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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/425-0.txt b/425-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fad761f --- /dev/null +++ b/425-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8957 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Familiar Studies of Men and Books, by Robert +Louis Stevenson + + +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: Familiar Studies of Men and Books + + +Author: Robert Louis Stevenson + + + +Release Date: February 12, 2013 [eBook #425] +[This file was first posted on December 23, 1995] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMILIAR STUDIES OF MEN AND +BOOKS*** + + +Transcribed from the 1896 Chatto & Windus edition by David Price, email +ccx074@pglaf.org + + + + + + FAMILIAR STUDIES + OF + MEN AND BOOKS + + + BY + + ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON + +[Picture: Decorative graphic] + + _ELEVENTH EDITION_ + + * * * * * + + London + CHATTO & WINDUS, PICADILLY + 1896 + + * * * * * + + TO + + THOMAS STEVENSON + + CIVIL ENGINEER + BY WHOSE DEVICES THE GREAT SEA LIGHTS IN EVERY QUARTER + OF THE WORLD NOW SHINE MORE BRIGHTLY + + THIS VOLUME IS IN LOVE AND GRATITUDE + + DEDICATED BY HIS SON + + THE AUTHOR + + + + +PREFACE +BY WAY OF CRITICISM. + + +THESE studies are collected from the monthly press. One appeared in the +_New Quarterly_, one in _Macmillan’s_, and the rest in the _Cornhill +Magazine_. To the _Cornhill_ I owe a double debt of thanks; first, that +I was received there in the very best society, and under the eye of the +very best of editors; and second, that the proprietors have allowed me to +republish so considerable an amount of copy. + +These nine worthies have been brought together from many different ages +and countries. Not the most erudite of men could be perfectly prepared +to deal with so many and such various sides of human life and manners. +To pass a true judgment upon Knox and Burns implies a grasp upon the very +deepest strain of thought in Scotland,—a country far more essentially +different from England than many parts of America; for, in a sense, the +first of these men re-created Scotland, and the second is its most +essentially national production. To treat fitly of Hugo and Villon would +involve yet wider knowledge, not only of a country foreign to the author +by race, history, and religion, but of the growth and liberties of art. +Of the two Americans, Whitman and Thoreau, each is the type of something +not so much realised as widely sought after among the late generations of +their countrymen; and to see them clearly in a nice relation to the +society that brought them forth, an author would require a large habit of +life among modern Americans. As for Yoshida, I have already disclaimed +responsibility; it was but my hand that held the pen. + +In truth, these are but the readings of a literary vagrant. One book led +to another, one study to another. The first was published with +trepidation. Since no bones were broken, the second was launched with +greater confidence. So, by insensible degrees, a young man of our +generation acquires, in his own eyes, a kind of roving judicial +commission through the ages; and, having once escaped the perils of the +Freemans and the Furnivalls, sets himself up to right the wrongs of +universal history and criticism. Now, it is one thing to write with +enjoyment on a subject while the story is hot in your mind from recent +reading, coloured with recent prejudice; and it is quite another business +to put these writings coldly forth again in a bound volume. We are most +of us attached to our opinions; that is one of the “natural affections” +of which we hear so much in youth; but few of us are altogether free from +paralysing doubts and scruples. For my part, I have a small idea of the +degree of accuracy possible to man, and I feel sure these studies teem +with error. One and all were written with genuine interest in the +subject; many, however, have been conceived and finished with imperfect +knowledge; and all have lain, from beginning to end, under the +disadvantages inherent in this style of writing. + +Of these disadvantages a word must here be said. The writer of short +studies, having to condense in a few pages the events of a whole +lifetime, and the effect on his own mind of many various volumes, is +bound, above all things, to make that condensation logical and striking. +For the only justification of his writing at all is that he shall present +a brief, reasoned, and memorable view. By the necessity of the case, all +the more neutral circumstances are omitted from his narrative; and that +of itself, by the negative exaggeration of which I have spoken in the +text, lends to the matter in hand a certain false and specious glitter. +By the necessity of the case, again, he is forced to view his subject +throughout in a particular illumination, like a studio artifice. Like +Hales with Pepys, he must nearly break his sitter’s neck to get the +proper shadows on the portrait. It is from one side only that he has +time to represent his subject. The side selected will either be the one +most striking to himself, or the one most obscured by controversy; and in +both cases that will be the one most liable to strained and sophisticated +reading. In a biography, this and that is displayed; the hero is seen at +home, playing the flute; the different tendencies of his work come, one +after another, into notice; and thus something like a true, general +impression of the subject may at last be struck. But in the short study, +the writer, having seized his “point of view,” must keep his eye steadily +to that. He seeks, perhaps, rather to differentiate than truly to +characterise. The proportions of the sitter must be sacrificed to the +proportions of the portrait; the lights are heightened, the shadows +overcharged; the chosen expression, continually forced, may degenerate at +length into a grimace; and we have at best something of a caricature, at +worst a calumny. Hence, if they be readable at all, and hang together by +their own ends, the peculiar convincing force of these brief +representations. They take so little a while to read, and yet in that +little while the subject is so repeatedly introduced in the same light +and with the same expression, that, by sheer force of repetition, that +view is imposed upon the reader. The two English masters of the style, +Macaulay and Carlyle, largely exemplify its dangers. Carlyle, indeed, +had so much more depth and knowledge of the heart, his portraits of +mankind are felt and rendered with so much more poetic comprehension, and +he, like his favourite Ram Dass, had a fire in his belly so much more +hotly burning than the patent reading lamp by which Macaulay studied, +that it seems at first sight hardly fair to bracket them together. But +the “point of view” was imposed by Carlyle on the men he judged of in his +writings with an austerity not only cruel but almost stupid. They are +too often broken outright on the Procrustean bed; they are probably +always disfigured. The rhetorical artifice of Macaulay is easily spied; +it will take longer to appreciate the moral bias of Carlyle. So with all +writers who insist on forcing some significance from all that comes +before them; and the writer of short studies is bound, by the necessity +of the case, to write entirely in that spirit. What he cannot vivify he +should omit. + +Had it been possible to rewrite some of these papers, I hope I should +have had the courage to attempt it. But it is not possible. Short +studies are, or should be, things woven like a carpet, from which it is +impossible to detach a strand. What is perverted has its place there for +ever, as a part of the technical means by which what is right has been +presented. It is only possible to write another study, and then, with a +new “point of view,” would follow new perversions and perhaps a fresh +caricature. Hence, it will be, at least, honest to offer a few grains of +salt to be taken with the text; and as some words of apology, addition, +correction, or amplification fall to be said on almost every study in the +volume, it will be most simple to run them over in their order. But this +must not be taken as a propitiatory offering to the gods of shipwreck; I +trust my cargo unreservedly to the chances of the sea; and do not, by +criticising myself, seek to disarm the wrath of other and less partial +critics. + +_Hugo’s Romances_.—This is an instance of the “point of view.” The five +romances studied with a different purpose might have given different +results, even with a critic so warmly interested in their favour. The +great contemporary master of wordmanship, and indeed of all literary arts +and technicalities, had not unnaturally dazzled a beginner. But it is +best to dwell on merits, for it is these that are most often overlooked. + +_Burns_.—I have left the introductory sentences on Principal Shairp, +partly to explain my own paper, which was merely supplemental to his +amiable but imperfect book, partly because that book appears to me truly +misleading both as to the character and the genius of Burns. This seems +ungracious, but Mr. Shairp has himself to blame; so good a Wordsworthian +was out of character upon that stage. + +This half apology apart, nothing more falls to be said except upon a +remark called forth by my study in the columns of a literary Review. The +exact terms in which that sheet disposed of Burns I cannot now recall; +but they were to this effect—that Burns was a bad man, the impure vehicle +of fine verses; and that this was the view to which all criticism tended. +Now I knew, for my own part, that it was with the profoundest pity, but +with a growing esteem, that I studied the man’s desperate efforts to do +right; and the more I reflected, the stranger it appeared to me that any +thinking being should feel otherwise. The complete letters shed, indeed, +a light on the depths to which Burns had sunk in his character of Don +Juan, but they enhance in the same proportion the hopeless nobility of +his marrying Jean. That I ought to have stated this more noisily I now +see; but that any one should fail to see it for himself, is to me a thing +both incomprehensible and worthy of open scorn. If Burns, on the facts +dealt with in this study, is to be called a bad man, I question very much +whether either I or the writer in the Review have ever encountered what +it would be fair to call a good one. All have some fault. The fault of +each grinds down the hearts of those about him, and—let us not blink the +truth—hurries both him and them into the grave. And when we find a man +persevering indeed, in his fault, as all of us do, and openly overtaken, +as not all of us are, by its consequences, to gloss the matter over, with +too polite biographers, is to do the work of the wrecker disfiguring +beacons on a perilous seaboard; but to call him bad, with a +self-righteous chuckle, is to be talking in one’s sleep with Heedless and +Too-bold in the arbour. + +Yet it is undeniable that much anger and distress is raised in many +quarters by the least attempt to state plainly, what every one well +knows, of Burns’s profligacy, and of the fatal consequences of his +marriage. And for this there are perhaps two subsidiary reasons. For, +first, there is, in our drunken land, a certain privilege extended to +drunkenness. In Scotland, in particular, it is almost respectable, above +all when compared with any “irregularity between the sexes.” The +selfishness of the one, so much more gross in essence, is so much less +immediately conspicuous in its results that our demiurgeous Mrs. Grundy +smiles apologetically on its victims. It is often said—I have heard it +with these ears—that drunkenness “may lead to vice.” Now I did not think +it at all proved that Burns was what is called a drunkard; and I was +obliged to dwell very plainly on the irregularity and the too frequent +vanity and meanness of his relations to women. Hence, in the eyes of +many, my study was a step towards the demonstration of Burns’s radical +badness. + +But second, there is a certain class, professors of that low morality so +greatly more distressing than the better sort of vice, to whom you must +never represent an act that was virtuous in itself, as attended by any +other consequences than a large family and fortune. To hint that Burns’s +marriage had an evil influence is, with this class, to deny the moral +law. Yet such is the fact. It was bravely done; but he had presumed too +far on his strength. One after another the lights of his life went out, +and he fell from circle to circle to the dishonoured sickbed of the end. +And surely for any one that has a thing to call a soul he shines out +tenfold more nobly in the failure of that frantic effort to do right, +than if he had turned on his heel with Worldly Wiseman, married a +congenial spouse, and lived orderly and died reputably an old man. It is +his chief title that he refrained from “the wrong that amendeth wrong.” +But the common, trashy mind of our generation is still aghast, like the +Jews of old, at any word of an unsuccessful virtue. Job has been written +and read; the tower of Siloam fell nineteen hundred years ago; yet we +have still to desire a little Christianity, or, failing that, a little +even of that rude, old, Norse nobility of soul, which saw virtue and vice +alike go unrewarded, and was yet not shaken in its faith. + +_Walt Whitman_.—This is a case of a second difficulty which lies +continually before the writer of critical studies: that he has to mediate +between the author whom he loves and the public who are certainly +indifferent and frequently averse. Many articles had been written on +this notable man. One after another had leaned, in my eyes, either to +praise or blame unduly. In the last case, they helped to blindfold our +fastidious public to an inspiring writer; in the other, by an excess of +unadulterated praise, they moved the more candid to revolt. I was here +on the horns of a dilemma; and between these horns I squeezed myself with +perhaps some loss to the substance of the paper. Seeing so much in +Whitman that was merely ridiculous, as well as so much more that was +unsurpassed in force and fitness,—seeing the true prophet doubled, as I +thought, in places with the Bull in a China Shop,—it appeared best to +steer a middle course, and to laugh with the scorners when I thought they +had any excuse, while I made haste to rejoice with the rejoicers over +what is imperishably good, lovely, human, or divine, in his extraordinary +poems. That was perhaps the right road; yet I cannot help feeling that +in this attempt to trim my sails between an author whom I love and honour +and a public too averse to recognise his merit, I have been led into a +tone unbecoming from one of my stature to one of Whitman’s. But the good +and the great man will go on his way not vexed with my little shafts of +merriment. He, first of any one, will understand how, in the attempt to +explain him credibly to Mrs. Grundy, I have been led into certain airs of +the man of the world, which are merely ridiculous in me, and were not +intentionally discourteous to himself. But there is a worse side to the +question; for in my eagerness to be all things to all men, I am afraid I +may have sinned against proportion. It will be enough to say here that +Whitman’s faults are few and unimportant when they are set beside his +surprising merits. I had written another paper full of gratitude for the +help that had been given me in my life, full of enthusiasm for the +intrinsic merit of the poems, and conceived in the noisiest extreme of +youthful eloquence. The present study was a rifacimento. From it, with +the design already mentioned, and in a fit of horror at my old excess, +the big words and emphatic passages were ruthlessly excised. But this +sort of prudence is frequently its own punishment; along with the +exaggeration, some of the truth is sacrificed; and the result is cold, +constrained, and grudging. In short, I might almost everywhere have +spoken more strongly than I did. + +_Thoreau_.—Here is an admirable instance of the “point of view” forced +throughout, and of too earnest reflection on imperfect facts. Upon me +this pure, narrow, sunnily-ascetic Thoreau had exercised a great charm. +I have scarce written ten sentences since I was introduced to him, but +his influence might be somewhere detected by a close observer. Still it +was as a writer that I had made his acquaintance; I took him on his own +explicit terms; and when I learned details of his life, they were, by the +nature of the case and my own _parti-pris_, read even with a certain +violence in terms of his writings. There could scarce be a perversion +more justifiable than that; yet it was still a perversion. The study +indeed, raised so much ire in the breast of Dr. Japp (H. A. Page), +Thoreau’s sincere and learned disciple, that had either of us been men, I +please myself with thinking, of less temper and justice, the difference +might have made us enemies instead of making us friends. To him who knew +the man from the inside, many of my statements sounded like inversions +made on purpose; and yet when we came to talk of them together, and he +had understood how I was looking at the man through the books, while he +had long since learned to read the books through the man, I believe he +understood the spirit in which I had been led astray. + +On two most important points, Dr. Japp added to my knowledge, and with +the same blow fairly demolished that part of my criticism. First, if +Thoreau were content to dwell by Walden Pond, it was not merely with +designs of self-improvement, but to serve mankind in the highest sense. +Hither came the fleeing slave; thence was he despatched along the road to +freedom. That shanty in the woods was a station in the great Underground +Railroad; that adroit and philosophic solitary was an ardent worker, soul +and body, in that so much more than honourable movement, which, if +atonement were possible for nations, should have gone far to wipe away +the guilt of slavery. But in history sin always meets with condign +punishment; the generation passes, the offence remains, and the innocent +must suffer. No underground railroad could atone for slavery, even as no +bills in Parliament can redeem the ancient wrongs of Ireland. But here +at least is a new light shed on the Walden episode. + +Second, it appears, and the point is capital, that Thoreau was once +fairly and manfully in love, and, with perhaps too much aping of the +angel, relinquished the woman to his brother. Even though the brother +were like to die of it, we have not yet heard the last opinion of the +woman. But be that as it may, we have here the explanation of the +“rarefied and freezing air” in which I complained that he had taught +himself to breathe. Reading the man through the books, I took his +professions in good faith. He made a dupe of me, even as he was seeking +to make a dupe of himself, wresting philosophy to the needs of his own +sorrow. But in the light of this new fact, those pages, seemingly so +cold, are seen to be alive with feeling. What appeared to be a lack of +interest in the philosopher turns out to have been a touching insincerity +of the man to his own heart; and that fine-spun airy theory of +friendship, so devoid, as I complained, of any quality of flesh and +blood, a mere anodyne to lull his pains. The most temperate of living +critics once marked a passage of my own with a cross and the words, “This +seems nonsense.” It not only seemed; it was so. It was a private +bravado of my own, which I had so often repeated to keep up my spirits, +that I had grown at last wholly to believe it, and had ended by setting +it down as a contribution to the theory of life. So with the more icy +parts of this philosophy of Thoreau’s. He was affecting the Spartanism +he had not; and the old sentimental wound still bled afresh, while he +deceived himself with reasons. + +Thoreau’s theory, in short, was one thing and himself another: of the +first, the reader will find what I believe to be a pretty faithful +statement and a fairly just criticism in the study; of the second he will +find but a contorted shadow. So much of the man as fitted nicely with +his doctrines, in the photographer’s phrase, came out. But that large +part which lay outside and beyond, for which he had found or sought no +formula, on which perhaps his philosophy even looked askance, is wanting +in my study, as it was wanting in the guide I followed. In some ways a +less serious writer, in all ways a nobler man, the true Thoreau still +remains to be depicted. + +_Villon_.—I am tempted to regret that I ever wrote on this subject, not +merely because the paper strikes me as too picturesque by half, but +because I regarded Villon as a bad fellow. Others still think well of +him, and can find beautiful and human traits where I saw nothing but +artistic evil; and by the principle of the art, those should have written +of the man, and not I. Where you see no good, silence is the best. +Though this penitence comes too late, it may be well, at least, to give +it expression. + +The spirit of Villon is still living in the literature of France. Fat +Peg is oddly of a piece with the work of Zola, the Goncourts, and the +infinitely greater Flaubert; and, while similar in ugliness, still +surpasses them in native power. The old author, breaking with an _éclat +de voix_, out of his tongue-tied century, has not yet been touched on his +own ground, and still gives us the most vivid and shocking impression of +reality. Even if that were not worth doing at all, it would be worth +doing as well as he has done it; for the pleasure we take in the author’s +skill repays us, or at least reconciles us to the baseness of his +attitude. Fat Peg (_La Grosse Margot_) is typical of much; it is a piece +of experience that has nowhere else been rendered into literature; and a +kind of gratitude for the author’s plainness mingles, as we read, with +the nausea proper to the business. I shall quote here a verse of an old +students’ song, worth laying side by side with Villon’s startling +ballade. This singer, also, had an unworthy mistress, but he did not +choose to share the wages of dishonour; and it is thus, with both wit and +pathos, that he laments her fall:— + + Nunc plango florem + Ætatis teneræ + Nitidiorem + Veneris sidere: + Tunc columbinam + Mentis dulcedinem, + Nunc serpentinam + Amaritudinem. + Verbo rogantes + Removes ostio, + Munera dantes + Foves cubiculo, + Illos abire præcipis + A quibus nihil accipis, + Cæcos claudosque recipis, + Viros illustres decipis + Cum melle venenosa. {0} + +But our illustrious writer of ballades it was unnecessary to deceive; it +was the flight of beauty alone, not that of honesty or honour, that he +lamented in his song; and the nameless mediæval vagabond has the best of +the comparison. + +There is now a Villon Society in England; and Mr. John Payne has +translated him entirely into English, a task of unusual difficulty. I +regret to find that Mr. Payne and I are not always at one as to the +author’s meaning; in such cases I am bound to suppose that he is in the +right, although the weakness of the flesh withholds me from anything +beyond a formal submission. He is now upon a larger venture, promising +us at last that complete Arabian Nights to which we have all so long +looked forward. + +_Charles of Orleans_.—Perhaps I have done scanty justice to the charm of +the old Duke’s verses, and certainly he is too much treated as a fool. +The period is not sufficiently remembered. What that period was, to what +a blank of imbecility the human mind had fallen, can only be known to +those who have waded in the chronicles. Excepting Comines and La Salle +and Villon, I have read no author who did not appal me by his torpor; and +even the trial of Joan of Arc, conducted as it was by chosen clerks, +bears witness to a dreary, sterile folly,—a twilight of the mind peopled +with childish phantoms. In relation to his contemporaries, Charles seems +quite a lively character. + +It remains for me to acknowledge the kindness of Mr. Henry Pyne, who, +immediately on the appearance of the study, sent me his edition of the +Debate between the Heralds: a courtesy from the expert to the amateur +only too uncommon in these days. + +_Knox_.—Knox, the second in order of interest among the reformers, lies +dead and buried in the works of the learned and unreadable M‘Crie. It +remains for some one to break the tomb and bring him forth, alive again +and breathing, in a human book. With the best intentions in the world, I +have only added two more flagstones, ponderous like their predecessors, +to the mass of obstruction that buries the reformer from the world; I +have touched him in my turn with that “mace of death,” which Carlyle has +attributed to Dryasdust; and my two dull papers are, in the matter of +dulness, worthy additions to the labours of M‘Crie. Yet I believe they +are worth reprinting in the interest of the next biographer of Knox. I +trust his book may be a masterpiece; and I indulge the hope that my two +studies may lend him a hint or perhaps spare him a delay in its +composition. + +Of the _Pepys_ I can say nothing; for it has been too recently through my +hands; and I still retain some of the heat of composition. Yet it may +serve as a text for the last remark I have to offer. To Pepys I think I +have been amply just; to the others, to Burns, Thoreau, Whitman, Charles +of Orleans, even Villon, I have found myself in the retrospect ever too +grudging of praise, ever too disrespectful in manner. It is not easy to +see why I should have been most liberal to the man of least pretensions. +Perhaps some cowardice withheld me from the proper warmth of tone; +perhaps it is easier to be just to those nearer us in rank of mind. Such +at least is the fact, which other critics may explain. For these were +all men whom, for one reason or another, I loved; or when I did not love +the men, my love was the greater to their books. I had read them and +lived with them; for months they were continually in my thoughts; I +seemed to rejoice in their joys and to sorrow with them in their griefs; +and behold, when I came to write of them, my tone was sometimes hardly +courteous and seldom wholly just. + + R. L. S. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + PAGE +VICTOR HUGO’S ROMANCES 1 +SOME ASPECTS OF ROBERT BURNS 38 +WALT WHITMAN 91 +HENRY DAVID THOREAU: HIS CHARACTER AND OPINIONS 129 +YOSHIDA-TORAJIRO 172 +FRANÇOIS VILLON, STUDENT, POET, AND HOUSE-BREAKER 192 +CHARLES OF ORLEANS 236 +SAMUEL PEPYS 290 +JOHN KNOX AND WOMEN 328 + +VICTOR HUGO’S ROMANCES. + + + Après le roman pittoresque mais prosaïque de Walter Scott il restera + un autre roman à créer, plus beau et plus complet encore selon nous. + C’est le roman, à la fois drame et épopée, pittoresque mais poétique, + réel mais idéal, vrai mais grand, qui enchâssera Walter Scott dans + Homère.—Victor Hugo on _Quentin Durward_. + +VICTOR HUGO’S romances occupy an important position in the history of +literature; many innovations, timidly made elsewhere, have in them been +carried boldly out to their last consequences; much that was indefinite +in literary tendencies has attained to definite maturity; many things +have come to a point and been distinguished one from the other; and it is +only in the last romance of all, _Quatre Vingt Treize_, that this +culmination is most perfect. This is in the nature of things. Men who +are in any way typical of a stage of progress may be compared more justly +to the hand upon the dial of the clock, which continues to advance as it +indicates, than to the stationary milestone, which is only the measure of +what is past. The movement is not arrested. That significant something +by which the work of such a man differs from that of his predecessors, +goes on disengaging itself and becoming more and more articulate and +cognisable. The same principle of growth that carried his first book +beyond the books of previous writers, carries his last book beyond his +first. And just as the most imbecile production of any literary age +gives us sometimes the very clue to comprehension we have sought long and +vainly in contemporary masterpieces, so it may be the very weakest of an +author’s books that, coming in the sequel of many others, enables us at +last to get hold of what underlies the whole of them—of that spinal +marrow of significance that unites the work of his life into something +organic and rational. This is what has been done by _Quatre Vingt +Treize_ for the earlier romances of Victor Hugo, and, through them, for a +whole division of modern literature. We have here the legitimate +continuation of a long and living literary tradition; and hence, so far, +its explanation. When many lines diverge from each other in direction so +slightly as to confuse the eye, we know that we have only to produce them +to make the chaos plain: this is continually so in literary history; and +we shall best understand the importance of Victor Hugo’s romances if we +think of them as some such prolongation of one of the main lines of +literary tendency. + + * * * * * + +When we compare the novels of Walter Scott with those of the man of +genius who preceded him, and whom he delighted to honour as a master in +the art—I mean Henry Fielding—we shall be somewhat puzzled, at the first +moment, to state the difference that there is between these two. +Fielding has as much human science; has a far firmer hold upon the tiller +of his story; has a keen sense of character, which he draws (and Scott +often does so too) in a rather abstract and academical manner; and +finally, is quite as humorous and quite as good-humoured as the great +Scotchman. With all these points of resemblance between the men, it is +astonishing that their work should be so different. The fact is, that +the English novel was looking one way and seeking one set of effects in +the hands of Fielding; and in the hands of Scott it was looking eagerly +in all ways and searching for all the effects that by any possibility it +could utilise. The difference between these two men marks a great +enfranchisement. With Scott the Romantic movement, the movement of an +extended curiosity and an enfranchised imagination, has begun. This is a +trite thing to say; but trite things are often very indefinitely +comprehended: and this enfranchisement, in as far as it regards the +technical change that came over modern prose romance, has never perhaps +been explained with any clearness. + +To do so, it will be necessary roughly to compare the two sets of +conventions upon which plays and romances are respectively based. The +purposes of these two arts are so much alike, and they deal so much with +the same passions and interests, that we are apt to forget the +fundamental opposition of their methods. And yet such a fundamental +opposition exists. In the drama the action is developed in great measure +by means of things that remain outside of the art; by means of real +things, that is, and not artistic conventions for things. This is a sort +of realism that is not to be confounded with that realism in painting of +which we hear so much. The realism in painting is a thing of purposes; +this, that we have to indicate in the drama, is an affair of method. We +have heard a story, indeed, of a painter in France who, when he wanted to +paint a sea-beach, carried realism from his ends to his means, and +plastered real sand upon his canvas; and that is precisely what is done +in the drama. The dramatic author has to paint his beaches with real +sand: real live men and women move about the stage; we hear real voices; +what is feigned merely puts a sense upon what is; we do actually see a +woman go behind a screen as Lady Teazle, and, after a certain interval, +we do actually see her very shamefully produced again. Now all these +things, that remain as they were in life, and are not transmuted into any +artistic convention, are terribly stubborn and difficult to deal with; +and hence there are for the dramatist many resultant limitations in time +and space. These limitations in some sort approximate towards those of +painting: the dramatic author is tied down, not indeed to a moment, but +to the duration of each scene or act; he is confined to the stage, almost +as the painter is confined within his frame. But the great restriction +is this, that a dramatic author must deal with his actors, and with his +actors alone. Certain moments of suspense, certain significant +dispositions of personages, a certain logical growth of emotion, these +are the only means at the disposal of the playwright. It is true that, +with the assistance of the scene-painter, the costumier and the conductor +of the orchestra, he may add to this something of pageant, something of +sound and fury; but these are, for the dramatic writer, beside the mark, +and do not come under the vivifying touch of his genius. When we turn to +romance, we find this no longer. Here nothing is reproduced to our +senses directly. Not only the main conception of the work, but the +scenery, the appliances, the mechanism by which this conception is +brought home to us, have been put through the crucible of another man’s +mind, and come out again, one and all, in the form of written words. +With the loss of every degree of such realism as we have described, there +is for art a clear gain of liberty and largeness of competence. Thus, +painting, in which the round outlines of things are thrown on to a flat +board, is far more free than sculpture, in which their solidity is +preserved. It is by giving up these identities that art gains true +strength. And so in the case of novels as compared with the stage. +Continuous narration is the flat board on to which the novelist throws +everything. And from this there results for him a great loss of +vividness, but a great compensating gain in his power over the subject; +so that he can now subordinate one thing to another in importance, and +introduce all manner of very subtle detail, to a degree that was before +impossible. He can render just as easily the flourish of trumpets before +a victorious emperor and the gossip of country market women, the gradual +decay of forty years of a man’s life and the gesture of a passionate +moment. He finds himself equally unable, if he looks at it from one +point of view—equally able, if he looks at it from another point of +view—to reproduce a colour, a sound, an outline, a logical argument, a +physical action. He can show his readers, behind and around the +personages that for the moment occupy the foreground of his story, the +continual suggestion of the landscape; the turn of the weather that will +turn with it men’s lives and fortunes, dimly foreshadowed on the horizon; +the fatality of distant events, the stream of national tendency, the +salient framework of causation. And all this thrown upon the flat +board—all this entering, naturally and smoothly, into the texture of +continuous intelligent narration. + +This touches the difference between Fielding and Scott. In the work of +the latter, true to his character of a modern and a romantic, we become +suddenly conscious of the background. Fielding, on the other hand, +although he had recognised that the novel was nothing else than an epic +in prose, wrote in the spirit not of the epic, but of the drama. This is +not, of course, to say that the drama was in any way incapable of a +regeneration similar in kind to that of which I am now speaking with +regard to the novel. The notorious contrary fact is sufficient to guard +the reader against such a misconstruction. All that is meant is, that +Fielding remained ignorant of certain capabilities which the novel +possesses over the drama; or, at least, neglected and did not develop +them. To the end he continued to see things as a playwright sees them. +The world with which he dealt, the world he had realised for himself and +sought to realise and set before his readers, was a world of exclusively +human interest. As for landscape, he was content to underline stage +directions, as it might be done in a play-book: Tom and Molly retire into +a practicable wood. As for nationality and public sentiment, it is +curious enough to think that Tom Jones is laid in the year forty-five, +and that the only use he makes of the rebellion is to throw a troop of +soldiers into his hero’s way. It is most really important, however, to +remark the change which has been introduced into the conception of +character by the beginning of the romantic movement and the consequent +introduction into fiction of a vast amount of new material. Fielding +tells us as much as he thought necessary to account for the actions of +his creatures; he thought that each of these actions could be decomposed +on the spot into a few simple personal elements, as we decompose a force +in a question of abstract dynamics. The larger motives are all unknown +to him; he had not understood that the nature of the landscape or the +spirit of the times could be for anything in a story; and so, naturally +and rightly, he said nothing about them. But Scott’s instinct, the +instinct of the man of an age profoundly different, taught him otherwise; +and, in his work, the individual characters begin to occupy a +comparatively small proportion of that canvas on which armies manœuvre, +and great hills pile themselves upon each other’s shoulders. Fielding’s +characters were always great to the full stature of a perfectly arbitrary +will. Already in Scott we begin to have a sense of the subtle influences +that moderate and qualify a man’s personality; that personality is no +longer thrown out in unnatural isolation, but is resumed into its place +in the constitution of things. + +It is this change in the manner of regarding men and their actions first +exhibited in romance, that has since renewed and vivified history. For +art precedes philosophy and even science. People must have noticed +things and interested themselves in them before they begin to debate upon +their causes or influence. And it is in this way that art is the pioneer +of knowledge; those predilections of the artist he knows not why, those +irrational acceptations and recognitions, reclaim, out of the world that +we have not yet realised, ever another and another corner; and after the +facts have been thus vividly brought before us and have had time to +settle and arrange themselves in our minds, some day there will be found +the man of science to stand up and give the explanation. Scott took an +interest in many things in which Fielding took none; and for this reason, +and no other, he introduced them into his romances. If he had been told +what would be the nature of the movement that he was so lightly +initiating, he would have been very incredulous and not a little +scandalised. At the time when he wrote, the real drift of this new +manner of pleasing people in fiction was not yet apparent; and, even now, +it is only by looking at the romances of Victor Hugo that we are enabled +to form any proper judgment in the matter. These books are not only +descended by ordinary generation from the Waverley novels, but it is in +them chiefly that we shall find the revolutionary tradition of Scott +carried farther that we shall find Scott himself, in so far as regards +his conception of prose fiction and its purposes, surpassed in his own +spirit, instead of tamely followed. We have here, as I said before, a +line of literary tendency produced, and by this production definitely +separated from others. When we come to Hugo, we see that the deviation, +which seemed slight enough and not very serious between Scott and +Fielding, is indeed such a great gulph in thought and sentiment as only +successive generations can pass over: and it is but natural that one of +the chief advances that Hugo has made upon Scott is an advance in +self-consciousness. Both men follow the same road; but where the one +went blindly and carelessly, the other advances with all deliberation and +forethought. There never was artist much more unconscious than Scott; +and there have been not many more conscious than Hugo. The passage at +the head of these pages shows how organically he had understood the +nature of his own changes. He has, underlying each of the five great +romances (which alone I purpose here to examine), two deliberate designs: +one artistic, the other consciously ethical and intellectual. This is a +man living in a different world from Scott, who professes sturdily (in +one of his introductions) that he does not believe in novels having any +moral influence at all; but still Hugo is too much of an artist to let +himself be hampered by his dogmas; and the truth is that the artistic +result seems, in at least one great instance, to have very little +connection with the other, or directly ethical result. + +The artistic result of a romance, what is left upon the memory by any +really powerful and artistic novel, is something so complicated and +refined that it is difficult to put a name upon it and yet something as +simple as nature. These two propositions may seem mutually destructive, +but they are so only in appearance. The fact is that art is working far +ahead of language as well as of science, realising for us, by all manner +of suggestions and exaggerations, effects for which as yet we have no +direct name; nay, for which we may never perhaps have a direct name, for +the reason that these effects do not enter very largely into the +necessities of life. Hence alone is that suspicion of vagueness that +often hangs about the purpose of a romance: it is clear enough to us in +thought; but we are not used to consider anything clear until we are able +to formulate it in words, and analytical language has not been +sufficiently shaped to that end. We all know this difficulty in the case +of a picture, simple and strong as may be the impression that it has left +with us; and it is only because language is the medium of romance, that +we are prevented from seeing that the two cases are the same. It is not +that there is anything blurred or indefinite in the impression left with +us, it is just because the impression is so very definite after its own +kind, that we find it hard to fit it exactly with the expressions of our +philosophical speech. + +It is this idea which underlies and issues from a romance, this something +which it is the function of that form of art to create, this epical +value, that I propose chiefly to seek and, as far as may be, to throw +into relief, in the present study. It is thus, I believe, that we shall +see most clearly the great stride that Hugo has taken beyond his +predecessors, and how, no longer content with expressing more or less +abstract relations of man to man, he has set before himself the task of +realising, in the language of romance, much of the involution of our +complicated lives. + +This epical value is not to be found, let it be understood, in every +so-called novel. The great majority are not works of art in anything but +a very secondary signification. One might almost number on one’s fingers +the works in which such a supreme artistic intention has been in any way +superior to the other and lesser aims, themselves more or less artistic, +that generally go hand in hand with it in the conception of prose +romance. The purely critical spirit is, in most novels, paramount. At +the present moment we can recall one man only, for whose works it would +have been equally possible to accomplish our present design: and that man +is Hawthorne. There is a unity, an unwavering creative purpose, about +some at least of Hawthorne’s romances, that impresses itself on the most +indifferent reader; and the very restrictions and weaknesses of the man +served perhaps to strengthen the vivid and single impression of his +works. There is nothing of this kind in Hugo: unity, if he attains to +it, is indeed unity out of multitude; and it is the wonderful power of +subordination and synthesis thus displayed, that gives us the measure of +his talent. No amount of mere discussion and statement, such as this, +could give a just conception of the greatness of this power. It must be +felt in the books themselves, and all that can be done in the present +essay is to recall to the reader the more general features of each of the +five great romances, hurriedly and imperfectly, as space will permit, and +rather as a suggestion than anything more complete. + + * * * * * + +The moral end that the author had before him in the conception of _Notre +Dame de Paris_ was (he tells us) to “denounce” the external fatality that +hangs over men in the form of foolish and inflexible superstition. To +speak plainly, this moral purpose seems to have mighty little to do with +the artistic conception; moreover it is very questionably handled, while +the artistic conception is developed with the most consummate success. +Old Paris lives for us with newness of life: we have ever before our eyes +the city cut into three by the two arms of the river, the boat-shaped +island “moored” by five bridges to the different shores, and the two +unequal towns on either hand. We forget all that enumeration of palaces +and churches and convents which occupies so many pages of admirable +description, and the thoughtless reader might be inclined to conclude +from this, that they were pages thrown away; but this is not so: we +forget, indeed, the details, as we forget or do not see the different +layers of paint on a completed picture; but the thing desired has been +accomplished, and we carry away with us a sense of the “Gothic profile” +of the city, of the “surprising forest of pinnacles and towers and +belfries,” and we know not what of rich and intricate and quaint. And +throughout, Notre Dame has been held up over Paris by a height far +greater than that of its twin towers: the Cathedral is present to us from +the first page to the last; the title has given us the clue, and already +in the Palace of Justice the story begins to attach itself to that +central building by character after character. It is purely an effect of +mirage; Notre Dame does not, in reality, thus dominate and stand out +above the city; and any one who should visit it, in the spirit of the +Scott-tourists to Edinburgh or the Trossachs, would be almost offended at +finding nothing more than this old church thrust away into a corner. It +is purely an effect of mirage, as we say; but it is an effect that +permeates and possesses the whole book with astonishing consistency and +strength. And then, Hugo has peopled this Gothic city, and, above all, +this Gothic church, with a race of men even more distinctly Gothic than +their surroundings. We know this generation already: we have seen them +clustered about the worn capitals of pillars, or craning forth over the +church-leads with the open mouths of gargoyles. About them all there is +that sort of stiff quaint unreality, that conjunction of the grotesque, +and even of a certain bourgeois snugness, with passionate contortion and +horror, that is so characteristic of Gothic art. Esmeralda is somewhat +an exception; she and the goat traverse the story like two children who +have wandered in a dream. The finest moment of the book is when these +two share with the two other leading characters, Dom Claude and +Quasimodo, the chill shelter of the old cathedral. It is here that we +touch most intimately the generative artistic idea of the romance: are +they not all four taken out of some quaint moulding, illustrative of the +Beatitudes, or the Ten Commandments, or the seven deadly sins? What is +Quasimodo but an animated gargoyle? What is the whole book but the +reanimation of Gothic art? + +It is curious that in this, the earliest of the five great romances, +there should be so little of that extravagance that latterly we have come +almost to identify with the author’s manner. Yet even here we are +distressed by words, thoughts, and incidents that defy belief and +alienate the sympathies. The scene of the _in pace_, for example, in +spite of its strength, verges dangerously on the province of the penny +novelist. I do not believe that Quasimodo rode upon the bell; I should +as soon imagine that he swung by the clapper. And again the following +two sentences, out of an otherwise admirable chapter, surely surpass what +it has ever entered into the heart of any other man to imagine (vol. ii. +p. 180): “Il souffrait tant que par instants il s’arrachait des poignées +de cheveux, _pour voir s’ils ne blanchissaient pas_.” And, p. 181: “Ses +pensées étaient si insupportables qu’il prenait sa tête à deux mains et +tâchait de l’arracher de ses épaules _pour la briser sur le pavé_.” + +One other fault, before we pass on. In spite of the horror and misery +that pervade all of his later work, there is in it much less of actual +melodrama than here, and rarely, I should say never, that sort of +brutality, that useless insufferable violence to the feelings, which is +the last distinction between melodrama and true tragedy. Now, in _Notre +Dame_, the whole story of Esmeralda’s passion for the worthless archer is +unpleasant enough; but when she betrays herself in her last hiding-place, +herself and her wretched mother, by calling out to this sordid hero who +has long since forgotten her—well, that is just one of those things that +readers will not forgive; they do not like it, and they are quite right; +life is hard enough for poor mortals, without having it indefinitely +embittered for them by bad art. + + * * * * * + +We look in vain for any similar blemish in _Les Misérables_. Here, on +the other hand, there is perhaps the nearest approach to literary +restraint that Hugo has ever made: there is here certainly the ripest and +most easy development of his powers. It is the moral intention of this +great novel to awaken us a little, if it may be—for such awakenings are +unpleasant—to the great cost of this society that we enjoy and profit by, +to the labour and sweat of those who support the litter, civilisation, in +which we ourselves are so smoothly carried forward. People are all glad +to shut their eyes; and it gives them a very simple pleasure when they +can forget that our laws commit a million individual injustices, to be +once roughly just in the general; that the bread that we eat, and the +quiet of the family, and all that embellishes life and makes it worth +having, have to be purchased by death—by the deaths of animals, and the +deaths of men wearied out with labour, and the deaths of those criminals +called tyrants and revolutionaries, and the deaths of those +revolutionaries called criminals. It is to something of all this that +Victor Hugo wishes to open men’s eyes in _Les Misérables_; and this moral +lesson is worked out in masterly coincidence with the artistic effect. +The deadly weight of civilisation to those who are below presses sensibly +on our shoulders as we read. A sort of mocking indignation grows upon us +as we find Society rejecting, again and again, the services of the most +serviceable; setting Jean Valjean to pick oakum, casting Galileo into +prison, even crucifying Christ. There is a haunting and horrible sense +of insecurity about the book. The terror we thus feel is a terror for +the machinery of law, that we can hear tearing, in the dark, good and bad +between its formidable wheels with the iron stolidity of all machinery, +human or divine. This terror incarnates itself sometimes and leaps +horribly out upon us; as when the crouching mendicant looks up, and Jean +Valjean, in the light of the street lamp, recognises the face of the +detective; as when the lantern of the patrol flashes suddenly through the +darkness of the sewer; or as when the fugitive comes forth at last at +evening, by the quiet riverside, and finds the police there also, waiting +stolidly for vice and stolidly satisfied to take virtue instead. The +whole book is full of oppression, and full of prejudice, which is the +great cause of oppression. We have the prejudices of M. Gillenormand, +the prejudices of Marius, the prejudices in revolt that defend the +barricade, and the throned prejudices that carry it by storm. And then +we have the admirable but ill-written character of Javert, the man who +had made a religion of the police, and would not survive the moment when +he learned that there was another truth outside the truth of laws; a just +creation, over which the reader will do well to ponder. + +With so gloomy a design this great work is still full of life and light +and love. The portrait of the good Bishop is one of the most agreeable +things in modern literature. The whole scene at Montfermeil is full of +the charm that Hugo knows so well how to throw about children. Who can +forget the passage where Cosette, sent out at night to draw water, stands +in admiration before the illuminated booth, and the huckster behind “lui +faisait un peu l’effet d’être le Père éternel?” The pathos of the +forlorn sabot laid trustingly by the chimney in expectation of the Santa +Claus that was not, takes us fairly by the throat; there is nothing in +Shakespeare that touches the heart more nearly. The loves of Cosette and +Marius are very pure and pleasant, and we cannot refuse our affection to +Gavroche, although we may make a mental reservation of our profound +disbelief in his existence. Take it for all in all, there are few books +in the world that can be compared with it. There is as much calm and +serenity as Hugo has ever attained to; the melodramatic coarsenesses that +disfigured _Notre Dame_ are no longer present. There is certainly much +that is painfully improbable; and again, the story itself is a little too +well constructed; it produces on us the effect of a puzzle, and we grow +incredulous as we find that every character fits again and again into the +plot, and is, like the child’s cube, serviceable on six faces; things are +not so well arranged in life as all that comes to. Some of the +digressions, also, seem out of place, and do nothing but interrupt and +irritate. But when all is said, the book remains of masterly conception +and of masterly development, full of pathos, full of truth, full of a +high eloquence. + + * * * * * + +Superstition and social exigency having been thus dealt with in the first +two members of the series, it remained for _Les Travailleurs de la Mer_ +to show man hand to hand with the elements, the last form of external +force that is brought against him. And here once more the artistic +effect and the moral lesson are worked out together, and are, indeed, +one. Gilliat, alone upon the reef at his herculean task, offers a type +of human industry in the midst of the vague “diffusion of forces into the +illimitable,” and the visionary development of “wasted labour” in the +sea, and the winds, and the clouds. No character was ever thrown into +such strange relief as Gilliat. The great circle of sea-birds that come +wanderingly around him on the night of his arrival, strikes at once the +note of his pre-eminence and isolation. He fills the whole reef with his +indefatigable toil; this solitary spot in the ocean rings with the +clamour of his anvil; we see him as he comes and goes, thrown out sharply +against the clear background of the sea. And yet his isolation is not to +be compared with the isolation of Robinson Crusoe, for example; indeed, +no two books could be more instructive to set side by side than _Les +Travailleurs_ and this other of the old days before art had learnt to +occupy itself with what lies outside of human will. Crusoe was one sole +centre of interest in the midst of a nature utterly dead and utterly +unrealised by the artist; but this is not how we feel with Gilliat; we +feel that he is opposed by a “dark coalition of forces,” that an “immense +animosity” surrounds him; we are the witnesses of the terrible warfare +that he wages with “the silent inclemency of phenomena going their own +way, and the great general law, implacable and passive:” “a conspiracy of +the indifferency of things” is against him. There is not one interest on +the reef, but two. Just as we recognise Gilliat for the hero, we +recognise, as implied by this indifferency of things, this direction of +forces to some purpose outside our purposes, yet another character who +may almost take rank as the villain of the novel, and the two face up to +one another blow for blow, feint for feint, until, in the storm, they +fight it epically out, and Gilliat remains the victor;—a victor, however, +who has still to encounter the octopus. I need say nothing of the +gruesome, repulsive excellence of that famous scene; it will be enough to +remind the reader that Gilliat is in pursuit of a crab when he is himself +assaulted by the devil fish, and that this, in its way, is the last touch +to the inner significance of the book; here, indeed, is the true position +of man in the universe. + +But in _Les Travailleurs_, with all its strength, with all its eloquence, +with all the beauty and fitness of its main situations, we cannot conceal +from ourselves that there is a thread of something that will not bear +calm scrutiny. There is much that is disquieting about the storm, +admirably as it begins. I am very doubtful whether it would be possible +to keep the boat from foundering in such circumstances, by any amount of +breakwater and broken rock. I do not understand the way in which the +waves are spoken of, and prefer just to take it as a loose way of +speaking, and pass on. And lastly, how does it happen that the sea was +quite calm next day? Is this great hurricane a piece of scene-painting +after all? And when we have forgiven Gilliat’s prodigies of strength +(although, in soberness, he reminds us more of Porthos in the Vicomte de +Bragelonne than is quite desirable), what is to be said to his suicide, +and how are we to condemn in adequate terms that unprincipled avidity +after effect, which tells us that the sloop disappeared over the horizon, +and the head under the water, at one and the same moment? Monsieur Hugo +may say what he will, but we know better; we know very well that they did +not; a thing like that raises up a despairing spirit of opposition in a +man’s readers; they give him the lie fiercely, as they read. Lastly, we +have here already some beginning of that curious series of English +blunders, that makes us wonder if there are neither proof-sheets nor +judicious friends in the whole of France, and affects us sometimes with a +sickening uneasiness as to what may be our own exploits when we touch +upon foreign countries and foreign tongues. It is here that we shall +find the famous “first of the fourth,” and many English words that may be +comprehensible perhaps in Paris. It is here that we learn that “laird” +in Scotland is the same title as “lord” in England. Here, also, is an +account of a Highland soldier’s equipment, which we recommend to the +lovers of genuine fun. + + * * * * * + +In_ L’Homme qui Rit_, it was Hugo’s object to ‘denounce’ (as he would say +himself) the aristocratic principle as it was exhibited in England; and +this purpose, somewhat more unmitigatedly satiric than that of the two +last, must answer for much that is unpleasant in the book. The +repulsiveness of the scheme of the story, and the manner in which it is +bound up with impossibilities and absurdities, discourage the reader at +the outset, and it needs an effort to take it as seriously as it +deserves. And yet when we judge it deliberately, it will be seen that, +here again, the story is admirably adapted to the moral. The +constructive ingenuity exhibited throughout is almost morbid. Nothing +could be more happily imagined, as a _reductio ad absurdum_ of the +aristocratic principle, than the adventures of Gwynplaine, the itinerant +mountebank, snatched suddenly out of his little way of life, and +installed without preparation as one of the hereditary legislators of a +great country. It is with a very bitter irony that the paper, on which +all this depends, is left to float for years at the will of wind and +tide. What, again, can be finer in conception than that voice from the +people heard suddenly in the House of Lords, in solemn arraignment of the +pleasures and privileges of its splendid occupants? The horrible +laughter, stamped for ever “by order of the king” upon the face of this +strange spokesman of democracy, adds yet another feature of justice to +the scene; in all time, travesty has been the argument of oppression; +and, in all time, the oppressed might have made this answer: “If I am +vile, is it not your system that has made me so?” This ghastly laughter +gives occasion, moreover, for the one strain of tenderness running +through the web of this unpleasant story: the love of the blind girl Dea, +for the monster. It is a most benignant providence that thus +harmoniously brings together these two misfortunes; it is one of those +compensations, one of those afterthoughts of a relenting destiny, that +reconcile us from time to time to the evil that is in the world; the +atmosphere of the book is purified by the presence of this pathetic love; +it seems to be above the story somehow, and not of it, as the full moon +over the night of some foul and feverish city. + +There is here a quality in the narration more intimate and particular +than is general with Hugo; but it must be owned, on the other hand, that +the book is wordy, and even, now and then, a little wearisome. Ursus and +his wolf are pleasant enough companions; but the former is nearly as much +an abstract type as the latter. There is a beginning, also, of an abuse +of conventional conversation, such as may be quite pardonable in the +drama where needs must, but is without excuse in the romance. Lastly, I +suppose one must say a word or two about the weak points of this not +immaculate novel; and if so, it will be best to distinguish at once. The +large family of English blunders, to which we have alluded already in +speaking of _Les Travailleurs_, are of a sort that is really indifferent +in art. If Shakespeare makes his ships cast anchor by some seaport of +Bohemia, if Hugo imagines Tom-Tim-Jack to be a likely nickname for an +English sailor, or if either Shakespeare, or Hugo, or Scott, for that +matter, be guilty of “figments enough to confuse the march of a whole +history—anachronisms enough to overset all, chronology,” {27} the life of +their creations, the artistic truth and accuracy of their work, is not so +much as compromised. But when we come upon a passage like the sinking of +the “Ourque” in this romance, we can do nothing but cover our face with +our hands: the conscientious reader feels a sort of disgrace in the very +reading. For such artistic falsehoods, springing from what I have called +already an unprincipled avidity after effect, no amount of blame can be +exaggerated; and above all, when the criminal is such a man as Victor +Hugo. We cannot forgive in him what we might have passed over in a +third-rate sensation novelist. Little as he seems to know of the sea and +nautical affairs, he must have known very well that vessels do not go +down as he makes the “Ourque” go down; he must have known that such a +liberty with fact was against the laws of the game, and incompatible with +all appearance of sincerity in conception or workmanship. + + * * * * * + +In each of these books, one after another, there has been some departure +from the traditional canons of romance; but taking each separately, one +would have feared to make too much of these departures, or to found any +theory upon what was perhaps purely accidental. The appearance of +_Quatre Vingt Treize_ has put us out of the region of such doubt. Like a +doctor who has long been hesitating how to classify an epidemic malady, +we have come at last upon a case so well marked that our uncertainty is +at an end. It is a novel built upon “a sort of enigma,” which was at +that date laid before revolutionary France, and which is presented by +Hugo to Tellmarch, to Lantenac, to Gauvain, and very terribly to +Cimourdain, each of whom gives his own solution of the question, clement +or stern, according to the temper of his spirit. That enigma was this: +“Can a good action be a bad action? Does not he who spares the wolf kill +the sheep?” This question, as I say, meets with one answer after another +during the course of the book, and yet seems to remain undecided to the +end. And something in the same way, although one character, or one set +of characters, after another comes to the front and occupies our +attention for the moment, we never identify our interest with any of +these temporary heroes nor regret them after they are withdrawn. We soon +come to regard them somewhat as special cases of a general law; what we +really care for is something that they only imply and body forth to us. +We know how history continues through century after century; how this +king or that patriot disappears from its pages with his whole generation, +and yet we do not cease to read, nor do we even feel as if we had reached +any legitimate conclusion, because our interest is not in the men, but in +the country that they loved or hated, benefited or injured. And so it is +here: Gauvain and Cimourdain pass away, and we regard them no more than +the lost armies of which we find the cold statistics in military annals; +what we regard is what remains behind; it is the principle that put these +men where they were, that filled them for a while with heroic +inspiration, and has the power, now that they are fallen, to inspire +others with the same courage. The interest of the novel centres about +revolutionary France: just as the plot is an abstract judicial +difficulty, the hero is an abstract historical force. And this has been +done, not, as it would have been before, by the cold and cumbersome +machinery of allegory, but with bold, straightforward realism, dealing +only with the objective materials of art, and dealing with them so +masterfully that the palest abstractions of thought come before us, and +move our hopes and fears, as if they were the young men and maidens of +customary romance. + +The episode of the mother and children in _Quatre Vingt Treize_ is equal +to anything that Hugo has ever written. There is one chapter in the +second volume, for instance, called “_Sein guéri_, _cœur saignant_,” that +is full of the very stuff of true tragedy, and nothing could be more +delightful than the humours of the three children on the day before the +assault. The passage on La Vendée is really great, and the scenes in +Paris have much of the same broad merit. The book is full, as usual, of +pregnant and splendid sayings. But when thus much is conceded by way of +praise, we come to the other scale of the balance, and find this, also, +somewhat heavy. There is here a yet greater over-employment of +conventional dialogue than in _L’Homme qui Rit_; and much that should +have been said by the author himself, if it were to be said at all, he +has most unwarrantably put into the mouths of one or other of his +characters. We should like to know what becomes of the main body of the +troop in the wood of La Saudraie during the thirty pages or so in which +the foreguard lays aside all discipline, and stops to gossip over a woman +and some children. We have an unpleasant idea forced upon us at one +place, in spite of all the good-natured incredulity that we can summon up +to resist it. Is it possible that Monsieur Hugo thinks they ceased to +steer the corvette while the gun was loose? Of the chapter in which +Lantenac and Halmalho are alone together in the boat, the less said the +better; of course, if there were nothing else, they would have been +swamped thirty times over during the course of Lantenac’s harangue. +Again, after Lantenac has landed, we have scenes of almost inimitable +workmanship that suggest the epithet “statuesque” by their clear and +trenchant outline; but the tocsin scene will not do, and the tocsin +unfortunately pervades the whole passage, ringing continually in our ears +with a taunting accusation of falsehood. And then, when we come to the +place where Lantenac meets the royalists, under the idea that he is going +to meet the republicans, it seems as if there were a hitch in the stage +mechanism. I have tried it over in every way, and I cannot conceive any +disposition that would make the scene possible as narrated. + + * * * * * + +Such then, with their faults and their signal excellences, are the five +great novels. + +Romance is a language in which many persons learn to speak with a certain +appearance of fluency; but there are few who can ever bend it to any +practical need, few who can ever be said to express themselves in it. It +has become abundantly plain in the foregoing examination that Victor Hugo +occupies a high place among those few. He has always a perfect command +over his stories; and we see that they are constructed with a high regard +to some ulterior purpose, and that every situation is informed with moral +significance and grandeur. Of no other man can the same thing be said in +the same degree. His romances are not to be confused with “the novel +with a purpose” as familiar to the English reader: this is generally the +model of incompetence; and we see the moral clumsily forced into every +hole and corner of the story, or thrown externally over it like a carpet +over a railing. Now the moral significance, with Hugo, is of the essence +of the romance; it is the organising principle. If you could somehow +despoil _Les Misérables or Les Travailleurs_ of their distinctive lesson, +you would find that the story had lost its interest and the book was +dead. + +Having thus learned to subordinate his story to an idea, to make his art +speak, he went on to teach it to say things heretofore unaccustomed. If +you look back at the five books of which we have now so hastily spoken, +you will be astonished at the freedom with which the original purposes of +story-telling have been laid aside and passed by. Where are now the two +lovers who descended the main watershed of all the Waverley novels, and +all the novels that have tried to follow in their wake? Sometimes they +are almost lost sight of before the solemn isolation of a man against the +sea and sky, as in _Les Travailleurs_; sometimes, as in _Les Misérables_, +they merely figure for awhile, as a beautiful episode in the epic of +oppression; sometimes they are entirely absent, as in _Quatre Vingt +Treize_. There is no hero in _Notre Dame_: in _Les Misérables_ it is an +old man: in _L’Homme qui Rit_ it is a monster: in _Quatre Vingt Treize_ +it is the Revolution. Those elements that only began to show themselves +timidly, as adjuncts, in the novels of Walter Scott, have usurped ever +more and more of the canvas; until we find the whole interest of one of +Hugo’s romances centring around matter that Fielding would have banished +from his altogether, as being out of the field of fiction. So we have +elemental forces occupying nearly as large a place, playing (so to speak) +nearly as important a _rôle_, as the man, Gilliat, who opposes and +overcomes them. So we find the fortunes of a nation put upon the stage +with as much vividness as ever before the fortunes of a village maiden or +a lost heir; and the forces that oppose and corrupt a principle holding +the attention quite as strongly as the wicked barons or dishonest +attorneys of the past. Hence those individual interests that were +supreme in Fielding, and even in Scott, stood out over everything else +and formed as it were the spine of the story, figure here only as one set +of interests among many sets, one force among many forces, one thing to +be treated out of a whole world of things equally vivid and important. +So that, for Hugo, man is no longer an isolated spirit without antecedent +or relation here below, but a being involved in the action and reaction +of natural forces, himself a centre of such action and reaction or an +unit in a great multitude, chased hither and thither by epidemic terrors +and aspirations, and, in all seriousness, blown about by every wind of +doctrine. This is a long way that we have travelled: between such work +and the work of Fielding is there not, indeed, a great gulph in thought +and sentiment? + +Art, thus conceived, realises for men a larger portion of life, and that +portion one that it is more difficult for them to realise unaided; and, +besides helping them to feel more intensely those restricted personal +interests which are patent to all, it awakes in them some consciousness +of those more general relations that are so strangely invisible to the +average man in ordinary moods. It helps to keep man in his place in +nature, and, above all, it helps him to understand more intelligently the +responsibilities of his place in society. And in all this generalisation +of interest, we never miss those small humanities that are at the +opposite pole of excellence in art; and while we admire the intellect +that could see life thus largely, we are touched with another sentiment +for the tender heart that slipped the piece of gold into Cosette’s sabot, +that was virginally troubled at the fluttering of her dress in the spring +wind, or put the blind girl beside the deformity of the laughing man. +This, then, is the last praise that we can award to these romances. The +author has shown a power of just subordination hitherto unequalled; and +as, in reaching forward to one class of effects, he has not been +forgetful or careless of the other, his work is more nearly complete +work, and his art, with all its imperfections, deals more comprehensively +with the materials of life than that of any of his otherwise more sure +and masterly predecessors. + +These five books would have made a very great fame for any writer, and +yet they are but one façade of the monument that Victor Hugo has erected +to his genius. Everywhere we find somewhat the same greatness, somewhat +the same infirmities. In his poems and plays there are the same +unaccountable protervities that have already astonished us in the +romances. There, too, is the same feverish strength, welding the fiery +iron of his idea under forge-hammer repetitions—an emphasis that is +somehow akin to weaknesses—strength that is a little epileptic. He +stands so far above all his contemporaries, and so incomparably excels +them in richness, breadth, variety, and moral earnestness, that we almost +feel as if he had a sort of right to fall oftener and more heavily than +others; but this does not reconcile us to seeing him profit by the +privilege so freely. We like to have, in our great men, something that +is above question; we like to place an implicit faith in them, and see +them always on the platform of their greatness; and this, unhappily, +cannot be with Hugo. As Heine said long ago, his is a genius somewhat +deformed; but, deformed as it is, we accept it gladly; we shall have the +wisdom to see where his foot slips, but we shall have the justice also to +recognise in him one of the greatest artists of our generation, and, in +many ways, one of the greatest artists of time. If we look back, yet +once, upon these five romances, we see blemishes such as we can lay to +the charge of no other man in the number of the famous; but to what other +man can we attribute such sweeping innovations, such a new and +significant presentment of the life of man, such an amount, if we merely +think of the amount, of equally consummate performance? + + + + +SOME ASPECTS OF ROBERT BURNS + + +TO write with authority about another man, we must have fellow-feeling +and some common ground of experience with our subject. We may praise or +blame according as we find him related to us by the best or worst in +ourselves; but it is only in virtue of some relationship that we can be +his judges, even to condemn. Feelings which we share and understand +enter for us into the tissue of the man’s character; those to which we +are strangers in our own experience we are inclined to regard as blots, +exceptions, inconsistencies, and excursions of the diabolic; we conceive +them with repugnance, explain them with difficulty, and raise our hands +to heaven in wonder when we find them in conjunction with talents that we +respect or virtues that we admire. David, king of Israel, would pass a +sounder judgment on a man than either Nathaniel or David Hume. Now, +Principal Shairp’s recent volume, although I believe no one will read it +without respect and interest, has this one capital defect—that there is +imperfect sympathy between the author and the subject, between the critic +and the personality under criticism. Hence an inorganic, if not an +incoherent, presentation of both the poems and the man. Of _Holy +Willie’s Prayer_, Principal Shairp remarks that “those who have loved +most what was best in Burns’s poetry must have regretted that it was ever +written.” To the _Jolly Beggars_, so far as my memory serves me, he +refers but once; and then only to remark on the “strange, not to say +painful,” circumstance that the same hand which wrote the _Cotter’s +Saturday Night_ should have stooped to write the _Jolly Beggars_. The +_Saturday Night_ may or may not be an admirable poem; but its +significance is trebled, and the power and range of the poet first +appears, when it is set beside the _Jolly Beggars_. To take a man’s work +piecemeal, except with the design of elegant extracts, is the way to +avoid, and not to perform, the critic’s duty. The same defect is +displayed in the treatment of Burns as a man, which is broken, +apologetical, and confused. The man here presented to us is not that +Burns, _teres atque rotundus_—a burly figure in literature, as, from our +present vantage of time, we have begun to see him. This, on the other +hand, is Burns as he may have appeared to a contemporary clergyman, whom +we shall conceive to have been a kind and indulgent but orderly and +orthodox person, anxious to be pleased, but too often hurt and +disappointed by the behaviour of his red-hot _protégé_, and solacing +himself with the explanation that the poet was “the most inconsistent of +men.” If you are so sensibly pained by the misconduct of your subject, +and so paternally delighted with his virtues, you will always be an +excellent gentleman, but a somewhat questionable biographer. Indeed, we +can only be sorry and surprised that Principal Shairp should have chosen +a theme so uncongenial. When we find a man writing on Burns, who likes +neither _Holy Willie_, nor the _Beggars_, nor the _Ordination_, nothing +is adequate to the situation but the old cry of Géronte: “Que diable +allait-il faire dans cette galère?” And every merit we find in the book, +which is sober and candid in a degree unusual with biographies of Burns, +only leads us to regret more heartily that good work should be so greatly +thrown away. + +It is far from my intention to tell over again a story that has been so +often told; but there are certainly some points in the character of Burns +that will bear to be brought out, and some chapters in his life that +demand a brief rehearsal. The unity of the man’s nature, for all its +richness, has fallen somewhat out of sight in the pressure of new +information and the apologetical ceremony of biographers. Mr. Carlyle +made an inimitable bust of the poet’s head of gold; may I not be forgiven +if my business should have more to do with the feet, which were of clay? + + + +YOUTH. + + +Any view of Burns would be misleading which passed over in silence the +influences of his home and his father. That father, William Burnes, +after having been for many years a gardener, took a farm, married, and, +like an emigrant in a new country, built himself a house with his own +hands. Poverty of the most distressing sort, with sometimes the near +prospect of a gaol, embittered the remainder of his life. Chill, +backward, and austere with strangers, grave and imperious in his family, +he was yet a man of very unusual parts and of an affectionate nature. On +his way through life he had remarked much upon other men, with more +result in theory than practice; and he had reflected upon many subjects +as he delved the garden. His great delight was in solid conversation; he +would leave his work to talk with the schoolmaster Murdoch; and Robert, +when he came home late at night, not only turned aside rebuke but kept +his father two hours beside the fire by the charm of his merry and +vigorous talk. Nothing is more characteristic of the class in general, +and William Burnes in particular, than the pains he took to get proper +schooling for his boys, and, when that was no longer possible, the sense +and resolution with which he set himself to supply the deficiency by his +own influence. For many years he was their chief companion; he spoke +with them seriously on all subjects as if they had been grown men; at +night, when work was over, he taught them arithmetic; he borrowed books +for them on history, science, and theology; and he felt it his duty to +supplement this last—the trait is laughably Scottish—by a dialogue of his +own composition, where his own private shade of orthodoxy was exactly +represented. He would go to his daughter as she stayed afield herding +cattle, to teach her the names of grasses and wild flowers, or to sit by +her side when it thundered. Distance to strangers, deep family +tenderness, love of knowledge, a narrow, precise, and formal reading of +theology—everything we learn of him hangs well together, and builds up a +popular Scotch type. If I mention the name of Andrew Fairservice, it is +only as I might couple for an instant Dugald Dalgetty with old Marshal +Loudon, to help out the reader’s comprehension by a popular but unworthy +instance of a class. Such was the influence of this good and wise man +that his household became a school to itself, and neighbours who came +into the farm at meal-time would find the whole family, father, brothers, +and sisters, helping themselves with one hand, and holding a book in the +other. We are surprised at the prose style of Robert; that of Gilbert +need surprise us no less; even William writes a remarkable letter for a +young man of such slender opportunities. One anecdote marks the taste of +the family. Murdoch brought _Titus Andronicus_, and, with such dominie +elocution as we may suppose, began to read it aloud before this rustic +audience; but when he had reached the passage where Tamora insults +Lavinia, with one voice and “in an agony of distress” they refused to +hear it to an end. In such a father and with such a home, Robert had +already the making of an excellent education; and what Murdoch added, +although it may not have been much in amount, was in character the very +essence of a literary training. Schools and colleges, for one great man +whom they complete, perhaps unmake a dozen; the strong spirit can do well +upon more scanty fare. + +Robert steps before us, almost from the first, in his complete +character—a proud, headstrong, impetuous lad, greedy of pleasure, greedy +of notice; in his own phrase “panting after distinction,” and in his +brother’s “cherishing a particular jealousy of people who were richer or +of more consequence than himself:” with all this, he was emphatically of +the artist nature. Already he made a conspicuous figure in Tarbolton +church, with the only tied hair in the parish, “and his plaid, which was +of a particular colour, wrapped in a particular manner round his +shoulders.” Ten years later, when a married man, the father of a family, +a farmer, and an officer of Excise, we shall find him out fishing in +masquerade, with fox-skin cap, belted great-coat, and great Highland +broadsword. He liked dressing up, in fact, for its own sake. This is +the spirit which leads to the extravagant array of Latin Quarter +students, and the proverbial velveteen of the English landscape-painter; +and, though the pleasure derived is in itself merely personal, it shows a +man who is, to say the least of it, not pained by general attention and +remark. His father wrote the family name _Burnes_; Robert early adopted +the orthography _Burness_ from his cousin in the Mearns; and in his +twenty-eighth year changed it once more to _Burns_. It is plain that the +last transformation was not made without some qualm; for in addressing +his cousin he adheres, in at least one more letter, to spelling number +two. And this, again, shows a man preoccupied about the manner of his +appearance even down to the name, and little willing to follow custom. +Again, he was proud, and justly proud, of his powers in conversation. To +no other man’s have we the same conclusive testimony from different +sources and from every rank of life. It is almost a commonplace that the +best of his works was what he said in talk. Robertson the historian +“scarcely ever met any man whose conversation displayed greater vigour;” +the Duchess of Gordon declared that he “carried her off her feet;” and, +when he came late to an inn, the servants would get out of bed to hear +him talk. But, in these early days at least, he was determined to shine +by any means. He made himself feared in the village for his tongue. He +would crush weaker men to their faces, or even perhaps—for the statement +of Sillar is not absolute—say cutting things of his acquaintances behind +their back. At the church door, between sermons, he would parade his +religious views amid hisses. These details stamp the man. He had no +genteel timidities in the conduct of his life. He loved to force his +personality upon the world. He would please himself, and shine. Had he +lived in the Paris of 1830, and joined his lot with the Romantics, we can +conceive him writing _Jehan_ for _Jean_, swaggering in Gautier’s red +waistcoat, and horrifying Bourgeois in a public café with paradox and +gasconnade. + +A leading trait throughout his whole career was his desire to be in love. +_Ne fait pas ce tour qui veut_. His affections were often enough +touched, but perhaps never engaged. He was all his life on a voyage of +discovery, but it does not appear conclusively that he ever touched the +happy isle. A man brings to love a deal of ready-made sentiment, and +even from childhood obscurely prognosticates the symptoms of this vital +malady. Burns was formed for love; he had passion, tenderness, and a +singular bent in the direction; he could foresee, with the intuition of +an artist, what love ought to be; and he could not conceive a worthy life +without it. But he had ill-fortune, and was besides so greedy after +every shadow of the true divinity, and so much the slave of a strong +temperament, that perhaps his nerve was relaxed and his heart had lost +the power of self-devotion before an opportunity occurred. The +circumstances of his youth doubtless counted for something in the result. +For the lads of Ayrshire, as soon as the day’s work was over and the +beasts were stabled, would take the road, it might be in a winter +tempest, and travel perhaps miles by moss and moorland to spend an hour +or two in courtship. Rule 10 of the Bachelors’ Club at Tarbolton +provides that “every man proper for a member of this Society must be a +professed lover of _one or more_ of the female sex.” The rich, as Burns +himself points out, may have a choice of pleasurable occupations, but +these lads had nothing but their “cannie hour at e’en.” It was upon love +and flirtation that this rustic society was built; gallantry was the +essence of life among the Ayrshire hills as well as in the Court of +Versailles; and the days were distinguished from each other by +love-letters, meetings, tiffs, reconciliations, and expansions to the +chosen confidant, as in a comedy of Marivaux. Here was a field for a man +of Burns’s indiscriminate personal ambition, where he might pursue his +voyage of discovery in quest of true love, and enjoy temporary triumphs +by the way. He was “constantly the victim of some fair enslaver”—at +least, when it was not the other way about; and there were often +underplots and secondary fair enslavers in the background. Many—or may +we not say most?—of these affairs were entirely artificial. One, he +tells us, he began out of “a vanity of showing his parts in courtship,” +for he piqued himself on his ability at a love-letter. But, however they +began, these flames of his were fanned into a passion ere the end; and he +stands unsurpassed in his power of self-deception, and positively without +a competitor in the art, to use his own words, of “battering himself into +a warm affection,”—a debilitating and futile exercise. Once he had +worked himself into the vein, “the agitations of his mind and body” were +an astonishment to all who knew him. Such a course as this, however +pleasant to a thirsty vanity, was lowering to his nature. He sank more +and more towards the professional Don Juan. With a leer of what the +French call fatuity, he bids the belles of Mauchline beware of his +seductions; and the same cheap self-satisfaction finds a yet uglier vent +when he plumes himself on the scandal at the birth of his first bastard. +We can well believe what we hear of his facility in striking up an +acquaintance with women: he would have conquering manners; he would bear +down upon his rustic game with the grace that comes of absolute +assurance—the Richelieu of Lochlea or Mossgiel. In yet another manner +did these quaint ways of courtship help him into fame. If he were great +as principal, he was unrivalled as confidant. He could enter into a +passion; he could counsel wary moves, being, in his own phrase, so old a +hawk; nay, he could turn a letter for some unlucky swain, or even string +a few lines of verse that should clinch the business and fetch the +hesitating fair one to the ground. Nor, perhaps, was it only his +“curiosity, zeal, and intrepid dexterity” that recommended him for a +second in such affairs; it must have been a distinction to have the +assistance and advice of _Rab the Ranter_; and one who was in no way +formidable by himself might grow dangerous and attractive through the +fame of his associate. + +I think we can conceive him, in these early years, in that rough moorland +country, poor among the poor with his seven pounds a year, looked upon +with doubt by respectable elders, but for all that the best talker, the +best letter-writer, the most famous lover and confidant, the laureate +poet, and the only man who wore his hair tied in the parish. He says he +had then as high a notion of himself as ever after; and I can well +believe it. Among the youth he walked _facile princeps_, an apparent +god; and even if, from time to time, the Reverend Mr. Auld should swoop +upon him with the thunders of the Church, and, in company with seven +others, Rab the Ranter must figure some fine Sunday on the stool of +repentance, would there not be a sort of glory, an infernal apotheosis, +in so conspicuous a shame? Was not Richelieu in disgrace more idolised +than ever by the dames of Paris? and when was the highwayman most +acclaimed but on his way to Tyburn? Or, to take a simile from nearer +home, and still more exactly to the point, what could even corporal +punishment avail, administered by a cold, abstract, unearthly +school-master, against the influence and fame of the school’s hero? + +And now we come to the culminating point of Burns’s early period. He +began to be received into the unknown upper world. His fame soon spread +from among his fellow-rebels on the benches, and began to reach the +ushers and monitors of this great Ayrshire academy. This arose in part +from his lax views about religion; for at this time that old war of the +creeds and confessors, which is always grumbling from end to end of our +poor Scotland, brisked up in these parts into a hot and virulent +skirmish; and Burns found himself identified with the opposition party,—a +clique of roaring lawyers and half-heretical divines, with wit enough to +appreciate the value of the poet’s help, and not sufficient taste to +moderate his grossness and personality. We may judge of their surprise +when _Holy Willie_ was put into their hand; like the amorous lads of +Tarbolton, they recognised in him the best of seconds. His satires began +to go the round in manuscript; Mr. Aiken, one of the lawyers, “read him +into fame;” he himself was soon welcome in many houses of a better sort, +where his admirable talk, and his manners, which he had direct from his +Maker, except for a brush he gave them at a country dancing school, +completed what his poems had begun. We have a sight of him at his first +visit to Adamhill, in his ploughman’s shoes, coasting around the carpet +as though that were sacred ground. But he soon grew used to carpets and +their owners; and he was still the superior of all whom he encountered, +and ruled the roost in conversation. Such was the impression made, that +a young clergyman, himself a man of ability, trembled and became confused +when he saw Robert enter the church in which he was to preach. It is not +surprising that the poet determined to publish: he had now stood the test +of some publicity, and under this hopeful impulse he composed in six +winter months the bulk of his more important poems. Here was a young man +who, from a very humble place, was mounting rapidly; from the cynosure of +a parish, he had become the talk of a county; once the bard of rural +courtships, he was now about to appear as a bound and printed poet in the +world’s bookshops. + +A few more intimate strokes are necessary to complete the sketch. This +strong young plough-man, who feared no competitor with the flail, +suffered like a fine lady from sleeplessness and vapours; he would fall +into the blackest melancholies, and be filled with remorse for the past +and terror for the future. He was still not perhaps devoted to religion, +but haunted by it; and at a touch of sickness prostrated himself before +God in what I can only call unmanly penitence. As he had aspirations +beyond his place in the world, so he had tastes, thoughts, and weaknesses +to match. He loved to walk under a wood to the sound of a winter +tempest; he had a singular tenderness for animals; he carried a book with +him in his pocket when he went abroad, and wore out in this service two +copies of the _Man of Feeling_. With young people in the field at work +he was very long-suffering; and when his brother Gilbert spoke sharply to +them—“O man, ye are no for young folk,” he would say, and give the +defaulter a helping hand and a smile. In the hearts of the men whom he +met, he read as in a book; and, what is yet more rare, his knowledge of +himself equalled his knowledge of others. There are no truer things said +of Burns than what is to be found in his own letters. Country Don Juan +as he was, he had none of that blind vanity which values itself on what +it is not; he knew his own strength and weakness to a hair: he took +himself boldly for what he was, and, except in moments of hypochondria, +declared himself content. + + + +THE LOVE STORIES. + + +On the night of Mauchline races, 1785, the young men and women of the +place joined in a penny ball, according to their custom. In the same set +danced Jean Armour, the master-mason’s daughter, and our dark-eyed Don +Juan. His dog (not the immortal Luath, but a successor unknown to fame, +_caret quia vate sacro_), apparently sensible of some neglect, followed +his master to and fro, to the confusion of the dancers. Some mirthful +comments followed; and Jean heard the poet say to his partner—or, as I +should imagine, laughingly launch the remark to the company at large—that +“he wished he could get any of the lasses to like him as well as his +dog.” Some time after, as the girl was bleaching clothes on Mauchline +green, Robert chanced to go by, still accompanied by his dog; and the +dog, “scouring in long excursion,” scampered with four black paws across +the linen. This brought the two into conversation; when Jean, with a +somewhat hoydenish advance, inquired if “he had yet got any of the lasses +to like him as well as his dog?” + +It is one of the misfortunes of the professional Don Juan that his honour +forbids him to refuse battle; he is in life like the Roman soldier upon +duty, or like the sworn physician who must attend on all diseases. Burns +accepted the provocation; hungry hope reawakened in his heart; here was a +girl—pretty, simple at least, if not honestly stupid, and plainly not +averse to his attentions: it seemed to him once more as if love might +here be waiting him. Had he but known the truth! for this facile and +empty-headed girl had nothing more in view than a flirtation; and her +heart, from the first and on to the end of her story, was engaged by +another man. Burns once more commenced the celebrated process of +“battering himself into a warm affection;” and the proofs of his success +are to be found in many verses of the period. Nor did he succeed with +himself only; Jean, with her heart still elsewhere, succumbed to his +fascination, and early in the next year the natural consequence became +manifest. It was a heavy stroke for this unfortunate couple. They had +trifled with life, and were now rudely reminded of life’s serious issues. +Jean awoke to the ruin of her hopes; the best she had now to expect was +marriage with a man who was a stranger to her dearest thoughts; she might +now be glad if she could get what she would never have chosen. As for +Burns, at the stroke of the calamity he recognised that his voyage of +discovery had led him into a wrong hemisphere—that he was not, and never +had been, really in love with Jean. Hear him in the pressure of the +hour. “Against two things,” he writes, “I am as fixed as fate—staying at +home, and owning her conjugally. The first, by heaven, I will not +do!—the last, by hell, I will never do!” And then he adds, perhaps +already in a more relenting temper: “If you see Jean, tell her I will +meet her, so God help me in my hour of need.” They met accordingly; and +Burns, touched with her misery, came down from these heights of +independence, and gave her a written acknowledgment of marriage. It is +the punishment of Don Juanism to create continually false +positions—relations in life which are wrong in themselves, and which it +is equally wrong to break or to perpetuate. This was such a case. +Worldly Wiseman would have laughed and gone his way; let us be glad that +Burns was better counselled by his heart. When we discover that we can +be no longer true, the next best is to be kind. I daresay he came away +from that interview not very content, but with a glorious conscience; and +as he went homeward, he would sing his favourite, “How are Thy servants +blest, O Lord!” Jean, on the other hand, armed with her “lines,” +confided her position to the master-mason, her father, and his wife. +Burns and his brother were then in a fair way to ruin themselves in their +farm; the poet was an execrable match for any well-to-do country lass; +and perhaps old Armour had an inkling of a previous attachment on his +daughter’s part. At least, he was not so much incensed by her slip from +virtue as by the marriage which had been designed to cover it. Of this +he would not hear a word. Jean, who had besought the acknowledgment only +to appease her parents, and not at all from any violent inclination to +the poet, readily gave up the paper for destruction; and all parties +imagined, although wrongly, that the marriage was thus dissolved. To a +proud man like Burns here was a crushing blow. The concession which had +been wrung from his pity was now publicly thrown back in his teeth. The +Armour family preferred disgrace to his connection. Since the promise, +besides, he had doubtless been busy “battering himself” back again into +his affection for the girl; and the blow would not only take him in his +vanity, but wound him at the heart. + +He relieved himself in verse; but for such a smarting affront manuscript +poetry was insufficient to console him. He must find a more powerful +remedy in good flesh and blood, and after this discomfiture, set forth +again at once upon his voyage of discovery in quest of love. It is +perhaps one of the most touching things in human nature, as it is a +commonplace of psychology, that when a man has just lost hope or +confidence in one love, he is then most eager to find and lean upon +another. The universe could not be yet exhausted; there must be hope and +love waiting for him somewhere; and so, with his head down, this poor, +insulted poet ran once more upon his fate. There was an innocent and +gentle Highland nursery-maid at service in a neighbouring family; and he +had soon battered himself and her into a warm affection and a secret +engagement. Jean’s marriage lines had not been destroyed till March 13, +1786; yet all was settled between Burns and Mary Campbell by Sunday, May +14, when they met for the last time, and said farewell with rustic +solemnities upon the banks of Ayr. They each wet their hands in a +stream, and, standing one on either bank, held a Bible between them as +they vowed eternal faith. Then they exchanged Bibles, on one of which +Burns, for greater security, had inscribed texts as to the binding nature +of an oath; and surely, if ceremony can do aught to fix the wandering +affections, here were two people united for life. Mary came of a +superstitious family, so that she perhaps insisted on these rites; but +they must have been eminently to the taste of Burns at this period; for +nothing would seem superfluous, and no oath great enough, to stay his +tottering constancy. + +Events of consequence now happened thickly in the poet’s life. His book +was announced; the Armours sought to summon him at law for the aliment of +the child; he lay here and there in hiding to correct the sheets; he was +under an engagement for Jamaica, where Mary was to join him as his wife; +now, he had “orders within three weeks at latest to repair aboard the +_Nancy_, Captain Smith;” now his chest was already on the road to +Greenock; and now, in the wild autumn weather on the moorland, he +measures verses of farewell:— + + “The bursting tears my heart declare; + Farewell the bonny banks of Ayr!” + +But the great master dramatist had secretly another intention for the +piece; by the most violent and complicated solution, in which death and +birth and sudden fame all play a part as interposing deities, the +act-drop fell upon a scene of transformation. Jean was brought to bed of +twins, and, by an amicable arrangement, the Burnses took the boy to bring +up by hand, while the girl remained with her mother. The success of the +book was immediate and emphatic; it put £20 at once into the author’s +purse; and he was encouraged upon all hands to go to Edinburgh and push +his success in a second and larger edition. Third and last in these +series of interpositions, a letter came one day to Mossgiel Farm for +Robert. He went to the window to read it; a sudden change came over his +face, and he left the room without a word. Years afterwards, when the +story began to leak out, his family understood that he had then learned +the death of Highland Mary. Except in a few poems and a few dry +indications purposely misleading as to date, Burns himself made no +reference to this passage of his life; it was an adventure of which, for +I think sufficient reasons, he desired to bury the details. Of one thing +we may be glad: in after years he visited the poor girl’s mother, and +left her with the impression that he was “a real warm-hearted chield.” + +Perhaps a month after he received this intelligence, he set out for +Edinburgh on a pony he had borrowed from a friend. The town that winter +was “agog with the ploughman poet.” Robertson, Dugald Stewart, Blair, +“Duchess Gordon and all the gay world,” were of his acquaintance. Such a +revolution is not to be found in literary history. He was now, it must +be remembered, twenty-seven years of age; he had fought since his early +boyhood an obstinate battle against poor soil, bad seed, and inclement +seasons, wading deep in Ayrshire mosses, guiding the plough in the furrow +wielding “the thresher’s weary flingin’-tree;” and his education, his +diet, and his pleasures, had been those of a Scotch countryman. Now he +stepped forth suddenly among the polite and learned. We can see him as +he then was, in his boots and buckskins, his blue coat and waistcoat +striped with buff and blue, like a farmer in his Sunday best; the heavy +ploughman’s figure firmly planted on its burly legs; his face full of +sense and shrewdness, and with a somewhat melancholy air of thought, and +his large dark eye “literally glowing” as he spoke. “I never saw such +another eye in a human head,” says Walter Scott, “though I have seen the +most distinguished men of my time.” With men, whether they were lords or +omnipotent critics, his manner was plain, dignified, and free from +bashfulness or affectation. If he made a slip, he had the social courage +to pass on and refrain from explanation. He was not embarrassed in this +society, because he read and judged the men; he could spy snobbery in a +titled lord; and, as for the critics, he dismissed their system in an +epigram. “These gentlemen,” said he, “remind me of some spinsters in my +country who spin their thread so fine that it is neither fit for weft nor +woof.” Ladies, on the other hand, surprised him; he was scarce commander +of himself in their society; he was disqualified by his acquired nature +as a Don Juan; and he, who had been so much at his ease with country +lasses, treated the town dames to an extreme of deference. One lady, who +met him at a ball, gave Chambers a speaking sketch of his demeanour. +“His manner was not prepossessing—scarcely, she thinks, manly or natural. +It seemed as if he affected a rusticity or _landertness_, so that when he +said the music was ‘bonnie, bonnie,’ it was like the expression of a +child.” These would be company manners; and doubtless on a slight degree +of intimacy the affectation would grow less. And his talk to women had +always “a turn either to the pathetic or humorous, which engaged the +attention particularly.” + +The Edinburgh magnates (to conclude this episode at once) behaved well to +Burns from first to last. Were heaven-born genius to revisit us in +similar guise, I am not venturing too far when I say that he need expect +neither so warm a welcome nor such solid help. Although Burns was only a +peasant, and one of no very elegant reputation as to morals, he was made +welcome to their homes. They gave him a great deal of good advice, +helped him to some five hundred pounds of ready money, and got him, as +soon as he asked it, a place in the Excise. Burns, on his part, bore the +elevation with perfect dignity; and with perfect dignity returned, when +the time had come, into a country privacy of life. His powerful sense +never deserted him, and from the first he recognised that his Edinburgh +popularity was but an ovation and the affair of a day. He wrote a few +letters in a high-flown, bombastic vein of gratitude; but in practice he +suffered no man to intrude upon his self-respect. On the other hand, he +never turned his back, even for a moment, on his old associates; and he +was always ready to sacrifice an acquaintance to a friend, although the +acquaintance were a duke. He would be a bold man who should promise +similar conduct in equally exacting circumstances. It was, in short, an +admirable appearance on the stage of life—socially successful, intimately +self-respecting, and like a gentleman from first to last. + +In the present study, this must only be taken by the way, while we return +to Burns’s love affairs. Even on the road to Edinburgh he had seized +upon the opportunity of a flirtation, and had carried the “battering” so +far that when next he moved from town, it was to steal two days with this +anonymous fair one. The exact importance to Burns of this affair may be +gathered from the song in which he commemorated its occurrence. “I love +the dear lassie,” he sings, “because she loves me;” or, in the tongue of +prose: “Finding an opportunity, I did not hesitate to profit by it, and +even now, if it returned, I should not hesitate to profit by it again.” +A love thus founded has no interest for mortal man. Meantime, early in +the winter, and only once, we find him regretting Jean in his +correspondence. “Because”—such is his reason—“because he does not think +he will ever meet so delicious an armful again;” and then, after a brief +excursion into verse, he goes straight on to describe a new episode in +the voyage of discovery with the daughter of a Lothian farmer for a +heroine. I must ask the reader to follow all these references to his +future wife; they are essential to the comprehension of Burns’s character +and fate. In June, we find him back at Mauchline, a famous man. There, +the Armour family greeted him with a “mean, servile compliance,” which +increased his former disgust. Jean was not less compliant; a second time +the poor girl submitted to the fascination of the man whom she did not +love, and whom she had so cruelly insulted little more than a year ago; +and, though Burns took advantage of her weakness, it was in the ugliest +and most cynical spirit, and with a heart absolutely indifferent. Judge +of this by a letter written some twenty days after his return—a letter to +my mind among the most degrading in the whole collection—a letter which +seems to have been inspired by a boastful, libertine bagman. “I am +afraid,” it goes, “I have almost ruined one source, the principal one, +indeed, of my former happiness—the eternal propensity I always had to +fall in love. My heart no more glows with feverish rapture; I have no +paradisiacal evening interviews.” Even the process of “battering” has +failed him, you perceive. Still he had some one in his eye—a lady, if +you please, with a fine figure and elegant manners, and who had “seen the +politest quarters in Europe.” “I frequently visited her,” he writes, +“and after passing regularly the intermediate degrees between the distant +formal bow and the familiar grasp round the waist, I ventured, in my +careless way, to talk of friendship in rather ambiguous terms; and after +her return to —, I wrote her in the same terms. Miss, construing my +remarks further than even I intended, flew off in a tangent of female +dignity and reserve, like a mounting lark in an April morning; and wrote +me an answer which measured out very completely what an immense way I had +to travel before I could reach the climate of her favours. But I am an +old hawk at the sport, and wrote her such a cool, deliberate, prudent +reply, as brought my bird from her aerial towerings, pop, down to my +foot, like Corporal Trim’s hat.” I avow a carnal longing, after this +transcription, to buffet the Old Hawk about the ears. There is little +question that to this lady he must have repeated his addresses, and that +he was by her (Miss Chalmers) eventually, though not at all unkindly, +rejected. One more detail to characterise the period. Six months after +the date of this letter, Burns, back in Edinburgh, is served with a writ +_in meditatione fugæ_, on behalf of some Edinburgh fair one, probably of +humble rank, who declared an intention of adding to his family. + +About the beginning of December (1787), a new period opens in the story +of the poet’s random affections. He met at a tea party one Mrs. Agnes +M’Lehose, a married woman of about his own age, who, with her two +children, had been deserted by an unworthy husband. She had wit, could +use her pen, and had read _Werther_ with attention. Sociable, and even +somewhat frisky, there was a good, sound, human kernel in the woman; a +warmth of love, strong dogmatic religious feeling, and a considerable, +but not authoritative, sense of the proprieties. Of what biographers +refer to daintily as “her somewhat voluptuous style of beauty,” judging +from the silhouette in Mr. Scott Douglas’s invaluable edition, the reader +will be fastidious if he does not approve. Take her for all in all, I +believe she was the best woman Burns encountered. The pair took a fancy +for each other on the spot; Mrs. M’Lehose, in her turn, invited him to +tea; but the poet, in his character of the Old Hawk, preferred a +_tête-à-tête_, excused himself at the last moment, and offered a visit +instead. An accident confined him to his room for nearly a month, and +this led to the famous Clarinda and Sylvander correspondence. It was +begun in simple sport; they are already at their fifth or sixth exchange, +when Clarinda writes: “It is really curious so much _fun_ passing between +two persons who saw each other only _once_;” but it is hardly safe for a +man and woman in the flower of their years to write almost daily, and +sometimes in terms too ambiguous, sometimes in terms too plain, and +generally in terms too warm, for mere acquaintance. The exercise +partakes a little of the nature of battering, and danger may be +apprehended when next they meet. It is difficult to give any account of +this remarkable correspondence; it is too far away from us, and perhaps, +not yet far enough, in point of time and manner; the imagination is +baffled by these stilted literary utterances, warming, in bravura +passages, into downright truculent nonsense. Clarinda has one famous +sentence in which she bids Sylvander connect the thought of his mistress +with the changing phases of the year; it was enthusiastically admired by +the swain, but on the modern mind produces mild amazement and alarm. +“Oh, Clarinda,” writes Burns, “shall we not meet in a state—some yet +unknown state—of being, where the lavish hand of Plenty shall minister to +the highest wish of Benevolence, and where the chill north wind of +Prudence shall never blow over the flowery field of Enjoyment?” The +design may be that of an Old Hawk, but the style is more suggestive of a +Bird of Paradise. It is sometimes hard to fancy they are not gravely +making fun of each other as they write. Religion, poetry, love, and +charming sensibility, are the current topics. “I am delighted, charming +Clarinda, with your honest enthusiasm for religion,” writes Burns; and +the pair entertained a fiction that this was their “favourite subject.” +“This is Sunday,” writes the lady, “and not a word on our favourite +subject. O fy ‘divine Clarinda!’” I suspect, although quite +unconsciously on the part of the lady, who was bent on his redemption, +they but used the favourite subject as a stalking-horse. In the +meantime, the sportive acquaintance was ripening steadily into a genuine +passion. Visits took place, and then became frequent. Clarinda’s +friends were hurt and suspicious; her clergyman interfered; she herself +had smart attacks of conscience, but her heart had gone from her control; +it was altogether his, and she “counted all things but loss—heaven +excepted—that she might win and keep him.” Burns himself was transported +while in her neighbourhood, but his transports somewhat rapidly declined +during an absence. I am tempted to imagine that, womanlike, he took on +the colour of his mistress’s feeling; that he could not but heat himself +at the fire of her unaffected passion; but that, like one who should +leave the hearth upon a winter’s night, his temperature soon fell when he +was out of sight, and in a word, though he could share the symptoms, that +he had never shared the disease. At the same time, amid the fustian of +the letters there are forcible and true expressions, and the love verses +that he wrote upon Clarinda are among the most moving in the language. + +We are approaching the solution. In mid-winter, Jean, once more in the +family way, was turned out of doors by her family; and Burns had her +received and cared for in the house of a friend. For he remained to the +last imperfect in his character of Don Juan, and lacked the sinister +courage to desert his victim. About the middle of February (1788), he +had to tear himself from his Clarinda and make a journey into the +south-west on business. Clarinda gave him two shirts for his little son. +They were daily to meet in prayer at an appointed hour. Burns, too late +for the post at Glasgow, sent her a letter by parcel that she might not +have to wait. Clarinda on her part writes, this time with a beautiful +simplicity: “I think the streets look deserted-like since Monday; and +there’s a certain insipidity in good kind folks I once enjoyed not a +little. Miss Wardrobe supped here on Monday. She once named you, which +kept me from falling asleep. I drank your health in a glass of ale—as +the lasses do at Hallowe’en—‘in to mysel’.’” Arrived at Mauchline, Burns +installed Jean Armour in a lodging, and prevailed on Mrs. Armour to +promise her help and countenance in the approaching confinement. This +was kind at least; but hear his expressions: “I have taken her a room; I +have taken her to my arms; I have given her a mahogany bed; I have given +her a guinea. . . . I swore her privately and solemnly never to attempt +any claim on me as a husband, even though anybody should persuade her she +had such a claim—which she has not, neither during my life nor after my +death. She did all this like a good girl.” And then he took advantage +of the situation. To Clarinda he wrote: “I this morning called for a +certain woman. I am disgusted with her; I cannot endure her;” and he +accused her of “tasteless insipidity, vulgarity of soul, and mercenary +fawning.” This was already in March; by the thirteenth of that month he +was back in Edinburgh. On the 17th, he wrote to Clarinda: “Your hopes, +your fears, your cares, my love, are mine; so don’t mind them. I will +take you in my hand through the dreary wilds of this world, and scare +away the ravening bird or beast that would annoy you.” Again, on the +21st: “Will you open, with satisfaction and delight, a letter from a man +who loves you, who has loved you, and who will love you, to death, +through death, and for ever. . . . How rich am I to have such a treasure +as you! . . . ‘The Lord God knoweth,’ and, perhaps, ‘Israel he shall +know,’ my love and your merit. Adieu, Clarinda! I am going to remember +you in my prayers.” By the 7th of April, seventeen days later he had +already decided to make Jean Armour publicly his wife. + +A more astonishing stage-trick is not to be found. And yet his conduct +is seen, upon a nearer examination, to be grounded both in reason and in +kindness. He was now about to embark on a solid worldly career; he had +taken a farm; the affair with Clarinda, however gratifying to his heart, +was too contingent to offer any great consolation to a man like Burns, to +whom marriage must have seemed the very dawn of hope and self-respect. +This is to regard the question from its lowest aspect; but there is no +doubt that he entered on this new period of his life with a sincere +determination to do right. He had just helped his brother with a loan of +a hundred and eighty pounds; should he do nothing for the poor girl whom +he had ruined? It was true he could not do as he did without brutally +wounding Clarinda; that was the punishment of his bygone fault; he was, +as he truly says, “damned with a choice only of different species of +error and misconduct.” To be professional Don Juan, to accept the +provocation of any lively lass upon the village green, may thus lead a +man through a series of detestable words and actions, and land him at +last in an undesired and most unsuitable union for life. If he had been +strong enough to refrain or bad enough to persevere in evil; if he had +only not been Don Juan at all, or been Don Juan altogether, there had +been some possible road for him throughout this troublesome world; but a +man, alas! who is equally at the call of his worse and better instincts, +stands among changing events without foundation or resource. {71} + + + +DOWNWARD COURSE. + + +It may be questionable whether any marriage could have tamed Burns; but +it is at least certain that there was no hope for him in the marriage he +contracted. He did right, but then he had done wrong before; it was, as +I said, one of those relations in life which it seems equally wrong to +break or to perpetuate. He neither loved nor respected his wife. “God +knows,” he writes, “my choice was as random as blind man’s buff.” He +consoles himself by the thought that he has acted kindly to her; that she +“has the most sacred enthusiasm of attachment to him;” that she has a +good figure; that she has a “wood-note wild,” “her voice rising with ease +to B natural,” no less. The effect on the reader is one of unmingled +pity for both parties concerned. This was not the wife who (in his own +words) could “enter into his favourite studies or relish his favourite +authors;” this was not even a wife, after the affair of the marriage +lines, in whom a husband could joy to place his trust. Let her manage a +farm with sense, let her voice rise to B natural all day long, she would +still be a peasant to her lettered lord, and an object of pity rather +than of equal affection. She could now be faithful, she could now be +forgiving, she could now be generous even to a pathetic and touching +degree; but coming from one who was unloved, and who had scarce shown +herself worthy of the sentiment, these were all virtues thrown away, +which could neither change her husband’s heart nor affect the inherent +destiny of their relation. From the outset, it was a marriage that had +no root in nature; and we find him, ere long, lyrically regretting +Highland Mary, renewing correspondence with Clarinda in the warmest +language, on doubtful terms with Mrs. Riddel, and on terms unfortunately +beyond any question with Anne Park. + +Alas! this was not the only ill circumstance in his future. He had been +idle for some eighteen months, superintending his new edition, hanging on +to settle with the publisher, travelling in the Highlands with Willie +Nichol, or philandering with Mrs. M’Lehose; and in this period the +radical part of the man had suffered irremediable hurt. He had lost his +habits of industry, and formed the habit of pleasure. Apologetical +biographers assure us of the contrary; but from the first, he saw and +recognised the danger for himself; his mind, he writes, is “enervated to +an alarming degree” by idleness and dissipation; and again, “my mind has +been vitiated with idleness.” It never fairly recovered. To business he +could bring the required diligence and attention without difficulty; but +he was thenceforward incapable, except in rare instances, of that +superior effort of concentration which is required for serious literary +work. He may be said, indeed, to have worked no more, and only amused +himself with letters. The man who had written a volume of masterpieces +in six months, during the remainder of his life rarely found courage for +any more sustained effort than a song. And the nature of the songs is +itself characteristic of these idle later years; for they are often as +polished and elaborate as his earlier works were frank, and headlong, and +colloquial; and this sort of verbal elaboration in short flights is, for +a man of literary turn, simply the most agreeable of pastimes. The +change in manner coincides exactly with the Edinburgh visit. In 1786 he +had written the _Address to a Louse_, which may be taken as an extreme +instance of the first manner; and already, in 1787, we come upon the +rosebud pieces to Miss Cruikshank, which are extreme examples of the +second. The change was, therefore, the direct and very natural +consequence of his great change in life; but it is not the less typical +of his loss of moral courage that he should have given up all larger +ventures, nor the less melancholy that a man who first attacked +literature with a hand that seemed capable of moving mountains, should +have spent his later years in whittling cherry-stones. + +Meanwhile, the farm did not prosper; he had to join to it the salary of +an exciseman; at last he had to give it up, and rely altogether on the +latter resource. He was an active officer; and, though he sometimes +tempered severity with mercy, we have local testimony oddly representing +the public feeling of the period, that, while “in everything else he was +a perfect gentleman, when he met with anything seizable he was no better +than any other gauger.” + +There is but one manifestation of the man in these last years which need +delay us: and that was the sudden interest in politics which arose from +his sympathy with the great French Revolution. His only political +feeling had been hitherto a sentimental Jacobitism, not more or less +respectable than that of Scott, Aytoun, and the rest of what George +Borrow has nicknamed the “Charlie over the water” Scotchmen. It was a +sentiment almost entirely literary and picturesque in its origin, built +on ballads and the adventures of the Young Chevalier; and in Burns it is +the more excusable, because he lay out of the way of active politics in +his youth. With the great French Revolution, something living, +practical, and feasible appeared to him for the first time in this realm +of human action. The young ploughman who had desired so earnestly to +rise, now reached out his sympathies to a whole nation animated with the +same desire. Already in 1788 we find the old Jacobitism hand in hand +with the new popular doctrine, when, in a letter of indignation against +the zeal of a Whig clergyman, he writes: “I daresay the American Congress +in 1776 will be allowed to be as able and as enlightened as the English +Convention was in 1688; and that their posterity will celebrate the +centenary of their deliverance from us, as duly and sincerely as we do +ours from the oppressive measures of the wrong-headed house of Stuart.” +As time wore on, his sentiments grew more pronounced and even violent; +but there was a basis of sense and generous feeling to his hottest +excess. What he asked was a fair chance for the individual in life; an +open road to success and distinction for all classes of men. It was in +the same spirit that he had helped to found a public library in the +parish where his farm was situated, and that he sang his fervent snatches +against tyranny and tyrants. Witness, were it alone, this verse:— + + “Here’s freedom to him that wad read, + Here’s freedom to him that wad write; + There’s nane ever feared that the truth should be heard + But them wham the truth wad indite.” + +Yet his enthusiasm for the cause was scarce guided by wisdom. Many +stories are preserved of the bitter and unwise words he used in country +coteries; how he proposed Washington’s health as an amendment to Pitt’s, +gave as a toast “the last verse of the last chapter of Kings,” and +celebrated Dumouriez in a doggrel impromptu full of ridicule and hate. +Now his sympathies would inspire him with _Scots_, _wha hae_; now involve +him in a drunken broil with a loyal officer, and consequent apologies and +explanations, hard to offer for a man of Burns’s stomach. Nor was this +the front of his offending. On February 27, 1792, he took part in the +capture of an armed smuggler, bought at the subsequent sale four +carronades, and despatched them with a letter to the French Assembly. +Letter and guns were stopped at Dover by the English officials; there was +trouble for Burns with his superiors; he was reminded firmly, however +delicately, that, as a paid official, it was his duty to obey and to be +silent; and all the blood of this poor, proud, and falling man must have +rushed to his head at the humiliation. His letter to Mr. Erskine, +subsequently Earl of Mar, testifies, in its turgid, turbulent phrases, to +a perfect passion of alarmed self-respect and vanity. He had been +muzzled, and muzzled, when all was said, by his paltry salary as an +exciseman; alas! had he not a family to keep? Already, he wrote, he +looked forward to some such judgment from a hackney scribbler as this: +“Burns, notwithstanding the _fanfaronnade_ of independence to be found in +his works, and after having been held forth to view and to public +estimation as a man of some genius, yet, quite destitute of resources +within himself to support his borrowed dignity, he dwindled into a paltry +exciseman, and shrunk out the rest of his insignificant existence in the +meanest of pursuits, and among the vilest of mankind.” And then on he +goes, in a style of rhodomontade, but filled with living indignation, to +declare his right to a political opinion, and his willingness to shed his +blood for the political birthright of his sons. Poor, perturbed spirit! +he was indeed exercised in vain; those who share and those who differ +from his sentiments about the Revolution, alike understand and sympathise +with him in this painful strait; for poetry and human manhood are lasting +like the race, and politics, which are but a wrongful striving after +right, pass and change from year to year and age to age. The _Twa Dogs_ +has already outlasted the constitution of Siéyès and the policy of the +Whigs; and Burns is better known among English-speaking races than either +Pitt or Fox. + +Meanwhile, whether as a man, a husband, or a poet, his steps led +downward. He knew, knew bitterly, that the best was out of him; he +refused to make another volume, for he felt that it would be a +disappointment; he grew petulantly alive to criticism, unless he was sure +it reached him from a friend. For his songs, he would take nothing; they +were all that he could do; the proposed Scotch play, the proposed series +of Scotch tales in verse, all had gone to water; and in a fling of pain +and disappointment, which is surely noble with the nobility of a viking, +he would rather stoop to borrow than to accept money for these last and +inadequate efforts of his muse. And this desperate abnegation rises at +times near to the height of madness; as when he pretended that he had not +written, but only found and published, his immortal _Auld Lang Syne_. In +the same spirit he became more scrupulous as an artist; he was doing so +little, he would fain do that little well; and about two months before +his death, he asked Thomson to send back all his manuscripts for revisal, +saying that he would rather write five songs to his taste than twice that +number otherwise. The battle of his life was lost; in forlorn efforts to +do well, in desperate submissions to evil, the last years flew by. His +temper is dark and explosive, launching epigrams, quarrelling with his +friends, jealous of young puppy officers. He tries to be a good father; +he boasts himself a libertine. Sick, sad, and jaded, he can refuse no +occasion of temporary pleasure, no opportunity to shine; and he who had +once refused the invitations of lords and ladies is now whistled to the +inn by any curious stranger. His death (July 21, 1796), in his +thirty-seventh year, was indeed a kindly dispensation. It is the fashion +to say he died of drink; many a man has drunk more and yet lived with +reputation, and reached a good age. That drink and debauchery helped to +destroy his constitution, and were the means of his unconscious suicide, +is doubtless true; but he had failed in life, had lost his power of work, +and was already married to the poor, unworthy, patient Jean, before he +had shown his inclination to convivial nights, or at least before that +inclination had become dangerous either to his health or his +self-respect. He had trifled with life, and must pay the penalty. He +had chosen to be Don Juan, he had grasped at temporary pleasures, and +substantial happiness and solid industry had passed him by. He died of +being Robert Burns, and there is no levity in such a statement of the +case; for shall we not, one and all, deserve a similar epitaph? + + + +WORKS. + + +The somewhat cruel necessity which has lain upon me throughout this paper +only to touch upon those points in the life of Burns where correction or +amplification seemed desirable, leaves me little opportunity to speak of +the works which have made his name so famous. Yet, even here, a few +observations seem necessary. + +At the time when the poet made his appearance and great first success, +his work was remarkable in two ways. For, first, in an age when poetry +had become abstract and conventional, instead of continuing to deal with +shepherds, thunderstorms, and personifications, he dealt with the actual +circumstances of his life, however matter-of-fact and sordid these might +be. And, second, in a time when English versification was particularly +stiff, lame, and feeble, and words were used with ultra-academical +timidity, he wrote verses that were easy, racy, graphic, and forcible, +and used language with absolute tact and courage as it seemed most fit to +give a clear impression. If you take even those English authors whom we +know Burns to have most admired and studied, you will see at once that he +owed them nothing but a warning. Take Shenstone, for instance, and watch +that elegant author as he tries to grapple with the facts of life. He +has a description, I remember, of a gentleman engaged in sliding or +walking on thin ice, which is a little miracle of incompetence. You see +my memory fails me, and I positively cannot recollect whether his hero +was sliding or walking; as though a writer should describe a skirmish, +and the reader, at the end, be still uncertain whether it were a charge +of cavalry or a slow and stubborn advance of foot. There could be no +such ambiguity in Burns; his work is at the opposite pole from such +indefinite and stammering performances; and a whole lifetime passed in +the study of Shenstone would only lead a man further and further from +writing the _Address to a Louse_. Yet Burns, like most great artists, +proceeded from a school and continued a tradition; only the school and +tradition were Scotch, and not English. While the English language was +becoming daily more pedantic and inflexible, and English letters more +colourless and slack, there was another dialect in the sister country, +and a different school of poetry tracing its descent, through King James +I., from Chaucer. The dialect alone accounts for much; for it was then +written colloquially, which kept it fresh and supple; and, although not +shaped for heroic flights, it was a direct and vivid medium for all that +had to do with social life. Hence, whenever Scotch poets left their +laborious imitations of bad English verses, and fell back on their own +dialect, their style would kindle, and they would write of their +convivial and somewhat gross existences with pith and point. In Ramsay, +and far more in the poor lad Fergusson, there was mettle, humour, +literary courage, and a power of saying what they wished to say +definitely and brightly, which in the latter case should have justified +great anticipations. Had Burns died at the same age as Fergusson, he +would have left us literally nothing worth remark. To Ramsay and to +Fergusson, then, he was indebted in a very uncommon degree, not only +following their tradition and using their measures, but directly and +avowedly imitating their pieces. The same tendency to borrow a hint, to +work on some one else’s foundation, is notable in Burns from first to +last, in the period of song-writing as well as in that of the early +poems; and strikes one oddly in a man of such deep originality, who left +so strong a print on all he touched, and whose work is so greatly +distinguished by that character of “inevitability” which Wordsworth +denied to Goethe. + +When we remember Burns’s obligations to his predecessors, we must never +forget his immense advances on them. They had already “discovered” +nature; but Burns discovered poetry—a higher and more intense way of +thinking of the things that go to make up nature, a higher and more ideal +key of words in which to speak of them. Ramsay and Fergusson excelled at +making a popular—or shall we say vulgar?