which they cannot resist, or by a faculty, infused by the supremest +power; we are neither to wonder at, nor to worship, the faculty that +worketh, nor the creature wherein it worketh. But herein lies the +wonder: and to him is the worship due, who hath created such a nature +in things, and such a faculty, as neither knowing itself, the matter +wherein it worketh, nor the virtue and power which it hath; do yet +work all things to their last and uttermost perfection. And therefore +every reasonable man, taking to himself for a ground that which is +granted by all antiquity, and by all men truly learned that ever the +world had; to wit; that there is a power infinite, and eternal (which +also necessity doth prove unto us, without the help of faith, and +reason; without the force of authority) all things do as easily +follow which have been delivered by divine letters, as the waters of +a running river do successfully pursue each other from the first +fountains. + +This much I say it is, that reason itself hath taught us: and this is +the beginning of knowledge. "Sapientia praecedit, Religio sequitur: +quia prius est Deum scire, consequens colere"; "Sapience goes before, +Religion follows: because it is first to know God, and then to worship +Him." This sapience Plato calleth "absoluti boni scientiam," "the +science of the absolute good": and another "scientiam rerum primarum, +sempiternarum, perpetuarum"[40] For "faith (saith Isidore) is not +extorted by violence; but by reason and examples persuaded": "fides +nequaquam vi extorquetur, sed ratione et exemplis suadetur." I confess +it, that to inquire further, as to the essence of God, of His power, +of His art, and by what means He created the world: or of His secret +judgment, and the causes, is not an effect of reason. "Sed cum ratione +insaniunt," but "they grow mad with reason," that inquire after it. +For as it is no shame, nor dishonor (saith a French author) "de faire +arrest au but qu'on nasceu surpasser," "for a man to rest himself +there where he finds it impossible to pass on further": so whatsoever +is beyond, and out of the reach of true reason, it acknowledged it to +be so; as understanding itself not to be infinite, but according to +the name and nature it hath, to be a teacher, that best knows the end +of his own art. For seeing both reason and necessity teach us (reason, +which is "pars divini spiritus in corpus humanum mersi"[41]) that the +world was made by a power infinite; and yet how it was made, it cannot +teach us: and seeing the same reason and necessity make us know, +that the same infinite power is everywhere in the world; and yet how +everywhere, it cannot inform us: our belief hereof is not weakened, +but greatly strengthened, by our ignorance, because it is the same +reason that tells us, that such a nature cannot be said to be God, +that can be in all conceived by man. + +I have already been over-long, to make any large discourse either of +the parts of the following story, or in mine own excuse: especially in +the excuse of this or that passage; seeing the whole is exceeding +weak and defective. Among the grossest, the unsuitable division of +the books, I could not know how to excuse, had I not been directed to +enlarge the building after the foundation was laid, and the first +part finished. All men know that there is no great art in the dividing +evenly of these things, which are subject to number and measure. For +the rest, it suits well enough with a great many books of this +age, which speak too much, and yet say little; "Ipsi nobis furto +subducimur"; "We are stolen away from ourselves," setting a high price +on all that is our own. But hereof, though a late good writer make +complaint, yet shall it not lay hold on me, because I believe as he +doth; that who so thinks himself the wisest man, is but a poor and +miserable ignorant. Those that are the best men of war against all +the vanities and fooleries of the world, do always keep the strongest +guards against themselves, to defend them from themselves; from +self-love, self-estimation, and self-opinion. + +Generally concerning the order of the work, I have only taken counsel +from the argument. For of the Assyrians, which after the downfall of +Babel take up the first part, and were the first great kings of +the world, there came little to the view of posterity: some few +enterprises, greater in fame than faith, of Ninus and Semiramis, +excepted. + +It was the story of the Hebrews, of all before the Olympiads, that +overcame the consuming disease of time, and preserved itself, from the +very cradle and beginning to this day: and yet not so entire, but +that the large discourses thereof (to which in many Scriptures we are +referred) are nowhere found. The fragments of other stories, with the +actions of those kings and princes which shot up here and there in the +same time, I am driven to relate by way of digression: of which we may +say with Virgil: "Apparent rari nantes in gurgite vasto"; "They appear +here and there floating in the great gulf of time." + +To the same first ages do belong the report of many inventions therein +found, and from them derived to us; though most of the authors' names +have perished in so long a navigation. For those ages had their laws; +they had diversity of government; they had kingly rule; nobility; +policy in war; navigation, and all, or the most of needful trades. To +speak therefore of these (seeing in a general history we should have +left a great deal of nakedness, by their omission) it cannot properly +be called a digression. True it is, that I have made also many others: +which if they shall be laid to my charge, I must cast the fault into +the great heap of human error. For seeing we digress in all the +ways of our lives: yea, seeing the life of man is nothing else but +digression; I may the better be excused, in writing their lives and +actions. I am not altogether ignorant in the laws of history and of +the kinds. + +The same hath been taught by many, but no man better, and with greater +brevity, than by that excellent learned gentleman, Sir Francis Bacon. +Christian laws are also taught us by the prophets and apostles; and +every day preached unto us. But we still make large digressions: yea, +the teachers themselves do not (in all) keep the path which they point +out to others. + +For the rest, after such time as the Persians had wrested the Empire +from the Chaldeans, and had raised a great monarchy, producing actions +of more importance than were elsewhere to be found; it was agreeable +to the order of the story, to attend this Empire; whilst it so +flourished, that the affairs of the nations adjoining had reference +thereunto. The like observance was to be used towards the fortunes of +Greece, when they again began to get ground upon the Persians; as also +towards the affairs of Rome, when the Romans grew more mighty than the +Greeks. + +As for the Medes, the Macedonians, the Sicilians, the Carthaginians, +and other nations who resisted the beginnings of the former empires, +and afterwards became but parts of their composition and enlargement; +it seemed best to remember what was known of them from their several +beginnings, in such times and places as they in their flourishing +estates opposed those monarchies, which in the end swallowed them up. +And herein I have followed the best geographers: who seldom give +names to those small brooks, whereof many, joined together, make great +rivers: till such times as they become united, and run in main stream +to the ocean sea. If the phrase be weak, and the style not everywhere +like itself: the first shows their legitimation and true parent; the +second will excuse itself upon the variety of matter. For Virgil, who +wrote his _Eclogues_, "gracili avena,"[42] used stronger pipes, when +he sounded the wars of Aeneas. It may also be laid to my charge, that +I use divers Hebrew words in my first book, and elsewhere: in which +language others may think and I myself acknowledge it, that I am +altogether ignorant: but it is true, that some of them I find in +Montanus, others in Latin characters in S. Senensis; and of the rest I +have borrowed the interpretation of some of my friends. But say I had +been beholding to neither, yet were it not to be wondered at, having +had an eleven years' leisure, to attain the knowledge of that, or of +any other tongue; howsoever, I know that it will be said by many, that +I might have been more pleasing to the reader, if I had written the +story of mine own times, having been permitted to draw water as near +the well-head as another. To this I answer, that whosoever in writing +a modern history, shall follow truth too near the heels, it may haply +strike out his teeth. There is no mistress or guide, that hath led her +followers and servants into greater miseries. He that goes after her +too far off, loseth her sight, and loseth himself: and he that walks +after her at a middle distance: I know not whether I should call that +kind of course, temper,[43] or baseness. It is true, that I never +travelled after men's opinions, when I might have made the best use +of them: and I have now too few days remaining, to imitate those, that +either out of extreme ambition, or of extreme cowardice, or both, do +yet (when death hath them on his shoulders) flatter the world, between +the bed and the grave. It is enough for me (being in that state I am) +to write of the eldest times: wherein also why may it not be said, +that in speaking of the past, I point at the present, and tax the +vices of those that are yet living, in their persons that are long +since dead; and have it laid to my charge? But this I cannot help, +though innocent. And certainly, if there be any, that finding +themselves spotted like the tigers of old time, shall find fault with +me for painting them over anew, they shall therein accuse themselves +justly, and me falsely. + +For I protest before the Majesty of God, that I malice no man under +the sun. Impossible I know it is to please all; seeing few or none are +so pleased with themselves, or so assured of themselves, by reason of +their subjection to their private passions, but that they seem divers +persons in one and the same day. Seneca hath said it, and so do I: +"Unus mihi pro populo erat";[44] and to the same effect Epicurus, "Hoc +ego non multis sed tibi";[45] or (as it hath since lamentably fallen +out) I may borrow the resolution of an ancient philosopher, "Satis +est unus, satis est nullus."[46] For it was for the service of that +inestimable Prince Henry, the successive hope, and one of the greatest +of the Christian world, that I undertook this work. It pleased him to +peruse some part thereof, and to pardon what was amiss. It is now left +to the world without a master: from which all that is presented, hath +received both blows and thanks: "Eadem probamus, eadem reprehendimus: +hic exitus est omnis judicii, in quolis secundum plures datur."[47] +But these discourses are idle. I know that as the charitable will +judge charitably: so against those, "Qui gloriantur in malitia,"[48] +my present adversity hath disarmed me, I am on the ground already, +and therefore have not far to fall: and for rising again, as in the +natural privation there is no recession to habit; so it is seldom seen +in the privation politic. I do therefore forbear to style my readers +gentle, courteous, and friendly, thereby to beg their good opinions, +or to promise a second and third volume (which I also intend) if the +first receive grace and good acceptance. For that which is already +done, may be thought enough, and too much: and it is certain, let us +claw the reader with never so many courteous phrases, yet shall we +evermore be thought fools, that write foolishly. For conclusion, all +the hope I have lies in this, that I have already found more ungentle +and uncourteous readers of my love towards them, and well-deserving of +them, than ever I shall do again. For had it been otherwise, I should +hardly have had this leisure, to have made myself a fool in print. + + +[Footnote A: A sketch of the life of Raleigh will be found prefixed to +his "Discovery of Guiana" in the volume of "Voyages and Travels". +His "History of the World" was written during his imprisonment in +the Tower of London, which lasted from 1603 to 1616. The Preface +is interesting not only as a fine piece of Elizabethan prose but as +exhibiting the attitude toward history, and the view of the relation +of history to religion and philosophy, which characterized one who +represented with exceptional vigor the typical Elizabethan man of +action and who was also a man of thought and imagination.] + +[Footnote 1: Queen Elizabeth] + +[Footnote 2: "An ill opinion, honorably acquired, is pleasing."] + +[Footnote 3: "So you not to yourselves."] + +[Footnote 4: "He increased, with the result that he is oppressed by +his greatness."] + +[Footnote 5: "The insult done in scorning her beauty."] + +[Footnote 6: "God gave to Solomon largeness of heart."--1 Kings iv. +89.] + +[Footnote 7: Step. Pasquiere, Recherches, lib. v. cap. i.] + +[Footnote 8: Step-mother.] + +[Footnote 9: i.e., Protestantism] + +[Footnote 10: Instantly.] + +[Footnote 11: Dispossessed.] + +[Footnote 12: "Nothing hindering."] + +[Footnote 13: "That they are wise in a foolish matter."--Lactantius, +_De falsa sapientia_, 3, 29.] + +[Footnote 14: Augustine, _De cura pro morte_.] + +[Footnote 15: "Wealth acquired without fraud."] + +[Footnote 16: "O how many go down with this hope to endless labors and +wars."] + +[Footnote 17: Transient.] + +[Footnote 18: Opponents.] + +[Footnote 19: "Everything which is to come lies in uncertainty."] + +[Footnote 20: "Who follow their commander with groans."] + +[Footnote 21: "It takes great genius to call back the mind from the +senses."] + +[Footnote 22: "Against him who denies the principles."] + +[Footnote 23: "Specific virtue, or power."] + +[Footnote 24: "The Roman Church."] + +[Footnote 25: "I shall light a lamp of understanding in thine +heart."--IV. Esdras xiv. 25.] + +[Footnote 26: Followers.] + +[Footnote 27: "Prepared and sworn to protect with unconquered minds +the opinions of the philosophers whom they follow."] + +[Footnote 28: "Out of nothing."] + +[Footnote 29: "Out of pre-existing matter."] + +[Footnote 30: "Because comprehension is between limits, which are +opposed to infinity."] + +[Footnote 31: "God exhibits all things in one existence"] + +[Footnote 32: "The essence of all things, visible and invisible, is +divinity itself"] + +[Footnote 33: "Causally."] + +[Footnote 34: "Not as form, but as universal cause"] + +[Footnote 35: "It [i.e., the infinite] has no beginning, but itself is +perceived to be the beginning of all things, and to embrace and govern +all things."] + +[Footnote 36: "Primal matter."] + +[Footnote 37: "Which destroys all proportion."] + +[Footnote 38: "The spiritual world."] + +[Footnote 39: "Providence, leader and head; Fate, in the middle and +proceeding from Providence; Nature, last."] + +[Footnote 40: "The science of things first, eternal, perpetual."] + +[Footnote 41: "Part of the divine spirit immersed in the human body."] + +[Footnote 42: "With delicate pipe."] + +[Footnote 43: Moderation] + +[Footnote 44: "To me one man stood for the people."] + +[Footnote 45: "I [have done] this not for many, but for thee."] + +[Footnote 46: "One is enough, none is enough."] + +[Footnote 47: "We approve the same things, we blame the same +things--this is the result in every case in which the verdict is +rendered according to the majority."] + +[Footnote 48: "Who glory in malice"] + + + + +PROOEMIUM, EPISTLE DEDICATORY, PREFACE, AND PLAN OF THE INSTAURATIO +MAGNA, ETC. + +BY FRANCIS BACON[A] + +FRANCIS OF VERULAM REASONED THUS WITH HIMSELF, + +AND JUDGED IT TO BE FOR THE INTEREST OF THE PRESENT AND FUTURE +GENERATIONS THAT THEY SHOULD BE MADE ACQUAINTED WITH HIS THOUGHTS + + +Being convinced that the human intellect makes its own difficulties, +not using the true helps which are at man's disposal soberly and +judiciously; whence follows manifold ignorance of things, and by +reason of that ignorance mischiefs innumerable; he thought all trial +should be made, whether that commerce between the mind of man and the +nature of things, which is more precious than anything on earth, or +at least than anything that is of the earth, might by any means be +restored to its perfect and original condition, or if that may not be, +yet reduced to a better condition than that in which it now is. Now +that the errors which have hitherto prevailed, and which will prevail +forever, should (if the mind be left to go its own way), either by +the natural force of the understanding or by help of the aids and +instruments of Logic, one by one correct themselves, was a thing not +to be hoped for: because the primary notions of things which the mind +readily and passively imbibes, stores up, and accumulates (and it is +from them that all the rest flow) are false, confused, and overhastily +abstracted from the facts; nor are the secondary and subsequent +notions less arbitrary and inconstant; whence it follows that the +entire fabric of human reason which we employ in the inquisition of +nature, is badly put together and built up, and like some magnificent +structure without any foundation. For while men are occupied in +admiring and applauding the false powers of the mind, they pass by and +throw away those true powers, which, if it be supplied with the proper +aids and can itself be content to wait upon nature instead of vainly +affecting to overrule her, are within its reach. There was but one +course left, therefore,--to try the whole thing anew upon a better +plan, and to commence a total reconstruction of sciences, arts, and +all human knowledge, raised upon the proper foundations. And this, +though in the project and undertaking it may seem a thing infinite and +beyond the powers of man, yet when it comes to be dealt with it will +be found sound and sober, more so than what has been done hitherto. +For of this there is some issue; whereas in what is now done in the +matter of science there is only a whirling round about, and perpetual +agitation, ending where it began. And although he was well aware how +solitary an enterprise it is, and how hard a thing to win faith and +credit for, nevertheless he was resolved not to abandon either it or +himself; nor to be deterred from trying and entering upon that one +path which is alone open to the human mind. For better it is to make +a beginning of that which may lead to something, than to engage in +a perpetual struggle and pursuit in courses which have no exit. And +certainly the two ways of contemplation are much like those two ways +of action, so much celebrated, in this--that the one, arduous and +difficult in the beginning, leads out at last into the open +country; while the other, seeming at first sight easy and free from +obstruction, leads to pathless and precipitous places. + +Moreover, because he knew not how long it might be before these things +would occur to any one else, judging especially from this, that he +has found no man hitherto who has applied his mind to the like, he +resolved to publish at once so much as he has been able to complete. +The cause of which haste was not ambition for himself, but solicitude +for the work; that in case of his death there might remain some +outline and project of that which he had conceived, and some evidence +likewise of his honest mind and inclination towards the benefit of the +human race. Certain it is that all other ambition whatsoever seemed +poor in his eyes compared with the work which he had in hand; seeing +that the matter at issue is either nothing, or a thing so great that +it may well be content with its own merit, without seeking other +recompence. + + +[Footnote A: A sketch of Bacon's life will be found prefixed to his +"Essays" in another volume of the Harvard Classics. His "Instauratio +Magna" or "Great Renewal," the great work by which he hoped to create +a scientific revolution and deliver mankind from Aristotelianism, was +left far from complete; but the nature of his scheme and the scale +on which it was planned are indicated in these Prefaces, which are +typical both of the man and of the age in which he lived.] + + + + +EPISTLE DEDICATORY + +TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +TO OUR MOST GRACIOUS AND MIGHTY PRINCE AND LORD + +JAMES + +BY THE GRACE OF GOD OF GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE AND IRELAND KING, +DEFENDER OF THE FAITH, ETC. + +_Most Gracious and Mighty King_, + + +Your Majesty may perhaps accuse me of larceny, having stolen from your +affairs so much time as was required for this work. I know not what to +say for myself. For of time there can be no restitution, unless it be +that what has been abstracted from your business may perhaps go to the +memory of your name and the honour of your age; if these things are +indeed worth anything. Certainly they are quite new; totally new in +their very kind: and yet they are copied from a very ancient model; +even the world itself and the nature of things and of the mind. And to +say truth, I am wont for my own part to regard this work as a child of +time rather than of wit; the only wonder being that the first notion +of the thing, and such great suspicions concerning matters long +established, should have come into any man's mind. All the rest +follows readily enough. And no doubt there is something of accident +(as we call it) and luck as well in what men think as in what they do +or say. But for this accident which I speak of, I wish that if +there be any good in what I have to offer, it may be ascribed to +the infinite mercy and goodness of God, and to the felicity of your +Majesty's times; to which as I have been an honest and affectionate +servant in my life, so after my death I may yet perhaps, through the +kindling of this new light in the darkness of philosophy, be the means +of making this age famous to posterity; and surely to the times of the +wisest and most learned of kings belongs of right the regeneration +and restoration of the sciences. Lastly, I have a request to make--a +request no way unworthy of your Majesty, and which especially concerns +the work in hand; namely, that you who resemble Solomon in so many +things--in the gravity of your judgments, in the peacefulness of your +reign, in the largeness of your heart, in the noble variety of the +books which you have composed--would further follow his example +in taking order for the collecting and perfecting of a Natural and +Experimental History, true and severe (unincumbered with literature +and book-learning), such as philosophy may be built upon,--such, in +fact, as I shall in its proper place describe: that so at length, +after the lapse of so many ages, philosophy and the sciences may no +longer float in air, but rest on the solid foundation of experience +of every kind, and the same well examined and weighed. I have provided +the machine, but the stuff must be gathered from the facts of nature. +May God Almighty long preserve your Majesty! + + Your Majesty's + Most bounden and devoted Servant, + FRANCIS VERULAM, + Chancellor. + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +_That the state of knowledge is not prosperous nor greatly advancing; +and that a way must be opened for the human understanding entirely +different from any hitherto known, and other helps provided, in order +that the mind may exercise over the nature of things the authority +which properly belongs to it._ + + +It seems to me that men do not rightly understand either their store +or their strength, but overrate the one and underrate the other. Hence +it follows, that either from an extravagant estimate of the value of +the arts which they possess, they seek no further; or else from too +mean an estimate of their own powers, they spend their strength in +small matters and never put it fairly to the trial in those which +go to the main. These are as the pillars of fate set in the path of +knowledge; for men have neither desire nor hope to encourage them +to penetrate further. And since opinion of store is one of the chief +causes of want, and satisfaction with the present induces neglect +of provision for the future, it becomes a thing not only useful, but +absolutely necessary, that the excess of honour and admiration with +which our existing stock of inventions is regarded be in the very +entrance and threshold of the work, and that frankly and without +circumlocution, stripped off, and men be duly warned not to exaggerate +or make too much of them. For let a man look carefully into all that +variety of books with which the arts and sciences abound, he will +find everywhere endless repetitions of the same thing, varying in the +method of treatment, but not new in substance, insomuch that the whole +stock, numerous as it appears at first view, proves on examination to +be but scanty. And for its value and utility it must be plainly avowed +that that wisdom which we have derived principally from the Greeks is +but like the boyhood of knowledge, and has the characteristic property +of boys; it can talk, but it cannot generate; for it is fruitful of +controversies but barren of works. So that the state of learning as +it now is appears to be represented to the life in the old fable of +Scylla, who had the head and face of a virgin, but her womb was hung +round with barking monsters, from which she could not be delivered. +For in like manner the sciences to which we are accustomed have +certain general positions which are specious and flattering; but +as soon as they come to particulars, which are as the parts of +generation, when they should produce fruit and works, then arise +contentions and barking disputations, which are the end of the matter +and all the issue they can yield. Observe also, that if sciences of +this kind had any life in them, that could never have come to pass +which has been the case now for many ages--that they stand almost at +a stay, without receiving any augmentations worthy of the human race; +insomuch that many times not only what was asserted once is asserted +still, but what was a question once is a question still, and instead +of being resolved by discussion is only fixed and fed; and all the +tradition and succession of schools is still a succession of masters +and scholars, not of inventors and those who bring to further +perfection the things invented. In the mechanical arts we do not find +it so; they, on the contrary, as having in them some breath of life, +are continually growing and becoming more perfect. As originally +invented they are commonly rude, clumsy, and shapeless; afterwards +they acquire new powers and more commodious arrangements and +constructions; in so far that men shall sooner leave the study and +pursuit of them and turn to something else, than they arrive at the +ultimate perfection of which they are capable. Philosophy and the +intellectual sciences, on the contrary, stand like statues, worshiped +and celebrated, but not moved or advanced. Nay, they sometimes +flourish most in the hands of the first author, and afterwards +degenerate. For when men have once made over their judgments to +others' keeping, and (like those senators whom they called _Pedarii_) +have agreed to support some one person's opinion, from that time +they make no enlargement of the sciences themselves, but fall to +the servile office of embellishing certain individual authors and +increasing their retinue. And let it not be said that the sciences +have been growing gradually till they have at last reached their full +stature, and so (their course being completed) have settled in the +works of a few writers; and that there being now no room for the +invention of better, all that remains is to embellish and cultivate +those things which have been invented already. Would it were so! But +the truth is that this appropriating of the sciences has its origin in +nothing better than the confidence of a few persons and the sloth +and indolence of the rest. For after the sciences had been in several +parts perhaps cultivated and handled diligently, there has risen up +some man of bold disposition, and famous for methods and short ways +which people like, who has in appearance reduced them to an art, while +he has in fact only spoiled all that the others had done. And yet this +is what posterity like, because it makes the work short and easy, and +saves further inquiry, of which they are weary and impatient. And if +any one take this general acquiescence and consent for an argument +of weight, as being the judgment of Time, let me tell him that the +reasoning on which he relies is most fallacious and weak. For, first, +we are far from knowing all that in the matter of sciences and arts +has in various ages and places been brought to light and published; +much less, all that has been by private persons secretly attempted +and stirred, so neither the births nor the miscarriages of Time are +entered in our records. Nor, secondly, is the consent itself and +the time it has continued a consideration of much worth. For however +various are the forms of civil politics, there is but one form of +polity in the sciences; and that always has been and always will be +popular. Now the doctrines which find most favour with the populace +are those which are either contentious and pugnacious, or specious +and empty; such, I say, as either entangle assent or tickle it. And +therefore no doubt the greatest wits in each successive age have been +forced out of their own course, men of capacity and intellect above +the vulgar having been fain, for reputation's sake, to bow to the +judgment of the time and the multitude; and thus if any contemplations +of a higher order took light anywhere, they were presently blown out +by the winds of vulgar opinions. So that Time is like a river, which +has brought down to us things light and puffed up, while those which +are weighty and solid have sunk. Nay, those very authors who have +usurped a kind of dictatorship in the sciences and taken upon them to +lay down the law with such confidence, yet when from time to time they +come to themselves again, they fall to complaints of the subtlety +of nature, the hiding-places of truth, the obscurity of things, +the entanglement of causes, the weakness of the human mind; wherein +nevertheless they show themselves never the more modest, seeing that +they will rather lay the blame upon the common condition of man +and nature than upon themselves. And then whatever any art fails to +attain, they ever set it down upon the authority of that art itself as +impossible of attainment; and how can art be found guilty when it is +judge in its own cause? So it is but a device for exempting ignorance +from ignominy. Now for those things which are delivered and received, +this is their condition: barren of works, full of questions; in point +of enlargement slow and languid; carrying a show of perfection in +the whole, but in the parts ill filled up; in selection popular, and +unsatisfactory even to those who propound them; and therefore fenced +round and set forth with sundry artifices. And if there be any who +have determined to make trial for themselves, and put their own +strength to the work of advancing the boundaries of the sciences, +yet have they not ventured to cast themselves completely loose from +received opinions or to seek their knowledge at the fountain; but they +think they have done some great thing if they do but add and introduce +into the existing sum of science something of their own; prudently +considering with themselves that by making the addition they can +assert their liberty, while they retain the credit of modesty by +assenting to the rest. But these mediocrities and middle ways so +much praised, in deferring to opinions and customs, turn to the great +detriment of the sciences. For it is hardly possible at once to admire +an author and to go beyond him; knowledge being as water, which +will not rise above the level from which it fell. Men of this kind, +therefore, amend some things, but advance little; and improve the +condition of knowledge, but do not extend its range. Some, indeed, +there have been who have gone more boldly to work, and taking it all +for an open matter and giving their genius full play, have made a +passage for themselves and their own opinions by pulling down and +demolishing former ones; and yet all their stir has but little +advanced the matter; since their aim has been not to extend philosophy +and the arts in substance and value, but only to change doctrines and +transfer the kingdom of opinions to themselves; whereby little has +indeed been gained, for though the error be the opposite of the other, +the causes of erring are the same in both. And if there have been any +who, not binding themselves either to other men's opinions or to their +own, but loving liberty, have desired to engage others along with +themselves in search, these, though honest in intention, have been +weak in endeavour. For they have been content to follow probable +reasons, and are carried round in a whirl of arguments, and in the +promiscuous liberty of search have relaxed the severity of inquiry. +There is none who has dwelt upon experience and the facts of nature +as long as is necessary. Some there are indeed who have committed +themselves to the waves of experience, and almost turned mechanics; +yet these again have in their very experiments pursued a kind of +wandering inquiry, without any regular system of operations. And +besides they have mostly proposed to themselves certain petty tasks, +taking it for a great matter to work out some single discovery;--a +course of proceeding at once poor in aim and unskilful in design. For +no man can rightly and successfully investigate the nature of anything +in the thing itself; let him vary his experiments as laboriously as he +will, he never comes to a resting-place, but still finds something to +seek beyond. And there is another thing to be remembered; namely, +that all industry in experimenting has begun with proposing to itself +certain definite works to be accomplished, and has pursued them +with premature and unseasonable eagerness; it has sought, I say, +experiments of Fruit, not experiments of Light; not Imitating the +divine procedure, which In its first day's work created light only and +assigned to it one entire day; on which day it produced no material +work, but proceeded to that on the days following. As for those who +have given the first place to Logic, supposing that the surest helps +to the sciences were to be found in that, they have indeed most truly +and excellently perceived that the human intellect left to its own +course is not to be trusted; but then the remedy is altogether too +weak for the disease; nor is it without evil in itself. For the +Logic which is received, though it be very properly applied to civil +business and to those arts which rest in discourse and opinion, is not +nearly subtle enough to deal with nature; and in offering at what it +cannot master, has done more to establish and perpetuate error than to +open the way to truth. + +Upon the whole therefore, it seems that men have not been happy +hitherto either in the trust which they have placed in others or in +their own industry with regard to the sciences; especially as neither +the demonstrations nor the experiments as yet known are much to be +relied upon. But the universe to the eye of the human understanding is +framed like a labyrinth; presenting as it does on every side so many +ambiguities of way, such deceitful resemblances of objects and signs, +natures so irregular in their lines, and so knotted and entangled. And +then the way is still to be made by the uncertain light of the sense, +sometimes shining out, sometimes clouded over, through the woods +of experience and particulars; while those who offer themselves for +guides are (as was said) themselves also puzzled, and increase the +number of errors and wanderers. In circumstances so difficult neither +the natural force of man's judgment nor even any accidental felicity +offers any chance of success. No excellence of wit, no repetition of +chance experiments, can overcome such difficulties as these. Our +steps must be guided by a clue, and the whole way from the very first +perception of the senses must be laid out upon a sure plan. Not that I +would be understood to mean that nothing whatever has been done in so +many ages by so great labours. We have no reason to be ashamed of the +discoveries which have been made, and no doubt the ancients proved +themselves in everything that turns on wit and abstract meditation, +wonderful men. But as in former ages when men sailed only by +observation of the stars, they could indeed coast along the shores +of the old continent or cross a few small and mediterranean seas; but +before the ocean could be traversed and the new world discovered, the +use of the mariner's needle, as a more faithful and certain guide, +had to be found out; in like manner the discoveries which have been +hitherto made in the arts and sciences are such as might be made by +practice, meditation, observation, argumentation,--for they lay near +to the senses, and immediately beneath common notions; but before we +can reach the remoter and more hidden parts of nature, it is necessary +that a more perfect use and application of the human mind and +intellect be introduced. + +For my own part at least, in obedience to the everlasting love of +truth, I have committed myself to the uncertainties and difficulties +and solitudes of the ways, and relying on the divine assistance have +upheld my mind both against the shocks and embattled ranks of opinion, +and against my own private and inward hesitations and scruples, and +against the fogs and clouds of nature, and the phantoms flitting about +on every side; in the hope of providing at last for the present and +future generations guidance more faithful and secure. Wherein if I +have made any progress, the way has been opened to me by no other +means than the true and legitimate humiliation of the human spirit. +For all those who before me have applied themselves to the invention +of arts have but cast a glance or two upon facts and examples and +experience, and straightway proceeded, as if invention were nothing +more than an exercise of thought, to invoke their own spirits to give +them oracles. I, on the contrary, dwelling purely and constantly among +the facts of nature, withdraw my intellect from them no further than +may suffice to let the images and rays of natural objects meet in a +point, as they do in the sense of vision; whence it follows that the +strength and excellency of the wit has but little to do in the matter. +And the same humility which I use in inventing I employ likewise in +teaching. For I do not endeavour either by triumphs of confutation, +or pleadings of antiquity, or assumption of authority, or even by +the veil of obscurity, to invest these inventions of mine with any +majesty; which might easily be done by one who sought to give lustre +to his own name rather than light to other men's minds. I have +not sought (I say) nor do I seek either to force or ensnare men's +judgments, but I lead them to things themselves and the concordances +of things, that they may see for themselves what they have, what they +can dispute, what they can add and contribute to the common stock. +And for myself, if in anything I have been either too credulous or +too little awake and attentive, or if I have fallen off by the way and +left the inquiry incomplete, nevertheless I so present these things +naked and open, that my errors can be marked and set aside before the +mass of knowledge be further infected by them; and it will be easy +also for others to continue and carry on my labours. And by these +means I suppose that I have established for ever a true and lawful +marriage between the empirical and the rational faculty, the unkind +and ill-starred divorce and separation of which has thrown into +confusion all the affairs of the human family. + +Wherefore, seeing that these things do not depend upon myself, at the +outset of the work I most humbly and fervently pray to God the Father, +God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, that remembering the sorrows of +mankind and the pilgrimage of this our life wherein we wear out days +few and evil, they will vouchsafe through my hands to endow the human +family with new mercies. This likewise I humbly pray, that things +human may not interfere with things divine, and that from the opening +of the ways of sense and the increase of natural light there may arise +in our minds no incredulity or darkness with regard to the divine +mysteries; but rather that the understanding being thereby purified +and purged of fancies and vanity, and yet not the less subject and +entirely submissive to the divine oracles, may give to faith that +which is faith's. Lastly, that knowledge being now discharged of that +venom which the serpent infused into it, and which makes the mind +of man to swell, we may not be wise above measure and sobriety, but +cultivate truth in charity. + +And now having said my prayers I turn to men; to whom I have certain +salutary admonitions to offer and certain fair requests to make. My +first admonition (which was also my prayer) is that men confine the +sense within the limits of duty in respect to things divine: for the +sense is like the sun, which reveals the face of earth, but seals and +shuts up the face of heaven. My next, that in flying from this evil +they fall not into the opposite error, which they will surely do if +they think that the inquisition of nature is in any part interdicted +or forbidden. For it was not that pure and uncorrupted natural +knowledge whereby Adam gave names to the creatures according to their +propriety, which gave occasion to the fall. It was the ambitious and +proud desire of moral knowledge to judge of good and evil, to the end +that man may revolt from God and give laws to himself, which was +the form and manner of the temptation. Whereas of the sciences which +regard nature, the divine philosopher declares that "it is the glory +of God to conceal a thing, but it is the glory of the King to find +a thing out," Even as though the divine nature took pleasure in the +innocent and kindly sport of children playing at hide and seek, and +vouchsafed of his kindness and goodness to admit the human spirit +for his playfellow at that game. Lastly, I would address one general +admonition to all; that they consider what are the true ends of +knowledge, and that they seek it not either for pleasure of the mind, +or for contention, or for superiority to others, or for profit, or +fame, or power, or any of these inferior things; but for the benefit +and use of life; and that they perfect and govern it in charity. For +it was from lust of power that the angels fell, from lust of knowledge +that man fell; but of charity there can be no excess, neither did +angel or man ever come in danger by it. + +The requests I have to make are these. Of myself I say nothing; but in +behalf of the business which is in hand I entreat men to believe that +it is not an opinion to be held, but a work to be done; and to be well +assured that I am labouring to lay the foundation, not of any sect +or doctrine, but of human utility and power. Next, I ask them to deal +fairly by their own interests, and laying aside all emulations and +prejudices in favour of this or that opinion, to join in consultation +for the common good; and being now freed and guarded by the securities +and helps which I offer from the errors and impediments of the way, to +come forward themselves and take part in that which remains to be done +Moreover, to be of good hope, nor to imagine that this Instauration +of mine is a thing infinite and beyond the power of man, when it is in +fact the true end and termination of infinite error, and seeing also +that it is by no means forgetful of the conditions of mortality and +humanity, (for it does not suppose that the work can be altogether +completed within one generation, but provides for its being taken up +by another), and finally that it seeks for the sciences not arrogantly +in the little cells of human wit, but with reverence in the greater +world. But it is the empty things that are vast things solid are most +contracted and lie in little room. And now I have only one favour +more to ask (else injustice to me may perhaps imperil the business +itself)--that men will consider well how far, upon that which I must +needs assert (if I am to be consistent with myself), they are entitled +to judge and decide upon these doctrines of mine, inasmuch as all that +premature human reasoning which anticipates inquiry, and is abstracted +from the facts rashly and sooner than is fit, is by me rejected (so +far as the inquisition of nature is concerned), as a thing uncertain, +confused, and ill built up, and I cannot be fairly asked to abide by +the decision of a tribunal which is itself on its trial. + +THE PLAN OF THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +The work is in six Parts:-- + + 1. _The Divisions of the Sciences_. + + 2. _The New Organon; or Directions concerning the + Interpretation of Nature_. + + 3. _The Phenomena of the Universe; or a Natural and + Experimental History for the foundation of + Philosophy_. + + 4. _The Ladder of the Intellect_. + + 5. _The Forerunners; or Anticipations of the New + Philosophy_. + + 6. _The New Philosophy; or Active Science_. + +_The Arguments of the several Parts_. + +It being part of my design to set everything forth, as far as may +be, plainly and perspicuously (for nakedness of the mind is still, +as nakedness of the body once was, the companion of innocence and +simplicity), let me first explain the order and plan of the work. I +distribute it into six parts. + +The first part exhibits a summary or general description of the +knowledge which the human race at present possesses. For I thought it +good to make some pause upon that which is received; that thereby +the old may be more easily made perfect and the new more easily +approached. And I hold the improvement of that which we have to be as +much an object as the acquisition of more. Besides which it will make +me the better listened to; for "He that is ignorant (says the proverb) +receives not the words of knowledge, unless thou first tell him that +which is in his own heart." We will therefore make a coasting voyage +along the shores of the arts and sciences received; not without +importing into them some useful things by the way. + +In laying out the divisions of the sciences however, I take into +account not only things already invented and known, but likewise +things omitted which ought to be there. For there are found in the +intellectual as in the terrestial globe waste regions as well as +cultivated ones. It is no wonder therefore if I am sometimes obliged +to depart from the ordinary divisions. For in adding to the total you +necessarily alter the parts and sections; and the received divisions +of the sciences are fitted only to the received sum of them as it +stands now. + +With regard to those things which I shall mark down as omitted, I +intend not merely to set down a simple title or a concise argument +of that which is wanted. For as often as I have occasion to report +anything as deficient, the nature of which is at all obscure, so that +men may not perhaps easily understand what I mean or what the work is +which I have in my head, I shall always (provided it be a matter of +any worth) take care to subjoin either directions for the execution of +such work, or else a portion of the work itself executed by myself as +a sample of the whole: thus giving assistance in every case either by +work or by counsel. For if it were for the sake of my reputation only +and other men's interests were not concerned in it, I would not have +any man think that in such cases merely some light and vague notion +has crossed my mind, and that the things which I desire and offer at +are no better than wishes; when they are in fact things which men may +certainly command if they will, and of which I have formed in my own +mind a clear and detailed conception. For I do not propose merely to +survey these regions in my mind, like an augur taking auspices, but to +enter them like a general who means to take possession.--So much for +the first part of the work. + + * * * * * + +Having thus coasted past the ancient arts, the next point is to equip +the intellect for passing beyond. To the second part therefore belongs +the doctrine concerning the better and more perfect use of human +reason in the inquisition of things, and the true helps of the +understanding: that thereby (as far as the condition of mortality and +humanity allows) the intellect may be raised and exalted, and made +capable of overcoming the difficulties and obscurities of nature. The +art which I introduce with this view (which I call _Interpretation of +Nature_) is a kind of logic; though the difference between it and +the ordinary logic is great; indeed immense. For the ordinary +logic professes to contrive and prepare helps and guards for the +understanding, as mine does; and in this one point they agree. But +mine differs from it in three points especially; viz. in the end aimed +at; in the order of demonstration; and in the starting point of the +inquiry. + +For the end which this science of mine proposes is the invention not +of arguments but of arts; not of things in accordance with principles, +but of principles themselves; not of probable reasons, but of +designations and directions for works. And as the intention is +different, so accordingly is the effect; the effect of the one being +to overcome an opponent in argument, of the other to command nature in +action. + +In accordance with this end is also the nature and order of the +demonstrations. For in the ordinary logic almost all the work is spent +about the syllogism. Of induction the logicians seem hardly to have +taken any serious thought, but they pass it by with a slight notice, +and hasten on to the formulæ of disputation. I on the contrary reject +demonstration by syllogism, as acting too confusedly, and letting +nature slip out of its hands. For although no one can doubt that +things which agree in a middle term agree with one another (which is +a proposition of mathematical certainty), yet it leaves an opening +for deception; which is this. The syllogism consists of propositions; +propositions of words; and words are the tokens and signs of notions. +Now if the very notions of the mind (which are as the soul of words +and the basis of the whole structure) be improperly and over-hastily +abstracted from facts, vague not sufficiently definite, faulty in +short in many ways, the whole edifice tumbles. I therefore reject the +syllogism; and that not only as regards principles (for to principles +the logicians themselves do not apply it) but also as regards middle +propositions; which, though obtainable no doubt by the syllogism, +are, when so obtained, barren of works, remote from practice, and +altogether unavailable for the active department of the sciences. +Although therefore I leave to the syllogism and these famous and +boasted modes of demonstration their jurisdiction over popular arts +and such as are matter of opinion (in which department I leave all +as it is), yet in dealing with the nature of things I use induction +throughout, and that in the minor propositions as well as the major. +For I consider induction to be that form of demonstration which +upholds the sense, and closes with nature, and comes to the very brink +of operation, if it does not actually deal with it. + +Hence it follows that the order of demonstration is likewise inverted. +For hitherto the proceeding has been to fly at once from the sense +and particulars up to the most general propositions, as certain fixed +poles for the argument to turn upon, and from these to derive the rest +by middle terms a short way, no doubt, but precipitate, and one which +will never lead to nature, though it offers an easy and ready way to +disputation. Now my plan is to proceed regularly and gradually from +one axiom to another, so that the most general are not reached till +the last but then when you do come to them you find them to be not +empty notions, but well defined, and such as nature would really +recognise as her first principles, and such as lie at the heart and +marrow of things. + +But the greatest change I introduce is in the form itself of induction +and the judgment made thereby. For the induction of which the +logicians speak, which proceeds by simple enumeration, is a puerile +thing, concludes at hazard, is always liable to be upset by a +contradictory instance, takes into account only what is known and +ordinary, and leads to no result. + +Now what the sciences stand in need of is a form of induction which +shall analyse experience and take it to pieces, and by a due process +of exclusion and rejection lead to an inevitable conclusion. And +if that ordinary mode of judgment practised by the logicians was so +laborious, and found exercise for such great wits how much more labour +must we be prepared to bestow upon this other, which is extracted not +merely out of the depths of the mind, but out of the very bowels of +nature. + +Nor is this all. For I also sink the foundations of the sciences +deeper and firmer; and I begin the inquiry nearer the source than men +have done heretofore; submitting to examination those things which +the common logic takes on trust. For first, the logicians borrow the +principles of each science from the science itself; secondly, they +hold in reverence the first notions of the mind; and lastly, they +receive as conclusive the immediate informations of the sense, when +well disposed. Now upon the first point, I hold that true logic +ought to enter the several provinces of science armed with a higher +authority than belongs to the principles of those sciences themselves, +and ought to call those putative principles to account until they +are fully established. Then with regard to the first notions of the +intellect; there is not one of the impressions taken by the intellect +when left to go its own way, but I hold it for suspected, and no +way established, until it has submitted to a new trial and a fresh +judgment has been thereupon pronounced. And lastly, the information +of the sense itself I sift and examine in many ways. For certain it +is that the senses deceive; but then at the same time they supply the +means of discovering their own errors; only the errors are here, the +means of discovery are to seek. + +The sense fails in two ways. Sometimes it gives no information, +sometimes it gives false information. For first, there are very many +things which escape the sense, even when best disposed and no way +obstructed; by reason either of the subtlety of the whole body, or +the minuteness of the parts, or distance of place, or slowness or else +swiftness of motion, or familiarity of the object, or other causes. +And again when the sense does apprehend a thing its apprehension is +not much to be relied upon. For the testimony and information of the +sense has reference always to man, not to the universe; and it is a +great error to assert that the sense is the measure of things. + +To meet these difficulties, I have sought on all sides diligently and +faithfully to provide helps for the sense--substitutes to supply its +failures, rectifications to correct its errors; and this I endeavour +to accomplish not so much by instruments as by experiments. For the +subtlety of experiments is far greater than that of the sense itself, +even when assisted by exquisite instruments; such experiments, I mean, +as are skilfully and artificially devised for the express purpose +of determining the point in question. To the immediate and proper +perception of the sense therefore I do not give much weight; but I +contrive that the office of the sense shall be only to judge of the +experiment, and that the experiment itself shall judge of the thing. +And thus I conceive that I perform the office of a true priest of the +sense (from which all knowledge in nature must be sought, unless men +mean to go mad) and a not unskilful interpreter of its oracles; and +that while others only profess to uphold and cultivate the sense, I +do so in fact. Such then are the provisions I make for finding the +genuine light of nature and kindling and bringing it to bear. And they +would be sufficient of themselves, if the human intellect were even, +and like a fair sheet of paper with no writing on it. But since the +minds of men are strangely possessed and beset, so that there is no +true and even surface left to reflect the genuine rays of things, it +is necessary to seek a remedy for this also. + +Now the idols, or phantoms, by which the mind is occupied are either +adventitious or innate. The adventitious come into the mind from +without; namely, either from the doctrines and sects of philosophers, +or from perverse rules of demonstration. But the innate are inherent +in the very nature of the intellect, which is far more prone to error +than the sense is. For let men please themselves as they will in +admiring and almost adoring the human mind, this is certain: that as +an uneven mirror distorts the rays of objects according to its own +figure and section, so the mind, when it receives impressions of +objects through the sense, cannot be trusted to report them truly, +but in forming its notions mixes up its own nature with the nature of +things. + +And as the first two kinds of idols are hard to eradicate, so idols of +this last kind cannot be eradicated at all. All that can be done is +to point them out, so that this insidious action of the mind may be +marked and reproved (else as fast as old errors are destroyed new ones +will spring up out of the ill complexion of the mind itself, and so we +shall have but a change or errors, and not a clearance); and to lay it +down once for all as a fixed and established maxim, that the intellect +is not qualified to judge except by means of induction, and induction +in its legitimate form. This doctrine then of the expurgation of the +intellect to qualify it for dealing with truth, is comprised in three +refutations: the refutation of the Philosophies; the refutation of the +Demonstrations; and the refutation of the Natural Human Reason. The +explanation of which things, and of the true relation between the +nature of things and the nature of the mind, is as the strewing and +decoration of the bridal chamber of the Mind and the Universe, the +Divine Goodness assisting; out of which marriage let us hope (and be +this the prayer of the bridal song) there may spring helps to man, +and a line and race of inventions that may in some degree subdue and +overcome the necessities and miseries of humanity. This is the second +part of the work. + + * * * * * + +But I design not only to indicate and mark out the ways, but also +to enter them. And therefore the third part of the work embraces the +Phenomena of the Universe; that is to say, experience of every kind, +and such a natural history as may serve for a foundation to build +philosophy upon. For a good method of demonstration or form of +interpreting nature may keep the mind from going astray or stumbling, +but it is not any excellence of method that can supply it with the +material of knowledge. Those however who aspire not to guess and +divine, but to discover and know; who propose not to devise mimic and +fabulous worlds of their own, but to examine and dissect the nature +of this very world itself; must go to facts themselves for +everything. Nor can the place of this labour and search and +worldwide perambulation be supplied by any genius or meditation or +argumentation; no, not if all men's wits could meet in one. This +therefore we must have, or the business must be for ever abandoned. +But up to this day such has been the condition of men in this matter, +that it is no wonder if nature will not give herself into their hands. + +For first, the information of the sense itself, sometimes failing, +sometimes false; observation, careless, irregular, and led by chance; +tradition, vain and fed on rumour; practice, slavishly bent upon its +work; experiment, blind, stupid, vague, and prematurely broken off; +lastly, natural history, trivial and poor;--all these have contributed +to supply the understanding with very bad materials for philosophy and +the sciences. + +Then an attempt is made to mend the matter by a preposterous subtlety +and winnowing of argument. But this comes too late, the case being +already past remedy; and is far from setting the business right +or sifting away the errors. The only hope therefore of any greater +increase or progress lies in a reconstruction of the sciences. + +Of this reconstruction the foundation must be laid in natural history, +and that of a new kind and gathered on a new principle. For it is +in vain that you polish the mirror if there are no images to be +reflected; and it is as necessary that the intellect should be +supplied with fit matter to work upon, as with safeguards to guide its +working. But my history differs from that in use (as my logic does) in +many things,--in end and office, in mass and composition, in subtlety, +in selection also and setting forth, with a view to the operations +which are to follow. + +For first, the object of a natural history which I propose is not so +much to delight with variety of matter or to help with present use of +experiments, as to give light to the discovery of causes and supply a +suckling philosophy with its first food. For though it be true that +I am principally in pursuit of works and the active department of the +sciences, yet I wait for harvest-time, and do not attempt to mow +the moss or to reap the green corn. For I well know that axioms once +rightly discovered will carry whole troops of works along with them, +and produce them, not here and there one, but in clusters. And that +unseasonable and puerile hurry to snatch by way of earnest at the +first works which come within reach, I utterly condemn and reject, as +an Atalanta's apple that hinders the race. Such then is the office of +this natural history of mine. + +Next, with regard to the mass and composition of it: I mean it to be a +history not only of nature free and at large (when she is left to +her own course and does her work her own way)--such as that of +the heavenly bodies, meteors, earth and sea, minerals, plants, +animals,--but much more of nature under constraint and vexed; that +is to say, when by art and the hand of man she is forced out of her +natural state, and squeezed and moulded. Therefore I set down at +length all experiments of the mechanical arts, of the operative part +of the liberal arts, of the many crafts which have not yet grown into +arts properly so called, so far as I have been able to examine them +and as they conduce to the end in view. Nay (to say the plain truth) +I do in fact (low and vulgar as men may think it) count more upon this +part both for helps and safeguards than upon the other; seeing that +the nature of things betrays itself more readily under the vexations +of art than in its natural freedom. + +Nor do I confine the history to Bodies; but I have thought it my +duty besides to make a separate history of such Virtues as may be +considered cardinal in nature. I mean those original passions or +desires of matter which constitute the primary elements of nature; +such as Dense and Rare, Hot and Cold, Solid and Fluid, Heavy and +Light, and several others. + +Then again, to speak of subtlety: I seek out and get together a +kind of experiments much subtler and simpler than those which occur +accidentally. For I drag into light many things which no one who was +not proceeding by a regular and certain way to the discovery of causes +would have thought of inquiring after; being indeed in themselves of +no great use; which shows that they were not sought for on their own +account; but having just the same relation to things and works which +the letters of the alphabet have to speech and words--which, though +in themselves useless, are the elements of which all discourse is made +up. + +Further, in the selection of the relation and experiments I conceive I +have been a more cautious purveyor than those who have hitherto dealt +with natural history. For I admit nothing but on the faith of eyes, +or at least of careful and severe examination; so that nothing is +exaggerated for wonder's sake, but what I state is sound and without +mixture of fables or vanity. All received or current falsehoods +also (which by strange negligence have been allowed for many ages to +prevail and become established) I proscribe and brand by name; that +the sciences may be no more troubled with them For it has been well +observed that the fables and superstitions and follies which nurses +instil into children do serious injury to their minds; and the same +consideration makes me anxious, having the management of the childhood +as it were of philosophy in its course of natural history, not to let +it accustom itself in the beginning to any vanity. Moreover, whenever +I come to a new experiment of any subtlety (though it be in my own +opinion certain and approved), I nevertheless subjoin a clear account +of the manner in which I made it; that men knowing exactly how each +point was made out, may see whether there be any error connected with +it, and may arouse themselves to devise proofs more trustworthy and +exquisite, if such can be found; and finally, I interpose everywhere +admonitions and scruples and cautions, with a religious care to eject, +repress, and as it were exorcise every kind of phantasm. + +Lastly, knowing how much the sight of man's mind is distracted by +experience and history, and how hard it is at the first (especially +for minds either tender or preoccupied) to become familiar with +nature, I not unfrequently subjoin observations of my own, being as +the first offers, inclinations, and as it were glances of history +towards philosophy; both by way of an assurance to men that they will +be kept for ever tossing on the waves of experience, and also that +when the time comes for the intellect to begin its work, it may find +everything the more ready. By such a natural history then as I have +described, I conceive that a safe and convenient approach may be made +to nature, and matter supplied of good quality and well prepared for +the understanding to work upon. + + * * * * * + +And now that we have surrounded the intellect with faithful helps and +guards, and got together with most careful selection a regular army of +divine works, it may seem that we have no more to do but to proceed to +philosophy itself. And yet in a matter so difficult and doubtful there +are still some things which it seems necessary to premise, partly for +convenience of explanation, partly for present use. + +Of these the first is to set forth examples of inquiry and invention +according to my method, exhibited by anticipation in some particular +subjects; choosing such subjects as are at once the most noble in +themselves among those under inquiry, and most different one from +another; that there may be an example in every kind. I do not speak of +those examples which are joined to the several precepts and rules by +way of illustration (for of these I have given plenty in the second +part of the work); but I mean actual types and models, by which the +entire process of the mind and the whole fabric and order of invention +from the beginning to the end, in certain subjects, and those various +and remarkable, should be set as it were before the eyes. For +I remember that in the mathematics it is easy to follow the +demonstration when you have a machine beside you; whereas without +that help all appears involved and more subtle than it really is. To +examples of this kind,--being in fact nothing more than an application +of the second part in detail and at large,--the fourth part of the +work is devoted. + + * * * * * + +The fifth part is for temporary use only, pending the completion of +the rest; like interest payable from time to time until the principal +be forthcoming. For I do not make so blindly for the end of my +journey, as to neglect anything useful that may turn up by the way. +And therefore I include in this fifth part such things as I have +myself discovered, proved, or added,--not however according to the +true rules and methods of interpretation, but by the ordinary use of +the understanding in inquiring and discovering. For besides that I +hope my speculations may in virtue of my continual conversancy with +nature have a value beyond the pretensions of my wit, they will +serve in the meantime for wayside inns in which the mind may rest +and refresh itself on its journey to more certain conclusions. +Nevertheless I wish it to be understood in the meantime that they are +conclusions by which (as not being discovered and proved by the true +form of interpretation) I do not at all mean to bind myself. Nor +need any one be alarmed at such suspension of judgment, in one who +maintains not simply that nothing can be known, but only that nothing +can be known except in a certain course and way; and yet establishes +provisionally certain degrees of assurance, for use and relief until +the mind shall arrive at a knowledge of causes in which it can +rest. For even those schools of philosophy which held the absolute +impossibility of knowing anything were not inferior to those which +took upon them to pronounce. But then they did not provide helps for +the sense and understanding, as I have done, but simply took away all +their authority: which is quite a different thing--almost the reverse. + + * * * * * + +The sixth part of my work (to which the rest is subservient and +ministrant) discloses and sets forth that philosophy which by +the legitimate, chaste, and severe course of inquiry which I have +explained and provided is at length developed and established. The +completion however of this last part is a thing both above my strength +and beyond my hopes. I have made a beginning of the work--a beginning, +as I hope, not unimportant:--the fortune of the human race will give +the issue;--such an issue, it may be, as in the present condition of +things and men's minds cannot easily be conceived or imagined. For +the matter in hand is no mere felicity of speculation, but the real +business and fortunes of the human race, and all power of operation. +For man is but the servant and interpreter of nature: what he does and +what he knows is only what he has observed of nature's order in fact +or in thought; beyond this he knows nothing and can do nothing. For +the chain of causes cannot by any force be loosed or broken, nor can +nature be commanded except by being obeyed. And so those twin objects, +human Knowledge and human Power, do really meet in one; and it is from +ignorance of causes that operation fails. + +And all depends on keeping the eye steadily fixed upon the facts +of nature and so receiving their images simply as they are. For God +forbid that we should give out a dream of our own imagination for a +pattern of the world; rather may he graciously grant to us to write an +apocalypse or true vision of the footsteps of the Creator imprinted on +his creatures. + +Therefore do thou, O Father, who gavest the visible light as the +first fruits of creation, and didst breathe into the face of man the +intellectual light as the crown and consummation thereof, guard and +protect this work, which coming from thy goodness returneth to thy +glory. Thou when thou turnedst to look upon the works which thy hands +had made, sawest that all was very good, and didst rest from thy +labours. But man, when he turned to look upon the work which his hands +had made, saw that all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and could +find no rest therein. Wherefore if we labour in thy works with the +sweat of our brows thou wilt make us partakers of thy vision and thy +sabbath. Humbly we pray that this mind may be steadfast in us, and +that through these our hands, and the hands of others to whom thou +shalt give the same spirit, thou wilt vouchsafe to endow the human +family with new mercies. + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE NOVUM ORGANUM + + +Those who have taken upon them to lay down the law of nature as a +thing already searched out and understood, whether they have spoken +in simple assurance or professional affectation, have therein done +philosophy and the sciences great injury. For as they have been +successful in inducing belief, so they have been effective in +quenching and stopping inquiry; and have done more harm by spoiling +and putting an end to other men's efforts than good by their own. +Those on the other hand who have taken a contrary course, and asserted +that absolutely nothing can be known,--whether it were from hatred of +the ancient sophists, or from uncertainty and fluctuation of mind, +or even from a kind of fulness of learning, that they fell upon this +opinion,--have certainly advanced reasons for it that are not to be +despised; but yet they have neither started from true principles nor +rested in the just conclusion, zeal and affectation having carried +them much too far. The more ancient of the Greeks (whose writings +are lost) took up with better judgment a position between these two +extremes,--between the presumption of pronouncing on everything, +and the despair of comprehending anything; and though frequently and +bitterly complaining of the difficulty of inquiry and the obscurity of +things, and like impatient horses champing the bit, they did not +the less follow up their object and engage with Nature; thinking (it +seems) that this very question,--viz. whether or no anything can be +known,--was to be settled not by arguing, but by trying. And yet they +too, trusting entirely to the force of their understanding, applied +no rule, but made everything turn upon hard thinking and perpetual +working and exercise of the mind. + +Now my method, though hard to practise, is easy to explain; and it +is this. I propose to establish progressive stages of certainty. The +evidence of the sense, helped and guarded by a certain process of +correction, I retain. But the mental operation which follows the act +of sense I for the most part reject; and instead of it I open and +lay out a new and certain path for the mind to proceed in, starting +directly from the simple sensuous perception. The necessity of this +was felt no doubt by those who attributed so much importance to +Logic; showing thereby that they were in search of helps for the +understanding, and had no confidence in the native and spontaneous +process of the mind. But this remedy comes too late to do any +good, when the mind is already, through the daily intercourse and +conversation of life, occupied with unsound doctrines and beset on all +sides by vain imaginations. And therefore that art of Logic, coming +(as I said) too late to the rescue, and no way able to set matters +right again, has had the effect of fixing errors rather than +disclosing truth. There remains but one course for the recovery of +a sound and healthy condition,--namely, that the entire work of the +understanding be commenced afresh, and the mind itself be from the +very outset not left to take its own course, but guided at every step; +and the business be done as if by machinery. Certainly if in things +mechanical men had set to work with their naked hands, without help or +force of instruments, just as in things intellectual they have set to +work with little else than the naked forces of the understanding, very +small would the matters have been which, even with their best efforts +applied in conjunction, they could have attempted or accomplished. Now +(to pause while upon this example and look in it as in a glass) let us +suppose that some vast obelisk were (for the decoration of a triumph +or some such magnificence) to be removed from its place, and that men +should set to work upon it with their naked hands; would not any +sober spectator think them mad? And if they should then send for more +people, thinking that in that way they might manage it, would he +not think them all the madder? And if they then proceeded to make a +selection, putting away the weaker hands, and using only the strong +and vigorous, would he not think them madder than ever? And if +lastly, not content with this, they resolved to call in aid the art +of athletics, and required all their men to come with hands, arms, +and sinews well anointed and medicated according to the rules of art, +would he not cry out that they were only taking pains to show a kind +of method and discretion in their madness? Yet just so it is that +men proceed in matters intellectual,--with just the same kind of mad +effort and useless combination of forces,--when they hope great things +either from the number and cooperation or from the excellency and +acuteness of individual wits; yea, and when they endeavour by Logic +(which may be considered as a kind of athletic art) to strengthen the +sinews of the understanding; and yet with all this study and endeavour +it is apparent to any true judgment that they are but applying the +naked intellect all the time; whereas in every great work to be done +by the hand of man it is manifestly impossible, without instruments +or machinery, either for the strength of each to be exerted or the +strength of all to be united. + +Upon these premises two things occur to me of which, that they may +not be overlooked, I would have men reminded. First it falls out +fortunately as I think for the allaying of contradictions and +heart-burnings, that the honour and reverence due to the ancients +remains untouched and undiminished; while I may carry out my designs +and at the same time reap the fruit of my modesty. For if I should +profess that I, going the same road as the ancients, have something +better to produce, there must needs have been some comparison or +rivalry between us (not to be avoided by any art of words) in respect +of excellency or ability of wit; and though in this there would be +nothing unlawful or new (for if there be anything misapprehended by +them, or falsely laid down, why may not I, using a liberty common +to all, take exception to it?) yet the contest, however just and +allowable, would have been an unequal one perhaps, in respect of the +measure of my own powers. As it is however,--my object being to open a +new way for the understanding, a way by them untried and unknown,--the +case is altered; party zeal and emulation are at an end; and I appear +merely as a guide to point out the road; an office of small authority, +and depending more upon a kind of luck than upon any ability or +excellency. And thus much relates to the persons only. The other point +of which I would have men reminded relates to the matter itself. + +Be it remembered then that I am far from wishing to interfere with +the philosophy which now flourishes, or with any other philosophy +more correct and complete than this which has been or may hereafter +be propounded. For I do not object to the use of this received +philosophy, or others like it, for supplying matter for disputations +or ornaments for discourse,--for the professor's lecture and for the +business of life. Nay more, I declare openly that for these uses the +philosophy which I bring forward will not be much available. It does +not lie in the way. It cannot be caught up in passage. It does not +flatter the understanding by conformity with preconceived notions. +Nor will it come down to the apprehension of the vulgar except by its +utility and effects. + +Let there be therefore (and may it be for the benefit of both) two +streams and two dispensations of knowledge; and in like manner two +tribes or kindreds of students in philosophy--tribes not hostile or +alien to each other, but bound together by mutual services;--let there +in short be one method for the cultivation, another for the invention, +of knowledge. + +And for those who prefer the former, either from hurry or from +considerations of business or for want of mental power to take in and +embrace the other (which must needs be most men's case), I wish that +they may succeed to their desire in what they are about, and obtain +what they are pursuing. But if any man there be who, not content +to rest in and use the knowledge which has already been discovered, +aspires to penetrate further; to overcome, not an adversary in +argument, but nature in action; to seek, not pretty and probable +conjectures, but certain and demonstrable knowledge;--I invite all +such to join themselves, as true sons of knowledge, with me, that +passing by the outer courts of nature, which numbers have trodden, +we may find a way at length into her inner chambers. And to make my +meaning clearer and to familiarise the thing by giving it a name, I +have chosen to call one of these methods or ways _Anticipation of the +Mind_, the other _Interpretation of Nature_. + +Moreover I have one request to make. I have on my own part made it my +care and study that the things which I shall propound should not only +be true, but should also be presented to men's minds, how strangely +soever preoccupied and obstructed, in a manner not harsh or +unpleasant. It is but reasonable however (especially in so great a +restoration of learning and knowledge) that I should claim of men one +favour in return; which is this; If any one would form an opinion or +judgment either out of his own observation, or out of the crowd of +authorities, or out of the forms of demonstration (which have now +acquired a sanction like that of judicial laws), concerning these +speculations of mine, let him not hope that he can do it in passage or +by the by; but let him examine the thing thoroughly; let him make some +little trial for himself of the way which I describe and lay out; let +him familiarise his thoughts with that subtlety of nature to which +experience bears witness; let him correct by seasonable patience and +due delay the depraved and deep-rooted habits of his mind; and when +all this is done and he has begun to be his own master, let him (if he +will) use his own judgment. + + + + +PREFACE TO THE FIRST FOLIO EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE'S PLAYS (1623)[A] + +TO THE GREAT VARIETY OF READERS + + +From the most able, to him that can but spell: There you are number'd. +We had rather you were weighd. Especially, when the fate of all Bookes +depends vpon your capacities: and not of your heads alone, but of your +purses. Well! it is now publique, & you wil stand for your priuiledges +wee know: to read, and censure. Do so, but buy it first. That doth +best commend a Booke, the Stationer saies. Then, how odde soeuer your +braines be, or your wisedomes, make your licence the same, and +spare not. Iudge your sixe-pen'orth, your shillings worth, your fiue +shillings worth at a time, or higher, so you rise to the iust rates, +and welcome. But, what euer you do, Buy. Censure will not driue a +Trade, or make the Iacke go. And though you be a Magistrate of wit, +and sit on the Stage at _Black-Friers_, or the _Cock-pit_, to arraigne +Playes dailie, know, these Playes haue had their triall alreadie, +and stood out all Appeals; and do now come forth quitted rather by a +Decree of Court, then any purchas'd Letters of commendation. + +It had bene a thing, we confesse, worthie to haue bene wished, that +the Author himselfe had liu'd to haue set forth, and ouerseen his owne +writings. But since it hath bin ordain'd otherwise, and he by death +departed from that right, we pray you do not envie his Friends, the +office of their care, and paine to haue collected & publish'd them, +and so to haue publish'd them, as where (before) you were abus'd with +diuerse stolne, and surreptitious copies, maimed, and deformed by the +frauds and stealthes of iniurious imposters, that expos'd them euen +those, are now offer'd to your view cur'd, and perfect of their +limbes, and all the rest, absolute in their numbers, as he conceiued +them. Who, as he was a happie imitator of Nature, was a most gentle +expresser of it. His mind and hand went together. And what he thought, +he vttered with that easinesse, that wee haue scarse receiued from him +a blot in his papers. But it is not our prouince, who onely gather his +works, and giue them you, to praise him. It is yours that reade him. +And there we hope, to your diuers capacities, you will finde enough, +both to draw, and hold you for his wit can no more lie hid then it +could be lost. Reade him, therefore and againe and againe. And if then +you doe not like him surely you are in some manifest danger, not to +vnderstand him. And so we leaue you to other of his Friends, whom if +you need can bee your guides: if you neede them not, you can leade +your selues, and others. And such Readers we wish him. + +JOHN HEMINGE HENRIE CONDELL. + + +[Footnote A: Little more than half of Shakespeare's plays were +published during his lifetime; and in the publication of these there +is no evidence that the author had any hand. Seven years after his +death, John Heminge and Henry Condell, two of his fellow-actors, +collected the unpublished plays, and, in 1623, issued them along with +the others in a single volume, usually known as the First Folio. +When one considers what would have been lost had it not been for the +enterprise of these men, it seems safe to say that the volume they +introduced by this quaint and not too accurate preface, is the most +important single book in the imaginative literature of the world.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE PHILOSOPHIAE NATURALIS PRINCIPIA MATHEMATICA + +BY SIR ISAAC NEWTON. (1686)[A] + + +Since the ancients (as we are told by Pappus) made great account of +the science of mechanics in the investigation of natural things; and +the moderns, laying aside substantial forms and occult qualities, +have endeavored to subject the phenomena of nature to the laws of +mathematics, I have in this treatise cultivated mathematics so far as +it regards philosophy. The ancients considered mechanics in a twofold +respect; as rational, which proceeds accurately by demonstration, and +practical. To practical mechanics all the manual arts belong, from +which mechanics took its name. But as artificers do not work with +perfect accuracy, it comes to pass that mechanics is so distinguished +from geometry, that what is perfectly accurate is called geometrical; +what is less so is called mechanical. But the errors are not in the +art, but in the artificers. He that works with less accuracy is an +imperfect mechanic: and if any could work with perfect accuracy, he +would be the most perfect mechanic of all; for the description of +right lines and circles, upon which geometry is founded, belongs +to mechanics. Geometry does not teach us to draw these lines, but +requires them to be drawn; for it requires that the learner should +first be taught to describe these accurately, before he enters upon +geometry; then it shows how by these operations problems may be +solved. To describe right lines and circles are problems, but not +geometrical problems. The solution of these problems is required from +mechanics; and by geometry the use of them, when so solved, is shown; +and it is the glory of geometry that from those few principles, +fetched from without, it is able to produce so many things. Therefore +geometry is founded in mechanical practice, and is nothing but that +part of universal mechanics which accurately proposes and demonstrates +the art of measuring. But since the manual arts are chiefly conversant +in the moving of bodies, it comes to pass that geometry is commonly +referred to their magnitudes, and mechanics to their motion. In this +sense rational mechanics will be the science of motions resulting +from any forces whatsoever, and of the forces required to produce any +motions, accurately proposed and demonstrated. This part of mechanics +was cultivated by the ancients in the five powers which relate to +manual arts, who considered gravity (it not being a manual power) no +otherwise than as it moved weights by those powers. Our design, not +respecting arts, but philosophy, and our subject, not manual, but +natural powers, we consider chiefly those things which relate to +gravity, levity, elastic force, the resistance of fluids, and the like +forces, whether attractive or impulsive; and therefore we offer this +work as mathematical principles of philosophy; for all the difficulty +of philosophy seems to consist in this--from the phenomena of motions +to investigate the forces of nature, and then from these forces +to demonstrate the other phenomena; and to this end the general +propositions in the first and second book are directed. In the third +book we give an example of this in the explication of the system of +the World; for by the propositions mathematically demonstrated in the +first book, we there derive from the celestial phenomena the forces +of gravity with which bodies tend to the sun and the several planets. +Then, from these forces, by other propositions which are also +mathematical, we deduce the motions of the planets, the comets, the +moon, and the sea. I wish we could derive the rest of the phenomena of +nature by the same kind of reasoning from mechanical principles; for +I am induced by many reasons to suspect that they may all depend +upon certain forces by which the particles of bodies, by some causes +hitherto unknown, are either mutually impelled towards each other, and +cohere in regular figures, or are repelled and recede from each other; +which forces being unknown, philosophers have hitherto attempted the +search of nature in vain; but I hope the principles here laid +down will afford some light either to that or some truer method of +philosophy. + +In the publication of this work, the most acute and universally +learned Mr. Edmund Halley not only assisted me with his pains in +correcting the press and taking care of the schemes, but it was to +his solicitations that its becoming public is owing; for when he +had obtained of me my demonstrations of the figure of the celestial +orbits, he continually pressed me to communicate the same to the Royal +Society, who afterwards, by their kind encouragement and entreaties, +engaged me to think of publishing them. But after I had begun to +consider the inequalities of the lunar motions, and had entered upon +some other things relating to the laws and measures of gravity, +and other forces; and the figures that would be described by bodies +attracted according to given laws; and the motion of several bodies +moving among themselves; the motion of bodies in resisting mediums; +the forces, densities, and motions of mediums; the orbits of the +comets, and such like; I put off that publication till I had made a +search into those matters, and could put out the whole together. What +relates to the lunar motions (being imperfect) I have put all together +in the corollaries of proposition 66, to avoid being obliged to +propose and distinctly demonstrate the several things there contained +in a method more prolix than the subject deserved, and interrupt the +series of the several propositions. Some things, found out after the +rest, I chose to insert in places less suitable, rather than change +the number of the propositions and the citations. I heartily beg that +what I have here done may be read with candor; and that the defects +I have been guilty of upon this difficult subject may be not so much +reprehended as kindly supplied, and investigated by new endeavors of +my readers. + +Cambridge, Trinity College, ISAAC NEWTON. + +May 8, 1686 + + +[Footnote A: Sir Isaac Newton, the great English mathematician and +physicist, was born at Woolsthorpe in 1642, and died at Kensington in +1727. He held a professorship at Cambridge, represented the University +in Parliament, as master of the mint reformed the English coinage, and +for twenty five years was president of the Royal Society. His theory +of the law of universal gravitation, the most important of his many +discoveries, is expounded in his "Philosophiae Naturalis Principia +Mathematical," usually known merely as the "Principia," from which, +this Preface is translated.] + + + + +PREFACE TO FABLES, + +ANCIENT AND MODERN + +BY JOHN DRYDEN. (1700)[A] + + +'Tis with a poet as with a man who designs to build, and is very +exact, as he supposes, in casting up the cost beforehand, but, +generally speaking, he is mistaken in his account, and reckons short +of the expense he first intended. He alters his mind as the work +proceeds, and will have this or that convenience more, of which he had +not thought when he began. So has it happened to me; I have built a +house, where I intended but a lodge; yet with better success than a +certain nobleman,[1] who, beginning with a dog kennel, never liv'd to +finish the palace he had contriv'd. + +From translating the first of Homer's _Iliads_ (which I intended as an +essay to the whole work) I proceeded to the translation of the twelfth +book of Ovid's _Metamorphoses_, because it contains, among other +things, the causes, the beginning, and ending, of the Trojan war. +Here I ought in reason to have stopp'd; but the speeches of Ajax +and Ulysses lying next in my way, I could not balk 'em. When I had +compass'd them, I was so taken with the former part of the fifteenth +book, (which is the masterpiece of the whole _Metamorphoses_,) that +I enjoin'd myself the pleasing task of rend'ring it into English. And +now I found, by the number of my verses, that they began to swell into +a little volume; which gave me an occasion of looking backward on some +beauties of my author, in his former books. There occurred to me the +_Hunting of the Boar, Cinyras and Myrrha_, the good-natur'd story of +_Baucis and Philemon_, with the rest, which I hope I have translated +closely enough, and given them the same turn of verse which they had +in the original; and this, I may say without vanity, is not the talent +of every poet. He who has arriv'd the nearest to it, is the ingenious +and learned Sandys, the best versifier of the former age; if I may +properly call it by that name, which was the former part of this +concluding century. For Spenser and Fairfax both flourish'd in the +reign of Queen Elizabeth; great masters in our language, and who +saw much farther into the beauties of our numbers than those who +immediately followed them. Milton was the poetical son of Spenser, and +Mr. Waller of Fairfax, for we have our lineal descents and clans as +well as other families. Spenser more than once insinuates that the +soul of Chaucer was transfus'd into his body, and that he was begotten +by him two hundred years after his decease. Milton has acknowledg'd to +me that Spenser was his original, and many besides myself have heard +our famous Waller own that he deriv'd the harmony of his numbers +from the _Godfrey of Bulloign_, which was turned into English by Mr. +Fairfax. But to return. Having done with Ovid for this time, it +came into my mind that our old English poet, Chaucer, in many things +resembled him, and that with no disadvantage on the side of the modern +author, as I shall endeavor to prove when I compare them; and as I +am, and always have been, studious to promote the honor of my native +country, so I soon resolv'd to put their merits to the trial, by +turning some of the _Canterbury Tales_ into our language, as it is +now refin'd; for by this means, both the poets being set in the same +light, and dress'd in the same English habit, story to be compar'd +with story, a certain judgment may be made betwixt them by the reader, +without obtruding my opinion on him. Or, if I seem partial to my +countryman and predecessor in the laurel, the friends of antiquity +are not few; and besides many of the learn'd, Ovid has almost all the +beaux, and the whole fair sex, his declared patrons. Perhaps I have +assum'd somewhat more to myself than they allow me, because I have +adventur'd to sum up the evidence; but the readers are the jury, and +their privilege remains entire, to decide, according to the merits of +the cause, or if they please, to bring it to another hearing before +some other court. In the mean time, to follow the thrid of my +discourse, (as thoughts, according to Mr. Hobbes, have always some +connection,) so from Chaucer I was led to think on Boccace, who was +not only his contemporary, but also pursued the same studies; wrote +novels in prose, and many works in verse; particularly is said to have +invented the octave rhyme,[2] or stanza of eight lines, which ever +since has been maintain'd by the practice of all Italian writers, who +are, or at least assume the title of, heroic poets. He and Chaucer, +among other things, had this in common, that they refin'd their mother +tongues; but with this difference, that Dante had begun to file their +language, at least in verse, before the time of Boccace, who likewise +receiv'd no little help from his master Petrarch. But the reformation +of their prose was wholly owing to Boccace himself, who is yet the +standard of purity in the Italian tongue; tho' many of his phrases are +become obsolete, as in process of time it must needs happen. Chaucer +(as you have formerly been told by our learn'd Mr. Rymer) first +adorn'd and amplified our barren tongue from the Provençal,[3] which +was then the most polish'd of all the modern languages; but this +subject has been copiously treated by that great critic, who deserves +no little commendation from us his countrymen. For these reasons of +time, and resemblance of genius in Chaucer and Boccace, I resolv'd +to join them in my present work; to which I have added some original +papers of my own; which, whether they are equal or inferior to my +other poems, an author is the most improper judge, and therefore I +leave them wholly to the mercy of the reader. I will hope the best, +that they will not be condemn'd; but if they should, I have the excuse +of an old gentleman, who mounting on horseback before some ladies, +when I was present, got up somewhat heavily, but desir'd of the fair +spectators that they would count fourscore and eight before they +judg'd him. By the mercy of God, I am already come within twenty years +of his number, a cripple in my limbs; but what decays are in my mind, +the reader must determine. I think myself as vigorous as ever in the +faculties of my soul, excepting only my memory, which is not impair'd +to any great degree; and if I lose not more of it, I have no great +reason to complain. What judgment I had, increases rather than +diminishes; and thoughts, such as they are, come crowding in so fast +upon me, that my only difficulty is to choose or to reject; to run +them into verse, or to give them the other harmony of prose. I have so +long studied and practic'd both, that they are grown into a habit, and +become familiar to me. In short, tho' I may lawfully plead some part +of the old gentleman's excuse, yet I will reserve it till I think I +have greater need, and ask no grains of allowance for the faults of +this my present work, but those which are given of course to human +frailty. I will not trouble my reader with the shortness of time in +which I writ it, or the several intervals of sickness. They who think +too well of their own performances are apt to boast in their prefaces +how little time their works have cost them, and what other business of +more importance interfere'd; but the reader will be as apt to ask the +question, why they allow'd not a longer time to make their works more +perfect, and why they had so despicable an opinion of their judges +as to thrust their indigested stuff upon them, as if they deser'd no +better. + +With this account of my present undertaking, I conclude the first part +of this discourse; in the second part, as at a second sitting, tho' I +alter not the draught, I must touch the same features over again, and +change the dead coloring[4] of the whole. In general, I will only say +that I have written nothing which savors of immorality or profaneness; +at least, I am not conscious to myself of any such intention. If there +happen to be found an irreverent expression, or a thought too wanton, +they are crept into my verses thro' my inadvertency; if the searchers +find any in the cargo, let them be stay'd or forfeited, like +counterbanded goods; at least, let their authors be answerable +for them, as being but imported merchandise, and not of my own +manufacture. On the other side, I have endeavor'd to choose such +fables, both ancient and modern, as contain in each of them some +instructive moral; which I could prove by induction, but the way +is tedious, and they leap foremost into sight, without the reader's +trouble of looking after them. I wish I could affirm, with a safe +conscience, that I had taken the same care in all my former writings; +for it must be own'd, that supposing verses are never so beautiful or +pleasing, yet if they contain anything which shocks religion, or good +manners, they are at best what Horace says of good numbers without +good sense, _Versus inopes rerum, nugaeque canorae_.[5] Thus far, I +hope, I am right in court, without renouncing to my other right of +self-defense, where I have been wrongfully accus'd, and my sense +wiredrawn into blasphemy or bawdry, as it has often been by a +religious lawyer,[6] in a late pleading against the stage; in which +he mixes truth with falsehood, and has not forgotten the old rule of +calumniating strongly, that something may remain. + +I resume the thrid of my discourse with the first of my translations, +which was the _First Iliad_ of Homer. If it shall please God to give +me longer life, and moderate health, my intentions are to +translate the whole _Ilias_; provided still that I meet with those +encouragements from the public which may enable me to proceed in my +undertaking with some cheerfulness. And this I dare assure the world +beforehand, that I have found by trial Homer a more pleasing task than +Virgil, (tho' I say not the translation will be less laborious). For +the Grecian is more according to my genius than the Latin poet. In +the works of the two authors we may read their manners and natural +inclinations, which are wholly different. Virgil was of a quiet, +sedate temper; Homer was violent, impetuous, and full of fire. The +chief talent of Virgil was propriety of thoughts, and ornament of +words; Homer was rapid in his thoughts, and took all the liberties, +both of numbers and of expressions, which his language, and the age +in which he liv'd, allow'd him. Homer's invention was more copious, +Virgil's more confin'd; so that if Homer had not led the way, it was +not in Virgil to have begun heroic poetry; for nothing can be more +evident than that the Roman poem is but the second part of the +_Ilias_; a continuation of the same story, and the persons already +form'd; the manners of Æneas are those of Hector superadded to those +which Homer gave him. The adventures of Ulysses in the _Odysseis_ are +imitated in the first six books of Virgil's _Aeneis_; and tho' the +accidents are not the same, (which would have argued him of a servile, +copying, and total barrenness of invention,) yet the seas were the +same, in which both the heroes wander'd; and Dido cannot be denied to +be the poetical daughter of Calypso. The six latter books of Virgil's +poem are the four and twenty _Iliads_ contracted: a quarrel occasioned +by a lady, a single combat, battles fought, and a town besieg'd. I +say not this in derogation to Virgil, neither do I contradict anything +which I have formerly said in his just praise: for his episodes are +almost wholly of his own invention; and the form which he has given to +the telling makes the tale his own, even tho' the original story had +been the same. But this proves, however, that Homer taught Virgil to +design; and if invention be the first virtue of an epic poet, then the +Latin poem can only be allow'd the second place. Mr. Hobbes, in the +preface to his own bald translation of the _Ilias_ (studying poetry as +he did mathematics, when it was too late)--Mr. Hobbes, I say, begins +the praise of Homer where he should have ended it. He tells us that +the first beauty of an epic poem consists in diction, that is, in +the choice of words, and harmony of numbers; now the words are the +coloring of the work, which in the order of nature is last to +be consider'd. The design, the disposition, the manners, and the +thoughts, are all before it: where any of those are wanting or +imperfect, so much wants or is imperfect in the imitation of human +life; which is in the very definition of a poem. Words, indeed, like +glaring colors, are the first beauties that arise and strike the +sight: but if the draught be false or lame, the figures ill disposed, +the manners obscure or inconsistent, or the thoughts unnatural, +then the finest colors are but daubing, and the piece is a beautiful +monster at the best. Neither Virgil nor Homer were deficient in any of +the former beauties; but in this last, which is expression, the Roman +poet is at least equal to the Grecian, as I have said elsewhere; +supplying the poverty of his language by his musical ear, and by his +diligence. But to return: our two great poets, being so different in +their tempers, one choleric and sanguine, the other phlegmatic and +melancholic; that which makes them excel in their several ways is +that each of them has follow'd his own natural inclination, as well +in forming the design as in the execution of it. The very heroes +shew their authors: Achilles is hot, impatient, revengeful, _Impiger, +iracundus, inexorabidis, acer_[7] &c.; Æneas patient, considerate, +careful of his people, and merciful to his enemies; ever submissive +to the will of Heaven--_Quo fata trahunt retrahuntque seqitamur_.[8] +I could please myself with enlarging on this subject, but am forc'd to +defer it to a fitter time. From all I have said I will only draw this +inference, that the action of Homer being more full of vigor than that +of Virgil, according to the temper of the writer, is of consequence +more pleasing to the reader. One warms you by degrees: the other sets +you on fire all at once, and never intermits his heat. 'Tis the same +difference which Longinus makes betwixt the effects of eloquence in +Demosthenes and Tully. One persuades; the other commands. You never +cool while you read Homer, even not in the second book (a graceful +flattery to his countrymen); but he hastens from the ships, and +concludes not that book till he has made you an amends by the violent +playing of a new machine. From thence he hurries on his action with +variety of events, and ends it in less compass than two months. +This vehemence of his, I confess, is more suitable to my temper; and +therefore I have translated his first book with greater pleasure +than any part of Virgil; but it was not a pleasure without pains. The +continual agitations of the spirits must needs be a weakening of any +constitution, especially in age; and many pauses are required for +refreshment betwixt the heats; the _Iliad_ of itself being a third +part longer than all Virgil's works together. + +This is what I thought needful in this place to say of Homer. I +proceed to Ovid and Chaucer, considering the former only in relation +to the latter. With Ovid ended the golden age of the Roman tongue; +from Chaucer the purity of the English tongue began. The manners of +the poets were not unlike: both of them were well bred, well natur'd, +amorous, and libertine, at least in their writings, it may be also in +their lives. Their studies were the same, philosophy and philology. +Both of them were knowing in astronomy, of which Ovid's books of the +Roman feasts, and Chaucer's treatise of the Astrolabe, are sufficient +witnesses. But Chaucer was likewise an astrologer, as were Virgil, +Horace, Persius, and Manilius. Both writ with wonderful facility and +clearness: neither were great inventors; for Ovid only copied the +Grecian fables; and most of Chaucer's stones were taken from his +Italian contemporaries, or their predecessors.[9] Boccace his +_Decameron_ was first publish'd; and from thence our Englishman has +borrow'd many of his _Canterbury Tales_; yet that of _Palamon and +Arcite_ was written in all probability by some Italian wit in a former +age, as I shall prove hereafter. The tale of Grizild was the invention +of Petrarch; by him sent to Boccace; from whom it came to Chaucer. +_Troilus and Cressida_ was also written by a Lombard author; but much +amplified by our English translator, as well as beautified; the genius +of our countrymen, in general, being rather to improve an invention, +than to invent themselves; as is evident not only in our poetry, but +in many of our manufactures. I find I have anticipated already, and +taken up from Boccace before I come to him; but there is so much +less behind; and I am of the temper of most kings, _who love to be +in debt_, are all for present money, no matter how they pay it +afterwards: besides, the nature of a preface is rambling; never wholly +out of the way, nor in it. This I have learn'd from the practice of +honest Montaigne, and return at my pleasure to Ovid and Chaucer, of +whom I have little more to say. Both of them built on the inventions +of other men; yet since Chaucer had something of his own, as _The Wife +of Bath's Tale, The Cock and the Fox_,[10] which I have translated, +and some others, I may justly give our countryman the precedence in +that part; since I can remember nothing of Ovid which was wholly his. +Both of them understood the manners, under which name I comprehend +the passions, and, in a larger sense, the descriptions of persons, +and their very habits; for an example, I see Baucis and Philemon as +perfectly before me, as if some ancient painter had drawn them; +and all the pilgrims in the _Canterbury Tales_, their humors, their +features, and the very dress, as distinctly as if I had supp'd with +them at the Tabard in Southwark; yet even there too the figures of +Chaucer are much more lively, and set in a better light: which tho' +I have not time to prove, yet I appeal to the reader, and am sure he +will clear me from partiality. The thoughts and words remain to be +consider'd in the comparison of the two poets; and I have sav'd myself +one half of that labor, by owning that Ovid liv'd when the Roman +tongue was in its meridian, Chaucer in the dawning of our language; +therefore that part of the comparison stands not on an equal foot, +any more than the diction of Ennius and Ovid, or of Chaucer and our +present English. The words are given up as a post not to be defended +in our poet, because he wanted the modern art of fortifying. The +thoughts remain to be consider'd, and they are to be measured only by +their propriety; that is, as they flow more or less naturally from +the persons describ'd, on such and such occasions. The vulgar judges, +which are nine parts in ten of all nations, who call conceits and +jingles wit, who see Ovid full of them, and Chaucer altogether +without them, will think me little less than mad, for preferring the +Englishman to the Roman: yet, with their leave, I must presume to say +that the things they admire are only glittering trifles, and so far +from being witty, that in a serious poem they are nauseous, because +they are unnatural. Would any man who is ready to die for love +describe his passion like Narcissus? Would he think of _inopem me +copia fecit_,[11] and a dozen more of such expressions, pour'd on the +neck of one another, and signifying all the same thing? If this were +wit, was this a time to be witty, when the poor wretch was in the +agony of death? This is just John Littlewit in _Bartholomew Fair_,[12] +who had a conceit (as he tells you) left him in his misery; a +miserable conceit. On these occasions the poet should endeavor to +raise pity; but instead of this, Ovid is tickling you to laugh. Virgil +never made use of such machines, when he was moving you to commiserate +the death of Dido: he would not destroy what he was building. Chaucer +makes Arcite violent in his love, and unjust in the pursuit of it; yet +when he came to die, he made him think more reasonably: he repents not +of his love, for that had alter'd his character; but acknowledges +the injustice of his proceedings, and resigns Emilia to Palamon. What +would Ovid have done on this occasion? He would certainly have made +Arcite witty on his deathbed. He had complain'd he was farther off +from possession by being so near, and a thousand such boyisms, which +Chaucer rejected as below the dignity of the subject. They who think +otherwise would by the same reason prefer Lucan and Ovid to Homer and +Virgil, and Martial to all four of them. As for the turn of words, in +which Ovid particularly excels all poets, they are sometimes a fault, +and sometimes a beauty, as they are us'd properly or improperly; but +in strong passions always to be shunn'd, because passions are serious, +and will admit no playing. The French have a high value for them; +and I confess, they are often what they call delicate, when they are +introduced with judgment; but Chaucer writ with more simplicity, and +followed nature more closely, than to use them. I have thus far, to +the best of my knowledge, been an upright judge betwixt the parties in +competition, not meddling with the design nor the disposition of it; +because the design was not their own, and in the disposing of it they +were equal. It remains that I say somewhat of Chaucer in particular. + +In the first place, as he is the father of English poetry, so I hold +him in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians held Homer or the +Romans Virgil. He is a perpetual fountain of good sense, learn'd in +all sciences, and therefore speaks properly on all subjects as he knew +what to say, so he knows also when to leave off, a continence which +is practic'd by few writers, and scarcely by any of the ancients, +excepting Virgil and Horace. One of our late great poets[13] is sunk +in his reputation, because he could never forgive any conceit which +came in his way, but swept like a dragnet, great and small. There +was plenty enough, but the dishes were ill sorted, whole pyramids of +sweetmeats for boys and women, but little of solid meat for men. +All this proceeded not from any want of knowledge, but of judgment, +neither did he want that in discerning the beauties and faults of +other poets, but only indulg'd himself in the luxury of writing, and +perhaps knew it was a fault, but hop'd the reader would not find it. +For this reason, tho' he must always be thought a great poet he is +no longer esteem'd a good writer, and for ten impressions, which his +works have had in so many successive years, yet at present a hundred +books are scarcely purchas'd once a twelvemonth for, as my last Lord +Rochester said, tho' somewhat profanely, "Not being of God, he could +not stand." + +Chaucer follow'd Nature everywhere, but was never so bold to go beyond +her, and there is a great difference of being _poeta_ and _aimis +poeta_,[14] if we may believe Catullus, as much as betwixt a modest +behavior and affectation. The verse of Chaucer, I confess, is not +harmonious to us, but 'tis like the eloquence of one whom Tacitus +commends it was _auribus istius temporis accommodata_[15] they who +liv'd with him, and some time after him, thought it musical and it +continued so even in our judgment, if compar'd with the numbers of +Lydgate and Gower, his contemporaries there is the rude sweetness of +a Scotch tune in it, which is natural and pleasing, tho' not perfect. +'Tis true, I cannot go so far as he who published the last edition of +him [16] for he would make us believe the fault is in our ears, and +that there were really ten syllables in a verse where we find but nine +but this opinion is not worth confuting, 'tis so gross and obvious an +error, that common sense (which is a rule in everything but matters +of faith and revelation) must convince the reader that equality of +numbers in every verse which we call heroic was either not known, +or not always practic'd, in Chaucer's age. It were an easy matter to +produce some thousands of his verses, which are lame for want of half +a foot, and sometimes a whole one, and which no pronunciation can +make otherwise. We can only say, that he liv'd in the infancy of our +poetry, and that nothing is brought to perfection at the first. We +must be children before we grow men. There was an Ennius, and in +process of time a Lucilius and a Lucretius, before Virgil and Horace; +even after Chaucer there was a Spenser, a Harrington, a Fairfax, +before Waller and Denham were in being: and our numbers were in their +nonage till these last appear'd. I need say little of his parentage, +life, and fortunes;[17] they are to be found at large in all the +editions of his works. He was employ'd abroad and favor'd by Edward +the Third, Richard the Second, and Henry the Fourth, and was poet, as +I suppose, to all three of them. In Richard's time, I doubt, he was +a little dipp'd in the rebellion of the commons, and being +brother-in-law to John of Ghant, it was no wonder if he follow'd the +fortunes of that family, and was well with Henry the Fourth when he +had depos'd his predecessor. Neither is it to be admir'd,[18] that +Henry, who was a wise as well as a valiant prince, who claim'd by +succession, and was sensible that his title was not sound, but was +rightfully in Mortimer, who had married the heir of York; it was not +to be admir'd, I say, if that great politician should be pleas'd to +have the greatest wit of those times in his interests, and to be the +trumpet of his praises. Augustus had given him the example, by the +advice of Mæcenas, who recommended Virgil and Horace to him; whose +praises help'd to make him popular while he was alive, and after his +death have made him precious to posterity. As for the religion of +our poet, he seems to have some little bias towards the opinions of +Wycliffe, after John of Ghant his patron; somewhat of which appears in +the tale of Piers Plowman.[19] Yet I cannot blame him for inveighing +so sharply against the vices of the clergy in his age; their pride, +their ambition, their pomp, their avarice, their worldly interest, +deserv'd the lashes which he gave them, both in that and in most of +his _Canterbury Tales_: neither has his contemporary Boccace spar'd +them. Yet both those poets liv'd in much esteem with good and holy +men in orders; for the scandal which is given by particular priests +reflects not on the sacred function. Chaucer's Monk, his Canon, and +his Friar, took not from the character of his Good Parson. A satirical +poet is the check of the laymen on bad priests. We are only to take +care that we involve not the innocent with the guilty in the same +condemnation. The good cannot be too much honor'd, nor the bad too +coarsely us'd: for the corruption of the best becomes the worst. When +a clergyman is whipp'd, his gown is first taken off, by which the +dignity of his order is secur'd: if he be wrongfully accus'd, he has +his action of slander; and 'tis at the poet's peril if he transgress +the law. But they will tell us that all kind of satire, tho' never so +well deserv'd by particular priests, yet brings the whole order into +contempt. Is then the peerage of England anything dishonored, when a +peer suffers for his treason? If he be libel'd or any way defam'd, he +has his _scandalum magnatum_[20] to punish the offender. They who use +this kind of argument seem to be conscious to themselves of somewhat +which has deserv'd the poet's lash, and are less concern'd for their +public capacity than for their private; at least there is pride at the +bottom of their reasoning. If the faults of men in orders are only to +be judg'd among themselves, they are all in some sort parties: for, +since they say the honor of their order is concern'd in every member +of it, how can we be sure that they will be impartial judges? How far +I may be allow'd to speak my opinion in this case, I know not; but I +am sure a dispute of this nature caus'd mischief in abundance betwixt +a king of England and an archbishop of Canterbury,[21] one standing +up for the laws of his land, and the other for the honor (as he call'd +it) of God's Church; which ended in the murther of the prelate, and in +the whipping of his Majesty from post to pillar for his penance. +The learn'd and ingenious Dr. Drake[22] has say'd me the labour of +inquiring into the esteem and reverence which the priests have had +of old, and I would rather extend than diminish any part of it: yet +I must needs say, that when a priest provokes me without any occasion +given him, I have no reason, unless it be the charity of a Christian, +to forgive him: _prior læsit_[23] is justification sufficient in the +civil law. If I answer him in his own language, self-defense, I am +sure, must be allow'd me; and if I carry it farther, even to a sharp +recrimination, somewhat may be indulg'd to human frailty. Yet my +resentment has not wrought so far, but that I have followed Chaucer +in his character of a holy man, and have enlarg'd on that subject with +some pleasure, reserving to myself the right, if I shall think fit +hereafter, to describe another sort of priests, such as are more +easily to be found than the Good Parson; such as have given the last +blow to Christianity in this age, by a practice so contrary to their +doctrine. But this will keep cold till another time. In the mean while +I take up Chaucer where I left him. He must have been a man of a most +wonderful comprehensive nature, because, as it has been truly observed +of him, he has taken into the compass of his _Canterbury Tales_ the +various manners and humors (as we now call them) of the whole English +nation, in his age. Not a single character has escap'd him. All his +pilgrims are severally distinguish'd from each other; and not only +in their inclinations, but in their very physiognomies and persons. +Bapista Porta[24] could not have described their natures better, than +by the marks which the poet gives them. The matter and manner of +their tales, and of their telling, are so suited to their different +educations, humors, and callings, that each of them would be improper +in any other mouth. Even the grave and serious characters are +distinguished by their several sorts of gravity: their discourses are +such as belong to their age, their calling, and their breeding; such +as are becoming of them, and of them only. Some of his persons are +vicious, and some virtuous; some are unlearn'd, or (as Chaucer +calls them) lewd, and some are learn'd. Even the ribaldry of the +low characters is different: the Reeve, the Miller, and the Cook are +several men, and distinguished from each other, as much as the mincing +Lady Prioress and the broad-speaking gap-tooth'd Wife of Bath. But +enough of this: there is such a variety of game springing up before +me, that I am distracted in my choice, and know not which to follow. +'Tis sufficient to say, according to the proverb, that here is God's +plenty. We have our forefathers and great-grandames all before us, +as they were in Chaucer's days; their general characters are still +remaining in mankind, and even in England, tho' they are call'd by +other names than those of Monks and Friars, and Canons, and Lady +Abbesses, and Nuns: for mankind is ever the same, and nothing lost out +of nature, tho' everything is alter'd. May I have leave to do myself +the justice--since my enemies will do me none, and are so far from +granting me to be a good poet, that they will not allow me so much as +to be a Christian, or a moral man--may I have leave, I say, to inform +my reader that I have confin'd my choice to such tales of Chaucer as +savor nothing of immodesty. If I had desir'd more to please than +to instruct, the Reeve, the Miller, the Shipman, the Merchant, the +Sumner, and, above all, the Wife of Bath, in the prologue to her tale, +would have procured me as many friends and readers, as there are beaux +and ladies of pleasure in the town. But I will no more offend against +good manners: I am sensible, as I ought to be, of the scandal I have +given by my loose writings; and make what reparation I am able, +by this public acknowledgment. If anything of this nature, or of +profaneness, be crept into these poems, I am so far from defending it, +that I disown it. _Totum hoc indictum volo._[25] Chaucer makes another +manner of apology for his broad speaking, and Boccace makes the like; +but I will follow neither of them. Our countryman, in the end of his +characters, before the _Canterbury Tales_, thus excuses the ribaldry, +which is very gross in many of his novels: + + But first, I pray you of your courtesy, + That ye ne arrete[26] it nought my villany, + Though that I plainly speak in this mattere + To tellen you her[27] words, and eke her chere: + Ne though I speak her words properly, + For this ye knowen as well as I, + Who shall tellen a tale after a man, + He mote rehearse as nye as ever he can: + Everich word of it been in his charge, + _All speke he never so rudely ne large._ + Or else he mote tellen his tale untrue, + Or feine things, or find words new: + He may not spare, altho he were his brother, + He mote as well say o word as another. + Christ spake himself full broad in holy writ, + And well I wote no villany is it. + Eke Plato saith, who so can him rede, + The words mote[28] been cousin to the dede.[29] + +Yet if a man should have enquired of Boccace or of Chaucer, what need +they had of introducing such characters, where obscene words were +proper in their mouths, but very undecent to be heard; I know not what +answer they could have made: for that reason such tales shall be left +untold by me. You have here a specimen of Chaucer's language, which +is so obsolete that his sense is scarce to be understood; and you +have likewise more than one example of his unequal numbers, which were +mentioned before. Yet many of his verses consist of ten syllables, and +the words not much behind our present English: as for example, these +two lines, in the description of the carpenter's young wife: + + Wincing she was, as is a jolly colt, + Long as a mast, and upright as a bolt. + +I have almost done with Chaucer, when I have answer'd some objections +relating to my present work. I find some people are offended that I +have turn'd these tales into modern English; because they think them +unworthy of my pains, and look on Chaucer as a dry, old-fashion'd wit, +not worth reviving. I have often heard the late Earl of Leicester say +that Mr. Cowley himself was of that opinion; who having read him over +at my lord's request, declar'd he had no taste of him. I dare not +advance my opinion against the judgment of so great an author; but +I think it fair, however, to leave the decision to the public: Mr. +Cowley was too modest to set up for a dictator; and being shock'd +perhaps with his old style, never examin'd into the depth of his +good sense. Chaucer, I confess, is a rough diamond, and must first +be polish'd, ere he shines. I deny not, likewise, that, living in our +early days of poetry, he writes not always of a piece, but sometimes +mingles trivial things with those of greater moment. Sometimes also, +tho' not often, he runs riot, like Ovid, and knows not when he has +said enough. But there are more great wits, beside Chaucer, whose +fault is their excess of conceits, and those ill sorted. An author is +not to write all he can, but only all he ought. Having observ'd this +redundancy in Chaucer, (as it is an easy matter for a man of ordinary +parts to find a fault in one of greater,) I have not tied myself to a +literal translation; but have often omitted what I judg'd unnecessary, +or not of dignity enough to appear in the company of better thoughts. +I have presumed farther, in some places, and added somewhat of my +own where I thought my author was deficient, and had not given his +thoughts their true luster, for want of words in the beginning of our +language. And to this I was the more embolden'd, because (if I may be +permitted to say it of myself) I found I had a soul congenial to his, +and that I had been conversant in the same studies. Another poet, in +another age, may take the same liberty with my writings; if at least +they live long enough to deserve correction. It was also necessary +sometimes to restore the sense of Chaucer, which was lost or mangled +in the errors of the press. Let this example suffice at present; +in the story of _Palawan and Arcite_, where the temple of Diana is +describ'd, you find these verses, in all the editions of our author: + + There saw I Danè turned unto a tree, + I mean not the goddess Diane, + But Venus daughter, which that hight Danè; + +which after a little consideration I knew was to be reformed into this +sense, that Daphne, the daughter of Peneus, was turn'd into a tree. I +durst not make thus bold with Ovid, lest some future Milbourne should +arise, and say I varied from my author, because I understood him not. + +But there are other judges, who think I ought not to have translated +Chaucer into English, out of a quite contrary notion: they suppose +there is a certain veneration due to his old language; and that it +is little less than profanation and sacrilege to alter it. They are +farther of opinion that somewhat of his good sense will suffer in this +transfusion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will infallibly be +lost, which appear with more grace in their old habit. Of this +opinion was that excellent person whom I mention'd, the late Earl of +Leicester, who valued Chaucer as much as Mr. Cowley despis'd him. My +lord dissuaded me from this attempt, (for I was thinking of it some +years before his death,) and his authority prevail'd so far with me +as to defer my undertaking while he liv'd, in deference to him: yet my +reason was not convinc'd with what he urg'd against it. If the first +end of a writer be to be understood, then as his language grows +obsolete, his thoughts must grow obscure: + + Multa renascentur quæ nunc cecidere; cadentque, + Quæ nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus, + Quem penes arbitrium est et jus et norma loquendi.[30] + +When an ancient word for its sound and significance deserves to be +reviv'd, I have that reasonable veneration for antiquity, to restore +it. All beyond this is superstition. Words are not like landmarks, so +sacred as never to be remov'd; customs are chang'd, and even statutes +are silently repeal'd, when the reason ceases for which they were +enacted. As for the other part of the argument, that his thoughts +will lose of their original beauty, by the innovation of words; in +the first place, not only their beauty, but their being is lost, where +they are no longer understood, which is the present case. I grant +that something must be lost in all transfusion, that is, in all +translations; but the sense will remain, which would otherwise be +lost, or at least be maim'd, when it is scarce intelligible; and +that but to a few. How few are there who can read Chaucer so as to +understand him perfectly! And if imperfectly, then with less profit +and no pleasure. 'Tis not for the use of some old Saxon friends that I +have taken these pains with him: let them neglect my version, because +they have no need of it. I made it for their sakes who understand +sense and poetry as well as they, when that poetry and sense is put +into words which they understand. I will go farther, and dare to add, +that what beauties I lose in some places, I give to others which had +them not originally; but in this I may be partial to myself; let the +reader judge, and I submit to his decision. Yet I think I have just +occasion to complain of them, who, because they understand Chaucer, +would deprive the greater part of their countrymen of the same +advantage, and hoard him up, as misers do their grandam gold, only to +look on it themselves and hinder others from making use of it. In +sum, I seriously protest that no man ever had, or can have, a greater +veneration for Chaucer, than myself. I have translated some part +of his works, only that I might perpetuate his memory, or at least +refresh it, amongst my countrymen. If I have alter'd him anywhere for +the better, I must at the same time acknowledge that I could have done +nothing without him: _facile est inventis addere_,[31] is no great +commendation; and I am not so vain to think I have deserv'd a greater. +I will conclude what I have to say of him singly, with this one +remark: a lady of my acquaintance, who keeps a kind of correspondence +with some authors of the fair sex in France, has been inform'd by +them, that Mademoiselle de Scudéry, who is as old as Sibyl, and +inspir'd like her by the same God of Poetry, is at this time +translating Chaucer into modern French. From which I gather that +he has been formerly translated into the old Provençal (for how she +should come to understand old English I know not). But the matter of +fact being true, it makes me think that there is something in it like +fatality; that, after certain periods of time, the fame and memory +of great wits should be renewed, as Chaucer is both in France and +England. If this be wholly chance, 't is extraordinary, and I dare not +call it more, for fear of being tax'd with superstition. + +Boccace comes last to be consider'd, who living in the same age with +Chaucer, had the same genius, and follow'd the same studies: both +writ novels, and each of them cultivated his mother tongue. But the +greatest resemblance of our two modern authors being in their familiar +style, and pleasing way of relating comical adventures, I may pass it +over, because I have translated nothing from Boccace of that nature. +In the serious part of poetry, the advantage is wholly on Chaucer's +side; for tho' the Englishman has borrow'd many tales from the +Italian, yet it appears that those of Boccace were not generally of +his own making, but taken from authors of former ages, and by him only +model'd; so that what there was of invention in either of them may be +judg'd equal. But Chaucer has refin'd on Boccace, and has mended the +stones which he has borrowed, in his way of telling; tho' prose +allows more liberty of thought, and the expression is more easy when +unconfin'd by numbers. Our countryman carries weight, and yet wins the +race at disadvantage. I desire not the reader should take my word, and +therefore I will set two of their discourses on the same subject, +in the same light, for every man to judge betwixt them. I translated +Chaucer first, and, amongst the rest, pitch'd on _The Wife of Bath's +Tale_; not daring, as I have said, to adventure on her prologue, +because 't is too licentious: there Chaucer introduces an old woman +of mean parentage, whom a youthful knight of noble blood was forc'd to +marry, and consequently loath'd her; the crone being in bed with him +on the wedding night, and finding his aversion, endeavors to win his +affection by reason, and speaks a good word for herself (as who could +blame her?) in hope to mollify the sullen bridegroom. She takes her +topics from the benefits of poverty, the advantages of old age and +ugliness, the vanity of youth, and the silly pride of ancestry and +titles without inherent virtue, which is the true nobility. When I had +clos'd Chaucer, I returned to Ovid, and translated some more of his +fables; and by this time had so far forgotten _The Wife of Bath's +Tale_, that, when I took up Boccace, unawares I fell on the same +argument of preferring virtue to nobility of blood, and titles, in the +story of Sigismonda; which I had certainly avoided for the resemblance +of the two discourses, if my memory had not fail'd me. Let the reader +weigh them both; and if he thinks me partial to Chaucer, 't is in him +to right Boccace. + +I prefer in our countryman, far above all his other stories, the noble +poem of _Palamon and Arcite_, which is of the epic kind, and perhaps +not much inferior to the _Ilias_ or the _Æneis_: the story is more +pleasing than either of them, the manners as perfect, the diction as +poetical, the learning as deep and various, and the disposition full +as artful; only it includes a greater length of time, as taking up +seven years at least, but Aristotle has left undecided the duration of +the action; which yet is easily reduc'd into the compass of a year, +by a narration of what preceded the return of Palamon to Athens. I had +thought for the honor of our nation, and more particularly for his, +whose laurel, tho' unworthy, I have worn after him, that this story +was of English growth, and Chaucer's own; but I was undeceiv'd by +Boccace; for, casually looking on the end of his seventh _Giornata_, +I found Dionco (under which name he shadows himself) and Fiametta +(who represents his mistress, the natural daughter of Robert, King of +Naples), of whom these words are spoken: _Dionco e Fiametta gran pezza +cantarono insieme d'Arcita, e di Palamone_:[32] by which it appears +that this story was written before the time of Boccace; but, the name +of its author being wholly lost, Chaucer is now become an original; +and I question not but the poem has receiv'd many beauties by passing +thro' his noble hands. Besides this tale, there is another of his own +invention, after the manner of the Provençals, call'd _The Flower and +the Leaf_,[33] with which I was so particularly pleas'd, both for the +invention and the moral, that I cannot hinder myself from recommending +it to the reader. + +As a corollary to this preface, in which I have done justice to +others, I owe somewhat to myself: not that I think it worth my time +to enter the lists with one M----,[34] or one B----,[35] but barely +to take notice, that such men there are who have written scurrilously +against me, without any provocation. M----, who is in orders, pretends +amongst the rest this quarrel to me, that I have fallen foul on +priesthood: if I have, I am only to ask pardon of good priests, and +am afraid his part of the reparation will come to little. Let him to +satisfied that he shall not be able to force himself upon me for an +adversary. I contemn him too much to enter into competition with him. +His own translations of Virgil have answer'd his criticisms on mine. +If (as they say he has declar'd in print) he prefers the version of +Ogleby to mine, the world has made him the same compliment: for 't is +agreed on all hands, that he writes even below Ogleby: that, you will +say, is not easily to be done; but what cannot M---- bring about? I am +satisfied, however, that while he and I live together, I shall not be +thought the worst poet of the age. It looks as if I had desir'd him +underhand to write so ill against me; but upon my honest word I have +not brib'd him to do me this service, and am wholly guiltless of his +pamphlet. 'T is true, I should be glad if I could persuade him to +continue his good offices, and write such another critique on anything +of mine for I find by experience he has a great stroke with the +reader, when he condemns any of my poems, to make the world have a +better opinion of them. He has taken some pains with my poetry, but +nobody will be persuaded to take the same with his. If I had taken +to the Church, (as he affirms, but which was never in my thoughts,) +I should have had more sense, if not more grace, than to have turn'd +myself out of my benefice by writing libels on my parishioners. But +his account of my manners and my principles are of a piece with his +cavils and his poetry; and so I have done with him for ever. + +As for the City Bard, or Knight Physician, I hear his quarrel to me is +that I was the author of _Absalom and Achitophel_, which, he thinks, +is a little hard on his fanatic patrons in London. + +But I will deal the more civilly with his two poems, because nothing +ill is to be spoken of the dead; and therefore peace be to the _manes_ +of his _Arthurs_. I will only say that it was not for this noble +knight that I drew the plan of an epic poem on King Arthur, in my +preface to the translation of Juvenal. The guardian angels of kingdoms +were machines too ponderous for him to manage; and therefore he +rejected them, as Dares did the whirlbats of Eryx, when they were +thrown before him by Entellus. Yet from that preface he plainly took +his hint: for he began immediately upon the story, tho' he had the +baseness not to acknowledge his benefactor but, instead of it, to +traduce me in a libel. + +I shall say the less of Mr. Collier, because in many things he +has tax'd me justly; and I have pleaded guilty to all thoughts +and expressions of mine which can be truly argued of obscenity, +profaneness, of immorality; and retract them. If he be my enemy, +let him triumph; if he be my friend, as I have given him no personal +occasion to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance. It becomes +me not to draw my pen in the defense of a bad cause, when I have so +often drawn it for a good one. Yet it were not difficult to prove +that in many places he has perverted my meaning by his glosses, and +interpreted my words into blasphemy and bawdry, of which they were +not guilty. Besides that, he is too much given to horseplay in his +raillery, and comes to battle like a dictator from the plow. I will +not say: "The zeal of God's house has eaten him up;" but I am sure it +has devoured some part of his good manners and civility. It might also +be doubted whether it were altogether zeal which prompted him to this +rough manner of proceeding: perhaps it became not one of his function +to rake into the rubbish of ancient and modern plays; a divine might +have employ'd his pains to better purpose than in the nastiness of +Plautus and Aristophanes; whose examples, as they excuse not me, so +it might be possibly supposed that he read them not without some +pleasure. They who have written commentaries on those poets, or on +Horace, Juvenal, and Martial, have explain'd some vices which, without +their interpretation, had been unknown to modern times. Neither has he +judg'd impartially betwixt the former age and us. + +There is more bawdry in one play of Fletcher's, call'd _The Custom of +the Country_, than in all ours together. Yet this has been often acted +on the stage in my remembrance. Are the times so much more reform'd +now than they were five and twenty years ago? If they are, I +congratulate the amendment of our morals. But I am not to prejudice +the cause of my fellow poets, tho' I abandon my own defense: they have +some of them answer'd for themselves, and neither they nor I can think +Mr. Collier so formidable an enemy that we should shun him. He has +lost ground at the latter end of the day, by pursuing his point too +far, like the Prince of Condé at the battle of Seneffe: from immoral +plays to no plays, _ab abusu ad usum, non valet consequentia_[36]. But +being a party, I am not to erect myself into a judge. As for the rest +of those who have written against me, they are such scoundrels that +they deserve not the least notice to be taken of them, B---- and M---- +are only distinguish'd from the crowd by being remember'd to their +infamy: + + --Demetri, teque Tigelli[37] + Discipulorum inter jubeo plorare cathedras. + + +[Footnote A: John Dryden (1631-1700), the great dramatic and satirical +poet of the later seventeenth century, whose translation of Virgil's +"Æneid" appears in another volume of the Harvard Classics, deserves +hardly less distinction as a prose writer than as a poet. The present +essay, prefixed to a volume of narrative poems, is largely concerned +with Chaucer, and in its genial and penetrating criticism, expressed +with characteristic clearness and vigor, can be seen the ground for +naming Dryden the first of English literary critics, and the founder +of modern prose style.] + +[Footnote 1: Scott suggests that the allusion is to the Duke of +Buckingham, who was often satirized for the slow progress of his great +mansion at Chefden.] + +[Footnote 2: Boccaccio did not invent this stanza, which had been used +in both French and Italian before his day, but he did constitute it +the Italian form for heroic verse.] + +[Footnote 3: Rymer misled Dryden. There is no trace of Provençal +influence on Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 4: The foundation layer of color in a painting.] + +[Footnote 5: "Verses without content, melodious trifles."--_Ars Poet_. +322.] + +[Footnote 6: Jeremy Collier, in his _Short View of the Immortality and +Profaneness of the Stage_, 1698.] + +[Footnote 7: "Energetic, irascible, unyielding, vehement."--Horace, +_Ars Poet._121.] + +[Footnote 8: "Whithersoever the fates drag us to and fro, let us +follow."--Virgil, _Æneid_, v. 709.] + +[Footnote 9: The statements that follow as to Chaucer's sources are +mostly not in accord with the results of modern scholarship.] + +[Footnote 10: The plot of neither of these poems was original with +Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 11: "Plenty has made me poor."--_Meta._ iii, 466.] + +[Footnote 12: By Ben Jonson.] + +[Footnote 13: Cowley] + +[Footnote 14: 'Too much a poet'--Martial iii 44 (not Catullus)] + +[Footnote 15: Suited to the ears of that time] + +[Footnote 16: Speght, whom modern scholarship has shown to be right in +this matter.] + +[Footnote 17: What follows on Chaucer's life is full of errors.] + +[Footnote 18: Wondered at] + +[Footnote 19: A spurious "Plowman's Tale" was included in the older +editions of Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 20: A law term for slander of a man of high rank, involving +more severe punishment than ordinary slander.] + +[Footnote 21: Henry II. and Thomas à Becket.] + +[Footnote 22: Dr. James Drake wrote a reply to Jeremy Collier's _Short +View_.] + +[Footnote 23: "He did the first injury"] + +[Footnote 24: A Neapolitan physician who wrote on physiognomy.] + +[Footnote 25: "I wish all this unsaid."] + +[Footnote 26: Reckon.] + +[Footnote 27: Their.] + +[Footnote 28: Must.] + +[Footnote 29: The corrupt state of the text of this passage is enough +to explain why Dryden found Chaucer rough.] + +[Footnote 30: "Many words which have now fallen out of use shall be +born again; and others which are now in honor shall fall, if custom +wills it, in the force of which lie the judgement and law and rules of +speech."--Horace _Ars Poet._ 70-72.] + +[Footnote 31: "It is easy to add to what is already invented."] + +[Footnote 32: Dionco and Fiametta sang together a long time of Arcite +and Palamon.] + +[Footnote 33: Not by Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 34: Rev. Luke Milbourne, who had attacked Dryden's Virgil.] + +[Footnote 35: Sir Richard Blackmore, who had censured Dryden for the +indecency of his writings.] + +[Footnote 36: "The argument from abuse to use is not valid."] + +[Footnote 37: "You, Demetrius and Tigellius, I bid lament among +the chairs of your scholars." Blackmore had once been a +schoolmaster.--Noyes.] + + + + +PREFACE TO JOSEPH ANDREWS + +BY HENRY FIELDING (1742)[A] + +THE COMIC EPIC IN PROSE + + +As it is possible the mere English reader may have a different idea of +romance with the author of these little volumes; and may consequently +expect a kind of entertainment, not to be found, nor which was even +intended, in the following pages; it may not be improper to premise a +few words concerning this kind of writing, which I do not remember to +have seen hitherto attempted in our language. + +The EPIC, as well as the DRAMA, is divided into tragedy and comedy. +HOMER, who was the father of this species of poetry, gave us the +pattern of both these, tho' that of the latter kind is entirely lost; +which Aristotle tells us, bore the same relation to comedy which his +Iliad bears to tragedy. And perhaps, that we have no more instances of +it among the writers of antiquity, is owing to the loss of this +great pattern, which, had it survived, would have found its imitators +equally with the other poems of this great original. + +And farther, as this poetry may be tragic or comic, I will not scruple +to say it may be likewise either in verse or prose: for tho' it wants +one particular, which the critic enumerates in the constituent parts +of an epic poem, namely, metre; yet, when any kind of writing contains +all its other parts, such as fable, action, characters, sentiments, +and diction, and is deficient in metre only, it seems, I think, +reasonable to refer it to the epic; at least, as no critic hath +thought proper to range it under any other head, nor to assign it a +particular name to itself. + +Thus the Telemachus of the archbishop of Cambray appears to me of the +epic kind, as well as the Odyssey of Homer, indeed, it is much fairer +and more reasonable to give it a name common with that species from +which it differs only in a single instance, than to confound it with +those which it resembles in no other. Such are those voluminous works, +commonly called Romances, namely Clelia, Cleopatra, Astræa, Cassandra, +the Grand Cyrus, and innumerable others which contain, as I apprehend, +very little instruction or entertainment. + +Now, a comic romance is a comic epic-poem in prose; differing from +comedy, as the serious epic from tragedy: its action being more +extended and comprehensive; containing a much larger circle of +incidents, and introducing a greater variety of characters. It differs +from the serious romance in its fable and action, in this: that as in +the one these are grave and solemn, so in the other they are light and +ridiculous; it differs in its characters, by introducing persons of +inferiour rank, and consequently of inferiour manners, whereas the +grave romance sets the highest before us; lastly in its sentiments and +diction; by preserving the ludicrous instead of the sublime. In the +diction I think, burlesque itself may be sometimes admitted; of which +many instances will occur in this work, as in the description of the +battles, and some other places not necessary to be pointed out to the +classical reader; for whose entertainment those parodies or burlesque +imitations are chiefly calculated. + +But tho' we have sometimes admitted this in our diction, we have +carefully excluded it from our sentiments and characters; for there +it is never properly introduced, unless in writings of the burlesque +kind, which this is not intended to be. Indeed, no two species of +writing can differ more widely than the comic and the burlesque: +for as the latter is ever the exhibition of what is monstrous and +unnatural, and where our delight, if we examine it, arises from the +surprising absurdity, as in appropriating the manners of the highest +to the lowest, or _è converso_; so in the former, we should ever +confine ourselves strictly to nature, from the just imitation of +which, will flow all the pleasure we can this way convey to a sensible +reader. And perhaps, there is one reason, why a comic writer should +of all others be the least excused for deviating from nature, since +it may not be always so easy for a serious poet to meet with the great +and the admirable; but life everywhere furnishes an accurate observer +with the ridiculous. + +I have hinted this little, concerning burlesque; because I have often +heard that name given to performances, which have been truly of the +comic kind, from the author's having sometimes admitted it in his +diction only; which as it is the dress of poetry, doth like the dress +of men establish characters, (the one of the whole poem, and the other +of the whole man), in vulgar opinion, beyond any of their greater +excellences: but surely, a certain drollery in style, where characters +and sentiments are perfectly natural, no more constitutes the +burlesque, than an empty pomp and dignity of words, where everything +else is mean and low, can entitle any performance to the appellation +of the true sublime. + +And I apprehend, my Lord Shaftesbury's opinion of mere burlesque +agrees with mine, when he asserts, "There is no such thing to be found +in the writings of the antients." But perhaps I have less abhorrence +than he professes for it: and that not because I have had some little +success on the stage this way; but rather as it contributes more to +exquisite mirth and laughter than any other; and these are probably +more wholesome physic for the mind, and conduce better to purge away +spleen, melancholy, and ill affections, than is generally imagined. +Nay, I will appeal to common observation, whether the same companies +are not found more full of good-humour and benevolence, after they +have been sweetened for two or three hours with entertainments of this +kind, than soured by a tragedy or a grave lecture. + +But to illustrate all this by another science, in which, perhaps, we +shall see the distinction more clearly and plainly: let us examine the +works of a comic history-painter, with those performances which +the Italians call _Caricatura_, where we shall find the greatest +excellence of the former to consist in the exactest copy of nature, +insomuch, that a judicious eye instantly rejects anything _outré_, any +liberty which the painter hath taken with the features of that _alma +mater_. Whereas in the _Caricatura_ we allow all licence. Its aim is +to exhibit monsters, not men, and all distortions and exaggerations +whatever are within its proper province. + +Now what Caricatura is in painting Burlesque is in writing, and in the +same manner the comic writer and painter correlate to each other. And +here I shall observe, that as in the former, the painter seems to have +the advantage, so it is in the latter infinitely on the side of the +writer, for the Monstrous is much easier to paint than describe, and +the Ridiculous to describe than paint. + +And tho' perhaps this latter species doth not in either science so +strongly affect and agitate the muscles as the other, yet it will be +owned I believe, that a more rational and useful pleasure arises to us +from it. He who should call the ingenious Hogarth a burlesque painter, +would, in my opinion, do him very little honour: for sure it is much +easier, much less the subject of admiration, to paint a man with a +nose, or any other feature of a preposterous size, or to expose him in +some absurd or monstrous attitude, than to express the affections of +men on canvas. It hath been thought a vast commendation of a painter +to say his figures _seem to breathe_, but surely it is a much greater +and nobler applause, _that they appear to think_. + +But to return The Ridiculous only, as I have before said, falls within +my province in the present work. Nor will some explanation of this +word be thought impertinent by the reader, if he considers how +wonderfully it hath been mistaken, even by writers who have profess'd +it; for to what but such a mistake, can we attribute the many attempts +to ridicule the blackest villainies, and what is yet worse the most +dreadful calamities? What could exceed the absurdity of an author, who +should write the comedy of Nero, with the merry incident of ripping +up his mother's belly, or what would give a greater shock to humanity +than an attempt to expose the miseries of poverty and distress to +ridicule? And yet, the reader will not want much learning to suggest +such instances to himself. + +Besides, it may seem remarkable, that Aristotle, who is so fond and +free of definitions, hath not thought proper to define the Ridiculous. +Indeed, where he tells us it is proper to comedy, he hath remarked +that villainy is not its object: but that he hath not, as I remember, +positively asserted what is. Nor doth the Abbé Bellegarde, who hath +written a treatise on this subject, tho' he shows us many species of +it, once trace it to its fountain. + +The only source of the true Ridiculous (as it appears to me) is +affectation. But tho' it arises from one spring only, when we consider +the infinite streams into which this one branches, we shall presently +cease to admire at the copious field it affords to an observer. +Now affectation proceeds from one of these two causes; vanity, or +hypocrisy: for as vanity puts us on affecting false characters, in +order to purchase applause; so hypocrisy sets us on an endeavour to +avoid censure by concealing our vices under an appearance of their +opposite virtues. And tho' these two causes are often confounded, +(for they require some distinguishing;) yet, as they proceed from +very different motives, so they are as clearly distinct in their +operations: for indeed, the affectation which arises from vanity is +nearer to truth than the other; as it hath not that violent repugnancy +of nature to struggle with, which that of the hypocrite hath. It +may be likewise noted, that affectation doth not imply an absolute +negation of those qualities which are affected: and therefore, tho', +when it proceeds from hypocrisy, it be nearly allied to deceit; +yet when it comes from vanity only, it partakes of the nature of +ostentation: for instance, the affectation of liberality in a vain +man, differs visibly from the same affectation in the avaricious; for +tho' the vain man is not what he would appear, or hath not the virtue +he affects, to the degree he would be thought to have it; yet it sits +less awkwardly on him than on the avaricious man, who is the very +reverse of what he would seem to be. + +From the discovery of this affectation arises the Ridiculous--which +always strikes the reader with surprize and pleasure; and that in a +higher and stronger degree when the affectation arises from hypocrisy, +than when from vanity: for to discover any one to be the exact +reverse of what he affects, is more surprizing, and consequently more +ridiculous, than to find him a little deficient in the quality he +desires the reputation of. I might observe that our Ben Jonson, who +of all men understood the Ridiculous the best, hath chiefly used the +hypocritical affectation. + +Now from affectation only, the misfortunes and calamities of life, +or the imperfections of nature, may become the objects of ridicule. +Surely he hath a very ill-framed mind, who can look on ugliness, +infirmity, or poverty, as ridiculous in themselves: nor do I believe +any man living who meets a dirty fellow riding through the streets in +a cart, is struck with an idea of the Ridiculous from it; but if he +should see the same figure descend from his coach and six, or bolt +from his chair with his hat under his arm, he would then begin to +laugh, and with justice. In the same manner, were we to enter a poor +house and behold a wretched family shivering with cold and languishing +with hunger, it would not incline us to laughter, (at least we must +have very diabolical natures, if it would): but should we discover +there a grate, instead of coals, adorned with flowers, empty plate or +china dishes on the side-board, or any other affectation of riches and +finery either on their persons or in their furniture: we might then +indeed be excused, for ridiculing so fantastical an appearance. +Much less are natural imperfections the object of derision: but when +ugliness aims at the applause of beauty, or lameness endeavours to +display agility; it is then that these unfortunate circumstances, +which at first moved our compassion, tend only to raise our mirth. + +The poet carries this very far; + + None are for being what they are in fault, + But for not being what they would be thought. + +Where if the metre would suffer the word Ridiculous to close the first +line, the thought would be rather more proper. Great vices are the +proper objects of our detestation, smaller faults of our pity: but +affectation appears to me the only true source of the Ridiculous. + +But perhaps it may be objected to me, that I have against my own rules +introduced vices, and of a very black kind into this work. To this I +shall answer: First, that it is very difficult to pursue a series of +human actions and keep clear from them. Secondly, that the vices to +be found here, are rather the accidental consequences of some human +frailty, or foible, than causes habitually existing in the mind. +Thirdly, that they are never set forth as the objects of ridicule, +but detestation. Fourthly, that they are never the principal figure at +that time on the scene; lastly, they never produce the intended evil. + + +[Footnote A: Henry Fielding, dramatist, novelist, and judge, was born +near Glastonbury, Somersetshire, April 22, 1707, and died at Lisbon, +October 8, 1754. Though seldom spoken of as an essayist, Fielding +scattered through his novels a large number of detached or detachable +discussions which are essentially essays, of which the preface +to "Joseph Andrews" on the "Comic Epic in Prose," is a favorable +specimen. The novel which it introduces was begun as a parody on +Richardson's "Pamela," and the preface gives Fielding's conception of +this form of fiction.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH DICTIONARY + +BY SAMUEL JOHNSON (1755)[A] + + +It is the fate of those who toil at the lower employments of life, to +be rather driven by the fear of evil, than attracted by the prospect +of good; to be exposed to censure, without hope of praise; to be +disgraced by miscarriage, or punished for neglect, where success would +have been without applause; and diligence without reward. + +Among these unhappy mortals is the writer of dictionaries; whom +mankind have considered, not as the pupil, but the slave of science, +the pioneer of literature, doomed only to remove rubbish and clear +obstructions from the paths through which Learning and Genius press +forward to conquest and glory, without bestowing a smile on the humble +drudge that facilitates their progress. Every other author may aspire +to praise; the lexicographer can only hope to escape reproach, and +even this negative recompense has been yet granted to very few. + +I have, notwithstanding this discouragement, attempted a Dictionary of +the English Language, which, while it was employed in the cultivation +of every species of literature, has itself been hitherto neglected; +suffered to spread, under the direction of chance, into wild +exuberance; resigned to the tyranny of time and fashion: and exposed +to the corruptions of ignorance, and caprices of innovation. + +When I took the first survey of my undertaking, I found our speech +copious without order, and energetic without rule: wherever I turned +my view, there was perplexity to be disentangled and confusion to be +regulated; choice was to be made out of boundless variety, without any +established principle of selection; adulterations were to be detected, +without a settled test of purity; and modes of expression to be +rejected or received, without the suffrages of any writers of +classical reputation or acknowledged authority. + +Having therefore no assistance but from general grammar, I applied +myself to the perusal of our writers; and noting whatever might be of +use to ascertain or illustrate any word or phrase, accumulated in time +the materials of a dictionary, which, by degrees, I reduced to +method, establishing to myself, in the progress of the work, such as +experience and analogy suggested to me; experience, which practice and +observation were continually increasing; and analogy, which, though in +some words obscure, was evident in others. + +In adjusting the ORTHOGRAPHY, which has been to this time +unsettled and fortuitous, I found it necessary to distinguish those +irregularities that are inherent in our tongue, and perhaps coeval +with it, from others which the ignorance or negligence of later +writers has produced. Every language has its anomalies, which though +inconvenient, and in themselves once unnecessary, must be tolerated +among the imperfections of human things, and which require only to be +registered, that they may not be increased; and ascertained, that +they may not be confounded: but every language has likewise +its improprieties and absurdities, which it is the duty of the +lexicographer to correct or proscribe. + +As language was at its beginning merely oral, all words of necessary +or common use were spoken before they were written; and while they +were unfixed by any visible signs, must have been spoken with great +diversity, as we now observe those who cannot read to catch sounds +imperfectly, and utter them negligently. When this wild and barbarous +jargon was first reduced to an alphabet, every penman endeavored to +express, as he could, the sounds which he was accustomed to pronounce +or to receive, and vitiated in writing such words as were already +vitiated in speech. The powers of the letters, when they were applied +to a new language, must have been vague and unsettled, and +therefore different hands would exhibit the same sound by different +combinations. + +From this uncertain pronunciation arise in a great part the various +dialects of the same country, which will always be observed to grow +fewer, and less different, as books are multiplied; and from this +arbitrary representation of sounds by letters proceeds that diversity +of spelling observable in the Saxon remains, and I suppose in the +first books of every nation, which perplexes or destroys analogy, +and produces anomalous formations, which, being once incorporated can +never be afterward dismissed or reformed. + +Of this kind are the derivatives _length_ from _long_, _strength_ from +_strong_, _darling_ from _dear_, _breadth_ from _broad_, from _dry_, +_drought_, and from _high_, _height_, which Milton, in zeal for +analogy, writes highth. 'Quid te exempta juvat spinis de pluribus +una?' To change all would be too much, and to change one is nothing. + +This uncertainty is most frequent in the vowels, which are so +capriciously pronounced, and so differently modified, by accident or +affectation, not only in every province, but in every mouth, that to +them, as is well known to etymologists, little regard is to be shown +in the deduction of one language from another. + +Such defects are not errors in orthography, but spots of barbarity +impressed so deep in the English language, that criticism can +never wash them away: these, therefore, must be permitted to remain +untouched; but many words have likewise been altered by accident, or +depraved by ignorance, as the pronunciation of the vulgar has been +weakly followed; and some still continue to be variously written, +as authors differ in their care or skill: of these it was proper +to inquire the true orthography, which I have always considered as +depending on their derivation, and have therefore referred them to +their original languages; thus I write _enchant_, _enchantment_, +_enchanter_, after the French, and _incantation_ after the Latin; thus +_entire_ is chosen rather than _intire_, because it passed to us not +from the Latin _integer_, but from the French _entier_. + +Of many words it is difficult to say whether they were immediately +received from the Latin or the French, since at the time when we had +dominions in France, we had Latin service in our churches. It is, +however, my opinion that the French generally supplied us; for we +have few Latin words, among the terms of domestic use, which are not +French; but many French, which are very remote from Latin. + +Even in words of which the derivation is apparent, I have been often +obliged to sacrifice uniformity to custom; thus I write, in compliance +with a numberless majority, _convey_ and _inveigh_, _deceit_ and +_receipt_, _fancy_ and _phantom_; sometimes the derivative varies +from the primitive, as _explain_ and _explanation_, _repeat_ and +_repetition_. + +Some combinations of letters having the same power, are used +indifferently without any discoverable reason of choice, as in +_choak, choke; soap, sope; fewel, fuel_, and many others; which I have +sometimes inserted twice, that those who search for them under either +form, may not search in vain. + +In examining the orthography of any doubtful word, the mode of +spelling by which it is inserted in the series of the dictionary, is +to be considered as that to which I give, perhaps not often rashly, +the preference. I have left, in the examples, to every author his own +practice unmolested, that the reader may balance suffrages, and +judge between us: but this question is not always to be determined +by reputed or by real learning; some men, intent upon greater things, +have thought little on sounds and derivations; some, knowing in the +ancient tongues, have neglected those in which our words are commonly +to be sought. Thus Hammond writes _fecibleness_ for _feasibleness_, +because I suppose he imagined it derived immediately from the +Latin; and some words, such as _dependant, dependent; dependance, +dependence_, vary their final syllable, as one or other language is +present to the writer. + +In this part of the work, where caprice has long wantoned without +control, and vanity sought praise by petty reformation, I have +endeavored to proceed with a scholar's reverence for antiquity, and a +grammarian's regard to the genius of our tongue. I have attempted few +alterations, and among those few, perhaps the greater part is from +the modern to the ancient practice; and I hope I may be allowed to +recommend to those, whose thoughts have been perhaps employed too +anxiously on verbal singularities, not to disturb, upon narrow views, +or for minute propriety, the orthography of their fathers. It has been +asserted, that for the law to be _known_, is of more importance +than to be _right_. 'Change,' says Hooker, 'is not made without +inconvenience, even from worse to better.' There is in constancy +and stability a general and lasting advantage, which will always +overbalance the slow improvements of gradual correction. Much less +ought our written language to comply with the corruptions of oral +utterance, or copy that which every variation of time or place makes +different from itself, and imitate those changes, which will again be +changed, while imitation is employed in observing them. + +This recommendation of steadiness and uniformity does not proceed from +an opinion that particular combinations of letters have much influence +on human happiness; or that truth may not be successfully taught by +modes of spelling fanciful and erroneous; I am not yet so lost in +lexicography as to forget that 'words are the daughters of earth, and +that things are the sons of heaven.' Language is only the instrument +of science, and words are but the signs of ideas: I wish, however, +that the instrument might be less apt to decay, and that signs might +be permanent, like the things which they denote. + +In settling the orthography, I have not wholly neglected the +pronunciation, which I have directed, by printing an accent upon the +acute or elevated syllable. It will sometimes be found that the accent +is placed by the author quoted, on a different syllable from that +marked in the alphabetical series; it is then to be understood, that +custom has varied, or that the author has, in my opinion, pronounced +wrong. Short directions are sometimes given where the sound of letters +is irregular; and if they are sometimes omitted, defect in such minute +observations will be more easily excused, than superfluity. + +In the investigation, both of the orthography and signification of +words, their ETYMOLOGY was necessarily to be considered, and they were +therefore to be divided into primitives and derivatives. A primitive +word is that which can be traced no further to any English root; +thus _circumspect, circumvent, circumstance, delude, concave_, and +_complicate_, though compounds in the Latin, are to us primitives. +Derivatives, are all those that can be referred to any word in English +of greater simplicity. + +The derivatives I have referred to their primitives, with an accuracy +sometimes needless; for who does not see that _remoteness_ comes +from _remote_, _lovely_ from _love_, _concavity_ from _concave_, and +_demonstrative_ from _demonstrate_? But this grammatical exuberance +the scheme of my work did not allow me to repress. It is of great +importance, in examining the general fabric of a language, to trace +one word from another, by noting the usual modes of derivation and +inflection; and uniformity must be preserved in systematical works; +though sometimes at the expense of particular propriety. + +Among other derivatives I have been careful to insert and elucidate +the anomalous plurals of nouns and preterites of verbs, which in the +Teutonic dialects are very frequent, and, though familiar to those +who have always used them, interrupt and embarrass the learners of our +language. + +The two languages from which our primitives have been derived, are +the Roman and Teutonic: under the Roman, I comprehend the French and +provincial tongues; and under the Teutonic, range the Saxon, German, +and all their kindred dialects. Most of our polysyllables are Roman, +and our words of one syllable are very often Teutonic. + +In assigning the Roman original, it has perhaps sometimes happened +that I have mentioned only the Latin, when the word was borrowed +from the French; and considering myself as employed only in the +illustration of my own language, I have not been very careful to +observe whether the Latin would be pure or barbarous, or the French +elegant or obsolete. + +For the Teutonic etymologies, I am commonly indebted to Junius and +Skinner, the only names which I have forborne to quote when I copied +their books; not that I might appropriate their labors or usurp their +honors, but that I might spare perpetual repetition by one general +acknowledgment. Of these, whom I ought not to mention but with the +reverence due to instructors and benefactors, Junius appears to +have excelled in extent of learning, and Skinner in rectitude of +understanding. Junius was accurately skilled in all the northern +languages, Skinner probably examined the ancient and remoter dialects +only by occasional inspection into dictionaries; but the learning of +Junius is often of no other use than to show him a track by which he +may deviate from his purpose, to which Skinner always presses forward +by the shortest way. Skinner is often ignorant, but never ridiculous: +Junius is always full of knowledge; but his variety distracts his +judgment, and his learning is very frequently disgraced by his +absurdities. + +The votaries of the northern muses will not perhaps easily restrain +their indignation, when they find the name of Junius thus degraded +by a disadvantageous comparison; but whatever reverence is due to +his diligence, or his attainments, it can be no criminal degree of +censoriousness to charge that etymologist with want of judgment, who +can seriously derive _dream_ from _drama_, because 'life is a drama +and a drama is a dream'; and who declares with a tone of defiance, +that no man can fail to derive _moan_ from [Greek: monos], _monos, +single_ or _solitary_, who considers that grief naturally loves to be +alone. + +Our knowledge of the northern literature is so scanty, that of words +undoubtedly Teutonic, the original is not always to be found in +an ancient language; and I have therefore inserted Dutch or German +substitutes, which I consider not as radical, but parallel, not as the +parents, but sisters of the English. + +The words which are represented as thus related by descent or +cognation, do not always agree in sense; for it is incident to words, +as to their authors, to degenerate from their ancestors, and to change +their manners when they change their country. It is sufficient, in +etymological inquiries, if the senses of kindred words be found such +as may easily pass into each other, or such as may both be referred to +one general idea. + +The etymology, so far as it is yet known, was easily found in the +volumes, where it is particularly and professedly delivered, and, by +proper attention to the rules of derivation, the orthography was +soon adjusted. But to COLLECT THE WORDS of our language was a task +of greater difficulty. The deficiency of dictionaries was immediately +apparent, and when they were exhausted, what was yet wanting must be +sought by fortuitous and unguided excursions into books and gleaned +as industry should find, or chance should offer it, in the boundless +chaos of a living speech. My search, however, has been either skilful +or lucky, for I have much augmented the vocabulary. + +As my design was a dictionary, common or appellative, I have omitted +all words which have relation to proper names, such as _Arian, +Socinian, Calvinist, Benedictine, Mahometan_, but have retained those +of a more general nature, as _Heathen, Pagan_. + +Of the terms of art I have received such as could be found either in +books of science or technical dictionaries, and have often inserted, +from philosophical writers, words which are supported perhaps only by +a single authority, and which, being not admitted into general use, +stand yet as candidates or probationers, and must depend for their +adoption on the suffrage of futurity. The words which our authors have +introduced by their knowledge of foreign languages or ignorance of +their own, by vanity or wantonness, by compliance with fashion or lust +of innovation, I have registered as they occurred, though commonly +only to censure them, and warn others against the folly of +naturalizing useless foreigners to the injury of the natives. + +I have not rejected any by design, merely because they were +unnecessary or exuberant, but have received those which by different +writers have been differently formed, as _viscid_, and _viscidity, +viscous_, and _viscosity_. + +Compounded or double words I have seldom noted, except when they +obtain a signification different from that which the components have +in then simple state. + +Thus _highwayman, woodman_, and _horsecourser_, require an +explanation, but of _thieflike_, or _coachdriver_, no notice was +needed, because the primitives contain the meaning of the compounds. + +Words arbitrarily formed by a constant and settled analogy, like +diminutive adjectives in _ish, as greenish, bluish_; adverbs in _ly_, +as _dully, openly_; substantives in _ness_, as _vileness, faultiness_; +were less diligently sought, and many sometimes have been omitted, +when I had no authority that invited me to insert them; not that they +are not genuine, and regular offsprings of English roots, but +because their relation to the primitive being always the same, their +signification cannot be mistaken. + +The verbal nouns in _ing_, such as the _keeping_ of the _castle_, +the _leading_ of the _army_, are always neglected, or placed only to +illustrate the sense of the verb, except when they signify things as +well as actions, and have therefore a plural number, as _dwelling, +living_; or have an absolute and abstract signification, as _coloring, +painting, learning_. + +The participles are likewise omitted, unless, by signifying rather +habit or quality than action, they take the nature of adjectives; as a +_thinking_ man, a man of prudence; a _pacing_ horse, a horse that +can pace: these I have ventured to call _participial adjectives_. But +neither are these always inserted, because they are commonly to be +understood without any danger of mistake, by consulting the verb. + +Obsolete words are admitted when they are found in authors not +obsolete, or when they have any force or beauty that may deserve +revival. + +As composition is one of the chief characteristics of a language, I +have endeavored to make some reparation for the universal negligence +of my predecessors, by inserting great numbers of compounded words, +as may be found under _after, fore, new, night, fair_, and many more. +These, numerous as they are, might be multiplied, but that use and +curiosity are here satisfied, and the frame of our language and modes +of our combination amply discovered. + +Of some forms of composition, such as that by which _re_ is +prefixed to note _repetition_, and _un_ to signify _contrariety_ or +_privation_, all the examples cannot be accumulated, because the use +of these particles, if not wholly arbitrary, is so little limited, +that they are hourly affixed to new words as occasion requires, or is +imagined to require them. + +There is another kind of composition more frequent in our language +than perhaps in any other, from which arises to foreigners the +greatest difficulty. We modify the signification of many verbs by a +particle subjoined; as to _come off_, to escape by a fetch; to _fall +on_, to attack; _fall off_, to apostatize; to _break off_, to stop +abruptly; to _bear out_, to justify; _to fall in_, to comply; to _give +over_, to cease; to _set off_, to embellish; to _set in_, to begin a +continual tenor; to _set out_, to begin a course or journey; to _take +off_, to copy; with innumerable expressions of the same kind, of which +some appear wildly irregular, being so far distant from the sense of +the simple words, that no sagacity will be able to trace the steps by +which they arrived at the present use. These I have noted with great +care; and though I cannot flatter myself that the collection is +complete, I believe I have so far assisted the students of our +language that this kind of phraseology will be no longer insuperable; +and the combinations of verbs and particles, by chance omitted, will +be easily explained by comparison with those that may be found. + +Many words yet stand supported only by the name of Bailey, Ainsworth, +Philips, or the contracted _Dict._ for Dictionaries, subjoined; of +these I am not always certain that they are read in any book but the +works of lexicographers. Of such I have omitted many, because I had +never read them; and many I have inserted, because they may perhaps +exist, though they have escaped my notice: they are, however, to be +yet considered as resting only upon the credit of former dictionaries. +Others, which I considered as useful, or know to be proper, though I +could not at present support them by authorities, I have suffered to +stand upon my own attestation, claiming the same privilege with my +predecessors, of being sometimes credited without proof. + +The words, thus selected and disposed, are grammatically considered; +they are referred to the different parts of speech; traced when they +are irregularly inflected, through their various terminations; +and illustrated by observations, not indeed of great or striking +importance, separately considered, but necessary to the elucidation +of our language, and hitherto neglected or forgotten by English +grammarians. + +That part of my work on which I expect malignity most frequently to +fasten, is the EXPLANATION; in which I cannot hope to satisfy those, +who are perhaps not inclined to be pleased, since I have not always +been able to satisfy myself. To interpret a language by itself is very +difficult; many words cannot be explained by synonimes, because the +idea signified by them has not more than one appellation; nor by +paraphrase, because simple ideas cannot be described. When the nature +of things is unknown, or the notion unsettled and indefinite, +and various in various minds, the words by which such notions are +conveyed, or such things denoted, will be ambiguous and perplexed. And +such is the fate of hapless lexicography, that not only darkness, but +light impedes and distresses it; things may be not only too little, +but too much known, to be happily illustrated. To explain, requires +the use of terms less abstruse than that which is to be explained, and +such terms cannot always be found; for as nothing can be proved but by +supposing something intuitively known, and evident without proof, so +nothing can be defined but by the use of words too plain to admit a +definition. + +Other words there are, of which the sense is too subtle and evanescent +to be fixed in a paraphrase; such are all those which are by the +grammarians termed expletives, and, in dead languages, are suffered +to pass for empty sounds, of no other use than to fill a verse, or to +modulate a period, but which are easily perceived in living tongues to +have power and emphasis, though it be sometimes such as no other form +of expression can convey. + +My labor has likewise been much increased by a class of verbs too +frequent in the English language, of which the signification is so +loose and general, the use so vague and indeterminate, and the senses +detorted so widely from the first idea, that it is hard to trace them +through the maze of variation, to catch them on the brink of utter +inanity, to circumscribe them by any limitations, or interpret them +by any words of distinct and settled meaning; such are _bear, break, +come, cast, full, get, give, do, put, set, go, run, make, take, turn, +throw_. If of these the whole power is not accurately delivered, +it must be remembered, that while our language is yet living, and +variable by the caprice of every one that speaks it, these words are +hourly shifting their relations, and can no more be ascertained in +a dictionary, than a grove, in the agitation of a storm, can be +accurately delineated from its picture in the water. + +The particles are among all nations applied with so great latitude, +that they are not easily reducible under any regular scheme of +explication: this difficulty is not less, nor perhaps greater, in +English, than in other languages. I have labored them with diligence, +I hope with success; such at least as can be expected in a task, which +no man, however learned or sagacious, has yet been able to perform. + +Some words there are which I cannot explain, because I do not +understand them; these might have been omitted very often with little +inconvenience, but I would not so far indulge my vanity as to +decline this confession: for when Tully owns himself ignorant whether +_lessus_, in the twelve tables, means a _funeral song_, or _mourning +garment_; and Aristotle doubts whether [Greek: ourous] in the _Iliad_ +signifies a _mule, or muleteer_, I may surely without shame, leave +some obscurities to happier industry, or future information. + +The rigor of interpretative lexicography requires that _the +explanation_, and _the word explained should be always reciprocal_; +this I have always endeavoured, but could not always attain. Words are +seldom exactly synonymous; a new term was not introduced, but because +the former was thought inadequate: names, therefore, have often many +ideas, but few ideas have many names. It was then necessary to use the +proximate word, for the deficiency of single terms can very seldom +be supplied by circumlocution; nor is the inconvenience great of such +mutilated interpretations, because the sense may easily be collected +entire from the examples. + +In every word of extensive use, it was requisite to mark the progress +of its meaning, and show by what gradations of intermediate sense +it has passed from its primitive to its remote and accidental +signification; so that every foregoing explanation should tend to that +which follows, and the series be regularly concatenated from the first +notion to the last. + +This is specious, but not always practicable; kindred senses may be so +interwoven, that the perplexity cannot be disentangled, nor any +reason be assigned why one should be ranged before the other. When +the radical idea branches out into parallel ramifications, how can a +consecutive series be formed of senses in their nature collateral? +The shades of meaning sometimes pass imperceptibly into each other, so +that though on one side they apparently differ, yet it is impossible +to mark the point of contact. Ideas of the same race, though not +exactly alike, are sometimes so little different, that no words can +express the dissimilitude, though the mind easily perceives it when +they are exhibited together; and sometimes there is such a confusion +of acceptations, that discernment is wearied and distinction puzzled, +and perseverance herself hurries to an end, by crowding together what +she cannot separate. + +These complaints of difficulty will, by those that have never +considered words beyond their popular use, be thought only the jargon +of a man willing to magnify his labors, and procure veneration to his +studies by involution and obscurity. But every art is obscure to those +that have not learned it; this uncertainty of terms, and commixture of +ideas, is well known to those who have joined philosophy with grammar; +and if I have not expressed them very clearly, it must be remembered +that I am speaking of that which words are insufficient to explain. + +The original sense of words is often driven out of use by their +metaphorical acceptations, yet must be inserted for the sake of a +regular origination. Thus I know not whether _ardor_ is used for +_material heat_, or whether _flagrant_, in English, ever signifies the +same with _burning_; yet such are the primitive ideas of these words, +which are therefore set first, though without examples, that the +figurative senses may be commodiously deduced. + +Such is the exuberance of signification which many words have +obtained, that it was scarcely possible to collect all their senses; +sometimes the meaning of derivatives must be sought in the mother +term, and sometimes deficient explanations of the primitive may +he supplied in the train of derivation. In any case of doubt or +difficulty, it will be always proper to examine all the words of +the same race; for some words are slightly passed over to avoid +repetition, some admitted easier and clearer explanation than others, +and all will be better understood, as they are considered in greater +variety of structures and relations. + +All the interpretations of words are not written with the same skill, +or the same happiness: things equally easy in themselves, are not all +equally easy to any single mind. Every writer of a long word commits +errors, where there appears neither ambiguity to mislead, nor +obscurity to confound him; and in a search like this, many felicities +of expression will be casually overlooked, many convenient parallels +will be forgotten, and many particulars will admit improvement from a +mind utterly unequal to the whole performance. + +But many seeming faults are to be imputed rather to the nature of +the undertaking, than the negligence of the performer. Thus some +explanations are unavoidably reciprocal or circular, as _hind, the +female of the stag; stag, the male of the hind_: sometimes easier +words are changed into harder, as _burial_ into _sepulture, or +interment, drier_ into _desiccative, dryness_ into _siccity_ or +_aridity, fit_ into _paroxysm_; for the easiest word, whatever it +be, can never be translated into one more easy. But easiness and +difficulty are merely relative; and if the present prevalence of our +language should invite foreigners to this Dictionary, many will be +assisted by those words which now seem only to increase or produce +obscurity. For this reason I have endeavoured frequently to join a +Teutonic and Roman interpretation, as to _cheer_, to _gladden_ or +_exhilarate_, that every learner of English may be assisted by his own +tongue. + +The solution of all difficulties, and the supply of all defects must +be sought in the examples, subjoined to the various senses of each +word, and ranged according to the time of their authors. + +When I first collected these authorities, I was desirous that every +quotation should be useful to some other end than the illustration of +a word; I therefore extracted from philosophers principles of science; +from historians remarkable facts; from chymists complete processes; +from divines striking exhortations; and from poets beautiful +descriptions. Such is design, while it is yet at a distance from +execution. When the time called upon me to range this accumulation +of elegance and wisdom into an alphabetical series, I soon discovered +that the bulk of my volumes would fright away the student, and was +forced to depart from my scheme of including all that was pleasing or +useful in English literature, and reduce my transcripts very often to +clusters of words, in which scarcely any meaning is retained; thus +to the weariness of copying, I was condemned to add the vexation of +expunging. Some passages I have yet spared, which may relieve the +labor of verbal searches, and intersperse with verdure and flowers the +dusty deserts of barren philology. + +The examples, thus mutilated, are no longer to be considered as +conveying the sentiments or doctrine of their authors; the word for +the sake of which they are inserted, with all its appendant clauses, +has been carefully preserved; but it may sometimes happen, by hasty +detruncation, that the general tendency of the sentence may be +changed: the divine may desert his tenets, or the philosopher his +system. + +Some of the examples have been taken from writers who were never +mentioned as masters of elegance, or models of style; but words must +be sought where they are used; and in what pages, eminent for purity, +can terms of manufacture or agriculture be found? Many quotations +serve no other purpose than that of proving the bare existence of +words, and are therefore selected with less scrupulousness than those +which are to teach their structures and relations. + +My purpose was to admit no testimony of living authors, that I might +not be misled by partiality, and that none of my contemporaries might +have reason to complain; nor have I departed from this resolution, but +when some performance of uncommon excellence excited my veneration, +when my memory supplied me, from late books, with an example that was +wanting, or when my heart, in the tenderness of friendship, solicited +admission for a favorite name. + +So far have I been from any care to grace my pages with modern +decorations, that I have studiously endeavored to collect examples +and authorities from the writers before the Restoration, whose works +I regard as the 'wells of English undefiled,' as the pure sources +of genuine diction. Our language, for almost a century, has, by the +concurrence of many causes, been gradually departing from its original +Teutonic character and deviating towards a Gallic structure and +phraseology, from which it ought to be our endeavor to recall it, by +making our ancient volumes the groundwork of style, admitting +among the additions of later times, only such as may supply real +deficiencies, such as are readily adopted by the genius of our tongue, +and incorporate easily with our native idioms. + +But as every language has a time of rudeness antecedent to perfection, +as well as of false refinement and declension, I have been cautious +lest my zeal for antiquity might drive me into times too remote, +and crowd my book with words now no longer understood. I have fixed +Sidney's work for the boundary, beyond which I make few excursions. +From the authors which rose in the time of Elizabeth, a speech might +be formed adequate to all the purposes of use and elegance. If the +language of theology were extracted from Hooker and the translation of +the Bible, the terms of natural knowledge from Bacon, the phrases of +policy, war, and navigation from Raleigh, the dialect of poetry and +fiction from Spenser and Sidney, and the diction of common life from +Shakespeare, few ideas would be lost to mankind, for want of English +words in which they might be expressed. + +It is not sufficient that a word is found, unless it be so combined +as that its meaning is apparently determined by the tract and tenor +of the sentence, such passages I have therefore chosen, and when +it happened that any author gave a definition of a term, or such +an explanation as is equivalent to a definition, I have placed +his authority as a supplement to my own, without regard to the +chronological order that is otherwise observed. + +Some words, indeed, stand unsupported by any authority, but they are +commonly derivative nouns or adverbs, formed from their primitives by +regular and constant analogy, or names of things seldom occurring in +books, or words of which I have reason to doubt the existence. + +There is more danger of censure from the multiplicity than paucity +of examples, authorities will sometimes seem to have been accumulated +without necessity or use, and perhaps some will be found, which +might, without loss, have been omitted. But a work of this kind is not +hastily to be charged with superfluities; those quotations, which to +careless or unskillful perusers appear only to repeat the same sense, +will often exhibit, to a more accurate examiner, diversities of +signification, or, at least, afford different shades of the same +meaning: one will show the word applied to persons, another to things; +one will express an ill, another a good, and a third a neutral sense; +one will prove the expression genuine from an ancient author; +another will show it elegant from a modern: a doubtful authority +is corroborated by another of more credit; an ambiguous sentence is +ascertained by a passage clear and determinate: the word, how +often soever repeated, appears with new associates and in different +combinations, and every quotation contributes something to the +stability or enlargement of the language. + +When words are used equivocally I receive them in either sense; when +they are metaphorical, I adopt them in their primitive acceptation. + +I have sometimes, though rarely, yielded to the temptation of +exhibiting a genealogy of sentiments, by showing how one author copied +the thoughts and diction of another: such quotations are indeed little +more than repetitions, which might justly be censured, did they not +gratify the mind, by affording a kind of intellectual history. + +The various syntactical structures occurring in the examples have been +carefully noted; the license or negligence with which many words have +been hitherto used, has made our style capricious and indeterminate; +when the different combinations of the same word are exhibited +together, the preference is readily given to propriety, and I have +often endeavored to direct the choice. + +Thus have I labored by settling the orthography, displaying the +analogy, regulating the structures, and ascertaining the +signification of English words, to perform all the parts of a faithful +lexicographer: but I have not always executed my own scheme, or +satisfied my own expectations. The work, whatever proofs of diligence +and attention it may exhibit, is yet capable of many improvements; the +orthography which I recommend is still controvertible, the etymology +which I adopt is uncertain, and perhaps frequently erroneous; the +explanations are sometimes too much contracted, and sometimes too much +diffused, the significations are distinguished rather with subtlety +than skill, and the attention is harassed with unnecessary minuteness. + +The examples are too often injudiciously truncated, and perhaps +sometimes--I hope very rarely--alleged in a mistaken sense; for in +making this collection I trusted more to memory, than, in a state of +disquiet and embarrassment, memory can contain, and purposed to supply +at the review what was left incomplete in the first transcription. + +Many terms appropriated to particular occupations, though necessary +and significant, are undoubtedly omitted, and of the words most +studiously considered and exemplified, many senses have escaped +observation. + +Yet these failures, however frequent, may admit extenuation and +apology. To have attempted much is always laudable, even when the +enterprise is above the strength that undertakes it: to rest below +his own aim is incident to every one whose fancy is active, and whose +views are comprehensive; nor is any man satisfied with himself because +he has done much, but because he can conceive little. When first I +engaged in this work, I resolved to leave neither words nor things +unexamined, and pleased myself with a prospect of the hours which I +should revel away in feasts of literature, the obscure recesses of +northern learning which I should enter and ransack, the treasures with +which I expected every search into those neglected mines to reward my +labor, and the triumph with which I should display my acquisitions +to mankind. When I had thus inquired into the original of words, I +resolved to show likewise my attention to things; to pierce deep into +every science, to inquire the nature of every substance of which +I inserted the name, to limit every idea by a definition strictly +logical, and exhibit every production of art or nature in an accurate +description, that my book might be in place of all other dictionaries +whether appellative or technical. But these were the dreams of a poet +doomed at last to wake a lexicographer. I soon found that it is too +late to look for instruments, when the work calls for execution, and +that whatever abilities I had brought to my task, with those I must +finally perform it. To deliberate whenever I doubted, to inquire +whenever I was ignorant, would have protracted the undertaking without +end, and, perhaps, without much improvement; for I did not find by +my first experiments, that what I had not of my own was easily to be +obtained: I saw that one inquiry only gave occasion to another, that +book referred to book, that to search was not always to find, and +to find was not always to be informed; and that thus to pursue +perfection, was, like the first inhabitants of Arcadia, to chase the +sun, which, when they had reached the hill where he seemed to rest, +was still beheld at the same distance from them. + +I then contracted my design, determining to confide in myself, and +no longer to solicit auxiliaries which produced more incumbrance than +assistance; by this I obtained at least one advantage, that I set +limits to my work, which would in time be ended, though not completed. + +Despondency has never so far prevailed as to depress me to negligence; +some faults will at last appear to be the effects of anxious diligence +and persevering activity. The nice and subtle ramifications of meaning +were not easily avoided by a mind intent upon accuracy, and convinced +of the necessity of disentangling combinations, and separating +similitudes. Many of the distinctions which to common readers appear +useless and idle, will be found real and important by men versed +in the school philosophy, without which no dictionary can ever be +accurately compiled, or skillfully examined. + +Some senses, however, there are, which, though not the same, are +yet so nearly allied, that they are often confounded. Most men +think indistinctly, and therefore cannot speak with exactness; and +consequently some examples might be indifferently put to either +signification: this uncertainty is not to be imputed to me, who do not +form, but register the language; who do not teach men how they should +think, but relate how they have hitherto expressed their thoughts. + +The imperfect sense of some examples I lamented, but could not remedy, +and hope they will be compensated by innumerable passages selected +with propriety, and preserved with exactness; some shining with sparks +of imagination, and some replete with treasures of wisdom. + +The orthography and etymology, though imperfect, are not imperfect +for want of care, but because care will not always be successful, and +recollection or information come too late for use. + +That many terms of art and manufacture are omitted, must be frankly +acknowledged; but for this defect I may boldly allege that it is +unavoidable; I could not visit caverns to learn the miner's language, +nor take a voyage to perfect my skill in the dialect of navigation, +nor visit the warehouses of merchants, and shops of artificers, to +gain the names of wares, tools, and operations, of which no mention is +found in books; what favorable accident or easy inquiry brought within +my reach, has not been neglected; but it had been a hopeless labor to +glean up words, by courting living information, and contesting with +the sullenness of one, and the roughness of another. + +To furnish the Academicians _della Crusca_ with words of this kind, a +series of comedies called _La Fiera_, or _The Fair_, was professedly +written by Buonaroti; but I had no such assistant, and therefore was +content to want what they must have wanted likewise, had they not +luckily been so supplied. + +Nor are all words which are not found in the vocabulary, to be +lamented as omissions. Of the laborious and mercantile part of the +people, the diction is in a great measure casual and mutable; many of +their terms are formed for some temporary or local convenience, and +though current at certain times and places, are in others utterly +unknown. This fugitive cant, which is always in a state of increase +or decay, cannot be regarded as any part of the durable materials of +a language, and therefore must be suffered to perish with other things +unworthy of preservation. + +Care will sometimes betray to the appearance of negligence. He that is +catching opportunities which seldom occur, will suffer those to pass +by unregarded, which he expects hourly to return; he that is searching +for rare and remote things, will neglect those that are obvious and +familiar: thus many of the most common and cursory words have +been inserted with little illustration, because in gathering the +authorities, I forebore to copy those which I thought likely to occur +whenever they were wanted. It is remarkable that, in reviewing my +collection, I found the word _sea_ unexemplified. + +Thus it happens, that in things difficult there is danger from +ignorance, and in things easy, from confidence; the mind, afraid of +greatness, and disdainful of littleness, hastily withdraws herself +from painful searches, and passes with scornful rapidity over tasks +not adequate to her powers; sometimes too secure for caution, and +again too anxious for vigorous effort; sometimes idle in a plain path, +and sometimes distracted in labyrinths, and dissipated by different +intentions. + +A large work is difficult because it is large, even though all its +parts might singly be performed with facility; where there are many +things to be done, each must be allowed its share of time and labor, +in the proportion only which it bears to the whole; nor can it be +expected, that the stones which form the dome of a temple, should be +squared and polished like the diamond of a ring. + +Of the event of this work, for which; having labored it with so much +application, I cannot but have some degree of parental fondness, it +is natural to form conjectures. Those who have been persuaded to think +well of my design, will require that it should fix our language, and +put a stop to those alterations which time and chance have hitherto +been suffered to make in it without opposition. With this consequence +I will confess that I flattered myself for a while; but now begin +to fear that I have indulged expectation which neither reason nor +experience can justify. When we see men grow old and die at a certain +time one after another, from century to century, we laugh at the +elixir that promises to prolong life to a thousand years; and with +equal justice may the lexicographer be derided, who being able to +produce no example of a nation that has preserved their words and +phrases from mutability, shall imagine that his dictionary can embalm +his language, and secure it from corruption and decay, that it is in +his power to change sublunary nature, and clear the world at once from +folly, vanity, and affectation. + +With this hope, however, academies have been instituted, to guard +the avenues of their languages, to retain fugitives, and repulse +intruders; but their vigilance and activity have hitherto been vain; +sounds are too volatile and subtile for legal restraints; to enchain +syllables, and to lash the wind, are equally the undertakings of +pride, unwilling to measure its desires by its strength. The French +language has visibly changed under the inspection of the Academy; +the style of Amelot's translation of Father Paul is observed by Le +Courayer to be _un peu passé_; and no Italian will maintain that the +diction of any modern writer is not perceptibly different from that of +Boccace, Machiavel, or Caro. + +Total and sudden transformations of a language seldom happen; +conquests and migrations are now very rare: but there are other causes +of change, which, though slow in their operation, and invisible in +their progress, are perhaps as much superior to human resistance, as +the revolutions of the sky, or intumescence of the tide. Commerce, +however necessary, however lucrative, as it depraves the manners, +corrupts the language; they that have frequent intercourse with +strangers, to whom they endeavor to accommodate themselves, must +in time learn a mingled dialect, like the jargon which serves the +traffickers on the Mediterranean and Indian coasts. This will not +always be confined to the exchange, the warehouse, or the port, but +will be communicated by degrees to other ranks of the people, and be +at last incorporated with the current speech. + +There are likewise internal causes equally forcible. The language most +likely to continue long without alterations, would be that of a nation +raised a little, and but a little, above barbarity, secluded from +strangers, and totally employed in procuring the conveniences of life; +either without books, or, like some of the Mahometan countries, with +every few: men thus busied and unlearned, having only such words as +common use requires, would perhaps long continue to express the same +notions by the same signs. But no such constancy can be expected in a +people polished by arts, and classed by subordination, where one part +of the community is sustained and accommodated by the labor of the +other. Those who have much leisure to think, will always be enlarging +the stock of ideas; and every increase of knowledge, whether real or +fancied, will produce new words, or combination of words. When the +mind is unchained from necessity, it will range after convenience; +when it is left at large in the fields of speculation, it will shift +opinions; as any custom is disused, the words that expressed it must +perish with it; as any opinion grows popular, it will innovate speech +in the same proportion as it alters practice. + +As by the cultivation of various sciences a language is amplified, it +will be more furnished with words deflected from their original sense; +the geometrician will talk of a courtier's zenith or the eccentric +virtue of a wild hero, and the physician, of sanguine expectations and +phlegmatic delays. Copiousness of speech will give opportunities to +capricious choice, by which some words will be preferred, and others +degraded; vicissitudes of fashion will enforce the use of new, or +extend the signification of known terms. The tropes of poetry will +make hourly encroachments, and the metaphorical will become the +current sense: pronunciation will be varied by levity or ignorance, +and the pen must at length comply with the tongue; illiterate writers +will, at one time or other, by public infatuation, rise into renown, +who, not knowing the original import of words, will use them with +colloquial licentiousness, confound distinction, and forget propriety. +As politeness increases, some expressions will be considered as +too gross and vulgar for the delicate, others as too formal and +ceremonious for the gay and airy; new phrases are therefore adopted, +which must for the same reasons be in time dismissed. Swift, in his +petty treatise on the English language, allows that new words must +sometimes be introduced, but proposes that none should be suffered +to become obsolete. But what makes a word obsolete, more than general +agreement to forbear it? and how shall it be continued, when it +conveys an offensive idea, or recalled again into the mouths of +mankind, when it has once become unfamiliar by disuse, and unpleasing +by unfamiliarity? + +There is another cause of alteration more prevalent than any other, +which yet in the present state of the world cannot be obviated. A +mixture of two languages will produce a third distinct from both, and +they will always be mixed, where the chief parts of education, and +the most conspicuous accomplishment, is skill in ancient or in foreign +tongues. He that has long cultivated another language, will find +its words and combinations crowd upon his memory; and haste and +negligence, refinement and affectation, will obtrude borrowed terms +and exotic expressions. + +The great pest of speech is frequency of translation. No book was ever +turned from one language into another, without imparting something +of its native idiom; this is the most mischievous and comprehensive +innovation; single words may enter by thousands, and the fabric of the +tongue continue the same; but new phraseology changes much at once; +it alters not the single stones of the building, but the order of the +columns. If an academy should be established for the cultivation of +our style--which I, who can never wish to see dependence multiplied, +hope the spirit of English liberty will hinder or destroy--let them, +instead of compiling grammars and dictionaries, endeavor, with all +their influence, to stop the license of translators, whose idleness +and ignorance, if it be suffered to proceed, will reduce us to babble +a dialect of France. + +If the changes that we fear be thus irresistible, what remains but to +acquiesce with silence, as in the other insurmountable distresses +of humanity? It remains that we retard what we cannot repel, that we +palliate what we cannot cure. Life may be lengthened by care, though +death cannot be ultimately defeated: tongues, like governments, have +a natural tendency to degeneration; we have long preserved our +constitution, let us make some struggles for our language. + +In hope of giving longevity to that which its own nature forbids to be +immortal, I have devoted this book, the labor of years, to the honor +of my country, that we may no longer yield the palm of philology, +without a contest, to the nations of the continent. The chief glory of +every people arises from its authors: whether I shall add any thing by +my own writings to the reputation of English literature, must be left +to time: much of my life has been lost under the pressures of +disease; much has been trifled away; and much has always been spent in +provision for the day that was passing over me; but I shall not think +my employment useless or ignoble, if by my assistance foreign nations, +and distant ages, gain access to the propagators of knowledge, and +understand the teachers of truth; if my labors afford light to the +repositories of science, and add celebrity to Bacon, to Hooker, to +Milton, and to Boyle. + +When I am animated by this wish, I look with pleasure on my book, +however defective, and deliver it to the world with the spirit of a +man that has endeavored well. That it will immediately become popular +I have not promised to myself: a few wild blunders, and risible +absurdities, from which no work of such multiplicity was ever free, +may for a time furnish folly with laughter, and harden ignorance into +contempt; but useful diligence will at last prevail, and there never +can be wanting some who distinguish desert; who will consider that no +dictionary of a living tongue ever can be perfect, since, while it +is hastening to publication, some words are budding, and some falling +away; that a whole life cannot be spent upon syntax and etymology, and +that even a whole life would not be sufficient; that he, whose design +includes whatever language can express, must often speak of what +he does not understand; that a writer will sometimes be hurried by +eagerness to the end, and sometimes faint with weariness under a task +which Scaliger compares to the labors of the anvil and the mine; that +what is obvious is not always known, and what is known is not always +present; that sudden fits of inadvertency will surprise vigilance, +slight avocations will seduce attention, and casual eclipses of the +mind will darken learning; and that the writer shall often in vain +trace his memory at the moment of need, for that which yesterday he +knew with intuitive readiness, and which will come uncalled into his +thoughts to-morrow. + +In this work, when it shall be found that much is omitted, let it not +be forgotten that much likewise is performed; and though no book was +ever spared out of tenderness to the author, and the world is +little solicitous to know whence proceed the faults of that which it +condemns; yet it may gratify curiosity to inform it, that the English +Dictionary was written with little assistance of the learned, and +without any patronage of the great; not in the soft obscurities +of retirement, or under the shelter of academic bowers, but amidst +inconvenience and distraction, in sickness and in sorrow. It may +repress the triumph of malignant criticism to observe, that if our +language is not here fully displayed, I have only failed in an attempt +which no human powers have hitherto completed. If the lexicons of +ancient tongues, now immutably fixed, and comprised in a few volumes, +be yet, after the toil of successive ages, inadequate and delusive; +if the aggregated knowledge, and co-operating diligence of the Italian +academicians, did not secure them from the censure of Beni; if the +embodied critics of France, when fifty years had been spent upon +their work, were obliged to change its economy, and give their second +edition another form, I may surely be contented without the praise of +perfection, which, if I could obtain, in this gloom of solitude, what +would it avail me? I have protracted my work till most of those whom I +wished to please have sunk into the grave, and success and miscarriage +are empty sounds: I therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, +having little to fear or hope from censure or from praise. + + +TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE THE EARL OF CHESTERFIELD + +February 7, 1755. + +MY LORD: + +I have lately been informed by the proprietor of _The World_, that two +papers, in which my _Dictionary_ is recommended to the public, were +written by your Lordship. To be so distinguished is an honor which, +being very little accustomed to favours from the great, I know not +well how to receive, or in what terms to acknowledge. + +When, upon some slight encouragement, I first visited your Lordship, I +was overpowered, like the rest of mankind, by the enchantment of your +address; and I could not forbear to wish that I might boast myself 'Le +vainqueur du vainqueur de la terre'; that I might obtain that regard +for which I saw the world contending; but I found my attendance so +little encouraged, that neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to +continue it. When I had once addressed your Lordship in public, I +had exhausted all the art of pleasing which a retired and uncourtly +scholar can possess. I had done all that I could; and no man is well +pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little. + +Seven years, my Lord, have now passed, since I waited in your outward +rooms, or was repulsed from your door; during which time I have been +pushing on my work through difficulties, of which it is useless to +complain, and have brought it at last to the verge of publication, +without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement, or one smile +of favor. Such treatment I did not expect, for I never had a Patron +before. + +The shepherd in Virgil grew at last acquainted with Love, and found +him a native of the rocks. + +Is not a Patron, my Lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man +struggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached ground, +encumbers him with help? The notice which you have been pleased to +take of my labors, had it been early, had been kind; but it has +been delayed till I am indifferent, and cannot enjoy it; till I am +solitary, and cannot impart it; till I am known, and do not want it. +I hope it is no very cynical asperity not to confess obligations +where no benefit has been received, or to be unwilling that the Public +should consider me as owing that to a Patron, which Providence has +enabled me to do for myself. + +Having carried on my work thus far with so little obligation to any +favorer of learning, I shall not be disappointed though I should +conclude it, if less be possible, with less; for I have been long +wakened from that dream of hope, in which I once boasted myself with +so much exultation, + +My Lord, Your Lordship's most humble, + +Most obedient servant, SAM. JOHNSON. + + +[Footnote A: For a sketch of Johnson's life, see the Introduction to +"Life of Addison" in the volume of English Essays. The interest of his +preface to the great Dictionary need hardly be pointed out, since the +work itself is a landmark in the history of our language. The letter +to Chesterfield, short though it is is a document of great importance +in the freeing of literature from patronage, and is in itself a +notable piece of literature. The preface to Johnson's edition of +Shakespeare's plays not only explains the editor's conception of +his task, but contains what is perhaps the best appreciation of the +dramatist written in the eighteenth century.] + + + + +PREFACE TO SHAKESPEARE + +BY SAMUEL JOHNSON. (1765) + + +That praises are without reason lavished on the dead, and that the +honours due only to excellence are paid to antiquity, is a complaint +likely to be always continued by those, who, being able to add nothing +to truth, hope for eminence from the heresies of paradox; or those, +who, being forced by disappointment upon consolatory expedients, +are willing to hope from posterity what the present age refuses, and +flatter themselves that the regard which is yet denied by envy, will +be at last bestowed by time. + +Antiquity, like every other quality that attracts the notice of +mankind, has undoubtedly votaries that reverence it, not from reason, +but from prejudice. Some seem to admire indiscriminately whatever +has been long preserved, without considering that time has sometimes +co-operated with chance; all perhaps are more willing to honour past +than present excellence; and the mind contemplates genius through the +shades of age, as the eye surveys the sun through artificial opacity. +The great contention of criticism is to find the faults of the +moderns, and the beauties of the ancients. While an author is yet +living we estimate his powers by his worst performance, and when he is +dead, we rate them by his best. + +To works, however, of which the excellence is not absolute and +definite, but gradual and comparative; to works not raised upon +principles demonstrative and scientifick, but appealing wholly to +observation and experience, no other test can he applied than +length of duration and continuance of esteem. What mankind have long +possessed they have often examined and compared; and if they persist +to value the possession, it is because frequent comparisons have +confirmed opinion in its favour. As among the works of nature no +man can properly call a river deep, or a mountain high, without the +knowledge of many mountains, and many rivers; so in the productions of +genius, nothing can be stiled excellent till it has been compared with +other works of the same kind. Demonstration immediately displays its +power, and has nothing to hope or fear from the flux of years; but +works tentative and experimental must be estimated by their proportion +to the general and collective ability of man, as it is discovered in a +long succession of endeavours. Of the first building that was raised, +it might be with certainty determined that it was round or square; but +whether it was spacious or lofty must have been referred to time. The +Pythagorean scale of numbers was at once discovered to be perfect; but +the poems of _Homer_ we yet know not to transcend the common limits +of human intelligence, but by remarking, that nation after nation, and +century after century, has been able to do little more than transpose +his incidents, new-name his characters, and paraphrase his sentiments. + +The reverence due to writings that have long subsisted arises +therefore not from any credulous confidence in the superior wisdom of +past ages, or gloomy persuasion of the degeneracy of mankind, but is +the consequence of acknowledged and indubitable positions, that what +has been longest known has been most considered, and what is most +considered is best understood. + +The Poet, of whose works I have undertaken the revision, may now +begin to assume the dignity of an ancient, and claim the privilege of +established fame and prescriptive veneration. He has long outlived +his century, the term commonly fixed as the test of literary merit. +Whatever advantages he might once derive from personal allusions, +local customs, or temporary opinions, have for many years been lost; +and every topick of merriment, or motive of sorrow, which the modes of +artificial life afforded him, now only obscure the scenes which they +once illuminated. The effects of favour and competition are at an end; +the tradition of his friendships and his enemies has perished; his +works support no opinion with arguments, nor supply any faction with +invectives; they can neither indulge vanity nor gratify malignity; but +are read without any other reason than the desire of pleasure, and are +therefore praised only as pleasure is obtained; yet, thus unassisted +by interest or passion, they have past through variations of taste +and changes of manners, and, as they devolved from one generation to +another, have received new honours at every transmission. + +But because human judgment, though it be gradually gaining upon +certainty, never becomes infallible; and approbation, though long +continued, may yet be only the approbation of prejudice or fashion; +it is proper to inquire, by what peculiarities of excellence +_Shakespeare_ has gained and kept the favour of his countrymen. + +Nothing can please many, and please long, but just representations of +general nature. Particular manner, can be known to few, and therefore +few only can judge how nearly they are copied. The irregular +combinations of fanciful invention may delight a-while, by that +novelty of which the common satiety of life sends us all in quest; but +the pleasures of sudden wonder are soon exhausted, and the mind can +only repose on the stability of truth. + +_Shakespeare_ is above all writers, at least above all modern writers, +the poet of nature; the poet that holds up to his readers a faithful +mirrour of manners and of life. His characters are not modified by the +customs of particular places, unpractised by the rest of the world; +by the peculiarities of studies or professions, which can operate +but upon small numbers; or by the accidents of transient fashions or +temporary opinions: they are the genuine progeny of common humanity, +such as the world will always supply, and observation will always +find. His persons act and speak by the influence of those general +passions and principles by which all minds are agitated, and the whole +system of life is continued in motion. In the writings of other poets +a character is too often an individual; in those of _Shakespeare_ it +is commonly a species. + +It is from this wide extension of design that so much instruction +is derived. It is this which fills the plays of _Shakespeare_ with +practical axioms and domestic wisdom. It was said of _Euripides_, that +every verse was a precept; and it may be said of _Shakespeare_, that +from his works may be collected a system of civil and oeconomical +prudence. Yet his real power is not shewn in the splendour of +particular passages, but by the progress of his fable, and the +tenour of his dialogue; and he that tries to recommend him by select +quotations, will succeed like the pedant in _Hierocles_, who, when +he offered his house to sale, carried a brick in his pocket as a +specimen. + +It will not easily be imagined how much _Shakespeare_ excells in +accommodating his sentiments to real life, but by comparing him with +other authors. It was observed of the ancient schools of declamation, +that the more diligently they were frequented, the more was the +student disqualified for the world, because he found nothing there +which he should ever meet in any other place. The same remark may be +applied to every stage but that of _Shakespeare_. The theatre, when +it is under any other direction, is peopled by such characters as +were never seen, conversing in a language which was never heard, upon +topicks which will never rise in the commerce of mankind. But the +dialogue of this author is often so evidently determined by the +incident which produces it, and is pursued with so much ease and +simplicity, that it seems scarcely to claim the merit of fiction, but +to have been gleaned by diligent selection out of common conversation, +and common occurrences. + +Upon every other stage the universal agent is love, by whose power all +good and evil is distributed, and every action quickened or retarded. +To bring a lover, a lady and a rival into the fable; to entangle +them in contradictory obligations, perplex them with oppositions of +interest, and harrass them with violence of desires inconsistent with +each other; to make them meet in rapture and part in agony; to fill +their mouths with hyperbolical joy and outrageous sorrow; to distress +them as nothing human ever was distressed; to deliver them as nothing +human ever was delivered; is the business of a modern dramatist. For +this probability is violated, life is misrepresented, and language +is depraved. But love is only one of many passions; and as it has no +great influence upon the sum of life, it has little operation in the +dramas of a poet, who caught his ideas from the living world, and +exhibited only what he saw before him. He knew, that any other +passion, as it was regular or exorbitant, was a cause of happiness or +calamity. + +Characters thus ample and general were not easily discriminated and +preserved, yet perhaps no poet ever kept his personages more distinct +from each other. I will not say with _Pope_, that every speech may be +assigned to the proper speaker, because many speeches there are which +have nothing characteristical; but perhaps, though some may be equally +adapted to every person, it will be difficult to find any that can be +properly transferred from the present possessor to another claimant. +The choice is right, when there is reason for choice. + +Other dramatists can only gain attention by hyperbolical or aggravated +characters, by fabulous and unexampled excellence or depravity, as the +writers of barbarous romances invigorated the reader by a giant and a +dwarf; and he that should form his expectations of human affairs from +the play, or from the tale, would be equally deceived. _Shakespeare_ +has no heroes; his scenes are occupied only by men, who act and speak +as the reader thinks that he should himself have spoken or acted on +the same occasion: Even where the agency is supernatural the dialogue +is level with life. Other writers disguise the most natural passions +and most frequent incidents; so that he who contemplates them in the +book will not know them in the world: _Shakespeare_ approximates the +remote, and familiarizes the wonderful; the event which he represents +will not happen, but if it were possible, its effects would probably +be such as he has assigned; and it may be said, that he has not only +shewn human nature as it acts in real exigencies, but as it would be +found in trials, to which it cannot be exposed. + +This therefore is the praise of _Shakespeare_, that his drama is the +mirrour of life; that he who has mazed his imagination, in following +the phantoms which other writers raise up before him, may here be +cured of his delirious extasies, by reading human sentiments in human +language, by scenes from which a hermit may estimate the transactions +of the world, and a confessor predict the progress of the passions. + +His adherence to general nature has exposed him to the censure of +criticks, who form their judgments upon narrow principles. _Dennis_ +and _Rhymer_ think his _Romans_ not sufficiently _Roman_; and +_Voltaire_ censures his kings as not completely royal. _Dennis_ +is offended, that _Menenius_, a senator of _Rome_, should play the +buffoon; and _Voltaire_ perhaps thinks decency violated when the +_Danish_ Usurper is represented as a drunkard. But _Shakespeare_ +always makes nature predominate over accident; and if he preserves the +essential character, is not very careful of distinctions superinduced +and adventitious. His story requires Romans or kings, but, he thinks +only on men. He knew that _Rome_, like every other city, had men of +all dispositions; and wanting a buffoon, he went into the senate-house +for that which the senate-house would certainly have afforded him. +He was inclined to shew an usurper and a murderer not only odious but +despicable, he therefore added drunkenness to his other qualities, +knowing that kings love wine like other men, and that wine exerts its +natural power upon kings. These are the petty cavils of petty minds; +a poet overlooks the casual distinction of country and condition, as a +painter, satisfied with the figure, neglects the drapery. + +The censure which he has incurred by mixing comick and tragick scenes, +as it extends to all his works, deserves more consideration. Let the +fact be first stated, and then examined. + +_Shakespeare's_ plays are not in the rigorous and critical sense +either tragedies or comedies, but compositions of a distinct kind; +exhibiting the real state of sublunary nature, which partakes of good +and evil, joy and sorrow, mingled with endless variety of proportion +and innumerable modes of combination; and expressing the course of the +world, in which the loss of one is the gain of another; in which, at +the same time, the reveller is hasting to his wine, and the mourner +burying his friend; in which the malignity of one is sometimes +defeated by the frolick of another; and many mischiefs and many +benefits are done and hindered without design. + +Out of this chaos of mingled purposes and casualties the ancient +poets, according to the laws which custom had prescribed, selected +some the crimes of men, and some their absurdities; some the momentous +vicissitudes of life, and some the lighter occurrences; some the +terrours of distress, and some the gayeties of prosperity. Thus +rose the two modes of imitation, known by the names of _tragedy_ and +_comedy_, compositions intended to promote different ends by contrary +means, and considered as so little allied, that I do not recollect +among the _Greeks_ or _Romans_ a single writer who attempted both. + +_Shakespeare_ has united the powers of exciting laughter and sorrow +not only in one mind, but in one composition. Almost all his plays +are divided between serious and ludicrous characters, and, in the +successive evolutions of the design, sometimes produce seriousness and +sorrow, and sometimes levity and laughter. + +That this is a practice contrary to the rules of criticism will be +readily allowed; but there is always an appeal open from criticism +to nature. The end of writing is to instruct; the end of poetry is +to instruct by pleasing. That the mingled drama may convey all the +instruction of tragedy or comedy cannot be denied, because it includes +both in its alterations of exhibition and approaches nearer than +either to the appearance of life, by shewing how great machinations +and slender designs may promote or obviate one another, and the +high and the low co-operate in the general system by unavoidable +concatenation. + +It is objected, that by this change of scenes the passions are +interrupted in their progression, and that the principal event, being +not advanced by a due gradation of preparatory incidents, wants at +last the power to move, which constitutes the perfection of dramatick +poetry. This reasoning is so specious, that it is received as true +even by those who in daily experience feel it to be false. The +interchanges of mingled scenes seldom fail to produce the intended +vicissitudes of passion. Fiction cannot move so much, but that the +attention may be easily transferred; and though it must be allowed +that pleasing melancholy be sometimes interrupted by unwelcome levity, +yet let it be considered likewise, that melancholy is often not +pleasing, and that the disturbance of one man may be the relief of +another; that different auditors have different habitudes; and that, +upon the whole, all pleasure consists in variety. + +The players, who in their edition divided our authour's works into +comedies, histories, and tragedies, seem not to have distinguished the +three kinds by any very exact or definite ideas. + +And action which ended happily to the principal persons, however +serious or distressful through its intermediate incidents, in their +opinion, constituted a comedy. This idea of a comedy continued +long amongst us; and plays were written, which, by changing the +catastrophe, were tragedies to-day, and comedies to-morrow. + +Tragedy was not in those times a poem of more general dignity or +elevation than comedy; it required only a calamitous conclusion, with +which the common criticism of that age was satisfied, whatever lighter +pleasure it afforded in its progress. + +History was a series of actions, with no other than chronological +succession, independent on each other, and without any tendency to +introduce or regulate the conclusion. It is not always very nicely +distinguished from tragedy. There is not much nearer approach to +unity of action in the tragedy of _Antony and Cleopatra_, than in +the history of _Richard the Second_. But a history might be continued +through many plays; as it had no plan, it had no limits. + +Through all these denominations of the drama, _Shakespeare's_ mode of +composition is the same; an interchange of seriousness and merriment, +by which the mind is softened at one time, and exhilarated at another. +But whatever be his purpose, whether to gladden or depress, or to +conduct the story, without vehemence or emotion, through tracts of +easy and familiar dialogue, he never fails to attain his purpose; +as he commands us, we laugh or mourn, or sit silent with quiet +expectation, in tranquillity without indifference. + +When _Shakespeare's_ plan is understood, most of the criticisms of +_Rhymer_ and _Voltaire_ vanish away. The play of _Hamlet_ is opened, +without impropriety, by two sentinels; _Iago_ bellows at _Brabantio's_ +window, without injury to the scheme of the play, though in terms +which a modern audience would not easily endure; the character of +_Polonius_ is seasonable and useful; and the Grave-diggers themselves +may be heard with applause. + +_Shakespeare_ engaged in dramatick poetry with the world open before +him; the rules of the ancients were yet known to few; but publick +judgment was unformed; he had no example of such fame as might force +him upon imitation, nor criticks of such authority as might restrain +his extravagance: He therefore indulged his natural disposition, +and his disposition, as _Rhymer_ has remarked, led him to comedy. In +tragedy he often writes, with great appearance of toil and study, what +is written at last with little felicity; but in his comick scenes, he +seems to produce without labour what no labour can improve. In tragedy +he is always struggling after some occasion to be comick; but in +comedy he seems to repose, or to luxuriate, as in a mode of thinking +congenial to his nature. In his tragick scenes there is always +something wanting, but his comedy often surpasses expectation or +desire. His comedy pleases by the thoughts and the language, and his +tragedy for the greater part by incident and action. His tragedy seems +to be skill, his comedy to be instinct. + +The force of his comick scenes has suffered little diminution from the +changes made by a century and a half, in manners or in words. As his +personages act upon principles arising from genuine passion, very +little modified by particular forms, their pleasures and vexations +are communicable to all times and to all places; they are natural, and +therefore durable; the adventitious peculiarities of personal habits, +are only superficial dies, bright and pleasing for a little while, yet +soon fading to a dim tinct, without any remains of former lustre; but +the discriminations of true passion are the colours of nature; +they pervade the whole mass, and can only perish with the body that +exhibits them. The accidental compositions of heterogeneous modes +are dissolved by the chance which combined them; but the uniform +simplicity of primitive qualities neither admits increase, nor suffers +decay. The sand heap by one flood is scattered by another, but the +rock always continues in its place. The stream of time, which is +continually washing the dissoluble fabricks of other poets, passes +without injury by the adamant of _Shakespeare_. + +If there be, what I believe there is, in every nation, a stile which +never becomes obsolete, a certain mode of phraseology so consonant and +congenial to the analogy and principles of its respective language as +to remain settled and unaltered; this style is probably to be sought +in the common intercourse of life, among those who speak only to +be understood, without ambition of elegance. The polite are always +catching modish innovations, and the learned depart from established +forms of speech, in hope of finding or making better; those who wish +for distinction forsake the vulgar, when the vulgar is right; but +there is a conversation above grossness and below refinement, where +propriety resides, and where this poet seems to have gathered his +comick dialogue. He is therefore more agreeable to the ears of the +present age than any other authour equally remote, and among his other +excellencies deserves to be studied as one of the original masters of +our language. + +These observations are to be considered not as unexceptionally +constant, but as containing general and predominant truth. +_Shakespeare's_ familiar dialogue is affirmed to be smooth and clear, +yet not wholly without ruggedness or difficulty; as a country may be +eminently fruitful, though it has spots unfit for cultivation: +His characters are praised as natural, though their sentiments are +sometimes forced, and their actions improbable; as the earth upon the +whole is spherical, though its surface is varied with protuberances +and cavities. + +_Shakespeare_ with his excellencies has likewise faults, and faults +sufficient to obscure and overwhelm any other merit. I shall shew +them in the proportion in which they appear to me, without envious +malignity or superstitious veneration. No question can be more +innocently discussed than a dead poet's pretensions to renown; and +little regard is due to that bigotry which sets candour higher than +truth. + +His first defect is that to which may be imputed most of the evil in +books or in men. He sacrifices virtue to convenience, and is so +much more careful to please than to instruct, that he seems to write +without any moral purpose. From his writings indeed a system of +social duty may be selected, for he that thinks reasonably must think +morally; but his precepts and axioms drop casually from him; he makes +no just distribution of good or evil, nor is always careful to shew +in the virtuous a disapprobation of the wicked; he carries his persons +indifferently through right and wrong, and at the close dismisses them +without further care, and leaves their examples to operate by chance. +This fault the barbarity of his age cannot extenuate; for it is always +a writer's duty to make the world better, and justice is a virtue +independent on time or place. + +The plots are often so loosely formed, that a very slight +consideration may improve them, and so carelessly pursued, that +he seems not always fully to comprehend his own design. He omits +opportunities of instructing or delighting which the train of +his story seems to force upon him, and apparently rejects those +exhibitions which would be more affecting, for the sake of those which +are more easy. + +It may be observed, that in many of his plays the latter part is +evidently neglected. When he found himself near the end of his work, +and, in view of his reward, he shortened the labour to snatch +the profit. He therefore remits his efforts where he should most +vigorously exert them, and his catastrophe is improbably produced or +imperfectly represented. + +He had no regard to distinction of time or place, but gives to one age +or nation, without scruple, the customs, institutions, and opinions +of another, at the expence not only of likelihood, but of possibility. +These faults _Pope_ has endeavoured, with more zeal than judgment, +to transfer to his imagined interpolators. We need not wonder to find +_Hector_ quoting _Aristotle_, when we see the loves of _Theseus_ +and _Hippolyta_ combined with the _Gothick_ mythology of fairies. +_Shakespeare_, indeed, was not the only violator of chronology, for in +the same age _Sidney_, who wanted not the advantages of learning, has, +in his _Arcadia_, confounded the pastoral with the feudal times, +the days of innocence, quiet and security, with those of turbulence, +violence, and adventure. + +In his comick scenes he is seldom very successful, when he engages +his characters in reciprocations of smartness and contests of sarcasm; +their jests are commonly gross, and their pleasantry licentious; +neither his gentlemen nor his ladies have much delicacy, nor are +sufficiently distinguished from his clowns by any appearance of +refined manners. Whether he represented the real conversation of his +time is not easy to determine; the reign of _Elizabeth_ is commonly +supposed to have been a time of stateliness, formality and reserve; +yet perhaps the relaxations of that severity were not very elegant. +There must, however, have been always some modes of gayety preferable +to others, and a writer ought to chuse the best. + +In tragedy his performance seems constantly to be worse, as his labour +is more. The effusions of passion which exigence forces out are for +the most part striking and energetick; but whenever he solicits his +invention, or strains his faculties, the offspring of his throes is +tumour, meanness, tediousness, and obscurity. + +In narration he affects a disproportionate pomp of diction, and a +wearisome train of circumlocution, and tells the incident imperfectly +in many words, which might have been more plainly delivered in +few. Narration in dramatick poetry is naturally tedious, as it is +unanimated and inactive, and obstructs the progress of the action; +it should therefore always be rapid, and enlivened by frequent +interruption. _Shakespeare_ found it an encumberance, and instead of +lightening it by brevity, endeavoured to recommend it by dignity and +splendour. + +His declamations or set speeches are commonly cold and weak, for his +power was the power of nature; when he endeavoured, like other tragick +writers, to catch opportunities of amplification, and instead of +inquiring what the occasion demanded, to show how much his stores +of knowledge could supply, he seldom escapes without the pity or +resentment of his reader. + +It is incident to him to be now and then entangled with an unwieldy +sentiment, which he cannot well express, and will not reject; he +struggles with it a while, and if it continues stubborn, comprises it +in words such as occur, and leaves it to be disentangled and evolved +by those who have more leisure to bestow upon it. + +Not that always where the language is intricate the thought is subtle, +or the image always great where the line is bulky; the equality of +words to things is very often neglected, and trivial sentiments and +vulgar ideas disappoint the attention, to which they are recommended +by sonorous epithets and swelling figures. + +But the admirers of this great poet have never less reason to indulge +their hopes of supreme excellence, than when he seems fully resolved +to sink them in dejection, and mollify them with tender emotions by +the fall of greatness, the danger of innocence, or the crosses of +love. He is not long soft and pathetick without some idle conceit, +or contemptible equivocation. He no sooner begins to move, than he +counteracts himself; and terrour and pity, as they are rising in the +mind, are checked and blasted by sudden frigidity. + +A quibble is to _Shakespeare_, what luminous vapours are to the +traveller; he follows it at all adventures; it is sure to lead him out +of his way, and sure to engulf him in the mire. It has some malignant +power over his mind, and its fascinations are irresistible. Whatever +be the dignity or profundity of his disquisition, whether he be +enlarging knowledge or exalting affection, whether he be amusing +attention with incidents, or enchaining it in suspense, let but a +quibble spring up before him, and he leaves his work unfinished. A +quibble is the golden apple for which he will always turn aside from +his career, or stoop from his elevation. A quibble, poor and barren as +it is, gave him such delight, that he was content to purchase it, by +the sacrifice of reason, propriety and truth. A quibble was to him the +fatal _Cleopatra_ for which he lost the world, and was content to lose +it. + +It will be thought strange, that, in enumerating the defects of this +writer, I have not yet mentioned his neglect of the unities: his +violation of those laws which have been instituted and established by +the joint authority of poets and criticks. + +For his other deviations from the art of writing I resign him to +critical justice, without making any other demand in his favour, than +that which must be indulged to all human excellence: that his +virtues be rated with his failings: But, from the censure which this +irregularity may bring upon him, I shall, with due reverence to that +learning which I must oppose, adventure to try how I can defend him. + +His histories, being neither tragedies nor comedies are not subject to +any of their laws; nothing more is necessary to all the praise which +they expect, than that the changes of action be so prepared as to +be understood, that the incidents be various and affecting, and +the characters consistent, natural, and distinct. No other unity is +intended, and therefore none is to be sought. + +In his other works he has well enough preserved the unity of action. +He has not, indeed, an intrigue regularly perplexed and regularly +unravelled: he does not endeavour to hide his design only to discover +it, for this is seldom the order of real events, and _Shakespeare_ +is the poet of nature: But his plan has commonly what _Aristotle_ +requires, a beginning, a middle, and an end; one event is concatenated +with another, and the conclusion follows by easy consequence. There +are perhaps some incidents that might be spared, as in other poets +there is much talk that only fills up time upon the stage; but the +general system makes gradual advances, and the end of the play is the +end of expectation. + +To the unities of time and place he has shewn no regard; and perhaps a +nearer view of the principles on which they stand will diminish their +value, and withdraw from them the veneration which, from the time of +_Corneille_, they have very generally received, by discovering +that they have given more trouble to the poet, than pleasure to the +auditor. + +The necessity of observing the unities of time and place arises from +the supposed necessity of making the drama credible. The criticks +hold it impossible, that an action of months or years can be possibly +believed to pass in three hours; or that the spectator can suppose +himself to sit in the theatre, while ambassadors go and return between +distant kings while armies are levied and towns besieged, while an +exile wanders and returns, or till he whom they saw courting his +mistress, shall lament the untimely fall of his son. The mind revolts +from evident falsehood, and fiction loses its force when it departs +from the resemblance of reality. + +From the narrow limitation of time necessarily arises the contraction +of place. The spectator, who knows that he saw the first act at +_Alexandria_, cannot suppose that he sees the next at _Rome_, at a +distance to which not the dragons of _Medea_ could, in so short a +time, have transported him; he knows with certainty that he has not +changed his place, and he knows that place cannot change itself; that +what was a house cannot become a plain; that what was _Thebes_ can +never be _Persepolis_. + +Such is the triumphant language with which a critick exults over the +misery of an irregular poet, and exults commonly without resistance +or reply. It is time therefore to tell him by the authority of +_Shakespeare_, that he assumes, as an unquestionable principle, +a position, which, while his breath is forming it into words, +his understanding pronounces to be false. It is false, that any +representation is mistake for reality; that any dramatick fable in +its materiality was ever credible, or, for a single moment, was ever +credited. + +The objection arising from the impossibility of passing the first hour +at _Alexandria_, and the next at _Rome_, supposes, that when the play +opens, the spectator really imagines himself at _Alexandria_, and +believes that his walk to the theatre has been a voyage to _Egypt_, +and that he lives in the days of _Antony_ and _Cleopatra_. Surely he +that imagines this may imagine more. He that can take the stage at one +time for the palace of the _Ptolemies_, may take it in half an hour +for the promontory of _Actium_. Delusion, if delusion be admitted, has +no certain limitation; if the spectator can be once persuaded, +that his old acquaintance are _Alexander_ and _Cæsar_, that a room +illuminated with candles is the plain of _Pharsalia_, or the bank of +_Granicus_, he is in a state of elevation above the reach of reason, +or of truth, and from the heights of empyrean poetry, may despise the +circumscriptions of terrestrial nature. There is no reason why a mind +thus wandering in extacy should count the clock, or why an hour should +not be a century in that calenture of the brains that can make the +stage a field. + +The truth is, that the spectators are always in their senses, and +know, from the first act to the last, that the stage is only a stage, +and that the players are only players. They came to hear a certain +number of lines recited with just gesture and elegant modulation. The +lines relate to some action, and an action must be in some place; +but the different actions that complete a story may be in places very +remote from each other; and where is the absurdity of allowing that +space to represent first _Athens_, and then _Sicily_, which was always +known to be neither _Sicily_ nor _Athens_, but a modern theatre? + +By supposition, as place is introduced, times may be extended; the +time required by the fable elapses for the most part between the acts; +for, of so much of the action as is represented, the real and poetical +duration is the same. If, in the first act, preparations for war +against _Mithridates_ are represented to be made in _Rome_, the event +of the war may, without absurdity, be represented, in the catastrophe, +as happening in _Pontus_; we know that there is neither war, nor +preparation for war; we know that we are neither in _Rome_ nor +_Pontus_; that neither _Mithridates_ nor _Lucullus_ are before us. The +drama exhibits successive imitations of successive actions; and why +may not the second imitation represent an action that happened years +after the first, if it be so connected with it, that nothing but time +can be supposed to intervene? Time is, of all modes of existence, most +obsequious to the imagination; a lapse of years is as easily conceived +as a passage of hours. In contemplation we easily contract the time of +real actions, and therefore willingly permit it to be contracted when +we only see their imitation. + +It will be asked, how the drama moves, if it is not credited. It is +credited with all the credit due to a drama. It is credited, whenever +it moves, as a just picture of a real original; as representing to the +auditor what he would himself feel, if he were to do or suffer what +is there feigned to be suffered or to be done. The reflection that +strikes the heart is not, that the evils before us are real evils, but +that they are evils to which we ourselves may be exposed. If there be +any fallacy, it is not that we fancy the players, but that we fancy +ourselves unhappy for a moment; but we rather lament the possibility +than suppose the presence of misery, as a mother weeps over her babe, +when she remembers that death may take it from her. The delight of +tragedy proceeds from our consciousness of fiction; if we thought +murders and treasons real, they would please no more. + +Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are mistaken +for realities, but because they bring realities to mind. When the +imagination is recreated by a painted landscape, the trees are not +supposed capable to give us shade, or the fountains coolness; but we +consider, how we should be pleased with such fountains playing beside +us, and such woods waving over us. We are agitated in reading the +history of _Henry_ the Fifth, yet no man takes his book for the +field of _Agencourt_. A dramatick exhibition is a book recited with +concomitants that encrease or diminish its effect. Familiar comedy is +often more powerful in the theatre, than on the page; imperial +tragedy is always less. The humour of _Petruchio_ may be heightened +by grimace; but what voice or what gesture can hope to add dignity or +force to the soliloquy of _Cato_. + +A play read, affects the mind like a play acted. It is therefore +evident, that the action is not supposed to be real; and it follows, +that between the acts a longer or shorter time may be allowed to pass, +and that no more account of space or duration is to be taken by the +auditor of a drama, than by the reader of a narrative, before whom may +pass in an hour the life of a hero, or the revolutions of an empire. + +Whether _Shakespeare_ knew the unities, and rejected them by design, +or deviated from them by happy ignorance, it is, I think, impossible +to decide, and useless to enquire. We may reasonably suppose, that, +when he rose to notice, he did not want the counsels and admonitions +of scholars and criticks, and that he at last deliberately persisted +in a practice, which he might have begun by chance. As nothing is +essential to the fable, but unity of action, and as the unities +of time and place arise evidently from false assumptions, and, by +circumscribing the extent of the drama, lessen its variety, I cannot +think it much to be lamented, that they were not known by him, or +not observed: Nor, if such another poet could arise, should I very +vehemently reproach him, that his first act passed at _Venice_, and +his next in _Cyprus_. Such violations of rules merely positive, become +the comprehensive genius of _Shakespeare_, and such censures are +suitable to the minute and slender criticism of _Voltaire_: + + Non usque adeo permiscuit imis + Longus summa dies, ut non, si voce Metelli + Serventur leges, malint a Cæsare tolli. + +Yet when I speak thus slightly of dramatick rules, I cannot but +recollect how much wit and learning may be produced against me; before +such authorities I am afraid to stand, not that I think the present +question one of those that are to be decided by mere authority, but +because it is to be suspected, that these precepts have not been so +easily received but for better reasons than I have yet been able to +find. The result of my enquiries, in which it would be ludicrous to +boast of impartiality, is, that the unities of time and place are not +essential to a just drama, that though they may sometimes conduce to +pleasure, they are always to be sacrificed to the nobler beauties +of variety and instruction; and that a play, written with nice +observation of critical rules, is to be contemplated as an elaborate +curiosity, as the product of superfluous and ostentatious art, by +which is shewn, rather what is possible, than what is necessary. + +He that, without diminution of any other excellence, shall preserve +all the unities unbroken, deserves the like applause with the +architect, who shall display all the orders of architecture in a +citadel; without any deduction from its strength; but the principal +beauty of a citadel is to exclude the enemy; and the greatest graces +of a play, are to copy nature and instruct life. + +Perhaps what I have here not dogmatically but deliberatively written, +may recal the principles of the drama to a new examination. I am +almost frighted at my own temerity; and when I estimate the fame and +the strength of those that maintain the contrary opinion, am ready to +sink down in reverential silence; as _Æneas_ withdrew from the defence +of _Troy_, when he saw _Neptune_ shaking the wall, and _Juno_ heading +the besiegers. + +Those whom my arguments cannot persuade to give their approbation +to the judgment of _Shakespeare_, will easily, if they consider the +condition of his life, make some allowance for his ignorance. + +Every man's performances, to be rightly estimated, must be compared +with the state of the age in which he lived, and with his own +particular opportunities; and though to the reader a book be not worse +or better for the circumstances of the authour, yet as there is always +a silent reference of human works to human abilities, and as the +enquiry, how far man may extend his designs, or how high he may rate +his native force, is of far greater dignity than in what rank we shall +place any particular performance, curiosity is always busy to discover +the instruments, as well as to survey the workmanship, to know how +much is to be ascribed to original powers, and how much to casual and +adventitious help. The palaces of _Peru_ or _Mexico_ were certainly +mean and incommodious habitations, if compared to the houses +of _European_ monarchs; yet who could forbear to view them with +astonishment, who remembered that they were built without the use of +iron? + +The _English_ nation, in the time of _Shakespeare_, was yet +struggling to emerge from barbarity. The philology of _Italy_ had +been transplanted hither in the reign of _Henry_ the Eighth; and +the learned languages had been successfully cultivated by _Lilly, +Linacer_, and _More_; by _Pole, Cheke_, and _Gardiner_; and afterwards +by _Smith, Clerk, Haddon_, and _Ascham_. Greek was now taught to boys +in the principal schools; and those who united elegance with learning, +read, with great diligence, the _Italian_ and _Spanish_ poets. But +literature was yet confined to professed scholars, or to men and women +of high rank. The publick was gross and dark; and to be able to read +and write, was an accomplishment still valued for its rarity. + +Nations, like individuals, have their infancy. A people newly awakened +to literary curiosity, being yet unacquainted with the true state +of things, knows not how to judge of that which is proposed as its +resemblance. Whatever is remote from common appearances is always +welcome to vulgar, as to childish credulity; and of a country +unenlightened by learning, the whole people is the vulgar. The study +of those who then aspired to plebeian learning was laid out upon +adventures, giants, dragons, and enchantments. _The Death of Arthur +was_ the favourite volume. + +The mind, which has feasted on the luxurious wonders of fiction, has +no taste of the insipidity of truth. A play which imitated only +the common occurrences of the world, would, upon the admirers of +_Palmerin_ and _Guy_ of _Warwick_, have made little impression; he +that wrote for such an audience was under the necessity of looking +round for strange events and fabulous transactions, and that +incredibility, by which maturer knowledge is offended, was the chief +recommendation of writings, to unskilful curiosity. + +Our authour's plots are generally borrowed from novels, and it is +reasonable to suppose, that he chose the most popular, such as were +read by many, and related by more; for his audience could not have +followed him through the intricacies of the drama, had they not held +the thread of the story in their hands. + +The stories, which we now find only in remoter authours, were in his +time accessible and familiar. The fable of _As you like it_, which is +supposed to be copied from _Chaucer's_ Gamelyn, was a little pamphlet +of those times; and old Mr. _Cibber_ remembered the tale of _Hamlet_ +in plain _English_ prose, which the criticks have now to seek in _Saxo +Grammaticus._ + +His _English_ histories he took from _English_ chronicles and +_English_ ballads; and as the ancient writers were made known to +his countrymen by versions, they supplied him with new subjects; he +dilated some of _Plutarch's_ lives into plays, when they had been +translated by _North_. + +His plots, whether historical or fabulous, are always crouded with +incidents, by which the attention of a rude people was more easily +caught than by sentiment or argumentation; and such is the power of +the marvellous even over those who despise it, that every man finds +his mind more strongly seized by the tragedies of _Shakespeare_ than +of any other writer; others please us by particular speeches, but he +always makes us anxious for the event, and has perhaps excelled all +but _Homer_ in securing the first purpose of a writer, by exciting +restless and unquenchable curiosity and compelling him that reads his +work to read it through. The shows and bustle with which his plays +abound have the same original. As knowledge advances, pleasure passes +from the eye to the ear, but returns, as it declines, from the ear to +the eye. Those to whom our authour's labours were exhibited had more +skill in pomps or processions than in poetical language, and perhaps +wanted some visible and discriminated events, as comments on the +dialogue. He knew how he should most please; and whether his practice +is more agreeable to nature, or whether his example has prejudiced the +nation, we still find that on our stage something must be done as +well as said, and inactive declamation is very coldly heard, however +musical or elegant, passionate or sublime. + +_Voltaire_ expresses his wonder, that our authour's extravagances are +endured by a nation, which has seen the tragedy of _Cato_. Let him +be answered, that _Addison_ speaks the language of poets, and +_Shakespeare_, of men. We find in _Cato_ innumerable beauties which +enamour us of its authour, but we see nothing that acquaints us with +human sentiments or human actions; we place it with the fairest and +the noblest progeny which judgment propagates by conjunction with +learning, but _Othello_ is the vigorous and vivacious offspring +of observation impregnated by genius. _Cato_ affords a splendid +exhibition of artificial and fictitious manners, and delivers just and +noble sentiments, in diction easy, elevated and harmonious, but its +hopes and fears communicate no vibration to the heart; the composition +refers us only to the writer; we pronounce the name of _Cato_, but we +think on _Addison_. + +The work of a correct and regular writer is a garden accurately formed +and diligently planted, varied with shades, and scented with flowers; +the composition of _Shakespeare_ is a forest, in which oaks extend +their branches, and pines tower in the air, interspersed sometimes +with weeds and brambles, and sometimes giving shelter to myrtles and +to roses; filling the eye with awful pomp, and gratifying the mind +with endless diversity. Other poets display cabinets of precious +rarities, minutely finished, wrought into shape, and polished into +brightness. _Shakespeare_ opens a mine which contains gold and +diamonds in unexhaustible plenty, though clouded by incrustations, +debased by impurities, and mingled with a mass of meaner minerals. + +It has been much disputed, whether _Shakespeare_ owed his excellence +to his own native force, or whether he had the common helps of +scholastick education, the precepts of critical science, and the +examples of ancient authours. + +There has always prevailed a tradition, that _Shakespeare_ wanted +learning, that he had no regular education, nor much skill in the dead +languages. _Johnson_, his friend, affirms, that _he had small Latin, +and no Greek_; who, besides that he had no imaginable temptation to +falsehood, wrote at a time when the character and acquisitions of +_Shakespeare_ were known to multitudes. His evidence ought therefore +to decide the controversy, unless some testimony of equal force could +be opposed. + +Some have imagined, that they have discovered deep learning in many +imitations of old writers; but the examples which I have known urged, +were drawn from books translated in his time; or were such easy +coincidences of thought, as will happen to all who consider the same +subjects; or such remarks on life or axioms of morality as float in +conversation, and are transmitted through the world in proverbial +sentences. + +I have found it remarked, that, in this important sentence, _Go +before, I'll follow_, we read a translation of, _I prae, sequar_. I +have been told, that when _Caliban_, after a pleasing dream, says, _I +cry'd to sleep again_, the authour imitates _Anacreon_, who had, like +every other man, the same wish on the same occasion. + +There are a few passages which may pass for imitations, but so few, +that the exception only confirms the rule; he obtained them from +accidental quotations, or by oral communication, and as he used what +he had, would have used more if he had obtained it. + +The _Comedy of Errors_ is confessedly taken from the _Menæchmi_ +of _Plautus_; from the only play of _Plautus_ which was then in +_English_. What can be more probable, than that he who copied that, +would have copied more; but that those which were not translated were +inaccessible? + +Whether he knew the modern languages is uncertain. That his plays have +some _French_ scenes proves but little; he might easily procure them +to be written, and probably, even though he had known the language in +the common degree, he could not have written it without assistance. In +the story of _Romeo_ and _Juliet_ he is observed to have followed the +_English_ translation, where it deviates from the _Italian_; but +this on the other part proves nothing against his knowledge of the +original. He was to copy, not what he knew himself, but what was known +to his audience. + +It is most likely that he had learned _Latin_ sufficiently to make him +acquainted with construction, but that he never advanced to an easy +perusal of the _Roman_ authours. Concerning his skill in modern +languages, I can find no sufficient ground of determination; but as +no imitations of _French_ or _Italian_ authours have been discovered, +though the _Italian_ poetry was then high in esteem, I am inclined to +believe, that he read little more than _English_, and chose for his +fables only such tales as he found translated. + +That much knowledge is scattered over his works is very justly +observed by _Pope_, but it is often such knowledge as books did not +supply. He that will understand _Shakespeare_, must not be content to +study him in the closet, he must look for his meaning sometimes among +the sports of the field, and sometimes among the manufactures of the +shop. + +There is however proof enough that he was a very diligent reader, nor +was our language then so indigent of books, but that he might very +liberally indulge his curiosity without excursion into foreign +literature. Many of the _Roman_ authours were translated, and some of +the _Greek_; the reformation had filled the kingdom with theological +learning; most of the topicks of human disquisition had found +_English_ writers; and poetry had been cultivated, not only with +diligence, but success. This was a stock of knowledge sufficient for a +mind so capable of appropriating and improving it. + +But the greater part of his excellence was the product of his +own genius. He found the _English_ stage in a state of the utmost +rudeness; no essays either in tragedy or comedy had appeared, from +which it could be discovered to what degree of delight either one +or other might be carried. Neither character nor dialogue were yet +understood. _Shakespeare_ may be truly said to have introduced them +both amongst us, and in some of his happier scenes to have carried +them both to the utmost height. + +By what gradations of improvement he proceeded, is not easily known; +for the chronology of his works is yet unsettled. _Rowe_ is of +opinion, that _perhaps we are not to look for his beginning, like +those of other writers, in his least perfect works; art had so little, +and nature so large a share in what he did, that for ought I know_, +says he, _the performances of his youth, as they were the most +vigorous, were the best._ But the power of nature is only the power of +using to any certain purpose the materials which diligence procures, +or opportunity supplies. Nature gives no man knowledge, and when +images are collected by study and experience, can only assist in +combining or applying them. _Shakespeare_, however favoured by nature, +could impart only what he had learned; and as he must increase his +ideals, like other mortals, by gradual acquisition, he, like them, +grew wiser as he grew older, could display life better, as he knew it +more, and instruct with more efficacy, as he was himself more amply +instructed. + +There is a vigilance of observation and accuracy of distinction which +books and precepts cannot confer; from this almost all original +and native excellence proceeds. _Shakespeare_ must have looked +upon mankind with perspicacity, in the highest degree curious and +attentive. Other writers borrow their characters from preceding +writers, and diversify them only by the accidental appendages of +present manners; the dress is a little varied, but the body is the +same. Our authour had both matter and form to provide; for except +the characters of _Chaucer_, to whom I think he is not much indebted, +there were no writers in _English_, and perhaps not many in other +modern languages, which shewed life in its native colours. + +The contest about the original benevolence or malignity of man had not +yet commenced. Speculation had not yet attempted to analyse the +mind, to trace the passions to their sources, to unfold the seminal +principles of vice and virtue, or sound the depths of the heart for +the motives of action. All those enquiries, which from that time that +human nature became the fashionable study, have been made sometimes +with nice discernment, but often with idle subtilty, were yet +unattempted. The tales, with which the infancy of learning was +satisfied, exhibited only the superficial appearances of action, +related the events but omitted the causes, and were formed for such as +delighted in wonders rather than in truth. Mankind was not then to +be studied in the closet; he that would know the world, was under the +necessity of gleaning his own remarks, by mingling as he could in its +business and amusements. + +_Boyle_ congratulated himself upon his high birth, because it favoured +his curiosity, by facilitating his access. _Shakespeare_ had no such +advantage; he came to _London_ a needy adventurer, and lived for a +time by very mean employments. Many works of genius and learning have +been performed in states of life, that appear very little favourable +to thought or to enquiry; so many, that he who considers them +is inclined to think that he sees enterprise and perseverance +predominating over all external agency, and bidding help and hindrance +vanish before them. The genius of _Shakespeare_ was not to be +depressed by the weight of poverty, nor limited by the narrow +conversation to which men in want are inevitably condemned; the +incumbrances of his fortune were shaken from his mind, _as dewdrops +from a lion's mane_. + +Though he had so many difficulties to encounter, and so little +assistance to surmount them, he has been able to obtain an +exact knowledge of many modes of life, and many casts of native +dispositions; to vary them with great multiplicity; to mark them +by nice distinctions; and to shew them in full view by proper +combinations. In this part of his performances he had none to imitate, +but has himself been imitated by all succeeding writers; and it may +be doubted, whether from all his successors more maxims of theoretical +knowledge, or more rules of practical prudence, can be collected, than +he alone has given to his country. + +Nor was his attention confined to the actions of men; he was an exact +surveyor of the inanimate world; his descriptions have always some +peculiarities, gathered by contemplating things as they really exist. +It may be observed, that the oldest poets of many nations preserve +their reputation, and that the following generations of wit, after a +short celebrity, sink into oblivion. The first, whoever they be, must +take their sentiments and descriptions immediately from knowledge; +the resemblance is therefore just, their descriptions are verified by +every eye, and their sentiments acknowledged by every breast. Those +whom their fame invites to the same studies, copy partly them, and +partly nature, till the books of one age gain such authority, as +to stand in the place of nature to another, and imitation, +always deviating a little, becomes at last capricious and casual. +_Shakespeare_, whether life or nature be his subject, shews plainly, +that he has seen with his own eyes; he gives the image which he +receives, not weakened or distorted by the intervention of any other +mind; the ignorant feel his representations to be just, and the +learned see that they are compleat. + +Perhaps it would not be easy to find any authour, except _Homer_, who +invented so much as _Shakespeare_, who so much advanced the studies +which he cultivated, or effused so much novelty upon his age or +country. The form, the characters, the language, and the shows of the +_English_ drama are his, _He seems_, says _Dennis, to have been the +very original of our_ English _tragical harmony, that is, the harmony +of blank verse, diversified often by dissyllable and trissyllable +terminations. For the diversity distinguishes it from heroick harmony, +and by bringing it nearer to common use makes it more proper to gain +attention, and more fit for action and dialogue. Such verse we make +when we are writing prose; we make such verse in common conversation_. + +I know not whether this praise is rigorously just. The dissyllable +termination, which the critic rightly appropriates to the drama, is +to be found, though, I think, not in _Gorboduc_ which is confessedly +before our author; yet in _Hieronnymo_, of which the date is not +certain, but which there is reason to believe at least as old as his +earliest plays. This however is certain, that he is the first who +taught either tragedy or comedy to please, there being no theatrical +piece of any older writer, of which the name is known, except to +antiquaries and collectors of books, which are sought because they are +scarce, and would not have been scarce, had they been much esteemed. + +To him we must ascribe the praise, unless _Spenser_ may divide it with +him, of having first discovered to how much smoothness and harmony +the _English_ language could be softened. He has speeches, perhaps +sometimes scenes, which have all the delicacy of _Rowe_, without his +effeminacy. He endeavours indeed commonly to strike by the force and +vigour of his dialogue, but he never executes his purpose better, than +when he tries to sooth by softness. + +Yet it must be at last confessed, that as we owe every thing to +him, he owes something to us; that, if much of his praise is paid +by perception and judgement, much is likewise given by custom and +veneration. We fix our eyes upon his graces, and turn them from his +deformities, and endure in him what we should in another loath or +despise. If we endured without praising, respect for the father of +our drama might excuse us; but I have seen, in the book of some modern +critick, a collection of anomalies, which shew that he has corrupted +language by every mode of depravation, but which his admirer has +accumulated as a monument of honour. + +He has scenes of undoubted and perpetual excellence, but perhaps +not one play, which, if it were now exhibited as the work of a +contemporary writer, would be heard to the conclusion. I am indeed +far from thinking, that his works were wrought to his own ideas of +perfection; when they were such as would satisfy the audience, they +satisfied the writer. It is seldom that authours, though more studious +of fame than _Shakespeare_, rise much above the standard of their own +age; to add a little of what is best will always be sufficient for +present praise, and those who find themselves exalted into fame, +are willing to credit their encomiasts, and to spare the labour of +contending with themselves. + +It does not appear, that _Shakespeare_ thought his works worthy of +posterity, that he levied any ideal tribute upon future times, or had +any further prospect, than of present popularity and present profit. +When his plays had been acted, his hope was at an end; he solicited +no addition of honour from the reader. He therefore made no scruple +to repeat the same jests in many dialogues, or to entangle different +plots by the same knot of perplexity, which may be at least forgiven +him, by those who recollect, that of _Congreve's_ four comedies, two +are concluded by a marriage in a mask, by a deception, which perhaps +never happened, and which, whether likely or not, he did not invent. + +So careless was this great poet of future fame, that, though he +retired to ease and plenty, while he was yet little _declined into the +vale of years_, before he could be disgusted with fatigue, or disabled +by infirmity, he made no collection of his works, nor desired to +rescue those that had been already published from the depravations +that obscured them, or secure to the rest a better destiny, by giving +them to the world in their genuine state. + +Of the plays which bear the name of _Shakespeare_ in the late +editions, the greater part were not published till about seven years +after his death, and the few which appeared in his life are apparently +thrust into the world without the care of the authour, and therefore +probably without his knowledge. + +Of all the publishers, clandestine or professed, their negligence and +unskilfulness has by the late revisers been sufficiently shown. +The faults of all are indeed numerous and gross, and have not only +corrupted many passages perhaps beyond recovery, but have brought +others into suspicion, which are only obscured by obsolete +phraseology, or by the writer's unskilfulness and affectation. To +alter is more easy than to explain, and temerity is a more common +quality than diligence. Those who saw that they must employ conjecture +to a certain degree, were willing to indulge it a little further. Had +the author published his own works, we should have sat quietly down +to disentangle his intricacies, and clear his obscurities; but now we +tear what we cannot loose, and eject what we happen not to understand. + +The faults are more than could have happened without the +concurrence of many causes. The stile of _Shakespeare_ was in itself +ungrammatical, perplexed and obscure; his works were transcribed for +the players by those who may be supposed to have seldom understood +them; they were transmitted by copiers equally unskilful, who still +multiplied errours; they were perhaps sometimes mutilated by the +actors, for the sake of shortening the speeches; and were at last +printed without correction of the press. + +In this state they remained, not as Dr. _Warburton_ supposes, because +they were unregarded, but because the editor's art was not yet applied +to modern languages, and our ancestors were accustomed to so much +negligence of _English_ printers, that they could very patiently +endure it. At last an edition was undertaken by _Rowe_; not because a +poet was to be published by a poet, for _Rowe_ seems to have thought +very little on correction or explanation, but that our authour's works +might appear like those of his fraternity, with the appendages of a +life and recommendatory preface. _Rowe_ has been clamorously blamed +for not performing what he did not undertake, and it is time that +justice be done him, by confessing, that though he seems to have had +no thought of corruption beyond the printer's errours, yet he has made +many emendations, if they were not made before, which his successors +have received without acknowledgement, and which, if they had produced +them, would have filled pages and pages with censures of the stupidity +by which the faults were committed, with displays of the absurdities +which they involved, with ostentatious expositions of the new reading, +and self congratulations on the happiness of discovering it. + +Of _Rowe_, as of all the editors, I have preserved the preface, and +have likewise retained the authour's life, though not written with +much elegance or spirit; it relates however what is now to be known, +and therefore deserves to pass through all succeeding publications. + +The nation had been for many years content enough with Mr. _Rowe's_ +performance, when Mr. _Pope_ made them acquainted with the true state +of _Shakespeare's_ text, shewed that it was extremely corrupt, and +gave reason to hope that there were means of reforming it. He collated +the old copies, which none had thought to examine before, and restored +many lines to their integrity; but, by a very compendious criticism, +he rejected whatever he disliked, and thought more of amputation than +of cure. + +I know not why he is commended by Dr. _Warburton_ for distinguishing +the genuine from the spurious plays. In this choice he exerted no +judgement of his own; the plays which he received, were given +by _Hemings_ and _Condel,_ the first editors; and those which he +rejected, though, according to the licentiousness of the press in +those times, they were printed during _Shakespeare's_ life, with his +name, had been omitted by his friends, and were never added to his +works before the edition of 1664, from which they were copied by the +later printers. + +This was a work which _Pope_ seems to have thought unworthy of his +abilities, being not able to suppress his contempt of _the dull duty +of an editor_. He understood but half his undertaking. The duty of +a collator is indeed dull, yet, like other tedious tasks, is very +necessary; but an emendatory critick would ill discharge his duty, +without qualities very different from dullness. In perusing a +corrupted piece, he must have before him all possibilities of meaning, +with all possibilities of expression. Such must be his comprehension +of thought, and such his copiousness of language. Out of many readings +possible, he must be able to select that which best suits with the +state, opinions, and modes of language prevailing in every age, and +with his authour's particular cast of thought, and turn of expression. +Such must be his knowledge, and such his taste. Conjectural criticism +demands more than humanity possesses, and he that exercises it with +most praise has very frequent need of indulgence. Let us now be told +no more of the dull duty of an editor. + +Confidence is the common consequence of success. They whose excellence +of any kind has been loudly celebrated, are ready to conclude, that +their powers are universal. _Pope's_ edition fell below his own +expectations, and he was so much offended, when he was found to have +left any thing for others to do, that he past the latter part of his +life in a state of hostility with verbal criticism. + +I have retained all his notes, that no fragment of so great a writer +may be lost; his preface, valuable alike for elegance of composition +and justness of remark, and containing a general criticism on his +authour, so extensive, that little can be added, and so exact, that +little can be disputed, every editor has an interest to suppress, but +that every reader would demand its insertion. + +_Pope_ was succeeded by _Theobald_, a man of narrow comprehension and +small acquisitions, with no native and intrinsick splendour of genius, +with little of the artificial light of learning, but zealous for +minute accuracy, and not negligent in pursuing it. He collated +the ancient copies, and rectified many errours. A man so anxiously +scrupulous might have been expected to do more, but what little he did +was commonly right. + +In his report of copies and editions he is not to be trusted, without +examination. He speaks sometimes indefinitely of copies, when he has +only one. In his enumeration of editions, he mentions the two first +folios as of high, and the third folio as of middle authority; but +the truth is, that the first is equivalent to all others, and that the +rest only deviate from it by the printer's negligence. Whoever has +any of the folios has all, excepting those diversities which mere +reiteration of editions will produce. I collated them all at the +beginning, but afterwards used only the first. + +Of his notes I have generally retained those which he retained himself +in his second edition, except when they were confuted by subsequent +annotators, or were too minute to merit preservation. I have sometimes +adopted his restoration of a comma, without inserting the panegyrick +in which he celebrated himself for his atchievement. The exuberant +excrescence of his diction I have often lopped, his triumphant +exultations over _Pope_ and _Rowe_ I have sometimes suppressed, and +his contemptible ostentation I have frequently concealed; but I have +in some places shewn him, as he would have shewn himself, for the +reader's diversion, that the inflated emptiness of some notes may +justify or excuse the contraction of the rest. + +_Theobald_, thus weak and ignorant, thus mean and faithless, thus +petulant and ostentatious, by the good luck of having _Pope_ for his +enemy, has escaped, and escaped alone, with reputation, from this +undertaking. So willingly does the world support those who solicite +favour, against those who command reverence; and so easily is he +praised, whom no man can envy. + +Our authour fell then into the hands of Sir _Thomas Hanmer,_ the +_Oxford_ editor, a man, in my opinion, eminently qualified by nature +for such studies. He had, what is the first requisite to emendatory +criticism, that intuition by which the poet's intention is immediately +discovered, and that dexterity of intellect which despatches its work +by the easiest means. He had undoubtedly read much; his acquaintance +with customs, opinions, and traditions, seems to have been large; and +he is often learned without shew. He seldom passes what he does not +understand, without an attempt to find or to make a meaning, and +sometimes hastily makes what a little more attention would have found. +He is solicitous to reduce to grammar, what he could not be sure that +his authour intended to be grammatical. _Shakespeare_ regarded more +the series of ideas, than of words; and his language, not being +designed for the reader's desk, was all that he desired it to be, if +it conveyed his meaning to the audience. + +_Hanmer's_ care of the metre has been too violently censured. He found +the measures reformed in so many passages, by the silent labours +of some editors, with the silent acquiescence of the rest, that he +thought himself allowed to extend a little further the license, which +had already been carried so far without reprehension; and of his +corrections in general, it must be confessed, that they are often +just, and made commonly with the least possible violation of the text. + +But, by inserting his emendations, whether invented or borrowed, into +the page, without any notice of varying copies, he has appropriated +the labour of his predecessors, and made his own edition of little +authority. His confidence indeed, both in himself and others, was +too great; he supposes all to be right that was done by _Pope_ and +_Theobald_; he seems not to suspect a critick of fallibility, and it +was but reasonable that he should claim what he so liberally granted. + +As he never writes without careful enquiry and diligent consideration, +I have received all his notes, and believe that every reader will wish +for more. + +Of the last editor it is more difficult to speak. Respect is due to +high place, tenderness to living reputation, and veneration to genius +and learning; but he cannot be justly offended at that liberty +of which he has himself so frequently given an example, nor very +solicitous what is thought of notes, which he ought never to have +considered as part of his serious employments, and which, I suppose, +since the ardour of composition is remitted, he no longer numbers +among his happy effusions. + +The original and predominant errour of his commentary, is acquiescence +in his first thoughts; that precipitation which is produced by +consciousness of quick discernment; and that confidence which presumes +to do, by surveying the surface, what labour only can perform, +by penetrating the bottom. His notes exhibit sometimes perverse +interpretations, and sometimes improbable conjectures; he at one +time gives the authour more profundity of meaning, than the sentence +admits, and at another discovers absurdities, where the sense is plain +to every other reader. But his emendations are likewise often happy +and just; and his interpretation of obscure passages learned and +sagacious. + +Of his notes, I have commonly rejected those, against which the +general voice of the publick has exclaimed, or which their own +incongruity immediately condemns, and which, I suppose, the authour +himself would desire to be forgotten. Of the rest, to part I have +given the highest approbation, by inserting the offered reading in +the text; part I have left to the judgment of the reader, as doubtful, +though specious; and part I have censured without reserve, but I am +sure without bitterness of malice, and, I hope, without wantonness of +insult. + +It is no pleasure to me, in revising my volumes, to observe how much +paper is wasted in confutation. Whoever considers the revolutions of +learning, and the various questions of greater or less importance, +upon which wit and reason have exercised their powers, must lament the +unsuccessfulness of enquiry, and the slow advances of truth, when he +reflects, that great part of the labour of every writer is only the +destruction of those that went before him. The first care of the +builder of a new system, is to demolish the fabricks which are +standing. The chief desire of him that comments an authour, is to +shew how much other commentators have corrupted and obscured him. +The opinions prevalent in one age, as truths above the reach of +controversy, are confuted and rejected in another, and rise again +to reception in remoter times. Thus the human mind is kept in motion +without progress. Thus sometimes truth and criour, and sometimes +contrarieties of errour, take each other's place by reciprocal +invasion. The tide of seeming knowledge which is poured over one +generation, retires and leaves another naked and barren; the sudden +meteors of intelligence which for a while appear to shoot their beams +into the regions of obscurity, on a sudden withdraw their lustre, and +leave mortals again to grope their way. + +These elevations and depressions of renown, and the contradictions to +which all improvers of knowledge must for ever be exposed, since they +are not escaped by the highest and brightest of mankind, may surely +be endured with patience by criticks and annotators, who can rank +themselves but as the satellites of their authours. How canst thou beg +for life, says _Achilles_ to his captive, when thou knowest that +thou art now to suffer only what must another day be suffered by +_Achilles?_ + +Dr. _Warburton_ had a name sufficient to confer celebrity on those who +could exalt themselves into antagonists, and his notes have raised a +clamour too loud to be distinct. His chief assailants are the authours +of _the Canons of criticism_ and of the _Review of_ Shakespeare's +_text_; of whom one ridicules his errours with airy petulance, +suitable enough to the levity of the controversy; the other attacks +them with gloomy malignity, as if he were dragging to justice an +assassin or incendiary. The one stings like a fly, sucks a little +blood, takes a gay flutter, and returns for more; the other bites like +a viper, and would be glad to leave inflammations and gangrene behind +him. When I think on one, with his confederates, I remember the danger +of _Coriolanus,_ who was afraid that _girls with spits, and boys with +stones, should slay him in puny battle_; when the other crosses my +imagination, I remember the prodigy in _Macbeth_, + + _An eagle tow'ring in his pride of place, + Was by a mousing owl hawk'd at and kill'd._ + +Let me however do them justice. One is a wit, and one a scholar. They +have both shown acuteness sufficient in the discovery of faults, and +have both advanced some probable interpretations of obscure passages; +but when they aspire to conjecture and emendation, it appears how +falsely we all estimate our own abilities, and the little which they +have been able to perform might have taught them more candour to the +endeavours of others. + +Before Dr. _Warburton's_ edition, _Critical observations on_ +Shakespeare had been published by Mr. _Upton_, a man skilled in +languages, and acquainted with books, but who seems to have had no +great vigour of genius or nicety of taste. Many of his explanations +are curious and useful, but he likewise, though he professed to oppose +the licentious confidence of editors, and adhere to the old copies, +is unable to restrain the rage of emendation, though his ardour is ill +seconded by his skill. Every cold empirick, when his heart is expanded +by a successful experiment, swells into a theorist, and the laborious +collator at some unlucky moment frolicks in conjecture. + +_Critical, historical and explanatory notes_ have been likewise +published upon _Shakespeare_ by Dr. _Grey_, whose diligent perusal +of the old _English_ writers has enabled him to make some useful +observations. What he undertook he has well enough performed, but +as he neither attempts judicial nor emendatory criticism, he employs +rather his memory than his sagacity. It were to be wished that all +would endeavour to imitate his modesty who have not been able to +surpass his knowledge. + +I can say with great sincerity of all my predecessors, what I hope +will hereafter be said of me, that not one has left _Shakespeare_ +without improvement, nor is there one to whom I have not been indebted +for assistance and information. Whatever I have taken from them it was +my intention to refer to its original authour, and it is certain, that +what I have not given to another, I believed when I wrote it to be my +own. In some perhaps I have been anticipated; but if I am ever found +to encroach upon the remarks of any other commentator, I am willing +that the honour, be it more or less, should be transferred to the +first claimant, for his right, and his alone, stands above dispute; +the second can prove his pretensions only to himself, nor can +himself always distinguish invention, with sufficient certainty, from +recollection. + +They have all been treated by me with candour, which they have not +been careful of observing to one another. It is not easy to discover +from what cause the acrimony of a scholiast can naturally proceed. +The subjects to be discussed by him are of very small importance; they +involve neither property nor liberty; nor favour the interest of +sect or party. The various readings of copies, and different +interpretations of a passage, seem to be questions that might exercise +the wit, without engaging the passions. But, whether it be, that +_small things make mean men proud_, and vanity catches small +occasions; or that all contrariety of opinion, even in those that can +defend it no longer, makes proud men angry; there is often found in +commentaries a spontaneous strain of invective and contempt, more +eager and venomous than is vented by the most furious controvertist in +politicks against those whom he is hired to defame. + +Perhaps the lightness of the matter may conduce to the vehemence +of the agency; when the truth to be investigated is so near to +inexistence, as to escape attention, its bulk is to be enlarged by +rage and exclamation: That to which all would be indifferent in its +original state, may attract notice when the fate of a name is appended +to it. A commentator has indeed great temptations to supply by +turbulence what he wants of dignity, to beat his little gold to a +spacious surface, to work that to foam which no art or diligence can +exalt to spirit. + +The notes which I have borrowed or written are either illustrative, +by which difficulties are explained; or judicial by which faults +and beauties are remarked; or emendatory, by which depravations are +corrected. + +The explanations transcribed from others, if I do not subjoin any +other interpretation, I suppose commonly to be right, at least I +intend by acquiescence to confess, that I have nothing better to +propose. + +After the labours of all the editors, I found many passages which +appeared to me likely to obstruct the greater number of readers, and +thought it my duty to facilitate their passage. It is impossible +for an expositor not to write too little for some, and too much for +others. He can only judge what is necessary by his own experience; +and how long soever he may deliberate, will at last explain many lines +which the learned will think impossible to be mistaken, and omit many +for which the ignorant will want his help. These are censures merely +relative, and must be quietly endured. I have endeavoured to be +neither superfluously copious, nor scrupulously reserved, and hope +that I have made my authour's meaning accessible to many who before +were frighted from perusing him, and contributed something to the +publick, by diffusing innocent and rational pleasure. + +The compleat explanation of an authour not systematick and +consequential, but desultory and vagrant, abounding in casual +allusions and light hints, is not to be expected from any single +scholiast. All personal reflections, when names are suppressed, must +be in a few years irrecoverably obliterated; and customs, too minute +to attract the notice of law, such as modes of dress, formalities of +conversation, rules of visits, disposition of furniture, and practices +of ceremony, which naturally find places in familiar dialogue, are +so fugitive and unsubstantial, that they are not easily retained or +recovered. What can be known, will be collected by chance, from the +recesses of obscure and obsolete papers, perused commonly with some +other view. Of this knowledge every man has some, and none has much; +but when an authour has engaged the publick attention, those who can +add any thing to his illustration, communicate their discoveries, and +time produces what had eluded diligence. + +To time I have been obliged to resign many passages, which, though I +did not understand them, will perhaps hereafter be explained, having, +I hope, illustrated some, which others have neglected or mistaken, +sometimes by short remarks, or marginal directions, such as every +editor has added at his will, and often by comments more laborious +than the matter will seem to deserve; but that which is most difficult +is not always most important, and to an editor nothing is a trifle by +which his authour is obscured. + +The poetical beauties or defects I have not been very diligent to +observe. Some plays have more, and some fewer judicial observations, +not in proportion to their difference of merit, but because I gave +this part of my design to chance and to caprice. The reader, I +believe, is seldom pleased to find his opinion anticipated; it is +natural to delight more in what we find or make, than in what we +receive. Judgement, like other faculties, is improved by practice, and +its advancement is hindered by submission to dictatorial decisions, as +the memory grows torpid by the use of a table book. Some initiation is +however necessary; of all skill, part is infused by precept, and part +is obtained by habit; I have therefore shewn so much as may enable the +candidate of criticism to discover the rest. + +To the end of most plays, I have added short strictures, containing +a general censure of faults, or praise of excellence; in which I know +not how much I have concurred with the current opinion; but I have +not, by any affectation of singularity, deviated from it. Nothing +is minutely and particularly examined, and therefore it is to be +supposed, that in the plays which are condemned there is much to be +praised, and in these which are praised much to be condemned. + +The part of criticism in which the whole succession of editors has +laboured with the greatest diligence, which has occasioned the +most arrogant ostentation, and excited the keenest acrimony, is the +emendation of corrupted passages, to which the publick attention +having been first drawn by the violence of contention between _Pope_ +and _Theobald_, has been continued by the persecution, which, with a +kind of conspiracy, has been since raised against all the publishers +of _Shakespeare_. + +That many passages have passed in a state of depravation through all +the editions is indubitably certain; of these the restoration is only +to be attempted by collation of copies or sagacity of conjecture. The +collator's province is safe and easy, the conjecturer's perilous and +difficult. Yet as the greater part of the plays are extant only in one +copy, the peril must not be avoided, nor the difficulty refused. + +Of the readings which this emulation of amendment has hitherto +produced, some from the labours of every publisher I have advanced +into the text; those are to be considered as in my opinion +sufficiently supported; some I have rejected without mention, as +evidently erroneous; some I have left in the notes without censure or +approbation, as resting in equipoise between objection and defence; +and some, which seemed specious but not right, I have inserted with a +subsequent animadversion. + +Having classed the observations of others, I was at last to try what +I could substitute for their mistakes, and how I could supply their +omissions. I collated such copies as I could procure, and wished +for more, but have not found the collectors of these rarities very +communicative. Of the editions which chance or kindness put into +my hands I have given an enumeration, that I may not be blamed for +neglecting what I had not the power to do. + +By examining the old copies, I soon found that the later publishers, +with all their boasts of diligence, suffered many passages to stand +unauthorised, and contented themselves with _Rowe's_ regulation of +the text, even where they knew it to be arbitrary, and with a +little consideration might have found it to be wrong. Some of these +alterations are only the ejection of a word for one that appeared to +him more elegant or more intelligible. These corruptions I have often +silently rectified; for the history of our language, and the true +force of our words, can only be preserved, by keeping the text of +authours free from adulteration. Others, and those very frequent, +smoothed the cadence, or regulated the measure; on these I have +not exercised the same rigour; if only a word was transposed, or a +particle Inserted or omitted, I have sometimes suffered the line +to stand; for the inconstancy of the copies is such, as that some +liberties may be easily permitted. But this practice I have not +suffered to proceed far, having restored the primitive diction +wherever it could for any reason be preferred. + +The emendations, which comparison of copies supplied, I have inserted +in the text; sometimes where the improvement was slight, without +notice, and sometimes with an account of the reasons of the change. + +Conjecture, though it be sometimes unavoidable, I have not wantonly +nor licentiously indulged. It has been my settled principle, that the +reading of the ancient books is probably true, and therefore is not +to be disturbed for the sake of elegance, perspicuity, or mere +improvement of the sense. For though much credit is not due to the +fidelity, nor any to the judgement of the first publishers, yet they +who had the copy before their eyes were more likely to read it right, +than we who read it only by imagination. But it is evident that they +have often made strange mistakes by ignorance or negligence, and that +therefore something may be properly attempted by criticism, keeping +the middle way between presumption and timidity. + +Such criticism I have attempted to practice, and where any passage +appeared inextricably perplexed, have endeavoured to discover how it +may be recalled to sense, with least violence. But my first labour +is, always to turn the old text on every side, and try if there be any +interstice, through which light can find its way; nor would _Huetius_ +himself condemn me, as refusing the trouble of research, for the +ambition of alteration. In this modest industry I have not been +unsuccessful. I have rescued many lines from the violations of +temerity, and secured many scenes from the inroads of correction. I +have adopted the _Roman_ sentiment, that it is more honourable to +save a citizen, than to kill an enemy, and have been more careful to +protect than to attack. + +I have preserved the common distribution of the plays into acts, +though I believe it to be in almost all the plays void of authority. +Some of those which are divided in the later editions have no division +in the first folio, and some that are divided in the folio have no +division in the preceding copies. The settled mode of the theatre +requires four intervals in the play, but few, if any, of our authour's +compositions can be properly distributed in that manner. An act is so +much of the drama as passes without intervention of time or change of +place. A pause makes a new act. In every real, and therefore in every +imitative action, the intervals may be more or fewer, the restriction +of five acts being accidental and arbitrary. This _Shakespeare_ knew, +and this he practised; his plays were written, and at first printed +in one unbroken continuity, and ought now to be exhibited with +short pauses, interposed as often as the scene is changed, or any +considerable time is required to pass. This method would at once quell +a thousand absurdities. + +In restoring the author's works to their integrity, I have considered +the punctuation as wholly in my power; for what could be their care of +colons and commas, who corrupted words and sentences. Whatever could +be done by adjusting points is therefore silently performed, in some +plays with much diligence, in others with less; it is hard to keep a +busy eye steadily fixed upon evanescent atoms, or a discursive mind +upon evanescent truth. + +The same liberty has been taken with a few particles, or other words +of slight effect. I have sometimes inserted or omitted them without +notice. I have done that sometimes, which the other editors have +done always, and which indeed the state of the text may sufficiently +justify. + +The greater part of readers, instead of blaming us for passing +trifles, will wonder that on mere trifles so much labour is expended, +with such importance of debate, and such solemnity of diction. To +these I answer with confidence, that they are judging of an art which +they do not understand; yet cannot much reproach them with their +ignorance, nor promise that they would become in general, by learning +criticism, more useful, happier or wiser. + +As I practised conjecture more, I learned to trust it less; and after +I had printed a few plays, resolved to insert none of my own readings +in the text. Upon this caution I now congratulate myself, for every +day encreases my doubt of my emendations. + +Since I have confined my imagination to the margin, it must not be +considered as very reprehensible, if I have suffered it to play some +freaks in its own dominion. There is no danger in conjecture, if it +be proposed as conjecture; and while the text remains uninjured, those +changes may be safely offered, which are not considered even by him +that offers them as necessary or safe. + +If my readings are of little value, they have not been ostentatiously +displayed or importunately obtruded. I could have written longer +notes, for the art of writing notes is not of difficult attainment. +The work is performed, first by railing at the stupidity, negligence, +ignorance, and asinine tastelessness of the former editors, and +shewing, from all that goes before and all that follows, the +inelegance and absurdity of the old reading; then by proposing +something which to superficial readers would seem specious, but +which the editor rejects with indignation; then by producing the true +reading, with a long paraphrase, and concluding with loud acclamations +on the discovery, and a sober wish for the advancement and prosperity +of genuine criticism. + +All this may be done, and perhaps done sometimes without impropriety. +But I have always suspected that the reading is right, which requires +many words to prove it wrong; and the emendation wrong, that cannot +without so much labour appear to be right The justness of a happy +restoration strikes at once, and the moral precept may be well applied +to criticism, _quod dubitas ne feceris_. + +To dread the shore which he sees spread with wrecks, is natural to +the sailor. I had before my eye, so many critical adventures ended in +miscarriage, that caution was forced upon me. I encountered in every +page Wit struggling with its own sophistry, and Learning confused by +the multiplicity of its views. I was forced to censure those whom I +admired, and could not but reflect, while I was dispossessing their +emendations, how soon the same fate might happen to my own, and how +many of the readings which I have corrected may be by some other +editor defended and established. + + Criticks, I saw, that other's names efface, + And fix their own, with labour, in the place; + Their own, like others, soon their place resign'd, + Or disappear'd, and left the first behind, + + POPE. + +That a conjectural critick should often be mistaken, cannot be +wonderful, either to others or himself, if it be considered, that in +his art there is no system, no principal and axiomatical truth that +regulates subordinate positions. His chance of errour is renewed +at every attempt; an oblique view of the passage, a slight +misapprehension of a phrase, a casual inattention to the parts +connected, is sufficient to make him not only fails, but fail +ridiculously; and when he succeeds best, he produces perhaps but one +reading of many probable, and he that suggests another will always be +able to dispute his claims. + +It is an unhappy state, in which danger is hid under pleasure. The +allurements of emendation are scarcely resistible. Conjecture has all +the joy and all the pride of invention, and he that has once started +a happy change, is too much delighted to consider what objections may +rise against it. + +Yet conjectural criticism has been of great use in the learned world; +nor is it my intention to depreciate a study, that has exercised so +many mighty minds, from the revival of learning to our own age, from +the Bishop of _Aleria_ to English _Bentley_. The criticks on ancient +authours have, in the exercise of their sagacity, many assistances, +which the editor of _Shakespeare_ is condemned to want. They are +employed upon grammatical and settled languages, whose construction +contributes so much to perspicuity, that _Homer_ has fewer passages +unintelligible than _Chaucer_. The words have not only a known +regimen, but invariable quantities, which direct and confine the +choice. There are commonly more manuscripts than one; and they do not +often conspire in the same mistakes. Yet _Scaliger_ could confess +to _Salmasius_ how little satisfaction his emendations gave him. +_Illudunt nobis conjectureæ nostræ, quarum nos pudet, posteaquam +in meliores codices incidimus_. And _Lipsius_ could complain, that +criticks were making faults, by trying to remove them, _Ut olim +vitiis, ita nunc remediis laboratur_. And indeed, where mere +conjecture is to be used, the emendations of _Scaliger_ and _Lipsius_, +notwithstanding their wonderful sagacity and erudition, are often +vague and disputable, like mine or _Theobald_'s. + +Perhaps I may not be more censured for doing wrong, than for doing +little; for raising in the publick expectations, which at last I have +not answered. The expectation of ignorance is indefinite, and that of +knowledge is often tyrannical. It is hard to satisfy those who know +not what to demand, or those who demand by design what they think +impossible to be done. I have indeed disappointed no opinion more +than my own; yet I have endeavoured to perform my task with no slight +solicitude. Not a single passage in the whole work has appeared to me +corrupt, which I have not attempted to restore; or obscure, which I +have not endeavoured to illustrate. In many I have failed like others, +and from many, after all my efforts, I have retreated, and confessed +the repulse. I have not passed over, with affected superiority, what +is equally difficult to the reader and to myself, but where I could +not instruct him, have owned my ignorance. I might easily have +accumulated a mass of seeming learning upon easy scenes; but it ought +not to be imputed to negligence, that, where nothing was necessary, +nothing has been done, or that, where others have said enough, I have +said no more. + +Notes are often necessary, but they are necessary evils. Let him, that +is yet unacquainted with the powers of _Shakespeare_, and who desires +to feel the highest pleasure that the drama can give, read every play +from the first scene to the last, with utter negligence of all his +commentators. When his fancy is once on the wing, let it not stoop at +correction or explanation. When his attention is strongly engaged, +let it disdain alike to turn aside to the name of _Theobald_ and of +_Pope_. Let him read on through brightness and obscurity, through +integrity and corruption; let him preserve his comprehension of the +dialogue and his interest in the fable. And when the pleasures +of novelty have ceased, let him attempt exactness, and read the +commentators. + +Particular passages are cleared by notes, but the general effect of +the work is weakened. The mind is refrigerated by interruption; the +thoughts are diverted from the principal subject; the reader is weary, +he suspects not why; and at last throws away the book, which he has +too diligently studied. + +Parts are not to be examined till the whole has been surveyed; there +is a kind of intellectual remoteness necessary for the comprehension +of any great work in its full design and its true proportions; a close +approach shews the smaller niceties, but the beauty of the whole is +discerned no longer. It is not very grateful to consider how little the +succession of editors has added to this authour's power of pleasing. +He was read, admired, studied, and imitated, while he was yet +deformed with all the improprieties which ignorance and neglect could +accumulate upon him; while the reading was yet not rectified, nor +his allusions understood; yet then did _Dryden_ pronounce "that +_Shakespeare_ was the man, who, of all modern and perhaps ancient +poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul." All the images +of nature were still present to him, and he drew them not laboriously, +but luckily: when he describes any thing, you more than see it, you +feel it too. Those who accuse him to have wanted learning, give him +the greater commendation: he was naturally learned: he needed not the +spectacles of books to read nature; he looked inwards, and found her +there. I cannot say he is every where alike; were he so, I should do +him injury to compare him with the greatest of mankind. He is many +times flat and insipid; his comick wit degenerating into clenches, his +serious swelling into bombast. But he is always great, when some +great occasion is presented to him: No man can say, he ever had a fit +subject for his wit, and did not then raise himself as high above the +rest of poets, + + "Quantum lenta solent inter viburna cupressi." + +It is to be lamented, that such a writer should want a commentary; +that his language should become obsolete, or his sentiments obscure. +But it is vain to carry wishes beyond the condition of human things; +that which must happen to all, has happened to _Shakespeare_, by +accident and time; and more than has been suffered by any other writer +since the use of types, has been suffered by him through his own +negligence of fame, or perhaps by that superiority of mind, which +despised its own performances, when it compared them with its powers, +and judged those works unworthy to be preserved, which the criticks +of following ages were to contend for the fame of restoring and +explaining. + +Among these candidates of inferiour fame, I am now to stand the +judgment of the publick; and wish that I could confidently produce my +commentary as equal to the encouragement which I have had the honour +of receiving. Every work of this kind is by its nature deficient, +and I should feel little solicitude about the sentence, were it to be +pronounced only by the skilful and the learned. + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPYLÄEN [A] + +BY J.W. VON GOETHE. (1798) + + +The youth, when Nature and Art attract him, thinks that with a +vigorous effort he can soon penetrate into the innermost sanctuary, +the man, after long wanderings, finds himself still in the outer +court. + +Such an observation has suggested our title. It is only on the step, +in the gateway, the entrance, the vestibule, the space between the +outside and the inner chamber, between the sacred and the common, that +we may ordinarily tarry with our friends. + +If the word _Propylaea_ recalls particularly the structure through +which was reached the citadel of Athens and the temple of Minerva, +this is not inconsistent with our purpose; but the presumption of +intending to produce here a similar work of art and splendor should +not be laid to our charge. The name of the place may be understood +as symbolizing what might have happened there; one may expect +conversations and discussions such as would perhaps not be unworthy of +that place. + +Are not thinkers, scholars, artists, in their best hours allured to +those regions, to dwell (at least in imagination) among a people to +whom a perfection which we desire but never attain was natural, +among whom in the course of time and life, a culture developed in a +beautiful continuity, which to us appears only in passing fragments? +What modern nation does not owe its artistic culture to the Greeks, +and, in certain branches, what nation more than the German? + +So much by way of excuse for the symbolic title, if indeed an excuse +be necessary. May the title be a reminder that we are to depart as +little as possible from classic ground; may it, through its brevity +and signification, modify the demands of the friends of art whom +we hope to interest through the present work, which is to contain +observations and reflections concerning Nature and Art by a harmonious +circle of friends. + +He who is called to be an artist will give careful heed to everything +around him; objects and their parts will attract his attention, and +by making practical use of such experience he will gradually train +himself to observe more sharply. He will, in his early career, apply +everything, so far as possible, to his own advantage; later he will +gladly make himself serviceable to others. Thus we also hope to +present and relate to our readers many things which we regard as +useful and agreeable, things which, under various circumstances, have +been noted by us during a number of years. + +But who will not willingly agree that pure observation is more rare +than is believed? We are apt to confuse our sensations, our opinion, +our judgment, with what we experience, so that we do not remain +long in the passive attitude of the observer, but soon go on to make +reflections; and upon these no greater weight can be placed than may +be more or less justified by the nature and quality of our individual +intellects. + +In this matter we are able to gain stronger confidence from our +harmony with others, and from the knowledge that we do not think and +work alone, but in common. The perplexing doubt whether our method +of thought belongs only to us--a doubt which often comes over us when +others express the direct opposite of our convictions--is softened, +even dispelled, when we find ourselves in agreement with others; only +then do we go on rejoicing with assurance in the possession of those +principles which a long experience, on our own part and on the part of +others, has gradually confirmed. + +When several persons thus live united, so that they may call one +another friends, because they have a common interest in bringing about +their progressive cultivation and in advancing towards closely related +aims, then they may be certain that they will meet again in the most +varied ways, and that even the courses which seemed to separate them +from one another will nevertheless soon bring them happily together +again. + +Who has not experienced what advantages are afforded in such cases by +conversation? But conversation is ephemeral; and while the results +of a mutual development are imperishable, the memory of the means by +which it was reached disappears. Letters preserve better the stages of +a progress which friends achieve together; every moment of growth is +fixed, and if the result attained affords us agreeable satisfaction, +a look backward at the process of development is instructive since it +permits its to hope for an unflagging advance in the future. + +Short papers, in which are set down from time to time one's thoughts, +convictions, and wishes, in order to find entertainment in one's past +self after a lapse of time, are excellent auxiliary means for +the development of oneself and of others, none of which should be +neglected when one considers the brief period allotted to life and the +many obstacles that stand in the way of every advance. + +It is self evident that we are talking here particularly of an +exchange of ideas between such friends as are striving for cultivation +in the sphere of science and art; although life in the world of +affairs and industry should not lack similar advantages. + +In the arts and sciences, however, in addition to this close +association among their votaries, a relation to the public is as +favorable as it is necessary. Whatever of universal interest one +thinks or accomplishes belongs to the world, and the world brings to +maturity whatever it can utilize of the efforts of the individual. The +desire for approval which the author feels is an impulse implanted by +Nature to draw him toward something higher; he thinks he has attained +the laurel wreath, but soon becomes aware that a more laborious +training of every native talent is necessary in order to retain the +public favor; though it may be attained for a short moment through +fortune or accident also. + +The relation of the author to his public is important in his early +period; even in later days he cannot dispense with it. However little +he may be fitted to teach others, he wishes to share his thoughts with +those whom he feels congenial, but who are scattered far and wide in +the world. By this means he wishes to re-establish his relation with +his old friends, to continue it with new ones, and to gain in the +younger generation still others for the remainder of his life. He +wishes to spare youth the circuitous paths upon which he himself +went astray, and while observing and utilizing the advantages of the +present, to maintain the memory of his praiseworthy earlier efforts. + +With this serious view, a small society has been brought together; may +cheerfulness attend our undertakings, and time may show whither we are +bound. + +The papers which we intend to present, though they are composed by +several authors, will, it is hoped, never be contradictory in the main +points, even though the methods of thought may not be the same in all. +No two persons regard the world in exactly the same way, and different +characters will often apply in different ways a principle which +they all acknowledge. Indeed, a person is not always consistent with +himself in his views and judgments: early convictions must give way to +later ones. The individual opinions that a man holds and expresses may +stand all tests or not; the main thing is that he continue on his way, +true to himself and to others! + +Much as the authors wish and hope to be in harmony with one another +and with a large part of the public, they must not shut their eyes to +the fact that from various quarters many a discord will ring out. +They must expect this all the more since they differ from prevailing +opinions in more than one point. Though far from wishing to dominate +or change the way of thinking of a third person, still they will +firmly express their own opinion, and, as circumstances dictate, will +avoid or take tip a quarrel. On the whole, however, they will adhere +to one creed, and especially will they repeat again and again those +conditions which seem to them indispensable in the training of an +artist. Whoever takes an interest in this matter, must be ready to +take sides; otherwise he does not deserve to be effective anywhere. + +If, therefore, we promise to present reflections and observations +concerning Nature, we must at the same time indicate that these +remarks will chiefly have reference, first, to plastic art; then, to +art in general; finally, to the general training of the artist. + +The highest demand that is made on an artist is this: that he be +true to Nature, study her, imitate her, and produce something that +resembles her phenomena. How great, how enormous, this demand is, +is not always kept in mind; and the true artist himself learns it by +experience only, in the course of his progressive development. Nature +is separated from Art by an enormous chasm, which genius itself is +unable to bridge without external assistance. + +All that we perceive around us is merely raw material; if it happens +rarely enough that an artist, through instinct and taste, through +practice and experiment, reaches the point of attaining the beautiful +exterior of things, of selecting the best from the good before him, +and of producing at least an agreeable appearance, it is still more +rare, particularly in modern times, for an artist to penetrate into +the depths of things as well as into the depths of his own soul, +in order to produce in his works not only something light and +superficially effective, but, as a rival of Nature, to produce +something spiritually organic, and to give his work of art a content +and a form through which it appears both natural and beyond Nature. + +Man is the highest, the characteristic subject of plastic art; +to understand him, to extricate oneself from the labyrinth of his +anatomy, a general knowledge of organic nature is imperative. The +artist should also acquaint himself theoretically with inorganic +bodies and with the general operations of Nature, particularly if, as +in the case of sound and color, they are adaptable to the purposes +of art; but what a circuitous path he would be obliged to take if +he wanted to seek laboriously in the schools of the anatomist, the +naturalist, and the physicist, for that which serves his purposes! It +is, indeed, a question whether he would find there what must be most +important for him. Those men have the entirely different needs of +their own pupils to satisfy, so that they cannot be expected to think +of the limited and special needs of the artist. For that reason it is +our intention to take a hand, and, even though we cannot see prospects +of completing the necessary work ourselves, both to give a view of the +whole and to begin the elaboration of details. + +The human figure cannot be understood merely through observation +of its surface; the interior must be laid bare, its parts must be +separated, the connections perceived, the differences noted, action +and reaction observed, the concealed, constant, and fundamental +elements of the phenomena impressed on the mind, if one really wishes +to contemplate and imitate what moves before our eyes in living waves +as a beautiful, undivided whole. A glance at the surface of a living +being confuses the observer; we may cite here, as in other cases, +the true proverb, "One sees only what one knows" For just as a +short-sighted man sees more clearly an object from which he draws +back than one to which he draws near, because his intellectual vision +comes to his aid, so the perfection of observation really depends on +knowledge. How well an expert naturalist, who can also draw, imitates +objects by recognizing and emphasizing the important and significant +parts from which is derived the character of the whole! + +Just as the artist is greatly helped by an exact knowledge of the +separate parts of the human figure, which he must in the end regard +again as a whole, so a general view, a side glance at related objects, +is highly advantageous, provided the artist is capable of rising to +Ideas and of grasping the close relationship of things apparently +remote. Comparative anatomy has prepared a general conception of +organic creatures; it leads us from form to form, and by observing +organisms closely or distantly related, we rise above them all to see +their characteristics in an ideal picture. If we keep this picture in +mind, we find that in observing objects our attention takes a definite +direction, that scattered facts can be learned and retained more +easily by comparison, that in the practice of art we can finally +vie with Nature only when we have learned from her, at least to some +extent, her method of procedure in the creation of her works. + +Furthermore, we would encourage the artist to gain knowledge also of +the inorganic world; this can be done all the more easily since now we +can conveniently and quickly acquire knowledge of the mineral kingdom. +The painter needs some knowledge of stones in order to imitate their +characteristics; the sculptor and architect, in order to utilize them; +the cutter of precious stones cannot be without a knowledge of +their nature; the connoisseur and amateur, too, will strive for such +information. + +Now that we have advised the artist to gain a conception of the +general operations of Nature, in order to become acquainted with those +which particularly interest him, partly to develop himself in more +directions, partly to understand better that which concerns him; we +shall add a few further remarks on this significant point. + +Up to the present the painter has been able merely to wonder at the +physicist's theory of colors, without gaining any advantage from it. +The natural feeling of the artist, however, constant training, and a +practical necessity led him into a way of his own. He felt the vivid +contrasts out of the union of which harmony of color arises, he +designated certain characteristics through approximate sensations, he +had warm and cold colors, colors which express proximity, others which +express distance, and what not; and thus in his own way he brought +these phenomena closer to the most general laws of Nature. Perhaps the +supposition is confirmed that the operations of Nature in colors, as +well as magnetic, electric, and other operations, depend upon a mutual +relation, a polarity, or whatever else we might call the twofold or +manifold aspects of a distinct unity. + +We shall make it our duty to present this matter in detail and in a +form comprehensible to the artist; and we can be the more hopeful of +doing something welcome to him, since we shall be concerned only with +explaining and tracing to fundamental principles things which he has +hitherto done by instinct. + +So much for what we hope to impart in regard to Nature; now for what +is most necessary in regard to Art. + +Since the arrangement of this work proposes the presentation of single +treatises, some of these only in part, and since it is not our desire +to dissect a whole, but rather to build up a whole from many parts, +it will be necessary to present, as soon as possible and in a general +summary, those thing's which the reader will gradually find unfolded +in our detailed elaborations. We shall, therefore, be occupied first +with an essay on plastic art, in which the familiar rubrics will be +presented according to our interpretation and method. Here it will be +our main concern to emphasize the importance of every branch of Art, +and to show that the artist must not neglect a single one, as has +unfortunately often happened, and still happens. + +Hitherto we have regarded Nature as the treasure chamber of material +in general; now, however, we reach the important point where it is +shown how Art prepares its materials for itself. + +When the artist takes any object of Nature, the object no longer +belongs to Nature; indeed, we can say that the artist creates the +object in that moment, by extracting from it all that is significant, +characteristic, interesting, or rather by putting into it a +higher value. In this way finer proportions, nobler forms, higher +characteristics are, as it were, forced upon the human figure; the +circle of regularity, perfection, signification, and completeness is +drawn, in which Nature gladly places her best possessions even though +elsewhere in her vast extent she easily degenerates into ugliness and +loses herself in indifference. + +The same is true of composite works of art, of their subject and +content, whether the theme be fable or history. Happy the artist who +makes no mistake in undertaking the work, who knows how to choose, or +rather to determine what is suitable for art! He who wanders uneasily +among scattered myths and far-stretching history in search of a +theme, he who wishes to be significantly scholarly or allegorically +interesting, will often be checked in the midst of his work by +unexpected obstacles, or will miss his finest aim after the completion +of the work. He who does not speak clearly to the senses, will not +address himself clearly to the mind; and we regard this point as so +important that we insert at the very outset a more extended discussion +of it. + +A theme having been happily found or invented, it is subjected to +treatment which we would divide into the spiritual the sensuous, and +the mechanical. The spiritual develops the subject according to its +inner relations, it discovers subordinate motives; and, if we can at +all judge the depth of ar artistic genius by the choice of subject, +we can recognize in his selection of themes his breadth, wealth, +fullness, and power of attraction. The sensuous treatment we +should define as that through which the work becomes thoroughly +comprehensible to the senses, agreeable, delightful, and irresistible +through its gentle charm. The mechanical treatment, finally, is that +which works upon given material through any bodily organ, and thus +brings the work into existence and gives it reality. + +While we hope to be useful to the artist in this way, and earnestly +wish that he may avail himself of advice and of suggestions in +his work, the disquieting observation is forced upon us that every +undertaking, like every man, is likely to suffer just as much from its +period as it is to derive occasional advantage from it, and in our +own case we cannot altogether put aside the question concerning the +reception we are likely to meet with. + +Everything is subject to constant change, and since certain things +cannot exist side by side, they displace one another This is true of +kinds of knowledge, of certain methods of instruction, of methods of +representation, and of maxims. The aims of men remain nearly always +the same: they still desire to become good artists or poets as they +did centuries ago; but the means through which the goal is reached are +not clear to everybody, and why should it be denied that nothing +would be more agreeable than to be able to carry out joyfully a great +design? + +Naturally the public has a great influence upon Art, since in +return for its approval and its money it demands work that may give +satisfaction and immediate enjoyment; and the artist will for the +most part be glad to adapt himself to it, for he also is a part of the +public, he has received his training during the same years, he feels +the same needs, strives in the same direction, and thus moves along +happily with the multitude which supports him and which is invigorated +by him. In this matter we see whole nations and epochs delighted by +their artists, just as the artist sees himself reflected in his nation +and his epoch, without either having even the slightest suspicion +that their path might not be right, that their taste might be at least +one-sided, their art on the decline, and their progress in the wrong +direction. + +Instead of proceeding to further generalities on this point, we shall +make a remark which refers particularly to plastic art. + +For the German artist, in fact for modern and northern artists in +general, it is difficult--indeed almost impossible--to make the +transition from formless matter to form, and to maintain himself at +that point, even should he succeed in reaching it. Let every artist +who has lived for a time in Italy ask himself whether the presence of +the best works of ancient and modern art have not aroused in him +the incessant endeavour to study and imitate the human figure in its +proportions, forms, and characteristics, to apply all diligence and +care in the execution in order to approach those artistic works, so +entirely complete in themselves, in order to produce a work which, in +gratifying the sense, exalts the spirit to the greatest heights. Let +him also admit, however, that after his return he must gradually relax +his efforts, because he finds few persons who will really see, enjoy, +and comprehend what is depicted, but, for the most part, finds only +those who look at a work superficially, receive from it mere random +impressions, and in some way of their own try to get out of it any +kind of sensation and pleasure. + +The worst picture can appeal to our senses and imagination by arousing +their activity, setting them free, and leaving them to themselves, the +best work of art also appeals to our senses, but in a higher language +which, of course, we must understand; it enchains the feelings and +imagination, it deprives us of caprice, we cannot deal with a perfect +work at our will; we are forced to give ourselves up to it, in order +to receive ourselves from it again, exalted and refined. + +That these are no dreams we shall try to show gradually, in detail, +and as clearly as possible, we shall call attention particularly to a +contradiction in which the moderns are often involved. They call +the ancients their teachers, they acknowledge in their works an +unattainable excellence, yet they depart both in theory and practice +far from the maxims which the ancients continually observed. In +starting from this important point and in returning to it often, we +shall find others about which something falls to be said. + +One of the principal signs of the decay of art is the mixture of its +various kinds. The arts themselves, as well as their branches, are +related to one another, and have a certain tendency to unite, even to +lose themselves in one another; but it is in this that the duty, the +merit, the dignity of the real artist consists, namely, in being able +to separate the field of art in which he works from others, in placing +every art and every branch of art on its own footing, and in isolating +it as far as possible. + +It has been noticed that all plastic art strives toward painting, all +literary art toward the drama, and this observation may in the future +give us occasion for important reflections. + +The genuine law-giving artist strives for the truth of art, the +lawless artist who follows a blind impulse strives for the reality of +Nature; through the former, art reaches its highest summit, through +the latter its lowest stage. + +What holds good of art in general holds good also of the kinds of art. +The sculptor must think and feel differently from the painter, indeed +he must proceed when he wishes to produce a work in relief, in a +different fashion from that which he will employ for a work in the +round. By the raising of low reliefs higher and higher, by the making +of various parts and figures stand out completely, and finally by the +adding of buildings and landscapes, so that work was produced which +was half painting and half puppet-show, true art steadily declined. +Excellent artists of modern times have unfortunately pursued this +course. + +When in the future we express such maxims as we think sound, we should +like, since they are deduced from works of art, to have them put +to the test of practice by the artist. How rarely one can come to a +theoretical agreement with anyone else on a fundamental principle. +That which is applicable and useful, on the other hand, is decided +upon much more quickly. How often we see artists in embarrassment over +the choice of subjects, over the general type of composition adapted +to their art, and the detailed arrangement; how often the painter over +the choice of colors! Then is the time to test a principle, then will +it he easier to decide whether it is bringing us closer to the great +models and to everything that we value and love in them, or whether it +leaves us entangled in the empirical confusion of an experience that +has not been sufficiently thought out. + +If such maxims hold good in training: the artist, in guiding him +in many an embarrassment, they will serve also in the development, +valuation, and judgment of old and new works of art, and will in turn +arise from an observation of these works. Indeed, it is all the more +necessary to adhere to this, because, notwithstanding the universally +praised excellences of antiquity, individuals and whole nations +among the moderns often fail to recognize wherein lies the highest +excellence of those works. + +An exact test will protect us best from this evil. For that reason let +us cite only one example to show what usually happens to the amateur +in plastic art, so that we may make clear how necessary it is that +criticism of ancient as well as modern works should be exact if it is +to be of any use. + +Upon him who has an eye for beauty, though untrained, even a blurred, +imperfect plaster cast of an excellent antique will always have a +great effect; for in such a reproduction there always remain the idea, +the simplicity and greatness of form, in short, the general outlines; +as much, at all events, as one could perceive with poor eyes at a +distance. + +It may be noticed that a strong inclination toward art is often +enkindled by such quite imperfect reproductions. But the effect is +like the object; it is rather that an obscure indefinite feeling is +aroused, than that the object in all its worth and dignity really +appears to such beginners in art. These are they who usually express +the theory that too minute a critical investigation destroys the +enjoyment, who are accustomed to oppose and resist regard for details. + +If gradually, however, after further experience and training, they +are confronted with a sharp cast instead of a blurred one, an original +instead of a cast, their pleasure grows with their insight, and +increases when the originals themselves, the perfect originals, +finally become known to them. + +The labyrinth of exact observations is willingly entered when the +details as well as the whole are perfect; indeed one learns to realize +that the excellences can be appreciated only in proportion as the +defects are perceived. To discriminate the restoration from the +genuine parts, and the copy from the original, to see in the smallest +fragments the ruined glory of the whole--this is the joy of the +finished expert; and there is a great difference between observing and +comprehending an imperfect whole with obscured vision, and a perfect +whole with clear vision. + +He who concerns himself with any branch of knowledge, should strive +for the highest! Insight is different from practice, for in practical +work everyone must soon resign himself to the fact that only a certain +measure of strength is alloted to him; far more people, however, +are capable of knowledge and insight. Indeed, one may well say that +everyone is thus capable who can deny himself and subordinate himself +to external objects, everyone who does not strive with rigid and +narrow-minded obstinacy to impose upon the highest works of Nature and +Art his own personality and his petty onesideness. + +To speak of works of art fitly and with true benefit to oneself and +others, the discussion should take place only in the presence of the +works themselves. Everything depends on the objects being in view; on +whether something absolutely definite is suggested by the word with +which one hopes to illuminate the work of art; for, otherwise, nothing +is thought of at all. This is why it so often happens that the writer +on art dwells merely on generalities, through which, indeed, ideas and +sensations are aroused in all readers, but no satisfaction is given to +the man who, book in hand, steps in front of the work of art itself. +Precisely on this account, however, we may in several essays be in a +position to arouse rather than to satisfy the desire of the readers; +for nothing is more natural than that they should wish to have before +their eyes immediately an excellent work of art which is minutely +dissected, in order to enjoy the whole which we are discussing, and, +so far as the parts are concerned, to subject to their own judgment +the opinion which they read. + +While the authors, however, write on the assumption that their readers +either have seen the works, or will see them in the future, yet they +hope to do everything in their power for those who are in neither +case. We shall mention reproductions, shall indicate where casts of +antique works of art and antique works themselves are accessible, +particularly to Germans; and thus try, as far as we can, to minister +to the genuine love and knowledge of art. + +A history of art can be based only upon the highest and most detailed +comprehension of art; only when one knows the finest things that man +can produce can one trace the psychological and chronological course +taken in art, as in other fields. This course began with a limited +activity, busied about a dry and even gloomy imitation of the +insignificant as well as the significant, whence developed a more +amiable, more kindly feeling toward Nature, till finally, under +favorable circumstances, accompanied by knowledge, regularity, +seriousness, and severity, art rose to its height. There at last it +became possible for the fortunate genius, surrounded by all these +auxiliaries, to produce the charming and the complete. + +Unfortunately, however, works of art with such ease of expression, +which instil into man cheerfulness, freedom, and a pleasant feeling of +his own personality, arouse in the striving artist the idea that the +process of production is also agreeable. Since the pinnacle of what +art and genius produce is an appearance of ease, the artists who come +after are tempted to make things easy for themselves, and to work for +the sake of appearances. Thus art gradually declines from its high +position, as to the whole as well as details. But if we wish to gain +a fair conception, we must come down to details of details, an +occupation not always agreeable or charming, but by and by richly +rewarded with a more certain view of the whole. + +If the experience of observing ancient and mediæval works of art has +shown us that certain maxims hold good we need these most of all +in judging the most recent modern productions; for, since personal +relations, love and hatred of individuals, favor or disfavor of the +multitude so easily enter into the valuation of living or recently +deceased artists, we are in all the more need of principles in order +to pass judgment on our contemporaries. The inquiry can be conducted +in two ways: by diminishing the influence of caprice; by bringing the +question before a higher tribunal. The principle can be tested as +well as its application; and even if we should not agree, the point in +dispute can still be definitely and clearly pointed out. + +Especially should we wish that the vivifying artist, in whose works +we might perhaps have found something to remember, might test our +judgments carefully in this way; for everyone who deserves this +name is forced in our times to form, as a result of his work and his +reflections, a theory, or at least a certain conception of theoretical +means, by the use of which he gets along tolerably well in a variety +of cases. It will often be noticed, however, that in this way he +sets up as laws such maxims as are in accordance with his talent, +his inclination, and his convenience. He is subject to a fate that is +common to all mankind. How many act in this very way in other fields! +But we are not cultivating ourselves when we merely set in motion with +ease and convenience that which lies in us. Every artist, like every +man, is only an individual, and will always lean to one side. For that +reason, man should pursue so far as possible, both theoretically and +practically, that which is contrary to his nature. Let the easy-going +seek what is serious and severe; let the stern keep before his +eyes the light and agreeable; the strong, loveliness; the amiable, +strength; and everyone will develop his own nature the more, the +farther he seems to remove himself from it. Every art requires the +whole man; the highest possible degree of art requires all mankind. + +The practice of the plastic arts is mechanical, and the training of +the artist rightly begins in his earliest youth with the mechanical +side; the rest of his education, on the other hand, is often +neglected, for it ought to be far more careful than the training of +others who have opportunity of deriving advantage from life itself. +Society soon makes a rough person courteous, a business life makes the +most simple person prudent; literary labors, which through print come +before a great public, find opposition and correction everywhere; +only the plastic artist is, for the most part, limited to a lonely +workshop; he has dealings almost solely with the man who orders +and pays for his labor, with a public which frequently follows only +certain morbid impressions, with connoisseurs who make him restless, +with auctioneers who receive every new work with praise and estimates +of value such as would fitly honor the most superlative production. + +But it is time to conclude this introduction lest it anticipate and +forestall the work, instead of merely preceding it. We have so far at +least designated the point from which we intend to set out; how far +our views can and will spread, must at first develop gradually. The +theory and criticism of literary art will, we hope, soon occupy us; +and whatever life, travel, and daily events suggest to us, shall not +be excluded. In closing, let us say a word on an important concern of +this moment. + +For the training of the artist, for the enjoyment of the friend of +art, it was from time immemorial of the greatest significance in what +place the works of art happened to be. There was a time when, except +for slight changes of location, they remained for the most part in +one place; now, however, a great change has occurred, which will +have important consequences for art in general and in particular. +At present we have perhaps more cause than ever to regard Italy as a +great storehouse of art--as it still was until recently. When it is +possible to give a general review of it, then it will be shown what +the world lost at the moment when so many parts were torn from this +great and ancient whole. + +What was destroyed in the very act of tearing away will probably +remain a secret forever; but a description of the new storehouse that +is being formed in Paris will be possible in a few years. Then the +method by which an artist and a lover of art is to use France and +Italy can be indicated; and a further important and fine question will +arise: what are other nations, particularly Germany and England, to +do in this period of scattering and loss, to make generally useful the +manifold and widely strewn treasures of art--a task requiring the true +cosmopolitan mind which is found perhaps nowhere purer than in the +arts and sciences? And what are they to do to help to form an ideal +storehouse, which in the course of time may perhaps happily compensate +us for what the present moment tears away when it does not destroy? + +So much in general of the purpose of a work in which we desire many +earnest and friendly sympathizers. + + +[Footnote A: The Propylaen was a periodical founded in July, 1798, by +Goethe and his friend Heinrich Meyer. During its short existence of +three years, there were published in it, besides the writings of the +editors, short contributions by Schiller and Humboldt. Its purpose was +to spread sound ideas about the aims and methods of art, and in this +notable introduction Goethe set forth with clearness and profundity +his fundamental ideas on these subjects. The present translation has +been made expressly for the Harvard Classics.] + + + + +PREFACES TO VARIOUS VOLUMES OF POEMS + +BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH[A] + +ADVERTISEMENT TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1798) + + +It is the honourable characteristic of Poetry that its materials are +to be found in every subject which can interest the human mind. The +evidence of this fact is to be sought, not in the writings of Critics, +but in those of Poets themselves. + +The majority of the following poems are to be considered as +experiments. They were written chiefly with a view to ascertain how +far the language of conversation in the middle and lower classes +of society is adapted to the purposes of poetic pleasure. Readers +accustomed to the gaudiness and inane phraseology of many modern +writers, if they persist in reading this book to its conclusion, will +perhaps frequently have to struggle with feelings of strangeness and +awkwardness: they will look round for poetry, and will be induced to +inquire by what species of courtesy these attempts can be permitted +to assume that title. It is desirable that such readers, for their +own sakes, should not suffer the solitary word Poetry, a word of very +disputed meaning, to stand in the way of their gratification; but +that, while they are perusing this book, they should ask themselves if +it contains a natural delineation of human passions, human characters, +and human incidents; and if the answer be favourable to the author's +wishes, that they should consent to be pleased in spite of that most +dreadful enemy to our pleasures, our own pre-established codes of +decision. + +Readers of superior judgement may disapprove of the style in which +many of these pieces are executed; it must be expected that many lines +and phrases will not exactly suit their taste. It will perhaps appear +to them, that wishing to avoid the prevalent fault of the day, +the author has sometimes descended too low, and that many of his +expressions are too familiar, and not of sufficient dignity. It is +apprehended that the more conversant the reader is with our elder +writers, and with those in modern times who have been the most +successful in painting manners and passions, the fewer complaints of +this kind will he have to make. + +An accurate taste in poetry, and in all the other arts, Sir Joshua +Reynolds has observed, is an acquired talent, which can only be +produced by severe thought, and a long continued intercourse with the +best models of composition. This is mentioned not with so ridiculous +a purpose as to prevent the most inexperienced reader from judging for +himself; but merely to temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest +that if poetry be a subject on which much time has not been bestowed, +the judgement may be erroneous, and that in many cases it necessarily +will be so. + +The tale of _Goody Blake and Harry Gill_ is founded on a +well-authenticated fact which happened in Warwickshire. Of the other +poems in the collection, it may be proper to say that they are either +absolute inventions of the author, or facts which took place within +his personal observation or that of his friends. The poem of _The +Thorn_, as the reader will soon discover, is not supposed to be spoken +in the author's own person: the character of the loquacious narrator +will sufficiently show itself in the course of the story. _The Rime +of the Ancyent Marinere_ was professedly written in imitation of the +_style_, as well as of the spirit of the elder poets; but with a few +exceptions, the Author believes that the language adopted in it has +been equally intelligible for these three last centuries. The lines +entitled _Expostulation and Reply_, and those which follow, arose out +of conversation with a friend who was somewhat unreasonably attached +to modern books of moral philosophy. + + +[Footnote A: William Wordsworth (1770-1830), probably the greatest of +the poets of the Romantic Movement in England, was also foremost in +the critical defence of that movement. The Prefaces and Essays printed +here form a kind of manifesto of the reaction from the poetical +traditions of the eighteenth century; and contain besides some of the +soundest theorizing on the nature of poetry to be found in English. +They afford an interesting comparison with the parallel protest in +Victor Hugo's Preface to "Cromwell," to be found later in the volume.] + + + + +PREFACE TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1800) + + +The first volume of these Poems has already been submitted to general +perusal. It was published as an experiment, which, I hoped, might be +of some use to ascertain, how far, by fitting to metrical arrangement +a selection of the real language of men in a state of vivid sensation, +that sort of pleasure and that quantity of pleasure may be imparted, +which a Poet may rationally endeavour to impart. + +I had formed no very inaccurate estimate of the probable effect of +those Poems: I flattered myself that they who should be pleased with +them would read them with more than common pleasure: and, on the other +hand, I was well aware, that by those who should dislike them, they +would be read with more than common dislike. The result has differed +from my expectation in this only, that a greater number have been +pleased than I ventured to hope I should please. + + * * * * * + +Several of my Friends are anxious for the success of these Poems, from +a belief, that, if the views with which they were composed were +indeed realized, a class of Poetry would be produced, well adapted to +interest mankind permanently, and not unimportant in the quality, and +in the multiplicity of its moral relations: and on this account they +have advised me to prefix a systematic defence of the theory upon +which the Poems were written. But I was unwilling to undertake the +task, knowing that on this occasion the Reader would look coldly upon +my arguments, since I might be suspected of having been principally +influenced by the selfish and foolish hope of _reasoning_ him into an +approbation of these particular Poems: and I was still more unwilling +to undertake the task, because, adequately to display the opinions, +and fully to enforce the arguments, would require a space wholly +disproportionate to a preface. For, to treat the subject with the +clearness and coherence of which it is susceptible, it would be +necessary to give a full account of the present state of the public +taste in this country, and to determine how far this taste is healthy +or depraved; which, again, could not be determined, without pointing +out in what manner language and the human mind act and re-act on each +other, and without retracing the revolutions, not of literature alone, +but likewise of society itself. I have therefore altogether declined +to enter regularly upon this defence; yet I am sensible, that there +would be something like impropriety in abruptly obtruding upon the +Public, without a few words of introduction, Poems so materially +different from those upon which general approbation is at present +bestowed. + +It is supposed that by the act of writing in verse an Author makes a +formal engagement that he will gratify certain known habits of +association; that he not only thus apprises the Reader that certain +classes of ideas and expressions will be found in his book, but that +others will be carefully excluded. This exponent or symbol held forth +by metrical language must in different eras of literature have excited +very different expectations: for example, in the age of Catullus, +Terence, and Lucretius, and that of Statius or Claudian; and in our own +country, in the age of Shakespeare and Beaumont and Fletcher, and that +of Donne and Cowley, or Dryden, or Pope. I will not take upon me to +determine the exact import of the promise which, by the act of writing +in verse, an Author in the present day makes to his reader: but it will +undoubtedly appear to many persons that I have not fulfilled the terms +of an engagement thus voluntarily contracted. I hope therefore the +reader will not censure me for attempting to state what I have proposed +to myself to perform; and also (as far as the limits of a preface will +permit) to explain some of the chief reasons which have determined me +in the choice of my purpose: that at least he may be spared any +unpleasant feeling of disappointment, and that I myself may be +protected from one of the most dishonourable accusations which can be +brought against an Author; namely, that of an indolence which prevents +him from endeavouring to ascertain what is his duty, or, when his duty +is ascertained, prevents him from performing it. + +The principal object, then, proposed in these Poems was to choose +incidents and situations from common life, and to relate or describe +them, throughout, as far as was possible in a selection of language +really used by men, and, at the same time, to throw over them a +certain colouring of imagination, whereby ordinary things should be +presented to the mind in an unusual aspect; and, further, and above +all, to make these incidents and situations interesting by tracing in +them, truly though not ostentatiously, the primary laws of our nature: +chiefly, as far as regards the manner in which we associate ideas in +a state of excitement. Humble and rustic life was generally chosen, +because, in that condition, the essential passions of the heart find +a better soil in which they can attain their maturity, are less under +restraint, and speak a plainer and more emphatic language; because in +that condition of life our elementary feelings coexist in a state +of greater simplicity, and, consequently, may be more accurately +contemplated, and more forcibly communicated; because the manners of +rural life germinate from those elementary feelings, and, from +the necessary character of rural occupations, are more easily +comprehended, and are more durable; and, lastly, because in that +condition the passions of men are incorporated with the beautiful and +permanent forms of nature. The language, too, of these men has been +adopted (purified indeed from what appear to be its real defects, from +all lasting and rational causes of dislike or disgust) because such +men hourly communicate with the best objects from which the best part +of language is originally derived; and because, from their rank in +society and the sameness and narrow circle of their intercourse, being +less under the influence of social vanity, they convey their feelings +and notions in simple and unelaborated expressions. Accordingly, such +a language, arising out of repeated experience and regular feelings, +is a more permanent, and a far more philosophical language, than that +which is frequently substituted for it by Poets, who think that they +are conferring honour upon themselves and their art, in proportion as +they separate themselves from the sympathies of men, and indulge in +arbitrary and capricious habits of expression, in order to +furnish food for fickle tastes, and fickle appetites, of their own +creation.[1] + +I cannot, however, be insensible to the present outcry against the +triviality and meanness, both of thought and language, which some of +my contemporaries have occasionally introduced into their metrical +compositions; and I acknowledge that this defect, where it exists, is +more dishonourable to the Writer's own character than false refinement +or arbitrary innovation, though I should contend at the same time, +that it is far less pernicious in the sum of its consequences. From +such verses the Poems in these volumes will be found distinguished +at least by one mark of difference, that each of them has a worthy +_purpose_. Not that I always began to write with a distinct purpose +formerly conceived; but habits of meditation have, I trust, so +prompted and regulated my feelings, that my descriptions of such +objects as strongly excite those feelings, will be found to carry +along with them a _purpose_. If this opinion be erroneous, I can +have little right to the name of a Poet. For all good poetry is the +spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: and though this be true, +Poems to which any value can be attached were never produced on any +variety of subjects but by a man who, being possessed of more than +usual organic sensibility, had also thought long and deeply. For +our continued influxes of feeling are modified and directed by +our thoughts, which are indeed the representatives of all our past +feelings; and, as by contemplating the relation of these general +representatives to each other, we discover what is really important to +men, so, by the repetition and continuance of this act, our feelings +will be connected with important subjects, till at length, if we be +originally possessed of much sensibility, such habits of mind will be +produced, that, by obeying blindly and mechanically the impulses of +those habits, we shall describe objects, and utter sentiments, of +such a nature, and in such connexion with each other, that the +understanding of the Reader must necessarily be in some degree +enlightened, and his affections strengthened and purified. + +It has been said that each of these poems has a purpose. Another +circumstance must be mentioned which distinguishes these Poems from +the popular Poetry of the day; it is this, that the feeling therein +developed gives importance to the action and situation, and not the +action and situation to the feeling. + +A sense of false modesty shall not prevent me from asserting, that the +Reader's attention is pointed to this mark of distinction, far +less for the sake of these particular Poems than from the general +importance of the subject. The subject is indeed important! For the +human mind is capable of being excited without the application of +gross and violent stimulants; and he must have a very faint perception +of its beauty and dignity who does not know this, and who does not +further know, that one being is elevated above another, in proportion +as he possesses this capability. It has therefore appeared to me, that +to endeavour to produce or enlarge this capability is one of the best +services in which, at any period, a Writer can be engaged; but this +service, excellent at all times, is especially so at the present day. +For a multitude of causes, unknown to former times, are now acting +with a combined force to blunt the discriminating powers of the mind, +and, unfitting it for all voluntary exertion, to reduce it to a state +of almost savage torpor. The most effective of these causes are the +great national events which are daily taking place, and the increasing +accumulation of men in cities, where the uniformity of their +occupations produces a craving for extraordinary incident, which the +rapid communication of intelligence hourly gratifies. To this tendency +of life and manners the literature and theatrical exhibitions of the +country have conformed themselves. The invaluable works of our elder +writers, I had almost said the works of Shakespeare and Milton, +are driven into neglect by frantic novels, sickly and stupid German +Tragedies, and deluges of idle and extravagant stories in verse.--When +I think upon this degrading thirst after outrageous stimulation, I am +almost ashamed to have spoken of the feeble endeavour made in these +volumes to counteract it; and, reflecting upon the magnitude of the +general evil, I should be oppressed with no dishonourable melancholy, +had I not a deep impression of certain inherent and indestructible +qualities of the human mind, and likewise of certain powers in the +great and permanent objects that act upon it, which are equally +inherent and indestructible; and were there not added to this +impression a belief, that the time is approaching when the evil will +be systematically opposed, by men of greater powers, and with far more +distinguished success. + +Having dwelt thus long on the subjects and aim of these Poems, I shall +request the Reader's permission to apprise him of a few circumstances +relating to their _style_, in order, among other reasons, that he may +not censure me for not having performed what I never attempted. The +Reader will find that personifications of abstract ideas rarely occur +in these volumes; and are utterly rejected, as an ordinary device +to elevate the style, and raise it above prose. My purpose was to +imitate, and, as far as possible, to adopt the very language of men; +and assuredly such personifications do not make any natural or +regular part of that language. They are, indeed, a figure of speech +occasionally prompted by passion, and I have made use of them as such; +but have endeavoured utterly to reject them as a mechanical device +of style, or as a family language which Writers in metre seem to lay +claim to by prescription. I have wished to keep the Reader in the +company of flesh and blood, persuaded that by so doing I shall +interest him. Others who pursue a different track will interest him +likewise; I do not interfere with their claim, but wish to prefer a +claim of my own. There will also be found in these volumes little of +what is usually called poetic diction; as much pains has been taken to +avoid it as is ordinarily taken to produce it; this has been done for +the reason already alleged, to bring my language near to the language +of men; and further, because the pleasure which I have proposed to +myself to impart, is of a kind very different from that which is +supposed by many persons to be the proper object of poetry. Without +being culpably particular, I do not know how to give my Reader a more +exact notion of the style in which it was my wish and intention to +write, than by informing him that I have at all times endeavoured to +look steadily at my subject; consequently, there is I hope in these +Poems little falsehood of description, and my ideas are expressed in +language fitted to their respective importance. Something must have +been gained by this practice, as it is friendly to one property of +all good poetry, namely, good sense: but it has necessarily cut me +off from a large portion of phrases and figures of speech which from +father to son have long been regarded as the common inheritance of +Poets. I have also thought it expedient to restrict myself still +further, having abstained from the use of many expressions, in +themselves proper and beautiful, but which have been foolishly +repeated by bad Poets, till such feelings of disgust are connected +with them as it is scarcely possible by any art of association to +overpower. + +If in a poem there should be found a series of lines, or even a single +line, in which the language, though naturally arranged, and according +to the strict laws of metre, does not differ from that of prose, there +is a numerous class of critics, who, when they stumble upon these +prosaisms, as they call them, imagine that they have made a notable +discovery, and exult over the Poet as over a man ignorant of his own +profession. Now these men would establish a canon of criticism which +the Reader will conclude he must utterly reject, if he wishes to be +pleased with these volumes. And it would be a most easy task to prove +to him, that not only the language of a large portion of every good +poem, even of the most elevated character, must necessarily, except +with reference to the metre, in no respect differ from that of good +prose, but likewise that some of the most interesting parts of the +best poems will be found to be strictly the language of prose +when prose is well written. The truth of this assertion might be +demonstrated by innumerable passages from almost all the poetical +writings, even of Milton himself. To illustrate the subject in a +general manner, I will here adduce a short composition of Gray, who +was at the head of those who, by their reasonings, have attempted to +widen the space of separation betwixt Prose and Metrical composition, +and was more than any other man curiously elaborate in the structure +of his own poetic diction. + + In vain to me the smiling mornings shine, + And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire; + The birds in vain their amorous descant join, + Or cheerful fields resume their green attire. + These ears, alas! for other notes repine; + _A different object do these eyes require; + My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine; + And in my breast the imperfect joys expire_; + Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer, + And new-born pleasure brings to happier men; + The fields to all their wonted tribute bear; + To warm their little loves the birds complain. + _I fruitless mourn to him that cannot hear, + And weep the more because I weep in vain._ + +It will easily be perceived, that the only part of this Sonnet +which is of any value is the lines printed in Italics; it is equally +obvious, that, except in the rhyme, and in the use of the single word +'fruitless' for fruitlessly, which is so far a defect, the language of +these lines does in no respect differ from that of prose. + +By the foregoing quotation it has been shown that the language +of Prose may yet be well adapted to Poetry; and it was previously +asserted, that a large portion of the language of every good poem can +in no respect differ from that of good Prose. We will go further. +It may be safely affirmed, that there neither is, nor can be, any +_essential_ difference between the language of prose and metrical +composition. We are fond of tracing the resemblance between Poetry and +Painting, and, accordingly, we call them Sisters: but where shall we +find bonds of connexion sufficiently strict to typify the affinity +betwixt metrical and prose composition? They both speak by and to the +same organs; the bodies in which both of them are clothed may be said +to be of the same substance, their affections are kindred, and almost +identical, not necessarily differing even in degree; Poetry[2] sheds +no tears 'such as Angels weep,' but natural and human tears; she can +boast of no celestial choir that distinguishes her vital juices from +those of prose; the same human blood circulates through the veins of +them both. + +If it be affirmed that rhyme and metrical arrangement of themselves +constitute a distinction which overturns what has just been said on +the strict affinity of metrical language with that of prose, and paves +the way for other artificial distinctions which the mind voluntarily +admits, I answer that the language of such Poetry as is here +recommended is, as far as is possible, a selection of the language +really spoken by men; that this selection, wherever it is made with +true taste and feeling, will of itself form a distinction far greater +than would at first be imagined, and will entirely separate the +composition from the vulgarity and meanness of ordinary life; and, if +metre be superadded thereto, I believe that a dissimilitude will be +produced altogether sufficient for the gratification of a rational +mind. What other distinction would we have? Whence is it to come? And +where is it to exist? Not, surely, where the Poet speaks through the +mouths of his characters: it cannot be necessary here, either for +elevation of style, or any of its supposed ornaments: for, if the +Poet's subject be judiciously chosen, it will naturally, and upon +fit occasion, lead him to passions the language of which, if selected +truly and judiciously, must necessarily be dignified and variegated, +and alive with metaphors and figures. I forbear to speak of an +incongruity which would shock the intelligent Reader, should the +Poet interweave any foreign splendour of his own with that which the +passion naturally suggests: it is sufficient to say that such addition +is unnecessary. And, surely, it is more probable that those passages, +which with propriety abound with metaphors and figures, will have +their due effect, if, upon other occasions where the passions are of a +milder character, the style also be subdued and temperate. + +But, as the pleasure which I hope to give by the Poems now presented +to the Reader must depend entirely on just notions upon this subject, +and, as it is in itself of high importance to our taste and moral +feelings, I cannot content myself with these detached remarks. And if, +in what I am about to say, it shall appear to some that my labour +is unnecessary, and that I am like a man fighting a battle without +enemies, such persons may be reminded, that, whatever be the language +outwardly holden by men, a practical faith in the opinions which I +am wishing to establish is almost unknown. If my conclusions are +admitted, and carried as far as they must be carried if admitted at +all, our judgements concerning the works of the greatest Poets +both ancient and modern will be far different from what they are +at present, both when we praise, and when we censure: and our moral +feelings influencing and influenced by these judgements will, I +believe, be corrected and purified. + +Taking up the subject, then, upon general grounds, let me ask, what +is meant by the word Poet? What is a Poet? To whom does he address +himself? And what language is to be expected from him?--He is a +man speaking to men: a man, it is true, endowed with more lively +sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness, who has a greater +knowledge of human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than are +supposed to be common among mankind; a man pleased with his own +passions and volitions, and who rejoices more than other men in the +spirit of life that is in him; delighting to contemplate similar +volitions and passions as manifested in the goings-on of the Universe, +and habitually impelled to create them where he does not find them. +To these qualities he has added a disposition to be affected more +than other men by absent things as if they were present; an ability of +conjuring up in himself passions, which are indeed far from being the +same as those produced by real events, yet (especially in those parts +of the general sympathy which are pleasing and delightful) do more +nearly resemble the passions produced by real events, than anything +which, from the motions of their own minds merely, other men are +accustomed to feel in themselves:--whence, and from practice, he has +acquired a greater readiness and power in expressing what he thinks +and feels, and especially those thoughts and feelings which, by +his own choice, or from the structure of his own mind, arise in him +without immediate external excitement. + +But whatever portion of this faculty we may suppose even the greatest +Poet to possess, there cannot be a doubt that the language which it +will suggest to him, must often, in liveliness and truth, fall +short of that which is uttered by men in real life, under the actual +pressure of those passions, certain shadows of which the Poet thus +produces, or feels to be produced, in himself. + +However exalted a notion we would wish to cherish of the character of +a Poet, it is obvious, that while he describes and imitates passions, +his employment is in some degree mechanical, compared with the freedom +and power of real and substantial action and suffering. So that it +will be the wish of the Poet to bring his feelings near to those of +the persons whose feelings he describes, nay, for short spaces of +time, perhaps, to let himself slip into an entire delusion, and even +confound and identify his own feelings with theirs; modifying only +the language which is thus suggested to him by a consideration that +he describes for a particular purpose, that of giving pleasure. Here, +then, he will apply the principle of selection which has been already +insisted upon. He will depend upon this for removing what would +otherwise be painful or disgusting in the passion; he will feel that +there is no necessity to trick out or to elevate nature: and, the more +industriously he applies this principle, the deeper will be his faith +that no words, which _his_ fancy or imagination can suggest, will +be to be compared with those which are the emanations of reality and +truth. + +But it may be said by those who do not object to the general spirit of +these remarks, that, as it is impossible for the Poet to produce upon +all occasions language as exquisitely fitted for the passion as that +which the real passion itself suggests, it is proper that he should +consider himself as in the situation of a translator, who does not +scruple to substitute excellencies of another kind for those which +are unattainable by him; and endeavours occasionally to surpass his +original, in order to make some amends for the general inferiority +to which he feels that he must submit. But this would be to encourage +idleness and unmanly despair. Further, it is the language of men +who speak of what they do not understand; who talk of Poetry as of a +matter of amusement and idle pleasure; who will converse with us as +gravely about a _taste_ for Poetry, as they express it, as if it were +a thing as indifferent as a taste for rope-dancing, or Frontiniac or +Sherry. Aristotle, I have been told, has said, that Poetry is the +most philosophic of all writing: it is so: its object is truth, not +individual and local, but general, and operative; not standing upon +external testimony, but carried alive into the heart by passion; truth +which is its own testimony, which gives competence and confidence +to the tribunal to which it appeals, and receives them from the same +tribunal. Poetry is the image of man and nature. The obstacles which +stand in the way of the fidelity of the Biographer and Historian, and +of their consequent utility, are incalculably greater than those which +are to be encountered by the Poet who comprehends the dignity of his +art. The Poet writes under one restriction only, namely, the necessity +of giving immediate pleasure to a human Being possessed of that +information which may be expected from him, not as a lawyer, a +physician, a mariner, an astronomer, or a natural philosopher, but +as a Man. Except this one restriction, there is no object standing +between the Poet and the image of things; between this, and the +Biographer and Historian, there are a thousand. + +Nor let this necessity of producing immediate pleasure be considered +as a degradation of the Poet's art. It is far otherwise. It is an +acknowledgement of the beauty of the universe, an acknowledgement the +more sincere, because not formal, but indirect; it is a task light and +easy to him who looks at the world in the spirit of love: further, it +is a homage paid to the native and naked dignity of man, to the grand +elementary principle of pleasure, by which he knows, and feels, +and lives, and moves. We have no sympathy but what is propagated by +pleasure: I would not be misunderstood; but wherever we sympathize +with pain, it will be found that the sympathy is produced and carried +on by subtle combinations with pleasure. We have no knowledge, that +is, no general principles drawn from the contemplation of particular +facts, but what has been built up by pleasure, and exists in us by +pleasure alone. The Man of science, the Chemist and Mathematician, +whatever difficulties and disgusts they may have had to struggle with, +know and feel this. However painful may be the objects with which the +Anatomist's knowledge is connected, he feels that his knowledge is +pleasure; and where he has no pleasure he has no knowledge. What then +does the Poet? He considers man and the objects that surround him as +acting and re-acting upon each other, so as to produce an infinite +complexity of pain and pleasure; he considers man in his own nature +and in his ordinary life as contemplating this with a certain quantity +of immediate knowledge, with certain convictions, intuitions, and +deductions, which from habit acquire the quality of intuitions; +he considers him as looking upon this complex scene of ideas and +sensations, and finding everywhere objects that immediately excite +in him sympathies which, from the necessities of his nature, are +accompanied by an overbalance of enjoyment. + +To this knowledge which all men carry about with them, and to these +sympathies in which, without any other discipline than that of our +daily life, we are fitted to take delight, the Poet principally +directs his attention. He considers man and nature as essentially +adapted to each other, and the mind of man as naturally the mirror of +the fairest and most interesting properties of nature. And thus the +Poet, prompted by this feeling of pleasure, which accompanies him +through the whole course of his studies, converses with general +nature, with affections akin to those, which, through labour and +length of time, the Man of science has raised up in himself, by +conversing with those particular parts of nature which are the objects +of his studies. The knowledge both of the Poet and the Man of science +is pleasure; but the knowledge of the one cleaves to us as a necessary +part of our existence, our natural and unalienable inheritance; the +other is a personal and individual acquisition, slow to come to +us, and by no habitual and direct sympathy connecting us with our +fellow-beings. The Man of science seeks truth as a remote and unknown +benefactor; he cherishes and loves it in his solitude: the Poet, +singing a song in which all human beings join with him, rejoices in +the presence of truth as our visible friend and hourly companion. +Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge; it is the +impassioned expression which is in the countenance of all Science. +Emphatically may it be said of the Poet, as Shakespeare hath said of +man, 'that he looks before and after.' He is the rock of defence for +human nature; an upholder and preserver, carrying everywhere with him +relationship and love. In spite of difference of soil and climate, of +language and manners, of laws and customs: in spite of things silently +gone out of mind, and things violently destroyed; the Poet binds +together by passion and knowledge the vast empire of human society, as +it is spread over the whole earth, and over all time. The objects of +the Poet's thoughts are everywhere; though the eyes and senses of man +are, it is true, his favourite guides, yet he will follow wheresoever +he can find an atmosphere of sensation in which to move his wings. +Poetry is the first and last of all knowledge--it is as immortal as +the heart of man. If the labours of Men of science should ever create +any material revolution, direct or indirect, in our condition, and in +the impressions which we habitually receive, the Poet will sleep then +no more than at present; he will be ready to follow the steps of the +Man of science, not only in those general indirect effects, but he +will be at his side, carrying sensation into the midst of the objects +of the science itself. The remotest discoveries of the Chemist, the +Botanist, or Mineralogist, will be as proper objects of the Poet's +art as any upon which it can be employed, if the time should ever come +when these things shall be familiar to us, and the relations under +which they are contemplated by the followers of these respective +sciences shall be manifestly and palpably material to us as enjoying +and suffering beings. If the time should ever come when what is now +called science, thus familiarized to men, shall be ready to put on, +as it were, a form of flesh and blood, the Poet will lend his divine +spirit to aid the transfiguration, and will welcome the Being thus +produced, as a dear and genuine inmate of the household of man.--It is +not, then, to be supposed that any one, who holds that sublime notion +of Poetry which I have attempted to convey, will break in upon the +sanctity and truth of his pictures by transitory and accidental +ornaments, and endeavour to excite admiration of himself by arts, the +necessity of which must manifestly depend upon the assumed meanness of +his subject. + +What has been thus far said applies to Poetry in general; but +especially to those parts of composition where the Poet speaks through +the mouths of his characters; and upon this point it appears to +authorize the conclusion, that there are few persons of good sense, +who would not allow that the dramatic parts of composition are +defective, in proportion as they deviate from the real language +of nature, and are coloured by a diction of the Poet's own, either +peculiar to him as an individual Poet or belonging simply to Poets +in general; to a body of men who, from the circumstance of their +compositions being in metre, it is expected will employ a particular +language. + +It is not, then, in the dramatic parts of composition that we look for +this distinction of language; but still it may be proper and necessary +where the Poet speaks to us in his own person and character. To this +I answer by referring the Reader to the description before given of a +Poet. Among the qualities there enumerated as principally conducing to +form a Poet, is implied nothing differing in kind from other men, but +only in degree. The sum of what was said is, that the Poet is chiefly +distinguished from other men by a greater promptness to think and +feel without immediate external excitement, and a greater power in +expressing such thoughts and feelings as are produced in him in that +manner. But these passions and thoughts and feelings are the general +passions and thoughts and feelings of men. And with what are +they connected? Undoubtedly with our moral sentiments and animal +sensations, and with the causes which excite these; with the +operations of the elements, and the appearances of the visible +universe; with storm and sunshine, with the revolutions of the +seasons, with cold and heat, with loss of friends and kindred, with +injuries and resentments, gratitude and hope, with fear and sorrow. +These, and the like, are the sensations and objects which the Poet +describes, as they are the sensations of other men, and the objects +which interest them. The Poet thinks and feels in the spirit of human +passions. How, then, can his language differ in any material degree +from that of all other men who feel vividly and see clearly? It might +be _proved_ that it is impossible. But supposing that this were not +the case, the Poet might then be allowed to use a peculiar language +when expressing his feelings for his own gratification, or that of +men like himself. But Poets do not write for Poets alone, but for men. +Unless therefore we are advocates for that admiration which subsists +upon ignorance, and that pleasure which arises from hearing what we do +not understand, the Poet must descend from this supposed height; and, +in order to excite rational sympathy, he must express himself as other +men express themselves. To this it may be added, that while he is only +selecting from the real language of men, or, which amounts to the same +thing, composing accurately in the spirit of such selection, he is +treading upon safe ground, and we know what we are to expect from him. +Our feelings are the same with respect to metre; for, as it may be +proper to remind the Reader, the distinction of metre is regular +and uniform, and not, like that which is produced by what is usually +called POETIC DICTION, arbitrary, and subject to infinite caprices +upon which no calculation whatever can be made. In the one case, the +Reader is utterly at the mercy of the Poet, respecting what imagery +or diction he may choose to connect with the passion; whereas, in the +other, the metre obeys certain laws, to which the Poet and Reader both +willingly submit because they are certain, and because no interference +is made by them with the passion, but such as the concurring testimony +of ages has shown to heighten and improve the pleasure which co-exists +with it. + +It will now be proper to answer an obvious question, namely, Why, +professing these opinions, have I written in verse? To this, in +addition to such answer as is included in what has been already said, +I reply, in the first place, Because, however I may have restricted +myself, there is still left open to me what confessedly constitutes +the most valuable object of all writing, whether in prose or verse; +the great and universal passions of men, the most general and +interesting of their occupations, and the entire world of nature +before me--to supply endless combinations of forms and imagery. Now, +supposing for a moment that whatever is interesting in these objects +may be as vividly described in prose, why should I be condemned for +attempting to superadd to such description the charm which, by the +consent of all nations, is acknowledged to exist in metrical language? +To this, by such as are yet unconvinced, it may he answered that +a very small part of the pleasure given by Poetry depends upon the +metre, and that it is injudicious to write in metre, unless it be +accompanied with the other artificial distinctions of style with which +metre is usually accompanied, and that, by such deviation, more will +be lost from the shock which will thereby be given to the Reader's +associations than will be counterbalanced by any pleasure which he can +derive from the general power of numbers. In answer to those who +still contend for the necessity of accompanying metre with certain +appropriate colours of style in order to the accomplishment of its +appropriate end, and who also, in my opinion, greatly underrate the +power of metre in itself, it might, perhaps, as far as relates to +these Volumes, have been almost sufficient to observe, that poems are +extant, written upon more humble subjects, and in a still more +naked and simple style, which have continued to give pleasure from +generation to generation. Now, if nakedness and simplicity be a +defect, the fact here mentioned affords a strong presumption that +poems somewhat less naked and simple are capable of affording pleasure +at the present day; and, what I wish _chiefly_ to attempt, at present, +was to justify myself for having written under the impression of this +belief. + +But various causes might be pointed out why, when the style is manly, +and the subject of some importance, words metrically arranged will +long continue to impart such a pleasure to mankind as he who proves +the extent of that pleasure will be desirous to impart. The end of +Poetry is to produce excitement in co-existence with an overbalance +of pleasure; but, by the supposition, excitement is an unusual and +irregular state of the mind; ideas and feelings do not, in that state, +succeed each other in accustomed order. If the words, however, by +which this excitement is produced be in themselves powerful, or the +images and feelings have an undue proportion of pain connected with +them, there is some danger that the excitement may be carried beyond +its proper bounds. Now the co-presence of something regular, something +to which the mind has been accustomed in various moods and in a +less excited state, cannot but have great efficacy in tempering and +restraining the passion by an inter-texture of ordinary feeling, and +of feeling not strictly and necessarily connected with the passion. +This is unquestionably true; and hence, though the opinion will +at first appear paradoxical, from the tendency of metre to divest +language, in a certain degree, of its reality, and thus to throw a +sort of half-consciousness of unsubstantial existence over the +whole composition, there can be little doubt but that more pathetic +situations and sentiments, that is, those which have a greater +proportion of pain connected with them, may be endured in metrical +composition, especially in rhyme, than in prose. The metre of the old +ballads is very artless; yet they contain many passages which would +illustrate this opinion; and, I hope, if the following Poems be +attentively perused, similar instances will be found in them. This +opinion may be further illustrated by appealing to the Reader's own +experience of the reluctance with which he comes to the re-perusal of +the distressful parts of _Clarissa Harlowe_, or _The Gamester_; while +Shakespeare's writings, in the most pathetic scenes, never act upon +us, as pathetic, beyond the bounds of pleasure--an effect which, in a +much greater degree than might at first be imagined, is to be ascribed +to small, but continual and regular impulses of pleasurable surprise +from the metrical arrangement.--On the other hand (what it must be +allowed will much more frequently happen) if the Poet's words should +be incommensurate with the passion, and inadequate to raise the Reader +to a height of desirable excitement, then (unless the Poet's choice of +his metre has been grossly injudicious), in the feelings of pleasure +which the Reader has been accustomed to connect with metre in general, +and in the feeling, whether cheerful or melancholy, which he has been +accustomed to connect with that particular movement of metre, there +will be found something which will greatly contribute to impart +passion to the words, and to effect the complex end which the Poet +proposes to himself. + +If I had undertaken a SYSTEMATIC defence of the theory here +maintained, it would have been my duty to develop the various causes +upon which the pleasure received from metrical language depends. Among +the chief of these causes is to be reckoned a principle which must +be well known to those who have made any of the Arts the object of +accurate reflection; namely, the pleasure which the mind derives from +the perception of similitude in dissimilitude. This principle is the +great spring of the activity of our minds, and their chief feeder. +From this principle the direction of the sexual appetite, and all the +passions connected with it, take their origin: it is the life of our +ordinary conversation; and upon the accuracy with which similitude in +dissimilitude, and dissimilitude in similitude are perceived, depend +our taste and our moral feelings. It would not be a useless employment +to apply this principle to the consideration of metre, and to show +that metre is hence enabled to afford much pleasure, and to point +out in what manner that pleasure is produced. But my limits will not +permit me to enter upon this subject, and I must content myself with a +general summary. + +I have said that poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful +feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in +tranquillity: the emotion is contemplated till, by a species of +reaction, the tranquillity gradually disappears, and an emotion, +kindred to that which was before the subject of contemplation, is +gradually produced, and does itself actually exist in the mind. In +this mood successful composition generally begins, and in a mood +similar to this it is carried on; but the emotion, of whatever kind, +and in whatever degree, from various causes, is qualified by various +pleasures, so that in describing any passions whatsoever, which are +voluntarily described, the mind will, upon the whole, be in a state +of enjoyment. If Nature be thus cautious to preserve in a state of +enjoyment a being so employed, the Poet ought to profit by the lesson +held forth to him, and ought especially to take care, that, whatever +passions he communicates to his Reader, those passions, if his +Reader's mind be sound and vigorous, should always be accompanied +with an overbalance of pleasure. Now the music of harmonious metrical +language, the sense of difficulty overcome, and the blind association +of pleasure which has been previously received from works of rhyme or +metre of the same or similar construction, an indistinct perception +perpetually renewed of language closely resembling that of real +life, and yet, in the circumstance of metre, differing from it so +widely--all these imperceptibly make up a complex feeling of delight, +which is of the most important use in tempering the painful feeling +always found intermingled with powerful descriptions of the deeper +passions. This effect is always produced in pathetic and impassioned +poetry; while, in lighter compositions, the ease and gracefulness +with which the Poet manages his numbers are themselves confessedly a +principal source of the gratification of the Reader. All that it is +_necessary_ to say, however, upon this subject, may he effected by +affirming, what few persons will deny, that, of two descriptions, +either of passions, manners, or characters, each of them equally well +executed, the one in prose and the other in verse, the verse will be +read a hundred times where the prose is read once. + +Having thus explained a few of my reasons for writing in verse, and +why I have chosen subjects from common life, and endeavoured to bring +my language near to the real language of men, if I have been too +minute in pleading my own cause, I have at the same time been treating +a subject of general interest; and for this reason a few words shall +be added with reference solely to these particular poems, and to some +defects which will probably be found in them. I am sensible that my +associations must have sometimes been particular instead of general, +and that, consequently, giving to things a false importance, I +may have sometimes written upon unworthy subjects; but I am less +apprehensive on this account, than that my language may frequently +have suffered from those arbitrary connexions of feelings and ideas +with particular words and phrases, from which no man can altogether +protect himself. Hence I have no doubt, that, in some instances, +feelings, even of the ludicrous, may be given to my Readers by +expressions which appeared to me tender and pathetic. Such faulty +expressions, were I convinced they were faulty at present, and that +they must necessarily continue to be so, I would willingly take +all reasonable pains to correct. But it is dangerous to make these +alterations on the simple authority of a few individuals, or even of +certain classes of men; for where the understanding of an Author is +not convinced, or his feelings altered, this cannot be done without +great injury to himself: for his own feelings are his stay and +support; and, if he set them aside in one instance, he may be induced +to repeat this act till his mind shall lose all confidence in itself, +and become utterly debilitated. To this it may be added, that the +critic ought never to forget that he is himself exposed to the same +errors as the Poet, and, perhaps, in a much greater degree: for +there can be no presumption in saying of most readers, that it is not +probable they will be so well acquainted with the various stages of +meaning through which words have passed, or with the fickleness or +stability of the relations of particular ideas to each other; and, +above all, since they are so much less interested in the subject, they +may decide lightly and carelessly. + +Long as the Reader has been detained, I hope he will permit me to +caution him against a mode of false criticism which has been applied +to Poetry, in which the language closely resembles that of life and +nature. Such verses have been triumphed over in parodies, of which Dr. +Johnson's stanza is a fair specimen:-- + + I put my hat upon my head + And walked into the Strand, + And there I met another man + Whose hat was in his hand. + +Immediately under these lines let us place one of the most justly +admired stanzas of the 'Babes in the Wood,' + + These pretty Babes with hand in hand + Went wandering up and down; + But never more they saw the Man + Approaching from the Town. + +In both these stanzas the words, and the order of the words, in no +respect differ from the most unimpassioned conversation. There are +words in both, for example, 'the Strand,' and 'the Town,' connected +with none but the most familiar ideas; yet the one stanza we admit +as admirable, and the other as a fair example of the superlatively +contemptible. Whence arises this difference? Not from the metre, not +from the language, not from the order of the words; but the _matter_ +expressed in Dr. Johnson's stanza is contemptible. The proper method +of treating trivial and simple verses, to which Dr. Johnson's stanza +would be a fair parallelism, is not to say, this is a bad kind of +poetry, or, this is not poetry; but, this wants sense; it is neither +interesting in itself nor can _lead_ to anything interesting; the +images neither originate in that sane state of feeling which arises +out of thought, nor can excite thought or feeling in the Reader. This +is the only sensible manner of dealing with such verses. Why trouble +yourself about the species till you have previously decided upon the +genus? Why take pains to prove than an ape is not a Newton, when it is +self-evident that he is not a man? + +One request I must make of my reader, which is, that in judging +these Poems he would decide by his own feelings genuinely, and not +by reflection upon what will probably be the judgement of others. +How common is it to hear a person say, I myself do not object to this +style of composition, or this or that expression, but, to such and +such classes of people it will appear mean or ludicrous! This mode +of criticism, so destructive of all sound unadulterated judgement, is +almost universal: let the Reader then abide, independently, by his own +feelings, and, if he finds himself affected, let him not suffer such +conjectures to interfere with his pleasure. + +If an Author, by any single composition, has impressed us with +respect for his talents, it is useful to consider this as affording +a presumption, that on other occasions where we have been displeased, +he, nevertheless, may not have written ill or absurdly; and further, +to give him so much credit for this one composition as may induce +us to review what has displeased us, with more care than we should +otherwise have bestowed upon it. This is not only an act of justice, +but, in our decisions upon poetry especially, may conduce, in a high +degree, to the improvement of our own taste; for an _accurate_ taste +in poetry, and in all the other arts, as Sir Joshua Reynolds has +observed, is an _acquired_ talent, which can only be produced by +thought and a long continued intercourse with the best models of +composition. This is mentioned, not with so ridiculous a purpose as to +prevent the most inexperienced Reader from judging for himself (I +have already said that I wish him to judge for himself), but merely to +temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest, that, if Poetry be a +subject on which much time has not been bestowed, the judgement may be +erroneous; and that, in many cases, it necessarily will be so. + +Nothing would, I know, have so effectually contributed to further the +end which I have in view, as to have shown of what kind the pleasure +is, and how that pleasure is produced, which is confessedly produced +by metrical composition essentially different from that which I have +here endeavoured to recommend: for the Reader will say that he has +been pleased by such composition; and what more can be done for him? +The power of any art is limited; and he will suspect, that, if it +be proposed to furnish him with new friends, that can be only upon +condition of his abandoning his old friends. Besides, as I have said, +the Reader is himself conscious of the pleasure which he has received +from such composition, composition to which he has peculiarly attached +the endearing name of Poetry; and all men feel an habitual gratitude, +and something of an honourable bigotry, for the objects which have +long continued to please them: we not only wish to be pleased, but to +be pleased in that particular way in which we have been accustomed +to be pleased. There is in these feelings enough to resist a host of +arguments; and I should be the less able to combat them successfully, +as I am willing to allow, that, in order entirely to enjoy the Poetry +which I am recommending, it would be necessary to give up much of what +is ordinarily enjoyed. But, would my limits have permitted me to point +out how this pleasure is produced, many obstacles might have been +removed, and the Reader assisted in perceiving that the powers of +language are not so limited as he may suppose; and that it is possible +for poetry to give other enjoyments, of a purer, more lasting, +and more exquisite nature. This part of the subject has not been +altogether neglected, but it has not been so much my present aim to +prove, that the interest excited by some other kinds of poetry is less +vivid, and less worthy of the nobler powers of the mind, as to offer +reasons for presuming, that if my purpose were fulfilled, a species of +poetry would be produced, which is genuine poetry; in its nature well +adapted to interest mankind permanently, and likewise important in the +multiplicity and quality of its moral relations. + +From what has been said, and from a perusal of the Poems, the Reader +will be able clearly to perceive the object which I had in view: he +will determine how far it has been attained; and, what is a much +more important question, whether it be worth attaining: and upon the +decision of these two questions will rest my claim to the approbation +of the Public. + + +[Footnote 1: It is worth while here to observe, that the affecting +parts of Chaucer are almost always expressed In language pure and +universally intelligible even to this day.] + +[Footnote 2: I here use the word 'Poetry' (though against my own +judgement) as opposed to the word Prose, and synonymous with metrical +composition. But much confusion has been introduced into criticism +by this contradistinction of Poetry and Prose, instead of the more +philosophical one of Poetry and Matter of Fact, or Science. The only +strict antithesis to Prose is Metre; nor is this, in truth, a _strict_ +antithesis, because lines and passages of metre so naturally occur in +writing prose, that it would be scarcely possible to avoid them, even +were it desirable.] + + + + +APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1802) + + +Perhaps, as I have no right to expect that attentive perusal, without +which, confined, as I have been, to the narrow limits of a preface, my +meaning cannot be thoroughly understood, I am anxious to give an exact +notion of the sense in which the phrase poetic diction has been used; +and for this purpose, a few words shall here be added, concerning the +origin and characteristics of the phraseology, which I have condemned +under that name. + +The earliest poets of all nations generally wrote from passion excited +by real events; they wrote naturally, and as men: feeling powerfully +as they did, their language was daring, and figurative. In succeeding +times, Poets, and Men ambitious of the fame of Poets, perceiving the +influence of such language, and desirous of producing the same effect +without being animated by the same passion, set themselves to a +mechanical adoption of these figures of speech, and made use of them, +sometimes with propriety, but much more frequently applied them +to feelings and thoughts with which they had no natural connexion +whatsoever. A language was thus insensibly produced, differing +materially from the real language of men in _any situation_. The +Reader or Hearer of this distorted language found himself in a +perturbed and unusual state of mind: when affected by the genuine +language of passion he had been in a perturbed and unusual state of +mind also: in both cases he was willing that his common judgement and +understanding should be laid asleep, and he had no instinctive and +infallible perception of the true to make him reject the false; the +one served as a passport for the other. The emotion was in both cases +delightful, and no wonder if he confounded the one with the other, +and believed them both to be produced by the same, or similar causes. +Besides, the Poet spake to him in the character of a man to be looked +up to, a man of genius and authority. Thus, and from a variety of +other causes, this distorted language was received with admiration; +and Poets, it is probable, who had before contented themselves for the +most part with misapplying only expressions which at first had +been dictated by real passion, carried the abuse still further, and +introduced phrases composed apparently in the spirit of the original +figurative language of passion, yet altogether of their own invention, +and characterized by various degrees of wanton deviation from good +sense and nature. + +It is indeed true, that the language of the earliest Poets was felt to +differ materially from ordinary language, because it was the language +of extraordinary occasions; but it was really spoken by men, language +which the Poet himself had uttered when he had been affected by the +events which he described, or which he had heard uttered by those +around him. To this language it is probable that metre of some sort +or other was early superadded. This separated the genuine language of +Poetry still further from common life, so that whoever read or heard +the poems of these earliest Poets felt himself moved in a way in which +he had not been accustomed to be moved in real life, and by causes +manifestly different from those which acted upon him in real life. +This was the great temptation to all the corruptions which have +followed: under the protection of this feeling succeeding Poets +constructed a phraseology which had one thing, it is true, in common +with the genuine language of poetry, namely, that it was not heard in +ordinary conversation; that it was unusual. But the first Poets, as +I have said, spake a language which, though unusual, was still the +language of men. This circumstance, however, was disregarded by their +successors; they found that they could please by easier means: +they became proud of modes of expression which they themselves had +invented, and which were uttered only by themselves. In process of +time metre became a symbol or promise of this unusual language, and +whoever took upon him to write in metre, according as he possessed +more or less of true poetic genius, introduced less or more of this +adulterated phraseology into his compositions, and the true and the +false were inseparately interwoven until, the taste of men becoming +gradually perverted, this language was received as a natural language: +and at length, by the influence of books upon men, did to a certain +degree really become so. Abuses of this kind were imported from one +nation to another, and with the progress of refinement this diction +became daily more and more corrupt, thrusting out of sight the plain +humanities of nature by a motley masquerade of tricks, quaintnesses, +hieroglyphics, and enigmas. + +It would not be uninteresting to point out the causes of the pleasure +given by this extravagant and absurd diction. It depends upon a great +variety of causes, but upon none, perhaps, more than its influence in +impressing a notion of the peculiarity and exaltation of the Poet's +character, and in flattering the Reader's self-love by bringing +him nearer to a sympathy with that character; an effect which is +accomplished by unsettling ordinary habits of thinking, and thus +assisting the Reader to approach to that perturbed and dizzy state +of mind in which if he does not find himself, he imagines that he is +_balked_ of a peculiar enjoyment which poetry can and ought to bestow. + +The sonnet quoted from Gray, in the Preface, except the lines printed +in italics, consists of little else but this diction, though not of +the worst kind; and indeed, if one may be permitted to say so, it is +far too common in the best writers both ancient and modern. Perhaps +in no way, by positive example could more easily be given a notion +of what I mean by the phrase _poetic diction_ than by referring to a +comparison between the metrical paraphrase which we have of passages +in the Old and New Testament, and those passages as they exist in +our common Translation. See Pope's _Messiah_ throughout; Prior's 'Did +sweeter sounds adorn my flowing tongue,' &c. &c. 'Though I speak with +the tongues of men and of angels,' &c. &c, 1st Corinthians, ch. xiii. +By way of immediate example take the following of Dr. Johnson: + + Turn on the prudent Ant thy heedless eyes, + Observe her labours, Sluggard, and be wise; + No stern command, no monitory voice, + Prescribes her duties, or directs her choice; + Yet, timely provident, she hastes away + To snatch the blessings of a plenteous day; + When fruitful Summer loads the teeming plain, + She crops the harvest, and she stores the grain. + How long shall sloth usurp thy useless hours, + Unnerve thy vigour, and enchain thy powers? + While artful shades thy downy couch enclose, + And soft solicitation courts repose, + Amidst the drowsy charms of dull delight, + Year chases year with unremitted flight, + Till Want now following, fraudulent and slow, + Shall spring to seize thee, like an ambush'd foe. + +From this hubbub of words pass to the original 'Go to the Ant, thou +Sluggard, consider her ways, and be wise: which having no guide, +overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth +her food in the harvest. How long wilt thou sleep, O Sluggard? +when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little +slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep. So shall thy poverty +come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man' Proverbs, +ch. vi. + +One more quotation, and I have done. It is from Cowper's Verses +supposed to be written by Alexander Selkirk: + + Religion! what treasure untold + Resides in that heavenly word! + More precious than silver and gold, + Or all that this earth can afford + But the sound of the church-going bell + These valleys and rocks never heard, + Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell, + Or smiled when a sabbath appeared + Ye winds, that have made me your sport + Convey to this desolate shore + Some cordial endearing report + Of a land I must visit no more + My friends, do they now and then send + A wish or a thought after me? + O tell me I yet have a friend, + Though a friend I am never to see + +This passage is quoted as an instance of three different styles of +composition. The first four lines are poorly expressed, some Critics +would call the language prosaic; the fact is, it would be bad prose, +so bad, that it is scarcely worse in metre. The epithet 'church-going' +applied to a bell, and that by so chaste a writer as Cowper, is an +instance of the strange abuses which Poets have introduced into their +language, till they and their Readers take them as matters of course, +if they do not single them out expressly as objects of admiration. +The two lines 'Ne'er sighed at the sound,' &c., are, in my opinion, an +instance of the language of passion wrested from its proper use, and, +from the mere circumstance of the composition being in metre, applied +upon an occasion that does not justify such violent expressions; and I +should condemn the passage, though perhaps few Readers will agree with +me, as vicious poetic diction. The last stanza is throughout admirably +expressed: it would be equally good whether in prose or verse, except +that the Reader has an exquisite pleasure in seeing such natural +language so naturally connected with metre. The beauty of this stanza +tempts me to conclude with a principle which ought never to be +lost sight of, and which has been my chief guide in all I have +said,--namely, that in works of _imagination and sentiment_, for of +these only have I been treating, in proportion as ideas and feelings +are valuable, whether the composition be in prose or in verse, they +require and exact one and the same language. Metre is but adventitious +to composition, and the phraseology for which that passport is +necessary, even where it may be graceful at all will be little valued +by the judicious. + + + + +PREFACE TO POEMS + +(1815) + + +The powers requisite for the production of poetry are: first, those +of Observation and Description,--i.e. the ability to observe with +accuracy things as they are in themselves, and with fidelity to +describe them, unmodified by any passion or feeling existing in the +mind of the describer; whether the things depicted be actually present +to the senses, or have a place only in the memory. This power, though +indispensable to a Poet, is one which he employs only in submission +to necessity, and never for a continuance of time: as its exercise +supposes all the higher qualities of the mind to be passive, and in +a state of subjection to external objects, much in the same way as +a translator or engraver ought to be to his original. 2ndly, +Sensibility,--which, the more exquisite it is, the wider will be the +range of a poet's perceptions; and the more will he be incited to +observe objects, both as they exist in themselves and as re-acted upon +by his own mind. (The distinction between poetic and human sensibility +has been marked in the character of the Poet delineated in the +original preface.) 3rdly, Reflection,--which makes the Poet acquainted +with the value of actions, images, thoughts, and feelings; and assists +the sensibility in perceiving their connexion with each other. 4thly, +Imagination and Fancy,--to modify, to create, and to associate. 5thly, +Invention,--by which characters are composed out of materials supplied +by observation; whether of the Poet's own heart and mind, or of +external life and nature; and such incidents and situations produced +as are most impressive to the imagination, and most fitted to do +justice to the characters, sentiments, and passions, which the Poet +undertakes to illustrate. And, lastly, Judgement, to decide how +and where, and in what degree, each of these faculties ought to be +exerted; so that the less shall not be sacrificed to the greater; nor +the greater, slighting the less, arrogate, to its own injury, more +than its due. By judgement, also, is determined what are the laws and +appropriate graces of every species of composition.[3] + +The materials of Poetry, by these powers collected and produced, are +cast, by means of various moulds, into divers forms. The moulds may be +enumerated, and the forms specified, in the following order. 1st, The +Narrative,--including the Epopoeia, the Historic Poem, the Tale, the +Romance, the Mock-heroic, and, if the spirit of Homer will tolerate +such neighbourhood, that dear production of our days, the metrical +Novel. Of this Class, the distinguishing mark is, that the Narrator, +however liberally his speaking agents be introduced, is himself the +source from which everything primarily flows. Epic Poets, in order +that their mode of composition may accord with the elevation of their +subject, represent themselves as _singing_ from the inspiration of the +Muse, 'Anna virumque _cano_;' but this is a fiction, in modern times, +of slight value: the _Iliad_ or the _Paradise Lost_ would gain little +in our estimation by being chanted. The other poets who belong to this +class are commonly content to _tell_ their tale;--so that of the +whole it may be affirmed that they neither require nor reject the +accompaniment of music. + +2ndly, The Dramatic,--consisting of Tragedy, Historic Drama, Comedy, +and Masque, in which the Poet does not appear at all in his own +person, and where the whole action is carried on by speech and +dialogue of the agents; music being admitted only incidentally and +rarely. The Opera may be placed here, inasmuch as it proceeds by +dialogue; though depending, to the degree that it does, upon music, it +has a strong claim to be ranked with the lyrical. The characteristic +and Impassioned Epistle, of which Ovid and Pope have given examples, +considered as a species of monodrama, may, without impropriety, be +placed in this class. + +3rdly, The Lyrical,--containing the Hymn, the Ode, the Elegy, the +Song, and the Ballad; in all which, for the production of their _full_ +effect, an accompaniment of music is indispensable. + +4thly, The Idyllium,--descriptive chiefly either of the processes and +appearances of external nature, as the _Seasons_ of Thomson; or +of characters, manners, and sentiments, as are Shenstone's +_Schoolmistress, The Cotter's Saturday Night_ of Burns, _The Twa Dogs_ +of the same Author; or of these in conjunction with the appearances +of Nature, as most of the pieces of Theocritus, the _Allegro_ and +_Penseroso_ of Milton, Beattie's _Minstrel_, Goldsmith's _Deserted +Village_. The Epitaph, the Inscription, the Sonnet, most of +the epistles of poets writing in their own persons, and all +loco-descriptive poetry, belonging to this class. + +5thly, Didactic,--the principal object of which is direct instruction; +as the Poem of Lucretius, the _Georgics_ of Virgil, _The Fleece_ of +Dyer, Mason's _English Garden_, &c. + +And, lastly, philosophical Satire, like that of Horace and Juvenal; +personal and occasional Satire rarely comprehending sufficient of the +general in the individual to be dignified with the name of poetry. + +Out of the three last has been constructed a composite order, of which +Young's _Night Thoughts_, and Cowper's _Task_, are excellent examples. + +It is deducible from the above, that poems apparently miscellaneous, +may with propriety be arranged either with reference to the powers of +mind _predominant_ in the production of them; or to the mould in which +they are cast; or, lastly, to the subjects to which they relate. From +each of these considerations, the following Poems have been divided +into classes; which, that the work may more obviously correspond with +the course of human life, and for the sake of exhibiting in it the +three requisites of a legitimate whole, a beginning, a middle, and an +end, have been also arranged, as far as it was possible, according to +an order of time, commencing with Childhood, and terminating with +Old Age, Death, and Immortality. My guiding wish was, that the small +pieces of which these volumes consist, thus discriminated, might be +regarded under a two-fold view; as composing an entire work within +themselves, and as adjuncts to the philosophical Poem, _The Recluse_. +This arrangement has long presented itself habitually to my own mind. +Nevertheless, I should have preferred to scatter the contents of these +volumes at random, if I had been persuaded that, by the plan adopted, +anything material would be taken from the natural effect of the +pieces, individually, on the mind of the unreflecting Reader. I trust +there is a sufficient variety in each class to prevent this; while, +for him who reads with reflection, the arrangement will serve as a +commentary unostentatiously directing his attention to my purposes, +both particular and general. But, as I wish to guard against the +possibility of misleading by this classification, it is proper first +to remind the Reader, that certain poems are placed according to +the powers of mind, in the Author's conception, predominant in the +production of them; _predominant_, which implies the exertion of other +faculties in less degree. Where there is more imagination than fancy +in a poem, it is placed under the head of imagination, and _vice +versa_. Both the above classes might without impropriety have been +enlarged from that consisting of 'Poems founded on the Affections;' +as might this latter from those, and from the class 'proceeding from +Sentiment and Reflection.' The most striking characteristics of each +piece, mutual illustration, variety, and proportion, have governed me +throughout. + +None of the other Classes, except those of Fancy and Imagination, +require any particular notice. But a remark of general application may +be made. All Poets, except the dramatic, have been in the practice of +feigning that their works were composed to the music of the harp or +lyre: with what degree of affectation this has done in modern times, I +leave to the judicious to determine. For my own part, I have not been +disposed to violate probability so far, or to make such a large +demand upon the Reader's charity. Some of these pieces are essentially +lyrical; and, therefore, cannot have their due force without a +supposed musical accompaniment; but, in much the greatest part, as a +substitute for the classic lyre or romantic harp, I require nothing +more than an animated or impassioned recitation, adapted to the +subject. Poems, however humble in their kind, if they be good in that +kind, cannot read themselves; the law of long syllable and short must +not be so inflexible,--the letter of metre must not be so impassive +to the spirit of versification,--as to deprive the Reader of all +voluntary power to modulate, in subordination to the sense, the music +of the poem;--in the same manner as his mind is left at liberty, and +even summoned, to act upon its thoughts and images. But, though the +accompaniment of a musical instrument be frequently dispensed with, +the true Poet does not therefore abandon his privilege distinct from +that of the mere Proseman; + + He murmurs near the running brooks + A music sweeter than their own. + +Let us come now to the consideration of the words Fancy and +Imagination, as employed in the classification of the following Poems. +'A man,' says an intelligent author, 'has imagination in proportion +as he can distinctly copy in idea the impressions of sense: it is the +faculty which _images_ within the mind the phenomena of sensation. A +man has fancy in proportion as he can call up, connect, or associate, +at pleasure, those internal images ([Greek: phantazein] is to cause +to appear) so as to complete ideal representations of absent objects. +Imagination is the power of depicting, and fancy of evoking and +combining. The imagination is formed by patient observation; the fancy +by a voluntary activity in shifting the scenery of the mind. The more +accurate the imagination, the more safely may a painter, or a poet, +undertake a delineation, or a description, without the presence of the +objects to be characterized. The more versatile the fancy, the more +original and striking will be the decorations produced.'--_British +Synonyms discriminated, by W. Taylor_. + +Is not this as if a man should undertake to supply an account of +a building, and be so intent upon what he had discovered of the +foundation, as to conclude his task without once looking up at the +superstructure? Here, as in other instances throughout the volume, the +judicious Author's mind is enthralled by Etymology; he takes up the +original word as his guide and escort, and too often does not perceive +how soon he becomes its prisoner, without liberty to tread in any +path but that to which it confines him. It is not easy to find out +how imagination, thus explained, differs from distinct remembrance of +images; or fancy from quick and vivid recollection of them: each is +nothing more than a mode of memory. If the two words bear the above +meaning, and no other, what term is left to designate that faculty of +which the Poet is 'all compact;' he whose eyes glances from earth to +heaven, whose spiritual attributes body forth what his pen is prompt +in turning to shape; or what is left to characterize Fancy, +as insinuating herself into the heart of objects with creative +activity?--Imagination, in the sense of the word as giving title to +a class of the following Poems, has no reference to images that are +merely a faithful copy, existing in the mind, of absent external +objects; but is a word of higher import, denoting operations of the +mind upon those objects, and processes of creation or of composition, +governed by certain fixed laws. I proceed to illustrate my meaning by +instances. A parrot _hangs_ from the wires of his cage by his beak or +by his claws; or a monkey from the bough of a tree by his paws or +his tail. Each creature does so literally and actually. In the first +Eclogue of Virgil, the shepherd, thinking of the time when he is to +take leave of his farm, thus addresses his goats:-- + + Non ego vos posthac viridi projectus in antro + Dumosa _pendere_ procul de rupe videbo. + ----half way down + _Hangs_ one who gathers samphire, + +is the well-known expression of Shakespeare, delineating an ordinary +image upon the cliffs of Dover. In these two instances is a slight +exertion of the faculty which I denominate imagination, in the use +of one word: neither the goats nor the samphire-gatherer do literally +hang, as does the parrot or the monkey; but, presenting to the senses +something of such an appearance, the mind in its activity, for its own +gratification, contemplates them as hanging. + + As when far off at sea a fleet descried + _Hangs_ in the clouds, by equinoctial winds + Close sailing from Bengala, or the isles + Of Ternate or Tidore, whence merchants bring + Their spicy drugs; they on the trading flood + Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape + Ply, stemming nightly toward the Pole; so seemed + Far off the flying Fiend. + +Here is the full strength of the imagination involved in the word +_hangs_, and exerted upon the whole image: First, the fleet, an +aggregate of many ships, is represented as one mighty person, whose +track, we know and feel, is upon the waters; but, taking advantage +of its appearance to the senses, the Poet dares to represent it as +_hanging in the clouds_, both for the gratification of the mind in +contemplating the image itself, and in reference to the motion and +appearance of the sublime objects to which it is compared. + +From impressions of sight we will pass to those of sound; which, +as they must necessarily be of a less definite character, shall be +selected from these volumes: + + Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove _broods_; + +of the same bird, + + His voice was _buried_ among trees, + Yet to be come at by the breeze; + + O, Cuckoo I shall I call thee _Bird_, + Or but a wandering _Voice_? + +The stock-dove is said to _coo_, a sound well imitating the note +of the bird; but, by the intervention of the metaphor _broods_, the +affections are called in by the imagination to assist in marking the +manner in which the bird reiterates and prolongs her soft note, as if +herself delighting to listen to it, and participating of a still and +quiet satisfaction, like that which may be supposed inseparable from +the continuous process of incubation. 'His voice was buried among +trees,' a metaphor expressing the love of _seclusion_ by which this +Bird is marked; and characterizing its note as not partaking of the +shrill and the piercing, and therefore more easily deadened by the +intervening shade; yet a note so peculiar and withal so pleasing, that +the breeze, gifted with that love of the sound which the Poet feels, +penetrates the shades in which it is entombed, and conveys it to the +ear of the listener. + + Shall I call thee Bird, + Or but a wandering _Voice_? + +This concise interrogation characterizes the seeming ubiquity of +the voice of the cuckoo, and dispossesses the creature almost of a +corporeal existence; the Imagination being tempted to this exertion of +her power by a consciousness in the memory that the cuckoo is almost +perpetually heard throughout the season of spring, but seldom becomes +an object of sight. + +Thus far of images independent of each other, and immediately endowed +by the mind with properties that do not inhere in them, upon an +incitement from properties and qualities the existence of which is +inherent and obvious. These processes of imagination are carried +on either by conferring additional properties upon an object, or +abstracting from it some of those which it actually possesses, and +thus enabling it to react upon the mind which hath performed the +process, like a new existence. + +I pass from the Imagination acting upon an individual image to +a consideration of the same faculty employed upon images in a +conjunction by which they modify each other. The Reader has already +had a fine instance before him in the passage quoted from Virgil, +where the apparently perilous situation of the goat, hanging upon +the shaggy precipice, is contrasted with that of the shepherd +contemplating it from the seclusion of the cavern in which he lies +stretched at ease and in security. Take these images separately, and +how unaffecting the picture compared with that produced by their being +thus connected with, and opposed to, each other! + + As a huge stone is sometimes seen to lie + Couched on the bald top of an eminence, + Wonder to all who do the same espy + By what means it could thither come, and whence, + So that it seems a thing endued with sense, + Like a sea-beast crawled forth, which on a shelf + Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun himself. + + Such seemed this Man; not all alive or dead + Nor all asleep, in his extreme old age. + + * * * * * + + Motionless as a cloud the old Man stood, + That heareth not the loud winds when they call, + And moveth altogether if it move at all. + +In these images, the conferring, the abstracting, and the modifying +powers of the Imagination, immediately and mediately acting, are all +brought into conjunction. The stone is endowed with something of the +power of life to approximate it to the sea-beast; and the sea-beast +stripped of some of its vital qualities to assimilate it to the stone; +which intermediate image is thus treated for the purpose of bringing +the original image, that of the stone, to a nearer resemblance to the +figure and condition of the aged Man; who is divested of so much of +the indications of life and motion as to bring him to the point where +the two objects unite and coalesce in just comparison. After what has +been said, the image of the cloud need not be commented upon. + +Thus far of an endowing or modifying power: but the Imagination also +shapes and _creates_; and how? By innumerable processes; and in none +does it more delight than in that of consolidating numbers into +unity, and dissolving and separating unity into number,--alternations +proceeding from, and governed by, a sublime consciousness of the +soul in her own mighty and almost divine powers. Recur to the passage +already cited from Milton. When the compact Fleet, as one Person, has +been introduced 'sailing from Bengala,' 'They,' i.e. the 'merchants,' +representing the fleet resolved into a multitude of ships, 'ply' their +voyage towards the extremities of the earth: 'So' (referring to the +word 'As' in the commencement) 'seemed the flying Fiend'; the image +of his Person acting to recombine the multitude of ships into one +body,--the point from which the comparison set out. 'So seemed,' and +to whom seemed? To the heavenly Muse who dictates the poem, to the eye +of the Poet's mind, and to that of the Reader, present at one moment +in the wide Ethiopian, and the next in the solitudes, then first +broken in upon, of the infernal regions! + + Modo me Thebis, modo ponit Athenis. + +Hear again this mighty Poet,--speaking of the Messiah going forth to +expel from heaven the rebellious angels, + + Attended by ten thousand thousand Saints + He onward came: far off his coming shone,-- + +the retinue of Saints, and the Person of the Messiah himself, lost +almost and merged in the splendour of that indefinite abstraction 'His +coming!' + +As I do not mean here to treat this subject further than to throw some +light upon the present Volumes, and especially upon one division of +them, I shall spare myself and the Reader the trouble of considering +the Imagination as it deals with thoughts and sentiments, as it +regulates the composition of characters, and determines the course +of actions: I will not consider it (more than I have already done by +implication) as that power which, in the language of one of my most +esteemed Friends, 'draws all things to one; which makes things animate +or inanimate, beings with their attributes, subjects with their +accessories, take one colour and serve to one effect[4].' The grand +storehouses of enthusiastic and meditative Imagination, of poetical, +as contra-distinguished from human and dramatic Imagination, are the +prophetic and lyrical parts of the Holy Scriptures, and the works of +Milton; to which I cannot forbear to add to those of Spenser. I select +these writers in preference to those of ancient Greece and Rome, +because the anthropomorphitism of the Pagan religion subjected the +minds of the greatest poets in those countries too much to the bondage +of definite form; from which the Hebrews were preserved by their +abhorrence of idolatry. This abhorrence was almost as strong in our +great epic Poet, both from circumstances of his life, and from the +constitution of his mind. However imbued the surface might be with +classical literature, he was a Hebrew in soul; and all things tended +in him towards the sublime. Spenser, of a gentler nature, maintained +his freedom by aid of his allegorical spirit, at one time inciting him +to create persons out of abstractions; and, at another, by a +superior effort of genius, to give the universality and permanence of +abstractions to his human beings, by means of attributes and emblems +that belong to the highest moral truths and the purest sensations,--of +which his character of Una is a glorious example. Of the human and +dramatic Imagination the works of Shakespeare are an inexhaustible +source. + + I tax not you, ye Elements, with unkindness, + I never gave you kingdoms, call'd you Daughters! + +And if, bearing in mind the many Poets distinguished by this prime +quality, whose names I omit to mention; yet justified by recollection +of the insults which the ignorant, the incapable, and the +presumptuous, have heaped upon these and my other writings, I may be +permitted to anticipate the judgment of posterity upon myself, I +shall declare (censurable, I grant, if the notoriety of the fact above +stated does not justify me) that I have given in these unfavourable +times evidence of exertions of this faculty upon its worthiest +objects, the external universe, the moral and religious sentiments of +Man, his natural affections, and his acquired passions; which have +the same ennobling tendency as the productions of men, in this kind, +worthy to be holden in undying remembrance. + +To the mode in which Fancy has already been characterized as the power +of evoking and combining, or, as my friend Mr. Coleridge has styled +it, 'the aggregative and associative power,' my objection is only that +the definition is too general. To aggregate and to associate, to evoke +and to combine, belong as well to the Imagination as to the Fancy; but +either the materials evoked and combined are different; or they are +brought together under a different law, and for a different purpose. +Fancy does not require that the materials which she makes use of +should be susceptible of change in their constitution, from her touch; +and, where they admit of modification, it is enough for her purpose if +it be slight, limited, and evanescent. Directly the reverse of these, +are the desires and demands of the Imagination. She recoils from +everything but the plastic, the pliant, and the indefinite. She leaves +it to Fancy to describe Queen Mab as coming, + + In shape no bigger than an agate-stone + On the fore-finger of an alderman. + +Having to speak of stature, she does not tell you that her gigantic +Angel was as tall as Pompey's Pillar; much less that he was twelve +cubits, or twelve hundred cubits high; or that his dimensions equalled +those of Teneriffe or Atlas;--because these, and if they were +a million times as high it would be the same, are bounded: The +expression is, 'His stature reached the sky!' the illimitable +firmament!--When the Imagination frames a comparison, if it does +not strike on the first presentation, a sense of the truth of the +likeness, from the moment that it is perceived, grows--and continues +to grow--upon the mind; the resemblance depending less upon outline +of form and feature, than upon expression and effect; less upon +casual and outstanding, than upon inherent and internal, properties: +moreover, the images invariably modify each other.--The law under +which the processes of Fancy are carried on is as capricious as +the accidents of things, and the effects are surprising, playful, +ludicrous, amusing, tender, or pathetic, as the objects happen to be +appositely produced or fortunately combined. Fancy depends upon +the rapidity and profusion with which she scatters her thoughts and +images; trusting that their number, and the felicity with which they +are linked together, will make amends for the want of individual +value: or she prides herself upon the curious subtilty and the +successful elaboration with which she can detect their lurking +affinities. If she can win you over to her purpose, and impart to +you her feelings, she cares not how unstable or transitory may be her +influence, knowing that it will not be out of her power to resume +it upon an apt occasion. But the Imagination is conscious of an +indestructible dominion;--the Soul may fall away from it, not being +able to sustain its grandeur; but, if once felt and acknowledged, by +no act of any other faculty of the mind can it be relaxed, impaired, +or diminished.--Fancy is given to quicken and to beguile the +temporal part of our nature, Imagination to incite and to support the +eternal.--Yet is it not the less true that Fancy, as she is an active, +is also, under her own laws and in her own spirit, a creative faculty? +In what manner Fancy ambitiously aims at a rivalship with Imagination, +and Imagination stoops to work with the materials of Fancy, might be +illustrated from the compositions of all eloquent writers, whether in +prose or verse; and chiefly from those of our own Country. Scarcely a +page of the impassioned parts of Bishop Taylor's Works can be opened +that shall not afford examples.--Referring the Reader to those +inestimable volumes, I will content myself with placing a conceit +(ascribed to Lord Chesterfield) in contrast with a passage from the +_Paradise Lost_: + + The dews of the evening most carefully shun, + They are the tears of the sky for the loss of the sun. + +After the transgression of Adam, Milton, with other appearances of +sympathizing Nature, thus marks the immediate consequence, + + Sky lowered, and, muttering thunder, some sad drops + Wept at completion of the mortal sin. + +The associating link is the same in each instance: Dew and rain, not +distinguishable from the liquid substance of tears, are employed as +indications of sorrow. A flash of surprise is the effect in the former +case; a flash of surprise, and nothing more; for the nature of things +does not sustain the combination. In the latter, the effects from the +act, of which there is this immediate consequence and visible +sign, are so momentous, that the mind acknowledges the justice and +reasonableness of the sympathy in nature so manifested; and the sky +weeps drops of water as if with human eyes, as 'Earth had before +trembled from her entrails, and Nature given a second groan.' + +Finally, I will refer to Cotton's _Ode upon Winter_, an admirable +composition, though stained with some peculiarities of the age in +which he lived, for a general illustration of the characteristics of +Fancy. The middle part of this ode contains a most lively description +of the entrance of Winter, with his retinue, as 'A palsied king,' and +yet a military monarch,--advancing for conquest with his army; the +several bodies of which, and their arms and equipments, are described +with a rapidity of detail, and a profusion of _fanciful_ comparisons, +which indicate on the part of the poet extreme activity of intellect, +and a correspondent hurry of delightful feeling. Winter retires from +the foe into his fortress, where + + a magazine + Of sovereign juice is cellared in; + Liquor that will the siege maintain + Should Phoebus ne'er return again. + +Though myself a water drinker, I cannot resist the pleasure of +transcribing what follows, as an instance still more happy of Fancy +employed in the treatment of feeling than, in its preceding passages, +the Poem supplies of her management of forms. + + 'Tis that, that gives the poet rage, + And thaws the gelid blood of age; + Matures the young, restores the old, + And makes the fainting coward bold. + + It lays the careful head to rest, + Calms palpitations in the breast, + Renders our lives' misfortune sweet; + + * * * * * + + Then let the chill Sirocco blow, + And gird us round with hills of snow, + Or else go whistle to the shore, + And make the hollow mountains roar, + + Whilst we together jovial sit + Careless, and crowned with mirth and wit, + Where, though bleak winds confine us home + Our fancies round the world shall roam. + + We'll think of all the Friends we know, + And drink to all worth drinking to; + When having drunk all thine and mine, + We rather shall want healths than wine. + + But where Friends fail us, we'll supply + Our friendships with our charity; + Men that remote in sorrows live, + Shall by our lusty brimmers thrive. + + We'll drink the wanting into wealth, + And those that languish into health, + The afflicted into joy; th' opprest + Into security and rest. + + The worthy in disgrace shall find + Favour return again more kind, + And in restraint who stifled lie, + Shall taste the air of liberty. + + The brave shall triumph in success, + The lover shall have mistresses, + Poor unregarded Virtue, praise, + And the neglected Poet, bays. + + Thus shall our healths do others good, + Whilst we ourselves do all we would; + For, freed from envy and from care, + What would we be but what we are? + +When I sate down to write this Preface, it was my intention to have +made it more comprehensive; but, thinking that I ought rather to +apologize for detaining the reader so long, I will here conclude. + + +[Footnote 3: As sensibility to harmony of numbers, and the power +of producing it, are invariably attendants upon the faculties above +specified, nothing has been said upon those requisites.] + +[Footnote 4: Charles Lamb upon the genius of Hogarth.] + + + + +ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO PREFACE + +(1815) + + +With the young of both sexes, Poetry is, like love, a passion; but, +for much the greater part of those who have been proud of its power +over their minds, a necessity soon arises of breaking the pleasing +bondage; or it relaxes of itself;--the thoughts being occupied in +domestic cares, or the time engrossed by business. Poetry then becomes +only an occasional recreation; while to those whose existence passes +away in a course of fashionable pleasure, it is a species of luxurious +amusement. In middle and declining age, a scattered number of serious +persons resort to poetry, as to religion, for a protection against +the pressure of trivial employments, and as a consolation for the +afflictions of life. And, lastly, there are many, who, having been +enamoured of this art in their youth, have found leisure, after +youth was spent, to cultivate general literature; in which poetry has +continued to be comprehended _as a study_. + +Into the above classes the Readers of poetry may be divided; Critics +abound in them all; but from the last only can opinions be collected +of absolute value, and worthy to be depended upon, as prophetic of the +destiny of a new work. The young, who in nothing can escape delusion, +are especially subject to it in their intercourse with Poetry. The +cause, not so obvious as the fact is unquestionable, is the same as +that from which erroneous judgements in this art, in the minds of men +of all ages, chiefly proceed; but upon Youth it operates with peculiar +force. The appropriate business of poetry (which, nevertheless, if +genuine, is as permanent as pure science), her appropriate employment, +her privilege and her _duty_, is to treat of things not as they _are_, +but as they _appear_; not as they exist in themselves, but as they +_seem_ to exist to the _senses_, and to the _passions_. What a +world of delusion does this acknowledged obligation prepare for the +inexperienced! what temptations to go astray are here held forth for +them whose thoughts have been little disciplined by the understanding, +and whose feelings revolt from the sway of reason!--When a juvenile +Reader is in the height of his rapture with some vicious passage, +should experience throw in doubts, or common sense suggest suspicions, +a lurking consciousness that the realities of the Muse are but shows, +and that her liveliest excitements are raised by transient shocks +of conflicting feeling and successive assemblages of contradictory +thoughts--is ever at hand to justify extravagance, and to sanction +absurdity. But, it may be asked, as these illusions are unavoidable, +and, no doubt, eminently useful to the mind as a process, what good +can be gained by making observations, the tendency of which is to +diminish the confidence of youth in its feelings, and thus to abridge +its innocent and even profitable pleasures? The reproach implied in +the question could not be warded off, if Youth were incapable of being +delighted with what is truly excellent; or, if these errors always +terminated of themselves in due season. But, with the majority, though +their force be abated, they continue through life. Moreover, the fire +of youth is too vivacious an element to be extinguished or damped by a +philosophical remark; and, while there is no danger that what has been +said will be injurious or painful to the ardent and the confident, +it may prove beneficial to those who, being enthusiastic, are, at the +same time, modest and ingenuous. The intimation may unite with their +own misgivings to regulate their sensibility, and to bring in, sooner +than it would otherwise have arrived, a more discreet and sound +judgement. + +If it should excite wonder that men of ability, in later life, whose +understandings have been rendered acute by practice in affairs, should +be so easily and so far imposed upon when they happen to take up a +new work in verse, this appears to be the cause;--that, having +discontinued their attention to poetry, whatever progress may have +been made in other departments of knowledge, they have not, as to this +art, advanced in true discernment beyond the age of youth. If, then, +a new poem fall in their way, whose attractions are of that kind which +would have enraptured them during the heat of youth, the judgement +not being improved to a degree that they shall be disgusted, they are +dazzled, and prize and cherish the faults for having had power to make +the present time vanish before them, and to throw the mind back, as +by enchantment, into the happiest season of life. As they read, powers +seem to be revived, passions are regenerated, and pleasures restored. +The Book was probably taken up after an escape from the burden of +business, and with a wish to forget the world, and all its vexations +and anxieties. Having obtained this wish, and so much more, it is +natural that they should make report as they have felt. + +If Men of mature age, through want of practice, be thus easily +beguiled into admiration of absurdities, extravagances, and misplaced +ornaments, thinking it proper that their understandings should enjoy +a holiday, while they are unbending their minds with verse, it may be +expected that such Readers will resemble their former selves also +in strength of prejudice, and an inaptitude to be moved by the +unostentatious beauties of a pure style. In the higher poetry, an +enlightened Critic chiefly looks for a reflection of the wisdom of +the heart and the grandeur of the imagination. Wherever these appear, +simplicity accompanies them, Magnificence herself, when legitimate, +depending upon a simplicity of her own, to regulate her ornaments. But +it is a well-known property of human nature, that our estimates are +ever governed by comparisons, of which we are conscious with various +degrees of distinctness. Is it not, then, inevitable (confining these +observations to the effects of style merely) that an eye, accustomed +to the glaring hues of diction by which such Readers are caught and +excited, will for the most part be rather repelled than attracted by +an original Work, the colouring of which is disposed according to a +pure and refined scheme of harmony? It is in the fine arts as in the +affairs of life, no man can _serve_ (i.e. obey with zeal and fidelity) +two Masters. + +As Poetry is most just to its own divine origin when it administers +the comforts and breathes the spirit of religion, they who have +learned to perceive this truth, and who betake themselves to reading +verse for sacred purposes, must be preserved from numerous illusions +to which the two Classes of Readers, whom we have been considering, +are liable. But, as the mind grows serious from the weight of +life, the range of its passions is contracted accordingly; and its +sympathies become so exclusive, that many species of high excellence +wholly escape, or but languidly excite, its notice. Besides, men who +read from religious or moral inclinations, even when the subject is +of that kind which they approve, are beset with misconceptions and +mistakes peculiar to themselves. Attaching so much importance to the +truths which interest them, they are prone to overrate the Authors by +whom those truths are expressed and enforced. They come prepared +to impart so much passion to the Poet's language, that they remain +unconscious how little, in fact, they receive from it. And, on the +other hand, religious faith is to him who holds it so momentous +a thing, and error appears to be attended with such tremendous +consequences, that, if opinions touching upon religion occur which +the Reader condemns, he not only cannot sympathize with them, however +animated the expression, but there is, for the most part, an end put +to all satisfaction and enjoyment. Love, if it before existed, is +converted into dislike; and the heart of the Reader is set against +the Author and his book.--To these excesses, they, who from their +professions ought to be the most guarded against them, are perhaps +the most liable; I mean those sects whose religion, being from the +calculating understanding, is cold and formal. For when Christianity, +the religion of humility, is founded upon the proudest faculty of +our nature, what can be expected but contradictions? Accordingly, +believers of this cast are at one time contemptuous; at another, being +troubled, as they are and must he, with inward misgivings, they are +jealous and suspicious;--and at all seasons, they are under temptation +to supply by the heat with which they defend their tenets, the +animation which is wanting to the constitution of the religion itself. + +Faith was given to man that his affections, detached from the +treasures of time, might be inclined to settle upon those of +eternity;--the elevation of his nature, which this habit produces +on earth, being to him a presumptive evidence of a future state of +existence; and giving him a title to partake of its holiness. The +religious man values what he sees chiefly as an 'imperfect shadowing +forth' of what he is incapable of seeing. The concerns of religion +refer to indefinite objects, and are too weighty for the mind to +support them without relieving itself by resting a great part of the +burthen upon words and symbols. The commerce between Man and his Maker +cannot be carried on but by a process where much is represented +in little, and the Infinite Being accommodates himself to a finite +capacity. In all this may be perceived the affinity between religion +and poetry; between religion--making up the deficiencies of reason by +faith; and poetry--passionate for the instruction of reason; between +religion--whose element is infinitude, and whose ultimate trust is +the supreme of things, submitting herself to circumscription, and +reconciled to substitutions; and poetry--ethereal and transcendent, +yet incapable to sustain her existence without sensuous incarnation. +In this community of nature may be perceived also the lurking +incitements of kindred error;--so that we shall find that no poetry +has been more subject to distortion, than that species, the argument +and scope of which is religious; and no lovers of the art have gone +farther astray than the pious and the devout. + +Whither then shall we turn for that union of qualifications which must +necessarily exist before the decisions of a critic can be of absolute +value? For a mind at once poetical and philosophical; for a critic +whose affections are as free and kindly as the spirit of society, and +whose understanding is severe as that of dispassionate government? +Where are we to look for that initiatory composure of mind which +no selfishness can disturb? For a natural sensibility that has been +tutored into correctness without losing anything of its quickness; and +for active faculties, capable of answering the demands which an +Author of original imagination shall make upon them, associated with +a judgement that cannot he duped into admiration by aught that +is unworthy of it?--among those and those only, who, never having +suffered their youthful love of poetry to remit much of its force, +have applied to the consideration of the laws of this art the +best power of their understandings. At the same time it must be +observed--that, as this Class comprehends the only judgements which +are trustworthy, so does it include the most erroneous and perverse. +For to be mistaught is worse than to be untaught; and no perverseness +equals that which is supported by system, no errors are so difficult +to root out as those which the understanding has pledged its credit to +uphold. In this Class are contained censors, who, if they be pleased +with what is good, are pleased with it only by imperfect glimpses, +and upon false principles; who, should they generalize rightly, to +a certain point, are sure to suffer for it in the end; who, if they +stumble upon a sound rule, are fettered by misapplying it, or by +straining it too far; being incapable of perceiving when it ought to +yield to one of higher order. In it are found critics too petulant to +be passive to a genuine poet, and too feeble to grapple with him; men, +who take upon them to report of the course which _he_ holds whom they +are utterly unable to accompany,--confounded if he turn quick upon the +wing, dismayed if he soar steadily 'into the region';--men of palsied +imaginations and indurated hearts; in whose minds all healthy action +is languid, who therefore feed as the many direct them, or, with the +many, are greedy after vicious provocatives;--judges, whose censure is +auspicious, and whose praise ominous! In this class meet together the +two extremes of best and worst. + +The observations presented in the foregoing series are of too +ungracious a nature to have been made without reluctance; and, were +it only on this account, I would invite the reader to try them by the +test of comprehensive experience. If the number of judges who can be +confidently relied upon be in reality so small, it ought to follow +that partial notice only, or neglect, perhaps long continued, or +attention wholly inadequate to their merits--must have been the fate +of most works in the higher departments of poetry; and that, on the +other hand, numerous productions have blazed into popularity, and have +passed away, leaving scarcely a trace behind them: it will be further +found, that when Authors shall have at length raised themselves into +general admiration and maintained their ground, errors and prejudices +have prevailed concerning their genius and their works, which the few +who are conscious of those errors and prejudices would deplore; if +they were not recompensed by perceiving that there are select Spirits +for whom it is ordained that their fame shall be in the world an +existence like that of Virtue, which owes its being to the struggles +it makes, and its vigour to the enemies whom it provokes;--a vivacious +quality, ever doomed to meet with opposition, and still triumphing +over it; and, from the nature of its dominion, incapable of being +brought to the sad conclusion of Alexander, when he wept that there +were no more worlds for him to conquer. + +Let us take a hasty retrospect of the poetical literature of this +Country for the greater part of the last two centuries, and see if the +facts support these inferences. + +Who is there that now reads the _Creation_ of Dubartas? Yet all Europe +once resounded with his praise; he was caressed by kings; and, when +his Poem was translated into our language, the _Faery Queen_ faded +before it. The name of Spenser, whose genius is of a higher order than +even that of Ariosto, is at this day scarcely known beyond the limits +of the British Isles. And if the value of his works is to be estimated +from the attention now paid to them by his countrymen, compared with +that which they bestow on those of some other writers, it must be +pronounced small indeed. + + The laurel, meed of mighty conquerors + And poets _sage_-- + +are his own words; but his wisdom has, in this particular, been his +worst enemy: while its opposite, whether in the shape of folly or +madness, has been _their_ best friend. But he was a great power, and +bears a high name: the laurel has been awarded to him. + +A dramatic Author, if he write for the stage, must adapt himself to +the taste of the audience, or they will not endure him; accordingly +the mighty genius of Shakespeare was listened to. The people were +delighted: but I am not sufficiently versed in stage antiquities to +determine whether they did not flock as eagerly to the representation +of many pieces of contemporary Authors, wholly undeserving to appear +upon the same boards. Had there been a formal contest for superiority +among dramatic writers, that Shakespeare, like his predecessors +Sophocles and Euripides, would have often been subject to the +mortification of seeing the prize adjudged to sorry competitors, +becomes too probable, when we reflect that the admirers of Settle +and Shadwell were, in a later age, as numerous, and reckoned as +respectable, in point of talent, as those of Dryden. At all events, +that Shakespeare stooped to accommodate himself to the People, is +sufficiently apparent; and one of the most striking proofs of his +almost omnipotent genius is, that he could turn to such glorious +purpose those materials which the prepossessions of the age compelled +him to make use of. Yet even this marvellous skill appears not to have +been enough to prevent his rivals from having some advantage over him +in public estimation; else how can we account for passages and scenes +that exist in his works, unless upon a supposition that some of the +grossest of them, a fact which in my own mind I have no doubt of, were +foisted in by the Players, for the gratification of the many? + +But that his Works, whatever might be their reception upon the stage, +made but little impression upon the ruling Intellects of the time, +may be inferred from the fact that Lord Bacon, in his multifarious +writings, nowhere either quotes or alludes to him.