—sort of society verses, comical +and prosaic, written, you would say, in taverns while a supper party +waited for its laureate’s word; but on the appearance of Burns, this +coarse and laughing literature was touched to finer issues, and learned +gravity of thought and natural pathos. + +What he had gained from his predecessors was a direct, speaking style, +and to walk on his own feet instead of on academical stilts. There was +never a man of letters with more absolute command of his means; and we +may say of him, without excess, that his style was his slave. Hence that +energy of epithet, so concise and telling, that a foreigner is tempted to +explain it by some special richness or aptitude in the dialect he wrote. +Hence that Homeric justice and completeness of description which gives us +the very physiognomy of nature, in body and detail, as nature is. Hence, +too, the unbroken literary quality of his best pieces, which keeps him +from any slip into the weariful trade of word-painting, and presents +everything, as everything should be presented by the art of words, in a +clear, continuous medium of thought. Principal Shairp, for instance, +gives us a paraphrase of one tough verse of the original; and for those +who know the Greek poets only by paraphrase, this has the very quality +they are accustomed to look for and admire in Greek. The contemporaries +of Burns were surprised that he should visit so many celebrated mountains +and waterfalls, and not seize the opportunity to make a poem. Indeed, it +is not for those who have a true command of the art of words, but for +peddling, professional amateurs, that these pointed occasions are most +useful and inspiring. As those who speak French imperfectly are glad to +dwell on any topic they may have talked upon or heard others talk upon +before, because they know appropriate words for it in French, so the +dabbler in verse rejoices to behold a waterfall, because he has learned +the sentiment and knows appropriate words for it in poetry. But the +dialect of Burns was fitted to deal with any subject; and whether it was +a stormy night, a shepherd’s collie, a sheep struggling in the snow, the +conduct of cowardly soldiers in the field, the gait and cogitations of a +drunken man, or only a village cockcrow in the morning, he could find +language to give it freshness, body, and relief. He was always ready to +borrow the hint of a design, as though he had a difficulty in +commencing—a difficulty, let us say, in choosing a subject out of a world +which seemed all equally living and significant to him; but once he had +the subject chosen, he could cope with nature single-handed, and make +every stroke a triumph. Again, his absolute mastery in his art enabled +him to express each and all of his different humours, and to pass +smoothly and congruously from one to another. Many men invent a dialect +for only one side of their nature—perhaps their pathos or their humour, +or the delicacy of their senses—and, for lack of a medium, leave all the +others unexpressed. You meet such an one, and find him in conversation +full of thought, feeling, and experience, which he has lacked the art to +employ in his writings. But Burns was not thus hampered in the practice +of the literary art; he could throw the whole weight of his nature into +his work, and impregnate it from end to end. If Doctor Johnson, that +stilted and accomplished stylist, had lacked the sacred Boswell, what +should we have known of him? and how should we have delighted in his +acquaintance as we do? Those who spoke with Burns tell us how much we +have lost who did not. But I think they exaggerate their privilege: I +think we have the whole Burns in our possession set forth in his +consummate verses. + +It was by his style, and not by his matter, that he affected Wordsworth +and the world. There is, indeed, only one merit worth considering in a +man of letters—that he should write well; and only one damning fault—that +he should write ill. We are little the better for the reflections of the +sailor’s parrot in the story. And so, if Burns helped to change the +course of literary history, it was by his frank, direct, and masterly +utterance, and not by his homely choice of subjects. That was imposed +upon him, not chosen upon a principle. He wrote from his own experience, +because it was his nature so to do, and the tradition of the school from +which he proceeded was fortunately not opposed to homely subjects. But +to these homely subjects he communicated the rich commentary of his +nature; they were all steeped in Burns; and they interest us not in +themselves, but because they have been passed through the spirit of so +genuine and vigorous a man. Such is the stamp of living literature; and +there was never any more alive than that of Burns. + +What a gust of sympathy there is in him sometimes flowing out in byways +hitherto unused, upon mice, and flowers, and the devil himself; sometimes +speaking plainly between human hearts; sometimes ringing out in +exultation like a peal of bells! When we compare the _Farmer’s +Salutation to his Auld Mare Maggie_, with the clever and inhumane +production of half a century earlier, _The Auld Man’s Mare’s dead_, we +see in a nutshell the spirit of the change introduced by Burns. And as +to its manner, who that has read it can forget how the collie, Luath, in +the _Twa Dogs_, describes and enters into the merry-making in the +cottage? + + “The luntin’ pipe an’ sneeshin’ mill, + Are handed round wi’ richt guid will; + The canty auld folks crackin’ crouse, + The young anes rantin’ through the house— + My heart has been sae fain to see them + That I for joy hae barkit wi’ them.” + +It was this ardent power of sympathy that was fatal to so many women, +and, through Jean Armour, to himself at last. His humour comes from him +in a stream so deep and easy that I will venture to call him the best of +humorous poets. He turns about in the midst to utter a noble sentiment +or a trenchant remark on human life, and the style changes and rises to +the occasion. I think it is Principal Shairp who says, happily, that +Burns would have been no Scotchman if he had not loved to moralise; +neither, may we add, would he have been his father’s son; but (what is +worthy of note) his moralisings are to a large extent the moral of his +own career. He was among the least impersonal of artists. Except in the +_Jolly Beggars_, he shows no gleam of dramatic instinct. Mr. Carlyle has +complained that _Tam o’ Shanter_ is, from the absence of this quality, +only a picturesque and external piece of work; and I may add that in the +_Twa Dogs_ it is precisely in the infringement of dramatic propriety that +a great deal of the humour of the speeches depends for its existence and +effect. Indeed, Burns was so full of his identity that it breaks forth +on every page; and there is scarce an appropriate remark either in praise +or blame of his own conduct, but he has put it himself into verse. Alas! +for the tenor of these remarks! They are, indeed, his own pitiful +apology for such a marred existence and talents so misused and stunted; +and they seem to prove for ever how small a part is played by reason in +the conduct of man’s affairs. Here was one, at least, who with unfailing +judgment predicted his own fate; yet his knowledge could not avail him, +and with open eyes he must fulfil his tragic destiny. Ten years before +the end he had written his epitaph; and neither subsequent events, nor +the critical eyes of posterity, have shown us a word in it to alter. +And, lastly, has he not put in for himself the last unanswerable plea?— + + “Then gently scan your brother man, + Still gentler sister woman; + Though they may gang a kennin wrang, + To step aside is human: + One point must still be greatly dark—” + +One? Alas! I fear every man and woman of us is “greatly dark” to all +their neighbours, from the day of birth until death removes them, in +their greatest virtues as well as in their saddest faults; and we, who +have been trying to read the character of Burns, may take home the lesson +and be gentle in our thoughts. + + + + +WALT WHITMAN. + + +OF late years the name of Walt Whitman has been a good deal bandied about +in books and magazines. It has become familiar both in good and ill +repute. His works have been largely bespattered with praise by his +admirers, and cruelly mauled and mangled by irreverent enemies. Now, +whether his poetry is good or bad as poetry, is a matter that may admit +of a difference of opinion without alienating those who differ. We could +not keep the peace with a man who should put forward claims to taste and +yet depreciate the choruses in _Samson Agonistes_; but, I think, we may +shake hands with one who sees no more in Walt Whitman’s volume, from a +literary point of view, than a farrago of incompetent essays in a wrong +direction. That may not be at all our own opinion. We may think that, +when a work contains many unforgettable phrases, it cannot be altogether +devoid of literary merit. We may even see passages of a high poetry here +and there among its eccentric contents. But when all is said, Walt +Whitman is neither a Milton nor a Shakespeare; to appreciate his works is +not a condition necessary to salvation; and I would not disinherit a son +upon the question, nor even think much the worse of a critic, for I +should always have an idea what he meant. + +What Whitman has to say is another affair from how he says it. It is not +possible to acquit any one of defective intelligence, or else stiff +prejudice, who is not interested by Whitman’s matter and the spirit it +represents. Not as a poet, but as what we must call (for lack of a more +exact expression) a prophet, he occupies a curious and prominent +position. Whether he may greatly influence the future or not, he is a +notable symptom of the present. As a sign of the times, it would be hard +to find his parallel. I should hazard a large wager, for instance, that +he was not unacquainted with the works of Herbert Spencer; and yet where, +in all the history books, shall we lay our hands on two more incongruous +contemporaries? Mr. Spencer so decorous—I had almost said, so dandy—in +dissent; and Whitman, like a large shaggy dog, just unchained, scouring +the beaches of the world and baying at the moon. And when was an echo +more curiously like a satire, than when Mr. Spencer found his Synthetic +Philosophy reverberated from the other shores of the Atlantic in the +“barbaric yawp” of Whitman? + + + +I. + + +Whitman, it cannot be too soon explained, writes up to a system. He was +a theoriser about society before he was a poet. He first perceived +something wanting, and then sat down squarely to supply the want. The +reader, running over his works, will find that he takes nearly as much +pleasure in critically expounding his theory of poetry as in making +poems. This is as far as it can be from the case of the spontaneous +village minstrel dear to elegy, who has no theory whatever, although +sometimes he may have fully as much poetry as Whitman. The whole of +Whitman’s work is deliberate and preconceived. A man born into a society +comparatively new, full of conflicting elements and interests, could not +fail, if he had any thoughts at all, to reflect upon the tendencies +around him. He saw much good and evil on all sides, not yet settled down +into some more or less unjust compromise as in older nations, but still +in the act of settlement. And he could not but wonder what it would turn +out; whether the compromise would be very just or very much the reverse, +and give great or little scope for healthy human energies. From idle +wonder to active speculation is but a step; and he seems to have been +early struck with the inefficacy of literature and its extreme +unsuitability to the conditions. What he calls “Feudal Literature” could +have little living action on the tumult of American democracy; what he +calls the “Literature of Wo,” meaning the whole tribe of Werther and +Byron, could have no action for good in any time or place. Both +propositions, if art had none but a direct moral influence, would be true +enough; and as this seems to be Whitman’s view, they were true enough for +him. He conceived the idea of a Literature which was to inhere in the +life of the present; which was to be, first, human, and next, American; +which was to be brave and cheerful as per contract; to give culture in a +popular and poetical presentment; and, in so doing, catch and stereotype +some democratic ideal of humanity which should be equally natural to all +grades of wealth and education, and suited, in one of his favourite +phrases, to “the average man.” To the formation of some such literature +as this his poems are to be regarded as so many contributions, one +sometimes explaining, sometimes superseding, the other: and the whole +together not so much a finished work as a body of suggestive hints. He +does not profess to have built the castle, but he pretends he has traced +the lines of the foundation. He has not made the poetry, but he flatters +himself he has done something towards making the poets. + +His notion of the poetic function is ambitious, and coincides roughly +with what Schopenhauer has laid down as the province of the +metaphysician. The poet is to gather together for men, and set in order, +the materials of their existence. He is “The Answerer;” he is to find +some way of speaking about life that shall satisfy, if only for the +moment, man’s enduring astonishment at his own position. And besides +having an answer ready, it is he who shall provoke the question. He must +shake people out of their indifference, and force them to make some +election in this world, instead of sliding dully forward in a dream. +Life is a business we are all apt to mismanage; either living recklessly +from day to day, or suffering ourselves to be gulled out of our moments +by the inanities of custom. We should despise a man who gave as little +activity and forethought to the conduct of any other business. But in +this, which is the one thing of all others, since it contains them all, +we cannot see the forest for the trees. One brief impression obliterates +another. There is something stupefying in the recurrence of unimportant +things. And it is only on rare provocations that we can rise to take an +outlook beyond daily concerns, and comprehend the narrow limits and great +possibilities of our existence. It is the duty of the poet to induce +such moments of clear sight. He is the declared enemy of all living by +reflex action, of all that is done betwixt sleep and waking, of all the +pleasureless pleasurings and imaginary duties in which we coin away our +hearts and fritter invaluable years. He has to electrify his readers +into an instant unflagging activity, founded on a wide and eager +observation of the world, and make them direct their ways by a superior +prudence, which has little or nothing in common with the maxims of the +copy-book. That many of us lead such lives as they would heartily disown +after two hours’ serious reflection on the subject is, I am afraid, a +true, and, I am sure, a very galling thought. The Enchanted Ground of +dead-alive respectability is next, upon the map, to the Beulah of +considerate virtue. But there they all slumber and take their rest in +the middle of God’s beautiful and wonderful universe; the drowsy heads +have nodded together in the same position since first their fathers fell +asleep; and not even the sound of the last trumpet can wake them to a +single active thought. + +The poet has a hard task before him to stir up such fellows to a sense of +their own and other people’s principles in life. + +And it happens that literature is, in some ways, but an indifferent means +to such an end. Language is but a poor bull’s-eye lantern wherewith to +show off the vast cathedral of the world; and yet a particular thing once +said in words is so definite and memorable, that it makes us forget the +absence of the many which remain unexpressed; like a bright window in a +distant view, which dazzles and confuses our sight of its surroundings. +There are not words enough in all Shakespeare to express the merest +fraction of a man’s experience in an hour. The speed of the eyesight and +the hearing, and the continual industry of the mind, produce, in ten +minutes, what it would require a laborious volume to shadow forth by +comparisons and roundabout approaches. If verbal logic were sufficient, +life would be as plain sailing as a piece of Euclid. But, as a matter of +fact, we make a travesty of the simplest process of thought when we put +it into words for the words are all coloured and forsworn, apply +inaccurately, and bring with them, from former uses ideas of praise and +blame that have nothing to do with the question in hand. So we must +always see to it nearly, that we judge by the realities of life and not +by the partial terms that represent them in man’s speech; and at times of +choice, we must leave words upon one side, and act upon those brute +convictions, unexpressed and perhaps inexpressible, which cannot be +flourished in an argument, but which are truly the sum and fruit of our +experience. Words are for communication, not for judgment. This is what +every thoughtful man knows for himself, for only fools and silly +schoolmasters push definitions over far into the domain of conduct; and +the majority of women, not learned in these scholastic refinements, live +all-of-a-piece and unconsciously, as a tree grows, without caring to put +a name upon their acts or motives. Hence, a new difficulty for Whitman’s +scrupulous and argumentative poet; he must do more than waken up the +sleepers to his words; he must persuade them to look over the book and at +life with their own eyes. + +This side of truth is very present to Whitman; it is this that he means +when he tells us that “To glance with an eye confounds the learning of +all times.” But he is not unready. He is never weary of descanting on +the undebatable conviction that is forced upon our minds by the presence +of other men, of animals, or of inanimate things. To glance with an eye, +were it only at a chair or a park railing, is by far a more persuasive +process, and brings us to a far more exact conclusion, than to read the +works of all the logicians extant. If both, by a large allowance, may be +said to end in certainty, the certainty in the one case transcends the +other to an incalculable degree. If people see a lion, they run away; if +they only apprehend a deduction, they keep wandering around in an +experimental humour. Now, how is the poet to convince like nature, and +not like books? Is there no actual piece of nature that he can show the +man to his face, as he might show him a tree if they were walking +together? Yes, there is one: the man’s own thoughts. In fact, if the +poet is to speak efficaciously, he must say what is already in his +hearer’s mind. That, alone, the hearer will believe; that, alone, he +will be able to apply intelligently to the facts of life. Any +conviction, even if it be a whole system or a whole religion, must pass +into the condition of commonplace, or postulate, before it becomes fully +operative. Strange excursions and high-flying theories may interest, but +they cannot rule behaviour. Our faith is not the highest truth that we +perceive, but the highest that we have been able to assimilate into the +very texture and method of our thinking. It is not, therefore, by +flashing before a man’s eyes the weapons of dialectic; it is not by +induction, deduction, or construction; it is not by forcing him on from +one stage of reasoning to another, that the man will be effectually +renewed. He cannot be made to believe anything; but he can be made to +see that he has always believed it. And this is the practical canon. It +is when the reader cries, “Oh, I know!” and is, perhaps, half irritated +to see how nearly the author has forestalled his own thoughts, that he is +on the way to what is called in theology a Saving Faith. + +Here we have the key to Whitman’s attitude. To give a certain unity of +ideal to the average population of America—to gather their activities +about some conception of humanity that shall be central and normal, if +only for the moment—the poet must portray that population as it is. Like +human law, human poetry is simply declaratory. If any ideal is possible, +it must be already in the thoughts of the people; and, by the same +reason, in the thoughts of the poet, who is one of them. And hence +Whitman’s own formula: “The poet is individual—he is complete in himself: +the others are as good as he; only he sees it, and they do not.” To show +them how good they are, the poet must study his fellow-countrymen and +himself somewhat like a traveller on the hunt for his book of travels. +There is a sense, of course, in which all true books are books of travel; +and all genuine poets must run their risk of being charged with the +traveller’s exaggeration; for to whom are such books more surprising than +to those whose own life is faithfully and smartly pictured? But this +danger is all upon one side; and you may judiciously flatter the portrait +without any likelihood of the sitter’s disowning it for a faithful +likeness. And so Whitman has reasoned: that by drawing at first hand +from himself and his neighbours, accepting without shame the +inconsistencies and brutalities that go to make up man, and yet treating +the whole in a high, magnanimous spirit, he would make sure of belief, +and at the same time encourage people forward by the means of praise. + + + +II. + + +We are accustomed nowadays to a great deal of puling over the +circumstances in which we are placed. The great refinement of many +poetical gentlemen has rendered them practically unfit for the jostling +and ugliness of life, and they record their unfitness at considerable +length. The bold and awful poetry of Job’s complaint produces too many +flimsy imitators; for there is always something consolatory in grandeur, +but the symphony transposed for the piano becomes hysterically sad. This +literature of woe, as Whitman calls it, this _Maladie de René_, as we +like to call it in Europe, is in many ways a most humiliating and sickly +phenomenon. Young gentlemen with three or four hundred a year of private +means look down from a pinnacle of doleful experience on all the grown +and hearty men who have dared to say a good word for life since the +beginning of the world. There is no prophet but the melancholy Jacques, +and the blue devils dance on all our literary wires. + +It would be a poor service to spread culture, if this be its result, +among the comparatively innocent and cheerful ranks of men. When our +little poets have to be sent to look at the ploughman and learn wisdom, +we must be careful how we tamper with our ploughmen. Where a man in not +the best of circumstances preserves composure of mind, and relishes ale +and tobacco, and his wife and children, in the intervals of dull and +unremunerative labour; where a man in this predicament can afford a +lesson by the way to what are called his intellectual superiors, there is +plainly something to be lost, as well as something to be gained, by +teaching him to think differently. It is better to leave him as he is +than to teach him whining. It is better that he should go without the +cheerful lights of culture, if cheerless doubt and paralysing +sentimentalism are to be the consequence. Let us, by all means, fight +against that hide-bound stolidity of sensation and sluggishness of mind +which blurs and decolorises for poor natures the wonderful pageant of +consciousness; let us teach people, as much as we can, to enjoy, and they +will learn for themselves to sympathise; but let us see to it, above all, +that we give these lessons in a brave, vivacious note, and build the man +up in courage while we demolish its substitute, indifference. + +Whitman is alive to all this. He sees that, if the poet is to be of any +help, he must testify to the livableness of life. His poems, he tells +us, are to be “hymns of the praise of things.” They are to make for a +certain high joy in living, or what he calls himself “a brave delight fit +for freedom’s athletes.” And he has had no difficulty in introducing his +optimism: it fitted readily enough with his system; for the average man +is truly a courageous person and truly fond of living. One of Whitman’s +remarks upon this head is worth quotation, as he is there perfectly +successful, and does precisely what he designs to do throughout: Takes +ordinary and even commonplace circumstances; throws them out, by a happy +turn of thinking, into significance and something like beauty; and tacks +a hopeful moral lesson to the end. + + “The passionate tenacity of hunters, woodmen, early risers, + cultivators of gardens and orchards and fields, he says, 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 + unvaried sign of the unfailing perception of beauty, and of a + residence of the poetic in outdoor people.” + +There seems to me something truly original in this choice of trite +examples. You will remark how adroitly Whitman begins, hunters and +woodmen being confessedly romantic. And one thing more. If he had said +“the love of healthy men for the female form,” he would have said almost +a silliness; for the thing has never been dissembled out of delicacy, and +is so obvious as to be a public nuisance. But by reversing it, he tells +us something not unlike news; something that sounds quite freshly in +words; and, if the reader be a man, gives him a moment of great +self-satisfaction and spiritual aggrandisement. In many different +authors you may find passages more remarkable for grammar, but few of a +more ingenious turn, and none that could be more to the point in our +connection. The tenacity of many ordinary people in ordinary pursuits is +a sort of standing challenge to everybody else. If one man can grow +absorbed in delving his garden, others may grow absorbed and happy over +something else. Not to be upsides in this with any groom or gardener, is +to be very meanly organised. A man should be ashamed to take his food if +he has not alchemy enough in his stomach to turn some of it into intense +and enjoyable occupation. + +Whitman tries to reinforce this cheerfulness by keeping up a sort of +outdoor atmosphere of sentiment. His book, he tells us, should be read +“among the cooling influences of external nature;” and this +recommendation, like that other famous one which Hawthorne prefixed to +his collected tales, is in itself a character of the work. Every one who +has been upon a walking or a boating tour, living in the open air, with +the body in constant exercise and the mind in fallow, knows true ease and +quiet. The irritating action of the brain is set at rest; we think in a +plain, unfeverish temper; little things seem big enough, and great things +no longer portentous; and the world is smilingly accepted as it is. This +is the spirit that Whitman inculcates and parades. He thinks very ill of +the atmosphere of parlours or libraries. Wisdom keeps school outdoors. +And he has the art to recommend this attitude of mind by simply pluming +himself upon it as a virtue; so that the reader, to keep the advantage +over his author which most readers enjoy, is tricked into professing the +same view. And this spirit, as it is his chief lesson, is the greatest +charm of his work. Thence, in spite of an uneven and emphatic key of +expression, something trenchant and straightforward, something simple and +surprising, distinguishes his poems. He has sayings that come home to +one like the Bible. We fall upon Whitman, after the works of so many men +who write better, with a sense of relief from strain, with a sense of +touching nature, as when one passes out of the flaring, noisy +thoroughfares of a great city into what he himself has called, with +unexcelled imaginative justice of language, “the huge and thoughtful +night.” And his book in consequence, whatever may be the final judgment +of its merit, whatever may be its influence on the future, should be in +the hands of all parents and guardians as a specific for the distressing +malady of being seventeen years old. Green-sickness yields to his +treatment as to a charm of magic; and the youth, after a short course of +reading, ceases to carry the universe upon his shoulders. + + + +III. + + +Whitman is not one of those who can be deceived by familiarity. He +considers it just as wonderful that there are myriads of stars, as that +one man should rise from the dead. He declares “a hair on the back of +his hand just as curious as any special revelation.” His whole life is +to him what it was to Sir Thomas Browne, one perpetual miracle. +Everything is strange, everything unaccountable, everything beautiful; +from a bug to the moon, from the sight of the eyes to the appetite for +food. He makes it his business to see things as if he saw them for the +first time, and professes astonishment on principle. But he has no +leaning towards mythology; avows his contempt for what he calls +“unregenerate poetry;” and does not mean by nature + + “The smooth walks, trimmed hedges, butterflies, posies, and + nightingales of the English poets, but the whole orb, with its + geologic history, the Kosmos, carrying fire and snow, that rolls + through the illimitable areas, light as a feather though weighing + billions of tons.” + +Nor is this exhaustive; for in his character of idealist all impressions, +all thoughts, trees and people, love and faith, astronomy, history, and +religion, enter upon equal terms into his notion of the universe. He is +not against religion; not, indeed, against any religion. He wishes to +drag with a larger net, to make a more comprehensive synthesis, than any +or than all of them put together. In feeling after the central type of +man, he must embrace all eccentricities; his cosmology must subsume all +cosmologies, and the feelings that gave birth to them; his statement of +facts must include all religion and all irreligion, Christ and Boodha, +God and the devil. The world as it is, and the whole world as it is, +physical, and spiritual, and historical, with its good and bad, with its +manifold inconsistencies, is what he wishes to set forth, in strong, +picturesque, and popular lineaments, for the understanding of the average +man. One of his favourite endeavours is to get the whole matter into a +nutshell; to knock the four corners of the universe, one after another, +about his readers’ ears; to hurry him, in breathless phrases, hither and +thither, back and forward, in time and space; to focus all this about his +own momentary personality; and then, drawing the ground from under his +feet, as if by some cataclysm of nature, to plunge him into the +unfathomable abyss sown with enormous suns and systems, and among the +inconceivable numbers and magnitudes and velocities of the heavenly +bodies. So that he concludes by striking into us some sense of that +disproportion of things which Shelley has illuminated by the ironical +flash of these eight words: The desire of the moth for the star. + +The same truth, but to what a different purpose! Whitman’s moth is +mightily at his ease about all the planets in heaven, and cannot think +too highly of our sublunary tapers. The universe is so large that +imagination flags in the effort to conceive it; but here, in the +meantime, is the world under our feet, a very warm and habitable corner. +“The earth, that is sufficient; I do not want the constellations any +nearer,” he remarks. And again: “Let your soul stand cool and composed,” +says he, “before a million universes.” It is the language of a +transcendental common sense, such as Thoreau held and sometimes uttered. +But Whitman, who has a somewhat vulgar inclination for technical talk and +the jargon of philosophy, is not content with a few pregnant hints; he +must put the dots upon his i’s; he must corroborate the songs of Apollo +by some of the darkest talk of human metaphysic. He tells his disciples +that they must be ready “to confront the growing arrogance of Realism.” +Each person is, for himself, the keystone and the occasion of this +universal edifice. “Nothing, not God,” he says, “is greater to one than +oneself is;” a statement with an irreligious smack at the first sight; +but like most startling sayings, a manifest truism on a second. He will +give effect to his own character without apology; he sees “that the +elementary laws never apologise.” “I reckon,” he adds, with quaint +colloquial arrogance, “I reckon I behave no prouder than the level I +plant my house by, after all.” The level follows the law of its being; +so, unrelentingly, will he; everything, every person, is good in his own +place and way; God is the maker of all and all are in one design. For he +believes in God, and that with a sort of blasphemous security. “No array +of terms,” quoth he, “no array of terms can say how much at peace I am +about God and about death.” There certainly never was a prophet who +carried things with a higher hand; he gives us less a body of dogmas than +a series of proclamations by the grace of God; and language, you will +observe, positively fails him to express how far he stands above the +highest human doubts and trepidations. + +But next in order of truths to a person’s sublime conviction of himself, +comes the attraction of one person for another, and all that we mean by +the word love:— + + “The dear love of man for his comrade—the attraction of friend for + friend, + Of the well-married husband and wife, of children and parents, + Of city for city and land for land.” + +The solitude of the most sublime idealist is broken in upon by other +people’s faces; he sees a look in their eyes that corresponds to +something in his own heart; there comes a tone in their voices which +convicts him of a startling weakness for his fellow-creatures. While he +is hymning the _ego_ and commercing with God and the universe, a woman +goes below his window; and at the turn of her skirt, or the colour of her +eyes, Icarus is recalled from heaven by the run. Love is so startlingly +real that it takes rank upon an equal footing of reality with the +consciousness of personal existence. We are as heartily persuaded of the +identity of those we love as of our own identity. And so sympathy pairs +with self-assertion, the two gerents of human life on earth; and +Whitman’s ideal man must not only be strong, free, and self-reliant in +himself, but his freedom must be bounded and his strength perfected by +the most intimate, eager, and long-suffering love for others. To some +extent this is taking away with the left hand what has been so generously +given with the right. Morality has been ceremoniously extruded from the +door only to be brought in again by the window. We are told, on one +page, to do as we please; and on the next we are sharply upbraided for +not having done as the author pleases. We are first assured that we are +the finest fellows in the world in our own right; and then it appears +that we are only fine fellows in so far as we practise a most quixotic +code of morals. The disciple who saw himself in clear ether a moment +before is plunged down again among the fogs and complications of duty. +And this is all the more overwhelming because Whitman insists not only on +love between sex and sex, and between friends of the same sex, but in the +field of the less intense political sympathies; and his ideal man must +not only be a generous friend but a conscientious voter into the bargain. + +His method somewhat lessens the difficulty. He is not, the reader will +remember, to tell us how good we ought to be, but to remind us how good +we are. He is to encourage us to be free and kind, by proving that we +are free and kind already. He passes our corporate life under review, to +show that it is upheld by the very virtues of which he makes himself the +advocate. “There is no object so soft,” he says somewhere in his big, +plain way, “there is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheel’d +universe.” Rightly understood, it is on the softest of all objects, the +sympathetic heart, that the wheel of society turns easily and securely as +on a perfect axle. There is no room, of course, for doubt or discussion, +about conduct, where every one is to follow the law of his being with +exact compliance. Whitman hates doubt, deprecates discussion, and +discourages to his utmost the craving, carping sensibilities of the +conscience. We are to imitate, to use one of his absurd and happy +phrases, “the satisfaction and aplomb of animals.” If he preaches a sort +of ranting Christianity in morals, a fit consequent to the ranting +optimism of his cosmology, it is because he declares it to be the +original deliverance of the human heart; or at least, for he would be +honestly historical in method, of the human heart as at present +Christianised. His is a morality without a prohibition; his policy is +one of encouragement all round. A man must be a born hero to come up to +Whitman’s standard in the practice of any of the positive virtues; but of +a negative virtue, such as temperance or chastity, he has so little to +say, that the reader need not be surprised if he drops a word or two upon +the other side. He would lay down nothing that would be a clog; he would +prescribe nothing that cannot be done ruddily, in a heat. The great +point is to get people under way. To the faithful Whitmanite this would +be justified by the belief that God made all, and that all was good; the +prophet, in this doctrine, has only to cry “Tally-ho,” and mankind will +break into a gallop on the road to El Dorado. Perhaps, to another class +of minds, it may look like the result of the somewhat cynical reflection +that you will not make a kind man out of one who is unkind by any +precepts under heaven; tempered by the belief that, in natural +circumstances, the large majority is well disposed. Thence it would +follow, that if you can only get every one to feel more warmly and act +more courageously, the balance of results will be for good. + +So far, you see, the doctrine is pretty coherent as a doctrine; as a +picture of man’s life it is incomplete and misleading, although eminently +cheerful. This he is himself the first to acknowledge; for if he is +prophetic in anything, it is in his noble disregard of consistency. “Do +I contradict myself?” he asks somewhere; and then pat comes the answer, +the best answer ever given in print, worthy of a sage, or rather of a +woman: “Very well, then, I contradict myself!” with this addition, not so +feminine and perhaps not altogether so satisfactory: “I am large—I +contain multitudes.” Life, as a matter of fact, partakes largely of the +nature of tragedy. The gospel according to Whitman, even if it be not so +logical, has this advantage over the gospel according to Pangloss, that +it does not utterly disregard the existence of temporal evil. Whitman +accepts the fact of disease and wretchedness like an honest man; and +instead of trying to qualify it in the interest of his optimism, sets +himself to spur people up to be helpful. He expresses a conviction, +indeed, that all will be made up to the victims in the end; that “what is +untried and afterward” will fail no one, not even “the old man who has +lived without purpose and feels it with bitterness worse than gall.” But +this is not to palliate our sense of what is hard or melancholy in the +present. Pangloss, smarting under one of the worst things that ever was +supposed to come from America, consoled himself with the reflection that +it was the price we have to pay for cochineal. And with that murderous +parody, logical optimism and the praises of the best of possible words +went irrevocably out of season, and have been no more heard of in the +mouths of reasonable men. Whitman spares us all allusions to the +cochineal; he treats evil and sorrow in a spirit almost as of welcome; as +an old sea-dog might have welcomed the sight of the enemy’s topsails off +the Spanish Main. There, at least, he seems to say, is something obvious +to be done. I do not know many better things in literature than the +brief pictures,—brief and vivid like things seen by lightning,—with which +he tries to stir up the world’s heart upon the side of mercy. He braces +us, on the one hand, with examples of heroic duty and helpfulness; on the +other, he touches us with pitiful instances of people needing help. He +knows how to make the heart beat at a brave story; to inflame us with +just resentment over the hunted slave; to stop our mouths for shame when +he tells of the drunken prostitute. For all the afflicted, all the weak, +all the wicked, a good word is said in a spirit which I can only call one +of ultra-Christianity; and however wild, however contradictory, it may be +in parts, this at least may be said for his book, as it may be said of +the Christian Gospels, that no one will read it, however respectable, but +he gets a knock upon his conscience; no one however fallen, but he finds +a kindly and supporting welcome. + + + +IV. + + +Nor has he been content with merely blowing the trumpet for the battle of +well-doing; he has given to his precepts the authority of his own brave +example. Naturally a grave, believing man, with little or no sense of +humour, he has succeeded as well in life as in his printed performances. +The spirit that was in him has come forth most eloquently in his actions. +Many who have only read his poetry have been tempted to set him down as +an ass, or even as a charlatan; but I never met any one who had known him +personally who did not profess a solid affection and respect for the +man’s character. He practises as he professes; he feels deeply that +Christian love for all men, that toleration, that cheerful delight in +serving others, which he often celebrates in literature with a doubtful +measure of success. And perhaps, out of all his writings, the best and +the most human and convincing passages are to be found in “these soil’d +and creas’d little livraisons, each composed of a sheet or two of paper, +folded small to carry in the pocket, and fastened with a pin,” which he +scribbled during the war by the bedsides of the wounded or in the +excitement of great events. They are hardly literature in the formal +meaning of the word; he has left his jottings for the most part as he +made them; a homely detail, a word from the lips of a dying soldier, a +business memorandum, the copy of a letter-short, straightforward to the +point, with none of the trappings of composition; but they breathe a +profound sentiment, they give us a vivid look at one of the sides of +life, and they make us acquainted with a man whom it is an honour to +love. + +Whitman’s intense Americanism, his unlimited belief in the future of +These States (as, with reverential capitals, he loves to call them), made +the war a period of great trial to his soul. The new virtue, Unionism, +of which he is the sole inventor, seemed to have fallen into premature +unpopularity. All that he loved, hoped, or hated, hung in the balance. +And the game of war was not only momentous to him in its issues; it +sublimated his spirit by its heroic displays, and tortured him intimately +by the spectacle of its horrors. It was a theatre, it was a place of +education, it was like a season of religious revival. He watched Lincoln +going daily to his work; he studied and fraternised with young soldiery +passing to the front; above all, he walked the hospitals, reading the +Bible, distributing clean clothes, or apples, or tobacco; a patient, +helpful, reverend man, full of kind speeches. + +His memoranda of this period are almost bewildering to read. From one +point of view they seem those of a district visitor; from another, they +look like the formless jottings of an artist in the picturesque. More +than one woman, on whom I tried the experiment, immediately claimed the +writer for a fellow-woman. More than one literary purist might identify +him as a shoddy newspaper correspondent without the necessary faculty of +style. And yet the story touches home; and if you are of the weeping +order of mankind, you will certainly find your eyes fill with tears, of +which you have no reason to be ashamed. There is only one way to +characterise a work of this order, and that is to quote. Here is a +passage from a letter to a mother, unknown to Whitman, whose son died in +hospital:— + + “Frank, as far as I saw, had everything requisite in surgical + treatment, nursing, etc. He had watches much of the time. He was so + good and well-behaved, and affectionate, I myself liked him very + much. I was in the habit of coming in afternoons and sitting by him, + and he liked to have me—liked to put out his arm and lay his hand on + my knee—would keep it so a long while. Toward the last he was more + restless and flighty at night—often fancied himself with his + regiment—by his talk sometimes seem’d as if his feelings were hurt by + being blamed by his officers for something he was entirely innocent + of—said ‘I never in my life was thought capable of such a thing, and + never was.’ At other times he would fancy himself talking as it + seem’d to children or such like, his relatives, I suppose, and giving + them good advice; would talk to them a long while. All the time he + was out of his head not one single bad word, or thought, or idea + escaped him. It was remark’d that many a man’s conversation in his + senses was not half so good as Frank’s delirium. + + “He was perfectly willing to die—he had become very weak, and had + suffer’d a good deal, and was perfectly resign’d, poor boy. I do not + know his past life, but I feel as if it must have been good. At any + rate what I saw of him here, under the most trying circumstances, + with a painful wound, and among strangers, I can say that he behaved + so brave, so composed, and so sweet and affectionate, it could not be + surpassed. And now, like many other noble and good men, after + serving his country as a soldier, he has yielded up his young life at + the very outset in her service. Such things are gloomy—yet there is + a text, ‘God doeth all things well,’ the meaning of which, after due + time, appears to the soul. + + “I thought perhaps a few words, though from a stranger, about your + son, from one who was with him at the last, might be worth while, for + I loved the young man, though I but saw him immediately to lose him.” + +It is easy enough to pick holes in the grammar of this letter, but what +are we to say of its profound goodness and tenderness? It is written as +though he had the mother’s face before his eyes, and saw her wincing in +the flesh at every word. And what, again, are we to say of its sober +truthfulness, not exaggerating, not running to phrases, not seeking to +make a hero out of what was only an ordinary but good and brave young +man? Literary reticence is not Whitman’s stronghold; and this reticence +is not literary, but humane; it is not that of a good artist but that of +a good man. He knew that what the mother wished to hear about was Frank; +and he told her about her Frank as he was. + + + +V. + + +Something should be said of Whitman’s style, for style is of the essence +of thinking. And where a man is so critically deliberate as our author, +and goes solemnly about his poetry for an ulterior end, every indication +is worth notice. He has chosen a rough, unrhymed, lyrical verse; +sometimes instinct with a fine processional movement; often so rugged and +careless that it can only be described by saying that he has not taken +the trouble to write prose. I believe myself that it was selected +principally because it was easy to write, although not without +recollections of the marching measures of some of the prose in our +English Old Testament. According to Whitman, on the other hand, “the +time has arrived to essentially break down the barriers of form between +Prose and Poetry . . . for the most cogent purposes of those great inland +states, and for Texas, and California, and Oregon;”—a statement which is +among the happiest achievements of American humour. He calls his verses +“recitatives,” in easily followed allusion to a musical form. +“Easily-written, loose-fingered chords,” he cries, “I feel the thrum of +your climax and close.” Too often, I fear, he is the only one who can +perceive the rhythm; and in spite of Mr. Swinburne, a great part of his +work considered as verses is poor bald stuff. Considered, not as verse, +but as speech, a great part of it is full of strange and admirable +merits. The right detail is seized; the right word, bold and trenchant, +is thrust into its place. Whitman has small regard to literary +decencies, and is totally free from literary timidities. He is neither +afraid of being slangy nor of being dull; nor, let me add, of being +ridiculous. The result is a most surprising compound of plain grandeur, +sentimental affectation, and downright nonsense. It would be useless to +follow his detractors and give instances of how bad he can be at his +worst; and perhaps it would be not much wiser to give extracted specimens +of how happily he can write when he is at his best. These come in to +most advantage in their own place; owing something, it may be, to the +offset of their curious surroundings. And one thing is certain, that no +one can appreciate Whitman’s excellences until he has grown accustomed to +his faults. Until you are content to pick poetry out of his pages almost +as you must pick it out of a Greek play in Bohn’s translation, your +gravity will be continually upset, your ears perpetually disappointed, +and the whole book will be no more to you than a particularly flagrant +production by the Poet Close. + +A writer of this uncertain quality was, perhaps, unfortunate in taking +for thesis the beauty of the world as it now is, not only on the +hill-tops but in the factory; not only by the harbour full of stately +ships, but in the magazine of the hopelessly prosaic hatter. To show +beauty in common things is the work of the rarest tact. It is not to be +done by the wishing. It is easy to posit as a theory, but to bring it +home to men’s minds is the problem of literature, and is only +accomplished by rare talent, and in comparatively rare instances. To bid +the whole world stand and deliver, with a dogma in one’s right hand by +way of pistol; to cover reams of paper in a galloping, headstrong vein; +to cry louder and louder over everything as it comes up, and make no +distinction in one’s enthusiasm over the most incomparable matters; to +prove one’s entire want of sympathy for the jaded, literary palate, by +calling, not a spade a spade, but a hatter a hatter, in a lyrical +apostrophe;—this, in spite of all the airs of inspiration, is not the way +to do it. It may be very wrong, and very wounding to a respectable +branch of industry, but the word “hatter” cannot be used seriously in +emotional verse; not to understand this, is to have no literary tact; and +I would, for his own sake, that this were the only inadmissible +expression with which Whitman had bedecked his pages. The book teems +with similar comicalities; and, to a reader who is determined to take it +from that side only, presents a perfect carnival of fun. + +A good deal of this is the result of theory playing its usual vile trick +upon the artist. It is because he is a Democrat that Whitman must have +in the hatter. If you may say Admiral, he reasons, why may you not say +Hatter? One man is as good as another, and it is the business of the +“great poet” to show poetry in the life of the one as well as the other. +A most incontrovertible sentiment surely, and one which nobody would +think of controverting, where—and here is the point—where any beauty has +been shown. But how, where that is not the case? where the hatter is +simply introduced, as God made him and as his fellow-men have miscalled +him, at the crisis of a high-flown rhapsody? And what are we to say, +where a man of Whitman’s notable capacity for putting things in a bright, +picturesque, and novel way, simply gives up the attempt, and indulges, +with apparent exultation, in an inventory of trades or implements, with +no more colour or coherence than so many index-words out of a dictionary? +I do not know that we can say anything, but that it is a prodigiously +amusing exhibition for a line or so. The worst of it is, that Whitman +must have known better. The man is a great critic, and, so far as I can +make out, a good one; and how much criticism does it require to know that +capitulation is not description, or that fingering on a dumb keyboard, +with whatever show of sentiment and execution, is not at all the same +thing as discoursing music? I wish I could believe he was quite honest +with us; but, indeed, who was ever quite honest who wrote a book for a +purpose? It is a flight beyond the reach of human magnanimity. + +One other point, where his means failed him, must be touched upon, +however shortly. In his desire to accept all facts loyally and simply, +it fell within his programme to speak at some length and with some +plainness on what is, for I really do not know what reason, the most +delicate of subjects. Seeing in that one of the most serious and +interesting parts of life, he was aggrieved that it should be looked upon +as ridiculous or shameful. No one speaks of maternity with his tongue in +his cheek; and Whitman made a bold push to set the sanctity of fatherhood +beside the sanctity of motherhood, and introduce this also among the +things that can be spoken of without either a blush or a wink. But the +Philistines have been too strong; and, to say truth, Whitman has rather +played the fool. We may be thoroughly conscious that his end is +improving; that it would be a good thing if a window were opened on these +close privacies of life; that on this subject, as on all others, he now +and then lets fall a pregnant saying. But we are not satisfied. We feel +that he was not the man for so difficult an enterprise. He loses our +sympathy in the character of a poet by attracting too much of our +attention in that of a Bull in a China Shop. And where, by a little more +art, we might have been solemnised ourselves, it is too often Whitman +alone who is solemn in the face of an audience somewhat indecorously +amused. + + + +VI. + + +Lastly, as most important, after all, to human beings in our disputable +state, what is that higher prudence which was to be the aim and issue of +these deliberate productions? + +Whitman is too clever to slip into a succinct formula. If he could have +adequately said his say in a single proverb, it is to be presumed he +would not have put himself to the trouble of writing several volumes. It +was his programme to state as much as he could of the world with all its +contradictions, and leave the upshot with God who planned it. What he +has made of the world and the world’s meanings is to be found at large in +his poems. These altogether give his answers to the problems of belief +and conduct; in many ways righteous and high-spirited, in some ways loose +and contradictory. And yet there are two passages from the preface to +the _Leaves of Grass_ which do pretty well condense his teaching on all +essential points, and yet preserve a measure of his spirit. + + “This is what you shall do,” he says in the one, “love the earth, and + sun, and animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, + stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labour to + others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and + indulgence towards 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 mothers of families, read + these leaves (his own works) 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, and dismiss whatever insults your own soul.” + + “The prudence of the greatest poet,” he adds in the other—and the + greatest poet is, of course, himself—“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 it + 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 long-lived things, + and favours body and soul the same, and perceives the indirect surely + 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 nor avoids death.” + +There is much that is Christian in these extracts, startlingly Christian. +Any reader who bears in mind Whitman’s own advice and “dismisses whatever +insults his own soul” will find plenty that is bracing, brightening, and +chastening to reward him for a little patience at first. It seems hardly +possible that any being should get evil from so healthy a book as the +_Leaves of Grass_, which is simply comical wherever it falls short of +nobility; but if there be any such, who cannot both take and leave, who +cannot let a single opportunity pass by without some unworthy and unmanly +thought, I should have as great difficulty, and neither more nor less, in +recommending the works of Whitman as in lending them Shakespeare, or +letting them go abroad outside of the grounds of a private asylum. + + + + +HENRY DAVID THOREAU: +HIS CHARACTER AND OPINIONS. + + +I. + + +THOREAU’S thin, penetrating, big-nosed face, even in a bad woodcut, +conveys some hint of the limitations of his mind and character. With his +almost acid sharpness of insight, with his almost animal dexterity in +act, there went none of that large, unconscious geniality of the world’s +heroes. He was not easy, not ample, not urbane, not even kind; his +enjoyment was hardly smiling, or the smile was not broad enough to be +convincing; he had no waste lands nor kitchen-midden in his nature, but +was all improved and sharpened to a point. “He was bred to no +profession,” says Emerson; “he never married; he lived alone; he never +went to church; he never voted; he refused to pay a tax to the State; he +ate no flesh, he drank no wine, he never knew the use of tobacco and, +though a naturalist, he used neither trap nor gun. When asked at dinner +what dish he preferred, he answered, ‘the nearest.’” So many negative +superiorities begin to smack a little of the prig. From his later works +he was in the habit of cutting out the humorous passages, under the +impression that they were beneath the dignity of his moral muse; and +there we see the prig stand public and confessed. It was “much easier,” +says Emerson acutely, much easier for Thoreau to say _no_ than _yes_; and +that is a characteristic which depicts the man. It is a useful +accomplishment to be able to say _no_, but surely it is the essence of +amiability to prefer to say _yes_ where it is possible. There is +something wanting in the man who does not hate himself whenever he is +constrained to say no. And there was a great deal wanting in this born +dissenter. He was almost shockingly devoid of weaknesses; he had not +enough of them to be truly polar with humanity; whether you call him +demi-god or demi-man, he was at least not altogether one of us, for he +was not touched with a feeling of our infirmities. The world’s heroes +have room for all positive qualities, even those which are disreputable, +in the capacious theatre of their dispositions. Such can live many +lives; while a Thoreau can live but one, and that only with perpetual +foresight. + +He was no ascetic, rather an Epicurean of the nobler sort; and he had +this one great merit, that he succeeded so far as to be happy. “I love +my fate to the core and rind,” he wrote once; and even while he lay +dying, here is what he dictated (for it seems he was already too feeble +to control the pen): “You ask particularly after my health. I _suppose_ +that I have not many months to live, but of course know nothing about it. +I may say that I am enjoying existence as much as ever, and regret +nothing.” It is not given to all to bear so clear a testimony to the +sweetness of their fate, nor to any without courage and wisdom; for this +world in itself is but a painful and uneasy place of residence, and +lasting happiness, at least to the self-conscious, comes only from +within. Now Thoreau’s content and ecstasy in living was, we may say, +like a plant that he had watered and tended with womanish solicitude; for +there is apt to be something unmanly, something almost dastardly, in a +life that does not move with dash and freedom, and that fears the bracing +contact of the world. In one word, Thoreau was a skulker. He did not +wish virtue to go out of him among his fellow-men, but slunk into a +corner to hoard it for himself. He left all for the sake of certain +virtuous self-indulgences. It is true that his tastes were noble; that +his ruling passion was to keep himself unspotted from the world; and that +his luxuries were all of the same healthy order as cold tubs and early +rising. But a man may be both coldly cruel in the pursuit of goodness, +and morbid even in the pursuit of health. I cannot lay my hands on the +passage in which he explains his abstinence from tea and coffee, but I am +sure I have the meaning correctly. It is this; He thought it bad economy +and worthy of no true virtuoso to spoil the natural rapture of the +morning with such muddy stimulants; let him but see the sun rise, and he +was already sufficiently inspirited for the labours of the day. That may +be reason good enough to abstain from tea; but when we go on to find the +same man, on the same or similar grounds, abstain from nearly everything +that his neighbours innocently and pleasurably use, and from the rubs and +trials of human society itself into the bargain, we recognise that +valetudinarian healthfulness which is more delicate than sickness itself. +We need have no respect for a state of artificial training. True health +is to be able to do without it. Shakespeare, we can imagine, might begin +the day upon a quart of ale, and yet enjoy the sunrise to the full as +much as Thoreau, and commemorate his enjoyment in vastly better verses. +A man who must separate himself from his neighbours’ habits in order to +be happy, is in much the same case with one who requires to take opium +for the same purpose. What we want to see is one who can breast into the +world, do a man’s work, and still preserve his first and pure enjoyment +of existence. + +Thoreau’s faculties were of a piece with his moral shyness; for they were +all delicacies. He could guide himself about the woods on the darkest +night by the touch of his feet. He could pick up at once an exact dozen +of pencils by the feeling, pace distances with accuracy, and gauge cubic +contents by the eye. His smell was so dainty that he could perceive the +fœtor of dwelling-houses as he passed them by at night; his palate so +unsophisticated that, like a child, he disliked the taste of wine—or +perhaps, living in America, had never tasted any that was good; and his +knowledge of nature was so complete and curious that he could have told +the time of year, within a day or so, by the aspect of the plants. In +his dealings with animals, he was the original of Hawthorne’s Donatello. +He pulled the woodchuck out of its hole by the tail; the hunted fox came +to him for protection; wild squirrels have been seen to nestle in his +waistcoat; he would thrust his arm into a pool and bring forth a bright, +panting fish, lying undismayed in the palm of his hand. There were few +things that he could not do. He could make a house, a boat, a pencil, or +a book. He was a surveyor, a scholar, a natural historian. He could +run, walk, climb, skate, swim, and manage a boat. The smallest occasion +served to display his physical accomplishment; and a manufacturer, from +merely observing his dexterity with the window of a railway carriage, +offered him a situation on the spot. “The only fruit of much living,” he +observes, “is the ability to do some slight thing better.” But such was +the exactitude of his senses, so alive was he in every fibre, that it +seems as if the maxim should be changed in his case, for he could do most +things with unusual perfection. And perhaps he had an approving eye to +himself when he wrote: “Though the youth at last grows indifferent, the +laws of the universe are not indifferent, _but are for ever on the side +of the most sensitive_.” + + + +II. + + +Thoreau had decided, it would seem, from the very first to lead a life of +self-improvement: the needle did not tremble as with richer natures, but +pointed steadily north; and as he saw duty and inclination in one, he +turned all his strength in that direction. He was met upon the threshold +by a common difficulty. In this world, in spite of its many agreeable +features, even the most sensitive must undergo some drudgery to live. It +is not possible to devote your time to study and meditation without what +are quaintly but happily denominated private means; these absent, a man +must contrive to earn his bread by some service to the public such as the +public cares to pay him for; or, as Thoreau loved to put it, Apollo must +serve Admetus. This was to Thoreau even a sourer necessity than it is to +most; there was a love of freedom, a strain of the wild man, in his +nature, that rebelled with violence against the yoke of custom; and he +was so eager to cultivate himself and to be happy in his own society, +that he could consent with difficulty even to the interruptions of +friendship. “_Such are my engagements to myself_ that I dare not +promise,” he once wrote in answer to an invitation; and the italics are +his own. Marcus Aurelius found time to study virtue, and between whiles +to conduct the imperial affairs of Rome; but Thoreau is so busy improving +himself, that he must think twice about a morning call. And now imagine +him condemned for eight hours a day to some uncongenial and unmeaning +business! He shrank from the very look of the mechanical in life; all +should, if possible, be sweetly spontaneous and swimmingly progressive. +Thus he learned to make lead-pencils, and, when he had gained the best +certificate and his friends began to congratulate him on his +establishment in life, calmly announced that he should never make +another. “Why should I?” said he “I would not do again what I have done +once.” For when a thing has once been done as well as it wants to be, it +is of no further interest to the self-improver. Yet in after years, and +when it became needful to support his family, he returned patiently to +this mechanical art—a step more than worthy of himself. + +The pencils seem to have been Apollo’s first experiment in the service of +Admetus; but others followed. “I have thoroughly tried school-keeping,” +he writes, “and found that my expenses were in proportion, or rather out +of proportion, to my income; for I was obliged to dress and train, not to +say think and believe, accordingly, and I lost my time into the bargain. +As I did not teach for the benefit of my fellow-men, but simply for a +livelihood, this was a failure. I have tried trade, but I found that it +would take ten years to get under way in that, and that then I should +probably be on my way to the devil.” Nothing, indeed, can surpass his +scorn for all so-called business. Upon that subject gall squirts from +him at a touch. “The whole enterprise of this nation is not illustrated +by a thought,” he writes; “it is not warmed by a sentiment; there is +nothing in it for which a man should lay down his life, nor even his +gloves.” And again: “If our merchants did not most of them fail, and the +banks too, my faith in the old laws of this world would be staggered. +The statement that ninety-six in a hundred doing such business surely +break down is perhaps the sweetest fact that statistics have revealed.” +The wish was probably father to the figures; but there is something +enlivening in a hatred of so genuine a brand, hot as Corsican revenge, +and sneering like Voltaire. + +Pencils, school-keeping, and trade being thus discarded one after +another, Thoreau, with a stroke of strategy, turned the position. He saw +his way to get his board and lodging for practically nothing; and Admetus +never got less work out of any servant since the world began. It was his +ambition to be an oriental philosopher; but he was always a very Yankee +sort of oriental. Even in the peculiar attitude in which he stood to +money, his system of personal economics, as we may call it, he displayed +a vast amount of truly down-East calculation, and he adopted poverty like +a piece of business. Yet his system is based on one or two ideas which, +I believe, come naturally to all thoughtful youths, and are only pounded +out of them by city uncles. Indeed, something essentially youthful +distinguishes all Thoreau’s knock-down blows at current opinion. Like +the posers of a child, they leave the orthodox in a kind of speechless +agony. These know the thing is nonsense. They are sure there must be an +answer, yet somehow cannot find it. So it is with his system of economy. +He cuts through the subject on so new a plane that the accepted arguments +apply no longer; he attacks it in a new dialect where there are no +catchwords ready made for the defender; after you have been boxing for +years on a polite, gladiatorial convention, here is an assailant who does +not scruple to hit below the belt. + +“The cost of a thing,” says he, “is _the amount of what I will call life_ +which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long +run.” I have been accustomed to put it to myself, perhaps more clearly, +that the price we have to pay for money is paid in liberty. Between +these two ways of it, at least, the reader will probably not fail to find +a third definition of his own; and it follows, on one or other, that a +man may pay too dearly for his livelihood, by giving, in Thoreau’s terms, +his whole life for it, or, in mine, bartering for it the whole of his +available liberty, and becoming a slave till death. There are two +questions to be considered—the quality of what we buy, and the price we +have to pay for it. Do you want a thousand a year, a two thousand a +year, or a ten thousand a year livelihood? and can you afford the one you +want? It is a matter of taste; it is not in the least degree a question +of duty, though commonly supposed so. But there is no authority for that +view anywhere. It is nowhere in the Bible. It is true that we might do +a vast amount of good if we were wealthy, but it is also highly +improbable; not many do; and the art of growing rich is not only quite +distinct from that of doing good, but the practice of the one does not at +all train a man for practising the other. “Money might be of great +service to me,” writes Thoreau; “but the difficulty now is that I do not +improve my opportunities, and therefore I am not prepared to have my +opportunities increased.” It is a mere illusion that, above a certain +income, the personal desires will be satisfied and leave a wider margin +for the generous impulse. It is as difficult to be generous, or anything +else, except perhaps a member of Parliament, on thirty thousand as on two +hundred a year. + +Now Thoreau’s tastes were well defined. He loved to be free, to be +master of his times and seasons, to indulge the mind rather than the +body; he preferred long rambles to rich dinners, his own reflections to +the consideration of society, and an easy, calm, unfettered, active life +among green trees to dull toiling at the counter of a bank. And such +being his inclination he determined to gratify it. A poor man must save +off something; he determined to save off his livelihood. “When a man has +attained those things which are necessary to life,” he writes, “there is +another alternative than to obtain the superfluities; _he may adventure +on life now_, his vacation from humbler toil having commenced.” Thoreau +would get shelter, some kind of covering for his body, and necessary +daily bread; even these he should get as cheaply as possible; and then, +his vacation from humbler toil having commenced, devote himself to +oriental philosophers, the study of nature, and the work of +self-improvement. + +Prudence, which bids us all go to the ant for wisdom and hoard against +the day of sickness, was not a favourite with Thoreau. He preferred that +other, whose name is so much misappropriated: Faith. When he had secured +the necessaries of the moment, he would not reckon up possible accidents +or torment himself with trouble for the future. He had no toleration for +the man “who ventures to live only by the aid of the mutual insurance +company, which has promised to bury him decently.” He would trust +himself a little to the world. “We may safely trust a good deal more +than we do,” says he. “How much is not done by us! or what if we had +been taken sick?” And then, with a stab of satire, he describes +contemporary mankind in a phrase: “All the day long on the alert, at +night we unwillingly say our prayers and commit ourselves to +uncertainties.” It is not likely that the public will be much affected +by Thoreau, when they blink the direct injunctions of the religion they +profess; and yet, whether we will or no, we make the same hazardous +ventures; we back our own health and the honesty of our neighbours for +all that we are worth; and it is chilling to think how many must lose +their wager. + +In 1845, twenty-eight years old, an age by which the liveliest have +usually declined into some conformity with the world, Thoreau, with a +capital of something less than five pounds and a borrowed axe, walked +forth into the woods by Walden Pond, and began his new experiment in +life. He built himself a dwelling, and returned the axe, he says with +characteristic and workman-like pride, sharper than when he borrowed it; +he reclaimed a patch, where he cultivated beans, peas, potatoes, and +sweet corn; he had his bread to bake, his farm to dig, and for the matter +of six weeks in the summer he worked at surveying, carpentry, or some +other of his numerous dexterities, for hire. + +For more than five years, this was all that he required to do for his +support, and he had the winter and most of the summer at his entire +disposal. For six weeks of occupation, a little cooking and a little +gentle hygienic gardening, the man, you may say, had as good as stolen +his livelihood. Or we must rather allow that he had done far better; for +the thief himself is continually and busily occupied; and even one born +to inherit a million will have more calls upon his time than Thoreau. +Well might he say, “What old people tell you you cannot do, you try and +find you can.” And how surprising is his conclusion: “I am convinced +that _to maintain oneself on this earth is not a hardship_, _but a +pastime_, if we will live simply and wisely; _as the pursuits of simpler +nations are still the sports of the more artificial_.” + +When he had enough of that kind of life, he showed the same simplicity in +giving it up as in beginning it. There are some who could have done the +one, but, vanity forbidding, not the other; and that is perhaps the story +of the hermits; but Thoreau made no fetish of his own example, and did +what he wanted squarely. And five years is long enough for an experiment +and to prove the success of transcendental Yankeeism. It is not his +frugality which is worthy of note; for, to begin with, that was inborn, +and therefore inimitable by others who are differently constituted; and +again, it was no new thing, but has often been equalled by poor Scotch +students at the universities. The point is the sanity of his view of +life, and the insight with which he recognised the position of money, and +thought out for himself the problem of riches and a livelihood. Apart +from his eccentricities, he had perceived, and was acting on, a truth of +universal application. For money enters in two different characters into +the scheme of life. A certain amount, varying with the number and empire +of our desires, is a true necessary to each one of us in the present +order of society; but beyond that amount, money is a commodity to be +bought or not to be bought, a luxury in which we may either indulge or +stint ourselves, like any other. And there are many luxuries that we may +legitimately prefer to it, such as a grateful conscience, a country life, +or the woman of our inclination. Trite, flat, and obvious as this +conclusion may appear, we have only to look round us in society to see +how scantily it has been recognised; and perhaps even ourselves, after a +little reflection, may decide to spend a trifle less for money, and +indulge ourselves a trifle more in the article of freedom. + + + +III. + + +“To have done anything by which you earned money merely,” says Thoreau, +“is to be” (have been, he means) “idle and worse.” There are two +passages in his letters, both, oddly enough, relating to firewood, which +must be brought together to be rightly understood. So taken, they +contain between them the marrow of all good sense on the subject of work +in its relation to something broader than mere livelihood. Here is the +first: “I suppose I have burned up a good-sized tree to-night—and for +what? I settled with Mr. Tarbell for it the other day; but that wasn’t +the final settlement. I got off cheaply from him. At last one will say: +‘Let us see, how much wood did you burn, sir?’ And I shall shudder to +think that the next question will be, ‘What did you do while you were +warm?’” Even after we have settled with Admetus in the person of Mr. +Tarbell, there comes, you see, a further question. It is not enough to +have earned our livelihood. Either the earning itself should have been +serviceable to mankind, or something else must follow. To live is +sometimes very difficult, but it is never meritorious in itself; and we +must have a reason to allege to our own conscience why we should continue +to exist upon this crowded earth. + +If Thoreau had simply dwelt in his house at Walden, a lover of trees, +birds, and fishes, and the open air and virtue, a reader of wise books, +an idle, selfish self-improver, he would have managed to cheat Admetus, +but, to cling to metaphor, the devil would have had him in the end. +Those who can avoid toil altogether and dwell in the Arcadia of private +means, and even those who can, by abstinence, reduce the necessary amount +of it to some six weeks a year, having the more liberty, have only the +higher moral obligation to be up and doing in the interest of man. + +The second passage is this: “There is a far more important and warming +heat, commonly lost, which precedes the burning of the wood. It is the +smoke of industry, which is incense. I had been so thoroughly warmed in +body and spirit, that when at length my fuel was housed, I came near +selling it to the ashman, as if I had extracted all its heat.” Industry +is, in itself and when properly chosen, delightful and profitable to the +worker; and when your toil has been a pleasure, you have not, as Thoreau +says, “earned money merely,” but money, health, delight, and moral +profit, all in one. “We must heap up a great pile of doing for a small +diameter of being,” he says in another place; and then exclaims, “How +admirably the artist is made to accomplish his self-culture by devotion +to his art!” We may escape uncongenial toil, only to devote ourselves to +that which is congenial. It is only to transact some higher business +that even Apollo dare play the truant from Admetus. We must all work for +the sake of work; we must all work, as Thoreau says again, in any +“absorbing pursuit—it does not much matter what, so it be honest;” but +the most profitable work is that which combines into one continued effort +the largest proportion of the powers and desires of a man’s nature; that +into which he will plunge with ardour, and from which he will desist with +reluctance; in which he will know the weariness of fatigue, but not that +of satiety; and which will be ever fresh, pleasing, and stimulating to +his taste. Such work holds a man together, braced at all points; it does +not suffer him to doze or wander; it keeps him actively conscious of +himself, yet raised among superior interests; it gives him the profit of +industry with the pleasures of a pastime. This is what his art should be +to the true artist, and that to a degree unknown in other and less +intimate pursuits. For other professions stand apart from the human +business of life; but an art has its seat at the centre of the artist’s +doings and sufferings, deals directly with his experiences, teaches him +the lessons of his own fortunes and mishaps, and becomes a part of his +biography. So says Goethe: + + “Spät erklingt was früh erklang; + Glück und Unglück wird Gesang.” + +Now Thoreau’s art was literature; and it was one of which he had +conceived most ambitiously. He loved and believed in good books. He +said well, “Life is not habitually seen from any common platform so truly +and unexaggerated as in the light of literature.” But the literature he +loved was of the heroic order. “Books, not which afford us a cowering +enjoyment, but in which each thought is of unusual daring; such as an +idle man cannot read, and a timid one would not be entertained by, which +even make us dangerous to existing institutions—such I call good books.” +He did not think them easy to be read. “The heroic books,” he says, +“even if printed in the character of our mother-tongue, will always be in +a language dead to degenerate times; and we must laboriously seek the +meaning of each word and line, conjecturing a larger sense than common +use permits out of what wisdom and valour and generosity we have.” Nor +does he suppose that such books are easily written. “Great prose, of +equal elevation, commands our respect more than great verse,” says he, +“since it implies a more permanent and level height, a life more pervaded +with the grandeur of the thought. The poet often only makes an +irruption, like the Parthian, and is off again, shooting while he +retreats; but the prose writer has conquered like a Roman and settled +colonies.” We may ask ourselves, almost with dismay, whether such works +exist at all but in the imagination of the student. For the bulk of the +best of books is apt to be made up with ballast; and those in which +energy of thought is combined with any stateliness of utterance may be +almost counted on the fingers. Looking round in English for a book that +should answer Thoreau’s two demands of a style like poetry and sense that +shall be both original and inspiriting, I come to Milton’s +_Areopagitica_, and can name no other instance for the moment. Two +things at least are plain: that if a man will condescend to nothing more +commonplace in the way of reading, he must not look to have a large +library; and that if he proposes himself to write in a similar vein, he +will find his work cut out for him. + +Thoreau composed seemingly while he walked, or at least exercise and +composition were with him intimately connected; for we are told that “the +length of his walk uniformly made the length of his writing.” He speaks +in one place of “plainness and vigour, the ornaments of style,” which is +rather too paradoxical to be comprehensively, true. + +In another he remarks: “As for style of writing, if one has anything to +say it drops from him simply as a stone falls to the ground.” We must +conjecture a very large sense indeed for the phrase “if one has anything +to say.” When truth flows from a man, fittingly clothed in style and +without conscious effort, it is because the effort has been made and the +work practically completed before he sat down to write. It is only out +of fulness of thinking that expression drops perfect like a ripe fruit; +and when Thoreau wrote so nonchalantly at his desk, it was because he had +been vigorously active during his walk. For neither clearness +compression, nor beauty of language, come to any living creature till +after a busy and a prolonged acquaintance with the subject on hand. Easy +writers are those who, like Walter Scott, choose to remain contented with +a less degree of perfection than is legitimately within the compass of +their powers. We hear of Shakespeare and his clean manuscript; but in +face of the evidence of the style itself and of the various editions of +_Hamlet_, this merely proves that Messrs. Hemming and Condell were +unacquainted with the common enough phenomenon called a fair copy. He +who would recast a tragedy already given to the world must frequently and +earnestly have revised details in the study. Thoreau himself, and in +spite of his protestations, is an instance of even extreme research in +one direction; and his effort after heroic utterance is proved not only +by the occasional finish, but by the determined exaggeration of his +style. “I trust you realise what an exaggerator I am—that I lay myself +out to exaggerate,” he writes. And again, hinting at the explanation: +“Who that has heard a strain of music feared lest he should speak +extravagantly any more for ever?” And yet once more, in his essay on +Carlyle, and this time with his meaning well in hand: “No truth, we +think, was ever expressed but with this sort of emphasis, that for the +time there seemed to be no other.” Thus Thoreau was an exaggerative and +a parabolical writer, not because he loved the literature of the East, +but from a desire that people should understand and realise what he was +writing. He was near the truth upon the general question; but in his own +particular method, it appears to me, he wandered. Literature is not less +a conventional art than painting or sculpture; and it is the least +striking, as it is the most comprehensive of the three. To hear a strain +of music to see a beautiful woman, a river, a great city, or a starry +night, is to make a man despair of his Lilliputian arts in language. +Now, to gain that emphasis which seems denied to us by the very nature of +the medium, the proper method of literature is by selection, which is a +kind of negative exaggeration. It is the right of the literary artist, +as Thoreau was on the point of seeing, to leave out whatever does not +suit his purpose. Thus we extract the pure gold; and thus the +well-written story of a noble life becomes, by its very omissions, more +thrilling to the reader. But to go beyond this, like Thoreau, and to +exaggerate directly, is to leave the saner classical tradition, and to +put the reader on his guard. And when you write the whole for the half, +you do not express your thought more forcibly, but only express a +different thought which is not yours. + +Thoreau’s true subject was the pursuit of self-improvement combined with +an unfriendly criticism of life as it goes on in our societies; it is +there that he best displays the freshness and surprising trenchancy of +his intellect; it is there that his style becomes plain and vigorous, and +therefore, according to his own formula, ornamental. Yet he did not care +to follow this vein singly, but must drop into it by the way in books of +a different purport. _Walden_, _or Life in the Woods_, _A Week on the +Concord and Merrimack Rivers_, _The Maine Woods_,—such are the titles he +affects. He was probably reminded by his delicate critical perception +that the true business of literature is with narrative; in reasoned +narrative, and there alone, that art enjoys all its advantages, and +suffers least from its defects. Dry precept and disembodied +disquisition, as they can only be read with an effort of abstraction, can +never convey a perfectly complete or a perfectly natural impression. +Truth, even in literature, must be clothed with flesh and blood, or it +cannot tell its whole story to the reader. Hence the effect of anecdote +on simple minds; and hence good biographies and works of high, +imaginative art, are not only far more entertaining, but far more +edifying, than books of theory or precept. Now Thoreau could not clothe +his opinions in the garment of art, for that was not his talent; but he +sought to gain the same elbow-room for himself, and to afford a similar +relief to his readers, by mingling his thoughts with a record of +experience. + +Again, he was a lover of nature. The quality which we should call +mystery in a painting, and which belongs so particularly to the aspect of +the external world and to its influence upon our feelings, was one which +he was never weary of attempting to reproduce in his books. The seeming +significance of nature’s appearances, their unchanging strangeness to the +senses, and the thrilling response which they waken in the mind of man, +continued to surprise and stimulate his spirits. It appeared to him, I +think, that if we could only write near enough to the facts, and yet with +no pedestrian calm, but ardently, we might transfer the glamour of +reality direct upon our pages; and that, if it were once thus captured +and expressed, a new and instructive relation might appear between men’s +thoughts and the phenomena of nature. This was the eagle that he pursued +all his life long, like a schoolboy with a butterfly net. Hear him to a +friend: “Let me suggest a theme for you—to state to yourself precisely +and completely what that walk over the mountains amounted to for you, +returning to this essay again and again until you are satisfied that all +that was important in your experience is in it. Don’t suppose that you +can tell it precisely the first dozen times you try, but at ’em again; +especially when, after a sufficient pause you suspect that you are +touching the heart or summit of the matter, reiterate your blows there, +and account for the mountain to yourself. Not that the story need be +long, but it will take a long while to make it short.” Such was the +method, not consistent for a man whose meanings were to “drop from him as +a stone falls to the ground.” Perhaps the most successful work that +Thoreau ever accomplished in this direction is to be found in the +passages relating to fish in the _Week_. These are remarkable for a +vivid truth of impression and a happy suitability of language, not +frequently surpassed. + +Whatever Thoreau tried to do was tried in fair, square prose, with +sentences solidly built, and no help from bastard rhythms. Moreover, +there is a progression—I cannot call it a progress—in his work towards a +more and more strictly prosaic level, until at last he sinks into the +bathos of the prosy. Emerson mentions having once remarked to Thoreau: +“Who would not like to write something which all can read, like _Robinson +Crusoe_? and who does not see with regret that his page is not solid with +a right materialistic treatment which delights everybody?” I must say in +passing that it is not the right materialistic treatment which delights +the world in _Robinson_, but the romantic and philosophic interest of the +fable. The same treatment does quite the reverse of delighting us when +it is applied, in _Colonel Jack_, to the management of a plantation. But +I cannot help suspecting Thoreau to have been influenced either by this +identical remark or by some other closely similar in meaning. He began +to fall more and more into a detailed materialistic treatment; he went +into the business doggedly, as one who should make a guide-book; he not +only chronicled what had been important in his own experience, but +whatever might have been important in the experience of anybody else; not +only what had affected him, but all that he saw or heard. His ardour had +grown less, or perhaps it was inconsistent with a right materialistic +treatment to display such emotions as he felt; and, to complete the +eventful change, he chose, from a sense of moral dignity, to gut these +later works of the saving quality of humour. He was not one of those +authors who have learned, in his own words, “to leave out their dulness.” +He inflicts his full quantity upon the reader in such books as _Cape +Cod_, or _The Yankee in Canada_. Of the latter he confessed that he had +not managed to get much of himself into it. Heaven knows he had not, nor +yet much of Canada, we may hope. “Nothing,” he says somewhere, “can +shock a brave man but dulness.” Well, there are few spots more shocking +to the brave than the pages of _The Yankee in Canada_. + +There are but three books of his that will be read with much pleasure: +the _Week_, _Walden_, and the collected letters. As to his poetry, +Emerson’s word shall suffice for us, it is so accurate and so prettily +said: “The thyme and majoram are not yet honey.” In this, as in his +prose, he relied greatly on the goodwill of the reader, and wrote +throughout in faith. It was an exercise of faith to suppose that many +would understand the sense of his best work, or that any could be +exhilarated by the dreary chronicling of his worst. “But,” as he says, +“the gods do not hear any rude or discordant sound, as we learn from the +echo; and I know that the nature towards which I launch these sounds is +so rich that it will modulate anew and wonderfully improve my rudest +strain.” + + + +IV. + + +“What means the fact,” he cries, “that a soul which has lost all hope for +itself can inspire in another listening soul such an infinite confidence +in it, even while it is expressing its despair?” The question is an echo +and an illustration of the words last quoted; and it forms the key-note +of his thoughts on friendship. No one else, to my knowledge, has spoken +in so high and just a spirit of the kindly relations; and I doubt whether +it be a drawback that these lessons should come from one in many ways so +unfitted to be a teacher in this branch. The very coldness and egoism of +his own intercourse gave him a clearer insight into the intellectual +basis of our warm, mutual tolerations; and testimony to their worth comes +with added force from one who was solitary and disobliging, and of whom a +friend remarked, with equal wit and wisdom, “I love Henry, but I cannot +like him.” + +He can hardly be persuaded to make any distinction between love and +friendship; in such rarefied and freezing air, upon the mountain-tops of +meditation, had he taught himself to breathe. He was, indeed, too +accurate an observer not to have remarked that “there exists already a +natural disinterestedness and liberality” between men and women; yet, he +thought, “friendship is no respecter of sex.” Perhaps there is a sense +in which the words are true; but they were spoken in ignorance; and +perhaps we shall have put the matter most correctly, if we call love a +foundation for a nearer and freer degree of friendship than can be +possible without it. For there are delicacies, eternal between persons +of the same sex, which are melted and disappear in the warmth of love. + +To both, if they are to be right, he attributes the same nature and +condition. “We are not what we are,” says he, “nor do we treat or esteem +each other for such, but for what we are capable of being.” “A friend is +one who incessantly pays us the compliment of expecting all the virtues +from us, and who can appreciate them in us.” “The friend asks no return +but that his friend will religiously accept and wear and not disgrace his +apotheosis of him.” “It is the merit and preservation of friendship that +it takes place on a level higher than the actual characters of the +parties would seem to warrant.” This is to put friendship on a pedestal +indeed; and yet the root of the matter is there; and the last sentence, +in particular, is like a light in a dark place, and makes many mysteries +plain. We are different with different friends; yet if we look closely +we shall find that every such relation reposes on some particular +apotheosis of oneself; with each friend, although we could not +distinguish it in words from any other, we have at least one special +reputation to preserve: and it is thus that we run, when mortified, to +our friend or the woman that we love, not to hear ourselves called +better, but to be better men in point of fact. We seek this society to +flatter ourselves with our own good conduct. And hence any falsehood in +the relation, any incomplete or perverted understanding, will spoil even +the pleasure of these visits. Thus says Thoreau again: “Only lovers know +the value of truth.” And yet again: “They ask for words and deeds, when +a true relation is word and deed.” + +But it follows that since they are neither of them so good as the other +hopes, and each is, in a very honest manner, playing a part above his +powers, such an intercourse must often be disappointing to both. “We may +bid farewell sooner than complain,” says Thoreau, “for our complaint is +too well grounded to be uttered.” “We have not so good a right to hate +any as our friend.” + + “It were treason to our love + And a sin to God above, + One iota to abate + Of a pure, impartial hate.” + +Love is not blind, nor yet forgiving. “O yes, believe me,” as the song +says, “Love has eyes!” The nearer the intimacy, the more cuttingly do we +feel the unworthiness of those we love; and because you love one, and +would die for that love to-morrow, you have not forgiven, and you never +will forgive, that friend’s misconduct. If you want a person’s faults, +go to those who love him. They will not tell you, but they know. And +herein lies the magnanimous courage of love, that it endures this +knowledge without change. + +It required a cold, distant personality like that of Thoreau, perhaps, to +recognise and certainly to utter this truth; for a more human love makes +it a point of honour not to acknowledge those faults of which it is most +conscious. But his point of view is both high and dry. He has no +illusions; he does not give way to love any more than to hatred, but +preserves them both with care like valuable curiosities. A more +bald-headed picture of life, if I may so express myself, has seldom been +presented. He is an egoist; he does not remember, or does not think it +worth while to remark, that, in these near intimacies, we are ninety-nine +times disappointed in our beggarly selves for once that we are +disappointed in our friend; that it is we who seem most frequently +undeserving of the love that unites us; and that it is by our friend’s +conduct that we are continually rebuked and yet strengthened for a fresh +endeavour. Thoreau is dry, priggish, and selfish. It is profit he is +after in these intimacies; moral profit, certainly, but still profit to +himself. If you will be the sort of friend I want, he remarks naïvely, +“my education cannot dispense with your society.” His education! as +though a friend were a dictionary. And with all this, not one word about +pleasure, or laughter, or kisses, or any quality of flesh and blood. It +was not inappropriate, surely, that he had such close relations with the +fish. We can understand the friend already quoted, when he cried: “As +for taking his arm, I would as soon think of taking the arm of an +elm-tree!” + +As a matter of fact he experienced but a broken enjoyment in his +intimacies. He says he has been perpetually on the brink of the sort of +intercourse he wanted, and yet never completely attained it. And what +else had he to expect when he would not, in a happy phrase of Carlyle’s, +“nestle down into it”? Truly, so it will be always if you only stroll in +upon your friends as you might stroll in to see a cricket match; and even +then not simply for the pleasure of the thing, but with some afterthought +of self-improvement, as though you had come to the cricket match to bet. +It was his theory that people saw each other too frequently, so that +their curiosity was not properly whetted, nor had they anything fresh to +communicate; but friendship must be something else than a society for +mutual improvement—indeed, it must only be that by the way, and to some +extent unconsciously; and if Thoreau had been a man instead of a manner +of elm-tree, he would have felt that he saw his friends too seldom, and +have reaped benefits unknown to his philosophy from a more sustained and +easy intercourse. We might remind him of his own words about love: “We +should have no reserve; we should give the whole of ourselves to that +business. But commonly men have not imagination enough to be thus +employed about a human being, but must be coopering a barrel, forsooth.” +Ay, or reading oriental philosophers. It is not the nature of the rival +occupation, it is the fact that you suffer it to be a rival, that renders +loving intimacy impossible. Nothing is given for nothing in this world; +there can be no true love, even on your own side, without devotion; +devotion is the exercise of love, by which it grows; but if you will give +enough of that, if you will pay the price in a sufficient “amount of what +you call life,” why then, indeed, whether with wife or comrade, you may +have months and even years of such easy, natural, pleasurable, and yet +improving intercourse as shall make time a moment and kindness a delight. + +The secret of his retirement lies not in misanthropy, of which he had no +tincture, but part in his engrossing design of self-improvement and part +in the real deficiencies of social intercourse. He was not so much +difficult about his fellow human beings as he could not tolerate the +terms of their association. He could take to a man for any genuine +qualities, as we see by his admirable sketch of the Canadian woodcutter +in _Walden_; but he would not consent, in his own words, to “feebly +fabulate and paddle in the social slush.” It seemed to him, I think, +that society is precisely the reverse of friendship, in that it takes +place on a lower level than the characters of any of the parties would +warrant us to expect. The society talk of even the most brilliant man is +of greatly less account than what you will get from him in (as the French +say) a little committee. And Thoreau wanted geniality; he had not enough +of the superficial, even at command; he could not swoop into a parlour +and, in the naval phrase, “cut out” a human being from that dreary port; +nor had he inclination for the task. I suspect he loved books and nature +as well and near as warmly as he loved his fellow-creatures,—a +melancholy, lean degeneration of the human character. + +“As for the dispute about solitude and society,” he thus sums up: “Any +comparison is impertinent. It is an idling down on the plain at the base +of the mountain instead of climbing steadily to its top. Of course you +will be glad of all the society you can get to go up with? Will you go +to glory with me? is the burden of the song. It is not that we love to +be alone, but that we love to soar, and when we do soar the company grows +thinner and thinner till there is none at all. It is either the tribune +on the plain, a sermon on the mount, or a very private ecstasy still +higher up. Use all the society that will abet you.” But surely it is no +very extravagant opinion that it is better to give than to receive, to +serve than to use our companions; and above all, where there is no +question of service upon either side, that it is good to enjoy their +company like a natural man. It is curious and in some ways dispiriting +that a writer may be always best corrected out of his own mouth; and so, +to conclude, here is another passage from Thoreau which seems aimed +directly at himself: “Do not be too moral; you may cheat yourself out of +much life so. . . . _All fables_, _indeed_, _have their morals_; _but +the innocent enjoy the story_.” + + + +V. + + +“The only obligation,” says he, “which I have a right to assume is to do +at any time what I think right.” “Why should we ever go abroad, even +across the way, to ask a neighbour’s advice?” “There is a nearer +neighbour within, who is incessantly telling us how we should behave. +_But we wait for the neighbour without to tell us of some false_, _easier +way_.” “The greater part of what my neighbours call good I believe in my +soul to be bad.” To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of +becoming, is the only end of life. It is “when we fall behind ourselves” +that “we are cursed with duties and the neglect of duties.” “I love the +wild,” he says, “not less than the good.” And again: “The life of a good +man will hardly improve us more than the life of a freebooter, for the +inevitable laws appear as plainly in the infringement as in the +observance, and” (mark this) “_our lives are sustained by a nearly equal +expense of virtue of some kind_.” Even although he were a prig, it will +be owned he could announce a startling doctrine. “As for doing good,” he +writes elsewhere, “that is one of the professions that are full. +Moreover, I have tried it fairly, and, strange as it may seem, am +satisfied that it does not agree with my constitution. Probably I should +not conscientiously and deliberately forsake my particular calling to do +the good which society demands of me, to save the universe from +annihilation; and I believe that a like but infinitely greater +steadfastness elsewhere is all that now preserves it. If you should ever +be betrayed into any of these philanthropies, do not let your left hand +know what your right hand does, for it is not worth knowing.” Elsewhere +he returns upon the subject, and explains his meaning thus: “If I ever +_did_ a man any good in their sense, of course it was something +exceptional and insignificant compared with the good or evil I am +constantly doing by being what I am.” + +There is a rude nobility, like that of a barbarian king, in this unshaken +confidence in himself and indifference to the wants, thoughts, or +sufferings of others. In his whole works I find no trace of pity. This +was partly the result of theory, for he held the world too mysterious to +be criticised, and asks conclusively: “What right have I to grieve who +have not ceased to wonder?” But it sprang still more from constitutional +indifference and superiority; and he grew up healthy, composed, and +unconscious from among life’s horrors, like a green bay-tree from a field +of battle. It was from this lack in himself that he failed to do justice +to the spirit of Christ; for while he could glean more meaning from +individual precepts than any score of Christians, yet he conceived life +in such a different hope, and viewed it with such contrary emotions, that +the sense and purport of the doctrine as a whole seems to have passed him +by or left him unimpressed. He could understand the idealism of the +Christian view, but he was himself so unaffectedly unhuman that he did +not recognise the human intention and essence of that teaching. Hence he +complained that Christ did not leave us a rule that was proper and +sufficient for this world, not having conceived the nature of the rule +that was laid down; for things of that character that are sufficiently +unacceptable become positively non-existent to the mind. But perhaps we +shall best appreciate the defect in Thoreau by seeing it supplied in the +case of Whitman. For the one, I feel confident, is the disciple of the +other; it is what Thoreau clearly whispered that Whitman so uproariously +bawls; it is the same doctrine, but with how immense a difference! the +same argument, but used to what a new conclusion! Thoreau had plenty of +humour until he tutored himself out of it, and so forfeited that best +birthright of a sensible man; Whitman, in that respect, seems to have +been sent into the world naked and unashamed; and yet by a strange +consummation, it is the theory of the former that is arid, abstract, and +claustral. Of these two philosophies so nearly identical at bottom, the +one pursues Self-improvement—a churlish, mangy dog; the other is up with +the morning, in the best of health, and following the nymph Happiness, +buxom, blithe, and debonair. Happiness, at least, is not solitary; it +joys to communicate; it loves others, for it depends on them for its +existence; it sanctions and encourages to all delights that are not +unkind in themselves; if it lived to a thousand, it would not make +excision of a single humorous passage; and while the self-improver +dwindles towards the prig, and, if he be not of an excellent constitution +may even grow deformed into an Obermann, the very name and appearance of +a happy man breathe of good-nature, and help the rest of us to live. + +In the case of Thoreau, so great a show of doctrine demands some outcome +in the field of action. If nothing were to be done but build a shanty +beside Walden Pond, we have heard altogether too much of these +declarations of independence. That the man wrote some books is nothing +to the purpose, for the same has been done in a suburban villa. That he +kept himself happy is perhaps a sufficient excuse, but it is +disappointing to the reader. We may be unjust, but when a man despises +commerce and philanthropy alike, and has views of good so soaring that he +must take himself apart from mankind for their cultivation, we will not +be content without some striking act. It was not Thoreau’s fault if he +were not martyred; had the occasion come, he would have made a noble +ending. As it is, he did once seek to interfere in the world’s course; +he made one practical appearance on the stage of affairs; and a strange +one it was, and strangely characteristic of the nobility and the +eccentricity of the man. It was forced on him by his calm but radical +opposition to negro slavery. “Voting for the right is doing nothing for +it,” he saw; “it is only expressing to men feebly your desire that it +should prevail.” For his part, he would not “for an instant recognise +that political organisation for _his_ government which is the _slave’s_ +government also.” “I do not hesitate to say,” he adds, “that those who +call themselves Abolitionists should at once effectually withdraw their +support, both in person and property, from the government of +Massachusetts.” That is what he did: in 1843 he ceased to pay the +poll-tax. The highway-tax he paid, for he said he was as desirous to be +a good neighbour as to be a bad subject; but no more poll-tax to the +State of Massachusetts. Thoreau had now seceded, and was a polity unto +himself; or, as he explains it with admirable sense, “In fact, I quietly +declare war with the State after my fashion, though I will still make +what use and get what advantage of her I can, as is usual in such cases.” +He was put in prison; but that was a part of his design. “Under a +government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is +also a prison. I know this well, that if one thousand, if one hundred, +if ten men whom I could name—ay, if _one_ HONEST man, in this State of +Massachusetts, _ceasing to hold slaves_, were actually to withdraw from +this copartnership, and be locked up in the county gaol therefor, it +would be the abolition of slavery in America. For it matters not how +small the beginning may seem to be; what is once well done is done for +ever.” Such was his theory of civil disobedience. + +And the upshot? A friend paid the tax for him; continued year by year to +pay it in the sequel; and Thoreau was free to walk the woods unmolested. +It was a _fiasco_, but to me it does not seem laughable; even those who +joined in the laughter at the moment would be insensibly affected by this +quaint instance of a good man’s horror for injustice. We may compute the +worth of that one night’s imprisonment as outweighing half a hundred +voters at some subsequent election: and if Thoreau had possessed as great +a power of persuasion as (let us say) Falstaff, if he had counted a party +however small, if his example had been followed by a hundred or by thirty +of his fellows, I cannot but believe it would have greatly precipitated +the era of freedom and justice. We feel the misdeeds of our country with +so little fervour, for we are not witnesses to the suffering they cause; +but when we see them wake an active horror in our fellow-man, when we see +a neighbour prefer to lie in prison rather than be so much as passively +implicated in their perpetration, even the dullest of us will begin to +realise them with a quicker pulse. + +Not far from twenty years later, when Captain John Brown was taken at +Harper’s Ferry, Thoreau was the first to come forward in his defence. +The committees wrote to him unanimously that his action was premature. +“I did not send to you for advice,” said he, “but to announce that I was +to speak.” I have used the word “defence;” in truth he did not seek to +defend him, even declared it would be better for the good cause that he +should die; but he praised his action as I think Brown would have liked +to hear it praised. + +Thus this singularly eccentric and independent mind, wedded to a +character of so much strength, singleness, and purity, pursued its own +path of self-improvement for more than half a century, part gymnosophist, +part backwoodsman; and thus did it come twice, though in a subaltern +attitude, into the field of political history. + + * * * * * + +NOTE.