[5] His dramatic +excellence enabled him to resume possession of the stage after the +Restoration; but Dryden tells us that in his time two of the plays +of Beaumont and Fletcher were acted for one of Shakespeare's. And so +faint and limited was the perception of the poetic beauties of his +dramas in the time of Pope, that, in his Edition of the Plays, with +a view of rendering to the general reader a necessary service, he +printed between inverted commas those passages which he thought most +worthy of notice. + +At this day, the French Critics have abated nothing of their aversion +to this darling of our Nation: 'the English, with their bouffon de +Shakespeare,' is as familiar an expression among them as in the time +of Voltaire. Baron Grimm is the only French writer who seems to have +perceived his infinite superiority to the first names of the French +Theatre; an advantage which the Parisian Critic owed to his German +blood and German education. The most enlightened Italians, though well +acquainted with our language, are wholly incompetent to measure the +proportions of Shakespeare. The Germans only, of foreign nations, are +approaching towards a knowledge and feeling of what he is. In some +respects they have acquired a superiority over the fellow countrymen +of the Poet: for among us it is a current, I might say, an established +opinion, that Shakespeare is justly praised when he is pronounced to +be 'a wild irregular genius, in whom great faults are compensated by +great beauties.' How long may it he before this misconception passes +away, and it becomes universally acknowledged that the judgement of +Shakespeare in the selection of his materials, and in the manner in +which he has made them, heterogeneous as they often are, constitute a +unity of their own, and contribute all to one great end, is not less +admirable than his imagination, his invention, and his intuitive +knowledge of human Nature? + +There is extant a small Volume of miscellaneous poems, in which +Shakespeare expresses his own feelings in his own person. It is not +difficult to conceive that the Editor, George Steevens, should have +been insensible to the beauties of one portion of that Volume, the +Sonnets; though in no part of the writings of this Poet is found, in +an equal compass, a greater number of exquisite feelings felicitously +expressed. But, from regard to the Critic's own credit, he would not +have ventured to talk of an[6] act of parliament not being strong +enough to compel the perusal of those little pieces, if he had not +known that the people of England were ignorant of the treasures +contained in them: and if he had not, moreover, shared the too common +propensity of human nature to exult over a supposed fall into the mire +of a genius whom he had been compelled to regard with admiration, as +an inmate of the celestial regions--'there sitting where he durst not +soar.' + +Nine years before the death of Shakespeare, Milton was born, and early +in life he published several small poems, which, though on their +first appearance they were praised by a few of the judicious, were +afterwards neglected to that degree, that Pope in his youth could +borrow from them without risk of its being known. Whether these poems +are at this day justly appreciated, I will not undertake to decide nor +would it imply a severe reflection upon the mass of readers to suppose +the contrary, seeing that a man of the acknowledged genius of Voss, +the German poet, could suffer their spirit to evaporate, and could +change their character, as is done in the translation made by him of +the most popular of these pieces. At all events, it is certain that +these Poems of Milton are now much read, and loudly praised, yet were +they little heard of till more than 150 years after their publication, +and of the Sonnets, Dr. Johnson, as appears from Boswell's _Life_ of +him, was in the habit of thinking and speaking as contemptuously as +Steevens wrote upon those of Shakespeare. + +About the time when the Pindaric odes of Cowley and his imitators, and +the productions of that class of curious thinkers whom Dr. Johnson has +strangely styled metaphysical Poets, were beginning to lose something +of that extravagant admiration which they had excited, the _Paradise +Lost_ made its appearance. 'Fit audience find though few,' was the +petition addressed by the Poet to his inspiring Muse. I have said +elsewhere that he gained more than he asked, this I believe to be +true, but Dr. Johnson has fallen into a gross mistake when he attempts +to prove, by the sale of the work, that Milton's Countrymen were +'_just_ to it' upon its first appearance. Thirteen hundred Copies were +sold in two years, an uncommon example, he asserts, of the prevalence +of genius in opposition to so much recent enmity as Milton's public +conduct had excited. But be it remembered that, if Milton's political +and religious opinions, and the manner in which he announced them, had +raised him many enemies, they had procured him numerous friends, who, +as all personal danger was passed away at the time of publication, +would be eager to procure the master-work of a man whom they revered, +and whom they would be proud of praising. Take, from the number +of purchasers, persons of this class, and also those who wished to +possess the Poem as a religious work, and but few I fear would be left +who sought for it on account of its poetical merits. The demand did +not immediately increase; 'for,' says Dr. Johnson, 'many more readers' +(he means persons in the habit of reading poetry) 'than were supplied +at first the Nation did not afford.' How careless must a writer be who +can make this assertion in the face of so many existing title-pages +to belie it! Turning to my own shelves, I find the folio of Cowley, +seventh edition, 1681. A book near it is Flatman's Poems, fourth +edition, 1686, Waller, fifth edition, same date. The Poems of Norris +of Bemerton not long after went, I believe, through nine editions. +What further demand there might be for these works I do not know; but +I well remember that, twenty-five years ago, the booksellers' stalls +in London swarmed with the folios of Cowley. This is not mentioned in +disparagement of that able writer and amiable man; but merely to show +that, if Milton's Works were not more read, it was not because readers +did not exist at the time. The early editions of the _Paradise Lost_ +were printed in a shape which allowed them to be sold at a low price, +yet only three thousand copies of the Work were sold in eleven years; +and the Nation, says Dr. Johnson, had been satisfied from 1623 to +1664, that is, forty-one years, with only two editions of the Works of +Shakespeare; which probably did not together make one thousand Copies; +facts adduced by the critic to prove the 'paucity of Readers,'--There +were readers in multitudes; but their money went for other purposes, +as their admiration was fixed elsewhere. We are authorized, then, +to affirm that the reception of the _Paradise Lost_, and the slow +progress of its fame, are proofs as striking as can be desired +that the positions which I am attempting to establish are not +erroneous.[7]--How amusing to shape to one's self such a critique as +a Wit of Charles's days, or a Lord of the Miscellanies or trading +Journalist of King William's time, would have brought forth, if he +had set his faculties industriously to work upon this Poem, everywhere +impregnated with _original_ excellence. + +So strange indeed are the obliquities of admiration, that they whose +opinions are much influenced by authority will often be tempted to +think that there are no fixed principles[8] in human nature for this +art to rest upon. I have been honoured by being permitted to peruse +in MS. a tract composed between the period of the Revolution and +the close of that century. It is the Work of an English Peer of high +accomplishments, its object to form the character and direct the +studies of his son. Perhaps nowhere does a more beautiful treatise +of the kind exist. The good sense and wisdom of the thoughts, the +delicacy of the feelings, and the charm of the style, are, throughout, +equally conspicuous. Yet the Author, selecting among the Poets of +his own country those whom he deems most worthy of his son's perusal, +particularizes only Lord Rochester, Sir John Denham, and Cowley. +Writing about the same time, Shaftesbury, an author at present +unjustly depreciated, describes the English Muses as only yet lisping +in their cradles. + +The arts by which Pope, soon afterwards, contrived to procure to +himself a more general and a higher reputation than perhaps any +English Poet ever attained during his lifetime, are known to the +judicious. And as well known is it to them, that the undue exertion +of those arts is the cause why Pope has for some time held a rank in +literature, to which, if he had not been seduced by an over-love of +immediate popularity, and had confided more in his native genius, he +never could have descended. He bewitched the nation by his melody, and +dazzled it by his polished style and was himself blinded by his own +success. Having wandered from humanity in his Eclogues with boyish +inexperience, the praise, which these compositions obtained, tempted +him into a belief that Nature was not to be trusted, at least in +pastoral Poetry. To prove this by example, he put his friend Gay upon +writing those Eclogues which their author intended to be burlesque. +The instigator of the work, and his admirers, could perceive in them +nothing but what was ridiculous. Nevertheless, though these Poems +contain some detestable passages, the effect, as Dr Johnson well +observes, 'of reality and truth became conspicuous even when the +intention was to show them grovelling and degraded.' The Pastorals, +ludicrous to such as prided themselves upon their refinement, in spite +of those disgusting passages, 'became popular, and were read with +delight, as just representations of rural manners and occupations.' + +Something less than sixty years after the publication of the _Paradise +Lost_ appeared Thomson's _Winter_, which was speedily followed by his +other Seasons. It is a work of inspiration, much of it is written +from himself, and nobly from himself. How was it received? 'It was +no sooner read,' says one of his contemporary biographers, 'than +universally admired those only excepted who had not been used to feel, +or to look for anything in poetry, beyond a _point_ of satirical or +epigrammatic wit, a smart _antithesis_ richly trimmed with rime, or +the softness of an _elegiac_ complaint. To such his manly classical +spirit could not readily commend itself, till, after a more attentive +perusal, they had got the better of their prejudices, and either +acquired or affected a truer taste. A few others stood aloof, merely +because they had long before fixed the articles of their poetical +creed, and resigned themselves to an absolute despair of ever seeing +anything new and original. These were somewhat mortified to find +their notions disturbed by the appearance of a poet, who seemed to owe +nothing but to nature and his own genius. But, in a short time, the +applause became unanimous, every one wondering how so many pictures, +and pictures so familiar, should have moved them but faintly to what +they felt in his descriptions. His digressions too, the overflowings +of a tender benevolent heart, charmed the reader no less, leaving him +in doubt, whether he should more admire the Poet or love the Man.' + +This case appears to bear strongly against us--but we must distinguish +between wonder and legitimate admiration. The subject of the work is +the changes produced in the appearances of nature by the revolution +of the year: and, by undertaking to write in verse, Thomson pledged +himself to treat his subject as became a Poet. Now, it is remarkable +that, excepting the nocturnal _Reverie of Lady Winchelsea_, and a +passage or two in the _Windsor Forest_ of Pope, the poetry of the +period intervening between the publication of the _Paradise Lost_ and +the _Seasons_ does not contain a single new image of external nature; +and scarcely presents a familiar one from which it can be inferred +that the eye of the Poet has been steadily fixed upon his object, much +less that his feelings had urged him to work upon it in the spirit of +genuine imagination. To what a low state knowledge of the most obvious +and important phenomena had sunk, is evident from the style in which +Dryden has executed a description of Night in one of his Tragedies, +and Pope his translation of the celebrated moonlight scene in +the _Iliad_. A blind man, in the habit of attending accurately to +descriptions casually dropped from the lips of those around him, might +easily depict these appearances with more truth. Dryden's lines are +vague, bombastic, and senseless;[9] those of Pope, though he had Homer +to guide him, are throughout false and contradictory. The verses of +Dryden, once highly celebrated, are forgotten; those of Pope still +retain their hold upon public estimation,--nay, there is not a passage +of descriptive poetry, which at this day finds so many and such ardent +admirers. Strange to think of an enthusiast, as may have been the case +with thousands, reciting those verses under the cope of a moonlight +sky, without having his raptures in the least disturbed by a suspicion +of their absurdity!--If these two distinguished writers could +habitually think that the visible universe was of so little +consequence to a poet, that it was scarcely necessary for him to cast +his eyes upon it, we may be assured that those passages of the elder +poets which faithfully and poetically describe the phenomena of +nature, were not at that time holden in much estimation, and that +there was little accurate attention paid to those appearances. + +Wonder is the natural product of Ignorance; and as the soil was _in +such good condition_ at the time of the publication of the _Seasons_ +the crop was doubtless abundant. Neither individuals nor nations +become corrupt all at once, nor are they enlightened in a moment. +Thomson was an inspired poet, but he could not work miracles; in cases +where the art of seeing had in some degree been learned, the teacher +would further the proficiency of his pupils, but he could do +little _more_; though so far does vanity assist men in acts of +self-deception, that many would often fancy they recognized a likeness +when they knew nothing of the original. Having shown that much of what +his biographer deemed genuine admiration must in fact have been +blind wonderment--how is the rest to be accounted for?--Thomson was +fortunate in the very title of his poem, which seemed to bring it +home to the prepared sympathies of every one: in the next place, +notwithstanding his high powers, he writes a vicious style; and his +false ornaments are exactly of that kind which would be most likely +to strike the undiscerning. He likewise abounds with sentimental +commonplaces, that, from the manner in which they were brought +forward, bore an imposing air of novelty. In any well-used copy of +the _Seasons_ the book generally opens of itself with the rhapsody on +love, or with one of the stories (perhaps 'Damon and Musidora'); these +also are prominent in our collections of Extracts, and are the parts +of his Work which, after all, were probably most efficient in first +recommending the author to general notice. Pope, repaying praises +which he had received, and wishing to extol him to the highest, only +styles him 'an elegant and philosophical Poet'; nor are we able to +collect any unquestionable proofs that the true characteristics of +Thomson's genius as an imaginative poet[10] were perceived, till +the elder Warton, almost forty years after the publication of the +_Seasons_, pointed them out by a note in his Essay on the _Life and +Writings of Pope_. In the _Castle of Indolence_ (of which Gray +speaks so coldly) these characteristics were almost as conspicuously +displayed, and in verse more harmonious and diction more pure. Yet +that fine poem was neglected on its appearance, and is at this day the +delight only of a few! + +When Thomson died, Collins breathed forth his regrets in an Elegiac +Poem, in which he pronounces a poetical curse upon _him_ who should +regard with insensibility the place where the Poet's remains were +deposited. The Poems of the mourner himself have now passed through +innumerable editions, and are universally known, but if, when Collins +died, the same kind of imprecation had been pronounced by a surviving +admirer, small is the number whom it would not have comprehended. The +notice which his poems attained during his lifetime was so small, and +of course the sale so insignificant, that not long before his death +he deemed it right to repay to the bookseller the sum which he had +advanced for them and threw the edition into the fire. + +Next in importance to the _Seasons_ of Thomson, though a considerable +distance from that work in order of time, come the _Reliques of +Ancient English Poetry_, collected, new-modelled, and in many +instances (if such a contradiction in terms may be used) composed by +the Editor, Dr Percy. This work did not steal silently into the world, +as is evident from the number of legendary tales, that appeared not +long after its publication, and had been modelled, as the authors +persuaded themselves, after the old Ballad. The Compilation was, +however ill suited to the then existing taste of city society, and Dr +Johnson, 'mid the little senate to which he gave laws, was not +sparing in his exertions to make it an object of contempt. The critic +triumphed, the legendary imitators were deservedly disregarded, and +as undeservedly, their ill imitated models sank in this country into +temporary neglect, while Burger and other able writers of Germany, +were translating or imitating these Reliques, and composing, with the +aid of inspiration thence derived, poems which are the delight of the +German nation. Dr Percy was so abashed by the ridicule flung upon his +labours from the ignorance and insensibility of the persons with whom +he lived, that, though while he was writing under a mask he had +not wanted resolution to follow his genius into the regions of true +simplicity and genuine pathos (as is evinced by the exquisite ballad +of _Sir Cauline_ and by many other pieces), yet when he appeared in +his own person and character as a poetical writer, he adopted, as in +the tale of the _Hermit of Warkworth_, a diction scarcely in any +one of its features distinguishable from the vague, the glossy, and +unfeeling language of his day. I mention this remarkable fact[11] +with regret, esteeming the genius of Dr. Percy in this kind of writing +superior to that of any other man by whom in modern times it has been +cultivated. That even Burger (to whom Klopstock gave, in my hearing, +a commendation which he denied to Goethe and Schiller, pronouncing him +to be a genuine poet, and one of the few among the Germans whose works +would last) had not the fine sensibility of Percy, might be shown +from many passages, in which he has deserted his original only to go +astray. For example, + + Now daye was gone, and night was come, + And all were fast asleepe, + All save the Lady Emeline, + Who sate in her bowre to weepe: + + And soone she heard her true Love's voice + Low whispering at the walle, + Awake, awake, my dear Ladye, + 'Tis I thy true love call + +Which is thus tricked out and dilated; + + Als nun die Nacht Gebirg' und Thal + Vermummt in Rabenschatten, + Und Hochburgs Lampen uberall + Schon ausgeflimmert hatten, + Und alles tief entschlafen war; + Doch nur das Fraulein immerdar, + Voll Fieberangst, noch wachte, + Und seinen Ritter dachte: + Da horch! Ein susser Liebeston + Kam leis, empor geflogen. + 'Ho, Trudchen, ho! Da bin ich schon! + Frisch auf! Dich angezogen!' + +But from humble ballads we must ascend to heroics. + +All hail, Macpherson! hail to thee, Sire of Ossian! The Phantom was +begotten by the snug embrace of an impudent Highlander upon a cloud +of tradition--it travelled southward, where it was greeted with +acclamation, and the thin Consistence took its course through Europe, +upon the breath of popular applause. The Editor of the _Reliques_ +had indirectly preferred a claim to the praise of invention, by not +concealing that his supplementary labours were considerable! how +selfish his conduct, contrasted with that of the disinterested Gael, +who, like Lear, gives his kingdom away, and is content to become +a pensioner upon his own issue for a beggarly pittance!--Open this +far-famed Book!--I have done so at random, and the beginning of the +_Epic Poem Temora_, in eight Books, presents itself. 'The blue waves +of Ullin roll in light. The green hills are covered with day. Trees +shake their dusky heads in the breeze. Grey torrents pour their noisy +streams. Two green hills with aged oaks surround a narrow plain. The +blue course of a stream is there. On its banks stood Cairbar of Atha. +His spear supports the king; the red eyes of his fear are sad. Cormac +rises on his soul with all his ghastly wounds.' Precious memorandums +from the pocket-book of the blind Ossian! + +If it be unbecoming, as I acknowledge that for the most part it is, to +speak disrespectfully of Works that have enjoyed for a length of +time a widely-spread reputation, without at the same time producing +irrefragable proofs of their unworthiness, let me be forgiven upon +this occasion.--Having had the good fortune to be born and reared in a +mountainous country, from my very childhood I have felt the falsehood +that pervades the volumes imposed upon the world under the name of +Ossian. From what I saw with my own eyes, I knew that the imagery was +spurious. In nature everything is distinct, yet nothing defined into +absolute independent singleness. In Macpherson's work it is exactly +the reverse; everything (that is not stolen) is in this manner +defined, insulated, dislocated, deadened,--yet nothing distinct. It +will always be so when words are substituted for things. To say that +the characters never could exist, that the manners are impossible, and +that a dream has more substance than the whole state of society, as +there depicted, is doing nothing more than pronouncing a censure which +Macpherson defied; when, with the steeps of Morven before his eyes, he +could talk so familiarly of his Car-borne heroes;--of Morven, which, +if one may judge from its appearance at the distance of a few miles, +contains scarcely an acre of ground sufficiently accommodating for a +sledge to be trailed along its surface.--Mr. Malcolm Laing has ably +shown that the diction of this pretended translation is a motley +assemblage from all quarters; but he is so fond of making out parallel +passages as to call poor Macpherson to account for his '_ands_' and +his '_buts_!' and he has weakened his argument by conducting it as +if he thought that every striking resemblance was a _conscious_ +plagiarism. It is enough that the coincidences are too remarkable +for its being probable or possible that they could arise in different +minds without communication between them. Now as the Translators of +the Bible, and Shakespeare, Milton, and Pope, could not be indebted +to Macpherson, it follows that he must have owed his fine feathers to +them; unless we are prepared gravely to assert, with Madame de Stael, +that many of the characteristic beauties of our most celebrated +English Poets are derived from the ancient Fingallian; in which case +the modern translator would have been but giving back to Ossian his +own.--It is consistent that Lucien Buonaparte, who could censure +Milton for having surrounded Satan in the infernal regions with +courtly and regal splendour, should pronounce the modern Ossian to +be the glory of Scotland;--a country that has produced a Dunbar, a +Buchanan, a Thomson, and a Burns! These opinions are of ill omen for +the Epic ambition of him who has given them to the world. + +Yet, much as those pretended treasures of antiquity have been admired, +they have been wholly uninfluential upon the literature of the +Country. No succeeding writer appears to have caught from them a ray +of inspiration; no author, in the least distinguished, has ventured +formally to imitate them--except the boy, Chatterton, on their first +appearance. He had perceived, from the successful trials which he +himself had made in literary forgery, how few critics were able to +distinguish between a real ancient medal and a counterfeit of modern +manufacture; and he set himself to the work of filling a magazine with +_Saxon Poems_,--counterparts of those of Ossian, as like his as one +of his misty stars is to another. This incapability to amalgamate with +the literature of the Island is, in my estimation, a decisive proof +that the book is essentially unnatural; nor should I require any other +to demonstrate it to be a forgery, audacious as worthless.--Contrast, +in this respect, the effect of Macpherson's publication with the +_Reliques_ of Percy, so unassuming, so modest in their pretensions!--I +have already stated how much Germany is indebted to this latter work; +and for our own country, its poetry has been absolutely redeemed +by it. I do not think that there is an able writer in verse of the +present day who would not be proud to acknowledge his obligations to +the _Reliques_; I know that it is so with my friends; and, for myself, +I am happy in this occasion to make a public avowal of my own. + +Dr. Johnson, more fortunate in his contempt of the labours of +Macpherson than those of his modest friend, was solicited not long +after to furnish Prefaces biographical and critical for the works +of some of the most eminent English Poets. The booksellers took upon +themselves to make the collection; they referred probably to the most +popular miscellanies, and, unquestionably, to their books of accounts; +and decided upon the claim of authors to be admitted into a body of +the most eminent, from the familiarity of their names with the readers +of that day, and by the profits, which, from the sale of his works, +each had brought and was bringing to the Trade. The Editor was allowed +a limited exercise of discretion, and the Authors whom he recommended +are scarcely to be mentioned without a smile. We open the volume of +Prefatory Lives, and to our astonishment the _first_ name we find is +that of Cowley!--What Is become of the morning-star of English Poetry? +Where is the bright Elizabethan constellation? Or, if names be more +acceptable than images, where is the ever to-be-honoured Chaucer? +where is Spenser? where Sidney? and, lastly, where he, whose rights +as a poet, contra-distinguished from those which he is universally +allowed to possess as a dramatist, we have vindicated,--where +Shakespeare?--These, and a multitude of others not unworthy to be +placed near them, their contemporaries and successors, we have _not_. +But in their stead, we have (could better be expected when precedence +was to be settled by an abstract of reputation at any given period +made, as in this case before us?) Roscommon, and Stepney, +and Phillips, and Walsh, and Smith, and Duke, and King, and +Spratt--Halifax, Granville, Sheffield, Congreve, Broome, and other +reputed Magnates--metrical writers utterly worthless and useless, +except for occasions like the present, when their productions are +referred to as evidence what a small quantity of brain is necessary to +procure a considerable stock of admiration, provided the aspirant will +accommodate himself to the likings and fashions of his day. + +As I do not mean to bring down this retrospect to our own times, it +may with propriety be closed at the era of this distinguished event. +From the literature of other ages and countries, proofs equally cogent +might have been adduced, that the opinions announced in the former +part of this Essay are founded upon truth. It was not an agreeable +office, nor a prudent undertaking, to declare them; but their +importance seemed to render it a duty. It may still be asked, +where lies the particular relation of what has been said to these +Volumes?--The question will be easily answered by the discerning +Reader who is old enough to remember the taste that prevailed when +some of these poems were first published, seventeen years ago; who has +also observed to what degree the poetry of this Island has since +that period been coloured by them; and who is further aware of the +unremitting hostility with which, upon some principle or other, they +have each and all been opposed. A sketch of my own notion of the +constitution of Fame has been given; and, as far as concerns myself, +I have cause to be satisfied. The love, the admiration, the +indifference, the slight, the aversion, and even the contempt, with +which these Poems have been received, knowing, as I do, the source +within my own mind, from which they have proceeded, and the labour +and pains, which, when labour and pains appeared needful, have been +bestowed upon them, must all, if I think consistently, be received as +pledges and tokens, bearing the same general impression, though widely +different in value;--they are all proofs that for the present time +I have not laboured in vain; and afford assurances, more or less +authentic, that the products of my industry will endure. + +If there be one conclusion more forcibly pressed upon us than another +by the review which has been given of the fortunes and fate of +poetical Works, it is this--that every author, as far as he is great +and at the same time _original_, has had the task of _creating_ +the taste by which he is to be enjoyed: so has it been, so will +it continue to be. This remark was long since made to me by the +philosophical Friend for the separation of whose poems from my own I +have previously expressed my regret. The predecessors of an original +Genius of a high order will have smoothed the way for all that he has +in common with them;--and much he will have in common; but, for what +is peculiarly his own, he will be called upon to clear and often to +shape his own road:--he will be in the condition of Hannibal among the +Alps. + +And where lies the real difficulty of creating that taste by which a +truly original poet is to be relished? Is it in breaking the bonds +of custom, in overcoming the prejudices of false refinement, and +displacing the aversions of inexperience? Or, if he labour for an +object which here and elsewhere I have proposed to myself, does it +consist in divesting the reader of the pride that induces him to dwell +upon those points wherein men differ from each other, to the exclusion +of those in which all men are alike, or the same; and in making him +ashamed of the vanity that renders him insensible of the appropriate +excellence which civil arrangements, less unjust than might appear, +and Nature illimitable in her bounty, had conferred on men who may +stand below him in the scale of society? Finally, does it lie in +establishing that dominion over the spirits of readers by which they +are to be humbled and humanized, in order that they may be purified +and exalted? + +If these ends are to be attained by the mere communication of +_knowledge_, it does _not_ lie here.--TASTE, I would remind the +reader, like IMAGINATION, is a word which has been forced to extend +its services far beyond the point to which philosophy would have +confined them. It is a metaphor, taken from a _passive_ sense of the +human body, and transferred to things which are in their essence +_not_ passive,--to intellectual _acts_ and _operations_. The word, +Imagination, has been overstrained, from impulses honourable to +mankind, to meet the demands of the faculty which is perhaps the +noblest of our nature. In the instance of Taste, the process has been +reversed; and from the prevalence of dispositions at once injurious +and discreditable, being no other than that selfishness which is the +child of apathy,--which, as Nations decline in productive and creative +power, makes them value themselves upon a presumed refinement of +judging. Poverty of language is the primary cause of the use which we +make of the word, Imagination; but the word, Taste, has been +stretched to the sense which it bears in modern Europe by habits of +self-conceit, inducing that inversion in the order of things whereby a +passive faculty is made paramount among the faculties conversant with +the fine arts. Proportion and congruity, the requisite knowledge +being supposed, are subjects upon which taste may be trusted; it is +competent to this office--for in its intercourse with these the +mind is _passive_, and is affected painfully or pleasurably as by an +instinct. But the profound and the exquisite in feeling, the lofty and +universal in thought and imagination; or, in ordinary language, the +pathetic and the sublime;--are neither of them, accurately speaking, +objects of a faculty which could ever without a sinking in the spirit +of Nations have been designated by the metaphor _Taste_. And why? +Because without the exertion of a co-operating _power_ in the mind +of the reader, there can be no adequate sympathy with either of these +emotions: without this auxiliary impulse, elevated or profound passion +cannot exist. + +Passion, it must be observed, is derived from a word which signifies +_suffering_; but the connexion which suffering has with effort, with +exertion, and _action_, is immediate and inseparable. How strikingly +is this property of human nature exhibited by the fact that, in +popular language, to be in a passion is to be angry! But, + + Anger in hasty _words_ or _blows_ + Itself discharges on its foes. + +To be moved, then, by a passion is to be excited, often to external, +and always to internal, effort; whether for the continuance and +strengthening of the passion, or for its suppression, accordingly +as the course which it takes may be painful or pleasurable. If the +latter, the soul must contribute to its support, or it never becomes +vivid,--and soon languishes and dies. And this brings us to the point. +If every great poet with whose writings men are familiar, in the +highest exercise of his genius, before he can be thoroughly enjoyed, +has to call forth and to communicate _power_, this service, in a still +greater degree, falls upon an original writer, at his first appearance +in the world.--Of genius the only proof is, the act of doing well what +is worthy to be done, and what was never done before: Of genius, in +the fine arts, the only infallible sign is the widening the sphere +of human sensibility, for the delight, honour, and benefit of +human nature. Genius is the introduction of a new element into +the intellectual universe: or, if that be not allowed, it is the +application of powers to objects on which they had not before been +exercised, or the employment of them in such a manner as to produce +effects hitherto unknown. What is all this but an advance, or a +conquest, made by the soul of the poet? Is it to be supposed that +the reader can make progress of this kind, like an Indian prince or +general--stretched on his palanquin, and borne by his slaves? No; +he is invigorated and inspirited by his leader, in order that he +may exert himself; for he cannot proceed in quiescence, he cannot be +carried like a dead weight. Therefore to create taste is to call forth +and bestow power, of which knowledge is the effect; and _there_ lies +the true difficulty. + +As the pathetic participates of an _animal_ sensation, it might +seem--that, if the springs of this emotion were genuine, all men, +possessed of competent knowledge of the facts and circumstances, would +be instantaneously affected. And, doubtless, in the works of every +true poet will be found passages of that species of excellence which +is proved by effects immediate and universal. But there are emotions +of the pathetic that are simple and direct, and others--that are +complex and revolutionary; some--to which the heart yields with +gentleness; others--against which it struggles with pride; these +varieties are infinite as the combinations of circumstance and the +constitutions of character. Remember, also, that the medium through +which, in poetry, the heart is to be affected, is language; a thing +subject to endless fluctuations and arbitrary associations. The genius +of the poet melts these down for his purpose; but they retain their +shape and quality to him who is not capable of exerting, within his +own mind, a corresponding energy. There is also a meditative, as well +as a human, pathos; an enthusiastic, as well as an ordinary, sorrow; +a sadness that has its seat in the depths of reason, to which the mind +cannot sink gently of itself--but to which it must descend by treading +the steps of thought. And for the sublime,--if we consider what are +the cares that occupy the passing day, and how remote is the practice +and the course of life from the sources of sublimity, in the soul of +Man, can it be wondered that there is little existing preparation +for a poet charged with a new mission to extend its kingdom, and to +augment and spread its enjoyments? + +Away, then, with the senseless iteration of the word _popular_, +applied to new works in poetry, as if there were no test of excellence +in this first of the fine arts but that all men should run after +its productions, as if urged by an appetite, or constrained by a +spell!--The qualities of writing best fitted for eager reception are +either such as startle the world into attention by their audacity and +extravagance; or they are chiefly of a superficial kind, lying upon +the surfaces of manners; or arising out of a selection and arrangement +of incidents, by which the mind is kept upon the stretch of curiosity, +and the fancy amused without the trouble of thought. But in everything +which is to send the soul into herself, to be admonished of her +weakness, or to be made conscious of her power;--wherever life and +nature are described as operated upon by the creative or abstracting +virtue of the imagination; wherever the instinctive wisdom of +antiquity and her heroic passions uniting, in the heart of the poet, +with the meditative wisdom of later ages, have produced that accord of +sublimated humanity which is at once a history of the remote past and +a prophetic enunciation of the remotest future, _there_, the poet must +reconcile himself for a season to few and scattered hearers.--Grand +thoughts (and Shakespeare must often have sighed over this truth), as +they are most naturally and most fitly conceived in solitude, so +can they not be brought forth in the midst of plaudits without +some violation of their sanctity. Go to a silent exhibition of the +productions of the sister Art, and be convinced that the qualities +which dazzle at first sight, and kindle the admiration of the +multitude, are essentially different from those by which permanent +influence is secured. Let us not shrink from following up these +principles as far as they will carry us, and conclude with +observing--that there never has been a period, and perhaps never will +be, in which vicious poetry, of some kind or other, has not excited +more zealous admiration, and been far more generally read, than good; +but this advantage attends the good, that the _individual_, as well +as the species, survives from age to age; whereas, of the depraved, +though the species be immortal, the individual quickly _perishes_; the +object of present admiration vanishes, being supplanted by some other +as easily produced; which, though no better, brings with it at least +the irritation of novelty,--with adaptation, more or less skilful, to +the changing humours of the majority of those who are most at leisure +to regard poetical works when they first solicit their attention. + +Is it the result of the whole, that, in the opinion of the Writer, the +judgement of the People is not to be respected? The thought is most +injurious; and, could the charge be brought against him, he would +repel it with indignation. The People have already been justified, +and their eulogium pronounced by implication, when it was said, +above--that, of _good_ poetry, the _individual_, as well as the +species, _survives_. And how does it survive but through the People? +What preserves it but their intellect and their wisdom? + + --Past and future, are the wings + On whose support, harmoniously conjoined, + Moves the great Spirit of human knowledge-- + _MS._ + +The voice that issues from this Spirit is that Vox Populi which the +Deity inspires. Foolish must he be who can mistake for this a local +acclamation, or a transitory out-cry--transitory though it be for +years, local though from a Nation. Still more lamentable is his error +who can believe that there is anything of divine infallibility in +the clamour of that small though loud portion of the community, ever +governed by factitious influence, which, under the name of the PUBLIC, +passes itself, upon the unthinking, for the PEOPLE. Towards the +Public, the Writer hopes that he feels as much deference as it is +entitled to: but to the People, philosophically characterized, and to +the embodied spirit of their knowledge, so far as it exists and moves, +at the present, faithfully supported by its two wings, the past and +the future, his devout respect, his reverence, is due. He offers it +willingly and readily; and, this done, takes leave of his Readers, +by assuring them--that, if he were not persuaded that the contents +of these Volumes, and the Work to which they are subsidiary, evince +something of the 'Vision and the Faculty divine'; and that, both in +words and things, they will operate in their degree, to extend the +domain of sensibility for the delight, the honour, and the benefit +of human nature, nothwithstanding the many happy hours which he +has employed in their composition, and the manifold comforts and +enjoyments they have procured to him, he would not, if a wish could +do it, save them from immediate destruction;--from becoming at this +moment, to the world, as a thing that had never been. + + +[Footnote 5: The learned Hakewill (a third edition of whose book bears +date 1635), writing to refute the error 'touching Nature's perpetual +and universal decay,' cites triumphantly the names of Ariosto, +Tasso, Bartas, and Spenser, as instances that poetic genius had not +degenerated; but be makes no mention of Shakespeare.] + +[Footnote 6: This flippant insensibility was publicly reprehended by +Mr. Coleridge in a course of Lectures upon Poetry given by him at the +Royal Institution. For the various merits of thought and language in +Shakespeare's _Sonnets_, see Nos. 27, 29, 30, 32, 33, 54, 64, 66, 68, +73, 76, 86, 91, 92, 93, 97, 98, 105, 107, 108, 109, 111, 113, 114, +116, 117, 129, and many others.] + +[Footnote 7: Hughes is express upon this subject in his dedication of +Spenser's Works to Lord Somers, he writes thus 'It was your Lordship's +encouraging a beautiful edition of _Paradise Lost_ that first brought +that incomparable Poem to be generally known and esteemed.'] + +[Footnote 8: This opinion seems actually to have been entertained by +Adam Smith, the worst critic, David Hume not excepted, that Scotland, +a soil to which this sort of weed seems natural, has produced.] + +[Footnote 9: CORTES, _alone in a night-gown_. + + All things are hush'd as Nature's self lay dead; + The mountains seem to nod their drowsy head. + The little Birds in dreams their songs repeat, + And sleeping Flowers beneath the Night-dew sweat: + Even Lust and Envy sleep; yet Love denies + Rest to my soul, and slumber to my eyes. + +DRYDEN'S _Indian Emperor_.] + +[Footnote 10: Since these observations upon Thomson were written, I +have perused the second edition of his _Seasons_, and find that even +_that_ does not contain the most striking passages which Warton points +out for admiration, these, with other improvements, throughout the +whole work, must have been added at a later period.] + +[Footnote 11: Shenstone, in his _Schoolmistress_, gives a still more +remarkable instance of this timidity On its first appearance (see +D'Israeli's 2d Series of the _Curiosities of Literature_) the Poem was +accompanied with an absurd prose commentary, showing, as indeed some +incongruous expressions in the text imply, that the whole was intended +for burlesque. In subsequent editions, the commentary was dropped, and +the People have since continued to read in seriousness, doing for the +Author what he had not courage openly to venture upon for himself.] + + + + +PREFACE TO CROMWELL + +BY VICTOR HUGO. (1827)[A] + + +The drama contained in the following pages has nothing to commend +it to the attention or the good will of the public. It has not, to +attract the interest of political disputants, the advantage of the +veto of the official censorship, nor even, to win for it at the outset +the literary sympathy of men of taste, the honour of having been +formally rejected by an infallible reading committee. + +It presents itself, therefore, to the public gaze, naked and +friendless, like the infirm man of the Gospel--_solus, pauper, nudus_. + +Not without some hesitation, moreover, did the author determine to +burden his drama with a preface. Such things are usually of very +little interest to the reader. He inquires concerning the talent of +a writer rather than concerning his point of view; and in determining +whether a work is good or bad, it matters little to him upon what +ideas it is based, or in what sort of mind it germinated. One seldom +inspects the cellars of a house after visiting its salons, and when +one eats the fruit of a tree, one cares but little about its root. + +On the other hand, notes and prefaces are sometimes a convenient +method of adding to the weight of a book, and of magnifying, in +appearance at least, the importance of a work; as a matter of tactics +this is not dissimilar to that of the general who, to make his +battle-front more imposing, puts everything, even his baggage-trains, +in the line. And then, while critics fall foul of the preface and +scholars of the notes, it may happen that the work itself will +escape them, passing uninjured between their cross-fires, as an army +extricates itself from a dangerous position between two skirmishes of +outposts and rear-guards. + +These reasons, weighty as they may seem, are not those which +influenced the author. This volume did not need to be _inflated_, it +was already too stout by far. Furthermore, and the author does not +know why it is so, his prefaces, frank and ingenuous as they are, have +always served rather to compromise him with the critics than to shield +him. Far from being staunch and trusty bucklers, they have played him +a trick like that played in a battle by an unusual and conspicuous +uniform, which, calling attention to the soldier who wears it, +attracts all the blows and is proof against none. + +Considerations of an altogether different sort acted upon the author. +It seemed to him that, although in fact, one seldom inspects the +cellars of a building for pleasure, one is not sorry sometimes to +examine its foundations. He will, therefore, give himself over once +more, with a preface, to the wrath of the _feuilletonists. Che sara, +sara_. He has never given much thought to the fortune of his works, +and he is but little appalled by dread of the literary _what will +people say_. In the discussion now raging, in which the theatre and +the schools, the public and the academies, are at daggers drawn, one +will hear, perhaps, not without some interest, the voice of a solitary +_apprentice_ of nature and truth, who has withdrawn betimes from the +literary world, for pure love of letters, and who offers good faith in +default of good taste, sincere conviction in default of talent, study +in default of learning. + +He will confine himself, however, to general considerations concerning +the art, without the slightest attempt to smooth the path of his own +work, without pretending to write an indictment or a plea, against or +for any person whomsoever. An attack upon or defence of his book is +of less importance to him than to anybody else. Nor is personal +controversy agreeable to him. It is always a pitiful spectacle to +see two hostile self-esteems crossing swords. He protests, therefore, +beforehand against every interpretation of his ideas, every personal +application of his words, saying with the Spanish fablist:-- + + Quien haga aplicaciones + Con su pan se lo coma. + +In truth, several of the leading champions of "sound literary +doctrines" have done him the honour to throw the gauntlet to him, even +in his profound obscurity--to him, a simple, imperceptible spectator +of this curious contest. He will not have the presumption to pick it +up. In the following pages will be found the observations with which +he might oppose them--there will be found his sling and his stone; +but others, if they choose, may hurl them at the head of the classical +Goliaths. + +This said, let us pass on. + +Let us set out from a fact. The same type of civilization, or to use +a more exact, although more extended expression, the same society, has +not always inhabited the earth. The human race as a whole has grown, +has developed, has matured, like one of ourselves. It was once a +child, it was once a man; we are now looking on at its impressive old +age. Before the epoch which modern society has dubbed "ancient," there +was another epoch which the ancients called "fabulous," but which it +would be more accurate to call "primitive." Behold then three great +successive orders of things in civilization, from its origin down to +our days. Now, as poetry is always superposed upon society, we +propose to try to demonstrate, from the form of its society, what the +character of the poetry must have been in those three great ages of +the world--primitive times, ancient times, modern times. + +In primitive times, when man awakes in a world that is newly created, +poetry awakes with him. In the face of the marvellous things that +dazzle and intoxicate him, his first speech is a hymn simply. He is +still so close to God that all his meditations are ecstatic, all his +dreams are visions. His bosom swells, he sings as he breathes. +His lyre has but three strings--God, the soul, creation; but this +threefold mystery envelopes everything, this threefold idea embraces +everything. The earth is still almost deserted. There are families, +but no nations; patriarchs, but no kings. Each race exists at its own +pleasure; no property, no laws, no contentions, no wars. Everything +belongs to each and to all. Society is a community. Man is restrained +in nought. He leads that nomadic pastoral life with which all +civilizations begin, and which is so well adapted to solitary +contemplation, to fanciful reverie. He follows every suggestion, +he goes hither and thither, at random. His thought, like his life, +resembles a cloud that changes its shape and its direction according +to the wind that drives it. Such is the first man, such is the first +poet. He is young, he is cynical. Prayer is his sole religion, the ode +is his only form of poetry. + +This ode, this poem of primitive times, is Genesis. + +By slow degrees, however, this youth of the world passes away. All +the spheres progress; the family becomes a tribe, the tribe becomes a +nation. Each of these groups of men camps about a common centre, and +kingdoms appear. The social instinct succeeds the nomadic instinct. +The camp gives place to the city, the tent to the palace, the ark to +the temple. The chiefs of these nascent states are still shepherds, +it is true, but shepherds of nations; the pastoral staff has already +assumed the shape of a sceptre. Everything tends to become stationary +and fixed. Religion takes on a definite shape; prayer is governed by +rites; dogma sets bounds to worship. Thus the priest and king share +the paternity of the people; thus theocratic society succeeds the +patriarchal community. + +Meanwhile the nations are beginning to be packed too closely on the +earth's surface. They annoy and jostle one another; hence the clash +of empires--war. They overflow upon another; hence, the migrations of +nations--voyages. Poetry reflects these momentous events; from ideas +it proceeds to things. It sings of ages, of nations, of empires. It +becomes epic, it gives birth to Homer. + +Homer, in truth, dominates the society of ancient times. In that +society, all is simple, all is epic. Poetry is religion, religion is +law. The virginity of the earlier age is succeeded by the chastity +of the later. A sort of solemn gravity is everywhere noticeable, in +private manners no less than in public. The nations have retained +nothing of the wandering life of the earlier time, save respect +for the stranger and the traveller. The family has a fatherland; +everything is connected therewith; it has the cult of the house and +the cult of the tomb. + +We say again, such a civilization can find its one expression only in +the epic. The epic will assume diverse forms, but will never lose its +specific character. Pindar is more priestlike than patriarchal, more +epic than lyrical. If the chroniclers, the necessary accompaniments +of this second age of the world, set about collecting traditions and +begin to reckon by centuries, they labour to no purpose--chronology +cannot expel poesy; history remains an epic. Herodotus is a Homer. + +But it is in the ancient tragedy, above all, that the epic breaks out +at every turn. It mounts the Greek stage without losing aught, so to +speak, of its immeasurable, gigantic proportions. Its characters +are still heroes, demigods, gods; its themes are visions, oracles, +fatality; its scenes are battles, funeral rites, catalogues. That +which the rhapsodists formerly sang, the actors declaim--that is the +whole difference. + +There is something more. When the whole plot, the whole spectacle +of the epic poem have passed to the stage, the Chorus takes all that +remains. The Chorus annotates the tragedy, encourages the heroes, +gives descriptions, summons and expels the daylight, rejoices, +laments, sometimes furnishes the scenery, explains the moral bearing +of the subject, flatters the listening assemblage. Now, what is the +Chorus, this anomalous character standing between the spectacle and +the spectator, if it be not the poet completing his epic? + +The theatre of the ancients is, like their dramas, huge, pontifical, +epic. It is capable of holding thirty thousand spectators; the plays +are given in the open air, in bright sunlight; the performances last +all day. The actors disguise their voices, wear masks, increase their +stature; they make themselves gigantic, like their roles. The stage is +immense. It may represent at the same moment both the interior and +the exterior of a temple, a palace, a camp, a city. Upon it, +vast spectacles are displayed. There is--we cite only from +memory--Prometheus on his mountain; there is Antigone, at the top of +a tower, seeking her brother Polynices in the hostile army (_The +Phoenicians_); there is Evadne hurling herself from a cliff into the +flames where the body of Capaneus is burning (_The Suppliants_ of +Euripides); there is a ship sailing into port and landing fifty +princesses with their retinues (_The Suppliants_ of Æschylus). +Architecture, poetry, everything assumes a monumental character. In +all antiquity there is nothing more solemn, more majestic. Its history +and its religion are mingled on its stage. Its first actors are +priests; its scenic performances are religious ceremonies, national +festivals. + +One last observation, which completes our demonstration of the epic +character of this epoch: in the subjects which it treats, no less than +in the forms it adopts, tragedy simply re-echoes the epic. All +the ancient tragic authors derive their plots from Homer. The same +fabulous exploits, the same catastrophes, the same heroes. One and +all drink from the Homeric stream. The Iliad and Odyssey are always +in evidence. Like Achilles dragging Hector at his chariot-wheel, the +Greek tragedy circles about Troy. + +But the age of the epic draws near its end. Like the society that +it represents, this form of poetry wears itself out revolving upon +itself. Rome reproduces Greece, Virgil copies Homer, and, as if to +make a becoming end, epic poetry expires in the last parturition. + +It was time. Another era is about to begin, for the world and for +poetry. + +A spiritual religion, supplanting the material and external paganism, +makes its way to the heart of the ancient society, kills it, and +deposits, in that corpse of a decrepit civilization, the germ of +modern civilization. This religion as complete, because it is true; +between its dogma and its cult, it embraces a deep-rooted moral. Arid +first of all, as a fundamental truth, it teaches man that he has two +lives to live, one ephemeral, the other immortal; one on earth, the +other in heaven. It shows him that he, like his destiny, is twofold: +that there is in him an animal and an intellect, a body and a soul; in +a word, that he is the point of intersection, the common link of +the two chains of beings which embrace all creation--of the chain +of material beings and the chain of incorporeal beings; the first +starting from the rock to arrive at man, the second starting from man +to end at God. + +A portion of these truths had perhaps been suspected by certain wise +men of ancient times, but their full, broad, luminous revelation dates +from the Gospels. The pagan schools walked in darkness, feeling their +way, clinging to falsehoods as well as to truths in their haphazard +journeying. Some of their philosophers occasionally cast upon certain +subjects feeble gleams which illuminated but one side and made the +darkness of the other side more profound. Hence all the phantoms +created by ancient philosophy. None but divine wisdom was capable of +substituting an even and all-embracing light for all those flickering +rays of human wisdom. Pythagoras, Epicurus, Socrates, Plato, are +torches: Christ is the glorious light of day. + +Nothing could be more material, indeed, than the ancient theogony. Far +from proposing, as Christianity does, to separate the spirit from the +body, it ascribes form and features to everything, even to impalpable +essences, even to the intelligence. In it everything is visible, +tangible, fleshly. Its gods need a cloud to conceal themselves from +men's eyes. They eat, drink, and sleep. They are wounded and their +blood flows; they are maimed, and lo! they limp forever after. That +religion has gods and halves of gods. Its thunderbolts are forged on +an anvil, and among other things three rays of twisted rain (_tres +imbris torti radios_) enter into their composition. Its Jupiter +suspends the world by a golden chain; its sun rides in a four-horse +chariot; its hell is a precipice the brink of which is marked on the +globe; its heaven is a mountain. + +Thus paganism, which moulded all creations from the same clay, +minimizes divinity and magnifies man. Homer's heroes are of almost the +same stature as his gods. Ajax defies Jupiter, Achilles is the peer +of Mars. Christianity on the contrary, as we have seen, draws a broad +line of division between spirit and matter. It places an abyss between +the soul and the body, an abyss between man and God. + +At this point--to omit nothing from the sketch upon which we have +ventured--we will call attention to the fact that, with Christianity, +and by its means, there entered into the mind of the nations a new +sentiment, unknown to the ancients and marvellously developed +among moderns, a sentiment which is more than gravity and less than +sadness--melancholy. In truth, might not the heart of man, hitherto +deadened by religions purely hierarchical and sacerdotal, awake and +feel springing to life within it some unexpected faculty, under the +breath of a religion that is human because it is divine, a religion +which makes of the poor man's prayer, the rich man's wealth, a +religion of equality, liberty and charity? Might it not see all things +in a new light, since the Gospel had shown it the soul through the +senses, eternity behind life? + +Moreover, at that very moment the world was undergoing so complete +a revolution that it was impossible that there should not be a +revolution in men's minds. Hitherto the catastrophes of empires +had rarely reached the hearts of the people; it was kings who fell, +majesties that vanished, nothing more. The lightning struck only in +the upper regions, and, as we have already pointed out, events seemed +to succeed one another with all the solemnity of the epic. In the +ancient society, the individual occupied so lowly a place that, to +strike him, adversity must needs descend to his family. So that he +knew little of misfortune outside of domestic sorrows. It was an +almost unheard of thing that the general disasters of the state should +disarrange his life. But the instant that Christian society became +firmly established, the ancient continent was thrown into confusion. +Everything was pulled up by the roots. Events, destined to destroy +ancient Europe and to construct a new Europe, trod upon one another's +heels in their ceaseless rush, and drove the nations pell-mell, some +into the light, others into darkness. So much uproar ensued that it +was impossible that some echoes of it should not reach the hearts +of the people. It was more than an echo, it was a reflex blow. Man, +withdrawing within himself in presence of these imposing vicissitudes, +began to take pity upon mankind, to reflect upon the bitter +disillusionments of life. Of this sentiment, which to Cato the heathen +was despair, Christianity fashioned melancholy. + +At the same time was born the spirit of scrutiny and curiosity. These +great catastrophes were also great spectacles, impressive cataclysms. +It was the North hurling itself upon the South; the Roman world +changing shape; the last convulsive throes of a whole universe in +the death agony. As soon as that world was dead, lo! clouds of +rhetoricians, grammarians, sophists, swooped down like insects on its +immense body. People saw them swarming and heard them buzzing in that +seat of putrefaction. They vied with one another in scrutinizing, +commenting, disputing. Each limb, each muscle, each fibre of the huge +prostrate body was twisted and turned in every direction. Surely it +must have been a keen satisfaction to those anatomists of the mind, to +be able, at their debut, to make experiments on a large scale; to have +a dead society to dissect, for their first "subject." + +Thus we see melancholy and meditation, the demons of analysis and +controversy, appear at the same moment, and, as it were, hand-in-hand. +At one extremity of this era of transition is Longinus, at the other +St. Augustine. We must beware of casting a disdainful eye upon that +epoch wherein all that has since borne fruit was contained in germs; +upon that epoch whose least eminent writers, if we may be pardoned a +vulgar but expressive phrase, made fertilizer for the harvest that was +to follow. The Middle Ages were grafted on the Lower Empire. + +Behold, then, a new religion, a new society; upon this twofold +foundation there must inevitably spring up a new poetry. Previously--- +we beg pardon for setting forth a result which the reader has probably +already foreseen from what has been said above--previously, following +therein the course pursued by the ancient polytheism and philosophy, +the purely epic muse of the ancients had studied nature in only a +single aspect, casting aside without pity almost everything in art +which, in the world subjected to its imitation, had not relation to a +certain, type of beauty. A type which was magnificent at first, but, +as always happens with everything systematic, became in later times +false, trivial and conventional. Christianity leads poetry to the +truth. Like it, the modern muse will see things in a higher and +broader light. It will realize that everything in creation is not +humanly _beautiful_, that the ugly exists beside the beautiful, the +unshapely beside the graceful, the grotesque on the reverse of the +sublime, evil with good, darkness with light. It will ask itself if +the narrow and relative sense of the artist should prevail over the +infinite, absolute sense of the Creator; if it is for man to correct +God; if a mutilated nature will be the more beautiful for the +mutilation; if art has the right to duplicate, so to speak, man, life, +creation; if things will progress better when their muscles and their +vigour have been taken from them; if, in short, to be incomplete is +the best way to be harmonious. Then it is that, with its eyes fixed +upon events that are both laughable and redoubtable, and under the +influence of that spirit of Christian melancholy and philosophical +criticism which we described a moment ago, poetry will take a +great step, a decisive step, a step which, like the upheaval of an +earthquake, will change the whole face of the intellectual world. It +will set about doing as nature does, mingling in its creations--but +without confounding them--darkness and light, the grotesque and the +sublime; in other words, the body and the soul, the beast and +the intellect; for the starting-point of religion is always the +starting-point of poetry. All things are connected. + +Thus, then, we see a principle unknown to the ancients, a new type, +introduced in poetry; and as an additional element in anything +modifies the whole of the thing, a new form of the art is developed. +This type is the grotesque; its new form is comedy. + +And we beg leave to dwell upon this point; for we have now indicated +the significant feature, the fundamental difference which, in our +opinion, separates modern from ancient art, the present form from +the defunct form; or, to use less definite but more popular terms, +_romantic_ literature from _classical_ literature. + +"At last!" exclaim the people who for some time past _have seen what +we were coming at_, "at last we have you--you are caught in the act. +So then you put forward the ugly as a type for imitation, you make the +_grotesque_ an element of art. But the graces; but good taste! Don't +you know that art should correct nature? that we must _ennoble_ art? +that we must _select_? Did the ancients ever exhibit the ugly or the +grotesque? Did they ever mingle comedy and tragedy? The example of +the ancients, gentlemen! And Aristotle, too, and Boileau, and La Haipe +Upon my word!" + +These arguments are sound, doubtless, and, above all, of extraordinary +novelty. But it is not our place to reply to them. We are constructing +no system here--God protect us from systems! We are stating a fact. We +are a historian, not a critic. Whether the fact is agreeable or not +matters little, it is a fact. Let us resume, therefore, and try +to prove that it is of the fruitful union of the grotesque and the +sublime types that modern genius is born--so complex, so diverse in +its forms, so inexhaustible in its creations, and therein directly +opposed to the uniform simplicity of the genius of the ancients, let +us show that that is the point from which we must set out to establish +the real and radical difference between the two forms of literature. + +Not that it is strictly true that comedy and the grotesque were +entirely unknown to the ancients. In fact, such a thing would be +impossible. Nothing grows without a root, the germ of the second epoch +always exists in the first. In the Iliad Thersites and Vulcan furnish +comedy, one to the mortals, the other to the gods. There is too much +nature and originality in the Greek tragedy for there not to be an +occasional touch of comedy in it. For example, to cite only what we +happen to recall, the scene between Menelaus and the portress of the +palace. _(Helen_, Act I), and the scene of the Phrygian _(Orestes,_ +Act IV) The Tritons, the Satyrs, the Cyclops are grotesque, Polyphemus +is a terrifying, Silenus a farcical grotesque. + +But one feels that this part of the art is still in its infancy. The +epic, which at this period imposes its form on everything, the epic +weighs heavily upon it and stifles it. The ancient grotesque is timid +and forever trying to keep out of sight. It is plain that it is not +on familiar ground, because it is not in its natural surroundings. It +conceals itself as much as it can. The Satyrs, the Tritons, and the +Sirens are hardly abnormal in form. The Fates and the Harpies are +hideous in their attributes rather than in feature; the Furies are +beautiful, and are called _Eumenides_, that is to say, _gentle, +beneficent_. There is a veil of grandeur or of divinity over other +grotesques. Polyphemus is a giant, Midas a king, Silenus a god. + +Thus comedy is almost imperceptible in the great epic _ensemble_ +of ancient times. What is the barrow of Thespis beside the Olympian +chariots? What are Aristophanes and Plautus, beside the Homeric +colossi, Æschylus, Sophocles, Euripides? Homer bears them along with +him, as Hercules bore the pygmies, hidden in his lion's skin! + +In the idea of men of modern times, however, the grotesque plays an +enormous part. It is found everywhere; on the one hand it creates the +abnormal and the horrible, on the other the comic and the burlesque. +It fastens upon religion a thousand original superstitions, upon +poetry a thousand picturesque fancies. It is the grotesque which +scatters lavishly, in air, water, earth, fire, those myriads of +intermediary creatures which we find all alive in the popular +traditions of the Middle Ages; it is the grotesque which impels the +ghastly antics of the witches' revels, which gives Satan his horns, +his cloven foot and his bat's wings. It is the grotesque, still the +grotesque, which now casts into the Christian hell the frightful faces +which the severe genius of Dante and Milton will evoke, and again +peoples it with those laughter-moving figures amid which Callot, the +burlesque Michelangelo, will disport himself. If it passes from the +world of imagination to the real world, it unfolds an inexhaustible +supply of parodies of mankind. Creations of its fantasy are the +Scaramouches, Crispins and Harlequins, grinning silhouettes of man, +types altogether unknown to serious-minded antiquity, although they +originated in classic Italy. It is the grotesque, lastly, which, +colouring the same drama with the fancies of the North and of the +South in turn, exhibits Sganarelle capering about Don Juan and +Mephistopheles crawling about Faust. + +And how free and open it is in its bearing! how boldly it brings +into relief all the strange forms which the preceding age had timidly +wrapped in swaddling-clothes! Ancient poetry, compelled to provide +the lame Vulcan with companions, tried to disguise their deformity by +distributing it, so to speak, upon gigantic proportions. Modern genius +retains this myth of the supernatural smiths, but gives it an entirely +different character and one which makes it even more striking; it +changes the giants to dwarfs and makes gnomes of the Cyclops. With +like originality, it substitutes for the somewhat commonplace Lernaean +hydra all the local dragons of our national legends--the gargoyle of +Rouen, the _gra-ouilli_ of Metz, the _chair sallée_ of Troyes, the +_drée_ of Montlhéry, the _tarasque_ of Tarascon--monsters of forms so +diverse, whose outlandish names are an additional attribute. All these +creations draw from their own nature that energetic and significant +expression before which antiquity seems sometimes to have recoiled. +Certain it is that the Greek Eumenides are much less horrible, and +consequently less _true_, than the witches in _Macbeth_. Pluto is not +the devil. + +In our opinion a most novel book might be written upon the employment +of the grotesque in the arts. One might point out the powerful +effects the moderns have obtained from that fruitful type, upon which +narrow-minded criticism continues to wage war even in our own day. +It may be that we shall be led by our subject to call attention in +passing to some features of this vast picture. We will simply say here +that, as a means of contrast with the sublime, the grotesque is, in +our view, the richest source that nature can offer art. Rubens so +understood it, doubtless, when it pleased him to introduce the hideous +features of a court dwarf amid his exhibitions of royal magnificence, +coronations and splendid ceremonial. The universal beauty which the +ancients solemnly laid upon everything, is not without monotony; the +same impression repeated again and again may prove fatiguing at last. +Sublime upon sublime scarcely presents a contrast, and we need a +little rest from everything, even the beautiful. On the other +hand, the grotesque seems to be a halting-place, a mean term, a +starting-point whence one rises toward the beautiful with a +fresher and keener perception. The salamander gives relief to the +water-sprite; the gnome heightens the charm of the sylph. + +And it would be true also to say that contact with the abnormal +has imparted to the modern sublime a something purer, grander, more +sublime, in short, than the beautiful of the ancients; and that is as +it should be. When art is consistent with itself, it guides everything +more surely to its goal. If the Homeric Elysium is a long, long way +from the ethereal charm, the angelic pleasureableness of Milton's +Paradise, it is because under Eden there is a hell far more terrible +than the heathen Tartarus. Do you think that Francesca da Rimini and +Beatrice would be so enchanting in a poet who should not confine us in +the Tower of Hunger and compel us to share Ugolino's revolting repast? +Dante would have less charm, if he had less power. Have the fleshly +naiads, the muscular Tritons, the wanton Zephyrs, the diaphanous +transparency of our water-sprites and sylphs? Is it not because the +modern imagination does not fear to picture the ghastly forms of +vampires, ogres, ghouls, snake-charmers and jinns prowling about +graveyards, that it can give to its fairies that incorporeal shape, +that purity of essence, of which the heathen nymphs fall so far short? +The antique Venus is beautiful, admirable, no doubt; but what has +imparted to Jean Goujon's faces that weird, tender, ethereal delicacy? +What has given them that unfamiliar suggestion of life and grandeur, +if not the proximity of the rough and powerful sculptures of the +Middle Ages? + +If the thread of our argument has not been broken in the reader's mind +by these necessary digressions--- which in truth, might be developed +much further--he has realized, doubtless, how powerfully the +grotesque--that germ of comedy, fostered by the modern muse--grew in +extent and importance as soon as it was transplanted to a soil more +propitious than paganism and the Epic. In truth, in the new poetry, +while the sublime represents the soul as it is, purified by Christian +morality, the grotesque plays the part of the human beast. The former +type, delivered of all impure alloy, has as its attributes all the +charms, all the graces, all the beauties; it must be able some day +to create Juliet, Desdemona, Ophelia. The latter assumes all the +absurdities, all the infirmities, all the blemishes. In this partition +of mankind and of creation, to it fall the passions, vices, crimes; +it is sensuous, fawning, greedy, miserly, false, incoherent, +hypocritical; it is, in turn, Iago, Tartuffe, Basile, Polonius, +Harpagon, Bartholo, Falstaff, Scapin, Figaro. The beautiful has but +one type, the ugly has a thousand. The fact is that the beautiful, +humanly speaking, is merely form considered in its simplest aspect +in its most perfect symmetry, in its most entire harmony with our +make-up. Thus the _ensemble_ that it offers us is always complete, but +restricted like ourselves. What we call the ugly, on the contrary, is +a detail of a great whole which eludes us, and which is in harmony, +not with man but with all creation. That is why it constantly presents +itself to us in new but incomplete aspects. + +It is interesting to study the first appearance and the progress +of the grotesque in modern times. At first, it is an invasion, an +irruption, an overflow, as of a torrent that has burst its banks. It +rushes through the expiring Latin literature, imparts some coloring to +Persius, Petronius and Juvenal, and leaves behind it the _Golden Ass_ +of Apuleius. Thence it diffuses itself through the imaginations of the +new nations that are remodelling Europe. It abounds in the work of +the fabulists, the chroniclers, the romancists. We see it make its way +from the South to the North. It disports itself in the dreams of the +Teutonic nations, and at the same time vivifies with its breath +the admirable Spanish _romanceros_, a veritable Iliad of the age of +chivalry. For example, it is the grotesque which describes thus, +in the _Roman de la Rose_, an august ceremonial, the election of a +king:-- + + "A long-shanked knave they chose, I wis, + Of all their men the boniest." + +More especially it imposes its characteristic qualities upon that +wonderful architecture which, in the Middle Ages, takes the place of +all the arts. It affixes its mark on the façades of cathedrals, frames +its hells and purgatories in the ogive arches of great doorways, +portrays them in brilliant hues on window-glass, exhibits its +monsters, its bull-dogs, its imps about capitals, along friezes, on +the edges of roofs. It flaunts itself in numberless shapes on the +wooden façades of houses, on the stone façades of châteaux, on the +marble façades of palaces. From the arts it makes its way into the +national manners, and while it stirs applause from the people for the +_graciosos_ of comedy, it gives to the kings court-jesters. Later, +in the age of etiquette, it will show us Scarron on the very edge of +Louis the Fourteenth's bed. Meanwhile it decorates coats of-arms, and +draws upon knight, shields the symbolic hieroglyphs of feudalism. +From the manners, it makes its way into the laws, numberless strange +customs at test its passage through the institutions of the Middle +Ages. Just as it represented Thespis, smeared with wine-lees, leaping +in her tomb it dances with the _Basoche_ on the famous marble table +which served at the same time as a stage for the popular farces and +for the royal banquets. Finally, having made its way into the arts, +the manners, and the laws, it enters even the Church. In every +Catholic city we see it organizing some one of those curious +ceremonies, those strange processions, wherein religion is attended by +all varieties of superstition--the sublime attended by all the forms +of the grotesque. To paint it in one stroke, so great is its vigour, +its energy, its creative sap, at the dawn of letters, that it casts, +at the outset, upon the threshold of modern poetry, three burlesque +Homers: Ariosto in Italy, Cervantes in Spain, Rabelais in France. + +It would be mere surplusage to dwell further upon the influence of +the grotesque in the third civilization. Every thing tends to show its +close creative alliance with the beautiful in the so called "romantic" +period. Even among the simplest popular legends there are none which +do not somewhere, with an admirable instinct, solve this mystery of +modern art. Antiquity could not have produced _Beauty and the Beast_. + +It is true that at the period at which we have arrived the +predominance of the grotesque over the sublime in literature is +clearly indicated. But it is a spasm of reaction, an eager thirst for +novelty, which is but temporary, it is an initial wave which gradually +recedes. The type of the beautiful will soon resume its rights and its +role, which is not to exclude the other principle, but to prevail over +it. It is time that the grotesque should be content with a corner +of the picture in Murillo's loyal frescoes, in the sacred pages of +Veronese, content to be introduced in two marvellous _Last Judgments_, +in which art will take a just pride, in the scene of fascination and +horror with which Michelangelo will embellish the Vatican, in those +awe-inspiring represervations of the fall of man which Rubens will +throw upon the arches of the Cathedral of Antwerp. The time has come +when the balance between the two principles is to be established. A +man, a poet-king, _poeta soverano_, as Dante calls Homer, is about +to adjust everything. The two rival genii combine their flames, and +thence issues Shakespeare. + +We have now reached the poetic culmination of modern times. +Shakespeare is the drama; and the drama, which with the same breath +moulds the grotesque and the sublime, the terrible and the absurd, +tragedy and comedy--the drama is the distinguishing characteristic of +the third epoch of poetry, of the literature of the present day. + +Thus, to sum up hurriedly the facts that we have noted thus far, +poetry has three periods, each of which corresponds to an epoch of +civilization: the ode, the epic, and the drama. Primitive times are +lyrical, ancient times epical, modern times dramatic. The ode sings +of eternity, the epic imparts solemnity to history, the drama depicts +life. The characteristic of the first poetry is ingenuousness, of +the second, simplicity, of the third, truth. The rhapsodists mark the +transition from the lyric to the epic poets, as do the romancists that +from the lyric to the dramatic poets. Historians appear in the second +period, chroniclers and critics in the third. The characters of +the ode are colossi--Adam, Cain, Noah; those of the epic are +giants--Achilles, Atreus, Orestes; those of the drama are men--Hamlet, +Macbeth, Othello. The ode lives upon the ideal, the epic upon the +grandiose, the drama upon the real. Lastly, this threefold poetry +flows from three great sources--The Bible, Homer, Shakespeare. + +Such then--and we confine ourselves herein to noting a single +result--such are the diverse aspects of thought in the different +epochs of mankind and of civilization. Such are its three faces, in +youth, in manhood, in old age. Whether one examines one literature by +itself or all literatures _en masse,_ one will always reach the same +result: the lyric poets before the epic poets, the epic poets before +the dramatic poets. In France, Malherbe before Chapelain, Chapelain +before Corneille; in ancient Greece, Orpheus before Homer, Homer +before Æschylus; in the first of all books, _Genesis_ before _Kings, +Kings_ before _Job_; or to come back to that monumental scale of all +ages of poetry, which we ran over a moment since, The Bible before the +_Iliad_, the _Iliad_ before Shakespeare. + +In a word, civilization begins by singing of its dreams, then narrates +its doings, and, lastly, sets about describing what it thinks. It is, +let us say in passing, because of this last, that the drama, combining +the most opposed qualities, may be at the same time full of profundity +and full of relief, philosophical and picturesque. + +It would be logical to add here that everything in nature and in +life passes through these three phases, the lyric, the epic, and the +dramatic, because everything is born, acts, and dies. If it were not +absurd to confound the fantastic conceits of the imagination with the +stern deductions of the reasoning faculty, a poet might say that the +rising of the sun, for example, is a hymn, noon-day a brilliant epic, +and sunset a gloomy drama wherein day and night, life and death, +contend for mastery. But that would be poetry--folly, perhaps--- and +_what does it prove_? + +Let us hold to the facts marshalled above; let us supplement them, +too, by an important observation, namely that we have in no wise +pretended to assign exclusive limits to the three epochs of poetry, +but simply to set forth their predominant characteristics. The Bible, +that divine lyric monument, contains in germ, as we suggested a moment +ago, an epic and a drama--_-Kings_ and _Job_. In the Homeric poems +one is conscious of a clinging reminiscence of lyric poetry and of a +beginning of dramatic poetry. Ode and drama meet in the epic. There is +a touch of all in each; but in each there exists a generative element +to which all the other elements give place, and which imposes its own +character upon the whole. + +The drama is complete poetry. The ode and the epic contain it only +in germ; it contains both of them in a state of high development, and +epitomizes both. Surely, he who said: "The French have not the epic +brain," said a true and clever thing; if he had said, "The moderns," +the clever remark would have been profound. It is beyond question, +however, that there is epic genius in that marvellous _Athalie,_ so +exalted and so simple in its sublimity that the royal century was +unable to comprehend it. It is certain, too, that the series of +Shakespeare's chronicle dramas presents a grand epic aspect. But it is +lyric poetry above all that befits the drama; it never embarrasses +it, adapts itself to all its caprices, disports itself in all forms, +sometimes sublime as in Ariel, sometimes grotesque as in Caliban. Our +era being above all else dramatic, is for that very reason eminently +lyric. There is more than one connection between the beginning and the +end; the sunset has some features of the sunrise; the old man becomes +a child once more. But this second childhood is not like the first; +it is as melancholy as the other is joyous. It is the same with lyric +poetry. Dazzling, dreamy, at the dawn of civilization it reappears, +solemn and pensive, at its decline. The Bible opens joyously with +_Genesis_ and comes to a close with the threatening _Apocalypse_. The +modern ode is still inspired, but is no longer ignorant. It meditates +more than it scrutinizes; its musing is melancholy. We see, by its +painful labour, that the muse has taken the drama for her mate. + +To make clear by a metaphor the ideas that we have ventured to put +forth, we will compare early lyric poetry to a placid lake which +reflects the clouds and stars; the epic is the stream which flows from +the lake, and rushes on, reflecting its banks, forests, fields and +cities, until it throws itself into the ocean of the drama. Like the +lake, the drama reflects the sky; like the stream, it reflects its +banks; but it alone has tempests and measureless depths. + +The drama, then, is the goal to which everything in modern poetry +leads. _Paradise Lost_ is a drama before it is an epic. As we know, it +first presented itself to the poet's imagination in the first of these +forms, and as a drama it always remains in the reader's memory, so +prominent is the old dramatic framework still beneath Milton's epic +structure! When Dante had finished his terrible _Inferno_, when he had +closed its doors and nought remained save to give his work a name, the +unerring instinct of his genius showed him that that multiform poem +was an emanation of the drama, not of the epic; and on the front +of that gigantic monument, he wrote with his pen of bronze: _Divina +Commedia._ + +Thus we see that the only two poets of modern times who are of +Shakespeare's stature follow him in unity of design. They coincide with +him in imparting a dramatic tinge to all our poetry, like him, they +blend the grotesque with the sublime, and, far from standing +by themselves in the great literary _ensemble_ that rests upon +Shakespeare, Dante and Milton are, in some sort, the two supporting +abutments of the edifice of which he is the central pillar, the +buttresses of the arch of which he is the keystone. + +Permit us, at this point, to recur to certain ideas already suggested, +which, however, it is necessary to emphasize. We have arrived, and now +we must set out again. + +On the day when Christianity said to man "Thou art twofold, thou art +made up of two beings, one perishable, the other immortal, one carnal, +the other ethereal, one enslaved by appetites, cravings and passions, +the other borne aloft on the wings of enthusiasm and reverie--in a +word, the one always stooping toward the earth, its mother, the other +always darting up toward heaven, its fatherland"--on that day the +drama was created. Is it in truth, anything other than that contrast +of every day, that struggle of every moment, between two opposing +principles which are ever face to face in life, and which dispute +possession of man from the cradle to the tomb? + +The poetry born of Christianity, the poetry of our time, is, +therefore, the drama, the real results from the wholly natural +combination of two types, the sublime and the grotesque, which meet +in the drama, as they meet in life and in creation. For true poetry, +complete poetry, consists in the harmony of contraries. Hence, it is +time to say aloud--and it is here above all that exceptions prove the +rule--that everything that exists in nature exists in art. + +On taking one's stand at this point of view, to pass judgment on +our petty conventional rules, to disentangle all those scholastic +labyrinths, to solve all those trivial problems which the critics of +the last two centuries have laboriously built up about the art, one is +struck by the promptitude with which the question of the modern stage +is made clear and distinct. The drama has but to take a step to +break all the spider's webs with which the militia of Lilliput have +attempted to fetter its sleep. + +And so, let addle-pated pedants (one does not exclude the other) claim +that the deformed, the ugly, the grotesque should never be imitated +in art; one replies that the grotesque is comedy, and that comedy +apparently makes a part of art. Tartuffe is not handsome, Pourceaugnac +is not noble, but Pourceaugnac and Tartuffe are admirable flashes of +art. + +If, driven back from this entrenchment to their second line of +custom-houses, they renew their prohibition of the grotesque coupled +with the sublime, of comedy melted into tragedy, we prove to them +that, in the poetry of Christian nations, the first of these two types +represents the human beast, the second the soul. These two stalks of +art, if we prevent their branches from mingling, if we persistently +separate them, will produce by way of fruit, on the one hand abstract +vices and absurdities, on the other, abstract crime, heroism and +virtue. The two types, thus isolated and left to themselves, will go +each its own way, leaving the real between them, at the left hand of +one, at the right hand of the other. Whence it follows that after +all these abstractions there will remain something to represent--man; +after these tragedies and comedies, something to create--the drama. + +In the drama, as it may be conceived at least, if not executed, all +things are connected and follow one another as in real life. The +body plays its part no less than the mind; and men and events, set +in motion by this twofold agent, pass across the stage, burlesque and +terrible in turn, and sometimes both at once. Thus the judge will say: +"Off with his head and let us go to dinner!" Thus the Roman Senate +will deliberate over Domitian's turbot. Thus Socrates, drinking the +hemlock and discoursing on the immortal soul and the only God, +will interrupt himself to suggest that a cook be sacrificed to +_Æsculapius_. Thus Elizabeth will swear and talk Latin. Thus Richelieu +will submit to Joseph the Capuchin, and Louis XI to his barber, Maître +Olivier le Diable. Thus Cromwell will say: "I have Parliament in my +bag and the King in my pocket"; or, with the hand that signed the +death sentence of Charles the First, smear with ink the face of a +regicide who smilingly returns the compliment. Thus Cæsar, in his +triumphal car, will be afraid of overturning. For men of genius, +however great they be, have always within them a touch of the beast +which mocks at their intelligence. Therein they are akin to mankind +in general, for therein they are dramatic. "It is but a step from the +sublime to the ridiculous," said Napoleon, when he was convinced that +he was mere man; and that outburst of a soul on fire illumines art and +history at once; that cry of anguish is the résumé of the drama and of +life. + +It is a striking fact that all these contrasts are met with in the +poets themselves, taken as men. By dint of meditating upon existence, +of laying stress upon its bitter irony, of pouring floods of sarcasm +and raillery upon our infirmities, the very men who make us laugh so +heartily become profoundly sad. These Democrituses are Heraclituses as +well. Beaumarchais was surly, Molière gloomy, Shakespeare melancholy. + +The fact is, then, that the grotesque is one of the supreme beauties +of the drama. It is not simply an appropriate element of it, but is +oftentimes a necessity. Sometimes it appears in homogeneous masses, in +entire characters, as Daudin, Prusias, Trissotin, Brid'oison, Juliet's +nurse; sometimes impregnated with terror, as Richard III, Bégears, +Tartuffe, Mephistopheles; sometimes, too, with a veil of grace and +refinement, as Figaro, Osric, Mercutio, Don Juan. It finds its way +in everywhere; for just as the most commonplace have their occasional +moments of sublimity, so the most exalted frequently pay tribute +to the trivial and ridiculous. Thus, often impalpable, often +imperceptible, it is always present on the stage, even when it says +nothing, even when it keeps out of sight. Thanks to it, there is no +thought of monotony. Sometimes it injects laughter, sometimes horror, +into tragedy. It will bring Romeo face to face with the apothecary, +Macbeth with the witches, Hamlet with the grave-diggers. Sometimes +it may, without discord, as in the scene between King Lear and his +jester, mingle its shrill voice with the most sublime, the most +dismal, the dreamiest music of the soul. + +That is what Shakespeare alone among all has succeeded in doing, in +a fashion of his own, which it would be no less fruitless than +impossible to imitate--Shakespeare, the god of the stage, in whom, +as in a trinity, the three characteristic geniuses of our stage, +Corneille, Molière, Beaumarchais, seem united. + +We see how quickly the arbitrary distinction between the species of +poetry vanishes before common sense and taste. No less easily one +might demolish the alleged rule of the two unities. We say _two_ and +not _three_ unities, because unity of plot or of _ensemble_, the only +true and well founded one, was long ago removed from the sphere of +discussion. + +Distinguished contemporaries, foreigners and Frenchmen, have already +attacked, both in theory and in practice that fundamental law of the +pseudo-Aristotelian code. Indeed, the combat was not likely to be a +long one. At the first blow it cracked, so worm eaten was that timber +of the old scholastic hovel! + +The strange thing is that the slaves of routine pretend to rest their +rule of the two unities on probability, whereas reality is the very +thing that destroys it. Indeed, what could be more improbable and +absurd than this porch or peristyle or ante-chamber--vulgar places +where our tragedies are obliging enough to develop themselves; whither +conspirators come, no one knows whence, to declaim against the tyrant, +and the tyrant to declaim against the conspirators, each in turn, as +if they had said to one another in bucolic phrase-- + + Alternis cantemus, amant alterna Camenæ. + +Where did anyone ever see a porch or peristyle of that sort? +What could be more opposed--we will not say to the truth, for the +scholastics hold it very cheap, but to probability? The result is that +everything that is too characteristic, too intimate, too local, to +happen in the ante chamber or on the street-corner--that is to say, +the whole drama--takes place in the wings. We see on the stage only +the elbows of the plot, so to speak; its hands are somewhere +else. Instead of scenes we have narrative, instead of tableaux, +descriptions. Solemn-faced characters, placed, as in the old chorus, +between the drama and ourselves, tell us what is going on in the +temple, in the palace, on the public square, until we are tempted many +a time to call out to them: "Indeed! then take us there! It must be +very entertaining--a fine sight!" To which they would reply no doubt: +"It is quite possible that it might entertain or interest you, but +that isn't the question; we are the guardians of the dignity of the +French Melpomene." And there you are! + +"But," someone will say, "this rule that you discard is borrowed from +the Greek drama." Wherein, pray, do the Greek stage and drama resemble +our stage and drama? Moreover, we have already shown that the vast +extent of the ancient stage enabled it to include a whole locality, +so that the poet could, according to the exigencies of the plot, +transport it at his pleasure from one part of the stage to another, +which is practically equivalent to a change of stage-setting. Curious +contradiction! the Greek theatre, restricted as it was to a national +and religious object, was much more free than ours, whose only +object is the enjoyment, and, if you please, the instruction, of the +spectator. The reason is that the one obeys only the laws that +are suited to it, while the other takes upon itself conditions +of existence which are absolutely foreign to its essence. One is +artistic, the other artificial. + +People are beginning to understand in our day that exact localization +is one of the first elements of reality. The speaking or acting +characters are not the only ones who engrave on the minds of the +spectators a faithful representation of the facts. The place where +this or that catastrophe took place becomes a terrible and inseparable +witness thereof; and the absence of silent characters of this sort +would make the greatest scenes of history incomplete in the drama. +Would the poet dare to murder Rizzio elsewhere than in Mary Stuart's +chamber? to stab Henri IV elsewhere than in Rue de la Ferronerie, all +blocked with drays and carriages? to burn Jeanne d'Arc elsewhere than +in the Vieux-Marché? to despatch the Duc de Guise elsewhere than in +that chateau of Blois where his ambition roused a popular assemblage +to frenzy? to behead Charles I and Louis XVI elsewhere than in those +ill-omened localities whence Whitehall or the Tuileries may be seen, +as if their scaffolds were appurtenances of their palaces? + +Unity of time rests on no firmer foundation than unity of place. A +plot forcibly confined within twenty-four hours is as absurd as one +confined within a peristyle. Every plot has its proper duration as +well as its appropriate place. Think of administering the same dose +of time to all events! of applying the same measure to everything! You +would laugh at a cobbler who should attempt to put the same shoe on +every foot. To cross unity of time and unity of place like the bars +of a cage, and pedantically to introduce therein, in the name of +Aristotle, all the deeds, all the nations, all the figures which +Providence sets before us in such vast numbers in real life,--to +proceed thus is to mutilate men and things, to cause history to +make wry faces. Let us say, rather, that everything will die in the +operation, and so the dogmatic mutilators reach their ordinary result: +what was alive in the chronicles is dead in tragedy. That is why the +cage of the unities often contains only a skeleton. + +And then, if twenty-four hours can be comprised in two, it is a +logical consequence that four hours may contain forty-eight. Thus +Shakespeare's unity must be different from Corneille's. 'Tis pity! + +But these are the wretched quibbles with which mediocrity, envy and +routine has pestered genius for two centuries past! By such means the +flight of our greatest poets has been cut short. Their wings have been +clipped with the scissors of the unities. And what has been given us +in exchange for the eagle feathers stolen from Corneille and Racine? +Campistron. + +We imagine that someone may say: "There is something in too frequent +changes of scene which confuses and fatigues the spectator, and which +produces a bewildering effect on his attention; it may be, too, that +manifold transitions from place to place, from one time to another +time, demand explanations which repel the attention; one should +also avoid leaving, in the midst of a plot, gaps which prevent the +different parts of the drama from adhering closely to one another, and +which, moreover, puzzle the spectator because he does not know what +there may be in those gaps." But these are precisely the difficulties +which art has to meet. These are some of the obstacles peculiar to +one subject or another, as to which it would be impossible to pass +judgment once for all. It is for genius to overcome, not for treatises +or poetry to evade them. + +A final argument, taken from the very bowels of the art, would of +itself suffice to show the absurdity of the rule of the two unities. +It is the existence of the third unity, unity of plot--the only one +that is universally admitted, because it results from a fact: neither +the human eye nor the human mind can grasp more than one _ensemble_ at +one time. This one is as essential as the other two are useless. It +is the one which fixes the view-point of the drama; now, by that very +fact, it excludes the other two. There can no more be three unities in +the drama than three horizons in a picture. But let us be careful not +to confound unity with simplicity of plot. The former does not in +any way exclude the secondary plots on which the principal plot +may depend. It is necessary only that these parts, being skilfully +subordinated to the general plan, shall tend constantly toward the +central plot and group themselves about it at the various stages, or +rather on the various levels of the drama. Unity of plot is the stage +law of perspective. + +"But," the customs-officers of thought will cry, "great geniuses have +submitted to these rules which you spurn!" Unfortunately, yes. But +what would those admirable men have done if they had been left to +themselves? At all events they did not accept your chains without +a struggle. You should have seen how Pierre Corneille, worried and +harassed at his first step in the art on account of his marvellous +work, _Le Cid_, struggled under Mairet, Claveret, d'Aubignac and +Scudéri! How he denounced to posterity the violent attacks of those +men, who, he says, made themselves "all white with Aristotle!" You +should read how they said to him--and we quote from books of the +time: "Young man, you must learn before you teach; and unless one is +a Scaliger or a Heinsius that is intolerable!" Thereupon Corneille +rebels and asks if their purpose is to force him "much below +Claveret." Here Scudéri waxes indignant at such a display of pride, +and reminds the "thrice great author of _Le Cid_ of the modest words +in which Tasso, the greatest man of his age, began his apology for +the finest of his works against the bitterest and most unjust censure +perhaps that will ever be pronounced. M. Corneille," he adds, "shows +in his replies that he is as far removed from that author's moderation +as from his merit." The young man _so justly and gently reproved_ +dares to protest; thereupon Scudéri returns to the charge; he calls +to his assistance the _Eminent Academy;_ "Pronounce, O my Judges, a +decree worthy of your eminence, which will give all Europe to know +that _Le Cid_ is not the chef-d'oeuvre of the greatest man in France, +but the least judicious performance of M. Corneille himself. You are +bound to do it, both for your own private renown; and for that of +our people in general, who are concerned in this matter; inasmuch +as foreigners who may see this precious masterpiece--they who have +possessed a Tasso or a Guarini--might think that our greatest masters +were no more than apprentices." + +These few instructive lines contain the everlasting tactics of envious +routine against growing talent--tactics which are still followed in +our own day, and which, for example, added such a curious page to the +youthful essays of Lord Byron. Scudéri gives us its quintessence. In +like manner the earlier works of a man of genius are always preferred +to the newer ones, in order to prove that he is going down instead of +up--_Melite and La Galerie du Palais_ placed above _Le Cid_. And +the names of the dead are always thrown at the heads of the +living--Corneille stoned with Tasso and Guarini (Guarini!), as, later, +Racine will be stoned with Corneille, Voltaire with Racine, and as +to-day, everyone who shows signs of rising is stoned with Corneille, +Racine and Voltaire. These tactics, as will be seen, are well-worn; +but they must be effective as they are still in use. However, the poor +devil of a great man still breathed. Here we cannot help but admire +the way in which Scudéri, the bully of this tragic-comedy, forced to +the wall, blackguards and maltreats him, how pitilessly he unmasks +his classical artillery, how he shows the author of _Le Cid_ "what the +episodes should be, according to Aristotle, who tells us in the tenth +and sixteenth chapters of his _Poetics";_ how he crushes Corneille, in +the name of the same Aristotle "in the eleventh chapter of his _Art of +Poetry_, wherein we find the condemnation of _Le Cid_"; in the name +of Plato, "in the tenth book of his _Republic_"; in the name of +Marcellinus, "as may be seen in the twenty-seventh book"; in the name +of "the tragedies of Niobe and Jephthah"; in the name of the "_Ajax_ +of Sophocles"; in the name of "the example of Euripides"; in the name +of "Heinsius, chapter six of the _Constitution_ of _Tragedy_; and +the younger Scaliger in his poems"; and finally, in the name of the +Canonists and Jurisconsults, under the title "Nuptials." The first +arguments were addressed to the Academy, the last one was aimed at +the Cardinal. After the pin-pricks the blow with a club. A judge was +needed to decide the question. Chapelain gave judgment. Corneille saw +that he was doomed; the lion was muzzled, or, as was said at the time, +the crow (_Corneille_) was plucked. Now comes the painful side of this +grotesque performance: after he had been thus quenched at his first +flash, this genius, thoroughly modern, fed upon the Middle Ages and +Spain, being compelled to lie to himself and to hark back to ancient +times, drew for us that Castilian Rome, which is sublime beyond +question, but in which, except perhaps in _Nicomede_, which was so +ridiculed by the eighteenth century for its dignified and simple +colouring, we find neither the real Rome nor the true Corneille. + +Racine was treated to the same persecution, but did not make the same +resistance. Neither in his genius nor in his character was there any +of Corneille's lofty asperity. He submitted in silence and sacrificed +to the scorn of his time his enchanting elegy of _Esther_, his +magnificent epic, _Athalie_. So that we can but believe that, if he +had not been paralyzed as he was by the prejudices of his epoch, if +he had come in contact less frequently with the classic cramp-fish, +he would not have failed to introduce Locuste in his drama between +Narcisse and Neron, and above all things would not have relegated to +the wings the admirable scene of the banquet at which Seneca's pupil +poisons Britannicus in the cup of reconciliation. But can we demand +of the bird that he fly under the receiver of an air-pump? What a +multitude of beautiful scenes the _people of taste_ have cost us, from +Scudéri to La Harpe! A noble work might be composed of all that their +scorching breath has withered in its germ. However, our great poets +have found a way none the less to cause their genius to blaze forth +through all these obstacles. Often the attempt to confine them behind +walls of dogmas and rules is vain. Like the Hebrew giant they carry +their prison doors with them to the mountains. + +But still the same refrain is repeated, and will be, no doubt, for +a long while to come: "Follow the rules! Copy the models! It was the +rules that shaped the models." One moment! In that case there are two +sorts of models, those which are made according to the rules, and, +prior to them, those according to which the rules were made. Now, in +which of these two categories should genius seek a place for itself? +Although it is always disagreeable to come in contact with pedants, +is it not a thousand times better to give them lessons than to receive +lessons from them? And then--copy! Is the reflection equal to the +light? Is the satellite which travels unceasingly in the same circle +equal to the central creative planet? With all his poetry Virgil is no +more than the moon of Homer. + +And whom are we to copy, I pray to know? The ancients? We have just +shown that their stage has nothing in common with ours. Moreover, +Voltaire, who will have none of Shakespeare, will have none of the +Greeks, either. Let him tell us why: "The Greeks ventured to produce +scenes no less revolting to us. Hippolyte, crushed by his fall, +counts his wounds and utters doleful cries. Philoctetes falls in his +paroxysms of pain; black blood flows from his wound. Oedipus, covered +with the blood that still drops from the sockets of the eyes he has +torn out, complains bitterly of gods and men. We hear the shrieks +of Clytemnestra, murdered by her own son, and Electra, on the +stage, cries: 'Strike! spare her not! she did not spare our father,' +Prometheus is fastened to a rock by nails driven through his stomach +and his arms. The Furies reply to Clytemnestra's bleeding shade with +inarticulate roars. Art was in its infancy in the time of Æschylus as +it was in London in Shakespeare's time." + +Whom shall we copy, then? The moderns? What! Copy copies! God forbid! + +"But," someone else will object, "according to your conception of the +art, you seem to look for none but great poets, to count always upon +genius." Art certainly does not count upon mediocrity. It prescribes +no rules for it, it knows nothing of it; in fact, mediocrity has +no existence so far as art is concerned; art supplies wings, not +crutches. Alas! D'Aubignac followed rules, Campistron copied models. +What does it matter to art? It does not build its palaces for ants. It +lets them make their ant-hill, without taking the trouble to find out +whether they have built their burlesque imitation of its palace upon +its foundation. + +The critics of the scholastic school place their poets in a strange +position. On the one hand they cry incessantly: "Copy the models!" +On the other hand they have a habit of declaring that "the models are +inimitable"! Now, if their craftsman, by dint of hard work, succeeds +in forcing through this dangerous defile some colourless tracing +of the masters, these ungrateful wretches, after examining the new +_refaccimiento_, exclaim sometimes: "This doesn't resemble anything!" +and sometimes: "This resembles everything!" And by virtue of a logic +made for the occasion each of these formulæ is a criticism. + +Let us then speak boldly. The time for it has come, and it would be +strange if, in this age, liberty, like the light, should penetrate +everywhere except to the one place where freedom is most natural--the +domain of thought. Let us take the hammer to theories and poetic +systems. Let us throw down the old plastering that conceals the facade +of art. There are neither rules nor models; or, rather, there are +no other rules than the general laws of nature, which soar above +the whole field of art, and the special rules which result from the +conditions appropriate to the subject of each composition. The +former are of the essence, eternal, and do not change; the latter +are variable, external, and are used but once. The former are the +framework that supports the house; the latter the scaffolding which +is used in building it, and which is made anew for each building. In a +word, the former are the flesh and bones, the latter the clothing, of +the drama. But these rules are not written in the treatises on poetry. +Richelet has no idea of their existence. Genius, which divines rather +than learns, devises for each work the general rules from the general +plan of things, the special rules from the separate _ensemble_ of the +subject treated; not after the manner of the chemist, who lights the +fire under his furnace, heats his crucible, analyzes and destroys; but +after the manner of the bee, which flies on its golden wings, lights +on each flower and extracts its honey, leaving it as brilliant and +fragrant as before. + +The poet--let us insist on this point--should take counsel therefore +only of nature, truth, and inspiration which is itself both truth and +nature. "Quando he," says Lope de Vega, + + "Quando he de escrivir una comedia, + Encierro los preceptos con seis llaves." + +To secure these precepts "six keys" are none too many, in very +truth. Let the poet beware especially of copying anything +whatsoever--Shakespeare no more than Molière, Schiller no more than +Corneille. If genuine talent could abdicate its own nature in this +matter, and thus lay aside its original personality, to transform +itself into another, it would lose everything by playing this role of +its own double. It is as if a god should turn valet. We must draw our +inspiration from the original sources. It is the same sap, distributed +through the soil, that produces all the trees of the forest, so +different in bearing power, in fruit, in foliage. It is the same +nature that fertilizes and nourishes the most diverse geniuses. The +poet is a tree that may be blown about by all winds and watered by +every fall of dew; and bears his works as his fruit, as the _fablier_ +of old bore his fables. Why attach one's self to a master, or graft +one's self upon a model? It were better to be a bramble or a thistle, +fed by the same earth as the cedar and the palm, than the fungus +or the lichen of those noble trees. The bramble lives, the fungus +vegetates. Moreover, however great the cedar and the palm may be, +it is not with the sap one sucks from them that one can become great +one's self. A giant's parasite will be at best a dwarf. The oak, +colossus that it is, can produce and sustain nothing more than the +mistletoe. + +Let there be no misunderstanding: if some of our poets have succeeded +in being great, even when copying, it is because, while forming +themselves on the antique model, they have often listened to the +voice of nature and to their own genius--it is because they have been +themselves in some one respect. Their branches became entangled in +those of the near-by tree, but their roots were buried deep in the +soil of art. They were the ivy, not the mistletoe. Then came imitators +of the second rank, who, having neither roots in the earth, nor genius +in their souls, had to confine themselves to imitation. As Charles +Nodier says: "After the school of Athens, the school of Alexandria." +Then there was a deluge of mediocrity; then there came a swarm of +those treatises on poetry, so annoying to true talent, so convenient +for mediocrity. We were told that everything was done, and God was +forbidden to create more Molières or Corneilles. Memory was put +in place of imagination. Imagination itself was subjected to +hard-and-fast rules, and aphorisms were made about it: "To imagine," +says La Harpe, with his naive assurance, "is in substance to remember, +that is all." + +But nature! Nature and truth!--And here, in order to prove that, far +from demolishing art, the new ideas aim only to reconstruct it +more firmly and on a better foundation, let us try to point out the +impassable limit which in our opinion, separates reality according to +art from reality according to nature. It is careless to confuse them +as some ill-informed partisans of _romanticism_ do. Truth in art +cannot possibly be, as several writers have claimed, _absolute_ +reality. Art cannot produce the thing itself. Let us imagine, for +example, one of those unreflecting promoters of absolute nature, of +nature viewed apart from art, at the performance of a romantic play, +say _Le Cid_. "What's that?" he will ask at the first word. "The Cid +speaks in verse? It isn't _natural_ to speak in verse."--"How would +you have him speak, pray?"--"In prose." Very good. A moment later, +"How's this!" he will continue, if he is consistent; "the Cid is +speaking French!"--"Well?"--"Nature demands that he speak his own +language; he can't speak anything but Spanish." + +We shall fail entirely to understand, but again--very good. You +imagine that this is all? By no means: before the tenth sentence in +Castilian, he is certain to rise and ask if the Cid who is speaking is +the real Cid, in flesh and blood. By what right does the actor, whose +name is Pierre or Jacques, take the name of the Cid? That is _false_. +There is no reason why he should not go on to demand that the sun +should be substituted for the footlights, _real_ trees and _real_ +houses for those deceitful wings. For, once started on that road, +logic has you by the collar, and you cannot stop. + +We must admit, therefore, or confess ourselves ridiculous, that the +domains of art and of nature are entirely distinct. Nature and art are +two things--were it not so, one or the other would not exist. Art, in +addition to its idealistic side, has a terrestrial, material side. Let +it do what it will, it is shut in between grammar and prosody, between +Vaugelas and Richelet. For its most capricious creations, it has +formulas, methods of execution, a complete apparatus to set in motion. +For genius there are delicate instruments, for mediocrity, tools. + +It seems to us that someone has already said that the drama is a +mirror wherein nature is reflected. But if it be an ordinary mirror, +a smooth and polished surface, it will give only a dull image of +objects, with no relief-faithful, but colourless; everyone knows +that colour and light are lost in a simple reflection. The drama, +therefore, must be a concentrating mirror, which, instead of +weakening, concentrates and condenses the coloured rays, which makes +of a mere gleam a light, and of a light a flame. Then only is the +drama acknowledged by art. + +The stage is an optical point. Everything that exists in the world--in +history, in life, in man--should be and can be reflected therein, +but under the magic wand of art. Art turns the leaves of the ages, +of nature, studies chronicles, strives to reproduce actual facts +(especially in respect to manners and peculiarities, which are much +less exposed to doubt and contradiction than are concrete facts), +restores what the chroniclers have lopped off, harmonises what they +have collected, divines and supplies their omissions, fills their gaps +with imaginary scenes which have the colour of the time, groups what +they have left scattered about, sets in motion anew the threads of +Providence which work the human marionettes, clothes the whole with a +form at once poetical and natural, and imparts to it that vitality of +truth and brilliancy which gives birth to illusion, that prestige of +reality which arouses the enthusiasm of the spectator, and of the poet +first of all, for the poet is sincere. Thus the aim of art is almost +divine: to bring to life again if it is writing history, to create if +it is writing poetry. + +It is a grand and beautiful sight to see this broad development of a +drama wherein art powerfully seconds nature; of a drama wherein the +plot moves on to the conclusion with a firm and unembarrassed step, +without diffuseness and without undue compression; of a drama, in +short, wherein the poet abundantly fulfills the multifold object +of art, which is to open to the spectator a double prospect, to +illuminate at the same time the interior and the exterior of mankind: +the exterior by their speech and their acts, the interior, by asides +and monologues; to bring together, in a word, in the same picture, the +drama of life and the drama of conscience. + +It will readily be imagined that, for a work of this kind, if the poet +must _choose_ (and he must), he should choose, not the _beautiful_, +but the _characteristic_. Not that it is advisable to "make local +colour," as they say to-day; that is, to add as an afterthought a few +discordant touches here and there to a work that is at best utterly +conventional and false. The local colour should not be on the surface +of the drama, but in its substance, in the very heart of the work, +whence it spreads of itself, naturally, evenly, and, so to speak, into +every corner of the drama, as the sap ascends from the root to the +tree's topmost leaf. The drama should be thoroughly impregnated with +this colour of the time, which should be, in some sort, in the air, +so that one detects it only on entering the theatre, and that on going +forth one finds one's self in a different period and atmosphere. It +requires some study, some labour, to attain this end; so much the +better. It is well that the avenues of art should be obstructed by +those brambles from which everybody recoils except those of +powerful will. Besides, it is this very study, fostered by an ardent +inspiration, which will ensure the drama against a vice that +kills it--the _commonplace_. To be commonplace is the failing of +short-sighted, short-breathed poets. In this tableau of the stage, +each figure must be held down to its most prominent, most individual, +most precisely defined characteristic. Even the vulgar and the trivial +should have an accent of their own. Like God, the true poet is present +in every part of his work at once. Genius resembles the die which +stamps the king's effigy on copper and golden coins alike. + +We do not hesitate--and this will demonstrate once more to honest men +how far we are from seeking to discredit the art--we do not hesitate +to consider verse as one of the means best adapted to protect the +drama from the scourge we have just mentioned, as one of the most +powerful dams against the irruption of the commonplace, which, like +democracy, is always flowing between full banks in men's minds. And at +this point we beg the younger literary generation, already so rich +in men and in works, to allow us to point out an error into which it +seems to have fallen--an error too fully justified, indeed, by the +extraordinary aberrations of the old school. The new century is at +that growing age at which one can readily set one's self right. + +There has appeared of late, like a penultimate branching-out of the +old classical trunk, or, better still, like one of those excrescences, +those polypi, which decrepitude develops, and which are a sign of +decomposition much more than a proof of life--there has appeared a +strange school of dramatic poetry. This school seems to us to have had +for its master and its fountain-head the poet who marks the transition +from the eighteenth to the nineteenth century, the man of wearisome +description and periphrases--that Delille who, they say, toward +the close of his life, boasted, after the fashion of the Homeric +catalogues, of having _made_ twelve camels, four dogs, three +horses, including Job's, six tigers, two cats, a chess-board, a +backgammon-board, a checker-board, a billiard-table, several winters, +many summers, a multitude of springs, fifty sunsets, and so many +daybreaks that he had lost count of them. + +Now, Delille went into tragedy. He is the father (he, and not Racine, +God save the mark!) of an alleged school of refinement and taste which +flourished until recently. Tragedy is not to this school what it was +to Will Shakespeare, say, a source of emotions of every sort, but a +convenient frame for the solution of a multitude of petty descriptive +problems which it propounds as it goes along. This muse, far from +spurning, as the true French classic school does, the trivial and +degrading things of life, eagerly seeks them out and brings them +together. The grotesque, shunned as undesirable company by the tragedy +of Louis the Fourteenth's day, cannot pass unnoticed before her. +_It must be described_, that is to say, ennobled. A scene in the +guard-house, a popular uprising, the fish-market, the galleys, the +wine-shop, the _poule au pot_ of Henri Quatre, are treasure-trove in +her eyes. She seizes upon this canaille, washes it clean, and sews her +tinsel and spangles over its villainies; _purpureus assuitur pannus_. +Her object seems to be to deliver patents of nobility to all these +_roturiers_ of the drama; and each of these patents under the great +seal is a speech. + +This muse, as may be imagined, is of a rare prudery. Wonted as she +is to the caresses of periphrasis, plain-speaking, if she should +occasionally be exposed to it, would horrify her. It does not accord +with her dignity to speak naturally. She _underlines_ old Corneille +for his blunt way of speaking, as in,-- + + "_A heap of men_ ruined by debt and crimes." + + "Chimène, _who'd have thought it_? Rodrigue, _who'd have said + it_?" + + "When their Flaminius _haggled with_ Hannibal." + + "Oh! do not _embroil_ me with the Republic." + +She still has her "Tout beau, monsieur!" on her heart. And it +needed many "seigneurs" and "madames" to procure forgiveness for our +admirable Racine for his monosyllabic "dogs!" and for so brutally +bestowing Claudius in Agrippina's bed. + +This Melpomene, as she is called, would shudder at the thought of +touching a chronicle. She leaves to the costumer the duty of learning +the period of the dramas she writes. In her eyes history is bad form +and bad taste. How, for example, can one tolerate kings and queens +who swear? They must be elevated from mere regal dignity to tragic +dignity. It was in a promotion of this sort that she exalted Henri IV. +It was thus that the people's king, purified by M. Legouvé, found +his "ventre-saint-gris" ignominiously banished from his mouth by +two sentences, and that he was reduced, like the girl in the old +_fabliau_, to the necessity of letting fall from those royal lips only +pearls and sapphires and rubies: the apotheosis of falsity, in very +truth. + +The fact is that nothing is so commonplace as this conventional +refinement and nobility. Nothing original, no imagination, +no invention in this style; simply what one has seen +everywhere--rhetoric, bombast, commonplaces, flowers of college +eloquence, poetry after the style of Latin verses. The poets of this +school are eloquent after the manner of stage princes and princesses, +always sure of finding in the costumer's labelled cases, cloaks and +pinchbeck crowns, which have no other disadvantage than that of having +been used by everybody. If these poets never turn the leaves of the +Bible, it is not because they have not a bulky book of their own, the +_Dictionnaire de rimes_. That is the source of their poetry--_fontes +aquarum_. + +It will be seen that, in all this, nature and truth get along as best +they can. It would be great good luck if any remnants of either should +survive in this cataclysm of false art, false style, false poetry. +This is what has caused the errors of several of our distinguished +reformers. Disgusted by the stiffness, the ostentation, the _pomposo_, +of this alleged dramatic poetry, they have concluded that the elements +of our poetic language were incompatible with the natural and the +true. The Alexandrine had wearied them so often, that they condemned +it without giving it a hearing, so to speak, and decided, a little +hastily, perhaps, that the drama should be written in prose. + +They were mistaken. If in fact the false is predominant in the style +as well as in the action of certain French tragedies, it is not the +verses that should be held responsible therefore, but the versifiers. +It was needful to condemn, not the form employed, but those who +employed it: the workmen, not the tool. + +To convince one's self how few obstacles the nature of our poetry +places in the way of the free expression of all that is true, we +should study our verse, not in Racine, perhaps, but often in Corneille +and always in Molière. Racine, a divine poet, is elegiac, lyric, epic; +Molière is dramatic. It is time to deal sternly with the criticisms +heaped upon that admirable style by the wretched taste of the last +century, and to proclaim aloud that Molière occupies the topmost +pinnacle of our drama, not only as a poet, but also as a writer. +_Palmas vere habet iste duas_. + +In his work the verse surrounds the idea, becomes of its very essence, +compresses and develops it at once, imparts to it a more slender, more +definite, more complete form, and gives us, in some sort, an extract +thereof. Verse is the optical form of thought. That is why it is +especially adapted to the perspective of the stage. Constructed in a +certain way, it communicates its relief to things which, but for it, +would be considered insignificant and trivial. It makes the tissue of +style finer and firmer. It is the knot which stays the thread. It is +the girdle which holds up the garment and gives it all its folds. What +could nature and the true lose, then, by entering into verse? We ask +the question of our prose-writers themselves--what do they lose +in Molière's poetry? Does wine--we beg pardon for another trivial +illustration--does wine cease to be wine when it is bottled? + +If we were entitled to say what, in our opinion, the style of dramatic +poetry should be, we would declare for a free, outspoken, sincere +verse, which dares say everything without prudery, express its meaning +without seeking for words; which passes naturally from comedy to +tragedy, from the sublime to the grotesque; by turns practical and +poetical, both artistic and inspired, profound and impulsive, of +wide range and true; verse which is apt opportunely to displace the +caesura, in order to disguise the monotony of Alexandrines; more +inclined to the _enjambement_ that lengthens the line, than to the +inversion of phrases that confuses the sense; faithful to rhyme, that +enslaved queen, that supreme charm of our poetry, that creator of +our metre; verse that is inexhaustible in the verity of its turns +of thought, unfathomable in its secrets of composition and of grace; +assuming, like Proteus, a thousand forms without changing its type and +character; avoiding long speeches; taking delight in dialogue; always +hiding behind the characters of the drama; intent, before everything, +on being in its place, and when it falls to its lot to be _beautiful_, +being so only by chance, as it were, in spite of itself and +unconsciously; lyric, epic, dramatic, at need; capable of running +through the whole gamut of poetry, of skipping from high notes to +low, from the most exalted to the most trivial ideas, from the most +extravagant to the most solemn, from the most superficial to the most +abstract, without ever passing beyond the limits of a spoken scene; in +a word, such verse as a man would write whom a fairy had endowed with +Corneille's mind and Molière's brain. It seems to us that such verse +would be _as fine as prose_. + +There would be nothing in common between poetry of this sort and that +of which we made a _post mortem_ examination just now. The distinction +will be easy to point out if a certain man of talent, to whom the +author of this book is under personal obligation, will allow us to +borrow his clever phrase: the other poetry was descriptive, this would +be picturesque. + +Let us repeat, verse on the stage should lay aside all self-love, all +exigence, all coquetry. It is simply a form, and a form which should +admit everything, which has no laws to impose on the drama, but on the +contrary should receive everything from it, to be transmitted to the +spectator--French, Latin, texts of laws, royal oaths, popular phrases, +comedy, tragedy, laughter, tears, prose and poetry. Woe to the poet +whose verse does not speak out! But this form is a form of bronze +which encases the thought in its metre beneath which the drama is +indestructible, which engraves it more deeply on the actor's mind, +warns him of what he omits and of what he adds, prevents him from +changing his role, from substituting himself for the author, makes +each word sacred, and causes what the poet has said to remain vivid +a long while in the hearer's memory. The idea, when steeped in verse, +suddenly assumes a more incisive, more brilliant quality. + +One feels that prose, which is necessarily more timid, obliged to wean +the drama from anything like epic or lyric poetry, reduced to dialogue +and to matter-of-fact, is a long way from possessing these resources. +It has much narrower wings. And then, too, it is much more easy of +access; mediocrity is at its ease in prose; and for the sake of a few +works of distinction such as have appeared of late, the art would very +soon be overloaded with abortions and embryos. Another faction of +the reformers incline to drama written in both prose and verse, as +Shakespeare composed it. This method has its advantages. There might, +however, be some incongruity in the transitions from one form to the +other; and when a tissue is homogeneous it is much stouter. However, +whether the drama should be written in prose is only a secondary +question. The rank of a work is certain to be fixed, not according to +its form, but according to its intrinsic value. In questions of this +sort, there is only one solution. There is but one weight that can +turn the scale in the balance of art--that is genius. + +Meanwhile, the first, the indispensable merit of a dramatic writer, +whether he write in prose or verse, is correctness. Not a mere +superficial correctness, the merit or defect of the descriptive +school, which makes Lhomond and Restaut the two wings of its Pegasus; +but that intimate, deep-rooted, deliberate correctness, which is +permeated with the genius of a language, which has sounded its roots +and searched its etymology; always unfettered, because it is sure +of its footing, and always more in harmony with the logic of the +language. Our Lady Grammar leads the one in leading-strings; the other +holds grammar in leash. It can venture anything, can create or invent +its style; it has a right to do so. For, whatever certain men may have +said who did not think what they were saying, and among whom we must +place, notably, him who writes these lines, the French tongue is not +_fixed_ and never will be. A language does not become fixed. The human +intellect is always on the march, or, if you prefer, in movement, +and languages with it. Things are made so. When the body changes, how +could the coat not change? The French of the nineteenth century can no +more be the French of the eighteenth, than that is the French of the +seventeenth, or than the French of the seventeenth is that of the +sixteenth. Montaigne's language is not Rabelais's, Pascal's is +not Montaigne's, Montesquieu's is not Pascal's. Each of the four +languages, taken by itself, is admirable because it is original. Every +age has its own ideas; it must have also words adapted to those ideas. +Languages are like the sea, they move to and fro incessantly. At +certain times they leave one shore of the world of thought and +overflow another. All that their waves thus abandon dries up and +vanishes. It is in this wise that ideas vanish, that words disappear. +It is the same with human tongues as with everything. Each age adds +and takes away something. What can be done? It is the decree of fate. +In vain, therefore, should we seek to petrify the mobile physiognomy +of our idiom in a fixed form. In vain do our literary Joshuas cry out +to the language to stand still; languages and the sun do not stand +still. The day when they become _fixed_, they are dead.--That is why +the French of a certain contemporary school is a dead language. + +Such are, substantially, but without the more elaborate development +which would make the evidence in their favour more complete, the +_present_ ideas of the author of this book concerning the drama. He is +far, however, from presuming to put forth his first dramatic essay as +an emanation of these ideas, which, on the contrary, are themselves, +it may be, simply results of its execution. It would be very +convenient for him, no doubt, and very clever, to rest his book on his +preface, and to defend each by the other. He prefers less cleverness +and more frankness. He proposes, therefore, to be the first to point +out the extreme tenuity of the thread connecting this preface with his +drama. His first plan, dictated by his laziness, was to give the work +to the public entirely unattended _el demonio sin las cuernas_, as +Yriarte said It was only after he had duly brought it to a close, that +at the solicitations of a few friends, blinded by their friendship, no +doubt, he determined to reckon with himself in a preface--to draw, so +to speak, a map of the poetic voyage he had made, to take account of +the acquisitions, good or bad, that he had brought home, and of the +new aspects in which the domain of art had presented itself to his +mind. Someone will take advantage of this admission, doubtless to +repeat the reproach already uttered by a critic in Germany, that +he has written "a treatise in defence of his poetry." What does it +matter? In the first place he was much more inclined to demolish +treatises on poetry than to write them. And then, would it not he +better always to write treatises based on a poem, than to write poems +based on a treatise? But no, we repeat that he has neither the talent +to create nor the presumption to put forth systems "Systems," cleverly +said Voltaire, "are like rats which pass through twenty holes, only to +find at last two or three which will not let them through." It would +have been, therefore, to undertake a useless task and one much beyond +his strength. What he has pleaded, on the contrary, is the freedom of +art against the despotism of systems, codes and rules It is his habit +to follow at all risks whatever he takes for his inspiration, and to +change moulds as often as he changes metals. Dogmatism in the arts is +what he shuns before everything. God forbid that he should aspire to +be numbered among those men, be they romanticists or classicists, who +compose _works according to their own systems_, who condemn themselves +to have but one form in their minds, to be forever _proving_ +something, to follow other laws than those of their temperaments and +then natures. The artificial work of these men, however talented they +may be, has no existence so far as art is concerned. It is a theory, +not poetry. + +Having attempted, in all that has gone before, to point out what, in +our opinion, was the origin of the drama, what its character is, and +what its style should he, the time has come to descend from these +exalted general considerations upon the art to the particular case +which has led us to put them forth. It remains for us to discourse to +the reader of our work, of this _Cromwell_; and as it is not a subject +in which we take pleasure, we will say very little about it in very +few words. + +Oliver Cromwell is one of those historical characters who are at once +very famous and very little known. Most of his biographers--and among +them there are some who are themselves historical--have left that +colossal figure incomplete. It would seem that they dared not assemble +all the characteristic features of that strange and gigantic prototype +of the religious reformation, of the political revolution of England. +Almost all of them have confined themselves to reproducing on a +larger scale the simple and ominous profile drawn by Bossuet from +his Catholic and monarchical standpoint, from his episcopal pulpit +supported by the throne of Louis XIV. + +Like everybody else, the author of this book went no further than +that. The name of Oliver Cromwell suggested to him simply the bare +conception of a fanatical regicide and a great captain. Only on +prowling among the chronicles of the times, which he did with delight, +and on looking through the English memoirs of the seventeenth century, +was he surprised to find that a wholly new Cromwell was gradually +exposed to his gaze. It was no longer simply Bossuet's Cromwell the +soldier, Cromwell the politician; it was a complex, heterogenous, +multiple being, made up of all sorts of contraries--a mixture of much +that was evil and much that was good, of genius and pettiness; a sort +of Tiberius-Dandin, the tyrant of Europe and the plaything of his +family; an old regicide, who delighted to humiliate the ambassadors +of all the kings of Europe, and was tormented by his young royalist +daughter; austere and gloomy in his manners, yet keeping four court +jesters about him; given to the composition of wretched verses; sober, +simple, frugal, yet a stickler for etiquette; a rough soldier and a +crafty politician; skilled in theological disputation and very fond +of it; a dull, diffuse, obscure orator, but clever in speaking the +language of anybody whom he wished to influence; a hypocrite and a +fanatic; a visionary swayed by phantoms of his childhood, believing +in astrologers and banishing them; suspicious to excess, always +threatening, rarely sanguinary; a strict observer of Puritan rules, +and solemnly wasting several hours a day in buffoonery; abrupt and +contemptuous with his intimates, caressing with the secretaries whom +he feared, holding his remorse at bay with sophistry, paltering with +his conscience, inexhaustible in adroitness, in tricks, in resources; +mastering his imagination by his intelligence; grotesque and sublime; +in a word, one of those men who are "square at the base," as they +were described by Napoleon, himself their chief, in his mathematically +exact and poetically figurative language. + +He who writes these lines, in presence of this rare and impressive +_ensemble_, felt that Bossuet's impassioned sketch was no longer +sufficient for him. He began to walk about that lofty figure, and he +was seized by a powerful temptation to depict the giant in all his +aspects. It was a rich soil. Beside the man of war and the statesman, +it remained to draw the theologian, the pedant, the wretched poet, +the seer of visions, the buffoon, the father, the husband, the human +Proteus--in a word, the twofold Cromwell, _homo et vir_. + +There is one period of his life, especially, in which this strange +personality exhibits itself in all its forms. It is not as one might +think at first blush, the period of the trial of Charles I, instinct +as that is with depressing and terrible interest; but it is the moment +when the ambitious mortal boldly attempted to pluck the fruit of that +monarch's death; it is the moment when Cromwell, having attained what +would have been to any other man the zenith of fortune--master of +England, whose innumerable factions knelt silently at his feet; master +of Scotland, of which he had made a satrapy, and of Ireland, which he +had turned into a prison; master of Europe through his diplomacy and +his fleets--seeks to fulfil the dream of his earliest childhood, the +last ambition of his life; to make himself king. History never had a +more impressive lesson in a more impressive drama. First of all, the +Protector arranges to be urged to assume the crown: the august farce +begins by addresses from municipalities, from counties; then there +comes an act of Parliament. Cromwell, the anonymous author of the +play, pretends to be displeased; we see him put out a hand toward the +sceptre, then draw it back; by a devious path he draws near the throne +from which he has swept the legitimate dynasty. At last he makes up +his mind, suddenly; by his command Westminster is decked with flags, +the dais is built, the crown is ordered from the jewelers, the day is +appointed for the ceremony.--Strange dénouement! On that very day, +in presence of the populace, the troops, the House of Commons, in +the great hall of Westminster, on that dais from which he expected +to descend as king, suddenly, as if aroused by a shock, he seems to +awaken at the sight of the crown, asks if he is dreaming, and what the +meaning is of all this regal pomp, and in a speech that lasts three +hours declines the kingly title. + +Was it because his spies had warned him of two conspiracies formed +by Cavaliers and Puritans in concert, which were intended, taking +advantage of this misstep, to break out on the same day? Was it +an inward revolution caused by the silence or the murmurs of the +populace, discomposed to see their regicide ascend the throne? Or was +it simply the sagacity of genius, the instinct of a far-seeing, albeit +unbridled ambition, which realizes how one step forward changes a +man's position and attitude, and which dares not expose its plebeian +structure to the wind of unpopularity? Was it all these at once? +This is a question which no contemporaneous document answers +satisfactorily. So much the better: the poet's liberty is the more +complete, and the drama is the gainer by the latitude which history +affords it. It will be seen that here the latitude is ample and +unique; this is, in truth, the decisive hour, the turning-point in +Cromwell's life. It is the moment when his chimera escapes from +him, when the present kills the future, when, to use an expressive +colloquialism, his destiny _misses fire_. All of Cromwell is at stake +in the comedy being played between England and himself. + +Such then is the man and such the period of which we have tried to +give an idea in this book. + +The author has allowed himself to be seduced by the childlike +diversion of touching the keys of that great harpsichord. +Unquestionably, more skillful hands might have evoked a thrilling +and profound melody--not of those which simply caress the ear--but of +those intimate harmonies which stir the whole man to the depths of his +being, as if each key of the key-board were connected with a fibre +of the heart. He has surrendered to the desire to depict all those +fanaticisms, all those superstitions--maladies to which religion is +subject at certain epochs; to the longing to "make playthings of all +these men," as Hamlet says. To set in array about and below Cromwell, +himself the centre and pivot of that court, of that people, of that +little world, which attracts all to his cause and inspires all with +his vigour, that twofold conspiracy devised by two factions which +detest each other, but join hands to overthrow the man who blocks +their path, but which unite simply without blending; and that Puritan +faction, of divers minds, fanatical, gloomy, unselfish, choosing +for leader the most insignificant of men for such a great part, the +egotistical and cowardly Lambert; and the faction of the Cavaliers, +featherheaded, merry, unscrupulous, reckless, devoted, led by the +man who, aside from his devotion to the cause, was least fitted to +represent it, the stern and upright Ormond; and those ambassadors, +so humble and fawning before the soldier of fortune; and the court +itself, an extraordinary mixture of upstarts and great nobles +vying with one another in baseness; and the four jesters whom the +contemptuous neglect of history permitted me to invent; and Cromwell's +family, each member of which is as a thorn in his flesh; and Thurloe, +the Protector's Achates; and the Jewish rabbi, Israel Ben-Manasseh, +spy, usurer, and astrologer, vile on two sides, sublime on the third; +and Rochester, the unique Rochester, absurd and clever, refined and +crapulous, always cursing, always in love, and always tipsy, as he +himself boasted to Bishop Burnet--wretched poet and gallant gentleman, +vicious and ingenuous, staking his head and indifferent whether +he wins the game provided it amuses him--in a word, capable of +everything, of ruse and recklessness, calculation and folly, villainy +and generosity; and the morose Carr, of whom history describes but +one trait, albeit a most characteristic and suggestive one; and those +other fanatics, of all ranks and varieties: Harrison, the thieving +fanatic; Barebones the shopkeeping fanatic; Syndercomb, the bravo; +Garland the tearful and pious assassin; gallant Colonel Overton, +intelligent but a little declamatory; the austere and unbending +Ludlow, who left his ashes and his epitaph at Lausanne; and lastly, +"Milton and a few other men of mind," as we read in a pamphlet of 1675 +(_Cromwell the Politician_), which reminds one of "a certain Dante" of +the Italian chronicle. + +We omit many less important characters, of each of whom, however, the +actual life is known, and each of whom has his marked individuality, +and all of whom contributed to the fascination which this vast +historical scene exerted upon the author's imagination. From that +scene he constructed this drama. He moulded it in verse, because he +preferred to do so. One will discover on reading it how little +thought he gave to his work while writing this preface--with what +disinterestedness, for instance, he contended against the dogma of the +unities. His drama does not leave London; it begins on June 25, 1657, +at three in the morning, and ends on the 26th at noon. Observe that he +has almost followed the classic formula, as the professors of poetry +lay it down to-day. They need not, however, thank him for it. With the +permission of history, not of Aristotle, the author constructed his +drama thus; and because, when the interest is the same, he prefers a +compact subject to a widely diffused one. + +It is evident that, in its present proportions, this drama could not +be given at one of our theatrical performances. It is too long. The +reader will perhaps comprehend, none the less, that every part of it +was written for the stage. It was on approaching his subject to study +it that the author recognized, or thought that he recognized, the +impossibility of procuring the performance of a faithful reproduction +of it on our stage, in the exceptional position it now occupies, +between the academic Charybdis and the administrative Scylla, between +the literary juries and the political censorship. He was required +to choose: either the wheedling, tricky, false tragedy, which may be +acted, or the audaciously true drama, which is prohibited. The first +was not worth the trouble of writing, so he preferred to attempt +the second. That is why, hopeless of ever being put on the stage, +he abandoned himself, freely and submissively, to the whims of +composition, to the pleasure of painting with a freer hand, to the +developments which his subject demanded, and which, even if they keep +his drama off the stage, have at all events the advantage of making it +almost complete from the historical standpoint. However, the reading +committees are an obstacle of the second class only. If it should +happen that the dramatic censorship, realizing how far this harmless, +conscientious and accurate picture of Cromwell and his time is removed +from our own age, should sanction its production on the stage, in that +case, but only in that case, the author might perhaps extract from +this drama a play which would venture to show itself on the boards, +and would be hissed. + +Until then he will continue to hold aloof from the theatre. And even +then he will leave his cherished and tranquil retirement soon enough, +for the agitation and excitement of this new world. God grant that he +may never repent of having exposed the unspotted obscurity of his name +and his person to the shoals, the squalls and tempests of the pit, +and above all (for what does a mere failure matter?) to the wretched +bickerings of the wings; of having entered that shifting, foggy, +stormy atmosphere, where ignorance dogmatises, where envy hisses, +where cabals cringe and crawl, where the probity of talent has so +often been misrepresented, where the noble innocence of genius is +sometimes so out of place, where mediocrity triumphs in lowering to +its level the superiority which obscures it, where one finds so many +small men for a single great one, so many nobodies for one Talma, so +many myrmidons for one Achilles! This sketch will seem ill-tempered +perhaps, and far from flattering; but does it not fully mark out the +distance that separates our stage, the abode of intrigues and uproar, +from the solemn serenity of the ancient stage? + +Whatever may happen, he feels bound to warn in advance that small +number of persons whom such a production might attract, that a play +made up of excerpts from _Cromwell_ would occupy no less time then is +ordinarily occupied by a theatrical performance. It is difficult for +a _romantic_ theatre to maintain itself otherwise. Surely, if people +desire something different from the tragedies in which one or two +characters, abstract types of a purely metaphysical idea, stalk +solemnly about on a narrow stage occupied only by a few confidents, +colourless reflections of the heroes, employed to fill the gaps in a +simple, unified, single-stringed plot; if that sort of thing has +grown tiresome, a whole evening is not too much time to devote to +delineating with some fullness a man among men, a whole critical +period: the one, with his peculiar temperament, his genius which +adapts itself thereto, his beliefs which dominate them both, his +passions which throw out of gear his temperament, his genius and his +beliefs, his tastes which give colour to his passions, his habits +which regulate his tastes and muzzle his passions, and with the +innumerable procession of men of every sort whom these various +elements keep in constant commotion about him; the other, with +its manners, its laws, its fashions, its wit, its attainments, its +superstitions, its events, and its people, whom all these first causes +in turn mould like soft wax. It is needless to say that such a picture +will be of huge proportions. Instead of one personality, like that +with which the abstract drama of the old school is content, there will +be twenty, forty, fifty,--who knows how many?--of every size and of +every degree of importance. There will be a crowd of characters in the +drama. Would it not be niggardly to assign it two hours only, and +give up the rest of the performance to opera-comique or farce? to cut +Shakespeare for Bobèche?--And do not imagine that, if the plot is well +adjusted, the multitude of characters set in motion will cause fatigue +to the spectator or confusion in the drama. Shakespeare, abounding in +petty details, is at the same time, and for that very reason, imposing +by the grandeur of the _ensemble._ It is the oak which casts a most +extensive shadow with its myriads of slender leaves. + +Let us hope that people in France will ere long become accustomed to +devote a whole evening to a single play. In England and Germany there +are plays that last six hours. The Greeks, about whom we hear so much, +the Greeks--and after the fashion of Scudéri we will cite at +this point the classicist Dacier, in the seventh chapter of his +_Poetics_--the Greeks sometimes went so far as to have twelve or +sixteen plays acted in a single day. Among a people who are fond of +spectacles the attention is more lively than is commonly believed +The _Mariage de Figaro_, the connecting link of Beaumarchais's +great trilogy, occupies the whole evening, and who was ever bored or +fatigued by it Beaumarchais was worthy to venture on the first step +toward that goal of modern art at which it will be impossible to +arrive in two hours, that profound, insatiable interest which results +from a vast, lifelike and multiform plot. "But," someone will say, +"this performance, consisting of a single play, would be monotonous, +would seem terribly long"--Not so. On the contrary it would lose +its present monotony and tediousness. For what is done now? The +spectator's entertainment is divided into two or three sharply defined +parts. At first he is given two hours of serious enjoyment, then one +hour of hilarious enjoyment, these, with the hour of entr' actes, +which we do not include in the enjoyment make four hours What would +the romantic drama do? It would mingle and blend artistically these +two kinds of enjoyment. It would lead the audience constantly from +sobriety to laughter, from mirthful excitement to heart breaking +emotion, "from grave to gay, from pleasant to severe." For, as we have +already proved, the drama is the grotesque in conjunction with the +sublime, the soul within the body, it is tragedy beneath comedy. Do +you not see that, by affording you repose from one impression by means +of another, by sharpening the tragic upon the comic, the merry upon +the terrible, and at need calling in the charms of the opera, +these performances, while presenting but one play, would be worth a +multitude of others? The romantic stage would make a piquant, savoury, +diversified dish of that which, on the classic stage, is a drug +divided into two pills. + +The author has soon come to the end of what he had to say to the +reader. He has no idea how the critics will greet this drama and +these thoughts, summarily set forth, stripped of their corollaries and +ramifications, put together _currente calamo_, and in haste to have +done with them. Doubtless they will appear to "the disciples of +La Harpe" most impudent and strange. But if perchance, naked and +undeveloped as they are, they should have the power to start upon +the road of truth this public whose education is so far advanced, +and whose minds so many notable writings, of criticism or of original +thought, books or newspapers, have already matured for art, let the +public follow that impulsion, caring naught whether it comes from a +man unknown, from a voice with no authority, from a work of little +merit. It is a copper bell which summons the people to the true temple +and the true God. + +There is to-day the old literary régime as well as the old political +régime. The last century still weighs upon the present one at almost +every point. It is notably oppressive in the matter of criticism. For +instance, you find living men who repeat to you this definition of +taste let fall by Voltaire: "Taste in poetry is no different from what +it is in women's clothes." Taste, then, is coquetry. Remarkable words, +which depict marvellously the painted, _moucheté_, powdered poetry +of the eighteenth century--that literature in paniers, pompons and +falbalas. They give an admirable résumé of an age with which the +loftiest geniuses could not come in contact without becoming petty, in +one respect or another; of an age when Montesquieu was able and apt +to produce _Le Temple de Gnide_, Voltaire _Le Temple du Goût_, +Jean-Jacques _Le Devin du Village_. + +Taste is the common sense of genius. This is what will soon be +demonstrated by another school of criticism, powerful, outspoken, +well-informed,--a school of the century which is beginning to put +forth vigorous shoots under the dead and withered branches of the old +school. This youthful criticism, as serious as the other is frivolous, +as learned as the other is ignorant, has already established organs +that are listened to, and one is sometimes surprised to find, even +in the least important sheets, excellent articles emanating from it. +Joining hands with all that is fearless and superior in letters, it +will deliver us from two scourges: tottering _classicism_, and false +_romanticism_, which has the presumption to show itself at the feet +of the true. For modern genius already has its shadow, its copy, its +parasite, its _classic_, which forms itself upon it, smears itself +with its colours, assumes its livery, picks up its crumbs, and, like +_the sorcerer's pupil_, puts in play, with words retained by the +memory, elements of theatrical action of which it has not the secret. +Thus it does idiotic things which its master many a time has much +difficulty in making good. But the thing that must be destroyed first +of all is the old false taste. Present-day literature must be cleansed +of its rust. In vain does the rust eat into it and tarnish it. It +is addressing a young, stern, vigorous generation, which does not +understand it. The train of the eighteenth century is still dragging +in the nineteenth; but we, we young men who have seen Bonaparte, are +not the ones who will carry it. + +We are approaching, then, the moment when we shall see the new +criticism prevail, firmly established upon a broad and deep +foundation. People generally will soon understand that writers should +be judged, not according to rules and species, which are contrary to +nature and art, but according to the immutable principles of the art +of composition, and the special laws of their individual temperaments. +The sound judgment of all men will be ashamed of the criticism which +broke Pierre Corneille on the wheel, gagged Jean Racine, and which +ridiculously rehabilitated John Milton only by virtue of the epic +code of Père le Bossu. People will consent to place themselves at the +author's standpoint, to view the subject with his eyes, in order +to judge a work intelligently. They will lay aside--and it is M. de +Chateaubriand who speaks--"the paltry criticism of defects for the +noble and fruitful criticism of beauties." It is time that all acute +minds should grasp the thread that frequently connects what we, +following our special whim, call "defects" with what we call "beauty." +Defects--at all events those which we call by that name--are often the +inborn, necessary, inevitable conditions of good qualities. + + Scit genius, natale comes qul temperat astrum. + +Who ever saw a medal without its reverse? a talent that had not some +shadow with its brilliancy, some smoke with its flame? Such a blemish +can be only the inseparable consequence of such beauty. This rough +stroke of the brush, which offends my eye at close range, completes +the effect and gives relief to the whole picture. Efface one and you +efface the other. Originality is made up of such things. Genius is +necessarily uneven. There are no high mountains without deep ravines. +Fill up the valley with the mountain and you will have nothing but +a steppe, a plateau, the plain of Les Sablons instead of the Alps, +swallows and not eagles. + +We must also take into account the weather, the climate, the local +influences. The Bible, Homer, hurt us sometimes by their very +sublimities. Who would want to part with a word of either of them? Our +infirmity often takes fright at the inspired bold flights of +genius, for lack of power to swoop down upon objects with such vast +intelligence. And then, once again, there are _defects_ which take +root only in masterpieces; it is given only to certain geniuses +to have certain defects. Shakespeare is blamed for his abuse of +metaphysics, of wit, of redundant scenes, of obscenities, for his +employment of the mythological nonsense in vogue in his time, for +exaggeration, obscurity, bad taste, bombast, asperities of style. The +oak, that giant tree which we were comparing to Shakespeare just now, +and which has more than one point of resemblance to him, the oak has +an unusual shape, gnarled branches, dark leaves, and hard, rough bark; +but it is the oak. + +And it is because of these qualities that it is the oak. If you would +have a smooth trunk, straight branches, satiny leaves, apply to the +pale birch, the hollow elder, the weeping willow; but leave the mighty +oak in peace. Do not stone that which gives you shade. + +The author of this book knows as well as any one the numerous and +gross faults of his works. If it happens too seldom that he corrects +them, it is because it is repugnant to him to return to a work that +has grown cold. Moreover, what has he ever done that is worth +that trouble? The labor that he would throw away in correcting the +imperfections of his books, he prefers to use in purging his intellect +of its defects. It is his method to correct one work only in another +work. + +However, no matter what treatment may be accorded his book, he +binds himself not to defend it, in whole or in part. If his drama is +worthless, what is the use of upholding it? If it is good, why defend +it? Time will do the book justice or will wreak justice upon it. Its +success for the moment is the affair of the publisher alone. If then +the wrath of the critics is aroused by the publication of this essay, +he will let them do their worst. What reply should he make to them? +He is not one of those who speak, as the Castilian poet says, "through +the mouths of their wounds." + + Por la boca de su herida. + +One last word. It may have been noticed that in this somewhat long +journey through so many different subjects, the author has generally +refrained from resting his personal views upon texts or citations of +authorities. It is not, however, because he did not have them at his +hand. + +"If the poet establishes things that are impossible according to the +rules of his art, he makes a mistake unquestionably; but it ceases to +be a mistake when by this means he has reached the end that he +aimed at; for he has found what he sought,"--"They take for nonsense +whatever the weakness of their intellects does not allow them to +understand. They are especially prone to call absurd those wonderful +passages in which the poet, in order the better to enforce his +argument, departs, if we may so express it, from his argument. In +fact, the precept which makes it a rule sometimes to disregard rules, +is a mystery of the art which it is not easy to make men understand +who are absolutely without taste and whom a sort of abnormality of +mind renders insensible to those things which ordinarily impress men." + +Who said the first? Aristotle. Who said the last? Boileau. By these +two specimens you will see that the author of this drama might, as +well as another, have shielded himself with proper names and taken +refuge behind others' reputations. But he preferred to leave that +style of argument to those who deem it unanswerable, universal and +all-powerful. As for himself, he prefers reasons to authorities; he +has always cared more for arms than for coats-of-arms. + +_October_, 1827. + + +[Footnote A: Victor Hugo (1802-1883) the chief of the romantic school +in France, issued in the Preface to "Cromwell" the manifesto of the +movement. Poet, dramatist, and novelist, Hugo remained through a +long life the most conspicuous man of letters in France; and in the +document here printed he laid down the principles which revolutionized +the literary world of his time.] + + + + +PREFACE TO LEAVES OF GRASS + +BY WALT WHITMAN. (1855)[A] + + +America does not repel the past or what it has produced under +its forms or amid other politics or the idea of castes or the old +religions ... accepts the lesson with calmness ... is not so impatient +as has been supposed that the slough still sticks to opinions and +manners and literature while the life which served its requirements +has passed into the new life of the new forms ... perceives that the +corpse is slowly borne from the eating and sleeping rooms of the house +... perceives that it waits a little while in the door ... that it was +fittest for its days ... that its action has descended to the stalwart +and well shaped heir who approaches ... and that he shall be fittest +for his days. + +The Americans of all nations at any time upon the earth, have +probably the fullest poetical nature. The United States themselves are +essentially the greatest poem. In the history of the earth hitherto +the largest and most stirring appear tame and orderly to their ampler +largeness and stir. Here at last is something in the doings of man +that corresponds with the broadcast doings of the day and night. Here +is not merely a nation but a teeming nation of nations. Here is action +untied from strings necessarily blind to particulars and details +magnificently moving in vast masses. Here is the hospitality which +forever indicates heroes.... Here are the roughs and beards and +space and ruggedness and nonchalance that the soul loves. Here the +performance disdaining the trivial unapproached in the tremendous +audacity of its crowds and groupings and the push of its perspective +spreads with crampless and flowing breadth and showers its prolific +and splendid extravagance. One sees it must indeed own the riches of +the summer and winter, and need never be bankrupt while corn grows +from the ground or the orchards drop apples or the bays contain fish +or men beget children upon women. + +Other states indicate themselves in their deputies ... but the genius of +the United States is not best or most in its executives or legislatures, +nor in its ambassadors or authors or colleges or churches or parlors, +nor even in its newspapers or inventors ... but always most in the +common people. Their manners speech dress friendship--the freshness and +candor of their physiognomy--the picturesque looseness of their carriage +... their deathless attachment to freedom--their aversion to anything +indecorous or soft or mean--the practical acknowledgment of the citizens +of one state by the citizens of all other states--the fierceness of +their roused resentment--- their curiosity and welcome of novelty--their +self-esteem and wonderful sympathy--their susceptibility to a +slight--the air they have of persons who never knew how it felt to stand +in the presence of superiors--the fluency of their speech--their delight +in music, the sure symptom of manly tenderness and native elegance of +soul ... their good temper and open handedness--the terrible +significance of their elections--the President's taking off his hat to +them, not they to him--these too are unrhymed poetry. It awaits the +gigantic and generous treatment worthy of it. + +The largeness of nature or the nation were monstrous without a +corresponding largeness and generosity of the spirit of the citizen. +Not nature nor swarming states nor streets and steamships nor +prosperous business nor farms nor capital nor learning may suffice +for the ideal of man ... nor suffice the poet. No reminiscences may +suffice either. A live nation can always cut a deep mark and can have +the best authority the cheapest ... namely from its own soul. This is +the sum of the profitable uses of individuals or states and of present +action and grandeur and of the subjects of poets.--As if it were +necessary to trot back generation after generation to the eastern +records! As if the beauty and sacredness of the demonstrable must fall +behind that of the mythical! As if men do not make their mark out of +any times! As if the opening of the western continent by discovery and +what has transpired since in North and South America were less than +the small theatre of the antique or the aimless sleepwalking of the +middle ages! The pride of the United States leaves the wealth and +finesse of the cities and all returns of commerce and agriculture and +all the magnitude of geography or shows of exterior victory to enjoy +the breed of full sized men or one full sized man unconquerable and +simple. + +The American poets are to enclose old and new for America is the race +of races. Of them a bard is to be commensurate with a people. To +him the other continents arrive as contributions ... he gives them +reception for their sake and his own sake. His spirit responds to his +country's spirit ... he incarnates its geography and natural life +and rivers and lakes. Mississippi with annual freshets and changing +chutes, Missouri and Columbia and Ohio and St. Lawrence with the Falls +and beautiful masculine Hudson, do not embouchure where they spend +themselves more than they embouchure into him. The blue breadth over +the inland sea of Virginia and Maryland and the sea off Massachusetts +and Maine and over Manhattan bay and over Champlain and Erie and over +Ontario and Huron and Michigan and Superior, and over the Texan and +Mexican and Floridian and Cuban seas, and over the seas off California +and Oregon, is not tallied by the blue breadth of the waters below +more than the breadth of above and below is tallied by him. When the +long Atlantic coast stretches longer and the Pacific coast stretches +longer he easily stretches with them north or south. He spans between +them also from east to west and reflects what is between them. On +him rise solid growths that offset the growths of pine and cedar and +hemlock and live oak and locust and chestnut and cypress and hickory +and limetree and cottonwood and tuliptree and cactus and wildvine and +tamarind and persimmon ... and tangles as tangled as any canebrake or +swamp ... and forests coated with transparent ice, and icicles hanging +from boughs and crackling in the wind ... and sides and peaks of +mountains ... and pasturage sweet and free as savannah or upland or +prairie ... with flights and songs and screams that answer those +of the wild pigeon and high-hold and orchard-oriole and coot and +surf-duck and red-shouldered-hawk and fish-hawk and white ibis +and Indian-hen and cat-owl and water-pheasant and qua-bird and +pied-sheldrake and blackbird and mockingbird and buzzard and condor +and night-heron and eagle. To him the hereditary countenance descends +both mother's and father's. To him enter the essences of the real +things and past and present events--of the enormous diversity +of temperature and agriculture and mines--the tribes of red +aborigines--the weather-beaten vessels entering new ports or making +landings on rocky coasts--the first settlements north or south--the +rapid stature and muscle--the haughty defiance of '76, and the war +and peace and formation of the constitution ... the Union always +surrounded by blatherers and always calm and impregnable--the +perpetual coming of immigrants--the wharf-hem'd cities and superior +marine--the unsurveyed interior--the loghouses and clearings and wild +animals and hunters and trappers ... the free commerce--the fisheries +and whaling and gold-digging--the endless gestation of new states--the +convening of Congress every December, the members duly coming up from +all climates and the uttermost parts ... the noble character of the +young mechanics and of all free American workmen and workwomen ... the +general ardor and friendliness and enterprise--the perfect equality of +the female with the male ... the large amativeness--the fluid movement +of the population--the factories and mercantile life and laborsaving +machinery--the Yankee swap--the New York firemen and the target +excursion--the Southern plantation life--the character of the +northeast and of the northwest and southwest--slavery and the +tremulous spreading of hands to protect it, and the stern opposition +to it which shall never cease till it ceases or the speaking of +tongues and the moving of lips cease. For such the expression of the +American poet is to be transcendent and new. It is to be indirect and +not direct or descriptive or epic. Its quality goes through these to +much more. Let the age and wars of other nations be chanted and their +eras and characters be illustrated and that finish the verse. Not so +the great psalm of the republic. Here the theme is creative and has +vista. Here comes one among the well beloved stonecutters and plans +with decision and science and sees the solid and beautiful forms of +the future where there are now no solid forms. + +Of all nations the United States with veins full of poetical stuff +most need poets and will doubtless have the greatest and use them the +greatest. Their Presidents shall not be their common referee so much +as their poets shall. Of all mankind the great poet is the equable +man. Not in him but off from him things are grotesque or eccentric or +fail of their sanity. Nothing out of its place is good and nothing +in its place is bad. He bestows on every object or quality its fit +proportions neither more nor less. He is the arbiter of the diverse +and he is the key. He is the equalizer of his age and land ... he +supplies what wants supplying and checks what wants checking. If peace +is the routine out of him speaks the spirit of peace, large, rich, +thrifty, building vast and populous cities, encouraging agriculture +and the arts and commerce--lighting the study of man, the soul, +immortality--federal, state or municipal government, marriage, health, +freetrade, intertravel by land and sea ... nothing too close, nothing +too far off ... the stars not too far off. In war he is the most +deadly force of the war. Who recruits him recruits horse and foot ... +he fetches parks of artillery the best that engineer ever knew. If the +time becomes slothful and heavy he knows how to arouse it ... he can +make every word he speaks draw blood. Whatever stagnates in the flat +of custom or obedience or legislation he never stagnates. Obedience +does not master him, he masters it. High up out of reach he stands +turning a concentrated light ... he turns the pivot with his finger +... he baffles the swiftest runners as he stands and easily overtakes +and envelopes them. The time straying towards infidelity and +confections and persiflage he withholds by his steady faith ... he +spreads out his dishes ... he offers the sweet firmfibred meat that +grows men and women. His brain is the ultimate brain. He is no arguer +... he is judgment. He judges not as the judge judges but as the sun +falling around a helpless thing. As he sees the farthest he has the +most faith. His thoughts are the hymns of the praise of things. In +the talk on the soul and eternity and God off of his equal plane he +is silent. He sees eternity less like a play with a prologue and +dénouement ... he sees eternity in men and women ... he does not see +men or women as dreams or dots. Faith is the antiseptic of the soul +... it pervades the common people and preserves them ... they +never give up believing and expecting and trusting. There is that +indescribable freshness and unconsciousness about an illiterate person +that humbles and mocks the power of the noblest expressive genius. The +poet sees for a certainty how one not a great artist may be just as +sacred and perfect as the greatest artist.... The power to destroy or +remould is freely used by him, but never the power of attack. What is +past is past. If he does not expose superior models and prove himself +by every step he takes he is not what is wanted. The presence of the +greatest poet conquers ... not parleying or struggling or any prepared +attempts. Now he has passed that way see after him! There is not left +any vestige of despair or misanthropy or cunning or exclusiveness +or the ignominy of a nativity or color or delusion of hell or the +necessity of hell ... and no man thenceforward shall be degraded for +ignorance or weakness or sin. + +The greatest poet hardly knows pettiness or triviality. If he breathes +into anything that was before thought small it dilates with the +grandeur and life of the universe. He is a seer ... he is individual +... he is complete in himself ... the others are as good as he, only +he sees it and they do not. He is not one of the chorus ... he does +not stop for any regulation ... he is the president of regulation. +What the eyesight does to the rest he does to the rest. Who knows +the curious mystery of the eyesight? The other senses corroborate +themselves, but this is removed from any proof but its own and +foreruns the identities of the spiritual world. A single glance of it +mocks all the investigations of man and all the instruments and books +of the earth and all reasoning. What is marvellous? what is unlikely? +what is impossible or baseless or vague? after you have once just +opened the space of a peachpit and given audience to far and near and +to the sunset and had all things enter with electric swiftness softly +and duly without contusion or jostling or jam. + +The land and sea, the animals fishes and birds, the sky of heavens and +the orbs, the forests mountains and rivers, are not small themes ... +but folks expect of the poet to indicate more than the beauty and +dignity which always attach to dumb real objects,... they expect him +to indicate the path between reality and their souls. Men and women +perceive the beauty well enough ... probably as well as he. The +passionate tenacity of hunters, woodmen, early risers, cultivators +of gardens and orchards and fields, the love of healthy women for +the manly form, seafaring persons, drivers of horses, the passion for +light and the open air, all is an old varied sign of the unfailing +perception of beauty and of a residence of the poetic in outdoor +people. They can never be assisted by poets to perceive ... some may +but they never can. The poetic quality is not marshalled in rhyme +or uniformity or abstract addresses to things nor in melancholy +complaints or good precepts, but is the life of these and much else +and is in the soul. The profit of rhyme is that it drops seeds of a +sweeter and more luxuriant rhyme, and of uniformity that it conveys +itself into its own roots in the ground out of sight. The rhyme and +uniformity of perfect poems show the free growth of metrical laws and +bud from them as unerringly and loosely as lilacs and roses on a bush, +and take shapes as compact as the shapes of chestnuts and oranges and +melons and pears, and shed the perfume impalpable to form. The fluency +and ornaments of the finest poems or music or orations or recitations +are not independent but dependent. All beauty comes from beautiful +blood and a beautiful brain. If the greatnesses are in conjunction +in a man or woman it is enough ... the fact will prevail through the +universe ... but the gaggery and gilt of a million years will not +prevail. Who troubles himself about his ornaments or fluency is lost. +This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, +despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for +the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate +tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward +the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any +man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and +with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in +the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine +all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss +whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great +poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the +silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes +and in every motion and joint of your body.... The poet shall not +spend his time in unneeded work. He shall know that the ground is +always ready ploughed and manured ... others may not know it but he +shall. He shall go directly to the creation. His trust shall +master the trust of everything he touches ... and shall master all +attachment. + +The known universe has one complete lover and that is the greatest +poet. He consumes an eternal passion and is indifferent which chance +happens and which possible contingency of fortune or misfortune and +persuades daily and hourly his delicious pay. What baulks or breaks +others is fuel for his burning progress to contact and amorous joy. +Other proportions of the reception of pleasure dwindle to nothing to +his proportions. All expected from heaven or from the highest he is +rapport with in the sight of the daybreak or a scene of the winter +woods or the presence of children playing or with his arm round +the neck of a man or woman. His love above all love has leisure and +expanse ... he leaves room ahead of himself. He is no irresolute +or suspicious lover ... he is sure ... he scorns intervals. His +experience and the showers and thrills are not for nothing. Nothing +can jar him ... suffering and darkness cannot--death and fear cannot. +To him complaint and jealousy and envy are corpses buried and rotten +in the earth ... he saw them buried. The sea is not surer of the shore +or the shore of the sea than he is of the fruition of his love and of +all perfection and beauty. + +The fruition of beauty is no chance of hit or miss ... it is +inevitable as life ... it is as exact and plumb as gravitation. From +the eyesight proceeds another eyesight and from the hearing proceeds +another hearing and from the voice proceeds another voice eternally +curious of the harmony of things with man. To these respond +perfections not only in the committees that were supposed to stand for +the rest but in the rest themselves just the same. These understand +the law of perfection in masses and floods ... that its finish is +to each for itself and onward from itself ... that it is profuse and +impartial ... that there is not a minute of the light or dark nor an +acre of the earth and sea without it--nor any direction of the sky +nor any trade or employment nor any turn of events. This is the reason +that about the proper expression of beauty there is precision and +balance ... one part does not need to be thrust above another. The +best singer is not the one who has the most lithe and powerful organ +... the pleasure of poems is not in them that take the handsomest +measure and similes and sound. + +Without effort and without exposing in the least how it is done the +greatest poet brings the spirit of any or all events and passions and +scenes and persons some more and some less to bear on your individual +character as you hear or read. To do this well is to compete with the +laws that pursue and follow time. What is the purpose must surely be +there and the clue of it must be there ... and the faintest +indication is the indication of the best and then becomes the clearest +indication. Past and present and future are not disjoined but joined. +The greatest poet forms the consistence of what is to be from what has +been and is. He drags the dead out of their coffins and stands them +again on their feet ... he says to the past, Rise and walk before me +that I may realize you. He learns the lesson ... he places himself +where the future becomes present. The greatest poet does not only +dazzle his rays over character and scenes and passions ... he finally +ascends and finishes all ... he exhibits the pinnacles that no man can +tell what they are for or what is beyond ... he glows a moment on the +extremest verge. He is most wonderful in his last half-hidden smile or +frown ... by that flash of the moment of parting the one that sees +it shall be encouraged or terrified afterward for many years. The +greatest poet does not moralize or make applications of morals ... he +knows the soul. The soul has that measureless pride which consists in +never acknowledging any lessons but its own. But it has sympathy as +measureless as its pride and the one balances the other and neither +can stretch too far while it stretches in company with the other. The +inmost secrets of art sleep with the twain. The greatest poet has lain +close betwixt both and they are vital in his style and thoughts. + +The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the +light of letters is simplicity. Nothing is better than simplicity ... +nothing can make up for excess or for the lack of definiteness. To +carry on the heave of impulse and pierce intellectual depths and give +all subjects their articulations are powers neither common nor very +uncommon. But to speak in literature with the perfect rectitude and +insouciance of the movements of animals and the unimpeachableness of +the sentiment of trees in the woods and grass by the roadside is the +flawless triumph of art. If you have looked on him who has achieved +it you have looked on one of the masters of the artists of all nations +and times. You shall not contemplate the flight of the gray gull +over the bay or the mettlesome action of the blood horse or the tall +leaning of sunflowers on their stalk or the appearance of the sun +journeying through heaven or the appearance of the moon afterward with +any more satisfaction than you shall contemplate him. The greatest +poet has less a marked style and is more the channel of thoughts +and things without increase or diminution and is the free channel of +himself. He swears to his art, I will not be meddlesome, I will not +have in my writing any elegance or effect or originality to hang in +the way between me and the rest like curtains. I will have nothing +hang in the way not the richest curtains. What I tell I tell for +precisely what it is. Let who may exalt or startle or fascinate or +soothe I will have purposes as health or heat or snow has and be as +regardless of observation. What I experience or portray shall go from +my composition without a shred of my composition. You shall stand by +my side and look in the mirror with me. + +The old red blood and stainless gentility of great poets will be +proved by their unconstraint. A heroic person walks at his ease +through and out of that custom or precedent or authority that suits +him not. Of the traits of the brotherhood of writers savans musicians +inventors and artists, nothing is finer than silent defiance advancing +from new free forms. In the need of poems philosophy politics +mechanism science behavior, the craft of art, an appropriate native +grand-opera, shipcraft; or any craft, he is greatest for ever and +for ever who contributes the greatest original practical example. The +cleanest expression is that which finds no sphere worthy of itself and +makes one. The messages of great poets to each man and woman are, +Come to us on equal terms, Only then can you understand us, We are no +better than you, What we enclose you enclose, What we enjoy you may +enjoy. Did you suppose there could be only one Supreme? We affirm +there can be unnumbered Supremes, and that one does not countervail +another any more than one eyesight countervails another ... and that +men can be good or grand only of the consciousness of their supremacy +within them. What do you think is the grandeur of storms and +dismemberments and the deadliest battles and wrecks and the wildest +fury of the elements and the power of the sea and the motion of nature +and the throes of human desires and dignity and hate and love? It +is that something in the soul which says, Rage on, Whirl on, I tread +master here and everywhere, Master of the spasms of the sky and of the +shatter of the sea, Master of nature and passion and death, And of all +terror and all pain. + +The American bards shall be marked for generosity and affection and +for encouraging competitors.... They shall be kosmos ... without +monopoly or secrecy ... glad to pass anything to any one ... hungry +for equals night and day. They shall not be careful of riches and +privilege ... they shall be riches and privilege ... they shall +perceive who the most affluent man is. The most affluent man is +he that confronts all the shows he sees by equivalents out of the +stronger wealth of himself. The American bard shall delineate no class +of persons nor one or two out of the strata of interests nor love most +nor truth most nor the soul most nor the body most ... and not be for +the eastern states more than the western or the northern states more +than the southern. + +Exact science and its practical movements are no checks on the +greatest poet but always his encouragement and support. The outset +and remembrance are there ... there the arms that lifted him first and +brace him best ... there he returns after all his goings and comings. +The sailor and traveller ... the anatomist chemist astronomer +geologist phrenologist spiritualist mathematician historian and +lexicographer are not poets, but they are the lawgivers of poets and +their construction underlies the structure of every perfect poem. No +matter what rises or is uttered they sent the seed of the conception +of it ... of them and by them stand the visible proofs of souls ... +always of their fatherstuff must be begotten the sinewy races of +bards. If there shall be love and content between the father and the +son and if the greatness of the son is the exuding of the greatness +of the father there shall be love between the poet and the man of +demonstrable science. In the beauty of poems are the tuft and final +applause of science. + +Great is the faith of the flush of knowledge and of the investigation +of the depths of qualities and things. Cleaving and circling here +swells the soul of the poet yet is president of itself always. The +depths are fathomless and therefore calm. The innocence and nakedness +are resumed ... they are neither modest nor immodest. The whole theory +of the special and supernatural and all that was twined with it or +educed out of it departs as a dream. What has ever happened ... what +happens and whatever may or shall happen, the vital laws enclose all +... they are sufficient for any case and for all cases ... none to be +hurried or retarded ... any miracle of affairs or persons inadmissible +in the vast clear scheme where every motion and every spear of grass +and the frames and spirits of men and women and all that concerns +them are unspeakably perfect miracles all referring to all and each +distinct and in its place. It is also not consistent with the reality +of the soul to admit that there is anything in the known universe more +divine than men and women. + +Men and women and the earth and all upon it are simply to be taken as +they are, and the investigation of their past and present and future +shall be unintermitted and shall be done with perfect candor. Upon +this basis philosophy speculates ever looking towards the poet, +ever regarding the eternal tendencies of all toward happiness never +inconsistent with what is clear to the senses and to the soul. For the +eternal tendencies of all toward happiness make the only point of sane +philosophy. Whatever comprehends less than that ... whatever is less +than the laws of light and of astronomical motion ... or less than +the laws that follow the thief the liar the glutton and the drunkard +through this life and doubtless afterward ... or less than vast +stretches of time or the slow formation of density or the patient +upheaving of strata--is of no account. Whatever would put God in +a poem or system of philosophy as contending against some being or +influence is also of no account. Sanity and ensemble characterize +the great master ... spoilt in one principle all is spoilt. The great +master has nothing to do with miracles. He sees health for himself in +being one of the mass ... he sees the hiatus in singular eminence. To +the perfect shape comes common ground. To be under the general law is +great, for that is to correspond with it. The master knows that he is +unspeakably great and that all are unspeakably great ... that nothing +for instance is greater than to conceive children and bring them up +well ... that to be is just as great as to perceive or tell. + +In the make of the great masters the idea of political liberty is +indispensable. Liberty takes the adherence of heroes wherever men and +women exist ... but never takes any adherence or welcome from the rest +more than from poets. They are the voice and exposition of liberty. +They out of ages are worthy the grand idea ... to them it is confided +and they must sustain it. Nothing has precedence of it and nothing can +warp or degrade it. The attitude of great poets is to cheer up slaves +and horrify despots. The turn of their necks, the sound of their feet, +the motions of their wrists, are full of hazard to the one and hope +to the other. Come nigh them awhile and though they neither speak nor +advise you shall learn the faithful American lesson. Liberty is poorly +served by men whose good intent is quelled from one failure or two +failures or any number of failures, or from the casual indifference +or ingratitude of the people, or from the sharp show of the tushes +of power, or the bringing to bear soldiers and cannon or any penal +statutes. Liberty relies upon itself, invites no one, promises +nothing, sits in calmness and light, is positive and composed, and +knows no discouragement. The battle rages with many a loud alarm and +frequent advance and retreat ... the enemy triumphs ... the prison, +the handcuffs, the iron necklace and anklet, the scaffold, garrote and +leadballs do their work ... the cause is asleep ... the strong throats +are choked with their own blood ... the young men drop their eyelashes +toward the ground when they pass each other ... and is liberty gone +out of that place? No never. When liberty goes it is not the first to +go nor the second or third to go ... it awaits for all the rest to go +... it is the last.... When the memories of the old martyrs are faded +utterly away ... when the large names of patriots are laughed at in +the public halls from the lips of the orators ... when the boys are +no more christened after the same but christened after tyrants +and traitors instead ... when the laws of the free are grudgingly +permitted and the laws for informers and bloodmoney are sweet to the +taste of the people ... when I and you walk abroad upon the earth +stung with compassion at the sight of numberless brothers answering +our equal friendship and calling no man master--and when we are elated +with noble joy at the sight of slaves ... when the soul retires in the +cool communion of the night and surveys its experience and has much +extasy over the word and deed that put back a helpless innocent person +into the gripe of the gripers or into any cruel inferiority ... when +those in all parts of these states who could easier realize the true +American character but do not yet--when the swarms of cringers, +suckers, doughfaces, lice of politics, planners of sly involutions +for their own preferment to city offices or state legislatures or the +judiciary or congress or the presidency, obtain a response of love and +natural deference from the people whether they get the offices or no +... when it is better to be a bound booby and rogue in office at a +high salary than the poorest free mechanic or farmer with his hat +unmoved from his head and firm eyes and a candid and generous heart +... and when servility by town or state or the federal government or +any oppression on a large scale or small scale can be tried on without +its own punishment following duly after in exact proportion against +the smallest chance of escape ... or rather when all life and all the +souls of men and women are discharged from any part of the earth--then +only shall the instinct of liberty be discharged from that part of the +earth. + +As the attributes of the poets of the kosmos concentre in the +real body and soul and in the pleasure of things they possess the +superiority of genuineness over all fiction and romance. As they emit +themselves facts are showered over with light ... the daylight is lit +with more volatile light ... also the deep between the setting and +rising sun goes deeper many fold. Each precise object or condition or +combination or process exhibits a beauty ... the multiplication table +its--old age its--the carpenter's trade its--the grand opera its--the +hugehulled cleanshaped New-York clipper at sea under steam or full +sail gleams with unmatched beauty.... the American circles and large +harmonies of government gleam with theirs ... and the commonest +definite intentions and actions with theirs. The poets of the kosmos +advance through all interpositions and coverings and turmoils and +stratagems to first principles. They are of use ... they dissolve +poverty from its need and riches from its conceit. You large +proprietor, they say, shall not realize or perceive more than any one +else. The owner of the library is not he who holds a legal title to it +having bought and paid for it. Any one and every one is owner of the +library who can read the same through all the varieties of tongues +and subjects and styles, and in whom they enter with ease and take +residence and force toward paternity and maternity, and make supple +and powerful and rich and large.... These American states strong and +healthy and accomplished shall receive no pleasure from violations of +natural models and must not permit them. In paintings or mouldings +or carvings in mineral or wood, or in the illustrations of books and +newspapers, or in any comic or tragic prints, or in the patterns of +woven stuffs or anything to beautify rooms or furniture or costumes, +or to put upon cornices or monuments or on the prows or sterns of +ships, or to put anywhere before the human eye indoors or out, that +which distorts honest shapes or which creates unearthly beings or +places or contingencies, is a nuisance and revolt. Of the human +form especially, it is so great it must never be made ridiculous. +Of ornaments to a work nothing outré can be allowed ... but those +ornaments can be allowed that conform to the perfect facts of the +open air, and that flow out of the nature of the work and come +irrepressibly from it and are necessary to the completion of the work. +Most works are most beautiful without ornament ... Exaggerations +will be revenged in human physiology. Clean and vigorous children are +jetted and conceived only in those communities where the models of +natural forms are public every day ... Great genius and the people of +these states must never be demeaned to romances. As soon as histories +are properly told there is no more need of romances. + +The great poets are also to be known by the absence in them of tricks +and by the justification of perfect personal candor. Then folks echo +a new cheap joy and a divine voice leaping from their brains: How +beautiful is candor! All faults may be forgiven of him who has +perfect candor. Henceforth let no man of us lie, for we have seen that +openness wins the inner and outer world and that there is no single +exception, and that never since our earth gathered itself in a mass +have deceit or subterfuge or prevarication attracted its smallest +particle or the faintest tinge of a shade--and that through the +enveloping wealth and rank of a state or the whole republic of states +a sneak or sly person shall be discovered and despised ... and that +the soul has never once been fooled and never can be fooled ... and +thrift without the loving nod of the soul is only a foetid puff ... +and there never grew up in any of the continents of the globe nor upon +any planet or satellite or star, nor upon the asteroids, nor in any +part of ethereal space, nor in the midst of density, nor under the +fluid wet of the sea, nor in that condition which precedes the birth +of babes, nor at any time during the changes of life, nor in that +condition that follows what we term death, nor in any stretch of +abeyance or action afterward of vitality, nor in any process of +formation or reformation anywhere, a being whose instinct hated the +truth. + +Extreme caution or prudence, the soundest organic health, large +hope and comparison and fondness for women and children, large +alimentiveness and destructiveness and causality, with a perfect sense +of the oneness of nature and the propriety of the same spirit applied +to human affairs ... these are called up of the float of the brain of +the world to be parts of the greatest poet from his birth out of his +mother's womb and from her birth out of her mother's. Caution seldom +goes far enough. It has been thought that the prudent citizen was the +citizen who applied himself to solid gains and did well for himself +and for his family and completed a lawful life without debt or crime. +The greatest poet sees and admits these economies as he sees the +economies of food and sleep, but has higher notions of prudence than +to think he gives much when he gives a few slight attentions at the +latch of the gate. The premises of the prudence of life are not +the hospitality of it or the ripeness and harvest of it. Beyond the +independence of a little sum laid aside for burial-money, and of a +few clapboards around and shingles overhead on a lot of American soil +owned, and the easy dollars that supply the year's plain clothing +and meals, the melancholy prudence of the abandonment of such a great +being as a man is to the toss and pallor of years of money-making with +all their scorching days and icy nights and all their stifling deceits +and underhanded dodgings, or infinitesimals of parlors, or shameless +stuffing while others starve ... and all the loss of the bloom and +odor of the earth and of the flowers and atmosphere and of the sea, +and of the true taste of the women and men you pass or have to do with +in youth or middle age, and the issuing sickness and desperate revolt +at the close of a life without elevation or naivete, and the ghastly +chatter of a death without serenity or majesty, is the great fraud +upon modern civilization and forethought, blotching the surface and +system which civilization undeniably drafts, and moistening with tears +the immense features it spreads and spreads with such velocity before +the reached kisses of the soul.... Still the right explanation +remains to be made about prudence. The prudence of the mere wealth and +respectability of the most esteemed life appears too faint for the eye +to observe at all when little and large alike drop quietly aside at +the thought of the prudence suitable for immortality. What is wisdom +that fills the thinness of a year or seventy or eighty years to wisdom +spaced out by ages and coming back at a certain time with strong +reinforcements and rich presents and the clear faces of wedding-guests +as far as you can look in every direction, running gaily toward you? +Only the soul is of itself ... all else has reference to what ensues. +All that a person does or thinks is of consequence. Not a move can a +man or woman make that effects him or her in a day or a month or any +part of the direct lifetime or the hour of death but the same affects +him or her onward afterward through the indirect lifetime. The +indirect is always as great and real as the direct. The spirit +receives from the body just as much as it gives to the body. Not one +name of word or deed ... not of venereal sores or discolorations ... +not the privacy of the onanist ... not of the putrid veins of gluttons +or rumdrinkers ... not peculation or cunning or betrayal or murder ... +no serpentine poison of those that seduce women ... not the foolish +yielding of women ... not prostitution ... not of any depravity of +young men ... not of the attainment of gain by discreditable means ... +not any nastiness of appetite ... not any harshness of officers to +men or judges to prisoners or fathers to sons or sons to fathers or +of husbands to wives or bosses to their boys ... not of greedy looks +or malignant wishes ... nor any of the wiles practised by people upon +themselves ... ever is or ever can be stamped on the programme but +it is duly realized and returned, and that returned in further +performances ... and they returned again. Nor can the push of charity +or personal force ever be anything else than the profoundest reason, +whether it bring argument to hand or no. No specification is necessary +... to add or subtract or divide is in vain. Little or big, learned +or unlearned, white or black, legal or illegal, sick or well, from the +first inspiration down the windpipe to the last expiration out of it, +all that a male or female does that is vigorous and benevolent and +clean is so much sure profit to him or her in the unshakable order of +the universe and through the whole scope of it for ever. If the savage +or felon is wise it is well ... if the greatest poet or savan is wise +it is simply the same ... if the President or chief justice is wise it +is the same ... if the young mechanic or farmer is wise it is no more +or less ... if the prostitute is wise it is no more nor less. The +interest will come round ... all will come round. All the best actions +of war and peace ... all help given to relatives and strangers and the +poor and old and sorrowful and young children and widows and the sick, +and to all shunned persons ... all furtherance of fugitives and of the +escape of slaves ... all the self-denial that stood steady and aloof +on wrecks and saw others take the seats of the boats ... all offering +of substance or life for the good old cause, or for a friend's sake +or opinion's sake ... all pains of enthusiasts scoffed at by their +neighbors ... all the vast sweet love and precious sufferings of +mothers ... all honest men baffled in strifes recorded or unrecorded +... all the grandeur and good of the few ancient nations whose +fragments of annals we inherit ... and all the good of the hundreds of +far mightier and more ancient nations unknown to us by name or date or +location ... all that was ever manfully begun, whether it succeeded or +no ... all that has at any time been well suggested out of the divine +heart of man or by the divinity of his mouth or by the shaping of his +great hands ... and all that is well thought or done this day on any +part of the surface of the globe ... or on any of the wandering stars +or fixed stars by those there as we are here ... or that is henceforth +to be well thought or done by you whoever you are, or by any +one--these singly and wholly inured at their time and inure now and +will inure always to the identities from which they sprung or shall +spring ... Did you guess any of them lived only its moment? The world +does not so exist ... no parts palpable or impalpable so exist ... no +result exists now without being from its long antecedent result, +and that from its antecedent, and so backward without the farthest +mentionable spot coming a bit nearer the beginning than any other +spot.... Whatever satisfies the soul is truth. The prudence of the +greatest poet answers at last the craving and glut of the soul, is +not contemptuous of less ways of prudence if they conform to its ways, +puts off nothing, permits no let-up for its own case or any case, has +no particular sabbath or judgment-day, divides not the living from +the dead or the righteous from the unrighteous, is satisfied with the +present, matches every thought or act by its correlative, knows no +possible forgiveness or deputed atonement ... knows that the young man +who composedly perilled his life and lost it has done exceeding well +for himself, while the man who has not perilled his life and retains +to old age in riches and ease has perhaps achieved nothing for himself +worth mentioning ... and that only that person has no great prudence +to learn who has learnt to prefer real longlived things, and favors +body and soul the same, and perceives the indirect assuredly following +the direct, and what evil or good he does leaping onward and waiting +to meet him again--and who in his spirit in any emergency whatever +neither hurries or avoids death. + +The direct trial of him who would be the greatest poet is to-day. If +he does not flood himself with the immediate age as with vast oceanic +tides ... and if he does not attract his own land body and soul to +himself, and hang on its neck with incomparable love and plunge his +Semitic muscle into its merits and demerits ... and if he be not +himself the age transfigured ... and if to him is not opened the +eternity which gives similitude to all periods and locations and +processes and animate and inanimate forms, and which is the bond of +time, and rises up from its inconceivable vagueness and infiniteness +in the swimming shape of to-day, and is held by the ductile anchors +of life, and makes the present spot the passage from what was to what +shall be, and commits itself to the representation of this wave of an +hour and this one of the sixty beautiful children of the wave--let him +merge in the general run and wait his development.... Still the final +test of poems or any character or work remains. The prescient poet +projects himself centuries ahead and judges performer or performance +after the changes of time. Does it live through them? Does it still +hold on untired? Will the same style and the direction of genius to +similar points be satisfactory now? Has no new discovery in science or +arrival at superior planes of thought and judgment and behavior fixed +him or his so that either can be looked down upon? Have the marches of +tens and hundreds and thousands of years made willing detours to the +right hand and the left hand for his sake? Is he beloved long and long +after he is buried? Does the young man think often of him? and the +young woman think often of him? and do the middle aged and the old +think of him? + +A great poem is for ages and ages in common, and for all degrees and +complexions, and all departments and sects, and for a woman as much as +a man and a man as much as a woman. A great poem is no finish to a man +or woman but rather a beginning. Has any one fancied he could sit at +last under some due authority and rest satisfied with explanations and +realize and be content and full? To no such terminus does the greatest +poet bring ... he brings neither cessation or sheltered fatness and +ease. The touch of him tells in action. Whom he takes he takes +with firm sure grasp into live regions previously unattained ... +thenceforward is no rest ... they see the space and ineffable sheen +that turn the old spots and lights into dead vacuums. The companion +of him beholds the birth and progress of stars and learns one of the +meanings. Now there shall be a man cohered out of tumult and chaos ... +the elder encourages the younger and shows him how ... they too shall +launch off fearlessly together till the new world fits an orbit for +itself and looks unabashed on the lesser orbits of the stars and +sweeps through the ceaseless rings and shall never be quiet again. + +There will soon be no more priests. Their work is done. They may wait +awhile ... perhaps a generation or two ... dropping off by degrees. +A superior breed shall take their place ... the gangs of kosmos and +prophets _en masse_ shall take their place. A new order shall arise +and they shall be the priests of man, and every man shall be his own +priest. The churches built under their umbrage shall be the churches +of men and women. Through the divinity of themselves shall the kosmos +and the new breed of poets be interpreters of men and women and of all +events and things. They shall find their inspiration in real objects +to-day, symptoms of the past and future.... They shall not deign to +defend immortality or God or the perfection of things or liberty or +the exquisite beauty and reality of the soul. They shall arise in +America and be responded to from the remainder of the earth. + +The English language befriends the grand American expression ... it is +brawny enough and limber and full enough ... on the tough stock of a +race who through all change of circumstance was never without the +idea of political liberty, which is the animus of all liberty, it has +attracted the terms of daintier and gayer and subtler and more elegant +tongues. It is the powerful language of resistance ... it is the +dialect of common sense. It is the speech of the proud and melancholy +races and of all who aspire. It is the chosen tongue to express growth +faith self-esteem freedom justice equality friendliness amplitude +prudence decision and courage. It is the medium that shall well nigh +express the inexpressible. + +No great literature nor any like style of behavior or oratory or +social intercourse or household arrangements or public institutions +or the treatment of bosses of employed people, nor executive detail +or detail of the army and navy, nor spirit of legislation or courts +or police or tuition or architecture or songs or amusements or the +costumes of young men, can long elude the jealous and passionate +instinct of American standards. Whether or no the sign appears from +the mouths of the people, it throbs a live interrogation in every +freeman's and freewoman's heart after that which passes by or this +built to remain. Is it uniform with my country? Are its disposals +without ignominious distinctions? Is it for the ever growing communes +of brothers and lovers, large, well-united, proud beyond the old +models, generous beyond all models? Is it something grown fresh out of +the fields or drawn from the sea for use to me today here? I know +that what answers for me an American must answer for any individual or +nation that serves for a part of my materials. Does this answer? or is +it without reference to universal needs? or sprung of the needs of +the less developed society of special ranks? or old needs of pleasure +overlaid by modern science or forms? Does this acknowledge liberty +with audible and absolute acknowledgment, and set slavery at nought +for life and death? Will it help breed one goodshaped and wellhung +man, and a woman to be his perfect and independent mate? Does it +improve manners? Is it for the nursing of the young of the republic? +Does it solve readily with the sweet milk of the nipples of the +breasts of the mother of many children? Has it too the old ever-fresh +forbearance and impartiality? Does it look for the same love on the +last born and on those hardening toward stature, and on the errant, +and on those who disdain all strength of assault outside their own? + +The poems distilled from other poems will probably pass away. The +coward will surely pass away. The expectation of the vital and great +can only be satisfied by the demeanor of the vital and great. The +swarms of the polished deprecating and reflectors and the polite float +off and leave no remembrance. America prepares with composure and +goodwill for the visitors that have sent word. It is not intellect +that is to be their warrant and welcome. The talented, the artist, +the ingenious, the editor, the statesman, the erudite ... they are not +unappreciated ... they fall in their place and do their work. The soul +of the nation also does its work. No disguise can pass on it ... no +disguise can conceal from it. It rejects none, it permits all. Only +towards as good as itself and toward the like of itself will it +advance half-way. An individual is as superb as a nation when he has +the qualities which make a superb nation. The soul of the largest and +wealthiest and proudest nation may well go half-way to meet that of +its poets. The signs are effectual. There is no fear of mistake. If +the one is true the other is true. The proof of a poet is that his +country absorbs him as affectionately as he has absorbed it. + + +[Footnote A: Walt Whitman (1819-1892), the most original of American +poets, was born in West Hills, Long Island, educated in the Brooklyn +Public Schools, and apprenticed to a printer. As a youth he taught +in a country school, and later went into journalism in New York, +Brooklyn, and New Orleans. The first edition of "Leaves of Grass" +appeared in 1855, with the remarkable preface here printed. During the +war he acted as a volunteer nurse in the army hospitals, and, when it +closed, he became a clerk in the government service at Washington. He +continued to write almost till his death.] + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE + +BY HIPPOLYTE ADOLPHE TAINE. (1863)[A] + + +I + +History, within a hundred years in Germany, and within sixty years +in France, has undergone a transformation owing to a study of +literatures. + +The discovery has been made that a literary work is not a mere play +of the imagination, the isolated caprice of an excited brain, but +a transcript of contemporary manners and customs and the sign of a +particular state of intellect. The conclusion derived from this is +that, through literary monuments, we can retrace the way in which men +felt and thought many centuries ago. This method has been tried and +found successful. + +We have meditated over these ways of feeling and thinking and have +accepted them as facts of prime significance. We have found that they +were dependent on most important events, that they explain these, and +that these explain them, and that henceforth it was necessary to give +them their place in history, and one of the highest. This place has +been assigned to them, and hence all is changed in history--the aim, +the method, the instrumentalities, and the conceptions of laws and of +causes. It is this change as now going on, and which must continue to +go on, that is here attempted to be set forth. + +On turning over the large stiff pages of a folio volume, or the yellow +leaves of a manuscript, in short, a poem, a code of laws, a confession +of faith, what is your first comment? You say to yourself that the +work before you is not of its own creation. It is simply a mold like +a fossil shell, an imprint similar to one of those forms embedded in +a stone by an animal which once lived and perished. Beneath the shell +was an animal and behind the document there was a man. Why do you +study the shell unless to form some idea of the animal? In the same +way do you study the document in order to comprehend the man; both +shell and document are dead fragments and of value only as indications +of the complete living being. The aim is to reach this being; this is +what you strive to reconstruct. It is a mistake to study the document +as if it existed alone by itself. That is treating things merely as a +pedant, and you subject yourself to the illusions of a book-worm. +At bottom mythologies and languages are not existences; the only +realities are human beings who have employed words and imagery adapted +to their organs and to suit the original cast of their intellects. A +creed is nothing in itself. Who made it? Look at this or that +portrait of the sixteenth century, the stern, energetic features of an +archbishop or of an English martyr. Nothing exists except through the +individual; it is necessary to know the individual himself. Let the +parentage of creeds be established, or the classification of poems, or +the growth of constitutions, or the transformations of idioms, and we +have only cleared the ground. True history begins when the historian +has discerned beyond the mists of ages the living, active man, endowed +with passions, furnished with habits, special in voice, feature, +gesture and costume, distinctive and complete, like anybody that you +have just encountered in the street. Let us strive then, as far as +possible, to get rid of this great interval of time which prevents us +from observing the man with our eyes, _the eyes of our own head_. What +revelations do we find in the calendared leaves of a modern poem? A +modern poet, a man like De Musset, Victor Hugo, Lamartine, or Heine, +graduated from a college and traveled, wearing a dress-coat and +gloves, favored by ladies, bowing fifty times and uttering a dozen +witticisms in an evening, reading daily newspapers, generally +occupying an apartment on the second story, not over-cheerful on +account of his nerves, and especially because, in this dense democracy +in which we stifle each other, the discredit of official rank +exaggerates his pretensions by raising his importance, and, owing to +the delicacy of his personal sensations, leading him to regard himself +as a Deity. Such is what we detect behind modern _meditations_ and +_sonnets_. + +Again, behind a tragedy of the seventeenth century there is a poet, +one, for example, like Racine, refined, discreet, a courtier, a fine +talker, with majestic perruque and ribboned shoes, a monarchist and +zealous Christian, "God having given him the grace not to blush in any +society on account of zeal for his king or for the Gospel," clever in +interesting the monarch, translating into proper French "the _gaulois_ +of Amyot," deferential to the great, always knowing how to keep +his place in their company, assiduous and respectful at Marly as at +Versailles, amid the formal creations of a decorative landscape and +the reverential bows, graces, intrigues, and fineness of the braided +seigniors Who get up early every morning to obtain the reversion of an +office, together with the charming ladies who count on their fingers +the pedigrees which entitle them to a seat on a footstool. On this +point consult Saint-Simon and the engravings of Perelle, the same as +you have just consulted Balzac and the water-color drawings of Eugene +Lami. + +In like manner, on reading a Greek tragedy, our first care is +to figure to ourselves the Greeks, that is to say, men who lived +half-naked in the gymnasiums or on a public square under a brilliant +sky, in full view of the noblest and most delicate landscape, busy in +rendering their bodies strong and agile, in conversing together, in +arguing, in voting, in carrying out patriotic piracies, and yet idle +and temperate, the furniture of their houses consisting of three +earthen jars and their food of two pots of anchovies preserved in oil, +served by slaves who afford them the time to cultivate their minds and +to exercise their limbs, with no other concern that that of having +the most beautiful city, the most beautiful processions, the most +beautiful ideas, and the most beautiful men. In this respect, a statue +like the "Meleager" or the "Theseus" of the Parthenon, or again a +sight of the blue and lustrous Mediterranean, resembling a silken +tunic out of which islands arise like marble bodies, together with +a dozen choice phrases selected from the works of Plato and +Aristophanes, teach us more than any number of dissertations and +commentaries. + +And so again, in order to understand an Indian Purana, one must begin +by imagining the father of a family who, "having seen a son on his +son's knees," follows the law and, with ax and pitcher, seeks solitude +under a banyan tree, talks no more, multiplies his fastings, lives +naked with four fires around him under the fifth fire, that terrible +sun which endlessly devours and resuscitates all living things; who +fixes his imagination in turn for weeks at a time on the foot of +Brahma, then on his knee, on his thigh, on his navel, and so on, +until, beneath the strain of this intense meditation, hallucinations +appear, when all the forms of being, mingling together and transformed +into each other, oscillate to and fro in this vertiginous brain until +the motionless man, with suspended breath and fixed eyeballs, beholds +the universe melting away like vapor over the vacant immensity of +the Being in which he hopes for absorption. In this case the best of +teachings would be a journey in India; but, for lack of a better +one, take the narratives of travelers along with works in geography, +botany, and ethnology. In any event, there must be the same research. +A language, a law, a creed, is never other than an abstraction; the +perfect thing is found in the active man, the visible corporeal figure +which eats, walks, fights, and labors. Set aside the theories of +constitutions and their results, of religions and their systems, and +try to observe men in their workshops or offices, in their fields +along with their own sky and soil, with their own homes, clothes, +occupations and repasts, just as you see them when, on landing in +England or in Italy, you remark their features and gestures, their +roads and their inns, the citizen on his promenades and the workman +taking a drink. Let us strive as much as possible to supply the +place of the actual, personal, sensible observation that is no longer +practicable, this being the only way in which we can really know the +man; let us make the past present; to judge of an object it must be +present; no experience can be had of what is absent. Undoubtedly, this +sort of reconstruction is always imperfect; only an imperfect +judgment can be based on it; but let us do the best we can; incomplete +knowledge is better than none at all, or than knowledge which +is erroneous, and there is no other way of obtaining knowledge +approximatively of bygone times than by _seeing_ approximatively the +men of former times. + +Such is the first step in history. This step was taken in Europe at +the end of the last century when the imagination took fresh flight +under the auspices of Lessing and Walter Scott, and a little later in +France under Chateaubriand, Augustin Thierry, Michelet, and others. We +now come to the second step. + + + + +II + + +On observing the visible man with your own eyes what do you try to +find in him? The invisible man. These words which your ears catch, +those gestures, those airs of the head, his attire and sensible +operations of all kinds, are, for you, merely so many expressions; +these express something, a soul. An inward man is hidden beneath the +outward man, and the latter simply manifests the former. You have +observed the house in which he lives, his furniture, his costume, in +order to discover his habits and tastes, the degree of his refinement +or rusticity, his extravagance or economy, his follies or his +cleverness. You have listened to his conversation and noted the +inflexions of his voice, the attitudes he has assumed, so as to judge +of his spirit, self-abandonment or gayety, his energy or his rigidity. +You consider his writings, works of art, financial and political +schemes, with a view to measure the reach and limits of his +intelligence, his creative power and self-command, to ascertain the +usual order, kind, and force of his conceptions, in what way he +thinks and how he resolves. All these externals are so many avenues +converging to one center, and you follow these only to reach that +center; here is the real man, namely, that group of faculties and of +sentiments which produces the rest. Behold a new world, an infinite +world; for each visible action involves an infinite train of +reasonings and emotions, new or old sensations which have combined to +bring this into light and which, like long ledges of rock sunk deep +in the earth, have cropped out above the surface and attained their +level. It is this subterranean world which forms the second aim, the +special object of the historian. If his critical education suffices, +he is able to discriminate under every ornament in architecture, under +every stroke of the brush in a picture, under each phrase of literary +composition, the particular sentiment out of which the ornament, the +stroke, and the phrase have sprung; he is a spectator of the inward +drama which has developed itself in the breast of the artist or +writer; the choice of words, the length or shortness of the period, +the species of metaphor, the accent of a verse, the chain of +reasoning--all are to him an indication; while his eyes are reading +the text his mind and soul are following the steady flow and +ever-changing series of emotions and conceptions from which this text +has issued; he is working out its _psychology_. Should you desire to +study this operation, regard the promoter and model of all the high +culture of the epoch, Goethe, who, before composing his "Iphigenia" +spent days in making drawings of the most perfect statues and who, at +last, his eyes filled with the noble forms of antique scenery and his +mind penetrated by the harmonious beauty of antique life, succeeded in +reproducing internally, with such exactness, the habits and yearnings +of Greek imagination as to provide us with an almost twin sister of +the "Antigone" of Sophocles and of the goddesses of Phidias. This +exact and demonstrated divination of bygone sentiments has, in our +days, given a new life to history. There was almost complete ignorance +of this in the last century; men of every race and of every epoch were +represented as about alike, the Greek, the barbarian, the Hindoo, the +man of the Renaissance and the man of the eighteenth century, cast in +the same mold and after the same pattern, and after a certain abstract +conception which served for the whole human species. There was a +knowledge of man but not of men. There was no penetration into +the soul itself; nothing of the infinite diversity and wonderful +complexity of souls had been detected; it was not known that the moral +organization of a people or of an age is as special and distinct +as the physical structure of a family of plants or of an order of +animals. History to-day, like zoölogy, has found its anatomy, and +whatever branch of it is studied, whether philology, languages or +mythologies, it is in this way that labor must be given to make it +produce new fruit. Among so many writers who, since Herder, Ottfried +Müller, and Goethe have steadily followed and rectified this great +effort, let the reader take two historians and two works, one "The +Life and Letters of Cromwell" by Carlyle, and the other the "Port +Royal" of Sainte-Beuve. He will see how precisely, how clearly, and +how profoundly we detect the soul of a man beneath his actions and +works; how, under an old general and in place of an ambitious man +vulgarly hypocritical, we find one tormented by the disordered +reveries of a gloomy imagination, but practical in instinct and +faculties, thoroughly English and strange and incomprehensible to +whoever has not studied the climate and the race; how, with about a +hundred scattered letters and a dozen or more mutilated speeches, we +follow him from his farm and his team to his general's tent and to his +Protector's throne, in his transformation and in his development, in +his struggles of conscience and in his statesman's resolutions, +in such a way that the mechanism of his thought and action becomes +visible and the ever renewed and fitful tragedy, within which wracked +this great gloomy soul, passes like the tragedies of Shakespeare +into the souls of those who behold them. We see how, behind convent +disputes and the obstinacy of nuns, we recover one of the great +provinces of human psychology; how fifty or more characters, rendered +invisible through the uniformity of a narration careful of the +proprieties, came forth in full daylight, each standing out clear in +its countless diversities; how, underneath theological dissertations +and monotonous sermons, we discern the throbbings of ever-breathing +hearts, the excitements and depressions of the religious life, +the unforeseen reaction and pell-mell stir of natural feeling, the +infiltrations of surrounding society, the intermittent triumphs +of grace, presenting so many shades of difference that the fullest +description and most flexible style can scarcely garner in the vast +harvest which the critic has caused to germinate in this abandoned +field. And the same elsewhere. Germany, with its genius, so pliant, so +broad, so prompt in transformations, so fitted for the reproduction of +the remotest and strangest states of human thought; England, with its +matter-of-fact mind, so suited to the grappling with moral problems, +to making them clear by figures, weights, and measures, by geography +and statistics, by texts and common sense; France, at length, with its +Parisian culture and drawing-room habits, with its unceasing analysis +of characters and of works, with its ever ready irony at detecting +weaknesses, with its skilled finesse in discriminating shades of +thought--all have plowed over the same ground, and we now begin +to comprehend that no region of history exists in which this deep +sub-soil should not be reached if we would secure adequate crops +between the furrows. + +Such is the second step, and we are now in train to follow it out. +Such is the proper aim of contemporary criticism. No one has done this +work so judiciously and on so grand a scale as Sainte-Beuve; in this +respect, we are all his pupils; literary, philosophic, and religious +criticism in books, and even in the newspapers, is to-day entirely +changed by his method. Ulterior evolution must start from this +point. I have often attempted to expose what this evolution is; in my +opinion, it is a new road open to history and which I shall strive to +describe more in detail. + + + + +III + + +After having observed in a man and noted down one, two, three, +and then a multitude of sentiments, do these suffice and does your +knowledge of him seem complete? Does a memorandum book constitute a +psychology? It is not a psychology, and here, as elsewhere, the search +for causes must follow the collection of facts. It matters not what +the facts may be, whether physical or moral, they always spring from +causes; there are causes for ambition, for courage, for veracity, as +well as for digestion, for muscular action, and for animal heat. Vice +and virtue are products like vitriol and sugar; every complex fact +grows out of the simple facts with which it is affiliated and on +which it depends. We must therefore try to ascertain what simple facts +underlie moral qualities the same as we ascertain those that underlie +physical qualities, and, for example, let us take the first fact +that comes to hand, a religious system of music, that of a Protestant +church. A certain inward cause has inclined the minds of worshipers +toward these grave, monotonous melodies, a cause much greater than its +effect; that is to say, a general conception of the veritable outward +forms of worship which man owes to God; it is this general conception +which has shaped the architecture of the temple, cast out statues, +dispensed with paintings, effaced ornaments, shortened ceremonies, +confined the members of a congregation to high pews which cut off the +view, and governed the thousand details of decoration, posture, and +all other externals. This conception itself again proceeds from a +more general cause, an idea off human conduct in general, inward and +outward, prayers, actions, dispositions of every sort that man is +bound to maintain toward the Deity; it is this which has enthroned the +doctrine of grace, lessened the importance of the clergy, transformed +the sacraments, suppressed observances, and changed the religion of +discipline into one of morality. This conception, in its turn, depends +on a third one, still more general, that of moral perfection as this +is found in a perfect God, the impeccable judge, the stern overseer, +who regards every soul as sinful, meriting punishment, incapable of +virtue or of salvation, except through a stricken conscience which He +provokes and the renewal of the heart which He brings about. Here is +the master conception, consisting of duty erected into the absolute +sovereign of human life, and which prostrates all other ideals at the +feet of the moral ideal. Here we reach what is deepest in man; for, to +explain this conception, we must consider the race he belongs to, +say the German, the Northman, the formation and character of his +intellect, his ways in general of thinking and feeling, that tardiness +and frigidity of sensation which keeps him from rashly and easily +falling tinder the empire of sensual enjoyments, that bluntness of +taste, that irregularity and those outbursts of conception which +arrest in him the birth of refined and harmonious forms and methods; +that disdain of appearances, that yearning for truth, that attachment +to abstract, bare ideas which develop conscience in him at the expense +of everything else. Here the search comes to an end. We have reached +a certain primitive disposition, a particular trait belonging to +sensations of all kinds, to every conception peculiar to an age or +to a race, to characteristics inseparable from every idea and feeling +that stir in the human breast. Such are the grand causes, for these +are universal and permanent causes, present in every case and at every +moment, everywhere and always active, indestructible, and inevitably +dominant in the end, since, whatever accidents cross their path being +limited and partial, end in yielding to the obscure and incessant +repetition of their energy; so that the general structure of things +and all the main features of events are their work, all religions and +philosophies, all poetic and industrial systems, all forms of society +and of the family, all, in fine, being imprints bearing the stamp of +their seal. + + + + +IV + + +There is, then, a system in human ideas and sentiments, the prime +motor of which consists in general traits, certain characteristics +of thought and feeling common to men belonging to a particular race, +epoch, or country. Just as crystals in mineralogy, whatever +their diversity, proceed from a few simple physical forms, so do +civilizations in history, however these may differ, proceed from a few +spiritual forms. One is explained by a primitive geometrical element +as the other is explained by a primitive psychological element. In +order to comprehend the entire group of mineralogical species we must +first study a regular solid in the general, its facets and angles, and +observe in this abridged form the innumerable transformations of which +it is susceptible. In like manner, if we would comprehend the entire +group of historic varieties we must consider beforehand a human soul +in the general, with its two or three fundamental faculties, and, in +this abridgment, observe the principal forms it may present. This sort +of ideal tableau, the geometrical as well as psychological, is not +very complex, and we soon detect the limitations of organic conditions +to which civilizations, the same as crystals, are forcibly confined. +What do we find in man at the point of departure? Images or +representations of objects, namely, that which floats before him +internally, lasts a certain time, is effaced, and then returns after +contemplating this or that tree or animal, in short, some sensible +object. This forms the material basis of the rest and the development +of this material basis is twofold, speculative or positive, just as +these representations end in a _general conception_ or in an _active +resolution_. Such is man, summarily abridged. It is here, within these +narrow confines, that human diversities are encountered, now in the +matter itself and again in the primordial twofold development. However +insignificant in the elements they are of vast significance in the +mass, while the slightest change in the factors leads to gigantic +changes in the results. According as the representation is distinct, +as if stamped by a coining-press, or confused and blurred; according +as it concentrates in itself a larger or smaller number of the +characters of an object; according as it is violent and accompanied +with impulsions or tranquil and surrounded with calmness, so are +all the operations and the whole running-gear of the human machine +entirely transformed. In like manner, again, according as the +ulterior development of the representation varies, so does the whole +development of the man vary. If the general conception in which this +ends is merely a dry notation in Chinese fashion, language becomes +a kind of algebra, religion and poetry are reduced to a minimum, +philosophy is brought down to a sort of moral and practical common +sense, science to a collection of recipes, classifications, and +utilitarian mnemonics, the mind itself taking a whole positive +turn. If, on the contrary, the general conception in which the +representation culminates is a poetic and figurative creation, a +living symbol, as with the Aryan races, language becomes a sort of +shaded and tinted epic in which each word stands as a personage, +poesy and religion assume magnificent and inexhaustible richness, +and metaphysics develops with breadth and subtlety without +any consideration of positive bearings; the whole intellect, +notwithstanding the deviation and inevitable weaknesses of the effort, +is captivated by the beautiful and sublime, thus conceiving an ideal +type which, through its nobleness and harmony, gathers to itself all +the affections and enthusiasms of humanity. If, on the other hand, the +general conception in which the representation culminates is poetic +but abrupt, is reached not gradually but by sudden intuition, if +the original operation is not a regular development but a violent +explosion--then, as with the semitic races, metaphysical power +is wanting; the religious conception becomes that of a royal God, +consuming and solitary; science cannot take shape, the intellect grows +rigid and too headstrong to reproduce the delicate ordering of nature; +poetry cannot give birth to aught but a series of vehement, grandiose +exclamations, while language no longer renders the concatenation of +reasoning and eloquence, man being reduced to lyric enthusiasm, to +ungovernable passion, and to narrow and fanatical action. It is in +this interval between the particular representation and the universal +conception that the germs of the greatest human differences are found. +Some races, like the classic, for example, pass from the former to the +latter by a graduated scale of ideas regularly classified and more +and more general; others, like the Germanic, traverse the interval +in leaps, with uniformity and after prolonged and uncertain groping. +Others, like the Romans and the English, stop at the lowest stages; +others, like the Hindoos and Germans, mount to the uppermost. + +If, now, after considering the passage from the representation to the +idea, we regard the passage from the representation to the resolution, +we find here elementary differences of like importance and of the same +order, according as the impression is vivid, as in Southern climes, +or faint, as in Northern climes, as it ends in instantaneous action +as with barbarians, or tardily as with civilized nations, as it +is capable or not of growth, of inequality, of persistence and of +association. The entire system of human passion, all the risks of +public peace and security, all labor and action, spring from these +sources. It is the same with the other primordial differences; their +effects embrace an entire civilization, and may be likened to those +algebraic formulæ which, within narrow bounds, describe beforehand +the curve of which these form the law. Not that this law always +prevails to the end; sometimes, perturbations arise, but, even when +this happens, it is not because the law is defective, but because it +has not operated alone. New elements have entered into combination +with old ones; powerful foreign forces have interfered to oppose +primitive forces. The race has emigrated, as with the ancient +Aryans, and the change of climate has led to a change in the whole +intellectual economy and structure of society. A people has been +conquered like the Saxon nation, and the new political structure +has imposed on its customs, capacities, and desires which it did not +possess. The nation has established itself permanently in the midst +of downtrodden and threatening subjects, as with the ancient Spartans, +while the necessity of living, as in an armed encampment, has +violently turned the whole moral and social organization in one unique +direction. At all events, the mechanism of human history is like this. +We always find the primitive mainspring consisting of some widespread +tendency of soul and intellect, either innate and natural to the race +or acquired by it and due to some circumstance forced upon it. These +great given mainsprings gradually produce their effects, that is to +say, at the end of a few centuries they place the nation in a new +religious, literary, social, and economic state; a new condition +which, combined with their renewed effort, produces another condition, +sometimes a good one, sometimes a bad one, now slowly, now +rapidly, and so on; so that the entire development of each distinct +civilization may be considered as the effect of one permanent force +which, at every moment, varies its work by modifying the circumstances +where it acts. + + + + +V + + +Three different sources contribute to the production of this +elementary moral state, _race, environment_, and _epoch._ What we call +_race_ consists of those innate and hereditary dispositions which man +brings with him into the world and which are generally accompanied +with marked differences of temperament and of bodily structure. They +vary in different nations. + +Naturally, there are varieties of men as there are varieties of +cattle and horses, some brave and intelligent, and others timid and of +limited capacity; some capable of superior conceptions and creations, +and others reduced to rudimentary ideas and contrivances; some +specially fitted for certain works, and more richly furnished with +certain instincts, as we see in the better endowed species of dogs, +some for running and others for fighting, some for hunting and others +for guarding houses and flocks. We have here a distinct force; so +distinct that, in spite of the enormous deviations which both the +other motors impress upon it, we still recognize, and which a race +like the Aryan people, scattered from the Ganges to the Hebrides, +established tinder all climates, ranged along every degree of +civilization, transformed by thirty centuries of revolutions, shows +nevertheless in its languages, in its religions, in its literatures, +and in its philosophies, the community of blood and of intellect +which still to-day binds together all its offshoots. However they may +differ, their parentage is not lost; barbarism, culture and grafting, +differences of atmosphere and of soil, fortunate or unfortunate +occurrences, have operated in vain; the grand characteristics of the +original form have lasted, and we find that the two or three leading +features of the primitive imprint are again apparent under the +subsequent imprints with which time has overlaid them. There is +nothing surprising in this extraordinary tenacity. Although the +immensity of the distance allows us to catch only a glimpse in a +dubious light of the origin of species,[1] the events of history throw +sufficient light on events anterior to history to explain the almost +unshaken solidity of primordial traits. At the moment of encountering +them, fifteen, twenty, and thirty centuries before our era, in an +Aryan, Egyptian, or Chinese, they represent the work of a much greater +number of centuries, perhaps the work of many myriads of centuries. +For, as soon as an animal is born it must adapt itself to its +surroundings; it breathes in another way, it renews itself +differently, it is otherwise stimulated according as the atmosphere, +the food, and the temperature are different. A different climate +and situation create different necessities and hence activities of a +different kind; and hence, again, a system of different habits, and, +finally, a system of different aptitudes and instincts. Man, thus +compelled to put himself in equilibrium with circumstances, contracts +a corresponding temperament and character, and his character, like +his temperament, are acquisitions all the more stable because of the +outward impression being more deeply imprinted in him by more frequent +repetitions and transmitted to his offspring by more ancient heredity. +So that at each moment of time the character of a people may be +considered as a summary of all antecedent actions and sensations; that +is to say, as a quantity and as a weighty mass, not infinite,[2] since +all things in nature are limited, but disproportionate to the rest and +almost impossible to raise, since each minute of an almost infinite +past has contributed to render it heavier, and, in order to turn +the scale, it would require, on the other side, a still greater +accumulation of actions and sensations. Such is the first and most +abundant source of these master faculties from which historic events +are derived; and we see at once that if it is powerful it is owing +to its not being a mere source, but a sort of lake, and like a +deep reservoir wherein other sources have poured their waters for a +multitude of centuries. + +When we have thus verified the internal structure of a race we must +consider the _environment_ in which it lives. For man is not alone in +the world; nature envelops him and other men surround him; accidental +and secondary folds come and overspread the primitive and permanent +fold, while physical or social circumstances derange or complete the +natural groundwork surrendered to them. At one time climate has +had its effect. Although the history of Aryan nations can be only +obscurely traced from their common country to their final abodes, we +can nevertheless affirm that the profound difference which is apparent +between the Germanic races on the one hand, and the Hellenic and +Latin races on the other, proceeds in great part from the differences +between the countries in which they have established themselves--the +former in cold and moist countries, in the depths of gloomy forests +and swamps, or on the borders of a wild ocean, confined to melancholic +or rude sensations, inclined to drunkenness and gross feeding, leading +a militant and carnivorous life; the latter, on the contrary, living +amidst the finest scenery, alongside of a brilliant, sparkling sea +inviting navigation and commerce, exempt from the grosser cravings of +the stomach, disposed at the start to social habits and customs, to +political organization, to the sentiments and faculties which develop +the art of speaking, the capacity for enjoyment and invention in the +sciences, in art, and in literature. At another time, political events +have operated, as in the two Italian civilizations: the first +one tending wholly to action, to conquest, to government, and to +legislation, through the primitive situation of a city of refuge, a +frontier _emporium_, and of an armed aristocracy which, importing and +enrolling foreigners and the vanquished under it, sets two hostile +bodies facing each other, with no outlet for its internal troubles and +rapacious instincts but systematic warfare; the second one, excluded +from unity and political ambition on a grand scale by the permanency +of its municipal system, by the cosmopolite situation of its pope and +by the military intervention of neighboring states, and following the +bent of its magnificent and harmonious genius, is wholly carried over +to the worship of voluptuousness and beauty. Finally, at another time, +social conditions have imposed their stamp as, eighteen centuries ago, +by Christianity, and twenty-five centuries ago, by Buddhism, when, +around the Mediterranean as in Hindostan, the extreme effects of Aryan +conquest and organization led to intolerable oppression, the crushing +of the individual, utter despair, the whole world under the ban of a +curse, with the development of metaphysics and visions, until man, +in this dungeon of despondency, feeling his heart melt, conceived +of abnegation, charity, tender love, gentleness, humility, human +brotherhood, here in the idea of universal nothingness and there under +that of the fatherhood of God. Look around at the regulative instincts +and faculties implanted in a race; in brief, the turn of mind +according to which it thinks and acts at the present day; we shall +find most frequently that its work is due to one of these prolonged +situations, to these enveloping circumstances, to these persistent +gigantic pressures brought to bear on a mass of men who, one by +one, and all collectively, from one generation to another, have been +unceasingly bent and fashioned by them, in Spain a crusade of eight +centuries against the Mohammedans, prolonged yet longer even to the +exhaustion of the nation through the expulsion of the Moors, +through the spoliation of the Jews, through the establishment of +the Inquisition, through the Catholic wars; in England, a political +establishment of eight centuries which maintains man erect and +respectful, independent and obedient, all accustomed to struggling +together in a body under the sanction of law; in France, a Latin +organization which, at first imposed on docile barbarians, than +leveled to the ground under the universal demolition, forms itself +anew under the latent workings of national instinct, developing under +hereditary monarchs and ending in a sort of equalized, centralized, +administrative republic under dynasties exposed to revolutions. Such +are the most efficacious among the observable causes which mold the +primitive man; they are to nations what education, pursuit, condition, +and abode are to individuals, and seem to comprise all, since the +external forces which fashion human matter, and by which the outward +acts on the inward, are comprehended in them. + +There is, nevertheless, a third order of causes, for, with the forces +within and without, there is the work these have already produced +together, which work itself contributes toward producing the ensuing +work; beside the permanent impulsion and the given environment there +is the acquired momentum. When national character and surrounding +circumstances operate it is not on a _tabula rasa_, but on one already +bearing imprints. According as this _tabula_ is taken at one or at +another moment so is the imprint different, and this suffices to +render the total effect different. Consider, for example, two moments +of a literature or of an art, French tragedy under Corneille and under +Voltaire, and Greek drama under Æschylus and under Euripides, Latin +poetry under Lucretius and under Claudian, and Italian painting under +Da Vinci and under Guido. Assuredly, there is no change of general +conception at either of these two extreme points; ever the same human +type must be portrayed or represented in action; the cast of the +verse, the dramatic structure, the physical form have all persisted. +But there is this among these differences, that one of the artists is +a precursor and the other a successor, that the first one has no model +and the second one has a model; that the former sees things face to +face, and that the latter sees them through the intermediation of the +former, that many departments of art have become more perfect, that +the simplicity and grandeur of the impression have diminished, that +what is pleasing and refined in form has augumented--in short, that +the first work has determined the second. In this respect, it is with +a people as with a plant; the same sap at the same temperature and +in the same soil produces, at different stages of its successive +elaborations, different developments, buds, flowers, fruits, and +seeds, in such a way that the condition of the following is always +that of the preceding and is born of its death. Now, if you no longer +regard a brief moment, as above, but one of those grand periods of +development which embraces one or many centuries like the Middle Ages, +or our last classic period, the conclusion is the same. A certain +dominating conception has prevailed throughout; mankind, during +two hundred years, during five hundred years, have represented to +themselves a certain ideal figure of man, in mediæval times the knight +and the monk, in our classic period the courtier and refined talker; +this creative and universal conception has monopolized the entire +field of action and thought, and, after spreading its involuntary +systematic works over the world, it languished and then died out, +and now a new idea has arisen, destined to a like domination and to +equally multiplied creations. Note here that the latter depends in +part on the former, and that it is the former, which, combining its +effect with those of national genius and surrounding circumstances, +will impose their bent and their direction on new-born things. It is +according to this law that great historic currents are formed, meaning +by this, the long rule of a form of intellect or of a master idea, +like that period of spontaneous creations called the Renaissance, or +that period of oratorical classifications called the Classic Age, or +that series of mystic systems called the Alexandrine and Christian +epoch, or that series of mythological efflorescences found at the +origins of Germany, India, and Greece. Here as elsewhere, we are +dealing merely with a mechanical problem: the total effect is a +compound wholly determined by the grandeur and direction of the forces +which produce it. The sole difference which separates these moral +problems from physical problems lies in this, that in the former the +directions and grandeur cannot be estimated by or stated in figures +with the same precision as in the latter. If a want, a faculty, is +a quantity capable of degrees, the same as pressure or weight, this +quantity is not measurable like that of the pressure or weight. We +cannot fix it in an exact or approximative formula; we can obtain or +give of it only a literary impression; we are reduced to nothing and +citing the prominent facts which make it manifest and which nearly, or +roughly, indicate about what grade on the scale it must be ranged at. +And yet, notwithstanding the methods of notation are not the same +in the moral sciences as in the physical sciences, nevertheless, +as matter is the same in both, and is equally composed of forces, +directions, and magnitudes, we can still show that in one as in the +other, the final effect takes place according to the same law. This is +great or small according as the fundamental forces are great or small +and act more or less precisely in the same sense, according as the +distinct effects of race, environment and epoch combine to enforce +each other or combine to neutralize each other. Thus are explained the +long impotences and the brilliant successes which appear irregularly +and with no apparent reason in the life of a people; the causes of +these consist in internal concordances and contrarieties. There was +one of these concordances when, in the seventeenth century, the social +disposition and conversational spirit innate in France encountered +drawing-room formalities and the moment of oratorical analysis; when, +in the nineteenth century, the flexible, profound genius of Germany +encountered the age of philosophic synthesis and of cosmopolite +criticism. One of these contrarieties happened when, in the +seventeenth century, the blunt, isolated genius of England awkwardly +tried to don the new polish of urbanity, and when, in the sixteenth +century, the lucid, prosaic French intellect tried to gestate a living +poesy. It is this secret concordance of creative forces which produced +the exquisite courtesy and noble cast of literature under Louis XIV. +and Bossuet, and the grandiose metaphysics and broad critical sympathy +under Hegel and Goethe. It is this secret contrariety of creative +forces which produced the literary incompleteness, the licentious +plays, the abortive drama of Dryden and Wycherly, the poor Greek +importations, the gropings, the minute beauties and fragments of +Ronsard and the Pleiad. We may confidently affirm that the unknown +creations toward which the current of coming ages is bearing up will +spring from and be governed by these primordial forces; that, if these +forces could be measured and computed we might deduce from them, as +from a formula, the characters of future civilization; and that +if, notwithstanding the evident rudeness of our notations, and the +fundamental inexactitude of our measures, we would nowadays form some +idea of our general destinies, we must base our conjectures on an +examination of these forces. For, in enumerating them, we run through +the full circle of active forces; and when the race, the environment, +and the moment have been considered,--that is to say the inner +mainspring, the pressure from without, and the impulsion already +acquired,--we have exhausted not only all real causes but again all +possible causes of movement. + + + + +VI + + +There remains to be ascertained in what way these causes, applied to +a nation or to a century, distribute their effects. Like a spring +issuing from an elevated spot and diffusing its waters, according +to the height, from ledge to ledge, until it finally reaches the low +ground, so does the tendency of mind or soul in a people, due to race, +epoch, or environment, diffuse itself in different proportions, and by +regular descent, over the different series of facts which compose +its civilization.[3] In preparing the geographical map of a country, +starting at its watershed, we see the slopes, just below this common +point, dividing themselves into five or six principal basins, and +then each of the latter into several others, and so on until the whole +country, with its thousands of inequalities of surface, is included +in the ramifications of this network. In like manner, in preparing the +psychological map of the events and sentiments belonging to a certain +human civilization, we find at the start five or six well determined +provinces--religion, art, philosophy, the state, the family, and +industries; next, in each of these provinces, natural departments, and +then finally, in each of these departments, still smaller territories +until we arrive at those countless details of life which we observe +daily in ourselves and around us. If, again, we examine and compare +together these various groups of facts we at once find that they are +composed of parts and that all have parts in common. Let us take first +the three principal products of human intelligence--religion, art, and +philosophy. What is a philosophy but a conception of nature and of its +primordial causes under the form of abstractions and formulas? What +underlies a religion and an art if not a conception of this same +nature, and of these same primordial causes, under the form of more +or less determinate symbols, and of more or less distinct personages, +with this difference, that in the first case we believe that they +exist, and in the second case that they do not exist. Let the reader +consider some of the great creations of the intellect in India, in +Scandinavia, in Persia, in Rome, in Greece, and he will find that art +everywhere is a sort of philosophy become sensible, religion a sort +of poem regarded as true, and philosophy a sort of art and religion, +desiccated and reduced to pure abstractions. There is, then, in the +center of each of these groups a common element, the conception of +the world and its origin, and if they differ amongst each other it is +because each combines with the common element a distinct element; +here the power of abstraction, there the faculty of personifying with +belief, and, finally, the talent for personifying without belief. Let +us now take the two leading products of human association, the Family +and the State. What constitutes the State other than the sentiment +of obedience by which a multitude of men collect together under the +authority of a chief? And what constitutes the Family other than the +sentiment of obedience by which a wife and children act together +under the direction of a father and husband? The Family is a natural, +primitive, limited state, as the State is an artificial, ulterior, and +expanded Family, while beneath the differences which arise from the +number, origin, and condition of its members, we distinguish, in the +small as in the large community, a like fundamental disposition of +mind which brings them together and unites them. Suppose, now, that +this common element receives from the environment, the epoch, and the +race peculiar characteristics, and it is clear that _all the groups +into which it enters will be proportionately modified_. If the +sentiment of obedience is merely one of fear,[4] you encounter, as in +most of the Oriental states, the brutality of despotism, a prodigality +of vigorous punishments, the exploitation of the subject, servile +habits, insecurity of property, impoverished production, female +slavery, and the customs of the harem. If the sentiment of obedience +is rooted in the instinct of discipline, sociability, and honor, +you find, as in France, a complete military organization, a superb +administrative hierarchy, a weak public spirit with outbursts of +patriotism, the unhesitating docility of the subject along with +the hot-headedness of the revolutionist, the obsequiousness of the +courtier along with the reserve of the gentleman, the charm of refined +conversation along with home and family bickerings, conjugal equality +together with matrimonial incompatibilities under the necessary +constraints of the law. If, finally, the sentiment of obedience is +rooted in the instinct of subordination and in the idea of duty, you +perceive, as in Germanic nations, the security and contentment of +the household, the firm foundations of domestic life, the slow +and imperfect development of worldly matters, innate respect for +established rank, superstitious reverence for the past, maintenance +of social inequalities, natural and habitual deference to the law. +Similarly in a race, just as there is a difference of aptitude for +general ideas, so will its religion, art, and philosophy be different. +If man is naturally fitted for broader universal conceptions and +inclined at the same time to their derangement, through the nervous +irritability of an over-excited organization, we find, as in India, a +surprising richness of gigantic religious creations, a splendid bloom +of extravagant transparent epics, a strange concatenation of subtle, +imaginative philosophic systems, all so intimately associated and so +interpenetrated with a common sap, that we at once recognize them, by +their amplitude, by their color, and by their disorder, as productions +of the same climate and of the same spirit. If, on the contrary, +the naturally sound and well-balanced man is content to restrict his +conceptions to narrow bounds in order to cast them in more precise +forms, we see, as in Greece, a theology of artists and narrators, +special gods that are soon separated from objects and almost +transformed at once into substantial personages, the sentiment of +universal unity nearly effaced and scarcely maintained in the vague +notion of destiny, a philosophy, rather than subtle and compact, +grandiose and systematic, narrow metaphysically[5] but incomparable +in its logic, sophistry, and morality, a poesy and arts superior to +anything we have seen in lucidity, naturalness, proportion, truth, and +beauty. If, finally, man is reduced to narrow conceptions deprived +of any speculative subtlety, and at the same time finds that he is +absorbed and completely hardened by practical interests, we see, as +in Rome, rudimentary deities, mere empty names, good for denoting the +petty details of agriculture, generation, and the household, veritable +marriage and farming labels, and, therefore, a null or borrowed +mythology, philosophy, and poesy. Here, as elsewhere, comes in the law +of mutual dependencies.[6] A civilization is a living unit, the parts +of which hold together the same as the parts of an organic body. Just +as in an animal, the instincts, teeth, limbs, bones, and muscular +apparatus are bound together in such a way that a variation of one +determines a corresponding variation in the others, and out of which +a skillful naturalist, with a few bits, imagines and reconstructs an +almost complete body, so, in a civilization, do religion, philosophy, +the family scheme, literature and the arts form a system in which +each local change involves a general change, so that an experienced +historian, who studies one portion apart from the others, sees +beforehand and partially predicts the characteristics of the rest. +There is nothing vague in this dependence. The regulation of all this +in the living body consists, first, of the tendency to manifest a +certain primordial type, and, next, the necessity of its possessing +organs which can supply its wants and put itself in harmony with +itself in order to live. The regulation in a civilization consists in +the presence in each great human creation of an elementary productor +equally present in other surrounding creations, that is, some faculty +and aptitude, some efficient and marked disposition, which, with its +own peculiar character, introduces this with that into all operations +in which it takes part, and which, according to its variations, causes +variation in all the works in which it coöperates. + + + + +VII + + +Having reached this point we can obtain a glimpse of the principal +features of human transformations, and can now search for the general +laws which regulate not only events, but classes of events; not only +this religion or that literature, but the whole group of religions or +of literatures. If, for example, it is admitted that a religion is +a metaphysical poem associated with belief; if it is recognized, +besides, that there are certain races and certain environments +in which belief, poetic faculty, and metaphysical faculty display +themselves in common with unwonted vigor; if we consider that +Christianity and Buddhism were developed at periods of grand +systematizations and in the midst of sufferings like the oppression +which stirred up the fanatics of Cevennes; if, on the other hand, it +is recognized that primitive religions are born at the dawn of human +reason, during the richest expansion of human imagination, at times +of the greatest naïveté and of the greatest credulity; if we consider, +again, that Mohammedanism appeared along with the advent of poetic +prose and of the conception of material unity, amongst a people +destitute of science and at the moment of a sudden development of the +intellect--we might conclude that religion is born and declines, is +reformed and transformed, according as circumstances fortify and bring +together, with more or less precision and energy, its three generative +instincts; and we would then comprehend why religion is endemic in +India among specially exalted imaginative and philosophic intellects; +why it blooms out so wonderfully and so grandly in the Middle Ages, +in an oppressive society, amongst new languages and literature; why +it develops again in the sixteenth century with a new character and an +heroic enthusiasm, at the time of an universal renaissance and at the +awakening of the Germanic races; why it swarms out in so many bizarre +sects in the rude democracy of America and under the bureaucratic +despotism of Russia; why, in fine, it is seen spreading out in the +Europe of to-day in such different proportions and with such special +traits, according to such differences of race and of civilizations. +And so for every kind of human production, for letters, music, the +arts of design, philosophy, the sciences, state industries, and +the rest. Each has some moral tendency for its direct cause, or a +concurrence of moral tendencies; given the cause, it appears; the +cause withdrawn, it disappears; the weakness or intensity of the cause +is the measure of its own weakness or intensity. It is bound to +that like any physical phenomenon to its condition, like dew to the +chilliness of a surrounding atmosphere, like dilatation to heat. +Couples exist in the moral world as they exist in the physical world, +as rigorously linked together and as universally diffused. Whatever +in one case produces, alters, or suppresses the first term, produces, +alters, and suppresses the second term as a necessary consequence. +Whatever cools the surrounding atmosphere causes the fall of dew. +Whatever develops credulity, along with poetic conceptions of the +universe, engenders religion. Thus have things come about, and +thus will they continue to come about. As soon as the adequate and +necessary condition of one of these vast apparitions becomes known to +us our mind has a hold on the future as well as on the past. We can +confidently state under what circumstances it will reappear, foretell +without rashness many portions of its future history, and sketch with +precaution some of the traits of its ulterior development. + + + + +VIII + + +History has reached this point at the present day, or rather it is +nearly there, on the threshold of this inquest. The question as now +stated is this: Given a literature, a philosophy, a society, an art, +a certain group of arts, what is the moral state of things which +produces it? And what are the conditions of race, epoch, and +environment the best adapted to produce this moral state? There is +a distinct moral state for each of these formations and for each of +their branches; there is one for art in general as well as for each +particular art; for architecture, painting, sculpture, music, and +poetry, each with a germ of its own in the large field of human +psychology; each has its own law, and it is by virtue of this law that +we see each shoot up, apparently haphazard, singly and alone, amidst +the miscarriages of their neighbors, like painting in Flanders and +Holland in the seventeenth century, like poetry in England in the +sixteenth century, like music in Germany in the eighteenth century. +At this moment, and in these countries, the conditions for one art and +not for the others are fulfilled, and one branch only has bloomed out +amidst the general sterility. It is these laws of human vegetation +which history must now search for; it is this special psychology of +each special formation which must be got at; it is the composition of +a complete table of these peculiar conditions that must now be worked +out. There is nothing more delicate and nothing more difficult. +Montesquieu undertook it, but in his day the interest in history was +too recent for him to be successful; nobody, indeed, had any idea +of the road that was to be followed, and even at the present day +we scarcely begin to obtain a glimpse of it. Just as astronomy, at +bottom, is a mechanical problem, and physiology, likewise, a chemical +problem, so is history, at bottom, a _problem of psychology_. There is +a particular system of inner impressions and operations which fashions +the artist, the believer, the musician, the painter, the nomad, +the social man; for each of these, the filiation, intensity, and +interdependence of ideas and of emotions are different; each has his +own moral history, and his own special organization, along with some +master tendency and with some dominant trait. To explain each of these +would require a chapter devoted to a profound internal analysis, and +that is a work that can scarcely be called sketched out at the present +day. But one man, Stendhal, through a certain turn of mind and a +peculiar education, has attempted it, and even yet most of his readers +find his works paradoxical and obscure. His talent and ideas were +too premature. His admirable insight, his profound sayings carelessly +thrown out, the astonishing precision of his notes and logic, were not +understood; people were not aware that, under the appearances and +talk of a man of the world, he explained the most complex of internal +mechanisms; that his finger touched the great mainspring, that he +brought scientific processes to bear in the history of the heart, the +art of employing figures, of decomposing, of deducing, that he was the +first to point out fundamental causes such as nationalities, climates, +and temperaments, in short, that he treated sentiments as they should +be treated, that is to say, as a naturalist and physicist, by making +classifications and estimating forces. On account of all this he +was pronounced dry and eccentric and allowed to live in isolation, +composing novels, books of travel and taking notes, for which he +counted upon, and has obtained, about a dozen or so of readers. And +yet his works are those in which we of the present day may find the +most satisfactory efforts that have been made to clear the road I have +just striven to describe. Nobody has taught one better how to observe +with one's own eyes, first, to regard humanity around us and life as +it is, and next, old and authentic documents, how to read more than +merely the black and white of the page, how to detect under old print +and the scrawl of the text the veritable sentiment and the train +of thought, the mental state in which the words were penned. In his +writings, as in those of Sainte Beuve and in those of the German +critics the reader will find how much is to be derived from a literary +document, if this document is rich and we know how to interpret it, +we will find in the psychology of a particular soul, often that of an +age, and sometimes that of a race. In this respect, a great poem, a +good novel, the confessions of a superior man, are more instructive +than a mass of historians and histories, I would give fifty volumes +of charters and a hundred diplomatic files for the memoirs of Cellini, +the epistles of Saint Paul, the table talk of Luther, or the comedies +of Aristophanes. Herein lies the value of literary productions. They +are instructive because they are beautiful, their usefulness increases +with their perfection and if they provide us with documents, it is +because they are monuments. The more visible a book renders sentiments +the more literary it is, for it is the special office of literature to +take note of sentiments. The more important the sentiments noted in a +book the higher its rank in literature, for it is by representing what +sort of a life a nation or an epoch leads, that a writer rallies to +himself the sympathies of a nation or of an epoch. Hence, among the +documents which bring before our eyes the sentiments of preceding +generations, a literature, and especially a great literature, is +incomparably the best. It resembles those admirable instruments of +remarkable sensitiveness which physicists make use of to detect and +measure the most profound and delicate changes that occur in a human +body. There is nothing approaching this in constitutions or religions; +the articles of a code or of a catechism do no more than depict mind +in gross and without finesse; if there are any documents which show +life and spirit in politics and in creeds, they are the eloquent +discourses of the pulpit and the tribune, memoirs and personal +confessions, all belonging to literature, so that, outside of itself, +literature embodies whatever is good elsewhere. It is mainly in +studying literatures that we are able to produce moral history, and +arrive at some knowledge of the psychological laws on which events +depend. + +I have undertaken to write a history of a literature and to ascertain +the psychology of a people; in selecting this one, it is not without +a motive. A people had to be taken possessing a vast and complete +literature, which is rarely found. There are few nations which, +throughout their existence, have thought and written well in the full +sense of the word. Among the ancients, Latin literature is null at the +beginning, and afterward borrowed and an imitation. Among the moderns, +German literature is nearly a blank for two centuries.[7] Italian and +Spanish literatures come to an end in the middle of the seventeenth +century. Ancient Greece, and modern France and England, alone offer a +complete series of great and expressive monuments. I have chosen +the English because, as this still exists and is open to direct +observation, it can be better studied than that of an extinct +civilization of which fragments only remain; and because, being +different, it offers better than that of France very marked +characteristics in the eyes of a Frenchman. Moreover, outside of +what is peculiar to English civilization, apart from a spontaneous +development, it presents a forced deviation due to the latest and most +effective conquest to which the country was subject; the three given +conditions out of which it issues--race, climate, and the Norman +conquest--are clearly and distinctly visible in its literary +monuments; so that we study in this history the two most potent motors +of human transformation, namely, nature and constraint, and we study +them, without any break or uncertainty, in a series of authentic and +complete monuments. I have tried to define these primitive motors, to +show their gradual effects, and explain how their insensible operation +has brought religious and literary productions into full light, and +how the inward mechanism is developed by which the barbarous Saxon +became the Englishman of the present day. + + +[Footnote A: Hippolyte Adolphe Taine (b. 1828; d. 1893) was one of the +most distinguished French critics of the nineteenth century. He held +the chair of esthetics at the Ècole des Beaux Arts, and wrote a +large number of works in history, travel, and literary criticism. +His "History of English Literature" is the most brilliant book on +the subject ever written by a foreigner, and in this introduction he +expounds the method of criticism which has come to be associated +with his name, and in accordance with which he seeks to interpret the +characteristics of English authors.] + +[Footnote 1: Darwin, "The Origin of Species." Prosper Lucas, "De +l'Hérédité."] + +[Footnote 2: Spinosa, "Ethics," part iv., axiom.] + +[Footnote 3: For this scale of coordinate effects consult, "Langues +Sémitiques," by Renan, ch I, "Comparison des civilizations Grecque +et Romaine," vol I, ch I, 3d ed, by Mommsen, "Consequences de la +démocratie," vol III., by Tocqueville.] + +[Footnote 4: "L'Esprit des Lois," by Montesquieu; the essential +principles of the three governments.] + +[Footnote 5: The birth of the Alexandrine philosophy is due to contact +with the Orient. Aristotle's metaphysical views stand alone. Moreover, +with him as with Plato, they afford merely a glimpse. By way of +contrast see systematic power in Plotinus, Proclus, Schelling, and +Hegel, or again in the admirable boldness of Brahmanic and Buddhist +speculation.] + +[Footnote 6: I have very often made attempts to state this law, +especially in the preface to "Essais de Critique et d'Histoire."] + +[Footnote 7: From 1550 to 1750.] + + + + +_Planned and Designed at The Collier Press By William Patten_ + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13182 *** diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f8ed487 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #13182 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/13182) diff --git a/old/13182-0.txt b/old/13182-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..26afebb --- /dev/null +++ b/old/13182-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,17184 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations, by Charles W. Eliot + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations + +Author: Charles W. Eliot + +Release Date: August 15, 2004 [eBook #13182] +[Most recently updated: April 28, 2021] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: Leah Moser and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PREFACES AND PROLOGUES TO FAMOUS BOOKS *** + + + + +[Illustration: _Hippolyte Adolphe Taine From the etching by Asher B. +Durand_] + +THE HARVARD CLASSICS EDITED BY CHARLES W. ELIOT LL.D. + + +PREFACES AND PROLOGUES TO FAMOUS BOOKS + +WITH INTRODUCTIONS, NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS + +[Illustration] + +"DR. ELIOT'S FIVE-FOOT SHELF OF BOOKS" + + +P.F. COLLIER & SON + +NEW YORK + +1909 BY LITTLE BROWN & COMPANY + +1910 BY P.F. COLLIER & SON + + + + +CONTENTS + + + TITLE, PROLOGUE AND EPILOGUES TO THE RECUYELL OF THE + HISTORIES OF TROY WILLIAM CAXTON + + EPILOGUE TO DICTES AND SAYINGS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS + WILLIAM CAXTON + + PROLOGUE TO GOLDEN LEGEND WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO CATON WILLIAM CAXTON + EPILOGUE TO AESOP WILLIAM CAXTON + PROEM TO CHAUCER'S CANTERBURY TALES WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO MALORY'S KING ARTHUR WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO VIRGIL'S ENEYDOS WILLIAM CAXTON + + DEDICATION OF THE INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION + JOHN CALVIN + TRANSLATED BY JOHN ALLEN + + DEDICATION OF THE REVOLUTIONS OF THE HEAVENLY BODIES + NICOLAUS COPERNICUS + + PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION IN SCOTLAND + JOHN KNOX + + PREFATORY LETTER TO SIR WALTER RALEIGH ON THE FAERIE + QUEENE EDMUND SPENSER + + PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD SIR WALTER RALEIGH + + PROOEMIUM, EPISTLE DEDICATORY, PREFACE, AND PLAN OF THE + INSTAURATIO MAGNA, ETC. FRANCIS BACON + TRANSLATION EDITED BY J. SPEDDING + + PREFACE TO THE NOVUM ORGANUM FRANCIS BACON + + PREFACE TO THE FIRST FOLIO EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE'S + PLAYS HEMINGE AND CONDELL + + PREFACE TO THE PHILOSOPHIAE NATURALIS PRINCIPIA + MATHEMATICA SIR ISAAC NEWTON + TRANSLATED BY ANDREW MOTTE + + PREFACE TO FABLES, ANCIENT AND MODERN + JOHN DRYDEN + + PREFACE TO JOSEPH ANDREWS HENRY FIELDING + PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH DICTIONARY SAMUEL JOHNSON + PREFACE TO SHAKESPEARE SAMUEL JOHNSON + INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPYLÄEN J.W. VON GOETHE + + PREFACES TO VARIOUS VOLUMES OF POEMS + WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO PREFACE WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + + PREFACE TO CROMWELL VICTOR HUGO + PREFACE TO LEAVES OF GRASS WALT WHITMAN + INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE + H.A. TAINE + + + + +_INTRODUCTORY NOTE_ + + +_No part of a book is so intimate as the Preface. Here, after the long +labor of the work is over, the author descends from his platform, and +speaks with his reader as man to man, disclosing his hopes and fears, +seeking sympathy for his difficulties, offering defence or defiance, +according to his temper, against the criticisms which he anticipates. +It thus happens that a personality which has been veiled by a formal +method throughout many chapters, is suddenly seen face to face in the +Preface; and this alone, if there were no other reason, would justify +a volume of Prefaces. + +But there are other reasons why a Preface may be presented apart from +its parent work, and may, indeed, be expected sometimes to survive +it. The Prologues and Epilogues of Caxton were chiefly prefixed to +translations which have long been superseded; but the comments of this +frank and enthusiastic pioneer of the art of printing in England +not only tell us of his personal tastes, but are in a high degree +illuminative of the literary habits and standards of western Europe +in the fifteenth century. Again, modern research has long ago put +Raleigh's "History of the World" out of date; but his eloquent Preface +still gives us a rare picture of the attitude of an intelligent +Elizabethan, of the generation which colonised America, toward the +past, the present, and the future worlds. Bacon's "Great Restoration" +is no longer a guide to scientific method; but his prefatory +statements as to his objects and hopes still offer a lofty +inspiration. + +And so with the documents here drawn from the folios of Copernicus and +Calvin, with the criticism of Dryden and Wordsworth and Hugo, with +Dr. Johnson's Preface to his great Dictionary, with the astounding +manifesto of a new poetry from Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass"--each +of them has a value and significance independent now of the work which +it originally introduced, and each of them presents to us a man._ + + + + +PREFACES AND EPILOGUES + +BY WILLIAM CAXTON[A] + + + + +THE RECUYELL OF THE HISTORIES OF TROY + +TITLE AND PROLOGUE TO BOOK I + + +Here beginneth the volume entitled and named the Recuyell of the +Histories of Troy, composed and drawn out of divers books of Latin +into French by the right venerable person and worshipful man, Raoul le +Feure, priest and chaplain unto the right noble, glorious, and mighty +prince in his time, Philip, Duke of Burgundy, of Brabant, etc. in the +year of the Incarnation of our Lord God a thousand four hundred sixty +and four, and translated and drawn out of French into English by +William Caxton, mercer, of the city of London, at the commandment of +the right high, mighty, and virtuous Princess, his redoubted Lady, +Margaret, by the grace of God Duchess of Burgundy, of Lotrylk, of +Brabant, etc.; which said translation and work was begun in Bruges +in the County of Flanders, the first day of March, the year of the +Incarnation of our said Lord God a thousand four hundred sixty and +eight, and ended and finished in the holy city of Cologne the 19th day +of September, the year of our said Lord God a thousand four hundred +sixty and eleven, etc. + +And on that other side of this leaf followeth the prologue. + +When I remember that every man is bounden by the commandment and +counsel of the wise man to eschew sloth and idleness, which is +mother and nourisher of vices, and ought to put myself unto virtuous +occupation and business, then I, having no great charge of occupation, +following the said counsel took a French book, and read therein many +strange and marvellous histories, wherein I had great pleasure and +delight, as well for the novelty of the same as for the fair language +of French, which was in prose so well and compendiously set and +written, which methought I understood the sentence and substance of +every matter. And for so much as this book was new and late made and +drawn into French, and never had seen it in our English tongue, I +thought in myself it should be a good business to translate it into +our English, to the end that it might be had as well in the royaume +of England as in other lands, and also for to pass therewith the time, +and thus concluded in myself to begin this said work. And forthwith +took pen and ink, and began boldly to run forth as blind Bayard +in this present work, which is named "The Recuyell of the Trojan +Histories." And afterward when I remembered myself of my simpleness +and unperfectness that I had in both languages, that is to wit in +French and in English, for in France was I never, and was born and +learned my English in Kent, in the Weald, where I doubt not is +spoken as broad and rude English as in any place of England; and have +continued by the space of 30 years for the most part in the countries +of Brabant, Flanders, Holland, and Zealand. And thus when all these +things came before me, after that I had made and written five or six +quires I fell in despair of this work, and purposed no more to have +continued therein, and those quires laid apart, and in two years after +laboured no more in this work, and was fully in will to have left it, +till on a time it fortuned that the right high, excellent, and right +virtuous princess, my right redoubted Lady, my Lady Margaret, by +the grace of God sister unto the King of England and of France, +my sovereign lord, Duchess of Burgundy, of Lotryk, of Brabant, of +Limburg, and of Luxembourg, Countess of Flanders, of Artois, and of +Burgundy, Palatine of Hainault, of Holland, of Zealand and of Namur, +Marquesse of the Holy Empire, Lady of Frisia, of Salins and of +Mechlin, sent for me to speak with her good Grace of divers matters, +among the which I let her Highness have knowledge of the foresaid +beginning of this work, which anon commanded me to show the said five +or six quires to her said Grace; and when she had seen them anon she +found a default in my English, which she commanded me to amend, and +moreover commanded me straitly to continue and make an end of the +residue then not translated; whose dreadful commandment I durst in no +wise disobey, because I am a servant unto her said Grace and receive +of her yearly fee and other many good and great benefits, (and also +hope many more to receive of her Highness), but forthwith went and +laboured in the said translation after my simple and poor cunning, +also nigh as I can following my author, meekly beseeching the +bounteous Highness of my said Lady that of her benevolence list to +accept and take in gree this simple and rude work here following; and +if there be anything written or said to her pleasure, I shall think my +labour well employed, and whereas there is default that she arette it +to the simpleness of my cunning which is full small in this behalf; +and require and pray all them that shall read this said work to +correct it, and to hold me excused of the rude and simple translation. + +And thus I end my prologue. + +[Footnote A: William Caxton (1422?-1491), merchant and translator, +learned the art of printing on the Continent, probably at Bruges or +Cologne. He translated "The Recuyell of the Histories of Troy" between +1469 and 1471, and, on account of the great demand for copies, was led +to have it printed--the first English book to be reproduced by this +means. The date was about 1474; the place, probably Bruges. In +1476, Caxton came back to England, and set up a press of his own at +Westminster. In 1477, he issued the first book known to have been +printed in England, "The Dictes and Sayings of the Philosophers." +The following Prefaces and Epilogues from Caxton's own pen show his +attitude towards some of the more important of the works that issued +from his press.] + + + + +EPILOGUE TO BOOK II + + +Thus endeth the second book of the Recule of the Histories of Troy. +Which bookes were late translated into French out of Latin by the +labour of the venerable person Raoul le Feure, priest, as afore +is said; and by me indigne and unworthy, translated into this rude +English by the commandment of my said redoubted Lady, Duchess of +Burgundy. And for as much as I suppose the said two books be not had +before this time in our English language, therefore I had the better +will to accomplish this said work; which work was begun in Bruges +and continued in Ghent and finished in Cologne, in the time of the +troublous world, and of the great divisions being and reigning, as +well in the royaumes of England and France as in all other places +universally through the world; that is to wit the year of our Lord a +thousand four hundred seventy one. And as for the third book, which +treateth of the general and last destruction of Troy, it needeth +not to translate it into English, for as much as that worshipful and +religious man, Dan John Lidgate, monk of Bury, did translate it but +late; after whose work I fear to take upon me, that am not worthy to +bear his penner and ink-horn after him, to meddle me in that work. +But yet for as much as I am bound to contemplate my said Lady's good +grace, and also that his work is in rhyme and as far as I know it is +not had in prose in our tongue, and also, peradventure, he translated +after some other author than this is; and yet for as much as divers +men be of divers desires, some to read in rhyme and metre and some +in prose; and also because that I have now good leisure, being in +Cologne, and have none other thing to do at this time; in eschewing +of idleness, mother of all vices, I have delibered in myself for the +contemplation of my said redoubted lady to take this labour in hand, +by the sufferance and help of Almighty God; whom I meekly supplye to +give me grace to accomplish it to the pleasure of her that is causer +thereof, and that she receive it in gree of me, her faithful, true, +and most humble servant etc. + + + + +EPILOGUE TO BOOK III + + +Thus end I this book, which I have translated after mine Author as +nigh as God hath given me cunning, to whom be given the laud and +praising. And for as much as in the writing of the same my pen is +worn, my hand weary and not steadfast, mine eyne dimmed with overmuch +looking on the white paper, and my courage not so prone and ready to +labour as it hath been, and that age creepeth on me daily and feebleth +all the body, and also because I have promised to divers gentlemen and +to my friends to address to them as hastily as I might this said book, +therefore I have practised and learned at my great charge and dispense +to ordain this said book in print, after the manner and form as ye may +here see, and is not written with pen and ink as other books be, to +the end that every man may have them at once. For all the books of +this story, named "The Recule of the Histories of Troy" thus imprinted +as ye here see, were begun in one day and also finished in one day, +which book I have presented to my said redoubted Lady, as afore +is said. And she hath well accepted it, and largely rewarded me, +wherefore I beseech Almighty God to reward her everlasting bliss after +this life, praying her said Grace and all them that shall read this +book not to disdain the simple and rude work, neither to reply against +the saying of the matters touched in this book, though it accord not +unto the translation of others which have written it. For divers men +have made divers books which in all points accord not, as Dictes, +Dares, and Homer. For Dictes and Homer, as Greeks, say and write +favorably for the Greeks, and give to them more worship than to the +Trojans; and Dares writeth otherwise than they do. And also as for the +proper names, it is no wonder that they accord not, for some one name +in these days have divers equivocations after the countries that they +dwell in; but all accord in conclusion the general destruction of that +noble city of Troy, and the death of so many noble princes, as +kings, dukes, earls, barons, knights, and common people, and the ruin +irreparable of that city that never since was re-edified; which may be +example to all men during the world how dreadful and jeopardous it is +to begin a war and what harms, losses, and death followeth. Therefore +the Apostle saith: "All that is written is written to our doctrine," +which doctrine for the common weal I beseech God may be taken in such +place and time as shall be most needful in increasing of peace, +love, and charity; which grant us He that suffered for the same to be +crucified on the rood tree. And say we all Amen for charity! + + + + +DICTES AND SAYINGS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS + +FIRST EDITION (1477). EPILOGUE + + +Here endeth the book named _The Dictes or Sayings of the +Philosophers_, imprinted by me, William Caxton, at Westminster, the +year of our Lord 1477. Which book is late translated out of French +into English by the noble and puissant Lord Lord Antony, Earl of +Rivers, Lord of Scales and of the Isle of Wight, defender and director +of the siege apostolic for our holy father the Pope in this royaume of +England, and governor of my Lord Prince of Wales. And it is so that at +such time as he had accomplished this said work, it liked him to send +it to me in certain quires to oversee, which forthwith I saw, +and found therein many great, notable, and wise sayings of the +philosophers, according unto the books made in French which I had +often before read; but certainly I had seen none in English until that +time. And so afterward I came unto my said Lord, and told him how I +had read and seen his book, and that he had done a meritorious deed in +the labour of the translation thereof into our English tongue, wherein +he had deserved a singular laud and thanks, &c. Then my said Lord +desired me to oversee it, and where I should find fault to correct it; +whereon I answered unto his Lordship that I could not amend it, but +if I should so presume I might apaire it, for it was right well +and cunningly made and translated into right good and fair English. +Notwithstanding, he willed me to oversee it, and shewed me divers +things, which, as seemed to him, might be left out, as divers letters, +missives sent from Alexander to Darius and Aristotle, and each to +other, which letters were little appertinent unto dictes and sayings +aforesaid, forasmuch as they specify of other matters. And also +desired me, that done, to put the said book in imprint. And thus +obeying his request and commandment, I have put me in devoir to +oversee this his said book, and behold as nigh as I could how it +accordeth with the original, being in French. And I find nothing +discordant therein, save only in the dictes and sayings of Socrates, +wherein I find that my said Lord hath left out certain and divers +conclusions touching women. Whereof I marvel that my Lord hath not +written them, ne what hath moved him so to do, ne what cause he had at +that time; but I suppose that some fair lady hath desired him to leave +it out of his book; or else he was amorous on some noble lady, for +whose love he would not set it in his book; or else for the very +affection, love, and good will that he hath unto all ladies and +gentlewomen, he thought that Socrates spared the sooth and wrote of +women more than truth; which I cannot think that so true a man and so +noble a philosopher as Socrates was should write otherwise than truth. +For if he had made fault in writing of women, he ought not, ne should +not, be believed in his other dictes and sayings. But I perceive that +my said Lord knoweth verily that such defaults be not had ne found in +the women born and dwelling in these parts ne regions of the world. +Socrates was a Greek, born in a far country from hence, which country +is all of other conditions than this is, and men and women of +other nature than they be here in this country. For I wot well, of +whatsoever condition women be in Greece, the women of this country be +right good, wise, pleasant, humble, discreet, sober, chaste, obedient +to their husbands, true, secret, steadfast, ever busy, and never idle, +attemperate in speaking, and virtuous in all their works--or at least +should be so. For which causes so evident my said Lord, as I suppose, +thought it was not of necessity to set in his book the sayings of his +author Socrates touching women. But forasmuch as I had commandment of +my said Lord to correct and amend where I should find fault, and other +find I none save that he hath left out these dictes and sayings of the +women of Greece, therefore in accomplishing his commandment--forasmuch +as I am not certain whether it was in my Lord's copy or not, or else, +peradventure, that the wind had blown over the leaf at the time of +translation of his book--I purpose to write those same sayings of that +Greek Socrates, which wrote of the women of Greece and nothing of them +of this royaume, whom, I suppose, he never knew; for if he had, I dare +plainly say that he would have reserved them specially in his said +dictes. Always not presuming to put and set them in my said Lord's +book but in the end apart in the rehearsal of the works, humbly +requiring all them that shall read this little rehearsal, that if they +find any fault to arette it to Socrates, and not to me, which writeth +as hereafter followeth. + +Socrates said that women be the apparels to catch men, but they take +none but them that will be poor or else them that know them not. +And he said that there is none so great empechement unto a man as +ignorance and women. And he saw a woman that bare fire, of whom he +said that the hotter bore the colder. And he saw a woman sick, of whom +he said that the evil resteth and dwelleth with the evil. And he saw +a woman brought to the justice, and many other women followed her +weeping, of whom he said the evil be sorry and angry because the evil +shall perish. And he saw a young maid that learned to write, of whom +he said that men multiplied evil upon evil. And he said that the +ignorance of a man is known in three things, that is to wit, when he +hath no thought to use reason; when he cannot refrain his covetise; +and when he is governed by the counsel of women, in that he knoweth +that they know not. And he said unto his disciples: "Will ye that I +enseign and teach you how ye shall now escape from all evil?" And they +answered, "Yea." And then he said to them, "For whatsoever thing that +it be, keep you and be well ware that ye obey not women." Who answered +to him again, "And what sayest thou by our good mothers, and of our +sisters?" He said to them, "Suffice you with that I have said to you, +for all be semblable in malice." And he said, "Whosoever will acquire +and get science, let him never put him in the governance of a woman." +And he saw a woman that made her fresh and gay, to whom he said, "Thou +resemblest the fire; for the more wood is laid to the fire the more +will it burn, and the greater is the heat." And on a time one asked +him what him semed of women; he answered that the women resemble a +tree called Edelfla, which is the fairest tree to behold and see +that may be, but within it is full of venom. And they said to him and +demanded wherefore he blamed so women? and that he himself had +not come into this world, ne none other men also, without them. He +answered, "The woman is like unto a tree named Chassoygnet, on which +tree there be many things sharp and pricking, which hurt and prick +them that approach unto it; and yet, nevertheless, that same tree +bringeth forth good dates and sweet." And they demanded him why he +fled from the women? And he answered, "Forasmuch as I see them flee +and eschew the good and commonly do evil." And a woman said to him, +"Wilt thou have any other woman than me?" And he answered to her, "Art +not ashamed to offer thyself to him that demandeth nor desireth thee +not?" + +So, these be the dictes and sayings of the philosopher Socrates, which +he wrote in his book; and certainly he wrote no worse than afore +is rehearsed. And forasmuch as it is accordant that his dictes and +sayings should be had as well as others', therefore I have set it in +the end of this book. And also some persons, peradventure, that have +read this book in French would have arette a great default in me that +I had not done my devoir in visiting and overseeing of my Lord's +book according to his desire. And some other also, haply, might have +supposed that Socrates had written much more ill of women than here +afore is specified, wherefore in satisfying of all parties, and also +for excuse of the said Socrates, I have set these said dictes and +sayings apart in the end of this book, to the intent that if my said +lord or any other person, whatsoever he or she be that shall read or +hear it, that if they be not well pleased withal, that they with a pen +race it out, or else rend the leaf out of the book. Humbly requiring +and beseeching my said lord to take no displeasure on me so presuming, +but to pardon whereas he shall find fault; and that it please him to +take the labour of the imprinting in gree and thanks, which gladly +have done my diligence in the accomplishing of his desire and +commandment; in which I am bounden so to do for the good reward that +I have received of his said lordship; whom I beseech Almighty God to +increase and to continue in his virtuous disposition in this world, +and after this life to live everlastingly in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +GOLDEN LEGEND. + +FIRST EDITION (1483). PROLOGUE + + +The Holy and blessed doctor Saint Jerome saith this authority, "Do +always some good work to the end that the devil find thee not Idle." +And the holy doctor Saint Austin saith in the book of the labour of +monks, that no man strong or mighty to labour ought to be idle; for +which cause when I had performed and accomplished divers works and +histories translated out of French into English at the request of +certain lords, ladies, and gentlemen, as the Recuyel of the History of +Troy, the Book of the Chess, the History of Jason, the history of +the Mirror of the World, the 15 books of Metamorphoses in which be +contained the fables of Ovid, and the History of Godfrey of Boulogne +in the conquest of Jerusalem, with other divers works and books, I +ne wist what work to begin and put forth after the said works to-fore +made. And forasmuch as idleness is so much blamed, as saith Saint +Bernard, the mellifluous doctor, that she is mother of lies and +step-dame of virtues, and it is she that overthroweth strong men into +sin, quencheth virtue, nourisheth pride, and maketh the way ready to +go to hell; and John Cassiodorus saith that the thought of him that is +idle thinketh on none other thing but on licorous meats and viands for +his belly; and the holy Saint Bernard aforesaid saith in an epistle, +when the time shall come that it shall behove us to render and give +accounts of our idle time, what reason may we render or what answer +shall we give when in idleness is none excuse; and Prosper saith that +whosoever liveth in idleness liveth in manner of a dumb beast. And +because I have seen the authorities that blame and despise so much +idleness, and also know well that it is one of the capital and deadly +sins much hateful unto God, therefore I have concluded and firmly +purposed in myself no more to be idle, but will apply myself to labour +and such occupation as I have been accustomed to do. And forasmuch as +Saint Austin aforesaid saith upon a psalm that good work ought not to +be done for fear of pain, but for the love of righteousness, and that +it be of very and sovereign franchise, and because me-seemeth to be +a sovereign weal to incite and exhort men and women to keep them from +sloth and idleness, and to let to be understood to such people as be +not lettered the nativities, the lives, the passions, the miracles, +and the death of the holy saints, and also some other notorious deeds +and acts of times past, I have submised myself to translate into +English the legend of Saints, which is called _Legenda Aurea_ in +Latin, that is to say, the _Golden Legend_; for in like wise as gold +is most noble above all other metals, in like wise is this legend +holden most noble above all other works. Against me here might some +persons say that this legend hath been translated before, and truth it +is; but forasmuch as I had by me a legend in French, another in Latin, +and the third in English, which varied in many and divers places, and +also many histories were comprised in the two other books which were +not in the English books; and therefore I have written one out of the +said three books, which I have ordered otherwise than the said English +legend is, which was so to-fore made, beseeching all them that shall +see or hear it read to pardon me where I have erred or made fault, +which, if any be, is of ignorance and against my will; and submit it +wholly of such as can and may, to correct it, humbly beseeching them +so to do, and in so doing they shall deserve a singular laud and +merit; and I shall pray for them unto Almighty God that He of His +benign grace reward them, etc., and that it profit to all them that +shall read or hear it read, and may increase in them virtue, and +expel vice and sin, that by the example of the holy saints amend their +living here in this short life, that by their merits they and I may +come to everlasting life and bliss in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +CATON (1483) + +PROLOGUE + + +Here beginneth the prologue of proem of the book called _Caton_, which +book hath been translated into English by Master Benet Burgh, +late Archdeacon of Cochester, and high canon of St. Stephen's at +Westminster, which ful craftily hath made it in ballad royal for the +erudition of my lord Bousher, son and heir at that time to my lord the +Earl of Essex. And because of late came to my hand a book of the said +Cato in French, which rehearseth many a fair learning and notable +examples, I have translated it out of French into English, as all +along hereafter shall appear, which I present unto the city of London. + +Unto the noble, ancient, and renowned city, the city of London, in +England, I, William Caxton, citizen and conjury of the same, and of +the fraternity and fellowship of the mercery, owe of right my service +and good will, and of very duty am bounden naturally to assist, aid, +and counsel, as far forth as I can to my power, as to my mother of +whom I have received my nurture and living, and shall pray for the +good prosperity and policy of the same during my life. For, as me +seemeth, it is of great need, because I have known it in my young age +much more wealthy, prosperous, and richer, than it is at this day. And +the cause is that there is almost none that intendeth to the common +weal, but only every man for his singular profit Oh! when I remember +the noble Romans, that for the common weal of the city of Rome they +spent not only their moveable goods but they put their bodies and +lives in jeopardy and to the death, as by many a noble example we may +see in the acts of Romans, as of the two noble Scipios, African and +Asian, Actilius, and many others. And among all others the noble Cato, +author and maker of this book, which he hath left for to remain ever +to all the people for to learn in it and to know how every man ought +to rule and govern him in this life, as well for the life temporal as +for the life spiritual. And as in my judgement it is the best book for +to be taught to young children in school, and also to people of every +age, it is full convenient if it be well understood And because I +see that the children that be born within the said city increase, and +profit not like their fathers and elders, but for the most part after +that they be come to their perfect years of discretion and ripeness of +age, how well that their fathers have left to them great quantity of +goods yet scarcely among ten two thrive, [whereas] I have seen and +know in other lands in divers cities that of one name and lineage +successively have endured prosperously many heirs, yea, a five or six +hundred years, and some a thousand; and in this noble city of +London it can unneth continue unto the third heir or scarcely to the +second,--O blessed Lord, when I remember this I am all abashed; I +cannot judge the cause, but fairer ne wiser ne better spoken children +in their youth be nowhere than there be in London, but at their full +ripening there is no kernel ne good corn found, but chaff for the most +part. I wot well there be many noble and wise, and prove well and be +better and richer than ever were their fathers. And to the end that +many might come to honour and worship, I intend to translate this +said book of Cato, in which I doubt not, and if they will read it and +understand they shall much the better con rule themselves thereby; for +among all other books this is a singular book, and may well be called +the regiment or governance of the body and soul. + +There was a noble clerk named Pogius of Florence, and was secretary +to Pope Eugene and also to Pope Nicholas, which had in the city of +Florence a noble and well-stuffed library which all noble strangers +coming to Florence desired to see; and therein they found many noble +and rare books. And when they had asked of him which was the best book +of them all, and that he reputed for best, he said that he held Cato +glosed for the best book of his library. Then since that he that was +so noble a clerk held this book for the best, doubtless it must follow +that this is a noble book and a virtuous, and such one that a man may +eschew all vices and ensue virtue. Then to the end that this said book +may profit unto the hearers of it, I beseech Almighty God that I +may achieve and accomplish it unto his laud and glory, and to the +erudition and learning of them that be ignorant, that they may thereby +profit and be the better. And I require and beseech all such that find +fault or error, that of their charity they correct and amend it, and I +shall heartily pray for them to Almighty God, that he reward them. + + + + +AESOP. (1483) + +EPILOGUE + + +Now then I will finish all these fables with this tale that followeth, +which a worshipful priest and a parson told me lately. He said that +there were dwelling in Oxford two priests, both masters of art, of +whom that one was quick and could put himself forth, and that other +was a good simple priest. And so it happened that the master that was +pert and quick, was anon promoted to a benefice or twain, and after +to prebends and for to be a dean of a great prince's chapel, supposing +and weening that his fellow the simple priest should never have been +promoted, but be alway an Annual, or at the most a parish priest. So +after long time that this worshipful man, this dean, came riding into +a good parish with a ten or twelve horses, like a prelate, and came +into the church of the said parish, and found there this good simple +man sometime his fellow, which came and welcomed him lowly; and that +other bade him "good morrow, master John," and took him slightly by +the hand, and asked him where he dwelt. And the good man said, "In +this parish." "How," said he, "are ye here a soul priest or a parish +priest?" "Nay, sir," said he, "for lack of a better, though I be not +able ne worthy, I am parson and curate of this parish." And then that +other availed his bonnet and said, "Master parson, I pray you to be +not displeased; I had supposed ye had not been beneficed; but master," +said he, "I pray you what is this benefice worth to you a year?" +"Forsooth," said the good simple man, "I wot never, for I make never +accounts thereof how well I have had it four or five years." "And know +ye not," said he, "what it is worth? it should seem a good benefice." +"No, forsooth," said he, "but I wot well what it shall be worth to +me." "Why," said he, "what shall it be worth?" "Forsooth," said he, +"if I do my true diligence in the cure of my parishioners in preaching +and teaching, and do my part longing to my cure, I shall have heaven +therefore; and if their souls be lost, or any of them by my default, I +shall be punished therefore, and hereof am I sure." And with that word +the rich dean was abashed, and thought he should do the better and +take more heed to his cures and benefices than he had done. This was +a good answer of a good priest and an honest. And herewith I +finished this book, translated and printed by me, William Caxton, at +Westminster in the Abbey, and finished the 26th day of March, the year +of our Lord 1484, and the first year of the reign of King Richard the +Third. + + + + +CHAUCER'S CANTERBURY TALES + +Second Edition. (1484) + +PROEM + + +Great thanks, laud, and honour ought to be given unto the clerks, +poets, and historiographs that have written many noble books of +wisedom of the lives, passions, and miracles of holy saints, of +histories of noble and famous acts and faites, and of the chronicles +since the beginning of the creation of the world unto this present +time, by which we be daily informed and have knowledge of many things +of whom we should not have known if they had not left to us their +monuments written. Among whom and in especial before all others, we +ought to give a singular laud unto that noble and great philosopher +Geoffrey Chaucer, the which for his ornate writing in our tongue may +well have the name of a laureate poet. For to-fore that he by labour +embellished, ornated, and made fair our English, in this realm was had +rude speech and incongruous, as yet it appeareth by old books, which +at this day ought not to have place ne be compared among, ne to, his +beauteous volumes and ornate writings, of whom he made many books and +treatises of many a noble history, as well in metre as in rhyme and +prose; and them so craftily made that he comprehended his matters in +short, quick, and high sentences, eschewing prolixity, casting away +the chaff of superfluity, and shewing the picked grain of sentence +uttered by crafty and sugared eloquence; of whom among all others of +his books I purpose to print, by the grace of God, the book of the +tales of Canterbury, in which I find many a noble history of every +state and degree; first rehearsing the conditions and the array of +each of them as properly as possible is to be said. And after their +tales which be of nobleness, wisdom, gentleness, mirth and also of +very holiness and virtue, wherein he finisheth this said book, which +book I have diligently overseen and duly examined, to that end it be +made according unto his own making. For I find many of the said books +which writers have abridged it, and many things left out; and in some +place have set certain verses that he never made ne set in his book; +of which books so incorrect was one brought to me, 6 years past, which +I supposed had been very true and correct; and according to the same I +did so imprint a certain number of them, which anon were sold to many +and divers gentlemen, of whom one gentleman came to me and said that +this book was not according in many place unto the book that Geoffrey +Chaucer had made. To whom I answered that I had made it according to +my copy, and by me was nothing added ne minished. Then he said he knew +a book which his father had and much loved, that was very true and +according unto his own first book by him made; and said more, if +I would imprint it again he would get me the same book for a copy, +howbeit he wist well that his father would not gladly depart from it. +To whom I said, in case that he could get me such a book, true and +correct, yet I would once endeavour me to imprint it again for to +satisfy the author, whereas before by ignorance I erred in hurting and +defaming his book in divers places, in setting in some things that he +never said ne made, and leaving out many things that he made which +be requisite to be set in it. And thus we fell at accord, and he full +gently got of his father the said book and delivered it to me, by +which I have corrected my book, as hereafter, all along by the aid of +Almighty God, shall follow; whom I humbly beseech to give me grace and +aid to achieve and accomplish to his laud, honour, and glory; and +that all ye that shall in this book read or hear, will of your charity +among your deeds of mercy remember the soul of the said Geoffrey +Chaucer, first author and maker of this book. And also that all we +that shall see and read therein may so take and understand the good +and virtuous tales, that it may so profit unto the health of our souls +that after this short and transitory life we may come to everlasting +life in Heaven. Amen. + +BY WILLIAM CAXTON + + + + +MALORY'S KING ARTHUR. (1485) + +PROLOGUE + + +After that I had accomplished and finished divers histories, as well +of contemplation as of other historical and worldly acts of great +conquerors and princes, and also certain books of ensamples and +doctrine, many noble and divers gentlemen of this realm of England +came and demanded me many and oft times wherefore that I have not done +made and printed the noble history of the Saint Graal, and of the most +renowned Christian King, first and chief of the three best Christian +and worthy, Arthur, which ought most to be remembered among us +Englishmen before all other Christian Kings. For it is notoyrly known +through the universal world that there be nine worthy and the best +that ever were; that is to wit three Paynims, three Jews, and three +Christian men. As for the Paynims, they were to-fore the Incarnation +of Christ, which were named--the first, Hector of Troy, of whom the +history is come both in ballad and in prose--the second, Alexander +the Great; and the third, Julius Cæsar, Emperor of Rome, of whom the +histories be well known and had. And as for the three Jews, which also +were before the Incarnation of our Lord of whom the first was Duke +Joshua, which brought the children of Israel into the land of behest; +the second, David, King of Jerusalem; and the third Judas Maccabaeus; +of these three the Bible rehearseth all their noble histories and +acts. And since the said Incarnation have been three noble Christian +men, installed and admitted through the universal world into the +number of the nine best and worthy, of whom was first the noble +Arthur, whose noble acts I purpose to write in this present book here +following. The second was Charlemagne, or Charles the Great, of whom +the history is had in many places both in French and English; and the +third and last was Godfrey of Boulogne, of whose acts and life I made +a book unto the excellent prince and king of noble memory, King Edward +the Fourth. The said noble gentlemen instantly required me to print +the history of the said noble king and conqueror, King Arthur, and of +his knights, with the history of the Saint Graal, and of the death and +ending of the said Arthur, affirming that I ought rather to print his +acts and noble feats than of Godfrey of Boulogne or any of the other +eight, considering that he was a man born within this realm, and king +and emperor of the same; and that there be in French divers and many +noble volumes of his acts, and also of his knights. To whom I answered +that divers men hold opinion that there was no such Arthur, and that +all such books as be made of him be but feigned and fables, because +that some chronicles make of him no mention, ne remember him nothing +ne of his knights; whereto they answered, and one in special said, +that in him that should say or think that there was never such a king +called Arthur, might well be aretted great folly and blindness; for he +said that there were many evidences of the contrary. First ye may +see his sepulchre in the monastery of Glastonbury; and also in +'Polychronicon,' in the fifth book, the sixth chapter, and in the +seventh book, the twenty-third chapter, where his body was buried, and +after found and translated into the said monastery. Ye shall see also +in the history of Boccaccio, in his book 'De casu principum,' part +of his noble acts and also of his fall. Also Galfridus in his British +book recounteth his life, and in divers places of England many +remembrances be yet of him, and shall remain perpetually, and also +of his knights. First in the Abbey of Westminster at Saint Edward's +shrine remaineth the print of his seal in red wax closed in beryl, +in which is written 'Patricius Arthurus, Britanniae Galliae Germaniae +Daciae Imperator.' Item, in the castle of Dover ye may see Gawain's +skull and Caradoc's mantle; at Winchester the round table; in other +places Lancelot's sword, and many other things. Then all these things +considered, there can no man reasonably gainsay but here was a king of +this land named Arthur; for in all places, Christian and heathen, he +is reputed and taken for one of the nine worthy, and the first of the +three Christian men. And also he is more spoken of beyond the sea; +more books made of his noble acts than there be in England, as well +in Dutch, Italian, Spanish, and Greek as in French; and yet of record +remain in witness of him in Wales in the town of Camelot the great +stones and marvellous works of iron lying under the ground, and royal +vaults, which divers now living hath seen. Wherefore it is a marvel +why he is no more renowned in his own country, save only it accordeth +to the word of God, which saith that no man is accepted for a prophet +in his own country. Then all these things aforesaid alleged, I could +not well deny but that there was such a noble king named Arthur, and +reputed one of the nine worthy, and first and chief of the Christian +men; and many noble volumes be made of him and of his noble knights in +French, which I have seen and read beyond the sea, which be not had +in our maternal tongue, but in Welsh be many, and also in French, and +some in English, but nowhere nigh all. Wherefore such as have lately +been drawn out briefly into English, I have, after the simple cunning +that God hath sent to me, under the favour and correction of all noble +lords and gentlemen, emprised to imprint a book of the noble histories +of the said King Arthur and of certain of his knights, after a copy +unto me delivered, which copy Sir Thomas Mallory did take out of +certain books of French and reduced it into English. And I according +to my copy have down set it in print, to the intent that noble men +may see and learn the noble acts of chivalry, the gentle and virtuous +deeds that some knights used in those days, by which they came to +honour, and how they that were vicious were punished and oft put to +shame and rebuke; humbly beseeching all noble lords and ladies and all +other estates, of what estate or degree they be of, that shall see and +read in this said book and work, that they take the good and honest +acts in their remembrance and to follow the same, wherein they shall +find many joyous and pleasant histories and noble and renowned acts +of humanity, gentleness, and chivalry. For herein may be seen +noble chivalry, courtesy, humanity, friendliness, hardyhood, love, +friendship, cowardice, murder, hate, virtue and sin. Do after the good +and leave the evil, and it shall bring you to good fame and renown. +And for to pass the time this book shall be pleasant to read in; +but for to give faith and believe that all is true that is contained +herein, ye be at your liberty. But all is written for our doctrine, +and for to beware that we fall not to vice ne sin, but to exercise and +follow virtue, by which we may come and attain to good fame and renown +in this life, and after this short and transitory life to come unto +everlasting bliss in heaven; the which He grant us that reigneth in +Heaven, the Blessed Trinity. Amen. + +Then to proceed forth in this said book which I direct unto all noble +princes, lords and ladies, gentlemen or gentlewomen, that desire +to read or hear read of the noble and joyous history of the great +conqueror and excellent king, King Arthur, sometime King of this noble +realm then called Britain, I, William Caxton, simple person, present +this book following which I have emprised to imprint. And treateth +of the noble acts, feats of arms, of chivalry, prowess, hardihood, +humanity, love, courtesy, and very gentleness, with many wonderful +histories and adventures. And for to understand briefly the contents +of this volume, I have divided it into 21 books, and every book +chaptered, as hereafter shall by God's grace follow. The first book +shall treat how Uther Pendragon begat the noble conqueror, King +Arthur, and containeth 28 chapters. The second book treateth of Balyn +the noble knight, and containeth 19 chapters. The third book treateth +of the marriage of King Arthur to Queen Guinevere, with other matters, +and containeth 15 chapters. The fourth book how Merlin was assotted, +and of war made to King Arthur, and containeth 29 chapters. The fifth +book treateth of the conquest of Lucius the emperor, and containeth 12 +chapters. The sixth book treateth of Sir Lancelot and Sir Lionel, and +marvellous adventures, and containeth 18 chapters. The seventh book +treateth of a noble knight called Sir Gareth, and named by Sir Kay +'Beaumains,' and containeth 36 chapters. The eighth book treateth +of the birth of Sir Tristram the noble knight, and of his acts, and +containeth 41 chapters. The ninth book treateth of a knight named +by Sir Kay, 'Le cote mal tailié,' and also of Sir Tristram, and +containeth 44 chapters. The tenth book treateth of Sir Tristram, and +other marvellous adventures, and containeth 83 chapters. The eleventh +book treateth of Sir Lancelot and Sir Galahad, and containeth 14 +chapters. The twelfth book treateth of Sir Lancelot and his madness, +and containeth 14 chapters. The thirteenth book treateth how Galahad +came first to King Arthur's court, and the quest how the Sangreal was +begun, and containeth 20 chapters. The fourteenth book treateth of the +quest of the Sangreal, and containeth 10 chapters. The fifteenth book +treateth of Sir Lancelot, and containeth 6 chapters. The sixteenth +book treateth of Sir Boris and Sir Lionel his brother, and containeth +17 chapters. The seventeenth book treateth of the Sangreal, and +containeth 23 chapters. The eighteenth book treateth of Sir Lancelot +and the Queen, and containeth 25 chapters. The nineteenth book +treateth of Queen Guinevere, and Lancelot, and containeth 13 chapters. +The twentieth book treateth of the piteous death of Arthur, and +containeth 22 chapters. The twenty-first book treateth of his last +departing, and how Sir Lancelot came to revenge his death, and +containeth 13 chapters. The sum is 21 books, which contain the sum +of five hundred and seven chapters, as more plainly shall follow +hereafter. + + + + +ENEYDOS (1490) + +PROLOGUE + + +After divers work made, translated, and achieved, having no work in +hand, I sitting in my study whereas lay many divers pamphlets and +books, happened that to my hand came a little book in French, which +lately was translated out of Latin by some noble clerk of France, +which book is named _Aeneidos_, made in Latin by that noble poet and +great clerk, Virgil Which book I saw over, and read therein how, after +the general destruction of the great Troy, Aeneas departed, bearing +his old father Anchises upon his shoulders, his little son Iulus +on his hand, his wife with much other people following, and how he +shipped and departed, with all the history of his adventures that he +had ere he came to the achievement of his conquest of Italy, as all +along shall be shewed in his present book. In which book I had great +pleasure because of the fair and honest terms and words in French; +which I never saw before like, ne none so pleasant ne so well ordered; +which book as seemed to me should be much requisite to noble men to +see, as well for the eloquence as the histories. How well that many +hundred years past was the said book of _Aeneidos_, with other works, +made and learned daily in schools, especially in Italy and other +places; which history the said Virgil made in metre. And when I had +advised me in this said book, I delibered and concluded to translate +it into English; and forthwith took a pen and ink and wrote a leaf or +twain, which I oversaw again to correct it. And when I saw the fair +and strange terms therein, I doubted that it should not please some +gentlemen which late blamed me, saying that in my translations I had +over curious terms, which could not be understood of common people, +and desired me to use old and homely terms in my translations. And +fain would I satisfy every man, and so to do took an old book and read +therein, and certainly the English was so rude and broad that I could +not well understood it. And also my Lord Abbot of Westminster did do +show to me lately certain evidences written in old English, for to +reduce it into our English now used. And certainly it was written in +such wise that it was more like to Dutch than English, I could not +reduce ne bring it to be understood. And certainly our language now +used varieth far from that which was used and spoken when I was born. +For we Englishmen be born under the domination of the moon, which is +never steadfast but ever wavering, waxing one season and waneth and +decreaseth another season. And that common English that is spoken in +one shire varieth from another, insomuch that in my days happened that +certain merchants were in a ship in Thames for to have sailed over the +sea into Zealand, and for lack of wind they tarried at Foreland, and +went to land for to refresh them. And one of them named Sheffield, a +mercer, came into a house and asked for meat, and especially he asked +after eggs; and the good wife answered that she could speak no French, +and the merchant was angry, for he also could speak no French, but +would have had eggs, and she understood him not. And then at last +another said, that he would have "eyren"; then the goodwife said +that she understood him well. Lo, what should a man in these days now +write, eggs or eyren? Certainly it is hard to please every man because +of diversity and change of language. For in these days every man that +is in any reputation in his country will utter his communication and +matters in such manners and terms that few men shall understand them. +And some honest and great clerks have been with me and desired me +to write the most curious terms that I could find; and thus between +plain, rude and curious I stand abashed. But in my judgment the common +terms that be daily used be lighter to be understood than the old and +ancient English. And forasmuch as this present book is not for a rude +uplandish man to labour therein ne read it, but only for a clerk and +a noble gentleman that feeleth and understandeth in feats of arms, in +love and in noble chivalry. Therefore in a mean between both I have +reduced and translated this said book into our English, not over-rude +ne curious; but in such terms as shall be understood, by God's grace, +according to my copy. And if any man will intermit in reading of it, +and findeth such terms that he cannot understand, let him go read +and learn Virgil of the pistles of Ovid, and there he shall see and +understand lightly all, if he have a good reader and informer. For +this book is not for every rude and uncunning man to see, but to +clerks and very gentlemen that understand gentleness and science. Then +I pray all them that shall read in this little treatise to hold me for +excused for the translating of it, for I acknowledge myself ignorant +of cunning to emprise on me so high and noble a work. But I pray +Master John Skelton, late created poet laureate in the University of +Oxenford, to oversee and correct this said book, and to address and +expound, wherever shall be found fault, to them that shall require it. + +For him I know for sufficient to expound and English every difficulty +that is therein; for he hath lately translated the Epistles of Tully, +and the book of Diodorus Siculus, and divers other works out of Latin +into English, not in rude and old language, but in polished and ornate +terms craftily, as he that hath read Virgil, Ovid, Tully, and all the +other noble poets and orators to me unknown. And also he hath read +the nine Muses, and understands their musical sciences, and to whom +of them each, science is appropred. I suppose he hath drunken of +Helicon's well. Then I pray him and such others to correct, add, or +minish whereas he or they shall find fault; for I have but followed my +copy in French as nigh as to me is possible. And if any word be said +therein well, I am glad; and if otherwise, I submit my said book +to their correction. Which book I present unto the high born, my +to-coming natural and sovereign lord Arthur, by the grace of God +Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall and Earl of Chester, first-begotten +son and heir unto our most dread natural and sovereign lord and most +Christian King, Henry the VII., by the grace of God King of England +and of France, and lord of Ireland; beseeching his noble Grace to +receive it in thank of me his most humble subject and servant. And I +shall pray unto Almighty God for his prosperous increasing in virtue, +wisedom, and humanity, that he may be equal with the most renowned of +all his noble progenitors; and so to live in this present life that +after this transitory life he and we all may come to everlasting life +in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +DEDICATION OF THE INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION + +BY JOHN CALVIN (1536)[A] + +To His Most Christian Majesty, FRANCIS, King of the French, and his +Sovereign, John Calvin wisheth peace and salvation in Christ. + + +When I began this work, Sire, nothing was further from my thoughts +than writing a book which would afterwards be presented to your +Majesty. My intention was only to lay down some elementary principles, +by which inquirers on the subject of religion might be instructed in +the nature of true piety. And this labour I undertook chiefly for +my countrymen, the French, of whom I apprehended multitudes to be +hungering and thirsting after Christ, but saw very few possessing any +real knowledge of him. That this was my design, the book itself proves +by its simple method and unadorned composition. But when I perceived +that the fury of certain wicked men in your kingdom had grown to +such a height, as to leave no room in the land for sound doctrine, I +thought I should be usefully employed, if in the same work I delivered +my instructions to them, and exhibited my confession to you, that +you may know the nature of that doctrine, which is the object of such +unbounded rage to those madmen who are now disturbing the country with +fire and sword. For I shall not be afraid to acknowledge, that this +treatise contains a summary of that very doctrine, which, according to +their clamours, deserves to be punished with imprisonment, banishment, +proscription, and flames, and to be exterminated from the face of the +earth. I well know with what atrocious insinuations your ears have +been filled by them, in order to render our cause most odious in +your esteem; but your clemency should lead you to consider that, if +accusation be accounted a sufficient evidence of guilt, there will be +an end of all innocence in words and actions. If any one, indeed, with +a view to bring odium upon the doctrine which I am endeavouring to +defend, should allege that it has long ago been condemned by the +general consent, and suppressed by many judicial decisions, this will +be only equivalent to saying, that it has been sometimes violently +rejected through the influence and power of its adversaries, and +sometimes insidiously and fraudulently oppressed by falsehoods, +artifices, and calumnies. Violence is displayed, when sanguinary +sentences are passed against it without the cause being heard; and +fraud, when it is unjustly accused of sedition and mischief. Lest +any one should suppose that these our complaints are unfounded, you +yourself, Sire, can bear witness of the false calumnies with which +you hear it daily traduced; that its only tendency is to wrest the +sceptres of kings out of their hands, to overturn all the tribunals +and judicial proceedings, to subvert all order and governments, to +disturb the peace and tranquillity of the people, to abrogate all +laws, to scatter all properties and possessions, and, in a word, to +involve every thing in total confusion. And yet you hear the smallest +portion of what is alleged against it; for such horrible things are +circulated amongst the vulgar, that, if they were true, the whole +world would justly pronounce it and its abettors worthy of a thousand +fires and gibbets. Who, then, will wonder at its becoming the object +of public odium, where credit is given to such most iniquitous +accusations? This is the cause of the general consent and conspiracy +to condemn us and our doctrine. Hurried away with this impulse, +those who sit in judgment pronounce for sentences the prejudices they +brought from home with them; and think their duty fully discharged if +they condemn none to be punished but such as are convicted by their +own confession, or by sufficient proofs. Convicted of what crime? +Of this condemned doctrine, they say. But with what justice is it +condemned? Now, the ground of defence was not to abjure the doctrine +itself, but to maintain its truth. On this subject, however, not a +word is allowed to be uttered. + +Wherefore I beseech you, Sire,--and surely it is not an unreasonable +request,--to take upon yourself the entire cognizance of this cause, +which has hitherto been confusedly and carelessly agitated, without +any order of law, and with outrageous passion rather than judicial +gravity. Think not that I am now meditating my own individual defence, +in order to effect a safe return to my native country; for, though I +feel the affection which every man ought to feel for it, yet, under +the existing circumstances, I regret not my removal from it. But I +plead the cause of all the godly, and consequently of Christ himself, +which, having been in these times persecuted and trampled on in all +ways in your kingdom, now lies in a most deplorable state; and this +indeed rather through the tyranny of certain Pharisees, than with your +knowledge. How this comes to pass is foreign to my present purpose to +say; but it certainly lies in a most afflicted state. For the +ungodly have gone to such lengths, that the truth of Christ, if not +vanquished, dissipated, and entirely destroyed, is buried, as it +were, in ignoble obscurity, while the poor, despised church is either +destroyed by cruel massacres, or driven away into banishment, or +menaced and terrified into total silence. And still they continue +their wonted madness and ferocity, pushing violently against the wall +already bent, and finishing the ruin they have begun. In the meantime, +no one comes forward to plead the cause against such furies. If there +be any persons desirous of appearing most favourable to the truth, +they only venture an opinion, that forgiveness should be extended to +the error and imprudence of ignorant people. For this is the language +of these moderate men, calling that error and imprudence which they +know to be the certain truth of God, and those ignorant people, whose +understanding they perceive not to have been so despicable to Christ, +but that he has favoured them with the mysteries of his heavenly +wisdom. Thus all are ashamed of the Gospel. But it shall be yours, +Sire, not to turn away your ears or thoughts from so just a defence, +especially in a cause of such importance as the maintenance of God's +glory unimpaired in the world, the preservation of the honor of divine +truth, and the continuance of the kingdom of Christ uninjured +among us. This is a cause worthy of your attention, worthy of your +cognizance, worthy of your throne. This consideration constitutes true +royalty, to acknowledge yourself in the government of your kingdom to +be the minister of God. For where the glory of God is not made the +end of the government, it is not a legitimate sovereignty, but a +usurpation. And he is deceived who expects lasting prosperity in that +kingdom which is not ruled by the sceptre of God, that is, his holy +word; for that heavenly oracle cannot fail, which declares that "where +there is no vision, the people perish,"[1] Nor should you be seduced +from this pursuit by a contempt of our meanness. We are fully +conscious to ourselves how very mean and abject we are, being +miserable sinners before God, and accounted most despicable by men; +being, (if you please) the refuse of the world, deserving of the +vilest appellations that can be found; so that nothing remains for +us to glory in before God, but his mercy alone, by which, without any +merit of ours, we have been admitted to the hope of eternal salvation, +and before men nothing but our weakness, the slightest confession of +which is esteemed by them as the greatest disgrace. But our doctrine +must stand, exalted above all the glory, and invincible by all the +power of the world; because it is not ours, but the doctrine of the +living God, and of his Christ, whom the Father hath constituted King, +that he may have dominion from sea to sea, and from the river even to +the ends of the earth, and that he may rule in such a manner, that the +whole earth, with its strength of iron and with its splendour of gold +and silver, smitten by the rod of his mouth, may be broken to pieces +like a potter's vessel;[2] for thus do the prophets foretell the +magnificence of his kingdom. + +Our adversaries reply, that our pleading the word of God is a false +pretence, and that we are nefarious corrupters of it. But that this is +not only a malicious calumny, but egregious impudence, by reading our +confession, you will, in your wisdom, be able to judge. Yet something +further is necessary to be said, to excite your attention, or at least +to prepare your mind for this perusal. Paul's direction, that every +prophecy be framed "according to the analogy of faith,"[3] has fixed +an invariable standard by which all interpretation of Scripture ought +to be tried. If our principles be examined by this rule of faith, +the victory is ours. For what is more consistent with faith than to +acknowledge ourselves naked of all virtue, that we may be clothed by +God; empty of all good, that we may be filled by him; slaves to sin, +that we may be liberated by him; blind, that we may be enlightened by +him; lame, that we may be guided; weak, that we may be supported by +him; to divest ourselves of all ground of glorying, that he alone may +be eminently glorious, and that we may glory in him? When we advance +these and similar sentiments, they interrupt us with complaints that +this is the way to overturn, I know not what blind light of nature, +pretended preparations, free will, and works meritorious of eternal +salvation, together with all their supererogations; because they +cannot bear that the praise and glory of all goodness, strength, +righteousness, and wisdom, should remain entirely with God. But we +read of none being reproved for having drawn too freely from the +fountain of living waters; on the contrary, they are severely +upbraided who have "hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can +hold no water."[4] Again, what is more consistent with faith, than +to assure ourselves of God being a propitious Father, where Christ is +acknowledged as a brother and Mediator? than securely to expect all +prosperity and happiness from Him, whose unspeakable love towards us +went so far, that "he spared not his own Son, but delivered him up +for us?"[5] than to rest in the certain expectation of salvation and +eternal life, when we reflect upon the Father's gift of Christ, in +whom such treasures are hidden? Here they oppose us, and complain +that this certainty of confidence is chargeable with arrogance and +presumption. But as we ought to presume nothing of ourselves, so we +should presume every thing of God; nor are we divested of vain glory +for any other reason than that we may learn to glory in the Lord. +What shall I say more? Review, Sire, all the parts of our cause, +and consider us worse than the most abandoned of mankind, unless you +clearly discover that we thus "both labor and suffer reproach, because +we trust in the living God,"[6] because we believe that "this is life +eternal, to know the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he hath +sent."[7] For this hope some of us are bound in chains, others are +lashed with scourges, others are carried about as laughing-stocks, +others are outlawed, others are cruelly tortured, others escape by +flight; but we are all reduced to extreme perplexities, execrated +with dreadful curses, cruelly slandered and treated with the greatest +indignities. Now, look at our adversaries, (I speak of the order +of priests, at whose will and directions others carry on these +hostilities against us,) and consider a little with me by what +principles they are actuated. The true religion, which is taught in +the Scriptures, and ought to be universally maintained, they readily +permit both themselves and others to be ignorant of, and to treat with +neglect and contempt. They think it unimportant what any one holds or +denies concerning God and Christ, provided he submits his mind with +an implicit faith (as they call it) to the judgment of the Church. +Nor are they much affected, if the glory of God happens to be violated +with open blasphemies, provided no one lift a finger against the +primacy of the Apostolic See, and the authority of their holy Mother +Church. Why, therefore, do they contend with such extreme bitterness +and cruelty for the mass, purgatory, pilgrimages, and similar trifles, +and deny that any piety can be maintained without a most explicit +faith, so to speak, in these things; whereas they prove none of them +from the word of God? Why, but because their belly is their God, their +kitchen is their religion; deprived of which they consider themselves +no longer as Christians, or even as men. For though some feast +themselves in splendour, and others subsist on slender fare, yet all +live on the same pot, which, without this fuel, would not only cool, +but completely freeze. Every one of them, therefore, who is most +solicitous for his belly, is found to be a most strenuous champion +for their faith. Indeed, they universally exert themselves for the +preservation of their kingdom, and the repletion of their bellies; but +not one of them discovers the least indication of sincere zeal. + +Nor do their attacks on our doctrine cease here; they urge every topic +of accusation and abuse to render it an object of hatred or suspicion. +They call it novel, and of recent origin,--they cavil at it as +doubtful and uncertain,--they inquire by what miracles it is +confirmed,--they ask whether it is right for it to be received +contrary to the consent of so many holy fathers, and the custom of the +highest antiquity,--they urge us to confess that it is schismatical +in stirring up opposition against the Church, or that the Church +was wholly extinct for many ages, during which no such thing was +known.--Lastly, they say all arguments are unnecessary; for that its +nature may be determined by its fruits, since it has produced such +a multitude of sects, so many factious tumults, and such great +licentiousness of vices. It is indeed very easy for them to insult a +deserted cause with the credulous and ignorant multitude; but, if we +had also the liberty of speaking in our turn, this acrimony, +which they now discover in violently foaming against us with equal +licentiousness and impunity, would presently cool. + +In the first place, their calling it novel is highly injurious to God, +whose holy word deserves not to be accused of novelty. I have no doubt +of its being new to them, to whom Jesus Christ and the Gospel are +equally new. But those who know the antiquity of this preaching of +Paul, "that Jesus Christ died for our sins, and rose again for our +justification,"[8] will find no novelty among us. That it has long +been concealed, buried, and unknown, is the crime of human impiety. +Now that the goodness of God has restored it to us, it ought at least +to be allowed its just claim of antiquity. + +From the same source of ignorance springs the notion of its being +doubtful and uncertain. This is the very thing which the Lord +complains of by his prophet; that "the ox knoweth his owner, and +the ass his master's crib,"[9] but that his people know not him. But +however they may laugh at its uncertainty, if they were called to seal +their own doctrine with their blood and lives, it would appear how +much they value it. Very different is our confidence, which dreads +neither the terrors of death, nor even the tribunal of God. + +Their requiring miracles of us is altogether unreasonable; for +we forge no new Gospel, but retain the very same whose truth was +confirmed by all the miracles ever wrought by Christ and the apostles. +But they have this peculiar advantage above us, that they can confirm +their faith by continual miracles even to this day. But the truth is, +they allege miracles which are calculated to unsettle a mind otherwise +well established, they are so frivolous and ridiculous, or vain and +false. Nor, if they were ever so preternatural, ought they to have any +weight in opposition to the truth of God, since the name of God ought +to be sanctified in all places and at all times, whether by miraculous +events, or by the common order of nature. This fallacy might +perhaps be more specious, if the Scripture did not apprize us of the +legitimate end and use of miracles. For Mark informs us, that the +miracles which followed the preaching of the apostles were wrought +in confirmation[10] of it, and Luke tells us, that[11] "the Lord gave +testimony to the word of his grace," when "signs and wonders" were +"done by the hands" of the apostles. Very similar to which is the +assertion of the apostle, that "salvation was confirmed" by the +preaching of the Gospel, "God also bearing witness with signs, and +wonders, and divers miracles."[12] But those things which we are told +were seals of the Gospel, shall we pervert to undermine the faith of +the Gospel? Those things which were designed to be testimonials of the +truth, shall we accommodate to the confirmation of falsehood? It +is right, therefore, that the doctrine, which, according to the +evangelist, claims the first attention, be examined and tried in +the first place; and if it be approved, then it ought to derive +confirmation from miracles. But it is the characteristic of sound +doctrine, given by Christ, that it tends to promote, not the glory of +men, but the glory of God.[13] Christ having laid down this proof of +a doctrine, it is wrong to esteem those as miracles which are directed +to any other end than the glorification of the name of God alone. And +we should remember that Satan has his wonders, which, though they +are juggling tricks rather than real miracles, are such as delude the +ignorant and inexperienced. Magicians and enchanters have always +been famous for miracles; idolatry has been supported by astonishing +miracles; and yet we admit them not as proofs of the superstition of +magicians or idolaters. With this engine also the simplicity of +the vulgar was anciently assailed by the Donatists, who abounded in +miracles. We therefore give the same answer now to our adversaries as +Augustine[14] gave to the Donatists, that our Lord hath cautioned us +against these miracle-mongers by his prediction, that there should +arise false prophets, who, by various signs and lying wonders, "should +deceive (if possible) the very elect."[15] And Paul has told us, that +the kingdom of Antichrist would be "with all power, and signs, and +lying wonders."[16] But these miracles (they say) are wrought, not by +idols, or sorcerers, or false prophets, but by saints; as if we were +ignorant, that it is a stratagem of Satan to "transform" himself "into +an angel of light."[17] At the tomb of Jeremiah,[18] who was buried +in Egypt, the Egyptians formerly offered sacrifices and other divine +honours. Was not this abusing God's holy prophet to the purposes of +idolatry? Yet they supposed this veneration of his sepulchre to be +rewarded with a cure for the bite of serpents. What shall we say, but +that it has been, and ever will be, the most righteous vengeance +of God to "send those who receive not the love of the truth strong +delusions, that they should believe a lie?"[19] We are by no means +without miracles, and such as are certain, and not liable to cavils. +But those under which they shelter themselves are mere illusions of +Satan, seducing the people from the true worship of God to vanity. + +Another calumny is their charging us with opposition to the +fathers,--I mean the writers of the earlier and purer ages,--as if +those writers were abettors of their impiety; whereas, if the contest +were to be terminated by this authority, the victory in most parts of +the controversy--to speak in the most modest terms--would be on our +side. But though the writings of those fathers contain many wise and +excellent things, yet in some respects they have suffered the common +fate of mankind; these very dutiful children reverence only their +errors and mistakes, but their excellences they either overlook, or +conceal, or corrupt; so that it may truly be said to be their only +study to collect dross from the midst of gold. Then they overwhelm us +with senseless clamours, as despisers and enemies of the fathers. But +we do not hold them in such contempt, but that, if it were consistent +with my present design, I could easily support by their suffrages most +of the sentiments that we now maintain. But while we make use of their +writings, we always remember that "all things are ours," to serve us, +not to have dominion over us, and that "we are Christ's"[20] alone, +and owe him universal obedience. He who neglects this distinction will +have nothing decided in religion; since those holy men were ignorant +of many things, frequently at variance with each other, and sometimes +even inconsistent with themselves. There is great reason, they say, +for the admonition of Solomon, "not to transgress or remove the +ancient landmarks, which our fathers have set."[21] But the same rule +is not applicable to the bounding of fields, and to the obedience +of faith, which ought to be ready to "forget her own people and her +father's house."[22] But if they are so fond of allegorizing, why do +they not explain the apostles, rather than any others, to be those +fathers, whose appointed landmarks it is so unlawful to remove? For +this is the interpretation of Jerome, whose works they have received +into their canons. But if they insist on preserving the landmarks of +those whom they understand to be intended, why do they at pleasure so +freely transgress them themselves? There were two fathers,[23] of whom +one said, that our God neither eats nor drinks, and therefore needs +neither cups nor dishes; the other, that sacred things require +no gold, and that gold is no recommendation of that which Is not +purchased with gold. This landmark therefore is transgressed by those +who in sacred things are so much delighted with gold, silver, ivory, +marble, jewels, and silks, and suppose that God is not rightly +worshipped, unless all things abound in exquisite splendour, or rather +extravagant profusion. There was a father[24] who said he freely +partook of flesh on a day when others abstained from it, because he +was a Christian. They transgress the landmarks therefore when they +curse the soul that tastes flesh in Lent. There were two fathers,[25] +of whom one said, that a monk who labors not with his hands is on a +level with a cheat or a robber; and the other, that it is unlawful +for monks to live on what is not their own, notwithstanding their +assiduity in contemplations, studies, and prayers; and they have +transgressed this landmark by placing the idle and distended carcasses +of monks in cells and brothels, to be pampered on the substance of +others. There was a father[26] who said, that to see a painted image +of Christ, or of any other saint, in the temples of Christians, is +a dreadful abomination. Nor was this merely the sentence of an +individual; it was also decreed by an ecclesiastical council, that +the object of worship should not be painted on the walls. They are far +from confining themselves within these landmarks, for every corner is +filled with images. Another father[27] has advised that, after having +discharged the office of humanity towards the dead by the rites of +sepulture, we should leave them to their repose. They break through +these landmarks by inculcating a constant solicitude for the dead. +There was one of the fathers[28] who asserted that the substance of +bread and wine in the eucharist ceases not, but remains, just as the +substance of the human nature remains in the Lord Christ united with +the divine. They transgress this landmark therefore by pretending +that, on the words of the Lord being recited, the substance of bread +and wine ceases, and is transubstantiated into his body and blood. +There were fathers[29] who, while they exhibited to the universal +Church only one eucharist, and forbade all scandalous and immoral +persons to approach it, at the same time severely censured all who, +when present, did not partake of it. How far have they removed these +landmarks, when they fill not only the churches, but even private +houses, with their masses, admit all who choose to be spectators of +them, and every one the more readily in proportion to the magnitude +of his contribution, however chargeable with impurity and wickedness! +They invite none to faith in Christ and a faithful participation of +the sacraments; but rather for purposes of gain bring forward their +own work instead of the grace and merit of Christ. There were two +fathers,[30] of whom one contended that the use of Christ's sacred +supper should be wholly forbidden to those who, content with +partaking of one kind, abstained from the other; the other strenuously +maintained that Christian people ought not to be refused the blood of +their Lord, for the confession of whom they are required to shed their +own. These landmarks also they have removed, in appointing, by +an inviolable law, that very thing which the former punished +with excommunication, and the latter gave a powerful reason for +disapproving. There was a father[31] who asserted the temerity of +deciding on either side of an obscure subject, without clear and +evident testimonies of Scripture. This landmark they forgot when +they made so many constitutions, canons, and judicial determinations, +without any authority from the word of God. There was a father[32] who +upbraided Montanus with having, among other heresies, been the first +imposer of laws for the observance of fasts. They have gone far beyond +this landmark also, in establishing fasts by the strictest laws. There +was a father[33] who denied that marriage ought to be forbidden to the +ministers of the Church, and pronounced cohabitation with a wife to +be real chastity; and there were fathers who assented to his judgment. +They have transgressed these landmarks by enjoining on their priests +the strictest celibacy. There was a father who thought that attention +should be paid to Christ only, of whom it is said, "Hear ye him," and +that no regard should be had to what others before us have either said +or done, only to what has been commanded by Christ, who is preeminent +over all. This landmark they neither prescribe to themselves, nor +permit to be observed by others, when they set up over themselves +and others any masters rather than Christ. There was a father[34] +who contended that the Church ought not to take precedence of Christ, +because his judgment is always according to truth; but ecclesiastical +judges, like other men, may generally be deceived. Breaking down this +landmark also, they scruple not to assert, that all the authority of +the Scripture depends on the decision of the Church. All the fathers, +with one heart and voice, have declared it execrable and detestable +for the holy word of God to be contaminated with the subtleties of +sophists, and perplexed by the wrangles of logicians. Do they confine +themselves within these landmarks, when the whole business of their +lives is to involve the simplicity of the Scripture in endless +controversies, and worse than sophistical wrangles? so that if the +fathers were now restored to life, and heard this art of wrangling, +which they call speculative divinity, they would not suspect the +dispute to have the least reference to God. But if I would enumerate +all the instances in which the authority of the fathers is insolently +rejected by those who would be thought their dutiful children, my +address would exceed all reasonable bounds. Months and years would be +insufficient for me. And yet such is their consummate and incorrigible +impudence, they dare to censure us for presuming to transgress the +ancient landmarks. + +Nor can they gain any advantage against us by their argument from +custom; for, if we were compelled to submit to custom, we should have +to complain of the greatest injustice. Indeed, if the judgments of men +were correct, custom should be sought among the good. But the fact +is often very different. What appears to be practiced by many soon +obtains the force of a custom. And human affairs have scarcely ever +been in so good a state as for the majority to be pleased with things +of real excellence. From the private vices of multitudes, therefore, +has arisen public error, or rather a common agreement of vices, which +these good men would now have to be received as law. It is evident to +all who can see, that the world is inundated with more than an ocean +of evils, that it is overrun with numerous destructive pests, that +every thing is fast verging to ruin, so that we must altogether +despair of human affairs, or vigorously and even violently oppose such +immense evils. And the remedy is rejected for no other reason, but +because we have been accustomed to the evils so long. But let public +error be tolerated in human society; in the kingdom of God nothing but +his eternal truth should he heard and regarded, which no succession of +years, no custom, no confederacy, can circumscribe. Thus Isaiah once +taught the chosen people of God: "Say ye not, A confederacy, to all to +whom this people shall say, A confederacy:" that is, that they should +not unite in the wicked consent of the people; "nor fear their fear, +nor be afraid," but rather "sanctify the Lord of hosts," that he might +"be their fear and their dread."[35] Now, therefore, let them, if +they please, object against us past ages and present examples; if +we "sanctify the Lord of hosts," we shall not be much afraid. For, +whether many ages agree in similar impiety, he is mighty to take +vengeance on the third and fourth generation; or whether the whole +world combine in the same iniquity, he has given an example of the +fatal end of those who sin with a multitude, by destroying all men +with a deluge, and preserving Noah and his small family, in order that +his individual faith might condemn the whole world. Lastly, a corrupt +custom is nothing but an epidemical pestilence, which is equally fatal +to its objects, though they fall with a multitude. Besides, they ought +to consider a remark, somewhere made by Cyprian,[36] that persons who +sin through ignorance, though they cannot be wholly exculpated, may +yet be considered in some degree excusable; but those who obstinately +reject the truth offered by the Divine goodness, are without any +excuse at all. + +Nor are we so embarrassed by their dilemma as to be obliged to +confess, either that the Church was for some time extinct, or that +we have now a controversy with the Church. The Church of Christ has +lived, and will continue to live, as long as Christ shall reign at +the right hand of the Father, by whose hand she is sustained, by whose +protection she is defended, by whose power she is preserved in safety. +For he will undoubtedly perform what he once promised, to be with his +people "even to the end of the world."[37] We have no quarrel against +the Church, for with one consent we unite with all the company of the +faithful in worshipping and adoring the one God and Christ the Lord, +as he has been adored by all the pious in all ages. But our opponents +deviate widely from the truth when they acknowledge no Church but what +is visible to the corporeal eye, and endeavour to circumscribe it +by those limits within which it is far from being included. Our +controversy turns on the two following points:--first, they contend +that the form of the Church is always apparent and visible; secondly, +they place that form in the see of the Roman Church and her order of +prelates. We assert, on the contrary, first, that the Church may exist +without any visible form; secondly, that its form is not contained +in that external splendour which they foolishly admire, but is +distinguished by a very different criterion, _viz_, the pure preaching +of God's word, and the legitimate administration of the sacraments. +They are not satisfied unless the Church can always be pointed out +with the finger. But how often among the Jewish people was it so +disorganized, as to have no visible form left? What splendid form +do we suppose could be seen, when Elias deplored his being left +alone?[38] How long, after the coming of Christ, did it remain without +any external form? How often, since that time, have wars, seditions, +and heresies, oppressed and totally obscured it? If they had lived +at that period, would they have believed that any Church existed? Yet +Elias was informed that there were "left seven thousand" who had "not +bowed the knee to Baal." Nor should we entertain any doubt of Christ's +having always reigned on earth ever since his ascension to heaven. But +if the pious at such periods had sought for any form evident to their +senses, must not their hearts have been quite discouraged? Indeed it +was already considered by Hilary in his day as a grievous error, that +people were absorbed in foolish admiration of the episcopal dignity, +and did not perceive the dreadful mischiefs concealed under +that disguise. For this is his language:[39] "One thing I advise +you--beware of Antichrist, for you have an improper attachment to +walls; your veneration for the Church of God is misplaced on houses +and buildings; you wrongly introduce under them the name of peace. +Is there any doubt that they will be seats of Antichrist? I think +mountains, woods, and lakes, prisons and whirlpools, less dangerous; +for these were the scenes of retirement or banishment in which the +prophets prophesied." But what excites the veneration of the multitude +in the present day for their horned bishops, but the supposition that +those are the holy prelates of religion whom they see presiding over +great cities? Away, then, with such stupid admiration. Let us rather +leave it to the Lord, since he alone "knoweth them that are his,"[40] +sometimes to remove from human observation all external knowledge +of his Church. I admit this to be a dreadful judgment of God on the +earth; but if it be deserved by the impiety of men, why do we attempt +to resist the righteous vengeance of God? Thus the Lord punished +the ingratitude of men in former ages; for, in consequence of their +resistance to his truth, and extinction of the light he had given +them, he permitted them to be blinded by sense, deluded by absurd +falsehoods, and immerged in profound darkness, so that there was no +appearance of the true Church left; yet, at the same time, in the +midst of darkness and errors, he preserved his scattered and concealed +people from total destruction. Nor is this to be wondered at; for he +knew how to save in all the confusion of Babylon, and the flame of +the fiery furnace. But how dangerous it is to estimate the form of the +Church by I know not what vain pomp, which they contend for; I shall +rather briefly suggest than state at large, lest I should protract +this discourse to an excessive length. The Pope, they say, who holds +the Apostolic see, and the bishops anointed and consecrated by him, +provided they are equipped with mitres and crosiers, represent the +Church, and ought to be considered as the Church. Therefore they +cannot err. How is this?--Because they are pastors of the Church, and +consecrated to the Lord. And did not the pastoral character belong to +Aaron, and the other rulers of Israel? Yet Aaron and his sons, after +their designation to the priesthood, fell into error when they made +the golden calf.[41] According to this mode of reasoning, why should +not the four hundred prophets, who lied to Ahab, have represented the +Church?[42] But the Church remained on the side of Micaiah, solitary +and despised as he was, and out of his mouth proceeded the truth. Did +not those prophets exhibit both the name and appearance of the Church, +who with united violence rose up against Jeremiah, and threatened and +boasted, "the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from +the wise, nor the word from the prophet?"[48] Jeremiah is sent singly +against the whole multitude of prophets, with a denunciation from the +Lord, that the "law shall perish from the priest, counsel from the +wise, and the word from the prophet."[44] And was there not the like +external respectability in the council convened by the chief priests, +scribes, and Pharisees, to consult about putting Christ to death?[45] +Now, let them go and adhere to the external appearance, and thereby +make Christ and all the prophets schismatics, and, on the other hand, +make the ministers of Satan instruments of the Holy Spirit. But if +they speak their real sentiments, let them answer me sincerely, what +nation or place they consider as the seat of the Church, from the time +when, by a decree of the council of Basil, Eugenius was deposed and +degraded from the pontificate, and Amadeus substituted in his place. +They cannot deny that the council, as far as relates to external +forms, was a lawful one, and summoned not only by one pope, but by +two. There Eugenius was pronounced guilty of schism, rebellion, and +obstinacy, together with all the host of cardinals and bishops who had +joined him in attempting a dissolution of the council. Yet afterwards, +assisted by the favour of princes, he regained the quiet possession of +his former dignity. That election of Amadeus, though formally made by +the authority of a general and holy synod, vanished into smoke; and he +was appeased with a cardinal's hat, like a barking dog with a morsel. +From the bosom of those heretics and rebels have proceeded all the +popes, cardinals, bishops, abbots, and priests ever since. Here they +must stop. For to which party will they give the title of the Church? +Will they deny that this was a general council, which wanted nothing +to complete its external majesty, being solemnly convened by two papal +bulls, consecrated by a presiding legate of the Roman see, and well +regulated in every point of order, and invariably preserving the +same dignity to the last? Will they acknowledge Eugenius to be +a schismatic, with all his adherents, by whom they have all been +consecrated? Either, therefore, let them give a different definition +of the form of the Church, or, whatever be their number, we shall +account them all schismatics, as having been knowingly and voluntarily +ordained by heretics. But if it had never been ascertained before, +that the Church is not confined to external pomps they would +themselves afford us abundant proof of it, who have so long +superciliously exhibited themselves to the world under the title of +the Church, though they were at the same time the deadly plagues of +it. I speak not of their morals, and those tragical exploits with +which all their lives abound, since they profess themselves to be +Pharisees, who are to be heard and not imitated. I refer to the very +doctrine itself, on which they found their claim to be considered +as the Church. If you devote a portion of your leisure, Sire, to the +perusal of our writings, you will clearly discover that doctrine to be +a fatal pestilence of souls, the firebrand, ruin, and destruction of +the Church. + +Finally, they betray great want of candour, by invidiously repeating +what great commotions, tumults, and contentions, have attended the +preaching of our doctrine, and what effects it produces in many +persons. For it is unfair to charge it with those evils which ought to +be attributed to the malice of Satan. It is the native property of the +Divine word, never to make its appearance without disturbing Satan, +and rousing his opposition. This is a most certain and unequivocal +criterion by which it is distinguished from false doctrines, which +are easily broached when they are heard with general attention, and +received with applauses by the world. Thus, in some ages, when all +things were immerged in profound darkness, the prince of this world +amused and diverted himself with the generality of mankind, and, like +another Sardanapalus, gave himself up to his ease and pleasures in +perfect peace; for what would he do but amuse and divert himself, +in the quiet and undisturbed possession of his kingdom? But when the +light shining from above dissipated a portion of his darkness--when +that Mighty One alarmed and assaulted his kingdom--then he began +to shake off his wonted torpor, and to hurry on his armour. First, +indeed, he stirred up the power of men to suppress the truth by +violence at its first appearance; and when this proved ineffectual, he +had recourse to subtlety. He made the Catabaptists, and other infamous +characters, the instruments of exciting dissensions and doctrinal +controversies, with a view to obscure and finally to extinguish it. +And now he continues to attack it both ways; for he endeavours to root +up this genuine seed by means of human force, and at the same time +tries every effort to choke it with his tares, that it may not grow +and produce fruit. But all his attempts will be vain, if we attend to +the admonitions of the Lord, who hath long ago made us acquainted +with his devices, that we might not be caught by him unawares, and has +armed us with sufficient means of defence against all his assaults. +But to charge the word of God with the odium of seditions, excited +against it by wicked and rebellious men, or of sects raised by +imposters,--is not this extreme malignity? Yet it is not without +example in former times. Elias was asked whether it was not he "that +troubled Israel."[46] Christ was represented by the Jews as guilty +of sedition.[47] The apostles were accused of stirring up popular +commotions.[48] Wherein does this differ from the conduct of those +who, at the present day, impute to us all the disturbances, tumults, +and contentions, that break out against us? But the proper answer to +such accusations has been taught us by Elias, that the dissemination +of errors and the raising of tumults is not chargeable on us, but on +those who are resisting the power of God. But as this one reply is +sufficient to repress their temerity, so, on the other hand, we must +meet the weakness of some persons, who are frequently disturbed with +such offences, and become unsettled and wavering in their minds. +Now, that they may not stumble and fall amidst this agitation and +perplexity, let them know that the apostles in their day experienced +the same things that now befall us. There were "unlearned and +unstable" men, Peter says, who "wrested" the inspired writings of Paul +"to their own destruction."[49] There were despisers of God, who, +when they heard that "where sin abounded grace did much more abound," +immediately concluded, Let us "continue in sin, that grace may +abound." When they heard that the faithful were "not under the law," +they immediately croaked, "We will sin, because we are not under +the law, but under grace."[50] There were some who accused him as +an encourager of sin. Many false apostles crept in, to destroy the +churches he had raised. "Some preached" the gospel "of envy and +strife, not in sincerity," maliciously "supposing to add affliction +to his bonds."[51] In some places the Gospel was attended with +little benefit. "All were seeking their own, not the things of Jesus +Christ."[52] Others returned "like dogs to their vomit, and like swine +to their wallowing in the mire."[53] Many perverted the liberty of +the spirit into the licentiousness of the flesh. Many insinuated +themselves as brethren, who afterwards brought the pious into dangers. +Various contentions were excited among the brethren themselves. What +was to be done by the apostles in such circumstances? Should they not +have dissembled for a time, or rather have rejected and deserted that +Gospel which appeared to be the nursery of so many disputes, the cause +of so many dangers, the occasion of so many offences? But in such +difficulties as these, their minds were relieved by this reflection +that Christ is the "stone of stumbling and rock of offence,"[54] "set +for the fall and rising again of many, and for a sign which shall be +spoken against;"[55] and armed with this confidence, they proceeded +boldly through all the dangers of tumults and offences. The same +consideration should support us, since Paul declares it to be the +perpetual character of the Gospel, that it is a "savour of death unto +death in them that perish,"[56] although it was rather given us to +be the "savour of life unto life," and "the power of God to" the +"salvation" of the faithful;[57] which we also should certainly +experience it to be, if we did not corrupt this eminent gift of God +by our ingratitude, and prevert to our destruction what ought to be a +principal instrument of our salvation. + +But I return to you, Sire. Let not your Majesty be at all moved by +those groundless accusations with which our adversaries endeavour +to terrify you; as that the sole tendency and design of this new +Gospel--for so they call it--is to furnish a pretext for seditions, +and to gain impunity for all crimes. "For God is not the author of +confusion, but of peace;"[58] nor is "the Son of God," who came to +"destroy the works of the devil, the minister of sin."[59] And it is +unjust to charge us with such motives and designs, of which we have +never given cause for the least suspicion. Is it probable that we are +meditating the subversion of kingdoms?--we, who were never heard to +utter a factious word, whose lives were ever known to be peaceable and +honest while We lived under your government, and who, even now in our +exile, cease not to pray for all prosperity to attend yourself and +your kingdom! Is it probable that we are seeking an unlimited license +to commit crimes with impunity? in whose conduct, though many things +may be blamed, yet there is nothing worthy of such severe reproach! +Nor have we, by Divine Grace, profited so little in the Gospel, +but that our life may be an example to our detractors of chastity, +liberality, mercy, temperance, patience, modesty, and every other +virtue. It is an undeniable fact, that we sincerely fear and worship +God, whose name we desire to be sanctified both by our life and by +our death; and envy itself is constrained to bear testimony to the +innocence and civil integrity of some of us, who have suffered the +punishment of death for that very thing which ought to be accounted +their highest praise. But if the Gospel be made a pretext for tumults, +which has not yet happened in your kingdom; if any persons make the +liberty of divine grace an excuse for the licentiousness of their +vices, of whom I have known many,--there are laws and legal penalties, +by which they may be punished according to their deserts; only let not +the Gospel of God be reproached for the crimes of wicked men. You have +now, Sire, the virulent iniquity of our calumniators laid before you +in a sufficient number of instances, that you may not receive their +accusations with too credulous an ear.--I fear I have gone too much +into the detail, as this preface already approaches the size of a full +apology; whereas I intended it not to contain our defence, but only to +prepare your mind to attend to the pleading of our cause; for, though +you are now averse and alienated from us, and even inflamed against +us, we despair not of regaining your favour, if you will only once +read with calmness and composure this our confession, which we intend +as our defence before your Majesty. But, on the contrary, if your ears +are so preoccupied with the whispers of the malevolent, as to leave +no opportunity for the accused to speak for themselves, and if those +outrageous furies, with your connivance, continue to persecute with +imprisonments, scourges, tortures, confiscations, and flames, we +shall indeed, like sheep destined to the slaughter, be reduced to the +greatest extremities. Yet shall we in patience possess our souls, and +wait for the mighty hand of the Lord, which undoubtedly will in time +appear, and show itself armed for the deliverance of the poor from +their affliction, and for the punishment of their despisers, who +now exult in such perfect security. May the Lord, the King of kings, +establish your throne with righteousness, and your kingdom with +equity. _Basil, 1st August, 1536._ + + +[Footnote A: John Calvin was born at Noyon, Picardy, France, in 1509, +and died at Geneva in 1564. He joined the Reformation about 1528, +and, having been banished from Paris, took refuge in Switzerland. +The "Institutes," published at Basle in 1536, contain a comprehensive +statement of the beliefs of that school of Protestant theology which +bears Calvin's name; and in this "Dedication" we have Calvin's own +summing up of the essentials of his creed.] + +[Footnote 1: Prov. xxix. 18.] + +[Footnote 2: Daniel ii. 34. Isaiah xi. 4. Psalm ii. 9.] + +[Footnote 3 Rom. xii. 6.] + +[Footnote 4: Jer. ii. 13.] + +[Footnote 5: Rom. viii. 32.] + +[Footnote 6: I Tim. iv. 10.] + +[Footnote 7: John xvii, 3.] + +[Footnote 8: Rom, iv. 25. I Cor. xv. 3, 17.] + +[Footnote 9: Isaiah i. 3.] + +[Footnote 10: Mark xvi. 20.] + +[Footnote 11: Acts xiv. 3.] + +[Footnote 12: Heb. ii. 3-4.] + +[Footnote 13: John vii. 18, viii. 50.] + +[Footnote 14: In Joan, tract. 13.] + +[Footnote 15: Matt. xxiv. 24.] + +[Footnote 16: 2 Thess. ii. 9.] + +[Footnote 17: 2 Cor. xi. 14.] + +[Footnote 18: Hierom. in praef. Jerem.] + +[Footnote 19: 2 Thess. ii. 10, 11.] + +[Footnote 20: i Cor. iii. 21, 23] + +[Footnote 21: Prov xxii. 28.] + +[Footnote 22: Psalm xlv. 10.] + +[Footnote 23: Acat. in lib. II, cap. 16. Trip. Hist. Amb. lib. 2, de +Off. c. 28.] + +[Footnote 24: Spiridion. Trip. Hist. lib. 1, c. 10.] + +[Footnote 25: Trip. Hist. lib. 8, c. 1. August. de Opere Mon. c. 17.] + +[Footnote 26: Epiph. Epist. ab Hier. vers. Con. Eliber. c. 36.] + +[Footnote 27: Amb de Abra. lib 1, c. 7.] + +[Footnote 28: Gelas. Pap in Conc. Rom.] + +[Footnote 29: Chrys. in 1 Cap. Ephes. Calix. Papa de Cons. dist. 2.] + +[Footnote 30: Gelas. can. Comperimus de Cons. dist. 2. Cypr. Epist. 2, +lib. 1, de Laps.] + +[Footnote 31: August. lib. 2, de Pec. Mer. cap. ult.] + +[Footnote 32: Apollon de quo Eccl. Hist. lib. 5, cap. 11, 12.] + +[Footnote 33: Paphnut. Trip. Hist. lib. 2, c. 14. Cypr. Epist. 2, lib. +2.] + +[Footnote 34: Aug. cap. 2, contr. Cresc. Grammatic.] + +[Footnote 35: Isaiah viii. 12, 13.] + +[Footnote 36: Epist. 3, lib. 2, et in Epist. ad. Julian, de Haeret. +baptiz.] + +[Footnote 37: Matt, xxvlii. 20.] + +[Footnote 38: i Kings xix. 14, 18.] + +[Footnote 39: Contr. Auxent.] + +[Footnote 40: 2 Tim. ii. 19.] + +[Footnote 41: Exod. xxxii. 4.] + +[Footnote 42: i Kings xxii. 6, 11-23.] + +[Footnote 43: Jer. xviii. 18.] + +[Footnote 44: Jer. iv. 9.] + +[Footnote 45: Matt. xxvi. 3, 4.] + +[Footnote 46: 1 Kings xviii. 17.] + +[Footnote 47: Luke xxiii. 2, 5.] + +[Footnote 48: Acts xvii. 6, xxiv. 5.] + +[Footnote 49: 2 Pet. iii. 16.] + +[Footnote 50: Rom. v. 20, vi. 1, 14, 15.] + +[Footnote 51: Phil. i. 15, 16.] + +[Footnote 52: Phil. ii. 21.] + +[Footnote 53: 2 Pet. ii. 22.] + +[Footnote 54: 1 Pet. ii. 8.] + +[Footnote 55: Luke ii. 34.] + +[Footnote 56: 2 Cor. ii. 15, 16.] + +[Footnote 57: Rom. i. 16.] + +[Footnote 58: 1 Cor. xiv. 33.] + +[Footnote 59: 1 John iii. 8. Gal. ii. 17.] + + + + +GENERAL SYLLABUS + + +The design of the Author in these Christian Institutes is twofold, +relating, First to the knowledge of God, as the way to attain a +blessed immortality; and, in connection with and subservience to this, +Secondly, to the knowledge of ourselves. + +In the prosecution of this design, he strictly follows the method of +the Apostles' Creed, as being most familiar to all Christians. For +as the Creed consists of four parts, the first relating to God the +Father, the second to the Son, the third to the Holy Spirit, the +fourth to the Church; so the Author distributes the whole of this work +into Four Books, corresponding respectively to the four parts of the +Creed; as will clearly appear from the following detail:-- + +I. The first article of the Creed relates to God the Father, and to +the creation, conservation, and government of all things, which are +included in his omnipotence. + +So the first book is on the knowledge of God, considered as the +Creator, Preserver, and Governor of the universe at large, and every +thing contained in it. It shows both the nature and tendency of +the true knowledge of the Creator--that this is not learned in the +schools, but that every man from his birth is self-taught it--Yet that +the depravity of men is so great as to corrupt and extinguish this +knowledge, partly by ignorance, partly by wickedness; so that it +neither leads him to glorify God as he ought, nor conducts him to +the attainment of happiness--And though this internal knowledge is +assisted by all the creatures around, which serve as a mirror to +display the Divine perfections, yet that man does not profit by +it--Therefore, that to those, whom it is God's will to bring to an +intimate and saving knowledge of himself, he gives his written word; +which introduces observations on the sacred Scripture--That he has +therein revealed himself; that not the Father only, but the Father, +Son, and Holy Spirit, united, is the Creator of heaven and earth; whom +neither the knowledge innate by nature, nor the very beautiful mirror +displayed to us in the world, can, in consequence of our depravity, +teach us to know so as to glorify him. This gives occasion for +treating of the revelation of God in the Scripture, of the unity of +the Divine Essence, and the trinity of Persons.--To prevent man from +attributing to God the blame of his own voluntary blindness, the +Author shows the state of man at his creation, and treats of the +image of God, freewill, and the primative integrity of nature.--Having +finished the subject of creation, he proceeds to the conservation +and government of all things, concluding the first book with a full +discussion of the doctrine of divine providence. + +II. But since man is fallen by sin from the state in which he was +created, it is necessary to come to Christ. Therefore it follows in +the Creed, "And in Jesus Christ, his only Son our Lord," &c. + +So in the second book of the Institutes our Author treats of the +knowledge of God as the Redeemer in Christ; and having shown the fall +of man, leads him to Christ the Mediator. Here he states the doctrine +of original sin--that man possesses no inherent strength to enable him +to deliver himself from sin and the impending curse, but that, on the +contrary, nothing can proceed from him, antecedently to reconciliation +and renovation, but what is deserving of condemnation--Therefore, +that, man being utterly lost in himself, and incapable of conceiving +even a good thought by which he may restore himself, or perform +actions acceptable to God, he must seek redemption out of himself, in +Christ--That the Law was given for this purpose, not to confine +its observers to itself, but to conduct them to Christ; which gives +occasion to introduce an exposition of the Moral Law--That he was +known, as the Author of salvation, to the Jews under the Law, but more +fully under the Gospel, in which he is manifested to the world.--Hence +follows the doctrine of the similarity and difference of the Old and +New Testament, of the Law and Gospel.--It is next stated, that, in +order to the complete accomplishment of salvation, it was necessary +for the eternal Son of God to become man, and that he actually +assumed a real human nature:--it is also shown how these two natures +constitute one person--That the office of Christ, appointed for the +acquisition and application of complete salvation by his merit and +efficacy, is sacerdotal, regal, and prophetical--Next follows the +manner in which Christ executed his office, or actually performed the +part of a Mediator, being an exposition of the Articles respecting +his death, resurrection, and ascension to heaven.--Lastly, the Author +shows the truth and propriety of affirming that Christ merited the +grace of God and salvation for us. + +III. As long as Christ is separate from us, he profits us nothing. +Hence the necessity of our being ingrafted into him, as branches into +a vine. Therefore the doctrine concerning Christ is followed, in +the third part of the Creed, by this clause, "I believe in the Holy +Spirit," as being the bond of union between us and Christ. + +So in the third book our Author treats of the Holy Spirit, who unites +us to Christ--and consequently of faith, by which we embrace Christ, +with his twofold benefit, free righteousness, which he imputes to +us, and regeneration, which he commences within us, by bestowing +repentance upon us.--And to show that we have not the least room to +glory in such faith as is unconnected with the pursuit of repentance, +before proceeding to the full discussion of justification, he treats +at large of repentance and the continual exercise of it, which Christ, +apprehended by faith, produces in us by his Spirit--He next fully +discusses the first and chief benefit of Christ when united to us by +the Holy Spirit that is, justification--and then treats of prayer, +which resembles the hand that actually receives those blessings to be +enjoyed, which faith knows, from the word of promise, to be laid up +with God for our use.--But as all men are not united to Christ, +the sole Author of salvation, by the Holy Spirit, who creates and +preserves faith in us, he treats of God's eternal election; which is +the cause that we, in whom he foresaw no good but what he intended +freely to bestow, have been favored with the gift of Christ, and +united to God by the effectual call of the Gospel.--Lastly, he treats +of complete regeneration, and the fruition of happiness; that is, the +final resurrection, towards which our eyes must be directed, since in +this world the felicity of the pious, in respect of enjoyment, is only +begun. + +IV. But as the Holy Spirit does not unite all men to Christ, or make +them partakers of faith, and on those to whom he imparts it he does +not ordinarily bestow it without means, but employs for this purpose +the preaching of the Gospel and the use of the sacraments, with the +administration of all discipline, therefore it follows in the Creed, +"I believe in the Holy Catholic Church," whom, although involved in +eternal death, yet, in pursuance of the gratuitous election, God has +freely reconciled to himself in Christ, and made partakers of the Holy +Spirit, that, being ingrafted into Christ, they may have communion +with him as their head, whence flows a perpetual remission of sins, +and a full restoration to eternal life. + +So in the fourth book our Author treats of the Church--then of the +means used by the Holy Spirit in effectually calling from spiritual +death, and preserving the church--the word and sacraments--baptism +and the Lord's supper--which are as it were Christ's regal sceptre, by +which he commences his spiritual reign in the Church by the energy of +his Spirit, and carries it forwards from day to day during the present +life, after the close of which he perfects it without those means. + +And as political institutions are the asylums of the Church in this +life, though civil government is distinct from the spiritual kingdom +of Christ, our Author instructs us respecting it as a signal blessing +of God, which the Church ought to acknowledge with gratitude of +heart, till we are called out of this transitory state to the heavenly +inheritance, where God will be all in all. + +This is the plan of the Institutes, which may be comprised in the +following brief summary:-- + +Man, created originally upright, being afterwards ruined, not +partially, but totally, finds salvation out of himself, wholly in +Christ; to whom being united by the Holy Spirit, freely bestowed, +without any regard of future works, he enjoys in him a twofold +benefit, the perfect imputation of righteousness, which attends him +to the grave, and the commencement of sanctification, which he daily +increases, till at length he completes it at the day of regeneration +or resurrection of the body, so that in eternal life and the heavenly +inheritance his praises are celebrated for such stupendous mercy. + + + + +DEDICATION OF THE REVOLUTIONS OF THE HEAVENLY BODIES + +BY NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (1543)[A] + +TO POPE PAUL III + + +I can easily conceive, most Holy Father, that as soon as some +people learn that in this book which I have written concerning the +revolutions of the heavenly bodies, I ascribe certain motions to +the Earth, they will cry out at once that I and my theory should be +rejected. For I am not so much in love with my conclusions as not to +weigh what others will think about them, and although I know that the +meditations of a philosopher are far removed from the judgment of the +laity, because his endeavor is to seek out the truth in all things, so +far as this is permitted by God to the human reason, I still believe +that one must avoid theories altogether foreign to orthodoxy. +Accordingly, when I considered in my own mind how absurd a performance +it must seem to those who know that the judgment of many centuries has +approved the view that the Earth remains fixed as center in the midst +of the heavens, if I should, on the contrary, assert that the Earth +moves; I was for a long time at a loss to know whether I should +publish the commentaries which I have written in proof of its +motion, or whether it were not better to follow the example of the +Pythagoreans and of some others, who were accustomed to transmit the +secrets of Philosophy not in writing but orally, and only to their +relatives and friends, as the letter from Lysis to Hipparchus bears +witness. They did this, it seems to me, not as some think, because of +a certain selfish reluctance to give their views to the world, but +in order that the noblest truths, worked out by the careful study of +great men, should not be despised by those who are vexed at the idea +of taking great pains with any forms of literature except such as +would be profitable, or by those who, if they are driven to the study +of Philosophy for its own sake by the admonitions and the example +of others, nevertheless, on account of their stupidity, hold a place +among philosophers similar to that of drones among bees. Therefore, +when I considered this carefully, the contempt which I had to fear +because of the novelty and apparent absurdity of my view, nearly +induced me to abandon utterly the work I had begun. + +My friends, however, in spite of long delay and even resistance on my +part, withheld me from this decision. First among these was Nicolaus +Schonberg, Cardinal of Capua, distinguished in all branches of +learning. Next to him comes my very dear friend, Tidemann Giese, +Bishop of Culm, a most earnest student, as he is, of sacred and, +indeed, of all good learning. The latter has often urged me, at times +even spurring me on with reproaches, to publish and at last bring to +the light the book which had lain in my study not nine years merely, +but already going on four times nine. Not a few other very eminent and +scholarly men made the same request, urging that I should no longer +through fear refuse to give out my work for the common benefit of +students of Mathematics. They said I should find that the more absurd +most men now thought this theory of mine concerning the motion of the +Earth, the more admiration and gratitude it would command after +they saw in the publication of my commentaries the mist of absurdity +cleared away by most transparent proofs. So, influenced by these +advisors and this hope, I have at length allowed my friends to publish +the work, as they had long besought me to do. + +But perhaps Your Holiness will not so much wonder that I have ventured +to publish these studies of mine, after having taken such pains in +elaborating them that I have not hesitated to commit to writing my +views of the motion of the Earth, as you will be curious to hear +how it occurred to me to venture, contrary to the accepted view of +mathematicians, and well-nigh contrary to common sense, to form a +conception of any terrestrial motion whatsoever. Therefore I would not +have it unknown to Your Holiness, that the only thing which induced +me to look for another way of reckoning the movements of the heavenly +bodies was that I knew that mathematicians by no means agree in their +investigations thereof. For, in the first place, they are so much in +doubt concerning the motion of the sun and the moon, that they can +not even demonstrate and prove by observation the constant length of +a complete year; and in the second place, in determining the motions +both of these and of the five other planets, they fail to employ +consistently one set of first principles and hypotheses, but use +methods of proof based only upon the apparent revolutions and motions. +For some employ concentric circles only; others, eccentric circles and +epicycles; and even by these means they do not completely attain the +desired end. For, although those who have depended upon concentric +circles have shown that certain diverse motions can be deduced from +these, yet they have not succeeded thereby in laying down any sure +principle, corresponding indisputably to the phenomena. These, on the +other hand, who have devised systems of eccentric circles, although +they seem in great part to have solved the apparent movements +by calculations which by these eccentrics are made to fit, have +nevertheless introduced many things which seem to contradict the first +principles of the uniformity of motion. Nor have they been able to +discover or calculate from these the main point, which is the shape of +the world and the fixed symmetry of its parts; but their procedure +has been as if someone were to collect hands, feet, a head, and other +members from various places, all very fine in themselves, but not +proportionate to one body, and no single one corresponding in its turn +to the others, so that a monster rather than a man would be formed +from them. Thus in their process of demonstration which they term a +"method," they are found to have omitted something essential, or to +have included something foreign and not pertaining to the matter in +hand. This certainly would never have happened to them if they had +followed fixed principles; for if the hypotheses they assumed were +not false, all that resulted therefrom would be verified indubitably. +Those things which I am saying now may be obscure, yet they will be +made clearer in their proper place. + +Therefore, having turned over in my mind for a long time this +uncertainty of the traditional mathematical methods of calculating +the motions of the celestial bodies, I began to grow disgusted that +no more consistent scheme of the movements of the mechanism of the +universe, set up for our benefit by that best and most law abiding +Architect of all things, was agreed upon by philosophers who otherwise +investigate so carefully the most minute details of this world. +Wherefore I undertook the task of rereading the books of all the +philosophers I could get access to, to see whether any one ever was of +the opinion that the motions of the celestial bodies were other than +those postulated by the men who taught mathematics in the schools. And +I found first, indeed, in Cicero, that Niceta perceived that the Earth +moved; and afterward in Plutarch I found that some others were of this +opinion, whose words I have seen fit to quote here, that they may be +accessible to all:-- + +"Some maintain that the Earth is stationary, but Philolaus the +Pythagorean says that it revolves in a circle about the fire of the +ecliptic, like the sun and moon. Heraklides of Pontus and Ekphantus +the Pythagorean make the Earth move, not changing its position, +however, confined in its falling and rising around its own center in +the manner of a wheel." + +Taking this as a starting point, I began to consider the mobility of +the Earth; and although the idea seemed absurd, yet because I knew +that the liberty had been granted to others before me to postulate all +sorts of little circles for explaining the phenomena of the stars, I +thought I also might easily be permitted to try whether by postulating +some motion of the Earth, more reliable conclusions could be reached +regarding the revolution of the heavenly bodies, than those of my +predecessors. + +And so, after postulating movements, which, farther on in the book, I +ascribe to the Earth, I have found by many and long observations that +if the movements of the other planets are assumed for the circular +motion of the Earth and are substituted for the revolution of each +star, not only do their phenomena follow logically therefrom, but +the relative positions and magnitudes both of the stars and all their +orbits, and of the heavens themselves, become so closely related that +in none of its parts can anything be changed without causing confusion +in the other parts and in the whole universe. Therefore, in the course +of the work I have followed this plan: I describe in the first book +all the positions of the orbits together with the movements which I +ascribe to the Earth, in order that this book might contain, as it +were, the general scheme of the universe. Thereafter in the remaining +books, I set forth the motions of the other stars and of all their +orbits together with the movement of the Earth, in order that one +may see from this to what extent the movements and appearances of the +other stars and their orbits can be saved, if they are transferred to +the movement of the Earth. Nor do I doubt that ingenious and learned +mathematicians will sustain me, if they are willing to recognize and +weigh, not superficially, but with that thoroughness which Philosophy +demands above all things, those matters which have been adduced by me +in this work to demonstrate these theories. In order, however, that +both the learned and the unlearned equally may see that I do not avoid +anyone's judgment, I have preferred to dedicate these lucubrations of +mine to Your Holiness rather than to any other, because, even in this +remote corner of the world where I live, you are considered to be the +most eminent man in dignity of rank and in love of all learning and +even of mathematics, so that by your authority and judgment you can +easily suppress the bites of slanderers, albeit the proverb hath it +that there is no remedy for the bite of a sycophant. If perchance +there shall be idle talkers, who, though they are ignorant of all +mathematical sciences, nevertheless assume the right to pass judgment +on these things, and if they should dare to criticise and attack this +theory of mine because of some passage of scripture which they have +falsely distorted for their own purpose, I care not at all; I will +even despise their judgment as foolish. For it is not unknown that +Lactantius, otherwise a famous writer but a poor mathematician, speaks +most childishly of the shape of the Earth when he makes fun of those +who said that the Earth has the form of a sphere. It should not seem +strange then to zealous students, if some such people shall ridicule +us also. Mathematics are written for mathematicians, to whom, if +my opinion does not deceive me, our labors will seem to contribute +something to the ecclesiastical state whose chief office Your Holiness +now occupies; for when not so very long ago, under Leo X, in the +Lateran Council the question of revising the ecclesiastical calendar +was discussed, it then remained unsettled, simply because the length +of the years and months, and the motions of the sun and moon were held +to have been not yet sufficiently determined. Since that time, I have +given my attention to observing these more accurately, urged on by a +very distinguished man, Paul, Bishop of Fossombrone, who at that time +had charge of the matter. But what I may have accomplished herein I +leave to the judgment of Your Holiness in particular, and to that of +all other learned mathematicians; and lest I seem to Your Holiness to +promise more regarding the usefulness of the work than I can perform, +I now pass to the work itself. + + +[Footnote A: Nicolaus Copernicus was born in 1473 at Thorn in West +Prussia, of a Polish father and a German mother. He attended +the university of Cracow and Bologna, lectured on astronomy and +mathematics at Rome, and later studied medicine at Padua and canon law +at Ferrara. He was appointed canon of the cathedral of Frauenburg, and +in this town he died in 1543, having devoted the latter part of his +life largely to astronomy. + +The book which was introduced by this dedication laid the foundations +of modern astronomy. At the time when it was written, the earth was +believed by all to be the fixed centre of the universe; and although +many of the arguments used by Copernicus were invalid and absurd, he +was the first modern to put forth the heliocentric theory as "a +better explanation." It remained for Kepler, Galileo, and Newton, to +establish the theory on firm grounds.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION IN SCOTLAND + +BY JOHN KNOX (C. 1566)[A] + +To the gentill readar, grace and peace from God the Father of our Lord +Jesus Christ, with the perpetuall encrease of the Holy Spreit. + + +It is not unknowen, Christeane Reader, that the same clud of +ignorance, that long hath darkened many realmes under this accurssed +kingdome of that Romane Antichrist, hath also owercovered this poore +Realme; that idolatrie hath bein manteined, the bloode of innocentis +hath bene sched, and Christ Jesus his eternall treuth hath bene +abhorred, detested, and blasphemed. But that same God that caused +light to schyne out of darknes, in the multitud of his mercyes, hath +of long tyme opened the eis of some evin within this Realme, to see +the vanitie of that which then was universally embrased for trew +religioun; and hes gevin unto them strenth to oppone[1] thame selfis +unto the same: and now, into these our last and moist[2] corrupt +dayis, hath maid his treuth so to triumphs amonges us, that, in +despyte of Sathan, hipochrisye is disclosed, and the trew wyrshipping +of God is manifested to all the inhabitantis of this realme who +eis Sathan blyndis not, eyther by thair fylthy lustes, or ellis by +ambitioun, and insatiable covetousness, which mack them repung to[3] +the power of God working by his worde. + +And becaus we ar not ignorant what diverse bruittis[4] war dispersed +of us, the professoures of Jesus Christ within this realme, in +the begynnyng of our interprise, ordour was tackin, that all our +proceidingis should be committed to register; as that thei war, by +such as then paynfullie travailled boith by toung and pen; and so was +collected a just volume, (as after will appeir,) conteanyng thingis +done frome the fyftie-awght[5] year of God, till the arrivall of the +Quenis Majestic[6] furth of France, with the which the Collectour and +Writtar for that tyme was content, and never mynded[7] further to have +travailled in that kynd of writting. But, after invocatioun of the +name of God, and after consultatioun with some faythfull, what was +thought by thame expedient to advance Goddis glorie, and to edifie +this present generatioun, and the posteritie to come, it was +concluded, that faythfull rehersall should be maid of such personages +as God had maid instruments of his glorie, by opponyng of thame selfis +to manifest abuses, superstitioun, and idolatrie; and albeit thare be +no great nomber, yet ar thei mo then the Collectour wold have looked +for at the begynnyng, and thairfoir is the volume somewhat enlarged +abuif his expectatioun: And yit, in the begynnyng, mon[8] we crave +of all the gentill Readaris, not to look[9] of us such ane History +as shall expresse all thingis that have occurred within this Realme, +during the tyme of this terrible conflict that lies bene betuix the +sanctes[10] of God and these bloody wolves who clame to thame selves +the titill of clargie, and to have authentic ower the saules of men; +for, with the Pollicey,[11] mynd we to meddill no further then it hath +Religioun mixed with it. And thairfoir albeit that many thingis which +wer don be omitted, yit, yf we invent no leys,[12] we think our selves +blamless in that behalf. Of one other (thing) we mon[8] foirwarne +the discreat Readaris, which is, that thei be not offended that the +sempill treuth be spokin without partialitie; for seing that of men we +neyther hunt for reward, nor yitt for vane glorie, we litill pass +by the approbatioun of such as seldome judge weill of God and of his +workis. Lett not thairfoar the Readir wonder, albeit that our style +vary and speik diverslie of men, according as thei have declared +thameselves sometymes ennemymes and sometymes freindis, sometymes +fervent, sometymes cold, sometymes constant, and sometymes changeable +in the cause of God and of his holy religioun: for, in this our +simplicitie, we suppoise that the Godlie shall espy our purpose, which +is, that God may be praised for his mercy schawin,[13] this present +age may be admonished to be thankfull for Goddis benefittis offerred, +and the posteritie to cum may be instructed how wonderouslie hath the +light of Christ Jesus prevailled against darkness in this last and +most corrupted age. + + +[Footnote A: John Knox (1505-1571), the leader of the Scottish +Reformation and its historian, was educated at Glasgow University; was +pastor to English congregations at Frankfort-on-Maine and at Geneva, +where he met Calvin; returned to Scotland in 1559; and from that time +till his death was active in the establishment of the Presbyterian +organization, through which his powerful personality has continued +to influence the Scottish national character to the present day. His +preface, which is printed here in the original Scottish spelling, +gives some indication of the sternness, not to say virulence, of his +temper towards the Roman Church.] + +[Footnote 1: Oppose] + +[Footnote 2: Most] + +[Footnote 3: Resist.] + +[Footnote 4: Rumors.] + +[Footnote 5: I.e. 1558.] + +[Footnote 6: Mary, Queen of Scots, arrived in Scotland, Aug. 19, +1562.] + +[Footnote 7: Intended.] + +[Footnote 8: Must.] + +[Footnote 9: Expect.] + +[Footnote 10: Saints.] + +[Footnote 11: Civil or State politics.] + +[Footnote 12: Lies.] + +[Footnote 13: Shown.] + + + + +PREFATORY LETTER TO SIR WALTER RALEIGH ON THE FAERIE QUEENE + +BY EDMUND SPENSER (1589)[A] + +A LETTER OF THE AUTHORS EXPOUNDING HIS WHOLE INTENTION IN THE COURSE +OF THIS WORKE: WHICH FOR THAT IT GIVETH GREAT LIGHT TO THE READER, FOR +THE BETTER UNDERSTANDING IS HEREUNTO ANNEXED + +To the Right Noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Raleigh, Knight, Lord +Wardein of the Stanneryes, and Her Majesties Liefetenaunt of the +County of Cornewayll + + +Sir, knowing how doubtfully all allegories may be construed, and this +booke of mine, which I have entituled the _Faery Queene_, being a +continued allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good, as well for +avoyding of gealous opinions and misconstructions, as also for your +better light in reading thereof, (being so by you commanded,) to +discover unto you the general intention and meaning, which in the +whole course thereof I have fashioned, without expressing of any +particular purposes or by accidents therein occasioned. The generall +end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble +person in vertuous and gentle discipline: which for that I conceived +shoulde be most plausible and pleasing, being coloured with an +historicall fiction, the which the most part of men delight to read, +rather for variety of matter then for profile of the ensample, I chose +the historye of King Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of +his person, being made famous by many mens former workes, and also +furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of present time. In +which I have followed all the antique poets historicall: first Homere, +who in the persons of Agamemnon and Ulysses hath ensampled a good +governour and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his +Odysseis; then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in the person +of Æneas; after him Ariosto comprised them both in his Orlando; and +lately Tasso dissevered them againe, and formed both parts in two +persons, namely that part which they in philosophy call Ethice, or +vertues of a private man, coloured in his Rinaldo; the other named +Politice in his Godfredo. By ensample of which excellente poets, I +labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king, the image of +a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as +Aristotle hath devised, the which is the purpose of these first +twelve bookes: which if I finde to be well accepted, I may be perhaps +encoraged to frame the other part of polliticke vertues in his person, +after that hee came to be king. To some, I know, this methode will +seeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline delivered +plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large, as they use, then +thus clowdily enwrapped in allegoricall devises. But such, me seeme, +should be satisfide with the use of these dayes, seeing all things +accounted by their showes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not +delightfull and pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon +preferred before Plato, for that the one, in the exquisite depth of +his judgement, formed a commune welth such as it should be, but the +other in the person of Cyrus and the Persians fashioned a governement, +such as might best be: so much more profitable and gratious is +doctrine by ensample, then by rule. So have I laboured to doe in +the person of Arthure: whome I conceive, after his long education by +Timon, to whom he was by Merlin delivered to be brought up, so soone +as he was borne of the Lady Igrayne, to have seene in a dream or +vision the Faery Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he +awaking resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin armed, and +by Timon throughly instructed, he went to seeke her forth in Faerye +Land. In that Faery Queene I meane glory in my generall intention, but +in my particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of +our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery Land. And yet, +in some places els, I doe otherwise shadow her. For considering she +beareth two persons, the one of a most royall queene or empresse, the +other of a most vertuous and beautifull lady, this latter part in some +places I doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name according to +your owne excellent conceipt of Cynthia, (Phæbe and Cynthia being +both names of Diana.) So in the person of Prince Arthure I sette +forth magnificence in particular, which vertue, for that (according +to Aristotle and the rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and +conteineth in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention the +deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue which I write of in that +booke. But of the xii. other vertues I make xii. other knights the +patrones, for the more variety of the history: of which these three +bookes contayn three. The first of the Knight of the Redcrosse, in +whome I expresse holynes: The seconde of Sir Guyon, in whome I sette +forth temperaunce: The third of Britomartis, a lady knight, in whome I +picture chastity. But because the beginning of the whole worke seemeth +abrupte and as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye +know the occasion of these three knights severall adventures. For the +methode of a poet historical is not such as of an historiographer. For +an historiographer discourseth of affayres orderly as they were donne, +accounting as well the times as the actions; but a poet thrusteth into +the middest, even where it most concerneth him, and there recoursing +to the thinges forepaste, and divining of thinges to come, maketh a +pleasing analysis of all. + +The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an +historiographer, should be the twelfth booke, which is the last; where +I devise that the Faery Queene kept her annuall feaste xii. dayes, +uppon which xii. severall dayes, the occasions of the xii. several +adventures hapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights, +are in these xii. books severally handled and discoursed. The first +was this. In the beginning of the feast, there presented him selfe +a tall clownish younge man, who, falling before the Queen of Faries, +desired a boone (as the manner then was) which during that feast she +might not refuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement of +any adventure, which during that feaste should happen: that being +graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitte through his rusticity +for a better place. Soone after entred a faire ladye in mourning +weedes, riding on a white asse, with a dwarfe behind her leading a +warlike steed, that bore the armes of a knight, and his speare in the +dwarfes hand. Shee, falling before the Queene of Faeries, complayned +that her father and mother, an ancient king and queene, had bene by an +huge dragon many years shut up in a brasen castle, who thence suffred +them not to yssew: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to assygne +her some one of her knights to take on him that exployt. Presently +that clownish person, upstarting, desired that adventure: whereat the +Queene much wondering, and the lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly +importuned his desire. In the end the lady told him, that unlesse that +armour which she brought would serve him (that is, the armour of a +Christian man specified by Saint Paul, vi. Ephes.), that he could not +succeed in that enterprise: which being forthwith put upon him with +dewe furnitures thereunto, he seemed the goodliest man in al that +company, and was well liked of the lady. And eftesoones taking on him +knighthood, and mounting on that straunge courser, he went forth with +her on that adventure: where beginneth the first booke vz. + + A gentle knight was pricking on the playne, &c. + +The second day ther came in a palmer bearing an infant with +bloody hands, whose parents he complained to have bene slayn by +an enchaunteresse called Acrasia: and therfore craved of the Faery +Queene, to appoint him some knight to performe that adventure; which +being assigned to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that same +palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke and the whole +subject thereof. The third day there came in a groome, who complained +before the Faery Queene, that a vile enchaunter, called Busirane, +had in hand a most faire lady, called Amoretta, whom he kept in most +grievous torment, because she would not yield him the pleasure of her +body. Whereupon Sir Scudamour, the lover of that lady, presently tooke +on him that adventure. But being unable to performe it by reason +of the hard enchauntments, after long sorrow, in the end met with +Britomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love. + +But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are intermedled, but +rather as accidents then intendments: as the love of Britomart, the +overthrow of Marinell, the misery of Florimell, the vertuousnes of +Belphoebe, the lasciviousnes of Hellenora, and many the like. + +Thus much, Sir, I have briefly overronne, to direct your understanding +to the wel-head of the history, that from thence gathering the whole +intention of the conceit, ye may, as in a handfull, gripe al the +discourse, which otherwise may happily seeme tedious and confused. So +humbly craving the continuance of your honourable favour towards me, +and th' eternall establishment of your happines, I humbly take leave. + +23. January, 1589. Yours most humbly affectionate, Ed. Spenser. + + +[Footnote A: Edmund Spenser was born in London about 1552, and died +there in 1599. He was the greatest of the non-dramatic poets of the +age of Elizabeth; and the "Faerie Queene" is the longest and most +famous of his works. The first three books were published in 1590, the +second three in 1596; of the remaining six which he had planned some +fragments were issued after his death. The poem is a combination of +allegory and romance; and in this prefatory letter to Raleigh the +poet himself explains the plan of the work and its main allegorical +signification.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD + +BY SIR WALTER RALEIGH (1614)[A] + + +How unfit and how unworthy a choice I have made of myself, to +undertake a work of this mixture, mine own reason, though exceeding +weak, hath sufficiently resolved me. For had it been begotten then +with my first dawn of day, when the light of common knowledge began to +open itself to my younger years, and before any wound received either +from Fortune or Time, I might yet well have doubted that the darkness +of Age and Death would have covered over both It and Me, long before +the performance. For, beginning with the Creation, I have proceeded +with the History of the World; and lastly purposed (some few sallies +excepted) to confine my discourse with this our renowned Island of +Great Britain. I confess that it had better sorted with my disability, +the better part of whose times are run out in other travails, to have +set together (as I could) the unjointed and scattered frame of our +English affairs, than of the universal in whom, had there been no +other defect (who am all defect) than the time of the day, it were +enough, the day of a tempestuous life, drawn on to the very evening +ere I began. But those inmost and soul-piercing wounds, which are ever +aching while uncured; with the desire to satisfy those few friends, +which I have tried by the fire of adversity, the former enforcing, +the latter persuading; have caused me to make my thoughts legible, and +myself the subject of every opinion, wise or weak. + +To the world I present them, to which I am nothing indebted: neither +have others that were, (Fortune changing) sped much better in any +age. For prosperity and adversity have evermore tied and untied vulgar +affections. And as we see it in experience, that dogs do always bark +at those they know not, and that it is their nature to accompany one +another in those clamors: so it is with the inconsiderate multitude; +who wanting that virtue which we call honesty in all men, and that +especial gift of God which we call charity in Christian men, condemn +without hearing, and wound without offence given: led thereunto by +uncertain report only; which his Majesty truly acknowledged for the +author of all lies. "Blame no man," saith Siracides, "before thou have +inquired the matter: understand first, and then reform righteously. +'Rumor, res sine teste, sine judice, maligna, fallax'; Rumor is +without witness, without judge, malicious and deceivable." This vanity +of vulgar opinion it was, that gave St. Augustine argument to affirm, +that he feared the praise of good men, and detested that of the evil. +And herein no man hath given a better rule, than this of Seneca; +"Conscientiæ satisfaciamus: nihil in famam laboremus, sequatur vel +mala, dum bene merearis." "Let us satisfy our own consciences, and not +trouble ourselves with fame: be it never so ill, it is to be despised +so we deserve well." + +For myself, if I have in anything served my Country, and prized it +before my private, the general acceptation can yield me no other +profit at this time, than doth a fair sunshine day to a sea-man after +shipwreck; and the contrary no other harm, than an outrageous tempest +after the port attained. I know that I lost the love of many, for my +fidelity towards Her,[1] whom I must still honor in the dust; though +further than the defence of her excellent person, I never persecuted +any man. Of those that did it, and by what device they did it, He that +is the Supreme Judge of all the world, hath taken the account: so as +for this kind of suffering, I must say With Seneca, "Mala opinio, bene +parta, delectat."[2] As for other men; if there be any that have made +themselves fathers of that fame which hath been begotten for them, I +can neither envy at such their purchased glory, nor much lament mine +own mishap in that kind; but content myself to say with Virgil, "Sic +vos non vobis,"[3] in many particulars. To labor other satisfaction, +were an effect of frenzy, not of hope, seeing it is not truth, but +opinion, that can travel the world without a passport. For were it +otherwise; and were there not as many internal forms of the mind, as +there are external figures of men; there were then some possibility to +persuade by the mouth of one advocate, even equity alone. + +But such is the multiplying and extensive virtue of dead earth, and +of that breath-giving life which God hath cast upon time and dust, as +that among those that were, of whom we read and hear; and among those +that are, whom we see and converse with; everyone hath received a +several picture of face, and everyone a diverse picture of mind; +everyone a form apart, everyone a fancy and cogitation differing: +there being nothing wherein Nature so much triumpheth as in +dissimilitude. From whence it cometh that there is found so great +diversity of opinions; so strong a contrariety of inclinations; +so many natural and unnatural; wise, foolish, manly, and childish +affections and passions in mortal men. For it is not the visible +fashion and shape of plants, and of reasonable creatures, that makes +the difference of working in the one, and of condition in the other; +but the form internal. + +And though it hath pleased God to reserve the art of reading men's +thoughts to himself: yet, as the fruit tells the name of the tree; so +do the outward works of men (so far as their cogitations are acted) +give us whereof to guess at the rest. Nay, it were not hard to express +the one by the other, very near the life, did not craft in many, +fear in the most, and the world's love in all, teach every capacity, +according to the compass it hath, to qualify and make over their +inward deformities for a time. Though it be also true, "Nemo potest +diu personam ferre fictam: cito in naturam suam residunt, quibus +veritas non subest": "No man can long continue masked in a counterfeit +behavior: the things that are forced for pretences having no ground of +truth, cannot long dissemble their own natures." Neither can any +man (saith Plutarch) so change himself, but that his heart may be +sometimes seen at his tongue's end. + +In this great discord and dissimilitude of reasonable creatures, if we +direct ourselves to the multitude; "omnis honestæ rei malus judex +est vulgus": "The common people are evil judges of honest things, and +whose wisdom (saith Ecclesiastes) is to be despised": if to the better +sort, every understanding hath a peculiar judgment, by which it both +censureth other men, and valueth itself. And therefore unto me it will +not seem strange, though I find these my worthless papers torn with +rats: seeing the slothful censurers of all ages have not spared to tax +the Reverend Fathers of the Church, with ambition; the severest men +to themselves, with hypocrisy; the greatest lovers of justice, +with popularity; and those of the truest valor and fortitude, with +vain-glory. But of these natures which lee in wait to find fault, and +to turn good into evil, seeing Solomon complained long since: and +that the very age of the world renders it every day after other +more malicious; I must leave the professors to their easy ways of +reprehension, than which there is nothing of more facility. + +To me it belongs in the first part of this Preface, following the +common and approved custom of those who have left the memories of +time past to after ages, to give, as near as I can, the same right to +history which they have done. Yet seeing therein I should but borrow +other men's words, I will not trouble the Reader with the repetition. +True it is that among many other benefits for which it hath been +honored, in this one it triumpheth over all human knowledge, that it +hath given us life in our understanding, since the world itself had +life and beginning, even to this day: yea, it hath triumphed over +time, which besides it nothing but eternity hath triumphed over: for +it hath carried our knowledge over the vast and devouring space of +many thousands of years, and given so fair and piercing eyes to our +mind; that we plainly behold living now (as if we had lived then) that +great world, "Magni Dei sapiens opus," "The wise work (saith Hermes) +of a great God," as it was then, when but new to itself. By it (I say) +it is, that we live in the very time when it was created: we behold +how it was governed: how it was covered with waters, and again +repeopled: how kings and kingdoms have flourished and fallen, and +for what virtue and piety God made prosperous; and for what vice and +deformity he made wretched, both the one and the other. And it is +not the least debt which we owe unto history, that it hath made us +acquainted with our dead ancestors; and, out of the depth and darkness +of the earth, delivered us their memory and fame. In a word, we may +gather out of history a policy no less wise than eternal; by the +comparison and application of other men's fore-passed miseries with +our own like errors and ill deservings. But it is neither of examples +the most lively instruction, nor the words of the wisest men, nor the +terror of future torments, that hath yet so wrought in our blind and +stupified minds, as to make us remember, that the infinite eye and +wisdom of God doth pierce through all our pretences; as to make us +remember, that the justice of God doth require none other accuser than +our own consciences: which neither the false beauty of our apparent +actions, nor all the formality, which (to pacify the opinions of men) +we put on, can in any, or the least kind, cover from his knowledge. +And so much did that heathen wisdom confess, no way as yet qualified +by the knowledge of a true God. If any (saith Euripides) "having +in his life committed wickedness, thinks he can hide it from the +everlasting gods, he thinks not well." + +To repeat God's judgments in particular, upon those of all degrees, +which have played with his mercies would require a volume apart: for +the sea of examples hath no bottom. The marks, set on private men, +are with their bodies cast into the earth; and their fortunes, written +only in the memories of those that lived with them: so as they who +succeed, and have not seen the fall of others, do not fear their own +faults. God's judgments upon the greater and greatest have been left +to posterity; first, by those happy hands which the Holy Ghost hath +guided; and secondly, by their virtue, who have gathered the acts and +ends of men mighty and remarkable in the world. Now to point far off, +and to speak of the conversion of angels into devils; for ambition: or +of the greatest and most glorious kings, who have gnawn the grass of +the earth with beasts for pride and ingratitude towards God: or of +that wise working of Pharaoh, when he slew the infants of Israel, +ere they had recovered their cradles: or of the policy of Jezebel, in +covering the murder of Naboth by a trial of the Elders, according to +the Law, with many thousands of the like: what were it other, than to +make an hopeless proof, that far-off examples would not be left to the +same far-off respects, as heretofore? For who hath not observed, what +labor, practice, peril, bloodshed, and cruelty, the kings and princes +of the world have undergone, exercised, taken on them, and committed; +to make themselves and their issues masters of the world? And yet +hath Babylon, Persia, Syria, Macedon, Carthage, Rome, and the rest, +no fruit, no flower, grass, nor leaf, springing upon the face of +the earth, of those seeds: no, their very roots and ruins do hardly +remain. "Omnia quae manu hominum facta sunt, vel manu hominum +evertuntur, vel stando et durando deficiunt": "All that the hand of +man can make, is either overturned by the hand of man, or at length +by standing and continuing consumed." The reasons of whose ruins, are +diversely given by those that ground their opinions on second causes. +All kingdoms and states have fallen (say the politicians) by outward +and foreign force, or by inward negligence and dissension, or by a +third cause arising from both. Others observe, that the greatest have +sunk down under their own weight; of which Livy hath a touch: "eo +crevit, ut magnitudine laboret sua":[4] Others, That the divine +providence (which Cratippus objected to Pompey) hath set _down_ the +date and period of every estate, before their first foundation and +erection. But hereof I will give myself a day over to resolve. + +For seeing the first hooks of the following story, have undertaken the +discourse of the first kings and kingdoms: and that it is impossible +for the short life of a Preface, to travel after, and overtake far-off +antiquity, and to judge of it; I will, for the present, examine +what profit hath been gathered by our own Kings, and their neighbour +princes: who having beheld, both in divine and human letters, the +success of infidelity, injustice, and cruelty; have (notwithstanding) +planted after the same pattern. + +True it is, that the judgments of all men are not agreeable; nor +(which is more strange) the affection of any one man stirred up alike +with examples of like nature: but every one is touched most, with that +which most nearly seemeth to touch his own private, or otherwise best +suiteth with his apprehension. But the judgments of God are forever +unchangeable: neither is He wearied by the long process of time, and +won to give His blessing in one age, to that which He hath cursed in +another. Wherefor those that are wise, or whose wisdom if it be not +great, yet is true and well grounded, will be able to discern the +bitter fruits of irreligious policy, as well among those examples that +are found in ages removed far from the present, as in those of latter +times. And that it may no less appear by evident proof, than by +asseveration, that ill doing hath always been attended with ill +success; I will here, by way of preface, run over some examples, which +the work ensuing hath not reached. + +Among our kings of the Norman race, we have no sooner passed over the +violence of the Norman Conquest, than we encounter with a singular and +most remarkable example of God's justice, upon the children of Henry +the First. For that King, when both by force, craft, and cruelty, he +had dispossessed, overreached, and lastly made blind and destroyed his +elder brother Robert Duke of Normandy, to make his own sons lords +of this land: God cast them all, male and female, nephews and nieces +(Maud excepted) into the bottom of the sea, with above a hundred and +fifty others that attended them; whereof a great many were noble and +of the King dearly beloved. + +To pass over the rest, till we come to Edward the Second; it is +certain, that after the murder of that King, the issue of blood then +made, though it had some times of stay and stopping, did again break +out, and that so often and in such abundance, as all our princes of +the masculine race (very few excepted) died of the same disease. And +although the young years of Edward the Third made his knowledge of +that horrible fact no more than suspicious; yet in that he afterwards +caused his own uncle, the Earl of Kent, to die, for no other offence +than the desire of his brother's redemption, whom the Earl as then +supposed to be living; the King making that to be treated in +his uncle, which was indeed treason in himself, (had his uncle's +intelligence been true) this I say made it manifest, that he was +not ignorant of what had past, nor greatly desirous to have had it +otherwise, though he caused Mortimer to die for the same. + +This cruelty the secret and unsearchable judgment of God revenged on +the grandchild of Edward the Third: and so it fell out, even to the +last of that line, that in the second or third descent they were all +buried under the ruins of those buildings, of which the mortar had +been tempered with innocent blood. For Richard the Second, who saw +both his Treasurers, his Chancellor, and his Steward, with divers +others of his counsellors, some of them slaughtered by the people, +others in his absence executed by his enemies, yet he always +took himself for over-wise to be taught by examples. The Earls of +Huntingdon and Kent, Montagu and Spencer, who thought themselves as +great politicians in those days as others have done in these: hoping +to please the King, and to secure themselves, by the murder of +Gloucester; died soon after, with many other their adherents, by the +like violent hands; and far more shamefully than did that duke. And +as for the King himself (who in regard of many deeds, unworthy of his +greatness, cannot be excused, as the disavowing himself by breach of +faith, charters, pardons, and patents): he was in the prime of his +youth deposed, and murdered by his cousin-german and vassal, Henry of +Lancaster, afterwards Henry the Fourth. + +This King, whose title was weak, and his obtaining the Crown +traitorous; who brake faith with the lords at his landing, protesting +to intend only the recovery of his proper inheritance, brake faith +with Richard himself; and brake faith with all the kingdom in +Parliament, to whom he swore that the deposed King should live. After +that he had enjoyed this realm some few years, and in that time +had been set upon all sides by his subjects, and never free from +conspiracies and rebellions: he saw (if souls immortal see and discern +anythings after the bodies' death) his grandchild Henry the Sixth, +and his son the Prince, suddenly and without mercy, murdered; the +possession of the Crown (for which he had caused so much blood to +be poured out) transferred from his race, and by the issues of +his enemies worn and enjoyed: enemies, whom by his own practice he +supposed that he had left no less powerless, than the succession of +the Kingdom questionless; by entailing the same upon his own issues +by Parliament. And out of doubt, human reason could have judged no +otherwise, but that these cautious provisions of the father, seconded +by the valor and signal victories of his son Henry the Fifth, had +buried the hopes of every competitor, under the despair of all +reconquest and recovery. I say, that human reason might so have +judged, were not this passage of Casaubon also true; "Dies, hora, +momentum, evertendis dominationibus sufficit, quae adamantinis +credebantur radicibus esse fundatae:" "A day, an hour, a moment, is +enough to overturn the things, that seemed to have been founded and +rooted in adamant." + +Now for Henry the Sixth, upon whom the great storm of his +grandfather's grievous faults fell, as it formerly had done upon +Richard the grandchild of Edward: although he was generally esteemed +for a gentle and innocent prince, yet as he refused the daughter of +Armagnac, of the House of Navarre, the greatest of the Princes +of France, to whom he was affianced (by which match he might have +defended his inheritance in France) and married the daughter of Anjou, +(by which he lost all that he had in France) so in condescending to +the unworthy death of his uncle of Gloucester, the main and strong +pillar of the House of Lancaster; he drew on himself and this kingdom +the greatest joint-loss and dishonor, that ever it sustained since the +Norman Conquest. Of whom it may truly be said which a counsellor of +his own spake of Henry the Third of France, "Qu'il estait tme fort +gentile Prince; mais son reigne est advenu en une fort mauvais +temps:" "He was a very gentle Prince; but his reign happened in a very +unfortunate season." + +It is true that Buckingham and Suffolk were the practicers and +contrivers of the Duke's death: Buckingham and Suffolk, because the +Duke gave instructions to their authority, which otherwise under the +Queen had been absolute; the Queen in respect of her personal wound, +"spretaeque injuria formae,"[5] because Gloucester dissuaded her +marriage. But the fruit was answerable to the seed; the success to +the counsel. For after the cutting down of Gloucester, York grew up so +fast, as he dared to dispute his right both by arguments and arms; +in which quarrel, Suffolk and Buckingham, with the greatest number of +their adherents, were dissolved. And although for his breach of oath +by sacrament, it pleased God to strike down York: yet his son the Earl +of March, following the plain path which his father had trodden out, +despoiled Henry the father, and Edward the son, both of their lives +and kingdom. And what was the end now of that politic lady the Queen, +other than this, that she lived to behold the wretched ends of all her +partakers: that she lived to look on, while her husband the King, and +her only son the Prince, were hewn in sunder; while the Crown was set +on his head that did it. She lived to see herself despoiled of her +estate, and of her moveables: and lastly, her father, by rendering up +to the Crown of France the Earldom of Provence and other places, for +the payment of fifty thousand crowns for her ransom, to become a +stark beggar. And this was the end of that subtility, which Siracides +calleth "fine" but "unrighteous:" for other fruit hath it never +yielded since the world was. + +And now it came to Edward the Fourth's turn (though after many +difficulties) to triumph. For all the plants of Lancaster were rooted +up, one only Earl of Richmond excepted: whom also he had once bought +of the Duke of Brittany, but could not hold him. And yet was not +this of Edward such a plantation, as could any way promise itself +stability. For this Edward the King (to omit more than many of his +other cruelties) beheld and allowed the slaughter which Gloucester, +Dorset, Hastings, and others, made of Edward the Prince in his own +presence; of which tragical actors, there was not one that escaped the +judgment of God in the same kind And he, which (besides the execution +of his brother Clarence, for none other offence than he himself had +formed in his own imagination) instructed Gloucester to kill Henry the +Sixth, his predecessor; taught him also by the same art to kill his +own sons and successors, Edward and Richard. For those kings which +have sold the blood of others at a low rate; have but made the market +for their own enemies, to buy of theirs at the same price. + +To Edward the Fourth succeeded Richard the Third, the greatest master +in mischief of all that fore-went him: who although, for the necessity +of his tragedy, he had more parts to play, and more to perform in his +own person, than all the rest; yet he so well fitted every affection +that played with him, as if each of them had but acted his own +interest. For he wrought so cunningly upon the affections of Hastings +and Buckingham, enemies to the Queen and to all her kindred, as he +easily allured them to condescend, that Rivers and Grey, the King's +maternal uncle and half brother, should (for the first) be severed +from him: secondly, he wrought their consent to have them imprisoned: +and lastly (for the avoiding of future inconvenience) to have their +heads severed from their bodies. And having now brought those his +chief instruments to exercise that common precept which the Devil hath +written on every post, namely, to depress those whom they had grieved, +and destroy those whom they had depressed; he urged that argument +so far and so forcibly, as nothing but the death of the young King +himself, and of his brother, could fashion the conclusion. For he +caused it to be hammered into Buckingham's head, that, whensoever the +King or his brother should have able years to exercise their power, +they would take a most severe revenge of that cureless wrong, offered +to their uncle and brother, Rivers and Grey. + +But this was not his manner of reasoning with Hastings, whose fidelity +to his master's sons was without suspect: and yet the Devil, who never +dissuades by impossibility, taught him to try him. And so he did. But +when he found by Catesby, who sounded him, that he was not fordable; +he first resolved to kill him sitting in council: wherein having +failed with his sword, he set the hangman upon him, with a weapon +of more weight. And because nothing else could move his appetite, +he caused his head to be stricken off, before he ate his dinner. A +greater judgment of God than this upon Hastings, I have never observed +in any story. For the selfsame day that the Earl Rivers, Grey, and +others, were (without trial of law, of offence given) by Hastings' +advice executed at Pomfret: I say Hastings himself in the same day, +and (as I take it) in the same hour, in the same lawless manner had +his head stricken off in the Tower of London. But Buckingham lived a +while longer; and with an eloquent oration persuaded the Londoners +to elect Richard for their king. And having received the Earldom of +Hereford for reward, besides the high hope of marrying his daughter +to the King's only son; after many grievous vexations of mind, and +unfortunate attempts, being in the end betrayed and delivered up +by his trustiest servant; he had his head severed from his body at +Salisbury, without the trouble of any of his Peers. And what success +had Richard himself after all these mischiefs and murders, policies, +and counter-policies to Christian religion: and after such time +as with a most merciless hand he had pressed out the breath of his +nephews and natural lords; other than the prosperity of so short a +life, as it took end, ere himself could well look over and discern +it? The great outcry of innocent blood, obtained at God's hands the +effusion of his; who became a spectacle of shame and dishonor, both to +his friends and enemies. + +This cruel King, Henry the Seventh cut off; and was therein (no doubt) +the immediate instrument of God's justice. A politic Prince he was if +ever there were any, who by the engine of his wisdom, beat down and +overturned as many strong oppositions both before and after he wore +the Crown, as ever King of England did: I say by his wisdom, because +as he ever left the reins of his affections in the hands of his +profit, so he always weighed his undertakings by his abilities, +leaving nothing more to hazard than so much as cannot be denied it in +all human actions. He had well observed the proceedings of Louis the +Eleventh, whom he followed in all that was royal or royal-like, but +he was far more just, and begun not their processes whom he hated or +feared by the execution, as Louis did. + +He could never endure any mediation in rewarding his servants, and +therein exceeding wise; for whatsoever himself gave, he himself +received back the thanks and the love, knowing it well that the +affections of men (purchased by nothing so readily as by benefits) +were trains that better became great kings, than great subjects. On +the contrary, in whatsoever he grieved his subjects, he wisely put it +off on those, that he found fit ministers for such actions. Howsoever +the taking off of Stanley's head, who set the Crown on his, and the +death of the young Earl of Warwick, son to George, Duke of Clarence, +shows, as the success also did, that he held somewhat of the errors +of his ancestors; for his possession in the first line ended in his +grandchildren, as that of Edward the Third and Henry the Fourth had +done. + +Now for King Henry the Eighth; if all the pictures and patterns of +a merciless prince were lost in the world, they might all again be +painted to the life, out of the story of this king. For how many +servants did he advance in haste (but for what virtue no man could +suspect) and with the change of his fancy ruined again; no man knowing +for what offence? To how many others of more desert gave he abundant +flowers from whence to gather honey, and in the end of harvest burnt +them in the hive? How many wives did he cut off, and cast off, as his +fancy and affection changed? How many princes of the blood (whereof +some of them for age could hardly crawl towards the block) with a +world of others of all degrees (of whom our common chronicles have +kept the account) did he execute? Yea, in his very death-bed, and when +he was at the point to have given his account to God for the abundance +of blood already spilt, he imprisoned the Duke of Norfolk the father; +and executed the Earl of Surrey the son; the one, whose deservings he +knew not how to value, having never omitted anything that concerned +his own honor, and the King's service; the other never having +committed anything worthy of his least displeasure: the one exceeding +valiant and advised; the other no less valiant than learned, and +of excellent hope. But besides the sorrows which he heaped upon +the fatherless and widows at home: and besides the vain enterprises +abroad, wherein it is thought that he consumed more treasure than all +our victorious kings did in their several conquests; what causeless +and cruel wars did he make upon his own nephew King James the First? +What laws and wills did he devise to cut off, and cut down those +branches, which sprang from the same root that himself did? And in +the end (notwithstanding these his so many irreligious provisions) it +pleased God to take away all his own, without increase; though, for +themselves in their several kinds, all princes of eminent virtue. +For these words of Samuel to Agag King of the Amalekites, have +been verified upon many others: "As thy sword hath made other women +childless, so shall thy mother be childless among other women." And +that blood which the same King Henry affirmed, that the cold air of +Scotland had frozen up in the North, God hath diffused by the sunshine +of his grace: from whence his Majesty now living, and long to live, is +descended. Of whom I may say it truly, "That if all the malice of the +world were infused into one eye: yet could it not discern in his +life, even to this day, any one of these foul spots, by which the +consciences of all the forenamed princes (in effect) have been +defiled; nor any drop of that innocent blood on the sword of his +justice, with which the most that fore-went him have stained both +their hands and fame." And for this Crown of England; it may truly he +avowed: that he hath received it even from the hand of God, and hath +stayed the time of putting it on, howsoever he were provoked to hasten +it: that he never took revenge of any man, that sought to put him +beside it: that he refused the assistance of Her enemies, that wore +it long, with as great glory as ever princess did: that his Majesty +entered not by a breach, nor by blood; but by the ordinary gate, +which his own right set open; and into which, by a general love and +obedience, he was received. And howsoever his Majesty's preceding +title to this Kingdom was preferred by many princes (witness the +Treaty at Cambray in the year 1559) yet he never pleased to dispute +it, during the life of that renowned lady his predecessor; no, +notwithstanding the injury of not being declared heir, in all the time +of her long reign. + +Neither ought we to forget, or neglect our thankfulness to God for +the uniting of the northern parts of Britain to the south, to wit, +of Scotland to England, which though they were severed but by small +brooks and banks, yet by reason of the long continued war, and the +cruelties exercised upon each other, in the affections of the nations, +they were infinitely severed. This I say is not the least of God's +blessings which his Majesty hath brought with him unto this land: +no, put all our petty grievances together, and heap them up to their +height, they will appear but as a molehill compared with the +mountain of this concord. And if all the historians since then have +acknowledged the uniting of the Red Rose, and the White, for the +greatest happiness (Christian Religion excepted), that ever this +kingdom received from God, certainly the peace between the two lions +of gold and gules, and the making them one, doth by many degrees +exceed the former; for by it, besides the sparing of our British +blood, heretofore and during the difference, so often and abundantly +shed, the state of England is more assured, the kingdom more +enabled to recover her ancient honor and rights, and by it made more +invincible, than by all our former alliances, practises, policies, and +conquests. It is true that hereof we do not yet find the effect. +But had the Duke of Parma in the year 1588, joined the army which he +commanded, with that of Spain, and landed it on the south coast; and +had his Majesty at the same time declared himself against us in the +North: it is easy to divine what had become of the liberty of England, +certainly we would then without murmur have bought this union at far +greater price than it hath since cost us. It is true, that there was +never any common weal or kingdom in the world, wherein no man had +cause to lament. Kings live in the world, and not above it. They are +not infinite to examine every man's cause, or to relieve every man's +wants. And yet in the latter (though to his own prejudice), his +Majesty hath had more comparison of other men's necessities, than of +his own coffers. Of whom it may he said, as of Solomon,[6] "Dedit Deus +Solomon! latitudinem cordis": Which if other men do not understand +with Pineda, to be meant by liberality, but by "latitude of +knowledge"; yet may it be better spoken of His Majesty, than of +any king that ever England had; who as well in divine, as human +understanding, hath exceeded all that fore-went him, by many degrees. + +I could say much more of the King's majesty, without flattery: did I +not fear the imputation of presumption, and withal suspect, that it +might befall these papers of mine (though the loss were little) as +it did the pictures of Queen Elizabeth, made by unskilful and common +painters, which by her own commandment were knocked in pieces and +cast into the fire. For ill artists, in setting out the beauty of the +external; and weak writers, in describing the virtues of the internal; +do often leave to posterity, of well formed faces a deformed +memory; and of the most perfect and princely minds, a most defective +representation. It may suffice, and there needs no other discourse; if +the honest reader but compare the cruel and turbulent passages of our +former kings, and of other their neighbor-princes (of whom for that +purpose I have inserted this brief discourse) with his Majesty's +temperate, revengeless and liberal disposition: I say, that if the +honest reader weigh them justly, and with an even hand; and withal but +bestow every deformed child on his true parent; he shall find, that +there is no man that hath so just cause to complain, as the King +himself hath. Now as we have told the success of the trumperies and +cruelties of our own kings, and other great personages: so we find, +that God is everywhere the same God. And as it pleased him to punish +the usurpation, and unnatural cruelty of Henry the First, and of our +third Edward, in their children for many generations: so dealt He +with the sons of Louis Debonnaire, the son of Charles the Great, or +Charlemagne. For after such time as Debonnaire of France, had torn +out the eyes of Bernard his nephew, the son of Pepin the eldest son +of Charlemagne, and heir of the Empire, and then caused him to die in +prison, as did our Henry to Robert his eldest brother: there followed +nothing but murders upon murders, poisoning, imprisonments, and civil +war; till the whole race of that famous Emperor was extinguished. And +though Debonnaire, after he had rid himself of his nephew by a violent +death; and of his bastard brothers by a civil death (having inclosed +them with sure guard, all the days of their lives, within a monastery) +held himself secure from all opposition: yet God raised up against him +(which he suspected not) his own sons, to vex him, to invade him, +to take him prisoner, and to depose him; his own sons, with whom +(to satisfy their ambition) he had shared his estate, and given them +crowns to wear, and kingdoms to govern, during his own life. Yea his +eldest son, Lothair (for he had four, three by his first wife, and one +by his second; to wit, Lothair, Pepin, Louis, and Charles), made it +the cause of his deposition, that he had used violence towards his +brothers and kinsmen; and that he had suffered his nephew (whom he +might have delivered) to be slain. "Eo quod," saith the text,[7] +"fratribus, et propinquis violentiam intulerit, et nepotem suum, +quern ipse liberate poterat, interfici permiserit": "Because he used +violence to his brothers and kinsmen, and suffered his nephew to be +slain whom he might have delivered." + +Yet did he that which few kings do; namely, repent him of his cruelty. +For, among many other things which he performed in the General +Assembly of the States, it follows: "Post haec autem palam se errasse +confessus, et imitatus Imperatoris Theodosii exemplum, poenitentiam +spontaneam suscepit, tarn de his, quam quae in Bernardum proprium +nepotem gesserat": "After this he did openly confess himself to +have erred, and following the example of the Emperor Theodosius, he +underwent voluntary penance, as well for his other offences, as for +that which he had done against Bernard his own nephew." + +This he did; and it was praise-worthy. But the blood that is unjustly +spilt, is not again gathered up from the ground by repentance. These +medicines, ministered to the dead, have but dead rewards. + +This king, as I have said, had four sons. To Lothair his eldest he +gave the Kingdom of Italy; as Charlemagne, his father, had done to +Pepin, the father of Bernard, who was to succeed him in the Empire. To +Pepin the second son he gave the Kingdom of Aquitaine: to Louis, +the Kingdom of Bavaria: and to Charles, whom he had by a second wife +called Judith, the remainder of the Kingdom of France. But this second +wife, being a mother-in-law[8] to the rest, persuaded Debonnaire +to cast his son Pepin out of Aquitaine, thereby to greaten Charles, +which, after the death of his son Pepin, he prosecuted to effect, +against his grandchild bearing the same name. In the meanwhile, being +invaded by his son Louis of Bavaria, he dies for grief. + +Debonnaire dead, Louis of Bavaria, and Charles afterwards called the +Bald, and their nephew Pepin, of Aquitaine, join in league against the +Emperor Lothair their eldest brother. They fight near to Auxerre the +most bloody battle that ever was stroken in France: in which, the +marvellous loss of nobility, and men of war, gave courage to the +Saracens to invade Italy; to the Huns to fall upon Almaine; and the +Danes to enter upon Normandy. Charles the Bald by treason seizeth upon +his nephew Pepin, kills him in a cloister: Carloman rebels against +his father Charles the Bald, the father burns out the eyes of his son +Carloman; Bavaria invades the Emperor Lothair his brother, Lothair +quits the Empire, he is assailed and wounded to the heart by his own +conscience, for his rebellion against his father, and for his other +cruelties, and dies in a monastery. Charles the Bald, the uncle, +oppresseth his nephews the sons of Lothair, he usurpeth the Empire to +the prejudice of Louis of Bavaria his elder brother; Bavaria's armies +and his son Carloman are beaten, he dies of grief, and the usurper +Charles is poisoned by Zedechias a Jew, his physician, his son Louis +le Bègue dies of the same drink. Bègue had Charles the Simple and two +bastards, Louis and Carloman; they rebel against their brother, but +the eldest breaks his neck, the younger is slain by a wild boar; the +son of Bavaria had the same ill destiny, and brake his neck by a fall +out of a window in sporting with his companions. Charles the Gross +becomes lord of all that the sons of Debonnaire held in Germany; +wherewith not contented, he invades Charles the Simple: but +being-forsaken of his nobility, of his wife, and of his understanding, +he dies a distracted beggar. Charles the Simple is held in wardship by +Eudes, Mayor of the Palace, then by Robert the brother of Eudes: and +lastly, being taken by the Earl of Vermandois; he is forced to die in +the prison of Peron, Louis the son of Charles the Simple breaks his +neck in chasing a wolf, and of the two sons of this Louis, the one +dies of poison, the other dies in the prison of Orleans; after whom +Hugh Capet, of another race, and a stranger to the French, makes +himself king. + +These miserable ends had the issues of Debonnaire, who after he had +once apparelled injustice with authority, his sons and successors took +up the fashion, and wore that garment so long without other provision, +as when the same was torn from their shoulders, every man despised +them as miserable and naked beggars. The wretched success they had +(saith a learned Frenchman) shows, "que en ceste mort il y avait plus +du fait des homines que de Pieu, ou de la justice": "that in the death +of that Prince, to wit, of Bernard the son of Pepin, the true heir of +Charlemagne, men had more meddling than either God or justice had." + +But to come nearer home; it is certain that Francis the First, one of +the worthiest kings (except for that fact) that ever Frenchmen had, +did never enjoy himself, after he had commended the destruction of the +Protestants of Mirandol and Cabrieres, to the Parliament of Provence, +which poor people were thereupon burnt and murdered; men, women, and +children. It is true that the said King Francis repented himself of +the fact, and gave charge to Henry his son, to do justice upon the +murderers, threatening his son with God's judgments, if he neglected +it. But this unseasonable care of his, God was not pleased to accept +for payment. For after Henry himself was slain in sport by Montgomery, +we all may remember what became of his four sons, Francis, Charles, +Henry, and Hercules. Of which although three of them became kings, +and were married to beautiful and virtuous ladies: yet were they, +one after another, cast out of the world, without stock or seed. And +notwithstanding their subtility, and breach of faith; with all their +massacres upon those of the religion,[9] and great effusion of blood, +the crown was set on his head, whom they all labored to dissolve; the +Protestants remain more in number than ever they were, and hold to +this day more strong cities than ever they had. + +Let us now see if God be not the same God in Spain, as in England and +France. Towards whom we will look no further back than to Don Pedro +of Castile: in respect of which Prince, all the tyrants of Sicil, our +Richard the Third, and the great Ivan Vasilowich of Moscow, were but +petty ones: this Castilian, of all Christian and heathen kings, having +been the most merciless. For, besides those of his own blood and +nobility, which he caused to be slain in his own court and chamber, +as Sancho Ruis, the great master of Calatrava, Ruis Gonsales, Alphonso +Tello, and Don John of Arragon, whom he cut in pieces and cast into +the streets, denying him Christian burial: I say, besides these, and +the slaughter of Gomes Mauriques, Diego Peres, Alphonso Gomes, and the +great commander of Castile; he made away the two infants of Arragon +his cousin germans, his brother Don Frederick, Don John de la Cerde, +Albuquergues, Nugnes de Guzman, Cornel, Cabrera, Tenorio, Mendes de +Toledo, Guttiere his great treasurer and all his kindred; and a world +of others. Neither did he spare his two youngest brothers, innocent +princes: whom after he had kept in close prison from their cradles, +till one of them had lived sixteen years, and the other fourteen, he +murdered them there. Nay, he spared not his mother, nor his wife +the Lady Blanche of Bourbon. Lastly, as he caused the Archbishop of +Toledo, and the Dean to be killed of purpose to enjoy their treasures; +so did he put to death Mahomet Aben Alhamar, King of Barbary, with +thirty-seven of his nobility, that came unto him for succor, with a +great sum of money, to levy (by his favor) some companies of soldiers +to return withal. Yea, he would needs assist the hangman with his +own hand, in the execution of the old king; in so much as Pope Urban +declareth him an enemy both to God and man. But what was his end? +Having been formerly beaten out of his kingdom, and reestablished by +the valor of the English nation, led by the famous Duke of Lancaster: +he was stabbed to death by his younger brother the Earl of Astramara, +who dispossessed all his children of their inheritance; which, but for +the father's injustice and cruelty, had never been in danger of any +such thing. + +If we can parallel any man with this king, it must be Duke John of +Burgogne, who, after his traitorous murder of the Duke of Orleans, +caused the Constable of Armagnac, the Chancellor of France, the +Bishops of Constance, Bayeux, Eureux, Senlis, Saintes, and other +religious and reverend Churchmen, the Earl of Gran Pre, Hector of +Chartres, and (in effect) all the officers of justice, of the Chamber +of Accounts, Treasury, and Request, (with sixteen hundred others to +accompany them) to be suddenly and violently slain. Hereby, while he +hoped to govern, and to have mastered France, he was soon after struck +with an axe in the face, in the presence of the Dauphin; and, without +any leisure to repent his misdeeds, presently[10] slain. _These were +the lovers of other men's miseries: and misery found them out_. + +Now for the kings of Spain, which lived both with Henry the Seventh, +Henry the Eighth, Queen Mary, and Queen Elizabeth; Ferdinand of +Arragon was the first: and the first that laid the foundation of the +present Austrian greatness. For this King did not content himself +to hold Arragon by the usurpation of his ancestor; and to fasten +thereunto the Kingdom of Castile and Leon, which Isabel his wife held +by strong hand, and his assistance, from her own niece the daughter +of the last Henry: but most cruelly and craftily, without all color +or pretence of right, he also cast his own niece out of the Kingdom +of Navarre, and, contrary to faith, and the promise that he made to +restore it, fortified the best places, and so wasted the rest, as +there was no means left for any army to invade it. This King, I say, +that betrayed also Ferdinand and Frederick, Kings of Naples, princes +of his own blood, and by double alliance tied unto him; sold them +to the French: and with the same army, sent for their succor under +Gonsalvo, cast them out; and shared their kingdom with the French, +whom afterwards he most shamefully betrayed. + +This wise and politic King, who sold Heaven and his own honor, to make +his son, the Prince of Spain, the greatest monarch of the world; saw +him die in the flower of his years; and his wife great with child, +with her untimely birth, at once and together buried. His eldest +daughter married unto Don Alphonso, Prince of Portugal, beheld her +first husband break his neck in her presence; and being with child +by her second, died with it. A just judgment of God upon the race of +John, father to Alphonso, now wholly extinguished; who had not only +left many disconsolate mothers in Portugal, by the slaughter of their +children; but had formerly slain with his own hand, the son and only +comfort of his aunt the Lady Beatrix, Duchess of Viseo. + +The second daughter of Ferdinand, married to the Arch-Duke Philip, +turned fool, and died mad and deprived.[11] His third daughter, +bestowed on King Henry the Eighth, he saw cast off by the King: the +mother of many troubles in England; and the mother of a daughter, that +in her unhappy zeal shed a world of innocent blood; lost Calais to the +French; and died heartbroken without increase. To conclude, all those +kingdoms of Ferdinand have masters of a new name; and by a strange +family are governed and possessed. + +Charles the Fifth, son to the Arch-Duke Philip, in whose vain +enterprises upon the French, upon the Almains, and other princes +and states, so many multitudes of Christian soldiers, and renowned +captains were consumed; who gave the while a most perilous entrance to +the Turks, and suffered Rhodes, the Key of Christendom, to be taken; +was in conclusion chased out of France, and in a sort out of Germany; +and left to the French, Mentz, Toule, and Verdun, places belonging +to the Empire, stole away from Inspurg; and scaled the Alps by +torchlight, pursued by Duke Maurice; having hoped to swallow up all +those dominions wherein he concocted nothing save his own disgraces. +And having, after the slaughter of so many millions of men, no one +foot of ground in either: he crept into a cloister, and made himself +a pensioner of an hundred thousand ducats by the year, to his son +Philip, from whom he very slowly received his mean and ordinary +maintenance. + +His son again King Philip the Second, not satisfied to hold Holland +and Zeeland, (wrested by his ancestors from Jacqueline their lawful +Princess) and to possess in peace many other provinces of the +Netherlands: persuaded by that mischievous Cardinal of Granvile, and +other Romish tyrants; not only forgot the most remarkable services +done to his father the Emperor by the nobilities of those countries, +not only forgot the present made him upon his entry, of forty millions +of florins, called the "Novaile aide"; nor only forgot that he had +twice most solemnly sworn to the General States, to maintain and +preserve their ancient rights, privileges, and customs, which they +had enjoyed under their thirty and five earls before him, Conditional +Princes of those provinces: but beginning first to constrain them, and +enthrall them by the Spanish Inquisition, and then to impoverish them +by many new devised and intolerable impositions; he lastly, by strong +hand and main force, attempted to make himself not only an absolute +monarch over them, like unto the kings and sovereigns of England and +France; but Turk-like to tread under his feet all their natural and +fundamental laws, privileges, and ancient rights. To effect which, +after he had easily obtained from the Pope a dispensation of his +former oaths (which dispensation was the true cause of the war and +bloodshed since then;) and after he had tried what he could perform, +by dividing of their own nobility, under the government of his base +sister Margaret of Austria, and the Cardinal Granvile; he employed +that most merciless Spaniard Don Ferdinand Alvarez of Toledo, Duke +of Alva, followed with a powerful army of strange nations: by whom he +first slaughtered that renowned captain, the Earl of Egmont, Prince of +Gavare: and Philip Montmorency, Earl of Horn: made away Montigue, +and the Marquis of Bergues, and cut off in those six years (that Alva +governed) of gentlemen and others, eighteen thousand and six hundred, +by the hands of the hangman, besides all his other barbarous murders +and massacres. By whose ministry when he could not yet bring his +affairs to their wished ends, having it in his hope to work that +by subtility, which he had failed to perform by force; he sent for +governor his bastard brother Don John of Austria, a prince of great +hope, and very gracious to those people. But he, using the same papal +advantage that his predecessors had done, made no scruple to take oath +upon the Holy Evangelists, to observe the treaty made with the General +States; and to discharge the Low Countries of all Spaniards, and other +strangers therein garrisoned: towards whose pay and passport, the +Netherlands strained themselves to make payment of six hundred +thousand pounds. Which monies received, he suddenly surprised the +citadels of Antwerp and Nemours: not doubting (being unsuspected by +the states) to have possessed himself of all the mastering places +of those provinces. For whatsoever he overtly pretended, he held +in secret a contrary counsel with the Secretary Escovedo, Rhodus, +Barlemont, and others, ministers of the Spanish tyranny, formerly +practised, and now again intended. But let us now see the effect and +end of this perjury and of all other the Duke's cruelties. First, for +himself, after he had murdered so many of the nobility; executed (as +aforesaid) eighteen thousand and six hundred in six years, and most +cruelly slain man, woman, and child, in Mechlin, Zutphen, Naerden, +and other places: notwithstanding his Spanish vaunt, that he would +suffocate the Hollanders in their own butter-barrels, and milk-tubs; +he departed the country no otherwise accompanied, than with the curse +and detestation of the whole nation; leaving his master's affairs in a +tenfold worse estate, than he found them at his first arrival. For +Don John, whose haughty conceit of himself overcame the greatest +difficulties; though his judgment were over-weak to manage the least: +what wonders did his fearful breach of faith bring forth, other than +the King his brother's jealousy and distrust, with the untimely death +that seized him, even in the flower of his youth? And for Escovedo his +sharp-witted secretary, who in his own imagination had conquered for +his master both England and the Netherlands; being sent into Spain +upon some new project, he was at the first arrival, and before any +access to the King, by certain ruffians appointed by Anthony Peres +(though by better warrant than his) rudely murdered in his own +lodging. Lastly, if we consider the King of Spain's carriage, his +counsel and success in this business, there is nothing left to the +memory of man more remarkable. For he hath paid above an hundred +millions, and the lives of above four hundred thousand Christians, +for the loss of all those countries; which, for beauty, gave place to +none; and for revenue, did equal his West Indies: for the loss of a +nation which most willingly obeyed him; and who at this day, after +forty years war, are in despite of all his forces become a free +estate, and far more rich and powerful than they were, when he first +began to impoverish and oppress them. + +Oh, by what plots, by what forswearings, betrayings, oppressions, +imprisonments, tortures, poisonings, and under what reasons of state, +and politic subtlety, have these fore-named kings, both strangers, +and of our own nation, pulled the vengeance of God upon themselves, +upon theirs, and upon their prudent ministers! and in the end have +brought those things to pass for their enemies, and seen an effect so +directly contrary to all their own counsels and cruelties; as the +one could never have hoped for themselves; and the other never have +succeeded; if no such opposition had ever been made. God hath said it +and performed it ever: "Perdam sapientiam sapientum"; "I will destroy +the wisdom of the wise." + +But what of all this? and to what end do we lay before the eyes of +the living, the fall and fortunes of the dead: seeing the world is +the same that it hath been; and the children of the present time, will +still obey their parents? It is in the present time that all the wits +of the world are exercised. To hold the times we have, we hold all +things lawful: and either we hope to hold them forever; or at least we +hope that there is nothing after them to be hoped for. For as we are +content to forget our own experience, and to counterfeit the ignorance +of our own knowledge, in all things that concern ourselves; or +persuade ourselves, that God hath given us letters patents to pursue +all our irreligious affections, with a "non obstante"[12] so we +neither look behind us what hath been, nor before us what shall be. It +is true, that the quantity which we have, is of the body: we are by +it joined to the earth: we are compounded of earth; and we inhabit +it. The Heavens are high, far off, and unsearchable: we have sense and +feeling of corporal things; and of eternal grace, but by revelation. +No marvel then that our thoughts are also earthly: and it is less to +be wondered at, that the words of worthless men can not cleanse them: +seeing their doctrine and instruction, whose understanding the Holy +Ghost vouchsafed to inhabit, have not performed it. For as the Prophet +Isaiah cried out long ago, "Lord, who hath believed our reports?" And +out of doubt, as Isaiah complained then for himself and others: so are +they less believed, every day after other. For although religion, and +the truth thereof be in every man's mouth, yea, in the discourse of +every woman, who for the greatest number are but idols of vanity: what +is it other than an universal dissimulation? We profess that we know +God: but by works we deny him. For beatitude doth not consist in the +knowledge of divine things, but in a divine life: for the Devils know +them better than men. "Beatitudo non est divinorum cognitio, sed vita +divina." And certainly there is nothing more to be admired, and more +to be lamented, than the private contention, the passionate dispute, +the personal hatred, and the perpetual war, massacres, and murders for +religion among Christians: the discourse whereof hath so occupied the +world, as it hath well near driven the practice thereof out of the +world. Who would not soon resolve, that took knowledge but of the +religious disputations among men, and not of their lives which +dispute, that there were no other thing in their desires, than the +purchase of Heaven; and that the world itself were but used as it +ought, and as an inn or place, wherein to repose ourselves in passing +on towards our celestial habitation? when on the contrary, besides the +discourse and outward profession, the soul hath nothing but hypocrisy. +We are all (in effect) become comedians in religion: and while we act +in gesture and voice, divine virtues, in all the course of our lives +we renounce our persons, and the parts we play. For Charity, Justice, +and Truth have but their being _in terms_, like the philosopher's +_Materia prima_. + +Neither is it that wisdom, which Solomon defineth to be the +"Schoolmistress of the knowledge of God," that hath valuation in the +world: it is enough that we give it our good word: but the same which is +altogether exercised in the service of the world as the gathering of +riches chiefly, by which we purchase and obtain honor, with the many +respects which attend it. These indeed be the marks, which (when we have +bent our consciences to the highest) we all shoot at. For the obtaining +whereof it is true, that the care is our own; the care our own in this +life, the peril our own in the future: and yet when we have gathered the +greatest abundance, we ourselves enjoy no more thereof, than so much as +belongs to one man. For the rest, he that had the greatest wisdom and +the greatest ability that ever man had, hath told us that this is the +use: "When goods increase (saith Solomon) they also increase that eat +them; and what good cometh to the owners, but the beholding thereof with +their eyes?" As for those that devour the rest, and follow us in fair +weather: they again forsake us in the first tempest of misfortune, and +steer away before the sea and wind; leaving us to the malice of our +destinies. Of these, among a thousand examples, I will take but one out +of Master Danner, and use his own words: "Whilest the Emperor Charles +the Fifth, after the resignation of his estates, stayed at Flushing for +wind, to carry him his last journey into Spain; he conferred on a time +with Seldius, his brother Ferdinand's Ambassador, till the deep of the +night. And when Seldius should depart, the Emperor calling for some of +his servants, and nobody answering him (for those that attended upon +him, were some gone to their lodgings, and all the rest asleep), the +Emperor took up the candle himself, and went before Seldius to light him +down the stairs; and so did, notwithstanding all the resistance that +Seldius could make. And when he was come to the stair's foot, he said +thus unto him: "Seldius, remember this of Charles the Emperor, when he +shall be dead and gone, that him, whom thou hast known in thy time +environed with so many mighty armies and guards of soldiers, thou hast +also seen alone, abandoned, and forsaken, yea even of his own domestical +servants, &c. I acknowledge this change of Fortune to proceed from the +mighty hand of God, which I will by no means go about to withstand." + +But you will say, that there are some things else, and of greater +regard than the former. The first is the reverend respect that is held +of great men, and the honor done unto them by all sorts of people. And +it is true indeed: provided, that an inward love for their justice and +piety accompany the outward worship given to their places and power; +without which what is the applause of the multitude, but as the outcry +of an herd of animals, who without the knowledge of any true cause, +please themselves with the noise they make? For seeing it is a thing +exceeding rare, to distinguish Virtue and Fortune: the most impious +(if prosperous) have ever been applauded; the most virtuous (if +unprosperous) have ever been despised. For as Fortune's man rides the +horse, so Fortune herself rides the man; who when he is descended and +on foot, the man taken from his beast, and Fortune from the man, a +base groom beats the one, and a bitter contempt spurns at the other, +with equal liberty. + +The second is the greatening of our posterity, and the contemplation +of their glory whom we leave behind us. Certainly, of those which +conceive that their souls departed take any comfort therein, it may +be truly said of them, which Lactantius spake of certain heathen +philosophers, "quod sapientes sunt in re stulta."[13] For when our +spirits immortal shall be once separate from our mortal bodies, +and disposed by God; there remaineth in them no other joy of their +posterity which succeed, than there doth of pride in that stone, which +sleepeth in the wall of the king's palace; nor any other sorrow for +their poverty, than there doth of shame in that, which beareth up a +beggar's cottage. "Nesciunt mortui, etiam sancti, quid agunt +vivi, etiam eorum filii, quia animae mortuorum rebus viventium non +intersunt": "The dead, though holy, know nothing of the living, no, +not of their own children: for the souls of those departed, are not +conversant with their affairs that remain."[14] And if we doubt of St. +Augustine, we can not of Job; who tells us, "That we know not if our +sons shall be honorable: neither shall we understand concerning +them, whether they shall be of low degree." Which Ecclesiastes also +confirmeth: "Man walketh in a shadow, and disquieteth himself in vain: +he heapeth up riches, and can not tell who shall gather them. The +living (saith he) know that they shall die, but the dead know nothing +at all: for who can show unto man what shall be after him under the +sun?" He therefore accounteth it among the rest of worldly vanities, +to labor and travail in the world; not knowing after death whether +a fool or a wise man should enjoy the fruits thereof: "which made me +(saith he) endeavor even to abhor mine own labor." And what can other +men hope, whose blessed or sorrowful estates after death God hath +reserved? man's knowledge lying but in his hope, seeing the Prophet +Isaiah confesseth of the elect, "That Abraham is ignorant of us, and +Israel knows us not." But hereof we are assured, that the long and +dark night of death (of whose following day we shall never behold the +dawn till his return that hath triumphed over it), shall cover us +over till the world be no more. After which, and when we shall again +receive organs glorified and incorruptible, the seats of angelical +affections, in so great admiration shall the souls of the blessed be +exercised, as they can not admit the mixture of any second or less +joy; nor any return of foregone and mortal affection towards friends, +kindred, or children. Of whom whether we shall retain any particular +knowledge, or in any sort distinguish them, no man can assure us; and +the wisest men doubt. But on the contrary, if a divine life retain any +of those faculties which the soul exercised in a mortal body, we shall +not at that time so divide the joys of Heaven, as to cast any part +thereof on the memory of their felicities which remain in the world. +No, be their estates greater than ever the world gave, we shall (by +the difference known unto us) even detest their consideration. And +whatsoever comfort shall remain of all forepast, the same will consist +in the charity which we exercised living; and in that piety, justice, +and firm faith, for which it pleased the infinite mercy of God to +accept of us, and receive us. Shall we therefore value honor and +riches at nothing? and neglect them, as unnecessary and vain? +Certainly no. For that infinite wisdom of God, which hath +distinguished his angels by degrees; which hath given greater and +less light and beauty to heavenly bodies; which hath made differences +between beasts and birds; created the eagle and the fly, the cedar and +the shrub; and among stones, given the fairest tincture to the ruby, +and the quickest light to the diamond; hath also ordained kings, +dukes, or leaders of the people, magistrates, judges, and other +degrees among men. And as honor is left to posterity, for a mark and +ensign of the virtue and understanding of their ancestors: so (seeing +Siracides preferreth death before beggary: and that titles, without +proportionable estates, fall under the miserable succor of other men's +pity) I account it foolishness to condemn such a care: provided, that +worldly goods be well gotten, and that we raise not our own buildings +out of other men's ruins. For, as Plato doth first prefer the +perfection of bodily health; secondly, the form and beauty; and +thirdly, "Divitias nulla fraude quaesitas":[15] so Jeremiah cries, +"Woe unto them that erect their houses by unrighteousness, and their +chambers without equity": and Isaiah the same, "Woe to those that +spoil and were not spoiled." And it was out of the true wisdom of +Solomon, that he commandeth us, "not to drink the wine of violence; +not to lie in wait for blood, and not to swallow them up alive, whose +riches we covet: for such are the ways (saith he) of everyone that is +greedy of gain." + +And if we could afford ourselves but so much leisure as to consider, +that he which hath most in the world, hath, in respect of the world, +nothing in it: and that he which hath the longest time lent him to +live in it, hath yet no proportion at all therein, setting it either +by that which is past, when we were not, or by that time which is to +come, in which we shall abide forever: I say, if both, to wit, our +proportion in the world, and our time in the world, differ not +much from that which is nothing; it is not out of any excellency of +understanding, that we so much prize the one, which hath (in effect) +no being: and so much neglect the other, which hath no ending: +coveting those mortal things of the world, as if our souls were +therein immortal; and neglecting those things which are immortal, as +if ourselves after the world were but mortal. + +But let every man value his own wisdom, as he pleaseth. Let the rich +man think all fools, that cannot equal his abundance: the revenger +esteem all negligent, that have not trodden down their opposites; the +politician, all gross that cannot merchandise their faith: yet when we +once come in sight of the port of death, to which all winds drive us, +and when by letting fall that fatal anchor, which can never be weighed +again, the navigation of this life takes end; then it is, I say, that +our own cogitations (those sad and severe cogitations, formerly beaten +from us by our health and felicity) return again, and pay us to the +uttermost for all the pleasing passages of our lives past. It is then +that we cry out to God for mercy; then when our selves can no longer +exercise cruelty to others; and it is only then, that we are strucken +through the soul with this terrible sentence, "That God will not be +mocked." For if according to St. Peter, "The righteous scarcely be +saved: and that God spared not his angels"; where shall those appear, +who, having served their appetites all their lives, presume to think, +that the severe commandments of the all-powerful God were given but +in sport; and that the short breath, which we draw when death presseth +us, if we can but fashion it to the sound of mercy (without any kind +of satisfaction or amends) is sufficient? "O quam multi," saith +a reverend father, "cum hac spe ad aeternos labores et bella +descendunt!"[16] I confess that it is a great comfort to our friends, +to have it said, that we ended well; for we all desire (as Balaam +did) "to die the death of the righteous." But what shall we call a +disesteeming, an opposing, or (indeed) a mocking of God: if those men +do not oppose Him, disesteem Him, and mock Him, that think it enough +for God, to ask Him forgiveness at leisure, with the remainder and +last drawing of a malicious breath? For what do they otherwise, +that die this kind of well-dying, but say unto God as followeth? +"We beseech Thee, O God, that all the falsehoods, forswearings, and +treacheries of our lives past, may be pleasing unto Thee; that Thou +wilt for our sakes (that have had no leisure to do anything for Thine) +change Thy nature (though impossible,) and forget to be a just God; +that Thou wilt love injuries and oppressions, call ambition wisdom, +and charity foolishness. For I shall prejudice my son (which I am +resolved not to do) if I make restitution; and confess myself to have +been unjust (which I am too proud to do) if I deliver the oppressed." +Certainly, these wise worldlings have either found out a new God, +or made one: and in all likelihood such a leaden one, as Louis the +Eleventh wore in his cap; which when he had caused any that he feared, +or hated, to be killed, he would take it from his head and kiss it: +beseeching it to pardon him this one evil act more, and it should be +the last; which (as at other times) he did, when by the practice of a +cardinal and a falsified sacrament, he caused the Earl of Armagnac to +be stabbed to death: mockeries indeed fit to be used towards a leaden, +but not towards the ever-living God. But of this composition are all +devout lovers of the world, that they fear all that is dureless[17] +and ridiculous: they fear the plots and practises of their +opposites,[18] and their very whisperings: they fear the opinions +of men, which beat but upon shadows: they flatter and forsake the +prosperous and unprosperous, be they friends or kings: yea they dive +under water, like ducks, at every pebblestone, that is but thrown +toward them by a powerful hand: and on the contrary, they show an +obstinate and giant-like valor, against the terrible judgments of +the all-powerful God, yea they show themselves gods against God, and +slaves towards men; towards men whose bodies and consciences are alike +rotten. + +Now for the rest: If we truly examine the difference of both +conditions; to wit, of the rich and mighty, whom we call fortunate; +and of the poor and oppressed, whom we account wretched we shall find +the happiness of the one, and the miserable estate of the other, so +tied by God to the very instant, and both so subject to interchange +(witness the sudden downfall of the greatest princes, and the speedy +uprising of the meanest persons) as the one hath nothing so certain, +whereof to boast; nor the other so uncertain, whereof to bewail +itself. For there is no man so assured of his honor, of his riches, +health, or life; but that he may be deprived of either, or all, the +very next hour or day to come. "Quid vesper vehat, incertum est," +"What the evening will bring with it, it is uncertain." "And yet ye +cannot tell (saith St. James) what shall be tomorrow. Today he is set +up, and tomorrow he shall not be found; for he is turned into dust, +and his purpose perisheth." And although the air which compasseth +adversity be very obscure; yet therein we better discern God, than in +that shining light which environeth worldly glory; through which, for +the clearness thereof, there is no vanity which escapeth our sight. +And let adversity seem what it will; to happy men ridiculous, who make +themselves merry at other men's misfortunes; and to those under the +cross, grievous: yet this is true, that for all that is past, to the +very instant, the portions remaining are equal to either. For be it +that we have lived many years, "and (according to Solomon) in them all +we have rejoiced;" or be it that we have measured the same length of +days and therein have evermore sorrowed: yet looking back from our +present being, we find both the one and the other, to wit, the joy and +the woe, sailed out of sight; and death, which doth pursue us and hold +us in chase, from our infancy, hath gathered it. "Quicquid aetatis +retro est, mors tenet:" "Whatsoever of our age is past, death holds +it." So as whosoever he be, to whom Fortune hath been a servant, and +the Time a friend; let him but take the account of his memory (for we +have no other keeper of our pleasures past), and truly examine what it +hath reserved either beauty and youth, or foregone delights; what +it hath saved, that it might last, of his dearest affections, or of +whatever else the amorous springtime gave his thoughts of contentment, +then unvaluable; and he shall find that all the art which his elder +years have, can draw no other vapor out of these dissolutions, than +heavy, secret, and sad sighs. He shall find nothing remaining, but +those sorrows, which grow up after our fast-springing youth; overtake +it, when it is at a stand; and overtopped it utterly, when it begins +to wither: in so much as looking back from the very instant time, and +from our now being, the poor, diseased, and captive creature, hath as +little sense of all his former miseries and pains, as he, that is +most blessed in common opinions, hath of his fore-passed pleasure and +delights. For whatsoever is cast behind us, is just nothing: and what +is to come, deceitful hope hath it: "Omnia quae eventura sunt, in +incerto jacent."[19] Only those few black swans, I must except: who +having had the grace to value worldly vanities at no more than their +own price; do, by retaining the comfortable memory of a well acted +life, behold death without dread, and the grave without fear; and +embrace both, as necessary guides to endless glory. + +For myself, this is my consolation, and all that I can offer to +others, that the sorrows of this life are but of two sorts: whereof +the one hath respect to God, the other, to the world. In the first we +complain to God against ourselves, for our offences against Him; and +confess, "Et Tu Justus es in omnibus quae venerunt super nos." "And +Thou, O Lord, are just in all that hath befallen us." In the second we +complain to ourselves against God: as if he had done us wrong, either +in not giving us worldly goods and honors, answering our appetites: or +for taking them again from us having had them; forgetting that humble +and just acknowledgment of Job, "the Lord hath given, and the Lord +hath taken." To the first of which St. Paul hath promised blessedness; +to the second, death. And out of doubt he is either a fool, or +ungrateful to God, or both, that doth not acknowledge, how mean soever +his estate be, that the same is yet far greater than that which God +oweth him: or doth not acknowledge, how sharp soever his afflictions +be, that the same are yet far less, than those which are due unto +him. And if an heathen wise man call the adversities of the world +but "tributa vivendi," "the tributes of living;" a wise Christian man +ought to know them, and bear them, but as the tributes of offending. +He ought to bear them manlike, and resolvedly; and not as those +whining soldiers do, "qui gementes sequuntur imperatorem."[20] + +For seeing God, who is the author of all our tragedies, hath written +out for us and appointed us all the parts we are to play: and hath +not, in their distribution, been partial to the most mighty princes of +the world: that gave unto Darius the part of the greatest emperor, and +the part of the most miserable beggar, a beggar begging water of an +enemy, to quench the great drought of death: that appointed Bajazet +to play the Grand Signior of the Turks in the morning, and in the same +day the footstool of Tamerlane (both which parts Valerian had also +played, being taken by Sapores): that made Belisarius play the most +victorious captain, and lastly the part of a blind beggar: of which +examples many thousands may be produced: why should other men, who are +but as the least worms, complain of wrong? Certainly there is no other +account to be made of this ridiculous world, than to resolve, that +the change of fortune on the great theatre, is but as the change of +garments on the less. For when on the one and the other, every man +wears but his own skin, the players are all alike. Now, if any man +out of weakness prize the passages of this world otherwise (for saith +Petrarch, "Magni ingenii est revocare mentem a sensibus"[21]) it is by +reason of that unhappy phantasy of ours, which forgeth in the brains +of man all the miseries (the corporal excepted) whereunto he is +subject. Therein it is, that misfortunes and adversity work all that +they work. For seeing Death, in the end of the play, takes from all +whatsoever Fortune or Force takes from any one; it were a foolish +madness in the shipwreck of worldly things, where all sinks but the +sorrow, to save it. That were, as Seneca saith, "Fortunae succumbere, +quod tristius est omni fato:" "To fall under Fortune, of all other the +most miserable destiny." + +But it is now time to sound a retreat; and to desire to be excused of +this long pursuit: and withal, that the good intent, which hath moved +me to draw the picture of time past (which we call History) in so +large a table, may also be accepted in place of a better reason. + +The examples of divine providence, everywhere found (the first divine +histories being nothing else but a continuation of such examples) have +persuaded me to fetch my beginning from the beginning of all things: +to wit, Creation. For though these two glorious actions of the +Almighty be so near, and (as it were) linked together, that the one +necessarily implieth the other: Creation inferring Providence (for +what father forsaketh the child that he hath begotten?) and Providence +pre-supposing Creation: yet many of those that have seemed to excel in +worldly wisdom, have gone about to disjoin this coherence; the epicure +denying both Creation and Providence, but granting the world had a +beginning; the Aristotelian granting Providence, but denying both the +creation and the beginning. + +Now although this doctrine of faith, touching the creation in time +(for by faith we understand, that the world was made by the word of +God), be too weighty a work for Aristotle's rotten ground to bear +up, upon which he hath (notwithstanding) founded the defences and +fortresses of all his verbal doctrine: yet that the necessity of +infinite power, and the world's beginning, and the impossibility +of the contrary even in the judgment of natural reason, wherein he +believed, had not better informed him; it is greatly to be marvelled +at. And it is no less strange, that those men which are desirous of +knowledge (seeing Aristotle hath failed in this main point; and taught +little other than terms in the rest) have so retrenched their +minds from the following and overtaking of truth, and so absolutely +subjected themselves to the law of those philosophical principles; +as all contrary kind of teaching, in the search of causes, they have +condemned either for phantastical, or curious. Both doth it follow, +that the positions of heathen philosophers are undoubted grounds and +principles indeed, because so called? Or that _ipsi dixerunt_, doth +make them to be such? Certainly no. But this is true, that where +natural reason hath built anything so strong against itself, as the +same reason can hardly assail it, much less batter it down: the same +in every question of nature, and infinite power, may be approved for +a fundamental law of human knowledge. For saith Charron in his book of +wisdom, "Toute proposition humaine a autant d'authorite quel'autre, +si la raison n'on fait la difference;" "Every human proposition hath +equal authority, if reason make not the difference," the rest being +but the fables of principles. But hereof how shall the upright and +impartial judgment of man give a sentence, where opposition and +examination are not admitted to give in evidence? And to this purpose +it was well said of Lactantius, "Sapientiam sibi adimunt, qui sine +ullo judicio inventa maiorum probant, et ab aliis pecudum more +ducuntur:" "They neglect their own wisdom, who without any judgment +approve the invention of those that forewent them; and suffer +themselves after the manner of beasts, to be led by them;" by the +advantage of which sloth and dullness, ignorance is now become so +powerful a tyrant, as it hath set true philosophy, physics, and +divinity in a pillory; and written over the first, "Contra negantem +principia;"[22] over the second, "Virtus specifica;"[23] over the +third, "Ecclesta Romana."[24] + +But for myself, I shall never be persuaded, that God hath shut up all +light of learning within the lanthorn of Aristotle's brains: or that +it was ever said unto him, as unto Esdras, "_Accendam in corde tuo +Lucernam intellectus_";[25] that God hath given invention but to the +heathen, and that they only invaded nature, and found the strength +and bottom thereof; the same nature having consumed all her store, +and left nothing of price to after-ages. That these and these be +the causes of these and these effects, time hath taught us; and not +reason: and so hath experience without art. The cheese-wife knoweth it +as well as the philosopher, that sour rennet doth coagulate her milk +into a curd. But if we ask a reason of this cause, why the sourness +doth it? whereby it doth it? and the manner how? I think that there +is nothing to be found in vulgar philosophy, to satisfy this and many +other like vulgar questions. But man to cover his ignorance in the +least things, who can not give a true reason for the grass under his +feet, why it should be green rather than red, or of any other color; +that could never yet discover the way and reason of nature's working, +in those which are far less noble creatures than himself; who is far +more noble than the heavens themselves: "Man (saith Solomon) that +can hardly discern the things that are upon the earth, and with great +labor find out the things that are before us"; that hath so short a +time in the world, as he no sooner begins to learn, than to die; +that hath in his memory but borrowed knowledge; in his understanding, +nothing truly; that is ignorant of the essence of his own soul, and +which the wisest of the naturalists (if Aristotle be he) could never +so much as define, but by the action and effect, telling us what it +works (which all men knew as well as he) but not what it is, which +neither he, nor any else, doth know, but God that created it; ("For +though I were perfect, yet I know not my soul," saith Job). Man, I +say, that is but an idiot in the next cause of his own life, and in +the cause of all actions of his life, will (notwithstanding) examine +the art of God in creating the world; of God, who (saith Job) "is so +excellent as we know him not"; and examine the beginning of the work, +which had end before mankind had a beginning of being. He will disable +God's power to make a world, without matter to make it of. He will +rather give the motes of the air for a cause; cast the work on +necessity or chance; bestow the honor thereof on nature; make two +powers, the one to be the author of the matter, the other of the +form; and lastly, for want of a workman, have it eternal: which latter +opinion Aristotle, to make himself the author of a new doctrine, +brought into the world: and his Sectators[26] have maintained it; +"parati ac conjurati, quos sequuntur, philosophorum animis invictis +opiniones tueri."[27] For Hermes, who lived at once with, or +soon after Moses, Zoroaster, Musaeus, Orpheus, Linus, Anaximenes, +Anaxagoras, Empedocles, Melissus, Pherecydes, Thales, Cleanthes, +Pythagoras, Plato, and many other (whose opinions are exquisitely +gathered by Steuchius Eugubinus) found in the necessity of invincible +reason, "One eternal and infinite Being," to be the parent of the +universal. "Horum omnium sententia quamvis sit incerta, eodem tamen +spectat, ut Providentiam unam esse consentiant: sive enim natura, sive +aether, sive ratio, sive mens, sive fatalis necessitas, sive divina +lex; idem est quod a nobis dicitur Deus": "All these men's opinions +(saith Lactantius) though uncertain, come to this; That they agree +upon one Providence; whether the same be nature, or light, or reason, +or understanding, or destiny, or divine ordinance, that it is the same +which we call God." Certainly, as all the rivers in the world, though +they have divers risings, and divers runnings; though they sometimes +hide themselves for a while under ground, and seem to be lost in +sea-like lakes; do at last find, and fall into the great ocean: +so after all the searches that human capacity hath, and after all +philosophical contemplation and curiosity; in the necessity of this +infinite power, all the reason of man ends and dissolves itself. + +As for the others; the first touching those which conceive the matter +of the world to have been eternal, and that God did not create +the world "Exnihilo,"[28] but "ex materia praeexistente":[29] the +supposition is so weak, as is hardly worth the answering. For +(saith Eusebius) "Mihi videntur qui hoc dicunt, fortunam quoque Deo +annectere," "They seem unto me, which affirm this, to give part of the +work to God, and part to Fortune"; insomuch as if God had not found +this first matter by chance, He had neither been author nor father, +nor creator, nor lord of the universal. For were the matter or chaos +eternal, it then follows, that either this supposed matter did fit +itself to God, or God accommodate Himself to the matter. For the +first, it is impossible, that things without sense could proportion +themselves to the workman's will. For the second: it were horrible to +conceive of God, that as an artificer He applied himself, according to +the proportion of matter which He lighted upon. + +But let it be supposed, that this matter hath been made by any power, +not omnipotent, and infinitely wise; I would gladly learn how it came +to pass, that the same was proportionable to his intention, that was +omnipotent and infinitely wise; and no more, nor no less, than served +to receive the form of the universal. For, had it wanted anything of +what was sufficient; then must it be granted, that God created out of +nothing so much new matter, as served to finish the work of the world: +or had there been more of this matter than sufficed, then God did +dissolve and annihilate whatsoever remained and was superfluous. And +this must every reasonable soul confess, that it is the same work of +God alone, to create anything out of nothing, and by the same art +and power, and by none other, can those things, or any part of that +eternal matter, be again changed into nothing; by which those things, +that once were nothing, obtained a beginning of being. + +Again, to say that this matter was the cause of itself; this, of all +other, were the greatest idiotism. For, if it were the cause of itself +at any time; then there was also a time when itself was not: at +which time of not being, it is easy enough to conceive, that it could +neither procure itself, nor anything else. For to be, and not to be, +at once, is impossible. "Nihil autem seipsum praecedit, neque; seipsum +componit corpus": "There is nothing that doth precede itself, neither +do bodies compound themselves." + +For the rest, those that feign this matter to be eternal, must of +necessity confess, that infinite cannot be separate from eternity. And +then had infinite matter left no place for infinite form, but that +the first matter was finite, the form which it received proves it. For +conclusion of this part, whosoever will make choice, rather to believe +in eternal deformity, or in eternal dead matter, than in eternal light +and eternal life: let eternal death be his reward. For it is a madness +of that kind, as wanteth terms to express it. For what reason of man +(whom the curse of presumption hath not stupefied) hath doubted, that +infinite power (of which we can comprehend but a kind of shadow, "quia +comprehensio est intra terminos, qui infinito repugnant"[30]) hath +anything wanting in itself, either for matter of form; yea for as many +worlds (if such had been God's will) as the sea hath sands? For where +the power is without limitation, the work hath no other limitation, +than the workman's will. Yea reason itself finds it more easy for +infinite power to deliver from itself a finite world, without the help +of matter prepared; than for a finite man, a fool and dust, to change +the form of matter made to his hands. They are Dionysius his words, +"Deus in una existentia omnia praehabet"[31] and again, "Esse omnium +est ipsa divinitas, omne quod vides, et quod non vides",[32] to wit, +"causaliter",[33] or in better terms, "non tanquam forma, sed tanquam +causa universalis"[34] Neither hath the world universal closed up all +of God "For the most part of his works (saith Siracides) are hid". +Neither can the depth of his wisdom be opened, by the glorious work of +the world, which never brought to knowledge all it can, for then were +his infinite power bounded and made finite. And hereof it comes, That +we seldom entitle God the all-showing, or the all-willing, but the +Almighty, that is, infinitely able. + +But now for those, who from that ground, "that out of nothing, nothing +is made," infer the world's eternity, and yet not so savage therein, +as those are, which give an eternal being to dead matter, it is true +if the word (nothing) be taken in the affirmative, and the making, +imposed upon natural agents and finite power; that out of nothing, +nothing is made. But seeing their great doctor Aristotle himself +confesseth, "quod omnes antiqui decreverunt quasi quodam return +principium, ipsumque infinitum" "That all the ancient decree a kind +of beginning, and the same to be infinite"; and a little after, more +largely and plainly, "Principium eius est nullum, sed ipsum omnium +cernitur esse principium, ac omnia complecti ac regere",[35] it is +strange that this philosopher, with his followers, should rather make +choice out of falsehood, to conclude falsely, than out of truth, to +resolve truly. For if we compare the world universal, and all the +unmeasureable orbs of Heaven, and those marvellous bodies of the sun, +moon, and stars, with "ipsum infinitum": it may truly be said of them +all, which himself affirms of his imaginary "Materia prima,"[36] that +they are neither "quid, quale," nor "quantum "; and therefore to bring +finite (which hath no proportion with infinite) out of infinite ("qui +destruit omnem proportionem"[37]) is no wonder in God's power. And +therefore Anaximander, Melissus, and Empedocles, call the world +universal, but "particulam universitatis" and "infinitatis," a parcel +of that which is the universality and the infinity inself; and Plato, +but a shadow of God. But the other to prove the world's eternity, +urgeth this maxim, "that, a sufficient and effectual cause being +granted, an answerable effect thereof is also granted": inferring that +God being forever a sufficient and effectual cause of the world, the +effect of the cause should also have been forever; to wit, the world +universal. But what a strange mockery is this in so great a master, +to confess a sufficient and effectual cause of the world, (to wit, +an almighty God) in his antecedent; and the same God to be a God +restrained in his conclusion; to make God free in power, and bound in +will; able to effect, unable to determine; able to make all things, +and yet unable to make choice of the time when? For this were +impiously to resolve of God, as of natural necessity; which hath +neither choice, nor will, nor understanding; which cannot but work +matter being present: as fire, to burn things combustible. Again he +thus disputeth, that every agent which can work, and doth not work, +if it afterward work, it is either thereto moved by itself, or by +somewhat else: and so it passeth from power to act. But God (saith he) +is immovable, and is neither moved by himself, nor by any other: but +being always the same, doth always work. Whence he concludeth, if the +world were caused by God, that he was forever the cause thereof: and +therefore eternal. The answer to this is very easy, for that God's +performing in due time that which he ever determined at length to +perform, doth not argue any alteration or change, but rather constancy +in him. For the same action of his will, which made the world forever, +did also withhold the effect to the time ordained. To this answer, in +itself sufficient, others add further, that the pattern or image +of the world may be said to be eternal: which the Platonics call +"spiritualem mundum"[38] and do in this sort distinguish the idea +and creation in time. "Spiritualis ille mundus, mundi huius exemplar, +primumque Dei opus, vita aequali est architecto, fuit semper cum illo, +eritque semper. Mundus autem corporalis, quod secundum opus est Dei, +decedit iam ab opifice ex parte una, quia non fuit semper: retinet +alteram, quia sit semper futurus": "That representative, or the +intentional world (say they) the sampler of this visible world, the +first work of God, was equally ancient with the architect; for it was +forever with him, and ever shall be. This material world, the second +work or creature of God, doth differ from the worker in this, that it +was not from everlasting, and in this it doth agree, that it shall +be forever to come." The first point, that it was not forever, all +Christians confess: the other they understand no otherwise, than that +after the consummation of this world, there shall be a new Heaven and +a new earth, without any new creation of matter. But of these things +we need not here stand to argue; though such opinions be not unworthy +the propounding, in this consideration, of an eternal and unchangeable +cause, producing a changeable and temporal effect. Touching which +point Proclus the Platonist disputeth, that the compounded essence of +the world (and because compounded, therefore dissipable) is continued, +and knit to the Divine Being, by an individual and inseparable power, +flowing from Divine unity; and that the world's natural appetite of +God showeth, that the same proceedeth from a good and understanding +divine; and that this virtue, by which the world is continued and knit +together, must be infinite, that it may infinitely and everlastingly +continue and preserve the same. Which infinite virtue, the finite +world (saith he) is not capable of, but receiveth it from the divine +infinite, according to the temporal nature it hath, successively every +moment by little and little; even as the whole material world is not +altogether: but the abolished parts are departed by small degrees, and +the parts yet to come, do by the same small degrees succeed; as the +shadow of a tree in a river seemeth to have continued the same a long +time in the water, but it is perpetually renewed, in the continual +ebbing and flowing thereof. + +But to return to them, which denying that ever the world had any +beginning, withal deny that ever it shall have any end, and to this +purpose affirm, that it was never heard, never read, never seen, +no not by any reason perceived, that the heavens have ever suffered +corruption; or that they appear any way the older by continuance; or +in any sort otherwise than they were; which had they been subject to +final corruption, some change would have been discerned in so long a +time. To this it is answered, that the little change as yet perceived, +doth rather prove their newness, and that they have not continued +so long; than that they will continue forever as they are. And if +conjectural arguments may receive answer by conjectures; it then +seemeth that some alteration may be found. For either Aristotle, +Pliny, Strabo, Beda, Aquinas, and others, were grossly mistaken; or +else those parts of the world lying within the burnt zone, were not in +elder times habitable, by reason of the sun's heat, neither were the +seas, under the equinoctial, navigable. But we know by experience, +that those regions, so situate, are filled with people, and exceeding +temperate; and the sea, over which we navigate, passable enough. We +read also many histories of deluges: and how in the time of Phaeton, +divers places in the world were burnt up, by the sun's violent heat. + +But in a word, this observation is exceeding feeble. For we know it +for certain, that stone walls, of matter mouldering and friable, have +stood two, or three thousand years; that many things have been digged +up out of the earth, of that depth, as supposed to have been buried +by the general flood; without any alteration either of substance or +figure: yea it is believed, and it is very probable, that the gold +which is daily found in mines, and rocks, under ground, was created +together with the earth. + +And if bodies elementary, and compounded, the eldest times have not +invaded and corrupted: what great alteration should we look for in +celestial and quint-essential bodies? And yet we have reason to think, +that the sun, by whose help all creatures are generate, doth not +in these latter ages assist nature, as heretofore. We have neither +giants, such as the eldest world had; nor mighty men, such as the +elder world had; but all things in general are reputed of less virtue +which from the heavens receive virtue. Whence, if the nature of a +preface would permit a larger discourse, we might easily fetch store +of proof; as that this world shall at length have end, as that once it +had beginning. + +And I see no good answer that can be made to this objection: if the +world were eternal, why not all things in the world eternal? If there +were no first, no cause, no father, no creator, no incomprehensible +wisdom, but that every nature had been alike eternal; and man more +rational than every other nature: why had not the eternal reason of +man provided for his eternal being in the world? For if all were +equal why not equal conditions to all? Why should heavenly bodies live +forever; and the bodies of men rot and die? + +Again, who was it that appointed the earth to keep the center, and +gave order that it should hang in the air: that the sun should travel +between the tropics, and never exceed those bounds, nor fail to +perform that progress once in every year: the moon to live by borrowed +light; the fixed stars (according to common opinion) to be fastened +like nails in a cartwheel; and the planets to wander at their +pleasure? Or if none of these had power over other: was it out of +charity and love, that the sun by his perpetual travel within these +two circles, hath visited, given light unto, and relieved all parts +of the earth, and the creatures therein, by turns and times? Out +of doubt, if the sun have of his own accord kept this course in all +eternity, he may justly be called eternal charity and everlasting +love. The same may be said of all the stars; who being all of them +most large and clear fountains of virtue and operation, may also, be +called eternal virtues: the earth may be called eternal patience; the +moon, an eternal borrower and beggar; and man of all other the most +miserable, eternally mortal. And what were this, but to believe again +in the old play of the gods? Yea in more gods by millions, than ever +Hesiodus dreamed of. But instead of this mad folly, we see it well +enough with our feeble and mortal eyes; and the eyes of our reason +discern it better; that the sun, moon, stars, and the earth, are +limited bounded, and constrained: themselves they have not constrained +nor could. "Omne determinatum causam habet aliquam efficientem, quae +illud determinaverit:" "Everything bounded hath some efficient cause, +by which it is bounded." + +Now for Nature; as by the ambiguity of this name, the school of +Aristotle hath both commended many errors unto us, and sought also +thereby to obscure the glory of the high moderator of all things, +shining in the creation, and in the governing of the world: so if the +best definition be taken out of the second of Aristotle's "Physics," +or "primo de Coelo," or out of the fifth of his "Metaphysics"; I +say that the best is but nominal, and serving only to difference the +beginning of natural motion from artificial: which yet the Academics +open better, when they call it "a seminary strength, infused into +matter by the soul of the world": who give the first place to +Providence, the second to Fate, and but the third to Nature. +"Providentia" (by which they understand God) "dux et caput; Fatum, +medium ex providentia prodiens; Natura postremum"[39] But be it what +he will, or be it any of these (God excepted) or participating of all: +yet that it hath choice or understanding (both which are necessarily +in the cause of all things) no man hath avowed. For this is +unanswerable of Lactantius, "Is autem facit aliquid, qui aut +voluntatem faciendi habet, aut scientiam:" "He only can be said to be +the doer of a thing, that hath either will or knowledge in the doing +it." + +But the will and science of Nature, are in these words truly expressed +by Ficinus: "Potest ubique Natura, vel per diversa media, vel ex +diversis materiis, diversa facere: sublata vero mediorum materiatumque +diversitate, vel unicum, vel similimum operatur, neque potest +quando adest materia non operari"; "It is the power of Nature by the +diversity of means, or out of diversity of matter, to produce divers +things: but taking away the diversity of means, and the diversity of +matter, it then works but one or the like work; neither can it but +work, matter being present." Now if Nature made choice of diversity of +matter, to work all these variable works of heaven and earth, it had +then both understanding and will; it had counsel to begin; reason to +dispose; virtue and knowledge to finish, and power to govern: without +which all things had been but one and the same: all of the matter of +heaven; or all of the matter of earth. And if we grant Nature this +will, and this understanding, this course, reason, and power: "Cur +Natura potius quam Deus nominetur?" "Why should we then call such a +cause rather Nature, than God?" "God, of whom all men have notion, +and give the first and highest place to divine power": "Omnes homines +notionem deorum habent, omnesque summun locum divino cuidam numini +assignant." And this I say in short; that it is a true effect of true +reason in man (were there no authority more binding than reason) +to acknowledge and adore the first and most sublime power. "Vera +philosophia, est ascensus ab his quae fluunt, et oriuntur, et +occidunt, ad ea quae vera sunt, et semper eadem": "True philosophy, is +an ascending from the things which flow, and arise, and fall, to the +things that are forever the same." + +For the rest; I do also account it not the meanest, but an impiety +monstrous, to confound God and Nature; be it but in terms. For it is +God, that only disposeth of all things according to His own will, and +maketh of one earth, vessels of honor and dishonor. It is Nature +that can dispose of nothing, but according to the will of the matter +wherein it worketh. It is God that commandeth all: it is Nature that +is obedient to all: it is God that doth good unto all, knowing and +loving the good He doth: It is Nature, that secondarily doth also +good, but it neither knoweth nor loveth the good it doth. It is God, +that hath all things in Himself: Nature, nothing in itself. It is God, +which is the Father, and hath begotten all things: it is Nature, which +is begotten by all things, in which it liveth and laboreth; for by +itself it existeth not. For shall we say, that it is out of affection +to the earth, that heavy things fall towards it? Shall we call it +reason, which doth conduct every river into the salt sea? Shall +we term it knowledge in fire, that makes it to consume combustible +matter? If it be affection, reason, and knowledge in these; by the +same affection, reason, and knowledge it is, that Nature worketh. +And therefore seeing all things work as they do, (call it by Form, or +Nature, or by what you please) yet because they work by an impulsion, +which they cannot resist, or by a faculty, infused by the supremest +power; we are neither to wonder at, nor to worship, the faculty that +worketh, nor the creature wherein it worketh. But herein lies the +wonder: and to him is the worship due, who hath created such a nature +in things, and such a faculty, as neither knowing itself, the matter +wherein it worketh, nor the virtue and power which it hath; do yet +work all things to their last and uttermost perfection. And therefore +every reasonable man, taking to himself for a ground that which is +granted by all antiquity, and by all men truly learned that ever the +world had; to wit; that there is a power infinite, and eternal (which +also necessity doth prove unto us, without the help of faith, and +reason; without the force of authority) all things do as easily +follow which have been delivered by divine letters, as the waters of +a running river do successfully pursue each other from the first +fountains. + +This much I say it is, that reason itself hath taught us: and this is +the beginning of knowledge. "Sapientia praecedit, Religio sequitur: +quia prius est Deum scire, consequens colere"; "Sapience goes before, +Religion follows: because it is first to know God, and then to worship +Him." This sapience Plato calleth "absoluti boni scientiam," "the +science of the absolute good": and another "scientiam rerum primarum, +sempiternarum, perpetuarum"[40] For "faith (saith Isidore) is not +extorted by violence; but by reason and examples persuaded": "fides +nequaquam vi extorquetur, sed ratione et exemplis suadetur." I confess +it, that to inquire further, as to the essence of God, of His power, +of His art, and by what means He created the world: or of His secret +judgment, and the causes, is not an effect of reason. "Sed cum ratione +insaniunt," but "they grow mad with reason," that inquire after it. +For as it is no shame, nor dishonor (saith a French author) "de faire +arrest au but qu'on nasceu surpasser," "for a man to rest himself +there where he finds it impossible to pass on further": so whatsoever +is beyond, and out of the reach of true reason, it acknowledged it to +be so; as understanding itself not to be infinite, but according to +the name and nature it hath, to be a teacher, that best knows the end +of his own art. For seeing both reason and necessity teach us (reason, +which is "pars divini spiritus in corpus humanum mersi"[41]) that the +world was made by a power infinite; and yet how it was made, it cannot +teach us: and seeing the same reason and necessity make us know, +that the same infinite power is everywhere in the world; and yet how +everywhere, it cannot inform us: our belief hereof is not weakened, +but greatly strengthened, by our ignorance, because it is the same +reason that tells us, that such a nature cannot be said to be God, +that can be in all conceived by man. + +I have already been over-long, to make any large discourse either of +the parts of the following story, or in mine own excuse: especially in +the excuse of this or that passage; seeing the whole is exceeding +weak and defective. Among the grossest, the unsuitable division of +the books, I could not know how to excuse, had I not been directed to +enlarge the building after the foundation was laid, and the first +part finished. All men know that there is no great art in the dividing +evenly of these things, which are subject to number and measure. For +the rest, it suits well enough with a great many books of this +age, which speak too much, and yet say little; "Ipsi nobis furto +subducimur"; "We are stolen away from ourselves," setting a high price +on all that is our own. But hereof, though a late good writer make +complaint, yet shall it not lay hold on me, because I believe as he +doth; that who so thinks himself the wisest man, is but a poor and +miserable ignorant. Those that are the best men of war against all +the vanities and fooleries of the world, do always keep the strongest +guards against themselves, to defend them from themselves; from +self-love, self-estimation, and self-opinion. + +Generally concerning the order of the work, I have only taken counsel +from the argument. For of the Assyrians, which after the downfall of +Babel take up the first part, and were the first great kings of +the world, there came little to the view of posterity: some few +enterprises, greater in fame than faith, of Ninus and Semiramis, +excepted. + +It was the story of the Hebrews, of all before the Olympiads, that +overcame the consuming disease of time, and preserved itself, from the +very cradle and beginning to this day: and yet not so entire, but +that the large discourses thereof (to which in many Scriptures we are +referred) are nowhere found. The fragments of other stories, with the +actions of those kings and princes which shot up here and there in the +same time, I am driven to relate by way of digression: of which we may +say with Virgil: "Apparent rari nantes in gurgite vasto"; "They appear +here and there floating in the great gulf of time." + +To the same first ages do belong the report of many inventions therein +found, and from them derived to us; though most of the authors' names +have perished in so long a navigation. For those ages had their laws; +they had diversity of government; they had kingly rule; nobility; +policy in war; navigation, and all, or the most of needful trades. To +speak therefore of these (seeing in a general history we should have +left a great deal of nakedness, by their omission) it cannot properly +be called a digression. True it is, that I have made also many others: +which if they shall be laid to my charge, I must cast the fault into +the great heap of human error. For seeing we digress in all the +ways of our lives: yea, seeing the life of man is nothing else but +digression; I may the better be excused, in writing their lives and +actions. I am not altogether ignorant in the laws of history and of +the kinds. + +The same hath been taught by many, but no man better, and with greater +brevity, than by that excellent learned gentleman, Sir Francis Bacon. +Christian laws are also taught us by the prophets and apostles; and +every day preached unto us. But we still make large digressions: yea, +the teachers themselves do not (in all) keep the path which they point +out to others. + +For the rest, after such time as the Persians had wrested the Empire +from the Chaldeans, and had raised a great monarchy, producing actions +of more importance than were elsewhere to be found; it was agreeable +to the order of the story, to attend this Empire; whilst it so +flourished, that the affairs of the nations adjoining had reference +thereunto. The like observance was to be used towards the fortunes of +Greece, when they again began to get ground upon the Persians; as also +towards the affairs of Rome, when the Romans grew more mighty than the +Greeks. + +As for the Medes, the Macedonians, the Sicilians, the Carthaginians, +and other nations who resisted the beginnings of the former empires, +and afterwards became but parts of their composition and enlargement; +it seemed best to remember what was known of them from their several +beginnings, in such times and places as they in their flourishing +estates opposed those monarchies, which in the end swallowed them up. +And herein I have followed the best geographers: who seldom give +names to those small brooks, whereof many, joined together, make great +rivers: till such times as they become united, and run in main stream +to the ocean sea. If the phrase be weak, and the style not everywhere +like itself: the first shows their legitimation and true parent; the +second will excuse itself upon the variety of matter. For Virgil, who +wrote his _Eclogues_, "gracili avena,"[42] used stronger pipes, when +he sounded the wars of Aeneas. It may also be laid to my charge, that +I use divers Hebrew words in my first book, and elsewhere: in which +language others may think and I myself acknowledge it, that I am +altogether ignorant: but it is true, that some of them I find in +Montanus, others in Latin characters in S. Senensis; and of the rest I +have borrowed the interpretation of some of my friends. But say I had +been beholding to neither, yet were it not to be wondered at, having +had an eleven years' leisure, to attain the knowledge of that, or of +any other tongue; howsoever, I know that it will be said by many, that +I might have been more pleasing to the reader, if I had written the +story of mine own times, having been permitted to draw water as near +the well-head as another. To this I answer, that whosoever in writing +a modern history, shall follow truth too near the heels, it may haply +strike out his teeth. There is no mistress or guide, that hath led her +followers and servants into greater miseries. He that goes after her +too far off, loseth her sight, and loseth himself: and he that walks +after her at a middle distance: I know not whether I should call that +kind of course, temper,[43] or baseness. It is true, that I never +travelled after men's opinions, when I might have made the best use +of them: and I have now too few days remaining, to imitate those, that +either out of extreme ambition, or of extreme cowardice, or both, do +yet (when death hath them on his shoulders) flatter the world, between +the bed and the grave. It is enough for me (being in that state I am) +to write of the eldest times: wherein also why may it not be said, +that in speaking of the past, I point at the present, and tax the +vices of those that are yet living, in their persons that are long +since dead; and have it laid to my charge? But this I cannot help, +though innocent. And certainly, if there be any, that finding +themselves spotted like the tigers of old time, shall find fault with +me for painting them over anew, they shall therein accuse themselves +justly, and me falsely. + +For I protest before the Majesty of God, that I malice no man under +the sun. Impossible I know it is to please all; seeing few or none are +so pleased with themselves, or so assured of themselves, by reason of +their subjection to their private passions, but that they seem divers +persons in one and the same day. Seneca hath said it, and so do I: +"Unus mihi pro populo erat";[44] and to the same effect Epicurus, "Hoc +ego non multis sed tibi";[45] or (as it hath since lamentably fallen +out) I may borrow the resolution of an ancient philosopher, "Satis +est unus, satis est nullus."[46] For it was for the service of that +inestimable Prince Henry, the successive hope, and one of the greatest +of the Christian world, that I undertook this work. It pleased him to +peruse some part thereof, and to pardon what was amiss. It is now left +to the world without a master: from which all that is presented, hath +received both blows and thanks: "Eadem probamus, eadem reprehendimus: +hic exitus est omnis judicii, in quolis secundum plures datur."[47] +But these discourses are idle. I know that as the charitable will +judge charitably: so against those, "Qui gloriantur in malitia,"[48] +my present adversity hath disarmed me, I am on the ground already, +and therefore have not far to fall: and for rising again, as in the +natural privation there is no recession to habit; so it is seldom seen +in the privation politic. I do therefore forbear to style my readers +gentle, courteous, and friendly, thereby to beg their good opinions, +or to promise a second and third volume (which I also intend) if the +first receive grace and good acceptance. For that which is already +done, may be thought enough, and too much: and it is certain, let us +claw the reader with never so many courteous phrases, yet shall we +evermore be thought fools, that write foolishly. For conclusion, all +the hope I have lies in this, that I have already found more ungentle +and uncourteous readers of my love towards them, and well-deserving of +them, than ever I shall do again. For had it been otherwise, I should +hardly have had this leisure, to have made myself a fool in print. + + +[Footnote A: A sketch of the life of Raleigh will be found prefixed to +his "Discovery of Guiana" in the volume of "Voyages and Travels". +His "History of the World" was written during his imprisonment in +the Tower of London, which lasted from 1603 to 1616. The Preface +is interesting not only as a fine piece of Elizabethan prose but as +exhibiting the attitude toward history, and the view of the relation +of history to religion and philosophy, which characterized one who +represented with exceptional vigor the typical Elizabethan man of +action and who was also a man of thought and imagination.] + +[Footnote 1: Queen Elizabeth] + +[Footnote 2: "An ill opinion, honorably acquired, is pleasing."] + +[Footnote 3: "So you not to yourselves."] + +[Footnote 4: "He increased, with the result that he is oppressed by +his greatness."] + +[Footnote 5: "The insult done in scorning her beauty."] + +[Footnote 6: "God gave to Solomon largeness of heart."--1 Kings iv. +89.] + +[Footnote 7: Step. Pasquiere, Recherches, lib. v. cap. i.] + +[Footnote 8: Step-mother.] + +[Footnote 9: i.e., Protestantism] + +[Footnote 10: Instantly.] + +[Footnote 11: Dispossessed.] + +[Footnote 12: "Nothing hindering."] + +[Footnote 13: "That they are wise in a foolish matter."--Lactantius, +_De falsa sapientia_, 3, 29.] + +[Footnote 14: Augustine, _De cura pro morte_.] + +[Footnote 15: "Wealth acquired without fraud."] + +[Footnote 16: "O how many go down with this hope to endless labors and +wars."] + +[Footnote 17: Transient.] + +[Footnote 18: Opponents.] + +[Footnote 19: "Everything which is to come lies in uncertainty."] + +[Footnote 20: "Who follow their commander with groans."] + +[Footnote 21: "It takes great genius to call back the mind from the +senses."] + +[Footnote 22: "Against him who denies the principles."] + +[Footnote 23: "Specific virtue, or power."] + +[Footnote 24: "The Roman Church."] + +[Footnote 25: "I shall light a lamp of understanding in thine +heart."--IV. Esdras xiv. 25.] + +[Footnote 26: Followers.] + +[Footnote 27: "Prepared and sworn to protect with unconquered minds +the opinions of the philosophers whom they follow."] + +[Footnote 28: "Out of nothing."] + +[Footnote 29: "Out of pre-existing matter."] + +[Footnote 30: "Because comprehension is between limits, which are +opposed to infinity."] + +[Footnote 31: "God exhibits all things in one existence"] + +[Footnote 32: "The essence of all things, visible and invisible, is +divinity itself"] + +[Footnote 33: "Causally."] + +[Footnote 34: "Not as form, but as universal cause"] + +[Footnote 35: "It [i.e., the infinite] has no beginning, but itself is +perceived to be the beginning of all things, and to embrace and govern +all things."] + +[Footnote 36: "Primal matter."] + +[Footnote 37: "Which destroys all proportion."] + +[Footnote 38: "The spiritual world."] + +[Footnote 39: "Providence, leader and head; Fate, in the middle and +proceeding from Providence; Nature, last."] + +[Footnote 40: "The science of things first, eternal, perpetual."] + +[Footnote 41: "Part of the divine spirit immersed in the human body."] + +[Footnote 42: "With delicate pipe."] + +[Footnote 43: Moderation] + +[Footnote 44: "To me one man stood for the people."] + +[Footnote 45: "I [have done] this not for many, but for thee."] + +[Footnote 46: "One is enough, none is enough."] + +[Footnote 47: "We approve the same things, we blame the same +things--this is the result in every case in which the verdict is +rendered according to the majority."] + +[Footnote 48: "Who glory in malice"] + + + + +PROOEMIUM, EPISTLE DEDICATORY, PREFACE, AND PLAN OF THE INSTAURATIO +MAGNA, ETC. + +BY FRANCIS BACON[A] + +FRANCIS OF VERULAM REASONED THUS WITH HIMSELF, + +AND JUDGED IT TO BE FOR THE INTEREST OF THE PRESENT AND FUTURE +GENERATIONS THAT THEY SHOULD BE MADE ACQUAINTED WITH HIS THOUGHTS + + +Being convinced that the human intellect makes its own difficulties, +not using the true helps which are at man's disposal soberly and +judiciously; whence follows manifold ignorance of things, and by +reason of that ignorance mischiefs innumerable; he thought all trial +should be made, whether that commerce between the mind of man and the +nature of things, which is more precious than anything on earth, or +at least than anything that is of the earth, might by any means be +restored to its perfect and original condition, or if that may not be, +yet reduced to a better condition than that in which it now is. Now +that the errors which have hitherto prevailed, and which will prevail +forever, should (if the mind be left to go its own way), either by +the natural force of the understanding or by help of the aids and +instruments of Logic, one by one correct themselves, was a thing not +to be hoped for: because the primary notions of things which the mind +readily and passively imbibes, stores up, and accumulates (and it is +from them that all the rest flow) are false, confused, and overhastily +abstracted from the facts; nor are the secondary and subsequent +notions less arbitrary and inconstant; whence it follows that the +entire fabric of human reason which we employ in the inquisition of +nature, is badly put together and built up, and like some magnificent +structure without any foundation. For while men are occupied in +admiring and applauding the false powers of the mind, they pass by and +throw away those true powers, which, if it be supplied with the proper +aids and can itself be content to wait upon nature instead of vainly +affecting to overrule her, are within its reach. There was but one +course left, therefore,--to try the whole thing anew upon a better +plan, and to commence a total reconstruction of sciences, arts, and +all human knowledge, raised upon the proper foundations. And this, +though in the project and undertaking it may seem a thing infinite and +beyond the powers of man, yet when it comes to be dealt with it will +be found sound and sober, more so than what has been done hitherto. +For of this there is some issue; whereas in what is now done in the +matter of science there is only a whirling round about, and perpetual +agitation, ending where it began. And although he was well aware how +solitary an enterprise it is, and how hard a thing to win faith and +credit for, nevertheless he was resolved not to abandon either it or +himself; nor to be deterred from trying and entering upon that one +path which is alone open to the human mind. For better it is to make +a beginning of that which may lead to something, than to engage in +a perpetual struggle and pursuit in courses which have no exit. And +certainly the two ways of contemplation are much like those two ways +of action, so much celebrated, in this--that the one, arduous and +difficult in the beginning, leads out at last into the open +country; while the other, seeming at first sight easy and free from +obstruction, leads to pathless and precipitous places. + +Moreover, because he knew not how long it might be before these things +would occur to any one else, judging especially from this, that he +has found no man hitherto who has applied his mind to the like, he +resolved to publish at once so much as he has been able to complete. +The cause of which haste was not ambition for himself, but solicitude +for the work; that in case of his death there might remain some +outline and project of that which he had conceived, and some evidence +likewise of his honest mind and inclination towards the benefit of the +human race. Certain it is that all other ambition whatsoever seemed +poor in his eyes compared with the work which he had in hand; seeing +that the matter at issue is either nothing, or a thing so great that +it may well be content with its own merit, without seeking other +recompence. + + +[Footnote A: A sketch of Bacon's life will be found prefixed to his +"Essays" in another volume of the Harvard Classics. His "Instauratio +Magna" or "Great Renewal," the great work by which he hoped to create +a scientific revolution and deliver mankind from Aristotelianism, was +left far from complete; but the nature of his scheme and the scale +on which it was planned are indicated in these Prefaces, which are +typical both of the man and of the age in which he lived.] + + + + +EPISTLE DEDICATORY + +TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +TO OUR MOST GRACIOUS AND MIGHTY PRINCE AND LORD + +JAMES + +BY THE GRACE OF GOD OF GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE AND IRELAND KING, +DEFENDER OF THE FAITH, ETC. + +_Most Gracious and Mighty King_, + + +Your Majesty may perhaps accuse me of larceny, having stolen from your +affairs so much time as was required for this work. I know not what to +say for myself. For of time there can be no restitution, unless it be +that what has been abstracted from your business may perhaps go to the +memory of your name and the honour of your age; if these things are +indeed worth anything. Certainly they are quite new; totally new in +their very kind: and yet they are copied from a very ancient model; +even the world itself and the nature of things and of the mind. And to +say truth, I am wont for my own part to regard this work as a child of +time rather than of wit; the only wonder being that the first notion +of the thing, and such great suspicions concerning matters long +established, should have come into any man's mind. All the rest +follows readily enough. And no doubt there is something of accident +(as we call it) and luck as well in what men think as in what they do +or say. But for this accident which I speak of, I wish that if +there be any good in what I have to offer, it may be ascribed to +the infinite mercy and goodness of God, and to the felicity of your +Majesty's times; to which as I have been an honest and affectionate +servant in my life, so after my death I may yet perhaps, through the +kindling of this new light in the darkness of philosophy, be the means +of making this age famous to posterity; and surely to the times of the +wisest and most learned of kings belongs of right the regeneration +and restoration of the sciences. Lastly, I have a request to make--a +request no way unworthy of your Majesty, and which especially concerns +the work in hand; namely, that you who resemble Solomon in so many +things--in the gravity of your judgments, in the peacefulness of your +reign, in the largeness of your heart, in the noble variety of the +books which you have composed--would further follow his example +in taking order for the collecting and perfecting of a Natural and +Experimental History, true and severe (unincumbered with literature +and book-learning), such as philosophy may be built upon,--such, in +fact, as I shall in its proper place describe: that so at length, +after the lapse of so many ages, philosophy and the sciences may no +longer float in air, but rest on the solid foundation of experience +of every kind, and the same well examined and weighed. I have provided +the machine, but the stuff must be gathered from the facts of nature. +May God Almighty long preserve your Majesty! + + Your Majesty's + Most bounden and devoted Servant, + FRANCIS VERULAM, + Chancellor. + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +_That the state of knowledge is not prosperous nor greatly advancing; +and that a way must be opened for the human understanding entirely +different from any hitherto known, and other helps provided, in order +that the mind may exercise over the nature of things the authority +which properly belongs to it._ + + +It seems to me that men do not rightly understand either their store +or their strength, but overrate the one and underrate the other. Hence +it follows, that either from an extravagant estimate of the value of +the arts which they possess, they seek no further; or else from too +mean an estimate of their own powers, they spend their strength in +small matters and never put it fairly to the trial in those which +go to the main. These are as the pillars of fate set in the path of +knowledge; for men have neither desire nor hope to encourage them +to penetrate further. And since opinion of store is one of the chief +causes of want, and satisfaction with the present induces neglect +of provision for the future, it becomes a thing not only useful, but +absolutely necessary, that the excess of honour and admiration with +which our existing stock of inventions is regarded be in the very +entrance and threshold of the work, and that frankly and without +circumlocution, stripped off, and men be duly warned not to exaggerate +or make too much of them. For let a man look carefully into all that +variety of books with which the arts and sciences abound, he will +find everywhere endless repetitions of the same thing, varying in the +method of treatment, but not new in substance, insomuch that the whole +stock, numerous as it appears at first view, proves on examination to +be but scanty. And for its value and utility it must be plainly avowed +that that wisdom which we have derived principally from the Greeks is +but like the boyhood of knowledge, and has the characteristic property +of boys; it can talk, but it cannot generate; for it is fruitful of +controversies but barren of works. So that the state of learning as +it now is appears to be represented to the life in the old fable of +Scylla, who had the head and face of a virgin, but her womb was hung +round with barking monsters, from which she could not be delivered. +For in like manner the sciences to which we are accustomed have +certain general positions which are specious and flattering; but +as soon as they come to particulars, which are as the parts of +generation, when they should produce fruit and works, then arise +contentions and barking disputations, which are the end of the matter +and all the issue they can yield. Observe also, that if sciences of +this kind had any life in them, that could never have come to pass +which has been the case now for many ages--that they stand almost at +a stay, without receiving any augmentations worthy of the human race; +insomuch that many times not only what was asserted once is asserted +still, but what was a question once is a question still, and instead +of being resolved by discussion is only fixed and fed; and all the +tradition and succession of schools is still a succession of masters +and scholars, not of inventors and those who bring to further +perfection the things invented. In the mechanical arts we do not find +it so; they, on the contrary, as having in them some breath of life, +are continually growing and becoming more perfect. As originally +invented they are commonly rude, clumsy, and shapeless; afterwards +they acquire new powers and more commodious arrangements and +constructions; in so far that men shall sooner leave the study and +pursuit of them and turn to something else, than they arrive at the +ultimate perfection of which they are capable. Philosophy and the +intellectual sciences, on the contrary, stand like statues, worshiped +and celebrated, but not moved or advanced. Nay, they sometimes +flourish most in the hands of the first author, and afterwards +degenerate. For when men have once made over their judgments to +others' keeping, and (like those senators whom they called _Pedarii_) +have agreed to support some one person's opinion, from that time +they make no enlargement of the sciences themselves, but fall to +the servile office of embellishing certain individual authors and +increasing their retinue. And let it not be said that the sciences +have been growing gradually till they have at last reached their full +stature, and so (their course being completed) have settled in the +works of a few writers; and that there being now no room for the +invention of better, all that remains is to embellish and cultivate +those things which have been invented already. Would it were so! But +the truth is that this appropriating of the sciences has its origin in +nothing better than the confidence of a few persons and the sloth +and indolence of the rest. For after the sciences had been in several +parts perhaps cultivated and handled diligently, there has risen up +some man of bold disposition, and famous for methods and short ways +which people like, who has in appearance reduced them to an art, while +he has in fact only spoiled all that the others had done. And yet this +is what posterity like, because it makes the work short and easy, and +saves further inquiry, of which they are weary and impatient. And if +any one take this general acquiescence and consent for an argument +of weight, as being the judgment of Time, let me tell him that the +reasoning on which he relies is most fallacious and weak. For, first, +we are far from knowing all that in the matter of sciences and arts +has in various ages and places been brought to light and published; +much less, all that has been by private persons secretly attempted +and stirred, so neither the births nor the miscarriages of Time are +entered in our records. Nor, secondly, is the consent itself and +the time it has continued a consideration of much worth. For however +various are the forms of civil politics, there is but one form of +polity in the sciences; and that always has been and always will be +popular. Now the doctrines which find most favour with the populace +are those which are either contentious and pugnacious, or specious +and empty; such, I say, as either entangle assent or tickle it. And +therefore no doubt the greatest wits in each successive age have been +forced out of their own course, men of capacity and intellect above +the vulgar having been fain, for reputation's sake, to bow to the +judgment of the time and the multitude; and thus if any contemplations +of a higher order took light anywhere, they were presently blown out +by the winds of vulgar opinions. So that Time is like a river, which +has brought down to us things light and puffed up, while those which +are weighty and solid have sunk. Nay, those very authors who have +usurped a kind of dictatorship in the sciences and taken upon them to +lay down the law with such confidence, yet when from time to time they +come to themselves again, they fall to complaints of the subtlety +of nature, the hiding-places of truth, the obscurity of things, +the entanglement of causes, the weakness of the human mind; wherein +nevertheless they show themselves never the more modest, seeing that +they will rather lay the blame upon the common condition of man +and nature than upon themselves. And then whatever any art fails to +attain, they ever set it down upon the authority of that art itself as +impossible of attainment; and how can art be found guilty when it is +judge in its own cause? So it is but a device for exempting ignorance +from ignominy. Now for those things which are delivered and received, +this is their condition: barren of works, full of questions; in point +of enlargement slow and languid; carrying a show of perfection in +the whole, but in the parts ill filled up; in selection popular, and +unsatisfactory even to those who propound them; and therefore fenced +round and set forth with sundry artifices. And if there be any who +have determined to make trial for themselves, and put their own +strength to the work of advancing the boundaries of the sciences, +yet have they not ventured to cast themselves completely loose from +received opinions or to seek their knowledge at the fountain; but they +think they have done some great thing if they do but add and introduce +into the existing sum of science something of their own; prudently +considering with themselves that by making the addition they can +assert their liberty, while they retain the credit of modesty by +assenting to the rest. But these mediocrities and middle ways so +much praised, in deferring to opinions and customs, turn to the great +detriment of the sciences. For it is hardly possible at once to admire +an author and to go beyond him; knowledge being as water, which +will not rise above the level from which it fell. Men of this kind, +therefore, amend some things, but advance little; and improve the +condition of knowledge, but do not extend its range. Some, indeed, +there have been who have gone more boldly to work, and taking it all +for an open matter and giving their genius full play, have made a +passage for themselves and their own opinions by pulling down and +demolishing former ones; and yet all their stir has but little +advanced the matter; since their aim has been not to extend philosophy +and the arts in substance and value, but only to change doctrines and +transfer the kingdom of opinions to themselves; whereby little has +indeed been gained, for though the error be the opposite of the other, +the causes of erring are the same in both. And if there have been any +who, not binding themselves either to other men's opinions or to their +own, but loving liberty, have desired to engage others along with +themselves in search, these, though honest in intention, have been +weak in endeavour. For they have been content to follow probable +reasons, and are carried round in a whirl of arguments, and in the +promiscuous liberty of search have relaxed the severity of inquiry. +There is none who has dwelt upon experience and the facts of nature +as long as is necessary. Some there are indeed who have committed +themselves to the waves of experience, and almost turned mechanics; +yet these again have in their very experiments pursued a kind of +wandering inquiry, without any regular system of operations. And +besides they have mostly proposed to themselves certain petty tasks, +taking it for a great matter to work out some single discovery;--a +course of proceeding at once poor in aim and unskilful in design. For +no man can rightly and successfully investigate the nature of anything +in the thing itself; let him vary his experiments as laboriously as he +will, he never comes to a resting-place, but still finds something to +seek beyond. And there is another thing to be remembered; namely, +that all industry in experimenting has begun with proposing to itself +certain definite works to be accomplished, and has pursued them +with premature and unseasonable eagerness; it has sought, I say, +experiments of Fruit, not experiments of Light; not Imitating the +divine procedure, which In its first day's work created light only and +assigned to it one entire day; on which day it produced no material +work, but proceeded to that on the days following. As for those who +have given the first place to Logic, supposing that the surest helps +to the sciences were to be found in that, they have indeed most truly +and excellently perceived that the human intellect left to its own +course is not to be trusted; but then the remedy is altogether too +weak for the disease; nor is it without evil in itself. For the +Logic which is received, though it be very properly applied to civil +business and to those arts which rest in discourse and opinion, is not +nearly subtle enough to deal with nature; and in offering at what it +cannot master, has done more to establish and perpetuate error than to +open the way to truth. + +Upon the whole therefore, it seems that men have not been happy +hitherto either in the trust which they have placed in others or in +their own industry with regard to the sciences; especially as neither +the demonstrations nor the experiments as yet known are much to be +relied upon. But the universe to the eye of the human understanding is +framed like a labyrinth; presenting as it does on every side so many +ambiguities of way, such deceitful resemblances of objects and signs, +natures so irregular in their lines, and so knotted and entangled. And +then the way is still to be made by the uncertain light of the sense, +sometimes shining out, sometimes clouded over, through the woods +of experience and particulars; while those who offer themselves for +guides are (as was said) themselves also puzzled, and increase the +number of errors and wanderers. In circumstances so difficult neither +the natural force of man's judgment nor even any accidental felicity +offers any chance of success. No excellence of wit, no repetition of +chance experiments, can overcome such difficulties as these. Our +steps must be guided by a clue, and the whole way from the very first +perception of the senses must be laid out upon a sure plan. Not that I +would be understood to mean that nothing whatever has been done in so +many ages by so great labours. We have no reason to be ashamed of the +discoveries which have been made, and no doubt the ancients proved +themselves in everything that turns on wit and abstract meditation, +wonderful men. But as in former ages when men sailed only by +observation of the stars, they could indeed coast along the shores +of the old continent or cross a few small and mediterranean seas; but +before the ocean could be traversed and the new world discovered, the +use of the mariner's needle, as a more faithful and certain guide, +had to be found out; in like manner the discoveries which have been +hitherto made in the arts and sciences are such as might be made by +practice, meditation, observation, argumentation,--for they lay near +to the senses, and immediately beneath common notions; but before we +can reach the remoter and more hidden parts of nature, it is necessary +that a more perfect use and application of the human mind and +intellect be introduced. + +For my own part at least, in obedience to the everlasting love of +truth, I have committed myself to the uncertainties and difficulties +and solitudes of the ways, and relying on the divine assistance have +upheld my mind both against the shocks and embattled ranks of opinion, +and against my own private and inward hesitations and scruples, and +against the fogs and clouds of nature, and the phantoms flitting about +on every side; in the hope of providing at last for the present and +future generations guidance more faithful and secure. Wherein if I +have made any progress, the way has been opened to me by no other +means than the true and legitimate humiliation of the human spirit. +For all those who before me have applied themselves to the invention +of arts have but cast a glance or two upon facts and examples and +experience, and straightway proceeded, as if invention were nothing +more than an exercise of thought, to invoke their own spirits to give +them oracles. I, on the contrary, dwelling purely and constantly among +the facts of nature, withdraw my intellect from them no further than +may suffice to let the images and rays of natural objects meet in a +point, as they do in the sense of vision; whence it follows that the +strength and excellency of the wit has but little to do in the matter. +And the same humility which I use in inventing I employ likewise in +teaching. For I do not endeavour either by triumphs of confutation, +or pleadings of antiquity, or assumption of authority, or even by +the veil of obscurity, to invest these inventions of mine with any +majesty; which might easily be done by one who sought to give lustre +to his own name rather than light to other men's minds. I have +not sought (I say) nor do I seek either to force or ensnare men's +judgments, but I lead them to things themselves and the concordances +of things, that they may see for themselves what they have, what they +can dispute, what they can add and contribute to the common stock. +And for myself, if in anything I have been either too credulous or +too little awake and attentive, or if I have fallen off by the way and +left the inquiry incomplete, nevertheless I so present these things +naked and open, that my errors can be marked and set aside before the +mass of knowledge be further infected by them; and it will be easy +also for others to continue and carry on my labours. And by these +means I suppose that I have established for ever a true and lawful +marriage between the empirical and the rational faculty, the unkind +and ill-starred divorce and separation of which has thrown into +confusion all the affairs of the human family. + +Wherefore, seeing that these things do not depend upon myself, at the +outset of the work I most humbly and fervently pray to God the Father, +God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, that remembering the sorrows of +mankind and the pilgrimage of this our life wherein we wear out days +few and evil, they will vouchsafe through my hands to endow the human +family with new mercies. This likewise I humbly pray, that things +human may not interfere with things divine, and that from the opening +of the ways of sense and the increase of natural light there may arise +in our minds no incredulity or darkness with regard to the divine +mysteries; but rather that the understanding being thereby purified +and purged of fancies and vanity, and yet not the less subject and +entirely submissive to the divine oracles, may give to faith that +which is faith's. Lastly, that knowledge being now discharged of that +venom which the serpent infused into it, and which makes the mind +of man to swell, we may not be wise above measure and sobriety, but +cultivate truth in charity. + +And now having said my prayers I turn to men; to whom I have certain +salutary admonitions to offer and certain fair requests to make. My +first admonition (which was also my prayer) is that men confine the +sense within the limits of duty in respect to things divine: for the +sense is like the sun, which reveals the face of earth, but seals and +shuts up the face of heaven. My next, that in flying from this evil +they fall not into the opposite error, which they will surely do if +they think that the inquisition of nature is in any part interdicted +or forbidden. For it was not that pure and uncorrupted natural +knowledge whereby Adam gave names to the creatures according to their +propriety, which gave occasion to the fall. It was the ambitious and +proud desire of moral knowledge to judge of good and evil, to the end +that man may revolt from God and give laws to himself, which was +the form and manner of the temptation. Whereas of the sciences which +regard nature, the divine philosopher declares that "it is the glory +of God to conceal a thing, but it is the glory of the King to find +a thing out," Even as though the divine nature took pleasure in the +innocent and kindly sport of children playing at hide and seek, and +vouchsafed of his kindness and goodness to admit the human spirit +for his playfellow at that game. Lastly, I would address one general +admonition to all; that they consider what are the true ends of +knowledge, and that they seek it not either for pleasure of the mind, +or for contention, or for superiority to others, or for profit, or +fame, or power, or any of these inferior things; but for the benefit +and use of life; and that they perfect and govern it in charity. For +it was from lust of power that the angels fell, from lust of knowledge +that man fell; but of charity there can be no excess, neither did +angel or man ever come in danger by it. + +The requests I have to make are these. Of myself I say nothing; but in +behalf of the business which is in hand I entreat men to believe that +it is not an opinion to be held, but a work to be done; and to be well +assured that I am labouring to lay the foundation, not of any sect +or doctrine, but of human utility and power. Next, I ask them to deal +fairly by their own interests, and laying aside all emulations and +prejudices in favour of this or that opinion, to join in consultation +for the common good; and being now freed and guarded by the securities +and helps which I offer from the errors and impediments of the way, to +come forward themselves and take part in that which remains to be done +Moreover, to be of good hope, nor to imagine that this Instauration +of mine is a thing infinite and beyond the power of man, when it is in +fact the true end and termination of infinite error, and seeing also +that it is by no means forgetful of the conditions of mortality and +humanity, (for it does not suppose that the work can be altogether +completed within one generation, but provides for its being taken up +by another), and finally that it seeks for the sciences not arrogantly +in the little cells of human wit, but with reverence in the greater +world. But it is the empty things that are vast things solid are most +contracted and lie in little room. And now I have only one favour +more to ask (else injustice to me may perhaps imperil the business +itself)--that men will consider well how far, upon that which I must +needs assert (if I am to be consistent with myself), they are entitled +to judge and decide upon these doctrines of mine, inasmuch as all that +premature human reasoning which anticipates inquiry, and is abstracted +from the facts rashly and sooner than is fit, is by me rejected (so +far as the inquisition of nature is concerned), as a thing uncertain, +confused, and ill built up, and I cannot be fairly asked to abide by +the decision of a tribunal which is itself on its trial. + +THE PLAN OF THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +The work is in six Parts:-- + + 1. _The Divisions of the Sciences_. + + 2. _The New Organon; or Directions concerning the + Interpretation of Nature_. + + 3. _The Phenomena of the Universe; or a Natural and + Experimental History for the foundation of + Philosophy_. + + 4. _The Ladder of the Intellect_. + + 5. _The Forerunners; or Anticipations of the New + Philosophy_. + + 6. _The New Philosophy; or Active Science_. + +_The Arguments of the several Parts_. + +It being part of my design to set everything forth, as far as may +be, plainly and perspicuously (for nakedness of the mind is still, +as nakedness of the body once was, the companion of innocence and +simplicity), let me first explain the order and plan of the work. I +distribute it into six parts. + +The first part exhibits a summary or general description of the +knowledge which the human race at present possesses. For I thought it +good to make some pause upon that which is received; that thereby +the old may be more easily made perfect and the new more easily +approached. And I hold the improvement of that which we have to be as +much an object as the acquisition of more. Besides which it will make +me the better listened to; for "He that is ignorant (says the proverb) +receives not the words of knowledge, unless thou first tell him that +which is in his own heart." We will therefore make a coasting voyage +along the shores of the arts and sciences received; not without +importing into them some useful things by the way. + +In laying out the divisions of the sciences however, I take into +account not only things already invented and known, but likewise +things omitted which ought to be there. For there are found in the +intellectual as in the terrestial globe waste regions as well as +cultivated ones. It is no wonder therefore if I am sometimes obliged +to depart from the ordinary divisions. For in adding to the total you +necessarily alter the parts and sections; and the received divisions +of the sciences are fitted only to the received sum of them as it +stands now. + +With regard to those things which I shall mark down as omitted, I +intend not merely to set down a simple title or a concise argument +of that which is wanted. For as often as I have occasion to report +anything as deficient, the nature of which is at all obscure, so that +men may not perhaps easily understand what I mean or what the work is +which I have in my head, I shall always (provided it be a matter of +any worth) take care to subjoin either directions for the execution of +such work, or else a portion of the work itself executed by myself as +a sample of the whole: thus giving assistance in every case either by +work or by counsel. For if it were for the sake of my reputation only +and other men's interests were not concerned in it, I would not have +any man think that in such cases merely some light and vague notion +has crossed my mind, and that the things which I desire and offer at +are no better than wishes; when they are in fact things which men may +certainly command if they will, and of which I have formed in my own +mind a clear and detailed conception. For I do not propose merely to +survey these regions in my mind, like an augur taking auspices, but to +enter them like a general who means to take possession.--So much for +the first part of the work. + + * * * * * + +Having thus coasted past the ancient arts, the next point is to equip +the intellect for passing beyond. To the second part therefore belongs +the doctrine concerning the better and more perfect use of human +reason in the inquisition of things, and the true helps of the +understanding: that thereby (as far as the condition of mortality and +humanity allows) the intellect may be raised and exalted, and made +capable of overcoming the difficulties and obscurities of nature. The +art which I introduce with this view (which I call _Interpretation of +Nature_) is a kind of logic; though the difference between it and +the ordinary logic is great; indeed immense. For the ordinary +logic professes to contrive and prepare helps and guards for the +understanding, as mine does; and in this one point they agree. But +mine differs from it in three points especially; viz. in the end aimed +at; in the order of demonstration; and in the starting point of the +inquiry. + +For the end which this science of mine proposes is the invention not +of arguments but of arts; not of things in accordance with principles, +but of principles themselves; not of probable reasons, but of +designations and directions for works. And as the intention is +different, so accordingly is the effect; the effect of the one being +to overcome an opponent in argument, of the other to command nature in +action. + +In accordance with this end is also the nature and order of the +demonstrations. For in the ordinary logic almost all the work is spent +about the syllogism. Of induction the logicians seem hardly to have +taken any serious thought, but they pass it by with a slight notice, +and hasten on to the formulæ of disputation. I on the contrary reject +demonstration by syllogism, as acting too confusedly, and letting +nature slip out of its hands. For although no one can doubt that +things which agree in a middle term agree with one another (which is +a proposition of mathematical certainty), yet it leaves an opening +for deception; which is this. The syllogism consists of propositions; +propositions of words; and words are the tokens and signs of notions. +Now if the very notions of the mind (which are as the soul of words +and the basis of the whole structure) be improperly and over-hastily +abstracted from facts, vague not sufficiently definite, faulty in +short in many ways, the whole edifice tumbles. I therefore reject the +syllogism; and that not only as regards principles (for to principles +the logicians themselves do not apply it) but also as regards middle +propositions; which, though obtainable no doubt by the syllogism, +are, when so obtained, barren of works, remote from practice, and +altogether unavailable for the active department of the sciences. +Although therefore I leave to the syllogism and these famous and +boasted modes of demonstration their jurisdiction over popular arts +and such as are matter of opinion (in which department I leave all +as it is), yet in dealing with the nature of things I use induction +throughout, and that in the minor propositions as well as the major. +For I consider induction to be that form of demonstration which +upholds the sense, and closes with nature, and comes to the very brink +of operation, if it does not actually deal with it. + +Hence it follows that the order of demonstration is likewise inverted. +For hitherto the proceeding has been to fly at once from the sense +and particulars up to the most general propositions, as certain fixed +poles for the argument to turn upon, and from these to derive the rest +by middle terms a short way, no doubt, but precipitate, and one which +will never lead to nature, though it offers an easy and ready way to +disputation. Now my plan is to proceed regularly and gradually from +one axiom to another, so that the most general are not reached till +the last but then when you do come to them you find them to be not +empty notions, but well defined, and such as nature would really +recognise as her first principles, and such as lie at the heart and +marrow of things. + +But the greatest change I introduce is in the form itself of induction +and the judgment made thereby. For the induction of which the +logicians speak, which proceeds by simple enumeration, is a puerile +thing, concludes at hazard, is always liable to be upset by a +contradictory instance, takes into account only what is known and +ordinary, and leads to no result. + +Now what the sciences stand in need of is a form of induction which +shall analyse experience and take it to pieces, and by a due process +of exclusion and rejection lead to an inevitable conclusion. And +if that ordinary mode of judgment practised by the logicians was so +laborious, and found exercise for such great wits how much more labour +must we be prepared to bestow upon this other, which is extracted not +merely out of the depths of the mind, but out of the very bowels of +nature. + +Nor is this all. For I also sink the foundations of the sciences +deeper and firmer; and I begin the inquiry nearer the source than men +have done heretofore; submitting to examination those things which +the common logic takes on trust. For first, the logicians borrow the +principles of each science from the science itself; secondly, they +hold in reverence the first notions of the mind; and lastly, they +receive as conclusive the immediate informations of the sense, when +well disposed. Now upon the first point, I hold that true logic +ought to enter the several provinces of science armed with a higher +authority than belongs to the principles of those sciences themselves, +and ought to call those putative principles to account until they +are fully established. Then with regard to the first notions of the +intellect; there is not one of the impressions taken by the intellect +when left to go its own way, but I hold it for suspected, and no +way established, until it has submitted to a new trial and a fresh +judgment has been thereupon pronounced. And lastly, the information +of the sense itself I sift and examine in many ways. For certain it +is that the senses deceive; but then at the same time they supply the +means of discovering their own errors; only the errors are here, the +means of discovery are to seek. + +The sense fails in two ways. Sometimes it gives no information, +sometimes it gives false information. For first, there are very many +things which escape the sense, even when best disposed and no way +obstructed; by reason either of the subtlety of the whole body, or +the minuteness of the parts, or distance of place, or slowness or else +swiftness of motion, or familiarity of the object, or other causes. +And again when the sense does apprehend a thing its apprehension is +not much to be relied upon. For the testimony and information of the +sense has reference always to man, not to the universe; and it is a +great error to assert that the sense is the measure of things. + +To meet these difficulties, I have sought on all sides diligently and +faithfully to provide helps for the sense--substitutes to supply its +failures, rectifications to correct its errors; and this I endeavour +to accomplish not so much by instruments as by experiments. For the +subtlety of experiments is far greater than that of the sense itself, +even when assisted by exquisite instruments; such experiments, I mean, +as are skilfully and artificially devised for the express purpose +of determining the point in question. To the immediate and proper +perception of the sense therefore I do not give much weight; but I +contrive that the office of the sense shall be only to judge of the +experiment, and that the experiment itself shall judge of the thing. +And thus I conceive that I perform the office of a true priest of the +sense (from which all knowledge in nature must be sought, unless men +mean to go mad) and a not unskilful interpreter of its oracles; and +that while others only profess to uphold and cultivate the sense, I +do so in fact. Such then are the provisions I make for finding the +genuine light of nature and kindling and bringing it to bear. And they +would be sufficient of themselves, if the human intellect were even, +and like a fair sheet of paper with no writing on it. But since the +minds of men are strangely possessed and beset, so that there is no +true and even surface left to reflect the genuine rays of things, it +is necessary to seek a remedy for this also. + +Now the idols, or phantoms, by which the mind is occupied are either +adventitious or innate. The adventitious come into the mind from +without; namely, either from the doctrines and sects of philosophers, +or from perverse rules of demonstration. But the innate are inherent +in the very nature of the intellect, which is far more prone to error +than the sense is. For let men please themselves as they will in +admiring and almost adoring the human mind, this is certain: that as +an uneven mirror distorts the rays of objects according to its own +figure and section, so the mind, when it receives impressions of +objects through the sense, cannot be trusted to report them truly, +but in forming its notions mixes up its own nature with the nature of +things. + +And as the first two kinds of idols are hard to eradicate, so idols of +this last kind cannot be eradicated at all. All that can be done is +to point them out, so that this insidious action of the mind may be +marked and reproved (else as fast as old errors are destroyed new ones +will spring up out of the ill complexion of the mind itself, and so we +shall have but a change or errors, and not a clearance); and to lay it +down once for all as a fixed and established maxim, that the intellect +is not qualified to judge except by means of induction, and induction +in its legitimate form. This doctrine then of the expurgation of the +intellect to qualify it for dealing with truth, is comprised in three +refutations: the refutation of the Philosophies; the refutation of the +Demonstrations; and the refutation of the Natural Human Reason. The +explanation of which things, and of the true relation between the +nature of things and the nature of the mind, is as the strewing and +decoration of the bridal chamber of the Mind and the Universe, the +Divine Goodness assisting; out of which marriage let us hope (and be +this the prayer of the bridal song) there may spring helps to man, +and a line and race of inventions that may in some degree subdue and +overcome the necessities and miseries of humanity. This is the second +part of the work. + + * * * * * + +But I design not only to indicate and mark out the ways, but also +to enter them. And therefore the third part of the work embraces the +Phenomena of the Universe; that is to say, experience of every kind, +and such a natural history as may serve for a foundation to build +philosophy upon. For a good method of demonstration or form of +interpreting nature may keep the mind from going astray or stumbling, +but it is not any excellence of method that can supply it with the +material of knowledge. Those however who aspire not to guess and +divine, but to discover and know; who propose not to devise mimic and +fabulous worlds of their own, but to examine and dissect the nature +of this very world itself; must go to facts themselves for +everything. Nor can the place of this labour and search and +worldwide perambulation be supplied by any genius or meditation or +argumentation; no, not if all men's wits could meet in one. This +therefore we must have, or the business must be for ever abandoned. +But up to this day such has been the condition of men in this matter, +that it is no wonder if nature will not give herself into their hands. + +For first, the information of the sense itself, sometimes failing, +sometimes false; observation, careless, irregular, and led by chance; +tradition, vain and fed on rumour; practice, slavishly bent upon its +work; experiment, blind, stupid, vague, and prematurely broken off; +lastly, natural history, trivial and poor;--all these have contributed +to supply the understanding with very bad materials for philosophy and +the sciences. + +Then an attempt is made to mend the matter by a preposterous subtlety +and winnowing of argument. But this comes too late, the case being +already past remedy; and is far from setting the business right +or sifting away the errors. The only hope therefore of any greater +increase or progress lies in a reconstruction of the sciences. + +Of this reconstruction the foundation must be laid in natural history, +and that of a new kind and gathered on a new principle. For it is +in vain that you polish the mirror if there are no images to be +reflected; and it is as necessary that the intellect should be +supplied with fit matter to work upon, as with safeguards to guide its +working. But my history differs from that in use (as my logic does) in +many things,--in end and office, in mass and composition, in subtlety, +in selection also and setting forth, with a view to the operations +which are to follow. + +For first, the object of a natural history which I propose is not so +much to delight with variety of matter or to help with present use of +experiments, as to give light to the discovery of causes and supply a +suckling philosophy with its first food. For though it be true that +I am principally in pursuit of works and the active department of the +sciences, yet I wait for harvest-time, and do not attempt to mow +the moss or to reap the green corn. For I well know that axioms once +rightly discovered will carry whole troops of works along with them, +and produce them, not here and there one, but in clusters. And that +unseasonable and puerile hurry to snatch by way of earnest at the +first works which come within reach, I utterly condemn and reject, as +an Atalanta's apple that hinders the race. Such then is the office of +this natural history of mine. + +Next, with regard to the mass and composition of it: I mean it to be a +history not only of nature free and at large (when she is left to +her own course and does her work her own way)--such as that of +the heavenly bodies, meteors, earth and sea, minerals, plants, +animals,--but much more of nature under constraint and vexed; that +is to say, when by art and the hand of man she is forced out of her +natural state, and squeezed and moulded. Therefore I set down at +length all experiments of the mechanical arts, of the operative part +of the liberal arts, of the many crafts which have not yet grown into +arts properly so called, so far as I have been able to examine them +and as they conduce to the end in view. Nay (to say the plain truth) +I do in fact (low and vulgar as men may think it) count more upon this +part both for helps and safeguards than upon the other; seeing that +the nature of things betrays itself more readily under the vexations +of art than in its natural freedom. + +Nor do I confine the history to Bodies; but I have thought it my +duty besides to make a separate history of such Virtues as may be +considered cardinal in nature. I mean those original passions or +desires of matter which constitute the primary elements of nature; +such as Dense and Rare, Hot and Cold, Solid and Fluid, Heavy and +Light, and several others. + +Then again, to speak of subtlety: I seek out and get together a +kind of experiments much subtler and simpler than those which occur +accidentally. For I drag into light many things which no one who was +not proceeding by a regular and certain way to the discovery of causes +would have thought of inquiring after; being indeed in themselves of +no great use; which shows that they were not sought for on their own +account; but having just the same relation to things and works which +the letters of the alphabet have to speech and words--which, though +in themselves useless, are the elements of which all discourse is made +up. + +Further, in the selection of the relation and experiments I conceive I +have been a more cautious purveyor than those who have hitherto dealt +with natural history. For I admit nothing but on the faith of eyes, +or at least of careful and severe examination; so that nothing is +exaggerated for wonder's sake, but what I state is sound and without +mixture of fables or vanity. All received or current falsehoods +also (which by strange negligence have been allowed for many ages to +prevail and become established) I proscribe and brand by name; that +the sciences may be no more troubled with them For it has been well +observed that the fables and superstitions and follies which nurses +instil into children do serious injury to their minds; and the same +consideration makes me anxious, having the management of the childhood +as it were of philosophy in its course of natural history, not to let +it accustom itself in the beginning to any vanity. Moreover, whenever +I come to a new experiment of any subtlety (though it be in my own +opinion certain and approved), I nevertheless subjoin a clear account +of the manner in which I made it; that men knowing exactly how each +point was made out, may see whether there be any error connected with +it, and may arouse themselves to devise proofs more trustworthy and +exquisite, if such can be found; and finally, I interpose everywhere +admonitions and scruples and cautions, with a religious care to eject, +repress, and as it were exorcise every kind of phantasm. + +Lastly, knowing how much the sight of man's mind is distracted by +experience and history, and how hard it is at the first (especially +for minds either tender or preoccupied) to become familiar with +nature, I not unfrequently subjoin observations of my own, being as +the first offers, inclinations, and as it were glances of history +towards philosophy; both by way of an assurance to men that they will +be kept for ever tossing on the waves of experience, and also that +when the time comes for the intellect to begin its work, it may find +everything the more ready. By such a natural history then as I have +described, I conceive that a safe and convenient approach may be made +to nature, and matter supplied of good quality and well prepared for +the understanding to work upon. + + * * * * * + +And now that we have surrounded the intellect with faithful helps and +guards, and got together with most careful selection a regular army of +divine works, it may seem that we have no more to do but to proceed to +philosophy itself. And yet in a matter so difficult and doubtful there +are still some things which it seems necessary to premise, partly for +convenience of explanation, partly for present use. + +Of these the first is to set forth examples of inquiry and invention +according to my method, exhibited by anticipation in some particular +subjects; choosing such subjects as are at once the most noble in +themselves among those under inquiry, and most different one from +another; that there may be an example in every kind. I do not speak of +those examples which are joined to the several precepts and rules by +way of illustration (for of these I have given plenty in the second +part of the work); but I mean actual types and models, by which the +entire process of the mind and the whole fabric and order of invention +from the beginning to the end, in certain subjects, and those various +and remarkable, should be set as it were before the eyes. For +I remember that in the mathematics it is easy to follow the +demonstration when you have a machine beside you; whereas without +that help all appears involved and more subtle than it really is. To +examples of this kind,--being in fact nothing more than an application +of the second part in detail and at large,--the fourth part of the +work is devoted. + + * * * * * + +The fifth part is for temporary use only, pending the completion of +the rest; like interest payable from time to time until the principal +be forthcoming. For I do not make so blindly for the end of my +journey, as to neglect anything useful that may turn up by the way. +And therefore I include in this fifth part such things as I have +myself discovered, proved, or added,--not however according to the +true rules and methods of interpretation, but by the ordinary use of +the understanding in inquiring and discovering. For besides that I +hope my speculations may in virtue of my continual conversancy with +nature have a value beyond the pretensions of my wit, they will +serve in the meantime for wayside inns in which the mind may rest +and refresh itself on its journey to more certain conclusions. +Nevertheless I wish it to be understood in the meantime that they are +conclusions by which (as not being discovered and proved by the true +form of interpretation) I do not at all mean to bind myself. Nor +need any one be alarmed at such suspension of judgment, in one who +maintains not simply that nothing can be known, but only that nothing +can be known except in a certain course and way; and yet establishes +provisionally certain degrees of assurance, for use and relief until +the mind shall arrive at a knowledge of causes in which it can +rest. For even those schools of philosophy which held the absolute +impossibility of knowing anything were not inferior to those which +took upon them to pronounce. But then they did not provide helps for +the sense and understanding, as I have done, but simply took away all +their authority: which is quite a different thing--almost the reverse. + + * * * * * + +The sixth part of my work (to which the rest is subservient and +ministrant) discloses and sets forth that philosophy which by +the legitimate, chaste, and severe course of inquiry which I have +explained and provided is at length developed and established. The +completion however of this last part is a thing both above my strength +and beyond my hopes. I have made a beginning of the work--a beginning, +as I hope, not unimportant:--the fortune of the human race will give +the issue;--such an issue, it may be, as in the present condition of +things and men's minds cannot easily be conceived or imagined. For +the matter in hand is no mere felicity of speculation, but the real +business and fortunes of the human race, and all power of operation. +For man is but the servant and interpreter of nature: what he does and +what he knows is only what he has observed of nature's order in fact +or in thought; beyond this he knows nothing and can do nothing. For +the chain of causes cannot by any force be loosed or broken, nor can +nature be commanded except by being obeyed. And so those twin objects, +human Knowledge and human Power, do really meet in one; and it is from +ignorance of causes that operation fails. + +And all depends on keeping the eye steadily fixed upon the facts +of nature and so receiving their images simply as they are. For God +forbid that we should give out a dream of our own imagination for a +pattern of the world; rather may he graciously grant to us to write an +apocalypse or true vision of the footsteps of the Creator imprinted on +his creatures. + +Therefore do thou, O Father, who gavest the visible light as the +first fruits of creation, and didst breathe into the face of man the +intellectual light as the crown and consummation thereof, guard and +protect this work, which coming from thy goodness returneth to thy +glory. Thou when thou turnedst to look upon the works which thy hands +had made, sawest that all was very good, and didst rest from thy +labours. But man, when he turned to look upon the work which his hands +had made, saw that all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and could +find no rest therein. Wherefore if we labour in thy works with the +sweat of our brows thou wilt make us partakers of thy vision and thy +sabbath. Humbly we pray that this mind may be steadfast in us, and +that through these our hands, and the hands of others to whom thou +shalt give the same spirit, thou wilt vouchsafe to endow the human +family with new mercies. + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE NOVUM ORGANUM + + +Those who have taken upon them to lay down the law of nature as a +thing already searched out and understood, whether they have spoken +in simple assurance or professional affectation, have therein done +philosophy and the sciences great injury. For as they have been +successful in inducing belief, so they have been effective in +quenching and stopping inquiry; and have done more harm by spoiling +and putting an end to other men's efforts than good by their own. +Those on the other hand who have taken a contrary course, and asserted +that absolutely nothing can be known,--whether it were from hatred of +the ancient sophists, or from uncertainty and fluctuation of mind, +or even from a kind of fulness of learning, that they fell upon this +opinion,--have certainly advanced reasons for it that are not to be +despised; but yet they have neither started from true principles nor +rested in the just conclusion, zeal and affectation having carried +them much too far. The more ancient of the Greeks (whose writings +are lost) took up with better judgment a position between these two +extremes,--between the presumption of pronouncing on everything, +and the despair of comprehending anything; and though frequently and +bitterly complaining of the difficulty of inquiry and the obscurity of +things, and like impatient horses champing the bit, they did not +the less follow up their object and engage with Nature; thinking (it +seems) that this very question,--viz. whether or no anything can be +known,--was to be settled not by arguing, but by trying. And yet they +too, trusting entirely to the force of their understanding, applied +no rule, but made everything turn upon hard thinking and perpetual +working and exercise of the mind. + +Now my method, though hard to practise, is easy to explain; and it +is this. I propose to establish progressive stages of certainty. The +evidence of the sense, helped and guarded by a certain process of +correction, I retain. But the mental operation which follows the act +of sense I for the most part reject; and instead of it I open and +lay out a new and certain path for the mind to proceed in, starting +directly from the simple sensuous perception. The necessity of this +was felt no doubt by those who attributed so much importance to +Logic; showing thereby that they were in search of helps for the +understanding, and had no confidence in the native and spontaneous +process of the mind. But this remedy comes too late to do any +good, when the mind is already, through the daily intercourse and +conversation of life, occupied with unsound doctrines and beset on all +sides by vain imaginations. And therefore that art of Logic, coming +(as I said) too late to the rescue, and no way able to set matters +right again, has had the effect of fixing errors rather than +disclosing truth. There remains but one course for the recovery of +a sound and healthy condition,--namely, that the entire work of the +understanding be commenced afresh, and the mind itself be from the +very outset not left to take its own course, but guided at every step; +and the business be done as if by machinery. Certainly if in things +mechanical men had set to work with their naked hands, without help or +force of instruments, just as in things intellectual they have set to +work with little else than the naked forces of the understanding, very +small would the matters have been which, even with their best efforts +applied in conjunction, they could have attempted or accomplished. Now +(to pause while upon this example and look in it as in a glass) let us +suppose that some vast obelisk were (for the decoration of a triumph +or some such magnificence) to be removed from its place, and that men +should set to work upon it with their naked hands; would not any +sober spectator think them mad? And if they should then send for more +people, thinking that in that way they might manage it, would he +not think them all the madder? And if they then proceeded to make a +selection, putting away the weaker hands, and using only the strong +and vigorous, would he not think them madder than ever? And if +lastly, not content with this, they resolved to call in aid the art +of athletics, and required all their men to come with hands, arms, +and sinews well anointed and medicated according to the rules of art, +would he not cry out that they were only taking pains to show a kind +of method and discretion in their madness? Yet just so it is that +men proceed in matters intellectual,--with just the same kind of mad +effort and useless combination of forces,--when they hope great things +either from the number and cooperation or from the excellency and +acuteness of individual wits; yea, and when they endeavour by Logic +(which may be considered as a kind of athletic art) to strengthen the +sinews of the understanding; and yet with all this study and endeavour +it is apparent to any true judgment that they are but applying the +naked intellect all the time; whereas in every great work to be done +by the hand of man it is manifestly impossible, without instruments +or machinery, either for the strength of each to be exerted or the +strength of all to be united. + +Upon these premises two things occur to me of which, that they may +not be overlooked, I would have men reminded. First it falls out +fortunately as I think for the allaying of contradictions and +heart-burnings, that the honour and reverence due to the ancients +remains untouched and undiminished; while I may carry out my designs +and at the same time reap the fruit of my modesty. For if I should +profess that I, going the same road as the ancients, have something +better to produce, there must needs have been some comparison or +rivalry between us (not to be avoided by any art of words) in respect +of excellency or ability of wit; and though in this there would be +nothing unlawful or new (for if there be anything misapprehended by +them, or falsely laid down, why may not I, using a liberty common +to all, take exception to it?) yet the contest, however just and +allowable, would have been an unequal one perhaps, in respect of the +measure of my own powers. As it is however,--my object being to open a +new way for the understanding, a way by them untried and unknown,--the +case is altered; party zeal and emulation are at an end; and I appear +merely as a guide to point out the road; an office of small authority, +and depending more upon a kind of luck than upon any ability or +excellency. And thus much relates to the persons only. The other point +of which I would have men reminded relates to the matter itself. + +Be it remembered then that I am far from wishing to interfere with +the philosophy which now flourishes, or with any other philosophy +more correct and complete than this which has been or may hereafter +be propounded. For I do not object to the use of this received +philosophy, or others like it, for supplying matter for disputations +or ornaments for discourse,--for the professor's lecture and for the +business of life. Nay more, I declare openly that for these uses the +philosophy which I bring forward will not be much available. It does +not lie in the way. It cannot be caught up in passage. It does not +flatter the understanding by conformity with preconceived notions. +Nor will it come down to the apprehension of the vulgar except by its +utility and effects. + +Let there be therefore (and may it be for the benefit of both) two +streams and two dispensations of knowledge; and in like manner two +tribes or kindreds of students in philosophy--tribes not hostile or +alien to each other, but bound together by mutual services;--let there +in short be one method for the cultivation, another for the invention, +of knowledge. + +And for those who prefer the former, either from hurry or from +considerations of business or for want of mental power to take in and +embrace the other (which must needs be most men's case), I wish that +they may succeed to their desire in what they are about, and obtain +what they are pursuing. But if any man there be who, not content +to rest in and use the knowledge which has already been discovered, +aspires to penetrate further; to overcome, not an adversary in +argument, but nature in action; to seek, not pretty and probable +conjectures, but certain and demonstrable knowledge;--I invite all +such to join themselves, as true sons of knowledge, with me, that +passing by the outer courts of nature, which numbers have trodden, +we may find a way at length into her inner chambers. And to make my +meaning clearer and to familiarise the thing by giving it a name, I +have chosen to call one of these methods or ways _Anticipation of the +Mind_, the other _Interpretation of Nature_. + +Moreover I have one request to make. I have on my own part made it my +care and study that the things which I shall propound should not only +be true, but should also be presented to men's minds, how strangely +soever preoccupied and obstructed, in a manner not harsh or +unpleasant. It is but reasonable however (especially in so great a +restoration of learning and knowledge) that I should claim of men one +favour in return; which is this; If any one would form an opinion or +judgment either out of his own observation, or out of the crowd of +authorities, or out of the forms of demonstration (which have now +acquired a sanction like that of judicial laws), concerning these +speculations of mine, let him not hope that he can do it in passage or +by the by; but let him examine the thing thoroughly; let him make some +little trial for himself of the way which I describe and lay out; let +him familiarise his thoughts with that subtlety of nature to which +experience bears witness; let him correct by seasonable patience and +due delay the depraved and deep-rooted habits of his mind; and when +all this is done and he has begun to be his own master, let him (if he +will) use his own judgment. + + + + +PREFACE TO THE FIRST FOLIO EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE'S PLAYS (1623)[A] + +TO THE GREAT VARIETY OF READERS + + +From the most able, to him that can but spell: There you are number'd. +We had rather you were weighd. Especially, when the fate of all Bookes +depends vpon your capacities: and not of your heads alone, but of your +purses. Well! it is now publique, & you wil stand for your priuiledges +wee know: to read, and censure. Do so, but buy it first. That doth +best commend a Booke, the Stationer saies. Then, how odde soeuer your +braines be, or your wisedomes, make your licence the same, and +spare not. Iudge your sixe-pen'orth, your shillings worth, your fiue +shillings worth at a time, or higher, so you rise to the iust rates, +and welcome. But, what euer you do, Buy. Censure will not driue a +Trade, or make the Iacke go. And though you be a Magistrate of wit, +and sit on the Stage at _Black-Friers_, or the _Cock-pit_, to arraigne +Playes dailie, know, these Playes haue had their triall alreadie, +and stood out all Appeals; and do now come forth quitted rather by a +Decree of Court, then any purchas'd Letters of commendation. + +It had bene a thing, we confesse, worthie to haue bene wished, that +the Author himselfe had liu'd to haue set forth, and ouerseen his owne +writings. But since it hath bin ordain'd otherwise, and he by death +departed from that right, we pray you do not envie his Friends, the +office of their care, and paine to haue collected & publish'd them, +and so to haue publish'd them, as where (before) you were abus'd with +diuerse stolne, and surreptitious copies, maimed, and deformed by the +frauds and stealthes of iniurious imposters, that expos'd them euen +those, are now offer'd to your view cur'd, and perfect of their +limbes, and all the rest, absolute in their numbers, as he conceiued +them. Who, as he was a happie imitator of Nature, was a most gentle +expresser of it. His mind and hand went together. And what he thought, +he vttered with that easinesse, that wee haue scarse receiued from him +a blot in his papers. But it is not our prouince, who onely gather his +works, and giue them you, to praise him. It is yours that reade him. +And there we hope, to your diuers capacities, you will finde enough, +both to draw, and hold you for his wit can no more lie hid then it +could be lost. Reade him, therefore and againe and againe. And if then +you doe not like him surely you are in some manifest danger, not to +vnderstand him. And so we leaue you to other of his Friends, whom if +you need can bee your guides: if you neede them not, you can leade +your selues, and others. And such Readers we wish him. + +JOHN HEMINGE HENRIE CONDELL. + + +[Footnote A: Little more than half of Shakespeare's plays were +published during his lifetime; and in the publication of these there +is no evidence that the author had any hand. Seven years after his +death, John Heminge and Henry Condell, two of his fellow-actors, +collected the unpublished plays, and, in 1623, issued them along with +the others in a single volume, usually known as the First Folio. +When one considers what would have been lost had it not been for the +enterprise of these men, it seems safe to say that the volume they +introduced by this quaint and not too accurate preface, is the most +important single book in the imaginative literature of the world.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE PHILOSOPHIAE NATURALIS PRINCIPIA MATHEMATICA + +BY SIR ISAAC NEWTON. (1686)[A] + + +Since the ancients (as we are told by Pappus) made great account of +the science of mechanics in the investigation of natural things; and +the moderns, laying aside substantial forms and occult qualities, +have endeavored to subject the phenomena of nature to the laws of +mathematics, I have in this treatise cultivated mathematics so far as +it regards philosophy. The ancients considered mechanics in a twofold +respect; as rational, which proceeds accurately by demonstration, and +practical. To practical mechanics all the manual arts belong, from +which mechanics took its name. But as artificers do not work with +perfect accuracy, it comes to pass that mechanics is so distinguished +from geometry, that what is perfectly accurate is called geometrical; +what is less so is called mechanical. But the errors are not in the +art, but in the artificers. He that works with less accuracy is an +imperfect mechanic: and if any could work with perfect accuracy, he +would be the most perfect mechanic of all; for the description of +right lines and circles, upon which geometry is founded, belongs +to mechanics. Geometry does not teach us to draw these lines, but +requires them to be drawn; for it requires that the learner should +first be taught to describe these accurately, before he enters upon +geometry; then it shows how by these operations problems may be +solved. To describe right lines and circles are problems, but not +geometrical problems. The solution of these problems is required from +mechanics; and by geometry the use of them, when so solved, is shown; +and it is the glory of geometry that from those few principles, +fetched from without, it is able to produce so many things. Therefore +geometry is founded in mechanical practice, and is nothing but that +part of universal mechanics which accurately proposes and demonstrates +the art of measuring. But since the manual arts are chiefly conversant +in the moving of bodies, it comes to pass that geometry is commonly +referred to their magnitudes, and mechanics to their motion. In this +sense rational mechanics will be the science of motions resulting +from any forces whatsoever, and of the forces required to produce any +motions, accurately proposed and demonstrated. This part of mechanics +was cultivated by the ancients in the five powers which relate to +manual arts, who considered gravity (it not being a manual power) no +otherwise than as it moved weights by those powers. Our design, not +respecting arts, but philosophy, and our subject, not manual, but +natural powers, we consider chiefly those things which relate to +gravity, levity, elastic force, the resistance of fluids, and the like +forces, whether attractive or impulsive; and therefore we offer this +work as mathematical principles of philosophy; for all the difficulty +of philosophy seems to consist in this--from the phenomena of motions +to investigate the forces of nature, and then from these forces +to demonstrate the other phenomena; and to this end the general +propositions in the first and second book are directed. In the third +book we give an example of this in the explication of the system of +the World; for by the propositions mathematically demonstrated in the +first book, we there derive from the celestial phenomena the forces +of gravity with which bodies tend to the sun and the several planets. +Then, from these forces, by other propositions which are also +mathematical, we deduce the motions of the planets, the comets, the +moon, and the sea. I wish we could derive the rest of the phenomena of +nature by the same kind of reasoning from mechanical principles; for +I am induced by many reasons to suspect that they may all depend +upon certain forces by which the particles of bodies, by some causes +hitherto unknown, are either mutually impelled towards each other, and +cohere in regular figures, or are repelled and recede from each other; +which forces being unknown, philosophers have hitherto attempted the +search of nature in vain; but I hope the principles here laid +down will afford some light either to that or some truer method of +philosophy. + +In the publication of this work, the most acute and universally +learned Mr. Edmund Halley not only assisted me with his pains in +correcting the press and taking care of the schemes, but it was to +his solicitations that its becoming public is owing; for when he +had obtained of me my demonstrations of the figure of the celestial +orbits, he continually pressed me to communicate the same to the Royal +Society, who afterwards, by their kind encouragement and entreaties, +engaged me to think of publishing them. But after I had begun to +consider the inequalities of the lunar motions, and had entered upon +some other things relating to the laws and measures of gravity, +and other forces; and the figures that would be described by bodies +attracted according to given laws; and the motion of several bodies +moving among themselves; the motion of bodies in resisting mediums; +the forces, densities, and motions of mediums; the orbits of the +comets, and such like; I put off that publication till I had made a +search into those matters, and could put out the whole together. What +relates to the lunar motions (being imperfect) I have put all together +in the corollaries of proposition 66, to avoid being obliged to +propose and distinctly demonstrate the several things there contained +in a method more prolix than the subject deserved, and interrupt the +series of the several propositions. Some things, found out after the +rest, I chose to insert in places less suitable, rather than change +the number of the propositions and the citations. I heartily beg that +what I have here done may be read with candor; and that the defects +I have been guilty of upon this difficult subject may be not so much +reprehended as kindly supplied, and investigated by new endeavors of +my readers. + +Cambridge, Trinity College, ISAAC NEWTON. + +May 8, 1686 + + +[Footnote A: Sir Isaac Newton, the great English mathematician and +physicist, was born at Woolsthorpe in 1642, and died at Kensington in +1727. He held a professorship at Cambridge, represented the University +in Parliament, as master of the mint reformed the English coinage, and +for twenty five years was president of the Royal Society. His theory +of the law of universal gravitation, the most important of his many +discoveries, is expounded in his "Philosophiae Naturalis Principia +Mathematical," usually known merely as the "Principia," from which, +this Preface is translated.] + + + + +PREFACE TO FABLES, + +ANCIENT AND MODERN + +BY JOHN DRYDEN. (1700)[A] + + +'Tis with a poet as with a man who designs to build, and is very +exact, as he supposes, in casting up the cost beforehand, but, +generally speaking, he is mistaken in his account, and reckons short +of the expense he first intended. He alters his mind as the work +proceeds, and will have this or that convenience more, of which he had +not thought when he began. So has it happened to me; I have built a +house, where I intended but a lodge; yet with better success than a +certain nobleman,[1] who, beginning with a dog kennel, never liv'd to +finish the palace he had contriv'd. + +From translating the first of Homer's _Iliads_ (which I intended as an +essay to the whole work) I proceeded to the translation of the twelfth +book of Ovid's _Metamorphoses_, because it contains, among other +things, the causes, the beginning, and ending, of the Trojan war. +Here I ought in reason to have stopp'd; but the speeches of Ajax +and Ulysses lying next in my way, I could not balk 'em. When I had +compass'd them, I was so taken with the former part of the fifteenth +book, (which is the masterpiece of the whole _Metamorphoses_,) that +I enjoin'd myself the pleasing task of rend'ring it into English. And +now I found, by the number of my verses, that they began to swell into +a little volume; which gave me an occasion of looking backward on some +beauties of my author, in his former books. There occurred to me the +_Hunting of the Boar, Cinyras and Myrrha_, the good-natur'd story of +_Baucis and Philemon_, with the rest, which I hope I have translated +closely enough, and given them the same turn of verse which they had +in the original; and this, I may say without vanity, is not the talent +of every poet. He who has arriv'd the nearest to it, is the ingenious +and learned Sandys, the best versifier of the former age; if I may +properly call it by that name, which was the former part of this +concluding century. For Spenser and Fairfax both flourish'd in the +reign of Queen Elizabeth; great masters in our language, and who +saw much farther into the beauties of our numbers than those who +immediately followed them. Milton was the poetical son of Spenser, and +Mr. Waller of Fairfax, for we have our lineal descents and clans as +well as other families. Spenser more than once insinuates that the +soul of Chaucer was transfus'd into his body, and that he was begotten +by him two hundred years after his decease. Milton has acknowledg'd to +me that Spenser was his original, and many besides myself have heard +our famous Waller own that he deriv'd the harmony of his numbers +from the _Godfrey of Bulloign_, which was turned into English by Mr. +Fairfax. But to return. Having done with Ovid for this time, it +came into my mind that our old English poet, Chaucer, in many things +resembled him, and that with no disadvantage on the side of the modern +author, as I shall endeavor to prove when I compare them; and as I +am, and always have been, studious to promote the honor of my native +country, so I soon resolv'd to put their merits to the trial, by +turning some of the _Canterbury Tales_ into our language, as it is +now refin'd; for by this means, both the poets being set in the same +light, and dress'd in the same English habit, story to be compar'd +with story, a certain judgment may be made betwixt them by the reader, +without obtruding my opinion on him. Or, if I seem partial to my +countryman and predecessor in the laurel, the friends of antiquity +are not few; and besides many of the learn'd, Ovid has almost all the +beaux, and the whole fair sex, his declared patrons. Perhaps I have +assum'd somewhat more to myself than they allow me, because I have +adventur'd to sum up the evidence; but the readers are the jury, and +their privilege remains entire, to decide, according to the merits of +the cause, or if they please, to bring it to another hearing before +some other court. In the mean time, to follow the thrid of my +discourse, (as thoughts, according to Mr. Hobbes, have always some +connection,) so from Chaucer I was led to think on Boccace, who was +not only his contemporary, but also pursued the same studies; wrote +novels in prose, and many works in verse; particularly is said to have +invented the octave rhyme,[2] or stanza of eight lines, which ever +since has been maintain'd by the practice of all Italian writers, who +are, or at least assume the title of, heroic poets. He and Chaucer, +among other things, had this in common, that they refin'd their mother +tongues; but with this difference, that Dante had begun to file their +language, at least in verse, before the time of Boccace, who likewise +receiv'd no little help from his master Petrarch. But the reformation +of their prose was wholly owing to Boccace himself, who is yet the +standard of purity in the Italian tongue; tho' many of his phrases are +become obsolete, as in process of time it must needs happen. Chaucer +(as you have formerly been told by our learn'd Mr. Rymer) first +adorn'd and amplified our barren tongue from the Provençal,[3] which +was then the most polish'd of all the modern languages; but this +subject has been copiously treated by that great critic, who deserves +no little commendation from us his countrymen. For these reasons of +time, and resemblance of genius in Chaucer and Boccace, I resolv'd +to join them in my present work; to which I have added some original +papers of my own; which, whether they are equal or inferior to my +other poems, an author is the most improper judge, and therefore I +leave them wholly to the mercy of the reader. I will hope the best, +that they will not be condemn'd; but if they should, I have the excuse +of an old gentleman, who mounting on horseback before some ladies, +when I was present, got up somewhat heavily, but desir'd of the fair +spectators that they would count fourscore and eight before they +judg'd him. By the mercy of God, I am already come within twenty years +of his number, a cripple in my limbs; but what decays are in my mind, +the reader must determine. I think myself as vigorous as ever in the +faculties of my soul, excepting only my memory, which is not impair'd +to any great degree; and if I lose not more of it, I have no great +reason to complain. What judgment I had, increases rather than +diminishes; and thoughts, such as they are, come crowding in so fast +upon me, that my only difficulty is to choose or to reject; to run +them into verse, or to give them the other harmony of prose. I have so +long studied and practic'd both, that they are grown into a habit, and +become familiar to me. In short, tho' I may lawfully plead some part +of the old gentleman's excuse, yet I will reserve it till I think I +have greater need, and ask no grains of allowance for the faults of +this my present work, but those which are given of course to human +frailty. I will not trouble my reader with the shortness of time in +which I writ it, or the several intervals of sickness. They who think +too well of their own performances are apt to boast in their prefaces +how little time their works have cost them, and what other business of +more importance interfere'd; but the reader will be as apt to ask the +question, why they allow'd not a longer time to make their works more +perfect, and why they had so despicable an opinion of their judges +as to thrust their indigested stuff upon them, as if they deser'd no +better. + +With this account of my present undertaking, I conclude the first part +of this discourse; in the second part, as at a second sitting, tho' I +alter not the draught, I must touch the same features over again, and +change the dead coloring[4] of the whole. In general, I will only say +that I have written nothing which savors of immorality or profaneness; +at least, I am not conscious to myself of any such intention. If there +happen to be found an irreverent expression, or a thought too wanton, +they are crept into my verses thro' my inadvertency; if the searchers +find any in the cargo, let them be stay'd or forfeited, like +counterbanded goods; at least, let their authors be answerable +for them, as being but imported merchandise, and not of my own +manufacture. On the other side, I have endeavor'd to choose such +fables, both ancient and modern, as contain in each of them some +instructive moral; which I could prove by induction, but the way +is tedious, and they leap foremost into sight, without the reader's +trouble of looking after them. I wish I could affirm, with a safe +conscience, that I had taken the same care in all my former writings; +for it must be own'd, that supposing verses are never so beautiful or +pleasing, yet if they contain anything which shocks religion, or good +manners, they are at best what Horace says of good numbers without +good sense, _Versus inopes rerum, nugaeque canorae_.[5] Thus far, I +hope, I am right in court, without renouncing to my other right of +self-defense, where I have been wrongfully accus'd, and my sense +wiredrawn into blasphemy or bawdry, as it has often been by a +religious lawyer,[6] in a late pleading against the stage; in which +he mixes truth with falsehood, and has not forgotten the old rule of +calumniating strongly, that something may remain. + +I resume the thrid of my discourse with the first of my translations, +which was the _First Iliad_ of Homer. If it shall please God to give +me longer life, and moderate health, my intentions are to +translate the whole _Ilias_; provided still that I meet with those +encouragements from the public which may enable me to proceed in my +undertaking with some cheerfulness. And this I dare assure the world +beforehand, that I have found by trial Homer a more pleasing task than +Virgil, (tho' I say not the translation will be less laborious). For +the Grecian is more according to my genius than the Latin poet. In +the works of the two authors we may read their manners and natural +inclinations, which are wholly different. Virgil was of a quiet, +sedate temper; Homer was violent, impetuous, and full of fire. The +chief talent of Virgil was propriety of thoughts, and ornament of +words; Homer was rapid in his thoughts, and took all the liberties, +both of numbers and of expressions, which his language, and the age +in which he liv'd, allow'd him. Homer's invention was more copious, +Virgil's more confin'd; so that if Homer had not led the way, it was +not in Virgil to have begun heroic poetry; for nothing can be more +evident than that the Roman poem is but the second part of the +_Ilias_; a continuation of the same story, and the persons already +form'd; the manners of Æneas are those of Hector superadded to those +which Homer gave him. The adventures of Ulysses in the _Odysseis_ are +imitated in the first six books of Virgil's _Aeneis_; and tho' the +accidents are not the same, (which would have argued him of a servile, +copying, and total barrenness of invention,) yet the seas were the +same, in which both the heroes wander'd; and Dido cannot be denied to +be the poetical daughter of Calypso. The six latter books of Virgil's +poem are the four and twenty _Iliads_ contracted: a quarrel occasioned +by a lady, a single combat, battles fought, and a town besieg'd. I +say not this in derogation to Virgil, neither do I contradict anything +which I have formerly said in his just praise: for his episodes are +almost wholly of his own invention; and the form which he has given to +the telling makes the tale his own, even tho' the original story had +been the same. But this proves, however, that Homer taught Virgil to +design; and if invention be the first virtue of an epic poet, then the +Latin poem can only be allow'd the second place. Mr. Hobbes, in the +preface to his own bald translation of the _Ilias_ (studying poetry as +he did mathematics, when it was too late)--Mr. Hobbes, I say, begins +the praise of Homer where he should have ended it. He tells us that +the first beauty of an epic poem consists in diction, that is, in +the choice of words, and harmony of numbers; now the words are the +coloring of the work, which in the order of nature is last to +be consider'd. The design, the disposition, the manners, and the +thoughts, are all before it: where any of those are wanting or +imperfect, so much wants or is imperfect in the imitation of human +life; which is in the very definition of a poem. Words, indeed, like +glaring colors, are the first beauties that arise and strike the +sight: but if the draught be false or lame, the figures ill disposed, +the manners obscure or inconsistent, or the thoughts unnatural, +then the finest colors are but daubing, and the piece is a beautiful +monster at the best. Neither Virgil nor Homer were deficient in any of +the former beauties; but in this last, which is expression, the Roman +poet is at least equal to the Grecian, as I have said elsewhere; +supplying the poverty of his language by his musical ear, and by his +diligence. But to return: our two great poets, being so different in +their tempers, one choleric and sanguine, the other phlegmatic and +melancholic; that which makes them excel in their several ways is +that each of them has follow'd his own natural inclination, as well +in forming the design as in the execution of it. The very heroes +shew their authors: Achilles is hot, impatient, revengeful, _Impiger, +iracundus, inexorabidis, acer_[7] &c.; Æneas patient, considerate, +careful of his people, and merciful to his enemies; ever submissive +to the will of Heaven--_Quo fata trahunt retrahuntque seqitamur_.[8] +I could please myself with enlarging on this subject, but am forc'd to +defer it to a fitter time. From all I have said I will only draw this +inference, that the action of Homer being more full of vigor than that +of Virgil, according to the temper of the writer, is of consequence +more pleasing to the reader. One warms you by degrees: the other sets +you on fire all at once, and never intermits his heat. 'Tis the same +difference which Longinus makes betwixt the effects of eloquence in +Demosthenes and Tully. One persuades; the other commands. You never +cool while you read Homer, even not in the second book (a graceful +flattery to his countrymen); but he hastens from the ships, and +concludes not that book till he has made you an amends by the violent +playing of a new machine. From thence he hurries on his action with +variety of events, and ends it in less compass than two months. +This vehemence of his, I confess, is more suitable to my temper; and +therefore I have translated his first book with greater pleasure +than any part of Virgil; but it was not a pleasure without pains. The +continual agitations of the spirits must needs be a weakening of any +constitution, especially in age; and many pauses are required for +refreshment betwixt the heats; the _Iliad_ of itself being a third +part longer than all Virgil's works together. + +This is what I thought needful in this place to say of Homer. I +proceed to Ovid and Chaucer, considering the former only in relation +to the latter. With Ovid ended the golden age of the Roman tongue; +from Chaucer the purity of the English tongue began. The manners of +the poets were not unlike: both of them were well bred, well natur'd, +amorous, and libertine, at least in their writings, it may be also in +their lives. Their studies were the same, philosophy and philology. +Both of them were knowing in astronomy, of which Ovid's books of the +Roman feasts, and Chaucer's treatise of the Astrolabe, are sufficient +witnesses. But Chaucer was likewise an astrologer, as were Virgil, +Horace, Persius, and Manilius. Both writ with wonderful facility and +clearness: neither were great inventors; for Ovid only copied the +Grecian fables; and most of Chaucer's stones were taken from his +Italian contemporaries, or their predecessors.[9] Boccace his +_Decameron_ was first publish'd; and from thence our Englishman has +borrow'd many of his _Canterbury Tales_; yet that of _Palamon and +Arcite_ was written in all probability by some Italian wit in a former +age, as I shall prove hereafter. The tale of Grizild was the invention +of Petrarch; by him sent to Boccace; from whom it came to Chaucer. +_Troilus and Cressida_ was also written by a Lombard author; but much +amplified by our English translator, as well as beautified; the genius +of our countrymen, in general, being rather to improve an invention, +than to invent themselves; as is evident not only in our poetry, but +in many of our manufactures. I find I have anticipated already, and +taken up from Boccace before I come to him; but there is so much +less behind; and I am of the temper of most kings, _who love to be +in debt_, are all for present money, no matter how they pay it +afterwards: besides, the nature of a preface is rambling; never wholly +out of the way, nor in it. This I have learn'd from the practice of +honest Montaigne, and return at my pleasure to Ovid and Chaucer, of +whom I have little more to say. Both of them built on the inventions +of other men; yet since Chaucer had something of his own, as _The Wife +of Bath's Tale, The Cock and the Fox_,[10] which I have translated, +and some others, I may justly give our countryman the precedence in +that part; since I can remember nothing of Ovid which was wholly his. +Both of them understood the manners, under which name I comprehend +the passions, and, in a larger sense, the descriptions of persons, +and their very habits; for an example, I see Baucis and Philemon as +perfectly before me, as if some ancient painter had drawn them; +and all the pilgrims in the _Canterbury Tales_, their humors, their +features, and the very dress, as distinctly as if I had supp'd with +them at the Tabard in Southwark; yet even there too the figures of +Chaucer are much more lively, and set in a better light: which tho' +I have not time to prove, yet I appeal to the reader, and am sure he +will clear me from partiality. The thoughts and words remain to be +consider'd in the comparison of the two poets; and I have sav'd myself +one half of that labor, by owning that Ovid liv'd when the Roman +tongue was in its meridian, Chaucer in the dawning of our language; +therefore that part of the comparison stands not on an equal foot, +any more than the diction of Ennius and Ovid, or of Chaucer and our +present English. The words are given up as a post not to be defended +in our poet, because he wanted the modern art of fortifying. The +thoughts remain to be consider'd, and they are to be measured only by +their propriety; that is, as they flow more or less naturally from +the persons describ'd, on such and such occasions. The vulgar judges, +which are nine parts in ten of all nations, who call conceits and +jingles wit, who see Ovid full of them, and Chaucer altogether +without them, will think me little less than mad, for preferring the +Englishman to the Roman: yet, with their leave, I must presume to say +that the things they admire are only glittering trifles, and so far +from being witty, that in a serious poem they are nauseous, because +they are unnatural. Would any man who is ready to die for love +describe his passion like Narcissus? Would he think of _inopem me +copia fecit_,[11] and a dozen more of such expressions, pour'd on the +neck of one another, and signifying all the same thing? If this were +wit, was this a time to be witty, when the poor wretch was in the +agony of death? This is just John Littlewit in _Bartholomew Fair_,[12] +who had a conceit (as he tells you) left him in his misery; a +miserable conceit. On these occasions the poet should endeavor to +raise pity; but instead of this, Ovid is tickling you to laugh. Virgil +never made use of such machines, when he was moving you to commiserate +the death of Dido: he would not destroy what he was building. Chaucer +makes Arcite violent in his love, and unjust in the pursuit of it; yet +when he came to die, he made him think more reasonably: he repents not +of his love, for that had alter'd his character; but acknowledges +the injustice of his proceedings, and resigns Emilia to Palamon. What +would Ovid have done on this occasion? He would certainly have made +Arcite witty on his deathbed. He had complain'd he was farther off +from possession by being so near, and a thousand such boyisms, which +Chaucer rejected as below the dignity of the subject. They who think +otherwise would by the same reason prefer Lucan and Ovid to Homer and +Virgil, and Martial to all four of them. As for the turn of words, in +which Ovid particularly excels all poets, they are sometimes a fault, +and sometimes a beauty, as they are us'd properly or improperly; but +in strong passions always to be shunn'd, because passions are serious, +and will admit no playing. The French have a high value for them; +and I confess, they are often what they call delicate, when they are +introduced with judgment; but Chaucer writ with more simplicity, and +followed nature more closely, than to use them. I have thus far, to +the best of my knowledge, been an upright judge betwixt the parties in +competition, not meddling with the design nor the disposition of it; +because the design was not their own, and in the disposing of it they +were equal. It remains that I say somewhat of Chaucer in particular. + +In the first place, as he is the father of English poetry, so I hold +him in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians held Homer or the +Romans Virgil. He is a perpetual fountain of good sense, learn'd in +all sciences, and therefore speaks properly on all subjects as he knew +what to say, so he knows also when to leave off, a continence which +is practic'd by few writers, and scarcely by any of the ancients, +excepting Virgil and Horace. One of our late great poets[13] is sunk +in his reputation, because he could never forgive any conceit which +came in his way, but swept like a dragnet, great and small. There +was plenty enough, but the dishes were ill sorted, whole pyramids of +sweetmeats for boys and women, but little of solid meat for men. +All this proceeded not from any want of knowledge, but of judgment, +neither did he want that in discerning the beauties and faults of +other poets, but only indulg'd himself in the luxury of writing, and +perhaps knew it was a fault, but hop'd the reader would not find it. +For this reason, tho' he must always be thought a great poet he is +no longer esteem'd a good writer, and for ten impressions, which his +works have had in so many successive years, yet at present a hundred +books are scarcely purchas'd once a twelvemonth for, as my last Lord +Rochester said, tho' somewhat profanely, "Not being of God, he could +not stand." + +Chaucer follow'd Nature everywhere, but was never so bold to go beyond +her, and there is a great difference of being _poeta_ and _aimis +poeta_,[14] if we may believe Catullus, as much as betwixt a modest +behavior and affectation. The verse of Chaucer, I confess, is not +harmonious to us, but 'tis like the eloquence of one whom Tacitus +commends it was _auribus istius temporis accommodata_[15] they who +liv'd with him, and some time after him, thought it musical and it +continued so even in our judgment, if compar'd with the numbers of +Lydgate and Gower, his contemporaries there is the rude sweetness of +a Scotch tune in it, which is natural and pleasing, tho' not perfect. +'Tis true, I cannot go so far as he who published the last edition of +him [16] for he would make us believe the fault is in our ears, and +that there were really ten syllables in a verse where we find but nine +but this opinion is not worth confuting, 'tis so gross and obvious an +error, that common sense (which is a rule in everything but matters +of faith and revelation) must convince the reader that equality of +numbers in every verse which we call heroic was either not known, +or not always practic'd, in Chaucer's age. It were an easy matter to +produce some thousands of his verses, which are lame for want of half +a foot, and sometimes a whole one, and which no pronunciation can +make otherwise. We can only say, that he liv'd in the infancy of our +poetry, and that nothing is brought to perfection at the first. We +must be children before we grow men. There was an Ennius, and in +process of time a Lucilius and a Lucretius, before Virgil and Horace; +even after Chaucer there was a Spenser, a Harrington, a Fairfax, +before Waller and Denham were in being: and our numbers were in their +nonage till these last appear'd. I need say little of his parentage, +life, and fortunes;[17] they are to be found at large in all the +editions of his works. He was employ'd abroad and favor'd by Edward +the Third, Richard the Second, and Henry the Fourth, and was poet, as +I suppose, to all three of them. In Richard's time, I doubt, he was +a little dipp'd in the rebellion of the commons, and being +brother-in-law to John of Ghant, it was no wonder if he follow'd the +fortunes of that family, and was well with Henry the Fourth when he +had depos'd his predecessor. Neither is it to be admir'd,[18] that +Henry, who was a wise as well as a valiant prince, who claim'd by +succession, and was sensible that his title was not sound, but was +rightfully in Mortimer, who had married the heir of York; it was not +to be admir'd, I say, if that great politician should be pleas'd to +have the greatest wit of those times in his interests, and to be the +trumpet of his praises. Augustus had given him the example, by the +advice of Mæcenas, who recommended Virgil and Horace to him; whose +praises help'd to make him popular while he was alive, and after his +death have made him precious to posterity. As for the religion of +our poet, he seems to have some little bias towards the opinions of +Wycliffe, after John of Ghant his patron; somewhat of which appears in +the tale of Piers Plowman.[19] Yet I cannot blame him for inveighing +so sharply against the vices of the clergy in his age; their pride, +their ambition, their pomp, their avarice, their worldly interest, +deserv'd the lashes which he gave them, both in that and in most of +his _Canterbury Tales_: neither has his contemporary Boccace spar'd +them. Yet both those poets liv'd in much esteem with good and holy +men in orders; for the scandal which is given by particular priests +reflects not on the sacred function. Chaucer's Monk, his Canon, and +his Friar, took not from the character of his Good Parson. A satirical +poet is the check of the laymen on bad priests. We are only to take +care that we involve not the innocent with the guilty in the same +condemnation. The good cannot be too much honor'd, nor the bad too +coarsely us'd: for the corruption of the best becomes the worst. When +a clergyman is whipp'd, his gown is first taken off, by which the +dignity of his order is secur'd: if he be wrongfully accus'd, he has +his action of slander; and 'tis at the poet's peril if he transgress +the law. But they will tell us that all kind of satire, tho' never so +well deserv'd by particular priests, yet brings the whole order into +contempt. Is then the peerage of England anything dishonored, when a +peer suffers for his treason? If he be libel'd or any way defam'd, he +has his _scandalum magnatum_[20] to punish the offender. They who use +this kind of argument seem to be conscious to themselves of somewhat +which has deserv'd the poet's lash, and are less concern'd for their +public capacity than for their private; at least there is pride at the +bottom of their reasoning. If the faults of men in orders are only to +be judg'd among themselves, they are all in some sort parties: for, +since they say the honor of their order is concern'd in every member +of it, how can we be sure that they will be impartial judges? How far +I may be allow'd to speak my opinion in this case, I know not; but I +am sure a dispute of this nature caus'd mischief in abundance betwixt +a king of England and an archbishop of Canterbury,[21] one standing +up for the laws of his land, and the other for the honor (as he call'd +it) of God's Church; which ended in the murther of the prelate, and in +the whipping of his Majesty from post to pillar for his penance. +The learn'd and ingenious Dr. Drake[22] has say'd me the labour of +inquiring into the esteem and reverence which the priests have had +of old, and I would rather extend than diminish any part of it: yet +I must needs say, that when a priest provokes me without any occasion +given him, I have no reason, unless it be the charity of a Christian, +to forgive him: _prior læsit_[23] is justification sufficient in the +civil law. If I answer him in his own language, self-defense, I am +sure, must be allow'd me; and if I carry it farther, even to a sharp +recrimination, somewhat may be indulg'd to human frailty. Yet my +resentment has not wrought so far, but that I have followed Chaucer +in his character of a holy man, and have enlarg'd on that subject with +some pleasure, reserving to myself the right, if I shall think fit +hereafter, to describe another sort of priests, such as are more +easily to be found than the Good Parson; such as have given the last +blow to Christianity in this age, by a practice so contrary to their +doctrine. But this will keep cold till another time. In the mean while +I take up Chaucer where I left him. He must have been a man of a most +wonderful comprehensive nature, because, as it has been truly observed +of him, he has taken into the compass of his _Canterbury Tales_ the +various manners and humors (as we now call them) of the whole English +nation, in his age. Not a single character has escap'd him. All his +pilgrims are severally distinguish'd from each other; and not only +in their inclinations, but in their very physiognomies and persons. +Bapista Porta[24] could not have described their natures better, than +by the marks which the poet gives them. The matter and manner of +their tales, and of their telling, are so suited to their different +educations, humors, and callings, that each of them would be improper +in any other mouth. Even the grave and serious characters are +distinguished by their several sorts of gravity: their discourses are +such as belong to their age, their calling, and their breeding; such +as are becoming of them, and of them only. Some of his persons are +vicious, and some virtuous; some are unlearn'd, or (as Chaucer +calls them) lewd, and some are learn'd. Even the ribaldry of the +low characters is different: the Reeve, the Miller, and the Cook are +several men, and distinguished from each other, as much as the mincing +Lady Prioress and the broad-speaking gap-tooth'd Wife of Bath. But +enough of this: there is such a variety of game springing up before +me, that I am distracted in my choice, and know not which to follow. +'Tis sufficient to say, according to the proverb, that here is God's +plenty. We have our forefathers and great-grandames all before us, +as they were in Chaucer's days; their general characters are still +remaining in mankind, and even in England, tho' they are call'd by +other names than those of Monks and Friars, and Canons, and Lady +Abbesses, and Nuns: for mankind is ever the same, and nothing lost out +of nature, tho' everything is alter'd. May I have leave to do myself +the justice--since my enemies will do me none, and are so far from +granting me to be a good poet, that they will not allow me so much as +to be a Christian, or a moral man--may I have leave, I say, to inform +my reader that I have confin'd my choice to such tales of Chaucer as +savor nothing of immodesty. If I had desir'd more to please than +to instruct, the Reeve, the Miller, the Shipman, the Merchant, the +Sumner, and, above all, the Wife of Bath, in the prologue to her tale, +would have procured me as many friends and readers, as there are beaux +and ladies of pleasure in the town. But I will no more offend against +good manners: I am sensible, as I ought to be, of the scandal I have +given by my loose writings; and make what reparation I am able, +by this public acknowledgment. If anything of this nature, or of +profaneness, be crept into these poems, I am so far from defending it, +that I disown it. _Totum hoc indictum volo._[25] Chaucer makes another +manner of apology for his broad speaking, and Boccace makes the like; +but I will follow neither of them. Our countryman, in the end of his +characters, before the _Canterbury Tales_, thus excuses the ribaldry, +which is very gross in many of his novels: + + But first, I pray you of your courtesy, + That ye ne arrete[26] it nought my villany, + Though that I plainly speak in this mattere + To tellen you her[27] words, and eke her chere: + Ne though I speak her words properly, + For this ye knowen as well as I, + Who shall tellen a tale after a man, + He mote rehearse as nye as ever he can: + Everich word of it been in his charge, + _All speke he never so rudely ne large._ + Or else he mote tellen his tale untrue, + Or feine things, or find words new: + He may not spare, altho he were his brother, + He mote as well say o word as another. + Christ spake himself full broad in holy writ, + And well I wote no villany is it. + Eke Plato saith, who so can him rede, + The words mote[28] been cousin to the dede.[29] + +Yet if a man should have enquired of Boccace or of Chaucer, what need +they had of introducing such characters, where obscene words were +proper in their mouths, but very undecent to be heard; I know not what +answer they could have made: for that reason such tales shall be left +untold by me. You have here a specimen of Chaucer's language, which +is so obsolete that his sense is scarce to be understood; and you +have likewise more than one example of his unequal numbers, which were +mentioned before. Yet many of his verses consist of ten syllables, and +the words not much behind our present English: as for example, these +two lines, in the description of the carpenter's young wife: + + Wincing she was, as is a jolly colt, + Long as a mast, and upright as a bolt. + +I have almost done with Chaucer, when I have answer'd some objections +relating to my present work. I find some people are offended that I +have turn'd these tales into modern English; because they think them +unworthy of my pains, and look on Chaucer as a dry, old-fashion'd wit, +not worth reviving. I have often heard the late Earl of Leicester say +that Mr. Cowley himself was of that opinion; who having read him over +at my lord's request, declar'd he had no taste of him. I dare not +advance my opinion against the judgment of so great an author; but +I think it fair, however, to leave the decision to the public: Mr. +Cowley was too modest to set up for a dictator; and being shock'd +perhaps with his old style, never examin'd into the depth of his +good sense. Chaucer, I confess, is a rough diamond, and must first +be polish'd, ere he shines. I deny not, likewise, that, living in our +early days of poetry, he writes not always of a piece, but sometimes +mingles trivial things with those of greater moment. Sometimes also, +tho' not often, he runs riot, like Ovid, and knows not when he has +said enough. But there are more great wits, beside Chaucer, whose +fault is their excess of conceits, and those ill sorted. An author is +not to write all he can, but only all he ought. Having observ'd this +redundancy in Chaucer, (as it is an easy matter for a man of ordinary +parts to find a fault in one of greater,) I have not tied myself to a +literal translation; but have often omitted what I judg'd unnecessary, +or not of dignity enough to appear in the company of better thoughts. +I have presumed farther, in some places, and added somewhat of my +own where I thought my author was deficient, and had not given his +thoughts their true luster, for want of words in the beginning of our +language. And to this I was the more embolden'd, because (if I may be +permitted to say it of myself) I found I had a soul congenial to his, +and that I had been conversant in the same studies. Another poet, in +another age, may take the same liberty with my writings; if at least +they live long enough to deserve correction. It was also necessary +sometimes to restore the sense of Chaucer, which was lost or mangled +in the errors of the press. Let this example suffice at present; +in the story of _Palawan and Arcite_, where the temple of Diana is +describ'd, you find these verses, in all the editions of our author: + + There saw I Danè turned unto a tree, + I mean not the goddess Diane, + But Venus daughter, which that hight Danè; + +which after a little consideration I knew was to be reformed into this +sense, that Daphne, the daughter of Peneus, was turn'd into a tree. I +durst not make thus bold with Ovid, lest some future Milbourne should +arise, and say I varied from my author, because I understood him not. + +But there are other judges, who think I ought not to have translated +Chaucer into English, out of a quite contrary notion: they suppose +there is a certain veneration due to his old language; and that it +is little less than profanation and sacrilege to alter it. They are +farther of opinion that somewhat of his good sense will suffer in this +transfusion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will infallibly be +lost, which appear with more grace in their old habit. Of this +opinion was that excellent person whom I mention'd, the late Earl of +Leicester, who valued Chaucer as much as Mr. Cowley despis'd him. My +lord dissuaded me from this attempt, (for I was thinking of it some +years before his death,) and his authority prevail'd so far with me +as to defer my undertaking while he liv'd, in deference to him: yet my +reason was not convinc'd with what he urg'd against it. If the first +end of a writer be to be understood, then as his language grows +obsolete, his thoughts must grow obscure: + + Multa renascentur quæ nunc cecidere; cadentque, + Quæ nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus, + Quem penes arbitrium est et jus et norma loquendi.[30] + +When an ancient word for its sound and significance deserves to be +reviv'd, I have that reasonable veneration for antiquity, to restore +it. All beyond this is superstition. Words are not like landmarks, so +sacred as never to be remov'd; customs are chang'd, and even statutes +are silently repeal'd, when the reason ceases for which they were +enacted. As for the other part of the argument, that his thoughts +will lose of their original beauty, by the innovation of words; in +the first place, not only their beauty, but their being is lost, where +they are no longer understood, which is the present case. I grant +that something must be lost in all transfusion, that is, in all +translations; but the sense will remain, which would otherwise be +lost, or at least be maim'd, when it is scarce intelligible; and +that but to a few. How few are there who can read Chaucer so as to +understand him perfectly! And if imperfectly, then with less profit +and no pleasure. 'Tis not for the use of some old Saxon friends that I +have taken these pains with him: let them neglect my version, because +they have no need of it. I made it for their sakes who understand +sense and poetry as well as they, when that poetry and sense is put +into words which they understand. I will go farther, and dare to add, +that what beauties I lose in some places, I give to others which had +them not originally; but in this I may be partial to myself; let the +reader judge, and I submit to his decision. Yet I think I have just +occasion to complain of them, who, because they understand Chaucer, +would deprive the greater part of their countrymen of the same +advantage, and hoard him up, as misers do their grandam gold, only to +look on it themselves and hinder others from making use of it. In +sum, I seriously protest that no man ever had, or can have, a greater +veneration for Chaucer, than myself. I have translated some part +of his works, only that I might perpetuate his memory, or at least +refresh it, amongst my countrymen. If I have alter'd him anywhere for +the better, I must at the same time acknowledge that I could have done +nothing without him: _facile est inventis addere_,[31] is no great +commendation; and I am not so vain to think I have deserv'd a greater. +I will conclude what I have to say of him singly, with this one +remark: a lady of my acquaintance, who keeps a kind of correspondence +with some authors of the fair sex in France, has been inform'd by +them, that Mademoiselle de Scudéry, who is as old as Sibyl, and +inspir'd like her by the same God of Poetry, is at this time +translating Chaucer into modern French. From which I gather that +he has been formerly translated into the old Provençal (for how she +should come to understand old English I know not). But the matter of +fact being true, it makes me think that there is something in it like +fatality; that, after certain periods of time, the fame and memory +of great wits should be renewed, as Chaucer is both in France and +England. If this be wholly chance, 't is extraordinary, and I dare not +call it more, for fear of being tax'd with superstition. + +Boccace comes last to be consider'd, who living in the same age with +Chaucer, had the same genius, and follow'd the same studies: both +writ novels, and each of them cultivated his mother tongue. But the +greatest resemblance of our two modern authors being in their familiar +style, and pleasing way of relating comical adventures, I may pass it +over, because I have translated nothing from Boccace of that nature. +In the serious part of poetry, the advantage is wholly on Chaucer's +side; for tho' the Englishman has borrow'd many tales from the +Italian, yet it appears that those of Boccace were not generally of +his own making, but taken from authors of former ages, and by him only +model'd; so that what there was of invention in either of them may be +judg'd equal. But Chaucer has refin'd on Boccace, and has mended the +stones which he has borrowed, in his way of telling; tho' prose +allows more liberty of thought, and the expression is more easy when +unconfin'd by numbers. Our countryman carries weight, and yet wins the +race at disadvantage. I desire not the reader should take my word, and +therefore I will set two of their discourses on the same subject, +in the same light, for every man to judge betwixt them. I translated +Chaucer first, and, amongst the rest, pitch'd on _The Wife of Bath's +Tale_; not daring, as I have said, to adventure on her prologue, +because 't is too licentious: there Chaucer introduces an old woman +of mean parentage, whom a youthful knight of noble blood was forc'd to +marry, and consequently loath'd her; the crone being in bed with him +on the wedding night, and finding his aversion, endeavors to win his +affection by reason, and speaks a good word for herself (as who could +blame her?) in hope to mollify the sullen bridegroom. She takes her +topics from the benefits of poverty, the advantages of old age and +ugliness, the vanity of youth, and the silly pride of ancestry and +titles without inherent virtue, which is the true nobility. When I had +clos'd Chaucer, I returned to Ovid, and translated some more of his +fables; and by this time had so far forgotten _The Wife of Bath's +Tale_, that, when I took up Boccace, unawares I fell on the same +argument of preferring virtue to nobility of blood, and titles, in the +story of Sigismonda; which I had certainly avoided for the resemblance +of the two discourses, if my memory had not fail'd me. Let the reader +weigh them both; and if he thinks me partial to Chaucer, 't is in him +to right Boccace. + +I prefer in our countryman, far above all his other stories, the noble +poem of _Palamon and Arcite_, which is of the epic kind, and perhaps +not much inferior to the _Ilias_ or the _Æneis_: the story is more +pleasing than either of them, the manners as perfect, the diction as +poetical, the learning as deep and various, and the disposition full +as artful; only it includes a greater length of time, as taking up +seven years at least, but Aristotle has left undecided the duration of +the action; which yet is easily reduc'd into the compass of a year, +by a narration of what preceded the return of Palamon to Athens. I had +thought for the honor of our nation, and more particularly for his, +whose laurel, tho' unworthy, I have worn after him, that this story +was of English growth, and Chaucer's own; but I was undeceiv'd by +Boccace; for, casually looking on the end of his seventh _Giornata_, +I found Dionco (under which name he shadows himself) and Fiametta +(who represents his mistress, the natural daughter of Robert, King of +Naples), of whom these words are spoken: _Dionco e Fiametta gran pezza +cantarono insieme d'Arcita, e di Palamone_:[32] by which it appears +that this story was written before the time of Boccace; but, the name +of its author being wholly lost, Chaucer is now become an original; +and I question not but the poem has receiv'd many beauties by passing +thro' his noble hands. Besides this tale, there is another of his own +invention, after the manner of the Provençals, call'd _The Flower and +the Leaf_,[33] with which I was so particularly pleas'd, both for the +invention and the moral, that I cannot hinder myself from recommending +it to the reader. + +As a corollary to this preface, in which I have done justice to +others, I owe somewhat to myself: not that I think it worth my time +to enter the lists with one M----,[34] or one B----,[35] but barely +to take notice, that such men there are who have written scurrilously +against me, without any provocation. M----, who is in orders, pretends +amongst the rest this quarrel to me, that I have fallen foul on +priesthood: if I have, I am only to ask pardon of good priests, and +am afraid his part of the reparation will come to little. Let him to +satisfied that he shall not be able to force himself upon me for an +adversary. I contemn him too much to enter into competition with him. +His own translations of Virgil have answer'd his criticisms on mine. +If (as they say he has declar'd in print) he prefers the version of +Ogleby to mine, the world has made him the same compliment: for 't is +agreed on all hands, that he writes even below Ogleby: that, you will +say, is not easily to be done; but what cannot M---- bring about? I am +satisfied, however, that while he and I live together, I shall not be +thought the worst poet of the age. It looks as if I had desir'd him +underhand to write so ill against me; but upon my honest word I have +not brib'd him to do me this service, and am wholly guiltless of his +pamphlet. 'T is true, I should be glad if I could persuade him to +continue his good offices, and write such another critique on anything +of mine for I find by experience he has a great stroke with the +reader, when he condemns any of my poems, to make the world have a +better opinion of them. He has taken some pains with my poetry, but +nobody will be persuaded to take the same with his. If I had taken +to the Church, (as he affirms, but which was never in my thoughts,) +I should have had more sense, if not more grace, than to have turn'd +myself out of my benefice by writing libels on my parishioners. But +his account of my manners and my principles are of a piece with his +cavils and his poetry; and so I have done with him for ever. + +As for the City Bard, or Knight Physician, I hear his quarrel to me is +that I was the author of _Absalom and Achitophel_, which, he thinks, +is a little hard on his fanatic patrons in London. + +But I will deal the more civilly with his two poems, because nothing +ill is to be spoken of the dead; and therefore peace be to the _manes_ +of his _Arthurs_. I will only say that it was not for this noble +knight that I drew the plan of an epic poem on King Arthur, in my +preface to the translation of Juvenal. The guardian angels of kingdoms +were machines too ponderous for him to manage; and therefore he +rejected them, as Dares did the whirlbats of Eryx, when they were +thrown before him by Entellus. Yet from that preface he plainly took +his hint: for he began immediately upon the story, tho' he had the +baseness not to acknowledge his benefactor but, instead of it, to +traduce me in a libel. + +I shall say the less of Mr. Collier, because in many things he +has tax'd me justly; and I have pleaded guilty to all thoughts +and expressions of mine which can be truly argued of obscenity, +profaneness, of immorality; and retract them. If he be my enemy, +let him triumph; if he be my friend, as I have given him no personal +occasion to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance. It becomes +me not to draw my pen in the defense of a bad cause, when I have so +often drawn it for a good one. Yet it were not difficult to prove +that in many places he has perverted my meaning by his glosses, and +interpreted my words into blasphemy and bawdry, of which they were +not guilty. Besides that, he is too much given to horseplay in his +raillery, and comes to battle like a dictator from the plow. I will +not say: "The zeal of God's house has eaten him up;" but I am sure it +has devoured some part of his good manners and civility. It might also +be doubted whether it were altogether zeal which prompted him to this +rough manner of proceeding: perhaps it became not one of his function +to rake into the rubbish of ancient and modern plays; a divine might +have employ'd his pains to better purpose than in the nastiness of +Plautus and Aristophanes; whose examples, as they excuse not me, so +it might be possibly supposed that he read them not without some +pleasure. They who have written commentaries on those poets, or on +Horace, Juvenal, and Martial, have explain'd some vices which, without +their interpretation, had been unknown to modern times. Neither has he +judg'd impartially betwixt the former age and us. + +There is more bawdry in one play of Fletcher's, call'd _The Custom of +the Country_, than in all ours together. Yet this has been often acted +on the stage in my remembrance. Are the times so much more reform'd +now than they were five and twenty years ago? If they are, I +congratulate the amendment of our morals. But I am not to prejudice +the cause of my fellow poets, tho' I abandon my own defense: they have +some of them answer'd for themselves, and neither they nor I can think +Mr. Collier so formidable an enemy that we should shun him. He has +lost ground at the latter end of the day, by pursuing his point too +far, like the Prince of Condé at the battle of Seneffe: from immoral +plays to no plays, _ab abusu ad usum, non valet consequentia_[36]. But +being a party, I am not to erect myself into a judge. As for the rest +of those who have written against me, they are such scoundrels that +they deserve not the least notice to be taken of them, B---- and M---- +are only distinguish'd from the crowd by being remember'd to their +infamy: + + --Demetri, teque Tigelli[37] + Discipulorum inter jubeo plorare cathedras. + + +[Footnote A: John Dryden (1631-1700), the great dramatic and satirical +poet of the later seventeenth century, whose translation of Virgil's +"Æneid" appears in another volume of the Harvard Classics, deserves +hardly less distinction as a prose writer than as a poet. The present +essay, prefixed to a volume of narrative poems, is largely concerned +with Chaucer, and in its genial and penetrating criticism, expressed +with characteristic clearness and vigor, can be seen the ground for +naming Dryden the first of English literary critics, and the founder +of modern prose style.] + +[Footnote 1: Scott suggests that the allusion is to the Duke of +Buckingham, who was often satirized for the slow progress of his great +mansion at Chefden.] + +[Footnote 2: Boccaccio did not invent this stanza, which had been used +in both French and Italian before his day, but he did constitute it +the Italian form for heroic verse.] + +[Footnote 3: Rymer misled Dryden. There is no trace of Provençal +influence on Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 4: The foundation layer of color in a painting.] + +[Footnote 5: "Verses without content, melodious trifles."--_Ars Poet_. +322.] + +[Footnote 6: Jeremy Collier, in his _Short View of the Immortality and +Profaneness of the Stage_, 1698.] + +[Footnote 7: "Energetic, irascible, unyielding, vehement."--Horace, +_Ars Poet._121.] + +[Footnote 8: "Whithersoever the fates drag us to and fro, let us +follow."--Virgil, _Æneid_, v. 709.] + +[Footnote 9: The statements that follow as to Chaucer's sources are +mostly not in accord with the results of modern scholarship.] + +[Footnote 10: The plot of neither of these poems was original with +Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 11: "Plenty has made me poor."--_Meta._ iii, 466.] + +[Footnote 12: By Ben Jonson.] + +[Footnote 13: Cowley] + +[Footnote 14: 'Too much a poet'--Martial iii 44 (not Catullus)] + +[Footnote 15: Suited to the ears of that time] + +[Footnote 16: Speght, whom modern scholarship has shown to be right in +this matter.] + +[Footnote 17: What follows on Chaucer's life is full of errors.] + +[Footnote 18: Wondered at] + +[Footnote 19: A spurious "Plowman's Tale" was included in the older +editions of Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 20: A law term for slander of a man of high rank, involving +more severe punishment than ordinary slander.] + +[Footnote 21: Henry II. and Thomas à Becket.] + +[Footnote 22: Dr. James Drake wrote a reply to Jeremy Collier's _Short +View_.] + +[Footnote 23: "He did the first injury"] + +[Footnote 24: A Neapolitan physician who wrote on physiognomy.] + +[Footnote 25: "I wish all this unsaid."] + +[Footnote 26: Reckon.] + +[Footnote 27: Their.] + +[Footnote 28: Must.] + +[Footnote 29: The corrupt state of the text of this passage is enough +to explain why Dryden found Chaucer rough.] + +[Footnote 30: "Many words which have now fallen out of use shall be +born again; and others which are now in honor shall fall, if custom +wills it, in the force of which lie the judgement and law and rules of +speech."--Horace _Ars Poet._ 70-72.] + +[Footnote 31: "It is easy to add to what is already invented."] + +[Footnote 32: Dionco and Fiametta sang together a long time of Arcite +and Palamon.] + +[Footnote 33: Not by Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 34: Rev. Luke Milbourne, who had attacked Dryden's Virgil.] + +[Footnote 35: Sir Richard Blackmore, who had censured Dryden for the +indecency of his writings.] + +[Footnote 36: "The argument from abuse to use is not valid."] + +[Footnote 37: "You, Demetrius and Tigellius, I bid lament among +the chairs of your scholars." Blackmore had once been a +schoolmaster.--Noyes.] + + + + +PREFACE TO JOSEPH ANDREWS + +BY HENRY FIELDING (1742)[A] + +THE COMIC EPIC IN PROSE + + +As it is possible the mere English reader may have a different idea of +romance with the author of these little volumes; and may consequently +expect a kind of entertainment, not to be found, nor which was even +intended, in the following pages; it may not be improper to premise a +few words concerning this kind of writing, which I do not remember to +have seen hitherto attempted in our language. + +The EPIC, as well as the DRAMA, is divided into tragedy and comedy. +HOMER, who was the father of this species of poetry, gave us the +pattern of both these, tho' that of the latter kind is entirely lost; +which Aristotle tells us, bore the same relation to comedy which his +Iliad bears to tragedy. And perhaps, that we have no more instances of +it among the writers of antiquity, is owing to the loss of this +great pattern, which, had it survived, would have found its imitators +equally with the other poems of this great original. + +And farther, as this poetry may be tragic or comic, I will not scruple +to say it may be likewise either in verse or prose: for tho' it wants +one particular, which the critic enumerates in the constituent parts +of an epic poem, namely, metre; yet, when any kind of writing contains +all its other parts, such as fable, action, characters, sentiments, +and diction, and is deficient in metre only, it seems, I think, +reasonable to refer it to the epic; at least, as no critic hath +thought proper to range it under any other head, nor to assign it a +particular name to itself. + +Thus the Telemachus of the archbishop of Cambray appears to me of the +epic kind, as well as the Odyssey of Homer, indeed, it is much fairer +and more reasonable to give it a name common with that species from +which it differs only in a single instance, than to confound it with +those which it resembles in no other. Such are those voluminous works, +commonly called Romances, namely Clelia, Cleopatra, Astræa, Cassandra, +the Grand Cyrus, and innumerable others which contain, as I apprehend, +very little instruction or entertainment. + +Now, a comic romance is a comic epic-poem in prose; differing from +comedy, as the serious epic from tragedy: its action being more +extended and comprehensive; containing a much larger circle of +incidents, and introducing a greater variety of characters. It differs +from the serious romance in its fable and action, in this: that as in +the one these are grave and solemn, so in the other they are light and +ridiculous; it differs in its characters, by introducing persons of +inferiour rank, and consequently of inferiour manners, whereas the +grave romance sets the highest before us; lastly in its sentiments and +diction; by preserving the ludicrous instead of the sublime. In the +diction I think, burlesque itself may be sometimes admitted; of which +many instances will occur in this work, as in the description of the +battles, and some other places not necessary to be pointed out to the +classical reader; for whose entertainment those parodies or burlesque +imitations are chiefly calculated. + +But tho' we have sometimes admitted this in our diction, we have +carefully excluded it from our sentiments and characters; for there +it is never properly introduced, unless in writings of the burlesque +kind, which this is not intended to be. Indeed, no two species of +writing can differ more widely than the comic and the burlesque: +for as the latter is ever the exhibition of what is monstrous and +unnatural, and where our delight, if we examine it, arises from the +surprising absurdity, as in appropriating the manners of the highest +to the lowest, or _è converso_; so in the former, we should ever +confine ourselves strictly to nature, from the just imitation of +which, will flow all the pleasure we can this way convey to a sensible +reader. And perhaps, there is one reason, why a comic writer should +of all others be the least excused for deviating from nature, since +it may not be always so easy for a serious poet to meet with the great +and the admirable; but life everywhere furnishes an accurate observer +with the ridiculous. + +I have hinted this little, concerning burlesque; because I have often +heard that name given to performances, which have been truly of the +comic kind, from the author's having sometimes admitted it in his +diction only; which as it is the dress of poetry, doth like the dress +of men establish characters, (the one of the whole poem, and the other +of the whole man), in vulgar opinion, beyond any of their greater +excellences: but surely, a certain drollery in style, where characters +and sentiments are perfectly natural, no more constitutes the +burlesque, than an empty pomp and dignity of words, where everything +else is mean and low, can entitle any performance to the appellation +of the true sublime. + +And I apprehend, my Lord Shaftesbury's opinion of mere burlesque +agrees with mine, when he asserts, "There is no such thing to be found +in the writings of the antients." But perhaps I have less abhorrence +than he professes for it: and that not because I have had some little +success on the stage this way; but rather as it contributes more to +exquisite mirth and laughter than any other; and these are probably +more wholesome physic for the mind, and conduce better to purge away +spleen, melancholy, and ill affections, than is generally imagined. +Nay, I will appeal to common observation, whether the same companies +are not found more full of good-humour and benevolence, after they +have been sweetened for two or three hours with entertainments of this +kind, than soured by a tragedy or a grave lecture. + +But to illustrate all this by another science, in which, perhaps, we +shall see the distinction more clearly and plainly: let us examine the +works of a comic history-painter, with those performances which +the Italians call _Caricatura_, where we shall find the greatest +excellence of the former to consist in the exactest copy of nature, +insomuch, that a judicious eye instantly rejects anything _outré_, any +liberty which the painter hath taken with the features of that _alma +mater_. Whereas in the _Caricatura_ we allow all licence. Its aim is +to exhibit monsters, not men, and all distortions and exaggerations +whatever are within its proper province. + +Now what Caricatura is in painting Burlesque is in writing, and in the +same manner the comic writer and painter correlate to each other. And +here I shall observe, that as in the former, the painter seems to have +the advantage, so it is in the latter infinitely on the side of the +writer, for the Monstrous is much easier to paint than describe, and +the Ridiculous to describe than paint. + +And tho' perhaps this latter species doth not in either science so +strongly affect and agitate the muscles as the other, yet it will be +owned I believe, that a more rational and useful pleasure arises to us +from it. He who should call the ingenious Hogarth a burlesque painter, +would, in my opinion, do him very little honour: for sure it is much +easier, much less the subject of admiration, to paint a man with a +nose, or any other feature of a preposterous size, or to expose him in +some absurd or monstrous attitude, than to express the affections of +men on canvas. It hath been thought a vast commendation of a painter +to say his figures _seem to breathe_, but surely it is a much greater +and nobler applause, _that they appear to think_. + +But to return The Ridiculous only, as I have before said, falls within +my province in the present work. Nor will some explanation of this +word be thought impertinent by the reader, if he considers how +wonderfully it hath been mistaken, even by writers who have profess'd +it; for to what but such a mistake, can we attribute the many attempts +to ridicule the blackest villainies, and what is yet worse the most +dreadful calamities? What could exceed the absurdity of an author, who +should write the comedy of Nero, with the merry incident of ripping +up his mother's belly, or what would give a greater shock to humanity +than an attempt to expose the miseries of poverty and distress to +ridicule? And yet, the reader will not want much learning to suggest +such instances to himself. + +Besides, it may seem remarkable, that Aristotle, who is so fond and +free of definitions, hath not thought proper to define the Ridiculous. +Indeed, where he tells us it is proper to comedy, he hath remarked +that villainy is not its object: but that he hath not, as I remember, +positively asserted what is. Nor doth the Abbé Bellegarde, who hath +written a treatise on this subject, tho' he shows us many species of +it, once trace it to its fountain. + +The only source of the true Ridiculous (as it appears to me) is +affectation. But tho' it arises from one spring only, when we consider +the infinite streams into which this one branches, we shall presently +cease to admire at the copious field it affords to an observer. +Now affectation proceeds from one of these two causes; vanity, or +hypocrisy: for as vanity puts us on affecting false characters, in +order to purchase applause; so hypocrisy sets us on an endeavour to +avoid censure by concealing our vices under an appearance of their +opposite virtues. And tho' these two causes are often confounded, +(for they require some distinguishing;) yet, as they proceed from +very different motives, so they are as clearly distinct in their +operations: for indeed, the affectation which arises from vanity is +nearer to truth than the other; as it hath not that violent repugnancy +of nature to struggle with, which that of the hypocrite hath. It +may be likewise noted, that affectation doth not imply an absolute +negation of those qualities which are affected: and therefore, tho', +when it proceeds from hypocrisy, it be nearly allied to deceit; +yet when it comes from vanity only, it partakes of the nature of +ostentation: for instance, the affectation of liberality in a vain +man, differs visibly from the same affectation in the avaricious; for +tho' the vain man is not what he would appear, or hath not the virtue +he affects, to the degree he would be thought to have it; yet it sits +less awkwardly on him than on the avaricious man, who is the very +reverse of what he would seem to be. + +From the discovery of this affectation arises the Ridiculous--which +always strikes the reader with surprize and pleasure; and that in a +higher and stronger degree when the affectation arises from hypocrisy, +than when from vanity: for to discover any one to be the exact +reverse of what he affects, is more surprizing, and consequently more +ridiculous, than to find him a little deficient in the quality he +desires the reputation of. I might observe that our Ben Jonson, who +of all men understood the Ridiculous the best, hath chiefly used the +hypocritical affectation. + +Now from affectation only, the misfortunes and calamities of life, +or the imperfections of nature, may become the objects of ridicule. +Surely he hath a very ill-framed mind, who can look on ugliness, +infirmity, or poverty, as ridiculous in themselves: nor do I believe +any man living who meets a dirty fellow riding through the streets in +a cart, is struck with an idea of the Ridiculous from it; but if he +should see the same figure descend from his coach and six, or bolt +from his chair with his hat under his arm, he would then begin to +laugh, and with justice. In the same manner, were we to enter a poor +house and behold a wretched family shivering with cold and languishing +with hunger, it would not incline us to laughter, (at least we must +have very diabolical natures, if it would): but should we discover +there a grate, instead of coals, adorned with flowers, empty plate or +china dishes on the side-board, or any other affectation of riches and +finery either on their persons or in their furniture: we might then +indeed be excused, for ridiculing so fantastical an appearance. +Much less are natural imperfections the object of derision: but when +ugliness aims at the applause of beauty, or lameness endeavours to +display agility; it is then that these unfortunate circumstances, +which at first moved our compassion, tend only to raise our mirth. + +The poet carries this very far; + + None are for being what they are in fault, + But for not being what they would be thought. + +Where if the metre would suffer the word Ridiculous to close the first +line, the thought would be rather more proper. Great vices are the +proper objects of our detestation, smaller faults of our pity: but +affectation appears to me the only true source of the Ridiculous. + +But perhaps it may be objected to me, that I have against my own rules +introduced vices, and of a very black kind into this work. To this I +shall answer: First, that it is very difficult to pursue a series of +human actions and keep clear from them. Secondly, that the vices to +be found here, are rather the accidental consequences of some human +frailty, or foible, than causes habitually existing in the mind. +Thirdly, that they are never set forth as the objects of ridicule, +but detestation. Fourthly, that they are never the principal figure at +that time on the scene; lastly, they never produce the intended evil. + + +[Footnote A: Henry Fielding, dramatist, novelist, and judge, was born +near Glastonbury, Somersetshire, April 22, 1707, and died at Lisbon, +October 8, 1754. Though seldom spoken of as an essayist, Fielding +scattered through his novels a large number of detached or detachable +discussions which are essentially essays, of which the preface +to "Joseph Andrews" on the "Comic Epic in Prose," is a favorable +specimen. The novel which it introduces was begun as a parody on +Richardson's "Pamela," and the preface gives Fielding's conception of +this form of fiction.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH DICTIONARY + +BY SAMUEL JOHNSON (1755)[A] + + +It is the fate of those who toil at the lower employments of life, to +be rather driven by the fear of evil, than attracted by the prospect +of good; to be exposed to censure, without hope of praise; to be +disgraced by miscarriage, or punished for neglect, where success would +have been without applause; and diligence without reward. + +Among these unhappy mortals is the writer of dictionaries; whom +mankind have considered, not as the pupil, but the slave of science, +the pioneer of literature, doomed only to remove rubbish and clear +obstructions from the paths through which Learning and Genius press +forward to conquest and glory, without bestowing a smile on the humble +drudge that facilitates their progress. Every other author may aspire +to praise; the lexicographer can only hope to escape reproach, and +even this negative recompense has been yet granted to very few. + +I have, notwithstanding this discouragement, attempted a Dictionary of +the English Language, which, while it was employed in the cultivation +of every species of literature, has itself been hitherto neglected; +suffered to spread, under the direction of chance, into wild +exuberance; resigned to the tyranny of time and fashion: and exposed +to the corruptions of ignorance, and caprices of innovation. + +When I took the first survey of my undertaking, I found our speech +copious without order, and energetic without rule: wherever I turned +my view, there was perplexity to be disentangled and confusion to be +regulated; choice was to be made out of boundless variety, without any +established principle of selection; adulterations were to be detected, +without a settled test of purity; and modes of expression to be +rejected or received, without the suffrages of any writers of +classical reputation or acknowledged authority. + +Having therefore no assistance but from general grammar, I applied +myself to the perusal of our writers; and noting whatever might be of +use to ascertain or illustrate any word or phrase, accumulated in time +the materials of a dictionary, which, by degrees, I reduced to +method, establishing to myself, in the progress of the work, such as +experience and analogy suggested to me; experience, which practice and +observation were continually increasing; and analogy, which, though in +some words obscure, was evident in others. + +In adjusting the ORTHOGRAPHY, which has been to this time +unsettled and fortuitous, I found it necessary to distinguish those +irregularities that are inherent in our tongue, and perhaps coeval +with it, from others which the ignorance or negligence of later +writers has produced. Every language has its anomalies, which though +inconvenient, and in themselves once unnecessary, must be tolerated +among the imperfections of human things, and which require only to be +registered, that they may not be increased; and ascertained, that +they may not be confounded: but every language has likewise +its improprieties and absurdities, which it is the duty of the +lexicographer to correct or proscribe. + +As language was at its beginning merely oral, all words of necessary +or common use were spoken before they were written; and while they +were unfixed by any visible signs, must have been spoken with great +diversity, as we now observe those who cannot read to catch sounds +imperfectly, and utter them negligently. When this wild and barbarous +jargon was first reduced to an alphabet, every penman endeavored to +express, as he could, the sounds which he was accustomed to pronounce +or to receive, and vitiated in writing such words as were already +vitiated in speech. The powers of the letters, when they were applied +to a new language, must have been vague and unsettled, and +therefore different hands would exhibit the same sound by different +combinations. + +From this uncertain pronunciation arise in a great part the various +dialects of the same country, which will always be observed to grow +fewer, and less different, as books are multiplied; and from this +arbitrary representation of sounds by letters proceeds that diversity +of spelling observable in the Saxon remains, and I suppose in the +first books of every nation, which perplexes or destroys analogy, +and produces anomalous formations, which, being once incorporated can +never be afterward dismissed or reformed. + +Of this kind are the derivatives _length_ from _long_, _strength_ from +_strong_, _darling_ from _dear_, _breadth_ from _broad_, from _dry_, +_drought_, and from _high_, _height_, which Milton, in zeal for +analogy, writes highth. 'Quid te exempta juvat spinis de pluribus +una?' To change all would be too much, and to change one is nothing. + +This uncertainty is most frequent in the vowels, which are so +capriciously pronounced, and so differently modified, by accident or +affectation, not only in every province, but in every mouth, that to +them, as is well known to etymologists, little regard is to be shown +in the deduction of one language from another. + +Such defects are not errors in orthography, but spots of barbarity +impressed so deep in the English language, that criticism can +never wash them away: these, therefore, must be permitted to remain +untouched; but many words have likewise been altered by accident, or +depraved by ignorance, as the pronunciation of the vulgar has been +weakly followed; and some still continue to be variously written, +as authors differ in their care or skill: of these it was proper +to inquire the true orthography, which I have always considered as +depending on their derivation, and have therefore referred them to +their original languages; thus I write _enchant_, _enchantment_, +_enchanter_, after the French, and _incantation_ after the Latin; thus +_entire_ is chosen rather than _intire_, because it passed to us not +from the Latin _integer_, but from the French _entier_. + +Of many words it is difficult to say whether they were immediately +received from the Latin or the French, since at the time when we had +dominions in France, we had Latin service in our churches. It is, +however, my opinion that the French generally supplied us; for we +have few Latin words, among the terms of domestic use, which are not +French; but many French, which are very remote from Latin. + +Even in words of which the derivation is apparent, I have been often +obliged to sacrifice uniformity to custom; thus I write, in compliance +with a numberless majority, _convey_ and _inveigh_, _deceit_ and +_receipt_, _fancy_ and _phantom_; sometimes the derivative varies +from the primitive, as _explain_ and _explanation_, _repeat_ and +_repetition_. + +Some combinations of letters having the same power, are used +indifferently without any discoverable reason of choice, as in +_choak, choke; soap, sope; fewel, fuel_, and many others; which I have +sometimes inserted twice, that those who search for them under either +form, may not search in vain. + +In examining the orthography of any doubtful word, the mode of +spelling by which it is inserted in the series of the dictionary, is +to be considered as that to which I give, perhaps not often rashly, +the preference. I have left, in the examples, to every author his own +practice unmolested, that the reader may balance suffrages, and +judge between us: but this question is not always to be determined +by reputed or by real learning; some men, intent upon greater things, +have thought little on sounds and derivations; some, knowing in the +ancient tongues, have neglected those in which our words are commonly +to be sought. Thus Hammond writes _fecibleness_ for _feasibleness_, +because I suppose he imagined it derived immediately from the +Latin; and some words, such as _dependant, dependent; dependance, +dependence_, vary their final syllable, as one or other language is +present to the writer. + +In this part of the work, where caprice has long wantoned without +control, and vanity sought praise by petty reformation, I have +endeavored to proceed with a scholar's reverence for antiquity, and a +grammarian's regard to the genius of our tongue. I have attempted few +alterations, and among those few, perhaps the greater part is from +the modern to the ancient practice; and I hope I may be allowed to +recommend to those, whose thoughts have been perhaps employed too +anxiously on verbal singularities, not to disturb, upon narrow views, +or for minute propriety, the orthography of their fathers. It has been +asserted, that for the law to be _known_, is of more importance +than to be _right_. 'Change,' says Hooker, 'is not made without +inconvenience, even from worse to better.' There is in constancy +and stability a general and lasting advantage, which will always +overbalance the slow improvements of gradual correction. Much less +ought our written language to comply with the corruptions of oral +utterance, or copy that which every variation of time or place makes +different from itself, and imitate those changes, which will again be +changed, while imitation is employed in observing them. + +This recommendation of steadiness and uniformity does not proceed from +an opinion that particular combinations of letters have much influence +on human happiness; or that truth may not be successfully taught by +modes of spelling fanciful and erroneous; I am not yet so lost in +lexicography as to forget that 'words are the daughters of earth, and +that things are the sons of heaven.' Language is only the instrument +of science, and words are but the signs of ideas: I wish, however, +that the instrument might be less apt to decay, and that signs might +be permanent, like the things which they denote. + +In settling the orthography, I have not wholly neglected the +pronunciation, which I have directed, by printing an accent upon the +acute or elevated syllable. It will sometimes be found that the accent +is placed by the author quoted, on a different syllable from that +marked in the alphabetical series; it is then to be understood, that +custom has varied, or that the author has, in my opinion, pronounced +wrong. Short directions are sometimes given where the sound of letters +is irregular; and if they are sometimes omitted, defect in such minute +observations will be more easily excused, than superfluity. + +In the investigation, both of the orthography and signification of +words, their ETYMOLOGY was necessarily to be considered, and they were +therefore to be divided into primitives and derivatives. A primitive +word is that which can be traced no further to any English root; +thus _circumspect, circumvent, circumstance, delude, concave_, and +_complicate_, though compounds in the Latin, are to us primitives. +Derivatives, are all those that can be referred to any word in English +of greater simplicity. + +The derivatives I have referred to their primitives, with an accuracy +sometimes needless; for who does not see that _remoteness_ comes +from _remote_, _lovely_ from _love_, _concavity_ from _concave_, and +_demonstrative_ from _demonstrate_? But this grammatical exuberance +the scheme of my work did not allow me to repress. It is of great +importance, in examining the general fabric of a language, to trace +one word from another, by noting the usual modes of derivation and +inflection; and uniformity must be preserved in systematical works; +though sometimes at the expense of particular propriety. + +Among other derivatives I have been careful to insert and elucidate +the anomalous plurals of nouns and preterites of verbs, which in the +Teutonic dialects are very frequent, and, though familiar to those +who have always used them, interrupt and embarrass the learners of our +language. + +The two languages from which our primitives have been derived, are +the Roman and Teutonic: under the Roman, I comprehend the French and +provincial tongues; and under the Teutonic, range the Saxon, German, +and all their kindred dialects. Most of our polysyllables are Roman, +and our words of one syllable are very often Teutonic. + +In assigning the Roman original, it has perhaps sometimes happened +that I have mentioned only the Latin, when the word was borrowed +from the French; and considering myself as employed only in the +illustration of my own language, I have not been very careful to +observe whether the Latin would be pure or barbarous, or the French +elegant or obsolete. + +For the Teutonic etymologies, I am commonly indebted to Junius and +Skinner, the only names which I have forborne to quote when I copied +their books; not that I might appropriate their labors or usurp their +honors, but that I might spare perpetual repetition by one general +acknowledgment. Of these, whom I ought not to mention but with the +reverence due to instructors and benefactors, Junius appears to +have excelled in extent of learning, and Skinner in rectitude of +understanding. Junius was accurately skilled in all the northern +languages, Skinner probably examined the ancient and remoter dialects +only by occasional inspection into dictionaries; but the learning of +Junius is often of no other use than to show him a track by which he +may deviate from his purpose, to which Skinner always presses forward +by the shortest way. Skinner is often ignorant, but never ridiculous: +Junius is always full of knowledge; but his variety distracts his +judgment, and his learning is very frequently disgraced by his +absurdities. + +The votaries of the northern muses will not perhaps easily restrain +their indignation, when they find the name of Junius thus degraded +by a disadvantageous comparison; but whatever reverence is due to +his diligence, or his attainments, it can be no criminal degree of +censoriousness to charge that etymologist with want of judgment, who +can seriously derive _dream_ from _drama_, because 'life is a drama +and a drama is a dream'; and who declares with a tone of defiance, +that no man can fail to derive _moan_ from [Greek: monos], _monos, +single_ or _solitary_, who considers that grief naturally loves to be +alone. + +Our knowledge of the northern literature is so scanty, that of words +undoubtedly Teutonic, the original is not always to be found in +an ancient language; and I have therefore inserted Dutch or German +substitutes, which I consider not as radical, but parallel, not as the +parents, but sisters of the English. + +The words which are represented as thus related by descent or +cognation, do not always agree in sense; for it is incident to words, +as to their authors, to degenerate from their ancestors, and to change +their manners when they change their country. It is sufficient, in +etymological inquiries, if the senses of kindred words be found such +as may easily pass into each other, or such as may both be referred to +one general idea. + +The etymology, so far as it is yet known, was easily found in the +volumes, where it is particularly and professedly delivered, and, by +proper attention to the rules of derivation, the orthography was +soon adjusted. But to COLLECT THE WORDS of our language was a task +of greater difficulty. The deficiency of dictionaries was immediately +apparent, and when they were exhausted, what was yet wanting must be +sought by fortuitous and unguided excursions into books and gleaned +as industry should find, or chance should offer it, in the boundless +chaos of a living speech. My search, however, has been either skilful +or lucky, for I have much augmented the vocabulary. + +As my design was a dictionary, common or appellative, I have omitted +all words which have relation to proper names, such as _Arian, +Socinian, Calvinist, Benedictine, Mahometan_, but have retained those +of a more general nature, as _Heathen, Pagan_. + +Of the terms of art I have received such as could be found either in +books of science or technical dictionaries, and have often inserted, +from philosophical writers, words which are supported perhaps only by +a single authority, and which, being not admitted into general use, +stand yet as candidates or probationers, and must depend for their +adoption on the suffrage of futurity. The words which our authors have +introduced by their knowledge of foreign languages or ignorance of +their own, by vanity or wantonness, by compliance with fashion or lust +of innovation, I have registered as they occurred, though commonly +only to censure them, and warn others against the folly of +naturalizing useless foreigners to the injury of the natives. + +I have not rejected any by design, merely because they were +unnecessary or exuberant, but have received those which by different +writers have been differently formed, as _viscid_, and _viscidity, +viscous_, and _viscosity_. + +Compounded or double words I have seldom noted, except when they +obtain a signification different from that which the components have +in then simple state. + +Thus _highwayman, woodman_, and _horsecourser_, require an +explanation, but of _thieflike_, or _coachdriver_, no notice was +needed, because the primitives contain the meaning of the compounds. + +Words arbitrarily formed by a constant and settled analogy, like +diminutive adjectives in _ish, as greenish, bluish_; adverbs in _ly_, +as _dully, openly_; substantives in _ness_, as _vileness, faultiness_; +were less diligently sought, and many sometimes have been omitted, +when I had no authority that invited me to insert them; not that they +are not genuine, and regular offsprings of English roots, but +because their relation to the primitive being always the same, their +signification cannot be mistaken. + +The verbal nouns in _ing_, such as the _keeping_ of the _castle_, +the _leading_ of the _army_, are always neglected, or placed only to +illustrate the sense of the verb, except when they signify things as +well as actions, and have therefore a plural number, as _dwelling, +living_; or have an absolute and abstract signification, as _coloring, +painting, learning_. + +The participles are likewise omitted, unless, by signifying rather +habit or quality than action, they take the nature of adjectives; as a +_thinking_ man, a man of prudence; a _pacing_ horse, a horse that +can pace: these I have ventured to call _participial adjectives_. But +neither are these always inserted, because they are commonly to be +understood without any danger of mistake, by consulting the verb. + +Obsolete words are admitted when they are found in authors not +obsolete, or when they have any force or beauty that may deserve +revival. + +As composition is one of the chief characteristics of a language, I +have endeavored to make some reparation for the universal negligence +of my predecessors, by inserting great numbers of compounded words, +as may be found under _after, fore, new, night, fair_, and many more. +These, numerous as they are, might be multiplied, but that use and +curiosity are here satisfied, and the frame of our language and modes +of our combination amply discovered. + +Of some forms of composition, such as that by which _re_ is +prefixed to note _repetition_, and _un_ to signify _contrariety_ or +_privation_, all the examples cannot be accumulated, because the use +of these particles, if not wholly arbitrary, is so little limited, +that they are hourly affixed to new words as occasion requires, or is +imagined to require them. + +There is another kind of composition more frequent in our language +than perhaps in any other, from which arises to foreigners the +greatest difficulty. We modify the signification of many verbs by a +particle subjoined; as to _come off_, to escape by a fetch; to _fall +on_, to attack; _fall off_, to apostatize; to _break off_, to stop +abruptly; to _bear out_, to justify; _to fall in_, to comply; to _give +over_, to cease; to _set off_, to embellish; to _set in_, to begin a +continual tenor; to _set out_, to begin a course or journey; to _take +off_, to copy; with innumerable expressions of the same kind, of which +some appear wildly irregular, being so far distant from the sense of +the simple words, that no sagacity will be able to trace the steps by +which they arrived at the present use. These I have noted with great +care; and though I cannot flatter myself that the collection is +complete, I believe I have so far assisted the students of our +language that this kind of phraseology will be no longer insuperable; +and the combinations of verbs and particles, by chance omitted, will +be easily explained by comparison with those that may be found. + +Many words yet stand supported only by the name of Bailey, Ainsworth, +Philips, or the contracted _Dict._ for Dictionaries, subjoined; of +these I am not always certain that they are read in any book but the +works of lexicographers. Of such I have omitted many, because I had +never read them; and many I have inserted, because they may perhaps +exist, though they have escaped my notice: they are, however, to be +yet considered as resting only upon the credit of former dictionaries. +Others, which I considered as useful, or know to be proper, though I +could not at present support them by authorities, I have suffered to +stand upon my own attestation, claiming the same privilege with my +predecessors, of being sometimes credited without proof. + +The words, thus selected and disposed, are grammatically considered; +they are referred to the different parts of speech; traced when they +are irregularly inflected, through their various terminations; +and illustrated by observations, not indeed of great or striking +importance, separately considered, but necessary to the elucidation +of our language, and hitherto neglected or forgotten by English +grammarians. + +That part of my work on which I expect malignity most frequently to +fasten, is the EXPLANATION; in which I cannot hope to satisfy those, +who are perhaps not inclined to be pleased, since I have not always +been able to satisfy myself. To interpret a language by itself is very +difficult; many words cannot be explained by synonimes, because the +idea signified by them has not more than one appellation; nor by +paraphrase, because simple ideas cannot be described. When the nature +of things is unknown, or the notion unsettled and indefinite, +and various in various minds, the words by which such notions are +conveyed, or such things denoted, will be ambiguous and perplexed. And +such is the fate of hapless lexicography, that not only darkness, but +light impedes and distresses it; things may be not only too little, +but too much known, to be happily illustrated. To explain, requires +the use of terms less abstruse than that which is to be explained, and +such terms cannot always be found; for as nothing can be proved but by +supposing something intuitively known, and evident without proof, so +nothing can be defined but by the use of words too plain to admit a +definition. + +Other words there are, of which the sense is too subtle and evanescent +to be fixed in a paraphrase; such are all those which are by the +grammarians termed expletives, and, in dead languages, are suffered +to pass for empty sounds, of no other use than to fill a verse, or to +modulate a period, but which are easily perceived in living tongues to +have power and emphasis, though it be sometimes such as no other form +of expression can convey. + +My labor has likewise been much increased by a class of verbs too +frequent in the English language, of which the signification is so +loose and general, the use so vague and indeterminate, and the senses +detorted so widely from the first idea, that it is hard to trace them +through the maze of variation, to catch them on the brink of utter +inanity, to circumscribe them by any limitations, or interpret them +by any words of distinct and settled meaning; such are _bear, break, +come, cast, full, get, give, do, put, set, go, run, make, take, turn, +throw_. If of these the whole power is not accurately delivered, +it must be remembered, that while our language is yet living, and +variable by the caprice of every one that speaks it, these words are +hourly shifting their relations, and can no more be ascertained in +a dictionary, than a grove, in the agitation of a storm, can be +accurately delineated from its picture in the water. + +The particles are among all nations applied with so great latitude, +that they are not easily reducible under any regular scheme of +explication: this difficulty is not less, nor perhaps greater, in +English, than in other languages. I have labored them with diligence, +I hope with success; such at least as can be expected in a task, which +no man, however learned or sagacious, has yet been able to perform. + +Some words there are which I cannot explain, because I do not +understand them; these might have been omitted very often with little +inconvenience, but I would not so far indulge my vanity as to +decline this confession: for when Tully owns himself ignorant whether +_lessus_, in the twelve tables, means a _funeral song_, or _mourning +garment_; and Aristotle doubts whether [Greek: ourous] in the _Iliad_ +signifies a _mule, or muleteer_, I may surely without shame, leave +some obscurities to happier industry, or future information. + +The rigor of interpretative lexicography requires that _the +explanation_, and _the word explained should be always reciprocal_; +this I have always endeavoured, but could not always attain. Words are +seldom exactly synonymous; a new term was not introduced, but because +the former was thought inadequate: names, therefore, have often many +ideas, but few ideas have many names. It was then necessary to use the +proximate word, for the deficiency of single terms can very seldom +be supplied by circumlocution; nor is the inconvenience great of such +mutilated interpretations, because the sense may easily be collected +entire from the examples. + +In every word of extensive use, it was requisite to mark the progress +of its meaning, and show by what gradations of intermediate sense +it has passed from its primitive to its remote and accidental +signification; so that every foregoing explanation should tend to that +which follows, and the series be regularly concatenated from the first +notion to the last. + +This is specious, but not always practicable; kindred senses may be so +interwoven, that the perplexity cannot be disentangled, nor any +reason be assigned why one should be ranged before the other. When +the radical idea branches out into parallel ramifications, how can a +consecutive series be formed of senses in their nature collateral? +The shades of meaning sometimes pass imperceptibly into each other, so +that though on one side they apparently differ, yet it is impossible +to mark the point of contact. Ideas of the same race, though not +exactly alike, are sometimes so little different, that no words can +express the dissimilitude, though the mind easily perceives it when +they are exhibited together; and sometimes there is such a confusion +of acceptations, that discernment is wearied and distinction puzzled, +and perseverance herself hurries to an end, by crowding together what +she cannot separate. + +These complaints of difficulty will, by those that have never +considered words beyond their popular use, be thought only the jargon +of a man willing to magnify his labors, and procure veneration to his +studies by involution and obscurity. But every art is obscure to those +that have not learned it; this uncertainty of terms, and commixture of +ideas, is well known to those who have joined philosophy with grammar; +and if I have not expressed them very clearly, it must be remembered +that I am speaking of that which words are insufficient to explain. + +The original sense of words is often driven out of use by their +metaphorical acceptations, yet must be inserted for the sake of a +regular origination. Thus I know not whether _ardor_ is used for +_material heat_, or whether _flagrant_, in English, ever signifies the +same with _burning_; yet such are the primitive ideas of these words, +which are therefore set first, though without examples, that the +figurative senses may be commodiously deduced. + +Such is the exuberance of signification which many words have +obtained, that it was scarcely possible to collect all their senses; +sometimes the meaning of derivatives must be sought in the mother +term, and sometimes deficient explanations of the primitive may +he supplied in the train of derivation. In any case of doubt or +difficulty, it will be always proper to examine all the words of +the same race; for some words are slightly passed over to avoid +repetition, some admitted easier and clearer explanation than others, +and all will be better understood, as they are considered in greater +variety of structures and relations. + +All the interpretations of words are not written with the same skill, +or the same happiness: things equally easy in themselves, are not all +equally easy to any single mind. Every writer of a long word commits +errors, where there appears neither ambiguity to mislead, nor +obscurity to confound him; and in a search like this, many felicities +of expression will be casually overlooked, many convenient parallels +will be forgotten, and many particulars will admit improvement from a +mind utterly unequal to the whole performance. + +But many seeming faults are to be imputed rather to the nature of +the undertaking, than the negligence of the performer. Thus some +explanations are unavoidably reciprocal or circular, as _hind, the +female of the stag; stag, the male of the hind_: sometimes easier +words are changed into harder, as _burial_ into _sepulture, or +interment, drier_ into _desiccative, dryness_ into _siccity_ or +_aridity, fit_ into _paroxysm_; for the easiest word, whatever it +be, can never be translated into one more easy. But easiness and +difficulty are merely relative; and if the present prevalence of our +language should invite foreigners to this Dictionary, many will be +assisted by those words which now seem only to increase or produce +obscurity. For this reason I have endeavoured frequently to join a +Teutonic and Roman interpretation, as to _cheer_, to _gladden_ or +_exhilarate_, that every learner of English may be assisted by his own +tongue. + +The solution of all difficulties, and the supply of all defects must +be sought in the examples, subjoined to the various senses of each +word, and ranged according to the time of their authors. + +When I first collected these authorities, I was desirous that every +quotation should be useful to some other end than the illustration of +a word; I therefore extracted from philosophers principles of science; +from historians remarkable facts; from chymists complete processes; +from divines striking exhortations; and from poets beautiful +descriptions. Such is design, while it is yet at a distance from +execution. When the time called upon me to range this accumulation +of elegance and wisdom into an alphabetical series, I soon discovered +that the bulk of my volumes would fright away the student, and was +forced to depart from my scheme of including all that was pleasing or +useful in English literature, and reduce my transcripts very often to +clusters of words, in which scarcely any meaning is retained; thus +to the weariness of copying, I was condemned to add the vexation of +expunging. Some passages I have yet spared, which may relieve the +labor of verbal searches, and intersperse with verdure and flowers the +dusty deserts of barren philology. + +The examples, thus mutilated, are no longer to be considered as +conveying the sentiments or doctrine of their authors; the word for +the sake of which they are inserted, with all its appendant clauses, +has been carefully preserved; but it may sometimes happen, by hasty +detruncation, that the general tendency of the sentence may be +changed: the divine may desert his tenets, or the philosopher his +system. + +Some of the examples have been taken from writers who were never +mentioned as masters of elegance, or models of style; but words must +be sought where they are used; and in what pages, eminent for purity, +can terms of manufacture or agriculture be found? Many quotations +serve no other purpose than that of proving the bare existence of +words, and are therefore selected with less scrupulousness than those +which are to teach their structures and relations. + +My purpose was to admit no testimony of living authors, that I might +not be misled by partiality, and that none of my contemporaries might +have reason to complain; nor have I departed from this resolution, but +when some performance of uncommon excellence excited my veneration, +when my memory supplied me, from late books, with an example that was +wanting, or when my heart, in the tenderness of friendship, solicited +admission for a favorite name. + +So far have I been from any care to grace my pages with modern +decorations, that I have studiously endeavored to collect examples +and authorities from the writers before the Restoration, whose works +I regard as the 'wells of English undefiled,' as the pure sources +of genuine diction. Our language, for almost a century, has, by the +concurrence of many causes, been gradually departing from its original +Teutonic character and deviating towards a Gallic structure and +phraseology, from which it ought to be our endeavor to recall it, by +making our ancient volumes the groundwork of style, admitting +among the additions of later times, only such as may supply real +deficiencies, such as are readily adopted by the genius of our tongue, +and incorporate easily with our native idioms. + +But as every language has a time of rudeness antecedent to perfection, +as well as of false refinement and declension, I have been cautious +lest my zeal for antiquity might drive me into times too remote, +and crowd my book with words now no longer understood. I have fixed +Sidney's work for the boundary, beyond which I make few excursions. +From the authors which rose in the time of Elizabeth, a speech might +be formed adequate to all the purposes of use and elegance. If the +language of theology were extracted from Hooker and the translation of +the Bible, the terms of natural knowledge from Bacon, the phrases of +policy, war, and navigation from Raleigh, the dialect of poetry and +fiction from Spenser and Sidney, and the diction of common life from +Shakespeare, few ideas would be lost to mankind, for want of English +words in which they might be expressed. + +It is not sufficient that a word is found, unless it be so combined +as that its meaning is apparently determined by the tract and tenor +of the sentence, such passages I have therefore chosen, and when +it happened that any author gave a definition of a term, or such +an explanation as is equivalent to a definition, I have placed +his authority as a supplement to my own, without regard to the +chronological order that is otherwise observed. + +Some words, indeed, stand unsupported by any authority, but they are +commonly derivative nouns or adverbs, formed from their primitives by +regular and constant analogy, or names of things seldom occurring in +books, or words of which I have reason to doubt the existence. + +There is more danger of censure from the multiplicity than paucity +of examples, authorities will sometimes seem to have been accumulated +without necessity or use, and perhaps some will be found, which +might, without loss, have been omitted. But a work of this kind is not +hastily to be charged with superfluities; those quotations, which to +careless or unskillful perusers appear only to repeat the same sense, +will often exhibit, to a more accurate examiner, diversities of +signification, or, at least, afford different shades of the same +meaning: one will show the word applied to persons, another to things; +one will express an ill, another a good, and a third a neutral sense; +one will prove the expression genuine from an ancient author; +another will show it elegant from a modern: a doubtful authority +is corroborated by another of more credit; an ambiguous sentence is +ascertained by a passage clear and determinate: the word, how +often soever repeated, appears with new associates and in different +combinations, and every quotation contributes something to the +stability or enlargement of the language. + +When words are used equivocally I receive them in either sense; when +they are metaphorical, I adopt them in their primitive acceptation. + +I have sometimes, though rarely, yielded to the temptation of +exhibiting a genealogy of sentiments, by showing how one author copied +the thoughts and diction of another: such quotations are indeed little +more than repetitions, which might justly be censured, did they not +gratify the mind, by affording a kind of intellectual history. + +The various syntactical structures occurring in the examples have been +carefully noted; the license or negligence with which many words have +been hitherto used, has made our style capricious and indeterminate; +when the different combinations of the same word are exhibited +together, the preference is readily given to propriety, and I have +often endeavored to direct the choice. + +Thus have I labored by settling the orthography, displaying the +analogy, regulating the structures, and ascertaining the +signification of English words, to perform all the parts of a faithful +lexicographer: but I have not always executed my own scheme, or +satisfied my own expectations. The work, whatever proofs of diligence +and attention it may exhibit, is yet capable of many improvements; the +orthography which I recommend is still controvertible, the etymology +which I adopt is uncertain, and perhaps frequently erroneous; the +explanations are sometimes too much contracted, and sometimes too much +diffused, the significations are distinguished rather with subtlety +than skill, and the attention is harassed with unnecessary minuteness. + +The examples are too often injudiciously truncated, and perhaps +sometimes--I hope very rarely--alleged in a mistaken sense; for in +making this collection I trusted more to memory, than, in a state of +disquiet and embarrassment, memory can contain, and purposed to supply +at the review what was left incomplete in the first transcription. + +Many terms appropriated to particular occupations, though necessary +and significant, are undoubtedly omitted, and of the words most +studiously considered and exemplified, many senses have escaped +observation. + +Yet these failures, however frequent, may admit extenuation and +apology. To have attempted much is always laudable, even when the +enterprise is above the strength that undertakes it: to rest below +his own aim is incident to every one whose fancy is active, and whose +views are comprehensive; nor is any man satisfied with himself because +he has done much, but because he can conceive little. When first I +engaged in this work, I resolved to leave neither words nor things +unexamined, and pleased myself with a prospect of the hours which I +should revel away in feasts of literature, the obscure recesses of +northern learning which I should enter and ransack, the treasures with +which I expected every search into those neglected mines to reward my +labor, and the triumph with which I should display my acquisitions +to mankind. When I had thus inquired into the original of words, I +resolved to show likewise my attention to things; to pierce deep into +every science, to inquire the nature of every substance of which +I inserted the name, to limit every idea by a definition strictly +logical, and exhibit every production of art or nature in an accurate +description, that my book might be in place of all other dictionaries +whether appellative or technical. But these were the dreams of a poet +doomed at last to wake a lexicographer. I soon found that it is too +late to look for instruments, when the work calls for execution, and +that whatever abilities I had brought to my task, with those I must +finally perform it. To deliberate whenever I doubted, to inquire +whenever I was ignorant, would have protracted the undertaking without +end, and, perhaps, without much improvement; for I did not find by +my first experiments, that what I had not of my own was easily to be +obtained: I saw that one inquiry only gave occasion to another, that +book referred to book, that to search was not always to find, and +to find was not always to be informed; and that thus to pursue +perfection, was, like the first inhabitants of Arcadia, to chase the +sun, which, when they had reached the hill where he seemed to rest, +was still beheld at the same distance from them. + +I then contracted my design, determining to confide in myself, and +no longer to solicit auxiliaries which produced more incumbrance than +assistance; by this I obtained at least one advantage, that I set +limits to my work, which would in time be ended, though not completed. + +Despondency has never so far prevailed as to depress me to negligence; +some faults will at last appear to be the effects of anxious diligence +and persevering activity. The nice and subtle ramifications of meaning +were not easily avoided by a mind intent upon accuracy, and convinced +of the necessity of disentangling combinations, and separating +similitudes. Many of the distinctions which to common readers appear +useless and idle, will be found real and important by men versed +in the school philosophy, without which no dictionary can ever be +accurately compiled, or skillfully examined. + +Some senses, however, there are, which, though not the same, are +yet so nearly allied, that they are often confounded. Most men +think indistinctly, and therefore cannot speak with exactness; and +consequently some examples might be indifferently put to either +signification: this uncertainty is not to be imputed to me, who do not +form, but register the language; who do not teach men how they should +think, but relate how they have hitherto expressed their thoughts. + +The imperfect sense of some examples I lamented, but could not remedy, +and hope they will be compensated by innumerable passages selected +with propriety, and preserved with exactness; some shining with sparks +of imagination, and some replete with treasures of wisdom. + +The orthography and etymology, though imperfect, are not imperfect +for want of care, but because care will not always be successful, and +recollection or information come too late for use. + +That many terms of art and manufacture are omitted, must be frankly +acknowledged; but for this defect I may boldly allege that it is +unavoidable; I could not visit caverns to learn the miner's language, +nor take a voyage to perfect my skill in the dialect of navigation, +nor visit the warehouses of merchants, and shops of artificers, to +gain the names of wares, tools, and operations, of which no mention is +found in books; what favorable accident or easy inquiry brought within +my reach, has not been neglected; but it had been a hopeless labor to +glean up words, by courting living information, and contesting with +the sullenness of one, and the roughness of another. + +To furnish the Academicians _della Crusca_ with words of this kind, a +series of comedies called _La Fiera_, or _The Fair_, was professedly +written by Buonaroti; but I had no such assistant, and therefore was +content to want what they must have wanted likewise, had they not +luckily been so supplied. + +Nor are all words which are not found in the vocabulary, to be +lamented as omissions. Of the laborious and mercantile part of the +people, the diction is in a great measure casual and mutable; many of +their terms are formed for some temporary or local convenience, and +though current at certain times and places, are in others utterly +unknown. This fugitive cant, which is always in a state of increase +or decay, cannot be regarded as any part of the durable materials of +a language, and therefore must be suffered to perish with other things +unworthy of preservation. + +Care will sometimes betray to the appearance of negligence. He that is +catching opportunities which seldom occur, will suffer those to pass +by unregarded, which he expects hourly to return; he that is searching +for rare and remote things, will neglect those that are obvious and +familiar: thus many of the most common and cursory words have +been inserted with little illustration, because in gathering the +authorities, I forebore to copy those which I thought likely to occur +whenever they were wanted. It is remarkable that, in reviewing my +collection, I found the word _sea_ unexemplified. + +Thus it happens, that in things difficult there is danger from +ignorance, and in things easy, from confidence; the mind, afraid of +greatness, and disdainful of littleness, hastily withdraws herself +from painful searches, and passes with scornful rapidity over tasks +not adequate to her powers; sometimes too secure for caution, and +again too anxious for vigorous effort; sometimes idle in a plain path, +and sometimes distracted in labyrinths, and dissipated by different +intentions. + +A large work is difficult because it is large, even though all its +parts might singly be performed with facility; where there are many +things to be done, each must be allowed its share of time and labor, +in the proportion only which it bears to the whole; nor can it be +expected, that the stones which form the dome of a temple, should be +squared and polished like the diamond of a ring. + +Of the event of this work, for which; having labored it with so much +application, I cannot but have some degree of parental fondness, it +is natural to form conjectures. Those who have been persuaded to think +well of my design, will require that it should fix our language, and +put a stop to those alterations which time and chance have hitherto +been suffered to make in it without opposition. With this consequence +I will confess that I flattered myself for a while; but now begin +to fear that I have indulged expectation which neither reason nor +experience can justify. When we see men grow old and die at a certain +time one after another, from century to century, we laugh at the +elixir that promises to prolong life to a thousand years; and with +equal justice may the lexicographer be derided, who being able to +produce no example of a nation that has preserved their words and +phrases from mutability, shall imagine that his dictionary can embalm +his language, and secure it from corruption and decay, that it is in +his power to change sublunary nature, and clear the world at once from +folly, vanity, and affectation. + +With this hope, however, academies have been instituted, to guard +the avenues of their languages, to retain fugitives, and repulse +intruders; but their vigilance and activity have hitherto been vain; +sounds are too volatile and subtile for legal restraints; to enchain +syllables, and to lash the wind, are equally the undertakings of +pride, unwilling to measure its desires by its strength. The French +language has visibly changed under the inspection of the Academy; +the style of Amelot's translation of Father Paul is observed by Le +Courayer to be _un peu passé_; and no Italian will maintain that the +diction of any modern writer is not perceptibly different from that of +Boccace, Machiavel, or Caro. + +Total and sudden transformations of a language seldom happen; +conquests and migrations are now very rare: but there are other causes +of change, which, though slow in their operation, and invisible in +their progress, are perhaps as much superior to human resistance, as +the revolutions of the sky, or intumescence of the tide. Commerce, +however necessary, however lucrative, as it depraves the manners, +corrupts the language; they that have frequent intercourse with +strangers, to whom they endeavor to accommodate themselves, must +in time learn a mingled dialect, like the jargon which serves the +traffickers on the Mediterranean and Indian coasts. This will not +always be confined to the exchange, the warehouse, or the port, but +will be communicated by degrees to other ranks of the people, and be +at last incorporated with the current speech. + +There are likewise internal causes equally forcible. The language most +likely to continue long without alterations, would be that of a nation +raised a little, and but a little, above barbarity, secluded from +strangers, and totally employed in procuring the conveniences of life; +either without books, or, like some of the Mahometan countries, with +every few: men thus busied and unlearned, having only such words as +common use requires, would perhaps long continue to express the same +notions by the same signs. But no such constancy can be expected in a +people polished by arts, and classed by subordination, where one part +of the community is sustained and accommodated by the labor of the +other. Those who have much leisure to think, will always be enlarging +the stock of ideas; and every increase of knowledge, whether real or +fancied, will produce new words, or combination of words. When the +mind is unchained from necessity, it will range after convenience; +when it is left at large in the fields of speculation, it will shift +opinions; as any custom is disused, the words that expressed it must +perish with it; as any opinion grows popular, it will innovate speech +in the same proportion as it alters practice. + +As by the cultivation of various sciences a language is amplified, it +will be more furnished with words deflected from their original sense; +the geometrician will talk of a courtier's zenith or the eccentric +virtue of a wild hero, and the physician, of sanguine expectations and +phlegmatic delays. Copiousness of speech will give opportunities to +capricious choice, by which some words will be preferred, and others +degraded; vicissitudes of fashion will enforce the use of new, or +extend the signification of known terms. The tropes of poetry will +make hourly encroachments, and the metaphorical will become the +current sense: pronunciation will be varied by levity or ignorance, +and the pen must at length comply with the tongue; illiterate writers +will, at one time or other, by public infatuation, rise into renown, +who, not knowing the original import of words, will use them with +colloquial licentiousness, confound distinction, and forget propriety. +As politeness increases, some expressions will be considered as +too gross and vulgar for the delicate, others as too formal and +ceremonious for the gay and airy; new phrases are therefore adopted, +which must for the same reasons be in time dismissed. Swift, in his +petty treatise on the English language, allows that new words must +sometimes be introduced, but proposes that none should be suffered +to become obsolete. But what makes a word obsolete, more than general +agreement to forbear it? and how shall it be continued, when it +conveys an offensive idea, or recalled again into the mouths of +mankind, when it has once become unfamiliar by disuse, and unpleasing +by unfamiliarity? + +There is another cause of alteration more prevalent than any other, +which yet in the present state of the world cannot be obviated. A +mixture of two languages will produce a third distinct from both, and +they will always be mixed, where the chief parts of education, and +the most conspicuous accomplishment, is skill in ancient or in foreign +tongues. He that has long cultivated another language, will find +its words and combinations crowd upon his memory; and haste and +negligence, refinement and affectation, will obtrude borrowed terms +and exotic expressions. + +The great pest of speech is frequency of translation. No book was ever +turned from one language into another, without imparting something +of its native idiom; this is the most mischievous and comprehensive +innovation; single words may enter by thousands, and the fabric of the +tongue continue the same; but new phraseology changes much at once; +it alters not the single stones of the building, but the order of the +columns. If an academy should be established for the cultivation of +our style--which I, who can never wish to see dependence multiplied, +hope the spirit of English liberty will hinder or destroy--let them, +instead of compiling grammars and dictionaries, endeavor, with all +their influence, to stop the license of translators, whose idleness +and ignorance, if it be suffered to proceed, will reduce us to babble +a dialect of France. + +If the changes that we fear be thus irresistible, what remains but to +acquiesce with silence, as in the other insurmountable distresses +of humanity? It remains that we retard what we cannot repel, that we +palliate what we cannot cure. Life may be lengthened by care, though +death cannot be ultimately defeated: tongues, like governments, have +a natural tendency to degeneration; we have long preserved our +constitution, let us make some struggles for our language. + +In hope of giving longevity to that which its own nature forbids to be +immortal, I have devoted this book, the labor of years, to the honor +of my country, that we may no longer yield the palm of philology, +without a contest, to the nations of the continent. The chief glory of +every people arises from its authors: whether I shall add any thing by +my own writings to the reputation of English literature, must be left +to time: much of my life has been lost under the pressures of +disease; much has been trifled away; and much has always been spent in +provision for the day that was passing over me; but I shall not think +my employment useless or ignoble, if by my assistance foreign nations, +and distant ages, gain access to the propagators of knowledge, and +understand the teachers of truth; if my labors afford light to the +repositories of science, and add celebrity to Bacon, to Hooker, to +Milton, and to Boyle. + +When I am animated by this wish, I look with pleasure on my book, +however defective, and deliver it to the world with the spirit of a +man that has endeavored well. That it will immediately become popular +I have not promised to myself: a few wild blunders, and risible +absurdities, from which no work of such multiplicity was ever free, +may for a time furnish folly with laughter, and harden ignorance into +contempt; but useful diligence will at last prevail, and there never +can be wanting some who distinguish desert; who will consider that no +dictionary of a living tongue ever can be perfect, since, while it +is hastening to publication, some words are budding, and some falling +away; that a whole life cannot be spent upon syntax and etymology, and +that even a whole life would not be sufficient; that he, whose design +includes whatever language can express, must often speak of what +he does not understand; that a writer will sometimes be hurried by +eagerness to the end, and sometimes faint with weariness under a task +which Scaliger compares to the labors of the anvil and the mine; that +what is obvious is not always known, and what is known is not always +present; that sudden fits of inadvertency will surprise vigilance, +slight avocations will seduce attention, and casual eclipses of the +mind will darken learning; and that the writer shall often in vain +trace his memory at the moment of need, for that which yesterday he +knew with intuitive readiness, and which will come uncalled into his +thoughts to-morrow. + +In this work, when it shall be found that much is omitted, let it not +be forgotten that much likewise is performed; and though no book was +ever spared out of tenderness to the author, and the world is +little solicitous to know whence proceed the faults of that which it +condemns; yet it may gratify curiosity to inform it, that the English +Dictionary was written with little assistance of the learned, and +without any patronage of the great; not in the soft obscurities +of retirement, or under the shelter of academic bowers, but amidst +inconvenience and distraction, in sickness and in sorrow. It may +repress the triumph of malignant criticism to observe, that if our +language is not here fully displayed, I have only failed in an attempt +which no human powers have hitherto completed. If the lexicons of +ancient tongues, now immutably fixed, and comprised in a few volumes, +be yet, after the toil of successive ages, inadequate and delusive; +if the aggregated knowledge, and co-operating diligence of the Italian +academicians, did not secure them from the censure of Beni; if the +embodied critics of France, when fifty years had been spent upon +their work, were obliged to change its economy, and give their second +edition another form, I may surely be contented without the praise of +perfection, which, if I could obtain, in this gloom of solitude, what +would it avail me? I have protracted my work till most of those whom I +wished to please have sunk into the grave, and success and miscarriage +are empty sounds: I therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, +having little to fear or hope from censure or from praise. + + +TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE THE EARL OF CHESTERFIELD + +February 7, 1755. + +MY LORD: + +I have lately been informed by the proprietor of _The World_, that two +papers, in which my _Dictionary_ is recommended to the public, were +written by your Lordship. To be so distinguished is an honor which, +being very little accustomed to favours from the great, I know not +well how to receive, or in what terms to acknowledge. + +When, upon some slight encouragement, I first visited your Lordship, I +was overpowered, like the rest of mankind, by the enchantment of your +address; and I could not forbear to wish that I might boast myself 'Le +vainqueur du vainqueur de la terre'; that I might obtain that regard +for which I saw the world contending; but I found my attendance so +little encouraged, that neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to +continue it. When I had once addressed your Lordship in public, I +had exhausted all the art of pleasing which a retired and uncourtly +scholar can possess. I had done all that I could; and no man is well +pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little. + +Seven years, my Lord, have now passed, since I waited in your outward +rooms, or was repulsed from your door; during which time I have been +pushing on my work through difficulties, of which it is useless to +complain, and have brought it at last to the verge of publication, +without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement, or one smile +of favor. Such treatment I did not expect, for I never had a Patron +before. + +The shepherd in Virgil grew at last acquainted with Love, and found +him a native of the rocks. + +Is not a Patron, my Lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man +struggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached ground, +encumbers him with help? The notice which you have been pleased to +take of my labors, had it been early, had been kind; but it has +been delayed till I am indifferent, and cannot enjoy it; till I am +solitary, and cannot impart it; till I am known, and do not want it. +I hope it is no very cynical asperity not to confess obligations +where no benefit has been received, or to be unwilling that the Public +should consider me as owing that to a Patron, which Providence has +enabled me to do for myself. + +Having carried on my work thus far with so little obligation to any +favorer of learning, I shall not be disappointed though I should +conclude it, if less be possible, with less; for I have been long +wakened from that dream of hope, in which I once boasted myself with +so much exultation, + +My Lord, Your Lordship's most humble, + +Most obedient servant, SAM. JOHNSON. + + +[Footnote A: For a sketch of Johnson's life, see the Introduction to +"Life of Addison" in the volume of English Essays. The interest of his +preface to the great Dictionary need hardly be pointed out, since the +work itself is a landmark in the history of our language. The letter +to Chesterfield, short though it is is a document of great importance +in the freeing of literature from patronage, and is in itself a +notable piece of literature. The preface to Johnson's edition of +Shakespeare's plays not only explains the editor's conception of +his task, but contains what is perhaps the best appreciation of the +dramatist written in the eighteenth century.] + + + + +PREFACE TO SHAKESPEARE + +BY SAMUEL JOHNSON. (1765) + + +That praises are without reason lavished on the dead, and that the +honours due only to excellence are paid to antiquity, is a complaint +likely to be always continued by those, who, being able to add nothing +to truth, hope for eminence from the heresies of paradox; or those, +who, being forced by disappointment upon consolatory expedients, +are willing to hope from posterity what the present age refuses, and +flatter themselves that the regard which is yet denied by envy, will +be at last bestowed by time. + +Antiquity, like every other quality that attracts the notice of +mankind, has undoubtedly votaries that reverence it, not from reason, +but from prejudice. Some seem to admire indiscriminately whatever +has been long preserved, without considering that time has sometimes +co-operated with chance; all perhaps are more willing to honour past +than present excellence; and the mind contemplates genius through the +shades of age, as the eye surveys the sun through artificial opacity. +The great contention of criticism is to find the faults of the +moderns, and the beauties of the ancients. While an author is yet +living we estimate his powers by his worst performance, and when he is +dead, we rate them by his best. + +To works, however, of which the excellence is not absolute and +definite, but gradual and comparative; to works not raised upon +principles demonstrative and scientifick, but appealing wholly to +observation and experience, no other test can he applied than +length of duration and continuance of esteem. What mankind have long +possessed they have often examined and compared; and if they persist +to value the possession, it is because frequent comparisons have +confirmed opinion in its favour. As among the works of nature no +man can properly call a river deep, or a mountain high, without the +knowledge of many mountains, and many rivers; so in the productions of +genius, nothing can be stiled excellent till it has been compared with +other works of the same kind. Demonstration immediately displays its +power, and has nothing to hope or fear from the flux of years; but +works tentative and experimental must be estimated by their proportion +to the general and collective ability of man, as it is discovered in a +long succession of endeavours. Of the first building that was raised, +it might be with certainty determined that it was round or square; but +whether it was spacious or lofty must have been referred to time. The +Pythagorean scale of numbers was at once discovered to be perfect; but +the poems of _Homer_ we yet know not to transcend the common limits +of human intelligence, but by remarking, that nation after nation, and +century after century, has been able to do little more than transpose +his incidents, new-name his characters, and paraphrase his sentiments. + +The reverence due to writings that have long subsisted arises +therefore not from any credulous confidence in the superior wisdom of +past ages, or gloomy persuasion of the degeneracy of mankind, but is +the consequence of acknowledged and indubitable positions, that what +has been longest known has been most considered, and what is most +considered is best understood. + +The Poet, of whose works I have undertaken the revision, may now +begin to assume the dignity of an ancient, and claim the privilege of +established fame and prescriptive veneration. He has long outlived +his century, the term commonly fixed as the test of literary merit. +Whatever advantages he might once derive from personal allusions, +local customs, or temporary opinions, have for many years been lost; +and every topick of merriment, or motive of sorrow, which the modes of +artificial life afforded him, now only obscure the scenes which they +once illuminated. The effects of favour and competition are at an end; +the tradition of his friendships and his enemies has perished; his +works support no opinion with arguments, nor supply any faction with +invectives; they can neither indulge vanity nor gratify malignity; but +are read without any other reason than the desire of pleasure, and are +therefore praised only as pleasure is obtained; yet, thus unassisted +by interest or passion, they have past through variations of taste +and changes of manners, and, as they devolved from one generation to +another, have received new honours at every transmission. + +But because human judgment, though it be gradually gaining upon +certainty, never becomes infallible; and approbation, though long +continued, may yet be only the approbation of prejudice or fashion; +it is proper to inquire, by what peculiarities of excellence +_Shakespeare_ has gained and kept the favour of his countrymen. + +Nothing can please many, and please long, but just representations of +general nature. Particular manner, can be known to few, and therefore +few only can judge how nearly they are copied. The irregular +combinations of fanciful invention may delight a-while, by that +novelty of which the common satiety of life sends us all in quest; but +the pleasures of sudden wonder are soon exhausted, and the mind can +only repose on the stability of truth. + +_Shakespeare_ is above all writers, at least above all modern writers, +the poet of nature; the poet that holds up to his readers a faithful +mirrour of manners and of life. His characters are not modified by the +customs of particular places, unpractised by the rest of the world; +by the peculiarities of studies or professions, which can operate +but upon small numbers; or by the accidents of transient fashions or +temporary opinions: they are the genuine progeny of common humanity, +such as the world will always supply, and observation will always +find. His persons act and speak by the influence of those general +passions and principles by which all minds are agitated, and the whole +system of life is continued in motion. In the writings of other poets +a character is too often an individual; in those of _Shakespeare_ it +is commonly a species. + +It is from this wide extension of design that so much instruction +is derived. It is this which fills the plays of _Shakespeare_ with +practical axioms and domestic wisdom. It was said of _Euripides_, that +every verse was a precept; and it may be said of _Shakespeare_, that +from his works may be collected a system of civil and oeconomical +prudence. Yet his real power is not shewn in the splendour of +particular passages, but by the progress of his fable, and the +tenour of his dialogue; and he that tries to recommend him by select +quotations, will succeed like the pedant in _Hierocles_, who, when +he offered his house to sale, carried a brick in his pocket as a +specimen. + +It will not easily be imagined how much _Shakespeare_ excells in +accommodating his sentiments to real life, but by comparing him with +other authors. It was observed of the ancient schools of declamation, +that the more diligently they were frequented, the more was the +student disqualified for the world, because he found nothing there +which he should ever meet in any other place. The same remark may be +applied to every stage but that of _Shakespeare_. The theatre, when +it is under any other direction, is peopled by such characters as +were never seen, conversing in a language which was never heard, upon +topicks which will never rise in the commerce of mankind. But the +dialogue of this author is often so evidently determined by the +incident which produces it, and is pursued with so much ease and +simplicity, that it seems scarcely to claim the merit of fiction, but +to have been gleaned by diligent selection out of common conversation, +and common occurrences. + +Upon every other stage the universal agent is love, by whose power all +good and evil is distributed, and every action quickened or retarded. +To bring a lover, a lady and a rival into the fable; to entangle +them in contradictory obligations, perplex them with oppositions of +interest, and harrass them with violence of desires inconsistent with +each other; to make them meet in rapture and part in agony; to fill +their mouths with hyperbolical joy and outrageous sorrow; to distress +them as nothing human ever was distressed; to deliver them as nothing +human ever was delivered; is the business of a modern dramatist. For +this probability is violated, life is misrepresented, and language +is depraved. But love is only one of many passions; and as it has no +great influence upon the sum of life, it has little operation in the +dramas of a poet, who caught his ideas from the living world, and +exhibited only what he saw before him. He knew, that any other +passion, as it was regular or exorbitant, was a cause of happiness or +calamity. + +Characters thus ample and general were not easily discriminated and +preserved, yet perhaps no poet ever kept his personages more distinct +from each other. I will not say with _Pope_, that every speech may be +assigned to the proper speaker, because many speeches there are which +have nothing characteristical; but perhaps, though some may be equally +adapted to every person, it will be difficult to find any that can be +properly transferred from the present possessor to another claimant. +The choice is right, when there is reason for choice. + +Other dramatists can only gain attention by hyperbolical or aggravated +characters, by fabulous and unexampled excellence or depravity, as the +writers of barbarous romances invigorated the reader by a giant and a +dwarf; and he that should form his expectations of human affairs from +the play, or from the tale, would be equally deceived. _Shakespeare_ +has no heroes; his scenes are occupied only by men, who act and speak +as the reader thinks that he should himself have spoken or acted on +the same occasion: Even where the agency is supernatural the dialogue +is level with life. Other writers disguise the most natural passions +and most frequent incidents; so that he who contemplates them in the +book will not know them in the world: _Shakespeare_ approximates the +remote, and familiarizes the wonderful; the event which he represents +will not happen, but if it were possible, its effects would probably +be such as he has assigned; and it may be said, that he has not only +shewn human nature as it acts in real exigencies, but as it would be +found in trials, to which it cannot be exposed. + +This therefore is the praise of _Shakespeare_, that his drama is the +mirrour of life; that he who has mazed his imagination, in following +the phantoms which other writers raise up before him, may here be +cured of his delirious extasies, by reading human sentiments in human +language, by scenes from which a hermit may estimate the transactions +of the world, and a confessor predict the progress of the passions. + +His adherence to general nature has exposed him to the censure of +criticks, who form their judgments upon narrow principles. _Dennis_ +and _Rhymer_ think his _Romans_ not sufficiently _Roman_; and +_Voltaire_ censures his kings as not completely royal. _Dennis_ +is offended, that _Menenius_, a senator of _Rome_, should play the +buffoon; and _Voltaire_ perhaps thinks decency violated when the +_Danish_ Usurper is represented as a drunkard. But _Shakespeare_ +always makes nature predominate over accident; and if he preserves the +essential character, is not very careful of distinctions superinduced +and adventitious. His story requires Romans or kings, but, he thinks +only on men. He knew that _Rome_, like every other city, had men of +all dispositions; and wanting a buffoon, he went into the senate-house +for that which the senate-house would certainly have afforded him. +He was inclined to shew an usurper and a murderer not only odious but +despicable, he therefore added drunkenness to his other qualities, +knowing that kings love wine like other men, and that wine exerts its +natural power upon kings. These are the petty cavils of petty minds; +a poet overlooks the casual distinction of country and condition, as a +painter, satisfied with the figure, neglects the drapery. + +The censure which he has incurred by mixing comick and tragick scenes, +as it extends to all his works, deserves more consideration. Let the +fact be first stated, and then examined. + +_Shakespeare's_ plays are not in the rigorous and critical sense +either tragedies or comedies, but compositions of a distinct kind; +exhibiting the real state of sublunary nature, which partakes of good +and evil, joy and sorrow, mingled with endless variety of proportion +and innumerable modes of combination; and expressing the course of the +world, in which the loss of one is the gain of another; in which, at +the same time, the reveller is hasting to his wine, and the mourner +burying his friend; in which the malignity of one is sometimes +defeated by the frolick of another; and many mischiefs and many +benefits are done and hindered without design. + +Out of this chaos of mingled purposes and casualties the ancient +poets, according to the laws which custom had prescribed, selected +some the crimes of men, and some their absurdities; some the momentous +vicissitudes of life, and some the lighter occurrences; some the +terrours of distress, and some the gayeties of prosperity. Thus +rose the two modes of imitation, known by the names of _tragedy_ and +_comedy_, compositions intended to promote different ends by contrary +means, and considered as so little allied, that I do not recollect +among the _Greeks_ or _Romans_ a single writer who attempted both. + +_Shakespeare_ has united the powers of exciting laughter and sorrow +not only in one mind, but in one composition. Almost all his plays +are divided between serious and ludicrous characters, and, in the +successive evolutions of the design, sometimes produce seriousness and +sorrow, and sometimes levity and laughter. + +That this is a practice contrary to the rules of criticism will be +readily allowed; but there is always an appeal open from criticism +to nature. The end of writing is to instruct; the end of poetry is +to instruct by pleasing. That the mingled drama may convey all the +instruction of tragedy or comedy cannot be denied, because it includes +both in its alterations of exhibition and approaches nearer than +either to the appearance of life, by shewing how great machinations +and slender designs may promote or obviate one another, and the +high and the low co-operate in the general system by unavoidable +concatenation. + +It is objected, that by this change of scenes the passions are +interrupted in their progression, and that the principal event, being +not advanced by a due gradation of preparatory incidents, wants at +last the power to move, which constitutes the perfection of dramatick +poetry. This reasoning is so specious, that it is received as true +even by those who in daily experience feel it to be false. The +interchanges of mingled scenes seldom fail to produce the intended +vicissitudes of passion. Fiction cannot move so much, but that the +attention may be easily transferred; and though it must be allowed +that pleasing melancholy be sometimes interrupted by unwelcome levity, +yet let it be considered likewise, that melancholy is often not +pleasing, and that the disturbance of one man may be the relief of +another; that different auditors have different habitudes; and that, +upon the whole, all pleasure consists in variety. + +The players, who in their edition divided our authour's works into +comedies, histories, and tragedies, seem not to have distinguished the +three kinds by any very exact or definite ideas. + +And action which ended happily to the principal persons, however +serious or distressful through its intermediate incidents, in their +opinion, constituted a comedy. This idea of a comedy continued +long amongst us; and plays were written, which, by changing the +catastrophe, were tragedies to-day, and comedies to-morrow. + +Tragedy was not in those times a poem of more general dignity or +elevation than comedy; it required only a calamitous conclusion, with +which the common criticism of that age was satisfied, whatever lighter +pleasure it afforded in its progress. + +History was a series of actions, with no other than chronological +succession, independent on each other, and without any tendency to +introduce or regulate the conclusion. It is not always very nicely +distinguished from tragedy. There is not much nearer approach to +unity of action in the tragedy of _Antony and Cleopatra_, than in +the history of _Richard the Second_. But a history might be continued +through many plays; as it had no plan, it had no limits. + +Through all these denominations of the drama, _Shakespeare's_ mode of +composition is the same; an interchange of seriousness and merriment, +by which the mind is softened at one time, and exhilarated at another. +But whatever be his purpose, whether to gladden or depress, or to +conduct the story, without vehemence or emotion, through tracts of +easy and familiar dialogue, he never fails to attain his purpose; +as he commands us, we laugh or mourn, or sit silent with quiet +expectation, in tranquillity without indifference. + +When _Shakespeare's_ plan is understood, most of the criticisms of +_Rhymer_ and _Voltaire_ vanish away. The play of _Hamlet_ is opened, +without impropriety, by two sentinels; _Iago_ bellows at _Brabantio's_ +window, without injury to the scheme of the play, though in terms +which a modern audience would not easily endure; the character of +_Polonius_ is seasonable and useful; and the Grave-diggers themselves +may be heard with applause. + +_Shakespeare_ engaged in dramatick poetry with the world open before +him; the rules of the ancients were yet known to few; but publick +judgment was unformed; he had no example of such fame as might force +him upon imitation, nor criticks of such authority as might restrain +his extravagance: He therefore indulged his natural disposition, +and his disposition, as _Rhymer_ has remarked, led him to comedy. In +tragedy he often writes, with great appearance of toil and study, what +is written at last with little felicity; but in his comick scenes, he +seems to produce without labour what no labour can improve. In tragedy +he is always struggling after some occasion to be comick; but in +comedy he seems to repose, or to luxuriate, as in a mode of thinking +congenial to his nature. In his tragick scenes there is always +something wanting, but his comedy often surpasses expectation or +desire. His comedy pleases by the thoughts and the language, and his +tragedy for the greater part by incident and action. His tragedy seems +to be skill, his comedy to be instinct. + +The force of his comick scenes has suffered little diminution from the +changes made by a century and a half, in manners or in words. As his +personages act upon principles arising from genuine passion, very +little modified by particular forms, their pleasures and vexations +are communicable to all times and to all places; they are natural, and +therefore durable; the adventitious peculiarities of personal habits, +are only superficial dies, bright and pleasing for a little while, yet +soon fading to a dim tinct, without any remains of former lustre; but +the discriminations of true passion are the colours of nature; +they pervade the whole mass, and can only perish with the body that +exhibits them. The accidental compositions of heterogeneous modes +are dissolved by the chance which combined them; but the uniform +simplicity of primitive qualities neither admits increase, nor suffers +decay. The sand heap by one flood is scattered by another, but the +rock always continues in its place. The stream of time, which is +continually washing the dissoluble fabricks of other poets, passes +without injury by the adamant of _Shakespeare_. + +If there be, what I believe there is, in every nation, a stile which +never becomes obsolete, a certain mode of phraseology so consonant and +congenial to the analogy and principles of its respective language as +to remain settled and unaltered; this style is probably to be sought +in the common intercourse of life, among those who speak only to +be understood, without ambition of elegance. The polite are always +catching modish innovations, and the learned depart from established +forms of speech, in hope of finding or making better; those who wish +for distinction forsake the vulgar, when the vulgar is right; but +there is a conversation above grossness and below refinement, where +propriety resides, and where this poet seems to have gathered his +comick dialogue. He is therefore more agreeable to the ears of the +present age than any other authour equally remote, and among his other +excellencies deserves to be studied as one of the original masters of +our language. + +These observations are to be considered not as unexceptionally +constant, but as containing general and predominant truth. +_Shakespeare's_ familiar dialogue is affirmed to be smooth and clear, +yet not wholly without ruggedness or difficulty; as a country may be +eminently fruitful, though it has spots unfit for cultivation: +His characters are praised as natural, though their sentiments are +sometimes forced, and their actions improbable; as the earth upon the +whole is spherical, though its surface is varied with protuberances +and cavities. + +_Shakespeare_ with his excellencies has likewise faults, and faults +sufficient to obscure and overwhelm any other merit. I shall shew +them in the proportion in which they appear to me, without envious +malignity or superstitious veneration. No question can be more +innocently discussed than a dead poet's pretensions to renown; and +little regard is due to that bigotry which sets candour higher than +truth. + +His first defect is that to which may be imputed most of the evil in +books or in men. He sacrifices virtue to convenience, and is so +much more careful to please than to instruct, that he seems to write +without any moral purpose. From his writings indeed a system of +social duty may be selected, for he that thinks reasonably must think +morally; but his precepts and axioms drop casually from him; he makes +no just distribution of good or evil, nor is always careful to shew +in the virtuous a disapprobation of the wicked; he carries his persons +indifferently through right and wrong, and at the close dismisses them +without further care, and leaves their examples to operate by chance. +This fault the barbarity of his age cannot extenuate; for it is always +a writer's duty to make the world better, and justice is a virtue +independent on time or place. + +The plots are often so loosely formed, that a very slight +consideration may improve them, and so carelessly pursued, that +he seems not always fully to comprehend his own design. He omits +opportunities of instructing or delighting which the train of +his story seems to force upon him, and apparently rejects those +exhibitions which would be more affecting, for the sake of those which +are more easy. + +It may be observed, that in many of his plays the latter part is +evidently neglected. When he found himself near the end of his work, +and, in view of his reward, he shortened the labour to snatch +the profit. He therefore remits his efforts where he should most +vigorously exert them, and his catastrophe is improbably produced or +imperfectly represented. + +He had no regard to distinction of time or place, but gives to one age +or nation, without scruple, the customs, institutions, and opinions +of another, at the expence not only of likelihood, but of possibility. +These faults _Pope_ has endeavoured, with more zeal than judgment, +to transfer to his imagined interpolators. We need not wonder to find +_Hector_ quoting _Aristotle_, when we see the loves of _Theseus_ +and _Hippolyta_ combined with the _Gothick_ mythology of fairies. +_Shakespeare_, indeed, was not the only violator of chronology, for in +the same age _Sidney_, who wanted not the advantages of learning, has, +in his _Arcadia_, confounded the pastoral with the feudal times, +the days of innocence, quiet and security, with those of turbulence, +violence, and adventure. + +In his comick scenes he is seldom very successful, when he engages +his characters in reciprocations of smartness and contests of sarcasm; +their jests are commonly gross, and their pleasantry licentious; +neither his gentlemen nor his ladies have much delicacy, nor are +sufficiently distinguished from his clowns by any appearance of +refined manners. Whether he represented the real conversation of his +time is not easy to determine; the reign of _Elizabeth_ is commonly +supposed to have been a time of stateliness, formality and reserve; +yet perhaps the relaxations of that severity were not very elegant. +There must, however, have been always some modes of gayety preferable +to others, and a writer ought to chuse the best. + +In tragedy his performance seems constantly to be worse, as his labour +is more. The effusions of passion which exigence forces out are for +the most part striking and energetick; but whenever he solicits his +invention, or strains his faculties, the offspring of his throes is +tumour, meanness, tediousness, and obscurity. + +In narration he affects a disproportionate pomp of diction, and a +wearisome train of circumlocution, and tells the incident imperfectly +in many words, which might have been more plainly delivered in +few. Narration in dramatick poetry is naturally tedious, as it is +unanimated and inactive, and obstructs the progress of the action; +it should therefore always be rapid, and enlivened by frequent +interruption. _Shakespeare_ found it an encumberance, and instead of +lightening it by brevity, endeavoured to recommend it by dignity and +splendour. + +His declamations or set speeches are commonly cold and weak, for his +power was the power of nature; when he endeavoured, like other tragick +writers, to catch opportunities of amplification, and instead of +inquiring what the occasion demanded, to show how much his stores +of knowledge could supply, he seldom escapes without the pity or +resentment of his reader. + +It is incident to him to be now and then entangled with an unwieldy +sentiment, which he cannot well express, and will not reject; he +struggles with it a while, and if it continues stubborn, comprises it +in words such as occur, and leaves it to be disentangled and evolved +by those who have more leisure to bestow upon it. + +Not that always where the language is intricate the thought is subtle, +or the image always great where the line is bulky; the equality of +words to things is very often neglected, and trivial sentiments and +vulgar ideas disappoint the attention, to which they are recommended +by sonorous epithets and swelling figures. + +But the admirers of this great poet have never less reason to indulge +their hopes of supreme excellence, than when he seems fully resolved +to sink them in dejection, and mollify them with tender emotions by +the fall of greatness, the danger of innocence, or the crosses of +love. He is not long soft and pathetick without some idle conceit, +or contemptible equivocation. He no sooner begins to move, than he +counteracts himself; and terrour and pity, as they are rising in the +mind, are checked and blasted by sudden frigidity. + +A quibble is to _Shakespeare_, what luminous vapours are to the +traveller; he follows it at all adventures; it is sure to lead him out +of his way, and sure to engulf him in the mire. It has some malignant +power over his mind, and its fascinations are irresistible. Whatever +be the dignity or profundity of his disquisition, whether he be +enlarging knowledge or exalting affection, whether he be amusing +attention with incidents, or enchaining it in suspense, let but a +quibble spring up before him, and he leaves his work unfinished. A +quibble is the golden apple for which he will always turn aside from +his career, or stoop from his elevation. A quibble, poor and barren as +it is, gave him such delight, that he was content to purchase it, by +the sacrifice of reason, propriety and truth. A quibble was to him the +fatal _Cleopatra_ for which he lost the world, and was content to lose +it. + +It will be thought strange, that, in enumerating the defects of this +writer, I have not yet mentioned his neglect of the unities: his +violation of those laws which have been instituted and established by +the joint authority of poets and criticks. + +For his other deviations from the art of writing I resign him to +critical justice, without making any other demand in his favour, than +that which must be indulged to all human excellence: that his +virtues be rated with his failings: But, from the censure which this +irregularity may bring upon him, I shall, with due reverence to that +learning which I must oppose, adventure to try how I can defend him. + +His histories, being neither tragedies nor comedies are not subject to +any of their laws; nothing more is necessary to all the praise which +they expect, than that the changes of action be so prepared as to +be understood, that the incidents be various and affecting, and +the characters consistent, natural, and distinct. No other unity is +intended, and therefore none is to be sought. + +In his other works he has well enough preserved the unity of action. +He has not, indeed, an intrigue regularly perplexed and regularly +unravelled: he does not endeavour to hide his design only to discover +it, for this is seldom the order of real events, and _Shakespeare_ +is the poet of nature: But his plan has commonly what _Aristotle_ +requires, a beginning, a middle, and an end; one event is concatenated +with another, and the conclusion follows by easy consequence. There +are perhaps some incidents that might be spared, as in other poets +there is much talk that only fills up time upon the stage; but the +general system makes gradual advances, and the end of the play is the +end of expectation. + +To the unities of time and place he has shewn no regard; and perhaps a +nearer view of the principles on which they stand will diminish their +value, and withdraw from them the veneration which, from the time of +_Corneille_, they have very generally received, by discovering +that they have given more trouble to the poet, than pleasure to the +auditor. + +The necessity of observing the unities of time and place arises from +the supposed necessity of making the drama credible. The criticks +hold it impossible, that an action of months or years can be possibly +believed to pass in three hours; or that the spectator can suppose +himself to sit in the theatre, while ambassadors go and return between +distant kings while armies are levied and towns besieged, while an +exile wanders and returns, or till he whom they saw courting his +mistress, shall lament the untimely fall of his son. The mind revolts +from evident falsehood, and fiction loses its force when it departs +from the resemblance of reality. + +From the narrow limitation of time necessarily arises the contraction +of place. The spectator, who knows that he saw the first act at +_Alexandria_, cannot suppose that he sees the next at _Rome_, at a +distance to which not the dragons of _Medea_ could, in so short a +time, have transported him; he knows with certainty that he has not +changed his place, and he knows that place cannot change itself; that +what was a house cannot become a plain; that what was _Thebes_ can +never be _Persepolis_. + +Such is the triumphant language with which a critick exults over the +misery of an irregular poet, and exults commonly without resistance +or reply. It is time therefore to tell him by the authority of +_Shakespeare_, that he assumes, as an unquestionable principle, +a position, which, while his breath is forming it into words, +his understanding pronounces to be false. It is false, that any +representation is mistake for reality; that any dramatick fable in +its materiality was ever credible, or, for a single moment, was ever +credited. + +The objection arising from the impossibility of passing the first hour +at _Alexandria_, and the next at _Rome_, supposes, that when the play +opens, the spectator really imagines himself at _Alexandria_, and +believes that his walk to the theatre has been a voyage to _Egypt_, +and that he lives in the days of _Antony_ and _Cleopatra_. Surely he +that imagines this may imagine more. He that can take the stage at one +time for the palace of the _Ptolemies_, may take it in half an hour +for the promontory of _Actium_. Delusion, if delusion be admitted, has +no certain limitation; if the spectator can be once persuaded, +that his old acquaintance are _Alexander_ and _Cæsar_, that a room +illuminated with candles is the plain of _Pharsalia_, or the bank of +_Granicus_, he is in a state of elevation above the reach of reason, +or of truth, and from the heights of empyrean poetry, may despise the +circumscriptions of terrestrial nature. There is no reason why a mind +thus wandering in extacy should count the clock, or why an hour should +not be a century in that calenture of the brains that can make the +stage a field. + +The truth is, that the spectators are always in their senses, and +know, from the first act to the last, that the stage is only a stage, +and that the players are only players. They came to hear a certain +number of lines recited with just gesture and elegant modulation. The +lines relate to some action, and an action must be in some place; +but the different actions that complete a story may be in places very +remote from each other; and where is the absurdity of allowing that +space to represent first _Athens_, and then _Sicily_, which was always +known to be neither _Sicily_ nor _Athens_, but a modern theatre? + +By supposition, as place is introduced, times may be extended; the +time required by the fable elapses for the most part between the acts; +for, of so much of the action as is represented, the real and poetical +duration is the same. If, in the first act, preparations for war +against _Mithridates_ are represented to be made in _Rome_, the event +of the war may, without absurdity, be represented, in the catastrophe, +as happening in _Pontus_; we know that there is neither war, nor +preparation for war; we know that we are neither in _Rome_ nor +_Pontus_; that neither _Mithridates_ nor _Lucullus_ are before us. The +drama exhibits successive imitations of successive actions; and why +may not the second imitation represent an action that happened years +after the first, if it be so connected with it, that nothing but time +can be supposed to intervene? Time is, of all modes of existence, most +obsequious to the imagination; a lapse of years is as easily conceived +as a passage of hours. In contemplation we easily contract the time of +real actions, and therefore willingly permit it to be contracted when +we only see their imitation. + +It will be asked, how the drama moves, if it is not credited. It is +credited with all the credit due to a drama. It is credited, whenever +it moves, as a just picture of a real original; as representing to the +auditor what he would himself feel, if he were to do or suffer what +is there feigned to be suffered or to be done. The reflection that +strikes the heart is not, that the evils before us are real evils, but +that they are evils to which we ourselves may be exposed. If there be +any fallacy, it is not that we fancy the players, but that we fancy +ourselves unhappy for a moment; but we rather lament the possibility +than suppose the presence of misery, as a mother weeps over her babe, +when she remembers that death may take it from her. The delight of +tragedy proceeds from our consciousness of fiction; if we thought +murders and treasons real, they would please no more. + +Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are mistaken +for realities, but because they bring realities to mind. When the +imagination is recreated by a painted landscape, the trees are not +supposed capable to give us shade, or the fountains coolness; but we +consider, how we should be pleased with such fountains playing beside +us, and such woods waving over us. We are agitated in reading the +history of _Henry_ the Fifth, yet no man takes his book for the +field of _Agencourt_. A dramatick exhibition is a book recited with +concomitants that encrease or diminish its effect. Familiar comedy is +often more powerful in the theatre, than on the page; imperial +tragedy is always less. The humour of _Petruchio_ may be heightened +by grimace; but what voice or what gesture can hope to add dignity or +force to the soliloquy of _Cato_. + +A play read, affects the mind like a play acted. It is therefore +evident, that the action is not supposed to be real; and it follows, +that between the acts a longer or shorter time may be allowed to pass, +and that no more account of space or duration is to be taken by the +auditor of a drama, than by the reader of a narrative, before whom may +pass in an hour the life of a hero, or the revolutions of an empire. + +Whether _Shakespeare_ knew the unities, and rejected them by design, +or deviated from them by happy ignorance, it is, I think, impossible +to decide, and useless to enquire. We may reasonably suppose, that, +when he rose to notice, he did not want the counsels and admonitions +of scholars and criticks, and that he at last deliberately persisted +in a practice, which he might have begun by chance. As nothing is +essential to the fable, but unity of action, and as the unities +of time and place arise evidently from false assumptions, and, by +circumscribing the extent of the drama, lessen its variety, I cannot +think it much to be lamented, that they were not known by him, or +not observed: Nor, if such another poet could arise, should I very +vehemently reproach him, that his first act passed at _Venice_, and +his next in _Cyprus_. Such violations of rules merely positive, become +the comprehensive genius of _Shakespeare_, and such censures are +suitable to the minute and slender criticism of _Voltaire_: + + Non usque adeo permiscuit imis + Longus summa dies, ut non, si voce Metelli + Serventur leges, malint a Cæsare tolli. + +Yet when I speak thus slightly of dramatick rules, I cannot but +recollect how much wit and learning may be produced against me; before +such authorities I am afraid to stand, not that I think the present +question one of those that are to be decided by mere authority, but +because it is to be suspected, that these precepts have not been so +easily received but for better reasons than I have yet been able to +find. The result of my enquiries, in which it would be ludicrous to +boast of impartiality, is, that the unities of time and place are not +essential to a just drama, that though they may sometimes conduce to +pleasure, they are always to be sacrificed to the nobler beauties +of variety and instruction; and that a play, written with nice +observation of critical rules, is to be contemplated as an elaborate +curiosity, as the product of superfluous and ostentatious art, by +which is shewn, rather what is possible, than what is necessary. + +He that, without diminution of any other excellence, shall preserve +all the unities unbroken, deserves the like applause with the +architect, who shall display all the orders of architecture in a +citadel; without any deduction from its strength; but the principal +beauty of a citadel is to exclude the enemy; and the greatest graces +of a play, are to copy nature and instruct life. + +Perhaps what I have here not dogmatically but deliberatively written, +may recal the principles of the drama to a new examination. I am +almost frighted at my own temerity; and when I estimate the fame and +the strength of those that maintain the contrary opinion, am ready to +sink down in reverential silence; as _Æneas_ withdrew from the defence +of _Troy_, when he saw _Neptune_ shaking the wall, and _Juno_ heading +the besiegers. + +Those whom my arguments cannot persuade to give their approbation +to the judgment of _Shakespeare_, will easily, if they consider the +condition of his life, make some allowance for his ignorance. + +Every man's performances, to be rightly estimated, must be compared +with the state of the age in which he lived, and with his own +particular opportunities; and though to the reader a book be not worse +or better for the circumstances of the authour, yet as there is always +a silent reference of human works to human abilities, and as the +enquiry, how far man may extend his designs, or how high he may rate +his native force, is of far greater dignity than in what rank we shall +place any particular performance, curiosity is always busy to discover +the instruments, as well as to survey the workmanship, to know how +much is to be ascribed to original powers, and how much to casual and +adventitious help. The palaces of _Peru_ or _Mexico_ were certainly +mean and incommodious habitations, if compared to the houses +of _European_ monarchs; yet who could forbear to view them with +astonishment, who remembered that they were built without the use of +iron? + +The _English_ nation, in the time of _Shakespeare_, was yet +struggling to emerge from barbarity. The philology of _Italy_ had +been transplanted hither in the reign of _Henry_ the Eighth; and +the learned languages had been successfully cultivated by _Lilly, +Linacer_, and _More_; by _Pole, Cheke_, and _Gardiner_; and afterwards +by _Smith, Clerk, Haddon_, and _Ascham_. Greek was now taught to boys +in the principal schools; and those who united elegance with learning, +read, with great diligence, the _Italian_ and _Spanish_ poets. But +literature was yet confined to professed scholars, or to men and women +of high rank. The publick was gross and dark; and to be able to read +and write, was an accomplishment still valued for its rarity. + +Nations, like individuals, have their infancy. A people newly awakened +to literary curiosity, being yet unacquainted with the true state +of things, knows not how to judge of that which is proposed as its +resemblance. Whatever is remote from common appearances is always +welcome to vulgar, as to childish credulity; and of a country +unenlightened by learning, the whole people is the vulgar. The study +of those who then aspired to plebeian learning was laid out upon +adventures, giants, dragons, and enchantments. _The Death of Arthur +was_ the favourite volume. + +The mind, which has feasted on the luxurious wonders of fiction, has +no taste of the insipidity of truth. A play which imitated only +the common occurrences of the world, would, upon the admirers of +_Palmerin_ and _Guy_ of _Warwick_, have made little impression; he +that wrote for such an audience was under the necessity of looking +round for strange events and fabulous transactions, and that +incredibility, by which maturer knowledge is offended, was the chief +recommendation of writings, to unskilful curiosity. + +Our authour's plots are generally borrowed from novels, and it is +reasonable to suppose, that he chose the most popular, such as were +read by many, and related by more; for his audience could not have +followed him through the intricacies of the drama, had they not held +the thread of the story in their hands. + +The stories, which we now find only in remoter authours, were in his +time accessible and familiar. The fable of _As you like it_, which is +supposed to be copied from _Chaucer's_ Gamelyn, was a little pamphlet +of those times; and old Mr. _Cibber_ remembered the tale of _Hamlet_ +in plain _English_ prose, which the criticks have now to seek in _Saxo +Grammaticus._ + +His _English_ histories he took from _English_ chronicles and +_English_ ballads; and as the ancient writers were made known to +his countrymen by versions, they supplied him with new subjects; he +dilated some of _Plutarch's_ lives into plays, when they had been +translated by _North_. + +His plots, whether historical or fabulous, are always crouded with +incidents, by which the attention of a rude people was more easily +caught than by sentiment or argumentation; and such is the power of +the marvellous even over those who despise it, that every man finds +his mind more strongly seized by the tragedies of _Shakespeare_ than +of any other writer; others please us by particular speeches, but he +always makes us anxious for the event, and has perhaps excelled all +but _Homer_ in securing the first purpose of a writer, by exciting +restless and unquenchable curiosity and compelling him that reads his +work to read it through. The shows and bustle with which his plays +abound have the same original. As knowledge advances, pleasure passes +from the eye to the ear, but returns, as it declines, from the ear to +the eye. Those to whom our authour's labours were exhibited had more +skill in pomps or processions than in poetical language, and perhaps +wanted some visible and discriminated events, as comments on the +dialogue. He knew how he should most please; and whether his practice +is more agreeable to nature, or whether his example has prejudiced the +nation, we still find that on our stage something must be done as +well as said, and inactive declamation is very coldly heard, however +musical or elegant, passionate or sublime. + +_Voltaire_ expresses his wonder, that our authour's extravagances are +endured by a nation, which has seen the tragedy of _Cato_. Let him +be answered, that _Addison_ speaks the language of poets, and +_Shakespeare_, of men. We find in _Cato_ innumerable beauties which +enamour us of its authour, but we see nothing that acquaints us with +human sentiments or human actions; we place it with the fairest and +the noblest progeny which judgment propagates by conjunction with +learning, but _Othello_ is the vigorous and vivacious offspring +of observation impregnated by genius. _Cato_ affords a splendid +exhibition of artificial and fictitious manners, and delivers just and +noble sentiments, in diction easy, elevated and harmonious, but its +hopes and fears communicate no vibration to the heart; the composition +refers us only to the writer; we pronounce the name of _Cato_, but we +think on _Addison_. + +The work of a correct and regular writer is a garden accurately formed +and diligently planted, varied with shades, and scented with flowers; +the composition of _Shakespeare_ is a forest, in which oaks extend +their branches, and pines tower in the air, interspersed sometimes +with weeds and brambles, and sometimes giving shelter to myrtles and +to roses; filling the eye with awful pomp, and gratifying the mind +with endless diversity. Other poets display cabinets of precious +rarities, minutely finished, wrought into shape, and polished into +brightness. _Shakespeare_ opens a mine which contains gold and +diamonds in unexhaustible plenty, though clouded by incrustations, +debased by impurities, and mingled with a mass of meaner minerals. + +It has been much disputed, whether _Shakespeare_ owed his excellence +to his own native force, or whether he had the common helps of +scholastick education, the precepts of critical science, and the +examples of ancient authours. + +There has always prevailed a tradition, that _Shakespeare_ wanted +learning, that he had no regular education, nor much skill in the dead +languages. _Johnson_, his friend, affirms, that _he had small Latin, +and no Greek_; who, besides that he had no imaginable temptation to +falsehood, wrote at a time when the character and acquisitions of +_Shakespeare_ were known to multitudes. His evidence ought therefore +to decide the controversy, unless some testimony of equal force could +be opposed. + +Some have imagined, that they have discovered deep learning in many +imitations of old writers; but the examples which I have known urged, +were drawn from books translated in his time; or were such easy +coincidences of thought, as will happen to all who consider the same +subjects; or such remarks on life or axioms of morality as float in +conversation, and are transmitted through the world in proverbial +sentences. + +I have found it remarked, that, in this important sentence, _Go +before, I'll follow_, we read a translation of, _I prae, sequar_. I +have been told, that when _Caliban_, after a pleasing dream, says, _I +cry'd to sleep again_, the authour imitates _Anacreon_, who had, like +every other man, the same wish on the same occasion. + +There are a few passages which may pass for imitations, but so few, +that the exception only confirms the rule; he obtained them from +accidental quotations, or by oral communication, and as he used what +he had, would have used more if he had obtained it. + +The _Comedy of Errors_ is confessedly taken from the _Menæchmi_ +of _Plautus_; from the only play of _Plautus_ which was then in +_English_. What can be more probable, than that he who copied that, +would have copied more; but that those which were not translated were +inaccessible? + +Whether he knew the modern languages is uncertain. That his plays have +some _French_ scenes proves but little; he might easily procure them +to be written, and probably, even though he had known the language in +the common degree, he could not have written it without assistance. In +the story of _Romeo_ and _Juliet_ he is observed to have followed the +_English_ translation, where it deviates from the _Italian_; but +this on the other part proves nothing against his knowledge of the +original. He was to copy, not what he knew himself, but what was known +to his audience. + +It is most likely that he had learned _Latin_ sufficiently to make him +acquainted with construction, but that he never advanced to an easy +perusal of the _Roman_ authours. Concerning his skill in modern +languages, I can find no sufficient ground of determination; but as +no imitations of _French_ or _Italian_ authours have been discovered, +though the _Italian_ poetry was then high in esteem, I am inclined to +believe, that he read little more than _English_, and chose for his +fables only such tales as he found translated. + +That much knowledge is scattered over his works is very justly +observed by _Pope_, but it is often such knowledge as books did not +supply. He that will understand _Shakespeare_, must not be content to +study him in the closet, he must look for his meaning sometimes among +the sports of the field, and sometimes among the manufactures of the +shop. + +There is however proof enough that he was a very diligent reader, nor +was our language then so indigent of books, but that he might very +liberally indulge his curiosity without excursion into foreign +literature. Many of the _Roman_ authours were translated, and some of +the _Greek_; the reformation had filled the kingdom with theological +learning; most of the topicks of human disquisition had found +_English_ writers; and poetry had been cultivated, not only with +diligence, but success. This was a stock of knowledge sufficient for a +mind so capable of appropriating and improving it. + +But the greater part of his excellence was the product of his +own genius. He found the _English_ stage in a state of the utmost +rudeness; no essays either in tragedy or comedy had appeared, from +which it could be discovered to what degree of delight either one +or other might be carried. Neither character nor dialogue were yet +understood. _Shakespeare_ may be truly said to have introduced them +both amongst us, and in some of his happier scenes to have carried +them both to the utmost height. + +By what gradations of improvement he proceeded, is not easily known; +for the chronology of his works is yet unsettled. _Rowe_ is of +opinion, that _perhaps we are not to look for his beginning, like +those of other writers, in his least perfect works; art had so little, +and nature so large a share in what he did, that for ought I know_, +says he, _the performances of his youth, as they were the most +vigorous, were the best._ But the power of nature is only the power of +using to any certain purpose the materials which diligence procures, +or opportunity supplies. Nature gives no man knowledge, and when +images are collected by study and experience, can only assist in +combining or applying them. _Shakespeare_, however favoured by nature, +could impart only what he had learned; and as he must increase his +ideals, like other mortals, by gradual acquisition, he, like them, +grew wiser as he grew older, could display life better, as he knew it +more, and instruct with more efficacy, as he was himself more amply +instructed. + +There is a vigilance of observation and accuracy of distinction which +books and precepts cannot confer; from this almost all original +and native excellence proceeds. _Shakespeare_ must have looked +upon mankind with perspicacity, in the highest degree curious and +attentive. Other writers borrow their characters from preceding +writers, and diversify them only by the accidental appendages of +present manners; the dress is a little varied, but the body is the +same. Our authour had both matter and form to provide; for except +the characters of _Chaucer_, to whom I think he is not much indebted, +there were no writers in _English_, and perhaps not many in other +modern languages, which shewed life in its native colours. + +The contest about the original benevolence or malignity of man had not +yet commenced. Speculation had not yet attempted to analyse the +mind, to trace the passions to their sources, to unfold the seminal +principles of vice and virtue, or sound the depths of the heart for +the motives of action. All those enquiries, which from that time that +human nature became the fashionable study, have been made sometimes +with nice discernment, but often with idle subtilty, were yet +unattempted. The tales, with which the infancy of learning was +satisfied, exhibited only the superficial appearances of action, +related the events but omitted the causes, and were formed for such as +delighted in wonders rather than in truth. Mankind was not then to +be studied in the closet; he that would know the world, was under the +necessity of gleaning his own remarks, by mingling as he could in its +business and amusements. + +_Boyle_ congratulated himself upon his high birth, because it favoured +his curiosity, by facilitating his access. _Shakespeare_ had no such +advantage; he came to _London_ a needy adventurer, and lived for a +time by very mean employments. Many works of genius and learning have +been performed in states of life, that appear very little favourable +to thought or to enquiry; so many, that he who considers them +is inclined to think that he sees enterprise and perseverance +predominating over all external agency, and bidding help and hindrance +vanish before them. The genius of _Shakespeare_ was not to be +depressed by the weight of poverty, nor limited by the narrow +conversation to which men in want are inevitably condemned; the +incumbrances of his fortune were shaken from his mind, _as dewdrops +from a lion's mane_. + +Though he had so many difficulties to encounter, and so little +assistance to surmount them, he has been able to obtain an +exact knowledge of many modes of life, and many casts of native +dispositions; to vary them with great multiplicity; to mark them +by nice distinctions; and to shew them in full view by proper +combinations. In this part of his performances he had none to imitate, +but has himself been imitated by all succeeding writers; and it may +be doubted, whether from all his successors more maxims of theoretical +knowledge, or more rules of practical prudence, can be collected, than +he alone has given to his country. + +Nor was his attention confined to the actions of men; he was an exact +surveyor of the inanimate world; his descriptions have always some +peculiarities, gathered by contemplating things as they really exist. +It may be observed, that the oldest poets of many nations preserve +their reputation, and that the following generations of wit, after a +short celebrity, sink into oblivion. The first, whoever they be, must +take their sentiments and descriptions immediately from knowledge; +the resemblance is therefore just, their descriptions are verified by +every eye, and their sentiments acknowledged by every breast. Those +whom their fame invites to the same studies, copy partly them, and +partly nature, till the books of one age gain such authority, as +to stand in the place of nature to another, and imitation, +always deviating a little, becomes at last capricious and casual. +_Shakespeare_, whether life or nature be his subject, shews plainly, +that he has seen with his own eyes; he gives the image which he +receives, not weakened or distorted by the intervention of any other +mind; the ignorant feel his representations to be just, and the +learned see that they are compleat. + +Perhaps it would not be easy to find any authour, except _Homer_, who +invented so much as _Shakespeare_, who so much advanced the studies +which he cultivated, or effused so much novelty upon his age or +country. The form, the characters, the language, and the shows of the +_English_ drama are his, _He seems_, says _Dennis, to have been the +very original of our_ English _tragical harmony, that is, the harmony +of blank verse, diversified often by dissyllable and trissyllable +terminations. For the diversity distinguishes it from heroick harmony, +and by bringing it nearer to common use makes it more proper to gain +attention, and more fit for action and dialogue. Such verse we make +when we are writing prose; we make such verse in common conversation_. + +I know not whether this praise is rigorously just. The dissyllable +termination, which the critic rightly appropriates to the drama, is +to be found, though, I think, not in _Gorboduc_ which is confessedly +before our author; yet in _Hieronnymo_, of which the date is not +certain, but which there is reason to believe at least as old as his +earliest plays. This however is certain, that he is the first who +taught either tragedy or comedy to please, there being no theatrical +piece of any older writer, of which the name is known, except to +antiquaries and collectors of books, which are sought because they are +scarce, and would not have been scarce, had they been much esteemed. + +To him we must ascribe the praise, unless _Spenser_ may divide it with +him, of having first discovered to how much smoothness and harmony +the _English_ language could be softened. He has speeches, perhaps +sometimes scenes, which have all the delicacy of _Rowe_, without his +effeminacy. He endeavours indeed commonly to strike by the force and +vigour of his dialogue, but he never executes his purpose better, than +when he tries to sooth by softness. + +Yet it must be at last confessed, that as we owe every thing to +him, he owes something to us; that, if much of his praise is paid +by perception and judgement, much is likewise given by custom and +veneration. We fix our eyes upon his graces, and turn them from his +deformities, and endure in him what we should in another loath or +despise. If we endured without praising, respect for the father of +our drama might excuse us; but I have seen, in the book of some modern +critick, a collection of anomalies, which shew that he has corrupted +language by every mode of depravation, but which his admirer has +accumulated as a monument of honour. + +He has scenes of undoubted and perpetual excellence, but perhaps +not one play, which, if it were now exhibited as the work of a +contemporary writer, would be heard to the conclusion. I am indeed +far from thinking, that his works were wrought to his own ideas of +perfection; when they were such as would satisfy the audience, they +satisfied the writer. It is seldom that authours, though more studious +of fame than _Shakespeare_, rise much above the standard of their own +age; to add a little of what is best will always be sufficient for +present praise, and those who find themselves exalted into fame, +are willing to credit their encomiasts, and to spare the labour of +contending with themselves. + +It does not appear, that _Shakespeare_ thought his works worthy of +posterity, that he levied any ideal tribute upon future times, or had +any further prospect, than of present popularity and present profit. +When his plays had been acted, his hope was at an end; he solicited +no addition of honour from the reader. He therefore made no scruple +to repeat the same jests in many dialogues, or to entangle different +plots by the same knot of perplexity, which may be at least forgiven +him, by those who recollect, that of _Congreve's_ four comedies, two +are concluded by a marriage in a mask, by a deception, which perhaps +never happened, and which, whether likely or not, he did not invent. + +So careless was this great poet of future fame, that, though he +retired to ease and plenty, while he was yet little _declined into the +vale of years_, before he could be disgusted with fatigue, or disabled +by infirmity, he made no collection of his works, nor desired to +rescue those that had been already published from the depravations +that obscured them, or secure to the rest a better destiny, by giving +them to the world in their genuine state. + +Of the plays which bear the name of _Shakespeare_ in the late +editions, the greater part were not published till about seven years +after his death, and the few which appeared in his life are apparently +thrust into the world without the care of the authour, and therefore +probably without his knowledge. + +Of all the publishers, clandestine or professed, their negligence and +unskilfulness has by the late revisers been sufficiently shown. +The faults of all are indeed numerous and gross, and have not only +corrupted many passages perhaps beyond recovery, but have brought +others into suspicion, which are only obscured by obsolete +phraseology, or by the writer's unskilfulness and affectation. To +alter is more easy than to explain, and temerity is a more common +quality than diligence. Those who saw that they must employ conjecture +to a certain degree, were willing to indulge it a little further. Had +the author published his own works, we should have sat quietly down +to disentangle his intricacies, and clear his obscurities; but now we +tear what we cannot loose, and eject what we happen not to understand. + +The faults are more than could have happened without the +concurrence of many causes. The stile of _Shakespeare_ was in itself +ungrammatical, perplexed and obscure; his works were transcribed for +the players by those who may be supposed to have seldom understood +them; they were transmitted by copiers equally unskilful, who still +multiplied errours; they were perhaps sometimes mutilated by the +actors, for the sake of shortening the speeches; and were at last +printed without correction of the press. + +In this state they remained, not as Dr. _Warburton_ supposes, because +they were unregarded, but because the editor's art was not yet applied +to modern languages, and our ancestors were accustomed to so much +negligence of _English_ printers, that they could very patiently +endure it. At last an edition was undertaken by _Rowe_; not because a +poet was to be published by a poet, for _Rowe_ seems to have thought +very little on correction or explanation, but that our authour's works +might appear like those of his fraternity, with the appendages of a +life and recommendatory preface. _Rowe_ has been clamorously blamed +for not performing what he did not undertake, and it is time that +justice be done him, by confessing, that though he seems to have had +no thought of corruption beyond the printer's errours, yet he has made +many emendations, if they were not made before, which his successors +have received without acknowledgement, and which, if they had produced +them, would have filled pages and pages with censures of the stupidity +by which the faults were committed, with displays of the absurdities +which they involved, with ostentatious expositions of the new reading, +and self congratulations on the happiness of discovering it. + +Of _Rowe_, as of all the editors, I have preserved the preface, and +have likewise retained the authour's life, though not written with +much elegance or spirit; it relates however what is now to be known, +and therefore deserves to pass through all succeeding publications. + +The nation had been for many years content enough with Mr. _Rowe's_ +performance, when Mr. _Pope_ made them acquainted with the true state +of _Shakespeare's_ text, shewed that it was extremely corrupt, and +gave reason to hope that there were means of reforming it. He collated +the old copies, which none had thought to examine before, and restored +many lines to their integrity; but, by a very compendious criticism, +he rejected whatever he disliked, and thought more of amputation than +of cure. + +I know not why he is commended by Dr. _Warburton_ for distinguishing +the genuine from the spurious plays. In this choice he exerted no +judgement of his own; the plays which he received, were given +by _Hemings_ and _Condel,_ the first editors; and those which he +rejected, though, according to the licentiousness of the press in +those times, they were printed during _Shakespeare's_ life, with his +name, had been omitted by his friends, and were never added to his +works before the edition of 1664, from which they were copied by the +later printers. + +This was a work which _Pope_ seems to have thought unworthy of his +abilities, being not able to suppress his contempt of _the dull duty +of an editor_. He understood but half his undertaking. The duty of +a collator is indeed dull, yet, like other tedious tasks, is very +necessary; but an emendatory critick would ill discharge his duty, +without qualities very different from dullness. In perusing a +corrupted piece, he must have before him all possibilities of meaning, +with all possibilities of expression. Such must be his comprehension +of thought, and such his copiousness of language. Out of many readings +possible, he must be able to select that which best suits with the +state, opinions, and modes of language prevailing in every age, and +with his authour's particular cast of thought, and turn of expression. +Such must be his knowledge, and such his taste. Conjectural criticism +demands more than humanity possesses, and he that exercises it with +most praise has very frequent need of indulgence. Let us now be told +no more of the dull duty of an editor. + +Confidence is the common consequence of success. They whose excellence +of any kind has been loudly celebrated, are ready to conclude, that +their powers are universal. _Pope's_ edition fell below his own +expectations, and he was so much offended, when he was found to have +left any thing for others to do, that he past the latter part of his +life in a state of hostility with verbal criticism. + +I have retained all his notes, that no fragment of so great a writer +may be lost; his preface, valuable alike for elegance of composition +and justness of remark, and containing a general criticism on his +authour, so extensive, that little can be added, and so exact, that +little can be disputed, every editor has an interest to suppress, but +that every reader would demand its insertion. + +_Pope_ was succeeded by _Theobald_, a man of narrow comprehension and +small acquisitions, with no native and intrinsick splendour of genius, +with little of the artificial light of learning, but zealous for +minute accuracy, and not negligent in pursuing it. He collated +the ancient copies, and rectified many errours. A man so anxiously +scrupulous might have been expected to do more, but what little he did +was commonly right. + +In his report of copies and editions he is not to be trusted, without +examination. He speaks sometimes indefinitely of copies, when he has +only one. In his enumeration of editions, he mentions the two first +folios as of high, and the third folio as of middle authority; but +the truth is, that the first is equivalent to all others, and that the +rest only deviate from it by the printer's negligence. Whoever has +any of the folios has all, excepting those diversities which mere +reiteration of editions will produce. I collated them all at the +beginning, but afterwards used only the first. + +Of his notes I have generally retained those which he retained himself +in his second edition, except when they were confuted by subsequent +annotators, or were too minute to merit preservation. I have sometimes +adopted his restoration of a comma, without inserting the panegyrick +in which he celebrated himself for his atchievement. The exuberant +excrescence of his diction I have often lopped, his triumphant +exultations over _Pope_ and _Rowe_ I have sometimes suppressed, and +his contemptible ostentation I have frequently concealed; but I have +in some places shewn him, as he would have shewn himself, for the +reader's diversion, that the inflated emptiness of some notes may +justify or excuse the contraction of the rest. + +_Theobald_, thus weak and ignorant, thus mean and faithless, thus +petulant and ostentatious, by the good luck of having _Pope_ for his +enemy, has escaped, and escaped alone, with reputation, from this +undertaking. So willingly does the world support those who solicite +favour, against those who command reverence; and so easily is he +praised, whom no man can envy. + +Our authour fell then into the hands of Sir _Thomas Hanmer,_ the +_Oxford_ editor, a man, in my opinion, eminently qualified by nature +for such studies. He had, what is the first requisite to emendatory +criticism, that intuition by which the poet's intention is immediately +discovered, and that dexterity of intellect which despatches its work +by the easiest means. He had undoubtedly read much; his acquaintance +with customs, opinions, and traditions, seems to have been large; and +he is often learned without shew. He seldom passes what he does not +understand, without an attempt to find or to make a meaning, and +sometimes hastily makes what a little more attention would have found. +He is solicitous to reduce to grammar, what he could not be sure that +his authour intended to be grammatical. _Shakespeare_ regarded more +the series of ideas, than of words; and his language, not being +designed for the reader's desk, was all that he desired it to be, if +it conveyed his meaning to the audience. + +_Hanmer's_ care of the metre has been too violently censured. He found +the measures reformed in so many passages, by the silent labours +of some editors, with the silent acquiescence of the rest, that he +thought himself allowed to extend a little further the license, which +had already been carried so far without reprehension; and of his +corrections in general, it must be confessed, that they are often +just, and made commonly with the least possible violation of the text. + +But, by inserting his emendations, whether invented or borrowed, into +the page, without any notice of varying copies, he has appropriated +the labour of his predecessors, and made his own edition of little +authority. His confidence indeed, both in himself and others, was +too great; he supposes all to be right that was done by _Pope_ and +_Theobald_; he seems not to suspect a critick of fallibility, and it +was but reasonable that he should claim what he so liberally granted. + +As he never writes without careful enquiry and diligent consideration, +I have received all his notes, and believe that every reader will wish +for more. + +Of the last editor it is more difficult to speak. Respect is due to +high place, tenderness to living reputation, and veneration to genius +and learning; but he cannot be justly offended at that liberty +of which he has himself so frequently given an example, nor very +solicitous what is thought of notes, which he ought never to have +considered as part of his serious employments, and which, I suppose, +since the ardour of composition is remitted, he no longer numbers +among his happy effusions. + +The original and predominant errour of his commentary, is acquiescence +in his first thoughts; that precipitation which is produced by +consciousness of quick discernment; and that confidence which presumes +to do, by surveying the surface, what labour only can perform, +by penetrating the bottom. His notes exhibit sometimes perverse +interpretations, and sometimes improbable conjectures; he at one +time gives the authour more profundity of meaning, than the sentence +admits, and at another discovers absurdities, where the sense is plain +to every other reader. But his emendations are likewise often happy +and just; and his interpretation of obscure passages learned and +sagacious. + +Of his notes, I have commonly rejected those, against which the +general voice of the publick has exclaimed, or which their own +incongruity immediately condemns, and which, I suppose, the authour +himself would desire to be forgotten. Of the rest, to part I have +given the highest approbation, by inserting the offered reading in +the text; part I have left to the judgment of the reader, as doubtful, +though specious; and part I have censured without reserve, but I am +sure without bitterness of malice, and, I hope, without wantonness of +insult. + +It is no pleasure to me, in revising my volumes, to observe how much +paper is wasted in confutation. Whoever considers the revolutions of +learning, and the various questions of greater or less importance, +upon which wit and reason have exercised their powers, must lament the +unsuccessfulness of enquiry, and the slow advances of truth, when he +reflects, that great part of the labour of every writer is only the +destruction of those that went before him. The first care of the +builder of a new system, is to demolish the fabricks which are +standing. The chief desire of him that comments an authour, is to +shew how much other commentators have corrupted and obscured him. +The opinions prevalent in one age, as truths above the reach of +controversy, are confuted and rejected in another, and rise again +to reception in remoter times. Thus the human mind is kept in motion +without progress. Thus sometimes truth and criour, and sometimes +contrarieties of errour, take each other's place by reciprocal +invasion. The tide of seeming knowledge which is poured over one +generation, retires and leaves another naked and barren; the sudden +meteors of intelligence which for a while appear to shoot their beams +into the regions of obscurity, on a sudden withdraw their lustre, and +leave mortals again to grope their way. + +These elevations and depressions of renown, and the contradictions to +which all improvers of knowledge must for ever be exposed, since they +are not escaped by the highest and brightest of mankind, may surely +be endured with patience by criticks and annotators, who can rank +themselves but as the satellites of their authours. How canst thou beg +for life, says _Achilles_ to his captive, when thou knowest that +thou art now to suffer only what must another day be suffered by +_Achilles?_ + +Dr. _Warburton_ had a name sufficient to confer celebrity on those who +could exalt themselves into antagonists, and his notes have raised a +clamour too loud to be distinct. His chief assailants are the authours +of _the Canons of criticism_ and of the _Review of_ Shakespeare's +_text_; of whom one ridicules his errours with airy petulance, +suitable enough to the levity of the controversy; the other attacks +them with gloomy malignity, as if he were dragging to justice an +assassin or incendiary. The one stings like a fly, sucks a little +blood, takes a gay flutter, and returns for more; the other bites like +a viper, and would be glad to leave inflammations and gangrene behind +him. When I think on one, with his confederates, I remember the danger +of _Coriolanus,_ who was afraid that _girls with spits, and boys with +stones, should slay him in puny battle_; when the other crosses my +imagination, I remember the prodigy in _Macbeth_, + + _An eagle tow'ring in his pride of place, + Was by a mousing owl hawk'd at and kill'd._ + +Let me however do them justice. One is a wit, and one a scholar. They +have both shown acuteness sufficient in the discovery of faults, and +have both advanced some probable interpretations of obscure passages; +but when they aspire to conjecture and emendation, it appears how +falsely we all estimate our own abilities, and the little which they +have been able to perform might have taught them more candour to the +endeavours of others. + +Before Dr. _Warburton's_ edition, _Critical observations on_ +Shakespeare had been published by Mr. _Upton_, a man skilled in +languages, and acquainted with books, but who seems to have had no +great vigour of genius or nicety of taste. Many of his explanations +are curious and useful, but he likewise, though he professed to oppose +the licentious confidence of editors, and adhere to the old copies, +is unable to restrain the rage of emendation, though his ardour is ill +seconded by his skill. Every cold empirick, when his heart is expanded +by a successful experiment, swells into a theorist, and the laborious +collator at some unlucky moment frolicks in conjecture. + +_Critical, historical and explanatory notes_ have been likewise +published upon _Shakespeare_ by Dr. _Grey_, whose diligent perusal +of the old _English_ writers has enabled him to make some useful +observations. What he undertook he has well enough performed, but +as he neither attempts judicial nor emendatory criticism, he employs +rather his memory than his sagacity. It were to be wished that all +would endeavour to imitate his modesty who have not been able to +surpass his knowledge. + +I can say with great sincerity of all my predecessors, what I hope +will hereafter be said of me, that not one has left _Shakespeare_ +without improvement, nor is there one to whom I have not been indebted +for assistance and information. Whatever I have taken from them it was +my intention to refer to its original authour, and it is certain, that +what I have not given to another, I believed when I wrote it to be my +own. In some perhaps I have been anticipated; but if I am ever found +to encroach upon the remarks of any other commentator, I am willing +that the honour, be it more or less, should be transferred to the +first claimant, for his right, and his alone, stands above dispute; +the second can prove his pretensions only to himself, nor can +himself always distinguish invention, with sufficient certainty, from +recollection. + +They have all been treated by me with candour, which they have not +been careful of observing to one another. It is not easy to discover +from what cause the acrimony of a scholiast can naturally proceed. +The subjects to be discussed by him are of very small importance; they +involve neither property nor liberty; nor favour the interest of +sect or party. The various readings of copies, and different +interpretations of a passage, seem to be questions that might exercise +the wit, without engaging the passions. But, whether it be, that +_small things make mean men proud_, and vanity catches small +occasions; or that all contrariety of opinion, even in those that can +defend it no longer, makes proud men angry; there is often found in +commentaries a spontaneous strain of invective and contempt, more +eager and venomous than is vented by the most furious controvertist in +politicks against those whom he is hired to defame. + +Perhaps the lightness of the matter may conduce to the vehemence +of the agency; when the truth to be investigated is so near to +inexistence, as to escape attention, its bulk is to be enlarged by +rage and exclamation: That to which all would be indifferent in its +original state, may attract notice when the fate of a name is appended +to it. A commentator has indeed great temptations to supply by +turbulence what he wants of dignity, to beat his little gold to a +spacious surface, to work that to foam which no art or diligence can +exalt to spirit. + +The notes which I have borrowed or written are either illustrative, +by which difficulties are explained; or judicial by which faults +and beauties are remarked; or emendatory, by which depravations are +corrected. + +The explanations transcribed from others, if I do not subjoin any +other interpretation, I suppose commonly to be right, at least I +intend by acquiescence to confess, that I have nothing better to +propose. + +After the labours of all the editors, I found many passages which +appeared to me likely to obstruct the greater number of readers, and +thought it my duty to facilitate their passage. It is impossible +for an expositor not to write too little for some, and too much for +others. He can only judge what is necessary by his own experience; +and how long soever he may deliberate, will at last explain many lines +which the learned will think impossible to be mistaken, and omit many +for which the ignorant will want his help. These are censures merely +relative, and must be quietly endured. I have endeavoured to be +neither superfluously copious, nor scrupulously reserved, and hope +that I have made my authour's meaning accessible to many who before +were frighted from perusing him, and contributed something to the +publick, by diffusing innocent and rational pleasure. + +The compleat explanation of an authour not systematick and +consequential, but desultory and vagrant, abounding in casual +allusions and light hints, is not to be expected from any single +scholiast. All personal reflections, when names are suppressed, must +be in a few years irrecoverably obliterated; and customs, too minute +to attract the notice of law, such as modes of dress, formalities of +conversation, rules of visits, disposition of furniture, and practices +of ceremony, which naturally find places in familiar dialogue, are +so fugitive and unsubstantial, that they are not easily retained or +recovered. What can be known, will be collected by chance, from the +recesses of obscure and obsolete papers, perused commonly with some +other view. Of this knowledge every man has some, and none has much; +but when an authour has engaged the publick attention, those who can +add any thing to his illustration, communicate their discoveries, and +time produces what had eluded diligence. + +To time I have been obliged to resign many passages, which, though I +did not understand them, will perhaps hereafter be explained, having, +I hope, illustrated some, which others have neglected or mistaken, +sometimes by short remarks, or marginal directions, such as every +editor has added at his will, and often by comments more laborious +than the matter will seem to deserve; but that which is most difficult +is not always most important, and to an editor nothing is a trifle by +which his authour is obscured. + +The poetical beauties or defects I have not been very diligent to +observe. Some plays have more, and some fewer judicial observations, +not in proportion to their difference of merit, but because I gave +this part of my design to chance and to caprice. The reader, I +believe, is seldom pleased to find his opinion anticipated; it is +natural to delight more in what we find or make, than in what we +receive. Judgement, like other faculties, is improved by practice, and +its advancement is hindered by submission to dictatorial decisions, as +the memory grows torpid by the use of a table book. Some initiation is +however necessary; of all skill, part is infused by precept, and part +is obtained by habit; I have therefore shewn so much as may enable the +candidate of criticism to discover the rest. + +To the end of most plays, I have added short strictures, containing +a general censure of faults, or praise of excellence; in which I know +not how much I have concurred with the current opinion; but I have +not, by any affectation of singularity, deviated from it. Nothing +is minutely and particularly examined, and therefore it is to be +supposed, that in the plays which are condemned there is much to be +praised, and in these which are praised much to be condemned. + +The part of criticism in which the whole succession of editors has +laboured with the greatest diligence, which has occasioned the +most arrogant ostentation, and excited the keenest acrimony, is the +emendation of corrupted passages, to which the publick attention +having been first drawn by the violence of contention between _Pope_ +and _Theobald_, has been continued by the persecution, which, with a +kind of conspiracy, has been since raised against all the publishers +of _Shakespeare_. + +That many passages have passed in a state of depravation through all +the editions is indubitably certain; of these the restoration is only +to be attempted by collation of copies or sagacity of conjecture. The +collator's province is safe and easy, the conjecturer's perilous and +difficult. Yet as the greater part of the plays are extant only in one +copy, the peril must not be avoided, nor the difficulty refused. + +Of the readings which this emulation of amendment has hitherto +produced, some from the labours of every publisher I have advanced +into the text; those are to be considered as in my opinion +sufficiently supported; some I have rejected without mention, as +evidently erroneous; some I have left in the notes without censure or +approbation, as resting in equipoise between objection and defence; +and some, which seemed specious but not right, I have inserted with a +subsequent animadversion. + +Having classed the observations of others, I was at last to try what +I could substitute for their mistakes, and how I could supply their +omissions. I collated such copies as I could procure, and wished +for more, but have not found the collectors of these rarities very +communicative. Of the editions which chance or kindness put into +my hands I have given an enumeration, that I may not be blamed for +neglecting what I had not the power to do. + +By examining the old copies, I soon found that the later publishers, +with all their boasts of diligence, suffered many passages to stand +unauthorised, and contented themselves with _Rowe's_ regulation of +the text, even where they knew it to be arbitrary, and with a +little consideration might have found it to be wrong. Some of these +alterations are only the ejection of a word for one that appeared to +him more elegant or more intelligible. These corruptions I have often +silently rectified; for the history of our language, and the true +force of our words, can only be preserved, by keeping the text of +authours free from adulteration. Others, and those very frequent, +smoothed the cadence, or regulated the measure; on these I have +not exercised the same rigour; if only a word was transposed, or a +particle Inserted or omitted, I have sometimes suffered the line +to stand; for the inconstancy of the copies is such, as that some +liberties may be easily permitted. But this practice I have not +suffered to proceed far, having restored the primitive diction +wherever it could for any reason be preferred. + +The emendations, which comparison of copies supplied, I have inserted +in the text; sometimes where the improvement was slight, without +notice, and sometimes with an account of the reasons of the change. + +Conjecture, though it be sometimes unavoidable, I have not wantonly +nor licentiously indulged. It has been my settled principle, that the +reading of the ancient books is probably true, and therefore is not +to be disturbed for the sake of elegance, perspicuity, or mere +improvement of the sense. For though much credit is not due to the +fidelity, nor any to the judgement of the first publishers, yet they +who had the copy before their eyes were more likely to read it right, +than we who read it only by imagination. But it is evident that they +have often made strange mistakes by ignorance or negligence, and that +therefore something may be properly attempted by criticism, keeping +the middle way between presumption and timidity. + +Such criticism I have attempted to practice, and where any passage +appeared inextricably perplexed, have endeavoured to discover how it +may be recalled to sense, with least violence. But my first labour +is, always to turn the old text on every side, and try if there be any +interstice, through which light can find its way; nor would _Huetius_ +himself condemn me, as refusing the trouble of research, for the +ambition of alteration. In this modest industry I have not been +unsuccessful. I have rescued many lines from the violations of +temerity, and secured many scenes from the inroads of correction. I +have adopted the _Roman_ sentiment, that it is more honourable to +save a citizen, than to kill an enemy, and have been more careful to +protect than to attack. + +I have preserved the common distribution of the plays into acts, +though I believe it to be in almost all the plays void of authority. +Some of those which are divided in the later editions have no division +in the first folio, and some that are divided in the folio have no +division in the preceding copies. The settled mode of the theatre +requires four intervals in the play, but few, if any, of our authour's +compositions can be properly distributed in that manner. An act is so +much of the drama as passes without intervention of time or change of +place. A pause makes a new act. In every real, and therefore in every +imitative action, the intervals may be more or fewer, the restriction +of five acts being accidental and arbitrary. This _Shakespeare_ knew, +and this he practised; his plays were written, and at first printed +in one unbroken continuity, and ought now to be exhibited with +short pauses, interposed as often as the scene is changed, or any +considerable time is required to pass. This method would at once quell +a thousand absurdities. + +In restoring the author's works to their integrity, I have considered +the punctuation as wholly in my power; for what could be their care of +colons and commas, who corrupted words and sentences. Whatever could +be done by adjusting points is therefore silently performed, in some +plays with much diligence, in others with less; it is hard to keep a +busy eye steadily fixed upon evanescent atoms, or a discursive mind +upon evanescent truth. + +The same liberty has been taken with a few particles, or other words +of slight effect. I have sometimes inserted or omitted them without +notice. I have done that sometimes, which the other editors have +done always, and which indeed the state of the text may sufficiently +justify. + +The greater part of readers, instead of blaming us for passing +trifles, will wonder that on mere trifles so much labour is expended, +with such importance of debate, and such solemnity of diction. To +these I answer with confidence, that they are judging of an art which +they do not understand; yet cannot much reproach them with their +ignorance, nor promise that they would become in general, by learning +criticism, more useful, happier or wiser. + +As I practised conjecture more, I learned to trust it less; and after +I had printed a few plays, resolved to insert none of my own readings +in the text. Upon this caution I now congratulate myself, for every +day encreases my doubt of my emendations. + +Since I have confined my imagination to the margin, it must not be +considered as very reprehensible, if I have suffered it to play some +freaks in its own dominion. There is no danger in conjecture, if it +be proposed as conjecture; and while the text remains uninjured, those +changes may be safely offered, which are not considered even by him +that offers them as necessary or safe. + +If my readings are of little value, they have not been ostentatiously +displayed or importunately obtruded. I could have written longer +notes, for the art of writing notes is not of difficult attainment. +The work is performed, first by railing at the stupidity, negligence, +ignorance, and asinine tastelessness of the former editors, and +shewing, from all that goes before and all that follows, the +inelegance and absurdity of the old reading; then by proposing +something which to superficial readers would seem specious, but +which the editor rejects with indignation; then by producing the true +reading, with a long paraphrase, and concluding with loud acclamations +on the discovery, and a sober wish for the advancement and prosperity +of genuine criticism. + +All this may be done, and perhaps done sometimes without impropriety. +But I have always suspected that the reading is right, which requires +many words to prove it wrong; and the emendation wrong, that cannot +without so much labour appear to be right The justness of a happy +restoration strikes at once, and the moral precept may be well applied +to criticism, _quod dubitas ne feceris_. + +To dread the shore which he sees spread with wrecks, is natural to +the sailor. I had before my eye, so many critical adventures ended in +miscarriage, that caution was forced upon me. I encountered in every +page Wit struggling with its own sophistry, and Learning confused by +the multiplicity of its views. I was forced to censure those whom I +admired, and could not but reflect, while I was dispossessing their +emendations, how soon the same fate might happen to my own, and how +many of the readings which I have corrected may be by some other +editor defended and established. + + Criticks, I saw, that other's names efface, + And fix their own, with labour, in the place; + Their own, like others, soon their place resign'd, + Or disappear'd, and left the first behind, + + POPE. + +That a conjectural critick should often be mistaken, cannot be +wonderful, either to others or himself, if it be considered, that in +his art there is no system, no principal and axiomatical truth that +regulates subordinate positions. His chance of errour is renewed +at every attempt; an oblique view of the passage, a slight +misapprehension of a phrase, a casual inattention to the parts +connected, is sufficient to make him not only fails, but fail +ridiculously; and when he succeeds best, he produces perhaps but one +reading of many probable, and he that suggests another will always be +able to dispute his claims. + +It is an unhappy state, in which danger is hid under pleasure. The +allurements of emendation are scarcely resistible. Conjecture has all +the joy and all the pride of invention, and he that has once started +a happy change, is too much delighted to consider what objections may +rise against it. + +Yet conjectural criticism has been of great use in the learned world; +nor is it my intention to depreciate a study, that has exercised so +many mighty minds, from the revival of learning to our own age, from +the Bishop of _Aleria_ to English _Bentley_. The criticks on ancient +authours have, in the exercise of their sagacity, many assistances, +which the editor of _Shakespeare_ is condemned to want. They are +employed upon grammatical and settled languages, whose construction +contributes so much to perspicuity, that _Homer_ has fewer passages +unintelligible than _Chaucer_. The words have not only a known +regimen, but invariable quantities, which direct and confine the +choice. There are commonly more manuscripts than one; and they do not +often conspire in the same mistakes. Yet _Scaliger_ could confess +to _Salmasius_ how little satisfaction his emendations gave him. +_Illudunt nobis conjectureæ nostræ, quarum nos pudet, posteaquam +in meliores codices incidimus_. And _Lipsius_ could complain, that +criticks were making faults, by trying to remove them, _Ut olim +vitiis, ita nunc remediis laboratur_. And indeed, where mere +conjecture is to be used, the emendations of _Scaliger_ and _Lipsius_, +notwithstanding their wonderful sagacity and erudition, are often +vague and disputable, like mine or _Theobald_'s. + +Perhaps I may not be more censured for doing wrong, than for doing +little; for raising in the publick expectations, which at last I have +not answered. The expectation of ignorance is indefinite, and that of +knowledge is often tyrannical. It is hard to satisfy those who know +not what to demand, or those who demand by design what they think +impossible to be done. I have indeed disappointed no opinion more +than my own; yet I have endeavoured to perform my task with no slight +solicitude. Not a single passage in the whole work has appeared to me +corrupt, which I have not attempted to restore; or obscure, which I +have not endeavoured to illustrate. In many I have failed like others, +and from many, after all my efforts, I have retreated, and confessed +the repulse. I have not passed over, with affected superiority, what +is equally difficult to the reader and to myself, but where I could +not instruct him, have owned my ignorance. I might easily have +accumulated a mass of seeming learning upon easy scenes; but it ought +not to be imputed to negligence, that, where nothing was necessary, +nothing has been done, or that, where others have said enough, I have +said no more. + +Notes are often necessary, but they are necessary evils. Let him, that +is yet unacquainted with the powers of _Shakespeare_, and who desires +to feel the highest pleasure that the drama can give, read every play +from the first scene to the last, with utter negligence of all his +commentators. When his fancy is once on the wing, let it not stoop at +correction or explanation. When his attention is strongly engaged, +let it disdain alike to turn aside to the name of _Theobald_ and of +_Pope_. Let him read on through brightness and obscurity, through +integrity and corruption; let him preserve his comprehension of the +dialogue and his interest in the fable. And when the pleasures +of novelty have ceased, let him attempt exactness, and read the +commentators. + +Particular passages are cleared by notes, but the general effect of +the work is weakened. The mind is refrigerated by interruption; the +thoughts are diverted from the principal subject; the reader is weary, +he suspects not why; and at last throws away the book, which he has +too diligently studied. + +Parts are not to be examined till the whole has been surveyed; there +is a kind of intellectual remoteness necessary for the comprehension +of any great work in its full design and its true proportions; a close +approach shews the smaller niceties, but the beauty of the whole is +discerned no longer. It is not very grateful to consider how little the +succession of editors has added to this authour's power of pleasing. +He was read, admired, studied, and imitated, while he was yet +deformed with all the improprieties which ignorance and neglect could +accumulate upon him; while the reading was yet not rectified, nor +his allusions understood; yet then did _Dryden_ pronounce "that +_Shakespeare_ was the man, who, of all modern and perhaps ancient +poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul." All the images +of nature were still present to him, and he drew them not laboriously, +but luckily: when he describes any thing, you more than see it, you +feel it too. Those who accuse him to have wanted learning, give him +the greater commendation: he was naturally learned: he needed not the +spectacles of books to read nature; he looked inwards, and found her +there. I cannot say he is every where alike; were he so, I should do +him injury to compare him with the greatest of mankind. He is many +times flat and insipid; his comick wit degenerating into clenches, his +serious swelling into bombast. But he is always great, when some +great occasion is presented to him: No man can say, he ever had a fit +subject for his wit, and did not then raise himself as high above the +rest of poets, + + "Quantum lenta solent inter viburna cupressi." + +It is to be lamented, that such a writer should want a commentary; +that his language should become obsolete, or his sentiments obscure. +But it is vain to carry wishes beyond the condition of human things; +that which must happen to all, has happened to _Shakespeare_, by +accident and time; and more than has been suffered by any other writer +since the use of types, has been suffered by him through his own +negligence of fame, or perhaps by that superiority of mind, which +despised its own performances, when it compared them with its powers, +and judged those works unworthy to be preserved, which the criticks +of following ages were to contend for the fame of restoring and +explaining. + +Among these candidates of inferiour fame, I am now to stand the +judgment of the publick; and wish that I could confidently produce my +commentary as equal to the encouragement which I have had the honour +of receiving. Every work of this kind is by its nature deficient, +and I should feel little solicitude about the sentence, were it to be +pronounced only by the skilful and the learned. + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPYLÄEN [A] + +BY J.W. VON GOETHE. (1798) + + +The youth, when Nature and Art attract him, thinks that with a +vigorous effort he can soon penetrate into the innermost sanctuary, +the man, after long wanderings, finds himself still in the outer +court. + +Such an observation has suggested our title. It is only on the step, +in the gateway, the entrance, the vestibule, the space between the +outside and the inner chamber, between the sacred and the common, that +we may ordinarily tarry with our friends. + +If the word _Propylaea_ recalls particularly the structure through +which was reached the citadel of Athens and the temple of Minerva, +this is not inconsistent with our purpose; but the presumption of +intending to produce here a similar work of art and splendor should +not be laid to our charge. The name of the place may be understood +as symbolizing what might have happened there; one may expect +conversations and discussions such as would perhaps not be unworthy of +that place. + +Are not thinkers, scholars, artists, in their best hours allured to +those regions, to dwell (at least in imagination) among a people to +whom a perfection which we desire but never attain was natural, +among whom in the course of time and life, a culture developed in a +beautiful continuity, which to us appears only in passing fragments? +What modern nation does not owe its artistic culture to the Greeks, +and, in certain branches, what nation more than the German? + +So much by way of excuse for the symbolic title, if indeed an excuse +be necessary. May the title be a reminder that we are to depart as +little as possible from classic ground; may it, through its brevity +and signification, modify the demands of the friends of art whom +we hope to interest through the present work, which is to contain +observations and reflections concerning Nature and Art by a harmonious +circle of friends. + +He who is called to be an artist will give careful heed to everything +around him; objects and their parts will attract his attention, and +by making practical use of such experience he will gradually train +himself to observe more sharply. He will, in his early career, apply +everything, so far as possible, to his own advantage; later he will +gladly make himself serviceable to others. Thus we also hope to +present and relate to our readers many things which we regard as +useful and agreeable, things which, under various circumstances, have +been noted by us during a number of years. + +But who will not willingly agree that pure observation is more rare +than is believed? We are apt to confuse our sensations, our opinion, +our judgment, with what we experience, so that we do not remain +long in the passive attitude of the observer, but soon go on to make +reflections; and upon these no greater weight can be placed than may +be more or less justified by the nature and quality of our individual +intellects. + +In this matter we are able to gain stronger confidence from our +harmony with others, and from the knowledge that we do not think and +work alone, but in common. The perplexing doubt whether our method +of thought belongs only to us--a doubt which often comes over us when +others express the direct opposite of our convictions--is softened, +even dispelled, when we find ourselves in agreement with others; only +then do we go on rejoicing with assurance in the possession of those +principles which a long experience, on our own part and on the part of +others, has gradually confirmed. + +When several persons thus live united, so that they may call one +another friends, because they have a common interest in bringing about +their progressive cultivation and in advancing towards closely related +aims, then they may be certain that they will meet again in the most +varied ways, and that even the courses which seemed to separate them +from one another will nevertheless soon bring them happily together +again. + +Who has not experienced what advantages are afforded in such cases by +conversation? But conversation is ephemeral; and while the results +of a mutual development are imperishable, the memory of the means by +which it was reached disappears. Letters preserve better the stages of +a progress which friends achieve together; every moment of growth is +fixed, and if the result attained affords us agreeable satisfaction, +a look backward at the process of development is instructive since it +permits its to hope for an unflagging advance in the future. + +Short papers, in which are set down from time to time one's thoughts, +convictions, and wishes, in order to find entertainment in one's past +self after a lapse of time, are excellent auxiliary means for +the development of oneself and of others, none of which should be +neglected when one considers the brief period allotted to life and the +many obstacles that stand in the way of every advance. + +It is self evident that we are talking here particularly of an +exchange of ideas between such friends as are striving for cultivation +in the sphere of science and art; although life in the world of +affairs and industry should not lack similar advantages. + +In the arts and sciences, however, in addition to this close +association among their votaries, a relation to the public is as +favorable as it is necessary. Whatever of universal interest one +thinks or accomplishes belongs to the world, and the world brings to +maturity whatever it can utilize of the efforts of the individual. The +desire for approval which the author feels is an impulse implanted by +Nature to draw him toward something higher; he thinks he has attained +the laurel wreath, but soon becomes aware that a more laborious +training of every native talent is necessary in order to retain the +public favor; though it may be attained for a short moment through +fortune or accident also. + +The relation of the author to his public is important in his early +period; even in later days he cannot dispense with it. However little +he may be fitted to teach others, he wishes to share his thoughts with +those whom he feels congenial, but who are scattered far and wide in +the world. By this means he wishes to re-establish his relation with +his old friends, to continue it with new ones, and to gain in the +younger generation still others for the remainder of his life. He +wishes to spare youth the circuitous paths upon which he himself +went astray, and while observing and utilizing the advantages of the +present, to maintain the memory of his praiseworthy earlier efforts. + +With this serious view, a small society has been brought together; may +cheerfulness attend our undertakings, and time may show whither we are +bound. + +The papers which we intend to present, though they are composed by +several authors, will, it is hoped, never be contradictory in the main +points, even though the methods of thought may not be the same in all. +No two persons regard the world in exactly the same way, and different +characters will often apply in different ways a principle which +they all acknowledge. Indeed, a person is not always consistent with +himself in his views and judgments: early convictions must give way to +later ones. The individual opinions that a man holds and expresses may +stand all tests or not; the main thing is that he continue on his way, +true to himself and to others! + +Much as the authors wish and hope to be in harmony with one another +and with a large part of the public, they must not shut their eyes to +the fact that from various quarters many a discord will ring out. +They must expect this all the more since they differ from prevailing +opinions in more than one point. Though far from wishing to dominate +or change the way of thinking of a third person, still they will +firmly express their own opinion, and, as circumstances dictate, will +avoid or take tip a quarrel. On the whole, however, they will adhere +to one creed, and especially will they repeat again and again those +conditions which seem to them indispensable in the training of an +artist. Whoever takes an interest in this matter, must be ready to +take sides; otherwise he does not deserve to be effective anywhere. + +If, therefore, we promise to present reflections and observations +concerning Nature, we must at the same time indicate that these +remarks will chiefly have reference, first, to plastic art; then, to +art in general; finally, to the general training of the artist. + +The highest demand that is made on an artist is this: that he be +true to Nature, study her, imitate her, and produce something that +resembles her phenomena. How great, how enormous, this demand is, +is not always kept in mind; and the true artist himself learns it by +experience only, in the course of his progressive development. Nature +is separated from Art by an enormous chasm, which genius itself is +unable to bridge without external assistance. + +All that we perceive around us is merely raw material; if it happens +rarely enough that an artist, through instinct and taste, through +practice and experiment, reaches the point of attaining the beautiful +exterior of things, of selecting the best from the good before him, +and of producing at least an agreeable appearance, it is still more +rare, particularly in modern times, for an artist to penetrate into +the depths of things as well as into the depths of his own soul, +in order to produce in his works not only something light and +superficially effective, but, as a rival of Nature, to produce +something spiritually organic, and to give his work of art a content +and a form through which it appears both natural and beyond Nature. + +Man is the highest, the characteristic subject of plastic art; +to understand him, to extricate oneself from the labyrinth of his +anatomy, a general knowledge of organic nature is imperative. The +artist should also acquaint himself theoretically with inorganic +bodies and with the general operations of Nature, particularly if, as +in the case of sound and color, they are adaptable to the purposes +of art; but what a circuitous path he would be obliged to take if +he wanted to seek laboriously in the schools of the anatomist, the +naturalist, and the physicist, for that which serves his purposes! It +is, indeed, a question whether he would find there what must be most +important for him. Those men have the entirely different needs of +their own pupils to satisfy, so that they cannot be expected to think +of the limited and special needs of the artist. For that reason it is +our intention to take a hand, and, even though we cannot see prospects +of completing the necessary work ourselves, both to give a view of the +whole and to begin the elaboration of details. + +The human figure cannot be understood merely through observation +of its surface; the interior must be laid bare, its parts must be +separated, the connections perceived, the differences noted, action +and reaction observed, the concealed, constant, and fundamental +elements of the phenomena impressed on the mind, if one really wishes +to contemplate and imitate what moves before our eyes in living waves +as a beautiful, undivided whole. A glance at the surface of a living +being confuses the observer; we may cite here, as in other cases, +the true proverb, "One sees only what one knows" For just as a +short-sighted man sees more clearly an object from which he draws +back than one to which he draws near, because his intellectual vision +comes to his aid, so the perfection of observation really depends on +knowledge. How well an expert naturalist, who can also draw, imitates +objects by recognizing and emphasizing the important and significant +parts from which is derived the character of the whole! + +Just as the artist is greatly helped by an exact knowledge of the +separate parts of the human figure, which he must in the end regard +again as a whole, so a general view, a side glance at related objects, +is highly advantageous, provided the artist is capable of rising to +Ideas and of grasping the close relationship of things apparently +remote. Comparative anatomy has prepared a general conception of +organic creatures; it leads us from form to form, and by observing +organisms closely or distantly related, we rise above them all to see +their characteristics in an ideal picture. If we keep this picture in +mind, we find that in observing objects our attention takes a definite +direction, that scattered facts can be learned and retained more +easily by comparison, that in the practice of art we can finally +vie with Nature only when we have learned from her, at least to some +extent, her method of procedure in the creation of her works. + +Furthermore, we would encourage the artist to gain knowledge also of +the inorganic world; this can be done all the more easily since now we +can conveniently and quickly acquire knowledge of the mineral kingdom. +The painter needs some knowledge of stones in order to imitate their +characteristics; the sculptor and architect, in order to utilize them; +the cutter of precious stones cannot be without a knowledge of +their nature; the connoisseur and amateur, too, will strive for such +information. + +Now that we have advised the artist to gain a conception of the +general operations of Nature, in order to become acquainted with those +which particularly interest him, partly to develop himself in more +directions, partly to understand better that which concerns him; we +shall add a few further remarks on this significant point. + +Up to the present the painter has been able merely to wonder at the +physicist's theory of colors, without gaining any advantage from it. +The natural feeling of the artist, however, constant training, and a +practical necessity led him into a way of his own. He felt the vivid +contrasts out of the union of which harmony of color arises, he +designated certain characteristics through approximate sensations, he +had warm and cold colors, colors which express proximity, others which +express distance, and what not; and thus in his own way he brought +these phenomena closer to the most general laws of Nature. Perhaps the +supposition is confirmed that the operations of Nature in colors, as +well as magnetic, electric, and other operations, depend upon a mutual +relation, a polarity, or whatever else we might call the twofold or +manifold aspects of a distinct unity. + +We shall make it our duty to present this matter in detail and in a +form comprehensible to the artist; and we can be the more hopeful of +doing something welcome to him, since we shall be concerned only with +explaining and tracing to fundamental principles things which he has +hitherto done by instinct. + +So much for what we hope to impart in regard to Nature; now for what +is most necessary in regard to Art. + +Since the arrangement of this work proposes the presentation of single +treatises, some of these only in part, and since it is not our desire +to dissect a whole, but rather to build up a whole from many parts, +it will be necessary to present, as soon as possible and in a general +summary, those thing's which the reader will gradually find unfolded +in our detailed elaborations. We shall, therefore, be occupied first +with an essay on plastic art, in which the familiar rubrics will be +presented according to our interpretation and method. Here it will be +our main concern to emphasize the importance of every branch of Art, +and to show that the artist must not neglect a single one, as has +unfortunately often happened, and still happens. + +Hitherto we have regarded Nature as the treasure chamber of material +in general; now, however, we reach the important point where it is +shown how Art prepares its materials for itself. + +When the artist takes any object of Nature, the object no longer +belongs to Nature; indeed, we can say that the artist creates the +object in that moment, by extracting from it all that is significant, +characteristic, interesting, or rather by putting into it a +higher value. In this way finer proportions, nobler forms, higher +characteristics are, as it were, forced upon the human figure; the +circle of regularity, perfection, signification, and completeness is +drawn, in which Nature gladly places her best possessions even though +elsewhere in her vast extent she easily degenerates into ugliness and +loses herself in indifference. + +The same is true of composite works of art, of their subject and +content, whether the theme be fable or history. Happy the artist who +makes no mistake in undertaking the work, who knows how to choose, or +rather to determine what is suitable for art! He who wanders uneasily +among scattered myths and far-stretching history in search of a +theme, he who wishes to be significantly scholarly or allegorically +interesting, will often be checked in the midst of his work by +unexpected obstacles, or will miss his finest aim after the completion +of the work. He who does not speak clearly to the senses, will not +address himself clearly to the mind; and we regard this point as so +important that we insert at the very outset a more extended discussion +of it. + +A theme having been happily found or invented, it is subjected to +treatment which we would divide into the spiritual the sensuous, and +the mechanical. The spiritual develops the subject according to its +inner relations, it discovers subordinate motives; and, if we can at +all judge the depth of ar artistic genius by the choice of subject, +we can recognize in his selection of themes his breadth, wealth, +fullness, and power of attraction. The sensuous treatment we +should define as that through which the work becomes thoroughly +comprehensible to the senses, agreeable, delightful, and irresistible +through its gentle charm. The mechanical treatment, finally, is that +which works upon given material through any bodily organ, and thus +brings the work into existence and gives it reality. + +While we hope to be useful to the artist in this way, and earnestly +wish that he may avail himself of advice and of suggestions in +his work, the disquieting observation is forced upon us that every +undertaking, like every man, is likely to suffer just as much from its +period as it is to derive occasional advantage from it, and in our +own case we cannot altogether put aside the question concerning the +reception we are likely to meet with. + +Everything is subject to constant change, and since certain things +cannot exist side by side, they displace one another This is true of +kinds of knowledge, of certain methods of instruction, of methods of +representation, and of maxims. The aims of men remain nearly always +the same: they still desire to become good artists or poets as they +did centuries ago; but the means through which the goal is reached are +not clear to everybody, and why should it be denied that nothing +would be more agreeable than to be able to carry out joyfully a great +design? + +Naturally the public has a great influence upon Art, since in +return for its approval and its money it demands work that may give +satisfaction and immediate enjoyment; and the artist will for the +most part be glad to adapt himself to it, for he also is a part of the +public, he has received his training during the same years, he feels +the same needs, strives in the same direction, and thus moves along +happily with the multitude which supports him and which is invigorated +by him. In this matter we see whole nations and epochs delighted by +their artists, just as the artist sees himself reflected in his nation +and his epoch, without either having even the slightest suspicion +that their path might not be right, that their taste might be at least +one-sided, their art on the decline, and their progress in the wrong +direction. + +Instead of proceeding to further generalities on this point, we shall +make a remark which refers particularly to plastic art. + +For the German artist, in fact for modern and northern artists in +general, it is difficult--indeed almost impossible--to make the +transition from formless matter to form, and to maintain himself at +that point, even should he succeed in reaching it. Let every artist +who has lived for a time in Italy ask himself whether the presence of +the best works of ancient and modern art have not aroused in him +the incessant endeavour to study and imitate the human figure in its +proportions, forms, and characteristics, to apply all diligence and +care in the execution in order to approach those artistic works, so +entirely complete in themselves, in order to produce a work which, in +gratifying the sense, exalts the spirit to the greatest heights. Let +him also admit, however, that after his return he must gradually relax +his efforts, because he finds few persons who will really see, enjoy, +and comprehend what is depicted, but, for the most part, finds only +those who look at a work superficially, receive from it mere random +impressions, and in some way of their own try to get out of it any +kind of sensation and pleasure. + +The worst picture can appeal to our senses and imagination by arousing +their activity, setting them free, and leaving them to themselves, the +best work of art also appeals to our senses, but in a higher language +which, of course, we must understand; it enchains the feelings and +imagination, it deprives us of caprice, we cannot deal with a perfect +work at our will; we are forced to give ourselves up to it, in order +to receive ourselves from it again, exalted and refined. + +That these are no dreams we shall try to show gradually, in detail, +and as clearly as possible, we shall call attention particularly to a +contradiction in which the moderns are often involved. They call +the ancients their teachers, they acknowledge in their works an +unattainable excellence, yet they depart both in theory and practice +far from the maxims which the ancients continually observed. In +starting from this important point and in returning to it often, we +shall find others about which something falls to be said. + +One of the principal signs of the decay of art is the mixture of its +various kinds. The arts themselves, as well as their branches, are +related to one another, and have a certain tendency to unite, even to +lose themselves in one another; but it is in this that the duty, the +merit, the dignity of the real artist consists, namely, in being able +to separate the field of art in which he works from others, in placing +every art and every branch of art on its own footing, and in isolating +it as far as possible. + +It has been noticed that all plastic art strives toward painting, all +literary art toward the drama, and this observation may in the future +give us occasion for important reflections. + +The genuine law-giving artist strives for the truth of art, the +lawless artist who follows a blind impulse strives for the reality of +Nature; through the former, art reaches its highest summit, through +the latter its lowest stage. + +What holds good of art in general holds good also of the kinds of art. +The sculptor must think and feel differently from the painter, indeed +he must proceed when he wishes to produce a work in relief, in a +different fashion from that which he will employ for a work in the +round. By the raising of low reliefs higher and higher, by the making +of various parts and figures stand out completely, and finally by the +adding of buildings and landscapes, so that work was produced which +was half painting and half puppet-show, true art steadily declined. +Excellent artists of modern times have unfortunately pursued this +course. + +When in the future we express such maxims as we think sound, we should +like, since they are deduced from works of art, to have them put +to the test of practice by the artist. How rarely one can come to a +theoretical agreement with anyone else on a fundamental principle. +That which is applicable and useful, on the other hand, is decided +upon much more quickly. How often we see artists in embarrassment over +the choice of subjects, over the general type of composition adapted +to their art, and the detailed arrangement; how often the painter over +the choice of colors! Then is the time to test a principle, then will +it he easier to decide whether it is bringing us closer to the great +models and to everything that we value and love in them, or whether it +leaves us entangled in the empirical confusion of an experience that +has not been sufficiently thought out. + +If such maxims hold good in training: the artist, in guiding him +in many an embarrassment, they will serve also in the development, +valuation, and judgment of old and new works of art, and will in turn +arise from an observation of these works. Indeed, it is all the more +necessary to adhere to this, because, notwithstanding the universally +praised excellences of antiquity, individuals and whole nations +among the moderns often fail to recognize wherein lies the highest +excellence of those works. + +An exact test will protect us best from this evil. For that reason let +us cite only one example to show what usually happens to the amateur +in plastic art, so that we may make clear how necessary it is that +criticism of ancient as well as modern works should be exact if it is +to be of any use. + +Upon him who has an eye for beauty, though untrained, even a blurred, +imperfect plaster cast of an excellent antique will always have a +great effect; for in such a reproduction there always remain the idea, +the simplicity and greatness of form, in short, the general outlines; +as much, at all events, as one could perceive with poor eyes at a +distance. + +It may be noticed that a strong inclination toward art is often +enkindled by such quite imperfect reproductions. But the effect is +like the object; it is rather that an obscure indefinite feeling is +aroused, than that the object in all its worth and dignity really +appears to such beginners in art. These are they who usually express +the theory that too minute a critical investigation destroys the +enjoyment, who are accustomed to oppose and resist regard for details. + +If gradually, however, after further experience and training, they +are confronted with a sharp cast instead of a blurred one, an original +instead of a cast, their pleasure grows with their insight, and +increases when the originals themselves, the perfect originals, +finally become known to them. + +The labyrinth of exact observations is willingly entered when the +details as well as the whole are perfect; indeed one learns to realize +that the excellences can be appreciated only in proportion as the +defects are perceived. To discriminate the restoration from the +genuine parts, and the copy from the original, to see in the smallest +fragments the ruined glory of the whole--this is the joy of the +finished expert; and there is a great difference between observing and +comprehending an imperfect whole with obscured vision, and a perfect +whole with clear vision. + +He who concerns himself with any branch of knowledge, should strive +for the highest! Insight is different from practice, for in practical +work everyone must soon resign himself to the fact that only a certain +measure of strength is alloted to him; far more people, however, +are capable of knowledge and insight. Indeed, one may well say that +everyone is thus capable who can deny himself and subordinate himself +to external objects, everyone who does not strive with rigid and +narrow-minded obstinacy to impose upon the highest works of Nature and +Art his own personality and his petty onesideness. + +To speak of works of art fitly and with true benefit to oneself and +others, the discussion should take place only in the presence of the +works themselves. Everything depends on the objects being in view; on +whether something absolutely definite is suggested by the word with +which one hopes to illuminate the work of art; for, otherwise, nothing +is thought of at all. This is why it so often happens that the writer +on art dwells merely on generalities, through which, indeed, ideas and +sensations are aroused in all readers, but no satisfaction is given to +the man who, book in hand, steps in front of the work of art itself. +Precisely on this account, however, we may in several essays be in a +position to arouse rather than to satisfy the desire of the readers; +for nothing is more natural than that they should wish to have before +their eyes immediately an excellent work of art which is minutely +dissected, in order to enjoy the whole which we are discussing, and, +so far as the parts are concerned, to subject to their own judgment +the opinion which they read. + +While the authors, however, write on the assumption that their readers +either have seen the works, or will see them in the future, yet they +hope to do everything in their power for those who are in neither +case. We shall mention reproductions, shall indicate where casts of +antique works of art and antique works themselves are accessible, +particularly to Germans; and thus try, as far as we can, to minister +to the genuine love and knowledge of art. + +A history of art can be based only upon the highest and most detailed +comprehension of art; only when one knows the finest things that man +can produce can one trace the psychological and chronological course +taken in art, as in other fields. This course began with a limited +activity, busied about a dry and even gloomy imitation of the +insignificant as well as the significant, whence developed a more +amiable, more kindly feeling toward Nature, till finally, under +favorable circumstances, accompanied by knowledge, regularity, +seriousness, and severity, art rose to its height. There at last it +became possible for the fortunate genius, surrounded by all these +auxiliaries, to produce the charming and the complete. + +Unfortunately, however, works of art with such ease of expression, +which instil into man cheerfulness, freedom, and a pleasant feeling of +his own personality, arouse in the striving artist the idea that the +process of production is also agreeable. Since the pinnacle of what +art and genius produce is an appearance of ease, the artists who come +after are tempted to make things easy for themselves, and to work for +the sake of appearances. Thus art gradually declines from its high +position, as to the whole as well as details. But if we wish to gain +a fair conception, we must come down to details of details, an +occupation not always agreeable or charming, but by and by richly +rewarded with a more certain view of the whole. + +If the experience of observing ancient and mediæval works of art has +shown us that certain maxims hold good we need these most of all +in judging the most recent modern productions; for, since personal +relations, love and hatred of individuals, favor or disfavor of the +multitude so easily enter into the valuation of living or recently +deceased artists, we are in all the more need of principles in order +to pass judgment on our contemporaries. The inquiry can be conducted +in two ways: by diminishing the influence of caprice; by bringing the +question before a higher tribunal. The principle can be tested as +well as its application; and even if we should not agree, the point in +dispute can still be definitely and clearly pointed out. + +Especially should we wish that the vivifying artist, in whose works +we might perhaps have found something to remember, might test our +judgments carefully in this way; for everyone who deserves this +name is forced in our times to form, as a result of his work and his +reflections, a theory, or at least a certain conception of theoretical +means, by the use of which he gets along tolerably well in a variety +of cases. It will often be noticed, however, that in this way he +sets up as laws such maxims as are in accordance with his talent, +his inclination, and his convenience. He is subject to a fate that is +common to all mankind. How many act in this very way in other fields! +But we are not cultivating ourselves when we merely set in motion with +ease and convenience that which lies in us. Every artist, like every +man, is only an individual, and will always lean to one side. For that +reason, man should pursue so far as possible, both theoretically and +practically, that which is contrary to his nature. Let the easy-going +seek what is serious and severe; let the stern keep before his +eyes the light and agreeable; the strong, loveliness; the amiable, +strength; and everyone will develop his own nature the more, the +farther he seems to remove himself from it. Every art requires the +whole man; the highest possible degree of art requires all mankind. + +The practice of the plastic arts is mechanical, and the training of +the artist rightly begins in his earliest youth with the mechanical +side; the rest of his education, on the other hand, is often +neglected, for it ought to be far more careful than the training of +others who have opportunity of deriving advantage from life itself. +Society soon makes a rough person courteous, a business life makes the +most simple person prudent; literary labors, which through print come +before a great public, find opposition and correction everywhere; +only the plastic artist is, for the most part, limited to a lonely +workshop; he has dealings almost solely with the man who orders +and pays for his labor, with a public which frequently follows only +certain morbid impressions, with connoisseurs who make him restless, +with auctioneers who receive every new work with praise and estimates +of value such as would fitly honor the most superlative production. + +But it is time to conclude this introduction lest it anticipate and +forestall the work, instead of merely preceding it. We have so far at +least designated the point from which we intend to set out; how far +our views can and will spread, must at first develop gradually. The +theory and criticism of literary art will, we hope, soon occupy us; +and whatever life, travel, and daily events suggest to us, shall not +be excluded. In closing, let us say a word on an important concern of +this moment. + +For the training of the artist, for the enjoyment of the friend of +art, it was from time immemorial of the greatest significance in what +place the works of art happened to be. There was a time when, except +for slight changes of location, they remained for the most part in +one place; now, however, a great change has occurred, which will +have important consequences for art in general and in particular. +At present we have perhaps more cause than ever to regard Italy as a +great storehouse of art--as it still was until recently. When it is +possible to give a general review of it, then it will be shown what +the world lost at the moment when so many parts were torn from this +great and ancient whole. + +What was destroyed in the very act of tearing away will probably +remain a secret forever; but a description of the new storehouse that +is being formed in Paris will be possible in a few years. Then the +method by which an artist and a lover of art is to use France and +Italy can be indicated; and a further important and fine question will +arise: what are other nations, particularly Germany and England, to +do in this period of scattering and loss, to make generally useful the +manifold and widely strewn treasures of art--a task requiring the true +cosmopolitan mind which is found perhaps nowhere purer than in the +arts and sciences? And what are they to do to help to form an ideal +storehouse, which in the course of time may perhaps happily compensate +us for what the present moment tears away when it does not destroy? + +So much in general of the purpose of a work in which we desire many +earnest and friendly sympathizers. + + +[Footnote A: The Propylaen was a periodical founded in July, 1798, by +Goethe and his friend Heinrich Meyer. During its short existence of +three years, there were published in it, besides the writings of the +editors, short contributions by Schiller and Humboldt. Its purpose was +to spread sound ideas about the aims and methods of art, and in this +notable introduction Goethe set forth with clearness and profundity +his fundamental ideas on these subjects. The present translation has +been made expressly for the Harvard Classics.] + + + + +PREFACES TO VARIOUS VOLUMES OF POEMS + +BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH[A] + +ADVERTISEMENT TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1798) + + +It is the honourable characteristic of Poetry that its materials are +to be found in every subject which can interest the human mind. The +evidence of this fact is to be sought, not in the writings of Critics, +but in those of Poets themselves. + +The majority of the following poems are to be considered as +experiments. They were written chiefly with a view to ascertain how +far the language of conversation in the middle and lower classes +of society is adapted to the purposes of poetic pleasure. Readers +accustomed to the gaudiness and inane phraseology of many modern +writers, if they persist in reading this book to its conclusion, will +perhaps frequently have to struggle with feelings of strangeness and +awkwardness: they will look round for poetry, and will be induced to +inquire by what species of courtesy these attempts can be permitted +to assume that title. It is desirable that such readers, for their +own sakes, should not suffer the solitary word Poetry, a word of very +disputed meaning, to stand in the way of their gratification; but +that, while they are perusing this book, they should ask themselves if +it contains a natural delineation of human passions, human characters, +and human incidents; and if the answer be favourable to the author's +wishes, that they should consent to be pleased in spite of that most +dreadful enemy to our pleasures, our own pre-established codes of +decision. + +Readers of superior judgement may disapprove of the style in which +many of these pieces are executed; it must be expected that many lines +and phrases will not exactly suit their taste. It will perhaps appear +to them, that wishing to avoid the prevalent fault of the day, +the author has sometimes descended too low, and that many of his +expressions are too familiar, and not of sufficient dignity. It is +apprehended that the more conversant the reader is with our elder +writers, and with those in modern times who have been the most +successful in painting manners and passions, the fewer complaints of +this kind will he have to make. + +An accurate taste in poetry, and in all the other arts, Sir Joshua +Reynolds has observed, is an acquired talent, which can only be +produced by severe thought, and a long continued intercourse with the +best models of composition. This is mentioned not with so ridiculous +a purpose as to prevent the most inexperienced reader from judging for +himself; but merely to temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest +that if poetry be a subject on which much time has not been bestowed, +the judgement may be erroneous, and that in many cases it necessarily +will be so. + +The tale of _Goody Blake and Harry Gill_ is founded on a +well-authenticated fact which happened in Warwickshire. Of the other +poems in the collection, it may be proper to say that they are either +absolute inventions of the author, or facts which took place within +his personal observation or that of his friends. The poem of _The +Thorn_, as the reader will soon discover, is not supposed to be spoken +in the author's own person: the character of the loquacious narrator +will sufficiently show itself in the course of the story. _The Rime +of the Ancyent Marinere_ was professedly written in imitation of the +_style_, as well as of the spirit of the elder poets; but with a few +exceptions, the Author believes that the language adopted in it has +been equally intelligible for these three last centuries. The lines +entitled _Expostulation and Reply_, and those which follow, arose out +of conversation with a friend who was somewhat unreasonably attached +to modern books of moral philosophy. + + +[Footnote A: William Wordsworth (1770-1830), probably the greatest of +the poets of the Romantic Movement in England, was also foremost in +the critical defence of that movement. The Prefaces and Essays printed +here form a kind of manifesto of the reaction from the poetical +traditions of the eighteenth century; and contain besides some of the +soundest theorizing on the nature of poetry to be found in English. +They afford an interesting comparison with the parallel protest in +Victor Hugo's Preface to "Cromwell," to be found later in the volume.] + + + + +PREFACE TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1800) + + +The first volume of these Poems has already been submitted to general +perusal. It was published as an experiment, which, I hoped, might be +of some use to ascertain, how far, by fitting to metrical arrangement +a selection of the real language of men in a state of vivid sensation, +that sort of pleasure and that quantity of pleasure may be imparted, +which a Poet may rationally endeavour to impart. + +I had formed no very inaccurate estimate of the probable effect of +those Poems: I flattered myself that they who should be pleased with +them would read them with more than common pleasure: and, on the other +hand, I was well aware, that by those who should dislike them, they +would be read with more than common dislike. The result has differed +from my expectation in this only, that a greater number have been +pleased than I ventured to hope I should please. + + * * * * * + +Several of my Friends are anxious for the success of these Poems, from +a belief, that, if the views with which they were composed were +indeed realized, a class of Poetry would be produced, well adapted to +interest mankind permanently, and not unimportant in the quality, and +in the multiplicity of its moral relations: and on this account they +have advised me to prefix a systematic defence of the theory upon +which the Poems were written. But I was unwilling to undertake the +task, knowing that on this occasion the Reader would look coldly upon +my arguments, since I might be suspected of having been principally +influenced by the selfish and foolish hope of _reasoning_ him into an +approbation of these particular Poems: and I was still more unwilling +to undertake the task, because, adequately to display the opinions, +and fully to enforce the arguments, would require a space wholly +disproportionate to a preface. For, to treat the subject with the +clearness and coherence of which it is susceptible, it would be +necessary to give a full account of the present state of the public +taste in this country, and to determine how far this taste is healthy +or depraved; which, again, could not be determined, without pointing +out in what manner language and the human mind act and re-act on each +other, and without retracing the revolutions, not of literature alone, +but likewise of society itself. I have therefore altogether declined +to enter regularly upon this defence; yet I am sensible, that there +would be something like impropriety in abruptly obtruding upon the +Public, without a few words of introduction, Poems so materially +different from those upon which general approbation is at present +bestowed. + +It is supposed that by the act of writing in verse an Author makes a +formal engagement that he will gratify certain known habits of +association; that he not only thus apprises the Reader that certain +classes of ideas and expressions will be found in his book, but that +others will be carefully excluded. This exponent or symbol held forth +by metrical language must in different eras of literature have excited +very different expectations: for example, in the age of Catullus, +Terence, and Lucretius, and that of Statius or Claudian; and in our own +country, in the age of Shakespeare and Beaumont and Fletcher, and that +of Donne and Cowley, or Dryden, or Pope. I will not take upon me to +determine the exact import of the promise which, by the act of writing +in verse, an Author in the present day makes to his reader: but it will +undoubtedly appear to many persons that I have not fulfilled the terms +of an engagement thus voluntarily contracted. I hope therefore the +reader will not censure me for attempting to state what I have proposed +to myself to perform; and also (as far as the limits of a preface will +permit) to explain some of the chief reasons which have determined me +in the choice of my purpose: that at least he may be spared any +unpleasant feeling of disappointment, and that I myself may be +protected from one of the most dishonourable accusations which can be +brought against an Author; namely, that of an indolence which prevents +him from endeavouring to ascertain what is his duty, or, when his duty +is ascertained, prevents him from performing it. + +The principal object, then, proposed in these Poems was to choose +incidents and situations from common life, and to relate or describe +them, throughout, as far as was possible in a selection of language +really used by men, and, at the same time, to throw over them a +certain colouring of imagination, whereby ordinary things should be +presented to the mind in an unusual aspect; and, further, and above +all, to make these incidents and situations interesting by tracing in +them, truly though not ostentatiously, the primary laws of our nature: +chiefly, as far as regards the manner in which we associate ideas in +a state of excitement. Humble and rustic life was generally chosen, +because, in that condition, the essential passions of the heart find +a better soil in which they can attain their maturity, are less under +restraint, and speak a plainer and more emphatic language; because in +that condition of life our elementary feelings coexist in a state +of greater simplicity, and, consequently, may be more accurately +contemplated, and more forcibly communicated; because the manners of +rural life germinate from those elementary feelings, and, from +the necessary character of rural occupations, are more easily +comprehended, and are more durable; and, lastly, because in that +condition the passions of men are incorporated with the beautiful and +permanent forms of nature. The language, too, of these men has been +adopted (purified indeed from what appear to be its real defects, from +all lasting and rational causes of dislike or disgust) because such +men hourly communicate with the best objects from which the best part +of language is originally derived; and because, from their rank in +society and the sameness and narrow circle of their intercourse, being +less under the influence of social vanity, they convey their feelings +and notions in simple and unelaborated expressions. Accordingly, such +a language, arising out of repeated experience and regular feelings, +is a more permanent, and a far more philosophical language, than that +which is frequently substituted for it by Poets, who think that they +are conferring honour upon themselves and their art, in proportion as +they separate themselves from the sympathies of men, and indulge in +arbitrary and capricious habits of expression, in order to +furnish food for fickle tastes, and fickle appetites, of their own +creation.[1] + +I cannot, however, be insensible to the present outcry against the +triviality and meanness, both of thought and language, which some of +my contemporaries have occasionally introduced into their metrical +compositions; and I acknowledge that this defect, where it exists, is +more dishonourable to the Writer's own character than false refinement +or arbitrary innovation, though I should contend at the same time, +that it is far less pernicious in the sum of its consequences. From +such verses the Poems in these volumes will be found distinguished +at least by one mark of difference, that each of them has a worthy +_purpose_. Not that I always began to write with a distinct purpose +formerly conceived; but habits of meditation have, I trust, so +prompted and regulated my feelings, that my descriptions of such +objects as strongly excite those feelings, will be found to carry +along with them a _purpose_. If this opinion be erroneous, I can +have little right to the name of a Poet. For all good poetry is the +spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: and though this be true, +Poems to which any value can be attached were never produced on any +variety of subjects but by a man who, being possessed of more than +usual organic sensibility, had also thought long and deeply. For +our continued influxes of feeling are modified and directed by +our thoughts, which are indeed the representatives of all our past +feelings; and, as by contemplating the relation of these general +representatives to each other, we discover what is really important to +men, so, by the repetition and continuance of this act, our feelings +will be connected with important subjects, till at length, if we be +originally possessed of much sensibility, such habits of mind will be +produced, that, by obeying blindly and mechanically the impulses of +those habits, we shall describe objects, and utter sentiments, of +such a nature, and in such connexion with each other, that the +understanding of the Reader must necessarily be in some degree +enlightened, and his affections strengthened and purified. + +It has been said that each of these poems has a purpose. Another +circumstance must be mentioned which distinguishes these Poems from +the popular Poetry of the day; it is this, that the feeling therein +developed gives importance to the action and situation, and not the +action and situation to the feeling. + +A sense of false modesty shall not prevent me from asserting, that the +Reader's attention is pointed to this mark of distinction, far +less for the sake of these particular Poems than from the general +importance of the subject. The subject is indeed important! For the +human mind is capable of being excited without the application of +gross and violent stimulants; and he must have a very faint perception +of its beauty and dignity who does not know this, and who does not +further know, that one being is elevated above another, in proportion +as he possesses this capability. It has therefore appeared to me, that +to endeavour to produce or enlarge this capability is one of the best +services in which, at any period, a Writer can be engaged; but this +service, excellent at all times, is especially so at the present day. +For a multitude of causes, unknown to former times, are now acting +with a combined force to blunt the discriminating powers of the mind, +and, unfitting it for all voluntary exertion, to reduce it to a state +of almost savage torpor. The most effective of these causes are the +great national events which are daily taking place, and the increasing +accumulation of men in cities, where the uniformity of their +occupations produces a craving for extraordinary incident, which the +rapid communication of intelligence hourly gratifies. To this tendency +of life and manners the literature and theatrical exhibitions of the +country have conformed themselves. The invaluable works of our elder +writers, I had almost said the works of Shakespeare and Milton, +are driven into neglect by frantic novels, sickly and stupid German +Tragedies, and deluges of idle and extravagant stories in verse.--When +I think upon this degrading thirst after outrageous stimulation, I am +almost ashamed to have spoken of the feeble endeavour made in these +volumes to counteract it; and, reflecting upon the magnitude of the +general evil, I should be oppressed with no dishonourable melancholy, +had I not a deep impression of certain inherent and indestructible +qualities of the human mind, and likewise of certain powers in the +great and permanent objects that act upon it, which are equally +inherent and indestructible; and were there not added to this +impression a belief, that the time is approaching when the evil will +be systematically opposed, by men of greater powers, and with far more +distinguished success. + +Having dwelt thus long on the subjects and aim of these Poems, I shall +request the Reader's permission to apprise him of a few circumstances +relating to their _style_, in order, among other reasons, that he may +not censure me for not having performed what I never attempted. The +Reader will find that personifications of abstract ideas rarely occur +in these volumes; and are utterly rejected, as an ordinary device +to elevate the style, and raise it above prose. My purpose was to +imitate, and, as far as possible, to adopt the very language of men; +and assuredly such personifications do not make any natural or +regular part of that language. They are, indeed, a figure of speech +occasionally prompted by passion, and I have made use of them as such; +but have endeavoured utterly to reject them as a mechanical device +of style, or as a family language which Writers in metre seem to lay +claim to by prescription. I have wished to keep the Reader in the +company of flesh and blood, persuaded that by so doing I shall +interest him. Others who pursue a different track will interest him +likewise; I do not interfere with their claim, but wish to prefer a +claim of my own. There will also be found in these volumes little of +what is usually called poetic diction; as much pains has been taken to +avoid it as is ordinarily taken to produce it; this has been done for +the reason already alleged, to bring my language near to the language +of men; and further, because the pleasure which I have proposed to +myself to impart, is of a kind very different from that which is +supposed by many persons to be the proper object of poetry. Without +being culpably particular, I do not know how to give my Reader a more +exact notion of the style in which it was my wish and intention to +write, than by informing him that I have at all times endeavoured to +look steadily at my subject; consequently, there is I hope in these +Poems little falsehood of description, and my ideas are expressed in +language fitted to their respective importance. Something must have +been gained by this practice, as it is friendly to one property of +all good poetry, namely, good sense: but it has necessarily cut me +off from a large portion of phrases and figures of speech which from +father to son have long been regarded as the common inheritance of +Poets. I have also thought it expedient to restrict myself still +further, having abstained from the use of many expressions, in +themselves proper and beautiful, but which have been foolishly +repeated by bad Poets, till such feelings of disgust are connected +with them as it is scarcely possible by any art of association to +overpower. + +If in a poem there should be found a series of lines, or even a single +line, in which the language, though naturally arranged, and according +to the strict laws of metre, does not differ from that of prose, there +is a numerous class of critics, who, when they stumble upon these +prosaisms, as they call them, imagine that they have made a notable +discovery, and exult over the Poet as over a man ignorant of his own +profession. Now these men would establish a canon of criticism which +the Reader will conclude he must utterly reject, if he wishes to be +pleased with these volumes. And it would be a most easy task to prove +to him, that not only the language of a large portion of every good +poem, even of the most elevated character, must necessarily, except +with reference to the metre, in no respect differ from that of good +prose, but likewise that some of the most interesting parts of the +best poems will be found to be strictly the language of prose +when prose is well written. The truth of this assertion might be +demonstrated by innumerable passages from almost all the poetical +writings, even of Milton himself. To illustrate the subject in a +general manner, I will here adduce a short composition of Gray, who +was at the head of those who, by their reasonings, have attempted to +widen the space of separation betwixt Prose and Metrical composition, +and was more than any other man curiously elaborate in the structure +of his own poetic diction. + + In vain to me the smiling mornings shine, + And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire; + The birds in vain their amorous descant join, + Or cheerful fields resume their green attire. + These ears, alas! for other notes repine; + _A different object do these eyes require; + My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine; + And in my breast the imperfect joys expire_; + Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer, + And new-born pleasure brings to happier men; + The fields to all their wonted tribute bear; + To warm their little loves the birds complain. + _I fruitless mourn to him that cannot hear, + And weep the more because I weep in vain._ + +It will easily be perceived, that the only part of this Sonnet +which is of any value is the lines printed in Italics; it is equally +obvious, that, except in the rhyme, and in the use of the single word +'fruitless' for fruitlessly, which is so far a defect, the language of +these lines does in no respect differ from that of prose. + +By the foregoing quotation it has been shown that the language +of Prose may yet be well adapted to Poetry; and it was previously +asserted, that a large portion of the language of every good poem can +in no respect differ from that of good Prose. We will go further. +It may be safely affirmed, that there neither is, nor can be, any +_essential_ difference between the language of prose and metrical +composition. We are fond of tracing the resemblance between Poetry and +Painting, and, accordingly, we call them Sisters: but where shall we +find bonds of connexion sufficiently strict to typify the affinity +betwixt metrical and prose composition? They both speak by and to the +same organs; the bodies in which both of them are clothed may be said +to be of the same substance, their affections are kindred, and almost +identical, not necessarily differing even in degree; Poetry[2] sheds +no tears 'such as Angels weep,' but natural and human tears; she can +boast of no celestial choir that distinguishes her vital juices from +those of prose; the same human blood circulates through the veins of +them both. + +If it be affirmed that rhyme and metrical arrangement of themselves +constitute a distinction which overturns what has just been said on +the strict affinity of metrical language with that of prose, and paves +the way for other artificial distinctions which the mind voluntarily +admits, I answer that the language of such Poetry as is here +recommended is, as far as is possible, a selection of the language +really spoken by men; that this selection, wherever it is made with +true taste and feeling, will of itself form a distinction far greater +than would at first be imagined, and will entirely separate the +composition from the vulgarity and meanness of ordinary life; and, if +metre be superadded thereto, I believe that a dissimilitude will be +produced altogether sufficient for the gratification of a rational +mind. What other distinction would we have? Whence is it to come? And +where is it to exist? Not, surely, where the Poet speaks through the +mouths of his characters: it cannot be necessary here, either for +elevation of style, or any of its supposed ornaments: for, if the +Poet's subject be judiciously chosen, it will naturally, and upon +fit occasion, lead him to passions the language of which, if selected +truly and judiciously, must necessarily be dignified and variegated, +and alive with metaphors and figures. I forbear to speak of an +incongruity which would shock the intelligent Reader, should the +Poet interweave any foreign splendour of his own with that which the +passion naturally suggests: it is sufficient to say that such addition +is unnecessary. And, surely, it is more probable that those passages, +which with propriety abound with metaphors and figures, will have +their due effect, if, upon other occasions where the passions are of a +milder character, the style also be subdued and temperate. + +But, as the pleasure which I hope to give by the Poems now presented +to the Reader must depend entirely on just notions upon this subject, +and, as it is in itself of high importance to our taste and moral +feelings, I cannot content myself with these detached remarks. And if, +in what I am about to say, it shall appear to some that my labour +is unnecessary, and that I am like a man fighting a battle without +enemies, such persons may be reminded, that, whatever be the language +outwardly holden by men, a practical faith in the opinions which I +am wishing to establish is almost unknown. If my conclusions are +admitted, and carried as far as they must be carried if admitted at +all, our judgements concerning the works of the greatest Poets +both ancient and modern will be far different from what they are +at present, both when we praise, and when we censure: and our moral +feelings influencing and influenced by these judgements will, I +believe, be corrected and purified. + +Taking up the subject, then, upon general grounds, let me ask, what +is meant by the word Poet? What is a Poet? To whom does he address +himself? And what language is to be expected from him?--He is a +man speaking to men: a man, it is true, endowed with more lively +sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness, who has a greater +knowledge of human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than are +supposed to be common among mankind; a man pleased with his own +passions and volitions, and who rejoices more than other men in the +spirit of life that is in him; delighting to contemplate similar +volitions and passions as manifested in the goings-on of the Universe, +and habitually impelled to create them where he does not find them. +To these qualities he has added a disposition to be affected more +than other men by absent things as if they were present; an ability of +conjuring up in himself passions, which are indeed far from being the +same as those produced by real events, yet (especially in those parts +of the general sympathy which are pleasing and delightful) do more +nearly resemble the passions produced by real events, than anything +which, from the motions of their own minds merely, other men are +accustomed to feel in themselves:--whence, and from practice, he has +acquired a greater readiness and power in expressing what he thinks +and feels, and especially those thoughts and feelings which, by +his own choice, or from the structure of his own mind, arise in him +without immediate external excitement. + +But whatever portion of this faculty we may suppose even the greatest +Poet to possess, there cannot be a doubt that the language which it +will suggest to him, must often, in liveliness and truth, fall +short of that which is uttered by men in real life, under the actual +pressure of those passions, certain shadows of which the Poet thus +produces, or feels to be produced, in himself. + +However exalted a notion we would wish to cherish of the character of +a Poet, it is obvious, that while he describes and imitates passions, +his employment is in some degree mechanical, compared with the freedom +and power of real and substantial action and suffering. So that it +will be the wish of the Poet to bring his feelings near to those of +the persons whose feelings he describes, nay, for short spaces of +time, perhaps, to let himself slip into an entire delusion, and even +confound and identify his own feelings with theirs; modifying only +the language which is thus suggested to him by a consideration that +he describes for a particular purpose, that of giving pleasure. Here, +then, he will apply the principle of selection which has been already +insisted upon. He will depend upon this for removing what would +otherwise be painful or disgusting in the passion; he will feel that +there is no necessity to trick out or to elevate nature: and, the more +industriously he applies this principle, the deeper will be his faith +that no words, which _his_ fancy or imagination can suggest, will +be to be compared with those which are the emanations of reality and +truth. + +But it may be said by those who do not object to the general spirit of +these remarks, that, as it is impossible for the Poet to produce upon +all occasions language as exquisitely fitted for the passion as that +which the real passion itself suggests, it is proper that he should +consider himself as in the situation of a translator, who does not +scruple to substitute excellencies of another kind for those which +are unattainable by him; and endeavours occasionally to surpass his +original, in order to make some amends for the general inferiority +to which he feels that he must submit. But this would be to encourage +idleness and unmanly despair. Further, it is the language of men +who speak of what they do not understand; who talk of Poetry as of a +matter of amusement and idle pleasure; who will converse with us as +gravely about a _taste_ for Poetry, as they express it, as if it were +a thing as indifferent as a taste for rope-dancing, or Frontiniac or +Sherry. Aristotle, I have been told, has said, that Poetry is the +most philosophic of all writing: it is so: its object is truth, not +individual and local, but general, and operative; not standing upon +external testimony, but carried alive into the heart by passion; truth +which is its own testimony, which gives competence and confidence +to the tribunal to which it appeals, and receives them from the same +tribunal. Poetry is the image of man and nature. The obstacles which +stand in the way of the fidelity of the Biographer and Historian, and +of their consequent utility, are incalculably greater than those which +are to be encountered by the Poet who comprehends the dignity of his +art. The Poet writes under one restriction only, namely, the necessity +of giving immediate pleasure to a human Being possessed of that +information which may be expected from him, not as a lawyer, a +physician, a mariner, an astronomer, or a natural philosopher, but +as a Man. Except this one restriction, there is no object standing +between the Poet and the image of things; between this, and the +Biographer and Historian, there are a thousand. + +Nor let this necessity of producing immediate pleasure be considered +as a degradation of the Poet's art. It is far otherwise. It is an +acknowledgement of the beauty of the universe, an acknowledgement the +more sincere, because not formal, but indirect; it is a task light and +easy to him who looks at the world in the spirit of love: further, it +is a homage paid to the native and naked dignity of man, to the grand +elementary principle of pleasure, by which he knows, and feels, +and lives, and moves. We have no sympathy but what is propagated by +pleasure: I would not be misunderstood; but wherever we sympathize +with pain, it will be found that the sympathy is produced and carried +on by subtle combinations with pleasure. We have no knowledge, that +is, no general principles drawn from the contemplation of particular +facts, but what has been built up by pleasure, and exists in us by +pleasure alone. The Man of science, the Chemist and Mathematician, +whatever difficulties and disgusts they may have had to struggle with, +know and feel this. However painful may be the objects with which the +Anatomist's knowledge is connected, he feels that his knowledge is +pleasure; and where he has no pleasure he has no knowledge. What then +does the Poet? He considers man and the objects that surround him as +acting and re-acting upon each other, so as to produce an infinite +complexity of pain and pleasure; he considers man in his own nature +and in his ordinary life as contemplating this with a certain quantity +of immediate knowledge, with certain convictions, intuitions, and +deductions, which from habit acquire the quality of intuitions; +he considers him as looking upon this complex scene of ideas and +sensations, and finding everywhere objects that immediately excite +in him sympathies which, from the necessities of his nature, are +accompanied by an overbalance of enjoyment. + +To this knowledge which all men carry about with them, and to these +sympathies in which, without any other discipline than that of our +daily life, we are fitted to take delight, the Poet principally +directs his attention. He considers man and nature as essentially +adapted to each other, and the mind of man as naturally the mirror of +the fairest and most interesting properties of nature. And thus the +Poet, prompted by this feeling of pleasure, which accompanies him +through the whole course of his studies, converses with general +nature, with affections akin to those, which, through labour and +length of time, the Man of science has raised up in himself, by +conversing with those particular parts of nature which are the objects +of his studies. The knowledge both of the Poet and the Man of science +is pleasure; but the knowledge of the one cleaves to us as a necessary +part of our existence, our natural and unalienable inheritance; the +other is a personal and individual acquisition, slow to come to +us, and by no habitual and direct sympathy connecting us with our +fellow-beings. The Man of science seeks truth as a remote and unknown +benefactor; he cherishes and loves it in his solitude: the Poet, +singing a song in which all human beings join with him, rejoices in +the presence of truth as our visible friend and hourly companion. +Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge; it is the +impassioned expression which is in the countenance of all Science. +Emphatically may it be said of the Poet, as Shakespeare hath said of +man, 'that he looks before and after.' He is the rock of defence for +human nature; an upholder and preserver, carrying everywhere with him +relationship and love. In spite of difference of soil and climate, of +language and manners, of laws and customs: in spite of things silently +gone out of mind, and things violently destroyed; the Poet binds +together by passion and knowledge the vast empire of human society, as +it is spread over the whole earth, and over all time. The objects of +the Poet's thoughts are everywhere; though the eyes and senses of man +are, it is true, his favourite guides, yet he will follow wheresoever +he can find an atmosphere of sensation in which to move his wings. +Poetry is the first and last of all knowledge--it is as immortal as +the heart of man. If the labours of Men of science should ever create +any material revolution, direct or indirect, in our condition, and in +the impressions which we habitually receive, the Poet will sleep then +no more than at present; he will be ready to follow the steps of the +Man of science, not only in those general indirect effects, but he +will be at his side, carrying sensation into the midst of the objects +of the science itself. The remotest discoveries of the Chemist, the +Botanist, or Mineralogist, will be as proper objects of the Poet's +art as any upon which it can be employed, if the time should ever come +when these things shall be familiar to us, and the relations under +which they are contemplated by the followers of these respective +sciences shall be manifestly and palpably material to us as enjoying +and suffering beings. If the time should ever come when what is now +called science, thus familiarized to men, shall be ready to put on, +as it were, a form of flesh and blood, the Poet will lend his divine +spirit to aid the transfiguration, and will welcome the Being thus +produced, as a dear and genuine inmate of the household of man.--It is +not, then, to be supposed that any one, who holds that sublime notion +of Poetry which I have attempted to convey, will break in upon the +sanctity and truth of his pictures by transitory and accidental +ornaments, and endeavour to excite admiration of himself by arts, the +necessity of which must manifestly depend upon the assumed meanness of +his subject. + +What has been thus far said applies to Poetry in general; but +especially to those parts of composition where the Poet speaks through +the mouths of his characters; and upon this point it appears to +authorize the conclusion, that there are few persons of good sense, +who would not allow that the dramatic parts of composition are +defective, in proportion as they deviate from the real language +of nature, and are coloured by a diction of the Poet's own, either +peculiar to him as an individual Poet or belonging simply to Poets +in general; to a body of men who, from the circumstance of their +compositions being in metre, it is expected will employ a particular +language. + +It is not, then, in the dramatic parts of composition that we look for +this distinction of language; but still it may be proper and necessary +where the Poet speaks to us in his own person and character. To this +I answer by referring the Reader to the description before given of a +Poet. Among the qualities there enumerated as principally conducing to +form a Poet, is implied nothing differing in kind from other men, but +only in degree. The sum of what was said is, that the Poet is chiefly +distinguished from other men by a greater promptness to think and +feel without immediate external excitement, and a greater power in +expressing such thoughts and feelings as are produced in him in that +manner. But these passions and thoughts and feelings are the general +passions and thoughts and feelings of men. And with what are +they connected? Undoubtedly with our moral sentiments and animal +sensations, and with the causes which excite these; with the +operations of the elements, and the appearances of the visible +universe; with storm and sunshine, with the revolutions of the +seasons, with cold and heat, with loss of friends and kindred, with +injuries and resentments, gratitude and hope, with fear and sorrow. +These, and the like, are the sensations and objects which the Poet +describes, as they are the sensations of other men, and the objects +which interest them. The Poet thinks and feels in the spirit of human +passions. How, then, can his language differ in any material degree +from that of all other men who feel vividly and see clearly? It might +be _proved_ that it is impossible. But supposing that this were not +the case, the Poet might then be allowed to use a peculiar language +when expressing his feelings for his own gratification, or that of +men like himself. But Poets do not write for Poets alone, but for men. +Unless therefore we are advocates for that admiration which subsists +upon ignorance, and that pleasure which arises from hearing what we do +not understand, the Poet must descend from this supposed height; and, +in order to excite rational sympathy, he must express himself as other +men express themselves. To this it may be added, that while he is only +selecting from the real language of men, or, which amounts to the same +thing, composing accurately in the spirit of such selection, he is +treading upon safe ground, and we know what we are to expect from him. +Our feelings are the same with respect to metre; for, as it may be +proper to remind the Reader, the distinction of metre is regular +and uniform, and not, like that which is produced by what is usually +called POETIC DICTION, arbitrary, and subject to infinite caprices +upon which no calculation whatever can be made. In the one case, the +Reader is utterly at the mercy of the Poet, respecting what imagery +or diction he may choose to connect with the passion; whereas, in the +other, the metre obeys certain laws, to which the Poet and Reader both +willingly submit because they are certain, and because no interference +is made by them with the passion, but such as the concurring testimony +of ages has shown to heighten and improve the pleasure which co-exists +with it. + +It will now be proper to answer an obvious question, namely, Why, +professing these opinions, have I written in verse? To this, in +addition to such answer as is included in what has been already said, +I reply, in the first place, Because, however I may have restricted +myself, there is still left open to me what confessedly constitutes +the most valuable object of all writing, whether in prose or verse; +the great and universal passions of men, the most general and +interesting of their occupations, and the entire world of nature +before me--to supply endless combinations of forms and imagery. Now, +supposing for a moment that whatever is interesting in these objects +may be as vividly described in prose, why should I be condemned for +attempting to superadd to such description the charm which, by the +consent of all nations, is acknowledged to exist in metrical language? +To this, by such as are yet unconvinced, it may he answered that +a very small part of the pleasure given by Poetry depends upon the +metre, and that it is injudicious to write in metre, unless it be +accompanied with the other artificial distinctions of style with which +metre is usually accompanied, and that, by such deviation, more will +be lost from the shock which will thereby be given to the Reader's +associations than will be counterbalanced by any pleasure which he can +derive from the general power of numbers. In answer to those who +still contend for the necessity of accompanying metre with certain +appropriate colours of style in order to the accomplishment of its +appropriate end, and who also, in my opinion, greatly underrate the +power of metre in itself, it might, perhaps, as far as relates to +these Volumes, have been almost sufficient to observe, that poems are +extant, written upon more humble subjects, and in a still more +naked and simple style, which have continued to give pleasure from +generation to generation. Now, if nakedness and simplicity be a +defect, the fact here mentioned affords a strong presumption that +poems somewhat less naked and simple are capable of affording pleasure +at the present day; and, what I wish _chiefly_ to attempt, at present, +was to justify myself for having written under the impression of this +belief. + +But various causes might be pointed out why, when the style is manly, +and the subject of some importance, words metrically arranged will +long continue to impart such a pleasure to mankind as he who proves +the extent of that pleasure will be desirous to impart. The end of +Poetry is to produce excitement in co-existence with an overbalance +of pleasure; but, by the supposition, excitement is an unusual and +irregular state of the mind; ideas and feelings do not, in that state, +succeed each other in accustomed order. If the words, however, by +which this excitement is produced be in themselves powerful, or the +images and feelings have an undue proportion of pain connected with +them, there is some danger that the excitement may be carried beyond +its proper bounds. Now the co-presence of something regular, something +to which the mind has been accustomed in various moods and in a +less excited state, cannot but have great efficacy in tempering and +restraining the passion by an inter-texture of ordinary feeling, and +of feeling not strictly and necessarily connected with the passion. +This is unquestionably true; and hence, though the opinion will +at first appear paradoxical, from the tendency of metre to divest +language, in a certain degree, of its reality, and thus to throw a +sort of half-consciousness of unsubstantial existence over the +whole composition, there can be little doubt but that more pathetic +situations and sentiments, that is, those which have a greater +proportion of pain connected with them, may be endured in metrical +composition, especially in rhyme, than in prose. The metre of the old +ballads is very artless; yet they contain many passages which would +illustrate this opinion; and, I hope, if the following Poems be +attentively perused, similar instances will be found in them. This +opinion may be further illustrated by appealing to the Reader's own +experience of the reluctance with which he comes to the re-perusal of +the distressful parts of _Clarissa Harlowe_, or _The Gamester_; while +Shakespeare's writings, in the most pathetic scenes, never act upon +us, as pathetic, beyond the bounds of pleasure--an effect which, in a +much greater degree than might at first be imagined, is to be ascribed +to small, but continual and regular impulses of pleasurable surprise +from the metrical arrangement.