—For many facts in the above essay, among which I may mention the +incident of the squirrel, I am indebted to _Thoreau_: _His Life and +Aims_, by J. A. Page, or, as is well known, Dr. Japp. + + + + +YOSHIDA-TORAJIRO + + +THE name at the head of this page is probably unknown to the English +reader, and yet I think it should become a household word like that of +Garibaldi or John Brown. Some day soon, we may expect to hear more fully +the details of Yoshida’s history, and the degree of his influence in the +transformation of Japan; even now there must be Englishmen acquainted +with the subject, and perhaps the appearance of this sketch may elicit +something more complete and exact. I wish to say that I am not, rightly +speaking, the author of the present paper: I tell the story on the +authority of an intelligent Japanese gentleman, Mr. Taiso Masaki, who +told it me with an emotion that does honour to his heart; and though I +have taken some pains, and sent my notes to him to be corrected, this can +be no more than an imperfect outline. + +Yoshida-Torajiro was son to the hereditary military instructor of the +house of Choshu. The name you are to pronounce with an equality of +accent on the different syllables, almost as in French, the vowels as in +Italian, but the consonants in the English manner—except the _j_, which +has the French sound, or, as it has been cleverly proposed to write it, +the sound of _zh_. Yoshida was very learned in Chinese letters, or, as +we might say, in the classics, and in his father’s subject; fortification +was among his favourite studies, and he was a poet from his boyhood. He +was born to a lively and intelligent patriotism; the condition of Japan +was his great concern; and while he projected a better future, he lost no +opportunity of improving his knowledge of her present state. With this +end he was continually travelling in his youth, going on foot and +sometimes with three days’ provision on his back, in the brave, +self-helpful manner of all heroes. He kept a full diary while he was +thus upon his journeys, but it is feared that these notes have been +destroyed. If their value were in any respect such as we have reason to +expect from the man’s character, this would be a loss not easy to +exaggerate. It is still wonderful to the Japanese how far he contrived +to push these explorations; a cultured gentleman of that land and period +would leave a complimentary poem wherever he had been hospitably +entertained; and a friend of Mr. Masaki, who was likewise a great +wanderer, has found such traces of Yoshida’s passage in very remote +regions of Japan. + +Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no preparation is +thought necessary; but Yoshida considered otherwise, and he studied the +miseries of his fellow-countrymen with as much attention and research as +though he had been going to write a book instead of merely to propose a +remedy. To a man of his intensity and singleness, there is no question +but that this survey was melancholy in the extreme. His dissatisfaction +is proved by the eagerness with which he threw himself into the cause of +reform; and what would have discouraged another braced Yoshida for his +task. As he professed the theory of arms, it was firstly the defences of +Japan that occupied his mind. The external feebleness of that country +was then illustrated by the manners of overriding barbarians, and the +visits of big barbarian war ships: she was a country beleaguered. Thus +the patriotism of Yoshida took a form which may be said to have defeated +itself: he had it upon him to keep out these all-powerful foreigners, +whom it is now one of his chief merits to have helped to introduce; but a +man who follows his own virtuous heart will be always found in the end to +have been fighting for the best. One thing leads naturally to another in +an awakened mind, and that with an upward progress from effect to cause. +The power and knowledge of these foreigners were things inseparable; by +envying them their military strength, Yoshida came to envy them their +culture; from the desire to equal them in the first, sprang his desire to +share with them in the second; and thus he is found treating in the same +book of a new scheme to strengthen the defences of Kioto and of the +establishment, in the same city, of a university of foreign teachers. He +hoped, perhaps, to get the good of other lands without their evil; to +enable Japan to profit by the knowledge of the barbarians, and still keep +her inviolate with her own arts and virtues. But whatever was the +precise nature of his hope, the means by which it was to be accomplished +were both difficult and obvious. Some one with eyes and understanding +must break through the official cordon, escape into the new world, and +study this other civilisation on the spot. And who could be better +suited for the business? It was not without danger, but he was without +fear. It needed preparation and insight; and what had he done since he +was a child but prepare himself with the best culture of Japan, and +acquire in his excursions the power and habit of observing? + +He was but twenty-two, and already all this was clear in his mind, when +news reached Choshu that Commodore Perry was lying near to Yeddo. Here, +then, was the patriot’s opportunity. Among the Samurai of Choshu, and in +particular among the councillors of the Daimio, his general culture, his +views, which the enlightened were eager to accept, and, above all, the +prophetic charm, the radiant persuasion of the man, had gained him many +and sincere disciples. He had thus a strong influence at the provincial +Court; and so he obtained leave to quit the district, and, by way of a +pretext, a privilege to follow his profession in Yeddo. Thither he +hurried, and arrived in time to be too late: Perry had weighed anchor, +and his sails had vanished from the waters of Japan. But Yoshida, having +put his hand to the plough, was not the man to go back; he had entered +upon this business, and, please God, he would carry it through; and so he +gave up his professional career and remained in Yeddo to be at hand +against the next opportunity. By this behaviour he put himself into an +attitude towards his superior, the Daimio of Choshu, which I cannot +thoroughly explain. Certainly, he became a _Ronyin_, a broken man, a +feudal outlaw; certainly he was liable to be arrested if he set foot upon +his native province; yet I am cautioned that “he did not really break his +allegiance,” but only so far separated himself as that the prince could +no longer be held accountable for his late vassal’s conduct. There is +some nicety of feudal custom here that escapes my comprehension. + +In Yeddo, with this nondescript political status, and cut off from any +means of livelihood, he was joyfully supported by those who sympathised +with his design. One was Sákuma-Shozan, hereditary retainer of one of +the Shogun’s councillors, and from him he got more than money or than +money’s worth. A steady, respectable man, with an eye to the world’s +opinion, Sákuma was one of those who, if they cannot do great deeds in +their own person, have yet an ardour of admiration for those who can, +that recommends them to the gratitude of history. They aid and abet +greatness more, perhaps, than we imagine. One thinks of them in +connection with Nicodemus, who visited our Lord by night. And Sákuma was +in a position to help Yoshida more practically than by simple +countenance; for he could read Dutch, and was eager to communicate what +he knew. + +While the young Ronyin thus lay studying in Yeddo, news came of a Russian +ship at Nangasaki. No time was to be lost. Sákuma contributed “a long +copy of encouraging verses;” and off set Yoshida on foot for Nangasaki. +His way lay through his own province of Choshu; but, as the highroad to +the south lay apart from the capital, he was able to avoid arrest. He +supported himself, like a _trouvère_, by his proficiency in verse. He +carried his works along with him, to serve as an introduction. When he +reached a town he would inquire for the house of any one celebrated for +swordsmanship, or poetry, or some of the other acknowledged forms of +culture; and there, on giving a taste of his skill, he would be received +and entertained, and leave behind him, when he went away, a compliment in +verse. Thus he travelled through the Middle Ages on his voyage of +discovery into the nineteenth century. When he reached Nangasaki he was +once more too late. The Russians were gone. But he made a profit on his +journey in spite of fate, and stayed awhile to pick up scraps of +knowledge from the Dutch interpreters—a low class of men, but one that +had opportunities; and then, still full of purpose, returned to Yeddo on +foot, as he had come. + +It was not only his youth and courage that supported him under these +successive disappointments, but the continual affluence of new disciples. +The man had the tenacity of a Bruce or a Columbus, with a pliability that +was all his own. He did not fight for what the world would call success; +but for “the wages of going on.” Check him off in a dozen directions, he +would find another outlet and break forth. He missed one vessel after +another, and the main work still halted; but so long as he had a single +Japanese to enlighten and prepare for the better future, he could still +feel that he was working for Japan. Now, he had scarce returned from +Nangasaki, when he was sought out by a new inquirer, the most promising +of all. This was a common soldier, of the Hemming class, a dyer by +birth, who had heard vaguely {179} of Yoshida’s movements, and had become +filled with wonder as to their design. This was a far different inquirer +from Sákuma-Shozan, or the councillors of the Daimio of Choshu. This was +no two-sworded gentleman, but the common stuff of the country, born in +low traditions and unimproved by books; and yet that influence, that +radiant persuasion that never failed Yoshida in any circumstance of his +short life, enchanted, enthralled, and converted the common soldier, as +it had done already with the elegant and learned. The man instantly +burned up into a true enthusiasm; his mind had been only waiting for a +teacher; he grasped in a moment the profit of these new ideas; he, too, +would go to foreign, outlandish parts, and bring back the knowledge that +was to strengthen and renew Japan; and in the meantime, that he might be +the better prepared, Yoshida set himself to teach, and he to learn, the +Chinese literature. It is an episode most honourable to Yoshida, and yet +more honourable still to the soldier, and to the capacity and virtue of +the common people of Japan. + +And now, at length, Commodore Perry returned to Simoda. Friends crowded +round Yoshida with help, counsels, and encouragement. One presented him +with a great sword, three feet long and very heavy, which, in the +exultation of the hour, he swore to carry throughout all his wanderings, +and to bring back—a far-travelled weapon—to Japan. A long letter was +prepared in Chinese for the American officers; it was revised and +corrected by Sákuma, and signed by Yoshida, under the name of +Urinaki-Manji, and by the soldier under that of Ichigi-Koda. Yoshida had +supplied himself with a profusion of materials for writing; his dress was +literally stuffed with paper which was to come back again enriched with +his observations, and make a great and happy kingdom of Japan. Thus +equipped, this pair of emigrants set forward on foot from Yeddo, and +reached Simoda about nightfall. At no period within history can travel +have presented to any European creature the same face of awe and terror +as to these courageous Japanese. The descent of Ulysses into hell is a +parallel more near the case than the boldest expedition in the Polar +circles. For their act was unprecedented; it was criminal; and it was to +take them beyond the pale of humanity into a land of devils. It is not +to be wondered at if they were thrilled by the thought of their unusual +situation; and perhaps the soldier gave utterance to the sentiment of +both when he sang, “in Chinese singing” (so that we see he had already +profited by his lessons), these two appropriate verses: + + “We do not know where we are to sleep to-night, + In a thousand miles of desert where we can see no human smoke.” + +In a little temple, hard by the sea-shore, they lay down to repose; sleep +overtook them as they lay; and when they awoke, “the east was already +white” for their last morning in Japan. They seized a fisherman’s boat +and rowed out—Perry lying far to sea because of the two tides. Their +very manner of boarding was significant of determination; for they had no +sooner caught hold upon the ship than they kicked away their boat to make +return impossible. And now you would have thought that all was over. +But the Commodore was already in treaty with the Shogun’s Government; it +was one of the stipulations that no Japanese was to be aided in escaping +from Japan; and Yoshida and his followers were handed over as prisoners +to the authorities at Simoda. That night he who had been to explore the +secrets of the barbarian slept, if he might sleep at all, in a cell too +short for lying down at full length, and too low for standing upright. +There are some disappointments too great for commentary. + +Sákuma, implicated by his handwriting, was sent into his own province in +confinement, from which he was soon released. Yoshida and the soldier +suffered a long and miserable period of captivity, and the latter, +indeed, died, while yet in prison, of a skin disease. But such a spirit +as that of Yoshida-Torajiro is not easily made or kept a captive; and +that which cannot be broken by misfortune you shall seek in vain to +confine in a bastille. He was indefatigably active, writing reports to +Government and treatises for dissemination. These latter were +contraband; and yet he found no difficulty in their distribution, for he +always had the jailor on his side. It was in vain that they kept +changing him from one prison to another; Government by that plan only +hastened the spread of new ideas; for Yoshida had only to arrive to make +a convert. Thus, though he himself has laid by the heels, he confirmed +and extended his party in the State. + +At last, after many lesser transferences, he was given over from the +prisons of the Shogun to those of his own superior, the Daimio of Choshu. +I conceive it possible that he may then have served out his time for the +attempt to leave Japan, and was now resigned to the provincial Government +on a lesser count, as a Ronyin or feudal rebel. But, however that may +be, the change was of great importance to Yoshida; for by the influence +of his admirers in the Daimio’s council, he was allowed the privilege, +underhand, of dwelling in his own house. And there, as well to keep up +communication with his fellow-reformers as to pursue his work of +education, he received boys to teach. It must not be supposed that he +was free; he was too marked a man for that; he was probably assigned to +some small circle, and lived, as we should say, under police +surveillance; but to him, who had done so much from under lock and key, +this would seem a large and profitable liberty. + +It was at this period that Mr. Masaki was brought into personal contact +with Yoshida; and hence, through the eyes of a boy of thirteen, we get +one good look at the character and habits of the hero. He was ugly and +laughably disfigured with the smallpox; and while nature had been so +niggardly with him from the first, his personal habits were even +sluttish. His clothes were wretched; when he ate or washed he wiped his +hands upon his sleeves; and as his hair was not tied more than once in +the two months, it was often disgusting to behold. With such a picture, +it is easy to believe that he never married. A good teacher, gentle in +act, although violent and abusive in speech, his lessons were apt to go +over the heads of his scholars and to leave them gaping, or more often +laughing. Such was his passion for study that he even grudged himself +natural repose; and when he grew drowsy over his books he would, if it +was summer, put mosquitoes up his sleeve; and, if it was winter, take off +his shoes and run barefoot on the snow. His handwriting was +exceptionally villainous; poet though he was, he had no taste for what +was elegant; and in a country where to write beautifully was not the mark +of a scrivener but an admired accomplishment for gentlemen, he suffered +his letters to be jolted out of him by the press of matter and the heat +of his convictions. He would not tolerate even the appearance of a +bribe; for bribery lay at the root of much that was evil in Japan, as +well as in countries nearer home; and once when a merchant brought him +his son to educate, and added, as was customary, {185} a little private +sweetener, Yoshida dashed the money in the giver’s face, and launched +into such an outbreak of indignation as made the matter public in the +school. He was still, when Masaki knew him, much weakened by his +hardships in prison; and the presentation sword, three feet long, was too +heavy for him to wear without distress; yet he would always gird it on +when he went to dig in his garden. That is a touch which qualifies the +man. A weaker nature would have shrunk from the sight of what only +commemorated a failure. But he was of Thoreau’s mind, that if you can +“make your failure tragical by courage, it will not differ from success.” +He could look back without confusion to his enthusiastic promise. If +events had been contrary, and he found himself unable to carry out that +purpose—well, there was but the more reason to be brave and constant in +another; if he could not carry the sword into barbarian lands, it should +at least be witness to a life spent entirely for Japan. + +This is the sight we have of him as he appeared to schoolboys, but not +related in the schoolboy spirit. A man so careless of the graces must be +out of court with boys and women. And, indeed, as we have all been more +or less to school, it will astonish no one that Yoshida was regarded by +his scholars as a laughing-stock. The schoolboy has a keen sense of +humour. Heroes he learns to understand and to admire in books; but he is +not forward to recognise the heroic under the traits of any contemporary +man, and least of all in a brawling, dirty, and eccentric teacher. But +as the years went by, and the scholars of Yoshida continued in vain to +look around them for the abstractly perfect, and began more and more to +understand the drift of his instructions, they learned to look back upon +their comic school-master as upon the noblest of mankind. + +The last act of this brief and full existence was already near at hand. +Some of his work was done; for already there had been Dutch teachers +admitted into Nangasaki, and the country at large was keen for the new +learning. But though the renaissance had begun, it was impeded and +dangerously threatened by the power of the Shogun. His minister—the same +who was afterwards assassinated in the snow in the very midst of his +bodyguard—not only held back pupils from going to the Dutchmen, but by +spies and detectives, by imprisonment and death, kept thinning out of +Japan the most intelligent and active spirits. It is the old story of a +power upon its last legs—learning to the bastille, and courage to the +block; when there are none left but sheep and donkeys, the State will +have been saved. But a man must not think to cope with a Revolution; nor +a minister, however fortified with guards, to hold in check a country +that had given birth to such men as Yoshida and his soldier-follower. +The violence of the ministerial Tarquin only served to direct attention +to the illegality of his master’s rule; and people began to turn their +allegiance from Yeddo and the Shogun to the long-forgotten Mikado in his +seclusion at Kioto. At this juncture, whether in consequence or not, the +relations between these two rulers became strained; and the Shogun’s +minister set forth for Kioto to put another affront upon the rightful +sovereign. The circumstance was well fitted to precipitate events. It +was a piece of religion to defend the Mikado; it was a plain piece of +political righteousness to oppose a tyrannical and bloody usurpation. To +Yoshida the moment for action seemed to have arrived. He was himself +still confined in Choshu. Nothing was free but his intelligence; but +with that he sharpened a sword for the Shogun’s minister. A party of his +followers were to waylay the tyrant at a village on the Yeddo and Kioto +road, present him with a petition, and put him to the sword. But Yoshida +and his friends were closely observed; and the too great expedition of +two of the conspirators, a boy of eighteen and his brother, wakened the +suspicion of the authorities, and led to a full discovery of the plot and +the arrest of all who were concerned. + +In Yeddo, to which he was taken, Yoshida was thrown again into a strict +confinement. But he was not left destitute of sympathy in this last hour +of trial. In the next cell lay one Kusákabé, a reformer from the +southern highlands of Satzuma. They were in prison for different plots +indeed, but for the same intention; they shared the same beliefs and the +same aspirations for Japan; many and long were the conversations they +held through the prison wall, and dear was the sympathy that soon united +them. It fell first to the lot of Kusákabé to pass before the judges; +and when sentence had been pronounced he was led towards the place of +death below Yoshida’s window. To turn the head would have been to +implicate his fellow-prisoner; but he threw him a look from his eye, and +bade him farewell in a loud voice, with these two Chinese verses:— + + “It is better to be a crystal and be broken, + Than to remain perfect like a tile upon the housetop.” + +So Kusákabé, from the highlands of Satzuma, passed out of the theatre of +this world. His death was like an antique worthy’s. + +A little after, and Yoshida too must appear before the Court. His last +scene was of a piece with his career, and fitly crowned it. He seized on +the opportunity of a public audience, confessed and gloried in his +design, and, reading his auditors a lesson in the history of their +country, told at length the illegality of the Shogun’s power and the +crimes by which its exercise was sullied. So, having said his say for +once, he was led forth and executed, thirty-one years old. + +A military engineer, a bold traveller (at least in wish), a poet, a +patriot, a schoolmaster, a friend to learning, a martyr to reform,—there +are not many men, dying at seventy, who have served their country in such +various characters. He was not only wise and provident in thought, but +surely one of the fieriest of heroes in execution. It is hard to say +which is most remarkable—his capacity for command, which subdued his very +jailors; his hot, unflagging zeal; or his stubborn superiority to defeat. +He failed in each particular enterprise that he attempted; and yet we +have only to look at his country to see how complete has been his general +success. His friends and pupils made the majority of leaders in that +final Revolution, now some twelve years old; and many of them are, or +were until the other day, high placed among the rulers of Japan. And +when we see all round us these brisk intelligent students, with their +strange foreign air, we should never forget how Yoshida marched afoot +from Choshu to Yeddo, and from Yeddo to Nangasaki, and from Nangasaki +back again to Yeddo; how he boarded the American ship, his dress stuffed +with writing material; nor how he languished in prison, and finally gave +his death, as he had formerly given all his life and strength and +leisure, to gain for his native land that very benefit which she now +enjoys so largely. It is better to be Yoshida and perish, than to be +only Sákuma and yet save the hide. Kusákabé, of Satzuma, has said the +word: it is better to be a crystal and be broken. + +I must add a word; for I hope the reader will not fail to perceive that +this is as much the story of a heroic people as that of a heroic man. It +is not enough to remember Yoshida; we must not forget the common soldier, +nor Kusákabé, nor the boy of eighteen, Nomura, of Choshu, whose eagerness +betrayed the plot. It is exhilarating to have lived in the same days +with these great-hearted gentlemen. Only a few miles from us, to speak +by the proportion of the universe, while I was droning over my lessons, +Yoshida was goading himself to be wakeful with the stings of the +mosquito; and while you were grudging a penny income tax, Kusákabé was +stepping to death with a noble sentence on his lips. + + + + +FRANÇOIS VILLON, STUDENT, POET, AND HOUSEBREAKER. + + +PERHAPS one of the most curious revolutions in literary history is the +sudden bull’s-eye light cast by M. Longnon on the obscure existence of +François Villon. {192} His book is not remarkable merely as a chapter of +biography exhumed after four centuries. To readers of the poet it will +recall, with a flavour of satire, that characteristic passage in which he +bequeaths his spectacles—with a humorous reservation of the case—to the +hospital for blind paupers known as the Fifteen-Score. Thus equipped, +let the blind paupers go and separate the good from the bad in the +cemetery of the Innocents! For his own part the poet can see no +distinction. Much have the dead people made of their advantages. What +does it matter now that they have lain in state beds and nourished portly +bodies upon cakes and cream! Here they all lie, to be trodden in the +mud; the large estate and the small, sounding virtue and adroit or +powerful vice, in very much the same condition; and a bishop not to be +distinguished from a lamp-lighter with even the strongest spectacles. + +Such was Villon’s cynical philosophy. Four hundred years after his +death, when surely all danger might be considered at an end, a pair of +critical spectacles have been applied to his own remains; and though he +left behind him a sufficiently ragged reputation from the first, it is +only after these four hundred years that his delinquencies have been +finally tracked home, and we can assign him to his proper place among the +good or wicked. It is a staggering thought, and one that affords a fine +figure of the imperishability of men’s acts, that the stealth of the +private inquiry office can be carried so far back into the dead and dusty +past. We are not so soon quit of our concerns as Villon fancied. In the +extreme of dissolution, when not so much as a man’s name is remembered, +when his dust is scattered to the four winds, and perhaps the very grave +and the very graveyard where he was laid to rest have been forgotten, +desecrated, and buried under populous towns,—even in this extreme let an +antiquary fall across a sheet of manuscript, and the name will be +recalled, the old infamy will pop out into daylight like a toad out of a +fissure in the rock, and the shadow of the shade of what was once a man +will be heartily pilloried by his descendants. A little while ago and +Villon was almost totally forgotten; then he was revived for the sake of +his verses; and now he is being revived with a vengeance in the detection +of his misdemeanours. How unsubstantial is this projection of a man’s +existence, which can lie in abeyance for centuries and then be brushed up +again and set forth for the consideration of posterity by a few dips in +an antiquary’s inkpot! This precarious tenure of fame goes a long way to +justify those (and they are not few) who prefer cakes and cream in the +immediate present. + + + + +A WILD YOUTH. + + +François de Montcorbier, _alias_ François des Loges, _alias_ François +Villon, _alias_ Michel Mouton, Master of Arts in the University of Paris, +was born in that city in the summer of 1431. It was a memorable year for +France on other and higher considerations. A great-hearted girl and a +poor-hearted boy made, the one her last, the other his first appearance +on the public stage of that unhappy country. On the 30th of May the +ashes of Joan of Arc were thrown into the Seine, and on the 2d of +December our Henry Sixth made his Joyous Entry dismally enough into +disaffected and depopulating Paris. Sword and fire still ravaged the +open country. On a single April Saturday twelve hundred persons, besides +children, made their escape out of the starving capital. The hangman, as +is not uninteresting to note in connection with Master Francis, was kept +hard at work in 1431; on the last of April and on the 4th of May alone, +sixty-two bandits swung from Paris gibbets. {195} A more confused or +troublous time it would have been difficult to select for a start in +life. Not even a man’s nationality was certain; for the people of Paris +there was no such thing as a Frenchman. The English were the English +indeed, but the French were only the Armagnacs, whom, with Joan of Arc at +their head, they had beaten back from under their ramparts not two years +before. Such public sentiment as they had centred about their dear Duke +of Burgundy, and the dear Duke had no more urgent business than to keep +out of their neighbourhood. . . . At least, and whether he liked it or +not, our disreputable troubadour was tubbed and swaddled as a subject of +the English crown. + +We hear nothing of Villon’s father except that he was poor and of mean +extraction. His mother was given piously, which does not imply very much +in an old Frenchwoman, and quite uneducated. He had an uncle, a monk in +an abbey at Angers, who must have prospered beyond the family average, +and was reported to be worth five or six hundred crowns. Of this uncle +and his money-box the reader will hear once more. In 1448 Francis became +a student of the University of Paris; in 1450 he took the degree of +Bachelor, and in 1452 that of Master of Arts. His _bourse_, or the sum +paid weekly for his board, was of the amount of two sous. Now two sous +was about the price of a pound of salt butter in the bad times of 1417; +it was the price of half-a-pound in the worse times of 1419; and in 1444, +just four years before Villon joined the University, it seems to have +been taken as the average wage for a day’s manual labour. {196} In +short, it cannot have been a very profuse allowance to keep a sharp-set +lad in breakfast and supper for seven mortal days; and Villon’s share of +the cakes and pastry and general good cheer, to which he is never weary +of referring, must have been slender from the first. + +The educational arrangements of the University of Paris were, to our way +of thinking, somewhat incomplete. Worldly and monkish elements were +presented in a curious confusion, which the youth might disentangle for +himself. If he had an opportunity, on the one hand, of acquiring much +hair-drawn divinity and a taste for formal disputation, he was put in the +way of much gross and flaunting vice upon the other. The lecture room of +a scholastic doctor was sometimes under the same roof with establishments +of a very different and peculiarly unedifying order. The students had +extraordinary privileges, which by all accounts they abused +extraordinarily. And while some condemned themselves to an almost +sepulchral regularity and seclusion, others fled the schools, swaggered +in the street “with their thumbs in their girdle,” passed the night in +riot, and behaved themselves as the worthy forerunners of Jehan Frollo in +the romance of _Notre Dame de Paris_. Villon tells us himself that he +was among the truants, but we hardly needed his avowal. The burlesque +erudition in which he sometimes indulged implies no more than the merest +smattering of knowledge; whereas his acquaintance with blackguard haunts +and industries could only have been acquired by early and consistent +impiety and idleness. He passed his degrees, it is true; but some of us +who have been to modern universities will make their own reflections on +the value of the test. As for his three pupils, Colin Laurent, Girard +Gossouyn, and Jehan Marceau—if they were really his pupils in any serious +sense—what can we say but God help them! And sure enough, by his own +description, they turned out as ragged, rowdy, and ignorant as was to be +looked for from the views and manners of their rare preceptor. + +At some time or other, before or during his university career, the poet +was adopted by Master Guillaume de Villon, chaplain of Saint +Benoît-le-Bétourné near the Sorbonne. From him he borrowed the surname +by which he is known to posterity. It was most likely from his house, +called the _Porte Rouge_, and situated in a garden in the cloister of St. +Benoît, that Master Francis heard the bell of the Sorbonne ring out the +Angelus while he was finishing his _Small Testament_ at Christmastide in +1456. Towards this benefactor he usually gets credit for a respectable +display of gratitude. But with his trap and pitfall style of writing, it +is easy to make too sure. His sentiments are about as much to be relied +on as those of a professional beggar; and in this, as in so many other +matters, he comes towards us whining and piping the eye, and goes off +again with a whoop and his finger to his nose. Thus, he calls Guillaume +de Villon his “more than father,” thanks him with a great show of +sincerity for having helped him out of many scrapes, and bequeaths him +his portion of renown. But the portion of renown which belonged to a +young thief, distinguished (if, at the period when he wrote this legacy, +he was distinguished at all) for having written some more or less obscene +and scurrilous ballads, must have been little fitted to gratify the +self-respect or increase the reputation of a benevolent ecclesiastic. +The same remark applies to a subsequent legacy of the poet’s library, +with specification of one work which was plainly neither decent nor +devout. We are thus left on the horns of a dilemma. If the chaplain was +a godly, philanthropic personage, who had tried to graft good principles +and good behaviour on this wild slip of an adopted son, these jesting +legacies would obviously cut him to the heart. The position of an +adopted son towards his adoptive father is one full of delicacy; where a +man lends his name he looks for great consideration. And this legacy of +Villon’s portion of renown may be taken as the mere fling of an +unregenerate scapegrace who has wit enough to recognise in his own shame +the readiest weapon of offence against a prosy benefactor’s feelings. +The gratitude of Master Francis figures, on this reading, as a frightful +_minus_ quantity. If, on the other hand, those jests were given and +taken in good humour, the whole relation between the pair degenerates +into the unedifying complicity of a debauched old chaplain and a witty +and dissolute young scholar. At this rate the house with the red door +may have rung with the most mundane minstrelsy; and it may have been +below its roof that Villon, through a hole in the plaster, studied, as he +tells us, the leisures of a rich ecclesiastic. + +It was, perhaps, of some moment in the poet’s life that he should have +inhabited the cloister of Saint Benoît. Three of the most remarkable +among his early acquaintances are Catherine de Vausselles, for whom he +entertained a short-lived affection and an enduring and most unmanly +resentment; Regnier de Montigny, a young blackguard of good birth; and +Colin de Cayeux, a fellow with a marked aptitude for picking locks. Now +we are on a foundation of mere conjecture, but it is at least curious to +find that two of the canons of Saint Benoît answered respectively to the +names of Pierre de Vaucel and Etienne de Montigny, and that there was a +householder called Nicolas de Cayeux in a street—the Rue des Poirées—in +the immediate neighbourhood of the cloister. M. Longnon is almost ready +to identify Catherine as the niece of Pierre; Regnier as the nephew of +Etienne, and Colin as the son of Nicolas. Without going so far, it must +be owned that the approximation of names is significant. As we go on to +see the part played by each of these persons in the sordid melodrama of +the poet’s life, we shall come to regard it as even more notable. Is it +not Clough who has remarked that, after all, everything lies in +juxtaposition? Many a man’s destiny has been settled by nothing +apparently more grave than a pretty face on the opposite side of the +street and a couple of bad companions round the corner. + +Catherine de Vausselles (or de Vaucel—the change is within the limits of +Villon’s licence) had plainly delighted in the poet’s conversation; near +neighbours or not, they were much together and Villon made no secret of +his court, and suffered himself to believe that his feeling was repaid in +kind. This may have been an error from the first, or he may have +estranged her by subsequent misconduct or temerity. One can easily +imagine Villon an impatient wooer. One thing, at least, is sure: that +the affair terminated in a manner bitterly humiliating to Master Francis. +In presence of his lady-love, perhaps under her window and certainly with +her connivance, he was unmercifully thrashed by one Noë le Joly—beaten, +as he says himself, like dirty linen on the washing-board. It is +characteristic that his malice had notably increased between the time +when he wrote the _Small Testament_ immediately on the back of the +occurrence, and the time when he wrote the _Large Testament_ five years +after. On the latter occasion nothing is too bad for his “damsel with +the twisted nose,” as he calls her. She is spared neither hint nor +accusation, and he tells his messenger to accost her with the vilest +insults. Villon, it is thought, was out of Paris when these amenities +escaped his pen; or perhaps the strong arm of Noë le Joly would have been +again in requisition. So ends the love story, if love story it may +properly be called. Poets are not necessarily fortunate in love; but +they usually fall among more romantic circumstances and bear their +disappointment with a better grace. + +The neighbourhood of Regnier de Montigny and Colin de Cayeux was probably +more influential on his after life than the contempt of Catherine. For a +man who is greedy of all pleasures, and provided with little money and +less dignity of character, we may prophesy a safe and speedy voyage +downward. Humble or even truckling virtue may walk unspotted in this +life. But only those who despise the pleasures can afford to despise the +opinion of the world. A man of a strong, heady temperament, like Villon, +is very differently tempted. His eyes lay hold on all provocations +greedily, and his heart flames up at a look into imperious desire; he is +snared and broached-to by anything and everything, from a pretty face to +a piece of pastry in a cookshop window; he will drink the rinsing of the +wine cup, stay the latest at the tavern party; tap at the lit windows, +follow the sound of singing, and beat the whole neighbourhood for another +reveller, as he goes reluctantly homeward; and grudge himself every hour +of sleep as a black empty period in which he cannot follow after +pleasure. Such a person is lost if he have not dignity, or, failing +that, at least pride, which is its shadow and in many ways its +substitute. Master Francis, I fancy, would follow his own eager +instincts without much spiritual struggle. And we soon find him fallen +among thieves in sober, literal earnest, and counting as acquaintances +the most disreputable people he could lay his hands on: fellows who stole +ducks in Paris Moat; sergeants of the criminal court, and archers of the +watch; blackguards who slept at night under the butchers’ stalls, and for +whom the aforesaid archers peered about carefully with lanterns; Regnier +de Montigny, Colin de Cayeux, and their crew, all bound on a favouring +breeze towards the gallows; the disorderly abbess of Port Royal, who went +about at fair time with soldiers and thieves, and conducted her abbey on +the queerest principles, and most likely Perette Mauger, the great Paris +receiver of stolen goods, not yet dreaming, poor woman! of the last scene +of her career when Henry Cousin, executor of the high justice, shall bury +her, alive and most reluctant, in front of the new Montigny gibbet. {204} +Nay, our friend soon began to take a foremost rank in this society. He +could string off verses, which is always an agreeable talent; and he +could make himself useful in many other ways. The whole ragged army of +Bohemia, and whosoever loved good cheer without at all loving to work and +pay for it, are addressed in contemporary verses as the “Subjects of +François Villon.” He was a good genius to all hungry and unscrupulous +persons; and became the hero of a whole legendary cycle of tavern tricks +and cheateries. At best, these were doubtful levities, rather too +thievish for a schoolboy, rather too gamesome for a thief. But he would +not linger long in this equivocal border land. He must soon have +complied with his surroundings. He was one who would go where the +cannikin clinked, not caring who should pay; and from supping in the +wolves’ den, there is but a step to hunting with the pack. And here, as +I am on the chapter of his degradation, I shall say all I mean to say +about its darkest expression, and be done with it for good. Some +charitable critics see no more than a _jeu d’esprit_, a graceful and +trifling exercise of the imagination, in the grimy ballad of Fat Peg +(_Grosse Margot_). I am not able to follow these gentlemen to this +polite extreme. Out of all Villon’s works that ballad stands forth in +flaring reality, gross and ghastly, as a thing written in a contraction +of disgust. M. Longnon shows us more and more clearly at every page that +we are to read our poet literally, that his names are the names of real +persons, and the events he chronicles were actual events. But even if +the tendency of criticism had run the other way, this ballad would have +gone far to prove itself. I can well understand the reluctance of worthy +persons in this matter; for of course it is unpleasant to think of a man +of genius as one who held, in the words of Marina to Boult— + + “A place, for which the pained’st fiend + Of hell would not in reputation change.” + +But beyond this natural unwillingness, the whole difficulty of the case +springs from a highly virtuous ignorance of life. Paris now is not so +different from the Paris of then; and the whole of the doings of Bohemia +are not written in the sugar-candy pastorals of Murger. It is really not +at all surprising that a young man of the fifteenth century, with a knack +of making verses, should accept his bread upon disgraceful terms. The +race of those who do is not extinct; and some of them to this day write +the prettiest verses imaginable. . . . After this, it were impossible +for Master Francis to fall lower: to go and steal for himself would be an +admirable advance from every point of view, divine or human. + +And yet it is not as a thief, but as a homicide, that he makes his first +appearance before angry justice. On June 5, 1455, when he was about +twenty-four, and had been Master of Arts for a matter of three years, we +behold him for the first time quite definitely. Angry justice had, as it +were, photographed him in the act of his homicide; and M. Longnon, +rummaging among old deeds, has turned up the negative and printed it off +for our instruction. Villon had been supping—copiously we may +believe—and sat on a stone bench in front of the Church of St. Benoît, in +company with a priest called Gilles and a woman of the name of Isabeau. +It was nine o’clock, a mighty late hour for the period, and evidently a +fine summer’s night. Master Francis carried a mantle, like a prudent +man, to keep him from the dews (_serain_), and had a sword below it +dangling from his girdle. So these three dallied in front of St. Benoît, +taking their pleasure (_pour soy esbatre_). Suddenly there arrived upon +the scene a priest, Philippe Chermoye or Sermaise, also with sword and +cloak, and accompanied by one Master Jehan le Mardi. Sermaise, according +to Villon’s account, which is all we have to go upon, came up blustering +and denying God; as Villon rose to make room for him upon the bench, +thrust him rudely back into his place; and finally drew his sword and cut +open his lower lip, by what I should imagine was a very clumsy stroke. +Up to this point, Villon professes to have been a model of courtesy, even +of feebleness: and the brawl, in his version, reads like the fable of the +wolf and the lamb. But now the lamb was roused; he drew his sword, +stabbed Sermaise in the groin, knocked him on the head with a big stone, +and then, leaving him to his fate, went away to have his own lip doctored +by a barber of the name of Fouquet. In one version, he says that Gilles, +Isabeau, and Le Mardi ran away at the first high words, and that he and +Sermaise had it out alone; in another, Le Mardi is represented as +returning and wresting Villon’s sword from him: the reader may please +himself. Sermaise was picked up, lay all that night in the prison of +Saint Benoît, where he was examined by an official of the Châtelet and +expressly pardoned Villon, and died on the following Saturday in the +Hôtel Dieu. + +This, as I have said, was in June. Not before January of the next year +could Villon extract a pardon from the king; but while his hand was in, +he got two. One is for “François des Loges, alias (_autrement dit_) de +Villon;” and the other runs in the name of François de Montcorbier. Nay, +it appears there was a further complication; for in the narrative of the +first of these documents, it is mentioned that he passed himself off upon +Fouquet, the barber-surgeon, as one Michel Mouton. M. Longnon has a +theory that this unhappy accident with Sermaise was the cause of Villon’s +subsequent irregularities; and that up to that moment he had been the +pink of good behaviour. But the matter has to my eyes a more dubious +air. A pardon necessary for Des Loges and another for Montcorbier? and +these two the same person? and one or both of them known by the _alias +of_ Villon, however honestly come by? and lastly, in the heat of the +moment, a fourth name thrown out with an assured countenance? A ship is +not to be trusted that sails under so many colours. This is not the +simple bearing of innocence. No—the young master was already treading +crooked paths; already, he would start and blench at a hand upon his +shoulder, with the look we know so well in the face of Hogarth’s Idle +Apprentice; already, in the blue devils, he would see Henry Cousin, the +executor of high justice, going in dolorous procession towards +Montfaucon, and hear the wind and the birds crying around Paris gibbet. + + + +A GANG OF THIEVES. + + +In spite of the prodigious number of people who managed to get hanged, +the fifteenth century was by no means a bad time for criminals. A great +confusion of parties and great dust of fighting favoured the escape of +private housebreakers and quiet fellows who stole ducks in Paris Moat. +Prisons were leaky; and as we shall see, a man with a few crowns in his +pocket and perhaps some acquaintance among the officials, could easily +slip out and become once more a free marauder. There was no want of a +sanctuary where he might harbour until troubles blew by; and accomplices +helped each other with more or less good faith. Clerks, above all, had +remarkable facilities for a criminal way of life; for they were +privileged, except in cases of notorious incorrigibility, to be plucked +from the hands of rude secular justice and tried by a tribunal of their +own. In 1402, a couple of thieves, both clerks of the University, were +condemned to death by the Provost of Paris. As they were taken to +Montfaucon, they kept crying “high and clearly” for their benefit of +clergy, but were none the less pitilessly hanged and gibbeted. Indignant +Alma Mater interfered before the king; and the Provost was deprived of +all royal offices, and condemned to return the bodies and erect a great +stone cross, on the road from Paris to the gibbet graven with the +effigies of these two holy martyrs. {210} We shall hear more of the +benefit of clergy; for after this the reader will not be surprised to +meet with thieves in the shape of tonsured clerks, or even priests and +monks. + +To a knot of such learned pilferers our poet certainly belonged; and by +turning over a few more of M. Longnon’s negatives, we shall get a clear +idea of their character and doings. Montigny and De Cayeux are names +already known; Guy Tabary, Petit-Jehan, Dom Nicolas, little Thibault, who +was both clerk and goldsmith, and who made picklocks and melted plate for +himself and his companions—with these the reader has still to become +acquainted. Petit-Jehan and De Cayeux were handy fellows and enjoyed a +useful pre-eminence in honour of their doings with the picklock. +“_Dictus des Cahyeus est fortis operator crochetorum_,” says Tabary’s +interrogation, “_sed dictus Petit-Jehan_, _ejus socius_, _est forcius +operator_.” But the flower of the flock was little Thibault; it was +reported that no lock could stand before him; he had a persuasive hand; +let us salute capacity wherever we may find it. Perhaps the term _gang_ +is not quite properly applied to the persons whose fortunes we are now +about to follow; rather they were independent malefactors, socially +intimate, and occasionally joining together for some serious operation +just as modern stockjobbers form a syndicate for an important loan. Nor +were they at all particular to any branch of misdoing. They did not +scrupulously confine themselves to a single sort of theft, as I hear is +common among modern thieves. They were ready for anything, from +pitch-and-toss to manslaughter. Montigny, for instance, had neglected +neither of these extremes, and we find him accused of cheating at games +of hazard on the one hand, and on the other of the murder of one Thevenin +Pensete in a house by the Cemetery of St. John. If time had only spared +us some particulars, might not this last have furnished us with the +matter of a grisly winter’s tale? + +At Christmas-time in 1456, readers of Villon will remember that he was +engaged on the _Small Testament_. About the same period, _circa festum +nativitatis Domini_, he took part in a memorable supper at the Mule +Tavern, in front of the Church of St. Mathurin. Tabary, who seems to +have been very much Villon’s creature, had ordered the supper in the +course of the afternoon. He was a man who had had troubles in his time +and languished in the Bishop of Paris’s prisons on a suspicion of picking +locks; confiding, convivial, not very astute—who had copied out a whole +improper romance with his own right hand. This supper-party was to be +his first introduction to De Cayeux and Petit-Jehan, which was probably a +matter of some concern to the poor man’s muddy wits; in the sequel, at +least, he speaks of both with an undisguised respect, based on +professional inferiority in the matter of picklocks. Dom Nicolas, a +Picardy monk, was the fifth and last at table. When supper had been +despatched and fairly washed down, we may suppose, with white Baigneux or +red Beaune, which were favourite wines among the fellowship, Tabary was +solemnly sworn over to secrecy on the night’s performances; and the party +left the Mule and proceeded to an unoccupied house belonging to Robert de +Saint-Simon. This, over a low wall, they entered without difficulty. +All but Tabary took off their upper garments; a ladder was found and +applied to the high wall which separated Saint-Simon’s house from the +court of the College of Navarre; the four fellows in their shirt-sleeves +(as we might say) clambered over in a twinkling; and Master Guy Tabary +remained alone beside the overcoats. From the court the burglars made +their way into the vestry of the chapel, where they found a large chest, +strengthened with iron bands and closed with four locks. One of these +locks they picked, and then, by levering up the corner, forced the other +three. Inside was a small coffer, of walnut wood, also barred with iron, +but fastened with only three locks, which were all comfortably picked by +way of the keyhole. In the walnut coffer—a joyous sight by our thieves’ +lantern—were five hundred crowns of gold. There was some talk of opening +the aumries, where, if they had only known, a booty eight or nine times +greater lay ready to their hand; but one of the party (I have a humorous +suspicion it was Dom Nicolas, the Picardy monk) hurried them away. It +was ten o’clock when they mounted the ladder; it was about midnight +before Tabary beheld them coming back. To him they gave ten crowns, and +promised a share of a two-crown dinner on the morrow; whereat we may +suppose his mouth watered. In course of time, he got wind of the real +amount of their booty and understood how scurvily he had been used; but +he seems to have borne no malice. How could he, against such superb +operators as Petit-Jehan and De Cayeux; or a person like Villon, who +could have made a new improper romance out of his own head, instead of +merely copying an old one with mechanical right hand? + +The rest of the winter was not uneventful for the gang. First they made +a demonstration against the Church of St. Mathurin after chalices, and +were ignominiously chased away by barking dogs. Then Tabary fell out +with Casin Chollet, one of the fellows who stole ducks in Paris Moat, who +subsequently became a sergeant of the Châtelet and distinguished himself +by misconduct, followed by imprisonment and public castigation, during +the wars of Louis Eleventh. The quarrel was not conducted with a proper +regard to the king’s peace, and the pair publicly belaboured each other +until the police stepped in, and Master Tabary was cast once more into +the prisons of the Bishop. While he still lay in durance, another job +was cleverly executed by the band in broad daylight, at the Augustine +Monastery. Brother Guillaume Coiffier was beguiled by an accomplice to +St. Mathurin to say mass; and during his absence, his chamber was entered +and five or six hundred crowns in money and some silver plate +successfully abstracted. A melancholy man was Coiffier on his return! +Eight crowns from this adventure were forwarded by little Thibault to the +incarcerated Tabary; and with these he bribed the jailor and reappeared +in Paris taverns. Some time before or shortly after this, Villon set out +for Angers, as he had promised in the _Small Testament_. The object of +this excursion was not merely to avoid the presence of his cruel mistress +or the strong arm of Noë le Joly, but to plan a deliberate robbery on his +uncle the monk. As soon as he had properly studied the ground, the +others were to go over in force from Paris—picklocks and all—and away +with my uncle’s strongbox! This throws a comical sidelight on his own +accusation against his relatives, that they had “forgotten natural duty” +and disowned him because he was poor. A poor relation is a distasteful +circumstance at the best, but a poor relation who plans deliberate +robberies against those of his blood, and trudges hundreds of weary +leagues to put them into execution, is surely a little on the wrong side +of toleration. The uncle at Angers may have been monstrously undutiful; +but the nephew from Paris was upsides with him. + +On the 23d April, that venerable and discreet person, Master Pierre +Marchand, Curate and Prior of Paray-le-Monial, in the diocese of +Chartres, arrived in Paris and put up at the sign of the Three +Chandeliers, in the Rue de la Huchette. Next day, or the day after, as +he was breakfasting at the sign of the Armchair, he fell into talk with +two customers, one of whom was a priest and the other our friend Tabary. +The idiotic Tabary became mighty confidential as to his past life. +Pierre Marchand, who was an acquaintance of Guillaume Coiffier’s and had +sympathised with him over his loss, pricked up his ears at the mention of +picklocks, and led on the transcriber of improper romances from one thing +to another, until they were fast friends. For picklocks the Prior of +Paray professed a keen curiosity; but Tabary, upon some late alarm, had +thrown all his into the Seine. Let that be no difficulty, however, for +was there not little Thibault, who could make them of all shapes and +sizes, and to whom Tabary, smelling an accomplice, would be only too glad +to introduce his new acquaintance? On the morrow, accordingly, they met; +and Tabary, after having first wet his whistle at the prior’s expense, +led him to Notre Dame and presented him to four or five “young +companions,” who were keeping sanctuary in the church. They were all +clerks, recently escaped, like Tabary himself, from the episcopal +prisons. Among these we may notice Thibault, the operator, a little +fellow of twenty-six, wearing long hair behind. The Prior expressed, +through Tabary, his anxiety to become their accomplice and altogether +such as they were (_de leur sorte et de leurs complices_). Mighty polite +they showed themselves, and made him many fine speeches in return. But +for all that, perhaps because they had longer heads than Tabary, perhaps +because it is less easy to wheedle men in a body, they kept obstinately +to generalities and gave him no information as to their exploits, past, +present, or to come. I suppose Tabary groaned under this reserve; for no +sooner were he and the Prior out of the church than he fairly emptied his +heart to him, gave him full details of many hanging matters in the past, +and explained the future intentions of the band. The scheme of the hour +was to rob another Augustine monk, Robert de la Porte, and in this the +Prior agreed to take a hand with simulated greed. Thus, in the course of +two days, he had turned this wineskin of a Tabary inside out. For a +while longer the farce was carried on; the Prior was introduced to +Petit-Jehan, whom he describes as a little, very smart man of thirty, +with a black beard and a short jacket; an appointment was made and broken +in the de la Porte affair; Tabary had some breakfast at the Prior’s +charge and leaked out more secrets under the influence of wine and +friendship; and then all of a sudden, on the 17th of May, an alarm sprang +up, the Prior picked up his skirts and walked quietly over to the +Châtelet to make a deposition, and the whole band took to their heels and +vanished out of Paris and the sight of the police. + +Vanish as they like, they all go with a clog about their feet. Sooner or +later, here or there, they will be caught in the fact, and ignominiously +sent home. From our vantage of four centuries afterwards, it is odd and +pitiful to watch the order in which the fugitives are captured and +dragged in. + +Montigny was the first. In August of that same year, he was laid by the +heels on many grievous counts; sacrilegious robberies, frauds, +incorrigibility, and that bad business about Thevenin Pensete in the +house by the cemetery of St. John. He was reclaimed by the +ecclesiastical authorities as a clerk; but the claim was rebutted on the +score of incorrigibility, and ultimately fell to the ground; and he was +condemned to death by the Provost of Paris. It was a very rude hour for +Montigny, but hope was not yet over. He was a fellow of some birth; his +father had been king’s pantler; his sister, probably married to some one +about the Court, was in the family way, and her health would be +endangered if the execution was proceeded with. So down comes Charles +the Seventh with letters of mercy, commuting the penalty to a year in a +dungeon on bread and water, and a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. James +in Galicia. Alas! the document was incomplete; it did not contain the +full tale of Montigny’s enormities; it did not recite that he had been +denied benefit of clergy, and it said nothing about Thevenin Pensete. +Montigny’s hour was at hand. Benefit of clergy, honourable descent from +king’s pantler, sister in the family way, royal letters of +commutation—all were of no avail. He had been in prison in Rouen, in +Tours, in Bordeaux, and four times already in Paris; and out of all these +he had come scatheless; but now he must make a little excursion as far as +Montfaucon with Henry Cousin, executor of high justice. There let him +swing among the carrion crows. + +About a year later, in July 1458, the police laid hands on Tabary. +Before the ecclesiastical commissary he was twice examined, and, on the +latter occasion, put to the question ordinary and extraordinary. What a +dismal change from pleasant suppers at the Mule, where he sat in triumph +with expert operators and great wits! He is at the lees of life, poor +rogue; and those fingers which once transcribed improper romances are now +agonisingly stretched upon the rack. We have no sure knowledge, but we +may have a shrewd guess of the conclusion. Tabary, the admirer, would go +the same way as those whom he admired. + +The last we hear of is Colin de Cayeux. He was caught in autumn 1460, in +the great Church of St. Leu d’Esserens, which makes so fine a figure in +the pleasant Oise valley between Creil and Beaumont. He was reclaimed by +no less than two bishops; but the Procureur for the Provost held fast by +incorrigible Colin. 1460 was an ill-starred year: for justice was making +a clean sweep of “poor and indigent persons, thieves, cheats, and +lockpickers,” in the neighbourhood of Paris; {220a} and Colin de Cayeux, +with many others, was condemned to death and hanged. {220b} + + + +VILLON AND THE GALLOWS. + + +Villon was still absent on the Angers expedition when the Prior of Paray +sent such a bombshell among his accomplices; and the dates of his return +and arrest remain undiscoverable. M. Campaux plausibly enough opined for +the autumn of 1457, which would make him closely follow on Montigny, and +the first of those denounced by the Prior to fall into the toils. We may +suppose, at least, that it was not long thereafter; we may suppose him +competed for between lay and clerical Courts; and we may suppose him +alternately pert and impudent, humble and fawning, in his defence. But +at the end of all supposing, we come upon some nuggets of fact. For +first, he was put to the question by water. He who had tossed off so +many cups of white Baigneux or red Beaune, now drank water through linen +folds, until his bowels were flooded and his heart stood still. After so +much raising of the elbow, so much outcry of fictitious thirst, here at +last was enough drinking for a lifetime. Truly, of our pleasant vices, +the gods make whips to scourge us. And secondly he was condemned to be +hanged. A man may have been expecting a catastrophe for years, and yet +find himself unprepared when it arrives. Certainly, Villon found, in +this legitimate issue of his career, a very staggering and grave +consideration. Every beast, as he says, clings bitterly to a whole skin. +If everything is lost, and even honour, life still remains; nay, and it +becomes, like the ewe lamb in Nathan’s parable, as dear as all the rest. +“Do you fancy,” he asks, in a lively ballad, “that I had not enough +philosophy under my hood to cry out: ‘I appeal’? If I had made any bones +about the matter, I should have been planted upright in the fields, by +the St. Denis Road”—Montfaucon being on the way to St. Denis. An appeal +to Parliament, as we saw in the case of Colin de Cayeux, did not +necessarily lead to an acquittal or a commutation; and while the matter +was pending, our poet had ample opportunity to reflect on his position. +Hanging is a sharp argument, and to swing with many others on the gibbet +adds a horrible corollary for the imagination. With the aspect of +Montfaucon he was well acquainted; indeed, as the neighbourhood appears +to have been sacred to junketing and nocturnal picnics of wild young men +and women, he had probably studied it under all varieties of hour and +weather. And now, as he lay in prison waiting the mortal push, these +different aspects crowded back on his imagination with a new and +startling significance; and he wrote a ballad, by way of epitaph for +himself and his companions, which remains unique in the annals of +mankind. It is, in the highest sense, a piece of his biography:— + + “La pluye nous a debuez et lavez, + Et le soleil dessechez et noirciz; + Pies, corbeaulx, nous ont les yeux cavez, + Et arrachez la barbe et les sourcilz. + Jamais, nul temps, nous ne sommes rassis; + Puis ça, puis là, comme le vent varie, + A son plaisir sans cesser nous charie, + Plus becquetez d’oiscaulx que dez à couldre. + Ne soyez donc de nostre confrairie, + Mais priez Dieu que tous nous vueille absouldre.” + +Here is some genuine thieves’ literature after so much that was spurious; +sharp as an etching, written with a shuddering soul. There is an +intensity of consideration in the piece that shows it to be the +transcript of familiar thoughts. It is the quintessence of many a +doleful nightmare on the straw, when he felt himself swing helpless in +the wind, and saw the birds turn about him, screaming and menacing his +eyes. + +And, after all, the Parliament changed his sentence into one of +banishment; and to Roussillon, in Dauphiny, our poet must carry his woes +without delay. Travellers between Lyons and Marseilles may remember a +station on the line, some way below Vienne, where the Rhone fleets +seaward between vine-clad hills. This was Villon’s Siberia. It would be +a little warm in summer perhaps, and a little cold in winter in that +draughty valley between two great mountain fields; but what with the +hills, and the racing river, and the fiery Rhone wines, he was little to +be pitied on the conditions of his exile. Villon, in a remarkably bad +ballad, written in a breath, heartily thanked and fulsomely belauded the +Parliament; the _envoi_, like the proverbial postscript of a lady’s +letter, containing the pith of his performance in a request for three +days’ delay to settle his affairs and bid his friends farewell. He was +probably not followed out of Paris, like Antoine Fradin, the popular +preacher, another exile of a few years later, by weeping multitudes; +{224} but I daresay one or two rogues of his acquaintance would keep him +company for a mile or so on the south road, and drink a bottle with him +before they turned. For banished people, in those days, seem to have set +out on their own responsibility, in their own guard, and at their own +expense. It was no joke to make one’s way from Paris to Roussillon alone +and penniless in the fifteenth century. Villon says he left a rag of his +tails on every bush. Indeed, he must have had many a weary tramp, many a +slender meal, and many a to-do with blustering captains of the +Ordonnance. But with one of his light fingers, we may fancy that he took +as good as he gave; for every rag of his tail, he would manage to +indemnify himself upon the population in the shape of food, or wine, or +ringing money; and his route would be traceable across France and +Burgundy by housewives and inn-keepers lamenting over petty thefts, like +the track of a single human locust. A strange figure he must have cut in +the eyes of the good country people: this ragged, blackguard city poet, +with a smack of the Paris student, and a smack of the Paris street arab, +posting along the highways, in rain or sun, among the green fields and +vineyards. For himself, he had no taste for rural loveliness; green +fields and vineyards would be mighty indifferent to Master Francis; but +he would often have his tongue in his cheek at the simplicity of rustic +dupes, and often, at city gates, he might stop to contemplate the gibbet +with its swinging bodies, and hug himself on his escape. + +How long he stayed at Roussillon, how far he became the protégé of the +Bourbons, to whom that town belonged, or when it was that he took part, +under the auspices of Charles of Orleans, in a rhyming tournament to be +referred to once again in the pages of the present volume, are matters +that still remain in darkness, in spite of M. Longnon’s diligent +rummaging among archives. When we next find him, in summer 1461, alas! +he is once more in durance: this time at Méun-sur-Loire, in the prisons +of Thibault d’Aussigny, Bishop of Orleans. He had been lowered in a +basket into a noisome pit, where he lay, all summer, gnawing hard crusts +and railing upon fate. His teeth, he says, were like the teeth of a +rake: a touch of haggard portraiture all the more real for being +excessive and burlesque, and all the more proper to the man for being a +caricature of his own misery. His eyes were “bandaged with thick walls.” +It might blow hurricanes overhead; the lightning might leap in high +heaven; but no word of all this reached him in his noisome pit. “Il +n’entre, ou gist, n’escler ni tourbillon.” Above all, he was fevered +with envy and anger at the freedom of others; and his heart flowed over +into curses as he thought of Thibault d’Aussigny, walking the streets in +God’s sunlight, and blessing people with extended fingers. So much we +find sharply lined in his own poems. Why he was cast again into +prison—how he had again managed to shave the gallows—this we know not, +nor, from the destruction of authorities, are we ever likely to learn. +But on October 2d, 1461, or some day immediately preceding, the new King, +Louis Eleventh, made his joyous entry into Méun. Now it was a part of +the formality on such occasions for the new King to liberate certain +prisoners; and so the basket was let down into Villon’s pit, and hastily +did Master Francis scramble in, and was most joyfully hauled up, and shot +out, blinking and tottering, but once more a free man, into the blessed +sun and wind. Now or never is the time for verses! Such a happy +revolution would turn the head of a stocking-weaver, and set him jingling +rhymes. And so—after a voyage to Paris, where he finds Montigny and De +Cayeux clattering, their bones upon the gibbet, and his three pupils +roystering in Paris streets, “with their thumbs under their +girdles,”—down sits Master Francis to write his _Large Testament_, and +perpetuate his name in a sort of glorious ignominy. + + + +THE _LARGE TESTAMENT_. + + +Of this capital achievement and, with it, of Villon’s style in general, +it is here the place to speak. The _Large Testament_ is a hurly-burly of +cynical and sentimental reflections about life, jesting legacies to +friends and enemies, and, interspersed among these many admirable +ballades, both serious and absurd. With so free a design, no thought +that occurred to him would need to be dismissed without expression; and +he could draw at full length the portrait of his own bedevilled soul, and +of the bleak and blackguardly world which was the theatre of his exploits +and sufferings. If the reader can conceive something between the +slap-dash inconsequence of Byron’s _Don Juan_ and the racy humorous +gravity and brief noble touches that distinguish the vernacular poems of +Burns, he will have formed some idea of Villon’s style. To the latter +writer—except in the ballades, which are quite his own, and can be +paralleled from no other language known to me—he bears a particular +resemblance. In common with Burns he has a certain rugged compression, a +brutal vivacity of epithet, a homely vigour, a delight in local +personalities, and an interest in many sides of life, that are often +despised and passed over by more effete and cultured poets. Both also, +in their strong, easy colloquial way, tend to become difficult and +obscure; the obscurity in the case of Villon passing at times into the +absolute darkness of cant language. They are perhaps the only two great +masters of expression who keep sending their readers to a glossary. + +“Shall we not dare to say of a thief,” asks Montaigne, “that he has a +handsome leg?” It is a far more serious claim that we have to put +forward in behalf of Villon. Beside that of his contemporaries, his +writing, so full of colour, so eloquent, so picturesque, stands out in an +almost miraculous isolation. If only one or two of the chroniclers could +have taken a leaf out of his book, history would have been a pastime, and +the fifteenth century as present to our minds as the age of Charles +Second. This gallows-bird was the one great writer of his age and +country, and initiated modern literature for France. Boileau, long ago, +in the period of perukes and snuff-boxes, recognised him as the first +articulate poet in the language; and if we measure him, not by priority +of merit, but living duration of influence, not on a comparison with +obscure forerunners, but with great and famous successors, we shall +instal this ragged and disreputable figure in a far higher niche in +glory’s temple than was ever dreamed of by the critic. It is, in itself, +a memorable fact that, before 1542, in the very dawn of printing, and +while modern France was in the making, the works of Villon ran through +seven different editions. Out of him flows much of Rabelais; and through +Rabelais, directly and indirectly, a deep, permanent, and growing +inspiration. Not only his style, but his callous pertinent way of +looking upon the sordid and ugly sides of life, becomes every day a more +specific feature in the literature of France. And only the other year, a +work of some power appeared in Paris, and appeared with infinite scandal, +which owed its whole inner significance and much of its outward form to +the study of our rhyming thief. + +The world to which he introduces us is, as before said, blackguardly and +bleak. Paris swarms before us, full of famine, shame, and death; monks +and the servants of great lords hold high wassail upon cakes and pastry; +the poor man licks his lips before the baker’s window; people with +patched eyes sprawl all night under the stalls; chuckling Tabary +transcribes an improper romance; bare-bosomed lasses and ruffling +students swagger in the streets; the drunkard goes stumbling homewards; +the graveyard is full of bones; and away on Montfaucon, Colin de Cayeux +and Montigny hang draggled in the rain. Is there nothing better to be +seen than sordid misery and worthless joys? Only where the poor old +mother of the poet kneels in church below painted windows, and makes +tremulous supplication to the Mother of God. + +In our mixed world, full of green fields and happy lovers, where not long +before, Joan of Arc had led one of the highest and noblest lives in the +whole story of mankind, this was all worth chronicling that our poet +could perceive. His eyes were indeed sealed with his own filth. He +dwelt all his life in a pit more noisome than the dungeon at Méun. In +the moral world, also, there are large phenomena not cognisable out of +holes and corners. Loud winds blow, speeding home deep-laden ships and +sweeping rubbish from the earth; the lightning leaps and cleans the face +of heaven; high purposes and brave passions shake and sublimate men’s +spirits; and meanwhile, in the narrow dungeon of his soul, Villon is +mumbling crusts and picking vermin. + +Along with this deadly gloom of outlook, we must take another +characteristic of his work: its unrivalled insincerity. I can give no +better similitude of this quality than I have given already: that he +comes up with a whine, and runs away with a whoop and his finger to his +nose. His pathos is that of a professional mendicant who should happen +to be a man of genius; his levity that of a bitter street arab, full of +bread. On a first reading, the pathetic passages preoccupy the reader, +and he is cheated out of an alms in the shape of sympathy. But when the +thing is studied the illusion fades away: in the transitions, above all, +we can detect the evil, ironical temper of the man; and instead of a +flighty work, where many crude but genuine feelings tumble together for +the mastery as in the lists of tournament, we are tempted to think of the +_Large Testament_ as of one long-drawn epical grimace, pulled by a +merry-andrew, who has found a certain despicable eminence over human +respect and human affections by perching himself astride upon the +gallows. Between these two views, at best, all temperate judgments will +be found to fall; and rather, as I imagine, towards the last. + +There were two things on which he felt with perfect and, in one case, +even threatening sincerity. + +The first of these was an undisguised envy of those richer than himself. +He was for ever drawing a parallel, already exemplified from his own +words, between the happy life of the well-to-do and the miseries of the +poor. Burns, too proud and honest not to work, continued through all +reverses to sing of poverty with a light, defiant note. Béranger waited +till he was himself beyond the reach of want, before writing the _Old +Vagabond_ or _Jacques_. Samuel Johnson, although he was very sorry to be +poor, “was a great arguer for the advantages of poverty” in his ill days. +Thus it is that brave men carry their crosses, and smile with the fox +burrowing in their vitals. But Villon, who had not the courage to be +poor with honesty, now whiningly implores our sympathy, now shows his +teeth upon the dung-heap with an ugly snarl. He envies bitterly, envies +passionately. Poverty, he protests, drives men to steal, as hunger makes +the wolf sally from the forest. The poor, he goes on, will always have a +carping word to say, or, if that outlet be denied, nourish rebellious +thoughts. It is a calumny on the noble army of the poor. Thousands in a +small way of life, ay, and even in the smallest, go through life with +tenfold as much honour and dignity and peace of mind, as the rich +gluttons whose dainties and state-beds awakened Villon’s covetous temper. +And every morning’s sun sees thousands who pass whistling to their toil. +But Villon was the “mauvais pauvre” defined by Victor Hugo, and, in its +English expression, so admirably stereotyped by Dickens. He was the +first wicked sansculotte. He is the man of genius with the moleskin cap. +He is mighty pathetic and beseeching here in the street, but I would not +go down a dark road with him for a large consideration. + +The second of the points on which he was genuine and emphatic was common +to the middle ages; a deep and somewhat snivelling conviction of the +transitory nature of this life and the pity and horror of death. Old age +and the grave, with some dark and yet half-sceptical terror of an +after-world—these were ideas that clung about his bones like a disease. +An old ape, as he says, may play all the tricks in its repertory, and +none of them will tickle an audience into good humour. “Tousjours vieil +synge est desplaisant.” It is not the old jester who receives most +recognition at a tavern party, but the young fellow, fresh and handsome, +who knows the new slang, and carries off his vice with a certain air. Of +this, as a tavern jester himself, he would be pointedly conscious. As +for the women with whom he was best acquainted, his reflections on their +old age, in all their harrowing pathos, shall remain in the original for +me. Horace has disgraced himself to something the same tune; but what +Horace throws out with an ill-favoured laugh, Villon dwells on with an +almost maudlin whimper. + +It is in death that he finds his truest inspiration in the swift and +sorrowful change that overtakes beauty; in the strange revolution by +which great fortunes and renowns are diminished to a handful of +churchyard dust; and in the utter passing away of what was once lovable +and mighty. It is in this that the mixed texture of his thought enables +him to reach such poignant and terrible effects, and to enchance pity +with ridicule, like a man cutting capers to a funeral march. It is in +this, also, that he rises out of himself into the higher spheres of art. +So, in the ballade by which he is best known, he rings the changes on +names that once stood for beautiful and queenly women, and are now no +more than letters and a legend. “Where are the snows of yester year?” +runs the burden. And so, in another not so famous, he passes in review +the different degrees of bygone men, from the holy Apostles and the +golden Emperor of the East, down to the heralds, pursuivants, and +trumpeters, who also bore their part in the world’s pageantries and ate +greedily at great folks’ tables: all this to the refrain of “So much +carry the winds away!” Probably, there was some melancholy in his mind +for a yet lower grade, and Montigny and Colin de Cayeux clattering their +bones on Paris gibbet. Alas, and with so pitiful an experience of life, +Villon can offer us nothing but terror and lamentation about death! No +one has ever more skilfully communicated his own disenchantment; no one +ever blown a more ear-piercing note of sadness. This unrepentant thief +can attain neither to Christian confidence, nor to the spirit of the +bright Greek saying, that whom the gods love die early. It is a poor +heart, and a poorer age, that cannot accept the conditions of life with +some heroic readiness. + + * * * * * + +The date of the _Large Testament_ is the last date in the poet’s +biography. After having achieved that admirable and despicable +performance, he disappears into the night from whence he came. How or +when he died, whether decently in bed or trussed up to a gallows, remains +a riddle for foolhardy commentators. It appears his health had suffered +in the pit at Méun; he was thirty years of age and quite bald; with the +notch in his under lip where Sermaise had struck him with the sword, and +what wrinkles the reader may imagine. In default of portraits, this is +all I have been able to piece together, and perhaps even the baldness +should be taken as a figure of his destitution. A sinister dog, in all +likelihood, but with a look in his eye, and the loose flexile mouth that +goes with wit and an overweening sensual temperament. Certainly the +sorriest figure on the rolls of fame. + + + + +CHARLES OF ORLEANS. + + +FOR one who was no great politician, nor (as men go) especially wise, +capable or virtuous, Charles of Orleans is more than usually enviable to +all who love that better sort of fame which consists in being known not +widely, but intimately. “To be content that time to come should know +there was such a man, not caring whether they knew more of him, or to +subsist under naked denominations, without deserts or noble acts,” is, +says Sir Thomas Browne, a frigid ambition. It is to some more specific +memory that youth looks forward in its vigils. Old kings are sometimes +disinterred in all the emphasis of life, the hands untainted by decay, +the beard that had so often wagged in camp or senate still spread upon +the royal bosom; and in busts and pictures, some similitude of the great +and beautiful of former days is handed down. In this way, public +curiosity may be gratified, but hardly any private aspiration after fame. +It is not likely that posterity will fall in love with us, but not +impossible that it may respect or sympathise; and so a man would rather +leave behind him the portrait of his spirit than a portrait of his face, +_figura animi magis quam corporis_. Of those who have thus survived +themselves most completely, left a sort of personal seduction behind them +in the world, and retained, after death, the art of making friends, +Montaigne and Samuel Johnson certainly stand first. But we have +portraits of all sorts of men, from august Cæsar to the king’s dwarf; and +all sorts of portraits, from a Titian treasured in the Louvre to a +profile over the grocer’s chimney shelf. And so in a less degree, but no +less truly, than the spirit of Montaigne lives on in the delightful +Essays, that of Charles of Orleans survives in a few old songs and old +account-books; and it is still in the choice of the reader to make this +duke’s acquaintance, and, if their humours suit, become his friend. + + + +I. + + +His birth—if we are to argue from a man’s parents—was above his merit. +It is not merely that he was the grandson of one king, the father of +another, and the uncle of a third; but something more specious was to be +looked for from the son of his father, Louis de Valois, Duke of Orleans, +brother to the mad king Charles VI., lover of Queen Isabel, and the +leading patron of art and one of the leading politicians in France. And +the poet might have inherited yet higher virtues from his mother, +Valentina of Milan, a very pathetic figure of the age, the faithful wife +of an unfaithful husband, and the friend of a most unhappy king. The +father, beautiful, eloquent, and accomplished, exercised a strange +fascination over his contemporaries; and among those who dip nowadays +into the annals of the time there are not many—and these few are little +to be envied—who can resist the fascination of the mother. All mankind +owe her a debt of gratitude because she brought some comfort into the +life of the poor madman who wore the crown of France. + +Born (May 1391) of such a noble stock, Charles was to know from the first +all favours of nature and art. His father’s gardens were the admiration +of his contemporaries; his castles were situated in the most agreeable +parts of France, and sumptuously adorned. We have preserved, in an +inventory of 1403, the description of tapestried rooms where Charles may +have played in childhood. {238} “A green room, with the ceiling full of +angels, and the _dossier_ of shepherds and shepherdesses seeming +(_faisant contenance_) to eat nuts and cherries. A room of gold, silk +and worsted, with a device of little children in a river, and the sky +full of birds. A room of green tapestry, showing a knight and lady at +chess in a pavilion. Another green room, with shepherdesses in a +trellised garden worked in gold and silk. A carpet representing +cherry-trees, where there is a fountain, and a lady gathering cherries in +a basin.” These were some of the pictures over which his fancy might +busy itself of an afternoon, or at morning as he lay awake in bed. With +our deeper and more logical sense of life, we can have no idea how large +a space in the attention of mediæval men might be occupied by such +figured hangings on the wall. There was something timid and purblind in +the view they had of the world. Morally, they saw nothing outside of +traditional axioms; and little of the physical aspect of things entered +vividly into their mind, beyond what was to be seen on church windows and +the walls and floors of palaces. The reader will remember how Villon’s +mother conceived of heaven and hell and took all her scanty stock of +theology from the stained glass that threw its light upon her as she +prayed. And there is scarcely a detail of external effect in the +chronicles and romances of the time, but might have been borrowed at +second hand from a piece of tapestry. It was a stage in the history of +mankind which we may see paralleled, to some extent, in the first infant +school, where the representations of lions and elephants alternate round +the wall with moral verses and trite presentments of the lesser virtues. +So that to live in a house of many pictures was tantamount, for the time, +to a liberal education in itself. + +At Charles’s birth an order of knighthood was inaugurated in his honour. +At nine years old, he was a squire; at eleven, he had the escort of a +chaplain and a schoolmaster; at twelve, his uncle the king made him a +pension of twelve thousand livres d’or. {240a} He saw the most brilliant +and the most learned persons of France, in his father’s Court; and would +not fail to notice that these brilliant and learned persons were one and +all engaged in rhyming. Indeed, if it is difficult to realise the part +played by pictures, it is perhaps even more difficult to realise that +played by verses in the polite and active history of the age. At the +siege of Pontoise, English and French exchanged defiant ballades over the +walls. {240b} If a scandal happened, as in the loathsome thirty-third +story of the _Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles_, all the wits must make rondels +and chansonettes, which they would hand from one to another with an +unmanly sneer. Ladies carried their favourite’s ballades in their +girdles. {241a} Margaret of Scotland, all the world knows already, +kissed Alain Chartier’s lips in honour of the many virtuous thoughts and +golden sayings they had uttered; but it is not so well known, that this +princess was herself the most industrious of poetasters, that she is +supposed to have hastened her death by her literary vigils, and sometimes +wrote as many as twelve rondels in the day. {241b} It was in rhyme, +even, that the young Charles should learn his lessons. He might get all +manner of instruction in the truly noble art of the chase, not without a +smack of ethics by the way, from the compendious didactic poem of Gace de +la Bigne. Nay, and it was in rhyme that he should learn rhyming: in the +verses of his father’s Maître d’Hôtel, Eustache Deschamps, which treated +of “l’art de dictier et de faire chançons, ballades, virelais et +rondeaux,” along with many other matters worth attention, from the courts +of Heaven to the misgovernment of France. {241c} At this rate, all +knowledge is to be had in a goody, and the end of it is an old song. We +need not wonder when we hear from Monstrelet that Charles was a very well +educated person. He could string Latin texts together by the hour, and +make ballades and rondels better than Eustache Deschamps himself. He had +seen a mad king who would not change his clothes, and a drunken emperor +who could not keep his hand from the wine-cup. He had spoken a great +deal with jesters and fiddlers, and with the profligate lords who helped +his father to waste the revenues of France. He had seen ladies dance on +into broad daylight, and much burning of torches and waste of dainties +and good wine. {242a} And when all is said, it was no very helpful +preparation for the battle of life. “I believe Louis XI.,” writes +Comines, “would not have saved himself, if he had not been very +differently brought up from such other lords as I have seen educated in +this country; for these were taught nothing but to play the jackanapes +with finery and fine words.” {242b} I am afraid Charles took such +lessons to heart, and conceived of life as a season principally for +junketing and war. His view of the whole duty of man, so empty, vain, +and wearisome to us, was yet sincerely and consistently held. When he +came in his ripe years to compare the glory of two kingdoms, England and +France, it was on three points only,—pleasures, valour, and riches,—that +he cared to measure them; and in the very outset of that tract he speaks +of the life of the great as passed, “whether in arms, as in assaults, +battles, and sieges, or in jousts and tournaments, in high and stately +festivities and in funeral solemnities.” {243} + +When he was no more than thirteen, his father had him affianced to +Isabella, virgin-widow of our Richard II. and daughter of his uncle +Charles VI.; and, two years after (June 29, 1406), the cousins were +married at Compiègne, he fifteen, she seventeen years of age. It was in +every way a most desirable match. The bride brought five hundred +thousand francs of dowry. The ceremony was of the utmost magnificence, +Louis of Orleans figuring in crimson velvet, adorned with no less than +seven hundred and ninety-five pearls, gathered together expressly for +this occasion. And no doubt it must have been very gratifying for a +young gentleman of fifteen, to play the chief part in a pageant so gaily +put upon the stage. Only, the bridegroom might have been a little older; +and, as ill-luck would have it, the bride herself was of this way of +thinking, and would not be consoled for the loss of her title as queen, +or the contemptible age of her new husband. _Pleuroit fort ladite +Isabeau_; the said Isabella wept copiously. {244} It is fairly debatable +whether Charles was much to be pitied when, three years later (September +1409), this odd marriage was dissolved by death. Short as it was, +however, this connection left a lasting stamp upon his mind; and we find +that, in the last decade of his life, and after he had remarried for +perhaps the second time, he had not yet forgotten or forgiven the violent +death of Richard II. “Ce mauvais cas”—that ugly business, he writes, has +yet to be avenged. + +The marriage festivity was on the threshold of evil days. The great +rivalry between Louis of Orleans and John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, +had been forsworn with the most reverend solemnities. But the feud was +only in abeyance, and John of Burgundy still conspired in secret. On +November 23, 1407—in that black winter when the frost lasted +six-and-sixty days on end—a summons from the king reached Louis of +Orleans at the Hôtel Barbette, where he had been supping with Queen +Isabel. It was seven or eight in the evening, and the inhabitants of the +quarter were abed. He set forth in haste, accompanied by two squires +riding on one horse, a page, and a few varlets running with torches. As +he rode, he hummed to himself and trifled with his glove. And so riding, +he was beset by the bravoes of his enemy and slain. My lord of Burgundy +set an ill precedent in this deed, as he found some years after on the +bridge of Montereau; and even in the meantime he did not profit quietly +by his rival’s death. The horror of the other princes seems to have +perturbed himself; he avowed his guilt in the council, tried to brazen it +out, finally lost heart and fled at full gallop, cutting bridges behind +him, towards Bapaume and Lille. And so there we have the head of one +faction, who had just made himself the most formidable man in France, +engaged in a remarkably hurried journey, with black care on the pillion. +And meantime, on the other side, the widowed duchess came to Paris in +appropriate mourning, to demand justice for her husband’s death. Charles +VI., who was then in a lucid interval, did probably all that he could, +when he raised up the kneeling suppliant with kisses and smooth words. +Things were at a dead-lock. The criminal might be in the sorriest +fright, but he was still the greatest of vassals. Justice was easy to +ask and not difficult to promise; how it was to be executed was another +question. No one in France was strong enough to punish John of Burgundy; +and perhaps no one, except the widow, very sincere in wishing to punish +him. + +She, indeed, was eaten up of zeal; but the intensity of her eagerness +wore her out; and she died about a year after the murder, of grief and +indignation, unrequited love and unsatisfied resentment. It was during +the last months of her life that this fiery and generous woman, seeing +the soft hearts of her own children, looked with envy on a certain +natural son of her husband’s destined to become famous in the sequel as +the Bastard of Orleans, or the brave Dunois. “_You were stolen from +me_,” she said; “it is you who are fit to avenge your father.” These are +not the words of ordinary mourning, or of an ordinary woman. It is a +saying, over which Balzac would have rubbed his episcopal hands. That +the child who was to avenge her husband had not been born out of her +body, was a thing intolerable to Valentina of Milan; and the expression +of this singular and tragic jealousy is preserved to us by a rare chance, +in such straightforward and vivid words as we are accustomed to hear only +on the stress of actual life, or in the theatre. In history—where we see +things as in a glass darkly, and the fashion of former times is brought +before us, deplorably adulterated and defaced, fitted to very vague and +pompous words, and strained through many men’s minds of everything +personal or precise—this speech of the widowed duchess startles a reader, +somewhat as the footprint startled Robinson Crusoe. A human voice breaks +in upon the silence of the study, and the student is aware of a +fellow-creature in his world of documents. With such a clue in hand, one +may imagine how this wounded lioness would spur and exasperate the +resentment of her children, and what would be the last words of counsel +and command she left behind her. + +With these instancies of his dying mother—almost a voice from the +tomb—still tingling in his ears, the position of young Charles of +Orleans, when he was left at the head of that great house, was curiously +similar to that of Shakspeare’s Hamlet. The times were out of joint; +here was a murdered father to avenge on a powerful murderer; and here, in +both cases, a lad of inactive disposition born to set these matters +right. Valentina’s commendation of Dunois involved a judgment on +Charles, and that judgment was exactly correct. Whoever might be, +Charles was not the man to avenge his father. Like Hamlet, this son of a +dear father murdered was sincerely grieved at heart. Like Hamlet, too, +he could unpack his heart with words, and wrote a most eloquent letter to +the king, complaining that what was denied to him would not be denied “to +the lowest born and poorest man on earth.” Even in his private hours he +strove to preserve a lively recollection of his injury, and keep up the +native hue of resolution. He had gems engraved with appropriate legends, +hortatory or threatening: “_Dieu le scet_,” God knows it; or +“_Souvenez-vous de_ —” Remember! {248} It is only towards the end that +the two stories begin to differ; and in some points the historical +version is the more tragic. Hamlet only stabbed a silly old councillor +behind the arras; Charles of Orleans trampled France for five years under +the hoofs of his banditti. The miscarriage of Hamlet’s vengeance was +confined, at widest, to the palace; the ruin wrought by Charles of +Orleans was as broad as France. + +Yet the first act of the young duke is worthy of honourable mention. +Prodigal Louis had made enormous debts; and there is a story extant, to +illustrate how lightly he himself regarded these commercial obligations. +It appears that Louis, after a narrow escape he made in a thunder-storm, +had a smart access of penitence, and announced he would pay his debts on +the following Sunday. More than eight hundred creditors presented +themselves, but by that time the devil was well again, and they were +shown the door with more gaiety than politeness. A time when such +cynical dishonesty was possible for a man of culture is not, it will be +granted, a fortunate epoch for creditors. When the original debtor was +so lax, we may imagine how an heir would deal with the incumbrances of +his inheritance. On the death of Philip the Forward, father of that John +the Fearless whom we have seen at work, the widow went through the +ceremony of a public renunciation of goods; taking off her purse and +girdle, she left them on the grave, and thus, by one notable act, +cancelled her husband’s debts and defamed his honour. The conduct of +young Charles of Orleans was very different. To meet the joint +liabilities of his father and mother (for Valentina also was lavish), he +had to sell or pledge a quantity of jewels; and yet he would not take +advantage of a pretext, even legally valid, to diminish the amount. +Thus, one Godefroi Lefèvre, having disbursed many odd sums for the late +duke, and received or kept no vouchers, Charles ordered that he should be +believed upon his oath. {249} To a modern mind this seems as honourable +to his father’s memory as if John the Fearless had been hanged as high as +Haman. And as things fell out, except a recantation from the University +of Paris, which had justified the murder out of party feeling, and +various other purely paper reparations, this was about the outside of +what Charles was to effect in that direction. He lived five years, and +grew up from sixteen to twenty-one, in the midst of the most horrible +civil war, or series of civil wars, that ever devastated France; and from +first to last his wars were ill-starred, or else his victories useless. +Two years after the murder (March 1409), John the Fearless having the +upper hand for the moment, a shameful and useless reconciliation took +place, by the king’s command, in the church of Our Lady at Chartres. The +advocate of the Duke of Burgundy stated that Louis of Orleans had been +killed “for the good of the king’s person and realm.” Charles and his +brothers, with tears of shame, under protest, _pour ne pas desobéir au +roi_, forgave their father’s murderer and swore peace upon the missal. +It was, as I say, a shameful and useless ceremony; the very greffier, +entering it in his register, wrote in the margin, “_Pax_, _pax_, _inquit +Propheta_, _et non est Pax_.” {250} Charles was soon after allied with +the abominable Bernard d’Armagnac, even betrothed or married to a +daughter of his, called by a name that sounds like a contradiction in +terms, Bonne d’Armagnac. From that time forth, throughout all this +monstrous period—a very nightmare in the history of France—he is no more +than a stalking-horse for the ambitious Gascon. Sometimes the smoke +lifts, and you can see him for the twinkling of an eye, a very pale +figure; at one moment there is a rumour he will be crowned king; at +another, when the uproar has subsided, he will be heard still crying out +for justice; and the next (1412), he is showing himself to the applauding +populace on the same horse with John of Burgundy. But these are +exceptional seasons, and, for the most part, he merely rides at the +Gascon’s bridle over devastated France. His very party go, not by the +name of Orleans, but by the name of Armagnac. Paris is in the hands of +the butchers: the peasants have taken to the woods. Alliances are made +and broken as if in a country dance; the English called in, now by this +one, now by the other. Poor people sing in church, with white faces and +lamentable music: “_Domine Jesu_, _parce populo tuo_, _dirige in viam +pacis principes_.” And the end and upshot of the whole affair for +Charles of Orleans is another peace with John the Fearless. France is +once more tranquil, with the tranquillity of ruin; he may ride home again +to Blois, and look, with what countenance he may, on those gems he had +got engraved in the early days of his resentment, “_Souvenez-vous de_ —” +Remember! He has killed Polonius, to be sure; but the king is never a +penny the worse. + + + +II. + + +From the battle of Agincourt (Oct. 1415) dates the second period of +Charles’s life. The English reader will remember the name of Orleans in +the play of _Henry V._; and it is at least odd that we can trace a +resemblance between the puppet and the original. The interjection, “I +have heard a sonnet begin so to one’s mistress” (Act iii. scene 7), may +very well indicate one who was already an expert in that sort of trifle; +and the game of proverbs he plays with the Constable in the same scene, +would be quite in character for a man who spent many years of his life +capping verses with his courtiers. Certainly, Charles was in the great +battle with five hundred lances (say, three thousand men), and there he +was made prisoner as he led the van. According to one story, some ragged +English archer shot him down; and some diligent English Pistol, hunting +ransoms on the field of battle, extracted him from under a heap of bodies +and retailed him to our King Henry. He was the most important capture of +the day, and used with all consideration. On the way to Calais, Henry +sent him a present of bread and wine (and bread, you will remember, was +an article of luxury in the English camp), but Charles would neither eat +nor drink. Thereupon, Henry came to visit him in his quarters. “Noble +cousin,” said he, “how are you?” Charles replied that he was well. +“Why, then, do you neither eat nor drink?” And then with some asperity, +as I imagine, the young duke told him that “truly he had no inclination +for food.” And our Henry improved the occasion with something of a +snuffle, assuring his prisoner that God had fought against the French on +account of their manifold sins and transgressions. Upon this there +supervened the agonies of a rough sea passage; and many French lords, +Charles, certainly, among the number, declared they would rather endure +such another defeat than such another sore trial on shipboard. Charles, +indeed, never forgot his sufferings. Long afterwards, he declared his +hatred to a seafaring life, and willingly yielded to England the empire +of the seas, “because there is danger and loss of life, and God knows +what pity when it storms; and sea-sickness is for many people hard to +bear; and the rough life that must be led is little suitable for the +nobility:” {253} which, of all babyish utterances that ever fell from any +public man, may surely bear the bell. Scarcely disembarked, he followed +his victor, with such wry face as we may fancy, through the streets of +holiday London. And then the doors closed upon his last day of garish +life for more than a quarter of a century. After a boyhood passed in the +dissipations of a luxurious court or in the camp of war, his ears still +stunned and his cheeks still burning from his enemies’ jubilations; out +of all this ringing of English bells and singing of English anthems, from +among all these shouting citizens in scarlet cloaks, and beautiful +virgins attired in white, he passed into the silence and solitude of a +political prison. {254} + +His captivity was not without alleviations. He was allowed to go +hawking, and he found England an admirable country for the sport; he was +a favourite with English ladies, and admired their beauty; and he did not +lack for money, wine, or books; he was honourably imprisoned in the +strongholds of great nobles, in Windsor Castle and the Tower of London. +But when all is said, he was a prisoner for five-and-twenty years. For +five-and-twenty years he could not go where he would, or do what he +liked, or speak with any but his gaolers. We may talk very wisely of +alleviations; there is only one alleviation for which the man would thank +you: he would thank you to open the door. With what regret Scottish +James I. bethought him (in the next room perhaps to Charles) of the time +when he rose “as early as the day.” What would he not have given to wet +his boots once more with morning dew, and follow his vagrant fancy among +the meadows? The only alleviation to the misery of constraint lies in +the disposition of the prisoner. To each one this place of discipline +brings his own lesson. It stirs Latude or Baron Trenck into heroic +action; it is a hermitage for pious and conformable spirits. Béranger +tells us he found prison life, with its regular hours and long evenings, +both pleasant and profitable. _The Pilgrim’s Progress_ and _Don Quixote_ +were begun in prison. It was after they were become (to use the words of +one of them), “Oh, worst imprisonment—the dungeon of themselves!” that +Homer and Milton worked so hard and so well for the profit of mankind. +In the year 1415 Henry V. had two distinguished prisoners, French Charles +of Orleans and Scottish James I., who whiled away the hours of their +captivity with rhyming. Indeed, there can be no better pastime for a +lonely man than the mechanical exercise of verse. Such intricate forms +as Charles had been used to from childhood, the ballade with its scanty +rhymes; the rondel, with the recurrence first of the whole, then of half +the burthen, in thirteen verses, seem to have been invented for the +prison and the sick bed. The common Scotch saying, on the sight of +anything operose and finical, “he must have had little to do that made +that!” might be put as epigraph on all the song books of old France. +Making such sorts of verse belongs to the same class of pleasures as +guessing acrostics or “burying proverbs.” It is almost purely formal, +almost purely verbal. It must be done gently and gingerly. It keeps the +mind occupied a long time, and never so intently as to be distressing; +for anything like strain is against the very nature of the craft. +Sometimes things go easily, the refrains fall into their place as if of +their own accord, and it becomes something of the nature of an +intellectual tennis; you must make your poem as the rhymes will go, just +as you must strike your ball as your adversary played it. So that these +forms are suitable rather for those who wish to make verses, than for +those who wish to express opinions. Sometimes, on the other hand, +difficulties arise: rival verses come into a man’s head, and fugitive +words elude his memory. Then it is that he enjoys at the same time the +deliberate pleasures of a connoisseur comparing wines, and the ardour of +the chase. He may have been sitting all day long in prison with folded +hands; but when he goes to bed, the retrospect will seem animated and +eventful. + +Besides confirming himself as an habitual maker of verses, Charles +acquired some new opinions during his captivity. He was perpetually +reminded of the change that had befallen him. He found the climate of +England cold and “prejudicial to the human frame;” he had a great +contempt for English fruit and English beer; even the coal fires were +unpleasing in his eyes. {257a} He was rooted up from among his friends +and customs and the places that had known him. And so in this strange +land he began to learn the love of his own. Sad people all the world +over are like to be moved when the wind is in some particular quarter. +So Burns preferred when it was in the west, and blew to him from his +mistress; so the girl in the ballade, looking south to Yarrow, thought it +might carry a kiss betwixt her and her gallant; and so we find Charles +singing of the “pleasant wind that comes from France.” {257b} One day, +at “Dover-on-the-Sea,” he looked across the straits, and saw the +sandhills about Calais. And it happened to him, he tells us in a +ballade, to remember his happiness over there in the past; and he was +both sad and merry at the recollection, and could not have his fill of +gazing on the shores of France. {257c} Although guilty of unpatriotic +acts, he had never been exactly unpatriotic in feeling. But his sojourn +in England gave, for the time at least, some consistency to what had been +a very weak and ineffectual prejudice. He must have been under the +influence of more than usually solemn considerations, when he proceeded +to turn Henry’s puritanical homily after Agincourt into a ballade, and +reproach France, and himself by implication, with pride, gluttony, +idleness, unbridled covetousness, and sensuality. {258a} For the moment, +he must really have been thinking more of France than of Charles of +Orleans. + +And another lesson he learned. He who was only to be released in case of +peace, begins to think upon the disadvantages of war. “Pray for peace,” +is his refrain: a strange enough subject for the ally of Bernard +d’Armagnac. {258b} But this lesson was plain and practical; it had one +side in particular that was specially attractive for Charles; and he did +not hesitate to explain it in so many words. “Everybody,” he writes—I +translate roughly—“everybody should be much inclined to peace, for +everybody has a deal to gain by it.” {258c} + +Charles made laudable endeavours to acquire English, and even learned to +write a rondel in that tongue of quite average mediocrity. {259a} He was +for some time billeted on the unhappy Suffolk, who received fourteen +shillings and fourpence a day for his expenses; and from the fact that +Suffolk afterwards visited Charles in France while he was negotiating the +marriage of Henry VI., as well as the terms of that nobleman’s +impeachment, we may believe there was some not unkindly intercourse +between the prisoner and his gaoler: a fact of considerable interest when +we remember that Suffolk’s wife was the granddaughter of the poet +Geoffrey Chaucer. {259b} Apart from this, and a mere catalogue of dates +and places, only one thing seems evident in the story of Charles’s +captivity. It seems evident that, as these five-and-twenty years drew +on, he became less and less resigned. Circumstances were against the +growth of such a feeling. One after another of his fellow-prisoners was +ransomed and went home. More than once he was himself permitted to visit +France; where he worked on abortive treaties and showed himself more +eager for his own deliverance than for the profit of his native land. +Resignation may follow after a reasonable time upon despair; but if a man +is persecuted by a series of brief and irritating hopes, his mind no more +attains to a settled frame of resolution, than his eye would grow +familiar with a night of thunder and lightning. Years after, when he was +speaking at the trial of that Duke of Alençon, who began life so +hopefully as the boyish favourite of Joan of Arc, he sought to prove that +captivity was a harder punishment than death. “For I have had experience +myself,” he said; “and in my prison of England, for the weariness, +danger, and displeasure in which I then lay, I have many a time wished I +had been slain at the battle where they took me.” {260} This is a +flourish, if you will, but it is something more. His spirit would +sometimes rise up in a fine anger against the petty desires and +contrarieties of life. He would compare his own condition with the quiet +and dignified estate of the dead; and aspire to lie among his comrades on +the field of Agincourt, as the Psalmist prayed to have the wings of a +dove and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea. But such high thoughts +came to Charles only in a flash. + +John the Fearless had been murdered in his turn on the bridge of +Montereau so far back as 1419. His son, Philip the Good—partly to +extinguish the feud, partly that he might do a popular action, and +partly, in view of his ambitious schemes, to detach another great vassal +from the throne of France—had taken up the cause of Charles of Orleans, +and negotiated diligently for his release. In 1433 a Burgundian embassy +was admitted to an interview with the captive duke, in the presence of +Suffolk. Charles shook hands most affectionately with the ambassadors. +They asked after his health. “I am well enough in body,” he replied, +“but far from well in mind. I am dying of grief at having to pass the +best days of my life in prison, with none to sympathise.” The talk +falling on the chances of peace, Charles referred to Suffolk if he were +not sincere and constant in his endeavours to bring it about. “If peace +depended on me,” he said, “I should procure it gladly, were it to cost me +my life seven days after.” We may take this as showing what a large +price he set, not so much on peace, as on seven days of freedom. Seven +days!—he would make them seven years in the employment. Finally, he +assured the ambassadors of his good will to Philip of Burgundy; squeezed +one of them by the hand and nipped him twice in the arm to signify things +unspeakable before Suffolk; and two days after sent them Suffolk’s +barber, one Jean Carnet, a native of Lille, to testify more freely of his +sentiments. “As I speak French,” said this emissary, “the Duke of +Orleans is more familiar with me than with any other of the household; +and I can bear witness he never said anything against Duke Philip.” +{262a} It will be remembered that this person, with whom he was so +anxious to stand well, was no other than his hereditary enemy, the son of +his father’s murderer. But the honest fellow bore no malice, indeed not +he. He began exchanging ballades with Philip, whom he apostrophises as +his companion, his cousin, and his brother. He assures him that, soul +and body, he is altogether Burgundian; and protests that he has given his +heart in pledge to him. Regarded as the history of a vendetta, it must +be owned that Charles’s life has points of some originality. And yet +there is an engaging frankness about these ballades which disarms +criticism. {262b} You see Charles throwing himself headforemost into the +trap; you hear Burgundy, in his answers begin to inspire him with his own +prejudices, and draw melancholy pictures of the misgovernment of France. +But Charles’s own spirits are so high and so amiable, and he is so +thoroughly convinced his cousin is a fine fellow, that one’s scruples are +carried away in the torrent of his happiness and gratitude. And his +would be a sordid spirit who would not clap hands at the consummation +(Nov. 1440); when Charles, after having sworn on the Sacrament that he +would never again bear arms against England, and pledged himself body and +soul to the unpatriotic faction in his own country, set out from London +with a light heart and a damaged integrity. + +In the magnificent copy of Charles’s poems, given by our Henry VII. to +Elizabeth of York on the occasion of their marriage, a large illumination +figures at the head of one of the pages, which, in chronological +perspective, is almost a history of his imprisonment. It gives a view of +London with all its spires, the river passing through the old bridge and +busy with boats. One side of the White Tower has been taken out, and we +can see, as under a sort of shrine, the paved room where the duke sits +writing. He occupies a high-backed bench in front of a great chimney; +red and black ink are before him; and the upper end of the apartment is +guarded by many halberdiers, with the red cross of England on their +breast. On the next side of the tower he appears again, leaning out of +window and gazing on the river; doubtless there blows just then “a +pleasant wind from out the land of France,” and some ship comes up the +river: “the ship of good news.” At the door we find him yet again; this +time embracing a messenger, while a groom stands by holding two saddled +horses. And yet further to the left, a cavalcade defiles out of the +tower; the duke is on his way at last towards “the sunshine of France.” + + + +III. + + +During the five-and-twenty years of his captivity, Charles had not lost +in the esteem of his fellow-countrymen. For so young a man, the head of +so great a house, and so numerous a party, to be taken prisoner as he +rode in the vanguard of France, and stereotyped for all men in this +heroic attitude, was to taste untimeously the honours of the grave. Of +him, as of the dead, it would be ungenerous to speak evil; what little +energy he had displayed would be remembered with piety, when all that he +had done amiss was courteously forgotten. As English folk looked for +Arthur; as Danes awaited the coming of Ogier; as Somersetshire peasants +or sergeants of the Old Guard expected the return of Monmouth or +Napoleon; the countrymen of Charles of Orleans looked over the straits +towards his English prison with desire and confidence. Events had so +fallen out while he was rhyming ballades, that he had become the type of +all that was most truly patriotic. The remnants of his old party had +been the chief defenders of the unity of France. His enemies of Burgundy +had been notoriously favourers and furtherers of English domination. +People forgot that his brother still lay by the heels for an unpatriotic +treaty with England, because Charles himself had been taken prisoner +patriotically fighting against it. That Henry V. had left special orders +against his liberation, served to increase the wistful pity with which he +was regarded. And when, in defiance of all contemporary virtue, and +against express pledges, the English carried war into their prisoner’s +fief, not only France, but all thinking men in Christendom, were roused +to indignation against the oppressors, and sympathy with the victim. It +was little wonder if he came to bulk somewhat largely in the imagination +of the best of those at home. Charles le Boutteillier, when (as the +story goes) he slew Clarence at Beaugé, was only seeking an exchange for +Charles of Orleans. {265a} It was one of Joan of Arc’s declared +intentions to deliver the captive duke. If there was no other way, she +meant to cross the seas and bring him home by force. And she professed +before her judges a sure knowledge that Charles of Orleans was beloved of +God. {265b} + +Alas! it was not at all as a deliverer that Charles returned to France. +He was nearly fifty years old. Many changes had been accomplished since, +at twenty-three, he was taken on the field of Agincourt. But of all +these he was profoundly ignorant, or had only heard of them in the +discoloured reports of Philip of Burgundy. He had the ideas of a former +generation, and sought to correct them by the scandal of a factious +party. With such qualifications he came back eager for the domination, +the pleasures, and the display that befitted his princely birth. A long +disuse of all political activity combined with the flatteries of his new +friends to fill him with an overweening conceit of his own capacity and +influence. If aught had gone wrong in his absence, it seemed quite +natural men should look to him for its redress. Was not King Arthur come +again? + +The Duke of Burgundy received him with politic honours. He took his +guest by his foible for pageantry, all the easier as it was a foible of +his own; and Charles walked right out of prison into much the same +atmosphere of trumpeting and bell-ringing as he had left behind when he +went in. Fifteen days after his deliverance he was married to Mary of +Cleves, at St. Omer. The marriage was celebrated with the usual pomp of +the Burgundian court; there were joustings, and illuminations, and +animals that spouted wine; and many nobles dined together, _comme en +brigade_, and were served abundantly with many rich and curious dishes. +{267a} It must have reminded Charles not a little of his first marriage +at Compiègne; only then he was two years the junior of his bride, and +this time he was five-and-thirty years her senior. It will be a fine +question which marriage promises more: for a boy of fifteen to lead off +with a lass of seventeen, or a man of fifty to make a match of it with a +child of fifteen. But there was something bitter in both. The +lamentations of Isabella will not have been forgotten. As for Mary, she +took up with one Jaquet de la Lain, a sort of muscular Methody of the +period, with a huge appetite for tournaments, and a habit of confessing +himself the last thing before he went to bed. {267b} With such a hero, +the young duchess’s amours were most likely innocent; and in all other +ways she was a suitable partner for the duke, and well fitted to enter +into his pleasures. + +When the festivities at Saint Omer had come to an end, Charles and his +wife set forth by Ghent and Tournay. The towns gave him offerings of +money as he passed through, to help in the payment of his ransom. From +all sides, ladies and gentlemen thronged to offer him their services; +some gave him their sons for pages, some archers for a bodyguard; and by +the time he reached Tournay, he had a following of 300 horse. Everywhere +he was received as though he had been the King of France. {268} If he +did not come to imagine himself something of the sort, he certainly +forgot the existence of any one with a better claim to the title. He +conducted himself on the hypothesis that Charles VII. was another Charles +VI. He signed with enthusiasm that treaty of Arras, which left France +almost at the discretion of Burgundy. On December 18 he was still no +farther than Bruges, where he entered into a private treaty with Philip; +and it was not until January 14, ten weeks after he disembarked in +France, and attended by a ruck of Burgundian gentlemen, that he arrived +in Paris and offered to present himself before Charles VII. The king +sent word that he might come, if he would, with a small retinue, but not +with his present following; and the duke, who was mightily on his high +horse after all the ovations he had received, took the king’s attitude +amiss, and turned aside into Touraine, to receive more welcome and more +presents, and be convoyed by torchlight into faithful cities. + +And so you see, here was King Arthur home again, and matters nowise +mended in consequence. The best we can say is, that this last stage of +Charles’s public life was of no long duration. His confidence was soon +knocked out of him in the contact with others. He began to find he was +an earthen vessel among many vessels of brass; he began to be shrewdly +aware that he was no King Arthur. In 1442, at Limoges, he made himself +the spokesman of the malcontent nobility. The king showed himself +humiliatingly indifferent to his counsels, and humiliatingly generous +towards his necessities. And there, with some blushes, he may be said to +have taken farewell of the political stage. A feeble attempt on the +county of Asti is scarce worth the name of exception. Thenceforward let +Ambition wile whom she may into the turmoil of events, our duke will walk +cannily in his well-ordered garden, or sit by the fire to touch the +slender reed. {269} + + + +IV. + + +If it were given each of us to transplant his life wherever he pleased in +time or space, with all the ages and all the countries of the world to +choose from, there would be quite an instructive diversity of taste. A +certain sedentary majority would prefer to remain where they were. Many +would choose the Renaissance; many some stately and simple period of +Grecian life; and still more elect to pass a few years wandering among +the villages of Palestine with an inspired conductor. For some of our +quaintly vicious contemporaries, we have the decline of the Roman Empire +and the reign of Henry III. of France. But there are others not quite so +vicious, who yet cannot look upon the world with perfect gravity, who +have never taken the categorical imperative to wife, and have more taste +for what is comfortable than for what is magnanimous and high; and I can +imagine some of these casting their lot in the Court of Blois during the +last twenty years of the life of Charles of Orleans. + +The duke and duchess, their staff of officers and ladies, and the +high-born and learned persons who were attracted to Blois on a visit, +formed a society for killing time and perfecting each other in various +elegant accomplishments, such as we might imagine for an ideal +watering-place in the Delectable Mountains. The company hunted and went +on pleasure-parties; they played chess, tables, and many other games. +What we now call the history of the period passed, I imagine, over the +heads of these good people much as it passes over our own. News reached +them, indeed, of great and joyful import. William Peel received eight +livres and five sous from the duchess, when he brought the first tidings +that Rouen was recaptured from the English. {271a} A little later and +the duke sang, in a truly patriotic vein, the deliverance of Guyenne and +Normandy. {271b} They were liberal of rhymes and largesse, and welcomed +the prosperity of their country much as they welcomed the coming of +spring, and with no more thought of collaborating towards the event. +Religion was not forgotten in the Court of Blois. Pilgrimages were +agreeable and picturesque excursions. In those days a well-served chapel +was something like a good vinery in our own, an opportunity for display +and the source of mild enjoyments. There was probably something of his +rooted delight in pageantry, as well as a good deal of gentle piety, in +the feelings with which Charles gave dinner every Friday to thirteen poor +people, served them himself, and washed their feet with his own hands. +{271c} Solemn affairs would interest Charles and his courtiers from +their trivial side. The duke perhaps cared less for the deliverance of +Guyenne and Normandy than for his own verses on the occasion; just as Dr. +Russell’s correspondence in _The Times_ was among the most material parts +of the Crimean War for that talented correspondent. And I think it +scarcely cynical to suppose that religion as well as patriotism was +principally cultivated as a means of filling up the day. + +It was not only messengers fiery red with haste and charged with the +destiny of nations, who were made welcome at the gates of Blois. If any +man of accomplishment came that way, he was sure of an audience, and +something for his pocket. The courtiers would have received Ben Jonson +like Drummond of Hawthornden, and a good pugilist like Captain Barclay. +They were catholic, as none but the entirely idle can be catholic. It +might be Pierre, called Dieu d’amours, the juggler; or it might be three +high English minstrels; or the two men, players of ghitterns, from the +kingdom of Scotland, who sang the destruction of the Turks; or again +Jehan Rognelet, player of instruments of music, who played and danced +with his wife and two children; they would each be called into the castle +to give a taste of his proficiency before my lord the duke. {272} +Sometimes the performance was of a more personal interest, and produced +much the same sensations as are felt on an English green on the arrival +of a professional cricketer, or round an English billiard table during a +match between Roberts and Cooke. This was when Jehan Nègre, the Lombard, +came to Blois and played chess against all these chess-players, and won +much money from my lord and his intimates; or when Baudet Harenc of +Chalons made ballades before all these ballade-makers. {273} + +It will not surprise the reader to learn they were all makers of ballades +and rondels. To write verses for May day, seems to have been as much a +matter of course, as to ride out with the cavalcade that went to gather +hawthorn. The choice of Valentines was a standing challenge, and the +courtiers pelted each other with humorous and sentimental verses as in a +literary carnival. If an indecorous adventure befell our friend Maistre +Estienne le Gout, my lord the duke would turn it into the funniest of +rondels, all the rhymes being the names of the cases of nouns or the +moods of verbs; and Maistre Estienne would make reply in similar fashion, +seeking to prune the story of its more humiliating episodes. If Frédet +was too long away from Court, a rondel went to upbraid him; and it was in +a rondel that Frédet would excuse himself. Sometimes two or three, or as +many as a dozen, would set to work on the same refrain, the same idea, or +in the same macaronic jargon. Some of the poetasters were heavy enough; +others were not wanting in address; and the duchess herself was among +those who most excelled. On one occasion eleven competitors made a +ballade on the idea, + + “I die of thirst beside the fountain’s edge” + + (Je meurs de soif emprès de la fontaine). + +These eleven ballades still exist; and one of them arrests the attention +rather from the name of the author than from any special merit in itself. +It purports to be the work of François Villon; and so far as a foreigner +can judge (which is indeed a small way), it may very well be his. Nay, +and if any one thing is more probable than another, in the great _tabula +rasa_, or unknown land, which we are fain to call the biography of +Villon, it seems probable enough that he may have gone upon a visit to +Charles of Orleans. Where Master Baudet Harenc, of Chalons, found a +sympathetic, or perhaps a derisive audience (for who can tell nowadays +the degree of Baudet’s excellence in his art?), favour would not be +wanting for the greatest ballade-maker of all time. Great as would seem +the incongruity, it may have pleased Charles to own a sort of kinship +with ragged singers, and whimsically regard himself as one of the +confraternity of poets. And he would have other grounds of intimacy with +Villon. A room looking upon Windsor gardens is a different matter from +Villon’s dungeon at Méun; yet each in his own degree had been tried in +prison. Each in his own way also, loved the good things of this life and +the service of the Muses. But the same gulf that separated Burns from +his Edinburgh patrons would separate the singer of Bohemia from the +rhyming duke. And it is hard to imagine that Villon’s training amongst +thieves, loose women, and vagabond students, had fitted him to move in a +society of any dignity and courtliness. Ballades are very admirable +things; and a poet is doubtless a most interesting visitor. But among +the courtiers of Charles, there would be considerable regard for the +proprieties of etiquette; and even a duke will sometimes have an eye to +his teaspoons. Moreover, as a poet, I can conceive he may have +disappointed expectation. It need surprise nobody if Villon’s ballade on +the theme, + + “I die of thirst beside the fountain’s edge,” + +was but a poor performance. He would make better verses on the lee-side +of a flagon at the sign of the Pomme du Pin, than in a cushioned settle +in the halls of Blois. + +Charles liked change of place. He was often not so much travelling as +making a progress; now to join the king for some great tournament; now to +visit King René, at Tarascon, where he had a study of his own and saw all +manner of interesting things—oriental curios, King René painting birds, +and, what particularly pleased him, Triboulet, the dwarf jester, whose +skull-cap was no bigger than an orange. {276a} Sometimes the journeys +were set about on horseback in a large party, with the _fourriers_ sent +forward to prepare a lodging at the next stage. We find almost +Gargantuan details of the provision made by these officers against the +duke’s arrival, of eggs and butter and bread, cheese and peas and +chickens, pike and bream and barbel, and wine both white and red. {276b} +Sometimes he went by water in a barge, playing chess or tables with a +friend in the pavilion, or watching other vessels as they went before the +wind. {276c} Children ran along the bank, as they do to this day on the +Crinan Canal; and when Charles threw in money, they would dive and bring +it up. {276d} As he looked on at their exploits, I wonder whether that +room of gold and silk and worsted came back into his memory, with the +device of little children in a river, and the sky full of birds? + +He was a bit of a book-fancier, and had vied with his brother Angoulême +in bringing back the library of their grandfather Charles V., when +Bedford put it up for sale in London. {277a} The duchess had a library +of her own; and we hear of her borrowing romances from ladies in +attendance on the blue-stocking Margaret of Scotland. {277b} Not only +were books collected, but new books were written at the court of Blois. +The widow of one Jean Fougère, a bookbinder, seems to have done a number +of odd commissions for the bibliophilous count. She it was who received +three vellum-skins to bind the duchess’s Book of Hours, and who was +employed to prepare parchment for the use of the duke’s scribes. And she +it was who bound in vermilion leather the great manuscript of Charles’s +own poems, which was presented to him by his secretary, Anthony Astesan, +with the text in one column, and Astesan’s Latin version in the other. +{277c} + +Such tastes, with the coming of years, would doubtless take the place of +many others. We find in Charles’s verse much semi-ironical regret for +other days, and resignation to growing infirmities. He who had been +“nourished in the schools of love,” now sees nothing either to please or +displease him. Old age has imprisoned him within doors, where he means +to take his ease, and let younger fellows bestir themselves in life. He +had written (in earlier days, we may presume) a bright and defiant little +poem in praise of solitude. If they would but leave him alone with his +own thoughts and happy recollections, he declared it was beyond the power +of melancholy to affect him. But now, when his animal strength has so +much declined that he sings the discomforts of winter instead of the +inspirations of spring, and he has no longer any appetite for life, he +confesses he is wretched when alone, and, to keep his mind from grievous +thoughts, he must have many people around him, laughing, talking, and +singing. {278} + +While Charles was thus falling into years, the order of things, of which +he was the outcome and ornament, was growing old along with him. The +semi-royalty of the princes of the blood was already a thing of the past; +and when Charles VII. was gathered to his fathers, a new king reigned in +France, who seemed every way the opposite of royal. Louis XI. had aims +that were incomprehensible, and virtues that were inconceivable to his +contemporaries. But his contemporaries were able enough to appreciate +his sordid exterior, and his cruel and treacherous spirit. To the whole +nobility of France he was a fatal and unreasonable phenomenon. All such +courts as that of Charles at Blois, or his friend René’s in Provence, +would soon be made impossible; interference was the order of the day; +hunting was already abolished; and who should say what was to go next? +Louis, in fact, must have appeared to Charles primarily in the light of a +kill-joy. I take it, when missionaries land in South Sea Islands and lay +strange embargo on the simplest things in life, the islanders will not be +much more puzzled and irritated than Charles of Orleans at the policy of +the Eleventh Louis. There was one thing, I seem to apprehend, that had +always particularly moved him; and that was, any proposal to punish a +person of his acquaintance. No matter what treason he may have made or +meddled with, an Alençon or an Armagnac was sure to find Charles reappear +from private life, and do his best to get him pardoned. He knew them +quite well. He had made rondels with them. They were charming people in +every way. There must certainly be some mistake. Had not he himself +made anti-national treaties almost before he was out of his nonage? And +for the matter of that, had not every one else done the like? Such are +some of the thoughts by which he might explain to himself his aversion to +such extremities; but it was on a deeper basis that the feeling probably +reposed. A man of his temper could not fail to be impressed at the +thought of disastrous revolutions in the fortunes of those he knew. He +would feel painfully the tragic contrast, when those who had everything +to make life valuable were deprived of life itself. And it was shocking +to the clemency of his spirit, that sinners should be hurried before +their judge without a fitting interval for penitence and satisfaction. +It was this feeling which brought him at last, a poor, purblind +blue-bottle of the later autumn, into collision with “the universal +spider,” Louis XI. He took up the defence of the Duke of Brittany at +Tours. But Louis was then in no humour to hear Charles’s texts and Latin +sentiments; he had his back to the wall, the future of France was at +stake; and if all the old men in the world had crossed his path, they +would have had the rough side of his tongue like Charles of Orleans. I +have found nowhere what he said, but it seems it was monstrously to the +point, and so rudely conceived that the old duke never recovered the +indignity. He got home as far as Amboise, sickened, and died two days +after (Jan. 4, 1465), in the seventy-fourth year of his age. And so a +whiff of pungent prose stopped the issue of melodious rondels to the end +of time. + + + +V. + + +The futility of Charles’s public life was of a piece throughout. He +never succeeded in any single purpose he set before him; for his +deliverance from England, after twenty-five years of failure and at the +cost of dignity and consistency, it would be ridiculously hyperbolical to +treat as a success. During the first part of his life he was the +stalking horse of Bernard d’Armagnac; during the second, he was the +passive instrument of English diplomatists; and before he was well +entered on the third, he hastened to become the dupe and catspaw of +Burgundian treason. On each of these occasions, a strong and not +dishonourable personal motive determined his behaviour. In 1407 and the +following years, he had his father’s murder uppermost in his mind. +During his English captivity, that thought was displaced by a more +immediate desire for his own liberation. In 1440 a sentiment of +gratitude to Philip of Burgundy blinded him to all else, and led him to +break with the tradition of his party and his own former life. He was +born a great vassal, and he conducted himself like a private gentleman. +He began life in a showy and brilliant enough fashion, by the light of a +petty personal chivalry. He was not without some tincture of patriotism; +but it was resolvable into two parts: a preference for life among his +fellow-countrymen, and a barren point of honour. In England, he could +comfort himself by the reflection that “he had been taken while loyally +doing his devoir,” without any misgiving as to his conduct in the +previous years, when he had prepared the disaster of Agincourt by +wasteful feud. This unconsciousness of the larger interests is perhaps +most happily exampled out of his own mouth. When Alençon stood accused +of betraying Normandy into the hands of the English, Charles made a +speech in his defence, from which I have already quoted more than once. +Alençon, he said, had professed a great love and trust towards him; “yet +did he give no great proof thereof, when he sought to betray Normandy; +whereby he would have made me lose an estate of 10,000 livres a year, and +might have occasioned the destruction of the kingdom and of all us +Frenchmen.” These are the words of one, mark you, against whom +Gloucester warned the English Council because of his “great subtility and +cautelous disposition.” It is not hard to excuse the impatience of Louis +XI., if such stuff was foisted on him by way of political deliberation. + +This incapacity to see things with any greatness, this obscure and narrow +view was fundamentally characteristic of the man as well as of the epoch. +It is not even so striking in his public life, where he failed, as in his +poems, where he notably succeeded. For wherever we might expect a poet +to be unintelligent, it certainly would not be in his poetry. And +Charles is unintelligent even there. Of all authors whom a modern may +still read and read over again with pleasure, he has perhaps the least to +say. His poems seem to bear testimony rather to the fashion of rhyming, +which distinguished the age, than to any special vocation in the man +himself. Some of them are drawing-room exercises and the rest seem made +by habit. Great writers are struck with something in nature or society, +with which they become pregnant and longing; they are possessed with an +idea, and cannot be at peace until they have put it outside of them in +some distinct embodiment. But with Charles literature was an object +rather than a mean; he was one who loved bandying words for its own sake; +the rigidity of intricate metrical forms stood him in lieu of precise +thought; instead of communicating truth, he observed the laws of a game; +and when he had no one to challenge at chess or rackets, he made verses +in a wager against himself. From the very idleness of the man’s mind, +and not from intensity of feeling, it happens that all his poems are more +or less autobiographical. But they form an autobiography singularly bald +and uneventful. Little is therein recorded beside sentiments. Thoughts, +in any true sense, he had none to record. And if we can gather that he +had been a prisoner in England, that he had lived in the Orleannese, and +that he hunted and went in parties of pleasure, I believe it is about as +much definite experience as is to be found in all these five hundred +pages of autobiographical verse. Doubtless, we find here and there a +complaint on the progress of the infirmities of age. Doubtless, he feels +the great change of the year, and distinguishes winter from spring; +winter as the time of snow and the fireside; spring as the return of +grass and flowers, the time of St. Valentine’s day and a beating heart. +And he feels love after a fashion. Again and again, we learn that +Charles of Orleans is in love, and hear him ring the changes through the +whole gamut of dainty and tender sentiment. But there is never a spark +of passion; and heaven alone knows whether there was any real woman in +the matter, or the whole thing was an exercise in fancy. If these poems +were indeed inspired by some living mistress, one would think he had +never seen, never heard, and never touched her. There is nothing in any +one of these so numerous love-songs to indicate who or what the lady was. +Was she dark or fair, passionate or gentle like himself, witty or simple? +Was it always one woman? or are there a dozen here immortalised in cold +indistinction? The old English translator mentions gray eyes in his +version of one of the amorous rondels; so far as I remember, he was +driven by some emergency of the verse; but in the absence of all sharp +lines of character and anything specific, we feel for the moment a sort +of surprise, as though the epithet were singularly happy and unusual, or +as though we had made our escape from cloudland into something tangible +and sure. The measure of Charles’s indifference to all that now +preoccupies and excites a poet, is best given by a positive example. If, +besides the coming of spring, any one external circumstance may be said +to have struck his imagination, it was the despatch of _fourriers_, while +on a journey, to prepare the night’s lodging. This seems to be his +favourite image; it reappears like the upas-tree in the early work of +Coleridge: we may judge with what childish eyes he looked upon the world, +if one of the sights which most impressed him was that of a man going to +order dinner. + +Although they are not inspired by any deeper motive than the common run +of contemporaneous drawing-room verses, those of Charles of Orleans are +executed with inimitable lightness and delicacy of touch. They deal with +floating and colourless sentiments, and the writer is never greatly +moved, but he seems always genuine. He makes no attempt to set off thin +conceptions with a multiplicity of phrases. His ballades are generally +thin and scanty of import; for the ballade presented too large a canvas, +and he was preoccupied by technical requirements. But in the rondel he +has put himself before all competitors by a happy knack and a prevailing +distinction of manner. He is very much more of a duke in his verses than +in his absurd and inconsequential career as a statesman; and how he shows +himself a duke is precisely by the absence of all pretension, turgidity, +or emphasis. He turns verses, as he would have come into the king’s +presence, with a quiet accomplishment of grace. + +Théodore de Banville, the youngest poet of a famous generation now nearly +extinct, and himself a sure and finished artist, knocked off, in his +happiest vein, a few experiments in imitation of Charles of Orleans. I +would recommend these modern rondels to all who care about the old duke, +not only because they are delightful in themselves, but because they +serve as a contrast to throw into relief the peculiarities of their +model. When de Banville revives a forgotten form of verse—and he has +already had the honour of reviving the ballade—he does it in the spirit +of a workman choosing a good tool wherever he can find one, and not at +all in that of the dilettante, who seeks to renew bygone forms of thought +and make historic forgeries. With the ballade this seemed natural +enough; for in connection with ballades the mind recurs to Villon, and +Villon was almost more of a modern than de Banville himself. But in the +case of the rondel, a comparison is challenged with Charles of Orleans, +and the difference between two ages and two literatures is illustrated in +a few poems of thirteen lines. Something, certainly, has been retained +of the old movement; the refrain falls in time like a well-played bass; +and the very brevity of the thing, by hampering and restraining the +greater fecundity of the modern mind, assists the imitation. But de +Banville’s poems are full of form and colour; they smack racily of modern +life, and own small kindred with the verse of other days, when it seems +as if men walked by twilight, seeing little, and that with distracted +eyes, and instead of blood, some thin and spectral fluid circulated in +their veins. They might gird themselves for battle, make love, eat and +drink, and acquit themselves manfully in all the external parts of life; +but of the life that is within, and those processes by which we render +ourselves an intelligent account of what we feel and do, and so represent +experience that we for the first time make it ours, they had only a loose +and troubled possession. They beheld or took part in great events, but +there was no answerable commotion in their reflective being; and they +passed throughout turbulent epochs in a sort of ghostly quiet and +abstraction. Feeling seems to have been strangely disproportioned to the +occasion, and words were laughably trivial and scanty to set forth the +feeling even such as it was. Juvenal des Ursins chronicles calamity +after calamity, with but one comment for them all: that “it was great +pity.” Perhaps, after too much of our florid literature, we find an +adventitious charm in what is so different; and while the big drums are +beaten every day by perspiring editors over the loss of a cock-boat or +the rejection of a clause, and nothing is heard that is not proclaimed +with sound of trumpet, it is not wonderful if we retire with pleasure +into old books, and listen to authors who speak small and clear, as if in +a private conversation. Truly this is so with Charles of Orleans. We +are pleased to find a small man without the buskin, and obvious +sentiments stated without affectation. If the sentiments are obvious, +there is all the more chance we may have experienced the like. As we +turn over the leaves, we may find ourselves in sympathy with some one or +other of these staid joys and smiling sorrows. If we do we shall be +strangely pleased, for there is a genuine pathos in these simple words, +and the lines go with a lilt, and sing themselves to music of their own. + + + + +SAMUEL PEPYS. + + +IN two books a fresh light has recently been thrown on the character and +position of Samuel Pepys. Mr. Mynors Bright has given us a new +transcription of the Diary, increasing it in bulk by near a third, +correcting many errors, and completing our knowledge of the man in some +curious and important points. We can only regret that he has taken +liberties with the author and the public. It is no part of the duties of +the editor of an established classic to decide what may or may not be +“tedious to the reader.” The book is either an historical document or +not, and in condemning Lord Braybrooke Mr. Bright condemns himself. As +for the time-honoured phrase, “unfit for publication,” without being +cynical, we may regard it as the sign of a precaution more or less +commercial; and we may think, without being sordid, that when we purchase +six huge and distressingly expensive volumes, we are entitled to be +treated rather more like scholars and rather less like children. But Mr. +Bright may rest assured: while we complain, we are still grateful. Mr. +Wheatley, to divide our obligation, brings together, clearly and with no +lost words, a body of illustrative material. Sometimes we might ask a +little more; never, I think, less. And as a matter of fact, a great part +of Mr. Wheatley’s volume might be transferred, by a good editor of Pepys, +to the margin of the text, for it is precisely what the reader wants. + +In the light of these two books, at least, we have now to read our +author. Between them they contain all we can expect to learn for, it may +be, many years. Now, if ever we should be able to form some notion of +that unparalleled figure in the annals of mankind—unparalleled for three +good reasons: first, because he was a man known to his contemporaries in +a halo of almost historical pomp, and to his remote descendants with an +indecent familiarity, like a tap-room comrade; second, because he has +outstripped all competitors in the art or virtue of a conscious honesty +about oneself; and, third, because, being in many ways a very ordinary +person, he has yet placed himself before the public eye with such a +fulness and such an intimacy of detail as might be envied by a genius +like Montaigne. Not then for his own sake only, but as a character in a +unique position, endowed with a unique talent, and shedding a unique +light upon the lives of the mass of mankind, he is surely worthy of +prolonged and patient study. + + + +THE DIARY. + + +That there should be such a book as Pepys’s Diary is incomparably +strange. Pepys, in a corrupt and idle period, played the man in public +employments, toiling hard and keeping his honour bright. Much of the +little good that is set down to James the Second comes by right to Pepys; +and if it were little for a king, it is much for a subordinate. To his +clear, capable head was owing somewhat of the greatness of England on the +seas. In the exploits of Hawke, Rodney, or Nelson, this dead Mr. Pepys +of the Navy Office had some considerable share. He stood well by his +business in the appalling plague of 1666. He was loved and respected by +some of the best and wisest men in England. He was President of the +Royal Society; and when he came to die, people said of his conduct in +that solemn hour—thinking it needless to say more—that it was answerable +to the greatness of his life. Thus he walked in dignity, guards of +soldiers sometimes attending him in his walks, subalterns bowing before +his periwig; and when he uttered his thoughts they were suitable to his +state and services. On February 8, 1668, we find him writing to Evelyn, +his mind bitterly occupied with the late Dutch war, and some thoughts of +the different story of the repulse of the Great Armada: “Sir, you will +not wonder at the backwardness of my thanks for the present you made me, +so many days since, of the Prospect of the Medway, while the Hollander +rode master in it, when I have told you that the sight of it hath led me +to such reflections on my particular interest, by my employment, in the +reproach due to that miscarriage, as have given me little less disquiet +than he is fancied to have who found his face in Michael Angelo’s hell. +The same should serve me also in excuse for my silence in celebrating +your mastery shown in the design and draught, did not indignation rather +than courtship urge me so far to commend them, as to wish the furniture +of our House of Lords changed from the story of ’88 to that of ’67 (of +Evelyn’s designing), till the pravity of this were reformed to the temper +of that age, wherein God Almighty found his blessings more operative +than, I fear, he doth in ours his judgments.” + +This is a letter honourable to the writer, where the meaning rather than +the words is eloquent. Such was the account he gave of himself to his +contemporaries; such thoughts he chose to utter, and in such language: +giving himself out for a grave and patriotic public servant. We turn to +the same date in the Diary by which he is known, after two centuries, to +his descendants. The entry begins in the same key with the letter, +blaming the “madness of the House of Commons” and “the base proceedings, +just the epitome of all our public proceedings in this age, of the House +of Lords;” and then, without the least transition, this is how our +diarist proceeds: “To the Strand, to my bookseller’s, and there bought an +idle, rogueish French book, _L’escholle des Filles_, which I have bought +in plain binding, avoiding the buying of it better bound, because I +resolve, as soon as I have read it, to burn it, that it may not stand in +the list of books, nor among them, to disgrace them, if it should be +found.” Even in our day, when responsibility is so much more clearly +apprehended, the man who wrote the letter would be notable; but what +about the man, I do not say who bought a roguish book, but who was +ashamed of doing so, yet did it, and recorded both the doing and the +shame in the pages of his daily journal? + +We all, whether we write or speak, must somewhat drape ourselves when we +address our fellows; at a given moment we apprehend our character and +acts by some particular side; we are merry with one, grave with another, +as befits the nature and demands of the relation. Pepys’s letter to +Evelyn would have little in common with that other one to Mrs. Knipp +which he signed by the pseudonym of _Dapper Dicky_; yet each would be +suitable to the character of his correspondent. There is no untruth in +this, for man, being a Protean animal, swiftly shares and changes with +his company and surroundings; and these changes are the better part of +his education in the world. To strike a posture once for all, and to +march through life like a drum-major, is to be highly disagreeable to +others and a fool for oneself into the bargain. To Evelyn and to Knipp +we understand the double facing; but to whom was he posing in the Diary, +and what, in the name of astonishment, was the nature of the pose? Had +he suppressed all mention of the book, or had he bought it, gloried in +the act, and cheerfully recorded his glorification, in either case we +should have made him out. But no; he is full of precautions to conceal +the “disgrace” of the purchase, and yet speeds to chronicle the whole +affair in pen and ink. It is a sort of anomaly in human action, which we +can exactly parallel from another part of the Diary. + +Mrs. Pepys had written a paper of her too just complaints against her +husband, and written it in plain and very pungent English. Pepys, in an +agony lest the world should come to see it, brutally seizes and destroys +the tell-tale document; and then—you disbelieve your eyes—down goes the +whole story with unsparing truth and in the cruellest detail. It seems +he has no design but to appear respectable, and here he keeps a private +book to prove he was not. You are at first faintly reminded of some of +the vagaries of the morbid religious diarist; but at a moment’s thought +the resemblance disappears. The design of Pepys is not at all to edify; +it is not from repentance that he chronicles his peccadilloes, for he +tells us when he does repent, and, to be just to him, there often follows +some improvement. Again, the sins of the religious diarist are of a very +formal pattern, and are told with an elaborate whine. But in Pepys you +come upon good, substantive misdemeanours; beams in his eye of which he +alone remains unconscious; healthy outbreaks of the animal nature, and +laughable subterfuges to himself that always command belief and often +engage the sympathies. + +Pepys was a young man for his age, came slowly to himself in the world, +sowed his wild oats late, took late to industry, and preserved till +nearly forty the headlong gusto of a boy. So, to come rightly at the +spirit in which the Diary was written, we must recall a class of +sentiments which with most of us are over and done before the age of +twelve. In our tender years we still preserve a freshness of surprise at +our prolonged existence; events make an impression out of all proportion +to their consequence; we are unspeakably touched by our own past +adventures, and look forward to our future personality with sentimental +interest. It was something of this, I think, that clung to Pepys. +Although not sentimental in the abstract, he was sweetly sentimental +about himself. His own past clung about his heart, an evergreen. He was +the slave of an association. He could not pass by Islington, where his +father used to carry him to cakes and ale, but he must light at the +“King’s Head” and eat and drink “for remembrance of the old house sake.” +He counted it good fortune to lie a night at Epsom to renew his old +walks, “where Mrs. Hely and I did use to walk and talk, with whom I had +the first sentiments of love and pleasure in a woman’s company, discourse +and taking her by the hand, she being a pretty woman.” He goes about +weighing up the _Assurance_, which lay near Woolwich underwater, and +cries in a parenthesis, “Poor ship, that I have been twice merry in, in +Captain Holland’s time;” and after revisiting the _Naseby_, now changed +into the _Charles_, he confesses “it was a great pleasure to myself to +see the ship that I began my good fortune in.” The stone that he was cut +for he preserved in a case; and to the Turners he kept alive such +gratitude for their assistance that for years, and after he had begun to +mount himself into higher zones, he continued to have that family to +dinner on the anniversary of the operation. Not Hazlitt nor Rousseau had +a more romantic passion for their past, although at times they might +express it more romantically; and if Pepys shared with them this childish +fondness, did not Rousseau, who left behind him the _Confessions_, or +Hazlitt, who wrote the _Liber Amoris_, and loaded his essays with loving +personal detail, share with Pepys in his unwearied egotism? For the two +things go hand in hand; or, to be more exact, it is the first that makes +the second either possible or pleasing. + +But, to be quite in sympathy with Pepys, we must return once more to the +experience of children. I can remember to have written, in the fly-leaf +of more than one book, the date and the place where I then was—if, for +instance, I was ill in bed or sitting in a certain garden; these were +jottings for my future self; if I should chance on such a note in after +years, I thought it would cause me a particular thrill to recognise +myself across the intervening distance. Indeed, I might come upon them +now, and not be moved one tittle—which shows that I have comparatively +failed in life, and grown older than Samuel Pepys. For in the Diary we +can find more than one such note of perfect childish egotism; as when he +explains that his candle is going out, “which makes me write thus +slobberingly;” or as in this incredible particularity, “To my study, +where I only wrote thus much of this day’s passages to this *, and so out +again;” or lastly, as here, with more of circumstance: “I staid up till +the bellman came by with his bell under my window, _as I was writing of +this very line_, and cried, ‘Past one of the clock, and a cold, frosty, +windy morning.’” Such passages are not to be misunderstood. The appeal +to Samuel Pepys years hence is unmistakable. He desires that dear, +though unknown, gentleman keenly to realise his predecessor; to remember +why a passage was uncleanly written; to recall (let us fancy, with a +sigh) the tones of the bellman, the chill of the early, windy morning, +and the very line his own romantic self was scribing at the moment. The +man, you will perceive, was making reminiscences—a sort of pleasure by +ricochet, which comforts many in distress, and turns some others into +sentimental libertines: and the whole book, if you will but look at it in +that way, is seen to be a work of art to Pepys’s own address. + +Here, then, we have the key to that remarkable attitude preserved by him +throughout his Diary, to that unflinching—I had almost said, that +unintelligent—sincerity which makes it a miracle among human books. He +was not unconscious of his errors—far from it; he was often startled into +shame, often reformed, often made and broke his vows of change. But +whether he did ill or well, he was still his own unequalled self; still +that entrancing _ego_ of whom alone he cared to write; and still sure of +his own affectionate indulgence, when the parts should be changed, and +the Writer come to read what he had written. Whatever he did, or said, +or thought, or suffered, it was still a trait of Pepys, a character of +his career; and as, to himself, he was more interesting than Moses or +than Alexander, so all should be faithfully set down. I have called his +Diary a work of art. Now when the artist has found something, word or +deed, exactly proper to a favourite character in play or novel, he will +neither suppress nor diminish it, though the remark be silly or the act +mean. The hesitation of Hamlet, the credulity of Othello, the baseness +of Emma Bovary, or the irregularities of Mr. Swiveller, caused neither +disappointment nor disgust to their creators. And so with Pepys and his +adored protagonist: adored not blindly, but with trenchant insight and +enduring, human toleration. I have gone over and over the greater part +of the Diary; and the points where, to the most suspicious scrutiny, he +has seemed not perfectly sincere, are so few, so doubtful, and so petty, +that I am ashamed to name them. It may be said that we all of us write +such a diary in airy characters upon our brain; but I fear there is a +distinction to be made; I fear that as we render to our consciousness an +account of our daily fortunes and behaviour, we too often weave a tissue +of romantic compliments and dull excuses; and even if Pepys were the ass +and coward that men call him, we must take rank as sillier and more +cowardly than he. The bald truth about oneself, what we are all too +timid to admit when we are not too dull to see it, that was what he saw +clearly and set down unsparingly. + +It is improbable that the Diary can have been carried on in the same +single spirit in which it was begun. Pepys was not such an ass, but he +must have perceived, as he went on, the extraordinary nature of the work +he was producing. He was a great reader, and he knew what other books +were like. It must, at least, have crossed his mind that some one might +ultimately decipher the manuscript, and he himself, with all his pains +and pleasures, be resuscitated in some later day; and the thought, +although discouraged, must have warmed his heart. He was not such an +ass, besides, but he must have been conscious of the deadly explosives, +the gun-cotton and the giant powder, he was hoarding in his drawer. Let +some contemporary light upon the journal, and Pepys was plunged for ever +in social and political disgrace. We can trace the growth of his terrors +by two facts. In 1660, while the Diary was still in its youth, he tells +about it, as a matter of course, to a lieutenant in the navy; but in +1669, when it was already near an end, he could have bitten his tongue +out, as the saying is, because he had let slip his secret to one so grave +and friendly as Sir William Coventry. And from two other facts I think +we may infer that he had entertained, even if he had not acquiesced in, +the thought of a far-distant publicity. The first is of capital +importance: the Diary was not destroyed. The second—that he took unusual +precautions to confound the cipher in “rogueish” passages—proves, beyond +question, that he was thinking of some other reader besides himself. +Perhaps while his friends were admiring the “greatness of his behaviour” +at the approach of death, he may have had a twinkling hope of +immortality. _Mens cujusque is est quisque_, said his chosen motto; and, +as he had stamped his mind with every crook and foible in the pages of +the Diary, he might feel that what he left behind him was indeed himself. +There is perhaps no other instance so remarkable of the desire of man for +publicity and an enduring name. The greatness of his life was open, yet +he longed to communicate its smallness also; and, while contemporaries +bowed before him, he must buttonhole posterity with the news that his +periwig was once alive with nits. But this thought, although I cannot +doubt he had it, was neither his first nor his deepest; it did not colour +one word that he wrote; and the Diary, for as long as he kept it, +remained what it was when he began, a private pleasure for himself. It +was his bosom secret; it added a zest to all his pleasures; he lived in +and for it, and might well write these solemn words, when he closed that +confidant for ever: “And so I betake myself to that course which is +almost as much as to see myself go into the grave; for which, and all the +discomforts that will accompany my being blind, the good God prepare me.” + + + +A LIBERAL GENIUS. + + +Pepys spent part of a certain winter Sunday, when he had taken physic, +composing “a song in praise of a liberal genius (such as I take my own to +be) to all studies and pleasures.” The song was unsuccessful, but the +Diary is, in a sense, the very song that he was seeking; and his portrait +by Hales, so admirably reproduced in Mynors Bright’s edition, is a +confirmation of the Diary. Hales, it would appear, had known his +business; and though he put his sitter to a deal of trouble, almost +breaking his neck “to have the portrait full of shadows,” and draping him +in an Indian gown hired expressly for the purpose, he was preoccupied +about no merely picturesque effects, but to portray the essence of the +man. Whether we read the picture by the Diary or the Diary by the +picture, we shall at least agree that Hales was among the number of those +who can “surprise the manners in the face.” Here we have a mouth +pouting, moist with desires; eyes greedy, protuberant, and yet apt for +weeping too; a nose great alike in character and dimensions; and +altogether a most fleshly, melting countenance. The face is attractive +by its promise of reciprocity. I have used the word _greedy_, but the +reader must not suppose that he can change it for that closely kindred +one of _hungry_, for there is here no aspiration, no waiting for better +things, but an animal joy in all that comes. It could never be the face +of an artist; it is the face of a _viveur_—kindly, pleased and pleasing, +protected from excess and upheld in contentment by the shifting +versatility of his desires. For a single desire is more rightly to be +called a lust; but there is health in a variety, where one may balance +and control another. + +The whole world, town or country, was to Pepys a garden of Armida. +Wherever he went, his steps were winged with the most eager expectation; +whatever he did, it was done with the most lively pleasure. An +insatiable curiosity in all the shows of the world and all the secrets of +knowledge, filled him brimful of the longing to travel, and supported him +in the toils of study. Rome was the dream of his life; he was never +happier than when he read or talked of the Eternal City. When he was in +Holland, he was “with child” to see any strange thing. Meeting some +friends and singing with them in a palace near the Hague, his pen fails +him to express his passion of delight, “the more so because in a heaven +of pleasure and in a strange country.” He must go to see all famous +executions. He must needs visit the body of a murdered man, defaced +“with a broad wound,” he says, “that makes my hand now shake to write of +it.” He learned to dance, and was “like to make a dancer.” He learned +to sing, and walked about Gray’s Inn Fields “humming to myself (which is +now my constant practice) the trillo.” He learned to play the lute, the +flute, the flageolet, and the theorbo, and it was not the fault of his +intention if he did not learn the harpsichord or the spinet. He learned +to compose songs, and burned to give forth “a scheme and theory of music +not yet ever made in the world.” When he heard “a fellow whistle like a +bird exceeding well,” he promised to return another day and give an angel +for a lesson in the art. Once, he writes, “I took the Bezan back with +me, and with a brave gale and tide reached up that night to the Hope, +taking great pleasure in learning the seamen’s manner of singing when +they sound the depths.” If he found himself rusty in his Latin grammar, +he must fall to it like a schoolboy. He was a member of Harrington’s +Club till its dissolution, and of the Royal Society before it had +received the name. Boyle’s _Hydrostatics_ was “of infinite delight” to +him, walking in Barnes Elms. We find him comparing Bible concordances, a +captious judge of sermons, deep in Descartes and Aristotle. We find him, +in a single year, studying timber and the measurement of timber; tar and +oil, hemp, and the process of preparing cordage; mathematics and +accounting; the hull and the rigging of ships from a model; and “looking +and improving himself of the (naval) stores with”—hark to the +fellow!—“great delight.” His familiar spirit of delight was not the same +with Shelley’s; but how true it was to him through life! He is only +copying something, and behold, he “takes great pleasure to rule the +lines, and have the capital words wrote with red ink;” he has only had +his coal-cellar emptied and cleaned, and behold, “it do please him +exceedingly.” A hog’s harslett is “a piece of meat he loves.” He cannot +ride home in my Lord Sandwich’s coach, but he must exclaim, with +breathless gusto, “his noble, rich coach.” When he is bound for a supper +party, he anticipates a “glut of pleasure.” When he has a new watch, “to +see my childishness,” says he, “I could not forbear carrying it in my +hand and seeing what o’clock it was an hundred times.” To go to +Vauxhall, he says, and “to hear the nightingales and other birds, hear +fiddles, and there a harp and here a Jew’s trump, and here laughing, and +there fine people walking, is mighty divertising.” And the nightingales, +I take it, were particularly dear to him; and it was again “with great +pleasure” that he paused to hear them as he walked to Woolwich, while the +fog was rising and the April sun broke through. + +He must always be doing something agreeable, and, by preference, two +agreeable things at once. In his house he had a box of carpenter’s +tools, two dogs, an eagle, a canary, and a blackbird that whistled tunes, +lest, even in that full life, he should chance upon an empty moment. If +he had to wait for a dish of poached eggs, he must put in the time by +playing on the flageolet; if a sermon were dull, he must read in the book +of Tobit or divert his mind with sly advances on the nearest women. When +he walked, it must be with a book in his pocket to beguile the way in +case the nightingales were silent; and even along the streets of London, +with so many pretty faces to be spied for and dignitaries to be saluted, +his trail was marked by little debts “for wine, pictures, etc.,” the true +headmark of a life intolerant of any joyless passage. He had a kind of +idealism in pleasure; like the princess in the fairy story, he was +conscious of a rose-leaf out of place. Dearly as he loved to talk, he +could not enjoy nor shine in a conversation when he thought himself +unsuitably dressed. Dearly as he loved eating, he “knew not how to eat +alone;” pleasure for him must heighten pleasure; and the eye and ear must +be flattered like the palate ere he avow himself content. He had no zest +in a good dinner when it fell to be eaten “in a bad street and in a +periwig-maker’s house;” and a collation was spoiled for him by +indifferent music. His body was indefatigable, doing him yeoman’s +service in this breathless chase of pleasures. On April 11, 1662, he +mentions that he went to bed “weary, _which I seldom am_;” and already +over thirty, he would sit up all night cheerfully to see a comet. But it +is never pleasure that exhausts the pleasure-seeker; for in that career, +as in all others, it is failure that kills. The man who enjoys so wholly +and bears so impatiently the slightest widowhood from joy, is just the +man to lose a night’s rest over some paltry question of his right to +fiddle on the leads, or to be “vexed to the blood” by a solecism in his +wife’s attire; and we find in consequence that he was always peevish when +he was hungry, and that his head “aked mightily” after a dispute. But +nothing could divert him from his aim in life; his remedy in care was the +same as his delight in prosperity; it was with pleasure, and with +pleasure only, that he sought to drive out sorrow; and, whether he was +jealous of his wife or skulking from a bailiff, he would equally take +refuge in the theatre. There, if the house be full and the company +noble, if the songs be tunable, the actors perfect, and the play +diverting, this odd hero of the secret Diary, this private self-adorer, +will speedily be healed of his distresses. + +Equally pleased with a watch, a coach, a piece of meat, a tune upon the +fiddle, or a fact in hydrostatics, Pepys was pleased yet more by the +beauty, the worth, the mirth, or the mere scenic attitude in life of his +fellow-creatures. He shows himself throughout a sterling humanist. +Indeed, he who loves himself, not in idle vanity, but with a plenitude of +knowledge, is the best equipped of all to love his neighbours. And +perhaps it is in this sense that charity may be most properly said to +begin at home. It does not matter what quality a person has: Pepys can +appreciate and love him for it. He “fills his eyes” with the beauty of +Lady Castlemaine; indeed, he may be said to dote upon the thought of her +for years; if a woman be good-looking and not painted, he will walk miles +to have another sight of her; and even when a lady by a mischance spat +upon his clothes, he was immediately consoled when he had observed that +she was pretty. But, on the other hand, he is delighted to see Mrs. Pett +upon her knees, and speaks thus of his Aunt James: “a poor, religious, +well-meaning, good soul, talking of nothing but God Almighty, and that +with so much innocence that mightily pleased me.” He is taken with Pen’s +merriment and loose songs, but not less taken with the sterling worth of +Coventry. He is jolly with a drunken sailor, but listens with interest +and patience, as he rides the Essex roads, to the story of a Quaker’s +spiritual trials and convictions. He lends a critical ear to the +discourse of kings and royal dukes. He spends an evening at Vauxhall +with “Killigrew and young Newport—loose company,” says he, “but worth a +man’s being in for once, to know the nature of it, and their manner of +talk and lives.” And when a rag-boy lights him home, he examines him +about his business and other ways of livelihood for destitute children. +This is almost half-way to the beginning of philanthropy; had it only +been the fashion, as it is at present, Pepys had perhaps been a man +famous for good deeds. And it is through this quality that he rises, at +times, superior to his surprising egotism; his interest in the love +affairs of others is, indeed, impersonal; he is filled with concern for +my Lady Castlemaine, whom he only knows by sight, shares in her very +jealousies, joys with her in her successes; and it is not untrue, however +strange it seems in his abrupt presentment, that he loved his maid Jane +because she was in love with his man Tom. + +Let us hear him, for once, at length: “So the women and W. Hewer and I +walked upon the Downes, where a flock of sheep was; and the most pleasant +and innocent sight that ever I saw in my life. We found a shepherd and +his little boy reading, far from any houses or sight of people, the Bible +to him; so I made the boy read to me, which he did with the forced tone +that children do usually read, that was mighty pretty; and then I did +give him something, and went to the father, and talked with him. He did +content himself mightily in my liking his boy’s reading, and did bless +God for him, the most like one of the old patriarchs that ever I saw in +my life, and it brought those thoughts of the old age of the world in my +mind for two or three days after. We took notice of his woolen knit +stockings of two colours mixed, and of his shoes shod with iron, both at +the toe and heels, and with great nails in the soles of his feet, which +was mighty pretty; and taking notice of them, ‘Why,’ says the poor man, +‘the downes, you see, are full of stones, and we are faine to shoe +ourselves thus; and these,’ says he, ‘will make the stones fly till they +ring before me.’ I did give the poor man something, for which he was +mighty thankful, and I tried to cast stones with his horne crooke. He +values his dog mightily, that would turn a sheep any way which he would +have him, when he goes to fold them; told me there was about eighteen +score sheep in his flock, and that he hath four shillings a week the year +round for keeping of them; and Mrs. Turner, in the common fields here, +did gather one of the prettiest nosegays that ever I saw in my life.” + +And so the story rambles on to the end of that day’s pleasuring; with +cups of milk, and glowworms, and people walking at sundown with their +wives and children, and all the way home Pepys still dreaming “of the old +age of the world” and the early innocence of man. This was how he walked +through life, his eyes and ears wide open, and his hand, you will +observe, not shut; and thus he observed the lives, the speech, and the +manners of his fellow-men, with prose fidelity of detail and yet a +lingering glamour of romance. + +It was “two or three days after” that he extended this passage in the +pages of his journal, and the style has thus the benefit of some +reflection. It is generally supposed that, as a writer, Pepys must rank +at the bottom of the scale of merit. But a style which is indefatigably +lively, telling, and picturesque through six large volumes of everyday +experience, which deals with the whole matter of a life, and yet is +rarely wearisome, which condescends to the most fastidious particulars, +and yet sweeps all away in the forthright current of the narrative,—such +a style may be ungrammatical, it may be inelegant, it may be one tissue +of mistakes, but it can never be devoid of merit. The first and the true +function of the writer has been thoroughly performed throughout; and +though the manner of his utterance may be childishly awkward, the matter +has been transformed and assimilated by his unfeigned interest and +delight. The gusto of the man speaks out fierily after all these years. +For the difference between Pepys and Shelley, to return to that +half-whimsical approximation, is one of quality but not one of degree; in +his sphere, Pepys felt as keenly, and his is the true prose of +poetry—prose because the spirit of the man was narrow and earthly, but +poetry because he was delightedly alive. Hence, in such a passage as +this about the Epsom shepherd, the result upon the reader’s mind is +entire conviction and unmingled pleasure. So, you feel, the thing fell +out, not otherwise; and you would no more change it than you would change +a sublimity of Shakespeare’s, a homely touch of Bunyan’s, or a favoured +reminiscence of your own. + +There never was a man nearer being an artist, who yet was not one. The +tang was in the family; while he was writing the journal for our +enjoyment in his comely house in Navy Gardens, no fewer than two of his +cousins were tramping the fens, kit under arm, to make music to the +country girls. But he himself, though he could play so many instruments +and pass judgment in so many fields of art, remained an amateur. It is +not given to any one so keenly to enjoy, without some greater power to +understand. That he did not like Shakespeare as an artist for the stage +may be a fault, but it is not without either parallel or excuse. He +certainly admired him as a poet; he was the first beyond mere actors on +the rolls of that innumerable army who have got “To be or not to be” by +heart. Nor was he content with that; it haunted his mind; he quoted it +to himself in the pages of the Diary, and, rushing in where angels fear +to tread, he set it to music. Nothing, indeed, is more notable than the +heroic quality of the verses that our little sensualist in a periwig +chose out to marry with his own mortal strains. Some gust from brave +Elizabethan times must have warmed his spirit, as he sat tuning his +sublime theorbo. “To be or not to be. Whether ’tis nobler”—“Beauty +retire, thou dost my pity move”—“It is decreed, nor shall thy fate, O +Rome;”—open and dignified in the sound, various and majestic in the +sentiment, it was no inapt, as it was certainly no timid, spirit that +selected such a range of themes. Of “Gaze not on Swans,” I know no more +than these four words; yet that also seems to promise well. It was, +however, on a probable suspicion, the work of his master, Mr. +Berkenshaw—as the drawings that figure at the breaking up of a young +ladies’ seminary are the work of the professor attached to the +establishment. Mr. Berkenshaw was not altogether happy in his pupil. +The amateur cannot usually rise into the artist, some leaven of the world +still clogging him; and we find Pepys behaving like a pickthank to the +man who taught him composition. In relation to the stage, which he so +warmly loved and understood, he was not only more hearty, but more +generous to others. Thus he encounters Colonel Reames, “a man,” says he, +“who understands and loves a play as well as I, and I love him for it.” +And again, when he and his wife had seen a most ridiculous insipid piece, +“Glad we were,” he writes, “that Betterton had no part in it.” It is by +such a zeal and loyalty to those who labour for his delight that the +amateur grows worthy of the artist. And it should be kept in mind that, +not only in art, but in morals, Pepys rejoiced to recognise his betters. +There was not one speck of envy in the whole human-hearted egotist. + + + +RESPECTABILITY. + + +When writers inveigh against respectability, in the present degraded +meaning of the word, they are usually suspected of a taste for clay pipes +and beer cellars; and their performances are thought to hail from the +_Owl’s Nest_ of the comedy. They have something more, however, in their +eye than the dulness of a round million dinner parties that sit down +yearly in old England. For to do anything because others do it, and not +because the thing is good, or kind, or honest in its own right, is to +resign all moral control and captaincy upon yourself, and go post-haste +to the devil with the greater number. We smile over the ascendency of +priests; but I had rather follow a priest than what they call the leaders +of society. No life can better than that of Pepys illustrate the dangers +of this respectable theory of living. For what can be more untoward than +the occurrence, at a critical period and while the habits are still +pliable, of such a sweeping transformation as the return of Charles the +Second? Round went the whole fleet of England on the other tack; and +while a few tall pintas, Milton or Pen, still sailed a lonely course by +the stars and their own private compass, the cock-boat, Pepys, must go +about with the majority among “the stupid starers and the loud huzzas.” + +The respectable are not led so much by any desire of applause as by a +positive need for countenance. The weaker and the tamer the man, the +more will he require this support; and any positive quality relieves him, +by just so much, of this dependence. In a dozen ways, Pepys was quite +strong enough to please himself without regard for others; but his +positive qualities were not co-extensive with the field of conduct; and +in many parts of life he followed, with gleeful precision, in the +footprints of the contemporary Mrs. Grundy. In morals, particularly, he +lived by the countenance of others; felt a slight from another more +keenly than a meanness in himself; and then first repented when he was +found out. You could talk of religion or morality to such a man; and by +the artist side of him, by his lively sympathy and apprehension, he could +rise, as it were dramatically, to the significance of what you said. All +that matter in religion which has been nicknamed other-worldliness was +strictly in his gamut; but a rule of life that should make a man rudely +virtuous, following right in good report and ill report, was foolishness +and a stumbling-block to Pepys. He was much thrown across the Friends; +and nothing can be more instructive than his attitude towards these most +interesting people of that age. I have mentioned how he conversed with +one as he rode; when he saw some brought from a meeting under arrest, “I +would to God,” said he, “they would either conform, or be more wise and +not be catched;” and to a Quaker in his own office he extended a timid +though effectual protection. Meanwhile there was growing up next door to +him that beautiful nature William Pen. It is odd that Pepys condemned +him for a fop; odd, though natural enough when you see Pen’s portrait, +that Pepys was jealous of him with his wife. But the cream of the story +is when Pen publishes his _Sandy Foundation Shaken_, and Pepys has it +read aloud by his wife. “I find it,” he says, “so well writ as, I think, +it is too good for him ever to have writ it; and it is a serious sort of +book, and _not fit for everybody to read_.” Nothing is more galling to +the merely respectable than to be brought in contact with religious +ardour. Pepys had his own foundation, sandy enough, but dear to him from +practical considerations, and he would read the book with true uneasiness +of spirit; for conceive the blow if, by some plaguy accident, this Pen +were to convert him! It was a different kind of doctrine that he judged +profitable for himself and others. “A good sermon of Mr. Gifford’s at +our church, upon ‘Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven.’ A very excellent +and persuasive, good and moral sermon. He showed, like a wise man, that +righteousness is a surer moral way of being rich than sin and villainy.” +It is thus that respectable people desire to have their Greathearts +address them, telling, in mild accents, how you may make the best of both +worlds, and be a moral hero without courage, kindness, or troublesome +reflection; and thus the Gospel, cleared of Eastern metaphor, becomes a +manual of worldly prudence, and a handybook for Pepys and the successful +merchant. + +The respectability of Pepys was deeply grained. He has no idea of truth +except for the Diary. He has no care that a thing shall be, if it but +appear; gives out that he has inherited a good estate, when he has +seemingly got nothing but a lawsuit; and is pleased to be thought liberal +when he knows he has been mean. He is conscientiously ostentatious. I +say conscientiously, with reason. He could never have been taken for a +fop, like Pen, but arrayed himself in a manner nicely suitable to his +position. For long he hesitated to assume the famous periwig; for a +public man should travel gravely with the fashions not foppishly before, +nor dowdily behind, the central movement of his age. For long he durst +not keep a carriage; that, in his circumstances would have been improper; +but a time comes, with the growth of his fortune, when the impropriety +has shifted to the other side, and he is “ashamed to be seen in a +hackney.” Pepys talked about being “a Quaker or some very melancholy +thing;” for my part, I can imagine nothing so melancholy, because nothing +half so silly, as to be concerned about such problems. But so +respectability and the duties of society haunt and burden their poor +devotees; and what seems at first the very primrose path of life, proves +difficult and thorny like the rest. And the time comes to Pepys, as to +all the merely respectable, when he must not only order his pleasures, +but even clip his virtuous movements, to the public pattern of the age. +There was some juggling among officials to avoid direct taxation; and +Pepys, with a noble impulse, growing ashamed of this dishonesty, designed +to charge himself with £1000; but finding none to set him an example, +“nobody of our ablest merchants” with this moderate liking for clean +hands, he judged it “not decent;” he feared it would “be thought vain +glory;” and, rather than appear singular, cheerfully remained a thief. +One able merchant’s countenance, and Pepys had dared to do an honest act! +Had he found one brave spirit, properly recognised by society, he might +have gone far as a disciple. Mrs. Turner, it is true, can fill him full +of sordid scandal, and make him believe, against the testimony of his +senses, that Pen’s venison pasty stank like the devil; but, on the other +hand, Sir William Coventry can raise him by a word into another being. +Pepys, when he is with Coventry, talks in the vein of an old Roman. What +does he care for office or emolument? “Thank God, I have enough of my +own,” says he, “to buy me a good book and a good fiddle, and I have a +good wife.” And again, we find this pair projecting an old age when an +ungrateful country shall have dismissed them from the field of public +service; Coventry living retired in a fine house, and Pepys dropping in, +“it may be, to read a chapter of Seneca.” + +Under this influence, the only good one in his life, Pepys continued +zealous and, for the period, pure in his employment. He would not be +“bribed to be unjust,” he says, though he was “not so squeamish as to +refuse a present after,” suppose the king to have received no wrong. His +new arrangement for the victualling of Tangier he tells us with honest +complacency, will save the king a thousand and gain Pepys three hundred +pounds a year,—a statement which exactly fixes the degree of the age’s +enlightenment. But for his industry and capacity no praise can be too +high. It was an unending struggle for the man to stick to his business +in such a garden of Armida as he found this life; and the story of his +oaths, so often broken, so courageously renewed, is worthy rather of +admiration that the contempt it has received. + +Elsewhere, and beyond the sphere of Coventry’s influence, we find him +losing scruples and daily complying further with the age. When he began +the journal, he was a trifle prim and puritanic; merry enough, to be +sure, over his private cups, and still remembering Magdalene ale and his +acquaintance with Mrs. Ainsworth of Cambridge. But youth is a hot season +with all; when a man smells April and May he is apt at times to stumble; +and in spite of a disordered practice, Pepys’s theory, the better things +that he approved and followed after, we may even say were strict. Where +there was “tag, rag, and bobtail, dancing, singing, and drinking,” he +felt “ashamed, and went away;” and when he slept in church, he prayed God +forgive him. In but a little while we find him with some ladies keeping +each other awake “from spite,” as though not to sleep in church were an +obvious hardship; and yet later he calmly passes the time of service, +looking about him, with a perspective glass, on all the pretty women. +His favourite ejaculation, “Lord!” occurs but once that I have observed +in 1660, never in ’61, twice in ’62, and at least five times in ’63; +after which the “Lords” may be said to pullulate like herrings, with here +and there a solitary “damned,” as it were a whale among the shoal. He +and his wife, once filled with dudgeon by some innocent freedoms at a +marriage, are soon content to go pleasuring with my Lord Brouncker’s +mistress, who was not even, by his own account, the most discreet of +mistresses. Tag, rag, and bobtail, dancing, singing, and drinking, +become his natural element; actors and actresses and drunken, roaring +courtiers are to be found in his society; until the man grew so involved +with Saturnalian manners and companions that he was shot almost +unconsciously into the grand domestic crash of 1668. + +That was the legitimate issue and punishment of years of staggering walk +and conversation. The man who has smoked his pipe for half a century in +a powder magazine finds himself at last the author and the victim of a +hideous disaster. So with our pleasant-minded Pepys and his +peccadilloes. All of a sudden, as he still trips dexterously enough +among the dangers of a double-faced career, thinking no great evil, +humming to himself the trillo, Fate takes the further conduct of that +matter from his hands, and brings him face to face with the consequences +of his acts. For a man still, after so many years, the lover, although +not the constant lover, of his wife,—for a man, besides, who was so +greatly careful of appearances,—the revelation of his infidelities was a +crushing blow. The tears that he shed, the indignities that he endured, +are not to be measured. A vulgar woman, and now justly incensed, Mrs. +Pepys spared him no detail of suffering. She was violent, threatening +him with the tongs; she was careless of his honour, driving him to insult +the mistress whom she had driven him to betray and to discard; worst of +all, she was hopelessly inconsequent, in word and thought and deed, now +lulling him with reconciliations, and anon flaming forth again with the +original anger. Pepys had not used his wife well; he had wearied her +with jealousies, even while himself unfaithful; he had grudged her +clothes and pleasures, while lavishing both upon himself; he had abused +her in words; he had bent his fist at her in anger; he had once blacked +her eye; and it is one of the oddest particulars in that odd Diary of +his, that, while the injury is referred to once in passing, there is no +hint as to the occasion or the manner of the blow. But now, when he is +in the wrong, nothing can exceed the long-suffering affection of this +impatient husband. While he was still sinning and still undiscovered, he +seems not to have known a touch of penitence stronger than what might +lead him to take his wife to the theatre, or for an airing, or to give +her a new dress, by way of compensation. Once found out, however, and he +seems to himself to have lost all claim to decent usage. It is perhaps +the strongest instance of his externality. His wife may do what she +pleases, and though he may groan, it will never occur to him to blame +her; he has no weapon left but tears and the most abject submission. We +should perhaps have respected him more had he not given way so +utterly—above all, had he refused to write, under his wife’s dictation, +an insulting letter to his unhappy fellow-culprit, Miss Willet; but +somehow I believe we like him better as he was. + +The death of his wife, following so shortly after, must have stamped the +impression of this episode upon his mind. For the remaining years of his +long life we have no Diary to help us, and we have seen already how +little stress is to be laid upon the tenor of his correspondence; but +what with the recollection of the catastrophe of his married life, what +with the natural influence of his advancing years and reputation, it +seems not unlikely that the period of gallantry was at an end for Pepys; +and it is beyond a doubt that he sat down at last to an honoured and +agreeable old age among his books and music, the correspondent of Sir +Isaac Newton, and, in one instance at least the poetical counsellor of +Dryden. Through all this period, that Diary which contained the secret +memoirs of his life, with all its inconsistencies and escapades, had been +religiously preserved; nor, when he came to die, does he appear to have +provided for its destruction. So we may conceive him faithful to the end +to all his dear and early memories; still mindful of Mrs. Hely in the +woods at Epsom; still lighting at Islington for a cup of kindness to the +dead; still, if he heard again that air that once so much disturbed him, +thrilling at the recollection of the love that bound him to his wife. + + + + +JOHN KNOX AND HIS RELATIONS TO WOMEN. + + +I.—THE CONTROVERSY ABOUT FEMALE RULE. + + +WHEN first the idea became widely spread among men that the Word of God, +instead of being truly the foundation of all existing institutions, was +rather a stone which the builders had rejected, it was but natural that +the consequent havoc among received opinions should be accompanied by the +generation of many new and lively hopes for the future. Somewhat as in +the early days of the French Revolution, men must have looked for an +immediate and universal improvement in their condition. Christianity, up +to that time, had been somewhat of a failure politically. The reason was +now obvious, the capital flaw was detected, the sickness of the body +politic traced at last to its efficient cause. It was only necessary to +put the Bible thoroughly into practice, to set themselves strenuously to +realise in life the Holy Commonwealth, and all abuses and iniquities +would surely pass away. Thus, in a pageant played at Geneva in the year +1523, the world was represented as a sick man at the end of his wits for +help, to whom his doctor recommends Lutheran specifics. {329} The +Reformers themselves had set their affections in a different world, and +professed to look for the finished result of their endeavours on the +other side of death. They took no interest in politics as such; they +even condemned political action as Antichristian: notably, Luther in the +case of the Peasants’ War. And yet, as the purely religious question was +inseparably complicated with political difficulties, and they had to make +opposition, from day to day, against principalities and powers, they were +led, one after another, and again and again, to leave the sphere which +was more strictly their own, and meddle, for good and evil, with the +affairs of State. Not much was to be expected from interference in such +a spirit. Whenever a minister found himself galled or hindered, he would +be inclined to suppose some contravention of the Bible. Whenever +Christian liberty was restrained (and Christian liberty for each +individual would be about coextensive with what he wished to do), it was +obvious that the State was Antichristian. The great thing, and the one +thing, was to push the Gospel and the Reformers’ own interpretation of +it. Whatever helped was good; whatever hindered was evil; and if this +simple classification proved inapplicable over the whole field, it was no +business of his to stop and reconcile incongruities. He had more +pressing concerns on hand; he had to save souls; he had to be about his +Father’s business. This short-sighted view resulted in a doctrine that +was actually Jesuitical in application. They had no serious ideas upon +politics, and they were ready, nay, they seemed almost bound, to adopt +and support whichever ensured for the moment the greatest benefit to the +souls of their fellow-men. They were dishonest in all sincerity. Thus +Labitte, in the introduction to a book {330a} in which he exposes the +hypocritical democracy of the Catholics under the League, steps aside for +a moment to stigmatise the hypocritical democracy of the Protestants. +And nowhere was this expediency in political questions more apparent than +about the question of female sovereignty. So much was this the case that +one James Thomasius, of Leipsic, wrote a little paper {330b} about the +religious partialities of those who took part in the controversy, in +which some of these learned disputants cut a very sorry figure. + +Now Knox has been from the first a man well hated; and it is somewhat +characteristic of his luck that he figures here in the very forefront of +the list of partial scribes who trimmed their doctrine with the wind in +all good conscience, and were political weathercocks out of conviction. +Not only has Thomasius mentioned him, but Bayle has taken the hint from +Thomasius, and dedicated a long note to the matter at the end of his +article on the Scotch Reformer. This is a little less than fair. If any +one among the evangelists of that period showed more serious political +sense than another, it was assuredly Knox; and even in this very matter +of female rule, although I do not suppose any one nowadays will feel +inclined to endorse his sentiments, I confess I can make great allowance +for his conduct. The controversy, besides, has an interest of its own, +in view of later controversies. + +John Knox, from 1556 to 1559, was resident in Geneva, as minister, +jointly with Goodman, of a little church of English refugees. He and his +congregation were banished from England by one woman, Mary Tudor, and +proscribed in Scotland by another, the Regent Mary of Guise. The +coincidence was tempting: here were many abuses centring about one abuse; +here was Christ’s Gospel persecuted in the two kingdoms by one anomalous +power. He had not far to go to find the idea that female government was +anomalous. It was an age, indeed, in which women, capable and incapable, +played a conspicuous part upon the stage of European history; and yet +their rule, whatever may have been the opinion of here and there a wise +man or enthusiast, was regarded as an anomaly by the great bulk of their +contemporaries. It was defended as an anomaly. It, and all that +accompanied and sanctioned it, was set aside as a single exception; and +no one thought of reasoning down from queens and extending their +privileges to ordinary women. Great ladies, as we know, had the +privilege of entering into monasteries and cloisters, otherwise forbidden +to their sex. As with one thing, so with another. Thus, Margaret of +Navarre wrote books with great acclamation, and no one, seemingly, saw +fit to call her conduct in question; but Mademoiselle de Gournay, +Montaigne’s adopted daughter, was in a controversy with the world as to +whether a woman might be an author without incongruity. Thus, too, we +have Théodore Agrippa d’Aubigné writing to his daughters about the +learned women of his century, and cautioning them, in conclusion, that +the study of letters was unsuited to ladies of a middling station, and +should be reserved for princesses. {333a} And once more, if we desire to +see the same principle carried to ludicrous extreme, we shall find that +Reverend Father in God the Abbot of Brantôme, claiming, on the authority +of some lord of his acquaintance, a privilege, or rather a duty, of free +love for great princesses, and carefully excluding other ladies from the +same gallant dispensation. {333b} One sees the spirit in which these +immunities were granted; and how they were but the natural consequence of +that awe for courts and kings that made the last writer tell us, with +simple wonder, how Catherine de Medici would “laugh her fill just like +another” over the humours of pantaloons and zanies. And such servility +was, of all things, what would touch most nearly the republican spirit of +Knox. It was not difficult for him to set aside this weak scruple of +loyalty. The lantern of his analysis did not always shine with a very +serviceable light; but he had the virtue, at least, to carry it into many +places of fictitious holiness, and was not abashed by the tinsel divinity +that hedged kings and queens from his contemporaries. And so he could +put the proposition in the form already mentioned: there was Christ’s +Gospel persecuted in the two kingdoms by one anomalous power plainly, +then, the “regiment of women” was Antichristian. Early in 1558 he +communicated this discovery to the world, by publishing at Geneva his +notorious book—_The First Blast of the Trumpet against the Monstrous +Regiment of Women_. {334} + +As a whole, it is a dull performance; but the preface, as is usual with +Knox, is both interesting and morally fine. Knox was not one of those +who are humble in the hour of triumph; he was aggressive even when things +were at their worst. He had a grim reliance in himself, or rather in his +mission; if he were not sure that he was a great man, he was at least +sure that he was one set apart to do great things. And he judged simply +that whatever passed in his mind, whatever moved him to flee from +persecution instead of constantly facing it out, or, as here, to publish +and withhold his name from the title-page of a critical work, would not +fail to be of interest, perhaps of benefit, to the world. There may be +something more finely sensitive in the modern humour, that tends more and +more to withdraw a man’s personality from the lessons he inculcates or +the cause that he has espoused; but there is a loss herewith of wholesome +responsibility; and when we find in the works of Knox, as in the Epistles +of Paul, the man himself standing nakedly forward, courting and +anticipating criticism, putting his character, as it were, in pledge for +the sincerity of his doctrine, we had best waive the question of +delicacy, and make our acknowledgments for a lesson of courage, not +unnecessary in these days of anonymous criticism, and much light, +otherwise unattainable, on the spirit in which great movements were +initiated and carried forward. Knox’s personal revelations are always +interesting; and, in the case of the “First Blast,” as I have said, there +is no exception to the rule. He begins by stating the solemn +responsibility of all who are watchmen over God’s flock; and all are +watchmen (he goes on to explain, with that fine breadth of spirit that +characterises him even when, as here, he shows himself most narrow), all +are watchmen “whose eyes God doth open, and whose conscience he pricketh +to admonish the ungodly.” And with the full consciousness of this great +duty before him, he sets himself to answer the scruples of timorous or +worldly-minded people. How can a man repent, he asks, unless the nature +of his transgression is made plain to him? “And therefore I say,” he +continues, “that of necessity it is that this monstriferous empire of +women (which among all enormities that this day do abound upon the face +of the whole earth, is most detestable and damnable) be openly and +plainly declared to the world, to the end that some may repent and be +saved.” To those who think the doctrine useless, because it cannot be +expected to amend those princes whom it would dispossess if once +accepted, he makes answer in a strain that shows him at his greatest. +After having instanced how the rumour of Christ’s censures found its way +to Herod in his own court, “even so,” he continues, “may the sound of our +weak trumpet, by the support of some wind (blow it from the south, or +blow it from the north, it is of no matter), come to the ears of the +chief offenders. _But whether it do or not_, _yet dare we not cease to +blow as God will give strength_. _For we are debtors to more than to +princes_, _to wit_, _to the great multitude of our brethren_, of whom, no +doubt, a great number have heretofore offended by error and ignorance.” + +It is for the multitude, then, he writes; he does not greatly hope that +his trumpet will be audible in palaces, or that crowned women will +submissively discrown themselves at his appeal; what he does hope, in +plain English, is to encourage and justify rebellion; and we shall see, +before we have done, that he can put his purpose into words as roundly as +I can put it for him. This he sees to be a matter of much hazard; he is +not “altogether so brutish and insensible, but that he has laid his +account what the finishing of the work may cost.” He knows that he will +find many adversaries, since “to the most part of men, lawful and godly +appeareth whatsoever antiquity hath received.” He looks for opposition, +“not only of the ignorant multitude, but of the wise, politic, and quiet +spirits of the earth.” He will be called foolish, curious, despiteful, +and a sower of sedition; and one day, perhaps, for all he is now +nameless, he may be attainted of treason. Yet he has “determined to obey +God, notwithstanding that the world shall rage thereat.” Finally, he +makes some excuse for the anonymous appearance of this first instalment: +it is his purpose thrice to blow the trumpet in this matter, if God so +permit; twice he intends to do it without name; but at the last blast to +take the odium upon himself, that all others may be purged. + +Thus he ends the preface, and enters upon his argument with a secondary +title: “The First Blast to awake Women degenerate.” We are in the land +of assertion without delay. That a woman should bear rule, superiority, +dominion or empire over any realm, nation, or city, he tells us, is +repugnant to nature, contumely to God, and a subversion of good order. +Women are weak, frail, impatient, feeble, and foolish. God has denied to +woman wisdom to consider, or providence to foresee, what is profitable to +a commonwealth. Women have been ever lightly esteemed; they have been +denied the tutory of their own sons, and subjected to the unquestionable +sway of their husbands; and surely it is irrational to give the greater +where the less has been withheld, and suffer a woman to reign supreme +over a great kingdom who would be allowed no authority by her own +fireside. He appeals to the Bible; but though he makes much of the first +transgression and certain strong texts in Genesis and Paul’s Epistles, he +does not appeal with entire success. The cases of Deborah and Huldah can +be brought into no sort of harmony with his thesis. Indeed, I may say +that, logically, he left his bones there; and that it is but the phantom +of an argument that he parades thenceforward to the end. Well was it for +Knox that he succeeded no better; it is under this very ambiguity about +Deborah that we shall find him fain to creep for shelter before he is +done with the regiment of women. After having thus exhausted Scripture, +and formulated its teaching in the somewhat blasphemous maxim that the +man is placed above the woman, even as God above the angels, he goes on +triumphantly to adduce the testimonies of Tertullian, Augustine, Ambrose, +Basil, Chrysostom, and the Pandects; and having gathered this little +cloud of witnesses about him, like pursuivants about a herald, he +solemnly proclaims all reigning women to be traitoresses and rebels +against God; discharges all men thenceforward from holding any office +under such monstrous regiment, and calls upon all the lieges with one +consent to “_study to repress the inordinate pride and tyranny_” _of +queens_. If this is not treasonable teaching, one would be glad to know +what is; and yet, as if he feared he had not made the case plain enough +against himself, he goes on to deduce the startling corollary that all +oaths of allegiance must be incontinently broken. If it was sin thus to +have sworn even in ignorance, it were obstinate sin to continue to +respect them after fuller knowledge. Then comes the peroration, in which +he cries aloud against the cruelties of that cursed Jezebel of +England—that horrible monster Jezebel of England; and after having +predicted sudden destruction to her rule and to the rule of all crowned +women, and warned all men that if they presume to defend the same when +any “noble heart” shall be raised up to vindicate the liberty of his +country, they shall not fail to perish themselves in the ruin, he +concludes with a last rhetorical flourish: “And therefore let all men be +advertised, for THE TRUMPET HATH ONCE BLOWN.” + +The capitals are his own. In writing, he probably felt the want of some +such reverberation of the pulpit under strong hands as he was wont to +emphasise his spoken utterances withal; there would seem to him a want of +passion in the orderly lines of type; and I suppose we may take the +capitals as a mere substitute for the great voice with which he would +have given it forth, had we heard it from his own lips. Indeed, as it +is, in this little strain of rhetoric about the trumpet, this current +allusion to the fall of Jericho, that alone distinguishes his bitter and +hasty production, he was probably right, according to all artistic canon, +thus to support and accentuate in conclusion the sustained metaphor of a +hostile proclamation. It is curious, by the way, to note how favourite +an image the trumpet was with the Reformer. He returns to it again and +again; it is the Alpha and Omega of his rhetoric; it is to him what a +ship is to the stage sailor; and one would almost fancy he had begun the +world as a trumpeter’s apprentice. The partiality is surely +characteristic. All his life long he was blowing summonses before +various Jerichos, some of which fell duly, but not all. Wherever he +appears in history his speech is loud, angry, and hostile; there is no +peace in his life, and little tenderness; he is always sounding hopefully +to the front for some rough enterprise. + +And as his voice had something of the trumpet’s hardness, it had +something also of the trumpet’s warlike inspiration. So Randolph, +possibly fresh from the sound of the Reformer’s preaching, writes of him +to Cecil:—“Where your honour exhorteth us to stoutness, I assure you the +voice of one man is able, in an hour, to put more life in us than six +hundred trumpets continually blustering in our ears.” {341} + +Thus was the proclamation made. Nor was it long in wakening all the +echoes of Europe. What success might have attended it, had the question +decided been a purely abstract question, it is difficult to say. As it +was, it was to stand or fall, not by logic, but by political needs and +sympathies. Thus, in France, his doctrine was to have some future, +because Protestants suffered there under the feeble and treacherous +regency of Catherine de Medici; and thus it was to have no future +anywhere else, because the Protestant interest was bound up with the +prosperity of Queen Elizabeth. This stumbling-block lay at the very +threshold of the matter; and Knox, in the text of the “First Blast,” had +set everybody the wrong example and gone to the ground himself. He finds +occasion to regret “the blood of innocent Lady Jane Dudley.” But Lady +Jane Dudley, or Lady Jane Grey, as we call her, was a would-be traitoress +and rebel against God, to use his own expressions. If, therefore, +political and religious sympathy led Knox himself into so grave a +partiality, what was he to expect from his disciples? + +If the trumpet gave so ambiguous a sound, who could heartily prepare +himself for the battle? The question whether Lady Jane Dudley was an +innocent martyr, or a traitoress against God, whose inordinate pride and +tyranny had been effectually repressed, was thus left altogether in the +wind; and it was not, perhaps, wonderful if many of Knox’s readers +concluded that all right and wrong in the matter turned upon the degree +of the sovereign’s orthodoxy and possible helpfulness to the Reformation. +He should have been the more careful of such an ambiguity of meaning, as +he must have known well the lukewarm indifference and dishonesty of his +fellow-reformers in political matters. He had already, in 1556 or 1557, +talked the matter over with his great master, Calvin, in “a private +conversation;” and the interview {342} must have been truly distasteful +to both parties. Calvin, indeed, went a far way with him in theory, and +owned that the “government of women was a deviation from the original and +proper order of nature, to be ranked, no less than slavery, among the +punishments consequent upon the fall of man.” But, in practice, their +two roads separated. For the Man of Geneva saw difficulties in the way +of the Scripture proof in the cases of Deborah and Huldah, and in the +prophecy of Isaiah that queens should be the nursing mothers of the +Church. And as the Bible was not decisive, he thought the subject should +be let alone, because, “by custom and public consent and long practice, +it has been established that realms and principalities may descend to +females by hereditary right, and it would not be lawful to unsettle +governments which are ordained by the peculiar providence of God.” I +imagine Knox’s ears must have burned during this interview. Think of him +listening dutifully to all this—how it would not do to meddle with +anointed kings—how there was a peculiar providence in these great +affairs; and then think of his own peroration, and the “noble heart” whom +he looks for “to vindicate the liberty of his country;” or his answer to +Queen Mary, when she asked him who he was, to interfere in the affairs of +Scotland:—“Madam, a subject born within the same!” Indeed, the two +doctors who differed at this private conversation represented, at the +moment, two principles of enormous import in the subsequent history of +Europe. In Calvin we have represented that passive obedience, that +toleration of injustice and absurdity, that holding back of the hand from +political affairs as from something unclean, which lost France, if we are +to believe M. Michelet, for the Reformation; a spirit necessarily fatal +in the long run to the existence of any sect that may profess it; a +suicidal doctrine that survives among us to this day in narrow views of +personal duty, and the low political morality of many virtuous men. In +Knox, on the other hand, we see foreshadowed the whole Puritan Revolution +and the scaffold of Charles I. + +There is little doubt in my mind that this interview was what caused Knox +to print his book without a name. {344} It was a dangerous thing to +contradict the Man of Geneva, and doubly so, surely, when one had had the +advantage of correction from him in a private conversation; and Knox had +his little flock of English refugees to consider. If they had fallen +into bad odour at Geneva, where else was there left to flee to? It was +printed, as I said, in 1558; and, by a singular _mal-à-propos_, in that +same year Mary died, and Elizabeth succeeded to the throne of England. +And just as the accession of Catholic Queen Mary had condemned female +rule in the eyes of Knox, the accession of Protestant Queen Elizabeth +justified it in the eyes of his colleagues. Female rule ceases to be an +anomaly, not because Elizabeth can “reply to eight ambassadors in one day +in their different languages,” but because she represents for the moment +the political future of the Reformation. The exiles troop back to +England with songs of praise in their mouths. The bright occidental +star, of which we have all read in the Preface to the Bible, has risen +over the darkness of Europe. There is a thrill of hope through the +persecuted Churches of the Continent. Calvin writes to Cecil, washing +his hands of Knox and his political heresies. The sale of the “First +Blast” is prohibited in Geneva; and along with it the bold book of Knox’s +colleague, Goodman—a book dear to Milton—where female rule was briefly +characterised as a “monster in nature and disorder among men.” {345a} +Any who may ever have doubted, or been for a moment led away by Knox or +Goodman, or their own wicked imaginations, are now more than convinced. +They have seen the occidental star. Aylmer, with his eye set greedily on +a possible bishopric, and “the better to obtain the favour of the new +Queen,” {345b} sharpens his pen to confound Knox by logic. What need? +He has been confounded by facts. “Thus what had been to the refugees of +Geneva as the very word of God, no sooner were they back in England than, +behold! it was the word of the devil.” {346a} + +Now, what of the real sentiments of these loyal subjects of Elizabeth? +They professed a holy horror for Knox’s position: let us see if their own +would please a modern audience any better, or was, in substance, greatly +different. + +John Aylmer, afterwards Bishop of London, published an answer to Knox, +under the title of _An Harbour for Faithful and true Subjects against the +late Blown Blast_, _concerning the government of Women_. {346b} And +certainly he was a thought more acute, a thought less precipitate and +simple, than his adversary. He is not to be led away by such captious +terms as _natural and unnatural_. It is obvious to him that a woman’s +disability to rule is not natural in the same sense in which it is +natural for a stone to fall or fire to burn. He is doubtful, on the +whole, whether this disability be natural at all; nay, when he is laying +it down that a woman should not be a priest, he shows some elementary +conception of what many of us now hold to be the truth of the matter. +“The bringing-up of women,” he says, “is commonly such” that they cannot +have the necessary qualifications, “for they are not brought up in +learning in schools, nor trained in disputation.” And even so, he can +ask, “Are there not in England women, think you, that for learning and +wisdom could tell their household and neighbours as good a tale as any +Sir John there?” For all that, his advocacy is weak. If women’s rule is +not unnatural in a sense preclusive of its very existence, it is neither +so convenient nor so profitable as the government of men. He holds +England to be specially suitable for the government of women, because +there the governor is more limited and restrained by the other members of +the constitution than in other places; and this argument has kept his +book from being altogether forgotten. It is only in hereditary +monarchies that he will offer any defence of the anomaly. “If rulers +were to be chosen by lot or suffrage, he would not that any women should +stand in the election, but men only.” The law of succession of crowns +was a law to him, in the same sense as the law of evolution is a law to +Mr. Herbert Spencer; and the one and the other counsels his readers, in a +spirit suggestively alike, not to kick against the pricks or seek to be +more wise than He who made them. {348} If God has put a female child +into the direct line of inheritance, it is God’s affair. His strength +will be perfected in her weakness. He makes the Creator address the +objectors in this not very flattering vein:—“I, that could make Daniel, a +sucking babe, to judge better than the wisest lawyers; a brute beast to +reprehend the folly of a prophet; and poor fishers to confound the great +clerks of the world—cannot I make a woman to be a good ruler over you?” +This is the last word of his reasoning. Although he was not altogether +without Puritanic leaven, shown particularly in what he says of the +incomes of Bishops, yet it was rather loyalty to the old order of things +than any generous belief in the capacity of women, that raised up for +them this clerical champion. His courtly spirit contrasts singularly +with the rude, bracing republicanism of Knox. “Thy knee shall bow,” he +says, “thy cap shall off, thy tongue shall speak reverently of thy +sovereign.” For himself, his tongue is even more than reverent. Nothing +can stay the issue of his eloquent adulation. Again and again, “the +remembrance of Elizabeth’s virtues” carries him away; and he has to hark +back again to find the scent of his argument. He is repressing his +vehement adoration throughout, until, when the end comes, and he feels +his business at an end, he can indulge himself to his heart’s content in +indiscriminate laudation of his royal mistress. It is humorous to think +that this illustrious lady, whom he here praises, among many other +excellences, for the simplicity of her attire and the “marvellous +meekness of her stomach,” threatened him, years after, in no very meek +terms, for a sermon against female vanity in dress, which she held as a +reflection on herself. {349} + +Whatever was wanting here in respect for women generally, there was no +want of respect for the Queen; and one cannot very greatly wonder if +these devoted servants looked askance, not upon Knox only, but on his +little flock, as they came back to England tainted with disloyal +doctrine. For them, as for him, the occidental star rose somewhat red +and angry. As for poor Knox, his position was the saddest of all. For +the juncture seemed to him of the highest importance; it was the nick of +time, the flood-water of opportunity. Not only was there an opening for +him in Scotland, a smouldering brand of civil liberty and religious +enthusiasm which it should be for him to kindle into flame with his +powerful breath but he had his eye seemingly on an object of even higher +worth. For now, when religious sympathy ran so high that it could be set +against national aversion, he wished to begin the fusion together of +England and Scotland, and to begin it at the sore place. If once the +open wound were closed at the Border, the work would be half done. +Ministers placed at Berwick and such places might seek their converts +equally on either side of the march; old enemies would sit together to +hear the gospel of peace, and forget the inherited jealousies of many +generations in the enthusiasm of a common faith; or—let us say better—a +common heresy. For people are not most conscious of brotherhood when +they continue languidly together in one creed, but when, with some doubt, +with some danger perhaps, and certainly not without some reluctance, they +violently break with the tradition of the past, and go forth from the +sanctuary of their fathers to worship under the bare heaven. A new +creed, like a new country, is an unhomely place of sojourn; but it makes +men lean on one another and join hands. It was on this that Knox relied +to begin the union of the English and the Scotch. And he had, perhaps, +better means of judging than any even of his contemporaries. He knew the +temper of both nations; and already during his two years’ chaplaincy at +Berwick, he had seen his scheme put to the proof. But whether +practicable or not, the proposal does him much honour. That he should +thus have sought to make a love-match of it between the two peoples, and +tried to win their inclination towards a union instead of simply +transferring them, like so many sheep, by a marriage, or testament, or +private treaty, is thoroughly characteristic of what is best in the man. +Nor was this all. He had, besides, to assure himself of English support, +secret or avowed, for the reformation party in Scotland; a delicate +affair, trenching upon treason. And so he had plenty to say to Cecil, +plenty that he did not care to “commit to paper neither yet to the +knowledge of many.” But his miserable publication had shut the doors of +England in his face. Summoned to Edinburgh by the confederate lords, he +waited at Dieppe, anxiously praying for leave to journey through England. +The most dispiriting tidings reach him. His messengers, coming from so +obnoxious a quarter, narrowly escape imprisonment. His old congregation +are coldly received, and even begin to look back again to their place of +exile with regret. “My First Blast,” he writes ruefully, “has blown from +me all my friends of England.” And then he adds, with a snarl, “The +Second Blast, I fear, shall sound somewhat more sharp, except men be more +moderate than I hear they are.” {352a} But the threat is empty; there +will never be a second blast—he has had enough of that trumpet. Nay, he +begins to feel uneasily that, unless he is to be rendered useless for the +rest of his life, unless he is to lose his right arm and go about his +great work maimed and impotent, he must find some way of making his peace +with England and the indignant Queen. The letter just quoted was written +on the 6th of April 1559; and on the 10th, after he had cooled his heels +for four days more about the streets of Dieppe, he gave in altogether, +and writes a letter of capitulation to Cecil. In this letter, {352b} +which he kept back until the 22d, still hoping that things would come +right of themselves, he censures the great secretary for having “followed +the world in the way of perdition,” characterises him as “worthy of +hell,” and threatens him, if he be not found simple, sincere, and fervent +in the cause of Christ’s gospel, that he shall “taste of the same cup +that politic heads have drunken in before him.” This is all, I take it, +out of respect for the Reformer’s own position; if he is going to be +humiliated, let others be humiliated first; like a child who will not +take his medicine until he has made his nurse and his mother drink of it +before him. “But I have, say you, written a treasonable book against the +regiment and empire of women. . . . The writing of that book I will not +deny; but to prove it treasonable I think it shall be hard. . . . It is +hinted that my book shall be written against. If so be, sir, I greatly +doubt they shall rather hurt nor (than) mend the matter.” And here come +the terms of capitulation; for he does not surrender unconditionally, +even in this sore strait: “And yet if any,” he goes on, “think me enemy +to the person, or yet to the regiment, of her whom God hath now promoted, +they are utterly deceived in me, _for the miraculous work of God_, +_comforting His afflicted by means of an infirm vessel_, _I do +acknowledge_, _and the power of His most potent hand I will obey_. _More +plainly to speak_, _if Queen Elizabeth shall confess_, _that the +extraordinary dispensation of God’s great mercy maketh that lawful unto +her which both nature and God’s law do deny to all women_, then shall +none in England be more willing to maintain her lawful authority than I +shall be. But if (God’s wondrous work set aside) she ground (as God +forbid) the justness of her title upon consuetude, laws, or ordinances of +men, then”—Then Knox will denounce her? Not so; he is more politic +nowadays—then, he “greatly fears” that her ingratitude to God will not go +long without punishment. + +His letter to Elizabeth, written some few months later, was a mere +amplification of the sentences quoted above. She must base her title +entirely upon the extraordinary providence of God; but if she does this, +“if thus, in God’s presence, she humbles herself, so will he with tongue +and pen justify her authority, as the Holy Ghost hath justified the same +in Deborah, that blessed mother in Israel.” {354} And so, you see, his +consistency is preserved; he is merely applying the doctrine of the +“First Blast.” The argument goes thus: The regiment of women is, as +before noted in our work, repugnant to nature, contumely to God, and a +subversion of good order. It has nevertheless pleased God to raise up, +as exceptions to this law, first Deborah, and afterward Elizabeth +Tudor—whose regiment we shall proceed to celebrate. + +There is no evidence as to how the Reformer’s explanations were received, +and indeed it is most probable that the letter was never shown to +Elizabeth at all. For it was sent under cover of another to Cecil, and +as it was not of a very courtly conception throughout, and was, of all +things, what would most excite the Queen’s uneasy jealousy about her +title, it is like enough that the secretary exercised his discretion (he +had Knox’s leave in this case, and did not always wait for that, it is +reputed) to put the letter harmlessly away beside other valueless or +unpresentable State Papers. I wonder very much if he did the same with +another, {355} written two years later, after Mary had come into +Scotland, in which Knox almost seeks to make Elizabeth an accomplice with +him in the matter of the “First Blast.” The Queen of Scotland is going +to have that work refuted, he tells her; and “though it were but +foolishness in him to prescribe unto her Majesty what is to be done,” he +would yet remind her that Mary is neither so much alarmed about her own +security, nor so generously interested in Elizabeth’s, “that she would +take such pains, _unless her crafty counsel in so doing shot at a further +mark_.” There is something really ingenious in this letter; it showed +Knox in the double capacity of the author of the “First Blast” and the +faithful friend of Elizabeth; and he combines them there so naturally, +that one would scarcely imagine the two to be incongruous. + +Twenty days later he was defending his intemperate publication to another +queen—his own queen, Mary Stuart. This was on the first of those three +interviews which he has preserved for us with so much dramatic vigour in +the picturesque pages of his history. After he had avowed the authorship +in his usual haughty style, Mary asked: “You think, then, that I have no +just authority?” The question was evaded. “Please your Majesty,” he +answered, “that learned men in all ages have had their judgments free, +and most commonly disagreeing from the common judgment of the world; such +also have they published by pen and tongue; and yet notwithstanding they +themselves have lived in the common society with others, and have borne +patiently with the errors and imperfections which they could not amend.” +Thus did “Plato the philosopher:” thus will do John Knox. “I have +communicated my judgment to the world: if the realm finds no +inconvenience from the regiment of a woman, that which they approve, +shall I not further disallow than within my own breast; but shall be as +well content to live under your Grace, as Paul was to live under Nero. +And my hope is, that so long as ye defile not your hands with the blood +of the saints of God, neither I nor my book shall hurt either you or your +authority.” All this is admirable in wisdom and moderation, and, except +that he might have hit upon a comparison less offensive than that with +Paul and Nero, hardly to be bettered. Having said thus much, he feels he +needs say no more; and so, when he is further pressed, he closes that +part of the discussion with an astonishing sally. If he has been content +to let this matter sleep, he would recommend her Grace to follow his +example with thankfulness of heart; it is grimly to be understood which +of them has most to fear if the question should be reawakened. So the +talk wandered to other subjects. Only, when the Queen was summoned at +last to dinner (“for it was afternoon”) Knox made his salutation in this +form of words: “I pray God, Madam, that you may be as much blessed within +the Commonwealth of Scotland, if it be the pleasure of God, as ever +Deborah was in the Commonwealth of Israel.” {357} Deborah again. + +But he was not yet done with the echoes of his own “First Blast.” In +1571, when he was already near his end, the old controversy was taken up +in one of a series of anonymous libels against the Reformer affixed, +Sunday after Sunday, to the church door. The dilemma was fairly enough +stated. Either his doctrine is false, in which case he is a “false +doctor” and seditious; or, if it be true, why does he “avow and approve +the contrare, I mean that regiment in the Queen of England’s person; +which he avoweth and approveth, not only praying for the maintenance of +her estate, but also procuring her aid and support against his own native +country?” Knox answered the libel, as his wont was, next Sunday, from +the pulpit. He justified the “First Blast” with all the old arrogance; +there is no drawing back there. The regiment of women is repugnant to +nature, contumely to God, and a subversion of good order, as before. +When he prays for the maintenance of Elizabeth’s estate, he is only +following the example of those prophets of God who warned and comforted +the wicked kings of Israel; or of Jeremiah, who bade the Jews pray for +the prosperity of Nebuchadnezzar. As for the Queen’s aid, there is no +harm in that: _quia_ (these are his own words) _quia omnia munda mundis_: +because to the pure all things are pure. One thing, in conclusion, he +“may not pretermit” to give the lie in the throat to his accuser, where +he charges him with seeking support against his native country. “What I +have been to my country,” said the old Reformer, “What I have been to my +country, albeit this unthankful age will not know, yet the ages to come +will be compelled to bear witness to the truth. And thus I cease, +requiring of all men that have anything to oppone against me, that he may +(they may) do it so plainly, as that I may make myself and all my doings +manifest to the world. For to me it seemeth a thing unreasonable, that, +in this my decrepit age, I shall be compelled to fight against shadows, +and howlets that dare not abide the light.” {359} + +Now, in this, which may be called his _Last Blast_, there is as sharp +speaking as any in the “First Blast” itself. He is of the same opinion +to the end, you see, although he has been obliged to cloak and garble +that opinion for political ends. He has been tacking indeed, and he has +indeed been seeking the favour of a queen; but what man ever sought a +queen’s favour with a more virtuous purpose, or with as little courtly +policy? The question of consistency is delicate, and must be made plain. +Knox never changed his opinion about female rule, but lived to regret +that he had published that opinion. Doubtless he had many thoughts so +far out of the range of public sympathy, that he could only keep them to +himself, and, in his own words, bear patiently with the errors and +imperfections that he could not amend. For example, I make no doubt +myself that, in his own heart, he did hold the shocking dogma attributed +to him by more than one calumniator; and that, had the time been ripe, +had there been aught to gain by it, instead of all to lose, he would have +been the first to assert that Scotland was elective instead of +hereditary—“elective as in the days of paganism,” as one Thevet says in +holy horror. {360} And yet, because the time was not ripe, I find no +hint of such an idea in his collected works. Now, the regiment of women +was another matter that he should have kept to himself; right or wrong, +his opinion did not fit the moment; right or wrong, as Aylmer puts it, +“the _Blast_ was blown out of season.” And this it was that he began to +perceive after the accession of Elizabeth; not that he had been wrong, +and that female rule was a good thing, for he had said from the first +that “the felicity of some women in their empires” could not change the +law of God and the nature of created things; not this, but that the +regiment of women was one of those imperfections of society which must be +borne with because yet they cannot be remedied. The thing had seemed so +obvious to him, in his sense of unspeakable masculine superiority, and +his fine contempt for what is only sanctioned by antiquity and common +consent, he had imagined that, at the first hint, men would arise and +shake off the debasing tyranny. He found himself wrong, and he showed +that he could be moderate in his own fashion, and understood the spirit +of true compromise. He came round to Calvin’s position, in fact, but by +a different way. And it derogates nothing from the merit of this wise +attitude that it was the consequence of a change of interest. We are all +taught by interest; and if the interest be not merely selfish, there is +no wiser preceptor under heaven, and perhaps no sterner. + +Such is the history of John Knox’s connection with the controversy about +female rule. In itself, this is obviously an incomplete study; not fully +to be understood, without a knowledge of his private relations with the +other sex, and what he thought of their position in domestic life. This +shall be dealt with in another paper. + + + +II.—PRIVATE LIFE. + + +TO those who know Knox by hearsay only, I believe the matter of this +paper will be somewhat astonishing. For the hard energy of the man in +all public matters has possessed the imagination of the world; he remains +for posterity in certain traditional phrases, browbeating Queen Mary, or +breaking beautiful carved work in abbeys and cathedrals, that had long +smoked themselves out and were no more than sorry ruins, while he was +still quietly teaching children in a country gentleman’s family. It does +not consist with the common acceptation of his character to fancy him +much moved, except with anger. And yet the language of passion came to +his pen as readily, whether it was a passion of denunciation against some +of the abuses that vexed his righteous spirit, or of yearning for the +society of an absent friend. He was vehement in affection, as in +doctrine. I will not deny that there may have been, along with his +vehemence, something shifty, and for the moment only; that, like many +men, and many Scotchmen, he saw the world and his own heart, not so much +under any very steady, equable light, as by extreme flashes of passion, +true for the moment, but not true in the long run. There does seem to me +to be something of this traceable in the Reformer’s utterances: +precipitation and repentance, hardy speech and action somewhat +circumspect, a strong tendency to see himself in a heroic light and to +place a ready belief in the disposition of the moment. Withal he had +considerable confidence in himself, and in the uprightness of his own +disciplined emotions, underlying much sincere aspiration after spiritual +humility. And it is this confidence that makes his intercourse with +women so interesting to a modern. It would be easy, of course, to make +fun of the whole affair, to picture him strutting vaingloriously among +these inferior creatures, or compare a religious friendship in the +sixteenth century with what was called, I think, a literary friendship in +the eighteenth. But it is more just and profitable to recognise what +there is sterling and human underneath all his theoretical affectations +of superiority. Women, he has said in his “First Blast,” are, “weak, +frail, impatient, feeble, and foolish;” and yet it does not appear that +he was himself any less dependent than other men upon the sympathy and +affection of these weak, frail, impatient, feeble, and foolish creatures; +it seems even as if he had been rather more dependent than most. + +Of those who are to act influentially on their fellows, we should expect +always something large and public in their way of life, something more or +less urbane and comprehensive in their sentiment for others. We should +not expect to see them spend their sympathy in idyls, however beautiful. +We should not seek them among those who, if they have but a wife to their +bosom, ask no more of womankind, just as they ask no more of their own +sex, if they can find a friend or two for their immediate need. They +will be quick to feel all the pleasures of our association—not the great +ones alone, but all. They will know not love only, but all those other +ways in which man and woman mutually make each other happy—by sympathy, +by admiration, by the atmosphere they bear about them—down to the mere +impersonal pleasure of passing happy faces in the street. For, through +all this gradation, the difference of sex makes itself pleasurably felt. +Down to the most lukewarm courtesies of life, there is a special chivalry +due and a special pleasure received, when the two sexes are brought ever +so lightly into contact. We love our mothers otherwise than we love our +fathers; a sister is not as a brother to us; and friendship between man +and woman, be it never so unalloyed and innocent, is not the same as +friendship between man and man. Such friendship is not even possible for +all. To conjoin tenderness for a woman that is not far short of +passionate with such disinterestedness and beautiful gratuity of +affection as there is between friends of the same sex, requires no +ordinary disposition in the man. For either it would presuppose quite +womanly delicacy of perception, and, as it were, a curiosity in shades of +differing sentiment; or it would mean that he had accepted the large, +simple divisions of society: a strong and positive spirit robustly +virtuous, who has chosen a better part coarsely, and holds to it +steadfastly, with all its consequences of pain to himself and others; as +one who should go straight before him on a journey, neither tempted by +wayside flowers nor very scrupulous of small lives under foot. It was in +virtue of this latter disposition that Knox was capable of those +intimacies with women that embellished his life; and we find him +preserved for us in old letters as a man of many women friends; a man of +some expansion toward the other sex; a man ever ready to comfort weeping +women, and to weep along with them. + +Of such scraps and fragments of evidence as to his private life and more +intimate thoughts as have survived to us from all the perils that environ +written paper, an astonishingly large proportion is in the shape of +letters to women of his familiarity. He was twice married, but that is +not greatly to the purpose; for the Turk, who thinks even more meanly of +women than John Knox, is none the less given to marrying. What is really +significant is quite apart from marriage. For the man Knox was a true +man, and woman, the _ewig-weibliche_, was as necessary to him, in spite +of all low theories, as ever she was to Goethe. He came to her in a +certain halo of his own, as the minister of truth, just as Goethe came to +her in a glory of art; he made himself necessary to troubled hearts and +minds exercised in the painful complications that naturally result from +all changes in the world’s way of thinking; and those whom he had thus +helped became dear to him, and were made the chosen companions of his +leisure if they were at hand, or encouraged and comforted by letter if +they were afar. + +It must not be forgotten that Knox had been a presbyter of the old +Church, and that the many women whom we shall see gathering around him, +as he goes through life, had probably been accustomed, while still in the +communion of Rome, to rely much upon some chosen spiritual director, so +that the intimacies of which I propose to offer some account, while +testifying to a good heart in the Reformer, testify also to a certain +survival of the spirit of the confessional in the Reformed Church, and +are not properly to be judged without this idea. There is no friendship +so noble, but it is the product of the time; and a world of little +finical observances, and little frail proprieties and fashions of the +hour, go to make or to mar, to stint or to perfect, the union of spirits +the most loving and the most intolerant of such interference. The trick +of the country and the age steps in even between the mother and her +child, counts out their caresses upon niggardly fingers, and says, in the +voice of authority, that this one thing shall be a matter of confidence +between them, and this other thing shall not. And thus it is that we +must take into reckoning whatever tended to modify the social atmosphere +in which Knox and his women friends met, and loved and trusted each +other. To the man who had been their priest and was now their minister, +women would be able to speak with a confidence quite impossible in these +latter days; the women would be able to speak, and the man to hear. It +was a beaten road just then; and I daresay we should be no less +scandalised at their plain speech than they, if they could come back to +earth, would be offended at our waltzes and worldly fashions. This, +then, was the footing on which Knox stood with his many women friends. +The reader will see, as he goes on, how much of warmth, of interest, and +of that happy mutual dependence which is the very gist of friendship, he +contrived to ingraft upon this somewhat dry relationship of penitent and +confessor. + +It must be understood that we know nothing of his intercourse with women +(as indeed we know little at all about his life) until he came to Berwick +in 1549, when he was already in the forty-fifth year of his age. At the +same time it is just possible that some of a little group at Edinburgh, +with whom he corresponded during his last absence, may have been friends +of an older standing. Certainly they were, of all his female +correspondents, the least personally favoured. He treats them throughout +in a comprehensive sort of spirit that must at times have been a little +wounding. Thus, he remits one of them to his former letters, “which I +trust be common betwixt you and the rest of our sisters, for to me ye are +all equal in Christ.” {368} Another letter is a gem in this way. +“Albeit” it begins, “albeit I have no particular matter to write unto +you, beloved sister, yet I could not refrain to write these few lines to +you in declaration of my remembrance of you. True it is that I have many +whom I bear in equal remembrance before God with you, to whom at present +I write nothing, either for that I esteem them stronger than you, and +therefore they need the less my rude labours, or else because they have +not provoked me by their writing to recompense their remembrance.” {369a} +His “sisters in Edinburgh” had evidently to “provoke” his attention +pretty constantly; nearly all his letters are, on the face of them, +answers to questions, and the answers are given with a certain crudity +that I do not find repeated when he writes to those he really cares for. +So when they consult him about women’s apparel (a subject on which his +opinion may be pretty correctly imagined by the ingenious reader for +himself) he takes occasion to anticipate some of the most offensive +matter of the “First Blast” in a style of real brutality. {369b} It is +not merely that he tells them “the garments of women do declare their +weakness and inability to execute the office of man,” though that in +itself is neither very wise nor very opportune in such a correspondence +one would think; but if the reader will take the trouble to wade through +the long, tedious sermon for himself, he will see proof enough that Knox +neither loved, nor very deeply respected, the women he was then +addressing. In very truth, I believe these Edinburgh sisters simply +bored him. He had a certain interest in them as his children in the +Lord; they were continually “provoking him by their writing;” and, if +they handed his letters about, writing to them was as good a form of +publication as was then open to him in Scotland. There is one letter, +however, in this budget, addressed to the wife of Clerk-Register Mackgil, +which is worthy of some further mention. The Clerk-Register had not +opened his heart, it would appear, to the preaching of the Gospel, and +Mrs. Mackgil has written, seeking the Reformer’s prayers in his behalf. +“Your husband,” he answers, “is dear to me for that he is a man indued +with some good gifts, but more dear for that he is your husband. Charity +moveth me to thirst his illumination, both for his comfort and for the +trouble which you sustain by his coldness, which justly may be called +infidelity.” He wishes her, however, not to hope too much; he can +promise that his prayers will be earnest, but not that they will be +effectual; it is possible that this is to be her “cross” in life; that +“her head, appointed by God for her comfort, should be her enemy.” And +if this be so, well, there is nothing for it; “with patience she must +abide God’s merciful deliverance,” taking heed only that she does not +“obey manifest iniquity for the pleasure of any mortal man.” {371a} I +conceive this epistle would have given a very modified sort of pleasure +to the Clerk-Register, had it chanced to fall into his hands. Compare +its tenor—the dry resignation not without a hope of merciful deliverance +therein recommended—with these words from another letter, written but the +year before to two married women of London: “Call first for grace by +Jesus, and thereafter communicate with your faithful husbands, and then +shall God, I doubt not, conduct your footsteps, and direct your counsels +to His glory.” {371b} Here the husbands are put in a very high place; we +can recognise here the same hand that has written for our instruction how +the man is set above the woman, even as God above the angels. But the +point of the distinction is plain. For Clerk-Register Mackgil was not a +faithful husband; displayed, indeed, towards religion a “coldness which +justly might be called infidelity.” We shall see in more notable +instances how much Knox’s conception of the duty of wives varies +according to the zeal and orthodoxy of the husband. + +As I have said, he may possibly have made the acquaintance of Mrs. +Mackgil, Mrs. Guthrie, or some other, or all, of these Edinburgh friends +while he was still Douglas of Longniddry’s private tutor. But our +certain knowledge begins in 1549. He was then but newly escaped from his +captivity in France, after pulling an oar for nineteen months on the +benches of the galley _Nostre Dame_; now up the rivers, holding stealthy +intercourse with other Scottish prisoners in the castle of Rouen; now out +in the North Sea, raising his sick head to catch a glimpse of the far-off +steeples of St. Andrews. And now he was sent down by the English Privy +Council as a preacher to Berwick-upon-Tweed; somewhat shaken in health by +all his hardships, full of pains and agues, and tormented by gravel, that +sorrow of great men; altogether, what with his romantic story, his weak +health, and his great faculty of eloquence, a very natural object for the +sympathy of devout women. At this happy juncture he fell into the +company of a Mrs. Elizabeth Bowes, wife of Richard Bowes, of Aske, in +Yorkshire, to whom she had borne twelve children. She was a religious +hypochondriac, a very weariful woman, full of doubts and scruples, and +giving no rest on earth either to herself or to those whom she honoured +with her confidence. From the first time she heard Knox preach she +formed a high opinion of him, and was solicitous ever after of his +society. {373a} Nor was Knox unresponsive. “I have always delighted in +your company,” he writes, “and when labours would permit, you know I have +not spared hours to talk and commune with you.” Often when they had met +in depression he reminds her, “God hath sent great comfort unto both.” +{373b} We can gather from such letters as are yet extant how close and +continuous was their intercourse. “I think it best you remain till the +morrow,” he writes once, “and so shall we commune at large at afternoon. +This day you know to be the day of my study and prayer unto God; yet if +your trouble be intolerable, or, if you think my presence may release +your pain, do as the Spirit shall move you. . . . Your messenger found me +in bed, after a sore trouble and most dolorous night, and so dolour may +complain to dolour when we two meet. . . . And this is more plain than +ever I spoke, to let you know you have a companion in trouble.” {373c} +Once we have the curtain raised for a moment, and can look at the two +together for the length of a phrase. “After the writing of this +preceding,” writes Knox, “your brother and mine, Harrie Wycliffe, did +advertise me by writing, that your adversary (the devil) took occasion to +trouble you because that _I did start back from you rehearsing your +infirmities_. _I remember myself so to have done_, _and that is my +common on consuetude when anything pierceth or toucheth my heart_. _Call +to your mind what I did standing at the cupboard at Alnwick_. In very +deed I thought that no creature had been tempted as I was; and when I +heard proceed from your mouth the very same words that he troubles me +with, I did wonder and from my heart lament your sore trouble, knowing in +myself the dolour thereof.” {374a} Now intercourse of so very close a +description, whether it be religious intercourse or not, is apt to +displease and disquiet a husband; and we know incidentally from Knox +himself that there was some little scandal about his intimacy with Mrs. +Bowes. “The slander and fear of men,” he writes, “has impeded me to +exercise my pen so oft as I would;_ yea_, _very shame hath holden me from +your company_, _when I was most surely persuaded that God had appointed +me at that time to comfort and feed your hungry and afflicted soul_. +_God in His infinite mercy_,” he goes on, “_remove not only from me all +fear that tendeth not to godliness_, _but from others suspicion to judge +of me otherwise than it becometh one member to judge of another_.” {374b} +And the scandal, such as it was, would not be allayed by the dissension +in which Mrs. Bowes seems to have lived with her family upon the matter +of religion, and the countenance shown by Knox to her resistance. +Talking of these conflicts, and her courage against “her own flesh and +most inward affections, yea, against some of her most natural friends,” +he writes it, “to the praise of God, he has wondered at the bold +constancy which he has found in her when his own heart was faint.” {375a} + +Now, perhaps in order to stop scandalous mouths, perhaps out of a desire +to bind the much-loved evangelist nearer to her in the only manner +possible, Mrs. Bowes conceived the scheme of marrying him to her fifth +daughter, Marjorie; and the Reformer seems to have fallen in with it +readily enough. It seems to have been believed in the family that the +whole matter had been originally made up between these two, with no very +spontaneous inclination on the part of the bride. {375b} Knox’s idea of +marriage, as I have said, was not the same for all men; but on the whole, +it was not lofty. We have a curious letter of his, written at the +request of Queen Mary, to the Earl of Argyle, on very delicate household +matters; which, as he tells us, “was not well accepted of the said Earl.” +{375c} We may suppose, however, that his own home was regulated in a +similar spirit. I can fancy that for such a man, emotional, and with a +need, now and again, to exercise parsimony in emotions not strictly +needful, something a little mechanical, something hard and fast and +clearly understood, would enter into his ideal of a home. There were +storms enough without, and equability was to be desired at the fireside +even at a sacrifice of deeper pleasures. So, from a wife, of all women, +he would not ask much. One letter to her which has come down to us is, I +had almost said, conspicuous for coldness. {376} He calls her, as he +called other female correspondents, “dearly beloved sister;” the epistle +is doctrinal, and nearly the half of it bears, not upon her own case, but +upon that of her mother. However, we know what Heine wrote in his wife’s +album; and there is, after all, one passage that may be held to intimate +some tenderness, although even that admits of an amusingly opposite +construction. “I think,” he says, “I _think_ this be the first letter I +ever wrote to you.” This, if we are to take it literally, may pair off +with the “two _or three_ children” whom Montaigne mentions having lost at +nurse; the one is as eccentric in a lover as the other in a parent. +Nevertheless, he displayed more energy in the course of his troubled +wooing than might have been expected. The whole Bowes family, angry +enough already at the influence he had obtained over the mother, set +their faces obdurately against the match. And I daresay the opposition +quickened his inclination. I find him writing to Mrs. Bowes that she +need no further trouble herself about the marriage; it should now be his +business altogether; it behoved him now to jeopard his life “for the +comfort of his own flesh, both fear and friendship of all earthly +creature laid aside.” {377} This is a wonderfully chivalrous utterance +for a Reformer forty-eight years old; and it compares well with the +leaden coquetries of Calvin, not much over thirty, taking this and that +into consideration, weighing together dowries and religious +qualifications and the instancy of friends, and exhibiting what M. +Bungener calls “an honourable and Christian difficulty” of choice, in +frigid indecisions and insincere proposals. But Knox’s next letter is in +a humbler tone; he has not found the negotiation so easy as he fancied; +he despairs of the marriage altogether, and talks of leaving +England,—regards not “what country consumes his wicked carcass.” “You +shall understand,” he says, “that this sixth of November, I spoke with +Sir Robert Bowes” (the head of the family, his bride’s uncle) “in the +matter you know, according to your request; whose disdainful, yea, +despiteful, words hath so pierced my heart that my life is bitter to me. +I bear a good countenance with a sore troubled heart, because he that +ought to consider matters with a deep judgment is become not only a +despiser, but also a taunter of God’s messengers—God be merciful unto +him! Amongst others his most unpleasing words, while that I was about to +have declared my heart in the whole matter, he said, ‘Away with your +rhetorical reasons! for I will not be persuaded with them.’ God knows I +did use no rhetoric nor coloured speech; but would have spoken the truth, +and that in most simple manner. I am not a good orator in my own cause; +but what he would not be content to hear of me, God shall declare to him +one day to his displeasure, unless he repent.” {378} Poor Knox, you see, +is quite commoved. It has been a very unpleasant interview. And as it +is the only sample that we have of how things went with him during his +courtship, we may infer that the period was not as agreeable for Knox as +it has been for some others. + +However, when once they were married, I imagine he and Marjorie Bowes hit +it off together comfortably enough. The little we know of it may be +brought together in a very short space. She bore him two sons. He seems +to have kept her pretty busy, and depended on her to some degree in his +work; so that when she fell ill, his papers got at once into disorder. +{379a} Certainly she sometimes wrote to his dictation; and, in this +capacity, he calls her “his left hand.” {379b} In June 1559, at the +headiest moment of the Reformation in Scotland, he writes regretting the +absence of his helpful colleague, Goodman, “whose presence” (this is the +not very grammatical form of his lament) “whose presence I more thirst, +than she that is my own flesh.” {379c} And this, considering the source +and the circumstances, may be held as evidence of a very tender +sentiment. He tells us himself in his history, on the occasion of a +certain meeting at the Kirk of Field, that “he was in no small heaviness +by reason of the late death of his dear bed-fellow, Marjorie Bowes.” +{379d} Calvin, condoling with him, speaks of her as “a wife whose like +is not to be found everywhere” (that is very like Calvin), and again, as +“the most delightful of wives.” We know what Calvin thought desirable in +a wife, “good humour, chastity, thrift, patience, and solicitude for her +husband’s health,” and so we may suppose that the first Mrs. Knox fell +not far short of this ideal. + +The actual date of the marriage is uncertain but by September 1566, at +the latest, the Reformer was settled in Geneva with his wife. There is +no fear either that he will be dull; even if the chaste, thrifty, patient +Marjorie should not altogether occupy his mind, he need not go out of the +house to seek more female sympathy; for behold! Mrs. Bowes is duly +domesticated with the young couple. Dr. M‘Crie imagined that Richard +Bowes was now dead, and his widow, consequently, free to live where she +would; and where could she go more naturally than to the house of a +married daughter? This, however, is not the case. Richard Bowes did not +die till at least two years later. It is impossible to believe that he +approved of his wife’s desertion, after so many years of marriage, after +twelve children had been born to them; and accordingly we find in his +will, dated 1558, no mention either of her or of Knox’s wife. {380} This +is plain sailing. It is easy enough to understand the anger of Bowes +against this interloper, who had come into a quiet family, married the +daughter in spite of the father’s opposition, alienated the wife from the +husband and the husband’s religion, supported her in a long course of +resistance and rebellion, and, after years of intimacy, already too close +and tender for any jealous spirit to behold without resentment, carried +her away with him at last into a foreign land. But it is not quite easy +to understand how, except out of sheer weariness and disgust, he was ever +brought to agree to the arrangement. Nor is it easy to square the +Reformer’s conduct with his public teaching. We have, for instance, a +letter by him, Craig, and Spottiswood, to the Archbishops of Canterbury +and York, anent “a wicked and rebellious woman,” one Anne Good, spouse to +“John Barron, a minister of Christ Jesus his evangel,” who, “after great +rebellion shown unto him, and divers admonitions given, as well by +himself as by others in his name, that she should in no wise depart from +this realm, nor from his house without his license, hath not the less +stubbornly and rebelliously departed, separated herself from his society, +left his house, and withdrawn herself from this realm.” {381} Perhaps +some sort of license was extorted, as I have said, from Richard Bowes, +weary with years of domestic dissension; but setting that aside, the +words employed with so much righteous indignation by Knox, Craig, and +Spottiswood, to describe the conduct of that wicked and rebellious woman, +Mrs. Barron, would describe nearly as exactly the conduct of the +religious Mrs. Bowes. It is a little bewildering, until we recollect the +distinction between faithful and unfaithful husbands; for Barron was “a +minister of Christ Jesus his evangel,” while Richard Bowes, besides being +own brother to a despiser and taunter of God’s messengers, is shrewdly +suspected to have been “a bigoted adherent of the Roman Catholic faith,” +or, as Knox himself would have expressed it, “a rotten Papist.” + +You would have thought that Knox was now pretty well supplied with female +society. But we are not yet at the end of the roll. The last year of +his sojourn in England had been spent principally in London, where he was +resident as one of the chaplains of Edward the Sixth; and here he boasts, +although a stranger, he had, by God’s grace, found favour before many. +{382a} The godly women of the metropolis made much of him; once he +writes to Mrs. Bowes that her last letter had found him closeted with +three, and he and the three women were all in tears. {382b} Out of all, +however, he had chosen two. “_God_,” he writes to them, “_brought us in +such familiar acquaintance_, _that your hearts were incensed and kindled +with a special care over me_, _as a mother useth to be over her natural +child_; and my heart was opened and compelled in your presence to be more +plain than ever I was to any.” {382c} And out of the two even he had +chosen one, Mrs. Anne Locke, wife to Mr. Harry Locke, merchant, nigh to +Bow Kirk, Cheapside, in London, as the address runs. If one may venture +to judge upon such imperfect evidence, this was the woman he loved best. +I have a difficulty in quite forming to myself an idea of her character. +She may have been one of the three tearful visitors before alluded to; +she may even have been that one of them who was so profoundly moved by +some passages of Mrs. Bowes’s letter, which the Reformer opened, and read +aloud to them before they went. “O would to God,” cried this +impressionable matron, “would to God that I might speak with that person, +for I perceive there are more tempted than I.” {383} This may have been +Mrs. Locke, as I say; but even if it were, we must not conclude from this +one fact that she was such another as Mrs. Bowes. All the evidence tends +the other way. She was a woman of understanding, plainly, who followed +political events with interest, and to whom Knox thought it worth while +to write, in detail, the history of his trials and successes. She was +religious, but without that morbid perversity of spirit that made +religion so heavy a burden for the poor-hearted Mrs. Bowes. More of her +I do not find, save testimony to the profound affection that united her +to the Reformer. So we find him writing to her from Geneva, in such +terms as these:—“You write that your desire is earnest to see me. _Dear +sister_, _if I should express the thirst and languor which I have had for +your presence_, _I should appear to pass measure_. . . _Yea_, _I weep and +rejoice in remembrance of you_; but that would evanish by the comfort of +your presence, which I assure you is so dear to me, that if the charge of +this little flock here, gathered together in Christ’s name, did not +impede me, my coming should prevent my letter.” {384} I say that this +was written from Geneva; and yet you will observe that it is no +consideration for his wife or mother-in-law, only the charge of his +little flock, that keeps him from setting out forthwith for London, to +comfort himself with the dear presence of Mrs. Locke. Remember that was +a certain plausible enough pretext for Mrs. Locke to come to Geneva—“the +most perfect school of Christ that ever was on earth since the days of +the Apostles”—for we are now under the reign of that “horrible monster +Jezebel of England,” when a lady of good orthodox sentiments was better +out of London. It was doubtful, however, whether this was to be. She +was detained in England, partly by circumstances unknown, “partly by +empire of her head,” Mr. Harry Locke, the Cheapside merchant. It is +somewhat humorous to see Knox struggling for resignation, now that he has +to do with a faithful husband (for Mr. Harry Locke was faithful). Had it +been otherwise, “in my heart,” he says, “I could have wished—yea,” here +he breaks out, “yea, and cannot cease to wish—that God would guide you to +this place.” {385} And after all, he had not long to wait, for, whether +Mr. Harry Locke died in the interval, or was wearied, he too, into giving +permission, five months after the date of the letter last quoted, “Mrs. +Anne Locke, Harry her son, and Anne her daughter, and Katharine her +maid,” arrived in that perfect school of Christ, the Presbyterian +paradise, Geneva. So now, and for the next two years, the cup of Knox’s +happiness was surely full. Of an afternoon, when the bells rang out for +the sermon, the shops closed, and the good folk gathered to the churches, +psalm-book in hand, we can imagine him drawing near to the English chapel +in quite patriarchal fashion, with Mrs. Knox and Mrs. Bowes and Mrs. +Locke, James his servant, Patrick his pupil, and a due following of +children and maids. He might be alone at work all morning in his study, +for he wrote much during these two years; but at night, you may be sure +there was a circle of admiring women, eager to hear the new paragraph, +and not sparing of applause. And what work, among others, was he +elaborating at this time, but the notorious “First Blast”? So that he +may have rolled out in his big pulpit voice, how women were weak, frail, +impatient, feeble, foolish, inconstant, variable, cruel, and lacking the +spirit of counsel, and how men were above them, even as God is above the +angels, in the ears of his own wife, and the two dearest friends he had +on earth. But he had lost the sense of incongruity, and continued to +despise in theory the sex he honoured so much in practice, of whom he +chose his most intimate associates, and whose courage he was compelled to +wonder at, when his own heart was faint. + +We may say that such a man was not worthy of his fortune; and so, as he +would not learn, he was taken away from that agreeable school, and his +fellowship of women was broken up, not to be reunited. Called into +Scotland to take at last that strange position in history which is his +best claim to commemoration, he was followed thither by his wife and his +mother-in-law. The wife soon died. The death of her daughter did not +altogether separate Mrs. Bowes from Knox, but she seems to have come and +gone between his house and England. In 1562, however, we find him +characterised as “a sole man by reason of the absence of his +mother-in-law, Mrs. Bowes,” and a passport is got for her, her man, a +maid, and “three horses, whereof two shall return,” as well as liberty to +take all her own money with her into Scotland. This looks like a +definite arrangement; but whether she died at Edinburgh, or went back to +England yet again, I cannot find. + +With that great family of hers, unless in leaving her husband she had +quarrelled with them all, there must have been frequent occasion for her +presence, one would think. Knox at least survived her; and we possess +his epigraph to their long intimacy, given to the world by him in an +appendix to his latest publication. I have said in a former paper that +Knox was not shy of personal revelations in his published works. And the +trick seems to have grown on him. To this last tract, a controversial +onslaught on a Scottish Jesuit, he prefixed a prayer, not very pertinent +to the matter in hand, and containing references to his family which were +the occasion of some wit in his adversary’s answer; and appended what +seems equally irrelevant, one of his devout letters to Mrs. Bowes, with +an explanatory preface. To say truth, I believe he had always felt +uneasily that the circumstances of this intimacy were very capable of +misconstruction; and now, when he was an old man, taking “his good night +of all the faithful in both realms,” and only desirous “that without any +notable sclander to the evangel of Jesus Christ, he might end his battle; +for as the world was weary of him, so was he of it;”—in such a spirit it +was not, perhaps, unnatural that he should return to this old story, and +seek to put it right in the eyes of all men, ere he died. “Because that +God,” he says, “because that God now in His mercy hath put an end to the +battle of my dear mother, Mistress Elizabeth Bowes, before that He put an +end to my wretched life, I could not cease but declare to the world what +was the cause of our great familiarity and long acquaintance; which was +neither flesh nor blood, but a troubled conscience upon her part, which +never suffered her to rest but when she was in the company of the +faithful, of whom (from the first hearing of the word at my mouth) she +judged me to be one. . . . Her company to me was comfortable (yea, +honourable and profitable, for she was to me and mine a mother), but yet +it was not without some cross; for besides trouble and fashery of body +sustained for her, my mind was seldom quiet, for doing somewhat for the +comfort of her troubled conscience.” {388} He had written to her years +before, from his first exile in Dieppe, that “only God’s hand” could +withhold him from once more speaking with her face to face; and now, when +God’s hand has indeed interposed, when there lies between them, instead +of the voyageable straits, that great gulf over which no man can pass, +this is the spirit in which he can look back upon their long +acquaintance. She was a religious hypochondriac, it appears, whom, not +without some cross and fashery of mind and body, he was good enough to +tend. He might have given a truer character of their friendship, had he +thought less of his own standing in public estimation, and more of the +dead woman. But he was in all things, as Burke said of his son in that +ever memorable passage, a public creature. He wished that even into this +private place of his affections posterity should follow him with a +complete approval; and he was willing, in order that this might be so, to +exhibit the defects of his lost friend, and tell the world what weariness +he had sustained through her unhappy disposition. There is something +here that reminds one of Rousseau. + +I do not think he ever saw Mrs. Locke after he left Geneva; but his +correspondence with her continued for three years. It may have continued +longer, of course, but I think the last letters we possess read like the +last that would be written. Perhaps Mrs. Locke was then remarried, for +there is much obscurity over her subsequent history. For as long as +their intimacy was kept up, at least, the human element remains in the +Reformer’s life. Here is one passage, for example, the most likable +utterance of Knox’s that I can quote:—Mrs. Locke has been upbraiding him +as a bad correspondent. “My remembrance of you,” he answers, “is not so +dead, but I trust it shall be fresh enough, albeit it be renewed by no +outward token for one year. _Of nature_, _I am churlish_; _yet one thing +I ashame not to affirm_, _that familiarity once thoroughly contracted was +never yet broken on my default_. _The cause may be that I have rather +need of all_, _than that any have need of me_. However it (_that_) be, +it cannot be, as I say, the corporal absence of one year or two that can +quench in my heart that familiar acquaintance in Christ Jesus, which half +a year did engender, and almost two years did nourish and confirm. And +therefore, whether I write or no, be assuredly persuaded that I have you +in such memory as becometh the faithful to have of the faithful.” {390} +This is the truest touch of personal humility that I can remember to have +seen in all the five volumes of the Reformer’s collected works: it is no +small honour to Mrs. Locke that his affection for her should have brought +home to him this unwonted feeling of dependence upon others. Everything +else in the course of the correspondence testifies to a good, sound, +down-right sort of friendship between the two, less ecstatic than it was +at first, perhaps, but serviceable and very equal. He gives her ample +details as to the progress of the work of reformation; sends her the +sheets of the _Confession of Faith_, “in quairs,” as he calls it; asks +her to assist him with her prayers, to collect money for the good cause +in Scotland, and to send him books for himself—books by Calvin +especially, one on Isaiah, and a new revised edition of the “Institutes.” +“I must be bold on your liberality,” he writes, “not only in that, but in +greater things as I shall need.” {391a} On her part she applies to him +for spiritual advice, not after the manner of the drooping Mrs. Bowes, +but in a more positive spirit,—advice as to practical points, advice as +to the Church of England, for instance, whose ritual he condemns as a +“mingle-mangle.” {391b} Just at the end she ceases to write, sends him +“a token, without writing.” “I understand your impediment,” he answers, +“and therefore I cannot complain. Yet if you understood the variety of +my temptations, I doubt not but you would have written somewhat.” {391c} +One letter more, and then silence. + +And I think the best of the Reformer died out with that correspondence. +It is after this, of course, that he wrote that ungenerous description of +his intercourse with Mrs. Bowes. It is after this, also, that we come to +the unlovely episode of his second marriage. He had been left a widower +at the age of fifty-five. Three years after, it occurred apparently to +yet another pious parent to sacrifice a child upon the altar of his +respect for the Reformer. In January 1563, Randolph writes to Cecil: +“Your Honour will take it for a great wonder when I shall write unto you +that Mr. Knox shall marry a very near kinswoman of the Duke’s, a Lord’s +daughter, a young lass not above sixteen years of age.” {392} He adds +that he fears he will be laughed at for reporting so mad a story. And +yet it was true; and on Palm Sunday, 1564, Margaret Stewart, daughter of +Andrew Lord Stewart of Ochiltree, aged seventeen, was duly united to John +Knox, Minister of St. Giles’s Kirk, Edinburgh, aged fifty-nine,—to the +great disgust of Queen Mary from family pride, and I would fain hope of +many others for more humane considerations. “In this,” as Randolph says, +“I wish he had done otherwise.” The Consistory of Geneva, “that most +perfect school of Christ that ever was on earth since the days of the +Apostles,” were wont to forbid marriages on the ground of too great a +disproportion in age. I cannot help wondering whether the old Reformer’s +conscience did not uneasily remind him, now and again, of this good +custom of his religious metropolis, as he thought of the two-and-forty +years that separated him from his poor bride. Fitly enough, we hear +nothing of the second Mrs. Knox until she appears at her husband’s +deathbed, eight years after. She bore him three daughters in the +interval; and I suppose the poor child’s martyrdom was made as easy for +her as might be. She was “extremely attentive to him” at the end, we +read and he seems to have spoken to her with some confidence. Moreover, +and this is very characteristic, he had copied out for her use a little +volume of his own devotional letters to other women. + +This is the end of the roll, unless we add to it Mrs. Adamson, who had +delighted much in his company “by reason that she had a troubled +conscience,” and whose deathbed is commemorated at some length in the +pages of his history. {393} + +And now, looking back, it cannot be said that Knox’s intercourse with +women was quite of the highest sort. It is characteristic that we find +him more alarmed for his own reputation than for the reputation of the +women with whom he was familiar. There was a fatal preponderance of self +in all his intimacies: many women came to learn from him, but he never +condescended to become a learner in his turn. And so there is not +anything idyllic in these intimacies of his; and they were never so +renovating to his spirit as they might have been. But I believe they +were good enough for the women. I fancy the women knew what they were +about when so many of them followed after Knox. It is not simply because +a man is always fully persuaded that he knows the right from the wrong +and sees his way plainly through the maze of life, great qualities as +these are, that people will love and follow him, and write him letters +full of their “earnest desire for him” when he is absent. It is not over +a man, whose one characteristic is grim fixity of purpose, that the +hearts of women are “incensed and kindled with a special care,” as it +were over their natural children. In the strong quiet patience of all +his letters to the weariful Mrs. Bowes, we may perhaps see one cause of +the fascination he possessed for these religious women. Here was one +whom you could besiege all the year round with inconsistent scruples and +complaints; you might write to him on Thursday that you were so elated it +was plain the devil was deceiving you, and again on Friday that you were +so depressed it was plain God had cast you off for ever; and he would +read all this patiently and sympathetically, and give you an answer in +the most reassuring polysyllables, and all divided into heads—who +knows?—like a treatise on divinity. And then, those easy tears of his. +There are some women who like to see men crying; and here was this +great-voiced, bearded man of God, who might be seen beating the solid +pulpit every Sunday, and casting abroad his clamorous denunciations to +the terror of all, and who on the Monday would sit in their parlours by +the hour, and weep with them over their manifold trials and temptations. +Nowadays, he would have to drink a dish of tea with all these penitents. +. . . It sounds a little vulgar, as the past will do, if we look into it +too closely. We could not let these great folk of old into our +drawing-rooms. Queen Elizabeth would positively not be eligible for a +housemaid. The old manners and the old customs go sinking from grade to +grade, until, if some mighty emperor revisited the glimpses of the moon, +he would not find any one of his way of thinking, any one he could strike +hands with and talk to freely and without offence, save perhaps the +porter at the end of the street, or the fellow with his elbows out who +loafs all day before the public-house. So that this little note of +vulgarity is not a thing to be dwelt upon; it is to be put away from us, +as we recall the fashion of these old intimacies; so that we may only +remember Knox as one who was very long-suffering with women, kind to them +in his own way, loving them in his own way—and that not the worst way, if +it was not the best—and once at least, if not twice, moved to his heart +of hearts by a woman, and giving expression to the yearning he had for +her society in words that none of us need be ashamed to borrow. + +And let us bear in mind always that the period I have gone over in this +essay begins when the Reformer was already beyond the middle age, and +already broken in bodily health: it has been the story of an old man’s +friendships. This it is that makes Knox enviable. Unknown until past +forty, he had then before him five-and-thirty years of splendid and +influential life, passed through uncommon hardships to an uncommon degree +of power, lived in his own country as a sort of king, and did what he +would with the sound of his voice out of the pulpit. And besides all +this, such a following of faithful women! One would take the first forty +years gladly, if one could be sure of the last thirty. Most of us, even +if, by reason of great strength and the dignity of gray hairs, we retain +some degree of public respect in the latter days of our existence, will +find a falling away of friends, and a solitude making itself round about +us day by day, until we are left alone with the hired sick-nurse. For +the attraction of a man’s character is apt to be outlived, like the +attraction of his body; and the power to love grows feeble in its turn, +as well as the power to inspire love in others. It is only with a few +rare natures that friendship is added to friendship, love to love, and +the man keeps growing richer in affection—richer, I mean, as a bank may +be said to grow richer, both giving and receiving more—after his head is +white and his back weary, and he prepares to go down into the dust of +death. + + * * * * * + + THE END. + + * * * * * + + _Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, _Edinburgh_. + + * * * * * + + + + +FOOTNOTES + + +{0} _Gaudeamus_: _Carmina vagorum selecta_. Leipsic. Trübner. 