--On the other hand (what it must be +allowed will much more frequently happen) if the Poet's words should +be incommensurate with the passion, and inadequate to raise the Reader +to a height of desirable excitement, then (unless the Poet's choice of +his metre has been grossly injudicious), in the feelings of pleasure +which the Reader has been accustomed to connect with metre in general, +and in the feeling, whether cheerful or melancholy, which he has been +accustomed to connect with that particular movement of metre, there +will be found something which will greatly contribute to impart +passion to the words, and to effect the complex end which the Poet +proposes to himself. + +If I had undertaken a SYSTEMATIC defence of the theory here +maintained, it would have been my duty to develop the various causes +upon which the pleasure received from metrical language depends. Among +the chief of these causes is to be reckoned a principle which must +be well known to those who have made any of the Arts the object of +accurate reflection; namely, the pleasure which the mind derives from +the perception of similitude in dissimilitude. This principle is the +great spring of the activity of our minds, and their chief feeder. +From this principle the direction of the sexual appetite, and all the +passions connected with it, take their origin: it is the life of our +ordinary conversation; and upon the accuracy with which similitude in +dissimilitude, and dissimilitude in similitude are perceived, depend +our taste and our moral feelings. It would not be a useless employment +to apply this principle to the consideration of metre, and to show +that metre is hence enabled to afford much pleasure, and to point +out in what manner that pleasure is produced. But my limits will not +permit me to enter upon this subject, and I must content myself with a +general summary. + +I have said that poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful +feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in +tranquillity: the emotion is contemplated till, by a species of +reaction, the tranquillity gradually disappears, and an emotion, +kindred to that which was before the subject of contemplation, is +gradually produced, and does itself actually exist in the mind. In +this mood successful composition generally begins, and in a mood +similar to this it is carried on; but the emotion, of whatever kind, +and in whatever degree, from various causes, is qualified by various +pleasures, so that in describing any passions whatsoever, which are +voluntarily described, the mind will, upon the whole, be in a state +of enjoyment. If Nature be thus cautious to preserve in a state of +enjoyment a being so employed, the Poet ought to profit by the lesson +held forth to him, and ought especially to take care, that, whatever +passions he communicates to his Reader, those passions, if his +Reader's mind be sound and vigorous, should always be accompanied +with an overbalance of pleasure. Now the music of harmonious metrical +language, the sense of difficulty overcome, and the blind association +of pleasure which has been previously received from works of rhyme or +metre of the same or similar construction, an indistinct perception +perpetually renewed of language closely resembling that of real +life, and yet, in the circumstance of metre, differing from it so +widely--all these imperceptibly make up a complex feeling of delight, +which is of the most important use in tempering the painful feeling +always found intermingled with powerful descriptions of the deeper +passions. This effect is always produced in pathetic and impassioned +poetry; while, in lighter compositions, the ease and gracefulness +with which the Poet manages his numbers are themselves confessedly a +principal source of the gratification of the Reader. All that it is +_necessary_ to say, however, upon this subject, may he effected by +affirming, what few persons will deny, that, of two descriptions, +either of passions, manners, or characters, each of them equally well +executed, the one in prose and the other in verse, the verse will be +read a hundred times where the prose is read once. + +Having thus explained a few of my reasons for writing in verse, and +why I have chosen subjects from common life, and endeavoured to bring +my language near to the real language of men, if I have been too +minute in pleading my own cause, I have at the same time been treating +a subject of general interest; and for this reason a few words shall +be added with reference solely to these particular poems, and to some +defects which will probably be found in them. I am sensible that my +associations must have sometimes been particular instead of general, +and that, consequently, giving to things a false importance, I +may have sometimes written upon unworthy subjects; but I am less +apprehensive on this account, than that my language may frequently +have suffered from those arbitrary connexions of feelings and ideas +with particular words and phrases, from which no man can altogether +protect himself. Hence I have no doubt, that, in some instances, +feelings, even of the ludicrous, may be given to my Readers by +expressions which appeared to me tender and pathetic. Such faulty +expressions, were I convinced they were faulty at present, and that +they must necessarily continue to be so, I would willingly take +all reasonable pains to correct. But it is dangerous to make these +alterations on the simple authority of a few individuals, or even of +certain classes of men; for where the understanding of an Author is +not convinced, or his feelings altered, this cannot be done without +great injury to himself: for his own feelings are his stay and +support; and, if he set them aside in one instance, he may be induced +to repeat this act till his mind shall lose all confidence in itself, +and become utterly debilitated. To this it may be added, that the +critic ought never to forget that he is himself exposed to the same +errors as the Poet, and, perhaps, in a much greater degree: for +there can be no presumption in saying of most readers, that it is not +probable they will be so well acquainted with the various stages of +meaning through which words have passed, or with the fickleness or +stability of the relations of particular ideas to each other; and, +above all, since they are so much less interested in the subject, they +may decide lightly and carelessly. + +Long as the Reader has been detained, I hope he will permit me to +caution him against a mode of false criticism which has been applied +to Poetry, in which the language closely resembles that of life and +nature. Such verses have been triumphed over in parodies, of which Dr. +Johnson's stanza is a fair specimen:-- + + I put my hat upon my head + And walked into the Strand, + And there I met another man + Whose hat was in his hand. + +Immediately under these lines let us place one of the most justly +admired stanzas of the 'Babes in the Wood,' + + These pretty Babes with hand in hand + Went wandering up and down; + But never more they saw the Man + Approaching from the Town. + +In both these stanzas the words, and the order of the words, in no +respect differ from the most unimpassioned conversation. There are +words in both, for example, 'the Strand,' and 'the Town,' connected +with none but the most familiar ideas; yet the one stanza we admit +as admirable, and the other as a fair example of the superlatively +contemptible. Whence arises this difference? Not from the metre, not +from the language, not from the order of the words; but the _matter_ +expressed in Dr. Johnson's stanza is contemptible. The proper method +of treating trivial and simple verses, to which Dr. Johnson's stanza +would be a fair parallelism, is not to say, this is a bad kind of +poetry, or, this is not poetry; but, this wants sense; it is neither +interesting in itself nor can _lead_ to anything interesting; the +images neither originate in that sane state of feeling which arises +out of thought, nor can excite thought or feeling in the Reader. This +is the only sensible manner of dealing with such verses. Why trouble +yourself about the species till you have previously decided upon the +genus? Why take pains to prove than an ape is not a Newton, when it is +self-evident that he is not a man? + +One request I must make of my reader, which is, that in judging +these Poems he would decide by his own feelings genuinely, and not +by reflection upon what will probably be the judgement of others. +How common is it to hear a person say, I myself do not object to this +style of composition, or this or that expression, but, to such and +such classes of people it will appear mean or ludicrous! This mode +of criticism, so destructive of all sound unadulterated judgement, is +almost universal: let the Reader then abide, independently, by his own +feelings, and, if he finds himself affected, let him not suffer such +conjectures to interfere with his pleasure. + +If an Author, by any single composition, has impressed us with +respect for his talents, it is useful to consider this as affording +a presumption, that on other occasions where we have been displeased, +he, nevertheless, may not have written ill or absurdly; and further, +to give him so much credit for this one composition as may induce +us to review what has displeased us, with more care than we should +otherwise have bestowed upon it. This is not only an act of justice, +but, in our decisions upon poetry especially, may conduce, in a high +degree, to the improvement of our own taste; for an _accurate_ taste +in poetry, and in all the other arts, as Sir Joshua Reynolds has +observed, is an _acquired_ talent, which can only be produced by +thought and a long continued intercourse with the best models of +composition. This is mentioned, not with so ridiculous a purpose as to +prevent the most inexperienced Reader from judging for himself (I +have already said that I wish him to judge for himself), but merely to +temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest, that, if Poetry be a +subject on which much time has not been bestowed, the judgement may be +erroneous; and that, in many cases, it necessarily will be so. + +Nothing would, I know, have so effectually contributed to further the +end which I have in view, as to have shown of what kind the pleasure +is, and how that pleasure is produced, which is confessedly produced +by metrical composition essentially different from that which I have +here endeavoured to recommend: for the Reader will say that he has +been pleased by such composition; and what more can be done for him? +The power of any art is limited; and he will suspect, that, if it +be proposed to furnish him with new friends, that can be only upon +condition of his abandoning his old friends. Besides, as I have said, +the Reader is himself conscious of the pleasure which he has received +from such composition, composition to which he has peculiarly attached +the endearing name of Poetry; and all men feel an habitual gratitude, +and something of an honourable bigotry, for the objects which have +long continued to please them: we not only wish to be pleased, but to +be pleased in that particular way in which we have been accustomed +to be pleased. There is in these feelings enough to resist a host of +arguments; and I should be the less able to combat them successfully, +as I am willing to allow, that, in order entirely to enjoy the Poetry +which I am recommending, it would be necessary to give up much of what +is ordinarily enjoyed. But, would my limits have permitted me to point +out how this pleasure is produced, many obstacles might have been +removed, and the Reader assisted in perceiving that the powers of +language are not so limited as he may suppose; and that it is possible +for poetry to give other enjoyments, of a purer, more lasting, +and more exquisite nature. This part of the subject has not been +altogether neglected, but it has not been so much my present aim to +prove, that the interest excited by some other kinds of poetry is less +vivid, and less worthy of the nobler powers of the mind, as to offer +reasons for presuming, that if my purpose were fulfilled, a species of +poetry would be produced, which is genuine poetry; in its nature well +adapted to interest mankind permanently, and likewise important in the +multiplicity and quality of its moral relations. + +From what has been said, and from a perusal of the Poems, the Reader +will be able clearly to perceive the object which I had in view: he +will determine how far it has been attained; and, what is a much +more important question, whether it be worth attaining: and upon the +decision of these two questions will rest my claim to the approbation +of the Public. + + +[Footnote 1: It is worth while here to observe, that the affecting +parts of Chaucer are almost always expressed In language pure and +universally intelligible even to this day.] + +[Footnote 2: I here use the word 'Poetry' (though against my own +judgement) as opposed to the word Prose, and synonymous with metrical +composition. But much confusion has been introduced into criticism +by this contradistinction of Poetry and Prose, instead of the more +philosophical one of Poetry and Matter of Fact, or Science. The only +strict antithesis to Prose is Metre; nor is this, in truth, a _strict_ +antithesis, because lines and passages of metre so naturally occur in +writing prose, that it would be scarcely possible to avoid them, even +were it desirable.] + + + + +APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1802) + + +Perhaps, as I have no right to expect that attentive perusal, without +which, confined, as I have been, to the narrow limits of a preface, my +meaning cannot be thoroughly understood, I am anxious to give an exact +notion of the sense in which the phrase poetic diction has been used; +and for this purpose, a few words shall here be added, concerning the +origin and characteristics of the phraseology, which I have condemned +under that name. + +The earliest poets of all nations generally wrote from passion excited +by real events; they wrote naturally, and as men: feeling powerfully +as they did, their language was daring, and figurative. In succeeding +times, Poets, and Men ambitious of the fame of Poets, perceiving the +influence of such language, and desirous of producing the same effect +without being animated by the same passion, set themselves to a +mechanical adoption of these figures of speech, and made use of them, +sometimes with propriety, but much more frequently applied them +to feelings and thoughts with which they had no natural connexion +whatsoever. A language was thus insensibly produced, differing +materially from the real language of men in _any situation_. The +Reader or Hearer of this distorted language found himself in a +perturbed and unusual state of mind: when affected by the genuine +language of passion he had been in a perturbed and unusual state of +mind also: in both cases he was willing that his common judgement and +understanding should be laid asleep, and he had no instinctive and +infallible perception of the true to make him reject the false; the +one served as a passport for the other. The emotion was in both cases +delightful, and no wonder if he confounded the one with the other, +and believed them both to be produced by the same, or similar causes. +Besides, the Poet spake to him in the character of a man to be looked +up to, a man of genius and authority. Thus, and from a variety of +other causes, this distorted language was received with admiration; +and Poets, it is probable, who had before contented themselves for the +most part with misapplying only expressions which at first had +been dictated by real passion, carried the abuse still further, and +introduced phrases composed apparently in the spirit of the original +figurative language of passion, yet altogether of their own invention, +and characterized by various degrees of wanton deviation from good +sense and nature. + +It is indeed true, that the language of the earliest Poets was felt to +differ materially from ordinary language, because it was the language +of extraordinary occasions; but it was really spoken by men, language +which the Poet himself had uttered when he had been affected by the +events which he described, or which he had heard uttered by those +around him. To this language it is probable that metre of some sort +or other was early superadded. This separated the genuine language of +Poetry still further from common life, so that whoever read or heard +the poems of these earliest Poets felt himself moved in a way in which +he had not been accustomed to be moved in real life, and by causes +manifestly different from those which acted upon him in real life. +This was the great temptation to all the corruptions which have +followed: under the protection of this feeling succeeding Poets +constructed a phraseology which had one thing, it is true, in common +with the genuine language of poetry, namely, that it was not heard in +ordinary conversation; that it was unusual. But the first Poets, as +I have said, spake a language which, though unusual, was still the +language of men. This circumstance, however, was disregarded by their +successors; they found that they could please by easier means: +they became proud of modes of expression which they themselves had +invented, and which were uttered only by themselves. In process of +time metre became a symbol or promise of this unusual language, and +whoever took upon him to write in metre, according as he possessed +more or less of true poetic genius, introduced less or more of this +adulterated phraseology into his compositions, and the true and the +false were inseparately interwoven until, the taste of men becoming +gradually perverted, this language was received as a natural language: +and at length, by the influence of books upon men, did to a certain +degree really become so. Abuses of this kind were imported from one +nation to another, and with the progress of refinement this diction +became daily more and more corrupt, thrusting out of sight the plain +humanities of nature by a motley masquerade of tricks, quaintnesses, +hieroglyphics, and enigmas. + +It would not be uninteresting to point out the causes of the pleasure +given by this extravagant and absurd diction. It depends upon a great +variety of causes, but upon none, perhaps, more than its influence in +impressing a notion of the peculiarity and exaltation of the Poet's +character, and in flattering the Reader's self-love by bringing +him nearer to a sympathy with that character; an effect which is +accomplished by unsettling ordinary habits of thinking, and thus +assisting the Reader to approach to that perturbed and dizzy state +of mind in which if he does not find himself, he imagines that he is +_balked_ of a peculiar enjoyment which poetry can and ought to bestow. + +The sonnet quoted from Gray, in the Preface, except the lines printed +in italics, consists of little else but this diction, though not of +the worst kind; and indeed, if one may be permitted to say so, it is +far too common in the best writers both ancient and modern. Perhaps +in no way, by positive example could more easily be given a notion +of what I mean by the phrase _poetic diction_ than by referring to a +comparison between the metrical paraphrase which we have of passages +in the Old and New Testament, and those passages as they exist in +our common Translation. See Pope's _Messiah_ throughout; Prior's 'Did +sweeter sounds adorn my flowing tongue,' &c. &c. 'Though I speak with +the tongues of men and of angels,' &c. &c, 1st Corinthians, ch. xiii. +By way of immediate example take the following of Dr. Johnson: + + Turn on the prudent Ant thy heedless eyes, + Observe her labours, Sluggard, and be wise; + No stern command, no monitory voice, + Prescribes her duties, or directs her choice; + Yet, timely provident, she hastes away + To snatch the blessings of a plenteous day; + When fruitful Summer loads the teeming plain, + She crops the harvest, and she stores the grain. + How long shall sloth usurp thy useless hours, + Unnerve thy vigour, and enchain thy powers? + While artful shades thy downy couch enclose, + And soft solicitation courts repose, + Amidst the drowsy charms of dull delight, + Year chases year with unremitted flight, + Till Want now following, fraudulent and slow, + Shall spring to seize thee, like an ambush'd foe. + +From this hubbub of words pass to the original 'Go to the Ant, thou +Sluggard, consider her ways, and be wise: which having no guide, +overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth +her food in the harvest. How long wilt thou sleep, O Sluggard? +when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little +slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep. So shall thy poverty +come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man' Proverbs, +ch. vi. + +One more quotation, and I have done. It is from Cowper's Verses +supposed to be written by Alexander Selkirk: + + Religion! what treasure untold + Resides in that heavenly word! + More precious than silver and gold, + Or all that this earth can afford + But the sound of the church-going bell + These valleys and rocks never heard, + Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell, + Or smiled when a sabbath appeared + Ye winds, that have made me your sport + Convey to this desolate shore + Some cordial endearing report + Of a land I must visit no more + My friends, do they now and then send + A wish or a thought after me? + O tell me I yet have a friend, + Though a friend I am never to see + +This passage is quoted as an instance of three different styles of +composition. The first four lines are poorly expressed, some Critics +would call the language prosaic; the fact is, it would be bad prose, +so bad, that it is scarcely worse in metre. The epithet 'church-going' +applied to a bell, and that by so chaste a writer as Cowper, is an +instance of the strange abuses which Poets have introduced into their +language, till they and their Readers take them as matters of course, +if they do not single them out expressly as objects of admiration. +The two lines 'Ne'er sighed at the sound,' &c., are, in my opinion, an +instance of the language of passion wrested from its proper use, and, +from the mere circumstance of the composition being in metre, applied +upon an occasion that does not justify such violent expressions; and I +should condemn the passage, though perhaps few Readers will agree with +me, as vicious poetic diction. The last stanza is throughout admirably +expressed: it would be equally good whether in prose or verse, except +that the Reader has an exquisite pleasure in seeing such natural +language so naturally connected with metre. The beauty of this stanza +tempts me to conclude with a principle which ought never to be +lost sight of, and which has been my chief guide in all I have +said,--namely, that in works of _imagination and sentiment_, for of +these only have I been treating, in proportion as ideas and feelings +are valuable, whether the composition be in prose or in verse, they +require and exact one and the same language. Metre is but adventitious +to composition, and the phraseology for which that passport is +necessary, even where it may be graceful at all will be little valued +by the judicious. + + + + +PREFACE TO POEMS + +(1815) + + +The powers requisite for the production of poetry are: first, those +of Observation and Description,--i.e. the ability to observe with +accuracy things as they are in themselves, and with fidelity to +describe them, unmodified by any passion or feeling existing in the +mind of the describer; whether the things depicted be actually present +to the senses, or have a place only in the memory. This power, though +indispensable to a Poet, is one which he employs only in submission +to necessity, and never for a continuance of time: as its exercise +supposes all the higher qualities of the mind to be passive, and in +a state of subjection to external objects, much in the same way as +a translator or engraver ought to be to his original. 2ndly, +Sensibility,--which, the more exquisite it is, the wider will be the +range of a poet's perceptions; and the more will he be incited to +observe objects, both as they exist in themselves and as re-acted upon +by his own mind. (The distinction between poetic and human sensibility +has been marked in the character of the Poet delineated in the +original preface.) 3rdly, Reflection,--which makes the Poet acquainted +with the value of actions, images, thoughts, and feelings; and assists +the sensibility in perceiving their connexion with each other. 4thly, +Imagination and Fancy,--to modify, to create, and to associate. 5thly, +Invention,--by which characters are composed out of materials supplied +by observation; whether of the Poet's own heart and mind, or of +external life and nature; and such incidents and situations produced +as are most impressive to the imagination, and most fitted to do +justice to the characters, sentiments, and passions, which the Poet +undertakes to illustrate. And, lastly, Judgement, to decide how +and where, and in what degree, each of these faculties ought to be +exerted; so that the less shall not be sacrificed to the greater; nor +the greater, slighting the less, arrogate, to its own injury, more +than its due. By judgement, also, is determined what are the laws and +appropriate graces of every species of composition.[3] + +The materials of Poetry, by these powers collected and produced, are +cast, by means of various moulds, into divers forms. The moulds may be +enumerated, and the forms specified, in the following order. 1st, The +Narrative,--including the Epopoeia, the Historic Poem, the Tale, the +Romance, the Mock-heroic, and, if the spirit of Homer will tolerate +such neighbourhood, that dear production of our days, the metrical +Novel. Of this Class, the distinguishing mark is, that the Narrator, +however liberally his speaking agents be introduced, is himself the +source from which everything primarily flows. Epic Poets, in order +that their mode of composition may accord with the elevation of their +subject, represent themselves as _singing_ from the inspiration of the +Muse, 'Anna virumque _cano_;' but this is a fiction, in modern times, +of slight value: the _Iliad_ or the _Paradise Lost_ would gain little +in our estimation by being chanted. The other poets who belong to this +class are commonly content to _tell_ their tale;--so that of the +whole it may be affirmed that they neither require nor reject the +accompaniment of music. + +2ndly, The Dramatic,--consisting of Tragedy, Historic Drama, Comedy, +and Masque, in which the Poet does not appear at all in his own +person, and where the whole action is carried on by speech and +dialogue of the agents; music being admitted only incidentally and +rarely. The Opera may be placed here, inasmuch as it proceeds by +dialogue; though depending, to the degree that it does, upon music, it +has a strong claim to be ranked with the lyrical. The characteristic +and Impassioned Epistle, of which Ovid and Pope have given examples, +considered as a species of monodrama, may, without impropriety, be +placed in this class. + +3rdly, The Lyrical,--containing the Hymn, the Ode, the Elegy, the +Song, and the Ballad; in all which, for the production of their _full_ +effect, an accompaniment of music is indispensable. + +4thly, The Idyllium,--descriptive chiefly either of the processes and +appearances of external nature, as the _Seasons_ of Thomson; or +of characters, manners, and sentiments, as are Shenstone's +_Schoolmistress, The Cotter's Saturday Night_ of Burns, _The Twa Dogs_ +of the same Author; or of these in conjunction with the appearances +of Nature, as most of the pieces of Theocritus, the _Allegro_ and +_Penseroso_ of Milton, Beattie's _Minstrel_, Goldsmith's _Deserted +Village_. The Epitaph, the Inscription, the Sonnet, most of +the epistles of poets writing in their own persons, and all +loco-descriptive poetry, belonging to this class. + +5thly, Didactic,--the principal object of which is direct instruction; +as the Poem of Lucretius, the _Georgics_ of Virgil, _The Fleece_ of +Dyer, Mason's _English Garden_, &c. + +And, lastly, philosophical Satire, like that of Horace and Juvenal; +personal and occasional Satire rarely comprehending sufficient of the +general in the individual to be dignified with the name of poetry. + +Out of the three last has been constructed a composite order, of which +Young's _Night Thoughts_, and Cowper's _Task_, are excellent examples. + +It is deducible from the above, that poems apparently miscellaneous, +may with propriety be arranged either with reference to the powers of +mind _predominant_ in the production of them; or to the mould in which +they are cast; or, lastly, to the subjects to which they relate. From +each of these considerations, the following Poems have been divided +into classes; which, that the work may more obviously correspond with +the course of human life, and for the sake of exhibiting in it the +three requisites of a legitimate whole, a beginning, a middle, and an +end, have been also arranged, as far as it was possible, according to +an order of time, commencing with Childhood, and terminating with +Old Age, Death, and Immortality. My guiding wish was, that the small +pieces of which these volumes consist, thus discriminated, might be +regarded under a two-fold view; as composing an entire work within +themselves, and as adjuncts to the philosophical Poem, _The Recluse_. +This arrangement has long presented itself habitually to my own mind. +Nevertheless, I should have preferred to scatter the contents of these +volumes at random, if I had been persuaded that, by the plan adopted, +anything material would be taken from the natural effect of the +pieces, individually, on the mind of the unreflecting Reader. I trust +there is a sufficient variety in each class to prevent this; while, +for him who reads with reflection, the arrangement will serve as a +commentary unostentatiously directing his attention to my purposes, +both particular and general. But, as I wish to guard against the +possibility of misleading by this classification, it is proper first +to remind the Reader, that certain poems are placed according to +the powers of mind, in the Author's conception, predominant in the +production of them; _predominant_, which implies the exertion of other +faculties in less degree. Where there is more imagination than fancy +in a poem, it is placed under the head of imagination, and _vice +versa_. Both the above classes might without impropriety have been +enlarged from that consisting of 'Poems founded on the Affections;' +as might this latter from those, and from the class 'proceeding from +Sentiment and Reflection.' The most striking characteristics of each +piece, mutual illustration, variety, and proportion, have governed me +throughout. + +None of the other Classes, except those of Fancy and Imagination, +require any particular notice. But a remark of general application may +be made. All Poets, except the dramatic, have been in the practice of +feigning that their works were composed to the music of the harp or +lyre: with what degree of affectation this has done in modern times, I +leave to the judicious to determine. For my own part, I have not been +disposed to violate probability so far, or to make such a large +demand upon the Reader's charity. Some of these pieces are essentially +lyrical; and, therefore, cannot have their due force without a +supposed musical accompaniment; but, in much the greatest part, as a +substitute for the classic lyre or romantic harp, I require nothing +more than an animated or impassioned recitation, adapted to the +subject. Poems, however humble in their kind, if they be good in that +kind, cannot read themselves; the law of long syllable and short must +not be so inflexible,--the letter of metre must not be so impassive +to the spirit of versification,--as to deprive the Reader of all +voluntary power to modulate, in subordination to the sense, the music +of the poem;--in the same manner as his mind is left at liberty, and +even summoned, to act upon its thoughts and images. But, though the +accompaniment of a musical instrument be frequently dispensed with, +the true Poet does not therefore abandon his privilege distinct from +that of the mere Proseman; + + He murmurs near the running brooks + A music sweeter than their own. + +Let us come now to the consideration of the words Fancy and +Imagination, as employed in the classification of the following Poems. +'A man,' says an intelligent author, 'has imagination in proportion +as he can distinctly copy in idea the impressions of sense: it is the +faculty which _images_ within the mind the phenomena of sensation. A +man has fancy in proportion as he can call up, connect, or associate, +at pleasure, those internal images ([Greek: phantazein] is to cause +to appear) so as to complete ideal representations of absent objects. +Imagination is the power of depicting, and fancy of evoking and +combining. The imagination is formed by patient observation; the fancy +by a voluntary activity in shifting the scenery of the mind. The more +accurate the imagination, the more safely may a painter, or a poet, +undertake a delineation, or a description, without the presence of the +objects to be characterized. The more versatile the fancy, the more +original and striking will be the decorations produced.'--_British +Synonyms discriminated, by W. Taylor_. + +Is not this as if a man should undertake to supply an account of +a building, and be so intent upon what he had discovered of the +foundation, as to conclude his task without once looking up at the +superstructure? Here, as in other instances throughout the volume, the +judicious Author's mind is enthralled by Etymology; he takes up the +original word as his guide and escort, and too often does not perceive +how soon he becomes its prisoner, without liberty to tread in any +path but that to which it confines him. It is not easy to find out +how imagination, thus explained, differs from distinct remembrance of +images; or fancy from quick and vivid recollection of them: each is +nothing more than a mode of memory. If the two words bear the above +meaning, and no other, what term is left to designate that faculty of +which the Poet is 'all compact;' he whose eyes glances from earth to +heaven, whose spiritual attributes body forth what his pen is prompt +in turning to shape; or what is left to characterize Fancy, +as insinuating herself into the heart of objects with creative +activity?--Imagination, in the sense of the word as giving title to +a class of the following Poems, has no reference to images that are +merely a faithful copy, existing in the mind, of absent external +objects; but is a word of higher import, denoting operations of the +mind upon those objects, and processes of creation or of composition, +governed by certain fixed laws. I proceed to illustrate my meaning by +instances. A parrot _hangs_ from the wires of his cage by his beak or +by his claws; or a monkey from the bough of a tree by his paws or +his tail. Each creature does so literally and actually. In the first +Eclogue of Virgil, the shepherd, thinking of the time when he is to +take leave of his farm, thus addresses his goats:-- + + Non ego vos posthac viridi projectus in antro + Dumosa _pendere_ procul de rupe videbo. + ----half way down + _Hangs_ one who gathers samphire, + +is the well-known expression of Shakespeare, delineating an ordinary +image upon the cliffs of Dover. In these two instances is a slight +exertion of the faculty which I denominate imagination, in the use +of one word: neither the goats nor the samphire-gatherer do literally +hang, as does the parrot or the monkey; but, presenting to the senses +something of such an appearance, the mind in its activity, for its own +gratification, contemplates them as hanging. + + As when far off at sea a fleet descried + _Hangs_ in the clouds, by equinoctial winds + Close sailing from Bengala, or the isles + Of Ternate or Tidore, whence merchants bring + Their spicy drugs; they on the trading flood + Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape + Ply, stemming nightly toward the Pole; so seemed + Far off the flying Fiend. + +Here is the full strength of the imagination involved in the word +_hangs_, and exerted upon the whole image: First, the fleet, an +aggregate of many ships, is represented as one mighty person, whose +track, we know and feel, is upon the waters; but, taking advantage +of its appearance to the senses, the Poet dares to represent it as +_hanging in the clouds_, both for the gratification of the mind in +contemplating the image itself, and in reference to the motion and +appearance of the sublime objects to which it is compared. + +From impressions of sight we will pass to those of sound; which, +as they must necessarily be of a less definite character, shall be +selected from these volumes: + + Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove _broods_; + +of the same bird, + + His voice was _buried_ among trees, + Yet to be come at by the breeze; + + O, Cuckoo I shall I call thee _Bird_, + Or but a wandering _Voice_? + +The stock-dove is said to _coo_, a sound well imitating the note +of the bird; but, by the intervention of the metaphor _broods_, the +affections are called in by the imagination to assist in marking the +manner in which the bird reiterates and prolongs her soft note, as if +herself delighting to listen to it, and participating of a still and +quiet satisfaction, like that which may be supposed inseparable from +the continuous process of incubation. 'His voice was buried among +trees,' a metaphor expressing the love of _seclusion_ by which this +Bird is marked; and characterizing its note as not partaking of the +shrill and the piercing, and therefore more easily deadened by the +intervening shade; yet a note so peculiar and withal so pleasing, that +the breeze, gifted with that love of the sound which the Poet feels, +penetrates the shades in which it is entombed, and conveys it to the +ear of the listener. + + Shall I call thee Bird, + Or but a wandering _Voice_? + +This concise interrogation characterizes the seeming ubiquity of +the voice of the cuckoo, and dispossesses the creature almost of a +corporeal existence; the Imagination being tempted to this exertion of +her power by a consciousness in the memory that the cuckoo is almost +perpetually heard throughout the season of spring, but seldom becomes +an object of sight. + +Thus far of images independent of each other, and immediately endowed +by the mind with properties that do not inhere in them, upon an +incitement from properties and qualities the existence of which is +inherent and obvious. These processes of imagination are carried +on either by conferring additional properties upon an object, or +abstracting from it some of those which it actually possesses, and +thus enabling it to react upon the mind which hath performed the +process, like a new existence. + +I pass from the Imagination acting upon an individual image to +a consideration of the same faculty employed upon images in a +conjunction by which they modify each other. The Reader has already +had a fine instance before him in the passage quoted from Virgil, +where the apparently perilous situation of the goat, hanging upon +the shaggy precipice, is contrasted with that of the shepherd +contemplating it from the seclusion of the cavern in which he lies +stretched at ease and in security. Take these images separately, and +how unaffecting the picture compared with that produced by their being +thus connected with, and opposed to, each other! + + As a huge stone is sometimes seen to lie + Couched on the bald top of an eminence, + Wonder to all who do the same espy + By what means it could thither come, and whence, + So that it seems a thing endued with sense, + Like a sea-beast crawled forth, which on a shelf + Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun himself. + + Such seemed this Man; not all alive or dead + Nor all asleep, in his extreme old age. + + * * * * * + + Motionless as a cloud the old Man stood, + That heareth not the loud winds when they call, + And moveth altogether if it move at all. + +In these images, the conferring, the abstracting, and the modifying +powers of the Imagination, immediately and mediately acting, are all +brought into conjunction. The stone is endowed with something of the +power of life to approximate it to the sea-beast; and the sea-beast +stripped of some of its vital qualities to assimilate it to the stone; +which intermediate image is thus treated for the purpose of bringing +the original image, that of the stone, to a nearer resemblance to the +figure and condition of the aged Man; who is divested of so much of +the indications of life and motion as to bring him to the point where +the two objects unite and coalesce in just comparison. After what has +been said, the image of the cloud need not be commented upon. + +Thus far of an endowing or modifying power: but the Imagination also +shapes and _creates_; and how? By innumerable processes; and in none +does it more delight than in that of consolidating numbers into +unity, and dissolving and separating unity into number,--alternations +proceeding from, and governed by, a sublime consciousness of the +soul in her own mighty and almost divine powers. Recur to the passage +already cited from Milton. When the compact Fleet, as one Person, has +been introduced 'sailing from Bengala,' 'They,' i.e. the 'merchants,' +representing the fleet resolved into a multitude of ships, 'ply' their +voyage towards the extremities of the earth: 'So' (referring to the +word 'As' in the commencement) 'seemed the flying Fiend'; the image +of his Person acting to recombine the multitude of ships into one +body,--the point from which the comparison set out. 'So seemed,' and +to whom seemed? To the heavenly Muse who dictates the poem, to the eye +of the Poet's mind, and to that of the Reader, present at one moment +in the wide Ethiopian, and the next in the solitudes, then first +broken in upon, of the infernal regions! + + Modo me Thebis, modo ponit Athenis. + +Hear again this mighty Poet,--speaking of the Messiah going forth to +expel from heaven the rebellious angels, + + Attended by ten thousand thousand Saints + He onward came: far off his coming shone,-- + +the retinue of Saints, and the Person of the Messiah himself, lost +almost and merged in the splendour of that indefinite abstraction 'His +coming!' + +As I do not mean here to treat this subject further than to throw some +light upon the present Volumes, and especially upon one division of +them, I shall spare myself and the Reader the trouble of considering +the Imagination as it deals with thoughts and sentiments, as it +regulates the composition of characters, and determines the course +of actions: I will not consider it (more than I have already done by +implication) as that power which, in the language of one of my most +esteemed Friends, 'draws all things to one; which makes things animate +or inanimate, beings with their attributes, subjects with their +accessories, take one colour and serve to one effect[4].' The grand +storehouses of enthusiastic and meditative Imagination, of poetical, +as contra-distinguished from human and dramatic Imagination, are the +prophetic and lyrical parts of the Holy Scriptures, and the works of +Milton; to which I cannot forbear to add to those of Spenser. I select +these writers in preference to those of ancient Greece and Rome, +because the anthropomorphitism of the Pagan religion subjected the +minds of the greatest poets in those countries too much to the bondage +of definite form; from which the Hebrews were preserved by their +abhorrence of idolatry. This abhorrence was almost as strong in our +great epic Poet, both from circumstances of his life, and from the +constitution of his mind. However imbued the surface might be with +classical literature, he was a Hebrew in soul; and all things tended +in him towards the sublime. Spenser, of a gentler nature, maintained +his freedom by aid of his allegorical spirit, at one time inciting him +to create persons out of abstractions; and, at another, by a +superior effort of genius, to give the universality and permanence of +abstractions to his human beings, by means of attributes and emblems +that belong to the highest moral truths and the purest sensations,--of +which his character of Una is a glorious example. Of the human and +dramatic Imagination the works of Shakespeare are an inexhaustible +source. + + I tax not you, ye Elements, with unkindness, + I never gave you kingdoms, call'd you Daughters! + +And if, bearing in mind the many Poets distinguished by this prime +quality, whose names I omit to mention; yet justified by recollection +of the insults which the ignorant, the incapable, and the +presumptuous, have heaped upon these and my other writings, I may be +permitted to anticipate the judgment of posterity upon myself, I +shall declare (censurable, I grant, if the notoriety of the fact above +stated does not justify me) that I have given in these unfavourable +times evidence of exertions of this faculty upon its worthiest +objects, the external universe, the moral and religious sentiments of +Man, his natural affections, and his acquired passions; which have +the same ennobling tendency as the productions of men, in this kind, +worthy to be holden in undying remembrance. + +To the mode in which Fancy has already been characterized as the power +of evoking and combining, or, as my friend Mr. Coleridge has styled +it, 'the aggregative and associative power,' my objection is only that +the definition is too general. To aggregate and to associate, to evoke +and to combine, belong as well to the Imagination as to the Fancy; but +either the materials evoked and combined are different; or they are +brought together under a different law, and for a different purpose. +Fancy does not require that the materials which she makes use of +should be susceptible of change in their constitution, from her touch; +and, where they admit of modification, it is enough for her purpose if +it be slight, limited, and evanescent. Directly the reverse of these, +are the desires and demands of the Imagination. She recoils from +everything but the plastic, the pliant, and the indefinite. She leaves +it to Fancy to describe Queen Mab as coming, + + In shape no bigger than an agate-stone + On the fore-finger of an alderman. + +Having to speak of stature, she does not tell you that her gigantic +Angel was as tall as Pompey's Pillar; much less that he was twelve +cubits, or twelve hundred cubits high; or that his dimensions equalled +those of Teneriffe or Atlas;--because these, and if they were +a million times as high it would be the same, are bounded: The +expression is, 'His stature reached the sky!' the illimitable +firmament!--When the Imagination frames a comparison, if it does +not strike on the first presentation, a sense of the truth of the +likeness, from the moment that it is perceived, grows--and continues +to grow--upon the mind; the resemblance depending less upon outline +of form and feature, than upon expression and effect; less upon +casual and outstanding, than upon inherent and internal, properties: +moreover, the images invariably modify each other.--The law under +which the processes of Fancy are carried on is as capricious as +the accidents of things, and the effects are surprising, playful, +ludicrous, amusing, tender, or pathetic, as the objects happen to be +appositely produced or fortunately combined. Fancy depends upon +the rapidity and profusion with which she scatters her thoughts and +images; trusting that their number, and the felicity with which they +are linked together, will make amends for the want of individual +value: or she prides herself upon the curious subtilty and the +successful elaboration with which she can detect their lurking +affinities. If she can win you over to her purpose, and impart to +you her feelings, she cares not how unstable or transitory may be her +influence, knowing that it will not be out of her power to resume +it upon an apt occasion. But the Imagination is conscious of an +indestructible dominion;--the Soul may fall away from it, not being +able to sustain its grandeur; but, if once felt and acknowledged, by +no act of any other faculty of the mind can it be relaxed, impaired, +or diminished.--Fancy is given to quicken and to beguile the +temporal part of our nature, Imagination to incite and to support the +eternal.--Yet is it not the less true that Fancy, as she is an active, +is also, under her own laws and in her own spirit, a creative faculty? +In what manner Fancy ambitiously aims at a rivalship with Imagination, +and Imagination stoops to work with the materials of Fancy, might be +illustrated from the compositions of all eloquent writers, whether in +prose or verse; and chiefly from those of our own Country. Scarcely a +page of the impassioned parts of Bishop Taylor's Works can be opened +that shall not afford examples.--Referring the Reader to those +inestimable volumes, I will content myself with placing a conceit +(ascribed to Lord Chesterfield) in contrast with a passage from the +_Paradise Lost_: + + The dews of the evening most carefully shun, + They are the tears of the sky for the loss of the sun. + +After the transgression of Adam, Milton, with other appearances of +sympathizing Nature, thus marks the immediate consequence, + + Sky lowered, and, muttering thunder, some sad drops + Wept at completion of the mortal sin. + +The associating link is the same in each instance: Dew and rain, not +distinguishable from the liquid substance of tears, are employed as +indications of sorrow. A flash of surprise is the effect in the former +case; a flash of surprise, and nothing more; for the nature of things +does not sustain the combination. In the latter, the effects from the +act, of which there is this immediate consequence and visible +sign, are so momentous, that the mind acknowledges the justice and +reasonableness of the sympathy in nature so manifested; and the sky +weeps drops of water as if with human eyes, as 'Earth had before +trembled from her entrails, and Nature given a second groan.' + +Finally, I will refer to Cotton's _Ode upon Winter_, an admirable +composition, though stained with some peculiarities of the age in +which he lived, for a general illustration of the characteristics of +Fancy. The middle part of this ode contains a most lively description +of the entrance of Winter, with his retinue, as 'A palsied king,' and +yet a military monarch,--advancing for conquest with his army; the +several bodies of which, and their arms and equipments, are described +with a rapidity of detail, and a profusion of _fanciful_ comparisons, +which indicate on the part of the poet extreme activity of intellect, +and a correspondent hurry of delightful feeling. Winter retires from +the foe into his fortress, where + + a magazine + Of sovereign juice is cellared in; + Liquor that will the siege maintain + Should Phoebus ne'er return again. + +Though myself a water drinker, I cannot resist the pleasure of +transcribing what follows, as an instance still more happy of Fancy +employed in the treatment of feeling than, in its preceding passages, +the Poem supplies of her management of forms. + + 'Tis that, that gives the poet rage, + And thaws the gelid blood of age; + Matures the young, restores the old, + And makes the fainting coward bold. + + It lays the careful head to rest, + Calms palpitations in the breast, + Renders our lives' misfortune sweet; + + * * * * * + + Then let the chill Sirocco blow, + And gird us round with hills of snow, + Or else go whistle to the shore, + And make the hollow mountains roar, + + Whilst we together jovial sit + Careless, and crowned with mirth and wit, + Where, though bleak winds confine us home + Our fancies round the world shall roam. + + We'll think of all the Friends we know, + And drink to all worth drinking to; + When having drunk all thine and mine, + We rather shall want healths than wine. + + But where Friends fail us, we'll supply + Our friendships with our charity; + Men that remote in sorrows live, + Shall by our lusty brimmers thrive. + + We'll drink the wanting into wealth, + And those that languish into health, + The afflicted into joy; th' opprest + Into security and rest. + + The worthy in disgrace shall find + Favour return again more kind, + And in restraint who stifled lie, + Shall taste the air of liberty. + + The brave shall triumph in success, + The lover shall have mistresses, + Poor unregarded Virtue, praise, + And the neglected Poet, bays. + + Thus shall our healths do others good, + Whilst we ourselves do all we would; + For, freed from envy and from care, + What would we be but what we are? + +When I sate down to write this Preface, it was my intention to have +made it more comprehensive; but, thinking that I ought rather to +apologize for detaining the reader so long, I will here conclude. + + +[Footnote 3: As sensibility to harmony of numbers, and the power +of producing it, are invariably attendants upon the faculties above +specified, nothing has been said upon those requisites.] + +[Footnote 4: Charles Lamb upon the genius of Hogarth.] + + + + +ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO PREFACE + +(1815) + + +With the young of both sexes, Poetry is, like love, a passion; but, +for much the greater part of those who have been proud of its power +over their minds, a necessity soon arises of breaking the pleasing +bondage; or it relaxes of itself;--the thoughts being occupied in +domestic cares, or the time engrossed by business. Poetry then becomes +only an occasional recreation; while to those whose existence passes +away in a course of fashionable pleasure, it is a species of luxurious +amusement. In middle and declining age, a scattered number of serious +persons resort to poetry, as to religion, for a protection against +the pressure of trivial employments, and as a consolation for the +afflictions of life. And, lastly, there are many, who, having been +enamoured of this art in their youth, have found leisure, after +youth was spent, to cultivate general literature; in which poetry has +continued to be comprehended _as a study_. + +Into the above classes the Readers of poetry may be divided; Critics +abound in them all; but from the last only can opinions be collected +of absolute value, and worthy to be depended upon, as prophetic of the +destiny of a new work. The young, who in nothing can escape delusion, +are especially subject to it in their intercourse with Poetry. The +cause, not so obvious as the fact is unquestionable, is the same as +that from which erroneous judgements in this art, in the minds of men +of all ages, chiefly proceed; but upon Youth it operates with peculiar +force. The appropriate business of poetry (which, nevertheless, if +genuine, is as permanent as pure science), her appropriate employment, +her privilege and her _duty_, is to treat of things not as they _are_, +but as they _appear_; not as they exist in themselves, but as they +_seem_ to exist to the _senses_, and to the _passions_. What a +world of delusion does this acknowledged obligation prepare for the +inexperienced! what temptations to go astray are here held forth for +them whose thoughts have been little disciplined by the understanding, +and whose feelings revolt from the sway of reason!--When a juvenile +Reader is in the height of his rapture with some vicious passage, +should experience throw in doubts, or common sense suggest suspicions, +a lurking consciousness that the realities of the Muse are but shows, +and that her liveliest excitements are raised by transient shocks +of conflicting feeling and successive assemblages of contradictory +thoughts--is ever at hand to justify extravagance, and to sanction +absurdity. But, it may be asked, as these illusions are unavoidable, +and, no doubt, eminently useful to the mind as a process, what good +can be gained by making observations, the tendency of which is to +diminish the confidence of youth in its feelings, and thus to abridge +its innocent and even profitable pleasures? The reproach implied in +the question could not be warded off, if Youth were incapable of being +delighted with what is truly excellent; or, if these errors always +terminated of themselves in due season. But, with the majority, though +their force be abated, they continue through life. Moreover, the fire +of youth is too vivacious an element to be extinguished or damped by a +philosophical remark; and, while there is no danger that what has been +said will be injurious or painful to the ardent and the confident, +it may prove beneficial to those who, being enthusiastic, are, at the +same time, modest and ingenuous. The intimation may unite with their +own misgivings to regulate their sensibility, and to bring in, sooner +than it would otherwise have arrived, a more discreet and sound +judgement. + +If it should excite wonder that men of ability, in later life, whose +understandings have been rendered acute by practice in affairs, should +be so easily and so far imposed upon when they happen to take up a +new work in verse, this appears to be the cause;--that, having +discontinued their attention to poetry, whatever progress may have +been made in other departments of knowledge, they have not, as to this +art, advanced in true discernment beyond the age of youth. If, then, +a new poem fall in their way, whose attractions are of that kind which +would have enraptured them during the heat of youth, the judgement +not being improved to a degree that they shall be disgusted, they are +dazzled, and prize and cherish the faults for having had power to make +the present time vanish before them, and to throw the mind back, as +by enchantment, into the happiest season of life. As they read, powers +seem to be revived, passions are regenerated, and pleasures restored. +The Book was probably taken up after an escape from the burden of +business, and with a wish to forget the world, and all its vexations +and anxieties. Having obtained this wish, and so much more, it is +natural that they should make report as they have felt. + +If Men of mature age, through want of practice, be thus easily +beguiled into admiration of absurdities, extravagances, and misplaced +ornaments, thinking it proper that their understandings should enjoy +a holiday, while they are unbending their minds with verse, it may be +expected that such Readers will resemble their former selves also +in strength of prejudice, and an inaptitude to be moved by the +unostentatious beauties of a pure style. In the higher poetry, an +enlightened Critic chiefly looks for a reflection of the wisdom of +the heart and the grandeur of the imagination. Wherever these appear, +simplicity accompanies them, Magnificence herself, when legitimate, +depending upon a simplicity of her own, to regulate her ornaments. But +it is a well-known property of human nature, that our estimates are +ever governed by comparisons, of which we are conscious with various +degrees of distinctness. Is it not, then, inevitable (confining these +observations to the effects of style merely) that an eye, accustomed +to the glaring hues of diction by which such Readers are caught and +excited, will for the most part be rather repelled than attracted by +an original Work, the colouring of which is disposed according to a +pure and refined scheme of harmony? It is in the fine arts as in the +affairs of life, no man can _serve_ (i.e. obey with zeal and fidelity) +two Masters. + +As Poetry is most just to its own divine origin when it administers +the comforts and breathes the spirit of religion, they who have +learned to perceive this truth, and who betake themselves to reading +verse for sacred purposes, must be preserved from numerous illusions +to which the two Classes of Readers, whom we have been considering, +are liable. But, as the mind grows serious from the weight of +life, the range of its passions is contracted accordingly; and its +sympathies become so exclusive, that many species of high excellence +wholly escape, or but languidly excite, its notice. Besides, men who +read from religious or moral inclinations, even when the subject is +of that kind which they approve, are beset with misconceptions and +mistakes peculiar to themselves. Attaching so much importance to the +truths which interest them, they are prone to overrate the Authors by +whom those truths are expressed and enforced. They come prepared +to impart so much passion to the Poet's language, that they remain +unconscious how little, in fact, they receive from it. And, on the +other hand, religious faith is to him who holds it so momentous +a thing, and error appears to be attended with such tremendous +consequences, that, if opinions touching upon religion occur which +the Reader condemns, he not only cannot sympathize with them, however +animated the expression, but there is, for the most part, an end put +to all satisfaction and enjoyment. Love, if it before existed, is +converted into dislike; and the heart of the Reader is set against +the Author and his book.--To these excesses, they, who from their +professions ought to be the most guarded against them, are perhaps +the most liable; I mean those sects whose religion, being from the +calculating understanding, is cold and formal. For when Christianity, +the religion of humility, is founded upon the proudest faculty of +our nature, what can be expected but contradictions? Accordingly, +believers of this cast are at one time contemptuous; at another, being +troubled, as they are and must he, with inward misgivings, they are +jealous and suspicious;--and at all seasons, they are under temptation +to supply by the heat with which they defend their tenets, the +animation which is wanting to the constitution of the religion itself. + +Faith was given to man that his affections, detached from the +treasures of time, might be inclined to settle upon those of +eternity;--the elevation of his nature, which this habit produces +on earth, being to him a presumptive evidence of a future state of +existence; and giving him a title to partake of its holiness. The +religious man values what he sees chiefly as an 'imperfect shadowing +forth' of what he is incapable of seeing. The concerns of religion +refer to indefinite objects, and are too weighty for the mind to +support them without relieving itself by resting a great part of the +burthen upon words and symbols. The commerce between Man and his Maker +cannot be carried on but by a process where much is represented +in little, and the Infinite Being accommodates himself to a finite +capacity. In all this may be perceived the affinity between religion +and poetry; between religion--making up the deficiencies of reason by +faith; and poetry--passionate for the instruction of reason; between +religion--whose element is infinitude, and whose ultimate trust is +the supreme of things, submitting herself to circumscription, and +reconciled to substitutions; and poetry--ethereal and transcendent, +yet incapable to sustain her existence without sensuous incarnation. +In this community of nature may be perceived also the lurking +incitements of kindred error;--so that we shall find that no poetry +has been more subject to distortion, than that species, the argument +and scope of which is religious; and no lovers of the art have gone +farther astray than the pious and the devout. + +Whither then shall we turn for that union of qualifications which must +necessarily exist before the decisions of a critic can be of absolute +value? For a mind at once poetical and philosophical; for a critic +whose affections are as free and kindly as the spirit of society, and +whose understanding is severe as that of dispassionate government? +Where are we to look for that initiatory composure of mind which +no selfishness can disturb? For a natural sensibility that has been +tutored into correctness without losing anything of its quickness; and +for active faculties, capable of answering the demands which an +Author of original imagination shall make upon them, associated with +a judgement that cannot he duped into admiration by aught that +is unworthy of it?--among those and those only, who, never having +suffered their youthful love of poetry to remit much of its force, +have applied to the consideration of the laws of this art the +best power of their understandings. At the same time it must be +observed--that, as this Class comprehends the only judgements which +are trustworthy, so does it include the most erroneous and perverse. +For to be mistaught is worse than to be untaught; and no perverseness +equals that which is supported by system, no errors are so difficult +to root out as those which the understanding has pledged its credit to +uphold. In this Class are contained censors, who, if they be pleased +with what is good, are pleased with it only by imperfect glimpses, +and upon false principles; who, should they generalize rightly, to +a certain point, are sure to suffer for it in the end; who, if they +stumble upon a sound rule, are fettered by misapplying it, or by +straining it too far; being incapable of perceiving when it ought to +yield to one of higher order. In it are found critics too petulant to +be passive to a genuine poet, and too feeble to grapple with him; men, +who take upon them to report of the course which _he_ holds whom they +are utterly unable to accompany,--confounded if he turn quick upon the +wing, dismayed if he soar steadily 'into the region';--men of palsied +imaginations and indurated hearts; in whose minds all healthy action +is languid, who therefore feed as the many direct them, or, with the +many, are greedy after vicious provocatives;--judges, whose censure is +auspicious, and whose praise ominous! In this class meet together the +two extremes of best and worst. + +The observations presented in the foregoing series are of too +ungracious a nature to have been made without reluctance; and, were +it only on this account, I would invite the reader to try them by the +test of comprehensive experience. If the number of judges who can be +confidently relied upon be in reality so small, it ought to follow +that partial notice only, or neglect, perhaps long continued, or +attention wholly inadequate to their merits--must have been the fate +of most works in the higher departments of poetry; and that, on the +other hand, numerous productions have blazed into popularity, and have +passed away, leaving scarcely a trace behind them: it will be further +found, that when Authors shall have at length raised themselves into +general admiration and maintained their ground, errors and prejudices +have prevailed concerning their genius and their works, which the few +who are conscious of those errors and prejudices would deplore; if +they were not recompensed by perceiving that there are select Spirits +for whom it is ordained that their fame shall be in the world an +existence like that of Virtue, which owes its being to the struggles +it makes, and its vigour to the enemies whom it provokes;--a vivacious +quality, ever doomed to meet with opposition, and still triumphing +over it; and, from the nature of its dominion, incapable of being +brought to the sad conclusion of Alexander, when he wept that there +were no more worlds for him to conquer. + +Let us take a hasty retrospect of the poetical literature of this +Country for the greater part of the last two centuries, and see if the +facts support these inferences. + +Who is there that now reads the _Creation_ of Dubartas? Yet all Europe +once resounded with his praise; he was caressed by kings; and, when +his Poem was translated into our language, the _Faery Queen_ faded +before it. The name of Spenser, whose genius is of a higher order than +even that of Ariosto, is at this day scarcely known beyond the limits +of the British Isles. And if the value of his works is to be estimated +from the attention now paid to them by his countrymen, compared with +that which they bestow on those of some other writers, it must be +pronounced small indeed. + + The laurel, meed of mighty conquerors + And poets _sage_-- + +are his own words; but his wisdom has, in this particular, been his +worst enemy: while its opposite, whether in the shape of folly or +madness, has been _their_ best friend. But he was a great power, and +bears a high name: the laurel has been awarded to him. + +A dramatic Author, if he write for the stage, must adapt himself to +the taste of the audience, or they will not endure him; accordingly +the mighty genius of Shakespeare was listened to. The people were +delighted: but I am not sufficiently versed in stage antiquities to +determine whether they did not flock as eagerly to the representation +of many pieces of contemporary Authors, wholly undeserving to appear +upon the same boards. Had there been a formal contest for superiority +among dramatic writers, that Shakespeare, like his predecessors +Sophocles and Euripides, would have often been subject to the +mortification of seeing the prize adjudged to sorry competitors, +becomes too probable, when we reflect that the admirers of Settle +and Shadwell were, in a later age, as numerous, and reckoned as +respectable, in point of talent, as those of Dryden. At all events, +that Shakespeare stooped to accommodate himself to the People, is +sufficiently apparent; and one of the most striking proofs of his +almost omnipotent genius is, that he could turn to such glorious +purpose those materials which the prepossessions of the age compelled +him to make use of. Yet even this marvellous skill appears not to have +been enough to prevent his rivals from having some advantage over him +in public estimation; else how can we account for passages and scenes +that exist in his works, unless upon a supposition that some of the +grossest of them, a fact which in my own mind I have no doubt of, were +foisted in by the Players, for the gratification of the many? + +But that his Works, whatever might be their reception upon the stage, +made but little impression upon the ruling Intellects of the time, +may be inferred from the fact that Lord Bacon, in his multifarious +writings, nowhere either quotes or alludes to him.[5] His dramatic +excellence enabled him to resume possession of the stage after the +Restoration; but Dryden tells us that in his time two of the plays +of Beaumont and Fletcher were acted for one of Shakespeare's. And so +faint and limited was the perception of the poetic beauties of his +dramas in the time of Pope, that, in his Edition of the Plays, with +a view of rendering to the general reader a necessary service, he +printed between inverted commas those passages which he thought most +worthy of notice. + +At this day, the French Critics have abated nothing of their aversion +to this darling of our Nation: 'the English, with their bouffon de +Shakespeare,' is as familiar an expression among them as in the time +of Voltaire. Baron Grimm is the only French writer who seems to have +perceived his infinite superiority to the first names of the French +Theatre; an advantage which the Parisian Critic owed to his German +blood and German education. The most enlightened Italians, though well +acquainted with our language, are wholly incompetent to measure the +proportions of Shakespeare. The Germans only, of foreign nations, are +approaching towards a knowledge and feeling of what he is. In some +respects they have acquired a superiority over the fellow countrymen +of the Poet: for among us it is a current, I might say, an established +opinion, that Shakespeare is justly praised when he is pronounced to +be 'a wild irregular genius, in whom great faults are compensated by +great beauties.' How long may it he before this misconception passes +away, and it becomes universally acknowledged that the judgement of +Shakespeare in the selection of his materials, and in the manner in +which he has made them, heterogeneous as they often are, constitute a +unity of their own, and contribute all to one great end, is not less +admirable than his imagination, his invention, and his intuitive +knowledge of human Nature? + +There is extant a small Volume of miscellaneous poems, in which +Shakespeare expresses his own feelings in his own person. It is not +difficult to conceive that the Editor, George Steevens, should have +been insensible to the beauties of one portion of that Volume, the +Sonnets; though in no part of the writings of this Poet is found, in +an equal compass, a greater number of exquisite feelings felicitously +expressed. But, from regard to the Critic's own credit, he would not +have ventured to talk of an[6] act of parliament not being strong +enough to compel the perusal of those little pieces, if he had not +known that the people of England were ignorant of the treasures +contained in them: and if he had not, moreover, shared the too common +propensity of human nature to exult over a supposed fall into the mire +of a genius whom he had been compelled to regard with admiration, as +an inmate of the celestial regions--'there sitting where he durst not +soar.' + +Nine years before the death of Shakespeare, Milton was born, and early +in life he published several small poems, which, though on their +first appearance they were praised by a few of the judicious, were +afterwards neglected to that degree, that Pope in his youth could +borrow from them without risk of its being known. Whether these poems +are at this day justly appreciated, I will not undertake to decide nor +would it imply a severe reflection upon the mass of readers to suppose +the contrary, seeing that a man of the acknowledged genius of Voss, +the German poet, could suffer their spirit to evaporate, and could +change their character, as is done in the translation made by him of +the most popular of these pieces. At all events, it is certain that +these Poems of Milton are now much read, and loudly praised, yet were +they little heard of till more than 150 years after their publication, +and of the Sonnets, Dr. Johnson, as appears from Boswell's _Life_ of +him, was in the habit of thinking and speaking as contemptuously as +Steevens wrote upon those of Shakespeare. + +About the time when the Pindaric odes of Cowley and his imitators, and +the productions of that class of curious thinkers whom Dr. Johnson has +strangely styled metaphysical Poets, were beginning to lose something +of that extravagant admiration which they had excited, the _Paradise +Lost_ made its appearance. 'Fit audience find though few,' was the +petition addressed by the Poet to his inspiring Muse. I have said +elsewhere that he gained more than he asked, this I believe to be +true, but Dr. Johnson has fallen into a gross mistake when he attempts +to prove, by the sale of the work, that Milton's Countrymen were +'_just_ to it' upon its first appearance. Thirteen hundred Copies were +sold in two years, an uncommon example, he asserts, of the prevalence +of genius in opposition to so much recent enmity as Milton's public +conduct had excited. But be it remembered that, if Milton's political +and religious opinions, and the manner in which he announced them, had +raised him many enemies, they had procured him numerous friends, who, +as all personal danger was passed away at the time of publication, +would be eager to procure the master-work of a man whom they revered, +and whom they would be proud of praising. Take, from the number +of purchasers, persons of this class, and also those who wished to +possess the Poem as a religious work, and but few I fear would be left +who sought for it on account of its poetical merits. The demand did +not immediately increase; 'for,' says Dr. Johnson, 'many more readers' +(he means persons in the habit of reading poetry) 'than were supplied +at first the Nation did not afford.' How careless must a writer be who +can make this assertion in the face of so many existing title-pages +to belie it! Turning to my own shelves, I find the folio of Cowley, +seventh edition, 1681. A book near it is Flatman's Poems, fourth +edition, 1686, Waller, fifth edition, same date. The Poems of Norris +of Bemerton not long after went, I believe, through nine editions. +What further demand there might be for these works I do not know; but +I well remember that, twenty-five years ago, the booksellers' stalls +in London swarmed with the folios of Cowley. This is not mentioned in +disparagement of that able writer and amiable man; but merely to show +that, if Milton's Works were not more read, it was not because readers +did not exist at the time. The early editions of the _Paradise Lost_ +were printed in a shape which allowed them to be sold at a low price, +yet only three thousand copies of the Work were sold in eleven years; +and the Nation, says Dr. Johnson, had been satisfied from 1623 to +1664, that is, forty-one years, with only two editions of the Works of +Shakespeare; which probably did not together make one thousand Copies; +facts adduced by the critic to prove the 'paucity of Readers,'--There +were readers in multitudes; but their money went for other purposes, +as their admiration was fixed elsewhere. We are authorized, then, +to affirm that the reception of the _Paradise Lost_, and the slow +progress of its fame, are proofs as striking as can be desired +that the positions which I am attempting to establish are not +erroneous.[7]--How amusing to shape to one's self such a critique as +a Wit of Charles's days, or a Lord of the Miscellanies or trading +Journalist of King William's time, would have brought forth, if he +had set his faculties industriously to work upon this Poem, everywhere +impregnated with _original_ excellence. + +So strange indeed are the obliquities of admiration, that they whose +opinions are much influenced by authority will often be tempted to +think that there are no fixed principles[8] in human nature for this +art to rest upon. I have been honoured by being permitted to peruse +in MS. a tract composed between the period of the Revolution and +the close of that century. It is the Work of an English Peer of high +accomplishments, its object to form the character and direct the +studies of his son. Perhaps nowhere does a more beautiful treatise +of the kind exist. The good sense and wisdom of the thoughts, the +delicacy of the feelings, and the charm of the style, are, throughout, +equally conspicuous. Yet the Author, selecting among the Poets of +his own country those whom he deems most worthy of his son's perusal, +particularizes only Lord Rochester, Sir John Denham, and Cowley. +Writing about the same time, Shaftesbury, an author at present +unjustly depreciated, describes the English Muses as only yet lisping +in their cradles. + +The arts by which Pope, soon afterwards, contrived to procure to +himself a more general and a higher reputation than perhaps any +English Poet ever attained during his lifetime, are known to the +judicious. And as well known is it to them, that the undue exertion +of those arts is the cause why Pope has for some time held a rank in +literature, to which, if he had not been seduced by an over-love of +immediate popularity, and had confided more in his native genius, he +never could have descended. He bewitched the nation by his melody, and +dazzled it by his polished style and was himself blinded by his own +success. Having wandered from humanity in his Eclogues with boyish +inexperience, the praise, which these compositions obtained, tempted +him into a belief that Nature was not to be trusted, at least in +pastoral Poetry. To prove this by example, he put his friend Gay upon +writing those Eclogues which their author intended to be burlesque. +The instigator of the work, and his admirers, could perceive in them +nothing but what was ridiculous. Nevertheless, though these Poems +contain some detestable passages, the effect, as Dr Johnson well +observes, 'of reality and truth became conspicuous even when the +intention was to show them grovelling and degraded.' The Pastorals, +ludicrous to such as prided themselves upon their refinement, in spite +of those disgusting passages, 'became popular, and were read with +delight, as just representations of rural manners and occupations.' + +Something less than sixty years after the publication of the _Paradise +Lost_ appeared Thomson's _Winter_, which was speedily followed by his +other Seasons. It is a work of inspiration, much of it is written +from himself, and nobly from himself. How was it received? 'It was +no sooner read,' says one of his contemporary biographers, 'than +universally admired those only excepted who had not been used to feel, +or to look for anything in poetry, beyond a _point_ of satirical or +epigrammatic wit, a smart _antithesis_ richly trimmed with rime, or +the softness of an _elegiac_ complaint. To such his manly classical +spirit could not readily commend itself, till, after a more attentive +perusal, they had got the better of their prejudices, and either +acquired or affected a truer taste. A few others stood aloof, merely +because they had long before fixed the articles of their poetical +creed, and resigned themselves to an absolute despair of ever seeing +anything new and original. These were somewhat mortified to find +their notions disturbed by the appearance of a poet, who seemed to owe +nothing but to nature and his own genius. But, in a short time, the +applause became unanimous, every one wondering how so many pictures, +and pictures so familiar, should have moved them but faintly to what +they felt in his descriptions. His digressions too, the overflowings +of a tender benevolent heart, charmed the reader no less, leaving him +in doubt, whether he should more admire the Poet or love the Man.' + +This case appears to bear strongly against us--but we must distinguish +between wonder and legitimate admiration. The subject of the work is +the changes produced in the appearances of nature by the revolution +of the year: and, by undertaking to write in verse, Thomson pledged +himself to treat his subject as became a Poet. Now, it is remarkable +that, excepting the nocturnal _Reverie of Lady Winchelsea_, and a +passage or two in the _Windsor Forest_ of Pope, the poetry of the +period intervening between the publication of the _Paradise Lost_ and +the _Seasons_ does not contain a single new image of external nature; +and scarcely presents a familiar one from which it can be inferred +that the eye of the Poet has been steadily fixed upon his object, much +less that his feelings had urged him to work upon it in the spirit of +genuine imagination. To what a low state knowledge of the most obvious +and important phenomena had sunk, is evident from the style in which +Dryden has executed a description of Night in one of his Tragedies, +and Pope his translation of the celebrated moonlight scene in +the _Iliad_. A blind man, in the habit of attending accurately to +descriptions casually dropped from the lips of those around him, might +easily depict these appearances with more truth. Dryden's lines are +vague, bombastic, and senseless;[9] those of Pope, though he had Homer +to guide him, are throughout false and contradictory. The verses of +Dryden, once highly celebrated, are forgotten; those of Pope still +retain their hold upon public estimation,--nay, there is not a passage +of descriptive poetry, which at this day finds so many and such ardent +admirers. Strange to think of an enthusiast, as may have been the case +with thousands, reciting those verses under the cope of a moonlight +sky, without having his raptures in the least disturbed by a suspicion +of their absurdity!--If these two distinguished writers could +habitually think that the visible universe was of so little +consequence to a poet, that it was scarcely necessary for him to cast +his eyes upon it, we may be assured that those passages of the elder +poets which faithfully and poetically describe the phenomena of +nature, were not at that time holden in much estimation, and that +there was little accurate attention paid to those appearances. + +Wonder is the natural product of Ignorance; and as the soil was _in +such good condition_ at the time of the publication of the _Seasons_ +the crop was doubtless abundant. Neither individuals nor nations +become corrupt all at once, nor are they enlightened in a moment. +Thomson was an inspired poet, but he could not work miracles; in cases +where the art of seeing had in some degree been learned, the teacher +would further the proficiency of his pupils, but he could do +little _more_; though so far does vanity assist men in acts of +self-deception, that many would often fancy they recognized a likeness +when they knew nothing of the original. Having shown that much of what +his biographer deemed genuine admiration must in fact have been +blind wonderment--how is the rest to be accounted for?--Thomson was +fortunate in the very title of his poem, which seemed to bring it +home to the prepared sympathies of every one: in the next place, +notwithstanding his high powers, he writes a vicious style; and his +false ornaments are exactly of that kind which would be most likely +to strike the undiscerning. He likewise abounds with sentimental +commonplaces, that, from the manner in which they were brought +forward, bore an imposing air of novelty. In any well-used copy of +the _Seasons_ the book generally opens of itself with the rhapsody on +love, or with one of the stories (perhaps 'Damon and Musidora'); these +also are prominent in our collections of Extracts, and are the parts +of his Work which, after all, were probably most efficient in first +recommending the author to general notice. Pope, repaying praises +which he had received, and wishing to extol him to the highest, only +styles him 'an elegant and philosophical Poet'; nor are we able to +collect any unquestionable proofs that the true characteristics of +Thomson's genius as an imaginative poet[10] were perceived, till +the elder Warton, almost forty years after the publication of the +_Seasons_, pointed them out by a note in his Essay on the _Life and +Writings of Pope_. In the _Castle of Indolence_ (of which Gray +speaks so coldly) these characteristics were almost as conspicuously +displayed, and in verse more harmonious and diction more pure. Yet +that fine poem was neglected on its appearance, and is at this day the +delight only of a few! + +When Thomson died, Collins breathed forth his regrets in an Elegiac +Poem, in which he pronounces a poetical curse upon _him_ who should +regard with insensibility the place where the Poet's remains were +deposited. The Poems of the mourner himself have now passed through +innumerable editions, and are universally known, but if, when Collins +died, the same kind of imprecation had been pronounced by a surviving +admirer, small is the number whom it would not have comprehended. The +notice which his poems attained during his lifetime was so small, and +of course the sale so insignificant, that not long before his death +he deemed it right to repay to the bookseller the sum which he had +advanced for them and threw the edition into the fire. + +Next in importance to the _Seasons_ of Thomson, though a considerable +distance from that work in order of time, come the _Reliques of +Ancient English Poetry_, collected, new-modelled, and in many +instances (if such a contradiction in terms may be used) composed by +the Editor, Dr Percy. This work did not steal silently into the world, +as is evident from the number of legendary tales, that appeared not +long after its publication, and had been modelled, as the authors +persuaded themselves, after the old Ballad. The Compilation was, +however ill suited to the then existing taste of city society, and Dr +Johnson, 'mid the little senate to which he gave laws, was not +sparing in his exertions to make it an object of contempt. The critic +triumphed, the legendary imitators were deservedly disregarded, and +as undeservedly, their ill imitated models sank in this country into +temporary neglect, while Burger and other able writers of Germany, +were translating or imitating these Reliques, and composing, with the +aid of inspiration thence derived, poems which are the delight of the +German nation. Dr Percy was so abashed by the ridicule flung upon his +labours from the ignorance and insensibility of the persons with whom +he lived, that, though while he was writing under a mask he had +not wanted resolution to follow his genius into the regions of true +simplicity and genuine pathos (as is evinced by the exquisite ballad +of _Sir Cauline_ and by many other pieces), yet when he appeared in +his own person and character as a poetical writer, he adopted, as in +the tale of the _Hermit of Warkworth_, a diction scarcely in any +one of its features distinguishable from the vague, the glossy, and +unfeeling language of his day. I mention this remarkable fact[11] +with regret, esteeming the genius of Dr. Percy in this kind of writing +superior to that of any other man by whom in modern times it has been +cultivated. That even Burger (to whom Klopstock gave, in my hearing, +a commendation which he denied to Goethe and Schiller, pronouncing him +to be a genuine poet, and one of the few among the Germans whose works +would last) had not the fine sensibility of Percy, might be shown +from many passages, in which he has deserted his original only to go +astray. For example, + + Now daye was gone, and night was come, + And all were fast asleepe, + All save the Lady Emeline, + Who sate in her bowre to weepe: + + And soone she heard her true Love's voice + Low whispering at the walle, + Awake, awake, my dear Ladye, + 'Tis I thy true love call + +Which is thus tricked out and dilated; + + Als nun die Nacht Gebirg' und Thal + Vermummt in Rabenschatten, + Und Hochburgs Lampen uberall + Schon ausgeflimmert hatten, + Und alles tief entschlafen war; + Doch nur das Fraulein immerdar, + Voll Fieberangst, noch wachte, + Und seinen Ritter dachte: + Da horch! Ein susser Liebeston + Kam leis, empor geflogen. + 'Ho, Trudchen, ho! Da bin ich schon! + Frisch auf! Dich angezogen!' + +But from humble ballads we must ascend to heroics. + +All hail, Macpherson! hail to thee, Sire of Ossian! The Phantom was +begotten by the snug embrace of an impudent Highlander upon a cloud +of tradition--it travelled southward, where it was greeted with +acclamation, and the thin Consistence took its course through Europe, +upon the breath of popular applause. The Editor of the _Reliques_ +had indirectly preferred a claim to the praise of invention, by not +concealing that his supplementary labours were considerable! how +selfish his conduct, contrasted with that of the disinterested Gael, +who, like Lear, gives his kingdom away, and is content to become +a pensioner upon his own issue for a beggarly pittance!--Open this +far-famed Book!--I have done so at random, and the beginning of the +_Epic Poem Temora_, in eight Books, presents itself. 'The blue waves +of Ullin roll in light. The green hills are covered with day. Trees +shake their dusky heads in the breeze. Grey torrents pour their noisy +streams. Two green hills with aged oaks surround a narrow plain. The +blue course of a stream is there. On its banks stood Cairbar of Atha. +His spear supports the king; the red eyes of his fear are sad. Cormac +rises on his soul with all his ghastly wounds.' Precious memorandums +from the pocket-book of the blind Ossian! + +If it be unbecoming, as I acknowledge that for the most part it is, to +speak disrespectfully of Works that have enjoyed for a length of +time a widely-spread reputation, without at the same time producing +irrefragable proofs of their unworthiness, let me be forgiven upon +this occasion.--Having had the good fortune to be born and reared in a +mountainous country, from my very childhood I have felt the falsehood +that pervades the volumes imposed upon the world under the name of +Ossian. From what I saw with my own eyes, I knew that the imagery was +spurious. In nature everything is distinct, yet nothing defined into +absolute independent singleness. In Macpherson's work it is exactly +the reverse; everything (that is not stolen) is in this manner +defined, insulated, dislocated, deadened,--yet nothing distinct. It +will always be so when words are substituted for things. To say that +the characters never could exist, that the manners are impossible, and +that a dream has more substance than the whole state of society, as +there depicted, is doing nothing more than pronouncing a censure which +Macpherson defied; when, with the steeps of Morven before his eyes, he +could talk so familiarly of his Car-borne heroes;--of Morven, which, +if one may judge from its appearance at the distance of a few miles, +contains scarcely an acre of ground sufficiently accommodating for a +sledge to be trailed along its surface.--Mr. Malcolm Laing has ably +shown that the diction of this pretended translation is a motley +assemblage from all quarters; but he is so fond of making out parallel +passages as to call poor Macpherson to account for his '_ands_' and +his '_buts_!' and he has weakened his argument by conducting it as +if he thought that every striking resemblance was a _conscious_ +plagiarism. It is enough that the coincidences are too remarkable +for its being probable or possible that they could arise in different +minds without communication between them. Now as the Translators of +the Bible, and Shakespeare, Milton, and Pope, could not be indebted +to Macpherson, it follows that he must have owed his fine feathers to +them; unless we are prepared gravely to assert, with Madame de Stael, +that many of the characteristic beauties of our most celebrated +English Poets are derived from the ancient Fingallian; in which case +the modern translator would have been but giving back to Ossian his +own.--It is consistent that Lucien Buonaparte, who could censure +Milton for having surrounded Satan in the infernal regions with +courtly and regal splendour, should pronounce the modern Ossian to +be the glory of Scotland;--a country that has produced a Dunbar, a +Buchanan, a Thomson, and a Burns! These opinions are of ill omen for +the Epic ambition of him who has given them to the world. + +Yet, much as those pretended treasures of antiquity have been admired, +they have been wholly uninfluential upon the literature of the +Country. No succeeding writer appears to have caught from them a ray +of inspiration; no author, in the least distinguished, has ventured +formally to imitate them--except the boy, Chatterton, on their first +appearance. He had perceived, from the successful trials which he +himself had made in literary forgery, how few critics were able to +distinguish between a real ancient medal and a counterfeit of modern +manufacture; and he set himself to the work of filling a magazine with +_Saxon Poems_,--counterparts of those of Ossian, as like his as one +of his misty stars is to another. This incapability to amalgamate with +the literature of the Island is, in my estimation, a decisive proof +that the book is essentially unnatural; nor should I require any other +to demonstrate it to be a forgery, audacious as worthless.--Contrast, +in this respect, the effect of Macpherson's publication with the +_Reliques_ of Percy, so unassuming, so modest in their pretensions!--I +have already stated how much Germany is indebted to this latter work; +and for our own country, its poetry has been absolutely redeemed +by it. I do not think that there is an able writer in verse of the +present day who would not be proud to acknowledge his obligations to +the _Reliques_; I know that it is so with my friends; and, for myself, +I am happy in this occasion to make a public avowal of my own. + +Dr. Johnson, more fortunate in his contempt of the labours of +Macpherson than those of his modest friend, was solicited not long +after to furnish Prefaces biographical and critical for the works +of some of the most eminent English Poets. The booksellers took upon +themselves to make the collection; they referred probably to the most +popular miscellanies, and, unquestionably, to their books of accounts; +and decided upon the claim of authors to be admitted into a body of +the most eminent, from the familiarity of their names with the readers +of that day, and by the profits, which, from the sale of his works, +each had brought and was bringing to the Trade. The Editor was allowed +a limited exercise of discretion, and the Authors whom he recommended +are scarcely to be mentioned without a smile. We open the volume of +Prefatory Lives, and to our astonishment the _first_ name we find is +that of Cowley!--What Is become of the morning-star of English Poetry? +Where is the bright Elizabethan constellation? Or, if names be more +acceptable than images, where is the ever to-be-honoured Chaucer? +where is Spenser? where Sidney? and, lastly, where he, whose rights +as a poet, contra-distinguished from those which he is universally +allowed to possess as a dramatist, we have vindicated,--where +Shakespeare?--These, and a multitude of others not unworthy to be +placed near them, their contemporaries and successors, we have _not_. +But in their stead, we have (could better be expected when precedence +was to be settled by an abstract of reputation at any given period +made, as in this case before us?) Roscommon, and Stepney, +and Phillips, and Walsh, and Smith, and Duke, and King, and +Spratt--Halifax, Granville, Sheffield, Congreve, Broome, and other +reputed Magnates--metrical writers utterly worthless and useless, +except for occasions like the present, when their productions are +referred to as evidence what a small quantity of brain is necessary to +procure a considerable stock of admiration, provided the aspirant will +accommodate himself to the likings and fashions of his day. + +As I do not mean to bring down this retrospect to our own times, it +may with propriety be closed at the era of this distinguished event. +From the literature of other ages and countries, proofs equally cogent +might have been adduced, that the opinions announced in the former +part of this Essay are founded upon truth. It was not an agreeable +office, nor a prudent undertaking, to declare them; but their +importance seemed to render it a duty. It may still be asked, +where lies the particular relation of what has been said to these +Volumes?--The question will be easily answered by the discerning +Reader who is old enough to remember the taste that prevailed when +some of these poems were first published, seventeen years ago; who has +also observed to what degree the poetry of this Island has since +that period been coloured by them; and who is further aware of the +unremitting hostility with which, upon some principle or other, they +have each and all been opposed. A sketch of my own notion of the +constitution of Fame has been given; and, as far as concerns myself, +I have cause to be satisfied. The love, the admiration, the +indifference, the slight, the aversion, and even the contempt, with +which these Poems have been received, knowing, as I do, the source +within my own mind, from which they have proceeded, and the labour +and pains, which, when labour and pains appeared needful, have been +bestowed upon them, must all, if I think consistently, be received as +pledges and tokens, bearing the same general impression, though widely +different in value;--they are all proofs that for the present time +I have not laboured in vain; and afford assurances, more or less +authentic, that the products of my industry will endure. + +If there be one conclusion more forcibly pressed upon us than another +by the review which has been given of the fortunes and fate of +poetical Works, it is this--that every author, as far as he is great +and at the same time _original_, has had the task of _creating_ +the taste by which he is to be enjoyed: so has it been, so will +it continue to be. This remark was long since made to me by the +philosophical Friend for the separation of whose poems from my own I +have previously expressed my regret. The predecessors of an original +Genius of a high order will have smoothed the way for all that he has +in common with them;--and much he will have in common; but, for what +is peculiarly his own, he will be called upon to clear and often to +shape his own road:--he will be in the condition of Hannibal among the +Alps. + +And where lies the real difficulty of creating that taste by which a +truly original poet is to be relished? Is it in breaking the bonds +of custom, in overcoming the prejudices of false refinement, and +displacing the aversions of inexperience? Or, if he labour for an +object which here and elsewhere I have proposed to myself, does it +consist in divesting the reader of the pride that induces him to dwell +upon those points wherein men differ from each other, to the exclusion +of those in which all men are alike, or the same; and in making him +ashamed of the vanity that renders him insensible of the appropriate +excellence which civil arrangements, less unjust than might appear, +and Nature illimitable in her bounty, had conferred on men who may +stand below him in the scale of society? Finally, does it lie in +establishing that dominion over the spirits of readers by which they +are to be humbled and humanized, in order that they may be purified +and exalted? + +If these ends are to be attained by the mere communication of +_knowledge_, it does _not_ lie here.--TASTE, I would remind the +reader, like IMAGINATION, is a word which has been forced to extend +its services far beyond the point to which philosophy would have +confined them. It is a metaphor, taken from a _passive_ sense of the +human body, and transferred to things which are in their essence +_not_ passive,--to intellectual _acts_ and _operations_. The word, +Imagination, has been overstrained, from impulses honourable to +mankind, to meet the demands of the faculty which is perhaps the +noblest of our nature. In the instance of Taste, the process has been +reversed; and from the prevalence of dispositions at once injurious +and discreditable, being no other than that selfishness which is the +child of apathy,--which, as Nations decline in productive and creative +power, makes them value themselves upon a presumed refinement of +judging. Poverty of language is the primary cause of the use which we +make of the word, Imagination; but the word, Taste, has been +stretched to the sense which it bears in modern Europe by habits of +self-conceit, inducing that inversion in the order of things whereby a +passive faculty is made paramount among the faculties conversant with +the fine arts. Proportion and congruity, the requisite knowledge +being supposed, are subjects upon which taste may be trusted; it is +competent to this office--for in its intercourse with these the +mind is _passive_, and is affected painfully or pleasurably as by an +instinct. But the profound and the exquisite in feeling, the lofty and +universal in thought and imagination; or, in ordinary language, the +pathetic and the sublime;--are neither of them, accurately speaking, +objects of a faculty which could ever without a sinking in the spirit +of Nations have been designated by the metaphor _Taste_. And why? +Because without the exertion of a co-operating _power_ in the mind +of the reader, there can be no adequate sympathy with either of these +emotions: without this auxiliary impulse, elevated or profound passion +cannot exist. + +Passion, it must be observed, is derived from a word which signifies +_suffering_; but the connexion which suffering has with effort, with +exertion, and _action_, is immediate and inseparable. How strikingly +is this property of human nature exhibited by the fact that, in +popular language, to be in a passion is to be angry! But, + + Anger in hasty _words_ or _blows_ + Itself discharges on its foes. + +To be moved, then, by a passion is to be excited, often to external, +and always to internal, effort; whether for the continuance and +strengthening of the passion, or for its suppression, accordingly +as the course which it takes may be painful or pleasurable. If the +latter, the soul must contribute to its support, or it never becomes +vivid,--and soon languishes and dies. And this brings us to the point. +If every great poet with whose writings men are familiar, in the +highest exercise of his genius, before he can be thoroughly enjoyed, +has to call forth and to communicate _power_, this service, in a still +greater degree, falls upon an original writer, at his first appearance +in the world.--Of genius the only proof is, the act of doing well what +is worthy to be done, and what was never done before: Of genius, in +the fine arts, the only infallible sign is the widening the sphere +of human sensibility, for the delight, honour, and benefit of +human nature. Genius is the introduction of a new element into +the intellectual universe: or, if that be not allowed, it is the +application of powers to objects on which they had not before been +exercised, or the employment of them in such a manner as to produce +effects hitherto unknown. What is all this but an advance, or a +conquest, made by the soul of the poet? Is it to be supposed that +the reader can make progress of this kind, like an Indian prince or +general--stretched on his palanquin, and borne by his slaves? No; +he is invigorated and inspirited by his leader, in order that he +may exert himself; for he cannot proceed in quiescence, he cannot be +carried like a dead weight. Therefore to create taste is to call forth +and bestow power, of which knowledge is the effect; and _there_ lies +the true difficulty. + +As the pathetic participates of an _animal_ sensation, it might +seem--that, if the springs of this emotion were genuine, all men, +possessed of competent knowledge of the facts and circumstances, would +be instantaneously affected. And, doubtless, in the works of every +true poet will be found passages of that species of excellence which +is proved by effects immediate and universal. But there are emotions +of the pathetic that are simple and direct, and others--that are +complex and revolutionary; some--to which the heart yields with +gentleness; others--against which it struggles with pride; these +varieties are infinite as the combinations of circumstance and the +constitutions of character. Remember, also, that the medium through +which, in poetry, the heart is to be affected, is language; a thing +subject to endless fluctuations and arbitrary associations. The genius +of the poet melts these down for his purpose; but they retain their +shape and quality to him who is not capable of exerting, within his +own mind, a corresponding energy. There is also a meditative, as well +as a human, pathos; an enthusiastic, as well as an ordinary, sorrow; +a sadness that has its seat in the depths of reason, to which the mind +cannot sink gently of itself--but to which it must descend by treading +the steps of thought. And for the sublime,--if we consider what are +the cares that occupy the passing day, and how remote is the practice +and the course of life from the sources of sublimity, in the soul of +Man, can it be wondered that there is little existing preparation +for a poet charged with a new mission to extend its kingdom, and to +augment and spread its enjoyments? + +Away, then, with the senseless iteration of the word _popular_, +applied to new works in poetry, as if there were no test of excellence +in this first of the fine arts but that all men should run after +its productions, as if urged by an appetite, or constrained by a +spell!--The qualities of writing best fitted for eager reception are +either such as startle the world into attention by their audacity and +extravagance; or they are chiefly of a superficial kind, lying upon +the surfaces of manners; or arising out of a selection and arrangement +of incidents, by which the mind is kept upon the stretch of curiosity, +and the fancy amused without the trouble of thought. But in everything +which is to send the soul into herself, to be admonished of her +weakness, or to be made conscious of her power;--wherever life and +nature are described as operated upon by the creative or abstracting +virtue of the imagination; wherever the instinctive wisdom of +antiquity and her heroic passions uniting, in the heart of the poet, +with the meditative wisdom of later ages, have produced that accord of +sublimated humanity which is at once a history of the remote past and +a prophetic enunciation of the remotest future, _there_, the poet must +reconcile himself for a season to few and scattered hearers.--Grand +thoughts (and Shakespeare must often have sighed over this truth), as +they are most naturally and most fitly conceived in solitude, so +can they not be brought forth in the midst of plaudits without +some violation of their sanctity. Go to a silent exhibition of the +productions of the sister Art, and be convinced that the qualities +which dazzle at first sight, and kindle the admiration of the +multitude, are essentially different from those by which permanent +influence is secured. Let us not shrink from following up these +principles as far as they will carry us, and conclude with +observing--that there never has been a period, and perhaps never will +be, in which vicious poetry, of some kind or other, has not excited +more zealous admiration, and been far more generally read, than good; +but this advantage attends the good, that the _individual_, as well +as the species, survives from age to age; whereas, of the depraved, +though the species be immortal, the individual quickly _perishes_; the +object of present admiration vanishes, being supplanted by some other +as easily produced; which, though no better, brings with it at least +the irritation of novelty,--with adaptation, more or less skilful, to +the changing humours of the majority of those who are most at leisure +to regard poetical works when they first solicit their attention. + +Is it the result of the whole, that, in the opinion of the Writer, the +judgement of the People is not to be respected? The thought is most +injurious; and, could the charge be brought against him, he would +repel it with indignation. The People have already been justified, +and their eulogium pronounced by implication, when it was said, +above--that, of _good_ poetry, the _individual_, as well as the +species, _survives_. And how does it survive but through the People? +What preserves it but their intellect and their wisdom? + + --Past and future, are the wings + On whose support, harmoniously conjoined, + Moves the great Spirit of human knowledge-- + _MS._ + +The voice that issues from this Spirit is that Vox Populi which the +Deity inspires. Foolish must he be who can mistake for this a local +acclamation, or a transitory out-cry--transitory though it be for +years, local though from a Nation. Still more lamentable is his error +who can believe that there is anything of divine infallibility in +the clamour of that small though loud portion of the community, ever +governed by factitious influence, which, under the name of the PUBLIC, +passes itself, upon the unthinking, for the PEOPLE. Towards the +Public, the Writer hopes that he feels as much deference as it is +entitled to: but to the People, philosophically characterized, and to +the embodied spirit of their knowledge, so far as it exists and moves, +at the present, faithfully supported by its two wings, the past and +the future, his devout respect, his reverence, is due. He offers it +willingly and readily; and, this done, takes leave of his Readers, +by assuring them--that, if he were not persuaded that the contents +of these Volumes, and the Work to which they are subsidiary, evince +something of the 'Vision and the Faculty divine'; and that, both in +words and things, they will operate in their degree, to extend the +domain of sensibility for the delight, the honour, and the benefit +of human nature, nothwithstanding the many happy hours which he +has employed in their composition, and the manifold comforts and +enjoyments they have procured to him, he would not, if a wish could +do it, save them from immediate destruction;--from becoming at this +moment, to the world, as a thing that had never been. + + +[Footnote 5: The learned Hakewill (a third edition of whose book bears +date 1635), writing to refute the error 'touching Nature's perpetual +and universal decay,' cites triumphantly the names of Ariosto, +Tasso, Bartas, and Spenser, as instances that poetic genius had not +degenerated; but be makes no mention of Shakespeare.] + +[Footnote 6: This flippant insensibility was publicly reprehended by +Mr. Coleridge in a course of Lectures upon Poetry given by him at the +Royal Institution. For the various merits of thought and language in +Shakespeare's _Sonnets_, see Nos. 27, 29, 30, 32, 33, 54, 64, 66, 68, +73, 76, 86, 91, 92, 93, 97, 98, 105, 107, 108, 109, 111, 113, 114, +116, 117, 129, and many others.] + +[Footnote 7: Hughes is express upon this subject in his dedication of +Spenser's Works to Lord Somers, he writes thus 'It was your Lordship's +encouraging a beautiful edition of _Paradise Lost_ that first brought +that incomparable Poem to be generally known and esteemed.'] + +[Footnote 8: This opinion seems actually to have been entertained by +Adam Smith, the worst critic, David Hume not excepted, that Scotland, +a soil to which this sort of weed seems natural, has produced.] + +[Footnote 9: CORTES, _alone in a night-gown_. + + All things are hush'd as Nature's self lay dead; + The mountains seem to nod their drowsy head. + The little Birds in dreams their songs repeat, + And sleeping Flowers beneath the Night-dew sweat: + Even Lust and Envy sleep; yet Love denies + Rest to my soul, and slumber to my eyes. + +DRYDEN'S _Indian Emperor_.] + +[Footnote 10: Since these observations upon Thomson were written, I +have perused the second edition of his _Seasons_, and find that even +_that_ does not contain the most striking passages which Warton points +out for admiration, these, with other improvements, throughout the +whole work, must have been added at a later period.] + +[Footnote 11: Shenstone, in his _Schoolmistress_, gives a still more +remarkable instance of this timidity On its first appearance (see +D'Israeli's 2d Series of the _Curiosities of Literature_) the Poem was +accompanied with an absurd prose commentary, showing, as indeed some +incongruous expressions in the text imply, that the whole was intended +for burlesque. In subsequent editions, the commentary was dropped, and +the People have since continued to read in seriousness, doing for the +Author what he had not courage openly to venture upon for himself.] + + + + +PREFACE TO CROMWELL + +BY VICTOR HUGO. (1827)[A] + + +The drama contained in the following pages has nothing to commend +it to the attention or the good will of the public. It has not, to +attract the interest of political disputants, the advantage of the +veto of the official censorship, nor even, to win for it at the outset +the literary sympathy of men of taste, the honour of having been +formally rejected by an infallible reading committee. + +It presents itself, therefore, to the public gaze, naked and +friendless, like the infirm man of the Gospel--_solus, pauper, nudus_. + +Not without some hesitation, moreover, did the author determine to +burden his drama with a preface. Such things are usually of very +little interest to the reader. He inquires concerning the talent of +a writer rather than concerning his point of view; and in determining +whether a work is good or bad, it matters little to him upon what +ideas it is based, or in what sort of mind it germinated. One seldom +inspects the cellars of a house after visiting its salons, and when +one eats the fruit of a tree, one cares but little about its root. + +On the other hand, notes and prefaces are sometimes a convenient +method of adding to the weight of a book, and of magnifying, in +appearance at least, the importance of a work; as a matter of tactics +this is not dissimilar to that of the general who, to make his +battle-front more imposing, puts everything, even his baggage-trains, +in the line. And then, while critics fall foul of the preface and +scholars of the notes, it may happen that the work itself will +escape them, passing uninjured between their cross-fires, as an army +extricates itself from a dangerous position between two skirmishes of +outposts and rear-guards. + +These reasons, weighty as they may seem, are not those which +influenced the author. This volume did not need to be _inflated_, it +was already too stout by far. Furthermore, and the author does not +know why it is so, his prefaces, frank and ingenuous as they are, have +always served rather to compromise him with the critics than to shield +him. Far from being staunch and trusty bucklers, they have played him +a trick like that played in a battle by an unusual and conspicuous +uniform, which, calling attention to the soldier who wears it, +attracts all the blows and is proof against none. + +Considerations of an altogether different sort acted upon the author. +It seemed to him that, although in fact, one seldom inspects the +cellars of a building for pleasure, one is not sorry sometimes to +examine its foundations. He will, therefore, give himself over once +more, with a preface, to the wrath of the _feuilletonists. Che sara, +sara_. He has never given much thought to the fortune of his works, +and he is but little appalled by dread of the literary _what will +people say_. In the discussion now raging, in which the theatre and +the schools, the public and the academies, are at daggers drawn, one +will hear, perhaps, not without some interest, the voice of a solitary +_apprentice_ of nature and truth, who has withdrawn betimes from the +literary world, for pure love of letters, and who offers good faith in +default of good taste, sincere conviction in default of talent, study +in default of learning. + +He will confine himself, however, to general considerations concerning +the art, without the slightest attempt to smooth the path of his own +work, without pretending to write an indictment or a plea, against or +for any person whomsoever. An attack upon or defence of his book is +of less importance to him than to anybody else. Nor is personal +controversy agreeable to him. It is always a pitiful spectacle to +see two hostile self-esteems crossing swords. He protests, therefore, +beforehand against every interpretation of his ideas, every personal +application of his words, saying with the Spanish fablist:-- + + Quien haga aplicaciones + Con su pan se lo coma. + +In truth, several of the leading champions of "sound literary +doctrines" have done him the honour to throw the gauntlet to him, even +in his profound obscurity--to him, a simple, imperceptible spectator +of this curious contest. He will not have the presumption to pick it +up. In the following pages will be found the observations with which +he might oppose them--there will be found his sling and his stone; +but others, if they choose, may hurl them at the head of the classical +Goliaths. + +This said, let us pass on. + +Let us set out from a fact. The same type of civilization, or to use +a more exact, although more extended expression, the same society, has +not always inhabited the earth. The human race as a whole has grown, +has developed, has matured, like one of ourselves. It was once a +child, it was once a man; we are now looking on at its impressive old +age. Before the epoch which modern society has dubbed "ancient," there +was another epoch which the ancients called "fabulous," but which it +would be more accurate to call "primitive." Behold then three great +successive orders of things in civilization, from its origin down to +our days. Now, as poetry is always superposed upon society, we +propose to try to demonstrate, from the form of its society, what the +character of the poetry must have been in those three great ages of +the world--primitive times, ancient times, modern times. + +In primitive times, when man awakes in a world that is newly created, +poetry awakes with him. In the face of the marvellous things that +dazzle and intoxicate him, his first speech is a hymn simply. He is +still so close to God that all his meditations are ecstatic, all his +dreams are visions. His bosom swells, he sings as he breathes. +His lyre has but three strings--God, the soul, creation; but this +threefold mystery envelopes everything, this threefold idea embraces +everything. The earth is still almost deserted. There are families, +but no nations; patriarchs, but no kings. Each race exists at its own +pleasure; no property, no laws, no contentions, no wars. Everything +belongs to each and to all. Society is a community. Man is restrained +in nought. He leads that nomadic pastoral life with which all +civilizations begin, and which is so well adapted to solitary +contemplation, to fanciful reverie. He follows every suggestion, +he goes hither and thither, at random. His thought, like his life, +resembles a cloud that changes its shape and its direction according +to the wind that drives it. Such is the first man, such is the first +poet. He is young, he is cynical. Prayer is his sole religion, the ode +is his only form of poetry. + +This ode, this poem of primitive times, is Genesis. + +By slow degrees, however, this youth of the world passes away. All +the spheres progress; the family becomes a tribe, the tribe becomes a +nation. Each of these groups of men camps about a common centre, and +kingdoms appear. The social instinct succeeds the nomadic instinct. +The camp gives place to the city, the tent to the palace, the ark to +the temple. The chiefs of these nascent states are still shepherds, +it is true, but shepherds of nations; the pastoral staff has already +assumed the shape of a sceptre. Everything tends to become stationary +and fixed. Religion takes on a definite shape; prayer is governed by +rites; dogma sets bounds to worship. Thus the priest and king share +the paternity of the people; thus theocratic society succeeds the +patriarchal community. + +Meanwhile the nations are beginning to be packed too closely on the +earth's surface. They annoy and jostle one another; hence the clash +of empires--war. They overflow upon another; hence, the migrations of +nations--voyages. Poetry reflects these momentous events; from ideas +it proceeds to things. It sings of ages, of nations, of empires. It +becomes epic, it gives birth to Homer. + +Homer, in truth, dominates the society of ancient times. In that +society, all is simple, all is epic. Poetry is religion, religion is +law. The virginity of the earlier age is succeeded by the chastity +of the later. A sort of solemn gravity is everywhere noticeable, in +private manners no less than in public. The nations have retained +nothing of the wandering life of the earlier time, save respect +for the stranger and the traveller. The family has a fatherland; +everything is connected therewith; it has the cult of the house and +the cult of the tomb. + +We say again, such a civilization can find its one expression only in +the epic. The epic will assume diverse forms, but will never lose its +specific character. Pindar is more priestlike than patriarchal, more +epic than lyrical. If the chroniclers, the necessary accompaniments +of this second age of the world, set about collecting traditions and +begin to reckon by centuries, they labour to no purpose--chronology +cannot expel poesy; history remains an epic. Herodotus is a Homer. + +But it is in the ancient tragedy, above all, that the epic breaks out +at every turn. It mounts the Greek stage without losing aught, so to +speak, of its immeasurable, gigantic proportions. Its characters +are still heroes, demigods, gods; its themes are visions, oracles, +fatality; its scenes are battles, funeral rites, catalogues. That +which the rhapsodists formerly sang, the actors declaim--that is the +whole difference. + +There is something more. When the whole plot, the whole spectacle +of the epic poem have passed to the stage, the Chorus takes all that +remains. The Chorus annotates the tragedy, encourages the heroes, +gives descriptions, summons and expels the daylight, rejoices, +laments, sometimes furnishes the scenery, explains the moral bearing +of the subject, flatters the listening assemblage. Now, what is the +Chorus, this anomalous character standing between the spectacle and +the spectator, if it be not the poet completing his epic? + +The theatre of the ancients is, like their dramas, huge, pontifical, +epic. It is capable of holding thirty thousand spectators; the plays +are given in the open air, in bright sunlight; the performances last +all day. The actors disguise their voices, wear masks, increase their +stature; they make themselves gigantic, like their roles. The stage is +immense. It may represent at the same moment both the interior and +the exterior of a temple, a palace, a camp, a city. Upon it, +vast spectacles are displayed. There is--we cite only from +memory--Prometheus on his mountain; there is Antigone, at the top of +a tower, seeking her brother Polynices in the hostile army (_The +Phoenicians_); there is Evadne hurling herself from a cliff into the +flames where the body of Capaneus is burning (_The Suppliants_ of +Euripides); there is a ship sailing into port and landing fifty +princesses with their retinues (_The Suppliants_ of Æschylus). +Architecture, poetry, everything assumes a monumental character. In +all antiquity there is nothing more solemn, more majestic. Its history +and its religion are mingled on its stage. Its first actors are +priests; its scenic performances are religious ceremonies, national +festivals. + +One last observation, which completes our demonstration of the epic +character of this epoch: in the subjects which it treats, no less than +in the forms it adopts, tragedy simply re-echoes the epic. All +the ancient tragic authors derive their plots from Homer. The same +fabulous exploits, the same catastrophes, the same heroes. One and +all drink from the Homeric stream. The Iliad and Odyssey are always +in evidence. Like Achilles dragging Hector at his chariot-wheel, the +Greek tragedy circles about Troy. + +But the age of the epic draws near its end. Like the society that +it represents, this form of poetry wears itself out revolving upon +itself. Rome reproduces Greece, Virgil copies Homer, and, as if to +make a becoming end, epic poetry expires in the last parturition. + +It was time. Another era is about to begin, for the world and for +poetry. + +A spiritual religion, supplanting the material and external paganism, +makes its way to the heart of the ancient society, kills it, and +deposits, in that corpse of a decrepit civilization, the germ of +modern civilization. This religion as complete, because it is true; +between its dogma and its cult, it embraces a deep-rooted moral. Arid +first of all, as a fundamental truth, it teaches man that he has two +lives to live, one ephemeral, the other immortal; one on earth, the +other in heaven. It shows him that he, like his destiny, is twofold: +that there is in him an animal and an intellect, a body and a soul; in +a word, that he is the point of intersection, the common link of +the two chains of beings which embrace all creation--of the chain +of material beings and the chain of incorporeal beings; the first +starting from the rock to arrive at man, the second starting from man +to end at God. + +A portion of these truths had perhaps been suspected by certain wise +men of ancient times, but their full, broad, luminous revelation dates +from the Gospels. The pagan schools walked in darkness, feeling their +way, clinging to falsehoods as well as to truths in their haphazard +journeying. Some of their philosophers occasionally cast upon certain +subjects feeble gleams which illuminated but one side and made the +darkness of the other side more profound. Hence all the phantoms +created by ancient philosophy. None but divine wisdom was capable of +substituting an even and all-embracing light for all those flickering +rays of human wisdom. Pythagoras, Epicurus, Socrates, Plato, are +torches: Christ is the glorious light of day. + +Nothing could be more material, indeed, than the ancient theogony. Far +from proposing, as Christianity does, to separate the spirit from the +body, it ascribes form and features to everything, even to impalpable +essences, even to the intelligence. In it everything is visible, +tangible, fleshly. Its gods need a cloud to conceal themselves from +men's eyes. They eat, drink, and sleep. They are wounded and their +blood flows; they are maimed, and lo! they limp forever after. That +religion has gods and halves of gods. Its thunderbolts are forged on +an anvil, and among other things three rays of twisted rain (_tres +imbris torti radios_) enter into their composition. Its Jupiter +suspends the world by a golden chain; its sun rides in a four-horse +chariot; its hell is a precipice the brink of which is marked on the +globe; its heaven is a mountain. + +Thus paganism, which moulded all creations from the same clay, +minimizes divinity and magnifies man. Homer's heroes are of almost the +same stature as his gods. Ajax defies Jupiter, Achilles is the peer +of Mars. Christianity on the contrary, as we have seen, draws a broad +line of division between spirit and matter. It places an abyss between +the soul and the body, an abyss between man and God. + +At this point--to omit nothing from the sketch upon which we have +ventured--we will call attention to the fact that, with Christianity, +and by its means, there entered into the mind of the nations a new +sentiment, unknown to the ancients and marvellously developed +among moderns, a sentiment which is more than gravity and less than +sadness--melancholy. In truth, might not the heart of man, hitherto +deadened by religions purely hierarchical and sacerdotal, awake and +feel springing to life within it some unexpected faculty, under the +breath of a religion that is human because it is divine, a religion +which makes of the poor man's prayer, the rich man's wealth, a +religion of equality, liberty and charity? Might it not see all things +in a new light, since the Gospel had shown it the soul through the +senses, eternity behind life? + +Moreover, at that very moment the world was undergoing so complete +a revolution that it was impossible that there should not be a +revolution in men's minds. Hitherto the catastrophes of empires +had rarely reached the hearts of the people; it was kings who fell, +majesties that vanished, nothing more. The lightning struck only in +the upper regions, and, as we have already pointed out, events seemed +to succeed one another with all the solemnity of the epic. In the +ancient society, the individual occupied so lowly a place that, to +strike him, adversity must needs descend to his family. So that he +knew little of misfortune outside of domestic sorrows. It was an +almost unheard of thing that the general disasters of the state should +disarrange his life. But the instant that Christian society became +firmly established, the ancient continent was thrown into confusion. +Everything was pulled up by the roots. Events, destined to destroy +ancient Europe and to construct a new Europe, trod upon one another's +heels in their ceaseless rush, and drove the nations pell-mell, some +into the light, others into darkness. So much uproar ensued that it +was impossible that some echoes of it should not reach the hearts +of the people. It was more than an echo, it was a reflex blow. Man, +withdrawing within himself in presence of these imposing vicissitudes, +began to take pity upon mankind, to reflect upon the bitter +disillusionments of life. Of this sentiment, which to Cato the heathen +was despair, Christianity fashioned melancholy. + +At the same time was born the spirit of scrutiny and curiosity. These +great catastrophes were also great spectacles, impressive cataclysms. +It was the North hurling itself upon the South; the Roman world +changing shape; the last convulsive throes of a whole universe in +the death agony. As soon as that world was dead, lo! clouds of +rhetoricians, grammarians, sophists, swooped down like insects on its +immense body. People saw them swarming and heard them buzzing in that +seat of putrefaction. They vied with one another in scrutinizing, +commenting, disputing. Each limb, each muscle, each fibre of the huge +prostrate body was twisted and turned in every direction. Surely it +must have been a keen satisfaction to those anatomists of the mind, to +be able, at their debut, to make experiments on a large scale; to have +a dead society to dissect, for their first "subject." + +Thus we see melancholy and meditation, the demons of analysis and +controversy, appear at the same moment, and, as it were, hand-in-hand. +At one extremity of this era of transition is Longinus, at the other +St. Augustine. We must beware of casting a disdainful eye upon that +epoch wherein all that has since borne fruit was contained in germs; +upon that epoch whose least eminent writers, if we may be pardoned a +vulgar but expressive phrase, made fertilizer for the harvest that was +to follow. The Middle Ages were grafted on the Lower Empire. + +Behold, then, a new religion, a new society; upon this twofold +foundation there must inevitably spring up a new poetry. Previously--- +we beg pardon for setting forth a result which the reader has probably +already foreseen from what has been said above--previously, following +therein the course pursued by the ancient polytheism and philosophy, +the purely epic muse of the ancients had studied nature in only a +single aspect, casting aside without pity almost everything in art +which, in the world subjected to its imitation, had not relation to a +certain, type of beauty. A type which was magnificent at first, but, +as always happens with everything systematic, became in later times +false, trivial and conventional. Christianity leads poetry to the +truth. Like it, the modern muse will see things in a higher and +broader light. It will realize that everything in creation is not +humanly _beautiful_, that the ugly exists beside the beautiful, the +unshapely beside the graceful, the grotesque on the reverse of the +sublime, evil with good, darkness with light. It will ask itself if +the narrow and relative sense of the artist should prevail over the +infinite, absolute sense of the Creator; if it is for man to correct +God; if a mutilated nature will be the more beautiful for the +mutilation; if art has the right to duplicate, so to speak, man, life, +creation; if things will progress better when their muscles and their +vigour have been taken from them; if, in short, to be incomplete is +the best way to be harmonious. Then it is that, with its eyes fixed +upon events that are both laughable and redoubtable, and under the +influence of that spirit of Christian melancholy and philosophical +criticism which we described a moment ago, poetry will take a +great step, a decisive step, a step which, like the upheaval of an +earthquake, will change the whole face of the intellectual world. It +will set about doing as nature does, mingling in its creations--but +without confounding them--darkness and light, the grotesque and the +sublime; in other words, the body and the soul, the beast and +the intellect; for the starting-point of religion is always the +starting-point of poetry. All things are connected. + +Thus, then, we see a principle unknown to the ancients, a new type, +introduced in poetry; and as an additional element in anything +modifies the whole of the thing, a new form of the art is developed. +This type is the grotesque; its new form is comedy. + +And we beg leave to dwell upon this point; for we have now indicated +the significant feature, the fundamental difference which, in our +opinion, separates modern from ancient art, the present form from +the defunct form; or, to use less definite but more popular terms, +_romantic_ literature from _classical_ literature. + +"At last!" exclaim the people who for some time past _have seen what +we were coming at_, "at last we have you--you are caught in the act. +So then you put forward the ugly as a type for imitation, you make the +_grotesque_ an element of art. But the graces; but good taste! Don't +you know that art should correct nature? that we must _ennoble_ art? +that we must _select_? Did the ancients ever exhibit the ugly or the +grotesque? Did they ever mingle comedy and tragedy? The example of +the ancients, gentlemen! And Aristotle, too, and Boileau, and La Haipe +Upon my word!" + +These arguments are sound, doubtless, and, above all, of extraordinary +novelty. But it is not our place to reply to them. We are constructing +no system here--God protect us from systems! We are stating a fact. We +are a historian, not a critic. Whether the fact is agreeable or not +matters little, it is a fact. Let us resume, therefore, and try +to prove that it is of the fruitful union of the grotesque and the +sublime types that modern genius is born--so complex, so diverse in +its forms, so inexhaustible in its creations, and therein directly +opposed to the uniform simplicity of the genius of the ancients, let +us show that that is the point from which we must set out to establish +the real and radical difference between the two forms of literature. + +Not that it is strictly true that comedy and the grotesque were +entirely unknown to the ancients. In fact, such a thing would be +impossible. Nothing grows without a root, the germ of the second epoch +always exists in the first. In the Iliad Thersites and Vulcan furnish +comedy, one to the mortals, the other to the gods. There is too much +nature and originality in the Greek tragedy for there not to be an +occasional touch of comedy in it. For example, to cite only what we +happen to recall, the scene between Menelaus and the portress of the +palace. _(Helen_, Act I), and the scene of the Phrygian _(Orestes,_ +Act IV) The Tritons, the Satyrs, the Cyclops are grotesque, Polyphemus +is a terrifying, Silenus a farcical grotesque. + +But one feels that this part of the art is still in its infancy. The +epic, which at this period imposes its form on everything, the epic +weighs heavily upon it and stifles it. The ancient grotesque is timid +and forever trying to keep out of sight. It is plain that it is not +on familiar ground, because it is not in its natural surroundings. It +conceals itself as much as it can. The Satyrs, the Tritons, and the +Sirens are hardly abnormal in form. The Fates and the Harpies are +hideous in their attributes rather than in feature; the Furies are +beautiful, and are called _Eumenides_, that is to say, _gentle, +beneficent_. There is a veil of grandeur or of divinity over other +grotesques. Polyphemus is a giant, Midas a king, Silenus a god. + +Thus comedy is almost imperceptible in the great epic _ensemble_ +of ancient times. What is the barrow of Thespis beside the Olympian +chariots? What are Aristophanes and Plautus, beside the Homeric +colossi, Æschylus, Sophocles, Euripides? Homer bears them along with +him, as Hercules bore the pygmies, hidden in his lion's skin! + +In the idea of men of modern times, however, the grotesque plays an +enormous part. It is found everywhere; on the one hand it creates the +abnormal and the horrible, on the other the comic and the burlesque. +It fastens upon religion a thousand original superstitions, upon +poetry a thousand picturesque fancies. It is the grotesque which +scatters lavishly, in air, water, earth, fire, those myriads of +intermediary creatures which we find all alive in the popular +traditions of the Middle Ages; it is the grotesque which impels the +ghastly antics of the witches' revels, which gives Satan his horns, +his cloven foot and his bat's wings. It is the grotesque, still the +grotesque, which now casts into the Christian hell the frightful faces +which the severe genius of Dante and Milton will evoke, and again +peoples it with those laughter-moving figures amid which Callot, the +burlesque Michelangelo, will disport himself. If it passes from the +world of imagination to the real world, it unfolds an inexhaustible +supply of parodies of mankind. Creations of its fantasy are the +Scaramouches, Crispins and Harlequins, grinning silhouettes of man, +types altogether unknown to serious-minded antiquity, although they +originated in classic Italy. It is the grotesque, lastly, which, +colouring the same drama with the fancies of the North and of the +South in turn, exhibits Sganarelle capering about Don Juan and +Mephistopheles crawling about Faust. + +And how free and open it is in its bearing! how boldly it brings +into relief all the strange forms which the preceding age had timidly +wrapped in swaddling-clothes! Ancient poetry, compelled to provide +the lame Vulcan with companions, tried to disguise their deformity by +distributing it, so to speak, upon gigantic proportions. Modern genius +retains this myth of the supernatural smiths, but gives it an entirely +different character and one which makes it even more striking; it +changes the giants to dwarfs and makes gnomes of the Cyclops. With +like originality, it substitutes for the somewhat commonplace Lernaean +hydra all the local dragons of our national legends--the gargoyle of +Rouen, the _gra-ouilli_ of Metz, the _chair sallée_ of Troyes, the +_drée_ of Montlhéry, the _tarasque_ of Tarascon--monsters of forms so +diverse, whose outlandish names are an additional attribute. All these +creations draw from their own nature that energetic and significant +expression before which antiquity seems sometimes to have recoiled. +Certain it is that the Greek Eumenides are much less horrible, and +consequently less _true_, than the witches in _Macbeth_. Pluto is not +the devil. + +In our opinion a most novel book might be written upon the employment +of the grotesque in the arts. One might point out the powerful +effects the moderns have obtained from that fruitful type, upon which +narrow-minded criticism continues to wage war even in our own day. +It may be that we shall be led by our subject to call attention in +passing to some features of this vast picture. We will simply say here +that, as a means of contrast with the sublime, the grotesque is, in +our view, the richest source that nature can offer art. Rubens so +understood it, doubtless, when it pleased him to introduce the hideous +features of a court dwarf amid his exhibitions of royal magnificence, +coronations and splendid ceremonial. The universal beauty which the +ancients solemnly laid upon everything, is not without monotony; the +same impression repeated again and again may prove fatiguing at last. +Sublime upon sublime scarcely presents a contrast, and we need a +little rest from everything, even the beautiful. On the other +hand, the grotesque seems to be a halting-place, a mean term, a +starting-point whence one rises toward the beautiful with a +fresher and keener perception. The salamander gives relief to the +water-sprite; the gnome heightens the charm of the sylph. + +And it would be true also to say that contact with the abnormal +has imparted to the modern sublime a something purer, grander, more +sublime, in short, than the beautiful of the ancients; and that is as +it should be. When art is consistent with itself, it guides everything +more surely to its goal. If the Homeric Elysium is a long, long way +from the ethereal charm, the angelic pleasureableness of Milton's +Paradise, it is because under Eden there is a hell far more terrible +than the heathen Tartarus. Do you think that Francesca da Rimini and +Beatrice would be so enchanting in a poet who should not confine us in +the Tower of Hunger and compel us to share Ugolino's revolting repast? +Dante would have less charm, if he had less power. Have the fleshly +naiads, the muscular Tritons, the wanton Zephyrs, the diaphanous +transparency of our water-sprites and sylphs? Is it not because the +modern imagination does not fear to picture the ghastly forms of +vampires, ogres, ghouls, snake-charmers and jinns prowling about +graveyards, that it can give to its fairies that incorporeal shape, +that purity of essence, of which the heathen nymphs fall so far short? +The antique Venus is beautiful, admirable, no doubt; but what has +imparted to Jean Goujon's faces that weird, tender, ethereal delicacy? +What has given them that unfamiliar suggestion of life and grandeur, +if not the proximity of the rough and powerful sculptures of the +Middle Ages? + +If the thread of our argument has not been broken in the reader's mind +by these necessary digressions--- which in truth, might be developed +much further--he has realized, doubtless, how powerfully the +grotesque--that germ of comedy, fostered by the modern muse--grew in +extent and importance as soon as it was transplanted to a soil more +propitious than paganism and the Epic. In truth, in the new poetry, +while the sublime represents the soul as it is, purified by Christian +morality, the grotesque plays the part of the human beast. The former +type, delivered of all impure alloy, has as its attributes all the +charms, all the graces, all the beauties; it must be able some day +to create Juliet, Desdemona, Ophelia. The latter assumes all the +absurdities, all the infirmities, all the blemishes. In this partition +of mankind and of creation, to it fall the passions, vices, crimes; +it is sensuous, fawning, greedy, miserly, false, incoherent, +hypocritical; it is, in turn, Iago, Tartuffe, Basile, Polonius, +Harpagon, Bartholo, Falstaff, Scapin, Figaro. The beautiful has but +one type, the ugly has a thousand. The fact is that the beautiful, +humanly speaking, is merely form considered in its simplest aspect +in its most perfect symmetry, in its most entire harmony with our +make-up. Thus the _ensemble_ that it offers us is always complete, but +restricted like ourselves. What we call the ugly, on the contrary, is +a detail of a great whole which eludes us, and which is in harmony, +not with man but with all creation. That is why it constantly presents +itself to us in new but incomplete aspects. + +It is interesting to study the first appearance and the progress +of the grotesque in modern times. At first, it is an invasion, an +irruption, an overflow, as of a torrent that has burst its banks. It +rushes through the expiring Latin literature, imparts some coloring to +Persius, Petronius and Juvenal, and leaves behind it the _Golden Ass_ +of Apuleius. Thence it diffuses itself through the imaginations of the +new nations that are remodelling Europe. It abounds in the work of +the fabulists, the chroniclers, the romancists. We see it make its way +from the South to the North. It disports itself in the dreams of the +Teutonic nations, and at the same time vivifies with its breath +the admirable Spanish _romanceros_, a veritable Iliad of the age of +chivalry. For example, it is the grotesque which describes thus, +in the _Roman de la Rose_, an august ceremonial, the election of a +king:-- + + "A long-shanked knave they chose, I wis, + Of all their men the boniest." + +More especially it imposes its characteristic qualities upon that +wonderful architecture which, in the Middle Ages, takes the place of +all the arts. It affixes its mark on the façades of cathedrals, frames +its hells and purgatories in the ogive arches of great doorways, +portrays them in brilliant hues on window-glass, exhibits its +monsters, its bull-dogs, its imps about capitals, along friezes, on +the edges of roofs. It flaunts itself in numberless shapes on the +wooden façades of houses, on the stone façades of châteaux, on the +marble façades of palaces. From the arts it makes its way into the +national manners, and while it stirs applause from the people for the +_graciosos_ of comedy, it gives to the kings court-jesters. Later, +in the age of etiquette, it will show us Scarron on the very edge of +Louis the Fourteenth's bed. Meanwhile it decorates coats of-arms, and +draws upon knight, shields the symbolic hieroglyphs of feudalism. +From the manners, it makes its way into the laws, numberless strange +customs at test its passage through the institutions of the Middle +Ages. Just as it represented Thespis, smeared with wine-lees, leaping +in her tomb it dances with the _Basoche_ on the famous marble table +which served at the same time as a stage for the popular farces and +for the royal banquets. Finally, having made its way into the arts, +the manners, and the laws, it enters even the Church. In every +Catholic city we see it organizing some one of those curious +ceremonies, those strange processions, wherein religion is attended by +all varieties of superstition--the sublime attended by all the forms +of the grotesque. To paint it in one stroke, so great is its vigour, +its energy, its creative sap, at the dawn of letters, that it casts, +at the outset, upon the threshold of modern poetry, three burlesque +Homers: Ariosto in Italy, Cervantes in Spain, Rabelais in France. + +It would be mere surplusage to dwell further upon the influence of +the grotesque in the third civilization. Every thing tends to show its +close creative alliance with the beautiful in the so called "romantic" +period. Even among the simplest popular legends there are none which +do not somewhere, with an admirable instinct, solve this mystery of +modern art. Antiquity could not have produced _Beauty and the Beast_. + +It is true that at the period at which we have arrived the +predominance of the grotesque over the sublime in literature is +clearly indicated. But it is a spasm of reaction, an eager thirst for +novelty, which is but temporary, it is an initial wave which gradually +recedes. The type of the beautiful will soon resume its rights and its +role, which is not to exclude the other principle, but to prevail over +it. It is time that the grotesque should be content with a corner +of the picture in Murillo's loyal frescoes, in the sacred pages of +Veronese, content to be introduced in two marvellous _Last Judgments_, +in which art will take a just pride, in the scene of fascination and +horror with which Michelangelo will embellish the Vatican, in those +awe-inspiring represervations of the fall of man which Rubens will +throw upon the arches of the Cathedral of Antwerp. The time has come +when the balance between the two principles is to be established. A +man, a poet-king, _poeta soverano_, as Dante calls Homer, is about +to adjust everything. The two rival genii combine their flames, and +thence issues Shakespeare. + +We have now reached the poetic culmination of modern times. +Shakespeare is the drama; and the drama, which with the same breath +moulds the grotesque and the sublime, the terrible and the absurd, +tragedy and comedy--the drama is the distinguishing characteristic of +the third epoch of poetry, of the literature of the present day. + +Thus, to sum up hurriedly the facts that we have noted thus far, +poetry has three periods, each of which corresponds to an epoch of +civilization: the ode, the epic, and the drama. Primitive times are +lyrical, ancient times epical, modern times dramatic. The ode sings +of eternity, the epic imparts solemnity to history, the drama depicts +life. The characteristic of the first poetry is ingenuousness, of +the second, simplicity, of the third, truth. The rhapsodists mark the +transition from the lyric to the epic poets, as do the romancists that +from the lyric to the dramatic poets. Historians appear in the second +period, chroniclers and critics in the third. The characters of +the ode are colossi--Adam, Cain, Noah; those of the epic are +giants--Achilles, Atreus, Orestes; those of the drama are men--Hamlet, +Macbeth, Othello. The ode lives upon the ideal, the epic upon the +grandiose, the drama upon the real. Lastly, this threefold poetry +flows from three great sources--The Bible, Homer, Shakespeare. + +Such then--and we confine ourselves herein to noting a single +result--such are the diverse aspects of thought in the different +epochs of mankind and of civilization. Such are its three faces, in +youth, in manhood, in old age. Whether one examines one literature by +itself or all literatures _en masse,_ one will always reach the same +result: the lyric poets before the epic poets, the epic poets before +the dramatic poets. In France, Malherbe before Chapelain, Chapelain +before Corneille; in ancient Greece, Orpheus before Homer, Homer +before Æschylus; in the first of all books, _Genesis_ before _Kings, +Kings_ before _Job_; or to come back to that monumental scale of all +ages of poetry, which we ran over a moment since, The Bible before the +_Iliad_, the _Iliad_ before Shakespeare. + +In a word, civilization begins by singing of its dreams, then narrates +its doings, and, lastly, sets about describing what it thinks. It is, +let us say in passing, because of this last, that the drama, combining +the most opposed qualities, may be at the same time full of profundity +and full of relief, philosophical and picturesque. + +It would be logical to add here that everything in nature and in +life passes through these three phases, the lyric, the epic, and the +dramatic, because everything is born, acts, and dies. If it were not +absurd to confound the fantastic conceits of the imagination with the +stern deductions of the reasoning faculty, a poet might say that the +rising of the sun, for example, is a hymn, noon-day a brilliant epic, +and sunset a gloomy drama wherein day and night, life and death, +contend for mastery. But that would be poetry--folly, perhaps--- and +_what does it prove_? + +Let us hold to the facts marshalled above; let us supplement them, +too, by an important observation, namely that we have in no wise +pretended to assign exclusive limits to the three epochs of poetry, +but simply to set forth their predominant characteristics. The Bible, +that divine lyric monument, contains in germ, as we suggested a moment +ago, an epic and a drama--_-Kings_ and _Job_. In the Homeric poems +one is conscious of a clinging reminiscence of lyric poetry and of a +beginning of dramatic poetry. Ode and drama meet in the epic. There is +a touch of all in each; but in each there exists a generative element +to which all the other elements give place, and which imposes its own +character upon the whole. + +The drama is complete poetry. The ode and the epic contain it only +in germ; it contains both of them in a state of high development, and +epitomizes both. Surely, he who said: "The French have not the epic +brain," said a true and clever thing; if he had said, "The moderns," +the clever remark would have been profound. It is beyond question, +however, that there is epic genius in that marvellous _Athalie,_ so +exalted and so simple in its sublimity that the royal century was +unable to comprehend it. It is certain, too, that the series of +Shakespeare's chronicle dramas presents a grand epic aspect. But it is +lyric poetry above all that befits the drama; it never embarrasses +it, adapts itself to all its caprices, disports itself in all forms, +sometimes sublime as in Ariel, sometimes grotesque as in Caliban. Our +era being above all else dramatic, is for that very reason eminently +lyric. There is more than one connection between the beginning and the +end; the sunset has some features of the sunrise; the old man becomes +a child once more. But this second childhood is not like the first; +it is as melancholy as the other is joyous. It is the same with lyric +poetry. Dazzling, dreamy, at the dawn of civilization it reappears, +solemn and pensive, at its decline. The Bible opens joyously with +_Genesis_ and comes to a close with the threatening _Apocalypse_. The +modern ode is still inspired, but is no longer ignorant. It meditates +more than it scrutinizes; its musing is melancholy. We see, by its +painful labour, that the muse has taken the drama for her mate. + +To make clear by a metaphor the ideas that we have ventured to put +forth, we will compare early lyric poetry to a placid lake which +reflects the clouds and stars; the epic is the stream which flows from +the lake, and rushes on, reflecting its banks, forests, fields and +cities, until it throws itself into the ocean of the drama. Like the +lake, the drama reflects the sky; like the stream, it reflects its +banks; but it alone has tempests and measureless depths. + +The drama, then, is the goal to which everything in modern poetry +leads. _Paradise Lost_ is a drama before it is an epic. As we know, it +first presented itself to the poet's imagination in the first of these +forms, and as a drama it always remains in the reader's memory, so +prominent is the old dramatic framework still beneath Milton's epic +structure! When Dante had finished his terrible _Inferno_, when he had +closed its doors and nought remained save to give his work a name, the +unerring instinct of his genius showed him that that multiform poem +was an emanation of the drama, not of the epic; and on the front +of that gigantic monument, he wrote with his pen of bronze: _Divina +Commedia._ + +Thus we see that the only two poets of modern times who are of +Shakespeare's stature follow him in unity of design. They coincide with +him in imparting a dramatic tinge to all our poetry, like him, they +blend the grotesque with the sublime, and, far from standing +by themselves in the great literary _ensemble_ that rests upon +Shakespeare, Dante and Milton are, in some sort, the two supporting +abutments of the edifice of which he is the central pillar, the +buttresses of the arch of which he is the keystone. + +Permit us, at this point, to recur to certain ideas already suggested, +which, however, it is necessary to emphasize. We have arrived, and now +we must set out again. + +On the day when Christianity said to man "Thou art twofold, thou art +made up of two beings, one perishable, the other immortal, one carnal, +the other ethereal, one enslaved by appetites, cravings and passions, +the other borne aloft on the wings of enthusiasm and reverie--in a +word, the one always stooping toward the earth, its mother, the other +always darting up toward heaven, its fatherland"--on that day the +drama was created. Is it in truth, anything other than that contrast +of every day, that struggle of every moment, between two opposing +principles which are ever face to face in life, and which dispute +possession of man from the cradle to the tomb? + +The poetry born of Christianity, the poetry of our time, is, +therefore, the drama, the real results from the wholly natural +combination of two types, the sublime and the grotesque, which meet +in the drama, as they meet in life and in creation. For true poetry, +complete poetry, consists in the harmony of contraries. Hence, it is +time to say aloud--and it is here above all that exceptions prove the +rule--that everything that exists in nature exists in art. + +On taking one's stand at this point of view, to pass judgment on +our petty conventional rules, to disentangle all those scholastic +labyrinths, to solve all those trivial problems which the critics of +the last two centuries have laboriously built up about the art, one is +struck by the promptitude with which the question of the modern stage +is made clear and distinct. The drama has but to take a step to +break all the spider's webs with which the militia of Lilliput have +attempted to fetter its sleep. + +And so, let addle-pated pedants (one does not exclude the other) claim +that the deformed, the ugly, the grotesque should never be imitated +in art; one replies that the grotesque is comedy, and that comedy +apparently makes a part of art. Tartuffe is not handsome, Pourceaugnac +is not noble, but Pourceaugnac and Tartuffe are admirable flashes of +art. + +If, driven back from this entrenchment to their second line of +custom-houses, they renew their prohibition of the grotesque coupled +with the sublime, of comedy melted into tragedy, we prove to them +that, in the poetry of Christian nations, the first of these two types +represents the human beast, the second the soul. These two stalks of +art, if we prevent their branches from mingling, if we persistently +separate them, will produce by way of fruit, on the one hand abstract +vices and absurdities, on the other, abstract crime, heroism and +virtue. The two types, thus isolated and left to themselves, will go +each its own way, leaving the real between them, at the left hand of +one, at the right hand of the other. Whence it follows that after +all these abstractions there will remain something to represent--man; +after these tragedies and comedies, something to create--the drama. + +In the drama, as it may be conceived at least, if not executed, all +things are connected and follow one another as in real life. The +body plays its part no less than the mind; and men and events, set +in motion by this twofold agent, pass across the stage, burlesque and +terrible in turn, and sometimes both at once. Thus the judge will say: +"Off with his head and let us go to dinner!" Thus the Roman Senate +will deliberate over Domitian's turbot. Thus Socrates, drinking the +hemlock and discoursing on the immortal soul and the only God, +will interrupt himself to suggest that a cook be sacrificed to +_Æsculapius_. Thus Elizabeth will swear and talk Latin. Thus Richelieu +will submit to Joseph the Capuchin, and Louis XI to his barber, Maître +Olivier le Diable. Thus Cromwell will say: "I have Parliament in my +bag and the King in my pocket"; or, with the hand that signed the +death sentence of Charles the First, smear with ink the face of a +regicide who smilingly returns the compliment. Thus Cæsar, in his +triumphal car, will be afraid of overturning. For men of genius, +however great they be, have always within them a touch of the beast +which mocks at their intelligence. Therein they are akin to mankind +in general, for therein they are dramatic. "It is but a step from the +sublime to the ridiculous," said Napoleon, when he was convinced that +he was mere man; and that outburst of a soul on fire illumines art and +history at once; that cry of anguish is the résumé of the drama and of +life. + +It is a striking fact that all these contrasts are met with in the +poets themselves, taken as men. By dint of meditating upon existence, +of laying stress upon its bitter irony, of pouring floods of sarcasm +and raillery upon our infirmities, the very men who make us laugh so +heartily become profoundly sad. These Democrituses are Heraclituses as +well. Beaumarchais was surly, Molière gloomy, Shakespeare melancholy. + +The fact is, then, that the grotesque is one of the supreme beauties +of the drama. It is not simply an appropriate element of it, but is +oftentimes a necessity. Sometimes it appears in homogeneous masses, in +entire characters, as Daudin, Prusias, Trissotin, Brid'oison, Juliet's +nurse; sometimes impregnated with terror, as Richard III, Bégears, +Tartuffe, Mephistopheles; sometimes, too, with a veil of grace and +refinement, as Figaro, Osric, Mercutio, Don Juan. It finds its way +in everywhere; for just as the most commonplace have their occasional +moments of sublimity, so the most exalted frequently pay tribute +to the trivial and ridiculous. Thus, often impalpable, often +imperceptible, it is always present on the stage, even when it says +nothing, even when it keeps out of sight. Thanks to it, there is no +thought of monotony. Sometimes it injects laughter, sometimes horror, +into tragedy. It will bring Romeo face to face with the apothecary, +Macbeth with the witches, Hamlet with the grave-diggers. Sometimes +it may, without discord, as in the scene between King Lear and his +jester, mingle its shrill voice with the most sublime, the most +dismal, the dreamiest music of the soul. + +That is what Shakespeare alone among all has succeeded in doing, in +a fashion of his own, which it would be no less fruitless than +impossible to imitate--Shakespeare, the god of the stage, in whom, +as in a trinity, the three characteristic geniuses of our stage, +Corneille, Molière, Beaumarchais, seem united. + +We see how quickly the arbitrary distinction between the species of +poetry vanishes before common sense and taste. No less easily one +might demolish the alleged rule of the two unities. We say _two_ and +not _three_ unities, because unity of plot or of _ensemble_, the only +true and well founded one, was long ago removed from the sphere of +discussion. + +Distinguished contemporaries, foreigners and Frenchmen, have already +attacked, both in theory and in practice that fundamental law of the +pseudo-Aristotelian code. Indeed, the combat was not likely to be a +long one. At the first blow it cracked, so worm eaten was that timber +of the old scholastic hovel! + +The strange thing is that the slaves of routine pretend to rest their +rule of the two unities on probability, whereas reality is the very +thing that destroys it. Indeed, what could be more improbable and +absurd than this porch or peristyle or ante-chamber--vulgar places +where our tragedies are obliging enough to develop themselves; whither +conspirators come, no one knows whence, to declaim against the tyrant, +and the tyrant to declaim against the conspirators, each in turn, as +if they had said to one another in bucolic phrase-- + + Alternis cantemus, amant alterna Camenæ. + +Where did anyone ever see a porch or peristyle of that sort? +What could be more opposed--we will not say to the truth, for the +scholastics hold it very cheap, but to probability? The result is that +everything that is too characteristic, too intimate, too local, to +happen in the ante chamber or on the street-corner--that is to say, +the whole drama--takes place in the wings. We see on the stage only +the elbows of the plot, so to speak; its hands are somewhere +else. Instead of scenes we have narrative, instead of tableaux, +descriptions. Solemn-faced characters, placed, as in the old chorus, +between the drama and ourselves, tell us what is going on in the +temple, in the palace, on the public square, until we are tempted many +a time to call out to them: "Indeed! then take us there! It must be +very entertaining--a fine sight!" To which they would reply no doubt: +"It is quite possible that it might entertain or interest you, but +that isn't the question; we are the guardians of the dignity of the +French Melpomene." And there you are! + +"But," someone will say, "this rule that you discard is borrowed from +the Greek drama." Wherein, pray, do the Greek stage and drama resemble +our stage and drama? Moreover, we have already shown that the vast +extent of the ancient stage enabled it to include a whole locality, +so that the poet could, according to the exigencies of the plot, +transport it at his pleasure from one part of the stage to another, +which is practically equivalent to a change of stage-setting. Curious +contradiction! the Greek theatre, restricted as it was to a national +and religious object, was much more free than ours, whose only +object is the enjoyment, and, if you please, the instruction, of the +spectator. The reason is that the one obeys only the laws that +are suited to it, while the other takes upon itself conditions +of existence which are absolutely foreign to its essence. One is +artistic, the other artificial. + +People are beginning to understand in our day that exact localization +is one of the first elements of reality. The speaking or acting +characters are not the only ones who engrave on the minds of the +spectators a faithful representation of the facts. The place where +this or that catastrophe took place becomes a terrible and inseparable +witness thereof; and the absence of silent characters of this sort +would make the greatest scenes of history incomplete in the drama. +Would the poet dare to murder Rizzio elsewhere than in Mary Stuart's +chamber? to stab Henri IV elsewhere than in Rue de la Ferronerie, all +blocked with drays and carriages? to burn Jeanne d'Arc elsewhere than +in the Vieux-Marché? to despatch the Duc de Guise elsewhere than in +that chateau of Blois where his ambition roused a popular assemblage +to frenzy? to behead Charles I and Louis XVI elsewhere than in those +ill-omened localities whence Whitehall or the Tuileries may be seen, +as if their scaffolds were appurtenances of their palaces? + +Unity of time rests on no firmer foundation than unity of place. A +plot forcibly confined within twenty-four hours is as absurd as one +confined within a peristyle. Every plot has its proper duration as +well as its appropriate place. Think of administering the same dose +of time to all events! of applying the same measure to everything! You +would laugh at a cobbler who should attempt to put the same shoe on +every foot. To cross unity of time and unity of place like the bars +of a cage, and pedantically to introduce therein, in the name of +Aristotle, all the deeds, all the nations, all the figures which +Providence sets before us in such vast numbers in real life,--to +proceed thus is to mutilate men and things, to cause history to +make wry faces. Let us say, rather, that everything will die in the +operation, and so the dogmatic mutilators reach their ordinary result: +what was alive in the chronicles is dead in tragedy. That is why the +cage of the unities often contains only a skeleton. + +And then, if twenty-four hours can be comprised in two, it is a +logical consequence that four hours may contain forty-eight. Thus +Shakespeare's unity must be different from Corneille's. 'Tis pity! + +But these are the wretched quibbles with which mediocrity, envy and +routine has pestered genius for two centuries past! By such means the +flight of our greatest poets has been cut short. Their wings have been +clipped with the scissors of the unities. And what has been given us +in exchange for the eagle feathers stolen from Corneille and Racine? +Campistron. + +We imagine that someone may say: "There is something in too frequent +changes of scene which confuses and fatigues the spectator, and which +produces a bewildering effect on his attention; it may be, too, that +manifold transitions from place to place, from one time to another +time, demand explanations which repel the attention; one should +also avoid leaving, in the midst of a plot, gaps which prevent the +different parts of the drama from adhering closely to one another, and +which, moreover, puzzle the spectator because he does not know what +there may be in those gaps." But these are precisely the difficulties +which art has to meet. These are some of the obstacles peculiar to +one subject or another, as to which it would be impossible to pass +judgment once for all. It is for genius to overcome, not for treatises +or poetry to evade them. + +A final argument, taken from the very bowels of the art, would of +itself suffice to show the absurdity of the rule of the two unities. +It is the existence of the third unity, unity of plot--the only one +that is universally admitted, because it results from a fact: neither +the human eye nor the human mind can grasp more than one _ensemble_ at +one time. This one is as essential as the other two are useless. It +is the one which fixes the view-point of the drama; now, by that very +fact, it excludes the other two. There can no more be three unities in +the drama than three horizons in a picture. But let us be careful not +to confound unity with simplicity of plot. The former does not in +any way exclude the secondary plots on which the principal plot +may depend. It is necessary only that these parts, being skilfully +subordinated to the general plan, shall tend constantly toward the +central plot and group themselves about it at the various stages, or +rather on the various levels of the drama. Unity of plot is the stage +law of perspective. + +"But," the customs-officers of thought will cry, "great geniuses have +submitted to these rules which you spurn!" Unfortunately, yes. But +what would those admirable men have done if they had been left to +themselves? At all events they did not accept your chains without +a struggle. You should have seen how Pierre Corneille, worried and +harassed at his first step in the art on account of his marvellous +work, _Le Cid_, struggled under Mairet, Claveret, d'Aubignac and +Scudéri! How he denounced to posterity the violent attacks of those +men, who, he says, made themselves "all white with Aristotle!" You +should read how they said to him--and we quote from books of the +time: "Young man, you must learn before you teach; and unless one is +a Scaliger or a Heinsius that is intolerable!" Thereupon Corneille +rebels and asks if their purpose is to force him "much below +Claveret." Here Scudéri waxes indignant at such a display of pride, +and reminds the "thrice great author of _Le Cid_ of the modest words +in which Tasso, the greatest man of his age, began his apology for +the finest of his works against the bitterest and most unjust censure +perhaps that will ever be pronounced. M. Corneille," he adds, "shows +in his replies that he is as far removed from that author's moderation +as from his merit." The young man _so justly and gently reproved_ +dares to protest; thereupon Scudéri returns to the charge; he calls +to his assistance the _Eminent Academy;_ "Pronounce, O my Judges, a +decree worthy of your eminence, which will give all Europe to know +that _Le Cid_ is not the chef-d'oeuvre of the greatest man in France, +but the least judicious performance of M. Corneille himself. You are +bound to do it, both for your own private renown; and for that of +our people in general, who are concerned in this matter; inasmuch +as foreigners who may see this precious masterpiece--they who have +possessed a Tasso or a Guarini--might think that our greatest masters +were no more than apprentices." + +These few instructive lines contain the everlasting tactics of envious +routine against growing talent--tactics which are still followed in +our own day, and which, for example, added such a curious page to the +youthful essays of Lord Byron. Scudéri gives us its quintessence. In +like manner the earlier works of a man of genius are always preferred +to the newer ones, in order to prove that he is going down instead of +up--_Melite and La Galerie du Palais_ placed above _Le Cid_. And +the names of the dead are always thrown at the heads of the +living--Corneille stoned with Tasso and Guarini (Guarini!), as, later, +Racine will be stoned with Corneille, Voltaire with Racine, and as +to-day, everyone who shows signs of rising is stoned with Corneille, +Racine and Voltaire. These tactics, as will be seen, are well-worn; +but they must be effective as they are still in use. However, the poor +devil of a great man still breathed. Here we cannot help but admire +the way in which Scudéri, the bully of this tragic-comedy, forced to +the wall, blackguards and maltreats him, how pitilessly he unmasks +his classical artillery, how he shows the author of _Le Cid_ "what the +episodes should be, according to Aristotle, who tells us in the tenth +and sixteenth chapters of his _Poetics";_ how he crushes Corneille, in +the name of the same Aristotle "in the eleventh chapter of his _Art of +Poetry_, wherein we find the condemnation of _Le Cid_"; in the name +of Plato, "in the tenth book of his _Republic_"; in the name of +Marcellinus, "as may be seen in the twenty-seventh book"; in the name +of "the tragedies of Niobe and Jephthah"; in the name of the "_Ajax_ +of Sophocles"; in the name of "the example of Euripides"; in the name +of "Heinsius, chapter six of the _Constitution_ of _Tragedy_; and +the younger Scaliger in his poems"; and finally, in the name of the +Canonists and Jurisconsults, under the title "Nuptials." The first +arguments were addressed to the Academy, the last one was aimed at +the Cardinal. After the pin-pricks the blow with a club. A judge was +needed to decide the question. Chapelain gave judgment. Corneille saw +that he was doomed; the lion was muzzled, or, as was said at the time, +the crow (_Corneille_) was plucked. Now comes the painful side of this +grotesque performance: after he had been thus quenched at his first +flash, this genius, thoroughly modern, fed upon the Middle Ages and +Spain, being compelled to lie to himself and to hark back to ancient +times, drew for us that Castilian Rome, which is sublime beyond +question, but in which, except perhaps in _Nicomede_, which was so +ridiculed by the eighteenth century for its dignified and simple +colouring, we find neither the real Rome nor the true Corneille. + +Racine was treated to the same persecution, but did not make the same +resistance. Neither in his genius nor in his character was there any +of Corneille's lofty asperity. He submitted in silence and sacrificed +to the scorn of his time his enchanting elegy of _Esther_, his +magnificent epic, _Athalie_. So that we can but believe that, if he +had not been paralyzed as he was by the prejudices of his epoch, if +he had come in contact less frequently with the classic cramp-fish, +he would not have failed to introduce Locuste in his drama between +Narcisse and Neron, and above all things would not have relegated to +the wings the admirable scene of the banquet at which Seneca's pupil +poisons Britannicus in the cup of reconciliation. But can we demand +of the bird that he fly under the receiver of an air-pump? What a +multitude of beautiful scenes the _people of taste_ have cost us, from +Scudéri to La Harpe! A noble work might be composed of all that their +scorching breath has withered in its germ. However, our great poets +have found a way none the less to cause their genius to blaze forth +through all these obstacles. Often the attempt to confine them behind +walls of dogmas and rules is vain. Like the Hebrew giant they carry +their prison doors with them to the mountains. + +But still the same refrain is repeated, and will be, no doubt, for +a long while to come: "Follow the rules! Copy the models! It was the +rules that shaped the models." One moment! In that case there are two +sorts of models, those which are made according to the rules, and, +prior to them, those according to which the rules were made. Now, in +which of these two categories should genius seek a place for itself? +Although it is always disagreeable to come in contact with pedants, +is it not a thousand times better to give them lessons than to receive +lessons from them? And then--copy! Is the reflection equal to the +light? Is the satellite which travels unceasingly in the same circle +equal to the central creative planet? With all his poetry Virgil is no +more than the moon of Homer. + +And whom are we to copy, I pray to know? The ancients? We have just +shown that their stage has nothing in common with ours. Moreover, +Voltaire, who will have none of Shakespeare, will have none of the +Greeks, either. Let him tell us why: "The Greeks ventured to produce +scenes no less revolting to us. Hippolyte, crushed by his fall, +counts his wounds and utters doleful cries. Philoctetes falls in his +paroxysms of pain; black blood flows from his wound. Oedipus, covered +with the blood that still drops from the sockets of the eyes he has +torn out, complains bitterly of gods and men. We hear the shrieks +of Clytemnestra, murdered by her own son, and Electra, on the +stage, cries: 'Strike! spare her not! she did not spare our father,' +Prometheus is fastened to a rock by nails driven through his stomach +and his arms. The Furies reply to Clytemnestra's bleeding shade with +inarticulate roars. Art was in its infancy in the time of Æschylus as +it was in London in Shakespeare's time." + +Whom shall we copy, then? The moderns? What! Copy copies! God forbid! + +"But," someone else will object, "according to your conception of the +art, you seem to look for none but great poets, to count always upon +genius." Art certainly does not count upon mediocrity. It prescribes +no rules for it, it knows nothing of it; in fact, mediocrity has +no existence so far as art is concerned; art supplies wings, not +crutches. Alas! D'Aubignac followed rules, Campistron copied models. +What does it matter to art? It does not build its palaces for ants. It +lets them make their ant-hill, without taking the trouble to find out +whether they have built their burlesque imitation of its palace upon +its foundation. + +The critics of the scholastic school place their poets in a strange +position. On the one hand they cry incessantly: "Copy the models!" +On the other hand they have a habit of declaring that "the models are +inimitable"! Now, if their craftsman, by dint of hard work, succeeds +in forcing through this dangerous defile some colourless tracing +of the masters, these ungrateful wretches, after examining the new +_refaccimiento_, exclaim sometimes: "This doesn't resemble anything!" +and sometimes: "This resembles everything!" And by virtue of a logic +made for the occasion each of these formulæ is a criticism. + +Let us then speak boldly. The time for it has come, and it would be +strange if, in this age, liberty, like the light, should penetrate +everywhere except to the one place where freedom is most natural--the +domain of thought. Let us take the hammer to theories and poetic +systems. Let us throw down the old plastering that conceals the facade +of art. There are neither rules nor models; or, rather, there are +no other rules than the general laws of nature, which soar above +the whole field of art, and the special rules which result from the +conditions appropriate to the subject of each composition. The +former are of the essence, eternal, and do not change; the latter +are variable, external, and are used but once. The former are the +framework that supports the house; the latter the scaffolding which +is used in building it, and which is made anew for each building. In a +word, the former are the flesh and bones, the latter the clothing, of +the drama. But these rules are not written in the treatises on poetry. +Richelet has no idea of their existence. Genius, which divines rather +than learns, devises for each work the general rules from the general +plan of things, the special rules from the separate _ensemble_ of the +subject treated; not after the manner of the chemist, who lights the +fire under his furnace, heats his crucible, analyzes and destroys; but +after the manner of the bee, which flies on its golden wings, lights +on each flower and extracts its honey, leaving it as brilliant and +fragrant as before. + +The poet--let us insist on this point--should take counsel therefore +only of nature, truth, and inspiration which is itself both truth and +nature. "Quando he," says Lope de Vega, + + "Quando he de escrivir una comedia, + Encierro los preceptos con seis llaves." + +To secure these precepts "six keys" are none too many, in very +truth. Let the poet beware especially of copying anything +whatsoever--Shakespeare no more than Molière, Schiller no more than +Corneille. If genuine talent could abdicate its own nature in this +matter, and thus lay aside its original personality, to transform +itself into another, it would lose everything by playing this role of +its own double. It is as if a god should turn valet. We must draw our +inspiration from the original sources. It is the same sap, distributed +through the soil, that produces all the trees of the forest, so +different in bearing power, in fruit, in foliage. It is the same +nature that fertilizes and nourishes the most diverse geniuses. The +poet is a tree that may be blown about by all winds and watered by +every fall of dew; and bears his works as his fruit, as the _fablier_ +of old bore his fables. Why attach one's self to a master, or graft +one's self upon a model? It were better to be a bramble or a thistle, +fed by the same earth as the cedar and the palm, than the fungus +or the lichen of those noble trees. The bramble lives, the fungus +vegetates. Moreover, however great the cedar and the palm may be, +it is not with the sap one sucks from them that one can become great +one's self. A giant's parasite will be at best a dwarf. The oak, +colossus that it is, can produce and sustain nothing more than the +mistletoe. + +Let there be no misunderstanding: if some of our poets have succeeded +in being great, even when copying, it is because, while forming +themselves on the antique model, they have often listened to the +voice of nature and to their own genius--it is because they have been +themselves in some one respect. Their branches became entangled in +those of the near-by tree, but their roots were buried deep in the +soil of art. They were the ivy, not the mistletoe. Then came imitators +of the second rank, who, having neither roots in the earth, nor genius +in their souls, had to confine themselves to imitation. As Charles +Nodier says: "After the school of Athens, the school of Alexandria." +Then there was a deluge of mediocrity; then there came a swarm of +those treatises on poetry, so annoying to true talent, so convenient +for mediocrity. We were told that everything was done, and God was +forbidden to create more Molières or Corneilles. Memory was put +in place of imagination. Imagination itself was subjected to +hard-and-fast rules, and aphorisms were made about it: "To imagine," +says La Harpe, with his naive assurance, "is in substance to remember, +that is all." + +But nature! Nature and truth!--And here, in order to prove that, far +from demolishing art, the new ideas aim only to reconstruct it +more firmly and on a better foundation, let us try to point out the +impassable limit which in our opinion, separates reality according to +art from reality according to nature. It is careless to confuse them +as some ill-informed partisans of _romanticism_ do. Truth in art +cannot possibly be, as several writers have claimed, _absolute_ +reality. Art cannot produce the thing itself. Let us imagine, for +example, one of those unreflecting promoters of absolute nature, of +nature viewed apart from art, at the performance of a romantic play, +say _Le Cid_. "What's that?" he will ask at the first word. "The Cid +speaks in verse? It isn't _natural_ to speak in verse."--"How would +you have him speak, pray?"--"In prose." Very good. A moment later, +"How's this!" he will continue, if he is consistent; "the Cid is +speaking French!"--"Well?"--"Nature demands that he speak his own +language; he can't speak anything but Spanish." + +We shall fail entirely to understand, but again--very good. You +imagine that this is all? By no means: before the tenth sentence in +Castilian, he is certain to rise and ask if the Cid who is speaking is +the real Cid, in flesh and blood. By what right does the actor, whose +name is Pierre or Jacques, take the name of the Cid? That is _false_. +There is no reason why he should not go on to demand that the sun +should be substituted for the footlights, _real_ trees and _real_ +houses for those deceitful wings. For, once started on that road, +logic has you by the collar, and you cannot stop. + +We must admit, therefore, or confess ourselves ridiculous, that the +domains of art and of nature are entirely distinct. Nature and art are +two things--were it not so, one or the other would not exist. Art, in +addition to its idealistic side, has a terrestrial, material side. Let +it do what it will, it is shut in between grammar and prosody, between +Vaugelas and Richelet. For its most capricious creations, it has +formulas, methods of execution, a complete apparatus to set in motion. +For genius there are delicate instruments, for mediocrity, tools. + +It seems to us that someone has already said that the drama is a +mirror wherein nature is reflected. But if it be an ordinary mirror, +a smooth and polished surface, it will give only a dull image of +objects, with no relief-faithful, but colourless; everyone knows +that colour and light are lost in a simple reflection. The drama, +therefore, must be a concentrating mirror, which, instead of +weakening, concentrates and condenses the coloured rays, which makes +of a mere gleam a light, and of a light a flame. Then only is the +drama acknowledged by art. + +The stage is an optical point. Everything that exists in the world--in +history, in life, in man--should be and can be reflected therein, +but under the magic wand of art. Art turns the leaves of the ages, +of nature, studies chronicles, strives to reproduce actual facts +(especially in respect to manners and peculiarities, which are much +less exposed to doubt and contradiction than are concrete facts), +restores what the chroniclers have lopped off, harmonises what they +have collected, divines and supplies their omissions, fills their gaps +with imaginary scenes which have the colour of the time, groups what +they have left scattered about, sets in motion anew the threads of +Providence which work the human marionettes, clothes the whole with a +form at once poetical and natural, and imparts to it that vitality of +truth and brilliancy which gives birth to illusion, that prestige of +reality which arouses the enthusiasm of the spectator, and of the poet +first of all, for the poet is sincere. Thus the aim of art is almost +divine: to bring to life again if it is writing history, to create if +it is writing poetry. + +It is a grand and beautiful sight to see this broad development of a +drama wherein art powerfully seconds nature; of a drama wherein the +plot moves on to the conclusion with a firm and unembarrassed step, +without diffuseness and without undue compression; of a drama, in +short, wherein the poet abundantly fulfills the multifold object +of art, which is to open to the spectator a double prospect, to +illuminate at the same time the interior and the exterior of mankind: +the exterior by their speech and their acts, the interior, by asides +and monologues; to bring together, in a word, in the same picture, the +drama of life and the drama of conscience. + +It will readily be imagined that, for a work of this kind, if the poet +must _choose_ (and he must), he should choose, not the _beautiful_, +but the _characteristic_. Not that it is advisable to "make local +colour," as they say to-day; that is, to add as an afterthought a few +discordant touches here and there to a work that is at best utterly +conventional and false. The local colour should not be on the surface +of the drama, but in its substance, in the very heart of the work, +whence it spreads of itself, naturally, evenly, and, so to speak, into +every corner of the drama, as the sap ascends from the root to the +tree's topmost leaf. The drama should be thoroughly impregnated with +this colour of the time, which should be, in some sort, in the air, +so that one detects it only on entering the theatre, and that on going +forth one finds one's self in a different period and atmosphere. It +requires some study, some labour, to attain this end; so much the +better. It is well that the avenues of art should be obstructed by +those brambles from which everybody recoils except those of +powerful will. Besides, it is this very study, fostered by an ardent +inspiration, which will ensure the drama against a vice that +kills it--the _commonplace_. To be commonplace is the failing of +short-sighted, short-breathed poets. In this tableau of the stage, +each figure must be held down to its most prominent, most individual, +most precisely defined characteristic. Even the vulgar and the trivial +should have an accent of their own. Like God, the true poet is present +in every part of his work at once. Genius resembles the die which +stamps the king's effigy on copper and golden coins alike. + +We do not hesitate--and this will demonstrate once more to honest men +how far we are from seeking to discredit the art--we do not hesitate +to consider verse as one of the means best adapted to protect the +drama from the scourge we have just mentioned, as one of the most +powerful dams against the irruption of the commonplace, which, like +democracy, is always flowing between full banks in men's minds. And at +this point we beg the younger literary generation, already so rich +in men and in works, to allow us to point out an error into which it +seems to have fallen--an error too fully justified, indeed, by the +extraordinary aberrations of the old school. The new century is at +that growing age at which one can readily set one's self right. + +There has appeared of late, like a penultimate branching-out of the +old classical trunk, or, better still, like one of those excrescences, +those polypi, which decrepitude develops, and which are a sign of +decomposition much more than a proof of life--there has appeared a +strange school of dramatic poetry. This school seems to us to have had +for its master and its fountain-head the poet who marks the transition +from the eighteenth to the nineteenth century, the man of wearisome +description and periphrases--that Delille who, they say, toward +the close of his life, boasted, after the fashion of the Homeric +catalogues, of having _made_ twelve camels, four dogs, three +horses, including Job's, six tigers, two cats, a chess-board, a +backgammon-board, a checker-board, a billiard-table, several winters, +many summers, a multitude of springs, fifty sunsets, and so many +daybreaks that he had lost count of them. + +Now, Delille went into tragedy. He is the father (he, and not Racine, +God save the mark!) of an alleged school of refinement and taste which +flourished until recently. Tragedy is not to this school what it was +to Will Shakespeare, say, a source of emotions of every sort, but a +convenient frame for the solution of a multitude of petty descriptive +problems which it propounds as it goes along. This muse, far from +spurning, as the true French classic school does, the trivial and +degrading things of life, eagerly seeks them out and brings them +together. The grotesque, shunned as undesirable company by the tragedy +of Louis the Fourteenth's day, cannot pass unnoticed before her. +_It must be described_, that is to say, ennobled. A scene in the +guard-house, a popular uprising, the fish-market, the galleys, the +wine-shop, the _poule au pot_ of Henri Quatre, are treasure-trove in +her eyes. She seizes upon this canaille, washes it clean, and sews her +tinsel and spangles over its villainies; _purpureus assuitur pannus_. +Her object seems to be to deliver patents of nobility to all these +_roturiers_ of the drama; and each of these patents under the great +seal is a speech. + +This muse, as may be imagined, is of a rare prudery. Wonted as she +is to the caresses of periphrasis, plain-speaking, if she should +occasionally be exposed to it, would horrify her. It does not accord +with her dignity to speak naturally. She _underlines_ old Corneille +for his blunt way of speaking, as in,-- + + "_A heap of men_ ruined by debt and crimes." + + "Chimène, _who'd have thought it_? Rodrigue, _who'd have said + it_?" + + "When their Flaminius _haggled with_ Hannibal." + + "Oh! do not _embroil_ me with the Republic." + +She still has her "Tout beau, monsieur!" on her heart. And it +needed many "seigneurs" and "madames" to procure forgiveness for our +admirable Racine for his monosyllabic "dogs!" and for so brutally +bestowing Claudius in Agrippina's bed. + +This Melpomene, as she is called, would shudder at the thought of +touching a chronicle. She leaves to the costumer the duty of learning +the period of the dramas she writes. In her eyes history is bad form +and bad taste. How, for example, can one tolerate kings and queens +who swear? They must be elevated from mere regal dignity to tragic +dignity. It was in a promotion of this sort that she exalted Henri IV. +It was thus that the people's king, purified by M. Legouvé, found +his "ventre-saint-gris" ignominiously banished from his mouth by +two sentences, and that he was reduced, like the girl in the old +_fabliau_, to the necessity of letting fall from those royal lips only +pearls and sapphires and rubies: the apotheosis of falsity, in very +truth. + +The fact is that nothing is so commonplace as this conventional +refinement and nobility. Nothing original, no imagination, +no invention in this style; simply what one has seen +everywhere--rhetoric, bombast, commonplaces, flowers of college +eloquence, poetry after the style of Latin verses. The poets of this +school are eloquent after the manner of stage princes and princesses, +always sure of finding in the costumer's labelled cases, cloaks and +pinchbeck crowns, which have no other disadvantage than that of having +been used by everybody. If these poets never turn the leaves of the +Bible, it is not because they have not a bulky book of their own, the +_Dictionnaire de rimes_. That is the source of their poetry--_fontes +aquarum_. + +It will be seen that, in all this, nature and truth get along as best +they can. It would be great good luck if any remnants of either should +survive in this cataclysm of false art, false style, false poetry. +This is what has caused the errors of several of our distinguished +reformers. Disgusted by the stiffness, the ostentation, the _pomposo_, +of this alleged dramatic poetry, they have concluded that the elements +of our poetic language were incompatible with the natural and the +true. The Alexandrine had wearied them so often, that they condemned +it without giving it a hearing, so to speak, and decided, a little +hastily, perhaps, that the drama should be written in prose. + +They were mistaken. If in fact the false is predominant in the style +as well as in the action of certain French tragedies, it is not the +verses that should be held responsible therefore, but the versifiers. +It was needful to condemn, not the form employed, but those who +employed it: the workmen, not the tool. + +To convince one's self how few obstacles the nature of our poetry +places in the way of the free expression of all that is true, we +should study our verse, not in Racine, perhaps, but often in Corneille +and always in Molière. Racine, a divine poet, is elegiac, lyric, epic; +Molière is dramatic. It is time to deal sternly with the criticisms +heaped upon that admirable style by the wretched taste of the last +century, and to proclaim aloud that Molière occupies the topmost +pinnacle of our drama, not only as a poet, but also as a writer. +_Palmas vere habet iste duas_. + +In his work the verse surrounds the idea, becomes of its very essence, +compresses and develops it at once, imparts to it a more slender, more +definite, more complete form, and gives us, in some sort, an extract +thereof. Verse is the optical form of thought. That is why it is +especially adapted to the perspective of the stage. Constructed in a +certain way, it communicates its relief to things which, but for it, +would be considered insignificant and trivial. It makes the tissue of +style finer and firmer. It is the knot which stays the thread. It is +the girdle which holds up the garment and gives it all its folds. What +could nature and the true lose, then, by entering into verse? We ask +the question of our prose-writers themselves--what do they lose +in Molière's poetry? Does wine--we beg pardon for another trivial +illustration--does wine cease to be wine when it is bottled? + +If we were entitled to say what, in our opinion, the style of dramatic +poetry should be, we would declare for a free, outspoken, sincere +verse, which dares say everything without prudery, express its meaning +without seeking for words; which passes naturally from comedy to +tragedy, from the sublime to the grotesque; by turns practical and +poetical, both artistic and inspired, profound and impulsive, of +wide range and true; verse which is apt opportunely to displace the +caesura, in order to disguise the monotony of Alexandrines; more +inclined to the _enjambement_ that lengthens the line, than to the +inversion of phrases that confuses the sense; faithful to rhyme, that +enslaved queen, that supreme charm of our poetry, that creator of +our metre; verse that is inexhaustible in the verity of its turns +of thought, unfathomable in its secrets of composition and of grace; +assuming, like Proteus, a thousand forms without changing its type and +character; avoiding long speeches; taking delight in dialogue; always +hiding behind the characters of the drama; intent, before everything, +on being in its place, and when it falls to its lot to be _beautiful_, +being so only by chance, as it were, in spite of itself and +unconsciously; lyric, epic, dramatic, at need; capable of running +through the whole gamut of poetry, of skipping from high notes to +low, from the most exalted to the most trivial ideas, from the most +extravagant to the most solemn, from the most superficial to the most +abstract, without ever passing beyond the limits of a spoken scene; in +a word, such verse as a man would write whom a fairy had endowed with +Corneille's mind and Molière's brain. It seems to us that such verse +would be _as fine as prose_. + +There would be nothing in common between poetry of this sort and that +of which we made a _post mortem_ examination just now. The distinction +will be easy to point out if a certain man of talent, to whom the +author of this book is under personal obligation, will allow us to +borrow his clever phrase: the other poetry was descriptive, this would +be picturesque. + +Let us repeat, verse on the stage should lay aside all self-love, all +exigence, all coquetry. It is simply a form, and a form which should +admit everything, which has no laws to impose on the drama, but on the +contrary should receive everything from it, to be transmitted to the +spectator--French, Latin, texts of laws, royal oaths, popular phrases, +comedy, tragedy, laughter, tears, prose and poetry. Woe to the poet +whose verse does not speak out! But this form is a form of bronze +which encases the thought in its metre beneath which the drama is +indestructible, which engraves it more deeply on the actor's mind, +warns him of what he omits and of what he adds, prevents him from +changing his role, from substituting himself for the author, makes +each word sacred, and causes what the poet has said to remain vivid +a long while in the hearer's memory. The idea, when steeped in verse, +suddenly assumes a more incisive, more brilliant quality. + +One feels that prose, which is necessarily more timid, obliged to wean +the drama from anything like epic or lyric poetry, reduced to dialogue +and to matter-of-fact, is a long way from possessing these resources. +It has much narrower wings. And then, too, it is much more easy of +access; mediocrity is at its ease in prose; and for the sake of a few +works of distinction such as have appeared of late, the art would very +soon be overloaded with abortions and embryos. Another faction of +the reformers incline to drama written in both prose and verse, as +Shakespeare composed it. This method has its advantages. There might, +however, be some incongruity in the transitions from one form to the +other; and when a tissue is homogeneous it is much stouter. However, +whether the drama should be written in prose is only a secondary +question. The rank of a work is certain to be fixed, not according to +its form, but according to its intrinsic value. In questions of this +sort, there is only one solution. There is but one weight that can +turn the scale in the balance of art--that is genius. + +Meanwhile, the first, the indispensable merit of a dramatic writer, +whether he write in prose or verse, is correctness. Not a mere +superficial correctness, the merit or defect of the descriptive +school, which makes Lhomond and Restaut the two wings of its Pegasus; +but that intimate, deep-rooted, deliberate correctness, which is +permeated with the genius of a language, which has sounded its roots +and searched its etymology; always unfettered, because it is sure +of its footing, and always more in harmony with the logic of the +language. Our Lady Grammar leads the one in leading-strings; the other +holds grammar in leash. It can venture anything, can create or invent +its style; it has a right to do so. For, whatever certain men may have +said who did not think what they were saying, and among whom we must +place, notably, him who writes these lines, the French tongue is not +_fixed_ and never will be. A language does not become fixed. The human +intellect is always on the march, or, if you prefer, in movement, +and languages with it. Things are made so. When the body changes, how +could the coat not change? The French of the nineteenth century can no +more be the French of the eighteenth, than that is the French of the +seventeenth, or than the French of the seventeenth is that of the +sixteenth. Montaigne's language is not Rabelais's, Pascal's is +not Montaigne's, Montesquieu's is not Pascal's. Each of the four +languages, taken by itself, is admirable because it is original. Every +age has its own ideas; it must have also words adapted to those ideas. +Languages are like the sea, they move to and fro incessantly. At +certain times they leave one shore of the world of thought and +overflow another. All that their waves thus abandon dries up and +vanishes. It is in this wise that ideas vanish, that words disappear. +It is the same with human tongues as with everything. Each age adds +and takes away something. What can be done? It is the decree of fate. +In vain, therefore, should we seek to petrify the mobile physiognomy +of our idiom in a fixed form. In vain do our literary Joshuas cry out +to the language to stand still; languages and the sun do not stand +still. The day when they become _fixed_, they are dead.--That is why +the French of a certain contemporary school is a dead language. + +Such are, substantially, but without the more elaborate development +which would make the evidence in their favour more complete, the +_present_ ideas of the author of this book concerning the drama. He is +far, however, from presuming to put forth his first dramatic essay as +an emanation of these ideas, which, on the contrary, are themselves, +it may be, simply results of its execution. It would be very +convenient for him, no doubt, and very clever, to rest his book on his +preface, and to defend each by the other. He prefers less cleverness +and more frankness. He proposes, therefore, to be the first to point +out the extreme tenuity of the thread connecting this preface with his +drama. His first plan, dictated by his laziness, was to give the work +to the public entirely unattended _el demonio sin las cuernas_, as +Yriarte said It was only after he had duly brought it to a close, that +at the solicitations of a few friends, blinded by their friendship, no +doubt, he determined to reckon with himself in a preface--to draw, so +to speak, a map of the poetic voyage he had made, to take account of +the acquisitions, good or bad, that he had brought home, and of the +new aspects in which the domain of art had presented itself to his +mind. Someone will take advantage of this admission, doubtless to +repeat the reproach already uttered by a critic in Germany, that +he has written "a treatise in defence of his poetry." What does it +matter? In the first place he was much more inclined to demolish +treatises on poetry than to write them. And then, would it not he +better always to write treatises based on a poem, than to write poems +based on a treatise? But no, we repeat that he has neither the talent +to create nor the presumption to put forth systems "Systems," cleverly +said Voltaire, "are like rats which pass through twenty holes, only to +find at last two or three which will not let them through." It would +have been, therefore, to undertake a useless task and one much beyond +his strength. What he has pleaded, on the contrary, is the freedom of +art against the despotism of systems, codes and rules It is his habit +to follow at all risks whatever he takes for his inspiration, and to +change moulds as often as he changes metals. Dogmatism in the arts is +what he shuns before everything. God forbid that he should aspire to +be numbered among those men, be they romanticists or classicists, who +compose _works according to their own systems_, who condemn themselves +to have but one form in their minds, to be forever _proving_ +something, to follow other laws than those of their temperaments and +then natures. The artificial work of these men, however talented they +may be, has no existence so far as art is concerned. It is a theory, +not poetry. + +Having attempted, in all that has gone before, to point out what, in +our opinion, was the origin of the drama, what its character is, and +what its style should he, the time has come to descend from these +exalted general considerations upon the art to the particular case +which has led us to put them forth. It remains for us to discourse to +the reader of our work, of this _Cromwell_; and as it is not a subject +in which we take pleasure, we will say very little about it in very +few words. + +Oliver Cromwell is one of those historical characters who are at once +very famous and very little known. Most of his biographers--and among +them there are some who are themselves historical--have left that +colossal figure incomplete. It would seem that they dared not assemble +all the characteristic features of that strange and gigantic prototype +of the religious reformation, of the political revolution of England. +Almost all of them have confined themselves to reproducing on a +larger scale the simple and ominous profile drawn by Bossuet from +his Catholic and monarchical standpoint, from his episcopal pulpit +supported by the throne of Louis XIV. + +Like everybody else, the author of this book went no further than +that. The name of Oliver Cromwell suggested to him simply the bare +conception of a fanatical regicide and a great captain. Only on +prowling among the chronicles of the times, which he did with delight, +and on looking through the English memoirs of the seventeenth century, +was he surprised to find that a wholly new Cromwell was gradually +exposed to his gaze. It was no longer simply Bossuet's Cromwell the +soldier, Cromwell the politician; it was a complex, heterogenous, +multiple being, made up of all sorts of contraries--a mixture of much +that was evil and much that was good, of genius and pettiness; a sort +of Tiberius-Dandin, the tyrant of Europe and the plaything of his +family; an old regicide, who delighted to humiliate the ambassadors +of all the kings of Europe, and was tormented by his young royalist +daughter; austere and gloomy in his manners, yet keeping four court +jesters about him; given to the composition of wretched verses; sober, +simple, frugal, yet a stickler for etiquette; a rough soldier and a +crafty politician; skilled in theological disputation and very fond +of it; a dull, diffuse, obscure orator, but clever in speaking the +language of anybody whom he wished to influence; a hypocrite and a +fanatic; a visionary swayed by phantoms of his childhood, believing +in astrologers and banishing them; suspicious to excess, always +threatening, rarely sanguinary; a strict observer of Puritan rules, +and solemnly wasting several hours a day in buffoonery; abrupt and +contemptuous with his intimates, caressing with the secretaries whom +he feared, holding his remorse at bay with sophistry, paltering with +his conscience, inexhaustible in adroitness, in tricks, in resources; +mastering his imagination by his intelligence; grotesque and sublime; +in a word, one of those men who are "square at the base," as they +were described by Napoleon, himself their chief, in his mathematically +exact and poetically figurative language. + +He who writes these lines, in presence of this rare and impressive +_ensemble_, felt that Bossuet's impassioned sketch was no longer +sufficient for him. He began to walk about that lofty figure, and he +was seized by a powerful temptation to depict the giant in all his +aspects. It was a rich soil. Beside the man of war and the statesman, +it remained to draw the theologian, the pedant, the wretched poet, +the seer of visions, the buffoon, the father, the husband, the human +Proteus--in a word, the twofold Cromwell, _homo et vir_. + +There is one period of his life, especially, in which this strange +personality exhibits itself in all its forms. It is not as one might +think at first blush, the period of the trial of Charles I, instinct +as that is with depressing and terrible interest; but it is the moment +when the ambitious mortal boldly attempted to pluck the fruit of that +monarch's death; it is the moment when Cromwell, having attained what +would have been to any other man the zenith of fortune--master of +England, whose innumerable factions knelt silently at his feet; master +of Scotland, of which he had made a satrapy, and of Ireland, which he +had turned into a prison; master of Europe through his diplomacy and +his fleets--seeks to fulfil the dream of his earliest childhood, the +last ambition of his life; to make himself king. History never had a +more impressive lesson in a more impressive drama. First of all, the +Protector arranges to be urged to assume the crown: the august farce +begins by addresses from municipalities, from counties; then there +comes an act of Parliament. Cromwell, the anonymous author of the +play, pretends to be displeased; we see him put out a hand toward the +sceptre, then draw it back; by a devious path he draws near the throne +from which he has swept the legitimate dynasty. At last he makes up +his mind, suddenly; by his command Westminster is decked with flags, +the dais is built, the crown is ordered from the jewelers, the day is +appointed for the ceremony.--Strange dénouement! On that very day, +in presence of the populace, the troops, the House of Commons, in +the great hall of Westminster, on that dais from which he expected +to descend as king, suddenly, as if aroused by a shock, he seems to +awaken at the sight of the crown, asks if he is dreaming, and what the +meaning is of all this regal pomp, and in a speech that lasts three +hours declines the kingly title. + +Was it because his spies had warned him of two conspiracies formed +by Cavaliers and Puritans in concert, which were intended, taking +advantage of this misstep, to break out on the same day? Was it +an inward revolution caused by the silence or the murmurs of the +populace, discomposed to see their regicide ascend the throne? Or was +it simply the sagacity of genius, the instinct of a far-seeing, albeit +unbridled ambition, which realizes how one step forward changes a +man's position and attitude, and which dares not expose its plebeian +structure to the wind of unpopularity? Was it all these at once? +This is a question which no contemporaneous document answers +satisfactorily. So much the better: the poet's liberty is the more +complete, and the drama is the gainer by the latitude which history +affords it. It will be seen that here the latitude is ample and +unique; this is, in truth, the decisive hour, the turning-point in +Cromwell's life. It is the moment when his chimera escapes from +him, when the present kills the future, when, to use an expressive +colloquialism, his destiny _misses fire_. All of Cromwell is at stake +in the comedy being played between England and himself. + +Such then is the man and such the period of which we have tried to +give an idea in this book. + +The author has allowed himself to be seduced by the childlike +diversion of touching the keys of that great harpsichord. +Unquestionably, more skillful hands might have evoked a thrilling +and profound melody--not of those which simply caress the ear--but of +those intimate harmonies which stir the whole man to the depths of his +being, as if each key of the key-board were connected with a fibre +of the heart. He has surrendered to the desire to depict all those +fanaticisms, all those superstitions--maladies to which religion is +subject at certain epochs; to the longing to "make playthings of all +these men," as Hamlet says. To set in array about and below Cromwell, +himself the centre and pivot of that court, of that people, of that +little world, which attracts all to his cause and inspires all with +his vigour, that twofold conspiracy devised by two factions which +detest each other, but join hands to overthrow the man who blocks +their path, but which unite simply without blending; and that Puritan +faction, of divers minds, fanatical, gloomy, unselfish, choosing +for leader the most insignificant of men for such a great part, the +egotistical and cowardly Lambert; and the faction of the Cavaliers, +featherheaded, merry, unscrupulous, reckless, devoted, led by the +man who, aside from his devotion to the cause, was least fitted to +represent it, the stern and upright Ormond; and those ambassadors, +so humble and fawning before the soldier of fortune; and the court +itself, an extraordinary mixture of upstarts and great nobles +vying with one another in baseness; and the four jesters whom the +contemptuous neglect of history permitted me to invent; and Cromwell's +family, each member of which is as a thorn in his flesh; and Thurloe, +the Protector's Achates; and the Jewish rabbi, Israel Ben-Manasseh, +spy, usurer, and astrologer, vile on two sides, sublime on the third; +and Rochester, the unique Rochester, absurd and clever, refined and +crapulous, always cursing, always in love, and always tipsy, as he +himself boasted to Bishop Burnet--wretched poet and gallant gentleman, +vicious and ingenuous, staking his head and indifferent whether +he wins the game provided it amuses him--in a word, capable of +everything, of ruse and recklessness, calculation and folly, villainy +and generosity; and the morose Carr, of whom history describes but +one trait, albeit a most characteristic and suggestive one; and those +other fanatics, of all ranks and varieties: Harrison, the thieving +fanatic; Barebones the shopkeeping fanatic; Syndercomb, the bravo; +Garland the tearful and pious assassin; gallant Colonel Overton, +intelligent but a little declamatory; the austere and unbending +Ludlow, who left his ashes and his epitaph at Lausanne; and lastly, +"Milton and a few other men of mind," as we read in a pamphlet of 1675 +(_Cromwell the Politician_), which reminds one of "a certain Dante" of +the Italian chronicle. + +We omit many less important characters, of each of whom, however, the +actual life is known, and each of whom has his marked individuality, +and all of whom contributed to the fascination which this vast +historical scene exerted upon the author's imagination. From that +scene he constructed this drama. He moulded it in verse, because he +preferred to do so. One will discover on reading it how little +thought he gave to his work while writing this preface--with what +disinterestedness, for instance, he contended against the dogma of the +unities. His drama does not leave London; it begins on June 25, 1657, +at three in the morning, and ends on the 26th at noon. Observe that he +has almost followed the classic formula, as the professors of poetry +lay it down to-day. They need not, however, thank him for it. With the +permission of history, not of Aristotle, the author constructed his +drama thus; and because, when the interest is the same, he prefers a +compact subject to a widely diffused one. + +It is evident that, in its present proportions, this drama could not +be given at one of our theatrical performances. It is too long. The +reader will perhaps comprehend, none the less, that every part of it +was written for the stage. It was on approaching his subject to study +it that the author recognized, or thought that he recognized, the +impossibility of procuring the performance of a faithful reproduction +of it on our stage, in the exceptional position it now occupies, +between the academic Charybdis and the administrative Scylla, between +the literary juries and the political censorship. He was required +to choose: either the wheedling, tricky, false tragedy, which may be +acted, or the audaciously true drama, which is prohibited. The first +was not worth the trouble of writing, so he preferred to attempt +the second. That is why, hopeless of ever being put on the stage, +he abandoned himself, freely and submissively, to the whims of +composition, to the pleasure of painting with a freer hand, to the +developments which his subject demanded, and which, even if they keep +his drama off the stage, have at all events the advantage of making it +almost complete from the historical standpoint. However, the reading +committees are an obstacle of the second class only. If it should +happen that the dramatic censorship, realizing how far this harmless, +conscientious and accurate picture of Cromwell and his time is removed +from our own age, should sanction its production on the stage, in that +case, but only in that case, the author might perhaps extract from +this drama a play which would venture to show itself on the boards, +and would be hissed. + +Until then he will continue to hold aloof from the theatre. And even +then he will leave his cherished and tranquil retirement soon enough, +for the agitation and excitement of this new world. God grant that he +may never repent of having exposed the unspotted obscurity of his name +and his person to the shoals, the squalls and tempests of the pit, +and above all (for what does a mere failure matter?) to the wretched +bickerings of the wings; of having entered that shifting, foggy, +stormy atmosphere, where ignorance dogmatises, where envy hisses, +where cabals cringe and crawl, where the probity of talent has so +often been misrepresented, where the noble innocence of genius is +sometimes so out of place, where mediocrity triumphs in lowering to +its level the superiority which obscures it, where one finds so many +small men for a single great one, so many nobodies for one Talma, so +many myrmidons for one Achilles! This sketch will seem ill-tempered +perhaps, and far from flattering; but does it not fully mark out the +distance that separates our stage, the abode of intrigues and uproar, +from the solemn serenity of the ancient stage? + +Whatever may happen, he feels bound to warn in advance that small +number of persons whom such a production might attract, that a play +made up of excerpts from _Cromwell_ would occupy no less time then is +ordinarily occupied by a theatrical performance. It is difficult for +a _romantic_ theatre to maintain itself otherwise. Surely, if people +desire something different from the tragedies in which one or two +characters, abstract types of a purely metaphysical idea, stalk +solemnly about on a narrow stage occupied only by a few confidents, +colourless reflections of the heroes, employed to fill the gaps in a +simple, unified, single-stringed plot; if that sort of thing has +grown tiresome, a whole evening is not too much time to devote to +delineating with some fullness a man among men, a whole critical +period: the one, with his peculiar temperament, his genius which +adapts itself thereto, his beliefs which dominate them both, his +passions which throw out of gear his temperament, his genius and his +beliefs, his tastes which give colour to his passions, his habits +which regulate his tastes and muzzle his passions, and with the +innumerable procession of men of every sort whom these various +elements keep in constant commotion about him; the other, with +its manners, its laws, its fashions, its wit, its attainments, its +superstitions, its events, and its people, whom all these first causes +in turn mould like soft wax. It is needless to say that such a picture +will be of huge proportions. Instead of one personality, like that +with which the abstract drama of the old school is content, there will +be twenty, forty, fifty,--who knows how many?--of every size and of +every degree of importance. There will be a crowd of characters in the +drama. Would it not be niggardly to assign it two hours only, and +give up the rest of the performance to opera-comique or farce? to cut +Shakespeare for Bobèche?--And do not imagine that, if the plot is well +adjusted, the multitude of characters set in motion will cause fatigue +to the spectator or confusion in the drama. Shakespeare, abounding in +petty details, is at the same time, and for that very reason, imposing +by the grandeur of the _ensemble._ It is the oak which casts a most +extensive shadow with its myriads of slender leaves. + +Let us hope that people in France will ere long become accustomed to +devote a whole evening to a single play. In England and Germany there +are plays that last six hours. The Greeks, about whom we hear so much, +the Greeks--and after the fashion of Scudéri we will cite at +this point the classicist Dacier, in the seventh chapter of his +_Poetics_--the Greeks sometimes went so far as to have twelve or +sixteen plays acted in a single day. Among a people who are fond of +spectacles the attention is more lively than is commonly believed +The _Mariage de Figaro_, the connecting link of Beaumarchais's +great trilogy, occupies the whole evening, and who was ever bored or +fatigued by it Beaumarchais was worthy to venture on the first step +toward that goal of modern art at which it will be impossible to +arrive in two hours, that profound, insatiable interest which results +from a vast, lifelike and multiform plot. "But," someone will say, +"this performance, consisting of a single play, would be monotonous, +would seem terribly long"--Not so. On the contrary it would lose +its present monotony and tediousness. For what is done now? The +spectator's entertainment is divided into two or three sharply defined +parts. At first he is given two hours of serious enjoyment, then one +hour of hilarious enjoyment, these, with the hour of entr' actes, +which we do not include in the enjoyment make four hours What would +the romantic drama do? It would mingle and blend artistically these +two kinds of enjoyment. It would lead the audience constantly from +sobriety to laughter, from mirthful excitement to heart breaking +emotion, "from grave to gay, from pleasant to severe." For, as we have +already proved, the drama is the grotesque in conjunction with the +sublime, the soul within the body, it is tragedy beneath comedy. Do +you not see that, by affording you repose from one impression by means +of another, by sharpening the tragic upon the comic, the merry upon +the terrible, and at need calling in the charms of the opera, +these performances, while presenting but one play, would be worth a +multitude of others? The romantic stage would make a piquant, savoury, +diversified dish of that which, on the classic stage, is a drug +divided into two pills. + +The author has soon come to the end of what he had to say to the +reader. He has no idea how the critics will greet this drama and +these thoughts, summarily set forth, stripped of their corollaries and +ramifications, put together _currente calamo_, and in haste to have +done with them. Doubtless they will appear to "the disciples of +La Harpe" most impudent and strange. But if perchance, naked and +undeveloped as they are, they should have the power to start upon +the road of truth this public whose education is so far advanced, +and whose minds so many notable writings, of criticism or of original +thought, books or newspapers, have already matured for art, let the +public follow that impulsion, caring naught whether it comes from a +man unknown, from a voice with no authority, from a work of little +merit. It is a copper bell which summons the people to the true temple +and the true God. + +There is to-day the old literary régime as well as the old political +régime. The last century still weighs upon the present one at almost +every point. It is notably oppressive in the matter of criticism. For +instance, you find living men who repeat to you this definition of +taste let fall by Voltaire: "Taste in poetry is no different from what +it is in women's clothes." Taste, then, is coquetry. Remarkable words, +which depict marvellously the painted, _moucheté_, powdered poetry +of the eighteenth century--that literature in paniers, pompons and +falbalas. They give an admirable résumé of an age with which the +loftiest geniuses could not come in contact without becoming petty, in +one respect or another; of an age when Montesquieu was able and apt +to produce _Le Temple de Gnide_, Voltaire _Le Temple du Goût_, +Jean-Jacques _Le Devin du Village_. + +Taste is the common sense of genius. This is what will soon be +demonstrated by another school of criticism, powerful, outspoken, +well-informed,--a school of the century which is beginning to put +forth vigorous shoots under the dead and withered branches of the old +school. This youthful criticism, as serious as the other is frivolous, +as learned as the other is ignorant, has already established organs +that are listened to, and one is sometimes surprised to find, even +in the least important sheets, excellent articles emanating from it. +Joining hands with all that is fearless and superior in letters, it +will deliver us from two scourges: tottering _classicism_, and false +_romanticism_, which has the presumption to show itself at the feet +of the true. For modern genius already has its shadow, its copy, its +parasite, its _classic_, which forms itself upon it, smears itself +with its colours, assumes its livery, picks up its crumbs, and, like +_the sorcerer's pupil_, puts in play, with words retained by the +memory, elements of theatrical action of which it has not the secret. +Thus it does idiotic things which its master many a time has much +difficulty in making good. But the thing that must be destroyed first +of all is the old false taste. Present-day literature must be cleansed +of its rust. In vain does the rust eat into it and tarnish it. It +is addressing a young, stern, vigorous generation, which does not +understand it. The train of the eighteenth century is still dragging +in the nineteenth; but we, we young men who have seen Bonaparte, are +not the ones who will carry it. + +We are approaching, then, the moment when we shall see the new +criticism prevail, firmly established upon a broad and deep +foundation. People generally will soon understand that writers should +be judged, not according to rules and species, which are contrary to +nature and art, but according to the immutable principles of the art +of composition, and the special laws of their individual temperaments. +The sound judgment of all men will be ashamed of the criticism which +broke Pierre Corneille on the wheel, gagged Jean Racine, and which +ridiculously rehabilitated John Milton only by virtue of the epic +code of Père le Bossu. People will consent to place themselves at the +author's standpoint, to view the subject with his eyes, in order +to judge a work intelligently. They will lay aside--and it is M. de +Chateaubriand who speaks--"the paltry criticism of defects for the +noble and fruitful criticism of beauties." It is time that all acute +minds should grasp the thread that frequently connects what we, +following our special whim, call "defects" with what we call "beauty." +Defects--at all events those which we call by that name--are often the +inborn, necessary, inevitable conditions of good qualities. + + Scit genius, natale comes qul temperat astrum. + +Who ever saw a medal without its reverse? a talent that had not some +shadow with its brilliancy, some smoke with its flame? Such a blemish +can be only the inseparable consequence of such beauty. This rough +stroke of the brush, which offends my eye at close range, completes +the effect and gives relief to the whole picture. Efface one and you +efface the other. Originality is made up of such things. Genius is +necessarily uneven. There are no high mountains without deep ravines. +Fill up the valley with the mountain and you will have nothing but +a steppe, a plateau, the plain of Les Sablons instead of the Alps, +swallows and not eagles. + +We must also take into account the weather, the climate, the local +influences. The Bible, Homer, hurt us sometimes by their very +sublimities. Who would want to part with a word of either of them? Our +infirmity often takes fright at the inspired bold flights of +genius, for lack of power to swoop down upon objects with such vast +intelligence. And then, once again, there are _defects_ which take +root only in masterpieces; it is given only to certain geniuses +to have certain defects. Shakespeare is blamed for his abuse of +metaphysics, of wit, of redundant scenes, of obscenities, for his +employment of the mythological nonsense in vogue in his time, for +exaggeration, obscurity, bad taste, bombast, asperities of style. The +oak, that giant tree which we were comparing to Shakespeare just now, +and which has more than one point of resemblance to him, the oak has +an unusual shape, gnarled branches, dark leaves, and hard, rough bark; +but it is the oak. + +And it is because of these qualities that it is the oak. If you would +have a smooth trunk, straight branches, satiny leaves, apply to the +pale birch, the hollow elder, the weeping willow; but leave the mighty +oak in peace. Do not stone that which gives you shade. + +The author of this book knows as well as any one the numerous and +gross faults of his works. If it happens too seldom that he corrects +them, it is because it is repugnant to him to return to a work that +has grown cold. Moreover, what has he ever done that is worth +that trouble? The labor that he would throw away in correcting the +imperfections of his books, he prefers to use in purging his intellect +of its defects. It is his method to correct one work only in another +work. + +However, no matter what treatment may be accorded his book, he +binds himself not to defend it, in whole or in part. If his drama is +worthless, what is the use of upholding it? If it is good, why defend +it? Time will do the book justice or will wreak justice upon it. Its +success for the moment is the affair of the publisher alone. If then +the wrath of the critics is aroused by the publication of this essay, +he will let them do their worst. What reply should he make to them? +He is not one of those who speak, as the Castilian poet says, "through +the mouths of their wounds." + + Por la boca de su herida. + +One last word. It may have been noticed that in this somewhat long +journey through so many different subjects, the author has generally +refrained from resting his personal views upon texts or citations of +authorities. It is not, however, because he did not have them at his +hand. + +"If the poet establishes things that are impossible according to the +rules of his art, he makes a mistake unquestionably; but it ceases to +be a mistake when by this means he has reached the end that he +aimed at; for he has found what he sought,"--"They take for nonsense +whatever the weakness of their intellects does not allow them to +understand. They are especially prone to call absurd those wonderful +passages in which the poet, in order the better to enforce his +argument, departs, if we may so express it, from his argument. In +fact, the precept which makes it a rule sometimes to disregard rules, +is a mystery of the art which it is not easy to make men understand +who are absolutely without taste and whom a sort of abnormality of +mind renders insensible to those things which ordinarily impress men." + +Who said the first? Aristotle. Who said the last? Boileau. By these +two specimens you will see that the author of this drama might, as +well as another, have shielded himself with proper names and taken +refuge behind others' reputations. But he preferred to leave that +style of argument to those who deem it unanswerable, universal and +all-powerful. As for himself, he prefers reasons to authorities; he +has always cared more for arms than for coats-of-arms. + +_October_, 1827. + + +[Footnote A: Victor Hugo (1802-1883) the chief of the romantic school +in France, issued in the Preface to "Cromwell" the manifesto of the +movement. Poet, dramatist, and novelist, Hugo remained through a +long life the most conspicuous man of letters in France; and in the +document here printed he laid down the principles which revolutionized +the literary world of his time.] + + + + +PREFACE TO LEAVES OF GRASS + +BY WALT WHITMAN. (1855)[A] + + +America does not repel the past or what it has produced under +its forms or amid other politics or the idea of castes or the old +religions ... accepts the lesson with calmness ... is not so impatient +as has been supposed that the slough still sticks to opinions and +manners and literature while the life which served its requirements +has passed into the new life of the new forms ... perceives that the +corpse is slowly borne from the eating and sleeping rooms of the house +... perceives that it waits a little while in the door ... that it was +fittest for its days ... that its action has descended to the stalwart +and well shaped heir who approaches ... and that he shall be fittest +for his days. + +The Americans of all nations at any time upon the earth, have +probably the fullest poetical nature. The United States themselves are +essentially the greatest poem. In the history of the earth hitherto +the largest and most stirring appear tame and orderly to their ampler +largeness and stir. Here at last is something in the doings of man +that corresponds with the broadcast doings of the day and night. Here +is not merely a nation but a teeming nation of nations. Here is action +untied from strings necessarily blind to particulars and details +magnificently moving in vast masses. Here is the hospitality which +forever indicates heroes.... Here are the roughs and beards and +space and ruggedness and nonchalance that the soul loves. Here the +performance disdaining the trivial unapproached in the tremendous +audacity of its crowds and groupings and the push of its perspective +spreads with crampless and flowing breadth and showers its prolific +and splendid extravagance. One sees it must indeed own the riches of +the summer and winter, and need never be bankrupt while corn grows +from the ground or the orchards drop apples or the bays contain fish +or men beget children upon women. + +Other states indicate themselves in their deputies ... but the genius of +the United States is not best or most in its executives or legislatures, +nor in its ambassadors or authors or colleges or churches or parlors, +nor even in its newspapers or inventors ... but always most in the +common people. Their manners speech dress friendship--the freshness and +candor of their physiognomy--the picturesque looseness of their carriage +... their deathless attachment to freedom--their aversion to anything +indecorous or soft or mean--the practical acknowledgment of the citizens +of one state by the citizens of all other states--the fierceness of +their roused resentment--- their curiosity and welcome of novelty--their +self-esteem and wonderful sympathy--their susceptibility to a +slight--the air they have of persons who never knew how it felt to stand +in the presence of superiors--the fluency of their speech--their delight +in music, the sure symptom of manly tenderness and native elegance of +soul ... their good temper and open handedness--the terrible +significance of their elections--the President's taking off his hat to +them, not they to him--these too are unrhymed poetry. It awaits the +gigantic and generous treatment worthy of it. + +The largeness of nature or the nation were monstrous without a +corresponding largeness and generosity of the spirit of the citizen. +Not nature nor swarming states nor streets and steamships nor +prosperous business nor farms nor capital nor learning may suffice +for the ideal of man ... nor suffice the poet. No reminiscences may +suffice either. A live nation can always cut a deep mark and can have +the best authority the cheapest ... namely from its own soul. This is +the sum of the profitable uses of individuals or states and of present +action and grandeur and of the subjects of poets.--As if it were +necessary to trot back generation after generation to the eastern +records! As if the beauty and sacredness of the demonstrable must fall +behind that of the mythical! As if men do not make their mark out of +any times! As if the opening of the western continent by discovery and +what has transpired since in North and South America were less than +the small theatre of the antique or the aimless sleepwalking of the +middle ages! The pride of the United States leaves the wealth and +finesse of the cities and all returns of commerce and agriculture and +all the magnitude of geography or shows of exterior victory to enjoy +the breed of full sized men or one full sized man unconquerable and +simple. + +The American poets are to enclose old and new for America is the race +of races. Of them a bard is to be commensurate with a people. To +him the other continents arrive as contributions ... he gives them +reception for their sake and his own sake. His spirit responds to his +country's spirit ... he incarnates its geography and natural life +and rivers and lakes. Mississippi with annual freshets and changing +chutes, Missouri and Columbia and Ohio and St. Lawrence with the Falls +and beautiful masculine Hudson, do not embouchure where they spend +themselves more than they embouchure into him. The blue breadth over +the inland sea of Virginia and Maryland and the sea off Massachusetts +and Maine and over Manhattan bay and over Champlain and Erie and over +Ontario and Huron and Michigan and Superior, and over the Texan and +Mexican and Floridian and Cuban seas, and over the seas off California +and Oregon, is not tallied by the blue breadth of the waters below +more than the breadth of above and below is tallied by him. When the +long Atlantic coast stretches longer and the Pacific coast stretches +longer he easily stretches with them north or south. He spans between +them also from east to west and reflects what is between them. On +him rise solid growths that offset the growths of pine and cedar and +hemlock and live oak and locust and chestnut and cypress and hickory +and limetree and cottonwood and tuliptree and cactus and wildvine and +tamarind and persimmon ... and tangles as tangled as any canebrake or +swamp ... and forests coated with transparent ice, and icicles hanging +from boughs and crackling in the wind ... and sides and peaks of +mountains ... and pasturage sweet and free as savannah or upland or +prairie ... with flights and songs and screams that answer those +of the wild pigeon and high-hold and orchard-oriole and coot and +surf-duck and red-shouldered-hawk and fish-hawk and white ibis +and Indian-hen and cat-owl and water-pheasant and qua-bird and +pied-sheldrake and blackbird and mockingbird and buzzard and condor +and night-heron and eagle. To him the hereditary countenance descends +both mother's and father's. To him enter the essences of the real +things and past and present events--of the enormous diversity +of temperature and agriculture and mines--the tribes of red +aborigines--the weather-beaten vessels entering new ports or making +landings on rocky coasts--the first settlements north or south--the +rapid stature and muscle--the haughty defiance of '76, and the war +and peace and formation of the constitution ... the Union always +surrounded by blatherers and always calm and impregnable--the +perpetual coming of immigrants--the wharf-hem'd cities and superior +marine--the unsurveyed interior--the loghouses and clearings and wild +animals and hunters and trappers ... the free commerce--the fisheries +and whaling and gold-digging--the endless gestation of new states--the +convening of Congress every December, the members duly coming up from +all climates and the uttermost parts ... the noble character of the +young mechanics and of all free American workmen and workwomen ... the +general ardor and friendliness and enterprise--the perfect equality of +the female with the male ... the large amativeness--the fluid movement +of the population--the factories and mercantile life and laborsaving +machinery--the Yankee swap--the New York firemen and the target +excursion--the Southern plantation life--the character of the +northeast and of the northwest and southwest--slavery and the +tremulous spreading of hands to protect it, and the stern opposition +to it which shall never cease till it ceases or the speaking of +tongues and the moving of lips cease. For such the expression of the +American poet is to be transcendent and new. It is to be indirect and +not direct or descriptive or epic. Its quality goes through these to +much more. Let the age and wars of other nations be chanted and their +eras and characters be illustrated and that finish the verse. Not so +the great psalm of the republic. Here the theme is creative and has +vista. Here comes one among the well beloved stonecutters and plans +with decision and science and sees the solid and beautiful forms of +the future where there are now no solid forms. + +Of all nations the United States with veins full of poetical stuff +most need poets and will doubtless have the greatest and use them the +greatest. Their Presidents shall not be their common referee so much +as their poets shall. Of all mankind the great poet is the equable +man. Not in him but off from him things are grotesque or eccentric or +fail of their sanity. Nothing out of its place is good and nothing +in its place is bad. He bestows on every object or quality its fit +proportions neither more nor less. He is the arbiter of the diverse +and he is the key. He is the equalizer of his age and land ... he +supplies what wants supplying and checks what wants checking. If peace +is the routine out of him speaks the spirit of peace, large, rich, +thrifty, building vast and populous cities, encouraging agriculture +and the arts and commerce--lighting the study of man, the soul, +immortality--federal, state or municipal government, marriage, health, +freetrade, intertravel by land and sea ... nothing too close, nothing +too far off ... the stars not too far off. In war he is the most +deadly force of the war. Who recruits him recruits horse and foot ... +he fetches parks of artillery the best that engineer ever knew. If the +time becomes slothful and heavy he knows how to arouse it ... he can +make every word he speaks draw blood. Whatever stagnates in the flat +of custom or obedience or legislation he never stagnates. Obedience +does not master him, he masters it. High up out of reach he stands +turning a concentrated light ... he turns the pivot with his finger +... he baffles the swiftest runners as he stands and easily overtakes +and envelopes them. The time straying towards infidelity and +confections and persiflage he withholds by his steady faith ... he +spreads out his dishes ... he offers the sweet firmfibred meat that +grows men and women. His brain is the ultimate brain. He is no arguer +... he is judgment. He judges not as the judge judges but as the sun +falling around a helpless thing. As he sees the farthest he has the +most faith. His thoughts are the hymns of the praise of things. In +the talk on the soul and eternity and God off of his equal plane he +is silent. He sees eternity less like a play with a prologue and +dénouement ... he sees eternity in men and women ... he does not see +men or women as dreams or dots. Faith is the antiseptic of the soul +... it pervades the common people and preserves them ... they +never give up believing and expecting and trusting. There is that +indescribable freshness and unconsciousness about an illiterate person +that humbles and mocks the power of the noblest expressive genius. The +poet sees for a certainty how one not a great artist may be just as +sacred and perfect as the greatest artist.... The power to destroy or +remould is freely used by him, but never the power of attack. What is +past is past. If he does not expose superior models and prove himself +by every step he takes he is not what is wanted. The presence of the +greatest poet conquers ... not parleying or struggling or any prepared +attempts. Now he has passed that way see after him! There is not left +any vestige of despair or misanthropy or cunning or exclusiveness +or the ignominy of a nativity or color or delusion of hell or the +necessity of hell ... and no man thenceforward shall be degraded for +ignorance or weakness or sin. + +The greatest poet hardly knows pettiness or triviality. If he breathes +into anything that was before thought small it dilates with the +grandeur and life of the universe. He is a seer ... he is individual +... he is complete in himself ... the others are as good as he, only +he sees it and they do not. He is not one of the chorus ... he does +not stop for any regulation ... he is the president of regulation. +What the eyesight does to the rest he does to the rest. Who knows +the curious mystery of the eyesight? The other senses corroborate +themselves, but this is removed from any proof but its own and +foreruns the identities of the spiritual world. A single glance of it +mocks all the investigations of man and all the instruments and books +of the earth and all reasoning. What is marvellous? what is unlikely? +what is impossible or baseless or vague? after you have once just +opened the space of a peachpit and given audience to far and near and +to the sunset and had all things enter with electric swiftness softly +and duly without contusion or jostling or jam. + +The land and sea, the animals fishes and birds, the sky of heavens and +the orbs, the forests mountains and rivers, are not small themes ... +but folks expect of the poet to indicate more than the beauty and +dignity which always attach to dumb real objects,... they expect him +to indicate the path between reality and their souls. Men and women +perceive the beauty well enough ... probably as well as he. The +passionate tenacity of hunters, woodmen, early risers, cultivators +of gardens and orchards and fields, the love of healthy women for +the manly form, seafaring persons, drivers of horses, the passion for +light and the open air, all is an old varied sign of the unfailing +perception of beauty and of a residence of the poetic in outdoor +people. They can never be assisted by poets to perceive ... some may +but they never can. The poetic quality is not marshalled in rhyme +or uniformity or abstract addresses to things nor in melancholy +complaints or good precepts, but is the life of these and much else +and is in the soul. The profit of rhyme is that it drops seeds of a +sweeter and more luxuriant rhyme, and of uniformity that it conveys +itself into its own roots in the ground out of sight. The rhyme and +uniformity of perfect poems show the free growth of metrical laws and +bud from them as unerringly and loosely as lilacs and roses on a bush, +and take shapes as compact as the shapes of chestnuts and oranges and +melons and pears, and shed the perfume impalpable to form. The fluency +and ornaments of the finest poems or music or orations or recitations +are not independent but dependent. All beauty comes from beautiful +blood and a beautiful brain. If the greatnesses are in conjunction +in a man or woman it is enough ... the fact will prevail through the +universe ... but the gaggery and gilt of a million years will not +prevail. Who troubles himself about his ornaments or fluency is lost. +This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, +despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for +the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate +tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward +the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any +man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and +with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in +the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine +all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss +whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great +poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the +silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes +and in every motion and joint of your body.... The poet shall not +spend his time in unneeded work. He shall know that the ground is +always ready ploughed and manured ... others may not know it but he +shall. He shall go directly to the creation. His trust shall +master the trust of everything he touches ... and shall master all +attachment. + +The known universe has one complete lover and that is the greatest +poet. He consumes an eternal passion and is indifferent which chance +happens and which possible contingency of fortune or misfortune and +persuades daily and hourly his delicious pay. What baulks or breaks +others is fuel for his burning progress to contact and amorous joy. +Other proportions of the reception of pleasure dwindle to nothing to +his proportions. All expected from heaven or from the highest he is +rapport with in the sight of the daybreak or a scene of the winter +woods or the presence of children playing or with his arm round +the neck of a man or woman. His love above all love has leisure and +expanse ... he leaves room ahead of himself. He is no irresolute +or suspicious lover ... he is sure ... he scorns intervals. His +experience and the showers and thrills are not for nothing. Nothing +can jar him ... suffering and darkness cannot--death and fear cannot. +To him complaint and jealousy and envy are corpses buried and rotten +in the earth ... he saw them buried. The sea is not surer of the shore +or the shore of the sea than he is of the fruition of his love and of +all perfection and beauty. + +The fruition of beauty is no chance of hit or miss ... it is +inevitable as life ... it is as exact and plumb as gravitation. From +the eyesight proceeds another eyesight and from the hearing proceeds +another hearing and from the voice proceeds another voice eternally +curious of the harmony of things with man. To these respond +perfections not only in the committees that were supposed to stand for +the rest but in the rest themselves just the same. These understand +the law of perfection in masses and floods ... that its finish is +to each for itself and onward from itself ... that it is profuse and +impartial ... that there is not a minute of the light or dark nor an +acre of the earth and sea without it--nor any direction of the sky +nor any trade or employment nor any turn of events. This is the reason +that about the proper expression of beauty there is precision and +balance ... one part does not need to be thrust above another. The +best singer is not the one who has the most lithe and powerful organ +... the pleasure of poems is not in them that take the handsomest +measure and similes and sound. + +Without effort and without exposing in the least how it is done the +greatest poet brings the spirit of any or all events and passions and +scenes and persons some more and some less to bear on your individual +character as you hear or read. To do this well is to compete with the +laws that pursue and follow time. What is the purpose must surely be +there and the clue of it must be there ... and the faintest +indication is the indication of the best and then becomes the clearest +indication. Past and present and future are not disjoined but joined. +The greatest poet forms the consistence of what is to be from what has +been and is. He drags the dead out of their coffins and stands them +again on their feet ... he says to the past, Rise and walk before me +that I may realize you. He learns the lesson ... he places himself +where the future becomes present. The greatest poet does not only +dazzle his rays over character and scenes and passions ... he finally +ascends and finishes all ... he exhibits the pinnacles that no man can +tell what they are for or what is beyond ... he glows a moment on the +extremest verge. He is most wonderful in his last half-hidden smile or +frown ... by that flash of the moment of parting the one that sees +it shall be encouraged or terrified afterward for many years. The +greatest poet does not moralize or make applications of morals ... he +knows the soul. The soul has that measureless pride which consists in +never acknowledging any lessons but its own. But it has sympathy as +measureless as its pride and the one balances the other and neither +can stretch too far while it stretches in company with the other. The +inmost secrets of art sleep with the twain. The greatest poet has lain +close betwixt both and they are vital in his style and thoughts. + +The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the +light of letters is simplicity. Nothing is better than simplicity ... +nothing can make up for excess or for the lack of definiteness. To +carry on the heave of impulse and pierce intellectual depths and give +all subjects their articulations are powers neither common nor very +uncommon. But to speak in literature with the perfect rectitude and +insouciance of the movements of animals and the unimpeachableness of +the sentiment of trees in the woods and grass by the roadside is the +flawless triumph of art. If you have looked on him who has achieved +it you have looked on one of the masters of the artists of all nations +and times. You shall not contemplate the flight of the gray gull +over the bay or the mettlesome action of the blood horse or the tall +leaning of sunflowers on their stalk or the appearance of the sun +journeying through heaven or the appearance of the moon afterward with +any more satisfaction than you shall contemplate him. The greatest +poet has less a marked style and is more the channel of thoughts +and things without increase or diminution and is the free channel of +himself. He swears to his art, I will not be meddlesome, I will not +have in my writing any elegance or effect or originality to hang in +the way between me and the rest like curtains. I will have nothing +hang in the way not the richest curtains. What I tell I tell for +precisely what it is. Let who may exalt or startle or fascinate or +soothe I will have purposes as health or heat or snow has and be as +regardless of observation. What I experience or portray shall go from +my composition without a shred of my composition. You shall stand by +my side and look in the mirror with me. + +The old red blood and stainless gentility of great poets will be +proved by their unconstraint. A heroic person walks at his ease +through and out of that custom or precedent or authority that suits +him not. Of the traits of the brotherhood of writers savans musicians +inventors and artists, nothing is finer than silent defiance advancing +from new free forms. In the need of poems philosophy politics +mechanism science behavior, the craft of art, an appropriate native +grand-opera, shipcraft; or any craft, he is greatest for ever and +for ever who contributes the greatest original practical example. The +cleanest expression is that which finds no sphere worthy of itself and +makes one. The messages of great poets to each man and woman are, +Come to us on equal terms, Only then can you understand us, We are no +better than you, What we enclose you enclose, What we enjoy you may +enjoy. Did you suppose there could be only one Supreme? We affirm +there can be unnumbered Supremes, and that one does not countervail +another any more than one eyesight countervails another ... and that +men can be good or grand only of the consciousness of their supremacy +within them. What do you think is the grandeur of storms and +dismemberments and the deadliest battles and wrecks and the wildest +fury of the elements and the power of the sea and the motion of nature +and the throes of human desires and dignity and hate and love? It +is that something in the soul which says, Rage on, Whirl on, I tread +master here and everywhere, Master of the spasms of the sky and of the +shatter of the sea, Master of nature and passion and death, And of all +terror and all pain. + +The American bards shall be marked for generosity and affection and +for encouraging competitors.... They shall be kosmos ... without +monopoly or secrecy ... glad to pass anything to any one ... hungry +for equals night and day. They shall not be careful of riches and +privilege ... they shall be riches and privilege ... they shall +perceive who the most affluent man is. The most affluent man is +he that confronts all the shows he sees by equivalents out of the +stronger wealth of himself. The American bard shall delineate no class +of persons nor one or two out of the strata of interests nor love most +nor truth most nor the soul most nor the body most ... and not be for +the eastern states more than the western or the northern states more +than the southern. + +Exact science and its practical movements are no checks on the +greatest poet but always his encouragement and support. The outset +and remembrance are there ... there the arms that lifted him first and +brace him best ... there he returns after all his goings and comings. +The sailor and traveller ... the anatomist chemist astronomer +geologist phrenologist spiritualist mathematician historian and +lexicographer are not poets, but they are the lawgivers of poets and +their construction underlies the structure of every perfect poem. No +matter what rises or is uttered they sent the seed of the conception +of it ... of them and by them stand the visible proofs of souls ... +always of their fatherstuff must be begotten the sinewy races of +bards. If there shall be love and content between the father and the +son and if the greatness of the son is the exuding of the greatness +of the father there shall be love between the poet and the man of +demonstrable science. In the beauty of poems are the tuft and final +applause of science. + +Great is the faith of the flush of knowledge and of the investigation +of the depths of qualities and things. Cleaving and circling here +swells the soul of the poet yet is president of itself always. The +depths are fathomless and therefore calm. The innocence and nakedness +are resumed ... they are neither modest nor immodest. The whole theory +of the special and supernatural and all that was twined with it or +educed out of it departs as a dream. What has ever happened ... what +happens and whatever may or shall happen, the vital laws enclose all +... they are sufficient for any case and for all cases ... none to be +hurried or retarded ... any miracle of affairs or persons inadmissible +in the vast clear scheme where every motion and every spear of grass +and the frames and spirits of men and women and all that concerns +them are unspeakably perfect miracles all referring to all and each +distinct and in its place. It is also not consistent with the reality +of the soul to admit that there is anything in the known universe more +divine than men and women. + +Men and women and the earth and all upon it are simply to be taken as +they are, and the investigation of their past and present and future +shall be unintermitted and shall be done with perfect candor. Upon +this basis philosophy speculates ever looking towards the poet, +ever regarding the eternal tendencies of all toward happiness never +inconsistent with what is clear to the senses and to the soul. For the +eternal tendencies of all toward happiness make the only point of sane +philosophy. Whatever comprehends less than that ... whatever is less +than the laws of light and of astronomical motion ... or less than +the laws that follow the thief the liar the glutton and the drunkard +through this life and doubtless afterward ... or less than vast +stretches of time or the slow formation of density or the patient +upheaving of strata--is of no account. Whatever would put God in +a poem or system of philosophy as contending against some being or +influence is also of no account. Sanity and ensemble characterize +the great master ... spoilt in one principle all is spoilt. The great +master has nothing to do with miracles. He sees health for himself in +being one of the mass ... he sees the hiatus in singular eminence. To +the perfect shape comes common ground. To be under the general law is +great, for that is to correspond with it. The master knows that he is +unspeakably great and that all are unspeakably great ... that nothing +for instance is greater than to conceive children and bring them up +well ... that to be is just as great as to perceive or tell. + +In the make of the great masters the idea of political liberty is +indispensable. Liberty takes the adherence of heroes wherever men and +women exist ... but never takes any adherence or welcome from the rest +more than from poets. They are the voice and exposition of liberty. +They out of ages are worthy the grand idea ... to them it is confided +and they must sustain it. Nothing has precedence of it and nothing can +warp or degrade it. The attitude of great poets is to cheer up slaves +and horrify despots. The turn of their necks, the sound of their feet, +the motions of their wrists, are full of hazard to the one and hope +to the other. Come nigh them awhile and though they neither speak nor +advise you shall learn the faithful American lesson. Liberty is poorly +served by men whose good intent is quelled from one failure or two +failures or any number of failures, or from the casual indifference +or ingratitude of the people, or from the sharp show of the tushes +of power, or the bringing to bear soldiers and cannon or any penal +statutes. Liberty relies upon itself, invites no one, promises +nothing, sits in calmness and light, is positive and composed, and +knows no discouragement. The battle rages with many a loud alarm and +frequent advance and retreat ... the enemy triumphs ... the prison, +the handcuffs, the iron necklace and anklet, the scaffold, garrote and +leadballs do their work ... the cause is asleep ... the strong throats +are choked with their own blood ... the young men drop their eyelashes +toward the ground when they pass each other ... and is liberty gone +out of that place? No never. When liberty goes it is not the first to +go nor the second or third to go ... it awaits for all the rest to go +... it is the last.... When the memories of the old martyrs are faded +utterly away ... when the large names of patriots are laughed at in +the public halls from the lips of the orators ... when the boys are +no more christened after the same but christened after tyrants +and traitors instead ... when the laws of the free are grudgingly +permitted and the laws for informers and bloodmoney are sweet to the +taste of the people ... when I and you walk abroad upon the earth +stung with compassion at the sight of numberless brothers answering +our equal friendship and calling no man master--and when we are elated +with noble joy at the sight of slaves ... when the soul retires in the +cool communion of the night and surveys its experience and has much +extasy over the word and deed that put back a helpless innocent person +into the gripe of the gripers or into any cruel inferiority ... when +those in all parts of these states who could easier realize the true +American character but do not yet--when the swarms of cringers, +suckers, doughfaces, lice of politics, planners of sly involutions +for their own preferment to city offices or state legislatures or the +judiciary or congress or the presidency, obtain a response of love and +natural deference from the people whether they get the offices or no +... when it is better to be a bound booby and rogue in office at a +high salary than the poorest free mechanic or farmer with his hat +unmoved from his head and firm eyes and a candid and generous heart +... and when servility by town or state or the federal government or +any oppression on a large scale or small scale can be tried on without +its own punishment following duly after in exact proportion against +the smallest chance of escape ... or rather when all life and all the +souls of men and women are discharged from any part of the earth--then +only shall the instinct of liberty be discharged from that part of the +earth. + +As the attributes of the poets of the kosmos concentre in the +real body and soul and in the pleasure of things they possess the +superiority of genuineness over all fiction and romance. As they emit +themselves facts are showered over with light ... the daylight is lit +with more volatile light ... also the deep between the setting and +rising sun goes deeper many fold. Each precise object or condition or +combination or process exhibits a beauty ... the multiplication table +its--old age its--the carpenter's trade its--the grand opera its--the +hugehulled cleanshaped New-York clipper at sea under steam or full +sail gleams with unmatched beauty.... the American circles and large +harmonies of government gleam with theirs ... and the commonest +definite intentions and actions with theirs. The poets of the kosmos +advance through all interpositions and coverings and turmoils and +stratagems to first principles. They are of use ... they dissolve +poverty from its need and riches from its conceit. You large +proprietor, they say, shall not realize or perceive more than any one +else. The owner of the library is not he who holds a legal title to it +having bought and paid for it. Any one and every one is owner of the +library who can read the same through all the varieties of tongues +and subjects and styles, and in whom they enter with ease and take +residence and force toward paternity and maternity, and make supple +and powerful and rich and large.... These American states strong and +healthy and accomplished shall receive no pleasure from violations of +natural models and must not permit them. In paintings or mouldings +or carvings in mineral or wood, or in the illustrations of books and +newspapers, or in any comic or tragic prints, or in the patterns of +woven stuffs or anything to beautify rooms or furniture or costumes, +or to put upon cornices or monuments or on the prows or sterns of +ships, or to put anywhere before the human eye indoors or out, that +which distorts honest shapes or which creates unearthly beings or +places or contingencies, is a nuisance and revolt. Of the human +form especially, it is so great it must never be made ridiculous. +Of ornaments to a work nothing outré can be allowed ... but those +ornaments can be allowed that conform to the perfect facts of the +open air, and that flow out of the nature of the work and come +irrepressibly from it and are necessary to the completion of the work. +Most works are most beautiful without ornament ... Exaggerations +will be revenged in human physiology. Clean and vigorous children are +jetted and conceived only in those communities where the models of +natural forms are public every day ... Great genius and the people of +these states must never be demeaned to romances. As soon as histories +are properly told there is no more need of romances. + +The great poets are also to be known by the absence in them of tricks +and by the justification of perfect personal candor. Then folks echo +a new cheap joy and a divine voice leaping from their brains: How +beautiful is candor! All faults may be forgiven of him who has +perfect candor. Henceforth let no man of us lie, for we have seen that +openness wins the inner and outer world and that there is no single +exception, and that never since our earth gathered itself in a mass +have deceit or subterfuge or prevarication attracted its smallest +particle or the faintest tinge of a shade--and that through the +enveloping wealth and rank of a state or the whole republic of states +a sneak or sly person shall be discovered and despised ... and that +the soul has never once been fooled and never can be fooled ... and +thrift without the loving nod of the soul is only a foetid puff ... +and there never grew up in any of the continents of the globe nor upon +any planet or satellite or star, nor upon the asteroids, nor in any +part of ethereal space, nor in the midst of density, nor under the +fluid wet of the sea, nor in that condition which precedes the birth +of babes, nor at any time during the changes of life, nor in that +condition that follows what we term death, nor in any stretch of +abeyance or action afterward of vitality, nor in any process of +formation or reformation anywhere, a being whose instinct hated the +truth. + +Extreme caution or prudence, the soundest organic health, large +hope and comparison and fondness for women and children, large +alimentiveness and destructiveness and causality, with a perfect sense +of the oneness of nature and the propriety of the same spirit applied +to human affairs ... these are called up of the float of the brain of +the world to be parts of the greatest poet from his birth out of his +mother's womb and from her birth out of her mother's. Caution seldom +goes far enough. It has been thought that the prudent citizen was the +citizen who applied himself to solid gains and did well for himself +and for his family and completed a lawful life without debt or crime. +The greatest poet sees and admits these economies as he sees the +economies of food and sleep, but has higher notions of prudence than +to think he gives much when he gives a few slight attentions at the +latch of the gate. The premises of the prudence of life are not +the hospitality of it or the ripeness and harvest of it. Beyond the +independence of a little sum laid aside for burial-money, and of a +few clapboards around and shingles overhead on a lot of American soil +owned, and the easy dollars that supply the year's plain clothing +and meals, the melancholy prudence of the abandonment of such a great +being as a man is to the toss and pallor of years of money-making with +all their scorching days and icy nights and all their stifling deceits +and underhanded dodgings, or infinitesimals of parlors, or shameless +stuffing while others starve ... and all the loss of the bloom and +odor of the earth and of the flowers and atmosphere and of the sea, +and of the true taste of the women and men you pass or have to do with +in youth or middle age, and the issuing sickness and desperate revolt +at the close of a life without elevation or naivete, and the ghastly +chatter of a death without serenity or majesty, is the great fraud +upon modern civilization and forethought, blotching the surface and +system which civilization undeniably drafts, and moistening with tears +the immense features it spreads and spreads with such velocity before +the reached kisses of the soul.... Still the right explanation +remains to be made about prudence. The prudence of the mere wealth and +respectability of the most esteemed life appears too faint for the eye +to observe at all when little and large alike drop quietly aside at +the thought of the prudence suitable for immortality. What is wisdom +that fills the thinness of a year or seventy or eighty years to wisdom +spaced out by ages and coming back at a certain time with strong +reinforcements and rich presents and the clear faces of wedding-guests +as far as you can look in every direction, running gaily toward you? +Only the soul is of itself ... all else has reference to what ensues. +All that a person does or thinks is of consequence. Not a move can a +man or woman make that effects him or her in a day or a month or any +part of the direct lifetime or the hour of death but the same affects +him or her onward afterward through the indirect lifetime. The +indirect is always as great and real as the direct. The spirit +receives from the body just as much as it gives to the body. Not one +name of word or deed ... not of venereal sores or discolorations ... +not the privacy of the onanist ... not of the putrid veins of gluttons +or rumdrinkers ... not peculation or cunning or betrayal or murder ... +no serpentine poison of those that seduce women ... not the foolish +yielding of women ... not prostitution ... not of any depravity of +young men ... not of the attainment of gain by discreditable means ... +not any nastiness of appetite ... not any harshness of officers to +men or judges to prisoners or fathers to sons or sons to fathers or +of husbands to wives or bosses to their boys ... not of greedy looks +or malignant wishes ... nor any of the wiles practised by people upon +themselves ... ever is or ever can be stamped on the programme but +it is duly realized and returned, and that returned in further +performances ... and they returned again. Nor can the push of charity +or personal force ever be anything else than the profoundest reason, +whether it bring argument to hand or no. No specification is necessary +... to add or subtract or divide is in vain. Little or big, learned +or unlearned, white or black, legal or illegal, sick or well, from the +first inspiration down the windpipe to the last expiration out of it, +all that a male or female does that is vigorous and benevolent and +clean is so much sure profit to him or her in the unshakable order of +the universe and through the whole scope of it for ever. If the savage +or felon is wise it is well ... if the greatest poet or savan is wise +it is simply the same ... if the President or chief justice is wise it +is the same ... if the young mechanic or farmer is wise it is no more +or less ... if the prostitute is wise it is no more nor less. The +interest will come round ... all will come round. All the best actions +of war and peace ... all help given to relatives and strangers and the +poor and old and sorrowful and young children and widows and the sick, +and to all shunned persons ... all furtherance of fugitives and of the +escape of slaves ... all the self-denial that stood steady and aloof +on wrecks and saw others take the seats of the boats ... all offering +of substance or life for the good old cause, or for a friend's sake +or opinion's sake ... all pains of enthusiasts scoffed at by their +neighbors ... all the vast sweet love and precious sufferings of +mothers ... all honest men baffled in strifes recorded or unrecorded +... all the grandeur and good of the few ancient nations whose +fragments of annals we inherit ... and all the good of the hundreds of +far mightier and more ancient nations unknown to us by name or date or +location ... all that was ever manfully begun, whether it succeeded or +no ... all that has at any time been well suggested out of the divine +heart of man or by the divinity of his mouth or by the shaping of his +great hands ... and all that is well thought or done this day on any +part of the surface of the globe ... or on any of the wandering stars +or fixed stars by those there as we are here ... or that is henceforth +to be well thought or done by you whoever you are, or by any +one--these singly and wholly inured at their time and inure now and +will inure always to the identities from which they sprung or shall +spring ... Did you guess any of them lived only its moment? The world +does not so exist ... no parts palpable or impalpable so exist ... no +result exists now without being from its long antecedent result, +and that from its antecedent, and so backward without the farthest +mentionable spot coming a bit nearer the beginning than any other +spot.... Whatever satisfies the soul is truth. The prudence of the +greatest poet answers at last the craving and glut of the soul, is +not contemptuous of less ways of prudence if they conform to its ways, +puts off nothing, permits no let-up for its own case or any case, has +no particular sabbath or judgment-day, divides not the living from +the dead or the righteous from the unrighteous, is satisfied with the +present, matches every thought or act by its correlative, knows no +possible forgiveness or deputed atonement ... knows that the young man +who composedly perilled his life and lost it has done exceeding well +for himself, while the man who has not perilled his life and retains +to old age in riches and ease has perhaps achieved nothing for himself +worth mentioning ... and that only that person has no great prudence +to learn who has learnt to prefer real longlived things, and favors +body and soul the same, and perceives the indirect assuredly following +the direct, and what evil or good he does leaping onward and waiting +to meet him again--and who in his spirit in any emergency whatever +neither hurries or avoids death. + +The direct trial of him who would be the greatest poet is to-day. If +he does not flood himself with the immediate age as with vast oceanic +tides ... and if he does not attract his own land body and soul to +himself, and hang on its neck with incomparable love and plunge his +Semitic muscle into its merits and demerits ... and if he be not +himself the age transfigured ... and if to him is not opened the +eternity which gives similitude to all periods and locations and +processes and animate and inanimate forms, and which is the bond of +time, and rises up from its inconceivable vagueness and infiniteness +in the swimming shape of to-day, and is held by the ductile anchors +of life, and makes the present spot the passage from what was to what +shall be, and commits itself to the representation of this wave of an +hour and this one of the sixty beautiful children of the wave--let him +merge in the general run and wait his development.... Still the final +test of poems or any character or work remains. The prescient poet +projects himself centuries ahead and judges performer or performance +after the changes of time. Does it live through them? Does it still +hold on untired? Will the same style and the direction of genius to +similar points be satisfactory now? Has no new discovery in science or +arrival at superior planes of thought and judgment and behavior fixed +him or his so that either can be looked down upon? Have the marches of +tens and hundreds and thousands of years made willing detours to the +right hand and the left hand for his sake? Is he beloved long and long +after he is buried? Does the young man think often of him? and the +young woman think often of him? and do the middle aged and the old +think of him? + +A great poem is for ages and ages in common, and for all degrees and +complexions, and all departments and sects, and for a woman as much as +a man and a man as much as a woman. A great poem is no finish to a man +or woman but rather a beginning. Has any one fancied he could sit at +last under some due authority and rest satisfied with explanations and +realize and be content and full? To no such terminus does the greatest +poet bring ... he brings neither cessation or sheltered fatness and +ease. The touch of him tells in action. Whom he takes he takes +with firm sure grasp into live regions previously unattained ... +thenceforward is no rest ... they see the space and ineffable sheen +that turn the old spots and lights into dead vacuums. The companion +of him beholds the birth and progress of stars and learns one of the +meanings. Now there shall be a man cohered out of tumult and chaos ... +the elder encourages the younger and shows him how ... they too shall +launch off fearlessly together till the new world fits an orbit for +itself and looks unabashed on the lesser orbits of the stars and +sweeps through the ceaseless rings and shall never be quiet again. + +There will soon be no more priests. Their work is done. They may wait +awhile ... perhaps a generation or two ... dropping off by degrees. +A superior breed shall take their place ... the gangs of kosmos and +prophets _en masse_ shall take their place. A new order shall arise +and they shall be the priests of man, and every man shall be his own +priest. The churches built under their umbrage shall be the churches +of men and women. Through the divinity of themselves shall the kosmos +and the new breed of poets be interpreters of men and women and of all +events and things. They shall find their inspiration in real objects +to-day, symptoms of the past and future.... They shall not deign to +defend immortality or God or the perfection of things or liberty or +the exquisite beauty and reality of the soul. They shall arise in +America and be responded to from the remainder of the earth. + +The English language befriends the grand American expression ... it is +brawny enough and limber and full enough ... on the tough stock of a +race who through all change of circumstance was never without the +idea of political liberty, which is the animus of all liberty, it has +attracted the terms of daintier and gayer and subtler and more elegant +tongues. It is the powerful language of resistance ... it is the +dialect of common sense. It is the speech of the proud and melancholy +races and of all who aspire. It is the chosen tongue to express growth +faith self-esteem freedom justice equality friendliness amplitude +prudence decision and courage. It is the medium that shall well nigh +express the inexpressible. + +No great literature nor any like style of behavior or oratory or +social intercourse or household arrangements or public institutions +or the treatment of bosses of employed people, nor executive detail +or detail of the army and navy, nor spirit of legislation or courts +or police or tuition or architecture or songs or amusements or the +costumes of young men, can long elude the jealous and passionate +instinct of American standards. Whether or no the sign appears from +the mouths of the people, it throbs a live interrogation in every +freeman's and freewoman's heart after that which passes by or this +built to remain. Is it uniform with my country? Are its disposals +without ignominious distinctions? Is it for the ever growing communes +of brothers and lovers, large, well-united, proud beyond the old +models, generous beyond all models? Is it something grown fresh out of +the fields or drawn from the sea for use to me today here? I know +that what answers for me an American must answer for any individual or +nation that serves for a part of my materials. Does this answer? or is +it without reference to universal needs? or sprung of the needs of +the less developed society of special ranks? or old needs of pleasure +overlaid by modern science or forms? Does this acknowledge liberty +with audible and absolute acknowledgment, and set slavery at nought +for life and death? Will it help breed one goodshaped and wellhung +man, and a woman to be his perfect and independent mate? Does it +improve manners? Is it for the nursing of the young of the republic? +Does it solve readily with the sweet milk of the nipples of the +breasts of the mother of many children? Has it too the old ever-fresh +forbearance and impartiality? Does it look for the same love on the +last born and on those hardening toward stature, and on the errant, +and on those who disdain all strength of assault outside their own? + +The poems distilled from other poems will probably pass away. The +coward will surely pass away. The expectation of the vital and great +can only be satisfied by the demeanor of the vital and great. The +swarms of the polished deprecating and reflectors and the polite float +off and leave no remembrance. America prepares with composure and +goodwill for the visitors that have sent word. It is not intellect +that is to be their warrant and welcome. The talented, the artist, +the ingenious, the editor, the statesman, the erudite ... they are not +unappreciated ... they fall in their place and do their work. The soul +of the nation also does its work. No disguise can pass on it ... no +disguise can conceal from it. It rejects none, it permits all. Only +towards as good as itself and toward the like of itself will it +advance half-way. An individual is as superb as a nation when he has +the qualities which make a superb nation. The soul of the largest and +wealthiest and proudest nation may well go half-way to meet that of +its poets. The signs are effectual. There is no fear of mistake. If +the one is true the other is true. The proof of a poet is that his +country absorbs him as affectionately as he has absorbed it. + + +[Footnote A: Walt Whitman (1819-1892), the most original of American +poets, was born in West Hills, Long Island, educated in the Brooklyn +Public Schools, and apprenticed to a printer. As a youth he taught +in a country school, and later went into journalism in New York, +Brooklyn, and New Orleans. The first edition of "Leaves of Grass" +appeared in 1855, with the remarkable preface here printed. During the +war he acted as a volunteer nurse in the army hospitals, and, when it +closed, he became a clerk in the government service at Washington. He +continued to write almost till his death.] + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE + +BY HIPPOLYTE ADOLPHE TAINE. (1863)[A] + + +I + +History, within a hundred years in Germany, and within sixty years +in France, has undergone a transformation owing to a study of +literatures. + +The discovery has been made that a literary work is not a mere play +of the imagination, the isolated caprice of an excited brain, but +a transcript of contemporary manners and customs and the sign of a +particular state of intellect. The conclusion derived from this is +that, through literary monuments, we can retrace the way in which men +felt and thought many centuries ago. This method has been tried and +found successful. + +We have meditated over these ways of feeling and thinking and have +accepted them as facts of prime significance. We have found that they +were dependent on most important events, that they explain these, and +that these explain them, and that henceforth it was necessary to give +them their place in history, and one of the highest. This place has +been assigned to them, and hence all is changed in history--the aim, +the method, the instrumentalities, and the conceptions of laws and of +causes. It is this change as now going on, and which must continue to +go on, that is here attempted to be set forth. + +On turning over the large stiff pages of a folio volume, or the yellow +leaves of a manuscript, in short, a poem, a code of laws, a confession +of faith, what is your first comment? You say to yourself that the +work before you is not of its own creation. It is simply a mold like +a fossil shell, an imprint similar to one of those forms embedded in +a stone by an animal which once lived and perished. Beneath the shell +was an animal and behind the document there was a man. Why do you +study the shell unless to form some idea of the animal? In the same +way do you study the document in order to comprehend the man; both +shell and document are dead fragments and of value only as indications +of the complete living being. The aim is to reach this being; this is +what you strive to reconstruct. It is a mistake to study the document +as if it existed alone by itself. That is treating things merely as a +pedant, and you subject yourself to the illusions of a book-worm. +At bottom mythologies and languages are not existences; the only +realities are human beings who have employed words and imagery adapted +to their organs and to suit the original cast of their intellects. A +creed is nothing in itself. Who made it? Look at this or that +portrait of the sixteenth century, the stern, energetic features of an +archbishop or of an English martyr. Nothing exists except through the +individual; it is necessary to know the individual himself. Let the +parentage of creeds be established, or the classification of poems, or +the growth of constitutions, or the transformations of idioms, and we +have only cleared the ground. True history begins when the historian +has discerned beyond the mists of ages the living, active man, endowed +with passions, furnished with habits, special in voice, feature, +gesture and costume, distinctive and complete, like anybody that you +have just encountered in the street. Let us strive then, as far as +possible, to get rid of this great interval of time which prevents us +from observing the man with our eyes, _the eyes of our own head_. What +revelations do we find in the calendared leaves of a modern poem? A +modern poet, a man like De Musset, Victor Hugo, Lamartine, or Heine, +graduated from a college and traveled, wearing a dress-coat and +gloves, favored by ladies, bowing fifty times and uttering a dozen +witticisms in an evening, reading daily newspapers, generally +occupying an apartment on the second story, not over-cheerful on +account of his nerves, and especially because, in this dense democracy +in which we stifle each other, the discredit of official rank +exaggerates his pretensions by raising his importance, and, owing to +the delicacy of his personal sensations, leading him to regard himself +as a Deity. Such is what we detect behind modern _meditations_ and +_sonnets_. + +Again, behind a tragedy of the seventeenth century there is a poet, +one, for example, like Racine, refined, discreet, a courtier, a fine +talker, with majestic perruque and ribboned shoes, a monarchist and +zealous Christian, "God having given him the grace not to blush in any +society on account of zeal for his king or for the Gospel," clever in +interesting the monarch, translating into proper French "the _gaulois_ +of Amyot," deferential to the great, always knowing how to keep +his place in their company, assiduous and respectful at Marly as at +Versailles, amid the formal creations of a decorative landscape and +the reverential bows, graces, intrigues, and fineness of the braided +seigniors Who get up early every morning to obtain the reversion of an +office, together with the charming ladies who count on their fingers +the pedigrees which entitle them to a seat on a footstool. On this +point consult Saint-Simon and the engravings of Perelle, the same as +you have just consulted Balzac and the water-color drawings of Eugene +Lami. + +In like manner, on reading a Greek tragedy, our first care is +to figure to ourselves the Greeks, that is to say, men who lived +half-naked in the gymnasiums or on a public square under a brilliant +sky, in full view of the noblest and most delicate landscape, busy in +rendering their bodies strong and agile, in conversing together, in +arguing, in voting, in carrying out patriotic piracies, and yet idle +and temperate, the furniture of their houses consisting of three +earthen jars and their food of two pots of anchovies preserved in oil, +served by slaves who afford them the time to cultivate their minds and +to exercise their limbs, with no other concern that that of having +the most beautiful city, the most beautiful processions, the most +beautiful ideas, and the most beautiful men. In this respect, a statue +like the "Meleager" or the "Theseus" of the Parthenon, or again a +sight of the blue and lustrous Mediterranean, resembling a silken +tunic out of which islands arise like marble bodies, together with +a dozen choice phrases selected from the works of Plato and +Aristophanes, teach us more than any number of dissertations and +commentaries. + +And so again, in order to understand an Indian Purana, one must begin +by imagining the father of a family who, "having seen a son on his +son's knees," follows the law and, with ax and pitcher, seeks solitude +under a banyan tree, talks no more, multiplies his fastings, lives +naked with four fires around him under the fifth fire, that terrible +sun which endlessly devours and resuscitates all living things; who +fixes his imagination in turn for weeks at a time on the foot of +Brahma, then on his knee, on his thigh, on his navel, and so on, +until, beneath the strain of this intense meditation, hallucinations +appear, when all the forms of being, mingling together and transformed +into each other, oscillate to and fro in this vertiginous brain until +the motionless man, with suspended breath and fixed eyeballs, beholds +the universe melting away like vapor over the vacant immensity of +the Being in which he hopes for absorption. In this case the best of +teachings would be a journey in India; but, for lack of a better +one, take the narratives of travelers along with works in geography, +botany, and ethnology. In any event, there must be the same research. +A language, a law, a creed, is never other than an abstraction; the +perfect thing is found in the active man, the visible corporeal figure +which eats, walks, fights, and labors. Set aside the theories of +constitutions and their results, of religions and their systems, and +try to observe men in their workshops or offices, in their fields +along with their own sky and soil, with their own homes, clothes, +occupations and repasts, just as you see them when, on landing in +England or in Italy, you remark their features and gestures, their +roads and their inns, the citizen on his promenades and the workman +taking a drink. Let us strive as much as possible to supply the +place of the actual, personal, sensible observation that is no longer +practicable, this being the only way in which we can really know the +man; let us make the past present; to judge of an object it must be +present; no experience can be had of what is absent. Undoubtedly, this +sort of reconstruction is always imperfect; only an imperfect +judgment can be based on it; but let us do the best we can; incomplete +knowledge is better than none at all, or than knowledge which +is erroneous, and there is no other way of obtaining knowledge +approximatively of bygone times than by _seeing_ approximatively the +men of former times. + +Such is the first step in history. This step was taken in Europe at +the end of the last century when the imagination took fresh flight +under the auspices of Lessing and Walter Scott, and a little later in +France under Chateaubriand, Augustin Thierry, Michelet, and others. We +now come to the second step. + + + + +II + + +On observing the visible man with your own eyes what do you try to +find in him? The invisible man. These words which your ears catch, +those gestures, those airs of the head, his attire and sensible +operations of all kinds, are, for you, merely so many expressions; +these express something, a soul. An inward man is hidden beneath the +outward man, and the latter simply manifests the former. You have +observed the house in which he lives, his furniture, his costume, in +order to discover his habits and tastes, the degree of his refinement +or rusticity, his extravagance or economy, his follies or his +cleverness. You have listened to his conversation and noted the +inflexions of his voice, the attitudes he has assumed, so as to judge +of his spirit, self-abandonment or gayety, his energy or his rigidity. +You consider his writings, works of art, financial and political +schemes, with a view to measure the reach and limits of his +intelligence, his creative power and self-command, to ascertain the +usual order, kind, and force of his conceptions, in what way he +thinks and how he resolves. All these externals are so many avenues +converging to one center, and you follow these only to reach that +center; here is the real man, namely, that group of faculties and of +sentiments which produces the rest. Behold a new world, an infinite +world; for each visible action involves an infinite train of +reasonings and emotions, new or old sensations which have combined to +bring this into light and which, like long ledges of rock sunk deep +in the earth, have cropped out above the surface and attained their +level. It is this subterranean world which forms the second aim, the +special object of the historian. If his critical education suffices, +he is able to discriminate under every ornament in architecture, under +every stroke of the brush in a picture, under each phrase of literary +composition, the particular sentiment out of which the ornament, the +stroke, and the phrase have sprung; he is a spectator of the inward +drama which has developed itself in the breast of the artist or +writer; the choice of words, the length or shortness of the period, +the species of metaphor, the accent of a verse, the chain of +reasoning--all are to him an indication; while his eyes are reading +the text his mind and soul are following the steady flow and +ever-changing series of emotions and conceptions from which this text +has issued; he is working out its _psychology_. Should you desire to +study this operation, regard the promoter and model of all the high +culture of the epoch, Goethe, who, before composing his "Iphigenia" +spent days in making drawings of the most perfect statues and who, at +last, his eyes filled with the noble forms of antique scenery and his +mind penetrated by the harmonious beauty of antique life, succeeded in +reproducing internally, with such exactness, the habits and yearnings +of Greek imagination as to provide us with an almost twin sister of +the "Antigone" of Sophocles and of the goddesses of Phidias. This +exact and demonstrated divination of bygone sentiments has, in our +days, given a new life to history. There was almost complete ignorance +of this in the last century; men of every race and of every epoch were +represented as about alike, the Greek, the barbarian, the Hindoo, the +man of the Renaissance and the man of the eighteenth century, cast in +the same mold and after the same pattern, and after a certain abstract +conception which served for the whole human species. There was a +knowledge of man but not of men. There was no penetration into +the soul itself; nothing of the infinite diversity and wonderful +complexity of souls had been detected; it was not known that the moral +organization of a people or of an age is as special and distinct +as the physical structure of a family of plants or of an order of +animals. History to-day, like zoölogy, has found its anatomy, and +whatever branch of it is studied, whether philology, languages or +mythologies, it is in this way that labor must be given to make it +produce new fruit. Among so many writers who, since Herder, Ottfried +Müller, and Goethe have steadily followed and rectified this great +effort, let the reader take two historians and two works, one "The +Life and Letters of Cromwell" by Carlyle, and the other the "Port +Royal" of Sainte-Beuve. He will see how precisely, how clearly, and +how profoundly we detect the soul of a man beneath his actions and +works; how, under an old general and in place of an ambitious man +vulgarly hypocritical, we find one tormented by the disordered +reveries of a gloomy imagination, but practical in instinct and +faculties, thoroughly English and strange and incomprehensible to +whoever has not studied the climate and the race; how, with about a +hundred scattered letters and a dozen or more mutilated speeches, we +follow him from his farm and his team to his general's tent and to his +Protector's throne, in his transformation and in his development, in +his struggles of conscience and in his statesman's resolutions, +in such a way that the mechanism of his thought and action becomes +visible and the ever renewed and fitful tragedy, within which wracked +this great gloomy soul, passes like the tragedies of Shakespeare +into the souls of those who behold them. We see how, behind convent +disputes and the obstinacy of nuns, we recover one of the great +provinces of human psychology; how fifty or more characters, rendered +invisible through the uniformity of a narration careful of the +proprieties, came forth in full daylight, each standing out clear in +its countless diversities; how, underneath theological dissertations +and monotonous sermons, we discern the throbbings of ever-breathing +hearts, the excitements and depressions of the religious life, +the unforeseen reaction and pell-mell stir of natural feeling, the +infiltrations of surrounding society, the intermittent triumphs +of grace, presenting so many shades of difference that the fullest +description and most flexible style can scarcely garner in the vast +harvest which the critic has caused to germinate in this abandoned +field. And the same elsewhere. Germany, with its genius, so pliant, so +broad, so prompt in transformations, so fitted for the reproduction of +the remotest and strangest states of human thought; England, with its +matter-of-fact mind, so suited to the grappling with moral problems, +to making them clear by figures, weights, and measures, by geography +and statistics, by texts and common sense; France, at length, with its +Parisian culture and drawing-room habits, with its unceasing analysis +of characters and of works, with its ever ready irony at detecting +weaknesses, with its skilled finesse in discriminating shades of +thought--all have plowed over the same ground, and we now begin +to comprehend that no region of history exists in which this deep +sub-soil should not be reached if we would secure adequate crops +between the furrows. + +Such is the second step, and we are now in train to follow it out. +Such is the proper aim of contemporary criticism. No one has done this +work so judiciously and on so grand a scale as Sainte-Beuve; in this +respect, we are all his pupils; literary, philosophic, and religious +criticism in books, and even in the newspapers, is to-day entirely +changed by his method. Ulterior evolution must start from this +point. I have often attempted to expose what this evolution is; in my +opinion, it is a new road open to history and which I shall strive to +describe more in detail. + + + + +III + + +After having observed in a man and noted down one, two, three, +and then a multitude of sentiments, do these suffice and does your +knowledge of him seem complete? Does a memorandum book constitute a +psychology? It is not a psychology, and here, as elsewhere, the search +for causes must follow the collection of facts. It matters not what +the facts may be, whether physical or moral, they always spring from +causes; there are causes for ambition, for courage, for veracity, as +well as for digestion, for muscular action, and for animal heat. Vice +and virtue are products like vitriol and sugar; every complex fact +grows out of the simple facts with which it is affiliated and on +which it depends. We must therefore try to ascertain what simple facts +underlie moral qualities the same as we ascertain those that underlie +physical qualities, and, for example, let us take the first fact +that comes to hand, a religious system of music, that of a Protestant +church. A certain inward cause has inclined the minds of worshipers +toward these grave, monotonous melodies, a cause much greater than its +effect; that is to say, a general conception of the veritable outward +forms of worship which man owes to God; it is this general conception +which has shaped the architecture of the temple, cast out statues, +dispensed with paintings, effaced ornaments, shortened ceremonies, +confined the members of a congregation to high pews which cut off the +view, and governed the thousand details of decoration, posture, and +all other externals. This conception itself again proceeds from a +more general cause, an idea off human conduct in general, inward and +outward, prayers, actions, dispositions of every sort that man is +bound to maintain toward the Deity; it is this which has enthroned the +doctrine of grace, lessened the importance of the clergy, transformed +the sacraments, suppressed observances, and changed the religion of +discipline into one of morality. This conception, in its turn, depends +on a third one, still more general, that of moral perfection as this +is found in a perfect God, the impeccable judge, the stern overseer, +who regards every soul as sinful, meriting punishment, incapable of +virtue or of salvation, except through a stricken conscience which He +provokes and the renewal of the heart which He brings about. Here is +the master conception, consisting of duty erected into the absolute +sovereign of human life, and which prostrates all other ideals at the +feet of the moral ideal. Here we reach what is deepest in man; for, to +explain this conception, we must consider the race he belongs to, +say the German, the Northman, the formation and character of his +intellect, his ways in general of thinking and feeling, that tardiness +and frigidity of sensation which keeps him from rashly and easily +falling tinder the empire of sensual enjoyments, that bluntness of +taste, that irregularity and those outbursts of conception which +arrest in him the birth of refined and harmonious forms and methods; +that disdain of appearances, that yearning for truth, that attachment +to abstract, bare ideas which develop conscience in him at the expense +of everything else. Here the search comes to an end. We have reached +a certain primitive disposition, a particular trait belonging to +sensations of all kinds, to every conception peculiar to an age or +to a race, to characteristics inseparable from every idea and feeling +that stir in the human breast. Such are the grand causes, for these +are universal and permanent causes, present in every case and at every +moment, everywhere and always active, indestructible, and inevitably +dominant in the end, since, whatever accidents cross their path being +limited and partial, end in yielding to the obscure and incessant +repetition of their energy; so that the general structure of things +and all the main features of events are their work, all religions and +philosophies, all poetic and industrial systems, all forms of society +and of the family, all, in fine, being imprints bearing the stamp of +their seal. + + + + +IV + + +There is, then, a system in human ideas and sentiments, the prime +motor of which consists in general traits, certain characteristics +of thought and feeling common to men belonging to a particular race, +epoch, or country. Just as crystals in mineralogy, whatever +their diversity, proceed from a few simple physical forms, so do +civilizations in history, however these may differ, proceed from a few +spiritual forms. One is explained by a primitive geometrical element +as the other is explained by a primitive psychological element. In +order to comprehend the entire group of mineralogical species we must +first study a regular solid in the general, its facets and angles, and +observe in this abridged form the innumerable transformations of which +it is susceptible. In like manner, if we would comprehend the entire +group of historic varieties we must consider beforehand a human soul +in the general, with its two or three fundamental faculties, and, in +this abridgment, observe the principal forms it may present. This sort +of ideal tableau, the geometrical as well as psychological, is not +very complex, and we soon detect the limitations of organic conditions +to which civilizations, the same as crystals, are forcibly confined. +What do we find in man at the point of departure? Images or +representations of objects, namely, that which floats before him +internally, lasts a certain time, is effaced, and then returns after +contemplating this or that tree or animal, in short, some sensible +object. This forms the material basis of the rest and the development +of this material basis is twofold, speculative or positive, just as +these representations end in a _general conception_ or in an _active +resolution_. Such is man, summarily abridged. It is here, within these +narrow confines, that human diversities are encountered, now in the +matter itself and again in the primordial twofold development. However +insignificant in the elements they are of vast significance in the +mass, while the slightest change in the factors leads to gigantic +changes in the results. According as the representation is distinct, +as if stamped by a coining-press, or confused and blurred; according +as it concentrates in itself a larger or smaller number of the +characters of an object; according as it is violent and accompanied +with impulsions or tranquil and surrounded with calmness, so are +all the operations and the whole running-gear of the human machine +entirely transformed. In like manner, again, according as the +ulterior development of the representation varies, so does the whole +development of the man vary. If the general conception in which this +ends is merely a dry notation in Chinese fashion, language becomes +a kind of algebra, religion and poetry are reduced to a minimum, +philosophy is brought down to a sort of moral and practical common +sense, science to a collection of recipes, classifications, and +utilitarian mnemonics, the mind itself taking a whole positive +turn. If, on the contrary, the general conception in which the +representation culminates is a poetic and figurative creation, a +living symbol, as with the Aryan races, language becomes a sort of +shaded and tinted epic in which each word stands as a personage, +poesy and religion assume magnificent and inexhaustible richness, +and metaphysics develops with breadth and subtlety without +any consideration of positive bearings; the whole intellect, +notwithstanding the deviation and inevitable weaknesses of the effort, +is captivated by the beautiful and sublime, thus conceiving an ideal +type which, through its nobleness and harmony, gathers to itself all +the affections and enthusiasms of humanity. If, on the other hand, the +general conception in which the representation culminates is poetic +but abrupt, is reached not gradually but by sudden intuition, if +the original operation is not a regular development but a violent +explosion--then, as with the semitic races, metaphysical power +is wanting; the religious conception becomes that of a royal God, +consuming and solitary; science cannot take shape, the intellect grows +rigid and too headstrong to reproduce the delicate ordering of nature; +poetry cannot give birth to aught but a series of vehement, grandiose +exclamations, while language no longer renders the concatenation of +reasoning and eloquence, man being reduced to lyric enthusiasm, to +ungovernable passion, and to narrow and fanatical action. It is in +this interval between the particular representation and the universal +conception that the germs of the greatest human differences are found. +Some races, like the classic, for example, pass from the former to the +latter by a graduated scale of ideas regularly classified and more +and more general; others, like the Germanic, traverse the interval +in leaps, with uniformity and after prolonged and uncertain groping. +Others, like the Romans and the English, stop at the lowest stages; +others, like the Hindoos and Germans, mount to the uppermost. + +If, now, after considering the passage from the representation to the +idea, we regard the passage from the representation to the resolution, +we find here elementary differences of like importance and of the same +order, according as the impression is vivid, as in Southern climes, +or faint, as in Northern climes, as it ends in instantaneous action +as with barbarians, or tardily as with civilized nations, as it +is capable or not of growth, of inequality, of persistence and of +association. The entire system of human passion, all the risks of +public peace and security, all labor and action, spring from these +sources. It is the same with the other primordial differences; their +effects embrace an entire civilization, and may be likened to those +algebraic formulæ which, within narrow bounds, describe beforehand +the curve of which these form the law. Not that this law always +prevails to the end; sometimes, perturbations arise, but, even when +this happens, it is not because the law is defective, but because it +has not operated alone. New elements have entered into combination +with old ones; powerful foreign forces have interfered to oppose +primitive forces. The race has emigrated, as with the ancient +Aryans, and the change of climate has led to a change in the whole +intellectual economy and structure of society. A people has been +conquered like the Saxon nation, and the new political structure +has imposed on its customs, capacities, and desires which it did not +possess. The nation has established itself permanently in the midst +of downtrodden and threatening subjects, as with the ancient Spartans, +while the necessity of living, as in an armed encampment, has +violently turned the whole moral and social organization in one unique +direction. At all events, the mechanism of human history is like this. +We always find the primitive mainspring consisting of some widespread +tendency of soul and intellect, either innate and natural to the race +or acquired by it and due to some circumstance forced upon it. These +great given mainsprings gradually produce their effects, that is to +say, at the end of a few centuries they place the nation in a new +religious, literary, social, and economic state; a new condition +which, combined with their renewed effort, produces another condition, +sometimes a good one, sometimes a bad one, now slowly, now +rapidly, and so on; so that the entire development of each distinct +civilization may be considered as the effect of one permanent force +which, at every moment, varies its work by modifying the circumstances +where it acts. + + + + +V + + +Three different sources contribute to the production of this +elementary moral state, _race, environment_, and _epoch._ What we call +_race_ consists of those innate and hereditary dispositions which man +brings with him into the world and which are generally accompanied +with marked differences of temperament and of bodily structure. They +vary in different nations. + +Naturally, there are varieties of men as there are varieties of +cattle and horses, some brave and intelligent, and others timid and of +limited capacity; some capable of superior conceptions and creations, +and others reduced to rudimentary ideas and contrivances; some +specially fitted for certain works, and more richly furnished with +certain instincts, as we see in the better endowed species of dogs, +some for running and others for fighting, some for hunting and others +for guarding houses and flocks. We have here a distinct force; so +distinct that, in spite of the enormous deviations which both the +other motors impress upon it, we still recognize, and which a race +like the Aryan people, scattered from the Ganges to the Hebrides, +established tinder all climates, ranged along every degree of +civilization, transformed by thirty centuries of revolutions, shows +nevertheless in its languages, in its religions, in its literatures, +and in its philosophies, the community of blood and of intellect +which still to-day binds together all its offshoots. However they may +differ, their parentage is not lost; barbarism, culture and grafting, +differences of atmosphere and of soil, fortunate or unfortunate +occurrences, have operated in vain; the grand characteristics of the +original form have lasted, and we find that the two or three leading +features of the primitive imprint are again apparent under the +subsequent imprints with which time has overlaid them. There is +nothing surprising in this extraordinary tenacity. Although the +immensity of the distance allows us to catch only a glimpse in a +dubious light of the origin of species,[1] the events of history throw +sufficient light on events anterior to history to explain the almost +unshaken solidity of primordial traits. At the moment of encountering +them, fifteen, twenty, and thirty centuries before our era, in an +Aryan, Egyptian, or Chinese, they represent the work of a much greater +number of centuries, perhaps the work of many myriads of centuries. +For, as soon as an animal is born it must adapt itself to its +surroundings; it breathes in another way, it renews itself +differently, it is otherwise stimulated according as the atmosphere, +the food, and the temperature are different. A different climate +and situation create different necessities and hence activities of a +different kind; and hence, again, a system of different habits, and, +finally, a system of different aptitudes and instincts. Man, thus +compelled to put himself in equilibrium with circumstances, contracts +a corresponding temperament and character, and his character, like +his temperament, are acquisitions all the more stable because of the +outward impression being more deeply imprinted in him by more frequent +repetitions and transmitted to his offspring by more ancient heredity. +So that at each moment of time the character of a people may be +considered as a summary of all antecedent actions and sensations; that +is to say, as a quantity and as a weighty mass, not infinite,[2] since +all things in nature are limited, but disproportionate to the rest and +almost impossible to raise, since each minute of an almost infinite +past has contributed to render it heavier, and, in order to turn +the scale, it would require, on the other side, a still greater +accumulation of actions and sensations. Such is the first and most +abundant source of these master faculties from which historic events +are derived; and we see at once that if it is powerful it is owing +to its not being a mere source, but a sort of lake, and like a +deep reservoir wherein other sources have poured their waters for a +multitude of centuries. + +When we have thus verified the internal structure of a race we must +consider the _environment_ in which it lives. For man is not alone in +the world; nature envelops him and other men surround him; accidental +and secondary folds come and overspread the primitive and permanent +fold, while physical or social circumstances derange or complete the +natural groundwork surrendered to them. At one time climate has +had its effect. Although the history of Aryan nations can be only +obscurely traced from their common country to their final abodes, we +can nevertheless affirm that the profound difference which is apparent +between the Germanic races on the one hand, and the Hellenic and +Latin races on the other, proceeds in great part from the differences +between the countries in which they have established themselves--the +former in cold and moist countries, in the depths of gloomy forests +and swamps, or on the borders of a wild ocean, confined to melancholic +or rude sensations, inclined to drunkenness and gross feeding, leading +a militant and carnivorous life; the latter, on the contrary, living +amidst the finest scenery, alongside of a brilliant, sparkling sea +inviting navigation and commerce, exempt from the grosser cravings of +the stomach, disposed at the start to social habits and customs, to +political organization, to the sentiments and faculties which develop +the art of speaking, the capacity for enjoyment and invention in the +sciences, in art, and in literature. At another time, political events +have operated, as in the two Italian civilizations: the first +one tending wholly to action, to conquest, to government, and to +legislation, through the primitive situation of a city of refuge, a +frontier _emporium_, and of an armed aristocracy which, importing and +enrolling foreigners and the vanquished under it, sets two hostile +bodies facing each other, with no outlet for its internal troubles and +rapacious instincts but systematic warfare; the second one, excluded +from unity and political ambition on a grand scale by the permanency +of its municipal system, by the cosmopolite situation of its pope and +by the military intervention of neighboring states, and following the +bent of its magnificent and harmonious genius, is wholly carried over +to the worship of voluptuousness and beauty. Finally, at another time, +social conditions have imposed their stamp as, eighteen centuries ago, +by Christianity, and twenty-five centuries ago, by Buddhism, when, +around the Mediterranean as in Hindostan, the extreme effects of Aryan +conquest and organization led to intolerable oppression, the crushing +of the individual, utter despair, the whole world under the ban of a +curse, with the development of metaphysics and visions, until man, +in this dungeon of despondency, feeling his heart melt, conceived +of abnegation, charity, tender love, gentleness, humility, human +brotherhood, here in the idea of universal nothingness and there under +that of the fatherhood of God. Look around at the regulative instincts +and faculties implanted in a race; in brief, the turn of mind +according to which it thinks and acts at the present day; we shall +find most frequently that its work is due to one of these prolonged +situations, to these enveloping circumstances, to these persistent +gigantic pressures brought to bear on a mass of men who, one by +one, and all collectively, from one generation to another, have been +unceasingly bent and fashioned by them, in Spain a crusade of eight +centuries against the Mohammedans, prolonged yet longer even to the +exhaustion of the nation through the expulsion of the Moors, +through the spoliation of the Jews, through the establishment of +the Inquisition, through the Catholic wars; in England, a political +establishment of eight centuries which maintains man erect and +respectful, independent and obedient, all accustomed to struggling +together in a body under the sanction of law; in France, a Latin +organization which, at first imposed on docile barbarians, than +leveled to the ground under the universal demolition, forms itself +anew under the latent workings of national instinct, developing under +hereditary monarchs and ending in a sort of equalized, centralized, +administrative republic under dynasties exposed to revolutions. Such +are the most efficacious among the observable causes which mold the +primitive man; they are to nations what education, pursuit, condition, +and abode are to individuals, and seem to comprise all, since the +external forces which fashion human matter, and by which the outward +acts on the inward, are comprehended in them. + +There is, nevertheless, a third order of causes, for, with the forces +within and without, there is the work these have already produced +together, which work itself contributes toward producing the ensuing +work; beside the permanent impulsion and the given environment there +is the acquired momentum. When national character and surrounding +circumstances operate it is not on a _tabula rasa_, but on one already +bearing imprints. According as this _tabula_ is taken at one or at +another moment so is the imprint different, and this suffices to +render the total effect different. Consider, for example, two moments +of a literature or of an art, French tragedy under Corneille and under +Voltaire, and Greek drama under Æschylus and under Euripides, Latin +poetry under Lucretius and under Claudian, and Italian painting under +Da Vinci and under Guido. Assuredly, there is no change of general +conception at either of these two extreme points; ever the same human +type must be portrayed or represented in action; the cast of the +verse, the dramatic structure, the physical form have all persisted. +But there is this among these differences, that one of the artists is +a precursor and the other a successor, that the first one has no model +and the second one has a model; that the former sees things face to +face, and that the latter sees them through the intermediation of the +former, that many departments of art have become more perfect, that +the simplicity and grandeur of the impression have diminished, that +what is pleasing and refined in form has augumented--in short, that +the first work has determined the second. In this respect, it is with +a people as with a plant; the same sap at the same temperature and +in the same soil produces, at different stages of its successive +elaborations, different developments, buds, flowers, fruits, and +seeds, in such a way that the condition of the following is always +that of the preceding and is born of its death. Now, if you no longer +regard a brief moment, as above, but one of those grand periods of +development which embraces one or many centuries like the Middle Ages, +or our last classic period, the conclusion is the same. A certain +dominating conception has prevailed throughout; mankind, during +two hundred years, during five hundred years, have represented to +themselves a certain ideal figure of man, in mediæval times the knight +and the monk, in our classic period the courtier and refined talker; +this creative and universal conception has monopolized the entire +field of action and thought, and, after spreading its involuntary +systematic works over the world, it languished and then died out, +and now a new idea has arisen, destined to a like domination and to +equally multiplied creations. Note here that the latter depends in +part on the former, and that it is the former, which, combining its +effect with those of national genius and surrounding circumstances, +will impose their bent and their direction on new-born things. It is +according to this law that great historic currents are formed, meaning +by this, the long rule of a form of intellect or of a master idea, +like that period of spontaneous creations called the Renaissance, or +that period of oratorical classifications called the Classic Age, or +that series of mystic systems called the Alexandrine and Christian +epoch, or that series of mythological efflorescences found at the +origins of Germany, India, and Greece. Here as elsewhere, we are +dealing merely with a mechanical problem: the total effect is a +compound wholly determined by the grandeur and direction of the forces +which produce it. The sole difference which separates these moral +problems from physical problems lies in this, that in the former the +directions and grandeur cannot be estimated by or stated in figures +with the same precision as in the latter. If a want, a faculty, is +a quantity capable of degrees, the same as pressure or weight, this +quantity is not measurable like that of the pressure or weight. We +cannot fix it in an exact or approximative formula; we can obtain or +give of it only a literary impression; we are reduced to nothing and +citing the prominent facts which make it manifest and which nearly, or +roughly, indicate about what grade on the scale it must be ranged at. +And yet, notwithstanding the methods of notation are not the same +in the moral sciences as in the physical sciences, nevertheless, +as matter is the same in both, and is equally composed of forces, +directions, and magnitudes, we can still show that in one as in the +other, the final effect takes place according to the same law. This is +great or small according as the fundamental forces are great or small +and act more or less precisely in the same sense, according as the +distinct effects of race, environment and epoch combine to enforce +each other or combine to neutralize each other. Thus are explained the +long impotences and the brilliant successes which appear irregularly +and with no apparent reason in the life of a people; the causes of +these consist in internal concordances and contrarieties. There was +one of these concordances when, in the seventeenth century, the social +disposition and conversational spirit innate in France encountered +drawing-room formalities and the moment of oratorical analysis; when, +in the nineteenth century, the flexible, profound genius of Germany +encountered the age of philosophic synthesis and of cosmopolite +criticism. One of these contrarieties happened when, in the +seventeenth century, the blunt, isolated genius of England awkwardly +tried to don the new polish of urbanity, and when, in the sixteenth +century, the lucid, prosaic French intellect tried to gestate a living +poesy. It is this secret concordance of creative forces which produced +the exquisite courtesy and noble cast of literature under Louis XIV. +and Bossuet, and the grandiose metaphysics and broad critical sympathy +under Hegel and Goethe. It is this secret contrariety of creative +forces which produced the literary incompleteness, the licentious +plays, the abortive drama of Dryden and Wycherly, the poor Greek +importations, the gropings, the minute beauties and fragments of +Ronsard and the Pleiad. We may confidently affirm that the unknown +creations toward which the current of coming ages is bearing up will +spring from and be governed by these primordial forces; that, if these +forces could be measured and computed we might deduce from them, as +from a formula, the characters of future civilization; and that +if, notwithstanding the evident rudeness of our notations, and the +fundamental inexactitude of our measures, we would nowadays form some +idea of our general destinies, we must base our conjectures on an +examination of these forces. For, in enumerating them, we run through +the full circle of active forces; and when the race, the environment, +and the moment have been considered,--that is to say the inner +mainspring, the pressure from without, and the impulsion already +acquired,--we have exhausted not only all real causes but again all +possible causes of movement. + + + + +VI + + +There remains to be ascertained in what way these causes, applied to +a nation or to a century, distribute their effects. Like a spring +issuing from an elevated spot and diffusing its waters, according +to the height, from ledge to ledge, until it finally reaches the low +ground, so does the tendency of mind or soul in a people, due to race, +epoch, or environment, diffuse itself in different proportions, and by +regular descent, over the different series of facts which compose +its civilization.[3] In preparing the geographical map of a country, +starting at its watershed, we see the slopes, just below this common +point, dividing themselves into five or six principal basins, and +then each of the latter into several others, and so on until the whole +country, with its thousands of inequalities of surface, is included +in the ramifications of this network. In like manner, in preparing the +psychological map of the events and sentiments belonging to a certain +human civilization, we find at the start five or six well determined +provinces--religion, art, philosophy, the state, the family, and +industries; next, in each of these provinces, natural departments, and +then finally, in each of these departments, still smaller territories +until we arrive at those countless details of life which we observe +daily in ourselves and around us. If, again, we examine and compare +together these various groups of facts we at once find that they are +composed of parts and that all have parts in common. Let us take first +the three principal products of human intelligence--religion, art, and +philosophy. What is a philosophy but a conception of nature and of its +primordial causes under the form of abstractions and formulas? What +underlies a religion and an art if not a conception of this same +nature, and of these same primordial causes, under the form of more +or less determinate symbols, and of more or less distinct personages, +with this difference, that in the first case we believe that they +exist, and in the second case that they do not exist. Let the reader +consider some of the great creations of the intellect in India, in +Scandinavia, in Persia, in Rome, in Greece, and he will find that art +everywhere is a sort of philosophy become sensible, religion a sort +of poem regarded as true, and philosophy a sort of art and religion, +desiccated and reduced to pure abstractions. There is, then, in the +center of each of these groups a common element, the conception of +the world and its origin, and if they differ amongst each other it is +because each combines with the common element a distinct element; +here the power of abstraction, there the faculty of personifying with +belief, and, finally, the talent for personifying without belief. Let +us now take the two leading products of human association, the Family +and the State. What constitutes the State other than the sentiment +of obedience by which a multitude of men collect together under the +authority of a chief? And what constitutes the Family other than the +sentiment of obedience by which a wife and children act together +under the direction of a father and husband? The Family is a natural, +primitive, limited state, as the State is an artificial, ulterior, and +expanded Family, while beneath the differences which arise from the +number, origin, and condition of its members, we distinguish, in the +small as in the large community, a like fundamental disposition of +mind which brings them together and unites them. Suppose, now, that +this common element receives from the environment, the epoch, and the +race peculiar characteristics, and it is clear that _all the groups +into which it enters will be proportionately modified_. If the +sentiment of obedience is merely one of fear,[4] you encounter, as in +most of the Oriental states, the brutality of despotism, a prodigality +of vigorous punishments, the exploitation of the subject, servile +habits, insecurity of property, impoverished production, female +slavery, and the customs of the harem. If the sentiment of obedience +is rooted in the instinct of discipline, sociability, and honor, +you find, as in France, a complete military organization, a superb +administrative hierarchy, a weak public spirit with outbursts of +patriotism, the unhesitating docility of the subject along with +the hot-headedness of the revolutionist, the obsequiousness of the +courtier along with the reserve of the gentleman, the charm of refined +conversation along with home and family bickerings, conjugal equality +together with matrimonial incompatibilities under the necessary +constraints of the law. If, finally, the sentiment of obedience is +rooted in the instinct of subordination and in the idea of duty, you +perceive, as in Germanic nations, the security and contentment of +the household, the firm foundations of domestic life, the slow +and imperfect development of worldly matters, innate respect for +established rank, superstitious reverence for the past, maintenance +of social inequalities, natural and habitual deference to the law. +Similarly in a race, just as there is a difference of aptitude for +general ideas, so will its religion, art, and philosophy be different. +If man is naturally fitted for broader universal conceptions and +inclined at the same time to their derangement, through the nervous +irritability of an over-excited organization, we find, as in India, a +surprising richness of gigantic religious creations, a splendid bloom +of extravagant transparent epics, a strange concatenation of subtle, +imaginative philosophic systems, all so intimately associated and so +interpenetrated with a common sap, that we at once recognize them, by +their amplitude, by their color, and by their disorder, as productions +of the same climate and of the same spirit. If, on the contrary, +the naturally sound and well-balanced man is content to restrict his +conceptions to narrow bounds in order to cast them in more precise +forms, we see, as in Greece, a theology of artists and narrators, +special gods that are soon separated from objects and almost +transformed at once into substantial personages, the sentiment of +universal unity nearly effaced and scarcely maintained in the vague +notion of destiny, a philosophy, rather than subtle and compact, +grandiose and systematic, narrow metaphysically[5] but incomparable +in its logic, sophistry, and morality, a poesy and arts superior to +anything we have seen in lucidity, naturalness, proportion, truth, and +beauty. If, finally, man is reduced to narrow conceptions deprived +of any speculative subtlety, and at the same time finds that he is +absorbed and completely hardened by practical interests, we see, as +in Rome, rudimentary deities, mere empty names, good for denoting the +petty details of agriculture, generation, and the household, veritable +marriage and farming labels, and, therefore, a null or borrowed +mythology, philosophy, and poesy. Here, as elsewhere, comes in the law +of mutual dependencies.[6] A civilization is a living unit, the parts +of which hold together the same as the parts of an organic body. Just +as in an animal, the instincts, teeth, limbs, bones, and muscular +apparatus are bound together in such a way that a variation of one +determines a corresponding variation in the others, and out of which +a skillful naturalist, with a few bits, imagines and reconstructs an +almost complete body, so, in a civilization, do religion, philosophy, +the family scheme, literature and the arts form a system in which +each local change involves a general change, so that an experienced +historian, who studies one portion apart from the others, sees +beforehand and partially predicts the characteristics of the rest. +There is nothing vague in this dependence. The regulation of all this +in the living body consists, first, of the tendency to manifest a +certain primordial type, and, next, the necessity of its possessing +organs which can supply its wants and put itself in harmony with +itself in order to live. The regulation in a civilization consists in +the presence in each great human creation of an elementary productor +equally present in other surrounding creations, that is, some faculty +and aptitude, some efficient and marked disposition, which, with its +own peculiar character, introduces this with that into all operations +in which it takes part, and which, according to its variations, causes +variation in all the works in which it coöperates. + + + + +VII + + +Having reached this point we can obtain a glimpse of the principal +features of human transformations, and can now search for the general +laws which regulate not only events, but classes of events; not only +this religion or that literature, but the whole group of religions or +of literatures. If, for example, it is admitted that a religion is +a metaphysical poem associated with belief; if it is recognized, +besides, that there are certain races and certain environments +in which belief, poetic faculty, and metaphysical faculty display +themselves in common with unwonted vigor; if we consider that +Christianity and Buddhism were developed at periods of grand +systematizations and in the midst of sufferings like the oppression +which stirred up the fanatics of Cevennes; if, on the other hand, it +is recognized that primitive religions are born at the dawn of human +reason, during the richest expansion of human imagination, at times +of the greatest naïveté and of the greatest credulity; if we consider, +again, that Mohammedanism appeared along with the advent of poetic +prose and of the conception of material unity, amongst a people +destitute of science and at the moment of a sudden development of the +intellect--we might conclude that religion is born and declines, is +reformed and transformed, according as circumstances fortify and bring +together, with more or less precision and energy, its three generative +instincts; and we would then comprehend why religion is endemic in +India among specially exalted imaginative and philosophic intellects; +why it blooms out so wonderfully and so grandly in the Middle Ages, +in an oppressive society, amongst new languages and literature; why +it develops again in the sixteenth century with a new character and an +heroic enthusiasm, at the time of an universal renaissance and at the +awakening of the Germanic races; why it swarms out in so many bizarre +sects in the rude democracy of America and under the bureaucratic +despotism of Russia; why, in fine, it is seen spreading out in the +Europe of to-day in such different proportions and with such special +traits, according to such differences of race and of civilizations. +And so for every kind of human production, for letters, music, the +arts of design, philosophy, the sciences, state industries, and +the rest. Each has some moral tendency for its direct cause, or a +concurrence of moral tendencies; given the cause, it appears; the +cause withdrawn, it disappears; the weakness or intensity of the cause +is the measure of its own weakness or intensity. It is bound to +that like any physical phenomenon to its condition, like dew to the +chilliness of a surrounding atmosphere, like dilatation to heat. +Couples exist in the moral world as they exist in the physical world, +as rigorously linked together and as universally diffused. Whatever +in one case produces, alters, or suppresses the first term, produces, +alters, and suppresses the second term as a necessary consequence. +Whatever cools the surrounding atmosphere causes the fall of dew. +Whatever develops credulity, along with poetic conceptions of the +universe, engenders religion. Thus have things come about, and +thus will they continue to come about. As soon as the adequate and +necessary condition of one of these vast apparitions becomes known to +us our mind has a hold on the future as well as on the past. We can +confidently state under what circumstances it will reappear, foretell +without rashness many portions of its future history, and sketch with +precaution some of the traits of its ulterior development. + + + + +VIII + + +History has reached this point at the present day, or rather it is +nearly there, on the threshold of this inquest. The question as now +stated is this: Given a literature, a philosophy, a society, an art, +a certain group of arts, what is the moral state of things which +produces it? And what are the conditions of race, epoch, and +environment the best adapted to produce this moral state? There is +a distinct moral state for each of these formations and for each of +their branches; there is one for art in general as well as for each +particular art; for architecture, painting, sculpture, music, and +poetry, each with a germ of its own in the large field of human +psychology; each has its own law, and it is by virtue of this law that +we see each shoot up, apparently haphazard, singly and alone, amidst +the miscarriages of their neighbors, like painting in Flanders and +Holland in the seventeenth century, like poetry in England in the +sixteenth century, like music in Germany in the eighteenth century. +At this moment, and in these countries, the conditions for one art and +not for the others are fulfilled, and one branch only has bloomed out +amidst the general sterility. It is these laws of human vegetation +which history must now search for; it is this special psychology of +each special formation which must be got at; it is the composition of +a complete table of these peculiar conditions that must now be worked +out. There is nothing more delicate and nothing more difficult. +Montesquieu undertook it, but in his day the interest in history was +too recent for him to be successful; nobody, indeed, had any idea +of the road that was to be followed, and even at the present day +we scarcely begin to obtain a glimpse of it. Just as astronomy, at +bottom, is a mechanical problem, and physiology, likewise, a chemical +problem, so is history, at bottom, a _problem of psychology_. There is +a particular system of inner impressions and operations which fashions +the artist, the believer, the musician, the painter, the nomad, +the social man; for each of these, the filiation, intensity, and +interdependence of ideas and of emotions are different; each has his +own moral history, and his own special organization, along with some +master tendency and with some dominant trait. To explain each of these +would require a chapter devoted to a profound internal analysis, and +that is a work that can scarcely be called sketched out at the present +day. But one man, Stendhal, through a certain turn of mind and a +peculiar education, has attempted it, and even yet most of his readers +find his works paradoxical and obscure. His talent and ideas were +too premature. His admirable insight, his profound sayings carelessly +thrown out, the astonishing precision of his notes and logic, were not +understood; people were not aware that, under the appearances and +talk of a man of the world, he explained the most complex of internal +mechanisms; that his finger touched the great mainspring, that he +brought scientific processes to bear in the history of the heart, the +art of employing figures, of decomposing, of deducing, that he was the +first to point out fundamental causes such as nationalities, climates, +and temperaments, in short, that he treated sentiments as they should +be treated, that is to say, as a naturalist and physicist, by making +classifications and estimating forces. On account of all this he +was pronounced dry and eccentric and allowed to live in isolation, +composing novels, books of travel and taking notes, for which he +counted upon, and has obtained, about a dozen or so of readers. And +yet his works are those in which we of the present day may find the +most satisfactory efforts that have been made to clear the road I have +just striven to describe. Nobody has taught one better how to observe +with one's own eyes, first, to regard humanity around us and life as +it is, and next, old and authentic documents, how to read more than +merely the black and white of the page, how to detect under old print +and the scrawl of the text the veritable sentiment and the train +of thought, the mental state in which the words were penned. In his +writings, as in those of Sainte Beuve and in those of the German +critics the reader will find how much is to be derived from a literary +document, if this document is rich and we know how to interpret it, +we will find in the psychology of a particular soul, often that of an +age, and sometimes that of a race. In this respect, a great poem, a +good novel, the confessions of a superior man, are more instructive +than a mass of historians and histories, I would give fifty volumes +of charters and a hundred diplomatic files for the memoirs of Cellini, +the epistles of Saint Paul, the table talk of Luther, or the comedies +of Aristophanes. Herein lies the value of literary productions. They +are instructive because they are beautiful, their usefulness increases +with their perfection and if they provide us with documents, it is +because they are monuments. The more visible a book renders sentiments +the more literary it is, for it is the special office of literature to +take note of sentiments. The more important the sentiments noted in a +book the higher its rank in literature, for it is by representing what +sort of a life a nation or an epoch leads, that a writer rallies to +himself the sympathies of a nation or of an epoch. Hence, among the +documents which bring before our eyes the sentiments of preceding +generations, a literature, and especially a great literature, is +incomparably the best. It resembles those admirable instruments of +remarkable sensitiveness which physicists make use of to detect and +measure the most profound and delicate changes that occur in a human +body. There is nothing approaching this in constitutions or religions; +the articles of a code or of a catechism do no more than depict mind +in gross and without finesse; if there are any documents which show +life and spirit in politics and in creeds, they are the eloquent +discourses of the pulpit and the tribune, memoirs and personal +confessions, all belonging to literature, so that, outside of itself, +literature embodies whatever is good elsewhere. It is mainly in +studying literatures that we are able to produce moral history, and +arrive at some knowledge of the psychological laws on which events +depend. + +I have undertaken to write a history of a literature and to ascertain +the psychology of a people; in selecting this one, it is not without +a motive. A people had to be taken possessing a vast and complete +literature, which is rarely found. There are few nations which, +throughout their existence, have thought and written well in the full +sense of the word. Among the ancients, Latin literature is null at the +beginning, and afterward borrowed and an imitation. Among the moderns, +German literature is nearly a blank for two centuries.[7] Italian and +Spanish literatures come to an end in the middle of the seventeenth +century. Ancient Greece, and modern France and England, alone offer a +complete series of great and expressive monuments. I have chosen +the English because, as this still exists and is open to direct +observation, it can be better studied than that of an extinct +civilization of which fragments only remain; and because, being +different, it offers better than that of France very marked +characteristics in the eyes of a Frenchman. Moreover, outside of +what is peculiar to English civilization, apart from a spontaneous +development, it presents a forced deviation due to the latest and most +effective conquest to which the country was subject; the three given +conditions out of which it issues--race, climate, and the Norman +conquest--are clearly and distinctly visible in its literary +monuments; so that we study in this history the two most potent motors +of human transformation, namely, nature and constraint, and we study +them, without any break or uncertainty, in a series of authentic and +complete monuments. I have tried to define these primitive motors, to +show their gradual effects, and explain how their insensible operation +has brought religious and literary productions into full light, and +how the inward mechanism is developed by which the barbarous Saxon +became the Englishman of the present day. + + +[Footnote A: Hippolyte Adolphe Taine (b. 1828; d. 1893) was one of the +most distinguished French critics of the nineteenth century. He held +the chair of esthetics at the Ècole des Beaux Arts, and wrote a +large number of works in history, travel, and literary criticism. +His "History of English Literature" is the most brilliant book on +the subject ever written by a foreigner, and in this introduction he +expounds the method of criticism which has come to be associated +with his name, and in accordance with which he seeks to interpret the +characteristics of English authors.] + +[Footnote 1: Darwin, "The Origin of Species." Prosper Lucas, "De +l'Hérédité."] + +[Footnote 2: Spinosa, "Ethics," part iv., axiom.] + +[Footnote 3: For this scale of coordinate effects consult, "Langues +Sémitiques," by Renan, ch I, "Comparison des civilizations Grecque +et Romaine," vol I, ch I, 3d ed, by Mommsen, "Consequences de la +démocratie," vol III., by Tocqueville.] + +[Footnote 4: "L'Esprit des Lois," by Montesquieu; the essential +principles of the three governments.] + +[Footnote 5: The birth of the Alexandrine philosophy is due to contact +with the Orient. Aristotle's metaphysical views stand alone. Moreover, +with him as with Plato, they afford merely a glimpse. By way of +contrast see systematic power in Plotinus, Proclus, Schelling, and +Hegel, or again in the admirable boldness of Brahmanic and Buddhist +speculation.] + +[Footnote 6: I have very often made attempts to state this law, +especially in the preface to "Essais de Critique et d'Histoire."] + +[Footnote 7: From 1550 to 1750.] + + + + +_Planned and Designed at The Collier Press By William Patten_ + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PREFACES AND PROLOGUES TO FAMOUS BOOKS *** + +***** This file should be named 13182-0.txt or 13182-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/3/1/8/13182/ + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the +United States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books + with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations + +Author: Charles W. Eliot + +Release Date: August 15, 2004 [EBook #13182] +Last Updated: March 21, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PREFACES AND PROLOGUES *** + + + + +Produced by Leah Moser and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team +from images provided by the Million Book Project, + + + + + + +[Illustration: _Hippolyte Adolphe Taine From the etching by Asher B. +Durand_] + +THE HARVARD CLASSICS EDITED BY CHARLES W. ELIOT LL.D. + + +PREFACES AND PROLOGUES TO FAMOUS BOOKS + +WITH INTRODUCTIONS, NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS + +[Illustration] + +"DR. ELIOT'S FIVE-FOOT SHELF OF BOOKS" + + +P.F. COLLIER & SON + +NEW YORK + +1909 BY LITTLE BROWN & COMPANY + +1910 BY P.F. COLLIER & SON + + + + +CONTENTS + + + TITLE, PROLOGUE AND EPILOGUES TO THE RECUYELL OF THE + HISTORIES OF TROY WILLIAM CAXTON + + EPILOGUE TO DICTES AND SAYINGS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS + WILLIAM CAXTON + + PROLOGUE TO GOLDEN LEGEND WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO CATON WILLIAM CAXTON + EPILOGUE TO AESOP WILLIAM CAXTON + PROEM TO CHAUCER'S CANTERBURY TALES WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO MALORY'S KING ARTHUR WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO VIRGIL'S ENEYDOS WILLIAM CAXTON + + DEDICATION OF THE INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION + JOHN CALVIN + TRANSLATED BY JOHN ALLEN + + DEDICATION OF THE REVOLUTIONS OF THE HEAVENLY BODIES + NICOLAUS COPERNICUS + + PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION IN SCOTLAND + JOHN KNOX + + PREFATORY LETTER TO SIR WALTER RALEIGH ON THE FAERIE + QUEENE EDMUND SPENSER + + PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD SIR WALTER RALEIGH + + PROOEMIUM, EPISTLE DEDICATORY, PREFACE, AND PLAN OF THE + INSTAURATIO MAGNA, ETC. FRANCIS BACON + TRANSLATION EDITED BY J. SPEDDING + + PREFACE TO THE NOVUM ORGANUM FRANCIS BACON + + PREFACE TO THE FIRST FOLIO EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE'S + PLAYS HEMINGE AND CONDELL + + PREFACE TO THE PHILOSOPHIAE NATURALIS PRINCIPIA + MATHEMATICA SIR ISAAC NEWTON + TRANSLATED BY ANDREW MOTTE + + PREFACE TO FABLES, ANCIENT AND MODERN + JOHN DRYDEN + + PREFACE TO JOSEPH ANDREWS HENRY FIELDING + PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH DICTIONARY SAMUEL JOHNSON + PREFACE TO SHAKESPEARE SAMUEL JOHNSON + INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPYLÄEN J.W. VON GOETHE + + PREFACES TO VARIOUS VOLUMES OF POEMS + WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO PREFACE WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + + PREFACE TO CROMWELL VICTOR HUGO + PREFACE TO LEAVES OF GRASS WALT WHITMAN + INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE + H.A. TAINE + + + + +_INTRODUCTORY NOTE_ + + +_No part of a book is so intimate as the Preface. Here, after the long +labor of the work is over, the author descends from his platform, and +speaks with his reader as man to man, disclosing his hopes and fears, +seeking sympathy for his difficulties, offering defence or defiance, +according to his temper, against the criticisms which he anticipates. +It thus happens that a personality which has been veiled by a formal +method throughout many chapters, is suddenly seen face to face in the +Preface; and this alone, if there were no other reason, would justify +a volume of Prefaces. + +But there are other reasons why a Preface may be presented apart from +its parent work, and may, indeed, be expected sometimes to survive +it. The Prologues and Epilogues of Caxton were chiefly prefixed to +translations which have long been superseded; but the comments of this +frank and enthusiastic pioneer of the art of printing in England +not only tell us of his personal tastes, but are in a high degree +illuminative of the literary habits and standards of western Europe +in the fifteenth century. Again, modern research has long ago put +Raleigh's "History of the World" out of date; but his eloquent Preface +still gives us a rare picture of the attitude of an intelligent +Elizabethan, of the generation which colonised America, toward the +past, the present, and the future worlds. Bacon's "Great Restoration" +is no longer a guide to scientific method; but his prefatory +statements as to his objects and hopes still offer a lofty +inspiration. + +And so with the documents here drawn from the folios of Copernicus and +Calvin, with the criticism of Dryden and Wordsworth and Hugo, with +Dr. Johnson's Preface to his great Dictionary, with the astounding +manifesto of a new poetry from Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass"--each +of them has a value and significance independent now of the work which +it originally introduced, and each of them presents to us a man._ + + + + +PREFACES AND EPILOGUES + +BY WILLIAM CAXTON[A] + + + + +THE RECUYELL OF THE HISTORIES OF TROY + +TITLE AND PROLOGUE TO BOOK I + + +Here beginneth the volume entitled and named the Recuyell of the +Histories of Troy, composed and drawn out of divers books of Latin +into French by the right venerable person and worshipful man, Raoul le +Feure, priest and chaplain unto the right noble, glorious, and mighty +prince in his time, Philip, Duke of Burgundy, of Brabant, etc. in the +year of the Incarnation of our Lord God a thousand four hundred sixty +and four, and translated and drawn out of French into English by +William Caxton, mercer, of the city of London, at the commandment of +the right high, mighty, and virtuous Princess, his redoubted Lady, +Margaret, by the grace of God Duchess of Burgundy, of Lotrylk, of +Brabant, etc.; which said translation and work was begun in Bruges +in the County of Flanders, the first day of March, the year of the +Incarnation of our said Lord God a thousand four hundred sixty and +eight, and ended and finished in the holy city of Cologne the 19th day +of September, the year of our said Lord God a thousand four hundred +sixty and eleven, etc. + +And on that other side of this leaf followeth the prologue. + +When I remember that every man is bounden by the commandment and +counsel of the wise man to eschew sloth and idleness, which is +mother and nourisher of vices, and ought to put myself unto virtuous +occupation and business, then I, having no great charge of occupation, +following the said counsel took a French book, and read therein many +strange and marvellous histories, wherein I had great pleasure and +delight, as well for the novelty of the same as for the fair language +of French, which was in prose so well and compendiously set and +written, which methought I understood the sentence and substance of +every matter. And for so much as this book was new and late made and +drawn into French, and never had seen it in our English tongue, I +thought in myself it should be a good business to translate it into +our English, to the end that it might be had as well in the royaume +of England as in other lands, and also for to pass therewith the time, +and thus concluded in myself to begin this said work. And forthwith +took pen and ink, and began boldly to run forth as blind Bayard +in this present work, which is named "The Recuyell of the Trojan +Histories." And afterward when I remembered myself of my simpleness +and unperfectness that I had in both languages, that is to wit in +French and in English, for in France was I never, and was born and +learned my English in Kent, in the Weald, where I doubt not is +spoken as broad and rude English as in any place of England; and have +continued by the space of 30 years for the most part in the countries +of Brabant, Flanders, Holland, and Zealand. And thus when all these +things came before me, after that I had made and written five or six +quires I fell in despair of this work, and purposed no more to have +continued therein, and those quires laid apart, and in two years after +laboured no more in this work, and was fully in will to have left it, +till on a time it fortuned that the right high, excellent, and right +virtuous princess, my right redoubted Lady, my Lady Margaret, by +the grace of God sister unto the King of England and of France, +my sovereign lord, Duchess of Burgundy, of Lotryk, of Brabant, of +Limburg, and of Luxembourg, Countess of Flanders, of Artois, and of +Burgundy, Palatine of Hainault, of Holland, of Zealand and of Namur, +Marquesse of the Holy Empire, Lady of Frisia, of Salins and of +Mechlin, sent for me to speak with her good Grace of divers matters, +among the which I let her Highness have knowledge of the foresaid +beginning of this work, which anon commanded me to show the said five +or six quires to her said Grace; and when she had seen them anon she +found a default in my English, which she commanded me to amend, and +moreover commanded me straitly to continue and make an end of the +residue then not translated; whose dreadful commandment I durst in no +wise disobey, because I am a servant unto her said Grace and receive +of her yearly fee and other many good and great benefits, (and also +hope many more to receive of her Highness), but forthwith went and +laboured in the said translation after my simple and poor cunning, +also nigh as I can following my author, meekly beseeching the +bounteous Highness of my said Lady that of her benevolence list to +accept and take in gree this simple and rude work here following; and +if there be anything written or said to her pleasure, I shall think my +labour well employed, and whereas there is default that she arette it +to the simpleness of my cunning which is full small in this behalf; +and require and pray all them that shall read this said work to +correct it, and to hold me excused of the rude and simple translation. + +And thus I end my prologue. + +[Footnote A: William Caxton (1422?-1491), merchant and translator, +learned the art of printing on the Continent, probably at Bruges or +Cologne. He translated "The Recuyell of the Histories of Troy" between +1469 and 1471, and, on account of the great demand for copies, was led +to have it printed--the first English book to be reproduced by this +means. The date was about 1474; the place, probably Bruges. In +1476, Caxton came back to England, and set up a press of his own at +Westminster. In 1477, he issued the first book known to have been +printed in England, "The Dictes and Sayings of the Philosophers." +The following Prefaces and Epilogues from Caxton's own pen show his +attitude towards some of the more important of the works that issued +from his press.] + + + + +EPILOGUE TO BOOK II + + +Thus endeth the second book of the Recule of the Histories of Troy. +Which bookes were late translated into French out of Latin by the +labour of the venerable person Raoul le Feure, priest, as afore +is said; and by me indigne and unworthy, translated into this rude +English by the commandment of my said redoubted Lady, Duchess of +Burgundy. And for as much as I suppose the said two books be not had +before this time in our English language, therefore I had the better +will to accomplish this said work; which work was begun in Bruges +and continued in Ghent and finished in Cologne, in the time of the +troublous world, and of the great divisions being and reigning, as +well in the royaumes of England and France as in all other places +universally through the world; that is to wit the year of our Lord a +thousand four hundred seventy one. And as for the third book, which +treateth of the general and last destruction of Troy, it needeth +not to translate it into English, for as much as that worshipful and +religious man, Dan John Lidgate, monk of Bury, did translate it but +late; after whose work I fear to take upon me, that am not worthy to +bear his penner and ink-horn after him, to meddle me in that work. +But yet for as much as I am bound to contemplate my said Lady's good +grace, and also that his work is in rhyme and as far as I know it is +not had in prose in our tongue, and also, peradventure, he translated +after some other author than this is; and yet for as much as divers +men be of divers desires, some to read in rhyme and metre and some +in prose; and also because that I have now good leisure, being in +Cologne, and have none other thing to do at this time; in eschewing +of idleness, mother of all vices, I have delibered in myself for the +contemplation of my said redoubted lady to take this labour in hand, +by the sufferance and help of Almighty God; whom I meekly supplye to +give me grace to accomplish it to the pleasure of her that is causer +thereof, and that she receive it in gree of me, her faithful, true, +and most humble servant etc. + + + + +EPILOGUE TO BOOK III + + +Thus end I this book, which I have translated after mine Author as +nigh as God hath given me cunning, to whom be given the laud and +praising. And for as much as in the writing of the same my pen is +worn, my hand weary and not steadfast, mine eyne dimmed with overmuch +looking on the white paper, and my courage not so prone and ready to +labour as it hath been, and that age creepeth on me daily and feebleth +all the body, and also because I have promised to divers gentlemen and +to my friends to address to them as hastily as I might this said book, +therefore I have practised and learned at my great charge and dispense +to ordain this said book in print, after the manner and form as ye may +here see, and is not written with pen and ink as other books be, to +the end that every man may have them at once. For all the books of +this story, named "The Recule of the Histories of Troy" thus imprinted +as ye here see, were begun in one day and also finished in one day, +which book I have presented to my said redoubted Lady, as afore +is said. And she hath well accepted it, and largely rewarded me, +wherefore I beseech Almighty God to reward her everlasting bliss after +this life, praying her said Grace and all them that shall read this +book not to disdain the simple and rude work, neither to reply against +the saying of the matters touched in this book, though it accord not +unto the translation of others which have written it. For divers men +have made divers books which in all points accord not, as Dictes, +Dares, and Homer. For Dictes and Homer, as Greeks, say and write +favorably for the Greeks, and give to them more worship than to the +Trojans; and Dares writeth otherwise than they do. And also as for the +proper names, it is no wonder that they accord not, for some one name +in these days have divers equivocations after the countries that they +dwell in; but all accord in conclusion the general destruction of that +noble city of Troy, and the death of so many noble princes, as +kings, dukes, earls, barons, knights, and common people, and the ruin +irreparable of that city that never since was re-edified; which may be +example to all men during the world how dreadful and jeopardous it is +to begin a war and what harms, losses, and death followeth. Therefore +the Apostle saith: "All that is written is written to our doctrine," +which doctrine for the common weal I beseech God may be taken in such +place and time as shall be most needful in increasing of peace, +love, and charity; which grant us He that suffered for the same to be +crucified on the rood tree. And say we all Amen for charity! + + + + +DICTES AND SAYINGS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS + +FIRST EDITION (1477). EPILOGUE + + +Here endeth the book named _The Dictes or Sayings of the +Philosophers_, imprinted by me, William Caxton, at Westminster, the +year of our Lord 1477. Which book is late translated out of French +into English by the noble and puissant Lord Lord Antony, Earl of +Rivers, Lord of Scales and of the Isle of Wight, defender and director +of the siege apostolic for our holy father the Pope in this royaume of +England, and governor of my Lord Prince of Wales. And it is so that at +such time as he had accomplished this said work, it liked him to send +it to me in certain quires to oversee, which forthwith I saw, +and found therein many great, notable, and wise sayings of the +philosophers, according unto the books made in French which I had +often before read; but certainly I had seen none in English until that +time. And so afterward I came unto my said Lord, and told him how I +had read and seen his book, and that he had done a meritorious deed in +the labour of the translation thereof into our English tongue, wherein +he had deserved a singular laud and thanks, &c. Then my said Lord +desired me to oversee it, and where I should find fault to correct it; +whereon I answered unto his Lordship that I could not amend it, but +if I should so presume I might apaire it, for it was right well +and cunningly made and translated into right good and fair English. +Notwithstanding, he willed me to oversee it, and shewed me divers +things, which, as seemed to him, might be left out, as divers letters, +missives sent from Alexander to Darius and Aristotle, and each to +other, which letters were little appertinent unto dictes and sayings +aforesaid, forasmuch as they specify of other matters. And also +desired me, that done, to put the said book in imprint. And thus +obeying his request and commandment, I have put me in devoir to +oversee this his said book, and behold as nigh as I could how it +accordeth with the original, being in French. And I find nothing +discordant therein, save only in the dictes and sayings of Socrates, +wherein I find that my said Lord hath left out certain and divers +conclusions touching women. Whereof I marvel that my Lord hath not +written them, ne what hath moved him so to do, ne what cause he had at +that time; but I suppose that some fair lady hath desired him to leave +it out of his book; or else he was amorous on some noble lady, for +whose love he would not set it in his book; or else for the very +affection, love, and good will that he hath unto all ladies and +gentlewomen, he thought that Socrates spared the sooth and wrote of +women more than truth; which I cannot think that so true a man and so +noble a philosopher as Socrates was should write otherwise than truth. +For if he had made fault in writing of women, he ought not, ne should +not, be believed in his other dictes and sayings. But I perceive that +my said Lord knoweth verily that such defaults be not had ne found in +the women born and dwelling in these parts ne regions of the world. +Socrates was a Greek, born in a far country from hence, which country +is all of other conditions than this is, and men and women of +other nature than they be here in this country. For I wot well, of +whatsoever condition women be in Greece, the women of this country be +right good, wise, pleasant, humble, discreet, sober, chaste, obedient +to their husbands, true, secret, steadfast, ever busy, and never idle, +attemperate in speaking, and virtuous in all their works--or at least +should be so. For which causes so evident my said Lord, as I suppose, +thought it was not of necessity to set in his book the sayings of his +author Socrates touching women. But forasmuch as I had commandment of +my said Lord to correct and amend where I should find fault, and other +find I none save that he hath left out these dictes and sayings of the +women of Greece, therefore in accomplishing his commandment--forasmuch +as I am not certain whether it was in my Lord's copy or not, or else, +peradventure, that the wind had blown over the leaf at the time of +translation of his book--I purpose to write those same sayings of that +Greek Socrates, which wrote of the women of Greece and nothing of them +of this royaume, whom, I suppose, he never knew; for if he had, I dare +plainly say that he would have reserved them specially in his said +dictes. Always not presuming to put and set them in my said Lord's +book but in the end apart in the rehearsal of the works, humbly +requiring all them that shall read this little rehearsal, that if they +find any fault to arette it to Socrates, and not to me, which writeth +as hereafter followeth. + +Socrates said that women be the apparels to catch men, but they take +none but them that will be poor or else them that know them not. +And he said that there is none so great empechement unto a man as +ignorance and women. And he saw a woman that bare fire, of whom he +said that the hotter bore the colder. And he saw a woman sick, of whom +he said that the evil resteth and dwelleth with the evil. And he saw +a woman brought to the justice, and many other women followed her +weeping, of whom he said the evil be sorry and angry because the evil +shall perish. And he saw a young maid that learned to write, of whom +he said that men multiplied evil upon evil. And he said that the +ignorance of a man is known in three things, that is to wit, when he +hath no thought to use reason; when he cannot refrain his covetise; +and when he is governed by the counsel of women, in that he knoweth +that they know not. And he said unto his disciples: "Will ye that I +enseign and teach you how ye shall now escape from all evil?" And they +answered, "Yea." And then he said to them, "For whatsoever thing that +it be, keep you and be well ware that ye obey not women." Who answered +to him again, "And what sayest thou by our good mothers, and of our +sisters?" He said to them, "Suffice you with that I have said to you, +for all be semblable in malice." And he said, "Whosoever will acquire +and get science, let him never put him in the governance of a woman." +And he saw a woman that made her fresh and gay, to whom he said, "Thou +resemblest the fire; for the more wood is laid to the fire the more +will it burn, and the greater is the heat." And on a time one asked +him what him semed of women; he answered that the women resemble a +tree called Edelfla, which is the fairest tree to behold and see +that may be, but within it is full of venom. And they said to him and +demanded wherefore he blamed so women? and that he himself had +not come into this world, ne none other men also, without them. He +answered, "The woman is like unto a tree named Chassoygnet, on which +tree there be many things sharp and pricking, which hurt and prick +them that approach unto it; and yet, nevertheless, that same tree +bringeth forth good dates and sweet." And they demanded him why he +fled from the women? And he answered, "Forasmuch as I see them flee +and eschew the good and commonly do evil." And a woman said to him, +"Wilt thou have any other woman than me?" And he answered to her, "Art +not ashamed to offer thyself to him that demandeth nor desireth thee +not?" + +So, these be the dictes and sayings of the philosopher Socrates, which +he wrote in his book; and certainly he wrote no worse than afore +is rehearsed. And forasmuch as it is accordant that his dictes and +sayings should be had as well as others', therefore I have set it in +the end of this book. And also some persons, peradventure, that have +read this book in French would have arette a great default in me that +I had not done my devoir in visiting and overseeing of my Lord's +book according to his desire. And some other also, haply, might have +supposed that Socrates had written much more ill of women than here +afore is specified, wherefore in satisfying of all parties, and also +for excuse of the said Socrates, I have set these said dictes and +sayings apart in the end of this book, to the intent that if my said +lord or any other person, whatsoever he or she be that shall read or +hear it, that if they be not well pleased withal, that they with a pen +race it out, or else rend the leaf out of the book. Humbly requiring +and beseeching my said lord to take no displeasure on me so presuming, +but to pardon whereas he shall find fault; and that it please him to +take the labour of the imprinting in gree and thanks, which gladly +have done my diligence in the accomplishing of his desire and +commandment; in which I am bounden so to do for the good reward that +I have received of his said lordship; whom I beseech Almighty God to +increase and to continue in his virtuous disposition in this world, +and after this life to live everlastingly in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +GOLDEN LEGEND. + +FIRST EDITION (1483). PROLOGUE + + +The Holy and blessed doctor Saint Jerome saith this authority, "Do +always some good work to the end that the devil find thee not Idle." +And the holy doctor Saint Austin saith in the book of the labour of +monks, that no man strong or mighty to labour ought to be idle; for +which cause when I had performed and accomplished divers works and +histories translated out of French into English at the request of +certain lords, ladies, and gentlemen, as the Recuyel of the History of +Troy, the Book of the Chess, the History of Jason, the history of +the Mirror of the World, the 15 books of Metamorphoses in which be +contained the fables of Ovid, and the History of Godfrey of Boulogne +in the conquest of Jerusalem, with other divers works and books, I +ne wist what work to begin and put forth after the said works to-fore +made. And forasmuch as idleness is so much blamed, as saith Saint +Bernard, the mellifluous doctor, that she is mother of lies and +step-dame of virtues, and it is she that overthroweth strong men into +sin, quencheth virtue, nourisheth pride, and maketh the way ready to +go to hell; and John Cassiodorus saith that the thought of him that is +idle thinketh on none other thing but on licorous meats and viands for +his belly; and the holy Saint Bernard aforesaid saith in an epistle, +when the time shall come that it shall behove us to render and give +accounts of our idle time, what reason may we render or what answer +shall we give when in idleness is none excuse; and Prosper saith that +whosoever liveth in idleness liveth in manner of a dumb beast. And +because I have seen the authorities that blame and despise so much +idleness, and also know well that it is one of the capital and deadly +sins much hateful unto God, therefore I have concluded and firmly +purposed in myself no more to be idle, but will apply myself to labour +and such occupation as I have been accustomed to do. And forasmuch as +Saint Austin aforesaid saith upon a psalm that good work ought not to +be done for fear of pain, but for the love of righteousness, and that +it be of very and sovereign franchise, and because me-seemeth to be +a sovereign weal to incite and exhort men and women to keep them from +sloth and idleness, and to let to be understood to such people as be +not lettered the nativities, the lives, the passions, the miracles, +and the death of the holy saints, and also some other notorious deeds +and acts of times past, I have submised myself to translate into +English the legend of Saints, which is called _Legenda Aurea_ in +Latin, that is to say, the _Golden Legend_; for in like wise as gold +is most noble above all other metals, in like wise is this legend +holden most noble above all other works. Against me here might some +persons say that this legend hath been translated before, and truth it +is; but forasmuch as I had by me a legend in French, another in Latin, +and the third in English, which varied in many and divers places, and +also many histories were comprised in the two other books which were +not in the English books; and therefore I have written one out of the +said three books, which I have ordered otherwise than the said English +legend is, which was so to-fore made, beseeching all them that shall +see or hear it read to pardon me where I have erred or made fault, +which, if any be, is of ignorance and against my will; and submit it +wholly of such as can and may, to correct it, humbly beseeching them +so to do, and in so doing they shall deserve a singular laud and +merit; and I shall pray for them unto Almighty God that He of His +benign grace reward them, etc., and that it profit to all them that +shall read or hear it read, and may increase in them virtue, and +expel vice and sin, that by the example of the holy saints amend their +living here in this short life, that by their merits they and I may +come to everlasting life and bliss in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +CATON (1483) + +PROLOGUE + + +Here beginneth the prologue of proem of the book called _Caton_, which +book hath been translated into English by Master Benet Burgh, +late Archdeacon of Cochester, and high canon of St. Stephen's at +Westminster, which ful craftily hath made it in ballad royal for the +erudition of my lord Bousher, son and heir at that time to my lord the +Earl of Essex. And because of late came to my hand a book of the said +Cato in French, which rehearseth many a fair learning and notable +examples, I have translated it out of French into English, as all +along hereafter shall appear, which I present unto the city of London. + +Unto the noble, ancient, and renowned city, the city of London, in +England, I, William Caxton, citizen and conjury of the same, and of +the fraternity and fellowship of the mercery, owe of right my service +and good will, and of very duty am bounden naturally to assist, aid, +and counsel, as far forth as I can to my power, as to my mother of +whom I have received my nurture and living, and shall pray for the +good prosperity and policy of the same during my life. For, as me +seemeth, it is of great need, because I have known it in my young age +much more wealthy, prosperous, and richer, than it is at this day. And +the cause is that there is almost none that intendeth to the common +weal, but only every man for his singular profit Oh! when I remember +the noble Romans, that for the common weal of the city of Rome they +spent not only their moveable goods but they put their bodies and +lives in jeopardy and to the death, as by many a noble example we may +see in the acts of Romans, as of the two noble Scipios, African and +Asian, Actilius, and many others. And among all others the noble Cato, +author and maker of this book, which he hath left for to remain ever +to all the people for to learn in it and to know how every man ought +to rule and govern him in this life, as well for the life temporal as +for the life spiritual. And as in my judgement it is the best book for +to be taught to young children in school, and also to people of every +age, it is full convenient if it be well understood And because I +see that the children that be born within the said city increase, and +profit not like their fathers and elders, but for the most part after +that they be come to their perfect years of discretion and ripeness of +age, how well that their fathers have left to them great quantity of +goods yet scarcely among ten two thrive, [whereas] I have seen and +know in other lands in divers cities that of one name and lineage +successively have endured prosperously many heirs, yea, a five or six +hundred years, and some a thousand; and in this noble city of +London it can unneth continue unto the third heir or scarcely to the +second,--O blessed Lord, when I remember this I am all abashed; I +cannot judge the cause, but fairer ne wiser ne better spoken children +in their youth be nowhere than there be in London, but at their full +ripening there is no kernel ne good corn found, but chaff for the most +part. I wot well there be many noble and wise, and prove well and be +better and richer than ever were their fathers. And to the end that +many might come to honour and worship, I intend to translate this +said book of Cato, in which I doubt not, and if they will read it and +understand they shall much the better con rule themselves thereby; for +among all other books this is a singular book, and may well be called +the regiment or governance of the body and soul. + +There was a noble clerk named Pogius of Florence, and was secretary +to Pope Eugene and also to Pope Nicholas, which had in the city of +Florence a noble and well-stuffed library which all noble strangers +coming to Florence desired to see; and therein they found many noble +and rare books. And when they had asked of him which was the best book +of them all, and that he reputed for best, he said that he held Cato +glosed for the best book of his library. Then since that he that was +so noble a clerk held this book for the best, doubtless it must follow +that this is a noble book and a virtuous, and such one that a man may +eschew all vices and ensue virtue. Then to the end that this said book +may profit unto the hearers of it, I beseech Almighty God that I +may achieve and accomplish it unto his laud and glory, and to the +erudition and learning of them that be ignorant, that they may thereby +profit and be the better. And I require and beseech all such that find +fault or error, that of their charity they correct and amend it, and I +shall heartily pray for them to Almighty God, that he reward them. + + + + +AESOP. (1483) + +EPILOGUE + + +Now then I will finish all these fables with this tale that followeth, +which a worshipful priest and a parson told me lately. He said that +there were dwelling in Oxford two priests, both masters of art, of +whom that one was quick and could put himself forth, and that other +was a good simple priest. And so it happened that the master that was +pert and quick, was anon promoted to a benefice or twain, and after +to prebends and for to be a dean of a great prince's chapel, supposing +and weening that his fellow the simple priest should never have been +promoted, but be alway an Annual, or at the most a parish priest. So +after long time that this worshipful man, this dean, came riding into +a good parish with a ten or twelve horses, like a prelate, and came +into the church of the said parish, and found there this good simple +man sometime his fellow, which came and welcomed him lowly; and that +other bade him "good morrow, master John," and took him slightly by +the hand, and asked him where he dwelt. And the good man said, "In +this parish." "How," said he, "are ye here a soul priest or a parish +priest?" "Nay, sir," said he, "for lack of a better, though I be not +able ne worthy, I am parson and curate of this parish." And then that +other availed his bonnet and said, "Master parson, I pray you to be +not displeased; I had supposed ye had not been beneficed; but master," +said he, "I pray you what is this benefice worth to you a year?" +"Forsooth," said the good simple man, "I wot never, for I make never +accounts thereof how well I have had it four or five years." "And know +ye not," said he, "what it is worth? it should seem a good benefice." +"No, forsooth," said he, "but I wot well what it shall be worth to +me." "Why," said he, "what shall it be worth?" "Forsooth," said he, +"if I do my true diligence in the cure of my parishioners in preaching +and teaching, and do my part longing to my cure, I shall have heaven +therefore; and if their souls be lost, or any of them by my default, I +shall be punished therefore, and hereof am I sure." And with that word +the rich dean was abashed, and thought he should do the better and +take more heed to his cures and benefices than he had done. This was +a good answer of a good priest and an honest. And herewith I +finished this book, translated and printed by me, William Caxton, at +Westminster in the Abbey, and finished the 26th day of March, the year +of our Lord 1484, and the first year of the reign of King Richard the +Third. + + + + +CHAUCER'S CANTERBURY TALES + +Second Edition. (1484) + +PROEM + + +Great thanks, laud, and honour ought to be given unto the clerks, +poets, and historiographs that have written many noble books of +wisedom of the lives, passions, and miracles of holy saints, of +histories of noble and famous acts and faites, and of the chronicles +since the beginning of the creation of the world unto this present +time, by which we be daily informed and have knowledge of many things +of whom we should not have known if they had not left to us their +monuments written. Among whom and in especial before all others, we +ought to give a singular laud unto that noble and great philosopher +Geoffrey Chaucer, the which for his ornate writing in our tongue may +well have the name of a laureate poet. For to-fore that he by labour +embellished, ornated, and made fair our English, in this realm was had +rude speech and incongruous, as yet it appeareth by old books, which +at this day ought not to have place ne be compared among, ne to, his +beauteous volumes and ornate writings, of whom he made many books and +treatises of many a noble history, as well in metre as in rhyme and +prose; and them so craftily made that he comprehended his matters in +short, quick, and high sentences, eschewing prolixity, casting away +the chaff of superfluity, and shewing the picked grain of sentence +uttered by crafty and sugared eloquence; of whom among all others of +his books I purpose to print, by the grace of God, the book of the +tales of Canterbury, in which I find many a noble history of every +state and degree; first rehearsing the conditions and the array of +each of them as properly as possible is to be said. And after their +tales which be of nobleness, wisdom, gentleness, mirth and also of +very holiness and virtue, wherein he finisheth this said book, which +book I have diligently overseen and duly examined, to that end it be +made according unto his own making. For I find many of the said books +which writers have abridged it, and many things left out; and in some +place have set certain verses that he never made ne set in his book; +of which books so incorrect was one brought to me, 6 years past, which +I supposed had been very true and correct; and according to the same I +did so imprint a certain number of them, which anon were sold to many +and divers gentlemen, of whom one gentleman came to me and said that +this book was not according in many place unto the book that Geoffrey +Chaucer had made. To whom I answered that I had made it according to +my copy, and by me was nothing added ne minished. Then he said he knew +a book which his father had and much loved, that was very true and +according unto his own first book by him made; and said more, if +I would imprint it again he would get me the same book for a copy, +howbeit he wist well that his father would not gladly depart from it. +To whom I said, in case that he could get me such a book, true and +correct, yet I would once endeavour me to imprint it again for to +satisfy the author, whereas before by ignorance I erred in hurting and +defaming his book in divers places, in setting in some things that he +never said ne made, and leaving out many things that he made which +be requisite to be set in it. And thus we fell at accord, and he full +gently got of his father the said book and delivered it to me, by +which I have corrected my book, as hereafter, all along by the aid of +Almighty God, shall follow; whom I humbly beseech to give me grace and +aid to achieve and accomplish to his laud, honour, and glory; and +that all ye that shall in this book read or hear, will of your charity +among your deeds of mercy remember the soul of the said Geoffrey +Chaucer, first author and maker of this book. And also that all we +that shall see and read therein may so take and understand the good +and virtuous tales, that it may so profit unto the health of our souls +that after this short and transitory life we may come to everlasting +life in Heaven. Amen. + +BY WILLIAM CAXTON + + + + +MALORY'S KING ARTHUR. (1485) + +PROLOGUE + + +After that I had accomplished and finished divers histories, as well +of contemplation as of other historical and worldly acts of great +conquerors and princes, and also certain books of ensamples and +doctrine, many noble and divers gentlemen of this realm of England +came and demanded me many and oft times wherefore that I have not done +made and printed the noble history of the Saint Graal, and of the most +renowned Christian King, first and chief of the three best Christian +and worthy, Arthur, which ought most to be remembered among us +Englishmen before all other Christian Kings. For it is notoyrly known +through the universal world that there be nine worthy and the best +that ever were; that is to wit three Paynims, three Jews, and three +Christian men. As for the Paynims, they were to-fore the Incarnation +of Christ, which were named--the first, Hector of Troy, of whom the +history is come both in ballad and in prose--the second, Alexander +the Great; and the third, Julius Cæsar, Emperor of Rome, of whom the +histories be well known and had. And as for the three Jews, which also +were before the Incarnation of our Lord of whom the first was Duke +Joshua, which brought the children of Israel into the land of behest; +the second, David, King of Jerusalem; and the third Judas Maccabaeus; +of these three the Bible rehearseth all their noble histories and +acts. And since the said Incarnation have been three noble Christian +men, installed and admitted through the universal world into the +number of the nine best and worthy, of whom was first the noble +Arthur, whose noble acts I purpose to write in this present book here +following. The second was Charlemagne, or Charles the Great, of whom +the history is had in many places both in French and English; and the +third and last was Godfrey of Boulogne, of whose acts and life I made +a book unto the excellent prince and king of noble memory, King Edward +the Fourth. The said noble gentlemen instantly required me to print +the history of the said noble king and conqueror, King Arthur, and of +his knights, with the history of the Saint Graal, and of the death and +ending of the said Arthur, affirming that I ought rather to print his +acts and noble feats than of Godfrey of Boulogne or any of the other +eight, considering that he was a man born within this realm, and king +and emperor of the same; and that there be in French divers and many +noble volumes of his acts, and also of his knights. To whom I answered +that divers men hold opinion that there was no such Arthur, and that +all such books as be made of him be but feigned and fables, because +that some chronicles make of him no mention, ne remember him nothing +ne of his knights; whereto they answered, and one in special said, +that in him that should say or think that there was never such a king +called Arthur, might well be aretted great folly and blindness; for he +said that there were many evidences of the contrary. First ye may +see his sepulchre in the monastery of Glastonbury; and also in +'Polychronicon,' in the fifth book, the sixth chapter, and in the +seventh book, the twenty-third chapter, where his body was buried, and +after found and translated into the said monastery. Ye shall see also +in the history of Boccaccio, in his book 'De casu principum,' part +of his noble acts and also of his fall. Also Galfridus in his British +book recounteth his life, and in divers places of England many +remembrances be yet of him, and shall remain perpetually, and also +of his knights. First in the Abbey of Westminster at Saint Edward's +shrine remaineth the print of his seal in red wax closed in beryl, +in which is written 'Patricius Arthurus, Britanniae Galliae Germaniae +Daciae Imperator.' Item, in the castle of Dover ye may see Gawain's +skull and Caradoc's mantle; at Winchester the round table; in other +places Lancelot's sword, and many other things. Then all these things +considered, there can no man reasonably gainsay but here was a king of +this land named Arthur; for in all places, Christian and heathen, he +is reputed and taken for one of the nine worthy, and the first of the +three Christian men. And also he is more spoken of beyond the sea; +more books made of his noble acts than there be in England, as well +in Dutch, Italian, Spanish, and Greek as in French; and yet of record +remain in witness of him in Wales in the town of Camelot the great +stones and marvellous works of iron lying under the ground, and royal +vaults, which divers now living hath seen. Wherefore it is a marvel +why he is no more renowned in his own country, save only it accordeth +to the word of God, which saith that no man is accepted for a prophet +in his own country. Then all these things aforesaid alleged, I could +not well deny but that there was such a noble king named Arthur, and +reputed one of the nine worthy, and first and chief of the Christian +men; and many noble volumes be made of him and of his noble knights in +French, which I have seen and read beyond the sea, which be not had +in our maternal tongue, but in Welsh be many, and also in French, and +some in English, but nowhere nigh all. Wherefore such as have lately +been drawn out briefly into English, I have, after the simple cunning +that God hath sent to me, under the favour and correction of all noble +lords and gentlemen, emprised to imprint a book of the noble histories +of the said King Arthur and of certain of his knights, after a copy +unto me delivered, which copy Sir Thomas Mallory did take out of +certain books of French and reduced it into English. And I according +to my copy have down set it in print, to the intent that noble men +may see and learn the noble acts of chivalry, the gentle and virtuous +deeds that some knights used in those days, by which they came to +honour, and how they that were vicious were punished and oft put to +shame and rebuke; humbly beseeching all noble lords and ladies and all +other estates, of what estate or degree they be of, that shall see and +read in this said book and work, that they take the good and honest +acts in their remembrance and to follow the same, wherein they shall +find many joyous and pleasant histories and noble and renowned acts +of humanity, gentleness, and chivalry. For herein may be seen +noble chivalry, courtesy, humanity, friendliness, hardyhood, love, +friendship, cowardice, murder, hate, virtue and sin. Do after the good +and leave the evil, and it shall bring you to good fame and renown. +And for to pass the time this book shall be pleasant to read in; +but for to give faith and believe that all is true that is contained +herein, ye be at your liberty. But all is written for our doctrine, +and for to beware that we fall not to vice ne sin, but to exercise and +follow virtue, by which we may come and attain to good fame and renown +in this life, and after this short and transitory life to come unto +everlasting bliss in heaven; the which He grant us that reigneth in +Heaven, the Blessed Trinity. Amen. + +Then to proceed forth in this said book which I direct unto all noble +princes, lords and ladies, gentlemen or gentlewomen, that desire +to read or hear read of the noble and joyous history of the great +conqueror and excellent king, King Arthur, sometime King of this noble +realm then called Britain, I, William Caxton, simple person, present +this book following which I have emprised to imprint. And treateth +of the noble acts, feats of arms, of chivalry, prowess, hardihood, +humanity, love, courtesy, and very gentleness, with many wonderful +histories and adventures. And for to understand briefly the contents +of this volume, I have divided it into 21 books, and every book +chaptered, as hereafter shall by God's grace follow. The first book +shall treat how Uther Pendragon begat the noble conqueror, King +Arthur, and containeth 28 chapters. The second book treateth of Balyn +the noble knight, and containeth 19 chapters. The third book treateth +of the marriage of King Arthur to Queen Guinevere, with other matters, +and containeth 15 chapters. The fourth book how Merlin was assotted, +and of war made to King Arthur, and containeth 29 chapters. The fifth +book treateth of the conquest of Lucius the emperor, and containeth 12 +chapters. The sixth book treateth of Sir Lancelot and Sir Lionel, and +marvellous adventures, and containeth 18 chapters. The seventh book +treateth of a noble knight called Sir Gareth, and named by Sir Kay +'Beaumains,' and containeth 36 chapters. The eighth book treateth +of the birth of Sir Tristram the noble knight, and of his acts, and +containeth 41 chapters. The ninth book treateth of a knight named +by Sir Kay, 'Le cote mal tailié,' and also of Sir Tristram, and +containeth 44 chapters. The tenth book treateth of Sir Tristram, and +other marvellous adventures, and containeth 83 chapters. The eleventh +book treateth of Sir Lancelot and Sir Galahad, and containeth 14 +chapters. The twelfth book treateth of Sir Lancelot and his madness, +and containeth 14 chapters. The thirteenth book treateth how Galahad +came first to King Arthur's court, and the quest how the Sangreal was +begun, and containeth 20 chapters. The fourteenth book treateth of the +quest of the Sangreal, and containeth 10 chapters. The fifteenth book +treateth of Sir Lancelot, and containeth 6 chapters. The sixteenth +book treateth of Sir Boris and Sir Lionel his brother, and containeth +17 chapters. The seventeenth book treateth of the Sangreal, and +containeth 23 chapters. The eighteenth book treateth of Sir Lancelot +and the Queen, and containeth 25 chapters. The nineteenth book +treateth of Queen Guinevere, and Lancelot, and containeth 13 chapters. +The twentieth book treateth of the piteous death of Arthur, and +containeth 22 chapters. The twenty-first book treateth of his last +departing, and how Sir Lancelot came to revenge his death, and +containeth 13 chapters. The sum is 21 books, which contain the sum +of five hundred and seven chapters, as more plainly shall follow +hereafter. + + + + +ENEYDOS (1490) + +PROLOGUE + + +After divers work made, translated, and achieved, having no work in +hand, I sitting in my study whereas lay many divers pamphlets and +books, happened that to my hand came a little book in French, which +lately was translated out of Latin by some noble clerk of France, +which book is named _Aeneidos_, made in Latin by that noble poet and +great clerk, Virgil Which book I saw over, and read therein how, after +the general destruction of the great Troy, Aeneas departed, bearing +his old father Anchises upon his shoulders, his little son Iulus +on his hand, his wife with much other people following, and how he +shipped and departed, with all the history of his adventures that he +had ere he came to the achievement of his conquest of Italy, as all +along shall be shewed in his present book. In which book I had great +pleasure because of the fair and honest terms and words in French; +which I never saw before like, ne none so pleasant ne so well ordered; +which book as seemed to me should be much requisite to noble men to +see, as well for the eloquence as the histories. How well that many +hundred years past was the said book of _Aeneidos_, with other works, +made and learned daily in schools, especially in Italy and other +places; which history the said Virgil made in metre. And when I had +advised me in this said book, I delibered and concluded to translate +it into English; and forthwith took a pen and ink and wrote a leaf or +twain, which I oversaw again to correct it. And when I saw the fair +and strange terms therein, I doubted that it should not please some +gentlemen which late blamed me, saying that in my translations I had +over curious terms, which could not be understood of common people, +and desired me to use old and homely terms in my translations. And +fain would I satisfy every man, and so to do took an old book and read +therein, and certainly the English was so rude and broad that I could +not well understood it. And also my Lord Abbot of Westminster did do +show to me lately certain evidences written in old English, for to +reduce it into our English now used. And certainly it was written in +such wise that it was more like to Dutch than English, I could not +reduce ne bring it to be understood. And certainly our language now +used varieth far from that which was used and spoken when I was born. +For we Englishmen be born under the domination of the moon, which is +never steadfast but ever wavering, waxing one season and waneth and +decreaseth another season. And that common English that is spoken in +one shire varieth from another, insomuch that in my days happened that +certain merchants were in a ship in Thames for to have sailed over the +sea into Zealand, and for lack of wind they tarried at Foreland, and +went to land for to refresh them. And one of them named Sheffield, a +mercer, came into a house and asked for meat, and especially he asked +after eggs; and the good wife answered that she could speak no French, +and the merchant was angry, for he also could speak no French, but +would have had eggs, and she understood him not. And then at last +another said, that he would have "eyren"; then the goodwife said +that she understood him well. Lo, what should a man in these days now +write, eggs or eyren? Certainly it is hard to please every man because +of diversity and change of language. For in these days every man that +is in any reputation in his country will utter his communication and +matters in such manners and terms that few men shall understand them. +And some honest and great clerks have been with me and desired me +to write the most curious terms that I could find; and thus between +plain, rude and curious I stand abashed. But in my judgment the common +terms that be daily used be lighter to be understood than the old and +ancient English. And forasmuch as this present book is not for a rude +uplandish man to labour therein ne read it, but only for a clerk and +a noble gentleman that feeleth and understandeth in feats of arms, in +love and in noble chivalry. Therefore in a mean between both I have +reduced and translated this said book into our English, not over-rude +ne curious; but in such terms as shall be understood, by God's grace, +according to my copy. And if any man will intermit in reading of it, +and findeth such terms that he cannot understand, let him go read +and learn Virgil of the pistles of Ovid, and there he shall see and +understand lightly all, if he have a good reader and informer. For +this book is not for every rude and uncunning man to see, but to +clerks and very gentlemen that understand gentleness and science. Then +I pray all them that shall read in this little treatise to hold me for +excused for the translating of it, for I acknowledge myself ignorant +of cunning to emprise on me so high and noble a work. But I pray +Master John Skelton, late created poet laureate in the University of +Oxenford, to oversee and correct this said book, and to address and +expound, wherever shall be found fault, to them that shall require it. + +For him I know for sufficient to expound and English every difficulty +that is therein; for he hath lately translated the Epistles of Tully, +and the book of Diodorus Siculus, and divers other works out of Latin +into English, not in rude and old language, but in polished and ornate +terms craftily, as he that hath read Virgil, Ovid, Tully, and all the +other noble poets and orators to me unknown. And also he hath read +the nine Muses, and understands their musical sciences, and to whom +of them each, science is appropred. I suppose he hath drunken of +Helicon's well. Then I pray him and such others to correct, add, or +minish whereas he or they shall find fault; for I have but followed my +copy in French as nigh as to me is possible. And if any word be said +therein well, I am glad; and if otherwise, I submit my said book +to their correction. Which book I present unto the high born, my +to-coming natural and sovereign lord Arthur, by the grace of God +Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall and Earl of Chester, first-begotten +son and heir unto our most dread natural and sovereign lord and most +Christian King, Henry the VII., by the grace of God King of England +and of France, and lord of Ireland; beseeching his noble Grace to +receive it in thank of me his most humble subject and servant. And I +shall pray unto Almighty God for his prosperous increasing in virtue, +wisedom, and humanity, that he may be equal with the most renowned of +all his noble progenitors; and so to live in this present life that +after this transitory life he and we all may come to everlasting life +in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +DEDICATION OF THE INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION + +BY JOHN CALVIN (1536)[A] + +To His Most Christian Majesty, FRANCIS, King of the French, and his +Sovereign, John Calvin wisheth peace and salvation in Christ. + + +When I began this work, Sire, nothing was further from my thoughts +than writing a book which would afterwards be presented to your +Majesty. My intention was only to lay down some elementary principles, +by which inquirers on the subject of religion might be instructed in +the nature of true piety. And this labour I undertook chiefly for +my countrymen, the French, of whom I apprehended multitudes to be +hungering and thirsting after Christ, but saw very few possessing any +real knowledge of him. That this was my design, the book itself proves +by its simple method and unadorned composition. But when I perceived +that the fury of certain wicked men in your kingdom had grown to +such a height, as to leave no room in the land for sound doctrine, I +thought I should be usefully employed, if in the same work I delivered +my instructions to them, and exhibited my confession to you, that +you may know the nature of that doctrine, which is the object of such +unbounded rage to those madmen who are now disturbing the country with +fire and sword. For I shall not be afraid to acknowledge, that this +treatise contains a summary of that very doctrine, which, according to +their clamours, deserves to be punished with imprisonment, banishment, +proscription, and flames, and to be exterminated from the face of the +earth. I well know with what atrocious insinuations your ears have +been filled by them, in order to render our cause most odious in +your esteem; but your clemency should lead you to consider that, if +accusation be accounted a sufficient evidence of guilt, there will be +an end of all innocence in words and actions. If any one, indeed, with +a view to bring odium upon the doctrine which I am endeavouring to +defend, should allege that it has long ago been condemned by the +general consent, and suppressed by many judicial decisions, this will +be only equivalent to saying, that it has been sometimes violently +rejected through the influence and power of its adversaries, and +sometimes insidiously and fraudulently oppressed by falsehoods, +artifices, and calumnies. Violence is displayed, when sanguinary +sentences are passed against it without the cause being heard; and +fraud, when it is unjustly accused of sedition and mischief. Lest +any one should suppose that these our complaints are unfounded, you +yourself, Sire, can bear witness of the false calumnies with which +you hear it daily traduced; that its only tendency is to wrest the +sceptres of kings out of their hands, to overturn all the tribunals +and judicial proceedings, to subvert all order and governments, to +disturb the peace and tranquillity of the people, to abrogate all +laws, to scatter all properties and possessions, and, in a word, to +involve every thing in total confusion. And yet you hear the smallest +portion of what is alleged against it; for such horrible things are +circulated amongst the vulgar, that, if they were true, the whole +world would justly pronounce it and its abettors worthy of a thousand +fires and gibbets. Who, then, will wonder at its becoming the object +of public odium, where credit is given to such most iniquitous +accusations? This is the cause of the general consent and conspiracy +to condemn us and our doctrine. Hurried away with this impulse, +those who sit in judgment pronounce for sentences the prejudices they +brought from home with them; and think their duty fully discharged if +they condemn none to be punished but such as are convicted by their +own confession, or by sufficient proofs. Convicted of what crime? +Of this condemned doctrine, they say. But with what justice is it +condemned? Now, the ground of defence was not to abjure the doctrine +itself, but to maintain its truth. On this subject, however, not a +word is allowed to be uttered. + +Wherefore I beseech you, Sire,--and surely it is not an unreasonable +request,--to take upon yourself the entire cognizance of this cause, +which has hitherto been confusedly and carelessly agitated, without +any order of law, and with outrageous passion rather than judicial +gravity. Think not that I am now meditating my own individual defence, +in order to effect a safe return to my native country; for, though I +feel the affection which every man ought to feel for it, yet, under +the existing circumstances, I regret not my removal from it. But I +plead the cause of all the godly, and consequently of Christ himself, +which, having been in these times persecuted and trampled on in all +ways in your kingdom, now lies in a most deplorable state; and this +indeed rather through the tyranny of certain Pharisees, than with your +knowledge. How this comes to pass is foreign to my present purpose to +say; but it certainly lies in a most afflicted state. For the +ungodly have gone to such lengths, that the truth of Christ, if not +vanquished, dissipated, and entirely destroyed, is buried, as it +were, in ignoble obscurity, while the poor, despised church is either +destroyed by cruel massacres, or driven away into banishment, or +menaced and terrified into total silence. And still they continue +their wonted madness and ferocity, pushing violently against the wall +already bent, and finishing the ruin they have begun. In the meantime, +no one comes forward to plead the cause against such furies. If there +be any persons desirous of appearing most favourable to the truth, +they only venture an opinion, that forgiveness should be extended to +the error and imprudence of ignorant people. For this is the language +of these moderate men, calling that error and imprudence which they +know to be the certain truth of God, and those ignorant people, whose +understanding they perceive not to have been so despicable to Christ, +but that he has favoured them with the mysteries of his heavenly +wisdom. Thus all are ashamed of the Gospel. But it shall be yours, +Sire, not to turn away your ears or thoughts from so just a defence, +especially in a cause of such importance as the maintenance of God's +glory unimpaired in the world, the preservation of the honor of divine +truth, and the continuance of the kingdom of Christ uninjured +among us. This is a cause worthy of your attention, worthy of your +cognizance, worthy of your throne. This consideration constitutes true +royalty, to acknowledge yourself in the government of your kingdom to +be the minister of God. For where the glory of God is not made the +end of the government, it is not a legitimate sovereignty, but a +usurpation. And he is deceived who expects lasting prosperity in that +kingdom which is not ruled by the sceptre of God, that is, his holy +word; for that heavenly oracle cannot fail, which declares that "where +there is no vision, the people perish,"[1] Nor should you be seduced +from this pursuit by a contempt of our meanness. We are fully +conscious to ourselves how very mean and abject we are, being +miserable sinners before God, and accounted most despicable by men; +being, (if you please) the refuse of the world, deserving of the +vilest appellations that can be found; so that nothing remains for +us to glory in before God, but his mercy alone, by which, without any +merit of ours, we have been admitted to the hope of eternal salvation, +and before men nothing but our weakness, the slightest confession of +which is esteemed by them as the greatest disgrace. But our doctrine +must stand, exalted above all the glory, and invincible by all the +power of the world; because it is not ours, but the doctrine of the +living God, and of his Christ, whom the Father hath constituted King, +that he may have dominion from sea to sea, and from the river even to +the ends of the earth, and that he may rule in such a manner, that the +whole earth, with its strength of iron and with its splendour of gold +and silver, smitten by the rod of his mouth, may be broken to pieces +like a potter's vessel;[2] for thus do the prophets foretell the +magnificence of his kingdom. + +Our adversaries reply, that our pleading the word of God is a false +pretence, and that we are nefarious corrupters of it. But that this is +not only a malicious calumny, but egregious impudence, by reading our +confession, you will, in your wisdom, be able to judge. Yet something +further is necessary to be said, to excite your attention, or at least +to prepare your mind for this perusal. Paul's direction, that every +prophecy be framed "according to the analogy of faith,"[3] has fixed +an invariable standard by which all interpretation of Scripture ought +to be tried. If our principles be examined by this rule of faith, +the victory is ours. For what is more consistent with faith than to +acknowledge ourselves naked of all virtue, that we may be clothed by +God; empty of all good, that we may be filled by him; slaves to sin, +that we may be liberated by him; blind, that we may be enlightened by +him; lame, that we may be guided; weak, that we may be supported by +him; to divest ourselves of all ground of glorying, that he alone may +be eminently glorious, and that we may glory in him? When we advance +these and similar sentiments, they interrupt us with complaints that +this is the way to overturn, I know not what blind light of nature, +pretended preparations, free will, and works meritorious of eternal +salvation, together with all their supererogations; because they +cannot bear that the praise and glory of all goodness, strength, +righteousness, and wisdom, should remain entirely with God. But we +read of none being reproved for having drawn too freely from the +fountain of living waters; on the contrary, they are severely +upbraided who have "hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can +hold no water."[4] Again, what is more consistent with faith, than +to assure ourselves of God being a propitious Father, where Christ is +acknowledged as a brother and Mediator? than securely to expect all +prosperity and happiness from Him, whose unspeakable love towards us +went so far, that "he spared not his own Son, but delivered him up +for us?"[5] than to rest in the certain expectation of salvation and +eternal life, when we reflect upon the Father's gift of Christ, in +whom such treasures are hidden? Here they oppose us, and complain +that this certainty of confidence is chargeable with arrogance and +presumption. But as we ought to presume nothing of ourselves, so we +should presume every thing of God; nor are we divested of vain glory +for any other reason than that we may learn to glory in the Lord. +What shall I say more? Review, Sire, all the parts of our cause, +and consider us worse than the most abandoned of mankind, unless you +clearly discover that we thus "both labor and suffer reproach, because +we trust in the living God,"[6] because we believe that "this is life +eternal, to know the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he hath +sent."[7] For this hope some of us are bound in chains, others are +lashed with scourges, others are carried about as laughing-stocks, +others are outlawed, others are cruelly tortured, others escape by +flight; but we are all reduced to extreme perplexities, execrated +with dreadful curses, cruelly slandered and treated with the greatest +indignities. Now, look at our adversaries, (I speak of the order +of priests, at whose will and directions others carry on these +hostilities against us,) and consider a little with me by what +principles they are actuated. The true religion, which is taught in +the Scriptures, and ought to be universally maintained, they readily +permit both themselves and others to be ignorant of, and to treat with +neglect and contempt. They think it unimportant what any one holds or +denies concerning God and Christ, provided he submits his mind with +an implicit faith (as they call it) to the judgment of the Church. +Nor are they much affected, if the glory of God happens to be violated +with open blasphemies, provided no one lift a finger against the +primacy of the Apostolic See, and the authority of their holy Mother +Church. Why, therefore, do they contend with such extreme bitterness +and cruelty for the mass, purgatory, pilgrimages, and similar trifles, +and deny that any piety can be maintained without a most explicit +faith, so to speak, in these things; whereas they prove none of them +from the word of God? Why, but because their belly is their God, their +kitchen is their religion; deprived of which they consider themselves +no longer as Christians, or even as men. For though some feast +themselves in splendour, and others subsist on slender fare, yet all +live on the same pot, which, without this fuel, would not only cool, +but completely freeze. Every one of them, therefore, who is most +solicitous for his belly, is found to be a most strenuous champion +for their faith. Indeed, they universally exert themselves for the +preservation of their kingdom, and the repletion of their bellies; but +not one of them discovers the least indication of sincere zeal. + +Nor do their attacks on our doctrine cease here; they urge every topic +of accusation and abuse to render it an object of hatred or suspicion. +They call it novel, and of recent origin,--they cavil at it as +doubtful and uncertain,--they inquire by what miracles it is +confirmed,--they ask whether it is right for it to be received +contrary to the consent of so many holy fathers, and the custom of the +highest antiquity,--they urge us to confess that it is schismatical +in stirring up opposition against the Church, or that the Church +was wholly extinct for many ages, during which no such thing was +known.--Lastly, they say all arguments are unnecessary; for that its +nature may be determined by its fruits, since it has produced such +a multitude of sects, so many factious tumults, and such great +licentiousness of vices. It is indeed very easy for them to insult a +deserted cause with the credulous and ignorant multitude; but, if we +had also the liberty of speaking in our turn, this acrimony, +which they now discover in violently foaming against us with equal +licentiousness and impunity, would presently cool. + +In the first place, their calling it novel is highly injurious to God, +whose holy word deserves not to be accused of novelty. I have no doubt +of its being new to them, to whom Jesus Christ and the Gospel are +equally new. But those who know the antiquity of this preaching of +Paul, "that Jesus Christ died for our sins, and rose again for our +justification,"[8] will find no novelty among us. That it has long +been concealed, buried, and unknown, is the crime of human impiety. +Now that the goodness of God has restored it to us, it ought at least +to be allowed its just claim of antiquity. + +From the same source of ignorance springs the notion of its being +doubtful and uncertain. This is the very thing which the Lord +complains of by his prophet; that "the ox knoweth his owner, and +the ass his master's crib,"[9] but that his people know not him. But +however they may laugh at its uncertainty, if they were called to seal +their own doctrine with their blood and lives, it would appear how +much they value it. Very different is our confidence, which dreads +neither the terrors of death, nor even the tribunal of God. + +Their requiring miracles of us is altogether unreasonable; for +we forge no new Gospel, but retain the very same whose truth was +confirmed by all the miracles ever wrought by Christ and the apostles. +But they have this peculiar advantage above us, that they can confirm +their faith by continual miracles even to this day. But the truth is, +they allege miracles which are calculated to unsettle a mind otherwise +well established, they are so frivolous and ridiculous, or vain and +false. Nor, if they were ever so preternatural, ought they to have any +weight in opposition to the truth of God, since the name of God ought +to be sanctified in all places and at all times, whether by miraculous +events, or by the common order of nature. This fallacy might +perhaps be more specious, if the Scripture did not apprize us of the +legitimate end and use of miracles. For Mark informs us, that the +miracles which followed the preaching of the apostles were wrought +in confirmation[10] of it, and Luke tells us, that[11] "the Lord gave +testimony to the word of his grace," when "signs and wonders" were +"done by the hands" of the apostles. Very similar to which is the +assertion of the apostle, that "salvation was confirmed" by the +preaching of the Gospel, "God also bearing witness with signs, and +wonders, and divers miracles."[12] But those things which we are told +were seals of the Gospel, shall we pervert to undermine the faith of +the Gospel? Those things which were designed to be testimonials of the +truth, shall we accommodate to the confirmation of falsehood? It +is right, therefore, that the doctrine, which, according to the +evangelist, claims the first attention, be examined and tried in +the first place; and if it be approved, then it ought to derive +confirmation from miracles. But it is the characteristic of sound +doctrine, given by Christ, that it tends to promote, not the glory of +men, but the glory of God.[13] Christ having laid down this proof of +a doctrine, it is wrong to esteem those as miracles which are directed +to any other end than the glorification of the name of God alone. And +we should remember that Satan has his wonders, which, though they +are juggling tricks rather than real miracles, are such as delude the +ignorant and inexperienced. Magicians and enchanters have always +been famous for miracles; idolatry has been supported by astonishing +miracles; and yet we admit them not as proofs of the superstition of +magicians or idolaters. With this engine also the simplicity of +the vulgar was anciently assailed by the Donatists, who abounded in +miracles. We therefore give the same answer now to our adversaries as +Augustine[14] gave to the Donatists, that our Lord hath cautioned us +against these miracle-mongers by his prediction, that there should +arise false prophets, who, by various signs and lying wonders, "should +deceive (if possible) the very elect."[15] And Paul has told us, that +the kingdom of Antichrist would be "with all power, and signs, and +lying wonders."[16] But these miracles (they say) are wrought, not by +idols, or sorcerers, or false prophets, but by saints; as if we were +ignorant, that it is a stratagem of Satan to "transform" himself "into +an angel of light."[17] At the tomb of Jeremiah,[18] who was buried +in Egypt, the Egyptians formerly offered sacrifices and other divine +honours. Was not this abusing God's holy prophet to the purposes of +idolatry? Yet they supposed this veneration of his sepulchre to be +rewarded with a cure for the bite of serpents. What shall we say, but +that it has been, and ever will be, the most righteous vengeance +of God to "send those who receive not the love of the truth strong +delusions, that they should believe a lie?"[19] We are by no means +without miracles, and such as are certain, and not liable to cavils. +But those under which they shelter themselves are mere illusions of +Satan, seducing the people from the true worship of God to vanity. + +Another calumny is their charging us with opposition to the +fathers,--I mean the writers of the earlier and purer ages,--as if +those writers were abettors of their impiety; whereas, if the contest +were to be terminated by this authority, the victory in most parts of +the controversy--to speak in the most modest terms--would be on our +side. But though the writings of those fathers contain many wise and +excellent things, yet in some respects they have suffered the common +fate of mankind; these very dutiful children reverence only their +errors and mistakes, but their excellences they either overlook, or +conceal, or corrupt; so that it may truly be said to be their only +study to collect dross from the midst of gold. Then they overwhelm us +with senseless clamours, as despisers and enemies of the fathers. But +we do not hold them in such contempt, but that, if it were consistent +with my present design, I could easily support by their suffrages most +of the sentiments that we now maintain. But while we make use of their +writings, we always remember that "all things are ours," to serve us, +not to have dominion over us, and that "we are Christ's"[20] alone, +and owe him universal obedience. He who neglects this distinction will +have nothing decided in religion; since those holy men were ignorant +of many things, frequently at variance with each other, and sometimes +even inconsistent with themselves. There is great reason, they say, +for the admonition of Solomon, "not to transgress or remove the +ancient landmarks, which our fathers have set."[21] But the same rule +is not applicable to the bounding of fields, and to the obedience +of faith, which ought to be ready to "forget her own people and her +father's house."[22] But if they are so fond of allegorizing, why do +they not explain the apostles, rather than any others, to be those +fathers, whose appointed landmarks it is so unlawful to remove? For +this is the interpretation of Jerome, whose works they have received +into their canons. But if they insist on preserving the landmarks of +those whom they understand to be intended, why do they at pleasure so +freely transgress them themselves? There were two fathers,[23] of whom +one said, that our God neither eats nor drinks, and therefore needs +neither cups nor dishes; the other, that sacred things require +no gold, and that gold is no recommendation of that which Is not +purchased with gold. This landmark therefore is transgressed by those +who in sacred things are so much delighted with gold, silver, ivory, +marble, jewels, and silks, and suppose that God is not rightly +worshipped, unless all things abound in exquisite splendour, or rather +extravagant profusion. There was a father[24] who said he freely +partook of flesh on a day when others abstained from it, because he +was a Christian. They transgress the landmarks therefore when they +curse the soul that tastes flesh in Lent. There were two fathers,[25] +of whom one said, that a monk who labors not with his hands is on a +level with a cheat or a robber; and the other, that it is unlawful +for monks to live on what is not their own, notwithstanding their +assiduity in contemplations, studies, and prayers; and they have +transgressed this landmark by placing the idle and distended carcasses +of monks in cells and brothels, to be pampered on the substance of +others. There was a father[26] who said, that to see a painted image +of Christ, or of any other saint, in the temples of Christians, is +a dreadful abomination. Nor was this merely the sentence of an +individual; it was also decreed by an ecclesiastical council, that +the object of worship should not be painted on the walls. They are far +from confining themselves within these landmarks, for every corner is +filled with images. Another father[27] has advised that, after having +discharged the office of humanity towards the dead by the rites of +sepulture, we should leave them to their repose. They break through +these landmarks by inculcating a constant solicitude for the dead. +There was one of the fathers[28] who asserted that the substance of +bread and wine in the eucharist ceases not, but remains, just as the +substance of the human nature remains in the Lord Christ united with +the divine. They transgress this landmark therefore by pretending +that, on the words of the Lord being recited, the substance of bread +and wine ceases, and is transubstantiated into his body and blood. +There were fathers[29] who, while they exhibited to the universal +Church only one eucharist, and forbade all scandalous and immoral +persons to approach it, at the same time severely censured all who, +when present, did not partake of it. How far have they removed these +landmarks, when they fill not only the churches, but even private +houses, with their masses, admit all who choose to be spectators of +them, and every one the more readily in proportion to the magnitude +of his contribution, however chargeable with impurity and wickedness! +They invite none to faith in Christ and a faithful participation of +the sacraments; but rather for purposes of gain bring forward their +own work instead of the grace and merit of Christ. There were two +fathers,[30] of whom one contended that the use of Christ's sacred +supper should be wholly forbidden to those who, content with +partaking of one kind, abstained from the other; the other strenuously +maintained that Christian people ought not to be refused the blood of +their Lord, for the confession of whom they are required to shed their +own. These landmarks also they have removed, in appointing, by +an inviolable law, that very thing which the former punished +with excommunication, and the latter gave a powerful reason for +disapproving. There was a father[31] who asserted the temerity of +deciding on either side of an obscure subject, without clear and +evident testimonies of Scripture. This landmark they forgot when +they made so many constitutions, canons, and judicial determinations, +without any authority from the word of God. There was a father[32] who +upbraided Montanus with having, among other heresies, been the first +imposer of laws for the observance of fasts. They have gone far beyond +this landmark also, in establishing fasts by the strictest laws. There +was a father[33] who denied that marriage ought to be forbidden to the +ministers of the Church, and pronounced cohabitation with a wife to +be real chastity; and there were fathers who assented to his judgment. +They have transgressed these landmarks by enjoining on their priests +the strictest celibacy. There was a father who thought that attention +should be paid to Christ only, of whom it is said, "Hear ye him," and +that no regard should be had to what others before us have either said +or done, only to what has been commanded by Christ, who is preeminent +over all. This landmark they neither prescribe to themselves, nor +permit to be observed by others, when they set up over themselves +and others any masters rather than Christ. There was a father[34] +who contended that the Church ought not to take precedence of Christ, +because his judgment is always according to truth; but ecclesiastical +judges, like other men, may generally be deceived. Breaking down this +landmark also, they scruple not to assert, that all the authority of +the Scripture depends on the decision of the Church. All the fathers, +with one heart and voice, have declared it execrable and detestable +for the holy word of God to be contaminated with the subtleties of +sophists, and perplexed by the wrangles of logicians. Do they confine +themselves within these landmarks, when the whole business of their +lives is to involve the simplicity of the Scripture in endless +controversies, and worse than sophistical wrangles? so that if the +fathers were now restored to life, and heard this art of wrangling, +which they call speculative divinity, they would not suspect the +dispute to have the least reference to God. But if I would enumerate +all the instances in which the authority of the fathers is insolently +rejected by those who would be thought their dutiful children, my +address would exceed all reasonable bounds. Months and years would be +insufficient for me. And yet such is their consummate and incorrigible +impudence, they dare to censure us for presuming to transgress the +ancient landmarks. + +Nor can they gain any advantage against us by their argument from +custom; for, if we were compelled to submit to custom, we should have +to complain of the greatest injustice. Indeed, if the judgments of men +were correct, custom should be sought among the good. But the fact +is often very different. What appears to be practiced by many soon +obtains the force of a custom. And human affairs have scarcely ever +been in so good a state as for the majority to be pleased with things +of real excellence. From the private vices of multitudes, therefore, +has arisen public error, or rather a common agreement of vices, which +these good men would now have to be received as law. It is evident to +all who can see, that the world is inundated with more than an ocean +of evils, that it is overrun with numerous destructive pests, that +every thing is fast verging to ruin, so that we must altogether +despair of human affairs, or vigorously and even violently oppose such +immense evils. And the remedy is rejected for no other reason, but +because we have been accustomed to the evils so long. But let public +error be tolerated in human society; in the kingdom of God nothing but +his eternal truth should he heard and regarded, which no succession of +years, no custom, no confederacy, can circumscribe. Thus Isaiah once +taught the chosen people of God: "Say ye not, A confederacy, to all to +whom this people shall say, A confederacy:" that is, that they should +not unite in the wicked consent of the people; "nor fear their fear, +nor be afraid," but rather "sanctify the Lord of hosts," that he might +"be their fear and their dread."[35] Now, therefore, let them, if +they please, object against us past ages and present examples; if +we "sanctify the Lord of hosts," we shall not be much afraid. For, +whether many ages agree in similar impiety, he is mighty to take +vengeance on the third and fourth generation; or whether the whole +world combine in the same iniquity, he has given an example of the +fatal end of those who sin with a multitude, by destroying all men +with a deluge, and preserving Noah and his small family, in order that +his individual faith might condemn the whole world. Lastly, a corrupt +custom is nothing but an epidemical pestilence, which is equally fatal +to its objects, though they fall with a multitude. Besides, they ought +to consider a remark, somewhere made by Cyprian,[36] that persons who +sin through ignorance, though they cannot be wholly exculpated, may +yet be considered in some degree excusable; but those who obstinately +reject the truth offered by the Divine goodness, are without any +excuse at all. + +Nor are we so embarrassed by their dilemma as to be obliged to +confess, either that the Church was for some time extinct, or that +we have now a controversy with the Church. The Church of Christ has +lived, and will continue to live, as long as Christ shall reign at +the right hand of the Father, by whose hand she is sustained, by whose +protection she is defended, by whose power she is preserved in safety. +For he will undoubtedly perform what he once promised, to be with his +people "even to the end of the world."[37] We have no quarrel against +the Church, for with one consent we unite with all the company of the +faithful in worshipping and adoring the one God and Christ the Lord, +as he has been adored by all the pious in all ages. But our opponents +deviate widely from the truth when they acknowledge no Church but what +is visible to the corporeal eye, and endeavour to circumscribe it +by those limits within which it is far from being included. Our +controversy turns on the two following points:--first, they contend +that the form of the Church is always apparent and visible; secondly, +they place that form in the see of the Roman Church and her order of +prelates. We assert, on the contrary, first, that the Church may exist +without any visible form; secondly, that its form is not contained +in that external splendour which they foolishly admire, but is +distinguished by a very different criterion, _viz_, the pure preaching +of God's word, and the legitimate administration of the sacraments. +They are not satisfied unless the Church can always be pointed out +with the finger. But how often among the Jewish people was it so +disorganized, as to have no visible form left? What splendid form +do we suppose could be seen, when Elias deplored his being left +alone?[38] How long, after the coming of Christ, did it remain without +any external form? How often, since that time, have wars, seditions, +and heresies, oppressed and totally obscured it? If they had lived +at that period, would they have believed that any Church existed? Yet +Elias was informed that there were "left seven thousand" who had "not +bowed the knee to Baal." Nor should we entertain any doubt of Christ's +having always reigned on earth ever since his ascension to heaven. But +if the pious at such periods had sought for any form evident to their +senses, must not their hearts have been quite discouraged? Indeed it +was already considered by Hilary in his day as a grievous error, that +people were absorbed in foolish admiration of the episcopal dignity, +and did not perceive the dreadful mischiefs concealed under +that disguise. For this is his language:[39] "One thing I advise +you--beware of Antichrist, for you have an improper attachment to +walls; your veneration for the Church of God is misplaced on houses +and buildings; you wrongly introduce under them the name of peace. +Is there any doubt that they will be seats of Antichrist? I think +mountains, woods, and lakes, prisons and whirlpools, less dangerous; +for these were the scenes of retirement or banishment in which the +prophets prophesied." But what excites the veneration of the multitude +in the present day for their horned bishops, but the supposition that +those are the holy prelates of religion whom they see presiding over +great cities? Away, then, with such stupid admiration. Let us rather +leave it to the Lord, since he alone "knoweth them that are his,"[40] +sometimes to remove from human observation all external knowledge +of his Church. I admit this to be a dreadful judgment of God on the +earth; but if it be deserved by the impiety of men, why do we attempt +to resist the righteous vengeance of God? Thus the Lord punished +the ingratitude of men in former ages; for, in consequence of their +resistance to his truth, and extinction of the light he had given +them, he permitted them to be blinded by sense, deluded by absurd +falsehoods, and immerged in profound darkness, so that there was no +appearance of the true Church left; yet, at the same time, in the +midst of darkness and errors, he preserved his scattered and concealed +people from total destruction. Nor is this to be wondered at; for he +knew how to save in all the confusion of Babylon, and the flame of +the fiery furnace. But how dangerous it is to estimate the form of the +Church by I know not what vain pomp, which they contend for; I shall +rather briefly suggest than state at large, lest I should protract +this discourse to an excessive length. The Pope, they say, who holds +the Apostolic see, and the bishops anointed and consecrated by him, +provided they are equipped with mitres and crosiers, represent the +Church, and ought to be considered as the Church. Therefore they +cannot err. How is this?--Because they are pastors of the Church, and +consecrated to the Lord. And did not the pastoral character belong to +Aaron, and the other rulers of Israel? Yet Aaron and his sons, after +their designation to the priesthood, fell into error when they made +the golden calf.[41] According to this mode of reasoning, why should +not the four hundred prophets, who lied to Ahab, have represented the +Church?[42] But the Church remained on the side of Micaiah, solitary +and despised as he was, and out of his mouth proceeded the truth. Did +not those prophets exhibit both the name and appearance of the Church, +who with united violence rose up against Jeremiah, and threatened and +boasted, "the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from +the wise, nor the word from the prophet?"[48] Jeremiah is sent singly +against the whole multitude of prophets, with a denunciation from the +Lord, that the "law shall perish from the priest, counsel from the +wise, and the word from the prophet."[44] And was there not the like +external respectability in the council convened by the chief priests, +scribes, and Pharisees, to consult about putting Christ to death?[45] +Now, let them go and adhere to the external appearance, and thereby +make Christ and all the prophets schismatics, and, on the other hand, +make the ministers of Satan instruments of the Holy Spirit. But if +they speak their real sentiments, let them answer me sincerely, what +nation or place they consider as the seat of the Church, from the time +when, by a decree of the council of Basil, Eugenius was deposed and +degraded from the pontificate, and Amadeus substituted in his place. +They cannot deny that the council, as far as relates to external +forms, was a lawful one, and summoned not only by one pope, but by +two. There Eugenius was pronounced guilty of schism, rebellion, and +obstinacy, together with all the host of cardinals and bishops who had +joined him in attempting a dissolution of the council. Yet afterwards, +assisted by the favour of princes, he regained the quiet possession of +his former dignity. That election of Amadeus, though formally made by +the authority of a general and holy synod, vanished into smoke; and he +was appeased with a cardinal's hat, like a barking dog with a morsel. +From the bosom of those heretics and rebels have proceeded all the +popes, cardinals, bishops, abbots, and priests ever since. Here they +must stop. For to which party will they give the title of the Church? +Will they deny that this was a general council, which wanted nothing +to complete its external majesty, being solemnly convened by two papal +bulls, consecrated by a presiding legate of the Roman see, and well +regulated in every point of order, and invariably preserving the +same dignity to the last? Will they acknowledge Eugenius to be +a schismatic, with all his adherents, by whom they have all been +consecrated? Either, therefore, let them give a different definition +of the form of the Church, or, whatever be their number, we shall +account them all schismatics, as having been knowingly and voluntarily +ordained by heretics. But if it had never been ascertained before, +that the Church is not confined to external pomps they would +themselves afford us abundant proof of it, who have so long +superciliously exhibited themselves to the world under the title of +the Church, though they were at the same time the deadly plagues of +it. I speak not of their morals, and those tragical exploits with +which all their lives abound, since they profess themselves to be +Pharisees, who are to be heard and not imitated. I refer to the very +doctrine itself, on which they found their claim to be considered +as the Church. If you devote a portion of your leisure, Sire, to the +perusal of our writings, you will clearly discover that doctrine to be +a fatal pestilence of souls, the firebrand, ruin, and destruction of +the Church. + +Finally, they betray great want of candour, by invidiously repeating +what great commotions, tumults, and contentions, have attended the +preaching of our doctrine, and what effects it produces in many +persons. For it is unfair to charge it with those evils which ought to +be attributed to the malice of Satan. It is the native property of the +Divine word, never to make its appearance without disturbing Satan, +and rousing his opposition. This is a most certain and unequivocal +criterion by which it is distinguished from false doctrines, which +are easily broached when they are heard with general attention, and +received with applauses by the world. Thus, in some ages, when all +things were immerged in profound darkness, the prince of this world +amused and diverted himself with the generality of mankind, and, like +another Sardanapalus, gave himself up to his ease and pleasures in +perfect peace; for what would he do but amuse and divert himself, +in the quiet and undisturbed possession of his kingdom? But when the +light shining from above dissipated a portion of his darkness--when +that Mighty One alarmed and assaulted his kingdom--then he began +to shake off his wonted torpor, and to hurry on his armour. First, +indeed, he stirred up the power of men to suppress the truth by +violence at its first appearance; and when this proved ineffectual, he +had recourse to subtlety. He made the Catabaptists, and other infamous +characters, the instruments of exciting dissensions and doctrinal +controversies, with a view to obscure and finally to extinguish it. +And now he continues to attack it both ways; for he endeavours to root +up this genuine seed by means of human force, and at the same time +tries every effort to choke it with his tares, that it may not grow +and produce fruit. But all his attempts will be vain, if we attend to +the admonitions of the Lord, who hath long ago made us acquainted +with his devices, that we might not be caught by him unawares, and has +armed us with sufficient means of defence against all his assaults. +But to charge the word of God with the odium of seditions, excited +against it by wicked and rebellious men, or of sects raised by +imposters,--is not this extreme malignity? Yet it is not without +example in former times. Elias was asked whether it was not he "that +troubled Israel."[46] Christ was represented by the Jews as guilty +of sedition.[47] The apostles were accused of stirring up popular +commotions.[48] Wherein does this differ from the conduct of those +who, at the present day, impute to us all the disturbances, tumults, +and contentions, that break out against us? But the proper answer to +such accusations has been taught us by Elias, that the dissemination +of errors and the raising of tumults is not chargeable on us, but on +those who are resisting the power of God. But as this one reply is +sufficient to repress their temerity, so, on the other hand, we must +meet the weakness of some persons, who are frequently disturbed with +such offences, and become unsettled and wavering in their minds. +Now, that they may not stumble and fall amidst this agitation and +perplexity, let them know that the apostles in their day experienced +the same things that now befall us. There were "unlearned and +unstable" men, Peter says, who "wrested" the inspired writings of Paul +"to their own destruction."[49] There were despisers of God, who, +when they heard that "where sin abounded grace did much more abound," +immediately concluded, Let us "continue in sin, that grace may +abound." When they heard that the faithful were "not under the law," +they immediately croaked, "We will sin, because we are not under +the law, but under grace."[50] There were some who accused him as +an encourager of sin. Many false apostles crept in, to destroy the +churches he had raised. "Some preached" the gospel "of envy and +strife, not in sincerity," maliciously "supposing to add affliction +to his bonds."[51] In some places the Gospel was attended with +little benefit. "All were seeking their own, not the things of Jesus +Christ."[52] Others returned "like dogs to their vomit, and like swine +to their wallowing in the mire."[53] Many perverted the liberty of +the spirit into the licentiousness of the flesh. Many insinuated +themselves as brethren, who afterwards brought the pious into dangers. +Various contentions were excited among the brethren themselves. What +was to be done by the apostles in such circumstances? Should they not +have dissembled for a time, or rather have rejected and deserted that +Gospel which appeared to be the nursery of so many disputes, the cause +of so many dangers, the occasion of so many offences? But in such +difficulties as these, their minds were relieved by this reflection +that Christ is the "stone of stumbling and rock of offence,"[54] "set +for the fall and rising again of many, and for a sign which shall be +spoken against;"[55] and armed with this confidence, they proceeded +boldly through all the dangers of tumults and offences. The same +consideration should support us, since Paul declares it to be the +perpetual character of the Gospel, that it is a "savour of death unto +death in them that perish,"[56] although it was rather given us to +be the "savour of life unto life," and "the power of God to" the +"salvation" of the faithful;[57] which we also should certainly +experience it to be, if we did not corrupt this eminent gift of God +by our ingratitude, and prevert to our destruction what ought to be a +principal instrument of our salvation. + +But I return to you, Sire. Let not your Majesty be at all moved by +those groundless accusations with which our adversaries endeavour +to terrify you; as that the sole tendency and design of this new +Gospel--for so they call it--is to furnish a pretext for seditions, +and to gain impunity for all crimes. "For God is not the author of +confusion, but of peace;"[58] nor is "the Son of God," who came to +"destroy the works of the devil, the minister of sin."[59] And it is +unjust to charge us with such motives and designs, of which we have +never given cause for the least suspicion. Is it probable that we are +meditating the subversion of kingdoms?--we, who were never heard to +utter a factious word, whose lives were ever known to be peaceable and +honest while We lived under your government, and who, even now in our +exile, cease not to pray for all prosperity to attend yourself and +your kingdom! Is it probable that we are seeking an unlimited license +to commit crimes with impunity? in whose conduct, though many things +may be blamed, yet there is nothing worthy of such severe reproach! +Nor have we, by Divine Grace, profited so little in the Gospel, +but that our life may be an example to our detractors of chastity, +liberality, mercy, temperance, patience, modesty, and every other +virtue. It is an undeniable fact, that we sincerely fear and worship +God, whose name we desire to be sanctified both by our life and by +our death; and envy itself is constrained to bear testimony to the +innocence and civil integrity of some of us, who have suffered the +punishment of death for that very thing which ought to be accounted +their highest praise. But if the Gospel be made a pretext for tumults, +which has not yet happened in your kingdom; if any persons make the +liberty of divine grace an excuse for the licentiousness of their +vices, of whom I have known many,--there are laws and legal penalties, +by which they may be punished according to their deserts; only let not +the Gospel of God be reproached for the crimes of wicked men. You have +now, Sire, the virulent iniquity of our calumniators laid before you +in a sufficient number of instances, that you may not receive their +accusations with too credulous an ear.--I fear I have gone too much +into the detail, as this preface already approaches the size of a full +apology; whereas I intended it not to contain our defence, but only to +prepare your mind to attend to the pleading of our cause; for, though +you are now averse and alienated from us, and even inflamed against +us, we despair not of regaining your favour, if you will only once +read with calmness and composure this our confession, which we intend +as our defence before your Majesty. But, on the contrary, if your ears +are so preoccupied with the whispers of the malevolent, as to leave +no opportunity for the accused to speak for themselves, and if those +outrageous furies, with your connivance, continue to persecute with +imprisonments, scourges, tortures, confiscations, and flames, we +shall indeed, like sheep destined to the slaughter, be reduced to the +greatest extremities. Yet shall we in patience possess our souls, and +wait for the mighty hand of the Lord, which undoubtedly will in time +appear, and show itself armed for the deliverance of the poor from +their affliction, and for the punishment of their despisers, who +now exult in such perfect security. May the Lord, the King of kings, +establish your throne with righteousness, and your kingdom with +equity. _Basil, 1st August, 1536._ + + +[Footnote A: John Calvin was born at Noyon, Picardy, France, in 1509, +and died at Geneva in 1564. He joined the Reformation about 1528, +and, having been banished from Paris, took refuge in Switzerland. +The "Institutes," published at Basle in 1536, contain a comprehensive +statement of the beliefs of that school of Protestant theology which +bears Calvin's name; and in this "Dedication" we have Calvin's own +summing up of the essentials of his creed.] + +[Footnote 1: Prov. xxix. 18.] + +[Footnote 2: Daniel ii. 34. Isaiah xi. 4. Psalm ii. 9.] + +[Footnote 3 Rom. xii. 6.] + +[Footnote 4: Jer. ii. 13.] + +[Footnote 5: Rom. viii. 32.] + +[Footnote 6: I Tim. iv. 10.] + +[Footnote 7: John xvii, 3.] + +[Footnote 8: Rom, iv. 25. I Cor. xv. 3, 17.] + +[Footnote 9: Isaiah i. 3.] + +[Footnote 10: Mark xvi. 20.] + +[Footnote 11: Acts xiv. 3.] + +[Footnote 12: Heb. ii. 3-4.] + +[Footnote 13: John vii. 18, viii. 50.] + +[Footnote 14: In Joan, tract. 13.] + +[Footnote 15: Matt. xxiv. 24.] + +[Footnote 16: 2 Thess. ii. 9.] + +[Footnote 17: 2 Cor. xi. 14.] + +[Footnote 18: Hierom. in praef. Jerem.] + +[Footnote 19: 2 Thess. ii. 10, 11.] + +[Footnote 20: i Cor. iii. 21, 23] + +[Footnote 21: Prov xxii. 28.] + +[Footnote 22: Psalm xlv. 10.] + +[Footnote 23: Acat. in lib. II, cap. 16. Trip. Hist. Amb. lib. 2, de +Off. c. 28.] + +[Footnote 24: Spiridion. Trip. Hist. lib. 1, c. 10.] + +[Footnote 25: Trip. Hist. lib. 8, c. 1. August. de Opere Mon. c. 17.] + +[Footnote 26: Epiph. Epist. ab Hier. vers. Con. Eliber. c. 36.] + +[Footnote 27: Amb de Abra. lib 1, c. 7.] + +[Footnote 28: Gelas. Pap in Conc. Rom.] + +[Footnote 29: Chrys. in 1 Cap. Ephes. Calix. Papa de Cons. dist. 2.] + +[Footnote 30: Gelas. can. Comperimus de Cons. dist. 2. Cypr. Epist. 2, +lib. 1, de Laps.] + +[Footnote 31: August. lib. 2, de Pec. Mer. cap. ult.] + +[Footnote 32: Apollon de quo Eccl. Hist. lib. 5, cap. 11, 12.] + +[Footnote 33: Paphnut. Trip. Hist. lib. 2, c. 14. Cypr. Epist. 2, lib. +2.] + +[Footnote 34: Aug. cap. 2, contr. Cresc. Grammatic.] + +[Footnote 35: Isaiah viii. 12, 13.] + +[Footnote 36: Epist. 3, lib. 2, et in Epist. ad. Julian, de Haeret. +baptiz.] + +[Footnote 37: Matt, xxvlii. 20.] + +[Footnote 38: i Kings xix. 14, 18.] + +[Footnote 39: Contr. Auxent.] + +[Footnote 40: 2 Tim. ii. 19.] + +[Footnote 41: Exod. xxxii. 4.] + +[Footnote 42: i Kings xxii. 6, 11-23.] + +[Footnote 43: Jer. xviii. 18.] + +[Footnote 44: Jer. iv. 9.] + +[Footnote 45: Matt. xxvi. 3, 4.] + +[Footnote 46: 1 Kings xviii. 17.] + +[Footnote 47: Luke xxiii. 2, 5.] + +[Footnote 48: Acts xvii. 6, xxiv. 5.] + +[Footnote 49: 2 Pet. iii. 16.] + +[Footnote 50: Rom. v. 20, vi. 1, 14, 15.] + +[Footnote 51: Phil. i. 15, 16.] + +[Footnote 52: Phil. ii. 21.] + +[Footnote 53: 2 Pet. ii. 22.] + +[Footnote 54: 1 Pet. ii. 8.] + +[Footnote 55: Luke ii. 34.] + +[Footnote 56: 2 Cor. ii. 15, 16.] + +[Footnote 57: Rom. i. 16.] + +[Footnote 58: 1 Cor. xiv. 33.] + +[Footnote 59: 1 John iii. 8. Gal. ii. 17.] + + + + +GENERAL SYLLABUS + + +The design of the Author in these Christian Institutes is twofold, +relating, First to the knowledge of God, as the way to attain a +blessed immortality; and, in connection with and subservience to this, +Secondly, to the knowledge of ourselves. + +In the prosecution of this design, he strictly follows the method of +the Apostles' Creed, as being most familiar to all Christians. For +as the Creed consists of four parts, the first relating to God the +Father, the second to the Son, the third to the Holy Spirit, the +fourth to the Church; so the Author distributes the whole of this work +into Four Books, corresponding respectively to the four parts of the +Creed; as will clearly appear from the following detail:-- + +I. The first article of the Creed relates to God the Father, and to +the creation, conservation, and government of all things, which are +included in his omnipotence. + +So the first book is on the knowledge of God, considered as the +Creator, Preserver, and Governor of the universe at large, and every +thing contained in it. It shows both the nature and tendency of +the true knowledge of the Creator--that this is not learned in the +schools, but that every man from his birth is self-taught it--Yet that +the depravity of men is so great as to corrupt and extinguish this +knowledge, partly by ignorance, partly by wickedness; so that it +neither leads him to glorify God as he ought, nor conducts him to +the attainment of happiness--And though this internal knowledge is +assisted by all the creatures around, which serve as a mirror to +display the Divine perfections, yet that man does not profit by +it--Therefore, that to those, whom it is God's will to bring to an +intimate and saving knowledge of himself, he gives his written word; +which introduces observations on the sacred Scripture--That he has +therein revealed himself; that not the Father only, but the Father, +Son, and Holy Spirit, united, is the Creator of heaven and earth; whom +neither the knowledge innate by nature, nor the very beautiful mirror +displayed to us in the world, can, in consequence of our depravity, +teach us to know so as to glorify him. This gives occasion for +treating of the revelation of God in the Scripture, of the unity of +the Divine Essence, and the trinity of Persons.--To prevent man from +attributing to God the blame of his own voluntary blindness, the +Author shows the state of man at his creation, and treats of the +image of God, freewill, and the primative integrity of nature.--Having +finished the subject of creation, he proceeds to the conservation +and government of all things, concluding the first book with a full +discussion of the doctrine of divine providence. + +II. But since man is fallen by sin from the state in which he was +created, it is necessary to come to Christ. Therefore it follows in +the Creed, "And in Jesus Christ, his only Son our Lord," &c. + +So in the second book of the Institutes our Author treats of the +knowledge of God as the Redeemer in Christ; and having shown the fall +of man, leads him to Christ the Mediator. Here he states the doctrine +of original sin--that man possesses no inherent strength to enable him +to deliver himself from sin and the impending curse, but that, on the +contrary, nothing can proceed from him, antecedently to reconciliation +and renovation, but what is deserving of condemnation--Therefore, +that, man being utterly lost in himself, and incapable of conceiving +even a good thought by which he may restore himself, or perform +actions acceptable to God, he must seek redemption out of himself, in +Christ--That the Law was given for this purpose, not to confine +its observers to itself, but to conduct them to Christ; which gives +occasion to introduce an exposition of the Moral Law--That he was +known, as the Author of salvation, to the Jews under the Law, but more +fully under the Gospel, in which he is manifested to the world.--Hence +follows the doctrine of the similarity and difference of the Old and +New Testament, of the Law and Gospel.--It is next stated, that, in +order to the complete accomplishment of salvation, it was necessary +for the eternal Son of God to become man, and that he actually +assumed a real human nature:--it is also shown how these two natures +constitute one person--That the office of Christ, appointed for the +acquisition and application of complete salvation by his merit and +efficacy, is sacerdotal, regal, and prophetical--Next follows the +manner in which Christ executed his office, or actually performed the +part of a Mediator, being an exposition of the Articles respecting +his death, resurrection, and ascension to heaven.--Lastly, the Author +shows the truth and propriety of affirming that Christ merited the +grace of God and salvation for us. + +III. As long as Christ is separate from us, he profits us nothing. +Hence the necessity of our being ingrafted into him, as branches into +a vine. Therefore the doctrine concerning Christ is followed, in +the third part of the Creed, by this clause, "I believe in the Holy +Spirit," as being the bond of union between us and Christ. + +So in the third book our Author treats of the Holy Spirit, who unites +us to Christ--and consequently of faith, by which we embrace Christ, +with his twofold benefit, free righteousness, which he imputes to +us, and regeneration, which he commences within us, by bestowing +repentance upon us.--And to show that we have not the least room to +glory in such faith as is unconnected with the pursuit of repentance, +before proceeding to the full discussion of justification, he treats +at large of repentance and the continual exercise of it, which Christ, +apprehended by faith, produces in us by his Spirit--He next fully +discusses the first and chief benefit of Christ when united to us by +the Holy Spirit that is, justification--and then treats of prayer, +which resembles the hand that actually receives those blessings to be +enjoyed, which faith knows, from the word of promise, to be laid up +with God for our use.--But as all men are not united to Christ, +the sole Author of salvation, by the Holy Spirit, who creates and +preserves faith in us, he treats of God's eternal election; which is +the cause that we, in whom he foresaw no good but what he intended +freely to bestow, have been favored with the gift of Christ, and +united to God by the effectual call of the Gospel.--Lastly, he treats +of complete regeneration, and the fruition of happiness; that is, the +final resurrection, towards which our eyes must be directed, since in +this world the felicity of the pious, in respect of enjoyment, is only +begun. + +IV. But as the Holy Spirit does not unite all men to Christ, or make +them partakers of faith, and on those to whom he imparts it he does +not ordinarily bestow it without means, but employs for this purpose +the preaching of the Gospel and the use of the sacraments, with the +administration of all discipline, therefore it follows in the Creed, +"I believe in the Holy Catholic Church," whom, although involved in +eternal death, yet, in pursuance of the gratuitous election, God has +freely reconciled to himself in Christ, and made partakers of the Holy +Spirit, that, being ingrafted into Christ, they may have communion +with him as their head, whence flows a perpetual remission of sins, +and a full restoration to eternal life. + +So in the fourth book our Author treats of the Church--then of the +means used by the Holy Spirit in effectually calling from spiritual +death, and preserving the church--the word and sacraments--baptism +and the Lord's supper--which are as it were Christ's regal sceptre, by +which he commences his spiritual reign in the Church by the energy of +his Spirit, and carries it forwards from day to day during the present +life, after the close of which he perfects it without those means. + +And as political institutions are the asylums of the Church in this +life, though civil government is distinct from the spiritual kingdom +of Christ, our Author instructs us respecting it as a signal blessing +of God, which the Church ought to acknowledge with gratitude of +heart, till we are called out of this transitory state to the heavenly +inheritance, where God will be all in all. + +This is the plan of the Institutes, which may be comprised in the +following brief summary:-- + +Man, created originally upright, being afterwards ruined, not +partially, but totally, finds salvation out of himself, wholly in +Christ; to whom being united by the Holy Spirit, freely bestowed, +without any regard of future works, he enjoys in him a twofold +benefit, the perfect imputation of righteousness, which attends him +to the grave, and the commencement of sanctification, which he daily +increases, till at length he completes it at the day of regeneration +or resurrection of the body, so that in eternal life and the heavenly +inheritance his praises are celebrated for such stupendous mercy. + + + + +DEDICATION OF THE REVOLUTIONS OF THE HEAVENLY BODIES + +BY NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (1543)[A] + +TO POPE PAUL III + + +I can easily conceive, most Holy Father, that as soon as some +people learn that in this book which I have written concerning the +revolutions of the heavenly bodies, I ascribe certain motions to +the Earth, they will cry out at once that I and my theory should be +rejected. For I am not so much in love with my conclusions as not to +weigh what others will think about them, and although I know that the +meditations of a philosopher are far removed from the judgment of the +laity, because his endeavor is to seek out the truth in all things, so +far as this is permitted by God to the human reason, I still believe +that one must avoid theories altogether foreign to orthodoxy. +Accordingly, when I considered in my own mind how absurd a performance +it must seem to those who know that the judgment of many centuries has +approved the view that the Earth remains fixed as center in the midst +of the heavens, if I should, on the contrary, assert that the Earth +moves; I was for a long time at a loss to know whether I should +publish the commentaries which I have written in proof of its +motion, or whether it were not better to follow the example of the +Pythagoreans and of some others, who were accustomed to transmit the +secrets of Philosophy not in writing but orally, and only to their +relatives and friends, as the letter from Lysis to Hipparchus bears +witness. They did this, it seems to me, not as some think, because of +a certain selfish reluctance to give their views to the world, but +in order that the noblest truths, worked out by the careful study of +great men, should not be despised by those who are vexed at the idea +of taking great pains with any forms of literature except such as +would be profitable, or by those who, if they are driven to the study +of Philosophy for its own sake by the admonitions and the example +of others, nevertheless, on account of their stupidity, hold a place +among philosophers similar to that of drones among bees. Therefore, +when I considered this carefully, the contempt which I had to fear +because of the novelty and apparent absurdity of my view, nearly +induced me to abandon utterly the work I had begun. + +My friends, however, in spite of long delay and even resistance on my +part, withheld me from this decision. First among these was Nicolaus +Schonberg, Cardinal of Capua, distinguished in all branches of +learning. Next to him comes my very dear friend, Tidemann Giese, +Bishop of Culm, a most earnest student, as he is, of sacred and, +indeed, of all good learning. The latter has often urged me, at times +even spurring me on with reproaches, to publish and at last bring to +the light the book which had lain in my study not nine years merely, +but already going on four times nine. Not a few other very eminent and +scholarly men made the same request, urging that I should no longer +through fear refuse to give out my work for the common benefit of +students of Mathematics. They said I should find that the more absurd +most men now thought this theory of mine concerning the motion of the +Earth, the more admiration and gratitude it would command after +they saw in the publication of my commentaries the mist of absurdity +cleared away by most transparent proofs. So, influenced by these +advisors and this hope, I have at length allowed my friends to publish +the work, as they had long besought me to do. + +But perhaps Your Holiness will not so much wonder that I have ventured +to publish these studies of mine, after having taken such pains in +elaborating them that I have not hesitated to commit to writing my +views of the motion of the Earth, as you will be curious to hear +how it occurred to me to venture, contrary to the accepted view of +mathematicians, and well-nigh contrary to common sense, to form a +conception of any terrestrial motion whatsoever. Therefore I would not +have it unknown to Your Holiness, that the only thing which induced +me to look for another way of reckoning the movements of the heavenly +bodies was that I knew that mathematicians by no means agree in their +investigations thereof. For, in the first place, they are so much in +doubt concerning the motion of the sun and the moon, that they can +not even demonstrate and prove by observation the constant length of +a complete year; and in the second place, in determining the motions +both of these and of the five other planets, they fail to employ +consistently one set of first principles and hypotheses, but use +methods of proof based only upon the apparent revolutions and motions. +For some employ concentric circles only; others, eccentric circles and +epicycles; and even by these means they do not completely attain the +desired end. For, although those who have depended upon concentric +circles have shown that certain diverse motions can be deduced from +these, yet they have not succeeded thereby in laying down any sure +principle, corresponding indisputably to the phenomena. These, on the +other hand, who have devised systems of eccentric circles, although +they seem in great part to have solved the apparent movements +by calculations which by these eccentrics are made to fit, have +nevertheless introduced many things which seem to contradict the first +principles of the uniformity of motion. Nor have they been able to +discover or calculate from these the main point, which is the shape of +the world and the fixed symmetry of its parts; but their procedure +has been as if someone were to collect hands, feet, a head, and other +members from various places, all very fine in themselves, but not +proportionate to one body, and no single one corresponding in its turn +to the others, so that a monster rather than a man would be formed +from them. Thus in their process of demonstration which they term a +"method," they are found to have omitted something essential, or to +have included something foreign and not pertaining to the matter in +hand. This certainly would never have happened to them if they had +followed fixed principles; for if the hypotheses they assumed were +not false, all that resulted therefrom would be verified indubitably. +Those things which I am saying now may be obscure, yet they will be +made clearer in their proper place. + +Therefore, having turned over in my mind for a long time this +uncertainty of the traditional mathematical methods of calculating +the motions of the celestial bodies, I began to grow disgusted that +no more consistent scheme of the movements of the mechanism of the +universe, set up for our benefit by that best and most law abiding +Architect of all things, was agreed upon by philosophers who otherwise +investigate so carefully the most minute details of this world. +Wherefore I undertook the task of rereading the books of all the +philosophers I could get access to, to see whether any one ever was of +the opinion that the motions of the celestial bodies were other than +those postulated by the men who taught mathematics in the schools. And +I found first, indeed, in Cicero, that Niceta perceived that the Earth +moved; and afterward in Plutarch I found that some others were of this +opinion, whose words I have seen fit to quote here, that they may be +accessible to all:-- + +"Some maintain that the Earth is stationary, but Philolaus the +Pythagorean says that it revolves in a circle about the fire of the +ecliptic, like the sun and moon. Heraklides of Pontus and Ekphantus +the Pythagorean make the Earth move, not changing its position, +however, confined in its falling and rising around its own center in +the manner of a wheel." + +Taking this as a starting point, I began to consider the mobility of +the Earth; and although the idea seemed absurd, yet because I knew +that the liberty had been granted to others before me to postulate all +sorts of little circles for explaining the phenomena of the stars, I +thought I also might easily be permitted to try whether by postulating +some motion of the Earth, more reliable conclusions could be reached +regarding the revolution of the heavenly bodies, than those of my +predecessors. + +And so, after postulating movements, which, farther on in the book, I +ascribe to the Earth, I have found by many and long observations that +if the movements of the other planets are assumed for the circular +motion of the Earth and are substituted for the revolution of each +star, not only do their phenomena follow logically therefrom, but +the relative positions and magnitudes both of the stars and all their +orbits, and of the heavens themselves, become so closely related that +in none of its parts can anything be changed without causing confusion +in the other parts and in the whole universe. Therefore, in the course +of the work I have followed this plan: I describe in the first book +all the positions of the orbits together with the movements which I +ascribe to the Earth, in order that this book might contain, as it +were, the general scheme of the universe. Thereafter in the remaining +books, I set forth the motions of the other stars and of all their +orbits together with the movement of the Earth, in order that one +may see from this to what extent the movements and appearances of the +other stars and their orbits can be saved, if they are transferred to +the movement of the Earth. Nor do I doubt that ingenious and learned +mathematicians will sustain me, if they are willing to recognize and +weigh, not superficially, but with that thoroughness which Philosophy +demands above all things, those matters which have been adduced by me +in this work to demonstrate these theories. In order, however, that +both the learned and the unlearned equally may see that I do not avoid +anyone's judgment, I have preferred to dedicate these lucubrations of +mine to Your Holiness rather than to any other, because, even in this +remote corner of the world where I live, you are considered to be the +most eminent man in dignity of rank and in love of all learning and +even of mathematics, so that by your authority and judgment you can +easily suppress the bites of slanderers, albeit the proverb hath it +that there is no remedy for the bite of a sycophant. If perchance +there shall be idle talkers, who, though they are ignorant of all +mathematical sciences, nevertheless assume the right to pass judgment +on these things, and if they should dare to criticise and attack this +theory of mine because of some passage of scripture which they have +falsely distorted for their own purpose, I care not at all; I will +even despise their judgment as foolish. For it is not unknown that +Lactantius, otherwise a famous writer but a poor mathematician, speaks +most childishly of the shape of the Earth when he makes fun of those +who said that the Earth has the form of a sphere. It should not seem +strange then to zealous students, if some such people shall ridicule +us also. Mathematics are written for mathematicians, to whom, if +my opinion does not deceive me, our labors will seem to contribute +something to the ecclesiastical state whose chief office Your Holiness +now occupies; for when not so very long ago, under Leo X, in the +Lateran Council the question of revising the ecclesiastical calendar +was discussed, it then remained unsettled, simply because the length +of the years and months, and the motions of the sun and moon were held +to have been not yet sufficiently determined. Since that time, I have +given my attention to observing these more accurately, urged on by a +very distinguished man, Paul, Bishop of Fossombrone, who at that time +had charge of the matter. But what I may have accomplished herein I +leave to the judgment of Your Holiness in particular, and to that of +all other learned mathematicians; and lest I seem to Your Holiness to +promise more regarding the usefulness of the work than I can perform, +I now pass to the work itself. + + +[Footnote A: Nicolaus Copernicus was born in 1473 at Thorn in West +Prussia, of a Polish father and a German mother. He attended +the university of Cracow and Bologna, lectured on astronomy and +mathematics at Rome, and later studied medicine at Padua and canon law +at Ferrara. He was appointed canon of the cathedral of Frauenburg, and +in this town he died in 1543, having devoted the latter part of his +life largely to astronomy. + +The book which was introduced by this dedication laid the foundations +of modern astronomy. At the time when it was written, the earth was +believed by all to be the fixed centre of the universe; and although +many of the arguments used by Copernicus were invalid and absurd, he +was the first modern to put forth the heliocentric theory as "a +better explanation." It remained for Kepler, Galileo, and Newton, to +establish the theory on firm grounds.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION IN SCOTLAND + +BY JOHN KNOX (C. 1566)[A] + +To the gentill readar, grace and peace from God the Father of our Lord +Jesus Christ, with the perpetuall encrease of the Holy Spreit. + + +It is not unknowen, Christeane Reader, that the same clud of +ignorance, that long hath darkened many realmes under this accurssed +kingdome of that Romane Antichrist, hath also owercovered this poore +Realme; that idolatrie hath bein manteined, the bloode of innocentis +hath bene sched, and Christ Jesus his eternall treuth hath bene +abhorred, detested, and blasphemed. But that same God that caused +light to schyne out of darknes, in the multitud of his mercyes, hath +of long tyme opened the eis of some evin within this Realme, to see +the vanitie of that which then was universally embrased for trew +religioun; and hes gevin unto them strenth to oppone[1] thame selfis +unto the same: and now, into these our last and moist[2] corrupt +dayis, hath maid his treuth so to triumphs amonges us, that, in +despyte of Sathan, hipochrisye is disclosed, and the trew wyrshipping +of God is manifested to all the inhabitantis of this realme who +eis Sathan blyndis not, eyther by thair fylthy lustes, or ellis by +ambitioun, and insatiable covetousness, which mack them repung to[3] +the power of God working by his worde. + +And becaus we ar not ignorant what diverse bruittis[4] war dispersed +of us, the professoures of Jesus Christ within this realme, in +the begynnyng of our interprise, ordour was tackin, that all our +proceidingis should be committed to register; as that thei war, by +such as then paynfullie travailled boith by toung and pen; and so was +collected a just volume, (as after will appeir,) conteanyng thingis +done frome the fyftie-awght[5] year of God, till the arrivall of the +Quenis Majestic[6] furth of France, with the which the Collectour and +Writtar for that tyme was content, and never mynded[7] further to have +travailled in that kynd of writting. But, after invocatioun of the +name of God, and after consultatioun with some faythfull, what was +thought by thame expedient to advance Goddis glorie, and to edifie +this present generatioun, and the posteritie to come, it was +concluded, that faythfull rehersall should be maid of such personages +as God had maid instruments of his glorie, by opponyng of thame selfis +to manifest abuses, superstitioun, and idolatrie; and albeit thare be +no great nomber, yet ar thei mo then the Collectour wold have looked +for at the begynnyng, and thairfoir is the volume somewhat enlarged +abuif his expectatioun: And yit, in the begynnyng, mon[8] we crave +of all the gentill Readaris, not to look[9] of us such ane History +as shall expresse all thingis that have occurred within this Realme, +during the tyme of this terrible conflict that lies bene betuix the +sanctes[10] of God and these bloody wolves who clame to thame selves +the titill of clargie, and to have authentic ower the saules of men; +for, with the Pollicey,[11] mynd we to meddill no further then it hath +Religioun mixed with it. And thairfoir albeit that many thingis which +wer don be omitted, yit, yf we invent no leys,[12] we think our selves +blamless in that behalf. Of one other (thing) we mon[8] foirwarne +the discreat Readaris, which is, that thei be not offended that the +sempill treuth be spokin without partialitie; for seing that of men we +neyther hunt for reward, nor yitt for vane glorie, we litill pass +by the approbatioun of such as seldome judge weill of God and of his +workis. Lett not thairfoar the Readir wonder, albeit that our style +vary and speik diverslie of men, according as thei have declared +thameselves sometymes ennemymes and sometymes freindis, sometymes +fervent, sometymes cold, sometymes constant, and sometymes changeable +in the cause of God and of his holy religioun: for, in this our +simplicitie, we suppoise that the Godlie shall espy our purpose, which +is, that God may be praised for his mercy schawin,[13] this present +age may be admonished to be thankfull for Goddis benefittis offerred, +and the posteritie to cum may be instructed how wonderouslie hath the +light of Christ Jesus prevailled against darkness in this last and +most corrupted age. + + +[Footnote A: John Knox (1505-1571), the leader of the Scottish +Reformation and its historian, was educated at Glasgow University; was +pastor to English congregations at Frankfort-on-Maine and at Geneva, +where he met Calvin; returned to Scotland in 1559; and from that time +till his death was active in the establishment of the Presbyterian +organization, through which his powerful personality has continued +to influence the Scottish national character to the present day. His +preface, which is printed here in the original Scottish spelling, +gives some indication of the sternness, not to say virulence, of his +temper towards the Roman Church.] + +[Footnote 1: Oppose] + +[Footnote 2: Most] + +[Footnote 3: Resist.] + +[Footnote 4: Rumors.] + +[Footnote 5: I.e. 1558.] + +[Footnote 6: Mary, Queen of Scots, arrived in Scotland, Aug. 19, +1562.] + +[Footnote 7: Intended.] + +[Footnote 8: Must.] + +[Footnote 9: Expect.] + +[Footnote 10: Saints.] + +[Footnote 11: Civil or State politics.] + +[Footnote 12: Lies.] + +[Footnote 13: Shown.] + + + + +PREFATORY LETTER TO SIR WALTER RALEIGH ON THE FAERIE QUEENE + +BY EDMUND SPENSER (1589)[A] + +A LETTER OF THE AUTHORS EXPOUNDING HIS WHOLE INTENTION IN THE COURSE +OF THIS WORKE: WHICH FOR THAT IT GIVETH GREAT LIGHT TO THE READER, FOR +THE BETTER UNDERSTANDING IS HEREUNTO ANNEXED + +To the Right Noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Raleigh, Knight, Lord +Wardein of the Stanneryes, and Her Majesties Liefetenaunt of the +County of Cornewayll + + +Sir, knowing how doubtfully all allegories may be construed, and this +booke of mine, which I have entituled the _Faery Queene_, being a +continued allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good, as well for +avoyding of gealous opinions and misconstructions, as also for your +better light in reading thereof, (being so by you commanded,) to +discover unto you the general intention and meaning, which in the +whole course thereof I have fashioned, without expressing of any +particular purposes or by accidents therein occasioned. The generall +end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble +person in vertuous and gentle discipline: which for that I conceived +shoulde be most plausible and pleasing, being coloured with an +historicall fiction, the which the most part of men delight to read, +rather for variety of matter then for profile of the ensample, I chose +the historye of King Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of +his person, being made famous by many mens former workes, and also +furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of present time. In +which I have followed all the antique poets historicall: first Homere, +who in the persons of Agamemnon and Ulysses hath ensampled a good +governour and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his +Odysseis; then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in the person +of Æneas; after him Ariosto comprised them both in his Orlando; and +lately Tasso dissevered them againe, and formed both parts in two +persons, namely that part which they in philosophy call Ethice, or +vertues of a private man, coloured in his Rinaldo; the other named +Politice in his Godfredo. By ensample of which excellente poets, I +labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king, the image of +a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as +Aristotle hath devised, the which is the purpose of these first +twelve bookes: which if I finde to be well accepted, I may be perhaps +encoraged to frame the other part of polliticke vertues in his person, +after that hee came to be king. To some, I know, this methode will +seeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline delivered +plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large, as they use, then +thus clowdily enwrapped in allegoricall devises. But such, me seeme, +should be satisfide with the use of these dayes, seeing all things +accounted by their showes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not +delightfull and pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon +preferred before Plato, for that the one, in the exquisite depth of +his judgement, formed a commune welth such as it should be, but the +other in the person of Cyrus and the Persians fashioned a governement, +such as might best be: so much more profitable and gratious is +doctrine by ensample, then by rule. So have I laboured to doe in +the person of Arthure: whome I conceive, after his long education by +Timon, to whom he was by Merlin delivered to be brought up, so soone +as he was borne of the Lady Igrayne, to have seene in a dream or +vision the Faery Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he +awaking resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin armed, and +by Timon throughly instructed, he went to seeke her forth in Faerye +Land. In that Faery Queene I meane glory in my generall intention, but +in my particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of +our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery Land. And yet, +in some places els, I doe otherwise shadow her. For considering she +beareth two persons, the one of a most royall queene or empresse, the +other of a most vertuous and beautifull lady, this latter part in some +places I doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name according to +your owne excellent conceipt of Cynthia, (Phæbe and Cynthia being +both names of Diana.) So in the person of Prince Arthure I sette +forth magnificence in particular, which vertue, for that (according +to Aristotle and the rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and +conteineth in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention the +deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue which I write of in that +booke. But of the xii. other vertues I make xii. other knights the +patrones, for the more variety of the history: of which these three +bookes contayn three. The first of the Knight of the Redcrosse, in +whome I expresse holynes: The seconde of Sir Guyon, in whome I sette +forth temperaunce: The third of Britomartis, a lady knight, in whome I +picture chastity. But because the beginning of the whole worke seemeth +abrupte and as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye +know the occasion of these three knights severall adventures. For the +methode of a poet historical is not such as of an historiographer. For +an historiographer discourseth of affayres orderly as they were donne, +accounting as well the times as the actions; but a poet thrusteth into +the middest, even where it most concerneth him, and there recoursing +to the thinges forepaste, and divining of thinges to come, maketh a +pleasing analysis of all. + +The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an +historiographer, should be the twelfth booke, which is the last; where +I devise that the Faery Queene kept her annuall feaste xii. dayes, +uppon which xii. severall dayes, the occasions of the xii. several +adventures hapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights, +are in these xii. books severally handled and discoursed. The first +was this. In the beginning of the feast, there presented him selfe +a tall clownish younge man, who, falling before the Queen of Faries, +desired a boone (as the manner then was) which during that feast she +might not refuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement of +any adventure, which during that feaste should happen: that being +graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitte through his rusticity +for a better place. Soone after entred a faire ladye in mourning +weedes, riding on a white asse, with a dwarfe behind her leading a +warlike steed, that bore the armes of a knight, and his speare in the +dwarfes hand. Shee, falling before the Queene of Faeries, complayned +that her father and mother, an ancient king and queene, had bene by an +huge dragon many years shut up in a brasen castle, who thence suffred +them not to yssew: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to assygne +her some one of her knights to take on him that exployt. Presently +that clownish person, upstarting, desired that adventure: whereat the +Queene much wondering, and the lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly +importuned his desire. In the end the lady told him, that unlesse that +armour which she brought would serve him (that is, the armour of a +Christian man specified by Saint Paul, vi. Ephes.), that he could not +succeed in that enterprise: which being forthwith put upon him with +dewe furnitures thereunto, he seemed the goodliest man in al that +company, and was well liked of the lady. And eftesoones taking on him +knighthood, and mounting on that straunge courser, he went forth with +her on that adventure: where beginneth the first booke vz. + + A gentle knight was pricking on the playne, &c. + +The second day ther came in a palmer bearing an infant with +bloody hands, whose parents he complained to have bene slayn by +an enchaunteresse called Acrasia: and therfore craved of the Faery +Queene, to appoint him some knight to performe that adventure; which +being assigned to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that same +palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke and the whole +subject thereof. The third day there came in a groome, who complained +before the Faery Queene, that a vile enchaunter, called Busirane, +had in hand a most faire lady, called Amoretta, whom he kept in most +grievous torment, because she would not yield him the pleasure of her +body. Whereupon Sir Scudamour, the lover of that lady, presently tooke +on him that adventure. But being unable to performe it by reason +of the hard enchauntments, after long sorrow, in the end met with +Britomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love. + +But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are intermedled, but +rather as accidents then intendments: as the love of Britomart, the +overthrow of Marinell, the misery of Florimell, the vertuousnes of +Belphoebe, the lasciviousnes of Hellenora, and many the like. + +Thus much, Sir, I have briefly overronne, to direct your understanding +to the wel-head of the history, that from thence gathering the whole +intention of the conceit, ye may, as in a handfull, gripe al the +discourse, which otherwise may happily seeme tedious and confused. So +humbly craving the continuance of your honourable favour towards me, +and th' eternall establishment of your happines, I humbly take leave. + +23. January, 1589. Yours most humbly affectionate, Ed. Spenser. + + +[Footnote A: Edmund Spenser was born in London about 1552, and died +there in 1599. He was the greatest of the non-dramatic poets of the +age of Elizabeth; and the "Faerie Queene" is the longest and most +famous of his works. The first three books were published in 1590, the +second three in 1596; of the remaining six which he had planned some +fragments were issued after his death. The poem is a combination of +allegory and romance; and in this prefatory letter to Raleigh the +poet himself explains the plan of the work and its main allegorical +signification.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD + +BY SIR WALTER RALEIGH (1614)[A] + + +How unfit and how unworthy a choice I have made of myself, to +undertake a work of this mixture, mine own reason, though exceeding +weak, hath sufficiently resolved me. For had it been begotten then +with my first dawn of day, when the light of common knowledge began to +open itself to my younger years, and before any wound received either +from Fortune or Time, I might yet well have doubted that the darkness +of Age and Death would have covered over both It and Me, long before +the performance. For, beginning with the Creation, I have proceeded +with the History of the World; and lastly purposed (some few sallies +excepted) to confine my discourse with this our renowned Island of +Great Britain. I confess that it had better sorted with my disability, +the better part of whose times are run out in other travails, to have +set together (as I could) the unjointed and scattered frame of our +English affairs, than of the universal in whom, had there been no +other defect (who am all defect) than the time of the day, it were +enough, the day of a tempestuous life, drawn on to the very evening +ere I began. But those inmost and soul-piercing wounds, which are ever +aching while uncured; with the desire to satisfy those few friends, +which I have tried by the fire of adversity, the former enforcing, +the latter persuading; have caused me to make my thoughts legible, and +myself the subject of every opinion, wise or weak. + +To the world I present them, to which I am nothing indebted: neither +have others that were, (Fortune changing) sped much better in any +age. For prosperity and adversity have evermore tied and untied vulgar +affections. And as we see it in experience, that dogs do always bark +at those they know not, and that it is their nature to accompany one +another in those clamors: so it is with the inconsiderate multitude; +who wanting that virtue which we call honesty in all men, and that +especial gift of God which we call charity in Christian men, condemn +without hearing, and wound without offence given: led thereunto by +uncertain report only; which his Majesty truly acknowledged for the +author of all lies. "Blame no man," saith Siracides, "before thou have +inquired the matter: understand first, and then reform righteously. +'Rumor, res sine teste, sine judice, maligna, fallax'; Rumor is +without witness, without judge, malicious and deceivable." This vanity +of vulgar opinion it was, that gave St. Augustine argument to affirm, +that he feared the praise of good men, and detested that of the evil. +And herein no man hath given a better rule, than this of Seneca; +"Conscientiæ satisfaciamus: nihil in famam laboremus, sequatur vel +mala, dum bene merearis." "Let us satisfy our own consciences, and not +trouble ourselves with fame: be it never so ill, it is to be despised +so we deserve well." + +For myself, if I have in anything served my Country, and prized it +before my private, the general acceptation can yield me no other +profit at this time, than doth a fair sunshine day to a sea-man after +shipwreck; and the contrary no other harm, than an outrageous tempest +after the port attained. I know that I lost the love of many, for my +fidelity towards Her,[1] whom I must still honor in the dust; though +further than the defence of her excellent person, I never persecuted +any man. Of those that did it, and by what device they did it, He that +is the Supreme Judge of all the world, hath taken the account: so as +for this kind of suffering, I must say With Seneca, "Mala opinio, bene +parta, delectat."[2] As for other men; if there be any that have made +themselves fathers of that fame which hath been begotten for them, I +can neither envy at such their purchased glory, nor much lament mine +own mishap in that kind; but content myself to say with Virgil, "Sic +vos non vobis,"[3] in many particulars. To labor other satisfaction, +were an effect of frenzy, not of hope, seeing it is not truth, but +opinion, that can travel the world without a passport. For were it +otherwise; and were there not as many internal forms of the mind, as +there are external figures of men; there were then some possibility to +persuade by the mouth of one advocate, even equity alone. + +But such is the multiplying and extensive virtue of dead earth, and +of that breath-giving life which God hath cast upon time and dust, as +that among those that were, of whom we read and hear; and among those +that are, whom we see and converse with; everyone hath received a +several picture of face, and everyone a diverse picture of mind; +everyone a form apart, everyone a fancy and cogitation differing: +there being nothing wherein Nature so much triumpheth as in +dissimilitude. From whence it cometh that there is found so great +diversity of opinions; so strong a contrariety of inclinations; +so many natural and unnatural; wise, foolish, manly, and childish +affections and passions in mortal men. For it is not the visible +fashion and shape of plants, and of reasonable creatures, that makes +the difference of working in the one, and of condition in the other; +but the form internal. + +And though it hath pleased God to reserve the art of reading men's +thoughts to himself: yet, as the fruit tells the name of the tree; so +do the outward works of men (so far as their cogitations are acted) +give us whereof to guess at the rest. Nay, it were not hard to express +the one by the other, very near the life, did not craft in many, +fear in the most, and the world's love in all, teach every capacity, +according to the compass it hath, to qualify and make over their +inward deformities for a time. Though it be also true, "Nemo potest +diu personam ferre fictam: cito in naturam suam residunt, quibus +veritas non subest": "No man can long continue masked in a counterfeit +behavior: the things that are forced for pretences having no ground of +truth, cannot long dissemble their own natures." Neither can any +man (saith Plutarch) so change himself, but that his heart may be +sometimes seen at his tongue's end. + +In this great discord and dissimilitude of reasonable creatures, if we +direct ourselves to the multitude; "omnis honestæ rei malus judex +est vulgus": "The common people are evil judges of honest things, and +whose wisdom (saith Ecclesiastes) is to be despised": if to the better +sort, every understanding hath a peculiar judgment, by which it both +censureth other men, and valueth itself. And therefore unto me it will +not seem strange, though I find these my worthless papers torn with +rats: seeing the slothful censurers of all ages have not spared to tax +the Reverend Fathers of the Church, with ambition; the severest men +to themselves, with hypocrisy; the greatest lovers of justice, +with popularity; and those of the truest valor and fortitude, with +vain-glory. But of these natures which lee in wait to find fault, and +to turn good into evil, seeing Solomon complained long since: and +that the very age of the world renders it every day after other +more malicious; I must leave the professors to their easy ways of +reprehension, than which there is nothing of more facility. + +To me it belongs in the first part of this Preface, following the +common and approved custom of those who have left the memories of +time past to after ages, to give, as near as I can, the same right to +history which they have done. Yet seeing therein I should but borrow +other men's words, I will not trouble the Reader with the repetition. +True it is that among many other benefits for which it hath been +honored, in this one it triumpheth over all human knowledge, that it +hath given us life in our understanding, since the world itself had +life and beginning, even to this day: yea, it hath triumphed over +time, which besides it nothing but eternity hath triumphed over: for +it hath carried our knowledge over the vast and devouring space of +many thousands of years, and given so fair and piercing eyes to our +mind; that we plainly behold living now (as if we had lived then) that +great world, "Magni Dei sapiens opus," "The wise work (saith Hermes) +of a great God," as it was then, when but new to itself. By it (I say) +it is, that we live in the very time when it was created: we behold +how it was governed: how it was covered with waters, and again +repeopled: how kings and kingdoms have flourished and fallen, and +for what virtue and piety God made prosperous; and for what vice and +deformity he made wretched, both the one and the other. And it is +not the least debt which we owe unto history, that it hath made us +acquainted with our dead ancestors; and, out of the depth and darkness +of the earth, delivered us their memory and fame. In a word, we may +gather out of history a policy no less wise than eternal; by the +comparison and application of other men's fore-passed miseries with +our own like errors and ill deservings. But it is neither of examples +the most lively instruction, nor the words of the wisest men, nor the +terror of future torments, that hath yet so wrought in our blind and +stupified minds, as to make us remember, that the infinite eye and +wisdom of God doth pierce through all our pretences; as to make us +remember, that the justice of God doth require none other accuser than +our own consciences: which neither the false beauty of our apparent +actions, nor all the formality, which (to pacify the opinions of men) +we put on, can in any, or the least kind, cover from his knowledge. +And so much did that heathen wisdom confess, no way as yet qualified +by the knowledge of a true God. If any (saith Euripides) "having +in his life committed wickedness, thinks he can hide it from the +everlasting gods, he thinks not well." + +To repeat God's judgments in particular, upon those of all degrees, +which have played with his mercies would require a volume apart: for +the sea of examples hath no bottom. The marks, set on private men, +are with their bodies cast into the earth; and their fortunes, written +only in the memories of those that lived with them: so as they who +succeed, and have not seen the fall of others, do not fear their own +faults. God's judgments upon the greater and greatest have been left +to posterity; first, by those happy hands which the Holy Ghost hath +guided; and secondly, by their virtue, who have gathered the acts and +ends of men mighty and remarkable in the world. Now to point far off, +and to speak of the conversion of angels into devils; for ambition: or +of the greatest and most glorious kings, who have gnawn the grass of +the earth with beasts for pride and ingratitude towards God: or of +that wise working of Pharaoh, when he slew the infants of Israel, +ere they had recovered their cradles: or of the policy of Jezebel, in +covering the murder of Naboth by a trial of the Elders, according to +the Law, with many thousands of the like: what were it other, than to +make an hopeless proof, that far-off examples would not be left to the +same far-off respects, as heretofore? For who hath not observed, what +labor, practice, peril, bloodshed, and cruelty, the kings and princes +of the world have undergone, exercised, taken on them, and committed; +to make themselves and their issues masters of the world? And yet +hath Babylon, Persia, Syria, Macedon, Carthage, Rome, and the rest, +no fruit, no flower, grass, nor leaf, springing upon the face of +the earth, of those seeds: no, their very roots and ruins do hardly +remain. "Omnia quae manu hominum facta sunt, vel manu hominum +evertuntur, vel stando et durando deficiunt": "All that the hand of +man can make, is either overturned by the hand of man, or at length +by standing and continuing consumed." The reasons of whose ruins, are +diversely given by those that ground their opinions on second causes. +All kingdoms and states have fallen (say the politicians) by outward +and foreign force, or by inward negligence and dissension, or by a +third cause arising from both. Others observe, that the greatest have +sunk down under their own weight; of which Livy hath a touch: "eo +crevit, ut magnitudine laboret sua":[4] Others, That the divine +providence (which Cratippus objected to Pompey) hath set _down_ the +date and period of every estate, before their first foundation and +erection. But hereof I will give myself a day over to resolve. + +For seeing the first hooks of the following story, have undertaken the +discourse of the first kings and kingdoms: and that it is impossible +for the short life of a Preface, to travel after, and overtake far-off +antiquity, and to judge of it; I will, for the present, examine +what profit hath been gathered by our own Kings, and their neighbour +princes: who having beheld, both in divine and human letters, the +success of infidelity, injustice, and cruelty; have (notwithstanding) +planted after the same pattern. + +True it is, that the judgments of all men are not agreeable; nor +(which is more strange) the affection of any one man stirred up alike +with examples of like nature: but every one is touched most, with that +which most nearly seemeth to touch his own private, or otherwise best +suiteth with his apprehension. But the judgments of God are forever +unchangeable: neither is He wearied by the long process of time, and +won to give His blessing in one age, to that which He hath cursed in +another. Wherefor those that are wise, or whose wisdom if it be not +great, yet is true and well grounded, will be able to discern the +bitter fruits of irreligious policy, as well among those examples that +are found in ages removed far from the present, as in those of latter +times. And that it may no less appear by evident proof, than by +asseveration, that ill doing hath always been attended with ill +success; I will here, by way of preface, run over some examples, which +the work ensuing hath not reached. + +Among our kings of the Norman race, we have no sooner passed over the +violence of the Norman Conquest, than we encounter with a singular and +most remarkable example of God's justice, upon the children of Henry +the First. For that King, when both by force, craft, and cruelty, he +had dispossessed, overreached, and lastly made blind and destroyed his +elder brother Robert Duke of Normandy, to make his own sons lords +of this land: God cast them all, male and female, nephews and nieces +(Maud excepted) into the bottom of the sea, with above a hundred and +fifty others that attended them; whereof a great many were noble and +of the King dearly beloved. + +To pass over the rest, till we come to Edward the Second; it is +certain, that after the murder of that King, the issue of blood then +made, though it had some times of stay and stopping, did again break +out, and that so often and in such abundance, as all our princes of +the masculine race (very few excepted) died of the same disease. And +although the young years of Edward the Third made his knowledge of +that horrible fact no more than suspicious; yet in that he afterwards +caused his own uncle, the Earl of Kent, to die, for no other offence +than the desire of his brother's redemption, whom the Earl as then +supposed to be living; the King making that to be treated in +his uncle, which was indeed treason in himself, (had his uncle's +intelligence been true) this I say made it manifest, that he was +not ignorant of what had past, nor greatly desirous to have had it +otherwise, though he caused Mortimer to die for the same. + +This cruelty the secret and unsearchable judgment of God revenged on +the grandchild of Edward the Third: and so it fell out, even to the +last of that line, that in the second or third descent they were all +buried under the ruins of those buildings, of which the mortar had +been tempered with innocent blood. For Richard the Second, who saw +both his Treasurers, his Chancellor, and his Steward, with divers +others of his counsellors, some of them slaughtered by the people, +others in his absence executed by his enemies, yet he always +took himself for over-wise to be taught by examples. The Earls of +Huntingdon and Kent, Montagu and Spencer, who thought themselves as +great politicians in those days as others have done in these: hoping +to please the King, and to secure themselves, by the murder of +Gloucester; died soon after, with many other their adherents, by the +like violent hands; and far more shamefully than did that duke. And +as for the King himself (who in regard of many deeds, unworthy of his +greatness, cannot be excused, as the disavowing himself by breach of +faith, charters, pardons, and patents): he was in the prime of his +youth deposed, and murdered by his cousin-german and vassal, Henry of +Lancaster, afterwards Henry the Fourth. + +This King, whose title was weak, and his obtaining the Crown +traitorous; who brake faith with the lords at his landing, protesting +to intend only the recovery of his proper inheritance, brake faith +with Richard himself; and brake faith with all the kingdom in +Parliament, to whom he swore that the deposed King should live. After +that he had enjoyed this realm some few years, and in that time +had been set upon all sides by his subjects, and never free from +conspiracies and rebellions: he saw (if souls immortal see and discern +anythings after the bodies' death) his grandchild Henry the Sixth, +and his son the Prince, suddenly and without mercy, murdered; the +possession of the Crown (for which he had caused so much blood to +be poured out) transferred from his race, and by the issues of +his enemies worn and enjoyed: enemies, whom by his own practice he +supposed that he had left no less powerless, than the succession of +the Kingdom questionless; by entailing the same upon his own issues +by Parliament. And out of doubt, human reason could have judged no +otherwise, but that these cautious provisions of the father, seconded +by the valor and signal victories of his son Henry the Fifth, had +buried the hopes of every competitor, under the despair of all +reconquest and recovery. I say, that human reason might so have +judged, were not this passage of Casaubon also true; "Dies, hora, +momentum, evertendis dominationibus sufficit, quae adamantinis +credebantur radicibus esse fundatae:" "A day, an hour, a moment, is +enough to overturn the things, that seemed to have been founded and +rooted in adamant." + +Now for Henry the Sixth, upon whom the great storm of his +grandfather's grievous faults fell, as it formerly had done upon +Richard the grandchild of Edward: although he was generally esteemed +for a gentle and innocent prince, yet as he refused the daughter of +Armagnac, of the House of Navarre, the greatest of the Princes +of France, to whom he was affianced (by which match he might have +defended his inheritance in France) and married the daughter of Anjou, +(by which he lost all that he had in France) so in condescending to +the unworthy death of his uncle of Gloucester, the main and strong +pillar of the House of Lancaster; he drew on himself and this kingdom +the greatest joint-loss and dishonor, that ever it sustained since the +Norman Conquest. Of whom it may truly be said which a counsellor of +his own spake of Henry the Third of France, "Qu'il estait tme fort +gentile Prince; mais son reigne est advenu en une fort mauvais +temps:" "He was a very gentle Prince; but his reign happened in a very +unfortunate season." + +It is true that Buckingham and Suffolk were the practicers and +contrivers of the Duke's death: Buckingham and Suffolk, because the +Duke gave instructions to their authority, which otherwise under the +Queen had been absolute; the Queen in respect of her personal wound, +"spretaeque injuria formae,"[5] because Gloucester dissuaded her +marriage. But the fruit was answerable to the seed; the success to +the counsel. For after the cutting down of Gloucester, York grew up so +fast, as he dared to dispute his right both by arguments and arms; +in which quarrel, Suffolk and Buckingham, with the greatest number of +their adherents, were dissolved. And although for his breach of oath +by sacrament, it pleased God to strike down York: yet his son the Earl +of March, following the plain path which his father had trodden out, +despoiled Henry the father, and Edward the son, both of their lives +and kingdom. And what was the end now of that politic lady the Queen, +other than this, that she lived to behold the wretched ends of all her +partakers: that she lived to look on, while her husband the King, and +her only son the Prince, were hewn in sunder; while the Crown was set +on his head that did it. She lived to see herself despoiled of her +estate, and of her moveables: and lastly, her father, by rendering up +to the Crown of France the Earldom of Provence and other places, for +the payment of fifty thousand crowns for her ransom, to become a +stark beggar. And this was the end of that subtility, which Siracides +calleth "fine" but "unrighteous:" for other fruit hath it never +yielded since the world was. + +And now it came to Edward the Fourth's turn (though after many +difficulties) to triumph. For all the plants of Lancaster were rooted +up, one only Earl of Richmond excepted: whom also he had once bought +of the Duke of Brittany, but could not hold him. And yet was not +this of Edward such a plantation, as could any way promise itself +stability. For this Edward the King (to omit more than many of his +other cruelties) beheld and allowed the slaughter which Gloucester, +Dorset, Hastings, and others, made of Edward the Prince in his own +presence; of which tragical actors, there was not one that escaped the +judgment of God in the same kind And he, which (besides the execution +of his brother Clarence, for none other offence than he himself had +formed in his own imagination) instructed Gloucester to kill Henry the +Sixth, his predecessor; taught him also by the same art to kill his +own sons and successors, Edward and Richard. For those kings which +have sold the blood of others at a low rate; have but made the market +for their own enemies, to buy of theirs at the same price. + +To Edward the Fourth succeeded Richard the Third, the greatest master +in mischief of all that fore-went him: who although, for the necessity +of his tragedy, he had more parts to play, and more to perform in his +own person, than all the rest; yet he so well fitted every affection +that played with him, as if each of them had but acted his own +interest. For he wrought so cunningly upon the affections of Hastings +and Buckingham, enemies to the Queen and to all her kindred, as he +easily allured them to condescend, that Rivers and Grey, the King's +maternal uncle and half brother, should (for the first) be severed +from him: secondly, he wrought their consent to have them imprisoned: +and lastly (for the avoiding of future inconvenience) to have their +heads severed from their bodies. And having now brought those his +chief instruments to exercise that common precept which the Devil hath +written on every post, namely, to depress those whom they had grieved, +and destroy those whom they had depressed; he urged that argument +so far and so forcibly, as nothing but the death of the young King +himself, and of his brother, could fashion the conclusion. For he +caused it to be hammered into Buckingham's head, that, whensoever the +King or his brother should have able years to exercise their power, +they would take a most severe revenge of that cureless wrong, offered +to their uncle and brother, Rivers and Grey. + +But this was not his manner of reasoning with Hastings, whose fidelity +to his master's sons was without suspect: and yet the Devil, who never +dissuades by impossibility, taught him to try him. And so he did. But +when he found by Catesby, who sounded him, that he was not fordable; +he first resolved to kill him sitting in council: wherein having +failed with his sword, he set the hangman upon him, with a weapon +of more weight. And because nothing else could move his appetite, +he caused his head to be stricken off, before he ate his dinner. A +greater judgment of God than this upon Hastings, I have never observed +in any story. For the selfsame day that the Earl Rivers, Grey, and +others, were (without trial of law, of offence given) by Hastings' +advice executed at Pomfret: I say Hastings himself in the same day, +and (as I take it) in the same hour, in the same lawless manner had +his head stricken off in the Tower of London. But Buckingham lived a +while longer; and with an eloquent oration persuaded the Londoners +to elect Richard for their king. And having received the Earldom of +Hereford for reward, besides the high hope of marrying his daughter +to the King's only son; after many grievous vexations of mind, and +unfortunate attempts, being in the end betrayed and delivered up +by his trustiest servant; he had his head severed from his body at +Salisbury, without the trouble of any of his Peers. And what success +had Richard himself after all these mischiefs and murders, policies, +and counter-policies to Christian religion: and after such time +as with a most merciless hand he had pressed out the breath of his +nephews and natural lords; other than the prosperity of so short a +life, as it took end, ere himself could well look over and discern +it? The great outcry of innocent blood, obtained at God's hands the +effusion of his; who became a spectacle of shame and dishonor, both to +his friends and enemies. + +This cruel King, Henry the Seventh cut off; and was therein (no doubt) +the immediate instrument of God's justice. A politic Prince he was if +ever there were any, who by the engine of his wisdom, beat down and +overturned as many strong oppositions both before and after he wore +the Crown, as ever King of England did: I say by his wisdom, because +as he ever left the reins of his affections in the hands of his +profit, so he always weighed his undertakings by his abilities, +leaving nothing more to hazard than so much as cannot be denied it in +all human actions. He had well observed the proceedings of Louis the +Eleventh, whom he followed in all that was royal or royal-like, but +he was far more just, and begun not their processes whom he hated or +feared by the execution, as Louis did. + +He could never endure any mediation in rewarding his servants, and +therein exceeding wise; for whatsoever himself gave, he himself +received back the thanks and the love, knowing it well that the +affections of men (purchased by nothing so readily as by benefits) +were trains that better became great kings, than great subjects. On +the contrary, in whatsoever he grieved his subjects, he wisely put it +off on those, that he found fit ministers for such actions. Howsoever +the taking off of Stanley's head, who set the Crown on his, and the +death of the young Earl of Warwick, son to George, Duke of Clarence, +shows, as the success also did, that he held somewhat of the errors +of his ancestors; for his possession in the first line ended in his +grandchildren, as that of Edward the Third and Henry the Fourth had +done. + +Now for King Henry the Eighth; if all the pictures and patterns of +a merciless prince were lost in the world, they might all again be +painted to the life, out of the story of this king. For how many +servants did he advance in haste (but for what virtue no man could +suspect) and with the change of his fancy ruined again; no man knowing +for what offence? To how many others of more desert gave he abundant +flowers from whence to gather honey, and in the end of harvest burnt +them in the hive? How many wives did he cut off, and cast off, as his +fancy and affection changed? How many princes of the blood (whereof +some of them for age could hardly crawl towards the block) with a +world of others of all degrees (of whom our common chronicles have +kept the account) did he execute? Yea, in his very death-bed, and when +he was at the point to have given his account to God for the abundance +of blood already spilt, he imprisoned the Duke of Norfolk the father; +and executed the Earl of Surrey the son; the one, whose deservings he +knew not how to value, having never omitted anything that concerned +his own honor, and the King's service; the other never having +committed anything worthy of his least displeasure: the one exceeding +valiant and advised; the other no less valiant than learned, and +of excellent hope. But besides the sorrows which he heaped upon +the fatherless and widows at home: and besides the vain enterprises +abroad, wherein it is thought that he consumed more treasure than all +our victorious kings did in their several conquests; what causeless +and cruel wars did he make upon his own nephew King James the First? +What laws and wills did he devise to cut off, and cut down those +branches, which sprang from the same root that himself did? And in +the end (notwithstanding these his so many irreligious provisions) it +pleased God to take away all his own, without increase; though, for +themselves in their several kinds, all princes of eminent virtue. +For these words of Samuel to Agag King of the Amalekites, have +been verified upon many others: "As thy sword hath made other women +childless, so shall thy mother be childless among other women." And +that blood which the same King Henry affirmed, that the cold air of +Scotland had frozen up in the North, God hath diffused by the sunshine +of his grace: from whence his Majesty now living, and long to live, is +descended. Of whom I may say it truly, "That if all the malice of the +world were infused into one eye: yet could it not discern in his +life, even to this day, any one of these foul spots, by which the +consciences of all the forenamed princes (in effect) have been +defiled; nor any drop of that innocent blood on the sword of his +justice, with which the most that fore-went him have stained both +their hands and fame." And for this Crown of England; it may truly he +avowed: that he hath received it even from the hand of God, and hath +stayed the time of putting it on, howsoever he were provoked to hasten +it: that he never took revenge of any man, that sought to put him +beside it: that he refused the assistance of Her enemies, that wore +it long, with as great glory as ever princess did: that his Majesty +entered not by a breach, nor by blood; but by the ordinary gate, +which his own right set open; and into which, by a general love and +obedience, he was received. And howsoever his Majesty's preceding +title to this Kingdom was preferred by many princes (witness the +Treaty at Cambray in the year 1559) yet he never pleased to dispute +it, during the life of that renowned lady his predecessor; no, +notwithstanding the injury of not being declared heir, in all the time +of her long reign. + +Neither ought we to forget, or neglect our thankfulness to God for +the uniting of the northern parts of Britain to the south, to wit, +of Scotland to England, which though they were severed but by small +brooks and banks, yet by reason of the long continued war, and the +cruelties exercised upon each other, in the affections of the nations, +they were infinitely severed. This I say is not the least of God's +blessings which his Majesty hath brought with him unto this land: +no, put all our petty grievances together, and heap them up to their +height, they will appear but as a molehill compared with the +mountain of this concord. And if all the historians since then have +acknowledged the uniting of the Red Rose, and the White, for the +greatest happiness (Christian Religion excepted), that ever this +kingdom received from God, certainly the peace between the two lions +of gold and gules, and the making them one, doth by many degrees +exceed the former; for by it, besides the sparing of our British +blood, heretofore and during the difference, so often and abundantly +shed, the state of England is more assured, the kingdom more +enabled to recover her ancient honor and rights, and by it made more +invincible, than by all our former alliances, practises, policies, and +conquests. It is true that hereof we do not yet find the effect. +But had the Duke of Parma in the year 1588, joined the army which he +commanded, with that of Spain, and landed it on the south coast; and +had his Majesty at the same time declared himself against us in the +North: it is easy to divine what had become of the liberty of England, +certainly we would then without murmur have bought this union at far +greater price than it hath since cost us. It is true, that there was +never any common weal or kingdom in the world, wherein no man had +cause to lament. Kings live in the world, and not above it. They are +not infinite to examine every man's cause, or to relieve every man's +wants. And yet in the latter (though to his own prejudice), his +Majesty hath had more comparison of other men's necessities, than of +his own coffers. Of whom it may he said, as of Solomon,[6] "Dedit Deus +Solomon! latitudinem cordis": Which if other men do not understand +with Pineda, to be meant by liberality, but by "latitude of +knowledge"; yet may it be better spoken of His Majesty, than of +any king that ever England had; who as well in divine, as human +understanding, hath exceeded all that fore-went him, by many degrees. + +I could say much more of the King's majesty, without flattery: did I +not fear the imputation of presumption, and withal suspect, that it +might befall these papers of mine (though the loss were little) as +it did the pictures of Queen Elizabeth, made by unskilful and common +painters, which by her own commandment were knocked in pieces and +cast into the fire. For ill artists, in setting out the beauty of the +external; and weak writers, in describing the virtues of the internal; +do often leave to posterity, of well formed faces a deformed +memory; and of the most perfect and princely minds, a most defective +representation. It may suffice, and there needs no other discourse; if +the honest reader but compare the cruel and turbulent passages of our +former kings, and of other their neighbor-princes (of whom for that +purpose I have inserted this brief discourse) with his Majesty's +temperate, revengeless and liberal disposition: I say, that if the +honest reader weigh them justly, and with an even hand; and withal but +bestow every deformed child on his true parent; he shall find, that +there is no man that hath so just cause to complain, as the King +himself hath. Now as we have told the success of the trumperies and +cruelties of our own kings, and other great personages: so we find, +that God is everywhere the same God. And as it pleased him to punish +the usurpation, and unnatural cruelty of Henry the First, and of our +third Edward, in their children for many generations: so dealt He +with the sons of Louis Debonnaire, the son of Charles the Great, or +Charlemagne. For after such time as Debonnaire of France, had torn +out the eyes of Bernard his nephew, the son of Pepin the eldest son +of Charlemagne, and heir of the Empire, and then caused him to die in +prison, as did our Henry to Robert his eldest brother: there followed +nothing but murders upon murders, poisoning, imprisonments, and civil +war; till the whole race of that famous Emperor was extinguished. And +though Debonnaire, after he had rid himself of his nephew by a violent +death; and of his bastard brothers by a civil death (having inclosed +them with sure guard, all the days of their lives, within a monastery) +held himself secure from all opposition: yet God raised up against him +(which he suspected not) his own sons, to vex him, to invade him, +to take him prisoner, and to depose him; his own sons, with whom +(to satisfy their ambition) he had shared his estate, and given them +crowns to wear, and kingdoms to govern, during his own life. Yea his +eldest son, Lothair (for he had four, three by his first wife, and one +by his second; to wit, Lothair, Pepin, Louis, and Charles), made it +the cause of his deposition, that he had used violence towards his +brothers and kinsmen; and that he had suffered his nephew (whom he +might have delivered) to be slain. "Eo quod," saith the text,[7] +"fratribus, et propinquis violentiam intulerit, et nepotem suum, +quern ipse liberate poterat, interfici permiserit": "Because he used +violence to his brothers and kinsmen, and suffered his nephew to be +slain whom he might have delivered." + +Yet did he that which few kings do; namely, repent him of his cruelty. +For, among many other things which he performed in the General +Assembly of the States, it follows: "Post haec autem palam se errasse +confessus, et imitatus Imperatoris Theodosii exemplum, poenitentiam +spontaneam suscepit, tarn de his, quam quae in Bernardum proprium +nepotem gesserat": "After this he did openly confess himself to +have erred, and following the example of the Emperor Theodosius, he +underwent voluntary penance, as well for his other offences, as for +that which he had done against Bernard his own nephew." + +This he did; and it was praise-worthy. But the blood that is unjustly +spilt, is not again gathered up from the ground by repentance. These +medicines, ministered to the dead, have but dead rewards. + +This king, as I have said, had four sons. To Lothair his eldest he +gave the Kingdom of Italy; as Charlemagne, his father, had done to +Pepin, the father of Bernard, who was to succeed him in the Empire. To +Pepin the second son he gave the Kingdom of Aquitaine: to Louis, +the Kingdom of Bavaria: and to Charles, whom he had by a second wife +called Judith, the remainder of the Kingdom of France. But this second +wife, being a mother-in-law[8] to the rest, persuaded Debonnaire +to cast his son Pepin out of Aquitaine, thereby to greaten Charles, +which, after the death of his son Pepin, he prosecuted to effect, +against his grandchild bearing the same name. In the meanwhile, being +invaded by his son Louis of Bavaria, he dies for grief. + +Debonnaire dead, Louis of Bavaria, and Charles afterwards called the +Bald, and their nephew Pepin, of Aquitaine, join in league against the +Emperor Lothair their eldest brother. They fight near to Auxerre the +most bloody battle that ever was stroken in France: in which, the +marvellous loss of nobility, and men of war, gave courage to the +Saracens to invade Italy; to the Huns to fall upon Almaine; and the +Danes to enter upon Normandy. Charles the Bald by treason seizeth upon +his nephew Pepin, kills him in a cloister: Carloman rebels against +his father Charles the Bald, the father burns out the eyes of his son +Carloman; Bavaria invades the Emperor Lothair his brother, Lothair +quits the Empire, he is assailed and wounded to the heart by his own +conscience, for his rebellion against his father, and for his other +cruelties, and dies in a monastery. Charles the Bald, the uncle, +oppresseth his nephews the sons of Lothair, he usurpeth the Empire to +the prejudice of Louis of Bavaria his elder brother; Bavaria's armies +and his son Carloman are beaten, he dies of grief, and the usurper +Charles is poisoned by Zedechias a Jew, his physician, his son Louis +le Bègue dies of the same drink. Bègue had Charles the Simple and two +bastards, Louis and Carloman; they rebel against their brother, but +the eldest breaks his neck, the younger is slain by a wild boar; the +son of Bavaria had the same ill destiny, and brake his neck by a fall +out of a window in sporting with his companions. Charles the Gross +becomes lord of all that the sons of Debonnaire held in Germany; +wherewith not contented, he invades Charles the Simple: but +being-forsaken of his nobility, of his wife, and of his understanding, +he dies a distracted beggar. Charles the Simple is held in wardship by +Eudes, Mayor of the Palace, then by Robert the brother of Eudes: and +lastly, being taken by the Earl of Vermandois; he is forced to die in +the prison of Peron, Louis the son of Charles the Simple breaks his +neck in chasing a wolf, and of the two sons of this Louis, the one +dies of poison, the other dies in the prison of Orleans; after whom +Hugh Capet, of another race, and a stranger to the French, makes +himself king. + +These miserable ends had the issues of Debonnaire, who after he had +once apparelled injustice with authority, his sons and successors took +up the fashion, and wore that garment so long without other provision, +as when the same was torn from their shoulders, every man despised +them as miserable and naked beggars. The wretched success they had +(saith a learned Frenchman) shows, "que en ceste mort il y avait plus +du fait des homines que de Pieu, ou de la justice": "that in the death +of that Prince, to wit, of Bernard the son of Pepin, the true heir of +Charlemagne, men had more meddling than either God or justice had." + +But to come nearer home; it is certain that Francis the First, one of +the worthiest kings (except for that fact) that ever Frenchmen had, +did never enjoy himself, after he had commended the destruction of the +Protestants of Mirandol and Cabrieres, to the Parliament of Provence, +which poor people were thereupon burnt and murdered; men, women, and +children. It is true that the said King Francis repented himself of +the fact, and gave charge to Henry his son, to do justice upon the +murderers, threatening his son with God's judgments, if he neglected +it. But this unseasonable care of his, God was not pleased to accept +for payment. For after Henry himself was slain in sport by Montgomery, +we all may remember what became of his four sons, Francis, Charles, +Henry, and Hercules. Of which although three of them became kings, +and were married to beautiful and virtuous ladies: yet were they, +one after another, cast out of the world, without stock or seed. And +notwithstanding their subtility, and breach of faith; with all their +massacres upon those of the religion,[9] and great effusion of blood, +the crown was set on his head, whom they all labored to dissolve; the +Protestants remain more in number than ever they were, and hold to +this day more strong cities than ever they had. + +Let us now see if God be not the same God in Spain, as in England and +France. Towards whom we will look no further back than to Don Pedro +of Castile: in respect of which Prince, all the tyrants of Sicil, our +Richard the Third, and the great Ivan Vasilowich of Moscow, were but +petty ones: this Castilian, of all Christian and heathen kings, having +been the most merciless. For, besides those of his own blood and +nobility, which he caused to be slain in his own court and chamber, +as Sancho Ruis, the great master of Calatrava, Ruis Gonsales, Alphonso +Tello, and Don John of Arragon, whom he cut in pieces and cast into +the streets, denying him Christian burial: I say, besides these, and +the slaughter of Gomes Mauriques, Diego Peres, Alphonso Gomes, and the +great commander of Castile; he made away the two infants of Arragon +his cousin germans, his brother Don Frederick, Don John de la Cerde, +Albuquergues, Nugnes de Guzman, Cornel, Cabrera, Tenorio, Mendes de +Toledo, Guttiere his great treasurer and all his kindred; and a world +of others. Neither did he spare his two youngest brothers, innocent +princes: whom after he had kept in close prison from their cradles, +till one of them had lived sixteen years, and the other fourteen, he +murdered them there. Nay, he spared not his mother, nor his wife +the Lady Blanche of Bourbon. Lastly, as he caused the Archbishop of +Toledo, and the Dean to be killed of purpose to enjoy their treasures; +so did he put to death Mahomet Aben Alhamar, King of Barbary, with +thirty-seven of his nobility, that came unto him for succor, with a +great sum of money, to levy (by his favor) some companies of soldiers +to return withal. Yea, he would needs assist the hangman with his +own hand, in the execution of the old king; in so much as Pope Urban +declareth him an enemy both to God and man. But what was his end? +Having been formerly beaten out of his kingdom, and reestablished by +the valor of the English nation, led by the famous Duke of Lancaster: +he was stabbed to death by his younger brother the Earl of Astramara, +who dispossessed all his children of their inheritance; which, but for +the father's injustice and cruelty, had never been in danger of any +such thing. + +If we can parallel any man with this king, it must be Duke John of +Burgogne, who, after his traitorous murder of the Duke of Orleans, +caused the Constable of Armagnac, the Chancellor of France, the +Bishops of Constance, Bayeux, Eureux, Senlis, Saintes, and other +religious and reverend Churchmen, the Earl of Gran Pre, Hector of +Chartres, and (in effect) all the officers of justice, of the Chamber +of Accounts, Treasury, and Request, (with sixteen hundred others to +accompany them) to be suddenly and violently slain. Hereby, while he +hoped to govern, and to have mastered France, he was soon after struck +with an axe in the face, in the presence of the Dauphin; and, without +any leisure to repent his misdeeds, presently[10] slain. _These were +the lovers of other men's miseries: and misery found them out_. + +Now for the kings of Spain, which lived both with Henry the Seventh, +Henry the Eighth, Queen Mary, and Queen Elizabeth; Ferdinand of +Arragon was the first: and the first that laid the foundation of the +present Austrian greatness. For this King did not content himself +to hold Arragon by the usurpation of his ancestor; and to fasten +thereunto the Kingdom of Castile and Leon, which Isabel his wife held +by strong hand, and his assistance, from her own niece the daughter +of the last Henry: but most cruelly and craftily, without all color +or pretence of right, he also cast his own niece out of the Kingdom +of Navarre, and, contrary to faith, and the promise that he made to +restore it, fortified the best places, and so wasted the rest, as +there was no means left for any army to invade it. This King, I say, +that betrayed also Ferdinand and Frederick, Kings of Naples, princes +of his own blood, and by double alliance tied unto him; sold them +to the French: and with the same army, sent for their succor under +Gonsalvo, cast them out; and shared their kingdom with the French, +whom afterwards he most shamefully betrayed. + +This wise and politic King, who sold Heaven and his own honor, to make +his son, the Prince of Spain, the greatest monarch of the world; saw +him die in the flower of his years; and his wife great with child, +with her untimely birth, at once and together buried. His eldest +daughter married unto Don Alphonso, Prince of Portugal, beheld her +first husband break his neck in her presence; and being with child +by her second, died with it. A just judgment of God upon the race of +John, father to Alphonso, now wholly extinguished; who had not only +left many disconsolate mothers in Portugal, by the slaughter of their +children; but had formerly slain with his own hand, the son and only +comfort of his aunt the Lady Beatrix, Duchess of Viseo. + +The second daughter of Ferdinand, married to the Arch-Duke Philip, +turned fool, and died mad and deprived.[11] His third daughter, +bestowed on King Henry the Eighth, he saw cast off by the King: the +mother of many troubles in England; and the mother of a daughter, that +in her unhappy zeal shed a world of innocent blood; lost Calais to the +French; and died heartbroken without increase. To conclude, all those +kingdoms of Ferdinand have masters of a new name; and by a strange +family are governed and possessed. + +Charles the Fifth, son to the Arch-Duke Philip, in whose vain +enterprises upon the French, upon the Almains, and other princes +and states, so many multitudes of Christian soldiers, and renowned +captains were consumed; who gave the while a most perilous entrance to +the Turks, and suffered Rhodes, the Key of Christendom, to be taken; +was in conclusion chased out of France, and in a sort out of Germany; +and left to the French, Mentz, Toule, and Verdun, places belonging +to the Empire, stole away from Inspurg; and scaled the Alps by +torchlight, pursued by Duke Maurice; having hoped to swallow up all +those dominions wherein he concocted nothing save his own disgraces. +And having, after the slaughter of so many millions of men, no one +foot of ground in either: he crept into a cloister, and made himself +a pensioner of an hundred thousand ducats by the year, to his son +Philip, from whom he very slowly received his mean and ordinary +maintenance. + +His son again King Philip the Second, not satisfied to hold Holland +and Zeeland, (wrested by his ancestors from Jacqueline their lawful +Princess) and to possess in peace many other provinces of the +Netherlands: persuaded by that mischievous Cardinal of Granvile, and +other Romish tyrants; not only forgot the most remarkable services +done to his father the Emperor by the nobilities of those countries, +not only forgot the present made him upon his entry, of forty millions +of florins, called the "Novaile aide"; nor only forgot that he had +twice most solemnly sworn to the General States, to maintain and +preserve their ancient rights, privileges, and customs, which they +had enjoyed under their thirty and five earls before him, Conditional +Princes of those provinces: but beginning first to constrain them, and +enthrall them by the Spanish Inquisition, and then to impoverish them +by many new devised and intolerable impositions; he lastly, by strong +hand and main force, attempted to make himself not only an absolute +monarch over them, like unto the kings and sovereigns of England and +France; but Turk-like to tread under his feet all their natural and +fundamental laws, privileges, and ancient rights. To effect which, +after he had easily obtained from the Pope a dispensation of his +former oaths (which dispensation was the true cause of the war and +bloodshed since then;) and after he had tried what he could perform, +by dividing of their own nobility, under the government of his base +sister Margaret of Austria, and the Cardinal Granvile; he employed +that most merciless Spaniard Don Ferdinand Alvarez of Toledo, Duke +of Alva, followed with a powerful army of strange nations: by whom he +first slaughtered that renowned captain, the Earl of Egmont, Prince of +Gavare: and Philip Montmorency, Earl of Horn: made away Montigue, +and the Marquis of Bergues, and cut off in those six years (that Alva +governed) of gentlemen and others, eighteen thousand and six hundred, +by the hands of the hangman, besides all his other barbarous murders +and massacres. By whose ministry when he could not yet bring his +affairs to their wished ends, having it in his hope to work that +by subtility, which he had failed to perform by force; he sent for +governor his bastard brother Don John of Austria, a prince of great +hope, and very gracious to those people. But he, using the same papal +advantage that his predecessors had done, made no scruple to take oath +upon the Holy Evangelists, to observe the treaty made with the General +States; and to discharge the Low Countries of all Spaniards, and other +strangers therein garrisoned: towards whose pay and passport, the +Netherlands strained themselves to make payment of six hundred +thousand pounds. Which monies received, he suddenly surprised the +citadels of Antwerp and Nemours: not doubting (being unsuspected by +the states) to have possessed himself of all the mastering places +of those provinces. For whatsoever he overtly pretended, he held +in secret a contrary counsel with the Secretary Escovedo, Rhodus, +Barlemont, and others, ministers of the Spanish tyranny, formerly +practised, and now again intended. But let us now see the effect and +end of this perjury and of all other the Duke's cruelties. First, for +himself, after he had murdered so many of the nobility; executed (as +aforesaid) eighteen thousand and six hundred in six years, and most +cruelly slain man, woman, and child, in Mechlin, Zutphen, Naerden, +and other places: notwithstanding his Spanish vaunt, that he would +suffocate the Hollanders in their own butter-barrels, and milk-tubs; +he departed the country no otherwise accompanied, than with the curse +and detestation of the whole nation; leaving his master's affairs in a +tenfold worse estate, than he found them at his first arrival. For +Don John, whose haughty conceit of himself overcame the greatest +difficulties; though his judgment were over-weak to manage the least: +what wonders did his fearful breach of faith bring forth, other than +the King his brother's jealousy and distrust, with the untimely death +that seized him, even in the flower of his youth? And for Escovedo his +sharp-witted secretary, who in his own imagination had conquered for +his master both England and the Netherlands; being sent into Spain +upon some new project, he was at the first arrival, and before any +access to the King, by certain ruffians appointed by Anthony Peres +(though by better warrant than his) rudely murdered in his own +lodging. Lastly, if we consider the King of Spain's carriage, his +counsel and success in this business, there is nothing left to the +memory of man more remarkable. For he hath paid above an hundred +millions, and the lives of above four hundred thousand Christians, +for the loss of all those countries; which, for beauty, gave place to +none; and for revenue, did equal his West Indies: for the loss of a +nation which most willingly obeyed him; and who at this day, after +forty years war, are in despite of all his forces become a free +estate, and far more rich and powerful than they were, when he first +began to impoverish and oppress them. + +Oh, by what plots, by what forswearings, betrayings, oppressions, +imprisonments, tortures, poisonings, and under what reasons of state, +and politic subtlety, have these fore-named kings, both strangers, +and of our own nation, pulled the vengeance of God upon themselves, +upon theirs, and upon their prudent ministers! and in the end have +brought those things to pass for their enemies, and seen an effect so +directly contrary to all their own counsels and cruelties; as the +one could never have hoped for themselves; and the other never have +succeeded; if no such opposition had ever been made. God hath said it +and performed it ever: "Perdam sapientiam sapientum"; "I will destroy +the wisdom of the wise." + +But what of all this? and to what end do we lay before the eyes of +the living, the fall and fortunes of the dead: seeing the world is +the same that it hath been; and the children of the present time, will +still obey their parents? It is in the present time that all the wits +of the world are exercised. To hold the times we have, we hold all +things lawful: and either we hope to hold them forever; or at least we +hope that there is nothing after them to be hoped for. For as we are +content to forget our own experience, and to counterfeit the ignorance +of our own knowledge, in all things that concern ourselves; or +persuade ourselves, that God hath given us letters patents to pursue +all our irreligious affections, with a "non obstante"[12] so we +neither look behind us what hath been, nor before us what shall be. It +is true, that the quantity which we have, is of the body: we are by +it joined to the earth: we are compounded of earth; and we inhabit +it. The Heavens are high, far off, and unsearchable: we have sense and +feeling of corporal things; and of eternal grace, but by revelation. +No marvel then that our thoughts are also earthly: and it is less to +be wondered at, that the words of worthless men can not cleanse them: +seeing their doctrine and instruction, whose understanding the Holy +Ghost vouchsafed to inhabit, have not performed it. For as the Prophet +Isaiah cried out long ago, "Lord, who hath believed our reports?" And +out of doubt, as Isaiah complained then for himself and others: so are +they less believed, every day after other. For although religion, and +the truth thereof be in every man's mouth, yea, in the discourse of +every woman, who for the greatest number are but idols of vanity: what +is it other than an universal dissimulation? We profess that we know +God: but by works we deny him. For beatitude doth not consist in the +knowledge of divine things, but in a divine life: for the Devils know +them better than men. "Beatitudo non est divinorum cognitio, sed vita +divina." And certainly there is nothing more to be admired, and more +to be lamented, than the private contention, the passionate dispute, +the personal hatred, and the perpetual war, massacres, and murders for +religion among Christians: the discourse whereof hath so occupied the +world, as it hath well near driven the practice thereof out of the +world. Who would not soon resolve, that took knowledge but of the +religious disputations among men, and not of their lives which +dispute, that there were no other thing in their desires, than the +purchase of Heaven; and that the world itself were but used as it +ought, and as an inn or place, wherein to repose ourselves in passing +on towards our celestial habitation? when on the contrary, besides the +discourse and outward profession, the soul hath nothing but hypocrisy. +We are all (in effect) become comedians in religion: and while we act +in gesture and voice, divine virtues, in all the course of our lives +we renounce our persons, and the parts we play. For Charity, Justice, +and Truth have but their being _in terms_, like the philosopher's +_Materia prima_. + +Neither is it that wisdom, which Solomon defineth to be the +"Schoolmistress of the knowledge of God," that hath valuation in the +world: it is enough that we give it our good word: but the same which is +altogether exercised in the service of the world as the gathering of +riches chiefly, by which we purchase and obtain honor, with the many +respects which attend it. These indeed be the marks, which (when we have +bent our consciences to the highest) we all shoot at. For the obtaining +whereof it is true, that the care is our own; the care our own in this +life, the peril our own in the future: and yet when we have gathered the +greatest abundance, we ourselves enjoy no more thereof, than so much as +belongs to one man. For the rest, he that had the greatest wisdom and +the greatest ability that ever man had, hath told us that this is the +use: "When goods increase (saith Solomon) they also increase that eat +them; and what good cometh to the owners, but the beholding thereof with +their eyes?" As for those that devour the rest, and follow us in fair +weather: they again forsake us in the first tempest of misfortune, and +steer away before the sea and wind; leaving us to the malice of our +destinies. Of these, among a thousand examples, I will take but one out +of Master Danner, and use his own words: "Whilest the Emperor Charles +the Fifth, after the resignation of his estates, stayed at Flushing for +wind, to carry him his last journey into Spain; he conferred on a time +with Seldius, his brother Ferdinand's Ambassador, till the deep of the +night. And when Seldius should depart, the Emperor calling for some of +his servants, and nobody answering him (for those that attended upon +him, were some gone to their lodgings, and all the rest asleep), the +Emperor took up the candle himself, and went before Seldius to light him +down the stairs; and so did, notwithstanding all the resistance that +Seldius could make. And when he was come to the stair's foot, he said +thus unto him: "Seldius, remember this of Charles the Emperor, when he +shall be dead and gone, that him, whom thou hast known in thy time +environed with so many mighty armies and guards of soldiers, thou hast +also seen alone, abandoned, and forsaken, yea even of his own domestical +servants, &c. I acknowledge this change of Fortune to proceed from the +mighty hand of God, which I will by no means go about to withstand." + +But you will say, that there are some things else, and of greater +regard than the former. The first is the reverend respect that is held +of great men, and the honor done unto them by all sorts of people. And +it is true indeed: provided, that an inward love for their justice and +piety accompany the outward worship given to their places and power; +without which what is the applause of the multitude, but as the outcry +of an herd of animals, who without the knowledge of any true cause, +please themselves with the noise they make? For seeing it is a thing +exceeding rare, to distinguish Virtue and Fortune: the most impious +(if prosperous) have ever been applauded; the most virtuous (if +unprosperous) have ever been despised. For as Fortune's man rides the +horse, so Fortune herself rides the man; who when he is descended and +on foot, the man taken from his beast, and Fortune from the man, a +base groom beats the one, and a bitter contempt spurns at the other, +with equal liberty. + +The second is the greatening of our posterity, and the contemplation +of their glory whom we leave behind us. Certainly, of those which +conceive that their souls departed take any comfort therein, it may +be truly said of them, which Lactantius spake of certain heathen +philosophers, "quod sapientes sunt in re stulta."[13] For when our +spirits immortal shall be once separate from our mortal bodies, +and disposed by God; there remaineth in them no other joy of their +posterity which succeed, than there doth of pride in that stone, which +sleepeth in the wall of the king's palace; nor any other sorrow for +their poverty, than there doth of shame in that, which beareth up a +beggar's cottage. "Nesciunt mortui, etiam sancti, quid agunt +vivi, etiam eorum filii, quia animae mortuorum rebus viventium non +intersunt": "The dead, though holy, know nothing of the living, no, +not of their own children: for the souls of those departed, are not +conversant with their affairs that remain."[14] And if we doubt of St. +Augustine, we can not of Job; who tells us, "That we know not if our +sons shall be honorable: neither shall we understand concerning +them, whether they shall be of low degree." Which Ecclesiastes also +confirmeth: "Man walketh in a shadow, and disquieteth himself in vain: +he heapeth up riches, and can not tell who shall gather them. The +living (saith he) know that they shall die, but the dead know nothing +at all: for who can show unto man what shall be after him under the +sun?" He therefore accounteth it among the rest of worldly vanities, +to labor and travail in the world; not knowing after death whether +a fool or a wise man should enjoy the fruits thereof: "which made me +(saith he) endeavor even to abhor mine own labor." And what can other +men hope, whose blessed or sorrowful estates after death God hath +reserved? man's knowledge lying but in his hope, seeing the Prophet +Isaiah confesseth of the elect, "That Abraham is ignorant of us, and +Israel knows us not." But hereof we are assured, that the long and +dark night of death (of whose following day we shall never behold the +dawn till his return that hath triumphed over it), shall cover us +over till the world be no more. After which, and when we shall again +receive organs glorified and incorruptible, the seats of angelical +affections, in so great admiration shall the souls of the blessed be +exercised, as they can not admit the mixture of any second or less +joy; nor any return of foregone and mortal affection towards friends, +kindred, or children. Of whom whether we shall retain any particular +knowledge, or in any sort distinguish them, no man can assure us; and +the wisest men doubt. But on the contrary, if a divine life retain any +of those faculties which the soul exercised in a mortal body, we shall +not at that time so divide the joys of Heaven, as to cast any part +thereof on the memory of their felicities which remain in the world. +No, be their estates greater than ever the world gave, we shall (by +the difference known unto us) even detest their consideration. And +whatsoever comfort shall remain of all forepast, the same will consist +in the charity which we exercised living; and in that piety, justice, +and firm faith, for which it pleased the infinite mercy of God to +accept of us, and receive us. Shall we therefore value honor and +riches at nothing? and neglect them, as unnecessary and vain? +Certainly no. For that infinite wisdom of God, which hath +distinguished his angels by degrees; which hath given greater and +less light and beauty to heavenly bodies; which hath made differences +between beasts and birds; created the eagle and the fly, the cedar and +the shrub; and among stones, given the fairest tincture to the ruby, +and the quickest light to the diamond; hath also ordained kings, +dukes, or leaders of the people, magistrates, judges, and other +degrees among men. And as honor is left to posterity, for a mark and +ensign of the virtue and understanding of their ancestors: so (seeing +Siracides preferreth death before beggary: and that titles, without +proportionable estates, fall under the miserable succor of other men's +pity) I account it foolishness to condemn such a care: provided, that +worldly goods be well gotten, and that we raise not our own buildings +out of other men's ruins. For, as Plato doth first prefer the +perfection of bodily health; secondly, the form and beauty; and +thirdly, "Divitias nulla fraude quaesitas":[15] so Jeremiah cries, +"Woe unto them that erect their houses by unrighteousness, and their +chambers without equity": and Isaiah the same, "Woe to those that +spoil and were not spoiled." And it was out of the true wisdom of +Solomon, that he commandeth us, "not to drink the wine of violence; +not to lie in wait for blood, and not to swallow them up alive, whose +riches we covet: for such are the ways (saith he) of everyone that is +greedy of gain." + +And if we could afford ourselves but so much leisure as to consider, +that he which hath most in the world, hath, in respect of the world, +nothing in it: and that he which hath the longest time lent him to +live in it, hath yet no proportion at all therein, setting it either +by that which is past, when we were not, or by that time which is to +come, in which we shall abide forever: I say, if both, to wit, our +proportion in the world, and our time in the world, differ not +much from that which is nothing; it is not out of any excellency of +understanding, that we so much prize the one, which hath (in effect) +no being: and so much neglect the other, which hath no ending: +coveting those mortal things of the world, as if our souls were +therein immortal; and neglecting those things which are immortal, as +if ourselves after the world were but mortal. + +But let every man value his own wisdom, as he pleaseth. Let the rich +man think all fools, that cannot equal his abundance: the revenger +esteem all negligent, that have not trodden down their opposites; the +politician, all gross that cannot merchandise their faith: yet when we +once come in sight of the port of death, to which all winds drive us, +and when by letting fall that fatal anchor, which can never be weighed +again, the navigation of this life takes end; then it is, I say, that +our own cogitations (those sad and severe cogitations, formerly beaten +from us by our health and felicity) return again, and pay us to the +uttermost for all the pleasing passages of our lives past. It is then +that we cry out to God for mercy; then when our selves can no longer +exercise cruelty to others; and it is only then, that we are strucken +through the soul with this terrible sentence, "That God will not be +mocked." For if according to St. Peter, "The righteous scarcely be +saved: and that God spared not his angels"; where shall those appear, +who, having served their appetites all their lives, presume to think, +that the severe commandments of the all-powerful God were given but +in sport; and that the short breath, which we draw when death presseth +us, if we can but fashion it to the sound of mercy (without any kind +of satisfaction or amends) is sufficient? "O quam multi," saith +a reverend father, "cum hac spe ad aeternos labores et bella +descendunt!"[16] I confess that it is a great comfort to our friends, +to have it said, that we ended well; for we all desire (as Balaam +did) "to die the death of the righteous." But what shall we call a +disesteeming, an opposing, or (indeed) a mocking of God: if those men +do not oppose Him, disesteem Him, and mock Him, that think it enough +for God, to ask Him forgiveness at leisure, with the remainder and +last drawing of a malicious breath? For what do they otherwise, +that die this kind of well-dying, but say unto God as followeth? +"We beseech Thee, O God, that all the falsehoods, forswearings, and +treacheries of our lives past, may be pleasing unto Thee; that Thou +wilt for our sakes (that have had no leisure to do anything for Thine) +change Thy nature (though impossible,) and forget to be a just God; +that Thou wilt love injuries and oppressions, call ambition wisdom, +and charity foolishness. For I shall prejudice my son (which I am +resolved not to do) if I make restitution; and confess myself to have +been unjust (which I am too proud to do) if I deliver the oppressed." +Certainly, these wise worldlings have either found out a new God, +or made one: and in all likelihood such a leaden one, as Louis the +Eleventh wore in his cap; which when he had caused any that he feared, +or hated, to be killed, he would take it from his head and kiss it: +beseeching it to pardon him this one evil act more, and it should be +the last; which (as at other times) he did, when by the practice of a +cardinal and a falsified sacrament, he caused the Earl of Armagnac to +be stabbed to death: mockeries indeed fit to be used towards a leaden, +but not towards the ever-living God. But of this composition are all +devout lovers of the world, that they fear all that is dureless[17] +and ridiculous: they fear the plots and practises of their +opposites,[18] and their very whisperings: they fear the opinions +of men, which beat but upon shadows: they flatter and forsake the +prosperous and unprosperous, be they friends or kings: yea they dive +under water, like ducks, at every pebblestone, that is but thrown +toward them by a powerful hand: and on the contrary, they show an +obstinate and giant-like valor, against the terrible judgments of +the all-powerful God, yea they show themselves gods against God, and +slaves towards men; towards men whose bodies and consciences are alike +rotten. + +Now for the rest: If we truly examine the difference of both +conditions; to wit, of the rich and mighty, whom we call fortunate; +and of the poor and oppressed, whom we account wretched we shall find +the happiness of the one, and the miserable estate of the other, so +tied by God to the very instant, and both so subject to interchange +(witness the sudden downfall of the greatest princes, and the speedy +uprising of the meanest persons) as the one hath nothing so certain, +whereof to boast; nor the other so uncertain, whereof to bewail +itself. For there is no man so assured of his honor, of his riches, +health, or life; but that he may be deprived of either, or all, the +very next hour or day to come. "Quid vesper vehat, incertum est," +"What the evening will bring with it, it is uncertain." "And yet ye +cannot tell (saith St. James) what shall be tomorrow. Today he is set +up, and tomorrow he shall not be found; for he is turned into dust, +and his purpose perisheth." And although the air which compasseth +adversity be very obscure; yet therein we better discern God, than in +that shining light which environeth worldly glory; through which, for +the clearness thereof, there is no vanity which escapeth our sight. +And let adversity seem what it will; to happy men ridiculous, who make +themselves merry at other men's misfortunes; and to those under the +cross, grievous: yet this is true, that for all that is past, to the +very instant, the portions remaining are equal to either. For be it +that we have lived many years, "and (according to Solomon) in them all +we have rejoiced;" or be it that we have measured the same length of +days and therein have evermore sorrowed: yet looking back from our +present being, we find both the one and the other, to wit, the joy and +the woe, sailed out of sight; and death, which doth pursue us and hold +us in chase, from our infancy, hath gathered it. "Quicquid aetatis +retro est, mors tenet:" "Whatsoever of our age is past, death holds +it." So as whosoever he be, to whom Fortune hath been a servant, and +the Time a friend; let him but take the account of his memory (for we +have no other keeper of our pleasures past), and truly examine what it +hath reserved either beauty and youth, or foregone delights; what +it hath saved, that it might last, of his dearest affections, or of +whatever else the amorous springtime gave his thoughts of contentment, +then unvaluable; and he shall find that all the art which his elder +years have, can draw no other vapor out of these dissolutions, than +heavy, secret, and sad sighs. He shall find nothing remaining, but +those sorrows, which grow up after our fast-springing youth; overtake +it, when it is at a stand; and overtopped it utterly, when it begins +to wither: in so much as looking back from the very instant time, and +from our now being, the poor, diseased, and captive creature, hath as +little sense of all his former miseries and pains, as he, that is +most blessed in common opinions, hath of his fore-passed pleasure and +delights. For whatsoever is cast behind us, is just nothing: and what +is to come, deceitful hope hath it: "Omnia quae eventura sunt, in +incerto jacent."[19] Only those few black swans, I must except: who +having had the grace to value worldly vanities at no more than their +own price; do, by retaining the comfortable memory of a well acted +life, behold death without dread, and the grave without fear; and +embrace both, as necessary guides to endless glory. + +For myself, this is my consolation, and all that I can offer to +others, that the sorrows of this life are but of two sorts: whereof +the one hath respect to God, the other, to the world. In the first we +complain to God against ourselves, for our offences against Him; and +confess, "Et Tu Justus es in omnibus quae venerunt super nos." "And +Thou, O Lord, are just in all that hath befallen us." In the second we +complain to ourselves against God: as if he had done us wrong, either +in not giving us worldly goods and honors, answering our appetites: or +for taking them again from us having had them; forgetting that humble +and just acknowledgment of Job, "the Lord hath given, and the Lord +hath taken." To the first of which St. Paul hath promised blessedness; +to the second, death. And out of doubt he is either a fool, or +ungrateful to God, or both, that doth not acknowledge, how mean soever +his estate be, that the same is yet far greater than that which God +oweth him: or doth not acknowledge, how sharp soever his afflictions +be, that the same are yet far less, than those which are due unto +him. And if an heathen wise man call the adversities of the world +but "tributa vivendi," "the tributes of living;" a wise Christian man +ought to know them, and bear them, but as the tributes of offending. +He ought to bear them manlike, and resolvedly; and not as those +whining soldiers do, "qui gementes sequuntur imperatorem."[20] + +For seeing God, who is the author of all our tragedies, hath written +out for us and appointed us all the parts we are to play: and hath +not, in their distribution, been partial to the most mighty princes of +the world: that gave unto Darius the part of the greatest emperor, and +the part of the most miserable beggar, a beggar begging water of an +enemy, to quench the great drought of death: that appointed Bajazet +to play the Grand Signior of the Turks in the morning, and in the same +day the footstool of Tamerlane (both which parts Valerian had also +played, being taken by Sapores): that made Belisarius play the most +victorious captain, and lastly the part of a blind beggar: of which +examples many thousands may be produced: why should other men, who are +but as the least worms, complain of wrong? Certainly there is no other +account to be made of this ridiculous world, than to resolve, that +the change of fortune on the great theatre, is but as the change of +garments on the less. For when on the one and the other, every man +wears but his own skin, the players are all alike. Now, if any man +out of weakness prize the passages of this world otherwise (for saith +Petrarch, "Magni ingenii est revocare mentem a sensibus"[21]) it is by +reason of that unhappy phantasy of ours, which forgeth in the brains +of man all the miseries (the corporal excepted) whereunto he is +subject. Therein it is, that misfortunes and adversity work all that +they work. For seeing Death, in the end of the play, takes from all +whatsoever Fortune or Force takes from any one; it were a foolish +madness in the shipwreck of worldly things, where all sinks but the +sorrow, to save it. That were, as Seneca saith, "Fortunae succumbere, +quod tristius est omni fato:" "To fall under Fortune, of all other the +most miserable destiny." + +But it is now time to sound a retreat; and to desire to be excused of +this long pursuit: and withal, that the good intent, which hath moved +me to draw the picture of time past (which we call History) in so +large a table, may also be accepted in place of a better reason. + +The examples of divine providence, everywhere found (the first divine +histories being nothing else but a continuation of such examples) have +persuaded me to fetch my beginning from the beginning of all things: +to wit, Creation. For though these two glorious actions of the +Almighty be so near, and (as it were) linked together, that the one +necessarily implieth the other: Creation inferring Providence (for +what father forsaketh the child that he hath begotten?) and Providence +pre-supposing Creation: yet many of those that have seemed to excel in +worldly wisdom, have gone about to disjoin this coherence; the epicure +denying both Creation and Providence, but granting the world had a +beginning; the Aristotelian granting Providence, but denying both the +creation and the beginning. + +Now although this doctrine of faith, touching the creation in time +(for by faith we understand, that the world was made by the word of +God), be too weighty a work for Aristotle's rotten ground to bear +up, upon which he hath (notwithstanding) founded the defences and +fortresses of all his verbal doctrine: yet that the necessity of +infinite power, and the world's beginning, and the impossibility +of the contrary even in the judgment of natural reason, wherein he +believed, had not better informed him; it is greatly to be marvelled +at. And it is no less strange, that those men which are desirous of +knowledge (seeing Aristotle hath failed in this main point; and taught +little other than terms in the rest) have so retrenched their +minds from the following and overtaking of truth, and so absolutely +subjected themselves to the law of those philosophical principles; +as all contrary kind of teaching, in the search of causes, they have +condemned either for phantastical, or curious. Both doth it follow, +that the positions of heathen philosophers are undoubted grounds and +principles indeed, because so called? Or that _ipsi dixerunt_, doth +make them to be such? Certainly no. But this is true, that where +natural reason hath built anything so strong against itself, as the +same reason can hardly assail it, much less batter it down: the same +in every question of nature, and infinite power, may be approved for +a fundamental law of human knowledge. For saith Charron in his book of +wisdom, "Toute proposition humaine a autant d'authorite quel'autre, +si la raison n'on fait la difference;" "Every human proposition hath +equal authority, if reason make not the difference," the rest being +but the fables of principles. But hereof how shall the upright and +impartial judgment of man give a sentence, where opposition and +examination are not admitted to give in evidence? And to this purpose +it was well said of Lactantius, "Sapientiam sibi adimunt, qui sine +ullo judicio inventa maiorum probant, et ab aliis pecudum more +ducuntur:" "They neglect their own wisdom, who without any judgment +approve the invention of those that forewent them; and suffer +themselves after the manner of beasts, to be led by them;" by the +advantage of which sloth and dullness, ignorance is now become so +powerful a tyrant, as it hath set true philosophy, physics, and +divinity in a pillory; and written over the first, "Contra negantem +principia;"[22] over the second, "Virtus specifica;"[23] over the +third, "Ecclesta Romana."[24] + +But for myself, I shall never be persuaded, that God hath shut up all +light of learning within the lanthorn of Aristotle's brains: or that +it was ever said unto him, as unto Esdras, "_Accendam in corde tuo +Lucernam intellectus_";[25] that God hath given invention but to the +heathen, and that they only invaded nature, and found the strength +and bottom thereof; the same nature having consumed all her store, +and left nothing of price to after-ages. That these and these be +the causes of these and these effects, time hath taught us; and not +reason: and so hath experience without art. The cheese-wife knoweth it +as well as the philosopher, that sour rennet doth coagulate her milk +into a curd. But if we ask a reason of this cause, why the sourness +doth it? whereby it doth it? and the manner how? I think that there +is nothing to be found in vulgar philosophy, to satisfy this and many +other like vulgar questions. But man to cover his ignorance in the +least things, who can not give a true reason for the grass under his +feet, why it should be green rather than red, or of any other color; +that could never yet discover the way and reason of nature's working, +in those which are far less noble creatures than himself; who is far +more noble than the heavens themselves: "Man (saith Solomon) that +can hardly discern the things that are upon the earth, and with great +labor find out the things that are before us"; that hath so short a +time in the world, as he no sooner begins to learn, than to die; +that hath in his memory but borrowed knowledge; in his understanding, +nothing truly; that is ignorant of the essence of his own soul, and +which the wisest of the naturalists (if Aristotle be he) could never +so much as define, but by the action and effect, telling us what it +works (which all men knew as well as he) but not what it is, which +neither he, nor any else, doth know, but God that created it; ("For +though I were perfect, yet I know not my soul," saith Job). Man, I +say, that is but an idiot in the next cause of his own life, and in +the cause of all actions of his life, will (notwithstanding) examine +the art of God in creating the world; of God, who (saith Job) "is so +excellent as we know him not"; and examine the beginning of the work, +which had end before mankind had a beginning of being. He will disable +God's power to make a world, without matter to make it of. He will +rather give the motes of the air for a cause; cast the work on +necessity or chance; bestow the honor thereof on nature; make two +powers, the one to be the author of the matter, the other of the +form; and lastly, for want of a workman, have it eternal: which latter +opinion Aristotle, to make himself the author of a new doctrine, +brought into the world: and his Sectators[26] have maintained it; +"parati ac conjurati, quos sequuntur, philosophorum animis invictis +opiniones tueri."[27] For Hermes, who lived at once with, or +soon after Moses, Zoroaster, Musaeus, Orpheus, Linus, Anaximenes, +Anaxagoras, Empedocles, Melissus, Pherecydes, Thales, Cleanthes, +Pythagoras, Plato, and many other (whose opinions are exquisitely +gathered by Steuchius Eugubinus) found in the necessity of invincible +reason, "One eternal and infinite Being," to be the parent of the +universal. "Horum omnium sententia quamvis sit incerta, eodem tamen +spectat, ut Providentiam unam esse consentiant: sive enim natura, sive +aether, sive ratio, sive mens, sive fatalis necessitas, sive divina +lex; idem est quod a nobis dicitur Deus": "All these men's opinions +(saith Lactantius) though uncertain, come to this; That they agree +upon one Providence; whether the same be nature, or light, or reason, +or understanding, or destiny, or divine ordinance, that it is the same +which we call God." Certainly, as all the rivers in the world, though +they have divers risings, and divers runnings; though they sometimes +hide themselves for a while under ground, and seem to be lost in +sea-like lakes; do at last find, and fall into the great ocean: +so after all the searches that human capacity hath, and after all +philosophical contemplation and curiosity; in the necessity of this +infinite power, all the reason of man ends and dissolves itself. + +As for the others; the first touching those which conceive the matter +of the world to have been eternal, and that God did not create +the world "Exnihilo,"[28] but "ex materia praeexistente":[29] the +supposition is so weak, as is hardly worth the answering. For +(saith Eusebius) "Mihi videntur qui hoc dicunt, fortunam quoque Deo +annectere," "They seem unto me, which affirm this, to give part of the +work to God, and part to Fortune"; insomuch as if God had not found +this first matter by chance, He had neither been author nor father, +nor creator, nor lord of the universal. For were the matter or chaos +eternal, it then follows, that either this supposed matter did fit +itself to God, or God accommodate Himself to the matter. For the +first, it is impossible, that things without sense could proportion +themselves to the workman's will. For the second: it were horrible to +conceive of God, that as an artificer He applied himself, according to +the proportion of matter which He lighted upon. + +But let it be supposed, that this matter hath been made by any power, +not omnipotent, and infinitely wise; I would gladly learn how it came +to pass, that the same was proportionable to his intention, that was +omnipotent and infinitely wise; and no more, nor no less, than served +to receive the form of the universal. For, had it wanted anything of +what was sufficient; then must it be granted, that God created out of +nothing so much new matter, as served to finish the work of the world: +or had there been more of this matter than sufficed, then God did +dissolve and annihilate whatsoever remained and was superfluous. And +this must every reasonable soul confess, that it is the same work of +God alone, to create anything out of nothing, and by the same art +and power, and by none other, can those things, or any part of that +eternal matter, be again changed into nothing; by which those things, +that once were nothing, obtained a beginning of being. + +Again, to say that this matter was the cause of itself; this, of all +other, were the greatest idiotism. For, if it were the cause of itself +at any time; then there was also a time when itself was not: at +which time of not being, it is easy enough to conceive, that it could +neither procure itself, nor anything else. For to be, and not to be, +at once, is impossible. "Nihil autem seipsum praecedit, neque; seipsum +componit corpus": "There is nothing that doth precede itself, neither +do bodies compound themselves." + +For the rest, those that feign this matter to be eternal, must of +necessity confess, that infinite cannot be separate from eternity. And +then had infinite matter left no place for infinite form, but that +the first matter was finite, the form which it received proves it. For +conclusion of this part, whosoever will make choice, rather to believe +in eternal deformity, or in eternal dead matter, than in eternal light +and eternal life: let eternal death be his reward. For it is a madness +of that kind, as wanteth terms to express it. For what reason of man +(whom the curse of presumption hath not stupefied) hath doubted, that +infinite power (of which we can comprehend but a kind of shadow, "quia +comprehensio est intra terminos, qui infinito repugnant"[30]) hath +anything wanting in itself, either for matter of form; yea for as many +worlds (if such had been God's will) as the sea hath sands? For where +the power is without limitation, the work hath no other limitation, +than the workman's will. Yea reason itself finds it more easy for +infinite power to deliver from itself a finite world, without the help +of matter prepared; than for a finite man, a fool and dust, to change +the form of matter made to his hands. They are Dionysius his words, +"Deus in una existentia omnia praehabet"[31] and again, "Esse omnium +est ipsa divinitas, omne quod vides, et quod non vides",[32] to wit, +"causaliter",[33] or in better terms, "non tanquam forma, sed tanquam +causa universalis"[34] Neither hath the world universal closed up all +of God "For the most part of his works (saith Siracides) are hid". +Neither can the depth of his wisdom be opened, by the glorious work of +the world, which never brought to knowledge all it can, for then were +his infinite power bounded and made finite. And hereof it comes, That +we seldom entitle God the all-showing, or the all-willing, but the +Almighty, that is, infinitely able. + +But now for those, who from that ground, "that out of nothing, nothing +is made," infer the world's eternity, and yet not so savage therein, +as those are, which give an eternal being to dead matter, it is true +if the word (nothing) be taken in the affirmative, and the making, +imposed upon natural agents and finite power; that out of nothing, +nothing is made. But seeing their great doctor Aristotle himself +confesseth, "quod omnes antiqui decreverunt quasi quodam return +principium, ipsumque infinitum" "That all the ancient decree a kind +of beginning, and the same to be infinite"; and a little after, more +largely and plainly, "Principium eius est nullum, sed ipsum omnium +cernitur esse principium, ac omnia complecti ac regere",[35] it is +strange that this philosopher, with his followers, should rather make +choice out of falsehood, to conclude falsely, than out of truth, to +resolve truly. For if we compare the world universal, and all the +unmeasureable orbs of Heaven, and those marvellous bodies of the sun, +moon, and stars, with "ipsum infinitum": it may truly be said of them +all, which himself affirms of his imaginary "Materia prima,"[36] that +they are neither "quid, quale," nor "quantum "; and therefore to bring +finite (which hath no proportion with infinite) out of infinite ("qui +destruit omnem proportionem"[37]) is no wonder in God's power. And +therefore Anaximander, Melissus, and Empedocles, call the world +universal, but "particulam universitatis" and "infinitatis," a parcel +of that which is the universality and the infinity inself; and Plato, +but a shadow of God. But the other to prove the world's eternity, +urgeth this maxim, "that, a sufficient and effectual cause being +granted, an answerable effect thereof is also granted": inferring that +God being forever a sufficient and effectual cause of the world, the +effect of the cause should also have been forever; to wit, the world +universal. But what a strange mockery is this in so great a master, +to confess a sufficient and effectual cause of the world, (to wit, +an almighty God) in his antecedent; and the same God to be a God +restrained in his conclusion; to make God free in power, and bound in +will; able to effect, unable to determine; able to make all things, +and yet unable to make choice of the time when? For this were +impiously to resolve of God, as of natural necessity; which hath +neither choice, nor will, nor understanding; which cannot but work +matter being present: as fire, to burn things combustible. Again he +thus disputeth, that every agent which can work, and doth not work, +if it afterward work, it is either thereto moved by itself, or by +somewhat else: and so it passeth from power to act. But God (saith he) +is immovable, and is neither moved by himself, nor by any other: but +being always the same, doth always work. Whence he concludeth, if the +world were caused by God, that he was forever the cause thereof: and +therefore eternal. The answer to this is very easy, for that God's +performing in due time that which he ever determined at length to +perform, doth not argue any alteration or change, but rather constancy +in him. For the same action of his will, which made the world forever, +did also withhold the effect to the time ordained. To this answer, in +itself sufficient, others add further, that the pattern or image +of the world may be said to be eternal: which the Platonics call +"spiritualem mundum"[38] and do in this sort distinguish the idea +and creation in time. "Spiritualis ille mundus, mundi huius exemplar, +primumque Dei opus, vita aequali est architecto, fuit semper cum illo, +eritque semper. Mundus autem corporalis, quod secundum opus est Dei, +decedit iam ab opifice ex parte una, quia non fuit semper: retinet +alteram, quia sit semper futurus": "That representative, or the +intentional world (say they) the sampler of this visible world, the +first work of God, was equally ancient with the architect; for it was +forever with him, and ever shall be. This material world, the second +work or creature of God, doth differ from the worker in this, that it +was not from everlasting, and in this it doth agree, that it shall +be forever to come." The first point, that it was not forever, all +Christians confess: the other they understand no otherwise, than that +after the consummation of this world, there shall be a new Heaven and +a new earth, without any new creation of matter. But of these things +we need not here stand to argue; though such opinions be not unworthy +the propounding, in this consideration, of an eternal and unchangeable +cause, producing a changeable and temporal effect. Touching which +point Proclus the Platonist disputeth, that the compounded essence of +the world (and because compounded, therefore dissipable) is continued, +and knit to the Divine Being, by an individual and inseparable power, +flowing from Divine unity; and that the world's natural appetite of +God showeth, that the same proceedeth from a good and understanding +divine; and that this virtue, by which the world is continued and knit +together, must be infinite, that it may infinitely and everlastingly +continue and preserve the same. Which infinite virtue, the finite +world (saith he) is not capable of, but receiveth it from the divine +infinite, according to the temporal nature it hath, successively every +moment by little and little; even as the whole material world is not +altogether: but the abolished parts are departed by small degrees, and +the parts yet to come, do by the same small degrees succeed; as the +shadow of a tree in a river seemeth to have continued the same a long +time in the water, but it is perpetually renewed, in the continual +ebbing and flowing thereof. + +But to return to them, which denying that ever the world had any +beginning, withal deny that ever it shall have any end, and to this +purpose affirm, that it was never heard, never read, never seen, +no not by any reason perceived, that the heavens have ever suffered +corruption; or that they appear any way the older by continuance; or +in any sort otherwise than they were; which had they been subject to +final corruption, some change would have been discerned in so long a +time. To this it is answered, that the little change as yet perceived, +doth rather prove their newness, and that they have not continued +so long; than that they will continue forever as they are. And if +conjectural arguments may receive answer by conjectures; it then +seemeth that some alteration may be found. For either Aristotle, +Pliny, Strabo, Beda, Aquinas, and others, were grossly mistaken; or +else those parts of the world lying within the burnt zone, were not in +elder times habitable, by reason of the sun's heat, neither were the +seas, under the equinoctial, navigable. But we know by experience, +that those regions, so situate, are filled with people, and exceeding +temperate; and the sea, over which we navigate, passable enough. We +read also many histories of deluges: and how in the time of Phaeton, +divers places in the world were burnt up, by the sun's violent heat. + +But in a word, this observation is exceeding feeble. For we know it +for certain, that stone walls, of matter mouldering and friable, have +stood two, or three thousand years; that many things have been digged +up out of the earth, of that depth, as supposed to have been buried +by the general flood; without any alteration either of substance or +figure: yea it is believed, and it is very probable, that the gold +which is daily found in mines, and rocks, under ground, was created +together with the earth. + +And if bodies elementary, and compounded, the eldest times have not +invaded and corrupted: what great alteration should we look for in +celestial and quint-essential bodies? And yet we have reason to think, +that the sun, by whose help all creatures are generate, doth not +in these latter ages assist nature, as heretofore. We have neither +giants, such as the eldest world had; nor mighty men, such as the +elder world had; but all things in general are reputed of less virtue +which from the heavens receive virtue. Whence, if the nature of a +preface would permit a larger discourse, we might easily fetch store +of proof; as that this world shall at length have end, as that once it +had beginning. + +And I see no good answer that can be made to this objection: if the +world were eternal, why not all things in the world eternal? If there +were no first, no cause, no father, no creator, no incomprehensible +wisdom, but that every nature had been alike eternal; and man more +rational than every other nature: why had not the eternal reason of +man provided for his eternal being in the world? For if all were +equal why not equal conditions to all? Why should heavenly bodies live +forever; and the bodies of men rot and die? + +Again, who was it that appointed the earth to keep the center, and +gave order that it should hang in the air: that the sun should travel +between the tropics, and never exceed those bounds, nor fail to +perform that progress once in every year: the moon to live by borrowed +light; the fixed stars (according to common opinion) to be fastened +like nails in a cartwheel; and the planets to wander at their +pleasure? Or if none of these had power over other: was it out of +charity and love, that the sun by his perpetual travel within these +two circles, hath visited, given light unto, and relieved all parts +of the earth, and the creatures therein, by turns and times? Out +of doubt, if the sun have of his own accord kept this course in all +eternity, he may justly be called eternal charity and everlasting +love. The same may be said of all the stars; who being all of them +most large and clear fountains of virtue and operation, may also, be +called eternal virtues: the earth may be called eternal patience; the +moon, an eternal borrower and beggar; and man of all other the most +miserable, eternally mortal. And what were this, but to believe again +in the old play of the gods? Yea in more gods by millions, than ever +Hesiodus dreamed of. But instead of this mad folly, we see it well +enough with our feeble and mortal eyes; and the eyes of our reason +discern it better; that the sun, moon, stars, and the earth, are +limited bounded, and constrained: themselves they have not constrained +nor could. "Omne determinatum causam habet aliquam efficientem, quae +illud determinaverit:" "Everything bounded hath some efficient cause, +by which it is bounded." + +Now for Nature; as by the ambiguity of this name, the school of +Aristotle hath both commended many errors unto us, and sought also +thereby to obscure the glory of the high moderator of all things, +shining in the creation, and in the governing of the world: so if the +best definition be taken out of the second of Aristotle's "Physics," +or "primo de Coelo," or out of the fifth of his "Metaphysics"; I +say that the best is but nominal, and serving only to difference the +beginning of natural motion from artificial: which yet the Academics +open better, when they call it "a seminary strength, infused into +matter by the soul of the world": who give the first place to +Providence, the second to Fate, and but the third to Nature. +"Providentia" (by which they understand God) "dux et caput; Fatum, +medium ex providentia prodiens; Natura postremum"[39] But be it what +he will, or be it any of these (God excepted) or participating of all: +yet that it hath choice or understanding (both which are necessarily +in the cause of all things) no man hath avowed. For this is +unanswerable of Lactantius, "Is autem facit aliquid, qui aut +voluntatem faciendi habet, aut scientiam:" "He only can be said to be +the doer of a thing, that hath either will or knowledge in the doing +it." + +But the will and science of Nature, are in these words truly expressed +by Ficinus: "Potest ubique Natura, vel per diversa media, vel ex +diversis materiis, diversa facere: sublata vero mediorum materiatumque +diversitate, vel unicum, vel similimum operatur, neque potest +quando adest materia non operari"; "It is the power of Nature by the +diversity of means, or out of diversity of matter, to produce divers +things: but taking away the diversity of means, and the diversity of +matter, it then works but one or the like work; neither can it but +work, matter being present." Now if Nature made choice of diversity of +matter, to work all these variable works of heaven and earth, it had +then both understanding and will; it had counsel to begin; reason to +dispose; virtue and knowledge to finish, and power to govern: without +which all things had been but one and the same: all of the matter of +heaven; or all of the matter of earth. And if we grant Nature this +will, and this understanding, this course, reason, and power: "Cur +Natura potius quam Deus nominetur?" "Why should we then call such a +cause rather Nature, than God?" "God, of whom all men have notion, +and give the first and highest place to divine power": "Omnes homines +notionem deorum habent, omnesque summun locum divino cuidam numini +assignant." And this I say in short; that it is a true effect of true +reason in man (were there no authority more binding than reason) +to acknowledge and adore the first and most sublime power. "Vera +philosophia, est ascensus ab his quae fluunt, et oriuntur, et +occidunt, ad ea quae vera sunt, et semper eadem": "True philosophy, is +an ascending from the things which flow, and arise, and fall, to the +things that are forever the same." + +For the rest; I do also account it not the meanest, but an impiety +monstrous, to confound God and Nature; be it but in terms. For it is +God, that only disposeth of all things according to His own will, and +maketh of one earth, vessels of honor and dishonor. It is Nature +that can dispose of nothing, but according to the will of the matter +wherein it worketh. It is God that commandeth all: it is Nature that +is obedient to all: it is God that doth good unto all, knowing and +loving the good He doth: It is Nature, that secondarily doth also +good, but it neither knoweth nor loveth the good it doth. It is God, +that hath all things in Himself: Nature, nothing in itself. It is God, +which is the Father, and hath begotten all things: it is Nature, which +is begotten by all things, in which it liveth and laboreth; for by +itself it existeth not. For shall we say, that it is out of affection +to the earth, that heavy things fall towards it? Shall we call it +reason, which doth conduct every river into the salt sea? Shall +we term it knowledge in fire, that makes it to consume combustible +matter? If it be affection, reason, and knowledge in these; by the +same affection, reason, and knowledge it is, that Nature worketh. +And therefore seeing all things work as they do, (call it by Form, or +Nature, or by what you please) yet because they work by an impulsion, +which they cannot resist, or by a faculty, infused by the supremest +power; we are neither to wonder at, nor to worship, the faculty that +worketh, nor the creature wherein it worketh. But herein lies the +wonder: and to him is the worship due, who hath created such a nature +in things, and such a faculty, as neither knowing itself, the matter +wherein it worketh, nor the virtue and power which it hath; do yet +work all things to their last and uttermost perfection. And therefore +every reasonable man, taking to himself for a ground that which is +granted by all antiquity, and by all men truly learned that ever the +world had; to wit; that there is a power infinite, and eternal (which +also necessity doth prove unto us, without the help of faith, and +reason; without the force of authority) all things do as easily +follow which have been delivered by divine letters, as the waters of +a running river do successfully pursue each other from the first +fountains. + +This much I say it is, that reason itself hath taught us: and this is +the beginning of knowledge. "Sapientia praecedit, Religio sequitur: +quia prius est Deum scire, consequens colere"; "Sapience goes before, +Religion follows: because it is first to know God, and then to worship +Him." This sapience Plato calleth "absoluti boni scientiam," "the +science of the absolute good": and another "scientiam rerum primarum, +sempiternarum, perpetuarum"[40] For "faith (saith Isidore) is not +extorted by violence; but by reason and examples persuaded": "fides +nequaquam vi extorquetur, sed ratione et exemplis suadetur." I confess +it, that to inquire further, as to the essence of God, of His power, +of His art, and by what means He created the world: or of His secret +judgment, and the causes, is not an effect of reason. "Sed cum ratione +insaniunt," but "they grow mad with reason," that inquire after it. +For as it is no shame, nor dishonor (saith a French author) "de faire +arrest au but qu'on nasceu surpasser," "for a man to rest himself +there where he finds it impossible to pass on further": so whatsoever +is beyond, and out of the reach of true reason, it acknowledged it to +be so; as understanding itself not to be infinite, but according to +the name and nature it hath, to be a teacher, that best knows the end +of his own art. For seeing both reason and necessity teach us (reason, +which is "pars divini spiritus in corpus humanum mersi"[41]) that the +world was made by a power infinite; and yet how it was made, it cannot +teach us: and seeing the same reason and necessity make us know, +that the same infinite power is everywhere in the world; and yet how +everywhere, it cannot inform us: our belief hereof is not weakened, +but greatly strengthened, by our ignorance, because it is the same +reason that tells us, that such a nature cannot be said to be God, +that can be in all conceived by man. + +I have already been over-long, to make any large discourse either of +the parts of the following story, or in mine own excuse: especially in +the excuse of this or that passage; seeing the whole is exceeding +weak and defective. Among the grossest, the unsuitable division of +the books, I could not know how to excuse, had I not been directed to +enlarge the building after the foundation was laid, and the first +part finished. All men know that there is no great art in the dividing +evenly of these things, which are subject to number and measure. For +the rest, it suits well enough with a great many books of this +age, which speak too much, and yet say little; "Ipsi nobis furto +subducimur"; "We are stolen away from ourselves," setting a high price +on all that is our own. But hereof, though a late good writer make +complaint, yet shall it not lay hold on me, because I believe as he +doth; that who so thinks himself the wisest man, is but a poor and +miserable ignorant. Those that are the best men of war against all +the vanities and fooleries of the world, do always keep the strongest +guards against themselves, to defend them from themselves; from +self-love, self-estimation, and self-opinion. + +Generally concerning the order of the work, I have only taken counsel +from the argument. For of the Assyrians, which after the downfall of +Babel take up the first part, and were the first great kings of +the world, there came little to the view of posterity: some few +enterprises, greater in fame than faith, of Ninus and Semiramis, +excepted. + +It was the story of the Hebrews, of all before the Olympiads, that +overcame the consuming disease of time, and preserved itself, from the +very cradle and beginning to this day: and yet not so entire, but +that the large discourses thereof (to which in many Scriptures we are +referred) are nowhere found. The fragments of other stories, with the +actions of those kings and princes which shot up here and there in the +same time, I am driven to relate by way of digression: of which we may +say with Virgil: "Apparent rari nantes in gurgite vasto"; "They appear +here and there floating in the great gulf of time." + +To the same first ages do belong the report of many inventions therein +found, and from them derived to us; though most of the authors' names +have perished in so long a navigation. For those ages had their laws; +they had diversity of government; they had kingly rule; nobility; +policy in war; navigation, and all, or the most of needful trades. To +speak therefore of these (seeing in a general history we should have +left a great deal of nakedness, by their omission) it cannot properly +be called a digression. True it is, that I have made also many others: +which if they shall be laid to my charge, I must cast the fault into +the great heap of human error. For seeing we digress in all the +ways of our lives: yea, seeing the life of man is nothing else but +digression; I may the better be excused, in writing their lives and +actions. I am not altogether ignorant in the laws of history and of +the kinds. + +The same hath been taught by many, but no man better, and with greater +brevity, than by that excellent learned gentleman, Sir Francis Bacon. +Christian laws are also taught us by the prophets and apostles; and +every day preached unto us. But we still make large digressions: yea, +the teachers themselves do not (in all) keep the path which they point +out to others. + +For the rest, after such time as the Persians had wrested the Empire +from the Chaldeans, and had raised a great monarchy, producing actions +of more importance than were elsewhere to be found; it was agreeable +to the order of the story, to attend this Empire; whilst it so +flourished, that the affairs of the nations adjoining had reference +thereunto. The like observance was to be used towards the fortunes of +Greece, when they again began to get ground upon the Persians; as also +towards the affairs of Rome, when the Romans grew more mighty than the +Greeks. + +As for the Medes, the Macedonians, the Sicilians, the Carthaginians, +and other nations who resisted the beginnings of the former empires, +and afterwards became but parts of their composition and enlargement; +it seemed best to remember what was known of them from their several +beginnings, in such times and places as they in their flourishing +estates opposed those monarchies, which in the end swallowed them up. +And herein I have followed the best geographers: who seldom give +names to those small brooks, whereof many, joined together, make great +rivers: till such times as they become united, and run in main stream +to the ocean sea. If the phrase be weak, and the style not everywhere +like itself: the first shows their legitimation and true parent; the +second will excuse itself upon the variety of matter. For Virgil, who +wrote his _Eclogues_, "gracili avena,"[42] used stronger pipes, when +he sounded the wars of Aeneas. It may also be laid to my charge, that +I use divers Hebrew words in my first book, and elsewhere: in which +language others may think and I myself acknowledge it, that I am +altogether ignorant: but it is true, that some of them I find in +Montanus, others in Latin characters in S. Senensis; and of the rest I +have borrowed the interpretation of some of my friends. But say I had +been beholding to neither, yet were it not to be wondered at, having +had an eleven years' leisure, to attain the knowledge of that, or of +any other tongue; howsoever, I know that it will be said by many, that +I might have been more pleasing to the reader, if I had written the +story of mine own times, having been permitted to draw water as near +the well-head as another. To this I answer, that whosoever in writing +a modern history, shall follow truth too near the heels, it may haply +strike out his teeth. There is no mistress or guide, that hath led her +followers and servants into greater miseries. He that goes after her +too far off, loseth her sight, and loseth himself: and he that walks +after her at a middle distance: I know not whether I should call that +kind of course, temper,[43] or baseness. It is true, that I never +travelled after men's opinions, when I might have made the best use +of them: and I have now too few days remaining, to imitate those, that +either out of extreme ambition, or of extreme cowardice, or both, do +yet (when death hath them on his shoulders) flatter the world, between +the bed and the grave. It is enough for me (being in that state I am) +to write of the eldest times: wherein also why may it not be said, +that in speaking of the past, I point at the present, and tax the +vices of those that are yet living, in their persons that are long +since dead; and have it laid to my charge? But this I cannot help, +though innocent. And certainly, if there be any, that finding +themselves spotted like the tigers of old time, shall find fault with +me for painting them over anew, they shall therein accuse themselves +justly, and me falsely. + +For I protest before the Majesty of God, that I malice no man under +the sun. Impossible I know it is to please all; seeing few or none are +so pleased with themselves, or so assured of themselves, by reason of +their subjection to their private passions, but that they seem divers +persons in one and the same day. Seneca hath said it, and so do I: +"Unus mihi pro populo erat";[44] and to the same effect Epicurus, "Hoc +ego non multis sed tibi";[45] or (as it hath since lamentably fallen +out) I may borrow the resolution of an ancient philosopher, "Satis +est unus, satis est nullus."[46] For it was for the service of that +inestimable Prince Henry, the successive hope, and one of the greatest +of the Christian world, that I undertook this work. It pleased him to +peruse some part thereof, and to pardon what was amiss. It is now left +to the world without a master: from which all that is presented, hath +received both blows and thanks: "Eadem probamus, eadem reprehendimus: +hic exitus est omnis judicii, in quolis secundum plures datur."[47] +But these discourses are idle. I know that as the charitable will +judge charitably: so against those, "Qui gloriantur in malitia,"[48] +my present adversity hath disarmed me, I am on the ground already, +and therefore have not far to fall: and for rising again, as in the +natural privation there is no recession to habit; so it is seldom seen +in the privation politic. I do therefore forbear to style my readers +gentle, courteous, and friendly, thereby to beg their good opinions, +or to promise a second and third volume (which I also intend) if the +first receive grace and good acceptance. For that which is already +done, may be thought enough, and too much: and it is certain, let us +claw the reader with never so many courteous phrases, yet shall we +evermore be thought fools, that write foolishly. For conclusion, all +the hope I have lies in this, that I have already found more ungentle +and uncourteous readers of my love towards them, and well-deserving of +them, than ever I shall do again. For had it been otherwise, I should +hardly have had this leisure, to have made myself a fool in print. + + +[Footnote A: A sketch of the life of Raleigh will be found prefixed to +his "Discovery of Guiana" in the volume of "Voyages and Travels". +His "History of the World" was written during his imprisonment in +the Tower of London, which lasted from 1603 to 1616. The Preface +is interesting not only as a fine piece of Elizabethan prose but as +exhibiting the attitude toward history, and the view of the relation +of history to religion and philosophy, which characterized one who +represented with exceptional vigor the typical Elizabethan man of +action and who was also a man of thought and imagination.] + +[Footnote 1: Queen Elizabeth] + +[Footnote 2: "An ill opinion, honorably acquired, is pleasing."] + +[Footnote 3: "So you not to yourselves."] + +[Footnote 4: "He increased, with the result that he is oppressed by +his greatness."] + +[Footnote 5: "The insult done in scorning her beauty."] + +[Footnote 6: "God gave to Solomon largeness of heart."--1 Kings iv. +89.] + +[Footnote 7: Step. Pasquiere, Recherches, lib. v. cap. i.] + +[Footnote 8: Step-mother.] + +[Footnote 9: i.e., Protestantism] + +[Footnote 10: Instantly.] + +[Footnote 11: Dispossessed.] + +[Footnote 12: "Nothing hindering."] + +[Footnote 13: "That they are wise in a foolish matter."--Lactantius, +_De falsa sapientia_, 3, 29.] + +[Footnote 14: Augustine, _De cura pro morte_.] + +[Footnote 15: "Wealth acquired without fraud."] + +[Footnote 16: "O how many go down with this hope to endless labors and +wars."] + +[Footnote 17: Transient.] + +[Footnote 18: Opponents.] + +[Footnote 19: "Everything which is to come lies in uncertainty."] + +[Footnote 20: "Who follow their commander with groans."] + +[Footnote 21: "It takes great genius to call back the mind from the +senses."] + +[Footnote 22: "Against him who denies the principles."] + +[Footnote 23: "Specific virtue, or power."] + +[Footnote 24: "The Roman Church."] + +[Footnote 25: "I shall light a lamp of understanding in thine +heart."--IV. Esdras xiv. 25.] + +[Footnote 26: Followers.] + +[Footnote 27: "Prepared and sworn to protect with unconquered minds +the opinions of the philosophers whom they follow."] + +[Footnote 28: "Out of nothing."] + +[Footnote 29: "Out of pre-existing matter."] + +[Footnote 30: "Because comprehension is between limits, which are +opposed to infinity."] + +[Footnote 31: "God exhibits all things in one existence"] + +[Footnote 32: "The essence of all things, visible and invisible, is +divinity itself"] + +[Footnote 33: "Causally."] + +[Footnote 34: "Not as form, but as universal cause"] + +[Footnote 35: "It [i.e., the infinite] has no beginning, but itself is +perceived to be the beginning of all things, and to embrace and govern +all things."] + +[Footnote 36: "Primal matter."] + +[Footnote 37: "Which destroys all proportion."] + +[Footnote 38: "The spiritual world."] + +[Footnote 39: "Providence, leader and head; Fate, in the middle and +proceeding from Providence; Nature, last."] + +[Footnote 40: "The science of things first, eternal, perpetual."] + +[Footnote 41: "Part of the divine spirit immersed in the human body."] + +[Footnote 42: "With delicate pipe."] + +[Footnote 43: Moderation] + +[Footnote 44: "To me one man stood for the people."] + +[Footnote 45: "I [have done] this not for many, but for thee."] + +[Footnote 46: "One is enough, none is enough."] + +[Footnote 47: "We approve the same things, we blame the same +things--this is the result in every case in which the verdict is +rendered according to the majority."] + +[Footnote 48: "Who glory in malice"] + + + + +PROOEMIUM, EPISTLE DEDICATORY, PREFACE, AND PLAN OF THE INSTAURATIO +MAGNA, ETC. + +BY FRANCIS BACON[A] + +FRANCIS OF VERULAM REASONED THUS WITH HIMSELF, + +AND JUDGED IT TO BE FOR THE INTEREST OF THE PRESENT AND FUTURE +GENERATIONS THAT THEY SHOULD BE MADE ACQUAINTED WITH HIS THOUGHTS + + +Being convinced that the human intellect makes its own difficulties, +not using the true helps which are at man's disposal soberly and +judiciously; whence follows manifold ignorance of things, and by +reason of that ignorance mischiefs innumerable; he thought all trial +should be made, whether that commerce between the mind of man and the +nature of things, which is more precious than anything on earth, or +at least than anything that is of the earth, might by any means be +restored to its perfect and original condition, or if that may not be, +yet reduced to a better condition than that in which it now is. Now +that the errors which have hitherto prevailed, and which will prevail +forever, should (if the mind be left to go its own way), either by +the natural force of the understanding or by help of the aids and +instruments of Logic, one by one correct themselves, was a thing not +to be hoped for: because the primary notions of things which the mind +readily and passively imbibes, stores up, and accumulates (and it is +from them that all the rest flow) are false, confused, and overhastily +abstracted from the facts; nor are the secondary and subsequent +notions less arbitrary and inconstant; whence it follows that the +entire fabric of human reason which we employ in the inquisition of +nature, is badly put together and built up, and like some magnificent +structure without any foundation. For while men are occupied in +admiring and applauding the false powers of the mind, they pass by and +throw away those true powers, which, if it be supplied with the proper +aids and can itself be content to wait upon nature instead of vainly +affecting to overrule her, are within its reach. There was but one +course left, therefore,--to try the whole thing anew upon a better +plan, and to commence a total reconstruction of sciences, arts, and +all human knowledge, raised upon the proper foundations. And this, +though in the project and undertaking it may seem a thing infinite and +beyond the powers of man, yet when it comes to be dealt with it will +be found sound and sober, more so than what has been done hitherto. +For of this there is some issue; whereas in what is now done in the +matter of science there is only a whirling round about, and perpetual +agitation, ending where it began. And although he was well aware how +solitary an enterprise it is, and how hard a thing to win faith and +credit for, nevertheless he was resolved not to abandon either it or +himself; nor to be deterred from trying and entering upon that one +path which is alone open to the human mind. For better it is to make +a beginning of that which may lead to something, than to engage in +a perpetual struggle and pursuit in courses which have no exit. And +certainly the two ways of contemplation are much like those two ways +of action, so much celebrated, in this--that the one, arduous and +difficult in the beginning, leads out at last into the open +country; while the other, seeming at first sight easy and free from +obstruction, leads to pathless and precipitous places. + +Moreover, because he knew not how long it might be before these things +would occur to any one else, judging especially from this, that he +has found no man hitherto who has applied his mind to the like, he +resolved to publish at once so much as he has been able to complete. +The cause of which haste was not ambition for himself, but solicitude +for the work; that in case of his death there might remain some +outline and project of that which he had conceived, and some evidence +likewise of his honest mind and inclination towards the benefit of the +human race. Certain it is that all other ambition whatsoever seemed +poor in his eyes compared with the work which he had in hand; seeing +that the matter at issue is either nothing, or a thing so great that +it may well be content with its own merit, without seeking other +recompence. + + +[Footnote A: A sketch of Bacon's life will be found prefixed to his +"Essays" in another volume of the Harvard Classics. His "Instauratio +Magna" or "Great Renewal," the great work by which he hoped to create +a scientific revolution and deliver mankind from Aristotelianism, was +left far from complete; but the nature of his scheme and the scale +on which it was planned are indicated in these Prefaces, which are +typical both of the man and of the age in which he lived.] + + + + +EPISTLE DEDICATORY + +TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +TO OUR MOST GRACIOUS AND MIGHTY PRINCE AND LORD + +JAMES + +BY THE GRACE OF GOD OF GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE AND IRELAND KING, +DEFENDER OF THE FAITH, ETC. + +_Most Gracious and Mighty King_, + + +Your Majesty may perhaps accuse me of larceny, having stolen from your +affairs so much time as was required for this work. I know not what to +say for myself. For of time there can be no restitution, unless it be +that what has been abstracted from your business may perhaps go to the +memory of your name and the honour of your age; if these things are +indeed worth anything. Certainly they are quite new; totally new in +their very kind: and yet they are copied from a very ancient model; +even the world itself and the nature of things and of the mind. And to +say truth, I am wont for my own part to regard this work as a child of +time rather than of wit; the only wonder being that the first notion +of the thing, and such great suspicions concerning matters long +established, should have come into any man's mind. All the rest +follows readily enough. And no doubt there is something of accident +(as we call it) and luck as well in what men think as in what they do +or say. But for this accident which I speak of, I wish that if +there be any good in what I have to offer, it may be ascribed to +the infinite mercy and goodness of God, and to the felicity of your +Majesty's times; to which as I have been an honest and affectionate +servant in my life, so after my death I may yet perhaps, through the +kindling of this new light in the darkness of philosophy, be the means +of making this age famous to posterity; and surely to the times of the +wisest and most learned of kings belongs of right the regeneration +and restoration of the sciences. Lastly, I have a request to make--a +request no way unworthy of your Majesty, and which especially concerns +the work in hand; namely, that you who resemble Solomon in so many +things--in the gravity of your judgments, in the peacefulness of your +reign, in the largeness of your heart, in the noble variety of the +books which you have composed--would further follow his example +in taking order for the collecting and perfecting of a Natural and +Experimental History, true and severe (unincumbered with literature +and book-learning), such as philosophy may be built upon,--such, in +fact, as I shall in its proper place describe: that so at length, +after the lapse of so many ages, philosophy and the sciences may no +longer float in air, but rest on the solid foundation of experience +of every kind, and the same well examined and weighed. I have provided +the machine, but the stuff must be gathered from the facts of nature. +May God Almighty long preserve your Majesty! + + Your Majesty's + Most bounden and devoted Servant, + FRANCIS VERULAM, + Chancellor. + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +_That the state of knowledge is not prosperous nor greatly advancing; +and that a way must be opened for the human understanding entirely +different from any hitherto known, and other helps provided, in order +that the mind may exercise over the nature of things the authority +which properly belongs to it._ + + +It seems to me that men do not rightly understand either their store +or their strength, but overrate the one and underrate the other. Hence +it follows, that either from an extravagant estimate of the value of +the arts which they possess, they seek no further; or else from too +mean an estimate of their own powers, they spend their strength in +small matters and never put it fairly to the trial in those which +go to the main. These are as the pillars of fate set in the path of +knowledge; for men have neither desire nor hope to encourage them +to penetrate further. And since opinion of store is one of the chief +causes of want, and satisfaction with the present induces neglect +of provision for the future, it becomes a thing not only useful, but +absolutely necessary, that the excess of honour and admiration with +which our existing stock of inventions is regarded be in the very +entrance and threshold of the work, and that frankly and without +circumlocution, stripped off, and men be duly warned not to exaggerate +or make too much of them. For let a man look carefully into all that +variety of books with which the arts and sciences abound, he will +find everywhere endless repetitions of the same thing, varying in the +method of treatment, but not new in substance, insomuch that the whole +stock, numerous as it appears at first view, proves on examination to +be but scanty. And for its value and utility it must be plainly avowed +that that wisdom which we have derived principally from the Greeks is +but like the boyhood of knowledge, and has the characteristic property +of boys; it can talk, but it cannot generate; for it is fruitful of +controversies but barren of works. So that the state of learning as +it now is appears to be represented to the life in the old fable of +Scylla, who had the head and face of a virgin, but her womb was hung +round with barking monsters, from which she could not be delivered. +For in like manner the sciences to which we are accustomed have +certain general positions which are specious and flattering; but +as soon as they come to particulars, which are as the parts of +generation, when they should produce fruit and works, then arise +contentions and barking disputations, which are the end of the matter +and all the issue they can yield. Observe also, that if sciences of +this kind had any life in them, that could never have come to pass +which has been the case now for many ages--that they stand almost at +a stay, without receiving any augmentations worthy of the human race; +insomuch that many times not only what was asserted once is asserted +still, but what was a question once is a question still, and instead +of being resolved by discussion is only fixed and fed; and all the +tradition and succession of schools is still a succession of masters +and scholars, not of inventors and those who bring to further +perfection the things invented. In the mechanical arts we do not find +it so; they, on the contrary, as having in them some breath of life, +are continually growing and becoming more perfect. As originally +invented they are commonly rude, clumsy, and shapeless; afterwards +they acquire new powers and more commodious arrangements and +constructions; in so far that men shall sooner leave the study and +pursuit of them and turn to something else, than they arrive at the +ultimate perfection of which they are capable. Philosophy and the +intellectual sciences, on the contrary, stand like statues, worshiped +and celebrated, but not moved or advanced. Nay, they sometimes +flourish most in the hands of the first author, and afterwards +degenerate. For when men have once made over their judgments to +others' keeping, and (like those senators whom they called _Pedarii_) +have agreed to support some one person's opinion, from that time +they make no enlargement of the sciences themselves, but fall to +the servile office of embellishing certain individual authors and +increasing their retinue. And let it not be said that the sciences +have been growing gradually till they have at last reached their full +stature, and so (their course being completed) have settled in the +works of a few writers; and that there being now no room for the +invention of better, all that remains is to embellish and cultivate +those things which have been invented already. Would it were so! But +the truth is that this appropriating of the sciences has its origin in +nothing better than the confidence of a few persons and the sloth +and indolence of the rest. For after the sciences had been in several +parts perhaps cultivated and handled diligently, there has risen up +some man of bold disposition, and famous for methods and short ways +which people like, who has in appearance reduced them to an art, while +he has in fact only spoiled all that the others had done. And yet this +is what posterity like, because it makes the work short and easy, and +saves further inquiry, of which they are weary and impatient. And if +any one take this general acquiescence and consent for an argument +of weight, as being the judgment of Time, let me tell him that the +reasoning on which he relies is most fallacious and weak. For, first, +we are far from knowing all that in the matter of sciences and arts +has in various ages and places been brought to light and published; +much less, all that has been by private persons secretly attempted +and stirred, so neither the births nor the miscarriages of Time are +entered in our records. Nor, secondly, is the consent itself and +the time it has continued a consideration of much worth. For however +various are the forms of civil politics, there is but one form of +polity in the sciences; and that always has been and always will be +popular. Now the doctrines which find most favour with the populace +are those which are either contentious and pugnacious, or specious +and empty; such, I say, as either entangle assent or tickle it. And +therefore no doubt the greatest wits in each successive age have been +forced out of their own course, men of capacity and intellect above +the vulgar having been fain, for reputation's sake, to bow to the +judgment of the time and the multitude; and thus if any contemplations +of a higher order took light anywhere, they were presently blown out +by the winds of vulgar opinions. So that Time is like a river, which +has brought down to us things light and puffed up, while those which +are weighty and solid have sunk. Nay, those very authors who have +usurped a kind of dictatorship in the sciences and taken upon them to +lay down the law with such confidence, yet when from time to time they +come to themselves again, they fall to complaints of the subtlety +of nature, the hiding-places of truth, the obscurity of things, +the entanglement of causes, the weakness of the human mind; wherein +nevertheless they show themselves never the more modest, seeing that +they will rather lay the blame upon the common condition of man +and nature than upon themselves. And then whatever any art fails to +attain, they ever set it down upon the authority of that art itself as +impossible of attainment; and how can art be found guilty when it is +judge in its own cause? So it is but a device for exempting ignorance +from ignominy. Now for those things which are delivered and received, +this is their condition: barren of works, full of questions; in point +of enlargement slow and languid; carrying a show of perfection in +the whole, but in the parts ill filled up; in selection popular, and +unsatisfactory even to those who propound them; and therefore fenced +round and set forth with sundry artifices. And if there be any who +have determined to make trial for themselves, and put their own +strength to the work of advancing the boundaries of the sciences, +yet have they not ventured to cast themselves completely loose from +received opinions or to seek their knowledge at the fountain; but they +think they have done some great thing if they do but add and introduce +into the existing sum of science something of their own; prudently +considering with themselves that by making the addition they can +assert their liberty, while they retain the credit of modesty by +assenting to the rest. But these mediocrities and middle ways so +much praised, in deferring to opinions and customs, turn to the great +detriment of the sciences. For it is hardly possible at once to admire +an author and to go beyond him; knowledge being as water, which +will not rise above the level from which it fell. Men of this kind, +therefore, amend some things, but advance little; and improve the +condition of knowledge, but do not extend its range. Some, indeed, +there have been who have gone more boldly to work, and taking it all +for an open matter and giving their genius full play, have made a +passage for themselves and their own opinions by pulling down and +demolishing former ones; and yet all their stir has but little +advanced the matter; since their aim has been not to extend philosophy +and the arts in substance and value, but only to change doctrines and +transfer the kingdom of opinions to themselves; whereby little has +indeed been gained, for though the error be the opposite of the other, +the causes of erring are the same in both. And if there have been any +who, not binding themselves either to other men's opinions or to their +own, but loving liberty, have desired to engage others along with +themselves in search, these, though honest in intention, have been +weak in endeavour. For they have been content to follow probable +reasons, and are carried round in a whirl of arguments, and in the +promiscuous liberty of search have relaxed the severity of inquiry. +There is none who has dwelt upon experience and the facts of nature +as long as is necessary. Some there are indeed who have committed +themselves to the waves of experience, and almost turned mechanics; +yet these again have in their very experiments pursued a kind of +wandering inquiry, without any regular system of operations. And +besides they have mostly proposed to themselves certain petty tasks, +taking it for a great matter to work out some single discovery;--a +course of proceeding at once poor in aim and unskilful in design. For +no man can rightly and successfully investigate the nature of anything +in the thing itself; let him vary his experiments as laboriously as he +will, he never comes to a resting-place, but still finds something to +seek beyond. And there is another thing to be remembered; namely, +that all industry in experimenting has begun with proposing to itself +certain definite works to be accomplished, and has pursued them +with premature and unseasonable eagerness; it has sought, I say, +experiments of Fruit, not experiments of Light; not Imitating the +divine procedure, which In its first day's work created light only and +assigned to it one entire day; on which day it produced no material +work, but proceeded to that on the days following. As for those who +have given the first place to Logic, supposing that the surest helps +to the sciences were to be found in that, they have indeed most truly +and excellently perceived that the human intellect left to its own +course is not to be trusted; but then the remedy is altogether too +weak for the disease; nor is it without evil in itself. For the +Logic which is received, though it be very properly applied to civil +business and to those arts which rest in discourse and opinion, is not +nearly subtle enough to deal with nature; and in offering at what it +cannot master, has done more to establish and perpetuate error than to +open the way to truth. + +Upon the whole therefore, it seems that men have not been happy +hitherto either in the trust which they have placed in others or in +their own industry with regard to the sciences; especially as neither +the demonstrations nor the experiments as yet known are much to be +relied upon. But the universe to the eye of the human understanding is +framed like a labyrinth; presenting as it does on every side so many +ambiguities of way, such deceitful resemblances of objects and signs, +natures so irregular in their lines, and so knotted and entangled. And +then the way is still to be made by the uncertain light of the sense, +sometimes shining out, sometimes clouded over, through the woods +of experience and particulars; while those who offer themselves for +guides are (as was said) themselves also puzzled, and increase the +number of errors and wanderers. In circumstances so difficult neither +the natural force of man's judgment nor even any accidental felicity +offers any chance of success. No excellence of wit, no repetition of +chance experiments, can overcome such difficulties as these. Our +steps must be guided by a clue, and the whole way from the very first +perception of the senses must be laid out upon a sure plan. Not that I +would be understood to mean that nothing whatever has been done in so +many ages by so great labours. We have no reason to be ashamed of the +discoveries which have been made, and no doubt the ancients proved +themselves in everything that turns on wit and abstract meditation, +wonderful men. But as in former ages when men sailed only by +observation of the stars, they could indeed coast along the shores +of the old continent or cross a few small and mediterranean seas; but +before the ocean could be traversed and the new world discovered, the +use of the mariner's needle, as a more faithful and certain guide, +had to be found out; in like manner the discoveries which have been +hitherto made in the arts and sciences are such as might be made by +practice, meditation, observation, argumentation,--for they lay near +to the senses, and immediately beneath common notions; but before we +can reach the remoter and more hidden parts of nature, it is necessary +that a more perfect use and application of the human mind and +intellect be introduced. + +For my own part at least, in obedience to the everlasting love of +truth, I have committed myself to the uncertainties and difficulties +and solitudes of the ways, and relying on the divine assistance have +upheld my mind both against the shocks and embattled ranks of opinion, +and against my own private and inward hesitations and scruples, and +against the fogs and clouds of nature, and the phantoms flitting about +on every side; in the hope of providing at last for the present and +future generations guidance more faithful and secure. Wherein if I +have made any progress, the way has been opened to me by no other +means than the true and legitimate humiliation of the human spirit. +For all those who before me have applied themselves to the invention +of arts have but cast a glance or two upon facts and examples and +experience, and straightway proceeded, as if invention were nothing +more than an exercise of thought, to invoke their own spirits to give +them oracles. I, on the contrary, dwelling purely and constantly among +the facts of nature, withdraw my intellect from them no further than +may suffice to let the images and rays of natural objects meet in a +point, as they do in the sense of vision; whence it follows that the +strength and excellency of the wit has but little to do in the matter. +And the same humility which I use in inventing I employ likewise in +teaching. For I do not endeavour either by triumphs of confutation, +or pleadings of antiquity, or assumption of authority, or even by +the veil of obscurity, to invest these inventions of mine with any +majesty; which might easily be done by one who sought to give lustre +to his own name rather than light to other men's minds. I have +not sought (I say) nor do I seek either to force or ensnare men's +judgments, but I lead them to things themselves and the concordances +of things, that they may see for themselves what they have, what they +can dispute, what they can add and contribute to the common stock. +And for myself, if in anything I have been either too credulous or +too little awake and attentive, or if I have fallen off by the way and +left the inquiry incomplete, nevertheless I so present these things +naked and open, that my errors can be marked and set aside before the +mass of knowledge be further infected by them; and it will be easy +also for others to continue and carry on my labours. And by these +means I suppose that I have established for ever a true and lawful +marriage between the empirical and the rational faculty, the unkind +and ill-starred divorce and separation of which has thrown into +confusion all the affairs of the human family. + +Wherefore, seeing that these things do not depend upon myself, at the +outset of the work I most humbly and fervently pray to God the Father, +God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, that remembering the sorrows of +mankind and the pilgrimage of this our life wherein we wear out days +few and evil, they will vouchsafe through my hands to endow the human +family with new mercies. This likewise I humbly pray, that things +human may not interfere with things divine, and that from the opening +of the ways of sense and the increase of natural light there may arise +in our minds no incredulity or darkness with regard to the divine +mysteries; but rather that the understanding being thereby purified +and purged of fancies and vanity, and yet not the less subject and +entirely submissive to the divine oracles, may give to faith that +which is faith's. Lastly, that knowledge being now discharged of that +venom which the serpent infused into it, and which makes the mind +of man to swell, we may not be wise above measure and sobriety, but +cultivate truth in charity. + +And now having said my prayers I turn to men; to whom I have certain +salutary admonitions to offer and certain fair requests to make. My +first admonition (which was also my prayer) is that men confine the +sense within the limits of duty in respect to things divine: for the +sense is like the sun, which reveals the face of earth, but seals and +shuts up the face of heaven. My next, that in flying from this evil +they fall not into the opposite error, which they will surely do if +they think that the inquisition of nature is in any part interdicted +or forbidden. For it was not that pure and uncorrupted natural +knowledge whereby Adam gave names to the creatures according to their +propriety, which gave occasion to the fall. It was the ambitious and +proud desire of moral knowledge to judge of good and evil, to the end +that man may revolt from God and give laws to himself, which was +the form and manner of the temptation. Whereas of the sciences which +regard nature, the divine philosopher declares that "it is the glory +of God to conceal a thing, but it is the glory of the King to find +a thing out," Even as though the divine nature took pleasure in the +innocent and kindly sport of children playing at hide and seek, and +vouchsafed of his kindness and goodness to admit the human spirit +for his playfellow at that game. Lastly, I would address one general +admonition to all; that they consider what are the true ends of +knowledge, and that they seek it not either for pleasure of the mind, +or for contention, or for superiority to others, or for profit, or +fame, or power, or any of these inferior things; but for the benefit +and use of life; and that they perfect and govern it in charity. For +it was from lust of power that the angels fell, from lust of knowledge +that man fell; but of charity there can be no excess, neither did +angel or man ever come in danger by it. + +The requests I have to make are these. Of myself I say nothing; but in +behalf of the business which is in hand I entreat men to believe that +it is not an opinion to be held, but a work to be done; and to be well +assured that I am labouring to lay the foundation, not of any sect +or doctrine, but of human utility and power. Next, I ask them to deal +fairly by their own interests, and laying aside all emulations and +prejudices in favour of this or that opinion, to join in consultation +for the common good; and being now freed and guarded by the securities +and helps which I offer from the errors and impediments of the way, to +come forward themselves and take part in that which remains to be done +Moreover, to be of good hope, nor to imagine that this Instauration +of mine is a thing infinite and beyond the power of man, when it is in +fact the true end and termination of infinite error, and seeing also +that it is by no means forgetful of the conditions of mortality and +humanity, (for it does not suppose that the work can be altogether +completed within one generation, but provides for its being taken up +by another), and finally that it seeks for the sciences not arrogantly +in the little cells of human wit, but with reverence in the greater +world. But it is the empty things that are vast things solid are most +contracted and lie in little room. And now I have only one favour +more to ask (else injustice to me may perhaps imperil the business +itself)--that men will consider well how far, upon that which I must +needs assert (if I am to be consistent with myself), they are entitled +to judge and decide upon these doctrines of mine, inasmuch as all that +premature human reasoning which anticipates inquiry, and is abstracted +from the facts rashly and sooner than is fit, is by me rejected (so +far as the inquisition of nature is concerned), as a thing uncertain, +confused, and ill built up, and I cannot be fairly asked to abide by +the decision of a tribunal which is itself on its trial. + +THE PLAN OF THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +The work is in six Parts:-- + + 1. _The Divisions of the Sciences_. + + 2. _The New Organon; or Directions concerning the + Interpretation of Nature_. + + 3. _The Phenomena of the Universe; or a Natural and + Experimental History for the foundation of + Philosophy_. + + 4. _The Ladder of the Intellect_. + + 5. _The Forerunners; or Anticipations of the New + Philosophy_. + + 6. _The New Philosophy; or Active Science_. + +_The Arguments of the several Parts_. + +It being part of my design to set everything forth, as far as may +be, plainly and perspicuously (for nakedness of the mind is still, +as nakedness of the body once was, the companion of innocence and +simplicity), let me first explain the order and plan of the work. I +distribute it into six parts. + +The first part exhibits a summary or general description of the +knowledge which the human race at present possesses. For I thought it +good to make some pause upon that which is received; that thereby +the old may be more easily made perfect and the new more easily +approached. And I hold the improvement of that which we have to be as +much an object as the acquisition of more. Besides which it will make +me the better listened to; for "He that is ignorant (says the proverb) +receives not the words of knowledge, unless thou first tell him that +which is in his own heart." We will therefore make a coasting voyage +along the shores of the arts and sciences received; not without +importing into them some useful things by the way. + +In laying out the divisions of the sciences however, I take into +account not only things already invented and known, but likewise +things omitted which ought to be there. For there are found in the +intellectual as in the terrestial globe waste regions as well as +cultivated ones. It is no wonder therefore if I am sometimes obliged +to depart from the ordinary divisions. For in adding to the total you +necessarily alter the parts and sections; and the received divisions +of the sciences are fitted only to the received sum of them as it +stands now. + +With regard to those things which I shall mark down as omitted, I +intend not merely to set down a simple title or a concise argument +of that which is wanted. For as often as I have occasion to report +anything as deficient, the nature of which is at all obscure, so that +men may not perhaps easily understand what I mean or what the work is +which I have in my head, I shall always (provided it be a matter of +any worth) take care to subjoin either directions for the execution of +such work, or else a portion of the work itself executed by myself as +a sample of the whole: thus giving assistance in every case either by +work or by counsel. For if it were for the sake of my reputation only +and other men's interests were not concerned in it, I would not have +any man think that in such cases merely some light and vague notion +has crossed my mind, and that the things which I desire and offer at +are no better than wishes; when they are in fact things which men may +certainly command if they will, and of which I have formed in my own +mind a clear and detailed conception. For I do not propose merely to +survey these regions in my mind, like an augur taking auspices, but to +enter them like a general who means to take possession.--So much for +the first part of the work. + + * * * * * + +Having thus coasted past the ancient arts, the next point is to equip +the intellect for passing beyond. To the second part therefore belongs +the doctrine concerning the better and more perfect use of human +reason in the inquisition of things, and the true helps of the +understanding: that thereby (as far as the condition of mortality and +humanity allows) the intellect may be raised and exalted, and made +capable of overcoming the difficulties and obscurities of nature. The +art which I introduce with this view (which I call _Interpretation of +Nature_) is a kind of logic; though the difference between it and +the ordinary logic is great; indeed immense. For the ordinary +logic professes to contrive and prepare helps and guards for the +understanding, as mine does; and in this one point they agree. But +mine differs from it in three points especially; viz. in the end aimed +at; in the order of demonstration; and in the starting point of the +inquiry. + +For the end which this science of mine proposes is the invention not +of arguments but of arts; not of things in accordance with principles, +but of principles themselves; not of probable reasons, but of +designations and directions for works. And as the intention is +different, so accordingly is the effect; the effect of the one being +to overcome an opponent in argument, of the other to command nature in +action. + +In accordance with this end is also the nature and order of the +demonstrations. For in the ordinary logic almost all the work is spent +about the syllogism. Of induction the logicians seem hardly to have +taken any serious thought, but they pass it by with a slight notice, +and hasten on to the formulæ of disputation. I on the contrary reject +demonstration by syllogism, as acting too confusedly, and letting +nature slip out of its hands. For although no one can doubt that +things which agree in a middle term agree with one another (which is +a proposition of mathematical certainty), yet it leaves an opening +for deception; which is this. The syllogism consists of propositions; +propositions of words; and words are the tokens and signs of notions. +Now if the very notions of the mind (which are as the soul of words +and the basis of the whole structure) be improperly and over-hastily +abstracted from facts, vague not sufficiently definite, faulty in +short in many ways, the whole edifice tumbles. I therefore reject the +syllogism; and that not only as regards principles (for to principles +the logicians themselves do not apply it) but also as regards middle +propositions; which, though obtainable no doubt by the syllogism, +are, when so obtained, barren of works, remote from practice, and +altogether unavailable for the active department of the sciences. +Although therefore I leave to the syllogism and these famous and +boasted modes of demonstration their jurisdiction over popular arts +and such as are matter of opinion (in which department I leave all +as it is), yet in dealing with the nature of things I use induction +throughout, and that in the minor propositions as well as the major. +For I consider induction to be that form of demonstration which +upholds the sense, and closes with nature, and comes to the very brink +of operation, if it does not actually deal with it. + +Hence it follows that the order of demonstration is likewise inverted. +For hitherto the proceeding has been to fly at once from the sense +and particulars up to the most general propositions, as certain fixed +poles for the argument to turn upon, and from these to derive the rest +by middle terms a short way, no doubt, but precipitate, and one which +will never lead to nature, though it offers an easy and ready way to +disputation. Now my plan is to proceed regularly and gradually from +one axiom to another, so that the most general are not reached till +the last but then when you do come to them you find them to be not +empty notions, but well defined, and such as nature would really +recognise as her first principles, and such as lie at the heart and +marrow of things. + +But the greatest change I introduce is in the form itself of induction +and the judgment made thereby. For the induction of which the +logicians speak, which proceeds by simple enumeration, is a puerile +thing, concludes at hazard, is always liable to be upset by a +contradictory instance, takes into account only what is known and +ordinary, and leads to no result. + +Now what the sciences stand in need of is a form of induction which +shall analyse experience and take it to pieces, and by a due process +of exclusion and rejection lead to an inevitable conclusion. And +if that ordinary mode of judgment practised by the logicians was so +laborious, and found exercise for such great wits how much more labour +must we be prepared to bestow upon this other, which is extracted not +merely out of the depths of the mind, but out of the very bowels of +nature. + +Nor is this all. For I also sink the foundations of the sciences +deeper and firmer; and I begin the inquiry nearer the source than men +have done heretofore; submitting to examination those things which +the common logic takes on trust. For first, the logicians borrow the +principles of each science from the science itself; secondly, they +hold in reverence the first notions of the mind; and lastly, they +receive as conclusive the immediate informations of the sense, when +well disposed. Now upon the first point, I hold that true logic +ought to enter the several provinces of science armed with a higher +authority than belongs to the principles of those sciences themselves, +and ought to call those putative principles to account until they +are fully established. Then with regard to the first notions of the +intellect; there is not one of the impressions taken by the intellect +when left to go its own way, but I hold it for suspected, and no +way established, until it has submitted to a new trial and a fresh +judgment has been thereupon pronounced. And lastly, the information +of the sense itself I sift and examine in many ways. For certain it +is that the senses deceive; but then at the same time they supply the +means of discovering their own errors; only the errors are here, the +means of discovery are to seek. + +The sense fails in two ways. Sometimes it gives no information, +sometimes it gives false information. For first, there are very many +things which escape the sense, even when best disposed and no way +obstructed; by reason either of the subtlety of the whole body, or +the minuteness of the parts, or distance of place, or slowness or else +swiftness of motion, or familiarity of the object, or other causes. +And again when the sense does apprehend a thing its apprehension is +not much to be relied upon. For the testimony and information of the +sense has reference always to man, not to the universe; and it is a +great error to assert that the sense is the measure of things. + +To meet these difficulties, I have sought on all sides diligently and +faithfully to provide helps for the sense--substitutes to supply its +failures, rectifications to correct its errors; and this I endeavour +to accomplish not so much by instruments as by experiments. For the +subtlety of experiments is far greater than that of the sense itself, +even when assisted by exquisite instruments; such experiments, I mean, +as are skilfully and artificially devised for the express purpose +of determining the point in question. To the immediate and proper +perception of the sense therefore I do not give much weight; but I +contrive that the office of the sense shall be only to judge of the +experiment, and that the experiment itself shall judge of the thing. +And thus I conceive that I perform the office of a true priest of the +sense (from which all knowledge in nature must be sought, unless men +mean to go mad) and a not unskilful interpreter of its oracles; and +that while others only profess to uphold and cultivate the sense, I +do so in fact. Such then are the provisions I make for finding the +genuine light of nature and kindling and bringing it to bear. And they +would be sufficient of themselves, if the human intellect were even, +and like a fair sheet of paper with no writing on it. But since the +minds of men are strangely possessed and beset, so that there is no +true and even surface left to reflect the genuine rays of things, it +is necessary to seek a remedy for this also. + +Now the idols, or phantoms, by which the mind is occupied are either +adventitious or innate. The adventitious come into the mind from +without; namely, either from the doctrines and sects of philosophers, +or from perverse rules of demonstration. But the innate are inherent +in the very nature of the intellect, which is far more prone to error +than the sense is. For let men please themselves as they will in +admiring and almost adoring the human mind, this is certain: that as +an uneven mirror distorts the rays of objects according to its own +figure and section, so the mind, when it receives impressions of +objects through the sense, cannot be trusted to report them truly, +but in forming its notions mixes up its own nature with the nature of +things. + +And as the first two kinds of idols are hard to eradicate, so idols of +this last kind cannot be eradicated at all. All that can be done is +to point them out, so that this insidious action of the mind may be +marked and reproved (else as fast as old errors are destroyed new ones +will spring up out of the ill complexion of the mind itself, and so we +shall have but a change or errors, and not a clearance); and to lay it +down once for all as a fixed and established maxim, that the intellect +is not qualified to judge except by means of induction, and induction +in its legitimate form. This doctrine then of the expurgation of the +intellect to qualify it for dealing with truth, is comprised in three +refutations: the refutation of the Philosophies; the refutation of the +Demonstrations; and the refutation of the Natural Human Reason. The +explanation of which things, and of the true relation between the +nature of things and the nature of the mind, is as the strewing and +decoration of the bridal chamber of the Mind and the Universe, the +Divine Goodness assisting; out of which marriage let us hope (and be +this the prayer of the bridal song) there may spring helps to man, +and a line and race of inventions that may in some degree subdue and +overcome the necessities and miseries of humanity. This is the second +part of the work. + + * * * * * + +But I design not only to indicate and mark out the ways, but also +to enter them. And therefore the third part of the work embraces the +Phenomena of the Universe; that is to say, experience of every kind, +and such a natural history as may serve for a foundation to build +philosophy upon. For a good method of demonstration or form of +interpreting nature may keep the mind from going astray or stumbling, +but it is not any excellence of method that can supply it with the +material of knowledge. Those however who aspire not to guess and +divine, but to discover and know; who propose not to devise mimic and +fabulous worlds of their own, but to examine and dissect the nature +of this very world itself; must go to facts themselves for +everything. Nor can the place of this labour and search and +worldwide perambulation be supplied by any genius or meditation or +argumentation; no, not if all men's wits could meet in one. This +therefore we must have, or the business must be for ever abandoned. +But up to this day such has been the condition of men in this matter, +that it is no wonder if nature will not give herself into their hands. + +For first, the information of the sense itself, sometimes failing, +sometimes false; observation, careless, irregular, and led by chance; +tradition, vain and fed on rumour; practice, slavishly bent upon its +work; experiment, blind, stupid, vague, and prematurely broken off; +lastly, natural history, trivial and poor;--all these have contributed +to supply the understanding with very bad materials for philosophy and +the sciences. + +Then an attempt is made to mend the matter by a preposterous subtlety +and winnowing of argument. But this comes too late, the case being +already past remedy; and is far from setting the business right +or sifting away the errors. The only hope therefore of any greater +increase or progress lies in a reconstruction of the sciences. + +Of this reconstruction the foundation must be laid in natural history, +and that of a new kind and gathered on a new principle. For it is +in vain that you polish the mirror if there are no images to be +reflected; and it is as necessary that the intellect should be +supplied with fit matter to work upon, as with safeguards to guide its +working. But my history differs from that in use (as my logic does) in +many things,--in end and office, in mass and composition, in subtlety, +in selection also and setting forth, with a view to the operations +which are to follow. + +For first, the object of a natural history which I propose is not so +much to delight with variety of matter or to help with present use of +experiments, as to give light to the discovery of causes and supply a +suckling philosophy with its first food. For though it be true that +I am principally in pursuit of works and the active department of the +sciences, yet I wait for harvest-time, and do not attempt to mow +the moss or to reap the green corn. For I well know that axioms once +rightly discovered will carry whole troops of works along with them, +and produce them, not here and there one, but in clusters. And that +unseasonable and puerile hurry to snatch by way of earnest at the +first works which come within reach, I utterly condemn and reject, as +an Atalanta's apple that hinders the race. Such then is the office of +this natural history of mine. + +Next, with regard to the mass and composition of it: I mean it to be a +history not only of nature free and at large (when she is left to +her own course and does her work her own way)--such as that of +the heavenly bodies, meteors, earth and sea, minerals, plants, +animals,--but much more of nature under constraint and vexed; that +is to say, when by art and the hand of man she is forced out of her +natural state, and squeezed and moulded. Therefore I set down at +length all experiments of the mechanical arts, of the operative part +of the liberal arts, of the many crafts which have not yet grown into +arts properly so called, so far as I have been able to examine them +and as they conduce to the end in view. Nay (to say the plain truth) +I do in fact (low and vulgar as men may think it) count more upon this +part both for helps and safeguards than upon the other; seeing that +the nature of things betrays itself more readily under the vexations +of art than in its natural freedom. + +Nor do I confine the history to Bodies; but I have thought it my +duty besides to make a separate history of such Virtues as may be +considered cardinal in nature. I mean those original passions or +desires of matter which constitute the primary elements of nature; +such as Dense and Rare, Hot and Cold, Solid and Fluid, Heavy and +Light, and several others. + +Then again, to speak of subtlety: I seek out and get together a +kind of experiments much subtler and simpler than those which occur +accidentally. For I drag into light many things which no one who was +not proceeding by a regular and certain way to the discovery of causes +would have thought of inquiring after; being indeed in themselves of +no great use; which shows that they were not sought for on their own +account; but having just the same relation to things and works which +the letters of the alphabet have to speech and words--which, though +in themselves useless, are the elements of which all discourse is made +up. + +Further, in the selection of the relation and experiments I conceive I +have been a more cautious purveyor than those who have hitherto dealt +with natural history. For I admit nothing but on the faith of eyes, +or at least of careful and severe examination; so that nothing is +exaggerated for wonder's sake, but what I state is sound and without +mixture of fables or vanity. All received or current falsehoods +also (which by strange negligence have been allowed for many ages to +prevail and become established) I proscribe and brand by name; that +the sciences may be no more troubled with them For it has been well +observed that the fables and superstitions and follies which nurses +instil into children do serious injury to their minds; and the same +consideration makes me anxious, having the management of the childhood +as it were of philosophy in its course of natural history, not to let +it accustom itself in the beginning to any vanity. Moreover, whenever +I come to a new experiment of any subtlety (though it be in my own +opinion certain and approved), I nevertheless subjoin a clear account +of the manner in which I made it; that men knowing exactly how each +point was made out, may see whether there be any error connected with +it, and may arouse themselves to devise proofs more trustworthy and +exquisite, if such can be found; and finally, I interpose everywhere +admonitions and scruples and cautions, with a religious care to eject, +repress, and as it were exorcise every kind of phantasm. + +Lastly, knowing how much the sight of man's mind is distracted by +experience and history, and how hard it is at the first (especially +for minds either tender or preoccupied) to become familiar with +nature, I not unfrequently subjoin observations of my own, being as +the first offers, inclinations, and as it were glances of history +towards philosophy; both by way of an assurance to men that they will +be kept for ever tossing on the waves of experience, and also that +when the time comes for the intellect to begin its work, it may find +everything the more ready. By such a natural history then as I have +described, I conceive that a safe and convenient approach may be made +to nature, and matter supplied of good quality and well prepared for +the understanding to work upon. + + * * * * * + +And now that we have surrounded the intellect with faithful helps and +guards, and got together with most careful selection a regular army of +divine works, it may seem that we have no more to do but to proceed to +philosophy itself. And yet in a matter so difficult and doubtful there +are still some things which it seems necessary to premise, partly for +convenience of explanation, partly for present use. + +Of these the first is to set forth examples of inquiry and invention +according to my method, exhibited by anticipation in some particular +subjects; choosing such subjects as are at once the most noble in +themselves among those under inquiry, and most different one from +another; that there may be an example in every kind. I do not speak of +those examples which are joined to the several precepts and rules by +way of illustration (for of these I have given plenty in the second +part of the work); but I mean actual types and models, by which the +entire process of the mind and the whole fabric and order of invention +from the beginning to the end, in certain subjects, and those various +and remarkable, should be set as it were before the eyes. For +I remember that in the mathematics it is easy to follow the +demonstration when you have a machine beside you; whereas without +that help all appears involved and more subtle than it really is. To +examples of this kind,--being in fact nothing more than an application +of the second part in detail and at large,--the fourth part of the +work is devoted. + + * * * * * + +The fifth part is for temporary use only, pending the completion of +the rest; like interest payable from time to time until the principal +be forthcoming. For I do not make so blindly for the end of my +journey, as to neglect anything useful that may turn up by the way. +And therefore I include in this fifth part such things as I have +myself discovered, proved, or added,--not however according to the +true rules and methods of interpretation, but by the ordinary use of +the understanding in inquiring and discovering. For besides that I +hope my speculations may in virtue of my continual conversancy with +nature have a value beyond the pretensions of my wit, they will +serve in the meantime for wayside inns in which the mind may rest +and refresh itself on its journey to more certain conclusions. +Nevertheless I wish it to be understood in the meantime that they are +conclusions by which (as not being discovered and proved by the true +form of interpretation) I do not at all mean to bind myself. Nor +need any one be alarmed at such suspension of judgment, in one who +maintains not simply that nothing can be known, but only that nothing +can be known except in a certain course and way; and yet establishes +provisionally certain degrees of assurance, for use and relief until +the mind shall arrive at a knowledge of causes in which it can +rest. For even those schools of philosophy which held the absolute +impossibility of knowing anything were not inferior to those which +took upon them to pronounce. But then they did not provide helps for +the sense and understanding, as I have done, but simply took away all +their authority: which is quite a different thing--almost the reverse. + + * * * * * + +The sixth part of my work (to which the rest is subservient and +ministrant) discloses and sets forth that philosophy which by +the legitimate, chaste, and severe course of inquiry which I have +explained and provided is at length developed and established. The +completion however of this last part is a thing both above my strength +and beyond my hopes. I have made a beginning of the work--a beginning, +as I hope, not unimportant:--the fortune of the human race will give +the issue;--such an issue, it may be, as in the present condition of +things and men's minds cannot easily be conceived or imagined. For +the matter in hand is no mere felicity of speculation, but the real +business and fortunes of the human race, and all power of operation. +For man is but the servant and interpreter of nature: what he does and +what he knows is only what he has observed of nature's order in fact +or in thought; beyond this he knows nothing and can do nothing. For +the chain of causes cannot by any force be loosed or broken, nor can +nature be commanded except by being obeyed. And so those twin objects, +human Knowledge and human Power, do really meet in one; and it is from +ignorance of causes that operation fails. + +And all depends on keeping the eye steadily fixed upon the facts +of nature and so receiving their images simply as they are. For God +forbid that we should give out a dream of our own imagination for a +pattern of the world; rather may he graciously grant to us to write an +apocalypse or true vision of the footsteps of the Creator imprinted on +his creatures. + +Therefore do thou, O Father, who gavest the visible light as the +first fruits of creation, and didst breathe into the face of man the +intellectual light as the crown and consummation thereof, guard and +protect this work, which coming from thy goodness returneth to thy +glory. Thou when thou turnedst to look upon the works which thy hands +had made, sawest that all was very good, and didst rest from thy +labours. But man, when he turned to look upon the work which his hands +had made, saw that all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and could +find no rest therein. Wherefore if we labour in thy works with the +sweat of our brows thou wilt make us partakers of thy vision and thy +sabbath. Humbly we pray that this mind may be steadfast in us, and +that through these our hands, and the hands of others to whom thou +shalt give the same spirit, thou wilt vouchsafe to endow the human +family with new mercies. + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE NOVUM ORGANUM + + +Those who have taken upon them to lay down the law of nature as a +thing already searched out and understood, whether they have spoken +in simple assurance or professional affectation, have therein done +philosophy and the sciences great injury. For as they have been +successful in inducing belief, so they have been effective in +quenching and stopping inquiry; and have done more harm by spoiling +and putting an end to other men's efforts than good by their own. +Those on the other hand who have taken a contrary course, and asserted +that absolutely nothing can be known,--whether it were from hatred of +the ancient sophists, or from uncertainty and fluctuation of mind, +or even from a kind of fulness of learning, that they fell upon this +opinion,--have certainly advanced reasons for it that are not to be +despised; but yet they have neither started from true principles nor +rested in the just conclusion, zeal and affectation having carried +them much too far. The more ancient of the Greeks (whose writings +are lost) took up with better judgment a position between these two +extremes,--between the presumption of pronouncing on everything, +and the despair of comprehending anything; and though frequently and +bitterly complaining of the difficulty of inquiry and the obscurity of +things, and like impatient horses champing the bit, they did not +the less follow up their object and engage with Nature; thinking (it +seems) that this very question,--viz. whether or no anything can be +known,--was to be settled not by arguing, but by trying. And yet they +too, trusting entirely to the force of their understanding, applied +no rule, but made everything turn upon hard thinking and perpetual +working and exercise of the mind. + +Now my method, though hard to practise, is easy to explain; and it +is this. I propose to establish progressive stages of certainty. The +evidence of the sense, helped and guarded by a certain process of +correction, I retain. But the mental operation which follows the act +of sense I for the most part reject; and instead of it I open and +lay out a new and certain path for the mind to proceed in, starting +directly from the simple sensuous perception. The necessity of this +was felt no doubt by those who attributed so much importance to +Logic; showing thereby that they were in search of helps for the +understanding, and had no confidence in the native and spontaneous +process of the mind. But this remedy comes too late to do any +good, when the mind is already, through the daily intercourse and +conversation of life, occupied with unsound doctrines and beset on all +sides by vain imaginations. And therefore that art of Logic, coming +(as I said) too late to the rescue, and no way able to set matters +right again, has had the effect of fixing errors rather than +disclosing truth. There remains but one course for the recovery of +a sound and healthy condition,--namely, that the entire work of the +understanding be commenced afresh, and the mind itself be from the +very outset not left to take its own course, but guided at every step; +and the business be done as if by machinery. Certainly if in things +mechanical men had set to work with their naked hands, without help or +force of instruments, just as in things intellectual they have set to +work with little else than the naked forces of the understanding, very +small would the matters have been which, even with their best efforts +applied in conjunction, they could have attempted or accomplished. Now +(to pause while upon this example and look in it as in a glass) let us +suppose that some vast obelisk were (for the decoration of a triumph +or some such magnificence) to be removed from its place, and that men +should set to work upon it with their naked hands; would not any +sober spectator think them mad? And if they should then send for more +people, thinking that in that way they might manage it, would he +not think them all the madder? And if they then proceeded to make a +selection, putting away the weaker hands, and using only the strong +and vigorous, would he not think them madder than ever? And if +lastly, not content with this, they resolved to call in aid the art +of athletics, and required all their men to come with hands, arms, +and sinews well anointed and medicated according to the rules of art, +would he not cry out that they were only taking pains to show a kind +of method and discretion in their madness? Yet just so it is that +men proceed in matters intellectual,--with just the same kind of mad +effort and useless combination of forces,--when they hope great things +either from the number and cooperation or from the excellency and +acuteness of individual wits; yea, and when they endeavour by Logic +(which may be considered as a kind of athletic art) to strengthen the +sinews of the understanding; and yet with all this study and endeavour +it is apparent to any true judgment that they are but applying the +naked intellect all the time; whereas in every great work to be done +by the hand of man it is manifestly impossible, without instruments +or machinery, either for the strength of each to be exerted or the +strength of all to be united. + +Upon these premises two things occur to me of which, that they may +not be overlooked, I would have men reminded. First it falls out +fortunately as I think for the allaying of contradictions and +heart-burnings, that the honour and reverence due to the ancients +remains untouched and undiminished; while I may carry out my designs +and at the same time reap the fruit of my modesty. For if I should +profess that I, going the same road as the ancients, have something +better to produce, there must needs have been some comparison or +rivalry between us (not to be avoided by any art of words) in respect +of excellency or ability of wit; and though in this there would be +nothing unlawful or new (for if there be anything misapprehended by +them, or falsely laid down, why may not I, using a liberty common +to all, take exception to it?) yet the contest, however just and +allowable, would have been an unequal one perhaps, in respect of the +measure of my own powers. As it is however,--my object being to open a +new way for the understanding, a way by them untried and unknown,--the +case is altered; party zeal and emulation are at an end; and I appear +merely as a guide to point out the road; an office of small authority, +and depending more upon a kind of luck than upon any ability or +excellency. And thus much relates to the persons only. The other point +of which I would have men reminded relates to the matter itself. + +Be it remembered then that I am far from wishing to interfere with +the philosophy which now flourishes, or with any other philosophy +more correct and complete than this which has been or may hereafter +be propounded. For I do not object to the use of this received +philosophy, or others like it, for supplying matter for disputations +or ornaments for discourse,--for the professor's lecture and for the +business of life. Nay more, I declare openly that for these uses the +philosophy which I bring forward will not be much available. It does +not lie in the way. It cannot be caught up in passage. It does not +flatter the understanding by conformity with preconceived notions. +Nor will it come down to the apprehension of the vulgar except by its +utility and effects. + +Let there be therefore (and may it be for the benefit of both) two +streams and two dispensations of knowledge; and in like manner two +tribes or kindreds of students in philosophy--tribes not hostile or +alien to each other, but bound together by mutual services;--let there +in short be one method for the cultivation, another for the invention, +of knowledge. + +And for those who prefer the former, either from hurry or from +considerations of business or for want of mental power to take in and +embrace the other (which must needs be most men's case), I wish that +they may succeed to their desire in what they are about, and obtain +what they are pursuing. But if any man there be who, not content +to rest in and use the knowledge which has already been discovered, +aspires to penetrate further; to overcome, not an adversary in +argument, but nature in action; to seek, not pretty and probable +conjectures, but certain and demonstrable knowledge;--I invite all +such to join themselves, as true sons of knowledge, with me, that +passing by the outer courts of nature, which numbers have trodden, +we may find a way at length into her inner chambers. And to make my +meaning clearer and to familiarise the thing by giving it a name, I +have chosen to call one of these methods or ways _Anticipation of the +Mind_, the other _Interpretation of Nature_. + +Moreover I have one request to make. I have on my own part made it my +care and study that the things which I shall propound should not only +be true, but should also be presented to men's minds, how strangely +soever preoccupied and obstructed, in a manner not harsh or +unpleasant. It is but reasonable however (especially in so great a +restoration of learning and knowledge) that I should claim of men one +favour in return; which is this; If any one would form an opinion or +judgment either out of his own observation, or out of the crowd of +authorities, or out of the forms of demonstration (which have now +acquired a sanction like that of judicial laws), concerning these +speculations of mine, let him not hope that he can do it in passage or +by the by; but let him examine the thing thoroughly; let him make some +little trial for himself of the way which I describe and lay out; let +him familiarise his thoughts with that subtlety of nature to which +experience bears witness; let him correct by seasonable patience and +due delay the depraved and deep-rooted habits of his mind; and when +all this is done and he has begun to be his own master, let him (if he +will) use his own judgment. + + + + +PREFACE TO THE FIRST FOLIO EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE'S PLAYS (1623)[A] + +TO THE GREAT VARIETY OF READERS + + +From the most able, to him that can but spell: There you are number'd. +We had rather you were weighd. Especially, when the fate of all Bookes +depends vpon your capacities: and not of your heads alone, but of your +purses. Well! it is now publique, & you wil stand for your priuiledges +wee know: to read, and censure. Do so, but buy it first. That doth +best commend a Booke, the Stationer saies. Then, how odde soeuer your +braines be, or your wisedomes, make your licence the same, and +spare not. Iudge your sixe-pen'orth, your shillings worth, your fiue +shillings worth at a time, or higher, so you rise to the iust rates, +and welcome. But, what euer you do, Buy. Censure will not driue a +Trade, or make the Iacke go. And though you be a Magistrate of wit, +and sit on the Stage at _Black-Friers_, or the _Cock-pit_, to arraigne +Playes dailie, know, these Playes haue had their triall alreadie, +and stood out all Appeals; and do now come forth quitted rather by a +Decree of Court, then any purchas'd Letters of commendation. + +It had bene a thing, we confesse, worthie to haue bene wished, that +the Author himselfe had liu'd to haue set forth, and ouerseen his owne +writings. But since it hath bin ordain'd otherwise, and he by death +departed from that right, we pray you do not envie his Friends, the +office of their care, and paine to haue collected & publish'd them, +and so to haue publish'd them, as where (before) you were abus'd with +diuerse stolne, and surreptitious copies, maimed, and deformed by the +frauds and stealthes of iniurious imposters, that expos'd them euen +those, are now offer'd to your view cur'd, and perfect of their +limbes, and all the rest, absolute in their numbers, as he conceiued +them. Who, as he was a happie imitator of Nature, was a most gentle +expresser of it. His mind and hand went together. And what he thought, +he vttered with that easinesse, that wee haue scarse receiued from him +a blot in his papers. But it is not our prouince, who onely gather his +works, and giue them you, to praise him. It is yours that reade him. +And there we hope, to your diuers capacities, you will finde enough, +both to draw, and hold you for his wit can no more lie hid then it +could be lost. Reade him, therefore and againe and againe. And if then +you doe not like him surely you are in some manifest danger, not to +vnderstand him. And so we leaue you to other of his Friends, whom if +you need can bee your guides: if you neede them not, you can leade +your selues, and others. And such Readers we wish him. + +JOHN HEMINGE HENRIE CONDELL. + + +[Footnote A: Little more than half of Shakespeare's plays were +published during his lifetime; and in the publication of these there +is no evidence that the author had any hand. Seven years after his +death, John Heminge and Henry Condell, two of his fellow-actors, +collected the unpublished plays, and, in 1623, issued them along with +the others in a single volume, usually known as the First Folio. +When one considers what would have been lost had it not been for the +enterprise of these men, it seems safe to say that the volume they +introduced by this quaint and not too accurate preface, is the most +important single book in the imaginative literature of the world.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE PHILOSOPHIAE NATURALIS PRINCIPIA MATHEMATICA + +BY SIR ISAAC NEWTON. (1686)[A] + + +Since the ancients (as we are told by Pappus) made great account of +the science of mechanics in the investigation of natural things; and +the moderns, laying aside substantial forms and occult qualities, +have endeavored to subject the phenomena of nature to the laws of +mathematics, I have in this treatise cultivated mathematics so far as +it regards philosophy. The ancients considered mechanics in a twofold +respect; as rational, which proceeds accurately by demonstration, and +practical. To practical mechanics all the manual arts belong, from +which mechanics took its name. But as artificers do not work with +perfect accuracy, it comes to pass that mechanics is so distinguished +from geometry, that what is perfectly accurate is called geometrical; +what is less so is called mechanical. But the errors are not in the +art, but in the artificers. He that works with less accuracy is an +imperfect mechanic: and if any could work with perfect accuracy, he +would be the most perfect mechanic of all; for the description of +right lines and circles, upon which geometry is founded, belongs +to mechanics. Geometry does not teach us to draw these lines, but +requires them to be drawn; for it requires that the learner should +first be taught to describe these accurately, before he enters upon +geometry; then it shows how by these operations problems may be +solved. To describe right lines and circles are problems, but not +geometrical problems. The solution of these problems is required from +mechanics; and by geometry the use of them, when so solved, is shown; +and it is the glory of geometry that from those few principles, +fetched from without, it is able to produce so many things. Therefore +geometry is founded in mechanical practice, and is nothing but that +part of universal mechanics which accurately proposes and demonstrates +the art of measuring. But since the manual arts are chiefly conversant +in the moving of bodies, it comes to pass that geometry is commonly +referred to their magnitudes, and mechanics to their motion. In this +sense rational mechanics will be the science of motions resulting +from any forces whatsoever, and of the forces required to produce any +motions, accurately proposed and demonstrated. This part of mechanics +was cultivated by the ancients in the five powers which relate to +manual arts, who considered gravity (it not being a manual power) no +otherwise than as it moved weights by those powers. Our design, not +respecting arts, but philosophy, and our subject, not manual, but +natural powers, we consider chiefly those things which relate to +gravity, levity, elastic force, the resistance of fluids, and the like +forces, whether attractive or impulsive; and therefore we offer this +work as mathematical principles of philosophy; for all the difficulty +of philosophy seems to consist in this--from the phenomena of motions +to investigate the forces of nature, and then from these forces +to demonstrate the other phenomena; and to this end the general +propositions in the first and second book are directed. In the third +book we give an example of this in the explication of the system of +the World; for by the propositions mathematically demonstrated in the +first book, we there derive from the celestial phenomena the forces +of gravity with which bodies tend to the sun and the several planets. +Then, from these forces, by other propositions which are also +mathematical, we deduce the motions of the planets, the comets, the +moon, and the sea. I wish we could derive the rest of the phenomena of +nature by the same kind of reasoning from mechanical principles; for +I am induced by many reasons to suspect that they may all depend +upon certain forces by which the particles of bodies, by some causes +hitherto unknown, are either mutually impelled towards each other, and +cohere in regular figures, or are repelled and recede from each other; +which forces being unknown, philosophers have hitherto attempted the +search of nature in vain; but I hope the principles here laid +down will afford some light either to that or some truer method of +philosophy. + +In the publication of this work, the most acute and universally +learned Mr. Edmund Halley not only assisted me with his pains in +correcting the press and taking care of the schemes, but it was to +his solicitations that its becoming public is owing; for when he +had obtained of me my demonstrations of the figure of the celestial +orbits, he continually pressed me to communicate the same to the Royal +Society, who afterwards, by their kind encouragement and entreaties, +engaged me to think of publishing them. But after I had begun to +consider the inequalities of the lunar motions, and had entered upon +some other things relating to the laws and measures of gravity, +and other forces; and the figures that would be described by bodies +attracted according to given laws; and the motion of several bodies +moving among themselves; the motion of bodies in resisting mediums; +the forces, densities, and motions of mediums; the orbits of the +comets, and such like; I put off that publication till I had made a +search into those matters, and could put out the whole together. What +relates to the lunar motions (being imperfect) I have put all together +in the corollaries of proposition 66, to avoid being obliged to +propose and distinctly demonstrate the several things there contained +in a method more prolix than the subject deserved, and interrupt the +series of the several propositions. Some things, found out after the +rest, I chose to insert in places less suitable, rather than change +the number of the propositions and the citations. I heartily beg that +what I have here done may be read with candor; and that the defects +I have been guilty of upon this difficult subject may be not so much +reprehended as kindly supplied, and investigated by new endeavors of +my readers. + +Cambridge, Trinity College, ISAAC NEWTON. + +May 8, 1686 + + +[Footnote A: Sir Isaac Newton, the great English mathematician and +physicist, was born at Woolsthorpe in 1642, and died at Kensington in +1727. He held a professorship at Cambridge, represented the University +in Parliament, as master of the mint reformed the English coinage, and +for twenty five years was president of the Royal Society. His theory +of the law of universal gravitation, the most important of his many +discoveries, is expounded in his "Philosophiae Naturalis Principia +Mathematical," usually known merely as the "Principia," from which, +this Preface is translated.] + + + + +PREFACE TO FABLES, + +ANCIENT AND MODERN + +BY JOHN DRYDEN. (1700)[A] + + +'Tis with a poet as with a man who designs to build, and is very +exact, as he supposes, in casting up the cost beforehand, but, +generally speaking, he is mistaken in his account, and reckons short +of the expense he first intended. He alters his mind as the work +proceeds, and will have this or that convenience more, of which he had +not thought when he began. So has it happened to me; I have built a +house, where I intended but a lodge; yet with better success than a +certain nobleman,[1] who, beginning with a dog kennel, never liv'd to +finish the palace he had contriv'd. + +From translating the first of Homer's _Iliads_ (which I intended as an +essay to the whole work) I proceeded to the translation of the twelfth +book of Ovid's _Metamorphoses_, because it contains, among other +things, the causes, the beginning, and ending, of the Trojan war. +Here I ought in reason to have stopp'd; but the speeches of Ajax +and Ulysses lying next in my way, I could not balk 'em. When I had +compass'd them, I was so taken with the former part of the fifteenth +book, (which is the masterpiece of the whole _Metamorphoses_,) that +I enjoin'd myself the pleasing task of rend'ring it into English. And +now I found, by the number of my verses, that they began to swell into +a little volume; which gave me an occasion of looking backward on some +beauties of my author, in his former books. There occurred to me the +_Hunting of the Boar, Cinyras and Myrrha_, the good-natur'd story of +_Baucis and Philemon_, with the rest, which I hope I have translated +closely enough, and given them the same turn of verse which they had +in the original; and this, I may say without vanity, is not the talent +of every poet. He who has arriv'd the nearest to it, is the ingenious +and learned Sandys, the best versifier of the former age; if I may +properly call it by that name, which was the former part of this +concluding century. For Spenser and Fairfax both flourish'd in the +reign of Queen Elizabeth; great masters in our language, and who +saw much farther into the beauties of our numbers than those who +immediately followed them. Milton was the poetical son of Spenser, and +Mr. Waller of Fairfax, for we have our lineal descents and clans as +well as other families. Spenser more than once insinuates that the +soul of Chaucer was transfus'd into his body, and that he was begotten +by him two hundred years after his decease. Milton has acknowledg'd to +me that Spenser was his original, and many besides myself have heard +our famous Waller own that he deriv'd the harmony of his numbers +from the _Godfrey of Bulloign_, which was turned into English by Mr. +Fairfax. But to return. Having done with Ovid for this time, it +came into my mind that our old English poet, Chaucer, in many things +resembled him, and that with no disadvantage on the side of the modern +author, as I shall endeavor to prove when I compare them; and as I +am, and always have been, studious to promote the honor of my native +country, so I soon resolv'd to put their merits to the trial, by +turning some of the _Canterbury Tales_ into our language, as it is +now refin'd; for by this means, both the poets being set in the same +light, and dress'd in the same English habit, story to be compar'd +with story, a certain judgment may be made betwixt them by the reader, +without obtruding my opinion on him. Or, if I seem partial to my +countryman and predecessor in the laurel, the friends of antiquity +are not few; and besides many of the learn'd, Ovid has almost all the +beaux, and the whole fair sex, his declared patrons. Perhaps I have +assum'd somewhat more to myself than they allow me, because I have +adventur'd to sum up the evidence; but the readers are the jury, and +their privilege remains entire, to decide, according to the merits of +the cause, or if they please, to bring it to another hearing before +some other court. In the mean time, to follow the thrid of my +discourse, (as thoughts, according to Mr. Hobbes, have always some +connection,) so from Chaucer I was led to think on Boccace, who was +not only his contemporary, but also pursued the same studies; wrote +novels in prose, and many works in verse; particularly is said to have +invented the octave rhyme,[2] or stanza of eight lines, which ever +since has been maintain'd by the practice of all Italian writers, who +are, or at least assume the title of, heroic poets. He and Chaucer, +among other things, had this in common, that they refin'd their mother +tongues; but with this difference, that Dante had begun to file their +language, at least in verse, before the time of Boccace, who likewise +receiv'd no little help from his master Petrarch. But the reformation +of their prose was wholly owing to Boccace himself, who is yet the +standard of purity in the Italian tongue; tho' many of his phrases are +become obsolete, as in process of time it must needs happen. Chaucer +(as you have formerly been told by our learn'd Mr. Rymer) first +adorn'd and amplified our barren tongue from the Provençal,[3] which +was then the most polish'd of all the modern languages; but this +subject has been copiously treated by that great critic, who deserves +no little commendation from us his countrymen. For these reasons of +time, and resemblance of genius in Chaucer and Boccace, I resolv'd +to join them in my present work; to which I have added some original +papers of my own; which, whether they are equal or inferior to my +other poems, an author is the most improper judge, and therefore I +leave them wholly to the mercy of the reader. I will hope the best, +that they will not be condemn'd; but if they should, I have the excuse +of an old gentleman, who mounting on horseback before some ladies, +when I was present, got up somewhat heavily, but desir'd of the fair +spectators that they would count fourscore and eight before they +judg'd him. By the mercy of God, I am already come within twenty years +of his number, a cripple in my limbs; but what decays are in my mind, +the reader must determine. I think myself as vigorous as ever in the +faculties of my soul, excepting only my memory, which is not impair'd +to any great degree; and if I lose not more of it, I have no great +reason to complain. What judgment I had, increases rather than +diminishes; and thoughts, such as they are, come crowding in so fast +upon me, that my only difficulty is to choose or to reject; to run +them into verse, or to give them the other harmony of prose. I have so +long studied and practic'd both, that they are grown into a habit, and +become familiar to me. In short, tho' I may lawfully plead some part +of the old gentleman's excuse, yet I will reserve it till I think I +have greater need, and ask no grains of allowance for the faults of +this my present work, but those which are given of course to human +frailty. I will not trouble my reader with the shortness of time in +which I writ it, or the several intervals of sickness. They who think +too well of their own performances are apt to boast in their prefaces +how little time their works have cost them, and what other business of +more importance interfere'd; but the reader will be as apt to ask the +question, why they allow'd not a longer time to make their works more +perfect, and why they had so despicable an opinion of their judges +as to thrust their indigested stuff upon them, as if they deser'd no +better. + +With this account of my present undertaking, I conclude the first part +of this discourse; in the second part, as at a second sitting, tho' I +alter not the draught, I must touch the same features over again, and +change the dead coloring[4] of the whole. In general, I will only say +that I have written nothing which savors of immorality or profaneness; +at least, I am not conscious to myself of any such intention. If there +happen to be found an irreverent expression, or a thought too wanton, +they are crept into my verses thro' my inadvertency; if the searchers +find any in the cargo, let them be stay'd or forfeited, like +counterbanded goods; at least, let their authors be answerable +for them, as being but imported merchandise, and not of my own +manufacture. On the other side, I have endeavor'd to choose such +fables, both ancient and modern, as contain in each of them some +instructive moral; which I could prove by induction, but the way +is tedious, and they leap foremost into sight, without the reader's +trouble of looking after them. I wish I could affirm, with a safe +conscience, that I had taken the same care in all my former writings; +for it must be own'd, that supposing verses are never so beautiful or +pleasing, yet if they contain anything which shocks religion, or good +manners, they are at best what Horace says of good numbers without +good sense, _Versus inopes rerum, nugaeque canorae_.[5] Thus far, I +hope, I am right in court, without renouncing to my other right of +self-defense, where I have been wrongfully accus'd, and my sense +wiredrawn into blasphemy or bawdry, as it has often been by a +religious lawyer,[6] in a late pleading against the stage; in which +he mixes truth with falsehood, and has not forgotten the old rule of +calumniating strongly, that something may remain. + +I resume the thrid of my discourse with the first of my translations, +which was the _First Iliad_ of Homer. If it shall please God to give +me longer life, and moderate health, my intentions are to +translate the whole _Ilias_; provided still that I meet with those +encouragements from the public which may enable me to proceed in my +undertaking with some cheerfulness. And this I dare assure the world +beforehand, that I have found by trial Homer a more pleasing task than +Virgil, (tho' I say not the translation will be less laborious). For +the Grecian is more according to my genius than the Latin poet. In +the works of the two authors we may read their manners and natural +inclinations, which are wholly different. Virgil was of a quiet, +sedate temper; Homer was violent, impetuous, and full of fire. The +chief talent of Virgil was propriety of thoughts, and ornament of +words; Homer was rapid in his thoughts, and took all the liberties, +both of numbers and of expressions, which his language, and the age +in which he liv'd, allow'd him. Homer's invention was more copious, +Virgil's more confin'd; so that if Homer had not led the way, it was +not in Virgil to have begun heroic poetry; for nothing can be more +evident than that the Roman poem is but the second part of the +_Ilias_; a continuation of the same story, and the persons already +form'd; the manners of Æneas are those of Hector superadded to those +which Homer gave him. The adventures of Ulysses in the _Odysseis_ are +imitated in the first six books of Virgil's _Aeneis_; and tho' the +accidents are not the same, (which would have argued him of a servile, +copying, and total barrenness of invention,) yet the seas were the +same, in which both the heroes wander'd; and Dido cannot be denied to +be the poetical daughter of Calypso. The six latter books of Virgil's +poem are the four and twenty _Iliads_ contracted: a quarrel occasioned +by a lady, a single combat, battles fought, and a town besieg'd. I +say not this in derogation to Virgil, neither do I contradict anything +which I have formerly said in his just praise: for his episodes are +almost wholly of his own invention; and the form which he has given to +the telling makes the tale his own, even tho' the original story had +been the same. But this proves, however, that Homer taught Virgil to +design; and if invention be the first virtue of an epic poet, then the +Latin poem can only be allow'd the second place. Mr. Hobbes, in the +preface to his own bald translation of the _Ilias_ (studying poetry as +he did mathematics, when it was too late)--Mr. Hobbes, I say, begins +the praise of Homer where he should have ended it. He tells us that +the first beauty of an epic poem consists in diction, that is, in +the choice of words, and harmony of numbers; now the words are the +coloring of the work, which in the order of nature is last to +be consider'd. The design, the disposition, the manners, and the +thoughts, are all before it: where any of those are wanting or +imperfect, so much wants or is imperfect in the imitation of human +life; which is in the very definition of a poem. Words, indeed, like +glaring colors, are the first beauties that arise and strike the +sight: but if the draught be false or lame, the figures ill disposed, +the manners obscure or inconsistent, or the thoughts unnatural, +then the finest colors are but daubing, and the piece is a beautiful +monster at the best. Neither Virgil nor Homer were deficient in any of +the former beauties; but in this last, which is expression, the Roman +poet is at least equal to the Grecian, as I have said elsewhere; +supplying the poverty of his language by his musical ear, and by his +diligence. But to return: our two great poets, being so different in +their tempers, one choleric and sanguine, the other phlegmatic and +melancholic; that which makes them excel in their several ways is +that each of them has follow'd his own natural inclination, as well +in forming the design as in the execution of it. The very heroes +shew their authors: Achilles is hot, impatient, revengeful, _Impiger, +iracundus, inexorabidis, acer_[7] &c.; Æneas patient, considerate, +careful of his people, and merciful to his enemies; ever submissive +to the will of Heaven--_Quo fata trahunt retrahuntque seqitamur_.[8] +I could please myself with enlarging on this subject, but am forc'd to +defer it to a fitter time. From all I have said I will only draw this +inference, that the action of Homer being more full of vigor than that +of Virgil, according to the temper of the writer, is of consequence +more pleasing to the reader. One warms you by degrees: the other sets +you on fire all at once, and never intermits his heat. 'Tis the same +difference which Longinus makes betwixt the effects of eloquence in +Demosthenes and Tully. One persuades; the other commands. You never +cool while you read Homer, even not in the second book (a graceful +flattery to his countrymen); but he hastens from the ships, and +concludes not that book till he has made you an amends by the violent +playing of a new machine. From thence he hurries on his action with +variety of events, and ends it in less compass than two months. +This vehemence of his, I confess, is more suitable to my temper; and +therefore I have translated his first book with greater pleasure +than any part of Virgil; but it was not a pleasure without pains. The +continual agitations of the spirits must needs be a weakening of any +constitution, especially in age; and many pauses are required for +refreshment betwixt the heats; the _Iliad_ of itself being a third +part longer than all Virgil's works together. + +This is what I thought needful in this place to say of Homer. I +proceed to Ovid and Chaucer, considering the former only in relation +to the latter. With Ovid ended the golden age of the Roman tongue; +from Chaucer the purity of the English tongue began. The manners of +the poets were not unlike: both of them were well bred, well natur'd, +amorous, and libertine, at least in their writings, it may be also in +their lives. Their studies were the same, philosophy and philology. +Both of them were knowing in astronomy, of which Ovid's books of the +Roman feasts, and Chaucer's treatise of the Astrolabe, are sufficient +witnesses. But Chaucer was likewise an astrologer, as were Virgil, +Horace, Persius, and Manilius. Both writ with wonderful facility and +clearness: neither were great inventors; for Ovid only copied the +Grecian fables; and most of Chaucer's stones were taken from his +Italian contemporaries, or their predecessors.[9] Boccace his +_Decameron_ was first publish'd; and from thence our Englishman has +borrow'd many of his _Canterbury Tales_; yet that of _Palamon and +Arcite_ was written in all probability by some Italian wit in a former +age, as I shall prove hereafter. The tale of Grizild was the invention +of Petrarch; by him sent to Boccace; from whom it came to Chaucer. +_Troilus and Cressida_ was also written by a Lombard author; but much +amplified by our English translator, as well as beautified; the genius +of our countrymen, in general, being rather to improve an invention, +than to invent themselves; as is evident not only in our poetry, but +in many of our manufactures. I find I have anticipated already, and +taken up from Boccace before I come to him; but there is so much +less behind; and I am of the temper of most kings, _who love to be +in debt_, are all for present money, no matter how they pay it +afterwards: besides, the nature of a preface is rambling; never wholly +out of the way, nor in it. This I have learn'd from the practice of +honest Montaigne, and return at my pleasure to Ovid and Chaucer, of +whom I have little more to say. Both of them built on the inventions +of other men; yet since Chaucer had something of his own, as _The Wife +of Bath's Tale, The Cock and the Fox_,[10] which I have translated, +and some others, I may justly give our countryman the precedence in +that part; since I can remember nothing of Ovid which was wholly his. +Both of them understood the manners, under which name I comprehend +the passions, and, in a larger sense, the descriptions of persons, +and their very habits; for an example, I see Baucis and Philemon as +perfectly before me, as if some ancient painter had drawn them; +and all the pilgrims in the _Canterbury Tales_, their humors, their +features, and the very dress, as distinctly as if I had supp'd with +them at the Tabard in Southwark; yet even there too the figures of +Chaucer are much more lively, and set in a better light: which tho' +I have not time to prove, yet I appeal to the reader, and am sure he +will clear me from partiality. The thoughts and words remain to be +consider'd in the comparison of the two poets; and I have sav'd myself +one half of that labor, by owning that Ovid liv'd when the Roman +tongue was in its meridian, Chaucer in the dawning of our language; +therefore that part of the comparison stands not on an equal foot, +any more than the diction of Ennius and Ovid, or of Chaucer and our +present English. The words are given up as a post not to be defended +in our poet, because he wanted the modern art of fortifying. The +thoughts remain to be consider'd, and they are to be measured only by +their propriety; that is, as they flow more or less naturally from +the persons describ'd, on such and such occasions. The vulgar judges, +which are nine parts in ten of all nations, who call conceits and +jingles wit, who see Ovid full of them, and Chaucer altogether +without them, will think me little less than mad, for preferring the +Englishman to the Roman: yet, with their leave, I must presume to say +that the things they admire are only glittering trifles, and so far +from being witty, that in a serious poem they are nauseous, because +they are unnatural. Would any man who is ready to die for love +describe his passion like Narcissus? Would he think of _inopem me +copia fecit_,[11] and a dozen more of such expressions, pour'd on the +neck of one another, and signifying all the same thing? If this were +wit, was this a time to be witty, when the poor wretch was in the +agony of death? This is just John Littlewit in _Bartholomew Fair_,[12] +who had a conceit (as he tells you) left him in his misery; a +miserable conceit. On these occasions the poet should endeavor to +raise pity; but instead of this, Ovid is tickling you to laugh. Virgil +never made use of such machines, when he was moving you to commiserate +the death of Dido: he would not destroy what he was building. Chaucer +makes Arcite violent in his love, and unjust in the pursuit of it; yet +when he came to die, he made him think more reasonably: he repents not +of his love, for that had alter'd his character; but acknowledges +the injustice of his proceedings, and resigns Emilia to Palamon. What +would Ovid have done on this occasion? He would certainly have made +Arcite witty on his deathbed. He had complain'd he was farther off +from possession by being so near, and a thousand such boyisms, which +Chaucer rejected as below the dignity of the subject. They who think +otherwise would by the same reason prefer Lucan and Ovid to Homer and +Virgil, and Martial to all four of them. As for the turn of words, in +which Ovid particularly excels all poets, they are sometimes a fault, +and sometimes a beauty, as they are us'd properly or improperly; but +in strong passions always to be shunn'd, because passions are serious, +and will admit no playing. The French have a high value for them; +and I confess, they are often what they call delicate, when they are +introduced with judgment; but Chaucer writ with more simplicity, and +followed nature more closely, than to use them. I have thus far, to +the best of my knowledge, been an upright judge betwixt the parties in +competition, not meddling with the design nor the disposition of it; +because the design was not their own, and in the disposing of it they +were equal. It remains that I say somewhat of Chaucer in particular. + +In the first place, as he is the father of English poetry, so I hold +him in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians held Homer or the +Romans Virgil. He is a perpetual fountain of good sense, learn'd in +all sciences, and therefore speaks properly on all subjects as he knew +what to say, so he knows also when to leave off, a continence which +is practic'd by few writers, and scarcely by any of the ancients, +excepting Virgil and Horace. One of our late great poets[13] is sunk +in his reputation, because he could never forgive any conceit which +came in his way, but swept like a dragnet, great and small. There +was plenty enough, but the dishes were ill sorted, whole pyramids of +sweetmeats for boys and women, but little of solid meat for men. +All this proceeded not from any want of knowledge, but of judgment, +neither did he want that in discerning the beauties and faults of +other poets, but only indulg'd himself in the luxury of writing, and +perhaps knew it was a fault, but hop'd the reader would not find it. +For this reason, tho' he must always be thought a great poet he is +no longer esteem'd a good writer, and for ten impressions, which his +works have had in so many successive years, yet at present a hundred +books are scarcely purchas'd once a twelvemonth for, as my last Lord +Rochester said, tho' somewhat profanely, "Not being of God, he could +not stand." + +Chaucer follow'd Nature everywhere, but was never so bold to go beyond +her, and there is a great difference of being _poeta_ and _aimis +poeta_,[14] if we may believe Catullus, as much as betwixt a modest +behavior and affectation. The verse of Chaucer, I confess, is not +harmonious to us, but 'tis like the eloquence of one whom Tacitus +commends it was _auribus istius temporis accommodata_[15] they who +liv'd with him, and some time after him, thought it musical and it +continued so even in our judgment, if compar'd with the numbers of +Lydgate and Gower, his contemporaries there is the rude sweetness of +a Scotch tune in it, which is natural and pleasing, tho' not perfect. +'Tis true, I cannot go so far as he who published the last edition of +him [16] for he would make us believe the fault is in our ears, and +that there were really ten syllables in a verse where we find but nine +but this opinion is not worth confuting, 'tis so gross and obvious an +error, that common sense (which is a rule in everything but matters +of faith and revelation) must convince the reader that equality of +numbers in every verse which we call heroic was either not known, +or not always practic'd, in Chaucer's age. It were an easy matter to +produce some thousands of his verses, which are lame for want of half +a foot, and sometimes a whole one, and which no pronunciation can +make otherwise. We can only say, that he liv'd in the infancy of our +poetry, and that nothing is brought to perfection at the first. We +must be children before we grow men. There was an Ennius, and in +process of time a Lucilius and a Lucretius, before Virgil and Horace; +even after Chaucer there was a Spenser, a Harrington, a Fairfax, +before Waller and Denham were in being: and our numbers were in their +nonage till these last appear'd. I need say little of his parentage, +life, and fortunes;[17] they are to be found at large in all the +editions of his works. He was employ'd abroad and favor'd by Edward +the Third, Richard the Second, and Henry the Fourth, and was poet, as +I suppose, to all three of them. In Richard's time, I doubt, he was +a little dipp'd in the rebellion of the commons, and being +brother-in-law to John of Ghant, it was no wonder if he follow'd the +fortunes of that family, and was well with Henry the Fourth when he +had depos'd his predecessor. Neither is it to be admir'd,[18] that +Henry, who was a wise as well as a valiant prince, who claim'd by +succession, and was sensible that his title was not sound, but was +rightfully in Mortimer, who had married the heir of York; it was not +to be admir'd, I say, if that great politician should be pleas'd to +have the greatest wit of those times in his interests, and to be the +trumpet of his praises. Augustus had given him the example, by the +advice of Mæcenas, who recommended Virgil and Horace to him; whose +praises help'd to make him popular while he was alive, and after his +death have made him precious to posterity. As for the religion of +our poet, he seems to have some little bias towards the opinions of +Wycliffe, after John of Ghant his patron; somewhat of which appears in +the tale of Piers Plowman.[19] Yet I cannot blame him for inveighing +so sharply against the vices of the clergy in his age; their pride, +their ambition, their pomp, their avarice, their worldly interest, +deserv'd the lashes which he gave them, both in that and in most of +his _Canterbury Tales_: neither has his contemporary Boccace spar'd +them. Yet both those poets liv'd in much esteem with good and holy +men in orders; for the scandal which is given by particular priests +reflects not on the sacred function. Chaucer's Monk, his Canon, and +his Friar, took not from the character of his Good Parson. A satirical +poet is the check of the laymen on bad priests. We are only to take +care that we involve not the innocent with the guilty in the same +condemnation. The good cannot be too much honor'd, nor the bad too +coarsely us'd: for the corruption of the best becomes the worst. When +a clergyman is whipp'd, his gown is first taken off, by which the +dignity of his order is secur'd: if he be wrongfully accus'd, he has +his action of slander; and 'tis at the poet's peril if he transgress +the law. But they will tell us that all kind of satire, tho' never so +well deserv'd by particular priests, yet brings the whole order into +contempt. Is then the peerage of England anything dishonored, when a +peer suffers for his treason? If he be libel'd or any way defam'd, he +has his _scandalum magnatum_[20] to punish the offender. They who use +this kind of argument seem to be conscious to themselves of somewhat +which has deserv'd the poet's lash, and are less concern'd for their +public capacity than for their private; at least there is pride at the +bottom of their reasoning. If the faults of men in orders are only to +be judg'd among themselves, they are all in some sort parties: for, +since they say the honor of their order is concern'd in every member +of it, how can we be sure that they will be impartial judges? How far +I may be allow'd to speak my opinion in this case, I know not; but I +am sure a dispute of this nature caus'd mischief in abundance betwixt +a king of England and an archbishop of Canterbury,[21] one standing +up for the laws of his land, and the other for the honor (as he call'd +it) of God's Church; which ended in the murther of the prelate, and in +the whipping of his Majesty from post to pillar for his penance. +The learn'd and ingenious Dr. Drake[22] has say'd me the labour of +inquiring into the esteem and reverence which the priests have had +of old, and I would rather extend than diminish any part of it: yet +I must needs say, that when a priest provokes me without any occasion +given him, I have no reason, unless it be the charity of a Christian, +to forgive him: _prior læsit_[23] is justification sufficient in the +civil law. If I answer him in his own language, self-defense, I am +sure, must be allow'd me; and if I carry it farther, even to a sharp +recrimination, somewhat may be indulg'd to human frailty. Yet my +resentment has not wrought so far, but that I have followed Chaucer +in his character of a holy man, and have enlarg'd on that subject with +some pleasure, reserving to myself the right, if I shall think fit +hereafter, to describe another sort of priests, such as are more +easily to be found than the Good Parson; such as have given the last +blow to Christianity in this age, by a practice so contrary to their +doctrine. But this will keep cold till another time. In the mean while +I take up Chaucer where I left him. He must have been a man of a most +wonderful comprehensive nature, because, as it has been truly observed +of him, he has taken into the compass of his _Canterbury Tales_ the +various manners and humors (as we now call them) of the whole English +nation, in his age. Not a single character has escap'd him. All his +pilgrims are severally distinguish'd from each other; and not only +in their inclinations, but in their very physiognomies and persons. +Bapista Porta[24] could not have described their natures better, than +by the marks which the poet gives them. The matter and manner of +their tales, and of their telling, are so suited to their different +educations, humors, and callings, that each of them would be improper +in any other mouth. Even the grave and serious characters are +distinguished by their several sorts of gravity: their discourses are +such as belong to their age, their calling, and their breeding; such +as are becoming of them, and of them only. Some of his persons are +vicious, and some virtuous; some are unlearn'd, or (as Chaucer +calls them) lewd, and some are learn'd. Even the ribaldry of the +low characters is different: the Reeve, the Miller, and the Cook are +several men, and distinguished from each other, as much as the mincing +Lady Prioress and the broad-speaking gap-tooth'd Wife of Bath. But +enough of this: there is such a variety of game springing up before +me, that I am distracted in my choice, and know not which to follow. +'Tis sufficient to say, according to the proverb, that here is God's +plenty. We have our forefathers and great-grandames all before us, +as they were in Chaucer's days; their general characters are still +remaining in mankind, and even in England, tho' they are call'd by +other names than those of Monks and Friars, and Canons, and Lady +Abbesses, and Nuns: for mankind is ever the same, and nothing lost out +of nature, tho' everything is alter'd. May I have leave to do myself +the justice--since my enemies will do me none, and are so far from +granting me to be a good poet, that they will not allow me so much as +to be a Christian, or a moral man--may I have leave, I say, to inform +my reader that I have confin'd my choice to such tales of Chaucer as +savor nothing of immodesty. If I had desir'd more to please than +to instruct, the Reeve, the Miller, the Shipman, the Merchant, the +Sumner, and, above all, the Wife of Bath, in the prologue to her tale, +would have procured me as many friends and readers, as there are beaux +and ladies of pleasure in the town. But I will no more offend against +good manners: I am sensible, as I ought to be, of the scandal I have +given by my loose writings; and make what reparation I am able, +by this public acknowledgment. If anything of this nature, or of +profaneness, be crept into these poems, I am so far from defending it, +that I disown it. _Totum hoc indictum volo._[25] Chaucer makes another +manner of apology for his broad speaking, and Boccace makes the like; +but I will follow neither of them. Our countryman, in the end of his +characters, before the _Canterbury Tales_, thus excuses the ribaldry, +which is very gross in many of his novels: + + But first, I pray you of your courtesy, + That ye ne arrete[26] it nought my villany, + Though that I plainly speak in this mattere + To tellen you her[27] words, and eke her chere: + Ne though I speak her words properly, + For this ye knowen as well as I, + Who shall tellen a tale after a man, + He mote rehearse as nye as ever he can: + Everich word of it been in his charge, + _All speke he never so rudely ne large._ + Or else he mote tellen his tale untrue, + Or feine things, or find words new: + He may not spare, altho he were his brother, + He mote as well say o word as another. + Christ spake himself full broad in holy writ, + And well I wote no villany is it. + Eke Plato saith, who so can him rede, + The words mote[28] been cousin to the dede.[29] + +Yet if a man should have enquired of Boccace or of Chaucer, what need +they had of introducing such characters, where obscene words were +proper in their mouths, but very undecent to be heard; I know not what +answer they could have made: for that reason such tales shall be left +untold by me. You have here a specimen of Chaucer's language, which +is so obsolete that his sense is scarce to be understood; and you +have likewise more than one example of his unequal numbers, which were +mentioned before. Yet many of his verses consist of ten syllables, and +the words not much behind our present English: as for example, these +two lines, in the description of the carpenter's young wife: + + Wincing she was, as is a jolly colt, + Long as a mast, and upright as a bolt. + +I have almost done with Chaucer, when I have answer'd some objections +relating to my present work. I find some people are offended that I +have turn'd these tales into modern English; because they think them +unworthy of my pains, and look on Chaucer as a dry, old-fashion'd wit, +not worth reviving. I have often heard the late Earl of Leicester say +that Mr. Cowley himself was of that opinion; who having read him over +at my lord's request, declar'd he had no taste of him. I dare not +advance my opinion against the judgment of so great an author; but +I think it fair, however, to leave the decision to the public: Mr. +Cowley was too modest to set up for a dictator; and being shock'd +perhaps with his old style, never examin'd into the depth of his +good sense. Chaucer, I confess, is a rough diamond, and must first +be polish'd, ere he shines. I deny not, likewise, that, living in our +early days of poetry, he writes not always of a piece, but sometimes +mingles trivial things with those of greater moment. Sometimes also, +tho' not often, he runs riot, like Ovid, and knows not when he has +said enough. But there are more great wits, beside Chaucer, whose +fault is their excess of conceits, and those ill sorted. An author is +not to write all he can, but only all he ought. Having observ'd this +redundancy in Chaucer, (as it is an easy matter for a man of ordinary +parts to find a fault in one of greater,) I have not tied myself to a +literal translation; but have often omitted what I judg'd unnecessary, +or not of dignity enough to appear in the company of better thoughts. +I have presumed farther, in some places, and added somewhat of my +own where I thought my author was deficient, and had not given his +thoughts their true luster, for want of words in the beginning of our +language. And to this I was the more embolden'd, because (if I may be +permitted to say it of myself) I found I had a soul congenial to his, +and that I had been conversant in the same studies. Another poet, in +another age, may take the same liberty with my writings; if at least +they live long enough to deserve correction. It was also necessary +sometimes to restore the sense of Chaucer, which was lost or mangled +in the errors of the press. Let this example suffice at present; +in the story of _Palawan and Arcite_, where the temple of Diana is +describ'd, you find these verses, in all the editions of our author: + + There saw I Danè turned unto a tree, + I mean not the goddess Diane, + But Venus daughter, which that hight Danè; + +which after a little consideration I knew was to be reformed into this +sense, that Daphne, the daughter of Peneus, was turn'd into a tree. I +durst not make thus bold with Ovid, lest some future Milbourne should +arise, and say I varied from my author, because I understood him not. + +But there are other judges, who think I ought not to have translated +Chaucer into English, out of a quite contrary notion: they suppose +there is a certain veneration due to his old language; and that it +is little less than profanation and sacrilege to alter it. They are +farther of opinion that somewhat of his good sense will suffer in this +transfusion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will infallibly be +lost, which appear with more grace in their old habit. Of this +opinion was that excellent person whom I mention'd, the late Earl of +Leicester, who valued Chaucer as much as Mr. Cowley despis'd him. My +lord dissuaded me from this attempt, (for I was thinking of it some +years before his death,) and his authority prevail'd so far with me +as to defer my undertaking while he liv'd, in deference to him: yet my +reason was not convinc'd with what he urg'd against it. If the first +end of a writer be to be understood, then as his language grows +obsolete, his thoughts must grow obscure: + + Multa renascentur quæ nunc cecidere; cadentque, + Quæ nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus, + Quem penes arbitrium est et jus et norma loquendi.[30] + +When an ancient word for its sound and significance deserves to be +reviv'd, I have that reasonable veneration for antiquity, to restore +it. All beyond this is superstition. Words are not like landmarks, so +sacred as never to be remov'd; customs are chang'd, and even statutes +are silently repeal'd, when the reason ceases for which they were +enacted. As for the other part of the argument, that his thoughts +will lose of their original beauty, by the innovation of words; in +the first place, not only their beauty, but their being is lost, where +they are no longer understood, which is the present case. I grant +that something must be lost in all transfusion, that is, in all +translations; but the sense will remain, which would otherwise be +lost, or at least be maim'd, when it is scarce intelligible; and +that but to a few. How few are there who can read Chaucer so as to +understand him perfectly! And if imperfectly, then with less profit +and no pleasure. 'Tis not for the use of some old Saxon friends that I +have taken these pains with him: let them neglect my version, because +they have no need of it. I made it for their sakes who understand +sense and poetry as well as they, when that poetry and sense is put +into words which they understand. I will go farther, and dare to add, +that what beauties I lose in some places, I give to others which had +them not originally; but in this I may be partial to myself; let the +reader judge, and I submit to his decision. Yet I think I have just +occasion to complain of them, who, because they understand Chaucer, +would deprive the greater part of their countrymen of the same +advantage, and hoard him up, as misers do their grandam gold, only to +look on it themselves and hinder others from making use of it. In +sum, I seriously protest that no man ever had, or can have, a greater +veneration for Chaucer, than myself. I have translated some part +of his works, only that I might perpetuate his memory, or at least +refresh it, amongst my countrymen. If I have alter'd him anywhere for +the better, I must at the same time acknowledge that I could have done +nothing without him: _facile est inventis addere_,[31] is no great +commendation; and I am not so vain to think I have deserv'd a greater. +I will conclude what I have to say of him singly, with this one +remark: a lady of my acquaintance, who keeps a kind of correspondence +with some authors of the fair sex in France, has been inform'd by +them, that Mademoiselle de Scudéry, who is as old as Sibyl, and +inspir'd like her by the same God of Poetry, is at this time +translating Chaucer into modern French. From which I gather that +he has been formerly translated into the old Provençal (for how she +should come to understand old English I know not). But the matter of +fact being true, it makes me think that there is something in it like +fatality; that, after certain periods of time, the fame and memory +of great wits should be renewed, as Chaucer is both in France and +England. If this be wholly chance, 't is extraordinary, and I dare not +call it more, for fear of being tax'd with superstition. + +Boccace comes last to be consider'd, who living in the same age with +Chaucer, had the same genius, and follow'd the same studies: both +writ novels, and each of them cultivated his mother tongue. But the +greatest resemblance of our two modern authors being in their familiar +style, and pleasing way of relating comical adventures, I may pass it +over, because I have translated nothing from Boccace of that nature. +In the serious part of poetry, the advantage is wholly on Chaucer's +side; for tho' the Englishman has borrow'd many tales from the +Italian, yet it appears that those of Boccace were not generally of +his own making, but taken from authors of former ages, and by him only +model'd; so that what there was of invention in either of them may be +judg'd equal. But Chaucer has refin'd on Boccace, and has mended the +stones which he has borrowed, in his way of telling; tho' prose +allows more liberty of thought, and the expression is more easy when +unconfin'd by numbers. Our countryman carries weight, and yet wins the +race at disadvantage. I desire not the reader should take my word, and +therefore I will set two of their discourses on the same subject, +in the same light, for every man to judge betwixt them. I translated +Chaucer first, and, amongst the rest, pitch'd on _The Wife of Bath's +Tale_; not daring, as I have said, to adventure on her prologue, +because 't is too licentious: there Chaucer introduces an old woman +of mean parentage, whom a youthful knight of noble blood was forc'd to +marry, and consequently loath'd her; the crone being in bed with him +on the wedding night, and finding his aversion, endeavors to win his +affection by reason, and speaks a good word for herself (as who could +blame her?) in hope to mollify the sullen bridegroom. She takes her +topics from the benefits of poverty, the advantages of old age and +ugliness, the vanity of youth, and the silly pride of ancestry and +titles without inherent virtue, which is the true nobility. When I had +clos'd Chaucer, I returned to Ovid, and translated some more of his +fables; and by this time had so far forgotten _The Wife of Bath's +Tale_, that, when I took up Boccace, unawares I fell on the same +argument of preferring virtue to nobility of blood, and titles, in the +story of Sigismonda; which I had certainly avoided for the resemblance +of the two discourses, if my memory had not fail'd me. Let the reader +weigh them both; and if he thinks me partial to Chaucer, 't is in him +to right Boccace. + +I prefer in our countryman, far above all his other stories, the noble +poem of _Palamon and Arcite_, which is of the epic kind, and perhaps +not much inferior to the _Ilias_ or the _Æneis_: the story is more +pleasing than either of them, the manners as perfect, the diction as +poetical, the learning as deep and various, and the disposition full +as artful; only it includes a greater length of time, as taking up +seven years at least, but Aristotle has left undecided the duration of +the action; which yet is easily reduc'd into the compass of a year, +by a narration of what preceded the return of Palamon to Athens. I had +thought for the honor of our nation, and more particularly for his, +whose laurel, tho' unworthy, I have worn after him, that this story +was of English growth, and Chaucer's own; but I was undeceiv'd by +Boccace; for, casually looking on the end of his seventh _Giornata_, +I found Dionco (under which name he shadows himself) and Fiametta +(who represents his mistress, the natural daughter of Robert, King of +Naples), of whom these words are spoken: _Dionco e Fiametta gran pezza +cantarono insieme d'Arcita, e di Palamone_:[32] by which it appears +that this story was written before the time of Boccace; but, the name +of its author being wholly lost, Chaucer is now become an original; +and I question not but the poem has receiv'd many beauties by passing +thro' his noble hands. Besides this tale, there is another of his own +invention, after the manner of the Provençals, call'd _The Flower and +the Leaf_,[33] with which I was so particularly pleas'd, both for the +invention and the moral, that I cannot hinder myself from recommending +it to the reader. + +As a corollary to this preface, in which I have done justice to +others, I owe somewhat to myself: not that I think it worth my time +to enter the lists with one M----,[34] or one B----,[35] but barely +to take notice, that such men there are who have written scurrilously +against me, without any provocation. M----, who is in orders, pretends +amongst the rest this quarrel to me, that I have fallen foul on +priesthood: if I have, I am only to ask pardon of good priests, and +am afraid his part of the reparation will come to little. Let him to +satisfied that he shall not be able to force himself upon me for an +adversary. I contemn him too much to enter into competition with him. +His own translations of Virgil have answer'd his criticisms on mine. +If (as they say he has declar'd in print) he prefers the version of +Ogleby to mine, the world has made him the same compliment: for 't is +agreed on all hands, that he writes even below Ogleby: that, you will +say, is not easily to be done; but what cannot M---- bring about? I am +satisfied, however, that while he and I live together, I shall not be +thought the worst poet of the age. It looks as if I had desir'd him +underhand to write so ill against me; but upon my honest word I have +not brib'd him to do me this service, and am wholly guiltless of his +pamphlet. 'T is true, I should be glad if I could persuade him to +continue his good offices, and write such another critique on anything +of mine for I find by experience he has a great stroke with the +reader, when he condemns any of my poems, to make the world have a +better opinion of them. He has taken some pains with my poetry, but +nobody will be persuaded to take the same with his. If I had taken +to the Church, (as he affirms, but which was never in my thoughts,) +I should have had more sense, if not more grace, than to have turn'd +myself out of my benefice by writing libels on my parishioners. But +his account of my manners and my principles are of a piece with his +cavils and his poetry; and so I have done with him for ever. + +As for the City Bard, or Knight Physician, I hear his quarrel to me is +that I was the author of _Absalom and Achitophel_, which, he thinks, +is a little hard on his fanatic patrons in London. + +But I will deal the more civilly with his two poems, because nothing +ill is to be spoken of the dead; and therefore peace be to the _manes_ +of his _Arthurs_. I will only say that it was not for this noble +knight that I drew the plan of an epic poem on King Arthur, in my +preface to the translation of Juvenal. The guardian angels of kingdoms +were machines too ponderous for him to manage; and therefore he +rejected them, as Dares did the whirlbats of Eryx, when they were +thrown before him by Entellus. Yet from that preface he plainly took +his hint: for he began immediately upon the story, tho' he had the +baseness not to acknowledge his benefactor but, instead of it, to +traduce me in a libel. + +I shall say the less of Mr. Collier, because in many things he +has tax'd me justly; and I have pleaded guilty to all thoughts +and expressions of mine which can be truly argued of obscenity, +profaneness, of immorality; and retract them. If he be my enemy, +let him triumph; if he be my friend, as I have given him no personal +occasion to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance. It becomes +me not to draw my pen in the defense of a bad cause, when I have so +often drawn it for a good one. Yet it were not difficult to prove +that in many places he has perverted my meaning by his glosses, and +interpreted my words into blasphemy and bawdry, of which they were +not guilty. Besides that, he is too much given to horseplay in his +raillery, and comes to battle like a dictator from the plow. I will +not say: "The zeal of God's house has eaten him up;" but I am sure it +has devoured some part of his good manners and civility. It might also +be doubted whether it were altogether zeal which prompted him to this +rough manner of proceeding: perhaps it became not one of his function +to rake into the rubbish of ancient and modern plays; a divine might +have employ'd his pains to better purpose than in the nastiness of +Plautus and Aristophanes; whose examples, as they excuse not me, so +it might be possibly supposed that he read them not without some +pleasure. They who have written commentaries on those poets, or on +Horace, Juvenal, and Martial, have explain'd some vices which, without +their interpretation, had been unknown to modern times. Neither has he +judg'd impartially betwixt the former age and us. + +There is more bawdry in one play of Fletcher's, call'd _The Custom of +the Country_, than in all ours together. Yet this has been often acted +on the stage in my remembrance. Are the times so much more reform'd +now than they were five and twenty years ago? If they are, I +congratulate the amendment of our morals. But I am not to prejudice +the cause of my fellow poets, tho' I abandon my own defense: they have +some of them answer'd for themselves, and neither they nor I can think +Mr. Collier so formidable an enemy that we should shun him. He has +lost ground at the latter end of the day, by pursuing his point too +far, like the Prince of Condé at the battle of Seneffe: from immoral +plays to no plays, _ab abusu ad usum, non valet consequentia_[36]. But +being a party, I am not to erect myself into a judge. As for the rest +of those who have written against me, they are such scoundrels that +they deserve not the least notice to be taken of them, B---- and M---- +are only distinguish'd from the crowd by being remember'd to their +infamy: + + --Demetri, teque Tigelli[37] + Discipulorum inter jubeo plorare cathedras. + + +[Footnote A: John Dryden (1631-1700), the great dramatic and satirical +poet of the later seventeenth century, whose translation of Virgil's +"Æneid" appears in another volume of the Harvard Classics, deserves +hardly less distinction as a prose writer than as a poet. The present +essay, prefixed to a volume of narrative poems, is largely concerned +with Chaucer, and in its genial and penetrating criticism, expressed +with characteristic clearness and vigor, can be seen the ground for +naming Dryden the first of English literary critics, and the founder +of modern prose style.] + +[Footnote 1: Scott suggests that the allusion is to the Duke of +Buckingham, who was often satirized for the slow progress of his great +mansion at Chefden.] + +[Footnote 2: Boccaccio did not invent this stanza, which had been used +in both French and Italian before his day, but he did constitute it +the Italian form for heroic verse.] + +[Footnote 3: Rymer misled Dryden. There is no trace of Provençal +influence on Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 4: The foundation layer of color in a painting.] + +[Footnote 5: "Verses without content, melodious trifles."--_Ars Poet_. +322.] + +[Footnote 6: Jeremy Collier, in his _Short View of the Immortality and +Profaneness of the Stage_, 1698.] + +[Footnote 7: "Energetic, irascible, unyielding, vehement."--Horace, +_Ars Poet._121.] + +[Footnote 8: "Whithersoever the fates drag us to and fro, let us +follow."--Virgil, _Æneid_, v. 709.] + +[Footnote 9: The statements that follow as to Chaucer's sources are +mostly not in accord with the results of modern scholarship.] + +[Footnote 10: The plot of neither of these poems was original with +Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 11: "Plenty has made me poor."--_Meta._ iii, 466.] + +[Footnote 12: By Ben Jonson.] + +[Footnote 13: Cowley] + +[Footnote 14: 'Too much a poet'--Martial iii 44 (not Catullus)] + +[Footnote 15: Suited to the ears of that time] + +[Footnote 16: Speght, whom modern scholarship has shown to be right in +this matter.] + +[Footnote 17: What follows on Chaucer's life is full of errors.] + +[Footnote 18: Wondered at] + +[Footnote 19: A spurious "Plowman's Tale" was included in the older +editions of Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 20: A law term for slander of a man of high rank, involving +more severe punishment than ordinary slander.] + +[Footnote 21: Henry II. and Thomas à Becket.] + +[Footnote 22: Dr. James Drake wrote a reply to Jeremy Collier's _Short +View_.] + +[Footnote 23: "He did the first injury"] + +[Footnote 24: A Neapolitan physician who wrote on physiognomy.] + +[Footnote 25: "I wish all this unsaid."] + +[Footnote 26: Reckon.] + +[Footnote 27: Their.] + +[Footnote 28: Must.] + +[Footnote 29: The corrupt state of the text of this passage is enough +to explain why Dryden found Chaucer rough.] + +[Footnote 30: "Many words which have now fallen out of use shall be +born again; and others which are now in honor shall fall, if custom +wills it, in the force of which lie the judgement and law and rules of +speech."--Horace _Ars Poet._ 70-72.] + +[Footnote 31: "It is easy to add to what is already invented."] + +[Footnote 32: Dionco and Fiametta sang together a long time of Arcite +and Palamon.] + +[Footnote 33: Not by Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 34: Rev. Luke Milbourne, who had attacked Dryden's Virgil.] + +[Footnote 35: Sir Richard Blackmore, who had censured Dryden for the +indecency of his writings.] + +[Footnote 36: "The argument from abuse to use is not valid."] + +[Footnote 37: "You, Demetrius and Tigellius, I bid lament among +the chairs of your scholars." Blackmore had once been a +schoolmaster.--Noyes.] + + + + +PREFACE TO JOSEPH ANDREWS + +BY HENRY FIELDING (1742)[A] + +THE COMIC EPIC IN PROSE + + +As it is possible the mere English reader may have a different idea of +romance with the author of these little volumes; and may consequently +expect a kind of entertainment, not to be found, nor which was even +intended, in the following pages; it may not be improper to premise a +few words concerning this kind of writing, which I do not remember to +have seen hitherto attempted in our language. + +The EPIC, as well as the DRAMA, is divided into tragedy and comedy. +HOMER, who was the father of this species of poetry, gave us the +pattern of both these, tho' that of the latter kind is entirely lost; +which Aristotle tells us, bore the same relation to comedy which his +Iliad bears to tragedy. And perhaps, that we have no more instances of +it among the writers of antiquity, is owing to the loss of this +great pattern, which, had it survived, would have found its imitators +equally with the other poems of this great original. + +And farther, as this poetry may be tragic or comic, I will not scruple +to say it may be likewise either in verse or prose: for tho' it wants +one particular, which the critic enumerates in the constituent parts +of an epic poem, namely, metre; yet, when any kind of writing contains +all its other parts, such as fable, action, characters, sentiments, +and diction, and is deficient in metre only, it seems, I think, +reasonable to refer it to the epic; at least, as no critic hath +thought proper to range it under any other head, nor to assign it a +particular name to itself. + +Thus the Telemachus of the archbishop of Cambray appears to me of the +epic kind, as well as the Odyssey of Homer, indeed, it is much fairer +and more reasonable to give it a name common with that species from +which it differs only in a single instance, than to confound it with +those which it resembles in no other. Such are those voluminous works, +commonly called Romances, namely Clelia, Cleopatra, Astræa, Cassandra, +the Grand Cyrus, and innumerable others which contain, as I apprehend, +very little instruction or entertainment. + +Now, a comic romance is a comic epic-poem in prose; differing from +comedy, as the serious epic from tragedy: its action being more +extended and comprehensive; containing a much larger circle of +incidents, and introducing a greater variety of characters. It differs +from the serious romance in its fable and action, in this: that as in +the one these are grave and solemn, so in the other they are light and +ridiculous; it differs in its characters, by introducing persons of +inferiour rank, and consequently of inferiour manners, whereas the +grave romance sets the highest before us; lastly in its sentiments and +diction; by preserving the ludicrous instead of the sublime. In the +diction I think, burlesque itself may be sometimes admitted; of which +many instances will occur in this work, as in the description of the +battles, and some other places not necessary to be pointed out to the +classical reader; for whose entertainment those parodies or burlesque +imitations are chiefly calculated. + +But tho' we have sometimes admitted this in our diction, we have +carefully excluded it from our sentiments and characters; for there +it is never properly introduced, unless in writings of the burlesque +kind, which this is not intended to be. Indeed, no two species of +writing can differ more widely than the comic and the burlesque: +for as the latter is ever the exhibition of what is monstrous and +unnatural, and where our delight, if we examine it, arises from the +surprising absurdity, as in appropriating the manners of the highest +to the lowest, or _è converso_; so in the former, we should ever +confine ourselves strictly to nature, from the just imitation of +which, will flow all the pleasure we can this way convey to a sensible +reader. And perhaps, there is one reason, why a comic writer should +of all others be the least excused for deviating from nature, since +it may not be always so easy for a serious poet to meet with the great +and the admirable; but life everywhere furnishes an accurate observer +with the ridiculous. + +I have hinted this little, concerning burlesque; because I have often +heard that name given to performances, which have been truly of the +comic kind, from the author's having sometimes admitted it in his +diction only; which as it is the dress of poetry, doth like the dress +of men establish characters, (the one of the whole poem, and the other +of the whole man), in vulgar opinion, beyond any of their greater +excellences: but surely, a certain drollery in style, where characters +and sentiments are perfectly natural, no more constitutes the +burlesque, than an empty pomp and dignity of words, where everything +else is mean and low, can entitle any performance to the appellation +of the true sublime. + +And I apprehend, my Lord Shaftesbury's opinion of mere burlesque +agrees with mine, when he asserts, "There is no such thing to be found +in the writings of the antients." But perhaps I have less abhorrence +than he professes for it: and that not because I have had some little +success on the stage this way; but rather as it contributes more to +exquisite mirth and laughter than any other; and these are probably +more wholesome physic for the mind, and conduce better to purge away +spleen, melancholy, and ill affections, than is generally imagined. +Nay, I will appeal to common observation, whether the same companies +are not found more full of good-humour and benevolence, after they +have been sweetened for two or three hours with entertainments of this +kind, than soured by a tragedy or a grave lecture. + +But to illustrate all this by another science, in which, perhaps, we +shall see the distinction more clearly and plainly: let us examine the +works of a comic history-painter, with those performances which +the Italians call _Caricatura_, where we shall find the greatest +excellence of the former to consist in the exactest copy of nature, +insomuch, that a judicious eye instantly rejects anything _outré_, any +liberty which the painter hath taken with the features of that _alma +mater_. Whereas in the _Caricatura_ we allow all licence. Its aim is +to exhibit monsters, not men, and all distortions and exaggerations +whatever are within its proper province. + +Now what Caricatura is in painting Burlesque is in writing, and in the +same manner the comic writer and painter correlate to each other. And +here I shall observe, that as in the former, the painter seems to have +the advantage, so it is in the latter infinitely on the side of the +writer, for the Monstrous is much easier to paint than describe, and +the Ridiculous to describe than paint. + +And tho' perhaps this latter species doth not in either science so +strongly affect and agitate the muscles as the other, yet it will be +owned I believe, that a more rational and useful pleasure arises to us +from it. He who should call the ingenious Hogarth a burlesque painter, +would, in my opinion, do him very little honour: for sure it is much +easier, much less the subject of admiration, to paint a man with a +nose, or any other feature of a preposterous size, or to expose him in +some absurd or monstrous attitude, than to express the affections of +men on canvas. It hath been thought a vast commendation of a painter +to say his figures _seem to breathe_, but surely it is a much greater +and nobler applause, _that they appear to think_. + +But to return The Ridiculous only, as I have before said, falls within +my province in the present work. Nor will some explanation of this +word be thought impertinent by the reader, if he considers how +wonderfully it hath been mistaken, even by writers who have profess'd +it; for to what but such a mistake, can we attribute the many attempts +to ridicule the blackest villainies, and what is yet worse the most +dreadful calamities? What could exceed the absurdity of an author, who +should write the comedy of Nero, with the merry incident of ripping +up his mother's belly, or what would give a greater shock to humanity +than an attempt to expose the miseries of poverty and distress to +ridicule? And yet, the reader will not want much learning to suggest +such instances to himself. + +Besides, it may seem remarkable, that Aristotle, who is so fond and +free of definitions, hath not thought proper to define the Ridiculous. +Indeed, where he tells us it is proper to comedy, he hath remarked +that villainy is not its object: but that he hath not, as I remember, +positively asserted what is. Nor doth the Abbé Bellegarde, who hath +written a treatise on this subject, tho' he shows us many species of +it, once trace it to its fountain. + +The only source of the true Ridiculous (as it appears to me) is +affectation. But tho' it arises from one spring only, when we consider +the infinite streams into which this one branches, we shall presently +cease to admire at the copious field it affords to an observer. +Now affectation proceeds from one of these two causes; vanity, or +hypocrisy: for as vanity puts us on affecting false characters, in +order to purchase applause; so hypocrisy sets us on an endeavour to +avoid censure by concealing our vices under an appearance of their +opposite virtues. And tho' these two causes are often confounded, +(for they require some distinguishing;) yet, as they proceed from +very different motives, so they are as clearly distinct in their +operations: for indeed, the affectation which arises from vanity is +nearer to truth than the other; as it hath not that violent repugnancy +of nature to struggle with, which that of the hypocrite hath. It +may be likewise noted, that affectation doth not imply an absolute +negation of those qualities which are affected: and therefore, tho', +when it proceeds from hypocrisy, it be nearly allied to deceit; +yet when it comes from vanity only, it partakes of the nature of +ostentation: for instance, the affectation of liberality in a vain +man, differs visibly from the same affectation in the avaricious; for +tho' the vain man is not what he would appear, or hath not the virtue +he affects, to the degree he would be thought to have it; yet it sits +less awkwardly on him than on the avaricious man, who is the very +reverse of what he would seem to be. + +From the discovery of this affectation arises the Ridiculous--which +always strikes the reader with surprize and pleasure; and that in a +higher and stronger degree when the affectation arises from hypocrisy, +than when from vanity: for to discover any one to be the exact +reverse of what he affects, is more surprizing, and consequently more +ridiculous, than to find him a little deficient in the quality he +desires the reputation of. I might observe that our Ben Jonson, who +of all men understood the Ridiculous the best, hath chiefly used the +hypocritical affectation. + +Now from affectation only, the misfortunes and calamities of life, +or the imperfections of nature, may become the objects of ridicule. +Surely he hath a very ill-framed mind, who can look on ugliness, +infirmity, or poverty, as ridiculous in themselves: nor do I believe +any man living who meets a dirty fellow riding through the streets in +a cart, is struck with an idea of the Ridiculous from it; but if he +should see the same figure descend from his coach and six, or bolt +from his chair with his hat under his arm, he would then begin to +laugh, and with justice. In the same manner, were we to enter a poor +house and behold a wretched family shivering with cold and languishing +with hunger, it would not incline us to laughter, (at least we must +have very diabolical natures, if it would): but should we discover +there a grate, instead of coals, adorned with flowers, empty plate or +china dishes on the side-board, or any other affectation of riches and +finery either on their persons or in their furniture: we might then +indeed be excused, for ridiculing so fantastical an appearance. +Much less are natural imperfections the object of derision: but when +ugliness aims at the applause of beauty, or lameness endeavours to +display agility; it is then that these unfortunate circumstances, +which at first moved our compassion, tend only to raise our mirth. + +The poet carries this very far; + + None are for being what they are in fault, + But for not being what they would be thought. + +Where if the metre would suffer the word Ridiculous to close the first +line, the thought would be rather more proper. Great vices are the +proper objects of our detestation, smaller faults of our pity: but +affectation appears to me the only true source of the Ridiculous. + +But perhaps it may be objected to me, that I have against my own rules +introduced vices, and of a very black kind into this work. To this I +shall answer: First, that it is very difficult to pursue a series of +human actions and keep clear from them. Secondly, that the vices to +be found here, are rather the accidental consequences of some human +frailty, or foible, than causes habitually existing in the mind. +Thirdly, that they are never set forth as the objects of ridicule, +but detestation. Fourthly, that they are never the principal figure at +that time on the scene; lastly, they never produce the intended evil. + + +[Footnote A: Henry Fielding, dramatist, novelist, and judge, was born +near Glastonbury, Somersetshire, April 22, 1707, and died at Lisbon, +October 8, 1754. Though seldom spoken of as an essayist, Fielding +scattered through his novels a large number of detached or detachable +discussions which are essentially essays, of which the preface +to "Joseph Andrews" on the "Comic Epic in Prose," is a favorable +specimen. The novel which it introduces was begun as a parody on +Richardson's "Pamela," and the preface gives Fielding's conception of +this form of fiction.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH DICTIONARY + +BY SAMUEL JOHNSON (1755)[A] + + +It is the fate of those who toil at the lower employments of life, to +be rather driven by the fear of evil, than attracted by the prospect +of good; to be exposed to censure, without hope of praise; to be +disgraced by miscarriage, or punished for neglect, where success would +have been without applause; and diligence without reward. + +Among these unhappy mortals is the writer of dictionaries; whom +mankind have considered, not as the pupil, but the slave of science, +the pioneer of literature, doomed only to remove rubbish and clear +obstructions from the paths through which Learning and Genius press +forward to conquest and glory, without bestowing a smile on the humble +drudge that facilitates their progress. Every other author may aspire +to praise; the lexicographer can only hope to escape reproach, and +even this negative recompense has been yet granted to very few. + +I have, notwithstanding this discouragement, attempted a Dictionary of +the English Language, which, while it was employed in the cultivation +of every species of literature, has itself been hitherto neglected; +suffered to spread, under the direction of chance, into wild +exuberance; resigned to the tyranny of time and fashion: and exposed +to the corruptions of ignorance, and caprices of innovation. + +When I took the first survey of my undertaking, I found our speech +copious without order, and energetic without rule: wherever I turned +my view, there was perplexity to be disentangled and confusion to be +regulated; choice was to be made out of boundless variety, without any +established principle of selection; adulterations were to be detected, +without a settled test of purity; and modes of expression to be +rejected or received, without the suffrages of any writers of +classical reputation or acknowledged authority. + +Having therefore no assistance but from general grammar, I applied +myself to the perusal of our writers; and noting whatever might be of +use to ascertain or illustrate any word or phrase, accumulated in time +the materials of a dictionary, which, by degrees, I reduced to +method, establishing to myself, in the progress of the work, such as +experience and analogy suggested to me; experience, which practice and +observation were continually increasing; and analogy, which, though in +some words obscure, was evident in others. + +In adjusting the ORTHOGRAPHY, which has been to this time +unsettled and fortuitous, I found it necessary to distinguish those +irregularities that are inherent in our tongue, and perhaps coeval +with it, from others which the ignorance or negligence of later +writers has produced. Every language has its anomalies, which though +inconvenient, and in themselves once unnecessary, must be tolerated +among the imperfections of human things, and which require only to be +registered, that they may not be increased; and ascertained, that +they may not be confounded: but every language has likewise +its improprieties and absurdities, which it is the duty of the +lexicographer to correct or proscribe. + +As language was at its beginning merely oral, all words of necessary +or common use were spoken before they were written; and while they +were unfixed by any visible signs, must have been spoken with great +diversity, as we now observe those who cannot read to catch sounds +imperfectly, and utter them negligently. When this wild and barbarous +jargon was first reduced to an alphabet, every penman endeavored to +express, as he could, the sounds which he was accustomed to pronounce +or to receive, and vitiated in writing such words as were already +vitiated in speech. The powers of the letters, when they were applied +to a new language, must have been vague and unsettled, and +therefore different hands would exhibit the same sound by different +combinations. + +From this uncertain pronunciation arise in a great part the various +dialects of the same country, which will always be observed to grow +fewer, and less different, as books are multiplied; and from this +arbitrary representation of sounds by letters proceeds that diversity +of spelling observable in the Saxon remains, and I suppose in the +first books of every nation, which perplexes or destroys analogy, +and produces anomalous formations, which, being once incorporated can +never be afterward dismissed or reformed. + +Of this kind are the derivatives _length_ from _long_, _strength_ from +_strong_, _darling_ from _dear_, _breadth_ from _broad_, from _dry_, +_drought_, and from _high_, _height_, which Milton, in zeal for +analogy, writes highth. 'Quid te exempta juvat spinis de pluribus +una?' To change all would be too much, and to change one is nothing. + +This uncertainty is most frequent in the vowels, which are so +capriciously pronounced, and so differently modified, by accident or +affectation, not only in every province, but in every mouth, that to +them, as is well known to etymologists, little regard is to be shown +in the deduction of one language from another. + +Such defects are not errors in orthography, but spots of barbarity +impressed so deep in the English language, that criticism can +never wash them away: these, therefore, must be permitted to remain +untouched; but many words have likewise been altered by accident, or +depraved by ignorance, as the pronunciation of the vulgar has been +weakly followed; and some still continue to be variously written, +as authors differ in their care or skill: of these it was proper +to inquire the true orthography, which I have always considered as +depending on their derivation, and have therefore referred them to +their original languages; thus I write _enchant_, _enchantment_, +_enchanter_, after the French, and _incantation_ after the Latin; thus +_entire_ is chosen rather than _intire_, because it passed to us not +from the Latin _integer_, but from the French _entier_. + +Of many words it is difficult to say whether they were immediately +received from the Latin or the French, since at the time when we had +dominions in France, we had Latin service in our churches. It is, +however, my opinion that the French generally supplied us; for we +have few Latin words, among the terms of domestic use, which are not +French; but many French, which are very remote from Latin. + +Even in words of which the derivation is apparent, I have been often +obliged to sacrifice uniformity to custom; thus I write, in compliance +with a numberless majority, _convey_ and _inveigh_, _deceit_ and +_receipt_, _fancy_ and _phantom_; sometimes the derivative varies +from the primitive, as _explain_ and _explanation_, _repeat_ and +_repetition_. + +Some combinations of letters having the same power, are used +indifferently without any discoverable reason of choice, as in +_choak, choke; soap, sope; fewel, fuel_, and many others; which I have +sometimes inserted twice, that those who search for them under either +form, may not search in vain. + +In examining the orthography of any doubtful word, the mode of +spelling by which it is inserted in the series of the dictionary, is +to be considered as that to which I give, perhaps not often rashly, +the preference. I have left, in the examples, to every author his own +practice unmolested, that the reader may balance suffrages, and +judge between us: but this question is not always to be determined +by reputed or by real learning; some men, intent upon greater things, +have thought little on sounds and derivations; some, knowing in the +ancient tongues, have neglected those in which our words are commonly +to be sought. Thus Hammond writes _fecibleness_ for _feasibleness_, +because I suppose he imagined it derived immediately from the +Latin; and some words, such as _dependant, dependent; dependance, +dependence_, vary their final syllable, as one or other language is +present to the writer. + +In this part of the work, where caprice has long wantoned without +control, and vanity sought praise by petty reformation, I have +endeavored to proceed with a scholar's reverence for antiquity, and a +grammarian's regard to the genius of our tongue. I have attempted few +alterations, and among those few, perhaps the greater part is from +the modern to the ancient practice; and I hope I may be allowed to +recommend to those, whose thoughts have been perhaps employed too +anxiously on verbal singularities, not to disturb, upon narrow views, +or for minute propriety, the orthography of their fathers. It has been +asserted, that for the law to be _known_, is of more importance +than to be _right_. 'Change,' says Hooker, 'is not made without +inconvenience, even from worse to better.' There is in constancy +and stability a general and lasting advantage, which will always +overbalance the slow improvements of gradual correction. Much less +ought our written language to comply with the corruptions of oral +utterance, or copy that which every variation of time or place makes +different from itself, and imitate those changes, which will again be +changed, while imitation is employed in observing them. + +This recommendation of steadiness and uniformity does not proceed from +an opinion that particular combinations of letters have much influence +on human happiness; or that truth may not be successfully taught by +modes of spelling fanciful and erroneous; I am not yet so lost in +lexicography as to forget that 'words are the daughters of earth, and +that things are the sons of heaven.' Language is only the instrument +of science, and words are but the signs of ideas: I wish, however, +that the instrument might be less apt to decay, and that signs might +be permanent, like the things which they denote. + +In settling the orthography, I have not wholly neglected the +pronunciation, which I have directed, by printing an accent upon the +acute or elevated syllable. It will sometimes be found that the accent +is placed by the author quoted, on a different syllable from that +marked in the alphabetical series; it is then to be understood, that +custom has varied, or that the author has, in my opinion, pronounced +wrong. Short directions are sometimes given where the sound of letters +is irregular; and if they are sometimes omitted, defect in such minute +observations will be more easily excused, than superfluity. + +In the investigation, both of the orthography and signification of +words, their ETYMOLOGY was necessarily to be considered, and they were +therefore to be divided into primitives and derivatives. A primitive +word is that which can be traced no further to any English root; +thus _circumspect, circumvent, circumstance, delude, concave_, and +_complicate_, though compounds in the Latin, are to us primitives. +Derivatives, are all those that can be referred to any word in English +of greater simplicity. + +The derivatives I have referred to their primitives, with an accuracy +sometimes needless; for who does not see that _remoteness_ comes +from _remote_, _lovely_ from _love_, _concavity_ from _concave_, and +_demonstrative_ from _demonstrate_? But this grammatical exuberance +the scheme of my work did not allow me to repress. It is of great +importance, in examining the general fabric of a language, to trace +one word from another, by noting the usual modes of derivation and +inflection; and uniformity must be preserved in systematical works; +though sometimes at the expense of particular propriety. + +Among other derivatives I have been careful to insert and elucidate +the anomalous plurals of nouns and preterites of verbs, which in the +Teutonic dialects are very frequent, and, though familiar to those +who have always used them, interrupt and embarrass the learners of our +language. + +The two languages from which our primitives have been derived, are +the Roman and Teutonic: under the Roman, I comprehend the French and +provincial tongues; and under the Teutonic, range the Saxon, German, +and all their kindred dialects. Most of our polysyllables are Roman, +and our words of one syllable are very often Teutonic. + +In assigning the Roman original, it has perhaps sometimes happened +that I have mentioned only the Latin, when the word was borrowed +from the French; and considering myself as employed only in the +illustration of my own language, I have not been very careful to +observe whether the Latin would be pure or barbarous, or the French +elegant or obsolete. + +For the Teutonic etymologies, I am commonly indebted to Junius and +Skinner, the only names which I have forborne to quote when I copied +their books; not that I might appropriate their labors or usurp their +honors, but that I might spare perpetual repetition by one general +acknowledgment. Of these, whom I ought not to mention but with the +reverence due to instructors and benefactors, Junius appears to +have excelled in extent of learning, and Skinner in rectitude of +understanding. Junius was accurately skilled in all the northern +languages, Skinner probably examined the ancient and remoter dialects +only by occasional inspection into dictionaries; but the learning of +Junius is often of no other use than to show him a track by which he +may deviate from his purpose, to which Skinner always presses forward +by the shortest way. Skinner is often ignorant, but never ridiculous: +Junius is always full of knowledge; but his variety distracts his +judgment, and his learning is very frequently disgraced by his +absurdities. + +The votaries of the northern muses will not perhaps easily restrain +their indignation, when they find the name of Junius thus degraded +by a disadvantageous comparison; but whatever reverence is due to +his diligence, or his attainments, it can be no criminal degree of +censoriousness to charge that etymologist with want of judgment, who +can seriously derive _dream_ from _drama_, because 'life is a drama +and a drama is a dream'; and who declares with a tone of defiance, +that no man can fail to derive _moan_ from [Greek: monos], _monos, +single_ or _solitary_, who considers that grief naturally loves to be +alone. + +Our knowledge of the northern literature is so scanty, that of words +undoubtedly Teutonic, the original is not always to be found in +an ancient language; and I have therefore inserted Dutch or German +substitutes, which I consider not as radical, but parallel, not as the +parents, but sisters of the English. + +The words which are represented as thus related by descent or +cognation, do not always agree in sense; for it is incident to words, +as to their authors, to degenerate from their ancestors, and to change +their manners when they change their country. It is sufficient, in +etymological inquiries, if the senses of kindred words be found such +as may easily pass into each other, or such as may both be referred to +one general idea. + +The etymology, so far as it is yet known, was easily found in the +volumes, where it is particularly and professedly delivered, and, by +proper attention to the rules of derivation, the orthography was +soon adjusted. But to COLLECT THE WORDS of our language was a task +of greater difficulty. The deficiency of dictionaries was immediately +apparent, and when they were exhausted, what was yet wanting must be +sought by fortuitous and unguided excursions into books and gleaned +as industry should find, or chance should offer it, in the boundless +chaos of a living speech. My search, however, has been either skilful +or lucky, for I have much augmented the vocabulary. + +As my design was a dictionary, common or appellative, I have omitted +all words which have relation to proper names, such as _Arian, +Socinian, Calvinist, Benedictine, Mahometan_, but have retained those +of a more general nature, as _Heathen, Pagan_. + +Of the terms of art I have received such as could be found either in +books of science or technical dictionaries, and have often inserted, +from philosophical writers, words which are supported perhaps only by +a single authority, and which, being not admitted into general use, +stand yet as candidates or probationers, and must depend for their +adoption on the suffrage of futurity. The words which our authors have +introduced by their knowledge of foreign languages or ignorance of +their own, by vanity or wantonness, by compliance with fashion or lust +of innovation, I have registered as they occurred, though commonly +only to censure them, and warn others against the folly of +naturalizing useless foreigners to the injury of the natives. + +I have not rejected any by design, merely because they were +unnecessary or exuberant, but have received those which by different +writers have been differently formed, as _viscid_, and _viscidity, +viscous_, and _viscosity_. + +Compounded or double words I have seldom noted, except when they +obtain a signification different from that which the components have +in then simple state. + +Thus _highwayman, woodman_, and _horsecourser_, require an +explanation, but of _thieflike_, or _coachdriver_, no notice was +needed, because the primitives contain the meaning of the compounds. + +Words arbitrarily formed by a constant and settled analogy, like +diminutive adjectives in _ish, as greenish, bluish_; adverbs in _ly_, +as _dully, openly_; substantives in _ness_, as _vileness, faultiness_; +were less diligently sought, and many sometimes have been omitted, +when I had no authority that invited me to insert them; not that they +are not genuine, and regular offsprings of English roots, but +because their relation to the primitive being always the same, their +signification cannot be mistaken. + +The verbal nouns in _ing_, such as the _keeping_ of the _castle_, +the _leading_ of the _army_, are always neglected, or placed only to +illustrate the sense of the verb, except when they signify things as +well as actions, and have therefore a plural number, as _dwelling, +living_; or have an absolute and abstract signification, as _coloring, +painting, learning_. + +The participles are likewise omitted, unless, by signifying rather +habit or quality than action, they take the nature of adjectives; as a +_thinking_ man, a man of prudence; a _pacing_ horse, a horse that +can pace: these I have ventured to call _participial adjectives_. But +neither are these always inserted, because they are commonly to be +understood without any danger of mistake, by consulting the verb. + +Obsolete words are admitted when they are found in authors not +obsolete, or when they have any force or beauty that may deserve +revival. + +As composition is one of the chief characteristics of a language, I +have endeavored to make some reparation for the universal negligence +of my predecessors, by inserting great numbers of compounded words, +as may be found under _after, fore, new, night, fair_, and many more. +These, numerous as they are, might be multiplied, but that use and +curiosity are here satisfied, and the frame of our language and modes +of our combination amply discovered. + +Of some forms of composition, such as that by which _re_ is +prefixed to note _repetition_, and _un_ to signify _contrariety_ or +_privation_, all the examples cannot be accumulated, because the use +of these particles, if not wholly arbitrary, is so little limited, +that they are hourly affixed to new words as occasion requires, or is +imagined to require them. + +There is another kind of composition more frequent in our language +than perhaps in any other, from which arises to foreigners the +greatest difficulty. We modify the signification of many verbs by a +particle subjoined; as to _come off_, to escape by a fetch; to _fall +on_, to attack; _fall off_, to apostatize; to _break off_, to stop +abruptly; to _bear out_, to justify; _to fall in_, to comply; to _give +over_, to cease; to _set off_, to embellish; to _set in_, to begin a +continual tenor; to _set out_, to begin a course or journey; to _take +off_, to copy; with innumerable expressions of the same kind, of which +some appear wildly irregular, being so far distant from the sense of +the simple words, that no sagacity will be able to trace the steps by +which they arrived at the present use. These I have noted with great +care; and though I cannot flatter myself that the collection is +complete, I believe I have so far assisted the students of our +language that this kind of phraseology will be no longer insuperable; +and the combinations of verbs and particles, by chance omitted, will +be easily explained by comparison with those that may be found. + +Many words yet stand supported only by the name of Bailey, Ainsworth, +Philips, or the contracted _Dict._ for Dictionaries, subjoined; of +these I am not always certain that they are read in any book but the +works of lexicographers. Of such I have omitted many, because I had +never read them; and many I have inserted, because they may perhaps +exist, though they have escaped my notice: they are, however, to be +yet considered as resting only upon the credit of former dictionaries. +Others, which I considered as useful, or know to be proper, though I +could not at present support them by authorities, I have suffered to +stand upon my own attestation, claiming the same privilege with my +predecessors, of being sometimes credited without proof. + +The words, thus selected and disposed, are grammatically considered; +they are referred to the different parts of speech; traced when they +are irregularly inflected, through their various terminations; +and illustrated by observations, not indeed of great or striking +importance, separately considered, but necessary to the elucidation +of our language, and hitherto neglected or forgotten by English +grammarians. + +That part of my work on which I expect malignity most frequently to +fasten, is the EXPLANATION; in which I cannot hope to satisfy those, +who are perhaps not inclined to be pleased, since I have not always +been able to satisfy myself. To interpret a language by itself is very +difficult; many words cannot be explained by synonimes, because the +idea signified by them has not more than one appellation; nor by +paraphrase, because simple ideas cannot be described. When the nature +of things is unknown, or the notion unsettled and indefinite, +and various in various minds, the words by which such notions are +conveyed, or such things denoted, will be ambiguous and perplexed. And +such is the fate of hapless lexicography, that not only darkness, but +light impedes and distresses it; things may be not only too little, +but too much known, to be happily illustrated. To explain, requires +the use of terms less abstruse than that which is to be explained, and +such terms cannot always be found; for as nothing can be proved but by +supposing something intuitively known, and evident without proof, so +nothing can be defined but by the use of words too plain to admit a +definition. + +Other words there are, of which the sense is too subtle and evanescent +to be fixed in a paraphrase; such are all those which are by the +grammarians termed expletives, and, in dead languages, are suffered +to pass for empty sounds, of no other use than to fill a verse, or to +modulate a period, but which are easily perceived in living tongues to +have power and emphasis, though it be sometimes such as no other form +of expression can convey. + +My labor has likewise been much increased by a class of verbs too +frequent in the English language, of which the signification is so +loose and general, the use so vague and indeterminate, and the senses +detorted so widely from the first idea, that it is hard to trace them +through the maze of variation, to catch them on the brink of utter +inanity, to circumscribe them by any limitations, or interpret them +by any words of distinct and settled meaning; such are _bear, break, +come, cast, full, get, give, do, put, set, go, run, make, take, turn, +throw_. If of these the whole power is not accurately delivered, +it must be remembered, that while our language is yet living, and +variable by the caprice of every one that speaks it, these words are +hourly shifting their relations, and can no more be ascertained in +a dictionary, than a grove, in the agitation of a storm, can be +accurately delineated from its picture in the water. + +The particles are among all nations applied with so great latitude, +that they are not easily reducible under any regular scheme of +explication: this difficulty is not less, nor perhaps greater, in +English, than in other languages. I have labored them with diligence, +I hope with success; such at least as can be expected in a task, which +no man, however learned or sagacious, has yet been able to perform. + +Some words there are which I cannot explain, because I do not +understand them; these might have been omitted very often with little +inconvenience, but I would not so far indulge my vanity as to +decline this confession: for when Tully owns himself ignorant whether +_lessus_, in the twelve tables, means a _funeral song_, or _mourning +garment_; and Aristotle doubts whether [Greek: ourous] in the _Iliad_ +signifies a _mule, or muleteer_, I may surely without shame, leave +some obscurities to happier industry, or future information. + +The rigor of interpretative lexicography requires that _the +explanation_, and _the word explained should be always reciprocal_; +this I have always endeavoured, but could not always attain. Words are +seldom exactly synonymous; a new term was not introduced, but because +the former was thought inadequate: names, therefore, have often many +ideas, but few ideas have many names. It was then necessary to use the +proximate word, for the deficiency of single terms can very seldom +be supplied by circumlocution; nor is the inconvenience great of such +mutilated interpretations, because the sense may easily be collected +entire from the examples. + +In every word of extensive use, it was requisite to mark the progress +of its meaning, and show by what gradations of intermediate sense +it has passed from its primitive to its remote and accidental +signification; so that every foregoing explanation should tend to that +which follows, and the series be regularly concatenated from the first +notion to the last. + +This is specious, but not always practicable; kindred senses may be so +interwoven, that the perplexity cannot be disentangled, nor any +reason be assigned why one should be ranged before the other. When +the radical idea branches out into parallel ramifications, how can a +consecutive series be formed of senses in their nature collateral? +The shades of meaning sometimes pass imperceptibly into each other, so +that though on one side they apparently differ, yet it is impossible +to mark the point of contact. Ideas of the same race, though not +exactly alike, are sometimes so little different, that no words can +express the dissimilitude, though the mind easily perceives it when +they are exhibited together; and sometimes there is such a confusion +of acceptations, that discernment is wearied and distinction puzzled, +and perseverance herself hurries to an end, by crowding together what +she cannot separate. + +These complaints of difficulty will, by those that have never +considered words beyond their popular use, be thought only the jargon +of a man willing to magnify his labors, and procure veneration to his +studies by involution and obscurity. But every art is obscure to those +that have not learned it; this uncertainty of terms, and commixture of +ideas, is well known to those who have joined philosophy with grammar; +and if I have not expressed them very clearly, it must be remembered +that I am speaking of that which words are insufficient to explain. + +The original sense of words is often driven out of use by their +metaphorical acceptations, yet must be inserted for the sake of a +regular origination. Thus I know not whether _ardor_ is used for +_material heat_, or whether _flagrant_, in English, ever signifies the +same with _burning_; yet such are the primitive ideas of these words, +which are therefore set first, though without examples, that the +figurative senses may be commodiously deduced. + +Such is the exuberance of signification which many words have +obtained, that it was scarcely possible to collect all their senses; +sometimes the meaning of derivatives must be sought in the mother +term, and sometimes deficient explanations of the primitive may +he supplied in the train of derivation. In any case of doubt or +difficulty, it will be always proper to examine all the words of +the same race; for some words are slightly passed over to avoid +repetition, some admitted easier and clearer explanation than others, +and all will be better understood, as they are considered in greater +variety of structures and relations. + +All the interpretations of words are not written with the same skill, +or the same happiness: things equally easy in themselves, are not all +equally easy to any single mind. Every writer of a long word commits +errors, where there appears neither ambiguity to mislead, nor +obscurity to confound him; and in a search like this, many felicities +of expression will be casually overlooked, many convenient parallels +will be forgotten, and many particulars will admit improvement from a +mind utterly unequal to the whole performance. + +But many seeming faults are to be imputed rather to the nature of +the undertaking, than the negligence of the performer. Thus some +explanations are unavoidably reciprocal or circular, as _hind, the +female of the stag; stag, the male of the hind_: sometimes easier +words are changed into harder, as _burial_ into _sepulture, or +interment, drier_ into _desiccative, dryness_ into _siccity_ or +_aridity, fit_ into _paroxysm_; for the easiest word, whatever it +be, can never be translated into one more easy. But easiness and +difficulty are merely relative; and if the present prevalence of our +language should invite foreigners to this Dictionary, many will be +assisted by those words which now seem only to increase or produce +obscurity. For this reason I have endeavoured frequently to join a +Teutonic and Roman interpretation, as to _cheer_, to _gladden_ or +_exhilarate_, that every learner of English may be assisted by his own +tongue. + +The solution of all difficulties, and the supply of all defects must +be sought in the examples, subjoined to the various senses of each +word, and ranged according to the time of their authors. + +When I first collected these authorities, I was desirous that every +quotation should be useful to some other end than the illustration of +a word; I therefore extracted from philosophers principles of science; +from historians remarkable facts; from chymists complete processes; +from divines striking exhortations; and from poets beautiful +descriptions. Such is design, while it is yet at a distance from +execution. When the time called upon me to range this accumulation +of elegance and wisdom into an alphabetical series, I soon discovered +that the bulk of my volumes would fright away the student, and was +forced to depart from my scheme of including all that was pleasing or +useful in English literature, and reduce my transcripts very often to +clusters of words, in which scarcely any meaning is retained; thus +to the weariness of copying, I was condemned to add the vexation of +expunging. Some passages I have yet spared, which may relieve the +labor of verbal searches, and intersperse with verdure and flowers the +dusty deserts of barren philology. + +The examples, thus mutilated, are no longer to be considered as +conveying the sentiments or doctrine of their authors; the word for +the sake of which they are inserted, with all its appendant clauses, +has been carefully preserved; but it may sometimes happen, by hasty +detruncation, that the general tendency of the sentence may be +changed: the divine may desert his tenets, or the philosopher his +system. + +Some of the examples have been taken from writers who were never +mentioned as masters of elegance, or models of style; but words must +be sought where they are used; and in what pages, eminent for purity, +can terms of manufacture or agriculture be found? Many quotations +serve no other purpose than that of proving the bare existence of +words, and are therefore selected with less scrupulousness than those +which are to teach their structures and relations. + +My purpose was to admit no testimony of living authors, that I might +not be misled by partiality, and that none of my contemporaries might +have reason to complain; nor have I departed from this resolution, but +when some performance of uncommon excellence excited my veneration, +when my memory supplied me, from late books, with an example that was +wanting, or when my heart, in the tenderness of friendship, solicited +admission for a favorite name. + +So far have I been from any care to grace my pages with modern +decorations, that I have studiously endeavored to collect examples +and authorities from the writers before the Restoration, whose works +I regard as the 'wells of English undefiled,' as the pure sources +of genuine diction. Our language, for almost a century, has, by the +concurrence of many causes, been gradually departing from its original +Teutonic character and deviating towards a Gallic structure and +phraseology, from which it ought to be our endeavor to recall it, by +making our ancient volumes the groundwork of style, admitting +among the additions of later times, only such as may supply real +deficiencies, such as are readily adopted by the genius of our tongue, +and incorporate easily with our native idioms. + +But as every language has a time of rudeness antecedent to perfection, +as well as of false refinement and declension, I have been cautious +lest my zeal for antiquity might drive me into times too remote, +and crowd my book with words now no longer understood. I have fixed +Sidney's work for the boundary, beyond which I make few excursions. +From the authors which rose in the time of Elizabeth, a speech might +be formed adequate to all the purposes of use and elegance. If the +language of theology were extracted from Hooker and the translation of +the Bible, the terms of natural knowledge from Bacon, the phrases of +policy, war, and navigation from Raleigh, the dialect of poetry and +fiction from Spenser and Sidney, and the diction of common life from +Shakespeare, few ideas would be lost to mankind, for want of English +words in which they might be expressed. + +It is not sufficient that a word is found, unless it be so combined +as that its meaning is apparently determined by the tract and tenor +of the sentence, such passages I have therefore chosen, and when +it happened that any author gave a definition of a term, or such +an explanation as is equivalent to a definition, I have placed +his authority as a supplement to my own, without regard to the +chronological order that is otherwise observed. + +Some words, indeed, stand unsupported by any authority, but they are +commonly derivative nouns or adverbs, formed from their primitives by +regular and constant analogy, or names of things seldom occurring in +books, or words of which I have reason to doubt the existence. + +There is more danger of censure from the multiplicity than paucity +of examples, authorities will sometimes seem to have been accumulated +without necessity or use, and perhaps some will be found, which +might, without loss, have been omitted. But a work of this kind is not +hastily to be charged with superfluities; those quotations, which to +careless or unskillful perusers appear only to repeat the same sense, +will often exhibit, to a more accurate examiner, diversities of +signification, or, at least, afford different shades of the same +meaning: one will show the word applied to persons, another to things; +one will express an ill, another a good, and a third a neutral sense; +one will prove the expression genuine from an ancient author; +another will show it elegant from a modern: a doubtful authority +is corroborated by another of more credit; an ambiguous sentence is +ascertained by a passage clear and determinate: the word, how +often soever repeated, appears with new associates and in different +combinations, and every quotation contributes something to the +stability or enlargement of the language. + +When words are used equivocally I receive them in either sense; when +they are metaphorical, I adopt them in their primitive acceptation. + +I have sometimes, though rarely, yielded to the temptation of +exhibiting a genealogy of sentiments, by showing how one author copied +the thoughts and diction of another: such quotations are indeed little +more than repetitions, which might justly be censured, did they not +gratify the mind, by affording a kind of intellectual history. + +The various syntactical structures occurring in the examples have been +carefully noted; the license or negligence with which many words have +been hitherto used, has made our style capricious and indeterminate; +when the different combinations of the same word are exhibited +together, the preference is readily given to propriety, and I have +often endeavored to direct the choice. + +Thus have I labored by settling the orthography, displaying the +analogy, regulating the structures, and ascertaining the +signification of English words, to perform all the parts of a faithful +lexicographer: but I have not always executed my own scheme, or +satisfied my own expectations. The work, whatever proofs of diligence +and attention it may exhibit, is yet capable of many improvements; the +orthography which I recommend is still controvertible, the etymology +which I adopt is uncertain, and perhaps frequently erroneous; the +explanations are sometimes too much contracted, and sometimes too much +diffused, the significations are distinguished rather with subtlety +than skill, and the attention is harassed with unnecessary minuteness. + +The examples are too often injudiciously truncated, and perhaps +sometimes--I hope very rarely--alleged in a mistaken sense; for in +making this collection I trusted more to memory, than, in a state of +disquiet and embarrassment, memory can contain, and purposed to supply +at the review what was left incomplete in the first transcription. + +Many terms appropriated to particular occupations, though necessary +and significant, are undoubtedly omitted, and of the words most +studiously considered and exemplified, many senses have escaped +observation. + +Yet these failures, however frequent, may admit extenuation and +apology. To have attempted much is always laudable, even when the +enterprise is above the strength that undertakes it: to rest below +his own aim is incident to every one whose fancy is active, and whose +views are comprehensive; nor is any man satisfied with himself because +he has done much, but because he can conceive little. When first I +engaged in this work, I resolved to leave neither words nor things +unexamined, and pleased myself with a prospect of the hours which I +should revel away in feasts of literature, the obscure recesses of +northern learning which I should enter and ransack, the treasures with +which I expected every search into those neglected mines to reward my +labor, and the triumph with which I should display my acquisitions +to mankind. When I had thus inquired into the original of words, I +resolved to show likewise my attention to things; to pierce deep into +every science, to inquire the nature of every substance of which +I inserted the name, to limit every idea by a definition strictly +logical, and exhibit every production of art or nature in an accurate +description, that my book might be in place of all other dictionaries +whether appellative or technical. But these were the dreams of a poet +doomed at last to wake a lexicographer. I soon found that it is too +late to look for instruments, when the work calls for execution, and +that whatever abilities I had brought to my task, with those I must +finally perform it. To deliberate whenever I doubted, to inquire +whenever I was ignorant, would have protracted the undertaking without +end, and, perhaps, without much improvement; for I did not find by +my first experiments, that what I had not of my own was easily to be +obtained: I saw that one inquiry only gave occasion to another, that +book referred to book, that to search was not always to find, and +to find was not always to be informed; and that thus to pursue +perfection, was, like the first inhabitants of Arcadia, to chase the +sun, which, when they had reached the hill where he seemed to rest, +was still beheld at the same distance from them. + +I then contracted my design, determining to confide in myself, and +no longer to solicit auxiliaries which produced more incumbrance than +assistance; by this I obtained at least one advantage, that I set +limits to my work, which would in time be ended, though not completed. + +Despondency has never so far prevailed as to depress me to negligence; +some faults will at last appear to be the effects of anxious diligence +and persevering activity. The nice and subtle ramifications of meaning +were not easily avoided by a mind intent upon accuracy, and convinced +of the necessity of disentangling combinations, and separating +similitudes. Many of the distinctions which to common readers appear +useless and idle, will be found real and important by men versed +in the school philosophy, without which no dictionary can ever be +accurately compiled, or skillfully examined. + +Some senses, however, there are, which, though not the same, are +yet so nearly allied, that they are often confounded. Most men +think indistinctly, and therefore cannot speak with exactness; and +consequently some examples might be indifferently put to either +signification: this uncertainty is not to be imputed to me, who do not +form, but register the language; who do not teach men how they should +think, but relate how they have hitherto expressed their thoughts. + +The imperfect sense of some examples I lamented, but could not remedy, +and hope they will be compensated by innumerable passages selected +with propriety, and preserved with exactness; some shining with sparks +of imagination, and some replete with treasures of wisdom. + +The orthography and etymology, though imperfect, are not imperfect +for want of care, but because care will not always be successful, and +recollection or information come too late for use. + +That many terms of art and manufacture are omitted, must be frankly +acknowledged; but for this defect I may boldly allege that it is +unavoidable; I could not visit caverns to learn the miner's language, +nor take a voyage to perfect my skill in the dialect of navigation, +nor visit the warehouses of merchants, and shops of artificers, to +gain the names of wares, tools, and operations, of which no mention is +found in books; what favorable accident or easy inquiry brought within +my reach, has not been neglected; but it had been a hopeless labor to +glean up words, by courting living information, and contesting with +the sullenness of one, and the roughness of another. + +To furnish the Academicians _della Crusca_ with words of this kind, a +series of comedies called _La Fiera_, or _The Fair_, was professedly +written by Buonaroti; but I had no such assistant, and therefore was +content to want what they must have wanted likewise, had they not +luckily been so supplied. + +Nor are all words which are not found in the vocabulary, to be +lamented as omissions. Of the laborious and mercantile part of the +people, the diction is in a great measure casual and mutable; many of +their terms are formed for some temporary or local convenience, and +though current at certain times and places, are in others utterly +unknown. This fugitive cant, which is always in a state of increase +or decay, cannot be regarded as any part of the durable materials of +a language, and therefore must be suffered to perish with other things +unworthy of preservation. + +Care will sometimes betray to the appearance of negligence. He that is +catching opportunities which seldom occur, will suffer those to pass +by unregarded, which he expects hourly to return; he that is searching +for rare and remote things, will neglect those that are obvious and +familiar: thus many of the most common and cursory words have +been inserted with little illustration, because in gathering the +authorities, I forebore to copy those which I thought likely to occur +whenever they were wanted. It is remarkable that, in reviewing my +collection, I found the word _sea_ unexemplified. + +Thus it happens, that in things difficult there is danger from +ignorance, and in things easy, from confidence; the mind, afraid of +greatness, and disdainful of littleness, hastily withdraws herself +from painful searches, and passes with scornful rapidity over tasks +not adequate to her powers; sometimes too secure for caution, and +again too anxious for vigorous effort; sometimes idle in a plain path, +and sometimes distracted in labyrinths, and dissipated by different +intentions. + +A large work is difficult because it is large, even though all its +parts might singly be performed with facility; where there are many +things to be done, each must be allowed its share of time and labor, +in the proportion only which it bears to the whole; nor can it be +expected, that the stones which form the dome of a temple, should be +squared and polished like the diamond of a ring. + +Of the event of this work, for which; having labored it with so much +application, I cannot but have some degree of parental fondness, it +is natural to form conjectures. Those who have been persuaded to think +well of my design, will require that it should fix our language, and +put a stop to those alterations which time and chance have hitherto +been suffered to make in it without opposition. With this consequence +I will confess that I flattered myself for a while; but now begin +to fear that I have indulged expectation which neither reason nor +experience can justify. When we see men grow old and die at a certain +time one after another, from century to century, we laugh at the +elixir that promises to prolong life to a thousand years; and with +equal justice may the lexicographer be derided, who being able to +produce no example of a nation that has preserved their words and +phrases from mutability, shall imagine that his dictionary can embalm +his language, and secure it from corruption and decay, that it is in +his power to change sublunary nature, and clear the world at once from +folly, vanity, and affectation. + +With this hope, however, academies have been instituted, to guard +the avenues of their languages, to retain fugitives, and repulse +intruders; but their vigilance and activity have hitherto been vain; +sounds are too volatile and subtile for legal restraints; to enchain +syllables, and to lash the wind, are equally the undertakings of +pride, unwilling to measure its desires by its strength. The French +language has visibly changed under the inspection of the Academy; +the style of Amelot's translation of Father Paul is observed by Le +Courayer to be _un peu passé_; and no Italian will maintain that the +diction of any modern writer is not perceptibly different from that of +Boccace, Machiavel, or Caro. + +Total and sudden transformations of a language seldom happen; +conquests and migrations are now very rare: but there are other causes +of change, which, though slow in their operation, and invisible in +their progress, are perhaps as much superior to human resistance, as +the revolutions of the sky, or intumescence of the tide. Commerce, +however necessary, however lucrative, as it depraves the manners, +corrupts the language; they that have frequent intercourse with +strangers, to whom they endeavor to accommodate themselves, must +in time learn a mingled dialect, like the jargon which serves the +traffickers on the Mediterranean and Indian coasts. This will not +always be confined to the exchange, the warehouse, or the port, but +will be communicated by degrees to other ranks of the people, and be +at last incorporated with the current speech. + +There are likewise internal causes equally forcible. The language most +likely to continue long without alterations, would be that of a nation +raised a little, and but a little, above barbarity, secluded from +strangers, and totally employed in procuring the conveniences of life; +either without books, or, like some of the Mahometan countries, with +every few: men thus busied and unlearned, having only such words as +common use requires, would perhaps long continue to express the same +notions by the same signs. But no such constancy can be expected in a +people polished by arts, and classed by subordination, where one part +of the community is sustained and accommodated by the labor of the +other. Those who have much leisure to think, will always be enlarging +the stock of ideas; and every increase of knowledge, whether real or +fancied, will produce new words, or combination of words. When the +mind is unchained from necessity, it will range after convenience; +when it is left at large in the fields of speculation, it will shift +opinions; as any custom is disused, the words that expressed it must +perish with it; as any opinion grows popular, it will innovate speech +in the same proportion as it alters practice. + +As by the cultivation of various sciences a language is amplified, it +will be more furnished with words deflected from their original sense; +the geometrician will talk of a courtier's zenith or the eccentric +virtue of a wild hero, and the physician, of sanguine expectations and +phlegmatic delays. Copiousness of speech will give opportunities to +capricious choice, by which some words will be preferred, and others +degraded; vicissitudes of fashion will enforce the use of new, or +extend the signification of known terms. The tropes of poetry will +make hourly encroachments, and the metaphorical will become the +current sense: pronunciation will be varied by levity or ignorance, +and the pen must at length comply with the tongue; illiterate writers +will, at one time or other, by public infatuation, rise into renown, +who, not knowing the original import of words, will use them with +colloquial licentiousness, confound distinction, and forget propriety. +As politeness increases, some expressions will be considered as +too gross and vulgar for the delicate, others as too formal and +ceremonious for the gay and airy; new phrases are therefore adopted, +which must for the same reasons be in time dismissed. Swift, in his +petty treatise on the English language, allows that new words must +sometimes be introduced, but proposes that none should be suffered +to become obsolete. But what makes a word obsolete, more than general +agreement to forbear it? and how shall it be continued, when it +conveys an offensive idea, or recalled again into the mouths of +mankind, when it has once become unfamiliar by disuse, and unpleasing +by unfamiliarity? + +There is another cause of alteration more prevalent than any other, +which yet in the present state of the world cannot be obviated. A +mixture of two languages will produce a third distinct from both, and +they will always be mixed, where the chief parts of education, and +the most conspicuous accomplishment, is skill in ancient or in foreign +tongues. He that has long cultivated another language, will find +its words and combinations crowd upon his memory; and haste and +negligence, refinement and affectation, will obtrude borrowed terms +and exotic expressions. + +The great pest of speech is frequency of translation. No book was ever +turned from one language into another, without imparting something +of its native idiom; this is the most mischievous and comprehensive +innovation; single words may enter by thousands, and the fabric of the +tongue continue the same; but new phraseology changes much at once; +it alters not the single stones of the building, but the order of the +columns. If an academy should be established for the cultivation of +our style--which I, who can never wish to see dependence multiplied, +hope the spirit of English liberty will hinder or destroy--let them, +instead of compiling grammars and dictionaries, endeavor, with all +their influence, to stop the license of translators, whose idleness +and ignorance, if it be suffered to proceed, will reduce us to babble +a dialect of France. + +If the changes that we fear be thus irresistible, what remains but to +acquiesce with silence, as in the other insurmountable distresses +of humanity? It remains that we retard what we cannot repel, that we +palliate what we cannot cure. Life may be lengthened by care, though +death cannot be ultimately defeated: tongues, like governments, have +a natural tendency to degeneration; we have long preserved our +constitution, let us make some struggles for our language. + +In hope of giving longevity to that which its own nature forbids to be +immortal, I have devoted this book, the labor of years, to the honor +of my country, that we may no longer yield the palm of philology, +without a contest, to the nations of the continent. The chief glory of +every people arises from its authors: whether I shall add any thing by +my own writings to the reputation of English literature, must be left +to time: much of my life has been lost under the pressures of +disease; much has been trifled away; and much has always been spent in +provision for the day that was passing over me; but I shall not think +my employment useless or ignoble, if by my assistance foreign nations, +and distant ages, gain access to the propagators of knowledge, and +understand the teachers of truth; if my labors afford light to the +repositories of science, and add celebrity to Bacon, to Hooker, to +Milton, and to Boyle. + +When I am animated by this wish, I look with pleasure on my book, +however defective, and deliver it to the world with the spirit of a +man that has endeavored well. That it will immediately become popular +I have not promised to myself: a few wild blunders, and risible +absurdities, from which no work of such multiplicity was ever free, +may for a time furnish folly with laughter, and harden ignorance into +contempt; but useful diligence will at last prevail, and there never +can be wanting some who distinguish desert; who will consider that no +dictionary of a living tongue ever can be perfect, since, while it +is hastening to publication, some words are budding, and some falling +away; that a whole life cannot be spent upon syntax and etymology, and +that even a whole life would not be sufficient; that he, whose design +includes whatever language can express, must often speak of what +he does not understand; that a writer will sometimes be hurried by +eagerness to the end, and sometimes faint with weariness under a task +which Scaliger compares to the labors of the anvil and the mine; that +what is obvious is not always known, and what is known is not always +present; that sudden fits of inadvertency will surprise vigilance, +slight avocations will seduce attention, and casual eclipses of the +mind will darken learning; and that the writer shall often in vain +trace his memory at the moment of need, for that which yesterday he +knew with intuitive readiness, and which will come uncalled into his +thoughts to-morrow. + +In this work, when it shall be found that much is omitted, let it not +be forgotten that much likewise is performed; and though no book was +ever spared out of tenderness to the author, and the world is +little solicitous to know whence proceed the faults of that which it +condemns; yet it may gratify curiosity to inform it, that the English +Dictionary was written with little assistance of the learned, and +without any patronage of the great; not in the soft obscurities +of retirement, or under the shelter of academic bowers, but amidst +inconvenience and distraction, in sickness and in sorrow. It may +repress the triumph of malignant criticism to observe, that if our +language is not here fully displayed, I have only failed in an attempt +which no human powers have hitherto completed. If the lexicons of +ancient tongues, now immutably fixed, and comprised in a few volumes, +be yet, after the toil of successive ages, inadequate and delusive; +if the aggregated knowledge, and co-operating diligence of the Italian +academicians, did not secure them from the censure of Beni; if the +embodied critics of France, when fifty years had been spent upon +their work, were obliged to change its economy, and give their second +edition another form, I may surely be contented without the praise of +perfection, which, if I could obtain, in this gloom of solitude, what +would it avail me? I have protracted my work till most of those whom I +wished to please have sunk into the grave, and success and miscarriage +are empty sounds: I therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, +having little to fear or hope from censure or from praise. + + +TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE THE EARL OF CHESTERFIELD + +February 7, 1755. + +MY LORD: + +I have lately been informed by the proprietor of _The World_, that two +papers, in which my _Dictionary_ is recommended to the public, were +written by your Lordship. To be so distinguished is an honor which, +being very little accustomed to favours from the great, I know not +well how to receive, or in what terms to acknowledge. + +When, upon some slight encouragement, I first visited your Lordship, I +was overpowered, like the rest of mankind, by the enchantment of your +address; and I could not forbear to wish that I might boast myself 'Le +vainqueur du vainqueur de la terre'; that I might obtain that regard +for which I saw the world contending; but I found my attendance so +little encouraged, that neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to +continue it. When I had once addressed your Lordship in public, I +had exhausted all the art of pleasing which a retired and uncourtly +scholar can possess. I had done all that I could; and no man is well +pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little. + +Seven years, my Lord, have now passed, since I waited in your outward +rooms, or was repulsed from your door; during which time I have been +pushing on my work through difficulties, of which it is useless to +complain, and have brought it at last to the verge of publication, +without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement, or one smile +of favor. Such treatment I did not expect, for I never had a Patron +before. + +The shepherd in Virgil grew at last acquainted with Love, and found +him a native of the rocks. + +Is not a Patron, my Lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man +struggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached ground, +encumbers him with help? The notice which you have been pleased to +take of my labors, had it been early, had been kind; but it has +been delayed till I am indifferent, and cannot enjoy it; till I am +solitary, and cannot impart it; till I am known, and do not want it. +I hope it is no very cynical asperity not to confess obligations +where no benefit has been received, or to be unwilling that the Public +should consider me as owing that to a Patron, which Providence has +enabled me to do for myself. + +Having carried on my work thus far with so little obligation to any +favorer of learning, I shall not be disappointed though I should +conclude it, if less be possible, with less; for I have been long +wakened from that dream of hope, in which I once boasted myself with +so much exultation, + +My Lord, Your Lordship's most humble, + +Most obedient servant, SAM. JOHNSON. + + +[Footnote A: For a sketch of Johnson's life, see the Introduction to +"Life of Addison" in the volume of English Essays. The interest of his +preface to the great Dictionary need hardly be pointed out, since the +work itself is a landmark in the history of our language. The letter +to Chesterfield, short though it is is a document of great importance +in the freeing of literature from patronage, and is in itself a +notable piece of literature. The preface to Johnson's edition of +Shakespeare's plays not only explains the editor's conception of +his task, but contains what is perhaps the best appreciation of the +dramatist written in the eighteenth century.] + + + + +PREFACE TO SHAKESPEARE + +BY SAMUEL JOHNSON. (1765) + + +That praises are without reason lavished on the dead, and that the +honours due only to excellence are paid to antiquity, is a complaint +likely to be always continued by those, who, being able to add nothing +to truth, hope for eminence from the heresies of paradox; or those, +who, being forced by disappointment upon consolatory expedients, +are willing to hope from posterity what the present age refuses, and +flatter themselves that the regard which is yet denied by envy, will +be at last bestowed by time. + +Antiquity, like every other quality that attracts the notice of +mankind, has undoubtedly votaries that reverence it, not from reason, +but from prejudice. Some seem to admire indiscriminately whatever +has been long preserved, without considering that time has sometimes +co-operated with chance; all perhaps are more willing to honour past +than present excellence; and the mind contemplates genius through the +shades of age, as the eye surveys the sun through artificial opacity. +The great contention of criticism is to find the faults of the +moderns, and the beauties of the ancients. While an author is yet +living we estimate his powers by his worst performance, and when he is +dead, we rate them by his best. + +To works, however, of which the excellence is not absolute and +definite, but gradual and comparative; to works not raised upon +principles demonstrative and scientifick, but appealing wholly to +observation and experience, no other test can he applied than +length of duration and continuance of esteem. What mankind have long +possessed they have often examined and compared; and if they persist +to value the possession, it is because frequent comparisons have +confirmed opinion in its favour. As among the works of nature no +man can properly call a river deep, or a mountain high, without the +knowledge of many mountains, and many rivers; so in the productions of +genius, nothing can be stiled excellent till it has been compared with +other works of the same kind. Demonstration immediately displays its +power, and has nothing to hope or fear from the flux of years; but +works tentative and experimental must be estimated by their proportion +to the general and collective ability of man, as it is discovered in a +long succession of endeavours. Of the first building that was raised, +it might be with certainty determined that it was round or square; but +whether it was spacious or lofty must have been referred to time. The +Pythagorean scale of numbers was at once discovered to be perfect; but +the poems of _Homer_ we yet know not to transcend the common limits +of human intelligence, but by remarking, that nation after nation, and +century after century, has been able to do little more than transpose +his incidents, new-name his characters, and paraphrase his sentiments. + +The reverence due to writings that have long subsisted arises +therefore not from any credulous confidence in the superior wisdom of +past ages, or gloomy persuasion of the degeneracy of mankind, but is +the consequence of acknowledged and indubitable positions, that what +has been longest known has been most considered, and what is most +considered is best understood. + +The Poet, of whose works I have undertaken the revision, may now +begin to assume the dignity of an ancient, and claim the privilege of +established fame and prescriptive veneration. He has long outlived +his century, the term commonly fixed as the test of literary merit. +Whatever advantages he might once derive from personal allusions, +local customs, or temporary opinions, have for many years been lost; +and every topick of merriment, or motive of sorrow, which the modes of +artificial life afforded him, now only obscure the scenes which they +once illuminated. The effects of favour and competition are at an end; +the tradition of his friendships and his enemies has perished; his +works support no opinion with arguments, nor supply any faction with +invectives; they can neither indulge vanity nor gratify malignity; but +are read without any other reason than the desire of pleasure, and are +therefore praised only as pleasure is obtained; yet, thus unassisted +by interest or passion, they have past through variations of taste +and changes of manners, and, as they devolved from one generation to +another, have received new honours at every transmission. + +But because human judgment, though it be gradually gaining upon +certainty, never becomes infallible; and approbation, though long +continued, may yet be only the approbation of prejudice or fashion; +it is proper to inquire, by what peculiarities of excellence +_Shakespeare_ has gained and kept the favour of his countrymen. + +Nothing can please many, and please long, but just representations of +general nature. Particular manner, can be known to few, and therefore +few only can judge how nearly they are copied. The irregular +combinations of fanciful invention may delight a-while, by that +novelty of which the common satiety of life sends us all in quest; but +the pleasures of sudden wonder are soon exhausted, and the mind can +only repose on the stability of truth. + +_Shakespeare_ is above all writers, at least above all modern writers, +the poet of nature; the poet that holds up to his readers a faithful +mirrour of manners and of life. His characters are not modified by the +customs of particular places, unpractised by the rest of the world; +by the peculiarities of studies or professions, which can operate +but upon small numbers; or by the accidents of transient fashions or +temporary opinions: they are the genuine progeny of common humanity, +such as the world will always supply, and observation will always +find. His persons act and speak by the influence of those general +passions and principles by which all minds are agitated, and the whole +system of life is continued in motion. In the writings of other poets +a character is too often an individual; in those of _Shakespeare_ it +is commonly a species. + +It is from this wide extension of design that so much instruction +is derived. It is this which fills the plays of _Shakespeare_ with +practical axioms and domestic wisdom. It was said of _Euripides_, that +every verse was a precept; and it may be said of _Shakespeare_, that +from his works may be collected a system of civil and oeconomical +prudence. Yet his real power is not shewn in the splendour of +particular passages, but by the progress of his fable, and the +tenour of his dialogue; and he that tries to recommend him by select +quotations, will succeed like the pedant in _Hierocles_, who, when +he offered his house to sale, carried a brick in his pocket as a +specimen. + +It will not easily be imagined how much _Shakespeare_ excells in +accommodating his sentiments to real life, but by comparing him with +other authors. It was observed of the ancient schools of declamation, +that the more diligently they were frequented, the more was the +student disqualified for the world, because he found nothing there +which he should ever meet in any other place. The same remark may be +applied to every stage but that of _Shakespeare_. The theatre, when +it is under any other direction, is peopled by such characters as +were never seen, conversing in a language which was never heard, upon +topicks which will never rise in the commerce of mankind. But the +dialogue of this author is often so evidently determined by the +incident which produces it, and is pursued with so much ease and +simplicity, that it seems scarcely to claim the merit of fiction, but +to have been gleaned by diligent selection out of common conversation, +and common occurrences. + +Upon every other stage the universal agent is love, by whose power all +good and evil is distributed, and every action quickened or retarded. +To bring a lover, a lady and a rival into the fable; to entangle +them in contradictory obligations, perplex them with oppositions of +interest, and harrass them with violence of desires inconsistent with +each other; to make them meet in rapture and part in agony; to fill +their mouths with hyperbolical joy and outrageous sorrow; to distress +them as nothing human ever was distressed; to deliver them as nothing +human ever was delivered; is the business of a modern dramatist. For +this probability is violated, life is misrepresented, and language +is depraved. But love is only one of many passions; and as it has no +great influence upon the sum of life, it has little operation in the +dramas of a poet, who caught his ideas from the living world, and +exhibited only what he saw before him. He knew, that any other +passion, as it was regular or exorbitant, was a cause of happiness or +calamity. + +Characters thus ample and general were not easily discriminated and +preserved, yet perhaps no poet ever kept his personages more distinct +from each other. I will not say with _Pope_, that every speech may be +assigned to the proper speaker, because many speeches there are which +have nothing characteristical; but perhaps, though some may be equally +adapted to every person, it will be difficult to find any that can be +properly transferred from the present possessor to another claimant. +The choice is right, when there is reason for choice. + +Other dramatists can only gain attention by hyperbolical or aggravated +characters, by fabulous and unexampled excellence or depravity, as the +writers of barbarous romances invigorated the reader by a giant and a +dwarf; and he that should form his expectations of human affairs from +the play, or from the tale, would be equally deceived. _Shakespeare_ +has no heroes; his scenes are occupied only by men, who act and speak +as the reader thinks that he should himself have spoken or acted on +the same occasion: Even where the agency is supernatural the dialogue +is level with life. Other writers disguise the most natural passions +and most frequent incidents; so that he who contemplates them in the +book will not know them in the world: _Shakespeare_ approximates the +remote, and familiarizes the wonderful; the event which he represents +will not happen, but if it were possible, its effects would probably +be such as he has assigned; and it may be said, that he has not only +shewn human nature as it acts in real exigencies, but as it would be +found in trials, to which it cannot be exposed. + +This therefore is the praise of _Shakespeare_, that his drama is the +mirrour of life; that he who has mazed his imagination, in following +the phantoms which other writers raise up before him, may here be +cured of his delirious extasies, by reading human sentiments in human +language, by scenes from which a hermit may estimate the transactions +of the world, and a confessor predict the progress of the passions. + +His adherence to general nature has exposed him to the censure of +criticks, who form their judgments upon narrow principles. _Dennis_ +and _Rhymer_ think his _Romans_ not sufficiently _Roman_; and +_Voltaire_ censures his kings as not completely royal. _Dennis_ +is offended, that _Menenius_, a senator of _Rome_, should play the +buffoon; and _Voltaire_ perhaps thinks decency violated when the +_Danish_ Usurper is represented as a drunkard. But _Shakespeare_ +always makes nature predominate over accident; and if he preserves the +essential character, is not very careful of distinctions superinduced +and adventitious. His story requires Romans or kings, but, he thinks +only on men. He knew that _Rome_, like every other city, had men of +all dispositions; and wanting a buffoon, he went into the senate-house +for that which the senate-house would certainly have afforded him. +He was inclined to shew an usurper and a murderer not only odious but +despicable, he therefore added drunkenness to his other qualities, +knowing that kings love wine like other men, and that wine exerts its +natural power upon kings. These are the petty cavils of petty minds; +a poet overlooks the casual distinction of country and condition, as a +painter, satisfied with the figure, neglects the drapery. + +The censure which he has incurred by mixing comick and tragick scenes, +as it extends to all his works, deserves more consideration. Let the +fact be first stated, and then examined. + +_Shakespeare's_ plays are not in the rigorous and critical sense +either tragedies or comedies, but compositions of a distinct kind; +exhibiting the real state of sublunary nature, which partakes of good +and evil, joy and sorrow, mingled with endless variety of proportion +and innumerable modes of combination; and expressing the course of the +world, in which the loss of one is the gain of another; in which, at +the same time, the reveller is hasting to his wine, and the mourner +burying his friend; in which the malignity of one is sometimes +defeated by the frolick of another; and many mischiefs and many +benefits are done and hindered without design. + +Out of this chaos of mingled purposes and casualties the ancient +poets, according to the laws which custom had prescribed, selected +some the crimes of men, and some their absurdities; some the momentous +vicissitudes of life, and some the lighter occurrences; some the +terrours of distress, and some the gayeties of prosperity. Thus +rose the two modes of imitation, known by the names of _tragedy_ and +_comedy_, compositions intended to promote different ends by contrary +means, and considered as so little allied, that I do not recollect +among the _Greeks_ or _Romans_ a single writer who attempted both. + +_Shakespeare_ has united the powers of exciting laughter and sorrow +not only in one mind, but in one composition. Almost all his plays +are divided between serious and ludicrous characters, and, in the +successive evolutions of the design, sometimes produce seriousness and +sorrow, and sometimes levity and laughter. + +That this is a practice contrary to the rules of criticism will be +readily allowed; but there is always an appeal open from criticism +to nature. The end of writing is to instruct; the end of poetry is +to instruct by pleasing. That the mingled drama may convey all the +instruction of tragedy or comedy cannot be denied, because it includes +both in its alterations of exhibition and approaches nearer than +either to the appearance of life, by shewing how great machinations +and slender designs may promote or obviate one another, and the +high and the low co-operate in the general system by unavoidable +concatenation. + +It is objected, that by this change of scenes the passions are +interrupted in their progression, and that the principal event, being +not advanced by a due gradation of preparatory incidents, wants at +last the power to move, which constitutes the perfection of dramatick +poetry. This reasoning is so specious, that it is received as true +even by those who in daily experience feel it to be false. The +interchanges of mingled scenes seldom fail to produce the intended +vicissitudes of passion. Fiction cannot move so much, but that the +attention may be easily transferred; and though it must be allowed +that pleasing melancholy be sometimes interrupted by unwelcome levity, +yet let it be considered likewise, that melancholy is often not +pleasing, and that the disturbance of one man may be the relief of +another; that different auditors have different habitudes; and that, +upon the whole, all pleasure consists in variety. + +The players, who in their edition divided our authour's works into +comedies, histories, and tragedies, seem not to have distinguished the +three kinds by any very exact or definite ideas. + +And action which ended happily to the principal persons, however +serious or distressful through its intermediate incidents, in their +opinion, constituted a comedy. This idea of a comedy continued +long amongst us; and plays were written, which, by changing the +catastrophe, were tragedies to-day, and comedies to-morrow. + +Tragedy was not in those times a poem of more general dignity or +elevation than comedy; it required only a calamitous conclusion, with +which the common criticism of that age was satisfied, whatever lighter +pleasure it afforded in its progress. + +History was a series of actions, with no other than chronological +succession, independent on each other, and without any tendency to +introduce or regulate the conclusion. It is not always very nicely +distinguished from tragedy. There is not much nearer approach to +unity of action in the tragedy of _Antony and Cleopatra_, than in +the history of _Richard the Second_. But a history might be continued +through many plays; as it had no plan, it had no limits. + +Through all these denominations of the drama, _Shakespeare's_ mode of +composition is the same; an interchange of seriousness and merriment, +by which the mind is softened at one time, and exhilarated at another. +But whatever be his purpose, whether to gladden or depress, or to +conduct the story, without vehemence or emotion, through tracts of +easy and familiar dialogue, he never fails to attain his purpose; +as he commands us, we laugh or mourn, or sit silent with quiet +expectation, in tranquillity without indifference. + +When _Shakespeare's_ plan is understood, most of the criticisms of +_Rhymer_ and _Voltaire_ vanish away. The play of _Hamlet_ is opened, +without impropriety, by two sentinels; _Iago_ bellows at _Brabantio's_ +window, without injury to the scheme of the play, though in terms +which a modern audience would not easily endure; the character of +_Polonius_ is seasonable and useful; and the Grave-diggers themselves +may be heard with applause. + +_Shakespeare_ engaged in dramatick poetry with the world open before +him; the rules of the ancients were yet known to few; but publick +judgment was unformed; he had no example of such fame as might force +him upon imitation, nor criticks of such authority as might restrain +his extravagance: He therefore indulged his natural disposition, +and his disposition, as _Rhymer_ has remarked, led him to comedy. In +tragedy he often writes, with great appearance of toil and study, what +is written at last with little felicity; but in his comick scenes, he +seems to produce without labour what no labour can improve. In tragedy +he is always struggling after some occasion to be comick; but in +comedy he seems to repose, or to luxuriate, as in a mode of thinking +congenial to his nature. In his tragick scenes there is always +something wanting, but his comedy often surpasses expectation or +desire. His comedy pleases by the thoughts and the language, and his +tragedy for the greater part by incident and action. His tragedy seems +to be skill, his comedy to be instinct. + +The force of his comick scenes has suffered little diminution from the +changes made by a century and a half, in manners or in words. As his +personages act upon principles arising from genuine passion, very +little modified by particular forms, their pleasures and vexations +are communicable to all times and to all places; they are natural, and +therefore durable; the adventitious peculiarities of personal habits, +are only superficial dies, bright and pleasing for a little while, yet +soon fading to a dim tinct, without any remains of former lustre; but +the discriminations of true passion are the colours of nature; +they pervade the whole mass, and can only perish with the body that +exhibits them. The accidental compositions of heterogeneous modes +are dissolved by the chance which combined them; but the uniform +simplicity of primitive qualities neither admits increase, nor suffers +decay. The sand heap by one flood is scattered by another, but the +rock always continues in its place. The stream of time, which is +continually washing the dissoluble fabricks of other poets, passes +without injury by the adamant of _Shakespeare_. + +If there be, what I believe there is, in every nation, a stile which +never becomes obsolete, a certain mode of phraseology so consonant and +congenial to the analogy and principles of its respective language as +to remain settled and unaltered; this style is probably to be sought +in the common intercourse of life, among those who speak only to +be understood, without ambition of elegance. The polite are always +catching modish innovations, and the learned depart from established +forms of speech, in hope of finding or making better; those who wish +for distinction forsake the vulgar, when the vulgar is right; but +there is a conversation above grossness and below refinement, where +propriety resides, and where this poet seems to have gathered his +comick dialogue. He is therefore more agreeable to the ears of the +present age than any other authour equally remote, and among his other +excellencies deserves to be studied as one of the original masters of +our language. + +These observations are to be considered not as unexceptionally +constant, but as containing general and predominant truth. +_Shakespeare's_ familiar dialogue is affirmed to be smooth and clear, +yet not wholly without ruggedness or difficulty; as a country may be +eminently fruitful, though it has spots unfit for cultivation: +His characters are praised as natural, though their sentiments are +sometimes forced, and their actions improbable; as the earth upon the +whole is spherical, though its surface is varied with protuberances +and cavities. + +_Shakespeare_ with his excellencies has likewise faults, and faults +sufficient to obscure and overwhelm any other merit. I shall shew +them in the proportion in which they appear to me, without envious +malignity or superstitious veneration. No question can be more +innocently discussed than a dead poet's pretensions to renown; and +little regard is due to that bigotry which sets candour higher than +truth. + +His first defect is that to which may be imputed most of the evil in +books or in men. He sacrifices virtue to convenience, and is so +much more careful to please than to instruct, that he seems to write +without any moral purpose. From his writings indeed a system of +social duty may be selected, for he that thinks reasonably must think +morally; but his precepts and axioms drop casually from him; he makes +no just distribution of good or evil, nor is always careful to shew +in the virtuous a disapprobation of the wicked; he carries his persons +indifferently through right and wrong, and at the close dismisses them +without further care, and leaves their examples to operate by chance. +This fault the barbarity of his age cannot extenuate; for it is always +a writer's duty to make the world better, and justice is a virtue +independent on time or place. + +The plots are often so loosely formed, that a very slight +consideration may improve them, and so carelessly pursued, that +he seems not always fully to comprehend his own design. He omits +opportunities of instructing or delighting which the train of +his story seems to force upon him, and apparently rejects those +exhibitions which would be more affecting, for the sake of those which +are more easy. + +It may be observed, that in many of his plays the latter part is +evidently neglected. When he found himself near the end of his work, +and, in view of his reward, he shortened the labour to snatch +the profit. He therefore remits his efforts where he should most +vigorously exert them, and his catastrophe is improbably produced or +imperfectly represented. + +He had no regard to distinction of time or place, but gives to one age +or nation, without scruple, the customs, institutions, and opinions +of another, at the expence not only of likelihood, but of possibility. +These faults _Pope_ has endeavoured, with more zeal than judgment, +to transfer to his imagined interpolators. We need not wonder to find +_Hector_ quoting _Aristotle_, when we see the loves of _Theseus_ +and _Hippolyta_ combined with the _Gothick_ mythology of fairies. +_Shakespeare_, indeed, was not the only violator of chronology, for in +the same age _Sidney_, who wanted not the advantages of learning, has, +in his _Arcadia_, confounded the pastoral with the feudal times, +the days of innocence, quiet and security, with those of turbulence, +violence, and adventure. + +In his comick scenes he is seldom very successful, when he engages +his characters in reciprocations of smartness and contests of sarcasm; +their jests are commonly gross, and their pleasantry licentious; +neither his gentlemen nor his ladies have much delicacy, nor are +sufficiently distinguished from his clowns by any appearance of +refined manners. Whether he represented the real conversation of his +time is not easy to determine; the reign of _Elizabeth_ is commonly +supposed to have been a time of stateliness, formality and reserve; +yet perhaps the relaxations of that severity were not very elegant. +There must, however, have been always some modes of gayety preferable +to others, and a writer ought to chuse the best. + +In tragedy his performance seems constantly to be worse, as his labour +is more. The effusions of passion which exigence forces out are for +the most part striking and energetick; but whenever he solicits his +invention, or strains his faculties, the offspring of his throes is +tumour, meanness, tediousness, and obscurity. + +In narration he affects a disproportionate pomp of diction, and a +wearisome train of circumlocution, and tells the incident imperfectly +in many words, which might have been more plainly delivered in +few. Narration in dramatick poetry is naturally tedious, as it is +unanimated and inactive, and obstructs the progress of the action; +it should therefore always be rapid, and enlivened by frequent +interruption. _Shakespeare_ found it an encumberance, and instead of +lightening it by brevity, endeavoured to recommend it by dignity and +splendour. + +His declamations or set speeches are commonly cold and weak, for his +power was the power of nature; when he endeavoured, like other tragick +writers, to catch opportunities of amplification, and instead of +inquiring what the occasion demanded, to show how much his stores +of knowledge could supply, he seldom escapes without the pity or +resentment of his reader. + +It is incident to him to be now and then entangled with an unwieldy +sentiment, which he cannot well express, and will not reject; he +struggles with it a while, and if it continues stubborn, comprises it +in words such as occur, and leaves it to be disentangled and evolved +by those who have more leisure to bestow upon it. + +Not that always where the language is intricate the thought is subtle, +or the image always great where the line is bulky; the equality of +words to things is very often neglected, and trivial sentiments and +vulgar ideas disappoint the attention, to which they are recommended +by sonorous epithets and swelling figures. + +But the admirers of this great poet have never less reason to indulge +their hopes of supreme excellence, than when he seems fully resolved +to sink them in dejection, and mollify them with tender emotions by +the fall of greatness, the danger of innocence, or the crosses of +love. He is not long soft and pathetick without some idle conceit, +or contemptible equivocation. He no sooner begins to move, than he +counteracts himself; and terrour and pity, as they are rising in the +mind, are checked and blasted by sudden frigidity. + +A quibble is to _Shakespeare_, what luminous vapours are to the +traveller; he follows it at all adventures; it is sure to lead him out +of his way, and sure to engulf him in the mire. It has some malignant +power over his mind, and its fascinations are irresistible. Whatever +be the dignity or profundity of his disquisition, whether he be +enlarging knowledge or exalting affection, whether he be amusing +attention with incidents, or enchaining it in suspense, let but a +quibble spring up before him, and he leaves his work unfinished. A +quibble is the golden apple for which he will always turn aside from +his career, or stoop from his elevation. A quibble, poor and barren as +it is, gave him such delight, that he was content to purchase it, by +the sacrifice of reason, propriety and truth. A quibble was to him the +fatal _Cleopatra_ for which he lost the world, and was content to lose +it. + +It will be thought strange, that, in enumerating the defects of this +writer, I have not yet mentioned his neglect of the unities: his +violation of those laws which have been instituted and established by +the joint authority of poets and criticks. + +For his other deviations from the art of writing I resign him to +critical justice, without making any other demand in his favour, than +that which must be indulged to all human excellence: that his +virtues be rated with his failings: But, from the censure which this +irregularity may bring upon him, I shall, with due reverence to that +learning which I must oppose, adventure to try how I can defend him. + +His histories, being neither tragedies nor comedies are not subject to +any of their laws; nothing more is necessary to all the praise which +they expect, than that the changes of action be so prepared as to +be understood, that the incidents be various and affecting, and +the characters consistent, natural, and distinct. No other unity is +intended, and therefore none is to be sought. + +In his other works he has well enough preserved the unity of action. +He has not, indeed, an intrigue regularly perplexed and regularly +unravelled: he does not endeavour to hide his design only to discover +it, for this is seldom the order of real events, and _Shakespeare_ +is the poet of nature: But his plan has commonly what _Aristotle_ +requires, a beginning, a middle, and an end; one event is concatenated +with another, and the conclusion follows by easy consequence. There +are perhaps some incidents that might be spared, as in other poets +there is much talk that only fills up time upon the stage; but the +general system makes gradual advances, and the end of the play is the +end of expectation. + +To the unities of time and place he has shewn no regard; and perhaps a +nearer view of the principles on which they stand will diminish their +value, and withdraw from them the veneration which, from the time of +_Corneille_, they have very generally received, by discovering +that they have given more trouble to the poet, than pleasure to the +auditor. + +The necessity of observing the unities of time and place arises from +the supposed necessity of making the drama credible. The criticks +hold it impossible, that an action of months or years can be possibly +believed to pass in three hours; or that the spectator can suppose +himself to sit in the theatre, while ambassadors go and return between +distant kings while armies are levied and towns besieged, while an +exile wanders and returns, or till he whom they saw courting his +mistress, shall lament the untimely fall of his son. The mind revolts +from evident falsehood, and fiction loses its force when it departs +from the resemblance of reality. + +From the narrow limitation of time necessarily arises the contraction +of place. The spectator, who knows that he saw the first act at +_Alexandria_, cannot suppose that he sees the next at _Rome_, at a +distance to which not the dragons of _Medea_ could, in so short a +time, have transported him; he knows with certainty that he has not +changed his place, and he knows that place cannot change itself; that +what was a house cannot become a plain; that what was _Thebes_ can +never be _Persepolis_. + +Such is the triumphant language with which a critick exults over the +misery of an irregular poet, and exults commonly without resistance +or reply. It is time therefore to tell him by the authority of +_Shakespeare_, that he assumes, as an unquestionable principle, +a position, which, while his breath is forming it into words, +his understanding pronounces to be false. It is false, that any +representation is mistake for reality; that any dramatick fable in +its materiality was ever credible, or, for a single moment, was ever +credited. + +The objection arising from the impossibility of passing the first hour +at _Alexandria_, and the next at _Rome_, supposes, that when the play +opens, the spectator really imagines himself at _Alexandria_, and +believes that his walk to the theatre has been a voyage to _Egypt_, +and that he lives in the days of _Antony_ and _Cleopatra_. Surely he +that imagines this may imagine more. He that can take the stage at one +time for the palace of the _Ptolemies_, may take it in half an hour +for the promontory of _Actium_. Delusion, if delusion be admitted, has +no certain limitation; if the spectator can be once persuaded, +that his old acquaintance are _Alexander_ and _Cæsar_, that a room +illuminated with candles is the plain of _Pharsalia_, or the bank of +_Granicus_, he is in a state of elevation above the reach of reason, +or of truth, and from the heights of empyrean poetry, may despise the +circumscriptions of terrestrial nature. There is no reason why a mind +thus wandering in extacy should count the clock, or why an hour should +not be a century in that calenture of the brains that can make the +stage a field. + +The truth is, that the spectators are always in their senses, and +know, from the first act to the last, that the stage is only a stage, +and that the players are only players. They came to hear a certain +number of lines recited with just gesture and elegant modulation. The +lines relate to some action, and an action must be in some place; +but the different actions that complete a story may be in places very +remote from each other; and where is the absurdity of allowing that +space to represent first _Athens_, and then _Sicily_, which was always +known to be neither _Sicily_ nor _Athens_, but a modern theatre? + +By supposition, as place is introduced, times may be extended; the +time required by the fable elapses for the most part between the acts; +for, of so much of the action as is represented, the real and poetical +duration is the same. If, in the first act, preparations for war +against _Mithridates_ are represented to be made in _Rome_, the event +of the war may, without absurdity, be represented, in the catastrophe, +as happening in _Pontus_; we know that there is neither war, nor +preparation for war; we know that we are neither in _Rome_ nor +_Pontus_; that neither _Mithridates_ nor _Lucullus_ are before us. The +drama exhibits successive imitations of successive actions; and why +may not the second imitation represent an action that happened years +after the first, if it be so connected with it, that nothing but time +can be supposed to intervene? Time is, of all modes of existence, most +obsequious to the imagination; a lapse of years is as easily conceived +as a passage of hours. In contemplation we easily contract the time of +real actions, and therefore willingly permit it to be contracted when +we only see their imitation. + +It will be asked, how the drama moves, if it is not credited. It is +credited with all the credit due to a drama. It is credited, whenever +it moves, as a just picture of a real original; as representing to the +auditor what he would himself feel, if he were to do or suffer what +is there feigned to be suffered or to be done. The reflection that +strikes the heart is not, that the evils before us are real evils, but +that they are evils to which we ourselves may be exposed. If there be +any fallacy, it is not that we fancy the players, but that we fancy +ourselves unhappy for a moment; but we rather lament the possibility +than suppose the presence of misery, as a mother weeps over her babe, +when she remembers that death may take it from her. The delight of +tragedy proceeds from our consciousness of fiction; if we thought +murders and treasons real, they would please no more. + +Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are mistaken +for realities, but because they bring realities to mind. When the +imagination is recreated by a painted landscape, the trees are not +supposed capable to give us shade, or the fountains coolness; but we +consider, how we should be pleased with such fountains playing beside +us, and such woods waving over us. We are agitated in reading the +history of _Henry_ the Fifth, yet no man takes his book for the +field of _Agencourt_. A dramatick exhibition is a book recited with +concomitants that encrease or diminish its effect. Familiar comedy is +often more powerful in the theatre, than on the page; imperial +tragedy is always less. The humour of _Petruchio_ may be heightened +by grimace; but what voice or what gesture can hope to add dignity or +force to the soliloquy of _Cato_. + +A play read, affects the mind like a play acted. It is therefore +evident, that the action is not supposed to be real; and it follows, +that between the acts a longer or shorter time may be allowed to pass, +and that no more account of space or duration is to be taken by the +auditor of a drama, than by the reader of a narrative, before whom may +pass in an hour the life of a hero, or the revolutions of an empire. + +Whether _Shakespeare_ knew the unities, and rejected them by design, +or deviated from them by happy ignorance, it is, I think, impossible +to decide, and useless to enquire. We may reasonably suppose, that, +when he rose to notice, he did not want the counsels and admonitions +of scholars and criticks, and that he at last deliberately persisted +in a practice, which he might have begun by chance. As nothing is +essential to the fable, but unity of action, and as the unities +of time and place arise evidently from false assumptions, and, by +circumscribing the extent of the drama, lessen its variety, I cannot +think it much to be lamented, that they were not known by him, or +not observed: Nor, if such another poet could arise, should I very +vehemently reproach him, that his first act passed at _Venice_, and +his next in _Cyprus_. Such violations of rules merely positive, become +the comprehensive genius of _Shakespeare_, and such censures are +suitable to the minute and slender criticism of _Voltaire_: + + Non usque adeo permiscuit imis + Longus summa dies, ut non, si voce Metelli + Serventur leges, malint a Cæsare tolli. + +Yet when I speak thus slightly of dramatick rules, I cannot but +recollect how much wit and learning may be produced against me; before +such authorities I am afraid to stand, not that I think the present +question one of those that are to be decided by mere authority, but +because it is to be suspected, that these precepts have not been so +easily received but for better reasons than I have yet been able to +find. The result of my enquiries, in which it would be ludicrous to +boast of impartiality, is, that the unities of time and place are not +essential to a just drama, that though they may sometimes conduce to +pleasure, they are always to be sacrificed to the nobler beauties +of variety and instruction; and that a play, written with nice +observation of critical rules, is to be contemplated as an elaborate +curiosity, as the product of superfluous and ostentatious art, by +which is shewn, rather what is possible, than what is necessary. + +He that, without diminution of any other excellence, shall preserve +all the unities unbroken, deserves the like applause with the +architect, who shall display all the orders of architecture in a +citadel; without any deduction from its strength; but the principal +beauty of a citadel is to exclude the enemy; and the greatest graces +of a play, are to copy nature and instruct life. + +Perhaps what I have here not dogmatically but deliberatively written, +may recal the principles of the drama to a new examination. I am +almost frighted at my own temerity; and when I estimate the fame and +the strength of those that maintain the contrary opinion, am ready to +sink down in reverential silence; as _Æneas_ withdrew from the defence +of _Troy_, when he saw _Neptune_ shaking the wall, and _Juno_ heading +the besiegers. + +Those whom my arguments cannot persuade to give their approbation +to the judgment of _Shakespeare_, will easily, if they consider the +condition of his life, make some allowance for his ignorance. + +Every man's performances, to be rightly estimated, must be compared +with the state of the age in which he lived, and with his own +particular opportunities; and though to the reader a book be not worse +or better for the circumstances of the authour, yet as there is always +a silent reference of human works to human abilities, and as the +enquiry, how far man may extend his designs, or how high he may rate +his native force, is of far greater dignity than in what rank we shall +place any particular performance, curiosity is always busy to discover +the instruments, as well as to survey the workmanship, to know how +much is to be ascribed to original powers, and how much to casual and +adventitious help. The palaces of _Peru_ or _Mexico_ were certainly +mean and incommodious habitations, if compared to the houses +of _European_ monarchs; yet who could forbear to view them with +astonishment, who remembered that they were built without the use of +iron? + +The _English_ nation, in the time of _Shakespeare_, was yet +struggling to emerge from barbarity. The philology of _Italy_ had +been transplanted hither in the reign of _Henry_ the Eighth; and +the learned languages had been successfully cultivated by _Lilly, +Linacer_, and _More_; by _Pole, Cheke_, and _Gardiner_; and afterwards +by _Smith, Clerk, Haddon_, and _Ascham_. Greek was now taught to boys +in the principal schools; and those who united elegance with learning, +read, with great diligence, the _Italian_ and _Spanish_ poets. But +literature was yet confined to professed scholars, or to men and women +of high rank. The publick was gross and dark; and to be able to read +and write, was an accomplishment still valued for its rarity. + +Nations, like individuals, have their infancy. A people newly awakened +to literary curiosity, being yet unacquainted with the true state +of things, knows not how to judge of that which is proposed as its +resemblance. Whatever is remote from common appearances is always +welcome to vulgar, as to childish credulity; and of a country +unenlightened by learning, the whole people is the vulgar. The study +of those who then aspired to plebeian learning was laid out upon +adventures, giants, dragons, and enchantments. _The Death of Arthur +was_ the favourite volume. + +The mind, which has feasted on the luxurious wonders of fiction, has +no taste of the insipidity of truth. A play which imitated only +the common occurrences of the world, would, upon the admirers of +_Palmerin_ and _Guy_ of _Warwick_, have made little impression; he +that wrote for such an audience was under the necessity of looking +round for strange events and fabulous transactions, and that +incredibility, by which maturer knowledge is offended, was the chief +recommendation of writings, to unskilful curiosity. + +Our authour's plots are generally borrowed from novels, and it is +reasonable to suppose, that he chose the most popular, such as were +read by many, and related by more; for his audience could not have +followed him through the intricacies of the drama, had they not held +the thread of the story in their hands. + +The stories, which we now find only in remoter authours, were in his +time accessible and familiar. The fable of _As you like it_, which is +supposed to be copied from _Chaucer's_ Gamelyn, was a little pamphlet +of those times; and old Mr. _Cibber_ remembered the tale of _Hamlet_ +in plain _English_ prose, which the criticks have now to seek in _Saxo +Grammaticus._ + +His _English_ histories he took from _English_ chronicles and +_English_ ballads; and as the ancient writers were made known to +his countrymen by versions, they supplied him with new subjects; he +dilated some of _Plutarch's_ lives into plays, when they had been +translated by _North_. + +His plots, whether historical or fabulous, are always crouded with +incidents, by which the attention of a rude people was more easily +caught than by sentiment or argumentation; and such is the power of +the marvellous even over those who despise it, that every man finds +his mind more strongly seized by the tragedies of _Shakespeare_ than +of any other writer; others please us by particular speeches, but he +always makes us anxious for the event, and has perhaps excelled all +but _Homer_ in securing the first purpose of a writer, by exciting +restless and unquenchable curiosity and compelling him that reads his +work to read it through. The shows and bustle with which his plays +abound have the same original. As knowledge advances, pleasure passes +from the eye to the ear, but returns, as it declines, from the ear to +the eye. Those to whom our authour's labours were exhibited had more +skill in pomps or processions than in poetical language, and perhaps +wanted some visible and discriminated events, as comments on the +dialogue. He knew how he should most please; and whether his practice +is more agreeable to nature, or whether his example has prejudiced the +nation, we still find that on our stage something must be done as +well as said, and inactive declamation is very coldly heard, however +musical or elegant, passionate or sublime. + +_Voltaire_ expresses his wonder, that our authour's extravagances are +endured by a nation, which has seen the tragedy of _Cato_. Let him +be answered, that _Addison_ speaks the language of poets, and +_Shakespeare_, of men. We find in _Cato_ innumerable beauties which +enamour us of its authour, but we see nothing that acquaints us with +human sentiments or human actions; we place it with the fairest and +the noblest progeny which judgment propagates by conjunction with +learning, but _Othello_ is the vigorous and vivacious offspring +of observation impregnated by genius. _Cato_ affords a splendid +exhibition of artificial and fictitious manners, and delivers just and +noble sentiments, in diction easy, elevated and harmonious, but its +hopes and fears communicate no vibration to the heart; the composition +refers us only to the writer; we pronounce the name of _Cato_, but we +think on _Addison_. + +The work of a correct and regular writer is a garden accurately formed +and diligently planted, varied with shades, and scented with flowers; +the composition of _Shakespeare_ is a forest, in which oaks extend +their branches, and pines tower in the air, interspersed sometimes +with weeds and brambles, and sometimes giving shelter to myrtles and +to roses; filling the eye with awful pomp, and gratifying the mind +with endless diversity. Other poets display cabinets of precious +rarities, minutely finished, wrought into shape, and polished into +brightness. _Shakespeare_ opens a mine which contains gold and +diamonds in unexhaustible plenty, though clouded by incrustations, +debased by impurities, and mingled with a mass of meaner minerals. + +It has been much disputed, whether _Shakespeare_ owed his excellence +to his own native force, or whether he had the common helps of +scholastick education, the precepts of critical science, and the +examples of ancient authours. + +There has always prevailed a tradition, that _Shakespeare_ wanted +learning, that he had no regular education, nor much skill in the dead +languages. _Johnson_, his friend, affirms, that _he had small Latin, +and no Greek_; who, besides that he had no imaginable temptation to +falsehood, wrote at a time when the character and acquisitions of +_Shakespeare_ were known to multitudes. His evidence ought therefore +to decide the controversy, unless some testimony of equal force could +be opposed. + +Some have imagined, that they have discovered deep learning in many +imitations of old writers; but the examples which I have known urged, +were drawn from books translated in his time; or were such easy +coincidences of thought, as will happen to all who consider the same +subjects; or such remarks on life or axioms of morality as float in +conversation, and are transmitted through the world in proverbial +sentences. + +I have found it remarked, that, in this important sentence, _Go +before, I'll follow_, we read a translation of, _I prae, sequar_. I +have been told, that when _Caliban_, after a pleasing dream, says, _I +cry'd to sleep again_, the authour imitates _Anacreon_, who had, like +every other man, the same wish on the same occasion. + +There are a few passages which may pass for imitations, but so few, +that the exception only confirms the rule; he obtained them from +accidental quotations, or by oral communication, and as he used what +he had, would have used more if he had obtained it. + +The _Comedy of Errors_ is confessedly taken from the _Menæchmi_ +of _Plautus_; from the only play of _Plautus_ which was then in +_English_. What can be more probable, than that he who copied that, +would have copied more; but that those which were not translated were +inaccessible? + +Whether he knew the modern languages is uncertain. That his plays have +some _French_ scenes proves but little; he might easily procure them +to be written, and probably, even though he had known the language in +the common degree, he could not have written it without assistance. In +the story of _Romeo_ and _Juliet_ he is observed to have followed the +_English_ translation, where it deviates from the _Italian_; but +this on the other part proves nothing against his knowledge of the +original. He was to copy, not what he knew himself, but what was known +to his audience. + +It is most likely that he had learned _Latin_ sufficiently to make him +acquainted with construction, but that he never advanced to an easy +perusal of the _Roman_ authours. Concerning his skill in modern +languages, I can find no sufficient ground of determination; but as +no imitations of _French_ or _Italian_ authours have been discovered, +though the _Italian_ poetry was then high in esteem, I am inclined to +believe, that he read little more than _English_, and chose for his +fables only such tales as he found translated. + +That much knowledge is scattered over his works is very justly +observed by _Pope_, but it is often such knowledge as books did not +supply. He that will understand _Shakespeare_, must not be content to +study him in the closet, he must look for his meaning sometimes among +the sports of the field, and sometimes among the manufactures of the +shop. + +There is however proof enough that he was a very diligent reader, nor +was our language then so indigent of books, but that he might very +liberally indulge his curiosity without excursion into foreign +literature. Many of the _Roman_ authours were translated, and some of +the _Greek_; the reformation had filled the kingdom with theological +learning; most of the topicks of human disquisition had found +_English_ writers; and poetry had been cultivated, not only with +diligence, but success. This was a stock of knowledge sufficient for a +mind so capable of appropriating and improving it. + +But the greater part of his excellence was the product of his +own genius. He found the _English_ stage in a state of the utmost +rudeness; no essays either in tragedy or comedy had appeared, from +which it could be discovered to what degree of delight either one +or other might be carried. Neither character nor dialogue were yet +understood. _Shakespeare_ may be truly said to have introduced them +both amongst us, and in some of his happier scenes to have carried +them both to the utmost height. + +By what gradations of improvement he proceeded, is not easily known; +for the chronology of his works is yet unsettled. _Rowe_ is of +opinion, that _perhaps we are not to look for his beginning, like +those of other writers, in his least perfect works; art had so little, +and nature so large a share in what he did, that for ought I know_, +says he, _the performances of his youth, as they were the most +vigorous, were the best._ But the power of nature is only the power of +using to any certain purpose the materials which diligence procures, +or opportunity supplies. Nature gives no man knowledge, and when +images are collected by study and experience, can only assist in +combining or applying them. _Shakespeare_, however favoured by nature, +could impart only what he had learned; and as he must increase his +ideals, like other mortals, by gradual acquisition, he, like them, +grew wiser as he grew older, could display life better, as he knew it +more, and instruct with more efficacy, as he was himself more amply +instructed. + +There is a vigilance of observation and accuracy of distinction which +books and precepts cannot confer; from this almost all original +and native excellence proceeds. _Shakespeare_ must have looked +upon mankind with perspicacity, in the highest degree curious and +attentive. Other writers borrow their characters from preceding +writers, and diversify them only by the accidental appendages of +present manners; the dress is a little varied, but the body is the +same. Our authour had both matter and form to provide; for except +the characters of _Chaucer_, to whom I think he is not much indebted, +there were no writers in _English_, and perhaps not many in other +modern languages, which shewed life in its native colours. + +The contest about the original benevolence or malignity of man had not +yet commenced. Speculation had not yet attempted to analyse the +mind, to trace the passions to their sources, to unfold the seminal +principles of vice and virtue, or sound the depths of the heart for +the motives of action. All those enquiries, which from that time that +human nature became the fashionable study, have been made sometimes +with nice discernment, but often with idle subtilty, were yet +unattempted. The tales, with which the infancy of learning was +satisfied, exhibited only the superficial appearances of action, +related the events but omitted the causes, and were formed for such as +delighted in wonders rather than in truth. Mankind was not then to +be studied in the closet; he that would know the world, was under the +necessity of gleaning his own remarks, by mingling as he could in its +business and amusements. + +_Boyle_ congratulated himself upon his high birth, because it favoured +his curiosity, by facilitating his access. _Shakespeare_ had no such +advantage; he came to _London_ a needy adventurer, and lived for a +time by very mean employments. Many works of genius and learning have +been performed in states of life, that appear very little favourable +to thought or to enquiry; so many, that he who considers them +is inclined to think that he sees enterprise and perseverance +predominating over all external agency, and bidding help and hindrance +vanish before them. The genius of _Shakespeare_ was not to be +depressed by the weight of poverty, nor limited by the narrow +conversation to which men in want are inevitably condemned; the +incumbrances of his fortune were shaken from his mind, _as dewdrops +from a lion's mane_. + +Though he had so many difficulties to encounter, and so little +assistance to surmount them, he has been able to obtain an +exact knowledge of many modes of life, and many casts of native +dispositions; to vary them with great multiplicity; to mark them +by nice distinctions; and to shew them in full view by proper +combinations. In this part of his performances he had none to imitate, +but has himself been imitated by all succeeding writers; and it may +be doubted, whether from all his successors more maxims of theoretical +knowledge, or more rules of practical prudence, can be collected, than +he alone has given to his country. + +Nor was his attention confined to the actions of men; he was an exact +surveyor of the inanimate world; his descriptions have always some +peculiarities, gathered by contemplating things as they really exist. +It may be observed, that the oldest poets of many nations preserve +their reputation, and that the following generations of wit, after a +short celebrity, sink into oblivion. The first, whoever they be, must +take their sentiments and descriptions immediately from knowledge; +the resemblance is therefore just, their descriptions are verified by +every eye, and their sentiments acknowledged by every breast. Those +whom their fame invites to the same studies, copy partly them, and +partly nature, till the books of one age gain such authority, as +to stand in the place of nature to another, and imitation, +always deviating a little, becomes at last capricious and casual. +_Shakespeare_, whether life or nature be his subject, shews plainly, +that he has seen with his own eyes; he gives the image which he +receives, not weakened or distorted by the intervention of any other +mind; the ignorant feel his representations to be just, and the +learned see that they are compleat. + +Perhaps it would not be easy to find any authour, except _Homer_, who +invented so much as _Shakespeare_, who so much advanced the studies +which he cultivated, or effused so much novelty upon his age or +country. The form, the characters, the language, and the shows of the +_English_ drama are his, _He seems_, says _Dennis, to have been the +very original of our_ English _tragical harmony, that is, the harmony +of blank verse, diversified often by dissyllable and trissyllable +terminations. For the diversity distinguishes it from heroick harmony, +and by bringing it nearer to common use makes it more proper to gain +attention, and more fit for action and dialogue. Such verse we make +when we are writing prose; we make such verse in common conversation_. + +I know not whether this praise is rigorously just. The dissyllable +termination, which the critic rightly appropriates to the drama, is +to be found, though, I think, not in _Gorboduc_ which is confessedly +before our author; yet in _Hieronnymo_, of which the date is not +certain, but which there is reason to believe at least as old as his +earliest plays. This however is certain, that he is the first who +taught either tragedy or comedy to please, there being no theatrical +piece of any older writer, of which the name is known, except to +antiquaries and collectors of books, which are sought because they are +scarce, and would not have been scarce, had they been much esteemed. + +To him we must ascribe the praise, unless _Spenser_ may divide it with +him, of having first discovered to how much smoothness and harmony +the _English_ language could be softened. He has speeches, perhaps +sometimes scenes, which have all the delicacy of _Rowe_, without his +effeminacy. He endeavours indeed commonly to strike by the force and +vigour of his dialogue, but he never executes his purpose better, than +when he tries to sooth by softness. + +Yet it must be at last confessed, that as we owe every thing to +him, he owes something to us; that, if much of his praise is paid +by perception and judgement, much is likewise given by custom and +veneration. We fix our eyes upon his graces, and turn them from his +deformities, and endure in him what we should in another loath or +despise. If we endured without praising, respect for the father of +our drama might excuse us; but I have seen, in the book of some modern +critick, a collection of anomalies, which shew that he has corrupted +language by every mode of depravation, but which his admirer has +accumulated as a monument of honour. + +He has scenes of undoubted and perpetual excellence, but perhaps +not one play, which, if it were now exhibited as the work of a +contemporary writer, would be heard to the conclusion. I am indeed +far from thinking, that his works were wrought to his own ideas of +perfection; when they were such as would satisfy the audience, they +satisfied the writer. It is seldom that authours, though more studious +of fame than _Shakespeare_, rise much above the standard of their own +age; to add a little of what is best will always be sufficient for +present praise, and those who find themselves exalted into fame, +are willing to credit their encomiasts, and to spare the labour of +contending with themselves. + +It does not appear, that _Shakespeare_ thought his works worthy of +posterity, that he levied any ideal tribute upon future times, or had +any further prospect, than of present popularity and present profit. +When his plays had been acted, his hope was at an end; he solicited +no addition of honour from the reader. He therefore made no scruple +to repeat the same jests in many dialogues, or to entangle different +plots by the same knot of perplexity, which may be at least forgiven +him, by those who recollect, that of _Congreve's_ four comedies, two +are concluded by a marriage in a mask, by a deception, which perhaps +never happened, and which, whether likely or not, he did not invent. + +So careless was this great poet of future fame, that, though he +retired to ease and plenty, while he was yet little _declined into the +vale of years_, before he could be disgusted with fatigue, or disabled +by infirmity, he made no collection of his works, nor desired to +rescue those that had been already published from the depravations +that obscured them, or secure to the rest a better destiny, by giving +them to the world in their genuine state. + +Of the plays which bear the name of _Shakespeare_ in the late +editions, the greater part were not published till about seven years +after his death, and the few which appeared in his life are apparently +thrust into the world without the care of the authour, and therefore +probably without his knowledge. + +Of all the publishers, clandestine or professed, their negligence and +unskilfulness has by the late revisers been sufficiently shown. +The faults of all are indeed numerous and gross, and have not only +corrupted many passages perhaps beyond recovery, but have brought +others into suspicion, which are only obscured by obsolete +phraseology, or by the writer's unskilfulness and affectation. To +alter is more easy than to explain, and temerity is a more common +quality than diligence. Those who saw that they must employ conjecture +to a certain degree, were willing to indulge it a little further. Had +the author published his own works, we should have sat quietly down +to disentangle his intricacies, and clear his obscurities; but now we +tear what we cannot loose, and eject what we happen not to understand. + +The faults are more than could have happened without the +concurrence of many causes. The stile of _Shakespeare_ was in itself +ungrammatical, perplexed and obscure; his works were transcribed for +the players by those who may be supposed to have seldom understood +them; they were transmitted by copiers equally unskilful, who still +multiplied errours; they were perhaps sometimes mutilated by the +actors, for the sake of shortening the speeches; and were at last +printed without correction of the press. + +In this state they remained, not as Dr. _Warburton_ supposes, because +they were unregarded, but because the editor's art was not yet applied +to modern languages, and our ancestors were accustomed to so much +negligence of _English_ printers, that they could very patiently +endure it. At last an edition was undertaken by _Rowe_; not because a +poet was to be published by a poet, for _Rowe_ seems to have thought +very little on correction or explanation, but that our authour's works +might appear like those of his fraternity, with the appendages of a +life and recommendatory preface. _Rowe_ has been clamorously blamed +for not performing what he did not undertake, and it is time that +justice be done him, by confessing, that though he seems to have had +no thought of corruption beyond the printer's errours, yet he has made +many emendations, if they were not made before, which his successors +have received without acknowledgement, and which, if they had produced +them, would have filled pages and pages with censures of the stupidity +by which the faults were committed, with displays of the absurdities +which they involved, with ostentatious expositions of the new reading, +and self congratulations on the happiness of discovering it. + +Of _Rowe_, as of all the editors, I have preserved the preface, and +have likewise retained the authour's life, though not written with +much elegance or spirit; it relates however what is now to be known, +and therefore deserves to pass through all succeeding publications. + +The nation had been for many years content enough with Mr. _Rowe's_ +performance, when Mr. _Pope_ made them acquainted with the true state +of _Shakespeare's_ text, shewed that it was extremely corrupt, and +gave reason to hope that there were means of reforming it. He collated +the old copies, which none had thought to examine before, and restored +many lines to their integrity; but, by a very compendious criticism, +he rejected whatever he disliked, and thought more of amputation than +of cure. + +I know not why he is commended by Dr. _Warburton_ for distinguishing +the genuine from the spurious plays. In this choice he exerted no +judgement of his own; the plays which he received, were given +by _Hemings_ and _Condel,_ the first editors; and those which he +rejected, though, according to the licentiousness of the press in +those times, they were printed during _Shakespeare's_ life, with his +name, had been omitted by his friends, and were never added to his +works before the edition of 1664, from which they were copied by the +later printers. + +This was a work which _Pope_ seems to have thought unworthy of his +abilities, being not able to suppress his contempt of _the dull duty +of an editor_. He understood but half his undertaking. The duty of +a collator is indeed dull, yet, like other tedious tasks, is very +necessary; but an emendatory critick would ill discharge his duty, +without qualities very different from dullness. In perusing a +corrupted piece, he must have before him all possibilities of meaning, +with all possibilities of expression. Such must be his comprehension +of thought, and such his copiousness of language. Out of many readings +possible, he must be able to select that which best suits with the +state, opinions, and modes of language prevailing in every age, and +with his authour's particular cast of thought, and turn of expression. +Such must be his knowledge, and such his taste. Conjectural criticism +demands more than humanity possesses, and he that exercises it with +most praise has very frequent need of indulgence. Let us now be told +no more of the dull duty of an editor. + +Confidence is the common consequence of success. They whose excellence +of any kind has been loudly celebrated, are ready to conclude, that +their powers are universal. _Pope's_ edition fell below his own +expectations, and he was so much offended, when he was found to have +left any thing for others to do, that he past the latter part of his +life in a state of hostility with verbal criticism. + +I have retained all his notes, that no fragment of so great a writer +may be lost; his preface, valuable alike for elegance of composition +and justness of remark, and containing a general criticism on his +authour, so extensive, that little can be added, and so exact, that +little can be disputed, every editor has an interest to suppress, but +that every reader would demand its insertion. + +_Pope_ was succeeded by _Theobald_, a man of narrow comprehension and +small acquisitions, with no native and intrinsick splendour of genius, +with little of the artificial light of learning, but zealous for +minute accuracy, and not negligent in pursuing it. He collated +the ancient copies, and rectified many errours. A man so anxiously +scrupulous might have been expected to do more, but what little he did +was commonly right. + +In his report of copies and editions he is not to be trusted, without +examination. He speaks sometimes indefinitely of copies, when he has +only one. In his enumeration of editions, he mentions the two first +folios as of high, and the third folio as of middle authority; but +the truth is, that the first is equivalent to all others, and that the +rest only deviate from it by the printer's negligence. Whoever has +any of the folios has all, excepting those diversities which mere +reiteration of editions will produce. I collated them all at the +beginning, but afterwards used only the first. + +Of his notes I have generally retained those which he retained himself +in his second edition, except when they were confuted by subsequent +annotators, or were too minute to merit preservation. I have sometimes +adopted his restoration of a comma, without inserting the panegyrick +in which he celebrated himself for his atchievement. The exuberant +excrescence of his diction I have often lopped, his triumphant +exultations over _Pope_ and _Rowe_ I have sometimes suppressed, and +his contemptible ostentation I have frequently concealed; but I have +in some places shewn him, as he would have shewn himself, for the +reader's diversion, that the inflated emptiness of some notes may +justify or excuse the contraction of the rest. + +_Theobald_, thus weak and ignorant, thus mean and faithless, thus +petulant and ostentatious, by the good luck of having _Pope_ for his +enemy, has escaped, and escaped alone, with reputation, from this +undertaking. So willingly does the world support those who solicite +favour, against those who command reverence; and so easily is he +praised, whom no man can envy. + +Our authour fell then into the hands of Sir _Thomas Hanmer,_ the +_Oxford_ editor, a man, in my opinion, eminently qualified by nature +for such studies. He had, what is the first requisite to emendatory +criticism, that intuition by which the poet's intention is immediately +discovered, and that dexterity of intellect which despatches its work +by the easiest means. He had undoubtedly read much; his acquaintance +with customs, opinions, and traditions, seems to have been large; and +he is often learned without shew. He seldom passes what he does not +understand, without an attempt to find or to make a meaning, and +sometimes hastily makes what a little more attention would have found. +He is solicitous to reduce to grammar, what he could not be sure that +his authour intended to be grammatical. _Shakespeare_ regarded more +the series of ideas, than of words; and his language, not being +designed for the reader's desk, was all that he desired it to be, if +it conveyed his meaning to the audience. + +_Hanmer's_ care of the metre has been too violently censured. He found +the measures reformed in so many passages, by the silent labours +of some editors, with the silent acquiescence of the rest, that he +thought himself allowed to extend a little further the license, which +had already been carried so far without reprehension; and of his +corrections in general, it must be confessed, that they are often +just, and made commonly with the least possible violation of the text. + +But, by inserting his emendations, whether invented or borrowed, into +the page, without any notice of varying copies, he has appropriated +the labour of his predecessors, and made his own edition of little +authority. His confidence indeed, both in himself and others, was +too great; he supposes all to be right that was done by _Pope_ and +_Theobald_; he seems not to suspect a critick of fallibility, and it +was but reasonable that he should claim what he so liberally granted. + +As he never writes without careful enquiry and diligent consideration, +I have received all his notes, and believe that every reader will wish +for more. + +Of the last editor it is more difficult to speak. Respect is due to +high place, tenderness to living reputation, and veneration to genius +and learning; but he cannot be justly offended at that liberty +of which he has himself so frequently given an example, nor very +solicitous what is thought of notes, which he ought never to have +considered as part of his serious employments, and which, I suppose, +since the ardour of composition is remitted, he no longer numbers +among his happy effusions. + +The original and predominant errour of his commentary, is acquiescence +in his first thoughts; that precipitation which is produced by +consciousness of quick discernment; and that confidence which presumes +to do, by surveying the surface, what labour only can perform, +by penetrating the bottom. His notes exhibit sometimes perverse +interpretations, and sometimes improbable conjectures; he at one +time gives the authour more profundity of meaning, than the sentence +admits, and at another discovers absurdities, where the sense is plain +to every other reader. But his emendations are likewise often happy +and just; and his interpretation of obscure passages learned and +sagacious. + +Of his notes, I have commonly rejected those, against which the +general voice of the publick has exclaimed, or which their own +incongruity immediately condemns, and which, I suppose, the authour +himself would desire to be forgotten. Of the rest, to part I have +given the highest approbation, by inserting the offered reading in +the text; part I have left to the judgment of the reader, as doubtful, +though specious; and part I have censured without reserve, but I am +sure without bitterness of malice, and, I hope, without wantonness of +insult. + +It is no pleasure to me, in revising my volumes, to observe how much +paper is wasted in confutation. Whoever considers the revolutions of +learning, and the various questions of greater or less importance, +upon which wit and reason have exercised their powers, must lament the +unsuccessfulness of enquiry, and the slow advances of truth, when he +reflects, that great part of the labour of every writer is only the +destruction of those that went before him. The first care of the +builder of a new system, is to demolish the fabricks which are +standing. The chief desire of him that comments an authour, is to +shew how much other commentators have corrupted and obscured him. +The opinions prevalent in one age, as truths above the reach of +controversy, are confuted and rejected in another, and rise again +to reception in remoter times. Thus the human mind is kept in motion +without progress. Thus sometimes truth and criour, and sometimes +contrarieties of errour, take each other's place by reciprocal +invasion. The tide of seeming knowledge which is poured over one +generation, retires and leaves another naked and barren; the sudden +meteors of intelligence which for a while appear to shoot their beams +into the regions of obscurity, on a sudden withdraw their lustre, and +leave mortals again to grope their way. + +These elevations and depressions of renown, and the contradictions to +which all improvers of knowledge must for ever be exposed, since they +are not escaped by the highest and brightest of mankind, may surely +be endured with patience by criticks and annotators, who can rank +themselves but as the satellites of their authours. How canst thou beg +for life, says _Achilles_ to his captive, when thou knowest that +thou art now to suffer only what must another day be suffered by +_Achilles?_ + +Dr. _Warburton_ had a name sufficient to confer celebrity on those who +could exalt themselves into antagonists, and his notes have raised a +clamour too loud to be distinct. His chief assailants are the authours +of _the Canons of criticism_ and of the _Review of_ Shakespeare's +_text_; of whom one ridicules his errours with airy petulance, +suitable enough to the levity of the controversy; the other attacks +them with gloomy malignity, as if he were dragging to justice an +assassin or incendiary. The one stings like a fly, sucks a little +blood, takes a gay flutter, and returns for more; the other bites like +a viper, and would be glad to leave inflammations and gangrene behind +him. When I think on one, with his confederates, I remember the danger +of _Coriolanus,_ who was afraid that _girls with spits, and boys with +stones, should slay him in puny battle_; when the other crosses my +imagination, I remember the prodigy in _Macbeth_, + + _An eagle tow'ring in his pride of place, + Was by a mousing owl hawk'd at and kill'd._ + +Let me however do them justice. One is a wit, and one a scholar. They +have both shown acuteness sufficient in the discovery of faults, and +have both advanced some probable interpretations of obscure passages; +but when they aspire to conjecture and emendation, it appears how +falsely we all estimate our own abilities, and the little which they +have been able to perform might have taught them more candour to the +endeavours of others. + +Before Dr. _Warburton's_ edition, _Critical observations on_ +Shakespeare had been published by Mr. _Upton_, a man skilled in +languages, and acquainted with books, but who seems to have had no +great vigour of genius or nicety of taste. Many of his explanations +are curious and useful, but he likewise, though he professed to oppose +the licentious confidence of editors, and adhere to the old copies, +is unable to restrain the rage of emendation, though his ardour is ill +seconded by his skill. Every cold empirick, when his heart is expanded +by a successful experiment, swells into a theorist, and the laborious +collator at some unlucky moment frolicks in conjecture. + +_Critical, historical and explanatory notes_ have been likewise +published upon _Shakespeare_ by Dr. _Grey_, whose diligent perusal +of the old _English_ writers has enabled him to make some useful +observations. What he undertook he has well enough performed, but +as he neither attempts judicial nor emendatory criticism, he employs +rather his memory than his sagacity. It were to be wished that all +would endeavour to imitate his modesty who have not been able to +surpass his knowledge. + +I can say with great sincerity of all my predecessors, what I hope +will hereafter be said of me, that not one has left _Shakespeare_ +without improvement, nor is there one to whom I have not been indebted +for assistance and information. Whatever I have taken from them it was +my intention to refer to its original authour, and it is certain, that +what I have not given to another, I believed when I wrote it to be my +own. In some perhaps I have been anticipated; but if I am ever found +to encroach upon the remarks of any other commentator, I am willing +that the honour, be it more or less, should be transferred to the +first claimant, for his right, and his alone, stands above dispute; +the second can prove his pretensions only to himself, nor can +himself always distinguish invention, with sufficient certainty, from +recollection. + +They have all been treated by me with candour, which they have not +been careful of observing to one another. It is not easy to discover +from what cause the acrimony of a scholiast can naturally proceed. +The subjects to be discussed by him are of very small importance; they +involve neither property nor liberty; nor favour the interest of +sect or party. The various readings of copies, and different +interpretations of a passage, seem to be questions that might exercise +the wit, without engaging the passions. But, whether it be, that +_small things make mean men proud_, and vanity catches small +occasions; or that all contrariety of opinion, even in those that can +defend it no longer, makes proud men angry; there is often found in +commentaries a spontaneous strain of invective and contempt, more +eager and venomous than is vented by the most furious controvertist in +politicks against those whom he is hired to defame. + +Perhaps the lightness of the matter may conduce to the vehemence +of the agency; when the truth to be investigated is so near to +inexistence, as to escape attention, its bulk is to be enlarged by +rage and exclamation: That to which all would be indifferent in its +original state, may attract notice when the fate of a name is appended +to it. A commentator has indeed great temptations to supply by +turbulence what he wants of dignity, to beat his little gold to a +spacious surface, to work that to foam which no art or diligence can +exalt to spirit. + +The notes which I have borrowed or written are either illustrative, +by which difficulties are explained; or judicial by which faults +and beauties are remarked; or emendatory, by which depravations are +corrected. + +The explanations transcribed from others, if I do not subjoin any +other interpretation, I suppose commonly to be right, at least I +intend by acquiescence to confess, that I have nothing better to +propose. + +After the labours of all the editors, I found many passages which +appeared to me likely to obstruct the greater number of readers, and +thought it my duty to facilitate their passage. It is impossible +for an expositor not to write too little for some, and too much for +others. He can only judge what is necessary by his own experience; +and how long soever he may deliberate, will at last explain many lines +which the learned will think impossible to be mistaken, and omit many +for which the ignorant will want his help. These are censures merely +relative, and must be quietly endured. I have endeavoured to be +neither superfluously copious, nor scrupulously reserved, and hope +that I have made my authour's meaning accessible to many who before +were frighted from perusing him, and contributed something to the +publick, by diffusing innocent and rational pleasure. + +The compleat explanation of an authour not systematick and +consequential, but desultory and vagrant, abounding in casual +allusions and light hints, is not to be expected from any single +scholiast. All personal reflections, when names are suppressed, must +be in a few years irrecoverably obliterated; and customs, too minute +to attract the notice of law, such as modes of dress, formalities of +conversation, rules of visits, disposition of furniture, and practices +of ceremony, which naturally find places in familiar dialogue, are +so fugitive and unsubstantial, that they are not easily retained or +recovered. What can be known, will be collected by chance, from the +recesses of obscure and obsolete papers, perused commonly with some +other view. Of this knowledge every man has some, and none has much; +but when an authour has engaged the publick attention, those who can +add any thing to his illustration, communicate their discoveries, and +time produces what had eluded diligence. + +To time I have been obliged to resign many passages, which, though I +did not understand them, will perhaps hereafter be explained, having, +I hope, illustrated some, which others have neglected or mistaken, +sometimes by short remarks, or marginal directions, such as every +editor has added at his will, and often by comments more laborious +than the matter will seem to deserve; but that which is most difficult +is not always most important, and to an editor nothing is a trifle by +which his authour is obscured. + +The poetical beauties or defects I have not been very diligent to +observe. Some plays have more, and some fewer judicial observations, +not in proportion to their difference of merit, but because I gave +this part of my design to chance and to caprice. The reader, I +believe, is seldom pleased to find his opinion anticipated; it is +natural to delight more in what we find or make, than in what we +receive. Judgement, like other faculties, is improved by practice, and +its advancement is hindered by submission to dictatorial decisions, as +the memory grows torpid by the use of a table book. Some initiation is +however necessary; of all skill, part is infused by precept, and part +is obtained by habit; I have therefore shewn so much as may enable the +candidate of criticism to discover the rest. + +To the end of most plays, I have added short strictures, containing +a general censure of faults, or praise of excellence; in which I know +not how much I have concurred with the current opinion; but I have +not, by any affectation of singularity, deviated from it. Nothing +is minutely and particularly examined, and therefore it is to be +supposed, that in the plays which are condemned there is much to be +praised, and in these which are praised much to be condemned. + +The part of criticism in which the whole succession of editors has +laboured with the greatest diligence, which has occasioned the +most arrogant ostentation, and excited the keenest acrimony, is the +emendation of corrupted passages, to which the publick attention +having been first drawn by the violence of contention between _Pope_ +and _Theobald_, has been continued by the persecution, which, with a +kind of conspiracy, has been since raised against all the publishers +of _Shakespeare_. + +That many passages have passed in a state of depravation through all +the editions is indubitably certain; of these the restoration is only +to be attempted by collation of copies or sagacity of conjecture. The +collator's province is safe and easy, the conjecturer's perilous and +difficult. Yet as the greater part of the plays are extant only in one +copy, the peril must not be avoided, nor the difficulty refused. + +Of the readings which this emulation of amendment has hitherto +produced, some from the labours of every publisher I have advanced +into the text; those are to be considered as in my opinion +sufficiently supported; some I have rejected without mention, as +evidently erroneous; some I have left in the notes without censure or +approbation, as resting in equipoise between objection and defence; +and some, which seemed specious but not right, I have inserted with a +subsequent animadversion. + +Having classed the observations of others, I was at last to try what +I could substitute for their mistakes, and how I could supply their +omissions. I collated such copies as I could procure, and wished +for more, but have not found the collectors of these rarities very +communicative. Of the editions which chance or kindness put into +my hands I have given an enumeration, that I may not be blamed for +neglecting what I had not the power to do. + +By examining the old copies, I soon found that the later publishers, +with all their boasts of diligence, suffered many passages to stand +unauthorised, and contented themselves with _Rowe's_ regulation of +the text, even where they knew it to be arbitrary, and with a +little consideration might have found it to be wrong. Some of these +alterations are only the ejection of a word for one that appeared to +him more elegant or more intelligible. These corruptions I have often +silently rectified; for the history of our language, and the true +force of our words, can only be preserved, by keeping the text of +authours free from adulteration. Others, and those very frequent, +smoothed the cadence, or regulated the measure; on these I have +not exercised the same rigour; if only a word was transposed, or a +particle Inserted or omitted, I have sometimes suffered the line +to stand; for the inconstancy of the copies is such, as that some +liberties may be easily permitted. But this practice I have not +suffered to proceed far, having restored the primitive diction +wherever it could for any reason be preferred. + +The emendations, which comparison of copies supplied, I have inserted +in the text; sometimes where the improvement was slight, without +notice, and sometimes with an account of the reasons of the change. + +Conjecture, though it be sometimes unavoidable, I have not wantonly +nor licentiously indulged. It has been my settled principle, that the +reading of the ancient books is probably true, and therefore is not +to be disturbed for the sake of elegance, perspicuity, or mere +improvement of the sense. For though much credit is not due to the +fidelity, nor any to the judgement of the first publishers, yet they +who had the copy before their eyes were more likely to read it right, +than we who read it only by imagination. But it is evident that they +have often made strange mistakes by ignorance or negligence, and that +therefore something may be properly attempted by criticism, keeping +the middle way between presumption and timidity. + +Such criticism I have attempted to practice, and where any passage +appeared inextricably perplexed, have endeavoured to discover how it +may be recalled to sense, with least violence. But my first labour +is, always to turn the old text on every side, and try if there be any +interstice, through which light can find its way; nor would _Huetius_ +himself condemn me, as refusing the trouble of research, for the +ambition of alteration. In this modest industry I have not been +unsuccessful. I have rescued many lines from the violations of +temerity, and secured many scenes from the inroads of correction. I +have adopted the _Roman_ sentiment, that it is more honourable to +save a citizen, than to kill an enemy, and have been more careful to +protect than to attack. + +I have preserved the common distribution of the plays into acts, +though I believe it to be in almost all the plays void of authority. +Some of those which are divided in the later editions have no division +in the first folio, and some that are divided in the folio have no +division in the preceding copies. The settled mode of the theatre +requires four intervals in the play, but few, if any, of our authour's +compositions can be properly distributed in that manner. An act is so +much of the drama as passes without intervention of time or change of +place. A pause makes a new act. In every real, and therefore in every +imitative action, the intervals may be more or fewer, the restriction +of five acts being accidental and arbitrary. This _Shakespeare_ knew, +and this he practised; his plays were written, and at first printed +in one unbroken continuity, and ought now to be exhibited with +short pauses, interposed as often as the scene is changed, or any +considerable time is required to pass. This method would at once quell +a thousand absurdities. + +In restoring the author's works to their integrity, I have considered +the punctuation as wholly in my power; for what could be their care of +colons and commas, who corrupted words and sentences. Whatever could +be done by adjusting points is therefore silently performed, in some +plays with much diligence, in others with less; it is hard to keep a +busy eye steadily fixed upon evanescent atoms, or a discursive mind +upon evanescent truth. + +The same liberty has been taken with a few particles, or other words +of slight effect. I have sometimes inserted or omitted them without +notice. I have done that sometimes, which the other editors have +done always, and which indeed the state of the text may sufficiently +justify. + +The greater part of readers, instead of blaming us for passing +trifles, will wonder that on mere trifles so much labour is expended, +with such importance of debate, and such solemnity of diction. To +these I answer with confidence, that they are judging of an art which +they do not understand; yet cannot much reproach them with their +ignorance, nor promise that they would become in general, by learning +criticism, more useful, happier or wiser. + +As I practised conjecture more, I learned to trust it less; and after +I had printed a few plays, resolved to insert none of my own readings +in the text. Upon this caution I now congratulate myself, for every +day encreases my doubt of my emendations. + +Since I have confined my imagination to the margin, it must not be +considered as very reprehensible, if I have suffered it to play some +freaks in its own dominion. There is no danger in conjecture, if it +be proposed as conjecture; and while the text remains uninjured, those +changes may be safely offered, which are not considered even by him +that offers them as necessary or safe. + +If my readings are of little value, they have not been ostentatiously +displayed or importunately obtruded. I could have written longer +notes, for the art of writing notes is not of difficult attainment. +The work is performed, first by railing at the stupidity, negligence, +ignorance, and asinine tastelessness of the former editors, and +shewing, from all that goes before and all that follows, the +inelegance and absurdity of the old reading; then by proposing +something which to superficial readers would seem specious, but +which the editor rejects with indignation; then by producing the true +reading, with a long paraphrase, and concluding with loud acclamations +on the discovery, and a sober wish for the advancement and prosperity +of genuine criticism. + +All this may be done, and perhaps done sometimes without impropriety. +But I have always suspected that the reading is right, which requires +many words to prove it wrong; and the emendation wrong, that cannot +without so much labour appear to be right The justness of a happy +restoration strikes at once, and the moral precept may be well applied +to criticism, _quod dubitas ne feceris_. + +To dread the shore which he sees spread with wrecks, is natural to +the sailor. I had before my eye, so many critical adventures ended in +miscarriage, that caution was forced upon me. I encountered in every +page Wit struggling with its own sophistry, and Learning confused by +the multiplicity of its views. I was forced to censure those whom I +admired, and could not but reflect, while I was dispossessing their +emendations, how soon the same fate might happen to my own, and how +many of the readings which I have corrected may be by some other +editor defended and established. + + Criticks, I saw, that other's names efface, + And fix their own, with labour, in the place; + Their own, like others, soon their place resign'd, + Or disappear'd, and left the first behind, + + POPE. + +That a conjectural critick should often be mistaken, cannot be +wonderful, either to others or himself, if it be considered, that in +his art there is no system, no principal and axiomatical truth that +regulates subordinate positions. His chance of errour is renewed +at every attempt; an oblique view of the passage, a slight +misapprehension of a phrase, a casual inattention to the parts +connected, is sufficient to make him not only fails, but fail +ridiculously; and when he succeeds best, he produces perhaps but one +reading of many probable, and he that suggests another will always be +able to dispute his claims. + +It is an unhappy state, in which danger is hid under pleasure. The +allurements of emendation are scarcely resistible. Conjecture has all +the joy and all the pride of invention, and he that has once started +a happy change, is too much delighted to consider what objections may +rise against it. + +Yet conjectural criticism has been of great use in the learned world; +nor is it my intention to depreciate a study, that has exercised so +many mighty minds, from the revival of learning to our own age, from +the Bishop of _Aleria_ to English _Bentley_. The criticks on ancient +authours have, in the exercise of their sagacity, many assistances, +which the editor of _Shakespeare_ is condemned to want. They are +employed upon grammatical and settled languages, whose construction +contributes so much to perspicuity, that _Homer_ has fewer passages +unintelligible than _Chaucer_. The words have not only a known +regimen, but invariable quantities, which direct and confine the +choice. There are commonly more manuscripts than one; and they do not +often conspire in the same mistakes. Yet _Scaliger_ could confess +to _Salmasius_ how little satisfaction his emendations gave him. +_Illudunt nobis conjectureæ nostræ, quarum nos pudet, posteaquam +in meliores codices incidimus_. And _Lipsius_ could complain, that +criticks were making faults, by trying to remove them, _Ut olim +vitiis, ita nunc remediis laboratur_. And indeed, where mere +conjecture is to be used, the emendations of _Scaliger_ and _Lipsius_, +notwithstanding their wonderful sagacity and erudition, are often +vague and disputable, like mine or _Theobald_'s. + +Perhaps I may not be more censured for doing wrong, than for doing +little; for raising in the publick expectations, which at last I have +not answered. The expectation of ignorance is indefinite, and that of +knowledge is often tyrannical. It is hard to satisfy those who know +not what to demand, or those who demand by design what they think +impossible to be done. I have indeed disappointed no opinion more +than my own; yet I have endeavoured to perform my task with no slight +solicitude. Not a single passage in the whole work has appeared to me +corrupt, which I have not attempted to restore; or obscure, which I +have not endeavoured to illustrate. In many I have failed like others, +and from many, after all my efforts, I have retreated, and confessed +the repulse. I have not passed over, with affected superiority, what +is equally difficult to the reader and to myself, but where I could +not instruct him, have owned my ignorance. I might easily have +accumulated a mass of seeming learning upon easy scenes; but it ought +not to be imputed to negligence, that, where nothing was necessary, +nothing has been done, or that, where others have said enough, I have +said no more. + +Notes are often necessary, but they are necessary evils. Let him, that +is yet unacquainted with the powers of _Shakespeare_, and who desires +to feel the highest pleasure that the drama can give, read every play +from the first scene to the last, with utter negligence of all his +commentators. When his fancy is once on the wing, let it not stoop at +correction or explanation. When his attention is strongly engaged, +let it disdain alike to turn aside to the name of _Theobald_ and of +_Pope_. Let him read on through brightness and obscurity, through +integrity and corruption; let him preserve his comprehension of the +dialogue and his interest in the fable. And when the pleasures +of novelty have ceased, let him attempt exactness, and read the +commentators. + +Particular passages are cleared by notes, but the general effect of +the work is weakened. The mind is refrigerated by interruption; the +thoughts are diverted from the principal subject; the reader is weary, +he suspects not why; and at last throws away the book, which he has +too diligently studied. + +Parts are not to be examined till the whole has been surveyed; there +is a kind of intellectual remoteness necessary for the comprehension +of any great work in its full design and its true proportions; a close +approach shews the smaller niceties, but the beauty of the whole is +discerned no longer. It is not very grateful to consider how little the +succession of editors has added to this authour's power of pleasing. +He was read, admired, studied, and imitated, while he was yet +deformed with all the improprieties which ignorance and neglect could +accumulate upon him; while the reading was yet not rectified, nor +his allusions understood; yet then did _Dryden_ pronounce "that +_Shakespeare_ was the man, who, of all modern and perhaps ancient +poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul." All the images +of nature were still present to him, and he drew them not laboriously, +but luckily: when he describes any thing, you more than see it, you +feel it too. Those who accuse him to have wanted learning, give him +the greater commendation: he was naturally learned: he needed not the +spectacles of books to read nature; he looked inwards, and found her +there. I cannot say he is every where alike; were he so, I should do +him injury to compare him with the greatest of mankind. He is many +times flat and insipid; his comick wit degenerating into clenches, his +serious swelling into bombast. But he is always great, when some +great occasion is presented to him: No man can say, he ever had a fit +subject for his wit, and did not then raise himself as high above the +rest of poets, + + "Quantum lenta solent inter viburna cupressi." + +It is to be lamented, that such a writer should want a commentary; +that his language should become obsolete, or his sentiments obscure. +But it is vain to carry wishes beyond the condition of human things; +that which must happen to all, has happened to _Shakespeare_, by +accident and time; and more than has been suffered by any other writer +since the use of types, has been suffered by him through his own +negligence of fame, or perhaps by that superiority of mind, which +despised its own performances, when it compared them with its powers, +and judged those works unworthy to be preserved, which the criticks +of following ages were to contend for the fame of restoring and +explaining. + +Among these candidates of inferiour fame, I am now to stand the +judgment of the publick; and wish that I could confidently produce my +commentary as equal to the encouragement which I have had the honour +of receiving. Every work of this kind is by its nature deficient, +and I should feel little solicitude about the sentence, were it to be +pronounced only by the skilful and the learned. + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPYLÄEN [A] + +BY J.W. VON GOETHE. (1798) + + +The youth, when Nature and Art attract him, thinks that with a +vigorous effort he can soon penetrate into the innermost sanctuary, +the man, after long wanderings, finds himself still in the outer +court. + +Such an observation has suggested our title. It is only on the step, +in the gateway, the entrance, the vestibule, the space between the +outside and the inner chamber, between the sacred and the common, that +we may ordinarily tarry with our friends. + +If the word _Propylaea_ recalls particularly the structure through +which was reached the citadel of Athens and the temple of Minerva, +this is not inconsistent with our purpose; but the presumption of +intending to produce here a similar work of art and splendor should +not be laid to our charge. The name of the place may be understood +as symbolizing what might have happened there; one may expect +conversations and discussions such as would perhaps not be unworthy of +that place. + +Are not thinkers, scholars, artists, in their best hours allured to +those regions, to dwell (at least in imagination) among a people to +whom a perfection which we desire but never attain was natural, +among whom in the course of time and life, a culture developed in a +beautiful continuity, which to us appears only in passing fragments? +What modern nation does not owe its artistic culture to the Greeks, +and, in certain branches, what nation more than the German? + +So much by way of excuse for the symbolic title, if indeed an excuse +be necessary. May the title be a reminder that we are to depart as +little as possible from classic ground; may it, through its brevity +and signification, modify the demands of the friends of art whom +we hope to interest through the present work, which is to contain +observations and reflections concerning Nature and Art by a harmonious +circle of friends. + +He who is called to be an artist will give careful heed to everything +around him; objects and their parts will attract his attention, and +by making practical use of such experience he will gradually train +himself to observe more sharply. He will, in his early career, apply +everything, so far as possible, to his own advantage; later he will +gladly make himself serviceable to others. Thus we also hope to +present and relate to our readers many things which we regard as +useful and agreeable, things which, under various circumstances, have +been noted by us during a number of years. + +But who will not willingly agree that pure observation is more rare +than is believed? We are apt to confuse our sensations, our opinion, +our judgment, with what we experience, so that we do not remain +long in the passive attitude of the observer, but soon go on to make +reflections; and upon these no greater weight can be placed than may +be more or less justified by the nature and quality of our individual +intellects. + +In this matter we are able to gain stronger confidence from our +harmony with others, and from the knowledge that we do not think and +work alone, but in common. The perplexing doubt whether our method +of thought belongs only to us--a doubt which often comes over us when +others express the direct opposite of our convictions--is softened, +even dispelled, when we find ourselves in agreement with others; only +then do we go on rejoicing with assurance in the possession of those +principles which a long experience, on our own part and on the part of +others, has gradually confirmed. + +When several persons thus live united, so that they may call one +another friends, because they have a common interest in bringing about +their progressive cultivation and in advancing towards closely related +aims, then they may be certain that they will meet again in the most +varied ways, and that even the courses which seemed to separate them +from one another will nevertheless soon bring them happily together +again. + +Who has not experienced what advantages are afforded in such cases by +conversation? But conversation is ephemeral; and while the results +of a mutual development are imperishable, the memory of the means by +which it was reached disappears. Letters preserve better the stages of +a progress which friends achieve together; every moment of growth is +fixed, and if the result attained affords us agreeable satisfaction, +a look backward at the process of development is instructive since it +permits its to hope for an unflagging advance in the future. + +Short papers, in which are set down from time to time one's thoughts, +convictions, and wishes, in order to find entertainment in one's past +self after a lapse of time, are excellent auxiliary means for +the development of oneself and of others, none of which should be +neglected when one considers the brief period allotted to life and the +many obstacles that stand in the way of every advance. + +It is self evident that we are talking here particularly of an +exchange of ideas between such friends as are striving for cultivation +in the sphere of science and art; although life in the world of +affairs and industry should not lack similar advantages. + +In the arts and sciences, however, in addition to this close +association among their votaries, a relation to the public is as +favorable as it is necessary. Whatever of universal interest one +thinks or accomplishes belongs to the world, and the world brings to +maturity whatever it can utilize of the efforts of the individual. The +desire for approval which the author feels is an impulse implanted by +Nature to draw him toward something higher; he thinks he has attained +the laurel wreath, but soon becomes aware that a more laborious +training of every native talent is necessary in order to retain the +public favor; though it may be attained for a short moment through +fortune or accident also. + +The relation of the author to his public is important in his early +period; even in later days he cannot dispense with it. However little +he may be fitted to teach others, he wishes to share his thoughts with +those whom he feels congenial, but who are scattered far and wide in +the world. By this means he wishes to re-establish his relation with +his old friends, to continue it with new ones, and to gain in the +younger generation still others for the remainder of his life. He +wishes to spare youth the circuitous paths upon which he himself +went astray, and while observing and utilizing the advantages of the +present, to maintain the memory of his praiseworthy earlier efforts. + +With this serious view, a small society has been brought together; may +cheerfulness attend our undertakings, and time may show whither we are +bound. + +The papers which we intend to present, though they are composed by +several authors, will, it is hoped, never be contradictory in the main +points, even though the methods of thought may not be the same in all. +No two persons regard the world in exactly the same way, and different +characters will often apply in different ways a principle which +they all acknowledge. Indeed, a person is not always consistent with +himself in his views and judgments: early convictions must give way to +later ones. The individual opinions that a man holds and expresses may +stand all tests or not; the main thing is that he continue on his way, +true to himself and to others! + +Much as the authors wish and hope to be in harmony with one another +and with a large part of the public, they must not shut their eyes to +the fact that from various quarters many a discord will ring out. +They must expect this all the more since they differ from prevailing +opinions in more than one point. Though far from wishing to dominate +or change the way of thinking of a third person, still they will +firmly express their own opinion, and, as circumstances dictate, will +avoid or take tip a quarrel. On the whole, however, they will adhere +to one creed, and especially will they repeat again and again those +conditions which seem to them indispensable in the training of an +artist. Whoever takes an interest in this matter, must be ready to +take sides; otherwise he does not deserve to be effective anywhere. + +If, therefore, we promise to present reflections and observations +concerning Nature, we must at the same time indicate that these +remarks will chiefly have reference, first, to plastic art; then, to +art in general; finally, to the general training of the artist. + +The highest demand that is made on an artist is this: that he be +true to Nature, study her, imitate her, and produce something that +resembles her phenomena. How great, how enormous, this demand is, +is not always kept in mind; and the true artist himself learns it by +experience only, in the course of his progressive development. Nature +is separated from Art by an enormous chasm, which genius itself is +unable to bridge without external assistance. + +All that we perceive around us is merely raw material; if it happens +rarely enough that an artist, through instinct and taste, through +practice and experiment, reaches the point of attaining the beautiful +exterior of things, of selecting the best from the good before him, +and of producing at least an agreeable appearance, it is still more +rare, particularly in modern times, for an artist to penetrate into +the depths of things as well as into the depths of his own soul, +in order to produce in his works not only something light and +superficially effective, but, as a rival of Nature, to produce +something spiritually organic, and to give his work of art a content +and a form through which it appears both natural and beyond Nature. + +Man is the highest, the characteristic subject of plastic art; +to understand him, to extricate oneself from the labyrinth of his +anatomy, a general knowledge of organic nature is imperative. The +artist should also acquaint himself theoretically with inorganic +bodies and with the general operations of Nature, particularly if, as +in the case of sound and color, they are adaptable to the purposes +of art; but what a circuitous path he would be obliged to take if +he wanted to seek laboriously in the schools of the anatomist, the +naturalist, and the physicist, for that which serves his purposes! It +is, indeed, a question whether he would find there what must be most +important for him. Those men have the entirely different needs of +their own pupils to satisfy, so that they cannot be expected to think +of the limited and special needs of the artist. For that reason it is +our intention to take a hand, and, even though we cannot see prospects +of completing the necessary work ourselves, both to give a view of the +whole and to begin the elaboration of details. + +The human figure cannot be understood merely through observation +of its surface; the interior must be laid bare, its parts must be +separated, the connections perceived, the differences noted, action +and reaction observed, the concealed, constant, and fundamental +elements of the phenomena impressed on the mind, if one really wishes +to contemplate and imitate what moves before our eyes in living waves +as a beautiful, undivided whole. A glance at the surface of a living +being confuses the observer; we may cite here, as in other cases, +the true proverb, "One sees only what one knows" For just as a +short-sighted man sees more clearly an object from which he draws +back than one to which he draws near, because his intellectual vision +comes to his aid, so the perfection of observation really depends on +knowledge. How well an expert naturalist, who can also draw, imitates +objects by recognizing and emphasizing the important and significant +parts from which is derived the character of the whole! + +Just as the artist is greatly helped by an exact knowledge of the +separate parts of the human figure, which he must in the end regard +again as a whole, so a general view, a side glance at related objects, +is highly advantageous, provided the artist is capable of rising to +Ideas and of grasping the close relationship of things apparently +remote. Comparative anatomy has prepared a general conception of +organic creatures; it leads us from form to form, and by observing +organisms closely or distantly related, we rise above them all to see +their characteristics in an ideal picture. If we keep this picture in +mind, we find that in observing objects our attention takes a definite +direction, that scattered facts can be learned and retained more +easily by comparison, that in the practice of art we can finally +vie with Nature only when we have learned from her, at least to some +extent, her method of procedure in the creation of her works. + +Furthermore, we would encourage the artist to gain knowledge also of +the inorganic world; this can be done all the more easily since now we +can conveniently and quickly acquire knowledge of the mineral kingdom. +The painter needs some knowledge of stones in order to imitate their +characteristics; the sculptor and architect, in order to utilize them; +the cutter of precious stones cannot be without a knowledge of +their nature; the connoisseur and amateur, too, will strive for such +information. + +Now that we have advised the artist to gain a conception of the +general operations of Nature, in order to become acquainted with those +which particularly interest him, partly to develop himself in more +directions, partly to understand better that which concerns him; we +shall add a few further remarks on this significant point. + +Up to the present the painter has been able merely to wonder at the +physicist's theory of colors, without gaining any advantage from it. +The natural feeling of the artist, however, constant training, and a +practical necessity led him into a way of his own. He felt the vivid +contrasts out of the union of which harmony of color arises, he +designated certain characteristics through approximate sensations, he +had warm and cold colors, colors which express proximity, others which +express distance, and what not; and thus in his own way he brought +these phenomena closer to the most general laws of Nature. Perhaps the +supposition is confirmed that the operations of Nature in colors, as +well as magnetic, electric, and other operations, depend upon a mutual +relation, a polarity, or whatever else we might call the twofold or +manifold aspects of a distinct unity. + +We shall make it our duty to present this matter in detail and in a +form comprehensible to the artist; and we can be the more hopeful of +doing something welcome to him, since we shall be concerned only with +explaining and tracing to fundamental principles things which he has +hitherto done by instinct. + +So much for what we hope to impart in regard to Nature; now for what +is most necessary in regard to Art. + +Since the arrangement of this work proposes the presentation of single +treatises, some of these only in part, and since it is not our desire +to dissect a whole, but rather to build up a whole from many parts, +it will be necessary to present, as soon as possible and in a general +summary, those thing's which the reader will gradually find unfolded +in our detailed elaborations. We shall, therefore, be occupied first +with an essay on plastic art, in which the familiar rubrics will be +presented according to our interpretation and method. Here it will be +our main concern to emphasize the importance of every branch of Art, +and to show that the artist must not neglect a single one, as has +unfortunately often happened, and still happens. + +Hitherto we have regarded Nature as the treasure chamber of material +in general; now, however, we reach the important point where it is +shown how Art prepares its materials for itself. + +When the artist takes any object of Nature, the object no longer +belongs to Nature; indeed, we can say that the artist creates the +object in that moment, by extracting from it all that is significant, +characteristic, interesting, or rather by putting into it a +higher value. In this way finer proportions, nobler forms, higher +characteristics are, as it were, forced upon the human figure; the +circle of regularity, perfection, signification, and completeness is +drawn, in which Nature gladly places her best possessions even though +elsewhere in her vast extent she easily degenerates into ugliness and +loses herself in indifference. + +The same is true of composite works of art, of their subject and +content, whether the theme be fable or history. Happy the artist who +makes no mistake in undertaking the work, who knows how to choose, or +rather to determine what is suitable for art! He who wanders uneasily +among scattered myths and far-stretching history in search of a +theme, he who wishes to be significantly scholarly or allegorically +interesting, will often be checked in the midst of his work by +unexpected obstacles, or will miss his finest aim after the completion +of the work. He who does not speak clearly to the senses, will not +address himself clearly to the mind; and we regard this point as so +important that we insert at the very outset a more extended discussion +of it. + +A theme having been happily found or invented, it is subjected to +treatment which we would divide into the spiritual the sensuous, and +the mechanical. The spiritual develops the subject according to its +inner relations, it discovers subordinate motives; and, if we can at +all judge the depth of ar artistic genius by the choice of subject, +we can recognize in his selection of themes his breadth, wealth, +fullness, and power of attraction. The sensuous treatment we +should define as that through which the work becomes thoroughly +comprehensible to the senses, agreeable, delightful, and irresistible +through its gentle charm. The mechanical treatment, finally, is that +which works upon given material through any bodily organ, and thus +brings the work into existence and gives it reality. + +While we hope to be useful to the artist in this way, and earnestly +wish that he may avail himself of advice and of suggestions in +his work, the disquieting observation is forced upon us that every +undertaking, like every man, is likely to suffer just as much from its +period as it is to derive occasional advantage from it, and in our +own case we cannot altogether put aside the question concerning the +reception we are likely to meet with. + +Everything is subject to constant change, and since certain things +cannot exist side by side, they displace one another This is true of +kinds of knowledge, of certain methods of instruction, of methods of +representation, and of maxims. The aims of men remain nearly always +the same: they still desire to become good artists or poets as they +did centuries ago; but the means through which the goal is reached are +not clear to everybody, and why should it be denied that nothing +would be more agreeable than to be able to carry out joyfully a great +design? + +Naturally the public has a great influence upon Art, since in +return for its approval and its money it demands work that may give +satisfaction and immediate enjoyment; and the artist will for the +most part be glad to adapt himself to it, for he also is a part of the +public, he has received his training during the same years, he feels +the same needs, strives in the same direction, and thus moves along +happily with the multitude which supports him and which is invigorated +by him. In this matter we see whole nations and epochs delighted by +their artists, just as the artist sees himself reflected in his nation +and his epoch, without either having even the slightest suspicion +that their path might not be right, that their taste might be at least +one-sided, their art on the decline, and their progress in the wrong +direction. + +Instead of proceeding to further generalities on this point, we shall +make a remark which refers particularly to plastic art. + +For the German artist, in fact for modern and northern artists in +general, it is difficult--indeed almost impossible--to make the +transition from formless matter to form, and to maintain himself at +that point, even should he succeed in reaching it. Let every artist +who has lived for a time in Italy ask himself whether the presence of +the best works of ancient and modern art have not aroused in him +the incessant endeavour to study and imitate the human figure in its +proportions, forms, and characteristics, to apply all diligence and +care in the execution in order to approach those artistic works, so +entirely complete in themselves, in order to produce a work which, in +gratifying the sense, exalts the spirit to the greatest heights. Let +him also admit, however, that after his return he must gradually relax +his efforts, because he finds few persons who will really see, enjoy, +and comprehend what is depicted, but, for the most part, finds only +those who look at a work superficially, receive from it mere random +impressions, and in some way of their own try to get out of it any +kind of sensation and pleasure. + +The worst picture can appeal to our senses and imagination by arousing +their activity, setting them free, and leaving them to themselves, the +best work of art also appeals to our senses, but in a higher language +which, of course, we must understand; it enchains the feelings and +imagination, it deprives us of caprice, we cannot deal with a perfect +work at our will; we are forced to give ourselves up to it, in order +to receive ourselves from it again, exalted and refined. + +That these are no dreams we shall try to show gradually, in detail, +and as clearly as possible, we shall call attention particularly to a +contradiction in which the moderns are often involved. They call +the ancients their teachers, they acknowledge in their works an +unattainable excellence, yet they depart both in theory and practice +far from the maxims which the ancients continually observed. In +starting from this important point and in returning to it often, we +shall find others about which something falls to be said. + +One of the principal signs of the decay of art is the mixture of its +various kinds. The arts themselves, as well as their branches, are +related to one another, and have a certain tendency to unite, even to +lose themselves in one another; but it is in this that the duty, the +merit, the dignity of the real artist consists, namely, in being able +to separate the field of art in which he works from others, in placing +every art and every branch of art on its own footing, and in isolating +it as far as possible. + +It has been noticed that all plastic art strives toward painting, all +literary art toward the drama, and this observation may in the future +give us occasion for important reflections. + +The genuine law-giving artist strives for the truth of art, the +lawless artist who follows a blind impulse strives for the reality of +Nature; through the former, art reaches its highest summit, through +the latter its lowest stage. + +What holds good of art in general holds good also of the kinds of art. +The sculptor must think and feel differently from the painter, indeed +he must proceed when he wishes to produce a work in relief, in a +different fashion from that which he will employ for a work in the +round. By the raising of low reliefs higher and higher, by the making +of various parts and figures stand out completely, and finally by the +adding of buildings and landscapes, so that work was produced which +was half painting and half puppet-show, true art steadily declined. +Excellent artists of modern times have unfortunately pursued this +course. + +When in the future we express such maxims as we think sound, we should +like, since they are deduced from works of art, to have them put +to the test of practice by the artist. How rarely one can come to a +theoretical agreement with anyone else on a fundamental principle. +That which is applicable and useful, on the other hand, is decided +upon much more quickly. How often we see artists in embarrassment over +the choice of subjects, over the general type of composition adapted +to their art, and the detailed arrangement; how often the painter over +the choice of colors! Then is the time to test a principle, then will +it he easier to decide whether it is bringing us closer to the great +models and to everything that we value and love in them, or whether it +leaves us entangled in the empirical confusion of an experience that +has not been sufficiently thought out. + +If such maxims hold good in training: the artist, in guiding him +in many an embarrassment, they will serve also in the development, +valuation, and judgment of old and new works of art, and will in turn +arise from an observation of these works. Indeed, it is all the more +necessary to adhere to this, because, notwithstanding the universally +praised excellences of antiquity, individuals and whole nations +among the moderns often fail to recognize wherein lies the highest +excellence of those works. + +An exact test will protect us best from this evil. For that reason let +us cite only one example to show what usually happens to the amateur +in plastic art, so that we may make clear how necessary it is that +criticism of ancient as well as modern works should be exact if it is +to be of any use. + +Upon him who has an eye for beauty, though untrained, even a blurred, +imperfect plaster cast of an excellent antique will always have a +great effect; for in such a reproduction there always remain the idea, +the simplicity and greatness of form, in short, the general outlines; +as much, at all events, as one could perceive with poor eyes at a +distance. + +It may be noticed that a strong inclination toward art is often +enkindled by such quite imperfect reproductions. But the effect is +like the object; it is rather that an obscure indefinite feeling is +aroused, than that the object in all its worth and dignity really +appears to such beginners in art. These are they who usually express +the theory that too minute a critical investigation destroys the +enjoyment, who are accustomed to oppose and resist regard for details. + +If gradually, however, after further experience and training, they +are confronted with a sharp cast instead of a blurred one, an original +instead of a cast, their pleasure grows with their insight, and +increases when the originals themselves, the perfect originals, +finally become known to them. + +The labyrinth of exact observations is willingly entered when the +details as well as the whole are perfect; indeed one learns to realize +that the excellences can be appreciated only in proportion as the +defects are perceived. To discriminate the restoration from the +genuine parts, and the copy from the original, to see in the smallest +fragments the ruined glory of the whole--this is the joy of the +finished expert; and there is a great difference between observing and +comprehending an imperfect whole with obscured vision, and a perfect +whole with clear vision. + +He who concerns himself with any branch of knowledge, should strive +for the highest! Insight is different from practice, for in practical +work everyone must soon resign himself to the fact that only a certain +measure of strength is alloted to him; far more people, however, +are capable of knowledge and insight. Indeed, one may well say that +everyone is thus capable who can deny himself and subordinate himself +to external objects, everyone who does not strive with rigid and +narrow-minded obstinacy to impose upon the highest works of Nature and +Art his own personality and his petty onesideness. + +To speak of works of art fitly and with true benefit to oneself and +others, the discussion should take place only in the presence of the +works themselves. Everything depends on the objects being in view; on +whether something absolutely definite is suggested by the word with +which one hopes to illuminate the work of art; for, otherwise, nothing +is thought of at all. This is why it so often happens that the writer +on art dwells merely on generalities, through which, indeed, ideas and +sensations are aroused in all readers, but no satisfaction is given to +the man who, book in hand, steps in front of the work of art itself. +Precisely on this account, however, we may in several essays be in a +position to arouse rather than to satisfy the desire of the readers; +for nothing is more natural than that they should wish to have before +their eyes immediately an excellent work of art which is minutely +dissected, in order to enjoy the whole which we are discussing, and, +so far as the parts are concerned, to subject to their own judgment +the opinion which they read. + +While the authors, however, write on the assumption that their readers +either have seen the works, or will see them in the future, yet they +hope to do everything in their power for those who are in neither +case. We shall mention reproductions, shall indicate where casts of +antique works of art and antique works themselves are accessible, +particularly to Germans; and thus try, as far as we can, to minister +to the genuine love and knowledge of art. + +A history of art can be based only upon the highest and most detailed +comprehension of art; only when one knows the finest things that man +can produce can one trace the psychological and chronological course +taken in art, as in other fields. This course began with a limited +activity, busied about a dry and even gloomy imitation of the +insignificant as well as the significant, whence developed a more +amiable, more kindly feeling toward Nature, till finally, under +favorable circumstances, accompanied by knowledge, regularity, +seriousness, and severity, art rose to its height. There at last it +became possible for the fortunate genius, surrounded by all these +auxiliaries, to produce the charming and the complete. + +Unfortunately, however, works of art with such ease of expression, +which instil into man cheerfulness, freedom, and a pleasant feeling of +his own personality, arouse in the striving artist the idea that the +process of production is also agreeable. Since the pinnacle of what +art and genius produce is an appearance of ease, the artists who come +after are tempted to make things easy for themselves, and to work for +the sake of appearances. Thus art gradually declines from its high +position, as to the whole as well as details. But if we wish to gain +a fair conception, we must come down to details of details, an +occupation not always agreeable or charming, but by and by richly +rewarded with a more certain view of the whole. + +If the experience of observing ancient and mediæval works of art has +shown us that certain maxims hold good we need these most of all +in judging the most recent modern productions; for, since personal +relations, love and hatred of individuals, favor or disfavor of the +multitude so easily enter into the valuation of living or recently +deceased artists, we are in all the more need of principles in order +to pass judgment on our contemporaries. The inquiry can be conducted +in two ways: by diminishing the influence of caprice; by bringing the +question before a higher tribunal. The principle can be tested as +well as its application; and even if we should not agree, the point in +dispute can still be definitely and clearly pointed out. + +Especially should we wish that the vivifying artist, in whose works +we might perhaps have found something to remember, might test our +judgments carefully in this way; for everyone who deserves this +name is forced in our times to form, as a result of his work and his +reflections, a theory, or at least a certain conception of theoretical +means, by the use of which he gets along tolerably well in a variety +of cases. It will often be noticed, however, that in this way he +sets up as laws such maxims as are in accordance with his talent, +his inclination, and his convenience. He is subject to a fate that is +common to all mankind. How many act in this very way in other fields! +But we are not cultivating ourselves when we merely set in motion with +ease and convenience that which lies in us. Every artist, like every +man, is only an individual, and will always lean to one side. For that +reason, man should pursue so far as possible, both theoretically and +practically, that which is contrary to his nature. Let the easy-going +seek what is serious and severe; let the stern keep before his +eyes the light and agreeable; the strong, loveliness; the amiable, +strength; and everyone will develop his own nature the more, the +farther he seems to remove himself from it. Every art requires the +whole man; the highest possible degree of art requires all mankind. + +The practice of the plastic arts is mechanical, and the training of +the artist rightly begins in his earliest youth with the mechanical +side; the rest of his education, on the other hand, is often +neglected, for it ought to be far more careful than the training of +others who have opportunity of deriving advantage from life itself. +Society soon makes a rough person courteous, a business life makes the +most simple person prudent; literary labors, which through print come +before a great public, find opposition and correction everywhere; +only the plastic artist is, for the most part, limited to a lonely +workshop; he has dealings almost solely with the man who orders +and pays for his labor, with a public which frequently follows only +certain morbid impressions, with connoisseurs who make him restless, +with auctioneers who receive every new work with praise and estimates +of value such as would fitly honor the most superlative production. + +But it is time to conclude this introduction lest it anticipate and +forestall the work, instead of merely preceding it. We have so far at +least designated the point from which we intend to set out; how far +our views can and will spread, must at first develop gradually. The +theory and criticism of literary art will, we hope, soon occupy us; +and whatever life, travel, and daily events suggest to us, shall not +be excluded. In closing, let us say a word on an important concern of +this moment. + +For the training of the artist, for the enjoyment of the friend of +art, it was from time immemorial of the greatest significance in what +place the works of art happened to be. There was a time when, except +for slight changes of location, they remained for the most part in +one place; now, however, a great change has occurred, which will +have important consequences for art in general and in particular. +At present we have perhaps more cause than ever to regard Italy as a +great storehouse of art--as it still was until recently. When it is +possible to give a general review of it, then it will be shown what +the world lost at the moment when so many parts were torn from this +great and ancient whole. + +What was destroyed in the very act of tearing away will probably +remain a secret forever; but a description of the new storehouse that +is being formed in Paris will be possible in a few years. Then the +method by which an artist and a lover of art is to use France and +Italy can be indicated; and a further important and fine question will +arise: what are other nations, particularly Germany and England, to +do in this period of scattering and loss, to make generally useful the +manifold and widely strewn treasures of art--a task requiring the true +cosmopolitan mind which is found perhaps nowhere purer than in the +arts and sciences? And what are they to do to help to form an ideal +storehouse, which in the course of time may perhaps happily compensate +us for what the present moment tears away when it does not destroy? + +So much in general of the purpose of a work in which we desire many +earnest and friendly sympathizers. + + +[Footnote A: The Propylaen was a periodical founded in July, 1798, by +Goethe and his friend Heinrich Meyer. During its short existence of +three years, there were published in it, besides the writings of the +editors, short contributions by Schiller and Humboldt. Its purpose was +to spread sound ideas about the aims and methods of art, and in this +notable introduction Goethe set forth with clearness and profundity +his fundamental ideas on these subjects. The present translation has +been made expressly for the Harvard Classics.] + + + + +PREFACES TO VARIOUS VOLUMES OF POEMS + +BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH[A] + +ADVERTISEMENT TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1798) + + +It is the honourable characteristic of Poetry that its materials are +to be found in every subject which can interest the human mind. The +evidence of this fact is to be sought, not in the writings of Critics, +but in those of Poets themselves. + +The majority of the following poems are to be considered as +experiments. They were written chiefly with a view to ascertain how +far the language of conversation in the middle and lower classes +of society is adapted to the purposes of poetic pleasure. Readers +accustomed to the gaudiness and inane phraseology of many modern +writers, if they persist in reading this book to its conclusion, will +perhaps frequently have to struggle with feelings of strangeness and +awkwardness: they will look round for poetry, and will be induced to +inquire by what species of courtesy these attempts can be permitted +to assume that title. It is desirable that such readers, for their +own sakes, should not suffer the solitary word Poetry, a word of very +disputed meaning, to stand in the way of their gratification; but +that, while they are perusing this book, they should ask themselves if +it contains a natural delineation of human passions, human characters, +and human incidents; and if the answer be favourable to the author's +wishes, that they should consent to be pleased in spite of that most +dreadful enemy to our pleasures, our own pre-established codes of +decision. + +Readers of superior judgement may disapprove of the style in which +many of these pieces are executed; it must be expected that many lines +and phrases will not exactly suit their taste. It will perhaps appear +to them, that wishing to avoid the prevalent fault of the day, +the author has sometimes descended too low, and that many of his +expressions are too familiar, and not of sufficient dignity. It is +apprehended that the more conversant the reader is with our elder +writers, and with those in modern times who have been the most +successful in painting manners and passions, the fewer complaints of +this kind will he have to make. + +An accurate taste in poetry, and in all the other arts, Sir Joshua +Reynolds has observed, is an acquired talent, which can only be +produced by severe thought, and a long continued intercourse with the +best models of composition. This is mentioned not with so ridiculous +a purpose as to prevent the most inexperienced reader from judging for +himself; but merely to temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest +that if poetry be a subject on which much time has not been bestowed, +the judgement may be erroneous, and that in many cases it necessarily +will be so. + +The tale of _Goody Blake and Harry Gill_ is founded on a +well-authenticated fact which happened in Warwickshire. Of the other +poems in the collection, it may be proper to say that they are either +absolute inventions of the author, or facts which took place within +his personal observation or that of his friends. The poem of _The +Thorn_, as the reader will soon discover, is not supposed to be spoken +in the author's own person: the character of the loquacious narrator +will sufficiently show itself in the course of the story. _The Rime +of the Ancyent Marinere_ was professedly written in imitation of the +_style_, as well as of the spirit of the elder poets; but with a few +exceptions, the Author believes that the language adopted in it has +been equally intelligible for these three last centuries. The lines +entitled _Expostulation and Reply_, and those which follow, arose out +of conversation with a friend who was somewhat unreasonably attached +to modern books of moral philosophy. + + +[Footnote A: William Wordsworth (1770-1830), probably the greatest of +the poets of the Romantic Movement in England, was also foremost in +the critical defence of that movement. The Prefaces and Essays printed +here form a kind of manifesto of the reaction from the poetical +traditions of the eighteenth century; and contain besides some of the +soundest theorizing on the nature of poetry to be found in English. +They afford an interesting comparison with the parallel protest in +Victor Hugo's Preface to "Cromwell," to be found later in the volume.] + + + + +PREFACE TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1800) + + +The first volume of these Poems has already been submitted to general +perusal. It was published as an experiment, which, I hoped, might be +of some use to ascertain, how far, by fitting to metrical arrangement +a selection of the real language of men in a state of vivid sensation, +that sort of pleasure and that quantity of pleasure may be imparted, +which a Poet may rationally endeavour to impart. + +I had formed no very inaccurate estimate of the probable effect of +those Poems: I flattered myself that they who should be pleased with +them would read them with more than common pleasure: and, on the other +hand, I was well aware, that by those who should dislike them, they +would be read with more than common dislike. The result has differed +from my expectation in this only, that a greater number have been +pleased than I ventured to hope I should please. + + * * * * * + +Several of my Friends are anxious for the success of these Poems, from +a belief, that, if the views with which they were composed were +indeed realized, a class of Poetry would be produced, well adapted to +interest mankind permanently, and not unimportant in the quality, and +in the multiplicity of its moral relations: and on this account they +have advised me to prefix a systematic defence of the theory upon +which the Poems were written. But I was unwilling to undertake the +task, knowing that on this occasion the Reader would look coldly upon +my arguments, since I might be suspected of having been principally +influenced by the selfish and foolish hope of _reasoning_ him into an +approbation of these particular Poems: and I was still more unwilling +to undertake the task, because, adequately to display the opinions, +and fully to enforce the arguments, would require a space wholly +disproportionate to a preface. For, to treat the subject with the +clearness and coherence of which it is susceptible, it would be +necessary to give a full account of the present state of the public +taste in this country, and to determine how far this taste is healthy +or depraved; which, again, could not be determined, without pointing +out in what manner language and the human mind act and re-act on each +other, and without retracing the revolutions, not of literature alone, +but likewise of society itself. I have therefore altogether declined +to enter regularly upon this defence; yet I am sensible, that there +would be something like impropriety in abruptly obtruding upon the +Public, without a few words of introduction, Poems so materially +different from those upon which general approbation is at present +bestowed. + +It is supposed that by the act of writing in verse an Author makes +a formal engagement that he will gratify certain known habits of +association; that he not only thus apprises the Reader that certain +classes of ideas and expressions will be found in his book, but that +others will be carefully excluded. This exponent or symbol held forth +by metrical language must in different eras of literature have excited +very different expectations: for example, in the age of Catullus, +Terence, and Lucretius, and that of Statius or Claudian; and in our +own country, in the age of Shakespeare and Beaumont and Fletcher, and +that of Donne and Cowley, or Dryden, or Pope. I will not take upon +me to determine the exact import of the promise which, by the act of +writing in verse, an Author in the present day makes to his reader: +but it will undoubtedly appear to many persons that I have not +fulfilled the terms of an engagement thus voluntarily contracted. They +who have been accustomed to the gaudiness and inane phraseology of +many modern writers, if they persist in reading this book to its +conclusion, will, no doubt, frequently have to struggle with feelings +of strangeness and awawkwardnessthey will look round for poetry, and +will be induced to inquire by what species of courtesy these attempts +can be permitted to assume that title. I hope therefore the reader +will not censure me for attempting to state what I have proposed to +myself to perform; and also (as far as the limits of a preface will +permit) to explain some of the chief reasons which have determined +me in the choice of my purpose: that at least he may be spared +any unpleasant feeling of disappointment, and that I myself may be +protected from one of the most dishonourable accusations which can be +brought against an Author; namely, that of an indolence which prevents +him from endeavouring to ascertain what is his duty, or, when his duty +is ascertained, prevents him from performing it. + +The principal object, then, proposed in these Poems was to choose +incidents and situations from common life, and to relate or describe +them, throughout, as far as was possible in a selection of language +really used by men, and, at the same time, to throw over them a +certain colouring of imagination, whereby ordinary things should be +presented to the mind in an unusual aspect; and, further, and above +all, to make these incidents and situations interesting by tracing in +them, truly though not ostentatiously, the primary laws of our nature: +chiefly, as far as regards the manner in which we associate ideas in +a state of excitement. Humble and rustic life was generally chosen, +because, in that condition, the essential passions of the heart find +a better soil in which they can attain their maturity, are less under +restraint, and speak a plainer and more emphatic language; because in +that condition of life our elementary feelings coexist in a state +of greater simplicity, and, consequently, may be more accurately +contemplated, and more forcibly communicated; because the manners of +rural life germinate from those elementary feelings, and, from +the necessary character of rural occupations, are more easily +comprehended, and are more durable; and, lastly, because in that +condition the passions of men are incorporated with the beautiful and +permanent forms of nature. The language, too, of these men has been +adopted (purified indeed from what appear to be its real defects, from +all lasting and rational causes of dislike or disgust) because such +men hourly communicate with the best objects from which the best part +of language is originally derived; and because, from their rank in +society and the sameness and narrow circle of their intercourse, being +less under the influence of social vanity, they convey their feelings +and notions in simple and unelaborated expressions. Accordingly, such +a language, arising out of repeated experience and regular feelings, +is a more permanent, and a far more philosophical language, than that +which is frequently substituted for it by Poets, who think that they +are conferring honour upon themselves and their art, in proportion as +they separate themselves from the sympathies of men, and indulge in +arbitrary and capricious habits of expression, in order to +furnish food for fickle tastes, and fickle appetites, of their own +creation.