1879. + +{27} Prefatory letter to _Peveril of the Peak_. + +{71} For the love affairs see, in particular, Mr. Scott Douglas’s +edition under the different dates. + +{179} Yoshida, when on his way to Nangasaki, met the soldier and talked +with him by the roadside; they then parted, but the soldier was so much +struck by the words he heard, that on Yoshida’s return he sought him out +and declared his intention of devoting his life to the good cause. I +venture, in the absence of the writer, to insert this correction, having +been present when the story was told by Mr. Masaki.—F. J. And I, there +being none to settle the difference, must reproduce both versions.—R. L. +S. + +{185} I understood that the merchant was endeavouring surreptitiously to +obtain for his son instruction to which he was not entitled.—F. J. + +{192} _Etude Biographique sur François Villon_. Paris: H. Menu. + +{195} _Bougeois de Paris_, ed. Panthéon, pp. 688, 689. + +{196} _Bourgeois_, pp. 627, 636, and 725. + +{204} _Chronìque Scandaleuse_, ed. Panthéon, p. 237. + +{210} Monstrelet: _Panthéon Littéraire_, p. 26. + +{220a} _Chron. Scand._ ut supra. + +{220b} Here and there, principally in the order of events, this article +differs from M. Longnon’s own reading of his material. The ground on +which he defers the execution of Montigny and De Cayeux beyond the date +of their trials seems insufficient. There is a law of parsimony for the +construction of historical documents; simplicity is the first duty of +narration; and hanged they were. + +{224} _Chron. Scand._, p. 338. + +{238} Champollion-Figeac’s _Louis et Charles d’Orléans_, p. 348. + +{240a} D’Héricault’s admirable _Memoir_, prefixed to his edition of +Charles’s works, vol. i. p. xi. + +{240b} Vallet de Viriville, _Charles VII. et son Epoque_, ii. 428, note +2. + +{241a} See Lecoy de la Marche, _Le Roi René_, i. 167. + +{241b} Vallet, _Charles VII_, ii. 85, 86, note 2. + +{241c} Champollion-Figeac, 193–198. + +{242a} Champollion-Figeac, 209. + +{242b} The student will see that there are facts cited, and expressions +borrowed, in this paragraph, from a period extending over almost the +whole of Charles’s life, instead of being confined entirely to his +boyhood. As I do not believe there was any change, so I do not believe +there is any anachronism involved. + +{243} _The Debate between the Heralds of France and England_, translated +and admirably edited by Mr. Henry Pyne. For the attribution of this +tract to Charles, the reader is referred to Mr. Pyne’s conclusive +argument. + +{244} Des Ursins. + +{248} Michelet, iv. App. 179, p. 337. + +{249} Champollion-Figeac, pp. 279–82. + +{250} Michelet, iv. pp. 123–4. + +{253} _Debate between the Heralds_. + +{254} Sir H. Nicholas, _Agincourt_. + +{257a} _Debate between the Heralds_. + +{257b} Works (ed. d’Héricault), i. 43. + +{257c} _Ibid._ 143. + +{258a} Works (ed. d’Héricault), i. 190. + +{258b} _Ibid._ 144. + +{258c} _Ibid._ 158. + +{259a} M. Champollion-Figeac gives many in his editions of Charles’s +works, most (as I should think) of very doubtful authenticity, or worse. + +{259b} Rymer, x. 564. D’Héricault’s _Memoir_, p. xli. Gairdner’s +_Paston Letters_, i. 27, 99. + +{260} Champollion-Figeac, 377. + +{262a} Dom Plancher, iv. 178–9. + +{262b} Works, i. 157–63. + +{265a} Vallet’s _Charles VII._, i. 251. + +{265b} _Procès de Jeanne d’Arc_, i. 133–55. + +{267a} Monstrelet. + +{267b} Vallet’s _Charles VII._, iii. chap. i. But see the chronicle +that bears Jaquet’s name: a lean and dreary book. + +{268} Monstrelet. + +{269} D’Héricault’s _Memoir_, xl. xli. Vallet, _Charles VI._, ii. 435. + +{271a} Champollion-Figeac, 368. + +{271b} Works, i. 115. + +{271c} D’Héricault’s _Memoir_, xlv. + +{272} ChampoIlion-Figeac, 381, 361, 381. + +{273} Champollion-Figeac, 359,361. + +{276a} Lecoy de la Marche, _Roi René_, ii. 155, 177. + +{276b} Champollion-Figeac, chaps. v. and vi. + +{276c} _Ibid._ 364; Works, i. 172. + +{276d} Champollion-Figeac, 364: “Jeter de l’argent aux petis enfans qui +estoient au long de Bourbon, pour les faire nonner en l’eau et aller +querre l’argent au fond.” + +{277a} Champollion-Figeac, 387. + +{277b} _Nouvelle Biographie Didot_, art. “Marie de Clèves.” Vallet, +_Charles VII_, iii. 85, note 1. + +{277c} Champollion-Figeac, 383, 384–386. + +{278} Works, ii. 57, 258. + +{329} Gaberel’s _Eglist de Genève_, i. 88. + +{330a} _La Démocratie chez les Prédicateurs de la Ligue_. + +{330b} _Historia affectuum se immiscentium controversiæ de +gynæcocratia_. It is in his collected prefaces, Leipsic, 1683. + +{333a} _Œuvres de d’Aubigné_, i. 449. + +{333b} _Dames Illustres_, pp. 358–360. + +{334} Works of John Knox, iv. 349. + +{341} M‘Crie’s _Life of Knox_, ii. 41. + +{342} Described by Calvin in a letter to Cecil, Knox’s Works, vol. iv. + +{344} It was anonymously published, but no one seems to have been in +doubt about its authorship; he might as well have set his name to it, for +all the good he got by holding it back. + +{345a} Knox’s Works, iv. 358. + +{345b} Strype’s _Aylmer_, p. 16. + +{346a} It may interest the reader to know that these (so says Thomasius) +are the “ipsissima verba Schlusselburgii.” + +{346b} I am indebted for a sight of this book to the kindness of Mr. +David Laing, the editor of Knox’s Works. + +{348} _Social Statics_, p. 64, etc. + +{349} Hallam’s _Const. Hist. of England_, i. 225, note m. + +{352a} Knox to Mrs. Locke, 6th April 1559. Works, vi. 14. + +{352b} Knox to Sir William Cecil, 10th April 1559. Works, ii. 16, or +vi. 15. + +{354} Knox to Queen Elizabeth, July. 20th, 1559. Works, vi. 47, or ii. +26. + +{355} Knox to Queen Elizabeth, August 6th, 1561. Works, vi. 126. + +{357} Knox’s Works, ii. 278–280. + +{359} Calderwood’s _History of the Kirk of Scotland_, edition of the +Wodrow Society, iii. 51–54. + +{360} _Bayle’s Historical Dictionary_, art. Knox, remark G. + +{368} Works, iv. 244. + +{369a} Works, iv. 246. + +{369b} _Ib._ iv. 225. + +{371a} Works, iv. 245. + +{371b} _Ib._ iv. 221. + +{373a} Works, vi. 514. + +{373b} _Ib._ iii. 338. + +{373c} _Ib._ iii. 352, 353. + +{374a} Works, iii. 350. + +{374b} _Ib._ iii. 390, 391. + +{375a} Works, iii. 142. + +{375b} _Ib._ iii. 378. + +{375c} _Ib._ ii. 379. + +{376} Works, iii. 394. + +{377} Works, iii. 376. + +{378} Works, iii. 378. + +{379a} Works, vi. 104. + +{379b} _Ib._ v. 5. + +{379c} _Ib._ vi. 27. + +{379d} _Ib._ ii. 138. + +{380} Mr. Laing’s preface to the sixth volume of Knox’s Works, p. lxii. + +{381} Works. vi. 534. + +{382a} Works, iv. 220. + +{382b} _Ib._ iii. 380. + +{382c} _Ib._ iv. 220. + +{383} Works, iii. 380. + +{384} Works, iv. 238. + +{385} Works, iv. 240. + +{388} Works, vi. 513, 514. + +{390} Works, vi. ii. + +{391a} Works, vi. pp. 21. 101, 108, 130. + +{391b} _Ib._ vi. 83. + +{391c} _Ib._ vi. 129. + +{392} Works, vi. 532. + +{393} Works, i. 246. + + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMILIAR STUDIES OF MEN AND BOOKS*** + + +******* This file should be named 425-0.txt or 425-0.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/4/2/425 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions 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: Familiar Studies of Men and Books + + +Author: Robert Louis Stevenson + + + +Release Date: February 12, 2013 [eBook #425] +[This file was first posted on December 23, 1995] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMILIAR STUDIES OF MEN AND +BOOKS*** +</pre> +<p>Transcribed from the 1896 Chatto & Windus edition by David +Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org</p> +<h1>FAMILIAR STUDIES<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">OF</span><br /> +MEN AND BOOKS</h1> +<p style="text-align: center"><span +class="GutSmall">BY</span></p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">ROBERT LOUIS +STEVENSON</span></p> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/p0b.jpg"> +<img alt= +"Decorative graphic" +title= +"Decorative graphic" +src="images/p0s.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall"><i>ELEVENTH +EDITION</i></span></p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center">London<br /> +CHATTO & WINDUS, PICADILLY<br /> +1896</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center">TO</p> +<p style="text-align: center">THOMAS STEVENSON</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">CIVIL +ENGINEER</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">BY WHOSE DEVICES THE GREAT SEA LIGHTS IN +EVERY QUARTER</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">OF THE WORLD NOW SHINE MORE +BRIGHTLY</span></p> +<p style="text-align: center">THIS VOLUME IS IN LOVE AND +GRATITUDE</p> +<p style="text-align: center">DEDICATED BY HIS SON</p> +<p style="text-align: center">THE AUTHOR</p> +<h2>PREFACE<br /> +BY WAY OF CRITICISM.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">These</span> studies are collected from +the monthly press. One appeared in the <i>New +Quarterly</i>, one in <i>Macmillan’s</i>, and the rest in +the <i>Cornhill Magazine</i>. To the <i>Cornhill</i> I owe +a double debt of thanks; first, that I was received there in the +very best society, and under the eye of the very best of editors; +and second, that the proprietors have allowed me to republish so +considerable an amount of copy.</p> +<p>These nine worthies have been brought together from many +different ages and countries. Not the most erudite of men +could be perfectly prepared to deal with so many and such various +sides of human life and manners. To pass a true judgment +upon Knox and Burns implies a grasp upon the very deepest strain +of thought in Scotland,—a country far more essentially +different from England than many parts of America; for, in a +sense, the first of these men re-created Scotland, and the second +is its most essentially national production. To treat fitly +of Hugo and Villon would involve yet wider knowledge, not only of +a country foreign to the author by race, history, and religion, +but of the growth and liberties of art. Of the two +Americans, Whitman and Thoreau, each is the type of something not +so much realised as widely sought after among the late +generations of their countrymen; and to see them clearly in a +nice relation to the society that brought them forth, an author +would require a large habit of life among modern Americans. +As for Yoshida, I have already disclaimed responsibility; it was +but my hand that held the pen.</p> +<p>In truth, these are but the readings of a literary +vagrant. One book led to another, one study to +another. The first was published with trepidation. +Since no bones were broken, the second was launched with greater +confidence. So, by insensible degrees, a young man of our +generation acquires, in his own eyes, a kind of roving judicial +commission through the ages; and, having once escaped the perils +of the Freemans and the Furnivalls, sets himself up to right the +wrongs of universal history and criticism. Now, it is one +thing to write with enjoyment on a subject while the story is hot +in your mind from recent reading, coloured with recent prejudice; +and it is quite another business to put these writings coldly +forth again in a bound volume. We are most of us attached +to our opinions; that is one of the “natural +affections” of which we hear so much in youth; but few of +us are altogether free from paralysing doubts and scruples. +For my part, I have a small idea of the degree of accuracy +possible to man, and I feel sure these studies teem with +error. One and all were written with genuine interest in +the subject; many, however, have been conceived and finished with +imperfect knowledge; and all have lain, from beginning to end, +under the disadvantages inherent in this style of writing.</p> +<p>Of these disadvantages a word must here be said. The +writer of short studies, having to condense in a few pages the +events of a whole lifetime, and the effect on his own mind of +many various volumes, is bound, above all things, to make that +condensation logical and striking. For the only +justification of his writing at all is that he shall present a +brief, reasoned, and memorable view. By the necessity of +the case, all the more neutral circumstances are omitted from his +narrative; and that of itself, by the negative exaggeration of +which I have spoken in the text, lends to the matter in hand a +certain false and specious glitter. By the necessity of the +case, again, he is forced to view his subject throughout in a +particular illumination, like a studio artifice. Like Hales +with Pepys, he must nearly break his sitter’s neck to get +the proper shadows on the portrait. It is from one side +only that he has time to represent his subject. The side +selected will either be the one most striking to himself, or the +one most obscured by controversy; and in both cases that will be +the one most liable to strained and sophisticated reading. +In a biography, this and that is displayed; the hero is seen at +home, playing the flute; the different tendencies of his work +come, one after another, into notice; and thus something like a +true, general impression of the subject may at last be +struck. But in the short study, the writer, having seized +his “point of view,” must keep his eye steadily to +that. He seeks, perhaps, rather to differentiate than truly +to characterise. The proportions of the sitter must be +sacrificed to the proportions of the portrait; the lights are +heightened, the shadows overcharged; the chosen expression, +continually forced, may degenerate at length into a grimace; and +we have at best something of a caricature, at worst a +calumny. Hence, if they be readable at all, and hang +together by their own ends, the peculiar convincing force of +these brief representations. They take so little a while to +read, and yet in that little while the subject is so repeatedly +introduced in the same light and with the same expression, that, +by sheer force of repetition, that view is imposed upon the +reader. The two English masters of the style, Macaulay and +Carlyle, largely exemplify its dangers. Carlyle, indeed, +had so much more depth and knowledge of the heart, his portraits +of mankind are felt and rendered with so much more poetic +comprehension, and he, like his favourite Ram Dass, had a fire in +his belly so much more hotly burning than the patent reading lamp +by which Macaulay studied, that it seems at first sight hardly +fair to bracket them together. But the “point of +view” was imposed by Carlyle on the men he judged of in his +writings with an austerity not only cruel but almost +stupid. They are too often broken outright on the +Procrustean bed; they are probably always disfigured. The +rhetorical artifice of Macaulay is easily spied; it will take +longer to appreciate the moral bias of Carlyle. So with all +writers who insist on forcing some significance from all that +comes before them; and the writer of short studies is bound, by +the necessity of the case, to write entirely in that +spirit. What he cannot vivify he should omit.</p> +<p>Had it been possible to rewrite some of these papers, I hope I +should have had the courage to attempt it. But it is not +possible. Short studies are, or should be, things woven +like a carpet, from which it is impossible to detach a +strand. What is perverted has its place there for ever, as +a part of the technical means by which what is right has been +presented. It is only possible to write another study, and +then, with a new “point of view,” would follow new +perversions and perhaps a fresh caricature. Hence, it will +be, at least, honest to offer a few grains of salt to be taken +with the text; and as some words of apology, addition, +correction, or amplification fall to be said on almost every +study in the volume, it will be most simple to run them over in +their order. But this must not be taken as a propitiatory +offering to the gods of shipwreck; I trust my cargo unreservedly +to the chances of the sea; and do not, by criticising myself, +seek to disarm the wrath of other and less partial critics.</p> +<p><i>Hugo’s Romances</i>.—This is an instance of the +“point of view.” The five romances studied with +a different purpose might have given different results, even with +a critic so warmly interested in their favour. The great +contemporary master of wordmanship, and indeed of all literary +arts and technicalities, had not unnaturally dazzled a +beginner. But it is best to dwell on merits, for it is +these that are most often overlooked.</p> +<p><i>Burns</i>.—I have left the introductory sentences on +Principal Shairp, partly to explain my own paper, which was +merely supplemental to his amiable but imperfect book, partly +because that book appears to me truly misleading both as to the +character and the genius of Burns. This seems ungracious, +but Mr. Shairp has himself to blame; so good a Wordsworthian was +out of character upon that stage.</p> +<p>This half apology apart, nothing more falls to be said except +upon a remark called forth by my study in the columns of a +literary Review. The exact terms in which that sheet +disposed of Burns I cannot now recall; but they were to this +effect—that Burns was a bad man, the impure vehicle of fine +verses; and that this was the view to which all criticism +tended. Now I knew, for my own part, that it was with the +profoundest pity, but with a growing esteem, that I studied the +man’s desperate efforts to do right; and the more I +reflected, the stranger it appeared to me that any thinking being +should feel otherwise. The complete letters shed, indeed, a +light on the depths to which Burns had sunk in his character of +Don Juan, but they enhance in the same proportion the hopeless +nobility of his marrying Jean. That I ought to have stated +this more noisily I now see; but that any one should fail to see +it for himself, is to me a thing both incomprehensible and worthy +of open scorn. If Burns, on the facts dealt with in this +study, is to be called a bad man, I question very much whether +either I or the writer in the Review have ever encountered what +it would be fair to call a good one. All have some +fault. The fault of each grinds down the hearts of those +about him, and—let us not blink the truth—hurries +both him and them into the grave. And when we find a man +persevering indeed, in his fault, as all of us do, and openly +overtaken, as not all of us are, by its consequences, to gloss +the matter over, with too polite biographers, is to do the work +of the wrecker disfiguring beacons on a perilous seaboard; but to +call him bad, with a self-righteous chuckle, is to be talking in +one’s sleep with Heedless and Too-bold in the arbour.</p> +<p>Yet it is undeniable that much anger and distress is raised in +many quarters by the least attempt to state plainly, what every +one well knows, of Burns’s profligacy, and of the fatal +consequences of his marriage. And for this there are +perhaps two subsidiary reasons. For, first, there is, in +our drunken land, a certain privilege extended to +drunkenness. In Scotland, in particular, it is almost +respectable, above all when compared with any “irregularity +between the sexes.” The selfishness of the one, so +much more gross in essence, is so much less immediately +conspicuous in its results that our demiurgeous Mrs. Grundy +smiles apologetically on its victims. It is often +said—I have heard it with these ears—that drunkenness +“may lead to vice.” Now I did not think it at +all proved that Burns was what is called a drunkard; and I was +obliged to dwell very plainly on the irregularity and the too +frequent vanity and meanness of his relations to women. +Hence, in the eyes of many, my study was a step towards the +demonstration of Burns’s radical badness.</p> +<p>But second, there is a certain class, professors of that low +morality so greatly more distressing than the better sort of +vice, to whom you must never represent an act that was virtuous +in itself, as attended by any other consequences than a large +family and fortune. To hint that Burns’s marriage had +an evil influence is, with this class, to deny the moral +law. Yet such is the fact. It was bravely done; but +he had presumed too far on his strength. One after another +the lights of his life went out, and he fell from circle to +circle to the dishonoured sickbed of the end. And surely +for any one that has a thing to call a soul he shines out tenfold +more nobly in the failure of that frantic effort to do right, +than if he had turned on his heel with Worldly Wiseman, married a +congenial spouse, and lived orderly and died reputably an old +man. It is his chief title that he refrained from +“the wrong that amendeth wrong.” But the +common, trashy mind of our generation is still aghast, like the +Jews of old, at any word of an unsuccessful virtue. Job has +been written and read; the tower of Siloam fell nineteen hundred +years ago; yet we have still to desire a little Christianity, or, +failing that, a little even of that rude, old, Norse nobility of +soul, which saw virtue and vice alike go unrewarded, and was yet +not shaken in its faith.</p> +<p><i>Walt Whitman</i>.—This is a case of a second +difficulty which lies continually before the writer of critical +studies: that he has to mediate between the author whom he loves +and the public who are certainly indifferent and frequently +averse. Many articles had been written on this notable +man. One after another had leaned, in my eyes, either to +praise or blame unduly. In the last case, they helped to +blindfold our fastidious public to an inspiring writer; in the +other, by an excess of unadulterated praise, they moved the more +candid to revolt. I was here on the horns of a dilemma; and +between these horns I squeezed myself with perhaps some loss to +the substance of the paper. Seeing so much in Whitman that +was merely ridiculous, as well as so much more that was +unsurpassed in force and fitness,—seeing the true prophet +doubled, as I thought, in places with the Bull in a China +Shop,—it appeared best to steer a middle course, and to +laugh with the scorners when I thought they had any excuse, while +I made haste to rejoice with the rejoicers over what is +imperishably good, lovely, human, or divine, in his extraordinary +poems. That was perhaps the right road; yet I cannot help +feeling that in this attempt to trim my sails between an author +whom I love and honour and a public too averse to recognise his +merit, I have been led into a tone unbecoming from one of my +stature to one of Whitman’s. But the good and the +great man will go on his way not vexed with my little shafts of +merriment. He, first of any one, will understand how, in +the attempt to explain him credibly to Mrs. Grundy, I have been +led into certain airs of the man of the world, which are merely +ridiculous in me, and were not intentionally discourteous to +himself. But there is a worse side to the question; for in +my eagerness to be all things to all men, I am afraid I may have +sinned against proportion. It will be enough to say here +that Whitman’s faults are few and unimportant when they are +set beside his surprising merits. I had written another +paper full of gratitude for the help that had been given me in my +life, full of enthusiasm for the intrinsic merit of the poems, +and conceived in the noisiest extreme of youthful +eloquence. The present study was a rifacimento. From +it, with the design already mentioned, and in a fit of horror at +my old excess, the big words and emphatic passages were +ruthlessly excised. But this sort of prudence is frequently +its own punishment; along with the exaggeration, some of the +truth is sacrificed; and the result is cold, constrained, and +grudging. In short, I might almost everywhere have spoken +more strongly than I did.</p> +<p><i>Thoreau</i>.—Here is an admirable instance of the +“point of view” forced throughout, and of too earnest +reflection on imperfect facts. Upon me this pure, narrow, +sunnily-ascetic Thoreau had exercised a great charm. I have +scarce written ten sentences since I was introduced to him, but +his influence might be somewhere detected by a close +observer. Still it was as a writer that I had made his +acquaintance; I took him on his own explicit terms; and when I +learned details of his life, they were, by the nature of the case +and my own <i>parti-pris</i>, read even with a certain violence +in terms of his writings. There could scarce be a +perversion more justifiable than that; yet it was still a +perversion. The study indeed, raised so much ire in the +breast of Dr. Japp (H. A. Page), Thoreau’s sincere and +learned disciple, that had either of us been men, I please myself +with thinking, of less temper and justice, the difference might +have made us enemies instead of making us friends. To him +who knew the man from the inside, many of my statements sounded +like inversions made on purpose; and yet when we came to talk of +them together, and he had understood how I was looking at the man +through the books, while he had long since learned to read the +books through the man, I believe he understood the spirit in +which I had been led astray.</p> +<p>On two most important points, Dr. Japp added to my knowledge, +and with the same blow fairly demolished that part of my +criticism. First, if Thoreau were content to dwell by +Walden Pond, it was not merely with designs of self-improvement, +but to serve mankind in the highest sense. Hither came the +fleeing slave; thence was he despatched along the road to +freedom. That shanty in the woods was a station in the +great Underground Railroad; that adroit and philosophic solitary +was an ardent worker, soul and body, in that so much more than +honourable movement, which, if atonement were possible for +nations, should have gone far to wipe away the guilt of +slavery. But in history sin always meets with condign +punishment; the generation passes, the offence remains, and the +innocent must suffer. No underground railroad could atone +for slavery, even as no bills in Parliament can redeem the +ancient wrongs of Ireland. But here at least is a new light +shed on the Walden episode.</p> +<p>Second, it appears, and the point is capital, that Thoreau was +once fairly and manfully in love, and, with perhaps too much +aping of the angel, relinquished the woman to his brother. +Even though the brother were like to die of it, we have not yet +heard the last opinion of the woman. But be that as it may, +we have here the explanation of the “rarefied and freezing +air” in which I complained that he had taught himself to +breathe. Reading the man through the books, I took his +professions in good faith. He made a dupe of me, even as he +was seeking to make a dupe of himself, wresting philosophy to the +needs of his own sorrow. But in the light of this new fact, +those pages, seemingly so cold, are seen to be alive with +feeling. What appeared to be a lack of interest in the +philosopher turns out to have been a touching insincerity of the +man to his own heart; and that fine-spun airy theory of +friendship, so devoid, as I complained, of any quality of flesh +and blood, a mere anodyne to lull his pains. The most +temperate of living critics once marked a passage of my own with +a cross and the words, “This seems nonsense.” +It not only seemed; it was so. It was a private bravado of +my own, which I had so often repeated to keep up my spirits, that +I had grown at last wholly to believe it, and had ended by +setting it down as a contribution to the theory of life. So +with the more icy parts of this philosophy of +Thoreau’s. He was affecting the Spartanism he had +not; and the old sentimental wound still bled afresh, while he +deceived himself with reasons.</p> +<p>Thoreau’s theory, in short, was one thing and himself +another: of the first, the reader will find what I believe to be +a pretty faithful statement and a fairly just criticism in the +study; of the second he will find but a contorted shadow. +So much of the man as fitted nicely with his doctrines, in the +photographer’s phrase, came out. But that large part +which lay outside and beyond, for which he had found or sought no +formula, on which perhaps his philosophy even looked askance, is +wanting in my study, as it was wanting in the guide I +followed. In some ways a less serious writer, in all ways a +nobler man, the true Thoreau still remains to be depicted.</p> +<p><i>Villon</i>.—I am tempted to regret that I ever wrote +on this subject, not merely because the paper strikes me as too +picturesque by half, but because I regarded Villon as a bad +fellow. Others still think well of him, and can find +beautiful and human traits where I saw nothing but artistic evil; +and by the principle of the art, those should have written of the +man, and not I. Where you see no good, silence is the +best. Though this penitence comes too late, it may be well, +at least, to give it expression.</p> +<p>The spirit of Villon is still living in the literature of +France. Fat Peg is oddly of a piece with the work of Zola, +the Goncourts, and the infinitely greater Flaubert; and, while +similar in ugliness, still surpasses them in native power. +The old author, breaking with an <i>éclat de voix</i>, out +of his tongue-tied century, has not yet been touched on his own +ground, and still gives us the most vivid and shocking impression +of reality. Even if that were not worth doing at all, it +would be worth doing as well as he has done it; for the pleasure +we take in the author’s skill repays us, or at least +reconciles us to the baseness of his attitude. Fat Peg +(<i>La Grosse Margot</i>) is typical of much; it is a piece of +experience that has nowhere else been rendered into literature; +and a kind of gratitude for the author’s plainness mingles, +as we read, with the nausea proper to the business. I shall +quote here a verse of an old students’ song, worth laying +side by side with Villon’s startling ballade. This +singer, also, had an unworthy mistress, but he did not choose to +share the wages of dishonour; and it is thus, with both wit and +pathos, that he laments her fall:—</p> +<blockquote><p>Nunc plango florem<br /> + Ætatis teneræ<br /> +Nitidiorem<br /> + Veneris sidere:<br /> +Tunc columbinam<br /> + Mentis dulcedinem,<br /> +Nunc serpentinam<br /> + Amaritudinem.<br /> +Verbo rogantes<br /> + Removes ostio,<br /> +Munera dantes<br /> + Foves cubiculo,<br /> + Illos abire +præcipis<br /> + A quibus nihil +accipis,<br /> + Cæcos +claudosque recipis,<br /> + Viros illustres +decipis<br /> + + +Cum melle venenosa. <a name="citation0"></a><a href="#footnote0" +class="citation">[0]</a></p> +</blockquote> +<p>But our illustrious writer of ballades it was unnecessary to +deceive; it was the flight of beauty alone, not that of honesty +or honour, that he lamented in his song; and the nameless +mediæval vagabond has the best of the comparison.</p> +<p>There is now a Villon Society in England; and Mr. John Payne +has translated him entirely into English, a task of unusual +difficulty. I regret to find that Mr. Payne and I are not +always at one as to the author’s meaning; in such cases I +am bound to suppose that he is in the right, although the +weakness of the flesh withholds me from anything beyond a formal +submission. He is now upon a larger venture, promising us +at last that complete Arabian Nights to which we have all so long +looked forward.</p> +<p><i>Charles of Orleans</i>.—Perhaps I have done scanty +justice to the charm of the old Duke’s verses, and +certainly he is too much treated as a fool. The period is +not sufficiently remembered. What that period was, to what +a blank of imbecility the human mind had fallen, can only be +known to those who have waded in the chronicles. Excepting +Comines and La Salle and Villon, I have read no author who did +not appal me by his torpor; and even the trial of Joan of Arc, +conducted as it was by chosen clerks, bears witness to a dreary, +sterile folly,—a twilight of the mind peopled with childish +phantoms. In relation to his contemporaries, Charles seems +quite a lively character.</p> +<p>It remains for me to acknowledge the kindness of Mr. Henry +Pyne, who, immediately on the appearance of the study, sent me +his edition of the Debate between the Heralds: a courtesy from +the expert to the amateur only too uncommon in these days.</p> +<p><i>Knox</i>.—Knox, the second in order of interest among +the reformers, lies dead and buried in the works of the learned +and unreadable M‘Crie. It remains for some one to +break the tomb and bring him forth, alive again and breathing, in +a human book. With the best intentions in the world, I have +only added two more flagstones, ponderous like their +predecessors, to the mass of obstruction that buries the reformer +from the world; I have touched him in my turn with that +“mace of death,” which Carlyle has attributed to +Dryasdust; and my two dull papers are, in the matter of dulness, +worthy additions to the labours of M‘Crie. Yet I +believe they are worth reprinting in the interest of the next +biographer of Knox. I trust his book may be a masterpiece; +and I indulge the hope that my two studies may lend him a hint or +perhaps spare him a delay in its composition.</p> +<p>Of the <i>Pepys</i> I can say nothing; for it has been too +recently through my hands; and I still retain some of the heat of +composition. Yet it may serve as a text for the last remark +I have to offer. To Pepys I think I have been amply just; +to the others, to Burns, Thoreau, Whitman, Charles of Orleans, +even Villon, I have found myself in the retrospect ever too +grudging of praise, ever too disrespectful in manner. It is +not easy to see why I should have been most liberal to the man of +least pretensions. Perhaps some cowardice withheld me from +the proper warmth of tone; perhaps it is easier to be just to +those nearer us in rank of mind. Such at least is the fact, +which other critics may explain. For these were all men +whom, for one reason or another, I loved; or when I did not love +the men, my love was the greater to their books. I had read +them and lived with them; for months they were continually in my +thoughts; I seemed to rejoice in their joys and to sorrow with +them in their griefs; and behold, when I came to write of them, +my tone was sometimes hardly courteous and seldom wholly +just.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">R. L. S.</p> +<h2>CONTENTS.</h2> +<table> +<tr> +<td><p> </p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">PAGE</span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Victor Hugo’s +Romances</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page1">1</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Some Aspects of Robert +Burns</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page38">38</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Walt Whitman</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page91">91</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Henry David Thoreau: His Character and +Opinions</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page129">129</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Yoshida-Torajiro</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page172">172</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">François Villon, Student, Poet, +and House-breaker</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page192">192</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Charles of Orleans</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page236">236</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">Samuel Pepys</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page290">290</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><span class="smcap">John Knox and Women</span></p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page328">328</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<h2><a name="page1"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 1</span>VICTOR +HUGO’S ROMANCES.</h2> +<blockquote><p>Après le roman pittoresque mais +prosaïque de Walter Scott il restera un autre roman à +créer, plus beau et plus complet encore selon nous. +C’est le roman, à la fois drame et +épopée, pittoresque mais poétique, +réel mais idéal, vrai mais grand, qui +enchâssera Walter Scott dans Homère.—Victor +Hugo on <i>Quentin Durward</i>.</p> +</blockquote> +<p><span class="smcap">Victor Hugo’s</span> romances occupy +an important position in the history of literature; many +innovations, timidly made elsewhere, have in them been carried +boldly out to their last consequences; much that was indefinite +in literary tendencies has attained to definite maturity; many +things have come to a point and been distinguished one from the +other; and it is only in the last romance of all, <i>Quatre Vingt +Treize</i>, that this culmination is most perfect. This is +in the nature of things. Men who are in any way typical of +a stage of progress may be compared more justly to the hand upon +the dial of the clock, which continues to advance as it +indicates, than to the stationary milestone, which is only the +measure of what is past. The movement is not +arrested. That significant something by which the work of +such a man differs from that of his predecessors, goes on +disengaging itself and becoming more and more articulate and +cognisable. The same principle of growth that carried his +first book beyond the books of previous writers, carries his last +book beyond his first. And just as the most imbecile +production of any literary age gives us sometimes the very clue +to comprehension we have sought long and vainly in contemporary +masterpieces, so it may be the very weakest of an author’s +books that, coming in the sequel of many others, enables us at +last to get hold of what underlies the whole of them—of +that spinal marrow of significance that unites the work of his +life into something organic and rational. This is what has +been done by <i>Quatre Vingt Treize</i> for the earlier romances +of Victor Hugo, and, through them, for a whole division of modern +literature. We have here the legitimate continuation of a +long and living literary tradition; and hence, so far, its +explanation. When many lines diverge from each other in +direction so slightly as to confuse the eye, we know that we have +only to produce them to make the chaos plain: this is continually +so in literary history; and we shall best understand the +importance of Victor Hugo’s romances if we think of them as +some such prolongation of one of the main lines of literary +tendency.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p>When we compare the novels of Walter Scott with those of the +man of genius who preceded him, and whom he delighted to honour +as a master in the art—I mean Henry Fielding—we shall +be somewhat puzzled, at the first moment, to state the difference +that there is between these two. Fielding has as much human +science; has a far firmer hold upon the tiller of his story; has +a keen sense of character, which he draws (and Scott often does +so too) in a rather abstract and academical manner; and finally, +is quite as humorous and quite as good-humoured as the great +Scotchman. With all these points of resemblance between the +men, it is astonishing that their work should be so +different. The fact is, that the English novel was looking +one way and seeking one set of effects in the hands of Fielding; +and in the hands of Scott it was looking eagerly in all ways and +searching for all the effects that by any possibility it could +utilise. The difference between these two men marks a great +enfranchisement. With Scott the Romantic movement, the +movement of an extended curiosity and an enfranchised +imagination, has begun. This is a trite thing to say; but +trite things are often very indefinitely comprehended: and this +enfranchisement, in as far as it regards the technical change +that came over modern prose romance, has never perhaps been +explained with any clearness.</p> +<p>To do so, it will be necessary roughly to compare the two sets +of conventions upon which plays and romances are respectively +based. The purposes of these two arts are so much alike, +and they deal so much with the same passions and interests, that +we are apt to forget the fundamental opposition of their +methods. And yet such a fundamental opposition +exists. In the drama the action is developed in great +measure by means of things that remain outside of the art; by +means of real things, that is, and not artistic conventions for +things. This is a sort of realism that is not to be +confounded with that realism in painting of which we hear so +much. The realism in painting is a thing of purposes; this, +that we have to indicate in the drama, is an affair of +method. We have heard a story, indeed, of a painter in +France who, when he wanted to paint a sea-beach, carried realism +from his ends to his means, and plastered real sand upon his +canvas; and that is precisely what is done in the drama. +The dramatic author has to paint his beaches with real sand: real +live men and women move about the stage; we hear real voices; +what is feigned merely puts a sense upon what is; we do actually +see a woman go behind a screen as Lady Teazle, and, after a +certain interval, we do actually see her very shamefully produced +again. Now all these things, that remain as they were in +life, and are not transmuted into any artistic convention, are +terribly stubborn and difficult to deal with; and hence there are +for the dramatist many resultant limitations in time and +space. These limitations in some sort approximate towards +those of painting: the dramatic author is tied down, not indeed +to a moment, but to the duration of each scene or act; he is +confined to the stage, almost as the painter is confined within +his frame. But the great restriction is this, that a +dramatic author must deal with his actors, and with his actors +alone. Certain moments of suspense, certain significant +dispositions of personages, a certain logical growth of emotion, +these are the only means at the disposal of the playwright. +It is true that, with the assistance of the scene-painter, the +costumier and the conductor of the orchestra, he may add to this +something of pageant, something of sound and fury; but these are, +for the dramatic writer, beside the mark, and do not come under +the vivifying touch of his genius. When we turn to romance, +we find this no longer. Here nothing is reproduced to our +senses directly. Not only the main conception of the work, +but the scenery, the appliances, the mechanism by which this +conception is brought home to us, have been put through the +crucible of another man’s mind, and come out again, one and +all, in the form of written words. With the loss of every +degree of such realism as we have described, there is for art a +clear gain of liberty and largeness of competence. Thus, +painting, in which the round outlines of things are thrown on to +a flat board, is far more free than sculpture, in which their +solidity is preserved. It is by giving up these identities +that art gains true strength. And so in the case of novels +as compared with the stage. Continuous narration is the +flat board on to which the novelist throws everything. And +from this there results for him a great loss of vividness, but a +great compensating gain in his power over the subject; so that he +can now subordinate one thing to another in importance, and +introduce all manner of very subtle detail, to a degree that was +before impossible. He can render just as easily the +flourish of trumpets before a victorious emperor and the gossip +of country market women, the gradual decay of forty years of a +man’s life and the gesture of a passionate moment. He +finds himself equally unable, if he looks at it from one point of +view—equally able, if he looks at it from another point of +view—to reproduce a colour, a sound, an outline, a logical +argument, a physical action. He can show his readers, +behind and around the personages that for the moment occupy the +foreground of his story, the continual suggestion of the +landscape; the turn of the weather that will turn with it +men’s lives and fortunes, dimly foreshadowed on the +horizon; the fatality of distant events, the stream of national +tendency, the salient framework of causation. And all this +thrown upon the flat board—all this entering, naturally and +smoothly, into the texture of continuous intelligent +narration.</p> +<p>This touches the difference between Fielding and Scott. +In the work of the latter, true to his character of a modern and +a romantic, we become suddenly conscious of the background. +Fielding, on the other hand, although he had recognised that the +novel was nothing else than an epic in prose, wrote in the spirit +not of the epic, but of the drama. This is not, of course, +to say that the drama was in any way incapable of a regeneration +similar in kind to that of which I am now speaking with regard to +the novel. The notorious contrary fact is sufficient to +guard the reader against such a misconstruction. All that +is meant is, that Fielding remained ignorant of certain +capabilities which the novel possesses over the drama; or, at +least, neglected and did not develop them. To the end he +continued to see things as a playwright sees them. The +world with which he dealt, the world he had realised for himself +and sought to realise and set before his readers, was a world of +exclusively human interest. As for landscape, he was +content to underline stage directions, as it might be done in a +play-book: Tom and Molly retire into a practicable wood. As +for nationality and public sentiment, it is curious enough to +think that Tom Jones is laid in the year forty-five, and that the +only use he makes of the rebellion is to throw a troop of +soldiers into his hero’s way. It is most really +important, however, to remark the change which has been +introduced into the conception of character by the beginning of +the romantic movement and the consequent introduction into +fiction of a vast amount of new material. Fielding tells us +as much as he thought necessary to account for the actions of his +creatures; he thought that each of these actions could be +decomposed on the spot into a few simple personal elements, as we +decompose a force in a question of abstract dynamics. The +larger motives are all unknown to him; he had not understood that +the nature of the landscape or the spirit of the times could be +for anything in a story; and so, naturally and rightly, he said +nothing about them. But Scott’s instinct, the +instinct of the man of an age profoundly different, taught him +otherwise; and, in his work, the individual characters begin to +occupy a comparatively small proportion of that canvas on which +armies manœuvre, and great hills pile themselves upon each +other’s shoulders. Fielding’s characters were +always great to the full stature of a perfectly arbitrary +will. Already in Scott we begin to have a sense of the +subtle influences that moderate and qualify a man’s +personality; that personality is no longer thrown out in +unnatural isolation, but is resumed into its place in the +constitution of things.</p> +<p>It is this change in the manner of regarding men and their +actions first exhibited in romance, that has since renewed and +vivified history. For art precedes philosophy and even +science. People must have noticed things and interested +themselves in them before they begin to debate upon their causes +or influence. And it is in this way that art is the pioneer +of knowledge; those predilections of the artist he knows not why, +those irrational acceptations and recognitions, reclaim, out of +the world that we have not yet realised, ever another and another +corner; and after the facts have been thus vividly brought before +us and have had time to settle and arrange themselves in our +minds, some day there will be found the man of science to stand +up and give the explanation. Scott took an interest in many +things in which Fielding took none; and for this reason, and no +other, he introduced them into his romances. If he had been +told what would be the nature of the movement that he was so +lightly initiating, he would have been very incredulous and not a +little scandalised. At the time when he wrote, the real +drift of this new manner of pleasing people in fiction was not +yet apparent; and, even now, it is only by looking at the +romances of Victor Hugo that we are enabled to form any proper +judgment in the matter. These books are not only descended +by ordinary generation from the Waverley novels, but it is in +them chiefly that we shall find the revolutionary tradition of +Scott carried farther that we shall find Scott himself, in so far +as regards his conception of prose fiction and its purposes, +surpassed in his own spirit, instead of tamely followed. We +have here, as I said before, a line of literary tendency +produced, and by this production definitely separated from +others. When we come to Hugo, we see that the deviation, +which seemed slight enough and not very serious between Scott and +Fielding, is indeed such a great gulph in thought and sentiment +as only successive generations can pass over: and it is but +natural that one of the chief advances that Hugo has made upon +Scott is an advance in self-consciousness. Both men follow +the same road; but where the one went blindly and carelessly, the +other advances with all deliberation and forethought. There +never was artist much more unconscious than Scott; and there have +been not many more conscious than Hugo. The passage at the +head of these pages shows how organically he had understood the +nature of his own changes. He has, underlying each of the +five great romances (which alone I purpose here to examine), two +deliberate designs: one artistic, the other consciously ethical +and intellectual. This is a man living in a different world +from Scott, who professes sturdily (in one of his introductions) +that he does not believe in novels having any moral influence at +all; but still Hugo is too much of an artist to let himself be +hampered by his dogmas; and the truth is that the artistic result +seems, in at least one great instance, to have very little +connection with the other, or directly ethical result.</p> +<p>The artistic result of a romance, what is left upon the memory +by any really powerful and artistic novel, is something so +complicated and refined that it is difficult to put a name upon +it and yet something as simple as nature. These two +propositions may seem mutually destructive, but they are so only +in appearance. The fact is that art is working far ahead of +language as well as of science, realising for us, by all manner +of suggestions and exaggerations, effects for which as yet we +have no direct name; nay, for which we may never perhaps have a +direct name, for the reason that these effects do not enter very +largely into the necessities of life. Hence alone is that +suspicion of vagueness that often hangs about the purpose of a +romance: it is clear enough to us in thought; but we are not used +to consider anything clear until we are able to formulate it in +words, and analytical language has not been sufficiently shaped +to that end. We all know this difficulty in the case of a +picture, simple and strong as may be the impression that it has +left with us; and it is only because language is the medium of +romance, that we are prevented from seeing that the two cases are +the same. It is not that there is anything blurred or +indefinite in the impression left with us, it is just because the +impression is so very definite after its own kind, that we find +it hard to fit it exactly with the expressions of our +philosophical speech.</p> +<p>It is this idea which underlies and issues from a romance, +this something which it is the function of that form of art to +create, this epical value, that I propose chiefly to seek and, as +far as may be, to throw into relief, in the present study. +It is thus, I believe, that we shall see most clearly the great +stride that Hugo has taken beyond his predecessors, and how, no +longer content with expressing more or less abstract relations of +man to man, he has set before himself the task of realising, in +the language of romance, much of the involution of our +complicated lives.</p> +<p>This epical value is not to be found, let it be understood, in +every so-called novel. The great majority are not works of +art in anything but a very secondary signification. One +might almost number on one’s fingers the works in which +such a supreme artistic intention has been in any way superior to +the other and lesser aims, themselves more or less artistic, that +generally go hand in hand with it in the conception of prose +romance. The purely critical spirit is, in most novels, +paramount. At the present moment we can recall one man +only, for whose works it would have been equally possible to +accomplish our present design: and that man is Hawthorne. +There is a unity, an unwavering creative purpose, about some at +least of Hawthorne’s romances, that impresses itself on the +most indifferent reader; and the very restrictions and weaknesses +of the man served perhaps to strengthen the vivid and single +impression of his works. There is nothing of this kind in +Hugo: unity, if he attains to it, is indeed unity out of +multitude; and it is the wonderful power of subordination and +synthesis thus displayed, that gives us the measure of his +talent. No amount of mere discussion and statement, such as +this, could give a just conception of the greatness of this +power. It must be felt in the books themselves, and all +that can be done in the present essay is to recall to the reader +the more general features of each of the five great romances, +hurriedly and imperfectly, as space will permit, and rather as a +suggestion than anything more complete.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p>The moral end that the author had before him in the conception +of <i>Notre Dame de Paris</i> was (he tells us) to +“denounce” the external fatality that hangs over men +in the form of foolish and inflexible superstition. To +speak plainly, this moral purpose seems to have mighty little to +do with the artistic conception; moreover it is very questionably +handled, while the artistic conception is developed with the most +consummate success. Old Paris lives for us with newness of +life: we have ever before our eyes the city cut into three by the +two arms of the river, the boat-shaped island +“moored” by five bridges to the different shores, and +the two unequal towns on either hand. We forget all that +enumeration of palaces and churches and convents which occupies +so many pages of admirable description, and the thoughtless +reader might be inclined to conclude from this, that they were +pages thrown away; but this is not so: we forget, indeed, the +details, as we forget or do not see the different layers of paint +on a completed picture; but the thing desired has been +accomplished, and we carry away with us a sense of the +“Gothic profile” of the city, of the +“surprising forest of pinnacles and towers and +belfries,” and we know not what of rich and intricate and +quaint. And throughout, Notre Dame has been held up over +Paris by a height far greater than that of its twin towers: the +Cathedral is present to us from the first page to the last; the +title has given us the clue, and already in the Palace of Justice +the story begins to attach itself to that central building by +character after character. It is purely an effect of +mirage; Notre Dame does not, in reality, thus dominate and stand +out above the city; and any one who should visit it, in the +spirit of the Scott-tourists to Edinburgh or the Trossachs, would +be almost offended at finding nothing more than this old church +thrust away into a corner. It is purely an effect of +mirage, as we say; but it is an effect that permeates and +possesses the whole book with astonishing consistency and +strength. And then, Hugo has peopled this Gothic city, and, +above all, this Gothic church, with a race of men even more +distinctly Gothic than their surroundings. We know this +generation already: we have seen them clustered about the worn +capitals of pillars, or craning forth over the church-leads with +the open mouths of gargoyles. About them all there is that +sort of stiff quaint unreality, that conjunction of the +grotesque, and even of a certain bourgeois snugness, with +passionate contortion and horror, that is so characteristic of +Gothic art. Esmeralda is somewhat an exception; she and the +goat traverse the story like two children who have wandered in a +dream. The finest moment of the book is when these two +share with the two other leading characters, Dom Claude and +Quasimodo, the chill shelter of the old cathedral. It is +here that we touch most intimately the generative artistic idea +of the romance: are they not all four taken out of some quaint +moulding, illustrative of the Beatitudes, or the Ten +Commandments, or the seven deadly sins? What is Quasimodo +but an animated gargoyle? What is the whole book but the +reanimation of Gothic art?</p> +<p>It is curious that in this, the earliest of the five great +romances, there should be so little of that extravagance that +latterly we have come almost to identify with the author’s +manner. Yet even here we are distressed by words, thoughts, +and incidents that defy belief and alienate the sympathies. +The scene of the <i>in pace</i>, for example, in spite of its +strength, verges dangerously on the province of the penny +novelist. I do not believe that Quasimodo rode upon the +bell; I should as soon imagine that he swung by the +clapper. And again the following two sentences, out of an +otherwise admirable chapter, surely surpass what it has ever +entered into the heart of any other man to imagine (vol. ii. p. +180): “Il souffrait tant que par instants il +s’arrachait des poignées de cheveux, <i>pour voir +s’ils ne blanchissaient pas</i>.” And, p. 181: +“Ses pensées étaient si insupportables +qu’il prenait sa tête à deux mains et +tâchait de l’arracher de ses épaules <i>pour +la briser sur le pavé</i>.”</p> +<p>One other fault, before we pass on. In spite of the +horror and misery that pervade all of his later work, there is in +it much less of actual melodrama than here, and rarely, I should +say never, that sort of brutality, that useless insufferable +violence to the feelings, which is the last distinction between +melodrama and true tragedy. Now, in <i>Notre Dame</i>, the +whole story of Esmeralda’s passion for the worthless archer +is unpleasant enough; but when she betrays herself in her last +hiding-place, herself and her wretched mother, by calling out to +this sordid hero who has long since forgotten her—well, +that is just one of those things that readers will not forgive; +they do not like it, and they are quite right; life is hard +enough for poor mortals, without having it indefinitely +embittered for them by bad art.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p>We look in vain for any similar blemish in <i>Les +Misérables</i>. Here, on the other hand, there is +perhaps the nearest approach to literary restraint that Hugo has +ever made: there is here certainly the ripest and most easy +development of his powers. It is the moral intention of +this great novel to awaken us a little, if it may be—for +such awakenings are unpleasant—to the great cost of this +society that we enjoy and profit by, to the labour and sweat of +those who support the litter, civilisation, in which we ourselves +are so smoothly carried forward. People are all glad to +shut their eyes; and it gives them a very simple pleasure when +they can forget that our laws commit a million individual +injustices, to be once roughly just in the general; that the +bread that we eat, and the quiet of the family, and all that +embellishes life and makes it worth having, have to be purchased +by death—by the deaths of animals, and the deaths of men +wearied out with labour, and the deaths of those criminals called +tyrants and revolutionaries, and the deaths of those +revolutionaries called criminals. It is to something of all +this that Victor Hugo wishes to open men’s eyes in <i>Les +Misérables</i>; and this moral lesson is worked out in +masterly coincidence with the artistic effect. The deadly +weight of civilisation to those who are below presses sensibly on +our shoulders as we read. A sort of mocking indignation +grows upon us as we find Society rejecting, again and again, the +services of the most serviceable; setting Jean Valjean to pick +oakum, casting Galileo into prison, even crucifying Christ. +There is a haunting and horrible sense of insecurity about the +book. The terror we thus feel is a terror for the machinery +of law, that we can hear tearing, in the dark, good and bad +between its formidable wheels with the iron stolidity of all +machinery, human or divine. This terror incarnates itself +sometimes and leaps horribly out upon us; as when the crouching +mendicant looks up, and Jean Valjean, in the light of the street +lamp, recognises the face of the detective; as when the lantern +of the patrol flashes suddenly through the darkness of the sewer; +or as when the fugitive comes forth at last at evening, by the +quiet riverside, and finds the police there also, waiting +stolidly for vice and stolidly satisfied to take virtue +instead. The whole book is full of oppression, and full of +prejudice, which is the great cause of oppression. We have +the prejudices of M. Gillenormand, the prejudices of Marius, the +prejudices in revolt that defend the barricade, and the throned +prejudices that carry it by storm. And then we have the +admirable but ill-written character of Javert, the man who had +made a religion of the police, and would not survive the moment +when he learned that there was another truth outside the truth of +laws; a just creation, over which the reader will do well to +ponder.</p> +<p>With so gloomy a design this great work is still full of life +and light and love. The portrait of the good Bishop is one +of the most agreeable things in modern literature. The +whole scene at Montfermeil is full of the charm that Hugo knows +so well how to throw about children. Who can forget the +passage where Cosette, sent out at night to draw water, stands in +admiration before the illuminated booth, and the huckster behind +“lui faisait un peu l’effet d’être le +Père éternel?” The pathos of the +forlorn sabot laid trustingly by the chimney in expectation of +the Santa Claus that was not, takes us fairly by the throat; +there is nothing in Shakespeare that touches the heart more +nearly. The loves of Cosette and Marius are very pure and +pleasant, and we cannot refuse our affection to Gavroche, +although we may make a mental reservation of our profound +disbelief in his existence. Take it for all in all, there +are few books in the world that can be compared with it. +There is as much calm and serenity as Hugo has ever attained to; +the melodramatic coarsenesses that disfigured <i>Notre Dame</i> +are no longer present. There is certainly much that is +painfully improbable; and again, the story itself is a little too +well constructed; it produces on us the effect of a puzzle, and +we grow incredulous as we find that every character fits again +and again into the plot, and is, like the child’s cube, +serviceable on six faces; things are not so well arranged in life +as all that comes to. Some of the digressions, also, seem +out of place, and do nothing but interrupt and irritate. +But when all is said, the book remains of masterly conception and +of masterly development, full of pathos, full of truth, full of a +high eloquence.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p>Superstition and social exigency having been thus dealt with +in the first two members of the series, it remained for <i>Les +Travailleurs de la Mer</i> to show man hand to hand with the +elements, the last form of external force that is brought against +him. And here once more the artistic effect and the moral +lesson are worked out together, and are, indeed, one. +Gilliat, alone upon the reef at his herculean task, offers a type +of human industry in the midst of the vague “diffusion of +forces into the illimitable,” and the visionary development +of “wasted labour” in the sea, and the winds, and the +clouds. No character was ever thrown into such strange +relief as Gilliat. The great circle of sea-birds that come +wanderingly around him on the night of his arrival, strikes at +once the note of his pre-eminence and isolation. He fills +the whole reef with his indefatigable toil; this solitary spot in +the ocean rings with the clamour of his anvil; we see him as he +comes and goes, thrown out sharply against the clear background +of the sea. And yet his isolation is not to be compared +with the isolation of Robinson Crusoe, for example; indeed, no +two books could be more instructive to set side by side than +<i>Les Travailleurs</i> and this other of the old days before art +had learnt to occupy itself with what lies outside of human +will. Crusoe was one sole centre of interest in the midst +of a nature utterly dead and utterly unrealised by the artist; +but this is not how we feel with Gilliat; we feel that he is +opposed by a “dark coalition of forces,” that an +“immense animosity” surrounds him; we are the +witnesses of the terrible warfare that he wages with “the +silent inclemency of phenomena going their own way, and the great +general law, implacable and passive:” “a conspiracy +of the indifferency of things” is against him. There +is not one interest on the reef, but two. Just as we +recognise Gilliat for the hero, we recognise, as implied by this +indifferency of things, this direction of forces to some purpose +outside our purposes, yet another character who may almost take +rank as the villain of the novel, and the two face up to one +another blow for blow, feint for feint, until, in the storm, they +fight it epically out, and Gilliat remains the victor;—a +victor, however, who has still to encounter the octopus. I +need say nothing of the gruesome, repulsive excellence of that +famous scene; it will be enough to remind the reader that Gilliat +is in pursuit of a crab when he is himself assaulted by the devil +fish, and that this, in its way, is the last touch to the inner +significance of the book; here, indeed, is the true position of +man in the universe.</p> +<p>But in <i>Les Travailleurs</i>, with all its strength, with +all its eloquence, with all the beauty and fitness of its main +situations, we cannot conceal from ourselves that there is a +thread of something that will not bear calm scrutiny. There +is much that is disquieting about the storm, admirably as it +begins. I am very doubtful whether it would be possible to +keep the boat from foundering in such circumstances, by any +amount of breakwater and broken rock. I do not understand +the way in which the waves are spoken of, and prefer just to take +it as a loose way of speaking, and pass on. And lastly, how +does it happen that the sea was quite calm next day? Is +this great hurricane a piece of scene-painting after all? +And when we have forgiven Gilliat’s prodigies of strength +(although, in soberness, he reminds us more of Porthos in the +Vicomte de Bragelonne than is quite desirable), what is to be +said to his suicide, and how are we to condemn in adequate terms +that unprincipled avidity after effect, which tells us that the +sloop disappeared over the horizon, and the head under the water, +at one and the same moment? Monsieur Hugo may say what he +will, but we know better; we know very well that they did not; a +thing like that raises up a despairing spirit of opposition in a +man’s readers; they give him the lie fiercely, as they +read. Lastly, we have here already some beginning of that +curious series of English blunders, that makes us wonder if there +are neither proof-sheets nor judicious friends in the whole of +France, and affects us sometimes with a sickening uneasiness as +to what may be our own exploits when we touch upon foreign +countries and foreign tongues. It is here that we shall +find the famous “first of the fourth,” and many +English words that may be comprehensible perhaps in Paris. +It is here that we learn that “laird” in Scotland is +the same title as “lord” in England. Here, +also, is an account of a Highland soldier’s equipment, +which we recommend to the lovers of genuine fun.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p>In<i> L’Homme qui Rit</i>, it was Hugo’s object to +‘denounce’ (as he would say himself) the aristocratic +principle as it was exhibited in England; and this purpose, +somewhat more unmitigatedly satiric than that of the two last, +must answer for much that is unpleasant in the book. The +repulsiveness of the scheme of the story, and the manner in which +it is bound up with impossibilities and absurdities, discourage +the reader at the outset, and it needs an effort to take it as +seriously as it deserves. And yet when we judge it +deliberately, it will be seen that, here again, the story is +admirably adapted to the moral. The constructive ingenuity +exhibited throughout is almost morbid. Nothing could be +more happily imagined, as a <i>reductio ad absurdum</i> of the +aristocratic principle, than the adventures of Gwynplaine, the +itinerant mountebank, snatched suddenly out of his little way of +life, and installed without preparation as one of the hereditary +legislators of a great country. It is with a very bitter +irony that the paper, on which all this depends, is left to float +for years at the will of wind and tide. What, again, can be +finer in conception than that voice from the people heard +suddenly in the House of Lords, in solemn arraignment of the +pleasures and privileges of its splendid occupants? The +horrible laughter, stamped for ever “by order of the +king” upon the face of this strange spokesman of democracy, +adds yet another feature of justice to the scene; in all time, +travesty has been the argument of oppression; and, in all time, +the oppressed might have made this answer: “If I am vile, +is it not your system that has made me so?” This +ghastly laughter gives occasion, moreover, for the one strain of +tenderness running through the web of this unpleasant story: the +love of the blind girl Dea, for the monster. It is a most +benignant providence that thus harmoniously brings together these +two misfortunes; it is one of those compensations, one of those +afterthoughts of a relenting destiny, that reconcile us from time +to time to the evil that is in the world; the atmosphere of the +book is purified by the presence of this pathetic love; it seems +to be above the story somehow, and not of it, as the full moon +over the night of some foul and feverish city.</p> +<p>There is here a quality in the narration more intimate and +particular than is general with Hugo; but it must be owned, on +the other hand, that the book is wordy, and even, now and then, a +little wearisome. Ursus and his wolf are pleasant enough +companions; but the former is nearly as much an abstract type as +the latter. There is a beginning, also, of an abuse of +conventional conversation, such as may be quite pardonable in the +drama where needs must, but is without excuse in the +romance. Lastly, I suppose one must say a word or two about +the weak points of this not immaculate novel; and if so, it will +be best to distinguish at once. The large family of English +blunders, to which we have alluded already in speaking of <i>Les +Travailleurs</i>, are of a sort that is really indifferent in +art. If Shakespeare makes his ships cast anchor by some +seaport of Bohemia, if Hugo imagines Tom-Tim-Jack to be a likely +nickname for an English sailor, or if either Shakespeare, or +Hugo, or Scott, for that matter, be guilty of “figments +enough to confuse the march of a whole history—anachronisms +enough to overset all, chronology,” <a +name="citation27"></a><a href="#footnote27" +class="citation">[27]</a> the life of their creations, the +artistic truth and accuracy of their work, is not so much as +compromised. But when we come upon a passage like the +sinking of the “Ourque” in this romance, we can do +nothing but cover our face with our hands: the conscientious +reader feels a sort of disgrace in the very reading. For +such artistic falsehoods, springing from what I have called +already an unprincipled avidity after effect, no amount of blame +can be exaggerated; and above all, when the criminal is such a +man as Victor Hugo. We cannot forgive in him what we might +have passed over in a third-rate sensation novelist. Little +as he seems to know of the sea and nautical affairs, he must have +known very well that vessels do not go down as he makes the +“Ourque” go down; he must have known that such a +liberty with fact was against the laws of the game, and +incompatible with all appearance of sincerity in conception or +workmanship.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p>In each of these books, one after another, there has been some +departure from the traditional canons of romance; but taking each +separately, one would have feared to make too much of these +departures, or to found any theory upon what was perhaps purely +accidental. The appearance of <i>Quatre Vingt Treize</i> +has put us out of the region of such doubt. Like a doctor +who has long been hesitating how to classify an epidemic malady, +we have come at last upon a case so well marked that our +uncertainty is at an end. It is a novel built upon “a +sort of enigma,” which was at that date laid before +revolutionary France, and which is presented by Hugo to +Tellmarch, to Lantenac, to Gauvain, and very terribly to +Cimourdain, each of whom gives his own solution of the question, +clement or stern, according to the temper of his spirit. +That enigma was this: “Can a good action be a bad +action? Does not he who spares the wolf kill the +sheep?” This question, as I say, meets with one +answer after another during the course of the book, and yet seems +to remain undecided to the end. And something in the same +way, although one character, or one set of characters, after +another comes to the front and occupies our attention for the +moment, we never identify our interest with any of these +temporary heroes nor regret them after they are withdrawn. +We soon come to regard them somewhat as special cases of a +general law; what we really care for is something that they only +imply and body forth to us. We know how history continues +through century after century; how this king or that patriot +disappears from its pages with his whole generation, and yet we +do not cease to read, nor do we even feel as if we had reached +any legitimate conclusion, because our interest is not in the +men, but in the country that they loved or hated, benefited or +injured. And so it is here: Gauvain and Cimourdain pass +away, and we regard them no more than the lost armies of which we +find the cold statistics in military annals; what we regard is +what remains behind; it is the principle that put these men where +they were, that filled them for a while with heroic inspiration, +and has the power, now that they are fallen, to inspire others +with the same courage. The interest of the novel centres +about revolutionary France: just as the plot is an abstract +judicial difficulty, the hero is an abstract historical +force. And this has been done, not, as it would have been +before, by the cold and cumbersome machinery of allegory, but +with bold, straightforward realism, dealing only with the +objective materials of art, and dealing with them so masterfully +that the palest abstractions of thought come before us, and move +our hopes and fears, as if they were the young men and maidens of +customary romance.</p> +<p>The episode of the mother and children in <i>Quatre Vingt +Treize</i> is equal to anything that Hugo has ever written. +There is one chapter in the second volume, for instance, called +“<i>Sein guéri</i>, <i>cœur +saignant</i>,” that is full of the very stuff of true +tragedy, and nothing could be more delightful than the humours of +the three children on the day before the assault. The +passage on La Vendée is really great, and the scenes in +Paris have much of the same broad merit. The book is full, +as usual, of pregnant and splendid sayings. But when thus +much is conceded by way of praise, we come to the other scale of +the balance, and find this, also, somewhat heavy. There is +here a yet greater over-employment of conventional dialogue than +in <i>L’Homme qui Rit</i>; and much that should have been +said by the author himself, if it were to be said at all, he has +most unwarrantably put into the mouths of one or other of his +characters. We should like to know what becomes of the main +body of the troop in the wood of La Saudraie during the thirty +pages or so in which the foreguard lays aside all discipline, and +stops to gossip over a woman and some children. We have an +unpleasant idea forced upon us at one place, in spite of all the +good-natured incredulity that we can summon up to resist +it. Is it possible that Monsieur Hugo thinks they ceased to +steer the corvette while the gun was loose? Of the chapter +in which Lantenac and Halmalho are alone together in the boat, +the less said the better; of course, if there were nothing else, +they would have been swamped thirty times over during the course +of Lantenac’s harangue. Again, after Lantenac has +landed, we have scenes of almost inimitable workmanship that +suggest the epithet “statuesque” by their clear and +trenchant outline; but the tocsin scene will not do, and the +tocsin unfortunately pervades the whole passage, ringing +continually in our ears with a taunting accusation of +falsehood. And then, when we come to the place where +Lantenac meets the royalists, under the idea that he is going to +meet the republicans, it seems as if there were a hitch in the +stage mechanism. I have tried it over in every way, and I +cannot conceive any disposition that would make the scene +possible as narrated.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p>Such then, with their faults and their signal excellences, are +the five great novels.</p> +<p>Romance is a language in which many persons learn to speak +with a certain appearance of fluency; but there are few who can +ever bend it to any practical need, few who can ever be said to +express themselves in it. It has become abundantly plain in +the foregoing examination that Victor Hugo occupies a high place +among those few. He has always a perfect command over his +stories; and we see that they are constructed with a high regard +to some ulterior purpose, and that every situation is informed +with moral significance and grandeur. Of no other man can +the same thing be said in the same degree. His romances are +not to be confused with “the novel with a purpose” as +familiar to the English reader: this is generally the model of +incompetence; and we see the moral clumsily forced into every +hole and corner of the story, or thrown externally over it like a +carpet over a railing. Now the moral significance, with +Hugo, is of the essence of the romance; it is the organising +principle. If you could somehow despoil <i>Les +Misérables or Les Travailleurs</i> of their distinctive +lesson, you would find that the story had lost its interest and +the book was dead.</p> +<p>Having thus learned to subordinate his story to an idea, to +make his art speak, he went on to teach it to say things +heretofore unaccustomed. If you look back at the five books +of which we have now so hastily spoken, you will be astonished at +the freedom with which the original purposes of story-telling +have been laid aside and passed by. Where are now the two +lovers who descended the main watershed of all the Waverley +novels, and all the novels that have tried to follow in their +wake? Sometimes they are almost lost sight of before the +solemn isolation of a man against the sea and sky, as in <i>Les +Travailleurs</i>; sometimes, as in <i>Les Misérables</i>, +they merely figure for awhile, as a beautiful episode in the epic +of oppression; sometimes they are entirely absent, as in +<i>Quatre Vingt Treize</i>. There is no hero in <i>Notre +Dame</i>: in <i>Les Misérables</i> it is an old man: in +<i>L’Homme qui Rit</i> it is a monster: in <i>Quatre Vingt +Treize</i> it is the Revolution. Those elements that only +began to show themselves timidly, as adjuncts, in the novels of +Walter Scott, have usurped ever more and more of the canvas; +until we find the whole interest of one of Hugo’s romances +centring around matter that Fielding would have banished from his +altogether, as being out of the field of fiction. So we +have elemental forces occupying nearly as large a place, playing +(so to speak) nearly as important a <i>rôle</i>, as the +man, Gilliat, who opposes and overcomes them. So we find +the fortunes of a nation put upon the stage with as much +vividness as ever before the fortunes of a village maiden or a +lost heir; and the forces that oppose and corrupt a principle +holding the attention quite as strongly as the wicked barons or +dishonest attorneys of the past. Hence those individual +interests that were supreme in Fielding, and even in Scott, stood +out over everything else and formed as it were the spine of the +story, figure here only as one set of interests among many sets, +one force among many forces, one thing to be treated out of a +whole world of things equally vivid and important. So that, +for Hugo, man is no longer an isolated spirit without antecedent +or relation here below, but a being involved in the action and +reaction of natural forces, himself a centre of such action and +reaction or an unit in a great multitude, chased hither and +thither by epidemic terrors and aspirations, and, in all +seriousness, blown about by every wind of doctrine. This is +a long way that we have travelled: between such work and the work +of Fielding is there not, indeed, a great gulph in thought and +sentiment?</p> +<p>Art, thus conceived, realises for men a larger portion of +life, and that portion one that it is more difficult for them to +realise unaided; and, besides helping them to feel more intensely +those restricted personal interests which are patent to all, it +awakes in them some consciousness of those more general relations +that are so strangely invisible to the average man in ordinary +moods. It helps to keep man in his place in nature, and, +above all, it helps him to understand more intelligently the +responsibilities of his place in society. And in all this +generalisation of interest, we never miss those small humanities +that are at the opposite pole of excellence in art; and while we +admire the intellect that could see life thus largely, we are +touched with another sentiment for the tender heart that slipped +the piece of gold into Cosette’s sabot, that was virginally +troubled at the fluttering of her dress in the spring wind, or +put the blind girl beside the deformity of the laughing +man. This, then, is the last praise that we can award to +these romances. The author has shown a power of just +subordination hitherto unequalled; and as, in reaching forward to +one class of effects, he has not been forgetful or careless of +the other, his work is more nearly complete work, and his art, +with all its imperfections, deals more comprehensively with the +materials of life than that of any of his otherwise more sure and +masterly predecessors.</p> +<p>These five books would have made a very great fame for any +writer, and yet they are but one façade of the monument +that Victor Hugo has erected to his genius. Everywhere we +find somewhat the same greatness, somewhat the same +infirmities. In his poems and plays there are the same +unaccountable protervities that have already astonished us in the +romances. There, too, is the same feverish strength, +welding the fiery iron of his idea under forge-hammer +repetitions—an emphasis that is somehow akin to +weaknesses—strength that is a little epileptic. He +stands so far above all his contemporaries, and so incomparably +excels them in richness, breadth, variety, and moral earnestness, +that we almost feel as if he had a sort of right to fall oftener +and more heavily than others; but this does not reconcile us to +seeing him profit by the privilege so freely. We like to +have, in our great men, something that is above question; we like +to place an implicit faith in them, and see them always on the +platform of their greatness; and this, unhappily, cannot be with +Hugo. As Heine said long ago, his is a genius somewhat +deformed; but, deformed as it is, we accept it gladly; we shall +have the wisdom to see where his foot slips, but we shall have +the justice also to recognise in him one of the greatest artists +of our generation, and, in many ways, one of the greatest artists +of time. If we look back, yet once, upon these five +romances, we see blemishes such as we can lay to the charge of no +other man in the number of the famous; but to what other man can +we attribute such sweeping innovations, such a new and +significant presentment of the life of man, such an amount, if we +merely think of the amount, of equally consummate +performance?</p> +<h2><a name="page38"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 38</span>SOME +ASPECTS OF ROBERT BURNS</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">To</span> write with authority about +another man, we must have fellow-feeling and some common ground +of experience with our subject. We may praise or blame +according as we find him related to us by the best or worst in +ourselves; but it is only in virtue of some relationship that we +can be his judges, even to condemn. Feelings which we share +and understand enter for us into the tissue of the man’s +character; those to which we are strangers in our own experience +we are inclined to regard as blots, exceptions, inconsistencies, +and excursions of the diabolic; we conceive them with repugnance, +explain them with difficulty, and raise our hands to heaven in +wonder when we find them in conjunction with talents that we +respect or virtues that we admire. David, king of Israel, +would pass a sounder judgment on a man than either Nathaniel or +David Hume. Now, Principal Shairp’s recent volume, +although I believe no one will read it without respect and +interest, has this one capital defect—that there is +imperfect sympathy between the author and the subject, between +the critic and the personality under criticism. Hence an +inorganic, if not an incoherent, presentation of both the poems +and the man. Of <i>Holy Willie’s Prayer</i>, +Principal Shairp remarks that “those who have loved most +what was best in Burns’s poetry must have regretted that it +was ever written.” To the <i>Jolly Beggars</i>, so +far as my memory serves me, he refers but once; and then only to +remark on the “strange, not to say painful,” +circumstance that the same hand which wrote the <i>Cotter’s +Saturday Night</i> should have stooped to write the <i>Jolly +Beggars</i>. The <i>Saturday Night</i> may or may not be an +admirable poem; but its significance is trebled, and the power +and range of the poet first appears, when it is set beside the +<i>Jolly Beggars</i>. To take a man’s work piecemeal, +except with the design of elegant extracts, is the way to avoid, +and not to perform, the critic’s duty. The same +defect is displayed in the treatment of Burns as a man, which is +broken, apologetical, and confused. The man here presented +to us is not that Burns, <i>teres atque rotundus</i>—a +burly figure in literature, as, from our present vantage of time, +we have begun to see him. This, on the other hand, is Burns +as he may have appeared to a contemporary clergyman, whom we +shall conceive to have been a kind and indulgent but orderly and +orthodox person, anxious to be pleased, but too often hurt and +disappointed by the behaviour of his red-hot +<i>protégé</i>, and solacing himself with the +explanation that the poet was “the most inconsistent of +men.” If you are so sensibly pained by the misconduct +of your subject, and so paternally delighted with his virtues, +you will always be an excellent gentleman, but a somewhat +questionable biographer. Indeed, we can only be sorry and +surprised that Principal Shairp should have chosen a theme so +uncongenial. When we find a man writing on Burns, who likes +neither <i>Holy Willie</i>, nor the <i>Beggars</i>, nor the +<i>Ordination</i>, nothing is adequate to the situation but the +old cry of Géronte: “Que diable allait-il faire dans +cette galère?” And every merit we find in the +book, which is sober and candid in a degree unusual with +biographies of Burns, only leads us to regret more heartily that +good work should be so greatly thrown away.</p> +<p>It is far from my intention to tell over again a story that +has been so often told; but there are certainly some points in +the character of Burns that will bear to be brought out, and some +chapters in his life that demand a brief rehearsal. The +unity of the man’s nature, for all its richness, has fallen +somewhat out of sight in the pressure of new information and the +apologetical ceremony of biographers. Mr. Carlyle made an +inimitable bust of the poet’s head of gold; may I not be +forgiven if my business should have more to do with the feet, +which were of clay?</p> +<h3><span class="smcap">Youth</span>.</h3> +<p>Any view of Burns would be misleading which passed over in +silence the influences of his home and his father. That +father, William Burnes, after having been for many years a +gardener, took a farm, married, and, like an emigrant in a new +country, built himself a house with his own hands. Poverty +of the most distressing sort, with sometimes the near prospect of +a gaol, embittered the remainder of his life. Chill, +backward, and austere with strangers, grave and imperious in his +family, he was yet a man of very unusual parts and of an +affectionate nature. On his way through life he had +remarked much upon other men, with more result in theory than +practice; and he had reflected upon many subjects as he delved +the garden. His great delight was in solid conversation; he +would leave his work to talk with the schoolmaster Murdoch; and +Robert, when he came home late at night, not only turned aside +rebuke but kept his father two hours beside the fire by the charm +of his merry and vigorous talk. Nothing is more +characteristic of the class in general, and William Burnes in +particular, than the pains he took to get proper schooling for +his boys, and, when that was no longer possible, the sense and +resolution with which he set himself to supply the deficiency by +his own influence. For many years he was their chief +companion; he spoke with them seriously on all subjects as if +they had been grown men; at night, when work was over, he taught +them arithmetic; he borrowed books for them on history, science, +and theology; and he felt it his duty to supplement this +last—the trait is laughably Scottish—by a dialogue of +his own composition, where his own private shade of orthodoxy was +exactly represented. He would go to his daughter as she +stayed afield herding cattle, to teach her the names of grasses +and wild flowers, or to sit by her side when it thundered. +Distance to strangers, deep family tenderness, love of knowledge, +a narrow, precise, and formal reading of +theology—everything we learn of him hangs well together, +and builds up a popular Scotch type. If I mention the name +of Andrew Fairservice, it is only as I might couple for an +instant Dugald Dalgetty with old Marshal Loudon, to help out the +reader’s comprehension by a popular but unworthy instance +of a class. Such was the influence of this good and wise +man that his household became a school to itself, and neighbours +who came into the farm at meal-time would find the whole family, +father, brothers, and sisters, helping themselves with one hand, +and holding a book in the other. We are surprised at the +prose style of Robert; that of Gilbert need surprise us no less; +even William writes a remarkable letter for a young man of such +slender opportunities. One anecdote marks the taste of the +family. Murdoch brought <i>Titus Andronicus</i>, and, with +such dominie elocution as we may suppose, began to read it aloud +before this rustic audience; but when he had reached the passage +where Tamora insults Lavinia, with one voice and “in an +agony of distress” they refused to hear it to an end. +In such a father and with such a home, Robert had already the +making of an excellent education; and what Murdoch added, +although it may not have been much in amount, was in character +the very essence of a literary training. Schools and +colleges, for one great man whom they complete, perhaps unmake a +dozen; the strong spirit can do well upon more scanty fare.</p> +<p>Robert steps before us, almost from the first, in his complete +character—a proud, headstrong, impetuous lad, greedy of +pleasure, greedy of notice; in his own phrase “panting +after distinction,” and in his brother’s +“cherishing a particular jealousy of people who were richer +or of more consequence than himself:” with all this, he was +emphatically of the artist nature. Already he made a +conspicuous figure in Tarbolton church, with the only tied hair +in the parish, “and his plaid, which was of a particular +colour, wrapped in a particular manner round his +shoulders.” Ten years later, when a married man, the +father of a family, a farmer, and an officer of Excise, we shall +find him out fishing in masquerade, with fox-skin cap, belted +great-coat, and great Highland broadsword. He liked +dressing up, in fact, for its own sake. This is the spirit +which leads to the extravagant array of Latin Quarter students, +and the proverbial velveteen of the English landscape-painter; +and, though the pleasure derived is in itself merely personal, it +shows a man who is, to say the least of it, not pained by general +attention and remark. His father wrote the family name +<i>Burnes</i>; Robert early adopted the orthography +<i>Burness</i> from his cousin in the Mearns; and in his +twenty-eighth year changed it once more to <i>Burns</i>. It +is plain that the last transformation was not made without some +qualm; for in addressing his cousin he adheres, in at least one +more letter, to spelling number two. And this, again, shows +a man preoccupied about the manner of his appearance even down to +the name, and little willing to follow custom. Again, he +was proud, and justly proud, of his powers in conversation. +To no other man’s have we the same conclusive testimony +from different sources and from every rank of life. It is +almost a commonplace that the best of his works was what he said +in talk. Robertson the historian “scarcely ever met +any man whose conversation displayed greater vigour;” the +Duchess of Gordon declared that he “carried her off her +feet;” and, when he came late to an inn, the servants would +get out of bed to hear him talk. But, in these early days +at least, he was determined to shine by any means. He made +himself feared in the village for his tongue. He would +crush weaker men to their faces, or even perhaps—for the +statement of Sillar is not absolute—say cutting things of +his acquaintances behind their back. At the church door, +between sermons, he would parade his religious views amid +hisses. These details stamp the man. He had no +genteel timidities in the conduct of his life. He loved to +force his personality upon the world. He would please +himself, and shine. Had he lived in the Paris of 1830, and +joined his lot with the Romantics, we can conceive him writing +<i>Jehan</i> for <i>Jean</i>, swaggering in Gautier’s red +waistcoat, and horrifying Bourgeois in a public café with +paradox and gasconnade.</p> +<p>A leading trait throughout his whole career was his desire to +be in love. <i>Ne fait pas ce tour qui veut</i>. His +affections were often enough touched, but perhaps never +engaged. He was all his life on a voyage of discovery, but +it does not appear conclusively that he ever touched the happy +isle. A man brings to love a deal of ready-made sentiment, +and even from childhood obscurely prognosticates the symptoms of +this vital malady. Burns was formed for love; he had +passion, tenderness, and a singular bent in the direction; he +could foresee, with the intuition of an artist, what love ought +to be; and he could not conceive a worthy life without it. +But he had ill-fortune, and was besides so greedy after every +shadow of the true divinity, and so much the slave of a strong +temperament, that perhaps his nerve was relaxed and his heart had +lost the power of self-devotion before an opportunity +occurred. The circumstances of his youth doubtless counted +for something in the result. For the lads of Ayrshire, as +soon as the day’s work was over and the beasts were +stabled, would take the road, it might be in a winter tempest, +and travel perhaps miles by moss and moorland to spend an hour or +two in courtship. Rule 10 of the Bachelors’ Club at +Tarbolton provides that “every man proper for a member of +this Society must be a professed lover of <i>one or more</i> of +the female sex.” The rich, as Burns himself points +out, may have a choice of pleasurable occupations, but these lads +had nothing but their “cannie hour at +e’en.” It was upon love and flirtation that +this rustic society was built; gallantry was the essence of life +among the Ayrshire hills as well as in the Court of Versailles; +and the days were distinguished from each other by love-letters, +meetings, tiffs, reconciliations, and expansions to the chosen +confidant, as in a comedy of Marivaux. Here was a field for +a man of Burns’s indiscriminate personal ambition, where he +might pursue his voyage of discovery in quest of true love, and +enjoy temporary triumphs by the way. He was +“constantly the victim of some fair +enslaver”—at least, when it was not the other way +about; and there were often underplots and secondary fair +enslavers in the background. Many—or may we not say +most?—of these affairs were entirely artificial. One, +he tells us, he began out of “a vanity of showing his parts +in courtship,” for he piqued himself on his ability at a +love-letter. But, however they began, these flames of his +were fanned into a passion ere the end; and he stands unsurpassed +in his power of self-deception, and positively without a +competitor in the art, to use his own words, of “battering +himself into a warm affection,”—a debilitating and +futile exercise. Once he had worked himself into the vein, +“the agitations of his mind and body” were an +astonishment to all who knew him. Such a course as this, +however pleasant to a thirsty vanity, was lowering to his +nature. He sank more and more towards the professional Don +Juan. With a leer of what the French call fatuity, he bids +the belles of Mauchline beware of his seductions; and the same +cheap self-satisfaction finds a yet uglier vent when he plumes +himself on the scandal at the birth of his first bastard. +We can well believe what we hear of his facility in striking up +an acquaintance with women: he would have conquering manners; he +would bear down upon his rustic game with the grace that comes of +absolute assurance—the Richelieu of Lochlea or +Mossgiel. In yet another manner did these quaint ways of +courtship help him into fame. If he were great as +principal, he was unrivalled as confidant. He could enter +into a passion; he could counsel wary moves, being, in his own +phrase, so old a hawk; nay, he could turn a letter for some +unlucky swain, or even string a few lines of verse that should +clinch the business and fetch the hesitating fair one to the +ground. Nor, perhaps, was it only his “curiosity, +zeal, and intrepid dexterity” that recommended him for a +second in such affairs; it must have been a distinction to have +the assistance and advice of <i>Rab the Ranter</i>; and one who +was in no way formidable by himself might grow dangerous and +attractive through the fame of his associate.</p> +<p>I think we can conceive him, in these early years, in that +rough moorland country, poor among the poor with his seven pounds +a year, looked upon with doubt by respectable elders, but for all +that the best talker, the best letter-writer, the most famous +lover and confidant, the laureate poet, and the only man who wore +his hair tied in the parish. He says he had then as high a +notion of himself as ever after; and I can well believe it. +Among the youth he walked <i>facile princeps</i>, an apparent +god; and even if, from time to time, the Reverend Mr. Auld should +swoop upon him with the thunders of the Church, and, in company +with seven others, Rab the Ranter must figure some fine Sunday on +the stool of repentance, would there not be a sort of glory, an +infernal apotheosis, in so conspicuous a shame? Was not +Richelieu in disgrace more idolised than ever by the dames of +Paris? and when was the highwayman most acclaimed but on his way +to Tyburn? Or, to take a simile from nearer home, and still +more exactly to the point, what could even corporal punishment +avail, administered by a cold, abstract, unearthly school-master, +against the influence and fame of the school’s hero?</p> +<p>And now we come to the culminating point of Burns’s +early period. He began to be received into the unknown +upper world. His fame soon spread from among his +fellow-rebels on the benches, and began to reach the ushers and +monitors of this great Ayrshire academy. This arose in part +from his lax views about religion; for at this time that old war +of the creeds and confessors, which is always grumbling from end +to end of our poor Scotland, brisked up in these parts into a hot +and virulent skirmish; and Burns found himself identified with +the opposition party,—a clique of roaring lawyers and +half-heretical divines, with wit enough to appreciate the value +of the poet’s help, and not sufficient taste to moderate +his grossness and personality. We may judge of their +surprise when <i>Holy Willie</i> was put into their hand; like +the amorous lads of Tarbolton, they recognised in him the best of +seconds. His satires began to go the round in manuscript; +Mr. Aiken, one of the lawyers, “read him into fame;” +he himself was soon welcome in many houses of a better sort, +where his admirable talk, and his manners, which he had direct +from his Maker, except for a brush he gave them at a country +dancing school, completed what his poems had begun. We have +a sight of him at his first visit to Adamhill, in his +ploughman’s shoes, coasting around the carpet as though +that were sacred ground. But he soon grew used to carpets +and their owners; and he was still the superior of all whom he +encountered, and ruled the roost in conversation. Such was +the impression made, that a young clergyman, himself a man of +ability, trembled and became confused when he saw Robert enter +the church in which he was to preach. It is not surprising +that the poet determined to publish: he had now stood the test of +some publicity, and under this hopeful impulse he composed in six +winter months the bulk of his more important poems. Here +was a young man who, from a very humble place, was mounting +rapidly; from the cynosure of a parish, he had become the talk of +a county; once the bard of rural courtships, he was now about to +appear as a bound and printed poet in the world’s +bookshops.</p> +<p>A few more intimate strokes are necessary to complete the +sketch. This strong young plough-man, who feared no +competitor with the flail, suffered like a fine lady from +sleeplessness and vapours; he would fall into the blackest +melancholies, and be filled with remorse for the past and terror +for the future. He was still not perhaps devoted to +religion, but haunted by it; and at a touch of sickness +prostrated himself before God in what I can only call unmanly +penitence. As he had aspirations beyond his place in the +world, so he had tastes, thoughts, and weaknesses to match. +He loved to walk under a wood to the sound of a winter tempest; +he had a singular tenderness for animals; he carried a book with +him in his pocket when he went abroad, and wore out in this +service two copies of the <i>Man of Feeling</i>. With young +people in the field at work he was very long-suffering; and when +his brother Gilbert spoke sharply to them—“O man, ye +are no for young folk,” he would say, and give the +defaulter a helping hand and a smile. In the hearts of the +men whom he met, he read as in a book; and, what is yet more +rare, his knowledge of himself equalled his knowledge of +others. There are no truer things said of Burns than what +is to be found in his own letters. Country Don Juan as he +was, he had none of that blind vanity which values itself on what +it is not; he knew his own strength and weakness to a hair: he +took himself boldly for what he was, and, except in moments of +hypochondria, declared himself content.</p> +<h3><span class="smcap">The Love Stories</span>.</h3> +<p>On the night of Mauchline races, 1785, the young men and women +of the place joined in a penny ball, according to their +custom. In the same set danced Jean Armour, the +master-mason’s daughter, and our dark-eyed Don Juan. +His dog (not the immortal Luath, but a successor unknown to fame, +<i>caret quia vate sacro</i>), apparently sensible of some +neglect, followed his master to and fro, to the confusion of the +dancers. Some mirthful comments followed; and Jean heard +the poet say to his partner—or, as I should imagine, +laughingly launch the remark to the company at large—that +“he wished he could get any of the lasses to like him as +well as his dog.” Some time after, as the girl was +bleaching clothes on Mauchline green, Robert chanced to go by, +still accompanied by his dog; and the dog, “scouring in +long excursion,” scampered with four black paws across the +linen. This brought the two into conversation; when Jean, +with a somewhat hoydenish advance, inquired if “he had yet +got any of the lasses to like him as well as his dog?”</p> +<p>It is one of the misfortunes of the professional Don Juan that +his honour forbids him to refuse battle; he is in life like the +Roman soldier upon duty, or like the sworn physician who must +attend on all diseases. Burns accepted the provocation; +hungry hope reawakened in his heart; here was a +girl—pretty, simple at least, if not honestly stupid, and +plainly not averse to his attentions: it seemed to him once more +as if love might here be waiting him. Had he but known the +truth! for this facile and empty-headed girl had nothing more in +view than a flirtation; and her heart, from the first and on to +the end of her story, was engaged by another man. Burns +once more commenced the celebrated process of “battering +himself into a warm affection;” and the proofs of his +success are to be found in many verses of the period. Nor +did he succeed with himself only; Jean, with her heart still +elsewhere, succumbed to his fascination, and early in the next +year the natural consequence became manifest. It was a +heavy stroke for this unfortunate couple. They had trifled +with life, and were now rudely reminded of life’s serious +issues. Jean awoke to the ruin of her hopes; the best she +had now to expect was marriage with a man who was a stranger to +her dearest thoughts; she might now be glad if she could get what +she would never have chosen. As for Burns, at the stroke of +the calamity he recognised that his voyage of discovery had led +him into a wrong hemisphere—that he was not, and never had +been, really in love with Jean. Hear him in the pressure of +the hour. “Against two things,” he writes, +“I am as fixed as fate—staying at home, and owning +her conjugally. The first, by heaven, I will not +do!—the last, by hell, I will never do!” And +then he adds, perhaps already in a more relenting temper: +“If you see Jean, tell her I will meet her, so God help me +in my hour of need.” They met accordingly; and Burns, +touched with her misery, came down from these heights of +independence, and gave her a written acknowledgment of +marriage. It is the punishment of Don Juanism to create +continually false positions—relations in life which are +wrong in themselves, and which it is equally wrong to break or to +perpetuate. This was such a case. Worldly Wiseman +would have laughed and gone his way; let us be glad that Burns +was better counselled by his heart. When we discover that +we can be no longer true, the next best is to be kind. I +daresay he came away from that interview not very content, but +with a glorious conscience; and as he went homeward, he would +sing his favourite, “How are Thy servants blest, O +Lord!” Jean, on the other hand, armed with her +“lines,” confided her position to the master-mason, +her father, and his wife. Burns and his brother were then +in a fair way to ruin themselves in their farm; the poet was an +execrable match for any well-to-do country lass; and perhaps old +Armour had an inkling of a previous attachment on his +daughter’s part. At least, he was not so much +incensed by her slip from virtue as by the marriage which had +been designed to cover it. Of this he would not hear a +word. Jean, who had besought the acknowledgment only to appease +her parents, and not at all from any violent inclination to the +poet, readily gave up the paper for destruction; and all parties +imagined, although wrongly, that the marriage was thus +dissolved. To a proud man like Burns here was a crushing +blow. The concession which had been wrung from his pity was +now publicly thrown back in his teeth. The Armour family +preferred disgrace to his connection. Since the promise, +besides, he had doubtless been busy “battering +himself” back again into his affection for the girl; and +the blow would not only take him in his vanity, but wound him at +the heart.</p> +<p>He relieved himself in verse; but for such a smarting affront +manuscript poetry was insufficient to console him. He must +find a more powerful remedy in good flesh and blood, and after +this discomfiture, set forth again at once upon his voyage of +discovery in quest of love. It is perhaps one of the most +touching things in human nature, as it is a commonplace of +psychology, that when a man has just lost hope or confidence in +one love, he is then most eager to find and lean upon +another. The universe could not be yet exhausted; there +must be hope and love waiting for him somewhere; and so, with his +head down, this poor, insulted poet ran once more upon his +fate. There was an innocent and gentle Highland +nursery-maid at service in a neighbouring family; and he had soon +battered himself and her into a warm affection and a secret +engagement. Jean’s marriage lines had not been +destroyed till March 13, 1786; yet all was settled between Burns +and Mary Campbell by Sunday, May 14, when they met for the last +time, and said farewell with rustic solemnities upon the banks of +Ayr. They each wet their hands in a stream, and, standing +one on either bank, held a Bible between them as they vowed +eternal faith. Then they exchanged Bibles, on one of which +Burns, for greater security, had inscribed texts as to the +binding nature of an oath; and surely, if ceremony can do aught +to fix the wandering affections, here were two people united for +life. Mary came of a superstitious family, so that she +perhaps insisted on these rites; but they must have been +eminently to the taste of Burns at this period; for nothing would +seem superfluous, and no oath great enough, to stay his tottering +constancy.</p> +<p>Events of consequence now happened thickly in the poet’s +life. His book was announced; the Armours sought to summon +him at law for the aliment of the child; he lay here and there in +hiding to correct the sheets; he was under an engagement for +Jamaica, where Mary was to join him as his wife; now, he had +“orders within three weeks at latest to repair aboard the +<i>Nancy</i>, Captain Smith;” now his chest was already on +the road to Greenock; and now, in the wild autumn weather on the +moorland, he measures verses of farewell:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“The bursting tears my heart declare;<br /> +Farewell the bonny banks of Ayr!”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But the great master dramatist had secretly another intention +for the piece; by the most violent and complicated solution, in +which death and birth and sudden fame all play a part as +interposing deities, the act-drop fell upon a scene of +transformation. Jean was brought to bed of twins, and, by +an amicable arrangement, the Burnses took the boy to bring up by +hand, while the girl remained with her mother. The success +of the book was immediate and emphatic; it put £20 at once +into the author’s purse; and he was encouraged upon all +hands to go to Edinburgh and push his success in a second and +larger edition. Third and last in these series of +interpositions, a letter came one day to Mossgiel Farm for +Robert. He went to the window to read it; a sudden change +came over his face, and he left the room without a word. +Years afterwards, when the story began to leak out, his family +understood that he had then learned the death of Highland +Mary. Except in a few poems and a few dry indications +purposely misleading as to date, Burns himself made no reference +to this passage of his life; it was an adventure of which, for I +think sufficient reasons, he desired to bury the details. +Of one thing we may be glad: in after years he visited the poor +girl’s mother, and left her with the impression that he was +“a real warm-hearted chield.”</p> +<p>Perhaps a month after he received this intelligence, he set +out for Edinburgh on a pony he had borrowed from a friend. +The town that winter was “agog with the ploughman +poet.” Robertson, Dugald Stewart, Blair, +“Duchess Gordon and all the gay world,” were of his +acquaintance. Such a revolution is not to be found in +literary history. He was now, it must be remembered, +twenty-seven years of age; he had fought since his early boyhood +an obstinate battle against poor soil, bad seed, and inclement +seasons, wading deep in Ayrshire mosses, guiding the plough in +the furrow wielding “the thresher’s weary +flingin’-tree;” and his education, his diet, and his +pleasures, had been those of a Scotch countryman. Now he +stepped forth suddenly among the polite and learned. We can +see him as he then was, in his boots and buckskins, his blue coat +and waistcoat striped with buff and blue, like a farmer in his +Sunday best; the heavy ploughman’s figure firmly planted on +its burly legs; his face full of sense and shrewdness, and with a +somewhat melancholy air of thought, and his large dark eye +“literally glowing” as he spoke. “I never +saw such another eye in a human head,” says Walter Scott, +“though I have seen the most distinguished men of my +time.” With men, whether they were lords or +omnipotent critics, his manner was plain, dignified, and free +from bashfulness or affectation. If he made a slip, he had +the social courage to pass on and refrain from explanation. +He was not embarrassed in this society, because he read and +judged the men; he could spy snobbery in a titled lord; and, as +for the critics, he dismissed their system in an epigram. +“These gentlemen,” said he, “remind me of some +spinsters in my country who spin their thread so fine that it is +neither fit for weft nor woof.” Ladies, on the other +hand, surprised him; he was scarce commander of himself in their +society; he was disqualified by his acquired nature as a Don +Juan; and he, who had been so much at his ease with country +lasses, treated the town dames to an extreme of deference. +One lady, who met him at a ball, gave Chambers a speaking sketch +of his demeanour. “His manner was not +prepossessing—scarcely, she thinks, manly or natural. +It seemed as if he affected a rusticity or <i>landertness</i>, so +that when he said the music was ‘bonnie, bonnie,’ it +was like the expression of a child.” These would be +company manners; and doubtless on a slight degree of intimacy the +affectation would grow less. And his talk to women had +always “a turn either to the pathetic or humorous, which +engaged the attention particularly.”</p> +<p>The Edinburgh magnates (to conclude this episode at once) +behaved well to Burns from first to last. Were heaven-born +genius to revisit us in similar guise, I am not venturing too far +when I say that he need expect neither so warm a welcome nor such +solid help. Although Burns was only a peasant, and one of +no very elegant reputation as to morals, he was made welcome to +their homes. They gave him a great deal of good advice, +helped him to some five hundred pounds of ready money, and got +him, as soon as he asked it, a place in the Excise. Burns, +on his part, bore the elevation with perfect dignity; and with +perfect dignity returned, when the time had come, into a country +privacy of life. His powerful sense never deserted him, and +from the first he recognised that his Edinburgh popularity was +but an ovation and the affair of a day. He wrote a few +letters in a high-flown, bombastic vein of gratitude; but in +practice he suffered no man to intrude upon his +self-respect. On the other hand, he never turned his back, +even for a moment, on his old associates; and he was always ready +to sacrifice an acquaintance to a friend, although the +acquaintance were a duke. He would be a bold man who should +promise similar conduct in equally exacting circumstances. +It was, in short, an admirable appearance on the stage of +life—socially successful, intimately self-respecting, and +like a gentleman from first to last.</p> +<p>In the present study, this must only be taken by the way, +while we return to Burns’s love affairs. Even on the +road to Edinburgh he had seized upon the opportunity of a +flirtation, and had carried the “battering” so far +that when next he moved from town, it was to steal two days with +this anonymous fair one. The exact importance to Burns of +this affair may be gathered from the song in which he +commemorated its occurrence. “I love the dear +lassie,” he sings, “because she loves me;” or, +in the tongue of prose: “Finding an opportunity, I did not +hesitate to profit by it, and even now, if it returned, I should +not hesitate to profit by it again.” A love thus +founded has no interest for mortal man. Meantime, early in +the winter, and only once, we find him regretting Jean in his +correspondence. “Because”—such is his +reason—“because he does not think he will ever meet +so delicious an armful again;” and then, after a brief +excursion into verse, he goes straight on to describe a new +episode in the voyage of discovery with the daughter of a Lothian +farmer for a heroine. I must ask the reader to follow all +these references to his future wife; they are essential to the +comprehension of Burns’s character and fate. In June, +we find him back at Mauchline, a famous man. There, the +Armour family greeted him with a “mean, servile +compliance,” which increased his former disgust. Jean +was not less compliant; a second time the poor girl submitted to +the fascination of the man whom she did not love, and whom she +had so cruelly insulted little more than a year ago; and, though +Burns took advantage of her weakness, it was in the ugliest and +most cynical spirit, and with a heart absolutely +indifferent. Judge of this by a letter written some twenty +days after his return—a letter to my mind among the most +degrading in the whole collection—a letter which seems to +have been inspired by a boastful, libertine bagman. +“I am afraid,” it goes, “I have almost ruined +one source, the principal one, indeed, of my former +happiness—the eternal propensity I always had to fall in +love. My heart no more glows with feverish rapture; I have +no paradisiacal evening interviews.” Even the process +of “battering” has failed him, you perceive. +Still he had some one in his eye—a lady, if you please, +with a fine figure and elegant manners, and who had “seen +the politest quarters in Europe.” “I frequently +visited her,” he writes, “and after passing regularly +the intermediate degrees between the distant formal bow and the +familiar grasp round the waist, I ventured, in my careless way, +to talk of friendship in rather ambiguous terms; and after her +return to —, I wrote her in the same terms. Miss, +construing my remarks further than even I intended, flew off in a +tangent of female dignity and reserve, like a mounting lark in an +April morning; and wrote me an answer which measured out very +completely what an immense way I had to travel before I could +reach the climate of her favours. But I am an old hawk at +the sport, and wrote her such a cool, deliberate, prudent reply, +as brought my bird from her aerial towerings, pop, down to my +foot, like Corporal Trim’s hat.” I avow a +carnal longing, after this transcription, to buffet the Old Hawk +about the ears. There is little question that to this lady +he must have repeated his addresses, and that he was by her (Miss +Chalmers) eventually, though not at all unkindly, rejected. +One more detail to characterise the period. Six months +after the date of this letter, Burns, back in Edinburgh, is +served with a writ <i>in meditatione fugæ</i>, on behalf of +some Edinburgh fair one, probably of humble rank, who declared an +intention of adding to his family.</p> +<p>About the beginning of December (1787), a new period opens in +the story of the poet’s random affections. He met at +a tea party one Mrs. Agnes M’Lehose, a married woman of +about his own age, who, with her two children, had been deserted +by an unworthy husband. She had wit, could use her pen, and +had read <i>Werther</i> with attention. Sociable, and even +somewhat frisky, there was a good, sound, human kernel in the +woman; a warmth of love, strong dogmatic religious feeling, and a +considerable, but not authoritative, sense of the +proprieties. Of what biographers refer to daintily as +“her somewhat voluptuous style of beauty,” judging +from the silhouette in Mr. Scott Douglas’s invaluable +edition, the reader will be fastidious if he does not +approve. Take her for all in all, I believe she was the +best woman Burns encountered. The pair took a fancy for +each other on the spot; Mrs. M’Lehose, in her turn, invited +him to tea; but the poet, in his character of the Old Hawk, +preferred a <i>tête-à-tête</i>, excused +himself at the last moment, and offered a visit instead. An +accident confined him to his room for nearly a month, and this +led to the famous Clarinda and Sylvander correspondence. It +was begun in simple sport; they are already at their fifth or +sixth exchange, when Clarinda writes: “It is really curious +so much <i>fun</i> passing between two persons who saw each other +only <i>once</i>;” but it is hardly safe for a man and +woman in the flower of their years to write almost daily, and +sometimes in terms too ambiguous, sometimes in terms too plain, +and generally in terms too warm, for mere acquaintance. The +exercise partakes a little of the nature of battering, and danger +may be apprehended when next they meet. It is difficult to +give any account of this remarkable correspondence; it is too far +away from us, and perhaps, not yet far enough, in point of time +and manner; the imagination is baffled by these stilted literary +utterances, warming, in bravura passages, into downright +truculent nonsense. Clarinda has one famous sentence in +which she bids Sylvander connect the thought of his mistress with +the changing phases of the year; it was enthusiastically admired +by the swain, but on the modern mind produces mild amazement and +alarm. “Oh, Clarinda,” writes Burns, +“shall we not meet in a state—some yet unknown +state—of being, where the lavish hand of Plenty shall +minister to the highest wish of Benevolence, and where the chill +north wind of Prudence shall never blow over the flowery field of +Enjoyment?” The design may be that of an Old Hawk, +but the style is more suggestive of a Bird of Paradise. It +is sometimes hard to fancy they are not gravely making fun of +each other as they write. Religion, poetry, love, and +charming sensibility, are the current topics. “I am +delighted, charming Clarinda, with your honest enthusiasm for +religion,” writes Burns; and the pair entertained a fiction +that this was their “favourite subject.” +“This is Sunday,” writes the lady, “and not a +word on our favourite subject. O fy ‘divine +Clarinda!’” I suspect, although quite +unconsciously on the part of the lady, who was bent on his +redemption, they but used the favourite subject as a +stalking-horse. In the meantime, the sportive acquaintance +was ripening steadily into a genuine passion. Visits took +place, and then became frequent. Clarinda’s friends +were hurt and suspicious; her clergyman interfered; she herself +had smart attacks of conscience, but her heart had gone from her +control; it was altogether his, and she “counted all things +but loss—heaven excepted—that she might win and keep +him.” Burns himself was transported while in her +neighbourhood, but his transports somewhat rapidly declined +during an absence. I am tempted to imagine that, womanlike, +he took on the colour of his mistress’s feeling; that he +could not but heat himself at the fire of her unaffected passion; +but that, like one who should leave the hearth upon a +winter’s night, his temperature soon fell when he was out +of sight, and in a word, though he could share the symptoms, that +he had never shared the disease. At the same time, amid the +fustian of the letters there are forcible and true expressions, +and the love verses that he wrote upon Clarinda are among the +most moving in the language.</p> +<p>We are approaching the solution. In mid-winter, Jean, +once more in the family way, was turned out of doors by her +family; and Burns had her received and cared for in the house of +a friend. For he remained to the last imperfect in his +character of Don Juan, and lacked the sinister courage to desert +his victim. About the middle of February (1788), he had to +tear himself from his Clarinda and make a journey into the +south-west on business. Clarinda gave him two shirts for +his little son. They were daily to meet in prayer at an +appointed hour. Burns, too late for the post at Glasgow, +sent her a letter by parcel that she might not have to +wait. Clarinda on her part writes, this time with a +beautiful simplicity: “I think the streets look +deserted-like since Monday; and there’s a certain +insipidity in good kind folks I once enjoyed not a little. +Miss Wardrobe supped here on Monday. She once named you, +which kept me from falling asleep. I drank your health in a +glass of ale—as the lasses do at +Hallowe’en—‘in to +mysel’.’” Arrived at Mauchline, Burns +installed Jean Armour in a lodging, and prevailed on Mrs. Armour +to promise her help and countenance in the approaching +confinement. This was kind at least; but hear his +expressions: “I have taken her a room; I have taken her to +my arms; I have given her a mahogany bed; I have given her a +guinea. . . . I swore her privately and solemnly never to attempt +any claim on me as a husband, even though anybody should persuade +her she had such a claim—which she has not, neither during +my life nor after my death. She did all this like a good +girl.” And then he took advantage of the +situation. To Clarinda he wrote: “I this morning +called for a certain woman. I am disgusted with her; I +cannot endure her;” and he accused her of “tasteless +insipidity, vulgarity of soul, and mercenary +fawning.” This was already in March; by the +thirteenth of that month he was back in Edinburgh. On the +17th, he wrote to Clarinda: “Your hopes, your fears, your +cares, my love, are mine; so don’t mind them. I will +take you in my hand through the dreary wilds of this world, and +scare away the ravening bird or beast that would annoy +you.” Again, on the 21st: “Will you open, with +satisfaction and delight, a letter from a man who loves you, who +has loved you, and who will love you, to death, through death, +and for ever. . . . How rich am I to have such a treasure as you! +. . . ‘The Lord God knoweth,’ and, perhaps, +‘Israel he shall know,’ my love and your merit. +Adieu, Clarinda! I am going to remember you in my +prayers.” By the 7th of April, seventeen days later +he had already decided to make Jean Armour publicly his wife.</p> +<p>A more astonishing stage-trick is not to be found. And +yet his conduct is seen, upon a nearer examination, to be +grounded both in reason and in kindness. He was now about +to embark on a solid worldly career; he had taken a farm; the +affair with Clarinda, however gratifying to his heart, was too +contingent to offer any great consolation to a man like Burns, to +whom marriage must have seemed the very dawn of hope and +self-respect. This is to regard the question from its +lowest aspect; but there is no doubt that he entered on this new +period of his life with a sincere determination to do +right. He had just helped his brother with a loan of a +hundred and eighty pounds; should he do nothing for the poor girl +whom he had ruined? It was true he could not do as he did +without brutally wounding Clarinda; that was the punishment of +his bygone fault; he was, as he truly says, “damned with a +choice only of different species of error and +misconduct.” To be professional Don Juan, to accept +the provocation of any lively lass upon the village green, may +thus lead a man through a series of detestable words and actions, +and land him at last in an undesired and most unsuitable union +for life. If he had been strong enough to refrain or bad +enough to persevere in evil; if he had only not been Don Juan at +all, or been Don Juan altogether, there had been some possible +road for him throughout this troublesome world; but a man, alas! +who is equally at the call of his worse and better instincts, +stands among changing events without foundation or resource. <a +name="citation71"></a><a href="#footnote71" +class="citation">[71]</a></p> +<h3><span class="smcap">Downward Course</span>.</h3> +<p>It may be questionable whether any marriage could have tamed +Burns; but it is at least certain that there was no hope for him +in the marriage he contracted. He did right, but then he +had done wrong before; it was, as I said, one of those relations +in life which it seems equally wrong to break or to +perpetuate. He neither loved nor respected his wife. +“God knows,” he writes, “my choice was as +random as blind man’s buff.” He consoles +himself by the thought that he has acted kindly to her; that she +“has the most sacred enthusiasm of attachment to +him;” that she has a good figure; that she has a +“wood-note wild,” “her voice rising with ease +to B natural,” no less. The effect on the reader is +one of unmingled pity for both parties concerned. This was +not the wife who (in his own words) could “enter into his +favourite studies or relish his favourite authors;” this +was not even a wife, after the affair of the marriage lines, in +whom a husband could joy to place his trust. Let her manage +a farm with sense, let her voice rise to B natural all day long, +she would still be a peasant to her lettered lord, and an object +of pity rather than of equal affection. She could now be +faithful, she could now be forgiving, she could now be generous +even to a pathetic and touching degree; but coming from one who +was unloved, and who had scarce shown herself worthy of the +sentiment, these were all virtues thrown away, which could +neither change her husband’s heart nor affect the inherent +destiny of their relation. From the outset, it was a +marriage that had no root in nature; and we find him, ere long, +lyrically regretting Highland Mary, renewing correspondence with +Clarinda in the warmest language, on doubtful terms with Mrs. +Riddel, and on terms unfortunately beyond any question with Anne +Park.