[1] + +I cannot, however, be insensible to the present outcry against the +triviality and meanness, both of thought and language, which some of +my contemporaries have occasionally introduced into their metrical +compositions; and I acknowledge that this defect, where it exists, is +more dishonourable to the Writer's own character than false refinement +or arbitrary innovation, though I should contend at the same time, +that it is far less pernicious in the sum of its consequences. From +such verses the Poems in these volumes will be found distinguished +at least by one mark of difference, that each of them has a worthy +_purpose_. Not that I always began to write with a distinct purpose +formerly conceived; but habits of meditation have, I trust, so +prompted and regulated my feelings, that my descriptions of such +objects as strongly excite those feelings, will be found to carry +along with them a _purpose_. If this opinion be erroneous, I can +have little right to the name of a Poet. For all good poetry is the +spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: and though this be true, +Poems to which any value can be attached were never produced on any +variety of subjects but by a man who, being possessed of more than +usual organic sensibility, had also thought long and deeply. For +our continued influxes of feeling are modified and directed by +our thoughts, which are indeed the representatives of all our past +feelings; and, as by contemplating the relation of these general +representatives to each other, we discover what is really important to +men, so, by the repetition and continuance of this act, our feelings +will be connected with important subjects, till at length, if we be +originally possessed of much sensibility, such habits of mind will be +produced, that, by obeying blindly and mechanically the impulses of +those habits, we shall describe objects, and utter sentiments, of +such a nature, and in such connexion with each other, that the +understanding of the Reader must necessarily be in some degree +enlightened, and his affections strengthened and purified. + +It has been said that each of these poems has a purpose. Another +circumstance must be mentioned which distinguishes these Poems from +the popular Poetry of the day; it is this, that the feeling therein +developed gives importance to the action and situation, and not the +action and situation to the feeling. + +A sense of false modesty shall not prevent me from asserting, that the +Reader's attention is pointed to this mark of distinction, far +less for the sake of these particular Poems than from the general +importance of the subject. The subject is indeed important! For the +human mind is capable of being excited without the application of +gross and violent stimulants; and he must have a very faint perception +of its beauty and dignity who does not know this, and who does not +further know, that one being is elevated above another, in proportion +as he possesses this capability. It has therefore appeared to me, that +to endeavour to produce or enlarge this capability is one of the best +services in which, at any period, a Writer can be engaged; but this +service, excellent at all times, is especially so at the present day. +For a multitude of causes, unknown to former times, are now acting +with a combined force to blunt the discriminating powers of the mind, +and, unfitting it for all voluntary exertion, to reduce it to a state +of almost savage torpor. The most effective of these causes are the +great national events which are daily taking place, and the increasing +accumulation of men in cities, where the uniformity of their +occupations produces a craving for extraordinary incident, which the +rapid communication of intelligence hourly gratifies. To this tendency +of life and manners the literature and theatrical exhibitions of the +country have conformed themselves. The invaluable works of our elder +writers, I had almost said the works of Shakespeare and Milton, +are driven into neglect by frantic novels, sickly and stupid German +Tragedies, and deluges of idle and extravagant stories in verse.--When +I think upon this degrading thirst after outrageous stimulation, I am +almost ashamed to have spoken of the feeble endeavour made in these +volumes to counteract it; and, reflecting upon the magnitude of the +general evil, I should be oppressed with no dishonourable melancholy, +had I not a deep impression of certain inherent and indestructible +qualities of the human mind, and likewise of certain powers in the +great and permanent objects that act upon it, which are equally +inherent and indestructible; and were there not added to this +impression a belief, that the time is approaching when the evil will +be systematically opposed, by men of greater powers, and with far more +distinguished success. + +Having dwelt thus long on the subjects and aim of these Poems, I shall +request the Reader's permission to apprise him of a few circumstances +relating to their _style_, in order, among other reasons, that he may +not censure me for not having performed what I never attempted. The +Reader will find that personifications of abstract ideas rarely occur +in these volumes; and are utterly rejected, as an ordinary device +to elevate the style, and raise it above prose. My purpose was to +imitate, and, as far as possible, to adopt the very language of men; +and assuredly such personifications do not make any natural or +regular part of that language. They are, indeed, a figure of speech +occasionally prompted by passion, and I have made use of them as such; +but have endeavoured utterly to reject them as a mechanical device +of style, or as a family language which Writers in metre seem to lay +claim to by prescription. I have wished to keep the Reader in the +company of flesh and blood, persuaded that by so doing I shall +interest him. Others who pursue a different track will interest him +likewise; I do not interfere with their claim, but wish to prefer a +claim of my own. There will also be found in these volumes little of +what is usually called poetic diction; as much pains has been taken to +avoid it as is ordinarily taken to produce it; this has been done for +the reason already alleged, to bring my language near to the language +of men; and further, because the pleasure which I have proposed to +myself to impart, is of a kind very different from that which is +supposed by many persons to be the proper object of poetry. Without +being culpably particular, I do not know how to give my Reader a more +exact notion of the style in which it was my wish and intention to +write, than by informing him that I have at all times endeavoured to +look steadily at my subject; consequently, there is I hope in these +Poems little falsehood of description, and my ideas are expressed in +language fitted to their respective importance. Something must have +been gained by this practice, as it is friendly to one property of +all good poetry, namely, good sense: but it has necessarily cut me +off from a large portion of phrases and figures of speech which from +father to son have long been regarded as the common inheritance of +Poets. I have also thought it expedient to restrict myself still +further, having abstained from the use of many expressions, in +themselves proper and beautiful, but which have been foolishly +repeated by bad Poets, till such feelings of disgust are connected +with them as it is scarcely possible by any art of association to +overpower. + +If in a poem there should be found a series of lines, or even a single +line, in which the language, though naturally arranged, and according +to the strict laws of metre, does not differ from that of prose, there +is a numerous class of critics, who, when they stumble upon these +prosaisms, as they call them, imagine that they have made a notable +discovery, and exult over the Poet as over a man ignorant of his own +profession. Now these men would establish a canon of criticism which +the Reader will conclude he must utterly reject, if he wishes to be +pleased with these volumes. And it would be a most easy task to prove +to him, that not only the language of a large portion of every good +poem, even of the most elevated character, must necessarily, except +with reference to the metre, in no respect differ from that of good +prose, but likewise that some of the most interesting parts of the +best poems will be found to be strictly the language of prose +when prose is well written. The truth of this assertion might be +demonstrated by innumerable passages from almost all the poetical +writings, even of Milton himself. To illustrate the subject in a +general manner, I will here adduce a short composition of Gray, who +was at the head of those who, by their reasonings, have attempted to +widen the space of separation betwixt Prose and Metrical composition, +and was more than any other man curiously elaborate in the structure +of his own poetic diction. + + In vain to me the smiling mornings shine, + And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire; + The birds in vain their amorous descant join, + Or cheerful fields resume their green attire. + These ears, alas! for other notes repine; + _A different object do these eyes require; + My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine; + And in my breast the imperfect joys expire_; + Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer, + And new-born pleasure brings to happier men; + The fields to all their wonted tribute bear; + To warm their little loves the birds complain. + _I fruitless mourn to him that cannot hear, + And weep the more because I weep in vain._ + +It will easily be perceived, that the only part of this Sonnet +which is of any value is the lines printed in Italics; it is equally +obvious, that, except in the rhyme, and in the use of the single word +'fruitless' for fruitlessly, which is so far a defect, the language of +these lines does in no respect differ from that of prose. + +By the foregoing quotation it has been shown that the language +of Prose may yet be well adapted to Poetry; and it was previously +asserted, that a large portion of the language of every good poem can +in no respect differ from that of good Prose. We will go further. +It may be safely affirmed, that there neither is, nor can be, any +_essential_ difference between the language of prose and metrical +composition. We are fond of tracing the resemblance between Poetry and +Painting, and, accordingly, we call them Sisters: but where shall we +find bonds of connexion sufficiently strict to typify the affinity +betwixt metrical and prose composition? They both speak by and to the +same organs; the bodies in which both of them are clothed may be said +to be of the same substance, their affections are kindred, and almost +identical, not necessarily differing even in degree; Poetry[2] sheds +no tears 'such as Angels weep,' but natural and human tears; she can +boast of no celestial choir that distinguishes her vital juices from +those of prose; the same human blood circulates through the veins of +them both. + +If it be affirmed that rhyme and metrical arrangement of themselves +constitute a distinction which overturns what has just been said on +the strict affinity of metrical language with that of prose, and paves +the way for other artificial distinctions which the mind voluntarily +admits, I answer that the language of such Poetry as is here +recommended is, as far as is possible, a selection of the language +really spoken by men; that this selection, wherever it is made with +true taste and feeling, will of itself form a distinction far greater +than would at first be imagined, and will entirely separate the +composition from the vulgarity and meanness of ordinary life; and, if +metre be superadded thereto, I believe that a dissimilitude will be +produced altogether sufficient for the gratification of a rational +mind. What other distinction would we have? Whence is it to come? And +where is it to exist? Not, surely, where the Poet speaks through the +mouths of his characters: it cannot be necessary here, either for +elevation of style, or any of its supposed ornaments: for, if the +Poet's subject be judiciously chosen, it will naturally, and upon +fit occasion, lead him to passions the language of which, if selected +truly and judiciously, must necessarily be dignified and variegated, +and alive with metaphors and figures. I forbear to speak of an +incongruity which would shock the intelligent Reader, should the +Poet interweave any foreign splendour of his own with that which the +passion naturally suggests: it is sufficient to say that such addition +is unnecessary. And, surely, it is more probable that those passages, +which with propriety abound with metaphors and figures, will have +their due effect, if, upon other occasions where the passions are of a +milder character, the style also be subdued and temperate. + +But, as the pleasure which I hope to give by the Poems now presented +to the Reader must depend entirely on just notions upon this subject, +and, as it is in itself of high importance to our taste and moral +feelings, I cannot content myself with these detached remarks. And if, +in what I am about to say, it shall appear to some that my labour +is unnecessary, and that I am like a man fighting a battle without +enemies, such persons may be reminded, that, whatever be the language +outwardly holden by men, a practical faith in the opinions which I +am wishing to establish is almost unknown. If my conclusions are +admitted, and carried as far as they must be carried if admitted at +all, our judgements concerning the works of the greatest Poets +both ancient and modern will be far different from what they are +at present, both when we praise, and when we censure: and our moral +feelings influencing and influenced by these judgements will, I +believe, be corrected and purified. + +Taking up the subject, then, upon general grounds, let me ask, what +is meant by the word Poet? What is a Poet? To whom does he address +himself? And what language is to be expected from him?--He is a +man speaking to men: a man, it is true, endowed with more lively +sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness, who has a greater +knowledge of human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than are +supposed to be common among mankind; a man pleased with his own +passions and volitions, and who rejoices more than other men in the +spirit of life that is in him; delighting to contemplate similar +volitions and passions as manifested in the goings-on of the Universe, +and habitually impelled to create them where he does not find them. +To these qualities he has added a disposition to be affected more +than other men by absent things as if they were present; an ability of +conjuring up in himself passions, which are indeed far from being the +same as those produced by real events, yet (especially in those parts +of the general sympathy which are pleasing and delightful) do more +nearly resemble the passions produced by real events, than anything +which, from the motions of their own minds merely, other men are +accustomed to feel in themselves:--whence, and from practice, he has +acquired a greater readiness and power in expressing what he thinks +and feels, and especially those thoughts and feelings which, by +his own choice, or from the structure of his own mind, arise in him +without immediate external excitement. + +But whatever portion of this faculty we may suppose even the greatest +Poet to possess, there cannot be a doubt that the language which it +will suggest to him, must often, in liveliness and truth, fall +short of that which is uttered by men in real life, under the actual +pressure of those passions, certain shadows of which the Poet thus +produces, or feels to be produced, in himself. + +However exalted a notion we would wish to cherish of the character of +a Poet, it is obvious, that while he describes and imitates passions, +his employment is in some degree mechanical, compared with the freedom +and power of real and substantial action and suffering. So that it +will be the wish of the Poet to bring his feelings near to those of +the persons whose feelings he describes, nay, for short spaces of +time, perhaps, to let himself slip into an entire delusion, and even +confound and identify his own feelings with theirs; modifying only +the language which is thus suggested to him by a consideration that +he describes for a particular purpose, that of giving pleasure. Here, +then, he will apply the principle of selection which has been already +insisted upon. He will depend upon this for removing what would +otherwise be painful or disgusting in the passion; he will feel that +there is no necessity to trick out or to elevate nature: and, the more +industriously he applies this principle, the deeper will be his faith +that no words, which _his_ fancy or imagination can suggest, will +be to be compared with those which are the emanations of reality and +truth. + +But it may be said by those who do not object to the general spirit of +these remarks, that, as it is impossible for the Poet to produce upon +all occasions language as exquisitely fitted for the passion as that +which the real passion itself suggests, it is proper that he should +consider himself as in the situation of a translator, who does not +scruple to substitute excellencies of another kind for those which +are unattainable by him; and endeavours occasionally to surpass his +original, in order to make some amends for the general inferiority +to which he feels that he must submit. But this would be to encourage +idleness and unmanly despair. Further, it is the language of men +who speak of what they do not understand; who talk of Poetry as of a +matter of amusement and idle pleasure; who will converse with us as +gravely about a _taste_ for Poetry, as they express it, as if it were +a thing as indifferent as a taste for rope-dancing, or Frontiniac or +Sherry. Aristotle, I have been told, has said, that Poetry is the +most philosophic of all writing: it is so: its object is truth, not +individual and local, but general, and operative; not standing upon +external testimony, but carried alive into the heart by passion; truth +which is its own testimony, which gives competence and confidence +to the tribunal to which it appeals, and receives them from the same +tribunal. Poetry is the image of man and nature. The obstacles which +stand in the way of the fidelity of the Biographer and Historian, and +of their consequent utility, are incalculably greater than those which +are to be encountered by the Poet who comprehends the dignity of his +art. The Poet writes under one restriction only, namely, the necessity +of giving immediate pleasure to a human Being possessed of that +information which may be expected from him, not as a lawyer, a +physician, a mariner, an astronomer, or a natural philosopher, but +as a Man. Except this one restriction, there is no object standing +between the Poet and the image of things; between this, and the +Biographer and Historian, there are a thousand. + +Nor let this necessity of producing immediate pleasure be considered +as a degradation of the Poet's art. It is far otherwise. It is an +acknowledgement of the beauty of the universe, an acknowledgement the +more sincere, because not formal, but indirect; it is a task light and +easy to him who looks at the world in the spirit of love: further, it +is a homage paid to the native and naked dignity of man, to the grand +elementary principle of pleasure, by which he knows, and feels, +and lives, and moves. We have no sympathy but what is propagated by +pleasure: I would not be misunderstood; but wherever we sympathize +with pain, it will be found that the sympathy is produced and carried +on by subtle combinations with pleasure. We have no knowledge, that +is, no general principles drawn from the contemplation of particular +facts, but what has been built up by pleasure, and exists in us by +pleasure alone. The Man of science, the Chemist and Mathematician, +whatever difficulties and disgusts they may have had to struggle with, +know and feel this. However painful may be the objects with which the +Anatomist's knowledge is connected, he feels that his knowledge is +pleasure; and where he has no pleasure he has no knowledge. What then +does the Poet? He considers man and the objects that surround him as +acting and re-acting upon each other, so as to produce an infinite +complexity of pain and pleasure; he considers man in his own nature +and in his ordinary life as contemplating this with a certain quantity +of immediate knowledge, with certain convictions, intuitions, and +deductions, which from habit acquire the quality of intuitions; +he considers him as looking upon this complex scene of ideas and +sensations, and finding everywhere objects that immediately excite +in him sympathies which, from the necessities of his nature, are +accompanied by an overbalance of enjoyment. + +To this knowledge which all men carry about with them, and to these +sympathies in which, without any other discipline than that of our +daily life, we are fitted to take delight, the Poet principally +directs his attention. He considers man and nature as essentially +adapted to each other, and the mind of man as naturally the mirror of +the fairest and most interesting properties of nature. And thus the +Poet, prompted by this feeling of pleasure, which accompanies him +through the whole course of his studies, converses with general +nature, with affections akin to those, which, through labour and +length of time, the Man of science has raised up in himself, by +conversing with those particular parts of nature which are the objects +of his studies. The knowledge both of the Poet and the Man of science +is pleasure; but the knowledge of the one cleaves to us as a necessary +part of our existence, our natural and unalienable inheritance; the +other is a personal and individual acquisition, slow to come to +us, and by no habitual and direct sympathy connecting us with our +fellow-beings. The Man of science seeks truth as a remote and unknown +benefactor; he cherishes and loves it in his solitude: the Poet, +singing a song in which all human beings join with him, rejoices in +the presence of truth as our visible friend and hourly companion. +Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge; it is the +impassioned expression which is in the countenance of all Science. +Emphatically may it be said of the Poet, as Shakespeare hath said of +man, 'that he looks before and after.' He is the rock of defence for +human nature; an upholder and preserver, carrying everywhere with him +relationship and love. In spite of difference of soil and climate, of +language and manners, of laws and customs: in spite of things silently +gone out of mind, and things violently destroyed; the Poet binds +together by passion and knowledge the vast empire of human society, as +it is spread over the whole earth, and over all time. The objects of +the Poet's thoughts are everywhere; though the eyes and senses of man +are, it is true, his favourite guides, yet he will follow wheresoever +he can find an atmosphere of sensation in which to move his wings. +Poetry is the first and last of all knowledge--it is as immortal as +the heart of man. If the labours of Men of science should ever create +any material revolution, direct or indirect, in our condition, and in +the impressions which we habitually receive, the Poet will sleep then +no more than at present; he will be ready to follow the steps of the +Man of science, not only in those general indirect effects, but he +will be at his side, carrying sensation into the midst of the objects +of the science itself. The remotest discoveries of the Chemist, the +Botanist, or Mineralogist, will be as proper objects of the Poet's +art as any upon which it can be employed, if the time should ever come +when these things shall be familiar to us, and the relations under +which they are contemplated by the followers of these respective +sciences shall be manifestly and palpably material to us as enjoying +and suffering beings. If the time should ever come when what is now +called science, thus familiarized to men, shall be ready to put on, +as it were, a form of flesh and blood, the Poet will lend his divine +spirit to aid the transfiguration, and will welcome the Being thus +produced, as a dear and genuine inmate of the household of man.--It is +not, then, to be supposed that any one, who holds that sublime notion +of Poetry which I have attempted to convey, will break in upon the +sanctity and truth of his pictures by transitory and accidental +ornaments, and endeavour to excite admiration of himself by arts, the +necessity of which must manifestly depend upon the assumed meanness of +his subject. + +What has been thus far said applies to Poetry in general; but +especially to those parts of composition where the Poet speaks through +the mouths of his characters; and upon this point it appears to +authorize the conclusion, that there are few persons of good sense, +who would not allow that the dramatic parts of composition are +defective, in proportion as they deviate from the real language +of nature, and are coloured by a diction of the Poet's own, either +peculiar to him as an individual Poet or belonging simply to Poets +in general; to a body of men who, from the circumstance of their +compositions being in metre, it is expected will employ a particular +language. + +It is not, then, in the dramatic parts of composition that we look for +this distinction of language; but still it may be proper and necessary +where the Poet speaks to us in his own person and character. To this +I answer by referring the Reader to the description before given of a +Poet. Among the qualities there enumerated as principally conducing to +form a Poet, is implied nothing differing in kind from other men, but +only in degree. The sum of what was said is, that the Poet is chiefly +distinguished from other men by a greater promptness to think and +feel without immediate external excitement, and a greater power in +expressing such thoughts and feelings as are produced in him in that +manner. But these passions and thoughts and feelings are the general +passions and thoughts and feelings of men. And with what are +they connected? Undoubtedly with our moral sentiments and animal +sensations, and with the causes which excite these; with the +operations of the elements, and the appearances of the visible +universe; with storm and sunshine, with the revolutions of the +seasons, with cold and heat, with loss of friends and kindred, with +injuries and resentments, gratitude and hope, with fear and sorrow. +These, and the like, are the sensations and objects which the Poet +describes, as they are the sensations of other men, and the objects +which interest them. The Poet thinks and feels in the spirit of human +passions. How, then, can his language differ in any material degree +from that of all other men who feel vividly and see clearly? It might +be _proved_ that it is impossible. But supposing that this were not +the case, the Poet might then be allowed to use a peculiar language +when expressing his feelings for his own gratification, or that of +men like himself. But Poets do not write for Poets alone, but for men. +Unless therefore we are advocates for that admiration which subsists +upon ignorance, and that pleasure which arises from hearing what we do +not understand, the Poet must descend from this supposed height; and, +in order to excite rational sympathy, he must express himself as other +men express themselves. To this it may be added, that while he is only +selecting from the real language of men, or, which amounts to the same +thing, composing accurately in the spirit of such selection, he is +treading upon safe ground, and we know what we are to expect from him. +Our feelings are the same with respect to metre; for, as it may be +proper to remind the Reader, the distinction of metre is regular +and uniform, and not, like that which is produced by what is usually +called POETIC DICTION, arbitrary, and subject to infinite caprices +upon which no calculation whatever can be made. In the one case, the +Reader is utterly at the mercy of the Poet, respecting what imagery +or diction he may choose to connect with the passion; whereas, in the +other, the metre obeys certain laws, to which the Poet and Reader both +willingly submit because they are certain, and because no interference +is made by them with the passion, but such as the concurring testimony +of ages has shown to heighten and improve the pleasure which co-exists +with it. + +It will now be proper to answer an obvious question, namely, Why, +professing these opinions, have I written in verse? To this, in +addition to such answer as is included in what has been already said, +I reply, in the first place, Because, however I may have restricted +myself, there is still left open to me what confessedly constitutes +the most valuable object of all writing, whether in prose or verse; +the great and universal passions of men, the most general and +interesting of their occupations, and the entire world of nature +before me--to supply endless combinations of forms and imagery. Now, +supposing for a moment that whatever is interesting in these objects +may be as vividly described in prose, why should I be condemned for +attempting to superadd to such description the charm which, by the +consent of all nations, is acknowledged to exist in metrical language? +To this, by such as are yet unconvinced, it may he answered that +a very small part of the pleasure given by Poetry depends upon the +metre, and that it is injudicious to write in metre, unless it be +accompanied with the other artificial distinctions of style with which +metre is usually accompanied, and that, by such deviation, more will +be lost from the shock which will thereby be given to the Reader's +associations than will be counterbalanced by any pleasure which he can +derive from the general power of numbers. In answer to those who +still contend for the necessity of accompanying metre with certain +appropriate colours of style in order to the accomplishment of its +appropriate end, and who also, in my opinion, greatly underrate the +power of metre in itself, it might, perhaps, as far as relates to +these Volumes, have been almost sufficient to observe, that poems are +extant, written upon more humble subjects, and in a still more +naked and simple style, which have continued to give pleasure from +generation to generation. Now, if nakedness and simplicity be a +defect, the fact here mentioned affords a strong presumption that +poems somewhat less naked and simple are capable of affording pleasure +at the present day; and, what I wish _chiefly_ to attempt, at present, +was to justify myself for having written under the impression of this +belief. + +But various causes might be pointed out why, when the style is manly, +and the subject of some importance, words metrically arranged will +long continue to impart such a pleasure to mankind as he who proves +the extent of that pleasure will be desirous to impart. The end of +Poetry is to produce excitement in co-existence with an overbalance +of pleasure; but, by the supposition, excitement is an unusual and +irregular state of the mind; ideas and feelings do not, in that state, +succeed each other in accustomed order. If the words, however, by +which this excitement is produced be in themselves powerful, or the +images and feelings have an undue proportion of pain connected with +them, there is some danger that the excitement may be carried beyond +its proper bounds. Now the co-presence of something regular, something +to which the mind has been accustomed in various moods and in a +less excited state, cannot but have great efficacy in tempering and +restraining the passion by an inter-texture of ordinary feeling, and +of feeling not strictly and necessarily connected with the passion. +This is unquestionably true; and hence, though the opinion will +at first appear paradoxical, from the tendency of metre to divest +language, in a certain degree, of its reality, and thus to throw a +sort of half-consciousness of unsubstantial existence over the +whole composition, there can be little doubt but that more pathetic +situations and sentiments, that is, those which have a greater +proportion of pain connected with them, may be endured in metrical +composition, especially in rhyme, than in prose. The metre of the old +ballads is very artless; yet they contain many passages which would +illustrate this opinion; and, I hope, if the following Poems be +attentively perused, similar instances will be found in them. This +opinion may be further illustrated by appealing to the Reader's own +experience of the reluctance with which he comes to the re-perusal of +the distressful parts of _Clarissa Harlowe_, or _The Gamester_; while +Shakespeare's writings, in the most pathetic scenes, never act upon +us, as pathetic, beyond the bounds of pleasure--an effect which, in a +much greater degree than might at first be imagined, is to be ascribed +to small, but continual and regular impulses of pleasurable surprise +from the metrical arrangement.--On the other hand (what it must be +allowed will much more frequently happen) if the Poet's words should +be incommensurate with the passion, and inadequate to raise the Reader +to a height of desirable excitement, then (unless the Poet's choice of +his metre has been grossly injudicious), in the feelings of pleasure +which the Reader has been accustomed to connect with metre in general, +and in the feeling, whether cheerful or melancholy, which he has been +accustomed to connect with that particular movement of metre, there +will be found something which will greatly contribute to impart +passion to the words, and to effect the complex end which the Poet +proposes to himself. + +If I had undertaken a SYSTEMATIC defence of the theory here +maintained, it would have been my duty to develop the various causes +upon which the pleasure received from metrical language depends. Among +the chief of these causes is to be reckoned a principle which must +be well known to those who have made any of the Arts the object of +accurate reflection; namely, the pleasure which the mind derives from +the perception of similitude in dissimilitude. This principle is the +great spring of the activity of our minds, and their chief feeder. +From this principle the direction of the sexual appetite, and all the +passions connected with it, take their origin: it is the life of our +ordinary conversation; and upon the accuracy with which similitude in +dissimilitude, and dissimilitude in similitude are perceived, depend +our taste and our moral feelings. It would not be a useless employment +to apply this principle to the consideration of metre, and to show +that metre is hence enabled to afford much pleasure, and to point +out in what manner that pleasure is produced. But my limits will not +permit me to enter upon this subject, and I must content myself with a +general summary. + +I have said that poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful +feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in +tranquillity: the emotion is contemplated till, by a species of +reaction, the tranquillity gradually disappears, and an emotion, +kindred to that which was before the subject of contemplation, is +gradually produced, and does itself actually exist in the mind. In +this mood successful composition generally begins, and in a mood +similar to this it is carried on; but the emotion, of whatever kind, +and in whatever degree, from various causes, is qualified by various +pleasures, so that in describing any passions whatsoever, which are +voluntarily described, the mind will, upon the whole, be in a state +of enjoyment. If Nature be thus cautious to preserve in a state of +enjoyment a being so employed, the Poet ought to profit by the lesson +held forth to him, and ought especially to take care, that, whatever +passions he communicates to his Reader, those passions, if his +Reader's mind be sound and vigorous, should always be accompanied +with an overbalance of pleasure. Now the music of harmonious metrical +language, the sense of difficulty overcome, and the blind association +of pleasure which has been previously received from works of rhyme or +metre of the same or similar construction, an indistinct perception +perpetually renewed of language closely resembling that of real +life, and yet, in the circumstance of metre, differing from it so +widely--all these imperceptibly make up a complex feeling of delight, +which is of the most important use in tempering the painful feeling +always found intermingled with powerful descriptions of the deeper +passions. This effect is always produced in pathetic and impassioned +poetry; while, in lighter compositions, the ease and gracefulness +with which the Poet manages his numbers are themselves confessedly a +principal source of the gratification of the Reader. All that it is +_necessary_ to say, however, upon this subject, may he effected by +affirming, what few persons will deny, that, of two descriptions, +either of passions, manners, or characters, each of them equally well +executed, the one in prose and the other in verse, the verse will be +read a hundred times where the prose is read once. + +Having thus explained a few of my reasons for writing in verse, and +why I have chosen subjects from common life, and endeavoured to bring +my language near to the real language of men, if I have been too +minute in pleading my own cause, I have at the same time been treating +a subject of general interest; and for this reason a few words shall +be added with reference solely to these particular poems, and to some +defects which will probably be found in them. I am sensible that my +associations must have sometimes been particular instead of general, +and that, consequently, giving to things a false importance, I +may have sometimes written upon unworthy subjects; but I am less +apprehensive on this account, than that my language may frequently +have suffered from those arbitrary connexions of feelings and ideas +with particular words and phrases, from which no man can altogether +protect himself. Hence I have no doubt, that, in some instances, +feelings, even of the ludicrous, may be given to my Readers by +expressions which appeared to me tender and pathetic. Such faulty +expressions, were I convinced they were faulty at present, and that +they must necessarily continue to be so, I would willingly take +all reasonable pains to correct. But it is dangerous to make these +alterations on the simple authority of a few individuals, or even of +certain classes of men; for where the understanding of an Author is +not convinced, or his feelings altered, this cannot be done without +great injury to himself: for his own feelings are his stay and +support; and, if he set them aside in one instance, he may be induced +to repeat this act till his mind shall lose all confidence in itself, +and become utterly debilitated. To this it may be added, that the +critic ought never to forget that he is himself exposed to the same +errors as the Poet, and, perhaps, in a much greater degree: for +there can be no presumption in saying of most readers, that it is not +probable they will be so well acquainted with the various stages of +meaning through which words have passed, or with the fickleness or +stability of the relations of particular ideas to each other; and, +above all, since they are so much less interested in the subject, they +may decide lightly and carelessly. + +Long as the Reader has been detained, I hope he will permit me to +caution him against a mode of false criticism which has been applied +to Poetry, in which the language closely resembles that of life and +nature. Such verses have been triumphed over in parodies, of which Dr. +Johnson's stanza is a fair specimen:-- + + I put my hat upon my head + And walked into the Strand, + And there I met another man + Whose hat was in his hand. + +Immediately under these lines let us place one of the most justly +admired stanzas of the 'Babes in the Wood,' + + These pretty Babes with hand in hand + Went wandering up and down; + But never more they saw the Man + Approaching from the Town. + +In both these stanzas the words, and the order of the words, in no +respect differ from the most unimpassioned conversation. There are +words in both, for example, 'the Strand,' and 'the Town,' connected +with none but the most familiar ideas; yet the one stanza we admit +as admirable, and the other as a fair example of the superlatively +contemptible. Whence arises this difference? Not from the metre, not +from the language, not from the order of the words; but the _matter_ +expressed in Dr. Johnson's stanza is contemptible. The proper method +of treating trivial and simple verses, to which Dr. Johnson's stanza +would be a fair parallelism, is not to say, this is a bad kind of +poetry, or, this is not poetry; but, this wants sense; it is neither +interesting in itself nor can _lead_ to anything interesting; the +images neither originate in that sane state of feeling which arises +out of thought, nor can excite thought or feeling in the Reader. This +is the only sensible manner of dealing with such verses. Why trouble +yourself about the species till you have previously decided upon the +genus? Why take pains to prove than an ape is not a Newton, when it is +self-evident that he is not a man? + +One request I must make of my reader, which is, that in judging +these Poems he would decide by his own feelings genuinely, and not +by reflection upon what will probably be the judgement of others. +How common is it to hear a person say, I myself do not object to this +style of composition, or this or that expression, but, to such and +such classes of people it will appear mean or ludicrous! This mode +of criticism, so destructive of all sound unadulterated judgement, is +almost universal: let the Reader then abide, independently, by his own +feelings, and, if he finds himself affected, let him not suffer such +conjectures to interfere with his pleasure. + +If an Author, by any single composition, has impressed us with +respect for his talents, it is useful to consider this as affording +a presumption, that on other occasions where we have been displeased, +he, nevertheless, may not have written ill or absurdly; and further, +to give him so much credit for this one composition as may induce +us to review what has displeased us, with more care than we should +otherwise have bestowed upon it. This is not only an act of justice, +but, in our decisions upon poetry especially, may conduce, in a high +degree, to the improvement of our own taste; for an _accurate_ taste +in poetry, and in all the other arts, as Sir Joshua Reynolds has +observed, is an _acquired_ talent, which can only be produced by +thought and a long continued intercourse with the best models of +composition. This is mentioned, not with so ridiculous a purpose as to +prevent the most inexperienced Reader from judging for himself (I +have already said that I wish him to judge for himself), but merely to +temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest, that, if Poetry be a +subject on which much time has not been bestowed, the judgement may be +erroneous; and that, in many cases, it necessarily will be so. + +Nothing would, I know, have so effectually contributed to further the +end which I have in view, as to have shown of what kind the pleasure +is, and how that pleasure is produced, which is confessedly produced +by metrical composition essentially different from that which I have +here endeavoured to recommend: for the Reader will say that he has +been pleased by such composition; and what more can be done for him? +The power of any art is limited; and he will suspect, that, if it +be proposed to furnish him with new friends, that can be only upon +condition of his abandoning his old friends. Besides, as I have said, +the Reader is himself conscious of the pleasure which he has received +from such composition, composition to which he has peculiarly attached +the endearing name of Poetry; and all men feel an habitual gratitude, +and something of an honourable bigotry, for the objects which have +long continued to please them: we not only wish to be pleased, but to +be pleased in that particular way in which we have been accustomed +to be pleased. There is in these feelings enough to resist a host of +arguments; and I should be the less able to combat them successfully, +as I am willing to allow, that, in order entirely to enjoy the Poetry +which I am recommending, it would be necessary to give up much of what +is ordinarily enjoyed. But, would my limits have permitted me to point +out how this pleasure is produced, many obstacles might have been +removed, and the Reader assisted in perceiving that the powers of +language are not so limited as he may suppose; and that it is possible +for poetry to give other enjoyments, of a purer, more lasting, +and more exquisite nature. This part of the subject has not been +altogether neglected, but it has not been so much my present aim to +prove, that the interest excited by some other kinds of poetry is less +vivid, and less worthy of the nobler powers of the mind, as to offer +reasons for presuming, that if my purpose were fulfilled, a species of +poetry would be produced, which is genuine poetry; in its nature well +adapted to interest mankind permanently, and likewise important in the +multiplicity and quality of its moral relations. + +From what has been said, and from a perusal of the Poems, the Reader +will be able clearly to perceive the object which I had in view: he +will determine how far it has been attained; and, what is a much +more important question, whether it be worth attaining: and upon the +decision of these two questions will rest my claim to the approbation +of the Public. + + +[Footnote 1: It is worth while here to observe, that the affecting +parts of Chaucer are almost always expressed In language pure and +universally intelligible even to this day.] + +[Footnote 2: I here use the word 'Poetry' (though against my own +judgement) as opposed to the word Prose, and synonymous with metrical +composition. But much confusion has been introduced into criticism +by this contradistinction of Poetry and Prose, instead of the more +philosophical one of Poetry and Matter of Fact, or Science. The only +strict antithesis to Prose is Metre; nor is this, in truth, a _strict_ +antithesis, because lines and passages of metre so naturally occur in +writing prose, that it would be scarcely possible to avoid them, even +were it desirable.] + + + + +APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1802) + + +Perhaps, as I have no right to expect that attentive perusal, without +which, confined, as I have been, to the narrow limits of a preface, my +meaning cannot be thoroughly understood, I am anxious to give an exact +notion of the sense in which the phrase poetic diction has been used; +and for this purpose, a few words shall here be added, concerning the +origin and characteristics of the phraseology, which I have condemned +under that name. + +The earliest poets of all nations generally wrote from passion excited +by real events; they wrote naturally, and as men: feeling powerfully +as they did, their language was daring, and figurative. In succeeding +times, Poets, and Men ambitious of the fame of Poets, perceiving the +influence of such language, and desirous of producing the same effect +without being animated by the same passion, set themselves to a +mechanical adoption of these figures of speech, and made use of them, +sometimes with propriety, but much more frequently applied them +to feelings and thoughts with which they had no natural connexion +whatsoever. A language was thus insensibly produced, differing +materially from the real language of men in _any situation_. The +Reader or Hearer of this distorted language found himself in a +perturbed and unusual state of mind: when affected by the genuine +language of passion he had been in a perturbed and unusual state of +mind also: in both cases he was willing that his common judgement and +understanding should be laid asleep, and he had no instinctive and +infallible perception of the true to make him reject the false; the +one served as a passport for the other. The emotion was in both cases +delightful, and no wonder if he confounded the one with the other, +and believed them both to be produced by the same, or similar causes. +Besides, the Poet spake to him in the character of a man to be looked +up to, a man of genius and authority. Thus, and from a variety of +other causes, this distorted language was received with admiration; +and Poets, it is probable, who had before contented themselves for the +most part with misapplying only expressions which at first had +been dictated by real passion, carried the abuse still further, and +introduced phrases composed apparently in the spirit of the original +figurative language of passion, yet altogether of their own invention, +and characterized by various degrees of wanton deviation from good +sense and nature. + +It is indeed true, that the language of the earliest Poets was felt to +differ materially from ordinary language, because it was the language +of extraordinary occasions; but it was really spoken by men, language +which the Poet himself had uttered when he had been affected by the +events which he described, or which he had heard uttered by those +around him. To this language it is probable that metre of some sort +or other was early superadded. This separated the genuine language of +Poetry still further from common life, so that whoever read or heard +the poems of these earliest Poets felt himself moved in a way in which +he had not been accustomed to be moved in real life, and by causes +manifestly different from those which acted upon him in real life. +This was the great temptation to all the corruptions which have +followed: under the protection of this feeling succeeding Poets +constructed a phraseology which had one thing, it is true, in common +with the genuine language of poetry, namely, that it was not heard in +ordinary conversation; that it was unusual. But the first Poets, as +I have said, spake a language which, though unusual, was still the +language of men. This circumstance, however, was disregarded by their +successors; they found that they could please by easier means: +they became proud of modes of expression which they themselves had +invented, and which were uttered only by themselves. In process of +time metre became a symbol or promise of this unusual language, and +whoever took upon him to write in metre, according as he possessed +more or less of true poetic genius, introduced less or more of this +adulterated phraseology into his compositions, and the true and the +false were inseparately interwoven until, the taste of men becoming +gradually perverted, this language was received as a natural language: +and at length, by the influence of books upon men, did to a certain +degree really become so. Abuses of this kind were imported from one +nation to another, and with the progress of refinement this diction +became daily more and more corrupt, thrusting out of sight the plain +humanities of nature by a motley masquerade of tricks, quaintnesses, +hieroglyphics, and enigmas. + +It would not be uninteresting to point out the causes of the pleasure +given by this extravagant and absurd diction. It depends upon a great +variety of causes, but upon none, perhaps, more than its influence in +impressing a notion of the peculiarity and exaltation of the Poet's +character, and in flattering the Reader's self-love by bringing +him nearer to a sympathy with that character; an effect which is +accomplished by unsettling ordinary habits of thinking, and thus +assisting the Reader to approach to that perturbed and dizzy state +of mind in which if he does not find himself, he imagines that he is +_balked_ of a peculiar enjoyment which poetry can and ought to bestow. + +The sonnet quoted from Gray, in the Preface, except the lines printed +in italics, consists of little else but this diction, though not of +the worst kind; and indeed, if one may be permitted to say so, it is +far too common in the best writers both ancient and modern. Perhaps +in no way, by positive example could more easily be given a notion +of what I mean by the phrase _poetic diction_ than by referring to a +comparison between the metrical paraphrase which we have of passages +in the Old and New Testament, and those passages as they exist in +our common Translation. See Pope's _Messiah_ throughout; Prior's 'Did +sweeter sounds adorn my flowing tongue,' &c. &c. 'Though I speak with +the tongues of men and of angels,' &c. &c, 1st Corinthians, ch. xiii. +By way of immediate example take the following of Dr. Johnson: + + Turn on the prudent Ant thy heedless eyes, + Observe her labours, Sluggard, and be wise; + No stern command, no monitory voice, + Prescribes her duties, or directs her choice; + Yet, timely provident, she hastes away + To snatch the blessings of a plenteous day; + When fruitful Summer loads the teeming plain, + She crops the harvest, and she stores the grain. + How long shall sloth usurp thy useless hours, + Unnerve thy vigour, and enchain thy powers? + While artful shades thy downy couch enclose, + And soft solicitation courts repose, + Amidst the drowsy charms of dull delight, + Year chases year with unremitted flight, + Till Want now following, fraudulent and slow, + Shall spring to seize thee, like an ambush'd foe. + +From this hubbub of words pass to the original 'Go to the Ant, thou +Sluggard, consider her ways, and be wise: which having no guide, +overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth +her food in the harvest. How long wilt thou sleep, O Sluggard? +when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little +slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep. So shall thy poverty +come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man' Proverbs, +ch. vi. + +One more quotation, and I have done. It is from Cowper's Verses +supposed to be written by Alexander Selkirk: + + Religion! what treasure untold + Resides in that heavenly word! + More precious than silver and gold, + Or all that this earth can afford + But the sound of the church-going bell + These valleys and rocks never heard, + Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell, + Or smiled when a sabbath appeared + Ye winds, that have made me your sport + Convey to this desolate shore + Some cordial endearing report + Of a land I must visit no more + My friends, do they now and then send + A wish or a thought after me? + O tell me I yet have a friend, + Though a friend I am never to see + +This passage is quoted as an instance of three different styles of +composition. The first four lines are poorly expressed, some Critics +would call the language prosaic; the fact is, it would be bad prose, +so bad, that it is scarcely worse in metre. The epithet 'church-going' +applied to a bell, and that by so chaste a writer as Cowper, is an +instance of the strange abuses which Poets have introduced into their +language, till they and their Readers take them as matters of course, +if they do not single them out expressly as objects of admiration. +The two lines 'Ne'er sighed at the sound,' &c., are, in my opinion, an +instance of the language of passion wrested from its proper use, and, +from the mere circumstance of the composition being in metre, applied +upon an occasion that does not justify such violent expressions; and I +should condemn the passage, though perhaps few Readers will agree with +me, as vicious poetic diction. The last stanza is throughout admirably +expressed: it would be equally good whether in prose or verse, except +that the Reader has an exquisite pleasure in seeing such natural +language so naturally connected with metre. The beauty of this stanza +tempts me to conclude with a principle which ought never to be +lost sight of, and which has been my chief guide in all I have +said,--namely, that in works of _imagination and sentiment_, for of +these only have I been treating, in proportion as ideas and feelings +are valuable, whether the composition be in prose or in verse, they +require and exact one and the same language. Metre is but adventitious +to composition, and the phraseology for which that passport is +necessary, even where it may be graceful at all will be little valued +by the judicious. + + + + +PREFACE TO POEMS + +(1815) + + +The powers requisite for the production of poetry are: first, those +of Observation and Description,--i.e. the ability to observe with +accuracy things as they are in themselves, and with fidelity to +describe them, unmodified by any passion or feeling existing in the +mind of the describer; whether the things depicted be actually present +to the senses, or have a place only in the memory. This power, though +indispensable to a Poet, is one which he employs only in submission +to necessity, and never for a continuance of time: as its exercise +supposes all the higher qualities of the mind to be passive, and in +a state of subjection to external objects, much in the same way as +a translator or engraver ought to be to his original. 2ndly, +Sensibility,--which, the more exquisite it is, the wider will be the +range of a poet's perceptions; and the more will he be incited to +observe objects, both as they exist in themselves and as re-acted upon +by his own mind. (The distinction between poetic and human sensibility +has been marked in the character of the Poet delineated in the +original preface.) 3rdly, Reflection,--which makes the Poet acquainted +with the value of actions, images, thoughts, and feelings; and assists +the sensibility in perceiving their connexion with each other. 4thly, +Imagination and Fancy,--to modify, to create, and to associate. 5thly, +Invention,--by which characters are composed out of materials supplied +by observation; whether of the Poet's own heart and mind, or of +external life and nature; and such incidents and situations produced +as are most impressive to the imagination, and most fitted to do +justice to the characters, sentiments, and passions, which the Poet +undertakes to illustrate. And, lastly, Judgement, to decide how +and where, and in what degree, each of these faculties ought to be +exerted; so that the less shall not be sacrificed to the greater; nor +the greater, slighting the less, arrogate, to its own injury, more +than its due. By judgement, also, is determined what are the laws and +appropriate graces of every species of composition.[3] + +The materials of Poetry, by these powers collected and produced, are +cast, by means of various moulds, into divers forms. The moulds may be +enumerated, and the forms specified, in the following order. 1st, The +Narrative,--including the Epopoeia, the Historic Poem, the Tale, the +Romance, the Mock-heroic, and, if the spirit of Homer will tolerate +such neighbourhood, that dear production of our days, the metrical +Novel. Of this Class, the distinguishing mark is, that the Narrator, +however liberally his speaking agents be introduced, is himself the +source from which everything primarily flows. Epic Poets, in order +that their mode of composition may accord with the elevation of their +subject, represent themselves as _singing_ from the inspiration of the +Muse, 'Anna virumque _cano_;' but this is a fiction, in modern times, +of slight value: the _Iliad_ or the _Paradise Lost_ would gain little +in our estimation by being chanted. The other poets who belong to this +class are commonly content to _tell_ their tale;--so that of the +whole it may be affirmed that they neither require nor reject the +accompaniment of music. + +2ndly, The Dramatic,--consisting of Tragedy, Historic Drama, Comedy, +and Masque, in which the Poet does not appear at all in his own +person, and where the whole action is carried on by speech and +dialogue of the agents; music being admitted only incidentally and +rarely. The Opera may be placed here, inasmuch as it proceeds by +dialogue; though depending, to the degree that it does, upon music, it +has a strong claim to be ranked with the lyrical. The characteristic +and Impassioned Epistle, of which Ovid and Pope have given examples, +considered as a species of monodrama, may, without impropriety, be +placed in this class. + +3rdly, The Lyrical,--containing the Hymn, the Ode, the Elegy, the +Song, and the Ballad; in all which, for the production of their _full_ +effect, an accompaniment of music is indispensable. + +4thly, The Idyllium,--descriptive chiefly either of the processes and +appearances of external nature, as the _Seasons_ of Thomson; or +of characters, manners, and sentiments, as are Shenstone's +_Schoolmistress, The Cotter's Saturday Night_ of Burns, _The Twa Dogs_ +of the same Author; or of these in conjunction with the appearances +of Nature, as most of the pieces of Theocritus, the _Allegro_ and +_Penseroso_ of Milton, Beattie's _Minstrel_, Goldsmith's _Deserted +Village_. The Epitaph, the Inscription, the Sonnet, most of +the epistles of poets writing in their own persons, and all +loco-descriptive poetry, belonging to this class. + +5thly, Didactic,--the principal object of which is direct instruction; +as the Poem of Lucretius, the _Georgics_ of Virgil, _The Fleece_ of +Dyer, Mason's _English Garden_, &c. + +And, lastly, philosophical Satire, like that of Horace and Juvenal; +personal and occasional Satire rarely comprehending sufficient of the +general in the individual to be dignified with the name of poetry. + +Out of the three last has been constructed a composite order, of which +Young's _Night Thoughts_, and Cowper's _Task_, are excellent examples. + +It is deducible from the above, that poems apparently miscellaneous, +may with propriety be arranged either with reference to the powers of +mind _predominant_ in the production of them; or to the mould in which +they are cast; or, lastly, to the subjects to which they relate. From +each of these considerations, the following Poems have been divided +into classes; which, that the work may more obviously correspond with +the course of human life, and for the sake of exhibiting in it the +three requisites of a legitimate whole, a beginning, a middle, and an +end, have been also arranged, as far as it was possible, according to +an order of time, commencing with Childhood, and terminating with +Old Age, Death, and Immortality. My guiding wish was, that the small +pieces of which these volumes consist, thus discriminated, might be +regarded under a two-fold view; as composing an entire work within +themselves, and as adjuncts to the philosophical Poem, _The Recluse_. +This arrangement has long presented itself habitually to my own mind. +Nevertheless, I should have preferred to scatter the contents of these +volumes at random, if I had been persuaded that, by the plan adopted, +anything material would be taken from the natural effect of the +pieces, individually, on the mind of the unreflecting Reader. I trust +there is a sufficient variety in each class to prevent this; while, +for him who reads with reflection, the arrangement will serve as a +commentary unostentatiously directing his attention to my purposes, +both particular and general. But, as I wish to guard against the +possibility of misleading by this classification, it is proper first +to remind the Reader, that certain poems are placed according to +the powers of mind, in the Author's conception, predominant in the +production of them; _predominant_, which implies the exertion of other +faculties in less degree. Where there is more imagination than fancy +in a poem, it is placed under the head of imagination, and _vice +versa_. Both the above classes might without impropriety have been +enlarged from that consisting of 'Poems founded on the Affections;' +as might this latter from those, and from the class 'proceeding from +Sentiment and Reflection.' The most striking characteristics of each +piece, mutual illustration, variety, and proportion, have governed me +throughout. + +None of the other Classes, except those of Fancy and Imagination, +require any particular notice. But a remark of general application may +be made. All Poets, except the dramatic, have been in the practice of +feigning that their works were composed to the music of the harp or +lyre: with what degree of affectation this has done in modern times, I +leave to the judicious to determine. For my own part, I have not been +disposed to violate probability so far, or to make such a large +demand upon the Reader's charity. Some of these pieces are essentially +lyrical; and, therefore, cannot have their due force without a +supposed musical accompaniment; but, in much the greatest part, as a +substitute for the classic lyre or romantic harp, I require nothing +more than an animated or impassioned recitation, adapted to the +subject. Poems, however humble in their kind, if they be good in that +kind, cannot read themselves; the law of long syllable and short must +not be so inflexible,--the letter of metre must not be so impassive +to the spirit of versification,--as to deprive the Reader of all +voluntary power to modulate, in subordination to the sense, the music +of the poem;--in the same manner as his mind is left at liberty, and +even summoned, to act upon its thoughts and images. But, though the +accompaniment of a musical instrument be frequently dispensed with, +the true Poet does not therefore abandon his privilege distinct from +that of the mere Proseman; + + He murmurs near the running brooks + A music sweeter than their own. + +Let us come now to the consideration of the words Fancy and +Imagination, as employed in the classification of the following Poems. +'A man,' says an intelligent author, 'has imagination in proportion +as he can distinctly copy in idea the impressions of sense: it is the +faculty which _images_ within the mind the phenomena of sensation. A +man has fancy in proportion as he can call up, connect, or associate, +at pleasure, those internal images ([Greek: phantazein] is to cause +to appear) so as to complete ideal representations of absent objects. +Imagination is the power of depicting, and fancy of evoking and +combining. The imagination is formed by patient observation; the fancy +by a voluntary activity in shifting the scenery of the mind. The more +accurate the imagination, the more safely may a painter, or a poet, +undertake a delineation, or a description, without the presence of the +objects to be characterized. The more versatile the fancy, the more +original and striking will be the decorations produced.'--_British +Synonyms discriminated, by W. Taylor_. + +Is not this as if a man should undertake to supply an account of +a building, and be so intent upon what he had discovered of the +foundation, as to conclude his task without once looking up at the +superstructure? Here, as in other instances throughout the volume, the +judicious Author's mind is enthralled by Etymology; he takes up the +original word as his guide and escort, and too often does not perceive +how soon he becomes its prisoner, without liberty to tread in any +path but that to which it confines him. It is not easy to find out +how imagination, thus explained, differs from distinct remembrance of +images; or fancy from quick and vivid recollection of them: each is +nothing more than a mode of memory. If the two words bear the above +meaning, and no other, what term is left to designate that faculty of +which the Poet is 'all compact;' he whose eyes glances from earth to +heaven, whose spiritual attributes body forth what his pen is prompt +in turning to shape; or what is left to characterize Fancy, +as insinuating herself into the heart of objects with creative +activity?--Imagination, in the sense of the word as giving title to +a class of the following Poems, has no reference to images that are +merely a faithful copy, existing in the mind, of absent external +objects; but is a word of higher import, denoting operations of the +mind upon those objects, and processes of creation or of composition, +governed by certain fixed laws. I proceed to illustrate my meaning by +instances. A parrot _hangs_ from the wires of his cage by his beak or +by his claws; or a monkey from the bough of a tree by his paws or +his tail. Each creature does so literally and actually. In the first +Eclogue of Virgil, the shepherd, thinking of the time when he is to +take leave of his farm, thus addresses his goats:-- + + Non ego vos posthac viridi projectus in antro + Dumosa _pendere_ procul de rupe videbo. + ----half way down + _Hangs_ one who gathers samphire, + +is the well-known expression of Shakespeare, delineating an ordinary +image upon the cliffs of Dover. In these two instances is a slight +exertion of the faculty which I denominate imagination, in the use +of one word: neither the goats nor the samphire-gatherer do literally +hang, as does the parrot or the monkey; but, presenting to the senses +something of such an appearance, the mind in its activity, for its own +gratification, contemplates them as hanging. + + As when far off at sea a fleet descried + _Hangs_ in the clouds, by equinoctial winds + Close sailing from Bengala, or the isles + Of Ternate or Tidore, whence merchants bring + Their spicy drugs; they on the trading flood + Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape + Ply, stemming nightly toward the Pole; so seemed + Far off the flying Fiend. + +Here is the full strength of the imagination involved in the word +_hangs_, and exerted upon the whole image: First, the fleet, an +aggregate of many ships, is represented as one mighty person, whose +track, we know and feel, is upon the waters; but, taking advantage +of its appearance to the senses, the Poet dares to represent it as +_hanging in the clouds_, both for the gratification of the mind in +contemplating the image itself, and in reference to the motion and +appearance of the sublime objects to which it is compared. + +From impressions of sight we will pass to those of sound; which, +as they must necessarily be of a less definite character, shall be +selected from these volumes: + + Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove _broods_; + +of the same bird, + + His voice was _buried_ among trees, + Yet to be come at by the breeze; + + O, Cuckoo I shall I call thee _Bird_, + Or but a wandering _Voice_? + +The stock-dove is said to _coo_, a sound well imitating the note +of the bird; but, by the intervention of the metaphor _broods_, the +affections are called in by the imagination to assist in marking the +manner in which the bird reiterates and prolongs her soft note, as if +herself delighting to listen to it, and participating of a still and +quiet satisfaction, like that which may be supposed inseparable from +the continuous process of incubation. 'His voice was buried among +trees,' a metaphor expressing the love of _seclusion_ by which this +Bird is marked; and characterizing its note as not partaking of the +shrill and the piercing, and therefore more easily deadened by the +intervening shade; yet a note so peculiar and withal so pleasing, that +the breeze, gifted with that love of the sound which the Poet feels, +penetrates the shades in which it is entombed, and conveys it to the +ear of the listener. + + Shall I call thee Bird, + Or but a wandering _Voice_? + +This concise interrogation characterizes the seeming ubiquity of +the voice of the cuckoo, and dispossesses the creature almost of a +corporeal existence; the Imagination being tempted to this exertion of +her power by a consciousness in the memory that the cuckoo is almost +perpetually heard throughout the season of spring, but seldom becomes +an object of sight. + +Thus far of images independent of each other, and immediately endowed +by the mind with properties that do not inhere in them, upon an +incitement from properties and qualities the existence of which is +inherent and obvious. These processes of imagination are carried +on either by conferring additional properties upon an object, or +abstracting from it some of those which it actually possesses, and +thus enabling it to react upon the mind which hath performed the +process, like a new existence. + +I pass from the Imagination acting upon an individual image to +a consideration of the same faculty employed upon images in a +conjunction by which they modify each other. The Reader has already +had a fine instance before him in the passage quoted from Virgil, +where the apparently perilous situation of the goat, hanging upon +the shaggy precipice, is contrasted with that of the shepherd +contemplating it from the seclusion of the cavern in which he lies +stretched at ease and in security. Take these images separately, and +how unaffecting the picture compared with that produced by their being +thus connected with, and opposed to, each other! + + As a huge stone is sometimes seen to lie + Couched on the bald top of an eminence, + Wonder to all who do the same espy + By what means it could thither come, and whence, + So that it seems a thing endued with sense, + Like a sea-beast crawled forth, which on a shelf + Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun himself. + + Such seemed this Man; not all alive or dead + Nor all asleep, in his extreme old age. + + * * * * * + + Motionless as a cloud the old Man stood, + That heareth not the loud winds when they call, + And moveth altogether if it move at all. + +In these images, the conferring, the abstracting, and the modifying +powers of the Imagination, immediately and mediately acting, are all +brought into conjunction. The stone is endowed with something of the +power of life to approximate it to the sea-beast; and the sea-beast +stripped of some of its vital qualities to assimilate it to the stone; +which intermediate image is thus treated for the purpose of bringing +the original image, that of the stone, to a nearer resemblance to the +figure and condition of the aged Man; who is divested of so much of +the indications of life and motion as to bring him to the point where +the two objects unite and coalesce in just comparison. After what has +been said, the image of the cloud need not be commented upon. + +Thus far of an endowing or modifying power: but the Imagination also +shapes and _creates_; and how? By innumerable processes; and in none +does it more delight than in that of consolidating numbers into +unity, and dissolving and separating unity into number,--alternations +proceeding from, and governed by, a sublime consciousness of the +soul in her own mighty and almost divine powers. Recur to the passage +already cited from Milton. When the compact Fleet, as one Person, has +been introduced 'sailing from Bengala,' 'They,' i.e. the 'merchants,' +representing the fleet resolved into a multitude of ships, 'ply' their +voyage towards the extremities of the earth: 'So' (referring to the +word 'As' in the commencement) 'seemed the flying Fiend'; the image +of his Person acting to recombine the multitude of ships into one +body,--the point from which the comparison set out. 'So seemed,' and +to whom seemed? To the heavenly Muse who dictates the poem, to the eye +of the Poet's mind, and to that of the Reader, present at one moment +in the wide Ethiopian, and the next in the solitudes, then first +broken in upon, of the infernal regions! + + Modo me Thebis, modo ponit Athenis. + +Hear again this mighty Poet,--speaking of the Messiah going forth to +expel from heaven the rebellious angels, + + Attended by ten thousand thousand Saints + He onward came: far off his coming shone,-- + +the retinue of Saints, and the Person of the Messiah himself, lost +almost and merged in the splendour of that indefinite abstraction 'His +coming!' + +As I do not mean here to treat this subject further than to throw some +light upon the present Volumes, and especially upon one division of +them, I shall spare myself and the Reader the trouble of considering +the Imagination as it deals with thoughts and sentiments, as it +regulates the composition of characters, and determines the course +of actions: I will not consider it (more than I have already done by +implication) as that power which, in the language of one of my most +esteemed Friends, 'draws all things to one; which makes things animate +or inanimate, beings with their attributes, subjects with their +accessories, take one colour and serve to one effect[4].' The grand +storehouses of enthusiastic and meditative Imagination, of poetical, +as contra-distinguished from human and dramatic Imagination, are the +prophetic and lyrical parts of the Holy Scriptures, and the works of +Milton; to which I cannot forbear to add to those of Spenser. I select +these writers in preference to those of ancient Greece and Rome, +because the anthropomorphitism of the Pagan religion subjected the +minds of the greatest poets in those countries too much to the bondage +of definite form; from which the Hebrews were preserved by their +abhorrence of idolatry. This abhorrence was almost as strong in our +great epic Poet, both from circumstances of his life, and from the +constitution of his mind. However imbued the surface might be with +classical literature, he was a Hebrew in soul; and all things tended +in him towards the sublime. Spenser, of a gentler nature, maintained +his freedom by aid of his allegorical spirit, at one time inciting him +to create persons out of abstractions; and, at another, by a +superior effort of genius, to give the universality and permanence of +abstractions to his human beings, by means of attributes and emblems +that belong to the highest moral truths and the purest sensations,--of +which his character of Una is a glorious example. Of the human and +dramatic Imagination the works of Shakespeare are an inexhaustible +source. + + I tax not you, ye Elements, with unkindness, + I never gave you kingdoms, call'd you Daughters! + +And if, bearing in mind the many Poets distinguished by this prime +quality, whose names I omit to mention; yet justified by recollection +of the insults which the ignorant, the incapable, and the +presumptuous, have heaped upon these and my other writings, I may be +permitted to anticipate the judgment of posterity upon myself, I +shall declare (censurable, I grant, if the notoriety of the fact above +stated does not justify me) that I have given in these unfavourable +times evidence of exertions of this faculty upon its worthiest +objects, the external universe, the moral and religious sentiments of +Man, his natural affections, and his acquired passions; which have +the same ennobling tendency as the productions of men, in this kind, +worthy to be holden in undying remembrance. + +To the mode in which Fancy has already been characterized as the power +of evoking and combining, or, as my friend Mr. Coleridge has styled +it, 'the aggregative and associative power,' my objection is only that +the definition is too general. To aggregate and to associate, to evoke +and to combine, belong as well to the Imagination as to the Fancy; but +either the materials evoked and combined are different; or they are +brought together under a different law, and for a different purpose. +Fancy does not require that the materials which she makes use of +should be susceptible of change in their constitution, from her touch; +and, where they admit of modification, it is enough for her purpose if +it be slight, limited, and evanescent. Directly the reverse of these, +are the desires and demands of the Imagination. She recoils from +everything but the plastic, the pliant, and the indefinite. She leaves +it to Fancy to describe Queen Mab as coming, + + In shape no bigger than an agate-stone + On the fore-finger of an alderman. + +Having to speak of stature, she does not tell you that her gigantic +Angel was as tall as Pompey's Pillar; much less that he was twelve +cubits, or twelve hundred cubits high; or that his dimensions equalled +those of Teneriffe or Atlas;--because these, and if they were +a million times as high it would be the same, are bounded: The +expression is, 'His stature reached the sky!' the illimitable +firmament!--When the Imagination frames a comparison, if it does +not strike on the first presentation, a sense of the truth of the +likeness, from the moment that it is perceived, grows--and continues +to grow--upon the mind; the resemblance depending less upon outline +of form and feature, than upon expression and effect; less upon +casual and outstanding, than upon inherent and internal, properties: +moreover, the images invariably modify each other.--The law under +which the processes of Fancy are carried on is as capricious as +the accidents of things, and the effects are surprising, playful, +ludicrous, amusing, tender, or pathetic, as the objects happen to be +appositely produced or fortunately combined. Fancy depends upon +the rapidity and profusion with which she scatters her thoughts and +images; trusting that their number, and the felicity with which they +are linked together, will make amends for the want of individual +value: or she prides herself upon the curious subtilty and the +successful elaboration with which she can detect their lurking +affinities. If she can win you over to her purpose, and impart to +you her feelings, she cares not how unstable or transitory may be her +influence, knowing that it will not be out of her power to resume +it upon an apt occasion. But the Imagination is conscious of an +indestructible dominion;--the Soul may fall away from it, not being +able to sustain its grandeur; but, if once felt and acknowledged, by +no act of any other faculty of the mind can it be relaxed, impaired, +or diminished.--Fancy is given to quicken and to beguile the +temporal part of our nature, Imagination to incite and to support the +eternal.--Yet is it not the less true that Fancy, as she is an active, +is also, under her own laws and in her own spirit, a creative faculty? +In what manner Fancy ambitiously aims at a rivalship with Imagination, +and Imagination stoops to work with the materials of Fancy, might be +illustrated from the compositions of all eloquent writers, whether in +prose or verse; and chiefly from those of our own Country. Scarcely a +page of the impassioned parts of Bishop Taylor's Works can be opened +that shall not afford examples.--Referring the Reader to those +inestimable volumes, I will content myself with placing a conceit +(ascribed to Lord Chesterfield) in contrast with a passage from the +_Paradise Lost_: + + The dews of the evening most carefully shun, + They are the tears of the sky for the loss of the sun. + +After the transgression of Adam, Milton, with other appearances of +sympathizing Nature, thus marks the immediate consequence, + + Sky lowered, and, muttering thunder, some sad drops + Wept at completion of the mortal sin. + +The associating link is the same in each instance: Dew and rain, not +distinguishable from the liquid substance of tears, are employed as +indications of sorrow. A flash of surprise is the effect in the former +case; a flash of surprise, and nothing more; for the nature of things +does not sustain the combination. In the latter, the effects from the +act, of which there is this immediate consequence and visible +sign, are so momentous, that the mind acknowledges the justice and +reasonableness of the sympathy in nature so manifested; and the sky +weeps drops of water as if with human eyes, as 'Earth had before +trembled from her entrails, and Nature given a second groan.' + +Finally, I will refer to Cotton's _Ode upon Winter_, an admirable +composition, though stained with some peculiarities of the age in +which he lived, for a general illustration of the characteristics of +Fancy. The middle part of this ode contains a most lively description +of the entrance of Winter, with his retinue, as 'A palsied king,' and +yet a military monarch,--advancing for conquest with his army; the +several bodies of which, and their arms and equipments, are described +with a rapidity of detail, and a profusion of _fanciful_ comparisons, +which indicate on the part of the poet extreme activity of intellect, +and a correspondent hurry of delightful feeling. Winter retires from +the foe into his fortress, where + + a magazine + Of sovereign juice is cellared in; + Liquor that will the siege maintain + Should Phoebus ne'er return again. + +Though myself a water drinker, I cannot resist the pleasure of +transcribing what follows, as an instance still more happy of Fancy +employed in the treatment of feeling than, in its preceding passages, +the Poem supplies of her management of forms. + + 'Tis that, that gives the poet rage, + And thaws the gelid blood of age; + Matures the young, restores the old, + And makes the fainting coward bold. + + It lays the careful head to rest, + Calms palpitations in the breast, + Renders our lives' misfortune sweet; + + * * * * * + + Then let the chill Sirocco blow, + And gird us round with hills of snow, + Or else go whistle to the shore, + And make the hollow mountains roar, + + Whilst we together jovial sit + Careless, and crowned with mirth and wit, + Where, though bleak winds confine us home + Our fancies round the world shall roam. + + We'll think of all the Friends we know, + And drink to all worth drinking to; + When having drunk all thine and mine, + We rather shall want healths than wine. + + But where Friends fail us, we'll supply + Our friendships with our charity; + Men that remote in sorrows live, + Shall by our lusty brimmers thrive. + + We'll drink the wanting into wealth, + And those that languish into health, + The afflicted into joy; th' opprest + Into security and rest. + + The worthy in disgrace shall find + Favour return again more kind, + And in restraint who stifled lie, + Shall taste the air of liberty. + + The brave shall triumph in success, + The lover shall have mistresses, + Poor unregarded Virtue, praise, + And the neglected Poet, bays. + + Thus shall our healths do others good, + Whilst we ourselves do all we would; + For, freed from envy and from care, + What would we be but what we are? + +When I sate down to write this Preface, it was my intention to have +made it more comprehensive; but, thinking that I ought rather to +apologize for detaining the reader so long, I will here conclude. + + +[Footnote 3: As sensibility to harmony of numbers, and the power +of producing it, are invariably attendants upon the faculties above +specified, nothing has been said upon those requisites.] + +[Footnote 4: Charles Lamb upon the genius of Hogarth.] + + + + +ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO PREFACE + +(1815) + + +With the young of both sexes, Poetry is, like love, a passion; but, +for much the greater part of those who have been proud of its power +over their minds, a necessity soon arises of breaking the pleasing +bondage; or it relaxes of itself;--the thoughts being occupied in +domestic cares, or the time engrossed by business. Poetry then becomes +only an occasional recreation; while to those whose existence passes +away in a course of fashionable pleasure, it is a species of luxurious +amusement. In middle and declining age, a scattered number of serious +persons resort to poetry, as to religion, for a protection against +the pressure of trivial employments, and as a consolation for the +afflictions of life. And, lastly, there are many, who, having been +enamoured of this art in their youth, have found leisure, after +youth was spent, to cultivate general literature; in which poetry has +continued to be comprehended _as a study_. + +Into the above classes the Readers of poetry may be divided; Critics +abound in them all; but from the last only can opinions be collected +of absolute value, and worthy to be depended upon, as prophetic of the +destiny of a new work. The young, who in nothing can escape delusion, +are especially subject to it in their intercourse with Poetry. The +cause, not so obvious as the fact is unquestionable, is the same as +that from which erroneous judgements in this art, in the minds of men +of all ages, chiefly proceed; but upon Youth it operates with peculiar +force. The appropriate business of poetry (which, nevertheless, if +genuine, is as permanent as pure science), her appropriate employment, +her privilege and her _duty_, is to treat of things not as they _are_, +but as they _appear_; not as they exist in themselves, but as they +_seem_ to exist to the _senses_, and to the _passions_. What a +world of delusion does this acknowledged obligation prepare for the +inexperienced! what temptations to go astray are here held forth for +them whose thoughts have been little disciplined by the understanding, +and whose feelings revolt from the sway of reason!--When a juvenile +Reader is in the height of his rapture with some vicious passage, +should experience throw in doubts, or common sense suggest suspicions, +a lurking consciousness that the realities of the Muse are but shows, +and that her liveliest excitements are raised by transient shocks +of conflicting feeling and successive assemblages of contradictory +thoughts--is ever at hand to justify extravagance, and to sanction +absurdity. But, it may be asked, as these illusions are unavoidable, +and, no doubt, eminently useful to the mind as a process, what good +can be gained by making observations, the tendency of which is to +diminish the confidence of youth in its feelings, and thus to abridge +its innocent and even profitable pleasures? The reproach implied in +the question could not be warded off, if Youth were incapable of being +delighted with what is truly excellent; or, if these errors always +terminated of themselves in due season. But, with the majority, though +their force be abated, they continue through life. Moreover, the fire +of youth is too vivacious an element to be extinguished or damped by a +philosophical remark; and, while there is no danger that what has been +said will be injurious or painful to the ardent and the confident, +it may prove beneficial to those who, being enthusiastic, are, at the +same time, modest and ingenuous. The intimation may unite with their +own misgivings to regulate their sensibility, and to bring in, sooner +than it would otherwise have arrived, a more discreet and sound +judgement. + +If it should excite wonder that men of ability, in later life, whose +understandings have been rendered acute by practice in affairs, should +be so easily and so far imposed upon when they happen to take up a +new work in verse, this appears to be the cause;--that, having +discontinued their attention to poetry, whatever progress may have +been made in other departments of knowledge, they have not, as to this +art, advanced in true discernment beyond the age of youth. If, then, +a new poem fall in their way, whose attractions are of that kind which +would have enraptured them during the heat of youth, the judgement +not being improved to a degree that they shall be disgusted, they are +dazzled, and prize and cherish the faults for having had power to make +the present time vanish before them, and to throw the mind back, as +by enchantment, into the happiest season of life. As they read, powers +seem to be revived, passions are regenerated, and pleasures restored. +The Book was probably taken up after an escape from the burden of +business, and with a wish to forget the world, and all its vexations +and anxieties. Having obtained this wish, and so much more, it is +natural that they should make report as they have felt. + +If Men of mature age, through want of practice, be thus easily +beguiled into admiration of absurdities, extravagances, and misplaced +ornaments, thinking it proper that their understandings should enjoy +a holiday, while they are unbending their minds with verse, it may be +expected that such Readers will resemble their former selves also +in strength of prejudice, and an inaptitude to be moved by the +unostentatious beauties of a pure style. In the higher poetry, an +enlightened Critic chiefly looks for a reflection of the wisdom of +the heart and the grandeur of the imagination. Wherever these appear, +simplicity accompanies them, Magnificence herself, when legitimate, +depending upon a simplicity of her own, to regulate her ornaments. But +it is a well-known property of human nature, that our estimates are +ever governed by comparisons, of which we are conscious with various +degrees of distinctness. Is it not, then, inevitable (confining these +observations to the effects of style merely) that an eye, accustomed +to the glaring hues of diction by which such Readers are caught and +excited, will for the most part be rather repelled than attracted by +an original Work, the colouring of which is disposed according to a +pure and refined scheme of harmony? It is in the fine arts as in the +affairs of life, no man can _serve_ (i.e. obey with zeal and fidelity) +two Masters. + +As Poetry is most just to its own divine origin when it administers +the comforts and breathes the spirit of religion, they who have +learned to perceive this truth, and who betake themselves to reading +verse for sacred purposes, must be preserved from numerous illusions +to which the two Classes of Readers, whom we have been considering, +are liable. But, as the mind grows serious from the weight of +life, the range of its passions is contracted accordingly; and its +sympathies become so exclusive, that many species of high excellence +wholly escape, or but languidly excite, its notice. Besides, men who +read from religious or moral inclinations, even when the subject is +of that kind which they approve, are beset with misconceptions and +mistakes peculiar to themselves. Attaching so much importance to the +truths which interest them, they are prone to overrate the Authors by +whom those truths are expressed and enforced. They come prepared +to impart so much passion to the Poet's language, that they remain +unconscious how little, in fact, they receive from it. And, on the +other hand, religious faith is to him who holds it so momentous +a thing, and error appears to be attended with such tremendous +consequences, that, if opinions touching upon religion occur which +the Reader condemns, he not only cannot sympathize with them, however +animated the expression, but there is, for the most part, an end put +to all satisfaction and enjoyment. Love, if it before existed, is +converted into dislike; and the heart of the Reader is set against +the Author and his book.--To these excesses, they, who from their +professions ought to be the most guarded against them, are perhaps +the most liable; I mean those sects whose religion, being from the +calculating understanding, is cold and formal. For when Christianity, +the religion of humility, is founded upon the proudest faculty of +our nature, what can be expected but contradictions? Accordingly, +believers of this cast are at one time contemptuous; at another, being +troubled, as they are and must he, with inward misgivings, they are +jealous and suspicious;--and at all seasons, they are under temptation +to supply by the heat with which they defend their tenets, the +animation which is wanting to the constitution of the religion itself. + +Faith was given to man that his affections, detached from the +treasures of time, might be inclined to settle upon those of +eternity;--the elevation of his nature, which this habit produces +on earth, being to him a presumptive evidence of a future state of +existence; and giving him a title to partake of its holiness. The +religious man values what he sees chiefly as an 'imperfect shadowing +forth' of what he is incapable of seeing. The concerns of religion +refer to indefinite objects, and are too weighty for the mind to +support them without relieving itself by resting a great part of the +burthen upon words and symbols. The commerce between Man and his Maker +cannot be carried on but by a process where much is represented +in little, and the Infinite Being accommodates himself to a finite +capacity. In all this may be perceived the affinity between religion +and poetry; between religion--making up the deficiencies of reason by +faith; and poetry--passionate for the instruction of reason; between +religion--whose element is infinitude, and whose ultimate trust is +the supreme of things, submitting herself to circumscription, and +reconciled to substitutions; and poetry--ethereal and transcendent, +yet incapable to sustain her existence without sensuous incarnation. +In this community of nature may be perceived also the lurking +incitements of kindred error;--so that we shall find that no poetry +has been more subject to distortion, than that species, the argument +and scope of which is religious; and no lovers of the art have gone +farther astray than the pious and the devout. + +Whither then shall we turn for that union of qualifications which must +necessarily exist before the decisions of a critic can be of absolute +value? For a mind at once poetical and philosophical; for a critic +whose affections are as free and kindly as the spirit of society, and +whose understanding is severe as that of dispassionate government? +Where are we to look for that initiatory composure of mind which +no selfishness can disturb? For a natural sensibility that has been +tutored into correctness without losing anything of its quickness; and +for active faculties, capable of answering the demands which an +Author of original imagination shall make upon them, associated with +a judgement that cannot he duped into admiration by aught that +is unworthy of it?--among those and those only, who, never having +suffered their youthful love of poetry to remit much of its force, +have applied to the consideration of the laws of this art the +best power of their understandings. At the same time it must be +observed--that, as this Class comprehends the only judgements which +are trustworthy, so does it include the most erroneous and perverse. +For to be mistaught is worse than to be untaught; and no perverseness +equals that which is supported by system, no errors are so difficult +to root out as those which the understanding has pledged its credit to +uphold. In this Class are contained censors, who, if they be pleased +with what is good, are pleased with it only by imperfect glimpses, +and upon false principles; who, should they generalize rightly, to +a certain point, are sure to suffer for it in the end; who, if they +stumble upon a sound rule, are fettered by misapplying it, or by +straining it too far; being incapable of perceiving when it ought to +yield to one of higher order. In it are found critics too petulant to +be passive to a genuine poet, and too feeble to grapple with him; men, +who take upon them to report of the course which _he_ holds whom they +are utterly unable to accompany,--confounded if he turn quick upon the +wing, dismayed if he soar steadily 'into the region';--men of palsied +imaginations and indurated hearts; in whose minds all healthy action +is languid, who therefore feed as the many direct them, or, with the +many, are greedy after vicious provocatives;--judges, whose censure is +auspicious, and whose praise ominous! In this class meet together the +two extremes of best and worst. + +The observations presented in the foregoing series are of too +ungracious a nature to have been made without reluctance; and, were +it only on this account, I would invite the reader to try them by the +test of comprehensive experience. If the number of judges who can be +confidently relied upon be in reality so small, it ought to follow +that partial notice only, or neglect, perhaps long continued, or +attention wholly inadequate to their merits--must have been the fate +of most works in the higher departments of poetry; and that, on the +other hand, numerous productions have blazed into popularity, and have +passed away, leaving scarcely a trace behind them: it will be further +found, that when Authors shall have at length raised themselves into +general admiration and maintained their ground, errors and prejudices +have prevailed concerning their genius and their works, which the few +who are conscious of those errors and prejudices would deplore; if +they were not recompensed by perceiving that there are select Spirits +for whom it is ordained that their fame shall be in the world an +existence like that of Virtue, which owes its being to the struggles +it makes, and its vigour to the enemies whom it provokes;--a vivacious +quality, ever doomed to meet with opposition, and still triumphing +over it; and, from the nature of its dominion, incapable of being +brought to the sad conclusion of Alexander, when he wept that there +were no more worlds for him to conquer. + +Let us take a hasty retrospect of the poetical literature of this +Country for the greater part of the last two centuries, and see if the +facts support these inferences. + +Who is there that now reads the _Creation_ of Dubartas? Yet all Europe +once resounded with his praise; he was caressed by kings; and, when +his Poem was translated into our language, the _Faery Queen_ faded +before it. The name of Spenser, whose genius is of a higher order than +even that of Ariosto, is at this day scarcely known beyond the limits +of the British Isles. And if the value of his works is to be estimated +from the attention now paid to them by his countrymen, compared with +that which they bestow on those of some other writers, it must be +pronounced small indeed. + + The laurel, meed of mighty conquerors + And poets _sage_-- + +are his own words; but his wisdom has, in this particular, been his +worst enemy: while its opposite, whether in the shape of folly or +madness, has been _their_ best friend. But he was a great power, and +bears a high name: the laurel has been awarded to him. + +A dramatic Author, if he write for the stage, must adapt himself to +the taste of the audience, or they will not endure him; accordingly +the mighty genius of Shakespeare was listened to. The people were +delighted: but I am not sufficiently versed in stage antiquities to +determine whether they did not flock as eagerly to the representation +of many pieces of contemporary Authors, wholly undeserving to appear +upon the same boards. Had there been a formal contest for superiority +among dramatic writers, that Shakespeare, like his predecessors +Sophocles and Euripides, would have often been subject to the +mortification of seeing the prize adjudged to sorry competitors, +becomes too probable, when we reflect that the admirers of Settle +and Shadwell were, in a later age, as numerous, and reckoned as +respectable, in point of talent, as those of Dryden. At all events, +that Shakespeare stooped to accommodate himself to the People, is +sufficiently apparent; and one of the most striking proofs of his +almost omnipotent genius is, that he could turn to such glorious +purpose those materials which the prepossessions of the age compelled +him to make use of. Yet even this marvellous skill appears not to have +been enough to prevent his rivals from having some advantage over him +in public estimation; else how can we account for passages and scenes +that exist in his works, unless upon a supposition that some of the +grossest of them, a fact which in my own mind I have no doubt of, were +foisted in by the Players, for the gratification of the many? + +But that his Works, whatever might be their reception upon the stage, +made but little impression upon the ruling Intellects of the time, +may be inferred from the fact that Lord Bacon, in his multifarious +writings, nowhere either quotes or alludes to him.[5] His dramatic +excellence enabled him to resume possession of the stage after the +Restoration; but Dryden tells us that in his time two of the plays +of Beaumont and Fletcher were acted for one of Shakespeare's. And so +faint and limited was the perception of the poetic beauties of his +dramas in the time of Pope, that, in his Edition of the Plays, with +a view of rendering to the general reader a necessary service, he +printed between inverted commas those passages which he thought most +worthy of notice. + +At this day, the French Critics have abated nothing of their aversion +to this darling of our Nation: 'the English, with their bouffon de +Shakespeare,' is as familiar an expression among them as in the time +of Voltaire. Baron Grimm is the only French writer who seems to have +perceived his infinite superiority to the first names of the French +Theatre; an advantage which the Parisian Critic owed to his German +blood and German education. The most enlightened Italians, though well +acquainted with our language, are wholly incompetent to measure the +proportions of Shakespeare. The Germans only, of foreign nations, are +approaching towards a knowledge and feeling of what he is. In some +respects they have acquired a superiority over the fellow countrymen +of the Poet: for among us it is a current, I might say, an established +opinion, that Shakespeare is justly praised when he is pronounced to +be 'a wild irregular genius, in whom great faults are compensated by +great beauties.' How long may it he before this misconception passes +away, and it becomes universally acknowledged that the judgement of +Shakespeare in the selection of his materials, and in the manner in +which he has made them, heterogeneous as they often are, constitute a +unity of their own, and contribute all to one great end, is not less +admirable than his imagination, his invention, and his intuitive +knowledge of human Nature? + +There is extant a small Volume of miscellaneous poems, in which +Shakespeare expresses his own feelings in his own person. It is not +difficult to conceive that the Editor, George Steevens, should have +been insensible to the beauties of one portion of that Volume, the +Sonnets; though in no part of the writings of this Poet is found, in +an equal compass, a greater number of exquisite feelings felicitously +expressed. But, from regard to the Critic's own credit, he would not +have ventured to talk of an[6] act of parliament not being strong +enough to compel the perusal of those little pieces, if he had not +known that the people of England were ignorant of the treasures +contained in them: and if he had not, moreover, shared the too common +propensity of human nature to exult over a supposed fall into the mire +of a genius whom he had been compelled to regard with admiration, as +an inmate of the celestial regions--'there sitting where he durst not +soar.' + +Nine years before the death of Shakespeare, Milton was born, and early +in life he published several small poems, which, though on their +first appearance they were praised by a few of the judicious, were +afterwards neglected to that degree, that Pope in his youth could +borrow from them without risk of its being known. Whether these poems +are at this day justly appreciated, I will not undertake to decide nor +would it imply a severe reflection upon the mass of readers to suppose +the contrary, seeing that a man of the acknowledged genius of Voss, +the German poet, could suffer their spirit to evaporate, and could +change their character, as is done in the translation made by him of +the most popular of these pieces. At all events, it is certain that +these Poems of Milton are now much read, and loudly praised, yet were +they little heard of till more than 150 years after their publication, +and of the Sonnets, Dr. Johnson, as appears from Boswell's _Life_ of +him, was in the habit of thinking and speaking as contemptuously as +Steevens wrote upon those of Shakespeare. + +About the time when the Pindaric odes of Cowley and his imitators, and +the productions of that class of curious thinkers whom Dr. Johnson has +strangely styled metaphysical Poets, were beginning to lose something +of that extravagant admiration which they had excited, the _Paradise +Lost_ made its appearance. 'Fit audience find though few,' was the +petition addressed by the Poet to his inspiring Muse. I have said +elsewhere that he gained more than he asked, this I believe to be +true, but Dr. Johnson has fallen into a gross mistake when he attempts +to prove, by the sale of the work, that Milton's Countrymen were +'_just_ to it' upon its first appearance. Thirteen hundred Copies were +sold in two years, an uncommon example, he asserts, of the prevalence +of genius in opposition to so much recent enmity as Milton's public +conduct had excited. But be it remembered that, if Milton's political +and religious opinions, and the manner in which he announced them, had +raised him many enemies, they had procured him numerous friends, who, +as all personal danger was passed away at the time of publication, +would be eager to procure the master-work of a man whom they revered, +and whom they would be proud of praising. Take, from the number +of purchasers, persons of this class, and also those who wished to +possess the Poem as a religious work, and but few I fear would be left +who sought for it on account of its poetical merits. The demand did +not immediately increase; 'for,' says Dr. Johnson, 'many more readers' +(he means persons in the habit of reading poetry) 'than were supplied +at first the Nation did not afford.' How careless must a writer be who +can make this assertion in the face of so many existing title-pages +to belie it! Turning to my own shelves, I find the folio of Cowley, +seventh edition, 1681. A book near it is Flatman's Poems, fourth +edition, 1686, Waller, fifth edition, same date. The Poems of Norris +of Bemerton not long after went, I believe, through nine editions. +What further demand there might be for these works I do not know; but +I well remember that, twenty-five years ago, the booksellers' stalls +in London swarmed with the folios of Cowley. This is not mentioned in +disparagement of that able writer and amiable man; but merely to show +that, if Milton's Works were not more read, it was not because readers +did not exist at the time. The early editions of the _Paradise Lost_ +were printed in a shape which allowed them to be sold at a low price, +yet only three thousand copies of the Work were sold in eleven years; +and the Nation, says Dr. Johnson, had been satisfied from 1623 to +1664, that is, forty-one years, with only two editions of the Works of +Shakespeare; which probably did not together make one thousand Copies; +facts adduced by the critic to prove the 'paucity of Readers,'--There +were readers in multitudes; but their money went for other purposes, +as their admiration was fixed elsewhere. We are authorized, then, +to affirm that the reception of the _Paradise Lost_, and the slow +progress of its fame, are proofs as striking as can be desired +that the positions which I am attempting to establish are not +erroneous.[7]--How amusing to shape to one's self such a critique as +a Wit of Charles's days, or a Lord of the Miscellanies or trading +Journalist of King William's time, would have brought forth, if he +had set his faculties industriously to work upon this Poem, everywhere +impregnated with _original_ excellence. + +So strange indeed are the obliquities of admiration, that they whose +opinions are much influenced by authority will often be tempted to +think that there are no fixed principles[8] in human nature for this +art to rest upon. I have been honoured by being permitted to peruse +in MS. a tract composed between the period of the Revolution and +the close of that century. It is the Work of an English Peer of high +accomplishments, its object to form the character and direct the +studies of his son. Perhaps nowhere does a more beautiful treatise +of the kind exist. The good sense and wisdom of the thoughts, the +delicacy of the feelings, and the charm of the style, are, throughout, +equally conspicuous. Yet the Author, selecting among the Poets of +his own country those whom he deems most worthy of his son's perusal, +particularizes only Lord Rochester, Sir John Denham, and Cowley. +Writing about the same time, Shaftesbury, an author at present +unjustly depreciated, describes the English Muses as only yet lisping +in their cradles. + +The arts by which Pope, soon afterwards, contrived to procure to +himself a more general and a higher reputation than perhaps any +English Poet ever attained during his lifetime, are known to the +judicious. And as well known is it to them, that the undue exertion +of those arts is the cause why Pope has for some time held a rank in +literature, to which, if he had not been seduced by an over-love of +immediate popularity, and had confided more in his native genius, he +never could have descended. He bewitched the nation by his melody, and +dazzled it by his polished style and was himself blinded by his own +success. Having wandered from humanity in his Eclogues with boyish +inexperience, the praise, which these compositions obtained, tempted +him into a belief that Nature was not to be trusted, at least in +pastoral Poetry. To prove this by example, he put his friend Gay upon +writing those Eclogues which their author intended to be burlesque. +The instigator of the work, and his admirers, could perceive in them +nothing but what was ridiculous. Nevertheless, though these Poems +contain some detestable passages, the effect, as Dr Johnson well +observes, 'of reality and truth became conspicuous even when the +intention was to show them grovelling and degraded.' The Pastorals, +ludicrous to such as prided themselves upon their refinement, in spite +of those disgusting passages, 'became popular, and were read with +delight, as just representations of rural manners and occupations.' + +Something less than sixty years after the publication of the _Paradise +Lost_ appeared Thomson's _Winter_, which was speedily followed by his +other Seasons. It is a work of inspiration, much of it is written +from himself, and nobly from himself. How was it received? 'It was +no sooner read,' says one of his contemporary biographers, 'than +universally admired those only excepted who had not been used to feel, +or to look for anything in poetry, beyond a _point_ of satirical or +epigrammatic wit, a smart _antithesis_ richly trimmed with rime, or +the softness of an _elegiac_ complaint. To such his manly classical +spirit could not readily commend itself, till, after a more attentive +perusal, they had got the better of their prejudices, and either +acquired or affected a truer taste. A few others stood aloof, merely +because they had long before fixed the articles of their poetical +creed, and resigned themselves to an absolute despair of ever seeing +anything new and original. These were somewhat mortified to find +their notions disturbed by the appearance of a poet, who seemed to owe +nothing but to nature and his own genius. But, in a short time, the +applause became unanimous, every one wondering how so many pictures, +and pictures so familiar, should have moved them but faintly to what +they felt in his descriptions. His digressions too, the overflowings +of a tender benevolent heart, charmed the reader no less, leaving him +in doubt, whether he should more admire the Poet or love the Man.' + +This case appears to bear strongly against us--but we must distinguish +between wonder and legitimate admiration. The subject of the work is +the changes produced in the appearances of nature by the revolution +of the year: and, by undertaking to write in verse, Thomson pledged +himself to treat his subject as became a Poet. Now, it is remarkable +that, excepting the nocturnal _Reverie of Lady Winchelsea_, and a +passage or two in the _Windsor Forest_ of Pope, the poetry of the +period intervening between the publication of the _Paradise Lost_ and +the _Seasons_ does not contain a single new image of external nature; +and scarcely presents a familiar one from which it can be inferred +that the eye of the Poet has been steadily fixed upon his object, much +less that his feelings had urged him to work upon it in the spirit of +genuine imagination. To what a low state knowledge of the most obvious +and important phenomena had sunk, is evident from the style in which +Dryden has executed a description of Night in one of his Tragedies, +and Pope his translation of the celebrated moonlight scene in +the _Iliad_. A blind man, in the habit of attending accurately to +descriptions casually dropped from the lips of those around him, might +easily depict these appearances with more truth. Dryden's lines are +vague, bombastic, and senseless;[9] those of Pope, though he had Homer +to guide him, are throughout false and contradictory. The verses of +Dryden, once highly celebrated, are forgotten; those of Pope still +retain their hold upon public estimation,--nay, there is not a passage +of descriptive poetry, which at this day finds so many and such ardent +admirers. Strange to think of an enthusiast, as may have been the case +with thousands, reciting those verses under the cope of a moonlight +sky, without having his raptures in the least disturbed by a suspicion +of their absurdity!--If these two distinguished writers could +habitually think that the visible universe was of so little +consequence to a poet, that it was scarcely necessary for him to cast +his eyes upon it, we may be assured that those passages of the elder +poets which faithfully and poetically describe the phenomena of +nature, were not at that time holden in much estimation, and that +there was little accurate attention paid to those appearances. + +Wonder is the natural product of Ignorance; and as the soil was _in +such good condition_ at the time of the publication of the _Seasons_ +the crop was doubtless abundant. Neither individuals nor nations +become corrupt all at once, nor are they enlightened in a moment. +Thomson was an inspired poet, but he could not work miracles; in cases +where the art of seeing had in some degree been learned, the teacher +would further the proficiency of his pupils, but he could do +little _more_; though so far does vanity assist men in acts of +self-deception, that many would often fancy they recognized a likeness +when they knew nothing of the original. Having shown that much of what +his biographer deemed genuine admiration must in fact have been +blind wonderment--how is the rest to be accounted for?--Thomson was +fortunate in the very title of his poem, which seemed to bring it +home to the prepared sympathies of every one: in the next place, +notwithstanding his high powers, he writes a vicious style; and his +false ornaments are exactly of that kind which would be most likely +to strike the undiscerning. He likewise abounds with sentimental +commonplaces, that, from the manner in which they were brought +forward, bore an imposing air of novelty. In any well-used copy of +the _Seasons_ the book generally opens of itself with the rhapsody on +love, or with one of the stories (perhaps 'Damon and Musidora'); these +also are prominent in our collections of Extracts, and are the parts +of his Work which, after all, were probably most efficient in first +recommending the author to general notice. Pope, repaying praises +which he had received, and wishing to extol him to the highest, only +styles him 'an elegant and philosophical Poet'; nor are we able to +collect any unquestionable proofs that the true characteristics of +Thomson's genius as an imaginative poet[10] were perceived, till +the elder Warton, almost forty years after the publication of the +_Seasons_, pointed them out by a note in his Essay on the _Life and +Writings of Pope_. In the _Castle of Indolence_ (of which Gray +speaks so coldly) these characteristics were almost as conspicuously +displayed, and in verse more harmonious and diction more pure. Yet +that fine poem was neglected on its appearance, and is at this day the +delight only of a few! + +When Thomson died, Collins breathed forth his regrets in an Elegiac +Poem, in which he pronounces a poetical curse upon _him_ who should +regard with insensibility the place where the Poet's remains were +deposited. The Poems of the mourner himself have now passed through +innumerable editions, and are universally known, but if, when Collins +died, the same kind of imprecation had been pronounced by a surviving +admirer, small is the number whom it would not have comprehended. The +notice which his poems attained during his lifetime was so small, and +of course the sale so insignificant, that not long before his death +he deemed it right to repay to the bookseller the sum which he had +advanced for them and threw the edition into the fire. + +Next in importance to the _Seasons_ of Thomson, though a considerable +distance from that work in order of time, come the _Reliques of +Ancient English Poetry_, collected, new-modelled, and in many +instances (if such a contradiction in terms may be used) composed by +the Editor, Dr Percy. This work did not steal silently into the world, +as is evident from the number of legendary tales, that appeared not +long after its publication, and had been modelled, as the authors +persuaded themselves, after the old Ballad. The Compilation was, +however ill suited to the then existing taste of city society, and Dr +Johnson, 'mid the little senate to which he gave laws, was not +sparing in his exertions to make it an object of contempt. The critic +triumphed, the legendary imitators were deservedly disregarded, and +as undeservedly, their ill imitated models sank in this country into +temporary neglect, while Burger and other able writers of Germany, +were translating or imitating these Reliques, and composing, with the +aid of inspiration thence derived, poems which are the delight of the +German nation. Dr Percy was so abashed by the ridicule flung upon his +labours from the ignorance and insensibility of the persons with whom +he lived, that, though while he was writing under a mask he had +not wanted resolution to follow his genius into the regions of true +simplicity and genuine pathos (as is evinced by the exquisite ballad +of _Sir Cauline_ and by many other pieces), yet when he appeared in +his own person and character as a poetical writer, he adopted, as in +the tale of the _Hermit of Warkworth_, a diction scarcely in any +one of its features distinguishable from the vague, the glossy, and +unfeeling language of his day. I mention this remarkable fact[11] +with regret, esteeming the genius of Dr. Percy in this kind of writing +superior to that of any other man by whom in modern times it has been +cultivated. That even Burger (to whom Klopstock gave, in my hearing, +a commendation which he denied to Goethe and Schiller, pronouncing him +to be a genuine poet, and one of the few among the Germans whose works +would last) had not the fine sensibility of Percy, might be shown +from many passages, in which he has deserted his original only to go +astray. For example, + + Now daye was gone, and night was come, + And all were fast asleepe, + All save the Lady Emeline, + Who sate in her bowre to weepe: + + And soone she heard her true Love's voice + Low whispering at the walle, + Awake, awake, my dear Ladye, + 'Tis I thy true love call + +Which is thus tricked out and dilated; + + Als nun die Nacht Gebirg' und Thal + Vermummt in Rabenschatten, + Und Hochburgs Lampen uberall + Schon ausgeflimmert hatten, + Und alles tief entschlafen war; + Doch nur das Fraulein immerdar, + Voll Fieberangst, noch wachte, + Und seinen Ritter dachte: + Da horch! Ein susser Liebeston + Kam leis, empor geflogen. + 'Ho, Trudchen, ho! Da bin ich schon! + Frisch auf! Dich angezogen!' + +But from humble ballads we must ascend to heroics. + +All hail, Macpherson! hail to thee, Sire of Ossian! The Phantom was +begotten by the snug embrace of an impudent Highlander upon a cloud +of tradition--it travelled southward, where it was greeted with +acclamation, and the thin Consistence took its course through Europe, +upon the breath of popular applause. The Editor of the _Reliques_ +had indirectly preferred a claim to the praise of invention, by not +concealing that his supplementary labours were considerable! how +selfish his conduct, contrasted with that of the disinterested Gael, +who, like Lear, gives his kingdom away, and is content to become +a pensioner upon his own issue for a beggarly pittance!--Open this +far-famed Book!--I have done so at random, and the beginning of the +_Epic Poem Temora_, in eight Books, presents itself. 'The blue waves +of Ullin roll in light. The green hills are covered with day. Trees +shake their dusky heads in the breeze. Grey torrents pour their noisy +streams. Two green hills with aged oaks surround a narrow plain. The +blue course of a stream is there. On its banks stood Cairbar of Atha. +His spear supports the king; the red eyes of his fear are sad. Cormac +rises on his soul with all his ghastly wounds.' Precious memorandums +from the pocket-book of the blind Ossian! + +If it be unbecoming, as I acknowledge that for the most part it is, to +speak disrespectfully of Works that have enjoyed for a length of +time a widely-spread reputation, without at the same time producing +irrefragable proofs of their unworthiness, let me be forgiven upon +this occasion.--Having had the good fortune to be born and reared in a +mountainous country, from my very childhood I have felt the falsehood +that pervades the volumes imposed upon the world under the name of +Ossian. From what I saw with my own eyes, I knew that the imagery was +spurious. In nature everything is distinct, yet nothing defined into +absolute independent singleness. In Macpherson's work it is exactly +the reverse; everything (that is not stolen) is in this manner +defined, insulated, dislocated, deadened,--yet nothing distinct. It +will always be so when words are substituted for things. To say that +the characters never could exist, that the manners are impossible, and +that a dream has more substance than the whole state of society, as +there depicted, is doing nothing more than pronouncing a censure which +Macpherson defied; when, with the steeps of Morven before his eyes, he +could talk so familiarly of his Car-borne heroes;--of Morven, which, +if one may judge from its appearance at the distance of a few miles, +contains scarcely an acre of ground sufficiently accommodating for a +sledge to be trailed along its surface.--Mr. Malcolm Laing has ably +shown that the diction of this pretended translation is a motley +assemblage from all quarters; but he is so fond of making out parallel +passages as to call poor Macpherson to account for his '_ands_' and +his '_buts_!' and he has weakened his argument by conducting it as +if he thought that every striking resemblance was a _conscious_ +plagiarism. It is enough that the coincidences are too remarkable +for its being probable or possible that they could arise in different +minds without communication between them. Now as the Translators of +the Bible, and Shakespeare, Milton, and Pope, could not be indebted +to Macpherson, it follows that he must have owed his fine feathers to +them; unless we are prepared gravely to assert, with Madame de Stael, +that many of the characteristic beauties of our most celebrated +English Poets are derived from the ancient Fingallian; in which case +the modern translator would have been but giving back to Ossian his +own.--It is consistent that Lucien Buonaparte, who could censure +Milton for having surrounded Satan in the infernal regions with +courtly and regal splendour, should pronounce the modern Ossian to +be the glory of Scotland;--a country that has produced a Dunbar, a +Buchanan, a Thomson, and a Burns! These opinions are of ill omen for +the Epic ambition of him who has given them to the world. + +Yet, much as those pretended treasures of antiquity have been admired, +they have been wholly uninfluential upon the literature of the +Country. No succeeding writer appears to have caught from them a ray +of inspiration; no author, in the least distinguished, has ventured +formally to imitate them--except the boy, Chatterton, on their first +appearance. He had perceived, from the successful trials which he +himself had made in literary forgery, how few critics were able to +distinguish between a real ancient medal and a counterfeit of modern +manufacture; and he set himself to the work of filling a magazine with +_Saxon Poems_,--counterparts of those of Ossian, as like his as one +of his misty stars is to another. This incapability to amalgamate with +the literature of the Island is, in my estimation, a decisive proof +that the book is essentially unnatural; nor should I require any other +to demonstrate it to be a forgery, audacious as worthless.--Contrast, +in this respect, the effect of Macpherson's publication with the +_Reliques_ of Percy, so unassuming, so modest in their pretensions!--I +have already stated how much Germany is indebted to this latter work; +and for our own country, its poetry has been absolutely redeemed +by it. I do not think that there is an able writer in verse of the +present day who would not be proud to acknowledge his obligations to +the _Reliques_; I know that it is so with my friends; and, for myself, +I am happy in this occasion to make a public avowal of my own. + +Dr. Johnson, more fortunate in his contempt of the labours of +Macpherson than those of his modest friend, was solicited not long +after to furnish Prefaces biographical and critical for the works +of some of the most eminent English Poets. The booksellers took upon +themselves to make the collection; they referred probably to the most +popular miscellanies, and, unquestionably, to their books of accounts; +and decided upon the claim of authors to be admitted into a body of +the most eminent, from the familiarity of their names with the readers +of that day, and by the profits, which, from the sale of his works, +each had brought and was bringing to the Trade. The Editor was allowed +a limited exercise of discretion, and the Authors whom he recommended +are scarcely to be mentioned without a smile. We open the volume of +Prefatory Lives, and to our astonishment the _first_ name we find is +that of Cowley!--What Is become of the morning-star of English Poetry? +Where is the bright Elizabethan constellation? Or, if names be more +acceptable than images, where is the ever to-be-honoured Chaucer? +where is Spenser? where Sidney? and, lastly, where he, whose rights +as a poet, contra-distinguished from those which he is universally +allowed to possess as a dramatist, we have vindicated,--where +Shakespeare?--These, and a multitude of others not unworthy to be +placed near them, their contemporaries and successors, we have _not_. +But in their stead, we have (could better be expected when precedence +was to be settled by an abstract of reputation at any given period +made, as in this case before us?) Roscommon, and Stepney, +and Phillips, and Walsh, and Smith, and Duke, and King, and +Spratt--Halifax, Granville, Sheffield, Congreve, Broome, and other +reputed Magnates--metrical writers utterly worthless and useless, +except for occasions like the present, when their productions are +referred to as evidence what a small quantity of brain is necessary to +procure a considerable stock of admiration, provided the aspirant will +accommodate himself to the likings and fashions of his day. + +As I do not mean to bring down this retrospect to our own times, it +may with propriety be closed at the era of this distinguished event. +From the literature of other ages and countries, proofs equally cogent +might have been adduced, that the opinions announced in the former +part of this Essay are founded upon truth. It was not an agreeable +office, nor a prudent undertaking, to declare them; but their +importance seemed to render it a duty. It may still be asked, +where lies the particular relation of what has been said to these +Volumes?--The question will be easily answered by the discerning +Reader who is old enough to remember the taste that prevailed when +some of these poems were first published, seventeen years ago; who has +also observed to what degree the poetry of this Island has since +that period been coloured by them; and who is further aware of the +unremitting hostility with which, upon some principle or other, they +have each and all been opposed. A sketch of my own notion of the +constitution of Fame has been given; and, as far as concerns myself, +I have cause to be satisfied. The love, the admiration, the +indifference, the slight, the aversion, and even the contempt, with +which these Poems have been received, knowing, as I do, the source +within my own mind, from which they have proceeded, and the labour +and pains, which, when labour and pains appeared needful, have been +bestowed upon them, must all, if I think consistently, be received as +pledges and tokens, bearing the same general impression, though widely +different in value;--they are all proofs that for the present time +I have not laboured in vain; and afford assurances, more or less +authentic, that the products of my industry will endure. + +If there be one conclusion more forcibly pressed upon us than another +by the review which has been given of the fortunes and fate of +poetical Works, it is this--that every author, as far as he is great +and at the same time _original_, has had the task of _creating_ +the taste by which he is to be enjoyed: so has it been, so will +it continue to be. This remark was long since made to me by the +philosophical Friend for the separation of whose poems from my own I +have previously expressed my regret. The predecessors of an original +Genius of a high order will have smoothed the way for all that he has +in common with them;--and much he will have in common; but, for what +is peculiarly his own, he will be called upon to clear and often to +shape his own road:--he will be in the condition of Hannibal among the +Alps. + +And where lies the real difficulty of creating that taste by which a +truly original poet is to be relished? Is it in breaking the bonds +of custom, in overcoming the prejudices of false refinement, and +displacing the aversions of inexperience? Or, if he labour for an +object which here and elsewhere I have proposed to myself, does it +consist in divesting the reader of the pride that induces him to dwell +upon those points wherein men differ from each other, to the exclusion +of those in which all men are alike, or the same; and in making him +ashamed of the vanity that renders him insensible of the appropriate +excellence which civil arrangements, less unjust than might appear, +and Nature illimitable in her bounty, had conferred on men who may +stand below him in the scale of society? Finally, does it lie in +establishing that dominion over the spirits of readers by which they +are to be humbled and humanized, in order that they may be purified +and exalted? + +If these ends are to be attained by the mere communication of +_knowledge_, it does _not_ lie here.--TASTE, I would remind the +reader, like IMAGINATION, is a word which has been forced to extend +its services far beyond the point to which philosophy would have +confined them. It is a metaphor, taken from a _passive_ sense of the +human body, and transferred to things which are in their essence +_not_ passive,--to intellectual _acts_ and _operations_. The word, +Imagination, has been overstrained, from impulses honourable to +mankind, to meet the demands of the faculty which is perhaps the +noblest of our nature. In the instance of Taste, the process has been +reversed; and from the prevalence of dispositions at once injurious +and discreditable, being no other than that selfishness which is the +child of apathy,--which, as Nations decline in productive and creative +power, makes them value themselves upon a presumed refinement of +judging. Poverty of language is the primary cause of the use which we +make of the word, Imagination; but the word, Taste, has been +stretched to the sense which it bears in modern Europe by habits of +self-conceit, inducing that inversion in the order of things whereby a +passive faculty is made paramount among the faculties conversant with +the fine arts. Proportion and congruity, the requisite knowledge +being supposed, are subjects upon which taste may be trusted; it is +competent to this office--for in its intercourse with these the +mind is _passive_, and is affected painfully or pleasurably as by an +instinct. But the profound and the exquisite in feeling, the lofty and +universal in thought and imagination; or, in ordinary language, the +pathetic and the sublime;--are neither of them, accurately speaking, +objects of a faculty which could ever without a sinking in the spirit +of Nations have been designated by the metaphor _Taste_. And why? +Because without the exertion of a co-operating _power_ in the mind +of the reader, there can be no adequate sympathy with either of these +emotions: without this auxiliary impulse, elevated or profound passion +cannot exist. + +Passion, it must be observed, is derived from a word which signifies +_suffering_; but the connexion which suffering has with effort, with +exertion, and _action_, is immediate and inseparable. How strikingly +is this property of human nature exhibited by the fact that, in +popular language, to be in a passion is to be angry! But, + + Anger in hasty _words_ or _blows_ + Itself discharges on its foes. + +To be moved, then, by a passion is to be excited, often to external, +and always to internal, effort; whether for the continuance and +strengthening of the passion, or for its suppression, accordingly +as the course which it takes may be painful or pleasurable. If the +latter, the soul must contribute to its support, or it never becomes +vivid,--and soon languishes and dies. And this brings us to the point. +If every great poet with whose writings men are familiar, in the +highest exercise of his genius, before he can be thoroughly enjoyed, +has to call forth and to communicate _power_, this service, in a still +greater degree, falls upon an original writer, at his first appearance +in the world.--Of genius the only proof is, the act of doing well what +is worthy to be done, and what was never done before: Of genius, in +the fine arts, the only infallible sign is the widening the sphere +of human sensibility, for the delight, honour, and benefit of +human nature. Genius is the introduction of a new element into +the intellectual universe: or, if that be not allowed, it is the +application of powers to objects on which they had not before been +exercised, or the employment of them in such a manner as to produce +effects hitherto unknown. What is all this but an advance, or a +conquest, made by the soul of the poet? Is it to be supposed that +the reader can make progress of this kind, like an Indian prince or +general--stretched on his palanquin, and borne by his slaves? No; +he is invigorated and inspirited by his leader, in order that he +may exert himself; for he cannot proceed in quiescence, he cannot be +carried like a dead weight. Therefore to create taste is to call forth +and bestow power, of which knowledge is the effect; and _there_ lies +the true difficulty. + +As the pathetic participates of an _animal_ sensation, it might +seem--that, if the springs of this emotion were genuine, all men, +possessed of competent knowledge of the facts and circumstances, would +be instantaneously affected. And, doubtless, in the works of every +true poet will be found passages of that species of excellence which +is proved by effects immediate and universal. But there are emotions +of the pathetic that are simple and direct, and others--that are +complex and revolutionary; some--to which the heart yields with +gentleness; others--against which it struggles with pride; these +varieties are infinite as the combinations of circumstance and the +constitutions of character. Remember, also, that the medium through +which, in poetry, the heart is to be affected, is language; a thing +subject to endless fluctuations and arbitrary associations. The genius +of the poet melts these down for his purpose; but they retain their +shape and quality to him who is not capable of exerting, within his +own mind, a corresponding energy. There is also a meditative, as well +as a human, pathos; an enthusiastic, as well as an ordinary, sorrow; +a sadness that has its seat in the depths of reason, to which the mind +cannot sink gently of itself--but to which it must descend by treading +the steps of thought. And for the sublime,--if we consider what are +the cares that occupy the passing day, and how remote is the practice +and the course of life from the sources of sublimity, in the soul of +Man, can it be wondered that there is little existing preparation +for a poet charged with a new mission to extend its kingdom, and to +augment and spread its enjoyments? + +Away, then, with the senseless iteration of the word _popular_, +applied to new works in poetry, as if there were no test of excellence +in this first of the fine arts but that all men should run after +its productions, as if urged by an appetite, or constrained by a +spell!--The qualities of writing best fitted for eager reception are +either such as startle the world into attention by their audacity and +extravagance; or they are chiefly of a superficial kind, lying upon +the surfaces of manners; or arising out of a selection and arrangement +of incidents, by which the mind is kept upon the stretch of curiosity, +and the fancy amused without the trouble of thought. But in everything +which is to send the soul into herself, to be admonished of her +weakness, or to be made conscious of her power;--wherever life and +nature are described as operated upon by the creative or abstracting +virtue of the imagination; wherever the instinctive wisdom of +antiquity and her heroic passions uniting, in the heart of the poet, +with the meditative wisdom of later ages, have produced that accord of +sublimated humanity which is at once a history of the remote past and +a prophetic enunciation of the remotest future, _there_, the poet must +reconcile himself for a season to few and scattered hearers.--Grand +thoughts (and Shakespeare must often have sighed over this truth), as +they are most naturally and most fitly conceived in solitude, so +can they not be brought forth in the midst of plaudits without +some violation of their sanctity. Go to a silent exhibition of the +productions of the sister Art, and be convinced that the qualities +which dazzle at first sight, and kindle the admiration of the +multitude, are essentially different from those by which permanent +influence is secured. Let us not shrink from following up these +principles as far as they will carry us, and conclude with +observing--that there never has been a period, and perhaps never will +be, in which vicious poetry, of some kind or other, has not excited +more zealous admiration, and been far more generally read, than good; +but this advantage attends the good, that the _individual_, as well +as the species, survives from age to age; whereas, of the depraved, +though the species be immortal, the individual quickly _perishes_; the +object of present admiration vanishes, being supplanted by some other +as easily produced; which, though no better, brings with it at least +the irritation of novelty,--with adaptation, more or less skilful, to +the changing humours of the majority of those who are most at leisure +to regard poetical works when they first solicit their attention. + +Is it the result of the whole, that, in the opinion of the Writer, the +judgement of the People is not to be respected? The thought is most +injurious; and, could the charge be brought against him, he would +repel it with indignation. The People have already been justified, +and their eulogium pronounced by implication, when it was said, +above--that, of _good_ poetry, the _individual_, as well as the +species, _survives_. And how does it survive but through the People? +What preserves it but their intellect and their wisdom? + + --Past and future, are the wings + On whose support, harmoniously conjoined, + Moves the great Spirit of human knowledge-- + _MS._ + +The voice that issues from this Spirit is that Vox Populi which the +Deity inspires. Foolish must he be who can mistake for this a local +acclamation, or a transitory out-cry--transitory though it be for +years, local though from a Nation. Still more lamentable is his error +who can believe that there is anything of divine infallibility in +the clamour of that small though loud portion of the community, ever +governed by factitious influence, which, under the name of the PUBLIC, +passes itself, upon the unthinking, for the PEOPLE. Towards the +Public, the Writer hopes that he feels as much deference as it is +entitled to: but to the People, philosophically characterized, and to +the embodied spirit of their knowledge, so far as it exists and moves, +at the present, faithfully supported by its two wings, the past and +the future, his devout respect, his reverence, is due. He offers it +willingly and readily; and, this done, takes leave of his Readers, +by assuring them--that, if he were not persuaded that the contents +of these Volumes, and the Work to which they are subsidiary, evince +something of the 'Vision and the Faculty divine'; and that, both in +words and things, they will operate in their degree, to extend the +domain of sensibility for the delight, the honour, and the benefit +of human nature, nothwithstanding the many happy hours which he +has employed in their composition, and the manifold comforts and +enjoyments they have procured to him, he would not, if a wish could +do it, save them from immediate destruction;--from becoming at this +moment, to the world, as a thing that had never been. + + +[Footnote 5: The learned Hakewill (a third edition of whose book bears +date 1635), writing to refute the error 'touching Nature's perpetual +and universal decay,' cites triumphantly the names of Ariosto, +Tasso, Bartas, and Spenser, as instances that poetic genius had not +degenerated; but be makes no mention of Shakespeare.] + +[Footnote 6: This flippant insensibility was publicly reprehended by +Mr. Coleridge in a course of Lectures upon Poetry given by him at the +Royal Institution. For the various merits of thought and language in +Shakespeare's _Sonnets_, see Nos. 27, 29, 30, 32, 33, 54, 64, 66, 68, +73, 76, 86, 91, 92, 93, 97, 98, 105, 107, 108, 109, 111, 113, 114, +116, 117, 129, and many others.] + +[Footnote 7: Hughes is express upon this subject in his dedication of +Spenser's Works to Lord Somers, he writes thus 'It was your Lordship's +encouraging a beautiful edition of _Paradise Lost_ that first brought +that incomparable Poem to be generally known and esteemed.'] + +[Footnote 8: This opinion seems actually to have been entertained by +Adam Smith, the worst critic, David Hume not excepted, that Scotland, +a soil to which this sort of weed seems natural, has produced.] + +[Footnote 9: CORTES, _alone in a night-gown_. + + All things are hush'd as Nature's self lay dead; + The mountains seem to nod their drowsy head. + The little Birds in dreams their songs repeat, + And sleeping Flowers beneath the Night-dew sweat: + Even Lust and Envy sleep; yet Love denies + Rest to my soul, and slumber to my eyes. + +DRYDEN'S _Indian Emperor_.] + +[Footnote 10: Since these observations upon Thomson were written, I +have perused the second edition of his _Seasons_, and find that even +_that_ does not contain the most striking passages which Warton points +out for admiration, these, with other improvements, throughout the +whole work, must have been added at a later period.] + +[Footnote 11: Shenstone, in his _Schoolmistress_, gives a still more +remarkable instance of this timidity On its first appearance (see +D'Israeli's 2d Series of the _Curiosities of Literature_) the Poem was +accompanied with an absurd prose commentary, showing, as indeed some +incongruous expressions in the text imply, that the whole was intended +for burlesque. In subsequent editions, the commentary was dropped, and +the People have since continued to read in seriousness, doing for the +Author what he had not courage openly to venture upon for himself.] + + + + +PREFACE TO CROMWELL + +BY VICTOR HUGO. (1827)[A] + + +The drama contained in the following pages has nothing to commend +it to the attention or the good will of the public. It has not, to +attract the interest of political disputants, the advantage of the +veto of the official censorship, nor even, to win for it at the outset +the literary sympathy of men of taste, the honour of having been +formally rejected by an infallible reading committee. + +It presents itself, therefore, to the public gaze, naked and +friendless, like the infirm man of the Gospel--_solus, pauper, nudus_. + +Not without some hesitation, moreover, did the author determine to +burden his drama with a preface. Such things are usually of very +little interest to the reader. He inquires concerning the talent of +a writer rather than concerning his point of view; and in determining +whether a work is good or bad, it matters little to him upon what +ideas it is based, or in what sort of mind it germinated. One seldom +inspects the cellars of a house after visiting its salons, and when +one eats the fruit of a tree, one cares but little about its root. + +On the other hand, notes and prefaces are sometimes a convenient +method of adding to the weight of a book, and of magnifying, in +appearance at least, the importance of a work; as a matter of tactics +this is not dissimilar to that of the general who, to make his +battle-front more imposing, puts everything, even his baggage-trains, +in the line. And then, while critics fall foul of the preface and +scholars of the notes, it may happen that the work itself will +escape them, passing uninjured between their cross-fires, as an army +extricates itself from a dangerous position between two skirmishes of +outposts and rear-guards. + +These reasons, weighty as they may seem, are not those which +influenced the author. This volume did not need to be _inflated_, it +was already too stout by far. Furthermore, and the author does not +know why it is so, his prefaces, frank and ingenuous as they are, have +always served rather to compromise him with the critics than to shield +him. Far from being staunch and trusty bucklers, they have played him +a trick like that played in a battle by an unusual and conspicuous +uniform, which, calling attention to the soldier who wears it, +attracts all the blows and is proof against none. + +Considerations of an altogether different sort acted upon the author. +It seemed to him that, although in fact, one seldom inspects the +cellars of a building for pleasure, one is not sorry sometimes to +examine its foundations. He will, therefore, give himself over once +more, with a preface, to the wrath of the _feuilletonists. Che sara, +sara_. He has never given much thought to the fortune of his works, +and he is but little appalled by dread of the literary _what will +people say_. In the discussion now raging, in which the theatre and +the schools, the public and the academies, are at daggers drawn, one +will hear, perhaps, not without some interest, the voice of a solitary +_apprentice_ of nature and truth, who has withdrawn betimes from the +literary world, for pure love of letters, and who offers good faith in +default of good taste, sincere conviction in default of talent, study +in default of learning. + +He will confine himself, however, to general considerations concerning +the art, without the slightest attempt to smooth the path of his own +work, without pretending to write an indictment or a plea, against or +for any person whomsoever. An attack upon or defence of his book is +of less importance to him than to anybody else. Nor is personal +controversy agreeable to him. It is always a pitiful spectacle to +see two hostile self-esteems crossing swords. He protests, therefore, +beforehand against every interpretation of his ideas, every personal +application of his words, saying with the Spanish fablist:-- + + Quien haga aplicaciones + Con su pan se lo coma. + +In truth, several of the leading champions of "sound literary +doctrines" have done him the honour to throw the gauntlet to him, even +in his profound obscurity--to him, a simple, imperceptible spectator +of this curious contest. He will not have the presumption to pick it +up. In the following pages will be found the observations with which +he might oppose them--there will be found his sling and his stone; +but others, if they choose, may hurl them at the head of the classical +Goliaths. + +This said, let us pass on. + +Let us set out from a fact. The same type of civilization, or to use +a more exact, although more extended expression, the same society, has +not always inhabited the earth. The human race as a whole has grown, +has developed, has matured, like one of ourselves. It was once a +child, it was once a man; we are now looking on at its impressive old +age. Before the epoch which modern society has dubbed "ancient," there +was another epoch which the ancients called "fabulous," but which it +would be more accurate to call "primitive." Behold then three great +successive orders of things in civilization, from its origin down to +our days. Now, as poetry is always superposed upon society, we +propose to try to demonstrate, from the form of its society, what the +character of the poetry must have been in those three great ages of +the world--primitive times, ancient times, modern times. + +In primitive times, when man awakes in a world that is newly created, +poetry awakes with him. In the face of the marvellous things that +dazzle and intoxicate him, his first speech is a hymn simply. He is +still so close to God that all his meditations are ecstatic, all his +dreams are visions. His bosom swells, he sings as he breathes. +His lyre has but three strings--God, the soul, creation; but this +threefold mystery envelopes everything, this threefold idea embraces +everything. The earth is still almost deserted. There are families, +but no nations; patriarchs, but no kings. Each race exists at its own +pleasure; no property, no laws, no contentions, no wars. Everything +belongs to each and to all. Society is a community. Man is restrained +in nought. He leads that nomadic pastoral life with which all +civilizations begin, and which is so well adapted to solitary +contemplation, to fanciful reverie. He follows every suggestion, +he goes hither and thither, at random. His thought, like his life, +resembles a cloud that changes its shape and its direction according +to the wind that drives it. Such is the first man, such is the first +poet. He is young, he is cynical. Prayer is his sole religion, the ode +is his only form of poetry. + +This ode, this poem of primitive times, is Genesis. + +By slow degrees, however, this youth of the world passes away. All +the spheres progress; the family becomes a tribe, the tribe becomes a +nation. Each of these groups of men camps about a common centre, and +kingdoms appear. The social instinct succeeds the nomadic instinct. +The camp gives place to the city, the tent to the palace, the ark to +the temple. The chiefs of these nascent states are still shepherds, +it is true, but shepherds of nations; the pastoral staff has already +assumed the shape of a sceptre. Everything tends to become stationary +and fixed. Religion takes on a definite shape; prayer is governed by +rites; dogma sets bounds to worship. Thus the priest and king share +the paternity of the people; thus theocratic society succeeds the +patriarchal community. + +Meanwhile the nations are beginning to be packed too closely on the +earth's surface. They annoy and jostle one another; hence the clash +of empires--war. They overflow upon another; hence, the migrations of +nations--voyages. Poetry reflects these momentous events; from ideas +it proceeds to things. It sings of ages, of nations, of empires. It +becomes epic, it gives birth to Homer. + +Homer, in truth, dominates the society of ancient times. In that +society, all is simple, all is epic. Poetry is religion, religion is +law. The virginity of the earlier age is succeeded by the chastity +of the later. A sort of solemn gravity is everywhere noticeable, in +private manners no less than in public. The nations have retained +nothing of the wandering life of the earlier time, save respect +for the stranger and the traveller. The family has a fatherland; +everything is connected therewith; it has the cult of the house and +the cult of the tomb. + +We say again, such a civilization can find its one expression only in +the epic. The epic will assume diverse forms, but will never lose its +specific character. Pindar is more priestlike than patriarchal, more +epic than lyrical. If the chroniclers, the necessary accompaniments +of this second age of the world, set about collecting traditions and +begin to reckon by centuries, they labour to no purpose--chronology +cannot expel poesy; history remains an epic. Herodotus is a Homer. + +But it is in the ancient tragedy, above all, that the epic breaks out +at every turn. It mounts the Greek stage without losing aught, so to +speak, of its immeasurable, gigantic proportions. Its characters +are still heroes, demigods, gods; its themes are visions, oracles, +fatality; its scenes are battles, funeral rites, catalogues. That +which the rhapsodists formerly sang, the actors declaim--that is the +whole difference. + +There is something more. When the whole plot, the whole spectacle +of the epic poem have passed to the stage, the Chorus takes all that +remains. The Chorus annotates the tragedy, encourages the heroes, +gives descriptions, summons and expels the daylight, rejoices, +laments, sometimes furnishes the scenery, explains the moral bearing +of the subject, flatters the listening assemblage. Now, what is the +Chorus, this anomalous character standing between the spectacle and +the spectator, if it be not the poet completing his epic? + +The theatre of the ancients is, like their dramas, huge, pontifical, +epic. It is capable of holding thirty thousand spectators; the plays +are given in the open air, in bright sunlight; the performances last +all day. The actors disguise their voices, wear masks, increase their +stature; they make themselves gigantic, like their roles. The stage is +immense. It may represent at the same moment both the interior and +the exterior of a temple, a palace, a camp, a city. Upon it, +vast spectacles are displayed. There is--we cite only from +memory--Prometheus on his mountain; there is Antigone, at the top of +a tower, seeking her brother Polynices in the hostile army (_The +Phoenicians_); there is Evadne hurling herself from a cliff into the +flames where the body of Capaneus is burning (_The Suppliants_ of +Euripides); there is a ship sailing into port and landing fifty +princesses with their retinues (_The Suppliants_ of Æschylus). +Architecture, poetry, everything assumes a monumental character. In +all antiquity there is nothing more solemn, more majestic. Its history +and its religion are mingled on its stage. Its first actors are +priests; its scenic performances are religious ceremonies, national +festivals. + +One last observation, which completes our demonstration of the epic +character of this epoch: in the subjects which it treats, no less than +in the forms it adopts, tragedy simply re-echoes the epic. All +the ancient tragic authors derive their plots from Homer. The same +fabulous exploits, the same catastrophes, the same heroes. One and +all drink from the Homeric stream. The Iliad and Odyssey are always +in evidence. Like Achilles dragging Hector at his chariot-wheel, the +Greek tragedy circles about Troy. + +But the age of the epic draws near its end. Like the society that +it represents, this form of poetry wears itself out revolving upon +itself. Rome reproduces Greece, Virgil copies Homer, and, as if to +make a becoming end, epic poetry expires in the last parturition. + +It was time. Another era is about to begin, for the world and for +poetry. + +A spiritual religion, supplanting the material and external paganism, +makes its way to the heart of the ancient society, kills it, and +deposits, in that corpse of a decrepit civilization, the germ of +modern civilization. This religion as complete, because it is true; +between its dogma and its cult, it embraces a deep-rooted moral. Arid +first of all, as a fundamental truth, it teaches man that he has two +lives to live, one ephemeral, the other immortal; one on earth, the +other in heaven. It shows him that he, like his destiny, is twofold: +that there is in him an animal and an intellect, a body and a soul; in +a word, that he is the point of intersection, the common link of +the two chains of beings which embrace all creation--of the chain +of material beings and the chain of incorporeal beings; the first +starting from the rock to arrive at man, the second starting from man +to end at God. + +A portion of these truths had perhaps been suspected by certain wise +men of ancient times, but their full, broad, luminous revelation dates +from the Gospels. The pagan schools walked in darkness, feeling their +way, clinging to falsehoods as well as to truths in their haphazard +journeying. Some of their philosophers occasionally cast upon certain +subjects feeble gleams which illuminated but one side and made the +darkness of the other side more profound. Hence all the phantoms +created by ancient philosophy. None but divine wisdom was capable of +substituting an even and all-embracing light for all those flickering +rays of human wisdom. Pythagoras, Epicurus, Socrates, Plato, are +torches: Christ is the glorious light of day. + +Nothing could be more material, indeed, than the ancient theogony. Far +from proposing, as Christianity does, to separate the spirit from the +body, it ascribes form and features to everything, even to impalpable +essences, even to the intelligence. In it everything is visible, +tangible, fleshly. Its gods need a cloud to conceal themselves from +men's eyes. They eat, drink, and sleep. They are wounded and their +blood flows; they are maimed, and lo! they limp forever after. That +religion has gods and halves of gods. Its thunderbolts are forged on +an anvil, and among other things three rays of twisted rain (_tres +imbris torti radios_) enter into their composition. Its Jupiter +suspends the world by a golden chain; its sun rides in a four-horse +chariot; its hell is a precipice the brink of which is marked on the +globe; its heaven is a mountain. + +Thus paganism, which moulded all creations from the same clay, +minimizes divinity and magnifies man. Homer's heroes are of almost the +same stature as his gods. Ajax defies Jupiter, Achilles is the peer +of Mars. Christianity on the contrary, as we have seen, draws a broad +line of division between spirit and matter. It places an abyss between +the soul and the body, an abyss between man and God. + +At this point--to omit nothing from the sketch upon which we have +ventured--we will call attention to the fact that, with Christianity, +and by its means, there entered into the mind of the nations a new +sentiment, unknown to the ancients and marvellously developed +among moderns, a sentiment which is more than gravity and less than +sadness--melancholy. In truth, might not the heart of man, hitherto +deadened by religions purely hierarchical and sacerdotal, awake and +feel springing to life within it some unexpected faculty, under the +breath of a religion that is human because it is divine, a religion +which makes of the poor man's prayer, the rich man's wealth, a +religion of equality, liberty and charity? Might it not see all things +in a new light, since the Gospel had shown it the soul through the +senses, eternity behind life? + +Moreover, at that very moment the world was undergoing so complete +a revolution that it was impossible that there should not be a +revolution in men's minds. Hitherto the catastrophes of empires +had rarely reached the hearts of the people; it was kings who fell, +majesties that vanished, nothing more. The lightning struck only in +the upper regions, and, as we have already pointed out, events seemed +to succeed one another with all the solemnity of the epic. In the +ancient society, the individual occupied so lowly a place that, to +strike him, adversity must needs descend to his family. So that he +knew little of misfortune outside of domestic sorrows. It was an +almost unheard of thing that the general disasters of the state should +disarrange his life. But the instant that Christian society became +firmly established, the ancient continent was thrown into confusion. +Everything was pulled up by the roots. Events, destined to destroy +ancient Europe and to construct a new Europe, trod upon one another's +heels in their ceaseless rush, and drove the nations pell-mell, some +into the light, others into darkness. So much uproar ensued that it +was impossible that some echoes of it should not reach the hearts +of the people. It was more than an echo, it was a reflex blow. Man, +withdrawing within himself in presence of these imposing vicissitudes, +began to take pity upon mankind, to reflect upon the bitter +disillusionments of life. Of this sentiment, which to Cato the heathen +was despair, Christianity fashioned melancholy. + +At the same time was born the spirit of scrutiny and curiosity. These +great catastrophes were also great spectacles, impressive cataclysms. +It was the North hurling itself upon the South; the Roman world +changing shape; the last convulsive throes of a whole universe in +the death agony. As soon as that world was dead, lo! clouds of +rhetoricians, grammarians, sophists, swooped down like insects on its +immense body. People saw them swarming and heard them buzzing in that +seat of putrefaction. They vied with one another in scrutinizing, +commenting, disputing. Each limb, each muscle, each fibre of the huge +prostrate body was twisted and turned in every direction. Surely it +must have been a keen satisfaction to those anatomists of the mind, to +be able, at their debut, to make experiments on a large scale; to have +a dead society to dissect, for their first "subject." + +Thus we see melancholy and meditation, the demons of analysis and +controversy, appear at the same moment, and, as it were, hand-in-hand. +At one extremity of this era of transition is Longinus, at the other +St. Augustine. We must beware of casting a disdainful eye upon that +epoch wherein all that has since borne fruit was contained in germs; +upon that epoch whose least eminent writers, if we may be pardoned a +vulgar but expressive phrase, made fertilizer for the harvest that was +to follow. The Middle Ages were grafted on the Lower Empire. + +Behold, then, a new religion, a new society; upon this twofold +foundation there must inevitably spring up a new poetry. Previously--- +we beg pardon for setting forth a result which the reader has probably +already foreseen from what has been said above--previously, following +therein the course pursued by the ancient polytheism and philosophy, +the purely epic muse of the ancients had studied nature in only a +single aspect, casting aside without pity almost everything in art +which, in the world subjected to its imitation, had not relation to a +certain, type of beauty. A type which was magnificent at first, but, +as always happens with everything systematic, became in later times +false, trivial and conventional. Christianity leads poetry to the +truth. Like it, the modern muse will see things in a higher and +broader light. It will realize that everything in creation is not +humanly _beautiful_, that the ugly exists beside the beautiful, the +unshapely beside the graceful, the grotesque on the reverse of the +sublime, evil with good, darkness with light. It will ask itself if +the narrow and relative sense of the artist should prevail over the +infinite, absolute sense of the Creator; if it is for man to correct +God; if a mutilated nature will be the more beautiful for the +mutilation; if art has the right to duplicate, so to speak, man, life, +creation; if things will progress better when their muscles and their +vigour have been taken from them; if, in short, to be incomplete is +the best way to be harmonious. Then it is that, with its eyes fixed +upon events that are both laughable and redoubtable, and under the +influence of that spirit of Christian melancholy and philosophical +criticism which we described a moment ago, poetry will take a +great step, a decisive step, a step which, like the upheaval of an +earthquake, will change the whole face of the intellectual world. It +will set about doing as nature does, mingling in its creations--but +without confounding them--darkness and light, the grotesque and the +sublime; in other words, the body and the soul, the beast and +the intellect; for the starting-point of religion is always the +starting-point of poetry. All things are connected. + +Thus, then, we see a principle unknown to the ancients, a new type, +introduced in poetry; and as an additional element in anything +modifies the whole of the thing, a new form of the art is developed. +This type is the grotesque; its new form is comedy. + +And we beg leave to dwell upon this point; for we have now indicated +the significant feature, the fundamental difference which, in our +opinion, separates modern from ancient art, the present form from +the defunct form; or, to use less definite but more popular terms, +_romantic_ literature from _classical_ literature. + +"At last!" exclaim the people who for some time past _have seen what +we were coming at_, "at last we have you--you are caught in the act. +So then you put forward the ugly as a type for imitation, you make the +_grotesque_ an element of art. But the graces; but good taste! Don't +you know that art should correct nature? that we must _ennoble_ art? +that we must _select_? Did the ancients ever exhibit the ugly or the +grotesque? Did they ever mingle comedy and tragedy? The example of +the ancients, gentlemen! And Aristotle, too, and Boileau, and La Haipe +Upon my word!" + +These arguments are sound, doubtless, and, above all, of extraordinary +novelty. But it is not our place to reply to them. We are constructing +no system here--God protect us from systems! We are stating a fact. We +are a historian, not a critic. Whether the fact is agreeable or not +matters little, it is a fact. Let us resume, therefore, and try +to prove that it is of the fruitful union of the grotesque and the +sublime types that modern genius is born--so complex, so diverse in +its forms, so inexhaustible in its creations, and therein directly +opposed to the uniform simplicity of the genius of the ancients, let +us show that that is the point from which we must set out to establish +the real and radical difference between the two forms of literature. + +Not that it is strictly true that comedy and the grotesque were +entirely unknown to the ancients. In fact, such a thing would be +impossible. Nothing grows without a root, the germ of the second epoch +always exists in the first. In the Iliad Thersites and Vulcan furnish +comedy, one to the mortals, the other to the gods. There is too much +nature and originality in the Greek tragedy for there not to be an +occasional touch of comedy in it. For example, to cite only what we +happen to recall, the scene between Menelaus and the portress of the +palace. _(Helen_, Act I), and the scene of the Phrygian _(Orestes,_ +Act IV) The Tritons, the Satyrs, the Cyclops are grotesque, Polyphemus +is a terrifying, Silenus a farcical grotesque. + +But one feels that this part of the art is still in its infancy. The +epic, which at this period imposes its form on everything, the epic +weighs heavily upon it and stifles it. The ancient grotesque is timid +and forever trying to keep out of sight. It is plain that it is not +on familiar ground, because it is not in its natural surroundings. It +conceals itself as much as it can. The Satyrs, the Tritons, and the +Sirens are hardly abnormal in form. The Fates and the Harpies are +hideous in their attributes rather than in feature; the Furies are +beautiful, and are called _Eumenides_, that is to say, _gentle, +beneficent_. There is a veil of grandeur or of divinity over other +grotesques. Polyphemus is a giant, Midas a king, Silenus a god. + +Thus comedy is almost imperceptible in the great epic _ensemble_ +of ancient times. What is the barrow of Thespis beside the Olympian +chariots? What are Aristophanes and Plautus, beside the Homeric +colossi, Æschylus, Sophocles, Euripides? Homer bears them along with +him, as Hercules bore the pygmies, hidden in his lion's skin! + +In the idea of men of modern times, however, the grotesque plays an +enormous part. It is found everywhere; on the one hand it creates the +abnormal and the horrible, on the other the comic and the burlesque. +It fastens upon religion a thousand original superstitions, upon +poetry a thousand picturesque fancies. It is the grotesque which +scatters lavishly, in air, water, earth, fire, those myriads of +intermediary creatures which we find all alive in the popular +traditions of the Middle Ages; it is the grotesque which impels the +ghastly antics of the witches' revels, which gives Satan his horns, +his cloven foot and his bat's wings. It is the grotesque, still the +grotesque, which now casts into the Christian hell the frightful faces +which the severe genius of Dante and Milton will evoke, and again +peoples it with those laughter-moving figures amid which Callot, the +burlesque Michelangelo, will disport himself. If it passes from the +world of imagination to the real world, it unfolds an inexhaustible +supply of parodies of mankind. Creations of its fantasy are the +Scaramouches, Crispins and Harlequins, grinning silhouettes of man, +types altogether unknown to serious-minded antiquity, although they +originated in classic Italy. It is the grotesque, lastly, which, +colouring the same drama with the fancies of the North and of the +South in turn, exhibits Sganarelle capering about Don Juan and +Mephistopheles crawling about Faust. + +And how free and open it is in its bearing! how boldly it brings +into relief all the strange forms which the preceding age had timidly +wrapped in swaddling-clothes! Ancient poetry, compelled to provide +the lame Vulcan with companions, tried to disguise their deformity by +distributing it, so to speak, upon gigantic proportions. Modern genius +retains this myth of the supernatural smiths, but gives it an entirely +different character and one which makes it even more striking; it +changes the giants to dwarfs and makes gnomes of the Cyclops. With +like originality, it substitutes for the somewhat commonplace Lernaean +hydra all the local dragons of our national legends--the gargoyle of +Rouen, the _gra-ouilli_ of Metz, the _chair sallée_ of Troyes, the +_drée_ of Montlhéry, the _tarasque_ of Tarascon--monsters of forms so +diverse, whose outlandish names are an additional attribute. All these +creations draw from their own nature that energetic and significant +expression before which antiquity seems sometimes to have recoiled. +Certain it is that the Greek Eumenides are much less horrible, and +consequently less _true_, than the witches in _Macbeth_. Pluto is not +the devil. + +In our opinion a most novel book might be written upon the employment +of the grotesque in the arts. One might point out the powerful +effects the moderns have obtained from that fruitful type, upon which +narrow-minded criticism continues to wage war even in our own day. +It may be that we shall be led by our subject to call attention in +passing to some features of this vast picture. We will simply say here +that, as a means of contrast with the sublime, the grotesque is, in +our view, the richest source that nature can offer art. Rubens so +understood it, doubtless, when it pleased him to introduce the hideous +features of a court dwarf amid his exhibitions of royal magnificence, +coronations and splendid ceremonial. The universal beauty which the +ancients solemnly laid upon everything, is not without monotony; the +same impression repeated again and again may prove fatiguing at last. +Sublime upon sublime scarcely presents a contrast, and we need a +little rest from everything, even the beautiful. On the other +hand, the grotesque seems to be a halting-place, a mean term, a +starting-point whence one rises toward the beautiful with a +fresher and keener perception. The salamander gives relief to the +water-sprite; the gnome heightens the charm of the sylph. + +And it would be true also to say that contact with the abnormal +has imparted to the modern sublime a something purer, grander, more +sublime, in short, than the beautiful of the ancients; and that is as +it should be. When art is consistent with itself, it guides everything +more surely to its goal. If the Homeric Elysium is a long, long way +from the ethereal charm, the angelic pleasureableness of Milton's +Paradise, it is because under Eden there is a hell far more terrible +than the heathen Tartarus. Do you think that Francesca da Rimini and +Beatrice would be so enchanting in a poet who should not confine us in +the Tower of Hunger and compel us to share Ugolino's revolting repast? +Dante would have less charm, if he had less power. Have the fleshly +naiads, the muscular Tritons, the wanton Zephyrs, the diaphanous +transparency of our water-sprites and sylphs? Is it not because the +modern imagination does not fear to picture the ghastly forms of +vampires, ogres, ghouls, snake-charmers and jinns prowling about +graveyards, that it can give to its fairies that incorporeal shape, +that purity of essence, of which the heathen nymphs fall so far short? +The antique Venus is beautiful, admirable, no doubt; but what has +imparted to Jean Goujon's faces that weird, tender, ethereal delicacy? +What has given them that unfamiliar suggestion of life and grandeur, +if not the proximity of the rough and powerful sculptures of the +Middle Ages? + +If the thread of our argument has not been broken in the reader's mind +by these necessary digressions--- which in truth, might be developed +much further--he has realized, doubtless, how powerfully the +grotesque--that germ of comedy, fostered by the modern muse--grew in +extent and importance as soon as it was transplanted to a soil more +propitious than paganism and the Epic. In truth, in the new poetry, +while the sublime represents the soul as it is, purified by Christian +morality, the grotesque plays the part of the human beast. The former +type, delivered of all impure alloy, has as its attributes all the +charms, all the graces, all the beauties; it must be able some day +to create Juliet, Desdemona, Ophelia. The latter assumes all the +absurdities, all the infirmities, all the blemishes. In this partition +of mankind and of creation, to it fall the passions, vices, crimes; +it is sensuous, fawning, greedy, miserly, false, incoherent, +hypocritical; it is, in turn, Iago, Tartuffe, Basile, Polonius, +Harpagon, Bartholo, Falstaff, Scapin, Figaro. The beautiful has but +one type, the ugly has a thousand. The fact is that the beautiful, +humanly speaking, is merely form considered in its simplest aspect +in its most perfect symmetry, in its most entire harmony with our +make-up. Thus the _ensemble_ that it offers us is always complete, but +restricted like ourselves. What we call the ugly, on the contrary, is +a detail of a great whole which eludes us, and which is in harmony, +not with man but with all creation. That is why it constantly presents +itself to us in new but incomplete aspects. + +It is interesting to study the first appearance and the progress +of the grotesque in modern times. At first, it is an invasion, an +irruption, an overflow, as of a torrent that has burst its banks. It +rushes through the expiring Latin literature, imparts some coloring to +Persius, Petronius and Juvenal, and leaves behind it the _Golden Ass_ +of Apuleius. Thence it diffuses itself through the imaginations of the +new nations that are remodelling Europe. It abounds in the work of +the fabulists, the chroniclers, the romancists. We see it make its way +from the South to the North. It disports itself in the dreams of the +Teutonic nations, and at the same time vivifies with its breath +the admirable Spanish _romanceros_, a veritable Iliad of the age of +chivalry. For example, it is the grotesque which describes thus, +in the _Roman de la Rose_, an august ceremonial, the election of a +king:-- + + "A long-shanked knave they chose, I wis, + Of all their men the boniest." + +More especially it imposes its characteristic qualities upon that +wonderful architecture which, in the Middle Ages, takes the place of +all the arts. It affixes its mark on the façades of cathedrals, frames +its hells and purgatories in the ogive arches of great doorways, +portrays them in brilliant hues on window-glass, exhibits its +monsters, its bull-dogs, its imps about capitals, along friezes, on +the edges of roofs. It flaunts itself in numberless shapes on the +wooden façades of houses, on the stone façades of châteaux, on the +marble façades of palaces. From the arts it makes its way into the +national manners, and while it stirs applause from the people for the +_graciosos_ of comedy, it gives to the kings court-jesters. Later, +in the age of etiquette, it will show us Scarron on the very edge of +Louis the Fourteenth's bed. Meanwhile it decorates coats of-arms, and +draws upon knight, shields the symbolic hieroglyphs of feudalism. +From the manners, it makes its way into the laws, numberless strange +customs at test its passage through the institutions of the Middle +Ages. Just as it represented Thespis, smeared with wine-lees, leaping +in her tomb it dances with the _Basoche_ on the famous marble table +which served at the same time as a stage for the popular farces and +for the royal banquets. Finally, having made its way into the arts, +the manners, and the laws, it enters even the Church. In every +Catholic city we see it organizing some one of those curious +ceremonies, those strange processions, wherein religion is attended by +all varieties of superstition--the sublime attended by all the forms +of the grotesque. To paint it in one stroke, so great is its vigour, +its energy, its creative sap, at the dawn of letters, that it casts, +at the outset, upon the threshold of modern poetry, three burlesque +Homers: Ariosto in Italy, Cervantes in Spain, Rabelais in France. + +It would be mere surplusage to dwell further upon the influence of +the grotesque in the third civilization. Every thing tends to show its +close creative alliance with the beautiful in the so called "romantic" +period. Even among the simplest popular legends there are none which +do not somewhere, with an admirable instinct, solve this mystery of +modern art. Antiquity could not have produced _Beauty and the Beast_. + +It is true that at the period at which we have arrived the +predominance of the grotesque over the sublime in literature is +clearly indicated. But it is a spasm of reaction, an eager thirst for +novelty, which is but temporary, it is an initial wave which gradually +recedes. The type of the beautiful will soon resume its rights and its +role, which is not to exclude the other principle, but to prevail over +it. It is time that the grotesque should be content with a corner +of the picture in Murillo's loyal frescoes, in the sacred pages of +Veronese, content to be introduced in two marvellous _Last Judgments_, +in which art will take a just pride, in the scene of fascination and +horror with which Michelangelo will embellish the Vatican, in those +awe-inspiring represervations of the fall of man which Rubens will +throw upon the arches of the Cathedral of Antwerp. The time has come +when the balance between the two principles is to be established. A +man, a poet-king, _poeta soverano_, as Dante calls Homer, is about +to adjust everything. The two rival genii combine their flames, and +thence issues Shakespeare. + +We have now reached the poetic culmination of modern times. +Shakespeare is the drama; and the drama, which with the same breath +moulds the grotesque and the sublime, the terrible and the absurd, +tragedy and comedy--the drama is the distinguishing characteristic of +the third epoch of poetry, of the literature of the present day. + +Thus, to sum up hurriedly the facts that we have noted thus far, +poetry has three periods, each of which corresponds to an epoch of +civilization: the ode, the epic, and the drama. Primitive times are +lyrical, ancient times epical, modern times dramatic. The ode sings +of eternity, the epic imparts solemnity to history, the drama depicts +life. The characteristic of the first poetry is ingenuousness, of +the second, simplicity, of the third, truth. The rhapsodists mark the +transition from the lyric to the epic poets, as do the romancists that +from the lyric to the dramatic poets. Historians appear in the second +period, chroniclers and critics in the third. The characters of +the ode are colossi--Adam, Cain, Noah; those of the epic are +giants--Achilles, Atreus, Orestes; those of the drama are men--Hamlet, +Macbeth, Othello. The ode lives upon the ideal, the epic upon the +grandiose, the drama upon the real. Lastly, this threefold poetry +flows from three great sources--The Bible, Homer, Shakespeare. + +Such then--and we confine ourselves herein to noting a single +result--such are the diverse aspects of thought in the different +epochs of mankind and of civilization. Such are its three faces, in +youth, in manhood, in old age. Whether one examines one literature by +itself or all literatures _en masse,_ one will always reach the same +result: the lyric poets before the epic poets, the epic poets before +the dramatic poets. In France, Malherbe before Chapelain, Chapelain +before Corneille; in ancient Greece, Orpheus before Homer, Homer +before Æschylus; in the first of all books, _Genesis_ before _Kings, +Kings_ before _Job_; or to come back to that monumental scale of all +ages of poetry, which we ran over a moment since, The Bible before the +_Iliad_, the _Iliad_ before Shakespeare. + +In a word, civilization begins by singing of its dreams, then narrates +its doings, and, lastly, sets about describing what it thinks. It is, +let us say in passing, because of this last, that the drama, combining +the most opposed qualities, may be at the same time full of profundity +and full of relief, philosophical and picturesque. + +It would be logical to add here that everything in nature and in +life passes through these three phases, the lyric, the epic, and the +dramatic, because everything is born, acts, and dies. If it were not +absurd to confound the fantastic conceits of the imagination with the +stern deductions of the reasoning faculty, a poet might say that the +rising of the sun, for example, is a hymn, noon-day a brilliant epic, +and sunset a gloomy drama wherein day and night, life and death, +contend for mastery. But that would be poetry--folly, perhaps--- and +_what does it prove_? + +Let us hold to the facts marshalled above; let us supplement them, +too, by an important observation, namely that we have in no wise +pretended to assign exclusive limits to the three epochs of poetry, +but simply to set forth their predominant characteristics. The Bible, +that divine lyric monument, contains in germ, as we suggested a moment +ago, an epic and a drama--_-Kings_ and _Job_. In the Homeric poems +one is conscious of a clinging reminiscence of lyric poetry and of a +beginning of dramatic poetry. Ode and drama meet in the epic. There is +a touch of all in each; but in each there exists a generative element +to which all the other elements give place, and which imposes its own +character upon the whole. + +The drama is complete poetry. The ode and the epic contain it only +in germ; it contains both of them in a state of high development, and +epitomizes both. Surely, he who said: "The French have not the epic +brain," said a true and clever thing; if he had said, "The moderns," +the clever remark would have been profound. It is beyond question, +however, that there is epic genius in that marvellous _Athalie,_ so +exalted and so simple in its sublimity that the royal century was +unable to comprehend it. It is certain, too, that the series of +Shakespeare's chronicle dramas presents a grand epic aspect. But it is +lyric poetry above all that befits the drama; it never embarrasses +it, adapts itself to all its caprices, disports itself in all forms, +sometimes sublime as in Ariel, sometimes grotesque as in Caliban. Our +era being above all else dramatic, is for that very reason eminently +lyric. There is more than one connection between the beginning and the +end; the sunset has some features of the sunrise; the old man becomes +a child once more. But this second childhood is not like the first; +it is as melancholy as the other is joyous. It is the same with lyric +poetry. Dazzling, dreamy, at the dawn of civilization it reappears, +solemn and pensive, at its decline. The Bible opens joyously with +_Genesis_ and comes to a close with the threatening _Apocalypse_. The +modern ode is still inspired, but is no longer ignorant. It meditates +more than it scrutinizes; its musing is melancholy. We see, by its +painful labour, that the muse has taken the drama for her mate. + +To make clear by a metaphor the ideas that we have ventured to put +forth, we will compare early lyric poetry to a placid lake which +reflects the clouds and stars; the epic is the stream which flows from +the lake, and rushes on, reflecting its banks, forests, fields and +cities, until it throws itself into the ocean of the drama. Like the +lake, the drama reflects the sky; like the stream, it reflects its +banks; but it alone has tempests and measureless depths. + +The drama, then, is the goal to which everything in modern poetry +leads. _Paradise Lost_ is a drama before it is an epic. As we know, it +first presented itself to the poet's imagination in the first of these +forms, and as a drama it always remains in the reader's memory, so +prominent is the old dramatic framework still beneath Milton's epic +structure! When Dante had finished his terrible _Inferno_, when he had +closed its doors and nought remained save to give his work a name, the +unerring instinct of his genius showed him that that multiform poem +was an emanation of the drama, not of the epic; and on the front +of that gigantic monument, he wrote with his pen of bronze: _Divina +Commedia._ + +Thus we see that the only two poets of modern times who are of +Shakespeare's stature follow him in unity of design. They coincide with +him in imparting a dramatic tinge to all our poetry, like him, they +blend the grotesque with the sublime, and, far from standing +by themselves in the great literary _ensemble_ that rests upon +Shakespeare, Dante and Milton are, in some sort, the two supporting +abutments of the edifice of which he is the central pillar, the +buttresses of the arch of which he is the keystone. + +Permit us, at this point, to recur to certain ideas already suggested, +which, however, it is necessary to emphasize. We have arrived, and now +we must set out again. + +On the day when Christianity said to man "Thou art twofold, thou art +made up of two beings, one perishable, the other immortal, one carnal, +the other ethereal, one enslaved by appetites, cravings and passions, +the other borne aloft on the wings of enthusiasm and reverie--in a +word, the one always stooping toward the earth, its mother, the other +always darting up toward heaven, its fatherland"--on that day the +drama was created. Is it in truth, anything other than that contrast +of every day, that struggle of every moment, between two opposing +principles which are ever face to face in life, and which dispute +possession of man from the cradle to the tomb? + +The poetry born of Christianity, the poetry of our time, is, +therefore, the drama, the real results from the wholly natural +combination of two types, the sublime and the grotesque, which meet +in the drama, as they meet in life and in creation. For true poetry, +complete poetry, consists in the harmony of contraries. Hence, it is +time to say aloud--and it is here above all that exceptions prove the +rule--that everything that exists in nature exists in art. + +On taking one's stand at this point of view, to pass judgment on +our petty conventional rules, to disentangle all those scholastic +labyrinths, to solve all those trivial problems which the critics of +the last two centuries have laboriously built up about the art, one is +struck by the promptitude with which the question of the modern stage +is made clear and distinct. The drama has but to take a step to +break all the spider's webs with which the militia of Lilliput have +attempted to fetter its sleep. + +And so, let addle-pated pedants (one does not exclude the other) claim +that the deformed, the ugly, the grotesque should never be imitated +in art; one replies that the grotesque is comedy, and that comedy +apparently makes a part of art. Tartuffe is not handsome, Pourceaugnac +is not noble, but Pourceaugnac and Tartuffe are admirable flashes of +art. + +If, driven back from this entrenchment to their second line of +custom-houses, they renew their prohibition of the grotesque coupled +with the sublime, of comedy melted into tragedy, we prove to them +that, in the poetry of Christian nations, the first of these two types +represents the human beast, the second the soul. These two stalks of +art, if we prevent their branches from mingling, if we persistently +separate them, will produce by way of fruit, on the one hand abstract +vices and absurdities, on the other, abstract crime, heroism and +virtue. The two types, thus isolated and left to themselves, will go +each its own way, leaving the real between them, at the left hand of +one, at the right hand of the other. Whence it follows that after +all these abstractions there will remain something to represent--man; +after these tragedies and comedies, something to create--the drama. + +In the drama, as it may be conceived at least, if not executed, all +things are connected and follow one another as in real life. The +body plays its part no less than the mind; and men and events, set +in motion by this twofold agent, pass across the stage, burlesque and +terrible in turn, and sometimes both at once. Thus the judge will say: +"Off with his head and let us go to dinner!" Thus the Roman Senate +will deliberate over Domitian's turbot. Thus Socrates, drinking the +hemlock and discoursing on the immortal soul and the only God, +will interrupt himself to suggest that a cook be sacrificed to +_Æsculapius_. Thus Elizabeth will swear and talk Latin. Thus Richelieu +will submit to Joseph the Capuchin, and Louis XI to his barber, Maître +Olivier le Diable. Thus Cromwell will say: "I have Parliament in my +bag and the King in my pocket"; or, with the hand that signed the +death sentence of Charles the First, smear with ink the face of a +regicide who smilingly returns the compliment. Thus Cæsar, in his +triumphal car, will be afraid of overturning. For men of genius, +however great they be, have always within them a touch of the beast +which mocks at their intelligence. Therein they are akin to mankind +in general, for therein they are dramatic. "It is but a step from the +sublime to the ridiculous," said Napoleon, when he was convinced that +he was mere man; and that outburst of a soul on fire illumines art and +history at once; that cry of anguish is the résumé of the drama and of +life. + +It is a striking fact that all these contrasts are met with in the +poets themselves, taken as men. By dint of meditating upon existence, +of laying stress upon its bitter irony, of pouring floods of sarcasm +and raillery upon our infirmities, the very men who make us laugh so +heartily become profoundly sad. These Democrituses are Heraclituses as +well. Beaumarchais was surly, Molière gloomy, Shakespeare melancholy. + +The fact is, then, that the grotesque is one of the supreme beauties +of the drama. It is not simply an appropriate element of it, but is +oftentimes a necessity. Sometimes it appears in homogeneous masses, in +entire characters, as Daudin, Prusias, Trissotin, Brid'oison, Juliet's +nurse; sometimes impregnated with terror, as Richard III, Bégears, +Tartuffe, Mephistopheles; sometimes, too, with a veil of grace and +refinement, as Figaro, Osric, Mercutio, Don Juan. It finds its way +in everywhere; for just as the most commonplace have their occasional +moments of sublimity, so the most exalted frequently pay tribute +to the trivial and ridiculous. Thus, often impalpable, often +imperceptible, it is always present on the stage, even when it says +nothing, even when it keeps out of sight. Thanks to it, there is no +thought of monotony. Sometimes it injects laughter, sometimes horror, +into tragedy. It will bring Romeo face to face with the apothecary, +Macbeth with the witches, Hamlet with the grave-diggers. Sometimes +it may, without discord, as in the scene between King Lear and his +jester, mingle its shrill voice with the most sublime, the most +dismal, the dreamiest music of the soul. + +That is what Shakespeare alone among all has succeeded in doing, in +a fashion of his own, which it would be no less fruitless than +impossible to imitate--Shakespeare, the god of the stage, in whom, +as in a trinity, the three characteristic geniuses of our stage, +Corneille, Molière, Beaumarchais, seem united. + +We see how quickly the arbitrary distinction between the species of +poetry vanishes before common sense and taste. No less easily one +might demolish the alleged rule of the two unities. We say _two_ and +not _three_ unities, because unity of plot or of _ensemble_, the only +true and well founded one, was long ago removed from the sphere of +discussion. + +Distinguished contemporaries, foreigners and Frenchmen, have already +attacked, both in theory and in practice that fundamental law of the +pseudo-Aristotelian code. Indeed, the combat was not likely to be a +long one. At the first blow it cracked, so worm eaten was that timber +of the old scholastic hovel! + +The strange thing is that the slaves of routine pretend to rest their +rule of the two unities on probability, whereas reality is the very +thing that destroys it. Indeed, what could be more improbable and +absurd than this porch or peristyle or ante-chamber--vulgar places +where our tragedies are obliging enough to develop themselves; whither +conspirators come, no one knows whence, to declaim against the tyrant, +and the tyrant to declaim against the conspirators, each in turn, as +if they had said to one another in bucolic phrase-- + + Alternis cantemus, amant alterna Camenæ. + +Where did anyone ever see a porch or peristyle of that sort? +What could be more opposed--we will not say to the truth, for the +scholastics hold it very cheap, but to probability? The result is that +everything that is too characteristic, too intimate, too local, to +happen in the ante chamber or on the street-corner--that is to say, +the whole drama--takes place in the wings. We see on the stage only +the elbows of the plot, so to speak; its hands are somewhere +else. Instead of scenes we have narrative, instead of tableaux, +descriptions. Solemn-faced characters, placed, as in the old chorus, +between the drama and ourselves, tell us what is going on in the +temple, in the palace, on the public square, until we are tempted many +a time to call out to them: "Indeed! then take us there! It must be +very entertaining--a fine sight!" To which they would reply no doubt: +"It is quite possible that it might entertain or interest you, but +that isn't the question; we are the guardians of the dignity of the +French Melpomene." And there you are! + +"But," someone will say, "this rule that you discard is borrowed from +the Greek drama." Wherein, pray, do the Greek stage and drama resemble +our stage and drama? Moreover, we have already shown that the vast +extent of the ancient stage enabled it to include a whole locality, +so that the poet could, according to the exigencies of the plot, +transport it at his pleasure from one part of the stage to another, +which is practically equivalent to a change of stage-setting. Curious +contradiction! the Greek theatre, restricted as it was to a national +and religious object, was much more free than ours, whose only +object is the enjoyment, and, if you please, the instruction, of the +spectator. The reason is that the one obeys only the laws that +are suited to it, while the other takes upon itself conditions +of existence which are absolutely foreign to its essence. One is +artistic, the other artificial. + +People are beginning to understand in our day that exact localization +is one of the first elements of reality. The speaking or acting +characters are not the only ones who engrave on the minds of the +spectators a faithful representation of the facts. The place where +this or that catastrophe took place becomes a terrible and inseparable +witness thereof; and the absence of silent characters of this sort +would make the greatest scenes of history incomplete in the drama. +Would the poet dare to murder Rizzio elsewhere than in Mary Stuart's +chamber? to stab Henri IV elsewhere than in Rue de la Ferronerie, all +blocked with drays and carriages? to burn Jeanne d'Arc elsewhere than +in the Vieux-Marché? to despatch the Duc de Guise elsewhere than in +that chateau of Blois where his ambition roused a popular assemblage +to frenzy? to behead Charles I and Louis XVI elsewhere than in those +ill-omened localities whence Whitehall or the Tuileries may be seen, +as if their scaffolds were appurtenances of their palaces? + +Unity of time rests on no firmer foundation than unity of place. A +plot forcibly confined within twenty-four hours is as absurd as one +confined within a peristyle. Every plot has its proper duration as +well as its appropriate place. Think of administering the same dose +of time to all events! of applying the same measure to everything! You +would laugh at a cobbler who should attempt to put the same shoe on +every foot. To cross unity of time and unity of place like the bars +of a cage, and pedantically to introduce therein, in the name of +Aristotle, all the deeds, all the nations, all the figures which +Providence sets before us in such vast numbers in real life,--to +proceed thus is to mutilate men and things, to cause history to +make wry faces. Let us say, rather, that everything will die in the +operation, and so the dogmatic mutilators reach their ordinary result: +what was alive in the chronicles is dead in tragedy. That is why the +cage of the unities often contains only a skeleton. + +And then, if twenty-four hours can be comprised in two, it is a +logical consequence that four hours may contain forty-eight. Thus +Shakespeare's unity must be different from Corneille's. 'Tis pity! + +But these are the wretched quibbles with which mediocrity, envy and +routine has pestered genius for two centuries past! By such means the +flight of our greatest poets has been cut short. Their wings have been +clipped with the scissors of the unities. And what has been given us +in exchange for the eagle feathers stolen from Corneille and Racine? +Campistron. + +We imagine that someone may say: "There is something in too frequent +changes of scene which confuses and fatigues the spectator, and which +produces a bewildering effect on his attention; it may be, too, that +manifold transitions from place to place, from one time to another +time, demand explanations which repel the attention; one should +also avoid leaving, in the midst of a plot, gaps which prevent the +different parts of the drama from adhering closely to one another, and +which, moreover, puzzle the spectator because he does not know what +there may be in those gaps." But these are precisely the difficulties +which art has to meet. These are some of the obstacles peculiar to +one subject or another, as to which it would be impossible to pass +judgment once for all. It is for genius to overcome, not for treatises +or poetry to evade them. + +A final argument, taken from the very bowels of the art, would of +itself suffice to show the absurdity of the rule of the two unities. +It is the existence of the third unity, unity of plot--the only one +that is universally admitted, because it results from a fact: neither +the human eye nor the human mind can grasp more than one _ensemble_ at +one time. This one is as essential as the other two are useless. It +is the one which fixes the view-point of the drama; now, by that very +fact, it excludes the other two. There can no more be three unities in +the drama than three horizons in a picture. But let us be careful not +to confound unity with simplicity of plot. The former does not in +any way exclude the secondary plots on which the principal plot +may depend. It is necessary only that these parts, being skilfully +subordinated to the general plan, shall tend constantly toward the +central plot and group themselves about it at the various stages, or +rather on the various levels of the drama. Unity of plot is the stage +law of perspective. + +"But," the customs-officers of thought will cry, "great geniuses have +submitted to these rules which you spurn!" Unfortunately, yes. But +what would those admirable men have done if they had been left to +themselves? At all events they did not accept your chains without +a struggle. You should have seen how Pierre Corneille, worried and +harassed at his first step in the art on account of his marvellous +work, _Le Cid_, struggled under Mairet, Claveret, d'Aubignac and +Scudéri! How he denounced to posterity the violent attacks of those +men, who, he says, made themselves "all white with Aristotle!" You +should read how they said to him--and we quote from books of the +time: "Young man, you must learn before you teach; and unless one is +a Scaliger or a Heinsius that is intolerable!" Thereupon Corneille +rebels and asks if their purpose is to force him "much below +Claveret." Here Scudéri waxes indignant at such a display of pride, +and reminds the "thrice great author of _Le Cid_ of the modest words +in which Tasso, the greatest man of his age, began his apology for +the finest of his works against the bitterest and most unjust censure +perhaps that will ever be pronounced. M. Corneille," he adds, "shows +in his replies that he is as far removed from that author's moderation +as from his merit." The young man _so justly and gently reproved_ +dares to protest; thereupon Scudéri returns to the charge; he calls +to his assistance the _Eminent Academy;_ "Pronounce, O my Judges, a +decree worthy of your eminence, which will give all Europe to know +that _Le Cid_ is not the chef-d'oeuvre of the greatest man in France, +but the least judicious performance of M. Corneille himself. You are +bound to do it, both for your own private renown; and for that of +our people in general, who are concerned in this matter; inasmuch +as foreigners who may see this precious masterpiece--they who have +possessed a Tasso or a Guarini--might think that our greatest masters +were no more than apprentices." + +These few instructive lines contain the everlasting tactics of envious +routine against growing talent--tactics which are still followed in +our own day, and which, for example, added such a curious page to the +youthful essays of Lord Byron. Scudéri gives us its quintessence. In +like manner the earlier works of a man of genius are always preferred +to the newer ones, in order to prove that he is going down instead of +up--_Melite and La Galerie du Palais_ placed above _Le Cid_. And +the names of the dead are always thrown at the heads of the +living--Corneille stoned with Tasso and Guarini (Guarini!), as, later, +Racine will be stoned with Corneille, Voltaire with Racine, and as +to-day, everyone who shows signs of rising is stoned with Corneille, +Racine and Voltaire. These tactics, as will be seen, are well-worn; +but they must be effective as they are still in use. However, the poor +devil of a great man still breathed. Here we cannot help but admire +the way in which Scudéri, the bully of this tragic-comedy, forced to +the wall, blackguards and maltreats him, how pitilessly he unmasks +his classical artillery, how he shows the author of _Le Cid_ "what the +episodes should be, according to Aristotle, who tells us in the tenth +and sixteenth chapters of his _Poetics";_ how he crushes Corneille, in +the name of the same Aristotle "in the eleventh chapter of his _Art of +Poetry_, wherein we find the condemnation of _Le Cid_"; in the name +of Plato, "in the tenth book of his _Republic_"; in the name of +Marcellinus, "as may be seen in the twenty-seventh book"; in the name +of "the tragedies of Niobe and Jephthah"; in the name of the "_Ajax_ +of Sophocles"; in the name of "the example of Euripides"; in the name +of "Heinsius, chapter six of the _Constitution_ of _Tragedy_; and +the younger Scaliger in his poems"; and finally, in the name of the +Canonists and Jurisconsults, under the title "Nuptials." The first +arguments were addressed to the Academy, the last one was aimed at +the Cardinal. After the pin-pricks the blow with a club. A judge was +needed to decide the question. Chapelain gave judgment. Corneille saw +that he was doomed; the lion was muzzled, or, as was said at the time, +the crow (_Corneille_) was plucked. Now comes the painful side of this +grotesque performance: after he had been thus quenched at his first +flash, this genius, thoroughly modern, fed upon the Middle Ages and +Spain, being compelled to lie to himself and to hark back to ancient +times, drew for us that Castilian Rome, which is sublime beyond +question, but in which, except perhaps in _Nicomede_, which was so +ridiculed by the eighteenth century for its dignified and simple +colouring, we find neither the real Rome nor the true Corneille. + +Racine was treated to the same persecution, but did not make the same +resistance. Neither in his genius nor in his character was there any +of Corneille's lofty asperity. He submitted in silence and sacrificed +to the scorn of his time his enchanting elegy of _Esther_, his +magnificent epic, _Athalie_. So that we can but believe that, if he +had not been paralyzed as he was by the prejudices of his epoch, if +he had come in contact less frequently with the classic cramp-fish, +he would not have failed to introduce Locuste in his drama between +Narcisse and Neron, and above all things would not have relegated to +the wings the admirable scene of the banquet at which Seneca's pupil +poisons Britannicus in the cup of reconciliation. But can we demand +of the bird that he fly under the receiver of an air-pump? What a +multitude of beautiful scenes the _people of taste_ have cost us, from +Scudéri to La Harpe! A noble work might be composed of all that their +scorching breath has withered in its germ. However, our great poets +have found a way none the less to cause their genius to blaze forth +through all these obstacles. Often the attempt to confine them behind +walls of dogmas and rules is vain. Like the Hebrew giant they carry +their prison doors with them to the mountains. + +But still the same refrain is repeated, and will be, no doubt, for +a long while to come: "Follow the rules! Copy the models! It was the +rules that shaped the models." One moment! In that case there are two +sorts of models, those which are made according to the rules, and, +prior to them, those according to which the rules were made. Now, in +which of these two categories should genius seek a place for itself? +Although it is always disagreeable to come in contact with pedants, +is it not a thousand times better to give them lessons than to receive +lessons from them? And then--copy! Is the reflection equal to the +light? Is the satellite which travels unceasingly in the same circle +equal to the central creative planet? With all his poetry Virgil is no +more than the moon of Homer. + +And whom are we to copy, I pray to know? The ancients? We have just +shown that their stage has nothing in common with ours. Moreover, +Voltaire, who will have none of Shakespeare, will have none of the +Greeks, either. Let him tell us why: "The Greeks ventured to produce +scenes no less revolting to us. Hippolyte, crushed by his fall, +counts his wounds and utters doleful cries. Philoctetes falls in his +paroxysms of pain; black blood flows from his wound. Oedipus, covered +with the blood that still drops from the sockets of the eyes he has +torn out, complains bitterly of gods and men. We hear the shrieks +of Clytemnestra, murdered by her own son, and Electra, on the +stage, cries: 'Strike! spare her not! she did not spare our father,' +Prometheus is fastened to a rock by nails driven through his stomach +and his arms. The Furies reply to Clytemnestra's bleeding shade with +inarticulate roars. Art was in its infancy in the time of Æschylus as +it was in London in Shakespeare's time." + +Whom shall we copy, then? The moderns? What! Copy copies! God forbid! + +"But," someone else will object, "according to your conception of the +art, you seem to look for none but great poets, to count always upon +genius." Art certainly does not count upon mediocrity. It prescribes +no rules for it, it knows nothing of it; in fact, mediocrity has +no existence so far as art is concerned; art supplies wings, not +crutches. Alas! D'Aubignac followed rules, Campistron copied models. +What does it matter to art? It does not build its palaces for ants. It +lets them make their ant-hill, without taking the trouble to find out +whether they have built their burlesque imitation of its palace upon +its foundation. + +The critics of the scholastic school place their poets in a strange +position. On the one hand they cry incessantly: "Copy the models!" +On the other hand they have a habit of declaring that "the models are +inimitable"! Now, if their craftsman, by dint of hard work, succeeds +in forcing through this dangerous defile some colourless tracing +of the masters, these ungrateful wretches, after examining the new +_refaccimiento_, exclaim sometimes: "This doesn't resemble anything!" +and sometimes: "This resembles everything!" And by virtue of a logic +made for the occasion each of these formulæ is a criticism. + +Let us then speak boldly. The time for it has come, and it would be +strange if, in this age, liberty, like the light, should penetrate +everywhere except to the one place where freedom is most natural--the +domain of thought. Let us take the hammer to theories and poetic +systems. Let us throw down the old plastering that conceals the facade +of art. There are neither rules nor models; or, rather, there are +no other rules than the general laws of nature, which soar above +the whole field of art, and the special rules which result from the +conditions appropriate to the subject of each composition. The +former are of the essence, eternal, and do not change; the latter +are variable, external, and are used but once. The former are the +framework that supports the house; the latter the scaffolding which +is used in building it, and which is made anew for each building. In a +word, the former are the flesh and bones, the latter the clothing, of +the drama. But these rules are not written in the treatises on poetry. +Richelet has no idea of their existence. Genius, which divines rather +than learns, devises for each work the general rules from the general +plan of things, the special rules from the separate _ensemble_ of the +subject treated; not after the manner of the chemist, who lights the +fire under his furnace, heats his crucible, analyzes and destroys; but +after the manner of the bee, which flies on its golden wings, lights +on each flower and extracts its honey, leaving it as brilliant and +fragrant as before. + +The poet--let us insist on this point--should take counsel therefore +only of nature, truth, and inspiration which is itself both truth and +nature. "Quando he," says Lope de Vega, + + "Quando he de escrivir una comedia, + Encierro los preceptos con seis llaves." + +To secure these precepts "six keys" are none too many, in very +truth. Let the poet beware especially of copying anything +whatsoever--Shakespeare no more than Molière, Schiller no more than +Corneille. If genuine talent could abdicate its own nature in this +matter, and thus lay aside its original personality, to transform +itself into another, it would lose everything by playing this role of +its own double. It is as if a god should turn valet. We must draw our +inspiration from the original sources. It is the same sap, distributed +through the soil, that produces all the trees of the forest, so +different in bearing power, in fruit, in foliage. It is the same +nature that fertilizes and nourishes the most diverse geniuses. The +poet is a tree that may be blown about by all winds and watered by +every fall of dew; and bears his works as his fruit, as the _fablier_ +of old bore his fables. Why attach one's self to a master, or graft +one's self upon a model? It were better to be a bramble or a thistle, +fed by the same earth as the cedar and the palm, than the fungus +or the lichen of those noble trees. The bramble lives, the fungus +vegetates. Moreover, however great the cedar and the palm may be, +it is not with the sap one sucks from them that one can become great +one's self. A giant's parasite will be at best a dwarf. The oak, +colossus that it is, can produce and sustain nothing more than the +mistletoe. + +Let there be no misunderstanding: if some of our poets have succeeded +in being great, even when copying, it is because, while forming +themselves on the antique model, they have often listened to the +voice of nature and to their own genius--it is because they have been +themselves in some one respect. Their branches became entangled in +those of the near-by tree, but their roots were buried deep in the +soil of art. They were the ivy, not the mistletoe. Then came imitators +of the second rank, who, having neither roots in the earth, nor genius +in their souls, had to confine themselves to imitation. As Charles +Nodier says: "After the school of Athens, the school of Alexandria." +Then there was a deluge of mediocrity; then there came a swarm of +those treatises on poetry, so annoying to true talent, so convenient +for mediocrity. We were told that everything was done, and God was +forbidden to create more Molières or Corneilles. Memory was put +in place of imagination. Imagination itself was subjected to +hard-and-fast rules, and aphorisms were made about it: "To imagine," +says La Harpe, with his naive assurance, "is in substance to remember, +that is all." + +But nature! Nature and truth!--And here, in order to prove that, far +from demolishing art, the new ideas aim only to reconstruct it +more firmly and on a better foundation, let us try to point out the +impassable limit which in our opinion, separates reality according to +art from reality according to nature. It is careless to confuse them +as some ill-informed partisans of _romanticism_ do. Truth in art +cannot possibly be, as several writers have claimed, _absolute_ +reality. Art cannot produce the thing itself. Let us imagine, for +example, one of those unreflecting promoters of absolute nature, of +nature viewed apart from art, at the performance of a romantic play, +say _Le Cid_. "What's that?" he will ask at the first word. "The Cid +speaks in verse? It isn't _natural_ to speak in verse."--"How would +you have him speak, pray?"--"In prose." Very good. A moment later, +"How's this!" he will continue, if he is consistent; "the Cid is +speaking French!"--"Well?"--"Nature demands that he speak his own +language; he can't speak anything but Spanish." + +We shall fail entirely to understand, but again--very good. You +imagine that this is all? By no means: before the tenth sentence in +Castilian, he is certain to rise and ask if the Cid who is speaking is +the real Cid, in flesh and blood. By what right does the actor, whose +name is Pierre or Jacques, take the name of the Cid? That is _false_. +There is no reason why he should not go on to demand that the sun +should be substituted for the footlights, _real_ trees and _real_ +houses for those deceitful wings. For, once started on that road, +logic has you by the collar, and you cannot stop. + +We must admit, therefore, or confess ourselves ridiculous, that the +domains of art and of nature are entirely distinct. Nature and art are +two things--were it not so, one or the other would not exist. Art, in +addition to its idealistic side, has a terrestrial, material side. Let +it do what it will, it is shut in between grammar and prosody, between +Vaugelas and Richelet. For its most capricious creations, it has +formulas, methods of execution, a complete apparatus to set in motion. +For genius there are delicate instruments, for mediocrity, tools. + +It seems to us that someone has already said that the drama is a +mirror wherein nature is reflected. But if it be an ordinary mirror, +a smooth and polished surface, it will give only a dull image of +objects, with no relief-faithful, but colourless; everyone knows +that colour and light are lost in a simple reflection. The drama, +therefore, must be a concentrating mirror, which, instead of +weakening, concentrates and condenses the coloured rays, which makes +of a mere gleam a light, and of a light a flame. Then only is the +drama acknowledged by art. + +The stage is an optical point. Everything that exists in the world--in +history, in life, in man--should be and can be reflected therein, +but under the magic wand of art. Art turns the leaves of the ages, +of nature, studies chronicles, strives to reproduce actual facts +(especially in respect to manners and peculiarities, which are much +less exposed to doubt and contradiction than are concrete facts), +restores what the chroniclers have lopped off, harmonises what they +have collected, divines and supplies their omissions, fills their gaps +with imaginary scenes which have the colour of the time, groups what +they have left scattered about, sets in motion anew the threads of +Providence which work the human marionettes, clothes the whole with a +form at once poetical and natural, and imparts to it that vitality of +truth and brilliancy which gives birth to illusion, that prestige of +reality which arouses the enthusiasm of the spectator, and of the poet +first of all, for the poet is sincere. Thus the aim of art is almost +divine: to bring to life again if it is writing history, to create if +it is writing poetry. + +It is a grand and beautiful sight to see this broad development of a +drama wherein art powerfully seconds nature; of a drama wherein the +plot moves on to the conclusion with a firm and unembarrassed step, +without diffuseness and without undue compression; of a drama, in +short, wherein the poet abundantly fulfills the multifold object +of art, which is to open to the spectator a double prospect, to +illuminate at the same time the interior and the exterior of mankind: +the exterior by their speech and their acts, the interior, by asides +and monologues; to bring together, in a word, in the same picture, the +drama of life and the drama of conscience. + +It will readily be imagined that, for a work of this kind, if the poet +must _choose_ (and he must), he should choose, not the _beautiful_, +but the _characteristic_. Not that it is advisable to "make local +colour," as they say to-day; that is, to add as an afterthought a few +discordant touches here and there to a work that is at best utterly +conventional and false. The local colour should not be on the surface +of the drama, but in its substance, in the very heart of the work, +whence it spreads of itself, naturally, evenly, and, so to speak, into +every corner of the drama, as the sap ascends from the root to the +tree's topmost leaf. The drama should be thoroughly impregnated with +this colour of the time, which should be, in some sort, in the air, +so that one detects it only on entering the theatre, and that on going +forth one finds one's self in a different period and atmosphere. It +requires some study, some labour, to attain this end; so much the +better. It is well that the avenues of art should be obstructed by +those brambles from which everybody recoils except those of +powerful will. Besides, it is this very study, fostered by an ardent +inspiration, which will ensure the drama against a vice that +kills it--the _commonplace_. To be commonplace is the failing of +short-sighted, short-breathed poets. In this tableau of the stage, +each figure must be held down to its most prominent, most individual, +most precisely defined characteristic. Even the vulgar and the trivial +should have an accent of their own. Like God, the true poet is present +in every part of his work at once. Genius resembles the die which +stamps the king's effigy on copper and golden coins alike. + +We do not hesitate--and this will demonstrate once more to honest men +how far we are from seeking to discredit the art--we do not hesitate +to consider verse as one of the means best adapted to protect the +drama from the scourge we have just mentioned, as one of the most +powerful dams against the irruption of the commonplace, which, like +democracy, is always flowing between full banks in men's minds. And at +this point we beg the younger literary generation, already so rich +in men and in works, to allow us to point out an error into which it +seems to have fallen--an error too fully justified, indeed, by the +extraordinary aberrations of the old school. The new century is at +that growing age at which one can readily set one's self right. + +There has appeared of late, like a penultimate branching-out of the +old classical trunk, or, better still, like one of those excrescences, +those polypi, which decrepitude develops, and which are a sign of +decomposition much more than a proof of life--there has appeared a +strange school of dramatic poetry. This school seems to us to have had +for its master and its fountain-head the poet who marks the transition +from the eighteenth to the nineteenth century, the man of wearisome +description and periphrases--that Delille who, they say, toward +the close of his life, boasted, after the fashion of the Homeric +catalogues, of having _made_ twelve camels, four dogs, three +horses, including Job's, six tigers, two cats, a chess-board, a +backgammon-board, a checker-board, a billiard-table, several winters, +many summers, a multitude of springs, fifty sunsets, and so many +daybreaks that he had lost count of them. + +Now, Delille went into tragedy. He is the father (he, and not Racine, +God save the mark!) of an alleged school of refinement and taste which +flourished until recently. Tragedy is not to this school what it was +to Will Shakespeare, say, a source of emotions of every sort, but a +convenient frame for the solution of a multitude of petty descriptive +problems which it propounds as it goes along. This muse, far from +spurning, as the true French classic school does, the trivial and +degrading things of life, eagerly seeks them out and brings them +together. The grotesque, shunned as undesirable company by the tragedy +of Louis the Fourteenth's day, cannot pass unnoticed before her. +_It must be described_, that is to say, ennobled. A scene in the +guard-house, a popular uprising, the fish-market, the galleys, the +wine-shop, the _poule au pot_ of Henri Quatre, are treasure-trove in +her eyes. She seizes upon this canaille, washes it clean, and sews her +tinsel and spangles over its villainies; _purpureus assuitur pannus_. +Her object seems to be to deliver patents of nobility to all these +_roturiers_ of the drama; and each of these patents under the great +seal is a speech. + +This muse, as may be imagined, is of a rare prudery. Wonted as she +is to the caresses of periphrasis, plain-speaking, if she should +occasionally be exposed to it, would horrify her. It does not accord +with her dignity to speak naturally. She _underlines_ old Corneille +for his blunt way of speaking, as in,-- + + "_A heap of men_ ruined by debt and crimes." + + "Chimène, _who'd have thought it_? Rodrigue, _who'd have said + it_?" + + "When their Flaminius _haggled with_ Hannibal." + + "Oh! do not _embroil_ me with the Republic." + +She still has her "Tout beau, monsieur!" on her heart. And it +needed many "seigneurs" and "madames" to procure forgiveness for our +admirable Racine for his monosyllabic "dogs!" and for so brutally +bestowing Claudius in Agrippina's bed. + +This Melpomene, as she is called, would shudder at the thought of +touching a chronicle. She leaves to the costumer the duty of learning +the period of the dramas she writes. In her eyes history is bad form +and bad taste. How, for example, can one tolerate kings and queens +who swear? They must be elevated from mere regal dignity to tragic +dignity. It was in a promotion of this sort that she exalted Henri IV. +It was thus that the people's king, purified by M. Legouvé, found +his "ventre-saint-gris" ignominiously banished from his mouth by +two sentences, and that he was reduced, like the girl in the old +_fabliau_, to the necessity of letting fall from those royal lips only +pearls and sapphires and rubies: the apotheosis of falsity, in very +truth. + +The fact is that nothing is so commonplace as this conventional +refinement and nobility. Nothing original, no imagination, +no invention in this style; simply what one has seen +everywhere--rhetoric, bombast, commonplaces, flowers of college +eloquence, poetry after the style of Latin verses. The poets of this +school are eloquent after the manner of stage princes and princesses, +always sure of finding in the costumer's labelled cases, cloaks and +pinchbeck crowns, which have no other disadvantage than that of having +been used by everybody. If these poets never turn the leaves of the +Bible, it is not because they have not a bulky book of their own, the +_Dictionnaire de rimes_. That is the source of their poetry--_fontes +aquarum_. + +It will be seen that, in all this, nature and truth get along as best +they can. It would be great good luck if any remnants of either should +survive in this cataclysm of false art, false style, false poetry. +This is what has caused the errors of several of our distinguished +reformers. Disgusted by the stiffness, the ostentation, the _pomposo_, +of this alleged dramatic poetry, they have concluded that the elements +of our poetic language were incompatible with the natural and the +true. The Alexandrine had wearied them so often, that they condemned +it without giving it a hearing, so to speak, and decided, a little +hastily, perhaps, that the drama should be written in prose. + +They were mistaken. If in fact the false is predominant in the style +as well as in the action of certain French tragedies, it is not the +verses that should be held responsible therefore, but the versifiers. +It was needful to condemn, not the form employed, but those who +employed it: the workmen, not the tool. + +To convince one's self how few obstacles the nature of our poetry +places in the way of the free expression of all that is true, we +should study our verse, not in Racine, perhaps, but often in Corneille +and always in Molière. Racine, a divine poet, is elegiac, lyric, epic; +Molière is dramatic. It is time to deal sternly with the criticisms +heaped upon that admirable style by the wretched taste of the last +century, and to proclaim aloud that Molière occupies the topmost +pinnacle of our drama, not only as a poet, but also as a writer. +_Palmas vere habet iste duas_. + +In his work the verse surrounds the idea, becomes of its very essence, +compresses and develops it at once, imparts to it a more slender, more +definite, more complete form, and gives us, in some sort, an extract +thereof. Verse is the optical form of thought. That is why it is +especially adapted to the perspective of the stage. Constructed in a +certain way, it communicates its relief to things which, but for it, +would be considered insignificant and trivial. It makes the tissue of +style finer and firmer. It is the knot which stays the thread. It is +the girdle which holds up the garment and gives it all its folds. What +could nature and the true lose, then, by entering into verse? We ask +the question of our prose-writers themselves--what do they lose +in Molière's poetry? Does wine--we beg pardon for another trivial +illustration--does wine cease to be wine when it is bottled? + +If we were entitled to say what, in our opinion, the style of dramatic +poetry should be, we would declare for a free, outspoken, sincere +verse, which dares say everything without prudery, express its meaning +without seeking for words; which passes naturally from comedy to +tragedy, from the sublime to the grotesque; by turns practical and +poetical, both artistic and inspired, profound and impulsive, of +wide range and true; verse which is apt opportunely to displace the +caesura, in order to disguise the monotony of Alexandrines; more +inclined to the _enjambement_ that lengthens the line, than to the +inversion of phrases that confuses the sense; faithful to rhyme, that +enslaved queen, that supreme charm of our poetry, that creator of +our metre; verse that is inexhaustible in the verity of its turns +of thought, unfathomable in its secrets of composition and of grace; +assuming, like Proteus, a thousand forms without changing its type and +character; avoiding long speeches; taking delight in dialogue; always +hiding behind the characters of the drama; intent, before everything, +on being in its place, and when it falls to its lot to be _beautiful_, +being so only by chance, as it were, in spite of itself and +unconsciously; lyric, epic, dramatic, at need; capable of running +through the whole gamut of poetry, of skipping from high notes to +low, from the most exalted to the most trivial ideas, from the most +extravagant to the most solemn, from the most superficial to the most +abstract, without ever passing beyond the limits of a spoken scene; in +a word, such verse as a man would write whom a fairy had endowed with +Corneille's mind and Molière's brain. It seems to us that such verse +would be _as fine as prose_. + +There would be nothing in common between poetry of this sort and that +of which we made a _post mortem_ examination just now. The distinction +will be easy to point out if a certain man of talent, to whom the +author of this book is under personal obligation, will allow us to +borrow his clever phrase: the other poetry was descriptive, this would +be picturesque. + +Let us repeat, verse on the stage should lay aside all self-love, all +exigence, all coquetry. It is simply a form, and a form which should +admit everything, which has no laws to impose on the drama, but on the +contrary should receive everything from it, to be transmitted to the +spectator--French, Latin, texts of laws, royal oaths, popular phrases, +comedy, tragedy, laughter, tears, prose and poetry. Woe to the poet +whose verse does not speak out! But this form is a form of bronze +which encases the thought in its metre beneath which the drama is +indestructible, which engraves it more deeply on the actor's mind, +warns him of what he omits and of what he adds, prevents him from +changing his role, from substituting himself for the author, makes +each word sacred, and causes what the poet has said to remain vivid +a long while in the hearer's memory. The idea, when steeped in verse, +suddenly assumes a more incisive, more brilliant quality. + +One feels that prose, which is necessarily more timid, obliged to wean +the drama from anything like epic or lyric poetry, reduced to dialogue +and to matter-of-fact, is a long way from possessing these resources. +It has much narrower wings. And then, too, it is much more easy of +access; mediocrity is at its ease in prose; and for the sake of a few +works of distinction such as have appeared of late, the art would very +soon be overloaded with abortions and embryos. Another faction of +the reformers incline to drama written in both prose and verse, as +Shakespeare composed it. This method has its advantages. There might, +however, be some incongruity in the transitions from one form to the +other; and when a tissue is homogeneous it is much stouter. However, +whether the drama should be written in prose is only a secondary +question. The rank of a work is certain to be fixed, not according to +its form, but according to its intrinsic value. In questions of this +sort, there is only one solution. There is but one weight that can +turn the scale in the balance of art--that is genius. + +Meanwhile, the first, the indispensable merit of a dramatic writer, +whether he write in prose or verse, is correctness. Not a mere +superficial correctness, the merit or defect of the descriptive +school, which makes Lhomond and Restaut the two wings of its Pegasus; +but that intimate, deep-rooted, deliberate correctness, which is +permeated with the genius of a language, which has sounded its roots +and searched its etymology; always unfettered, because it is sure +of its footing, and always more in harmony with the logic of the +language. Our Lady Grammar leads the one in leading-strings; the other +holds grammar in leash. It can venture anything, can create or invent +its style; it has a right to do so. For, whatever certain men may have +said who did not think what they were saying, and among whom we must +place, notably, him who writes these lines, the French tongue is not +_fixed_ and never will be. A language does not become fixed. The human +intellect is always on the march, or, if you prefer, in movement, +and languages with it. Things are made so. When the body changes, how +could the coat not change? The French of the nineteenth century can no +more be the French of the eighteenth, than that is the French of the +seventeenth, or than the French of the seventeenth is that of the +sixteenth. Montaigne's language is not Rabelais's, Pascal's is +not Montaigne's, Montesquieu's is not Pascal's. Each of the four +languages, taken by itself, is admirable because it is original. Every +age has its own ideas; it must have also words adapted to those ideas. +Languages are like the sea, they move to and fro incessantly. At +certain times they leave one shore of the world of thought and +overflow another. All that their waves thus abandon dries up and +vanishes. It is in this wise that ideas vanish, that words disappear. +It is the same with human tongues as with everything. Each age adds +and takes away something. What can be done? It is the decree of fate. +In vain, therefore, should we seek to petrify the mobile physiognomy +of our idiom in a fixed form. In vain do our literary Joshuas cry out +to the language to stand still; languages and the sun do not stand +still. The day when they become _fixed_, they are dead.--That is why +the French of a certain contemporary school is a dead language. + +Such are, substantially, but without the more elaborate development +which would make the evidence in their favour more complete, the +_present_ ideas of the author of this book concerning the drama. He is +far, however, from presuming to put forth his first dramatic essay as +an emanation of these ideas, which, on the contrary, are themselves, +it may be, simply results of its execution. It would be very +convenient for him, no doubt, and very clever, to rest his book on his +preface, and to defend each by the other. He prefers less cleverness +and more frankness. He proposes, therefore, to be the first to point +out the extreme tenuity of the thread connecting this preface with his +drama. His first plan, dictated by his laziness, was to give the work +to the public entirely unattended _el demonio sin las cuernas_, as +Yriarte said It was only after he had duly brought it to a close, that +at the solicitations of a few friends, blinded by their friendship, no +doubt, he determined to reckon with himself in a preface--to draw, so +to speak, a map of the poetic voyage he had made, to take account of +the acquisitions, good or bad, that he had brought home, and of the +new aspects in which the domain of art had presented itself to his +mind. Someone will take advantage of this admission, doubtless to +repeat the reproach already uttered by a critic in Germany, that +he has written "a treatise in defence of his poetry." What does it +matter? In the first place he was much more inclined to demolish +treatises on poetry than to write them. And then, would it not he +better always to write treatises based on a poem, than to write poems +based on a treatise? But no, we repeat that he has neither the talent +to create nor the presumption to put forth systems "Systems," cleverly +said Voltaire, "are like rats which pass through twenty holes, only to +find at last two or three which will not let them through." It would +have been, therefore, to undertake a useless task and one much beyond +his strength. What he has pleaded, on the contrary, is the freedom of +art against the despotism of systems, codes and rules It is his habit +to follow at all risks whatever he takes for his inspiration, and to +change moulds as often as he changes metals. Dogmatism in the arts is +what he shuns before everything. God forbid that he should aspire to +be numbered among those men, be they romanticists or classicists, who +compose _works according to their own systems_, who condemn themselves +to have but one form in their minds, to be forever _proving_ +something, to follow other laws than those of their temperaments and +then natures. The artificial work of these men, however talented they +may be, has no existence so far as art is concerned. It is a theory, +not poetry. + +Having attempted, in all that has gone before, to point out what, in +our opinion, was the origin of the drama, what its character is, and +what its style should he, the time has come to descend from these +exalted general considerations upon the art to the particular case +which has led us to put them forth. It remains for us to discourse to +the reader of our work, of this _Cromwell_; and as it is not a subject +in which we take pleasure, we will say very little about it in very +few words. + +Oliver Cromwell is one of those historical characters who are at once +very famous and very little known. Most of his biographers--and among +them there are some who are themselves historical--have left that +colossal figure incomplete. It would seem that they dared not assemble +all the characteristic features of that strange and gigantic prototype +of the religious reformation, of the political revolution of England. +Almost all of them have confined themselves to reproducing on a +larger scale the simple and ominous profile drawn by Bossuet from +his Catholic and monarchical standpoint, from his episcopal pulpit +supported by the throne of Louis XIV. + +Like everybody else, the author of this book went no further than +that. The name of Oliver Cromwell suggested to him simply the bare +conception of a fanatical regicide and a great captain. Only on +prowling among the chronicles of the times, which he did with delight, +and on looking through the English memoirs of the seventeenth century, +was he surprised to find that a wholly new Cromwell was gradually +exposed to his gaze. It was no longer simply Bossuet's Cromwell the +soldier, Cromwell the politician; it was a complex, heterogenous, +multiple being, made up of all sorts of contraries--a mixture of much +that was evil and much that was good, of genius and pettiness; a sort +of Tiberius-Dandin, the tyrant of Europe and the plaything of his +family; an old regicide, who delighted to humiliate the ambassadors +of all the kings of Europe, and was tormented by his young royalist +daughter; austere and gloomy in his manners, yet keeping four court +jesters about him; given to the composition of wretched verses; sober, +simple, frugal, yet a stickler for etiquette; a rough soldier and a +crafty politician; skilled in theological disputation and very fond +of it; a dull, diffuse, obscure orator, but clever in speaking the +language of anybody whom he wished to influence; a hypocrite and a +fanatic; a visionary swayed by phantoms of his childhood, believing +in astrologers and banishing them; suspicious to excess, always +threatening, rarely sanguinary; a strict observer of Puritan rules, +and solemnly wasting several hours a day in buffoonery; abrupt and +contemptuous with his intimates, caressing with the secretaries whom +he feared, holding his remorse at bay with sophistry, paltering with +his conscience, inexhaustible in adroitness, in tricks, in resources; +mastering his imagination by his intelligence; grotesque and sublime; +in a word, one of those men who are "square at the base," as they +were described by Napoleon, himself their chief, in his mathematically +exact and poetically figurative language. + +He who writes these lines, in presence of this rare and impressive +_ensemble_, felt that Bossuet's impassioned sketch was no longer +sufficient for him. He began to walk about that lofty figure, and he +was seized by a powerful temptation to depict the giant in all his +aspects. It was a rich soil. Beside the man of war and the statesman, +it remained to draw the theologian, the pedant, the wretched poet, +the seer of visions, the buffoon, the father, the husband, the human +Proteus--in a word, the twofold Cromwell, _homo et vir_. + +There is one period of his life, especially, in which this strange +personality exhibits itself in all its forms. It is not as one might +think at first blush, the period of the trial of Charles I, instinct +as that is with depressing and terrible interest; but it is the moment +when the ambitious mortal boldly attempted to pluck the fruit of that +monarch's death; it is the moment when Cromwell, having attained what +would have been to any other man the zenith of fortune--master of +England, whose innumerable factions knelt silently at his feet; master +of Scotland, of which he had made a satrapy, and of Ireland, which he +had turned into a prison; master of Europe through his diplomacy and +his fleets--seeks to fulfil the dream of his earliest childhood, the +last ambition of his life; to make himself king. History never had a +more impressive lesson in a more impressive drama. First of all, the +Protector arranges to be urged to assume the crown: the august farce +begins by addresses from municipalities, from counties; then there +comes an act of Parliament. Cromwell, the anonymous author of the +play, pretends to be displeased; we see him put out a hand toward the +sceptre, then draw it back; by a devious path he draws near the throne +from which he has swept the legitimate dynasty. At last he makes up +his mind, suddenly; by his command Westminster is decked with flags, +the dais is built, the crown is ordered from the jewelers, the day is +appointed for the ceremony.--Strange dénouement! On that very day, +in presence of the populace, the troops, the House of Commons, in +the great hall of Westminster, on that dais from which he expected +to descend as king, suddenly, as if aroused by a shock, he seems to +awaken at the sight of the crown, asks if he is dreaming, and what the +meaning is of all this regal pomp, and in a speech that lasts three +hours declines the kingly title. + +Was it because his spies had warned him of two conspiracies formed +by Cavaliers and Puritans in concert, which were intended, taking +advantage of this misstep, to break out on the same day? Was it +an inward revolution caused by the silence or the murmurs of the +populace, discomposed to see their regicide ascend the throne? Or was +it simply the sagacity of genius, the instinct of a far-seeing, albeit +unbridled ambition, which realizes how one step forward changes a +man's position and attitude, and which dares not expose its plebeian +structure to the wind of unpopularity? Was it all these at once? +This is a question which no contemporaneous document answers +satisfactorily. So much the better: the poet's liberty is the more +complete, and the drama is the gainer by the latitude which history +affords it. It will be seen that here the latitude is ample and +unique; this is, in truth, the decisive hour, the turning-point in +Cromwell's life. It is the moment when his chimera escapes from +him, when the present kills the future, when, to use an expressive +colloquialism, his destiny _misses fire_. All of Cromwell is at stake +in the comedy being played between England and himself. + +Such then is the man and such the period of which we have tried to +give an idea in this book. + +The author has allowed himself to be seduced by the childlike +diversion of touching the keys of that great harpsichord. +Unquestionably, more skillful hands might have evoked a thrilling +and profound melody--not of those which simply caress the ear--but of +those intimate harmonies which stir the whole man to the depths of his +being, as if each key of the key-board were connected with a fibre +of the heart. He has surrendered to the desire to depict all those +fanaticisms, all those superstitions--maladies to which religion is +subject at certain epochs; to the longing to "make playthings of all +these men," as Hamlet says. To set in array about and below Cromwell, +himself the centre and pivot of that court, of that people, of that +little world, which attracts all to his cause and inspires all with +his vigour, that twofold conspiracy devised by two factions which +detest each other, but join hands to overthrow the man who blocks +their path, but which unite simply without blending; and that Puritan +faction, of divers minds, fanatical, gloomy, unselfish, choosing +for leader the most insignificant of men for such a great part, the +egotistical and cowardly Lambert; and the faction of the Cavaliers, +featherheaded, merry, unscrupulous, reckless, devoted, led by the +man who, aside from his devotion to the cause, was least fitted to +represent it, the stern and upright Ormond; and those ambassadors, +so humble and fawning before the soldier of fortune; and the court +itself, an extraordinary mixture of upstarts and great nobles +vying with one another in baseness; and the four jesters whom the +contemptuous neglect of history permitted me to invent; and Cromwell's +family, each member of which is as a thorn in his flesh; and Thurloe, +the Protector's Achates; and the Jewish rabbi, Israel Ben-Manasseh, +spy, usurer, and astrologer, vile on two sides, sublime on the third; +and Rochester, the unique Rochester, absurd and clever, refined and +crapulous, always cursing, always in love, and always tipsy, as he +himself boasted to Bishop Burnet--wretched poet and gallant gentleman, +vicious and ingenuous, staking his head and indifferent whether +he wins the game provided it amuses him--in a word, capable of +everything, of ruse and recklessness, calculation and folly, villainy +and generosity; and the morose Carr, of whom history describes but +one trait, albeit a most characteristic and suggestive one; and those +other fanatics, of all ranks and varieties: Harrison, the thieving +fanatic; Barebones the shopkeeping fanatic; Syndercomb, the bravo; +Garland the tearful and pious assassin; gallant Colonel Overton, +intelligent but a little declamatory; the austere and unbending +Ludlow, who left his ashes and his epitaph at Lausanne; and lastly, +"Milton and a few other men of mind," as we read in a pamphlet of 1675 +(_Cromwell the Politician_), which reminds one of "a certain Dante" of +the Italian chronicle. + +We omit many less important characters, of each of whom, however, the +actual life is known, and each of whom has his marked individuality, +and all of whom contributed to the fascination which this vast +historical scene exerted upon the author's imagination. From that +scene he constructed this drama. He moulded it in verse, because he +preferred to do so. One will discover on reading it how little +thought he gave to his work while writing this preface--with what +disinterestedness, for instance, he contended against the dogma of the +unities. His drama does not leave London; it begins on June 25, 1657, +at three in the morning, and ends on the 26th at noon. Observe that he +has almost followed the classic formula, as the professors of poetry +lay it down to-day. They need not, however, thank him for it. With the +permission of history, not of Aristotle, the author constructed his +drama thus; and because, when the interest is the same, he prefers a +compact subject to a widely diffused one. + +It is evident that, in its present proportions, this drama could not +be given at one of our theatrical performances. It is too long. The +reader will perhaps comprehend, none the less, that every part of it +was written for the stage. It was on approaching his subject to study +it that the author recognized, or thought that he recognized, the +impossibility of procuring the performance of a faithful reproduction +of it on our stage, in the exceptional position it now occupies, +between the academic Charybdis and the administrative Scylla, between +the literary juries and the political censorship. He was required +to choose: either the wheedling, tricky, false tragedy, which may be +acted, or the audaciously true drama, which is prohibited. The first +was not worth the trouble of writing, so he preferred to attempt +the second. That is why, hopeless of ever being put on the stage, +he abandoned himself, freely and submissively, to the whims of +composition, to the pleasure of painting with a freer hand, to the +developments which his subject demanded, and which, even if they keep +his drama off the stage, have at all events the advantage of making it +almost complete from the historical standpoint. However, the reading +committees are an obstacle of the second class only. If it should +happen that the dramatic censorship, realizing how far this harmless, +conscientious and accurate picture of Cromwell and his time is removed +from our own age, should sanction its production on the stage, in that +case, but only in that case, the author might perhaps extract from +this drama a play which would venture to show itself on the boards, +and would be hissed. + +Until then he will continue to hold aloof from the theatre. And even +then he will leave his cherished and tranquil retirement soon enough, +for the agitation and excitement of this new world. God grant that he +may never repent of having exposed the unspotted obscurity of his name +and his person to the shoals, the squalls and tempests of the pit, +and above all (for what does a mere failure matter?) to the wretched +bickerings of the wings; of having entered that shifting, foggy, +stormy atmosphere, where ignorance dogmatises, where envy hisses, +where cabals cringe and crawl, where the probity of talent has so +often been misrepresented, where the noble innocence of genius is +sometimes so out of place, where mediocrity triumphs in lowering to +its level the superiority which obscures it, where one finds so many +small men for a single great one, so many nobodies for one Talma, so +many myrmidons for one Achilles! This sketch will seem ill-tempered +perhaps, and far from flattering; but does it not fully mark out the +distance that separates our stage, the abode of intrigues and uproar, +from the solemn serenity of the ancient stage? + +Whatever may happen, he feels bound to warn in advance that small +number of persons whom such a production might attract, that a play +made up of excerpts from _Cromwell_ would occupy no less time then is +ordinarily occupied by a theatrical performance. It is difficult for +a _romantic_ theatre to maintain itself otherwise. Surely, if people +desire something different from the tragedies in which one or two +characters, abstract types of a purely metaphysical idea, stalk +solemnly about on a narrow stage occupied only by a few confidents, +colourless reflections of the heroes, employed to fill the gaps in a +simple, unified, single-stringed plot; if that sort of thing has +grown tiresome, a whole evening is not too much time to devote to +delineating with some fullness a man among men, a whole critical +period: the one, with his peculiar temperament, his genius which +adapts itself thereto, his beliefs which dominate them both, his +passions which throw out of gear his temperament, his genius and his +beliefs, his tastes which give colour to his passions, his habits +which regulate his tastes and muzzle his passions, and with the +innumerable procession of men of every sort whom these various +elements keep in constant commotion about him; the other, with +its manners, its laws, its fashions, its wit, its attainments, its +superstitions, its events, and its people, whom all these first causes +in turn mould like soft wax. It is needless to say that such a picture +will be of huge proportions. Instead of one personality, like that +with which the abstract drama of the old school is content, there will +be twenty, forty, fifty,--who knows how many?--of every size and of +every degree of importance. There will be a crowd of characters in the +drama. Would it not be niggardly to assign it two hours only, and +give up the rest of the performance to opera-comique or farce? to cut +Shakespeare for Bobèche?--And do not imagine that, if the plot is well +adjusted, the multitude of characters set in motion will cause fatigue +to the spectator or confusion in the drama. Shakespeare, abounding in +petty details, is at the same time, and for that very reason, imposing +by the grandeur of the _ensemble._ It is the oak which casts a most +extensive shadow with its myriads of slender leaves. + +Let us hope that people in France will ere long become accustomed to +devote a whole evening to a single play. In England and Germany there +are plays that last six hours. The Greeks, about whom we hear so much, +the Greeks--and after the fashion of Scudéri we will cite at +this point the classicist Dacier, in the seventh chapter of his +_Poetics_--the Greeks sometimes went so far as to have twelve or +sixteen plays acted in a single day. Among a people who are fond of +spectacles the attention is more lively than is commonly believed +The _Mariage de Figaro_, the connecting link of Beaumarchais's +great trilogy, occupies the whole evening, and who was ever bored or +fatigued by it Beaumarchais was worthy to venture on the first step +toward that goal of modern art at which it will be impossible to +arrive in two hours, that profound, insatiable interest which results +from a vast, lifelike and multiform plot. "But," someone will say, +"this performance, consisting of a single play, would be monotonous, +would seem terribly long"--Not so. On the contrary it would lose +its present monotony and tediousness. For what is done now? The +spectator's entertainment is divided into two or three sharply defined +parts. At first he is given two hours of serious enjoyment, then one +hour of hilarious enjoyment, these, with the hour of entr' actes, +which we do not include in the enjoyment make four hours What would +the romantic drama do? It would mingle and blend artistically these +two kinds of enjoyment. It would lead the audience constantly from +sobriety to laughter, from mirthful excitement to heart breaking +emotion, "from grave to gay, from pleasant to severe." For, as we have +already proved, the drama is the grotesque in conjunction with the +sublime, the soul within the body, it is tragedy beneath comedy. Do +you not see that, by affording you repose from one impression by means +of another, by sharpening the tragic upon the comic, the merry upon +the terrible, and at need calling in the charms of the opera, +these performances, while presenting but one play, would be worth a +multitude of others? The romantic stage would make a piquant, savoury, +diversified dish of that which, on the classic stage, is a drug +divided into two pills. + +The author has soon come to the end of what he had to say to the +reader. He has no idea how the critics will greet this drama and +these thoughts, summarily set forth, stripped of their corollaries and +ramifications, put together _currente calamo_, and in haste to have +done with them. Doubtless they will appear to "the disciples of +La Harpe" most impudent and strange. But if perchance, naked and +undeveloped as they are, they should have the power to start upon +the road of truth this public whose education is so far advanced, +and whose minds so many notable writings, of criticism or of original +thought, books or newspapers, have already matured for art, let the +public follow that impulsion, caring naught whether it comes from a +man unknown, from a voice with no authority, from a work of little +merit. It is a copper bell which summons the people to the true temple +and the true God. + +There is to-day the old literary régime as well as the old political +régime. The last century still weighs upon the present one at almost +every point. It is notably oppressive in the matter of criticism. For +instance, you find living men who repeat to you this definition of +taste let fall by Voltaire: "Taste in poetry is no different from what +it is in women's clothes." Taste, then, is coquetry. Remarkable words, +which depict marvellously the painted, _moucheté_, powdered poetry +of the eighteenth century--that literature in paniers, pompons and +falbalas. They give an admirable résumé of an age with which the +loftiest geniuses could not come in contact without becoming petty, in +one respect or another; of an age when Montesquieu was able and apt +to produce _Le Temple de Gnide_, Voltaire _Le Temple du Goût_, +Jean-Jacques _Le Devin du Village_. + +Taste is the common sense of genius. This is what will soon be +demonstrated by another school of criticism, powerful, outspoken, +well-informed,--a school of the century which is beginning to put +forth vigorous shoots under the dead and withered branches of the old +school. This youthful criticism, as serious as the other is frivolous, +as learned as the other is ignorant, has already established organs +that are listened to, and one is sometimes surprised to find, even +in the least important sheets, excellent articles emanating from it. +Joining hands with all that is fearless and superior in letters, it +will deliver us from two scourges: tottering _classicism_, and false +_romanticism_, which has the presumption to show itself at the feet +of the true. For modern genius already has its shadow, its copy, its +parasite, its _classic_, which forms itself upon it, smears itself +with its colours, assumes its livery, picks up its crumbs, and, like +_the sorcerer's pupil_, puts in play, with words retained by the +memory, elements of theatrical action of which it has not the secret. +Thus it does idiotic things which its master many a time has much +difficulty in making good. But the thing that must be destroyed first +of all is the old false taste. Present-day literature must be cleansed +of its rust. In vain does the rust eat into it and tarnish it. It +is addressing a young, stern, vigorous generation, which does not +understand it. The train of the eighteenth century is still dragging +in the nineteenth; but we, we young men who have seen Bonaparte, are +not the ones who will carry it. + +We are approaching, then, the moment when we shall see the new +criticism prevail, firmly established upon a broad and deep +foundation. People generally will soon understand that writers should +be judged, not according to rules and species, which are contrary to +nature and art, but according to the immutable principles of the art +of composition, and the special laws of their individual temperaments. +The sound judgment of all men will be ashamed of the criticism which +broke Pierre Corneille on the wheel, gagged Jean Racine, and which +ridiculously rehabilitated John Milton only by virtue of the epic +code of Père le Bossu. People will consent to place themselves at the +author's standpoint, to view the subject with his eyes, in order +to judge a work intelligently. They will lay aside--and it is M. de +Chateaubriand who speaks--"the paltry criticism of defects for the +noble and fruitful criticism of beauties." It is time that all acute +minds should grasp the thread that frequently connects what we, +following our special whim, call "defects" with what we call "beauty." +Defects--at all events those which we call by that name--are often the +inborn, necessary, inevitable conditions of good qualities. + + Scit genius, natale comes qul temperat astrum. + +Who ever saw a medal without its reverse? a talent that had not some +shadow with its brilliancy, some smoke with its flame? Such a blemish +can be only the inseparable consequence of such beauty. This rough +stroke of the brush, which offends my eye at close range, completes +the effect and gives relief to the whole picture. Efface one and you +efface the other. Originality is made up of such things. Genius is +necessarily uneven. There are no high mountains without deep ravines. +Fill up the valley with the mountain and you will have nothing but +a steppe, a plateau, the plain of Les Sablons instead of the Alps, +swallows and not eagles. + +We must also take into account the weather, the climate, the local +influences. The Bible, Homer, hurt us sometimes by their very +sublimities. Who would want to part with a word of either of them? Our +infirmity often takes fright at the inspired bold flights of +genius, for lack of power to swoop down upon objects with such vast +intelligence. And then, once again, there are _defects_ which take +root only in masterpieces; it is given only to certain geniuses +to have certain defects. Shakespeare is blamed for his abuse of +metaphysics, of wit, of redundant scenes, of obscenities, for his +employment of the mythological nonsense in vogue in his time, for +exaggeration, obscurity, bad taste, bombast, asperities of style. The +oak, that giant tree which we were comparing to Shakespeare just now, +and which has more than one point of resemblance to him, the oak has +an unusual shape, gnarled branches, dark leaves, and hard, rough bark; +but it is the oak. + +And it is because of these qualities that it is the oak. If you would +have a smooth trunk, straight branches, satiny leaves, apply to the +pale birch, the hollow elder, the weeping willow; but leave the mighty +oak in peace. Do not stone that which gives you shade. + +The author of this book knows as well as any one the numerous and +gross faults of his works. If it happens too seldom that he corrects +them, it is because it is repugnant to him to return to a work that +has grown cold. Moreover, what has he ever done that is worth +that trouble? The labor that he would throw away in correcting the +imperfections of his books, he prefers to use in purging his intellect +of its defects. It is his method to correct one work only in another +work. + +However, no matter what treatment may be accorded his book, he +binds himself not to defend it, in whole or in part. If his drama is +worthless, what is the use of upholding it? If it is good, why defend +it? Time will do the book justice or will wreak justice upon it. Its +success for the moment is the affair of the publisher alone. If then +the wrath of the critics is aroused by the publication of this essay, +he will let them do their worst. What reply should he make to them? +He is not one of those who speak, as the Castilian poet says, "through +the mouths of their wounds." + + Por la boca de su herida. + +One last word. It may have been noticed that in this somewhat long +journey through so many different subjects, the author has generally +refrained from resting his personal views upon texts or citations of +authorities. It is not, however, because he did not have them at his +hand. + +"If the poet establishes things that are impossible according to the +rules of his art, he makes a mistake unquestionably; but it ceases to +be a mistake when by this means he has reached the end that he +aimed at; for he has found what he sought,"--"They take for nonsense +whatever the weakness of their intellects does not allow them to +understand. They are especially prone to call absurd those wonderful +passages in which the poet, in order the better to enforce his +argument, departs, if we may so express it, from his argument. In +fact, the precept which makes it a rule sometimes to disregard rules, +is a mystery of the art which it is not easy to make men understand +who are absolutely without taste and whom a sort of abnormality of +mind renders insensible to those things which ordinarily impress men." + +Who said the first? Aristotle. Who said the last? Boileau. By these +two specimens you will see that the author of this drama might, as +well as another, have shielded himself with proper names and taken +refuge behind others' reputations. But he preferred to leave that +style of argument to those who deem it unanswerable, universal and +all-powerful. As for himself, he prefers reasons to authorities; he +has always cared more for arms than for coats-of-arms. + +_October_, 1827. + + +[Footnote A: Victor Hugo (1802-1883) the chief of the romantic school +in France, issued in the Preface to "Cromwell" the manifesto of the +movement. Poet, dramatist, and novelist, Hugo remained through a +long life the most conspicuous man of letters in France; and in the +document here printed he laid down the principles which revolutionized +the literary world of his time.] + + + + +PREFACE TO LEAVES OF GRASS + +BY WALT WHITMAN. (1855)[A] + + +America does not repel the past or what it has produced under +its forms or amid other politics or the idea of castes or the old +religions ... accepts the lesson with calmness ... is not so impatient +as has been supposed that the slough still sticks to opinions and +manners and literature while the life which served its requirements +has passed into the new life of the new forms ... perceives that the +corpse is slowly borne from the eating and sleeping rooms of the house +... perceives that it waits a little while in the door ... that it was +fittest for its days ... that its action has descended to the stalwart +and well shaped heir who approaches ... and that he shall be fittest +for his days. + +The Americans of all nations at any time upon the earth, have +probably the fullest poetical nature. The United States themselves are +essentially the greatest poem. In the history of the earth hitherto +the largest and most stirring appear tame and orderly to their ampler +largeness and stir. Here at last is something in the doings of man +that corresponds with the broadcast doings of the day and night. Here +is not merely a nation but a teeming nation of nations. Here is action +untied from strings necessarily blind to particulars and details +magnificently moving in vast masses. Here is the hospitality which +forever indicates heroes.... Here are the roughs and beards and +space and ruggedness and nonchalance that the soul loves. Here the +performance disdaining the trivial unapproached in the tremendous +audacity of its crowds and groupings and the push of its perspective +spreads with crampless and flowing breadth and showers its prolific +and splendid extravagance. One sees it must indeed own the riches of +the summer and winter, and need never be bankrupt while corn grows +from the ground or the orchards drop apples or the bays contain fish +or men beget children upon women. + +Other states indicate themselves in their deputies ... but the genius of +the United States is not best or most in its executives or legislatures, +nor in its ambassadors or authors or colleges or churches or parlors, +nor even in its newspapers or inventors ... but always most in the +common people. Their manners speech dress friendship--the freshness and +candor of their physiognomy--the picturesque looseness of their carriage +... their deathless attachment to freedom--their aversion to anything +indecorous or soft or mean--the practical acknowledgment of the citizens +of one state by the citizens of all other states--the fierceness of +their roused resentment--- their curiosity and welcome of novelty--their +self-esteem and wonderful sympathy--their susceptibility to a +slight--the air they have of persons who never knew how it felt to stand +in the presence of superiors--the fluency of their speech--their delight +in music, the sure symptom of manly tenderness and native elegance of +soul ... their good temper and open handedness--the terrible +significance of their elections--the President's taking off his hat to +them, not they to him--these too are unrhymed poetry. It awaits the +gigantic and generous treatment worthy of it. + +The largeness of nature or the nation were monstrous without a +corresponding largeness and generosity of the spirit of the citizen. +Not nature nor swarming states nor streets and steamships nor +prosperous business nor farms nor capital nor learning may suffice +for the ideal of man ... nor suffice the poet. No reminiscences may +suffice either. A live nation can always cut a deep mark and can have +the best authority the cheapest ... namely from its own soul. This is +the sum of the profitable uses of individuals or states and of present +action and grandeur and of the subjects of poets.--As if it were +necessary to trot back generation after generation to the eastern +records! As if the beauty and sacredness of the demonstrable must fall +behind that of the mythical! As if men do not make their mark out of +any times! As if the opening of the western continent by discovery and +what has transpired since in North and South America were less than +the small theatre of the antique or the aimless sleepwalking of the +middle ages! The pride of the United States leaves the wealth and +finesse of the cities and all returns of commerce and agriculture and +all the magnitude of geography or shows of exterior victory to enjoy +the breed of full sized men or one full sized man unconquerable and +simple. + +The American poets are to enclose old and new for America is the race +of races. Of them a bard is to be commensurate with a people. To +him the other continents arrive as contributions ... he gives them +reception for their sake and his own sake. His spirit responds to his +country's spirit ... he incarnates its geography and natural life +and rivers and lakes. Mississippi with annual freshets and changing +chutes, Missouri and Columbia and Ohio and St. Lawrence with the Falls +and beautiful masculine Hudson, do not embouchure where they spend +themselves more than they embouchure into him. The blue breadth over +the inland sea of Virginia and Maryland and the sea off Massachusetts +and Maine and over Manhattan bay and over Champlain and Erie and over +Ontario and Huron and Michigan and Superior, and over the Texan and +Mexican and Floridian and Cuban seas, and over the seas off California +and Oregon, is not tallied by the blue breadth of the waters below +more than the breadth of above and below is tallied by him. When the +long Atlantic coast stretches longer and the Pacific coast stretches +longer he easily stretches with them north or south. He spans between +them also from east to west and reflects what is between them. On +him rise solid growths that offset the growths of pine and cedar and +hemlock and live oak and locust and chestnut and cypress and hickory +and limetree and cottonwood and tuliptree and cactus and wildvine and +tamarind and persimmon ... and tangles as tangled as any canebrake or +swamp ... and forests coated with transparent ice, and icicles hanging +from boughs and crackling in the wind ... and sides and peaks of +mountains ... and pasturage sweet and free as savannah or upland or +prairie ... with flights and songs and screams that answer those +of the wild pigeon and high-hold and orchard-oriole and coot and +surf-duck and red-shouldered-hawk and fish-hawk and white ibis +and Indian-hen and cat-owl and water-pheasant and qua-bird and +pied-sheldrake and blackbird and mockingbird and buzzard and condor +and night-heron and eagle. To him the hereditary countenance descends +both mother's and father's. To him enter the essences of the real +things and past and present events--of the enormous diversity +of temperature and agriculture and mines--the tribes of red +aborigines--the weather-beaten vessels entering new ports or making +landings on rocky coasts--the first settlements north or south--the +rapid stature and muscle--the haughty defiance of '76, and the war +and peace and formation of the constitution ... the Union always +surrounded by blatherers and always calm and impregnable--the +perpetual coming of immigrants--the wharf-hem'd cities and superior +marine--the unsurveyed interior--the loghouses and clearings and wild +animals and hunters and trappers ... the free commerce--the fisheries +and whaling and gold-digging--the endless gestation of new states--the +convening of Congress every December, the members duly coming up from +all climates and the uttermost parts ... the noble character of the +young mechanics and of all free American workmen and workwomen ... the +general ardor and friendliness and enterprise--the perfect equality of +the female with the male ... the large amativeness--the fluid movement +of the population--the factories and mercantile life and laborsaving +machinery--the Yankee swap--the New York firemen and the target +excursion--the Southern plantation life--the character of the +northeast and of the northwest and southwest--slavery and the +tremulous spreading of hands to protect it, and the stern opposition +to it which shall never cease till it ceases or the speaking of +tongues and the moving of lips cease. For such the expression of the +American poet is to be transcendent and new. It is to be indirect and +not direct or descriptive or epic. Its quality goes through these to +much more. Let the age and wars of other nations be chanted and their +eras and characters be illustrated and that finish the verse. Not so +the great psalm of the republic. Here the theme is creative and has +vista. Here comes one among the well beloved stonecutters and plans +with decision and science and sees the solid and beautiful forms of +the future where there are now no solid forms. + +Of all nations the United States with veins full of poetical stuff +most need poets and will doubtless have the greatest and use them the +greatest. Their Presidents shall not be their common referee so much +as their poets shall. Of all mankind the great poet is the equable +man. Not in him but off from him things are grotesque or eccentric or +fail of their sanity. Nothing out of its place is good and nothing +in its place is bad. He bestows on every object or quality its fit +proportions neither more nor less. He is the arbiter of the diverse +and he is the key. He is the equalizer of his age and land ... he +supplies what wants supplying and checks what wants checking. If peace +is the routine out of him speaks the spirit of peace, large, rich, +thrifty, building vast and populous cities, encouraging agriculture +and the arts and commerce--lighting the study of man, the soul, +immortality--federal, state or municipal government, marriage, health, +freetrade, intertravel by land and sea ... nothing too close, nothing +too far off ... the stars not too far off. In war he is the most +deadly force of the war. Who recruits him recruits horse and foot ... +he fetches parks of artillery the best that engineer ever knew. If the +time becomes slothful and heavy he knows how to arouse it ... he can +make every word he speaks draw blood. Whatever stagnates in the flat +of custom or obedience or legislation he never stagnates. Obedience +does not master him, he masters it. High up out of reach he stands +turning a concentrated light ... he turns the pivot with his finger +... he baffles the swiftest runners as he stands and easily overtakes +and envelopes them. The time straying towards infidelity and +confections and persiflage he withholds by his steady faith ... he +spreads out his dishes ... he offers the sweet firmfibred meat that +grows men and women. His brain is the ultimate brain. He is no arguer +... he is judgment. He judges not as the judge judges but as the sun +falling around a helpless thing. As he sees the farthest he has the +most faith. His thoughts are the hymns of the praise of things. In +the talk on the soul and eternity and God off of his equal plane he +is silent. He sees eternity less like a play with a prologue and +dénouement ... he sees eternity in men and women ... he does not see +men or women as dreams or dots. Faith is the antiseptic of the soul +... it pervades the common people and preserves them ... they +never give up believing and expecting and trusting. There is that +indescribable freshness and unconsciousness about an illiterate person +that humbles and mocks the power of the noblest expressive genius. The +poet sees for a certainty how one not a great artist may be just as +sacred and perfect as the greatest artist.... The power to destroy or +remould is freely used by him, but never the power of attack. What is +past is past. If he does not expose superior models and prove himself +by every step he takes he is not what is wanted. The presence of the +greatest poet conquers ... not parleying or struggling or any prepared +attempts. Now he has passed that way see after him! There is not left +any vestige of despair or misanthropy or cunning or exclusiveness +or the ignominy of a nativity or color or delusion of hell or the +necessity of hell ... and no man thenceforward shall be degraded for +ignorance or weakness or sin. + +The greatest poet hardly knows pettiness or triviality. If he breathes +into anything that was before thought small it dilates with the +grandeur and life of the universe. He is a seer ... he is individual +... he is complete in himself ... the others are as good as he, only +he sees it and they do not. He is not one of the chorus ... he does +not stop for any regulation ... he is the president of regulation. +What the eyesight does to the rest he does to the rest. Who knows +the curious mystery of the eyesight? The other senses corroborate +themselves, but this is removed from any proof but its own and +foreruns the identities of the spiritual world. A single glance of it +mocks all the investigations of man and all the instruments and books +of the earth and all reasoning. What is marvellous? what is unlikely? +what is impossible or baseless or vague? after you have once just +opened the space of a peachpit and given audience to far and near and +to the sunset and had all things enter with electric swiftness softly +and duly without contusion or jostling or jam. + +The land and sea, the animals fishes and birds, the sky of heavens and +the orbs, the forests mountains and rivers, are not small themes ... +but folks expect of the poet to indicate more than the beauty and +dignity which always attach to dumb real objects,... they expect him +to indicate the path between reality and their souls. Men and women +perceive the beauty well enough ... probably as well as he. The +passionate tenacity of hunters, woodmen, early risers, cultivators +of gardens and orchards and fields, the love of healthy women for +the manly form, seafaring persons, drivers of horses, the passion for +light and the open air, all is an old varied sign of the unfailing +perception of beauty and of a residence of the poetic in outdoor +people. They can never be assisted by poets to perceive ... some may +but they never can. The poetic quality is not marshalled in rhyme +or uniformity or abstract addresses to things nor in melancholy +complaints or good precepts, but is the life of these and much else +and is in the soul. The profit of rhyme is that it drops seeds of a +sweeter and more luxuriant rhyme, and of uniformity that it conveys +itself into its own roots in the ground out of sight. The rhyme and +uniformity of perfect poems show the free growth of metrical laws and +bud from them as unerringly and loosely as lilacs and roses on a bush, +and take shapes as compact as the shapes of chestnuts and oranges and +melons and pears, and shed the perfume impalpable to form. The fluency +and ornaments of the finest poems or music or orations or recitations +are not independent but dependent. All beauty comes from beautiful +blood and a beautiful brain. If the greatnesses are in conjunction +in a man or woman it is enough ... the fact will prevail through the +universe ... but the gaggery and gilt of a million years will not +prevail. Who troubles himself about his ornaments or fluency is lost. +This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, +despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for +the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate +tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward +the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any +man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and +with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in +the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine +all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss +whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great +poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the +silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes +and in every motion and joint of your body.... The poet shall not +spend his time in unneeded work. He shall know that the ground is +always ready ploughed and manured ... others may not know it but he +shall. He shall go directly to the creation. His trust shall +master the trust of everything he touches ... and shall master all +attachment. + +The known universe has one complete lover and that is the greatest +poet. He consumes an eternal passion and is indifferent which chance +happens and which possible contingency of fortune or misfortune and +persuades daily and hourly his delicious pay. What baulks or breaks +others is fuel for his burning progress to contact and amorous joy. +Other proportions of the reception of pleasure dwindle to nothing to +his proportions. All expected from heaven or from the highest he is +rapport with in the sight of the daybreak or a scene of the winter +woods or the presence of children playing or with his arm round +the neck of a man or woman. His love above all love has leisure and +expanse ... he leaves room ahead of himself. He is no irresolute +or suspicious lover ... he is sure ... he scorns intervals. His +experience and the showers and thrills are not for nothing. Nothing +can jar him ... suffering and darkness cannot--death and fear cannot. +To him complaint and jealousy and envy are corpses buried and rotten +in the earth ... he saw them buried. The sea is not surer of the shore +or the shore of the sea than he is of the fruition of his love and of +all perfection and beauty. + +The fruition of beauty is no chance of hit or miss ... it is +inevitable as life ... it is as exact and plumb as gravitation. From +the eyesight proceeds another eyesight and from the hearing proceeds +another hearing and from the voice proceeds another voice eternally +curious of the harmony of things with man. To these respond +perfections not only in the committees that were supposed to stand for +the rest but in the rest themselves just the same. These understand +the law of perfection in masses and floods ... that its finish is +to each for itself and onward from itself ... that it is profuse and +impartial ... that there is not a minute of the light or dark nor an +acre of the earth and sea without it--nor any direction of the sky +nor any trade or employment nor any turn of events. This is the reason +that about the proper expression of beauty there is precision and +balance ... one part does not need to be thrust above another. The +best singer is not the one who has the most lithe and powerful organ +... the pleasure of poems is not in them that take the handsomest +measure and similes and sound. + +Without effort and without exposing in the least how it is done the +greatest poet brings the spirit of any or all events and passions and +scenes and persons some more and some less to bear on your individual +character as you hear or read. To do this well is to compete with the +laws that pursue and follow time. What is the purpose must surely be +there and the clue of it must be there ... and the faintest +indication is the indication of the best and then becomes the clearest +indication. Past and present and future are not disjoined but joined. +The greatest poet forms the consistence of what is to be from what has +been and is. He drags the dead out of their coffins and stands them +again on their feet ... he says to the past, Rise and walk before me +that I may realize you. He learns the lesson ... he places himself +where the future becomes present. The greatest poet does not only +dazzle his rays over character and scenes and passions ... he finally +ascends and finishes all ... he exhibits the pinnacles that no man can +tell what they are for or what is beyond ... he glows a moment on the +extremest verge. He is most wonderful in his last half-hidden smile or +frown ... by that flash of the moment of parting the one that sees +it shall be encouraged or terrified afterward for many years. The +greatest poet does not moralize or make applications of morals ... he +knows the soul. The soul has that measureless pride which consists in +never acknowledging any lessons but its own. But it has sympathy as +measureless as its pride and the one balances the other and neither +can stretch too far while it stretches in company with the other. The +inmost secrets of art sleep with the twain. The greatest poet has lain +close betwixt both and they are vital in his style and thoughts. + +The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the +light of letters is simplicity. Nothing is better than simplicity ... +nothing can make up for excess or for the lack of definiteness. To +carry on the heave of impulse and pierce intellectual depths and give +all subjects their articulations are powers neither common nor very +uncommon. But to speak in literature with the perfect rectitude and +insouciance of the movements of animals and the unimpeachableness of +the sentiment of trees in the woods and grass by the roadside is the +flawless triumph of art. If you have looked on him who has achieved +it you have looked on one of the masters of the artists of all nations +and times. You shall not contemplate the flight of the gray gull +over the bay or the mettlesome action of the blood horse or the tall +leaning of sunflowers on their stalk or the appearance of the sun +journeying through heaven or the appearance of the moon afterward with +any more satisfaction than you shall contemplate him. The greatest +poet has less a marked style and is more the channel of thoughts +and things without increase or diminution and is the free channel of +himself. He swears to his art, I will not be meddlesome, I will not +have in my writing any elegance or effect or originality to hang in +the way between me and the rest like curtains. I will have nothing +hang in the way not the richest curtains. What I tell I tell for +precisely what it is. Let who may exalt or startle or fascinate or +soothe I will have purposes as health or heat or snow has and be as +regardless of observation. What I experience or portray shall go from +my composition without a shred of my composition. You shall stand by +my side and look in the mirror with me. + +The old red blood and stainless gentility of great poets will be +proved by their unconstraint. A heroic person walks at his ease +through and out of that custom or precedent or authority that suits +him not. Of the traits of the brotherhood of writers savans musicians +inventors and artists, nothing is finer than silent defiance advancing +from new free forms. In the need of poems philosophy politics +mechanism science behavior, the craft of art, an appropriate native +grand-opera, shipcraft; or any craft, he is greatest for ever and +for ever who contributes the greatest original practical example. The +cleanest expression is that which finds no sphere worthy of itself and +makes one. The messages of great poets to each man and woman are, +Come to us on equal terms, Only then can you understand us, We are no +better than you, What we enclose you enclose, What we enjoy you may +enjoy. Did you suppose there could be only one Supreme? We affirm +there can be unnumbered Supremes, and that one does not countervail +another any more than one eyesight countervails another ... and that +men can be good or grand only of the consciousness of their supremacy +within them. What do you think is the grandeur of storms and +dismemberments and the deadliest battles and wrecks and the wildest +fury of the elements and the power of the sea and the motion of nature +and the throes of human desires and dignity and hate and love? It +is that something in the soul which says, Rage on, Whirl on, I tread +master here and everywhere, Master of the spasms of the sky and of the +shatter of the sea, Master of nature and passion and death, And of all +terror and all pain. + +The American bards shall be marked for generosity and affection and +for encouraging competitors.... They shall be kosmos ... without +monopoly or secrecy ... glad to pass anything to any one ... hungry +for equals night and day. They shall not be careful of riches and +privilege ... they shall be riches and privilege ... they shall +perceive who the most affluent man is. The most affluent man is +he that confronts all the shows he sees by equivalents out of the +stronger wealth of himself. The American bard shall delineate no class +of persons nor one or two out of the strata of interests nor love most +nor truth most nor the soul most nor the body most ... and not be for +the eastern states more than the western or the northern states more +than the southern. + +Exact science and its practical movements are no checks on the +greatest poet but always his encouragement and support. The outset +and remembrance are there ... there the arms that lifted him first and +brace him best ... there he returns after all his goings and comings. +The sailor and traveller ... the anatomist chemist astronomer +geologist phrenologist spiritualist mathematician historian and +lexicographer are not poets, but they are the lawgivers of poets and +their construction underlies the structure of every perfect poem. No +matter what rises or is uttered they sent the seed of the conception +of it ... of them and by them stand the visible proofs of souls ... +always of their fatherstuff must be begotten the sinewy races of +bards. If there shall be love and content between the father and the +son and if the greatness of the son is the exuding of the greatness +of the father there shall be love between the poet and the man of +demonstrable science. In the beauty of poems are the tuft and final +applause of science. + +Great is the faith of the flush of knowledge and of the investigation +of the depths of qualities and things. Cleaving and circling here +swells the soul of the poet yet is president of itself always. The +depths are fathomless and therefore calm. The innocence and nakedness +are resumed ... they are neither modest nor immodest. The whole theory +of the special and supernatural and all that was twined with it or +educed out of it departs as a dream. What has ever happened ... what +happens and whatever may or shall happen, the vital laws enclose all +... they are sufficient for any case and for all cases ... none to be +hurried or retarded ... any miracle of affairs or persons inadmissible +in the vast clear scheme where every motion and every spear of grass +and the frames and spirits of men and women and all that concerns +them are unspeakably perfect miracles all referring to all and each +distinct and in its place. It is also not consistent with the reality +of the soul to admit that there is anything in the known universe more +divine than men and women. + +Men and women and the earth and all upon it are simply to be taken as +they are, and the investigation of their past and present and future +shall be unintermitted and shall be done with perfect candor. Upon +this basis philosophy speculates ever looking towards the poet, +ever regarding the eternal tendencies of all toward happiness never +inconsistent with what is clear to the senses and to the soul. For the +eternal tendencies of all toward happiness make the only point of sane +philosophy. Whatever comprehends less than that ... whatever is less +than the laws of light and of astronomical motion ... or less than +the laws that follow the thief the liar the glutton and the drunkard +through this life and doubtless afterward ... or less than vast +stretches of time or the slow formation of density or the patient +upheaving of strata--is of no account. Whatever would put God in +a poem or system of philosophy as contending against some being or +influence is also of no account. Sanity and ensemble characterize +the great master ... spoilt in one principle all is spoilt. The great +master has nothing to do with miracles. He sees health for himself in +being one of the mass ... he sees the hiatus in singular eminence. To +the perfect shape comes common ground. To be under the general law is +great, for that is to correspond with it. The master knows that he is +unspeakably great and that all are unspeakably great ... that nothing +for instance is greater than to conceive children and bring them up +well ... that to be is just as great as to perceive or tell. + +In the make of the great masters the idea of political liberty is +indispensable. Liberty takes the adherence of heroes wherever men and +women exist ... but never takes any adherence or welcome from the rest +more than from poets. They are the voice and exposition of liberty. +They out of ages are worthy the grand idea ... to them it is confided +and they must sustain it. Nothing has precedence of it and nothing can +warp or degrade it. The attitude of great poets is to cheer up slaves +and horrify despots. The turn of their necks, the sound of their feet, +the motions of their wrists, are full of hazard to the one and hope +to the other. Come nigh them awhile and though they neither speak nor +advise you shall learn the faithful American lesson. Liberty is poorly +served by men whose good intent is quelled from one failure or two +failures or any number of failures, or from the casual indifference +or ingratitude of the people, or from the sharp show of the tushes +of power, or the bringing to bear soldiers and cannon or any penal +statutes. Liberty relies upon itself, invites no one, promises +nothing, sits in calmness and light, is positive and composed, and +knows no discouragement. The battle rages with many a loud alarm and +frequent advance and retreat ... the enemy triumphs ... the prison, +the handcuffs, the iron necklace and anklet, the scaffold, garrote and +leadballs do their work ... the cause is asleep ... the strong throats +are choked with their own blood ... the young men drop their eyelashes +toward the ground when they pass each other ... and is liberty gone +out of that place? No never. When liberty goes it is not the first to +go nor the second or third to go ... it awaits for all the rest to go +... it is the last.... When the memories of the old martyrs are faded +utterly away ... when the large names of patriots are laughed at in +the public halls from the lips of the orators ... when the boys are +no more christened after the same but christened after tyrants +and traitors instead ... when the laws of the free are grudgingly +permitted and the laws for informers and bloodmoney are sweet to the +taste of the people ... when I and you walk abroad upon the earth +stung with compassion at the sight of numberless brothers answering +our equal friendship and calling no man master--and when we are elated +with noble joy at the sight of slaves ... when the soul retires in the +cool communion of the night and surveys its experience and has much +extasy over the word and deed that put back a helpless innocent person +into the gripe of the gripers or into any cruel inferiority ... when +those in all parts of these states who could easier realize the true +American character but do not yet--when the swarms of cringers, +suckers, doughfaces, lice of politics, planners of sly involutions +for their own preferment to city offices or state legislatures or the +judiciary or congress or the presidency, obtain a response of love and +natural deference from the people whether they get the offices or no +... when it is better to be a bound booby and rogue in office at a +high salary than the poorest free mechanic or farmer with his hat +unmoved from his head and firm eyes and a candid and generous heart +... and when servility by town or state or the federal government or +any oppression on a large scale or small scale can be tried on without +its own punishment following duly after in exact proportion against +the smallest chance of escape ... or rather when all life and all the +souls of men and women are discharged from any part of the earth--then +only shall the instinct of liberty be discharged from that part of the +earth. + +As the attributes of the poets of the kosmos concentre in the +real body and soul and in the pleasure of things they possess the +superiority of genuineness over all fiction and romance. As they emit +themselves facts are showered over with light ... the daylight is lit +with more volatile light ... also the deep between the setting and +rising sun goes deeper many fold. Each precise object or condition or +combination or process exhibits a beauty ... the multiplication table +its--old age its--the carpenter's trade its--the grand opera its--the +hugehulled cleanshaped New-York clipper at sea under steam or full +sail gleams with unmatched beauty.... the American circles and large +harmonies of government gleam with theirs ... and the commonest +definite intentions and actions with theirs. The poets of the kosmos +advance through all interpositions and coverings and turmoils and +stratagems to first principles. They are of use ... they dissolve +poverty from its need and riches from its conceit. You large +proprietor, they say, shall not realize or perceive more than any one +else. The owner of the library is not he who holds a legal title to it +having bought and paid for it. Any one and every one is owner of the +library who can read the same through all the varieties of tongues +and subjects and styles, and in whom they enter with ease and take +residence and force toward paternity and maternity, and make supple +and powerful and rich and large.... These American states strong and +healthy and accomplished shall receive no pleasure from violations of +natural models and must not permit them. In paintings or mouldings +or carvings in mineral or wood, or in the illustrations of books and +newspapers, or in any comic or tragic prints, or in the patterns of +woven stuffs or anything to beautify rooms or furniture or costumes, +or to put upon cornices or monuments or on the prows or sterns of +ships, or to put anywhere before the human eye indoors or out, that +which distorts honest shapes or which creates unearthly beings or +places or contingencies, is a nuisance and revolt. Of the human +form especially, it is so great it must never be made ridiculous. +Of ornaments to a work nothing outré can be allowed ... but those +ornaments can be allowed that conform to the perfect facts of the +open air, and that flow out of the nature of the work and come +irrepressibly from it and are necessary to the completion of the work. +Most works are most beautiful without ornament ... Exaggerations +will be revenged in human physiology. Clean and vigorous children are +jetted and conceived only in those communities where the models of +natural forms are public every day ... Great genius and the people of +these states must never be demeaned to romances. As soon as histories +are properly told there is no more need of romances. + +The great poets are also to be known by the absence in them of tricks +and by the justification of perfect personal candor. Then folks echo +a new cheap joy and a divine voice leaping from their brains: How +beautiful is candor! All faults may be forgiven of him who has +perfect candor. Henceforth let no man of us lie, for we have seen that +openness wins the inner and outer world and that there is no single +exception, and that never since our earth gathered itself in a mass +have deceit or subterfuge or prevarication attracted its smallest +particle or the faintest tinge of a shade--and that through the +enveloping wealth and rank of a state or the whole republic of states +a sneak or sly person shall be discovered and despised ... and that +the soul has never once been fooled and never can be fooled ... and +thrift without the loving nod of the soul is only a foetid puff ... +and there never grew up in any of the continents of the globe nor upon +any planet or satellite or star, nor upon the asteroids, nor in any +part of ethereal space, nor in the midst of density, nor under the +fluid wet of the sea, nor in that condition which precedes the birth +of babes, nor at any time during the changes of life, nor in that +condition that follows what we term death, nor in any stretch of +abeyance or action afterward of vitality, nor in any process of +formation or reformation anywhere, a being whose instinct hated the +truth. + +Extreme caution or prudence, the soundest organic health, large +hope and comparison and fondness for women and children, large +alimentiveness and destructiveness and causality, with a perfect sense +of the oneness of nature and the propriety of the same spirit applied +to human affairs ... these are called up of the float of the brain of +the world to be parts of the greatest poet from his birth out of his +mother's womb and from her birth out of her mother's. Caution seldom +goes far enough. It has been thought that the prudent citizen was the +citizen who applied himself to solid gains and did well for himself +and for his family and completed a lawful life without debt or crime. +The greatest poet sees and admits these economies as he sees the +economies of food and sleep, but has higher notions of prudence than +to think he gives much when he gives a few slight attentions at the +latch of the gate. The premises of the prudence of life are not +the hospitality of it or the ripeness and harvest of it. Beyond the +independence of a little sum laid aside for burial-money, and of a +few clapboards around and shingles overhead on a lot of American soil +owned, and the easy dollars that supply the year's plain clothing +and meals, the melancholy prudence of the abandonment of such a great +being as a man is to the toss and pallor of years of money-making with +all their scorching days and icy nights and all their stifling deceits +and underhanded dodgings, or infinitesimals of parlors, or shameless +stuffing while others starve ... and all the loss of the bloom and +odor of the earth and of the flowers and atmosphere and of the sea, +and of the true taste of the women and men you pass or have to do with +in youth or middle age, and the issuing sickness and desperate revolt +at the close of a life without elevation or naivete, and the ghastly +chatter of a death without serenity or majesty, is the great fraud +upon modern civilization and forethought, blotching the surface and +system which civilization undeniably drafts, and moistening with tears +the immense features it spreads and spreads with such velocity before +the reached kisses of the soul.... Still the right explanation +remains to be made about prudence. The prudence of the mere wealth and +respectability of the most esteemed life appears too faint for the eye +to observe at all when little and large alike drop quietly aside at +the thought of the prudence suitable for immortality. What is wisdom +that fills the thinness of a year or seventy or eighty years to wisdom +spaced out by ages and coming back at a certain time with strong +reinforcements and rich presents and the clear faces of wedding-guests +as far as you can look in every direction, running gaily toward you? +Only the soul is of itself ... all else has reference to what ensues. +All that a person does or thinks is of consequence. Not a move can a +man or woman make that effects him or her in a day or a month or any +part of the direct lifetime or the hour of death but the same affects +him or her onward afterward through the indirect lifetime. The +indirect is always as great and real as the direct. The spirit +receives from the body just as much as it gives to the body. Not one +name of word or deed ... not of venereal sores or discolorations ... +not the privacy of the onanist ... not of the putrid veins of gluttons +or rumdrinkers ... not peculation or cunning or betrayal or murder ... +no serpentine poison of those that seduce women ... not the foolish +yielding of women ... not prostitution ... not of any depravity of +young men ... not of the attainment of gain by discreditable means ... +not any nastiness of appetite ... not any harshness of officers to +men or judges to prisoners or fathers to sons or sons to fathers or +of husbands to wives or bosses to their boys ... not of greedy looks +or malignant wishes ... nor any of the wiles practised by people upon +themselves ... ever is or ever can be stamped on the programme but +it is duly realized and returned, and that returned in further +performances ... and they returned again. Nor can the push of charity +or personal force ever be anything else than the profoundest reason, +whether it bring argument to hand or no. No specification is necessary +... to add or subtract or divide is in vain. Little or big, learned +or unlearned, white or black, legal or illegal, sick or well, from the +first inspiration down the windpipe to the last expiration out of it, +all that a male or female does that is vigorous and benevolent and +clean is so much sure profit to him or her in the unshakable order of +the universe and through the whole scope of it for ever. If the savage +or felon is wise it is well ... if the greatest poet or savan is wise +it is simply the same ... if the President or chief justice is wise it +is the same ... if the young mechanic or farmer is wise it is no more +or less ... if the prostitute is wise it is no more nor less. The +interest will come round ... all will come round. All the best actions +of war and peace ... all help given to relatives and strangers and the +poor and old and sorrowful and young children and widows and the sick, +and to all shunned persons ... all furtherance of fugitives and of the +escape of slaves ... all the self-denial that stood steady and aloof +on wrecks and saw others take the seats of the boats ... all offering +of substance or life for the good old cause, or for a friend's sake +or opinion's sake ... all pains of enthusiasts scoffed at by their +neighbors ... all the vast sweet love and precious sufferings of +mothers ... all honest men baffled in strifes recorded or unrecorded +... all the grandeur and good of the few ancient nations whose +fragments of annals we inherit ... and all the good of the hundreds of +far mightier and more ancient nations unknown to us by name or date or +location ... all that was ever manfully begun, whether it succeeded or +no ... all that has at any time been well suggested out of the divine +heart of man or by the divinity of his mouth or by the shaping of his +great hands ... and all that is well thought or done this day on any +part of the surface of the globe ... or on any of the wandering stars +or fixed stars by those there as we are here ... or that is henceforth +to be well thought or done by you whoever you are, or by any +one--these singly and wholly inured at their time and inure now and +will inure always to the identities from which they sprung or shall +spring ... Did you guess any of them lived only its moment? The world +does not so exist ... no parts palpable or impalpable so exist ... no +result exists now without being from its long antecedent result, +and that from its antecedent, and so backward without the farthest +mentionable spot coming a bit nearer the beginning than any other +spot.... Whatever satisfies the soul is truth. The prudence of the +greatest poet answers at last the craving and glut of the soul, is +not contemptuous of less ways of prudence if they conform to its ways, +puts off nothing, permits no let-up for its own case or any case, has +no particular sabbath or judgment-day, divides not the living from +the dead or the righteous from the unrighteous, is satisfied with the +present, matches every thought or act by its correlative, knows no +possible forgiveness or deputed atonement ... knows that the young man +who composedly perilled his life and lost it has done exceeding well +for himself, while the man who has not perilled his life and retains +to old age in riches and ease has perhaps achieved nothing for himself +worth mentioning ... and that only that person has no great prudence +to learn who has learnt to prefer real longlived things, and favors +body and soul the same, and perceives the indirect assuredly following +the direct, and what evil or good he does leaping onward and waiting +to meet him again--and who in his spirit in any emergency whatever +neither hurries or avoids death. + +The direct trial of him who would be the greatest poet is to-day. If +he does not flood himself with the immediate age as with vast oceanic +tides ... and if he does not attract his own land body and soul to +himself, and hang on its neck with incomparable love and plunge his +Semitic muscle into its merits and demerits ... and if he be not +himself the age transfigured ... and if to him is not opened the +eternity which gives similitude to all periods and locations and +processes and animate and inanimate forms, and which is the bond of +time, and rises up from its inconceivable vagueness and infiniteness +in the swimming shape of to-day, and is held by the ductile anchors +of life, and makes the present spot the passage from what was to what +shall be, and commits itself to the representation of this wave of an +hour and this one of the sixty beautiful children of the wave--let him +merge in the general run and wait his development.... Still the final +test of poems or any character or work remains. The prescient poet +projects himself centuries ahead and judges performer or performance +after the changes of time. Does it live through them? Does it still +hold on untired? Will the same style and the direction of genius to +similar points be satisfactory now? Has no new discovery in science or +arrival at superior planes of thought and judgment and behavior fixed +him or his so that either can be looked down upon? Have the marches of +tens and hundreds and thousands of years made willing detours to the +right hand and the left hand for his sake? Is he beloved long and long +after he is buried? Does the young man think often of him? and the +young woman think often of him? and do the middle aged and the old +think of him? + +A great poem is for ages and ages in common, and for all degrees and +complexions, and all departments and sects, and for a woman as much as +a man and a man as much as a woman. A great poem is no finish to a man +or woman but rather a beginning. Has any one fancied he could sit at +last under some due authority and rest satisfied with explanations and +realize and be content and full? To no such terminus does the greatest +poet bring ... he brings neither cessation or sheltered fatness and +ease. The touch of him tells in action. Whom he takes he takes +with firm sure grasp into live regions previously unattained ... +thenceforward is no rest ... they see the space and ineffable sheen +that turn the old spots and lights into dead vacuums. The companion +of him beholds the birth and progress of stars and learns one of the +meanings. Now there shall be a man cohered out of tumult and chaos ... +the elder encourages the younger and shows him how ... they too shall +launch off fearlessly together till the new world fits an orbit for +itself and looks unabashed on the lesser orbits of the stars and +sweeps through the ceaseless rings and shall never be quiet again. + +There will soon be no more priests. Their work is done. They may wait +awhile ... perhaps a generation or two ... dropping off by degrees. +A superior breed shall take their place ... the gangs of kosmos and +prophets _en masse_ shall take their place. A new order shall arise +and they shall be the priests of man, and every man shall be his own +priest. The churches built under their umbrage shall be the churches +of men and women. Through the divinity of themselves shall the kosmos +and the new breed of poets be interpreters of men and women and of all +events and things. They shall find their inspiration in real objects +to-day, symptoms of the past and future.... They shall not deign to +defend immortality or God or the perfection of things or liberty or +the exquisite beauty and reality of the soul. They shall arise in +America and be responded to from the remainder of the earth. + +The English language befriends the grand American expression ... it is +brawny enough and limber and full enough ... on the tough stock of a +race who through all change of circumstance was never without the +idea of political liberty, which is the animus of all liberty, it has +attracted the terms of daintier and gayer and subtler and more elegant +tongues. It is the powerful language of resistance ... it is the +dialect of common sense. It is the speech of the proud and melancholy +races and of all who aspire. It is the chosen tongue to express growth +faith self-esteem freedom justice equality friendliness amplitude +prudence decision and courage. It is the medium that shall well nigh +express the inexpressible. + +No great literature nor any like style of behavior or oratory or +social intercourse or household arrangements or public institutions +or the treatment of bosses of employed people, nor executive detail +or detail of the army and navy, nor spirit of legislation or courts +or police or tuition or architecture or songs or amusements or the +costumes of young men, can long elude the jealous and passionate +instinct of American standards. Whether or no the sign appears from +the mouths of the people, it throbs a live interrogation in every +freeman's and freewoman's heart after that which passes by or this +built to remain. Is it uniform with my country? Are its disposals +without ignominious distinctions? Is it for the ever growing communes +of brothers and lovers, large, well-united, proud beyond the old +models, generous beyond all models? Is it something grown fresh out of +the fields or drawn from the sea for use to me today here? I know +that what answers for me an American must answer for any individual or +nation that serves for a part of my materials. Does this answer? or is +it without reference to universal needs? or sprung of the needs of +the less developed society of special ranks? or old needs of pleasure +overlaid by modern science or forms? Does this acknowledge liberty +with audible and absolute acknowledgment, and set slavery at nought +for life and death? Will it help breed one goodshaped and wellhung +man, and a woman to be his perfect and independent mate? Does it +improve manners? Is it for the nursing of the young of the republic? +Does it solve readily with the sweet milk of the nipples of the +breasts of the mother of many children? Has it too the old ever-fresh +forbearance and impartiality? Does it look for the same love on the +last born and on those hardening toward stature, and on the errant, +and on those who disdain all strength of assault outside their own? + +The poems distilled from other poems will probably pass away. The +coward will surely pass away. The expectation of the vital and great +can only be satisfied by the demeanor of the vital and great. The +swarms of the polished deprecating and reflectors and the polite float +off and leave no remembrance. America prepares with composure and +goodwill for the visitors that have sent word. It is not intellect +that is to be their warrant and welcome. The talented, the artist, +the ingenious, the editor, the statesman, the erudite ... they are not +unappreciated ... they fall in their place and do their work. The soul +of the nation also does its work. No disguise can pass on it ... no +disguise can conceal from it. It rejects none, it permits all. Only +towards as good as itself and toward the like of itself will it +advance half-way. An individual is as superb as a nation when he has +the qualities which make a superb nation. The soul of the largest and +wealthiest and proudest nation may well go half-way to meet that of +its poets. The signs are effectual. There is no fear of mistake. If +the one is true the other is true. The proof of a poet is that his +country absorbs him as affectionately as he has absorbed it. + + +[Footnote A: Walt Whitman (1819-1892), the most original of American +poets, was born in West Hills, Long Island, educated in the Brooklyn +Public Schools, and apprenticed to a printer. As a youth he taught +in a country school, and later went into journalism in New York, +Brooklyn, and New Orleans. The first edition of "Leaves of Grass" +appeared in 1855, with the remarkable preface here printed. During the +war he acted as a volunteer nurse in the army hospitals, and, when it +closed, he became a clerk in the government service at Washington. He +continued to write almost till his death.] + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE + +BY HIPPOLYTE ADOLPHE TAINE. (1863)[A] + + +I + +History, within a hundred years in Germany, and within sixty years +in France, has undergone a transformation owing to a study of +literatures. + +The discovery has been made that a literary work is not a mere play +of the imagination, the isolated caprice of an excited brain, but +a transcript of contemporary manners and customs and the sign of a +particular state of intellect. The conclusion derived from this is +that, through literary monuments, we can retrace the way in which men +felt and thought many centuries ago. This method has been tried and +found successful. + +We have meditated over these ways of feeling and thinking and have +accepted them as facts of prime significance. We have found that they +were dependent on most important events, that they explain these, and +that these explain them, and that henceforth it was necessary to give +them their place in history, and one of the highest. This place has +been assigned to them, and hence all is changed in history--the aim, +the method, the instrumentalities, and the conceptions of laws and of +causes. It is this change as now going on, and which must continue to +go on, that is here attempted to be set forth. + +On turning over the large stiff pages of a folio volume, or the yellow +leaves of a manuscript, in short, a poem, a code of laws, a confession +of faith, what is your first comment? You say to yourself that the +work before you is not of its own creation. It is simply a mold like +a fossil shell, an imprint similar to one of those forms embedded in +a stone by an animal which once lived and perished. Beneath the shell +was an animal and behind the document there was a man. Why do you +study the shell unless to form some idea of the animal? In the same +way do you study the document in order to comprehend the man; both +shell and document are dead fragments and of value only as indications +of the complete living being. The aim is to reach this being; this is +what you strive to reconstruct. It is a mistake to study the document +as if it existed alone by itself. That is treating things merely as a +pedant, and you subject yourself to the illusions of a book-worm. +At bottom mythologies and languages are not existences; the only +realities are human beings who have employed words and imagery adapted +to their organs and to suit the original cast of their intellects. A +creed is nothing in itself. Who made it? Look at this or that +portrait of the sixteenth century, the stern, energetic features of an +archbishop or of an English martyr. Nothing exists except through the +individual; it is necessary to know the individual himself. Let the +parentage of creeds be established, or the classification of poems, or +the growth of constitutions, or the transformations of idioms, and we +have only cleared the ground. True history begins when the historian +has discerned beyond the mists of ages the living, active man, endowed +with passions, furnished with habits, special in voice, feature, +gesture and costume, distinctive and complete, like anybody that you +have just encountered in the street. Let us strive then, as far as +possible, to get rid of this great interval of time which prevents us +from observing the man with our eyes, _the eyes of our own head_. What +revelations do we find in the calendared leaves of a modern poem? A +modern poet, a man like De Musset, Victor Hugo, Lamartine, or Heine, +graduated from a college and traveled, wearing a dress-coat and +gloves, favored by ladies, bowing fifty times and uttering a dozen +witticisms in an evening, reading daily newspapers, generally +occupying an apartment on the second story, not over-cheerful on +account of his nerves, and especially because, in this dense democracy +in which we stifle each other, the discredit of official rank +exaggerates his pretensions by raising his importance, and, owing to +the delicacy of his personal sensations, leading him to regard himself +as a Deity. Such is what we detect behind modern _meditations_ and +_sonnets_. + +Again, behind a tragedy of the seventeenth century there is a poet, +one, for example, like Racine, refined, discreet, a courtier, a fine +talker, with majestic perruque and ribboned shoes, a monarchist and +zealous Christian, "God having given him the grace not to blush in any +society on account of zeal for his king or for the Gospel," clever in +interesting the monarch, translating into proper French "the _gaulois_ +of Amyot," deferential to the great, always knowing how to keep +his place in their company, assiduous and respectful at Marly as at +Versailles, amid the formal creations of a decorative landscape and +the reverential bows, graces, intrigues, and fineness of the braided +seigniors Who get up early every morning to obtain the reversion of an +office, together with the charming ladies who count on their fingers +the pedigrees which entitle them to a seat on a footstool. On this +point consult Saint-Simon and the engravings of Perelle, the same as +you have just consulted Balzac and the water-color drawings of Eugene +Lami. + +In like manner, on reading a Greek tragedy, our first care is +to figure to ourselves the Greeks, that is to say, men who lived +half-naked in the gymnasiums or on a public square under a brilliant +sky, in full view of the noblest and most delicate landscape, busy in +rendering their bodies strong and agile, in conversing together, in +arguing, in voting, in carrying out patriotic piracies, and yet idle +and temperate, the furniture of their houses consisting of three +earthen jars and their food of two pots of anchovies preserved in oil, +served by slaves who afford them the time to cultivate their minds and +to exercise their limbs, with no other concern that that of having +the most beautiful city, the most beautiful processions, the most +beautiful ideas, and the most beautiful men. In this respect, a statue +like the "Meleager" or the "Theseus" of the Parthenon, or again a +sight of the blue and lustrous Mediterranean, resembling a silken +tunic out of which islands arise like marble bodies, together with +a dozen choice phrases selected from the works of Plato and +Aristophanes, teach us more than any number of dissertations and +commentaries. + +And so again, in order to understand an Indian Purana, one must begin +by imagining the father of a family who, "having seen a son on his +son's knees," follows the law and, with ax and pitcher, seeks solitude +under a banyan tree, talks no more, multiplies his fastings, lives +naked with four fires around him under the fifth fire, that terrible +sun which endlessly devours and resuscitates all living things; who +fixes his imagination in turn for weeks at a time on the foot of +Brahma, then on his knee, on his thigh, on his navel, and so on, +until, beneath the strain of this intense meditation, hallucinations +appear, when all the forms of being, mingling together and transformed +into each other, oscillate to and fro in this vertiginous brain until +the motionless man, with suspended breath and fixed eyeballs, beholds +the universe melting away like vapor over the vacant immensity of +the Being in which he hopes for absorption. In this case the best of +teachings would be a journey in India; but, for lack of a better +one, take the narratives of travelers along with works in geography, +botany, and ethnology. In any event, there must be the same research. +A language, a law, a creed, is never other than an abstraction; the +perfect thing is found in the active man, the visible corporeal figure +which eats, walks, fights, and labors. Set aside the theories of +constitutions and their results, of religions and their systems, and +try to observe men in their workshops or offices, in their fields +along with their own sky and soil, with their own homes, clothes, +occupations and repasts, just as you see them when, on landing in +England or in Italy, you remark their features and gestures, their +roads and their inns, the citizen on his promenades and the workman +taking a drink. Let us strive as much as possible to supply the +place of the actual, personal, sensible observation that is no longer +practicable, this being the only way in which we can really know the +man; let us make the past present; to judge of an object it must be +present; no experience can be had of what is absent. Undoubtedly, this +sort of reconstruction is always imperfect; only an imperfect +judgment can be based on it; but let us do the best we can; incomplete +knowledge is better than none at all, or than knowledge which +is erroneous, and there is no other way of obtaining knowledge +approximatively of bygone times than by _seeing_ approximatively the +men of former times. + +Such is the first step in history. This step was taken in Europe at +the end of the last century when the imagination took fresh flight +under the auspices of Lessing and Walter Scott, and a little later in +France under Chateaubriand, Augustin Thierry, Michelet, and others. We +now come to the second step. + + + + +II + + +On observing the visible man with your own eyes what do you try to +find in him? The invisible man. These words which your ears catch, +those gestures, those airs of the head, his attire and sensible +operations of all kinds, are, for you, merely so many expressions; +these express something, a soul. An inward man is hidden beneath the +outward man, and the latter simply manifests the former. You have +observed the house in which he lives, his furniture, his costume, in +order to discover his habits and tastes, the degree of his refinement +or rusticity, his extravagance or economy, his follies or his +cleverness. You have listened to his conversation and noted the +inflexions of his voice, the attitudes he has assumed, so as to judge +of his spirit, self-abandonment or gayety, his energy or his rigidity. +You consider his writings, works of art, financial and political +schemes, with a view to measure the reach and limits of his +intelligence, his creative power and self-command, to ascertain the +usual order, kind, and force of his conceptions, in what way he +thinks and how he resolves. All these externals are so many avenues +converging to one center, and you follow these only to reach that +center; here is the real man, namely, that group of faculties and of +sentiments which produces the rest. Behold a new world, an infinite +world; for each visible action involves an infinite train of +reasonings and emotions, new or old sensations which have combined to +bring this into light and which, like long ledges of rock sunk deep +in the earth, have cropped out above the surface and attained their +level. It is this subterranean world which forms the second aim, the +special object of the historian. If his critical education suffices, +he is able to discriminate under every ornament in architecture, under +every stroke of the brush in a picture, under each phrase of literary +composition, the particular sentiment out of which the ornament, the +stroke, and the phrase have sprung; he is a spectator of the inward +drama which has developed itself in the breast of the artist or +writer; the choice of words, the length or shortness of the period, +the species of metaphor, the accent of a verse, the chain of +reasoning--all are to him an indication; while his eyes are reading +the text his mind and soul are following the steady flow and +ever-changing series of emotions and conceptions from which this text +has issued; he is working out its _psychology_. Should you desire to +study this operation, regard the promoter and model of all the high +culture of the epoch, Goethe, who, before composing his "Iphigenia" +spent days in making drawings of the most perfect statues and who, at +last, his eyes filled with the noble forms of antique scenery and his +mind penetrated by the harmonious beauty of antique life, succeeded in +reproducing internally, with such exactness, the habits and yearnings +of Greek imagination as to provide us with an almost twin sister of +the "Antigone" of Sophocles and of the goddesses of Phidias. This +exact and demonstrated divination of bygone sentiments has, in our +days, given a new life to history. There was almost complete ignorance +of this in the last century; men of every race and of every epoch were +represented as about alike, the Greek, the barbarian, the Hindoo, the +man of the Renaissance and the man of the eighteenth century, cast in +the same mold and after the same pattern, and after a certain abstract +conception which served for the whole human species. There was a +knowledge of man but not of men. There was no penetration into +the soul itself; nothing of the infinite diversity and wonderful +complexity of souls had been detected; it was not known that the moral +organization of a people or of an age is as special and distinct +as the physical structure of a family of plants or of an order of +animals. History to-day, like zoölogy, has found its anatomy, and +whatever branch of it is studied, whether philology, languages or +mythologies, it is in this way that labor must be given to make it +produce new fruit. Among so many writers who, since Herder, Ottfried +Müller, and Goethe have steadily followed and rectified this great +effort, let the reader take two historians and two works, one "The +Life and Letters of Cromwell" by Carlyle, and the other the "Port +Royal" of Sainte-Beuve. He will see how precisely, how clearly, and +how profoundly we detect the soul of a man beneath his actions and +works; how, under an old general and in place of an ambitious man +vulgarly hypocritical, we find one tormented by the disordered +reveries of a gloomy imagination, but practical in instinct and +faculties, thoroughly English and strange and incomprehensible to +whoever has not studied the climate and the race; how, with about a +hundred scattered letters and a dozen or more mutilated speeches, we +follow him from his farm and his team to his general's tent and to his +Protector's throne, in his transformation and in his development, in +his struggles of conscience and in his statesman's resolutions, +in such a way that the mechanism of his thought and action becomes +visible and the ever renewed and fitful tragedy, within which wracked +this great gloomy soul, passes like the tragedies of Shakespeare +into the souls of those who behold them. We see how, behind convent +disputes and the obstinacy of nuns, we recover one of the great +provinces of human psychology; how fifty or more characters, rendered +invisible through the uniformity of a narration careful of the +proprieties, came forth in full daylight, each standing out clear in +its countless diversities; how, underneath theological dissertations +and monotonous sermons, we discern the throbbings of ever-breathing +hearts, the excitements and depressions of the religious life, +the unforeseen reaction and pell-mell stir of natural feeling, the +infiltrations of surrounding society, the intermittent triumphs +of grace, presenting so many shades of difference that the fullest +description and most flexible style can scarcely garner in the vast +harvest which the critic has caused to germinate in this abandoned +field. And the same elsewhere. Germany, with its genius, so pliant, so +broad, so prompt in transformations, so fitted for the reproduction of +the remotest and strangest states of human thought; England, with its +matter-of-fact mind, so suited to the grappling with moral problems, +to making them clear by figures, weights, and measures, by geography +and statistics, by texts and common sense; France, at length, with its +Parisian culture and drawing-room habits, with its unceasing analysis +of characters and of works, with its ever ready irony at detecting +weaknesses, with its skilled finesse in discriminating shades of +thought--all have plowed over the same ground, and we now begin +to comprehend that no region of history exists in which this deep +sub-soil should not be reached if we would secure adequate crops +between the furrows. + +Such is the second step, and we are now in train to follow it out. +Such is the proper aim of contemporary criticism. No one has done this +work so judiciously and on so grand a scale as Sainte-Beuve; in this +respect, we are all his pupils; literary, philosophic, and religious +criticism in books, and even in the newspapers, is to-day entirely +changed by his method. Ulterior evolution must start from this +point. I have often attempted to expose what this evolution is; in my +opinion, it is a new road open to history and which I shall strive to +describe more in detail. + + + + +III + + +After having observed in a man and noted down one, two, three, +and then a multitude of sentiments, do these suffice and does your +knowledge of him seem complete? Does a memorandum book constitute a +psychology? It is not a psychology, and here, as elsewhere, the search +for causes must follow the collection of facts. It matters not what +the facts may be, whether physical or moral, they always spring from +causes; there are causes for ambition, for courage, for veracity, as +well as for digestion, for muscular action, and for animal heat. Vice +and virtue are products like vitriol and sugar; every complex fact +grows out of the simple facts with which it is affiliated and on +which it depends. We must therefore try to ascertain what simple facts +underlie moral qualities the same as we ascertain those that underlie +physical qualities, and, for example, let us take the first fact +that comes to hand, a religious system of music, that of a Protestant +church. A certain inward cause has inclined the minds of worshipers +toward these grave, monotonous melodies, a cause much greater than its +effect; that is to say, a general conception of the veritable outward +forms of worship which man owes to God; it is this general conception +which has shaped the architecture of the temple, cast out statues, +dispensed with paintings, effaced ornaments, shortened ceremonies, +confined the members of a congregation to high pews which cut off the +view, and governed the thousand details of decoration, posture, and +all other externals. This conception itself again proceeds from a +more general cause, an idea off human conduct in general, inward and +outward, prayers, actions, dispositions of every sort that man is +bound to maintain toward the Deity; it is this which has enthroned the +doctrine of grace, lessened the importance of the clergy, transformed +the sacraments, suppressed observances, and changed the religion of +discipline into one of morality. This conception, in its turn, depends +on a third one, still more general, that of moral perfection as this +is found in a perfect God, the impeccable judge, the stern overseer, +who regards every soul as sinful, meriting punishment, incapable of +virtue or of salvation, except through a stricken conscience which He +provokes and the renewal of the heart which He brings about. Here is +the master conception, consisting of duty erected into the absolute +sovereign of human life, and which prostrates all other ideals at the +feet of the moral ideal. Here we reach what is deepest in man; for, to +explain this conception, we must consider the race he belongs to, +say the German, the Northman, the formation and character of his +intellect, his ways in general of thinking and feeling, that tardiness +and frigidity of sensation which keeps him from rashly and easily +falling tinder the empire of sensual enjoyments, that bluntness of +taste, that irregularity and those outbursts of conception which +arrest in him the birth of refined and harmonious forms and methods; +that disdain of appearances, that yearning for truth, that attachment +to abstract, bare ideas which develop conscience in him at the expense +of everything else. Here the search comes to an end. We have reached +a certain primitive disposition, a particular trait belonging to +sensations of all kinds, to every conception peculiar to an age or +to a race, to characteristics inseparable from every idea and feeling +that stir in the human breast. Such are the grand causes, for these +are universal and permanent causes, present in every case and at every +moment, everywhere and always active, indestructible, and inevitably +dominant in the end, since, whatever accidents cross their path being +limited and partial, end in yielding to the obscure and incessant +repetition of their energy; so that the general structure of things +and all the main features of events are their work, all religions and +philosophies, all poetic and industrial systems, all forms of society +and of the family, all, in fine, being imprints bearing the stamp of +their seal. + + + + +IV + + +There is, then, a system in human ideas and sentiments, the prime +motor of which consists in general traits, certain characteristics +of thought and feeling common to men belonging to a particular race, +epoch, or country. Just as crystals in mineralogy, whatever +their diversity, proceed from a few simple physical forms, so do +civilizations in history, however these may differ, proceed from a few +spiritual forms. One is explained by a primitive geometrical element +as the other is explained by a primitive psychological element. In +order to comprehend the entire group of mineralogical species we must +first study a regular solid in the general, its facets and angles, and +observe in this abridged form the innumerable transformations of which +it is susceptible. In like manner, if we would comprehend the entire +group of historic varieties we must consider beforehand a human soul +in the general, with its two or three fundamental faculties, and, in +this abridgment, observe the principal forms it may present. This sort +of ideal tableau, the geometrical as well as psychological, is not +very complex, and we soon detect the limitations of organic conditions +to which civilizations, the same as crystals, are forcibly confined. +What do we find in man at the point of departure? Images or +representations of objects, namely, that which floats before him +internally, lasts a certain time, is effaced, and then returns after +contemplating this or that tree or animal, in short, some sensible +object. This forms the material basis of the rest and the development +of this material basis is twofold, speculative or positive, just as +these representations end in a _general conception_ or in an _active +resolution_. Such is man, summarily abridged. It is here, within these +narrow confines, that human diversities are encountered, now in the +matter itself and again in the primordial twofold development. However +insignificant in the elements they are of vast significance in the +mass, while the slightest change in the factors leads to gigantic +changes in the results. According as the representation is distinct, +as if stamped by a coining-press, or confused and blurred; according +as it concentrates in itself a larger or smaller number of the +characters of an object; according as it is violent and accompanied +with impulsions or tranquil and surrounded with calmness, so are +all the operations and the whole running-gear of the human machine +entirely transformed. In like manner, again, according as the +ulterior development of the representation varies, so does the whole +development of the man vary. If the general conception in which this +ends is merely a dry notation in Chinese fashion, language becomes +a kind of algebra, religion and poetry are reduced to a minimum, +philosophy is brought down to a sort of moral and practical common +sense, science to a collection of recipes, classifications, and +utilitarian mnemonics, the mind itself taking a whole positive +turn. If, on the contrary, the general conception in which the +representation culminates is a poetic and figurative creation, a +living symbol, as with the Aryan races, language becomes a sort of +shaded and tinted epic in which each word stands as a personage, +poesy and religion assume magnificent and inexhaustible richness, +and metaphysics develops with breadth and subtlety without +any consideration of positive bearings; the whole intellect, +notwithstanding the deviation and inevitable weaknesses of the effort, +is captivated by the beautiful and sublime, thus conceiving an ideal +type which, through its nobleness and harmony, gathers to itself all +the affections and enthusiasms of humanity. If, on the other hand, the +general conception in which the representation culminates is poetic +but abrupt, is reached not gradually but by sudden intuition, if +the original operation is not a regular development but a violent +explosion--then, as with the semitic races, metaphysical power +is wanting; the religious conception becomes that of a royal God, +consuming and solitary; science cannot take shape, the intellect grows +rigid and too headstrong to reproduce the delicate ordering of nature; +poetry cannot give birth to aught but a series of vehement, grandiose +exclamations, while language no longer renders the concatenation of +reasoning and eloquence, man being reduced to lyric enthusiasm, to +ungovernable passion, and to narrow and fanatical action. It is in +this interval between the particular representation and the universal +conception that the germs of the greatest human differences are found. +Some races, like the classic, for example, pass from the former to the +latter by a graduated scale of ideas regularly classified and more +and more general; others, like the Germanic, traverse the interval +in leaps, with uniformity and after prolonged and uncertain groping. +Others, like the Romans and the English, stop at the lowest stages; +others, like the Hindoos and Germans, mount to the uppermost. + +If, now, after considering the passage from the representation to the +idea, we regard the passage from the representation to the resolution, +we find here elementary differences of like importance and of the same +order, according as the impression is vivid, as in Southern climes, +or faint, as in Northern climes, as it ends in instantaneous action +as with barbarians, or tardily as with civilized nations, as it +is capable or not of growth, of inequality, of persistence and of +association. The entire system of human passion, all the risks of +public peace and security, all labor and action, spring from these +sources. It is the same with the other primordial differences; their +effects embrace an entire civilization, and may be likened to those +algebraic formulæ which, within narrow bounds, describe beforehand +the curve of which these form the law. Not that this law always +prevails to the end; sometimes, perturbations arise, but, even when +this happens, it is not because the law is defective, but because it +has not operated alone. New elements have entered into combination +with old ones; powerful foreign forces have interfered to oppose +primitive forces. The race has emigrated, as with the ancient +Aryans, and the change of climate has led to a change in the whole +intellectual economy and structure of society. A people has been +conquered like the Saxon nation, and the new political structure +has imposed on its customs, capacities, and desires which it did not +possess. The nation has established itself permanently in the midst +of downtrodden and threatening subjects, as with the ancient Spartans, +while the necessity of living, as in an armed encampment, has +violently turned the whole moral and social organization in one unique +direction. At all events, the mechanism of human history is like this. +We always find the primitive mainspring consisting of some widespread +tendency of soul and intellect, either innate and natural to the race +or acquired by it and due to some circumstance forced upon it. These +great given mainsprings gradually produce their effects, that is to +say, at the end of a few centuries they place the nation in a new +religious, literary, social, and economic state; a new condition +which, combined with their renewed effort, produces another condition, +sometimes a good one, sometimes a bad one, now slowly, now +rapidly, and so on; so that the entire development of each distinct +civilization may be considered as the effect of one permanent force +which, at every moment, varies its work by modifying the circumstances +where it acts. + + + + +V + + +Three different sources contribute to the production of this +elementary moral state, _race, environment_, and _epoch._ What we call +_race_ consists of those innate and hereditary dispositions which man +brings with him into the world and which are generally accompanied +with marked differences of temperament and of bodily structure. They +vary in different nations. + +Naturally, there are varieties of men as there are varieties of +cattle and horses, some brave and intelligent, and others timid and of +limited capacity; some capable of superior conceptions and creations, +and others reduced to rudimentary ideas and contrivances; some +specially fitted for certain works, and more richly furnished with +certain instincts, as we see in the better endowed species of dogs, +some for running and others for fighting, some for hunting and others +for guarding houses and flocks. We have here a distinct force; so +distinct that, in spite of the enormous deviations which both the +other motors impress upon it, we still recognize, and which a race +like the Aryan people, scattered from the Ganges to the Hebrides, +established tinder all climates, ranged along every degree of +civilization, transformed by thirty centuries of revolutions, shows +nevertheless in its languages, in its religions, in its literatures, +and in its philosophies, the community of blood and of intellect +which still to-day binds together all its offshoots. However they may +differ, their parentage is not lost; barbarism, culture and grafting, +differences of atmosphere and of soil, fortunate or unfortunate +occurrences, have operated in vain; the grand characteristics of the +original form have lasted, and we find that the two or three leading +features of the primitive imprint are again apparent under the +subsequent imprints with which time has overlaid them. There is +nothing surprising in this extraordinary tenacity. Although the +immensity of the distance allows us to catch only a glimpse in a +dubious light of the origin of species,[1] the events of history throw +sufficient light on events anterior to history to explain the almost +unshaken solidity of primordial traits. At the moment of encountering +them, fifteen, twenty, and thirty centuries before our era, in an +Aryan, Egyptian, or Chinese, they represent the work of a much greater +number of centuries, perhaps the work of many myriads of centuries. +For, as soon as an animal is born it must adapt itself to its +surroundings; it breathes in another way, it renews itself +differently, it is otherwise stimulated according as the atmosphere, +the food, and the temperature are different. A different climate +and situation create different necessities and hence activities of a +different kind; and hence, again, a system of different habits, and, +finally, a system of different aptitudes and instincts. Man, thus +compelled to put himself in equilibrium with circumstances, contracts +a corresponding temperament and character, and his character, like +his temperament, are acquisitions all the more stable because of the +outward impression being more deeply imprinted in him by more frequent +repetitions and transmitted to his offspring by more ancient heredity. +So that at each moment of time the character of a people may be +considered as a summary of all antecedent actions and sensations; that +is to say, as a quantity and as a weighty mass, not infinite,[2] since +all things in nature are limited, but disproportionate to the rest and +almost impossible to raise, since each minute of an almost infinite +past has contributed to render it heavier, and, in order to turn +the scale, it would require, on the other side, a still greater +accumulation of actions and sensations. Such is the first and most +abundant source of these master faculties from which historic events +are derived; and we see at once that if it is powerful it is owing +to its not being a mere source, but a sort of lake, and like a +deep reservoir wherein other sources have poured their waters for a +multitude of centuries. + +When we have thus verified the internal structure of a race we must +consider the _environment_ in which it lives. For man is not alone in +the world; nature envelops him and other men surround him; accidental +and secondary folds come and overspread the primitive and permanent +fold, while physical or social circumstances derange or complete the +natural groundwork surrendered to them. At one time climate has +had its effect. Although the history of Aryan nations can be only +obscurely traced from their common country to their final abodes, we +can nevertheless affirm that the profound difference which is apparent +between the Germanic races on the one hand, and the Hellenic and +Latin races on the other, proceeds in great part from the differences +between the countries in which they have established themselves--the +former in cold and moist countries, in the depths of gloomy forests +and swamps, or on the borders of a wild ocean, confined to melancholic +or rude sensations, inclined to drunkenness and gross feeding, leading +a militant and carnivorous life; the latter, on the contrary, living +amidst the finest scenery, alongside of a brilliant, sparkling sea +inviting navigation and commerce, exempt from the grosser cravings of +the stomach, disposed at the start to social habits and customs, to +political organization, to the sentiments and faculties which develop +the art of speaking, the capacity for enjoyment and invention in the +sciences, in art, and in literature. At another time, political events +have operated, as in the two Italian civilizations: the first +one tending wholly to action, to conquest, to government, and to +legislation, through the primitive situation of a city of refuge, a +frontier _emporium_, and of an armed aristocracy which, importing and +enrolling foreigners and the vanquished under it, sets two hostile +bodies facing each other, with no outlet for its internal troubles and +rapacious instincts but systematic warfare; the second one, excluded +from unity and political ambition on a grand scale by the permanency +of its municipal system, by the cosmopolite situation of its pope and +by the military intervention of neighboring states, and following the +bent of its magnificent and harmonious genius, is wholly carried over +to the worship of voluptuousness and beauty. Finally, at another time, +social conditions have imposed their stamp as, eighteen centuries ago, +by Christianity, and twenty-five centuries ago, by Buddhism, when, +around the Mediterranean as in Hindostan, the extreme effects of Aryan +conquest and organization led to intolerable oppression, the crushing +of the individual, utter despair, the whole world under the ban of a +curse, with the development of metaphysics and visions, until man, +in this dungeon of despondency, feeling his heart melt, conceived +of abnegation, charity, tender love, gentleness, humility, human +brotherhood, here in the idea of universal nothingness and there under +that of the fatherhood of God. Look around at the regulative instincts +and faculties implanted in a race; in brief, the turn of mind +according to which it thinks and acts at the present day; we shall +find most frequently that its work is due to one of these prolonged +situations, to these enveloping circumstances, to these persistent +gigantic pressures brought to bear on a mass of men who, one by +one, and all collectively, from one generation to another, have been +unceasingly bent and fashioned by them, in Spain a crusade of eight +centuries against the Mohammedans, prolonged yet longer even to the +exhaustion of the nation through the expulsion of the Moors, +through the spoliation of the Jews, through the establishment of +the Inquisition, through the Catholic wars; in England, a political +establishment of eight centuries which maintains man erect and +respectful, independent and obedient, all accustomed to struggling +together in a body under the sanction of law; in France, a Latin +organization which, at first imposed on docile barbarians, than +leveled to the ground under the universal demolition, forms itself +anew under the latent workings of national instinct, developing under +hereditary monarchs and ending in a sort of equalized, centralized, +administrative republic under dynasties exposed to revolutions. Such +are the most efficacious among the observable causes which mold the +primitive man; they are to nations what education, pursuit, condition, +and abode are to individuals, and seem to comprise all, since the +external forces which fashion human matter, and by which the outward +acts on the inward, are comprehended in them. + +There is, nevertheless, a third order of causes, for, with the forces +within and without, there is the work these have already produced +together, which work itself contributes toward producing the ensuing +work; beside the permanent impulsion and the given environment there +is the acquired momentum. When national character and surrounding +circumstances operate it is not on a _tabula rasa_, but on one already +bearing imprints. According as this _tabula_ is taken at one or at +another moment so is the imprint different, and this suffices to +render the total effect different. Consider, for example, two moments +of a literature or of an art, French tragedy under Corneille and under +Voltaire, and Greek drama under Æschylus and under Euripides, Latin +poetry under Lucretius and under Claudian, and Italian painting under +Da Vinci and under Guido. Assuredly, there is no change of general +conception at either of these two extreme points; ever the same human +type must be portrayed or represented in action; the cast of the +verse, the dramatic structure, the physical form have all persisted. +But there is this among these differences, that one of the artists is +a precursor and the other a successor, that the first one has no model +and the second one has a model; that the former sees things face to +face, and that the latter sees them through the intermediation of the +former, that many departments of art have become more perfect, that +the simplicity and grandeur of the impression have diminished, that +what is pleasing and refined in form has augumented--in short, that +the first work has determined the second. In this respect, it is with +a people as with a plant; the same sap at the same temperature and +in the same soil produces, at different stages of its successive +elaborations, different developments, buds, flowers, fruits, and +seeds, in such a way that the condition of the following is always +that of the preceding and is born of its death. Now, if you no longer +regard a brief moment, as above, but one of those grand periods of +development which embraces one or many centuries like the Middle Ages, +or our last classic period, the conclusion is the same. A certain +dominating conception has prevailed throughout; mankind, during +two hundred years, during five hundred years, have represented to +themselves a certain ideal figure of man, in mediæval times the knight +and the monk, in our classic period the courtier and refined talker; +this creative and universal conception has monopolized the entire +field of action and thought, and, after spreading its involuntary +systematic works over the world, it languished and then died out, +and now a new idea has arisen, destined to a like domination and to +equally multiplied creations. Note here that the latter depends in +part on the former, and that it is the former, which, combining its +effect with those of national genius and surrounding circumstances, +will impose their bent and their direction on new-born things. It is +according to this law that great historic currents are formed, meaning +by this, the long rule of a form of intellect or of a master idea, +like that period of spontaneous creations called the Renaissance, or +that period of oratorical classifications called the Classic Age, or +that series of mystic systems called the Alexandrine and Christian +epoch, or that series of mythological efflorescences found at the +origins of Germany, India, and Greece. Here as elsewhere, we are +dealing merely with a mechanical problem: the total effect is a +compound wholly determined by the grandeur and direction of the forces +which produce it. The sole difference which separates these moral +problems from physical problems lies in this, that in the former the +directions and grandeur cannot be estimated by or stated in figures +with the same precision as in the latter. If a want, a faculty, is +a quantity capable of degrees, the same as pressure or weight, this +quantity is not measurable like that of the pressure or weight. We +cannot fix it in an exact or approximative formula; we can obtain or +give of it only a literary impression; we are reduced to nothing and +citing the prominent facts which make it manifest and which nearly, or +roughly, indicate about what grade on the scale it must be ranged at. +And yet, notwithstanding the methods of notation are not the same +in the moral sciences as in the physical sciences, nevertheless, +as matter is the same in both, and is equally composed of forces, +directions, and magnitudes, we can still show that in one as in the +other, the final effect takes place according to the same law. This is +great or small according as the fundamental forces are great or small +and act more or less precisely in the same sense, according as the +distinct effects of race, environment and epoch combine to enforce +each other or combine to neutralize each other. Thus are explained the +long impotences and the brilliant successes which appear irregularly +and with no apparent reason in the life of a people; the causes of +these consist in internal concordances and contrarieties. There was +one of these concordances when, in the seventeenth century, the social +disposition and conversational spirit innate in France encountered +drawing-room formalities and the moment of oratorical analysis; when, +in the nineteenth century, the flexible, profound genius of Germany +encountered the age of philosophic synthesis and of cosmopolite +criticism. One of these contrarieties happened when, in the +seventeenth century, the blunt, isolated genius of England awkwardly +tried to don the new polish of urbanity, and when, in the sixteenth +century, the lucid, prosaic French intellect tried to gestate a living +poesy. It is this secret concordance of creative forces which produced +the exquisite courtesy and noble cast of literature under Louis XIV. +and Bossuet, and the grandiose metaphysics and broad critical sympathy +under Hegel and Goethe. It is this secret contrariety of creative +forces which produced the literary incompleteness, the licentious +plays, the abortive drama of Dryden and Wycherly, the poor Greek +importations, the gropings, the minute beauties and fragments of +Ronsard and the Pleiad. We may confidently affirm that the unknown +creations toward which the current of coming ages is bearing up will +spring from and be governed by these primordial forces; that, if these +forces could be measured and computed we might deduce from them, as +from a formula, the characters of future civilization; and that +if, notwithstanding the evident rudeness of our notations, and the +fundamental inexactitude of our measures, we would nowadays form some +idea of our general destinies, we must base our conjectures on an +examination of these forces. For, in enumerating them, we run through +the full circle of active forces; and when the race, the environment, +and the moment have been considered,--that is to say the inner +mainspring, the pressure from without, and the impulsion already +acquired,--we have exhausted not only all real causes but again all +possible causes of movement. + + + + +VI + + +There remains to be ascertained in what way these causes, applied to +a nation or to a century, distribute their effects. Like a spring +issuing from an elevated spot and diffusing its waters, according +to the height, from ledge to ledge, until it finally reaches the low +ground, so does the tendency of mind or soul in a people, due to race, +epoch, or environment, diffuse itself in different proportions, and by +regular descent, over the different series of facts which compose +its civilization.[3] In preparing the geographical map of a country, +starting at its watershed, we see the slopes, just below this common +point, dividing themselves into five or six principal basins, and +then each of the latter into several others, and so on until the whole +country, with its thousands of inequalities of surface, is included +in the ramifications of this network. In like manner, in preparing the +psychological map of the events and sentiments belonging to a certain +human civilization, we find at the start five or six well determined +provinces--religion, art, philosophy, the state, the family, and +industries; next, in each of these provinces, natural departments, and +then finally, in each of these departments, still smaller territories +until we arrive at those countless details of life which we observe +daily in ourselves and around us. If, again, we examine and compare +together these various groups of facts we at once find that they are +composed of parts and that all have parts in common. Let us take first +the three principal products of human intelligence--religion, art, and +philosophy. What is a philosophy but a conception of nature and of its +primordial causes under the form of abstractions and formulas? What +underlies a religion and an art if not a conception of this same +nature, and of these same primordial causes, under the form of more +or less determinate symbols, and of more or less distinct personages, +with this difference, that in the first case we believe that they +exist, and in the second case that they do not exist. Let the reader +consider some of the great creations of the intellect in India, in +Scandinavia, in Persia, in Rome, in Greece, and he will find that art +everywhere is a sort of philosophy become sensible, religion a sort +of poem regarded as true, and philosophy a sort of art and religion, +desiccated and reduced to pure abstractions. There is, then, in the +center of each of these groups a common element, the conception of +the world and its origin, and if they differ amongst each other it is +because each combines with the common element a distinct element; +here the power of abstraction, there the faculty of personifying with +belief, and, finally, the talent for personifying without belief. Let +us now take the two leading products of human association, the Family +and the State. What constitutes the State other than the sentiment +of obedience by which a multitude of men collect together under the +authority of a chief? And what constitutes the Family other than the +sentiment of obedience by which a wife and children act together +under the direction of a father and husband? The Family is a natural, +primitive, limited state, as the State is an artificial, ulterior, and +expanded Family, while beneath the differences which arise from the +number, origin, and condition of its members, we distinguish, in the +small as in the large community, a like fundamental disposition of +mind which brings them together and unites them. Suppose, now, that +this common element receives from the environment, the epoch, and the +race peculiar characteristics, and it is clear that _all the groups +into which it enters will be proportionately modified_. If the +sentiment of obedience is merely one of fear,[4] you encounter, as in +most of the Oriental states, the brutality of despotism, a prodigality +of vigorous punishments, the exploitation of the subject, servile +habits, insecurity of property, impoverished production, female +slavery, and the customs of the harem. If the sentiment of obedience +is rooted in the instinct of discipline, sociability, and honor, +you find, as in France, a complete military organization, a superb +administrative hierarchy, a weak public spirit with outbursts of +patriotism, the unhesitating docility of the subject along with +the hot-headedness of the revolutionist, the obsequiousness of the +courtier along with the reserve of the gentleman, the charm of refined +conversation along with home and family bickerings, conjugal equality +together with matrimonial incompatibilities under the necessary +constraints of the law. If, finally, the sentiment of obedience is +rooted in the instinct of subordination and in the idea of duty, you +perceive, as in Germanic nations, the security and contentment of +the household, the firm foundations of domestic life, the slow +and imperfect development of worldly matters, innate respect for +established rank, superstitious reverence for the past, maintenance +of social inequalities, natural and habitual deference to the law. +Similarly in a race, just as there is a difference of aptitude for +general ideas, so will its religion, art, and philosophy be different. +If man is naturally fitted for broader universal conceptions and +inclined at the same time to their derangement, through the nervous +irritability of an over-excited organization, we find, as in India, a +surprising richness of gigantic religious creations, a splendid bloom +of extravagant transparent epics, a strange concatenation of subtle, +imaginative philosophic systems, all so intimately associated and so +interpenetrated with a common sap, that we at once recognize them, by +their amplitude, by their color, and by their disorder, as productions +of the same climate and of the same spirit. If, on the contrary, +the naturally sound and well-balanced man is content to restrict his +conceptions to narrow bounds in order to cast them in more precise +forms, we see, as in Greece, a theology of artists and narrators, +special gods that are soon separated from objects and almost +transformed at once into substantial personages, the sentiment of +universal unity nearly effaced and scarcely maintained in the vague +notion of destiny, a philosophy, rather than subtle and compact, +grandiose and systematic, narrow metaphysically[5] but incomparable +in its logic, sophistry, and morality, a poesy and arts superior to +anything we have seen in lucidity, naturalness, proportion, truth, and +beauty. If, finally, man is reduced to narrow conceptions deprived +of any speculative subtlety, and at the same time finds that he is +absorbed and completely hardened by practical interests, we see, as +in Rome, rudimentary deities, mere empty names, good for denoting the +petty details of agriculture, generation, and the household, veritable +marriage and farming labels, and, therefore, a null or borrowed +mythology, philosophy, and poesy. Here, as elsewhere, comes in the law +of mutual dependencies.[6] A civilization is a living unit, the parts +of which hold together the same as the parts of an organic body. Just +as in an animal, the instincts, teeth, limbs, bones, and muscular +apparatus are bound together in such a way that a variation of one +determines a corresponding variation in the others, and out of which +a skillful naturalist, with a few bits, imagines and reconstructs an +almost complete body, so, in a civilization, do religion, philosophy, +the family scheme, literature and the arts form a system in which +each local change involves a general change, so that an experienced +historian, who studies one portion apart from the others, sees +beforehand and partially predicts the characteristics of the rest. +There is nothing vague in this dependence. The regulation of all this +in the living body consists, first, of the tendency to manifest a +certain primordial type, and, next, the necessity of its possessing +organs which can supply its wants and put itself in harmony with +itself in order to live. The regulation in a civilization consists in +the presence in each great human creation of an elementary productor +equally present in other surrounding creations, that is, some faculty +and aptitude, some efficient and marked disposition, which, with its +own peculiar character, introduces this with that into all operations +in which it takes part, and which, according to its variations, causes +variation in all the works in which it coöperates. + + + + +VII + + +Having reached this point we can obtain a glimpse of the principal +features of human transformations, and can now search for the general +laws which regulate not only events, but classes of events; not only +this religion or that literature, but the whole group of religions or +of literatures. If, for example, it is admitted that a religion is +a metaphysical poem associated with belief; if it is recognized, +besides, that there are certain races and certain environments +in which belief, poetic faculty, and metaphysical faculty display +themselves in common with unwonted vigor; if we consider that +Christianity and Buddhism were developed at periods of grand +systematizations and in the midst of sufferings like the oppression +which stirred up the fanatics of Cevennes; if, on the other hand, it +is recognized that primitive religions are born at the dawn of human +reason, during the richest expansion of human imagination, at times +of the greatest naïveté and of the greatest credulity; if we consider, +again, that Mohammedanism appeared along with the advent of poetic +prose and of the conception of material unity, amongst a people +destitute of science and at the moment of a sudden development of the +intellect--we might conclude that religion is born and declines, is +reformed and transformed, according as circumstances fortify and bring +together, with more or less precision and energy, its three generative +instincts; and we would then comprehend why religion is endemic in +India among specially exalted imaginative and philosophic intellects; +why it blooms out so wonderfully and so grandly in the Middle Ages, +in an oppressive society, amongst new languages and literature; why +it develops again in the sixteenth century with a new character and an +heroic enthusiasm, at the time of an universal renaissance and at the +awakening of the Germanic races; why it swarms out in so many bizarre +sects in the rude democracy of America and under the bureaucratic +despotism of Russia; why, in fine, it is seen spreading out in the +Europe of to-day in such different proportions and with such special +traits, according to such differences of race and of civilizations. +And so for every kind of human production, for letters, music, the +arts of design, philosophy, the sciences, state industries, and +the rest. Each has some moral tendency for its direct cause, or a +concurrence of moral tendencies; given the cause, it appears; the +cause withdrawn, it disappears; the weakness or intensity of the cause +is the measure of its own weakness or intensity. It is bound to +that like any physical phenomenon to its condition, like dew to the +chilliness of a surrounding atmosphere, like dilatation to heat. +Couples exist in the moral world as they exist in the physical world, +as rigorously linked together and as universally diffused. Whatever +in one case produces, alters, or suppresses the first term, produces, +alters, and suppresses the second term as a necessary consequence. +Whatever cools the surrounding atmosphere causes the fall of dew. +Whatever develops credulity, along with poetic conceptions of the +universe, engenders religion. Thus have things come about, and +thus will they continue to come about. As soon as the adequate and +necessary condition of one of these vast apparitions becomes known to +us our mind has a hold on the future as well as on the past. We can +confidently state under what circumstances it will reappear, foretell +without rashness many portions of its future history, and sketch with +precaution some of the traits of its ulterior development. + + + + +VIII + + +History has reached this point at the present day, or rather it is +nearly there, on the threshold of this inquest. The question as now +stated is this: Given a literature, a philosophy, a society, an art, +a certain group of arts, what is the moral state of things which +produces it? And what are the conditions of race, epoch, and +environment the best adapted to produce this moral state? There is +a distinct moral state for each of these formations and for each of +their branches; there is one for art in general as well as for each +particular art; for architecture, painting, sculpture, music, and +poetry, each with a germ of its own in the large field of human +psychology; each has its own law, and it is by virtue of this law that +we see each shoot up, apparently haphazard, singly and alone, amidst +the miscarriages of their neighbors, like painting in Flanders and +Holland in the seventeenth century, like poetry in England in the +sixteenth century, like music in Germany in the eighteenth century. +At this moment, and in these countries, the conditions for one art and +not for the others are fulfilled, and one branch only has bloomed out +amidst the general sterility. It is these laws of human vegetation +which history must now search for; it is this special psychology of +each special formation which must be got at; it is the composition of +a complete table of these peculiar conditions that must now be worked +out. There is nothing more delicate and nothing more difficult. +Montesquieu undertook it, but in his day the interest in history was +too recent for him to be successful; nobody, indeed, had any idea +of the road that was to be followed, and even at the present day +we scarcely begin to obtain a glimpse of it. Just as astronomy, at +bottom, is a mechanical problem, and physiology, likewise, a chemical +problem, so is history, at bottom, a _problem of psychology_. There is +a particular system of inner impressions and operations which fashions +the artist, the believer, the musician, the painter, the nomad, +the social man; for each of these, the filiation, intensity, and +interdependence of ideas and of emotions are different; each has his +own moral history, and his own special organization, along with some +master tendency and with some dominant trait. To explain each of these +would require a chapter devoted to a profound internal analysis, and +that is a work that can scarcely be called sketched out at the present +day. But one man, Stendhal, through a certain turn of mind and a +peculiar education, has attempted it, and even yet most of his readers +find his works paradoxical and obscure. His talent and ideas were +too premature. His admirable insight, his profound sayings carelessly +thrown out, the astonishing precision of his notes and logic, were not +understood; people were not aware that, under the appearances and +talk of a man of the world, he explained the most complex of internal +mechanisms; that his finger touched the great mainspring, that he +brought scientific processes to bear in the history of the heart, the +art of employing figures, of decomposing, of deducing, that he was the +first to point out fundamental causes such as nationalities, climates, +and temperaments, in short, that he treated sentiments as they should +be treated, that is to say, as a naturalist and physicist, by making +classifications and estimating forces. On account of all this he +was pronounced dry and eccentric and allowed to live in isolation, +composing novels, books of travel and taking notes, for which he +counted upon, and has obtained, about a dozen or so of readers. And +yet his works are those in which we of the present day may find the +most satisfactory efforts that have been made to clear the road I have +just striven to describe. Nobody has taught one better how to observe +with one's own eyes, first, to regard humanity around us and life as +it is, and next, old and authentic documents, how to read more than +merely the black and white of the page, how to detect under old print +and the scrawl of the text the veritable sentiment and the train +of thought, the mental state in which the words were penned. In his +writings, as in those of Sainte Beuve and in those of the German +critics the reader will find how much is to be derived from a literary +document, if this document is rich and we know how to interpret it, +we will find in the psychology of a particular soul, often that of an +age, and sometimes that of a race. In this respect, a great poem, a +good novel, the confessions of a superior man, are more instructive +than a mass of historians and histories, I would give fifty volumes +of charters and a hundred diplomatic files for the memoirs of Cellini, +the epistles of Saint Paul, the table talk of Luther, or the comedies +of Aristophanes. Herein lies the value of literary productions. They +are instructive because they are beautiful, their usefulness increases +with their perfection and if they provide us with documents, it is +because they are monuments. The more visible a book renders sentiments +the more literary it is, for it is the special office of literature to +take note of sentiments. The more important the sentiments noted in a +book the higher its rank in literature, for it is by representing what +sort of a life a nation or an epoch leads, that a writer rallies to +himself the sympathies of a nation or of an epoch. Hence, among the +documents which bring before our eyes the sentiments of preceding +generations, a literature, and especially a great literature, is +incomparably the best. It resembles those admirable instruments of +remarkable sensitiveness which physicists make use of to detect and +measure the most profound and delicate changes that occur in a human +body. There is nothing approaching this in constitutions or religions; +the articles of a code or of a catechism do no more than depict mind +in gross and without finesse; if there are any documents which show +life and spirit in politics and in creeds, they are the eloquent +discourses of the pulpit and the tribune, memoirs and personal +confessions, all belonging to literature, so that, outside of itself, +literature embodies whatever is good elsewhere. It is mainly in +studying literatures that we are able to produce moral history, and +arrive at some knowledge of the psychological laws on which events +depend. + +I have undertaken to write a history of a literature and to ascertain +the psychology of a people; in selecting this one, it is not without +a motive. A people had to be taken possessing a vast and complete +literature, which is rarely found. There are few nations which, +throughout their existence, have thought and written well in the full +sense of the word. Among the ancients, Latin literature is null at the +beginning, and afterward borrowed and an imitation. Among the moderns, +German literature is nearly a blank for two centuries.[7] Italian and +Spanish literatures come to an end in the middle of the seventeenth +century. Ancient Greece, and modern France and England, alone offer a +complete series of great and expressive monuments. I have chosen +the English because, as this still exists and is open to direct +observation, it can be better studied than that of an extinct +civilization of which fragments only remain; and because, being +different, it offers better than that of France very marked +characteristics in the eyes of a Frenchman. Moreover, outside of +what is peculiar to English civilization, apart from a spontaneous +development, it presents a forced deviation due to the latest and most +effective conquest to which the country was subject; the three given +conditions out of which it issues--race, climate, and the Norman +conquest--are clearly and distinctly visible in its literary +monuments; so that we study in this history the two most potent motors +of human transformation, namely, nature and constraint, and we study +them, without any break or uncertainty, in a series of authentic and +complete monuments. I have tried to define these primitive motors, to +show their gradual effects, and explain how their insensible operation +has brought religious and literary productions into full light, and +how the inward mechanism is developed by which the barbarous Saxon +became the Englishman of the present day. + + +[Footnote A: Hippolyte Adolphe Taine (b. 1828; d. 1893) was one of the +most distinguished French critics of the nineteenth century. He held +the chair of esthetics at the Ècole des Beaux Arts, and wrote a +large number of works in history, travel, and literary criticism. +His "History of English Literature" is the most brilliant book on +the subject ever written by a foreigner, and in this introduction he +expounds the method of criticism which has come to be associated +with his name, and in accordance with which he seeks to interpret the +characteristics of English authors.] + +[Footnote 1: Darwin, "The Origin of Species." Prosper Lucas, "De +l'Hérédité."] + +[Footnote 2: Spinosa, "Ethics," part iv., axiom.] + +[Footnote 3: For this scale of coordinate effects consult, "Langues +Sémitiques," by Renan, ch I, "Comparison des civilizations Grecque +et Romaine," vol I, ch I, 3d ed, by Mommsen, "Consequences de la +démocratie," vol III., by Tocqueville.] + +[Footnote 4: "L'Esprit des Lois," by Montesquieu; the essential +principles of the three governments.] + +[Footnote 5: The birth of the Alexandrine philosophy is due to contact +with the Orient. Aristotle's metaphysical views stand alone. Moreover, +with him as with Plato, they afford merely a glimpse. By way of +contrast see systematic power in Plotinus, Proclus, Schelling, and +Hegel, or again in the admirable boldness of Brahmanic and Buddhist +speculation.] + +[Footnote 6: I have very often made attempts to state this law, +especially in the preface to "Essais de Critique et d'Histoire."] + +[Footnote 7: From 1550 to 1750.] + + + + +_Planned and Designed at The Collier Press By William Patten_ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books +with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations, by Charles W. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + diff --git a/old/old/13182-8.zip b/old/old/13182-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4317480 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/old/13182-8.zip diff --git a/old/old/13182.txt b/old/old/13182.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..df3c4ef --- /dev/null +++ b/old/old/13182.txt @@ -0,0 +1,17220 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books with +Introductions, Notes and Illustrations, by Charles W. Eliot + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books + with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations + +Author: Charles W. Eliot + +Release Date: August 15, 2004 [EBook #13182] +Last Updated: March 21, 2018 + + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PREFACES AND PROLOGUES *** + + + + +Produced by Leah Moser and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team +from images provided by the Million Book Project, + + + + + + +[Illustration: _Hippolyte Adolphe Taine From the etching by Asher B. +Durand_] + +THE HARVARD CLASSICS EDITED BY CHARLES W. ELIOT LL.D. + + +PREFACES AND PROLOGUES TO FAMOUS BOOKS + +WITH INTRODUCTIONS, NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS + +[Illustration] + +"DR. ELIOT'S FIVE-FOOT SHELF OF BOOKS" + + +P.F. COLLIER & SON + +NEW YORK + +1909 BY LITTLE BROWN & COMPANY + +1910 BY P.F. COLLIER & SON + + + + +CONTENTS + + + TITLE, PROLOGUE AND EPILOGUES TO THE RECUYELL OF THE + HISTORIES OF TROY WILLIAM CAXTON + + EPILOGUE TO DICTES AND SAYINGS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS + WILLIAM CAXTON + + PROLOGUE TO GOLDEN LEGEND WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO CATON WILLIAM CAXTON + EPILOGUE TO AESOP WILLIAM CAXTON + PROEM TO CHAUCER'S CANTERBURY TALES WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO MALORY'S KING ARTHUR WILLIAM CAXTON + PROLOGUE TO VIRGIL'S ENEYDOS WILLIAM CAXTON + + DEDICATION OF THE INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION + JOHN CALVIN + TRANSLATED BY JOHN ALLEN + + DEDICATION OF THE REVOLUTIONS OF THE HEAVENLY BODIES + NICOLAUS COPERNICUS + + PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION IN SCOTLAND + JOHN KNOX + + PREFATORY LETTER TO SIR WALTER RALEIGH ON THE FAERIE + QUEENE EDMUND SPENSER + + PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD SIR WALTER RALEIGH + + PROOEMIUM, EPISTLE DEDICATORY, PREFACE, AND PLAN OF THE + INSTAURATIO MAGNA, ETC. FRANCIS BACON + TRANSLATION EDITED BY J. SPEDDING + + PREFACE TO THE NOVUM ORGANUM FRANCIS BACON + + PREFACE TO THE FIRST FOLIO EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE'S + PLAYS HEMINGE AND CONDELL + + PREFACE TO THE PHILOSOPHIAE NATURALIS PRINCIPIA + MATHEMATICA SIR ISAAC NEWTON + TRANSLATED BY ANDREW MOTTE + + PREFACE TO FABLES, ANCIENT AND MODERN + JOHN DRYDEN + + PREFACE TO JOSEPH ANDREWS HENRY FIELDING + PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH DICTIONARY SAMUEL JOHNSON + PREFACE TO SHAKESPEARE SAMUEL JOHNSON + INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPYLAeEN J.W. VON GOETHE + + PREFACES TO VARIOUS VOLUMES OF POEMS + WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO PREFACE WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + + PREFACE TO CROMWELL VICTOR HUGO + PREFACE TO LEAVES OF GRASS WALT WHITMAN + INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE + H.A. TAINE + + + + +_INTRODUCTORY NOTE_ + + +_No part of a book is so intimate as the Preface. Here, after the long +labor of the work is over, the author descends from his platform, and +speaks with his reader as man to man, disclosing his hopes and fears, +seeking sympathy for his difficulties, offering defence or defiance, +according to his temper, against the criticisms which he anticipates. +It thus happens that a personality which has been veiled by a formal +method throughout many chapters, is suddenly seen face to face in the +Preface; and this alone, if there were no other reason, would justify +a volume of Prefaces. + +But there are other reasons why a Preface may be presented apart from +its parent work, and may, indeed, be expected sometimes to survive +it. The Prologues and Epilogues of Caxton were chiefly prefixed to +translations which have long been superseded; but the comments of this +frank and enthusiastic pioneer of the art of printing in England +not only tell us of his personal tastes, but are in a high degree +illuminative of the literary habits and standards of western Europe +in the fifteenth century. Again, modern research has long ago put +Raleigh's "History of the World" out of date; but his eloquent Preface +still gives us a rare picture of the attitude of an intelligent +Elizabethan, of the generation which colonised America, toward the +past, the present, and the future worlds. Bacon's "Great Restoration" +is no longer a guide to scientific method; but his prefatory +statements as to his objects and hopes still offer a lofty +inspiration. + +And so with the documents here drawn from the folios of Copernicus and +Calvin, with the criticism of Dryden and Wordsworth and Hugo, with +Dr. Johnson's Preface to his great Dictionary, with the astounding +manifesto of a new poetry from Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass"--each +of them has a value and significance independent now of the work which +it originally introduced, and each of them presents to us a man._ + + + + +PREFACES AND EPILOGUES + +BY WILLIAM CAXTON[A] + + + + +THE RECUYELL OF THE HISTORIES OF TROY + +TITLE AND PROLOGUE TO BOOK I + + +Here beginneth the volume entitled and named the Recuyell of the +Histories of Troy, composed and drawn out of divers books of Latin +into French by the right venerable person and worshipful man, Raoul le +Feure, priest and chaplain unto the right noble, glorious, and mighty +prince in his time, Philip, Duke of Burgundy, of Brabant, etc. in the +year of the Incarnation of our Lord God a thousand four hundred sixty +and four, and translated and drawn out of French into English by +William Caxton, mercer, of the city of London, at the commandment of +the right high, mighty, and virtuous Princess, his redoubted Lady, +Margaret, by the grace of God Duchess of Burgundy, of Lotrylk, of +Brabant, etc.; which said translation and work was begun in Bruges +in the County of Flanders, the first day of March, the year of the +Incarnation of our said Lord God a thousand four hundred sixty and +eight, and ended and finished in the holy city of Cologne the 19th day +of September, the year of our said Lord God a thousand four hundred +sixty and eleven, etc. + +And on that other side of this leaf followeth the prologue. + +When I remember that every man is bounden by the commandment and +counsel of the wise man to eschew sloth and idleness, which is +mother and nourisher of vices, and ought to put myself unto virtuous +occupation and business, then I, having no great charge of occupation, +following the said counsel took a French book, and read therein many +strange and marvellous histories, wherein I had great pleasure and +delight, as well for the novelty of the same as for the fair language +of French, which was in prose so well and compendiously set and +written, which methought I understood the sentence and substance of +every matter. And for so much as this book was new and late made and +drawn into French, and never had seen it in our English tongue, I +thought in myself it should be a good business to translate it into +our English, to the end that it might be had as well in the royaume +of England as in other lands, and also for to pass therewith the time, +and thus concluded in myself to begin this said work. And forthwith +took pen and ink, and began boldly to run forth as blind Bayard +in this present work, which is named "The Recuyell of the Trojan +Histories." And afterward when I remembered myself of my simpleness +and unperfectness that I had in both languages, that is to wit in +French and in English, for in France was I never, and was born and +learned my English in Kent, in the Weald, where I doubt not is +spoken as broad and rude English as in any place of England; and have +continued by the space of 30 years for the most part in the countries +of Brabant, Flanders, Holland, and Zealand. And thus when all these +things came before me, after that I had made and written five or six +quires I fell in despair of this work, and purposed no more to have +continued therein, and those quires laid apart, and in two years after +laboured no more in this work, and was fully in will to have left it, +till on a time it fortuned that the right high, excellent, and right +virtuous princess, my right redoubted Lady, my Lady Margaret, by +the grace of God sister unto the King of England and of France, +my sovereign lord, Duchess of Burgundy, of Lotryk, of Brabant, of +Limburg, and of Luxembourg, Countess of Flanders, of Artois, and of +Burgundy, Palatine of Hainault, of Holland, of Zealand and of Namur, +Marquesse of the Holy Empire, Lady of Frisia, of Salins and of +Mechlin, sent for me to speak with her good Grace of divers matters, +among the which I let her Highness have knowledge of the foresaid +beginning of this work, which anon commanded me to show the said five +or six quires to her said Grace; and when she had seen them anon she +found a default in my English, which she commanded me to amend, and +moreover commanded me straitly to continue and make an end of the +residue then not translated; whose dreadful commandment I durst in no +wise disobey, because I am a servant unto her said Grace and receive +of her yearly fee and other many good and great benefits, (and also +hope many more to receive of her Highness), but forthwith went and +laboured in the said translation after my simple and poor cunning, +also nigh as I can following my author, meekly beseeching the +bounteous Highness of my said Lady that of her benevolence list to +accept and take in gree this simple and rude work here following; and +if there be anything written or said to her pleasure, I shall think my +labour well employed, and whereas there is default that she arette it +to the simpleness of my cunning which is full small in this behalf; +and require and pray all them that shall read this said work to +correct it, and to hold me excused of the rude and simple translation. + +And thus I end my prologue. + +[Footnote A: William Caxton (1422?-1491), merchant and translator, +learned the art of printing on the Continent, probably at Bruges or +Cologne. He translated "The Recuyell of the Histories of Troy" between +1469 and 1471, and, on account of the great demand for copies, was led +to have it printed--the first English book to be reproduced by this +means. The date was about 1474; the place, probably Bruges. In +1476, Caxton came back to England, and set up a press of his own at +Westminster. In 1477, he issued the first book known to have been +printed in England, "The Dictes and Sayings of the Philosophers." +The following Prefaces and Epilogues from Caxton's own pen show his +attitude towards some of the more important of the works that issued +from his press.] + + + + +EPILOGUE TO BOOK II + + +Thus endeth the second book of the Recule of the Histories of Troy. +Which bookes were late translated into French out of Latin by the +labour of the venerable person Raoul le Feure, priest, as afore +is said; and by me indigne and unworthy, translated into this rude +English by the commandment of my said redoubted Lady, Duchess of +Burgundy. And for as much as I suppose the said two books be not had +before this time in our English language, therefore I had the better +will to accomplish this said work; which work was begun in Bruges +and continued in Ghent and finished in Cologne, in the time of the +troublous world, and of the great divisions being and reigning, as +well in the royaumes of England and France as in all other places +universally through the world; that is to wit the year of our Lord a +thousand four hundred seventy one. And as for the third book, which +treateth of the general and last destruction of Troy, it needeth +not to translate it into English, for as much as that worshipful and +religious man, Dan John Lidgate, monk of Bury, did translate it but +late; after whose work I fear to take upon me, that am not worthy to +bear his penner and ink-horn after him, to meddle me in that work. +But yet for as much as I am bound to contemplate my said Lady's good +grace, and also that his work is in rhyme and as far as I know it is +not had in prose in our tongue, and also, peradventure, he translated +after some other author than this is; and yet for as much as divers +men be of divers desires, some to read in rhyme and metre and some +in prose; and also because that I have now good leisure, being in +Cologne, and have none other thing to do at this time; in eschewing +of idleness, mother of all vices, I have delibered in myself for the +contemplation of my said redoubted lady to take this labour in hand, +by the sufferance and help of Almighty God; whom I meekly supplye to +give me grace to accomplish it to the pleasure of her that is causer +thereof, and that she receive it in gree of me, her faithful, true, +and most humble servant etc. + + + + +EPILOGUE TO BOOK III + + +Thus end I this book, which I have translated after mine Author as +nigh as God hath given me cunning, to whom be given the laud and +praising. And for as much as in the writing of the same my pen is +worn, my hand weary and not steadfast, mine eyne dimmed with overmuch +looking on the white paper, and my courage not so prone and ready to +labour as it hath been, and that age creepeth on me daily and feebleth +all the body, and also because I have promised to divers gentlemen and +to my friends to address to them as hastily as I might this said book, +therefore I have practised and learned at my great charge and dispense +to ordain this said book in print, after the manner and form as ye may +here see, and is not written with pen and ink as other books be, to +the end that every man may have them at once. For all the books of +this story, named "The Recule of the Histories of Troy" thus imprinted +as ye here see, were begun in one day and also finished in one day, +which book I have presented to my said redoubted Lady, as afore +is said. And she hath well accepted it, and largely rewarded me, +wherefore I beseech Almighty God to reward her everlasting bliss after +this life, praying her said Grace and all them that shall read this +book not to disdain the simple and rude work, neither to reply against +the saying of the matters touched in this book, though it accord not +unto the translation of others which have written it. For divers men +have made divers books which in all points accord not, as Dictes, +Dares, and Homer. For Dictes and Homer, as Greeks, say and write +favorably for the Greeks, and give to them more worship than to the +Trojans; and Dares writeth otherwise than they do. And also as for the +proper names, it is no wonder that they accord not, for some one name +in these days have divers equivocations after the countries that they +dwell in; but all accord in conclusion the general destruction of that +noble city of Troy, and the death of so many noble princes, as +kings, dukes, earls, barons, knights, and common people, and the ruin +irreparable of that city that never since was re-edified; which may be +example to all men during the world how dreadful and jeopardous it is +to begin a war and what harms, losses, and death followeth. Therefore +the Apostle saith: "All that is written is written to our doctrine," +which doctrine for the common weal I beseech God may be taken in such +place and time as shall be most needful in increasing of peace, +love, and charity; which grant us He that suffered for the same to be +crucified on the rood tree. And say we all Amen for charity! + + + + +DICTES AND SAYINGS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS + +FIRST EDITION (1477). EPILOGUE + + +Here endeth the book named _The Dictes or Sayings of the +Philosophers_, imprinted by me, William Caxton, at Westminster, the +year of our Lord 1477. Which book is late translated out of French +into English by the noble and puissant Lord Lord Antony, Earl of +Rivers, Lord of Scales and of the Isle of Wight, defender and director +of the siege apostolic for our holy father the Pope in this royaume of +England, and governor of my Lord Prince of Wales. And it is so that at +such time as he had accomplished this said work, it liked him to send +it to me in certain quires to oversee, which forthwith I saw, +and found therein many great, notable, and wise sayings of the +philosophers, according unto the books made in French which I had +often before read; but certainly I had seen none in English until that +time. And so afterward I came unto my said Lord, and told him how I +had read and seen his book, and that he had done a meritorious deed in +the labour of the translation thereof into our English tongue, wherein +he had deserved a singular laud and thanks, &c. Then my said Lord +desired me to oversee it, and where I should find fault to correct it; +whereon I answered unto his Lordship that I could not amend it, but +if I should so presume I might apaire it, for it was right well +and cunningly made and translated into right good and fair English. +Notwithstanding, he willed me to oversee it, and shewed me divers +things, which, as seemed to him, might be left out, as divers letters, +missives sent from Alexander to Darius and Aristotle, and each to +other, which letters were little appertinent unto dictes and sayings +aforesaid, forasmuch as they specify of other matters. And also +desired me, that done, to put the said book in imprint. And thus +obeying his request and commandment, I have put me in devoir to +oversee this his said book, and behold as nigh as I could how it +accordeth with the original, being in French. And I find nothing +discordant therein, save only in the dictes and sayings of Socrates, +wherein I find that my said Lord hath left out certain and divers +conclusions touching women. Whereof I marvel that my Lord hath not +written them, ne what hath moved him so to do, ne what cause he had at +that time; but I suppose that some fair lady hath desired him to leave +it out of his book; or else he was amorous on some noble lady, for +whose love he would not set it in his book; or else for the very +affection, love, and good will that he hath unto all ladies and +gentlewomen, he thought that Socrates spared the sooth and wrote of +women more than truth; which I cannot think that so true a man and so +noble a philosopher as Socrates was should write otherwise than truth. +For if he had made fault in writing of women, he ought not, ne should +not, be believed in his other dictes and sayings. But I perceive that +my said Lord knoweth verily that such defaults be not had ne found in +the women born and dwelling in these parts ne regions of the world. +Socrates was a Greek, born in a far country from hence, which country +is all of other conditions than this is, and men and women of +other nature than they be here in this country. For I wot well, of +whatsoever condition women be in Greece, the women of this country be +right good, wise, pleasant, humble, discreet, sober, chaste, obedient +to their husbands, true, secret, steadfast, ever busy, and never idle, +attemperate in speaking, and virtuous in all their works--or at least +should be so. For which causes so evident my said Lord, as I suppose, +thought it was not of necessity to set in his book the sayings of his +author Socrates touching women. But forasmuch as I had commandment of +my said Lord to correct and amend where I should find fault, and other +find I none save that he hath left out these dictes and sayings of the +women of Greece, therefore in accomplishing his commandment--forasmuch +as I am not certain whether it was in my Lord's copy or not, or else, +peradventure, that the wind had blown over the leaf at the time of +translation of his book--I purpose to write those same sayings of that +Greek Socrates, which wrote of the women of Greece and nothing of them +of this royaume, whom, I suppose, he never knew; for if he had, I dare +plainly say that he would have reserved them specially in his said +dictes. Always not presuming to put and set them in my said Lord's +book but in the end apart in the rehearsal of the works, humbly +requiring all them that shall read this little rehearsal, that if they +find any fault to arette it to Socrates, and not to me, which writeth +as hereafter followeth. + +Socrates said that women be the apparels to catch men, but they take +none but them that will be poor or else them that know them not. +And he said that there is none so great empechement unto a man as +ignorance and women. And he saw a woman that bare fire, of whom he +said that the hotter bore the colder. And he saw a woman sick, of whom +he said that the evil resteth and dwelleth with the evil. And he saw +a woman brought to the justice, and many other women followed her +weeping, of whom he said the evil be sorry and angry because the evil +shall perish. And he saw a young maid that learned to write, of whom +he said that men multiplied evil upon evil. And he said that the +ignorance of a man is known in three things, that is to wit, when he +hath no thought to use reason; when he cannot refrain his covetise; +and when he is governed by the counsel of women, in that he knoweth +that they know not. And he said unto his disciples: "Will ye that I +enseign and teach you how ye shall now escape from all evil?" And they +answered, "Yea." And then he said to them, "For whatsoever thing that +it be, keep you and be well ware that ye obey not women." Who answered +to him again, "And what sayest thou by our good mothers, and of our +sisters?" He said to them, "Suffice you with that I have said to you, +for all be semblable in malice." And he said, "Whosoever will acquire +and get science, let him never put him in the governance of a woman." +And he saw a woman that made her fresh and gay, to whom he said, "Thou +resemblest the fire; for the more wood is laid to the fire the more +will it burn, and the greater is the heat." And on a time one asked +him what him semed of women; he answered that the women resemble a +tree called Edelfla, which is the fairest tree to behold and see +that may be, but within it is full of venom. And they said to him and +demanded wherefore he blamed so women? and that he himself had +not come into this world, ne none other men also, without them. He +answered, "The woman is like unto a tree named Chassoygnet, on which +tree there be many things sharp and pricking, which hurt and prick +them that approach unto it; and yet, nevertheless, that same tree +bringeth forth good dates and sweet." And they demanded him why he +fled from the women? And he answered, "Forasmuch as I see them flee +and eschew the good and commonly do evil." And a woman said to him, +"Wilt thou have any other woman than me?" And he answered to her, "Art +not ashamed to offer thyself to him that demandeth nor desireth thee +not?" + +So, these be the dictes and sayings of the philosopher Socrates, which +he wrote in his book; and certainly he wrote no worse than afore +is rehearsed. And forasmuch as it is accordant that his dictes and +sayings should be had as well as others', therefore I have set it in +the end of this book. And also some persons, peradventure, that have +read this book in French would have arette a great default in me that +I had not done my devoir in visiting and overseeing of my Lord's +book according to his desire. And some other also, haply, might have +supposed that Socrates had written much more ill of women than here +afore is specified, wherefore in satisfying of all parties, and also +for excuse of the said Socrates, I have set these said dictes and +sayings apart in the end of this book, to the intent that if my said +lord or any other person, whatsoever he or she be that shall read or +hear it, that if they be not well pleased withal, that they with a pen +race it out, or else rend the leaf out of the book. Humbly requiring +and beseeching my said lord to take no displeasure on me so presuming, +but to pardon whereas he shall find fault; and that it please him to +take the labour of the imprinting in gree and thanks, which gladly +have done my diligence in the accomplishing of his desire and +commandment; in which I am bounden so to do for the good reward that +I have received of his said lordship; whom I beseech Almighty God to +increase and to continue in his virtuous disposition in this world, +and after this life to live everlastingly in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +GOLDEN LEGEND. + +FIRST EDITION (1483). PROLOGUE + + +The Holy and blessed doctor Saint Jerome saith this authority, "Do +always some good work to the end that the devil find thee not Idle." +And the holy doctor Saint Austin saith in the book of the labour of +monks, that no man strong or mighty to labour ought to be idle; for +which cause when I had performed and accomplished divers works and +histories translated out of French into English at the request of +certain lords, ladies, and gentlemen, as the Recuyel of the History of +Troy, the Book of the Chess, the History of Jason, the history of +the Mirror of the World, the 15 books of Metamorphoses in which be +contained the fables of Ovid, and the History of Godfrey of Boulogne +in the conquest of Jerusalem, with other divers works and books, I +ne wist what work to begin and put forth after the said works to-fore +made. And forasmuch as idleness is so much blamed, as saith Saint +Bernard, the mellifluous doctor, that she is mother of lies and +step-dame of virtues, and it is she that overthroweth strong men into +sin, quencheth virtue, nourisheth pride, and maketh the way ready to +go to hell; and John Cassiodorus saith that the thought of him that is +idle thinketh on none other thing but on licorous meats and viands for +his belly; and the holy Saint Bernard aforesaid saith in an epistle, +when the time shall come that it shall behove us to render and give +accounts of our idle time, what reason may we render or what answer +shall we give when in idleness is none excuse; and Prosper saith that +whosoever liveth in idleness liveth in manner of a dumb beast. And +because I have seen the authorities that blame and despise so much +idleness, and also know well that it is one of the capital and deadly +sins much hateful unto God, therefore I have concluded and firmly +purposed in myself no more to be idle, but will apply myself to labour +and such occupation as I have been accustomed to do. And forasmuch as +Saint Austin aforesaid saith upon a psalm that good work ought not to +be done for fear of pain, but for the love of righteousness, and that +it be of very and sovereign franchise, and because me-seemeth to be +a sovereign weal to incite and exhort men and women to keep them from +sloth and idleness, and to let to be understood to such people as be +not lettered the nativities, the lives, the passions, the miracles, +and the death of the holy saints, and also some other notorious deeds +and acts of times past, I have submised myself to translate into +English the legend of Saints, which is called _Legenda Aurea_ in +Latin, that is to say, the _Golden Legend_; for in like wise as gold +is most noble above all other metals, in like wise is this legend +holden most noble above all other works. Against me here might some +persons say that this legend hath been translated before, and truth it +is; but forasmuch as I had by me a legend in French, another in Latin, +and the third in English, which varied in many and divers places, and +also many histories were comprised in the two other books which were +not in the English books; and therefore I have written one out of the +said three books, which I have ordered otherwise than the said English +legend is, which was so to-fore made, beseeching all them that shall +see or hear it read to pardon me where I have erred or made fault, +which, if any be, is of ignorance and against my will; and submit it +wholly of such as can and may, to correct it, humbly beseeching them +so to do, and in so doing they shall deserve a singular laud and +merit; and I shall pray for them unto Almighty God that He of His +benign grace reward them, etc., and that it profit to all them that +shall read or hear it read, and may increase in them virtue, and +expel vice and sin, that by the example of the holy saints amend their +living here in this short life, that by their merits they and I may +come to everlasting life and bliss in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +CATON (1483) + +PROLOGUE + + +Here beginneth the prologue of proem of the book called _Caton_, which +book hath been translated into English by Master Benet Burgh, +late Archdeacon of Cochester, and high canon of St. Stephen's at +Westminster, which ful craftily hath made it in ballad royal for the +erudition of my lord Bousher, son and heir at that time to my lord the +Earl of Essex. And because of late came to my hand a book of the said +Cato in French, which rehearseth many a fair learning and notable +examples, I have translated it out of French into English, as all +along hereafter shall appear, which I present unto the city of London. + +Unto the noble, ancient, and renowned city, the city of London, in +England, I, William Caxton, citizen and conjury of the same, and of +the fraternity and fellowship of the mercery, owe of right my service +and good will, and of very duty am bounden naturally to assist, aid, +and counsel, as far forth as I can to my power, as to my mother of +whom I have received my nurture and living, and shall pray for the +good prosperity and policy of the same during my life. For, as me +seemeth, it is of great need, because I have known it in my young age +much more wealthy, prosperous, and richer, than it is at this day. And +the cause is that there is almost none that intendeth to the common +weal, but only every man for his singular profit Oh! when I remember +the noble Romans, that for the common weal of the city of Rome they +spent not only their moveable goods but they put their bodies and +lives in jeopardy and to the death, as by many a noble example we may +see in the acts of Romans, as of the two noble Scipios, African and +Asian, Actilius, and many others. And among all others the noble Cato, +author and maker of this book, which he hath left for to remain ever +to all the people for to learn in it and to know how every man ought +to rule and govern him in this life, as well for the life temporal as +for the life spiritual. And as in my judgement it is the best book for +to be taught to young children in school, and also to people of every +age, it is full convenient if it be well understood And because I +see that the children that be born within the said city increase, and +profit not like their fathers and elders, but for the most part after +that they be come to their perfect years of discretion and ripeness of +age, how well that their fathers have left to them great quantity of +goods yet scarcely among ten two thrive, [whereas] I have seen and +know in other lands in divers cities that of one name and lineage +successively have endured prosperously many heirs, yea, a five or six +hundred years, and some a thousand; and in this noble city of +London it can unneth continue unto the third heir or scarcely to the +second,--O blessed Lord, when I remember this I am all abashed; I +cannot judge the cause, but fairer ne wiser ne better spoken children +in their youth be nowhere than there be in London, but at their full +ripening there is no kernel ne good corn found, but chaff for the most +part. I wot well there be many noble and wise, and prove well and be +better and richer than ever were their fathers. And to the end that +many might come to honour and worship, I intend to translate this +said book of Cato, in which I doubt not, and if they will read it and +understand they shall much the better con rule themselves thereby; for +among all other books this is a singular book, and may well be called +the regiment or governance of the body and soul. + +There was a noble clerk named Pogius of Florence, and was secretary +to Pope Eugene and also to Pope Nicholas, which had in the city of +Florence a noble and well-stuffed library which all noble strangers +coming to Florence desired to see; and therein they found many noble +and rare books. And when they had asked of him which was the best book +of them all, and that he reputed for best, he said that he held Cato +glosed for the best book of his library. Then since that he that was +so noble a clerk held this book for the best, doubtless it must follow +that this is a noble book and a virtuous, and such one that a man may +eschew all vices and ensue virtue. Then to the end that this said book +may profit unto the hearers of it, I beseech Almighty God that I +may achieve and accomplish it unto his laud and glory, and to the +erudition and learning of them that be ignorant, that they may thereby +profit and be the better. And I require and beseech all such that find +fault or error, that of their charity they correct and amend it, and I +shall heartily pray for them to Almighty God, that he reward them. + + + + +AESOP. (1483) + +EPILOGUE + + +Now then I will finish all these fables with this tale that followeth, +which a worshipful priest and a parson told me lately. He said that +there were dwelling in Oxford two priests, both masters of art, of +whom that one was quick and could put himself forth, and that other +was a good simple priest. And so it happened that the master that was +pert and quick, was anon promoted to a benefice or twain, and after +to prebends and for to be a dean of a great prince's chapel, supposing +and weening that his fellow the simple priest should never have been +promoted, but be alway an Annual, or at the most a parish priest. So +after long time that this worshipful man, this dean, came riding into +a good parish with a ten or twelve horses, like a prelate, and came +into the church of the said parish, and found there this good simple +man sometime his fellow, which came and welcomed him lowly; and that +other bade him "good morrow, master John," and took him slightly by +the hand, and asked him where he dwelt. And the good man said, "In +this parish." "How," said he, "are ye here a soul priest or a parish +priest?" "Nay, sir," said he, "for lack of a better, though I be not +able ne worthy, I am parson and curate of this parish." And then that +other availed his bonnet and said, "Master parson, I pray you to be +not displeased; I had supposed ye had not been beneficed; but master," +said he, "I pray you what is this benefice worth to you a year?" +"Forsooth," said the good simple man, "I wot never, for I make never +accounts thereof how well I have had it four or five years." "And know +ye not," said he, "what it is worth? it should seem a good benefice." +"No, forsooth," said he, "but I wot well what it shall be worth to +me." "Why," said he, "what shall it be worth?" "Forsooth," said he, +"if I do my true diligence in the cure of my parishioners in preaching +and teaching, and do my part longing to my cure, I shall have heaven +therefore; and if their souls be lost, or any of them by my default, I +shall be punished therefore, and hereof am I sure." And with that word +the rich dean was abashed, and thought he should do the better and +take more heed to his cures and benefices than he had done. This was +a good answer of a good priest and an honest. And herewith I +finished this book, translated and printed by me, William Caxton, at +Westminster in the Abbey, and finished the 26th day of March, the year +of our Lord 1484, and the first year of the reign of King Richard the +Third. + + + + +CHAUCER'S CANTERBURY TALES + +Second Edition. (1484) + +PROEM + + +Great thanks, laud, and honour ought to be given unto the clerks, +poets, and historiographs that have written many noble books of +wisedom of the lives, passions, and miracles of holy saints, of +histories of noble and famous acts and faites, and of the chronicles +since the beginning of the creation of the world unto this present +time, by which we be daily informed and have knowledge of many things +of whom we should not have known if they had not left to us their +monuments written. Among whom and in especial before all others, we +ought to give a singular laud unto that noble and great philosopher +Geoffrey Chaucer, the which for his ornate writing in our tongue may +well have the name of a laureate poet. For to-fore that he by labour +embellished, ornated, and made fair our English, in this realm was had +rude speech and incongruous, as yet it appeareth by old books, which +at this day ought not to have place ne be compared among, ne to, his +beauteous volumes and ornate writings, of whom he made many books and +treatises of many a noble history, as well in metre as in rhyme and +prose; and them so craftily made that he comprehended his matters in +short, quick, and high sentences, eschewing prolixity, casting away +the chaff of superfluity, and shewing the picked grain of sentence +uttered by crafty and sugared eloquence; of whom among all others of +his books I purpose to print, by the grace of God, the book of the +tales of Canterbury, in which I find many a noble history of every +state and degree; first rehearsing the conditions and the array of +each of them as properly as possible is to be said. And after their +tales which be of nobleness, wisdom, gentleness, mirth and also of +very holiness and virtue, wherein he finisheth this said book, which +book I have diligently overseen and duly examined, to that end it be +made according unto his own making. For I find many of the said books +which writers have abridged it, and many things left out; and in some +place have set certain verses that he never made ne set in his book; +of which books so incorrect was one brought to me, 6 years past, which +I supposed had been very true and correct; and according to the same I +did so imprint a certain number of them, which anon were sold to many +and divers gentlemen, of whom one gentleman came to me and said that +this book was not according in many place unto the book that Geoffrey +Chaucer had made. To whom I answered that I had made it according to +my copy, and by me was nothing added ne minished. Then he said he knew +a book which his father had and much loved, that was very true and +according unto his own first book by him made; and said more, if +I would imprint it again he would get me the same book for a copy, +howbeit he wist well that his father would not gladly depart from it. +To whom I said, in case that he could get me such a book, true and +correct, yet I would once endeavour me to imprint it again for to +satisfy the author, whereas before by ignorance I erred in hurting and +defaming his book in divers places, in setting in some things that he +never said ne made, and leaving out many things that he made which +be requisite to be set in it. And thus we fell at accord, and he full +gently got of his father the said book and delivered it to me, by +which I have corrected my book, as hereafter, all along by the aid of +Almighty God, shall follow; whom I humbly beseech to give me grace and +aid to achieve and accomplish to his laud, honour, and glory; and +that all ye that shall in this book read or hear, will of your charity +among your deeds of mercy remember the soul of the said Geoffrey +Chaucer, first author and maker of this book. And also that all we +that shall see and read therein may so take and understand the good +and virtuous tales, that it may so profit unto the health of our souls +that after this short and transitory life we may come to everlasting +life in Heaven. Amen. + +BY WILLIAM CAXTON + + + + +MALORY'S KING ARTHUR. (1485) + +PROLOGUE + + +After that I had accomplished and finished divers histories, as well +of contemplation as of other historical and worldly acts of great +conquerors and princes, and also certain books of ensamples and +doctrine, many noble and divers gentlemen of this realm of England +came and demanded me many and oft times wherefore that I have not done +made and printed the noble history of the Saint Graal, and of the most +renowned Christian King, first and chief of the three best Christian +and worthy, Arthur, which ought most to be remembered among us +Englishmen before all other Christian Kings. For it is notoyrly known +through the universal world that there be nine worthy and the best +that ever were; that is to wit three Paynims, three Jews, and three +Christian men. As for the Paynims, they were to-fore the Incarnation +of Christ, which were named--the first, Hector of Troy, of whom the +history is come both in ballad and in prose--the second, Alexander +the Great; and the third, Julius Caesar, Emperor of Rome, of whom the +histories be well known and had. And as for the three Jews, which also +were before the Incarnation of our Lord of whom the first was Duke +Joshua, which brought the children of Israel into the land of behest; +the second, David, King of Jerusalem; and the third Judas Maccabaeus; +of these three the Bible rehearseth all their noble histories and +acts. And since the said Incarnation have been three noble Christian +men, installed and admitted through the universal world into the +number of the nine best and worthy, of whom was first the noble +Arthur, whose noble acts I purpose to write in this present book here +following. The second was Charlemagne, or Charles the Great, of whom +the history is had in many places both in French and English; and the +third and last was Godfrey of Boulogne, of whose acts and life I made +a book unto the excellent prince and king of noble memory, King Edward +the Fourth. The said noble gentlemen instantly required me to print +the history of the said noble king and conqueror, King Arthur, and of +his knights, with the history of the Saint Graal, and of the death and +ending of the said Arthur, affirming that I ought rather to print his +acts and noble feats than of Godfrey of Boulogne or any of the other +eight, considering that he was a man born within this realm, and king +and emperor of the same; and that there be in French divers and many +noble volumes of his acts, and also of his knights. To whom I answered +that divers men hold opinion that there was no such Arthur, and that +all such books as be made of him be but feigned and fables, because +that some chronicles make of him no mention, ne remember him nothing +ne of his knights; whereto they answered, and one in special said, +that in him that should say or think that there was never such a king +called Arthur, might well be aretted great folly and blindness; for he +said that there were many evidences of the contrary. First ye may +see his sepulchre in the monastery of Glastonbury; and also in +'Polychronicon,' in the fifth book, the sixth chapter, and in the +seventh book, the twenty-third chapter, where his body was buried, and +after found and translated into the said monastery. Ye shall see also +in the history of Boccaccio, in his book 'De casu principum,' part +of his noble acts and also of his fall. Also Galfridus in his British +book recounteth his life, and in divers places of England many +remembrances be yet of him, and shall remain perpetually, and also +of his knights. First in the Abbey of Westminster at Saint Edward's +shrine remaineth the print of his seal in red wax closed in beryl, +in which is written 'Patricius Arthurus, Britanniae Galliae Germaniae +Daciae Imperator.' Item, in the castle of Dover ye may see Gawain's +skull and Caradoc's mantle; at Winchester the round table; in other +places Lancelot's sword, and many other things. Then all these things +considered, there can no man reasonably gainsay but here was a king of +this land named Arthur; for in all places, Christian and heathen, he +is reputed and taken for one of the nine worthy, and the first of the +three Christian men. And also he is more spoken of beyond the sea; +more books made of his noble acts than there be in England, as well +in Dutch, Italian, Spanish, and Greek as in French; and yet of record +remain in witness of him in Wales in the town of Camelot the great +stones and marvellous works of iron lying under the ground, and royal +vaults, which divers now living hath seen. Wherefore it is a marvel +why he is no more renowned in his own country, save only it accordeth +to the word of God, which saith that no man is accepted for a prophet +in his own country. Then all these things aforesaid alleged, I could +not well deny but that there was such a noble king named Arthur, and +reputed one of the nine worthy, and first and chief of the Christian +men; and many noble volumes be made of him and of his noble knights in +French, which I have seen and read beyond the sea, which be not had +in our maternal tongue, but in Welsh be many, and also in French, and +some in English, but nowhere nigh all. Wherefore such as have lately +been drawn out briefly into English, I have, after the simple cunning +that God hath sent to me, under the favour and correction of all noble +lords and gentlemen, emprised to imprint a book of the noble histories +of the said King Arthur and of certain of his knights, after a copy +unto me delivered, which copy Sir Thomas Mallory did take out of +certain books of French and reduced it into English. And I according +to my copy have down set it in print, to the intent that noble men +may see and learn the noble acts of chivalry, the gentle and virtuous +deeds that some knights used in those days, by which they came to +honour, and how they that were vicious were punished and oft put to +shame and rebuke; humbly beseeching all noble lords and ladies and all +other estates, of what estate or degree they be of, that shall see and +read in this said book and work, that they take the good and honest +acts in their remembrance and to follow the same, wherein they shall +find many joyous and pleasant histories and noble and renowned acts +of humanity, gentleness, and chivalry. For herein may be seen +noble chivalry, courtesy, humanity, friendliness, hardyhood, love, +friendship, cowardice, murder, hate, virtue and sin. Do after the good +and leave the evil, and it shall bring you to good fame and renown. +And for to pass the time this book shall be pleasant to read in; +but for to give faith and believe that all is true that is contained +herein, ye be at your liberty. But all is written for our doctrine, +and for to beware that we fall not to vice ne sin, but to exercise and +follow virtue, by which we may come and attain to good fame and renown +in this life, and after this short and transitory life to come unto +everlasting bliss in heaven; the which He grant us that reigneth in +Heaven, the Blessed Trinity. Amen. + +Then to proceed forth in this said book which I direct unto all noble +princes, lords and ladies, gentlemen or gentlewomen, that desire +to read or hear read of the noble and joyous history of the great +conqueror and excellent king, King Arthur, sometime King of this noble +realm then called Britain, I, William Caxton, simple person, present +this book following which I have emprised to imprint. And treateth +of the noble acts, feats of arms, of chivalry, prowess, hardihood, +humanity, love, courtesy, and very gentleness, with many wonderful +histories and adventures. And for to understand briefly the contents +of this volume, I have divided it into 21 books, and every book +chaptered, as hereafter shall by God's grace follow. The first book +shall treat how Uther Pendragon begat the noble conqueror, King +Arthur, and containeth 28 chapters. The second book treateth of Balyn +the noble knight, and containeth 19 chapters. The third book treateth +of the marriage of King Arthur to Queen Guinevere, with other matters, +and containeth 15 chapters. The fourth book how Merlin was assotted, +and of war made to King Arthur, and containeth 29 chapters. The fifth +book treateth of the conquest of Lucius the emperor, and containeth 12 +chapters. The sixth book treateth of Sir Lancelot and Sir Lionel, and +marvellous adventures, and containeth 18 chapters. The seventh book +treateth of a noble knight called Sir Gareth, and named by Sir Kay +'Beaumains,' and containeth 36 chapters. The eighth book treateth +of the birth of Sir Tristram the noble knight, and of his acts, and +containeth 41 chapters. The ninth book treateth of a knight named +by Sir Kay, 'Le cote mal tailie,' and also of Sir Tristram, and +containeth 44 chapters. The tenth book treateth of Sir Tristram, and +other marvellous adventures, and containeth 83 chapters. The eleventh +book treateth of Sir Lancelot and Sir Galahad, and containeth 14 +chapters. The twelfth book treateth of Sir Lancelot and his madness, +and containeth 14 chapters. The thirteenth book treateth how Galahad +came first to King Arthur's court, and the quest how the Sangreal was +begun, and containeth 20 chapters. The fourteenth book treateth of the +quest of the Sangreal, and containeth 10 chapters. The fifteenth book +treateth of Sir Lancelot, and containeth 6 chapters. The sixteenth +book treateth of Sir Boris and Sir Lionel his brother, and containeth +17 chapters. The seventeenth book treateth of the Sangreal, and +containeth 23 chapters. The eighteenth book treateth of Sir Lancelot +and the Queen, and containeth 25 chapters. The nineteenth book +treateth of Queen Guinevere, and Lancelot, and containeth 13 chapters. +The twentieth book treateth of the piteous death of Arthur, and +containeth 22 chapters. The twenty-first book treateth of his last +departing, and how Sir Lancelot came to revenge his death, and +containeth 13 chapters. The sum is 21 books, which contain the sum +of five hundred and seven chapters, as more plainly shall follow +hereafter. + + + + +ENEYDOS (1490) + +PROLOGUE + + +After divers work made, translated, and achieved, having no work in +hand, I sitting in my study whereas lay many divers pamphlets and +books, happened that to my hand came a little book in French, which +lately was translated out of Latin by some noble clerk of France, +which book is named _Aeneidos_, made in Latin by that noble poet and +great clerk, Virgil Which book I saw over, and read therein how, after +the general destruction of the great Troy, Aeneas departed, bearing +his old father Anchises upon his shoulders, his little son Iulus +on his hand, his wife with much other people following, and how he +shipped and departed, with all the history of his adventures that he +had ere he came to the achievement of his conquest of Italy, as all +along shall be shewed in his present book. In which book I had great +pleasure because of the fair and honest terms and words in French; +which I never saw before like, ne none so pleasant ne so well ordered; +which book as seemed to me should be much requisite to noble men to +see, as well for the eloquence as the histories. How well that many +hundred years past was the said book of _Aeneidos_, with other works, +made and learned daily in schools, especially in Italy and other +places; which history the said Virgil made in metre. And when I had +advised me in this said book, I delibered and concluded to translate +it into English; and forthwith took a pen and ink and wrote a leaf or +twain, which I oversaw again to correct it. And when I saw the fair +and strange terms therein, I doubted that it should not please some +gentlemen which late blamed me, saying that in my translations I had +over curious terms, which could not be understood of common people, +and desired me to use old and homely terms in my translations. And +fain would I satisfy every man, and so to do took an old book and read +therein, and certainly the English was so rude and broad that I could +not well understood it. And also my Lord Abbot of Westminster did do +show to me lately certain evidences written in old English, for to +reduce it into our English now used. And certainly it was written in +such wise that it was more like to Dutch than English, I could not +reduce ne bring it to be understood. And certainly our language now +used varieth far from that which was used and spoken when I was born. +For we Englishmen be born under the domination of the moon, which is +never steadfast but ever wavering, waxing one season and waneth and +decreaseth another season. And that common English that is spoken in +one shire varieth from another, insomuch that in my days happened that +certain merchants were in a ship in Thames for to have sailed over the +sea into Zealand, and for lack of wind they tarried at Foreland, and +went to land for to refresh them. And one of them named Sheffield, a +mercer, came into a house and asked for meat, and especially he asked +after eggs; and the good wife answered that she could speak no French, +and the merchant was angry, for he also could speak no French, but +would have had eggs, and she understood him not. And then at last +another said, that he would have "eyren"; then the goodwife said +that she understood him well. Lo, what should a man in these days now +write, eggs or eyren? Certainly it is hard to please every man because +of diversity and change of language. For in these days every man that +is in any reputation in his country will utter his communication and +matters in such manners and terms that few men shall understand them. +And some honest and great clerks have been with me and desired me +to write the most curious terms that I could find; and thus between +plain, rude and curious I stand abashed. But in my judgment the common +terms that be daily used be lighter to be understood than the old and +ancient English. And forasmuch as this present book is not for a rude +uplandish man to labour therein ne read it, but only for a clerk and +a noble gentleman that feeleth and understandeth in feats of arms, in +love and in noble chivalry. Therefore in a mean between both I have +reduced and translated this said book into our English, not over-rude +ne curious; but in such terms as shall be understood, by God's grace, +according to my copy. And if any man will intermit in reading of it, +and findeth such terms that he cannot understand, let him go read +and learn Virgil of the pistles of Ovid, and there he shall see and +understand lightly all, if he have a good reader and informer. For +this book is not for every rude and uncunning man to see, but to +clerks and very gentlemen that understand gentleness and science. Then +I pray all them that shall read in this little treatise to hold me for +excused for the translating of it, for I acknowledge myself ignorant +of cunning to emprise on me so high and noble a work. But I pray +Master John Skelton, late created poet laureate in the University of +Oxenford, to oversee and correct this said book, and to address and +expound, wherever shall be found fault, to them that shall require it. + +For him I know for sufficient to expound and English every difficulty +that is therein; for he hath lately translated the Epistles of Tully, +and the book of Diodorus Siculus, and divers other works out of Latin +into English, not in rude and old language, but in polished and ornate +terms craftily, as he that hath read Virgil, Ovid, Tully, and all the +other noble poets and orators to me unknown. And also he hath read +the nine Muses, and understands their musical sciences, and to whom +of them each, science is appropred. I suppose he hath drunken of +Helicon's well. Then I pray him and such others to correct, add, or +minish whereas he or they shall find fault; for I have but followed my +copy in French as nigh as to me is possible. And if any word be said +therein well, I am glad; and if otherwise, I submit my said book +to their correction. Which book I present unto the high born, my +to-coming natural and sovereign lord Arthur, by the grace of God +Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall and Earl of Chester, first-begotten +son and heir unto our most dread natural and sovereign lord and most +Christian King, Henry the VII., by the grace of God King of England +and of France, and lord of Ireland; beseeching his noble Grace to +receive it in thank of me his most humble subject and servant. And I +shall pray unto Almighty God for his prosperous increasing in virtue, +wisedom, and humanity, that he may be equal with the most renowned of +all his noble progenitors; and so to live in this present life that +after this transitory life he and we all may come to everlasting life +in Heaven. Amen. + + + + +DEDICATION OF THE INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION + +BY JOHN CALVIN (1536)[A] + +To His Most Christian Majesty, FRANCIS, King of the French, and his +Sovereign, John Calvin wisheth peace and salvation in Christ. + + +When I began this work, Sire, nothing was further from my thoughts +than writing a book which would afterwards be presented to your +Majesty. My intention was only to lay down some elementary principles, +by which inquirers on the subject of religion might be instructed in +the nature of true piety. And this labour I undertook chiefly for +my countrymen, the French, of whom I apprehended multitudes to be +hungering and thirsting after Christ, but saw very few possessing any +real knowledge of him. That this was my design, the book itself proves +by its simple method and unadorned composition. But when I perceived +that the fury of certain wicked men in your kingdom had grown to +such a height, as to leave no room in the land for sound doctrine, I +thought I should be usefully employed, if in the same work I delivered +my instructions to them, and exhibited my confession to you, that +you may know the nature of that doctrine, which is the object of such +unbounded rage to those madmen who are now disturbing the country with +fire and sword. For I shall not be afraid to acknowledge, that this +treatise contains a summary of that very doctrine, which, according to +their clamours, deserves to be punished with imprisonment, banishment, +proscription, and flames, and to be exterminated from the face of the +earth. I well know with what atrocious insinuations your ears have +been filled by them, in order to render our cause most odious in +your esteem; but your clemency should lead you to consider that, if +accusation be accounted a sufficient evidence of guilt, there will be +an end of all innocence in words and actions. If any one, indeed, with +a view to bring odium upon the doctrine which I am endeavouring to +defend, should allege that it has long ago been condemned by the +general consent, and suppressed by many judicial decisions, this will +be only equivalent to saying, that it has been sometimes violently +rejected through the influence and power of its adversaries, and +sometimes insidiously and fraudulently oppressed by falsehoods, +artifices, and calumnies. Violence is displayed, when sanguinary +sentences are passed against it without the cause being heard; and +fraud, when it is unjustly accused of sedition and mischief. Lest +any one should suppose that these our complaints are unfounded, you +yourself, Sire, can bear witness of the false calumnies with which +you hear it daily traduced; that its only tendency is to wrest the +sceptres of kings out of their hands, to overturn all the tribunals +and judicial proceedings, to subvert all order and governments, to +disturb the peace and tranquillity of the people, to abrogate all +laws, to scatter all properties and possessions, and, in a word, to +involve every thing in total confusion. And yet you hear the smallest +portion of what is alleged against it; for such horrible things are +circulated amongst the vulgar, that, if they were true, the whole +world would justly pronounce it and its abettors worthy of a thousand +fires and gibbets. Who, then, will wonder at its becoming the object +of public odium, where credit is given to such most iniquitous +accusations? This is the cause of the general consent and conspiracy +to condemn us and our doctrine. Hurried away with this impulse, +those who sit in judgment pronounce for sentences the prejudices they +brought from home with them; and think their duty fully discharged if +they condemn none to be punished but such as are convicted by their +own confession, or by sufficient proofs. Convicted of what crime? +Of this condemned doctrine, they say. But with what justice is it +condemned? Now, the ground of defence was not to abjure the doctrine +itself, but to maintain its truth. On this subject, however, not a +word is allowed to be uttered. + +Wherefore I beseech you, Sire,--and surely it is not an unreasonable +request,--to take upon yourself the entire cognizance of this cause, +which has hitherto been confusedly and carelessly agitated, without +any order of law, and with outrageous passion rather than judicial +gravity. Think not that I am now meditating my own individual defence, +in order to effect a safe return to my native country; for, though I +feel the affection which every man ought to feel for it, yet, under +the existing circumstances, I regret not my removal from it. But I +plead the cause of all the godly, and consequently of Christ himself, +which, having been in these times persecuted and trampled on in all +ways in your kingdom, now lies in a most deplorable state; and this +indeed rather through the tyranny of certain Pharisees, than with your +knowledge. How this comes to pass is foreign to my present purpose to +say; but it certainly lies in a most afflicted state. For the +ungodly have gone to such lengths, that the truth of Christ, if not +vanquished, dissipated, and entirely destroyed, is buried, as it +were, in ignoble obscurity, while the poor, despised church is either +destroyed by cruel massacres, or driven away into banishment, or +menaced and terrified into total silence. And still they continue +their wonted madness and ferocity, pushing violently against the wall +already bent, and finishing the ruin they have begun. In the meantime, +no one comes forward to plead the cause against such furies. If there +be any persons desirous of appearing most favourable to the truth, +they only venture an opinion, that forgiveness should be extended to +the error and imprudence of ignorant people. For this is the language +of these moderate men, calling that error and imprudence which they +know to be the certain truth of God, and those ignorant people, whose +understanding they perceive not to have been so despicable to Christ, +but that he has favoured them with the mysteries of his heavenly +wisdom. Thus all are ashamed of the Gospel. But it shall be yours, +Sire, not to turn away your ears or thoughts from so just a defence, +especially in a cause of such importance as the maintenance of God's +glory unimpaired in the world, the preservation of the honor of divine +truth, and the continuance of the kingdom of Christ uninjured +among us. This is a cause worthy of your attention, worthy of your +cognizance, worthy of your throne. This consideration constitutes true +royalty, to acknowledge yourself in the government of your kingdom to +be the minister of God. For where the glory of God is not made the +end of the government, it is not a legitimate sovereignty, but a +usurpation. And he is deceived who expects lasting prosperity in that +kingdom which is not ruled by the sceptre of God, that is, his holy +word; for that heavenly oracle cannot fail, which declares that "where +there is no vision, the people perish,"[1] Nor should you be seduced +from this pursuit by a contempt of our meanness. We are fully +conscious to ourselves how very mean and abject we are, being +miserable sinners before God, and accounted most despicable by men; +being, (if you please) the refuse of the world, deserving of the +vilest appellations that can be found; so that nothing remains for +us to glory in before God, but his mercy alone, by which, without any +merit of ours, we have been admitted to the hope of eternal salvation, +and before men nothing but our weakness, the slightest confession of +which is esteemed by them as the greatest disgrace. But our doctrine +must stand, exalted above all the glory, and invincible by all the +power of the world; because it is not ours, but the doctrine of the +living God, and of his Christ, whom the Father hath constituted King, +that he may have dominion from sea to sea, and from the river even to +the ends of the earth, and that he may rule in such a manner, that the +whole earth, with its strength of iron and with its splendour of gold +and silver, smitten by the rod of his mouth, may be broken to pieces +like a potter's vessel;[2] for thus do the prophets foretell the +magnificence of his kingdom. + +Our adversaries reply, that our pleading the word of God is a false +pretence, and that we are nefarious corrupters of it. But that this is +not only a malicious calumny, but egregious impudence, by reading our +confession, you will, in your wisdom, be able to judge. Yet something +further is necessary to be said, to excite your attention, or at least +to prepare your mind for this perusal. Paul's direction, that every +prophecy be framed "according to the analogy of faith,"[3] has fixed +an invariable standard by which all interpretation of Scripture ought +to be tried. If our principles be examined by this rule of faith, +the victory is ours. For what is more consistent with faith than to +acknowledge ourselves naked of all virtue, that we may be clothed by +God; empty of all good, that we may be filled by him; slaves to sin, +that we may be liberated by him; blind, that we may be enlightened by +him; lame, that we may be guided; weak, that we may be supported by +him; to divest ourselves of all ground of glorying, that he alone may +be eminently glorious, and that we may glory in him? When we advance +these and similar sentiments, they interrupt us with complaints that +this is the way to overturn, I know not what blind light of nature, +pretended preparations, free will, and works meritorious of eternal +salvation, together with all their supererogations; because they +cannot bear that the praise and glory of all goodness, strength, +righteousness, and wisdom, should remain entirely with God. But we +read of none being reproved for having drawn too freely from the +fountain of living waters; on the contrary, they are severely +upbraided who have "hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can +hold no water."[4] Again, what is more consistent with faith, than +to assure ourselves of God being a propitious Father, where Christ is +acknowledged as a brother and Mediator? than securely to expect all +prosperity and happiness from Him, whose unspeakable love towards us +went so far, that "he spared not his own Son, but delivered him up +for us?"[5] than to rest in the certain expectation of salvation and +eternal life, when we reflect upon the Father's gift of Christ, in +whom such treasures are hidden? Here they oppose us, and complain +that this certainty of confidence is chargeable with arrogance and +presumption. But as we ought to presume nothing of ourselves, so we +should presume every thing of God; nor are we divested of vain glory +for any other reason than that we may learn to glory in the Lord. +What shall I say more? Review, Sire, all the parts of our cause, +and consider us worse than the most abandoned of mankind, unless you +clearly discover that we thus "both labor and suffer reproach, because +we trust in the living God,"[6] because we believe that "this is life +eternal, to know the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he hath +sent."[7] For this hope some of us are bound in chains, others are +lashed with scourges, others are carried about as laughing-stocks, +others are outlawed, others are cruelly tortured, others escape by +flight; but we are all reduced to extreme perplexities, execrated +with dreadful curses, cruelly slandered and treated with the greatest +indignities. Now, look at our adversaries, (I speak of the order +of priests, at whose will and directions others carry on these +hostilities against us,) and consider a little with me by what +principles they are actuated. The true religion, which is taught in +the Scriptures, and ought to be universally maintained, they readily +permit both themselves and others to be ignorant of, and to treat with +neglect and contempt. They think it unimportant what any one holds or +denies concerning God and Christ, provided he submits his mind with +an implicit faith (as they call it) to the judgment of the Church. +Nor are they much affected, if the glory of God happens to be violated +with open blasphemies, provided no one lift a finger against the +primacy of the Apostolic See, and the authority of their holy Mother +Church. Why, therefore, do they contend with such extreme bitterness +and cruelty for the mass, purgatory, pilgrimages, and similar trifles, +and deny that any piety can be maintained without a most explicit +faith, so to speak, in these things; whereas they prove none of them +from the word of God? Why, but because their belly is their God, their +kitchen is their religion; deprived of which they consider themselves +no longer as Christians, or even as men. For though some feast +themselves in splendour, and others subsist on slender fare, yet all +live on the same pot, which, without this fuel, would not only cool, +but completely freeze. Every one of them, therefore, who is most +solicitous for his belly, is found to be a most strenuous champion +for their faith. Indeed, they universally exert themselves for the +preservation of their kingdom, and the repletion of their bellies; but +not one of them discovers the least indication of sincere zeal. + +Nor do their attacks on our doctrine cease here; they urge every topic +of accusation and abuse to render it an object of hatred or suspicion. +They call it novel, and of recent origin,--they cavil at it as +doubtful and uncertain,--they inquire by what miracles it is +confirmed,--they ask whether it is right for it to be received +contrary to the consent of so many holy fathers, and the custom of the +highest antiquity,--they urge us to confess that it is schismatical +in stirring up opposition against the Church, or that the Church +was wholly extinct for many ages, during which no such thing was +known.--Lastly, they say all arguments are unnecessary; for that its +nature may be determined by its fruits, since it has produced such +a multitude of sects, so many factious tumults, and such great +licentiousness of vices. It is indeed very easy for them to insult a +deserted cause with the credulous and ignorant multitude; but, if we +had also the liberty of speaking in our turn, this acrimony, +which they now discover in violently foaming against us with equal +licentiousness and impunity, would presently cool. + +In the first place, their calling it novel is highly injurious to God, +whose holy word deserves not to be accused of novelty. I have no doubt +of its being new to them, to whom Jesus Christ and the Gospel are +equally new. But those who know the antiquity of this preaching of +Paul, "that Jesus Christ died for our sins, and rose again for our +justification,"[8] will find no novelty among us. That it has long +been concealed, buried, and unknown, is the crime of human impiety. +Now that the goodness of God has restored it to us, it ought at least +to be allowed its just claim of antiquity. + +From the same source of ignorance springs the notion of its being +doubtful and uncertain. This is the very thing which the Lord +complains of by his prophet; that "the ox knoweth his owner, and +the ass his master's crib,"[9] but that his people know not him. But +however they may laugh at its uncertainty, if they were called to seal +their own doctrine with their blood and lives, it would appear how +much they value it. Very different is our confidence, which dreads +neither the terrors of death, nor even the tribunal of God. + +Their requiring miracles of us is altogether unreasonable; for +we forge no new Gospel, but retain the very same whose truth was +confirmed by all the miracles ever wrought by Christ and the apostles. +But they have this peculiar advantage above us, that they can confirm +their faith by continual miracles even to this day. But the truth is, +they allege miracles which are calculated to unsettle a mind otherwise +well established, they are so frivolous and ridiculous, or vain and +false. Nor, if they were ever so preternatural, ought they to have any +weight in opposition to the truth of God, since the name of God ought +to be sanctified in all places and at all times, whether by miraculous +events, or by the common order of nature. This fallacy might +perhaps be more specious, if the Scripture did not apprize us of the +legitimate end and use of miracles. For Mark informs us, that the +miracles which followed the preaching of the apostles were wrought +in confirmation[10] of it, and Luke tells us, that[11] "the Lord gave +testimony to the word of his grace," when "signs and wonders" were +"done by the hands" of the apostles. Very similar to which is the +assertion of the apostle, that "salvation was confirmed" by the +preaching of the Gospel, "God also bearing witness with signs, and +wonders, and divers miracles."[12] But those things which we are told +were seals of the Gospel, shall we pervert to undermine the faith of +the Gospel? Those things which were designed to be testimonials of the +truth, shall we accommodate to the confirmation of falsehood? It +is right, therefore, that the doctrine, which, according to the +evangelist, claims the first attention, be examined and tried in +the first place; and if it be approved, then it ought to derive +confirmation from miracles. But it is the characteristic of sound +doctrine, given by Christ, that it tends to promote, not the glory of +men, but the glory of God.[13] Christ having laid down this proof of +a doctrine, it is wrong to esteem those as miracles which are directed +to any other end than the glorification of the name of God alone. And +we should remember that Satan has his wonders, which, though they +are juggling tricks rather than real miracles, are such as delude the +ignorant and inexperienced. Magicians and enchanters have always +been famous for miracles; idolatry has been supported by astonishing +miracles; and yet we admit them not as proofs of the superstition of +magicians or idolaters. With this engine also the simplicity of +the vulgar was anciently assailed by the Donatists, who abounded in +miracles. We therefore give the same answer now to our adversaries as +Augustine[14] gave to the Donatists, that our Lord hath cautioned us +against these miracle-mongers by his prediction, that there should +arise false prophets, who, by various signs and lying wonders, "should +deceive (if possible) the very elect."[15] And Paul has told us, that +the kingdom of Antichrist would be "with all power, and signs, and +lying wonders."[16] But these miracles (they say) are wrought, not by +idols, or sorcerers, or false prophets, but by saints; as if we were +ignorant, that it is a stratagem of Satan to "transform" himself "into +an angel of light."[17] At the tomb of Jeremiah,[18] who was buried +in Egypt, the Egyptians formerly offered sacrifices and other divine +honours. Was not this abusing God's holy prophet to the purposes of +idolatry? Yet they supposed this veneration of his sepulchre to be +rewarded with a cure for the bite of serpents. What shall we say, but +that it has been, and ever will be, the most righteous vengeance +of God to "send those who receive not the love of the truth strong +delusions, that they should believe a lie?"[19] We are by no means +without miracles, and such as are certain, and not liable to cavils. +But those under which they shelter themselves are mere illusions of +Satan, seducing the people from the true worship of God to vanity. + +Another calumny is their charging us with opposition to the +fathers,--I mean the writers of the earlier and purer ages,--as if +those writers were abettors of their impiety; whereas, if the contest +were to be terminated by this authority, the victory in most parts of +the controversy--to speak in the most modest terms--would be on our +side. But though the writings of those fathers contain many wise and +excellent things, yet in some respects they have suffered the common +fate of mankind; these very dutiful children reverence only their +errors and mistakes, but their excellences they either overlook, or +conceal, or corrupt; so that it may truly be said to be their only +study to collect dross from the midst of gold. Then they overwhelm us +with senseless clamours, as despisers and enemies of the fathers. But +we do not hold them in such contempt, but that, if it were consistent +with my present design, I could easily support by their suffrages most +of the sentiments that we now maintain. But while we make use of their +writings, we always remember that "all things are ours," to serve us, +not to have dominion over us, and that "we are Christ's"[20] alone, +and owe him universal obedience. He who neglects this distinction will +have nothing decided in religion; since those holy men were ignorant +of many things, frequently at variance with each other, and sometimes +even inconsistent with themselves. There is great reason, they say, +for the admonition of Solomon, "not to transgress or remove the +ancient landmarks, which our fathers have set."[21] But the same rule +is not applicable to the bounding of fields, and to the obedience +of faith, which ought to be ready to "forget her own people and her +father's house."[22] But if they are so fond of allegorizing, why do +they not explain the apostles, rather than any others, to be those +fathers, whose appointed landmarks it is so unlawful to remove? For +this is the interpretation of Jerome, whose works they have received +into their canons. But if they insist on preserving the landmarks of +those whom they understand to be intended, why do they at pleasure so +freely transgress them themselves? There were two fathers,[23] of whom +one said, that our God neither eats nor drinks, and therefore needs +neither cups nor dishes; the other, that sacred things require +no gold, and that gold is no recommendation of that which Is not +purchased with gold. This landmark therefore is transgressed by those +who in sacred things are so much delighted with gold, silver, ivory, +marble, jewels, and silks, and suppose that God is not rightly +worshipped, unless all things abound in exquisite splendour, or rather +extravagant profusion. There was a father[24] who said he freely +partook of flesh on a day when others abstained from it, because he +was a Christian. They transgress the landmarks therefore when they +curse the soul that tastes flesh in Lent. There were two fathers,[25] +of whom one said, that a monk who labors not with his hands is on a +level with a cheat or a robber; and the other, that it is unlawful +for monks to live on what is not their own, notwithstanding their +assiduity in contemplations, studies, and prayers; and they have +transgressed this landmark by placing the idle and distended carcasses +of monks in cells and brothels, to be pampered on the substance of +others. There was a father[26] who said, that to see a painted image +of Christ, or of any other saint, in the temples of Christians, is +a dreadful abomination. Nor was this merely the sentence of an +individual; it was also decreed by an ecclesiastical council, that +the object of worship should not be painted on the walls. They are far +from confining themselves within these landmarks, for every corner is +filled with images. Another father[27] has advised that, after having +discharged the office of humanity towards the dead by the rites of +sepulture, we should leave them to their repose. They break through +these landmarks by inculcating a constant solicitude for the dead. +There was one of the fathers[28] who asserted that the substance of +bread and wine in the eucharist ceases not, but remains, just as the +substance of the human nature remains in the Lord Christ united with +the divine. They transgress this landmark therefore by pretending +that, on the words of the Lord being recited, the substance of bread +and wine ceases, and is transubstantiated into his body and blood. +There were fathers[29] who, while they exhibited to the universal +Church only one eucharist, and forbade all scandalous and immoral +persons to approach it, at the same time severely censured all who, +when present, did not partake of it. How far have they removed these +landmarks, when they fill not only the churches, but even private +houses, with their masses, admit all who choose to be spectators of +them, and every one the more readily in proportion to the magnitude +of his contribution, however chargeable with impurity and wickedness! +They invite none to faith in Christ and a faithful participation of +the sacraments; but rather for purposes of gain bring forward their +own work instead of the grace and merit of Christ. There were two +fathers,[30] of whom one contended that the use of Christ's sacred +supper should be wholly forbidden to those who, content with +partaking of one kind, abstained from the other; the other strenuously +maintained that Christian people ought not to be refused the blood of +their Lord, for the confession of whom they are required to shed their +own. These landmarks also they have removed, in appointing, by +an inviolable law, that very thing which the former punished +with excommunication, and the latter gave a powerful reason for +disapproving. There was a father[31] who asserted the temerity of +deciding on either side of an obscure subject, without clear and +evident testimonies of Scripture. This landmark they forgot when +they made so many constitutions, canons, and judicial determinations, +without any authority from the word of God. There was a father[32] who +upbraided Montanus with having, among other heresies, been the first +imposer of laws for the observance of fasts. They have gone far beyond +this landmark also, in establishing fasts by the strictest laws. There +was a father[33] who denied that marriage ought to be forbidden to the +ministers of the Church, and pronounced cohabitation with a wife to +be real chastity; and there were fathers who assented to his judgment. +They have transgressed these landmarks by enjoining on their priests +the strictest celibacy. There was a father who thought that attention +should be paid to Christ only, of whom it is said, "Hear ye him," and +that no regard should be had to what others before us have either said +or done, only to what has been commanded by Christ, who is preeminent +over all. This landmark they neither prescribe to themselves, nor +permit to be observed by others, when they set up over themselves +and others any masters rather than Christ. There was a father[34] +who contended that the Church ought not to take precedence of Christ, +because his judgment is always according to truth; but ecclesiastical +judges, like other men, may generally be deceived. Breaking down this +landmark also, they scruple not to assert, that all the authority of +the Scripture depends on the decision of the Church. All the fathers, +with one heart and voice, have declared it execrable and detestable +for the holy word of God to be contaminated with the subtleties of +sophists, and perplexed by the wrangles of logicians. Do they confine +themselves within these landmarks, when the whole business of their +lives is to involve the simplicity of the Scripture in endless +controversies, and worse than sophistical wrangles? so that if the +fathers were now restored to life, and heard this art of wrangling, +which they call speculative divinity, they would not suspect the +dispute to have the least reference to God. But if I would enumerate +all the instances in which the authority of the fathers is insolently +rejected by those who would be thought their dutiful children, my +address would exceed all reasonable bounds. Months and years would be +insufficient for me. And yet such is their consummate and incorrigible +impudence, they dare to censure us for presuming to transgress the +ancient landmarks. + +Nor can they gain any advantage against us by their argument from +custom; for, if we were compelled to submit to custom, we should have +to complain of the greatest injustice. Indeed, if the judgments of men +were correct, custom should be sought among the good. But the fact +is often very different. What appears to be practiced by many soon +obtains the force of a custom. And human affairs have scarcely ever +been in so good a state as for the majority to be pleased with things +of real excellence. From the private vices of multitudes, therefore, +has arisen public error, or rather a common agreement of vices, which +these good men would now have to be received as law. It is evident to +all who can see, that the world is inundated with more than an ocean +of evils, that it is overrun with numerous destructive pests, that +every thing is fast verging to ruin, so that we must altogether +despair of human affairs, or vigorously and even violently oppose such +immense evils. And the remedy is rejected for no other reason, but +because we have been accustomed to the evils so long. But let public +error be tolerated in human society; in the kingdom of God nothing but +his eternal truth should he heard and regarded, which no succession of +years, no custom, no confederacy, can circumscribe. Thus Isaiah once +taught the chosen people of God: "Say ye not, A confederacy, to all to +whom this people shall say, A confederacy:" that is, that they should +not unite in the wicked consent of the people; "nor fear their fear, +nor be afraid," but rather "sanctify the Lord of hosts," that he might +"be their fear and their dread."[35] Now, therefore, let them, if +they please, object against us past ages and present examples; if +we "sanctify the Lord of hosts," we shall not be much afraid. For, +whether many ages agree in similar impiety, he is mighty to take +vengeance on the third and fourth generation; or whether the whole +world combine in the same iniquity, he has given an example of the +fatal end of those who sin with a multitude, by destroying all men +with a deluge, and preserving Noah and his small family, in order that +his individual faith might condemn the whole world. Lastly, a corrupt +custom is nothing but an epidemical pestilence, which is equally fatal +to its objects, though they fall with a multitude. Besides, they ought +to consider a remark, somewhere made by Cyprian,[36] that persons who +sin through ignorance, though they cannot be wholly exculpated, may +yet be considered in some degree excusable; but those who obstinately +reject the truth offered by the Divine goodness, are without any +excuse at all. + +Nor are we so embarrassed by their dilemma as to be obliged to +confess, either that the Church was for some time extinct, or that +we have now a controversy with the Church. The Church of Christ has +lived, and will continue to live, as long as Christ shall reign at +the right hand of the Father, by whose hand she is sustained, by whose +protection she is defended, by whose power she is preserved in safety. +For he will undoubtedly perform what he once promised, to be with his +people "even to the end of the world."[37] We have no quarrel against +the Church, for with one consent we unite with all the company of the +faithful in worshipping and adoring the one God and Christ the Lord, +as he has been adored by all the pious in all ages. But our opponents +deviate widely from the truth when they acknowledge no Church but what +is visible to the corporeal eye, and endeavour to circumscribe it +by those limits within which it is far from being included. Our +controversy turns on the two following points:--first, they contend +that the form of the Church is always apparent and visible; secondly, +they place that form in the see of the Roman Church and her order of +prelates. We assert, on the contrary, first, that the Church may exist +without any visible form; secondly, that its form is not contained +in that external splendour which they foolishly admire, but is +distinguished by a very different criterion, _viz_, the pure preaching +of God's word, and the legitimate administration of the sacraments. +They are not satisfied unless the Church can always be pointed out +with the finger. But how often among the Jewish people was it so +disorganized, as to have no visible form left? What splendid form +do we suppose could be seen, when Elias deplored his being left +alone?[38] How long, after the coming of Christ, did it remain without +any external form? How often, since that time, have wars, seditions, +and heresies, oppressed and totally obscured it? If they had lived +at that period, would they have believed that any Church existed? Yet +Elias was informed that there were "left seven thousand" who had "not +bowed the knee to Baal." Nor should we entertain any doubt of Christ's +having always reigned on earth ever since his ascension to heaven. But +if the pious at such periods had sought for any form evident to their +senses, must not their hearts have been quite discouraged? Indeed it +was already considered by Hilary in his day as a grievous error, that +people were absorbed in foolish admiration of the episcopal dignity, +and did not perceive the dreadful mischiefs concealed under +that disguise. For this is his language:[39] "One thing I advise +you--beware of Antichrist, for you have an improper attachment to +walls; your veneration for the Church of God is misplaced on houses +and buildings; you wrongly introduce under them the name of peace. +Is there any doubt that they will be seats of Antichrist? I think +mountains, woods, and lakes, prisons and whirlpools, less dangerous; +for these were the scenes of retirement or banishment in which the +prophets prophesied." But what excites the veneration of the multitude +in the present day for their horned bishops, but the supposition that +those are the holy prelates of religion whom they see presiding over +great cities? Away, then, with such stupid admiration. Let us rather +leave it to the Lord, since he alone "knoweth them that are his,"[40] +sometimes to remove from human observation all external knowledge +of his Church. I admit this to be a dreadful judgment of God on the +earth; but if it be deserved by the impiety of men, why do we attempt +to resist the righteous vengeance of God? Thus the Lord punished +the ingratitude of men in former ages; for, in consequence of their +resistance to his truth, and extinction of the light he had given +them, he permitted them to be blinded by sense, deluded by absurd +falsehoods, and immerged in profound darkness, so that there was no +appearance of the true Church left; yet, at the same time, in the +midst of darkness and errors, he preserved his scattered and concealed +people from total destruction. Nor is this to be wondered at; for he +knew how to save in all the confusion of Babylon, and the flame of +the fiery furnace. But how dangerous it is to estimate the form of the +Church by I know not what vain pomp, which they contend for; I shall +rather briefly suggest than state at large, lest I should protract +this discourse to an excessive length. The Pope, they say, who holds +the Apostolic see, and the bishops anointed and consecrated by him, +provided they are equipped with mitres and crosiers, represent the +Church, and ought to be considered as the Church. Therefore they +cannot err. How is this?--Because they are pastors of the Church, and +consecrated to the Lord. And did not the pastoral character belong to +Aaron, and the other rulers of Israel? Yet Aaron and his sons, after +their designation to the priesthood, fell into error when they made +the golden calf.[41] According to this mode of reasoning, why should +not the four hundred prophets, who lied to Ahab, have represented the +Church?[42] But the Church remained on the side of Micaiah, solitary +and despised as he was, and out of his mouth proceeded the truth. Did +not those prophets exhibit both the name and appearance of the Church, +who with united violence rose up against Jeremiah, and threatened and +boasted, "the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from +the wise, nor the word from the prophet?"[48] Jeremiah is sent singly +against the whole multitude of prophets, with a denunciation from the +Lord, that the "law shall perish from the priest, counsel from the +wise, and the word from the prophet."[44] And was there not the like +external respectability in the council convened by the chief priests, +scribes, and Pharisees, to consult about putting Christ to death?[45] +Now, let them go and adhere to the external appearance, and thereby +make Christ and all the prophets schismatics, and, on the other hand, +make the ministers of Satan instruments of the Holy Spirit. But if +they speak their real sentiments, let them answer me sincerely, what +nation or place they consider as the seat of the Church, from the time +when, by a decree of the council of Basil, Eugenius was deposed and +degraded from the pontificate, and Amadeus substituted in his place. +They cannot deny that the council, as far as relates to external +forms, was a lawful one, and summoned not only by one pope, but by +two. There Eugenius was pronounced guilty of schism, rebellion, and +obstinacy, together with all the host of cardinals and bishops who had +joined him in attempting a dissolution of the council. Yet afterwards, +assisted by the favour of princes, he regained the quiet possession of +his former dignity. That election of Amadeus, though formally made by +the authority of a general and holy synod, vanished into smoke; and he +was appeased with a cardinal's hat, like a barking dog with a morsel. +From the bosom of those heretics and rebels have proceeded all the +popes, cardinals, bishops, abbots, and priests ever since. Here they +must stop. For to which party will they give the title of the Church? +Will they deny that this was a general council, which wanted nothing +to complete its external majesty, being solemnly convened by two papal +bulls, consecrated by a presiding legate of the Roman see, and well +regulated in every point of order, and invariably preserving the +same dignity to the last? Will they acknowledge Eugenius to be +a schismatic, with all his adherents, by whom they have all been +consecrated? Either, therefore, let them give a different definition +of the form of the Church, or, whatever be their number, we shall +account them all schismatics, as having been knowingly and voluntarily +ordained by heretics. But if it had never been ascertained before, +that the Church is not confined to external pomps they would +themselves afford us abundant proof of it, who have so long +superciliously exhibited themselves to the world under the title of +the Church, though they were at the same time the deadly plagues of +it. I speak not of their morals, and those tragical exploits with +which all their lives abound, since they profess themselves to be +Pharisees, who are to be heard and not imitated. I refer to the very +doctrine itself, on which they found their claim to be considered +as the Church. If you devote a portion of your leisure, Sire, to the +perusal of our writings, you will clearly discover that doctrine to be +a fatal pestilence of souls, the firebrand, ruin, and destruction of +the Church. + +Finally, they betray great want of candour, by invidiously repeating +what great commotions, tumults, and contentions, have attended the +preaching of our doctrine, and what effects it produces in many +persons. For it is unfair to charge it with those evils which ought to +be attributed to the malice of Satan. It is the native property of the +Divine word, never to make its appearance without disturbing Satan, +and rousing his opposition. This is a most certain and unequivocal +criterion by which it is distinguished from false doctrines, which +are easily broached when they are heard with general attention, and +received with applauses by the world. Thus, in some ages, when all +things were immerged in profound darkness, the prince of this world +amused and diverted himself with the generality of mankind, and, like +another Sardanapalus, gave himself up to his ease and pleasures in +perfect peace; for what would he do but amuse and divert himself, +in the quiet and undisturbed possession of his kingdom? But when the +light shining from above dissipated a portion of his darkness--when +that Mighty One alarmed and assaulted his kingdom--then he began +to shake off his wonted torpor, and to hurry on his armour. First, +indeed, he stirred up the power of men to suppress the truth by +violence at its first appearance; and when this proved ineffectual, he +had recourse to subtlety. He made the Catabaptists, and other infamous +characters, the instruments of exciting dissensions and doctrinal +controversies, with a view to obscure and finally to extinguish it. +And now he continues to attack it both ways; for he endeavours to root +up this genuine seed by means of human force, and at the same time +tries every effort to choke it with his tares, that it may not grow +and produce fruit. But all his attempts will be vain, if we attend to +the admonitions of the Lord, who hath long ago made us acquainted +with his devices, that we might not be caught by him unawares, and has +armed us with sufficient means of defence against all his assaults. +But to charge the word of God with the odium of seditions, excited +against it by wicked and rebellious men, or of sects raised by +imposters,--is not this extreme malignity? Yet it is not without +example in former times. Elias was asked whether it was not he "that +troubled Israel."[46] Christ was represented by the Jews as guilty +of sedition.[47] The apostles were accused of stirring up popular +commotions.[48] Wherein does this differ from the conduct of those +who, at the present day, impute to us all the disturbances, tumults, +and contentions, that break out against us? But the proper answer to +such accusations has been taught us by Elias, that the dissemination +of errors and the raising of tumults is not chargeable on us, but on +those who are resisting the power of God. But as this one reply is +sufficient to repress their temerity, so, on the other hand, we must +meet the weakness of some persons, who are frequently disturbed with +such offences, and become unsettled and wavering in their minds. +Now, that they may not stumble and fall amidst this agitation and +perplexity, let them know that the apostles in their day experienced +the same things that now befall us. There were "unlearned and +unstable" men, Peter says, who "wrested" the inspired writings of Paul +"to their own destruction."[49] There were despisers of God, who, +when they heard that "where sin abounded grace did much more abound," +immediately concluded, Let us "continue in sin, that grace may +abound." When they heard that the faithful were "not under the law," +they immediately croaked, "We will sin, because we are not under +the law, but under grace."[50] There were some who accused him as +an encourager of sin. Many false apostles crept in, to destroy the +churches he had raised. "Some preached" the gospel "of envy and +strife, not in sincerity," maliciously "supposing to add affliction +to his bonds."[51] In some places the Gospel was attended with +little benefit. "All were seeking their own, not the things of Jesus +Christ."[52] Others returned "like dogs to their vomit, and like swine +to their wallowing in the mire."[53] Many perverted the liberty of +the spirit into the licentiousness of the flesh. Many insinuated +themselves as brethren, who afterwards brought the pious into dangers. +Various contentions were excited among the brethren themselves. What +was to be done by the apostles in such circumstances? Should they not +have dissembled for a time, or rather have rejected and deserted that +Gospel which appeared to be the nursery of so many disputes, the cause +of so many dangers, the occasion of so many offences? But in such +difficulties as these, their minds were relieved by this reflection +that Christ is the "stone of stumbling and rock of offence,"[54] "set +for the fall and rising again of many, and for a sign which shall be +spoken against;"[55] and armed with this confidence, they proceeded +boldly through all the dangers of tumults and offences. The same +consideration should support us, since Paul declares it to be the +perpetual character of the Gospel, that it is a "savour of death unto +death in them that perish,"[56] although it was rather given us to +be the "savour of life unto life," and "the power of God to" the +"salvation" of the faithful;[57] which we also should certainly +experience it to be, if we did not corrupt this eminent gift of God +by our ingratitude, and prevert to our destruction what ought to be a +principal instrument of our salvation. + +But I return to you, Sire. Let not your Majesty be at all moved by +those groundless accusations with which our adversaries endeavour +to terrify you; as that the sole tendency and design of this new +Gospel--for so they call it--is to furnish a pretext for seditions, +and to gain impunity for all crimes. "For God is not the author of +confusion, but of peace;"[58] nor is "the Son of God," who came to +"destroy the works of the devil, the minister of sin."[59] And it is +unjust to charge us with such motives and designs, of which we have +never given cause for the least suspicion. Is it probable that we are +meditating the subversion of kingdoms?--we, who were never heard to +utter a factious word, whose lives were ever known to be peaceable and +honest while We lived under your government, and who, even now in our +exile, cease not to pray for all prosperity to attend yourself and +your kingdom! Is it probable that we are seeking an unlimited license +to commit crimes with impunity? in whose conduct, though many things +may be blamed, yet there is nothing worthy of such severe reproach! +Nor have we, by Divine Grace, profited so little in the Gospel, +but that our life may be an example to our detractors of chastity, +liberality, mercy, temperance, patience, modesty, and every other +virtue. It is an undeniable fact, that we sincerely fear and worship +God, whose name we desire to be sanctified both by our life and by +our death; and envy itself is constrained to bear testimony to the +innocence and civil integrity of some of us, who have suffered the +punishment of death for that very thing which ought to be accounted +their highest praise. But if the Gospel be made a pretext for tumults, +which has not yet happened in your kingdom; if any persons make the +liberty of divine grace an excuse for the licentiousness of their +vices, of whom I have known many,--there are laws and legal penalties, +by which they may be punished according to their deserts; only let not +the Gospel of God be reproached for the crimes of wicked men. You have +now, Sire, the virulent iniquity of our calumniators laid before you +in a sufficient number of instances, that you may not receive their +accusations with too credulous an ear.--I fear I have gone too much +into the detail, as this preface already approaches the size of a full +apology; whereas I intended it not to contain our defence, but only to +prepare your mind to attend to the pleading of our cause; for, though +you are now averse and alienated from us, and even inflamed against +us, we despair not of regaining your favour, if you will only once +read with calmness and composure this our confession, which we intend +as our defence before your Majesty. But, on the contrary, if your ears +are so preoccupied with the whispers of the malevolent, as to leave +no opportunity for the accused to speak for themselves, and if those +outrageous furies, with your connivance, continue to persecute with +imprisonments, scourges, tortures, confiscations, and flames, we +shall indeed, like sheep destined to the slaughter, be reduced to the +greatest extremities. Yet shall we in patience possess our souls, and +wait for the mighty hand of the Lord, which undoubtedly will in time +appear, and show itself armed for the deliverance of the poor from +their affliction, and for the punishment of their despisers, who +now exult in such perfect security. May the Lord, the King of kings, +establish your throne with righteousness, and your kingdom with +equity. _Basil, 1st August, 1536._ + + +[Footnote A: John Calvin was born at Noyon, Picardy, France, in 1509, +and died at Geneva in 1564. He joined the Reformation about 1528, +and, having been banished from Paris, took refuge in Switzerland. +The "Institutes," published at Basle in 1536, contain a comprehensive +statement of the beliefs of that school of Protestant theology which +bears Calvin's name; and in this "Dedication" we have Calvin's own +summing up of the essentials of his creed.] + +[Footnote 1: Prov. xxix. 18.] + +[Footnote 2: Daniel ii. 34. Isaiah xi. 4. Psalm ii. 9.] + +[Footnote 3 Rom. xii. 6.] + +[Footnote 4: Jer. ii. 13.] + +[Footnote 5: Rom. viii. 32.] + +[Footnote 6: I Tim. iv. 10.] + +[Footnote 7: John xvii, 3.] + +[Footnote 8: Rom, iv. 25. I Cor. xv. 3, 17.] + +[Footnote 9: Isaiah i. 3.] + +[Footnote 10: Mark xvi. 20.] + +[Footnote 11: Acts xiv. 3.] + +[Footnote 12: Heb. ii. 3-4.] + +[Footnote 13: John vii. 18, viii. 50.] + +[Footnote 14: In Joan, tract. 13.] + +[Footnote 15: Matt. xxiv. 24.] + +[Footnote 16: 2 Thess. ii. 9.] + +[Footnote 17: 2 Cor. xi. 14.] + +[Footnote 18: Hierom. in praef. Jerem.] + +[Footnote 19: 2 Thess. ii. 10, 11.] + +[Footnote 20: i Cor. iii. 21, 23] + +[Footnote 21: Prov xxii. 28.] + +[Footnote 22: Psalm xlv. 10.] + +[Footnote 23: Acat. in lib. II, cap. 16. Trip. Hist. Amb. lib. 2, de +Off. c. 28.] + +[Footnote 24: Spiridion. Trip. Hist. lib. 1, c. 10.] + +[Footnote 25: Trip. Hist. lib. 8, c. 1. August. de Opere Mon. c. 17.] + +[Footnote 26: Epiph. Epist. ab Hier. vers. Con. Eliber. c. 36.] + +[Footnote 27: Amb de Abra. lib 1, c. 7.] + +[Footnote 28: Gelas. Pap in Conc. Rom.] + +[Footnote 29: Chrys. in 1 Cap. Ephes. Calix. Papa de Cons. dist. 2.] + +[Footnote 30: Gelas. can. Comperimus de Cons. dist. 2. Cypr. Epist. 2, +lib. 1, de Laps.] + +[Footnote 31: August. lib. 2, de Pec. Mer. cap. ult.] + +[Footnote 32: Apollon de quo Eccl. Hist. lib. 5, cap. 11, 12.] + +[Footnote 33: Paphnut. Trip. Hist. lib. 2, c. 14. Cypr. Epist. 2, lib. +2.] + +[Footnote 34: Aug. cap. 2, contr. Cresc. Grammatic.] + +[Footnote 35: Isaiah viii. 12, 13.] + +[Footnote 36: Epist. 3, lib. 2, et in Epist. ad. Julian, de Haeret. +baptiz.] + +[Footnote 37: Matt, xxvlii. 20.] + +[Footnote 38: i Kings xix. 14, 18.] + +[Footnote 39: Contr. Auxent.] + +[Footnote 40: 2 Tim. ii. 19.] + +[Footnote 41: Exod. xxxii. 4.] + +[Footnote 42: i Kings xxii. 6, 11-23.] + +[Footnote 43: Jer. xviii. 18.] + +[Footnote 44: Jer. iv. 9.] + +[Footnote 45: Matt. xxvi. 3, 4.] + +[Footnote 46: 1 Kings xviii. 17.] + +[Footnote 47: Luke xxiii. 2, 5.] + +[Footnote 48: Acts xvii. 6, xxiv. 5.] + +[Footnote 49: 2 Pet. iii. 16.] + +[Footnote 50: Rom. v. 20, vi. 1, 14, 15.] + +[Footnote 51: Phil. i. 15, 16.] + +[Footnote 52: Phil. ii. 21.] + +[Footnote 53: 2 Pet. ii. 22.] + +[Footnote 54: 1 Pet. ii. 8.] + +[Footnote 55: Luke ii. 34.] + +[Footnote 56: 2 Cor. ii. 15, 16.] + +[Footnote 57: Rom. i. 16.] + +[Footnote 58: 1 Cor. xiv. 33.] + +[Footnote 59: 1 John iii. 8. Gal. ii. 17.] + + + + +GENERAL SYLLABUS + + +The design of the Author in these Christian Institutes is twofold, +relating, First to the knowledge of God, as the way to attain a +blessed immortality; and, in connection with and subservience to this, +Secondly, to the knowledge of ourselves. + +In the prosecution of this design, he strictly follows the method of +the Apostles' Creed, as being most familiar to all Christians. For +as the Creed consists of four parts, the first relating to God the +Father, the second to the Son, the third to the Holy Spirit, the +fourth to the Church; so the Author distributes the whole of this work +into Four Books, corresponding respectively to the four parts of the +Creed; as will clearly appear from the following detail:-- + +I. The first article of the Creed relates to God the Father, and to +the creation, conservation, and government of all things, which are +included in his omnipotence. + +So the first book is on the knowledge of God, considered as the +Creator, Preserver, and Governor of the universe at large, and every +thing contained in it. It shows both the nature and tendency of +the true knowledge of the Creator--that this is not learned in the +schools, but that every man from his birth is self-taught it--Yet that +the depravity of men is so great as to corrupt and extinguish this +knowledge, partly by ignorance, partly by wickedness; so that it +neither leads him to glorify God as he ought, nor conducts him to +the attainment of happiness--And though this internal knowledge is +assisted by all the creatures around, which serve as a mirror to +display the Divine perfections, yet that man does not profit by +it--Therefore, that to those, whom it is God's will to bring to an +intimate and saving knowledge of himself, he gives his written word; +which introduces observations on the sacred Scripture--That he has +therein revealed himself; that not the Father only, but the Father, +Son, and Holy Spirit, united, is the Creator of heaven and earth; whom +neither the knowledge innate by nature, nor the very beautiful mirror +displayed to us in the world, can, in consequence of our depravity, +teach us to know so as to glorify him. This gives occasion for +treating of the revelation of God in the Scripture, of the unity of +the Divine Essence, and the trinity of Persons.--To prevent man from +attributing to God the blame of his own voluntary blindness, the +Author shows the state of man at his creation, and treats of the +image of God, freewill, and the primative integrity of nature.--Having +finished the subject of creation, he proceeds to the conservation +and government of all things, concluding the first book with a full +discussion of the doctrine of divine providence. + +II. But since man is fallen by sin from the state in which he was +created, it is necessary to come to Christ. Therefore it follows in +the Creed, "And in Jesus Christ, his only Son our Lord," &c. + +So in the second book of the Institutes our Author treats of the +knowledge of God as the Redeemer in Christ; and having shown the fall +of man, leads him to Christ the Mediator. Here he states the doctrine +of original sin--that man possesses no inherent strength to enable him +to deliver himself from sin and the impending curse, but that, on the +contrary, nothing can proceed from him, antecedently to reconciliation +and renovation, but what is deserving of condemnation--Therefore, +that, man being utterly lost in himself, and incapable of conceiving +even a good thought by which he may restore himself, or perform +actions acceptable to God, he must seek redemption out of himself, in +Christ--That the Law was given for this purpose, not to confine +its observers to itself, but to conduct them to Christ; which gives +occasion to introduce an exposition of the Moral Law--That he was +known, as the Author of salvation, to the Jews under the Law, but more +fully under the Gospel, in which he is manifested to the world.--Hence +follows the doctrine of the similarity and difference of the Old and +New Testament, of the Law and Gospel.--It is next stated, that, in +order to the complete accomplishment of salvation, it was necessary +for the eternal Son of God to become man, and that he actually +assumed a real human nature:--it is also shown how these two natures +constitute one person--That the office of Christ, appointed for the +acquisition and application of complete salvation by his merit and +efficacy, is sacerdotal, regal, and prophetical--Next follows the +manner in which Christ executed his office, or actually performed the +part of a Mediator, being an exposition of the Articles respecting +his death, resurrection, and ascension to heaven.--Lastly, the Author +shows the truth and propriety of affirming that Christ merited the +grace of God and salvation for us. + +III. As long as Christ is separate from us, he profits us nothing. +Hence the necessity of our being ingrafted into him, as branches into +a vine. Therefore the doctrine concerning Christ is followed, in +the third part of the Creed, by this clause, "I believe in the Holy +Spirit," as being the bond of union between us and Christ. + +So in the third book our Author treats of the Holy Spirit, who unites +us to Christ--and consequently of faith, by which we embrace Christ, +with his twofold benefit, free righteousness, which he imputes to +us, and regeneration, which he commences within us, by bestowing +repentance upon us.--And to show that we have not the least room to +glory in such faith as is unconnected with the pursuit of repentance, +before proceeding to the full discussion of justification, he treats +at large of repentance and the continual exercise of it, which Christ, +apprehended by faith, produces in us by his Spirit--He next fully +discusses the first and chief benefit of Christ when united to us by +the Holy Spirit that is, justification--and then treats of prayer, +which resembles the hand that actually receives those blessings to be +enjoyed, which faith knows, from the word of promise, to be laid up +with God for our use.--But as all men are not united to Christ, +the sole Author of salvation, by the Holy Spirit, who creates and +preserves faith in us, he treats of God's eternal election; which is +the cause that we, in whom he foresaw no good but what he intended +freely to bestow, have been favored with the gift of Christ, and +united to God by the effectual call of the Gospel.--Lastly, he treats +of complete regeneration, and the fruition of happiness; that is, the +final resurrection, towards which our eyes must be directed, since in +this world the felicity of the pious, in respect of enjoyment, is only +begun. + +IV. But as the Holy Spirit does not unite all men to Christ, or make +them partakers of faith, and on those to whom he imparts it he does +not ordinarily bestow it without means, but employs for this purpose +the preaching of the Gospel and the use of the sacraments, with the +administration of all discipline, therefore it follows in the Creed, +"I believe in the Holy Catholic Church," whom, although involved in +eternal death, yet, in pursuance of the gratuitous election, God has +freely reconciled to himself in Christ, and made partakers of the Holy +Spirit, that, being ingrafted into Christ, they may have communion +with him as their head, whence flows a perpetual remission of sins, +and a full restoration to eternal life. + +So in the fourth book our Author treats of the Church--then of the +means used by the Holy Spirit in effectually calling from spiritual +death, and preserving the church--the word and sacraments--baptism +and the Lord's supper--which are as it were Christ's regal sceptre, by +which he commences his spiritual reign in the Church by the energy of +his Spirit, and carries it forwards from day to day during the present +life, after the close of which he perfects it without those means. + +And as political institutions are the asylums of the Church in this +life, though civil government is distinct from the spiritual kingdom +of Christ, our Author instructs us respecting it as a signal blessing +of God, which the Church ought to acknowledge with gratitude of +heart, till we are called out of this transitory state to the heavenly +inheritance, where God will be all in all. + +This is the plan of the Institutes, which may be comprised in the +following brief summary:-- + +Man, created originally upright, being afterwards ruined, not +partially, but totally, finds salvation out of himself, wholly in +Christ; to whom being united by the Holy Spirit, freely bestowed, +without any regard of future works, he enjoys in him a twofold +benefit, the perfect imputation of righteousness, which attends him +to the grave, and the commencement of sanctification, which he daily +increases, till at length he completes it at the day of regeneration +or resurrection of the body, so that in eternal life and the heavenly +inheritance his praises are celebrated for such stupendous mercy. + + + + +DEDICATION OF THE REVOLUTIONS OF THE HEAVENLY BODIES + +BY NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (1543)[A] + +TO POPE PAUL III + + +I can easily conceive, most Holy Father, that as soon as some +people learn that in this book which I have written concerning the +revolutions of the heavenly bodies, I ascribe certain motions to +the Earth, they will cry out at once that I and my theory should be +rejected. For I am not so much in love with my conclusions as not to +weigh what others will think about them, and although I know that the +meditations of a philosopher are far removed from the judgment of the +laity, because his endeavor is to seek out the truth in all things, so +far as this is permitted by God to the human reason, I still believe +that one must avoid theories altogether foreign to orthodoxy. +Accordingly, when I considered in my own mind how absurd a performance +it must seem to those who know that the judgment of many centuries has +approved the view that the Earth remains fixed as center in the midst +of the heavens, if I should, on the contrary, assert that the Earth +moves; I was for a long time at a loss to know whether I should +publish the commentaries which I have written in proof of its +motion, or whether it were not better to follow the example of the +Pythagoreans and of some others, who were accustomed to transmit the +secrets of Philosophy not in writing but orally, and only to their +relatives and friends, as the letter from Lysis to Hipparchus bears +witness. They did this, it seems to me, not as some think, because of +a certain selfish reluctance to give their views to the world, but +in order that the noblest truths, worked out by the careful study of +great men, should not be despised by those who are vexed at the idea +of taking great pains with any forms of literature except such as +would be profitable, or by those who, if they are driven to the study +of Philosophy for its own sake by the admonitions and the example +of others, nevertheless, on account of their stupidity, hold a place +among philosophers similar to that of drones among bees. Therefore, +when I considered this carefully, the contempt which I had to fear +because of the novelty and apparent absurdity of my view, nearly +induced me to abandon utterly the work I had begun. + +My friends, however, in spite of long delay and even resistance on my +part, withheld me from this decision. First among these was Nicolaus +Schonberg, Cardinal of Capua, distinguished in all branches of +learning. Next to him comes my very dear friend, Tidemann Giese, +Bishop of Culm, a most earnest student, as he is, of sacred and, +indeed, of all good learning. The latter has often urged me, at times +even spurring me on with reproaches, to publish and at last bring to +the light the book which had lain in my study not nine years merely, +but already going on four times nine. Not a few other very eminent and +scholarly men made the same request, urging that I should no longer +through fear refuse to give out my work for the common benefit of +students of Mathematics. They said I should find that the more absurd +most men now thought this theory of mine concerning the motion of the +Earth, the more admiration and gratitude it would command after +they saw in the publication of my commentaries the mist of absurdity +cleared away by most transparent proofs. So, influenced by these +advisors and this hope, I have at length allowed my friends to publish +the work, as they had long besought me to do. + +But perhaps Your Holiness will not so much wonder that I have ventured +to publish these studies of mine, after having taken such pains in +elaborating them that I have not hesitated to commit to writing my +views of the motion of the Earth, as you will be curious to hear +how it occurred to me to venture, contrary to the accepted view of +mathematicians, and well-nigh contrary to common sense, to form a +conception of any terrestrial motion whatsoever. Therefore I would not +have it unknown to Your Holiness, that the only thing which induced +me to look for another way of reckoning the movements of the heavenly +bodies was that I knew that mathematicians by no means agree in their +investigations thereof. For, in the first place, they are so much in +doubt concerning the motion of the sun and the moon, that they can +not even demonstrate and prove by observation the constant length of +a complete year; and in the second place, in determining the motions +both of these and of the five other planets, they fail to employ +consistently one set of first principles and hypotheses, but use +methods of proof based only upon the apparent revolutions and motions. +For some employ concentric circles only; others, eccentric circles and +epicycles; and even by these means they do not completely attain the +desired end. For, although those who have depended upon concentric +circles have shown that certain diverse motions can be deduced from +these, yet they have not succeeded thereby in laying down any sure +principle, corresponding indisputably to the phenomena. These, on the +other hand, who have devised systems of eccentric circles, although +they seem in great part to have solved the apparent movements +by calculations which by these eccentrics are made to fit, have +nevertheless introduced many things which seem to contradict the first +principles of the uniformity of motion. Nor have they been able to +discover or calculate from these the main point, which is the shape of +the world and the fixed symmetry of its parts; but their procedure +has been as if someone were to collect hands, feet, a head, and other +members from various places, all very fine in themselves, but not +proportionate to one body, and no single one corresponding in its turn +to the others, so that a monster rather than a man would be formed +from them. Thus in their process of demonstration which they term a +"method," they are found to have omitted something essential, or to +have included something foreign and not pertaining to the matter in +hand. This certainly would never have happened to them if they had +followed fixed principles; for if the hypotheses they assumed were +not false, all that resulted therefrom would be verified indubitably. +Those things which I am saying now may be obscure, yet they will be +made clearer in their proper place. + +Therefore, having turned over in my mind for a long time this +uncertainty of the traditional mathematical methods of calculating +the motions of the celestial bodies, I began to grow disgusted that +no more consistent scheme of the movements of the mechanism of the +universe, set up for our benefit by that best and most law abiding +Architect of all things, was agreed upon by philosophers who otherwise +investigate so carefully the most minute details of this world. +Wherefore I undertook the task of rereading the books of all the +philosophers I could get access to, to see whether any one ever was of +the opinion that the motions of the celestial bodies were other than +those postulated by the men who taught mathematics in the schools. And +I found first, indeed, in Cicero, that Niceta perceived that the Earth +moved; and afterward in Plutarch I found that some others were of this +opinion, whose words I have seen fit to quote here, that they may be +accessible to all:-- + +"Some maintain that the Earth is stationary, but Philolaus the +Pythagorean says that it revolves in a circle about the fire of the +ecliptic, like the sun and moon. Heraklides of Pontus and Ekphantus +the Pythagorean make the Earth move, not changing its position, +however, confined in its falling and rising around its own center in +the manner of a wheel." + +Taking this as a starting point, I began to consider the mobility of +the Earth; and although the idea seemed absurd, yet because I knew +that the liberty had been granted to others before me to postulate all +sorts of little circles for explaining the phenomena of the stars, I +thought I also might easily be permitted to try whether by postulating +some motion of the Earth, more reliable conclusions could be reached +regarding the revolution of the heavenly bodies, than those of my +predecessors. + +And so, after postulating movements, which, farther on in the book, I +ascribe to the Earth, I have found by many and long observations that +if the movements of the other planets are assumed for the circular +motion of the Earth and are substituted for the revolution of each +star, not only do their phenomena follow logically therefrom, but +the relative positions and magnitudes both of the stars and all their +orbits, and of the heavens themselves, become so closely related that +in none of its parts can anything be changed without causing confusion +in the other parts and in the whole universe. Therefore, in the course +of the work I have followed this plan: I describe in the first book +all the positions of the orbits together with the movements which I +ascribe to the Earth, in order that this book might contain, as it +were, the general scheme of the universe. Thereafter in the remaining +books, I set forth the motions of the other stars and of all their +orbits together with the movement of the Earth, in order that one +may see from this to what extent the movements and appearances of the +other stars and their orbits can be saved, if they are transferred to +the movement of the Earth. Nor do I doubt that ingenious and learned +mathematicians will sustain me, if they are willing to recognize and +weigh, not superficially, but with that thoroughness which Philosophy +demands above all things, those matters which have been adduced by me +in this work to demonstrate these theories. In order, however, that +both the learned and the unlearned equally may see that I do not avoid +anyone's judgment, I have preferred to dedicate these lucubrations of +mine to Your Holiness rather than to any other, because, even in this +remote corner of the world where I live, you are considered to be the +most eminent man in dignity of rank and in love of all learning and +even of mathematics, so that by your authority and judgment you can +easily suppress the bites of slanderers, albeit the proverb hath it +that there is no remedy for the bite of a sycophant. If perchance +there shall be idle talkers, who, though they are ignorant of all +mathematical sciences, nevertheless assume the right to pass judgment +on these things, and if they should dare to criticise and attack this +theory of mine because of some passage of scripture which they have +falsely distorted for their own purpose, I care not at all; I will +even despise their judgment as foolish. For it is not unknown that +Lactantius, otherwise a famous writer but a poor mathematician, speaks +most childishly of the shape of the Earth when he makes fun of those +who said that the Earth has the form of a sphere. It should not seem +strange then to zealous students, if some such people shall ridicule +us also. Mathematics are written for mathematicians, to whom, if +my opinion does not deceive me, our labors will seem to contribute +something to the ecclesiastical state whose chief office Your Holiness +now occupies; for when not so very long ago, under Leo X, in the +Lateran Council the question of revising the ecclesiastical calendar +was discussed, it then remained unsettled, simply because the length +of the years and months, and the motions of the sun and moon were held +to have been not yet sufficiently determined. Since that time, I have +given my attention to observing these more accurately, urged on by a +very distinguished man, Paul, Bishop of Fossombrone, who at that time +had charge of the matter. But what I may have accomplished herein I +leave to the judgment of Your Holiness in particular, and to that of +all other learned mathematicians; and lest I seem to Your Holiness to +promise more regarding the usefulness of the work than I can perform, +I now pass to the work itself. + + +[Footnote A: Nicolaus Copernicus was born in 1473 at Thorn in West +Prussia, of a Polish father and a German mother. He attended +the university of Cracow and Bologna, lectured on astronomy and +mathematics at Rome, and later studied medicine at Padua and canon law +at Ferrara. He was appointed canon of the cathedral of Frauenburg, and +in this town he died in 1543, having devoted the latter part of his +life largely to astronomy. + +The book which was introduced by this dedication laid the foundations +of modern astronomy. At the time when it was written, the earth was +believed by all to be the fixed centre of the universe; and although +many of the arguments used by Copernicus were invalid and absurd, he +was the first modern to put forth the heliocentric theory as "a +better explanation." It remained for Kepler, Galileo, and Newton, to +establish the theory on firm grounds.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION IN SCOTLAND + +BY JOHN KNOX (C. 1566)[A] + +To the gentill readar, grace and peace from God the Father of our Lord +Jesus Christ, with the perpetuall encrease of the Holy Spreit. + + +It is not unknowen, Christeane Reader, that the same clud of +ignorance, that long hath darkened many realmes under this accurssed +kingdome of that Romane Antichrist, hath also owercovered this poore +Realme; that idolatrie hath bein manteined, the bloode of innocentis +hath bene sched, and Christ Jesus his eternall treuth hath bene +abhorred, detested, and blasphemed. But that same God that caused +light to schyne out of darknes, in the multitud of his mercyes, hath +of long tyme opened the eis of some evin within this Realme, to see +the vanitie of that which then was universally embrased for trew +religioun; and hes gevin unto them strenth to oppone[1] thame selfis +unto the same: and now, into these our last and moist[2] corrupt +dayis, hath maid his treuth so to triumphs amonges us, that, in +despyte of Sathan, hipochrisye is disclosed, and the trew wyrshipping +of God is manifested to all the inhabitantis of this realme who +eis Sathan blyndis not, eyther by thair fylthy lustes, or ellis by +ambitioun, and insatiable covetousness, which mack them repung to[3] +the power of God working by his worde. + +And becaus we ar not ignorant what diverse bruittis[4] war dispersed +of us, the professoures of Jesus Christ within this realme, in +the begynnyng of our interprise, ordour was tackin, that all our +proceidingis should be committed to register; as that thei war, by +such as then paynfullie travailled boith by toung and pen; and so was +collected a just volume, (as after will appeir,) conteanyng thingis +done frome the fyftie-awght[5] year of God, till the arrivall of the +Quenis Majestic[6] furth of France, with the which the Collectour and +Writtar for that tyme was content, and never mynded[7] further to have +travailled in that kynd of writting. But, after invocatioun of the +name of God, and after consultatioun with some faythfull, what was +thought by thame expedient to advance Goddis glorie, and to edifie +this present generatioun, and the posteritie to come, it was +concluded, that faythfull rehersall should be maid of such personages +as God had maid instruments of his glorie, by opponyng of thame selfis +to manifest abuses, superstitioun, and idolatrie; and albeit thare be +no great nomber, yet ar thei mo then the Collectour wold have looked +for at the begynnyng, and thairfoir is the volume somewhat enlarged +abuif his expectatioun: And yit, in the begynnyng, mon[8] we crave +of all the gentill Readaris, not to look[9] of us such ane History +as shall expresse all thingis that have occurred within this Realme, +during the tyme of this terrible conflict that lies bene betuix the +sanctes[10] of God and these bloody wolves who clame to thame selves +the titill of clargie, and to have authentic ower the saules of men; +for, with the Pollicey,[11] mynd we to meddill no further then it hath +Religioun mixed with it. And thairfoir albeit that many thingis which +wer don be omitted, yit, yf we invent no leys,[12] we think our selves +blamless in that behalf. Of one other (thing) we mon[8] foirwarne +the discreat Readaris, which is, that thei be not offended that the +sempill treuth be spokin without partialitie; for seing that of men we +neyther hunt for reward, nor yitt for vane glorie, we litill pass +by the approbatioun of such as seldome judge weill of God and of his +workis. Lett not thairfoar the Readir wonder, albeit that our style +vary and speik diverslie of men, according as thei have declared +thameselves sometymes ennemymes and sometymes freindis, sometymes +fervent, sometymes cold, sometymes constant, and sometymes changeable +in the cause of God and of his holy religioun: for, in this our +simplicitie, we suppoise that the Godlie shall espy our purpose, which +is, that God may be praised for his mercy schawin,[13] this present +age may be admonished to be thankfull for Goddis benefittis offerred, +and the posteritie to cum may be instructed how wonderouslie hath the +light of Christ Jesus prevailled against darkness in this last and +most corrupted age. + + +[Footnote A: John Knox (1505-1571), the leader of the Scottish +Reformation and its historian, was educated at Glasgow University; was +pastor to English congregations at Frankfort-on-Maine and at Geneva, +where he met Calvin; returned to Scotland in 1559; and from that time +till his death was active in the establishment of the Presbyterian +organization, through which his powerful personality has continued +to influence the Scottish national character to the present day. His +preface, which is printed here in the original Scottish spelling, +gives some indication of the sternness, not to say virulence, of his +temper towards the Roman Church.] + +[Footnote 1: Oppose] + +[Footnote 2: Most] + +[Footnote 3: Resist.] + +[Footnote 4: Rumors.] + +[Footnote 5: I.e. 1558.] + +[Footnote 6: Mary, Queen of Scots, arrived in Scotland, Aug. 19, +1562.] + +[Footnote 7: Intended.] + +[Footnote 8: Must.] + +[Footnote 9: Expect.] + +[Footnote 10: Saints.] + +[Footnote 11: Civil or State politics.] + +[Footnote 12: Lies.] + +[Footnote 13: Shown.] + + + + +PREFATORY LETTER TO SIR WALTER RALEIGH ON THE FAERIE QUEENE + +BY EDMUND SPENSER (1589)[A] + +A LETTER OF THE AUTHORS EXPOUNDING HIS WHOLE INTENTION IN THE COURSE +OF THIS WORKE: WHICH FOR THAT IT GIVETH GREAT LIGHT TO THE READER, FOR +THE BETTER UNDERSTANDING IS HEREUNTO ANNEXED + +To the Right Noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Raleigh, Knight, Lord +Wardein of the Stanneryes, and Her Majesties Liefetenaunt of the +County of Cornewayll + + +Sir, knowing how doubtfully all allegories may be construed, and this +booke of mine, which I have entituled the _Faery Queene_, being a +continued allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good, as well for +avoyding of gealous opinions and misconstructions, as also for your +better light in reading thereof, (being so by you commanded,) to +discover unto you the general intention and meaning, which in the +whole course thereof I have fashioned, without expressing of any +particular purposes or by accidents therein occasioned. The generall +end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble +person in vertuous and gentle discipline: which for that I conceived +shoulde be most plausible and pleasing, being coloured with an +historicall fiction, the which the most part of men delight to read, +rather for variety of matter then for profile of the ensample, I chose +the historye of King Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of +his person, being made famous by many mens former workes, and also +furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of present time. In +which I have followed all the antique poets historicall: first Homere, +who in the persons of Agamemnon and Ulysses hath ensampled a good +governour and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his +Odysseis; then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in the person +of AEneas; after him Ariosto comprised them both in his Orlando; and +lately Tasso dissevered them againe, and formed both parts in two +persons, namely that part which they in philosophy call Ethice, or +vertues of a private man, coloured in his Rinaldo; the other named +Politice in his Godfredo. By ensample of which excellente poets, I +labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king, the image of +a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as +Aristotle hath devised, the which is the purpose of these first +twelve bookes: which if I finde to be well accepted, I may be perhaps +encoraged to frame the other part of polliticke vertues in his person, +after that hee came to be king. To some, I know, this methode will +seeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline delivered +plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large, as they use, then +thus clowdily enwrapped in allegoricall devises. But such, me seeme, +should be satisfide with the use of these dayes, seeing all things +accounted by their showes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not +delightfull and pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon +preferred before Plato, for that the one, in the exquisite depth of +his judgement, formed a commune welth such as it should be, but the +other in the person of Cyrus and the Persians fashioned a governement, +such as might best be: so much more profitable and gratious is +doctrine by ensample, then by rule. So have I laboured to doe in +the person of Arthure: whome I conceive, after his long education by +Timon, to whom he was by Merlin delivered to be brought up, so soone +as he was borne of the Lady Igrayne, to have seene in a dream or +vision the Faery Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he +awaking resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin armed, and +by Timon throughly instructed, he went to seeke her forth in Faerye +Land. In that Faery Queene I meane glory in my generall intention, but +in my particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of +our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery Land. And yet, +in some places els, I doe otherwise shadow her. For considering she +beareth two persons, the one of a most royall queene or empresse, the +other of a most vertuous and beautifull lady, this latter part in some +places I doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name according to +your owne excellent conceipt of Cynthia, (Phaebe and Cynthia being +both names of Diana.) So in the person of Prince Arthure I sette +forth magnificence in particular, which vertue, for that (according +to Aristotle and the rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and +conteineth in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention the +deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue which I write of in that +booke. But of the xii. other vertues I make xii. other knights the +patrones, for the more variety of the history: of which these three +bookes contayn three. The first of the Knight of the Redcrosse, in +whome I expresse holynes: The seconde of Sir Guyon, in whome I sette +forth temperaunce: The third of Britomartis, a lady knight, in whome I +picture chastity. But because the beginning of the whole worke seemeth +abrupte and as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye +know the occasion of these three knights severall adventures. For the +methode of a poet historical is not such as of an historiographer. For +an historiographer discourseth of affayres orderly as they were donne, +accounting as well the times as the actions; but a poet thrusteth into +the middest, even where it most concerneth him, and there recoursing +to the thinges forepaste, and divining of thinges to come, maketh a +pleasing analysis of all. + +The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an +historiographer, should be the twelfth booke, which is the last; where +I devise that the Faery Queene kept her annuall feaste xii. dayes, +uppon which xii. severall dayes, the occasions of the xii. several +adventures hapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights, +are in these xii. books severally handled and discoursed. The first +was this. In the beginning of the feast, there presented him selfe +a tall clownish younge man, who, falling before the Queen of Faries, +desired a boone (as the manner then was) which during that feast she +might not refuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement of +any adventure, which during that feaste should happen: that being +graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitte through his rusticity +for a better place. Soone after entred a faire ladye in mourning +weedes, riding on a white asse, with a dwarfe behind her leading a +warlike steed, that bore the armes of a knight, and his speare in the +dwarfes hand. Shee, falling before the Queene of Faeries, complayned +that her father and mother, an ancient king and queene, had bene by an +huge dragon many years shut up in a brasen castle, who thence suffred +them not to yssew: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to assygne +her some one of her knights to take on him that exployt. Presently +that clownish person, upstarting, desired that adventure: whereat the +Queene much wondering, and the lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly +importuned his desire. In the end the lady told him, that unlesse that +armour which she brought would serve him (that is, the armour of a +Christian man specified by Saint Paul, vi. Ephes.), that he could not +succeed in that enterprise: which being forthwith put upon him with +dewe furnitures thereunto, he seemed the goodliest man in al that +company, and was well liked of the lady. And eftesoones taking on him +knighthood, and mounting on that straunge courser, he went forth with +her on that adventure: where beginneth the first booke vz. + + A gentle knight was pricking on the playne, &c. + +The second day ther came in a palmer bearing an infant with +bloody hands, whose parents he complained to have bene slayn by +an enchaunteresse called Acrasia: and therfore craved of the Faery +Queene, to appoint him some knight to performe that adventure; which +being assigned to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that same +palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke and the whole +subject thereof. The third day there came in a groome, who complained +before the Faery Queene, that a vile enchaunter, called Busirane, +had in hand a most faire lady, called Amoretta, whom he kept in most +grievous torment, because she would not yield him the pleasure of her +body. Whereupon Sir Scudamour, the lover of that lady, presently tooke +on him that adventure. But being unable to performe it by reason +of the hard enchauntments, after long sorrow, in the end met with +Britomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love. + +But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are intermedled, but +rather as accidents then intendments: as the love of Britomart, the +overthrow of Marinell, the misery of Florimell, the vertuousnes of +Belphoebe, the lasciviousnes of Hellenora, and many the like. + +Thus much, Sir, I have briefly overronne, to direct your understanding +to the wel-head of the history, that from thence gathering the whole +intention of the conceit, ye may, as in a handfull, gripe al the +discourse, which otherwise may happily seeme tedious and confused. So +humbly craving the continuance of your honourable favour towards me, +and th' eternall establishment of your happines, I humbly take leave. + +23. January, 1589. Yours most humbly affectionate, Ed. Spenser. + + +[Footnote A: Edmund Spenser was born in London about 1552, and died +there in 1599. He was the greatest of the non-dramatic poets of the +age of Elizabeth; and the "Faerie Queene" is the longest and most +famous of his works. The first three books were published in 1590, the +second three in 1596; of the remaining six which he had planned some +fragments were issued after his death. The poem is a combination of +allegory and romance; and in this prefatory letter to Raleigh the +poet himself explains the plan of the work and its main allegorical +signification.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD + +BY SIR WALTER RALEIGH (1614)[A] + + +How unfit and how unworthy a choice I have made of myself, to +undertake a work of this mixture, mine own reason, though exceeding +weak, hath sufficiently resolved me. For had it been begotten then +with my first dawn of day, when the light of common knowledge began to +open itself to my younger years, and before any wound received either +from Fortune or Time, I might yet well have doubted that the darkness +of Age and Death would have covered over both It and Me, long before +the performance. For, beginning with the Creation, I have proceeded +with the History of the World; and lastly purposed (some few sallies +excepted) to confine my discourse with this our renowned Island of +Great Britain. I confess that it had better sorted with my disability, +the better part of whose times are run out in other travails, to have +set together (as I could) the unjointed and scattered frame of our +English affairs, than of the universal in whom, had there been no +other defect (who am all defect) than the time of the day, it were +enough, the day of a tempestuous life, drawn on to the very evening +ere I began. But those inmost and soul-piercing wounds, which are ever +aching while uncured; with the desire to satisfy those few friends, +which I have tried by the fire of adversity, the former enforcing, +the latter persuading; have caused me to make my thoughts legible, and +myself the subject of every opinion, wise or weak. + +To the world I present them, to which I am nothing indebted: neither +have others that were, (Fortune changing) sped much better in any +age. For prosperity and adversity have evermore tied and untied vulgar +affections. And as we see it in experience, that dogs do always bark +at those they know not, and that it is their nature to accompany one +another in those clamors: so it is with the inconsiderate multitude; +who wanting that virtue which we call honesty in all men, and that +especial gift of God which we call charity in Christian men, condemn +without hearing, and wound without offence given: led thereunto by +uncertain report only; which his Majesty truly acknowledged for the +author of all lies. "Blame no man," saith Siracides, "before thou have +inquired the matter: understand first, and then reform righteously. +'Rumor, res sine teste, sine judice, maligna, fallax'; Rumor is +without witness, without judge, malicious and deceivable." This vanity +of vulgar opinion it was, that gave St. Augustine argument to affirm, +that he feared the praise of good men, and detested that of the evil. +And herein no man hath given a better rule, than this of Seneca; +"Conscientiae satisfaciamus: nihil in famam laboremus, sequatur vel +mala, dum bene merearis." "Let us satisfy our own consciences, and not +trouble ourselves with fame: be it never so ill, it is to be despised +so we deserve well." + +For myself, if I have in anything served my Country, and prized it +before my private, the general acceptation can yield me no other +profit at this time, than doth a fair sunshine day to a sea-man after +shipwreck; and the contrary no other harm, than an outrageous tempest +after the port attained. I know that I lost the love of many, for my +fidelity towards Her,[1] whom I must still honor in the dust; though +further than the defence of her excellent person, I never persecuted +any man. Of those that did it, and by what device they did it, He that +is the Supreme Judge of all the world, hath taken the account: so as +for this kind of suffering, I must say With Seneca, "Mala opinio, bene +parta, delectat."[2] As for other men; if there be any that have made +themselves fathers of that fame which hath been begotten for them, I +can neither envy at such their purchased glory, nor much lament mine +own mishap in that kind; but content myself to say with Virgil, "Sic +vos non vobis,"[3] in many particulars. To labor other satisfaction, +were an effect of frenzy, not of hope, seeing it is not truth, but +opinion, that can travel the world without a passport. For were it +otherwise; and were there not as many internal forms of the mind, as +there are external figures of men; there were then some possibility to +persuade by the mouth of one advocate, even equity alone. + +But such is the multiplying and extensive virtue of dead earth, and +of that breath-giving life which God hath cast upon time and dust, as +that among those that were, of whom we read and hear; and among those +that are, whom we see and converse with; everyone hath received a +several picture of face, and everyone a diverse picture of mind; +everyone a form apart, everyone a fancy and cogitation differing: +there being nothing wherein Nature so much triumpheth as in +dissimilitude. From whence it cometh that there is found so great +diversity of opinions; so strong a contrariety of inclinations; +so many natural and unnatural; wise, foolish, manly, and childish +affections and passions in mortal men. For it is not the visible +fashion and shape of plants, and of reasonable creatures, that makes +the difference of working in the one, and of condition in the other; +but the form internal. + +And though it hath pleased God to reserve the art of reading men's +thoughts to himself: yet, as the fruit tells the name of the tree; so +do the outward works of men (so far as their cogitations are acted) +give us whereof to guess at the rest. Nay, it were not hard to express +the one by the other, very near the life, did not craft in many, +fear in the most, and the world's love in all, teach every capacity, +according to the compass it hath, to qualify and make over their +inward deformities for a time. Though it be also true, "Nemo potest +diu personam ferre fictam: cito in naturam suam residunt, quibus +veritas non subest": "No man can long continue masked in a counterfeit +behavior: the things that are forced for pretences having no ground of +truth, cannot long dissemble their own natures." Neither can any +man (saith Plutarch) so change himself, but that his heart may be +sometimes seen at his tongue's end. + +In this great discord and dissimilitude of reasonable creatures, if we +direct ourselves to the multitude; "omnis honestae rei malus judex +est vulgus": "The common people are evil judges of honest things, and +whose wisdom (saith Ecclesiastes) is to be despised": if to the better +sort, every understanding hath a peculiar judgment, by which it both +censureth other men, and valueth itself. And therefore unto me it will +not seem strange, though I find these my worthless papers torn with +rats: seeing the slothful censurers of all ages have not spared to tax +the Reverend Fathers of the Church, with ambition; the severest men +to themselves, with hypocrisy; the greatest lovers of justice, +with popularity; and those of the truest valor and fortitude, with +vain-glory. But of these natures which lee in wait to find fault, and +to turn good into evil, seeing Solomon complained long since: and +that the very age of the world renders it every day after other +more malicious; I must leave the professors to their easy ways of +reprehension, than which there is nothing of more facility. + +To me it belongs in the first part of this Preface, following the +common and approved custom of those who have left the memories of +time past to after ages, to give, as near as I can, the same right to +history which they have done. Yet seeing therein I should but borrow +other men's words, I will not trouble the Reader with the repetition. +True it is that among many other benefits for which it hath been +honored, in this one it triumpheth over all human knowledge, that it +hath given us life in our understanding, since the world itself had +life and beginning, even to this day: yea, it hath triumphed over +time, which besides it nothing but eternity hath triumphed over: for +it hath carried our knowledge over the vast and devouring space of +many thousands of years, and given so fair and piercing eyes to our +mind; that we plainly behold living now (as if we had lived then) that +great world, "Magni Dei sapiens opus," "The wise work (saith Hermes) +of a great God," as it was then, when but new to itself. By it (I say) +it is, that we live in the very time when it was created: we behold +how it was governed: how it was covered with waters, and again +repeopled: how kings and kingdoms have flourished and fallen, and +for what virtue and piety God made prosperous; and for what vice and +deformity he made wretched, both the one and the other. And it is +not the least debt which we owe unto history, that it hath made us +acquainted with our dead ancestors; and, out of the depth and darkness +of the earth, delivered us their memory and fame. In a word, we may +gather out of history a policy no less wise than eternal; by the +comparison and application of other men's fore-passed miseries with +our own like errors and ill deservings. But it is neither of examples +the most lively instruction, nor the words of the wisest men, nor the +terror of future torments, that hath yet so wrought in our blind and +stupified minds, as to make us remember, that the infinite eye and +wisdom of God doth pierce through all our pretences; as to make us +remember, that the justice of God doth require none other accuser than +our own consciences: which neither the false beauty of our apparent +actions, nor all the formality, which (to pacify the opinions of men) +we put on, can in any, or the least kind, cover from his knowledge. +And so much did that heathen wisdom confess, no way as yet qualified +by the knowledge of a true God. If any (saith Euripides) "having +in his life committed wickedness, thinks he can hide it from the +everlasting gods, he thinks not well." + +To repeat God's judgments in particular, upon those of all degrees, +which have played with his mercies would require a volume apart: for +the sea of examples hath no bottom. The marks, set on private men, +are with their bodies cast into the earth; and their fortunes, written +only in the memories of those that lived with them: so as they who +succeed, and have not seen the fall of others, do not fear their own +faults. God's judgments upon the greater and greatest have been left +to posterity; first, by those happy hands which the Holy Ghost hath +guided; and secondly, by their virtue, who have gathered the acts and +ends of men mighty and remarkable in the world. Now to point far off, +and to speak of the conversion of angels into devils; for ambition: or +of the greatest and most glorious kings, who have gnawn the grass of +the earth with beasts for pride and ingratitude towards God: or of +that wise working of Pharaoh, when he slew the infants of Israel, +ere they had recovered their cradles: or of the policy of Jezebel, in +covering the murder of Naboth by a trial of the Elders, according to +the Law, with many thousands of the like: what were it other, than to +make an hopeless proof, that far-off examples would not be left to the +same far-off respects, as heretofore? For who hath not observed, what +labor, practice, peril, bloodshed, and cruelty, the kings and princes +of the world have undergone, exercised, taken on them, and committed; +to make themselves and their issues masters of the world? And yet +hath Babylon, Persia, Syria, Macedon, Carthage, Rome, and the rest, +no fruit, no flower, grass, nor leaf, springing upon the face of +the earth, of those seeds: no, their very roots and ruins do hardly +remain. "Omnia quae manu hominum facta sunt, vel manu hominum +evertuntur, vel stando et durando deficiunt": "All that the hand of +man can make, is either overturned by the hand of man, or at length +by standing and continuing consumed." The reasons of whose ruins, are +diversely given by those that ground their opinions on second causes. +All kingdoms and states have fallen (say the politicians) by outward +and foreign force, or by inward negligence and dissension, or by a +third cause arising from both. Others observe, that the greatest have +sunk down under their own weight; of which Livy hath a touch: "eo +crevit, ut magnitudine laboret sua":[4] Others, That the divine +providence (which Cratippus objected to Pompey) hath set _down_ the +date and period of every estate, before their first foundation and +erection. But hereof I will give myself a day over to resolve. + +For seeing the first hooks of the following story, have undertaken the +discourse of the first kings and kingdoms: and that it is impossible +for the short life of a Preface, to travel after, and overtake far-off +antiquity, and to judge of it; I will, for the present, examine +what profit hath been gathered by our own Kings, and their neighbour +princes: who having beheld, both in divine and human letters, the +success of infidelity, injustice, and cruelty; have (notwithstanding) +planted after the same pattern. + +True it is, that the judgments of all men are not agreeable; nor +(which is more strange) the affection of any one man stirred up alike +with examples of like nature: but every one is touched most, with that +which most nearly seemeth to touch his own private, or otherwise best +suiteth with his apprehension. But the judgments of God are forever +unchangeable: neither is He wearied by the long process of time, and +won to give His blessing in one age, to that which He hath cursed in +another. Wherefor those that are wise, or whose wisdom if it be not +great, yet is true and well grounded, will be able to discern the +bitter fruits of irreligious policy, as well among those examples that +are found in ages removed far from the present, as in those of latter +times. And that it may no less appear by evident proof, than by +asseveration, that ill doing hath always been attended with ill +success; I will here, by way of preface, run over some examples, which +the work ensuing hath not reached. + +Among our kings of the Norman race, we have no sooner passed over the +violence of the Norman Conquest, than we encounter with a singular and +most remarkable example of God's justice, upon the children of Henry +the First. For that King, when both by force, craft, and cruelty, he +had dispossessed, overreached, and lastly made blind and destroyed his +elder brother Robert Duke of Normandy, to make his own sons lords +of this land: God cast them all, male and female, nephews and nieces +(Maud excepted) into the bottom of the sea, with above a hundred and +fifty others that attended them; whereof a great many were noble and +of the King dearly beloved. + +To pass over the rest, till we come to Edward the Second; it is +certain, that after the murder of that King, the issue of blood then +made, though it had some times of stay and stopping, did again break +out, and that so often and in such abundance, as all our princes of +the masculine race (very few excepted) died of the same disease. And +although the young years of Edward the Third made his knowledge of +that horrible fact no more than suspicious; yet in that he afterwards +caused his own uncle, the Earl of Kent, to die, for no other offence +than the desire of his brother's redemption, whom the Earl as then +supposed to be living; the King making that to be treated in +his uncle, which was indeed treason in himself, (had his uncle's +intelligence been true) this I say made it manifest, that he was +not ignorant of what had past, nor greatly desirous to have had it +otherwise, though he caused Mortimer to die for the same. + +This cruelty the secret and unsearchable judgment of God revenged on +the grandchild of Edward the Third: and so it fell out, even to the +last of that line, that in the second or third descent they were all +buried under the ruins of those buildings, of which the mortar had +been tempered with innocent blood. For Richard the Second, who saw +both his Treasurers, his Chancellor, and his Steward, with divers +others of his counsellors, some of them slaughtered by the people, +others in his absence executed by his enemies, yet he always +took himself for over-wise to be taught by examples. The Earls of +Huntingdon and Kent, Montagu and Spencer, who thought themselves as +great politicians in those days as others have done in these: hoping +to please the King, and to secure themselves, by the murder of +Gloucester; died soon after, with many other their adherents, by the +like violent hands; and far more shamefully than did that duke. And +as for the King himself (who in regard of many deeds, unworthy of his +greatness, cannot be excused, as the disavowing himself by breach of +faith, charters, pardons, and patents): he was in the prime of his +youth deposed, and murdered by his cousin-german and vassal, Henry of +Lancaster, afterwards Henry the Fourth. + +This King, whose title was weak, and his obtaining the Crown +traitorous; who brake faith with the lords at his landing, protesting +to intend only the recovery of his proper inheritance, brake faith +with Richard himself; and brake faith with all the kingdom in +Parliament, to whom he swore that the deposed King should live. After +that he had enjoyed this realm some few years, and in that time +had been set upon all sides by his subjects, and never free from +conspiracies and rebellions: he saw (if souls immortal see and discern +anythings after the bodies' death) his grandchild Henry the Sixth, +and his son the Prince, suddenly and without mercy, murdered; the +possession of the Crown (for which he had caused so much blood to +be poured out) transferred from his race, and by the issues of +his enemies worn and enjoyed: enemies, whom by his own practice he +supposed that he had left no less powerless, than the succession of +the Kingdom questionless; by entailing the same upon his own issues +by Parliament. And out of doubt, human reason could have judged no +otherwise, but that these cautious provisions of the father, seconded +by the valor and signal victories of his son Henry the Fifth, had +buried the hopes of every competitor, under the despair of all +reconquest and recovery. I say, that human reason might so have +judged, were not this passage of Casaubon also true; "Dies, hora, +momentum, evertendis dominationibus sufficit, quae adamantinis +credebantur radicibus esse fundatae:" "A day, an hour, a moment, is +enough to overturn the things, that seemed to have been founded and +rooted in adamant." + +Now for Henry the Sixth, upon whom the great storm of his +grandfather's grievous faults fell, as it formerly had done upon +Richard the grandchild of Edward: although he was generally esteemed +for a gentle and innocent prince, yet as he refused the daughter of +Armagnac, of the House of Navarre, the greatest of the Princes +of France, to whom he was affianced (by which match he might have +defended his inheritance in France) and married the daughter of Anjou, +(by which he lost all that he had in France) so in condescending to +the unworthy death of his uncle of Gloucester, the main and strong +pillar of the House of Lancaster; he drew on himself and this kingdom +the greatest joint-loss and dishonor, that ever it sustained since the +Norman Conquest. Of whom it may truly be said which a counsellor of +his own spake of Henry the Third of France, "Qu'il estait tme fort +gentile Prince; mais son reigne est advenu en une fort mauvais +temps:" "He was a very gentle Prince; but his reign happened in a very +unfortunate season." + +It is true that Buckingham and Suffolk were the practicers and +contrivers of the Duke's death: Buckingham and Suffolk, because the +Duke gave instructions to their authority, which otherwise under the +Queen had been absolute; the Queen in respect of her personal wound, +"spretaeque injuria formae,"[5] because Gloucester dissuaded her +marriage. But the fruit was answerable to the seed; the success to +the counsel. For after the cutting down of Gloucester, York grew up so +fast, as he dared to dispute his right both by arguments and arms; +in which quarrel, Suffolk and Buckingham, with the greatest number of +their adherents, were dissolved. And although for his breach of oath +by sacrament, it pleased God to strike down York: yet his son the Earl +of March, following the plain path which his father had trodden out, +despoiled Henry the father, and Edward the son, both of their lives +and kingdom. And what was the end now of that politic lady the Queen, +other than this, that she lived to behold the wretched ends of all her +partakers: that she lived to look on, while her husband the King, and +her only son the Prince, were hewn in sunder; while the Crown was set +on his head that did it. She lived to see herself despoiled of her +estate, and of her moveables: and lastly, her father, by rendering up +to the Crown of France the Earldom of Provence and other places, for +the payment of fifty thousand crowns for her ransom, to become a +stark beggar. And this was the end of that subtility, which Siracides +calleth "fine" but "unrighteous:" for other fruit hath it never +yielded since the world was. + +And now it came to Edward the Fourth's turn (though after many +difficulties) to triumph. For all the plants of Lancaster were rooted +up, one only Earl of Richmond excepted: whom also he had once bought +of the Duke of Brittany, but could not hold him. And yet was not +this of Edward such a plantation, as could any way promise itself +stability. For this Edward the King (to omit more than many of his +other cruelties) beheld and allowed the slaughter which Gloucester, +Dorset, Hastings, and others, made of Edward the Prince in his own +presence; of which tragical actors, there was not one that escaped the +judgment of God in the same kind And he, which (besides the execution +of his brother Clarence, for none other offence than he himself had +formed in his own imagination) instructed Gloucester to kill Henry the +Sixth, his predecessor; taught him also by the same art to kill his +own sons and successors, Edward and Richard. For those kings which +have sold the blood of others at a low rate; have but made the market +for their own enemies, to buy of theirs at the same price. + +To Edward the Fourth succeeded Richard the Third, the greatest master +in mischief of all that fore-went him: who although, for the necessity +of his tragedy, he had more parts to play, and more to perform in his +own person, than all the rest; yet he so well fitted every affection +that played with him, as if each of them had but acted his own +interest. For he wrought so cunningly upon the affections of Hastings +and Buckingham, enemies to the Queen and to all her kindred, as he +easily allured them to condescend, that Rivers and Grey, the King's +maternal uncle and half brother, should (for the first) be severed +from him: secondly, he wrought their consent to have them imprisoned: +and lastly (for the avoiding of future inconvenience) to have their +heads severed from their bodies. And having now brought those his +chief instruments to exercise that common precept which the Devil hath +written on every post, namely, to depress those whom they had grieved, +and destroy those whom they had depressed; he urged that argument +so far and so forcibly, as nothing but the death of the young King +himself, and of his brother, could fashion the conclusion. For he +caused it to be hammered into Buckingham's head, that, whensoever the +King or his brother should have able years to exercise their power, +they would take a most severe revenge of that cureless wrong, offered +to their uncle and brother, Rivers and Grey. + +But this was not his manner of reasoning with Hastings, whose fidelity +to his master's sons was without suspect: and yet the Devil, who never +dissuades by impossibility, taught him to try him. And so he did. But +when he found by Catesby, who sounded him, that he was not fordable; +he first resolved to kill him sitting in council: wherein having +failed with his sword, he set the hangman upon him, with a weapon +of more weight. And because nothing else could move his appetite, +he caused his head to be stricken off, before he ate his dinner. A +greater judgment of God than this upon Hastings, I have never observed +in any story. For the selfsame day that the Earl Rivers, Grey, and +others, were (without trial of law, of offence given) by Hastings' +advice executed at Pomfret: I say Hastings himself in the same day, +and (as I take it) in the same hour, in the same lawless manner had +his head stricken off in the Tower of London. But Buckingham lived a +while longer; and with an eloquent oration persuaded the Londoners +to elect Richard for their king. And having received the Earldom of +Hereford for reward, besides the high hope of marrying his daughter +to the King's only son; after many grievous vexations of mind, and +unfortunate attempts, being in the end betrayed and delivered up +by his trustiest servant; he had his head severed from his body at +Salisbury, without the trouble of any of his Peers. And what success +had Richard himself after all these mischiefs and murders, policies, +and counter-policies to Christian religion: and after such time +as with a most merciless hand he had pressed out the breath of his +nephews and natural lords; other than the prosperity of so short a +life, as it took end, ere himself could well look over and discern +it? The great outcry of innocent blood, obtained at God's hands the +effusion of his; who became a spectacle of shame and dishonor, both to +his friends and enemies. + +This cruel King, Henry the Seventh cut off; and was therein (no doubt) +the immediate instrument of God's justice. A politic Prince he was if +ever there were any, who by the engine of his wisdom, beat down and +overturned as many strong oppositions both before and after he wore +the Crown, as ever King of England did: I say by his wisdom, because +as he ever left the reins of his affections in the hands of his +profit, so he always weighed his undertakings by his abilities, +leaving nothing more to hazard than so much as cannot be denied it in +all human actions. He had well observed the proceedings of Louis the +Eleventh, whom he followed in all that was royal or royal-like, but +he was far more just, and begun not their processes whom he hated or +feared by the execution, as Louis did. + +He could never endure any mediation in rewarding his servants, and +therein exceeding wise; for whatsoever himself gave, he himself +received back the thanks and the love, knowing it well that the +affections of men (purchased by nothing so readily as by benefits) +were trains that better became great kings, than great subjects. On +the contrary, in whatsoever he grieved his subjects, he wisely put it +off on those, that he found fit ministers for such actions. Howsoever +the taking off of Stanley's head, who set the Crown on his, and the +death of the young Earl of Warwick, son to George, Duke of Clarence, +shows, as the success also did, that he held somewhat of the errors +of his ancestors; for his possession in the first line ended in his +grandchildren, as that of Edward the Third and Henry the Fourth had +done. + +Now for King Henry the Eighth; if all the pictures and patterns of +a merciless prince were lost in the world, they might all again be +painted to the life, out of the story of this king. For how many +servants did he advance in haste (but for what virtue no man could +suspect) and with the change of his fancy ruined again; no man knowing +for what offence? To how many others of more desert gave he abundant +flowers from whence to gather honey, and in the end of harvest burnt +them in the hive? How many wives did he cut off, and cast off, as his +fancy and affection changed? How many princes of the blood (whereof +some of them for age could hardly crawl towards the block) with a +world of others of all degrees (of whom our common chronicles have +kept the account) did he execute? Yea, in his very death-bed, and when +he was at the point to have given his account to God for the abundance +of blood already spilt, he imprisoned the Duke of Norfolk the father; +and executed the Earl of Surrey the son; the one, whose deservings he +knew not how to value, having never omitted anything that concerned +his own honor, and the King's service; the other never having +committed anything worthy of his least displeasure: the one exceeding +valiant and advised; the other no less valiant than learned, and +of excellent hope. But besides the sorrows which he heaped upon +the fatherless and widows at home: and besides the vain enterprises +abroad, wherein it is thought that he consumed more treasure than all +our victorious kings did in their several conquests; what causeless +and cruel wars did he make upon his own nephew King James the First? +What laws and wills did he devise to cut off, and cut down those +branches, which sprang from the same root that himself did? And in +the end (notwithstanding these his so many irreligious provisions) it +pleased God to take away all his own, without increase; though, for +themselves in their several kinds, all princes of eminent virtue. +For these words of Samuel to Agag King of the Amalekites, have +been verified upon many others: "As thy sword hath made other women +childless, so shall thy mother be childless among other women." And +that blood which the same King Henry affirmed, that the cold air of +Scotland had frozen up in the North, God hath diffused by the sunshine +of his grace: from whence his Majesty now living, and long to live, is +descended. Of whom I may say it truly, "That if all the malice of the +world were infused into one eye: yet could it not discern in his +life, even to this day, any one of these foul spots, by which the +consciences of all the forenamed princes (in effect) have been +defiled; nor any drop of that innocent blood on the sword of his +justice, with which the most that fore-went him have stained both +their hands and fame." And for this Crown of England; it may truly he +avowed: that he hath received it even from the hand of God, and hath +stayed the time of putting it on, howsoever he were provoked to hasten +it: that he never took revenge of any man, that sought to put him +beside it: that he refused the assistance of Her enemies, that wore +it long, with as great glory as ever princess did: that his Majesty +entered not by a breach, nor by blood; but by the ordinary gate, +which his own right set open; and into which, by a general love and +obedience, he was received. And howsoever his Majesty's preceding +title to this Kingdom was preferred by many princes (witness the +Treaty at Cambray in the year 1559) yet he never pleased to dispute +it, during the life of that renowned lady his predecessor; no, +notwithstanding the injury of not being declared heir, in all the time +of her long reign. + +Neither ought we to forget, or neglect our thankfulness to God for +the uniting of the northern parts of Britain to the south, to wit, +of Scotland to England, which though they were severed but by small +brooks and banks, yet by reason of the long continued war, and the +cruelties exercised upon each other, in the affections of the nations, +they were infinitely severed. This I say is not the least of God's +blessings which his Majesty hath brought with him unto this land: +no, put all our petty grievances together, and heap them up to their +height, they will appear but as a molehill compared with the +mountain of this concord. And if all the historians since then have +acknowledged the uniting of the Red Rose, and the White, for the +greatest happiness (Christian Religion excepted), that ever this +kingdom received from God, certainly the peace between the two lions +of gold and gules, and the making them one, doth by many degrees +exceed the former; for by it, besides the sparing of our British +blood, heretofore and during the difference, so often and abundantly +shed, the state of England is more assured, the kingdom more +enabled to recover her ancient honor and rights, and by it made more +invincible, than by all our former alliances, practises, policies, and +conquests. It is true that hereof we do not yet find the effect. +But had the Duke of Parma in the year 1588, joined the army which he +commanded, with that of Spain, and landed it on the south coast; and +had his Majesty at the same time declared himself against us in the +North: it is easy to divine what had become of the liberty of England, +certainly we would then without murmur have bought this union at far +greater price than it hath since cost us. It is true, that there was +never any common weal or kingdom in the world, wherein no man had +cause to lament. Kings live in the world, and not above it. They are +not infinite to examine every man's cause, or to relieve every man's +wants. And yet in the latter (though to his own prejudice), his +Majesty hath had more comparison of other men's necessities, than of +his own coffers. Of whom it may he said, as of Solomon,[6] "Dedit Deus +Solomon! latitudinem cordis": Which if other men do not understand +with Pineda, to be meant by liberality, but by "latitude of +knowledge"; yet may it be better spoken of His Majesty, than of +any king that ever England had; who as well in divine, as human +understanding, hath exceeded all that fore-went him, by many degrees. + +I could say much more of the King's majesty, without flattery: did I +not fear the imputation of presumption, and withal suspect, that it +might befall these papers of mine (though the loss were little) as +it did the pictures of Queen Elizabeth, made by unskilful and common +painters, which by her own commandment were knocked in pieces and +cast into the fire. For ill artists, in setting out the beauty of the +external; and weak writers, in describing the virtues of the internal; +do often leave to posterity, of well formed faces a deformed +memory; and of the most perfect and princely minds, a most defective +representation. It may suffice, and there needs no other discourse; if +the honest reader but compare the cruel and turbulent passages of our +former kings, and of other their neighbor-princes (of whom for that +purpose I have inserted this brief discourse) with his Majesty's +temperate, revengeless and liberal disposition: I say, that if the +honest reader weigh them justly, and with an even hand; and withal but +bestow every deformed child on his true parent; he shall find, that +there is no man that hath so just cause to complain, as the King +himself hath. Now as we have told the success of the trumperies and +cruelties of our own kings, and other great personages: so we find, +that God is everywhere the same God. And as it pleased him to punish +the usurpation, and unnatural cruelty of Henry the First, and of our +third Edward, in their children for many generations: so dealt He +with the sons of Louis Debonnaire, the son of Charles the Great, or +Charlemagne. For after such time as Debonnaire of France, had torn +out the eyes of Bernard his nephew, the son of Pepin the eldest son +of Charlemagne, and heir of the Empire, and then caused him to die in +prison, as did our Henry to Robert his eldest brother: there followed +nothing but murders upon murders, poisoning, imprisonments, and civil +war; till the whole race of that famous Emperor was extinguished. And +though Debonnaire, after he had rid himself of his nephew by a violent +death; and of his bastard brothers by a civil death (having inclosed +them with sure guard, all the days of their lives, within a monastery) +held himself secure from all opposition: yet God raised up against him +(which he suspected not) his own sons, to vex him, to invade him, +to take him prisoner, and to depose him; his own sons, with whom +(to satisfy their ambition) he had shared his estate, and given them +crowns to wear, and kingdoms to govern, during his own life. Yea his +eldest son, Lothair (for he had four, three by his first wife, and one +by his second; to wit, Lothair, Pepin, Louis, and Charles), made it +the cause of his deposition, that he had used violence towards his +brothers and kinsmen; and that he had suffered his nephew (whom he +might have delivered) to be slain. "Eo quod," saith the text,[7] +"fratribus, et propinquis violentiam intulerit, et nepotem suum, +quern ipse liberate poterat, interfici permiserit": "Because he used +violence to his brothers and kinsmen, and suffered his nephew to be +slain whom he might have delivered." + +Yet did he that which few kings do; namely, repent him of his cruelty. +For, among many other things which he performed in the General +Assembly of the States, it follows: "Post haec autem palam se errasse +confessus, et imitatus Imperatoris Theodosii exemplum, poenitentiam +spontaneam suscepit, tarn de his, quam quae in Bernardum proprium +nepotem gesserat": "After this he did openly confess himself to +have erred, and following the example of the Emperor Theodosius, he +underwent voluntary penance, as well for his other offences, as for +that which he had done against Bernard his own nephew." + +This he did; and it was praise-worthy. But the blood that is unjustly +spilt, is not again gathered up from the ground by repentance. These +medicines, ministered to the dead, have but dead rewards. + +This king, as I have said, had four sons. To Lothair his eldest he +gave the Kingdom of Italy; as Charlemagne, his father, had done to +Pepin, the father of Bernard, who was to succeed him in the Empire. To +Pepin the second son he gave the Kingdom of Aquitaine: to Louis, +the Kingdom of Bavaria: and to Charles, whom he had by a second wife +called Judith, the remainder of the Kingdom of France. But this second +wife, being a mother-in-law[8] to the rest, persuaded Debonnaire +to cast his son Pepin out of Aquitaine, thereby to greaten Charles, +which, after the death of his son Pepin, he prosecuted to effect, +against his grandchild bearing the same name. In the meanwhile, being +invaded by his son Louis of Bavaria, he dies for grief. + +Debonnaire dead, Louis of Bavaria, and Charles afterwards called the +Bald, and their nephew Pepin, of Aquitaine, join in league against the +Emperor Lothair their eldest brother. They fight near to Auxerre the +most bloody battle that ever was stroken in France: in which, the +marvellous loss of nobility, and men of war, gave courage to the +Saracens to invade Italy; to the Huns to fall upon Almaine; and the +Danes to enter upon Normandy. Charles the Bald by treason seizeth upon +his nephew Pepin, kills him in a cloister: Carloman rebels against +his father Charles the Bald, the father burns out the eyes of his son +Carloman; Bavaria invades the Emperor Lothair his brother, Lothair +quits the Empire, he is assailed and wounded to the heart by his own +conscience, for his rebellion against his father, and for his other +cruelties, and dies in a monastery. Charles the Bald, the uncle, +oppresseth his nephews the sons of Lothair, he usurpeth the Empire to +the prejudice of Louis of Bavaria his elder brother; Bavaria's armies +and his son Carloman are beaten, he dies of grief, and the usurper +Charles is poisoned by Zedechias a Jew, his physician, his son Louis +le Begue dies of the same drink. Begue had Charles the Simple and two +bastards, Louis and Carloman; they rebel against their brother, but +the eldest breaks his neck, the younger is slain by a wild boar; the +son of Bavaria had the same ill destiny, and brake his neck by a fall +out of a window in sporting with his companions. Charles the Gross +becomes lord of all that the sons of Debonnaire held in Germany; +wherewith not contented, he invades Charles the Simple: but +being-forsaken of his nobility, of his wife, and of his understanding, +he dies a distracted beggar. Charles the Simple is held in wardship by +Eudes, Mayor of the Palace, then by Robert the brother of Eudes: and +lastly, being taken by the Earl of Vermandois; he is forced to die in +the prison of Peron, Louis the son of Charles the Simple breaks his +neck in chasing a wolf, and of the two sons of this Louis, the one +dies of poison, the other dies in the prison of Orleans; after whom +Hugh Capet, of another race, and a stranger to the French, makes +himself king. + +These miserable ends had the issues of Debonnaire, who after he had +once apparelled injustice with authority, his sons and successors took +up the fashion, and wore that garment so long without other provision, +as when the same was torn from their shoulders, every man despised +them as miserable and naked beggars. The wretched success they had +(saith a learned Frenchman) shows, "que en ceste mort il y avait plus +du fait des homines que de Pieu, ou de la justice": "that in the death +of that Prince, to wit, of Bernard the son of Pepin, the true heir of +Charlemagne, men had more meddling than either God or justice had." + +But to come nearer home; it is certain that Francis the First, one of +the worthiest kings (except for that fact) that ever Frenchmen had, +did never enjoy himself, after he had commended the destruction of the +Protestants of Mirandol and Cabrieres, to the Parliament of Provence, +which poor people were thereupon burnt and murdered; men, women, and +children. It is true that the said King Francis repented himself of +the fact, and gave charge to Henry his son, to do justice upon the +murderers, threatening his son with God's judgments, if he neglected +it. But this unseasonable care of his, God was not pleased to accept +for payment. For after Henry himself was slain in sport by Montgomery, +we all may remember what became of his four sons, Francis, Charles, +Henry, and Hercules. Of which although three of them became kings, +and were married to beautiful and virtuous ladies: yet were they, +one after another, cast out of the world, without stock or seed. And +notwithstanding their subtility, and breach of faith; with all their +massacres upon those of the religion,[9] and great effusion of blood, +the crown was set on his head, whom they all labored to dissolve; the +Protestants remain more in number than ever they were, and hold to +this day more strong cities than ever they had. + +Let us now see if God be not the same God in Spain, as in England and +France. Towards whom we will look no further back than to Don Pedro +of Castile: in respect of which Prince, all the tyrants of Sicil, our +Richard the Third, and the great Ivan Vasilowich of Moscow, were but +petty ones: this Castilian, of all Christian and heathen kings, having +been the most merciless. For, besides those of his own blood and +nobility, which he caused to be slain in his own court and chamber, +as Sancho Ruis, the great master of Calatrava, Ruis Gonsales, Alphonso +Tello, and Don John of Arragon, whom he cut in pieces and cast into +the streets, denying him Christian burial: I say, besides these, and +the slaughter of Gomes Mauriques, Diego Peres, Alphonso Gomes, and the +great commander of Castile; he made away the two infants of Arragon +his cousin germans, his brother Don Frederick, Don John de la Cerde, +Albuquergues, Nugnes de Guzman, Cornel, Cabrera, Tenorio, Mendes de +Toledo, Guttiere his great treasurer and all his kindred; and a world +of others. Neither did he spare his two youngest brothers, innocent +princes: whom after he had kept in close prison from their cradles, +till one of them had lived sixteen years, and the other fourteen, he +murdered them there. Nay, he spared not his mother, nor his wife +the Lady Blanche of Bourbon. Lastly, as he caused the Archbishop of +Toledo, and the Dean to be killed of purpose to enjoy their treasures; +so did he put to death Mahomet Aben Alhamar, King of Barbary, with +thirty-seven of his nobility, that came unto him for succor, with a +great sum of money, to levy (by his favor) some companies of soldiers +to return withal. Yea, he would needs assist the hangman with his +own hand, in the execution of the old king; in so much as Pope Urban +declareth him an enemy both to God and man. But what was his end? +Having been formerly beaten out of his kingdom, and reestablished by +the valor of the English nation, led by the famous Duke of Lancaster: +he was stabbed to death by his younger brother the Earl of Astramara, +who dispossessed all his children of their inheritance; which, but for +the father's injustice and cruelty, had never been in danger of any +such thing. + +If we can parallel any man with this king, it must be Duke John of +Burgogne, who, after his traitorous murder of the Duke of Orleans, +caused the Constable of Armagnac, the Chancellor of France, the +Bishops of Constance, Bayeux, Eureux, Senlis, Saintes, and other +religious and reverend Churchmen, the Earl of Gran Pre, Hector of +Chartres, and (in effect) all the officers of justice, of the Chamber +of Accounts, Treasury, and Request, (with sixteen hundred others to +accompany them) to be suddenly and violently slain. Hereby, while he +hoped to govern, and to have mastered France, he was soon after struck +with an axe in the face, in the presence of the Dauphin; and, without +any leisure to repent his misdeeds, presently[10] slain. _These were +the lovers of other men's miseries: and misery found them out_. + +Now for the kings of Spain, which lived both with Henry the Seventh, +Henry the Eighth, Queen Mary, and Queen Elizabeth; Ferdinand of +Arragon was the first: and the first that laid the foundation of the +present Austrian greatness. For this King did not content himself +to hold Arragon by the usurpation of his ancestor; and to fasten +thereunto the Kingdom of Castile and Leon, which Isabel his wife held +by strong hand, and his assistance, from her own niece the daughter +of the last Henry: but most cruelly and craftily, without all color +or pretence of right, he also cast his own niece out of the Kingdom +of Navarre, and, contrary to faith, and the promise that he made to +restore it, fortified the best places, and so wasted the rest, as +there was no means left for any army to invade it. This King, I say, +that betrayed also Ferdinand and Frederick, Kings of Naples, princes +of his own blood, and by double alliance tied unto him; sold them +to the French: and with the same army, sent for their succor under +Gonsalvo, cast them out; and shared their kingdom with the French, +whom afterwards he most shamefully betrayed. + +This wise and politic King, who sold Heaven and his own honor, to make +his son, the Prince of Spain, the greatest monarch of the world; saw +him die in the flower of his years; and his wife great with child, +with her untimely birth, at once and together buried. His eldest +daughter married unto Don Alphonso, Prince of Portugal, beheld her +first husband break his neck in her presence; and being with child +by her second, died with it. A just judgment of God upon the race of +John, father to Alphonso, now wholly extinguished; who had not only +left many disconsolate mothers in Portugal, by the slaughter of their +children; but had formerly slain with his own hand, the son and only +comfort of his aunt the Lady Beatrix, Duchess of Viseo. + +The second daughter of Ferdinand, married to the Arch-Duke Philip, +turned fool, and died mad and deprived.[11] His third daughter, +bestowed on King Henry the Eighth, he saw cast off by the King: the +mother of many troubles in England; and the mother of a daughter, that +in her unhappy zeal shed a world of innocent blood; lost Calais to the +French; and died heartbroken without increase. To conclude, all those +kingdoms of Ferdinand have masters of a new name; and by a strange +family are governed and possessed. + +Charles the Fifth, son to the Arch-Duke Philip, in whose vain +enterprises upon the French, upon the Almains, and other princes +and states, so many multitudes of Christian soldiers, and renowned +captains were consumed; who gave the while a most perilous entrance to +the Turks, and suffered Rhodes, the Key of Christendom, to be taken; +was in conclusion chased out of France, and in a sort out of Germany; +and left to the French, Mentz, Toule, and Verdun, places belonging +to the Empire, stole away from Inspurg; and scaled the Alps by +torchlight, pursued by Duke Maurice; having hoped to swallow up all +those dominions wherein he concocted nothing save his own disgraces. +And having, after the slaughter of so many millions of men, no one +foot of ground in either: he crept into a cloister, and made himself +a pensioner of an hundred thousand ducats by the year, to his son +Philip, from whom he very slowly received his mean and ordinary +maintenance. + +His son again King Philip the Second, not satisfied to hold Holland +and Zeeland, (wrested by his ancestors from Jacqueline their lawful +Princess) and to possess in peace many other provinces of the +Netherlands: persuaded by that mischievous Cardinal of Granvile, and +other Romish tyrants; not only forgot the most remarkable services +done to his father the Emperor by the nobilities of those countries, +not only forgot the present made him upon his entry, of forty millions +of florins, called the "Novaile aide"; nor only forgot that he had +twice most solemnly sworn to the General States, to maintain and +preserve their ancient rights, privileges, and customs, which they +had enjoyed under their thirty and five earls before him, Conditional +Princes of those provinces: but beginning first to constrain them, and +enthrall them by the Spanish Inquisition, and then to impoverish them +by many new devised and intolerable impositions; he lastly, by strong +hand and main force, attempted to make himself not only an absolute +monarch over them, like unto the kings and sovereigns of England and +France; but Turk-like to tread under his feet all their natural and +fundamental laws, privileges, and ancient rights. To effect which, +after he had easily obtained from the Pope a dispensation of his +former oaths (which dispensation was the true cause of the war and +bloodshed since then;) and after he had tried what he could perform, +by dividing of their own nobility, under the government of his base +sister Margaret of Austria, and the Cardinal Granvile; he employed +that most merciless Spaniard Don Ferdinand Alvarez of Toledo, Duke +of Alva, followed with a powerful army of strange nations: by whom he +first slaughtered that renowned captain, the Earl of Egmont, Prince of +Gavare: and Philip Montmorency, Earl of Horn: made away Montigue, +and the Marquis of Bergues, and cut off in those six years (that Alva +governed) of gentlemen and others, eighteen thousand and six hundred, +by the hands of the hangman, besides all his other barbarous murders +and massacres. By whose ministry when he could not yet bring his +affairs to their wished ends, having it in his hope to work that +by subtility, which he had failed to perform by force; he sent for +governor his bastard brother Don John of Austria, a prince of great +hope, and very gracious to those people. But he, using the same papal +advantage that his predecessors had done, made no scruple to take oath +upon the Holy Evangelists, to observe the treaty made with the General +States; and to discharge the Low Countries of all Spaniards, and other +strangers therein garrisoned: towards whose pay and passport, the +Netherlands strained themselves to make payment of six hundred +thousand pounds. Which monies received, he suddenly surprised the +citadels of Antwerp and Nemours: not doubting (being unsuspected by +the states) to have possessed himself of all the mastering places +of those provinces. For whatsoever he overtly pretended, he held +in secret a contrary counsel with the Secretary Escovedo, Rhodus, +Barlemont, and others, ministers of the Spanish tyranny, formerly +practised, and now again intended. But let us now see the effect and +end of this perjury and of all other the Duke's cruelties. First, for +himself, after he had murdered so many of the nobility; executed (as +aforesaid) eighteen thousand and six hundred in six years, and most +cruelly slain man, woman, and child, in Mechlin, Zutphen, Naerden, +and other places: notwithstanding his Spanish vaunt, that he would +suffocate the Hollanders in their own butter-barrels, and milk-tubs; +he departed the country no otherwise accompanied, than with the curse +and detestation of the whole nation; leaving his master's affairs in a +tenfold worse estate, than he found them at his first arrival. For +Don John, whose haughty conceit of himself overcame the greatest +difficulties; though his judgment were over-weak to manage the least: +what wonders did his fearful breach of faith bring forth, other than +the King his brother's jealousy and distrust, with the untimely death +that seized him, even in the flower of his youth? And for Escovedo his +sharp-witted secretary, who in his own imagination had conquered for +his master both England and the Netherlands; being sent into Spain +upon some new project, he was at the first arrival, and before any +access to the King, by certain ruffians appointed by Anthony Peres +(though by better warrant than his) rudely murdered in his own +lodging. Lastly, if we consider the King of Spain's carriage, his +counsel and success in this business, there is nothing left to the +memory of man more remarkable. For he hath paid above an hundred +millions, and the lives of above four hundred thousand Christians, +for the loss of all those countries; which, for beauty, gave place to +none; and for revenue, did equal his West Indies: for the loss of a +nation which most willingly obeyed him; and who at this day, after +forty years war, are in despite of all his forces become a free +estate, and far more rich and powerful than they were, when he first +began to impoverish and oppress them. + +Oh, by what plots, by what forswearings, betrayings, oppressions, +imprisonments, tortures, poisonings, and under what reasons of state, +and politic subtlety, have these fore-named kings, both strangers, +and of our own nation, pulled the vengeance of God upon themselves, +upon theirs, and upon their prudent ministers! and in the end have +brought those things to pass for their enemies, and seen an effect so +directly contrary to all their own counsels and cruelties; as the +one could never have hoped for themselves; and the other never have +succeeded; if no such opposition had ever been made. God hath said it +and performed it ever: "Perdam sapientiam sapientum"; "I will destroy +the wisdom of the wise." + +But what of all this? and to what end do we lay before the eyes of +the living, the fall and fortunes of the dead: seeing the world is +the same that it hath been; and the children of the present time, will +still obey their parents? It is in the present time that all the wits +of the world are exercised. To hold the times we have, we hold all +things lawful: and either we hope to hold them forever; or at least we +hope that there is nothing after them to be hoped for. For as we are +content to forget our own experience, and to counterfeit the ignorance +of our own knowledge, in all things that concern ourselves; or +persuade ourselves, that God hath given us letters patents to pursue +all our irreligious affections, with a "non obstante"[12] so we +neither look behind us what hath been, nor before us what shall be. It +is true, that the quantity which we have, is of the body: we are by +it joined to the earth: we are compounded of earth; and we inhabit +it. The Heavens are high, far off, and unsearchable: we have sense and +feeling of corporal things; and of eternal grace, but by revelation. +No marvel then that our thoughts are also earthly: and it is less to +be wondered at, that the words of worthless men can not cleanse them: +seeing their doctrine and instruction, whose understanding the Holy +Ghost vouchsafed to inhabit, have not performed it. For as the Prophet +Isaiah cried out long ago, "Lord, who hath believed our reports?" And +out of doubt, as Isaiah complained then for himself and others: so are +they less believed, every day after other. For although religion, and +the truth thereof be in every man's mouth, yea, in the discourse of +every woman, who for the greatest number are but idols of vanity: what +is it other than an universal dissimulation? We profess that we know +God: but by works we deny him. For beatitude doth not consist in the +knowledge of divine things, but in a divine life: for the Devils know +them better than men. "Beatitudo non est divinorum cognitio, sed vita +divina." And certainly there is nothing more to be admired, and more +to be lamented, than the private contention, the passionate dispute, +the personal hatred, and the perpetual war, massacres, and murders for +religion among Christians: the discourse whereof hath so occupied the +world, as it hath well near driven the practice thereof out of the +world. Who would not soon resolve, that took knowledge but of the +religious disputations among men, and not of their lives which +dispute, that there were no other thing in their desires, than the +purchase of Heaven; and that the world itself were but used as it +ought, and as an inn or place, wherein to repose ourselves in passing +on towards our celestial habitation? when on the contrary, besides the +discourse and outward profession, the soul hath nothing but hypocrisy. +We are all (in effect) become comedians in religion: and while we act +in gesture and voice, divine virtues, in all the course of our lives +we renounce our persons, and the parts we play. For Charity, Justice, +and Truth have but their being _in terms_, like the philosopher's +_Materia prima_. + +Neither is it that wisdom, which Solomon defineth to be the +"Schoolmistress of the knowledge of God," that hath valuation in the +world: it is enough that we give it our good word: but the same which is +altogether exercised in the service of the world as the gathering of +riches chiefly, by which we purchase and obtain honor, with the many +respects which attend it. These indeed be the marks, which (when we have +bent our consciences to the highest) we all shoot at. For the obtaining +whereof it is true, that the care is our own; the care our own in this +life, the peril our own in the future: and yet when we have gathered the +greatest abundance, we ourselves enjoy no more thereof, than so much as +belongs to one man. For the rest, he that had the greatest wisdom and +the greatest ability that ever man had, hath told us that this is the +use: "When goods increase (saith Solomon) they also increase that eat +them; and what good cometh to the owners, but the beholding thereof with +their eyes?" As for those that devour the rest, and follow us in fair +weather: they again forsake us in the first tempest of misfortune, and +steer away before the sea and wind; leaving us to the malice of our +destinies. Of these, among a thousand examples, I will take but one out +of Master Danner, and use his own words: "Whilest the Emperor Charles +the Fifth, after the resignation of his estates, stayed at Flushing for +wind, to carry him his last journey into Spain; he conferred on a time +with Seldius, his brother Ferdinand's Ambassador, till the deep of the +night. And when Seldius should depart, the Emperor calling for some of +his servants, and nobody answering him (for those that attended upon +him, were some gone to their lodgings, and all the rest asleep), the +Emperor took up the candle himself, and went before Seldius to light him +down the stairs; and so did, notwithstanding all the resistance that +Seldius could make. And when he was come to the stair's foot, he said +thus unto him: "Seldius, remember this of Charles the Emperor, when he +shall be dead and gone, that him, whom thou hast known in thy time +environed with so many mighty armies and guards of soldiers, thou hast +also seen alone, abandoned, and forsaken, yea even of his own domestical +servants, &c. I acknowledge this change of Fortune to proceed from the +mighty hand of God, which I will by no means go about to withstand." + +But you will say, that there are some things else, and of greater +regard than the former. The first is the reverend respect that is held +of great men, and the honor done unto them by all sorts of people. And +it is true indeed: provided, that an inward love for their justice and +piety accompany the outward worship given to their places and power; +without which what is the applause of the multitude, but as the outcry +of an herd of animals, who without the knowledge of any true cause, +please themselves with the noise they make? For seeing it is a thing +exceeding rare, to distinguish Virtue and Fortune: the most impious +(if prosperous) have ever been applauded; the most virtuous (if +unprosperous) have ever been despised. For as Fortune's man rides the +horse, so Fortune herself rides the man; who when he is descended and +on foot, the man taken from his beast, and Fortune from the man, a +base groom beats the one, and a bitter contempt spurns at the other, +with equal liberty. + +The second is the greatening of our posterity, and the contemplation +of their glory whom we leave behind us. Certainly, of those which +conceive that their souls departed take any comfort therein, it may +be truly said of them, which Lactantius spake of certain heathen +philosophers, "quod sapientes sunt in re stulta."[13] For when our +spirits immortal shall be once separate from our mortal bodies, +and disposed by God; there remaineth in them no other joy of their +posterity which succeed, than there doth of pride in that stone, which +sleepeth in the wall of the king's palace; nor any other sorrow for +their poverty, than there doth of shame in that, which beareth up a +beggar's cottage. "Nesciunt mortui, etiam sancti, quid agunt +vivi, etiam eorum filii, quia animae mortuorum rebus viventium non +intersunt": "The dead, though holy, know nothing of the living, no, +not of their own children: for the souls of those departed, are not +conversant with their affairs that remain."[14] And if we doubt of St. +Augustine, we can not of Job; who tells us, "That we know not if our +sons shall be honorable: neither shall we understand concerning +them, whether they shall be of low degree." Which Ecclesiastes also +confirmeth: "Man walketh in a shadow, and disquieteth himself in vain: +he heapeth up riches, and can not tell who shall gather them. The +living (saith he) know that they shall die, but the dead know nothing +at all: for who can show unto man what shall be after him under the +sun?" He therefore accounteth it among the rest of worldly vanities, +to labor and travail in the world; not knowing after death whether +a fool or a wise man should enjoy the fruits thereof: "which made me +(saith he) endeavor even to abhor mine own labor." And what can other +men hope, whose blessed or sorrowful estates after death God hath +reserved? man's knowledge lying but in his hope, seeing the Prophet +Isaiah confesseth of the elect, "That Abraham is ignorant of us, and +Israel knows us not." But hereof we are assured, that the long and +dark night of death (of whose following day we shall never behold the +dawn till his return that hath triumphed over it), shall cover us +over till the world be no more. After which, and when we shall again +receive organs glorified and incorruptible, the seats of angelical +affections, in so great admiration shall the souls of the blessed be +exercised, as they can not admit the mixture of any second or less +joy; nor any return of foregone and mortal affection towards friends, +kindred, or children. Of whom whether we shall retain any particular +knowledge, or in any sort distinguish them, no man can assure us; and +the wisest men doubt. But on the contrary, if a divine life retain any +of those faculties which the soul exercised in a mortal body, we shall +not at that time so divide the joys of Heaven, as to cast any part +thereof on the memory of their felicities which remain in the world. +No, be their estates greater than ever the world gave, we shall (by +the difference known unto us) even detest their consideration. And +whatsoever comfort shall remain of all forepast, the same will consist +in the charity which we exercised living; and in that piety, justice, +and firm faith, for which it pleased the infinite mercy of God to +accept of us, and receive us. Shall we therefore value honor and +riches at nothing? and neglect them, as unnecessary and vain? +Certainly no. For that infinite wisdom of God, which hath +distinguished his angels by degrees; which hath given greater and +less light and beauty to heavenly bodies; which hath made differences +between beasts and birds; created the eagle and the fly, the cedar and +the shrub; and among stones, given the fairest tincture to the ruby, +and the quickest light to the diamond; hath also ordained kings, +dukes, or leaders of the people, magistrates, judges, and other +degrees among men. And as honor is left to posterity, for a mark and +ensign of the virtue and understanding of their ancestors: so (seeing +Siracides preferreth death before beggary: and that titles, without +proportionable estates, fall under the miserable succor of other men's +pity) I account it foolishness to condemn such a care: provided, that +worldly goods be well gotten, and that we raise not our own buildings +out of other men's ruins. For, as Plato doth first prefer the +perfection of bodily health; secondly, the form and beauty; and +thirdly, "Divitias nulla fraude quaesitas":[15] so Jeremiah cries, +"Woe unto them that erect their houses by unrighteousness, and their +chambers without equity": and Isaiah the same, "Woe to those that +spoil and were not spoiled." And it was out of the true wisdom of +Solomon, that he commandeth us, "not to drink the wine of violence; +not to lie in wait for blood, and not to swallow them up alive, whose +riches we covet: for such are the ways (saith he) of everyone that is +greedy of gain." + +And if we could afford ourselves but so much leisure as to consider, +that he which hath most in the world, hath, in respect of the world, +nothing in it: and that he which hath the longest time lent him to +live in it, hath yet no proportion at all therein, setting it either +by that which is past, when we were not, or by that time which is to +come, in which we shall abide forever: I say, if both, to wit, our +proportion in the world, and our time in the world, differ not +much from that which is nothing; it is not out of any excellency of +understanding, that we so much prize the one, which hath (in effect) +no being: and so much neglect the other, which hath no ending: +coveting those mortal things of the world, as if our souls were +therein immortal; and neglecting those things which are immortal, as +if ourselves after the world were but mortal. + +But let every man value his own wisdom, as he pleaseth. Let the rich +man think all fools, that cannot equal his abundance: the revenger +esteem all negligent, that have not trodden down their opposites; the +politician, all gross that cannot merchandise their faith: yet when we +once come in sight of the port of death, to which all winds drive us, +and when by letting fall that fatal anchor, which can never be weighed +again, the navigation of this life takes end; then it is, I say, that +our own cogitations (those sad and severe cogitations, formerly beaten +from us by our health and felicity) return again, and pay us to the +uttermost for all the pleasing passages of our lives past. It is then +that we cry out to God for mercy; then when our selves can no longer +exercise cruelty to others; and it is only then, that we are strucken +through the soul with this terrible sentence, "That God will not be +mocked." For if according to St. Peter, "The righteous scarcely be +saved: and that God spared not his angels"; where shall those appear, +who, having served their appetites all their lives, presume to think, +that the severe commandments of the all-powerful God were given but +in sport; and that the short breath, which we draw when death presseth +us, if we can but fashion it to the sound of mercy (without any kind +of satisfaction or amends) is sufficient? "O quam multi," saith +a reverend father, "cum hac spe ad aeternos labores et bella +descendunt!"[16] I confess that it is a great comfort to our friends, +to have it said, that we ended well; for we all desire (as Balaam +did) "to die the death of the righteous." But what shall we call a +disesteeming, an opposing, or (indeed) a mocking of God: if those men +do not oppose Him, disesteem Him, and mock Him, that think it enough +for God, to ask Him forgiveness at leisure, with the remainder and +last drawing of a malicious breath? For what do they otherwise, +that die this kind of well-dying, but say unto God as followeth? +"We beseech Thee, O God, that all the falsehoods, forswearings, and +treacheries of our lives past, may be pleasing unto Thee; that Thou +wilt for our sakes (that have had no leisure to do anything for Thine) +change Thy nature (though impossible,) and forget to be a just God; +that Thou wilt love injuries and oppressions, call ambition wisdom, +and charity foolishness. For I shall prejudice my son (which I am +resolved not to do) if I make restitution; and confess myself to have +been unjust (which I am too proud to do) if I deliver the oppressed." +Certainly, these wise worldlings have either found out a new God, +or made one: and in all likelihood such a leaden one, as Louis the +Eleventh wore in his cap; which when he had caused any that he feared, +or hated, to be killed, he would take it from his head and kiss it: +beseeching it to pardon him this one evil act more, and it should be +the last; which (as at other times) he did, when by the practice of a +cardinal and a falsified sacrament, he caused the Earl of Armagnac to +be stabbed to death: mockeries indeed fit to be used towards a leaden, +but not towards the ever-living God. But of this composition are all +devout lovers of the world, that they fear all that is dureless[17] +and ridiculous: they fear the plots and practises of their +opposites,[18] and their very whisperings: they fear the opinions +of men, which beat but upon shadows: they flatter and forsake the +prosperous and unprosperous, be they friends or kings: yea they dive +under water, like ducks, at every pebblestone, that is but thrown +toward them by a powerful hand: and on the contrary, they show an +obstinate and giant-like valor, against the terrible judgments of +the all-powerful God, yea they show themselves gods against God, and +slaves towards men; towards men whose bodies and consciences are alike +rotten. + +Now for the rest: If we truly examine the difference of both +conditions; to wit, of the rich and mighty, whom we call fortunate; +and of the poor and oppressed, whom we account wretched we shall find +the happiness of the one, and the miserable estate of the other, so +tied by God to the very instant, and both so subject to interchange +(witness the sudden downfall of the greatest princes, and the speedy +uprising of the meanest persons) as the one hath nothing so certain, +whereof to boast; nor the other so uncertain, whereof to bewail +itself. For there is no man so assured of his honor, of his riches, +health, or life; but that he may be deprived of either, or all, the +very next hour or day to come. "Quid vesper vehat, incertum est," +"What the evening will bring with it, it is uncertain." "And yet ye +cannot tell (saith St. James) what shall be tomorrow. Today he is set +up, and tomorrow he shall not be found; for he is turned into dust, +and his purpose perisheth." And although the air which compasseth +adversity be very obscure; yet therein we better discern God, than in +that shining light which environeth worldly glory; through which, for +the clearness thereof, there is no vanity which escapeth our sight. +And let adversity seem what it will; to happy men ridiculous, who make +themselves merry at other men's misfortunes; and to those under the +cross, grievous: yet this is true, that for all that is past, to the +very instant, the portions remaining are equal to either. For be it +that we have lived many years, "and (according to Solomon) in them all +we have rejoiced;" or be it that we have measured the same length of +days and therein have evermore sorrowed: yet looking back from our +present being, we find both the one and the other, to wit, the joy and +the woe, sailed out of sight; and death, which doth pursue us and hold +us in chase, from our infancy, hath gathered it. "Quicquid aetatis +retro est, mors tenet:" "Whatsoever of our age is past, death holds +it." So as whosoever he be, to whom Fortune hath been a servant, and +the Time a friend; let him but take the account of his memory (for we +have no other keeper of our pleasures past), and truly examine what it +hath reserved either beauty and youth, or foregone delights; what +it hath saved, that it might last, of his dearest affections, or of +whatever else the amorous springtime gave his thoughts of contentment, +then unvaluable; and he shall find that all the art which his elder +years have, can draw no other vapor out of these dissolutions, than +heavy, secret, and sad sighs. He shall find nothing remaining, but +those sorrows, which grow up after our fast-springing youth; overtake +it, when it is at a stand; and overtopped it utterly, when it begins +to wither: in so much as looking back from the very instant time, and +from our now being, the poor, diseased, and captive creature, hath as +little sense of all his former miseries and pains, as he, that is +most blessed in common opinions, hath of his fore-passed pleasure and +delights. For whatsoever is cast behind us, is just nothing: and what +is to come, deceitful hope hath it: "Omnia quae eventura sunt, in +incerto jacent."[19] Only those few black swans, I must except: who +having had the grace to value worldly vanities at no more than their +own price; do, by retaining the comfortable memory of a well acted +life, behold death without dread, and the grave without fear; and +embrace both, as necessary guides to endless glory. + +For myself, this is my consolation, and all that I can offer to +others, that the sorrows of this life are but of two sorts: whereof +the one hath respect to God, the other, to the world. In the first we +complain to God against ourselves, for our offences against Him; and +confess, "Et Tu Justus es in omnibus quae venerunt super nos." "And +Thou, O Lord, are just in all that hath befallen us." In the second we +complain to ourselves against God: as if he had done us wrong, either +in not giving us worldly goods and honors, answering our appetites: or +for taking them again from us having had them; forgetting that humble +and just acknowledgment of Job, "the Lord hath given, and the Lord +hath taken." To the first of which St. Paul hath promised blessedness; +to the second, death. And out of doubt he is either a fool, or +ungrateful to God, or both, that doth not acknowledge, how mean soever +his estate be, that the same is yet far greater than that which God +oweth him: or doth not acknowledge, how sharp soever his afflictions +be, that the same are yet far less, than those which are due unto +him. And if an heathen wise man call the adversities of the world +but "tributa vivendi," "the tributes of living;" a wise Christian man +ought to know them, and bear them, but as the tributes of offending. +He ought to bear them manlike, and resolvedly; and not as those +whining soldiers do, "qui gementes sequuntur imperatorem."[20] + +For seeing God, who is the author of all our tragedies, hath written +out for us and appointed us all the parts we are to play: and hath +not, in their distribution, been partial to the most mighty princes of +the world: that gave unto Darius the part of the greatest emperor, and +the part of the most miserable beggar, a beggar begging water of an +enemy, to quench the great drought of death: that appointed Bajazet +to play the Grand Signior of the Turks in the morning, and in the same +day the footstool of Tamerlane (both which parts Valerian had also +played, being taken by Sapores): that made Belisarius play the most +victorious captain, and lastly the part of a blind beggar: of which +examples many thousands may be produced: why should other men, who are +but as the least worms, complain of wrong? Certainly there is no other +account to be made of this ridiculous world, than to resolve, that +the change of fortune on the great theatre, is but as the change of +garments on the less. For when on the one and the other, every man +wears but his own skin, the players are all alike. Now, if any man +out of weakness prize the passages of this world otherwise (for saith +Petrarch, "Magni ingenii est revocare mentem a sensibus"[21]) it is by +reason of that unhappy phantasy of ours, which forgeth in the brains +of man all the miseries (the corporal excepted) whereunto he is +subject. Therein it is, that misfortunes and adversity work all that +they work. For seeing Death, in the end of the play, takes from all +whatsoever Fortune or Force takes from any one; it were a foolish +madness in the shipwreck of worldly things, where all sinks but the +sorrow, to save it. That were, as Seneca saith, "Fortunae succumbere, +quod tristius est omni fato:" "To fall under Fortune, of all other the +most miserable destiny." + +But it is now time to sound a retreat; and to desire to be excused of +this long pursuit: and withal, that the good intent, which hath moved +me to draw the picture of time past (which we call History) in so +large a table, may also be accepted in place of a better reason. + +The examples of divine providence, everywhere found (the first divine +histories being nothing else but a continuation of such examples) have +persuaded me to fetch my beginning from the beginning of all things: +to wit, Creation. For though these two glorious actions of the +Almighty be so near, and (as it were) linked together, that the one +necessarily implieth the other: Creation inferring Providence (for +what father forsaketh the child that he hath begotten?) and Providence +pre-supposing Creation: yet many of those that have seemed to excel in +worldly wisdom, have gone about to disjoin this coherence; the epicure +denying both Creation and Providence, but granting the world had a +beginning; the Aristotelian granting Providence, but denying both the +creation and the beginning. + +Now although this doctrine of faith, touching the creation in time +(for by faith we understand, that the world was made by the word of +God), be too weighty a work for Aristotle's rotten ground to bear +up, upon which he hath (notwithstanding) founded the defences and +fortresses of all his verbal doctrine: yet that the necessity of +infinite power, and the world's beginning, and the impossibility +of the contrary even in the judgment of natural reason, wherein he +believed, had not better informed him; it is greatly to be marvelled +at. And it is no less strange, that those men which are desirous of +knowledge (seeing Aristotle hath failed in this main point; and taught +little other than terms in the rest) have so retrenched their +minds from the following and overtaking of truth, and so absolutely +subjected themselves to the law of those philosophical principles; +as all contrary kind of teaching, in the search of causes, they have +condemned either for phantastical, or curious. Both doth it follow, +that the positions of heathen philosophers are undoubted grounds and +principles indeed, because so called? Or that _ipsi dixerunt_, doth +make them to be such? Certainly no. But this is true, that where +natural reason hath built anything so strong against itself, as the +same reason can hardly assail it, much less batter it down: the same +in every question of nature, and infinite power, may be approved for +a fundamental law of human knowledge. For saith Charron in his book of +wisdom, "Toute proposition humaine a autant d'authorite quel'autre, +si la raison n'on fait la difference;" "Every human proposition hath +equal authority, if reason make not the difference," the rest being +but the fables of principles. But hereof how shall the upright and +impartial judgment of man give a sentence, where opposition and +examination are not admitted to give in evidence? And to this purpose +it was well said of Lactantius, "Sapientiam sibi adimunt, qui sine +ullo judicio inventa maiorum probant, et ab aliis pecudum more +ducuntur:" "They neglect their own wisdom, who without any judgment +approve the invention of those that forewent them; and suffer +themselves after the manner of beasts, to be led by them;" by the +advantage of which sloth and dullness, ignorance is now become so +powerful a tyrant, as it hath set true philosophy, physics, and +divinity in a pillory; and written over the first, "Contra negantem +principia;"[22] over the second, "Virtus specifica;"[23] over the +third, "Ecclesta Romana."[24] + +But for myself, I shall never be persuaded, that God hath shut up all +light of learning within the lanthorn of Aristotle's brains: or that +it was ever said unto him, as unto Esdras, "_Accendam in corde tuo +Lucernam intellectus_";[25] that God hath given invention but to the +heathen, and that they only invaded nature, and found the strength +and bottom thereof; the same nature having consumed all her store, +and left nothing of price to after-ages. That these and these be +the causes of these and these effects, time hath taught us; and not +reason: and so hath experience without art. The cheese-wife knoweth it +as well as the philosopher, that sour rennet doth coagulate her milk +into a curd. But if we ask a reason of this cause, why the sourness +doth it? whereby it doth it? and the manner how? I think that there +is nothing to be found in vulgar philosophy, to satisfy this and many +other like vulgar questions. But man to cover his ignorance in the +least things, who can not give a true reason for the grass under his +feet, why it should be green rather than red, or of any other color; +that could never yet discover the way and reason of nature's working, +in those which are far less noble creatures than himself; who is far +more noble than the heavens themselves: "Man (saith Solomon) that +can hardly discern the things that are upon the earth, and with great +labor find out the things that are before us"; that hath so short a +time in the world, as he no sooner begins to learn, than to die; +that hath in his memory but borrowed knowledge; in his understanding, +nothing truly; that is ignorant of the essence of his own soul, and +which the wisest of the naturalists (if Aristotle be he) could never +so much as define, but by the action and effect, telling us what it +works (which all men knew as well as he) but not what it is, which +neither he, nor any else, doth know, but God that created it; ("For +though I were perfect, yet I know not my soul," saith Job). Man, I +say, that is but an idiot in the next cause of his own life, and in +the cause of all actions of his life, will (notwithstanding) examine +the art of God in creating the world; of God, who (saith Job) "is so +excellent as we know him not"; and examine the beginning of the work, +which had end before mankind had a beginning of being. He will disable +God's power to make a world, without matter to make it of. He will +rather give the motes of the air for a cause; cast the work on +necessity or chance; bestow the honor thereof on nature; make two +powers, the one to be the author of the matter, the other of the +form; and lastly, for want of a workman, have it eternal: which latter +opinion Aristotle, to make himself the author of a new doctrine, +brought into the world: and his Sectators[26] have maintained it; +"parati ac conjurati, quos sequuntur, philosophorum animis invictis +opiniones tueri."[27] For Hermes, who lived at once with, or +soon after Moses, Zoroaster, Musaeus, Orpheus, Linus, Anaximenes, +Anaxagoras, Empedocles, Melissus, Pherecydes, Thales, Cleanthes, +Pythagoras, Plato, and many other (whose opinions are exquisitely +gathered by Steuchius Eugubinus) found in the necessity of invincible +reason, "One eternal and infinite Being," to be the parent of the +universal. "Horum omnium sententia quamvis sit incerta, eodem tamen +spectat, ut Providentiam unam esse consentiant: sive enim natura, sive +aether, sive ratio, sive mens, sive fatalis necessitas, sive divina +lex; idem est quod a nobis dicitur Deus": "All these men's opinions +(saith Lactantius) though uncertain, come to this; That they agree +upon one Providence; whether the same be nature, or light, or reason, +or understanding, or destiny, or divine ordinance, that it is the same +which we call God." Certainly, as all the rivers in the world, though +they have divers risings, and divers runnings; though they sometimes +hide themselves for a while under ground, and seem to be lost in +sea-like lakes; do at last find, and fall into the great ocean: +so after all the searches that human capacity hath, and after all +philosophical contemplation and curiosity; in the necessity of this +infinite power, all the reason of man ends and dissolves itself. + +As for the others; the first touching those which conceive the matter +of the world to have been eternal, and that God did not create +the world "Exnihilo,"[28] but "ex materia praeexistente":[29] the +supposition is so weak, as is hardly worth the answering. For +(saith Eusebius) "Mihi videntur qui hoc dicunt, fortunam quoque Deo +annectere," "They seem unto me, which affirm this, to give part of the +work to God, and part to Fortune"; insomuch as if God had not found +this first matter by chance, He had neither been author nor father, +nor creator, nor lord of the universal. For were the matter or chaos +eternal, it then follows, that either this supposed matter did fit +itself to God, or God accommodate Himself to the matter. For the +first, it is impossible, that things without sense could proportion +themselves to the workman's will. For the second: it were horrible to +conceive of God, that as an artificer He applied himself, according to +the proportion of matter which He lighted upon. + +But let it be supposed, that this matter hath been made by any power, +not omnipotent, and infinitely wise; I would gladly learn how it came +to pass, that the same was proportionable to his intention, that was +omnipotent and infinitely wise; and no more, nor no less, than served +to receive the form of the universal. For, had it wanted anything of +what was sufficient; then must it be granted, that God created out of +nothing so much new matter, as served to finish the work of the world: +or had there been more of this matter than sufficed, then God did +dissolve and annihilate whatsoever remained and was superfluous. And +this must every reasonable soul confess, that it is the same work of +God alone, to create anything out of nothing, and by the same art +and power, and by none other, can those things, or any part of that +eternal matter, be again changed into nothing; by which those things, +that once were nothing, obtained a beginning of being. + +Again, to say that this matter was the cause of itself; this, of all +other, were the greatest idiotism. For, if it were the cause of itself +at any time; then there was also a time when itself was not: at +which time of not being, it is easy enough to conceive, that it could +neither procure itself, nor anything else. For to be, and not to be, +at once, is impossible. "Nihil autem seipsum praecedit, neque; seipsum +componit corpus": "There is nothing that doth precede itself, neither +do bodies compound themselves." + +For the rest, those that feign this matter to be eternal, must of +necessity confess, that infinite cannot be separate from eternity. And +then had infinite matter left no place for infinite form, but that +the first matter was finite, the form which it received proves it. For +conclusion of this part, whosoever will make choice, rather to believe +in eternal deformity, or in eternal dead matter, than in eternal light +and eternal life: let eternal death be his reward. For it is a madness +of that kind, as wanteth terms to express it. For what reason of man +(whom the curse of presumption hath not stupefied) hath doubted, that +infinite power (of which we can comprehend but a kind of shadow, "quia +comprehensio est intra terminos, qui infinito repugnant"[30]) hath +anything wanting in itself, either for matter of form; yea for as many +worlds (if such had been God's will) as the sea hath sands? For where +the power is without limitation, the work hath no other limitation, +than the workman's will. Yea reason itself finds it more easy for +infinite power to deliver from itself a finite world, without the help +of matter prepared; than for a finite man, a fool and dust, to change +the form of matter made to his hands. They are Dionysius his words, +"Deus in una existentia omnia praehabet"[31] and again, "Esse omnium +est ipsa divinitas, omne quod vides, et quod non vides",[32] to wit, +"causaliter",[33] or in better terms, "non tanquam forma, sed tanquam +causa universalis"[34] Neither hath the world universal closed up all +of God "For the most part of his works (saith Siracides) are hid". +Neither can the depth of his wisdom be opened, by the glorious work of +the world, which never brought to knowledge all it can, for then were +his infinite power bounded and made finite. And hereof it comes, That +we seldom entitle God the all-showing, or the all-willing, but the +Almighty, that is, infinitely able. + +But now for those, who from that ground, "that out of nothing, nothing +is made," infer the world's eternity, and yet not so savage therein, +as those are, which give an eternal being to dead matter, it is true +if the word (nothing) be taken in the affirmative, and the making, +imposed upon natural agents and finite power; that out of nothing, +nothing is made. But seeing their great doctor Aristotle himself +confesseth, "quod omnes antiqui decreverunt quasi quodam return +principium, ipsumque infinitum" "That all the ancient decree a kind +of beginning, and the same to be infinite"; and a little after, more +largely and plainly, "Principium eius est nullum, sed ipsum omnium +cernitur esse principium, ac omnia complecti ac regere",[35] it is +strange that this philosopher, with his followers, should rather make +choice out of falsehood, to conclude falsely, than out of truth, to +resolve truly. For if we compare the world universal, and all the +unmeasureable orbs of Heaven, and those marvellous bodies of the sun, +moon, and stars, with "ipsum infinitum": it may truly be said of them +all, which himself affirms of his imaginary "Materia prima,"[36] that +they are neither "quid, quale," nor "quantum "; and therefore to bring +finite (which hath no proportion with infinite) out of infinite ("qui +destruit omnem proportionem"[37]) is no wonder in God's power. And +therefore Anaximander, Melissus, and Empedocles, call the world +universal, but "particulam universitatis" and "infinitatis," a parcel +of that which is the universality and the infinity inself; and Plato, +but a shadow of God. But the other to prove the world's eternity, +urgeth this maxim, "that, a sufficient and effectual cause being +granted, an answerable effect thereof is also granted": inferring that +God being forever a sufficient and effectual cause of the world, the +effect of the cause should also have been forever; to wit, the world +universal. But what a strange mockery is this in so great a master, +to confess a sufficient and effectual cause of the world, (to wit, +an almighty God) in his antecedent; and the same God to be a God +restrained in his conclusion; to make God free in power, and bound in +will; able to effect, unable to determine; able to make all things, +and yet unable to make choice of the time when? For this were +impiously to resolve of God, as of natural necessity; which hath +neither choice, nor will, nor understanding; which cannot but work +matter being present: as fire, to burn things combustible. Again he +thus disputeth, that every agent which can work, and doth not work, +if it afterward work, it is either thereto moved by itself, or by +somewhat else: and so it passeth from power to act. But God (saith he) +is immovable, and is neither moved by himself, nor by any other: but +being always the same, doth always work. Whence he concludeth, if the +world were caused by God, that he was forever the cause thereof: and +therefore eternal. The answer to this is very easy, for that God's +performing in due time that which he ever determined at length to +perform, doth not argue any alteration or change, but rather constancy +in him. For the same action of his will, which made the world forever, +did also withhold the effect to the time ordained. To this answer, in +itself sufficient, others add further, that the pattern or image +of the world may be said to be eternal: which the Platonics call +"spiritualem mundum"[38] and do in this sort distinguish the idea +and creation in time. "Spiritualis ille mundus, mundi huius exemplar, +primumque Dei opus, vita aequali est architecto, fuit semper cum illo, +eritque semper. Mundus autem corporalis, quod secundum opus est Dei, +decedit iam ab opifice ex parte una, quia non fuit semper: retinet +alteram, quia sit semper futurus": "That representative, or the +intentional world (say they) the sampler of this visible world, the +first work of God, was equally ancient with the architect; for it was +forever with him, and ever shall be. This material world, the second +work or creature of God, doth differ from the worker in this, that it +was not from everlasting, and in this it doth agree, that it shall +be forever to come." The first point, that it was not forever, all +Christians confess: the other they understand no otherwise, than that +after the consummation of this world, there shall be a new Heaven and +a new earth, without any new creation of matter. But of these things +we need not here stand to argue; though such opinions be not unworthy +the propounding, in this consideration, of an eternal and unchangeable +cause, producing a changeable and temporal effect. Touching which +point Proclus the Platonist disputeth, that the compounded essence of +the world (and because compounded, therefore dissipable) is continued, +and knit to the Divine Being, by an individual and inseparable power, +flowing from Divine unity; and that the world's natural appetite of +God showeth, that the same proceedeth from a good and understanding +divine; and that this virtue, by which the world is continued and knit +together, must be infinite, that it may infinitely and everlastingly +continue and preserve the same. Which infinite virtue, the finite +world (saith he) is not capable of, but receiveth it from the divine +infinite, according to the temporal nature it hath, successively every +moment by little and little; even as the whole material world is not +altogether: but the abolished parts are departed by small degrees, and +the parts yet to come, do by the same small degrees succeed; as the +shadow of a tree in a river seemeth to have continued the same a long +time in the water, but it is perpetually renewed, in the continual +ebbing and flowing thereof. + +But to return to them, which denying that ever the world had any +beginning, withal deny that ever it shall have any end, and to this +purpose affirm, that it was never heard, never read, never seen, +no not by any reason perceived, that the heavens have ever suffered +corruption; or that they appear any way the older by continuance; or +in any sort otherwise than they were; which had they been subject to +final corruption, some change would have been discerned in so long a +time. To this it is answered, that the little change as yet perceived, +doth rather prove their newness, and that they have not continued +so long; than that they will continue forever as they are. And if +conjectural arguments may receive answer by conjectures; it then +seemeth that some alteration may be found. For either Aristotle, +Pliny, Strabo, Beda, Aquinas, and others, were grossly mistaken; or +else those parts of the world lying within the burnt zone, were not in +elder times habitable, by reason of the sun's heat, neither were the +seas, under the equinoctial, navigable. But we know by experience, +that those regions, so situate, are filled with people, and exceeding +temperate; and the sea, over which we navigate, passable enough. We +read also many histories of deluges: and how in the time of Phaeton, +divers places in the world were burnt up, by the sun's violent heat. + +But in a word, this observation is exceeding feeble. For we know it +for certain, that stone walls, of matter mouldering and friable, have +stood two, or three thousand years; that many things have been digged +up out of the earth, of that depth, as supposed to have been buried +by the general flood; without any alteration either of substance or +figure: yea it is believed, and it is very probable, that the gold +which is daily found in mines, and rocks, under ground, was created +together with the earth. + +And if bodies elementary, and compounded, the eldest times have not +invaded and corrupted: what great alteration should we look for in +celestial and quint-essential bodies? And yet we have reason to think, +that the sun, by whose help all creatures are generate, doth not +in these latter ages assist nature, as heretofore. We have neither +giants, such as the eldest world had; nor mighty men, such as the +elder world had; but all things in general are reputed of less virtue +which from the heavens receive virtue. Whence, if the nature of a +preface would permit a larger discourse, we might easily fetch store +of proof; as that this world shall at length have end, as that once it +had beginning. + +And I see no good answer that can be made to this objection: if the +world were eternal, why not all things in the world eternal? If there +were no first, no cause, no father, no creator, no incomprehensible +wisdom, but that every nature had been alike eternal; and man more +rational than every other nature: why had not the eternal reason of +man provided for his eternal being in the world? For if all were +equal why not equal conditions to all? Why should heavenly bodies live +forever; and the bodies of men rot and die? + +Again, who was it that appointed the earth to keep the center, and +gave order that it should hang in the air: that the sun should travel +between the tropics, and never exceed those bounds, nor fail to +perform that progress once in every year: the moon to live by borrowed +light; the fixed stars (according to common opinion) to be fastened +like nails in a cartwheel; and the planets to wander at their +pleasure? Or if none of these had power over other: was it out of +charity and love, that the sun by his perpetual travel within these +two circles, hath visited, given light unto, and relieved all parts +of the earth, and the creatures therein, by turns and times? Out +of doubt, if the sun have of his own accord kept this course in all +eternity, he may justly be called eternal charity and everlasting +love. The same may be said of all the stars; who being all of them +most large and clear fountains of virtue and operation, may also, be +called eternal virtues: the earth may be called eternal patience; the +moon, an eternal borrower and beggar; and man of all other the most +miserable, eternally mortal. And what were this, but to believe again +in the old play of the gods? Yea in more gods by millions, than ever +Hesiodus dreamed of. But instead of this mad folly, we see it well +enough with our feeble and mortal eyes; and the eyes of our reason +discern it better; that the sun, moon, stars, and the earth, are +limited bounded, and constrained: themselves they have not constrained +nor could. "Omne determinatum causam habet aliquam efficientem, quae +illud determinaverit:" "Everything bounded hath some efficient cause, +by which it is bounded." + +Now for Nature; as by the ambiguity of this name, the school of +Aristotle hath both commended many errors unto us, and sought also +thereby to obscure the glory of the high moderator of all things, +shining in the creation, and in the governing of the world: so if the +best definition be taken out of the second of Aristotle's "Physics," +or "primo de Coelo," or out of the fifth of his "Metaphysics"; I +say that the best is but nominal, and serving only to difference the +beginning of natural motion from artificial: which yet the Academics +open better, when they call it "a seminary strength, infused into +matter by the soul of the world": who give the first place to +Providence, the second to Fate, and but the third to Nature. +"Providentia" (by which they understand God) "dux et caput; Fatum, +medium ex providentia prodiens; Natura postremum"[39] But be it what +he will, or be it any of these (God excepted) or participating of all: +yet that it hath choice or understanding (both which are necessarily +in the cause of all things) no man hath avowed. For this is +unanswerable of Lactantius, "Is autem facit aliquid, qui aut +voluntatem faciendi habet, aut scientiam:" "He only can be said to be +the doer of a thing, that hath either will or knowledge in the doing +it." + +But the will and science of Nature, are in these words truly expressed +by Ficinus: "Potest ubique Natura, vel per diversa media, vel ex +diversis materiis, diversa facere: sublata vero mediorum materiatumque +diversitate, vel unicum, vel similimum operatur, neque potest +quando adest materia non operari"; "It is the power of Nature by the +diversity of means, or out of diversity of matter, to produce divers +things: but taking away the diversity of means, and the diversity of +matter, it then works but one or the like work; neither can it but +work, matter being present." Now if Nature made choice of diversity of +matter, to work all these variable works of heaven and earth, it had +then both understanding and will; it had counsel to begin; reason to +dispose; virtue and knowledge to finish, and power to govern: without +which all things had been but one and the same: all of the matter of +heaven; or all of the matter of earth. And if we grant Nature this +will, and this understanding, this course, reason, and power: "Cur +Natura potius quam Deus nominetur?" "Why should we then call such a +cause rather Nature, than God?" "God, of whom all men have notion, +and give the first and highest place to divine power": "Omnes homines +notionem deorum habent, omnesque summun locum divino cuidam numini +assignant." And this I say in short; that it is a true effect of true +reason in man (were there no authority more binding than reason) +to acknowledge and adore the first and most sublime power. "Vera +philosophia, est ascensus ab his quae fluunt, et oriuntur, et +occidunt, ad ea quae vera sunt, et semper eadem": "True philosophy, is +an ascending from the things which flow, and arise, and fall, to the +things that are forever the same." + +For the rest; I do also account it not the meanest, but an impiety +monstrous, to confound God and Nature; be it but in terms. For it is +God, that only disposeth of all things according to His own will, and +maketh of one earth, vessels of honor and dishonor. It is Nature +that can dispose of nothing, but according to the will of the matter +wherein it worketh. It is God that commandeth all: it is Nature that +is obedient to all: it is God that doth good unto all, knowing and +loving the good He doth: It is Nature, that secondarily doth also +good, but it neither knoweth nor loveth the good it doth. It is God, +that hath all things in Himself: Nature, nothing in itself. It is God, +which is the Father, and hath begotten all things: it is Nature, which +is begotten by all things, in which it liveth and laboreth; for by +itself it existeth not. For shall we say, that it is out of affection +to the earth, that heavy things fall towards it? Shall we call it +reason, which doth conduct every river into the salt sea? Shall +we term it knowledge in fire, that makes it to consume combustible +matter? If it be affection, reason, and knowledge in these; by the +same affection, reason, and knowledge it is, that Nature worketh. +And therefore seeing all things work as they do, (call it by Form, or +Nature, or by what you please) yet because they work by an impulsion, +which they cannot resist, or by a faculty, infused by the supremest +power; we are neither to wonder at, nor to worship, the faculty that +worketh, nor the creature wherein it worketh. But herein lies the +wonder: and to him is the worship due, who hath created such a nature +in things, and such a faculty, as neither knowing itself, the matter +wherein it worketh, nor the virtue and power which it hath; do yet +work all things to their last and uttermost perfection. And therefore +every reasonable man, taking to himself for a ground that which is +granted by all antiquity, and by all men truly learned that ever the +world had; to wit; that there is a power infinite, and eternal (which +also necessity doth prove unto us, without the help of faith, and +reason; without the force of authority) all things do as easily +follow which have been delivered by divine letters, as the waters of +a running river do successfully pursue each other from the first +fountains. + +This much I say it is, that reason itself hath taught us: and this is +the beginning of knowledge. "Sapientia praecedit, Religio sequitur: +quia prius est Deum scire, consequens colere"; "Sapience goes before, +Religion follows: because it is first to know God, and then to worship +Him." This sapience Plato calleth "absoluti boni scientiam," "the +science of the absolute good": and another "scientiam rerum primarum, +sempiternarum, perpetuarum"[40] For "faith (saith Isidore) is not +extorted by violence; but by reason and examples persuaded": "fides +nequaquam vi extorquetur, sed ratione et exemplis suadetur." I confess +it, that to inquire further, as to the essence of God, of His power, +of His art, and by what means He created the world: or of His secret +judgment, and the causes, is not an effect of reason. "Sed cum ratione +insaniunt," but "they grow mad with reason," that inquire after it. +For as it is no shame, nor dishonor (saith a French author) "de faire +arrest au but qu'on nasceu surpasser," "for a man to rest himself +there where he finds it impossible to pass on further": so whatsoever +is beyond, and out of the reach of true reason, it acknowledged it to +be so; as understanding itself not to be infinite, but according to +the name and nature it hath, to be a teacher, that best knows the end +of his own art. For seeing both reason and necessity teach us (reason, +which is "pars divini spiritus in corpus humanum mersi"[41]) that the +world was made by a power infinite; and yet how it was made, it cannot +teach us: and seeing the same reason and necessity make us know, +that the same infinite power is everywhere in the world; and yet how +everywhere, it cannot inform us: our belief hereof is not weakened, +but greatly strengthened, by our ignorance, because it is the same +reason that tells us, that such a nature cannot be said to be God, +that can be in all conceived by man. + +I have already been over-long, to make any large discourse either of +the parts of the following story, or in mine own excuse: especially in +the excuse of this or that passage; seeing the whole is exceeding +weak and defective. Among the grossest, the unsuitable division of +the books, I could not know how to excuse, had I not been directed to +enlarge the building after the foundation was laid, and the first +part finished. All men know that there is no great art in the dividing +evenly of these things, which are subject to number and measure. For +the rest, it suits well enough with a great many books of this +age, which speak too much, and yet say little; "Ipsi nobis furto +subducimur"; "We are stolen away from ourselves," setting a high price +on all that is our own. But hereof, though a late good writer make +complaint, yet shall it not lay hold on me, because I believe as he +doth; that who so thinks himself the wisest man, is but a poor and +miserable ignorant. Those that are the best men of war against all +the vanities and fooleries of the world, do always keep the strongest +guards against themselves, to defend them from themselves; from +self-love, self-estimation, and self-opinion. + +Generally concerning the order of the work, I have only taken counsel +from the argument. For of the Assyrians, which after the downfall of +Babel take up the first part, and were the first great kings of +the world, there came little to the view of posterity: some few +enterprises, greater in fame than faith, of Ninus and Semiramis, +excepted. + +It was the story of the Hebrews, of all before the Olympiads, that +overcame the consuming disease of time, and preserved itself, from the +very cradle and beginning to this day: and yet not so entire, but +that the large discourses thereof (to which in many Scriptures we are +referred) are nowhere found. The fragments of other stories, with the +actions of those kings and princes which shot up here and there in the +same time, I am driven to relate by way of digression: of which we may +say with Virgil: "Apparent rari nantes in gurgite vasto"; "They appear +here and there floating in the great gulf of time." + +To the same first ages do belong the report of many inventions therein +found, and from them derived to us; though most of the authors' names +have perished in so long a navigation. For those ages had their laws; +they had diversity of government; they had kingly rule; nobility; +policy in war; navigation, and all, or the most of needful trades. To +speak therefore of these (seeing in a general history we should have +left a great deal of nakedness, by their omission) it cannot properly +be called a digression. True it is, that I have made also many others: +which if they shall be laid to my charge, I must cast the fault into +the great heap of human error. For seeing we digress in all the +ways of our lives: yea, seeing the life of man is nothing else but +digression; I may the better be excused, in writing their lives and +actions. I am not altogether ignorant in the laws of history and of +the kinds. + +The same hath been taught by many, but no man better, and with greater +brevity, than by that excellent learned gentleman, Sir Francis Bacon. +Christian laws are also taught us by the prophets and apostles; and +every day preached unto us. But we still make large digressions: yea, +the teachers themselves do not (in all) keep the path which they point +out to others. + +For the rest, after such time as the Persians had wrested the Empire +from the Chaldeans, and had raised a great monarchy, producing actions +of more importance than were elsewhere to be found; it was agreeable +to the order of the story, to attend this Empire; whilst it so +flourished, that the affairs of the nations adjoining had reference +thereunto. The like observance was to be used towards the fortunes of +Greece, when they again began to get ground upon the Persians; as also +towards the affairs of Rome, when the Romans grew more mighty than the +Greeks. + +As for the Medes, the Macedonians, the Sicilians, the Carthaginians, +and other nations who resisted the beginnings of the former empires, +and afterwards became but parts of their composition and enlargement; +it seemed best to remember what was known of them from their several +beginnings, in such times and places as they in their flourishing +estates opposed those monarchies, which in the end swallowed them up. +And herein I have followed the best geographers: who seldom give +names to those small brooks, whereof many, joined together, make great +rivers: till such times as they become united, and run in main stream +to the ocean sea. If the phrase be weak, and the style not everywhere +like itself: the first shows their legitimation and true parent; the +second will excuse itself upon the variety of matter. For Virgil, who +wrote his _Eclogues_, "gracili avena,"[42] used stronger pipes, when +he sounded the wars of Aeneas. It may also be laid to my charge, that +I use divers Hebrew words in my first book, and elsewhere: in which +language others may think and I myself acknowledge it, that I am +altogether ignorant: but it is true, that some of them I find in +Montanus, others in Latin characters in S. Senensis; and of the rest I +have borrowed the interpretation of some of my friends. But say I had +been beholding to neither, yet were it not to be wondered at, having +had an eleven years' leisure, to attain the knowledge of that, or of +any other tongue; howsoever, I know that it will be said by many, that +I might have been more pleasing to the reader, if I had written the +story of mine own times, having been permitted to draw water as near +the well-head as another. To this I answer, that whosoever in writing +a modern history, shall follow truth too near the heels, it may haply +strike out his teeth. There is no mistress or guide, that hath led her +followers and servants into greater miseries. He that goes after her +too far off, loseth her sight, and loseth himself: and he that walks +after her at a middle distance: I know not whether I should call that +kind of course, temper,[43] or baseness. It is true, that I never +travelled after men's opinions, when I might have made the best use +of them: and I have now too few days remaining, to imitate those, that +either out of extreme ambition, or of extreme cowardice, or both, do +yet (when death hath them on his shoulders) flatter the world, between +the bed and the grave. It is enough for me (being in that state I am) +to write of the eldest times: wherein also why may it not be said, +that in speaking of the past, I point at the present, and tax the +vices of those that are yet living, in their persons that are long +since dead; and have it laid to my charge? But this I cannot help, +though innocent. And certainly, if there be any, that finding +themselves spotted like the tigers of old time, shall find fault with +me for painting them over anew, they shall therein accuse themselves +justly, and me falsely. + +For I protest before the Majesty of God, that I malice no man under +the sun. Impossible I know it is to please all; seeing few or none are +so pleased with themselves, or so assured of themselves, by reason of +their subjection to their private passions, but that they seem divers +persons in one and the same day. Seneca hath said it, and so do I: +"Unus mihi pro populo erat";[44] and to the same effect Epicurus, "Hoc +ego non multis sed tibi";[45] or (as it hath since lamentably fallen +out) I may borrow the resolution of an ancient philosopher, "Satis +est unus, satis est nullus."[46] For it was for the service of that +inestimable Prince Henry, the successive hope, and one of the greatest +of the Christian world, that I undertook this work. It pleased him to +peruse some part thereof, and to pardon what was amiss. It is now left +to the world without a master: from which all that is presented, hath +received both blows and thanks: "Eadem probamus, eadem reprehendimus: +hic exitus est omnis judicii, in quolis secundum plures datur."[47] +But these discourses are idle. I know that as the charitable will +judge charitably: so against those, "Qui gloriantur in malitia,"[48] +my present adversity hath disarmed me, I am on the ground already, +and therefore have not far to fall: and for rising again, as in the +natural privation there is no recession to habit; so it is seldom seen +in the privation politic. I do therefore forbear to style my readers +gentle, courteous, and friendly, thereby to beg their good opinions, +or to promise a second and third volume (which I also intend) if the +first receive grace and good acceptance. For that which is already +done, may be thought enough, and too much: and it is certain, let us +claw the reader with never so many courteous phrases, yet shall we +evermore be thought fools, that write foolishly. For conclusion, all +the hope I have lies in this, that I have already found more ungentle +and uncourteous readers of my love towards them, and well-deserving of +them, than ever I shall do again. For had it been otherwise, I should +hardly have had this leisure, to have made myself a fool in print. + + +[Footnote A: A sketch of the life of Raleigh will be found prefixed to +his "Discovery of Guiana" in the volume of "Voyages and Travels". +His "History of the World" was written during his imprisonment in +the Tower of London, which lasted from 1603 to 1616. The Preface +is interesting not only as a fine piece of Elizabethan prose but as +exhibiting the attitude toward history, and the view of the relation +of history to religion and philosophy, which characterized one who +represented with exceptional vigor the typical Elizabethan man of +action and who was also a man of thought and imagination.] + +[Footnote 1: Queen Elizabeth] + +[Footnote 2: "An ill opinion, honorably acquired, is pleasing."] + +[Footnote 3: "So you not to yourselves."] + +[Footnote 4: "He increased, with the result that he is oppressed by +his greatness."] + +[Footnote 5: "The insult done in scorning her beauty."] + +[Footnote 6: "God gave to Solomon largeness of heart."--1 Kings iv. +89.] + +[Footnote 7: Step. Pasquiere, Recherches, lib. v. cap. i.] + +[Footnote 8: Step-mother.] + +[Footnote 9: i.e., Protestantism] + +[Footnote 10: Instantly.] + +[Footnote 11: Dispossessed.] + +[Footnote 12: "Nothing hindering."] + +[Footnote 13: "That they are wise in a foolish matter."--Lactantius, +_De falsa sapientia_, 3, 29.] + +[Footnote 14: Augustine, _De cura pro morte_.] + +[Footnote 15: "Wealth acquired without fraud."] + +[Footnote 16: "O how many go down with this hope to endless labors and +wars."] + +[Footnote 17: Transient.] + +[Footnote 18: Opponents.] + +[Footnote 19: "Everything which is to come lies in uncertainty."] + +[Footnote 20: "Who follow their commander with groans."] + +[Footnote 21: "It takes great genius to call back the mind from the +senses."] + +[Footnote 22: "Against him who denies the principles."] + +[Footnote 23: "Specific virtue, or power."] + +[Footnote 24: "The Roman Church."] + +[Footnote 25: "I shall light a lamp of understanding in thine +heart."--IV. Esdras xiv. 25.] + +[Footnote 26: Followers.] + +[Footnote 27: "Prepared and sworn to protect with unconquered minds +the opinions of the philosophers whom they follow."] + +[Footnote 28: "Out of nothing."] + +[Footnote 29: "Out of pre-existing matter."] + +[Footnote 30: "Because comprehension is between limits, which are +opposed to infinity."] + +[Footnote 31: "God exhibits all things in one existence"] + +[Footnote 32: "The essence of all things, visible and invisible, is +divinity itself"] + +[Footnote 33: "Causally."] + +[Footnote 34: "Not as form, but as universal cause"] + +[Footnote 35: "It [i.e., the infinite] has no beginning, but itself is +perceived to be the beginning of all things, and to embrace and govern +all things."] + +[Footnote 36: "Primal matter."] + +[Footnote 37: "Which destroys all proportion."] + +[Footnote 38: "The spiritual world."] + +[Footnote 39: "Providence, leader and head; Fate, in the middle and +proceeding from Providence; Nature, last."] + +[Footnote 40: "The science of things first, eternal, perpetual."] + +[Footnote 41: "Part of the divine spirit immersed in the human body."] + +[Footnote 42: "With delicate pipe."] + +[Footnote 43: Moderation] + +[Footnote 44: "To me one man stood for the people."] + +[Footnote 45: "I [have done] this not for many, but for thee."] + +[Footnote 46: "One is enough, none is enough."] + +[Footnote 47: "We approve the same things, we blame the same +things--this is the result in every case in which the verdict is +rendered according to the majority."] + +[Footnote 48: "Who glory in malice"] + + + + +PROOEMIUM, EPISTLE DEDICATORY, PREFACE, AND PLAN OF THE INSTAURATIO +MAGNA, ETC. + +BY FRANCIS BACON[A] + +FRANCIS OF VERULAM REASONED THUS WITH HIMSELF, + +AND JUDGED IT TO BE FOR THE INTEREST OF THE PRESENT AND FUTURE +GENERATIONS THAT THEY SHOULD BE MADE ACQUAINTED WITH HIS THOUGHTS + + +Being convinced that the human intellect makes its own difficulties, +not using the true helps which are at man's disposal soberly and +judiciously; whence follows manifold ignorance of things, and by +reason of that ignorance mischiefs innumerable; he thought all trial +should be made, whether that commerce between the mind of man and the +nature of things, which is more precious than anything on earth, or +at least than anything that is of the earth, might by any means be +restored to its perfect and original condition, or if that may not be, +yet reduced to a better condition than that in which it now is. Now +that the errors which have hitherto prevailed, and which will prevail +forever, should (if the mind be left to go its own way), either by +the natural force of the understanding or by help of the aids and +instruments of Logic, one by one correct themselves, was a thing not +to be hoped for: because the primary notions of things which the mind +readily and passively imbibes, stores up, and accumulates (and it is +from them that all the rest flow) are false, confused, and overhastily +abstracted from the facts; nor are the secondary and subsequent +notions less arbitrary and inconstant; whence it follows that the +entire fabric of human reason which we employ in the inquisition of +nature, is badly put together and built up, and like some magnificent +structure without any foundation. For while men are occupied in +admiring and applauding the false powers of the mind, they pass by and +throw away those true powers, which, if it be supplied with the proper +aids and can itself be content to wait upon nature instead of vainly +affecting to overrule her, are within its reach. There was but one +course left, therefore,--to try the whole thing anew upon a better +plan, and to commence a total reconstruction of sciences, arts, and +all human knowledge, raised upon the proper foundations. And this, +though in the project and undertaking it may seem a thing infinite and +beyond the powers of man, yet when it comes to be dealt with it will +be found sound and sober, more so than what has been done hitherto. +For of this there is some issue; whereas in what is now done in the +matter of science there is only a whirling round about, and perpetual +agitation, ending where it began. And although he was well aware how +solitary an enterprise it is, and how hard a thing to win faith and +credit for, nevertheless he was resolved not to abandon either it or +himself; nor to be deterred from trying and entering upon that one +path which is alone open to the human mind. For better it is to make +a beginning of that which may lead to something, than to engage in +a perpetual struggle and pursuit in courses which have no exit. And +certainly the two ways of contemplation are much like those two ways +of action, so much celebrated, in this--that the one, arduous and +difficult in the beginning, leads out at last into the open +country; while the other, seeming at first sight easy and free from +obstruction, leads to pathless and precipitous places. + +Moreover, because he knew not how long it might be before these things +would occur to any one else, judging especially from this, that he +has found no man hitherto who has applied his mind to the like, he +resolved to publish at once so much as he has been able to complete. +The cause of which haste was not ambition for himself, but solicitude +for the work; that in case of his death there might remain some +outline and project of that which he had conceived, and some evidence +likewise of his honest mind and inclination towards the benefit of the +human race. Certain it is that all other ambition whatsoever seemed +poor in his eyes compared with the work which he had in hand; seeing +that the matter at issue is either nothing, or a thing so great that +it may well be content with its own merit, without seeking other +recompence. + + +[Footnote A: A sketch of Bacon's life will be found prefixed to his +"Essays" in another volume of the Harvard Classics. His "Instauratio +Magna" or "Great Renewal," the great work by which he hoped to create +a scientific revolution and deliver mankind from Aristotelianism, was +left far from complete; but the nature of his scheme and the scale +on which it was planned are indicated in these Prefaces, which are +typical both of the man and of the age in which he lived.] + + + + +EPISTLE DEDICATORY + +TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +TO OUR MOST GRACIOUS AND MIGHTY PRINCE AND LORD + +JAMES + +BY THE GRACE OF GOD OF GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE AND IRELAND KING, +DEFENDER OF THE FAITH, ETC. + +_Most Gracious and Mighty King_, + + +Your Majesty may perhaps accuse me of larceny, having stolen from your +affairs so much time as was required for this work. I know not what to +say for myself. For of time there can be no restitution, unless it be +that what has been abstracted from your business may perhaps go to the +memory of your name and the honour of your age; if these things are +indeed worth anything. Certainly they are quite new; totally new in +their very kind: and yet they are copied from a very ancient model; +even the world itself and the nature of things and of the mind. And to +say truth, I am wont for my own part to regard this work as a child of +time rather than of wit; the only wonder being that the first notion +of the thing, and such great suspicions concerning matters long +established, should have come into any man's mind. All the rest +follows readily enough. And no doubt there is something of accident +(as we call it) and luck as well in what men think as in what they do +or say. But for this accident which I speak of, I wish that if +there be any good in what I have to offer, it may be ascribed to +the infinite mercy and goodness of God, and to the felicity of your +Majesty's times; to which as I have been an honest and affectionate +servant in my life, so after my death I may yet perhaps, through the +kindling of this new light in the darkness of philosophy, be the means +of making this age famous to posterity; and surely to the times of the +wisest and most learned of kings belongs of right the regeneration +and restoration of the sciences. Lastly, I have a request to make--a +request no way unworthy of your Majesty, and which especially concerns +the work in hand; namely, that you who resemble Solomon in so many +things--in the gravity of your judgments, in the peacefulness of your +reign, in the largeness of your heart, in the noble variety of the +books which you have composed--would further follow his example +in taking order for the collecting and perfecting of a Natural and +Experimental History, true and severe (unincumbered with literature +and book-learning), such as philosophy may be built upon,--such, in +fact, as I shall in its proper place describe: that so at length, +after the lapse of so many ages, philosophy and the sciences may no +longer float in air, but rest on the solid foundation of experience +of every kind, and the same well examined and weighed. I have provided +the machine, but the stuff must be gathered from the facts of nature. +May God Almighty long preserve your Majesty! + + Your Majesty's + Most bounden and devoted Servant, + FRANCIS VERULAM, + Chancellor. + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +_That the state of knowledge is not prosperous nor greatly advancing; +and that a way must be opened for the human understanding entirely +different from any hitherto known, and other helps provided, in order +that the mind may exercise over the nature of things the authority +which properly belongs to it._ + + +It seems to me that men do not rightly understand either their store +or their strength, but overrate the one and underrate the other. Hence +it follows, that either from an extravagant estimate of the value of +the arts which they possess, they seek no further; or else from too +mean an estimate of their own powers, they spend their strength in +small matters and never put it fairly to the trial in those which +go to the main. These are as the pillars of fate set in the path of +knowledge; for men have neither desire nor hope to encourage them +to penetrate further. And since opinion of store is one of the chief +causes of want, and satisfaction with the present induces neglect +of provision for the future, it becomes a thing not only useful, but +absolutely necessary, that the excess of honour and admiration with +which our existing stock of inventions is regarded be in the very +entrance and threshold of the work, and that frankly and without +circumlocution, stripped off, and men be duly warned not to exaggerate +or make too much of them. For let a man look carefully into all that +variety of books with which the arts and sciences abound, he will +find everywhere endless repetitions of the same thing, varying in the +method of treatment, but not new in substance, insomuch that the whole +stock, numerous as it appears at first view, proves on examination to +be but scanty. And for its value and utility it must be plainly avowed +that that wisdom which we have derived principally from the Greeks is +but like the boyhood of knowledge, and has the characteristic property +of boys; it can talk, but it cannot generate; for it is fruitful of +controversies but barren of works. So that the state of learning as +it now is appears to be represented to the life in the old fable of +Scylla, who had the head and face of a virgin, but her womb was hung +round with barking monsters, from which she could not be delivered. +For in like manner the sciences to which we are accustomed have +certain general positions which are specious and flattering; but +as soon as they come to particulars, which are as the parts of +generation, when they should produce fruit and works, then arise +contentions and barking disputations, which are the end of the matter +and all the issue they can yield. Observe also, that if sciences of +this kind had any life in them, that could never have come to pass +which has been the case now for many ages--that they stand almost at +a stay, without receiving any augmentations worthy of the human race; +insomuch that many times not only what was asserted once is asserted +still, but what was a question once is a question still, and instead +of being resolved by discussion is only fixed and fed; and all the +tradition and succession of schools is still a succession of masters +and scholars, not of inventors and those who bring to further +perfection the things invented. In the mechanical arts we do not find +it so; they, on the contrary, as having in them some breath of life, +are continually growing and becoming more perfect. As originally +invented they are commonly rude, clumsy, and shapeless; afterwards +they acquire new powers and more commodious arrangements and +constructions; in so far that men shall sooner leave the study and +pursuit of them and turn to something else, than they arrive at the +ultimate perfection of which they are capable. Philosophy and the +intellectual sciences, on the contrary, stand like statues, worshiped +and celebrated, but not moved or advanced. Nay, they sometimes +flourish most in the hands of the first author, and afterwards +degenerate. For when men have once made over their judgments to +others' keeping, and (like those senators whom they called _Pedarii_) +have agreed to support some one person's opinion, from that time +they make no enlargement of the sciences themselves, but fall to +the servile office of embellishing certain individual authors and +increasing their retinue. And let it not be said that the sciences +have been growing gradually till they have at last reached their full +stature, and so (their course being completed) have settled in the +works of a few writers; and that there being now no room for the +invention of better, all that remains is to embellish and cultivate +those things which have been invented already. Would it were so! But +the truth is that this appropriating of the sciences has its origin in +nothing better than the confidence of a few persons and the sloth +and indolence of the rest. For after the sciences had been in several +parts perhaps cultivated and handled diligently, there has risen up +some man of bold disposition, and famous for methods and short ways +which people like, who has in appearance reduced them to an art, while +he has in fact only spoiled all that the others had done. And yet this +is what posterity like, because it makes the work short and easy, and +saves further inquiry, of which they are weary and impatient. And if +any one take this general acquiescence and consent for an argument +of weight, as being the judgment of Time, let me tell him that the +reasoning on which he relies is most fallacious and weak. For, first, +we are far from knowing all that in the matter of sciences and arts +has in various ages and places been brought to light and published; +much less, all that has been by private persons secretly attempted +and stirred, so neither the births nor the miscarriages of Time are +entered in our records. Nor, secondly, is the consent itself and +the time it has continued a consideration of much worth. For however +various are the forms of civil politics, there is but one form of +polity in the sciences; and that always has been and always will be +popular. Now the doctrines which find most favour with the populace +are those which are either contentious and pugnacious, or specious +and empty; such, I say, as either entangle assent or tickle it. And +therefore no doubt the greatest wits in each successive age have been +forced out of their own course, men of capacity and intellect above +the vulgar having been fain, for reputation's sake, to bow to the +judgment of the time and the multitude; and thus if any contemplations +of a higher order took light anywhere, they were presently blown out +by the winds of vulgar opinions. So that Time is like a river, which +has brought down to us things light and puffed up, while those which +are weighty and solid have sunk. Nay, those very authors who have +usurped a kind of dictatorship in the sciences and taken upon them to +lay down the law with such confidence, yet when from time to time they +come to themselves again, they fall to complaints of the subtlety +of nature, the hiding-places of truth, the obscurity of things, +the entanglement of causes, the weakness of the human mind; wherein +nevertheless they show themselves never the more modest, seeing that +they will rather lay the blame upon the common condition of man +and nature than upon themselves. And then whatever any art fails to +attain, they ever set it down upon the authority of that art itself as +impossible of attainment; and how can art be found guilty when it is +judge in its own cause? So it is but a device for exempting ignorance +from ignominy. Now for those things which are delivered and received, +this is their condition: barren of works, full of questions; in point +of enlargement slow and languid; carrying a show of perfection in +the whole, but in the parts ill filled up; in selection popular, and +unsatisfactory even to those who propound them; and therefore fenced +round and set forth with sundry artifices. And if there be any who +have determined to make trial for themselves, and put their own +strength to the work of advancing the boundaries of the sciences, +yet have they not ventured to cast themselves completely loose from +received opinions or to seek their knowledge at the fountain; but they +think they have done some great thing if they do but add and introduce +into the existing sum of science something of their own; prudently +considering with themselves that by making the addition they can +assert their liberty, while they retain the credit of modesty by +assenting to the rest. But these mediocrities and middle ways so +much praised, in deferring to opinions and customs, turn to the great +detriment of the sciences. For it is hardly possible at once to admire +an author and to go beyond him; knowledge being as water, which +will not rise above the level from which it fell. Men of this kind, +therefore, amend some things, but advance little; and improve the +condition of knowledge, but do not extend its range. Some, indeed, +there have been who have gone more boldly to work, and taking it all +for an open matter and giving their genius full play, have made a +passage for themselves and their own opinions by pulling down and +demolishing former ones; and yet all their stir has but little +advanced the matter; since their aim has been not to extend philosophy +and the arts in substance and value, but only to change doctrines and +transfer the kingdom of opinions to themselves; whereby little has +indeed been gained, for though the error be the opposite of the other, +the causes of erring are the same in both. And if there have been any +who, not binding themselves either to other men's opinions or to their +own, but loving liberty, have desired to engage others along with +themselves in search, these, though honest in intention, have been +weak in endeavour. For they have been content to follow probable +reasons, and are carried round in a whirl of arguments, and in the +promiscuous liberty of search have relaxed the severity of inquiry. +There is none who has dwelt upon experience and the facts of nature +as long as is necessary. Some there are indeed who have committed +themselves to the waves of experience, and almost turned mechanics; +yet these again have in their very experiments pursued a kind of +wandering inquiry, without any regular system of operations. And +besides they have mostly proposed to themselves certain petty tasks, +taking it for a great matter to work out some single discovery;--a +course of proceeding at once poor in aim and unskilful in design. For +no man can rightly and successfully investigate the nature of anything +in the thing itself; let him vary his experiments as laboriously as he +will, he never comes to a resting-place, but still finds something to +seek beyond. And there is another thing to be remembered; namely, +that all industry in experimenting has begun with proposing to itself +certain definite works to be accomplished, and has pursued them +with premature and unseasonable eagerness; it has sought, I say, +experiments of Fruit, not experiments of Light; not Imitating the +divine procedure, which In its first day's work created light only and +assigned to it one entire day; on which day it produced no material +work, but proceeded to that on the days following. As for those who +have given the first place to Logic, supposing that the surest helps +to the sciences were to be found in that, they have indeed most truly +and excellently perceived that the human intellect left to its own +course is not to be trusted; but then the remedy is altogether too +weak for the disease; nor is it without evil in itself. For the +Logic which is received, though it be very properly applied to civil +business and to those arts which rest in discourse and opinion, is not +nearly subtle enough to deal with nature; and in offering at what it +cannot master, has done more to establish and perpetuate error than to +open the way to truth. + +Upon the whole therefore, it seems that men have not been happy +hitherto either in the trust which they have placed in others or in +their own industry with regard to the sciences; especially as neither +the demonstrations nor the experiments as yet known are much to be +relied upon. But the universe to the eye of the human understanding is +framed like a labyrinth; presenting as it does on every side so many +ambiguities of way, such deceitful resemblances of objects and signs, +natures so irregular in their lines, and so knotted and entangled. And +then the way is still to be made by the uncertain light of the sense, +sometimes shining out, sometimes clouded over, through the woods +of experience and particulars; while those who offer themselves for +guides are (as was said) themselves also puzzled, and increase the +number of errors and wanderers. In circumstances so difficult neither +the natural force of man's judgment nor even any accidental felicity +offers any chance of success. No excellence of wit, no repetition of +chance experiments, can overcome such difficulties as these. Our +steps must be guided by a clue, and the whole way from the very first +perception of the senses must be laid out upon a sure plan. Not that I +would be understood to mean that nothing whatever has been done in so +many ages by so great labours. We have no reason to be ashamed of the +discoveries which have been made, and no doubt the ancients proved +themselves in everything that turns on wit and abstract meditation, +wonderful men. But as in former ages when men sailed only by +observation of the stars, they could indeed coast along the shores +of the old continent or cross a few small and mediterranean seas; but +before the ocean could be traversed and the new world discovered, the +use of the mariner's needle, as a more faithful and certain guide, +had to be found out; in like manner the discoveries which have been +hitherto made in the arts and sciences are such as might be made by +practice, meditation, observation, argumentation,--for they lay near +to the senses, and immediately beneath common notions; but before we +can reach the remoter and more hidden parts of nature, it is necessary +that a more perfect use and application of the human mind and +intellect be introduced. + +For my own part at least, in obedience to the everlasting love of +truth, I have committed myself to the uncertainties and difficulties +and solitudes of the ways, and relying on the divine assistance have +upheld my mind both against the shocks and embattled ranks of opinion, +and against my own private and inward hesitations and scruples, and +against the fogs and clouds of nature, and the phantoms flitting about +on every side; in the hope of providing at last for the present and +future generations guidance more faithful and secure. Wherein if I +have made any progress, the way has been opened to me by no other +means than the true and legitimate humiliation of the human spirit. +For all those who before me have applied themselves to the invention +of arts have but cast a glance or two upon facts and examples and +experience, and straightway proceeded, as if invention were nothing +more than an exercise of thought, to invoke their own spirits to give +them oracles. I, on the contrary, dwelling purely and constantly among +the facts of nature, withdraw my intellect from them no further than +may suffice to let the images and rays of natural objects meet in a +point, as they do in the sense of vision; whence it follows that the +strength and excellency of the wit has but little to do in the matter. +And the same humility which I use in inventing I employ likewise in +teaching. For I do not endeavour either by triumphs of confutation, +or pleadings of antiquity, or assumption of authority, or even by +the veil of obscurity, to invest these inventions of mine with any +majesty; which might easily be done by one who sought to give lustre +to his own name rather than light to other men's minds. I have +not sought (I say) nor do I seek either to force or ensnare men's +judgments, but I lead them to things themselves and the concordances +of things, that they may see for themselves what they have, what they +can dispute, what they can add and contribute to the common stock. +And for myself, if in anything I have been either too credulous or +too little awake and attentive, or if I have fallen off by the way and +left the inquiry incomplete, nevertheless I so present these things +naked and open, that my errors can be marked and set aside before the +mass of knowledge be further infected by them; and it will be easy +also for others to continue and carry on my labours. And by these +means I suppose that I have established for ever a true and lawful +marriage between the empirical and the rational faculty, the unkind +and ill-starred divorce and separation of which has thrown into +confusion all the affairs of the human family. + +Wherefore, seeing that these things do not depend upon myself, at the +outset of the work I most humbly and fervently pray to God the Father, +God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, that remembering the sorrows of +mankind and the pilgrimage of this our life wherein we wear out days +few and evil, they will vouchsafe through my hands to endow the human +family with new mercies. This likewise I humbly pray, that things +human may not interfere with things divine, and that from the opening +of the ways of sense and the increase of natural light there may arise +in our minds no incredulity or darkness with regard to the divine +mysteries; but rather that the understanding being thereby purified +and purged of fancies and vanity, and yet not the less subject and +entirely submissive to the divine oracles, may give to faith that +which is faith's. Lastly, that knowledge being now discharged of that +venom which the serpent infused into it, and which makes the mind +of man to swell, we may not be wise above measure and sobriety, but +cultivate truth in charity. + +And now having said my prayers I turn to men; to whom I have certain +salutary admonitions to offer and certain fair requests to make. My +first admonition (which was also my prayer) is that men confine the +sense within the limits of duty in respect to things divine: for the +sense is like the sun, which reveals the face of earth, but seals and +shuts up the face of heaven. My next, that in flying from this evil +they fall not into the opposite error, which they will surely do if +they think that the inquisition of nature is in any part interdicted +or forbidden. For it was not that pure and uncorrupted natural +knowledge whereby Adam gave names to the creatures according to their +propriety, which gave occasion to the fall. It was the ambitious and +proud desire of moral knowledge to judge of good and evil, to the end +that man may revolt from God and give laws to himself, which was +the form and manner of the temptation. Whereas of the sciences which +regard nature, the divine philosopher declares that "it is the glory +of God to conceal a thing, but it is the glory of the King to find +a thing out," Even as though the divine nature took pleasure in the +innocent and kindly sport of children playing at hide and seek, and +vouchsafed of his kindness and goodness to admit the human spirit +for his playfellow at that game. Lastly, I would address one general +admonition to all; that they consider what are the true ends of +knowledge, and that they seek it not either for pleasure of the mind, +or for contention, or for superiority to others, or for profit, or +fame, or power, or any of these inferior things; but for the benefit +and use of life; and that they perfect and govern it in charity. For +it was from lust of power that the angels fell, from lust of knowledge +that man fell; but of charity there can be no excess, neither did +angel or man ever come in danger by it. + +The requests I have to make are these. Of myself I say nothing; but in +behalf of the business which is in hand I entreat men to believe that +it is not an opinion to be held, but a work to be done; and to be well +assured that I am labouring to lay the foundation, not of any sect +or doctrine, but of human utility and power. Next, I ask them to deal +fairly by their own interests, and laying aside all emulations and +prejudices in favour of this or that opinion, to join in consultation +for the common good; and being now freed and guarded by the securities +and helps which I offer from the errors and impediments of the way, to +come forward themselves and take part in that which remains to be done +Moreover, to be of good hope, nor to imagine that this Instauration +of mine is a thing infinite and beyond the power of man, when it is in +fact the true end and termination of infinite error, and seeing also +that it is by no means forgetful of the conditions of mortality and +humanity, (for it does not suppose that the work can be altogether +completed within one generation, but provides for its being taken up +by another), and finally that it seeks for the sciences not arrogantly +in the little cells of human wit, but with reverence in the greater +world. But it is the empty things that are vast things solid are most +contracted and lie in little room. And now I have only one favour +more to ask (else injustice to me may perhaps imperil the business +itself)--that men will consider well how far, upon that which I must +needs assert (if I am to be consistent with myself), they are entitled +to judge and decide upon these doctrines of mine, inasmuch as all that +premature human reasoning which anticipates inquiry, and is abstracted +from the facts rashly and sooner than is fit, is by me rejected (so +far as the inquisition of nature is concerned), as a thing uncertain, +confused, and ill built up, and I cannot be fairly asked to abide by +the decision of a tribunal which is itself on its trial. + +THE PLAN OF THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA + +The work is in six Parts:-- + + 1. _The Divisions of the Sciences_. + + 2. _The New Organon; or Directions concerning the + Interpretation of Nature_. + + 3. _The Phenomena of the Universe; or a Natural and + Experimental History for the foundation of + Philosophy_. + + 4. _The Ladder of the Intellect_. + + 5. _The Forerunners; or Anticipations of the New + Philosophy_. + + 6. _The New Philosophy; or Active Science_. + +_The Arguments of the several Parts_. + +It being part of my design to set everything forth, as far as may +be, plainly and perspicuously (for nakedness of the mind is still, +as nakedness of the body once was, the companion of innocence and +simplicity), let me first explain the order and plan of the work. I +distribute it into six parts. + +The first part exhibits a summary or general description of the +knowledge which the human race at present possesses. For I thought it +good to make some pause upon that which is received; that thereby +the old may be more easily made perfect and the new more easily +approached. And I hold the improvement of that which we have to be as +much an object as the acquisition of more. Besides which it will make +me the better listened to; for "He that is ignorant (says the proverb) +receives not the words of knowledge, unless thou first tell him that +which is in his own heart." We will therefore make a coasting voyage +along the shores of the arts and sciences received; not without +importing into them some useful things by the way. + +In laying out the divisions of the sciences however, I take into +account not only things already invented and known, but likewise +things omitted which ought to be there. For there are found in the +intellectual as in the terrestial globe waste regions as well as +cultivated ones. It is no wonder therefore if I am sometimes obliged +to depart from the ordinary divisions. For in adding to the total you +necessarily alter the parts and sections; and the received divisions +of the sciences are fitted only to the received sum of them as it +stands now. + +With regard to those things which I shall mark down as omitted, I +intend not merely to set down a simple title or a concise argument +of that which is wanted. For as often as I have occasion to report +anything as deficient, the nature of which is at all obscure, so that +men may not perhaps easily understand what I mean or what the work is +which I have in my head, I shall always (provided it be a matter of +any worth) take care to subjoin either directions for the execution of +such work, or else a portion of the work itself executed by myself as +a sample of the whole: thus giving assistance in every case either by +work or by counsel. For if it were for the sake of my reputation only +and other men's interests were not concerned in it, I would not have +any man think that in such cases merely some light and vague notion +has crossed my mind, and that the things which I desire and offer at +are no better than wishes; when they are in fact things which men may +certainly command if they will, and of which I have formed in my own +mind a clear and detailed conception. For I do not propose merely to +survey these regions in my mind, like an augur taking auspices, but to +enter them like a general who means to take possession.--So much for +the first part of the work. + + * * * * * + +Having thus coasted past the ancient arts, the next point is to equip +the intellect for passing beyond. To the second part therefore belongs +the doctrine concerning the better and more perfect use of human +reason in the inquisition of things, and the true helps of the +understanding: that thereby (as far as the condition of mortality and +humanity allows) the intellect may be raised and exalted, and made +capable of overcoming the difficulties and obscurities of nature. The +art which I introduce with this view (which I call _Interpretation of +Nature_) is a kind of logic; though the difference between it and +the ordinary logic is great; indeed immense. For the ordinary +logic professes to contrive and prepare helps and guards for the +understanding, as mine does; and in this one point they agree. But +mine differs from it in three points especially; viz. in the end aimed +at; in the order of demonstration; and in the starting point of the +inquiry. + +For the end which this science of mine proposes is the invention not +of arguments but of arts; not of things in accordance with principles, +but of principles themselves; not of probable reasons, but of +designations and directions for works. And as the intention is +different, so accordingly is the effect; the effect of the one being +to overcome an opponent in argument, of the other to command nature in +action. + +In accordance with this end is also the nature and order of the +demonstrations. For in the ordinary logic almost all the work is spent +about the syllogism. Of induction the logicians seem hardly to have +taken any serious thought, but they pass it by with a slight notice, +and hasten on to the formulae of disputation. I on the contrary reject +demonstration by syllogism, as acting too confusedly, and letting +nature slip out of its hands. For although no one can doubt that +things which agree in a middle term agree with one another (which is +a proposition of mathematical certainty), yet it leaves an opening +for deception; which is this. The syllogism consists of propositions; +propositions of words; and words are the tokens and signs of notions. +Now if the very notions of the mind (which are as the soul of words +and the basis of the whole structure) be improperly and over-hastily +abstracted from facts, vague not sufficiently definite, faulty in +short in many ways, the whole edifice tumbles. I therefore reject the +syllogism; and that not only as regards principles (for to principles +the logicians themselves do not apply it) but also as regards middle +propositions; which, though obtainable no doubt by the syllogism, +are, when so obtained, barren of works, remote from practice, and +altogether unavailable for the active department of the sciences. +Although therefore I leave to the syllogism and these famous and +boasted modes of demonstration their jurisdiction over popular arts +and such as are matter of opinion (in which department I leave all +as it is), yet in dealing with the nature of things I use induction +throughout, and that in the minor propositions as well as the major. +For I consider induction to be that form of demonstration which +upholds the sense, and closes with nature, and comes to the very brink +of operation, if it does not actually deal with it. + +Hence it follows that the order of demonstration is likewise inverted. +For hitherto the proceeding has been to fly at once from the sense +and particulars up to the most general propositions, as certain fixed +poles for the argument to turn upon, and from these to derive the rest +by middle terms a short way, no doubt, but precipitate, and one which +will never lead to nature, though it offers an easy and ready way to +disputation. Now my plan is to proceed regularly and gradually from +one axiom to another, so that the most general are not reached till +the last but then when you do come to them you find them to be not +empty notions, but well defined, and such as nature would really +recognise as her first principles, and such as lie at the heart and +marrow of things. + +But the greatest change I introduce is in the form itself of induction +and the judgment made thereby. For the induction of which the +logicians speak, which proceeds by simple enumeration, is a puerile +thing, concludes at hazard, is always liable to be upset by a +contradictory instance, takes into account only what is known and +ordinary, and leads to no result. + +Now what the sciences stand in need of is a form of induction which +shall analyse experience and take it to pieces, and by a due process +of exclusion and rejection lead to an inevitable conclusion. And +if that ordinary mode of judgment practised by the logicians was so +laborious, and found exercise for such great wits how much more labour +must we be prepared to bestow upon this other, which is extracted not +merely out of the depths of the mind, but out of the very bowels of +nature. + +Nor is this all. For I also sink the foundations of the sciences +deeper and firmer; and I begin the inquiry nearer the source than men +have done heretofore; submitting to examination those things which +the common logic takes on trust. For first, the logicians borrow the +principles of each science from the science itself; secondly, they +hold in reverence the first notions of the mind; and lastly, they +receive as conclusive the immediate informations of the sense, when +well disposed. Now upon the first point, I hold that true logic +ought to enter the several provinces of science armed with a higher +authority than belongs to the principles of those sciences themselves, +and ought to call those putative principles to account until they +are fully established. Then with regard to the first notions of the +intellect; there is not one of the impressions taken by the intellect +when left to go its own way, but I hold it for suspected, and no +way established, until it has submitted to a new trial and a fresh +judgment has been thereupon pronounced. And lastly, the information +of the sense itself I sift and examine in many ways. For certain it +is that the senses deceive; but then at the same time they supply the +means of discovering their own errors; only the errors are here, the +means of discovery are to seek. + +The sense fails in two ways. Sometimes it gives no information, +sometimes it gives false information. For first, there are very many +things which escape the sense, even when best disposed and no way +obstructed; by reason either of the subtlety of the whole body, or +the minuteness of the parts, or distance of place, or slowness or else +swiftness of motion, or familiarity of the object, or other causes. +And again when the sense does apprehend a thing its apprehension is +not much to be relied upon. For the testimony and information of the +sense has reference always to man, not to the universe; and it is a +great error to assert that the sense is the measure of things. + +To meet these difficulties, I have sought on all sides diligently and +faithfully to provide helps for the sense--substitutes to supply its +failures, rectifications to correct its errors; and this I endeavour +to accomplish not so much by instruments as by experiments. For the +subtlety of experiments is far greater than that of the sense itself, +even when assisted by exquisite instruments; such experiments, I mean, +as are skilfully and artificially devised for the express purpose +of determining the point in question. To the immediate and proper +perception of the sense therefore I do not give much weight; but I +contrive that the office of the sense shall be only to judge of the +experiment, and that the experiment itself shall judge of the thing. +And thus I conceive that I perform the office of a true priest of the +sense (from which all knowledge in nature must be sought, unless men +mean to go mad) and a not unskilful interpreter of its oracles; and +that while others only profess to uphold and cultivate the sense, I +do so in fact. Such then are the provisions I make for finding the +genuine light of nature and kindling and bringing it to bear. And they +would be sufficient of themselves, if the human intellect were even, +and like a fair sheet of paper with no writing on it. But since the +minds of men are strangely possessed and beset, so that there is no +true and even surface left to reflect the genuine rays of things, it +is necessary to seek a remedy for this also. + +Now the idols, or phantoms, by which the mind is occupied are either +adventitious or innate. The adventitious come into the mind from +without; namely, either from the doctrines and sects of philosophers, +or from perverse rules of demonstration. But the innate are inherent +in the very nature of the intellect, which is far more prone to error +than the sense is. For let men please themselves as they will in +admiring and almost adoring the human mind, this is certain: that as +an uneven mirror distorts the rays of objects according to its own +figure and section, so the mind, when it receives impressions of +objects through the sense, cannot be trusted to report them truly, +but in forming its notions mixes up its own nature with the nature of +things. + +And as the first two kinds of idols are hard to eradicate, so idols of +this last kind cannot be eradicated at all. All that can be done is +to point them out, so that this insidious action of the mind may be +marked and reproved (else as fast as old errors are destroyed new ones +will spring up out of the ill complexion of the mind itself, and so we +shall have but a change or errors, and not a clearance); and to lay it +down once for all as a fixed and established maxim, that the intellect +is not qualified to judge except by means of induction, and induction +in its legitimate form. This doctrine then of the expurgation of the +intellect to qualify it for dealing with truth, is comprised in three +refutations: the refutation of the Philosophies; the refutation of the +Demonstrations; and the refutation of the Natural Human Reason. The +explanation of which things, and of the true relation between the +nature of things and the nature of the mind, is as the strewing and +decoration of the bridal chamber of the Mind and the Universe, the +Divine Goodness assisting; out of which marriage let us hope (and be +this the prayer of the bridal song) there may spring helps to man, +and a line and race of inventions that may in some degree subdue and +overcome the necessities and miseries of humanity. This is the second +part of the work. + + * * * * * + +But I design not only to indicate and mark out the ways, but also +to enter them. And therefore the third part of the work embraces the +Phenomena of the Universe; that is to say, experience of every kind, +and such a natural history as may serve for a foundation to build +philosophy upon. For a good method of demonstration or form of +interpreting nature may keep the mind from going astray or stumbling, +but it is not any excellence of method that can supply it with the +material of knowledge. Those however who aspire not to guess and +divine, but to discover and know; who propose not to devise mimic and +fabulous worlds of their own, but to examine and dissect the nature +of this very world itself; must go to facts themselves for +everything. Nor can the place of this labour and search and +worldwide perambulation be supplied by any genius or meditation or +argumentation; no, not if all men's wits could meet in one. This +therefore we must have, or the business must be for ever abandoned. +But up to this day such has been the condition of men in this matter, +that it is no wonder if nature will not give herself into their hands. + +For first, the information of the sense itself, sometimes failing, +sometimes false; observation, careless, irregular, and led by chance; +tradition, vain and fed on rumour; practice, slavishly bent upon its +work; experiment, blind, stupid, vague, and prematurely broken off; +lastly, natural history, trivial and poor;--all these have contributed +to supply the understanding with very bad materials for philosophy and +the sciences. + +Then an attempt is made to mend the matter by a preposterous subtlety +and winnowing of argument. But this comes too late, the case being +already past remedy; and is far from setting the business right +or sifting away the errors. The only hope therefore of any greater +increase or progress lies in a reconstruction of the sciences. + +Of this reconstruction the foundation must be laid in natural history, +and that of a new kind and gathered on a new principle. For it is +in vain that you polish the mirror if there are no images to be +reflected; and it is as necessary that the intellect should be +supplied with fit matter to work upon, as with safeguards to guide its +working. But my history differs from that in use (as my logic does) in +many things,--in end and office, in mass and composition, in subtlety, +in selection also and setting forth, with a view to the operations +which are to follow. + +For first, the object of a natural history which I propose is not so +much to delight with variety of matter or to help with present use of +experiments, as to give light to the discovery of causes and supply a +suckling philosophy with its first food. For though it be true that +I am principally in pursuit of works and the active department of the +sciences, yet I wait for harvest-time, and do not attempt to mow +the moss or to reap the green corn. For I well know that axioms once +rightly discovered will carry whole troops of works along with them, +and produce them, not here and there one, but in clusters. And that +unseasonable and puerile hurry to snatch by way of earnest at the +first works which come within reach, I utterly condemn and reject, as +an Atalanta's apple that hinders the race. Such then is the office of +this natural history of mine. + +Next, with regard to the mass and composition of it: I mean it to be a +history not only of nature free and at large (when she is left to +her own course and does her work her own way)--such as that of +the heavenly bodies, meteors, earth and sea, minerals, plants, +animals,--but much more of nature under constraint and vexed; that +is to say, when by art and the hand of man she is forced out of her +natural state, and squeezed and moulded. Therefore I set down at +length all experiments of the mechanical arts, of the operative part +of the liberal arts, of the many crafts which have not yet grown into +arts properly so called, so far as I have been able to examine them +and as they conduce to the end in view. Nay (to say the plain truth) +I do in fact (low and vulgar as men may think it) count more upon this +part both for helps and safeguards than upon the other; seeing that +the nature of things betrays itself more readily under the vexations +of art than in its natural freedom. + +Nor do I confine the history to Bodies; but I have thought it my +duty besides to make a separate history of such Virtues as may be +considered cardinal in nature. I mean those original passions or +desires of matter which constitute the primary elements of nature; +such as Dense and Rare, Hot and Cold, Solid and Fluid, Heavy and +Light, and several others. + +Then again, to speak of subtlety: I seek out and get together a +kind of experiments much subtler and simpler than those which occur +accidentally. For I drag into light many things which no one who was +not proceeding by a regular and certain way to the discovery of causes +would have thought of inquiring after; being indeed in themselves of +no great use; which shows that they were not sought for on their own +account; but having just the same relation to things and works which +the letters of the alphabet have to speech and words--which, though +in themselves useless, are the elements of which all discourse is made +up. + +Further, in the selection of the relation and experiments I conceive I +have been a more cautious purveyor than those who have hitherto dealt +with natural history. For I admit nothing but on the faith of eyes, +or at least of careful and severe examination; so that nothing is +exaggerated for wonder's sake, but what I state is sound and without +mixture of fables or vanity. All received or current falsehoods +also (which by strange negligence have been allowed for many ages to +prevail and become established) I proscribe and brand by name; that +the sciences may be no more troubled with them For it has been well +observed that the fables and superstitions and follies which nurses +instil into children do serious injury to their minds; and the same +consideration makes me anxious, having the management of the childhood +as it were of philosophy in its course of natural history, not to let +it accustom itself in the beginning to any vanity. Moreover, whenever +I come to a new experiment of any subtlety (though it be in my own +opinion certain and approved), I nevertheless subjoin a clear account +of the manner in which I made it; that men knowing exactly how each +point was made out, may see whether there be any error connected with +it, and may arouse themselves to devise proofs more trustworthy and +exquisite, if such can be found; and finally, I interpose everywhere +admonitions and scruples and cautions, with a religious care to eject, +repress, and as it were exorcise every kind of phantasm. + +Lastly, knowing how much the sight of man's mind is distracted by +experience and history, and how hard it is at the first (especially +for minds either tender or preoccupied) to become familiar with +nature, I not unfrequently subjoin observations of my own, being as +the first offers, inclinations, and as it were glances of history +towards philosophy; both by way of an assurance to men that they will +be kept for ever tossing on the waves of experience, and also that +when the time comes for the intellect to begin its work, it may find +everything the more ready. By such a natural history then as I have +described, I conceive that a safe and convenient approach may be made +to nature, and matter supplied of good quality and well prepared for +the understanding to work upon. + + * * * * * + +And now that we have surrounded the intellect with faithful helps and +guards, and got together with most careful selection a regular army of +divine works, it may seem that we have no more to do but to proceed to +philosophy itself. And yet in a matter so difficult and doubtful there +are still some things which it seems necessary to premise, partly for +convenience of explanation, partly for present use. + +Of these the first is to set forth examples of inquiry and invention +according to my method, exhibited by anticipation in some particular +subjects; choosing such subjects as are at once the most noble in +themselves among those under inquiry, and most different one from +another; that there may be an example in every kind. I do not speak of +those examples which are joined to the several precepts and rules by +way of illustration (for of these I have given plenty in the second +part of the work); but I mean actual types and models, by which the +entire process of the mind and the whole fabric and order of invention +from the beginning to the end, in certain subjects, and those various +and remarkable, should be set as it were before the eyes. For +I remember that in the mathematics it is easy to follow the +demonstration when you have a machine beside you; whereas without +that help all appears involved and more subtle than it really is. To +examples of this kind,--being in fact nothing more than an application +of the second part in detail and at large,--the fourth part of the +work is devoted. + + * * * * * + +The fifth part is for temporary use only, pending the completion of +the rest; like interest payable from time to time until the principal +be forthcoming. For I do not make so blindly for the end of my +journey, as to neglect anything useful that may turn up by the way. +And therefore I include in this fifth part such things as I have +myself discovered, proved, or added,--not however according to the +true rules and methods of interpretation, but by the ordinary use of +the understanding in inquiring and discovering. For besides that I +hope my speculations may in virtue of my continual conversancy with +nature have a value beyond the pretensions of my wit, they will +serve in the meantime for wayside inns in which the mind may rest +and refresh itself on its journey to more certain conclusions. +Nevertheless I wish it to be understood in the meantime that they are +conclusions by which (as not being discovered and proved by the true +form of interpretation) I do not at all mean to bind myself. Nor +need any one be alarmed at such suspension of judgment, in one who +maintains not simply that nothing can be known, but only that nothing +can be known except in a certain course and way; and yet establishes +provisionally certain degrees of assurance, for use and relief until +the mind shall arrive at a knowledge of causes in which it can +rest. For even those schools of philosophy which held the absolute +impossibility of knowing anything were not inferior to those which +took upon them to pronounce. But then they did not provide helps for +the sense and understanding, as I have done, but simply took away all +their authority: which is quite a different thing--almost the reverse. + + * * * * * + +The sixth part of my work (to which the rest is subservient and +ministrant) discloses and sets forth that philosophy which by +the legitimate, chaste, and severe course of inquiry which I have +explained and provided is at length developed and established. The +completion however of this last part is a thing both above my strength +and beyond my hopes. I have made a beginning of the work--a beginning, +as I hope, not unimportant:--the fortune of the human race will give +the issue;--such an issue, it may be, as in the present condition of +things and men's minds cannot easily be conceived or imagined. For +the matter in hand is no mere felicity of speculation, but the real +business and fortunes of the human race, and all power of operation. +For man is but the servant and interpreter of nature: what he does and +what he knows is only what he has observed of nature's order in fact +or in thought; beyond this he knows nothing and can do nothing. For +the chain of causes cannot by any force be loosed or broken, nor can +nature be commanded except by being obeyed. And so those twin objects, +human Knowledge and human Power, do really meet in one; and it is from +ignorance of causes that operation fails. + +And all depends on keeping the eye steadily fixed upon the facts +of nature and so receiving their images simply as they are. For God +forbid that we should give out a dream of our own imagination for a +pattern of the world; rather may he graciously grant to us to write an +apocalypse or true vision of the footsteps of the Creator imprinted on +his creatures. + +Therefore do thou, O Father, who gavest the visible light as the +first fruits of creation, and didst breathe into the face of man the +intellectual light as the crown and consummation thereof, guard and +protect this work, which coming from thy goodness returneth to thy +glory. Thou when thou turnedst to look upon the works which thy hands +had made, sawest that all was very good, and didst rest from thy +labours. But man, when he turned to look upon the work which his hands +had made, saw that all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and could +find no rest therein. Wherefore if we labour in thy works with the +sweat of our brows thou wilt make us partakers of thy vision and thy +sabbath. Humbly we pray that this mind may be steadfast in us, and +that through these our hands, and the hands of others to whom thou +shalt give the same spirit, thou wilt vouchsafe to endow the human +family with new mercies. + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE NOVUM ORGANUM + + +Those who have taken upon them to lay down the law of nature as a +thing already searched out and understood, whether they have spoken +in simple assurance or professional affectation, have therein done +philosophy and the sciences great injury. For as they have been +successful in inducing belief, so they have been effective in +quenching and stopping inquiry; and have done more harm by spoiling +and putting an end to other men's efforts than good by their own. +Those on the other hand who have taken a contrary course, and asserted +that absolutely nothing can be known,--whether it were from hatred of +the ancient sophists, or from uncertainty and fluctuation of mind, +or even from a kind of fulness of learning, that they fell upon this +opinion,--have certainly advanced reasons for it that are not to be +despised; but yet they have neither started from true principles nor +rested in the just conclusion, zeal and affectation having carried +them much too far. The more ancient of the Greeks (whose writings +are lost) took up with better judgment a position between these two +extremes,--between the presumption of pronouncing on everything, +and the despair of comprehending anything; and though frequently and +bitterly complaining of the difficulty of inquiry and the obscurity of +things, and like impatient horses champing the bit, they did not +the less follow up their object and engage with Nature; thinking (it +seems) that this very question,--viz. whether or no anything can be +known,--was to be settled not by arguing, but by trying. And yet they +too, trusting entirely to the force of their understanding, applied +no rule, but made everything turn upon hard thinking and perpetual +working and exercise of the mind. + +Now my method, though hard to practise, is easy to explain; and it +is this. I propose to establish progressive stages of certainty. The +evidence of the sense, helped and guarded by a certain process of +correction, I retain. But the mental operation which follows the act +of sense I for the most part reject; and instead of it I open and +lay out a new and certain path for the mind to proceed in, starting +directly from the simple sensuous perception. The necessity of this +was felt no doubt by those who attributed so much importance to +Logic; showing thereby that they were in search of helps for the +understanding, and had no confidence in the native and spontaneous +process of the mind. But this remedy comes too late to do any +good, when the mind is already, through the daily intercourse and +conversation of life, occupied with unsound doctrines and beset on all +sides by vain imaginations. And therefore that art of Logic, coming +(as I said) too late to the rescue, and no way able to set matters +right again, has had the effect of fixing errors rather than +disclosing truth. There remains but one course for the recovery of +a sound and healthy condition,--namely, that the entire work of the +understanding be commenced afresh, and the mind itself be from the +very outset not left to take its own course, but guided at every step; +and the business be done as if by machinery. Certainly if in things +mechanical men had set to work with their naked hands, without help or +force of instruments, just as in things intellectual they have set to +work with little else than the naked forces of the understanding, very +small would the matters have been which, even with their best efforts +applied in conjunction, they could have attempted or accomplished. Now +(to pause while upon this example and look in it as in a glass) let us +suppose that some vast obelisk were (for the decoration of a triumph +or some such magnificence) to be removed from its place, and that men +should set to work upon it with their naked hands; would not any +sober spectator think them mad? And if they should then send for more +people, thinking that in that way they might manage it, would he +not think them all the madder? And if they then proceeded to make a +selection, putting away the weaker hands, and using only the strong +and vigorous, would he not think them madder than ever? And if +lastly, not content with this, they resolved to call in aid the art +of athletics, and required all their men to come with hands, arms, +and sinews well anointed and medicated according to the rules of art, +would he not cry out that they were only taking pains to show a kind +of method and discretion in their madness? Yet just so it is that +men proceed in matters intellectual,--with just the same kind of mad +effort and useless combination of forces,--when they hope great things +either from the number and cooperation or from the excellency and +acuteness of individual wits; yea, and when they endeavour by Logic +(which may be considered as a kind of athletic art) to strengthen the +sinews of the understanding; and yet with all this study and endeavour +it is apparent to any true judgment that they are but applying the +naked intellect all the time; whereas in every great work to be done +by the hand of man it is manifestly impossible, without instruments +or machinery, either for the strength of each to be exerted or the +strength of all to be united. + +Upon these premises two things occur to me of which, that they may +not be overlooked, I would have men reminded. First it falls out +fortunately as I think for the allaying of contradictions and +heart-burnings, that the honour and reverence due to the ancients +remains untouched and undiminished; while I may carry out my designs +and at the same time reap the fruit of my modesty. For if I should +profess that I, going the same road as the ancients, have something +better to produce, there must needs have been some comparison or +rivalry between us (not to be avoided by any art of words) in respect +of excellency or ability of wit; and though in this there would be +nothing unlawful or new (for if there be anything misapprehended by +them, or falsely laid down, why may not I, using a liberty common +to all, take exception to it?) yet the contest, however just and +allowable, would have been an unequal one perhaps, in respect of the +measure of my own powers. As it is however,--my object being to open a +new way for the understanding, a way by them untried and unknown,--the +case is altered; party zeal and emulation are at an end; and I appear +merely as a guide to point out the road; an office of small authority, +and depending more upon a kind of luck than upon any ability or +excellency. And thus much relates to the persons only. The other point +of which I would have men reminded relates to the matter itself. + +Be it remembered then that I am far from wishing to interfere with +the philosophy which now flourishes, or with any other philosophy +more correct and complete than this which has been or may hereafter +be propounded. For I do not object to the use of this received +philosophy, or others like it, for supplying matter for disputations +or ornaments for discourse,--for the professor's lecture and for the +business of life. Nay more, I declare openly that for these uses the +philosophy which I bring forward will not be much available. It does +not lie in the way. It cannot be caught up in passage. It does not +flatter the understanding by conformity with preconceived notions. +Nor will it come down to the apprehension of the vulgar except by its +utility and effects. + +Let there be therefore (and may it be for the benefit of both) two +streams and two dispensations of knowledge; and in like manner two +tribes or kindreds of students in philosophy--tribes not hostile or +alien to each other, but bound together by mutual services;--let there +in short be one method for the cultivation, another for the invention, +of knowledge. + +And for those who prefer the former, either from hurry or from +considerations of business or for want of mental power to take in and +embrace the other (which must needs be most men's case), I wish that +they may succeed to their desire in what they are about, and obtain +what they are pursuing. But if any man there be who, not content +to rest in and use the knowledge which has already been discovered, +aspires to penetrate further; to overcome, not an adversary in +argument, but nature in action; to seek, not pretty and probable +conjectures, but certain and demonstrable knowledge;--I invite all +such to join themselves, as true sons of knowledge, with me, that +passing by the outer courts of nature, which numbers have trodden, +we may find a way at length into her inner chambers. And to make my +meaning clearer and to familiarise the thing by giving it a name, I +have chosen to call one of these methods or ways _Anticipation of the +Mind_, the other _Interpretation of Nature_. + +Moreover I have one request to make. I have on my own part made it my +care and study that the things which I shall propound should not only +be true, but should also be presented to men's minds, how strangely +soever preoccupied and obstructed, in a manner not harsh or +unpleasant. It is but reasonable however (especially in so great a +restoration of learning and knowledge) that I should claim of men one +favour in return; which is this; If any one would form an opinion or +judgment either out of his own observation, or out of the crowd of +authorities, or out of the forms of demonstration (which have now +acquired a sanction like that of judicial laws), concerning these +speculations of mine, let him not hope that he can do it in passage or +by the by; but let him examine the thing thoroughly; let him make some +little trial for himself of the way which I describe and lay out; let +him familiarise his thoughts with that subtlety of nature to which +experience bears witness; let him correct by seasonable patience and +due delay the depraved and deep-rooted habits of his mind; and when +all this is done and he has begun to be his own master, let him (if he +will) use his own judgment. + + + + +PREFACE TO THE FIRST FOLIO EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE'S PLAYS (1623)[A] + +TO THE GREAT VARIETY OF READERS + + +From the most able, to him that can but spell: There you are number'd. +We had rather you were weighd. Especially, when the fate of all Bookes +depends vpon your capacities: and not of your heads alone, but of your +purses. Well! it is now publique, & you wil stand for your priuiledges +wee know: to read, and censure. Do so, but buy it first. That doth +best commend a Booke, the Stationer saies. Then, how odde soeuer your +braines be, or your wisedomes, make your licence the same, and +spare not. Iudge your sixe-pen'orth, your shillings worth, your fiue +shillings worth at a time, or higher, so you rise to the iust rates, +and welcome. But, what euer you do, Buy. Censure will not driue a +Trade, or make the Iacke go. And though you be a Magistrate of wit, +and sit on the Stage at _Black-Friers_, or the _Cock-pit_, to arraigne +Playes dailie, know, these Playes haue had their triall alreadie, +and stood out all Appeals; and do now come forth quitted rather by a +Decree of Court, then any purchas'd Letters of commendation. + +It had bene a thing, we confesse, worthie to haue bene wished, that +the Author himselfe had liu'd to haue set forth, and ouerseen his owne +writings. But since it hath bin ordain'd otherwise, and he by death +departed from that right, we pray you do not envie his Friends, the +office of their care, and paine to haue collected & publish'd them, +and so to haue publish'd them, as where (before) you were abus'd with +diuerse stolne, and surreptitious copies, maimed, and deformed by the +frauds and stealthes of iniurious imposters, that expos'd them euen +those, are now offer'd to your view cur'd, and perfect of their +limbes, and all the rest, absolute in their numbers, as he conceiued +them. Who, as he was a happie imitator of Nature, was a most gentle +expresser of it. His mind and hand went together. And what he thought, +he vttered with that easinesse, that wee haue scarse receiued from him +a blot in his papers. But it is not our prouince, who onely gather his +works, and giue them you, to praise him. It is yours that reade him. +And there we hope, to your diuers capacities, you will finde enough, +both to draw, and hold you for his wit can no more lie hid then it +could be lost. Reade him, therefore and againe and againe. And if then +you doe not like him surely you are in some manifest danger, not to +vnderstand him. And so we leaue you to other of his Friends, whom if +you need can bee your guides: if you neede them not, you can leade +your selues, and others. And such Readers we wish him. + +JOHN HEMINGE HENRIE CONDELL. + + +[Footnote A: Little more than half of Shakespeare's plays were +published during his lifetime; and in the publication of these there +is no evidence that the author had any hand. Seven years after his +death, John Heminge and Henry Condell, two of his fellow-actors, +collected the unpublished plays, and, in 1623, issued them along with +the others in a single volume, usually known as the First Folio. +When one considers what would have been lost had it not been for the +enterprise of these men, it seems safe to say that the volume they +introduced by this quaint and not too accurate preface, is the most +important single book in the imaginative literature of the world.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE PHILOSOPHIAE NATURALIS PRINCIPIA MATHEMATICA + +BY SIR ISAAC NEWTON. (1686)[A] + + +Since the ancients (as we are told by Pappus) made great account of +the science of mechanics in the investigation of natural things; and +the moderns, laying aside substantial forms and occult qualities, +have endeavored to subject the phenomena of nature to the laws of +mathematics, I have in this treatise cultivated mathematics so far as +it regards philosophy. The ancients considered mechanics in a twofold +respect; as rational, which proceeds accurately by demonstration, and +practical. To practical mechanics all the manual arts belong, from +which mechanics took its name. But as artificers do not work with +perfect accuracy, it comes to pass that mechanics is so distinguished +from geometry, that what is perfectly accurate is called geometrical; +what is less so is called mechanical. But the errors are not in the +art, but in the artificers. He that works with less accuracy is an +imperfect mechanic: and if any could work with perfect accuracy, he +would be the most perfect mechanic of all; for the description of +right lines and circles, upon which geometry is founded, belongs +to mechanics. Geometry does not teach us to draw these lines, but +requires them to be drawn; for it requires that the learner should +first be taught to describe these accurately, before he enters upon +geometry; then it shows how by these operations problems may be +solved. To describe right lines and circles are problems, but not +geometrical problems. The solution of these problems is required from +mechanics; and by geometry the use of them, when so solved, is shown; +and it is the glory of geometry that from those few principles, +fetched from without, it is able to produce so many things. Therefore +geometry is founded in mechanical practice, and is nothing but that +part of universal mechanics which accurately proposes and demonstrates +the art of measuring. But since the manual arts are chiefly conversant +in the moving of bodies, it comes to pass that geometry is commonly +referred to their magnitudes, and mechanics to their motion. In this +sense rational mechanics will be the science of motions resulting +from any forces whatsoever, and of the forces required to produce any +motions, accurately proposed and demonstrated. This part of mechanics +was cultivated by the ancients in the five powers which relate to +manual arts, who considered gravity (it not being a manual power) no +otherwise than as it moved weights by those powers. Our design, not +respecting arts, but philosophy, and our subject, not manual, but +natural powers, we consider chiefly those things which relate to +gravity, levity, elastic force, the resistance of fluids, and the like +forces, whether attractive or impulsive; and therefore we offer this +work as mathematical principles of philosophy; for all the difficulty +of philosophy seems to consist in this--from the phenomena of motions +to investigate the forces of nature, and then from these forces +to demonstrate the other phenomena; and to this end the general +propositions in the first and second book are directed. In the third +book we give an example of this in the explication of the system of +the World; for by the propositions mathematically demonstrated in the +first book, we there derive from the celestial phenomena the forces +of gravity with which bodies tend to the sun and the several planets. +Then, from these forces, by other propositions which are also +mathematical, we deduce the motions of the planets, the comets, the +moon, and the sea. I wish we could derive the rest of the phenomena of +nature by the same kind of reasoning from mechanical principles; for +I am induced by many reasons to suspect that they may all depend +upon certain forces by which the particles of bodies, by some causes +hitherto unknown, are either mutually impelled towards each other, and +cohere in regular figures, or are repelled and recede from each other; +which forces being unknown, philosophers have hitherto attempted the +search of nature in vain; but I hope the principles here laid +down will afford some light either to that or some truer method of +philosophy. + +In the publication of this work, the most acute and universally +learned Mr. Edmund Halley not only assisted me with his pains in +correcting the press and taking care of the schemes, but it was to +his solicitations that its becoming public is owing; for when he +had obtained of me my demonstrations of the figure of the celestial +orbits, he continually pressed me to communicate the same to the Royal +Society, who afterwards, by their kind encouragement and entreaties, +engaged me to think of publishing them. But after I had begun to +consider the inequalities of the lunar motions, and had entered upon +some other things relating to the laws and measures of gravity, +and other forces; and the figures that would be described by bodies +attracted according to given laws; and the motion of several bodies +moving among themselves; the motion of bodies in resisting mediums; +the forces, densities, and motions of mediums; the orbits of the +comets, and such like; I put off that publication till I had made a +search into those matters, and could put out the whole together. What +relates to the lunar motions (being imperfect) I have put all together +in the corollaries of proposition 66, to avoid being obliged to +propose and distinctly demonstrate the several things there contained +in a method more prolix than the subject deserved, and interrupt the +series of the several propositions. Some things, found out after the +rest, I chose to insert in places less suitable, rather than change +the number of the propositions and the citations. I heartily beg that +what I have here done may be read with candor; and that the defects +I have been guilty of upon this difficult subject may be not so much +reprehended as kindly supplied, and investigated by new endeavors of +my readers. + +Cambridge, Trinity College, ISAAC NEWTON. + +May 8, 1686 + + +[Footnote A: Sir Isaac Newton, the great English mathematician and +physicist, was born at Woolsthorpe in 1642, and died at Kensington in +1727. He held a professorship at Cambridge, represented the University +in Parliament, as master of the mint reformed the English coinage, and +for twenty five years was president of the Royal Society. His theory +of the law of universal gravitation, the most important of his many +discoveries, is expounded in his "Philosophiae Naturalis Principia +Mathematical," usually known merely as the "Principia," from which, +this Preface is translated.] + + + + +PREFACE TO FABLES, + +ANCIENT AND MODERN + +BY JOHN DRYDEN. (1700)[A] + + +'Tis with a poet as with a man who designs to build, and is very +exact, as he supposes, in casting up the cost beforehand, but, +generally speaking, he is mistaken in his account, and reckons short +of the expense he first intended. He alters his mind as the work +proceeds, and will have this or that convenience more, of which he had +not thought when he began. So has it happened to me; I have built a +house, where I intended but a lodge; yet with better success than a +certain nobleman,[1] who, beginning with a dog kennel, never liv'd to +finish the palace he had contriv'd. + +From translating the first of Homer's _Iliads_ (which I intended as an +essay to the whole work) I proceeded to the translation of the twelfth +book of Ovid's _Metamorphoses_, because it contains, among other +things, the causes, the beginning, and ending, of the Trojan war. +Here I ought in reason to have stopp'd; but the speeches of Ajax +and Ulysses lying next in my way, I could not balk 'em. When I had +compass'd them, I was so taken with the former part of the fifteenth +book, (which is the masterpiece of the whole _Metamorphoses_,) that +I enjoin'd myself the pleasing task of rend'ring it into English. And +now I found, by the number of my verses, that they began to swell into +a little volume; which gave me an occasion of looking backward on some +beauties of my author, in his former books. There occurred to me the +_Hunting of the Boar, Cinyras and Myrrha_, the good-natur'd story of +_Baucis and Philemon_, with the rest, which I hope I have translated +closely enough, and given them the same turn of verse which they had +in the original; and this, I may say without vanity, is not the talent +of every poet. He who has arriv'd the nearest to it, is the ingenious +and learned Sandys, the best versifier of the former age; if I may +properly call it by that name, which was the former part of this +concluding century. For Spenser and Fairfax both flourish'd in the +reign of Queen Elizabeth; great masters in our language, and who +saw much farther into the beauties of our numbers than those who +immediately followed them. Milton was the poetical son of Spenser, and +Mr. Waller of Fairfax, for we have our lineal descents and clans as +well as other families. Spenser more than once insinuates that the +soul of Chaucer was transfus'd into his body, and that he was begotten +by him two hundred years after his decease. Milton has acknowledg'd to +me that Spenser was his original, and many besides myself have heard +our famous Waller own that he deriv'd the harmony of his numbers +from the _Godfrey of Bulloign_, which was turned into English by Mr. +Fairfax. But to return. Having done with Ovid for this time, it +came into my mind that our old English poet, Chaucer, in many things +resembled him, and that with no disadvantage on the side of the modern +author, as I shall endeavor to prove when I compare them; and as I +am, and always have been, studious to promote the honor of my native +country, so I soon resolv'd to put their merits to the trial, by +turning some of the _Canterbury Tales_ into our language, as it is +now refin'd; for by this means, both the poets being set in the same +light, and dress'd in the same English habit, story to be compar'd +with story, a certain judgment may be made betwixt them by the reader, +without obtruding my opinion on him. Or, if I seem partial to my +countryman and predecessor in the laurel, the friends of antiquity +are not few; and besides many of the learn'd, Ovid has almost all the +beaux, and the whole fair sex, his declared patrons. Perhaps I have +assum'd somewhat more to myself than they allow me, because I have +adventur'd to sum up the evidence; but the readers are the jury, and +their privilege remains entire, to decide, according to the merits of +the cause, or if they please, to bring it to another hearing before +some other court. In the mean time, to follow the thrid of my +discourse, (as thoughts, according to Mr. Hobbes, have always some +connection,) so from Chaucer I was led to think on Boccace, who was +not only his contemporary, but also pursued the same studies; wrote +novels in prose, and many works in verse; particularly is said to have +invented the octave rhyme,[2] or stanza of eight lines, which ever +since has been maintain'd by the practice of all Italian writers, who +are, or at least assume the title of, heroic poets. He and Chaucer, +among other things, had this in common, that they refin'd their mother +tongues; but with this difference, that Dante had begun to file their +language, at least in verse, before the time of Boccace, who likewise +receiv'd no little help from his master Petrarch. But the reformation +of their prose was wholly owing to Boccace himself, who is yet the +standard of purity in the Italian tongue; tho' many of his phrases are +become obsolete, as in process of time it must needs happen. Chaucer +(as you have formerly been told by our learn'd Mr. Rymer) first +adorn'd and amplified our barren tongue from the Provencal,[3] which +was then the most polish'd of all the modern languages; but this +subject has been copiously treated by that great critic, who deserves +no little commendation from us his countrymen. For these reasons of +time, and resemblance of genius in Chaucer and Boccace, I resolv'd +to join them in my present work; to which I have added some original +papers of my own; which, whether they are equal or inferior to my +other poems, an author is the most improper judge, and therefore I +leave them wholly to the mercy of the reader. I will hope the best, +that they will not be condemn'd; but if they should, I have the excuse +of an old gentleman, who mounting on horseback before some ladies, +when I was present, got up somewhat heavily, but desir'd of the fair +spectators that they would count fourscore and eight before they +judg'd him. By the mercy of God, I am already come within twenty years +of his number, a cripple in my limbs; but what decays are in my mind, +the reader must determine. I think myself as vigorous as ever in the +faculties of my soul, excepting only my memory, which is not impair'd +to any great degree; and if I lose not more of it, I have no great +reason to complain. What judgment I had, increases rather than +diminishes; and thoughts, such as they are, come crowding in so fast +upon me, that my only difficulty is to choose or to reject; to run +them into verse, or to give them the other harmony of prose. I have so +long studied and practic'd both, that they are grown into a habit, and +become familiar to me. In short, tho' I may lawfully plead some part +of the old gentleman's excuse, yet I will reserve it till I think I +have greater need, and ask no grains of allowance for the faults of +this my present work, but those which are given of course to human +frailty. I will not trouble my reader with the shortness of time in +which I writ it, or the several intervals of sickness. They who think +too well of their own performances are apt to boast in their prefaces +how little time their works have cost them, and what other business of +more importance interfere'd; but the reader will be as apt to ask the +question, why they allow'd not a longer time to make their works more +perfect, and why they had so despicable an opinion of their judges +as to thrust their indigested stuff upon them, as if they deser'd no +better. + +With this account of my present undertaking, I conclude the first part +of this discourse; in the second part, as at a second sitting, tho' I +alter not the draught, I must touch the same features over again, and +change the dead coloring[4] of the whole. In general, I will only say +that I have written nothing which savors of immorality or profaneness; +at least, I am not conscious to myself of any such intention. If there +happen to be found an irreverent expression, or a thought too wanton, +they are crept into my verses thro' my inadvertency; if the searchers +find any in the cargo, let them be stay'd or forfeited, like +counterbanded goods; at least, let their authors be answerable +for them, as being but imported merchandise, and not of my own +manufacture. On the other side, I have endeavor'd to choose such +fables, both ancient and modern, as contain in each of them some +instructive moral; which I could prove by induction, but the way +is tedious, and they leap foremost into sight, without the reader's +trouble of looking after them. I wish I could affirm, with a safe +conscience, that I had taken the same care in all my former writings; +for it must be own'd, that supposing verses are never so beautiful or +pleasing, yet if they contain anything which shocks religion, or good +manners, they are at best what Horace says of good numbers without +good sense, _Versus inopes rerum, nugaeque canorae_.[5] Thus far, I +hope, I am right in court, without renouncing to my other right of +self-defense, where I have been wrongfully accus'd, and my sense +wiredrawn into blasphemy or bawdry, as it has often been by a +religious lawyer,[6] in a late pleading against the stage; in which +he mixes truth with falsehood, and has not forgotten the old rule of +calumniating strongly, that something may remain. + +I resume the thrid of my discourse with the first of my translations, +which was the _First Iliad_ of Homer. If it shall please God to give +me longer life, and moderate health, my intentions are to +translate the whole _Ilias_; provided still that I meet with those +encouragements from the public which may enable me to proceed in my +undertaking with some cheerfulness. And this I dare assure the world +beforehand, that I have found by trial Homer a more pleasing task than +Virgil, (tho' I say not the translation will be less laborious). For +the Grecian is more according to my genius than the Latin poet. In +the works of the two authors we may read their manners and natural +inclinations, which are wholly different. Virgil was of a quiet, +sedate temper; Homer was violent, impetuous, and full of fire. The +chief talent of Virgil was propriety of thoughts, and ornament of +words; Homer was rapid in his thoughts, and took all the liberties, +both of numbers and of expressions, which his language, and the age +in which he liv'd, allow'd him. Homer's invention was more copious, +Virgil's more confin'd; so that if Homer had not led the way, it was +not in Virgil to have begun heroic poetry; for nothing can be more +evident than that the Roman poem is but the second part of the +_Ilias_; a continuation of the same story, and the persons already +form'd; the manners of AEneas are those of Hector superadded to those +which Homer gave him. The adventures of Ulysses in the _Odysseis_ are +imitated in the first six books of Virgil's _Aeneis_; and tho' the +accidents are not the same, (which would have argued him of a servile, +copying, and total barrenness of invention,) yet the seas were the +same, in which both the heroes wander'd; and Dido cannot be denied to +be the poetical daughter of Calypso. The six latter books of Virgil's +poem are the four and twenty _Iliads_ contracted: a quarrel occasioned +by a lady, a single combat, battles fought, and a town besieg'd. I +say not this in derogation to Virgil, neither do I contradict anything +which I have formerly said in his just praise: for his episodes are +almost wholly of his own invention; and the form which he has given to +the telling makes the tale his own, even tho' the original story had +been the same. But this proves, however, that Homer taught Virgil to +design; and if invention be the first virtue of an epic poet, then the +Latin poem can only be allow'd the second place. Mr. Hobbes, in the +preface to his own bald translation of the _Ilias_ (studying poetry as +he did mathematics, when it was too late)--Mr. Hobbes, I say, begins +the praise of Homer where he should have ended it. He tells us that +the first beauty of an epic poem consists in diction, that is, in +the choice of words, and harmony of numbers; now the words are the +coloring of the work, which in the order of nature is last to +be consider'd. The design, the disposition, the manners, and the +thoughts, are all before it: where any of those are wanting or +imperfect, so much wants or is imperfect in the imitation of human +life; which is in the very definition of a poem. Words, indeed, like +glaring colors, are the first beauties that arise and strike the +sight: but if the draught be false or lame, the figures ill disposed, +the manners obscure or inconsistent, or the thoughts unnatural, +then the finest colors are but daubing, and the piece is a beautiful +monster at the best. Neither Virgil nor Homer were deficient in any of +the former beauties; but in this last, which is expression, the Roman +poet is at least equal to the Grecian, as I have said elsewhere; +supplying the poverty of his language by his musical ear, and by his +diligence. But to return: our two great poets, being so different in +their tempers, one choleric and sanguine, the other phlegmatic and +melancholic; that which makes them excel in their several ways is +that each of them has follow'd his own natural inclination, as well +in forming the design as in the execution of it. The very heroes +shew their authors: Achilles is hot, impatient, revengeful, _Impiger, +iracundus, inexorabidis, acer_[7] &c.; AEneas patient, considerate, +careful of his people, and merciful to his enemies; ever submissive +to the will of Heaven--_Quo fata trahunt retrahuntque seqitamur_.[8] +I could please myself with enlarging on this subject, but am forc'd to +defer it to a fitter time. From all I have said I will only draw this +inference, that the action of Homer being more full of vigor than that +of Virgil, according to the temper of the writer, is of consequence +more pleasing to the reader. One warms you by degrees: the other sets +you on fire all at once, and never intermits his heat. 'Tis the same +difference which Longinus makes betwixt the effects of eloquence in +Demosthenes and Tully. One persuades; the other commands. You never +cool while you read Homer, even not in the second book (a graceful +flattery to his countrymen); but he hastens from the ships, and +concludes not that book till he has made you an amends by the violent +playing of a new machine. From thence he hurries on his action with +variety of events, and ends it in less compass than two months. +This vehemence of his, I confess, is more suitable to my temper; and +therefore I have translated his first book with greater pleasure +than any part of Virgil; but it was not a pleasure without pains. The +continual agitations of the spirits must needs be a weakening of any +constitution, especially in age; and many pauses are required for +refreshment betwixt the heats; the _Iliad_ of itself being a third +part longer than all Virgil's works together. + +This is what I thought needful in this place to say of Homer. I +proceed to Ovid and Chaucer, considering the former only in relation +to the latter. With Ovid ended the golden age of the Roman tongue; +from Chaucer the purity of the English tongue began. The manners of +the poets were not unlike: both of them were well bred, well natur'd, +amorous, and libertine, at least in their writings, it may be also in +their lives. Their studies were the same, philosophy and philology. +Both of them were knowing in astronomy, of which Ovid's books of the +Roman feasts, and Chaucer's treatise of the Astrolabe, are sufficient +witnesses. But Chaucer was likewise an astrologer, as were Virgil, +Horace, Persius, and Manilius. Both writ with wonderful facility and +clearness: neither were great inventors; for Ovid only copied the +Grecian fables; and most of Chaucer's stones were taken from his +Italian contemporaries, or their predecessors.[9] Boccace his +_Decameron_ was first publish'd; and from thence our Englishman has +borrow'd many of his _Canterbury Tales_; yet that of _Palamon and +Arcite_ was written in all probability by some Italian wit in a former +age, as I shall prove hereafter. The tale of Grizild was the invention +of Petrarch; by him sent to Boccace; from whom it came to Chaucer. +_Troilus and Cressida_ was also written by a Lombard author; but much +amplified by our English translator, as well as beautified; the genius +of our countrymen, in general, being rather to improve an invention, +than to invent themselves; as is evident not only in our poetry, but +in many of our manufactures. I find I have anticipated already, and +taken up from Boccace before I come to him; but there is so much +less behind; and I am of the temper of most kings, _who love to be +in debt_, are all for present money, no matter how they pay it +afterwards: besides, the nature of a preface is rambling; never wholly +out of the way, nor in it. This I have learn'd from the practice of +honest Montaigne, and return at my pleasure to Ovid and Chaucer, of +whom I have little more to say. Both of them built on the inventions +of other men; yet since Chaucer had something of his own, as _The Wife +of Bath's Tale, The Cock and the Fox_,[10] which I have translated, +and some others, I may justly give our countryman the precedence in +that part; since I can remember nothing of Ovid which was wholly his. +Both of them understood the manners, under which name I comprehend +the passions, and, in a larger sense, the descriptions of persons, +and their very habits; for an example, I see Baucis and Philemon as +perfectly before me, as if some ancient painter had drawn them; +and all the pilgrims in the _Canterbury Tales_, their humors, their +features, and the very dress, as distinctly as if I had supp'd with +them at the Tabard in Southwark; yet even there too the figures of +Chaucer are much more lively, and set in a better light: which tho' +I have not time to prove, yet I appeal to the reader, and am sure he +will clear me from partiality. The thoughts and words remain to be +consider'd in the comparison of the two poets; and I have sav'd myself +one half of that labor, by owning that Ovid liv'd when the Roman +tongue was in its meridian, Chaucer in the dawning of our language; +therefore that part of the comparison stands not on an equal foot, +any more than the diction of Ennius and Ovid, or of Chaucer and our +present English. The words are given up as a post not to be defended +in our poet, because he wanted the modern art of fortifying. The +thoughts remain to be consider'd, and they are to be measured only by +their propriety; that is, as they flow more or less naturally from +the persons describ'd, on such and such occasions. The vulgar judges, +which are nine parts in ten of all nations, who call conceits and +jingles wit, who see Ovid full of them, and Chaucer altogether +without them, will think me little less than mad, for preferring the +Englishman to the Roman: yet, with their leave, I must presume to say +that the things they admire are only glittering trifles, and so far +from being witty, that in a serious poem they are nauseous, because +they are unnatural. Would any man who is ready to die for love +describe his passion like Narcissus? Would he think of _inopem me +copia fecit_,[11] and a dozen more of such expressions, pour'd on the +neck of one another, and signifying all the same thing? If this were +wit, was this a time to be witty, when the poor wretch was in the +agony of death? This is just John Littlewit in _Bartholomew Fair_,[12] +who had a conceit (as he tells you) left him in his misery; a +miserable conceit. On these occasions the poet should endeavor to +raise pity; but instead of this, Ovid is tickling you to laugh. Virgil +never made use of such machines, when he was moving you to commiserate +the death of Dido: he would not destroy what he was building. Chaucer +makes Arcite violent in his love, and unjust in the pursuit of it; yet +when he came to die, he made him think more reasonably: he repents not +of his love, for that had alter'd his character; but acknowledges +the injustice of his proceedings, and resigns Emilia to Palamon. What +would Ovid have done on this occasion? He would certainly have made +Arcite witty on his deathbed. He had complain'd he was farther off +from possession by being so near, and a thousand such boyisms, which +Chaucer rejected as below the dignity of the subject. They who think +otherwise would by the same reason prefer Lucan and Ovid to Homer and +Virgil, and Martial to all four of them. As for the turn of words, in +which Ovid particularly excels all poets, they are sometimes a fault, +and sometimes a beauty, as they are us'd properly or improperly; but +in strong passions always to be shunn'd, because passions are serious, +and will admit no playing. The French have a high value for them; +and I confess, they are often what they call delicate, when they are +introduced with judgment; but Chaucer writ with more simplicity, and +followed nature more closely, than to use them. I have thus far, to +the best of my knowledge, been an upright judge betwixt the parties in +competition, not meddling with the design nor the disposition of it; +because the design was not their own, and in the disposing of it they +were equal. It remains that I say somewhat of Chaucer in particular. + +In the first place, as he is the father of English poetry, so I hold +him in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians held Homer or the +Romans Virgil. He is a perpetual fountain of good sense, learn'd in +all sciences, and therefore speaks properly on all subjects as he knew +what to say, so he knows also when to leave off, a continence which +is practic'd by few writers, and scarcely by any of the ancients, +excepting Virgil and Horace. One of our late great poets[13] is sunk +in his reputation, because he could never forgive any conceit which +came in his way, but swept like a dragnet, great and small. There +was plenty enough, but the dishes were ill sorted, whole pyramids of +sweetmeats for boys and women, but little of solid meat for men. +All this proceeded not from any want of knowledge, but of judgment, +neither did he want that in discerning the beauties and faults of +other poets, but only indulg'd himself in the luxury of writing, and +perhaps knew it was a fault, but hop'd the reader would not find it. +For this reason, tho' he must always be thought a great poet he is +no longer esteem'd a good writer, and for ten impressions, which his +works have had in so many successive years, yet at present a hundred +books are scarcely purchas'd once a twelvemonth for, as my last Lord +Rochester said, tho' somewhat profanely, "Not being of God, he could +not stand." + +Chaucer follow'd Nature everywhere, but was never so bold to go beyond +her, and there is a great difference of being _poeta_ and _aimis +poeta_,[14] if we may believe Catullus, as much as betwixt a modest +behavior and affectation. The verse of Chaucer, I confess, is not +harmonious to us, but 'tis like the eloquence of one whom Tacitus +commends it was _auribus istius temporis accommodata_[15] they who +liv'd with him, and some time after him, thought it musical and it +continued so even in our judgment, if compar'd with the numbers of +Lydgate and Gower, his contemporaries there is the rude sweetness of +a Scotch tune in it, which is natural and pleasing, tho' not perfect. +'Tis true, I cannot go so far as he who published the last edition of +him [16] for he would make us believe the fault is in our ears, and +that there were really ten syllables in a verse where we find but nine +but this opinion is not worth confuting, 'tis so gross and obvious an +error, that common sense (which is a rule in everything but matters +of faith and revelation) must convince the reader that equality of +numbers in every verse which we call heroic was either not known, +or not always practic'd, in Chaucer's age. It were an easy matter to +produce some thousands of his verses, which are lame for want of half +a foot, and sometimes a whole one, and which no pronunciation can +make otherwise. We can only say, that he liv'd in the infancy of our +poetry, and that nothing is brought to perfection at the first. We +must be children before we grow men. There was an Ennius, and in +process of time a Lucilius and a Lucretius, before Virgil and Horace; +even after Chaucer there was a Spenser, a Harrington, a Fairfax, +before Waller and Denham were in being: and our numbers were in their +nonage till these last appear'd. I need say little of his parentage, +life, and fortunes;[17] they are to be found at large in all the +editions of his works. He was employ'd abroad and favor'd by Edward +the Third, Richard the Second, and Henry the Fourth, and was poet, as +I suppose, to all three of them. In Richard's time, I doubt, he was +a little dipp'd in the rebellion of the commons, and being +brother-in-law to John of Ghant, it was no wonder if he follow'd the +fortunes of that family, and was well with Henry the Fourth when he +had depos'd his predecessor. Neither is it to be admir'd,[18] that +Henry, who was a wise as well as a valiant prince, who claim'd by +succession, and was sensible that his title was not sound, but was +rightfully in Mortimer, who had married the heir of York; it was not +to be admir'd, I say, if that great politician should be pleas'd to +have the greatest wit of those times in his interests, and to be the +trumpet of his praises. Augustus had given him the example, by the +advice of Maecenas, who recommended Virgil and Horace to him; whose +praises help'd to make him popular while he was alive, and after his +death have made him precious to posterity. As for the religion of +our poet, he seems to have some little bias towards the opinions of +Wycliffe, after John of Ghant his patron; somewhat of which appears in +the tale of Piers Plowman.[19] Yet I cannot blame him for inveighing +so sharply against the vices of the clergy in his age; their pride, +their ambition, their pomp, their avarice, their worldly interest, +deserv'd the lashes which he gave them, both in that and in most of +his _Canterbury Tales_: neither has his contemporary Boccace spar'd +them. Yet both those poets liv'd in much esteem with good and holy +men in orders; for the scandal which is given by particular priests +reflects not on the sacred function. Chaucer's Monk, his Canon, and +his Friar, took not from the character of his Good Parson. A satirical +poet is the check of the laymen on bad priests. We are only to take +care that we involve not the innocent with the guilty in the same +condemnation. The good cannot be too much honor'd, nor the bad too +coarsely us'd: for the corruption of the best becomes the worst. When +a clergyman is whipp'd, his gown is first taken off, by which the +dignity of his order is secur'd: if he be wrongfully accus'd, he has +his action of slander; and 'tis at the poet's peril if he transgress +the law. But they will tell us that all kind of satire, tho' never so +well deserv'd by particular priests, yet brings the whole order into +contempt. Is then the peerage of England anything dishonored, when a +peer suffers for his treason? If he be libel'd or any way defam'd, he +has his _scandalum magnatum_[20] to punish the offender. They who use +this kind of argument seem to be conscious to themselves of somewhat +which has deserv'd the poet's lash, and are less concern'd for their +public capacity than for their private; at least there is pride at the +bottom of their reasoning. If the faults of men in orders are only to +be judg'd among themselves, they are all in some sort parties: for, +since they say the honor of their order is concern'd in every member +of it, how can we be sure that they will be impartial judges? How far +I may be allow'd to speak my opinion in this case, I know not; but I +am sure a dispute of this nature caus'd mischief in abundance betwixt +a king of England and an archbishop of Canterbury,[21] one standing +up for the laws of his land, and the other for the honor (as he call'd +it) of God's Church; which ended in the murther of the prelate, and in +the whipping of his Majesty from post to pillar for his penance. +The learn'd and ingenious Dr. Drake[22] has say'd me the labour of +inquiring into the esteem and reverence which the priests have had +of old, and I would rather extend than diminish any part of it: yet +I must needs say, that when a priest provokes me without any occasion +given him, I have no reason, unless it be the charity of a Christian, +to forgive him: _prior laesit_[23] is justification sufficient in the +civil law. If I answer him in his own language, self-defense, I am +sure, must be allow'd me; and if I carry it farther, even to a sharp +recrimination, somewhat may be indulg'd to human frailty. Yet my +resentment has not wrought so far, but that I have followed Chaucer +in his character of a holy man, and have enlarg'd on that subject with +some pleasure, reserving to myself the right, if I shall think fit +hereafter, to describe another sort of priests, such as are more +easily to be found than the Good Parson; such as have given the last +blow to Christianity in this age, by a practice so contrary to their +doctrine. But this will keep cold till another time. In the mean while +I take up Chaucer where I left him. He must have been a man of a most +wonderful comprehensive nature, because, as it has been truly observed +of him, he has taken into the compass of his _Canterbury Tales_ the +various manners and humors (as we now call them) of the whole English +nation, in his age. Not a single character has escap'd him. All his +pilgrims are severally distinguish'd from each other; and not only +in their inclinations, but in their very physiognomies and persons. +Bapista Porta[24] could not have described their natures better, than +by the marks which the poet gives them. The matter and manner of +their tales, and of their telling, are so suited to their different +educations, humors, and callings, that each of them would be improper +in any other mouth. Even the grave and serious characters are +distinguished by their several sorts of gravity: their discourses are +such as belong to their age, their calling, and their breeding; such +as are becoming of them, and of them only. Some of his persons are +vicious, and some virtuous; some are unlearn'd, or (as Chaucer +calls them) lewd, and some are learn'd. Even the ribaldry of the +low characters is different: the Reeve, the Miller, and the Cook are +several men, and distinguished from each other, as much as the mincing +Lady Prioress and the broad-speaking gap-tooth'd Wife of Bath. But +enough of this: there is such a variety of game springing up before +me, that I am distracted in my choice, and know not which to follow. +'Tis sufficient to say, according to the proverb, that here is God's +plenty. We have our forefathers and great-grandames all before us, +as they were in Chaucer's days; their general characters are still +remaining in mankind, and even in England, tho' they are call'd by +other names than those of Monks and Friars, and Canons, and Lady +Abbesses, and Nuns: for mankind is ever the same, and nothing lost out +of nature, tho' everything is alter'd. May I have leave to do myself +the justice--since my enemies will do me none, and are so far from +granting me to be a good poet, that they will not allow me so much as +to be a Christian, or a moral man--may I have leave, I say, to inform +my reader that I have confin'd my choice to such tales of Chaucer as +savor nothing of immodesty. If I had desir'd more to please than +to instruct, the Reeve, the Miller, the Shipman, the Merchant, the +Sumner, and, above all, the Wife of Bath, in the prologue to her tale, +would have procured me as many friends and readers, as there are beaux +and ladies of pleasure in the town. But I will no more offend against +good manners: I am sensible, as I ought to be, of the scandal I have +given by my loose writings; and make what reparation I am able, +by this public acknowledgment. If anything of this nature, or of +profaneness, be crept into these poems, I am so far from defending it, +that I disown it. _Totum hoc indictum volo._[25] Chaucer makes another +manner of apology for his broad speaking, and Boccace makes the like; +but I will follow neither of them. Our countryman, in the end of his +characters, before the _Canterbury Tales_, thus excuses the ribaldry, +which is very gross in many of his novels: + + But first, I pray you of your courtesy, + That ye ne arrete[26] it nought my villany, + Though that I plainly speak in this mattere + To tellen you her[27] words, and eke her chere: + Ne though I speak her words properly, + For this ye knowen as well as I, + Who shall tellen a tale after a man, + He mote rehearse as nye as ever he can: + Everich word of it been in his charge, + _All speke he never so rudely ne large._ + Or else he mote tellen his tale untrue, + Or feine things, or find words new: + He may not spare, altho he were his brother, + He mote as well say o word as another. + Christ spake himself full broad in holy writ, + And well I wote no villany is it. + Eke Plato saith, who so can him rede, + The words mote[28] been cousin to the dede.[29] + +Yet if a man should have enquired of Boccace or of Chaucer, what need +they had of introducing such characters, where obscene words were +proper in their mouths, but very undecent to be heard; I know not what +answer they could have made: for that reason such tales shall be left +untold by me. You have here a specimen of Chaucer's language, which +is so obsolete that his sense is scarce to be understood; and you +have likewise more than one example of his unequal numbers, which were +mentioned before. Yet many of his verses consist of ten syllables, and +the words not much behind our present English: as for example, these +two lines, in the description of the carpenter's young wife: + + Wincing she was, as is a jolly colt, + Long as a mast, and upright as a bolt. + +I have almost done with Chaucer, when I have answer'd some objections +relating to my present work. I find some people are offended that I +have turn'd these tales into modern English; because they think them +unworthy of my pains, and look on Chaucer as a dry, old-fashion'd wit, +not worth reviving. I have often heard the late Earl of Leicester say +that Mr. Cowley himself was of that opinion; who having read him over +at my lord's request, declar'd he had no taste of him. I dare not +advance my opinion against the judgment of so great an author; but +I think it fair, however, to leave the decision to the public: Mr. +Cowley was too modest to set up for a dictator; and being shock'd +perhaps with his old style, never examin'd into the depth of his +good sense. Chaucer, I confess, is a rough diamond, and must first +be polish'd, ere he shines. I deny not, likewise, that, living in our +early days of poetry, he writes not always of a piece, but sometimes +mingles trivial things with those of greater moment. Sometimes also, +tho' not often, he runs riot, like Ovid, and knows not when he has +said enough. But there are more great wits, beside Chaucer, whose +fault is their excess of conceits, and those ill sorted. An author is +not to write all he can, but only all he ought. Having observ'd this +redundancy in Chaucer, (as it is an easy matter for a man of ordinary +parts to find a fault in one of greater,) I have not tied myself to a +literal translation; but have often omitted what I judg'd unnecessary, +or not of dignity enough to appear in the company of better thoughts. +I have presumed farther, in some places, and added somewhat of my +own where I thought my author was deficient, and had not given his +thoughts their true luster, for want of words in the beginning of our +language. And to this I was the more embolden'd, because (if I may be +permitted to say it of myself) I found I had a soul congenial to his, +and that I had been conversant in the same studies. Another poet, in +another age, may take the same liberty with my writings; if at least +they live long enough to deserve correction. It was also necessary +sometimes to restore the sense of Chaucer, which was lost or mangled +in the errors of the press. Let this example suffice at present; +in the story of _Palawan and Arcite_, where the temple of Diana is +describ'd, you find these verses, in all the editions of our author: + + There saw I Dane turned unto a tree, + I mean not the goddess Diane, + But Venus daughter, which that hight Dane; + +which after a little consideration I knew was to be reformed into this +sense, that Daphne, the daughter of Peneus, was turn'd into a tree. I +durst not make thus bold with Ovid, lest some future Milbourne should +arise, and say I varied from my author, because I understood him not. + +But there are other judges, who think I ought not to have translated +Chaucer into English, out of a quite contrary notion: they suppose +there is a certain veneration due to his old language; and that it +is little less than profanation and sacrilege to alter it. They are +farther of opinion that somewhat of his good sense will suffer in this +transfusion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will infallibly be +lost, which appear with more grace in their old habit. Of this +opinion was that excellent person whom I mention'd, the late Earl of +Leicester, who valued Chaucer as much as Mr. Cowley despis'd him. My +lord dissuaded me from this attempt, (for I was thinking of it some +years before his death,) and his authority prevail'd so far with me +as to defer my undertaking while he liv'd, in deference to him: yet my +reason was not convinc'd with what he urg'd against it. If the first +end of a writer be to be understood, then as his language grows +obsolete, his thoughts must grow obscure: + + Multa renascentur quae nunc cecidere; cadentque, + Quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus, + Quem penes arbitrium est et jus et norma loquendi.[30] + +When an ancient word for its sound and significance deserves to be +reviv'd, I have that reasonable veneration for antiquity, to restore +it. All beyond this is superstition. Words are not like landmarks, so +sacred as never to be remov'd; customs are chang'd, and even statutes +are silently repeal'd, when the reason ceases for which they were +enacted. As for the other part of the argument, that his thoughts +will lose of their original beauty, by the innovation of words; in +the first place, not only their beauty, but their being is lost, where +they are no longer understood, which is the present case. I grant +that something must be lost in all transfusion, that is, in all +translations; but the sense will remain, which would otherwise be +lost, or at least be maim'd, when it is scarce intelligible; and +that but to a few. How few are there who can read Chaucer so as to +understand him perfectly! And if imperfectly, then with less profit +and no pleasure. 'Tis not for the use of some old Saxon friends that I +have taken these pains with him: let them neglect my version, because +they have no need of it. I made it for their sakes who understand +sense and poetry as well as they, when that poetry and sense is put +into words which they understand. I will go farther, and dare to add, +that what beauties I lose in some places, I give to others which had +them not originally; but in this I may be partial to myself; let the +reader judge, and I submit to his decision. Yet I think I have just +occasion to complain of them, who, because they understand Chaucer, +would deprive the greater part of their countrymen of the same +advantage, and hoard him up, as misers do their grandam gold, only to +look on it themselves and hinder others from making use of it. In +sum, I seriously protest that no man ever had, or can have, a greater +veneration for Chaucer, than myself. I have translated some part +of his works, only that I might perpetuate his memory, or at least +refresh it, amongst my countrymen. If I have alter'd him anywhere for +the better, I must at the same time acknowledge that I could have done +nothing without him: _facile est inventis addere_,[31] is no great +commendation; and I am not so vain to think I have deserv'd a greater. +I will conclude what I have to say of him singly, with this one +remark: a lady of my acquaintance, who keeps a kind of correspondence +with some authors of the fair sex in France, has been inform'd by +them, that Mademoiselle de Scudery, who is as old as Sibyl, and +inspir'd like her by the same God of Poetry, is at this time +translating Chaucer into modern French. From which I gather that +he has been formerly translated into the old Provencal (for how she +should come to understand old English I know not). But the matter of +fact being true, it makes me think that there is something in it like +fatality; that, after certain periods of time, the fame and memory +of great wits should be renewed, as Chaucer is both in France and +England. If this be wholly chance, 't is extraordinary, and I dare not +call it more, for fear of being tax'd with superstition. + +Boccace comes last to be consider'd, who living in the same age with +Chaucer, had the same genius, and follow'd the same studies: both +writ novels, and each of them cultivated his mother tongue. But the +greatest resemblance of our two modern authors being in their familiar +style, and pleasing way of relating comical adventures, I may pass it +over, because I have translated nothing from Boccace of that nature. +In the serious part of poetry, the advantage is wholly on Chaucer's +side; for tho' the Englishman has borrow'd many tales from the +Italian, yet it appears that those of Boccace were not generally of +his own making, but taken from authors of former ages, and by him only +model'd; so that what there was of invention in either of them may be +judg'd equal. But Chaucer has refin'd on Boccace, and has mended the +stones which he has borrowed, in his way of telling; tho' prose +allows more liberty of thought, and the expression is more easy when +unconfin'd by numbers. Our countryman carries weight, and yet wins the +race at disadvantage. I desire not the reader should take my word, and +therefore I will set two of their discourses on the same subject, +in the same light, for every man to judge betwixt them. I translated +Chaucer first, and, amongst the rest, pitch'd on _The Wife of Bath's +Tale_; not daring, as I have said, to adventure on her prologue, +because 't is too licentious: there Chaucer introduces an old woman +of mean parentage, whom a youthful knight of noble blood was forc'd to +marry, and consequently loath'd her; the crone being in bed with him +on the wedding night, and finding his aversion, endeavors to win his +affection by reason, and speaks a good word for herself (as who could +blame her?) in hope to mollify the sullen bridegroom. She takes her +topics from the benefits of poverty, the advantages of old age and +ugliness, the vanity of youth, and the silly pride of ancestry and +titles without inherent virtue, which is the true nobility. When I had +clos'd Chaucer, I returned to Ovid, and translated some more of his +fables; and by this time had so far forgotten _The Wife of Bath's +Tale_, that, when I took up Boccace, unawares I fell on the same +argument of preferring virtue to nobility of blood, and titles, in the +story of Sigismonda; which I had certainly avoided for the resemblance +of the two discourses, if my memory had not fail'd me. Let the reader +weigh them both; and if he thinks me partial to Chaucer, 't is in him +to right Boccace. + +I prefer in our countryman, far above all his other stories, the noble +poem of _Palamon and Arcite_, which is of the epic kind, and perhaps +not much inferior to the _Ilias_ or the _AEneis_: the story is more +pleasing than either of them, the manners as perfect, the diction as +poetical, the learning as deep and various, and the disposition full +as artful; only it includes a greater length of time, as taking up +seven years at least, but Aristotle has left undecided the duration of +the action; which yet is easily reduc'd into the compass of a year, +by a narration of what preceded the return of Palamon to Athens. I had +thought for the honor of our nation, and more particularly for his, +whose laurel, tho' unworthy, I have worn after him, that this story +was of English growth, and Chaucer's own; but I was undeceiv'd by +Boccace; for, casually looking on the end of his seventh _Giornata_, +I found Dionco (under which name he shadows himself) and Fiametta +(who represents his mistress, the natural daughter of Robert, King of +Naples), of whom these words are spoken: _Dionco e Fiametta gran pezza +cantarono insieme d'Arcita, e di Palamone_:[32] by which it appears +that this story was written before the time of Boccace; but, the name +of its author being wholly lost, Chaucer is now become an original; +and I question not but the poem has receiv'd many beauties by passing +thro' his noble hands. Besides this tale, there is another of his own +invention, after the manner of the Provencals, call'd _The Flower and +the Leaf_,[33] with which I was so particularly pleas'd, both for the +invention and the moral, that I cannot hinder myself from recommending +it to the reader. + +As a corollary to this preface, in which I have done justice to +others, I owe somewhat to myself: not that I think it worth my time +to enter the lists with one M----,[34] or one B----,[35] but barely +to take notice, that such men there are who have written scurrilously +against me, without any provocation. M----, who is in orders, pretends +amongst the rest this quarrel to me, that I have fallen foul on +priesthood: if I have, I am only to ask pardon of good priests, and +am afraid his part of the reparation will come to little. Let him to +satisfied that he shall not be able to force himself upon me for an +adversary. I contemn him too much to enter into competition with him. +His own translations of Virgil have answer'd his criticisms on mine. +If (as they say he has declar'd in print) he prefers the version of +Ogleby to mine, the world has made him the same compliment: for 't is +agreed on all hands, that he writes even below Ogleby: that, you will +say, is not easily to be done; but what cannot M---- bring about? I am +satisfied, however, that while he and I live together, I shall not be +thought the worst poet of the age. It looks as if I had desir'd him +underhand to write so ill against me; but upon my honest word I have +not brib'd him to do me this service, and am wholly guiltless of his +pamphlet. 'T is true, I should be glad if I could persuade him to +continue his good offices, and write such another critique on anything +of mine for I find by experience he has a great stroke with the +reader, when he condemns any of my poems, to make the world have a +better opinion of them. He has taken some pains with my poetry, but +nobody will be persuaded to take the same with his. If I had taken +to the Church, (as he affirms, but which was never in my thoughts,) +I should have had more sense, if not more grace, than to have turn'd +myself out of my benefice by writing libels on my parishioners. But +his account of my manners and my principles are of a piece with his +cavils and his poetry; and so I have done with him for ever. + +As for the City Bard, or Knight Physician, I hear his quarrel to me is +that I was the author of _Absalom and Achitophel_, which, he thinks, +is a little hard on his fanatic patrons in London. + +But I will deal the more civilly with his two poems, because nothing +ill is to be spoken of the dead; and therefore peace be to the _manes_ +of his _Arthurs_. I will only say that it was not for this noble +knight that I drew the plan of an epic poem on King Arthur, in my +preface to the translation of Juvenal. The guardian angels of kingdoms +were machines too ponderous for him to manage; and therefore he +rejected them, as Dares did the whirlbats of Eryx, when they were +thrown before him by Entellus. Yet from that preface he plainly took +his hint: for he began immediately upon the story, tho' he had the +baseness not to acknowledge his benefactor but, instead of it, to +traduce me in a libel. + +I shall say the less of Mr. Collier, because in many things he +has tax'd me justly; and I have pleaded guilty to all thoughts +and expressions of mine which can be truly argued of obscenity, +profaneness, of immorality; and retract them. If he be my enemy, +let him triumph; if he be my friend, as I have given him no personal +occasion to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance. It becomes +me not to draw my pen in the defense of a bad cause, when I have so +often drawn it for a good one. Yet it were not difficult to prove +that in many places he has perverted my meaning by his glosses, and +interpreted my words into blasphemy and bawdry, of which they were +not guilty. Besides that, he is too much given to horseplay in his +raillery, and comes to battle like a dictator from the plow. I will +not say: "The zeal of God's house has eaten him up;" but I am sure it +has devoured some part of his good manners and civility. It might also +be doubted whether it were altogether zeal which prompted him to this +rough manner of proceeding: perhaps it became not one of his function +to rake into the rubbish of ancient and modern plays; a divine might +have employ'd his pains to better purpose than in the nastiness of +Plautus and Aristophanes; whose examples, as they excuse not me, so +it might be possibly supposed that he read them not without some +pleasure. They who have written commentaries on those poets, or on +Horace, Juvenal, and Martial, have explain'd some vices which, without +their interpretation, had been unknown to modern times. Neither has he +judg'd impartially betwixt the former age and us. + +There is more bawdry in one play of Fletcher's, call'd _The Custom of +the Country_, than in all ours together. Yet this has been often acted +on the stage in my remembrance. Are the times so much more reform'd +now than they were five and twenty years ago? If they are, I +congratulate the amendment of our morals. But I am not to prejudice +the cause of my fellow poets, tho' I abandon my own defense: they have +some of them answer'd for themselves, and neither they nor I can think +Mr. Collier so formidable an enemy that we should shun him. He has +lost ground at the latter end of the day, by pursuing his point too +far, like the Prince of Conde at the battle of Seneffe: from immoral +plays to no plays, _ab abusu ad usum, non valet consequentia_[36]. But +being a party, I am not to erect myself into a judge. As for the rest +of those who have written against me, they are such scoundrels that +they deserve not the least notice to be taken of them, B---- and M---- +are only distinguish'd from the crowd by being remember'd to their +infamy: + + --Demetri, teque Tigelli[37] + Discipulorum inter jubeo plorare cathedras. + + +[Footnote A: John Dryden (1631-1700), the great dramatic and satirical +poet of the later seventeenth century, whose translation of Virgil's +"AEneid" appears in another volume of the Harvard Classics, deserves +hardly less distinction as a prose writer than as a poet. The present +essay, prefixed to a volume of narrative poems, is largely concerned +with Chaucer, and in its genial and penetrating criticism, expressed +with characteristic clearness and vigor, can be seen the ground for +naming Dryden the first of English literary critics, and the founder +of modern prose style.] + +[Footnote 1: Scott suggests that the allusion is to the Duke of +Buckingham, who was often satirized for the slow progress of his great +mansion at Chefden.] + +[Footnote 2: Boccaccio did not invent this stanza, which had been used +in both French and Italian before his day, but he did constitute it +the Italian form for heroic verse.] + +[Footnote 3: Rymer misled Dryden. There is no trace of Provencal +influence on Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 4: The foundation layer of color in a painting.] + +[Footnote 5: "Verses without content, melodious trifles."--_Ars Poet_. +322.] + +[Footnote 6: Jeremy Collier, in his _Short View of the Immortality and +Profaneness of the Stage_, 1698.] + +[Footnote 7: "Energetic, irascible, unyielding, vehement."--Horace, +_Ars Poet._121.] + +[Footnote 8: "Whithersoever the fates drag us to and fro, let us +follow."--Virgil, _AEneid_, v. 709.] + +[Footnote 9: The statements that follow as to Chaucer's sources are +mostly not in accord with the results of modern scholarship.] + +[Footnote 10: The plot of neither of these poems was original with +Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 11: "Plenty has made me poor."--_Meta._ iii, 466.] + +[Footnote 12: By Ben Jonson.] + +[Footnote 13: Cowley] + +[Footnote 14: 'Too much a poet'--Martial iii 44 (not Catullus)] + +[Footnote 15: Suited to the ears of that time] + +[Footnote 16: Speght, whom modern scholarship has shown to be right in +this matter.] + +[Footnote 17: What follows on Chaucer's life is full of errors.] + +[Footnote 18: Wondered at] + +[Footnote 19: A spurious "Plowman's Tale" was included in the older +editions of Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 20: A law term for slander of a man of high rank, involving +more severe punishment than ordinary slander.] + +[Footnote 21: Henry II. and Thomas a Becket.] + +[Footnote 22: Dr. James Drake wrote a reply to Jeremy Collier's _Short +View_.] + +[Footnote 23: "He did the first injury"] + +[Footnote 24: A Neapolitan physician who wrote on physiognomy.] + +[Footnote 25: "I wish all this unsaid."] + +[Footnote 26: Reckon.] + +[Footnote 27: Their.] + +[Footnote 28: Must.] + +[Footnote 29: The corrupt state of the text of this passage is enough +to explain why Dryden found Chaucer rough.] + +[Footnote 30: "Many words which have now fallen out of use shall be +born again; and others which are now in honor shall fall, if custom +wills it, in the force of which lie the judgement and law and rules of +speech."--Horace _Ars Poet._ 70-72.] + +[Footnote 31: "It is easy to add to what is already invented."] + +[Footnote 32: Dionco and Fiametta sang together a long time of Arcite +and Palamon.] + +[Footnote 33: Not by Chaucer.] + +[Footnote 34: Rev. Luke Milbourne, who had attacked Dryden's Virgil.] + +[Footnote 35: Sir Richard Blackmore, who had censured Dryden for the +indecency of his writings.] + +[Footnote 36: "The argument from abuse to use is not valid."] + +[Footnote 37: "You, Demetrius and Tigellius, I bid lament among +the chairs of your scholars." Blackmore had once been a +schoolmaster.--Noyes.] + + + + +PREFACE TO JOSEPH ANDREWS + +BY HENRY FIELDING (1742)[A] + +THE COMIC EPIC IN PROSE + + +As it is possible the mere English reader may have a different idea of +romance with the author of these little volumes; and may consequently +expect a kind of entertainment, not to be found, nor which was even +intended, in the following pages; it may not be improper to premise a +few words concerning this kind of writing, which I do not remember to +have seen hitherto attempted in our language. + +The EPIC, as well as the DRAMA, is divided into tragedy and comedy. +HOMER, who was the father of this species of poetry, gave us the +pattern of both these, tho' that of the latter kind is entirely lost; +which Aristotle tells us, bore the same relation to comedy which his +Iliad bears to tragedy. And perhaps, that we have no more instances of +it among the writers of antiquity, is owing to the loss of this +great pattern, which, had it survived, would have found its imitators +equally with the other poems of this great original. + +And farther, as this poetry may be tragic or comic, I will not scruple +to say it may be likewise either in verse or prose: for tho' it wants +one particular, which the critic enumerates in the constituent parts +of an epic poem, namely, metre; yet, when any kind of writing contains +all its other parts, such as fable, action, characters, sentiments, +and diction, and is deficient in metre only, it seems, I think, +reasonable to refer it to the epic; at least, as no critic hath +thought proper to range it under any other head, nor to assign it a +particular name to itself. + +Thus the Telemachus of the archbishop of Cambray appears to me of the +epic kind, as well as the Odyssey of Homer, indeed, it is much fairer +and more reasonable to give it a name common with that species from +which it differs only in a single instance, than to confound it with +those which it resembles in no other. Such are those voluminous works, +commonly called Romances, namely Clelia, Cleopatra, Astraea, Cassandra, +the Grand Cyrus, and innumerable others which contain, as I apprehend, +very little instruction or entertainment. + +Now, a comic romance is a comic epic-poem in prose; differing from +comedy, as the serious epic from tragedy: its action being more +extended and comprehensive; containing a much larger circle of +incidents, and introducing a greater variety of characters. It differs +from the serious romance in its fable and action, in this: that as in +the one these are grave and solemn, so in the other they are light and +ridiculous; it differs in its characters, by introducing persons of +inferiour rank, and consequently of inferiour manners, whereas the +grave romance sets the highest before us; lastly in its sentiments and +diction; by preserving the ludicrous instead of the sublime. In the +diction I think, burlesque itself may be sometimes admitted; of which +many instances will occur in this work, as in the description of the +battles, and some other places not necessary to be pointed out to the +classical reader; for whose entertainment those parodies or burlesque +imitations are chiefly calculated. + +But tho' we have sometimes admitted this in our diction, we have +carefully excluded it from our sentiments and characters; for there +it is never properly introduced, unless in writings of the burlesque +kind, which this is not intended to be. Indeed, no two species of +writing can differ more widely than the comic and the burlesque: +for as the latter is ever the exhibition of what is monstrous and +unnatural, and where our delight, if we examine it, arises from the +surprising absurdity, as in appropriating the manners of the highest +to the lowest, or _e converso_; so in the former, we should ever +confine ourselves strictly to nature, from the just imitation of +which, will flow all the pleasure we can this way convey to a sensible +reader. And perhaps, there is one reason, why a comic writer should +of all others be the least excused for deviating from nature, since +it may not be always so easy for a serious poet to meet with the great +and the admirable; but life everywhere furnishes an accurate observer +with the ridiculous. + +I have hinted this little, concerning burlesque; because I have often +heard that name given to performances, which have been truly of the +comic kind, from the author's having sometimes admitted it in his +diction only; which as it is the dress of poetry, doth like the dress +of men establish characters, (the one of the whole poem, and the other +of the whole man), in vulgar opinion, beyond any of their greater +excellences: but surely, a certain drollery in style, where characters +and sentiments are perfectly natural, no more constitutes the +burlesque, than an empty pomp and dignity of words, where everything +else is mean and low, can entitle any performance to the appellation +of the true sublime. + +And I apprehend, my Lord Shaftesbury's opinion of mere burlesque +agrees with mine, when he asserts, "There is no such thing to be found +in the writings of the antients." But perhaps I have less abhorrence +than he professes for it: and that not because I have had some little +success on the stage this way; but rather as it contributes more to +exquisite mirth and laughter than any other; and these are probably +more wholesome physic for the mind, and conduce better to purge away +spleen, melancholy, and ill affections, than is generally imagined. +Nay, I will appeal to common observation, whether the same companies +are not found more full of good-humour and benevolence, after they +have been sweetened for two or three hours with entertainments of this +kind, than soured by a tragedy or a grave lecture. + +But to illustrate all this by another science, in which, perhaps, we +shall see the distinction more clearly and plainly: let us examine the +works of a comic history-painter, with those performances which +the Italians call _Caricatura_, where we shall find the greatest +excellence of the former to consist in the exactest copy of nature, +insomuch, that a judicious eye instantly rejects anything _outre_, any +liberty which the painter hath taken with the features of that _alma +mater_. Whereas in the _Caricatura_ we allow all licence. Its aim is +to exhibit monsters, not men, and all distortions and exaggerations +whatever are within its proper province. + +Now what Caricatura is in painting Burlesque is in writing, and in the +same manner the comic writer and painter correlate to each other. And +here I shall observe, that as in the former, the painter seems to have +the advantage, so it is in the latter infinitely on the side of the +writer, for the Monstrous is much easier to paint than describe, and +the Ridiculous to describe than paint. + +And tho' perhaps this latter species doth not in either science so +strongly affect and agitate the muscles as the other, yet it will be +owned I believe, that a more rational and useful pleasure arises to us +from it. He who should call the ingenious Hogarth a burlesque painter, +would, in my opinion, do him very little honour: for sure it is much +easier, much less the subject of admiration, to paint a man with a +nose, or any other feature of a preposterous size, or to expose him in +some absurd or monstrous attitude, than to express the affections of +men on canvas. It hath been thought a vast commendation of a painter +to say his figures _seem to breathe_, but surely it is a much greater +and nobler applause, _that they appear to think_. + +But to return The Ridiculous only, as I have before said, falls within +my province in the present work. Nor will some explanation of this +word be thought impertinent by the reader, if he considers how +wonderfully it hath been mistaken, even by writers who have profess'd +it; for to what but such a mistake, can we attribute the many attempts +to ridicule the blackest villainies, and what is yet worse the most +dreadful calamities? What could exceed the absurdity of an author, who +should write the comedy of Nero, with the merry incident of ripping +up his mother's belly, or what would give a greater shock to humanity +than an attempt to expose the miseries of poverty and distress to +ridicule? And yet, the reader will not want much learning to suggest +such instances to himself. + +Besides, it may seem remarkable, that Aristotle, who is so fond and +free of definitions, hath not thought proper to define the Ridiculous. +Indeed, where he tells us it is proper to comedy, he hath remarked +that villainy is not its object: but that he hath not, as I remember, +positively asserted what is. Nor doth the Abbe Bellegarde, who hath +written a treatise on this subject, tho' he shows us many species of +it, once trace it to its fountain. + +The only source of the true Ridiculous (as it appears to me) is +affectation. But tho' it arises from one spring only, when we consider +the infinite streams into which this one branches, we shall presently +cease to admire at the copious field it affords to an observer. +Now affectation proceeds from one of these two causes; vanity, or +hypocrisy: for as vanity puts us on affecting false characters, in +order to purchase applause; so hypocrisy sets us on an endeavour to +avoid censure by concealing our vices under an appearance of their +opposite virtues. And tho' these two causes are often confounded, +(for they require some distinguishing;) yet, as they proceed from +very different motives, so they are as clearly distinct in their +operations: for indeed, the affectation which arises from vanity is +nearer to truth than the other; as it hath not that violent repugnancy +of nature to struggle with, which that of the hypocrite hath. It +may be likewise noted, that affectation doth not imply an absolute +negation of those qualities which are affected: and therefore, tho', +when it proceeds from hypocrisy, it be nearly allied to deceit; +yet when it comes from vanity only, it partakes of the nature of +ostentation: for instance, the affectation of liberality in a vain +man, differs visibly from the same affectation in the avaricious; for +tho' the vain man is not what he would appear, or hath not the virtue +he affects, to the degree he would be thought to have it; yet it sits +less awkwardly on him than on the avaricious man, who is the very +reverse of what he would seem to be. + +From the discovery of this affectation arises the Ridiculous--which +always strikes the reader with surprize and pleasure; and that in a +higher and stronger degree when the affectation arises from hypocrisy, +than when from vanity: for to discover any one to be the exact +reverse of what he affects, is more surprizing, and consequently more +ridiculous, than to find him a little deficient in the quality he +desires the reputation of. I might observe that our Ben Jonson, who +of all men understood the Ridiculous the best, hath chiefly used the +hypocritical affectation. + +Now from affectation only, the misfortunes and calamities of life, +or the imperfections of nature, may become the objects of ridicule. +Surely he hath a very ill-framed mind, who can look on ugliness, +infirmity, or poverty, as ridiculous in themselves: nor do I believe +any man living who meets a dirty fellow riding through the streets in +a cart, is struck with an idea of the Ridiculous from it; but if he +should see the same figure descend from his coach and six, or bolt +from his chair with his hat under his arm, he would then begin to +laugh, and with justice. In the same manner, were we to enter a poor +house and behold a wretched family shivering with cold and languishing +with hunger, it would not incline us to laughter, (at least we must +have very diabolical natures, if it would): but should we discover +there a grate, instead of coals, adorned with flowers, empty plate or +china dishes on the side-board, or any other affectation of riches and +finery either on their persons or in their furniture: we might then +indeed be excused, for ridiculing so fantastical an appearance. +Much less are natural imperfections the object of derision: but when +ugliness aims at the applause of beauty, or lameness endeavours to +display agility; it is then that these unfortunate circumstances, +which at first moved our compassion, tend only to raise our mirth. + +The poet carries this very far; + + None are for being what they are in fault, + But for not being what they would be thought. + +Where if the metre would suffer the word Ridiculous to close the first +line, the thought would be rather more proper. Great vices are the +proper objects of our detestation, smaller faults of our pity: but +affectation appears to me the only true source of the Ridiculous. + +But perhaps it may be objected to me, that I have against my own rules +introduced vices, and of a very black kind into this work. To this I +shall answer: First, that it is very difficult to pursue a series of +human actions and keep clear from them. Secondly, that the vices to +be found here, are rather the accidental consequences of some human +frailty, or foible, than causes habitually existing in the mind. +Thirdly, that they are never set forth as the objects of ridicule, +but detestation. Fourthly, that they are never the principal figure at +that time on the scene; lastly, they never produce the intended evil. + + +[Footnote A: Henry Fielding, dramatist, novelist, and judge, was born +near Glastonbury, Somersetshire, April 22, 1707, and died at Lisbon, +October 8, 1754. Though seldom spoken of as an essayist, Fielding +scattered through his novels a large number of detached or detachable +discussions which are essentially essays, of which the preface +to "Joseph Andrews" on the "Comic Epic in Prose," is a favorable +specimen. The novel which it introduces was begun as a parody on +Richardson's "Pamela," and the preface gives Fielding's conception of +this form of fiction.] + + + + +PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH DICTIONARY + +BY SAMUEL JOHNSON (1755)[A] + + +It is the fate of those who toil at the lower employments of life, to +be rather driven by the fear of evil, than attracted by the prospect +of good; to be exposed to censure, without hope of praise; to be +disgraced by miscarriage, or punished for neglect, where success would +have been without applause; and diligence without reward. + +Among these unhappy mortals is the writer of dictionaries; whom +mankind have considered, not as the pupil, but the slave of science, +the pioneer of literature, doomed only to remove rubbish and clear +obstructions from the paths through which Learning and Genius press +forward to conquest and glory, without bestowing a smile on the humble +drudge that facilitates their progress. Every other author may aspire +to praise; the lexicographer can only hope to escape reproach, and +even this negative recompense has been yet granted to very few. + +I have, notwithstanding this discouragement, attempted a Dictionary of +the English Language, which, while it was employed in the cultivation +of every species of literature, has itself been hitherto neglected; +suffered to spread, under the direction of chance, into wild +exuberance; resigned to the tyranny of time and fashion: and exposed +to the corruptions of ignorance, and caprices of innovation. + +When I took the first survey of my undertaking, I found our speech +copious without order, and energetic without rule: wherever I turned +my view, there was perplexity to be disentangled and confusion to be +regulated; choice was to be made out of boundless variety, without any +established principle of selection; adulterations were to be detected, +without a settled test of purity; and modes of expression to be +rejected or received, without the suffrages of any writers of +classical reputation or acknowledged authority. + +Having therefore no assistance but from general grammar, I applied +myself to the perusal of our writers; and noting whatever might be of +use to ascertain or illustrate any word or phrase, accumulated in time +the materials of a dictionary, which, by degrees, I reduced to +method, establishing to myself, in the progress of the work, such as +experience and analogy suggested to me; experience, which practice and +observation were continually increasing; and analogy, which, though in +some words obscure, was evident in others. + +In adjusting the ORTHOGRAPHY, which has been to this time +unsettled and fortuitous, I found it necessary to distinguish those +irregularities that are inherent in our tongue, and perhaps coeval +with it, from others which the ignorance or negligence of later +writers has produced. Every language has its anomalies, which though +inconvenient, and in themselves once unnecessary, must be tolerated +among the imperfections of human things, and which require only to be +registered, that they may not be increased; and ascertained, that +they may not be confounded: but every language has likewise +its improprieties and absurdities, which it is the duty of the +lexicographer to correct or proscribe. + +As language was at its beginning merely oral, all words of necessary +or common use were spoken before they were written; and while they +were unfixed by any visible signs, must have been spoken with great +diversity, as we now observe those who cannot read to catch sounds +imperfectly, and utter them negligently. When this wild and barbarous +jargon was first reduced to an alphabet, every penman endeavored to +express, as he could, the sounds which he was accustomed to pronounce +or to receive, and vitiated in writing such words as were already +vitiated in speech. The powers of the letters, when they were applied +to a new language, must have been vague and unsettled, and +therefore different hands would exhibit the same sound by different +combinations. + +From this uncertain pronunciation arise in a great part the various +dialects of the same country, which will always be observed to grow +fewer, and less different, as books are multiplied; and from this +arbitrary representation of sounds by letters proceeds that diversity +of spelling observable in the Saxon remains, and I suppose in the +first books of every nation, which perplexes or destroys analogy, +and produces anomalous formations, which, being once incorporated can +never be afterward dismissed or reformed. + +Of this kind are the derivatives _length_ from _long_, _strength_ from +_strong_, _darling_ from _dear_, _breadth_ from _broad_, from _dry_, +_drought_, and from _high_, _height_, which Milton, in zeal for +analogy, writes highth. 'Quid te exempta juvat spinis de pluribus +una?' To change all would be too much, and to change one is nothing. + +This uncertainty is most frequent in the vowels, which are so +capriciously pronounced, and so differently modified, by accident or +affectation, not only in every province, but in every mouth, that to +them, as is well known to etymologists, little regard is to be shown +in the deduction of one language from another. + +Such defects are not errors in orthography, but spots of barbarity +impressed so deep in the English language, that criticism can +never wash them away: these, therefore, must be permitted to remain +untouched; but many words have likewise been altered by accident, or +depraved by ignorance, as the pronunciation of the vulgar has been +weakly followed; and some still continue to be variously written, +as authors differ in their care or skill: of these it was proper +to inquire the true orthography, which I have always considered as +depending on their derivation, and have therefore referred them to +their original languages; thus I write _enchant_, _enchantment_, +_enchanter_, after the French, and _incantation_ after the Latin; thus +_entire_ is chosen rather than _intire_, because it passed to us not +from the Latin _integer_, but from the French _entier_. + +Of many words it is difficult to say whether they were immediately +received from the Latin or the French, since at the time when we had +dominions in France, we had Latin service in our churches. It is, +however, my opinion that the French generally supplied us; for we +have few Latin words, among the terms of domestic use, which are not +French; but many French, which are very remote from Latin. + +Even in words of which the derivation is apparent, I have been often +obliged to sacrifice uniformity to custom; thus I write, in compliance +with a numberless majority, _convey_ and _inveigh_, _deceit_ and +_receipt_, _fancy_ and _phantom_; sometimes the derivative varies +from the primitive, as _explain_ and _explanation_, _repeat_ and +_repetition_. + +Some combinations of letters having the same power, are used +indifferently without any discoverable reason of choice, as in +_choak, choke; soap, sope; fewel, fuel_, and many others; which I have +sometimes inserted twice, that those who search for them under either +form, may not search in vain. + +In examining the orthography of any doubtful word, the mode of +spelling by which it is inserted in the series of the dictionary, is +to be considered as that to which I give, perhaps not often rashly, +the preference. I have left, in the examples, to every author his own +practice unmolested, that the reader may balance suffrages, and +judge between us: but this question is not always to be determined +by reputed or by real learning; some men, intent upon greater things, +have thought little on sounds and derivations; some, knowing in the +ancient tongues, have neglected those in which our words are commonly +to be sought. Thus Hammond writes _fecibleness_ for _feasibleness_, +because I suppose he imagined it derived immediately from the +Latin; and some words, such as _dependant, dependent; dependance, +dependence_, vary their final syllable, as one or other language is +present to the writer. + +In this part of the work, where caprice has long wantoned without +control, and vanity sought praise by petty reformation, I have +endeavored to proceed with a scholar's reverence for antiquity, and a +grammarian's regard to the genius of our tongue. I have attempted few +alterations, and among those few, perhaps the greater part is from +the modern to the ancient practice; and I hope I may be allowed to +recommend to those, whose thoughts have been perhaps employed too +anxiously on verbal singularities, not to disturb, upon narrow views, +or for minute propriety, the orthography of their fathers. It has been +asserted, that for the law to be _known_, is of more importance +than to be _right_. 'Change,' says Hooker, 'is not made without +inconvenience, even from worse to better.' There is in constancy +and stability a general and lasting advantage, which will always +overbalance the slow improvements of gradual correction. Much less +ought our written language to comply with the corruptions of oral +utterance, or copy that which every variation of time or place makes +different from itself, and imitate those changes, which will again be +changed, while imitation is employed in observing them. + +This recommendation of steadiness and uniformity does not proceed from +an opinion that particular combinations of letters have much influence +on human happiness; or that truth may not be successfully taught by +modes of spelling fanciful and erroneous; I am not yet so lost in +lexicography as to forget that 'words are the daughters of earth, and +that things are the sons of heaven.' Language is only the instrument +of science, and words are but the signs of ideas: I wish, however, +that the instrument might be less apt to decay, and that signs might +be permanent, like the things which they denote. + +In settling the orthography, I have not wholly neglected the +pronunciation, which I have directed, by printing an accent upon the +acute or elevated syllable. It will sometimes be found that the accent +is placed by the author quoted, on a different syllable from that +marked in the alphabetical series; it is then to be understood, that +custom has varied, or that the author has, in my opinion, pronounced +wrong. Short directions are sometimes given where the sound of letters +is irregular; and if they are sometimes omitted, defect in such minute +observations will be more easily excused, than superfluity. + +In the investigation, both of the orthography and signification of +words, their ETYMOLOGY was necessarily to be considered, and they were +therefore to be divided into primitives and derivatives. A primitive +word is that which can be traced no further to any English root; +thus _circumspect, circumvent, circumstance, delude, concave_, and +_complicate_, though compounds in the Latin, are to us primitives. +Derivatives, are all those that can be referred to any word in English +of greater simplicity. + +The derivatives I have referred to their primitives, with an accuracy +sometimes needless; for who does not see that _remoteness_ comes +from _remote_, _lovely_ from _love_, _concavity_ from _concave_, and +_demonstrative_ from _demonstrate_? But this grammatical exuberance +the scheme of my work did not allow me to repress. It is of great +importance, in examining the general fabric of a language, to trace +one word from another, by noting the usual modes of derivation and +inflection; and uniformity must be preserved in systematical works; +though sometimes at the expense of particular propriety. + +Among other derivatives I have been careful to insert and elucidate +the anomalous plurals of nouns and preterites of verbs, which in the +Teutonic dialects are very frequent, and, though familiar to those +who have always used them, interrupt and embarrass the learners of our +language. + +The two languages from which our primitives have been derived, are +the Roman and Teutonic: under the Roman, I comprehend the French and +provincial tongues; and under the Teutonic, range the Saxon, German, +and all their kindred dialects. Most of our polysyllables are Roman, +and our words of one syllable are very often Teutonic. + +In assigning the Roman original, it has perhaps sometimes happened +that I have mentioned only the Latin, when the word was borrowed +from the French; and considering myself as employed only in the +illustration of my own language, I have not been very careful to +observe whether the Latin would be pure or barbarous, or the French +elegant or obsolete. + +For the Teutonic etymologies, I am commonly indebted to Junius and +Skinner, the only names which I have forborne to quote when I copied +their books; not that I might appropriate their labors or usurp their +honors, but that I might spare perpetual repetition by one general +acknowledgment. Of these, whom I ought not to mention but with the +reverence due to instructors and benefactors, Junius appears to +have excelled in extent of learning, and Skinner in rectitude of +understanding. Junius was accurately skilled in all the northern +languages, Skinner probably examined the ancient and remoter dialects +only by occasional inspection into dictionaries; but the learning of +Junius is often of no other use than to show him a track by which he +may deviate from his purpose, to which Skinner always presses forward +by the shortest way. Skinner is often ignorant, but never ridiculous: +Junius is always full of knowledge; but his variety distracts his +judgment, and his learning is very frequently disgraced by his +absurdities. + +The votaries of the northern muses will not perhaps easily restrain +their indignation, when they find the name of Junius thus degraded +by a disadvantageous comparison; but whatever reverence is due to +his diligence, or his attainments, it can be no criminal degree of +censoriousness to charge that etymologist with want of judgment, who +can seriously derive _dream_ from _drama_, because 'life is a drama +and a drama is a dream'; and who declares with a tone of defiance, +that no man can fail to derive _moan_ from [Greek: monos], _monos, +single_ or _solitary_, who considers that grief naturally loves to be +alone. + +Our knowledge of the northern literature is so scanty, that of words +undoubtedly Teutonic, the original is not always to be found in +an ancient language; and I have therefore inserted Dutch or German +substitutes, which I consider not as radical, but parallel, not as the +parents, but sisters of the English. + +The words which are represented as thus related by descent or +cognation, do not always agree in sense; for it is incident to words, +as to their authors, to degenerate from their ancestors, and to change +their manners when they change their country. It is sufficient, in +etymological inquiries, if the senses of kindred words be found such +as may easily pass into each other, or such as may both be referred to +one general idea. + +The etymology, so far as it is yet known, was easily found in the +volumes, where it is particularly and professedly delivered, and, by +proper attention to the rules of derivation, the orthography was +soon adjusted. But to COLLECT THE WORDS of our language was a task +of greater difficulty. The deficiency of dictionaries was immediately +apparent, and when they were exhausted, what was yet wanting must be +sought by fortuitous and unguided excursions into books and gleaned +as industry should find, or chance should offer it, in the boundless +chaos of a living speech. My search, however, has been either skilful +or lucky, for I have much augmented the vocabulary. + +As my design was a dictionary, common or appellative, I have omitted +all words which have relation to proper names, such as _Arian, +Socinian, Calvinist, Benedictine, Mahometan_, but have retained those +of a more general nature, as _Heathen, Pagan_. + +Of the terms of art I have received such as could be found either in +books of science or technical dictionaries, and have often inserted, +from philosophical writers, words which are supported perhaps only by +a single authority, and which, being not admitted into general use, +stand yet as candidates or probationers, and must depend for their +adoption on the suffrage of futurity. The words which our authors have +introduced by their knowledge of foreign languages or ignorance of +their own, by vanity or wantonness, by compliance with fashion or lust +of innovation, I have registered as they occurred, though commonly +only to censure them, and warn others against the folly of +naturalizing useless foreigners to the injury of the natives. + +I have not rejected any by design, merely because they were +unnecessary or exuberant, but have received those which by different +writers have been differently formed, as _viscid_, and _viscidity, +viscous_, and _viscosity_. + +Compounded or double words I have seldom noted, except when they +obtain a signification different from that which the components have +in then simple state. + +Thus _highwayman, woodman_, and _horsecourser_, require an +explanation, but of _thieflike_, or _coachdriver_, no notice was +needed, because the primitives contain the meaning of the compounds. + +Words arbitrarily formed by a constant and settled analogy, like +diminutive adjectives in _ish, as greenish, bluish_; adverbs in _ly_, +as _dully, openly_; substantives in _ness_, as _vileness, faultiness_; +were less diligently sought, and many sometimes have been omitted, +when I had no authority that invited me to insert them; not that they +are not genuine, and regular offsprings of English roots, but +because their relation to the primitive being always the same, their +signification cannot be mistaken. + +The verbal nouns in _ing_, such as the _keeping_ of the _castle_, +the _leading_ of the _army_, are always neglected, or placed only to +illustrate the sense of the verb, except when they signify things as +well as actions, and have therefore a plural number, as _dwelling, +living_; or have an absolute and abstract signification, as _coloring, +painting, learning_. + +The participles are likewise omitted, unless, by signifying rather +habit or quality than action, they take the nature of adjectives; as a +_thinking_ man, a man of prudence; a _pacing_ horse, a horse that +can pace: these I have ventured to call _participial adjectives_. But +neither are these always inserted, because they are commonly to be +understood without any danger of mistake, by consulting the verb. + +Obsolete words are admitted when they are found in authors not +obsolete, or when they have any force or beauty that may deserve +revival. + +As composition is one of the chief characteristics of a language, I +have endeavored to make some reparation for the universal negligence +of my predecessors, by inserting great numbers of compounded words, +as may be found under _after, fore, new, night, fair_, and many more. +These, numerous as they are, might be multiplied, but that use and +curiosity are here satisfied, and the frame of our language and modes +of our combination amply discovered. + +Of some forms of composition, such as that by which _re_ is +prefixed to note _repetition_, and _un_ to signify _contrariety_ or +_privation_, all the examples cannot be accumulated, because the use +of these particles, if not wholly arbitrary, is so little limited, +that they are hourly affixed to new words as occasion requires, or is +imagined to require them. + +There is another kind of composition more frequent in our language +than perhaps in any other, from which arises to foreigners the +greatest difficulty. We modify the signification of many verbs by a +particle subjoined; as to _come off_, to escape by a fetch; to _fall +on_, to attack; _fall off_, to apostatize; to _break off_, to stop +abruptly; to _bear out_, to justify; _to fall in_, to comply; to _give +over_, to cease; to _set off_, to embellish; to _set in_, to begin a +continual tenor; to _set out_, to begin a course or journey; to _take +off_, to copy; with innumerable expressions of the same kind, of which +some appear wildly irregular, being so far distant from the sense of +the simple words, that no sagacity will be able to trace the steps by +which they arrived at the present use. These I have noted with great +care; and though I cannot flatter myself that the collection is +complete, I believe I have so far assisted the students of our +language that this kind of phraseology will be no longer insuperable; +and the combinations of verbs and particles, by chance omitted, will +be easily explained by comparison with those that may be found. + +Many words yet stand supported only by the name of Bailey, Ainsworth, +Philips, or the contracted _Dict._ for Dictionaries, subjoined; of +these I am not always certain that they are read in any book but the +works of lexicographers. Of such I have omitted many, because I had +never read them; and many I have inserted, because they may perhaps +exist, though they have escaped my notice: they are, however, to be +yet considered as resting only upon the credit of former dictionaries. +Others, which I considered as useful, or know to be proper, though I +could not at present support them by authorities, I have suffered to +stand upon my own attestation, claiming the same privilege with my +predecessors, of being sometimes credited without proof. + +The words, thus selected and disposed, are grammatically considered; +they are referred to the different parts of speech; traced when they +are irregularly inflected, through their various terminations; +and illustrated by observations, not indeed of great or striking +importance, separately considered, but necessary to the elucidation +of our language, and hitherto neglected or forgotten by English +grammarians. + +That part of my work on which I expect malignity most frequently to +fasten, is the EXPLANATION; in which I cannot hope to satisfy those, +who are perhaps not inclined to be pleased, since I have not always +been able to satisfy myself. To interpret a language by itself is very +difficult; many words cannot be explained by synonimes, because the +idea signified by them has not more than one appellation; nor by +paraphrase, because simple ideas cannot be described. When the nature +of things is unknown, or the notion unsettled and indefinite, +and various in various minds, the words by which such notions are +conveyed, or such things denoted, will be ambiguous and perplexed. And +such is the fate of hapless lexicography, that not only darkness, but +light impedes and distresses it; things may be not only too little, +but too much known, to be happily illustrated. To explain, requires +the use of terms less abstruse than that which is to be explained, and +such terms cannot always be found; for as nothing can be proved but by +supposing something intuitively known, and evident without proof, so +nothing can be defined but by the use of words too plain to admit a +definition. + +Other words there are, of which the sense is too subtle and evanescent +to be fixed in a paraphrase; such are all those which are by the +grammarians termed expletives, and, in dead languages, are suffered +to pass for empty sounds, of no other use than to fill a verse, or to +modulate a period, but which are easily perceived in living tongues to +have power and emphasis, though it be sometimes such as no other form +of expression can convey. + +My labor has likewise been much increased by a class of verbs too +frequent in the English language, of which the signification is so +loose and general, the use so vague and indeterminate, and the senses +detorted so widely from the first idea, that it is hard to trace them +through the maze of variation, to catch them on the brink of utter +inanity, to circumscribe them by any limitations, or interpret them +by any words of distinct and settled meaning; such are _bear, break, +come, cast, full, get, give, do, put, set, go, run, make, take, turn, +throw_. If of these the whole power is not accurately delivered, +it must be remembered, that while our language is yet living, and +variable by the caprice of every one that speaks it, these words are +hourly shifting their relations, and can no more be ascertained in +a dictionary, than a grove, in the agitation of a storm, can be +accurately delineated from its picture in the water. + +The particles are among all nations applied with so great latitude, +that they are not easily reducible under any regular scheme of +explication: this difficulty is not less, nor perhaps greater, in +English, than in other languages. I have labored them with diligence, +I hope with success; such at least as can be expected in a task, which +no man, however learned or sagacious, has yet been able to perform. + +Some words there are which I cannot explain, because I do not +understand them; these might have been omitted very often with little +inconvenience, but I would not so far indulge my vanity as to +decline this confession: for when Tully owns himself ignorant whether +_lessus_, in the twelve tables, means a _funeral song_, or _mourning +garment_; and Aristotle doubts whether [Greek: ourous] in the _Iliad_ +signifies a _mule, or muleteer_, I may surely without shame, leave +some obscurities to happier industry, or future information. + +The rigor of interpretative lexicography requires that _the +explanation_, and _the word explained should be always reciprocal_; +this I have always endeavoured, but could not always attain. Words are +seldom exactly synonymous; a new term was not introduced, but because +the former was thought inadequate: names, therefore, have often many +ideas, but few ideas have many names. It was then necessary to use the +proximate word, for the deficiency of single terms can very seldom +be supplied by circumlocution; nor is the inconvenience great of such +mutilated interpretations, because the sense may easily be collected +entire from the examples. + +In every word of extensive use, it was requisite to mark the progress +of its meaning, and show by what gradations of intermediate sense +it has passed from its primitive to its remote and accidental +signification; so that every foregoing explanation should tend to that +which follows, and the series be regularly concatenated from the first +notion to the last. + +This is specious, but not always practicable; kindred senses may be so +interwoven, that the perplexity cannot be disentangled, nor any +reason be assigned why one should be ranged before the other. When +the radical idea branches out into parallel ramifications, how can a +consecutive series be formed of senses in their nature collateral? +The shades of meaning sometimes pass imperceptibly into each other, so +that though on one side they apparently differ, yet it is impossible +to mark the point of contact. Ideas of the same race, though not +exactly alike, are sometimes so little different, that no words can +express the dissimilitude, though the mind easily perceives it when +they are exhibited together; and sometimes there is such a confusion +of acceptations, that discernment is wearied and distinction puzzled, +and perseverance herself hurries to an end, by crowding together what +she cannot separate. + +These complaints of difficulty will, by those that have never +considered words beyond their popular use, be thought only the jargon +of a man willing to magnify his labors, and procure veneration to his +studies by involution and obscurity. But every art is obscure to those +that have not learned it; this uncertainty of terms, and commixture of +ideas, is well known to those who have joined philosophy with grammar; +and if I have not expressed them very clearly, it must be remembered +that I am speaking of that which words are insufficient to explain. + +The original sense of words is often driven out of use by their +metaphorical acceptations, yet must be inserted for the sake of a +regular origination. Thus I know not whether _ardor_ is used for +_material heat_, or whether _flagrant_, in English, ever signifies the +same with _burning_; yet such are the primitive ideas of these words, +which are therefore set first, though without examples, that the +figurative senses may be commodiously deduced. + +Such is the exuberance of signification which many words have +obtained, that it was scarcely possible to collect all their senses; +sometimes the meaning of derivatives must be sought in the mother +term, and sometimes deficient explanations of the primitive may +he supplied in the train of derivation. In any case of doubt or +difficulty, it will be always proper to examine all the words of +the same race; for some words are slightly passed over to avoid +repetition, some admitted easier and clearer explanation than others, +and all will be better understood, as they are considered in greater +variety of structures and relations. + +All the interpretations of words are not written with the same skill, +or the same happiness: things equally easy in themselves, are not all +equally easy to any single mind. Every writer of a long word commits +errors, where there appears neither ambiguity to mislead, nor +obscurity to confound him; and in a search like this, many felicities +of expression will be casually overlooked, many convenient parallels +will be forgotten, and many particulars will admit improvement from a +mind utterly unequal to the whole performance. + +But many seeming faults are to be imputed rather to the nature of +the undertaking, than the negligence of the performer. Thus some +explanations are unavoidably reciprocal or circular, as _hind, the +female of the stag; stag, the male of the hind_: sometimes easier +words are changed into harder, as _burial_ into _sepulture, or +interment, drier_ into _desiccative, dryness_ into _siccity_ or +_aridity, fit_ into _paroxysm_; for the easiest word, whatever it +be, can never be translated into one more easy. But easiness and +difficulty are merely relative; and if the present prevalence of our +language should invite foreigners to this Dictionary, many will be +assisted by those words which now seem only to increase or produce +obscurity. For this reason I have endeavoured frequently to join a +Teutonic and Roman interpretation, as to _cheer_, to _gladden_ or +_exhilarate_, that every learner of English may be assisted by his own +tongue. + +The solution of all difficulties, and the supply of all defects must +be sought in the examples, subjoined to the various senses of each +word, and ranged according to the time of their authors. + +When I first collected these authorities, I was desirous that every +quotation should be useful to some other end than the illustration of +a word; I therefore extracted from philosophers principles of science; +from historians remarkable facts; from chymists complete processes; +from divines striking exhortations; and from poets beautiful +descriptions. Such is design, while it is yet at a distance from +execution. When the time called upon me to range this accumulation +of elegance and wisdom into an alphabetical series, I soon discovered +that the bulk of my volumes would fright away the student, and was +forced to depart from my scheme of including all that was pleasing or +useful in English literature, and reduce my transcripts very often to +clusters of words, in which scarcely any meaning is retained; thus +to the weariness of copying, I was condemned to add the vexation of +expunging. Some passages I have yet spared, which may relieve the +labor of verbal searches, and intersperse with verdure and flowers the +dusty deserts of barren philology. + +The examples, thus mutilated, are no longer to be considered as +conveying the sentiments or doctrine of their authors; the word for +the sake of which they are inserted, with all its appendant clauses, +has been carefully preserved; but it may sometimes happen, by hasty +detruncation, that the general tendency of the sentence may be +changed: the divine may desert his tenets, or the philosopher his +system. + +Some of the examples have been taken from writers who were never +mentioned as masters of elegance, or models of style; but words must +be sought where they are used; and in what pages, eminent for purity, +can terms of manufacture or agriculture be found? Many quotations +serve no other purpose than that of proving the bare existence of +words, and are therefore selected with less scrupulousness than those +which are to teach their structures and relations. + +My purpose was to admit no testimony of living authors, that I might +not be misled by partiality, and that none of my contemporaries might +have reason to complain; nor have I departed from this resolution, but +when some performance of uncommon excellence excited my veneration, +when my memory supplied me, from late books, with an example that was +wanting, or when my heart, in the tenderness of friendship, solicited +admission for a favorite name. + +So far have I been from any care to grace my pages with modern +decorations, that I have studiously endeavored to collect examples +and authorities from the writers before the Restoration, whose works +I regard as the 'wells of English undefiled,' as the pure sources +of genuine diction. Our language, for almost a century, has, by the +concurrence of many causes, been gradually departing from its original +Teutonic character and deviating towards a Gallic structure and +phraseology, from which it ought to be our endeavor to recall it, by +making our ancient volumes the groundwork of style, admitting +among the additions of later times, only such as may supply real +deficiencies, such as are readily adopted by the genius of our tongue, +and incorporate easily with our native idioms. + +But as every language has a time of rudeness antecedent to perfection, +as well as of false refinement and declension, I have been cautious +lest my zeal for antiquity might drive me into times too remote, +and crowd my book with words now no longer understood. I have fixed +Sidney's work for the boundary, beyond which I make few excursions. +From the authors which rose in the time of Elizabeth, a speech might +be formed adequate to all the purposes of use and elegance. If the +language of theology were extracted from Hooker and the translation of +the Bible, the terms of natural knowledge from Bacon, the phrases of +policy, war, and navigation from Raleigh, the dialect of poetry and +fiction from Spenser and Sidney, and the diction of common life from +Shakespeare, few ideas would be lost to mankind, for want of English +words in which they might be expressed. + +It is not sufficient that a word is found, unless it be so combined +as that its meaning is apparently determined by the tract and tenor +of the sentence, such passages I have therefore chosen, and when +it happened that any author gave a definition of a term, or such +an explanation as is equivalent to a definition, I have placed +his authority as a supplement to my own, without regard to the +chronological order that is otherwise observed. + +Some words, indeed, stand unsupported by any authority, but they are +commonly derivative nouns or adverbs, formed from their primitives by +regular and constant analogy, or names of things seldom occurring in +books, or words of which I have reason to doubt the existence. + +There is more danger of censure from the multiplicity than paucity +of examples, authorities will sometimes seem to have been accumulated +without necessity or use, and perhaps some will be found, which +might, without loss, have been omitted. But a work of this kind is not +hastily to be charged with superfluities; those quotations, which to +careless or unskillful perusers appear only to repeat the same sense, +will often exhibit, to a more accurate examiner, diversities of +signification, or, at least, afford different shades of the same +meaning: one will show the word applied to persons, another to things; +one will express an ill, another a good, and a third a neutral sense; +one will prove the expression genuine from an ancient author; +another will show it elegant from a modern: a doubtful authority +is corroborated by another of more credit; an ambiguous sentence is +ascertained by a passage clear and determinate: the word, how +often soever repeated, appears with new associates and in different +combinations, and every quotation contributes something to the +stability or enlargement of the language. + +When words are used equivocally I receive them in either sense; when +they are metaphorical, I adopt them in their primitive acceptation. + +I have sometimes, though rarely, yielded to the temptation of +exhibiting a genealogy of sentiments, by showing how one author copied +the thoughts and diction of another: such quotations are indeed little +more than repetitions, which might justly be censured, did they not +gratify the mind, by affording a kind of intellectual history. + +The various syntactical structures occurring in the examples have been +carefully noted; the license or negligence with which many words have +been hitherto used, has made our style capricious and indeterminate; +when the different combinations of the same word are exhibited +together, the preference is readily given to propriety, and I have +often endeavored to direct the choice. + +Thus have I labored by settling the orthography, displaying the +analogy, regulating the structures, and ascertaining the +signification of English words, to perform all the parts of a faithful +lexicographer: but I have not always executed my own scheme, or +satisfied my own expectations. The work, whatever proofs of diligence +and attention it may exhibit, is yet capable of many improvements; the +orthography which I recommend is still controvertible, the etymology +which I adopt is uncertain, and perhaps frequently erroneous; the +explanations are sometimes too much contracted, and sometimes too much +diffused, the significations are distinguished rather with subtlety +than skill, and the attention is harassed with unnecessary minuteness. + +The examples are too often injudiciously truncated, and perhaps +sometimes--I hope very rarely--alleged in a mistaken sense; for in +making this collection I trusted more to memory, than, in a state of +disquiet and embarrassment, memory can contain, and purposed to supply +at the review what was left incomplete in the first transcription. + +Many terms appropriated to particular occupations, though necessary +and significant, are undoubtedly omitted, and of the words most +studiously considered and exemplified, many senses have escaped +observation. + +Yet these failures, however frequent, may admit extenuation and +apology. To have attempted much is always laudable, even when the +enterprise is above the strength that undertakes it: to rest below +his own aim is incident to every one whose fancy is active, and whose +views are comprehensive; nor is any man satisfied with himself because +he has done much, but because he can conceive little. When first I +engaged in this work, I resolved to leave neither words nor things +unexamined, and pleased myself with a prospect of the hours which I +should revel away in feasts of literature, the obscure recesses of +northern learning which I should enter and ransack, the treasures with +which I expected every search into those neglected mines to reward my +labor, and the triumph with which I should display my acquisitions +to mankind. When I had thus inquired into the original of words, I +resolved to show likewise my attention to things; to pierce deep into +every science, to inquire the nature of every substance of which +I inserted the name, to limit every idea by a definition strictly +logical, and exhibit every production of art or nature in an accurate +description, that my book might be in place of all other dictionaries +whether appellative or technical. But these were the dreams of a poet +doomed at last to wake a lexicographer. I soon found that it is too +late to look for instruments, when the work calls for execution, and +that whatever abilities I had brought to my task, with those I must +finally perform it. To deliberate whenever I doubted, to inquire +whenever I was ignorant, would have protracted the undertaking without +end, and, perhaps, without much improvement; for I did not find by +my first experiments, that what I had not of my own was easily to be +obtained: I saw that one inquiry only gave occasion to another, that +book referred to book, that to search was not always to find, and +to find was not always to be informed; and that thus to pursue +perfection, was, like the first inhabitants of Arcadia, to chase the +sun, which, when they had reached the hill where he seemed to rest, +was still beheld at the same distance from them. + +I then contracted my design, determining to confide in myself, and +no longer to solicit auxiliaries which produced more incumbrance than +assistance; by this I obtained at least one advantage, that I set +limits to my work, which would in time be ended, though not completed. + +Despondency has never so far prevailed as to depress me to negligence; +some faults will at last appear to be the effects of anxious diligence +and persevering activity. The nice and subtle ramifications of meaning +were not easily avoided by a mind intent upon accuracy, and convinced +of the necessity of disentangling combinations, and separating +similitudes. Many of the distinctions which to common readers appear +useless and idle, will be found real and important by men versed +in the school philosophy, without which no dictionary can ever be +accurately compiled, or skillfully examined. + +Some senses, however, there are, which, though not the same, are +yet so nearly allied, that they are often confounded. Most men +think indistinctly, and therefore cannot speak with exactness; and +consequently some examples might be indifferently put to either +signification: this uncertainty is not to be imputed to me, who do not +form, but register the language; who do not teach men how they should +think, but relate how they have hitherto expressed their thoughts. + +The imperfect sense of some examples I lamented, but could not remedy, +and hope they will be compensated by innumerable passages selected +with propriety, and preserved with exactness; some shining with sparks +of imagination, and some replete with treasures of wisdom. + +The orthography and etymology, though imperfect, are not imperfect +for want of care, but because care will not always be successful, and +recollection or information come too late for use. + +That many terms of art and manufacture are omitted, must be frankly +acknowledged; but for this defect I may boldly allege that it is +unavoidable; I could not visit caverns to learn the miner's language, +nor take a voyage to perfect my skill in the dialect of navigation, +nor visit the warehouses of merchants, and shops of artificers, to +gain the names of wares, tools, and operations, of which no mention is +found in books; what favorable accident or easy inquiry brought within +my reach, has not been neglected; but it had been a hopeless labor to +glean up words, by courting living information, and contesting with +the sullenness of one, and the roughness of another. + +To furnish the Academicians _della Crusca_ with words of this kind, a +series of comedies called _La Fiera_, or _The Fair_, was professedly +written by Buonaroti; but I had no such assistant, and therefore was +content to want what they must have wanted likewise, had they not +luckily been so supplied. + +Nor are all words which are not found in the vocabulary, to be +lamented as omissions. Of the laborious and mercantile part of the +people, the diction is in a great measure casual and mutable; many of +their terms are formed for some temporary or local convenience, and +though current at certain times and places, are in others utterly +unknown. This fugitive cant, which is always in a state of increase +or decay, cannot be regarded as any part of the durable materials of +a language, and therefore must be suffered to perish with other things +unworthy of preservation. + +Care will sometimes betray to the appearance of negligence. He that is +catching opportunities which seldom occur, will suffer those to pass +by unregarded, which he expects hourly to return; he that is searching +for rare and remote things, will neglect those that are obvious and +familiar: thus many of the most common and cursory words have +been inserted with little illustration, because in gathering the +authorities, I forebore to copy those which I thought likely to occur +whenever they were wanted. It is remarkable that, in reviewing my +collection, I found the word _sea_ unexemplified. + +Thus it happens, that in things difficult there is danger from +ignorance, and in things easy, from confidence; the mind, afraid of +greatness, and disdainful of littleness, hastily withdraws herself +from painful searches, and passes with scornful rapidity over tasks +not adequate to her powers; sometimes too secure for caution, and +again too anxious for vigorous effort; sometimes idle in a plain path, +and sometimes distracted in labyrinths, and dissipated by different +intentions. + +A large work is difficult because it is large, even though all its +parts might singly be performed with facility; where there are many +things to be done, each must be allowed its share of time and labor, +in the proportion only which it bears to the whole; nor can it be +expected, that the stones which form the dome of a temple, should be +squared and polished like the diamond of a ring. + +Of the event of this work, for which; having labored it with so much +application, I cannot but have some degree of parental fondness, it +is natural to form conjectures. Those who have been persuaded to think +well of my design, will require that it should fix our language, and +put a stop to those alterations which time and chance have hitherto +been suffered to make in it without opposition. With this consequence +I will confess that I flattered myself for a while; but now begin +to fear that I have indulged expectation which neither reason nor +experience can justify. When we see men grow old and die at a certain +time one after another, from century to century, we laugh at the +elixir that promises to prolong life to a thousand years; and with +equal justice may the lexicographer be derided, who being able to +produce no example of a nation that has preserved their words and +phrases from mutability, shall imagine that his dictionary can embalm +his language, and secure it from corruption and decay, that it is in +his power to change sublunary nature, and clear the world at once from +folly, vanity, and affectation. + +With this hope, however, academies have been instituted, to guard +the avenues of their languages, to retain fugitives, and repulse +intruders; but their vigilance and activity have hitherto been vain; +sounds are too volatile and subtile for legal restraints; to enchain +syllables, and to lash the wind, are equally the undertakings of +pride, unwilling to measure its desires by its strength. The French +language has visibly changed under the inspection of the Academy; +the style of Amelot's translation of Father Paul is observed by Le +Courayer to be _un peu passe_; and no Italian will maintain that the +diction of any modern writer is not perceptibly different from that of +Boccace, Machiavel, or Caro. + +Total and sudden transformations of a language seldom happen; +conquests and migrations are now very rare: but there are other causes +of change, which, though slow in their operation, and invisible in +their progress, are perhaps as much superior to human resistance, as +the revolutions of the sky, or intumescence of the tide. Commerce, +however necessary, however lucrative, as it depraves the manners, +corrupts the language; they that have frequent intercourse with +strangers, to whom they endeavor to accommodate themselves, must +in time learn a mingled dialect, like the jargon which serves the +traffickers on the Mediterranean and Indian coasts. This will not +always be confined to the exchange, the warehouse, or the port, but +will be communicated by degrees to other ranks of the people, and be +at last incorporated with the current speech. + +There are likewise internal causes equally forcible. The language most +likely to continue long without alterations, would be that of a nation +raised a little, and but a little, above barbarity, secluded from +strangers, and totally employed in procuring the conveniences of life; +either without books, or, like some of the Mahometan countries, with +every few: men thus busied and unlearned, having only such words as +common use requires, would perhaps long continue to express the same +notions by the same signs. But no such constancy can be expected in a +people polished by arts, and classed by subordination, where one part +of the community is sustained and accommodated by the labor of the +other. Those who have much leisure to think, will always be enlarging +the stock of ideas; and every increase of knowledge, whether real or +fancied, will produce new words, or combination of words. When the +mind is unchained from necessity, it will range after convenience; +when it is left at large in the fields of speculation, it will shift +opinions; as any custom is disused, the words that expressed it must +perish with it; as any opinion grows popular, it will innovate speech +in the same proportion as it alters practice. + +As by the cultivation of various sciences a language is amplified, it +will be more furnished with words deflected from their original sense; +the geometrician will talk of a courtier's zenith or the eccentric +virtue of a wild hero, and the physician, of sanguine expectations and +phlegmatic delays. Copiousness of speech will give opportunities to +capricious choice, by which some words will be preferred, and others +degraded; vicissitudes of fashion will enforce the use of new, or +extend the signification of known terms. The tropes of poetry will +make hourly encroachments, and the metaphorical will become the +current sense: pronunciation will be varied by levity or ignorance, +and the pen must at length comply with the tongue; illiterate writers +will, at one time or other, by public infatuation, rise into renown, +who, not knowing the original import of words, will use them with +colloquial licentiousness, confound distinction, and forget propriety. +As politeness increases, some expressions will be considered as +too gross and vulgar for the delicate, others as too formal and +ceremonious for the gay and airy; new phrases are therefore adopted, +which must for the same reasons be in time dismissed. Swift, in his +petty treatise on the English language, allows that new words must +sometimes be introduced, but proposes that none should be suffered +to become obsolete. But what makes a word obsolete, more than general +agreement to forbear it? and how shall it be continued, when it +conveys an offensive idea, or recalled again into the mouths of +mankind, when it has once become unfamiliar by disuse, and unpleasing +by unfamiliarity? + +There is another cause of alteration more prevalent than any other, +which yet in the present state of the world cannot be obviated. A +mixture of two languages will produce a third distinct from both, and +they will always be mixed, where the chief parts of education, and +the most conspicuous accomplishment, is skill in ancient or in foreign +tongues. He that has long cultivated another language, will find +its words and combinations crowd upon his memory; and haste and +negligence, refinement and affectation, will obtrude borrowed terms +and exotic expressions. + +The great pest of speech is frequency of translation. No book was ever +turned from one language into another, without imparting something +of its native idiom; this is the most mischievous and comprehensive +innovation; single words may enter by thousands, and the fabric of the +tongue continue the same; but new phraseology changes much at once; +it alters not the single stones of the building, but the order of the +columns. If an academy should be established for the cultivation of +our style--which I, who can never wish to see dependence multiplied, +hope the spirit of English liberty will hinder or destroy--let them, +instead of compiling grammars and dictionaries, endeavor, with all +their influence, to stop the license of translators, whose idleness +and ignorance, if it be suffered to proceed, will reduce us to babble +a dialect of France. + +If the changes that we fear be thus irresistible, what remains but to +acquiesce with silence, as in the other insurmountable distresses +of humanity? It remains that we retard what we cannot repel, that we +palliate what we cannot cure. Life may be lengthened by care, though +death cannot be ultimately defeated: tongues, like governments, have +a natural tendency to degeneration; we have long preserved our +constitution, let us make some struggles for our language. + +In hope of giving longevity to that which its own nature forbids to be +immortal, I have devoted this book, the labor of years, to the honor +of my country, that we may no longer yield the palm of philology, +without a contest, to the nations of the continent. The chief glory of +every people arises from its authors: whether I shall add any thing by +my own writings to the reputation of English literature, must be left +to time: much of my life has been lost under the pressures of +disease; much has been trifled away; and much has always been spent in +provision for the day that was passing over me; but I shall not think +my employment useless or ignoble, if by my assistance foreign nations, +and distant ages, gain access to the propagators of knowledge, and +understand the teachers of truth; if my labors afford light to the +repositories of science, and add celebrity to Bacon, to Hooker, to +Milton, and to Boyle. + +When I am animated by this wish, I look with pleasure on my book, +however defective, and deliver it to the world with the spirit of a +man that has endeavored well. That it will immediately become popular +I have not promised to myself: a few wild blunders, and risible +absurdities, from which no work of such multiplicity was ever free, +may for a time furnish folly with laughter, and harden ignorance into +contempt; but useful diligence will at last prevail, and there never +can be wanting some who distinguish desert; who will consider that no +dictionary of a living tongue ever can be perfect, since, while it +is hastening to publication, some words are budding, and some falling +away; that a whole life cannot be spent upon syntax and etymology, and +that even a whole life would not be sufficient; that he, whose design +includes whatever language can express, must often speak of what +he does not understand; that a writer will sometimes be hurried by +eagerness to the end, and sometimes faint with weariness under a task +which Scaliger compares to the labors of the anvil and the mine; that +what is obvious is not always known, and what is known is not always +present; that sudden fits of inadvertency will surprise vigilance, +slight avocations will seduce attention, and casual eclipses of the +mind will darken learning; and that the writer shall often in vain +trace his memory at the moment of need, for that which yesterday he +knew with intuitive readiness, and which will come uncalled into his +thoughts to-morrow. + +In this work, when it shall be found that much is omitted, let it not +be forgotten that much likewise is performed; and though no book was +ever spared out of tenderness to the author, and the world is +little solicitous to know whence proceed the faults of that which it +condemns; yet it may gratify curiosity to inform it, that the English +Dictionary was written with little assistance of the learned, and +without any patronage of the great; not in the soft obscurities +of retirement, or under the shelter of academic bowers, but amidst +inconvenience and distraction, in sickness and in sorrow. It may +repress the triumph of malignant criticism to observe, that if our +language is not here fully displayed, I have only failed in an attempt +which no human powers have hitherto completed. If the lexicons of +ancient tongues, now immutably fixed, and comprised in a few volumes, +be yet, after the toil of successive ages, inadequate and delusive; +if the aggregated knowledge, and co-operating diligence of the Italian +academicians, did not secure them from the censure of Beni; if the +embodied critics of France, when fifty years had been spent upon +their work, were obliged to change its economy, and give their second +edition another form, I may surely be contented without the praise of +perfection, which, if I could obtain, in this gloom of solitude, what +would it avail me? I have protracted my work till most of those whom I +wished to please have sunk into the grave, and success and miscarriage +are empty sounds: I therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, +having little to fear or hope from censure or from praise. + + +TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE THE EARL OF CHESTERFIELD + +February 7, 1755. + +MY LORD: + +I have lately been informed by the proprietor of _The World_, that two +papers, in which my _Dictionary_ is recommended to the public, were +written by your Lordship. To be so distinguished is an honor which, +being very little accustomed to favours from the great, I know not +well how to receive, or in what terms to acknowledge. + +When, upon some slight encouragement, I first visited your Lordship, I +was overpowered, like the rest of mankind, by the enchantment of your +address; and I could not forbear to wish that I might boast myself 'Le +vainqueur du vainqueur de la terre'; that I might obtain that regard +for which I saw the world contending; but I found my attendance so +little encouraged, that neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to +continue it. When I had once addressed your Lordship in public, I +had exhausted all the art of pleasing which a retired and uncourtly +scholar can possess. I had done all that I could; and no man is well +pleased to have his all neglected, be it ever so little. + +Seven years, my Lord, have now passed, since I waited in your outward +rooms, or was repulsed from your door; during which time I have been +pushing on my work through difficulties, of which it is useless to +complain, and have brought it at last to the verge of publication, +without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement, or one smile +of favor. Such treatment I did not expect, for I never had a Patron +before. + +The shepherd in Virgil grew at last acquainted with Love, and found +him a native of the rocks. + +Is not a Patron, my Lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man +struggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached ground, +encumbers him with help? The notice which you have been pleased to +take of my labors, had it been early, had been kind; but it has +been delayed till I am indifferent, and cannot enjoy it; till I am +solitary, and cannot impart it; till I am known, and do not want it. +I hope it is no very cynical asperity not to confess obligations +where no benefit has been received, or to be unwilling that the Public +should consider me as owing that to a Patron, which Providence has +enabled me to do for myself. + +Having carried on my work thus far with so little obligation to any +favorer of learning, I shall not be disappointed though I should +conclude it, if less be possible, with less; for I have been long +wakened from that dream of hope, in which I once boasted myself with +so much exultation, + +My Lord, Your Lordship's most humble, + +Most obedient servant, SAM. JOHNSON. + + +[Footnote A: For a sketch of Johnson's life, see the Introduction to +"Life of Addison" in the volume of English Essays. The interest of his +preface to the great Dictionary need hardly be pointed out, since the +work itself is a landmark in the history of our language. The letter +to Chesterfield, short though it is is a document of great importance +in the freeing of literature from patronage, and is in itself a +notable piece of literature. The preface to Johnson's edition of +Shakespeare's plays not only explains the editor's conception of +his task, but contains what is perhaps the best appreciation of the +dramatist written in the eighteenth century.] + + + + +PREFACE TO SHAKESPEARE + +BY SAMUEL JOHNSON. (1765) + + +That praises are without reason lavished on the dead, and that the +honours due only to excellence are paid to antiquity, is a complaint +likely to be always continued by those, who, being able to add nothing +to truth, hope for eminence from the heresies of paradox; or those, +who, being forced by disappointment upon consolatory expedients, +are willing to hope from posterity what the present age refuses, and +flatter themselves that the regard which is yet denied by envy, will +be at last bestowed by time. + +Antiquity, like every other quality that attracts the notice of +mankind, has undoubtedly votaries that reverence it, not from reason, +but from prejudice. Some seem to admire indiscriminately whatever +has been long preserved, without considering that time has sometimes +co-operated with chance; all perhaps are more willing to honour past +than present excellence; and the mind contemplates genius through the +shades of age, as the eye surveys the sun through artificial opacity. +The great contention of criticism is to find the faults of the +moderns, and the beauties of the ancients. While an author is yet +living we estimate his powers by his worst performance, and when he is +dead, we rate them by his best. + +To works, however, of which the excellence is not absolute and +definite, but gradual and comparative; to works not raised upon +principles demonstrative and scientifick, but appealing wholly to +observation and experience, no other test can he applied than +length of duration and continuance of esteem. What mankind have long +possessed they have often examined and compared; and if they persist +to value the possession, it is because frequent comparisons have +confirmed opinion in its favour. As among the works of nature no +man can properly call a river deep, or a mountain high, without the +knowledge of many mountains, and many rivers; so in the productions of +genius, nothing can be stiled excellent till it has been compared with +other works of the same kind. Demonstration immediately displays its +power, and has nothing to hope or fear from the flux of years; but +works tentative and experimental must be estimated by their proportion +to the general and collective ability of man, as it is discovered in a +long succession of endeavours. Of the first building that was raised, +it might be with certainty determined that it was round or square; but +whether it was spacious or lofty must have been referred to time. The +Pythagorean scale of numbers was at once discovered to be perfect; but +the poems of _Homer_ we yet know not to transcend the common limits +of human intelligence, but by remarking, that nation after nation, and +century after century, has been able to do little more than transpose +his incidents, new-name his characters, and paraphrase his sentiments. + +The reverence due to writings that have long subsisted arises +therefore not from any credulous confidence in the superior wisdom of +past ages, or gloomy persuasion of the degeneracy of mankind, but is +the consequence of acknowledged and indubitable positions, that what +has been longest known has been most considered, and what is most +considered is best understood. + +The Poet, of whose works I have undertaken the revision, may now +begin to assume the dignity of an ancient, and claim the privilege of +established fame and prescriptive veneration. He has long outlived +his century, the term commonly fixed as the test of literary merit. +Whatever advantages he might once derive from personal allusions, +local customs, or temporary opinions, have for many years been lost; +and every topick of merriment, or motive of sorrow, which the modes of +artificial life afforded him, now only obscure the scenes which they +once illuminated. The effects of favour and competition are at an end; +the tradition of his friendships and his enemies has perished; his +works support no opinion with arguments, nor supply any faction with +invectives; they can neither indulge vanity nor gratify malignity; but +are read without any other reason than the desire of pleasure, and are +therefore praised only as pleasure is obtained; yet, thus unassisted +by interest or passion, they have past through variations of taste +and changes of manners, and, as they devolved from one generation to +another, have received new honours at every transmission. + +But because human judgment, though it be gradually gaining upon +certainty, never becomes infallible; and approbation, though long +continued, may yet be only the approbation of prejudice or fashion; +it is proper to inquire, by what peculiarities of excellence +_Shakespeare_ has gained and kept the favour of his countrymen. + +Nothing can please many, and please long, but just representations of +general nature. Particular manner, can be known to few, and therefore +few only can judge how nearly they are copied. The irregular +combinations of fanciful invention may delight a-while, by that +novelty of which the common satiety of life sends us all in quest; but +the pleasures of sudden wonder are soon exhausted, and the mind can +only repose on the stability of truth. + +_Shakespeare_ is above all writers, at least above all modern writers, +the poet of nature; the poet that holds up to his readers a faithful +mirrour of manners and of life. His characters are not modified by the +customs of particular places, unpractised by the rest of the world; +by the peculiarities of studies or professions, which can operate +but upon small numbers; or by the accidents of transient fashions or +temporary opinions: they are the genuine progeny of common humanity, +such as the world will always supply, and observation will always +find. His persons act and speak by the influence of those general +passions and principles by which all minds are agitated, and the whole +system of life is continued in motion. In the writings of other poets +a character is too often an individual; in those of _Shakespeare_ it +is commonly a species. + +It is from this wide extension of design that so much instruction +is derived. It is this which fills the plays of _Shakespeare_ with +practical axioms and domestic wisdom. It was said of _Euripides_, that +every verse was a precept; and it may be said of _Shakespeare_, that +from his works may be collected a system of civil and oeconomical +prudence. Yet his real power is not shewn in the splendour of +particular passages, but by the progress of his fable, and the +tenour of his dialogue; and he that tries to recommend him by select +quotations, will succeed like the pedant in _Hierocles_, who, when +he offered his house to sale, carried a brick in his pocket as a +specimen. + +It will not easily be imagined how much _Shakespeare_ excells in +accommodating his sentiments to real life, but by comparing him with +other authors. It was observed of the ancient schools of declamation, +that the more diligently they were frequented, the more was the +student disqualified for the world, because he found nothing there +which he should ever meet in any other place. The same remark may be +applied to every stage but that of _Shakespeare_. The theatre, when +it is under any other direction, is peopled by such characters as +were never seen, conversing in a language which was never heard, upon +topicks which will never rise in the commerce of mankind. But the +dialogue of this author is often so evidently determined by the +incident which produces it, and is pursued with so much ease and +simplicity, that it seems scarcely to claim the merit of fiction, but +to have been gleaned by diligent selection out of common conversation, +and common occurrences. + +Upon every other stage the universal agent is love, by whose power all +good and evil is distributed, and every action quickened or retarded. +To bring a lover, a lady and a rival into the fable; to entangle +them in contradictory obligations, perplex them with oppositions of +interest, and harrass them with violence of desires inconsistent with +each other; to make them meet in rapture and part in agony; to fill +their mouths with hyperbolical joy and outrageous sorrow; to distress +them as nothing human ever was distressed; to deliver them as nothing +human ever was delivered; is the business of a modern dramatist. For +this probability is violated, life is misrepresented, and language +is depraved. But love is only one of many passions; and as it has no +great influence upon the sum of life, it has little operation in the +dramas of a poet, who caught his ideas from the living world, and +exhibited only what he saw before him. He knew, that any other +passion, as it was regular or exorbitant, was a cause of happiness or +calamity. + +Characters thus ample and general were not easily discriminated and +preserved, yet perhaps no poet ever kept his personages more distinct +from each other. I will not say with _Pope_, that every speech may be +assigned to the proper speaker, because many speeches there are which +have nothing characteristical; but perhaps, though some may be equally +adapted to every person, it will be difficult to find any that can be +properly transferred from the present possessor to another claimant. +The choice is right, when there is reason for choice. + +Other dramatists can only gain attention by hyperbolical or aggravated +characters, by fabulous and unexampled excellence or depravity, as the +writers of barbarous romances invigorated the reader by a giant and a +dwarf; and he that should form his expectations of human affairs from +the play, or from the tale, would be equally deceived. _Shakespeare_ +has no heroes; his scenes are occupied only by men, who act and speak +as the reader thinks that he should himself have spoken or acted on +the same occasion: Even where the agency is supernatural the dialogue +is level with life. Other writers disguise the most natural passions +and most frequent incidents; so that he who contemplates them in the +book will not know them in the world: _Shakespeare_ approximates the +remote, and familiarizes the wonderful; the event which he represents +will not happen, but if it were possible, its effects would probably +be such as he has assigned; and it may be said, that he has not only +shewn human nature as it acts in real exigencies, but as it would be +found in trials, to which it cannot be exposed. + +This therefore is the praise of _Shakespeare_, that his drama is the +mirrour of life; that he who has mazed his imagination, in following +the phantoms which other writers raise up before him, may here be +cured of his delirious extasies, by reading human sentiments in human +language, by scenes from which a hermit may estimate the transactions +of the world, and a confessor predict the progress of the passions. + +His adherence to general nature has exposed him to the censure of +criticks, who form their judgments upon narrow principles. _Dennis_ +and _Rhymer_ think his _Romans_ not sufficiently _Roman_; and +_Voltaire_ censures his kings as not completely royal. _Dennis_ +is offended, that _Menenius_, a senator of _Rome_, should play the +buffoon; and _Voltaire_ perhaps thinks decency violated when the +_Danish_ Usurper is represented as a drunkard. But _Shakespeare_ +always makes nature predominate over accident; and if he preserves the +essential character, is not very careful of distinctions superinduced +and adventitious. His story requires Romans or kings, but, he thinks +only on men. He knew that _Rome_, like every other city, had men of +all dispositions; and wanting a buffoon, he went into the senate-house +for that which the senate-house would certainly have afforded him. +He was inclined to shew an usurper and a murderer not only odious but +despicable, he therefore added drunkenness to his other qualities, +knowing that kings love wine like other men, and that wine exerts its +natural power upon kings. These are the petty cavils of petty minds; +a poet overlooks the casual distinction of country and condition, as a +painter, satisfied with the figure, neglects the drapery. + +The censure which he has incurred by mixing comick and tragick scenes, +as it extends to all his works, deserves more consideration. Let the +fact be first stated, and then examined. + +_Shakespeare's_ plays are not in the rigorous and critical sense +either tragedies or comedies, but compositions of a distinct kind; +exhibiting the real state of sublunary nature, which partakes of good +and evil, joy and sorrow, mingled with endless variety of proportion +and innumerable modes of combination; and expressing the course of the +world, in which the loss of one is the gain of another; in which, at +the same time, the reveller is hasting to his wine, and the mourner +burying his friend; in which the malignity of one is sometimes +defeated by the frolick of another; and many mischiefs and many +benefits are done and hindered without design. + +Out of this chaos of mingled purposes and casualties the ancient +poets, according to the laws which custom had prescribed, selected +some the crimes of men, and some their absurdities; some the momentous +vicissitudes of life, and some the lighter occurrences; some the +terrours of distress, and some the gayeties of prosperity. Thus +rose the two modes of imitation, known by the names of _tragedy_ and +_comedy_, compositions intended to promote different ends by contrary +means, and considered as so little allied, that I do not recollect +among the _Greeks_ or _Romans_ a single writer who attempted both. + +_Shakespeare_ has united the powers of exciting laughter and sorrow +not only in one mind, but in one composition. Almost all his plays +are divided between serious and ludicrous characters, and, in the +successive evolutions of the design, sometimes produce seriousness and +sorrow, and sometimes levity and laughter. + +That this is a practice contrary to the rules of criticism will be +readily allowed; but there is always an appeal open from criticism +to nature. The end of writing is to instruct; the end of poetry is +to instruct by pleasing. That the mingled drama may convey all the +instruction of tragedy or comedy cannot be denied, because it includes +both in its alterations of exhibition and approaches nearer than +either to the appearance of life, by shewing how great machinations +and slender designs may promote or obviate one another, and the +high and the low co-operate in the general system by unavoidable +concatenation. + +It is objected, that by this change of scenes the passions are +interrupted in their progression, and that the principal event, being +not advanced by a due gradation of preparatory incidents, wants at +last the power to move, which constitutes the perfection of dramatick +poetry. This reasoning is so specious, that it is received as true +even by those who in daily experience feel it to be false. The +interchanges of mingled scenes seldom fail to produce the intended +vicissitudes of passion. Fiction cannot move so much, but that the +attention may be easily transferred; and though it must be allowed +that pleasing melancholy be sometimes interrupted by unwelcome levity, +yet let it be considered likewise, that melancholy is often not +pleasing, and that the disturbance of one man may be the relief of +another; that different auditors have different habitudes; and that, +upon the whole, all pleasure consists in variety. + +The players, who in their edition divided our authour's works into +comedies, histories, and tragedies, seem not to have distinguished the +three kinds by any very exact or definite ideas. + +And action which ended happily to the principal persons, however +serious or distressful through its intermediate incidents, in their +opinion, constituted a comedy. This idea of a comedy continued +long amongst us; and plays were written, which, by changing the +catastrophe, were tragedies to-day, and comedies to-morrow. + +Tragedy was not in those times a poem of more general dignity or +elevation than comedy; it required only a calamitous conclusion, with +which the common criticism of that age was satisfied, whatever lighter +pleasure it afforded in its progress. + +History was a series of actions, with no other than chronological +succession, independent on each other, and without any tendency to +introduce or regulate the conclusion. It is not always very nicely +distinguished from tragedy. There is not much nearer approach to +unity of action in the tragedy of _Antony and Cleopatra_, than in +the history of _Richard the Second_. But a history might be continued +through many plays; as it had no plan, it had no limits. + +Through all these denominations of the drama, _Shakespeare's_ mode of +composition is the same; an interchange of seriousness and merriment, +by which the mind is softened at one time, and exhilarated at another. +But whatever be his purpose, whether to gladden or depress, or to +conduct the story, without vehemence or emotion, through tracts of +easy and familiar dialogue, he never fails to attain his purpose; +as he commands us, we laugh or mourn, or sit silent with quiet +expectation, in tranquillity without indifference. + +When _Shakespeare's_ plan is understood, most of the criticisms of +_Rhymer_ and _Voltaire_ vanish away. The play of _Hamlet_ is opened, +without impropriety, by two sentinels; _Iago_ bellows at _Brabantio's_ +window, without injury to the scheme of the play, though in terms +which a modern audience would not easily endure; the character of +_Polonius_ is seasonable and useful; and the Grave-diggers themselves +may be heard with applause. + +_Shakespeare_ engaged in dramatick poetry with the world open before +him; the rules of the ancients were yet known to few; but publick +judgment was unformed; he had no example of such fame as might force +him upon imitation, nor criticks of such authority as might restrain +his extravagance: He therefore indulged his natural disposition, +and his disposition, as _Rhymer_ has remarked, led him to comedy. In +tragedy he often writes, with great appearance of toil and study, what +is written at last with little felicity; but in his comick scenes, he +seems to produce without labour what no labour can improve. In tragedy +he is always struggling after some occasion to be comick; but in +comedy he seems to repose, or to luxuriate, as in a mode of thinking +congenial to his nature. In his tragick scenes there is always +something wanting, but his comedy often surpasses expectation or +desire. His comedy pleases by the thoughts and the language, and his +tragedy for the greater part by incident and action. His tragedy seems +to be skill, his comedy to be instinct. + +The force of his comick scenes has suffered little diminution from the +changes made by a century and a half, in manners or in words. As his +personages act upon principles arising from genuine passion, very +little modified by particular forms, their pleasures and vexations +are communicable to all times and to all places; they are natural, and +therefore durable; the adventitious peculiarities of personal habits, +are only superficial dies, bright and pleasing for a little while, yet +soon fading to a dim tinct, without any remains of former lustre; but +the discriminations of true passion are the colours of nature; +they pervade the whole mass, and can only perish with the body that +exhibits them. The accidental compositions of heterogeneous modes +are dissolved by the chance which combined them; but the uniform +simplicity of primitive qualities neither admits increase, nor suffers +decay. The sand heap by one flood is scattered by another, but the +rock always continues in its place. The stream of time, which is +continually washing the dissoluble fabricks of other poets, passes +without injury by the adamant of _Shakespeare_. + +If there be, what I believe there is, in every nation, a stile which +never becomes obsolete, a certain mode of phraseology so consonant and +congenial to the analogy and principles of its respective language as +to remain settled and unaltered; this style is probably to be sought +in the common intercourse of life, among those who speak only to +be understood, without ambition of elegance. The polite are always +catching modish innovations, and the learned depart from established +forms of speech, in hope of finding or making better; those who wish +for distinction forsake the vulgar, when the vulgar is right; but +there is a conversation above grossness and below refinement, where +propriety resides, and where this poet seems to have gathered his +comick dialogue. He is therefore more agreeable to the ears of the +present age than any other authour equally remote, and among his other +excellencies deserves to be studied as one of the original masters of +our language. + +These observations are to be considered not as unexceptionally +constant, but as containing general and predominant truth. +_Shakespeare's_ familiar dialogue is affirmed to be smooth and clear, +yet not wholly without ruggedness or difficulty; as a country may be +eminently fruitful, though it has spots unfit for cultivation: +His characters are praised as natural, though their sentiments are +sometimes forced, and their actions improbable; as the earth upon the +whole is spherical, though its surface is varied with protuberances +and cavities. + +_Shakespeare_ with his excellencies has likewise faults, and faults +sufficient to obscure and overwhelm any other merit. I shall shew +them in the proportion in which they appear to me, without envious +malignity or superstitious veneration. No question can be more +innocently discussed than a dead poet's pretensions to renown; and +little regard is due to that bigotry which sets candour higher than +truth. + +His first defect is that to which may be imputed most of the evil in +books or in men. He sacrifices virtue to convenience, and is so +much more careful to please than to instruct, that he seems to write +without any moral purpose. From his writings indeed a system of +social duty may be selected, for he that thinks reasonably must think +morally; but his precepts and axioms drop casually from him; he makes +no just distribution of good or evil, nor is always careful to shew +in the virtuous a disapprobation of the wicked; he carries his persons +indifferently through right and wrong, and at the close dismisses them +without further care, and leaves their examples to operate by chance. +This fault the barbarity of his age cannot extenuate; for it is always +a writer's duty to make the world better, and justice is a virtue +independent on time or place. + +The plots are often so loosely formed, that a very slight +consideration may improve them, and so carelessly pursued, that +he seems not always fully to comprehend his own design. He omits +opportunities of instructing or delighting which the train of +his story seems to force upon him, and apparently rejects those +exhibitions which would be more affecting, for the sake of those which +are more easy. + +It may be observed, that in many of his plays the latter part is +evidently neglected. When he found himself near the end of his work, +and, in view of his reward, he shortened the labour to snatch +the profit. He therefore remits his efforts where he should most +vigorously exert them, and his catastrophe is improbably produced or +imperfectly represented. + +He had no regard to distinction of time or place, but gives to one age +or nation, without scruple, the customs, institutions, and opinions +of another, at the expence not only of likelihood, but of possibility. +These faults _Pope_ has endeavoured, with more zeal than judgment, +to transfer to his imagined interpolators. We need not wonder to find +_Hector_ quoting _Aristotle_, when we see the loves of _Theseus_ +and _Hippolyta_ combined with the _Gothick_ mythology of fairies. +_Shakespeare_, indeed, was not the only violator of chronology, for in +the same age _Sidney_, who wanted not the advantages of learning, has, +in his _Arcadia_, confounded the pastoral with the feudal times, +the days of innocence, quiet and security, with those of turbulence, +violence, and adventure. + +In his comick scenes he is seldom very successful, when he engages +his characters in reciprocations of smartness and contests of sarcasm; +their jests are commonly gross, and their pleasantry licentious; +neither his gentlemen nor his ladies have much delicacy, nor are +sufficiently distinguished from his clowns by any appearance of +refined manners. Whether he represented the real conversation of his +time is not easy to determine; the reign of _Elizabeth_ is commonly +supposed to have been a time of stateliness, formality and reserve; +yet perhaps the relaxations of that severity were not very elegant. +There must, however, have been always some modes of gayety preferable +to others, and a writer ought to chuse the best. + +In tragedy his performance seems constantly to be worse, as his labour +is more. The effusions of passion which exigence forces out are for +the most part striking and energetick; but whenever he solicits his +invention, or strains his faculties, the offspring of his throes is +tumour, meanness, tediousness, and obscurity. + +In narration he affects a disproportionate pomp of diction, and a +wearisome train of circumlocution, and tells the incident imperfectly +in many words, which might have been more plainly delivered in +few. Narration in dramatick poetry is naturally tedious, as it is +unanimated and inactive, and obstructs the progress of the action; +it should therefore always be rapid, and enlivened by frequent +interruption. _Shakespeare_ found it an encumberance, and instead of +lightening it by brevity, endeavoured to recommend it by dignity and +splendour. + +His declamations or set speeches are commonly cold and weak, for his +power was the power of nature; when he endeavoured, like other tragick +writers, to catch opportunities of amplification, and instead of +inquiring what the occasion demanded, to show how much his stores +of knowledge could supply, he seldom escapes without the pity or +resentment of his reader. + +It is incident to him to be now and then entangled with an unwieldy +sentiment, which he cannot well express, and will not reject; he +struggles with it a while, and if it continues stubborn, comprises it +in words such as occur, and leaves it to be disentangled and evolved +by those who have more leisure to bestow upon it. + +Not that always where the language is intricate the thought is subtle, +or the image always great where the line is bulky; the equality of +words to things is very often neglected, and trivial sentiments and +vulgar ideas disappoint the attention, to which they are recommended +by sonorous epithets and swelling figures. + +But the admirers of this great poet have never less reason to indulge +their hopes of supreme excellence, than when he seems fully resolved +to sink them in dejection, and mollify them with tender emotions by +the fall of greatness, the danger of innocence, or the crosses of +love. He is not long soft and pathetick without some idle conceit, +or contemptible equivocation. He no sooner begins to move, than he +counteracts himself; and terrour and pity, as they are rising in the +mind, are checked and blasted by sudden frigidity. + +A quibble is to _Shakespeare_, what luminous vapours are to the +traveller; he follows it at all adventures; it is sure to lead him out +of his way, and sure to engulf him in the mire. It has some malignant +power over his mind, and its fascinations are irresistible. Whatever +be the dignity or profundity of his disquisition, whether he be +enlarging knowledge or exalting affection, whether he be amusing +attention with incidents, or enchaining it in suspense, let but a +quibble spring up before him, and he leaves his work unfinished. A +quibble is the golden apple for which he will always turn aside from +his career, or stoop from his elevation. A quibble, poor and barren as +it is, gave him such delight, that he was content to purchase it, by +the sacrifice of reason, propriety and truth. A quibble was to him the +fatal _Cleopatra_ for which he lost the world, and was content to lose +it. + +It will be thought strange, that, in enumerating the defects of this +writer, I have not yet mentioned his neglect of the unities: his +violation of those laws which have been instituted and established by +the joint authority of poets and criticks. + +For his other deviations from the art of writing I resign him to +critical justice, without making any other demand in his favour, than +that which must be indulged to all human excellence: that his +virtues be rated with his failings: But, from the censure which this +irregularity may bring upon him, I shall, with due reverence to that +learning which I must oppose, adventure to try how I can defend him. + +His histories, being neither tragedies nor comedies are not subject to +any of their laws; nothing more is necessary to all the praise which +they expect, than that the changes of action be so prepared as to +be understood, that the incidents be various and affecting, and +the characters consistent, natural, and distinct. No other unity is +intended, and therefore none is to be sought. + +In his other works he has well enough preserved the unity of action. +He has not, indeed, an intrigue regularly perplexed and regularly +unravelled: he does not endeavour to hide his design only to discover +it, for this is seldom the order of real events, and _Shakespeare_ +is the poet of nature: But his plan has commonly what _Aristotle_ +requires, a beginning, a middle, and an end; one event is concatenated +with another, and the conclusion follows by easy consequence. There +are perhaps some incidents that might be spared, as in other poets +there is much talk that only fills up time upon the stage; but the +general system makes gradual advances, and the end of the play is the +end of expectation. + +To the unities of time and place he has shewn no regard; and perhaps a +nearer view of the principles on which they stand will diminish their +value, and withdraw from them the veneration which, from the time of +_Corneille_, they have very generally received, by discovering +that they have given more trouble to the poet, than pleasure to the +auditor. + +The necessity of observing the unities of time and place arises from +the supposed necessity of making the drama credible. The criticks +hold it impossible, that an action of months or years can be possibly +believed to pass in three hours; or that the spectator can suppose +himself to sit in the theatre, while ambassadors go and return between +distant kings while armies are levied and towns besieged, while an +exile wanders and returns, or till he whom they saw courting his +mistress, shall lament the untimely fall of his son. The mind revolts +from evident falsehood, and fiction loses its force when it departs +from the resemblance of reality. + +From the narrow limitation of time necessarily arises the contraction +of place. The spectator, who knows that he saw the first act at +_Alexandria_, cannot suppose that he sees the next at _Rome_, at a +distance to which not the dragons of _Medea_ could, in so short a +time, have transported him; he knows with certainty that he has not +changed his place, and he knows that place cannot change itself; that +what was a house cannot become a plain; that what was _Thebes_ can +never be _Persepolis_. + +Such is the triumphant language with which a critick exults over the +misery of an irregular poet, and exults commonly without resistance +or reply. It is time therefore to tell him by the authority of +_Shakespeare_, that he assumes, as an unquestionable principle, +a position, which, while his breath is forming it into words, +his understanding pronounces to be false. It is false, that any +representation is mistake for reality; that any dramatick fable in +its materiality was ever credible, or, for a single moment, was ever +credited. + +The objection arising from the impossibility of passing the first hour +at _Alexandria_, and the next at _Rome_, supposes, that when the play +opens, the spectator really imagines himself at _Alexandria_, and +believes that his walk to the theatre has been a voyage to _Egypt_, +and that he lives in the days of _Antony_ and _Cleopatra_. Surely he +that imagines this may imagine more. He that can take the stage at one +time for the palace of the _Ptolemies_, may take it in half an hour +for the promontory of _Actium_. Delusion, if delusion be admitted, has +no certain limitation; if the spectator can be once persuaded, +that his old acquaintance are _Alexander_ and _Caesar_, that a room +illuminated with candles is the plain of _Pharsalia_, or the bank of +_Granicus_, he is in a state of elevation above the reach of reason, +or of truth, and from the heights of empyrean poetry, may despise the +circumscriptions of terrestrial nature. There is no reason why a mind +thus wandering in extacy should count the clock, or why an hour should +not be a century in that calenture of the brains that can make the +stage a field. + +The truth is, that the spectators are always in their senses, and +know, from the first act to the last, that the stage is only a stage, +and that the players are only players. They came to hear a certain +number of lines recited with just gesture and elegant modulation. The +lines relate to some action, and an action must be in some place; +but the different actions that complete a story may be in places very +remote from each other; and where is the absurdity of allowing that +space to represent first _Athens_, and then _Sicily_, which was always +known to be neither _Sicily_ nor _Athens_, but a modern theatre? + +By supposition, as place is introduced, times may be extended; the +time required by the fable elapses for the most part between the acts; +for, of so much of the action as is represented, the real and poetical +duration is the same. If, in the first act, preparations for war +against _Mithridates_ are represented to be made in _Rome_, the event +of the war may, without absurdity, be represented, in the catastrophe, +as happening in _Pontus_; we know that there is neither war, nor +preparation for war; we know that we are neither in _Rome_ nor +_Pontus_; that neither _Mithridates_ nor _Lucullus_ are before us. The +drama exhibits successive imitations of successive actions; and why +may not the second imitation represent an action that happened years +after the first, if it be so connected with it, that nothing but time +can be supposed to intervene? Time is, of all modes of existence, most +obsequious to the imagination; a lapse of years is as easily conceived +as a passage of hours. In contemplation we easily contract the time of +real actions, and therefore willingly permit it to be contracted when +we only see their imitation. + +It will be asked, how the drama moves, if it is not credited. It is +credited with all the credit due to a drama. It is credited, whenever +it moves, as a just picture of a real original; as representing to the +auditor what he would himself feel, if he were to do or suffer what +is there feigned to be suffered or to be done. The reflection that +strikes the heart is not, that the evils before us are real evils, but +that they are evils to which we ourselves may be exposed. If there be +any fallacy, it is not that we fancy the players, but that we fancy +ourselves unhappy for a moment; but we rather lament the possibility +than suppose the presence of misery, as a mother weeps over her babe, +when she remembers that death may take it from her. The delight of +tragedy proceeds from our consciousness of fiction; if we thought +murders and treasons real, they would please no more. + +Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are mistaken +for realities, but because they bring realities to mind. When the +imagination is recreated by a painted landscape, the trees are not +supposed capable to give us shade, or the fountains coolness; but we +consider, how we should be pleased with such fountains playing beside +us, and such woods waving over us. We are agitated in reading the +history of _Henry_ the Fifth, yet no man takes his book for the +field of _Agencourt_. A dramatick exhibition is a book recited with +concomitants that encrease or diminish its effect. Familiar comedy is +often more powerful in the theatre, than on the page; imperial +tragedy is always less. The humour of _Petruchio_ may be heightened +by grimace; but what voice or what gesture can hope to add dignity or +force to the soliloquy of _Cato_. + +A play read, affects the mind like a play acted. It is therefore +evident, that the action is not supposed to be real; and it follows, +that between the acts a longer or shorter time may be allowed to pass, +and that no more account of space or duration is to be taken by the +auditor of a drama, than by the reader of a narrative, before whom may +pass in an hour the life of a hero, or the revolutions of an empire. + +Whether _Shakespeare_ knew the unities, and rejected them by design, +or deviated from them by happy ignorance, it is, I think, impossible +to decide, and useless to enquire. We may reasonably suppose, that, +when he rose to notice, he did not want the counsels and admonitions +of scholars and criticks, and that he at last deliberately persisted +in a practice, which he might have begun by chance. As nothing is +essential to the fable, but unity of action, and as the unities +of time and place arise evidently from false assumptions, and, by +circumscribing the extent of the drama, lessen its variety, I cannot +think it much to be lamented, that they were not known by him, or +not observed: Nor, if such another poet could arise, should I very +vehemently reproach him, that his first act passed at _Venice_, and +his next in _Cyprus_. Such violations of rules merely positive, become +the comprehensive genius of _Shakespeare_, and such censures are +suitable to the minute and slender criticism of _Voltaire_: + + Non usque adeo permiscuit imis + Longus summa dies, ut non, si voce Metelli + Serventur leges, malint a Caesare tolli. + +Yet when I speak thus slightly of dramatick rules, I cannot but +recollect how much wit and learning may be produced against me; before +such authorities I am afraid to stand, not that I think the present +question one of those that are to be decided by mere authority, but +because it is to be suspected, that these precepts have not been so +easily received but for better reasons than I have yet been able to +find. The result of my enquiries, in which it would be ludicrous to +boast of impartiality, is, that the unities of time and place are not +essential to a just drama, that though they may sometimes conduce to +pleasure, they are always to be sacrificed to the nobler beauties +of variety and instruction; and that a play, written with nice +observation of critical rules, is to be contemplated as an elaborate +curiosity, as the product of superfluous and ostentatious art, by +which is shewn, rather what is possible, than what is necessary. + +He that, without diminution of any other excellence, shall preserve +all the unities unbroken, deserves the like applause with the +architect, who shall display all the orders of architecture in a +citadel; without any deduction from its strength; but the principal +beauty of a citadel is to exclude the enemy; and the greatest graces +of a play, are to copy nature and instruct life. + +Perhaps what I have here not dogmatically but deliberatively written, +may recal the principles of the drama to a new examination. I am +almost frighted at my own temerity; and when I estimate the fame and +the strength of those that maintain the contrary opinion, am ready to +sink down in reverential silence; as _AEneas_ withdrew from the defence +of _Troy_, when he saw _Neptune_ shaking the wall, and _Juno_ heading +the besiegers. + +Those whom my arguments cannot persuade to give their approbation +to the judgment of _Shakespeare_, will easily, if they consider the +condition of his life, make some allowance for his ignorance. + +Every man's performances, to be rightly estimated, must be compared +with the state of the age in which he lived, and with his own +particular opportunities; and though to the reader a book be not worse +or better for the circumstances of the authour, yet as there is always +a silent reference of human works to human abilities, and as the +enquiry, how far man may extend his designs, or how high he may rate +his native force, is of far greater dignity than in what rank we shall +place any particular performance, curiosity is always busy to discover +the instruments, as well as to survey the workmanship, to know how +much is to be ascribed to original powers, and how much to casual and +adventitious help. The palaces of _Peru_ or _Mexico_ were certainly +mean and incommodious habitations, if compared to the houses +of _European_ monarchs; yet who could forbear to view them with +astonishment, who remembered that they were built without the use of +iron? + +The _English_ nation, in the time of _Shakespeare_, was yet +struggling to emerge from barbarity. The philology of _Italy_ had +been transplanted hither in the reign of _Henry_ the Eighth; and +the learned languages had been successfully cultivated by _Lilly, +Linacer_, and _More_; by _Pole, Cheke_, and _Gardiner_; and afterwards +by _Smith, Clerk, Haddon_, and _Ascham_. Greek was now taught to boys +in the principal schools; and those who united elegance with learning, +read, with great diligence, the _Italian_ and _Spanish_ poets. But +literature was yet confined to professed scholars, or to men and women +of high rank. The publick was gross and dark; and to be able to read +and write, was an accomplishment still valued for its rarity. + +Nations, like individuals, have their infancy. A people newly awakened +to literary curiosity, being yet unacquainted with the true state +of things, knows not how to judge of that which is proposed as its +resemblance. Whatever is remote from common appearances is always +welcome to vulgar, as to childish credulity; and of a country +unenlightened by learning, the whole people is the vulgar. The study +of those who then aspired to plebeian learning was laid out upon +adventures, giants, dragons, and enchantments. _The Death of Arthur +was_ the favourite volume. + +The mind, which has feasted on the luxurious wonders of fiction, has +no taste of the insipidity of truth. A play which imitated only +the common occurrences of the world, would, upon the admirers of +_Palmerin_ and _Guy_ of _Warwick_, have made little impression; he +that wrote for such an audience was under the necessity of looking +round for strange events and fabulous transactions, and that +incredibility, by which maturer knowledge is offended, was the chief +recommendation of writings, to unskilful curiosity. + +Our authour's plots are generally borrowed from novels, and it is +reasonable to suppose, that he chose the most popular, such as were +read by many, and related by more; for his audience could not have +followed him through the intricacies of the drama, had they not held +the thread of the story in their hands. + +The stories, which we now find only in remoter authours, were in his +time accessible and familiar. The fable of _As you like it_, which is +supposed to be copied from _Chaucer's_ Gamelyn, was a little pamphlet +of those times; and old Mr. _Cibber_ remembered the tale of _Hamlet_ +in plain _English_ prose, which the criticks have now to seek in _Saxo +Grammaticus._ + +His _English_ histories he took from _English_ chronicles and +_English_ ballads; and as the ancient writers were made known to +his countrymen by versions, they supplied him with new subjects; he +dilated some of _Plutarch's_ lives into plays, when they had been +translated by _North_. + +His plots, whether historical or fabulous, are always crouded with +incidents, by which the attention of a rude people was more easily +caught than by sentiment or argumentation; and such is the power of +the marvellous even over those who despise it, that every man finds +his mind more strongly seized by the tragedies of _Shakespeare_ than +of any other writer; others please us by particular speeches, but he +always makes us anxious for the event, and has perhaps excelled all +but _Homer_ in securing the first purpose of a writer, by exciting +restless and unquenchable curiosity and compelling him that reads his +work to read it through. The shows and bustle with which his plays +abound have the same original. As knowledge advances, pleasure passes +from the eye to the ear, but returns, as it declines, from the ear to +the eye. Those to whom our authour's labours were exhibited had more +skill in pomps or processions than in poetical language, and perhaps +wanted some visible and discriminated events, as comments on the +dialogue. He knew how he should most please; and whether his practice +is more agreeable to nature, or whether his example has prejudiced the +nation, we still find that on our stage something must be done as +well as said, and inactive declamation is very coldly heard, however +musical or elegant, passionate or sublime. + +_Voltaire_ expresses his wonder, that our authour's extravagances are +endured by a nation, which has seen the tragedy of _Cato_. Let him +be answered, that _Addison_ speaks the language of poets, and +_Shakespeare_, of men. We find in _Cato_ innumerable beauties which +enamour us of its authour, but we see nothing that acquaints us with +human sentiments or human actions; we place it with the fairest and +the noblest progeny which judgment propagates by conjunction with +learning, but _Othello_ is the vigorous and vivacious offspring +of observation impregnated by genius. _Cato_ affords a splendid +exhibition of artificial and fictitious manners, and delivers just and +noble sentiments, in diction easy, elevated and harmonious, but its +hopes and fears communicate no vibration to the heart; the composition +refers us only to the writer; we pronounce the name of _Cato_, but we +think on _Addison_. + +The work of a correct and regular writer is a garden accurately formed +and diligently planted, varied with shades, and scented with flowers; +the composition of _Shakespeare_ is a forest, in which oaks extend +their branches, and pines tower in the air, interspersed sometimes +with weeds and brambles, and sometimes giving shelter to myrtles and +to roses; filling the eye with awful pomp, and gratifying the mind +with endless diversity. Other poets display cabinets of precious +rarities, minutely finished, wrought into shape, and polished into +brightness. _Shakespeare_ opens a mine which contains gold and +diamonds in unexhaustible plenty, though clouded by incrustations, +debased by impurities, and mingled with a mass of meaner minerals. + +It has been much disputed, whether _Shakespeare_ owed his excellence +to his own native force, or whether he had the common helps of +scholastick education, the precepts of critical science, and the +examples of ancient authours. + +There has always prevailed a tradition, that _Shakespeare_ wanted +learning, that he had no regular education, nor much skill in the dead +languages. _Johnson_, his friend, affirms, that _he had small Latin, +and no Greek_; who, besides that he had no imaginable temptation to +falsehood, wrote at a time when the character and acquisitions of +_Shakespeare_ were known to multitudes. His evidence ought therefore +to decide the controversy, unless some testimony of equal force could +be opposed. + +Some have imagined, that they have discovered deep learning in many +imitations of old writers; but the examples which I have known urged, +were drawn from books translated in his time; or were such easy +coincidences of thought, as will happen to all who consider the same +subjects; or such remarks on life or axioms of morality as float in +conversation, and are transmitted through the world in proverbial +sentences. + +I have found it remarked, that, in this important sentence, _Go +before, I'll follow_, we read a translation of, _I prae, sequar_. I +have been told, that when _Caliban_, after a pleasing dream, says, _I +cry'd to sleep again_, the authour imitates _Anacreon_, who had, like +every other man, the same wish on the same occasion. + +There are a few passages which may pass for imitations, but so few, +that the exception only confirms the rule; he obtained them from +accidental quotations, or by oral communication, and as he used what +he had, would have used more if he had obtained it. + +The _Comedy of Errors_ is confessedly taken from the _Menaechmi_ +of _Plautus_; from the only play of _Plautus_ which was then in +_English_. What can be more probable, than that he who copied that, +would have copied more; but that those which were not translated were +inaccessible? + +Whether he knew the modern languages is uncertain. That his plays have +some _French_ scenes proves but little; he might easily procure them +to be written, and probably, even though he had known the language in +the common degree, he could not have written it without assistance. In +the story of _Romeo_ and _Juliet_ he is observed to have followed the +_English_ translation, where it deviates from the _Italian_; but +this on the other part proves nothing against his knowledge of the +original. He was to copy, not what he knew himself, but what was known +to his audience. + +It is most likely that he had learned _Latin_ sufficiently to make him +acquainted with construction, but that he never advanced to an easy +perusal of the _Roman_ authours. Concerning his skill in modern +languages, I can find no sufficient ground of determination; but as +no imitations of _French_ or _Italian_ authours have been discovered, +though the _Italian_ poetry was then high in esteem, I am inclined to +believe, that he read little more than _English_, and chose for his +fables only such tales as he found translated. + +That much knowledge is scattered over his works is very justly +observed by _Pope_, but it is often such knowledge as books did not +supply. He that will understand _Shakespeare_, must not be content to +study him in the closet, he must look for his meaning sometimes among +the sports of the field, and sometimes among the manufactures of the +shop. + +There is however proof enough that he was a very diligent reader, nor +was our language then so indigent of books, but that he might very +liberally indulge his curiosity without excursion into foreign +literature. Many of the _Roman_ authours were translated, and some of +the _Greek_; the reformation had filled the kingdom with theological +learning; most of the topicks of human disquisition had found +_English_ writers; and poetry had been cultivated, not only with +diligence, but success. This was a stock of knowledge sufficient for a +mind so capable of appropriating and improving it. + +But the greater part of his excellence was the product of his +own genius. He found the _English_ stage in a state of the utmost +rudeness; no essays either in tragedy or comedy had appeared, from +which it could be discovered to what degree of delight either one +or other might be carried. Neither character nor dialogue were yet +understood. _Shakespeare_ may be truly said to have introduced them +both amongst us, and in some of his happier scenes to have carried +them both to the utmost height. + +By what gradations of improvement he proceeded, is not easily known; +for the chronology of his works is yet unsettled. _Rowe_ is of +opinion, that _perhaps we are not to look for his beginning, like +those of other writers, in his least perfect works; art had so little, +and nature so large a share in what he did, that for ought I know_, +says he, _the performances of his youth, as they were the most +vigorous, were the best._ But the power of nature is only the power of +using to any certain purpose the materials which diligence procures, +or opportunity supplies. Nature gives no man knowledge, and when +images are collected by study and experience, can only assist in +combining or applying them. _Shakespeare_, however favoured by nature, +could impart only what he had learned; and as he must increase his +ideals, like other mortals, by gradual acquisition, he, like them, +grew wiser as he grew older, could display life better, as he knew it +more, and instruct with more efficacy, as he was himself more amply +instructed. + +There is a vigilance of observation and accuracy of distinction which +books and precepts cannot confer; from this almost all original +and native excellence proceeds. _Shakespeare_ must have looked +upon mankind with perspicacity, in the highest degree curious and +attentive. Other writers borrow their characters from preceding +writers, and diversify them only by the accidental appendages of +present manners; the dress is a little varied, but the body is the +same. Our authour had both matter and form to provide; for except +the characters of _Chaucer_, to whom I think he is not much indebted, +there were no writers in _English_, and perhaps not many in other +modern languages, which shewed life in its native colours. + +The contest about the original benevolence or malignity of man had not +yet commenced. Speculation had not yet attempted to analyse the +mind, to trace the passions to their sources, to unfold the seminal +principles of vice and virtue, or sound the depths of the heart for +the motives of action. All those enquiries, which from that time that +human nature became the fashionable study, have been made sometimes +with nice discernment, but often with idle subtilty, were yet +unattempted. The tales, with which the infancy of learning was +satisfied, exhibited only the superficial appearances of action, +related the events but omitted the causes, and were formed for such as +delighted in wonders rather than in truth. Mankind was not then to +be studied in the closet; he that would know the world, was under the +necessity of gleaning his own remarks, by mingling as he could in its +business and amusements. + +_Boyle_ congratulated himself upon his high birth, because it favoured +his curiosity, by facilitating his access. _Shakespeare_ had no such +advantage; he came to _London_ a needy adventurer, and lived for a +time by very mean employments. Many works of genius and learning have +been performed in states of life, that appear very little favourable +to thought or to enquiry; so many, that he who considers them +is inclined to think that he sees enterprise and perseverance +predominating over all external agency, and bidding help and hindrance +vanish before them. The genius of _Shakespeare_ was not to be +depressed by the weight of poverty, nor limited by the narrow +conversation to which men in want are inevitably condemned; the +incumbrances of his fortune were shaken from his mind, _as dewdrops +from a lion's mane_. + +Though he had so many difficulties to encounter, and so little +assistance to surmount them, he has been able to obtain an +exact knowledge of many modes of life, and many casts of native +dispositions; to vary them with great multiplicity; to mark them +by nice distinctions; and to shew them in full view by proper +combinations. In this part of his performances he had none to imitate, +but has himself been imitated by all succeeding writers; and it may +be doubted, whether from all his successors more maxims of theoretical +knowledge, or more rules of practical prudence, can be collected, than +he alone has given to his country. + +Nor was his attention confined to the actions of men; he was an exact +surveyor of the inanimate world; his descriptions have always some +peculiarities, gathered by contemplating things as they really exist. +It may be observed, that the oldest poets of many nations preserve +their reputation, and that the following generations of wit, after a +short celebrity, sink into oblivion. The first, whoever they be, must +take their sentiments and descriptions immediately from knowledge; +the resemblance is therefore just, their descriptions are verified by +every eye, and their sentiments acknowledged by every breast. Those +whom their fame invites to the same studies, copy partly them, and +partly nature, till the books of one age gain such authority, as +to stand in the place of nature to another, and imitation, +always deviating a little, becomes at last capricious and casual. +_Shakespeare_, whether life or nature be his subject, shews plainly, +that he has seen with his own eyes; he gives the image which he +receives, not weakened or distorted by the intervention of any other +mind; the ignorant feel his representations to be just, and the +learned see that they are compleat. + +Perhaps it would not be easy to find any authour, except _Homer_, who +invented so much as _Shakespeare_, who so much advanced the studies +which he cultivated, or effused so much novelty upon his age or +country. The form, the characters, the language, and the shows of the +_English_ drama are his, _He seems_, says _Dennis, to have been the +very original of our_ English _tragical harmony, that is, the harmony +of blank verse, diversified often by dissyllable and trissyllable +terminations. For the diversity distinguishes it from heroick harmony, +and by bringing it nearer to common use makes it more proper to gain +attention, and more fit for action and dialogue. Such verse we make +when we are writing prose; we make such verse in common conversation_. + +I know not whether this praise is rigorously just. The dissyllable +termination, which the critic rightly appropriates to the drama, is +to be found, though, I think, not in _Gorboduc_ which is confessedly +before our author; yet in _Hieronnymo_, of which the date is not +certain, but which there is reason to believe at least as old as his +earliest plays. This however is certain, that he is the first who +taught either tragedy or comedy to please, there being no theatrical +piece of any older writer, of which the name is known, except to +antiquaries and collectors of books, which are sought because they are +scarce, and would not have been scarce, had they been much esteemed. + +To him we must ascribe the praise, unless _Spenser_ may divide it with +him, of having first discovered to how much smoothness and harmony +the _English_ language could be softened. He has speeches, perhaps +sometimes scenes, which have all the delicacy of _Rowe_, without his +effeminacy. He endeavours indeed commonly to strike by the force and +vigour of his dialogue, but he never executes his purpose better, than +when he tries to sooth by softness. + +Yet it must be at last confessed, that as we owe every thing to +him, he owes something to us; that, if much of his praise is paid +by perception and judgement, much is likewise given by custom and +veneration. We fix our eyes upon his graces, and turn them from his +deformities, and endure in him what we should in another loath or +despise. If we endured without praising, respect for the father of +our drama might excuse us; but I have seen, in the book of some modern +critick, a collection of anomalies, which shew that he has corrupted +language by every mode of depravation, but which his admirer has +accumulated as a monument of honour. + +He has scenes of undoubted and perpetual excellence, but perhaps +not one play, which, if it were now exhibited as the work of a +contemporary writer, would be heard to the conclusion. I am indeed +far from thinking, that his works were wrought to his own ideas of +perfection; when they were such as would satisfy the audience, they +satisfied the writer. It is seldom that authours, though more studious +of fame than _Shakespeare_, rise much above the standard of their own +age; to add a little of what is best will always be sufficient for +present praise, and those who find themselves exalted into fame, +are willing to credit their encomiasts, and to spare the labour of +contending with themselves. + +It does not appear, that _Shakespeare_ thought his works worthy of +posterity, that he levied any ideal tribute upon future times, or had +any further prospect, than of present popularity and present profit. +When his plays had been acted, his hope was at an end; he solicited +no addition of honour from the reader. He therefore made no scruple +to repeat the same jests in many dialogues, or to entangle different +plots by the same knot of perplexity, which may be at least forgiven +him, by those who recollect, that of _Congreve's_ four comedies, two +are concluded by a marriage in a mask, by a deception, which perhaps +never happened, and which, whether likely or not, he did not invent. + +So careless was this great poet of future fame, that, though he +retired to ease and plenty, while he was yet little _declined into the +vale of years_, before he could be disgusted with fatigue, or disabled +by infirmity, he made no collection of his works, nor desired to +rescue those that had been already published from the depravations +that obscured them, or secure to the rest a better destiny, by giving +them to the world in their genuine state. + +Of the plays which bear the name of _Shakespeare_ in the late +editions, the greater part were not published till about seven years +after his death, and the few which appeared in his life are apparently +thrust into the world without the care of the authour, and therefore +probably without his knowledge. + +Of all the publishers, clandestine or professed, their negligence and +unskilfulness has by the late revisers been sufficiently shown. +The faults of all are indeed numerous and gross, and have not only +corrupted many passages perhaps beyond recovery, but have brought +others into suspicion, which are only obscured by obsolete +phraseology, or by the writer's unskilfulness and affectation. To +alter is more easy than to explain, and temerity is a more common +quality than diligence. Those who saw that they must employ conjecture +to a certain degree, were willing to indulge it a little further. Had +the author published his own works, we should have sat quietly down +to disentangle his intricacies, and clear his obscurities; but now we +tear what we cannot loose, and eject what we happen not to understand. + +The faults are more than could have happened without the +concurrence of many causes. The stile of _Shakespeare_ was in itself +ungrammatical, perplexed and obscure; his works were transcribed for +the players by those who may be supposed to have seldom understood +them; they were transmitted by copiers equally unskilful, who still +multiplied errours; they were perhaps sometimes mutilated by the +actors, for the sake of shortening the speeches; and were at last +printed without correction of the press. + +In this state they remained, not as Dr. _Warburton_ supposes, because +they were unregarded, but because the editor's art was not yet applied +to modern languages, and our ancestors were accustomed to so much +negligence of _English_ printers, that they could very patiently +endure it. At last an edition was undertaken by _Rowe_; not because a +poet was to be published by a poet, for _Rowe_ seems to have thought +very little on correction or explanation, but that our authour's works +might appear like those of his fraternity, with the appendages of a +life and recommendatory preface. _Rowe_ has been clamorously blamed +for not performing what he did not undertake, and it is time that +justice be done him, by confessing, that though he seems to have had +no thought of corruption beyond the printer's errours, yet he has made +many emendations, if they were not made before, which his successors +have received without acknowledgement, and which, if they had produced +them, would have filled pages and pages with censures of the stupidity +by which the faults were committed, with displays of the absurdities +which they involved, with ostentatious expositions of the new reading, +and self congratulations on the happiness of discovering it. + +Of _Rowe_, as of all the editors, I have preserved the preface, and +have likewise retained the authour's life, though not written with +much elegance or spirit; it relates however what is now to be known, +and therefore deserves to pass through all succeeding publications. + +The nation had been for many years content enough with Mr. _Rowe's_ +performance, when Mr. _Pope_ made them acquainted with the true state +of _Shakespeare's_ text, shewed that it was extremely corrupt, and +gave reason to hope that there were means of reforming it. He collated +the old copies, which none had thought to examine before, and restored +many lines to their integrity; but, by a very compendious criticism, +he rejected whatever he disliked, and thought more of amputation than +of cure. + +I know not why he is commended by Dr. _Warburton_ for distinguishing +the genuine from the spurious plays. In this choice he exerted no +judgement of his own; the plays which he received, were given +by _Hemings_ and _Condel,_ the first editors; and those which he +rejected, though, according to the licentiousness of the press in +those times, they were printed during _Shakespeare's_ life, with his +name, had been omitted by his friends, and were never added to his +works before the edition of 1664, from which they were copied by the +later printers. + +This was a work which _Pope_ seems to have thought unworthy of his +abilities, being not able to suppress his contempt of _the dull duty +of an editor_. He understood but half his undertaking. The duty of +a collator is indeed dull, yet, like other tedious tasks, is very +necessary; but an emendatory critick would ill discharge his duty, +without qualities very different from dullness. In perusing a +corrupted piece, he must have before him all possibilities of meaning, +with all possibilities of expression. Such must be his comprehension +of thought, and such his copiousness of language. Out of many readings +possible, he must be able to select that which best suits with the +state, opinions, and modes of language prevailing in every age, and +with his authour's particular cast of thought, and turn of expression. +Such must be his knowledge, and such his taste. Conjectural criticism +demands more than humanity possesses, and he that exercises it with +most praise has very frequent need of indulgence. Let us now be told +no more of the dull duty of an editor. + +Confidence is the common consequence of success. They whose excellence +of any kind has been loudly celebrated, are ready to conclude, that +their powers are universal. _Pope's_ edition fell below his own +expectations, and he was so much offended, when he was found to have +left any thing for others to do, that he past the latter part of his +life in a state of hostility with verbal criticism. + +I have retained all his notes, that no fragment of so great a writer +may be lost; his preface, valuable alike for elegance of composition +and justness of remark, and containing a general criticism on his +authour, so extensive, that little can be added, and so exact, that +little can be disputed, every editor has an interest to suppress, but +that every reader would demand its insertion. + +_Pope_ was succeeded by _Theobald_, a man of narrow comprehension and +small acquisitions, with no native and intrinsick splendour of genius, +with little of the artificial light of learning, but zealous for +minute accuracy, and not negligent in pursuing it. He collated +the ancient copies, and rectified many errours. A man so anxiously +scrupulous might have been expected to do more, but what little he did +was commonly right. + +In his report of copies and editions he is not to be trusted, without +examination. He speaks sometimes indefinitely of copies, when he has +only one. In his enumeration of editions, he mentions the two first +folios as of high, and the third folio as of middle authority; but +the truth is, that the first is equivalent to all others, and that the +rest only deviate from it by the printer's negligence. Whoever has +any of the folios has all, excepting those diversities which mere +reiteration of editions will produce. I collated them all at the +beginning, but afterwards used only the first. + +Of his notes I have generally retained those which he retained himself +in his second edition, except when they were confuted by subsequent +annotators, or were too minute to merit preservation. I have sometimes +adopted his restoration of a comma, without inserting the panegyrick +in which he celebrated himself for his atchievement. The exuberant +excrescence of his diction I have often lopped, his triumphant +exultations over _Pope_ and _Rowe_ I have sometimes suppressed, and +his contemptible ostentation I have frequently concealed; but I have +in some places shewn him, as he would have shewn himself, for the +reader's diversion, that the inflated emptiness of some notes may +justify or excuse the contraction of the rest. + +_Theobald_, thus weak and ignorant, thus mean and faithless, thus +petulant and ostentatious, by the good luck of having _Pope_ for his +enemy, has escaped, and escaped alone, with reputation, from this +undertaking. So willingly does the world support those who solicite +favour, against those who command reverence; and so easily is he +praised, whom no man can envy. + +Our authour fell then into the hands of Sir _Thomas Hanmer,_ the +_Oxford_ editor, a man, in my opinion, eminently qualified by nature +for such studies. He had, what is the first requisite to emendatory +criticism, that intuition by which the poet's intention is immediately +discovered, and that dexterity of intellect which despatches its work +by the easiest means. He had undoubtedly read much; his acquaintance +with customs, opinions, and traditions, seems to have been large; and +he is often learned without shew. He seldom passes what he does not +understand, without an attempt to find or to make a meaning, and +sometimes hastily makes what a little more attention would have found. +He is solicitous to reduce to grammar, what he could not be sure that +his authour intended to be grammatical. _Shakespeare_ regarded more +the series of ideas, than of words; and his language, not being +designed for the reader's desk, was all that he desired it to be, if +it conveyed his meaning to the audience. + +_Hanmer's_ care of the metre has been too violently censured. He found +the measures reformed in so many passages, by the silent labours +of some editors, with the silent acquiescence of the rest, that he +thought himself allowed to extend a little further the license, which +had already been carried so far without reprehension; and of his +corrections in general, it must be confessed, that they are often +just, and made commonly with the least possible violation of the text. + +But, by inserting his emendations, whether invented or borrowed, into +the page, without any notice of varying copies, he has appropriated +the labour of his predecessors, and made his own edition of little +authority. His confidence indeed, both in himself and others, was +too great; he supposes all to be right that was done by _Pope_ and +_Theobald_; he seems not to suspect a critick of fallibility, and it +was but reasonable that he should claim what he so liberally granted. + +As he never writes without careful enquiry and diligent consideration, +I have received all his notes, and believe that every reader will wish +for more. + +Of the last editor it is more difficult to speak. Respect is due to +high place, tenderness to living reputation, and veneration to genius +and learning; but he cannot be justly offended at that liberty +of which he has himself so frequently given an example, nor very +solicitous what is thought of notes, which he ought never to have +considered as part of his serious employments, and which, I suppose, +since the ardour of composition is remitted, he no longer numbers +among his happy effusions. + +The original and predominant errour of his commentary, is acquiescence +in his first thoughts; that precipitation which is produced by +consciousness of quick discernment; and that confidence which presumes +to do, by surveying the surface, what labour only can perform, +by penetrating the bottom. His notes exhibit sometimes perverse +interpretations, and sometimes improbable conjectures; he at one +time gives the authour more profundity of meaning, than the sentence +admits, and at another discovers absurdities, where the sense is plain +to every other reader. But his emendations are likewise often happy +and just; and his interpretation of obscure passages learned and +sagacious. + +Of his notes, I have commonly rejected those, against which the +general voice of the publick has exclaimed, or which their own +incongruity immediately condemns, and which, I suppose, the authour +himself would desire to be forgotten. Of the rest, to part I have +given the highest approbation, by inserting the offered reading in +the text; part I have left to the judgment of the reader, as doubtful, +though specious; and part I have censured without reserve, but I am +sure without bitterness of malice, and, I hope, without wantonness of +insult. + +It is no pleasure to me, in revising my volumes, to observe how much +paper is wasted in confutation. Whoever considers the revolutions of +learning, and the various questions of greater or less importance, +upon which wit and reason have exercised their powers, must lament the +unsuccessfulness of enquiry, and the slow advances of truth, when he +reflects, that great part of the labour of every writer is only the +destruction of those that went before him. The first care of the +builder of a new system, is to demolish the fabricks which are +standing. The chief desire of him that comments an authour, is to +shew how much other commentators have corrupted and obscured him. +The opinions prevalent in one age, as truths above the reach of +controversy, are confuted and rejected in another, and rise again +to reception in remoter times. Thus the human mind is kept in motion +without progress. Thus sometimes truth and criour, and sometimes +contrarieties of errour, take each other's place by reciprocal +invasion. The tide of seeming knowledge which is poured over one +generation, retires and leaves another naked and barren; the sudden +meteors of intelligence which for a while appear to shoot their beams +into the regions of obscurity, on a sudden withdraw their lustre, and +leave mortals again to grope their way. + +These elevations and depressions of renown, and the contradictions to +which all improvers of knowledge must for ever be exposed, since they +are not escaped by the highest and brightest of mankind, may surely +be endured with patience by criticks and annotators, who can rank +themselves but as the satellites of their authours. How canst thou beg +for life, says _Achilles_ to his captive, when thou knowest that +thou art now to suffer only what must another day be suffered by +_Achilles?