</p> +<p>Alas! this was not the only ill circumstance in his +future. He had been idle for some eighteen months, +superintending his new edition, hanging on to settle with the +publisher, travelling in the Highlands with Willie Nichol, or +philandering with Mrs. M’Lehose; and in this period the +radical part of the man had suffered irremediable hurt. He +had lost his habits of industry, and formed the habit of +pleasure. Apologetical biographers assure us of the +contrary; but from the first, he saw and recognised the danger +for himself; his mind, he writes, is “enervated to an +alarming degree” by idleness and dissipation; and again, +“my mind has been vitiated with idleness.” It +never fairly recovered. To business he could bring the +required diligence and attention without difficulty; but he was +thenceforward incapable, except in rare instances, of that +superior effort of concentration which is required for serious +literary work. He may be said, indeed, to have worked no +more, and only amused himself with letters. The man who had +written a volume of masterpieces in six months, during the +remainder of his life rarely found courage for any more sustained +effort than a song. And the nature of the songs is itself +characteristic of these idle later years; for they are often as +polished and elaborate as his earlier works were frank, and +headlong, and colloquial; and this sort of verbal elaboration in +short flights is, for a man of literary turn, simply the most +agreeable of pastimes. The change in manner coincides +exactly with the Edinburgh visit. In 1786 he had written +the <i>Address to a Louse</i>, which may be taken as an extreme +instance of the first manner; and already, in 1787, we come upon +the rosebud pieces to Miss Cruikshank, which are extreme examples +of the second. The change was, therefore, the direct and +very natural consequence of his great change in life; but it is +not the less typical of his loss of moral courage that he should +have given up all larger ventures, nor the less melancholy that a +man who first attacked literature with a hand that seemed capable +of moving mountains, should have spent his later years in +whittling cherry-stones.</p> +<p>Meanwhile, the farm did not prosper; he had to join to it the +salary of an exciseman; at last he had to give it up, and rely +altogether on the latter resource. He was an active +officer; and, though he sometimes tempered severity with mercy, +we have local testimony oddly representing the public feeling of +the period, that, while “in everything else he was a +perfect gentleman, when he met with anything seizable he was no +better than any other gauger.”</p> +<p>There is but one manifestation of the man in these last years +which need delay us: and that was the sudden interest in politics +which arose from his sympathy with the great French +Revolution. His only political feeling had been hitherto a +sentimental Jacobitism, not more or less respectable than that of +Scott, Aytoun, and the rest of what George Borrow has nicknamed +the “Charlie over the water” Scotchmen. It was +a sentiment almost entirely literary and picturesque in its +origin, built on ballads and the adventures of the Young +Chevalier; and in Burns it is the more excusable, because he lay +out of the way of active politics in his youth. With the +great French Revolution, something living, practical, and +feasible appeared to him for the first time in this realm of +human action. The young ploughman who had desired so +earnestly to rise, now reached out his sympathies to a whole +nation animated with the same desire. Already in 1788 we +find the old Jacobitism hand in hand with the new popular +doctrine, when, in a letter of indignation against the zeal of a +Whig clergyman, he writes: “I daresay the American Congress +in 1776 will be allowed to be as able and as enlightened as the +English Convention was in 1688; and that their posterity will +celebrate the centenary of their deliverance from us, as duly and +sincerely as we do ours from the oppressive measures of the +wrong-headed house of Stuart.” As time wore on, his +sentiments grew more pronounced and even violent; but there was a +basis of sense and generous feeling to his hottest excess. +What he asked was a fair chance for the individual in life; an +open road to success and distinction for all classes of +men. It was in the same spirit that he had helped to found +a public library in the parish where his farm was situated, and +that he sang his fervent snatches against tyranny and +tyrants. Witness, were it alone, this verse:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Here’s freedom to him that wad +read,<br /> +Here’s freedom to him that wad write;<br /> +There’s nane ever feared that the truth should be heard<br +/> +But them wham the truth wad indite.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Yet his enthusiasm for the cause was scarce guided by +wisdom. Many stories are preserved of the bitter and unwise +words he used in country coteries; how he proposed +Washington’s health as an amendment to Pitt’s, gave +as a toast “the last verse of the last chapter of +Kings,” and celebrated Dumouriez in a doggrel impromptu +full of ridicule and hate. Now his sympathies would inspire +him with <i>Scots</i>, <i>wha hae</i>; now involve him in a +drunken broil with a loyal officer, and consequent apologies and +explanations, hard to offer for a man of Burns’s +stomach. Nor was this the front of his offending. On +February 27, 1792, he took part in the capture of an armed +smuggler, bought at the subsequent sale four carronades, and +despatched them with a letter to the French Assembly. +Letter and guns were stopped at Dover by the English officials; +there was trouble for Burns with his superiors; he was reminded +firmly, however delicately, that, as a paid official, it was his +duty to obey and to be silent; and all the blood of this poor, +proud, and falling man must have rushed to his head at the +humiliation. His letter to Mr. Erskine, subsequently Earl +of Mar, testifies, in its turgid, turbulent phrases, to a perfect +passion of alarmed self-respect and vanity. He had been +muzzled, and muzzled, when all was said, by his paltry salary as +an exciseman; alas! had he not a family to keep? Already, +he wrote, he looked forward to some such judgment from a hackney +scribbler as this: “Burns, notwithstanding the +<i>fanfaronnade</i> of independence to be found in his works, and +after having been held forth to view and to public estimation as +a man of some genius, yet, quite destitute of resources within +himself to support his borrowed dignity, he dwindled into a +paltry exciseman, and shrunk out the rest of his insignificant +existence in the meanest of pursuits, and among the vilest of +mankind.” And then on he goes, in a style of +rhodomontade, but filled with living indignation, to declare his +right to a political opinion, and his willingness to shed his +blood for the political birthright of his sons. Poor, +perturbed spirit! he was indeed exercised in vain; those who +share and those who differ from his sentiments about the +Revolution, alike understand and sympathise with him in this +painful strait; for poetry and human manhood are lasting like the +race, and politics, which are but a wrongful striving after +right, pass and change from year to year and age to age. +The <i>Twa Dogs</i> has already outlasted the constitution of +Siéyès and the policy of the Whigs; and Burns is +better known among English-speaking races than either Pitt or +Fox.</p> +<p>Meanwhile, whether as a man, a husband, or a poet, his steps +led downward. He knew, knew bitterly, that the best was out +of him; he refused to make another volume, for he felt that it +would be a disappointment; he grew petulantly alive to criticism, +unless he was sure it reached him from a friend. For his +songs, he would take nothing; they were all that he could do; the +proposed Scotch play, the proposed series of Scotch tales in +verse, all had gone to water; and in a fling of pain and +disappointment, which is surely noble with the nobility of a +viking, he would rather stoop to borrow than to accept money for +these last and inadequate efforts of his muse. And this +desperate abnegation rises at times near to the height of +madness; as when he pretended that he had not written, but only +found and published, his immortal <i>Auld Lang Syne</i>. In +the same spirit he became more scrupulous as an artist; he was +doing so little, he would fain do that little well; and about two +months before his death, he asked Thomson to send back all his +manuscripts for revisal, saying that he would rather write five +songs to his taste than twice that number otherwise. The +battle of his life was lost; in forlorn efforts to do well, in +desperate submissions to evil, the last years flew by. His +temper is dark and explosive, launching epigrams, quarrelling +with his friends, jealous of young puppy officers. He tries +to be a good father; he boasts himself a libertine. Sick, +sad, and jaded, he can refuse no occasion of temporary pleasure, +no opportunity to shine; and he who had once refused the +invitations of lords and ladies is now whistled to the inn by any +curious stranger. His death (July 21, 1796), in his +thirty-seventh year, was indeed a kindly dispensation. It +is the fashion to say he died of drink; many a man has drunk more +and yet lived with reputation, and reached a good age. That +drink and debauchery helped to destroy his constitution, and were +the means of his unconscious suicide, is doubtless true; but he +had failed in life, had lost his power of work, and was already +married to the poor, unworthy, patient Jean, before he had shown +his inclination to convivial nights, or at least before that +inclination had become dangerous either to his health or his +self-respect. He had trifled with life, and must pay the +penalty. He had chosen to be Don Juan, he had grasped at +temporary pleasures, and substantial happiness and solid industry +had passed him by. He died of being Robert Burns, and there +is no levity in such a statement of the case; for shall we not, +one and all, deserve a similar epitaph?</p> +<h3><span class="smcap">Works</span>.</h3> +<p>The somewhat cruel necessity which has lain upon me throughout +this paper only to touch upon those points in the life of Burns +where correction or amplification seemed desirable, leaves me +little opportunity to speak of the works which have made his name +so famous. Yet, even here, a few observations seem +necessary.</p> +<p>At the time when the poet made his appearance and great first +success, his work was remarkable in two ways. For, first, +in an age when poetry had become abstract and conventional, +instead of continuing to deal with shepherds, thunderstorms, and +personifications, he dealt with the actual circumstances of his +life, however matter-of-fact and sordid these might be. +And, second, in a time when English versification was +particularly stiff, lame, and feeble, and words were used with +ultra-academical timidity, he wrote verses that were easy, racy, +graphic, and forcible, and used language with absolute tact and +courage as it seemed most fit to give a clear impression. +If you take even those English authors whom we know Burns to have +most admired and studied, you will see at once that he owed them +nothing but a warning. Take Shenstone, for instance, and +watch that elegant author as he tries to grapple with the facts +of life. He has a description, I remember, of a gentleman +engaged in sliding or walking on thin ice, which is a little +miracle of incompetence. You see my memory fails me, and I +positively cannot recollect whether his hero was sliding or +walking; as though a writer should describe a skirmish, and the +reader, at the end, be still uncertain whether it were a charge +of cavalry or a slow and stubborn advance of foot. There +could be no such ambiguity in Burns; his work is at the opposite +pole from such indefinite and stammering performances; and a +whole lifetime passed in the study of Shenstone would only lead a +man further and further from writing the <i>Address to a +Louse</i>. Yet Burns, like most great artists, proceeded +from a school and continued a tradition; only the school and +tradition were Scotch, and not English. While the English +language was becoming daily more pedantic and inflexible, and +English letters more colourless and slack, there was another +dialect in the sister country, and a different school of poetry +tracing its descent, through King James I., from Chaucer. +The dialect alone accounts for much; for it was then written +colloquially, which kept it fresh and supple; and, although not +shaped for heroic flights, it was a direct and vivid medium for +all that had to do with social life. Hence, whenever Scotch +poets left their laborious imitations of bad English verses, and +fell back on their own dialect, their style would kindle, and +they would write of their convivial and somewhat gross existences +with pith and point. In Ramsay, and far more in the poor +lad Fergusson, there was mettle, humour, literary courage, and a +power of saying what they wished to say definitely and brightly, +which in the latter case should have justified great +anticipations. Had Burns died at the same age as Fergusson, +he would have left us literally nothing worth remark. To +Ramsay and to Fergusson, then, he was indebted in a very uncommon +degree, not only following their tradition and using their +measures, but directly and avowedly imitating their pieces. +The same tendency to borrow a hint, to work on some one +else’s foundation, is notable in Burns from first to last, +in the period of song-writing as well as in that of the early +poems; and strikes one oddly in a man of such deep originality, +who left so strong a print on all he touched, and whose work is +so greatly distinguished by that character of +“inevitability” which Wordsworth denied to +Goethe.</p> +<p>When we remember Burns’s obligations to his +predecessors, we must never forget his immense advances on +them. They had already “discovered” nature; but +Burns discovered poetry—a higher and more intense way of +thinking of the things that go to make up nature, a higher and +more ideal key of words in which to speak of them. Ramsay +and Fergusson excelled at making a popular—or shall we say +vulgar?—sort of society verses, comical and prosaic, +written, you would say, in taverns while a supper party waited +for its laureate’s word; but on the appearance of Burns, +this coarse and laughing literature was touched to finer issues, +and learned gravity of thought and natural pathos.</p> +<p>What he had gained from his predecessors was a direct, +speaking style, and to walk on his own feet instead of on +academical stilts. There was never a man of letters with +more absolute command of his means; and we may say of him, +without excess, that his style was his slave. Hence that +energy of epithet, so concise and telling, that a foreigner is +tempted to explain it by some special richness or aptitude in the +dialect he wrote. Hence that Homeric justice and +completeness of description which gives us the very physiognomy +of nature, in body and detail, as nature is. Hence, too, +the unbroken literary quality of his best pieces, which keeps him +from any slip into the weariful trade of word-painting, and +presents everything, as everything should be presented by the art +of words, in a clear, continuous medium of thought. +Principal Shairp, for instance, gives us a paraphrase of one +tough verse of the original; and for those who know the Greek +poets only by paraphrase, this has the very quality they are +accustomed to look for and admire in Greek. The +contemporaries of Burns were surprised that he should visit so +many celebrated mountains and waterfalls, and not seize the +opportunity to make a poem. Indeed, it is not for those who +have a true command of the art of words, but for peddling, +professional amateurs, that these pointed occasions are most +useful and inspiring. As those who speak French imperfectly +are glad to dwell on any topic they may have talked upon or heard +others talk upon before, because they know appropriate words for +it in French, so the dabbler in verse rejoices to behold a +waterfall, because he has learned the sentiment and knows +appropriate words for it in poetry. But the dialect of +Burns was fitted to deal with any subject; and whether it was a +stormy night, a shepherd’s collie, a sheep struggling in +the snow, the conduct of cowardly soldiers in the field, the gait +and cogitations of a drunken man, or only a village cockcrow in +the morning, he could find language to give it freshness, body, +and relief. He was always ready to borrow the hint of a +design, as though he had a difficulty in commencing—a +difficulty, let us say, in choosing a subject out of a world +which seemed all equally living and significant to him; but once +he had the subject chosen, he could cope with nature +single-handed, and make every stroke a triumph. Again, his +absolute mastery in his art enabled him to express each and all +of his different humours, and to pass smoothly and congruously +from one to another. Many men invent a dialect for only one +side of their nature—perhaps their pathos or their humour, +or the delicacy of their senses—and, for lack of a medium, +leave all the others unexpressed. You meet such an one, and +find him in conversation full of thought, feeling, and +experience, which he has lacked the art to employ in his +writings. But Burns was not thus hampered in the practice +of the literary art; he could throw the whole weight of his +nature into his work, and impregnate it from end to end. If +Doctor Johnson, that stilted and accomplished stylist, had lacked +the sacred Boswell, what should we have known of him? and how +should we have delighted in his acquaintance as we do? +Those who spoke with Burns tell us how much we have lost who did +not. But I think they exaggerate their privilege: I think +we have the whole Burns in our possession set forth in his +consummate verses.</p> +<p>It was by his style, and not by his matter, that he affected +Wordsworth and the world. There is, indeed, only one merit +worth considering in a man of letters—that he should write +well; and only one damning fault—that he should write +ill. We are little the better for the reflections of the +sailor’s parrot in the story. And so, if Burns helped +to change the course of literary history, it was by his frank, +direct, and masterly utterance, and not by his homely choice of +subjects. That was imposed upon him, not chosen upon a +principle. He wrote from his own experience, because it was +his nature so to do, and the tradition of the school from which +he proceeded was fortunately not opposed to homely +subjects. But to these homely subjects he communicated the +rich commentary of his nature; they were all steeped in Burns; +and they interest us not in themselves, but because they have +been passed through the spirit of so genuine and vigorous a +man. Such is the stamp of living literature; and there was +never any more alive than that of Burns.</p> +<p>What a gust of sympathy there is in him sometimes flowing out +in byways hitherto unused, upon mice, and flowers, and the devil +himself; sometimes speaking plainly between human hearts; +sometimes ringing out in exultation like a peal of bells! +When we compare the <i>Farmer’s Salutation to his Auld Mare +Maggie</i>, with the clever and inhumane production of half a +century earlier, <i>The Auld Man’s Mare’s dead</i>, +we see in a nutshell the spirit of the change introduced by +Burns. And as to its manner, who that has read it can +forget how the collie, Luath, in the <i>Twa Dogs</i>, describes +and enters into the merry-making in the cottage?</p> +<blockquote><p>“The luntin’ pipe an’ +sneeshin’ mill,<br /> +Are handed round wi’ richt guid will;<br /> +The canty auld folks crackin’ crouse,<br /> +The young anes rantin’ through the house—<br /> +My heart has been sae fain to see them<br /> +That I for joy hae barkit wi’ them.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>It was this ardent power of sympathy that was fatal to so many +women, and, through Jean Armour, to himself at last. His +humour comes from him in a stream so deep and easy that I will +venture to call him the best of humorous poets. He turns +about in the midst to utter a noble sentiment or a trenchant +remark on human life, and the style changes and rises to the +occasion. I think it is Principal Shairp who says, happily, +that Burns would have been no Scotchman if he had not loved to +moralise; neither, may we add, would he have been his +father’s son; but (what is worthy of note) his moralisings +are to a large extent the moral of his own career. He was +among the least impersonal of artists. Except in the +<i>Jolly Beggars</i>, he shows no gleam of dramatic +instinct. Mr. Carlyle has complained that <i>Tam o’ +Shanter</i> is, from the absence of this quality, only a +picturesque and external piece of work; and I may add that in the +<i>Twa Dogs</i> it is precisely in the infringement of dramatic +propriety that a great deal of the humour of the speeches depends +for its existence and effect. Indeed, Burns was so full of +his identity that it breaks forth on every page; and there is +scarce an appropriate remark either in praise or blame of his own +conduct, but he has put it himself into verse. Alas! for +the tenor of these remarks! They are, indeed, his own +pitiful apology for such a marred existence and talents so +misused and stunted; and they seem to prove for ever how small a +part is played by reason in the conduct of man’s +affairs. Here was one, at least, who with unfailing +judgment predicted his own fate; yet his knowledge could not +avail him, and with open eyes he must fulfil his tragic +destiny. Ten years before the end he had written his +epitaph; and neither subsequent events, nor the critical eyes of +posterity, have shown us a word in it to alter. And, +lastly, has he not put in for himself the last unanswerable +plea?—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Then gently scan your brother man,<br /> + Still gentler sister woman;<br /> +Though they may gang a kennin wrang,<br /> + To step aside is human:<br /> +One point must still be greatly dark—”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>One? Alas! I fear every man and woman of us is +“greatly dark” to all their neighbours, from the day +of birth until death removes them, in their greatest virtues as +well as in their saddest faults; and we, who have been trying to +read the character of Burns, may take home the lesson and be +gentle in our thoughts.</p> +<h2><a name="page91"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 91</span>WALT +WHITMAN.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Of</span> late years the name of Walt +Whitman has been a good deal bandied about in books and +magazines. It has become familiar both in good and ill +repute. His works have been largely bespattered with praise +by his admirers, and cruelly mauled and mangled by irreverent +enemies. Now, whether his poetry is good or bad as poetry, +is a matter that may admit of a difference of opinion without +alienating those who differ. We could not keep the peace +with a man who should put forward claims to taste and yet +depreciate the choruses in <i>Samson Agonistes</i>; but, I think, +we may shake hands with one who sees no more in Walt +Whitman’s volume, from a literary point of view, than a +farrago of incompetent essays in a wrong direction. That +may not be at all our own opinion. We may think that, when +a work contains many unforgettable phrases, it cannot be +altogether devoid of literary merit. We may even see +passages of a high poetry here and there among its eccentric +contents. But when all is said, Walt Whitman is neither a +Milton nor a Shakespeare; to appreciate his works is not a +condition necessary to salvation; and I would not disinherit a +son upon the question, nor even think much the worse of a critic, +for I should always have an idea what he meant.</p> +<p>What Whitman has to say is another affair from how he says +it. It is not possible to acquit any one of defective +intelligence, or else stiff prejudice, who is not interested by +Whitman’s matter and the spirit it represents. Not as +a poet, but as what we must call (for lack of a more exact +expression) a prophet, he occupies a curious and prominent +position. Whether he may greatly influence the future or +not, he is a notable symptom of the present. As a sign of +the times, it would be hard to find his parallel. I should +hazard a large wager, for instance, that he was not unacquainted +with the works of Herbert Spencer; and yet where, in all the +history books, shall we lay our hands on two more incongruous +contemporaries? Mr. Spencer so decorous—I had almost +said, so dandy—in dissent; and Whitman, like a large shaggy +dog, just unchained, scouring the beaches of the world and baying +at the moon. And when was an echo more curiously like a +satire, than when Mr. Spencer found his Synthetic Philosophy +reverberated from the other shores of the Atlantic in the +“barbaric yawp” of Whitman?</p> +<h3>I.</h3> +<p>Whitman, it cannot be too soon explained, writes up to a +system. He was a theoriser about society before he was a +poet. He first perceived something wanting, and then sat +down squarely to supply the want. The reader, running over +his works, will find that he takes nearly as much pleasure in +critically expounding his theory of poetry as in making +poems. This is as far as it can be from the case of the +spontaneous village minstrel dear to elegy, who has no theory +whatever, although sometimes he may have fully as much poetry as +Whitman. The whole of Whitman’s work is deliberate +and preconceived. A man born into a society comparatively +new, full of conflicting elements and interests, could not fail, +if he had any thoughts at all, to reflect upon the tendencies +around him. He saw much good and evil on all sides, not yet +settled down into some more or less unjust compromise as in older +nations, but still in the act of settlement. And he could +not but wonder what it would turn out; whether the compromise +would be very just or very much the reverse, and give great or +little scope for healthy human energies. From idle wonder +to active speculation is but a step; and he seems to have been +early struck with the inefficacy of literature and its extreme +unsuitability to the conditions. What he calls +“Feudal Literature” could have little living action +on the tumult of American democracy; what he calls the +“Literature of Wo,” meaning the whole tribe of +Werther and Byron, could have no action for good in any time or +place. Both propositions, if art had none but a direct +moral influence, would be true enough; and as this seems to be +Whitman’s view, they were true enough for him. He +conceived the idea of a Literature which was to inhere in the +life of the present; which was to be, first, human, and next, +American; which was to be brave and cheerful as per contract; to +give culture in a popular and poetical presentment; and, in so +doing, catch and stereotype some democratic ideal of humanity +which should be equally natural to all grades of wealth and +education, and suited, in one of his favourite phrases, to +“the average man.” To the formation of some +such literature as this his poems are to be regarded as so many +contributions, one sometimes explaining, sometimes superseding, +the other: and the whole together not so much a finished work as +a body of suggestive hints. He does not profess to have +built the castle, but he pretends he has traced the lines of the +foundation. He has not made the poetry, but he flatters +himself he has done something towards making the poets.</p> +<p>His notion of the poetic function is ambitious, and coincides +roughly with what Schopenhauer has laid down as the province of +the metaphysician. The poet is to gather together for men, +and set in order, the materials of their existence. He is +“The Answerer;” he is to find some way of speaking +about life that shall satisfy, if only for the moment, +man’s enduring astonishment at his own position. And +besides having an answer ready, it is he who shall provoke the +question. He must shake people out of their indifference, +and force them to make some election in this world, instead of +sliding dully forward in a dream. Life is a business we are +all apt to mismanage; either living recklessly from day to day, +or suffering ourselves to be gulled out of our moments by the +inanities of custom. We should despise a man who gave as +little activity and forethought to the conduct of any other +business. But in this, which is the one thing of all +others, since it contains them all, we cannot see the forest for +the trees. One brief impression obliterates another. +There is something stupefying in the recurrence of unimportant +things. And it is only on rare provocations that we can +rise to take an outlook beyond daily concerns, and comprehend the +narrow limits and great possibilities of our existence. It +is the duty of the poet to induce such moments of clear +sight. He is the declared enemy of all living by reflex +action, of all that is done betwixt sleep and waking, of all the +pleasureless pleasurings and imaginary duties in which we coin +away our hearts and fritter invaluable years. He has to +electrify his readers into an instant unflagging activity, +founded on a wide and eager observation of the world, and make +them direct their ways by a superior prudence, which has little +or nothing in common with the maxims of the copy-book. That +many of us lead such lives as they would heartily disown after +two hours’ serious reflection on the subject is, I am +afraid, a true, and, I am sure, a very galling thought. The +Enchanted Ground of dead-alive respectability is next, upon the +map, to the Beulah of considerate virtue. But there they +all slumber and take their rest in the middle of God’s +beautiful and wonderful universe; the drowsy heads have nodded +together in the same position since first their fathers fell +asleep; and not even the sound of the last trumpet can wake them +to a single active thought.</p> +<p>The poet has a hard task before him to stir up such fellows to +a sense of their own and other people’s principles in +life.</p> +<p>And it happens that literature is, in some ways, but an +indifferent means to such an end. Language is but a poor +bull’s-eye lantern wherewith to show off the vast cathedral +of the world; and yet a particular thing once said in words is so +definite and memorable, that it makes us forget the absence of +the many which remain unexpressed; like a bright window in a +distant view, which dazzles and confuses our sight of its +surroundings. There are not words enough in all Shakespeare +to express the merest fraction of a man’s experience in an +hour. The speed of the eyesight and the hearing, and the +continual industry of the mind, produce, in ten minutes, what it +would require a laborious volume to shadow forth by comparisons +and roundabout approaches. If verbal logic were sufficient, +life would be as plain sailing as a piece of Euclid. But, +as a matter of fact, we make a travesty of the simplest process +of thought when we put it into words for the words are all +coloured and forsworn, apply inaccurately, and bring with them, +from former uses ideas of praise and blame that have nothing to +do with the question in hand. So we must always see to it +nearly, that we judge by the realities of life and not by the +partial terms that represent them in man’s speech; and at +times of choice, we must leave words upon one side, and act upon +those brute convictions, unexpressed and perhaps inexpressible, +which cannot be flourished in an argument, but which are truly +the sum and fruit of our experience. Words are for +communication, not for judgment. This is what every +thoughtful man knows for himself, for only fools and silly +schoolmasters push definitions over far into the domain of +conduct; and the majority of women, not learned in these +scholastic refinements, live all-of-a-piece and unconsciously, as +a tree grows, without caring to put a name upon their acts or +motives. Hence, a new difficulty for Whitman’s +scrupulous and argumentative poet; he must do more than waken up +the sleepers to his words; he must persuade them to look over the +book and at life with their own eyes.</p> +<p>This side of truth is very present to Whitman; it is this that +he means when he tells us that “To glance with an eye +confounds the learning of all times.” But he is not +unready. He is never weary of descanting on the undebatable +conviction that is forced upon our minds by the presence of other +men, of animals, or of inanimate things. To glance with an +eye, were it only at a chair or a park railing, is by far a more +persuasive process, and brings us to a far more exact conclusion, +than to read the works of all the logicians extant. If +both, by a large allowance, may be said to end in certainty, the +certainty in the one case transcends the other to an incalculable +degree. If people see a lion, they run away; if they only +apprehend a deduction, they keep wandering around in an +experimental humour. Now, how is the poet to convince like +nature, and not like books? Is there no actual piece of +nature that he can show the man to his face, as he might show him +a tree if they were walking together? Yes, there is one: +the man’s own thoughts. In fact, if the poet is to +speak efficaciously, he must say what is already in his +hearer’s mind. That, alone, the hearer will believe; +that, alone, he will be able to apply intelligently to the facts +of life. Any conviction, even if it be a whole system or a +whole religion, must pass into the condition of commonplace, or +postulate, before it becomes fully operative. Strange +excursions and high-flying theories may interest, but they cannot +rule behaviour. Our faith is not the highest truth that we +perceive, but the highest that we have been able to assimilate +into the very texture and method of our thinking. It is +not, therefore, by flashing before a man’s eyes the weapons +of dialectic; it is not by induction, deduction, or construction; +it is not by forcing him on from one stage of reasoning to +another, that the man will be effectually renewed. He +cannot be made to believe anything; but he can be made to see +that he has always believed it. And this is the practical +canon. It is when the reader cries, “Oh, I +know!” and is, perhaps, half irritated to see how nearly +the author has forestalled his own thoughts, that he is on the +way to what is called in theology a Saving Faith.</p> +<p>Here we have the key to Whitman’s attitude. To +give a certain unity of ideal to the average population of +America—to gather their activities about some conception of +humanity that shall be central and normal, if only for the +moment—the poet must portray that population as it +is. Like human law, human poetry is simply +declaratory. If any ideal is possible, it must be already +in the thoughts of the people; and, by the same reason, in the +thoughts of the poet, who is one of them. And hence +Whitman’s own formula: “The poet is +individual—he is complete in himself: the others are as +good as he; only he sees it, and they do not.” To +show them how good they are, the poet must study his +fellow-countrymen and himself somewhat like a traveller on the +hunt for his book of travels. There is a sense, of course, +in which all true books are books of travel; and all genuine +poets must run their risk of being charged with the +traveller’s exaggeration; for to whom are such books more +surprising than to those whose own life is faithfully and smartly +pictured? But this danger is all upon one side; and you may +judiciously flatter the portrait without any likelihood of the +sitter’s disowning it for a faithful likeness. And so +Whitman has reasoned: that by drawing at first hand from himself +and his neighbours, accepting without shame the inconsistencies +and brutalities that go to make up man, and yet treating the +whole in a high, magnanimous spirit, he would make sure of +belief, and at the same time encourage people forward by the +means of praise.</p> +<h3>II.</h3> +<p>We are accustomed nowadays to a great deal of puling over the +circumstances in which we are placed. The great refinement +of many poetical gentlemen has rendered them practically unfit +for the jostling and ugliness of life, and they record their +unfitness at considerable length. The bold and awful poetry +of Job’s complaint produces too many flimsy imitators; for +there is always something consolatory in grandeur, but the +symphony transposed for the piano becomes hysterically sad. +This literature of woe, as Whitman calls it, this <i>Maladie de +René</i>, as we like to call it in Europe, is in many ways +a most humiliating and sickly phenomenon. Young gentlemen +with three or four hundred a year of private means look down from +a pinnacle of doleful experience on all the grown and hearty men +who have dared to say a good word for life since the beginning of +the world. There is no prophet but the melancholy Jacques, +and the blue devils dance on all our literary wires.</p> +<p>It would be a poor service to spread culture, if this be its +result, among the comparatively innocent and cheerful ranks of +men. When our little poets have to be sent to look at the +ploughman and learn wisdom, we must be careful how we tamper with +our ploughmen. Where a man in not the best of circumstances +preserves composure of mind, and relishes ale and tobacco, and +his wife and children, in the intervals of dull and +unremunerative labour; where a man in this predicament can afford +a lesson by the way to what are called his intellectual +superiors, there is plainly something to be lost, as well as +something to be gained, by teaching him to think +differently. It is better to leave him as he is than to +teach him whining. It is better that he should go without +the cheerful lights of culture, if cheerless doubt and paralysing +sentimentalism are to be the consequence. Let us, by all +means, fight against that hide-bound stolidity of sensation and +sluggishness of mind which blurs and decolorises for poor natures +the wonderful pageant of consciousness; let us teach people, as +much as we can, to enjoy, and they will learn for themselves to +sympathise; but let us see to it, above all, that we give these +lessons in a brave, vivacious note, and build the man up in +courage while we demolish its substitute, indifference.</p> +<p>Whitman is alive to all this. He sees that, if the poet +is to be of any help, he must testify to the livableness of +life. His poems, he tells us, are to be “hymns of the +praise of things.” They are to make for a certain +high joy in living, or what he calls himself “a brave +delight fit for freedom’s athletes.” And he has +had no difficulty in introducing his optimism: it fitted readily +enough with his system; for the average man is truly a courageous +person and truly fond of living. One of Whitman’s +remarks upon this head is worth quotation, as he is there +perfectly successful, and does precisely what he designs to do +throughout: Takes ordinary and even commonplace circumstances; +throws them out, by a happy turn of thinking, into significance +and something like beauty; and tacks a hopeful moral lesson to +the end.</p> +<blockquote><p>“The passionate tenacity of hunters, +woodmen, early risers, cultivators of gardens and orchards and +fields, he says, 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 unvaried sign of the unfailing +perception of beauty, and of a residence of the poetic in outdoor +people.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>There seems to me something truly original in this choice of +trite examples. You will remark how adroitly Whitman +begins, hunters and woodmen being confessedly romantic. And +one thing more. If he had said “the love of healthy +men for the female form,” he would have said almost a +silliness; for the thing has never been dissembled out of +delicacy, and is so obvious as to be a public nuisance. But +by reversing it, he tells us something not unlike news; something +that sounds quite freshly in words; and, if the reader be a man, +gives him a moment of great self-satisfaction and spiritual +aggrandisement. In many different authors you may find +passages more remarkable for grammar, but few of a more ingenious +turn, and none that could be more to the point in our +connection. The tenacity of many ordinary people in +ordinary pursuits is a sort of standing challenge to everybody +else. If one man can grow absorbed in delving his garden, +others may grow absorbed and happy over something else. Not +to be upsides in this with any groom or gardener, is to be very +meanly organised. A man should be ashamed to take his food +if he has not alchemy enough in his stomach to turn some of it +into intense and enjoyable occupation.</p> +<p>Whitman tries to reinforce this cheerfulness by keeping up a +sort of outdoor atmosphere of sentiment. His book, he tells +us, should be read “among the cooling influences of +external nature;” and this recommendation, like that other +famous one which Hawthorne prefixed to his collected tales, is in +itself a character of the work. Every one who has been upon +a walking or a boating tour, living in the open air, with the +body in constant exercise and the mind in fallow, knows true ease +and quiet. The irritating action of the brain is set at +rest; we think in a plain, unfeverish temper; little things seem +big enough, and great things no longer portentous; and the world +is smilingly accepted as it is. This is the spirit that +Whitman inculcates and parades. He thinks very ill of the +atmosphere of parlours or libraries. Wisdom keeps school +outdoors. And he has the art to recommend this attitude of +mind by simply pluming himself upon it as a virtue; so that the +reader, to keep the advantage over his author which most readers +enjoy, is tricked into professing the same view. And this +spirit, as it is his chief lesson, is the greatest charm of his +work. Thence, in spite of an uneven and emphatic key of +expression, something trenchant and straightforward, something +simple and surprising, distinguishes his poems. He has +sayings that come home to one like the Bible. We fall upon +Whitman, after the works of so many men who write better, with a +sense of relief from strain, with a sense of touching nature, as +when one passes out of the flaring, noisy thoroughfares of a +great city into what he himself has called, with unexcelled +imaginative justice of language, “the huge and thoughtful +night.” And his book in consequence, whatever may be +the final judgment of its merit, whatever may be its influence on +the future, should be in the hands of all parents and guardians +as a specific for the distressing malady of being seventeen years +old. Green-sickness yields to his treatment as to a charm +of magic; and the youth, after a short course of reading, ceases +to carry the universe upon his shoulders.</p> +<h3>III.</h3> +<p>Whitman is not one of those who can be deceived by +familiarity. He considers it just as wonderful that there +are myriads of stars, as that one man should rise from the +dead. He declares “a hair on the back of his hand +just as curious as any special revelation.” His whole +life is to him what it was to Sir Thomas Browne, one perpetual +miracle. Everything is strange, everything unaccountable, +everything beautiful; from a bug to the moon, from the sight of +the eyes to the appetite for food. He makes it his business +to see things as if he saw them for the first time, and professes +astonishment on principle. But he has no leaning towards +mythology; avows his contempt for what he calls +“unregenerate poetry;” and does not mean by +nature</p> +<blockquote><p>“The smooth walks, trimmed hedges, +butterflies, posies, and nightingales of the English poets, but +the whole orb, with its geologic history, the Kosmos, carrying +fire and snow, that rolls through the illimitable areas, light as +a feather though weighing billions of tons.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Nor is this exhaustive; for in his character of idealist all +impressions, all thoughts, trees and people, love and faith, +astronomy, history, and religion, enter upon equal terms into his +notion of the universe. He is not against religion; not, +indeed, against any religion. He wishes to drag with a +larger net, to make a more comprehensive synthesis, than any or +than all of them put together. In feeling after the central +type of man, he must embrace all eccentricities; his cosmology +must subsume all cosmologies, and the feelings that gave birth to +them; his statement of facts must include all religion and all +irreligion, Christ and Boodha, God and the devil. The world +as it is, and the whole world as it is, physical, and spiritual, +and historical, with its good and bad, with its manifold +inconsistencies, is what he wishes to set forth, in strong, +picturesque, and popular lineaments, for the understanding of the +average man. One of his favourite endeavours is to get the +whole matter into a nutshell; to knock the four corners of the +universe, one after another, about his readers’ ears; to +hurry him, in breathless phrases, hither and thither, back and +forward, in time and space; to focus all this about his own +momentary personality; and then, drawing the ground from under +his feet, as if by some cataclysm of nature, to plunge him into +the unfathomable abyss sown with enormous suns and systems, and +among the inconceivable numbers and magnitudes and velocities of +the heavenly bodies. So that he concludes by striking into +us some sense of that disproportion of things which Shelley has +illuminated by the ironical flash of these eight words: The +desire of the moth for the star.</p> +<p>The same truth, but to what a different purpose! +Whitman’s moth is mightily at his ease about all the +planets in heaven, and cannot think too highly of our sublunary +tapers. The universe is so large that imagination flags in +the effort to conceive it; but here, in the meantime, is the +world under our feet, a very warm and habitable corner. +“The earth, that is sufficient; I do not want the +constellations any nearer,” he remarks. And again: +“Let your soul stand cool and composed,” says he, +“before a million universes.” It is the +language of a transcendental common sense, such as Thoreau held +and sometimes uttered. But Whitman, who has a somewhat +vulgar inclination for technical talk and the jargon of +philosophy, is not content with a few pregnant hints; he must put +the dots upon his i’s; he must corroborate the songs of +Apollo by some of the darkest talk of human metaphysic. He +tells his disciples that they must be ready “to confront +the growing arrogance of Realism.” Each person is, +for himself, the keystone and the occasion of this universal +edifice. “Nothing, not God,” he says, “is +greater to one than oneself is;” a statement with an +irreligious smack at the first sight; but like most startling +sayings, a manifest truism on a second. He will give effect +to his own character without apology; he sees “that the +elementary laws never apologise.” “I +reckon,” he adds, with quaint colloquial arrogance, +“I reckon I behave no prouder than the level I plant my +house by, after all.” The level follows the law of +its being; so, unrelentingly, will he; everything, every person, +is good in his own place and way; God is the maker of all and all +are in one design. For he believes in God, and that with a +sort of blasphemous security. “No array of +terms,” quoth he, “no array of terms can say how much +at peace I am about God and about death.” There +certainly never was a prophet who carried things with a higher +hand; he gives us less a body of dogmas than a series of +proclamations by the grace of God; and language, you will +observe, positively fails him to express how far he stands above +the highest human doubts and trepidations.</p> +<p>But next in order of truths to a person’s sublime +conviction of himself, comes the attraction of one person for +another, and all that we mean by the word love:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“The dear love of man for his +comrade—the attraction of friend for friend,<br /> +Of the well-married husband and wife, of children and parents,<br +/> +Of city for city and land for land.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The solitude of the most sublime idealist is broken in upon by +other people’s faces; he sees a look in their eyes that +corresponds to something in his own heart; there comes a tone in +their voices which convicts him of a startling weakness for his +fellow-creatures. While he is hymning the <i>ego</i> and +commercing with God and the universe, a woman goes below his +window; and at the turn of her skirt, or the colour of her eyes, +Icarus is recalled from heaven by the run. Love is so +startlingly real that it takes rank upon an equal footing of +reality with the consciousness of personal existence. We +are as heartily persuaded of the identity of those we love as of +our own identity. And so sympathy pairs with +self-assertion, the two gerents of human life on earth; and +Whitman’s ideal man must not only be strong, free, and +self-reliant in himself, but his freedom must be bounded and his +strength perfected by the most intimate, eager, and +long-suffering love for others. To some extent this is +taking away with the left hand what has been so generously given +with the right. Morality has been ceremoniously extruded +from the door only to be brought in again by the window. We +are told, on one page, to do as we please; and on the next we are +sharply upbraided for not having done as the author +pleases. We are first assured that we are the finest +fellows in the world in our own right; and then it appears that +we are only fine fellows in so far as we practise a most quixotic +code of morals. The disciple who saw himself in clear ether +a moment before is plunged down again among the fogs and +complications of duty. And this is all the more +overwhelming because Whitman insists not only on love between sex +and sex, and between friends of the same sex, but in the field of +the less intense political sympathies; and his ideal man must not +only be a generous friend but a conscientious voter into the +bargain.</p> +<p>His method somewhat lessens the difficulty. He is not, +the reader will remember, to tell us how good we ought to be, but +to remind us how good we are. He is to encourage us to be +free and kind, by proving that we are free and kind +already. He passes our corporate life under review, to show +that it is upheld by the very virtues of which he makes himself +the advocate. “There is no object so soft,” he +says somewhere in his big, plain way, “there is no object +so soft but it makes a hub for the wheel’d +universe.” Rightly understood, it is on the softest +of all objects, the sympathetic heart, that the wheel of society +turns easily and securely as on a perfect axle. There is no +room, of course, for doubt or discussion, about conduct, where +every one is to follow the law of his being with exact +compliance. Whitman hates doubt, deprecates discussion, and +discourages to his utmost the craving, carping sensibilities of +the conscience. We are to imitate, to use one of his absurd +and happy phrases, “the satisfaction and aplomb of +animals.” If he preaches a sort of ranting +Christianity in morals, a fit consequent to the ranting optimism +of his cosmology, it is because he declares it to be the original +deliverance of the human heart; or at least, for he would be +honestly historical in method, of the human heart as at present +Christianised. His is a morality without a prohibition; his +policy is one of encouragement all round. A man must be a +born hero to come up to Whitman’s standard in the practice +of any of the positive virtues; but of a negative virtue, such as +temperance or chastity, he has so little to say, that the reader +need not be surprised if he drops a word or two upon the other +side. He would lay down nothing that would be a clog; he +would prescribe nothing that cannot be done ruddily, in a +heat. The great point is to get people under way. To +the faithful Whitmanite this would be justified by the belief +that God made all, and that all was good; the prophet, in this +doctrine, has only to cry “Tally-ho,” and mankind +will break into a gallop on the road to El Dorado. Perhaps, +to another class of minds, it may look like the result of the +somewhat cynical reflection that you will not make a kind man out +of one who is unkind by any precepts under heaven; tempered by +the belief that, in natural circumstances, the large majority is +well disposed. Thence it would follow, that if you can only +get every one to feel more warmly and act more courageously, the +balance of results will be for good.</p> +<p>So far, you see, the doctrine is pretty coherent as a +doctrine; as a picture of man’s life it is incomplete and +misleading, although eminently cheerful. This he is himself +the first to acknowledge; for if he is prophetic in anything, it +is in his noble disregard of consistency. “Do I +contradict myself?” he asks somewhere; and then pat comes +the answer, the best answer ever given in print, worthy of a +sage, or rather of a woman: “Very well, then, I contradict +myself!” with this addition, not so feminine and perhaps +not altogether so satisfactory: “I am large—I contain +multitudes.” Life, as a matter of fact, partakes +largely of the nature of tragedy. The gospel according to +Whitman, even if it be not so logical, has this advantage over +the gospel according to Pangloss, that it does not utterly +disregard the existence of temporal evil. Whitman accepts +the fact of disease and wretchedness like an honest man; and +instead of trying to qualify it in the interest of his optimism, +sets himself to spur people up to be helpful. He expresses +a conviction, indeed, that all will be made up to the victims in +the end; that “what is untried and afterward” will +fail no one, not even “the old man who has lived without +purpose and feels it with bitterness worse than +gall.” But this is not to palliate our sense of what +is hard or melancholy in the present. Pangloss, smarting +under one of the worst things that ever was supposed to come from +America, consoled himself with the reflection that it was the +price we have to pay for cochineal. And with that murderous +parody, logical optimism and the praises of the best of possible +words went irrevocably out of season, and have been no more heard +of in the mouths of reasonable men. Whitman spares us all +allusions to the cochineal; he treats evil and sorrow in a spirit +almost as of welcome; as an old sea-dog might have welcomed the +sight of the enemy’s topsails off the Spanish Main. +There, at least, he seems to say, is something obvious to be +done. I do not know many better things in literature than +the brief pictures,—brief and vivid like things seen by +lightning,—with which he tries to stir up the world’s +heart upon the side of mercy. He braces us, on the one +hand, with examples of heroic duty and helpfulness; on the other, +he touches us with pitiful instances of people needing +help. He knows how to make the heart beat at a brave story; +to inflame us with just resentment over the hunted slave; to stop +our mouths for shame when he tells of the drunken +prostitute. For all the afflicted, all the weak, all the +wicked, a good word is said in a spirit which I can only call one +of ultra-Christianity; and however wild, however contradictory, +it may be in parts, this at least may be said for his book, as it +may be said of the Christian Gospels, that no one will read it, +however respectable, but he gets a knock upon his conscience; no +one however fallen, but he finds a kindly and supporting +welcome.</p> +<h3>IV.</h3> +<p>Nor has he been content with merely blowing the trumpet for +the battle of well-doing; he has given to his precepts the +authority of his own brave example. Naturally a grave, +believing man, with little or no sense of humour, he has +succeeded as well in life as in his printed performances. +The spirit that was in him has come forth most eloquently in his +actions. Many who have only read his poetry have been +tempted to set him down as an ass, or even as a charlatan; but I +never met any one who had known him personally who did not +profess a solid affection and respect for the man’s +character. He practises as he professes; he feels deeply +that Christian love for all men, that toleration, that cheerful +delight in serving others, which he often celebrates in +literature with a doubtful measure of success. And perhaps, +out of all his writings, the best and the most human and +convincing passages are to be found in “these soil’d +and creas’d little livraisons, each composed of a sheet or +two of paper, folded small to carry in the pocket, and fastened +with a pin,” which he scribbled during the war by the +bedsides of the wounded or in the excitement of great +events. They are hardly literature in the formal meaning of +the word; he has left his jottings for the most part as he made +them; a homely detail, a word from the lips of a dying soldier, a +business memorandum, the copy of a letter-short, straightforward +to the point, with none of the trappings of composition; but they +breathe a profound sentiment, they give us a vivid look at one of +the sides of life, and they make us acquainted with a man whom it +is an honour to love.</p> +<p>Whitman’s intense Americanism, his unlimited belief in +the future of These States (as, with reverential capitals, he +loves to call them), made the war a period of great trial to his +soul. The new virtue, Unionism, of which he is the sole +inventor, seemed to have fallen into premature +unpopularity. All that he loved, hoped, or hated, hung in +the balance. And the game of war was not only momentous to +him in its issues; it sublimated his spirit by its heroic +displays, and tortured him intimately by the spectacle of its +horrors. It was a theatre, it was a place of education, it +was like a season of religious revival. He watched Lincoln +going daily to his work; he studied and fraternised with young +soldiery passing to the front; above all, he walked the +hospitals, reading the Bible, distributing clean clothes, or +apples, or tobacco; a patient, helpful, reverend man, full of +kind speeches.</p> +<p>His memoranda of this period are almost bewildering to +read. From one point of view they seem those of a district +visitor; from another, they look like the formless jottings of an +artist in the picturesque. More than one woman, on whom I +tried the experiment, immediately claimed the writer for a +fellow-woman. More than one literary purist might identify +him as a shoddy newspaper correspondent without the necessary +faculty of style. And yet the story touches home; and if +you are of the weeping order of mankind, you will certainly find +your eyes fill with tears, of which you have no reason to be +ashamed. There is only one way to characterise a work of +this order, and that is to quote. Here is a passage from a +letter to a mother, unknown to Whitman, whose son died in +hospital:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Frank, as far as I saw, had everything +requisite in surgical treatment, nursing, etc. He had +watches much of the time. He was so good and well-behaved, +and affectionate, I myself liked him very much. I was in +the habit of coming in afternoons and sitting by him, and he +liked to have me—liked to put out his arm and lay his hand +on my knee—would keep it so a long while. Toward the +last he was more restless and flighty at night—often +fancied himself with his regiment—by his talk sometimes +seem’d as if his feelings were hurt by being blamed by his +officers for something he was entirely innocent of—said +‘I never in my life was thought capable of such a thing, +and never was.’ At other times he would fancy himself +talking as it seem’d to children or such like, his +relatives, I suppose, and giving them good advice; would talk to +them a long while. All the time he was out of his head not +one single bad word, or thought, or idea escaped him. It +was remark’d that many a man’s conversation in his +senses was not half so good as Frank’s delirium.</p> +<p>“He was perfectly willing to die—he had become +very weak, and had suffer’d a good deal, and was perfectly +resign’d, poor boy. I do not know his past life, but +I feel as if it must have been good. At any rate what I saw +of him here, under the most trying circumstances, with a painful +wound, and among strangers, I can say that he behaved so brave, +so composed, and so sweet and affectionate, it could not be +surpassed. And now, like many other noble and good men, +after serving his country as a soldier, he has yielded up his +young life at the very outset in her service. Such things +are gloomy—yet there is a text, ‘God doeth all things +well,’ the meaning of which, after due time, appears to the +soul.</p> +<p>“I thought perhaps a few words, though from a stranger, +about your son, from one who was with him at the last, might be +worth while, for I loved the young man, though I but saw him +immediately to lose him.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>It is easy enough to pick holes in the grammar of this letter, +but what are we to say of its profound goodness and +tenderness? It is written as though he had the +mother’s face before his eyes, and saw her wincing in the +flesh at every word. And what, again, are we to say of its +sober truthfulness, not exaggerating, not running to phrases, not +seeking to make a hero out of what was only an ordinary but good +and brave young man? Literary reticence is not +Whitman’s stronghold; and this reticence is not literary, +but humane; it is not that of a good artist but that of a good +man. He knew that what the mother wished to hear about was +Frank; and he told her about her Frank as he was.</p> +<h3>V.</h3> +<p>Something should be said of Whitman’s style, for style +is of the essence of thinking. And where a man is so +critically deliberate as our author, and goes solemnly about his +poetry for an ulterior end, every indication is worth +notice. He has chosen a rough, unrhymed, lyrical verse; +sometimes instinct with a fine processional movement; often so +rugged and careless that it can only be described by saying that +he has not taken the trouble to write prose. I believe +myself that it was selected principally because it was easy to +write, although not without recollections of the marching +measures of some of the prose in our English Old Testament. +According to Whitman, on the other hand, “the time has +arrived to essentially break down the barriers of form between +Prose and Poetry . . . for the most cogent purposes of those +great inland states, and for Texas, and California, and +Oregon;”—a statement which is among the happiest +achievements of American humour. He calls his verses +“recitatives,” in easily followed allusion to a +musical form. “Easily-written, loose-fingered +chords,” he cries, “I feel the thrum of your climax +and close.” Too often, I fear, he is the only one who +can perceive the rhythm; and in spite of Mr. Swinburne, a great +part of his work considered as verses is poor bald stuff. +Considered, not as verse, but as speech, a great part of it is +full of strange and admirable merits. The right detail is +seized; the right word, bold and trenchant, is thrust into its +place. Whitman has small regard to literary decencies, and +is totally free from literary timidities. He is neither +afraid of being slangy nor of being dull; nor, let me add, of +being ridiculous. The result is a most surprising compound +of plain grandeur, sentimental affectation, and downright +nonsense. It would be useless to follow his detractors and +give instances of how bad he can be at his worst; and perhaps it +would be not much wiser to give extracted specimens of how +happily he can write when he is at his best. These come in +to most advantage in their own place; owing something, it may be, +to the offset of their curious surroundings. And one thing +is certain, that no one can appreciate Whitman’s +excellences until he has grown accustomed to his faults. +Until you are content to pick poetry out of his pages almost as +you must pick it out of a Greek play in Bohn’s translation, +your gravity will be continually upset, your ears perpetually +disappointed, and the whole book will be no more to you than a +particularly flagrant production by the Poet Close.</p> +<p>A writer of this uncertain quality was, perhaps, unfortunate +in taking for thesis the beauty of the world as it now is, not +only on the hill-tops but in the factory; not only by the harbour +full of stately ships, but in the magazine of the hopelessly +prosaic hatter. To show beauty in common things is the work +of the rarest tact. It is not to be done by the +wishing. It is easy to posit as a theory, but to bring it +home to men’s minds is the problem of literature, and is +only accomplished by rare talent, and in comparatively rare +instances. To bid the whole world stand and deliver, with a +dogma in one’s right hand by way of pistol; to cover reams +of paper in a galloping, headstrong vein; to cry louder and +louder over everything as it comes up, and make no distinction in +one’s enthusiasm over the most incomparable matters; to +prove one’s entire want of sympathy for the jaded, literary +palate, by calling, not a spade a spade, but a hatter a hatter, +in a lyrical apostrophe;—this, in spite of all the airs of +inspiration, is not the way to do it. It may be very wrong, +and very wounding to a respectable branch of industry, but the +word “hatter” cannot be used seriously in emotional +verse; not to understand this, is to have no literary tact; and I +would, for his own sake, that this were the only inadmissible +expression with which Whitman had bedecked his pages. The +book teems with similar comicalities; and, to a reader who is +determined to take it from that side only, presents a perfect +carnival of fun.</p> +<p>A good deal of this is the result of theory playing its usual +vile trick upon the artist. It is because he is a Democrat +that Whitman must have in the hatter. If you may say +Admiral, he reasons, why may you not say Hatter? One man is +as good as another, and it is the business of the “great +poet” to show poetry in the life of the one as well as the +other. A most incontrovertible sentiment surely, and one +which nobody would think of controverting, where—and here +is the point—where any beauty has been shown. But +how, where that is not the case? where the hatter is simply +introduced, as God made him and as his fellow-men have miscalled +him, at the crisis of a high-flown rhapsody? And what are +we to say, where a man of Whitman’s notable capacity for +putting things in a bright, picturesque, and novel way, simply +gives up the attempt, and indulges, with apparent exultation, in +an inventory of trades or implements, with no more colour or +coherence than so many index-words out of a dictionary? I +do not know that we can say anything, but that it is a +prodigiously amusing exhibition for a line or so. The worst +of it is, that Whitman must have known better. The man is a +great critic, and, so far as I can make out, a good one; and how +much criticism does it require to know that capitulation is not +description, or that fingering on a dumb keyboard, with whatever +show of sentiment and execution, is not at all the same thing as +discoursing music? I wish I could believe he was quite +honest with us; but, indeed, who was ever quite honest who wrote +a book for a purpose? It is a flight beyond the reach of +human magnanimity.</p> +<p>One other point, where his means failed him, must be touched +upon, however shortly. In his desire to accept all facts +loyally and simply, it fell within his programme to speak at some +length and with some plainness on what is, for I really do not +know what reason, the most delicate of subjects. Seeing in +that one of the most serious and interesting parts of life, he +was aggrieved that it should be looked upon as ridiculous or +shameful. No one speaks of maternity with his tongue in his +cheek; and Whitman made a bold push to set the sanctity of +fatherhood beside the sanctity of motherhood, and introduce this +also among the things that can be spoken of without either a +blush or a wink. But the Philistines have been too strong; +and, to say truth, Whitman has rather played the fool. We +may be thoroughly conscious that his end is improving; that it +would be a good thing if a window were opened on these close +privacies of life; that on this subject, as on all others, he now +and then lets fall a pregnant saying. But we are not +satisfied. We feel that he was not the man for so difficult +an enterprise. He loses our sympathy in the character of a +poet by attracting too much of our attention in that of a Bull in +a China Shop. And where, by a little more art, we might +have been solemnised ourselves, it is too often Whitman alone who +is solemn in the face of an audience somewhat indecorously +amused.</p> +<h3>VI.</h3> +<p>Lastly, as most important, after all, to human beings in our +disputable state, what is that higher prudence which was to be +the aim and issue of these deliberate productions?</p> +<p>Whitman is too clever to slip into a succinct formula. +If he could have adequately said his say in a single proverb, it +is to be presumed he would not have put himself to the trouble of +writing several volumes. It was his programme to state as +much as he could of the world with all its contradictions, and +leave the upshot with God who planned it. What he has made +of the world and the world’s meanings is to be found at +large in his poems. These altogether give his answers to +the problems of belief and conduct; in many ways righteous and +high-spirited, in some ways loose and contradictory. And +yet there are two passages from the preface to the <i>Leaves of +Grass</i> which do pretty well condense his teaching on all +essential points, and yet preserve a measure of his spirit.</p> +<blockquote><p>“This is what you shall do,” he says +in the one, “love the earth, and sun, and animals, despise +riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid +and crazy, devote your income and labour to others, hate tyrants, +argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence towards +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 mothers of families, read these +leaves (his own works) 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, and dismiss whatever insults your own +soul.”</p> +<p>“The prudence of the greatest poet,” he adds in +the other—and the greatest poet is, of course, +himself—“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 +it 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 long-lived +things, and favours body and soul the same, and perceives the +indirect surely 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 nor avoids +death.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>There is much that is Christian in these extracts, startlingly +Christian. Any reader who bears in mind Whitman’s own +advice and “dismisses whatever insults his own soul” +will find plenty that is bracing, brightening, and chastening to +reward him for a little patience at first. It seems hardly +possible that any being should get evil from so healthy a book as +the <i>Leaves of Grass</i>, which is simply comical wherever it +falls short of nobility; but if there be any such, who cannot +both take and leave, who cannot let a single opportunity pass by +without some unworthy and unmanly thought, I should have as great +difficulty, and neither more nor less, in recommending the works +of Whitman as in lending them Shakespeare, or letting them go +abroad outside of the grounds of a private asylum.</p> +<h2><a name="page129"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +129</span>HENRY DAVID THOREAU:<br /> +HIS CHARACTER AND OPINIONS.</h2> +<h3>I.</h3> +<p><span class="smcap">Thoreau’s</span> thin, penetrating, +big-nosed face, even in a bad woodcut, conveys some hint of the +limitations of his mind and character. With his almost acid +sharpness of insight, with his almost animal dexterity in act, +there went none of that large, unconscious geniality of the +world’s heroes. He was not easy, not ample, not +urbane, not even kind; his enjoyment was hardly smiling, or the +smile was not broad enough to be convincing; he had no waste +lands nor kitchen-midden in his nature, but was all improved and +sharpened to a point. “He was bred to no +profession,” says Emerson; “he never married; he +lived alone; he never went to church; he never voted; he refused +to pay a tax to the State; he ate no flesh, he drank no wine, he +never knew the use of tobacco and, though a naturalist, he used +neither trap nor gun. When asked at dinner what dish he +preferred, he answered, ‘the nearest.’” +So many negative superiorities begin to smack a little of the +prig. From his later works he was in the habit of cutting +out the humorous passages, under the impression that they were +beneath the dignity of his moral muse; and there we see the prig +stand public and confessed. It was “much +easier,” says Emerson acutely, much easier for Thoreau to +say <i>no</i> than <i>yes</i>; and that is a characteristic which +depicts the man. It is a useful accomplishment to be able +to say <i>no</i>, but surely it is the essence of amiability to +prefer to say <i>yes</i> where it is possible. There is +something wanting in the man who does not hate himself whenever +he is constrained to say no. And there was a great deal +wanting in this born dissenter. He was almost shockingly +devoid of weaknesses; he had not enough of them to be truly polar +with humanity; whether you call him demi-god or demi-man, he was +at least not altogether one of us, for he was not touched with a +feeling of our infirmities. The world’s heroes have +room for all positive qualities, even those which are +disreputable, in the capacious theatre of their +dispositions. Such can live many lives; while a Thoreau can +live but one, and that only with perpetual foresight.</p> +<p>He was no ascetic, rather an Epicurean of the nobler sort; and +he had this one great merit, that he succeeded so far as to be +happy. “I love my fate to the core and rind,” +he wrote once; and even while he lay dying, here is what he +dictated (for it seems he was already too feeble to control the +pen): “You ask particularly after my health. I +<i>suppose</i> that I have not many months to live, but of course +know nothing about it. I may say that I am enjoying +existence as much as ever, and regret nothing.” It is +not given to all to bear so clear a testimony to the sweetness of +their fate, nor to any without courage and wisdom; for this world +in itself is but a painful and uneasy place of residence, and +lasting happiness, at least to the self-conscious, comes only +from within. Now Thoreau’s content and ecstasy in +living was, we may say, like a plant that he had watered and +tended with womanish solicitude; for there is apt to be something +unmanly, something almost dastardly, in a life that does not move +with dash and freedom, and that fears the bracing contact of the +world. In one word, Thoreau was a skulker. He did not +wish virtue to go out of him among his fellow-men, but slunk into +a corner to hoard it for himself. He left all for the sake +of certain virtuous self-indulgences. It is true that his +tastes were noble; that his ruling passion was to keep himself +unspotted from the world; and that his luxuries were all of the +same healthy order as cold tubs and early rising. But a man +may be both coldly cruel in the pursuit of goodness, and morbid +even in the pursuit of health. I cannot lay my hands on the +passage in which he explains his abstinence from tea and coffee, +but I am sure I have the meaning correctly. It is this; He +thought it bad economy and worthy of no true virtuoso to spoil +the natural rapture of the morning with such muddy stimulants; +let him but see the sun rise, and he was already sufficiently +inspirited for the labours of the day. That may be reason +good enough to abstain from tea; but when we go on to find the +same man, on the same or similar grounds, abstain from nearly +everything that his neighbours innocently and pleasurably use, +and from the rubs and trials of human society itself into the +bargain, we recognise that valetudinarian healthfulness which is +more delicate than sickness itself. We need have no respect +for a state of artificial training. True health is to be +able to do without it. Shakespeare, we can imagine, might +begin the day upon a quart of ale, and yet enjoy the sunrise to +the full as much as Thoreau, and commemorate his enjoyment in +vastly better verses. A man who must separate himself from +his neighbours’ habits in order to be happy, is in much the +same case with one who requires to take opium for the same +purpose. What we want to see is one who can breast into the +world, do a man’s work, and still preserve his first and +pure enjoyment of existence.</p> +<p>Thoreau’s faculties were of a piece with his moral +shyness; for they were all delicacies. He could guide +himself about the woods on the darkest night by the touch of his +feet. He could pick up at once an exact dozen of pencils by +the feeling, pace distances with accuracy, and gauge cubic +contents by the eye. His smell was so dainty that he could +perceive the fœtor of dwelling-houses as he passed them by +at night; his palate so unsophisticated that, like a child, he +disliked the taste of wine—or perhaps, living in America, +had never tasted any that was good; and his knowledge of nature +was so complete and curious that he could have told the time of +year, within a day or so, by the aspect of the plants. In +his dealings with animals, he was the original of +Hawthorne’s Donatello. He pulled the woodchuck out of its +hole by the tail; the hunted fox came to him for protection; wild +squirrels have been seen to nestle in his waistcoat; he would +thrust his arm into a pool and bring forth a bright, panting +fish, lying undismayed in the palm of his hand. There were +few things that he could not do. He could make a house, a +boat, a pencil, or a book. He was a surveyor, a scholar, a +natural historian. He could run, walk, climb, skate, swim, +and manage a boat. The smallest occasion served to display +his physical accomplishment; and a manufacturer, from merely +observing his dexterity with the window of a railway carriage, +offered him a situation on the spot. “The only fruit +of much living,” he observes, “is the ability to do +some slight thing better.” But such was the +exactitude of his senses, so alive was he in every fibre, that it +seems as if the maxim should be changed in his case, for he could +do most things with unusual perfection. And perhaps he had +an approving eye to himself when he wrote: “Though the +youth at last grows indifferent, the laws of the universe are not +indifferent, <i>but are for ever on the side of the most +sensitive</i>.”</p> +<h3>II.</h3> +<p>Thoreau had decided, it would seem, from the very first to +lead a life of self-improvement: the needle did not tremble as +with richer natures, but pointed steadily north; and as he saw +duty and inclination in one, he turned all his strength in that +direction. He was met upon the threshold by a common +difficulty. In this world, in spite of its many agreeable +features, even the most sensitive must undergo some drudgery to +live. It is not possible to devote your time to study and +meditation without what are quaintly but happily denominated +private means; these absent, a man must contrive to earn his +bread by some service to the public such as the public cares to +pay him for; or, as Thoreau loved to put it, Apollo must serve +Admetus. This was to Thoreau even a sourer necessity than +it is to most; there was a love of freedom, a strain of the wild +man, in his nature, that rebelled with violence against the yoke +of custom; and he was so eager to cultivate himself and to be +happy in his own society, that he could consent with difficulty +even to the interruptions of friendship. “<i>Such are +my engagements to myself</i> that I dare not promise,” he +once wrote in answer to an invitation; and the italics are his +own. Marcus Aurelius found time to study virtue, and +between whiles to conduct the imperial affairs of Rome; but +Thoreau is so busy improving himself, that he must think twice +about a morning call. And now imagine him condemned for +eight hours a day to some uncongenial and unmeaning +business! He shrank from the very look of the mechanical in +life; all should, if possible, be sweetly spontaneous and +swimmingly progressive. Thus he learned to make +lead-pencils, and, when he had gained the best certificate and +his friends began to congratulate him on his establishment in +life, calmly announced that he should never make another. +“Why should I?” said he “I would not do again +what I have done once.” For when a thing has once +been done as well as it wants to be, it is of no further interest +to the self-improver. Yet in after years, and when it +became needful to support his family, he returned patiently to +this mechanical art—a step more than worthy of himself.</p> +<p>The pencils seem to have been Apollo’s first experiment +in the service of Admetus; but others followed. “I +have thoroughly tried school-keeping,” he writes, +“and found that my expenses were in proportion, or rather +out of proportion, to my income; for I was obliged to dress and +train, not to say think and believe, accordingly, and I lost my +time into the bargain. As I did not teach for the benefit +of my fellow-men, but simply for a livelihood, this was a +failure. I have tried trade, but I found that it would take +ten years to get under way in that, and that then I should +probably be on my way to the devil.” Nothing, indeed, +can surpass his scorn for all so-called business. Upon that +subject gall squirts from him at a touch. “The whole +enterprise of this nation is not illustrated by a thought,” +he writes; “it is not warmed by a sentiment; there is +nothing in it for which a man should lay down his life, nor even +his gloves.” And again: “If our merchants did +not most of them fail, and the banks too, my faith in the old +laws of this world would be staggered. The statement that +ninety-six in a hundred doing such business surely break down is +perhaps the sweetest fact that statistics have +revealed.” The wish was probably father to the +figures; but there is something enlivening in a hatred of so +genuine a brand, hot as Corsican revenge, and sneering like +Voltaire.</p> +<p>Pencils, school-keeping, and trade being thus discarded one +after another, Thoreau, with a stroke of strategy, turned the +position. He saw his way to get his board and lodging for +practically nothing; and Admetus never got less work out of any +servant since the world began. It was his ambition to be an +oriental philosopher; but he was always a very Yankee sort of +oriental. Even in the peculiar attitude in which he stood +to money, his system of personal economics, as we may call it, he +displayed a vast amount of truly down-East calculation, and he +adopted poverty like a piece of business. Yet his system is +based on one or two ideas which, I believe, come naturally to all +thoughtful youths, and are only pounded out of them by city +uncles. Indeed, something essentially youthful +distinguishes all Thoreau’s knock-down blows at current +opinion. Like the posers of a child, they leave the +orthodox in a kind of speechless agony. These know the +thing is nonsense. They are sure there must be an answer, +yet somehow cannot find it. So it is with his system of +economy. He cuts through the subject on so new a plane that +the accepted arguments apply no longer; he attacks it in a new +dialect where there are no catchwords ready made for the +defender; after you have been boxing for years on a polite, +gladiatorial convention, here is an assailant who does not +scruple to hit below the belt.</p> +<p>“The cost of a thing,” says he, “is <i>the +amount of what I will call life</i> which is required to be +exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run.” I +have been accustomed to put it to myself, perhaps more clearly, +that the price we have to pay for money is paid in liberty. +Between these two ways of it, at least, the reader will probably +not fail to find a third definition of his own; and it follows, +on one or other, that a man may pay too dearly for his +livelihood, by giving, in Thoreau’s terms, his whole life +for it, or, in mine, bartering for it the whole of his available +liberty, and becoming a slave till death. There are two +questions to be considered—the quality of what we buy, and +the price we have to pay for it. Do you want a thousand a +year, a two thousand a year, or a ten thousand a year livelihood? +and can you afford the one you want? It is a matter of +taste; it is not in the least degree a question of duty, though +commonly supposed so. But there is no authority for that +view anywhere. It is nowhere in the Bible. It is true +that we might do a vast amount of good if we were wealthy, but it +is also highly improbable; not many do; and the art of growing +rich is not only quite distinct from that of doing good, but the +practice of the one does not at all train a man for practising +the other. “Money might be of great service to +me,” writes Thoreau; “but the difficulty now is that +I do not improve my opportunities, and therefore I am not +prepared to have my opportunities increased.” It is a +mere illusion that, above a certain income, the personal desires +will be satisfied and leave a wider margin for the generous +impulse. It is as difficult to be generous, or anything +else, except perhaps a member of Parliament, on thirty thousand +as on two hundred a year.</p> +<p>Now Thoreau’s tastes were well defined. He loved +to be free, to be master of his times and seasons, to indulge the +mind rather than the body; he preferred long rambles to rich +dinners, his own reflections to the consideration of society, and +an easy, calm, unfettered, active life among green trees to dull +toiling at the counter of a bank. And such being his +inclination he determined to gratify it. A poor man must +save off something; he determined to save off his +livelihood. “When a man has attained those things +which are necessary to life,” he writes, “there is +another alternative than to obtain the superfluities; <i>he may +adventure on life now</i>, his vacation from humbler toil having +commenced.” Thoreau would get shelter, some kind of +covering for his body, and necessary daily bread; even these he +should get as cheaply as possible; and then, his vacation from +humbler toil having commenced, devote himself to oriental +philosophers, the study of nature, and the work of +self-improvement.</p> +<p>Prudence, which bids us all go to the ant for wisdom and hoard +against the day of sickness, was not a favourite with +Thoreau. He preferred that other, whose name is so much +misappropriated: Faith. When he had secured the necessaries +of the moment, he would not reckon up possible accidents or +torment himself with trouble for the future. He had no +toleration for the man “who ventures to live only by the +aid of the mutual insurance company, which has promised to bury +him decently.” He would trust himself a little to the +world. “We may safely trust a good deal more than we +do,” says he. “How much is not done by us! or +what if we had been taken sick?” And then, with a +stab of satire, he describes contemporary mankind in a phrase: +“All the day long on the alert, at night we unwillingly say +our prayers and commit ourselves to uncertainties.” +It is not likely that the public will be much affected by +Thoreau, when they blink the direct injunctions of the religion +they profess; and yet, whether we will or no, we make the same +hazardous ventures; we back our own health and the honesty of our +neighbours for all that we are worth; and it is chilling to think +how many must lose their wager.</p> +<p>In 1845, twenty-eight years old, an age by which the liveliest +have usually declined into some conformity with the world, +Thoreau, with a capital of something less than five pounds and a +borrowed axe, walked forth into the woods by Walden Pond, and +began his new experiment in life. He built himself a +dwelling, and returned the axe, he says with characteristic and +workman-like pride, sharper than when he borrowed it; he +reclaimed a patch, where he cultivated beans, peas, potatoes, and +sweet corn; he had his bread to bake, his farm to dig, and for +the matter of six weeks in the summer he worked at surveying, +carpentry, or some other of his numerous dexterities, for +hire.</p> +<p>For more than five years, this was all that he required to do +for his support, and he had the winter and most of the summer at +his entire disposal. For six weeks of occupation, a little +cooking and a little gentle hygienic gardening, the man, you may +say, had as good as stolen his livelihood. Or we must +rather allow that he had done far better; for the thief himself +is continually and busily occupied; and even one born to inherit +a million will have more calls upon his time than Thoreau. +Well might he say, “What old people tell you you cannot do, +you try and find you can.” And how surprising is his +conclusion: “I am convinced that <i>to maintain oneself on +this earth is not a hardship</i>, <i>but a pastime</i>, if we +will live simply and wisely; <i>as the pursuits of simpler +nations are still the sports of the more +artificial</i>.”</p> +<p>When he had enough of that kind of life, he showed the same +simplicity in giving it up as in beginning it. There are +some who could have done the one, but, vanity forbidding, not the +other; and that is perhaps the story of the hermits; but Thoreau +made no fetish of his own example, and did what he wanted +squarely. And five years is long enough for an experiment +and to prove the success of transcendental Yankeeism. It is +not his frugality which is worthy of note; for, to begin with, +that was inborn, and therefore inimitable by others who are +differently constituted; and again, it was no new thing, but has +often been equalled by poor Scotch students at the +universities. The point is the sanity of his view of life, +and the insight with which he recognised the position of money, +and thought out for himself the problem of riches and a +livelihood. Apart from his eccentricities, he had +perceived, and was acting on, a truth of universal +application. For money enters in two different characters +into the scheme of life. A certain amount, varying with the +number and empire of our desires, is a true necessary to each one +of us in the present order of society; but beyond that amount, +money is a commodity to be bought or not to be bought, a luxury +in which we may either indulge or stint ourselves, like any +other. And there are many luxuries that we may legitimately +prefer to it, such as a grateful conscience, a country life, or +the woman of our inclination. Trite, flat, and obvious as +this conclusion may appear, we have only to look round us in +society to see how scantily it has been recognised; and perhaps +even ourselves, after a little reflection, may decide to spend a +trifle less for money, and indulge ourselves a trifle more in the +article of freedom.</p> +<h3>III.</h3> +<p>“To have done anything by which you earned money +merely,” says Thoreau, “is to be” (have been, +he means) “idle and worse.” There are two +passages in his letters, both, oddly enough, relating to +firewood, which must be brought together to be rightly +understood. So taken, they contain between them the marrow +of all good sense on the subject of work in its relation to +something broader than mere livelihood. Here is the first: +“I suppose I have burned up a good-sized tree +to-night—and for what? I settled with Mr. Tarbell for +it the other day; but that wasn’t the final +settlement. I got off cheaply from him. At last one +will say: ‘Let us see, how much wood did you burn, +sir?’ And I shall shudder to think that the next +question will be, ‘What did you do while you were +warm?’” Even after we have settled with Admetus +in the person of Mr. Tarbell, there comes, you see, a further +question. It is not enough to have earned our +livelihood. Either the earning itself should have been +serviceable to mankind, or something else must follow. To +live is sometimes very difficult, but it is never meritorious in +itself; and we must have a reason to allege to our own conscience +why we should continue to exist upon this crowded earth.</p> +<p>If Thoreau had simply dwelt in his house at Walden, a lover of +trees, birds, and fishes, and the open air and virtue, a reader +of wise books, an idle, selfish self-improver, he would have +managed to cheat Admetus, but, to cling to metaphor, the devil +would have had him in the end. Those who can avoid toil +altogether and dwell in the Arcadia of private means, and even +those who can, by abstinence, reduce the necessary amount of it +to some six weeks a year, having the more liberty, have only the +higher moral obligation to be up and doing in the interest of +man.</p> +<p>The second passage is this: “There is a far more +important and warming heat, commonly lost, which precedes the +burning of the wood. It is the smoke of industry, which is +incense. I had been so thoroughly warmed in body and +spirit, that when at length my fuel was housed, I came near +selling it to the ashman, as if I had extracted all its +heat.” Industry is, in itself and when properly +chosen, delightful and profitable to the worker; and when your +toil has been a pleasure, you have not, as Thoreau says, +“earned money merely,” but money, health, delight, +and moral profit, all in one. “We must heap up a +great pile of doing for a small diameter of being,” he says +in another place; and then exclaims, “How admirably the +artist is made to accomplish his self-culture by devotion to his +art!” We may escape uncongenial toil, only to devote +ourselves to that which is congenial. It is only to +transact some higher business that even Apollo dare play the +truant from Admetus. We must all work for the sake of work; +we must all work, as Thoreau says again, in any “absorbing +pursuit—it does not much matter what, so it be +honest;” but the most profitable work is that which +combines into one continued effort the largest proportion of the +powers and desires of a man’s nature; that into which he +will plunge with ardour, and from which he will desist with +reluctance; in which he will know the weariness of fatigue, but +not that of satiety; and which will be ever fresh, pleasing, and +stimulating to his taste. Such work holds a man together, +braced at all points; it does not suffer him to doze or wander; +it keeps him actively conscious of himself, yet raised among +superior interests; it gives him the profit of industry with the +pleasures of a pastime. This is what his art should be to +the true artist, and that to a degree unknown in other and less +intimate pursuits. For other professions stand apart from +the human business of life; but an art has its seat at the centre +of the artist’s doings and sufferings, deals directly with +his experiences, teaches him the lessons of his own fortunes and +mishaps, and becomes a part of his biography. So says +Goethe:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Spät erklingt was früh +erklang;<br /> +Glück und Unglück wird Gesang.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Now Thoreau’s art was literature; and it was one of +which he had conceived most ambitiously. He loved and +believed in good books. He said well, “Life is not +habitually seen from any common platform so truly and +unexaggerated as in the light of literature.” But the +literature he loved was of the heroic order. “Books, +not which afford us a cowering enjoyment, but in which each +thought is of unusual daring; such as an idle man cannot read, +and a timid one would not be entertained by, which even make us +dangerous to existing institutions—such I call good +books.” He did not think them easy to be read. +“The heroic books,” he says, “even if printed +in the character of our mother-tongue, will always be in a +language dead to degenerate times; and we must laboriously seek +the meaning of each word and line, conjecturing a larger sense +than common use permits out of what wisdom and valour and +generosity we have.” Nor does he suppose that such +books are easily written. “Great prose, of equal +elevation, commands our respect more than great verse,” +says he, “since it implies a more permanent and level +height, a life more pervaded with the grandeur of the +thought. The poet often only makes an irruption, like the +Parthian, and is off again, shooting while he retreats; but the +prose writer has conquered like a Roman and settled +colonies.” We may ask ourselves, almost with dismay, +whether such works exist at all but in the imagination of the +student. For the bulk of the best of books is apt to be +made up with ballast; and those in which energy of thought is +combined with any stateliness of utterance may be almost counted +on the fingers. Looking round in English for a book that +should answer Thoreau’s two demands of a style like poetry +and sense that shall be both original and inspiriting, I come to +Milton’s <i>Areopagitica</i>, and can name no other +instance for the moment. Two things at least are plain: +that if a man will condescend to nothing more commonplace in the +way of reading, he must not look to have a large library; and +that if he proposes himself to write in a similar vein, he will +find his work cut out for him.</p> +<p>Thoreau composed seemingly while he walked, or at least +exercise and composition were with him intimately connected; for +we are told that “the length of his walk uniformly made the +length of his writing.” He speaks in one place of +“plainness and vigour, the ornaments of style,” which +is rather too paradoxical to be comprehensively, true.</p> +<p>In another he remarks: “As for style of writing, if one +has anything to say it drops from him simply as a stone falls to +the ground.” We must conjecture a very large sense +indeed for the phrase “if one has anything to +say.” When truth flows from a man, fittingly clothed +in style and without conscious effort, it is because the effort +has been made and the work practically completed before he sat +down to write. It is only out of fulness of thinking that +expression drops perfect like a ripe fruit; and when Thoreau +wrote so nonchalantly at his desk, it was because he had been +vigorously active during his walk. For neither clearness +compression, nor beauty of language, come to any living creature +till after a busy and a prolonged acquaintance with the subject +on hand. Easy writers are those who, like Walter Scott, +choose to remain contented with a less degree of perfection than +is legitimately within the compass of their powers. We hear +of Shakespeare and his clean manuscript; but in face of the +evidence of the style itself and of the various editions of +<i>Hamlet</i>, this merely proves that Messrs. Hemming and +Condell were unacquainted with the common enough phenomenon +called a fair copy. He who would recast a tragedy already +given to the world must frequently and earnestly have revised +details in the study. Thoreau himself, and in spite of his +protestations, is an instance of even extreme research in one +direction; and his effort after heroic utterance is proved not +only by the occasional finish, but by the determined exaggeration +of his style. “I trust you realise what an +exaggerator I am—that I lay myself out to +exaggerate,” he writes. And again, hinting at the +explanation: “Who that has heard a strain of music feared +lest he should speak extravagantly any more for +ever?” And yet once more, in his essay on Carlyle, +and this time with his meaning well in hand: “No truth, we +think, was ever expressed but with this sort of emphasis, that +for the time there seemed to be no other.” Thus +Thoreau was an exaggerative and a parabolical writer, not because +he loved the literature of the East, but from a desire that +people should understand and realise what he was writing. +He was near the truth upon the general question; but in his own +particular method, it appears to me, he wandered. +Literature is not less a conventional art than painting or +sculpture; and it is the least striking, as it is the most +comprehensive of the three. To hear a strain of music to +see a beautiful woman, a river, a great city, or a starry night, +is to make a man despair of his Lilliputian arts in +language. Now, to gain that emphasis which seems denied to +us by the very nature of the medium, the proper method of +literature is by selection, which is a kind of negative +exaggeration. It is the right of the literary artist, as +Thoreau was on the point of seeing, to leave out whatever does +not suit his purpose. Thus we extract the pure gold; and +thus the well-written story of a noble life becomes, by its very +omissions, more thrilling to the reader. But to go beyond +this, like Thoreau, and to exaggerate directly, is to leave the +saner classical tradition, and to put the reader on his +guard. And when you write the whole for the half, you do +not express your thought more forcibly, but only express a +different thought which is not yours.</p> +<p>Thoreau’s true subject was the pursuit of +self-improvement combined with an unfriendly criticism of life as +it goes on in our societies; it is there that he best displays +the freshness and surprising trenchancy of his intellect; it is +there that his style becomes plain and vigorous, and therefore, +according to his own formula, ornamental. Yet he did not +care to follow this vein singly, but must drop into it by the way +in books of a different purport. <i>Walden</i>, <i>or Life +in the Woods</i>, <i>A Week on the Concord and Merrimack +Rivers</i>, <i>The Maine Woods</i>,—such are the titles he +affects. He was probably reminded by his delicate critical +perception that the true business of literature is with +narrative; in reasoned narrative, and there alone, that art +enjoys all its advantages, and suffers least from its +defects. Dry precept and disembodied disquisition, as they +can only be read with an effort of abstraction, can never convey +a perfectly complete or a perfectly natural impression. +Truth, even in literature, must be clothed with flesh and blood, +or it cannot tell its whole story to the reader. Hence the +effect of anecdote on simple minds; and hence good biographies +and works of high, imaginative art, are not only far more +entertaining, but far more edifying, than books of theory or +precept. Now Thoreau could not clothe his opinions in the +garment of art, for that was not his talent; but he sought to +gain the same elbow-room for himself, and to afford a similar +relief to his readers, by mingling his thoughts with a record of +experience.</p> +<p>Again, he was a lover of nature. The quality which we +should call mystery in a painting, and which belongs so +particularly to the aspect of the external world and to its +influence upon our feelings, was one which he was never weary of +attempting to reproduce in his books. The seeming +significance of nature’s appearances, their unchanging +strangeness to the senses, and the thrilling response which they +waken in the mind of man, continued to surprise and stimulate his +spirits. It appeared to him, I think, that if we could only +write near enough to the facts, and yet with no pedestrian calm, +but ardently, we might transfer the glamour of reality direct +upon our pages; and that, if it were once thus captured and +expressed, a new and instructive relation might appear between +men’s thoughts and the phenomena of nature. This was +the eagle that he pursued all his life long, like a schoolboy +with a butterfly net. Hear him to a friend: “Let me +suggest a theme for you—to state to yourself precisely and +completely what that walk over the mountains amounted to for you, +returning to this essay again and again until you are satisfied +that all that was important in your experience is in it. +Don’t suppose that you can tell it precisely the first +dozen times you try, but at ’em again; especially when, +after a sufficient pause you suspect that you are touching the +heart or summit of the matter, reiterate your blows there, and +account for the mountain to yourself. Not that the story +need be long, but it will take a long while to make it +short.” Such was the method, not consistent for a man +whose meanings were to “drop from him as a stone falls to +the ground.” Perhaps the most successful work that +Thoreau ever accomplished in this direction is to be found in the +passages relating to fish in the <i>Week</i>. These are +remarkable for a vivid truth of impression and a happy +suitability of language, not frequently surpassed.</p> +<p>Whatever Thoreau tried to do was tried in fair, square prose, +with sentences solidly built, and no help from bastard +rhythms. Moreover, there is a progression—I cannot +call it a progress—in his work towards a more and more +strictly prosaic level, until at last he sinks into the bathos of +the prosy. Emerson mentions having once remarked to +Thoreau: “Who would not like to write something which all +can read, like <i>Robinson Crusoe</i>? and who does not see with +regret that his page is not solid with a right materialistic +treatment which delights everybody?” I must say in +passing that it is not the right materialistic treatment which +delights the world in <i>Robinson</i>, but the romantic and +philosophic interest of the fable. The same treatment does +quite the reverse of delighting us when it is applied, in +<i>Colonel Jack</i>, to the management of a plantation. But +I cannot help suspecting Thoreau to have been influenced either +by this identical remark or by some other closely similar in +meaning. He began to fall more and more into a detailed +materialistic treatment; he went into the business doggedly, as +one who should make a guide-book; he not only chronicled what had +been important in his own experience, but whatever might have +been important in the experience of anybody else; not only what +had affected him, but all that he saw or heard. His ardour +had grown less, or perhaps it was inconsistent with a right +materialistic treatment to display such emotions as he felt; and, +to complete the eventful change, he chose, from a sense of moral +dignity, to gut these later works of the saving quality of +humour. He was not one of those authors who have learned, +in his own words, “to leave out their dulness.” +He inflicts his full quantity upon the reader in such books as +<i>Cape Cod</i>, or <i>The Yankee in Canada</i>. Of the +latter he confessed that he had not managed to get much of +himself into it. Heaven knows he had not, nor yet much of +Canada, we may hope. “Nothing,” he says +somewhere, “can shock a brave man but dulness.” +Well, there are few spots more shocking to the brave than the +pages of <i>The Yankee in Canada</i>.</p> +<p>There are but three books of his that will be read with much +pleasure: the <i>Week</i>, <i>Walden</i>, and the collected +letters. As to his poetry, Emerson’s word shall +suffice for us, it is so accurate and so prettily said: +“The thyme and majoram are not yet honey.” In +this, as in his prose, he relied greatly on the goodwill of the +reader, and wrote throughout in faith. It was an exercise +of faith to suppose that many would understand the sense of his +best work, or that any could be exhilarated by the dreary +chronicling of his worst. “But,” as he says, +“the gods do not hear any rude or discordant sound, as we +learn from the echo; and I know that the nature towards which I +launch these sounds is so rich that it will modulate anew and +wonderfully improve my rudest strain.”</p> +<h3>IV.</h3> +<p>“What means the fact,” he cries, “that a +soul which has lost all hope for itself can inspire in another +listening soul such an infinite confidence in it, even while it +is expressing its despair?” The question is an echo +and an illustration of the words last quoted; and it forms the +key-note of his thoughts on friendship. No one else, to my +knowledge, has spoken in so high and just a spirit of the kindly +relations; and I doubt whether it be a drawback that these +lessons should come from one in many ways so unfitted to be a +teacher in this branch. The very coldness and egoism of his +own intercourse gave him a clearer insight into the intellectual +basis of our warm, mutual tolerations; and testimony to their +worth comes with added force from one who was solitary and +disobliging, and of whom a friend remarked, with equal wit and +wisdom, “I love Henry, but I cannot like him.”</p> +<p>He can hardly be persuaded to make any distinction between +love and friendship; in such rarefied and freezing air, upon the +mountain-tops of meditation, had he taught himself to +breathe. He was, indeed, too accurate an observer not to +have remarked that “there exists already a natural +disinterestedness and liberality” between men and women; +yet, he thought, “friendship is no respecter of +sex.” Perhaps there is a sense in which the words are +true; but they were spoken in ignorance; and perhaps we shall +have put the matter most correctly, if we call love a foundation +for a nearer and freer degree of friendship than can be possible +without it. For there are delicacies, eternal between +persons of the same sex, which are melted and disappear in the +warmth of love.</p> +<p>To both, if they are to be right, he attributes the same +nature and condition. “We are not what we are,” +says he, “nor do we treat or esteem each other for such, +but for what we are capable of being.” “A +friend is one who incessantly pays us the compliment of expecting +all the virtues from us, and who can appreciate them in +us.” “The friend asks no return but that his +friend will religiously accept and wear and not disgrace his +apotheosis of him.” “It is the merit and +preservation of friendship that it takes place on a level higher +than the actual characters of the parties would seem to +warrant.” This is to put friendship on a pedestal +indeed; and yet the root of the matter is there; and the last +sentence, in particular, is like a light in a dark place, and +makes many mysteries plain. We are different with different +friends; yet if we look closely we shall find that every such +relation reposes on some particular apotheosis of oneself; with +each friend, although we could not distinguish it in words from +any other, we have at least one special reputation to preserve: +and it is thus that we run, when mortified, to our friend or the +woman that we love, not to hear ourselves called better, but to +be better men in point of fact. We seek this society to +flatter ourselves with our own good conduct. And hence any +falsehood in the relation, any incomplete or perverted +understanding, will spoil even the pleasure of these +visits. Thus says Thoreau again: “Only lovers know +the value of truth.” And yet again: “They ask +for words and deeds, when a true relation is word and +deed.”</p> +<p>But it follows that since they are neither of them so good as +the other hopes, and each is, in a very honest manner, playing a +part above his powers, such an intercourse must often be +disappointing to both. “We may bid farewell sooner +than complain,” says Thoreau, “for our complaint is +too well grounded to be uttered.” “We have not +so good a right to hate any as our friend.”</p> +<blockquote><p>“It were treason to our love<br /> +And a sin to God above,<br /> +One iota to abate<br /> +Of a pure, impartial hate.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Love is not blind, nor yet forgiving. “O yes, +believe me,” as the song says, “Love has +eyes!” The nearer the intimacy, the more cuttingly do +we feel the unworthiness of those we love; and because you love +one, and would die for that love to-morrow, you have not +forgiven, and you never will forgive, that friend’s +misconduct. If you want a person’s faults, go to +those who love him. They will not tell you, but they +know. And herein lies the magnanimous courage of love, that +it endures this knowledge without change.</p> +<p>It required a cold, distant personality like that of Thoreau, +perhaps, to recognise and certainly to utter this truth; for a +more human love makes it a point of honour not to acknowledge +those faults of which it is most conscious. But his point +of view is both high and dry. He has no illusions; he does +not give way to love any more than to hatred, but preserves them +both with care like valuable curiosities. A more +bald-headed picture of life, if I may so express myself, has +seldom been presented. He is an egoist; he does not +remember, or does not think it worth while to remark, that, in +these near intimacies, we are ninety-nine times disappointed in +our beggarly selves for once that we are disappointed in our +friend; that it is we who seem most frequently undeserving of the +love that unites us; and that it is by our friend’s conduct +that we are continually rebuked and yet strengthened for a fresh +endeavour. Thoreau is dry, priggish, and selfish. It +is profit he is after in these intimacies; moral profit, +certainly, but still profit to himself. If you will be the +sort of friend I want, he remarks naïvely, “my +education cannot dispense with your society.” His +education! as though a friend were a dictionary. And with +all this, not one word about pleasure, or laughter, or kisses, or +any quality of flesh and blood. It was not inappropriate, +surely, that he had such close relations with the fish. We +can understand the friend already quoted, when he cried: +“As for taking his arm, I would as soon think of taking the +arm of an elm-tree!”</p> +<p>As a matter of fact he experienced but a broken enjoyment in +his intimacies. He says he has been perpetually on the +brink of the sort of intercourse he wanted, and yet never +completely attained it. And what else had he to expect when +he would not, in a happy phrase of Carlyle’s, “nestle +down into it”? Truly, so it will be always if you +only stroll in upon your friends as you might stroll in to see a +cricket match; and even then not simply for the pleasure of the +thing, but with some afterthought of self-improvement, as though +you had come to the cricket match to bet. It was his theory +that people saw each other too frequently, so that their +curiosity was not properly whetted, nor had they anything fresh +to communicate; but friendship must be something else than a +society for mutual improvement—indeed, it must only be that +by the way, and to some extent unconsciously; and if Thoreau had +been a man instead of a manner of elm-tree, he would have felt +that he saw his friends too seldom, and have reaped benefits +unknown to his philosophy from a more sustained and easy +intercourse. We might remind him of his own words about +love: “We should have no reserve; we should give the whole +of ourselves to that business. But commonly men have not +imagination enough to be thus employed about a human being, but +must be coopering a barrel, forsooth.” Ay, or reading +oriental philosophers. It is not the nature of the rival +occupation, it is the fact that you suffer it to be a rival, that +renders loving intimacy impossible. Nothing is given for +nothing in this world; there can be no true love, even on your +own side, without devotion; devotion is the exercise of love, by +which it grows; but if you will give enough of that, if you will +pay the price in a sufficient “amount of what you call +life,” why then, indeed, whether with wife or comrade, you +may have months and even years of such easy, natural, +pleasurable, and yet improving intercourse as shall make time a +moment and kindness a delight.</p> +<p>The secret of his retirement lies not in misanthropy, of which +he had no tincture, but part in his engrossing design of +self-improvement and part in the real deficiencies of social +intercourse. He was not so much difficult about his fellow +human beings as he could not tolerate the terms of their +association. He could take to a man for any genuine +qualities, as we see by his admirable sketch of the Canadian +woodcutter in <i>Walden</i>; but he would not consent, in his own +words, to “feebly fabulate and paddle in the social +slush.” It seemed to him, I think, that society is +precisely the reverse of friendship, in that it takes place on a +lower level than the characters of any of the parties would +warrant us to expect. The society talk of even the most +brilliant man is of greatly less account than what you will get +from him in (as the French say) a little committee. And +Thoreau wanted geniality; he had not enough of the superficial, +even at command; he could not swoop into a parlour and, in the +naval phrase, “cut out” a human being from that +dreary port; nor had he inclination for the task. I suspect +he loved books and nature as well and near as warmly as he loved +his fellow-creatures,—a melancholy, lean degeneration of +the human character.</p> +<p>“As for the dispute about solitude and society,” +he thus sums up: “Any comparison is impertinent. It +is an idling down on the plain at the base of the mountain +instead of climbing steadily to its top. Of course you will +be glad of all the society you can get to go up with? Will +you go to glory with me? is the burden of the song. It is +not that we love to be alone, but that we love to soar, and when +we do soar the company grows thinner and thinner till there is +none at all. It is either the tribune on the plain, a +sermon on the mount, or a very private ecstasy still higher +up. Use all the society that will abet you.” +But surely it is no very extravagant opinion that it is better to +give than to receive, to serve than to use our companions; and +above all, where there is no question of service upon either +side, that it is good to enjoy their company like a natural +man. It is curious and in some ways dispiriting that a +writer may be always best corrected out of his own mouth; and so, +to conclude, here is another passage from Thoreau which seems +aimed directly at himself: “Do not be too moral; you may +cheat yourself out of much life so. . . . <i>All +fables</i>, <i>indeed</i>, <i>have their morals</i>; <i>but the +innocent enjoy the story</i>.”</p> +<h3>V.</h3> +<p>“The only obligation,” says he, “which I +have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think +right.” “Why should we ever go abroad, even +across the way, to ask a neighbour’s advice?” +“There is a nearer neighbour within, who is incessantly +telling us how we should behave. <i>But we wait for the +neighbour without to tell us of some false</i>, <i>easier +way</i>.” “The greater part of what my +neighbours call good I believe in my soul to be bad.” +To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, +is the only end of life. It is “when we fall behind +ourselves” that “we are cursed with duties and the +neglect of duties.” “I love the wild,” he +says, “not less than the good.” And again: +“The life of a good man will hardly improve us more than +the life of a freebooter, for the inevitable laws appear as +plainly in the infringement as in the observance, and” +(mark this) “<i>our lives are sustained by a nearly equal +expense of virtue of some kind</i>.” Even although he +were a prig, it will be owned he could announce a startling +doctrine. “As for doing good,” he writes +elsewhere, “that is one of the professions that are +full. Moreover, I have tried it fairly, and, strange as it +may seem, am satisfied that it does not agree with my +constitution. Probably I should not conscientiously and +deliberately forsake my particular calling to do the good which +society demands of me, to save the universe from annihilation; +and I believe that a like but infinitely greater steadfastness +elsewhere is all that now preserves it. If you should ever +be betrayed into any of these philanthropies, do not let your +left hand know what your right hand does, for it is not worth +knowing.” Elsewhere he returns upon the subject, and +explains his meaning thus: “If I ever <i>did</i> a man any +good in their sense, of course it was something exceptional and +insignificant compared with the good or evil I am constantly +doing by being what I am.”</p> +<p>There is a rude nobility, like that of a barbarian king, in +this unshaken confidence in himself and indifference to the +wants, thoughts, or sufferings of others. In his whole +works I find no trace of pity. This was partly the result +of theory, for he held the world too mysterious to be criticised, +and asks conclusively: “What right have I to grieve who +have not ceased to wonder?” But it sprang still more +from constitutional indifference and superiority; and he grew up +healthy, composed, and unconscious from among life’s +horrors, like a green bay-tree from a field of battle. It +was from this lack in himself that he failed to do justice to the +spirit of Christ; for while he could glean more meaning from +individual precepts than any score of Christians, yet he +conceived life in such a different hope, and viewed it with such +contrary emotions, that the sense and purport of the doctrine as +a whole seems to have passed him by or left him +unimpressed. He could understand the idealism of the +Christian view, but he was himself so unaffectedly unhuman that +he did not recognise the human intention and essence of that +teaching. Hence he complained that Christ did not leave us +a rule that was proper and sufficient for this world, not having +conceived the nature of the rule that was laid down; for things +of that character that are sufficiently unacceptable become +positively non-existent to the mind. But perhaps we shall +best appreciate the defect in Thoreau by seeing it supplied in +the case of Whitman. For the one, I feel confident, is the +disciple of the other; it is what Thoreau clearly whispered that +Whitman so uproariously bawls; it is the same doctrine, but with +how immense a difference! the same argument, but used to what a +new conclusion! Thoreau had plenty of humour until he +tutored himself out of it, and so forfeited that best birthright +of a sensible man; Whitman, in that respect, seems to have been +sent into the world naked and unashamed; and yet by a strange +consummation, it is the theory of the former that is arid, +abstract, and claustral. Of these two philosophies so +nearly identical at bottom, the one pursues +Self-improvement—a churlish, mangy dog; the other is up +with the morning, in the best of health, and following the nymph +Happiness, buxom, blithe, and debonair. Happiness, at +least, is not solitary; it joys to communicate; it loves others, +for it depends on them for its existence; it sanctions and +encourages to all delights that are not unkind in themselves; if +it lived to a thousand, it would not make excision of a single +humorous passage; and while the self-improver dwindles towards +the prig, and, if he be not of an excellent constitution may even +grow deformed into an Obermann, the very name and appearance of a +happy man breathe of good-nature, and help the rest of us to +live.</p> +<p>In the case of Thoreau, so great a show of doctrine demands +some outcome in the field of action. If nothing were to be +done but build a shanty beside Walden Pond, we have heard +altogether too much of these declarations of independence. +That the man wrote some books is nothing to the purpose, for the +same has been done in a suburban villa. That he kept +himself happy is perhaps a sufficient excuse, but it is +disappointing to the reader. We may be unjust, but when a +man despises commerce and philanthropy alike, and has views of +good so soaring that he must take himself apart from mankind for +their cultivation, we will not be content without some striking +act. It was not Thoreau’s fault if he were not +martyred; had the occasion come, he would have made a noble +ending. As it is, he did once seek to interfere in the +world’s course; he made one practical appearance on the +stage of affairs; and a strange one it was, and strangely +characteristic of the nobility and the eccentricity of the +man. It was forced on him by his calm but radical +opposition to negro slavery. “Voting for the right is +doing nothing for it,” he saw; “it is only expressing +to men feebly your desire that it should prevail.” +For his part, he would not “for an instant recognise that +political organisation for <i>his</i> government which is the +<i>slave’s</i> government also.” “I do +not hesitate to say,” he adds, “that those who call +themselves Abolitionists should at once effectually withdraw +their support, both in person and property, from the government +of Massachusetts.” That is what he did: in 1843 he +ceased to pay the poll-tax. The highway-tax he paid, for he +said he was as desirous to be a good neighbour as to be a bad +subject; but no more poll-tax to the State of +Massachusetts. Thoreau had now seceded, and was a polity +unto himself; or, as he explains it with admirable sense, +“In fact, I quietly declare war with the State after my +fashion, though I will still make what use and get what advantage +of her I can, as is usual in such cases.” He was put +in prison; but that was a part of his design. “Under +a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a +just man is also a prison. I know this well, that if one +thousand, if one hundred, if ten men whom I could name—ay, +if <i>one</i> <span class="GutSmall">HONEST</span> man, in this +State of Massachusetts, <i>ceasing to hold slaves</i>, were +actually to withdraw from this copartnership, and be locked up in +the county gaol therefor, it would be the abolition of slavery in +America. For it matters not how small the beginning may +seem to be; what is once well done is done for ever.” +Such was his theory of civil disobedience.</p> +<p>And the upshot? A friend paid the tax for him; continued +year by year to pay it in the sequel; and Thoreau was free to +walk the woods unmolested. It was a <i>fiasco</i>, but to +me it does not seem laughable; even those who joined in the +laughter at the moment would be insensibly affected by this +quaint instance of a good man’s horror for injustice. +We may compute the worth of that one night’s imprisonment +as outweighing half a hundred voters at some subsequent election: +and if Thoreau had possessed as great a power of persuasion as +(let us say) Falstaff, if he had counted a party however small, +if his example had been followed by a hundred or by thirty of his +fellows, I cannot but believe it would have greatly precipitated +the era of freedom and justice. We feel the misdeeds of our +country with so little fervour, for we are not witnesses to the +suffering they cause; but when we see them wake an active horror +in our fellow-man, when we see a neighbour prefer to lie in +prison rather than be so much as passively implicated in their +perpetration, even the dullest of us will begin to realise them +with a quicker pulse.</p> +<p>Not far from twenty years later, when Captain John Brown was +taken at Harper’s Ferry, Thoreau was the first to come +forward in his defence. The committees wrote to him +unanimously that his action was premature. “I did not +send to you for advice,” said he, “but to announce +that I was to speak.” I have used the word +“defence;” in truth he did not seek to defend him, +even declared it would be better for the good cause that he +should die; but he praised his action as I think Brown would have +liked to hear it praised.</p> +<p>Thus this singularly eccentric and independent mind, wedded to +a character of so much strength, singleness, and purity, pursued +its own path of self-improvement for more than half a century, +part gymnosophist, part backwoodsman; and thus did it come twice, +though in a subaltern attitude, into the field of political +history.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p><span class="smcap">Note</span>.—For many facts in the +above essay, among which I may mention the incident of the +squirrel, I am indebted to <i>Thoreau</i>: <i>His Life and +Aims</i>, by J. A. Page, or, as is well known, Dr. Japp.</p> +<h2><a name="page172"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +172</span>YOSHIDA-TORAJIRO</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">The</span> name at the head of this page +is probably unknown to the English reader, and yet I think it +should become a household word like that of Garibaldi or John +Brown. Some day soon, we may expect to hear more fully the +details of Yoshida’s history, and the degree of his +influence in the transformation of Japan; even now there must be +Englishmen acquainted with the subject, and perhaps the +appearance of this sketch may elicit something more complete and +exact. I wish to say that I am not, rightly speaking, the +author of the present paper: I tell the story on the authority of +an intelligent Japanese gentleman, Mr. Taiso Masaki, who told it +me with an emotion that does honour to his heart; and though I +have taken some pains, and sent my notes to him to be corrected, +this can be no more than an imperfect outline.</p> +<p>Yoshida-Torajiro was son to the hereditary military instructor +of the house of Choshu. The name you are to pronounce +with an equality of accent on the different syllables, almost as +in French, the vowels as in Italian, but the consonants in the +English manner—except the <i>j</i>, which has the French +sound, or, as it has been cleverly proposed to write it, the +sound of <i>zh</i>. Yoshida was very learned in Chinese +letters, or, as we might say, in the classics, and in his +father’s subject; fortification was among his favourite +studies, and he was a poet from his boyhood. He was born to +a lively and intelligent patriotism; the condition of Japan was +his great concern; and while he projected a better future, he +lost no opportunity of improving his knowledge of her present +state. With this end he was continually travelling in his +youth, going on foot and sometimes with three days’ +provision on his back, in the brave, self-helpful manner of all +heroes. He kept a full diary while he was thus upon his +journeys, but it is feared that these notes have been +destroyed. If their value were in any respect such as we +have reason to expect from the man’s character, this would +be a loss not easy to exaggerate. It is still wonderful to +the Japanese how far he contrived to push these explorations; a +cultured gentleman of that land and period would leave a +complimentary poem wherever he had been hospitably entertained; +and a friend of Mr. Masaki, who was likewise a great wanderer, +has found such traces of Yoshida’s passage in very remote +regions of Japan.</p> +<p>Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no +preparation is thought necessary; but Yoshida considered +otherwise, and he studied the miseries of his fellow-countrymen +with as much attention and research as though he had been going +to write a book instead of merely to propose a remedy. To a +man of his intensity and singleness, there is no question but +that this survey was melancholy in the extreme. His +dissatisfaction is proved by the eagerness with which he threw +himself into the cause of reform; and what would have discouraged +another braced Yoshida for his task. As he professed the +theory of arms, it was firstly the defences of Japan that +occupied his mind. The external feebleness of that country +was then illustrated by the manners of overriding barbarians, and +the visits of big barbarian war ships: she was a country +beleaguered. Thus the patriotism of Yoshida took a form +which may be said to have defeated itself: he had it upon him to +keep out these all-powerful foreigners, whom it is now one of his +chief merits to have helped to introduce; but a man who follows +his own virtuous heart will be always found in the end to have +been fighting for the best. One thing leads naturally to +another in an awakened mind, and that with an upward progress +from effect to cause. The power and knowledge of these +foreigners were things inseparable; by envying them their +military strength, Yoshida came to envy them their culture; from +the desire to equal them in the first, sprang his desire to share +with them in the second; and thus he is found treating in the +same book of a new scheme to strengthen the defences of Kioto and +of the establishment, in the same city, of a university of +foreign teachers. He hoped, perhaps, to get the good of +other lands without their evil; to enable Japan to profit by the +knowledge of the barbarians, and still keep her inviolate with +her own arts and virtues. But whatever was the precise +nature of his hope, the means by which it was to be accomplished +were both difficult and obvious. Some one with eyes and +understanding must break through the official cordon, escape into +the new world, and study this other civilisation on the +spot. And who could be better suited for the +business? It was not without danger, but he was without +fear. It needed preparation and insight; and what had he +done since he was a child but prepare himself with the best +culture of Japan, and acquire in his excursions the power and +habit of observing?</p> +<p>He was but twenty-two, and already all this was clear in his +mind, when news reached Choshu that Commodore Perry was lying +near to Yeddo. Here, then, was the patriot’s +opportunity. Among the Samurai of Choshu, and in particular +among the councillors of the Daimio, his general culture, his +views, which the enlightened were eager to accept, and, above +all, the prophetic charm, the radiant persuasion of the man, had +gained him many and sincere disciples. He had thus a strong +influence at the provincial Court; and so he obtained leave to +quit the district, and, by way of a pretext, a privilege to +follow his profession in Yeddo. Thither he hurried, and +arrived in time to be too late: Perry had weighed anchor, and his +sails had vanished from the waters of Japan. But Yoshida, +having put his hand to the plough, was not the man to go back; he +had entered upon this business, and, please God, he would carry +it through; and so he gave up his professional career and +remained in Yeddo to be at hand against the next +opportunity. By this behaviour he put himself into an +attitude towards his superior, the Daimio of Choshu, which I +cannot thoroughly explain. Certainly, he became a +<i>Ronyin</i>, a broken man, a feudal outlaw; certainly he was +liable to be arrested if he set foot upon his native province; +yet I am cautioned that “he did not really break his +allegiance,” but only so far separated himself as that the +prince could no longer be held accountable for his late +vassal’s conduct. There is some nicety of feudal +custom here that escapes my comprehension.</p> +<p>In Yeddo, with this nondescript political status, and cut off +from any means of livelihood, he was joyfully supported by those +who sympathised with his design. One was +Sákuma-Shozan, hereditary retainer of one of the +Shogun’s councillors, and from him he got more than money +or than money’s worth. A steady, respectable man, +with an eye to the world’s opinion, Sákuma was one +of those who, if they cannot do great deeds in their own person, +have yet an ardour of admiration for those who can, that +recommends them to the gratitude of history. They aid and +abet greatness more, perhaps, than we imagine. One thinks +of them in connection with Nicodemus, who visited our Lord by +night. And Sákuma was in a position to help Yoshida +more practically than by simple countenance; for he could read +Dutch, and was eager to communicate what he knew.</p> +<p>While the young Ronyin thus lay studying in Yeddo, news came +of a Russian ship at Nangasaki. No time was to be +lost. Sákuma contributed “a long copy of +encouraging verses;” and off set Yoshida on foot for +Nangasaki. His way lay through his own province of Choshu; +but, as the highroad to the south lay apart from the capital, he +was able to avoid arrest. He supported himself, like a +<i>trouvère</i>, by his proficiency in verse. He +carried his works along with him, to serve as an +introduction. When he reached a town he would inquire for +the house of any one celebrated for swordsmanship, or poetry, or +some of the other acknowledged forms of culture; and there, on +giving a taste of his skill, he would be received and +entertained, and leave behind him, when he went away, a +compliment in verse. Thus he travelled through the Middle +Ages on his voyage of discovery into the nineteenth +century. When he reached Nangasaki he was once more too +late. The Russians were gone. But he made a profit on +his journey in spite of fate, and stayed awhile to pick up scraps +of knowledge from the Dutch interpreters—a low class of +men, but one that had opportunities; and then, still full of +purpose, returned to Yeddo on foot, as he had come.</p> +<p>It was not only his youth and courage that supported him under +these successive disappointments, but the continual affluence of +new disciples. The man had the tenacity of a Bruce or a +Columbus, with a pliability that was all his own. He did +not fight for what the world would call success; but for +“the wages of going on.” Check him off in a +dozen directions, he would find another outlet and break +forth. He missed one vessel after another, and the main +work still halted; but so long as he had a single Japanese to +enlighten and prepare for the better future, he could still feel +that he was working for Japan. Now, he had scarce returned +from Nangasaki, when he was sought out by a new inquirer, the +most promising of all. This was a common soldier, of the +Hemming class, a dyer by birth, who had heard vaguely <a +name="citation179"></a><a href="#footnote179" +class="citation">[179]</a> of Yoshida’s movements, and had +become filled with wonder as to their design. This was a +far different inquirer from Sákuma-Shozan, or the +councillors of the Daimio of Choshu. This was no +two-sworded gentleman, but the common stuff of the country, born +in low traditions and unimproved by books; and yet that +influence, that radiant persuasion that never failed Yoshida in +any circumstance of his short life, enchanted, enthralled, and +converted the common soldier, as it had done already with the +elegant and learned. The man instantly burned up into a +true enthusiasm; his mind had been only waiting for a teacher; he +grasped in a moment the profit of these new ideas; he, too, would +go to foreign, outlandish parts, and bring back the knowledge +that was to strengthen and renew Japan; and in the meantime, that +he might be the better prepared, Yoshida set himself to teach, +and he to learn, the Chinese literature. It is an episode +most honourable to Yoshida, and yet more honourable still to the +soldier, and to the capacity and virtue of the common people of +Japan.</p> +<p>And now, at length, Commodore Perry returned to Simoda. +Friends crowded round Yoshida with help, counsels, and +encouragement. One presented him with a great sword, three +feet long and very heavy, which, in the exultation of the hour, +he swore to carry throughout all his wanderings, and to bring +back—a far-travelled weapon—to Japan. A long +letter was prepared in Chinese for the American officers; it was +revised and corrected by Sákuma, and signed by Yoshida, +under the name of Urinaki-Manji, and by the soldier under that of +Ichigi-Koda. Yoshida had supplied himself with a profusion +of materials for writing; his dress was literally stuffed with +paper which was to come back again enriched with his +observations, and make a great and happy kingdom of Japan. +Thus equipped, this pair of emigrants set forward on foot from +Yeddo, and reached Simoda about nightfall. At no period +within history can travel have presented to any European creature +the same face of awe and terror as to these courageous +Japanese. The descent of Ulysses into hell is a parallel +more near the case than the boldest expedition in the Polar +circles. For their act was unprecedented; it was criminal; +and it was to take them beyond the pale of humanity into a land +of devils. It is not to be wondered at if they were +thrilled by the thought of their unusual situation; and perhaps +the soldier gave utterance to the sentiment of both when he sang, +“in Chinese singing” (so that we see he had already +profited by his lessons), these two appropriate verses:</p> +<blockquote><p>“We do not know where we are to sleep +to-night,<br /> +In a thousand miles of desert where we can see no human +smoke.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>In a little temple, hard by the sea-shore, they lay down to +repose; sleep overtook them as they lay; and when they awoke, +“the east was already white” for their last morning +in Japan. They seized a fisherman’s boat and rowed +out—Perry lying far to sea because of the two tides. +Their very manner of boarding was significant of determination; +for they had no sooner caught hold upon the ship than they kicked +away their boat to make return impossible. And now you +would have thought that all was over. But the Commodore was +already in treaty with the Shogun’s Government; it was one +of the stipulations that no Japanese was to be aided in escaping +from Japan; and Yoshida and his followers were handed over as +prisoners to the authorities at Simoda. That night he who +had been to explore the secrets of the barbarian slept, if he +might sleep at all, in a cell too short for lying down at full +length, and too low for standing upright. There are some +disappointments too great for commentary.</p> +<p>Sákuma, implicated by his handwriting, was sent into +his own province in confinement, from which he was soon +released. Yoshida and the soldier suffered a long and +miserable period of captivity, and the latter, indeed, died, +while yet in prison, of a skin disease. But such a spirit +as that of Yoshida-Torajiro is not easily made or kept a captive; +and that which cannot be broken by misfortune you shall seek in +vain to confine in a bastille. He was indefatigably active, +writing reports to Government and treatises for +dissemination. These latter were contraband; and yet he +found no difficulty in their distribution, for he always had the +jailor on his side. It was in vain that they kept changing +him from one prison to another; Government by that plan only +hastened the spread of new ideas; for Yoshida had only to arrive +to make a convert. Thus, though he himself has laid by the +heels, he confirmed and extended his party in the State.</p> +<p>At last, after many lesser transferences, he was given over +from the prisons of the Shogun to those of his own superior, the +Daimio of Choshu. I conceive it possible that he may then +have served out his time for the attempt to leave Japan, and was +now resigned to the provincial Government on a lesser count, as a +Ronyin or feudal rebel. But, however that may be, the +change was of great importance to Yoshida; for by the influence +of his admirers in the Daimio’s council, he was allowed the +privilege, underhand, of dwelling in his own house. And +there, as well to keep up communication with his fellow-reformers +as to pursue his work of education, he received boys to +teach. It must not be supposed that he was free; he was too +marked a man for that; he was probably assigned to some small +circle, and lived, as we should say, under police surveillance; +but to him, who had done so much from under lock and key, this +would seem a large and profitable liberty.</p> +<p>It was at this period that Mr. Masaki was brought into +personal contact with Yoshida; and hence, through the eyes of a +boy of thirteen, we get one good look at the character and habits +of the hero. He was ugly and laughably disfigured with the +smallpox; and while nature had been so niggardly with him from +the first, his personal habits were even sluttish. His +clothes were wretched; when he ate or washed he wiped his hands +upon his sleeves; and as his hair was not tied more than once in +the two months, it was often disgusting to behold. With +such a picture, it is easy to believe that he never +married. A good teacher, gentle in act, although violent +and abusive in speech, his lessons were apt to go over the heads +of his scholars and to leave them gaping, or more often +laughing. Such was his passion for study that he even +grudged himself natural repose; and when he grew drowsy over his +books he would, if it was summer, put mosquitoes up his sleeve; +and, if it was winter, take off his shoes and run barefoot on the +snow. His handwriting was exceptionally villainous; poet +though he was, he had no taste for what was elegant; and in a +country where to write beautifully was not the mark of a +scrivener but an admired accomplishment for gentlemen, he +suffered his letters to be jolted out of him by the press of +matter and the heat of his convictions. He would not +tolerate even the appearance of a bribe; for bribery lay at the +root of much that was evil in Japan, as well as in countries +nearer home; and once when a merchant brought him his son to +educate, and added, as was customary, <a +name="citation185"></a><a href="#footnote185" +class="citation">[185]</a> a little private sweetener, Yoshida +dashed the money in the giver’s face, and launched into +such an outbreak of indignation as made the matter public in the +school. He was still, when Masaki knew him, much weakened +by his hardships in prison; and the presentation sword, three +feet long, was too heavy for him to wear without distress; yet he +would always gird it on when he went to dig in his garden. +That is a touch which qualifies the man. A weaker nature +would have shrunk from the sight of what only commemorated a +failure. But he was of Thoreau’s mind, that if you +can “make your failure tragical by courage, it will not +differ from success.” He could look back without +confusion to his enthusiastic promise. If events had been +contrary, and he found himself unable to carry out that +purpose—well, there was but the more reason to be brave and +constant in another; if he could not carry the sword into +barbarian lands, it should at least be witness to a life spent +entirely for Japan.</p> +<p>This is the sight we have of him as he appeared to schoolboys, +but not related in the schoolboy spirit. A man so careless +of the graces must be out of court with boys and women. +And, indeed, as we have all been more or less to school, it will +astonish no one that Yoshida was regarded by his scholars as a +laughing-stock. The schoolboy has a keen sense of +humour. Heroes he learns to understand and to admire in +books; but he is not forward to recognise the heroic under the +traits of any contemporary man, and least of all in a brawling, +dirty, and eccentric teacher. But as the years went by, and +the scholars of Yoshida continued in vain to look around them for +the abstractly perfect, and began more and more to understand the +drift of his instructions, they learned to look back upon their +comic school-master as upon the noblest of mankind.</p> +<p>The last act of this brief and full existence was already near +at hand. Some of his work was done; for already there had +been Dutch teachers admitted into Nangasaki, and the country at +large was keen for the new learning. But though the +renaissance had begun, it was impeded and dangerously threatened +by the power of the Shogun. His minister—the same who +was afterwards assassinated in the snow in the very midst of his +bodyguard—not only held back pupils from going to the +Dutchmen, but by spies and detectives, by imprisonment and death, +kept thinning out of Japan the most intelligent and active +spirits. It is the old story of a power upon its last +legs—learning to the bastille, and courage to the block; +when there are none left but sheep and donkeys, the State will +have been saved. But a man must not think to cope with a +Revolution; nor a minister, however fortified with guards, to +hold in check a country that had given birth to such men as +Yoshida and his soldier-follower. The violence of the +ministerial Tarquin only served to direct attention to the +illegality of his master’s rule; and people began to turn +their allegiance from Yeddo and the Shogun to the long-forgotten +Mikado in his seclusion at Kioto. At this juncture, whether +in consequence or not, the relations between these two rulers +became strained; and the Shogun’s minister set forth for +Kioto to put another affront upon the rightful sovereign. +The circumstance was well fitted to precipitate events. It +was a piece of religion to defend the Mikado; it was a plain +piece of political righteousness to oppose a tyrannical and +bloody usurpation. To Yoshida the moment for action seemed +to have arrived. He was himself still confined in +Choshu. Nothing was free but his intelligence; but with +that he sharpened a sword for the Shogun’s minister. +A party of his followers were to waylay the tyrant at a village +on the Yeddo and Kioto road, present him with a petition, and put +him to the sword. But Yoshida and his friends were closely +observed; and the too great expedition of two of the +conspirators, a boy of eighteen and his brother, wakened the +suspicion of the authorities, and led to a full discovery of the +plot and the arrest of all who were concerned.</p> +<p>In Yeddo, to which he was taken, Yoshida was thrown again into +a strict confinement. But he was not left destitute of +sympathy in this last hour of trial. In the next cell lay +one Kusákabé, a reformer from the southern +highlands of Satzuma. They were in prison for different +plots indeed, but for the same intention; they shared the same +beliefs and the same aspirations for Japan; many and long were +the conversations they held through the prison wall, and dear was +the sympathy that soon united them. It fell first to the +lot of Kusákabé to pass before the judges; and when +sentence had been pronounced he was led towards the place of +death below Yoshida’s window. To turn the head would +have been to implicate his fellow-prisoner; but he threw him a +look from his eye, and bade him farewell in a loud voice, with +these two Chinese verses:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“It is better to be a crystal and be +broken,<br /> +Than to remain perfect like a tile upon the housetop.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>So Kusákabé, from the highlands of Satzuma, +passed out of the theatre of this world. His death was like +an antique worthy’s.</p> +<p>A little after, and Yoshida too must appear before the +Court. His last scene was of a piece with his career, and +fitly crowned it. He seized on the opportunity of a public +audience, confessed and gloried in his design, and, reading his +auditors a lesson in the history of their country, told at length +the illegality of the Shogun’s power and the crimes by +which its exercise was sullied. So, having said his say for +once, he was led forth and executed, thirty-one years old.</p> +<p>A military engineer, a bold traveller (at least in wish), a +poet, a patriot, a schoolmaster, a friend to learning, a martyr +to reform,—there are not many men, dying at seventy, who +have served their country in such various characters. He +was not only wise and provident in thought, but surely one of the +fieriest of heroes in execution. It is hard to say which is +most remarkable—his capacity for command, which subdued his +very jailors; his hot, unflagging zeal; or his stubborn +superiority to defeat. He failed in each particular +enterprise that he attempted; and yet we have only to look at his +country to see how complete has been his general success. +His friends and pupils made the majority of leaders in that final +Revolution, now some twelve years old; and many of them are, or +were until the other day, high placed among the rulers of +Japan. And when we see all round us these brisk intelligent +students, with their strange foreign air, we should never forget +how Yoshida marched afoot from Choshu to Yeddo, and from Yeddo to +Nangasaki, and from Nangasaki back again to Yeddo; how he boarded +the American ship, his dress stuffed with writing material; nor +how he languished in prison, and finally gave his death, as he +had formerly given all his life and strength and leisure, to gain +for his native land that very benefit which she now enjoys so +largely. It is better to be Yoshida and perish, than to be +only Sákuma and yet save the hide. +Kusákabé, of Satzuma, has said the word: it is +better to be a crystal and be broken.</p> +<p>I must add a word; for I hope the reader will not fail to +perceive that this is as much the story of a heroic people as +that of a heroic man. It is not enough to remember Yoshida; +we must not forget the common soldier, nor +Kusákabé, nor the boy of eighteen, Nomura, of +Choshu, whose eagerness betrayed the plot. It is +exhilarating to have lived in the same days with these +great-hearted gentlemen. Only a few miles from us, to speak +by the proportion of the universe, while I was droning over my +lessons, Yoshida was goading himself to be wakeful with the +stings of the mosquito; and while you were grudging a penny +income tax, Kusákabé was stepping to death with a +noble sentence on his lips.</p> +<h2><a name="page192"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +192</span>FRANÇOIS VILLON, STUDENT, POET, AND +HOUSEBREAKER.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Perhaps</span> one of the most curious +revolutions in literary history is the sudden bull’s-eye +light cast by M. Longnon on the obscure existence of +François Villon. <a name="citation192"></a><a +href="#footnote192" class="citation">[192]</a> His book is +not remarkable merely as a chapter of biography exhumed after +four centuries. To readers of the poet it will recall, with +a flavour of satire, that characteristic passage in which he +bequeaths his spectacles—with a humorous reservation of the +case—to the hospital for blind paupers known as the +Fifteen-Score. Thus equipped, let the blind paupers go and +separate the good from the bad in the cemetery of the +Innocents! For his own part the poet can see no +distinction. Much have the dead people made of their +advantages. What does it matter now that they have lain in +state beds and nourished portly bodies upon cakes and +cream! Here they all lie, to be trodden in the mud; the +large estate and the small, sounding virtue and adroit or +powerful vice, in very much the same condition; and a bishop not +to be distinguished from a lamp-lighter with even the strongest +spectacles.</p> +<p>Such was Villon’s cynical philosophy. Four hundred +years after his death, when surely all danger might be considered +at an end, a pair of critical spectacles have been applied to his +own remains; and though he left behind him a sufficiently ragged +reputation from the first, it is only after these four hundred +years that his delinquencies have been finally tracked home, and +we can assign him to his proper place among the good or +wicked. It is a staggering thought, and one that affords a +fine figure of the imperishability of men’s acts, that the +stealth of the private inquiry office can be carried so far back +into the dead and dusty past. We are not so soon quit of +our concerns as Villon fancied. In the extreme of +dissolution, when not so much as a man’s name is +remembered, when his dust is scattered to the four winds, and +perhaps the very grave and the very graveyard where he was laid +to rest have been forgotten, desecrated, and buried under +populous towns,—even in this extreme let an antiquary fall +across a sheet of manuscript, and the name will be recalled, the +old infamy will pop out into daylight like a toad out of a +fissure in the rock, and the shadow of the shade of what was once +a man will be heartily pilloried by his descendants. A +little while ago and Villon was almost totally forgotten; then he +was revived for the sake of his verses; and now he is being +revived with a vengeance in the detection of his +misdemeanours. How unsubstantial is this projection of a +man’s existence, which can lie in abeyance for centuries +and then be brushed up again and set forth for the consideration +of posterity by a few dips in an antiquary’s inkpot! +This precarious tenure of fame goes a long way to justify those +(and they are not few) who prefer cakes and cream in the +immediate present.</p> +<h2><span class="smcap">A Wild Youth</span>.</h2> +<p>François de Montcorbier, <i>alias</i> François +des Loges, <i>alias</i> François Villon, <i>alias</i> +Michel Mouton, Master of Arts in the University of Paris, was +born in that city in the summer of 1431. It was a memorable +year for France on other and higher considerations. A +great-hearted girl and a poor-hearted boy made, the one her last, +the other his first appearance on the public stage of that +unhappy country. On the 30th of May the ashes of Joan of +Arc were thrown into the Seine, and on the 2d of December our +Henry Sixth made his Joyous Entry dismally enough into +disaffected and depopulating Paris. Sword and fire still +ravaged the open country. On a single April Saturday twelve +hundred persons, besides children, made their escape out of the +starving capital. The hangman, as is not uninteresting to +note in connection with Master Francis, was kept hard at work in +1431; on the last of April and on the 4th of May alone, sixty-two +bandits swung from Paris gibbets. <a name="citation195"></a><a +href="#footnote195" class="citation">[195]</a> A more +confused or troublous time it would have been difficult to select +for a start in life. Not even a man’s nationality was +certain; for the people of Paris there was no such thing as a +Frenchman. The English were the English indeed, but the +French were only the Armagnacs, whom, with Joan of Arc at their +head, they had beaten back from under their ramparts not two +years before. Such public sentiment as they had centred +about their dear Duke of Burgundy, and the dear Duke had no more +urgent business than to keep out of their neighbourhood. . . +. At least, and whether he liked it or not, our +disreputable troubadour was tubbed and swaddled as a subject of +the English crown.</p> +<p>We hear nothing of Villon’s father except that he was +poor and of mean extraction. His mother was given piously, +which does not imply very much in an old Frenchwoman, and quite +uneducated. He had an uncle, a monk in an abbey at Angers, +who must have prospered beyond the family average, and was +reported to be worth five or six hundred crowns. Of this +uncle and his money-box the reader will hear once more. In +1448 Francis became a student of the University of Paris; in 1450 +he took the degree of Bachelor, and in 1452 that of Master of +Arts. His <i>bourse</i>, or the sum paid weekly for his +board, was of the amount of two sous. Now two sous was +about the price of a pound of salt butter in the bad times of +1417; it was the price of half-a-pound in the worse times of +1419; and in 1444, just four years before Villon joined the +University, it seems to have been taken as the average wage for a +day’s manual labour. <a name="citation196"></a><a +href="#footnote196" class="citation">[196]</a> In short, it +cannot have been a very profuse allowance to keep a sharp-set lad +in breakfast and supper for seven mortal days; and Villon’s +share of the cakes and pastry and general good cheer, to which he +is never weary of referring, must have been slender from the +first.</p> +<p>The educational arrangements of the University of Paris were, +to our way of thinking, somewhat incomplete. Worldly and +monkish elements were presented in a curious confusion, which the +youth might disentangle for himself. If he had an +opportunity, on the one hand, of acquiring much hair-drawn +divinity and a taste for formal disputation, he was put in the +way of much gross and flaunting vice upon the other. The +lecture room of a scholastic doctor was sometimes under the same +roof with establishments of a very different and peculiarly +unedifying order. The students had extraordinary +privileges, which by all accounts they abused +extraordinarily. And while some condemned themselves to an +almost sepulchral regularity and seclusion, others fled the +schools, swaggered in the street “with their thumbs in +their girdle,” passed the night in riot, and behaved +themselves as the worthy forerunners of Jehan Frollo in the +romance of <i>Notre Dame de Paris</i>. Villon tells us +himself that he was among the truants, but we hardly needed his +avowal. The burlesque erudition in which he sometimes +indulged implies no more than the merest smattering of knowledge; +whereas his acquaintance with blackguard haunts and industries +could only have been acquired by early and consistent impiety and +idleness. He passed his degrees, it is true; but some of us +who have been to modern universities will make their own +reflections on the value of the test. As for his three +pupils, Colin Laurent, Girard Gossouyn, and Jehan +Marceau—if they were really his pupils in any serious +sense—what can we say but God help them! And sure +enough, by his own description, they turned out as ragged, rowdy, +and ignorant as was to be looked for from the views and manners +of their rare preceptor.</p> +<p>At some time or other, before or during his university career, +the poet was adopted by Master Guillaume de Villon, chaplain of +Saint Benoît-le-Bétourné near the +Sorbonne. From him he borrowed the surname by which he is +known to posterity. It was most likely from his house, +called the <i>Porte Rouge</i>, and situated in a garden in the +cloister of St. Benoît, that Master Francis heard the bell +of the Sorbonne ring out the Angelus while he was finishing his +<i>Small Testament</i> at Christmastide in 1456. Towards +this benefactor he usually gets credit for a respectable display +of gratitude. But with his trap and pitfall style of +writing, it is easy to make too sure. His sentiments are +about as much to be relied on as those of a professional beggar; +and in this, as in so many other matters, he comes towards us +whining and piping the eye, and goes off again with a whoop and +his finger to his nose. Thus, he calls Guillaume de Villon +his “more than father,” thanks him with a great show +of sincerity for having helped him out of many scrapes, and +bequeaths him his portion of renown. But the portion of +renown which belonged to a young thief, distinguished (if, at the +period when he wrote this legacy, he was distinguished at all) +for having written some more or less obscene and scurrilous +ballads, must have been little fitted to gratify the self-respect +or increase the reputation of a benevolent ecclesiastic. +The same remark applies to a subsequent legacy of the +poet’s library, with specification of one work which was +plainly neither decent nor devout. We are thus left on the +horns of a dilemma. If the chaplain was a godly, +philanthropic personage, who had tried to graft good principles +and good behaviour on this wild slip of an adopted son, these +jesting legacies would obviously cut him to the heart. The +position of an adopted son towards his adoptive father is one +full of delicacy; where a man lends his name he looks for great +consideration. And this legacy of Villon’s portion of +renown may be taken as the mere fling of an unregenerate +scapegrace who has wit enough to recognise in his own shame the +readiest weapon of offence against a prosy benefactor’s +feelings. The gratitude of Master Francis figures, on this +reading, as a frightful <i>minus</i> quantity. If, on the +other hand, those jests were given and taken in good humour, the +whole relation between the pair degenerates into the unedifying +complicity of a debauched old chaplain and a witty and dissolute +young scholar. At this rate the house with the red door may +have rung with the most mundane minstrelsy; and it may have been +below its roof that Villon, through a hole in the plaster, +studied, as he tells us, the leisures of a rich ecclesiastic.</p> +<p>It was, perhaps, of some moment in the poet’s life that +he should have inhabited the cloister of Saint +Benoît. Three of the most remarkable among his early +acquaintances are Catherine de Vausselles, for whom he +entertained a short-lived affection and an enduring and most +unmanly resentment; Regnier de Montigny, a young blackguard of +good birth; and Colin de Cayeux, a fellow with a marked aptitude +for picking locks. Now we are on a foundation of mere +conjecture, but it is at least curious to find that two of the +canons of Saint Benoît answered respectively to the names +of Pierre de Vaucel and Etienne de Montigny, and that there was a +householder called Nicolas de Cayeux in a street—the Rue +des Poirées—in the immediate neighbourhood of the +cloister. M. Longnon is almost ready to identify Catherine +as the niece of Pierre; Regnier as the nephew of Etienne, and +Colin as the son of Nicolas. Without going so far, it must +be owned that the approximation of names is significant. As +we go on to see the part played by each of these persons in the +sordid melodrama of the poet’s life, we shall come to +regard it as even more notable. Is it not Clough who has +remarked that, after all, everything lies in juxtaposition? +Many a man’s destiny has been settled by nothing apparently +more grave than a pretty face on the opposite side of the street +and a couple of bad companions round the corner.</p> +<p>Catherine de Vausselles (or de Vaucel—the change is +within the limits of Villon’s licence) had plainly +delighted in the poet’s conversation; near neighbours or +not, they were much together and Villon made no secret of his +court, and suffered himself to believe that his feeling was +repaid in kind. This may have been an error from the first, +or he may have estranged her by subsequent misconduct or +temerity. One can easily imagine Villon an impatient +wooer. One thing, at least, is sure: that the affair +terminated in a manner bitterly humiliating to Master +Francis. In presence of his lady-love, perhaps under her +window and certainly with her connivance, he was unmercifully +thrashed by one Noë le Joly—beaten, as he says +himself, like dirty linen on the washing-board. It is +characteristic that his malice had notably increased between the +time when he wrote the <i>Small Testament</i> immediately on the +back of the occurrence, and the time when he wrote the <i>Large +Testament</i> five years after. On the latter occasion +nothing is too bad for his “damsel with the twisted +nose,” as he calls her. She is spared neither hint +nor accusation, and he tells his messenger to accost her with the +vilest insults. Villon, it is thought, was out of Paris +when these amenities escaped his pen; or perhaps the strong arm +of Noë le Joly would have been again in requisition. +So ends the love story, if love story it may properly be +called. Poets are not necessarily fortunate in love; but +they usually fall among more romantic circumstances and bear +their disappointment with a better grace.</p> +<p>The neighbourhood of Regnier de Montigny and Colin de Cayeux +was probably more influential on his after life than the contempt +of Catherine. For a man who is greedy of all pleasures, and +provided with little money and less dignity of character, we may +prophesy a safe and speedy voyage downward. Humble or even +truckling virtue may walk unspotted in this life. But only +those who despise the pleasures can afford to despise the opinion +of the world. A man of a strong, heady temperament, like +Villon, is very differently tempted. His eyes lay hold on +all provocations greedily, and his heart flames up at a look into +imperious desire; he is snared and broached-to by anything and +everything, from a pretty face to a piece of pastry in a cookshop +window; he will drink the rinsing of the wine cup, stay the +latest at the tavern party; tap at the lit windows, follow the +sound of singing, and beat the whole neighbourhood for another +reveller, as he goes reluctantly homeward; and grudge himself +every hour of sleep as a black empty period in which he cannot +follow after pleasure. Such a person is lost if he have not +dignity, or, failing that, at least pride, which is its shadow +and in many ways its substitute. Master Francis, I fancy, +would follow his own eager instincts without much spiritual +struggle. And we soon find him fallen among thieves in +sober, literal earnest, and counting as acquaintances the most +disreputable people he could lay his hands on: fellows who stole +ducks in Paris Moat; sergeants of the criminal court, and archers +of the watch; blackguards who slept at night under the +butchers’ stalls, and for whom the aforesaid archers peered +about carefully with lanterns; Regnier de Montigny, Colin de +Cayeux, and their crew, all bound on a favouring breeze towards +the gallows; the disorderly abbess of Port Royal, who went about +at fair time with soldiers and thieves, and conducted her abbey +on the queerest principles, and most likely Perette Mauger, the +great Paris receiver of stolen goods, not yet dreaming, poor +woman! of the last scene of her career when Henry Cousin, +executor of the high justice, shall bury her, alive and most +reluctant, in front of the new Montigny gibbet. <a +name="citation204"></a><a href="#footnote204" +class="citation">[204]</a> Nay, our friend soon began to +take a foremost rank in this society. He could string off +verses, which is always an agreeable talent; and he could make +himself useful in many other ways. The whole ragged army of +Bohemia, and whosoever loved good cheer without at all loving to +work and pay for it, are addressed in contemporary verses as the +“Subjects of François Villon.” He was a +good genius to all hungry and unscrupulous persons; and became +the hero of a whole legendary cycle of tavern tricks and +cheateries. At best, these were doubtful levities, rather +too thievish for a schoolboy, rather too gamesome for a +thief. But he would not linger long in this equivocal +border land. He must soon have complied with his +surroundings. He was one who would go where the cannikin +clinked, not caring who should pay; and from supping in the +wolves’ den, there is but a step to hunting with the +pack. And here, as I am on the chapter of his degradation, +I shall say all I mean to say about its darkest expression, and +be done with it for good. Some charitable critics see no +more than a <i>jeu d’esprit</i>, a graceful and trifling +exercise of the imagination, in the grimy ballad of Fat Peg +(<i>Grosse Margot</i>). I am not able to follow these +gentlemen to this polite extreme. Out of all Villon’s +works that ballad stands forth in flaring reality, gross and +ghastly, as a thing written in a contraction of disgust. M. +Longnon shows us more and more clearly at every page that we are +to read our poet literally, that his names are the names of real +persons, and the events he chronicles were actual events. +But even if the tendency of criticism had run the other way, this +ballad would have gone far to prove itself. I can well +understand the reluctance of worthy persons in this matter; for +of course it is unpleasant to think of a man of genius as one who +held, in the words of Marina to Boult—</p> +<blockquote><p> “A place, for which the +pained’st fiend<br /> +Of hell would not in reputation change.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But beyond this natural unwillingness, the whole difficulty of +the case springs from a highly virtuous ignorance of life. +Paris now is not so different from the Paris of then; and the +whole of the doings of Bohemia are not written in the sugar-candy +pastorals of Murger. It is really not at all surprising +that a young man of the fifteenth century, with a knack of making +verses, should accept his bread upon disgraceful terms. The +race of those who do is not extinct; and some of them to this day +write the prettiest verses imaginable. . . . After this, it +were impossible for Master Francis to fall lower: to go and steal +for himself would be an admirable advance from every point of +view, divine or human.</p> +<p>And yet it is not as a thief, but as a homicide, that he makes +his first appearance before angry justice. On June 5, 1455, +when he was about twenty-four, and had been Master of Arts for a +matter of three years, we behold him for the first time quite +definitely. Angry justice had, as it were, photographed him +in the act of his homicide; and M. Longnon, rummaging among old +deeds, has turned up the negative and printed it off for our +instruction. Villon had been supping—copiously we may +believe—and sat on a stone bench in front of the Church of +St. Benoît, in company with a priest called Gilles and a +woman of the name of Isabeau. It was nine o’clock, a +mighty late hour for the period, and evidently a fine +summer’s night. Master Francis carried a mantle, like +a prudent man, to keep him from the dews (<i>serain</i>), and had +a sword below it dangling from his girdle. So these three +dallied in front of St. Benoît, taking their pleasure +(<i>pour soy esbatre</i>). Suddenly there arrived upon the +scene a priest, Philippe Chermoye or Sermaise, also with sword +and cloak, and accompanied by one Master Jehan le Mardi. +Sermaise, according to Villon’s account, which is all we +have to go upon, came up blustering and denying God; as Villon +rose to make room for him upon the bench, thrust him rudely back +into his place; and finally drew his sword and cut open his lower +lip, by what I should imagine was a very clumsy stroke. Up +to this point, Villon professes to have been a model of courtesy, +even of feebleness: and the brawl, in his version, reads like the +fable of the wolf and the lamb. But now the lamb was +roused; he drew his sword, stabbed Sermaise in the groin, knocked +him on the head with a big stone, and then, leaving him to his +fate, went away to have his own lip doctored by a barber of the +name of Fouquet. In one version, he says that Gilles, +Isabeau, and Le Mardi ran away at the first high words, and that +he and Sermaise had it out alone; in another, Le Mardi is +represented as returning and wresting Villon’s sword from +him: the reader may please himself. Sermaise was picked up, +lay all that night in the prison of Saint Benoît, where he +was examined by an official of the Châtelet and expressly +pardoned Villon, and died on the following Saturday in the +Hôtel Dieu.</p> +<p>This, as I have said, was in June. Not before January of +the next year could Villon extract a pardon from the king; but +while his hand was in, he got two. One is for +“François des Loges, alias (<i>autrement dit</i>) de +Villon;” and the other runs in the name of François +de Montcorbier. Nay, it appears there was a further +complication; for in the narrative of the first of these +documents, it is mentioned that he passed himself off upon +Fouquet, the barber-surgeon, as one Michel Mouton. M. +Longnon has a theory that this unhappy accident with Sermaise was +the cause of Villon’s subsequent irregularities; and that +up to that moment he had been the pink of good behaviour. +But the matter has to my eyes a more dubious air. A pardon +necessary for Des Loges and another for Montcorbier? and these +two the same person? and one or both of them known by the +<i>alias of</i> Villon, however honestly come by? and lastly, in +the heat of the moment, a fourth name thrown out with an assured +countenance? A ship is not to be trusted that sails under +so many colours. This is not the simple bearing of +innocence. No—the young master was already treading +crooked paths; already, he would start and blench at a hand upon +his shoulder, with the look we know so well in the face of +Hogarth’s Idle Apprentice; already, in the blue devils, he +would see Henry Cousin, the executor of high justice, going in +dolorous procession towards Montfaucon, and hear the wind and the +birds crying around Paris gibbet.</p> +<h3><span class="smcap">A Gang of Thieves</span>.</h3> +<p>In spite of the prodigious number of people who managed to get +hanged, the fifteenth century was by no means a bad time for +criminals. A great confusion of parties and great dust of +fighting favoured the escape of private housebreakers and quiet +fellows who stole ducks in Paris Moat. Prisons were leaky; +and as we shall see, a man with a few crowns in his pocket and +perhaps some acquaintance among the officials, could easily slip +out and become once more a free marauder. There was no want +of a sanctuary where he might harbour until troubles blew by; and +accomplices helped each other with more or less good faith. +Clerks, above all, had remarkable facilities for a criminal way +of life; for they were privileged, except in cases of notorious +incorrigibility, to be plucked from the hands of rude secular +justice and tried by a tribunal of their own. In 1402, a +couple of thieves, both clerks of the University, were condemned +to death by the Provost of Paris. As they were taken to +Montfaucon, they kept crying “high and clearly” for +their benefit of clergy, but were none the less pitilessly hanged +and gibbeted. Indignant Alma Mater interfered before the +king; and the Provost was deprived of all royal offices, and +condemned to return the bodies and erect a great stone cross, on +the road from Paris to the gibbet graven with the effigies of +these two holy martyrs. <a name="citation210"></a><a +href="#footnote210" class="citation">[210]</a> We shall +hear more of the benefit of clergy; for after this the reader +will not be surprised to meet with thieves in the shape of +tonsured clerks, or even priests and monks.</p> +<p>To a knot of such learned pilferers our poet certainly +belonged; and by turning over a few more of M. Longnon’s +negatives, we shall get a clear idea of their character and +doings. Montigny and De Cayeux are names already known; Guy +Tabary, Petit-Jehan, Dom Nicolas, little Thibault, who was both +clerk and goldsmith, and who made picklocks and melted plate for +himself and his companions—with these the reader has still +to become acquainted. Petit-Jehan and De Cayeux were handy +fellows and enjoyed a useful pre-eminence in honour of their +doings with the picklock. “<i>Dictus des Cahyeus est +fortis operator crochetorum</i>,” says Tabary’s +interrogation, “<i>sed dictus Petit-Jehan</i>, <i>ejus +socius</i>, <i>est forcius operator</i>.” But the +flower of the flock was little Thibault; it was reported that no +lock could stand before him; he had a persuasive hand; let us +salute capacity wherever we may find it. Perhaps the term +<i>gang</i> is not quite properly applied to the persons whose +fortunes we are now about to follow; rather they were independent +malefactors, socially intimate, and occasionally joining together +for some serious operation just as modern stockjobbers form a +syndicate for an important loan. Nor were they at all +particular to any branch of misdoing. They did not +scrupulously confine themselves to a single sort of theft, as I +hear is common among modern thieves. They were ready for +anything, from pitch-and-toss to manslaughter. Montigny, +for instance, had neglected neither of these extremes, and we +find him accused of cheating at games of hazard on the one hand, +and on the other of the murder of one Thevenin Pensete in a house +by the Cemetery of St. John. If time had only spared us +some particulars, might not this last have furnished us with the +matter of a grisly winter’s tale?</p> +<p>At Christmas-time in 1456, readers of Villon will remember +that he was engaged on the <i>Small Testament</i>. About +the same period, <i>circa festum nativitatis Domini</i>, he took +part in a memorable supper at the Mule Tavern, in front of the +Church of St. Mathurin. Tabary, who seems to have been very +much Villon’s creature, had ordered the supper in the +course of the afternoon. He was a man who had had troubles +in his time and languished in the Bishop of Paris’s prisons +on a suspicion of picking locks; confiding, convivial, not very +astute—who had copied out a whole improper romance with his +own right hand. This supper-party was to be his first +introduction to De Cayeux and Petit-Jehan, which was probably a +matter of some concern to the poor man’s muddy wits; in the +sequel, at least, he speaks of both with an undisguised respect, +based on professional inferiority in the matter of +picklocks. Dom Nicolas, a Picardy monk, was the fifth and +last at table. When supper had been despatched and fairly +washed down, we may suppose, with white Baigneux or red Beaune, +which were favourite wines among the fellowship, Tabary was +solemnly sworn over to secrecy on the night’s performances; +and the party left the Mule and proceeded to an unoccupied house +belonging to Robert de Saint-Simon. This, over a low wall, +they entered without difficulty. All but Tabary took off +their upper garments; a ladder was found and applied to the high +wall which separated Saint-Simon’s house from the court of +the College of Navarre; the four fellows in their shirt-sleeves +(as we might say) clambered over in a twinkling; and Master Guy +Tabary remained alone beside the overcoats. From the court +the burglars made their way into the vestry of the chapel, where +they found a large chest, strengthened with iron bands and closed +with four locks. One of these locks they picked, and then, +by levering up the corner, forced the other three. Inside +was a small coffer, of walnut wood, also barred with iron, but +fastened with only three locks, which were all comfortably picked +by way of the keyhole. In the walnut coffer—a joyous +sight by our thieves’ lantern—were five hundred +crowns of gold. There was some talk of opening the aumries, +where, if they had only known, a booty eight or nine times +greater lay ready to their hand; but one of the party (I have a +humorous suspicion it was Dom Nicolas, the Picardy monk) hurried +them away. It was ten o’clock when they mounted the +ladder; it was about midnight before Tabary beheld them coming +back. To him they gave ten crowns, and promised a share of +a two-crown dinner on the morrow; whereat we may suppose his +mouth watered. In course of time, he got wind of the real +amount of their booty and understood how scurvily he had been +used; but he seems to have borne no malice. How could he, +against such superb operators as Petit-Jehan and De Cayeux; or a +person like Villon, who could have made a new improper romance +out of his own head, instead of merely copying an old one with +mechanical right hand?</p> +<p>The rest of the winter was not uneventful for the gang. +First they made a demonstration against the Church of St. +Mathurin after chalices, and were ignominiously chased away by +barking dogs. Then Tabary fell out with Casin Chollet, one +of the fellows who stole ducks in Paris Moat, who subsequently +became a sergeant of the Châtelet and distinguished himself +by misconduct, followed by imprisonment and public castigation, +during the wars of Louis Eleventh. The quarrel was not +conducted with a proper regard to the king’s peace, and the +pair publicly belaboured each other until the police stepped in, +and Master Tabary was cast once more into the prisons of the +Bishop. While he still lay in durance, another job was +cleverly executed by the band in broad daylight, at the Augustine +Monastery. Brother Guillaume Coiffier was beguiled by an +accomplice to St. Mathurin to say mass; and during his absence, +his chamber was entered and five or six hundred crowns in money +and some silver plate successfully abstracted. A melancholy +man was Coiffier on his return! Eight crowns from this +adventure were forwarded by little Thibault to the incarcerated +Tabary; and with these he bribed the jailor and reappeared in +Paris taverns. Some time before or shortly after this, +Villon set out for Angers, as he had promised in the <i>Small +Testament</i>. The object of this excursion was not merely +to avoid the presence of his cruel mistress or the strong arm of +Noë le Joly, but to plan a deliberate robbery on his uncle +the monk. As soon as he had properly studied the ground, +the others were to go over in force from Paris—picklocks +and all—and away with my uncle’s strongbox! +This throws a comical sidelight on his own accusation against his +relatives, that they had “forgotten natural duty” and +disowned him because he was poor. A poor relation is a +distasteful circumstance at the best, but a poor relation who +plans deliberate robberies against those of his blood, and +trudges hundreds of weary leagues to put them into execution, is +surely a little on the wrong side of toleration. The uncle +at Angers may have been monstrously undutiful; but the nephew +from Paris was upsides with him.</p> +<p>On the 23d April, that venerable and discreet person, Master +Pierre Marchand, Curate and Prior of Paray-le-Monial, in the +diocese of Chartres, arrived in Paris and put up at the sign of +the Three Chandeliers, in the Rue de la Huchette. Next day, +or the day after, as he was breakfasting at the sign of the +Armchair, he fell into talk with two customers, one of whom was a +priest and the other our friend Tabary. The idiotic Tabary +became mighty confidential as to his past life. Pierre +Marchand, who was an acquaintance of Guillaume Coiffier’s +and had sympathised with him over his loss, pricked up his ears +at the mention of picklocks, and led on the transcriber of +improper romances from one thing to another, until they were fast +friends. For picklocks the Prior of Paray professed a keen +curiosity; but Tabary, upon some late alarm, had thrown all his +into the Seine. Let that be no difficulty, however, for was +there not little Thibault, who could make them of all shapes and +sizes, and to whom Tabary, smelling an accomplice, would be only +too glad to introduce his new acquaintance? On the morrow, +accordingly, they met; and Tabary, after having first wet his +whistle at the prior’s expense, led him to Notre Dame and +presented him to four or five “young companions,” who +were keeping sanctuary in the church. They were all clerks, +recently escaped, like Tabary himself, from the episcopal +prisons. Among these we may notice Thibault, the operator, +a little fellow of twenty-six, wearing long hair behind. +The Prior expressed, through Tabary, his anxiety to become their +accomplice and altogether such as they were (<i>de leur sorte et +de leurs complices</i>). Mighty polite they showed +themselves, and made him many fine speeches in return. But +for all that, perhaps because they had longer heads than Tabary, +perhaps because it is less easy to wheedle men in a body, they +kept obstinately to generalities and gave him no information as +to their exploits, past, present, or to come. I suppose +Tabary groaned under this reserve; for no sooner were he and the +Prior out of the church than he fairly emptied his heart to him, +gave him full details of many hanging matters in the past, and +explained the future intentions of the band. The scheme of +the hour was to rob another Augustine monk, Robert de la Porte, +and in this the Prior agreed to take a hand with simulated +greed. Thus, in the course of two days, he had turned this +wineskin of a Tabary inside out. For a while longer the +farce was carried on; the Prior was introduced to Petit-Jehan, +whom he describes as a little, very smart man of thirty, with a +black beard and a short jacket; an appointment was made and +broken in the de la Porte affair; Tabary had some breakfast at +the Prior’s charge and leaked out more secrets under the +influence of wine and friendship; and then all of a sudden, on +the 17th of May, an alarm sprang up, the Prior picked up his +skirts and walked quietly over to the Châtelet to make a +deposition, and the whole band took to their heels and vanished +out of Paris and the sight of the police.</p> +<p>Vanish as they like, they all go with a clog about their +feet. Sooner or later, here or there, they will be caught +in the fact, and ignominiously sent home. From our vantage +of four centuries afterwards, it is odd and pitiful to watch the +order in which the fugitives are captured and dragged in.</p> +<p>Montigny was the first. In August of that same year, he +was laid by the heels on many grievous counts; sacrilegious +robberies, frauds, incorrigibility, and that bad business about +Thevenin Pensete in the house by the cemetery of St. John. +He was reclaimed by the ecclesiastical authorities as a clerk; +but the claim was rebutted on the score of incorrigibility, and +ultimately fell to the ground; and he was condemned to death by +the Provost of Paris. It was a very rude hour for Montigny, +but hope was not yet over. He was a fellow of some birth; +his father had been king’s pantler; his sister, probably +married to some one about the Court, was in the family way, and +her health would be endangered if the execution was proceeded +with. So down comes Charles the Seventh with letters of +mercy, commuting the penalty to a year in a dungeon on bread and +water, and a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. James in +Galicia. Alas! the document was incomplete; it did not +contain the full tale of Montigny’s enormities; it did not +recite that he had been denied benefit of clergy, and it said +nothing about Thevenin Pensete. Montigny’s hour was +at hand. Benefit of clergy, honourable descent from +king’s pantler, sister in the family way, royal letters of +commutation—all were of no avail. He had been in +prison in Rouen, in Tours, in Bordeaux, and four times already in +Paris; and out of all these he had come scatheless; but now he +must make a little excursion as far as Montfaucon with Henry +Cousin, executor of high justice. There let him swing among +the carrion crows.</p> +<p>About a year later, in July 1458, the police laid hands on +Tabary. Before the ecclesiastical commissary he was twice +examined, and, on the latter occasion, put to the question +ordinary and extraordinary. What a dismal change from +pleasant suppers at the Mule, where he sat in triumph with expert +operators and great wits! He is at the lees of life, poor +rogue; and those fingers which once transcribed improper romances +are now agonisingly stretched upon the rack. We have no +sure knowledge, but we may have a shrewd guess of the +conclusion. Tabary, the admirer, would go the same way as +those whom he admired.</p> +<p>The last we hear of is Colin de Cayeux. He was caught in +autumn 1460, in the great Church of St. Leu d’Esserens, +which makes so fine a figure in the pleasant Oise valley between +Creil and Beaumont. He was reclaimed by no less than two +bishops; but the Procureur for the Provost held fast by +incorrigible Colin. 1460 was an ill-starred year: for +justice was making a clean sweep of “poor and indigent +persons, thieves, cheats, and lockpickers,” in the +neighbourhood of Paris; <a name="citation220a"></a><a +href="#footnote220a" class="citation">[220a]</a> and Colin de +Cayeux, with many others, was condemned to death and hanged. <a +name="citation220b"></a><a href="#footnote220b" +class="citation">[220b]</a></p> +<h3><span class="smcap">Villon and the Gallows</span>.</h3> +<p>Villon was still absent on the Angers expedition when the +Prior of Paray sent such a bombshell among his accomplices; and +the dates of his return and arrest remain undiscoverable. +M. Campaux plausibly enough opined for the autumn of 1457, which +would make him closely follow on Montigny, and the first of those +denounced by the Prior to fall into the toils. We may +suppose, at least, that it was not long thereafter; we may +suppose him competed for between lay and clerical Courts; and we +may suppose him alternately pert and impudent, humble and +fawning, in his defence. But at the end of all supposing, +we come upon some nuggets of fact. For first, he was put to +the question by water. He who had tossed off so many cups +of white Baigneux or red Beaune, now drank water through linen +folds, until his bowels were flooded and his heart stood +still. After so much raising of the elbow, so much outcry +of fictitious thirst, here at last was enough drinking for a +lifetime. Truly, of our pleasant vices, the gods make whips +to scourge us. And secondly he was condemned to be +hanged. A man may have been expecting a catastrophe for +years, and yet find himself unprepared when it arrives. +Certainly, Villon found, in this legitimate issue of his career, +a very staggering and grave consideration. Every beast, as +he says, clings bitterly to a whole skin. If everything is +lost, and even honour, life still remains; nay, and it becomes, +like the ewe lamb in Nathan’s parable, as dear as all the +rest. “Do you fancy,” he asks, in a lively +ballad, “that I had not enough philosophy under my hood to +cry out: ‘I appeal’? If I had made any bones +about the matter, I should have been planted upright in the +fields, by the St. Denis Road”—Montfaucon being on +the way to St. Denis. An appeal to Parliament, as we saw in +the case of Colin de Cayeux, did not necessarily lead to an +acquittal or a commutation; and while the matter was pending, our +poet had ample opportunity to reflect on his position. +Hanging is a sharp argument, and to swing with many others on the +gibbet adds a horrible corollary for the imagination. With +the aspect of Montfaucon he was well acquainted; indeed, as the +neighbourhood appears to have been sacred to junketing and +nocturnal picnics of wild young men and women, he had probably +studied it under all varieties of hour and weather. And +now, as he lay in prison waiting the mortal push, these different +aspects crowded back on his imagination with a new and startling +significance; and he wrote a ballad, by way of epitaph for +himself and his companions, which remains unique in the annals of +mankind. It is, in the highest sense, a piece of his +biography:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“La pluye nous a debuez et lavez,<br /> +Et le soleil dessechez et noirciz;<br /> +Pies, corbeaulx, nous ont les yeux cavez,<br /> +Et arrachez la barbe et les sourcilz.<br /> +Jamais, nul temps, nous ne sommes rassis;<br /> +Puis ça, puis là, comme le vent varie,<br /> +A son plaisir sans cesser nous charie,<br /> +Plus becquetez d’oiscaulx que dez à couldre.<br /> +Ne soyez donc de nostre confrairie,<br /> +Mais priez Dieu que tous nous vueille absouldre.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Here is some genuine thieves’ literature after so much +that was spurious; sharp as an etching, written with a shuddering +soul. There is an intensity of consideration in the piece +that shows it to be the transcript of familiar thoughts. It +is the quintessence of many a doleful nightmare on the straw, +when he felt himself swing helpless in the wind, and saw the +birds turn about him, screaming and menacing his eyes.</p> +<p>And, after all, the Parliament changed his sentence into one +of banishment; and to Roussillon, in Dauphiny, our poet must +carry his woes without delay. Travellers between Lyons and +Marseilles may remember a station on the line, some way below +Vienne, where the Rhone fleets seaward between vine-clad +hills. This was Villon’s Siberia. It would be a +little warm in summer perhaps, and a little cold in winter in +that draughty valley between two great mountain fields; but what +with the hills, and the racing river, and the fiery Rhone wines, +he was little to be pitied on the conditions of his exile. +Villon, in a remarkably bad ballad, written in a breath, heartily +thanked and fulsomely belauded the Parliament; the <i>envoi</i>, +like the proverbial postscript of a lady’s letter, +containing the pith of his performance in a request for three +days’ delay to settle his affairs and bid his friends +farewell. He was probably not followed out of Paris, like +Antoine Fradin, the popular preacher, another exile of a few +years later, by weeping multitudes; <a name="citation224"></a><a +href="#footnote224" class="citation">[224]</a> but I daresay one +or two rogues of his acquaintance would keep him company for a +mile or so on the south road, and drink a bottle with him before +they turned. For banished people, in those days, seem to +have set out on their own responsibility, in their own guard, and +at their own expense. It was no joke to make one’s +way from Paris to Roussillon alone and penniless in the fifteenth +century. Villon says he left a rag of his tails on every +bush. Indeed, he must have had many a weary tramp, many a +slender meal, and many a to-do with blustering captains of the +Ordonnance. But with one of his light fingers, we may fancy +that he took as good as he gave; for every rag of his tail, he +would manage to indemnify himself upon the population in the +shape of food, or wine, or ringing money; and his route would be +traceable across France and Burgundy by housewives and +inn-keepers lamenting over petty thefts, like the track of a +single human locust. A strange figure he must have cut in +the eyes of the good country people: this ragged, blackguard city +poet, with a smack of the Paris student, and a smack of the Paris +street arab, posting along the highways, in rain or sun, among +the green fields and vineyards. For himself, he had no +taste for rural loveliness; green fields and vineyards would be +mighty indifferent to Master Francis; but he would often have his +tongue in his cheek at the simplicity of rustic dupes, and often, +at city gates, he might stop to contemplate the gibbet with its +swinging bodies, and hug himself on his escape.</p> +<p>How long he stayed at Roussillon, how far he became the +protégé of the Bourbons, to whom that town +belonged, or when it was that he took part, under the auspices of +Charles of Orleans, in a rhyming tournament to be referred to +once again in the pages of the present volume, are matters that +still remain in darkness, in spite of M. Longnon’s diligent +rummaging among archives. When we next find him, in summer +1461, alas! he is once more in durance: this time at +Méun-sur-Loire, in the prisons of Thibault +d’Aussigny, Bishop of Orleans. He had been lowered in +a basket into a noisome pit, where he lay, all summer, gnawing +hard crusts and railing upon fate. His teeth, he says, were +like the teeth of a rake: a touch of haggard portraiture all the +more real for being excessive and burlesque, and all the more +proper to the man for being a caricature of his own misery. +His eyes were “bandaged with thick walls.” It +might blow hurricanes overhead; the lightning might leap in high +heaven; but no word of all this reached him in his noisome +pit. “Il n’entre, ou gist, n’escler ni +tourbillon.” Above all, he was fevered with envy and +anger at the freedom of others; and his heart flowed over into +curses as he thought of Thibault d’Aussigny, walking the +streets in God’s sunlight, and blessing people with +extended fingers. So much we find sharply lined in his own +poems. Why he was cast again into prison—how he had +again managed to shave the gallows—this we know not, nor, +from the destruction of authorities, are we ever likely to +learn. But on October 2d, 1461, or some day immediately +preceding, the new King, Louis Eleventh, made his joyous entry +into Méun. Now it was a part of the formality on +such occasions for the new King to liberate certain prisoners; +and so the basket was let down into Villon’s pit, and +hastily did Master Francis scramble in, and was most joyfully +hauled up, and shot out, blinking and tottering, but once more a +free man, into the blessed sun and wind. Now or never is +the time for verses! Such a happy revolution would turn the +head of a stocking-weaver, and set him jingling rhymes. And +so—after a voyage to Paris, where he finds Montigny and De +Cayeux clattering, their bones upon the gibbet, and his three +pupils roystering in Paris streets, “with their thumbs +under their girdles,”—down sits Master Francis to +write his <i>Large Testament</i>, and perpetuate his name in a +sort of glorious ignominy.</p> +<h3><span class="smcap">The </span><span class="smcap"><i>Large +Testament</i></span>.</h3> +<p>Of this capital achievement and, with it, of Villon’s +style in general, it is here the place to speak. The +<i>Large Testament</i> is a hurly-burly of cynical and +sentimental reflections about life, jesting legacies to friends +and enemies, and, interspersed among these many admirable +ballades, both serious and absurd. With so free a design, +no thought that occurred to him would need to be dismissed +without expression; and he could draw at full length the portrait +of his own bedevilled soul, and of the bleak and blackguardly +world which was the theatre of his exploits and sufferings. +If the reader can conceive something between the slap-dash +inconsequence of Byron’s <i>Don Juan</i> and the racy +humorous gravity and brief noble touches that distinguish the +vernacular poems of Burns, he will have formed some idea of +Villon’s style. To the latter writer—except in +the ballades, which are quite his own, and can be paralleled from +no other language known to me—he bears a particular +resemblance. In common with Burns he has a certain rugged +compression, a brutal vivacity of epithet, a homely vigour, a +delight in local personalities, and an interest in many sides of +life, that are often despised and passed over by more effete and +cultured poets. Both also, in their strong, easy colloquial +way, tend to become difficult and obscure; the obscurity in the +case of Villon passing at times into the absolute darkness of +cant language. They are perhaps the only two great masters +of expression who keep sending their readers to a glossary.</p> +<p>“Shall we not dare to say of a thief,” asks +Montaigne, “that he has a handsome leg?” It is +a far more serious claim that we have to put forward in behalf of +Villon. Beside that of his contemporaries, his writing, so +full of colour, so eloquent, so picturesque, stands out in an +almost miraculous isolation. If only one or two of the +chroniclers could have taken a leaf out of his book, history +would have been a pastime, and the fifteenth century as present +to our minds as the age of Charles Second. This +gallows-bird was the one great writer of his age and country, and +initiated modern literature for France. Boileau, long ago, +in the period of perukes and snuff-boxes, recognised him as the +first articulate poet in the language; and if we measure him, not +by priority of merit, but living duration of influence, not on a +comparison with obscure forerunners, but with great and famous +successors, we shall instal this ragged and disreputable figure +in a far higher niche in glory’s temple than was ever +dreamed of by the critic. It is, in itself, a memorable +fact that, before 1542, in the very dawn of printing, and while +modern France was in the making, the works of Villon ran through +seven different editions. Out of him flows much of +Rabelais; and through Rabelais, directly and indirectly, a deep, +permanent, and growing inspiration. Not only his style, but +his callous pertinent way of looking upon the sordid and ugly +sides of life, becomes every day a more specific feature in the +literature of France. And only the other year, a work of +some power appeared in Paris, and appeared with infinite scandal, +which owed its whole inner significance and much of its outward +form to the study of our rhyming thief.</p> +<p>The world to which he introduces us is, as before said, +blackguardly and bleak. Paris swarms before us, full of +famine, shame, and death; monks and the servants of great lords +hold high wassail upon cakes and pastry; the poor man licks his +lips before the baker’s window; people with patched eyes +sprawl all night under the stalls; chuckling Tabary transcribes +an improper romance; bare-bosomed lasses and ruffling students +swagger in the streets; the drunkard goes stumbling homewards; +the graveyard is full of bones; and away on Montfaucon, Colin de +Cayeux and Montigny hang draggled in the rain. Is there +nothing better to be seen than sordid misery and worthless +joys? Only where the poor old mother of the poet kneels in +church below painted windows, and makes tremulous supplication to +the Mother of God.</p> +<p>In our mixed world, full of green fields and happy lovers, +where not long before, Joan of Arc had led one of the highest and +noblest lives in the whole story of mankind, this was all worth +chronicling that our poet could perceive. His eyes were +indeed sealed with his own filth. He dwelt all his life in +a pit more noisome than the dungeon at Méun. In the +moral world, also, there are large phenomena not cognisable out +of holes and corners. Loud winds blow, speeding home +deep-laden ships and sweeping rubbish from the earth; the +lightning leaps and cleans the face of heaven; high purposes and +brave passions shake and sublimate men’s spirits; and +meanwhile, in the narrow dungeon of his soul, Villon is mumbling +crusts and picking vermin.</p> +<p>Along with this deadly gloom of outlook, we must take another +characteristic of his work: its unrivalled insincerity. I +can give no better similitude of this quality than I have given +already: that he comes up with a whine, and runs away with a +whoop and his finger to his nose. His pathos is that of a +professional mendicant who should happen to be a man of genius; +his levity that of a bitter street arab, full of bread. On +a first reading, the pathetic passages preoccupy the reader, and +he is cheated out of an alms in the shape of sympathy. But +when the thing is studied the illusion fades away: in the +transitions, above all, we can detect the evil, ironical temper +of the man; and instead of a flighty work, where many crude but +genuine feelings tumble together for the mastery as in the lists +of tournament, we are tempted to think of the <i>Large +Testament</i> as of one long-drawn epical grimace, pulled by a +merry-andrew, who has found a certain despicable eminence over +human respect and human affections by perching himself astride +upon the gallows. Between these two views, at best, all +temperate judgments will be found to fall; and rather, as I +imagine, towards the last.</p> +<p>There were two things on which he felt with perfect and, in +one case, even threatening sincerity.</p> +<p>The first of these was an undisguised envy of those richer +than himself. He was for ever drawing a parallel, already +exemplified from his own words, between the happy life of the +well-to-do and the miseries of the poor. Burns, too proud +and honest not to work, continued through all reverses to sing of +poverty with a light, defiant note. Béranger waited +till he was himself beyond the reach of want, before writing the +<i>Old Vagabond</i> or <i>Jacques</i>. Samuel Johnson, +although he was very sorry to be poor, “was a great arguer +for the advantages of poverty” in his ill days. Thus +it is that brave men carry their crosses, and smile with the fox +burrowing in their vitals. But Villon, who had not the +courage to be poor with honesty, now whiningly implores our +sympathy, now shows his teeth upon the dung-heap with an ugly +snarl. He envies bitterly, envies passionately. +Poverty, he protests, drives men to steal, as hunger makes the +wolf sally from the forest. The poor, he goes on, will +always have a carping word to say, or, if that outlet be denied, +nourish rebellious thoughts. It is a calumny on the noble +army of the poor. Thousands in a small way of life, ay, and +even in the smallest, go through life with tenfold as much honour +and dignity and peace of mind, as the rich gluttons whose +dainties and state-beds awakened Villon’s covetous +temper. And every morning’s sun sees thousands who +pass whistling to their toil. But Villon was the +“mauvais pauvre” defined by Victor Hugo, and, in its +English expression, so admirably stereotyped by Dickens. He +was the first wicked sansculotte. He is the man of genius +with the moleskin cap. He is mighty pathetic and beseeching +here in the street, but I would not go down a dark road with him +for a large consideration.</p> +<p>The second of the points on which he was genuine and emphatic +was common to the middle ages; a deep and somewhat snivelling +conviction of the transitory nature of this life and the pity and +horror of death. Old age and the grave, with some dark and +yet half-sceptical terror of an after-world—these were +ideas that clung about his bones like a disease. An old +ape, as he says, may play all the tricks in its repertory, and +none of them will tickle an audience into good humour. +“Tousjours vieil synge est desplaisant.” It is +not the old jester who receives most recognition at a tavern +party, but the young fellow, fresh and handsome, who knows the +new slang, and carries off his vice with a certain air. Of +this, as a tavern jester himself, he would be pointedly +conscious. As for the women with whom he was best +acquainted, his reflections on their old age, in all their +harrowing pathos, shall remain in the original for me. +Horace has disgraced himself to something the same tune; but what +Horace throws out with an ill-favoured laugh, Villon dwells on +with an almost maudlin whimper.</p> +<p>It is in death that he finds his truest inspiration in the +swift and sorrowful change that overtakes beauty; in the strange +revolution by which great fortunes and renowns are diminished to +a handful of churchyard dust; and in the utter passing away of +what was once lovable and mighty. It is in this that the +mixed texture of his thought enables him to reach such poignant +and terrible effects, and to enchance pity with ridicule, like a +man cutting capers to a funeral march. It is in this, also, +that he rises out of himself into the higher spheres of +art. So, in the ballade by which he is best known, he rings +the changes on names that once stood for beautiful and queenly +women, and are now no more than letters and a legend. +“Where are the snows of yester year?” runs the +burden. And so, in another not so famous, he passes in +review the different degrees of bygone men, from the holy +Apostles and the golden Emperor of the East, down to the heralds, +pursuivants, and trumpeters, who also bore their part in the +world’s pageantries and ate greedily at great folks’ +tables: all this to the refrain of “So much carry the winds +away!” Probably, there was some melancholy in his +mind for a yet lower grade, and Montigny and Colin de Cayeux +clattering their bones on Paris gibbet. Alas, and with so +pitiful an experience of life, Villon can offer us nothing but +terror and lamentation about death! No one has ever more +skilfully communicated his own disenchantment; no one ever blown +a more ear-piercing note of sadness. This unrepentant thief +can attain neither to Christian confidence, nor to the spirit of +the bright Greek saying, that whom the gods love die early. +It is a poor heart, and a poorer age, that cannot accept the +conditions of life with some heroic readiness.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * * * *</p> +<p>The date of the <i>Large Testament</i> is the last date in the +poet’s biography. After having achieved that +admirable and despicable performance, he disappears into the +night from whence he came. How or when he died, whether +decently in bed or trussed up to a gallows, remains a riddle for +foolhardy commentators. It appears his health had suffered +in the pit at Méun; he was thirty years of age and quite +bald; with the notch in his under lip where Sermaise had struck +him with the sword, and what wrinkles the reader may +imagine. In default of portraits, this is all I have been +able to piece together, and perhaps even the baldness should be +taken as a figure of his destitution. A sinister dog, in +all likelihood, but with a look in his eye, and the loose flexile +mouth that goes with wit and an overweening sensual +temperament. Certainly the sorriest figure on the rolls of +fame.</p> +<h2><a name="page236"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +236</span>CHARLES OF ORLEANS.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">For</span> one who was no great +politician, nor (as men go) especially wise, capable or virtuous, +Charles of Orleans is more than usually enviable to all who love +that better sort of fame which consists in being known not +widely, but intimately. “To be content that time to +come should know there was such a man, not caring whether they +knew more of him, or to subsist under naked denominations, +without deserts or noble acts,” is, says Sir Thomas Browne, +a frigid ambition. It is to some more specific memory that +youth looks forward in its vigils. Old kings are sometimes +disinterred in all the emphasis of life, the hands untainted by +decay, the beard that had so often wagged in camp or senate still +spread upon the royal bosom; and in busts and pictures, some +similitude of the great and beautiful of former days is handed +down. In this way, public curiosity may be gratified, but +hardly any private aspiration after fame. It is not likely +that posterity will fall in love with us, but not impossible that +it may respect or sympathise; and so a man would rather leave +behind him the portrait of his spirit than a portrait of his +face, <i>figura animi magis quam corporis</i>. Of those who have +thus survived themselves most completely, left a sort of personal +seduction behind them in the world, and retained, after death, +the art of making friends, Montaigne and Samuel Johnson certainly +stand first. But we have portraits of all sorts of men, +from august Cæsar to the king’s dwarf; and all sorts +of portraits, from a Titian treasured in the Louvre to a profile +over the grocer’s chimney shelf. And so in a less +degree, but no less truly, than the spirit of Montaigne lives on +in the delightful Essays, that of Charles of Orleans survives in +a few old songs and old account-books; and it is still in the +choice of the reader to make this duke’s acquaintance, and, +if their humours suit, become his friend.</p> +<h3>I.</h3> +<p>His birth—if we are to argue from a man’s +parents—was above his merit. It is not merely that he +was the grandson of one king, the father of another, and the +uncle of a third; but something more specious was to be looked +for from the son of his father, Louis de Valois, Duke of Orleans, +brother to the mad king Charles VI., lover of Queen Isabel, and +the leading patron of art and one of the leading politicians in +France. And the poet might have inherited yet higher +virtues from his mother, Valentina of Milan, a very pathetic +figure of the age, the faithful wife of an unfaithful husband, +and the friend of a most unhappy king. The father, +beautiful, eloquent, and accomplished, exercised a strange +fascination over his contemporaries; and among those who dip +nowadays into the annals of the time there are not many—and +these few are little to be envied—who can resist the +fascination of the mother. All mankind owe her a debt of +gratitude because she brought some comfort into the life of the +poor madman who wore the crown of France.</p> +<p>Born (May 1391) of such a noble stock, Charles was to know +from the first all favours of nature and art. His +father’s gardens were the admiration of his contemporaries; +his castles were situated in the most agreeable parts of France, +and sumptuously adorned. We have preserved, in an inventory +of 1403, the description of tapestried rooms where Charles may +have played in childhood. <a name="citation238"></a><a +href="#footnote238" class="citation">[238]</a> “A +green room, with the ceiling full of angels, and the +<i>dossier</i> of shepherds and shepherdesses seeming (<i>faisant +contenance</i>) to eat nuts and cherries. A room of gold, +silk and worsted, with a device of little children in a river, +and the sky full of birds. A room of green tapestry, +showing a knight and lady at chess in a pavilion. Another +green room, with shepherdesses in a trellised garden worked in +gold and silk. A carpet representing cherry-trees, where +there is a fountain, and a lady gathering cherries in a +basin.” These were some of the pictures over which +his fancy might busy itself of an afternoon, or at morning as he +lay awake in bed. With our deeper and more logical sense of +life, we can have no idea how large a space in the attention of +mediæval men might be occupied by such figured hangings on +the wall. There was something timid and purblind in the +view they had of the world. Morally, they saw nothing +outside of traditional axioms; and little of the physical aspect +of things entered vividly into their mind, beyond what was to be +seen on church windows and the walls and floors of palaces. +The reader will remember how Villon’s mother conceived of +heaven and hell and took all her scanty stock of theology from +the stained glass that threw its light upon her as she +prayed. And there is scarcely a detail of external effect +in the chronicles and romances of the time, but might have been +borrowed at second hand from a piece of tapestry. It was a +stage in the history of mankind which we may see paralleled, to +some extent, in the first infant school, where the +representations of lions and elephants alternate round the wall +with moral verses and trite presentments of the lesser +virtues. So that to live in a house of many pictures was +tantamount, for the time, to a liberal education in itself.</p> +<p>At Charles’s birth an order of knighthood was +inaugurated in his honour. At nine years old, he was a +squire; at eleven, he had the escort of a chaplain and a +schoolmaster; at twelve, his uncle the king made him a pension of +twelve thousand livres d’or. <a name="citation240a"></a><a +href="#footnote240a" class="citation">[240a]</a> He saw the +most brilliant and the most learned persons of France, in his +father’s Court; and would not fail to notice that these +brilliant and learned persons were one and all engaged in +rhyming. Indeed, if it is difficult to realise the part +played by pictures, it is perhaps even more difficult to realise +that played by verses in the polite and active history of the +age. At the siege of Pontoise, English and French exchanged +defiant ballades over the walls. <a name="citation240b"></a><a +href="#footnote240b" class="citation">[240b]</a> If a +scandal happened, as in the loathsome thirty-third story of the +<i>Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles</i>, all the wits must make rondels +and chansonettes, which they would hand from one to another with +an unmanly sneer. Ladies carried their favourite’s +ballades in their girdles. <a name="citation241a"></a><a +href="#footnote241a" class="citation">[241a]</a> +Margaret of Scotland, all the world knows already, kissed Alain +Chartier’s lips in honour of the many virtuous thoughts and +golden sayings they had uttered; but it is not so well known, +that this princess was herself the most industrious of +poetasters, that she is supposed to have hastened her death by +her literary vigils, and sometimes wrote as many as twelve +rondels in the day. <a name="citation241b"></a><a +href="#footnote241b" class="citation">[241b]</a> It was in +rhyme, even, that the young Charles should learn his +lessons. He might get all manner of instruction in the +truly noble art of the chase, not without a smack of ethics by +the way, from the compendious didactic poem of Gace de la +Bigne. Nay, and it was in rhyme that he should learn +rhyming: in the verses of his father’s Maître +d’Hôtel, Eustache Deschamps, which treated of +“l’art de dictier et de faire chançons, +ballades, virelais et rondeaux,” along with many other +matters worth attention, from the courts of Heaven to the +misgovernment of France. <a name="citation241c"></a><a +href="#footnote241c" class="citation">[241c]</a> At this +rate, all knowledge is to be had in a goody, and the end of it is +an old song. We need not wonder when we hear from +Monstrelet that Charles was a very well educated person. He +could string Latin texts together by the hour, and make ballades +and rondels better than Eustache Deschamps himself. He had +seen a mad king who would not change his clothes, and a drunken +emperor who could not keep his hand from the wine-cup. He +had spoken a great deal with jesters and fiddlers, and with the +profligate lords who helped his father to waste the revenues of +France. He had seen ladies dance on into broad daylight, +and much burning of torches and waste of dainties and good wine. +<a name="citation242a"></a><a href="#footnote242a" +class="citation">[242a]</a> And when all is said, it was no +very helpful preparation for the battle of life. “I +believe Louis XI.,” writes Comines, “would not have +saved himself, if he had not been very differently brought up +from such other lords as I have seen educated in this country; +for these were taught nothing but to play the jackanapes with +finery and fine words.” <a name="citation242b"></a><a +href="#footnote242b" class="citation">[242b]</a> I am +afraid Charles took such lessons to heart, and conceived of life +as a season principally for junketing and war. His view of +the whole duty of man, so empty, vain, and wearisome to us, was +yet sincerely and consistently held. When he came in his +ripe years to compare the glory of two kingdoms, England and +France, it was on three points only,—pleasures, valour, and +riches,—that he cared to measure them; and in the very +outset of that tract he speaks of the life of the great as +passed, “whether in arms, as in assaults, battles, and +sieges, or in jousts and tournaments, in high and stately +festivities and in funeral solemnities.” <a +name="citation243"></a><a href="#footnote243" +class="citation">[243]</a></p> +<p>When he was no more than thirteen, his father had him +affianced to Isabella, virgin-widow of our Richard II. and +daughter of his uncle Charles VI.; and, two years after (June 29, +1406), the cousins were married at Compiègne, he fifteen, +she seventeen years of age. It was in every way a most +desirable match. The bride brought five hundred thousand +francs of dowry. The ceremony was of the utmost +magnificence, Louis of Orleans figuring in crimson velvet, +adorned with no less than seven hundred and ninety-five pearls, +gathered together expressly for this occasion. And no doubt +it must have been very gratifying for a young gentleman of +fifteen, to play the chief part in a pageant so gaily put upon +the stage. Only, the bridegroom might have been a little +older; and, as ill-luck would have it, the bride herself was of +this way of thinking, and would not be consoled for the loss of +her title as queen, or the contemptible age of her new +husband. <i>Pleuroit fort ladite Isabeau</i>; the said +Isabella wept copiously. <a name="citation244"></a><a +href="#footnote244" class="citation">[244]</a> It is fairly +debatable whether Charles was much to be pitied when, three years +later (September 1409), this odd marriage was dissolved by +death. Short as it was, however, this connection left a +lasting stamp upon his mind; and we find that, in the last decade +of his life, and after he had remarried for perhaps the second +time, he had not yet forgotten or forgiven the violent death of +Richard II. “Ce mauvais cas”—that ugly +business, he writes, has yet to be avenged.</p> +<p>The marriage festivity was on the threshold of evil +days. The great rivalry between Louis of Orleans and John +the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, had been forsworn with the most +reverend solemnities. But the feud was only in abeyance, +and John of Burgundy still conspired in secret. On November +23, 1407—in that black winter when the frost lasted +six-and-sixty days on end—a summons from the king reached +Louis of Orleans at the Hôtel Barbette, where he had been +supping with Queen Isabel. It was seven or eight in the +evening, and the inhabitants of the quarter were abed. He +set forth in haste, accompanied by two squires riding on one +horse, a page, and a few varlets running with torches. As +he rode, he hummed to himself and trifled with his glove. +And so riding, he was beset by the bravoes of his enemy and +slain. My lord of Burgundy set an ill precedent in this +deed, as he found some years after on the bridge of Montereau; +and even in the meantime he did not profit quietly by his +rival’s death. The horror of the other princes seems +to have perturbed himself; he avowed his guilt in the council, +tried to brazen it out, finally lost heart and fled at full +gallop, cutting bridges behind him, towards Bapaume and +Lille. And so there we have the head of one faction, who +had just made himself the most formidable man in France, engaged +in a remarkably hurried journey, with black care on the +pillion. And meantime, on the other side, the widowed +duchess came to Paris in appropriate mourning, to demand justice +for her husband’s death. Charles VI., who was then in +a lucid interval, did probably all that he could, when he raised +up the kneeling suppliant with kisses and smooth words. +Things were at a dead-lock. The criminal might be in the +sorriest fright, but he was still the greatest of vassals. +Justice was easy to ask and not difficult to promise; how it was +to be executed was another question. No one in France was +strong enough to punish John of Burgundy; and perhaps no one, +except the widow, very sincere in wishing to punish him.</p> +<p>She, indeed, was eaten up of zeal; but the intensity of her +eagerness wore her out; and she died about a year after the +murder, of grief and indignation, unrequited love and unsatisfied +resentment. It was during the last months of her life that +this fiery and generous woman, seeing the soft hearts of her own +children, looked with envy on a certain natural son of her +husband’s destined to become famous in the sequel as the +Bastard of Orleans, or the brave Dunois. “<i>You were +stolen from me</i>,” she said; “it is you who are fit +to avenge your father.” These are not the words of +ordinary mourning, or of an ordinary woman. It is a saying, +over which Balzac would have rubbed his episcopal hands. +That the child who was to avenge her husband had not been born +out of her body, was a thing intolerable to Valentina of Milan; +and the expression of this singular and tragic jealousy is +preserved to us by a rare chance, in such straightforward and +vivid words as we are accustomed to hear only on the stress of +actual life, or in the theatre. In history—where we +see things as in a glass darkly, and the fashion of former times +is brought before us, deplorably adulterated and defaced, fitted +to very vague and pompous words, and strained through many +men’s minds of everything personal or precise—this +speech of the widowed duchess startles a reader, somewhat as the +footprint startled Robinson Crusoe. A human voice breaks in +upon the silence of the study, and the student is aware of a +fellow-creature in his world of documents. With such a clue +in hand, one may imagine how this wounded lioness would spur and +exasperate the resentment of her children, and what would be the +last words of counsel and command she left behind her.</p> +<p>With these instancies of his dying mother—almost a voice +from the tomb—still tingling in his ears, the position of +young Charles of Orleans, when he was left at the head of that +great house, was curiously similar to that of Shakspeare’s +Hamlet. The times were out of joint; here was a murdered +father to avenge on a powerful murderer; and here, in both cases, +a lad of inactive disposition born to set these matters +right. Valentina’s commendation of Dunois involved a +judgment on Charles, and that judgment was exactly correct. +Whoever might be, Charles was not the man to avenge his +father. Like Hamlet, this son of a dear father murdered was +sincerely grieved at heart. Like Hamlet, too, he could +unpack his heart with words, and wrote a most eloquent letter to +the king, complaining that what was denied to him would not be +denied “to the lowest born and poorest man on +earth.” Even in his private hours he strove to +preserve a lively recollection of his injury, and keep up the +native hue of resolution. He had gems engraved with +appropriate legends, hortatory or threatening: “<i>Dieu le +scet</i>,” God knows it; or “<i>Souvenez-vous de</i> +—” Remember! <a name="citation248"></a><a +href="#footnote248" class="citation">[248]</a> It is only +towards the end that the two stories begin to differ; and in some +points the historical version is the more tragic. Hamlet +only stabbed a silly old councillor behind the arras; Charles of +Orleans trampled France for five years under the hoofs of his +banditti. The miscarriage of Hamlet’s vengeance was +confined, at widest, to the palace; the ruin wrought by Charles +of Orleans was as broad as France.</p> +<p>Yet the first act of the young duke is worthy of honourable +mention. Prodigal Louis had made enormous debts; and there +is a story extant, to illustrate how lightly he himself regarded +these commercial obligations. It appears that Louis, after +a narrow escape he made in a thunder-storm, had a smart access of +penitence, and announced he would pay his debts on the following +Sunday. More than eight hundred creditors presented +themselves, but by that time the devil was well again, and they +were shown the door with more gaiety than politeness. A +time when such cynical dishonesty was possible for a man of +culture is not, it will be granted, a fortunate epoch for +creditors. When the original debtor was so lax, we may +imagine how an heir would deal with the incumbrances of his +inheritance. On the death of Philip the Forward, father of +that John the Fearless whom we have seen at work, the widow went +through the ceremony of a public renunciation of goods; taking +off her purse and girdle, she left them on the grave, and thus, +by one notable act, cancelled her husband’s debts and +defamed his honour. The conduct of young Charles of Orleans +was very different. To meet the joint liabilities of his +father and mother (for Valentina also was lavish), he had to sell +or pledge a quantity of jewels; and yet he would not take +advantage of a pretext, even legally valid, to diminish the +amount. Thus, one Godefroi Lefèvre, having disbursed +many odd sums for the late duke, and received or kept no +vouchers, Charles ordered that he should be believed upon his +oath. <a name="citation249"></a><a href="#footnote249" +class="citation">[249]</a> To a modern mind this seems as +honourable to his father’s memory as if John the Fearless +had been hanged as high as Haman. And as things fell out, +except a recantation from the University of Paris, which had +justified the murder out of party feeling, and various other +purely paper reparations, this was about the outside of what +Charles was to effect in that direction. He lived five +years, and grew up from sixteen to twenty-one, in the midst of +the most horrible civil war, or series of civil wars, that ever +devastated France; and from first to last his wars were +ill-starred, or else his victories useless. Two years after +the murder (March 1409), John the Fearless having the upper hand +for the moment, a shameful and useless reconciliation took place, +by the king’s command, in the church of Our Lady at +Chartres. The advocate of the Duke of Burgundy stated that +Louis of Orleans had been killed “for the good of the +king’s person and realm.” Charles and his +brothers, with tears of shame, under protest, <i>pour ne pas +desobéir au roi</i>, forgave their father’s murderer +and swore peace upon the missal. It was, as I say, a +shameful and useless ceremony; the very greffier, entering it in +his register, wrote in the margin, “<i>Pax</i>, <i>pax</i>, +<i>inquit Propheta</i>, <i>et non est Pax</i>.” <a +name="citation250"></a><a href="#footnote250" +class="citation">[250]</a> Charles was soon after allied +with the abominable Bernard d’Armagnac, even betrothed or +married to a daughter of his, called by a name that sounds like a +contradiction in terms, Bonne d’Armagnac. From that +time forth, throughout all this monstrous period—a very +nightmare in the history of France—he is no more than a +stalking-horse for the ambitious Gascon. Sometimes the +smoke lifts, and you can see him for the twinkling of an eye, a +very pale figure; at one moment there is a rumour he will be +crowned king; at another, when the uproar has subsided, he will +be heard still crying out for justice; and the next (1412), he is +showing himself to the applauding populace on the same horse with +John of Burgundy. But these are exceptional seasons, and, +for the most part, he merely rides at the Gascon’s bridle +over devastated France. His very party go, not by the name +of Orleans, but by the name of Armagnac. Paris is in the +hands of the butchers: the peasants have taken to the +woods. Alliances are made and broken as if in a country +dance; the English called in, now by this one, now by the +other. Poor people sing in church, with white faces and +lamentable music: “<i>Domine Jesu</i>, <i>parce populo +tuo</i>, <i>dirige in viam pacis principes</i>.” And +the end and upshot of the whole affair for Charles of Orleans is +another peace with John the Fearless. France is once more +tranquil, with the tranquillity of ruin; he may ride home again +to Blois, and look, with what countenance he may, on those gems +he had got engraved in the early days of his resentment, +“<i>Souvenez-vous de</i> —” +Remember! He has killed Polonius, to be sure; but the king +is never a penny the worse.</p> +<h3>II.</h3> +<p>From the battle of Agincourt (Oct. 1415) dates the second +period of Charles’s life. The English reader will +remember the name of Orleans in the play of <i>Henry V.</i>; and +it is at least odd that we can trace a resemblance between the +puppet and the original. The interjection, “I have +heard a sonnet begin so to one’s mistress” (Act iii. +scene 7), may very well indicate one who was already an expert in +that sort of trifle; and the game of proverbs he plays with the +Constable in the same scene, would be quite in character for a +man who spent many years of his life capping verses with his +courtiers. Certainly, Charles was in the great battle with +five hundred lances (say, three thousand men), and there he was +made prisoner as he led the van. According to one story, +some ragged English archer shot him down; and some diligent +English Pistol, hunting ransoms on the field of battle, extracted +him from under a heap of bodies and retailed him to our King +Henry. He was the most important capture of the day, and +used with all consideration. On the way to Calais, Henry +sent him a present of bread and wine (and bread, you will +remember, was an article of luxury in the English camp), but +Charles would neither eat nor drink. Thereupon, Henry came +to visit him in his quarters. “Noble cousin,” +said he, “how are you?” Charles replied that he +was well. “Why, then, do you neither eat nor +drink?” And then with some asperity, as I imagine, +the young duke told him that “truly he had no inclination +for food.” And our Henry improved the occasion with +something of a snuffle, assuring his prisoner that God had fought +against the French on account of their manifold sins and +transgressions. Upon this there supervened the agonies of a +rough sea passage; and many French lords, Charles, certainly, +among the number, declared they would rather endure such another +defeat than such another sore trial on shipboard. Charles, +indeed, never forgot his sufferings. Long afterwards, he +declared his hatred to a seafaring life, and willingly yielded to +England the empire of the seas, “because there is danger +and loss of life, and God knows what pity when it storms; and +sea-sickness is for many people hard to bear; and the rough life +that must be led is little suitable for the nobility:” <a +name="citation253"></a><a href="#footnote253" +class="citation">[253]</a> which, of all babyish utterances that +ever fell from any public man, may surely bear the bell. +Scarcely disembarked, he followed his victor, with such wry face +as we may fancy, through the streets of holiday London. And +then the doors closed upon his last day of garish life for more +than a quarter of a century. After a boyhood passed in the +dissipations of a luxurious court or in the camp of war, his ears +still stunned and his cheeks still burning from his +enemies’ jubilations; out of all this ringing of English +bells and singing of English anthems, from among all these +shouting citizens in scarlet cloaks, and beautiful virgins +attired in white, he passed into the silence and solitude of a +political prison. <a name="citation254"></a><a +href="#footnote254" class="citation">[254]</a></p> +<p>His captivity was not without alleviations. He was +allowed to go hawking, and he found England an admirable country +for the sport; he was a favourite with English ladies, and +admired their beauty; and he did not lack for money, wine, or +books; he was honourably imprisoned in the strongholds of great +nobles, in Windsor Castle and the Tower of London. But when +all is said, he was a prisoner for five-and-twenty years. +For five-and-twenty years he could not go where he would, or do +what he liked, or speak with any but his gaolers. We may +talk very wisely of alleviations; there is only one alleviation +for which the man would thank you: he would thank you to open the +door. With what regret Scottish James I. bethought him (in +the next room perhaps to Charles) of the time when he rose +“as early as the day.” What would he not have +given to wet his boots once more with morning dew, and follow his +vagrant fancy among the meadows? The only alleviation to +the misery of constraint lies in the disposition of the +prisoner. To each one this place of discipline brings his +own lesson. It stirs Latude or Baron Trenck into heroic +action; it is a hermitage for pious and conformable +spirits. Béranger tells us he found prison life, +with its regular hours and long evenings, both pleasant and +profitable. <i>The Pilgrim’s Progress</i> and <i>Don +Quixote</i> were begun in prison. It was after they were +become (to use the words of one of them), “Oh, worst +imprisonment—the dungeon of themselves!” that Homer +and Milton worked so hard and so well for the profit of +mankind. In the year 1415 Henry V. had two distinguished +prisoners, French Charles of Orleans and Scottish James I., who +whiled away the hours of their captivity with rhyming. +Indeed, there can be no better pastime for a lonely man than the +mechanical exercise of verse. Such intricate forms as +Charles had been used to from childhood, the ballade with its +scanty rhymes; the rondel, with the recurrence first of the +whole, then of half the burthen, in thirteen verses, seem to have +been invented for the prison and the sick bed. The common +Scotch saying, on the sight of anything operose and finical, +“he must have had little to do that made that!” might +be put as epigraph on all the song books of old France. +Making such sorts of verse belongs to the same class of pleasures +as guessing acrostics or “burying proverbs.” It +is almost purely formal, almost purely verbal. It must be +done gently and gingerly. It keeps the mind occupied a long +time, and never so intently as to be distressing; for anything +like strain is against the very nature of the craft. +Sometimes things go easily, the refrains fall into their place as +if of their own accord, and it becomes something of the nature of +an intellectual tennis; you must make your poem as the rhymes +will go, just as you must strike your ball as your adversary +played it. So that these forms are suitable rather for +those who wish to make verses, than for those who wish to express +opinions. Sometimes, on the other hand, difficulties arise: +rival verses come into a man’s head, and fugitive words +elude his memory. Then it is that he enjoys at the same +time the deliberate pleasures of a connoisseur comparing wines, +and the ardour of the chase. He may have been sitting all +day long in prison with folded hands; but when he goes to bed, +the retrospect will seem animated and eventful.</p> +<p>Besides confirming himself as an habitual maker of verses, +Charles acquired some new opinions during his captivity. He +was perpetually reminded of the change that had befallen +him. He found the climate of England cold and +“prejudicial to the human frame;” he had a great +contempt for English fruit and English beer; even the coal fires +were unpleasing in his eyes. <a name="citation257a"></a><a +href="#footnote257a" class="citation">[257a]</a> He was +rooted up from among his friends and customs and the places that +had known him. And so in this strange land he began to +learn the love of his own. Sad people all the world over +are like to be moved when the wind is in some particular +quarter. So Burns preferred when it was in the west, and +blew to him from his mistress; so the girl in the ballade, +looking south to Yarrow, thought it might carry a kiss betwixt +her and her gallant; and so we find Charles singing of the +“pleasant wind that comes from France.” <a +name="citation257b"></a><a href="#footnote257b" +class="citation">[257b]</a> One day, at +“Dover-on-the-Sea,” he looked across the straits, and +saw the sandhills about Calais. And it happened to him, he +tells us in a ballade, to remember his happiness over there in +the past; and he was both sad and merry at the recollection, and +could not have his fill of gazing on the shores of France. <a +name="citation257c"></a><a href="#footnote257c" +class="citation">[257c]</a> Although guilty of unpatriotic +acts, he had never been exactly unpatriotic in feeling. But +his sojourn in England gave, for the time at least, some +consistency to what had been a very weak and ineffectual +prejudice. He must have been under the influence of more +than usually solemn considerations, when he proceeded to turn +Henry’s puritanical homily after Agincourt into a ballade, +and reproach France, and himself by implication, with pride, +gluttony, idleness, unbridled covetousness, and sensuality. <a +name="citation258a"></a><a href="#footnote258a" +class="citation">[258a]</a> For the moment, he must really +have been thinking more of France than of Charles of Orleans.</p> +<p>And another lesson he learned. He who was only to be +released in case of peace, begins to think upon the disadvantages +of war. “Pray for peace,” is his refrain: a +strange enough subject for the ally of Bernard d’Armagnac. +<a name="citation258b"></a><a href="#footnote258b" +class="citation">[258b]</a> But this lesson was plain and +practical; it had one side in particular that was specially +attractive for Charles; and he did not hesitate to explain it in +so many words. “Everybody,” he writes—I +translate roughly—“everybody should be much inclined +to peace, for everybody has a deal to gain by it.” <a +name="citation258c"></a><a href="#footnote258c" +class="citation">[258c]</a></p> +<p>Charles made laudable endeavours to acquire English, and even +learned to write a rondel in that tongue of quite average +mediocrity. <a name="citation259a"></a><a href="#footnote259a" +class="citation">[259a]</a> He was for some time billeted +on the unhappy Suffolk, who received fourteen shillings and +fourpence a day for his expenses; and from the fact that Suffolk +afterwards visited Charles in France while he was negotiating the +marriage of Henry VI., as well as the terms of that +nobleman’s impeachment, we may believe there was some not +unkindly intercourse between the prisoner and his gaoler: a fact +of considerable interest when we remember that Suffolk’s +wife was the granddaughter of the poet Geoffrey Chaucer. <a +name="citation259b"></a><a href="#footnote259b" +class="citation">[259b]</a> Apart from this, and a mere +catalogue of dates and places, only one thing seems evident in +the story of Charles’s captivity. It seems evident +that, as these five-and-twenty years drew on, he became less and +less resigned. Circumstances were against the growth of +such a feeling. One after another of his fellow-prisoners +was ransomed and went home. More than once he was himself +permitted to visit France; where he worked on abortive treaties +and showed himself more eager for his own deliverance than for +the profit of his native land. Resignation may follow after +a reasonable time upon despair; but if a man is persecuted by a +series of brief and irritating hopes, his mind no more attains to +a settled frame of resolution, than his eye would grow familiar +with a night of thunder and lightning. Years after, when he +was speaking at the trial of that Duke of Alençon, who +began life so hopefully as the boyish favourite of Joan of Arc, +he sought to prove that captivity was a harder punishment than +death. “For I have had experience myself,” he +said; “and in my prison of England, for the weariness, +danger, and displeasure in which I then lay, I have many a time +wished I had been slain at the battle where they took me.” +<a name="citation260"></a><a href="#footnote260" +class="citation">[260]</a> This is a flourish, if you will, +but it is something more. His spirit would sometimes rise +up in a fine anger against the petty desires and contrarieties of +life. He would compare his own condition with the quiet and +dignified estate of the dead; and aspire to lie among his +comrades on the field of Agincourt, as the Psalmist prayed to +have the wings of a dove and dwell in the uttermost parts of the +sea. But such high thoughts came to Charles only in a +flash.</p> +<p>John the Fearless had been murdered in his turn on the bridge +of Montereau so far back as 1419. His son, Philip the +Good—partly to extinguish the feud, partly that he might do +a popular action, and partly, in view of his ambitious schemes, +to detach another great vassal from the throne of +France—had taken up the cause of Charles of Orleans, and +negotiated diligently for his release. In 1433 a Burgundian +embassy was admitted to an interview with the captive duke, in +the presence of Suffolk. Charles shook hands most +affectionately with the ambassadors. They asked after his +health. “I am well enough in body,” he replied, +“but far from well in mind. I am dying of grief at +having to pass the best days of my life in prison, with none to +sympathise.” The talk falling on the chances of +peace, Charles referred to Suffolk if he were not sincere and +constant in his endeavours to bring it about. “If +peace depended on me,” he said, “I should procure it +gladly, were it to cost me my life seven days after.” +We may take this as showing what a large price he set, not so +much on peace, as on seven days of freedom. Seven +days!—he would make them seven years in the +employment. Finally, he assured the ambassadors of his good +will to Philip of Burgundy; squeezed one of them by the hand and +nipped him twice in the arm to signify things unspeakable before +Suffolk; and two days after sent them Suffolk’s barber, one +Jean Carnet, a native of Lille, to testify more freely of his +sentiments. “As I speak French,” said this +emissary, “the Duke of Orleans is more familiar with me +than with any other of the household; and I can bear witness he +never said anything against Duke Philip.” <a +name="citation262a"></a><a href="#footnote262a" +class="citation">[262a]</a> It will be remembered that this +person, with whom he was so anxious to stand well, was no other +than his hereditary enemy, the son of his father’s +murderer. But the honest fellow bore no malice, indeed not +he. He began exchanging ballades with Philip, whom he +apostrophises as his companion, his cousin, and his +brother. He assures him that, soul and body, he is +altogether Burgundian; and protests that he has given his heart +in pledge to him. Regarded as the history of a vendetta, it +must be owned that Charles’s life has points of some +originality. And yet there is an engaging frankness about +these ballades which disarms criticism. <a +name="citation262b"></a><a href="#footnote262b" +class="citation">[262b]</a> You see Charles throwing +himself headforemost into the trap; you hear Burgundy, in his +answers begin to inspire him with his own prejudices, and draw +melancholy pictures of the misgovernment of France. But +Charles’s own spirits are so high and so amiable, and he is +so thoroughly convinced his cousin is a fine fellow, that +one’s scruples are carried away in the torrent of his +happiness and gratitude. And his would be a sordid spirit +who would not clap hands at the consummation (Nov. 1440); when +Charles, after having sworn on the Sacrament that he would never +again bear arms against England, and pledged himself body and +soul to the unpatriotic faction in his own country, set out from +London with a light heart and a damaged integrity.</p> +<p>In the magnificent copy of Charles’s poems, given by our +Henry VII. to Elizabeth of York on the occasion of their +marriage, a large illumination figures at the head of one of the +pages, which, in chronological perspective, is almost a history +of his imprisonment. It gives a view of London with all its +spires, the river passing through the old bridge and busy with +boats. One side of the White Tower has been taken out, and +we can see, as under a sort of shrine, the paved room where the +duke sits writing. He occupies a high-backed bench in front +of a great chimney; red and black ink are before him; and the +upper end of the apartment is guarded by many halberdiers, with +the red cross of England on their breast. On the next side +of the tower he appears again, leaning out of window and gazing +on the river; doubtless there blows just then “a pleasant +wind from out the land of France,” and some ship comes up +the river: “the ship of good news.” At the door +we find him yet again; this time embracing a messenger, while a +groom stands by holding two saddled horses. And yet further +to the left, a cavalcade defiles out of the tower; the duke is on +his way at last towards “the sunshine of France.”</p> +<h3>III.</h3> +<p>During the five-and-twenty years of his captivity, Charles had +not lost in the esteem of his fellow-countrymen. For so +young a man, the head of so great a house, and so numerous a +party, to be taken prisoner as he rode in the vanguard of France, +and stereotyped for all men in this heroic attitude, was to taste +untimeously the honours of the grave. Of him, as of the +dead, it would be ungenerous to speak evil; what little energy he +had displayed would be remembered with piety, when all that he +had done amiss was courteously forgotten. As English folk +looked for Arthur; as Danes awaited the coming of Ogier; as +Somersetshire peasants or sergeants of the Old Guard expected the +return of Monmouth or Napoleon; the countrymen of Charles of +Orleans looked over the straits towards his English prison with +desire and confidence. Events had so fallen out while he +was rhyming ballades, that he had become the type of all that was +most truly patriotic. The remnants of his old party had +been the chief defenders of the unity of France. His +enemies of Burgundy had been notoriously favourers and furtherers +of English domination. People forgot that his brother still +lay by the heels for an unpatriotic treaty with England, because +Charles himself had been taken prisoner patriotically fighting +against it. That Henry V. had left special orders against +his liberation, served to increase the wistful pity with which he +was regarded. And when, in defiance of all contemporary +virtue, and against express pledges, the English carried war into +their prisoner’s fief, not only France, but all thinking +men in Christendom, were roused to indignation against the +oppressors, and sympathy with the victim. It was little +wonder if he came to bulk somewhat largely in the imagination of +the best of those at home. Charles le Boutteillier, when +(as the story goes) he slew Clarence at Beaugé, was only +seeking an exchange for Charles of Orleans. <a +name="citation265a"></a><a href="#footnote265a" +class="citation">[265a]</a> It was one of Joan of +Arc’s declared intentions to deliver the captive +duke. If there was no other way, she meant to cross the +seas and bring him home by force. And she professed before +her judges a sure knowledge that Charles of Orleans was beloved +of God. <a name="citation265b"></a><a href="#footnote265b" +class="citation">[265b]</a></p> +<p>Alas! it was not at all as a deliverer that Charles returned +to France. He was nearly fifty years old. Many +changes had been accomplished since, at twenty-three, he was +taken on the field of Agincourt. But of all these he was +profoundly ignorant, or had only heard of them in the discoloured +reports of Philip of Burgundy. He had the ideas of a former +generation, and sought to correct them by the scandal of a +factious party. With such qualifications he came back eager +for the domination, the pleasures, and the display that befitted +his princely birth. A long disuse of all political activity +combined with the flatteries of his new friends to fill him with +an overweening conceit of his own capacity and influence. +If aught had gone wrong in his absence, it seemed quite natural +men should look to him for its redress. Was not King Arthur +come again?</p> +<p>The Duke of Burgundy received him with politic honours. +He took his guest by his foible for pageantry, all the easier as +it was a foible of his own; and Charles walked right out of +prison into much the same atmosphere of trumpeting and +bell-ringing as he had left behind when he went in. Fifteen +days after his deliverance he was married to Mary of Cleves, at +St. Omer. The marriage was celebrated with the usual pomp +of the Burgundian court; there were joustings, and illuminations, +and animals that spouted wine; and many nobles dined together, +<i>comme en brigade</i>, and were served abundantly with many +rich and curious dishes. <a name="citation267a"></a><a +href="#footnote267a" class="citation">[267a]</a> It must +have reminded Charles not a little of his first marriage at +Compiègne; only then he was two years the junior of his +bride, and this time he was five-and-thirty years her +senior. It will be a fine question which marriage promises +more: for a boy of fifteen to lead off with a lass of seventeen, +or a man of fifty to make a match of it with a child of +fifteen. But there was something bitter in both. The +lamentations of Isabella will not have been forgotten. As +for Mary, she took up with one Jaquet de la Lain, a sort of +muscular Methody of the period, with a huge appetite for +tournaments, and a habit of confessing himself the last thing +before he went to bed. <a name="citation267b"></a><a +href="#footnote267b" class="citation">[267b]</a> With such +a hero, the young duchess’s amours were most likely +innocent; and in all other ways she was a suitable partner for +the duke, and well fitted to enter into his pleasures.</p> +<p>When the festivities at Saint Omer had come to an end, Charles +and his wife set forth by Ghent and Tournay. The towns gave +him offerings of money as he passed through, to help in the +payment of his ransom. From all sides, ladies and gentlemen +thronged to offer him their services; some gave him their sons +for pages, some archers for a bodyguard; and by the time he +reached Tournay, he had a following of 300 horse. +Everywhere he was received as though he had been the King of +France. <a name="citation268"></a><a href="#footnote268" +class="citation">[268]</a> If he did not come to imagine +himself something of the sort, he certainly forgot the existence +of any one with a better claim to the title. He conducted +himself on the hypothesis that Charles VII. was another Charles +VI. He signed with enthusiasm that treaty of Arras, which +left France almost at the discretion of Burgundy. On +December 18 he was still no farther than Bruges, where he entered +into a private treaty with Philip; and it was not until January +14, ten weeks after he disembarked in France, and attended by a +ruck of Burgundian gentlemen, that he arrived in Paris and +offered to present himself before Charles VII. The king +sent word that he might come, if he would, with a small retinue, +but not with his present following; and the duke, who was +mightily on his high horse after all the ovations he had +received, took the king’s attitude amiss, and turned aside +into Touraine, to receive more welcome and more presents, and be +convoyed by torchlight into faithful cities.</p> +<p>And so you see, here was King Arthur home again, and matters +nowise mended in consequence. The best we can say is, that +this last stage of Charles’s public life was of no long +duration. His confidence was soon knocked out of him in the +contact with others. He began to find he was an earthen +vessel among many vessels of brass; he began to be shrewdly aware +that he was no King Arthur. In 1442, at Limoges, he made +himself the spokesman of the malcontent nobility. The king +showed himself humiliatingly indifferent to his counsels, and +humiliatingly generous towards his necessities. And there, +with some blushes, he may be said to have taken farewell of the +political stage. A feeble attempt on the county of Asti is +scarce worth the name of exception. Thenceforward let +Ambition wile whom she may into the turmoil of events, our duke +will walk cannily in his well-ordered garden, or sit by the fire +to touch the slender reed. <a name="citation269"></a><a +href="#footnote269" class="citation">[269]</a></p> +<h3>IV.</h3> +<p>If it were given each of us to transplant his life wherever he +pleased in time or space, with all the ages and all the countries +of the world to choose from, there would be quite an instructive +diversity of taste. A certain sedentary majority would +prefer to remain where they were. Many would choose the +Renaissance; many some stately and simple period of Grecian life; +and still more elect to pass a few years wandering among the +villages of Palestine with an inspired conductor. For some +of our quaintly vicious contemporaries, we have the decline of +the Roman Empire and the reign of Henry III. of France. But +there are others not quite so vicious, who yet cannot look upon +the world with perfect gravity, who have never taken the +categorical imperative to wife, and have more taste for what is +comfortable than for what is magnanimous and high; and I can +imagine some of these casting their lot in the Court of Blois +during the last twenty years of the life of Charles of +Orleans.</p> +<p>The duke and duchess, their staff of officers and ladies, and +the high-born and learned persons who were attracted to Blois on +a visit, formed a society for killing time and perfecting each +other in various elegant accomplishments, such as we might +imagine for an ideal watering-place in the Delectable +Mountains. The company hunted and went on pleasure-parties; +they played chess, tables, and many other games. What we +now call the history of the period passed, I imagine, over the +heads of these good people much as it passes over our own. +News reached them, indeed, of great and joyful import. +William Peel received eight livres and five sous from the +duchess, when he brought the first tidings that Rouen was +recaptured from the English. <a name="citation271a"></a><a +href="#footnote271a" class="citation">[271a]</a> A little +later and the duke sang, in a truly patriotic vein, the +deliverance of Guyenne and Normandy. <a +name="citation271b"></a><a href="#footnote271b" +class="citation">[271b]</a> They were liberal of rhymes and +largesse, and welcomed the prosperity of their country much as +they welcomed the coming of spring, and with no more thought of +collaborating towards the event. Religion was not forgotten +in the Court of Blois. Pilgrimages were agreeable and +picturesque excursions. In those days a well-served chapel +was something like a good vinery in our own, an opportunity for +display and the source of mild enjoyments. There was +probably something of his rooted delight in pageantry, as well as +a good deal of gentle piety, in the feelings with which Charles +gave dinner every Friday to thirteen poor people, served them +himself, and washed their feet with his own hands. <a +name="citation271c"></a><a href="#footnote271c" +class="citation">[271c]</a> Solemn affairs would interest +Charles and his courtiers from their trivial side. The duke +perhaps cared less for the deliverance of Guyenne and Normandy +than for his own verses on the occasion; just as Dr. +Russell’s correspondence in <i>The Times</i> was among the +most material parts of the Crimean War for that talented +correspondent. And I think it scarcely cynical to suppose +that religion as well as patriotism was principally cultivated as +a means of filling up the day.</p> +<p>It was not only messengers fiery red with haste and charged +with the destiny of nations, who were made welcome at the gates +of Blois. If any man of accomplishment came that way, he +was sure of an audience, and something for his pocket. The +courtiers would have received Ben Jonson like Drummond of +Hawthornden, and a good pugilist like Captain Barclay. They +were catholic, as none but the entirely idle can be +catholic. It might be Pierre, called Dieu d’amours, +the juggler; or it might be three high English minstrels; or the +two men, players of ghitterns, from the kingdom of Scotland, who +sang the destruction of the Turks; or again Jehan Rognelet, +player of instruments of music, who played and danced with his +wife and two children; they would each be called into the castle +to give a taste of his proficiency before my lord the duke. <a +name="citation272"></a><a href="#footnote272" +class="citation">[272]</a> Sometimes the performance was of +a more personal interest, and produced much the same sensations +as are felt on an English green on the arrival of a professional +cricketer, or round an English billiard table during a match +between Roberts and Cooke. This was when Jehan +Nègre, the Lombard, came to Blois and played chess against +all these chess-players, and won much money from my lord and his +intimates; or when Baudet Harenc of Chalons made ballades before +all these ballade-makers. <a name="citation273"></a><a +href="#footnote273" class="citation">[273]</a></p> +<p>It will not surprise the reader to learn they were all makers +of ballades and rondels. To write verses for May day, seems +to have been as much a matter of course, as to ride out with the +cavalcade that went to gather hawthorn. The choice of +Valentines was a standing challenge, and the courtiers pelted +each other with humorous and sentimental verses as in a literary +carnival. If an indecorous adventure befell our friend +Maistre Estienne le Gout, my lord the duke would turn it into the +funniest of rondels, all the rhymes being the names of the cases +of nouns or the moods of verbs; and Maistre Estienne would make +reply in similar fashion, seeking to prune the story of its more +humiliating episodes. If Frédet was too long away +from Court, a rondel went to upbraid him; and it was in a rondel +that Frédet would excuse himself. Sometimes two or +three, or as many as a dozen, would set to work on the same +refrain, the same idea, or in the same macaronic jargon. +Some of the poetasters were heavy enough; others were not wanting +in address; and the duchess herself was among those who most +excelled. On one occasion eleven competitors made a ballade +on the idea,</p> +<blockquote><p>“I die of thirst beside the fountain’s +edge”</p> +<p>(Je meurs de soif emprès de la fontaine).</p> +</blockquote> +<p>These eleven ballades still exist; and one of them arrests the +attention rather from the name of the author than from any +special merit in itself. It purports to be the work of +François Villon; and so far as a foreigner can judge +(which is indeed a small way), it may very well be his. +Nay, and if any one thing is more probable than another, in the +great <i>tabula rasa</i>, or unknown land, which we are fain to +call the biography of Villon, it seems probable enough that he +may have gone upon a visit to Charles of Orleans. Where +Master Baudet Harenc, of Chalons, found a sympathetic, or perhaps +a derisive audience (for who can tell nowadays the degree of +Baudet’s excellence in his art?), favour would not be +wanting for the greatest ballade-maker of all time. Great +as would seem the incongruity, it may have pleased Charles to own +a sort of kinship with ragged singers, and whimsically regard +himself as one of the confraternity of poets. And he would +have other grounds of intimacy with Villon. A room looking +upon Windsor gardens is a different matter from Villon’s +dungeon at Méun; yet each in his own degree had been tried +in prison. Each in his own way also, loved the good things +of this life and the service of the Muses. But the same +gulf that separated Burns from his Edinburgh patrons would +separate the singer of Bohemia from the rhyming duke. And +it is hard to imagine that Villon’s training amongst +thieves, loose women, and vagabond students, had fitted him to +move in a society of any dignity and courtliness. Ballades +are very admirable things; and a poet is doubtless a most +interesting visitor. But among the courtiers of Charles, +there would be considerable regard for the proprieties of +etiquette; and even a duke will sometimes have an eye to his +teaspoons. Moreover, as a poet, I can conceive he may have +disappointed expectation. It need surprise nobody if +Villon’s ballade on the theme,</p> +<blockquote><p>“I die of thirst beside the fountain’s +edge,”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>was but a poor performance. He would make better verses +on the lee-side of a flagon at the sign of the Pomme du Pin, than +in a cushioned settle in the halls of Blois.</p> +<p>Charles liked change of place. He was often not so much +travelling as making a progress; now to join the king for some +great tournament; now to visit King René, at Tarascon, +where he had a study of his own and saw all manner of interesting +things—oriental curios, King René painting birds, +and, what particularly pleased him, Triboulet, the dwarf jester, +whose skull-cap was no bigger than an orange. <a +name="citation276a"></a><a href="#footnote276a" +class="citation">[276a]</a> Sometimes the journeys were set +about on horseback in a large party, with the <i>fourriers</i> +sent forward to prepare a lodging at the next stage. We +find almost Gargantuan details of the provision made by these +officers against the duke’s arrival, of eggs and butter and +bread, cheese and peas and chickens, pike and bream and barbel, +and wine both white and red. <a name="citation276b"></a><a +href="#footnote276b" class="citation">[276b]</a> Sometimes +he went by water in a barge, playing chess or tables with a +friend in the pavilion, or watching other vessels as they went +before the wind. <a name="citation276c"></a><a +href="#footnote276c" class="citation">[276c]</a> Children +ran along the bank, as they do to this day on the Crinan Canal; +and when Charles threw in money, they would dive and bring it up. +<a name="citation276d"></a><a href="#footnote276d" +class="citation">[276d]</a> As he looked on at their +exploits, I wonder whether that room of gold and silk and worsted +came back into his memory, with the device of little children in +a river, and the sky full of birds?