_ + +Dr. _Warburton_ had a name sufficient to confer celebrity on those who +could exalt themselves into antagonists, and his notes have raised a +clamour too loud to be distinct. His chief assailants are the authours +of _the Canons of criticism_ and of the _Review of_ Shakespeare's +_text_; of whom one ridicules his errours with airy petulance, +suitable enough to the levity of the controversy; the other attacks +them with gloomy malignity, as if he were dragging to justice an +assassin or incendiary. The one stings like a fly, sucks a little +blood, takes a gay flutter, and returns for more; the other bites like +a viper, and would be glad to leave inflammations and gangrene behind +him. When I think on one, with his confederates, I remember the danger +of _Coriolanus,_ who was afraid that _girls with spits, and boys with +stones, should slay him in puny battle_; when the other crosses my +imagination, I remember the prodigy in _Macbeth_, + + _An eagle tow'ring in his pride of place, + Was by a mousing owl hawk'd at and kill'd._ + +Let me however do them justice. One is a wit, and one a scholar. They +have both shown acuteness sufficient in the discovery of faults, and +have both advanced some probable interpretations of obscure passages; +but when they aspire to conjecture and emendation, it appears how +falsely we all estimate our own abilities, and the little which they +have been able to perform might have taught them more candour to the +endeavours of others. + +Before Dr. _Warburton's_ edition, _Critical observations on_ +Shakespeare had been published by Mr. _Upton_, a man skilled in +languages, and acquainted with books, but who seems to have had no +great vigour of genius or nicety of taste. Many of his explanations +are curious and useful, but he likewise, though he professed to oppose +the licentious confidence of editors, and adhere to the old copies, +is unable to restrain the rage of emendation, though his ardour is ill +seconded by his skill. Every cold empirick, when his heart is expanded +by a successful experiment, swells into a theorist, and the laborious +collator at some unlucky moment frolicks in conjecture. + +_Critical, historical and explanatory notes_ have been likewise +published upon _Shakespeare_ by Dr. _Grey_, whose diligent perusal +of the old _English_ writers has enabled him to make some useful +observations. What he undertook he has well enough performed, but +as he neither attempts judicial nor emendatory criticism, he employs +rather his memory than his sagacity. It were to be wished that all +would endeavour to imitate his modesty who have not been able to +surpass his knowledge. + +I can say with great sincerity of all my predecessors, what I hope +will hereafter be said of me, that not one has left _Shakespeare_ +without improvement, nor is there one to whom I have not been indebted +for assistance and information. Whatever I have taken from them it was +my intention to refer to its original authour, and it is certain, that +what I have not given to another, I believed when I wrote it to be my +own. In some perhaps I have been anticipated; but if I am ever found +to encroach upon the remarks of any other commentator, I am willing +that the honour, be it more or less, should be transferred to the +first claimant, for his right, and his alone, stands above dispute; +the second can prove his pretensions only to himself, nor can +himself always distinguish invention, with sufficient certainty, from +recollection. + +They have all been treated by me with candour, which they have not +been careful of observing to one another. It is not easy to discover +from what cause the acrimony of a scholiast can naturally proceed. +The subjects to be discussed by him are of very small importance; they +involve neither property nor liberty; nor favour the interest of +sect or party. The various readings of copies, and different +interpretations of a passage, seem to be questions that might exercise +the wit, without engaging the passions. But, whether it be, that +_small things make mean men proud_, and vanity catches small +occasions; or that all contrariety of opinion, even in those that can +defend it no longer, makes proud men angry; there is often found in +commentaries a spontaneous strain of invective and contempt, more +eager and venomous than is vented by the most furious controvertist in +politicks against those whom he is hired to defame. + +Perhaps the lightness of the matter may conduce to the vehemence +of the agency; when the truth to be investigated is so near to +inexistence, as to escape attention, its bulk is to be enlarged by +rage and exclamation: That to which all would be indifferent in its +original state, may attract notice when the fate of a name is appended +to it. A commentator has indeed great temptations to supply by +turbulence what he wants of dignity, to beat his little gold to a +spacious surface, to work that to foam which no art or diligence can +exalt to spirit. + +The notes which I have borrowed or written are either illustrative, +by which difficulties are explained; or judicial by which faults +and beauties are remarked; or emendatory, by which depravations are +corrected. + +The explanations transcribed from others, if I do not subjoin any +other interpretation, I suppose commonly to be right, at least I +intend by acquiescence to confess, that I have nothing better to +propose. + +After the labours of all the editors, I found many passages which +appeared to me likely to obstruct the greater number of readers, and +thought it my duty to facilitate their passage. It is impossible +for an expositor not to write too little for some, and too much for +others. He can only judge what is necessary by his own experience; +and how long soever he may deliberate, will at last explain many lines +which the learned will think impossible to be mistaken, and omit many +for which the ignorant will want his help. These are censures merely +relative, and must be quietly endured. I have endeavoured to be +neither superfluously copious, nor scrupulously reserved, and hope +that I have made my authour's meaning accessible to many who before +were frighted from perusing him, and contributed something to the +publick, by diffusing innocent and rational pleasure. + +The compleat explanation of an authour not systematick and +consequential, but desultory and vagrant, abounding in casual +allusions and light hints, is not to be expected from any single +scholiast. All personal reflections, when names are suppressed, must +be in a few years irrecoverably obliterated; and customs, too minute +to attract the notice of law, such as modes of dress, formalities of +conversation, rules of visits, disposition of furniture, and practices +of ceremony, which naturally find places in familiar dialogue, are +so fugitive and unsubstantial, that they are not easily retained or +recovered. What can be known, will be collected by chance, from the +recesses of obscure and obsolete papers, perused commonly with some +other view. Of this knowledge every man has some, and none has much; +but when an authour has engaged the publick attention, those who can +add any thing to his illustration, communicate their discoveries, and +time produces what had eluded diligence. + +To time I have been obliged to resign many passages, which, though I +did not understand them, will perhaps hereafter be explained, having, +I hope, illustrated some, which others have neglected or mistaken, +sometimes by short remarks, or marginal directions, such as every +editor has added at his will, and often by comments more laborious +than the matter will seem to deserve; but that which is most difficult +is not always most important, and to an editor nothing is a trifle by +which his authour is obscured. + +The poetical beauties or defects I have not been very diligent to +observe. Some plays have more, and some fewer judicial observations, +not in proportion to their difference of merit, but because I gave +this part of my design to chance and to caprice. The reader, I +believe, is seldom pleased to find his opinion anticipated; it is +natural to delight more in what we find or make, than in what we +receive. Judgement, like other faculties, is improved by practice, and +its advancement is hindered by submission to dictatorial decisions, as +the memory grows torpid by the use of a table book. Some initiation is +however necessary; of all skill, part is infused by precept, and part +is obtained by habit; I have therefore shewn so much as may enable the +candidate of criticism to discover the rest. + +To the end of most plays, I have added short strictures, containing +a general censure of faults, or praise of excellence; in which I know +not how much I have concurred with the current opinion; but I have +not, by any affectation of singularity, deviated from it. Nothing +is minutely and particularly examined, and therefore it is to be +supposed, that in the plays which are condemned there is much to be +praised, and in these which are praised much to be condemned. + +The part of criticism in which the whole succession of editors has +laboured with the greatest diligence, which has occasioned the +most arrogant ostentation, and excited the keenest acrimony, is the +emendation of corrupted passages, to which the publick attention +having been first drawn by the violence of contention between _Pope_ +and _Theobald_, has been continued by the persecution, which, with a +kind of conspiracy, has been since raised against all the publishers +of _Shakespeare_. + +That many passages have passed in a state of depravation through all +the editions is indubitably certain; of these the restoration is only +to be attempted by collation of copies or sagacity of conjecture. The +collator's province is safe and easy, the conjecturer's perilous and +difficult. Yet as the greater part of the plays are extant only in one +copy, the peril must not be avoided, nor the difficulty refused. + +Of the readings which this emulation of amendment has hitherto +produced, some from the labours of every publisher I have advanced +into the text; those are to be considered as in my opinion +sufficiently supported; some I have rejected without mention, as +evidently erroneous; some I have left in the notes without censure or +approbation, as resting in equipoise between objection and defence; +and some, which seemed specious but not right, I have inserted with a +subsequent animadversion. + +Having classed the observations of others, I was at last to try what +I could substitute for their mistakes, and how I could supply their +omissions. I collated such copies as I could procure, and wished +for more, but have not found the collectors of these rarities very +communicative. Of the editions which chance or kindness put into +my hands I have given an enumeration, that I may not be blamed for +neglecting what I had not the power to do. + +By examining the old copies, I soon found that the later publishers, +with all their boasts of diligence, suffered many passages to stand +unauthorised, and contented themselves with _Rowe's_ regulation of +the text, even where they knew it to be arbitrary, and with a +little consideration might have found it to be wrong. Some of these +alterations are only the ejection of a word for one that appeared to +him more elegant or more intelligible. These corruptions I have often +silently rectified; for the history of our language, and the true +force of our words, can only be preserved, by keeping the text of +authours free from adulteration. Others, and those very frequent, +smoothed the cadence, or regulated the measure; on these I have +not exercised the same rigour; if only a word was transposed, or a +particle Inserted or omitted, I have sometimes suffered the line +to stand; for the inconstancy of the copies is such, as that some +liberties may be easily permitted. But this practice I have not +suffered to proceed far, having restored the primitive diction +wherever it could for any reason be preferred. + +The emendations, which comparison of copies supplied, I have inserted +in the text; sometimes where the improvement was slight, without +notice, and sometimes with an account of the reasons of the change. + +Conjecture, though it be sometimes unavoidable, I have not wantonly +nor licentiously indulged. It has been my settled principle, that the +reading of the ancient books is probably true, and therefore is not +to be disturbed for the sake of elegance, perspicuity, or mere +improvement of the sense. For though much credit is not due to the +fidelity, nor any to the judgement of the first publishers, yet they +who had the copy before their eyes were more likely to read it right, +than we who read it only by imagination. But it is evident that they +have often made strange mistakes by ignorance or negligence, and that +therefore something may be properly attempted by criticism, keeping +the middle way between presumption and timidity. + +Such criticism I have attempted to practice, and where any passage +appeared inextricably perplexed, have endeavoured to discover how it +may be recalled to sense, with least violence. But my first labour +is, always to turn the old text on every side, and try if there be any +interstice, through which light can find its way; nor would _Huetius_ +himself condemn me, as refusing the trouble of research, for the +ambition of alteration. In this modest industry I have not been +unsuccessful. I have rescued many lines from the violations of +temerity, and secured many scenes from the inroads of correction. I +have adopted the _Roman_ sentiment, that it is more honourable to +save a citizen, than to kill an enemy, and have been more careful to +protect than to attack. + +I have preserved the common distribution of the plays into acts, +though I believe it to be in almost all the plays void of authority. +Some of those which are divided in the later editions have no division +in the first folio, and some that are divided in the folio have no +division in the preceding copies. The settled mode of the theatre +requires four intervals in the play, but few, if any, of our authour's +compositions can be properly distributed in that manner. An act is so +much of the drama as passes without intervention of time or change of +place. A pause makes a new act. In every real, and therefore in every +imitative action, the intervals may be more or fewer, the restriction +of five acts being accidental and arbitrary. This _Shakespeare_ knew, +and this he practised; his plays were written, and at first printed +in one unbroken continuity, and ought now to be exhibited with +short pauses, interposed as often as the scene is changed, or any +considerable time is required to pass. This method would at once quell +a thousand absurdities. + +In restoring the author's works to their integrity, I have considered +the punctuation as wholly in my power; for what could be their care of +colons and commas, who corrupted words and sentences. Whatever could +be done by adjusting points is therefore silently performed, in some +plays with much diligence, in others with less; it is hard to keep a +busy eye steadily fixed upon evanescent atoms, or a discursive mind +upon evanescent truth. + +The same liberty has been taken with a few particles, or other words +of slight effect. I have sometimes inserted or omitted them without +notice. I have done that sometimes, which the other editors have +done always, and which indeed the state of the text may sufficiently +justify. + +The greater part of readers, instead of blaming us for passing +trifles, will wonder that on mere trifles so much labour is expended, +with such importance of debate, and such solemnity of diction. To +these I answer with confidence, that they are judging of an art which +they do not understand; yet cannot much reproach them with their +ignorance, nor promise that they would become in general, by learning +criticism, more useful, happier or wiser. + +As I practised conjecture more, I learned to trust it less; and after +I had printed a few plays, resolved to insert none of my own readings +in the text. Upon this caution I now congratulate myself, for every +day encreases my doubt of my emendations. + +Since I have confined my imagination to the margin, it must not be +considered as very reprehensible, if I have suffered it to play some +freaks in its own dominion. There is no danger in conjecture, if it +be proposed as conjecture; and while the text remains uninjured, those +changes may be safely offered, which are not considered even by him +that offers them as necessary or safe. + +If my readings are of little value, they have not been ostentatiously +displayed or importunately obtruded. I could have written longer +notes, for the art of writing notes is not of difficult attainment. +The work is performed, first by railing at the stupidity, negligence, +ignorance, and asinine tastelessness of the former editors, and +shewing, from all that goes before and all that follows, the +inelegance and absurdity of the old reading; then by proposing +something which to superficial readers would seem specious, but +which the editor rejects with indignation; then by producing the true +reading, with a long paraphrase, and concluding with loud acclamations +on the discovery, and a sober wish for the advancement and prosperity +of genuine criticism. + +All this may be done, and perhaps done sometimes without impropriety. +But I have always suspected that the reading is right, which requires +many words to prove it wrong; and the emendation wrong, that cannot +without so much labour appear to be right The justness of a happy +restoration strikes at once, and the moral precept may be well applied +to criticism, _quod dubitas ne feceris_. + +To dread the shore which he sees spread with wrecks, is natural to +the sailor. I had before my eye, so many critical adventures ended in +miscarriage, that caution was forced upon me. I encountered in every +page Wit struggling with its own sophistry, and Learning confused by +the multiplicity of its views. I was forced to censure those whom I +admired, and could not but reflect, while I was dispossessing their +emendations, how soon the same fate might happen to my own, and how +many of the readings which I have corrected may be by some other +editor defended and established. + + Criticks, I saw, that other's names efface, + And fix their own, with labour, in the place; + Their own, like others, soon their place resign'd, + Or disappear'd, and left the first behind, + + POPE. + +That a conjectural critick should often be mistaken, cannot be +wonderful, either to others or himself, if it be considered, that in +his art there is no system, no principal and axiomatical truth that +regulates subordinate positions. His chance of errour is renewed +at every attempt; an oblique view of the passage, a slight +misapprehension of a phrase, a casual inattention to the parts +connected, is sufficient to make him not only fails, but fail +ridiculously; and when he succeeds best, he produces perhaps but one +reading of many probable, and he that suggests another will always be +able to dispute his claims. + +It is an unhappy state, in which danger is hid under pleasure. The +allurements of emendation are scarcely resistible. Conjecture has all +the joy and all the pride of invention, and he that has once started +a happy change, is too much delighted to consider what objections may +rise against it. + +Yet conjectural criticism has been of great use in the learned world; +nor is it my intention to depreciate a study, that has exercised so +many mighty minds, from the revival of learning to our own age, from +the Bishop of _Aleria_ to English _Bentley_. The criticks on ancient +authours have, in the exercise of their sagacity, many assistances, +which the editor of _Shakespeare_ is condemned to want. They are +employed upon grammatical and settled languages, whose construction +contributes so much to perspicuity, that _Homer_ has fewer passages +unintelligible than _Chaucer_. The words have not only a known +regimen, but invariable quantities, which direct and confine the +choice. There are commonly more manuscripts than one; and they do not +often conspire in the same mistakes. Yet _Scaliger_ could confess +to _Salmasius_ how little satisfaction his emendations gave him. +_Illudunt nobis conjectureae nostrae, quarum nos pudet, posteaquam +in meliores codices incidimus_. And _Lipsius_ could complain, that +criticks were making faults, by trying to remove them, _Ut olim +vitiis, ita nunc remediis laboratur_. And indeed, where mere +conjecture is to be used, the emendations of _Scaliger_ and _Lipsius_, +notwithstanding their wonderful sagacity and erudition, are often +vague and disputable, like mine or _Theobald_'s. + +Perhaps I may not be more censured for doing wrong, than for doing +little; for raising in the publick expectations, which at last I have +not answered. The expectation of ignorance is indefinite, and that of +knowledge is often tyrannical. It is hard to satisfy those who know +not what to demand, or those who demand by design what they think +impossible to be done. I have indeed disappointed no opinion more +than my own; yet I have endeavoured to perform my task with no slight +solicitude. Not a single passage in the whole work has appeared to me +corrupt, which I have not attempted to restore; or obscure, which I +have not endeavoured to illustrate. In many I have failed like others, +and from many, after all my efforts, I have retreated, and confessed +the repulse. I have not passed over, with affected superiority, what +is equally difficult to the reader and to myself, but where I could +not instruct him, have owned my ignorance. I might easily have +accumulated a mass of seeming learning upon easy scenes; but it ought +not to be imputed to negligence, that, where nothing was necessary, +nothing has been done, or that, where others have said enough, I have +said no more. + +Notes are often necessary, but they are necessary evils. Let him, that +is yet unacquainted with the powers of _Shakespeare_, and who desires +to feel the highest pleasure that the drama can give, read every play +from the first scene to the last, with utter negligence of all his +commentators. When his fancy is once on the wing, let it not stoop at +correction or explanation. When his attention is strongly engaged, +let it disdain alike to turn aside to the name of _Theobald_ and of +_Pope_. Let him read on through brightness and obscurity, through +integrity and corruption; let him preserve his comprehension of the +dialogue and his interest in the fable. And when the pleasures +of novelty have ceased, let him attempt exactness, and read the +commentators. + +Particular passages are cleared by notes, but the general effect of +the work is weakened. The mind is refrigerated by interruption; the +thoughts are diverted from the principal subject; the reader is weary, +he suspects not why; and at last throws away the book, which he has +too diligently studied. + +Parts are not to be examined till the whole has been surveyed; there +is a kind of intellectual remoteness necessary for the comprehension +of any great work in its full design and its true proportions; a close +approach shews the smaller niceties, but the beauty of the whole is +discerned no longer. It is not very grateful to consider how little the +succession of editors has added to this authour's power of pleasing. +He was read, admired, studied, and imitated, while he was yet +deformed with all the improprieties which ignorance and neglect could +accumulate upon him; while the reading was yet not rectified, nor +his allusions understood; yet then did _Dryden_ pronounce "that +_Shakespeare_ was the man, who, of all modern and perhaps ancient +poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul." All the images +of nature were still present to him, and he drew them not laboriously, +but luckily: when he describes any thing, you more than see it, you +feel it too. Those who accuse him to have wanted learning, give him +the greater commendation: he was naturally learned: he needed not the +spectacles of books to read nature; he looked inwards, and found her +there. I cannot say he is every where alike; were he so, I should do +him injury to compare him with the greatest of mankind. He is many +times flat and insipid; his comick wit degenerating into clenches, his +serious swelling into bombast. But he is always great, when some +great occasion is presented to him: No man can say, he ever had a fit +subject for his wit, and did not then raise himself as high above the +rest of poets, + + "Quantum lenta solent inter viburna cupressi." + +It is to be lamented, that such a writer should want a commentary; +that his language should become obsolete, or his sentiments obscure. +But it is vain to carry wishes beyond the condition of human things; +that which must happen to all, has happened to _Shakespeare_, by +accident and time; and more than has been suffered by any other writer +since the use of types, has been suffered by him through his own +negligence of fame, or perhaps by that superiority of mind, which +despised its own performances, when it compared them with its powers, +and judged those works unworthy to be preserved, which the criticks +of following ages were to contend for the fame of restoring and +explaining. + +Among these candidates of inferiour fame, I am now to stand the +judgment of the publick; and wish that I could confidently produce my +commentary as equal to the encouragement which I have had the honour +of receiving. Every work of this kind is by its nature deficient, +and I should feel little solicitude about the sentence, were it to be +pronounced only by the skilful and the learned. + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO THE PROPYLAeEN [A] + +BY J.W. VON GOETHE. (1798) + + +The youth, when Nature and Art attract him, thinks that with a +vigorous effort he can soon penetrate into the innermost sanctuary, +the man, after long wanderings, finds himself still in the outer +court. + +Such an observation has suggested our title. It is only on the step, +in the gateway, the entrance, the vestibule, the space between the +outside and the inner chamber, between the sacred and the common, that +we may ordinarily tarry with our friends. + +If the word _Propylaea_ recalls particularly the structure through +which was reached the citadel of Athens and the temple of Minerva, +this is not inconsistent with our purpose; but the presumption of +intending to produce here a similar work of art and splendor should +not be laid to our charge. The name of the place may be understood +as symbolizing what might have happened there; one may expect +conversations and discussions such as would perhaps not be unworthy of +that place. + +Are not thinkers, scholars, artists, in their best hours allured to +those regions, to dwell (at least in imagination) among a people to +whom a perfection which we desire but never attain was natural, +among whom in the course of time and life, a culture developed in a +beautiful continuity, which to us appears only in passing fragments? +What modern nation does not owe its artistic culture to the Greeks, +and, in certain branches, what nation more than the German? + +So much by way of excuse for the symbolic title, if indeed an excuse +be necessary. May the title be a reminder that we are to depart as +little as possible from classic ground; may it, through its brevity +and signification, modify the demands of the friends of art whom +we hope to interest through the present work, which is to contain +observations and reflections concerning Nature and Art by a harmonious +circle of friends. + +He who is called to be an artist will give careful heed to everything +around him; objects and their parts will attract his attention, and +by making practical use of such experience he will gradually train +himself to observe more sharply. He will, in his early career, apply +everything, so far as possible, to his own advantage; later he will +gladly make himself serviceable to others. Thus we also hope to +present and relate to our readers many things which we regard as +useful and agreeable, things which, under various circumstances, have +been noted by us during a number of years. + +But who will not willingly agree that pure observation is more rare +than is believed? We are apt to confuse our sensations, our opinion, +our judgment, with what we experience, so that we do not remain +long in the passive attitude of the observer, but soon go on to make +reflections; and upon these no greater weight can be placed than may +be more or less justified by the nature and quality of our individual +intellects. + +In this matter we are able to gain stronger confidence from our +harmony with others, and from the knowledge that we do not think and +work alone, but in common. The perplexing doubt whether our method +of thought belongs only to us--a doubt which often comes over us when +others express the direct opposite of our convictions--is softened, +even dispelled, when we find ourselves in agreement with others; only +then do we go on rejoicing with assurance in the possession of those +principles which a long experience, on our own part and on the part of +others, has gradually confirmed. + +When several persons thus live united, so that they may call one +another friends, because they have a common interest in bringing about +their progressive cultivation and in advancing towards closely related +aims, then they may be certain that they will meet again in the most +varied ways, and that even the courses which seemed to separate them +from one another will nevertheless soon bring them happily together +again. + +Who has not experienced what advantages are afforded in such cases by +conversation? But conversation is ephemeral; and while the results +of a mutual development are imperishable, the memory of the means by +which it was reached disappears. Letters preserve better the stages of +a progress which friends achieve together; every moment of growth is +fixed, and if the result attained affords us agreeable satisfaction, +a look backward at the process of development is instructive since it +permits its to hope for an unflagging advance in the future. + +Short papers, in which are set down from time to time one's thoughts, +convictions, and wishes, in order to find entertainment in one's past +self after a lapse of time, are excellent auxiliary means for +the development of oneself and of others, none of which should be +neglected when one considers the brief period allotted to life and the +many obstacles that stand in the way of every advance. + +It is self evident that we are talking here particularly of an +exchange of ideas between such friends as are striving for cultivation +in the sphere of science and art; although life in the world of +affairs and industry should not lack similar advantages. + +In the arts and sciences, however, in addition to this close +association among their votaries, a relation to the public is as +favorable as it is necessary. Whatever of universal interest one +thinks or accomplishes belongs to the world, and the world brings to +maturity whatever it can utilize of the efforts of the individual. The +desire for approval which the author feels is an impulse implanted by +Nature to draw him toward something higher; he thinks he has attained +the laurel wreath, but soon becomes aware that a more laborious +training of every native talent is necessary in order to retain the +public favor; though it may be attained for a short moment through +fortune or accident also. + +The relation of the author to his public is important in his early +period; even in later days he cannot dispense with it. However little +he may be fitted to teach others, he wishes to share his thoughts with +those whom he feels congenial, but who are scattered far and wide in +the world. By this means he wishes to re-establish his relation with +his old friends, to continue it with new ones, and to gain in the +younger generation still others for the remainder of his life. He +wishes to spare youth the circuitous paths upon which he himself +went astray, and while observing and utilizing the advantages of the +present, to maintain the memory of his praiseworthy earlier efforts. + +With this serious view, a small society has been brought together; may +cheerfulness attend our undertakings, and time may show whither we are +bound. + +The papers which we intend to present, though they are composed by +several authors, will, it is hoped, never be contradictory in the main +points, even though the methods of thought may not be the same in all. +No two persons regard the world in exactly the same way, and different +characters will often apply in different ways a principle which +they all acknowledge. Indeed, a person is not always consistent with +himself in his views and judgments: early convictions must give way to +later ones. The individual opinions that a man holds and expresses may +stand all tests or not; the main thing is that he continue on his way, +true to himself and to others! + +Much as the authors wish and hope to be in harmony with one another +and with a large part of the public, they must not shut their eyes to +the fact that from various quarters many a discord will ring out. +They must expect this all the more since they differ from prevailing +opinions in more than one point. Though far from wishing to dominate +or change the way of thinking of a third person, still they will +firmly express their own opinion, and, as circumstances dictate, will +avoid or take tip a quarrel. On the whole, however, they will adhere +to one creed, and especially will they repeat again and again those +conditions which seem to them indispensable in the training of an +artist. Whoever takes an interest in this matter, must be ready to +take sides; otherwise he does not deserve to be effective anywhere. + +If, therefore, we promise to present reflections and observations +concerning Nature, we must at the same time indicate that these +remarks will chiefly have reference, first, to plastic art; then, to +art in general; finally, to the general training of the artist. + +The highest demand that is made on an artist is this: that he be +true to Nature, study her, imitate her, and produce something that +resembles her phenomena. How great, how enormous, this demand is, +is not always kept in mind; and the true artist himself learns it by +experience only, in the course of his progressive development. Nature +is separated from Art by an enormous chasm, which genius itself is +unable to bridge without external assistance. + +All that we perceive around us is merely raw material; if it happens +rarely enough that an artist, through instinct and taste, through +practice and experiment, reaches the point of attaining the beautiful +exterior of things, of selecting the best from the good before him, +and of producing at least an agreeable appearance, it is still more +rare, particularly in modern times, for an artist to penetrate into +the depths of things as well as into the depths of his own soul, +in order to produce in his works not only something light and +superficially effective, but, as a rival of Nature, to produce +something spiritually organic, and to give his work of art a content +and a form through which it appears both natural and beyond Nature. + +Man is the highest, the characteristic subject of plastic art; +to understand him, to extricate oneself from the labyrinth of his +anatomy, a general knowledge of organic nature is imperative. The +artist should also acquaint himself theoretically with inorganic +bodies and with the general operations of Nature, particularly if, as +in the case of sound and color, they are adaptable to the purposes +of art; but what a circuitous path he would be obliged to take if +he wanted to seek laboriously in the schools of the anatomist, the +naturalist, and the physicist, for that which serves his purposes! It +is, indeed, a question whether he would find there what must be most +important for him. Those men have the entirely different needs of +their own pupils to satisfy, so that they cannot be expected to think +of the limited and special needs of the artist. For that reason it is +our intention to take a hand, and, even though we cannot see prospects +of completing the necessary work ourselves, both to give a view of the +whole and to begin the elaboration of details. + +The human figure cannot be understood merely through observation +of its surface; the interior must be laid bare, its parts must be +separated, the connections perceived, the differences noted, action +and reaction observed, the concealed, constant, and fundamental +elements of the phenomena impressed on the mind, if one really wishes +to contemplate and imitate what moves before our eyes in living waves +as a beautiful, undivided whole. A glance at the surface of a living +being confuses the observer; we may cite here, as in other cases, +the true proverb, "One sees only what one knows" For just as a +short-sighted man sees more clearly an object from which he draws +back than one to which he draws near, because his intellectual vision +comes to his aid, so the perfection of observation really depends on +knowledge. How well an expert naturalist, who can also draw, imitates +objects by recognizing and emphasizing the important and significant +parts from which is derived the character of the whole! + +Just as the artist is greatly helped by an exact knowledge of the +separate parts of the human figure, which he must in the end regard +again as a whole, so a general view, a side glance at related objects, +is highly advantageous, provided the artist is capable of rising to +Ideas and of grasping the close relationship of things apparently +remote. Comparative anatomy has prepared a general conception of +organic creatures; it leads us from form to form, and by observing +organisms closely or distantly related, we rise above them all to see +their characteristics in an ideal picture. If we keep this picture in +mind, we find that in observing objects our attention takes a definite +direction, that scattered facts can be learned and retained more +easily by comparison, that in the practice of art we can finally +vie with Nature only when we have learned from her, at least to some +extent, her method of procedure in the creation of her works. + +Furthermore, we would encourage the artist to gain knowledge also of +the inorganic world; this can be done all the more easily since now we +can conveniently and quickly acquire knowledge of the mineral kingdom. +The painter needs some knowledge of stones in order to imitate their +characteristics; the sculptor and architect, in order to utilize them; +the cutter of precious stones cannot be without a knowledge of +their nature; the connoisseur and amateur, too, will strive for such +information. + +Now that we have advised the artist to gain a conception of the +general operations of Nature, in order to become acquainted with those +which particularly interest him, partly to develop himself in more +directions, partly to understand better that which concerns him; we +shall add a few further remarks on this significant point. + +Up to the present the painter has been able merely to wonder at the +physicist's theory of colors, without gaining any advantage from it. +The natural feeling of the artist, however, constant training, and a +practical necessity led him into a way of his own. He felt the vivid +contrasts out of the union of which harmony of color arises, he +designated certain characteristics through approximate sensations, he +had warm and cold colors, colors which express proximity, others which +express distance, and what not; and thus in his own way he brought +these phenomena closer to the most general laws of Nature. Perhaps the +supposition is confirmed that the operations of Nature in colors, as +well as magnetic, electric, and other operations, depend upon a mutual +relation, a polarity, or whatever else we might call the twofold or +manifold aspects of a distinct unity. + +We shall make it our duty to present this matter in detail and in a +form comprehensible to the artist; and we can be the more hopeful of +doing something welcome to him, since we shall be concerned only with +explaining and tracing to fundamental principles things which he has +hitherto done by instinct. + +So much for what we hope to impart in regard to Nature; now for what +is most necessary in regard to Art. + +Since the arrangement of this work proposes the presentation of single +treatises, some of these only in part, and since it is not our desire +to dissect a whole, but rather to build up a whole from many parts, +it will be necessary to present, as soon as possible and in a general +summary, those thing's which the reader will gradually find unfolded +in our detailed elaborations. We shall, therefore, be occupied first +with an essay on plastic art, in which the familiar rubrics will be +presented according to our interpretation and method. Here it will be +our main concern to emphasize the importance of every branch of Art, +and to show that the artist must not neglect a single one, as has +unfortunately often happened, and still happens. + +Hitherto we have regarded Nature as the treasure chamber of material +in general; now, however, we reach the important point where it is +shown how Art prepares its materials for itself. + +When the artist takes any object of Nature, the object no longer +belongs to Nature; indeed, we can say that the artist creates the +object in that moment, by extracting from it all that is significant, +characteristic, interesting, or rather by putting into it a +higher value. In this way finer proportions, nobler forms, higher +characteristics are, as it were, forced upon the human figure; the +circle of regularity, perfection, signification, and completeness is +drawn, in which Nature gladly places her best possessions even though +elsewhere in her vast extent she easily degenerates into ugliness and +loses herself in indifference. + +The same is true of composite works of art, of their subject and +content, whether the theme be fable or history. Happy the artist who +makes no mistake in undertaking the work, who knows how to choose, or +rather to determine what is suitable for art! He who wanders uneasily +among scattered myths and far-stretching history in search of a +theme, he who wishes to be significantly scholarly or allegorically +interesting, will often be checked in the midst of his work by +unexpected obstacles, or will miss his finest aim after the completion +of the work. He who does not speak clearly to the senses, will not +address himself clearly to the mind; and we regard this point as so +important that we insert at the very outset a more extended discussion +of it. + +A theme having been happily found or invented, it is subjected to +treatment which we would divide into the spiritual the sensuous, and +the mechanical. The spiritual develops the subject according to its +inner relations, it discovers subordinate motives; and, if we can at +all judge the depth of ar artistic genius by the choice of subject, +we can recognize in his selection of themes his breadth, wealth, +fullness, and power of attraction. The sensuous treatment we +should define as that through which the work becomes thoroughly +comprehensible to the senses, agreeable, delightful, and irresistible +through its gentle charm. The mechanical treatment, finally, is that +which works upon given material through any bodily organ, and thus +brings the work into existence and gives it reality. + +While we hope to be useful to the artist in this way, and earnestly +wish that he may avail himself of advice and of suggestions in +his work, the disquieting observation is forced upon us that every +undertaking, like every man, is likely to suffer just as much from its +period as it is to derive occasional advantage from it, and in our +own case we cannot altogether put aside the question concerning the +reception we are likely to meet with. + +Everything is subject to constant change, and since certain things +cannot exist side by side, they displace one another This is true of +kinds of knowledge, of certain methods of instruction, of methods of +representation, and of maxims. The aims of men remain nearly always +the same: they still desire to become good artists or poets as they +did centuries ago; but the means through which the goal is reached are +not clear to everybody, and why should it be denied that nothing +would be more agreeable than to be able to carry out joyfully a great +design? + +Naturally the public has a great influence upon Art, since in +return for its approval and its money it demands work that may give +satisfaction and immediate enjoyment; and the artist will for the +most part be glad to adapt himself to it, for he also is a part of the +public, he has received his training during the same years, he feels +the same needs, strives in the same direction, and thus moves along +happily with the multitude which supports him and which is invigorated +by him. In this matter we see whole nations and epochs delighted by +their artists, just as the artist sees himself reflected in his nation +and his epoch, without either having even the slightest suspicion +that their path might not be right, that their taste might be at least +one-sided, their art on the decline, and their progress in the wrong +direction. + +Instead of proceeding to further generalities on this point, we shall +make a remark which refers particularly to plastic art. + +For the German artist, in fact for modern and northern artists in +general, it is difficult--indeed almost impossible--to make the +transition from formless matter to form, and to maintain himself at +that point, even should he succeed in reaching it. Let every artist +who has lived for a time in Italy ask himself whether the presence of +the best works of ancient and modern art have not aroused in him +the incessant endeavour to study and imitate the human figure in its +proportions, forms, and characteristics, to apply all diligence and +care in the execution in order to approach those artistic works, so +entirely complete in themselves, in order to produce a work which, in +gratifying the sense, exalts the spirit to the greatest heights. Let +him also admit, however, that after his return he must gradually relax +his efforts, because he finds few persons who will really see, enjoy, +and comprehend what is depicted, but, for the most part, finds only +those who look at a work superficially, receive from it mere random +impressions, and in some way of their own try to get out of it any +kind of sensation and pleasure. + +The worst picture can appeal to our senses and imagination by arousing +their activity, setting them free, and leaving them to themselves, the +best work of art also appeals to our senses, but in a higher language +which, of course, we must understand; it enchains the feelings and +imagination, it deprives us of caprice, we cannot deal with a perfect +work at our will; we are forced to give ourselves up to it, in order +to receive ourselves from it again, exalted and refined. + +That these are no dreams we shall try to show gradually, in detail, +and as clearly as possible, we shall call attention particularly to a +contradiction in which the moderns are often involved. They call +the ancients their teachers, they acknowledge in their works an +unattainable excellence, yet they depart both in theory and practice +far from the maxims which the ancients continually observed. In +starting from this important point and in returning to it often, we +shall find others about which something falls to be said. + +One of the principal signs of the decay of art is the mixture of its +various kinds. The arts themselves, as well as their branches, are +related to one another, and have a certain tendency to unite, even to +lose themselves in one another; but it is in this that the duty, the +merit, the dignity of the real artist consists, namely, in being able +to separate the field of art in which he works from others, in placing +every art and every branch of art on its own footing, and in isolating +it as far as possible. + +It has been noticed that all plastic art strives toward painting, all +literary art toward the drama, and this observation may in the future +give us occasion for important reflections. + +The genuine law-giving artist strives for the truth of art, the +lawless artist who follows a blind impulse strives for the reality of +Nature; through the former, art reaches its highest summit, through +the latter its lowest stage. + +What holds good of art in general holds good also of the kinds of art. +The sculptor must think and feel differently from the painter, indeed +he must proceed when he wishes to produce a work in relief, in a +different fashion from that which he will employ for a work in the +round. By the raising of low reliefs higher and higher, by the making +of various parts and figures stand out completely, and finally by the +adding of buildings and landscapes, so that work was produced which +was half painting and half puppet-show, true art steadily declined. +Excellent artists of modern times have unfortunately pursued this +course. + +When in the future we express such maxims as we think sound, we should +like, since they are deduced from works of art, to have them put +to the test of practice by the artist. How rarely one can come to a +theoretical agreement with anyone else on a fundamental principle. +That which is applicable and useful, on the other hand, is decided +upon much more quickly. How often we see artists in embarrassment over +the choice of subjects, over the general type of composition adapted +to their art, and the detailed arrangement; how often the painter over +the choice of colors! Then is the time to test a principle, then will +it he easier to decide whether it is bringing us closer to the great +models and to everything that we value and love in them, or whether it +leaves us entangled in the empirical confusion of an experience that +has not been sufficiently thought out. + +If such maxims hold good in training: the artist, in guiding him +in many an embarrassment, they will serve also in the development, +valuation, and judgment of old and new works of art, and will in turn +arise from an observation of these works. Indeed, it is all the more +necessary to adhere to this, because, notwithstanding the universally +praised excellences of antiquity, individuals and whole nations +among the moderns often fail to recognize wherein lies the highest +excellence of those works. + +An exact test will protect us best from this evil. For that reason let +us cite only one example to show what usually happens to the amateur +in plastic art, so that we may make clear how necessary it is that +criticism of ancient as well as modern works should be exact if it is +to be of any use. + +Upon him who has an eye for beauty, though untrained, even a blurred, +imperfect plaster cast of an excellent antique will always have a +great effect; for in such a reproduction there always remain the idea, +the simplicity and greatness of form, in short, the general outlines; +as much, at all events, as one could perceive with poor eyes at a +distance. + +It may be noticed that a strong inclination toward art is often +enkindled by such quite imperfect reproductions. But the effect is +like the object; it is rather that an obscure indefinite feeling is +aroused, than that the object in all its worth and dignity really +appears to such beginners in art. These are they who usually express +the theory that too minute a critical investigation destroys the +enjoyment, who are accustomed to oppose and resist regard for details. + +If gradually, however, after further experience and training, they +are confronted with a sharp cast instead of a blurred one, an original +instead of a cast, their pleasure grows with their insight, and +increases when the originals themselves, the perfect originals, +finally become known to them. + +The labyrinth of exact observations is willingly entered when the +details as well as the whole are perfect; indeed one learns to realize +that the excellences can be appreciated only in proportion as the +defects are perceived. To discriminate the restoration from the +genuine parts, and the copy from the original, to see in the smallest +fragments the ruined glory of the whole--this is the joy of the +finished expert; and there is a great difference between observing and +comprehending an imperfect whole with obscured vision, and a perfect +whole with clear vision. + +He who concerns himself with any branch of knowledge, should strive +for the highest! Insight is different from practice, for in practical +work everyone must soon resign himself to the fact that only a certain +measure of strength is alloted to him; far more people, however, +are capable of knowledge and insight. Indeed, one may well say that +everyone is thus capable who can deny himself and subordinate himself +to external objects, everyone who does not strive with rigid and +narrow-minded obstinacy to impose upon the highest works of Nature and +Art his own personality and his petty onesideness. + +To speak of works of art fitly and with true benefit to oneself and +others, the discussion should take place only in the presence of the +works themselves. Everything depends on the objects being in view; on +whether something absolutely definite is suggested by the word with +which one hopes to illuminate the work of art; for, otherwise, nothing +is thought of at all. This is why it so often happens that the writer +on art dwells merely on generalities, through which, indeed, ideas and +sensations are aroused in all readers, but no satisfaction is given to +the man who, book in hand, steps in front of the work of art itself. +Precisely on this account, however, we may in several essays be in a +position to arouse rather than to satisfy the desire of the readers; +for nothing is more natural than that they should wish to have before +their eyes immediately an excellent work of art which is minutely +dissected, in order to enjoy the whole which we are discussing, and, +so far as the parts are concerned, to subject to their own judgment +the opinion which they read. + +While the authors, however, write on the assumption that their readers +either have seen the works, or will see them in the future, yet they +hope to do everything in their power for those who are in neither +case. We shall mention reproductions, shall indicate where casts of +antique works of art and antique works themselves are accessible, +particularly to Germans; and thus try, as far as we can, to minister +to the genuine love and knowledge of art. + +A history of art can be based only upon the highest and most detailed +comprehension of art; only when one knows the finest things that man +can produce can one trace the psychological and chronological course +taken in art, as in other fields. This course began with a limited +activity, busied about a dry and even gloomy imitation of the +insignificant as well as the significant, whence developed a more +amiable, more kindly feeling toward Nature, till finally, under +favorable circumstances, accompanied by knowledge, regularity, +seriousness, and severity, art rose to its height. There at last it +became possible for the fortunate genius, surrounded by all these +auxiliaries, to produce the charming and the complete. + +Unfortunately, however, works of art with such ease of expression, +which instil into man cheerfulness, freedom, and a pleasant feeling of +his own personality, arouse in the striving artist the idea that the +process of production is also agreeable. Since the pinnacle of what +art and genius produce is an appearance of ease, the artists who come +after are tempted to make things easy for themselves, and to work for +the sake of appearances. Thus art gradually declines from its high +position, as to the whole as well as details. But if we wish to gain +a fair conception, we must come down to details of details, an +occupation not always agreeable or charming, but by and by richly +rewarded with a more certain view of the whole. + +If the experience of observing ancient and mediaeval works of art has +shown us that certain maxims hold good we need these most of all +in judging the most recent modern productions; for, since personal +relations, love and hatred of individuals, favor or disfavor of the +multitude so easily enter into the valuation of living or recently +deceased artists, we are in all the more need of principles in order +to pass judgment on our contemporaries. The inquiry can be conducted +in two ways: by diminishing the influence of caprice; by bringing the +question before a higher tribunal. The principle can be tested as +well as its application; and even if we should not agree, the point in +dispute can still be definitely and clearly pointed out. + +Especially should we wish that the vivifying artist, in whose works +we might perhaps have found something to remember, might test our +judgments carefully in this way; for everyone who deserves this +name is forced in our times to form, as a result of his work and his +reflections, a theory, or at least a certain conception of theoretical +means, by the use of which he gets along tolerably well in a variety +of cases. It will often be noticed, however, that in this way he +sets up as laws such maxims as are in accordance with his talent, +his inclination, and his convenience. He is subject to a fate that is +common to all mankind. How many act in this very way in other fields! +But we are not cultivating ourselves when we merely set in motion with +ease and convenience that which lies in us. Every artist, like every +man, is only an individual, and will always lean to one side. For that +reason, man should pursue so far as possible, both theoretically and +practically, that which is contrary to his nature. Let the easy-going +seek what is serious and severe; let the stern keep before his +eyes the light and agreeable; the strong, loveliness; the amiable, +strength; and everyone will develop his own nature the more, the +farther he seems to remove himself from it. Every art requires the +whole man; the highest possible degree of art requires all mankind. + +The practice of the plastic arts is mechanical, and the training of +the artist rightly begins in his earliest youth with the mechanical +side; the rest of his education, on the other hand, is often +neglected, for it ought to be far more careful than the training of +others who have opportunity of deriving advantage from life itself. +Society soon makes a rough person courteous, a business life makes the +most simple person prudent; literary labors, which through print come +before a great public, find opposition and correction everywhere; +only the plastic artist is, for the most part, limited to a lonely +workshop; he has dealings almost solely with the man who orders +and pays for his labor, with a public which frequently follows only +certain morbid impressions, with connoisseurs who make him restless, +with auctioneers who receive every new work with praise and estimates +of value such as would fitly honor the most superlative production. + +But it is time to conclude this introduction lest it anticipate and +forestall the work, instead of merely preceding it. We have so far at +least designated the point from which we intend to set out; how far +our views can and will spread, must at first develop gradually. The +theory and criticism of literary art will, we hope, soon occupy us; +and whatever life, travel, and daily events suggest to us, shall not +be excluded. In closing, let us say a word on an important concern of +this moment. + +For the training of the artist, for the enjoyment of the friend of +art, it was from time immemorial of the greatest significance in what +place the works of art happened to be. There was a time when, except +for slight changes of location, they remained for the most part in +one place; now, however, a great change has occurred, which will +have important consequences for art in general and in particular. +At present we have perhaps more cause than ever to regard Italy as a +great storehouse of art--as it still was until recently. When it is +possible to give a general review of it, then it will be shown what +the world lost at the moment when so many parts were torn from this +great and ancient whole. + +What was destroyed in the very act of tearing away will probably +remain a secret forever; but a description of the new storehouse that +is being formed in Paris will be possible in a few years. Then the +method by which an artist and a lover of art is to use France and +Italy can be indicated; and a further important and fine question will +arise: what are other nations, particularly Germany and England, to +do in this period of scattering and loss, to make generally useful the +manifold and widely strewn treasures of art--a task requiring the true +cosmopolitan mind which is found perhaps nowhere purer than in the +arts and sciences? And what are they to do to help to form an ideal +storehouse, which in the course of time may perhaps happily compensate +us for what the present moment tears away when it does not destroy? + +So much in general of the purpose of a work in which we desire many +earnest and friendly sympathizers. + + +[Footnote A: The Propylaen was a periodical founded in July, 1798, by +Goethe and his friend Heinrich Meyer. During its short existence of +three years, there were published in it, besides the writings of the +editors, short contributions by Schiller and Humboldt. Its purpose was +to spread sound ideas about the aims and methods of art, and in this +notable introduction Goethe set forth with clearness and profundity +his fundamental ideas on these subjects. The present translation has +been made expressly for the Harvard Classics.] + + + + +PREFACES TO VARIOUS VOLUMES OF POEMS + +BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH[A] + +ADVERTISEMENT TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1798) + + +It is the honourable characteristic of Poetry that its materials are +to be found in every subject which can interest the human mind. The +evidence of this fact is to be sought, not in the writings of Critics, +but in those of Poets themselves. + +The majority of the following poems are to be considered as +experiments. They were written chiefly with a view to ascertain how +far the language of conversation in the middle and lower classes +of society is adapted to the purposes of poetic pleasure. Readers +accustomed to the gaudiness and inane phraseology of many modern +writers, if they persist in reading this book to its conclusion, will +perhaps frequently have to struggle with feelings of strangeness and +awkwardness: they will look round for poetry, and will be induced to +inquire by what species of courtesy these attempts can be permitted +to assume that title. It is desirable that such readers, for their +own sakes, should not suffer the solitary word Poetry, a word of very +disputed meaning, to stand in the way of their gratification; but +that, while they are perusing this book, they should ask themselves if +it contains a natural delineation of human passions, human characters, +and human incidents; and if the answer be favourable to the author's +wishes, that they should consent to be pleased in spite of that most +dreadful enemy to our pleasures, our own pre-established codes of +decision. + +Readers of superior judgement may disapprove of the style in which +many of these pieces are executed; it must be expected that many lines +and phrases will not exactly suit their taste. It will perhaps appear +to them, that wishing to avoid the prevalent fault of the day, +the author has sometimes descended too low, and that many of his +expressions are too familiar, and not of sufficient dignity. It is +apprehended that the more conversant the reader is with our elder +writers, and with those in modern times who have been the most +successful in painting manners and passions, the fewer complaints of +this kind will he have to make. + +An accurate taste in poetry, and in all the other arts, Sir Joshua +Reynolds has observed, is an acquired talent, which can only be +produced by severe thought, and a long continued intercourse with the +best models of composition. This is mentioned not with so ridiculous +a purpose as to prevent the most inexperienced reader from judging for +himself; but merely to temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest +that if poetry be a subject on which much time has not been bestowed, +the judgement may be erroneous, and that in many cases it necessarily +will be so. + +The tale of _Goody Blake and Harry Gill_ is founded on a +well-authenticated fact which happened in Warwickshire. Of the other +poems in the collection, it may be proper to say that they are either +absolute inventions of the author, or facts which took place within +his personal observation or that of his friends. The poem of _The +Thorn_, as the reader will soon discover, is not supposed to be spoken +in the author's own person: the character of the loquacious narrator +will sufficiently show itself in the course of the story. _The Rime +of the Ancyent Marinere_ was professedly written in imitation of the +_style_, as well as of the spirit of the elder poets; but with a few +exceptions, the Author believes that the language adopted in it has +been equally intelligible for these three last centuries. The lines +entitled _Expostulation and Reply_, and those which follow, arose out +of conversation with a friend who was somewhat unreasonably attached +to modern books of moral philosophy. + + +[Footnote A: William Wordsworth (1770-1830), probably the greatest of +the poets of the Romantic Movement in England, was also foremost in +the critical defence of that movement. The Prefaces and Essays printed +here form a kind of manifesto of the reaction from the poetical +traditions of the eighteenth century; and contain besides some of the +soundest theorizing on the nature of poetry to be found in English. +They afford an interesting comparison with the parallel protest in +Victor Hugo's Preface to "Cromwell," to be found later in the volume.] + + + + +PREFACE TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1800) + + +The first volume of these Poems has already been submitted to general +perusal. It was published as an experiment, which, I hoped, might be +of some use to ascertain, how far, by fitting to metrical arrangement +a selection of the real language of men in a state of vivid sensation, +that sort of pleasure and that quantity of pleasure may be imparted, +which a Poet may rationally endeavour to impart. + +I had formed no very inaccurate estimate of the probable effect of +those Poems: I flattered myself that they who should be pleased with +them would read them with more than common pleasure: and, on the other +hand, I was well aware, that by those who should dislike them, they +would be read with more than common dislike. The result has differed +from my expectation in this only, that a greater number have been +pleased than I ventured to hope I should please. + + * * * * * + +Several of my Friends are anxious for the success of these Poems, from +a belief, that, if the views with which they were composed were +indeed realized, a class of Poetry would be produced, well adapted to +interest mankind permanently, and not unimportant in the quality, and +in the multiplicity of its moral relations: and on this account they +have advised me to prefix a systematic defence of the theory upon +which the Poems were written. But I was unwilling to undertake the +task, knowing that on this occasion the Reader would look coldly upon +my arguments, since I might be suspected of having been principally +influenced by the selfish and foolish hope of _reasoning_ him into an +approbation of these particular Poems: and I was still more unwilling +to undertake the task, because, adequately to display the opinions, +and fully to enforce the arguments, would require a space wholly +disproportionate to a preface. For, to treat the subject with the +clearness and coherence of which it is susceptible, it would be +necessary to give a full account of the present state of the public +taste in this country, and to determine how far this taste is healthy +or depraved; which, again, could not be determined, without pointing +out in what manner language and the human mind act and re-act on each +other, and without retracing the revolutions, not of literature alone, +but likewise of society itself. I have therefore altogether declined +to enter regularly upon this defence; yet I am sensible, that there +would be something like impropriety in abruptly obtruding upon the +Public, without a few words of introduction, Poems so materially +different from those upon which general approbation is at present +bestowed. + +It is supposed that by the act of writing in verse an Author makes +a formal engagement that he will gratify certain known habits of +association; that he not only thus apprises the Reader that certain +classes of ideas and expressions will be found in his book, but that +others will be carefully excluded. This exponent or symbol held forth +by metrical language must in different eras of literature have excited +very different expectations: for example, in the age of Catullus, +Terence, and Lucretius, and that of Statius or Claudian; and in our +own country, in the age of Shakespeare and Beaumont and Fletcher, and +that of Donne and Cowley, or Dryden, or Pope. I will not take upon +me to determine the exact import of the promise which, by the act of +writing in verse, an Author in the present day makes to his reader: +but it will undoubtedly appear to many persons that I have not +fulfilled the terms of an engagement thus voluntarily contracted. They +who have been accustomed to the gaudiness and inane phraseology of +many modern writers, if they persist in reading this book to its +conclusion, will, no doubt, frequently have to struggle with feelings +of strangeness and awawkwardnessthey will look round for poetry, and +will be induced to inquire by what species of courtesy these attempts +can be permitted to assume that title. I hope therefore the reader +will not censure me for attempting to state what I have proposed to +myself to perform; and also (as far as the limits of a preface will +permit) to explain some of the chief reasons which have determined +me in the choice of my purpose: that at least he may be spared +any unpleasant feeling of disappointment, and that I myself may be +protected from one of the most dishonourable accusations which can be +brought against an Author; namely, that of an indolence which prevents +him from endeavouring to ascertain what is his duty, or, when his duty +is ascertained, prevents him from performing it. + +The principal object, then, proposed in these Poems was to choose +incidents and situations from common life, and to relate or describe +them, throughout, as far as was possible in a selection of language +really used by men, and, at the same time, to throw over them a +certain colouring of imagination, whereby ordinary things should be +presented to the mind in an unusual aspect; and, further, and above +all, to make these incidents and situations interesting by tracing in +them, truly though not ostentatiously, the primary laws of our nature: +chiefly, as far as regards the manner in which we associate ideas in +a state of excitement. Humble and rustic life was generally chosen, +because, in that condition, the essential passions of the heart find +a better soil in which they can attain their maturity, are less under +restraint, and speak a plainer and more emphatic language; because in +that condition of life our elementary feelings coexist in a state +of greater simplicity, and, consequently, may be more accurately +contemplated, and more forcibly communicated; because the manners of +rural life germinate from those elementary feelings, and, from +the necessary character of rural occupations, are more easily +comprehended, and are more durable; and, lastly, because in that +condition the passions of men are incorporated with the beautiful and +permanent forms of nature. The language, too, of these men has been +adopted (purified indeed from what appear to be its real defects, from +all lasting and rational causes of dislike or disgust) because such +men hourly communicate with the best objects from which the best part +of language is originally derived; and because, from their rank in +society and the sameness and narrow circle of their intercourse, being +less under the influence of social vanity, they convey their feelings +and notions in simple and unelaborated expressions. Accordingly, such +a language, arising out of repeated experience and regular feelings, +is a more permanent, and a far more philosophical language, than that +which is frequently substituted for it by Poets, who think that they +are conferring honour upon themselves and their art, in proportion as +they separate themselves from the sympathies of men, and indulge in +arbitrary and capricious habits of expression, in order to +furnish food for fickle tastes, and fickle appetites, of their own +creation.[1] + +I cannot, however, be insensible to the present outcry against the +triviality and meanness, both of thought and language, which some of +my contemporaries have occasionally introduced into their metrical +compositions; and I acknowledge that this defect, where it exists, is +more dishonourable to the Writer's own character than false refinement +or arbitrary innovation, though I should contend at the same time, +that it is far less pernicious in the sum of its consequences. From +such verses the Poems in these volumes will be found distinguished +at least by one mark of difference, that each of them has a worthy +_purpose_. Not that I always began to write with a distinct purpose +formerly conceived; but habits of meditation have, I trust, so +prompted and regulated my feelings, that my descriptions of such +objects as strongly excite those feelings, will be found to carry +along with them a _purpose_. If this opinion be erroneous, I can +have little right to the name of a Poet. For all good poetry is the +spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: and though this be true, +Poems to which any value can be attached were never produced on any +variety of subjects but by a man who, being possessed of more than +usual organic sensibility, had also thought long and deeply. For +our continued influxes of feeling are modified and directed by +our thoughts, which are indeed the representatives of all our past +feelings; and, as by contemplating the relation of these general +representatives to each other, we discover what is really important to +men, so, by the repetition and continuance of this act, our feelings +will be connected with important subjects, till at length, if we be +originally possessed of much sensibility, such habits of mind will be +produced, that, by obeying blindly and mechanically the impulses of +those habits, we shall describe objects, and utter sentiments, of +such a nature, and in such connexion with each other, that the +understanding of the Reader must necessarily be in some degree +enlightened, and his affections strengthened and purified. + +It has been said that each of these poems has a purpose. Another +circumstance must be mentioned which distinguishes these Poems from +the popular Poetry of the day; it is this, that the feeling therein +developed gives importance to the action and situation, and not the +action and situation to the feeling. + +A sense of false modesty shall not prevent me from asserting, that the +Reader's attention is pointed to this mark of distinction, far +less for the sake of these particular Poems than from the general +importance of the subject. The subject is indeed important! For the +human mind is capable of being excited without the application of +gross and violent stimulants; and he must have a very faint perception +of its beauty and dignity who does not know this, and who does not +further know, that one being is elevated above another, in proportion +as he possesses this capability. It has therefore appeared to me, that +to endeavour to produce or enlarge this capability is one of the best +services in which, at any period, a Writer can be engaged; but this +service, excellent at all times, is especially so at the present day. +For a multitude of causes, unknown to former times, are now acting +with a combined force to blunt the discriminating powers of the mind, +and, unfitting it for all voluntary exertion, to reduce it to a state +of almost savage torpor. The most effective of these causes are the +great national events which are daily taking place, and the increasing +accumulation of men in cities, where the uniformity of their +occupations produces a craving for extraordinary incident, which the +rapid communication of intelligence hourly gratifies. To this tendency +of life and manners the literature and theatrical exhibitions of the +country have conformed themselves. The invaluable works of our elder +writers, I had almost said the works of Shakespeare and Milton, +are driven into neglect by frantic novels, sickly and stupid German +Tragedies, and deluges of idle and extravagant stories in verse.--When +I think upon this degrading thirst after outrageous stimulation, I am +almost ashamed to have spoken of the feeble endeavour made in these +volumes to counteract it; and, reflecting upon the magnitude of the +general evil, I should be oppressed with no dishonourable melancholy, +had I not a deep impression of certain inherent and indestructible +qualities of the human mind, and likewise of certain powers in the +great and permanent objects that act upon it, which are equally +inherent and indestructible; and were there not added to this +impression a belief, that the time is approaching when the evil will +be systematically opposed, by men of greater powers, and with far more +distinguished success. + +Having dwelt thus long on the subjects and aim of these Poems, I shall +request the Reader's permission to apprise him of a few circumstances +relating to their _style_, in order, among other reasons, that he may +not censure me for not having performed what I never attempted. The +Reader will find that personifications of abstract ideas rarely occur +in these volumes; and are utterly rejected, as an ordinary device +to elevate the style, and raise it above prose. My purpose was to +imitate, and, as far as possible, to adopt the very language of men; +and assuredly such personifications do not make any natural or +regular part of that language. They are, indeed, a figure of speech +occasionally prompted by passion, and I have made use of them as such; +but have endeavoured utterly to reject them as a mechanical device +of style, or as a family language which Writers in metre seem to lay +claim to by prescription. I have wished to keep the Reader in the +company of flesh and blood, persuaded that by so doing I shall +interest him. Others who pursue a different track will interest him +likewise; I do not interfere with their claim, but wish to prefer a +claim of my own. There will also be found in these volumes little of +what is usually called poetic diction; as much pains has been taken to +avoid it as is ordinarily taken to produce it; this has been done for +the reason already alleged, to bring my language near to the language +of men; and further, because the pleasure which I have proposed to +myself to impart, is of a kind very different from that which is +supposed by many persons to be the proper object of poetry. Without +being culpably particular, I do not know how to give my Reader a more +exact notion of the style in which it was my wish and intention to +write, than by informing him that I have at all times endeavoured to +look steadily at my subject; consequently, there is I hope in these +Poems little falsehood of description, and my ideas are expressed in +language fitted to their respective importance. Something must have +been gained by this practice, as it is friendly to one property of +all good poetry, namely, good sense: but it has necessarily cut me +off from a large portion of phrases and figures of speech which from +father to son have long been regarded as the common inheritance of +Poets. I have also thought it expedient to restrict myself still +further, having abstained from the use of many expressions, in +themselves proper and beautiful, but which have been foolishly +repeated by bad Poets, till such feelings of disgust are connected +with them as it is scarcely possible by any art of association to +overpower. + +If in a poem there should be found a series of lines, or even a single +line, in which the language, though naturally arranged, and according +to the strict laws of metre, does not differ from that of prose, there +is a numerous class of critics, who, when they stumble upon these +prosaisms, as they call them, imagine that they have made a notable +discovery, and exult over the Poet as over a man ignorant of his own +profession. Now these men would establish a canon of criticism which +the Reader will conclude he must utterly reject, if he wishes to be +pleased with these volumes. And it would be a most easy task to prove +to him, that not only the language of a large portion of every good +poem, even of the most elevated character, must necessarily, except +with reference to the metre, in no respect differ from that of good +prose, but likewise that some of the most interesting parts of the +best poems will be found to be strictly the language of prose +when prose is well written. The truth of this assertion might be +demonstrated by innumerable passages from almost all the poetical +writings, even of Milton himself. To illustrate the subject in a +general manner, I will here adduce a short composition of Gray, who +was at the head of those who, by their reasonings, have attempted to +widen the space of separation betwixt Prose and Metrical composition, +and was more than any other man curiously elaborate in the structure +of his own poetic diction. + + In vain to me the smiling mornings shine, + And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire; + The birds in vain their amorous descant join, + Or cheerful fields resume their green attire. + These ears, alas! for other notes repine; + _A different object do these eyes require; + My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine; + And in my breast the imperfect joys expire_; + Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer, + And new-born pleasure brings to happier men; + The fields to all their wonted tribute bear; + To warm their little loves the birds complain. + _I fruitless mourn to him that cannot hear, + And weep the more because I weep in vain._ + +It will easily be perceived, that the only part of this Sonnet +which is of any value is the lines printed in Italics; it is equally +obvious, that, except in the rhyme, and in the use of the single word +'fruitless' for fruitlessly, which is so far a defect, the language of +these lines does in no respect differ from that of prose. + +By the foregoing quotation it has been shown that the language +of Prose may yet be well adapted to Poetry; and it was previously +asserted, that a large portion of the language of every good poem can +in no respect differ from that of good Prose. We will go further. +It may be safely affirmed, that there neither is, nor can be, any +_essential_ difference between the language of prose and metrical +composition. We are fond of tracing the resemblance between Poetry and +Painting, and, accordingly, we call them Sisters: but where shall we +find bonds of connexion sufficiently strict to typify the affinity +betwixt metrical and prose composition? They both speak by and to the +same organs; the bodies in which both of them are clothed may be said +to be of the same substance, their affections are kindred, and almost +identical, not necessarily differing even in degree; Poetry[2] sheds +no tears 'such as Angels weep,' but natural and human tears; she can +boast of no celestial choir that distinguishes her vital juices from +those of prose; the same human blood circulates through the veins of +them both. + +If it be affirmed that rhyme and metrical arrangement of themselves +constitute a distinction which overturns what has just been said on +the strict affinity of metrical language with that of prose, and paves +the way for other artificial distinctions which the mind voluntarily +admits, I answer that the language of such Poetry as is here +recommended is, as far as is possible, a selection of the language +really spoken by men; that this selection, wherever it is made with +true taste and feeling, will of itself form a distinction far greater +than would at first be imagined, and will entirely separate the +composition from the vulgarity and meanness of ordinary life; and, if +metre be superadded thereto, I believe that a dissimilitude will be +produced altogether sufficient for the gratification of a rational +mind. What other distinction would we have? Whence is it to come? And +where is it to exist? Not, surely, where the Poet speaks through the +mouths of his characters: it cannot be necessary here, either for +elevation of style, or any of its supposed ornaments: for, if the +Poet's subject be judiciously chosen, it will naturally, and upon +fit occasion, lead him to passions the language of which, if selected +truly and judiciously, must necessarily be dignified and variegated, +and alive with metaphors and figures. I forbear to speak of an +incongruity which would shock the intelligent Reader, should the +Poet interweave any foreign splendour of his own with that which the +passion naturally suggests: it is sufficient to say that such addition +is unnecessary. And, surely, it is more probable that those passages, +which with propriety abound with metaphors and figures, will have +their due effect, if, upon other occasions where the passions are of a +milder character, the style also be subdued and temperate. + +But, as the pleasure which I hope to give by the Poems now presented +to the Reader must depend entirely on just notions upon this subject, +and, as it is in itself of high importance to our taste and moral +feelings, I cannot content myself with these detached remarks. And if, +in what I am about to say, it shall appear to some that my labour +is unnecessary, and that I am like a man fighting a battle without +enemies, such persons may be reminded, that, whatever be the language +outwardly holden by men, a practical faith in the opinions which I +am wishing to establish is almost unknown. If my conclusions are +admitted, and carried as far as they must be carried if admitted at +all, our judgements concerning the works of the greatest Poets +both ancient and modern will be far different from what they are +at present, both when we praise, and when we censure: and our moral +feelings influencing and influenced by these judgements will, I +believe, be corrected and purified. + +Taking up the subject, then, upon general grounds, let me ask, what +is meant by the word Poet? What is a Poet? To whom does he address +himself? And what language is to be expected from him?--He is a +man speaking to men: a man, it is true, endowed with more lively +sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness, who has a greater +knowledge of human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than are +supposed to be common among mankind; a man pleased with his own +passions and volitions, and who rejoices more than other men in the +spirit of life that is in him; delighting to contemplate similar +volitions and passions as manifested in the goings-on of the Universe, +and habitually impelled to create them where he does not find them. +To these qualities he has added a disposition to be affected more +than other men by absent things as if they were present; an ability of +conjuring up in himself passions, which are indeed far from being the +same as those produced by real events, yet (especially in those parts +of the general sympathy which are pleasing and delightful) do more +nearly resemble the passions produced by real events, than anything +which, from the motions of their own minds merely, other men are +accustomed to feel in themselves:--whence, and from practice, he has +acquired a greater readiness and power in expressing what he thinks +and feels, and especially those thoughts and feelings which, by +his own choice, or from the structure of his own mind, arise in him +without immediate external excitement. + +But whatever portion of this faculty we may suppose even the greatest +Poet to possess, there cannot be a doubt that the language which it +will suggest to him, must often, in liveliness and truth, fall +short of that which is uttered by men in real life, under the actual +pressure of those passions, certain shadows of which the Poet thus +produces, or feels to be produced, in himself. + +However exalted a notion we would wish to cherish of the character of +a Poet, it is obvious, that while he describes and imitates passions, +his employment is in some degree mechanical, compared with the freedom +and power of real and substantial action and suffering. So that it +will be the wish of the Poet to bring his feelings near to those of +the persons whose feelings he describes, nay, for short spaces of +time, perhaps, to let himself slip into an entire delusion, and even +confound and identify his own feelings with theirs; modifying only +the language which is thus suggested to him by a consideration that +he describes for a particular purpose, that of giving pleasure. Here, +then, he will apply the principle of selection which has been already +insisted upon. He will depend upon this for removing what would +otherwise be painful or disgusting in the passion; he will feel that +there is no necessity to trick out or to elevate nature: and, the more +industriously he applies this principle, the deeper will be his faith +that no words, which _his_ fancy or imagination can suggest, will +be to be compared with those which are the emanations of reality and +truth. + +But it may be said by those who do not object to the general spirit of +these remarks, that, as it is impossible for the Poet to produce upon +all occasions language as exquisitely fitted for the passion as that +which the real passion itself suggests, it is proper that he should +consider himself as in the situation of a translator, who does not +scruple to substitute excellencies of another kind for those which +are unattainable by him; and endeavours occasionally to surpass his +original, in order to make some amends for the general inferiority +to which he feels that he must submit. But this would be to encourage +idleness and unmanly despair. Further, it is the language of men +who speak of what they do not understand; who talk of Poetry as of a +matter of amusement and idle pleasure; who will converse with us as +gravely about a _taste_ for Poetry, as they express it, as if it were +a thing as indifferent as a taste for rope-dancing, or Frontiniac or +Sherry. Aristotle, I have been told, has said, that Poetry is the +most philosophic of all writing: it is so: its object is truth, not +individual and local, but general, and operative; not standing upon +external testimony, but carried alive into the heart by passion; truth +which is its own testimony, which gives competence and confidence +to the tribunal to which it appeals, and receives them from the same +tribunal. Poetry is the image of man and nature. The obstacles which +stand in the way of the fidelity of the Biographer and Historian, and +of their consequent utility, are incalculably greater than those which +are to be encountered by the Poet who comprehends the dignity of his +art. The Poet writes under one restriction only, namely, the necessity +of giving immediate pleasure to a human Being possessed of that +information which may be expected from him, not as a lawyer, a +physician, a mariner, an astronomer, or a natural philosopher, but +as a Man. Except this one restriction, there is no object standing +between the Poet and the image of things; between this, and the +Biographer and Historian, there are a thousand. + +Nor let this necessity of producing immediate pleasure be considered +as a degradation of the Poet's art. It is far otherwise. It is an +acknowledgement of the beauty of the universe, an acknowledgement the +more sincere, because not formal, but indirect; it is a task light and +easy to him who looks at the world in the spirit of love: further, it +is a homage paid to the native and naked dignity of man, to the grand +elementary principle of pleasure, by which he knows, and feels, +and lives, and moves. We have no sympathy but what is propagated by +pleasure: I would not be misunderstood; but wherever we sympathize +with pain, it will be found that the sympathy is produced and carried +on by subtle combinations with pleasure. We have no knowledge, that +is, no general principles drawn from the contemplation of particular +facts, but what has been built up by pleasure, and exists in us by +pleasure alone. The Man of science, the Chemist and Mathematician, +whatever difficulties and disgusts they may have had to struggle with, +know and feel this. However painful may be the objects with which the +Anatomist's knowledge is connected, he feels that his knowledge is +pleasure; and where he has no pleasure he has no knowledge. What then +does the Poet? He considers man and the objects that surround him as +acting and re-acting upon each other, so as to produce an infinite +complexity of pain and pleasure; he considers man in his own nature +and in his ordinary life as contemplating this with a certain quantity +of immediate knowledge, with certain convictions, intuitions, and +deductions, which from habit acquire the quality of intuitions; +he considers him as looking upon this complex scene of ideas and +sensations, and finding everywhere objects that immediately excite +in him sympathies which, from the necessities of his nature, are +accompanied by an overbalance of enjoyment. + +To this knowledge which all men carry about with them, and to these +sympathies in which, without any other discipline than that of our +daily life, we are fitted to take delight, the Poet principally +directs his attention. He considers man and nature as essentially +adapted to each other, and the mind of man as naturally the mirror of +the fairest and most interesting properties of nature. And thus the +Poet, prompted by this feeling of pleasure, which accompanies him +through the whole course of his studies, converses with general +nature, with affections akin to those, which, through labour and +length of time, the Man of science has raised up in himself, by +conversing with those particular parts of nature which are the objects +of his studies. The knowledge both of the Poet and the Man of science +is pleasure; but the knowledge of the one cleaves to us as a necessary +part of our existence, our natural and unalienable inheritance; the +other is a personal and individual acquisition, slow to come to +us, and by no habitual and direct sympathy connecting us with our +fellow-beings. The Man of science seeks truth as a remote and unknown +benefactor; he cherishes and loves it in his solitude: the Poet, +singing a song in which all human beings join with him, rejoices in +the presence of truth as our visible friend and hourly companion. +Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge; it is the +impassioned expression which is in the countenance of all Science. +Emphatically may it be said of the Poet, as Shakespeare hath said of +man, 'that he looks before and after.' He is the rock of defence for +human nature; an upholder and preserver, carrying everywhere with him +relationship and love. In spite of difference of soil and climate, of +language and manners, of laws and customs: in spite of things silently +gone out of mind, and things violently destroyed; the Poet binds +together by passion and knowledge the vast empire of human society, as +it is spread over the whole earth, and over all time. The objects of +the Poet's thoughts are everywhere; though the eyes and senses of man +are, it is true, his favourite guides, yet he will follow wheresoever +he can find an atmosphere of sensation in which to move his wings. +Poetry is the first and last of all knowledge--it is as immortal as +the heart of man. If the labours of Men of science should ever create +any material revolution, direct or indirect, in our condition, and in +the impressions which we habitually receive, the Poet will sleep then +no more than at present; he will be ready to follow the steps of the +Man of science, not only in those general indirect effects, but he +will be at his side, carrying sensation into the midst of the objects +of the science itself. The remotest discoveries of the Chemist, the +Botanist, or Mineralogist, will be as proper objects of the Poet's +art as any upon which it can be employed, if the time should ever come +when these things shall be familiar to us, and the relations under +which they are contemplated by the followers of these respective +sciences shall be manifestly and palpably material to us as enjoying +and suffering beings. If the time should ever come when what is now +called science, thus familiarized to men, shall be ready to put on, +as it were, a form of flesh and blood, the Poet will lend his divine +spirit to aid the transfiguration, and will welcome the Being thus +produced, as a dear and genuine inmate of the household of man.--It is +not, then, to be supposed that any one, who holds that sublime notion +of Poetry which I have attempted to convey, will break in upon the +sanctity and truth of his pictures by transitory and accidental +ornaments, and endeavour to excite admiration of himself by arts, the +necessity of which must manifestly depend upon the assumed meanness of +his subject. + +What has been thus far said applies to Poetry in general; but +especially to those parts of composition where the Poet speaks through +the mouths of his characters; and upon this point it appears to +authorize the conclusion, that there are few persons of good sense, +who would not allow that the dramatic parts of composition are +defective, in proportion as they deviate from the real language +of nature, and are coloured by a diction of the Poet's own, either +peculiar to him as an individual Poet or belonging simply to Poets +in general; to a body of men who, from the circumstance of their +compositions being in metre, it is expected will employ a particular +language. + +It is not, then, in the dramatic parts of composition that we look for +this distinction of language; but still it may be proper and necessary +where the Poet speaks to us in his own person and character. To this +I answer by referring the Reader to the description before given of a +Poet. Among the qualities there enumerated as principally conducing to +form a Poet, is implied nothing differing in kind from other men, but +only in degree. The sum of what was said is, that the Poet is chiefly +distinguished from other men by a greater promptness to think and +feel without immediate external excitement, and a greater power in +expressing such thoughts and feelings as are produced in him in that +manner. But these passions and thoughts and feelings are the general +passions and thoughts and feelings of men. And with what are +they connected? Undoubtedly with our moral sentiments and animal +sensations, and with the causes which excite these; with the +operations of the elements, and the appearances of the visible +universe; with storm and sunshine, with the revolutions of the +seasons, with cold and heat, with loss of friends and kindred, with +injuries and resentments, gratitude and hope, with fear and sorrow. +These, and the like, are the sensations and objects which the Poet +describes, as they are the sensations of other men, and the objects +which interest them. The Poet thinks and feels in the spirit of human +passions. How, then, can his language differ in any material degree +from that of all other men who feel vividly and see clearly? It might +be _proved_ that it is impossible. But supposing that this were not +the case, the Poet might then be allowed to use a peculiar language +when expressing his feelings for his own gratification, or that of +men like himself. But Poets do not write for Poets alone, but for men. +Unless therefore we are advocates for that admiration which subsists +upon ignorance, and that pleasure which arises from hearing what we do +not understand, the Poet must descend from this supposed height; and, +in order to excite rational sympathy, he must express himself as other +men express themselves. To this it may be added, that while he is only +selecting from the real language of men, or, which amounts to the same +thing, composing accurately in the spirit of such selection, he is +treading upon safe ground, and we know what we are to expect from him. +Our feelings are the same with respect to metre; for, as it may be +proper to remind the Reader, the distinction of metre is regular +and uniform, and not, like that which is produced by what is usually +called POETIC DICTION, arbitrary, and subject to infinite caprices +upon which no calculation whatever can be made. In the one case, the +Reader is utterly at the mercy of the Poet, respecting what imagery +or diction he may choose to connect with the passion; whereas, in the +other, the metre obeys certain laws, to which the Poet and Reader both +willingly submit because they are certain, and because no interference +is made by them with the passion, but such as the concurring testimony +of ages has shown to heighten and improve the pleasure which co-exists +with it. + +It will now be proper to answer an obvious question, namely, Why, +professing these opinions, have I written in verse? To this, in +addition to such answer as is included in what has been already said, +I reply, in the first place, Because, however I may have restricted +myself, there is still left open to me what confessedly constitutes +the most valuable object of all writing, whether in prose or verse; +the great and universal passions of men, the most general and +interesting of their occupations, and the entire world of nature +before me--to supply endless combinations of forms and imagery. Now, +supposing for a moment that whatever is interesting in these objects +may be as vividly described in prose, why should I be condemned for +attempting to superadd to such description the charm which, by the +consent of all nations, is acknowledged to exist in metrical language? +To this, by such as are yet unconvinced, it may he answered that +a very small part of the pleasure given by Poetry depends upon the +metre, and that it is injudicious to write in metre, unless it be +accompanied with the other artificial distinctions of style with which +metre is usually accompanied, and that, by such deviation, more will +be lost from the shock which will thereby be given to the Reader's +associations than will be counterbalanced by any pleasure which he can +derive from the general power of numbers. In answer to those who +still contend for the necessity of accompanying metre with certain +appropriate colours of style in order to the accomplishment of its +appropriate end, and who also, in my opinion, greatly underrate the +power of metre in itself, it might, perhaps, as far as relates to +these Volumes, have been almost sufficient to observe, that poems are +extant, written upon more humble subjects, and in a still more +naked and simple style, which have continued to give pleasure from +generation to generation. Now, if nakedness and simplicity be a +defect, the fact here mentioned affords a strong presumption that +poems somewhat less naked and simple are capable of affording pleasure +at the present day; and, what I wish _chiefly_ to attempt, at present, +was to justify myself for having written under the impression of this +belief. + +But various causes might be pointed out why, when the style is manly, +and the subject of some importance, words metrically arranged will +long continue to impart such a pleasure to mankind as he who proves +the extent of that pleasure will be desirous to impart. The end of +Poetry is to produce excitement in co-existence with an overbalance +of pleasure; but, by the supposition, excitement is an unusual and +irregular state of the mind; ideas and feelings do not, in that state, +succeed each other in accustomed order. If the words, however, by +which this excitement is produced be in themselves powerful, or the +images and feelings have an undue proportion of pain connected with +them, there is some danger that the excitement may be carried beyond +its proper bounds. Now the co-presence of something regular, something +to which the mind has been accustomed in various moods and in a +less excited state, cannot but have great efficacy in tempering and +restraining the passion by an inter-texture of ordinary feeling, and +of feeling not strictly and necessarily connected with the passion. +This is unquestionably true; and hence, though the opinion will +at first appear paradoxical, from the tendency of metre to divest +language, in a certain degree, of its reality, and thus to throw a +sort of half-consciousness of unsubstantial existence over the +whole composition, there can be little doubt but that more pathetic +situations and sentiments, that is, those which have a greater +proportion of pain connected with them, may be endured in metrical +composition, especially in rhyme, than in prose. The metre of the old +ballads is very artless; yet they contain many passages which would +illustrate this opinion; and, I hope, if the following Poems be +attentively perused, similar instances will be found in them. This +opinion may be further illustrated by appealing to the Reader's own +experience of the reluctance with which he comes to the re-perusal of +the distressful parts of _Clarissa Harlowe_, or _The Gamester_; while +Shakespeare's writings, in the most pathetic scenes, never act upon +us, as pathetic, beyond the bounds of pleasure--an effect which, in a +much greater degree than might at first be imagined, is to be ascribed +to small, but continual and regular impulses of pleasurable surprise +from the metrical arrangement.--On the other hand (what it must be +allowed will much more frequently happen) if the Poet's words should +be incommensurate with the passion, and inadequate to raise the Reader +to a height of desirable excitement, then (unless the Poet's choice of +his metre has been grossly injudicious), in the feelings of pleasure +which the Reader has been accustomed to connect with metre in general, +and in the feeling, whether cheerful or melancholy, which he has been +accustomed to connect with that particular movement of metre, there +will be found something which will greatly contribute to impart +passion to the words, and to effect the complex end which the Poet +proposes to himself. + +If I had undertaken a SYSTEMATIC defence of the theory here +maintained, it would have been my duty to develop the various causes +upon which the pleasure received from metrical language depends. Among +the chief of these causes is to be reckoned a principle which must +be well known to those who have made any of the Arts the object of +accurate reflection; namely, the pleasure which the mind derives from +the perception of similitude in dissimilitude. This principle is the +great spring of the activity of our minds, and their chief feeder. +From this principle the direction of the sexual appetite, and all the +passions connected with it, take their origin: it is the life of our +ordinary conversation; and upon the accuracy with which similitude in +dissimilitude, and dissimilitude in similitude are perceived, depend +our taste and our moral feelings. It would not be a useless employment +to apply this principle to the consideration of metre, and to show +that metre is hence enabled to afford much pleasure, and to point +out in what manner that pleasure is produced. But my limits will not +permit me to enter upon this subject, and I must content myself with a +general summary. + +I have said that poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful +feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in +tranquillity: the emotion is contemplated till, by a species of +reaction, the tranquillity gradually disappears, and an emotion, +kindred to that which was before the subject of contemplation, is +gradually produced, and does itself actually exist in the mind. In +this mood successful composition generally begins, and in a mood +similar to this it is carried on; but the emotion, of whatever kind, +and in whatever degree, from various causes, is qualified by various +pleasures, so that in describing any passions whatsoever, which are +voluntarily described, the mind will, upon the whole, be in a state +of enjoyment. If Nature be thus cautious to preserve in a state of +enjoyment a being so employed, the Poet ought to profit by the lesson +held forth to him, and ought especially to take care, that, whatever +passions he communicates to his Reader, those passions, if his +Reader's mind be sound and vigorous, should always be accompanied +with an overbalance of pleasure. Now the music of harmonious metrical +language, the sense of difficulty overcome, and the blind association +of pleasure which has been previously received from works of rhyme or +metre of the same or similar construction, an indistinct perception +perpetually renewed of language closely resembling that of real +life, and yet, in the circumstance of metre, differing from it so +widely--all these imperceptibly make up a complex feeling of delight, +which is of the most important use in tempering the painful feeling +always found intermingled with powerful descriptions of the deeper +passions. This effect is always produced in pathetic and impassioned +poetry; while, in lighter compositions, the ease and gracefulness +with which the Poet manages his numbers are themselves confessedly a +principal source of the gratification of the Reader. All that it is +_necessary_ to say, however, upon this subject, may he effected by +affirming, what few persons will deny, that, of two descriptions, +either of passions, manners, or characters, each of them equally well +executed, the one in prose and the other in verse, the verse will be +read a hundred times where the prose is read once. + +Having thus explained a few of my reasons for writing in verse, and +why I have chosen subjects from common life, and endeavoured to bring +my language near to the real language of men, if I have been too +minute in pleading my own cause, I have at the same time been treating +a subject of general interest; and for this reason a few words shall +be added with reference solely to these particular poems, and to some +defects which will probably be found in them. I am sensible that my +associations must have sometimes been particular instead of general, +and that, consequently, giving to things a false importance, I +may have sometimes written upon unworthy subjects; but I am less +apprehensive on this account, than that my language may frequently +have suffered from those arbitrary connexions of feelings and ideas +with particular words and phrases, from which no man can altogether +protect himself. Hence I have no doubt, that, in some instances, +feelings, even of the ludicrous, may be given to my Readers by +expressions which appeared to me tender and pathetic. Such faulty +expressions, were I convinced they were faulty at present, and that +they must necessarily continue to be so, I would willingly take +all reasonable pains to correct. But it is dangerous to make these +alterations on the simple authority of a few individuals, or even of +certain classes of men; for where the understanding of an Author is +not convinced, or his feelings altered, this cannot be done without +great injury to himself: for his own feelings are his stay and +support; and, if he set them aside in one instance, he may be induced +to repeat this act till his mind shall lose all confidence in itself, +and become utterly debilitated. To this it may be added, that the +critic ought never to forget that he is himself exposed to the same +errors as the Poet, and, perhaps, in a much greater degree: for +there can be no presumption in saying of most readers, that it is not +probable they will be so well acquainted with the various stages of +meaning through which words have passed, or with the fickleness or +stability of the relations of particular ideas to each other; and, +above all, since they are so much less interested in the subject, they +may decide lightly and carelessly. + +Long as the Reader has been detained, I hope he will permit me to +caution him against a mode of false criticism which has been applied +to Poetry, in which the language closely resembles that of life and +nature. Such verses have been triumphed over in parodies, of which Dr. +Johnson's stanza is a fair specimen:-- + + I put my hat upon my head + And walked into the Strand, + And there I met another man + Whose hat was in his hand. + +Immediately under these lines let us place one of the most justly +admired stanzas of the 'Babes in the Wood,' + + These pretty Babes with hand in hand + Went wandering up and down; + But never more they saw the Man + Approaching from the Town. + +In both these stanzas the words, and the order of the words, in no +respect differ from the most unimpassioned conversation. There are +words in both, for example, 'the Strand,' and 'the Town,' connected +with none but the most familiar ideas; yet the one stanza we admit +as admirable, and the other as a fair example of the superlatively +contemptible. Whence arises this difference? Not from the metre, not +from the language, not from the order of the words; but the _matter_ +expressed in Dr. Johnson's stanza is contemptible. The proper method +of treating trivial and simple verses, to which Dr. Johnson's stanza +would be a fair parallelism, is not to say, this is a bad kind of +poetry, or, this is not poetry; but, this wants sense; it is neither +interesting in itself nor can _lead_ to anything interesting; the +images neither originate in that sane state of feeling which arises +out of thought, nor can excite thought or feeling in the Reader. This +is the only sensible manner of dealing with such verses. Why trouble +yourself about the species till you have previously decided upon the +genus? Why take pains to prove than an ape is not a Newton, when it is +self-evident that he is not a man? + +One request I must make of my reader, which is, that in judging +these Poems he would decide by his own feelings genuinely, and not +by reflection upon what will probably be the judgement of others. +How common is it to hear a person say, I myself do not object to this +style of composition, or this or that expression, but, to such and +such classes of people it will appear mean or ludicrous! This mode +of criticism, so destructive of all sound unadulterated judgement, is +almost universal: let the Reader then abide, independently, by his own +feelings, and, if he finds himself affected, let him not suffer such +conjectures to interfere with his pleasure. + +If an Author, by any single composition, has impressed us with +respect for his talents, it is useful to consider this as affording +a presumption, that on other occasions where we have been displeased, +he, nevertheless, may not have written ill or absurdly; and further, +to give him so much credit for this one composition as may induce +us to review what has displeased us, with more care than we should +otherwise have bestowed upon it. This is not only an act of justice, +but, in our decisions upon poetry especially, may conduce, in a high +degree, to the improvement of our own taste; for an _accurate_ taste +in poetry, and in all the other arts, as Sir Joshua Reynolds has +observed, is an _acquired_ talent, which can only be produced by +thought and a long continued intercourse with the best models of +composition. This is mentioned, not with so ridiculous a purpose as to +prevent the most inexperienced Reader from judging for himself (I +have already said that I wish him to judge for himself), but merely to +temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest, that, if Poetry be a +subject on which much time has not been bestowed, the judgement may be +erroneous; and that, in many cases, it necessarily will be so. + +Nothing would, I know, have so effectually contributed to further the +end which I have in view, as to have shown of what kind the pleasure +is, and how that pleasure is produced, which is confessedly produced +by metrical composition essentially different from that which I have +here endeavoured to recommend: for the Reader will say that he has +been pleased by such composition; and what more can be done for him? +The power of any art is limited; and he will suspect, that, if it +be proposed to furnish him with new friends, that can be only upon +condition of his abandoning his old friends. Besides, as I have said, +the Reader is himself conscious of the pleasure which he has received +from such composition, composition to which he has peculiarly attached +the endearing name of Poetry; and all men feel an habitual gratitude, +and something of an honourable bigotry, for the objects which have +long continued to please them: we not only wish to be pleased, but to +be pleased in that particular way in which we have been accustomed +to be pleased. There is in these feelings enough to resist a host of +arguments; and I should be the less able to combat them successfully, +as I am willing to allow, that, in order entirely to enjoy the Poetry +which I am recommending, it would be necessary to give up much of what +is ordinarily enjoyed. But, would my limits have permitted me to point +out how this pleasure is produced, many obstacles might have been +removed, and the Reader assisted in perceiving that the powers of +language are not so limited as he may suppose; and that it is possible +for poetry to give other enjoyments, of a purer, more lasting, +and more exquisite nature. This part of the subject has not been +altogether neglected, but it has not been so much my present aim to +prove, that the interest excited by some other kinds of poetry is less +vivid, and less worthy of the nobler powers of the mind, as to offer +reasons for presuming, that if my purpose were fulfilled, a species of +poetry would be produced, which is genuine poetry; in its nature well +adapted to interest mankind permanently, and likewise important in the +multiplicity and quality of its moral relations. + +From what has been said, and from a perusal of the Poems, the Reader +will be able clearly to perceive the object which I had in view: he +will determine how far it has been attained; and, what is a much +more important question, whether it be worth attaining: and upon the +decision of these two questions will rest my claim to the approbation +of the Public. + + +[Footnote 1: It is worth while here to observe, that the affecting +parts of Chaucer are almost always expressed In language pure and +universally intelligible even to this day.] + +[Footnote 2: I here use the word 'Poetry' (though against my own +judgement) as opposed to the word Prose, and synonymous with metrical +composition. But much confusion has been introduced into criticism +by this contradistinction of Poetry and Prose, instead of the more +philosophical one of Poetry and Matter of Fact, or Science. The only +strict antithesis to Prose is Metre; nor is this, in truth, a _strict_ +antithesis, because lines and passages of metre so naturally occur in +writing prose, that it would be scarcely possible to avoid them, even +were it desirable.] + + + + +APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS + +(1802) + + +Perhaps, as I have no right to expect that attentive perusal, without +which, confined, as I have been, to the narrow limits of a preface, my +meaning cannot be thoroughly understood, I am anxious to give an exact +notion of the sense in which the phrase poetic diction has been used; +and for this purpose, a few words shall here be added, concerning the +origin and characteristics of the phraseology, which I have condemned +under that name. + +The earliest poets of all nations generally wrote from passion excited +by real events; they wrote naturally, and as men: feeling powerfully +as they did, their language was daring, and figurative. In succeeding +times, Poets, and Men ambitious of the fame of Poets, perceiving the +influence of such language, and desirous of producing the same effect +without being animated by the same passion, set themselves to a +mechanical adoption of these figures of speech, and made use of them, +sometimes with propriety, but much more frequently applied them +to feelings and thoughts with which they had no natural connexion +whatsoever. A language was thus insensibly produced, differing +materially from the real language of men in _any situation_. The +Reader or Hearer of this distorted language found himself in a +perturbed and unusual state of mind: when affected by the genuine +language of passion he had been in a perturbed and unusual state of +mind also: in both cases he was willing that his common judgement and +understanding should be laid asleep, and he had no instinctive and +infallible perception of the true to make him reject the false; the +one served as a passport for the other. The emotion was in both cases +delightful, and no wonder if he confounded the one with the other, +and believed them both to be produced by the same, or similar causes. +Besides, the Poet spake to him in the character of a man to be looked +up to, a man of genius and authority. Thus, and from a variety of +other causes, this distorted language was received with admiration; +and Poets, it is probable, who had before contented themselves for the +most part with misapplying only expressions which at first had +been dictated by real passion, carried the abuse still further, and +introduced phrases composed apparently in the spirit of the original +figurative language of passion, yet altogether of their own invention, +and characterized by various degrees of wanton deviation from good +sense and nature. + +It is indeed true, that the language of the earliest Poets was felt to +differ materially from ordinary language, because it was the language +of extraordinary occasions; but it was really spoken by men, language +which the Poet himself had uttered when he had been affected by the +events which he described, or which he had heard uttered by those +around him. To this language it is probable that metre of some sort +or other was early superadded. This separated the genuine language of +Poetry still further from common life, so that whoever read or heard +the poems of these earliest Poets felt himself moved in a way in which +he had not been accustomed to be moved in real life, and by causes +manifestly different from those which acted upon him in real life. +This was the great temptation to all the corruptions which have +followed: under the protection of this feeling succeeding Poets +constructed a phraseology which had one thing, it is true, in common +with the genuine language of poetry, namely, that it was not heard in +ordinary conversation; that it was unusual. But the first Poets, as +I have said, spake a language which, though unusual, was still the +language of men. This circumstance, however, was disregarded by their +successors; they found that they could please by easier means: +they became proud of modes of expression which they themselves had +invented, and which were uttered only by themselves. In process of +time metre became a symbol or promise of this unusual language, and +whoever took upon him to write in metre, according as he possessed +more or less of true poetic genius, introduced less or more of this +adulterated phraseology into his compositions, and the true and the +false were inseparately interwoven until, the taste of men becoming +gradually perverted, this language was received as a natural language: +and at length, by the influence of books upon men, did to a certain +degree really become so. Abuses of this kind were imported from one +nation to another, and with the progress of refinement this diction +became daily more and more corrupt, thrusting out of sight the plain +humanities of nature by a motley masquerade of tricks, quaintnesses, +hieroglyphics, and enigmas. + +It would not be uninteresting to point out the causes of the pleasure +given by this extravagant and absurd diction. It depends upon a great +variety of causes, but upon none, perhaps, more than its influence in +impressing a notion of the peculiarity and exaltation of the Poet's +character, and in flattering the Reader's self-love by bringing +him nearer to a sympathy with that character; an effect which is +accomplished by unsettling ordinary habits of thinking, and thus +assisting the Reader to approach to that perturbed and dizzy state +of mind in which if he does not find himself, he imagines that he is +_balked_ of a peculiar enjoyment which poetry can and ought to bestow. + +The sonnet quoted from Gray, in the Preface, except the lines printed +in italics, consists of little else but this diction, though not of +the worst kind; and indeed, if one may be permitted to say so, it is +far too common in the best writers both ancient and modern. Perhaps +in no way, by positive example could more easily be given a notion +of what I mean by the phrase _poetic diction_ than by referring to a +comparison between the metrical paraphrase which we have of passages +in the Old and New Testament, and those passages as they exist in +our common Translation. See Pope's _Messiah_ throughout; Prior's 'Did +sweeter sounds adorn my flowing tongue,' &c. &c. 'Though I speak with +the tongues of men and of angels,' &c. &c, 1st Corinthians, ch. xiii. +By way of immediate example take the following of Dr. Johnson: + + Turn on the prudent Ant thy heedless eyes, + Observe her labours, Sluggard, and be wise; + No stern command, no monitory voice, + Prescribes her duties, or directs her choice; + Yet, timely provident, she hastes away + To snatch the blessings of a plenteous day; + When fruitful Summer loads the teeming plain, + She crops the harvest, and she stores the grain. + How long shall sloth usurp thy useless hours, + Unnerve thy vigour, and enchain thy powers? + While artful shades thy downy couch enclose, + And soft solicitation courts repose, + Amidst the drowsy charms of dull delight, + Year chases year with unremitted flight, + Till Want now following, fraudulent and slow, + Shall spring to seize thee, like an ambush'd foe. + +From this hubbub of words pass to the original 'Go to the Ant, thou +Sluggard, consider her ways, and be wise: which having no guide, +overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth +her food in the harvest. How long wilt thou sleep, O Sluggard? +when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little +slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep. So shall thy poverty +come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man' Proverbs, +ch. vi. + +One more quotation, and I have done. It is from Cowper's Verses +supposed to be written by Alexander Selkirk: + + Religion! what treasure untold + Resides in that heavenly word! + More precious than silver and gold, + Or all that this earth can afford + But the sound of the church-going bell + These valleys and rocks never heard, + Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell, + Or smiled when a sabbath appeared + Ye winds, that have made me your sport + Convey to this desolate shore + Some cordial endearing report + Of a land I must visit no more + My friends, do they now and then send + A wish or a thought after me? + O tell me I yet have a friend, + Though a friend I am never to see + +This passage is quoted as an instance of three different styles of +composition. The first four lines are poorly expressed, some Critics +would call the language prosaic; the fact is, it would be bad prose, +so bad, that it is scarcely worse in metre. The epithet 'church-going' +applied to a bell, and that by so chaste a writer as Cowper, is an +instance of the strange abuses which Poets have introduced into their +language, till they and their Readers take them as matters of course, +if they do not single them out expressly as objects of admiration. +The two lines 'Ne'er sighed at the sound,' &c., are, in my opinion, an +instance of the language of passion wrested from its proper use, and, +from the mere circumstance of the composition being in metre, applied +upon an occasion that does not justify such violent expressions; and I +should condemn the passage, though perhaps few Readers will agree with +me, as vicious poetic diction. The last stanza is throughout admirably +expressed: it would be equally good whether in prose or verse, except +that the Reader has an exquisite pleasure in seeing such natural +language so naturally connected with metre. The beauty of this stanza +tempts me to conclude with a principle which ought never to be +lost sight of, and which has been my chief guide in all I have +said,--namely, that in works of _imagination and sentiment_, for of +these only have I been treating, in proportion as ideas and feelings +are valuable, whether the composition be in prose or in verse, they +require and exact one and the same language. Metre is but adventitious +to composition, and the phraseology for which that passport is +necessary, even where it may be graceful at all will be little valued +by the judicious. + + + + +PREFACE TO POEMS + +(1815) + + +The powers requisite for the production of poetry are: first, those +of Observation and Description,--i.e. the ability to observe with +accuracy things as they are in themselves, and with fidelity to +describe them, unmodified by any passion or feeling existing in the +mind of the describer; whether the things depicted be actually present +to the senses, or have a place only in the memory. This power, though +indispensable to a Poet, is one which he employs only in submission +to necessity, and never for a continuance of time: as its exercise +supposes all the higher qualities of the mind to be passive, and in +a state of subjection to external objects, much in the same way as +a translator or engraver ought to be to his original. 2ndly, +Sensibility,--which, the more exquisite it is, the wider will be the +range of a poet's perceptions; and the more will he be incited to +observe objects, both as they exist in themselves and as re-acted upon +by his own mind. (The distinction between poetic and human sensibility +has been marked in the character of the Poet delineated in the +original preface.) 3rdly, Reflection,--which makes the Poet acquainted +with the value of actions, images, thoughts, and feelings; and assists +the sensibility in perceiving their connexion with each other. 4thly, +Imagination and Fancy,--to modify, to create, and to associate. 5thly, +Invention,--by which characters are composed out of materials supplied +by observation; whether of the Poet's own heart and mind, or of +external life and nature; and such incidents and situations produced +as are most impressive to the imagination, and most fitted to do +justice to the characters, sentiments, and passions, which the Poet +undertakes to illustrate. And, lastly, Judgement, to decide how +and where, and in what degree, each of these faculties ought to be +exerted; so that the less shall not be sacrificed to the greater; nor +the greater, slighting the less, arrogate, to its own injury, more +than its due. By judgement, also, is determined what are the laws and +appropriate graces of every species of composition.[3] + +The materials of Poetry, by these powers collected and produced, are +cast, by means of various moulds, into divers forms. The moulds may be +enumerated, and the forms specified, in the following order. 1st, The +Narrative,--including the Epopoeia, the Historic Poem, the Tale, the +Romance, the Mock-heroic, and, if the spirit of Homer will tolerate +such neighbourhood, that dear production of our days, the metrical +Novel. Of this Class, the distinguishing mark is, that the Narrator, +however liberally his speaking agents be introduced, is himself the +source from which everything primarily flows. Epic Poets, in order +that their mode of composition may accord with the elevation of their +subject, represent themselves as _singing_ from the inspiration of the +Muse, 'Anna virumque _cano_;' but this is a fiction, in modern times, +of slight value: the _Iliad_ or the _Paradise Lost_ would gain little +in our estimation by being chanted. The other poets who belong to this +class are commonly content to _tell_ their tale;--so that of the +whole it may be affirmed that they neither require nor reject the +accompaniment of music. + +2ndly, The Dramatic,--consisting of Tragedy, Historic Drama, Comedy, +and Masque, in which the Poet does not appear at all in his own +person, and where the whole action is carried on by speech and +dialogue of the agents; music being admitted only incidentally and +rarely. The Opera may be placed here, inasmuch as it proceeds by +dialogue; though depending, to the degree that it does, upon music, it +has a strong claim to be ranked with the lyrical. The characteristic +and Impassioned Epistle, of which Ovid and Pope have given examples, +considered as a species of monodrama, may, without impropriety, be +placed in this class. + +3rdly, The Lyrical,--containing the Hymn, the Ode, the Elegy, the +Song, and the Ballad; in all which, for the production of their _full_ +effect, an accompaniment of music is indispensable. + +4thly, The Idyllium,--descriptive chiefly either of the processes and +appearances of external nature, as the _Seasons_ of Thomson; or +of characters, manners, and sentiments, as are Shenstone's +_Schoolmistress, The Cotter's Saturday Night_ of Burns, _The Twa Dogs_ +of the same Author; or of these in conjunction with the appearances +of Nature, as most of the pieces of Theocritus, the _Allegro_ and +_Penseroso_ of Milton, Beattie's _Minstrel_, Goldsmith's _Deserted +Village_. The Epitaph, the Inscription, the Sonnet, most of +the epistles of poets writing in their own persons, and all +loco-descriptive poetry, belonging to this class. + +5thly, Didactic,--the principal object of which is direct instruction; +as the Poem of Lucretius, the _Georgics_ of Virgil, _The Fleece_ of +Dyer, Mason's _English Garden_, &c. + +And, lastly, philosophical Satire, like that of Horace and Juvenal; +personal and occasional Satire rarely comprehending sufficient of the +general in the individual to be dignified with the name of poetry. + +Out of the three last has been constructed a composite order, of which +Young's _Night Thoughts_, and Cowper's _Task_, are excellent examples. + +It is deducible from the above, that poems apparently miscellaneous, +may with propriety be arranged either with reference to the powers of +mind _predominant_ in the production of them; or to the mould in which +they are cast; or, lastly, to the subjects to which they relate. From +each of these considerations, the following Poems have been divided +into classes; which, that the work may more obviously correspond with +the course of human life, and for the sake of exhibiting in it the +three requisites of a legitimate whole, a beginning, a middle, and an +end, have been also arranged, as far as it was possible, according to +an order of time, commencing with Childhood, and terminating with +Old Age, Death, and Immortality. My guiding wish was, that the small +pieces of which these volumes consist, thus discriminated, might be +regarded under a two-fold view; as composing an entire work within +themselves, and as adjuncts to the philosophical Poem, _The Recluse_. +This arrangement has long presented itself habitually to my own mind. +Nevertheless, I should have preferred to scatter the contents of these +volumes at random, if I had been persuaded that, by the plan adopted, +anything material would be taken from the natural effect of the +pieces, individually, on the mind of the unreflecting Reader. I trust +there is a sufficient variety in each class to prevent this; while, +for him who reads with reflection, the arrangement will serve as a +commentary unostentatiously directing his attention to my purposes, +both particular and general. But, as I wish to guard against the +possibility of misleading by this classification, it is proper first +to remind the Reader, that certain poems are placed according to +the powers of mind, in the Author's conception, predominant in the +production of them; _predominant_, which implies the exertion of other +faculties in less degree. Where there is more imagination than fancy +in a poem, it is placed under the head of imagination, and _vice +versa_. Both the above classes might without impropriety have been +enlarged from that consisting of 'Poems founded on the Affections;' +as might this latter from those, and from the class 'proceeding from +Sentiment and Reflection.' The most striking characteristics of each +piece, mutual illustration, variety, and proportion, have governed me +throughout. + +None of the other Classes, except those of Fancy and Imagination, +require any particular notice. But a remark of general application may +be made. All Poets, except the dramatic, have been in the practice of +feigning that their works were composed to the music of the harp or +lyre: with what degree of affectation this has done in modern times, I +leave to the judicious to determine. For my own part, I have not been +disposed to violate probability so far, or to make such a large +demand upon the Reader's charity. Some of these pieces are essentially +lyrical; and, therefore, cannot have their due force without a +supposed musical accompaniment; but, in much the greatest part, as a +substitute for the classic lyre or romantic harp, I require nothing +more than an animated or impassioned recitation, adapted to the +subject. Poems, however humble in their kind, if they be good in that +kind, cannot read themselves; the law of long syllable and short must +not be so inflexible,--the letter of metre must not be so impassive +to the spirit of versification,--as to deprive the Reader of all +voluntary power to modulate, in subordination to the sense, the music +of the poem;--in the same manner as his mind is left at liberty, and +even summoned, to act upon its thoughts and images. But, though the +accompaniment of a musical instrument be frequently dispensed with, +the true Poet does not therefore abandon his privilege distinct from +that of the mere Proseman; + + He murmurs near the running brooks + A music sweeter than their own. + +Let us come now to the consideration of the words Fancy and +Imagination, as employed in the classification of the following Poems. +'A man,' says an intelligent author, 'has imagination in proportion +as he can distinctly copy in idea the impressions of sense: it is the +faculty which _images_ within the mind the phenomena of sensation. A +man has fancy in proportion as he can call up, connect, or associate, +at pleasure, those internal images ([Greek: phantazein] is to cause +to appear) so as to complete ideal representations of absent objects. +Imagination is the power of depicting, and fancy of evoking and +combining. The imagination is formed by patient observation; the fancy +by a voluntary activity in shifting the scenery of the mind. The more +accurate the imagination, the more safely may a painter, or a poet, +undertake a delineation, or a description, without the presence of the +objects to be characterized. The more versatile the fancy, the more +original and striking will be the decorations produced.'--_British +Synonyms discriminated, by W. Taylor_. + +Is not this as if a man should undertake to supply an account of +a building, and be so intent upon what he had discovered of the +foundation, as to conclude his task without once looking up at the +superstructure? Here, as in other instances throughout the volume, the +judicious Author's mind is enthralled by Etymology; he takes up the +original word as his guide and escort, and too often does not perceive +how soon he becomes its prisoner, without liberty to tread in any +path but that to which it confines him. It is not easy to find out +how imagination, thus explained, differs from distinct remembrance of +images; or fancy from quick and vivid recollection of them: each is +nothing more than a mode of memory. If the two words bear the above +meaning, and no other, what term is left to designate that faculty of +which the Poet is 'all compact;' he whose eyes glances from earth to +heaven, whose spiritual attributes body forth what his pen is prompt +in turning to shape; or what is left to characterize Fancy, +as insinuating herself into the heart of objects with creative +activity?--Imagination, in the sense of the word as giving title to +a class of the following Poems, has no reference to images that are +merely a faithful copy, existing in the mind, of absent external +objects; but is a word of higher import, denoting operations of the +mind upon those objects, and processes of creation or of composition, +governed by certain fixed laws. I proceed to illustrate my meaning by +instances. A parrot _hangs_ from the wires of his cage by his beak or +by his claws; or a monkey from the bough of a tree by his paws or +his tail. Each creature does so literally and actually. In the first +Eclogue of Virgil, the shepherd, thinking of the time when he is to +take leave of his farm, thus addresses his goats:-- + + Non ego vos posthac viridi projectus in antro + Dumosa _pendere_ procul de rupe videbo. + ----half way down + _Hangs_ one who gathers samphire, + +is the well-known expression of Shakespeare, delineating an ordinary +image upon the cliffs of Dover. In these two instances is a slight +exertion of the faculty which I denominate imagination, in the use +of one word: neither the goats nor the samphire-gatherer do literally +hang, as does the parrot or the monkey; but, presenting to the senses +something of such an appearance, the mind in its activity, for its own +gratification, contemplates them as hanging. + + As when far off at sea a fleet descried + _Hangs_ in the clouds, by equinoctial winds + Close sailing from Bengala, or the isles + Of Ternate or Tidore, whence merchants bring + Their spicy drugs; they on the trading flood + Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape + Ply, stemming nightly toward the Pole; so seemed + Far off the flying Fiend. + +Here is the full strength of the imagination involved in the word +_hangs_, and exerted upon the whole image: First, the fleet, an +aggregate of many ships, is represented as one mighty person, whose +track, we know and feel, is upon the waters; but, taking advantage +of its appearance to the senses, the Poet dares to represent it as +_hanging in the clouds_, both for the gratification of the mind in +contemplating the image itself, and in reference to the motion and +appearance of the sublime objects to which it is compared. + +From impressions of sight we will pass to those of sound; which, +as they must necessarily be of a less definite character, shall be +selected from these volumes: + + Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove _broods_; + +of the same bird, + + His voice was _buried_ among trees, + Yet to be come at by the breeze; + + O, Cuckoo I shall I call thee _Bird_, + Or but a wandering _Voice_? + +The stock-dove is said to _coo_, a sound well imitating the note +of the bird; but, by the intervention of the metaphor _broods_, the +affections are called in by the imagination to assist in marking the +manner in which the bird reiterates and prolongs her soft note, as if +herself delighting to listen to it, and participating of a still and +quiet satisfaction, like that which may be supposed inseparable from +the continuous process of incubation. 'His voice was buried among +trees,' a metaphor expressing the love of _seclusion_ by which this +Bird is marked; and characterizing its note as not partaking of the +shrill and the piercing, and therefore more easily deadened by the +intervening shade; yet a note so peculiar and withal so pleasing, that +the breeze, gifted with that love of the sound which the Poet feels, +penetrates the shades in which it is entombed, and conveys it to the +ear of the listener. + + Shall I call thee Bird, + Or but a wandering _Voice_? + +This concise interrogation characterizes the seeming ubiquity of +the voice of the cuckoo, and dispossesses the creature almost of a +corporeal existence; the Imagination being tempted to this exertion of +her power by a consciousness in the memory that the cuckoo is almost +perpetually heard throughout the season of spring, but seldom becomes +an object of sight. + +Thus far of images independent of each other, and immediately endowed +by the mind with properties that do not inhere in them, upon an +incitement from properties and qualities the existence of which is +inherent and obvious. These processes of imagination are carried +on either by conferring additional properties upon an object, or +abstracting from it some of those which it actually possesses, and +thus enabling it to react upon the mind which hath performed the +process, like a new existence. + +I pass from the Imagination acting upon an individual image to +a consideration of the same faculty employed upon images in a +conjunction by which they modify each other. The Reader has already +had a fine instance before him in the passage quoted from Virgil, +where the apparently perilous situation of the goat, hanging upon +the shaggy precipice, is contrasted with that of the shepherd +contemplating it from the seclusion of the cavern in which he lies +stretched at ease and in security. Take these images separately, and +how unaffecting the picture compared with that produced by their being +thus connected with, and opposed to, each other! + + As a huge stone is sometimes seen to lie + Couched on the bald top of an eminence, + Wonder to all who do the same espy + By what means it could thither come, and whence, + So that it seems a thing endued with sense, + Like a sea-beast crawled forth, which on a shelf + Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun himself. + + Such seemed this Man; not all alive or dead + Nor all asleep, in his extreme old age. + + * * * * * + + Motionless as a cloud the old Man stood, + That heareth not the loud winds when they call, + And moveth altogether if it move at all. + +In these images, the conferring, the abstracting, and the modifying +powers of the Imagination, immediately and mediately acting, are all +brought into conjunction. The stone is endowed with something of the +power of life to approximate it to the sea-beast; and the sea-beast +stripped of some of its vital qualities to assimilate it to the stone; +which intermediate image is thus treated for the purpose of bringing +the original image, that of the stone, to a nearer resemblance to the +figure and condition of the aged Man; who is divested of so much of +the indications of life and motion as to bring him to the point where +the two objects unite and coalesce in just comparison. After what has +been said, the image of the cloud need not be commented upon. + +Thus far of an endowing or modifying power: but the Imagination also +shapes and _creates_; and how? By innumerable processes; and in none +does it more delight than in that of consolidating numbers into +unity, and dissolving and separating unity into number,--alternations +proceeding from, and governed by, a sublime consciousness of the +soul in her own mighty and almost divine powers. Recur to the passage +already cited from Milton. When the compact Fleet, as one Person, has +been introduced 'sailing from Bengala,' 'They,' i.e. the 'merchants,' +representing the fleet resolved into a multitude of ships, 'ply' their +voyage towards the extremities of the earth: 'So' (referring to the +word 'As' in the commencement) 'seemed the flying Fiend'; the image +of his Person acting to recombine the multitude of ships into one +body,--the point from which the comparison set out. 'So seemed,' and +to whom seemed? To the heavenly Muse who dictates the poem, to the eye +of the Poet's mind, and to that of the Reader, present at one moment +in the wide Ethiopian, and the next in the solitudes, then first +broken in upon, of the infernal regions! + + Modo me Thebis, modo ponit Athenis. + +Hear again this mighty Poet,--speaking of the Messiah going forth to +expel from heaven the rebellious angels, + + Attended by ten thousand thousand Saints + He onward came: far off his coming shone,-- + +the retinue of Saints, and the Person of the Messiah himself, lost +almost and merged in the splendour of that indefinite abstraction 'His +coming!' + +As I do not mean here to treat this subject further than to throw some +light upon the present Volumes, and especially upon one division of +them, I shall spare myself and the Reader the trouble of considering +the Imagination as it deals with thoughts and sentiments, as it +regulates the composition of characters, and determines the course +of actions: I will not consider it (more than I have already done by +implication) as that power which, in the language of one of my most +esteemed Friends, 'draws all things to one; which makes things animate +or inanimate, beings with their attributes, subjects with their +accessories, take one colour and serve to one effect[4].' The grand +storehouses of enthusiastic and meditative Imagination, of poetical, +as contra-distinguished from human and dramatic Imagination, are the +prophetic and lyrical parts of the Holy Scriptures, and the works of +Milton; to which I cannot forbear to add to those of Spenser. I select +these writers in preference to those of ancient Greece and Rome, +because the anthropomorphitism of the Pagan religion subjected the +minds of the greatest poets in those countries too much to the bondage +of definite form; from which the Hebrews were preserved by their +abhorrence of idolatry. This abhorrence was almost as strong in our +great epic Poet, both from circumstances of his life, and from the +constitution of his mind. However imbued the surface might be with +classical literature, he was a Hebrew in soul; and all things tended +in him towards the sublime. Spenser, of a gentler nature, maintained +his freedom by aid of his allegorical spirit, at one time inciting him +to create persons out of abstractions; and, at another, by a +superior effort of genius, to give the universality and permanence of +abstractions to his human beings, by means of attributes and emblems +that belong to the highest moral truths and the purest sensations,--of +which his character of Una is a glorious example. Of the human and +dramatic Imagination the works of Shakespeare are an inexhaustible +source. + + I tax not you, ye Elements, with unkindness, + I never gave you kingdoms, call'd you Daughters! + +And if, bearing in mind the many Poets distinguished by this prime +quality, whose names I omit to mention; yet justified by recollection +of the insults which the ignorant, the incapable, and the +presumptuous, have heaped upon these and my other writings, I may be +permitted to anticipate the judgment of posterity upon myself, I +shall declare (censurable, I grant, if the notoriety of the fact above +stated does not justify me) that I have given in these unfavourable +times evidence of exertions of this faculty upon its worthiest +objects, the external universe, the moral and religious sentiments of +Man, his natural affections, and his acquired passions; which have +the same ennobling tendency as the productions of men, in this kind, +worthy to be holden in undying remembrance. + +To the mode in which Fancy has already been characterized as the power +of evoking and combining, or, as my friend Mr. Coleridge has styled +it, 'the aggregative and associative power,' my objection is only that +the definition is too general. To aggregate and to associate, to evoke +and to combine, belong as well to the Imagination as to the Fancy; but +either the materials evoked and combined are different; or they are +brought together under a different law, and for a different purpose. +Fancy does not require that the materials which she makes use of +should be susceptible of change in their constitution, from her touch; +and, where they admit of modification, it is enough for her purpose if +it be slight, limited, and evanescent. Directly the reverse of these, +are the desires and demands of the Imagination. She recoils from +everything but the plastic, the pliant, and the indefinite. She leaves +it to Fancy to describe Queen Mab as coming, + + In shape no bigger than an agate-stone + On the fore-finger of an alderman. + +Having to speak of stature, she does not tell you that her gigantic +Angel was as tall as Pompey's Pillar; much less that he was twelve +cubits, or twelve hundred cubits high; or that his dimensions equalled +those of Teneriffe or Atlas;--because these, and if they were +a million times as high it would be the same, are bounded: The +expression is, 'His stature reached the sky!' the illimitable +firmament!--When the Imagination frames a comparison, if it does +not strike on the first presentation, a sense of the truth of the +likeness, from the moment that it is perceived, grows--and continues +to grow--upon the mind; the resemblance depending less upon outline +of form and feature, than upon expression and effect; less upon +casual and outstanding, than upon inherent and internal, properties: +moreover, the images invariably modify each other.--The law under +which the processes of Fancy are carried on is as capricious as +the accidents of things, and the effects are surprising, playful, +ludicrous, amusing, tender, or pathetic, as the objects happen to be +appositely produced or fortunately combined. Fancy depends upon +the rapidity and profusion with which she scatters her thoughts and +images; trusting that their number, and the felicity with which they +are linked together, will make amends for the want of individual +value: or she prides herself upon the curious subtilty and the +successful elaboration with which she can detect their lurking +affinities. If she can win you over to her purpose, and impart to +you her feelings, she cares not how unstable or transitory may be her +influence, knowing that it will not be out of her power to resume +it upon an apt occasion. But the Imagination is conscious of an +indestructible dominion;--the Soul may fall away from it, not being +able to sustain its grandeur; but, if once felt and acknowledged, by +no act of any other faculty of the mind can it be relaxed, impaired, +or diminished.--Fancy is given to quicken and to beguile the +temporal part of our nature, Imagination to incite and to support the +eternal.--Yet is it not the less true that Fancy, as she is an active, +is also, under her own laws and in her own spirit, a creative faculty? +In what manner Fancy ambitiously aims at a rivalship with Imagination, +and Imagination stoops to work with the materials of Fancy, might be +illustrated from the compositions of all eloquent writers, whether in +prose or verse; and chiefly from those of our own Country. Scarcely a +page of the impassioned parts of Bishop Taylor's Works can be opened +that shall not afford examples.--Referring the Reader to those +inestimable volumes, I will content myself with placing a conceit +(ascribed to Lord Chesterfield) in contrast with a passage from the +_Paradise Lost_: + + The dews of the evening most carefully shun, + They are the tears of the sky for the loss of the sun. + +After the transgression of Adam, Milton, with other appearances of +sympathizing Nature, thus marks the immediate consequence, + + Sky lowered, and, muttering thunder, some sad drops + Wept at completion of the mortal sin. + +The associating link is the same in each instance: Dew and rain, not +distinguishable from the liquid substance of tears, are employed as +indications of sorrow. A flash of surprise is the effect in the former +case; a flash of surprise, and nothing more; for the nature of things +does not sustain the combination. In the latter, the effects from the +act, of which there is this immediate consequence and visible +sign, are so momentous, that the mind acknowledges the justice and +reasonableness of the sympathy in nature so manifested; and the sky +weeps drops of water as if with human eyes, as 'Earth had before +trembled from her entrails, and Nature given a second groan.' + +Finally, I will refer to Cotton's _Ode upon Winter_, an admirable +composition, though stained with some peculiarities of the age in +which he lived, for a general illustration of the characteristics of +Fancy. The middle part of this ode contains a most lively description +of the entrance of Winter, with his retinue, as 'A palsied king,' and +yet a military monarch,--advancing for conquest with his army; the +several bodies of which, and their arms and equipments, are described +with a rapidity of detail, and a profusion of _fanciful_ comparisons, +which indicate on the part of the poet extreme activity of intellect, +and a correspondent hurry of delightful feeling. Winter retires from +the foe into his fortress, where + + a magazine + Of sovereign juice is cellared in; + Liquor that will the siege maintain + Should Phoebus ne'er return again. + +Though myself a water drinker, I cannot resist the pleasure of +transcribing what follows, as an instance still more happy of Fancy +employed in the treatment of feeling than, in its preceding passages, +the Poem supplies of her management of forms. + + 'Tis that, that gives the poet rage, + And thaws the gelid blood of age; + Matures the young, restores the old, + And makes the fainting coward bold. + + It lays the careful head to rest, + Calms palpitations in the breast, + Renders our lives' misfortune sweet; + + * * * * * + + Then let the chill Sirocco blow, + And gird us round with hills of snow, + Or else go whistle to the shore, + And make the hollow mountains roar, + + Whilst we together jovial sit + Careless, and crowned with mirth and wit, + Where, though bleak winds confine us home + Our fancies round the world shall roam. + + We'll think of all the Friends we know, + And drink to all worth drinking to; + When having drunk all thine and mine, + We rather shall want healths than wine. + + But where Friends fail us, we'll supply + Our friendships with our charity; + Men that remote in sorrows live, + Shall by our lusty brimmers thrive. + + We'll drink the wanting into wealth, + And those that languish into health, + The afflicted into joy; th' opprest + Into security and rest. + + The worthy in disgrace shall find + Favour return again more kind, + And in restraint who stifled lie, + Shall taste the air of liberty. + + The brave shall triumph in success, + The lover shall have mistresses, + Poor unregarded Virtue, praise, + And the neglected Poet, bays. + + Thus shall our healths do others good, + Whilst we ourselves do all we would; + For, freed from envy and from care, + What would we be but what we are? + +When I sate down to write this Preface, it was my intention to have +made it more comprehensive; but, thinking that I ought rather to +apologize for detaining the reader so long, I will here conclude. + + +[Footnote 3: As sensibility to harmony of numbers, and the power +of producing it, are invariably attendants upon the faculties above +specified, nothing has been said upon those requisites.] + +[Footnote 4: Charles Lamb upon the genius of Hogarth.] + + + + +ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO PREFACE + +(1815) + + +With the young of both sexes, Poetry is, like love, a passion; but, +for much the greater part of those who have been proud of its power +over their minds, a necessity soon arises of breaking the pleasing +bondage; or it relaxes of itself;--the thoughts being occupied in +domestic cares, or the time engrossed by business. Poetry then becomes +only an occasional recreation; while to those whose existence passes +away in a course of fashionable pleasure, it is a species of luxurious +amusement. In middle and declining age, a scattered number of serious +persons resort to poetry, as to religion, for a protection against +the pressure of trivial employments, and as a consolation for the +afflictions of life. And, lastly, there are many, who, having been +enamoured of this art in their youth, have found leisure, after +youth was spent, to cultivate general literature; in which poetry has +continued to be comprehended _as a study_. + +Into the above classes the Readers of poetry may be divided; Critics +abound in them all; but from the last only can opinions be collected +of absolute value, and worthy to be depended upon, as prophetic of the +destiny of a new work. The young, who in nothing can escape delusion, +are especially subject to it in their intercourse with Poetry. The +cause, not so obvious as the fact is unquestionable, is the same as +that from which erroneous judgements in this art, in the minds of men +of all ages, chiefly proceed; but upon Youth it operates with peculiar +force. The appropriate business of poetry (which, nevertheless, if +genuine, is as permanent as pure science), her appropriate employment, +her privilege and her _duty_, is to treat of things not as they _are_, +but as they _appear_; not as they exist in themselves, but as they +_seem_ to exist to the _senses_, and to the _passions_. What a +world of delusion does this acknowledged obligation prepare for the +inexperienced! what temptations to go astray are here held forth for +them whose thoughts have been little disciplined by the understanding, +and whose feelings revolt from the sway of reason!--When a juvenile +Reader is in the height of his rapture with some vicious passage, +should experience throw in doubts, or common sense suggest suspicions, +a lurking consciousness that the realities of the Muse are but shows, +and that her liveliest excitements are raised by transient shocks +of conflicting feeling and successive assemblages of contradictory +thoughts--is ever at hand to justify extravagance, and to sanction +absurdity. But, it may be asked, as these illusions are unavoidable, +and, no doubt, eminently useful to the mind as a process, what good +can be gained by making observations, the tendency of which is to +diminish the confidence of youth in its feelings, and thus to abridge +its innocent and even profitable pleasures? The reproach implied in +the question could not be warded off, if Youth were incapable of being +delighted with what is truly excellent; or, if these errors always +terminated of themselves in due season. But, with the majority, though +their force be abated, they continue through life. Moreover, the fire +of youth is too vivacious an element to be extinguished or damped by a +philosophical remark; and, while there is no danger that what has been +said will be injurious or painful to the ardent and the confident, +it may prove beneficial to those who, being enthusiastic, are, at the +same time, modest and ingenuous. The intimation may unite with their +own misgivings to regulate their sensibility, and to bring in, sooner +than it would otherwise have arrived, a more discreet and sound +judgement. + +If it should excite wonder that men of ability, in later life, whose +understandings have been rendered acute by practice in affairs, should +be so easily and so far imposed upon when they happen to take up a +new work in verse, this appears to be the cause;--that, having +discontinued their attention to poetry, whatever progress may have +been made in other departments of knowledge, they have not, as to this +art, advanced in true discernment beyond the age of youth. If, then, +a new poem fall in their way, whose attractions are of that kind which +would have enraptured them during the heat of youth, the judgement +not being improved to a degree that they shall be disgusted, they are +dazzled, and prize and cherish the faults for having had power to make +the present time vanish before them, and to throw the mind back, as +by enchantment, into the happiest season of life. As they read, powers +seem to be revived, passions are regenerated, and pleasures restored. +The Book was probably taken up after an escape from the burden of +business, and with a wish to forget the world, and all its vexations +and anxieties. Having obtained this wish, and so much more, it is +natural that they should make report as they have felt. + +If Men of mature age, through want of practice, be thus easily +beguiled into admiration of absurdities, extravagances, and misplaced +ornaments, thinking it proper that their understandings should enjoy +a holiday, while they are unbending their minds with verse, it may be +expected that such Readers will resemble their former selves also +in strength of prejudice, and an inaptitude to be moved by the +unostentatious beauties of a pure style. In the higher poetry, an +enlightened Critic chiefly looks for a reflection of the wisdom of +the heart and the grandeur of the imagination. Wherever these appear, +simplicity accompanies them, Magnificence herself, when legitimate, +depending upon a simplicity of her own, to regulate her ornaments. But +it is a well-known property of human nature, that our estimates are +ever governed by comparisons, of which we are conscious with various +degrees of distinctness. Is it not, then, inevitable (confining these +observations to the effects of style merely) that an eye, accustomed +to the glaring hues of diction by which such Readers are caught and +excited, will for the most part be rather repelled than attracted by +an original Work, the colouring of which is disposed according to a +pure and refined scheme of harmony? It is in the fine arts as in the +affairs of life, no man can _serve_ (i.e. obey with zeal and fidelity) +two Masters. + +As Poetry is most just to its own divine origin when it administers +the comforts and breathes the spirit of religion, they who have +learned to perceive this truth, and who betake themselves to reading +verse for sacred purposes, must be preserved from numerous illusions +to which the two Classes of Readers, whom we have been considering, +are liable. But, as the mind grows serious from the weight of +life, the range of its passions is contracted accordingly; and its +sympathies become so exclusive, that many species of high excellence +wholly escape, or but languidly excite, its notice. Besides, men who +read from religious or moral inclinations, even when the subject is +of that kind which they approve, are beset with misconceptions and +mistakes peculiar to themselves. Attaching so much importance to the +truths which interest them, they are prone to overrate the Authors by +whom those truths are expressed and enforced. They come prepared +to impart so much passion to the Poet's language, that they remain +unconscious how little, in fact, they receive from it. And, on the +other hand, religious faith is to him who holds it so momentous +a thing, and error appears to be attended with such tremendous +consequences, that, if opinions touching upon religion occur which +the Reader condemns, he not only cannot sympathize with them, however +animated the expression, but there is, for the most part, an end put +to all satisfaction and enjoyment. Love, if it before existed, is +converted into dislike; and the heart of the Reader is set against +the Author and his book.--To these excesses, they, who from their +professions ought to be the most guarded against them, are perhaps +the most liable; I mean those sects whose religion, being from the +calculating understanding, is cold and formal. For when Christianity, +the religion of humility, is founded upon the proudest faculty of +our nature, what can be expected but contradictions? Accordingly, +believers of this cast are at one time contemptuous; at another, being +troubled, as they are and must he, with inward misgivings, they are +jealous and suspicious;--and at all seasons, they are under temptation +to supply by the heat with which they defend their tenets, the +animation which is wanting to the constitution of the religion itself. + +Faith was given to man that his affections, detached from the +treasures of time, might be inclined to settle upon those of +eternity;--the elevation of his nature, which this habit produces +on earth, being to him a presumptive evidence of a future state of +existence; and giving him a title to partake of its holiness. The +religious man values what he sees chiefly as an 'imperfect shadowing +forth' of what he is incapable of seeing. The concerns of religion +refer to indefinite objects, and are too weighty for the mind to +support them without relieving itself by resting a great part of the +burthen upon words and symbols. The commerce between Man and his Maker +cannot be carried on but by a process where much is represented +in little, and the Infinite Being accommodates himself to a finite +capacity. In all this may be perceived the affinity between religion +and poetry; between religion--making up the deficiencies of reason by +faith; and poetry--passionate for the instruction of reason; between +religion--whose element is infinitude, and whose ultimate trust is +the supreme of things, submitting herself to circumscription, and +reconciled to substitutions; and poetry--ethereal and transcendent, +yet incapable to sustain her existence without sensuous incarnation. +In this community of nature may be perceived also the lurking +incitements of kindred error;--so that we shall find that no poetry +has been more subject to distortion, than that species, the argument +and scope of which is religious; and no lovers of the art have gone +farther astray than the pious and the devout. + +Whither then shall we turn for that union of qualifications which must +necessarily exist before the decisions of a critic can be of absolute +value? For a mind at once poetical and philosophical; for a critic +whose affections are as free and kindly as the spirit of society, and +whose understanding is severe as that of dispassionate government? +Where are we to look for that initiatory composure of mind which +no selfishness can disturb? For a natural sensibility that has been +tutored into correctness without losing anything of its quickness; and +for active faculties, capable of answering the demands which an +Author of original imagination shall make upon them, associated with +a judgement that cannot he duped into admiration by aught that +is unworthy of it?--among those and those only, who, never having +suffered their youthful love of poetry to remit much of its force, +have applied to the consideration of the laws of this art the +best power of their understandings. At the same time it must be +observed--that, as this Class comprehends the only judgements which +are trustworthy, so does it include the most erroneous and perverse. +For to be mistaught is worse than to be untaught; and no perverseness +equals that which is supported by system, no errors are so difficult +to root out as those which the understanding has pledged its credit to +uphold. In this Class are contained censors, who, if they be pleased +with what is good, are pleased with it only by imperfect glimpses, +and upon false principles; who, should they generalize rightly, to +a certain point, are sure to suffer for it in the end; who, if they +stumble upon a sound rule, are fettered by misapplying it, or by +straining it too far; being incapable of perceiving when it ought to +yield to one of higher order. In it are found critics too petulant to +be passive to a genuine poet, and too feeble to grapple with him; men, +who take upon them to report of the course which _he_ holds whom they +are utterly unable to accompany,--confounded if he turn quick upon the +wing, dismayed if he soar steadily 'into the region';--men of palsied +imaginations and indurated hearts; in whose minds all healthy action +is languid, who therefore feed as the many direct them, or, with the +many, are greedy after vicious provocatives;--judges, whose censure is +auspicious, and whose praise ominous! In this class meet together the +two extremes of best and worst. + +The observations presented in the foregoing series are of too +ungracious a nature to have been made without reluctance; and, were +it only on this account, I would invite the reader to try them by the +test of comprehensive experience. If the number of judges who can be +confidently relied upon be in reality so small, it ought to follow +that partial notice only, or neglect, perhaps long continued, or +attention wholly inadequate to their merits--must have been the fate +of most works in the higher departments of poetry; and that, on the +other hand, numerous productions have blazed into popularity, and have +passed away, leaving scarcely a trace behind them: it will be further +found, that when Authors shall have at length raised themselves into +general admiration and maintained their ground, errors and prejudices +have prevailed concerning their genius and their works, which the few +who are conscious of those errors and prejudices would deplore; if +they were not recompensed by perceiving that there are select Spirits +for whom it is ordained that their fame shall be in the world an +existence like that of Virtue, which owes its being to the struggles +it makes, and its vigour to the enemies whom it provokes;--a vivacious +quality, ever doomed to meet with opposition, and still triumphing +over it; and, from the nature of its dominion, incapable of being +brought to the sad conclusion of Alexander, when he wept that there +were no more worlds for him to conquer. + +Let us take a hasty retrospect of the poetical literature of this +Country for the greater part of the last two centuries, and see if the +facts support these inferences. + +Who is there that now reads the _Creation_ of Dubartas? Yet all Europe +once resounded with his praise; he was caressed by kings; and, when +his Poem was translated into our language, the _Faery Queen_ faded +before it. The name of Spenser, whose genius is of a higher order than +even that of Ariosto, is at this day scarcely known beyond the limits +of the British Isles. And if the value of his works is to be estimated +from the attention now paid to them by his countrymen, compared with +that which they bestow on those of some other writers, it must be +pronounced small indeed. + + The laurel, meed of mighty conquerors + And poets _sage_-- + +are his own words; but his wisdom has, in this particular, been his +worst enemy: while its opposite, whether in the shape of folly or +madness, has been _their_ best friend. But he was a great power, and +bears a high name: the laurel has been awarded to him. + +A dramatic Author, if he write for the stage, must adapt himself to +the taste of the audience, or they will not endure him; accordingly +the mighty genius of Shakespeare was listened to. The people were +delighted: but I am not sufficiently versed in stage antiquities to +determine whether they did not flock as eagerly to the representation +of many pieces of contemporary Authors, wholly undeserving to appear +upon the same boards. Had there been a formal contest for superiority +among dramatic writers, that Shakespeare, like his predecessors +Sophocles and Euripides, would have often been subject to the +mortification of seeing the prize adjudged to sorry competitors, +becomes too probable, when we reflect that the admirers of Settle +and Shadwell were, in a later age, as numerous, and reckoned as +respectable, in point of talent, as those of Dryden. At all events, +that Shakespeare stooped to accommodate himself to the People, is +sufficiently apparent; and one of the most striking proofs of his +almost omnipotent genius is, that he could turn to such glorious +purpose those materials which the prepossessions of the age compelled +him to make use of. Yet even this marvellous skill appears not to have +been enough to prevent his rivals from having some advantage over him +in public estimation; else how can we account for passages and scenes +that exist in his works, unless upon a supposition that some of the +grossest of them, a fact which in my own mind I have no doubt of, were +foisted in by the Players, for the gratification of the many? + +But that his Works, whatever might be their reception upon the stage, +made but little impression upon the ruling Intellects of the time, +may be inferred from the fact that Lord Bacon, in his multifarious +writings, nowhere either quotes or alludes to him.[5] His dramatic +excellence enabled him to resume possession of the stage after the +Restoration; but Dryden tells us that in his time two of the plays +of Beaumont and Fletcher were acted for one of Shakespeare's. And so +faint and limited was the perception of the poetic beauties of his +dramas in the time of Pope, that, in his Edition of the Plays, with +a view of rendering to the general reader a necessary service, he +printed between inverted commas those passages which he thought most +worthy of notice. + +At this day, the French Critics have abated nothing of their aversion +to this darling of our Nation: 'the English, with their bouffon de +Shakespeare,' is as familiar an expression among them as in the time +of Voltaire. Baron Grimm is the only French writer who seems to have +perceived his infinite superiority to the first names of the French +Theatre; an advantage which the Parisian Critic owed to his German +blood and German education. The most enlightened Italians, though well +acquainted with our language, are wholly incompetent to measure the +proportions of Shakespeare. The Germans only, of foreign nations, are +approaching towards a knowledge and feeling of what he is. In some +respects they have acquired a superiority over the fellow countrymen +of the Poet: for among us it is a current, I might say, an established +opinion, that Shakespeare is justly praised when he is pronounced to +be 'a wild irregular genius, in whom great faults are compensated by +great beauties.' How long may it he before this misconception passes +away, and it becomes universally acknowledged that the judgement of +Shakespeare in the selection of his materials, and in the manner in +which he has made them, heterogeneous as they often are, constitute a +unity of their own, and contribute all to one great end, is not less +admirable than his imagination, his invention, and his intuitive +knowledge of human Nature? + +There is extant a small Volume of miscellaneous poems, in which +Shakespeare expresses his own feelings in his own person. It is not +difficult to conceive that the Editor, George Steevens, should have +been insensible to the beauties of one portion of that Volume, the +Sonnets; though in no part of the writings of this Poet is found, in +an equal compass, a greater number of exquisite feelings felicitously +expressed. But, from regard to the Critic's own credit, he would not +have ventured to talk of an[6] act of parliament not being strong +enough to compel the perusal of those little pieces, if he had not +known that the people of England were ignorant of the treasures +contained in them: and if he had not, moreover, shared the too common +propensity of human nature to exult over a supposed fall into the mire +of a genius whom he had been compelled to regard with admiration, as +an inmate of the celestial regions--'there sitting where he durst not +soar.' + +Nine years before the death of Shakespeare, Milton was born, and early +in life he published several small poems, which, though on their +first appearance they were praised by a few of the judicious, were +afterwards neglected to that degree, that Pope in his youth could +borrow from them without risk of its being known. Whether these poems +are at this day justly appreciated, I will not undertake to decide nor +would it imply a severe reflection upon the mass of readers to suppose +the contrary, seeing that a man of the acknowledged genius of Voss, +the German poet, could suffer their spirit to evaporate, and could +change their character, as is done in the translation made by him of +the most popular of these pieces. At all events, it is certain that +these Poems of Milton are now much read, and loudly praised, yet were +they little heard of till more than 150 years after their publication, +and of the Sonnets, Dr. Johnson, as appears from Boswell's _Life_ of +him, was in the habit of thinking and speaking as contemptuously as +Steevens wrote upon those of Shakespeare. + +About the time when the Pindaric odes of Cowley and his imitators, and +the productions of that class of curious thinkers whom Dr. Johnson has +strangely styled metaphysical Poets, were beginning to lose something +of that extravagant admiration which they had excited, the _Paradise +Lost_ made its appearance. 'Fit audience find though few,' was the +petition addressed by the Poet to his inspiring Muse. I have said +elsewhere that he gained more than he asked, this I believe to be +true, but Dr. Johnson has fallen into a gross mistake when he attempts +to prove, by the sale of the work, that Milton's Countrymen were +'_just_ to it' upon its first appearance. Thirteen hundred Copies were +sold in two years, an uncommon example, he asserts, of the prevalence +of genius in opposition to so much recent enmity as Milton's public +conduct had excited. But be it remembered that, if Milton's political +and religious opinions, and the manner in which he announced them, had +raised him many enemies, they had procured him numerous friends, who, +as all personal danger was passed away at the time of publication, +would be eager to procure the master-work of a man whom they revered, +and whom they would be proud of praising. Take, from the number +of purchasers, persons of this class, and also those who wished to +possess the Poem as a religious work, and but few I fear would be left +who sought for it on account of its poetical merits. The demand did +not immediately increase; 'for,' says Dr. Johnson, 'many more readers' +(he means persons in the habit of reading poetry) 'than were supplied +at first the Nation did not afford.' How careless must a writer be who +can make this assertion in the face of so many existing title-pages +to belie it! Turning to my own shelves, I find the folio of Cowley, +seventh edition, 1681. A book near it is Flatman's Poems, fourth +edition, 1686, Waller, fifth edition, same date. The Poems of Norris +of Bemerton not long after went, I believe, through nine editions. +What further demand there might be for these works I do not know; but +I well remember that, twenty-five years ago, the booksellers' stalls +in London swarmed with the folios of Cowley. This is not mentioned in +disparagement of that able writer and amiable man; but merely to show +that, if Milton's Works were not more read, it was not because readers +did not exist at the time. The early editions of the _Paradise Lost_ +were printed in a shape which allowed them to be sold at a low price, +yet only three thousand copies of the Work were sold in eleven years; +and the Nation, says Dr. Johnson, had been satisfied from 1623 to +1664, that is, forty-one years, with only two editions of the Works of +Shakespeare; which probably did not together make one thousand Copies; +facts adduced by the critic to prove the 'paucity of Readers,'--There +were readers in multitudes; but their money went for other purposes, +as their admiration was fixed elsewhere. We are authorized, then, +to affirm that the reception of the _Paradise Lost_, and the slow +progress of its fame, are proofs as striking as can be desired +that the positions which I am attempting to establish are not +erroneous.[7]--How amusing to shape to one's self such a critique as +a Wit of Charles's days, or a Lord of the Miscellanies or trading +Journalist of King William's time, would have brought forth, if he +had set his faculties industriously to work upon this Poem, everywhere +impregnated with _original_ excellence. + +So strange indeed are the obliquities of admiration, that they whose +opinions are much influenced by authority will often be tempted to +think that there are no fixed principles[8] in human nature for this +art to rest upon. I have been honoured by being permitted to peruse +in MS. a tract composed between the period of the Revolution and +the close of that century. It is the Work of an English Peer of high +accomplishments, its object to form the character and direct the +studies of his son. Perhaps nowhere does a more beautiful treatise +of the kind exist. The good sense and wisdom of the thoughts, the +delicacy of the feelings, and the charm of the style, are, throughout, +equally conspicuous. Yet the Author, selecting among the Poets of +his own country those whom he deems most worthy of his son's perusal, +particularizes only Lord Rochester, Sir John Denham, and Cowley. +Writing about the same time, Shaftesbury, an author at present +unjustly depreciated, describes the English Muses as only yet lisping +in their cradles. + +The arts by which Pope, soon afterwards, contrived to procure to +himself a more general and a higher reputation than perhaps any +English Poet ever attained during his lifetime, are known to the +judicious. And as well known is it to them, that the undue exertion +of those arts is the cause why Pope has for some time held a rank in +literature, to which, if he had not been seduced by an over-love of +immediate popularity, and had confided more in his native genius, he +never could have descended. He bewitched the nation by his melody, and +dazzled it by his polished style and was himself blinded by his own +success. Having wandered from humanity in his Eclogues with boyish +inexperience, the praise, which these compositions obtained, tempted +him into a belief that Nature was not to be trusted, at least in +pastoral Poetry. To prove this by example, he put his friend Gay upon +writing those Eclogues which their author intended to be burlesque. +The instigator of the work, and his admirers, could perceive in them +nothing but what was ridiculous. Nevertheless, though these Poems +contain some detestable passages, the effect, as Dr Johnson well +observes, 'of reality and truth became conspicuous even when the +intention was to show them grovelling and degraded.' The Pastorals, +ludicrous to such as prided themselves upon their refinement, in spite +of those disgusting passages, 'became popular, and were read with +delight, as just representations of rural manners and occupations.' + +Something less than sixty years after the publication of the _Paradise +Lost_ appeared Thomson's _Winter_, which was speedily followed by his +other Seasons. It is a work of inspiration, much of it is written +from himself, and nobly from himself. How was it received? 'It was +no sooner read,' says one of his contemporary biographers, 'than +universally admired those only excepted who had not been used to feel, +or to look for anything in poetry, beyond a _point_ of satirical or +epigrammatic wit, a smart _antithesis_ richly trimmed with rime, or +the softness of an _elegiac_ complaint. To such his manly classical +spirit could not readily commend itself, till, after a more attentive +perusal, they had got the better of their prejudices, and either +acquired or affected a truer taste. A few others stood aloof, merely +because they had long before fixed the articles of their poetical +creed, and resigned themselves to an absolute despair of ever seeing +anything new and original. These were somewhat mortified to find +their notions disturbed by the appearance of a poet, who seemed to owe +nothing but to nature and his own genius. But, in a short time, the +applause became unanimous, every one wondering how so many pictures, +and pictures so familiar, should have moved them but faintly to what +they felt in his descriptions. His digressions too, the overflowings +of a tender benevolent heart, charmed the reader no less, leaving him +in doubt, whether he should more admire the Poet or love the Man.' + +This case appears to bear strongly against us--but we must distinguish +between wonder and legitimate admiration. The subject of the work is +the changes produced in the appearances of nature by the revolution +of the year: and, by undertaking to write in verse, Thomson pledged +himself to treat his subject as became a Poet. Now, it is remarkable +that, excepting the nocturnal _Reverie of Lady Winchelsea_, and a +passage or two in the _Windsor Forest_ of Pope, the poetry of the +period intervening between the publication of the _Paradise Lost_ and +the _Seasons_ does not contain a single new image of external nature; +and scarcely presents a familiar one from which it can be inferred +that the eye of the Poet has been steadily fixed upon his object, much +less that his feelings had urged him to work upon it in the spirit of +genuine imagination. To what a low state knowledge of the most obvious +and important phenomena had sunk, is evident from the style in which +Dryden has executed a description of Night in one of his Tragedies, +and Pope his translation of the celebrated moonlight scene in +the _Iliad_. A blind man, in the habit of attending accurately to +descriptions casually dropped from the lips of those around him, might +easily depict these appearances with more truth. Dryden's lines are +vague, bombastic, and senseless;[9] those of Pope, though he had Homer +to guide him, are throughout false and contradictory. The verses of +Dryden, once highly celebrated, are forgotten; those of Pope still +retain their hold upon public estimation,--nay, there is not a passage +of descriptive poetry, which at this day finds so many and such ardent +admirers. Strange to think of an enthusiast, as may have been the case +with thousands, reciting those verses under the cope of a moonlight +sky, without having his raptures in the least disturbed by a suspicion +of their absurdity!--If these two distinguished writers could +habitually think that the visible universe was of so little +consequence to a poet, that it was scarcely necessary for him to cast +his eyes upon it, we may be assured that those passages of the elder +poets which faithfully and poetically describe the phenomena of +nature, were not at that time holden in much estimation, and that +there was little accurate attention paid to those appearances. + +Wonder is the natural product of Ignorance; and as the soil was _in +such good condition_ at the time of the publication of the _Seasons_ +the crop was doubtless abundant. Neither individuals nor nations +become corrupt all at once, nor are they enlightened in a moment. +Thomson was an inspired poet, but he could not work miracles; in cases +where the art of seeing had in some degree been learned, the teacher +would further the proficiency of his pupils, but he could do +little _more_; though so far does vanity assist men in acts of +self-deception, that many would often fancy they recognized a likeness +when they knew nothing of the original. Having shown that much of what +his biographer deemed genuine admiration must in fact have been +blind wonderment--how is the rest to be accounted for?--Thomson was +fortunate in the very title of his poem, which seemed to bring it +home to the prepared sympathies of every one: in the next place, +notwithstanding his high powers, he writes a vicious style; and his +false ornaments are exactly of that kind which would be most likely +to strike the undiscerning. He likewise abounds with sentimental +commonplaces, that, from the manner in which they were brought +forward, bore an imposing air of novelty. In any well-used copy of +the _Seasons_ the book generally opens of itself with the rhapsody on +love, or with one of the stories (perhaps 'Damon and Musidora'); these +also are prominent in our collections of Extracts, and are the parts +of his Work which, after all, were probably most efficient in first +recommending the author to general notice. Pope, repaying praises +which he had received, and wishing to extol him to the highest, only +styles him 'an elegant and philosophical Poet'; nor are we able to +collect any unquestionable proofs that the true characteristics of +Thomson's genius as an imaginative poet[10] were perceived, till +the elder Warton, almost forty years after the publication of the +_Seasons_, pointed them out by a note in his Essay on the _Life and +Writings of Pope_. In the _Castle of Indolence_ (of which Gray +speaks so coldly) these characteristics were almost as conspicuously +displayed, and in verse more harmonious and diction more pure. Yet +that fine poem was neglected on its appearance, and is at this day the +delight only of a few! + +When Thomson died, Collins breathed forth his regrets in an Elegiac +Poem, in which he pronounces a poetical curse upon _him_ who should +regard with insensibility the place where the Poet's remains were +deposited. The Poems of the mourner himself have now passed through +innumerable editions, and are universally known, but if, when Collins +died, the same kind of imprecation had been pronounced by a surviving +admirer, small is the number whom it would not have comprehended. The +notice which his poems attained during his lifetime was so small, and +of course the sale so insignificant, that not long before his death +he deemed it right to repay to the bookseller the sum which he had +advanced for them and threw the edition into the fire. + +Next in importance to the _Seasons_ of Thomson, though a considerable +distance from that work in order of time, come the _Reliques of +Ancient English Poetry_, collected, new-modelled, and in many +instances (if such a contradiction in terms may be used) composed by +the Editor, Dr Percy. This work did not steal silently into the world, +as is evident from the number of legendary tales, that appeared not +long after its publication, and had been modelled, as the authors +persuaded themselves, after the old Ballad. The Compilation was, +however ill suited to the then existing taste of city society, and Dr +Johnson, 'mid the little senate to which he gave laws, was not +sparing in his exertions to make it an object of contempt. The critic +triumphed, the legendary imitators were deservedly disregarded, and +as undeservedly, their ill imitated models sank in this country into +temporary neglect, while Burger and other able writers of Germany, +were translating or imitating these Reliques, and composing, with the +aid of inspiration thence derived, poems which are the delight of the +German nation. Dr Percy was so abashed by the ridicule flung upon his +labours from the ignorance and insensibility of the persons with whom +he lived, that, though while he was writing under a mask he had +not wanted resolution to follow his genius into the regions of true +simplicity and genuine pathos (as is evinced by the exquisite ballad +of _Sir Cauline_ and by many other pieces), yet when he appeared in +his own person and character as a poetical writer, he adopted, as in +the tale of the _Hermit of Warkworth_, a diction scarcely in any +one of its features distinguishable from the vague, the glossy, and +unfeeling language of his day. I mention this remarkable fact[11] +with regret, esteeming the genius of Dr. Percy in this kind of writing +superior to that of any other man by whom in modern times it has been +cultivated. That even Burger (to whom Klopstock gave, in my hearing, +a commendation which he denied to Goethe and Schiller, pronouncing him +to be a genuine poet, and one of the few among the Germans whose works +would last) had not the fine sensibility of Percy, might be shown +from many passages, in which he has deserted his original only to go +astray. For example, + + Now daye was gone, and night was come, + And all were fast asleepe, + All save the Lady Emeline, + Who sate in her bowre to weepe: + + And soone she heard her true Love's voice + Low whispering at the walle, + Awake, awake, my dear Ladye, + 'Tis I thy true love call + +Which is thus tricked out and dilated; + + Als nun die Nacht Gebirg' und Thal + Vermummt in Rabenschatten, + Und Hochburgs Lampen uberall + Schon ausgeflimmert hatten, + Und alles tief entschlafen war; + Doch nur das Fraulein immerdar, + Voll Fieberangst, noch wachte, + Und seinen Ritter dachte: + Da horch! Ein susser Liebeston + Kam leis, empor geflogen. + 'Ho, Trudchen, ho! Da bin ich schon! + Frisch auf! Dich angezogen!' + +But from humble ballads we must ascend to heroics. + +All hail, Macpherson! hail to thee, Sire of Ossian! The Phantom was +begotten by the snug embrace of an impudent Highlander upon a cloud +of tradition--it travelled southward, where it was greeted with +acclamation, and the thin Consistence took its course through Europe, +upon the breath of popular applause. The Editor of the _Reliques_ +had indirectly preferred a claim to the praise of invention, by not +concealing that his supplementary labours were considerable! how +selfish his conduct, contrasted with that of the disinterested Gael, +who, like Lear, gives his kingdom away, and is content to become +a pensioner upon his own issue for a beggarly pittance!--Open this +far-famed Book!--I have done so at random, and the beginning of the +_Epic Poem Temora_, in eight Books, presents itself. 'The blue waves +of Ullin roll in light. The green hills are covered with day. Trees +shake their dusky heads in the breeze. Grey torrents pour their noisy +streams. Two green hills with aged oaks surround a narrow plain. The +blue course of a stream is there. On its banks stood Cairbar of Atha. +His spear supports the king; the red eyes of his fear are sad. Cormac +rises on his soul with all his ghastly wounds.' Precious memorandums +from the pocket-book of the blind Ossian! + +If it be unbecoming, as I acknowledge that for the most part it is, to +speak disrespectfully of Works that have enjoyed for a length of +time a widely-spread reputation, without at the same time producing +irrefragable proofs of their unworthiness, let me be forgiven upon +this occasion.--Having had the good fortune to be born and reared in a +mountainous country, from my very childhood I have felt the falsehood +that pervades the volumes imposed upon the world under the name of +Ossian. From what I saw with my own eyes, I knew that the imagery was +spurious. In nature everything is distinct, yet nothing defined into +absolute independent singleness. In Macpherson's work it is exactly +the reverse; everything (that is not stolen) is in this manner +defined, insulated, dislocated, deadened,--yet nothing distinct. It +will always be so when words are substituted for things. To say that +the characters never could exist, that the manners are impossible, and +that a dream has more substance than the whole state of society, as +there depicted, is doing nothing more than pronouncing a censure which +Macpherson defied; when, with the steeps of Morven before his eyes, he +could talk so familiarly of his Car-borne heroes;--of Morven, which, +if one may judge from its appearance at the distance of a few miles, +contains scarcely an acre of ground sufficiently accommodating for a +sledge to be trailed along its surface.--Mr. Malcolm Laing has ably +shown that the diction of this pretended translation is a motley +assemblage from all quarters; but he is so fond of making out parallel +passages as to call poor Macpherson to account for his '_ands_' and +his '_buts_!' and he has weakened his argument by conducting it as +if he thought that every striking resemblance was a _conscious_ +plagiarism. It is enough that the coincidences are too remarkable +for its being probable or possible that they could arise in different +minds without communication between them. Now as the Translators of +the Bible, and Shakespeare, Milton, and Pope, could not be indebted +to Macpherson, it follows that he must have owed his fine feathers to +them; unless we are prepared gravely to assert, with Madame de Stael, +that many of the characteristic beauties of our most celebrated +English Poets are derived from the ancient Fingallian; in which case +the modern translator would have been but giving back to Ossian his +own.--It is consistent that Lucien Buonaparte, who could censure +Milton for having surrounded Satan in the infernal regions with +courtly and regal splendour, should pronounce the modern Ossian to +be the glory of Scotland;--a country that has produced a Dunbar, a +Buchanan, a Thomson, and a Burns! These opinions are of ill omen for +the Epic ambition of him who has given them to the world. + +Yet, much as those pretended treasures of antiquity have been admired, +they have been wholly uninfluential upon the literature of the +Country. No succeeding writer appears to have caught from them a ray +of inspiration; no author, in the least distinguished, has ventured +formally to imitate them--except the boy, Chatterton, on their first +appearance. He had perceived, from the successful trials which he +himself had made in literary forgery, how few critics were able to +distinguish between a real ancient medal and a counterfeit of modern +manufacture; and he set himself to the work of filling a magazine with +_Saxon Poems_,--counterparts of those of Ossian, as like his as one +of his misty stars is to another. This incapability to amalgamate with +the literature of the Island is, in my estimation, a decisive proof +that the book is essentially unnatural; nor should I require any other +to demonstrate it to be a forgery, audacious as worthless.--Contrast, +in this respect, the effect of Macpherson's publication with the +_Reliques_ of Percy, so unassuming, so modest in their pretensions!--I +have already stated how much Germany is indebted to this latter work; +and for our own country, its poetry has been absolutely redeemed +by it. I do not think that there is an able writer in verse of the +present day who would not be proud to acknowledge his obligations to +the _Reliques_; I know that it is so with my friends; and, for myself, +I am happy in this occasion to make a public avowal of my own. + +Dr. Johnson, more fortunate in his contempt of the labours of +Macpherson than those of his modest friend, was solicited not long +after to furnish Prefaces biographical and critical for the works +of some of the most eminent English Poets. The booksellers took upon +themselves to make the collection; they referred probably to the most +popular miscellanies, and, unquestionably, to their books of accounts; +and decided upon the claim of authors to be admitted into a body of +the most eminent, from the familiarity of their names with the readers +of that day, and by the profits, which, from the sale of his works, +each had brought and was bringing to the Trade. The Editor was allowed +a limited exercise of discretion, and the Authors whom he recommended +are scarcely to be mentioned without a smile. We open the volume of +Prefatory Lives, and to our astonishment the _first_ name we find is +that of Cowley!--What Is become of the morning-star of English Poetry? +Where is the bright Elizabethan constellation? Or, if names be more +acceptable than images, where is the ever to-be-honoured Chaucer? +where is Spenser? where Sidney? and, lastly, where he, whose rights +as a poet, contra-distinguished from those which he is universally +allowed to possess as a dramatist, we have vindicated,--where +Shakespeare?--These, and a multitude of others not unworthy to be +placed near them, their contemporaries and successors, we have _not_. +But in their stead, we have (could better be expected when precedence +was to be settled by an abstract of reputation at any given period +made, as in this case before us?) Roscommon, and Stepney, +and Phillips, and Walsh, and Smith, and Duke, and King, and +Spratt--Halifax, Granville, Sheffield, Congreve, Broome, and other +reputed Magnates--metrical writers utterly worthless and useless, +except for occasions like the present, when their productions are +referred to as evidence what a small quantity of brain is necessary to +procure a considerable stock of admiration, provided the aspirant will +accommodate himself to the likings and fashions of his day. + +As I do not mean to bring down this retrospect to our own times, it +may with propriety be closed at the era of this distinguished event. +From the literature of other ages and countries, proofs equally cogent +might have been adduced, that the opinions announced in the former +part of this Essay are founded upon truth. It was not an agreeable +office, nor a prudent undertaking, to declare them; but their +importance seemed to render it a duty. It may still be asked, +where lies the particular relation of what has been said to these +Volumes?--The question will be easily answered by the discerning +Reader who is old enough to remember the taste that prevailed when +some of these poems were first published, seventeen years ago; who has +also observed to what degree the poetry of this Island has since +that period been coloured by them; and who is further aware of the +unremitting hostility with which, upon some principle or other, they +have each and all been opposed. A sketch of my own notion of the +constitution of Fame has been given; and, as far as concerns myself, +I have cause to be satisfied. The love, the admiration, the +indifference, the slight, the aversion, and even the contempt, with +which these Poems have been received, knowing, as I do, the source +within my own mind, from which they have proceeded, and the labour +and pains, which, when labour and pains appeared needful, have been +bestowed upon them, must all, if I think consistently, be received as +pledges and tokens, bearing the same general impression, though widely +different in value;--they are all proofs that for the present time +I have not laboured in vain; and afford assurances, more or less +authentic, that the products of my industry will endure. + +If there be one conclusion more forcibly pressed upon us than another +by the review which has been given of the fortunes and fate of +poetical Works, it is this--that every author, as far as he is great +and at the same time _original_, has had the task of _creating_ +the taste by which he is to be enjoyed: so has it been, so will +it continue to be. This remark was long since made to me by the +philosophical Friend for the separation of whose poems from my own I +have previously expressed my regret. The predecessors of an original +Genius of a high order will have smoothed the way for all that he has +in common with them;--and much he will have in common; but, for what +is peculiarly his own, he will be called upon to clear and often to +shape his own road:--he will be in the condition of Hannibal among the +Alps. + +And where lies the real difficulty of creating that taste by which a +truly original poet is to be relished? Is it in breaking the bonds +of custom, in overcoming the prejudices of false refinement, and +displacing the aversions of inexperience? Or, if he labour for an +object which here and elsewhere I have proposed to myself, does it +consist in divesting the reader of the pride that induces him to dwell +upon those points wherein men differ from each other, to the exclusion +of those in which all men are alike, or the same; and in making him +ashamed of the vanity that renders him insensible of the appropriate +excellence which civil arrangements, less unjust than might appear, +and Nature illimitable in her bounty, had conferred on men who may +stand below him in the scale of society? Finally, does it lie in +establishing that dominion over the spirits of readers by which they +are to be humbled and humanized, in order that they may be purified +and exalted? + +If these ends are to be attained by the mere communication of +_knowledge_, it does _not_ lie here.--TASTE, I would remind the +reader, like IMAGINATION, is a word which has been forced to extend +its services far beyond the point to which philosophy would have +confined them. It is a metaphor, taken from a _passive_ sense of the +human body, and transferred to things which are in their essence +_not_ passive,--to intellectual _acts_ and _operations_. The word, +Imagination, has been overstrained, from impulses honourable to +mankind, to meet the demands of the faculty which is perhaps the +noblest of our nature. In the instance of Taste, the process has been +reversed; and from the prevalence of dispositions at once injurious +and discreditable, being no other than that selfishness which is the +child of apathy,--which, as Nations decline in productive and creative +power, makes them value themselves upon a presumed refinement of +judging. Poverty of language is the primary cause of the use which we +make of the word, Imagination; but the word, Taste, has been +stretched to the sense which it bears in modern Europe by habits of +self-conceit, inducing that inversion in the order of things whereby a +passive faculty is made paramount among the faculties conversant with +the fine arts. Proportion and congruity, the requisite knowledge +being supposed, are subjects upon which taste may be trusted; it is +competent to this office--for in its intercourse with these the +mind is _passive_, and is affected painfully or pleasurably as by an +instinct. But the profound and the exquisite in feeling, the lofty and +universal in thought and imagination; or, in ordinary language, the +pathetic and the sublime;--are neither of them, accurately speaking, +objects of a faculty which could ever without a sinking in the spirit +of Nations have been designated by the metaphor _Taste_. And why? +Because without the exertion of a co-operating _power_ in the mind +of the reader, there can be no adequate sympathy with either of these +emotions: without this auxiliary impulse, elevated or profound passion +cannot exist. + +Passion, it must be observed, is derived from a word which signifies +_suffering_; but the connexion which suffering has with effort, with +exertion, and _action_, is immediate and inseparable. How strikingly +is this property of human nature exhibited by the fact that, in +popular language, to be in a passion is to be angry! But, + + Anger in hasty _words_ or _blows_ + Itself discharges on its foes. + +To be moved, then, by a passion is to be excited, often to external, +and always to internal, effort; whether for the continuance and +strengthening of the passion, or for its suppression, accordingly +as the course which it takes may be painful or pleasurable. If the +latter, the soul must contribute to its support, or it never becomes +vivid,--and soon languishes and dies. And this brings us to the point. +If every great poet with whose writings men are familiar, in the +highest exercise of his genius, before he can be thoroughly enjoyed, +has to call forth and to communicate _power_, this service, in a still +greater degree, falls upon an original writer, at his first appearance +in the world.--Of genius the only proof is, the act of doing well what +is worthy to be done, and what was never done before: Of genius, in +the fine arts, the only infallible sign is the widening the sphere +of human sensibility, for the delight, honour, and benefit of +human nature. Genius is the introduction of a new element into +the intellectual universe: or, if that be not allowed, it is the +application of powers to objects on which they had not before been +exercised, or the employment of them in such a manner as to produce +effects hitherto unknown. What is all this but an advance, or a +conquest, made by the soul of the poet? Is it to be supposed that +the reader can make progress of this kind, like an Indian prince or +general--stretched on his palanquin, and borne by his slaves? No; +he is invigorated and inspirited by his leader, in order that he +may exert himself; for he cannot proceed in quiescence, he cannot be +carried like a dead weight. Therefore to create taste is to call forth +and bestow power, of which knowledge is the effect; and _there_ lies +the true difficulty. + +As the pathetic participates of an _animal_ sensation, it might +seem--that, if the springs of this emotion were genuine, all men, +possessed of competent knowledge of the facts and circumstances, would +be instantaneously affected. And, doubtless, in the works of every +true poet will be found passages of that species of excellence which +is proved by effects immediate and universal. But there are emotions +of the pathetic that are simple and direct, and others--that are +complex and revolutionary; some--to which the heart yields with +gentleness; others--against which it struggles with pride; these +varieties are infinite as the combinations of circumstance and the +constitutions of character. Remember, also, that the medium through +which, in poetry, the heart is to be affected, is language; a thing +subject to endless fluctuations and arbitrary associations. The genius +of the poet melts these down for his purpose; but they retain their +shape and quality to him who is not capable of exerting, within his +own mind, a corresponding energy. There is also a meditative, as well +as a human, pathos; an enthusiastic, as well as an ordinary, sorrow; +a sadness that has its seat in the depths of reason, to which the mind +cannot sink gently of itself--but to which it must descend by treading +the steps of thought. And for the sublime,--if we consider what are +the cares that occupy the passing day, and how remote is the practice +and the course of life from the sources of sublimity, in the soul of +Man, can it be wondered that there is little existing preparation +for a poet charged with a new mission to extend its kingdom, and to +augment and spread its enjoyments? + +Away, then, with the senseless iteration of the word _popular_, +applied to new works in poetry, as if there were no test of excellence +in this first of the fine arts but that all men should run after +its productions, as if urged by an appetite, or constrained by a +spell!--The qualities of writing best fitted for eager reception are +either such as startle the world into attention by their audacity and +extravagance; or they are chiefly of a superficial kind, lying upon +the surfaces of manners; or arising out of a selection and arrangement +of incidents, by which the mind is kept upon the stretch of curiosity, +and the fancy amused without the trouble of thought. But in everything +which is to send the soul into herself, to be admonished of her +weakness, or to be made conscious of her power;--wherever life and +nature are described as operated upon by the creative or abstracting +virtue of the imagination; wherever the instinctive wisdom of +antiquity and her heroic passions uniting, in the heart of the poet, +with the meditative wisdom of later ages, have produced that accord of +sublimated humanity which is at once a history of the remote past and +a prophetic enunciation of the remotest future, _there_, the poet must +reconcile himself for a season to few and scattered hearers.--Grand +thoughts (and Shakespeare must often have sighed over this truth), as +they are most naturally and most fitly conceived in solitude, so +can they not be brought forth in the midst of plaudits without +some violation of their sanctity. Go to a silent exhibition of the +productions of the sister Art, and be convinced that the qualities +which dazzle at first sight, and kindle the admiration of the +multitude, are essentially different from those by which permanent +influence is secured. Let us not shrink from following up these +principles as far as they will carry us, and conclude with +observing--that there never has been a period, and perhaps never will +be, in which vicious poetry, of some kind or other, has not excited +more zealous admiration, and been far more generally read, than good; +but this advantage attends the good, that the _individual_, as well +as the species, survives from age to age; whereas, of the depraved, +though the species be immortal, the individual quickly _perishes_; the +object of present admiration vanishes, being supplanted by some other +as easily produced; which, though no better, brings with it at least +the irritation of novelty,--with adaptation, more or less skilful, to +the changing humours of the majority of those who are most at leisure +to regard poetical works when they first solicit their attention. + +Is it the result of the whole, that, in the opinion of the Writer, the +judgement of the People is not to be respected? The thought is most +injurious; and, could the charge be brought against him, he would +repel it with indignation. The People have already been justified, +and their eulogium pronounced by implication, when it was said, +above--that, of _good_ poetry, the _individual_, as well as the +species, _survives_. And how does it survive but through the People? +What preserves it but their intellect and their wisdom? + + --Past and future, are the wings + On whose support, harmoniously conjoined, + Moves the great Spirit of human knowledge-- + _MS._ + +The voice that issues from this Spirit is that Vox Populi which the +Deity inspires. Foolish must he be who can mistake for this a local +acclamation, or a transitory out-cry--transitory though it be for +years, local though from a Nation. Still more lamentable is his error +who can believe that there is anything of divine infallibility in +the clamour of that small though loud portion of the community, ever +governed by factitious influence, which, under the name of the PUBLIC, +passes itself, upon the unthinking, for the PEOPLE. Towards the +Public, the Writer hopes that he feels as much deference as it is +entitled to: but to the People, philosophically characterized, and to +the embodied spirit of their knowledge, so far as it exists and moves, +at the present, faithfully supported by its two wings, the past and +the future, his devout respect, his reverence, is due. He offers it +willingly and readily; and, this done, takes leave of his Readers, +by assuring them--that, if he were not persuaded that the contents +of these Volumes, and the Work to which they are subsidiary, evince +something of the 'Vision and the Faculty divine'; and that, both in +words and things, they will operate in their degree, to extend the +domain of sensibility for the delight, the honour, and the benefit +of human nature, nothwithstanding the many happy hours which he +has employed in their composition, and the manifold comforts and +enjoyments they have procured to him, he would not, if a wish could +do it, save them from immediate destruction;--from becoming at this +moment, to the world, as a thing that had never been. + + +[Footnote 5: The learned Hakewill (a third edition of whose book bears +date 1635), writing to refute the error 'touching Nature's perpetual +and universal decay,' cites triumphantly the names of Ariosto, +Tasso, Bartas, and Spenser, as instances that poetic genius had not +degenerated; but be makes no mention of Shakespeare.] + +[Footnote 6: This flippant insensibility was publicly reprehended by +Mr. Coleridge in a course of Lectures upon Poetry given by him at the +Royal Institution. For the various merits of thought and language in +Shakespeare's _Sonnets_, see Nos. 27, 29, 30, 32, 33, 54, 64, 66, 68, +73, 76, 86, 91, 92, 93, 97, 98, 105, 107, 108, 109, 111, 113, 114, +116, 117, 129, and many others.] + +[Footnote 7: Hughes is express upon this subject in his dedication of +Spenser's Works to Lord Somers, he writes thus 'It was your Lordship's +encouraging a beautiful edition of _Paradise Lost_ that first brought +that incomparable Poem to be generally known and esteemed.'] + +[Footnote 8: This opinion seems actually to have been entertained by +Adam Smith, the worst critic, David Hume not excepted, that Scotland, +a soil to which this sort of weed seems natural, has produced.] + +[Footnote 9: CORTES, _alone in a night-gown_. + + All things are hush'd as Nature's self lay dead; + The mountains seem to nod their drowsy head. + The little Birds in dreams their songs repeat, + And sleeping Flowers beneath the Night-dew sweat: + Even Lust and Envy sleep; yet Love denies + Rest to my soul, and slumber to my eyes. + +DRYDEN'S _Indian Emperor_.] + +[Footnote 10: Since these observations upon Thomson were written, I +have perused the second edition of his _Seasons_, and find that even +_that_ does not contain the most striking passages which Warton points +out for admiration, these, with other improvements, throughout the +whole work, must have been added at a later period.] + +[Footnote 11: Shenstone, in his _Schoolmistress_, gives a still more +remarkable instance of this timidity On its first appearance (see +D'Israeli's 2d Series of the _Curiosities of Literature_) the Poem was +accompanied with an absurd prose commentary, showing, as indeed some +incongruous expressions in the text imply, that the whole was intended +for burlesque. In subsequent editions, the commentary was dropped, and +the People have since continued to read in seriousness, doing for the +Author what he had not courage openly to venture upon for himself.] + + + + +PREFACE TO CROMWELL + +BY VICTOR HUGO. (1827)[A] + + +The drama contained in the following pages has nothing to commend +it to the attention or the good will of the public. It has not, to +attract the interest of political disputants, the advantage of the +veto of the official censorship, nor even, to win for it at the outset +the literary sympathy of men of taste, the honour of having been +formally rejected by an infallible reading committee. + +It presents itself, therefore, to the public gaze, naked and +friendless, like the infirm man of the Gospel--_solus, pauper, nudus_. + +Not without some hesitation, moreover, did the author determine to +burden his drama with a preface. Such things are usually of very +little interest to the reader. He inquires concerning the talent of +a writer rather than concerning his point of view; and in determining +whether a work is good or bad, it matters little to him upon what +ideas it is based, or in what sort of mind it germinated. One seldom +inspects the cellars of a house after visiting its salons, and when +one eats the fruit of a tree, one cares but little about its root. + +On the other hand, notes and prefaces are sometimes a convenient +method of adding to the weight of a book, and of magnifying, in +appearance at least, the importance of a work; as a matter of tactics +this is not dissimilar to that of the general who, to make his +battle-front more imposing, puts everything, even his baggage-trains, +in the line. And then, while critics fall foul of the preface and +scholars of the notes, it may happen that the work itself will +escape them, passing uninjured between their cross-fires, as an army +extricates itself from a dangerous position between two skirmishes of +outposts and rear-guards. + +These reasons, weighty as they may seem, are not those which +influenced the author. This volume did not need to be _inflated_, it +was already too stout by far. Furthermore, and the author does not +know why it is so, his prefaces, frank and ingenuous as they are, have +always served rather to compromise him with the critics than to shield +him. Far from being staunch and trusty bucklers, they have played him +a trick like that played in a battle by an unusual and conspicuous +uniform, which, calling attention to the soldier who wears it, +attracts all the blows and is proof against none. + +Considerations of an altogether different sort acted upon the author. +It seemed to him that, although in fact, one seldom inspects the +cellars of a building for pleasure, one is not sorry sometimes to +examine its foundations. He will, therefore, give himself over once +more, with a preface, to the wrath of the _feuilletonists. Che sara, +sara_. He has never given much thought to the fortune of his works, +and he is but little appalled by dread of the literary _what will +people say_. In the discussion now raging, in which the theatre and +the schools, the public and the academies, are at daggers drawn, one +will hear, perhaps, not without some interest, the voice of a solitary +_apprentice_ of nature and truth, who has withdrawn betimes from the +literary world, for pure love of letters, and who offers good faith in +default of good taste, sincere conviction in default of talent, study +in default of learning. + +He will confine himself, however, to general considerations concerning +the art, without the slightest attempt to smooth the path of his own +work, without pretending to write an indictment or a plea, against or +for any person whomsoever. An attack upon or defence of his book is +of less importance to him than to anybody else. Nor is personal +controversy agreeable to him. It is always a pitiful spectacle to +see two hostile self-esteems crossing swords. He protests, therefore, +beforehand against every interpretation of his ideas, every personal +application of his words, saying with the Spanish fablist:-- + + Quien haga aplicaciones + Con su pan se lo coma. + +In truth, several of the leading champions of "sound literary +doctrines" have done him the honour to throw the gauntlet to him, even +in his profound obscurity--to him, a simple, imperceptible spectator +of this curious contest. He will not have the presumption to pick it +up. In the following pages will be found the observations with which +he might oppose them--there will be found his sling and his stone; +but others, if they choose, may hurl them at the head of the classical +Goliaths. + +This said, let us pass on. + +Let us set out from a fact. The same type of civilization, or to use +a more exact, although more extended expression, the same society, has +not always inhabited the earth. The human race as a whole has grown, +has developed, has matured, like one of ourselves. It was once a +child, it was once a man; we are now looking on at its impressive old +age. Before the epoch which modern society has dubbed "ancient," there +was another epoch which the ancients called "fabulous," but which it +would be more accurate to call "primitive." Behold then three great +successive orders of things in civilization, from its origin down to +our days. Now, as poetry is always superposed upon society, we +propose to try to demonstrate, from the form of its society, what the +character of the poetry must have been in those three great ages of +the world--primitive times, ancient times, modern times. + +In primitive times, when man awakes in a world that is newly created, +poetry awakes with him. In the face of the marvellous things that +dazzle and intoxicate him, his first speech is a hymn simply. He is +still so close to God that all his meditations are ecstatic, all his +dreams are visions. His bosom swells, he sings as he breathes. +His lyre has but three strings--God, the soul, creation; but this +threefold mystery envelopes everything, this threefold idea embraces +everything. The earth is still almost deserted. There are families, +but no nations; patriarchs, but no kings. Each race exists at its own +pleasure; no property, no laws, no contentions, no wars. Everything +belongs to each and to all. Society is a community. Man is restrained +in nought. He leads that nomadic pastoral life with which all +civilizations begin, and which is so well adapted to solitary +contemplation, to fanciful reverie. He follows every suggestion, +he goes hither and thither, at random. His thought, like his life, +resembles a cloud that changes its shape and its direction according +to the wind that drives it. Such is the first man, such is the first +poet. He is young, he is cynical. Prayer is his sole religion, the ode +is his only form of poetry. + +This ode, this poem of primitive times, is Genesis. + +By slow degrees, however, this youth of the world passes away. All +the spheres progress; the family becomes a tribe, the tribe becomes a +nation. Each of these groups of men camps about a common centre, and +kingdoms appear. The social instinct succeeds the nomadic instinct. +The camp gives place to the city, the tent to the palace, the ark to +the temple. The chiefs of these nascent states are still shepherds, +it is true, but shepherds of nations; the pastoral staff has already +assumed the shape of a sceptre. Everything tends to become stationary +and fixed. Religion takes on a definite shape; prayer is governed by +rites; dogma sets bounds to worship. Thus the priest and king share +the paternity of the people; thus theocratic society succeeds the +patriarchal community. + +Meanwhile the nations are beginning to be packed too closely on the +earth's surface. They annoy and jostle one another; hence the clash +of empires--war. They overflow upon another; hence, the migrations of +nations--voyages. Poetry reflects these momentous events; from ideas +it proceeds to things. It sings of ages, of nations, of empires. It +becomes epic, it gives birth to Homer. + +Homer, in truth, dominates the society of ancient times. In that +society, all is simple, all is epic. Poetry is religion, religion is +law. The virginity of the earlier age is succeeded by the chastity +of the later. A sort of solemn gravity is everywhere noticeable, in +private manners no less than in public. The nations have retained +nothing of the wandering life of the earlier time, save respect +for the stranger and the traveller. The family has a fatherland; +everything is connected therewith; it has the cult of the house and +the cult of the tomb. + +We say again, such a civilization can find its one expression only in +the epic. The epic will assume diverse forms, but will never lose its +specific character. Pindar is more priestlike than patriarchal, more +epic than lyrical. If the chroniclers, the necessary accompaniments +of this second age of the world, set about collecting traditions and +begin to reckon by centuries, they labour to no purpose--chronology +cannot expel poesy; history remains an epic. Herodotus is a Homer. + +But it is in the ancient tragedy, above all, that the epic breaks out +at every turn. It mounts the Greek stage without losing aught, so to +speak, of its immeasurable, gigantic proportions. Its characters +are still heroes, demigods, gods; its themes are visions, oracles, +fatality; its scenes are battles, funeral rites, catalogues. That +which the rhapsodists formerly sang, the actors declaim--that is the +whole difference. + +There is something more. When the whole plot, the whole spectacle +of the epic poem have passed to the stage, the Chorus takes all that +remains. The Chorus annotates the tragedy, encourages the heroes, +gives descriptions, summons and expels the daylight, rejoices, +laments, sometimes furnishes the scenery, explains the moral bearing +of the subject, flatters the listening assemblage. Now, what is the +Chorus, this anomalous character standing between the spectacle and +the spectator, if it be not the poet completing his epic? + +The theatre of the ancients is, like their dramas, huge, pontifical, +epic. It is capable of holding thirty thousand spectators; the plays +are given in the open air, in bright sunlight; the performances last +all day. The actors disguise their voices, wear masks, increase their +stature; they make themselves gigantic, like their roles. The stage is +immense. It may represent at the same moment both the interior and +the exterior of a temple, a palace, a camp, a city. Upon it, +vast spectacles are displayed. There is--we cite only from +memory--Prometheus on his mountain; there is Antigone, at the top of +a tower, seeking her brother Polynices in the hostile army (_The +Phoenicians_); there is Evadne hurling herself from a cliff into the +flames where the body of Capaneus is burning (_The Suppliants_ of +Euripides); there is a ship sailing into port and landing fifty +princesses with their retinues (_The Suppliants_ of AEschylus). +Architecture, poetry, everything assumes a monumental character. In +all antiquity there is nothing more solemn, more majestic. Its history +and its religion are mingled on its stage. Its first actors are +priests; its scenic performances are religious ceremonies, national +festivals. + +One last observation, which completes our demonstration of the epic +character of this epoch: in the subjects which it treats, no less than +in the forms it adopts, tragedy simply re-echoes the epic. All +the ancient tragic authors derive their plots from Homer. The same +fabulous exploits, the same catastrophes, the same heroes. One and +all drink from the Homeric stream. The Iliad and Odyssey are always +in evidence. Like Achilles dragging Hector at his chariot-wheel, the +Greek tragedy circles about Troy. + +But the age of the epic draws near its end. Like the society that +it represents, this form of poetry wears itself out revolving upon +itself. Rome reproduces Greece, Virgil copies Homer, and, as if to +make a becoming end, epic poetry expires in the last parturition. + +It was time. Another era is about to begin, for the world and for +poetry. + +A spiritual religion, supplanting the material and external paganism, +makes its way to the heart of the ancient society, kills it, and +deposits, in that corpse of a decrepit civilization, the germ of +modern civilization. This religion as complete, because it is true; +between its dogma and its cult, it embraces a deep-rooted moral. Arid +first of all, as a fundamental truth, it teaches man that he has two +lives to live, one ephemeral, the other immortal; one on earth, the +other in heaven. It shows him that he, like his destiny, is twofold: +that there is in him an animal and an intellect, a body and a soul; in +a word, that he is the point of intersection, the common link of +the two chains of beings which embrace all creation--of the chain +of material beings and the chain of incorporeal beings; the first +starting from the rock to arrive at man, the second starting from man +to end at God. + +A portion of these truths had perhaps been suspected by certain wise +men of ancient times, but their full, broad, luminous revelation dates +from the Gospels. The pagan schools walked in darkness, feeling their +way, clinging to falsehoods as well as to truths in their haphazard +journeying. Some of their philosophers occasionally cast upon certain +subjects feeble gleams which illuminated but one side and made the +darkness of the other side more profound. Hence all the phantoms +created by ancient philosophy. None but divine wisdom was capable of +substituting an even and all-embracing light for all those flickering +rays of human wisdom. Pythagoras, Epicurus, Socrates, Plato, are +torches: Christ is the glorious light of day. + +Nothing could be more material, indeed, than the ancient theogony. Far +from proposing, as Christianity does, to separate the spirit from the +body, it ascribes form and features to everything, even to impalpable +essences, even to the intelligence. In it everything is visible, +tangible, fleshly. Its gods need a cloud to conceal themselves from +men's eyes. They eat, drink, and sleep. They are wounded and their +blood flows; they are maimed, and lo! they limp forever after. That +religion has gods and halves of gods. Its thunderbolts are forged on +an anvil, and among other things three rays of twisted rain (_tres +imbris torti radios_) enter into their composition. Its Jupiter +suspends the world by a golden chain; its sun rides in a four-horse +chariot; its hell is a precipice the brink of which is marked on the +globe; its heaven is a mountain. + +Thus paganism, which moulded all creations from the same clay, +minimizes divinity and magnifies man. Homer's heroes are of almost the +same stature as his gods. Ajax defies Jupiter, Achilles is the peer +of Mars. Christianity on the contrary, as we have seen, draws a broad +line of division between spirit and matter. It places an abyss between +the soul and the body, an abyss between man and God. + +At this point--to omit nothing from the sketch upon which we have +ventured--we will call attention to the fact that, with Christianity, +and by its means, there entered into the mind of the nations a new +sentiment, unknown to the ancients and marvellously developed +among moderns, a sentiment which is more than gravity and less than +sadness--melancholy. In truth, might not the heart of man, hitherto +deadened by religions purely hierarchical and sacerdotal, awake and +feel springing to life within it some unexpected faculty, under the +breath of a religion that is human because it is divine, a religion +which makes of the poor man's prayer, the rich man's wealth, a +religion of equality, liberty and charity? Might it not see all things +in a new light, since the Gospel had shown it the soul through the +senses, eternity behind life? + +Moreover, at that very moment the world was undergoing so complete +a revolution that it was impossible that there should not be a +revolution in men's minds. Hitherto the catastrophes of empires +had rarely reached the hearts of the people; it was kings who fell, +majesties that vanished, nothing more. The lightning struck only in +the upper regions, and, as we have already pointed out, events seemed +to succeed one another with all the solemnity of the epic. In the +ancient society, the individual occupied so lowly a place that, to +strike him, adversity must needs descend to his family. So that he +knew little of misfortune outside of domestic sorrows. It was an +almost unheard of thing that the general disasters of the state should +disarrange his life. But the instant that Christian society became +firmly established, the ancient continent was thrown into confusion. +Everything was pulled up by the roots. Events, destined to destroy +ancient Europe and to construct a new Europe, trod upon one another's +heels in their ceaseless rush, and drove the nations pell-mell, some +into the light, others into darkness. So much uproar ensued that it +was impossible that some echoes of it should not reach the hearts +of the people. It was more than an echo, it was a reflex blow. Man, +withdrawing within himself in presence of these imposing vicissitudes, +began to take pity upon mankind, to reflect upon the bitter +disillusionments of life. Of this sentiment, which to Cato the heathen +was despair, Christianity fashioned melancholy. + +At the same time was born the spirit of scrutiny and curiosity. These +great catastrophes were also great spectacles, impressive cataclysms. +It was the North hurling itself upon the South; the Roman world +changing shape; the last convulsive throes of a whole universe in +the death agony. As soon as that world was dead, lo! clouds of +rhetoricians, grammarians, sophists, swooped down like insects on its +immense body. People saw them swarming and heard them buzzing in that +seat of putrefaction. They vied with one another in scrutinizing, +commenting, disputing. Each limb, each muscle, each fibre of the huge +prostrate body was twisted and turned in every direction. Surely it +must have been a keen satisfaction to those anatomists of the mind, to +be able, at their debut, to make experiments on a large scale; to have +a dead society to dissect, for their first "subject." + +Thus we see melancholy and meditation, the demons of analysis and +controversy, appear at the same moment, and, as it were, hand-in-hand. +At one extremity of this era of transition is Longinus, at the other +St. Augustine. We must beware of casting a disdainful eye upon that +epoch wherein all that has since borne fruit was contained in germs; +upon that epoch whose least eminent writers, if we may be pardoned a +vulgar but expressive phrase, made fertilizer for the harvest that was +to follow. The Middle Ages were grafted on the Lower Empire. + +Behold, then, a new religion, a new society; upon this twofold +foundation there must inevitably spring up a new poetry. Previously--- +we beg pardon for setting forth a result which the reader has probably +already foreseen from what has been said above--previously, following +therein the course pursued by the ancient polytheism and philosophy, +the purely epic muse of the ancients had studied nature in only a +single aspect, casting aside without pity almost everything in art +which, in the world subjected to its imitation, had not relation to a +certain, type of beauty. A type which was magnificent at first, but, +as always happens with everything systematic, became in later times +false, trivial and conventional. Christianity leads poetry to the +truth. Like it, the modern muse will see things in a higher and +broader light. It will realize that everything in creation is not +humanly _beautiful_, that the ugly exists beside the beautiful, the +unshapely beside the graceful, the grotesque on the reverse of the +sublime, evil with good, darkness with light. It will ask itself if +the narrow and relative sense of the artist should prevail over the +infinite, absolute sense of the Creator; if it is for man to correct +God; if a mutilated nature will be the more beautiful for the +mutilation; if art has the right to duplicate, so to speak, man, life, +creation; if things will progress better when their muscles and their +vigour have been taken from them; if, in short, to be incomplete is +the best way to be harmonious. Then it is that, with its eyes fixed +upon events that are both laughable and redoubtable, and under the +influence of that spirit of Christian melancholy and philosophical +criticism which we described a moment ago, poetry will take a +great step, a decisive step, a step which, like the upheaval of an +earthquake, will change the whole face of the intellectual world. It +will set about doing as nature does, mingling in its creations--but +without confounding them--darkness and light, the grotesque and the +sublime; in other words, the body and the soul, the beast and +the intellect; for the starting-point of religion is always the +starting-point of poetry. All things are connected. + +Thus, then, we see a principle unknown to the ancients, a new type, +introduced in poetry; and as an additional element in anything +modifies the whole of the thing, a new form of the art is developed. +This type is the grotesque; its new form is comedy. + +And we beg leave to dwell upon this point; for we have now indicated +the significant feature, the fundamental difference which, in our +opinion, separates modern from ancient art, the present form from +the defunct form; or, to use less definite but more popular terms, +_romantic_ literature from _classical_ literature. + +"At last!" exclaim the people who for some time past _have seen what +we were coming at_, "at last we have you--you are caught in the act. +So then you put forward the ugly as a type for imitation, you make the +_grotesque_ an element of art. But the graces; but good taste! Don't +you know that art should correct nature? that we must _ennoble_ art? +that we must _select_? Did the ancients ever exhibit the ugly or the +grotesque? Did they ever mingle comedy and tragedy? The example of +the ancients, gentlemen! And Aristotle, too, and Boileau, and La Haipe +Upon my word!" + +These arguments are sound, doubtless, and, above all, of extraordinary +novelty. But it is not our place to reply to them. We are constructing +no system here--God protect us from systems! We are stating a fact. We +are a historian, not a critic. Whether the fact is agreeable or not +matters little, it is a fact. Let us resume, therefore, and try +to prove that it is of the fruitful union of the grotesque and the +sublime types that modern genius is born--so complex, so diverse in +its forms, so inexhaustible in its creations, and therein directly +opposed to the uniform simplicity of the genius of the ancients, let +us show that that is the point from which we must set out to establish +the real and radical difference between the two forms of literature. + +Not that it is strictly true that comedy and the grotesque were +entirely unknown to the ancients. In fact, such a thing would be +impossible. Nothing grows without a root, the germ of the second epoch +always exists in the first. In the Iliad Thersites and Vulcan furnish +comedy, one to the mortals, the other to the gods. There is too much +nature and originality in the Greek tragedy for there not to be an +occasional touch of comedy in it. For example, to cite only what we +happen to recall, the scene between Menelaus and the portress of the +palace. _(Helen_, Act I), and the scene of the Phrygian _(Orestes,_ +Act IV) The Tritons, the Satyrs, the Cyclops are grotesque, Polyphemus +is a terrifying, Silenus a farcical grotesque. + +But one feels that this part of the art is still in its infancy. The +epic, which at this period imposes its form on everything, the epic +weighs heavily upon it and stifles it. The ancient grotesque is timid +and forever trying to keep out of sight. It is plain that it is not +on familiar ground, because it is not in its natural surroundings. It +conceals itself as much as it can. The Satyrs, the Tritons, and the +Sirens are hardly abnormal in form. The Fates and the Harpies are +hideous in their attributes rather than in feature; the Furies are +beautiful, and are called _Eumenides_, that is to say, _gentle, +beneficent_. There is a veil of grandeur or of divinity over other +grotesques. Polyphemus is a giant, Midas a king, Silenus a god. + +Thus comedy is almost imperceptible in the great epic _ensemble_ +of ancient times. What is the barrow of Thespis beside the Olympian +chariots? What are Aristophanes and Plautus, beside the Homeric +colossi, AEschylus, Sophocles, Euripides? Homer bears them along with +him, as Hercules bore the pygmies, hidden in his lion's skin! + +In the idea of men of modern times, however, the grotesque plays an +enormous part. It is found everywhere; on the one hand it creates the +abnormal and the horrible, on the other the comic and the burlesque. +It fastens upon religion a thousand original superstitions, upon +poetry a thousand picturesque fancies. It is the grotesque which +scatters lavishly, in air, water, earth, fire, those myriads of +intermediary creatures which we find all alive in the popular +traditions of the Middle Ages; it is the grotesque which impels the +ghastly antics of the witches' revels, which gives Satan his horns, +his cloven foot and his bat's wings. It is the grotesque, still the +grotesque, which now casts into the Christian hell the frightful faces +which the severe genius of Dante and Milton will evoke, and again +peoples it with those laughter-moving figures amid which Callot, the +burlesque Michelangelo, will disport himself. If it passes from the +world of imagination to the real world, it unfolds an inexhaustible +supply of parodies of mankind. Creations of its fantasy are the +Scaramouches, Crispins and Harlequins, grinning silhouettes of man, +types altogether unknown to serious-minded antiquity, although they +originated in classic Italy. It is the grotesque, lastly, which, +colouring the same drama with the fancies of the North and of the +South in turn, exhibits Sganarelle capering about Don Juan and +Mephistopheles crawling about Faust. + +And how free and open it is in its bearing! how boldly it brings +into relief all the strange forms which the preceding age had timidly +wrapped in swaddling-clothes! Ancient poetry, compelled to provide +the lame Vulcan with companions, tried to disguise their deformity by +distributing it, so to speak, upon gigantic proportions. Modern genius +retains this myth of the supernatural smiths, but gives it an entirely +different character and one which makes it even more striking; it +changes the giants to dwarfs and makes gnomes of the Cyclops. With +like originality, it substitutes for the somewhat commonplace Lernaean +hydra all the local dragons of our national legends--the gargoyle of +Rouen, the _gra-ouilli_ of Metz, the _chair sallee_ of Troyes, the +_dree_ of Montlhery, the _tarasque_ of Tarascon--monsters of forms so +diverse, whose outlandish names are an additional attribute. All these +creations draw from their own nature that energetic and significant +expression before which antiquity seems sometimes to have recoiled. +Certain it is that the Greek Eumenides are much less horrible, and +consequently less _true_, than the witches in _Macbeth_. Pluto is not +the devil. + +In our opinion a most novel book might be written upon the employment +of the grotesque in the arts. One might point out the powerful +effects the moderns have obtained from that fruitful type, upon which +narrow-minded criticism continues to wage war even in our own day. +It may be that we shall be led by our subject to call attention in +passing to some features of this vast picture. We will simply say here +that, as a means of contrast with the sublime, the grotesque is, in +our view, the richest source that nature can offer art. Rubens so +understood it, doubtless, when it pleased him to introduce the hideous +features of a court dwarf amid his exhibitions of royal magnificence, +coronations and splendid ceremonial. The universal beauty which the +ancients solemnly laid upon everything, is not without monotony; the +same impression repeated again and again may prove fatiguing at last. +Sublime upon sublime scarcely presents a contrast, and we need a +little rest from everything, even the beautiful. On the other +hand, the grotesque seems to be a halting-place, a mean term, a +starting-point whence one rises toward the beautiful with a +fresher and keener perception. The salamander gives relief to the +water-sprite; the gnome heightens the charm of the sylph. + +And it would be true also to say that contact with the abnormal +has imparted to the modern sublime a something purer, grander, more +sublime, in short, than the beautiful of the ancients; and that is as +it should be. When art is consistent with itself, it guides everything +more surely to its goal. If the Homeric Elysium is a long, long way +from the ethereal charm, the angelic pleasureableness of Milton's +Paradise, it is because under Eden there is a hell far more terrible +than the heathen Tartarus. Do you think that Francesca da Rimini and +Beatrice would be so enchanting in a poet who should not confine us in +the Tower of Hunger and compel us to share Ugolino's revolting repast? +Dante would have less charm, if he had less power. Have the fleshly +naiads, the muscular Tritons, the wanton Zephyrs, the diaphanous +transparency of our water-sprites and sylphs? Is it not because the +modern imagination does not fear to picture the ghastly forms of +vampires, ogres, ghouls, snake-charmers and jinns prowling about +graveyards, that it can give to its fairies that incorporeal shape, +that purity of essence, of which the heathen nymphs fall so far short? +The antique Venus is beautiful, admirable, no doubt; but what has +imparted to Jean Goujon's faces that weird, tender, ethereal delicacy? +What has given them that unfamiliar suggestion of life and grandeur, +if not the proximity of the rough and powerful sculptures of the +Middle Ages? + +If the thread of our argument has not been broken in the reader's mind +by these necessary digressions--- which in truth, might be developed +much further--he has realized, doubtless, how powerfully the +grotesque--that germ of comedy, fostered by the modern muse--grew in +extent and importance as soon as it was transplanted to a soil more +propitious than paganism and the Epic. In truth, in the new poetry, +while the sublime represents the soul as it is, purified by Christian +morality, the grotesque plays the part of the human beast. The former +type, delivered of all impure alloy, has as its attributes all the +charms, all the graces, all the beauties; it must be able some day +to create Juliet, Desdemona, Ophelia. The latter assumes all the +absurdities, all the infirmities, all the blemishes. In this partition +of mankind and of creation, to it fall the passions, vices, crimes; +it is sensuous, fawning, greedy, miserly, false, incoherent, +hypocritical; it is, in turn, Iago, Tartuffe, Basile, Polonius, +Harpagon, Bartholo, Falstaff, Scapin, Figaro. The beautiful has but +one type, the ugly has a thousand. The fact is that the beautiful, +humanly speaking, is merely form considered in its simplest aspect +in its most perfect symmetry, in its most entire harmony with our +make-up. Thus the _ensemble_ that it offers us is always complete, but +restricted like ourselves. What we call the ugly, on the contrary, is +a detail of a great whole which eludes us, and which is in harmony, +not with man but with all creation. That is why it constantly presents +itself to us in new but incomplete aspects. + +It is interesting to study the first appearance and the progress +of the grotesque in modern times. At first, it is an invasion, an +irruption, an overflow, as of a torrent that has burst its banks. It +rushes through the expiring Latin literature, imparts some coloring to +Persius, Petronius and Juvenal, and leaves behind it the _Golden Ass_ +of Apuleius. Thence it diffuses itself through the imaginations of the +new nations that are remodelling Europe. It abounds in the work of +the fabulists, the chroniclers, the romancists. We see it make its way +from the South to the North. It disports itself in the dreams of the +Teutonic nations, and at the same time vivifies with its breath +the admirable Spanish _romanceros_, a veritable Iliad of the age of +chivalry. For example, it is the grotesque which describes thus, +in the _Roman de la Rose_, an august ceremonial, the election of a +king:-- + + "A long-shanked knave they chose, I wis, + Of all their men the boniest." + +More especially it imposes its characteristic qualities upon that +wonderful architecture which, in the Middle Ages, takes the place of +all the arts. It affixes its mark on the facades of cathedrals, frames +its hells and purgatories in the ogive arches of great doorways, +portrays them in brilliant hues on window-glass, exhibits its +monsters, its bull-dogs, its imps about capitals, along friezes, on +the edges of roofs. It flaunts itself in numberless shapes on the +wooden facades of houses, on the stone facades of chateaux, on the +marble facades of palaces. From the arts it makes its way into the +national manners, and while it stirs applause from the people for the +_graciosos_ of comedy, it gives to the kings court-jesters. Later, +in the age of etiquette, it will show us Scarron on the very edge of +Louis the Fourteenth's bed. Meanwhile it decorates coats of-arms, and +draws upon knight, shields the symbolic hieroglyphs of feudalism. +From the manners, it makes its way into the laws, numberless strange +customs at test its passage through the institutions of the Middle +Ages. Just as it represented Thespis, smeared with wine-lees, leaping +in her tomb it dances with the _Basoche_ on the famous marble table +which served at the same time as a stage for the popular farces and +for the royal banquets. Finally, having made its way into the arts, +the manners, and the laws, it enters even the Church. In every +Catholic city we see it organizing some one of those curious +ceremonies, those strange processions, wherein religion is attended by +all varieties of superstition--the sublime attended by all the forms +of the grotesque. To paint it in one stroke, so great is its vigour, +its energy, its creative sap, at the dawn of letters, that it casts, +at the outset, upon the threshold of modern poetry, three burlesque +Homers: Ariosto in Italy, Cervantes in Spain, Rabelais in France. + +It would be mere surplusage to dwell further upon the influence of +the grotesque in the third civilization. Every thing tends to show its +close creative alliance with the beautiful in the so called "romantic" +period. Even among the simplest popular legends there are none which +do not somewhere, with an admirable instinct, solve this mystery of +modern art. Antiquity could not have produced _Beauty and the Beast_. + +It is true that at the period at which we have arrived the +predominance of the grotesque over the sublime in literature is +clearly indicated. But it is a spasm of reaction, an eager thirst for +novelty, which is but temporary, it is an initial wave which gradually +recedes. The type of the beautiful will soon resume its rights and its +role, which is not to exclude the other principle, but to prevail over +it. It is time that the grotesque should be content with a corner +of the picture in Murillo's loyal frescoes, in the sacred pages of +Veronese, content to be introduced in two marvellous _Last Judgments_, +in which art will take a just pride, in the scene of fascination and +horror with which Michelangelo will embellish the Vatican, in those +awe-inspiring represervations of the fall of man which Rubens will +throw upon the arches of the Cathedral of Antwerp. The time has come +when the balance between the two principles is to be established. A +man, a poet-king, _poeta soverano_, as Dante calls Homer, is about +to adjust everything. The two rival genii combine their flames, and +thence issues Shakespeare. + +We have now reached the poetic culmination of modern times. +Shakespeare is the drama; and the drama, which with the same breath +moulds the grotesque and the sublime, the terrible and the absurd, +tragedy and comedy--the drama is the distinguishing characteristic of +the third epoch of poetry, of the literature of the present day. + +Thus, to sum up hurriedly the facts that we have noted thus far, +poetry has three periods, each of which corresponds to an epoch of +civilization: the ode, the epic, and the drama. Primitive times are +lyrical, ancient times epical, modern times dramatic. The ode sings +of eternity, the epic imparts solemnity to history, the drama depicts +life. The characteristic of the first poetry is ingenuousness, of +the second, simplicity, of the third, truth. The rhapsodists mark the +transition from the lyric to the epic poets, as do the romancists that +from the lyric to the dramatic poets. Historians appear in the second +period, chroniclers and critics in the third. The characters of +the ode are colossi--Adam, Cain, Noah; those of the epic are +giants--Achilles, Atreus, Orestes; those of the drama are men--Hamlet, +Macbeth, Othello. The ode lives upon the ideal, the epic upon the +grandiose, the drama upon the real. Lastly, this threefold poetry +flows from three great sources--The Bible, Homer, Shakespeare. + +Such then--and we confine ourselves herein to noting a single +result--such are the diverse aspects of thought in the different +epochs of mankind and of civilization. Such are its three faces, in +youth, in manhood, in old age. Whether one examines one literature by +itself or all literatures _en masse,_ one will always reach the same +result: the lyric poets before the epic poets, the epic poets before +the dramatic poets. In France, Malherbe before Chapelain, Chapelain +before Corneille; in ancient Greece, Orpheus before Homer, Homer +before AEschylus; in the first of all books, _Genesis_ before _Kings, +Kings_ before _Job_; or to come back to that monumental scale of all +ages of poetry, which we ran over a moment since, The Bible before the +_Iliad_, the _Iliad_ before Shakespeare. + +In a word, civilization begins by singing of its dreams, then narrates +its doings, and, lastly, sets about describing what it thinks. It is, +let us say in passing, because of this last, that the drama, combining +the most opposed qualities, may be at the same time full of profundity +and full of relief, philosophical and picturesque. + +It would be logical to add here that everything in nature and in +life passes through these three phases, the lyric, the epic, and the +dramatic, because everything is born, acts, and dies. If it were not +absurd to confound the fantastic conceits of the imagination with the +stern deductions of the reasoning faculty, a poet might say that the +rising of the sun, for example, is a hymn, noon-day a brilliant epic, +and sunset a gloomy drama wherein day and night, life and death, +contend for mastery. But that would be poetry--folly, perhaps--- and +_what does it prove_? + +Let us hold to the facts marshalled above; let us supplement them, +too, by an important observation, namely that we have in no wise +pretended to assign exclusive limits to the three epochs of poetry, +but simply to set forth their predominant characteristics. The Bible, +that divine lyric monument, contains in germ, as we suggested a moment +ago, an epic and a drama--_-Kings_ and _Job_. In the Homeric poems +one is conscious of a clinging reminiscence of lyric poetry and of a +beginning of dramatic poetry. Ode and drama meet in the epic. There is +a touch of all in each; but in each there exists a generative element +to which all the other elements give place, and which imposes its own +character upon the whole. + +The drama is complete poetry. The ode and the epic contain it only +in germ; it contains both of them in a state of high development, and +epitomizes both. Surely, he who said: "The French have not the epic +brain," said a true and clever thing; if he had said, "The moderns," +the clever remark would have been profound. It is beyond question, +however, that there is epic genius in that marvellous _Athalie,_ so +exalted and so simple in its sublimity that the royal century was +unable to comprehend it. It is certain, too, that the series of +Shakespeare's chronicle dramas presents a grand epic aspect. But it is +lyric poetry above all that befits the drama; it never embarrasses +it, adapts itself to all its caprices, disports itself in all forms, +sometimes sublime as in Ariel, sometimes grotesque as in Caliban. Our +era being above all else dramatic, is for that very reason eminently +lyric. There is more than one connection between the beginning and the +end; the sunset has some features of the sunrise; the old man becomes +a child once more. But this second childhood is not like the first; +it is as melancholy as the other is joyous. It is the same with lyric +poetry. Dazzling, dreamy, at the dawn of civilization it reappears, +solemn and pensive, at its decline. The Bible opens joyously with +_Genesis_ and comes to a close with the threatening _Apocalypse_. The +modern ode is still inspired, but is no longer ignorant. It meditates +more than it scrutinizes; its musing is melancholy. We see, by its +painful labour, that the muse has taken the drama for her mate. + +To make clear by a metaphor the ideas that we have ventured to put +forth, we will compare early lyric poetry to a placid lake which +reflects the clouds and stars; the epic is the stream which flows from +the lake, and rushes on, reflecting its banks, forests, fields and +cities, until it throws itself into the ocean of the drama. Like the +lake, the drama reflects the sky; like the stream, it reflects its +banks; but it alone has tempests and measureless depths. + +The drama, then, is the goal to which everything in modern poetry +leads. _Paradise Lost_ is a drama before it is an epic. As we know, it +first presented itself to the poet's imagination in the first of these +forms, and as a drama it always remains in the reader's memory, so +prominent is the old dramatic framework still beneath Milton's epic +structure! When Dante had finished his terrible _Inferno_, when he had +closed its doors and nought remained save to give his work a name, the +unerring instinct of his genius showed him that that multiform poem +was an emanation of the drama, not of the epic; and on the front +of that gigantic monument, he wrote with his pen of bronze: _Divina +Commedia._ + +Thus we see that the only two poets of modern times who are of +Shakespeare's stature follow him in unity of design. They coincide with +him in imparting a dramatic tinge to all our poetry, like him, they +blend the grotesque with the sublime, and, far from standing +by themselves in the great literary _ensemble_ that rests upon +Shakespeare, Dante and Milton are, in some sort, the two supporting +abutments of the edifice of which he is the central pillar, the +buttresses of the arch of which he is the keystone. + +Permit us, at this point, to recur to certain ideas already suggested, +which, however, it is necessary to emphasize. We have arrived, and now +we must set out again. + +On the day when Christianity said to man "Thou art twofold, thou art +made up of two beings, one perishable, the other immortal, one carnal, +the other ethereal, one enslaved by appetites, cravings and passions, +the other borne aloft on the wings of enthusiasm and reverie--in a +word, the one always stooping toward the earth, its mother, the other +always darting up toward heaven, its fatherland"--on that day the +drama was created. Is it in truth, anything other than that contrast +of every day, that struggle of every moment, between two opposing +principles which are ever face to face in life, and which dispute +possession of man from the cradle to the tomb? + +The poetry born of Christianity, the poetry of our time, is, +therefore, the drama, the real results from the wholly natural +combination of two types, the sublime and the grotesque, which meet +in the drama, as they meet in life and in creation. For true poetry, +complete poetry, consists in the harmony of contraries. Hence, it is +time to say aloud--and it is here above all that exceptions prove the +rule--that everything that exists in nature exists in art. + +On taking one's stand at this point of view, to pass judgment on +our petty conventional rules, to disentangle all those scholastic +labyrinths, to solve all those trivial problems which the critics of +the last two centuries have laboriously built up about the art, one is +struck by the promptitude with which the question of the modern stage +is made clear and distinct. The drama has but to take a step to +break all the spider's webs with which the militia of Lilliput have +attempted to fetter its sleep. + +And so, let addle-pated pedants (one does not exclude the other) claim +that the deformed, the ugly, the grotesque should never be imitated +in art; one replies that the grotesque is comedy, and that comedy +apparently makes a part of art. Tartuffe is not handsome, Pourceaugnac +is not noble, but Pourceaugnac and Tartuffe are admirable flashes of +art. + +If, driven back from this entrenchment to their second line of +custom-houses, they renew their prohibition of the grotesque coupled +with the sublime, of comedy melted into tragedy, we prove to them +that, in the poetry of Christian nations, the first of these two types +represents the human beast, the second the soul. These two stalks of +art, if we prevent their branches from mingling, if we persistently +separate them, will produce by way of fruit, on the one hand abstract +vices and absurdities, on the other, abstract crime, heroism and +virtue. The two types, thus isolated and left to themselves, will go +each its own way, leaving the real between them, at the left hand of +one, at the right hand of the other. Whence it follows that after +all these abstractions there will remain something to represent--man; +after these tragedies and comedies, something to create--the drama. + +In the drama, as it may be conceived at least, if not executed, all +things are connected and follow one another as in real life. The +body plays its part no less than the mind; and men and events, set +in motion by this twofold agent, pass across the stage, burlesque and +terrible in turn, and sometimes both at once. Thus the judge will say: +"Off with his head and let us go to dinner!" Thus the Roman Senate +will deliberate over Domitian's turbot. Thus Socrates, drinking the +hemlock and discoursing on the immortal soul and the only God, +will interrupt himself to suggest that a cook be sacrificed to +_AEsculapius_. Thus Elizabeth will swear and talk Latin. Thus Richelieu +will submit to Joseph the Capuchin, and Louis XI to his barber, Maitre +Olivier le Diable. Thus Cromwell will say: "I have Parliament in my +bag and the King in my pocket"; or, with the hand that signed the +death sentence of Charles the First, smear with ink the face of a +regicide who smilingly returns the compliment. Thus Caesar, in his +triumphal car, will be afraid of overturning. For men of genius, +however great they be, have always within them a touch of the beast +which mocks at their intelligence. Therein they are akin to mankind +in general, for therein they are dramatic. "It is but a step from the +sublime to the ridiculous," said Napoleon, when he was convinced that +he was mere man; and that outburst of a soul on fire illumines art and +history at once; that cry of anguish is the resume of the drama and of +life. + +It is a striking fact that all these contrasts are met with in the +poets themselves, taken as men. By dint of meditating upon existence, +of laying stress upon its bitter irony, of pouring floods of sarcasm +and raillery upon our infirmities, the very men who make us laugh so +heartily become profoundly sad. These Democrituses are Heraclituses as +well. Beaumarchais was surly, Moliere gloomy, Shakespeare melancholy. + +The fact is, then, that the grotesque is one of the supreme beauties +of the drama. It is not simply an appropriate element of it, but is +oftentimes a necessity. Sometimes it appears in homogeneous masses, in +entire characters, as Daudin, Prusias, Trissotin, Brid'oison, Juliet's +nurse; sometimes impregnated with terror, as Richard III, Begears, +Tartuffe, Mephistopheles; sometimes, too, with a veil of grace and +refinement, as Figaro, Osric, Mercutio, Don Juan. It finds its way +in everywhere; for just as the most commonplace have their occasional +moments of sublimity, so the most exalted frequently pay tribute +to the trivial and ridiculous. Thus, often impalpable, often +imperceptible, it is always present on the stage, even when it says +nothing, even when it keeps out of sight. Thanks to it, there is no +thought of monotony. Sometimes it injects laughter, sometimes horror, +into tragedy. It will bring Romeo face to face with the apothecary, +Macbeth with the witches, Hamlet with the grave-diggers. Sometimes +it may, without discord, as in the scene between King Lear and his +jester, mingle its shrill voice with the most sublime, the most +dismal, the dreamiest music of the soul. + +That is what Shakespeare alone among all has succeeded in doing, in +a fashion of his own, which it would be no less fruitless than +impossible to imitate--Shakespeare, the god of the stage, in whom, +as in a trinity, the three characteristic geniuses of our stage, +Corneille, Moliere, Beaumarchais, seem united. + +We see how quickly the arbitrary distinction between the species of +poetry vanishes before common sense and taste. No less easily one +might demolish the alleged rule of the two unities. We say _two_ and +not _three_ unities, because unity of plot or of _ensemble_, the only +true and well founded one, was long ago removed from the sphere of +discussion. + +Distinguished contemporaries, foreigners and Frenchmen, have already +attacked, both in theory and in practice that fundamental law of the +pseudo-Aristotelian code. Indeed, the combat was not likely to be a +long one. At the first blow it cracked, so worm eaten was that timber +of the old scholastic hovel! + +The strange thing is that the slaves of routine pretend to rest their +rule of the two unities on probability, whereas reality is the very +thing that destroys it. Indeed, what could be more improbable and +absurd than this porch or peristyle or ante-chamber--vulgar places +where our tragedies are obliging enough to develop themselves; whither +conspirators come, no one knows whence, to declaim against the tyrant, +and the tyrant to declaim against the conspirators, each in turn, as +if they had said to one another in bucolic phrase-- + + Alternis cantemus, amant alterna Camenae. + +Where did anyone ever see a porch or peristyle of that sort? +What could be more opposed--we will not say to the truth, for the +scholastics hold it very cheap, but to probability? The result is that +everything that is too characteristic, too intimate, too local, to +happen in the ante chamber or on the street-corner--that is to say, +the whole drama--takes place in the wings. We see on the stage only +the elbows of the plot, so to speak; its hands are somewhere +else. Instead of scenes we have narrative, instead of tableaux, +descriptions. Solemn-faced characters, placed, as in the old chorus, +between the drama and ourselves, tell us what is going on in the +temple, in the palace, on the public square, until we are tempted many +a time to call out to them: "Indeed! then take us there! It must be +very entertaining--a fine sight!" To which they would reply no doubt: +"It is quite possible that it might entertain or interest you, but +that isn't the question; we are the guardians of the dignity of the +French Melpomene." And there you are! + +"But," someone will say, "this rule that you discard is borrowed from +the Greek drama." Wherein, pray, do the Greek stage and drama resemble +our stage and drama? Moreover, we have already shown that the vast +extent of the ancient stage enabled it to include a whole locality, +so that the poet could, according to the exigencies of the plot, +transport it at his pleasure from one part of the stage to another, +which is practically equivalent to a change of stage-setting. Curious +contradiction! the Greek theatre, restricted as it was to a national +and religious object, was much more free than ours, whose only +object is the enjoyment, and, if you please, the instruction, of the +spectator. The reason is that the one obeys only the laws that +are suited to it, while the other takes upon itself conditions +of existence which are absolutely foreign to its essence. One is +artistic, the other artificial. + +People are beginning to understand in our day that exact localization +is one of the first elements of reality. The speaking or acting +characters are not the only ones who engrave on the minds of the +spectators a faithful representation of the facts. The place where +this or that catastrophe took place becomes a terrible and inseparable +witness thereof; and the absence of silent characters of this sort +would make the greatest scenes of history incomplete in the drama. +Would the poet dare to murder Rizzio elsewhere than in Mary Stuart's +chamber? to stab Henri IV elsewhere than in Rue de la Ferronerie, all +blocked with drays and carriages? to burn Jeanne d'Arc elsewhere than +in the Vieux-Marche? to despatch the Duc de Guise elsewhere than in +that chateau of Blois where his ambition roused a popular assemblage +to frenzy? to behead Charles I and Louis XVI elsewhere than in those +ill-omened localities whence Whitehall or the Tuileries may be seen, +as if their scaffolds were appurtenances of their palaces? + +Unity of time rests on no firmer foundation than unity of place. A +plot forcibly confined within twenty-four hours is as absurd as one +confined within a peristyle. Every plot has its proper duration as +well as its appropriate place. Think of administering the same dose +of time to all events! of applying the same measure to everything! You +would laugh at a cobbler who should attempt to put the same shoe on +every foot. To cross unity of time and unity of place like the bars +of a cage, and pedantically to introduce therein, in the name of +Aristotle, all the deeds, all the nations, all the figures which +Providence sets before us in such vast numbers in real life,--to +proceed thus is to mutilate men and things, to cause history to +make wry faces. Let us say, rather, that everything will die in the +operation, and so the dogmatic mutilators reach their ordinary result: +what was alive in the chronicles is dead in tragedy. That is why the +cage of the unities often contains only a skeleton. + +And then, if twenty-four hours can be comprised in two, it is a +logical consequence that four hours may contain forty-eight. Thus +Shakespeare's unity must be different from Corneille's. 'Tis pity! + +But these are the wretched quibbles with which mediocrity, envy and +routine has pestered genius for two centuries past! By such means the +flight of our greatest poets has been cut short. Their wings have been +clipped with the scissors of the unities. And what has been given us +in exchange for the eagle feathers stolen from Corneille and Racine? +Campistron. + +We imagine that someone may say: "There is something in too frequent +changes of scene which confuses and fatigues the spectator, and which +produces a bewildering effect on his attention; it may be, too, that +manifold transitions from place to place, from one time to another +time, demand explanations which repel the attention; one should +also avoid leaving, in the midst of a plot, gaps which prevent the +different parts of the drama from adhering closely to one another, and +which, moreover, puzzle the spectator because he does not know what +there may be in those gaps." But these are precisely the difficulties +which art has to meet. These are some of the obstacles peculiar to +one subject or another, as to which it would be impossible to pass +judgment once for all. It is for genius to overcome, not for treatises +or poetry to evade them. + +A final argument, taken from the very bowels of the art, would of +itself suffice to show the absurdity of the rule of the two unities. +It is the existence of the third unity, unity of plot--the only one +that is universally admitted, because it results from a fact: neither +the human eye nor the human mind can grasp more than one _ensemble_ at +one time. This one is as essential as the other two are useless. It +is the one which fixes the view-point of the drama; now, by that very +fact, it excludes the other two. There can no more be three unities in +the drama than three horizons in a picture. But let us be careful not +to confound unity with simplicity of plot. The former does not in +any way exclude the secondary plots on which the principal plot +may depend. It is necessary only that these parts, being skilfully +subordinated to the general plan, shall tend constantly toward the +central plot and group themselves about it at the various stages, or +rather on the various levels of the drama. Unity of plot is the stage +law of perspective. + +"But," the customs-officers of thought will cry, "great geniuses have +submitted to these rules which you spurn!" Unfortunately, yes. But +what would those admirable men have done if they had been left to +themselves? At all events they did not accept your chains without +a struggle. You should have seen how Pierre Corneille, worried and +harassed at his first step in the art on account of his marvellous +work, _Le Cid_, struggled under Mairet, Claveret, d'Aubignac and +Scuderi! How he denounced to posterity the violent attacks of those +men, who, he says, made themselves "all white with Aristotle!" You +should read how they said to him--and we quote from books of the +time: "Young man, you must learn before you teach; and unless one is +a Scaliger or a Heinsius that is intolerable!" Thereupon Corneille +rebels and asks if their purpose is to force him "much below +Claveret." Here Scuderi waxes indignant at such a display of pride, +and reminds the "thrice great author of _Le Cid_ of the modest words +in which Tasso, the greatest man of his age, began his apology for +the finest of his works against the bitterest and most unjust censure +perhaps that will ever be pronounced. M. Corneille," he adds, "shows +in his replies that he is as far removed from that author's moderation +as from his merit." The young man _so justly and gently reproved_ +dares to protest; thereupon Scuderi returns to the charge; he calls +to his assistance the _Eminent Academy;_ "Pronounce, O my Judges, a +decree worthy of your eminence, which will give all Europe to know +that _Le Cid_ is not the chef-d'oeuvre of the greatest man in France, +but the least judicious performance of M. Corneille himself. You are +bound to do it, both for your own private renown; and for that of +our people in general, who are concerned in this matter; inasmuch +as foreigners who may see this precious masterpiece--they who have +possessed a Tasso or a Guarini--might think that our greatest masters +were no more than apprentices." + +These few instructive lines contain the everlasting tactics of envious +routine against growing talent--tactics which are still followed in +our own day, and which, for example, added such a curious page to the +youthful essays of Lord Byron. Scuderi gives us its quintessence. In +like manner the earlier works of a man of genius are always preferred +to the newer ones, in order to prove that he is going down instead of +up--_Melite and La Galerie du Palais_ placed above _Le Cid_. And +the names of the dead are always thrown at the heads of the +living--Corneille stoned with Tasso and Guarini (Guarini!), as, later, +Racine will be stoned with Corneille, Voltaire with Racine, and as +to-day, everyone who shows signs of rising is stoned with Corneille, +Racine and Voltaire. These tactics, as will be seen, are well-worn; +but they must be effective as they are still in use. However, the poor +devil of a great man still breathed. Here we cannot help but admire +the way in which Scuderi, the bully of this tragic-comedy, forced to +the wall, blackguards and maltreats him, how pitilessly he unmasks +his classical artillery, how he shows the author of _Le Cid_ "what the +episodes should be, according to Aristotle, who tells us in the tenth +and sixteenth chapters of his _Poetics";_ how he crushes Corneille, in +the name of the same Aristotle "in the eleventh chapter of his _Art of +Poetry_, wherein we find the condemnation of _Le Cid_"; in the name +of Plato, "in the tenth book of his _Republic_"; in the name of +Marcellinus, "as may be seen in the twenty-seventh book"; in the name +of "the tragedies of Niobe and Jephthah"; in the name of the "_Ajax_ +of Sophocles"; in the name of "the example of Euripides"; in the name +of "Heinsius, chapter six of the _Constitution_ of _Tragedy_; and +the younger Scaliger in his poems"; and finally, in the name of the +Canonists and Jurisconsults, under the title "Nuptials." The first +arguments were addressed to the Academy, the last one was aimed at +the Cardinal. After the pin-pricks the blow with a club. A judge was +needed to decide the question. Chapelain gave judgment. Corneille saw +that he was doomed; the lion was muzzled, or, as was said at the time, +the crow (_Corneille_) was plucked. Now comes the painful side of this +grotesque performance: after he had been thus quenched at his first +flash, this genius, thoroughly modern, fed upon the Middle Ages and +Spain, being compelled to lie to himself and to hark back to ancient +times, drew for us that Castilian Rome, which is sublime beyond +question, but in which, except perhaps in _Nicomede_, which was so +ridiculed by the eighteenth century for its dignified and simple +colouring, we find neither the real Rome nor the true Corneille. + +Racine was treated to the same persecution, but did not make the same +resistance. Neither in his genius nor in his character was there any +of Corneille's lofty asperity. He submitted in silence and sacrificed +to the scorn of his time his enchanting elegy of _Esther_, his +magnificent epic, _Athalie_. So that we can but believe that, if he +had not been paralyzed as he was by the prejudices of his epoch, if +he had come in contact less frequently with the classic cramp-fish, +he would not have failed to introduce Locuste in his drama between +Narcisse and Neron, and above all things would not have relegated to +the wings the admirable scene of the banquet at which Seneca's pupil +poisons Britannicus in the cup of reconciliation. But can we demand +of the bird that he fly under the receiver of an air-pump? What a +multitude of beautiful scenes the _people of taste_ have cost us, from +Scuderi to La Harpe! A noble work might be composed of all that their +scorching breath has withered in its germ. However, our great poets +have found a way none the less to cause their genius to blaze forth +through all these obstacles. Often the attempt to confine them behind +walls of dogmas and rules is vain. Like the Hebrew giant they carry +their prison doors with them to the mountains. + +But still the same refrain is repeated, and will be, no doubt, for +a long while to come: "Follow the rules! Copy the models! It was the +rules that shaped the models." One moment! In that case there are two +sorts of models, those which are made according to the rules, and, +prior to them, those according to which the rules were made. Now, in +which of these two categories should genius seek a place for itself? +Although it is always disagreeable to come in contact with pedants, +is it not a thousand times better to give them lessons than to receive +lessons from them? And then--copy! Is the reflection equal to the +light? Is the satellite which travels unceasingly in the same circle +equal to the central creative planet? With all his poetry Virgil is no +more than the moon of Homer. + +And whom are we to copy, I pray to know? The ancients? We have just +shown that their stage has nothing in common with ours. Moreover, +Voltaire, who will have none of Shakespeare, will have none of the +Greeks, either. Let him tell us why: "The Greeks ventured to produce +scenes no less revolting to us. Hippolyte, crushed by his fall, +counts his wounds and utters doleful cries. Philoctetes falls in his +paroxysms of pain; black blood flows from his wound. Oedipus, covered +with the blood that still drops from the sockets of the eyes he has +torn out, complains bitterly of gods and men. We hear the shrieks +of Clytemnestra, murdered by her own son, and Electra, on the +stage, cries: 'Strike! spare her not! she did not spare our father,' +Prometheus is fastened to a rock by nails driven through his stomach +and his arms. The Furies reply to Clytemnestra's bleeding shade with +inarticulate roars. Art was in its infancy in the time of AEschylus as +it was in London in Shakespeare's time." + +Whom shall we copy, then? The moderns? What! Copy copies! God forbid! + +"But," someone else will object, "according to your conception of the +art, you seem to look for none but great poets, to count always upon +genius." Art certainly does not count upon mediocrity. It prescribes +no rules for it, it knows nothing of it; in fact, mediocrity has +no existence so far as art is concerned; art supplies wings, not +crutches. Alas! D'Aubignac followed rules, Campistron copied models. +What does it matter to art? It does not build its palaces for ants. It +lets them make their ant-hill, without taking the trouble to find out +whether they have built their burlesque imitation of its palace upon +its foundation. + +The critics of the scholastic school place their poets in a strange +position. On the one hand they cry incessantly: "Copy the models!" +On the other hand they have a habit of declaring that "the models are +inimitable"! Now, if their craftsman, by dint of hard work, succeeds +in forcing through this dangerous defile some colourless tracing +of the masters, these ungrateful wretches, after examining the new +_refaccimiento_, exclaim sometimes: "This doesn't resemble anything!" +and sometimes: "This resembles everything!" And by virtue of a logic +made for the occasion each of these formulae is a criticism. + +Let us then speak boldly. The time for it has come, and it would be +strange if, in this age, liberty, like the light, should penetrate +everywhere except to the one place where freedom is most natural--the +domain of thought. Let us take the hammer to theories and poetic +systems. Let us throw down the old plastering that conceals the facade +of art. There are neither rules nor models; or, rather, there are +no other rules than the general laws of nature, which soar above +the whole field of art, and the special rules which result from the +conditions appropriate to the subject of each composition. The +former are of the essence, eternal, and do not change; the latter +are variable, external, and are used but once. The former are the +framework that supports the house; the latter the scaffolding which +is used in building it, and which is made anew for each building. In a +word, the former are the flesh and bones, the latter the clothing, of +the drama. But these rules are not written in the treatises on poetry. +Richelet has no idea of their existence. Genius, which divines rather +than learns, devises for each work the general rules from the general +plan of things, the special rules from the separate _ensemble_ of the +subject treated; not after the manner of the chemist, who lights the +fire under his furnace, heats his crucible, analyzes and destroys; but +after the manner of the bee, which flies on its golden wings, lights +on each flower and extracts its honey, leaving it as brilliant and +fragrant as before. + +The poet--let us insist on this point--should take counsel therefore +only of nature, truth, and inspiration which is itself both truth and +nature. "Quando he," says Lope de Vega, + + "Quando he de escrivir una comedia, + Encierro los preceptos con seis llaves." + +To secure these precepts "six keys" are none too many, in very +truth. Let the poet beware especially of copying anything +whatsoever--Shakespeare no more than Moliere, Schiller no more than +Corneille. If genuine talent could abdicate its own nature in this +matter, and thus lay aside its original personality, to transform +itself into another, it would lose everything by playing this role of +its own double. It is as if a god should turn valet. We must draw our +inspiration from the original sources. It is the same sap, distributed +through the soil, that produces all the trees of the forest, so +different in bearing power, in fruit, in foliage. It is the same +nature that fertilizes and nourishes the most diverse geniuses. The +poet is a tree that may be blown about by all winds and watered by +every fall of dew; and bears his works as his fruit, as the _fablier_ +of old bore his fables. Why attach one's self to a master, or graft +one's self upon a model? It were better to be a bramble or a thistle, +fed by the same earth as the cedar and the palm, than the fungus +or the lichen of those noble trees. The bramble lives, the fungus +vegetates. Moreover, however great the cedar and the palm may be, +it is not with the sap one sucks from them that one can become great +one's self. A giant's parasite will be at best a dwarf. The oak, +colossus that it is, can produce and sustain nothing more than the +mistletoe. + +Let there be no misunderstanding: if some of our poets have succeeded +in being great, even when copying, it is because, while forming +themselves on the antique model, they have often listened to the +voice of nature and to their own genius--it is because they have been +themselves in some one respect. Their branches became entangled in +those of the near-by tree, but their roots were buried deep in the +soil of art. They were the ivy, not the mistletoe. Then came imitators +of the second rank, who, having neither roots in the earth, nor genius +in their souls, had to confine themselves to imitation. As Charles +Nodier says: "After the school of Athens, the school of Alexandria." +Then there was a deluge of mediocrity; then there came a swarm of +those treatises on poetry, so annoying to true talent, so convenient +for mediocrity. We were told that everything was done, and God was +forbidden to create more Molieres or Corneilles. Memory was put +in place of imagination. Imagination itself was subjected to +hard-and-fast rules, and aphorisms were made about it: "To imagine," +says La Harpe, with his naive assurance, "is in substance to remember, +that is all." + +But nature! Nature and truth!--And here, in order to prove that, far +from demolishing art, the new ideas aim only to reconstruct it +more firmly and on a better foundation, let us try to point out the +impassable limit which in our opinion, separates reality according to +art from reality according to nature. It is careless to confuse them +as some ill-informed partisans of _romanticism_ do. Truth in art +cannot possibly be, as several writers have claimed, _absolute_ +reality. Art cannot produce the thing itself. Let us imagine, for +example, one of those unreflecting promoters of absolute nature, of +nature viewed apart from art, at the performance of a romantic play, +say _Le Cid_. "What's that?" he will ask at the first word. "The Cid +speaks in verse? It isn't _natural_ to speak in verse."--"How would +you have him speak, pray?"--"In prose." Very good. A moment later, +"How's this!" he will continue, if he is consistent; "the Cid is +speaking French!"--"Well?"--"Nature demands that he speak his own +language; he can't speak anything but Spanish." + +We shall fail entirely to understand, but again--very good. You +imagine that this is all? By no means: before the tenth sentence in +Castilian, he is certain to rise and ask if the Cid who is speaking is +the real Cid, in flesh and blood. By what right does the actor, whose +name is Pierre or Jacques, take the name of the Cid? That is _false_. +There is no reason why he should not go on to demand that the sun +should be substituted for the footlights, _real_ trees and _real_ +houses for those deceitful wings. For, once started on that road, +logic has you by the collar, and you cannot stop. + +We must admit, therefore, or confess ourselves ridiculous, that the +domains of art and of nature are entirely distinct. Nature and art are +two things--were it not so, one or the other would not exist. Art, in +addition to its idealistic side, has a terrestrial, material side. Let +it do what it will, it is shut in between grammar and prosody, between +Vaugelas and Richelet. For its most capricious creations, it has +formulas, methods of execution, a complete apparatus to set in motion. +For genius there are delicate instruments, for mediocrity, tools. + +It seems to us that someone has already said that the drama is a +mirror wherein nature is reflected. But if it be an ordinary mirror, +a smooth and polished surface, it will give only a dull image of +objects, with no relief-faithful, but colourless; everyone knows +that colour and light are lost in a simple reflection. The drama, +therefore, must be a concentrating mirror, which, instead of +weakening, concentrates and condenses the coloured rays, which makes +of a mere gleam a light, and of a light a flame. Then only is the +drama acknowledged by art. + +The stage is an optical point. Everything that exists in the world--in +history, in life, in man--should be and can be reflected therein, +but under the magic wand of art. Art turns the leaves of the ages, +of nature, studies chronicles, strives to reproduce actual facts +(especially in respect to manners and peculiarities, which are much +less exposed to doubt and contradiction than are concrete facts), +restores what the chroniclers have lopped off, harmonises what they +have collected, divines and supplies their omissions, fills their gaps +with imaginary scenes which have the colour of the time, groups what +they have left scattered about, sets in motion anew the threads of +Providence which work the human marionettes, clothes the whole with a +form at once poetical and natural, and imparts to it that vitality of +truth and brilliancy which gives birth to illusion, that prestige of +reality which arouses the enthusiasm of the spectator, and of the poet +first of all, for the poet is sincere. Thus the aim of art is almost +divine: to bring to life again if it is writing history, to create if +it is writing poetry. + +It is a grand and beautiful sight to see this broad development of a +drama wherein art powerfully seconds nature; of a drama wherein the +plot moves on to the conclusion with a firm and unembarrassed step, +without diffuseness and without undue compression; of a drama, in +short, wherein the poet abundantly fulfills the multifold object +of art, which is to open to the spectator a double prospect, to +illuminate at the same time the interior and the exterior of mankind: +the exterior by their speech and their acts, the interior, by asides +and monologues; to bring together, in a word, in the same picture, the +drama of life and the drama of conscience. + +It will readily be imagined that, for a work of this kind, if the poet +must _choose_ (and he must), he should choose, not the _beautiful_, +but the _characteristic_. Not that it is advisable to "make local +colour," as they say to-day; that is, to add as an afterthought a few +discordant touches here and there to a work that is at best utterly +conventional and false. The local colour should not be on the surface +of the drama, but in its substance, in the very heart of the work, +whence it spreads of itself, naturally, evenly, and, so to speak, into +every corner of the drama, as the sap ascends from the root to the +tree's topmost leaf. The drama should be thoroughly impregnated with +this colour of the time, which should be, in some sort, in the air, +so that one detects it only on entering the theatre, and that on going +forth one finds one's self in a different period and atmosphere. It +requires some study, some labour, to attain this end; so much the +better. It is well that the avenues of art should be obstructed by +those brambles from which everybody recoils except those of +powerful will. Besides, it is this very study, fostered by an ardent +inspiration, which will ensure the drama against a vice that +kills it--the _commonplace_. To be commonplace is the failing of +short-sighted, short-breathed poets. In this tableau of the stage, +each figure must be held down to its most prominent, most individual, +most precisely defined characteristic. Even the vulgar and the trivial +should have an accent of their own. Like God, the true poet is present +in every part of his work at once. Genius resembles the die which +stamps the king's effigy on copper and golden coins alike. + +We do not hesitate--and this will demonstrate once more to honest men +how far we are from seeking to discredit the art--we do not hesitate +to consider verse as one of the means best adapted to protect the +drama from the scourge we have just mentioned, as one of the most +powerful dams against the irruption of the commonplace, which, like +democracy, is always flowing between full banks in men's minds. And at +this point we beg the younger literary generation, already so rich +in men and in works, to allow us to point out an error into which it +seems to have fallen--an error too fully justified, indeed, by the +extraordinary aberrations of the old school. The new century is at +that growing age at which one can readily set one's self right. + +There has appeared of late, like a penultimate branching-out of the +old classical trunk, or, better still, like one of those excrescences, +those polypi, which decrepitude develops, and which are a sign of +decomposition much more than a proof of life--there has appeared a +strange school of dramatic poetry. This school seems to us to have had +for its master and its fountain-head the poet who marks the transition +from the eighteenth to the nineteenth century, the man of wearisome +description and periphrases--that Delille who, they say, toward +the close of his life, boasted, after the fashion of the Homeric +catalogues, of having _made_ twelve camels, four dogs, three +horses, including Job's, six tigers, two cats, a chess-board, a +backgammon-board, a checker-board, a billiard-table, several winters, +many summers, a multitude of springs, fifty sunsets, and so many +daybreaks that he had lost count of them. + +Now, Delille went into tragedy. He is the father (he, and not Racine, +God save the mark!) of an alleged school of refinement and taste which +flourished until recently. Tragedy is not to this school what it was +to Will Shakespeare, say, a source of emotions of every sort, but a +convenient frame for the solution of a multitude of petty descriptive +problems which it propounds as it goes along. This muse, far from +spurning, as the true French classic school does, the trivial and +degrading things of life, eagerly seeks them out and brings them +together. The grotesque, shunned as undesirable company by the tragedy +of Louis the Fourteenth's day, cannot pass unnoticed before her. +_It must be described_, that is to say, ennobled. A scene in the +guard-house, a popular uprising, the fish-market, the galleys, the +wine-shop, the _poule au pot_ of Henri Quatre, are treasure-trove in +her eyes. She seizes upon this canaille, washes it clean, and sews her +tinsel and spangles over its villainies; _purpureus assuitur pannus_. +Her object seems to be to deliver patents of nobility to all these +_roturiers_ of the drama; and each of these patents under the great +seal is a speech. + +This muse, as may be imagined, is of a rare prudery. Wonted as she +is to the caresses of periphrasis, plain-speaking, if she should +occasionally be exposed to it, would horrify her. It does not accord +with her dignity to speak naturally. She _underlines_ old Corneille +for his blunt way of speaking, as in,-- + + "_A heap of men_ ruined by debt and crimes." + + "Chimene, _who'd have thought it_? Rodrigue, _who'd have said + it_?" + + "When their Flaminius _haggled with_ Hannibal." + + "Oh! do not _embroil_ me with the Republic." + +She still has her "Tout beau, monsieur!" on her heart. And it +needed many "seigneurs" and "madames" to procure forgiveness for our +admirable Racine for his monosyllabic "dogs!" and for so brutally +bestowing Claudius in Agrippina's bed. + +This Melpomene, as she is called, would shudder at the thought of +touching a chronicle. She leaves to the costumer the duty of learning +the period of the dramas she writes. In her eyes history is bad form +and bad taste. How, for example, can one tolerate kings and queens +who swear? They must be elevated from mere regal dignity to tragic +dignity. It was in a promotion of this sort that she exalted Henri IV. +It was thus that the people's king, purified by M. Legouve, found +his "ventre-saint-gris" ignominiously banished from his mouth by +two sentences, and that he was reduced, like the girl in the old +_fabliau_, to the necessity of letting fall from those royal lips only +pearls and sapphires and rubies: the apotheosis of falsity, in very +truth. + +The fact is that nothing is so commonplace as this conventional +refinement and nobility. Nothing original, no imagination, +no invention in this style; simply what one has seen +everywhere--rhetoric, bombast, commonplaces, flowers of college +eloquence, poetry after the style of Latin verses. The poets of this +school are eloquent after the manner of stage princes and princesses, +always sure of finding in the costumer's labelled cases, cloaks and +pinchbeck crowns, which have no other disadvantage than that of having +been used by everybody. If these poets never turn the leaves of the +Bible, it is not because they have not a bulky book of their own, the +_Dictionnaire de rimes_. That is the source of their poetry--_fontes +aquarum_. + +It will be seen that, in all this, nature and truth get along as best +they can. It would be great good luck if any remnants of either should +survive in this cataclysm of false art, false style, false poetry. +This is what has caused the errors of several of our distinguished +reformers. Disgusted by the stiffness, the ostentation, the _pomposo_, +of this alleged dramatic poetry, they have concluded that the elements +of our poetic language were incompatible with the natural and the +true. The Alexandrine had wearied them so often, that they condemned +it without giving it a hearing, so to speak, and decided, a little +hastily, perhaps, that the drama should be written in prose. + +They were mistaken. If in fact the false is predominant in the style +as well as in the action of certain French tragedies, it is not the +verses that should be held responsible therefore, but the versifiers. +It was needful to condemn, not the form employed, but those who +employed it: the workmen, not the tool. + +To convince one's self how few obstacles the nature of our poetry +places in the way of the free expression of all that is true, we +should study our verse, not in Racine, perhaps, but often in Corneille +and always in Moliere. Racine, a divine poet, is elegiac, lyric, epic; +Moliere is dramatic. It is time to deal sternly with the criticisms +heaped upon that admirable style by the wretched taste of the last +century, and to proclaim aloud that Moliere occupies the topmost +pinnacle of our drama, not only as a poet, but also as a writer. +_Palmas vere habet iste duas_. + +In his work the verse surrounds the idea, becomes of its very essence, +compresses and develops it at once, imparts to it a more slender, more +definite, more complete form, and gives us, in some sort, an extract +thereof. Verse is the optical form of thought. That is why it is +especially adapted to the perspective of the stage. Constructed in a +certain way, it communicates its relief to things which, but for it, +would be considered insignificant and trivial. It makes the tissue of +style finer and firmer. It is the knot which stays the thread. It is +the girdle which holds up the garment and gives it all its folds. What +could nature and the true lose, then, by entering into verse? We ask +the question of our prose-writers themselves--what do they lose +in Moliere's poetry? Does wine--we beg pardon for another trivial +illustration--does wine cease to be wine when it is bottled? + +If we were entitled to say what, in our opinion, the style of dramatic +poetry should be, we would declare for a free, outspoken, sincere +verse, which dares say everything without prudery, express its meaning +without seeking for words; which passes naturally from comedy to +tragedy, from the sublime to the grotesque; by turns practical and +poetical, both artistic and inspired, profound and impulsive, of +wide range and true; verse which is apt opportunely to displace the +caesura, in order to disguise the monotony of Alexandrines; more +inclined to the _enjambement_ that lengthens the line, than to the +inversion of phrases that confuses the sense; faithful to rhyme, that +enslaved queen, that supreme charm of our poetry, that creator of +our metre; verse that is inexhaustible in the verity of its turns +of thought, unfathomable in its secrets of composition and of grace; +assuming, like Proteus, a thousand forms without changing its type and +character; avoiding long speeches; taking delight in dialogue; always +hiding behind the characters of the drama; intent, before everything, +on being in its place, and when it falls to its lot to be _beautiful_, +being so only by chance, as it were, in spite of itself and +unconsciously; lyric, epic, dramatic, at need; capable of running +through the whole gamut of poetry, of skipping from high notes to +low, from the most exalted to the most trivial ideas, from the most +extravagant to the most solemn, from the most superficial to the most +abstract, without ever passing beyond the limits of a spoken scene; in +a word, such verse as a man would write whom a fairy had endowed with +Corneille's mind and Moliere's brain. It seems to us that such verse +would be _as fine as prose_. + +There would be nothing in common between poetry of this sort and that +of which we made a _post mortem_ examination just now. The distinction +will be easy to point out if a certain man of talent, to whom the +author of this book is under personal obligation, will allow us to +borrow his clever phrase: the other poetry was descriptive, this would +be picturesque. + +Let us repeat, verse on the stage should lay aside all self-love, all +exigence, all coquetry. It is simply a form, and a form which should +admit everything, which has no laws to impose on the drama, but on the +contrary should receive everything from it, to be transmitted to the +spectator--French, Latin, texts of laws, royal oaths, popular phrases, +comedy, tragedy, laughter, tears, prose and poetry. Woe to the poet +whose verse does not speak out! But this form is a form of bronze +which encases the thought in its metre beneath which the drama is +indestructible, which engraves it more deeply on the actor's mind, +warns him of what he omits and of what he adds, prevents him from +changing his role, from substituting himself for the author, makes +each word sacred, and causes what the poet has said to remain vivid +a long while in the hearer's memory. The idea, when steeped in verse, +suddenly assumes a more incisive, more brilliant quality. + +One feels that prose, which is necessarily more timid, obliged to wean +the drama from anything like epic or lyric poetry, reduced to dialogue +and to matter-of-fact, is a long way from possessing these resources. +It has much narrower wings. And then, too, it is much more easy of +access; mediocrity is at its ease in prose; and for the sake of a few +works of distinction such as have appeared of late, the art would very +soon be overloaded with abortions and embryos. Another faction of +the reformers incline to drama written in both prose and verse, as +Shakespeare composed it. This method has its advantages. There might, +however, be some incongruity in the transitions from one form to the +other; and when a tissue is homogeneous it is much stouter. However, +whether the drama should be written in prose is only a secondary +question. The rank of a work is certain to be fixed, not according to +its form, but according to its intrinsic value. In questions of this +sort, there is only one solution. There is but one weight that can +turn the scale in the balance of art--that is genius. + +Meanwhile, the first, the indispensable merit of a dramatic writer, +whether he write in prose or verse, is correctness. Not a mere +superficial correctness, the merit or defect of the descriptive +school, which makes Lhomond and Restaut the two wings of its Pegasus; +but that intimate, deep-rooted, deliberate correctness, which is +permeated with the genius of a language, which has sounded its roots +and searched its etymology; always unfettered, because it is sure +of its footing, and always more in harmony with the logic of the +language. Our Lady Grammar leads the one in leading-strings; the other +holds grammar in leash. It can venture anything, can create or invent +its style; it has a right to do so. For, whatever certain men may have +said who did not think what they were saying, and among whom we must +place, notably, him who writes these lines, the French tongue is not +_fixed_ and never will be. A language does not become fixed. The human +intellect is always on the march, or, if you prefer, in movement, +and languages with it. Things are made so. When the body changes, how +could the coat not change? The French of the nineteenth century can no +more be the French of the eighteenth, than that is the French of the +seventeenth, or than the French of the seventeenth is that of the +sixteenth. Montaigne's language is not Rabelais's, Pascal's is +not Montaigne's, Montesquieu's is not Pascal's. Each of the four +languages, taken by itself, is admirable because it is original. Every +age has its own ideas; it must have also words adapted to those ideas. +Languages are like the sea, they move to and fro incessantly. At +certain times they leave one shore of the world of thought and +overflow another. All that their waves thus abandon dries up and +vanishes. It is in this wise that ideas vanish, that words disappear. +It is the same with human tongues as with everything. Each age adds +and takes away something. What can be done? It is the decree of fate. +In vain, therefore, should we seek to petrify the mobile physiognomy +of our idiom in a fixed form. In vain do our literary Joshuas cry out +to the language to stand still; languages and the sun do not stand +still. The day when they become _fixed_, they are dead.--That is why +the French of a certain contemporary school is a dead language. + +Such are, substantially, but without the more elaborate development +which would make the evidence in their favour more complete, the +_present_ ideas of the author of this book concerning the drama. He is +far, however, from presuming to put forth his first dramatic essay as +an emanation of these ideas, which, on the contrary, are themselves, +it may be, simply results of its execution. It would be very +convenient for him, no doubt, and very clever, to rest his book on his +preface, and to defend each by the other. He prefers less cleverness +and more frankness. He proposes, therefore, to be the first to point +out the extreme tenuity of the thread connecting this preface with his +drama. His first plan, dictated by his laziness, was to give the work +to the public entirely unattended _el demonio sin las cuernas_, as +Yriarte said It was only after he had duly brought it to a close, that +at the solicitations of a few friends, blinded by their friendship, no +doubt, he determined to reckon with himself in a preface--to draw, so +to speak, a map of the poetic voyage he had made, to take account of +the acquisitions, good or bad, that he had brought home, and of the +new aspects in which the domain of art had presented itself to his +mind. Someone will take advantage of this admission, doubtless to +repeat the reproach already uttered by a critic in Germany, that +he has written "a treatise in defence of his poetry." What does it +matter? In the first place he was much more inclined to demolish +treatises on poetry than to write them. And then, would it not he +better always to write treatises based on a poem, than to write poems +based on a treatise? But no, we repeat that he has neither the talent +to create nor the presumption to put forth systems "Systems," cleverly +said Voltaire, "are like rats which pass through twenty holes, only to +find at last two or three which will not let them through." It would +have been, therefore, to undertake a useless task and one much beyond +his strength. What he has pleaded, on the contrary, is the freedom of +art against the despotism of systems, codes and rules It is his habit +to follow at all risks whatever he takes for his inspiration, and to +change moulds as often as he changes metals. Dogmatism in the arts is +what he shuns before everything. God forbid that he should aspire to +be numbered among those men, be they romanticists or classicists, who +compose _works according to their own systems_, who condemn themselves +to have but one form in their minds, to be forever _proving_ +something, to follow other laws than those of their temperaments and +then natures. The artificial work of these men, however talented they +may be, has no existence so far as art is concerned. It is a theory, +not poetry. + +Having attempted, in all that has gone before, to point out what, in +our opinion, was the origin of the drama, what its character is, and +what its style should he, the time has come to descend from these +exalted general considerations upon the art to the particular case +which has led us to put them forth. It remains for us to discourse to +the reader of our work, of this _Cromwell_; and as it is not a subject +in which we take pleasure, we will say very little about it in very +few words. + +Oliver Cromwell is one of those historical characters who are at once +very famous and very little known. Most of his biographers--and among +them there are some who are themselves historical--have left that +colossal figure incomplete. It would seem that they dared not assemble +all the characteristic features of that strange and gigantic prototype +of the religious reformation, of the political revolution of England. +Almost all of them have confined themselves to reproducing on a +larger scale the simple and ominous profile drawn by Bossuet from +his Catholic and monarchical standpoint, from his episcopal pulpit +supported by the throne of Louis XIV. + +Like everybody else, the author of this book went no further than +that. The name of Oliver Cromwell suggested to him simply the bare +conception of a fanatical regicide and a great captain. Only on +prowling among the chronicles of the times, which he did with delight, +and on looking through the English memoirs of the seventeenth century, +was he surprised to find that a wholly new Cromwell was gradually +exposed to his gaze. It was no longer simply Bossuet's Cromwell the +soldier, Cromwell the politician; it was a complex, heterogenous, +multiple being, made up of all sorts of contraries--a mixture of much +that was evil and much that was good, of genius and pettiness; a sort +of Tiberius-Dandin, the tyrant of Europe and the plaything of his +family; an old regicide, who delighted to humiliate the ambassadors +of all the kings of Europe, and was tormented by his young royalist +daughter; austere and gloomy in his manners, yet keeping four court +jesters about him; given to the composition of wretched verses; sober, +simple, frugal, yet a stickler for etiquette; a rough soldier and a +crafty politician; skilled in theological disputation and very fond +of it; a dull, diffuse, obscure orator, but clever in speaking the +language of anybody whom he wished to influence; a hypocrite and a +fanatic; a visionary swayed by phantoms of his childhood, believing +in astrologers and banishing them; suspicious to excess, always +threatening, rarely sanguinary; a strict observer of Puritan rules, +and solemnly wasting several hours a day in buffoonery; abrupt and +contemptuous with his intimates, caressing with the secretaries whom +he feared, holding his remorse at bay with sophistry, paltering with +his conscience, inexhaustible in adroitness, in tricks, in resources; +mastering his imagination by his intelligence; grotesque and sublime; +in a word, one of those men who are "square at the base," as they +were described by Napoleon, himself their chief, in his mathematically +exact and poetically figurative language. + +He who writes these lines, in presence of this rare and impressive +_ensemble_, felt that Bossuet's impassioned sketch was no longer +sufficient for him. He began to walk about that lofty figure, and he +was seized by a powerful temptation to depict the giant in all his +aspects. It was a rich soil. Beside the man of war and the statesman, +it remained to draw the theologian, the pedant, the wretched poet, +the seer of visions, the buffoon, the father, the husband, the human +Proteus--in a word, the twofold Cromwell, _homo et vir_. + +There is one period of his life, especially, in which this strange +personality exhibits itself in all its forms. It is not as one might +think at first blush, the period of the trial of Charles I, instinct +as that is with depressing and terrible interest; but it is the moment +when the ambitious mortal boldly attempted to pluck the fruit of that +monarch's death; it is the moment when Cromwell, having attained what +would have been to any other man the zenith of fortune--master of +England, whose innumerable factions knelt silently at his feet; master +of Scotland, of which he had made a satrapy, and of Ireland, which he +had turned into a prison; master of Europe through his diplomacy and +his fleets--seeks to fulfil the dream of his earliest childhood, the +last ambition of his life; to make himself king. History never had a +more impressive lesson in a more impressive drama. First of all, the +Protector arranges to be urged to assume the crown: the august farce +begins by addresses from municipalities, from counties; then there +comes an act of Parliament. Cromwell, the anonymous author of the +play, pretends to be displeased; we see him put out a hand toward the +sceptre, then draw it back; by a devious path he draws near the throne +from which he has swept the legitimate dynasty. At last he makes up +his mind, suddenly; by his command Westminster is decked with flags, +the dais is built, the crown is ordered from the jewelers, the day is +appointed for the ceremony.--Strange denouement! On that very day, +in presence of the populace, the troops, the House of Commons, in +the great hall of Westminster, on that dais from which he expected +to descend as king, suddenly, as if aroused by a shock, he seems to +awaken at the sight of the crown, asks if he is dreaming, and what the +meaning is of all this regal pomp, and in a speech that lasts three +hours declines the kingly title. + +Was it because his spies had warned him of two conspiracies formed +by Cavaliers and Puritans in concert, which were intended, taking +advantage of this misstep, to break out on the same day? Was it +an inward revolution caused by the silence or the murmurs of the +populace, discomposed to see their regicide ascend the throne? Or was +it simply the sagacity of genius, the instinct of a far-seeing, albeit +unbridled ambition, which realizes how one step forward changes a +man's position and attitude, and which dares not expose its plebeian +structure to the wind of unpopularity? Was it all these at once? +This is a question which no contemporaneous document answers +satisfactorily. So much the better: the poet's liberty is the more +complete, and the drama is the gainer by the latitude which history +affords it. It will be seen that here the latitude is ample and +unique; this is, in truth, the decisive hour, the turning-point in +Cromwell's life. It is the moment when his chimera escapes from +him, when the present kills the future, when, to use an expressive +colloquialism, his destiny _misses fire_. All of Cromwell is at stake +in the comedy being played between England and himself. + +Such then is the man and such the period of which we have tried to +give an idea in this book. + +The author has allowed himself to be seduced by the childlike +diversion of touching the keys of that great harpsichord. +Unquestionably, more skillful hands might have evoked a thrilling +and profound melody--not of those which simply caress the ear--but of +those intimate harmonies which stir the whole man to the depths of his +being, as if each key of the key-board were connected with a fibre +of the heart. He has surrendered to the desire to depict all those +fanaticisms, all those superstitions--maladies to which religion is +subject at certain epochs; to the longing to "make playthings of all +these men," as Hamlet says. To set in array about and below Cromwell, +himself the centre and pivot of that court, of that people, of that +little world, which attracts all to his cause and inspires all with +his vigour, that twofold conspiracy devised by two factions which +detest each other, but join hands to overthrow the man who blocks +their path, but which unite simply without blending; and that Puritan +faction, of divers minds, fanatical, gloomy, unselfish, choosing +for leader the most insignificant of men for such a great part, the +egotistical and cowardly Lambert; and the faction of the Cavaliers, +featherheaded, merry, unscrupulous, reckless, devoted, led by the +man who, aside from his devotion to the cause, was least fitted to +represent it, the stern and upright Ormond; and those ambassadors, +so humble and fawning before the soldier of fortune; and the court +itself, an extraordinary mixture of upstarts and great nobles +vying with one another in baseness; and the four jesters whom the +contemptuous neglect of history permitted me to invent; and Cromwell's +family, each member of which is as a thorn in his flesh; and Thurloe, +the Protector's Achates; and the Jewish rabbi, Israel Ben-Manasseh, +spy, usurer, and astrologer, vile on two sides, sublime on the third; +and Rochester, the unique Rochester, absurd and clever, refined and +crapulous, always cursing, always in love, and always tipsy, as he +himself boasted to Bishop Burnet--wretched poet and gallant gentleman, +vicious and ingenuous, staking his head and indifferent whether +he wins the game provided it amuses him--in a word, capable of +everything, of ruse and recklessness, calculation and folly, villainy +and generosity; and the morose Carr, of whom history describes but +one trait, albeit a most characteristic and suggestive one; and those +other fanatics, of all ranks and varieties: Harrison, the thieving +fanatic; Barebones the shopkeeping fanatic; Syndercomb, the bravo; +Garland the tearful and pious assassin; gallant Colonel Overton, +intelligent but a little declamatory; the austere and unbending +Ludlow, who left his ashes and his epitaph at Lausanne; and lastly, +"Milton and a few other men of mind," as we read in a pamphlet of 1675 +(_Cromwell the Politician_), which reminds one of "a certain Dante" of +the Italian chronicle. + +We omit many less important characters, of each of whom, however, the +actual life is known, and each of whom has his marked individuality, +and all of whom contributed to the fascination which this vast +historical scene exerted upon the author's imagination. From that +scene he constructed this drama. He moulded it in verse, because he +preferred to do so. One will discover on reading it how little +thought he gave to his work while writing this preface--with what +disinterestedness, for instance, he contended against the dogma of the +unities. His drama does not leave London; it begins on June 25, 1657, +at three in the morning, and ends on the 26th at noon. Observe that he +has almost followed the classic formula, as the professors of poetry +lay it down to-day. They need not, however, thank him for it. With the +permission of history, not of Aristotle, the author constructed his +drama thus; and because, when the interest is the same, he prefers a +compact subject to a widely diffused one. + +It is evident that, in its present proportions, this drama could not +be given at one of our theatrical performances. It is too long. The +reader will perhaps comprehend, none the less, that every part of it +was written for the stage. It was on approaching his subject to study +it that the author recognized, or thought that he recognized, the +impossibility of procuring the performance of a faithful reproduction +of it on our stage, in the exceptional position it now occupies, +between the academic Charybdis and the administrative Scylla, between +the literary juries and the political censorship. He was required +to choose: either the wheedling, tricky, false tragedy, which may be +acted, or the audaciously true drama, which is prohibited. The first +was not worth the trouble of writing, so he preferred to attempt +the second. That is why, hopeless of ever being put on the stage, +he abandoned himself, freely and submissively, to the whims of +composition, to the pleasure of painting with a freer hand, to the +developments which his subject demanded, and which, even if they keep +his drama off the stage, have at all events the advantage of making it +almost complete from the historical standpoint. However, the reading +committees are an obstacle of the second class only. If it should +happen that the dramatic censorship, realizing how far this harmless, +conscientious and accurate picture of Cromwell and his time is removed +from our own age, should sanction its production on the stage, in that +case, but only in that case, the author might perhaps extract from +this drama a play which would venture to show itself on the boards, +and would be hissed. + +Until then he will continue to hold aloof from the theatre. And even +then he will leave his cherished and tranquil retirement soon enough, +for the agitation and excitement of this new world. God grant that he +may never repent of having exposed the unspotted obscurity of his name +and his person to the shoals, the squalls and tempests of the pit, +and above all (for what does a mere failure matter?) to the wretched +bickerings of the wings; of having entered that shifting, foggy, +stormy atmosphere, where ignorance dogmatises, where envy hisses, +where cabals cringe and crawl, where the probity of talent has so +often been misrepresented, where the noble innocence of genius is +sometimes so out of place, where mediocrity triumphs in lowering to +its level the superiority which obscures it, where one finds so many +small men for a single great one, so many nobodies for one Talma, so +many myrmidons for one Achilles! This sketch will seem ill-tempered +perhaps, and far from flattering; but does it not fully mark out the +distance that separates our stage, the abode of intrigues and uproar, +from the solemn serenity of the ancient stage? + +Whatever may happen, he feels bound to warn in advance that small +number of persons whom such a production might attract, that a play +made up of excerpts from _Cromwell_ would occupy no less time then is +ordinarily occupied by a theatrical performance. It is difficult for +a _romantic_ theatre to maintain itself otherwise. Surely, if people +desire something different from the tragedies in which one or two +characters, abstract types of a purely metaphysical idea, stalk +solemnly about on a narrow stage occupied only by a few confidents, +colourless reflections of the heroes, employed to fill the gaps in a +simple, unified, single-stringed plot; if that sort of thing has +grown tiresome, a whole evening is not too much time to devote to +delineating with some fullness a man among men, a whole critical +period: the one, with his peculiar temperament, his genius which +adapts itself thereto, his beliefs which dominate them both, his +passions which throw out of gear his temperament, his genius and his +beliefs, his tastes which give colour to his passions, his habits +which regulate his tastes and muzzle his passions, and with the +innumerable procession of men of every sort whom these various +elements keep in constant commotion about him; the other, with +its manners, its laws, its fashions, its wit, its attainments, its +superstitions, its events, and its people, whom all these first causes +in turn mould like soft wax. It is needless to say that such a picture +will be of huge proportions. Instead of one personality, like that +with which the abstract drama of the old school is content, there will +be twenty, forty, fifty,--who knows how many?--of every size and of +every degree of importance. There will be a crowd of characters in the +drama. Would it not be niggardly to assign it two hours only, and +give up the rest of the performance to opera-comique or farce? to cut +Shakespeare for Bobeche?--And do not imagine that, if the plot is well +adjusted, the multitude of characters set in motion will cause fatigue +to the spectator or confusion in the drama. Shakespeare, abounding in +petty details, is at the same time, and for that very reason, imposing +by the grandeur of the _ensemble._ It is the oak which casts a most +extensive shadow with its myriads of slender leaves. + +Let us hope that people in France will ere long become accustomed to +devote a whole evening to a single play. In England and Germany there +are plays that last six hours. The Greeks, about whom we hear so much, +the Greeks--and after the fashion of Scuderi we will cite at +this point the classicist Dacier, in the seventh chapter of his +_Poetics_--the Greeks sometimes went so far as to have twelve or +sixteen plays acted in a single day. Among a people who are fond of +spectacles the attention is more lively than is commonly believed +The _Mariage de Figaro_, the connecting link of Beaumarchais's +great trilogy, occupies the whole evening, and who was ever bored or +fatigued by it Beaumarchais was worthy to venture on the first step +toward that goal of modern art at which it will be impossible to +arrive in two hours, that profound, insatiable interest which results +from a vast, lifelike and multiform plot. "But," someone will say, +"this performance, consisting of a single play, would be monotonous, +would seem terribly long"--Not so. On the contrary it would lose +its present monotony and tediousness. For what is done now? The +spectator's entertainment is divided into two or three sharply defined +parts. At first he is given two hours of serious enjoyment, then one +hour of hilarious enjoyment, these, with the hour of entr' actes, +which we do not include in the enjoyment make four hours What would +the romantic drama do? It would mingle and blend artistically these +two kinds of enjoyment. It would lead the audience constantly from +sobriety to laughter, from mirthful excitement to heart breaking +emotion, "from grave to gay, from pleasant to severe." For, as we have +already proved, the drama is the grotesque in conjunction with the +sublime, the soul within the body, it is tragedy beneath comedy. Do +you not see that, by affording you repose from one impression by means +of another, by sharpening the tragic upon the comic, the merry upon +the terrible, and at need calling in the charms of the opera, +these performances, while presenting but one play, would be worth a +multitude of others? The romantic stage would make a piquant, savoury, +diversified dish of that which, on the classic stage, is a drug +divided into two pills. + +The author has soon come to the end of what he had to say to the +reader. He has no idea how the critics will greet this drama and +these thoughts, summarily set forth, stripped of their corollaries and +ramifications, put together _currente calamo_, and in haste to have +done with them. Doubtless they will appear to "the disciples of +La Harpe" most impudent and strange. But if perchance, naked and +undeveloped as they are, they should have the power to start upon +the road of truth this public whose education is so far advanced, +and whose minds so many notable writings, of criticism or of original +thought, books or newspapers, have already matured for art, let the +public follow that impulsion, caring naught whether it comes from a +man unknown, from a voice with no authority, from a work of little +merit. It is a copper bell which summons the people to the true temple +and the true God. + +There is to-day the old literary regime as well as the old political +regime. The last century still weighs upon the present one at almost +every point. It is notably oppressive in the matter of criticism. For +instance, you find living men who repeat to you this definition of +taste let fall by Voltaire: "Taste in poetry is no different from what +it is in women's clothes." Taste, then, is coquetry. Remarkable words, +which depict marvellously the painted, _mouchete_, powdered poetry +of the eighteenth century--that literature in paniers, pompons and +falbalas. They give an admirable resume of an age with which the +loftiest geniuses could not come in contact without becoming petty, in +one respect or another; of an age when Montesquieu was able and apt +to produce _Le Temple de Gnide_, Voltaire _Le Temple du Gout_, +Jean-Jacques _Le Devin du Village_. + +Taste is the common sense of genius. This is what will soon be +demonstrated by another school of criticism, powerful, outspoken, +well-informed,--a school of the century which is beginning to put +forth vigorous shoots under the dead and withered branches of the old +school. This youthful criticism, as serious as the other is frivolous, +as learned as the other is ignorant, has already established organs +that are listened to, and one is sometimes surprised to find, even +in the least important sheets, excellent articles emanating from it. +Joining hands with all that is fearless and superior in letters, it +will deliver us from two scourges: tottering _classicism_, and false +_romanticism_, which has the presumption to show itself at the feet +of the true. For modern genius already has its shadow, its copy, its +parasite, its _classic_, which forms itself upon it, smears itself +with its colours, assumes its livery, picks up its crumbs, and, like +_the sorcerer's pupil_, puts in play, with words retained by the +memory, elements of theatrical action of which it has not the secret. +Thus it does idiotic things which its master many a time has much +difficulty in making good. But the thing that must be destroyed first +of all is the old false taste. Present-day literature must be cleansed +of its rust. In vain does the rust eat into it and tarnish it. It +is addressing a young, stern, vigorous generation, which does not +understand it. The train of the eighteenth century is still dragging +in the nineteenth; but we, we young men who have seen Bonaparte, are +not the ones who will carry it. + +We are approaching, then, the moment when we shall see the new +criticism prevail, firmly established upon a broad and deep +foundation. People generally will soon understand that writers should +be judged, not according to rules and species, which are contrary to +nature and art, but according to the immutable principles of the art +of composition, and the special laws of their individual temperaments. +The sound judgment of all men will be ashamed of the criticism which +broke Pierre Corneille on the wheel, gagged Jean Racine, and which +ridiculously rehabilitated John Milton only by virtue of the epic +code of Pere le Bossu. People will consent to place themselves at the +author's standpoint, to view the subject with his eyes, in order +to judge a work intelligently. They will lay aside--and it is M. de +Chateaubriand who speaks--"the paltry criticism of defects for the +noble and fruitful criticism of beauties." It is time that all acute +minds should grasp the thread that frequently connects what we, +following our special whim, call "defects" with what we call "beauty." +Defects--at all events those which we call by that name--are often the +inborn, necessary, inevitable conditions of good qualities. + + Scit genius, natale comes qul temperat astrum. + +Who ever saw a medal without its reverse? a talent that had not some +shadow with its brilliancy, some smoke with its flame? Such a blemish +can be only the inseparable consequence of such beauty. This rough +stroke of the brush, which offends my eye at close range, completes +the effect and gives relief to the whole picture. Efface one and you +efface the other. Originality is made up of such things. Genius is +necessarily uneven. There are no high mountains without deep ravines. +Fill up the valley with the mountain and you will have nothing but +a steppe, a plateau, the plain of Les Sablons instead of the Alps, +swallows and not eagles. + +We must also take into account the weather, the climate, the local +influences. The Bible, Homer, hurt us sometimes by their very +sublimities. Who would want to part with a word of either of them? Our +infirmity often takes fright at the inspired bold flights of +genius, for lack of power to swoop down upon objects with such vast +intelligence. And then, once again, there are _defects_ which take +root only in masterpieces; it is given only to certain geniuses +to have certain defects. Shakespeare is blamed for his abuse of +metaphysics, of wit, of redundant scenes, of obscenities, for his +employment of the mythological nonsense in vogue in his time, for +exaggeration, obscurity, bad taste, bombast, asperities of style. The +oak, that giant tree which we were comparing to Shakespeare just now, +and which has more than one point of resemblance to him, the oak has +an unusual shape, gnarled branches, dark leaves, and hard, rough bark; +but it is the oak. + +And it is because of these qualities that it is the oak. If you would +have a smooth trunk, straight branches, satiny leaves, apply to the +pale birch, the hollow elder, the weeping willow; but leave the mighty +oak in peace. Do not stone that which gives you shade. + +The author of this book knows as well as any one the numerous and +gross faults of his works. If it happens too seldom that he corrects +them, it is because it is repugnant to him to return to a work that +has grown cold. Moreover, what has he ever done that is worth +that trouble? The labor that he would throw away in correcting the +imperfections of his books, he prefers to use in purging his intellect +of its defects. It is his method to correct one work only in another +work. + +However, no matter what treatment may be accorded his book, he +binds himself not to defend it, in whole or in part. If his drama is +worthless, what is the use of upholding it? If it is good, why defend +it? Time will do the book justice or will wreak justice upon it. Its +success for the moment is the affair of the publisher alone. If then +the wrath of the critics is aroused by the publication of this essay, +he will let them do their worst. What reply should he make to them? +He is not one of those who speak, as the Castilian poet says, "through +the mouths of their wounds." + + Por la boca de su herida. + +One last word. It may have been noticed that in this somewhat long +journey through so many different subjects, the author has generally +refrained from resting his personal views upon texts or citations of +authorities. It is not, however, because he did not have them at his +hand. + +"If the poet establishes things that are impossible according to the +rules of his art, he makes a mistake unquestionably; but it ceases to +be a mistake when by this means he has reached the end that he +aimed at; for he has found what he sought,"--"They take for nonsense +whatever the weakness of their intellects does not allow them to +understand. They are especially prone to call absurd those wonderful +passages in which the poet, in order the better to enforce his +argument, departs, if we may so express it, from his argument. In +fact, the precept which makes it a rule sometimes to disregard rules, +is a mystery of the art which it is not easy to make men understand +who are absolutely without taste and whom a sort of abnormality of +mind renders insensible to those things which ordinarily impress men." + +Who said the first? Aristotle. Who said the last? Boileau. By these +two specimens you will see that the author of this drama might, as +well as another, have shielded himself with proper names and taken +refuge behind others' reputations. But he preferred to leave that +style of argument to those who deem it unanswerable, universal and +all-powerful. As for himself, he prefers reasons to authorities; he +has always cared more for arms than for coats-of-arms. + +_October_, 1827. + + +[Footnote A: Victor Hugo (1802-1883) the chief of the romantic school +in France, issued in the Preface to "Cromwell" the manifesto of the +movement. Poet, dramatist, and novelist, Hugo remained through a +long life the most conspicuous man of letters in France; and in the +document here printed he laid down the principles which revolutionized +the literary world of his time.] + + + + +PREFACE TO LEAVES OF GRASS + +BY WALT WHITMAN. (1855)[A] + + +America does not repel the past or what it has produced under +its forms or amid other politics or the idea of castes or the old +religions ... accepts the lesson with calmness ... is not so impatient +as has been supposed that the slough still sticks to opinions and +manners and literature while the life which served its requirements +has passed into the new life of the new forms ... perceives that the +corpse is slowly borne from the eating and sleeping rooms of the house +... perceives that it waits a little while in the door ... that it was +fittest for its days ... that its action has descended to the stalwart +and well shaped heir who approaches ... and that he shall be fittest +for his days. + +The Americans of all nations at any time upon the earth, have +probably the fullest poetical nature. The United States themselves are +essentially the greatest poem. In the history of the earth hitherto +the largest and most stirring appear tame and orderly to their ampler +largeness and stir. Here at last is something in the doings of man +that corresponds with the broadcast doings of the day and night. Here +is not merely a nation but a teeming nation of nations. Here is action +untied from strings necessarily blind to particulars and details +magnificently moving in vast masses. Here is the hospitality which +forever indicates heroes.... Here are the roughs and beards and +space and ruggedness and nonchalance that the soul loves. Here the +performance disdaining the trivial unapproached in the tremendous +audacity of its crowds and groupings and the push of its perspective +spreads with crampless and flowing breadth and showers its prolific +and splendid extravagance. One sees it must indeed own the riches of +the summer and winter, and need never be bankrupt while corn grows +from the ground or the orchards drop apples or the bays contain fish +or men beget children upon women. + +Other states indicate themselves in their deputies ... but the genius of +the United States is not best or most in its executives or legislatures, +nor in its ambassadors or authors or colleges or churches or parlors, +nor even in its newspapers or inventors ... but always most in the +common people. Their manners speech dress friendship--the freshness and +candor of their physiognomy--the picturesque looseness of their carriage +... their deathless attachment to freedom--their aversion to anything +indecorous or soft or mean--the practical acknowledgment of the citizens +of one state by the citizens of all other states--the fierceness of +their roused resentment--- their curiosity and welcome of novelty--their +self-esteem and wonderful sympathy--their susceptibility to a +slight--the air they have of persons who never knew how it felt to stand +in the presence of superiors--the fluency of their speech--their delight +in music, the sure symptom of manly tenderness and native elegance of +soul ... their good temper and open handedness--the terrible +significance of their elections--the President's taking off his hat to +them, not they to him--these too are unrhymed poetry. It awaits the +gigantic and generous treatment worthy of it. + +The largeness of nature or the nation were monstrous without a +corresponding largeness and generosity of the spirit of the citizen. +Not nature nor swarming states nor streets and steamships nor +prosperous business nor farms nor capital nor learning may suffice +for the ideal of man ... nor suffice the poet. No reminiscences may +suffice either. A live nation can always cut a deep mark and can have +the best authority the cheapest ... namely from its own soul. This is +the sum of the profitable uses of individuals or states and of present +action and grandeur and of the subjects of poets.--As if it were +necessary to trot back generation after generation to the eastern +records! As if the beauty and sacredness of the demonstrable must fall +behind that of the mythical! As if men do not make their mark out of +any times! As if the opening of the western continent by discovery and +what has transpired since in North and South America were less than +the small theatre of the antique or the aimless sleepwalking of the +middle ages! The pride of the United States leaves the wealth and +finesse of the cities and all returns of commerce and agriculture and +all the magnitude of geography or shows of exterior victory to enjoy +the breed of full sized men or one full sized man unconquerable and +simple. + +The American poets are to enclose old and new for America is the race +of races. Of them a bard is to be commensurate with a people. To +him the other continents arrive as contributions ... he gives them +reception for their sake and his own sake. His spirit responds to his +country's spirit ... he incarnates its geography and natural life +and rivers and lakes. Mississippi with annual freshets and changing +chutes, Missouri and Columbia and Ohio and St. Lawrence with the Falls +and beautiful masculine Hudson, do not embouchure where they spend +themselves more than they embouchure into him. The blue breadth over +the inland sea of Virginia and Maryland and the sea off Massachusetts +and Maine and over Manhattan bay and over Champlain and Erie and over +Ontario and Huron and Michigan and Superior, and over the Texan and +Mexican and Floridian and Cuban seas, and over the seas off California +and Oregon, is not tallied by the blue breadth of the waters below +more than the breadth of above and below is tallied by him. When the +long Atlantic coast stretches longer and the Pacific coast stretches +longer he easily stretches with them north or south. He spans between +them also from east to west and reflects what is between them. On +him rise solid growths that offset the growths of pine and cedar and +hemlock and live oak and locust and chestnut and cypress and hickory +and limetree and cottonwood and tuliptree and cactus and wildvine and +tamarind and persimmon ... and tangles as tangled as any canebrake or +swamp ... and forests coated with transparent ice, and icicles hanging +from boughs and crackling in the wind ... and sides and peaks of +mountains ... and pasturage sweet and free as savannah or upland or +prairie ... with flights and songs and screams that answer those +of the wild pigeon and high-hold and orchard-oriole and coot and +surf-duck and red-shouldered-hawk and fish-hawk and white ibis +and Indian-hen and cat-owl and water-pheasant and qua-bird and +pied-sheldrake and blackbird and mockingbird and buzzard and condor +and night-heron and eagle. To him the hereditary countenance descends +both mother's and father's. To him enter the essences of the real +things and past and present events--of the enormous diversity +of temperature and agriculture and mines--the tribes of red +aborigines--the weather-beaten vessels entering new ports or making +landings on rocky coasts--the first settlements north or south--the +rapid stature and muscle--the haughty defiance of '76, and the war +and peace and formation of the constitution ... the Union always +surrounded by blatherers and always calm and impregnable--the +perpetual coming of immigrants--the wharf-hem'd cities and superior +marine--the unsurveyed interior--the loghouses and clearings and wild +animals and hunters and trappers ... the free commerce--the fisheries +and whaling and gold-digging--the endless gestation of new states--the +convening of Congress every December, the members duly coming up from +all climates and the uttermost parts ... the noble character of the +young mechanics and of all free American workmen and workwomen ... the +general ardor and friendliness and enterprise--the perfect equality of +the female with the male ... the large amativeness--the fluid movement +of the population--the factories and mercantile life and laborsaving +machinery--the Yankee swap--the New York firemen and the target +excursion--the Southern plantation life--the character of the +northeast and of the northwest and southwest--slavery and the +tremulous spreading of hands to protect it, and the stern opposition +to it which shall never cease till it ceases or the speaking of +tongues and the moving of lips cease. For such the expression of the +American poet is to be transcendent and new. It is to be indirect and +not direct or descriptive or epic. Its quality goes through these to +much more. Let the age and wars of other nations be chanted and their +eras and characters be illustrated and that finish the verse. Not so +the great psalm of the republic. Here the theme is creative and has +vista. Here comes one among the well beloved stonecutters and plans +with decision and science and sees the solid and beautiful forms of +the future where there are now no solid forms. + +Of all nations the United States with veins full of poetical stuff +most need poets and will doubtless have the greatest and use them the +greatest. Their Presidents shall not be their common referee so much +as their poets shall. Of all mankind the great poet is the equable +man. Not in him but off from him things are grotesque or eccentric or +fail of their sanity. Nothing out of its place is good and nothing +in its place is bad. He bestows on every object or quality its fit +proportions neither more nor less. He is the arbiter of the diverse +and he is the key. He is the equalizer of his age and land ... he +supplies what wants supplying and checks what wants checking. If peace +is the routine out of him speaks the spirit of peace, large, rich, +thrifty, building vast and populous cities, encouraging agriculture +and the arts and commerce--lighting the study of man, the soul, +immortality--federal, state or municipal government, marriage, health, +freetrade, intertravel by land and sea ... nothing too close, nothing +too far off ... the stars not too far off. In war he is the most +deadly force of the war. Who recruits him recruits horse and foot ... +he fetches parks of artillery the best that engineer ever knew. If the +time becomes slothful and heavy he knows how to arouse it ... he can +make every word he speaks draw blood. Whatever stagnates in the flat +of custom or obedience or legislation he never stagnates. Obedience +does not master him, he masters it. High up out of reach he stands +turning a concentrated light ... he turns the pivot with his finger +... he baffles the swiftest runners as he stands and easily overtakes +and envelopes them. The time straying towards infidelity and +confections and persiflage he withholds by his steady faith ... he +spreads out his dishes ... he offers the sweet firmfibred meat that +grows men and women. His brain is the ultimate brain. He is no arguer +... he is judgment. He judges not as the judge judges but as the sun +falling around a helpless thing. As he sees the farthest he has the +most faith. His thoughts are the hymns of the praise of things. In +the talk on the soul and eternity and God off of his equal plane he +is silent. He sees eternity less like a play with a prologue and +denouement ... he sees eternity in men and women ... he does not see +men or women as dreams or dots. Faith is the antiseptic of the soul +... it pervades the common people and preserves them ... they +never give up believing and expecting and trusting. There is that +indescribable freshness and unconsciousness about an illiterate person +that humbles and mocks the power of the noblest expressive genius. The +poet sees for a certainty how one not a great artist may be just as +sacred and perfect as the greatest artist.... The power to destroy or +remould is freely used by him, but never the power of attack. What is +past is past. If he does not expose superior models and prove himself +by every step he takes he is not what is wanted. The presence of the +greatest poet conquers ... not parleying or struggling or any prepared +attempts. Now he has passed that way see after him! There is not left +any vestige of despair or misanthropy or cunning or exclusiveness +or the ignominy of a nativity or color or delusion of hell or the +necessity of hell ... and no man thenceforward shall be degraded for +ignorance or weakness or sin. + +The greatest poet hardly knows pettiness or triviality. If he breathes +into anything that was before thought small it dilates with the +grandeur and life of the universe. He is a seer ... he is individual +... he is complete in himself ... the others are as good as he, only +he sees it and they do not. He is not one of the chorus ... he does +not stop for any regulation ... he is the president of regulation. +What the eyesight does to the rest he does to the rest. Who knows +the curious mystery of the eyesight? The other senses corroborate +themselves, but this is removed from any proof but its own and +foreruns the identities of the spiritual world. A single glance of it +mocks all the investigations of man and all the instruments and books +of the earth and all reasoning. What is marvellous? what is unlikely? +what is impossible or baseless or vague? after you have once just +opened the space of a peachpit and given audience to far and near and +to the sunset and had all things enter with electric swiftness softly +and duly without contusion or jostling or jam. + +The land and sea, the animals fishes and birds, the sky of heavens and +the orbs, the forests mountains and rivers, are not small themes ... +but folks expect of the poet to indicate more than the beauty and +dignity which always attach to dumb real objects,... they expect him +to indicate the path between reality and their souls. Men and women +perceive the beauty well enough ... probably as well as he. The +passionate tenacity of hunters, woodmen, early risers, cultivators +of gardens and orchards and fields, the love of healthy women for +the manly form, seafaring persons, drivers of horses, the passion for +light and the open air, all is an old varied sign of the unfailing +perception of beauty and of a residence of the poetic in outdoor +people. They can never be assisted by poets to perceive ... some may +but they never can. The poetic quality is not marshalled in rhyme +or uniformity or abstract addresses to things nor in melancholy +complaints or good precepts, but is the life of these and much else +and is in the soul. The profit of rhyme is that it drops seeds of a +sweeter and more luxuriant rhyme, and of uniformity that it conveys +itself into its own roots in the ground out of sight. The rhyme and +uniformity of perfect poems show the free growth of metrical laws and +bud from them as unerringly and loosely as lilacs and roses on a bush, +and take shapes as compact as the shapes of chestnuts and oranges and +melons and pears, and shed the perfume impalpable to form. The fluency +and ornaments of the finest poems or music or orations or recitations +are not independent but dependent. All beauty comes from beautiful +blood and a beautiful brain. If the greatnesses are in conjunction +in a man or woman it is enough ... the fact will prevail through the +universe ... but the gaggery and gilt of a million years will not +prevail. Who troubles himself about his ornaments or fluency is lost. +This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, +despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for +the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate +tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward +the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any +man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and +with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in +the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine +all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss +whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great +poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the +silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes +and in every motion and joint of your body.... The poet shall not +spend his time in unneeded work. He shall know that the ground is +always ready ploughed and manured ... others may not know it but he +shall. He shall go directly to the creation. His trust shall +master the trust of everything he touches ... and shall master all +attachment. + +The known universe has one complete lover and that is the greatest +poet. He consumes an eternal passion and is indifferent which chance +happens and which possible contingency of fortune or misfortune and +persuades daily and hourly his delicious pay. What baulks or breaks +others is fuel for his burning progress to contact and amorous joy. +Other proportions of the reception of pleasure dwindle to nothing to +his proportions. All expected from heaven or from the highest he is +rapport with in the sight of the daybreak or a scene of the winter +woods or the presence of children playing or with his arm round +the neck of a man or woman. His love above all love has leisure and +expanse ... he leaves room ahead of himself. He is no irresolute +or suspicious lover ... he is sure ... he scorns intervals. His +experience and the showers and thrills are not for nothing. Nothing +can jar him ... suffering and darkness cannot--death and fear cannot. +To him complaint and jealousy and envy are corpses buried and rotten +in the earth ... he saw them buried. The sea is not surer of the shore +or the shore of the sea than he is of the fruition of his love and of +all perfection and beauty. + +The fruition of beauty is no chance of hit or miss ... it is +inevitable as life ... it is as exact and plumb as gravitation. From +the eyesight proceeds another eyesight and from the hearing proceeds +another hearing and from the voice proceeds another voice eternally +curious of the harmony of things with man. To these respond +perfections not only in the committees that were supposed to stand for +the rest but in the rest themselves just the same. These understand +the law of perfection in masses and floods ... that its finish is +to each for itself and onward from itself ... that it is profuse and +impartial ... that there is not a minute of the light or dark nor an +acre of the earth and sea without it--nor any direction of the sky +nor any trade or employment nor any turn of events. This is the reason +that about the proper expression of beauty there is precision and +balance ... one part does not need to be thrust above another. The +best singer is not the one who has the most lithe and powerful organ +... the pleasure of poems is not in them that take the handsomest +measure and similes and sound. + +Without effort and without exposing in the least how it is done the +greatest poet brings the spirit of any or all events and passions and +scenes and persons some more and some less to bear on your individual +character as you hear or read. To do this well is to compete with the +laws that pursue and follow time. What is the purpose must surely be +there and the clue of it must be there ... and the faintest +indication is the indication of the best and then becomes the clearest +indication. Past and present and future are not disjoined but joined. +The greatest poet forms the consistence of what is to be from what has +been and is. He drags the dead out of their coffins and stands them +again on their feet ... he says to the past, Rise and walk before me +that I may realize you. He learns the lesson ... he places himself +where the future becomes present. The greatest poet does not only +dazzle his rays over character and scenes and passions ... he finally +ascends and finishes all ... he exhibits the pinnacles that no man can +tell what they are for or what is beyond ... he glows a moment on the +extremest verge. He is most wonderful in his last half-hidden smile or +frown ... by that flash of the moment of parting the one that sees +it shall be encouraged or terrified afterward for many years. The +greatest poet does not moralize or make applications of morals ... he +knows the soul. The soul has that measureless pride which consists in +never acknowledging any lessons but its own. But it has sympathy as +measureless as its pride and the one balances the other and neither +can stretch too far while it stretches in company with the other. The +inmost secrets of art sleep with the twain. The greatest poet has lain +close betwixt both and they are vital in his style and thoughts. + +The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the +light of letters is simplicity. Nothing is better than simplicity ... +nothing can make up for excess or for the lack of definiteness. To +carry on the heave of impulse and pierce intellectual depths and give +all subjects their articulations are powers neither common nor very +uncommon. But to speak in literature with the perfect rectitude and +insouciance of the movements of animals and the unimpeachableness of +the sentiment of trees in the woods and grass by the roadside is the +flawless triumph of art. If you have looked on him who has achieved +it you have looked on one of the masters of the artists of all nations +and times. You shall not contemplate the flight of the gray gull +over the bay or the mettlesome action of the blood horse or the tall +leaning of sunflowers on their stalk or the appearance of the sun +journeying through heaven or the appearance of the moon afterward with +any more satisfaction than you shall contemplate him. The greatest +poet has less a marked style and is more the channel of thoughts +and things without increase or diminution and is the free channel of +himself. He swears to his art, I will not be meddlesome, I will not +have in my writing any elegance or effect or originality to hang in +the way between me and the rest like curtains. I will have nothing +hang in the way not the richest curtains. What I tell I tell for +precisely what it is. Let who may exalt or startle or fascinate or +soothe I will have purposes as health or heat or snow has and be as +regardless of observation. What I experience or portray shall go from +my composition without a shred of my composition. You shall stand by +my side and look in the mirror with me. + +The old red blood and stainless gentility of great poets will be +proved by their unconstraint. A heroic person walks at his ease +through and out of that custom or precedent or authority that suits +him not. Of the traits of the brotherhood of writers savans musicians +inventors and artists, nothing is finer than silent defiance advancing +from new free forms. In the need of poems philosophy politics +mechanism science behavior, the craft of art, an appropriate native +grand-opera, shipcraft; or any craft, he is greatest for ever and +for ever who contributes the greatest original practical example. The +cleanest expression is that which finds no sphere worthy of itself and +makes one. The messages of great poets to each man and woman are, +Come to us on equal terms, Only then can you understand us, We are no +better than you, What we enclose you enclose, What we enjoy you may +enjoy. Did you suppose there could be only one Supreme? We affirm +there can be unnumbered Supremes, and that one does not countervail +another any more than one eyesight countervails another ... and that +men can be good or grand only of the consciousness of their supremacy +within them. What do you think is the grandeur of storms and +dismemberments and the deadliest battles and wrecks and the wildest +fury of the elements and the power of the sea and the motion of nature +and the throes of human desires and dignity and hate and love? It +is that something in the soul which says, Rage on, Whirl on, I tread +master here and everywhere, Master of the spasms of the sky and of the +shatter of the sea, Master of nature and passion and death, And of all +terror and all pain. + +The American bards shall be marked for generosity and affection and +for encouraging competitors.... They shall be kosmos ... without +monopoly or secrecy ... glad to pass anything to any one ... hungry +for equals night and day. They shall not be careful of riches and +privilege ... they shall be riches and privilege ... they shall +perceive who the most affluent man is. The most affluent man is +he that confronts all the shows he sees by equivalents out of the +stronger wealth of himself. The American bard shall delineate no class +of persons nor one or two out of the strata of interests nor love most +nor truth most nor the soul most nor the body most ... and not be for +the eastern states more than the western or the northern states more +than the southern. + +Exact science and its practical movements are no checks on the +greatest poet but always his encouragement and support. The outset +and remembrance are there ... there the arms that lifted him first and +brace him best ... there he returns after all his goings and comings. +The sailor and traveller ... the anatomist chemist astronomer +geologist phrenologist spiritualist mathematician historian and +lexicographer are not poets, but they are the lawgivers of poets and +their construction underlies the structure of every perfect poem. No +matter what rises or is uttered they sent the seed of the conception +of it ... of them and by them stand the visible proofs of souls ... +always of their fatherstuff must be begotten the sinewy races of +bards. If there shall be love and content between the father and the +son and if the greatness of the son is the exuding of the greatness +of the father there shall be love between the poet and the man of +demonstrable science. In the beauty of poems are the tuft and final +applause of science. + +Great is the faith of the flush of knowledge and of the investigation +of the depths of qualities and things. Cleaving and circling here +swells the soul of the poet yet is president of itself always. The +depths are fathomless and therefore calm. The innocence and nakedness +are resumed ... they are neither modest nor immodest. The whole theory +of the special and supernatural and all that was twined with it or +educed out of it departs as a dream. What has ever happened ... what +happens and whatever may or shall happen, the vital laws enclose all +... they are sufficient for any case and for all cases ... none to be +hurried or retarded ... any miracle of affairs or persons inadmissible +in the vast clear scheme where every motion and every spear of grass +and the frames and spirits of men and women and all that concerns +them are unspeakably perfect miracles all referring to all and each +distinct and in its place. It is also not consistent with the reality +of the soul to admit that there is anything in the known universe more +divine than men and women. + +Men and women and the earth and all upon it are simply to be taken as +they are, and the investigation of their past and present and future +shall be unintermitted and shall be done with perfect candor. Upon +this basis philosophy speculates ever looking towards the poet, +ever regarding the eternal tendencies of all toward happiness never +inconsistent with what is clear to the senses and to the soul. For the +eternal tendencies of all toward happiness make the only point of sane +philosophy. Whatever comprehends less than that ... whatever is less +than the laws of light and of astronomical motion ... or less than +the laws that follow the thief the liar the glutton and the drunkard +through this life and doubtless afterward ... or less than vast +stretches of time or the slow formation of density or the patient +upheaving of strata--is of no account. Whatever would put God in +a poem or system of philosophy as contending against some being or +influence is also of no account. Sanity and ensemble characterize +the great master ... spoilt in one principle all is spoilt. The great +master has nothing to do with miracles. He sees health for himself in +being one of the mass ... he sees the hiatus in singular eminence. To +the perfect shape comes common ground. To be under the general law is +great, for that is to correspond with it. The master knows that he is +unspeakably great and that all are unspeakably great ... that nothing +for instance is greater than to conceive children and bring them up +well ... that to be is just as great as to perceive or tell. + +In the make of the great masters the idea of political liberty is +indispensable. Liberty takes the adherence of heroes wherever men and +women exist ... but never takes any adherence or welcome from the rest +more than from poets. They are the voice and exposition of liberty. +They out of ages are worthy the grand idea ... to them it is confided +and they must sustain it. Nothing has precedence of it and nothing can +warp or degrade it. The attitude of great poets is to cheer up slaves +and horrify despots. The turn of their necks, the sound of their feet, +the motions of their wrists, are full of hazard to the one and hope +to the other. Come nigh them awhile and though they neither speak nor +advise you shall learn the faithful American lesson. Liberty is poorly +served by men whose good intent is quelled from one failure or two +failures or any number of failures, or from the casual indifference +or ingratitude of the people, or from the sharp show of the tushes +of power, or the bringing to bear soldiers and cannon or any penal +statutes. Liberty relies upon itself, invites no one, promises +nothing, sits in calmness and light, is positive and composed, and +knows no discouragement. The battle rages with many a loud alarm and +frequent advance and retreat ... the enemy triumphs ... the prison, +the handcuffs, the iron necklace and anklet, the scaffold, garrote and +leadballs do their work ... the cause is asleep ... the strong throats +are choked with their own blood ... the young men drop their eyelashes +toward the ground when they pass each other ... and is liberty gone +out of that place? No never. When liberty goes it is not the first to +go nor the second or third to go ... it awaits for all the rest to go +... it is the last.... When the memories of the old martyrs are faded +utterly away ... when the large names of patriots are laughed at in +the public halls from the lips of the orators ... when the boys are +no more christened after the same but christened after tyrants +and traitors instead ... when the laws of the free are grudgingly +permitted and the laws for informers and bloodmoney are sweet to the +taste of the people ... when I and you walk abroad upon the earth +stung with compassion at the sight of numberless brothers answering +our equal friendship and calling no man master--and when we are elated +with noble joy at the sight of slaves ... when the soul retires in the +cool communion of the night and surveys its experience and has much +extasy over the word and deed that put back a helpless innocent person +into the gripe of the gripers or into any cruel inferiority ... when +those in all parts of these states who could easier realize the true +American character but do not yet--when the swarms of cringers, +suckers, doughfaces, lice of politics, planners of sly involutions +for their own preferment to city offices or state legislatures or the +judiciary or congress or the presidency, obtain a response of love and +natural deference from the people whether they get the offices or no +... when it is better to be a bound booby and rogue in office at a +high salary than the poorest free mechanic or farmer with his hat +unmoved from his head and firm eyes and a candid and generous heart +... and when servility by town or state or the federal government or +any oppression on a large scale or small scale can be tried on without +its own punishment following duly after in exact proportion against +the smallest chance of escape ... or rather when all life and all the +souls of men and women are discharged from any part of the earth--then +only shall the instinct of liberty be discharged from that part of the +earth. + +As the attributes of the poets of the kosmos concentre in the +real body and soul and in the pleasure of things they possess the +superiority of genuineness over all fiction and romance. As they emit +themselves facts are showered over with light ... the daylight is lit +with more volatile light ... also the deep between the setting and +rising sun goes deeper many fold. Each precise object or condition or +combination or process exhibits a beauty ... the multiplication table +its--old age its--the carpenter's trade its--the grand opera its--the +hugehulled cleanshaped New-York clipper at sea under steam or full +sail gleams with unmatched beauty.... the American circles and large +harmonies of government gleam with theirs ... and the commonest +definite intentions and actions with theirs. The poets of the kosmos +advance through all interpositions and coverings and turmoils and +stratagems to first principles. They are of use ... they dissolve +poverty from its need and riches from its conceit. You large +proprietor, they say, shall not realize or perceive more than any one +else. The owner of the library is not he who holds a legal title to it +having bought and paid for it. Any one and every one is owner of the +library who can read the same through all the varieties of tongues +and subjects and styles, and in whom they enter with ease and take +residence and force toward paternity and maternity, and make supple +and powerful and rich and large.... These American states strong and +healthy and accomplished shall receive no pleasure from violations of +natural models and must not permit them. In paintings or mouldings +or carvings in mineral or wood, or in the illustrations of books and +newspapers, or in any comic or tragic prints, or in the patterns of +woven stuffs or anything to beautify rooms or furniture or costumes, +or to put upon cornices or monuments or on the prows or sterns of +ships, or to put anywhere before the human eye indoors or out, that +which distorts honest shapes or which creates unearthly beings or +places or contingencies, is a nuisance and revolt. Of the human +form especially, it is so great it must never be made ridiculous. +Of ornaments to a work nothing outre can be allowed ... but those +ornaments can be allowed that conform to the perfect facts of the +open air, and that flow out of the nature of the work and come +irrepressibly from it and are necessary to the completion of the work. +Most works are most beautiful without ornament ... Exaggerations +will be revenged in human physiology. Clean and vigorous children are +jetted and conceived only in those communities where the models of +natural forms are public every day ... Great genius and the people of +these states must never be demeaned to romances. As soon as histories +are properly told there is no more need of romances. + +The great poets are also to be known by the absence in them of tricks +and by the justification of perfect personal candor. Then folks echo +a new cheap joy and a divine voice leaping from their brains: How +beautiful is candor! All faults may be forgiven of him who has +perfect candor. Henceforth let no man of us lie, for we have seen that +openness wins the inner and outer world and that there is no single +exception, and that never since our earth gathered itself in a mass +have deceit or subterfuge or prevarication attracted its smallest +particle or the faintest tinge of a shade--and that through the +enveloping wealth and rank of a state or the whole republic of states +a sneak or sly person shall be discovered and despised ... and that +the soul has never once been fooled and never can be fooled ... and +thrift without the loving nod of the soul is only a foetid puff ... +and there never grew up in any of the continents of the globe nor upon +any planet or satellite or star, nor upon the asteroids, nor in any +part of ethereal space, nor in the midst of density, nor under the +fluid wet of the sea, nor in that condition which precedes the birth +of babes, nor at any time during the changes of life, nor in that +condition that follows what we term death, nor in any stretch of +abeyance or action afterward of vitality, nor in any process of +formation or reformation anywhere, a being whose instinct hated the +truth. + +Extreme caution or prudence, the soundest organic health, large +hope and comparison and fondness for women and children, large +alimentiveness and destructiveness and causality, with a perfect sense +of the oneness of nature and the propriety of the same spirit applied +to human affairs ... these are called up of the float of the brain of +the world to be parts of the greatest poet from his birth out of his +mother's womb and from her birth out of her mother's. Caution seldom +goes far enough. It has been thought that the prudent citizen was the +citizen who applied himself to solid gains and did well for himself +and for his family and completed a lawful life without debt or crime. +The greatest poet sees and admits these economies as he sees the +economies of food and sleep, but has higher notions of prudence than +to think he gives much when he gives a few slight attentions at the +latch of the gate. The premises of the prudence of life are not +the hospitality of it or the ripeness and harvest of it. Beyond the +independence of a little sum laid aside for burial-money, and of a +few clapboards around and shingles overhead on a lot of American soil +owned, and the easy dollars that supply the year's plain clothing +and meals, the melancholy prudence of the abandonment of such a great +being as a man is to the toss and pallor of years of money-making with +all their scorching days and icy nights and all their stifling deceits +and underhanded dodgings, or infinitesimals of parlors, or shameless +stuffing while others starve ... and all the loss of the bloom and +odor of the earth and of the flowers and atmosphere and of the sea, +and of the true taste of the women and men you pass or have to do with +in youth or middle age, and the issuing sickness and desperate revolt +at the close of a life without elevation or naivete, and the ghastly +chatter of a death without serenity or majesty, is the great fraud +upon modern civilization and forethought, blotching the surface and +system which civilization undeniably drafts, and moistening with tears +the immense features it spreads and spreads with such velocity before +the reached kisses of the soul.... Still the right explanation +remains to be made about prudence. The prudence of the mere wealth and +respectability of the most esteemed life appears too faint for the eye +to observe at all when little and large alike drop quietly aside at +the thought of the prudence suitable for immortality. What is wisdom +that fills the thinness of a year or seventy or eighty years to wisdom +spaced out by ages and coming back at a certain time with strong +reinforcements and rich presents and the clear faces of wedding-guests +as far as you can look in every direction, running gaily toward you? +Only the soul is of itself ... all else has reference to what ensues. +All that a person does or thinks is of consequence. Not a move can a +man or woman make that effects him or her in a day or a month or any +part of the direct lifetime or the hour of death but the same affects +him or her onward afterward through the indirect lifetime. The +indirect is always as great and real as the direct. The spirit +receives from the body just as much as it gives to the body. Not one +name of word or deed ... not of venereal sores or discolorations ... +not the privacy of the onanist ... not of the putrid veins of gluttons +or rumdrinkers ... not peculation or cunning or betrayal or murder ... +no serpentine poison of those that seduce women ... not the foolish +yielding of women ... not prostitution ... not of any depravity of +young men ... not of the attainment of gain by discreditable means ... +not any nastiness of appetite ... not any harshness of officers to +men or judges to prisoners or fathers to sons or sons to fathers or +of husbands to wives or bosses to their boys ... not of greedy looks +or malignant wishes ... nor any of the wiles practised by people upon +themselves ... ever is or ever can be stamped on the programme but +it is duly realized and returned, and that returned in further +performances ... and they returned again. Nor can the push of charity +or personal force ever be anything else than the profoundest reason, +whether it bring argument to hand or no. No specification is necessary +... to add or subtract or divide is in vain. Little or big, learned +or unlearned, white or black, legal or illegal, sick or well, from the +first inspiration down the windpipe to the last expiration out of it, +all that a male or female does that is vigorous and benevolent and +clean is so much sure profit to him or her in the unshakable order of +the universe and through the whole scope of it for ever. If the savage +or felon is wise it is well ... if the greatest poet or savan is wise +it is simply the same ... if the President or chief justice is wise it +is the same ... if the young mechanic or farmer is wise it is no more +or less ... if the prostitute is wise it is no more nor less. The +interest will come round ... all will come round. All the best actions +of war and peace ... all help given to relatives and strangers and the +poor and old and sorrowful and young children and widows and the sick, +and to all shunned persons ... all furtherance of fugitives and of the +escape of slaves ... all the self-denial that stood steady and aloof +on wrecks and saw others take the seats of the boats ... all offering +of substance or life for the good old cause, or for a friend's sake +or opinion's sake ... all pains of enthusiasts scoffed at by their +neighbors ... all the vast sweet love and precious sufferings of +mothers ... all honest men baffled in strifes recorded or unrecorded +... all the grandeur and good of the few ancient nations whose +fragments of annals we inherit ... and all the good of the hundreds of +far mightier and more ancient nations unknown to us by name or date or +location ... all that was ever manfully begun, whether it succeeded or +no ... all that has at any time been well suggested out of the divine +heart of man or by the divinity of his mouth or by the shaping of his +great hands ... and all that is well thought or done this day on any +part of the surface of the globe ... or on any of the wandering stars +or fixed stars by those there as we are here ... or that is henceforth +to be well thought or done by you whoever you are, or by any +one--these singly and wholly inured at their time and inure now and +will inure always to the identities from which they sprung or shall +spring ... Did you guess any of them lived only its moment? The world +does not so exist ... no parts palpable or impalpable so exist ... no +result exists now without being from its long antecedent result, +and that from its antecedent, and so backward without the farthest +mentionable spot coming a bit nearer the beginning than any other +spot.... Whatever satisfies the soul is truth. The prudence of the +greatest poet answers at last the craving and glut of the soul, is +not contemptuous of less ways of prudence if they conform to its ways, +puts off nothing, permits no let-up for its own case or any case, has +no particular sabbath or judgment-day, divides not the living from +the dead or the righteous from the unrighteous, is satisfied with the +present, matches every thought or act by its correlative, knows no +possible forgiveness or deputed atonement ... knows that the young man +who composedly perilled his life and lost it has done exceeding well +for himself, while the man who has not perilled his life and retains +to old age in riches and ease has perhaps achieved nothing for himself +worth mentioning ... and that only that person has no great prudence +to learn who has learnt to prefer real longlived things, and favors +body and soul the same, and perceives the indirect assuredly following +the direct, and what evil or good he does leaping onward and waiting +to meet him again--and who in his spirit in any emergency whatever +neither hurries or avoids death. + +The direct trial of him who would be the greatest poet is to-day. If +he does not flood himself with the immediate age as with vast oceanic +tides ... and if he does not attract his own land body and soul to +himself, and hang on its neck with incomparable love and plunge his +Semitic muscle into its merits and demerits ... and if he be not +himself the age transfigured ... and if to him is not opened the +eternity which gives similitude to all periods and locations and +processes and animate and inanimate forms, and which is the bond of +time, and rises up from its inconceivable vagueness and infiniteness +in the swimming shape of to-day, and is held by the ductile anchors +of life, and makes the present spot the passage from what was to what +shall be, and commits itself to the representation of this wave of an +hour and this one of the sixty beautiful children of the wave--let him +merge in the general run and wait his development.... Still the final +test of poems or any character or work remains. The prescient poet +projects himself centuries ahead and judges performer or performance +after the changes of time. Does it live through them? Does it still +hold on untired? Will the same style and the direction of genius to +similar points be satisfactory now? Has no new discovery in science or +arrival at superior planes of thought and judgment and behavior fixed +him or his so that either can be looked down upon? Have the marches of +tens and hundreds and thousands of years made willing detours to the +right hand and the left hand for his sake? Is he beloved long and long +after he is buried? Does the young man think often of him? and the +young woman think often of him? and do the middle aged and the old +think of him? + +A great poem is for ages and ages in common, and for all degrees and +complexions, and all departments and sects, and for a woman as much as +a man and a man as much as a woman. A great poem is no finish to a man +or woman but rather a beginning. Has any one fancied he could sit at +last under some due authority and rest satisfied with explanations and +realize and be content and full? To no such terminus does the greatest +poet bring ... he brings neither cessation or sheltered fatness and +ease. The touch of him tells in action. Whom he takes he takes +with firm sure grasp into live regions previously unattained ... +thenceforward is no rest ... they see the space and ineffable sheen +that turn the old spots and lights into dead vacuums. The companion +of him beholds the birth and progress of stars and learns one of the +meanings. Now there shall be a man cohered out of tumult and chaos ... +the elder encourages the younger and shows him how ... they too shall +launch off fearlessly together till the new world fits an orbit for +itself and looks unabashed on the lesser orbits of the stars and +sweeps through the ceaseless rings and shall never be quiet again. + +There will soon be no more priests. Their work is done. They may wait +awhile ... perhaps a generation or two ... dropping off by degrees. +A superior breed shall take their place ... the gangs of kosmos and +prophets _en masse_ shall take their place. A new order shall arise +and they shall be the priests of man, and every man shall be his own +priest. The churches built under their umbrage shall be the churches +of men and women. Through the divinity of themselves shall the kosmos +and the new breed of poets be interpreters of men and women and of all +events and things. They shall find their inspiration in real objects +to-day, symptoms of the past and future.... They shall not deign to +defend immortality or God or the perfection of things or liberty or +the exquisite beauty and reality of the soul. They shall arise in +America and be responded to from the remainder of the earth. + +The English language befriends the grand American expression ... it is +brawny enough and limber and full enough ... on the tough stock of a +race who through all change of circumstance was never without the +idea of political liberty, which is the animus of all liberty, it has +attracted the terms of daintier and gayer and subtler and more elegant +tongues. It is the powerful language of resistance ... it is the +dialect of common sense. It is the speech of the proud and melancholy +races and of all who aspire. It is the chosen tongue to express growth +faith self-esteem freedom justice equality friendliness amplitude +prudence decision and courage. It is the medium that shall well nigh +express the inexpressible. + +No great literature nor any like style of behavior or oratory or +social intercourse or household arrangements or public institutions +or the treatment of bosses of employed people, nor executive detail +or detail of the army and navy, nor spirit of legislation or courts +or police or tuition or architecture or songs or amusements or the +costumes of young men, can long elude the jealous and passionate +instinct of American standards. Whether or no the sign appears from +the mouths of the people, it throbs a live interrogation in every +freeman's and freewoman's heart after that which passes by or this +built to remain. Is it uniform with my country? Are its disposals +without ignominious distinctions? Is it for the ever growing communes +of brothers and lovers, large, well-united, proud beyond the old +models, generous beyond all models? Is it something grown fresh out of +the fields or drawn from the sea for use to me today here? I know +that what answers for me an American must answer for any individual or +nation that serves for a part of my materials. Does this answer? or is +it without reference to universal needs? or sprung of the needs of +the less developed society of special ranks? or old needs of pleasure +overlaid by modern science or forms? Does this acknowledge liberty +with audible and absolute acknowledgment, and set slavery at nought +for life and death? Will it help breed one goodshaped and wellhung +man, and a woman to be his perfect and independent mate? Does it +improve manners? Is it for the nursing of the young of the republic? +Does it solve readily with the sweet milk of the nipples of the +breasts of the mother of many children? Has it too the old ever-fresh +forbearance and impartiality? Does it look for the same love on the +last born and on those hardening toward stature, and on the errant, +and on those who disdain all strength of assault outside their own? + +The poems distilled from other poems will probably pass away. The +coward will surely pass away. The expectation of the vital and great +can only be satisfied by the demeanor of the vital and great. The +swarms of the polished deprecating and reflectors and the polite float +off and leave no remembrance. America prepares with composure and +goodwill for the visitors that have sent word. It is not intellect +that is to be their warrant and welcome. The talented, the artist, +the ingenious, the editor, the statesman, the erudite ... they are not +unappreciated ... they fall in their place and do their work. The soul +of the nation also does its work. No disguise can pass on it ... no +disguise can conceal from it. It rejects none, it permits all. Only +towards as good as itself and toward the like of itself will it +advance half-way. An individual is as superb as a nation when he has +the qualities which make a superb nation. The soul of the largest and +wealthiest and proudest nation may well go half-way to meet that of +its poets. The signs are effectual. There is no fear of mistake. If +the one is true the other is true. The proof of a poet is that his +country absorbs him as affectionately as he has absorbed it. + + +[Footnote A: Walt Whitman (1819-1892), the most original of American +poets, was born in West Hills, Long Island, educated in the Brooklyn +Public Schools, and apprenticed to a printer. As a youth he taught +in a country school, and later went into journalism in New York, +Brooklyn, and New Orleans. The first edition of "Leaves of Grass" +appeared in 1855, with the remarkable preface here printed. During the +war he acted as a volunteer nurse in the army hospitals, and, when it +closed, he became a clerk in the government service at Washington. He +continued to write almost till his death.] + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE + +BY HIPPOLYTE ADOLPHE TAINE. (1863)[A] + + +I + +History, within a hundred years in Germany, and within sixty years +in France, has undergone a transformation owing to a study of +literatures. + +The discovery has been made that a literary work is not a mere play +of the imagination, the isolated caprice of an excited brain, but +a transcript of contemporary manners and customs and the sign of a +particular state of intellect. The conclusion derived from this is +that, through literary monuments, we can retrace the way in which men +felt and thought many centuries ago. This method has been tried and +found successful. + +We have meditated over these ways of feeling and thinking and have +accepted them as facts of prime significance. We have found that they +were dependent on most important events, that they explain these, and +that these explain them, and that henceforth it was necessary to give +them their place in history, and one of the highest. This place has +been assigned to them, and hence all is changed in history--the aim, +the method, the instrumentalities, and the conceptions of laws and of +causes. It is this change as now going on, and which must continue to +go on, that is here attempted to be set forth. + +On turning over the large stiff pages of a folio volume, or the yellow +leaves of a manuscript, in short, a poem, a code of laws, a confession +of faith, what is your first comment? You say to yourself that the +work before you is not of its own creation. It is simply a mold like +a fossil shell, an imprint similar to one of those forms embedded in +a stone by an animal which once lived and perished. Beneath the shell +was an animal and behind the document there was a man. Why do you +study the shell unless to form some idea of the animal? In the same +way do you study the document in order to comprehend the man; both +shell and document are dead fragments and of value only as indications +of the complete living being. The aim is to reach this being; this is +what you strive to reconstruct. It is a mistake to study the document +as if it existed alone by itself. That is treating things merely as a +pedant, and you subject yourself to the illusions of a book-worm. +At bottom mythologies and languages are not existences; the only +realities are human beings who have employed words and imagery adapted +to their organs and to suit the original cast of their intellects. A +creed is nothing in itself. Who made it? Look at this or that +portrait of the sixteenth century, the stern, energetic features of an +archbishop or of an English martyr. Nothing exists except through the +individual; it is necessary to know the individual himself. Let the +parentage of creeds be established, or the classification of poems, or +the growth of constitutions, or the transformations of idioms, and we +have only cleared the ground. True history begins when the historian +has discerned beyond the mists of ages the living, active man, endowed +with passions, furnished with habits, special in voice, feature, +gesture and costume, distinctive and complete, like anybody that you +have just encountered in the street. Let us strive then, as far as +possible, to get rid of this great interval of time which prevents us +from observing the man with our eyes, _the eyes of our own head_. What +revelations do we find in the calendared leaves of a modern poem? A +modern poet, a man like De Musset, Victor Hugo, Lamartine, or Heine, +graduated from a college and traveled, wearing a dress-coat and +gloves, favored by ladies, bowing fifty times and uttering a dozen +witticisms in an evening, reading daily newspapers, generally +occupying an apartment on the second story, not over-cheerful on +account of his nerves, and especially because, in this dense democracy +in which we stifle each other, the discredit of official rank +exaggerates his pretensions by raising his importance, and, owing to +the delicacy of his personal sensations, leading him to regard himself +as a Deity. Such is what we detect behind modern _meditations_ and +_sonnets_. + +Again, behind a tragedy of the seventeenth century there is a poet, +one, for example, like Racine, refined, discreet, a courtier, a fine +talker, with majestic perruque and ribboned shoes, a monarchist and +zealous Christian, "God having given him the grace not to blush in any +society on account of zeal for his king or for the Gospel," clever in +interesting the monarch, translating into proper French "the _gaulois_ +of Amyot," deferential to the great, always knowing how to keep +his place in their company, assiduous and respectful at Marly as at +Versailles, amid the formal creations of a decorative landscape and +the reverential bows, graces, intrigues, and fineness of the braided +seigniors Who get up early every morning to obtain the reversion of an +office, together with the charming ladies who count on their fingers +the pedigrees which entitle them to a seat on a footstool. On this +point consult Saint-Simon and the engravings of Perelle, the same as +you have just consulted Balzac and the water-color drawings of Eugene +Lami. + +In like manner, on reading a Greek tragedy, our first care is +to figure to ourselves the Greeks, that is to say, men who lived +half-naked in the gymnasiums or on a public square under a brilliant +sky, in full view of the noblest and most delicate landscape, busy in +rendering their bodies strong and agile, in conversing together, in +arguing, in voting, in carrying out patriotic piracies, and yet idle +and temperate, the furniture of their houses consisting of three +earthen jars and their food of two pots of anchovies preserved in oil, +served by slaves who afford them the time to cultivate their minds and +to exercise their limbs, with no other concern that that of having +the most beautiful city, the most beautiful processions, the most +beautiful ideas, and the most beautiful men. In this respect, a statue +like the "Meleager" or the "Theseus" of the Parthenon, or again a +sight of the blue and lustrous Mediterranean, resembling a silken +tunic out of which islands arise like marble bodies, together with +a dozen choice phrases selected from the works of Plato and +Aristophanes, teach us more than any number of dissertations and +commentaries. + +And so again, in order to understand an Indian Purana, one must begin +by imagining the father of a family who, "having seen a son on his +son's knees," follows the law and, with ax and pitcher, seeks solitude +under a banyan tree, talks no more, multiplies his fastings, lives +naked with four fires around him under the fifth fire, that terrible +sun which endlessly devours and resuscitates all living things; who +fixes his imagination in turn for weeks at a time on the foot of +Brahma, then on his knee, on his thigh, on his navel, and so on, +until, beneath the strain of this intense meditation, hallucinations +appear, when all the forms of being, mingling together and transformed +into each other, oscillate to and fro in this vertiginous brain until +the motionless man, with suspended breath and fixed eyeballs, beholds +the universe melting away like vapor over the vacant immensity of +the Being in which he hopes for absorption. In this case the best of +teachings would be a journey in India; but, for lack of a better +one, take the narratives of travelers along with works in geography, +botany, and ethnology. In any event, there must be the same research. +A language, a law, a creed, is never other than an abstraction; the +perfect thing is found in the active man, the visible corporeal figure +which eats, walks, fights, and labors. Set aside the theories of +constitutions and their results, of religions and their systems, and +try to observe men in their workshops or offices, in their fields +along with their own sky and soil, with their own homes, clothes, +occupations and repasts, just as you see them when, on landing in +England or in Italy, you remark their features and gestures, their +roads and their inns, the citizen on his promenades and the workman +taking a drink. Let us strive as much as possible to supply the +place of the actual, personal, sensible observation that is no longer +practicable, this being the only way in which we can really know the +man; let us make the past present; to judge of an object it must be +present; no experience can be had of what is absent. Undoubtedly, this +sort of reconstruction is always imperfect; only an imperfect +judgment can be based on it; but let us do the best we can; incomplete +knowledge is better than none at all, or than knowledge which +is erroneous, and there is no other way of obtaining knowledge +approximatively of bygone times than by _seeing_ approximatively the +men of former times. + +Such is the first step in history. This step was taken in Europe at +the end of the last century when the imagination took fresh flight +under the auspices of Lessing and Walter Scott, and a little later in +France under Chateaubriand, Augustin Thierry, Michelet, and others. We +now come to the second step. + + + + +II + + +On observing the visible man with your own eyes what do you try to +find in him? The invisible man. These words which your ears catch, +those gestures, those airs of the head, his attire and sensible +operations of all kinds, are, for you, merely so many expressions; +these express something, a soul. An inward man is hidden beneath the +outward man, and the latter simply manifests the former. You have +observed the house in which he lives, his furniture, his costume, in +order to discover his habits and tastes, the degree of his refinement +or rusticity, his extravagance or economy, his follies or his +cleverness. You have listened to his conversation and noted the +inflexions of his voice, the attitudes he has assumed, so as to judge +of his spirit, self-abandonment or gayety, his energy or his rigidity. +You consider his writings, works of art, financial and political +schemes, with a view to measure the reach and limits of his +intelligence, his creative power and self-command, to ascertain the +usual order, kind, and force of his conceptions, in what way he +thinks and how he resolves. All these externals are so many avenues +converging to one center, and you follow these only to reach that +center; here is the real man, namely, that group of faculties and of +sentiments which produces the rest. Behold a new world, an infinite +world; for each visible action involves an infinite train of +reasonings and emotions, new or old sensations which have combined to +bring this into light and which, like long ledges of rock sunk deep +in the earth, have cropped out above the surface and attained their +level. It is this subterranean world which forms the second aim, the +special object of the historian. If his critical education suffices, +he is able to discriminate under every ornament in architecture, under +every stroke of the brush in a picture, under each phrase of literary +composition, the particular sentiment out of which the ornament, the +stroke, and the phrase have sprung; he is a spectator of the inward +drama which has developed itself in the breast of the artist or +writer; the choice of words, the length or shortness of the period, +the species of metaphor, the accent of a verse, the chain of +reasoning--all are to him an indication; while his eyes are reading +the text his mind and soul are following the steady flow and +ever-changing series of emotions and conceptions from which this text +has issued; he is working out its _psychology_. Should you desire to +study this operation, regard the promoter and model of all the high +culture of the epoch, Goethe, who, before composing his "Iphigenia" +spent days in making drawings of the most perfect statues and who, at +last, his eyes filled with the noble forms of antique scenery and his +mind penetrated by the harmonious beauty of antique life, succeeded in +reproducing internally, with such exactness, the habits and yearnings +of Greek imagination as to provide us with an almost twin sister of +the "Antigone" of Sophocles and of the goddesses of Phidias. This +exact and demonstrated divination of bygone sentiments has, in our +days, given a new life to history. There was almost complete ignorance +of this in the last century; men of every race and of every epoch were +represented as about alike, the Greek, the barbarian, the Hindoo, the +man of the Renaissance and the man of the eighteenth century, cast in +the same mold and after the same pattern, and after a certain abstract +conception which served for the whole human species. There was a +knowledge of man but not of men. There was no penetration into +the soul itself; nothing of the infinite diversity and wonderful +complexity of souls had been detected; it was not known that the moral +organization of a people or of an age is as special and distinct +as the physical structure of a family of plants or of an order of +animals. History to-day, like zooelogy, has found its anatomy, and +whatever branch of it is studied, whether philology, languages or +mythologies, it is in this way that labor must be given to make it +produce new fruit. Among so many writers who, since Herder, Ottfried +Mueller, and Goethe have steadily followed and rectified this great +effort, let the reader take two historians and two works, one "The +Life and Letters of Cromwell" by Carlyle, and the other the "Port +Royal" of Sainte-Beuve. He will see how precisely, how clearly, and +how profoundly we detect the soul of a man beneath his actions and +works; how, under an old general and in place of an ambitious man +vulgarly hypocritical, we find one tormented by the disordered +reveries of a gloomy imagination, but practical in instinct and +faculties, thoroughly English and strange and incomprehensible to +whoever has not studied the climate and the race; how, with about a +hundred scattered letters and a dozen or more mutilated speeches, we +follow him from his farm and his team to his general's tent and to his +Protector's throne, in his transformation and in his development, in +his struggles of conscience and in his statesman's resolutions, +in such a way that the mechanism of his thought and action becomes +visible and the ever renewed and fitful tragedy, within which wracked +this great gloomy soul, passes like the tragedies of Shakespeare +into the souls of those who behold them. We see how, behind convent +disputes and the obstinacy of nuns, we recover one of the great +provinces of human psychology; how fifty or more characters, rendered +invisible through the uniformity of a narration careful of the +proprieties, came forth in full daylight, each standing out clear in +its countless diversities; how, underneath theological dissertations +and monotonous sermons, we discern the throbbings of ever-breathing +hearts, the excitements and depressions of the religious life, +the unforeseen reaction and pell-mell stir of natural feeling, the +infiltrations of surrounding society, the intermittent triumphs +of grace, presenting so many shades of difference that the fullest +description and most flexible style can scarcely garner in the vast +harvest which the critic has caused to germinate in this abandoned +field. And the same elsewhere. Germany, with its genius, so pliant, so +broad, so prompt in transformations, so fitted for the reproduction of +the remotest and strangest states of human thought; England, with its +matter-of-fact mind, so suited to the grappling with moral problems, +to making them clear by figures, weights, and measures, by geography +and statistics, by texts and common sense; France, at length, with its +Parisian culture and drawing-room habits, with its unceasing analysis +of characters and of works, with its ever ready irony at detecting +weaknesses, with its skilled finesse in discriminating shades of +thought--all have plowed over the same ground, and we now begin +to comprehend that no region of history exists in which this deep +sub-soil should not be reached if we would secure adequate crops +between the furrows. + +Such is the second step, and we are now in train to follow it out. +Such is the proper aim of contemporary criticism. No one has done this +work so judiciously and on so grand a scale as Sainte-Beuve; in this +respect, we are all his pupils; literary, philosophic, and religious +criticism in books, and even in the newspapers, is to-day entirely +changed by his method. Ulterior evolution must start from this +point. I have often attempted to expose what this evolution is; in my +opinion, it is a new road open to history and which I shall strive to +describe more in detail. + + + + +III + + +After having observed in a man and noted down one, two, three, +and then a multitude of sentiments, do these suffice and does your +knowledge of him seem complete? Does a memorandum book constitute a +psychology? It is not a psychology, and here, as elsewhere, the search +for causes must follow the collection of facts. It matters not what +the facts may be, whether physical or moral, they always spring from +causes; there are causes for ambition, for courage, for veracity, as +well as for digestion, for muscular action, and for animal heat. Vice +and virtue are products like vitriol and sugar; every complex fact +grows out of the simple facts with which it is affiliated and on +which it depends. We must therefore try to ascertain what simple facts +underlie moral qualities the same as we ascertain those that underlie +physical qualities, and, for example, let us take the first fact +that comes to hand, a religious system of music, that of a Protestant +church. A certain inward cause has inclined the minds of worshipers +toward these grave, monotonous melodies, a cause much greater than its +effect; that is to say, a general conception of the veritable outward +forms of worship which man owes to God; it is this general conception +which has shaped the architecture of the temple, cast out statues, +dispensed with paintings, effaced ornaments, shortened ceremonies, +confined the members of a congregation to high pews which cut off the +view, and governed the thousand details of decoration, posture, and +all other externals. This conception itself again proceeds from a +more general cause, an idea off human conduct in general, inward and +outward, prayers, actions, dispositions of every sort that man is +bound to maintain toward the Deity; it is this which has enthroned the +doctrine of grace, lessened the importance of the clergy, transformed +the sacraments, suppressed observances, and changed the religion of +discipline into one of morality. This conception, in its turn, depends +on a third one, still more general, that of moral perfection as this +is found in a perfect God, the impeccable judge, the stern overseer, +who regards every soul as sinful, meriting punishment, incapable of +virtue or of salvation, except through a stricken conscience which He +provokes and the renewal of the heart which He brings about. Here is +the master conception, consisting of duty erected into the absolute +sovereign of human life, and which prostrates all other ideals at the +feet of the moral ideal. Here we reach what is deepest in man; for, to +explain this conception, we must consider the race he belongs to, +say the German, the Northman, the formation and character of his +intellect, his ways in general of thinking and feeling, that tardiness +and frigidity of sensation which keeps him from rashly and easily +falling tinder the empire of sensual enjoyments, that bluntness of +taste, that irregularity and those outbursts of conception which +arrest in him the birth of refined and harmonious forms and methods; +that disdain of appearances, that yearning for truth, that attachment +to abstract, bare ideas which develop conscience in him at the expense +of everything else. Here the search comes to an end. We have reached +a certain primitive disposition, a particular trait belonging to +sensations of all kinds, to every conception peculiar to an age or +to a race, to characteristics inseparable from every idea and feeling +that stir in the human breast. Such are the grand causes, for these +are universal and permanent causes, present in every case and at every +moment, everywhere and always active, indestructible, and inevitably +dominant in the end, since, whatever accidents cross their path being +limited and partial, end in yielding to the obscure and incessant +repetition of their energy; so that the general structure of things +and all the main features of events are their work, all religions and +philosophies, all poetic and industrial systems, all forms of society +and of the family, all, in fine, being imprints bearing the stamp of +their seal. + + + + +IV + + +There is, then, a system in human ideas and sentiments, the prime +motor of which consists in general traits, certain characteristics +of thought and feeling common to men belonging to a particular race, +epoch, or country. Just as crystals in mineralogy, whatever +their diversity, proceed from a few simple physical forms, so do +civilizations in history, however these may differ, proceed from a few +spiritual forms. One is explained by a primitive geometrical element +as the other is explained by a primitive psychological element. In +order to comprehend the entire group of mineralogical species we must +first study a regular solid in the general, its facets and angles, and +observe in this abridged form the innumerable transformations of which +it is susceptible. In like manner, if we would comprehend the entire +group of historic varieties we must consider beforehand a human soul +in the general, with its two or three fundamental faculties, and, in +this abridgment, observe the principal forms it may present. This sort +of ideal tableau, the geometrical as well as psychological, is not +very complex, and we soon detect the limitations of organic conditions +to which civilizations, the same as crystals, are forcibly confined. +What do we find in man at the point of departure? Images or +representations of objects, namely, that which floats before him +internally, lasts a certain time, is effaced, and then returns after +contemplating this or that tree or animal, in short, some sensible +object. This forms the material basis of the rest and the development +of this material basis is twofold, speculative or positive, just as +these representations end in a _general conception_ or in an _active +resolution_. Such is man, summarily abridged. It is here, within these +narrow confines, that human diversities are encountered, now in the +matter itself and again in the primordial twofold development. However +insignificant in the elements they are of vast significance in the +mass, while the slightest change in the factors leads to gigantic +changes in the results. According as the representation is distinct, +as if stamped by a coining-press, or confused and blurred; according +as it concentrates in itself a larger or smaller number of the +characters of an object; according as it is violent and accompanied +with impulsions or tranquil and surrounded with calmness, so are +all the operations and the whole running-gear of the human machine +entirely transformed. In like manner, again, according as the +ulterior development of the representation varies, so does the whole +development of the man vary. If the general conception in which this +ends is merely a dry notation in Chinese fashion, language becomes +a kind of algebra, religion and poetry are reduced to a minimum, +philosophy is brought down to a sort of moral and practical common +sense, science to a collection of recipes, classifications, and +utilitarian mnemonics, the mind itself taking a whole positive +turn. If, on the contrary, the general conception in which the +representation culminates is a poetic and figurative creation, a +living symbol, as with the Aryan races, language becomes a sort of +shaded and tinted epic in which each word stands as a personage, +poesy and religion assume magnificent and inexhaustible richness, +and metaphysics develops with breadth and subtlety without +any consideration of positive bearings; the whole intellect, +notwithstanding the deviation and inevitable weaknesses of the effort, +is captivated by the beautiful and sublime, thus conceiving an ideal +type which, through its nobleness and harmony, gathers to itself all +the affections and enthusiasms of humanity. If, on the other hand, the +general conception in which the representation culminates is poetic +but abrupt, is reached not gradually but by sudden intuition, if +the original operation is not a regular development but a violent +explosion--then, as with the semitic races, metaphysical power +is wanting; the religious conception becomes that of a royal God, +consuming and solitary; science cannot take shape, the intellect grows +rigid and too headstrong to reproduce the delicate ordering of nature; +poetry cannot give birth to aught but a series of vehement, grandiose +exclamations, while language no longer renders the concatenation of +reasoning and eloquence, man being reduced to lyric enthusiasm, to +ungovernable passion, and to narrow and fanatical action. It is in +this interval between the particular representation and the universal +conception that the germs of the greatest human differences are found. +Some races, like the classic, for example, pass from the former to the +latter by a graduated scale of ideas regularly classified and more +and more general; others, like the Germanic, traverse the interval +in leaps, with uniformity and after prolonged and uncertain groping. +Others, like the Romans and the English, stop at the lowest stages; +others, like the Hindoos and Germans, mount to the uppermost. + +If, now, after considering the passage from the representation to the +idea, we regard the passage from the representation to the resolution, +we find here elementary differences of like importance and of the same +order, according as the impression is vivid, as in Southern climes, +or faint, as in Northern climes, as it ends in instantaneous action +as with barbarians, or tardily as with civilized nations, as it +is capable or not of growth, of inequality, of persistence and of +association. The entire system of human passion, all the risks of +public peace and security, all labor and action, spring from these +sources. It is the same with the other primordial differences; their +effects embrace an entire civilization, and may be likened to those +algebraic formulae which, within narrow bounds, describe beforehand +the curve of which these form the law. Not that this law always +prevails to the end; sometimes, perturbations arise, but, even when +this happens, it is not because the law is defective, but because it +has not operated alone. New elements have entered into combination +with old ones; powerful foreign forces have interfered to oppose +primitive forces. The race has emigrated, as with the ancient +Aryans, and the change of climate has led to a change in the whole +intellectual economy and structure of society. A people has been +conquered like the Saxon nation, and the new political structure +has imposed on its customs, capacities, and desires which it did not +possess. The nation has established itself permanently in the midst +of downtrodden and threatening subjects, as with the ancient Spartans, +while the necessity of living, as in an armed encampment, has +violently turned the whole moral and social organization in one unique +direction. At all events, the mechanism of human history is like this. +We always find the primitive mainspring consisting of some widespread +tendency of soul and intellect, either innate and natural to the race +or acquired by it and due to some circumstance forced upon it. These +great given mainsprings gradually produce their effects, that is to +say, at the end of a few centuries they place the nation in a new +religious, literary, social, and economic state; a new condition +which, combined with their renewed effort, produces another condition, +sometimes a good one, sometimes a bad one, now slowly, now +rapidly, and so on; so that the entire development of each distinct +civilization may be considered as the effect of one permanent force +which, at every moment, varies its work by modifying the circumstances +where it acts. + + + + +V + + +Three different sources contribute to the production of this +elementary moral state, _race, environment_, and _epoch._ What we call +_race_ consists of those innate and hereditary dispositions which man +brings with him into the world and which are generally accompanied +with marked differences of temperament and of bodily structure. They +vary in different nations. + +Naturally, there are varieties of men as there are varieties of +cattle and horses, some brave and intelligent, and others timid and of +limited capacity; some capable of superior conceptions and creations, +and others reduced to rudimentary ideas and contrivances; some +specially fitted for certain works, and more richly furnished with +certain instincts, as we see in the better endowed species of dogs, +some for running and others for fighting, some for hunting and others +for guarding houses and flocks. We have here a distinct force; so +distinct that, in spite of the enormous deviations which both the +other motors impress upon it, we still recognize, and which a race +like the Aryan people, scattered from the Ganges to the Hebrides, +established tinder all climates, ranged along every degree of +civilization, transformed by thirty centuries of revolutions, shows +nevertheless in its languages, in its religions, in its literatures, +and in its philosophies, the community of blood and of intellect +which still to-day binds together all its offshoots. However they may +differ, their parentage is not lost; barbarism, culture and grafting, +differences of atmosphere and of soil, fortunate or unfortunate +occurrences, have operated in vain; the grand characteristics of the +original form have lasted, and we find that the two or three leading +features of the primitive imprint are again apparent under the +subsequent imprints with which time has overlaid them. There is +nothing surprising in this extraordinary tenacity. Although the +immensity of the distance allows us to catch only a glimpse in a +dubious light of the origin of species,[1] the events of history throw +sufficient light on events anterior to history to explain the almost +unshaken solidity of primordial traits. At the moment of encountering +them, fifteen, twenty, and thirty centuries before our era, in an +Aryan, Egyptian, or Chinese, they represent the work of a much greater +number of centuries, perhaps the work of many myriads of centuries. +For, as soon as an animal is born it must adapt itself to its +surroundings; it breathes in another way, it renews itself +differently, it is otherwise stimulated according as the atmosphere, +the food, and the temperature are different. A different climate +and situation create different necessities and hence activities of a +different kind; and hence, again, a system of different habits, and, +finally, a system of different aptitudes and instincts. Man, thus +compelled to put himself in equilibrium with circumstances, contracts +a corresponding temperament and character, and his character, like +his temperament, are acquisitions all the more stable because of the +outward impression being more deeply imprinted in him by more frequent +repetitions and transmitted to his offspring by more ancient heredity. +So that at each moment of time the character of a people may be +considered as a summary of all antecedent actions and sensations; that +is to say, as a quantity and as a weighty mass, not infinite,[2] since +all things in nature are limited, but disproportionate to the rest and +almost impossible to raise, since each minute of an almost infinite +past has contributed to render it heavier, and, in order to turn +the scale, it would require, on the other side, a still greater +accumulation of actions and sensations. Such is the first and most +abundant source of these master faculties from which historic events +are derived; and we see at once that if it is powerful it is owing +to its not being a mere source, but a sort of lake, and like a +deep reservoir wherein other sources have poured their waters for a +multitude of centuries. + +When we have thus verified the internal structure of a race we must +consider the _environment_ in which it lives. For man is not alone in +the world; nature envelops him and other men surround him; accidental +and secondary folds come and overspread the primitive and permanent +fold, while physical or social circumstances derange or complete the +natural groundwork surrendered to them. At one time climate has +had its effect. Although the history of Aryan nations can be only +obscurely traced from their common country to their final abodes, we +can nevertheless affirm that the profound difference which is apparent +between the Germanic races on the one hand, and the Hellenic and +Latin races on the other, proceeds in great part from the differences +between the countries in which they have established themselves--the +former in cold and moist countries, in the depths of gloomy forests +and swamps, or on the borders of a wild ocean, confined to melancholic +or rude sensations, inclined to drunkenness and gross feeding, leading +a militant and carnivorous life; the latter, on the contrary, living +amidst the finest scenery, alongside of a brilliant, sparkling sea +inviting navigation and commerce, exempt from the grosser cravings of +the stomach, disposed at the start to social habits and customs, to +political organization, to the sentiments and faculties which develop +the art of speaking, the capacity for enjoyment and invention in the +sciences, in art, and in literature. At another time, political events +have operated, as in the two Italian civilizations: the first +one tending wholly to action, to conquest, to government, and to +legislation, through the primitive situation of a city of refuge, a +frontier _emporium_, and of an armed aristocracy which, importing and +enrolling foreigners and the vanquished under it, sets two hostile +bodies facing each other, with no outlet for its internal troubles and +rapacious instincts but systematic warfare; the second one, excluded +from unity and political ambition on a grand scale by the permanency +of its municipal system, by the cosmopolite situation of its pope and +by the military intervention of neighboring states, and following the +bent of its magnificent and harmonious genius, is wholly carried over +to the worship of voluptuousness and beauty. Finally, at another time, +social conditions have imposed their stamp as, eighteen centuries ago, +by Christianity, and twenty-five centuries ago, by Buddhism, when, +around the Mediterranean as in Hindostan, the extreme effects of Aryan +conquest and organization led to intolerable oppression, the crushing +of the individual, utter despair, the whole world under the ban of a +curse, with the development of metaphysics and visions, until man, +in this dungeon of despondency, feeling his heart melt, conceived +of abnegation, charity, tender love, gentleness, humility, human +brotherhood, here in the idea of universal nothingness and there under +that of the fatherhood of God. Look around at the regulative instincts +and faculties implanted in a race; in brief, the turn of mind +according to which it thinks and acts at the present day; we shall +find most frequently that its work is due to one of these prolonged +situations, to these enveloping circumstances, to these persistent +gigantic pressures brought to bear on a mass of men who, one by +one, and all collectively, from one generation to another, have been +unceasingly bent and fashioned by them, in Spain a crusade of eight +centuries against the Mohammedans, prolonged yet longer even to the +exhaustion of the nation through the expulsion of the Moors, +through the spoliation of the Jews, through the establishment of +the Inquisition, through the Catholic wars; in England, a political +establishment of eight centuries which maintains man erect and +respectful, independent and obedient, all accustomed to struggling +together in a body under the sanction of law; in France, a Latin +organization which, at first imposed on docile barbarians, than +leveled to the ground under the universal demolition, forms itself +anew under the latent workings of national instinct, developing under +hereditary monarchs and ending in a sort of equalized, centralized, +administrative republic under dynasties exposed to revolutions. Such +are the most efficacious among the observable causes which mold the +primitive man; they are to nations what education, pursuit, condition, +and abode are to individuals, and seem to comprise all, since the +external forces which fashion human matter, and by which the outward +acts on the inward, are comprehended in them. + +There is, nevertheless, a third order of causes, for, with the forces +within and without, there is the work these have already produced +together, which work itself contributes toward producing the ensuing +work; beside the permanent impulsion and the given environment there +is the acquired momentum. When national character and surrounding +circumstances operate it is not on a _tabula rasa_, but on one already +bearing imprints. According as this _tabula_ is taken at one or at +another moment so is the imprint different, and this suffices to +render the total effect different. Consider, for example, two moments +of a literature or of an art, French tragedy under Corneille and under +Voltaire, and Greek drama under AEschylus and under Euripides, Latin +poetry under Lucretius and under Claudian, and Italian painting under +Da Vinci and under Guido. Assuredly, there is no change of general +conception at either of these two extreme points; ever the same human +type must be portrayed or represented in action; the cast of the +verse, the dramatic structure, the physical form have all persisted. +But there is this among these differences, that one of the artists is +a precursor and the other a successor, that the first one has no model +and the second one has a model; that the former sees things face to +face, and that the latter sees them through the intermediation of the +former, that many departments of art have become more perfect, that +the simplicity and grandeur of the impression have diminished, that +what is pleasing and refined in form has augumented--in short, that +the first work has determined the second. In this respect, it is with +a people as with a plant; the same sap at the same temperature and +in the same soil produces, at different stages of its successive +elaborations, different developments, buds, flowers, fruits, and +seeds, in such a way that the condition of the following is always +that of the preceding and is born of its death. Now, if you no longer +regard a brief moment, as above, but one of those grand periods of +development which embraces one or many centuries like the Middle Ages, +or our last classic period, the conclusion is the same. A certain +dominating conception has prevailed throughout; mankind, during +two hundred years, during five hundred years, have represented to +themselves a certain ideal figure of man, in mediaeval times the knight +and the monk, in our classic period the courtier and refined talker; +this creative and universal conception has monopolized the entire +field of action and thought, and, after spreading its involuntary +systematic works over the world, it languished and then died out, +and now a new idea has arisen, destined to a like domination and to +equally multiplied creations. Note here that the latter depends in +part on the former, and that it is the former, which, combining its +effect with those of national genius and surrounding circumstances, +will impose their bent and their direction on new-born things. It is +according to this law that great historic currents are formed, meaning +by this, the long rule of a form of intellect or of a master idea, +like that period of spontaneous creations called the Renaissance, or +that period of oratorical classifications called the Classic Age, or +that series of mystic systems called the Alexandrine and Christian +epoch, or that series of mythological efflorescences found at the +origins of Germany, India, and Greece. Here as elsewhere, we are +dealing merely with a mechanical problem: the total effect is a +compound wholly determined by the grandeur and direction of the forces +which produce it. The sole difference which separates these moral +problems from physical problems lies in this, that in the former the +directions and grandeur cannot be estimated by or stated in figures +with the same precision as in the latter. If a want, a faculty, is +a quantity capable of degrees, the same as pressure or weight, this +quantity is not measurable like that of the pressure or weight. We +cannot fix it in an exact or approximative formula; we can obtain or +give of it only a literary impression; we are reduced to nothing and +citing the prominent facts which make it manifest and which nearly, or +roughly, indicate about what grade on the scale it must be ranged at. +And yet, notwithstanding the methods of notation are not the same +in the moral sciences as in the physical sciences, nevertheless, +as matter is the same in both, and is equally composed of forces, +directions, and magnitudes, we can still show that in one as in the +other, the final effect takes place according to the same law. This is +great or small according as the fundamental forces are great or small +and act more or less precisely in the same sense, according as the +distinct effects of race, environment and epoch combine to enforce +each other or combine to neutralize each other. Thus are explained the +long impotences and the brilliant successes which appear irregularly +and with no apparent reason in the life of a people; the causes of +these consist in internal concordances and contrarieties. There was +one of these concordances when, in the seventeenth century, the social +disposition and conversational spirit innate in France encountered +drawing-room formalities and the moment of oratorical analysis; when, +in the nineteenth century, the flexible, profound genius of Germany +encountered the age of philosophic synthesis and of cosmopolite +criticism. One of these contrarieties happened when, in the +seventeenth century, the blunt, isolated genius of England awkwardly +tried to don the new polish of urbanity, and when, in the sixteenth +century, the lucid, prosaic French intellect tried to gestate a living +poesy. It is this secret concordance of creative forces which produced +the exquisite courtesy and noble cast of literature under Louis XIV. +and Bossuet, and the grandiose metaphysics and broad critical sympathy +under Hegel and Goethe. It is this secret contrariety of creative +forces which produced the literary incompleteness, the licentious +plays, the abortive drama of Dryden and Wycherly, the poor Greek +importations, the gropings, the minute beauties and fragments of +Ronsard and the Pleiad. We may confidently affirm that the unknown +creations toward which the current of coming ages is bearing up will +spring from and be governed by these primordial forces; that, if these +forces could be measured and computed we might deduce from them, as +from a formula, the characters of future civilization; and that +if, notwithstanding the evident rudeness of our notations, and the +fundamental inexactitude of our measures, we would nowadays form some +idea of our general destinies, we must base our conjectures on an +examination of these forces. For, in enumerating them, we run through +the full circle of active forces; and when the race, the environment, +and the moment have been considered,--that is to say the inner +mainspring, the pressure from without, and the impulsion already +acquired,--we have exhausted not only all real causes but again all +possible causes of movement. + + + + +VI + + +There remains to be ascertained in what way these causes, applied to +a nation or to a century, distribute their effects. Like a spring +issuing from an elevated spot and diffusing its waters, according +to the height, from ledge to ledge, until it finally reaches the low +ground, so does the tendency of mind or soul in a people, due to race, +epoch, or environment, diffuse itself in different proportions, and by +regular descent, over the different series of facts which compose +its civilization.[3] In preparing the geographical map of a country, +starting at its watershed, we see the slopes, just below this common +point, dividing themselves into five or six principal basins, and +then each of the latter into several others, and so on until the whole +country, with its thousands of inequalities of surface, is included +in the ramifications of this network. In like manner, in preparing the +psychological map of the events and sentiments belonging to a certain +human civilization, we find at the start five or six well determined +provinces--religion, art, philosophy, the state, the family, and +industries; next, in each of these provinces, natural departments, and +then finally, in each of these departments, still smaller territories +until we arrive at those countless details of life which we observe +daily in ourselves and around us. If, again, we examine and compare +together these various groups of facts we at once find that they are +composed of parts and that all have parts in common. Let us take first +the three principal products of human intelligence--religion, art, and +philosophy. What is a philosophy but a conception of nature and of its +primordial causes under the form of abstractions and formulas? What +underlies a religion and an art if not a conception of this same +nature, and of these same primordial causes, under the form of more +or less determinate symbols, and of more or less distinct personages, +with this difference, that in the first case we believe that they +exist, and in the second case that they do not exist. Let the reader +consider some of the great creations of the intellect in India, in +Scandinavia, in Persia, in Rome, in Greece, and he will find that art +everywhere is a sort of philosophy become sensible, religion a sort +of poem regarded as true, and philosophy a sort of art and religion, +desiccated and reduced to pure abstractions. There is, then, in the +center of each of these groups a common element, the conception of +the world and its origin, and if they differ amongst each other it is +because each combines with the common element a distinct element; +here the power of abstraction, there the faculty of personifying with +belief, and, finally, the talent for personifying without belief. Let +us now take the two leading products of human association, the Family +and the State. What constitutes the State other than the sentiment +of obedience by which a multitude of men collect together under the +authority of a chief? And what constitutes the Family other than the +sentiment of obedience by which a wife and children act together +under the direction of a father and husband? The Family is a natural, +primitive, limited state, as the State is an artificial, ulterior, and +expanded Family, while beneath the differences which arise from the +number, origin, and condition of its members, we distinguish, in the +small as in the large community, a like fundamental disposition of +mind which brings them together and unites them. Suppose, now, that +this common element receives from the environment, the epoch, and the +race peculiar characteristics, and it is clear that _all the groups +into which it enters will be proportionately modified_. If the +sentiment of obedience is merely one of fear,[4] you encounter, as in +most of the Oriental states, the brutality of despotism, a prodigality +of vigorous punishments, the exploitation of the subject, servile +habits, insecurity of property, impoverished production, female +slavery, and the customs of the harem. If the sentiment of obedience +is rooted in the instinct of discipline, sociability, and honor, +you find, as in France, a complete military organization, a superb +administrative hierarchy, a weak public spirit with outbursts of +patriotism, the unhesitating docility of the subject along with +the hot-headedness of the revolutionist, the obsequiousness of the +courtier along with the reserve of the gentleman, the charm of refined +conversation along with home and family bickerings, conjugal equality +together with matrimonial incompatibilities under the necessary +constraints of the law. If, finally, the sentiment of obedience is +rooted in the instinct of subordination and in the idea of duty, you +perceive, as in Germanic nations, the security and contentment of +the household, the firm foundations of domestic life, the slow +and imperfect development of worldly matters, innate respect for +established rank, superstitious reverence for the past, maintenance +of social inequalities, natural and habitual deference to the law. +Similarly in a race, just as there is a difference of aptitude for +general ideas, so will its religion, art, and philosophy be different. +If man is naturally fitted for broader universal conceptions and +inclined at the same time to their derangement, through the nervous +irritability of an over-excited organization, we find, as in India, a +surprising richness of gigantic religious creations, a splendid bloom +of extravagant transparent epics, a strange concatenation of subtle, +imaginative philosophic systems, all so intimately associated and so +interpenetrated with a common sap, that we at once recognize them, by +their amplitude, by their color, and by their disorder, as productions +of the same climate and of the same spirit. If, on the contrary, +the naturally sound and well-balanced man is content to restrict his +conceptions to narrow bounds in order to cast them in more precise +forms, we see, as in Greece, a theology of artists and narrators, +special gods that are soon separated from objects and almost +transformed at once into substantial personages, the sentiment of +universal unity nearly effaced and scarcely maintained in the vague +notion of destiny, a philosophy, rather than subtle and compact, +grandiose and systematic, narrow metaphysically[5] but incomparable +in its logic, sophistry, and morality, a poesy and arts superior to +anything we have seen in lucidity, naturalness, proportion, truth, and +beauty. If, finally, man is reduced to narrow conceptions deprived +of any speculative subtlety, and at the same time finds that he is +absorbed and completely hardened by practical interests, we see, as +in Rome, rudimentary deities, mere empty names, good for denoting the +petty details of agriculture, generation, and the household, veritable +marriage and farming labels, and, therefore, a null or borrowed +mythology, philosophy, and poesy. Here, as elsewhere, comes in the law +of mutual dependencies.[6] A civilization is a living unit, the parts +of which hold together the same as the parts of an organic body. Just +as in an animal, the instincts, teeth, limbs, bones, and muscular +apparatus are bound together in such a way that a variation of one +determines a corresponding variation in the others, and out of which +a skillful naturalist, with a few bits, imagines and reconstructs an +almost complete body, so, in a civilization, do religion, philosophy, +the family scheme, literature and the arts form a system in which +each local change involves a general change, so that an experienced +historian, who studies one portion apart from the others, sees +beforehand and partially predicts the characteristics of the rest. +There is nothing vague in this dependence. The regulation of all this +in the living body consists, first, of the tendency to manifest a +certain primordial type, and, next, the necessity of its possessing +organs which can supply its wants and put itself in harmony with +itself in order to live. The regulation in a civilization consists in +the presence in each great human creation of an elementary productor +equally present in other surrounding creations, that is, some faculty +and aptitude, some efficient and marked disposition, which, with its +own peculiar character, introduces this with that into all operations +in which it takes part, and which, according to its variations, causes +variation in all the works in which it cooeperates. + + + + +VII + + +Having reached this point we can obtain a glimpse of the principal +features of human transformations, and can now search for the general +laws which regulate not only events, but classes of events; not only +this religion or that literature, but the whole group of religions or +of literatures. If, for example, it is admitted that a religion is +a metaphysical poem associated with belief; if it is recognized, +besides, that there are certain races and certain environments +in which belief, poetic faculty, and metaphysical faculty display +themselves in common with unwonted vigor; if we consider that +Christianity and Buddhism were developed at periods of grand +systematizations and in the midst of sufferings like the oppression +which stirred up the fanatics of Cevennes; if, on the other hand, it +is recognized that primitive religions are born at the dawn of human +reason, during the richest expansion of human imagination, at times +of the greatest naivete and of the greatest credulity; if we consider, +again, that Mohammedanism appeared along with the advent of poetic +prose and of the conception of material unity, amongst a people +destitute of science and at the moment of a sudden development of the +intellect--we might conclude that religion is born and declines, is +reformed and transformed, according as circumstances fortify and bring +together, with more or less precision and energy, its three generative +instincts; and we would then comprehend why religion is endemic in +India among specially exalted imaginative and philosophic intellects; +why it blooms out so wonderfully and so grandly in the Middle Ages, +in an oppressive society, amongst new languages and literature; why +it develops again in the sixteenth century with a new character and an +heroic enthusiasm, at the time of an universal renaissance and at the +awakening of the Germanic races; why it swarms out in so many bizarre +sects in the rude democracy of America and under the bureaucratic +despotism of Russia; why, in fine, it is seen spreading out in the +Europe of to-day in such different proportions and with such special +traits, according to such differences of race and of civilizations. +And so for every kind of human production, for letters, music, the +arts of design, philosophy, the sciences, state industries, and +the rest. Each has some moral tendency for its direct cause, or a +concurrence of moral tendencies; given the cause, it appears; the +cause withdrawn, it disappears; the weakness or intensity of the cause +is the measure of its own weakness or intensity. It is bound to +that like any physical phenomenon to its condition, like dew to the +chilliness of a surrounding atmosphere, like dilatation to heat. +Couples exist in the moral world as they exist in the physical world, +as rigorously linked together and as universally diffused. Whatever +in one case produces, alters, or suppresses the first term, produces, +alters, and suppresses the second term as a necessary consequence. +Whatever cools the surrounding atmosphere causes the fall of dew. +Whatever develops credulity, along with poetic conceptions of the +universe, engenders religion. Thus have things come about, and +thus will they continue to come about. As soon as the adequate and +necessary condition of one of these vast apparitions becomes known to +us our mind has a hold on the future as well as on the past. We can +confidently state under what circumstances it will reappear, foretell +without rashness many portions of its future history, and sketch with +precaution some of the traits of its ulterior development. + + + + +VIII + + +History has reached this point at the present day, or rather it is +nearly there, on the threshold of this inquest. The question as now +stated is this: Given a literature, a philosophy, a society, an art, +a certain group of arts, what is the moral state of things which +produces it? And what are the conditions of race, epoch, and +environment the best adapted to produce this moral state? There is +a distinct moral state for each of these formations and for each of +their branches; there is one for art in general as well as for each +particular art; for architecture, painting, sculpture, music, and +poetry, each with a germ of its own in the large field of human +psychology; each has its own law, and it is by virtue of this law that +we see each shoot up, apparently haphazard, singly and alone, amidst +the miscarriages of their neighbors, like painting in Flanders and +Holland in the seventeenth century, like poetry in England in the +sixteenth century, like music in Germany in the eighteenth century. +At this moment, and in these countries, the conditions for one art and +not for the others are fulfilled, and one branch only has bloomed out +amidst the general sterility. It is these laws of human vegetation +which history must now search for; it is this special psychology of +each special formation which must be got at; it is the composition of +a complete table of these peculiar conditions that must now be worked +out. There is nothing more delicate and nothing more difficult. +Montesquieu undertook it, but in his day the interest in history was +too recent for him to be successful; nobody, indeed, had any idea +of the road that was to be followed, and even at the present day +we scarcely begin to obtain a glimpse of it. Just as astronomy, at +bottom, is a mechanical problem, and physiology, likewise, a chemical +problem, so is history, at bottom, a _problem of psychology_. There is +a particular system of inner impressions and operations which fashions +the artist, the believer, the musician, the painter, the nomad, +the social man; for each of these, the filiation, intensity, and +interdependence of ideas and of emotions are different; each has his +own moral history, and his own special organization, along with some +master tendency and with some dominant trait. To explain each of these +would require a chapter devoted to a profound internal analysis, and +that is a work that can scarcely be called sketched out at the present +day. But one man, Stendhal, through a certain turn of mind and a +peculiar education, has attempted it, and even yet most of his readers +find his works paradoxical and obscure. His talent and ideas were +too premature. His admirable insight, his profound sayings carelessly +thrown out, the astonishing precision of his notes and logic, were not +understood; people were not aware that, under the appearances and +talk of a man of the world, he explained the most complex of internal +mechanisms; that his finger touched the great mainspring, that he +brought scientific processes to bear in the history of the heart, the +art of employing figures, of decomposing, of deducing, that he was the +first to point out fundamental causes such as nationalities, climates, +and temperaments, in short, that he treated sentiments as they should +be treated, that is to say, as a naturalist and physicist, by making +classifications and estimating forces. On account of all this he +was pronounced dry and eccentric and allowed to live in isolation, +composing novels, books of travel and taking notes, for which he +counted upon, and has obtained, about a dozen or so of readers. And +yet his works are those in which we of the present day may find the +most satisfactory efforts that have been made to clear the road I have +just striven to describe. Nobody has taught one better how to observe +with one's own eyes, first, to regard humanity around us and life as +it is, and next, old and authentic documents, how to read more than +merely the black and white of the page, how to detect under old print +and the scrawl of the text the veritable sentiment and the train +of thought, the mental state in which the words were penned. In his +writings, as in those of Sainte Beuve and in those of the German +critics the reader will find how much is to be derived from a literary +document, if this document is rich and we know how to interpret it, +we will find in the psychology of a particular soul, often that of an +age, and sometimes that of a race. In this respect, a great poem, a +good novel, the confessions of a superior man, are more instructive +than a mass of historians and histories, I would give fifty volumes +of charters and a hundred diplomatic files for the memoirs of Cellini, +the epistles of Saint Paul, the table talk of Luther, or the comedies +of Aristophanes. Herein lies the value of literary productions. They +are instructive because they are beautiful, their usefulness increases +with their perfection and if they provide us with documents, it is +because they are monuments. The more visible a book renders sentiments +the more literary it is, for it is the special office of literature to +take note of sentiments. The more important the sentiments noted in a +book the higher its rank in literature, for it is by representing what +sort of a life a nation or an epoch leads, that a writer rallies to +himself the sympathies of a nation or of an epoch. Hence, among the +documents which bring before our eyes the sentiments of preceding +generations, a literature, and especially a great literature, is +incomparably the best. It resembles those admirable instruments of +remarkable sensitiveness which physicists make use of to detect and +measure the most profound and delicate changes that occur in a human +body. There is nothing approaching this in constitutions or religions; +the articles of a code or of a catechism do no more than depict mind +in gross and without finesse; if there are any documents which show +life and spirit in politics and in creeds, they are the eloquent +discourses of the pulpit and the tribune, memoirs and personal +confessions, all belonging to literature, so that, outside of itself, +literature embodies whatever is good elsewhere. It is mainly in +studying literatures that we are able to produce moral history, and +arrive at some knowledge of the psychological laws on which events +depend. + +I have undertaken to write a history of a literature and to ascertain +the psychology of a people; in selecting this one, it is not without +a motive. A people had to be taken possessing a vast and complete +literature, which is rarely found. There are few nations which, +throughout their existence, have thought and written well in the full +sense of the word. Among the ancients, Latin literature is null at the +beginning, and afterward borrowed and an imitation. Among the moderns, +German literature is nearly a blank for two centuries.[7] Italian and +Spanish literatures come to an end in the middle of the seventeenth +century. Ancient Greece, and modern France and England, alone offer a +complete series of great and expressive monuments. I have chosen +the English because, as this still exists and is open to direct +observation, it can be better studied than that of an extinct +civilization of which fragments only remain; and because, being +different, it offers better than that of France very marked +characteristics in the eyes of a Frenchman. Moreover, outside of +what is peculiar to English civilization, apart from a spontaneous +development, it presents a forced deviation due to the latest and most +effective conquest to which the country was subject; the three given +conditions out of which it issues--race, climate, and the Norman +conquest--are clearly and distinctly visible in its literary +monuments; so that we study in this history the two most potent motors +of human transformation, namely, nature and constraint, and we study +them, without any break or uncertainty, in a series of authentic and +complete monuments. I have tried to define these primitive motors, to +show their gradual effects, and explain how their insensible operation +has brought religious and literary productions into full light, and +how the inward mechanism is developed by which the barbarous Saxon +became the Englishman of the present day. + + +[Footnote A: Hippolyte Adolphe Taine (b. 1828; d. 1893) was one of the +most distinguished French critics of the nineteenth century. He held +the chair of esthetics at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, and wrote a +large number of works in history, travel, and literary criticism. +His "History of English Literature" is the most brilliant book on +the subject ever written by a foreigner, and in this introduction he +expounds the method of criticism which has come to be associated +with his name, and in accordance with which he seeks to interpret the +characteristics of English authors.] + +[Footnote 1: Darwin, "The Origin of Species." Prosper Lucas, "De +l'Heredite."] + +[Footnote 2: Spinosa, "Ethics," part iv., axiom.] + +[Footnote 3: For this scale of coordinate effects consult, "Langues +Semitiques," by Renan, ch I, "Comparison des civilizations Grecque +et Romaine," vol I, ch I, 3d ed, by Mommsen, "Consequences de la +democratie," vol III., by Tocqueville.] + +[Footnote 4: "L'Esprit des Lois," by Montesquieu; the essential +principles of the three governments.] + +[Footnote 5: The birth of the Alexandrine philosophy is due to contact +with the Orient. Aristotle's metaphysical views stand alone. Moreover, +with him as with Plato, they afford merely a glimpse. By way of +contrast see systematic power in Plotinus, Proclus, Schelling, and +Hegel, or again in the admirable boldness of Brahmanic and Buddhist +speculation.] + +[Footnote 6: I have very often made attempts to state this law, +especially in the preface to "Essais de Critique et d'Histoire."] + +[Footnote 7: From 1550 to 1750.] + + + + +_Planned and Designed at The Collier Press By William Patten_ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books +with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations, by Charles W. 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