</p> +<p>He was a bit of a book-fancier, and had vied with his brother +Angoulême in bringing back the library of their grandfather +Charles V., when Bedford put it up for sale in London. <a +name="citation277a"></a><a href="#footnote277a" +class="citation">[277a]</a> The duchess had a library of +her own; and we hear of her borrowing romances from ladies in +attendance on the blue-stocking Margaret of Scotland. <a +name="citation277b"></a><a href="#footnote277b" +class="citation">[277b]</a> Not only were books collected, +but new books were written at the court of Blois. The widow +of one Jean Fougère, a bookbinder, seems to have done a +number of odd commissions for the bibliophilous count. She +it was who received three vellum-skins to bind the +duchess’s Book of Hours, and who was employed to prepare +parchment for the use of the duke’s scribes. And she +it was who bound in vermilion leather the great manuscript of +Charles’s own poems, which was presented to him by his +secretary, Anthony Astesan, with the text in one column, and +Astesan’s Latin version in the other. <a +name="citation277c"></a><a href="#footnote277c" +class="citation">[277c]</a></p> +<p>Such tastes, with the coming of years, would doubtless take +the place of many others. We find in Charles’s verse +much semi-ironical regret for other days, and resignation to +growing infirmities. He who had been “nourished in +the schools of love,” now sees nothing either to please or +displease him. Old age has imprisoned him within doors, +where he means to take his ease, and let younger fellows bestir +themselves in life. He had written (in earlier days, we may +presume) a bright and defiant little poem in praise of +solitude. If they would but leave him alone with his own +thoughts and happy recollections, he declared it was beyond the +power of melancholy to affect him. But now, when his animal +strength has so much declined that he sings the discomforts of +winter instead of the inspirations of spring, and he has no +longer any appetite for life, he confesses he is wretched when +alone, and, to keep his mind from grievous thoughts, he must have +many people around him, laughing, talking, and singing. <a +name="citation278"></a><a href="#footnote278" +class="citation">[278]</a></p> +<p>While Charles was thus falling into years, the order of +things, of which he was the outcome and ornament, was growing old +along with him. The semi-royalty of the princes of the +blood was already a thing of the past; and when Charles VII. was +gathered to his fathers, a new king reigned in France, who seemed +every way the opposite of royal. Louis XI. had aims that +were incomprehensible, and virtues that were inconceivable to his +contemporaries. But his contemporaries were able enough to +appreciate his sordid exterior, and his cruel and treacherous +spirit. To the whole nobility of France he was a fatal and +unreasonable phenomenon. All such courts as that of Charles +at Blois, or his friend René’s in Provence, would +soon be made impossible; interference was the order of the day; +hunting was already abolished; and who should say what was to go +next? Louis, in fact, must have appeared to Charles +primarily in the light of a kill-joy. I take it, when +missionaries land in South Sea Islands and lay strange embargo on +the simplest things in life, the islanders will not be much more +puzzled and irritated than Charles of Orleans at the policy of +the Eleventh Louis. There was one thing, I seem to +apprehend, that had always particularly moved him; and that was, +any proposal to punish a person of his acquaintance. No +matter what treason he may have made or meddled with, an +Alençon or an Armagnac was sure to find Charles reappear +from private life, and do his best to get him pardoned. He +knew them quite well. He had made rondels with them. +They were charming people in every way. There must +certainly be some mistake. Had not he himself made +anti-national treaties almost before he was out of his +nonage? And for the matter of that, had not every one else +done the like? Such are some of the thoughts by which he +might explain to himself his aversion to such extremities; but it +was on a deeper basis that the feeling probably reposed. A +man of his temper could not fail to be impressed at the thought +of disastrous revolutions in the fortunes of those he knew. +He would feel painfully the tragic contrast, when those who had +everything to make life valuable were deprived of life +itself. And it was shocking to the clemency of his spirit, +that sinners should be hurried before their judge without a +fitting interval for penitence and satisfaction. It was +this feeling which brought him at last, a poor, purblind +blue-bottle of the later autumn, into collision with “the +universal spider,” Louis XI. He took up the defence +of the Duke of Brittany at Tours. But Louis was then in no +humour to hear Charles’s texts and Latin sentiments; he had +his back to the wall, the future of France was at stake; and if +all the old men in the world had crossed his path, they would +have had the rough side of his tongue like Charles of +Orleans. I have found nowhere what he said, but it seems it +was monstrously to the point, and so rudely conceived that the +old duke never recovered the indignity. He got home as far +as Amboise, sickened, and died two days after (Jan. 4, 1465), in +the seventy-fourth year of his age. And so a whiff of +pungent prose stopped the issue of melodious rondels to the end +of time.</p> +<h3>V.</h3> +<p>The futility of Charles’s public life was of a piece +throughout. He never succeeded in any single purpose he set +before him; for his deliverance from England, after twenty-five +years of failure and at the cost of dignity and consistency, it +would be ridiculously hyperbolical to treat as a success. +During the first part of his life he was the stalking horse of +Bernard d’Armagnac; during the second, he was the passive +instrument of English diplomatists; and before he was well +entered on the third, he hastened to become the dupe and catspaw +of Burgundian treason. On each of these occasions, a strong +and not dishonourable personal motive determined his +behaviour. In 1407 and the following years, he had his +father’s murder uppermost in his mind. During his +English captivity, that thought was displaced by a more immediate +desire for his own liberation. In 1440 a sentiment of +gratitude to Philip of Burgundy blinded him to all else, and led +him to break with the tradition of his party and his own former +life. He was born a great vassal, and he conducted himself +like a private gentleman. He began life in a showy and +brilliant enough fashion, by the light of a petty personal +chivalry. He was not without some tincture of patriotism; +but it was resolvable into two parts: a preference for life among +his fellow-countrymen, and a barren point of honour. In +England, he could comfort himself by the reflection that +“he had been taken while loyally doing his devoir,” +without any misgiving as to his conduct in the previous years, +when he had prepared the disaster of Agincourt by wasteful +feud. This unconsciousness of the larger interests is +perhaps most happily exampled out of his own mouth. When +Alençon stood accused of betraying Normandy into the hands +of the English, Charles made a speech in his defence, from which +I have already quoted more than once. Alençon, he +said, had professed a great love and trust towards him; +“yet did he give no great proof thereof, when he sought to +betray Normandy; whereby he would have made me lose an estate of +10,000 livres a year, and might have occasioned the destruction +of the kingdom and of all us Frenchmen.” These are +the words of one, mark you, against whom Gloucester warned the +English Council because of his “great subtility and +cautelous disposition.” It is not hard to excuse the +impatience of Louis XI., if such stuff was foisted on him by way +of political deliberation.</p> +<p>This incapacity to see things with any greatness, this obscure +and narrow view was fundamentally characteristic of the man as +well as of the epoch. It is not even so striking in his +public life, where he failed, as in his poems, where he notably +succeeded. For wherever we might expect a poet to be +unintelligent, it certainly would not be in his poetry. And +Charles is unintelligent even there. Of all authors whom a +modern may still read and read over again with pleasure, he has +perhaps the least to say. His poems seem to bear testimony +rather to the fashion of rhyming, which distinguished the age, +than to any special vocation in the man himself. Some of +them are drawing-room exercises and the rest seem made by +habit. Great writers are struck with something in nature or +society, with which they become pregnant and longing; they are +possessed with an idea, and cannot be at peace until they have +put it outside of them in some distinct embodiment. But +with Charles literature was an object rather than a mean; he was +one who loved bandying words for its own sake; the rigidity of +intricate metrical forms stood him in lieu of precise thought; +instead of communicating truth, he observed the laws of a game; +and when he had no one to challenge at chess or rackets, he made +verses in a wager against himself. From the very idleness +of the man’s mind, and not from intensity of feeling, it +happens that all his poems are more or less +autobiographical. But they form an autobiography singularly +bald and uneventful. Little is therein recorded beside +sentiments. Thoughts, in any true sense, he had none to +record. And if we can gather that he had been a prisoner in +England, that he had lived in the Orleannese, and that he hunted +and went in parties of pleasure, I believe it is about as much +definite experience as is to be found in all these five hundred +pages of autobiographical verse. Doubtless, we find here +and there a complaint on the progress of the infirmities of +age. Doubtless, he feels the great change of the year, and +distinguishes winter from spring; winter as the time of snow and +the fireside; spring as the return of grass and flowers, the time +of St. Valentine’s day and a beating heart. And he +feels love after a fashion. Again and again, we learn that +Charles of Orleans is in love, and hear him ring the changes +through the whole gamut of dainty and tender sentiment. But +there is never a spark of passion; and heaven alone knows whether +there was any real woman in the matter, or the whole thing was an +exercise in fancy. If these poems were indeed inspired by +some living mistress, one would think he had never seen, never +heard, and never touched her. There is nothing in any one +of these so numerous love-songs to indicate who or what the lady +was. Was she dark or fair, passionate or gentle like +himself, witty or simple? Was it always one woman? or are +there a dozen here immortalised in cold indistinction? The +old English translator mentions gray eyes in his version of one +of the amorous rondels; so far as I remember, he was driven by +some emergency of the verse; but in the absence of all sharp +lines of character and anything specific, we feel for the moment +a sort of surprise, as though the epithet were singularly happy +and unusual, or as though we had made our escape from cloudland +into something tangible and sure. The measure of +Charles’s indifference to all that now preoccupies and +excites a poet, is best given by a positive example. If, +besides the coming of spring, any one external circumstance may +be said to have struck his imagination, it was the despatch of +<i>fourriers</i>, while on a journey, to prepare the +night’s lodging. This seems to be his favourite +image; it reappears like the upas-tree in the early work of +Coleridge: we may judge with what childish eyes he looked upon +the world, if one of the sights which most impressed him was that +of a man going to order dinner.</p> +<p>Although they are not inspired by any deeper motive than the +common run of contemporaneous drawing-room verses, those of +Charles of Orleans are executed with inimitable lightness and +delicacy of touch. They deal with floating and colourless +sentiments, and the writer is never greatly moved, but he seems +always genuine. He makes no attempt to set off thin +conceptions with a multiplicity of phrases. His ballades +are generally thin and scanty of import; for the ballade +presented too large a canvas, and he was preoccupied by technical +requirements. But in the rondel he has put himself before +all competitors by a happy knack and a prevailing distinction of +manner. He is very much more of a duke in his verses than +in his absurd and inconsequential career as a statesman; and how +he shows himself a duke is precisely by the absence of all +pretension, turgidity, or emphasis. He turns verses, as he +would have come into the king’s presence, with a quiet +accomplishment of grace.</p> +<p>Théodore de Banville, the youngest poet of a famous +generation now nearly extinct, and himself a sure and finished +artist, knocked off, in his happiest vein, a few experiments in +imitation of Charles of Orleans. I would recommend these +modern rondels to all who care about the old duke, not only +because they are delightful in themselves, but because they serve +as a contrast to throw into relief the peculiarities of their +model. When de Banville revives a forgotten form of +verse—and he has already had the honour of reviving the +ballade—he does it in the spirit of a workman choosing a +good tool wherever he can find one, and not at all in that of the +dilettante, who seeks to renew bygone forms of thought and make +historic forgeries. With the ballade this seemed natural +enough; for in connection with ballades the mind recurs to +Villon, and Villon was almost more of a modern than de Banville +himself. But in the case of the rondel, a comparison is +challenged with Charles of Orleans, and the difference between +two ages and two literatures is illustrated in a few poems of +thirteen lines. Something, certainly, has been retained of +the old movement; the refrain falls in time like a well-played +bass; and the very brevity of the thing, by hampering and +restraining the greater fecundity of the modern mind, assists the +imitation. But de Banville’s poems are full of form +and colour; they smack racily of modern life, and own small +kindred with the verse of other days, when it seems as if men +walked by twilight, seeing little, and that with distracted eyes, +and instead of blood, some thin and spectral fluid circulated in +their veins. They might gird themselves for battle, make +love, eat and drink, and acquit themselves manfully in all the +external parts of life; but of the life that is within, and those +processes by which we render ourselves an intelligent account of +what we feel and do, and so represent experience that we for the +first time make it ours, they had only a loose and troubled +possession. They beheld or took part in great events, but +there was no answerable commotion in their reflective being; and +they passed throughout turbulent epochs in a sort of ghostly +quiet and abstraction. Feeling seems to have been strangely +disproportioned to the occasion, and words were laughably trivial +and scanty to set forth the feeling even such as it was. +Juvenal des Ursins chronicles calamity after calamity, with but +one comment for them all: that “it was great +pity.” Perhaps, after too much of our florid +literature, we find an adventitious charm in what is so +different; and while the big drums are beaten every day by +perspiring editors over the loss of a cock-boat or the rejection +of a clause, and nothing is heard that is not proclaimed with +sound of trumpet, it is not wonderful if we retire with pleasure +into old books, and listen to authors who speak small and clear, +as if in a private conversation. Truly this is so with +Charles of Orleans. We are pleased to find a small man +without the buskin, and obvious sentiments stated without +affectation. If the sentiments are obvious, there is all +the more chance we may have experienced the like. As we +turn over the leaves, we may find ourselves in sympathy with some +one or other of these staid joys and smiling sorrows. If we +do we shall be strangely pleased, for there is a genuine pathos +in these simple words, and the lines go with a lilt, and sing +themselves to music of their own.</p> +<h2><a name="page290"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +290</span>SAMUEL PEPYS.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">In</span> two books a fresh light has +recently been thrown on the character and position of Samuel +Pepys. Mr. Mynors Bright has given us a new transcription +of the Diary, increasing it in bulk by near a third, correcting +many errors, and completing our knowledge of the man in some +curious and important points. We can only regret that he +has taken liberties with the author and the public. It is +no part of the duties of the editor of an established classic to +decide what may or may not be “tedious to the +reader.” The book is either an historical document or +not, and in condemning Lord Braybrooke Mr. Bright condemns +himself. As for the time-honoured phrase, “unfit for +publication,” without being cynical, we may regard it as +the sign of a precaution more or less commercial; and we may +think, without being sordid, that when we purchase six huge and +distressingly expensive volumes, we are entitled to be treated +rather more like scholars and rather less like children. +But Mr. Bright may rest assured: while we complain, we are still +grateful. Mr. Wheatley, to divide our obligation, brings +together, clearly and with no lost words, a body of illustrative +material. Sometimes we might ask a little more; never, I +think, less. And as a matter of fact, a great part of Mr. +Wheatley’s volume might be transferred, by a good editor of +Pepys, to the margin of the text, for it is precisely what the +reader wants.</p> +<p>In the light of these two books, at least, we have now to read +our author. Between them they contain all we can expect to +learn for, it may be, many years. Now, if ever we should be +able to form some notion of that unparalleled figure in the +annals of mankind—unparalleled for three good reasons: +first, because he was a man known to his contemporaries in a halo +of almost historical pomp, and to his remote descendants with an +indecent familiarity, like a tap-room comrade; second, because he +has outstripped all competitors in the art or virtue of a +conscious honesty about oneself; and, third, because, being in +many ways a very ordinary person, he has yet placed himself +before the public eye with such a fulness and such an intimacy of +detail as might be envied by a genius like Montaigne. Not +then for his own sake only, but as a character in a unique +position, endowed with a unique talent, and shedding a unique +light upon the lives of the mass of mankind, he is surely worthy +of prolonged and patient study.</p> +<h3><span class="smcap">The Diary</span>.</h3> +<p>That there should be such a book as Pepys’s Diary is +incomparably strange. Pepys, in a corrupt and idle period, +played the man in public employments, toiling hard and keeping +his honour bright. Much of the little good that is set down +to James the Second comes by right to Pepys; and if it were +little for a king, it is much for a subordinate. To his +clear, capable head was owing somewhat of the greatness of +England on the seas. In the exploits of Hawke, Rodney, or +Nelson, this dead Mr. Pepys of the Navy Office had some +considerable share. He stood well by his business in the +appalling plague of 1666. He was loved and respected by +some of the best and wisest men in England. He was +President of the Royal Society; and when he came to die, people +said of his conduct in that solemn hour—thinking it +needless to say more—that it was answerable to the +greatness of his life. Thus he walked in dignity, guards of +soldiers sometimes attending him in his walks, subalterns bowing +before his periwig; and when he uttered his thoughts they were +suitable to his state and services. On February 8, 1668, we +find him writing to Evelyn, his mind bitterly occupied with the +late Dutch war, and some thoughts of the different story of the +repulse of the Great Armada: “Sir, you will not wonder at +the backwardness of my thanks for the present you made me, so +many days since, of the Prospect of the Medway, while the +Hollander rode master in it, when I have told you that the sight +of it hath led me to such reflections on my particular interest, +by my employment, in the reproach due to that miscarriage, as +have given me little less disquiet than he is fancied to have who +found his face in Michael Angelo’s hell. The same +should serve me also in excuse for my silence in celebrating your +mastery shown in the design and draught, did not indignation +rather than courtship urge me so far to commend them, as to wish +the furniture of our House of Lords changed from the story of +’88 to that of ’67 (of Evelyn’s designing), +till the pravity of this were reformed to the temper of that age, +wherein God Almighty found his blessings more operative than, I +fear, he doth in ours his judgments.”</p> +<p>This is a letter honourable to the writer, where the meaning +rather than the words is eloquent. Such was the account he +gave of himself to his contemporaries; such thoughts he chose to +utter, and in such language: giving himself out for a grave and +patriotic public servant. We turn to the same date in the +Diary by which he is known, after two centuries, to his +descendants. The entry begins in the same key with the +letter, blaming the “madness of the House of Commons” +and “the base proceedings, just the epitome of all our +public proceedings in this age, of the House of Lords;” and +then, without the least transition, this is how our diarist +proceeds: “To the Strand, to my bookseller’s, and +there bought an idle, rogueish French book, <i>L’escholle +des Filles</i>, which I have bought in plain binding, avoiding +the buying of it better bound, because I resolve, as soon as I +have read it, to burn it, that it may not stand in the list of +books, nor among them, to disgrace them, if it should be +found.” Even in our day, when responsibility is so +much more clearly apprehended, the man who wrote the letter would +be notable; but what about the man, I do not say who bought a +roguish book, but who was ashamed of doing so, yet did it, and +recorded both the doing and the shame in the pages of his daily +journal?</p> +<p>We all, whether we write or speak, must somewhat drape +ourselves when we address our fellows; at a given moment we +apprehend our character and acts by some particular side; we are +merry with one, grave with another, as befits the nature and +demands of the relation. Pepys’s letter to Evelyn +would have little in common with that other one to Mrs. Knipp +which he signed by the pseudonym of <i>Dapper Dicky</i>; yet each +would be suitable to the character of his correspondent. +There is no untruth in this, for man, being a Protean animal, +swiftly shares and changes with his company and surroundings; and +these changes are the better part of his education in the +world. To strike a posture once for all, and to march +through life like a drum-major, is to be highly disagreeable to +others and a fool for oneself into the bargain. To Evelyn +and to Knipp we understand the double facing; but to whom was he +posing in the Diary, and what, in the name of astonishment, was +the nature of the pose? Had he suppressed all mention of +the book, or had he bought it, gloried in the act, and cheerfully +recorded his glorification, in either case we should have made +him out. But no; he is full of precautions to conceal the +“disgrace” of the purchase, and yet speeds to +chronicle the whole affair in pen and ink. It is a sort of +anomaly in human action, which we can exactly parallel from +another part of the Diary.</p> +<p>Mrs. Pepys had written a paper of her too just complaints +against her husband, and written it in plain and very pungent +English. Pepys, in an agony lest the world should come to +see it, brutally seizes and destroys the tell-tale document; and +then—you disbelieve your eyes—down goes the whole +story with unsparing truth and in the cruellest detail. It +seems he has no design but to appear respectable, and here he +keeps a private book to prove he was not. You are at first +faintly reminded of some of the vagaries of the morbid religious +diarist; but at a moment’s thought the resemblance +disappears. The design of Pepys is not at all to edify; it +is not from repentance that he chronicles his peccadilloes, for +he tells us when he does repent, and, to be just to him, there +often follows some improvement. Again, the sins of the +religious diarist are of a very formal pattern, and are told with +an elaborate whine. But in Pepys you come upon good, +substantive misdemeanours; beams in his eye of which he alone +remains unconscious; healthy outbreaks of the animal nature, and +laughable subterfuges to himself that always command belief and +often engage the sympathies.</p> +<p>Pepys was a young man for his age, came slowly to himself in +the world, sowed his wild oats late, took late to industry, and +preserved till nearly forty the headlong gusto of a boy. +So, to come rightly at the spirit in which the Diary was written, +we must recall a class of sentiments which with most of us are +over and done before the age of twelve. In our tender years +we still preserve a freshness of surprise at our prolonged +existence; events make an impression out of all proportion to +their consequence; we are unspeakably touched by our own past +adventures, and look forward to our future personality with +sentimental interest. It was something of this, I think, +that clung to Pepys. Although not sentimental in the +abstract, he was sweetly sentimental about himself. His own +past clung about his heart, an evergreen. He was the slave +of an association. He could not pass by Islington, where +his father used to carry him to cakes and ale, but he must light +at the “King’s Head” and eat and drink +“for remembrance of the old house sake.” He +counted it good fortune to lie a night at Epsom to renew his old +walks, “where Mrs. Hely and I did use to walk and talk, +with whom I had the first sentiments of love and pleasure in a +woman’s company, discourse and taking her by the hand, she +being a pretty woman.” He goes about weighing up the +<i>Assurance</i>, which lay near Woolwich underwater, and cries +in a parenthesis, “Poor ship, that I have been twice merry +in, in Captain Holland’s time;” and after revisiting +the <i>Naseby</i>, now changed into the <i>Charles</i>, he +confesses “it was a great pleasure to myself to see the +ship that I began my good fortune in.” The stone that +he was cut for he preserved in a case; and to the Turners he kept +alive such gratitude for their assistance that for years, and +after he had begun to mount himself into higher zones, he +continued to have that family to dinner on the anniversary of the +operation. Not Hazlitt nor Rousseau had a more romantic +passion for their past, although at times they might express it +more romantically; and if Pepys shared with them this childish +fondness, did not Rousseau, who left behind him the +<i>Confessions</i>, or Hazlitt, who wrote the <i>Liber +Amoris</i>, and loaded his essays with loving personal detail, +share with Pepys in his unwearied egotism? For the two +things go hand in hand; or, to be more exact, it is the first +that makes the second either possible or pleasing.</p> +<p>But, to be quite in sympathy with Pepys, we must return once +more to the experience of children. I can remember to have +written, in the fly-leaf of more than one book, the date and the +place where I then was—if, for instance, I was ill in bed +or sitting in a certain garden; these were jottings for my future +self; if I should chance on such a note in after years, I thought +it would cause me a particular thrill to recognise myself across +the intervening distance. Indeed, I might come upon them +now, and not be moved one tittle—which shows that I have +comparatively failed in life, and grown older than Samuel +Pepys. For in the Diary we can find more than one such note +of perfect childish egotism; as when he explains that his candle +is going out, “which makes me write thus +slobberingly;” or as in this incredible particularity, +“To my study, where I only wrote thus much of this +day’s passages to this *, and so out again;” or +lastly, as here, with more of circumstance: “I staid up +till the bellman came by with his bell under my window, <i>as I +was writing of this very line</i>, and cried, ‘Past one of +the clock, and a cold, frosty, windy morning.’” +Such passages are not to be misunderstood. The appeal to +Samuel Pepys years hence is unmistakable. He desires that +dear, though unknown, gentleman keenly to realise his +predecessor; to remember why a passage was uncleanly written; to +recall (let us fancy, with a sigh) the tones of the bellman, the +chill of the early, windy morning, and the very line his own +romantic self was scribing at the moment. The man, you will +perceive, was making reminiscences—a sort of pleasure by +ricochet, which comforts many in distress, and turns some others +into sentimental libertines: and the whole book, if you will but +look at it in that way, is seen to be a work of art to +Pepys’s own address.</p> +<p>Here, then, we have the key to that remarkable attitude +preserved by him throughout his Diary, to that +unflinching—I had almost said, that +unintelligent—sincerity which makes it a miracle among +human books. He was not unconscious of his errors—far +from it; he was often startled into shame, often reformed, often +made and broke his vows of change. But whether he did ill +or well, he was still his own unequalled self; still that +entrancing <i>ego</i> of whom alone he cared to write; and still +sure of his own affectionate indulgence, when the parts should be +changed, and the Writer come to read what he had written. +Whatever he did, or said, or thought, or suffered, it was still a +trait of Pepys, a character of his career; and as, to himself, he +was more interesting than Moses or than Alexander, so all should +be faithfully set down. I have called his Diary a work of +art. Now when the artist has found something, word or deed, +exactly proper to a favourite character in play or novel, he will +neither suppress nor diminish it, though the remark be silly or +the act mean. The hesitation of Hamlet, the credulity of +Othello, the baseness of Emma Bovary, or the irregularities of +Mr. Swiveller, caused neither disappointment nor disgust to their +creators. And so with Pepys and his adored protagonist: +adored not blindly, but with trenchant insight and enduring, +human toleration. I have gone over and over the greater +part of the Diary; and the points where, to the most suspicious +scrutiny, he has seemed not perfectly sincere, are so few, so +doubtful, and so petty, that I am ashamed to name them. It +may be said that we all of us write such a diary in airy +characters upon our brain; but I fear there is a distinction to +be made; I fear that as we render to our consciousness an account +of our daily fortunes and behaviour, we too often weave a tissue +of romantic compliments and dull excuses; and even if Pepys were +the ass and coward that men call him, we must take rank as +sillier and more cowardly than he. The bald truth about +oneself, what we are all too timid to admit when we are not too +dull to see it, that was what he saw clearly and set down +unsparingly.</p> +<p>It is improbable that the Diary can have been carried on in +the same single spirit in which it was begun. Pepys was not +such an ass, but he must have perceived, as he went on, the +extraordinary nature of the work he was producing. He was a +great reader, and he knew what other books were like. It +must, at least, have crossed his mind that some one might +ultimately decipher the manuscript, and he himself, with all his +pains and pleasures, be resuscitated in some later day; and the +thought, although discouraged, must have warmed his heart. +He was not such an ass, besides, but he must have been conscious +of the deadly explosives, the gun-cotton and the giant powder, he +was hoarding in his drawer. Let some contemporary light +upon the journal, and Pepys was plunged for ever in social and +political disgrace. We can trace the growth of his terrors +by two facts. In 1660, while the Diary was still in its +youth, he tells about it, as a matter of course, to a lieutenant +in the navy; but in 1669, when it was already near an end, he +could have bitten his tongue out, as the saying is, because he +had let slip his secret to one so grave and friendly as Sir +William Coventry. And from two other facts I think we may +infer that he had entertained, even if he had not acquiesced in, +the thought of a far-distant publicity. The first is of +capital importance: the Diary was not destroyed. The +second—that he took unusual precautions to confound the +cipher in “rogueish” passages—proves, beyond +question, that he was thinking of some other reader besides +himself. Perhaps while his friends were admiring the +“greatness of his behaviour” at the approach of +death, he may have had a twinkling hope of immortality. +<i>Mens cujusque is est quisque</i>, said his chosen motto; and, +as he had stamped his mind with every crook and foible in the +pages of the Diary, he might feel that what he left behind him +was indeed himself. There is perhaps no other instance so +remarkable of the desire of man for publicity and an enduring +name. The greatness of his life was open, yet he longed to +communicate its smallness also; and, while contemporaries bowed +before him, he must buttonhole posterity with the news that his +periwig was once alive with nits. But this thought, +although I cannot doubt he had it, was neither his first nor his +deepest; it did not colour one word that he wrote; and the Diary, +for as long as he kept it, remained what it was when he began, a +private pleasure for himself. It was his bosom secret; it +added a zest to all his pleasures; he lived in and for it, and +might well write these solemn words, when he closed that +confidant for ever: “And so I betake myself to that course +which is almost as much as to see myself go into the grave; for +which, and all the discomforts that will accompany my being +blind, the good God prepare me.”</p> +<h3><span class="smcap">A Liberal Genius</span>.</h3> +<p>Pepys spent part of a certain winter Sunday, when he had taken +physic, composing “a song in praise of a liberal genius +(such as I take my own to be) to all studies and +pleasures.” The song was unsuccessful, but the Diary +is, in a sense, the very song that he was seeking; and his +portrait by Hales, so admirably reproduced in Mynors +Bright’s edition, is a confirmation of the Diary. +Hales, it would appear, had known his business; and though he put +his sitter to a deal of trouble, almost breaking his neck +“to have the portrait full of shadows,” and draping +him in an Indian gown hired expressly for the purpose, he was +preoccupied about no merely picturesque effects, but to portray +the essence of the man. Whether we read the picture by the +Diary or the Diary by the picture, we shall at least agree that +Hales was among the number of those who can “surprise the +manners in the face.” Here we have a mouth pouting, +moist with desires; eyes greedy, protuberant, and yet apt for +weeping too; a nose great alike in character and dimensions; and +altogether a most fleshly, melting countenance. The face is +attractive by its promise of reciprocity. I have used the +word <i>greedy</i>, but the reader must not suppose that he can +change it for that closely kindred one of <i>hungry</i>, for +there is here no aspiration, no waiting for better things, but an +animal joy in all that comes. It could never be the face of +an artist; it is the face of a <i>viveur</i>—kindly, +pleased and pleasing, protected from excess and upheld in +contentment by the shifting versatility of his desires. For +a single desire is more rightly to be called a lust; but there is +health in a variety, where one may balance and control +another.</p> +<p>The whole world, town or country, was to Pepys a garden of +Armida. Wherever he went, his steps were winged with the +most eager expectation; whatever he did, it was done with the +most lively pleasure. An insatiable curiosity in all the +shows of the world and all the secrets of knowledge, filled him +brimful of the longing to travel, and supported him in the toils +of study. Rome was the dream of his life; he was never +happier than when he read or talked of the Eternal City. +When he was in Holland, he was “with child” to see +any strange thing. Meeting some friends and singing with +them in a palace near the Hague, his pen fails him to express his +passion of delight, “the more so because in a heaven of +pleasure and in a strange country.” He must go to see +all famous executions. He must needs visit the body of a +murdered man, defaced “with a broad wound,” he says, +“that makes my hand now shake to write of it.” +He learned to dance, and was “like to make a +dancer.” He learned to sing, and walked about +Gray’s Inn Fields “humming to myself (which is now my +constant practice) the trillo.” He learned to play +the lute, the flute, the flageolet, and the theorbo, and it was +not the fault of his intention if he did not learn the +harpsichord or the spinet. He learned to compose songs, and +burned to give forth “a scheme and theory of music not yet +ever made in the world.” When he heard “a +fellow whistle like a bird exceeding well,” he promised to +return another day and give an angel for a lesson in the +art. Once, he writes, “I took the Bezan back with me, +and with a brave gale and tide reached up that night to the Hope, +taking great pleasure in learning the seamen’s manner of +singing when they sound the depths.” If he found +himself rusty in his Latin grammar, he must fall to it like a +schoolboy. He was a member of Harrington’s Club till +its dissolution, and of the Royal Society before it had received +the name. Boyle’s <i>Hydrostatics</i> was “of +infinite delight” to him, walking in Barnes Elms. We +find him comparing Bible concordances, a captious judge of +sermons, deep in Descartes and Aristotle. We find him, in a +single year, studying timber and the measurement of timber; tar +and oil, hemp, and the process of preparing cordage; mathematics +and accounting; the hull and the rigging of ships from a model; +and “looking and improving himself of the (naval) stores +with”—hark to the fellow!—“great +delight.” His familiar spirit of delight was not the +same with Shelley’s; but how true it was to him through +life! He is only copying something, and behold, he +“takes great pleasure to rule the lines, and have the +capital words wrote with red ink;” he has only had his +coal-cellar emptied and cleaned, and behold, “it do please +him exceedingly.” A hog’s harslett is “a +piece of meat he loves.” He cannot ride home in my +Lord Sandwich’s coach, but he must exclaim, with breathless +gusto, “his noble, rich coach.” When he is +bound for a supper party, he anticipates a “glut of +pleasure.” When he has a new watch, “to see my +childishness,” says he, “I could not forbear carrying +it in my hand and seeing what o’clock it was an hundred +times.” To go to Vauxhall, he says, and “to +hear the nightingales and other birds, hear fiddles, and there a +harp and here a Jew’s trump, and here laughing, and there +fine people walking, is mighty divertising.” And the +nightingales, I take it, were particularly dear to him; and it +was again “with great pleasure” that he paused to +hear them as he walked to Woolwich, while the fog was rising and +the April sun broke through.</p> +<p>He must always be doing something agreeable, and, by +preference, two agreeable things at once. In his house he +had a box of carpenter’s tools, two dogs, an eagle, a +canary, and a blackbird that whistled tunes, lest, even in that +full life, he should chance upon an empty moment. If he had +to wait for a dish of poached eggs, he must put in the time by +playing on the flageolet; if a sermon were dull, he must read in +the book of Tobit or divert his mind with sly advances on the +nearest women. When he walked, it must be with a book in +his pocket to beguile the way in case the nightingales were +silent; and even along the streets of London, with so many pretty +faces to be spied for and dignitaries to be saluted, his trail +was marked by little debts “for wine, pictures, +etc.,” the true headmark of a life intolerant of any +joyless passage. He had a kind of idealism in pleasure; +like the princess in the fairy story, he was conscious of a +rose-leaf out of place. Dearly as he loved to talk, he +could not enjoy nor shine in a conversation when he thought +himself unsuitably dressed. Dearly as he loved eating, he +“knew not how to eat alone;” pleasure for him must +heighten pleasure; and the eye and ear must be flattered like the +palate ere he avow himself content. He had no zest in a +good dinner when it fell to be eaten “in a bad street and +in a periwig-maker’s house;” and a collation was +spoiled for him by indifferent music. His body was +indefatigable, doing him yeoman’s service in this +breathless chase of pleasures. On April 11, 1662, he +mentions that he went to bed “weary, <i>which I seldom +am</i>;” and already over thirty, he would sit up all night +cheerfully to see a comet. But it is never pleasure that +exhausts the pleasure-seeker; for in that career, as in all +others, it is failure that kills. The man who enjoys so +wholly and bears so impatiently the slightest widowhood from joy, +is just the man to lose a night’s rest over some paltry +question of his right to fiddle on the leads, or to be +“vexed to the blood” by a solecism in his +wife’s attire; and we find in consequence that he was +always peevish when he was hungry, and that his head “aked +mightily” after a dispute. But nothing could divert +him from his aim in life; his remedy in care was the same as his +delight in prosperity; it was with pleasure, and with pleasure +only, that he sought to drive out sorrow; and, whether he was +jealous of his wife or skulking from a bailiff, he would equally +take refuge in the theatre. There, if the house be full and +the company noble, if the songs be tunable, the actors perfect, +and the play diverting, this odd hero of the secret Diary, this +private self-adorer, will speedily be healed of his +distresses.</p> +<p>Equally pleased with a watch, a coach, a piece of meat, a tune +upon the fiddle, or a fact in hydrostatics, Pepys was pleased yet +more by the beauty, the worth, the mirth, or the mere scenic +attitude in life of his fellow-creatures. He shows himself +throughout a sterling humanist. Indeed, he who loves +himself, not in idle vanity, but with a plenitude of knowledge, +is the best equipped of all to love his neighbours. And +perhaps it is in this sense that charity may be most properly +said to begin at home. It does not matter what quality a +person has: Pepys can appreciate and love him for it. He +“fills his eyes” with the beauty of Lady Castlemaine; +indeed, he may be said to dote upon the thought of her for years; +if a woman be good-looking and not painted, he will walk miles to +have another sight of her; and even when a lady by a mischance +spat upon his clothes, he was immediately consoled when he had +observed that she was pretty. But, on the other hand, he is +delighted to see Mrs. Pett upon her knees, and speaks thus of his +Aunt James: “a poor, religious, well-meaning, good soul, +talking of nothing but God Almighty, and that with so much +innocence that mightily pleased me.” He is taken with +Pen’s merriment and loose songs, but not less taken with +the sterling worth of Coventry. He is jolly with a drunken +sailor, but listens with interest and patience, as he rides the +Essex roads, to the story of a Quaker’s spiritual trials +and convictions. He lends a critical ear to the discourse +of kings and royal dukes. He spends an evening at Vauxhall +with “Killigrew and young Newport—loose +company,” says he, “but worth a man’s being in +for once, to know the nature of it, and their manner of talk and +lives.” And when a rag-boy lights him home, he +examines him about his business and other ways of livelihood for +destitute children. This is almost half-way to the +beginning of philanthropy; had it only been the fashion, as it is +at present, Pepys had perhaps been a man famous for good +deeds. And it is through this quality that he rises, at +times, superior to his surprising egotism; his interest in the +love affairs of others is, indeed, impersonal; he is filled with +concern for my Lady Castlemaine, whom he only knows by sight, +shares in her very jealousies, joys with her in her successes; +and it is not untrue, however strange it seems in his abrupt +presentment, that he loved his maid Jane because she was in love +with his man Tom.</p> +<p>Let us hear him, for once, at length: “So the women and +W. Hewer and I walked upon the Downes, where a flock of sheep +was; and the most pleasant and innocent sight that ever I saw in +my life. We found a shepherd and his little boy reading, +far from any houses or sight of people, the Bible to him; so I +made the boy read to me, which he did with the forced tone that +children do usually read, that was mighty pretty; and then I did +give him something, and went to the father, and talked with +him. He did content himself mightily in my liking his +boy’s reading, and did bless God for him, the most like one +of the old patriarchs that ever I saw in my life, and it brought +those thoughts of the old age of the world in my mind for two or +three days after. We took notice of his woolen knit +stockings of two colours mixed, and of his shoes shod with iron, +both at the toe and heels, and with great nails in the soles of +his feet, which was mighty pretty; and taking notice of them, +‘Why,’ says the poor man, ‘the downes, you see, +are full of stones, and we are faine to shoe ourselves thus; and +these,’ says he, ‘will make the stones fly till they +ring before me.’ I did give the poor man something, +for which he was mighty thankful, and I tried to cast stones with +his horne crooke. He values his dog mightily, that would +turn a sheep any way which he would have him, when he goes to +fold them; told me there was about eighteen score sheep in his +flock, and that he hath four shillings a week the year round for +keeping of them; and Mrs. Turner, in the common fields here, did +gather one of the prettiest nosegays that ever I saw in my +life.”</p> +<p>And so the story rambles on to the end of that day’s +pleasuring; with cups of milk, and glowworms, and people walking +at sundown with their wives and children, and all the way home +Pepys still dreaming “of the old age of the world” +and the early innocence of man. This was how he walked +through life, his eyes and ears wide open, and his hand, you will +observe, not shut; and thus he observed the lives, the speech, +and the manners of his fellow-men, with prose fidelity of detail +and yet a lingering glamour of romance.</p> +<p>It was “two or three days after” that he extended +this passage in the pages of his journal, and the style has thus +the benefit of some reflection. It is generally supposed +that, as a writer, Pepys must rank at the bottom of the scale of +merit. But a style which is indefatigably lively, telling, +and picturesque through six large volumes of everyday experience, +which deals with the whole matter of a life, and yet is rarely +wearisome, which condescends to the most fastidious particulars, +and yet sweeps all away in the forthright current of the +narrative,—such a style may be ungrammatical, it may be +inelegant, it may be one tissue of mistakes, but it can never be +devoid of merit. The first and the true function of the +writer has been thoroughly performed throughout; and though the +manner of his utterance may be childishly awkward, the matter has +been transformed and assimilated by his unfeigned interest and +delight. The gusto of the man speaks out fierily after all +these years. For the difference between Pepys and Shelley, +to return to that half-whimsical approximation, is one of quality +but not one of degree; in his sphere, Pepys felt as keenly, and +his is the true prose of poetry—prose because the spirit of +the man was narrow and earthly, but poetry because he was +delightedly alive. Hence, in such a passage as this about +the Epsom shepherd, the result upon the reader’s mind is +entire conviction and unmingled pleasure. So, you feel, the +thing fell out, not otherwise; and you would no more change it +than you would change a sublimity of Shakespeare’s, a +homely touch of Bunyan’s, or a favoured reminiscence of +your own.</p> +<p>There never was a man nearer being an artist, who yet was not +one. The tang was in the family; while he was writing the +journal for our enjoyment in his comely house in Navy Gardens, no +fewer than two of his cousins were tramping the fens, kit under +arm, to make music to the country girls. But he himself, +though he could play so many instruments and pass judgment in so +many fields of art, remained an amateur. It is not given to +any one so keenly to enjoy, without some greater power to +understand. That he did not like Shakespeare as an artist +for the stage may be a fault, but it is not without either +parallel or excuse. He certainly admired him as a poet; he +was the first beyond mere actors on the rolls of that innumerable +army who have got “To be or not to be” by +heart. Nor was he content with that; it haunted his mind; +he quoted it to himself in the pages of the Diary, and, rushing +in where angels fear to tread, he set it to music. Nothing, +indeed, is more notable than the heroic quality of the verses +that our little sensualist in a periwig chose out to marry with +his own mortal strains. Some gust from brave Elizabethan +times must have warmed his spirit, as he sat tuning his sublime +theorbo. “To be or not to be. Whether +’tis nobler”—“Beauty retire, thou dost my +pity move”—“It is decreed, nor shall thy fate, +O Rome;”—open and dignified in the sound, various and +majestic in the sentiment, it was no inapt, as it was certainly +no timid, spirit that selected such a range of themes. Of +“Gaze not on Swans,” I know no more than these four +words; yet that also seems to promise well. It was, +however, on a probable suspicion, the work of his master, Mr. +Berkenshaw—as the drawings that figure at the breaking up +of a young ladies’ seminary are the work of the professor +attached to the establishment. Mr. Berkenshaw was not +altogether happy in his pupil. The amateur cannot usually +rise into the artist, some leaven of the world still clogging +him; and we find Pepys behaving like a pickthank to the man who +taught him composition. In relation to the stage, which he +so warmly loved and understood, he was not only more hearty, but +more generous to others. Thus he encounters Colonel Reames, +“a man,” says he, “who understands and loves a +play as well as I, and I love him for it.” And again, +when he and his wife had seen a most ridiculous insipid piece, +“Glad we were,” he writes, “that Betterton had +no part in it.” It is by such a zeal and loyalty to +those who labour for his delight that the amateur grows worthy of +the artist. And it should be kept in mind that, not only in +art, but in morals, Pepys rejoiced to recognise his +betters. There was not one speck of envy in the whole +human-hearted egotist.</p> +<h3><span class="smcap">Respectability</span>.</h3> +<p>When writers inveigh against respectability, in the present +degraded meaning of the word, they are usually suspected of a +taste for clay pipes and beer cellars; and their performances are +thought to hail from the <i>Owl’s Nest</i> of the +comedy. They have something more, however, in their eye +than the dulness of a round million dinner parties that sit down +yearly in old England. For to do anything because others do +it, and not because the thing is good, or kind, or honest in its +own right, is to resign all moral control and captaincy upon +yourself, and go post-haste to the devil with the greater +number. We smile over the ascendency of priests; but I had +rather follow a priest than what they call the leaders of +society. No life can better than that of Pepys illustrate +the dangers of this respectable theory of living. For what +can be more untoward than the occurrence, at a critical period +and while the habits are still pliable, of such a sweeping +transformation as the return of Charles the Second? Round +went the whole fleet of England on the other tack; and while a +few tall pintas, Milton or Pen, still sailed a lonely course by +the stars and their own private compass, the cock-boat, Pepys, +must go about with the majority among “the stupid starers +and the loud huzzas.”</p> +<p>The respectable are not led so much by any desire of applause +as by a positive need for countenance. The weaker and the +tamer the man, the more will he require this support; and any +positive quality relieves him, by just so much, of this +dependence. In a dozen ways, Pepys was quite strong enough +to please himself without regard for others; but his positive +qualities were not co-extensive with the field of conduct; and in +many parts of life he followed, with gleeful precision, in the +footprints of the contemporary Mrs. Grundy. In morals, +particularly, he lived by the countenance of others; felt a +slight from another more keenly than a meanness in himself; and +then first repented when he was found out. You could talk +of religion or morality to such a man; and by the artist side of +him, by his lively sympathy and apprehension, he could rise, as +it were dramatically, to the significance of what you said. +All that matter in religion which has been nicknamed +other-worldliness was strictly in his gamut; but a rule of life +that should make a man rudely virtuous, following right in good +report and ill report, was foolishness and a stumbling-block to +Pepys. He was much thrown across the Friends; and nothing +can be more instructive than his attitude towards these most +interesting people of that age. I have mentioned how he +conversed with one as he rode; when he saw some brought from a +meeting under arrest, “I would to God,” said he, +“they would either conform, or be more wise and not be +catched;” and to a Quaker in his own office he extended a +timid though effectual protection. Meanwhile there was +growing up next door to him that beautiful nature William +Pen. It is odd that Pepys condemned him for a fop; odd, +though natural enough when you see Pen’s portrait, that +Pepys was jealous of him with his wife. But the cream of +the story is when Pen publishes his <i>Sandy Foundation +Shaken</i>, and Pepys has it read aloud by his wife. +“I find it,” he says, “so well writ as, I +think, it is too good for him ever to have writ it; and it is a +serious sort of book, and <i>not fit for everybody to +read</i>.” Nothing is more galling to the merely +respectable than to be brought in contact with religious +ardour. Pepys had his own foundation, sandy enough, but +dear to him from practical considerations, and he would read the +book with true uneasiness of spirit; for conceive the blow if, by +some plaguy accident, this Pen were to convert him! It was +a different kind of doctrine that he judged profitable for +himself and others. “A good sermon of Mr. +Gifford’s at our church, upon ‘Seek ye first the +kingdom of heaven.’ A very excellent and persuasive, +good and moral sermon. He showed, like a wise man, that +righteousness is a surer moral way of being rich than sin and +villainy.” It is thus that respectable people desire +to have their Greathearts address them, telling, in mild accents, +how you may make the best of both worlds, and be a moral hero +without courage, kindness, or troublesome reflection; and thus +the Gospel, cleared of Eastern metaphor, becomes a manual of +worldly prudence, and a handybook for Pepys and the successful +merchant.</p> +<p>The respectability of Pepys was deeply grained. He has +no idea of truth except for the Diary. He has no care that +a thing shall be, if it but appear; gives out that he has +inherited a good estate, when he has seemingly got nothing but a +lawsuit; and is pleased to be thought liberal when he knows he +has been mean. He is conscientiously ostentatious. I +say conscientiously, with reason. He could never have been +taken for a fop, like Pen, but arrayed himself in a manner nicely +suitable to his position. For long he hesitated to assume +the famous periwig; for a public man should travel gravely with +the fashions not foppishly before, nor dowdily behind, the +central movement of his age. For long he durst not keep a +carriage; that, in his circumstances would have been improper; +but a time comes, with the growth of his fortune, when the +impropriety has shifted to the other side, and he is +“ashamed to be seen in a hackney.” Pepys talked +about being “a Quaker or some very melancholy thing;” +for my part, I can imagine nothing so melancholy, because nothing +half so silly, as to be concerned about such problems. But +so respectability and the duties of society haunt and burden +their poor devotees; and what seems at first the very primrose +path of life, proves difficult and thorny like the rest. +And the time comes to Pepys, as to all the merely respectable, +when he must not only order his pleasures, but even clip his +virtuous movements, to the public pattern of the age. There +was some juggling among officials to avoid direct taxation; and +Pepys, with a noble impulse, growing ashamed of this dishonesty, +designed to charge himself with £1000; but finding none to +set him an example, “nobody of our ablest merchants” +with this moderate liking for clean hands, he judged it +“not decent;” he feared it would “be thought +vain glory;” and, rather than appear singular, cheerfully +remained a thief. One able merchant’s countenance, +and Pepys had dared to do an honest act! Had he found one +brave spirit, properly recognised by society, he might have gone +far as a disciple. Mrs. Turner, it is true, can fill him +full of sordid scandal, and make him believe, against the +testimony of his senses, that Pen’s venison pasty stank +like the devil; but, on the other hand, Sir William Coventry can +raise him by a word into another being. Pepys, when he is +with Coventry, talks in the vein of an old Roman. What does +he care for office or emolument? “Thank God, I have +enough of my own,” says he, “to buy me a good book +and a good fiddle, and I have a good wife.” And +again, we find this pair projecting an old age when an ungrateful +country shall have dismissed them from the field of public +service; Coventry living retired in a fine house, and Pepys +dropping in, “it may be, to read a chapter of +Seneca.”</p> +<p>Under this influence, the only good one in his life, Pepys +continued zealous and, for the period, pure in his +employment. He would not be “bribed to be +unjust,” he says, though he was “not so squeamish as +to refuse a present after,” suppose the king to have +received no wrong. His new arrangement for the victualling +of Tangier he tells us with honest complacency, will save the +king a thousand and gain Pepys three hundred pounds a +year,—a statement which exactly fixes the degree of the +age’s enlightenment. But for his industry and +capacity no praise can be too high. It was an unending +struggle for the man to stick to his business in such a garden of +Armida as he found this life; and the story of his oaths, so +often broken, so courageously renewed, is worthy rather of +admiration that the contempt it has received.</p> +<p>Elsewhere, and beyond the sphere of Coventry’s +influence, we find him losing scruples and daily complying +further with the age. When he began the journal, he was a +trifle prim and puritanic; merry enough, to be sure, over his +private cups, and still remembering Magdalene ale and his +acquaintance with Mrs. Ainsworth of Cambridge. But youth is +a hot season with all; when a man smells April and May he is apt +at times to stumble; and in spite of a disordered practice, +Pepys’s theory, the better things that he approved and +followed after, we may even say were strict. Where there +was “tag, rag, and bobtail, dancing, singing, and +drinking,” he felt “ashamed, and went away;” +and when he slept in church, he prayed God forgive him. In +but a little while we find him with some ladies keeping each +other awake “from spite,” as though not to sleep in +church were an obvious hardship; and yet later he calmly passes +the time of service, looking about him, with a perspective glass, +on all the pretty women. His favourite ejaculation, +“Lord!” occurs but once that I have observed in 1660, +never in ’61, twice in ’62, and at least five times +in ’63; after which the “Lords” may be said to +pullulate like herrings, with here and there a solitary +“damned,” as it were a whale among the shoal. +He and his wife, once filled with dudgeon by some innocent +freedoms at a marriage, are soon content to go pleasuring with my +Lord Brouncker’s mistress, who was not even, by his own +account, the most discreet of mistresses. Tag, rag, and +bobtail, dancing, singing, and drinking, become his natural +element; actors and actresses and drunken, roaring courtiers are +to be found in his society; until the man grew so involved with +Saturnalian manners and companions that he was shot almost +unconsciously into the grand domestic crash of 1668.</p> +<p>That was the legitimate issue and punishment of years of +staggering walk and conversation. The man who has smoked +his pipe for half a century in a powder magazine finds himself at +last the author and the victim of a hideous disaster. So +with our pleasant-minded Pepys and his peccadilloes. All of +a sudden, as he still trips dexterously enough among the dangers +of a double-faced career, thinking no great evil, humming to +himself the trillo, Fate takes the further conduct of that matter +from his hands, and brings him face to face with the consequences +of his acts. For a man still, after so many years, the +lover, although not the constant lover, of his wife,—for a +man, besides, who was so greatly careful of +appearances,—the revelation of his infidelities was a +crushing blow. The tears that he shed, the indignities that +he endured, are not to be measured. A vulgar woman, and now +justly incensed, Mrs. Pepys spared him no detail of +suffering. She was violent, threatening him with the tongs; +she was careless of his honour, driving him to insult the +mistress whom she had driven him to betray and to discard; worst +of all, she was hopelessly inconsequent, in word and thought and +deed, now lulling him with reconciliations, and anon flaming +forth again with the original anger. Pepys had not used his +wife well; he had wearied her with jealousies, even while himself +unfaithful; he had grudged her clothes and pleasures, while +lavishing both upon himself; he had abused her in words; he had +bent his fist at her in anger; he had once blacked her eye; and +it is one of the oddest particulars in that odd Diary of his, +that, while the injury is referred to once in passing, there is +no hint as to the occasion or the manner of the blow. But +now, when he is in the wrong, nothing can exceed the +long-suffering affection of this impatient husband. While +he was still sinning and still undiscovered, he seems not to have +known a touch of penitence stronger than what might lead him to +take his wife to the theatre, or for an airing, or to give her a +new dress, by way of compensation. Once found out, however, +and he seems to himself to have lost all claim to decent +usage. It is perhaps the strongest instance of his +externality. His wife may do what she pleases, and though +he may groan, it will never occur to him to blame her; he has no +weapon left but tears and the most abject submission. We +should perhaps have respected him more had he not given way so +utterly—above all, had he refused to write, under his +wife’s dictation, an insulting letter to his unhappy +fellow-culprit, Miss Willet; but somehow I believe we like him +better as he was.</p> +<p>The death of his wife, following so shortly after, must have +stamped the impression of this episode upon his mind. For +the remaining years of his long life we have no Diary to help us, +and we have seen already how little stress is to be laid upon the +tenor of his correspondence; but what with the recollection of +the catastrophe of his married life, what with the natural +influence of his advancing years and reputation, it seems not +unlikely that the period of gallantry was at an end for Pepys; +and it is beyond a doubt that he sat down at last to an honoured +and agreeable old age among his books and music, the +correspondent of Sir Isaac Newton, and, in one instance at least +the poetical counsellor of Dryden. Through all this period, +that Diary which contained the secret memoirs of his life, with +all its inconsistencies and escapades, had been religiously +preserved; nor, when he came to die, does he appear to have +provided for its destruction. So we may conceive him +faithful to the end to all his dear and early memories; still +mindful of Mrs. Hely in the woods at Epsom; still lighting at +Islington for a cup of kindness to the dead; still, if he heard +again that air that once so much disturbed him, thrilling at the +recollection of the love that bound him to his wife.</p> +<h2><a name="page328"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 328</span>JOHN +KNOX AND HIS RELATIONS TO WOMEN.</h2> +<h3>I.—<span class="smcap">The Controversy about Female +Rule</span>.</h3> +<p><span class="smcap">When</span> first the idea became widely +spread among men that the Word of God, instead of being truly the +foundation of all existing institutions, was rather a stone which +the builders had rejected, it was but natural that the consequent +havoc among received opinions should be accompanied by the +generation of many new and lively hopes for the future. +Somewhat as in the early days of the French Revolution, men must +have looked for an immediate and universal improvement in their +condition. Christianity, up to that time, had been somewhat +of a failure politically. The reason was now obvious, the +capital flaw was detected, the sickness of the body politic +traced at last to its efficient cause. It was only +necessary to put the Bible thoroughly into practice, to set +themselves strenuously to realise in life the Holy Commonwealth, +and all abuses and iniquities would surely pass away. Thus, +in a pageant played at Geneva in the year 1523, the world was +represented as a sick man at the end of his wits for help, to +whom his doctor recommends Lutheran specifics. <a +name="citation329"></a><a href="#footnote329" +class="citation">[329]</a> The Reformers themselves had set +their affections in a different world, and professed to look for +the finished result of their endeavours on the other side of +death. They took no interest in politics as such; they even +condemned political action as Antichristian: notably, Luther in +the case of the Peasants’ War. And yet, as the purely +religious question was inseparably complicated with political +difficulties, and they had to make opposition, from day to day, +against principalities and powers, they were led, one after +another, and again and again, to leave the sphere which was more +strictly their own, and meddle, for good and evil, with the +affairs of State. Not much was to be expected from +interference in such a spirit. Whenever a minister found +himself galled or hindered, he would be inclined to suppose some +contravention of the Bible. Whenever Christian liberty was +restrained (and Christian liberty for each individual would be +about coextensive with what he wished to do), it was obvious that +the State was Antichristian. The great thing, and the one +thing, was to push the Gospel and the Reformers’ own +interpretation of it. Whatever helped was good; whatever +hindered was evil; and if this simple classification proved +inapplicable over the whole field, it was no business of his to +stop and reconcile incongruities. He had more pressing +concerns on hand; he had to save souls; he had to be about his +Father’s business. This short-sighted view resulted +in a doctrine that was actually Jesuitical in application. +They had no serious ideas upon politics, and they were ready, +nay, they seemed almost bound, to adopt and support whichever +ensured for the moment the greatest benefit to the souls of their +fellow-men. They were dishonest in all sincerity. +Thus Labitte, in the introduction to a book <a +name="citation330a"></a><a href="#footnote330a" +class="citation">[330a]</a> in which he exposes the hypocritical +democracy of the Catholics under the League, steps aside for a +moment to stigmatise the hypocritical democracy of the +Protestants. And nowhere was this expediency in political +questions more apparent than about the question of female +sovereignty. So much was this the case that one James +Thomasius, of Leipsic, wrote a little paper <a +name="citation330b"></a><a href="#footnote330b" +class="citation">[330b]</a> about the religious partialities of +those who took part in the controversy, in which some of these +learned disputants cut a very sorry figure.</p> +<p>Now Knox has been from the first a man well hated; and it is +somewhat characteristic of his luck that he figures here in the +very forefront of the list of partial scribes who trimmed their +doctrine with the wind in all good conscience, and were political +weathercocks out of conviction. Not only has Thomasius +mentioned him, but Bayle has taken the hint from Thomasius, and +dedicated a long note to the matter at the end of his article on +the Scotch Reformer. This is a little less than fair. +If any one among the evangelists of that period showed more +serious political sense than another, it was assuredly Knox; and +even in this very matter of female rule, although I do not +suppose any one nowadays will feel inclined to endorse his +sentiments, I confess I can make great allowance for his +conduct. The controversy, besides, has an interest of its +own, in view of later controversies.</p> +<p>John Knox, from 1556 to 1559, was resident in Geneva, as +minister, jointly with Goodman, of a little church of English +refugees. He and his congregation were banished from +England by one woman, Mary Tudor, and proscribed in Scotland by +another, the Regent Mary of Guise. The coincidence was +tempting: here were many abuses centring about one abuse; here +was Christ’s Gospel persecuted in the two kingdoms by one +anomalous power. He had not far to go to find the idea that +female government was anomalous. It was an age, indeed, in +which women, capable and incapable, played a conspicuous part +upon the stage of European history; and yet their rule, whatever +may have been the opinion of here and there a wise man or +enthusiast, was regarded as an anomaly by the great bulk of their +contemporaries. It was defended as an anomaly. It, +and all that accompanied and sanctioned it, was set aside as a +single exception; and no one thought of reasoning down from +queens and extending their privileges to ordinary women. +Great ladies, as we know, had the privilege of entering into +monasteries and cloisters, otherwise forbidden to their +sex. As with one thing, so with another. Thus, +Margaret of Navarre wrote books with great acclamation, and no +one, seemingly, saw fit to call her conduct in question; but +Mademoiselle de Gournay, Montaigne’s adopted daughter, was +in a controversy with the world as to whether a woman might be an +author without incongruity. Thus, too, we have +Théodore Agrippa d’Aubigné writing to his +daughters about the learned women of his century, and cautioning +them, in conclusion, that the study of letters was unsuited to +ladies of a middling station, and should be reserved for +princesses. <a name="citation333a"></a><a href="#footnote333a" +class="citation">[333a]</a> And once more, if we desire to +see the same principle carried to ludicrous extreme, we shall +find that Reverend Father in God the Abbot of Brantôme, +claiming, on the authority of some lord of his acquaintance, a +privilege, or rather a duty, of free love for great princesses, +and carefully excluding other ladies from the same gallant +dispensation. <a name="citation333b"></a><a href="#footnote333b" +class="citation">[333b]</a> One sees the spirit in which +these immunities were granted; and how they were but the natural +consequence of that awe for courts and kings that made the last +writer tell us, with simple wonder, how Catherine de Medici would +“laugh her fill just like another” over the humours +of pantaloons and zanies. And such servility was, of all +things, what would touch most nearly the republican spirit of +Knox. It was not difficult for him to set aside this weak +scruple of loyalty. The lantern of his analysis did not +always shine with a very serviceable light; but he had the +virtue, at least, to carry it into many places of fictitious +holiness, and was not abashed by the tinsel divinity that hedged +kings and queens from his contemporaries. And so he could +put the proposition in the form already mentioned: there was +Christ’s Gospel persecuted in the two kingdoms by one +anomalous power plainly, then, the “regiment of +women” was Antichristian. Early in 1558 he +communicated this discovery to the world, by publishing at Geneva +his notorious book—<i>The First Blast of the Trumpet +against the Monstrous Regiment of Women</i>. <a +name="citation334"></a><a href="#footnote334" +class="citation">[334]</a></p> +<p>As a whole, it is a dull performance; but the preface, as is +usual with Knox, is both interesting and morally fine. Knox +was not one of those who are humble in the hour of triumph; he +was aggressive even when things were at their worst. He had +a grim reliance in himself, or rather in his mission; if he were +not sure that he was a great man, he was at least sure that he +was one set apart to do great things. And he judged simply +that whatever passed in his mind, whatever moved him to flee from +persecution instead of constantly facing it out, or, as here, to +publish and withhold his name from the title-page of a critical +work, would not fail to be of interest, perhaps of benefit, to +the world. There may be something more finely sensitive in +the modern humour, that tends more and more to withdraw a +man’s personality from the lessons he inculcates or the +cause that he has espoused; but there is a loss herewith of +wholesome responsibility; and when we find in the works of Knox, +as in the Epistles of Paul, the man himself standing nakedly +forward, courting and anticipating criticism, putting his +character, as it were, in pledge for the sincerity of his +doctrine, we had best waive the question of delicacy, and make +our acknowledgments for a lesson of courage, not unnecessary in +these days of anonymous criticism, and much light, otherwise +unattainable, on the spirit in which great movements were +initiated and carried forward. Knox’s personal +revelations are always interesting; and, in the case of the +“First Blast,” as I have said, there is no exception +to the rule. He begins by stating the solemn responsibility +of all who are watchmen over God’s flock; and all are +watchmen (he goes on to explain, with that fine breadth of spirit +that characterises him even when, as here, he shows himself most +narrow), all are watchmen “whose eyes God doth open, and +whose conscience he pricketh to admonish the +ungodly.” And with the full consciousness of this +great duty before him, he sets himself to answer the scruples of +timorous or worldly-minded people. How can a man repent, he +asks, unless the nature of his transgression is made plain to +him? “And therefore I say,” he continues, +“that of necessity it is that this monstriferous empire of +women (which among all enormities that this day do abound upon +the face of the whole earth, is most detestable and damnable) be +openly and plainly declared to the world, to the end that some +may repent and be saved.” To those who think the +doctrine useless, because it cannot be expected to amend those +princes whom it would dispossess if once accepted, he makes +answer in a strain that shows him at his greatest. After +having instanced how the rumour of Christ’s censures found +its way to Herod in his own court, “even so,” he +continues, “may the sound of our weak trumpet, by the +support of some wind (blow it from the south, or blow it from the +north, it is of no matter), come to the ears of the chief +offenders. <i>But whether it do or not</i>, <i>yet dare we +not cease to blow as God will give strength</i>. <i>For we +are debtors to more than to princes</i>, <i>to wit</i>, <i>to the +great multitude of our brethren</i>, of whom, no doubt, a great +number have heretofore offended by error and +ignorance.”</p> +<p>It is for the multitude, then, he writes; he does not greatly +hope that his trumpet will be audible in palaces, or that crowned +women will submissively discrown themselves at his appeal; what +he does hope, in plain English, is to encourage and justify +rebellion; and we shall see, before we have done, that he can put +his purpose into words as roundly as I can put it for him. +This he sees to be a matter of much hazard; he is not +“altogether so brutish and insensible, but that he has laid +his account what the finishing of the work may cost.” +He knows that he will find many adversaries, since “to the +most part of men, lawful and godly appeareth whatsoever antiquity +hath received.” He looks for opposition, “not +only of the ignorant multitude, but of the wise, politic, and +quiet spirits of the earth.” He will be called +foolish, curious, despiteful, and a sower of sedition; and one +day, perhaps, for all he is now nameless, he may be attainted of +treason. Yet he has “determined to obey God, +notwithstanding that the world shall rage thereat.” +Finally, he makes some excuse for the anonymous appearance of +this first instalment: it is his purpose thrice to blow the +trumpet in this matter, if God so permit; twice he intends to do +it without name; but at the last blast to take the odium upon +himself, that all others may be purged.</p> +<p>Thus he ends the preface, and enters upon his argument with a +secondary title: “The First Blast to awake Women +degenerate.” We are in the land of assertion without +delay. That a woman should bear rule, superiority, dominion +or empire over any realm, nation, or city, he tells us, is +repugnant to nature, contumely to God, and a subversion of good +order. Women are weak, frail, impatient, feeble, and +foolish. God has denied to woman wisdom to consider, or +providence to foresee, what is profitable to a +commonwealth. Women have been ever lightly esteemed; they +have been denied the tutory of their own sons, and subjected to +the unquestionable sway of their husbands; and surely it is +irrational to give the greater where the less has been withheld, +and suffer a woman to reign supreme over a great kingdom who +would be allowed no authority by her own fireside. He +appeals to the Bible; but though he makes much of the first +transgression and certain strong texts in Genesis and +Paul’s Epistles, he does not appeal with entire +success. The cases of Deborah and Huldah can be brought +into no sort of harmony with his thesis. Indeed, I may say +that, logically, he left his bones there; and that it is but the +phantom of an argument that he parades thenceforward to the +end. Well was it for Knox that he succeeded no better; it +is under this very ambiguity about Deborah that we shall find him +fain to creep for shelter before he is done with the regiment of +women. After having thus exhausted Scripture, and +formulated its teaching in the somewhat blasphemous maxim that +the man is placed above the woman, even as God above the angels, +he goes on triumphantly to adduce the testimonies of Tertullian, +Augustine, Ambrose, Basil, Chrysostom, and the Pandects; and +having gathered this little cloud of witnesses about him, like +pursuivants about a herald, he solemnly proclaims all reigning +women to be traitoresses and rebels against God; discharges all +men thenceforward from holding any office under such monstrous +regiment, and calls upon all the lieges with one consent to +“<i>study to repress the inordinate pride and +tyranny</i>” <i>of queens</i>. If this is not +treasonable teaching, one would be glad to know what is; and yet, +as if he feared he had not made the case plain enough against +himself, he goes on to deduce the startling corollary that all +oaths of allegiance must be incontinently broken. If it was +sin thus to have sworn even in ignorance, it were obstinate sin +to continue to respect them after fuller knowledge. Then +comes the peroration, in which he cries aloud against the +cruelties of that cursed Jezebel of England—that horrible +monster Jezebel of England; and after having predicted sudden +destruction to her rule and to the rule of all crowned women, and +warned all men that if they presume to defend the same when any +“noble heart” shall be raised up to vindicate the +liberty of his country, they shall not fail to perish themselves +in the ruin, he concludes with a last rhetorical flourish: +“And therefore let all men be advertised, for <span +class="smcap">the Trumpet hath once blown</span>.”</p> +<p>The capitals are his own. In writing, he probably felt +the want of some such reverberation of the pulpit under strong +hands as he was wont to emphasise his spoken utterances withal; +there would seem to him a want of passion in the orderly lines of +type; and I suppose we may take the capitals as a mere substitute +for the great voice with which he would have given it forth, had +we heard it from his own lips. Indeed, as it is, in this +little strain of rhetoric about the trumpet, this current +allusion to the fall of Jericho, that alone distinguishes his +bitter and hasty production, he was probably right, according to +all artistic canon, thus to support and accentuate in conclusion +the sustained metaphor of a hostile proclamation. It is +curious, by the way, to note how favourite an image the trumpet +was with the Reformer. He returns to it again and again; it +is the Alpha and Omega of his rhetoric; it is to him what a ship +is to the stage sailor; and one would almost fancy he had begun +the world as a trumpeter’s apprentice. The partiality +is surely characteristic. All his life long he was blowing +summonses before various Jerichos, some of which fell duly, but +not all. Wherever he appears in history his speech is loud, +angry, and hostile; there is no peace in his life, and little +tenderness; he is always sounding hopefully to the front for some +rough enterprise.</p> +<p>And as his voice had something of the trumpet’s +hardness, it had something also of the trumpet’s warlike +inspiration. So Randolph, possibly fresh from the sound of +the Reformer’s preaching, writes of him to +Cecil:—“Where your honour exhorteth us to stoutness, +I assure you the voice of one man is able, in an hour, to put +more life in us than six hundred trumpets continually blustering +in our ears.” <a name="citation341"></a><a +href="#footnote341" class="citation">[341]</a></p> +<p>Thus was the proclamation made. Nor was it long in +wakening all the echoes of Europe. What success might have +attended it, had the question decided been a purely abstract +question, it is difficult to say. As it was, it was to +stand or fall, not by logic, but by political needs and +sympathies. Thus, in France, his doctrine was to have some +future, because Protestants suffered there under the feeble and +treacherous regency of Catherine de Medici; and thus it was to +have no future anywhere else, because the Protestant interest was +bound up with the prosperity of Queen Elizabeth. This +stumbling-block lay at the very threshold of the matter; and +Knox, in the text of the “First Blast,” had set +everybody the wrong example and gone to the ground himself. +He finds occasion to regret “the blood of innocent Lady +Jane Dudley.” But Lady Jane Dudley, or Lady Jane +Grey, as we call her, was a would-be traitoress and rebel against +God, to use his own expressions. If, therefore, political +and religious sympathy led Knox himself into so grave a +partiality, what was he to expect from his disciples?</p> +<p>If the trumpet gave so ambiguous a sound, who could heartily +prepare himself for the battle? The question whether Lady +Jane Dudley was an innocent martyr, or a traitoress against God, +whose inordinate pride and tyranny had been effectually +repressed, was thus left altogether in the wind; and it was not, +perhaps, wonderful if many of Knox’s readers concluded that +all right and wrong in the matter turned upon the degree of the +sovereign’s orthodoxy and possible helpfulness to the +Reformation. He should have been the more careful of such +an ambiguity of meaning, as he must have known well the lukewarm +indifference and dishonesty of his fellow-reformers in political +matters. He had already, in 1556 or 1557, talked the matter +over with his great master, Calvin, in “a private +conversation;” and the interview <a +name="citation342"></a><a href="#footnote342" +class="citation">[342]</a> must have been truly distasteful to +both parties. Calvin, indeed, went a far way with him in +theory, and owned that the “government of women was a +deviation from the original and proper order of nature, to be +ranked, no less than slavery, among the punishments consequent +upon the fall of man.” But, in practice, their two +roads separated. For the Man of Geneva saw difficulties in +the way of the Scripture proof in the cases of Deborah and +Huldah, and in the prophecy of Isaiah that queens should be the +nursing mothers of the Church. And as the Bible was not +decisive, he thought the subject should be let alone, because, +“by custom and public consent and long practice, it has +been established that realms and principalities may descend to +females by hereditary right, and it would not be lawful to +unsettle governments which are ordained by the peculiar +providence of God.” I imagine Knox’s ears must +have burned during this interview. Think of him listening +dutifully to all this—how it would not do to meddle with +anointed kings—how there was a peculiar providence in these +great affairs; and then think of his own peroration, and the +“noble heart” whom he looks for “to vindicate +the liberty of his country;” or his answer to Queen Mary, +when she asked him who he was, to interfere in the affairs of +Scotland:—“Madam, a subject born within the +same!” Indeed, the two doctors who differed at this +private conversation represented, at the moment, two principles +of enormous import in the subsequent history of Europe. In +Calvin we have represented that passive obedience, that +toleration of injustice and absurdity, that holding back of the +hand from political affairs as from something unclean, which lost +France, if we are to believe M. Michelet, for the Reformation; a +spirit necessarily fatal in the long run to the existence of any +sect that may profess it; a suicidal doctrine that survives among +us to this day in narrow views of personal duty, and the low +political morality of many virtuous men. In Knox, on the +other hand, we see foreshadowed the whole Puritan Revolution and +the scaffold of Charles I.</p> +<p>There is little doubt in my mind that this interview was what +caused Knox to print his book without a name. <a +name="citation344"></a><a href="#footnote344" +class="citation">[344]</a> It was a dangerous thing to +contradict the Man of Geneva, and doubly so, surely, when one had +had the advantage of correction from him in a private +conversation; and Knox had his little flock of English refugees +to consider. If they had fallen into bad odour at Geneva, +where else was there left to flee to? It was printed, as I +said, in 1558; and, by a singular <i>mal-à-propos</i>, in +that same year Mary died, and Elizabeth succeeded to the throne +of England. And just as the accession of Catholic Queen +Mary had condemned female rule in the eyes of Knox, the accession +of Protestant Queen Elizabeth justified it in the eyes of his +colleagues. Female rule ceases to be an anomaly, not +because Elizabeth can “reply to eight ambassadors in one +day in their different languages,” but because she +represents for the moment the political future of the +Reformation. The exiles troop back to England with songs of +praise in their mouths. The bright occidental star, of +which we have all read in the Preface to the Bible, has risen +over the darkness of Europe. There is a thrill of hope +through the persecuted Churches of the Continent. Calvin +writes to Cecil, washing his hands of Knox and his political +heresies. The sale of the “First Blast” is +prohibited in Geneva; and along with it the bold book of +Knox’s colleague, Goodman—a book dear to +Milton—where female rule was briefly characterised as a +“monster in nature and disorder among men.” <a +name="citation345a"></a><a href="#footnote345a" +class="citation">[345a]</a> Any who may ever have doubted, +or been for a moment led away by Knox or Goodman, or their own +wicked imaginations, are now more than convinced. They have +seen the occidental star. Aylmer, with his eye set greedily +on a possible bishopric, and “the better to obtain the +favour of the new Queen,” <a name="citation345b"></a><a +href="#footnote345b" class="citation">[345b]</a> sharpens his pen +to confound Knox by logic. What need? He has been +confounded by facts. “Thus what had been to the +refugees of Geneva as the very word of God, no sooner were they +back in England than, behold! it was the word of the +devil.” <a name="citation346a"></a><a href="#footnote346a" +class="citation">[346a]</a></p> +<p>Now, what of the real sentiments of these loyal subjects of +Elizabeth? They professed a holy horror for Knox’s +position: let us see if their own would please a modern audience +any better, or was, in substance, greatly different.</p> +<p>John Aylmer, afterwards Bishop of London, published an answer +to Knox, under the title of <i>An Harbour for Faithful and true +Subjects against the late Blown Blast</i>, <i>concerning the +government of Women</i>. <a name="citation346b"></a><a +href="#footnote346b" class="citation">[346b]</a> And +certainly he was a thought more acute, a thought less precipitate +and simple, than his adversary. He is not to be led away by +such captious terms as <i>natural and unnatural</i>. It is +obvious to him that a woman’s disability to rule is not +natural in the same sense in which it is natural for a stone to +fall or fire to burn. He is doubtful, on the whole, whether +this disability be natural at all; nay, when he is laying it down +that a woman should not be a priest, he shows some elementary +conception of what many of us now hold to be the truth of the +matter. “The bringing-up of women,” he says, +“is commonly such” that they cannot have the +necessary qualifications, “for they are not brought up in +learning in schools, nor trained in disputation.” And +even so, he can ask, “Are there not in England women, think +you, that for learning and wisdom could tell their household and +neighbours as good a tale as any Sir John there?” For +all that, his advocacy is weak. If women’s rule is +not unnatural in a sense preclusive of its very existence, it is +neither so convenient nor so profitable as the government of +men. He holds England to be specially suitable for the +government of women, because there the governor is more limited +and restrained by the other members of the constitution than in +other places; and this argument has kept his book from being +altogether forgotten. It is only in hereditary monarchies +that he will offer any defence of the anomaly. “If +rulers were to be chosen by lot or suffrage, he would not that +any women should stand in the election, but men +only.” The law of succession of crowns was a law to +him, in the same sense as the law of evolution is a law to Mr. +Herbert Spencer; and the one and the other counsels his readers, +in a spirit suggestively alike, not to kick against the pricks or +seek to be more wise than He who made them. <a +name="citation348"></a><a href="#footnote348" +class="citation">[348]</a> If God has put a female child +into the direct line of inheritance, it is God’s +affair. His strength will be perfected in her +weakness. He makes the Creator address the objectors in +this not very flattering vein:—“I, that could make +Daniel, a sucking babe, to judge better than the wisest lawyers; +a brute beast to reprehend the folly of a prophet; and poor +fishers to confound the great clerks of the world—cannot I +make a woman to be a good ruler over you?” This is +the last word of his reasoning. Although he was not +altogether without Puritanic leaven, shown particularly in what +he says of the incomes of Bishops, yet it was rather loyalty to +the old order of things than any generous belief in the capacity +of women, that raised up for them this clerical champion. +His courtly spirit contrasts singularly with the rude, bracing +republicanism of Knox. “Thy knee shall bow,” he +says, “thy cap shall off, thy tongue shall speak reverently +of thy sovereign.” For himself, his tongue is even +more than reverent. Nothing can stay the issue of his +eloquent adulation. Again and again, “the remembrance +of Elizabeth’s virtues” carries him away; and he has +to hark back again to find the scent of his argument. He is +repressing his vehement adoration throughout, until, when the end +comes, and he feels his business at an end, he can indulge +himself to his heart’s content in indiscriminate laudation +of his royal mistress. It is humorous to think that this +illustrious lady, whom he here praises, among many other +excellences, for the simplicity of her attire and the +“marvellous meekness of her stomach,” threatened him, +years after, in no very meek terms, for a sermon against female +vanity in dress, which she held as a reflection on herself. <a +name="citation349"></a><a href="#footnote349" +class="citation">[349]</a></p> +<p>Whatever was wanting here in respect for women generally, +there was no want of respect for the Queen; and one cannot very +greatly wonder if these devoted servants looked askance, not upon +Knox only, but on his little flock, as they came back to England +tainted with disloyal doctrine. For them, as for him, the +occidental star rose somewhat red and angry. As for poor +Knox, his position was the saddest of all. For the juncture +seemed to him of the highest importance; it was the nick of time, +the flood-water of opportunity. Not only was there an +opening for him in Scotland, a smouldering brand of civil liberty +and religious enthusiasm which it should be for him to kindle +into flame with his powerful breath but he had his eye seemingly +on an object of even higher worth. For now, when religious +sympathy ran so high that it could be set against national +aversion, he wished to begin the fusion together of England and +Scotland, and to begin it at the sore place. If once the +open wound were closed at the Border, the work would be half +done. Ministers placed at Berwick and such places might +seek their converts equally on either side of the march; old +enemies would sit together to hear the gospel of peace, and +forget the inherited jealousies of many generations in the +enthusiasm of a common faith; or—let us say better—a +common heresy. For people are not most conscious of +brotherhood when they continue languidly together in one creed, +but when, with some doubt, with some danger perhaps, and +certainly not without some reluctance, they violently break with +the tradition of the past, and go forth from the sanctuary of +their fathers to worship under the bare heaven. A new +creed, like a new country, is an unhomely place of sojourn; but +it makes men lean on one another and join hands. It was on +this that Knox relied to begin the union of the English and the +Scotch. And he had, perhaps, better means of judging than +any even of his contemporaries. He knew the temper of both +nations; and already during his two years’ chaplaincy at +Berwick, he had seen his scheme put to the proof. But +whether practicable or not, the proposal does him much +honour. That he should thus have sought to make a +love-match of it between the two peoples, and tried to win their +inclination towards a union instead of simply transferring them, +like so many sheep, by a marriage, or testament, or private +treaty, is thoroughly characteristic of what is best in the +man. Nor was this all. He had, besides, to assure +himself of English support, secret or avowed, for the reformation +party in Scotland; a delicate affair, trenching upon +treason. And so he had plenty to say to Cecil, plenty that +he did not care to “commit to paper neither yet to the +knowledge of many.” But his miserable publication had +shut the doors of England in his face. Summoned to +Edinburgh by the confederate lords, he waited at Dieppe, +anxiously praying for leave to journey through England. The +most dispiriting tidings reach him. His messengers, coming +from so obnoxious a quarter, narrowly escape imprisonment. +His old congregation are coldly received, and even begin to look +back again to their place of exile with regret. “My +First Blast,” he writes ruefully, “has blown from me +all my friends of England.” And then he adds, with a +snarl, “The Second Blast, I fear, shall sound somewhat more +sharp, except men be more moderate than I hear they are.” +<a name="citation352a"></a><a href="#footnote352a" +class="citation">[352a]</a> But the threat is empty; there +will never be a second blast—he has had enough of that +trumpet. Nay, he begins to feel uneasily that, unless he is +to be rendered useless for the rest of his life, unless he is to +lose his right arm and go about his great work maimed and +impotent, he must find some way of making his peace with England +and the indignant Queen. The letter just quoted was written +on the 6th of April 1559; and on the 10th, after he had cooled +his heels for four days more about the streets of Dieppe, he gave +in altogether, and writes a letter of capitulation to +Cecil. In this letter, <a name="citation352b"></a><a +href="#footnote352b" class="citation">[352b]</a> which he kept +back until the 22d, still hoping that things would come right of +themselves, he censures the great secretary for having +“followed the world in the way of perdition,” +characterises him as “worthy of hell,” and threatens +him, if he be not found simple, sincere, and fervent in the cause +of Christ’s gospel, that he shall “taste of the same +cup that politic heads have drunken in before him.” +This is all, I take it, out of respect for the Reformer’s +own position; if he is going to be humiliated, let others be +humiliated first; like a child who will not take his medicine +until he has made his nurse and his mother drink of it before +him. “But I have, say you, written a treasonable book +against the regiment and empire of women. . . . The writing of +that book I will not deny; but to prove it treasonable I think it +shall be hard. . . . It is hinted that my book shall be written +against. If so be, sir, I greatly doubt they shall rather +hurt nor (than) mend the matter.” And here come the +terms of capitulation; for he does not surrender unconditionally, +even in this sore strait: “And yet if any,” he goes +on, “think me enemy to the person, or yet to the regiment, +of her whom God hath now promoted, they are utterly deceived in +me, <i>for the miraculous work of God</i>, <i>comforting His +afflicted by means of an infirm vessel</i>, <i>I do +acknowledge</i>, <i>and the power of His most potent hand I will +obey</i>. <i>More plainly to speak</i>, <i>if Queen +Elizabeth shall confess</i>, <i>that the extraordinary +dispensation of God’s great mercy maketh that lawful unto +her which both nature and God’s law do deny to all +women</i>, then shall none in England be more willing to maintain +her lawful authority than I shall be. But if (God’s +wondrous work set aside) she ground (as God forbid) the justness +of her title upon consuetude, laws, or ordinances of men, +then”—Then Knox will denounce her? Not so; he +is more politic nowadays—then, he “greatly +fears” that her ingratitude to God will not go long without +punishment.</p> +<p>His letter to Elizabeth, written some few months later, was a +mere amplification of the sentences quoted above. She must +base her title entirely upon the extraordinary providence of God; +but if she does this, “if thus, in God’s presence, +she humbles herself, so will he with tongue and pen justify her +authority, as the Holy Ghost hath justified the same in Deborah, +that blessed mother in Israel.” <a +name="citation354"></a><a href="#footnote354" +class="citation">[354]</a> And so, you see, his consistency +is preserved; he is merely applying the doctrine of the +“First Blast.” The argument goes thus: The +regiment of women is, as before noted in our work, repugnant to +nature, contumely to God, and a subversion of good order. +It has nevertheless pleased God to raise up, as exceptions to +this law, first Deborah, and afterward Elizabeth +Tudor—whose regiment we shall proceed to celebrate.</p> +<p>There is no evidence as to how the Reformer’s +explanations were received, and indeed it is most probable that +the letter was never shown to Elizabeth at all. For it was +sent under cover of another to Cecil, and as it was not of a very +courtly conception throughout, and was, of all things, what would +most excite the Queen’s uneasy jealousy about her title, it +is like enough that the secretary exercised his discretion (he +had Knox’s leave in this case, and did not always wait for +that, it is reputed) to put the letter harmlessly away beside +other valueless or unpresentable State Papers. I wonder +very much if he did the same with another, <a +name="citation355"></a><a href="#footnote355" +class="citation">[355]</a> written two years later, after Mary +had come into Scotland, in which Knox almost seeks to make +Elizabeth an accomplice with him in the matter of the +“First Blast.” The Queen of Scotland is going +to have that work refuted, he tells her; and “though it +were but foolishness in him to prescribe unto her Majesty what is +to be done,” he would yet remind her that Mary is neither +so much alarmed about her own security, nor so generously +interested in Elizabeth’s, “that she would take such +pains, <i>unless her crafty counsel in so doing shot at a further +mark</i>.” There is something really ingenious in +this letter; it showed Knox in the double capacity of the author +of the “First Blast” and the faithful friend of +Elizabeth; and he combines them there so naturally, that one +would scarcely imagine the two to be incongruous.</p> +<p>Twenty days later he was defending his intemperate publication +to another queen—his own queen, Mary Stuart. This was +on the first of those three interviews which he has preserved for +us with so much dramatic vigour in the picturesque pages of his +history. After he had avowed the authorship in his usual +haughty style, Mary asked: “You think, then, that I have no +just authority?” The question was evaded. +“Please your Majesty,” he answered, “that +learned men in all ages have had their judgments free, and most +commonly disagreeing from the common judgment of the world; such +also have they published by pen and tongue; and yet +notwithstanding they themselves have lived in the common society +with others, and have borne patiently with the errors and +imperfections which they could not amend.” Thus did +“Plato the philosopher:” thus will do John +Knox. “I have communicated my judgment to the world: +if the realm finds no inconvenience from the regiment of a woman, +that which they approve, shall I not further disallow than within +my own breast; but shall be as well content to live under your +Grace, as Paul was to live under Nero. And my hope is, that +so long as ye defile not your hands with the blood of the saints +of God, neither I nor my book shall hurt either you or your +authority.” All this is admirable in wisdom and +moderation, and, except that he might have hit upon a comparison +less offensive than that with Paul and Nero, hardly to be +bettered. Having said thus much, he feels he needs say no +more; and so, when he is further pressed, he closes that part of +the discussion with an astonishing sally. If he has been +content to let this matter sleep, he would recommend her Grace to +follow his example with thankfulness of heart; it is grimly to be +understood which of them has most to fear if the question should +be reawakened. So the talk wandered to other +subjects. Only, when the Queen was summoned at last to +dinner (“for it was afternoon”) Knox made his +salutation in this form of words: “I pray God, Madam, that +you may be as much blessed within the Commonwealth of Scotland, +if it be the pleasure of God, as ever Deborah was in the +Commonwealth of Israel.” <a name="citation357"></a><a +href="#footnote357" class="citation">[357]</a> Deborah +again.</p> +<p>But he was not yet done with the echoes of his own +“First Blast.” In 1571, when he was already +near his end, the old controversy was taken up in one of a series +of anonymous libels against the Reformer affixed, Sunday after +Sunday, to the church door. The dilemma was fairly enough +stated. Either his doctrine is false, in which case he is a +“false doctor” and seditious; or, if it be true, why +does he “avow and approve the contrare, I mean that +regiment in the Queen of England’s person; which he avoweth +and approveth, not only praying for the maintenance of her +estate, but also procuring her aid and support against his own +native country?” Knox answered the libel, as his wont +was, next Sunday, from the pulpit. He justified the +“First Blast” with all the old arrogance; there is no +drawing back there. The regiment of women is repugnant to +nature, contumely to God, and a subversion of good order, as +before. When he prays for the maintenance of +Elizabeth’s estate, he is only following the example of +those prophets of God who warned and comforted the wicked kings +of Israel; or of Jeremiah, who bade the Jews pray for the +prosperity of Nebuchadnezzar. As for the Queen’s aid, +there is no harm in that: <i>quia</i> (these are his own words) +<i>quia omnia munda mundis</i>: because to the pure all things +are pure. One thing, in conclusion, he “may not +pretermit” to give the lie in the throat to his accuser, +where he charges him with seeking support against his native +country. “What I have been to my country,” said +the old Reformer, “What I have been to my country, albeit +this unthankful age will not know, yet the ages to come will be +compelled to bear witness to the truth. And thus I cease, +requiring of all men that have anything to oppone against me, +that he may (they may) do it so plainly, as that I may make +myself and all my doings manifest to the world. For to me +it seemeth a thing unreasonable, that, in this my decrepit age, I +shall be compelled to fight against shadows, and howlets that +dare not abide the light.” <a name="citation359"></a><a +href="#footnote359" class="citation">[359]</a></p> +<p>Now, in this, which may be called his <i>Last Blast</i>, there +is as sharp speaking as any in the “First Blast” +itself. He is of the same opinion to the end, you see, +although he has been obliged to cloak and garble that opinion for +political ends. He has been tacking indeed, and he has +indeed been seeking the favour of a queen; but what man ever +sought a queen’s favour with a more virtuous purpose, or +with as little courtly policy? The question of consistency +is delicate, and must be made plain. Knox never changed his +opinion about female rule, but lived to regret that he had +published that opinion. Doubtless he had many thoughts so +far out of the range of public sympathy, that he could only keep +them to himself, and, in his own words, bear patiently with the +errors and imperfections that he could not amend. For +example, I make no doubt myself that, in his own heart, he did +hold the shocking dogma attributed to him by more than one +calumniator; and that, had the time been ripe, had there been +aught to gain by it, instead of all to lose, he would have been +the first to assert that Scotland was elective instead of +hereditary—“elective as in the days of +paganism,” as one Thevet says in holy horror. <a +name="citation360"></a><a href="#footnote360" +class="citation">[360]</a> And yet, because the time was +not ripe, I find no hint of such an idea in his collected +works. Now, the regiment of women was another matter that +he should have kept to himself; right or wrong, his opinion did +not fit the moment; right or wrong, as Aylmer puts it, “the +<i>Blast</i> was blown out of season.” And this it +was that he began to perceive after the accession of Elizabeth; +not that he had been wrong, and that female rule was a good +thing, for he had said from the first that “the felicity of +some women in their empires” could not change the law of +God and the nature of created things; not this, but that the +regiment of women was one of those imperfections of society which +must be borne with because yet they cannot be remedied. The +thing had seemed so obvious to him, in his sense of unspeakable +masculine superiority, and his fine contempt for what is only +sanctioned by antiquity and common consent, he had imagined that, +at the first hint, men would arise and shake off the debasing +tyranny. He found himself wrong, and he showed that he +could be moderate in his own fashion, and understood the spirit +of true compromise. He came round to Calvin’s +position, in fact, but by a different way. And it derogates +nothing from the merit of this wise attitude that it was the +consequence of a change of interest. We are all taught by +interest; and if the interest be not merely selfish, there is no +wiser preceptor under heaven, and perhaps no sterner.</p> +<p>Such is the history of John Knox’s connection with the +controversy about female rule. In itself, this is obviously +an incomplete study; not fully to be understood, without a +knowledge of his private relations with the other sex, and what +he thought of their position in domestic life. This shall +be dealt with in another paper.</p> +<h3>II.—<span class="smcap">Private Life</span>.</h3> +<p><span class="smcap">To</span> those who know Knox by hearsay +only, I believe the matter of this paper will be somewhat +astonishing. For the hard energy of the man in all public +matters has possessed the imagination of the world; he remains +for posterity in certain traditional phrases, browbeating Queen +Mary, or breaking beautiful carved work in abbeys and cathedrals, +that had long smoked themselves out and were no more than sorry +ruins, while he was still quietly teaching children in a country +gentleman’s family. It does not consist with the +common acceptation of his character to fancy him much moved, +except with anger. And yet the language of passion came to +his pen as readily, whether it was a passion of denunciation +against some of the abuses that vexed his righteous spirit, or of +yearning for the society of an absent friend. He was +vehement in affection, as in doctrine. I will not deny that +there may have been, along with his vehemence, something shifty, +and for the moment only; that, like many men, and many Scotchmen, +he saw the world and his own heart, not so much under any very +steady, equable light, as by extreme flashes of passion, true for +the moment, but not true in the long run. There does seem +to me to be something of this traceable in the Reformer’s +utterances: precipitation and repentance, hardy speech and action +somewhat circumspect, a strong tendency to see himself in a +heroic light and to place a ready belief in the disposition of +the moment. Withal he had considerable confidence in +himself, and in the uprightness of his own disciplined emotions, +underlying much sincere aspiration after spiritual +humility. And it is this confidence that makes his +intercourse with women so interesting to a modern. It would +be easy, of course, to make fun of the whole affair, to picture +him strutting vaingloriously among these inferior creatures, or +compare a religious friendship in the sixteenth century with what +was called, I think, a literary friendship in the +eighteenth. But it is more just and profitable to recognise +what there is sterling and human underneath all his theoretical +affectations of superiority. Women, he has said in his +“First Blast,” are, “weak, frail, impatient, +feeble, and foolish;” and yet it does not appear that he +was himself any less dependent than other men upon the sympathy +and affection of these weak, frail, impatient, feeble, and +foolish creatures; it seems even as if he had been rather more +dependent than most.</p> +<p>Of those who are to act influentially on their fellows, we +should expect always something large and public in their way of +life, something more or less urbane and comprehensive in their +sentiment for others. We should not expect to see them +spend their sympathy in idyls, however beautiful. We should +not seek them among those who, if they have but a wife to their +bosom, ask no more of womankind, just as they ask no more of +their own sex, if they can find a friend or two for their +immediate need. They will be quick to feel all the +pleasures of our association—not the great ones alone, but +all. They will know not love only, but all those other ways +in which man and woman mutually make each other happy—by +sympathy, by admiration, by the atmosphere they bear about +them—down to the mere impersonal pleasure of passing happy +faces in the street. For, through all this gradation, the +difference of sex makes itself pleasurably felt. Down to +the most lukewarm courtesies of life, there is a special chivalry +due and a special pleasure received, when the two sexes are +brought ever so lightly into contact. We love our mothers +otherwise than we love our fathers; a sister is not as a brother +to us; and friendship between man and woman, be it never so +unalloyed and innocent, is not the same as friendship between man +and man. Such friendship is not even possible for +all. To conjoin tenderness for a woman that is not far +short of passionate with such disinterestedness and beautiful +gratuity of affection as there is between friends of the same +sex, requires no ordinary disposition in the man. For +either it would presuppose quite womanly delicacy of perception, +and, as it were, a curiosity in shades of differing sentiment; or +it would mean that he had accepted the large, simple divisions of +society: a strong and positive spirit robustly virtuous, who has +chosen a better part coarsely, and holds to it steadfastly, with +all its consequences of pain to himself and others; as one who +should go straight before him on a journey, neither tempted by +wayside flowers nor very scrupulous of small lives under +foot. It was in virtue of this latter disposition that Knox +was capable of those intimacies with women that embellished his +life; and we find him preserved for us in old letters as a man of +many women friends; a man of some expansion toward the other sex; +a man ever ready to comfort weeping women, and to weep along with +them.</p> +<p>Of such scraps and fragments of evidence as to his private +life and more intimate thoughts as have survived to us from all +the perils that environ written paper, an astonishingly large +proportion is in the shape of letters to women of his +familiarity. He was twice married, but that is not greatly +to the purpose; for the Turk, who thinks even more meanly of +women than John Knox, is none the less given to marrying. +What is really significant is quite apart from marriage. +For the man Knox was a true man, and woman, the +<i>ewig-weibliche</i>, was as necessary to him, in spite of all +low theories, as ever she was to Goethe. He came to her in +a certain halo of his own, as the minister of truth, just as +Goethe came to her in a glory of art; he made himself necessary +to troubled hearts and minds exercised in the painful +complications that naturally result from all changes in the +world’s way of thinking; and those whom he had thus helped +became dear to him, and were made the chosen companions of his +leisure if they were at hand, or encouraged and comforted by +letter if they were afar.</p> +<p>It must not be forgotten that Knox had been a presbyter of the +old Church, and that the many women whom we shall see gathering +around him, as he goes through life, had probably been +accustomed, while still in the communion of Rome, to rely much +upon some chosen spiritual director, so that the intimacies of +which I propose to offer some account, while testifying to a good +heart in the Reformer, testify also to a certain survival of the +spirit of the confessional in the Reformed Church, and are not +properly to be judged without this idea. There is no +friendship so noble, but it is the product of the time; and a +world of little finical observances, and little frail proprieties +and fashions of the hour, go to make or to mar, to stint or to +perfect, the union of spirits the most loving and the most +intolerant of such interference. The trick of the country +and the age steps in even between the mother and her child, +counts out their caresses upon niggardly fingers, and says, in +the voice of authority, that this one thing shall be a matter of +confidence between them, and this other thing shall not. +And thus it is that we must take into reckoning whatever tended +to modify the social atmosphere in which Knox and his women +friends met, and loved and trusted each other. To the man +who had been their priest and was now their minister, women would +be able to speak with a confidence quite impossible in these +latter days; the women would be able to speak, and the man to +hear. It was a beaten road just then; and I daresay we +should be no less scandalised at their plain speech than they, if +they could come back to earth, would be offended at our waltzes +and worldly fashions. This, then, was the footing on which +Knox stood with his many women friends. The reader will +see, as he goes on, how much of warmth, of interest, and of that +happy mutual dependence which is the very gist of friendship, he +contrived to ingraft upon this somewhat dry relationship of +penitent and confessor.</p> +<p>It must be understood that we know nothing of his intercourse +with women (as indeed we know little at all about his life) until +he came to Berwick in 1549, when he was already in the +forty-fifth year of his age. At the same time it is just +possible that some of a little group at Edinburgh, with whom he +corresponded during his last absence, may have been friends of an +older standing. Certainly they were, of all his female +correspondents, the least personally favoured. He treats +them throughout in a comprehensive sort of spirit that must at +times have been a little wounding. Thus, he remits one of +them to his former letters, “which I trust be common +betwixt you and the rest of our sisters, for to me ye are all +equal in Christ.” <a name="citation368"></a><a +href="#footnote368" class="citation">[368]</a> Another +letter is a gem in this way. “Albeit” it +begins, “albeit I have no particular matter to write unto +you, beloved sister, yet I could not refrain to write these few +lines to you in declaration of my remembrance of you. True +it is that I have many whom I bear in equal remembrance before +God with you, to whom at present I write nothing, either for that +I esteem them stronger than you, and therefore they need the less +my rude labours, or else because they have not provoked me by +their writing to recompense their remembrance.” <a +name="citation369a"></a><a href="#footnote369a" +class="citation">[369a]</a> His “sisters in +Edinburgh” had evidently to “provoke” his +attention pretty constantly; nearly all his letters are, on the +face of them, answers to questions, and the answers are given +with a certain crudity that I do not find repeated when he writes +to those he really cares for. So when they consult him +about women’s apparel (a subject on which his opinion may +be pretty correctly imagined by the ingenious reader for himself) +he takes occasion to anticipate some of the most offensive matter +of the “First Blast” in a style of real brutality. <a +name="citation369b"></a><a href="#footnote369b" +class="citation">[369b]</a> It is not merely that he tells +them “the garments of women do declare their weakness and +inability to execute the office of man,” though that in +itself is neither very wise nor very opportune in such a +correspondence one would think; but if the reader will take the +trouble to wade through the long, tedious sermon for himself, he +will see proof enough that Knox neither loved, nor very deeply +respected, the women he was then addressing. In very truth, +I believe these Edinburgh sisters simply bored him. He had +a certain interest in them as his children in the Lord; they were +continually “provoking him by their writing;” and, if +they handed his letters about, writing to them was as good a form +of publication as was then open to him in Scotland. There +is one letter, however, in this budget, addressed to the wife of +Clerk-Register Mackgil, which is worthy of some further +mention. The Clerk-Register had not opened his heart, it +would appear, to the preaching of the Gospel, and Mrs. Mackgil +has written, seeking the Reformer’s prayers in his +behalf. “Your husband,” he answers, “is +dear to me for that he is a man indued with some good gifts, but +more dear for that he is your husband. Charity moveth me to +thirst his illumination, both for his comfort and for the trouble +which you sustain by his coldness, which justly may be called +infidelity.” He wishes her, however, not to hope too +much; he can promise that his prayers will be earnest, but not +that they will be effectual; it is possible that this is to be +her “cross” in life; that “her head, appointed +by God for her comfort, should be her enemy.” And if +this be so, well, there is nothing for it; “with patience +she must abide God’s merciful deliverance,” taking +heed only that she does not “obey manifest iniquity for the +pleasure of any mortal man.” <a name="citation371a"></a><a +href="#footnote371a" class="citation">[371a]</a> I conceive +this epistle would have given a very modified sort of pleasure to +the Clerk-Register, had it chanced to fall into his hands. +Compare its tenor—the dry resignation not without a hope of +merciful deliverance therein recommended—with these words +from another letter, written but the year before to two married +women of London: “Call first for grace by Jesus, and +thereafter communicate with your faithful husbands, and then +shall God, I doubt not, conduct your footsteps, and direct your +counsels to His glory.” <a name="citation371b"></a><a +href="#footnote371b" class="citation">[371b]</a> Here the +husbands are put in a very high place; we can recognise here the +same hand that has written for our instruction how the man is set +above the woman, even as God above the angels. But the +point of the distinction is plain. For Clerk-Register +Mackgil was not a faithful husband; displayed, indeed, towards +religion a “coldness which justly might be called +infidelity.” We shall see in more notable instances +how much Knox’s conception of the duty of wives varies +according to the zeal and orthodoxy of the husband.</p> +<p>As I have said, he may possibly have made the acquaintance of +Mrs. Mackgil, Mrs. Guthrie, or some other, or all, of these +Edinburgh friends while he was still Douglas of +Longniddry’s private tutor. But our certain knowledge +begins in 1549. He was then but newly escaped from his +captivity in France, after pulling an oar for nineteen months on +the benches of the galley <i>Nostre Dame</i>; now up the rivers, +holding stealthy intercourse with other Scottish prisoners in the +castle of Rouen; now out in the North Sea, raising his sick head +to catch a glimpse of the far-off steeples of St. Andrews. +And now he was sent down by the English Privy Council as a +preacher to Berwick-upon-Tweed; somewhat shaken in health by all +his hardships, full of pains and agues, and tormented by gravel, +that sorrow of great men; altogether, what with his romantic +story, his weak health, and his great faculty of eloquence, a +very natural object for the sympathy of devout women. At +this happy juncture he fell into the company of a Mrs. Elizabeth +Bowes, wife of Richard Bowes, of Aske, in Yorkshire, to whom she +had borne twelve children. She was a religious +hypochondriac, a very weariful woman, full of doubts and +scruples, and giving no rest on earth either to herself or to +those whom she honoured with her confidence. From the first +time she heard Knox preach she formed a high opinion of him, and +was solicitous ever after of his society. <a +name="citation373a"></a><a href="#footnote373a" +class="citation">[373a]</a> Nor was Knox unresponsive. +“I have always delighted in your company,” he writes, +“and when labours would permit, you know I have not spared +hours to talk and commune with you.” Often when they +had met in depression he reminds her, “God hath sent great +comfort unto both.” <a name="citation373b"></a><a +href="#footnote373b" class="citation">[373b]</a> We can +gather from such letters as are yet extant how close and +continuous was their intercourse. “I think it best +you remain till the morrow,” he writes once, “and so +shall we commune at large at afternoon. This day you know +to be the day of my study and prayer unto God; yet if your +trouble be intolerable, or, if you think my presence may release +your pain, do as the Spirit shall move you. . . . Your messenger +found me in bed, after a sore trouble and most dolorous night, +and so dolour may complain to dolour when we two meet. . . . And +this is more plain than ever I spoke, to let you know you have a +companion in trouble.” <a name="citation373c"></a><a +href="#footnote373c" class="citation">[373c]</a> Once we +have the curtain raised for a moment, and can look at the two +together for the length of a phrase. “After the +writing of this preceding,” writes Knox, “your +brother and mine, Harrie Wycliffe, did advertise me by writing, +that your adversary (the devil) took occasion to trouble you +because that <i>I did start back from you rehearsing your +infirmities</i>. <i>I remember myself so to have done</i>, +<i>and that is my common on consuetude when anything pierceth or +toucheth my heart</i>. <i>Call to your mind what I did +standing at the cupboard at Alnwick</i>. In very deed I +thought that no creature had been tempted as I was; and when I +heard proceed from your mouth the very same words that he +troubles me with, I did wonder and from my heart lament your sore +trouble, knowing in myself the dolour thereof.” <a +name="citation374a"></a><a href="#footnote374a" +class="citation">[374a]</a> Now intercourse of so very +close a description, whether it be religious intercourse or not, +is apt to displease and disquiet a husband; and we know +incidentally from Knox himself that there was some little scandal +about his intimacy with Mrs. Bowes. “The slander and +fear of men,” he writes, “has impeded me to exercise +my pen so oft as I would;<i> yea</i>, <i>very shame hath holden +me from your company</i>, <i>when I was most surely persuaded +that God had appointed me at that time to comfort and feed your +hungry and afflicted soul</i>. <i>God in His infinite +mercy</i>,” he goes on, “<i>remove not only from me +all fear that tendeth not to godliness</i>, <i>but from others +suspicion to judge of me otherwise than it becometh one member to +judge of another</i>.” <a name="citation374b"></a><a +href="#footnote374b" class="citation">[374b]</a> And the +scandal, such as it was, would not be allayed by the dissension +in which Mrs. Bowes seems to have lived with her family upon the +matter of religion, and the countenance shown by Knox to her +resistance. Talking of these conflicts, and her courage +against “her own flesh and most inward affections, yea, +against some of her most natural friends,” he writes it, +“to the praise of God, he has wondered at the bold +constancy which he has found in her when his own heart was +faint.” <a name="citation375a"></a><a href="#footnote375a" +class="citation">[375a]</a></p> +<p>Now, perhaps in order to stop scandalous mouths, perhaps out +of a desire to bind the much-loved evangelist nearer to her in +the only manner possible, Mrs. Bowes conceived the scheme of +marrying him to her fifth daughter, Marjorie; and the Reformer +seems to have fallen in with it readily enough. It seems to +have been believed in the family that the whole matter had been +originally made up between these two, with no very spontaneous +inclination on the part of the bride. <a +name="citation375b"></a><a href="#footnote375b" +class="citation">[375b]</a> Knox’s idea of marriage, +as I have said, was not the same for all men; but on the whole, +it was not lofty. We have a curious letter of his, written +at the request of Queen Mary, to the Earl of Argyle, on very +delicate household matters; which, as he tells us, “was not +well accepted of the said Earl.” <a +name="citation375c"></a><a href="#footnote375c" +class="citation">[375c]</a> We may suppose, however, that +his own home was regulated in a similar spirit. I can fancy +that for such a man, emotional, and with a need, now and again, +to exercise parsimony in emotions not strictly needful, something +a little mechanical, something hard and fast and clearly +understood, would enter into his ideal of a home. There +were storms enough without, and equability was to be desired at +the fireside even at a sacrifice of deeper pleasures. So, +from a wife, of all women, he would not ask much. One +letter to her which has come down to us is, I had almost said, +conspicuous for coldness. <a name="citation376"></a><a +href="#footnote376" class="citation">[376]</a> He calls +her, as he called other female correspondents, “dearly +beloved sister;” the epistle is doctrinal, and nearly the +half of it bears, not upon her own case, but upon that of her +mother. However, we know what Heine wrote in his +wife’s album; and there is, after all, one passage that may +be held to intimate some tenderness, although even that admits of +an amusingly opposite construction. “I think,” +he says, “I <i>think</i> this be the first letter I ever +wrote to you.” This, if we are to take it literally, +may pair off with the “two <i>or three</i> children” +whom Montaigne mentions having lost at nurse; the one is as +eccentric in a lover as the other in a parent. +Nevertheless, he displayed more energy in the course of his +troubled wooing than might have been expected. The whole +Bowes family, angry enough already at the influence he had +obtained over the mother, set their faces obdurately against the +match. And I daresay the opposition quickened his +inclination. I find him writing to Mrs. Bowes that she need +no further trouble herself about the marriage; it should now be +his business altogether; it behoved him now to jeopard his life +“for the comfort of his own flesh, both fear and friendship +of all earthly creature laid aside.” <a +name="citation377"></a><a href="#footnote377" +class="citation">[377]</a> This is a wonderfully chivalrous +utterance for a Reformer forty-eight years old; and it compares +well with the leaden coquetries of Calvin, not much over thirty, +taking this and that into consideration, weighing together +dowries and religious qualifications and the instancy of friends, +and exhibiting what M. Bungener calls “an honourable and +Christian difficulty” of choice, in frigid indecisions and +insincere proposals. But Knox’s next letter is in a +humbler tone; he has not found the negotiation so easy as he +fancied; he despairs of the marriage altogether, and talks of +leaving England,—regards not “what country consumes +his wicked carcass.” “You shall +understand,” he says, “that this sixth of November, I +spoke with Sir Robert Bowes” (the head of the family, his +bride’s uncle) “in the matter you know, according to +your request; whose disdainful, yea, despiteful, words hath so +pierced my heart that my life is bitter to me. I bear a +good countenance with a sore troubled heart, because he that +ought to consider matters with a deep judgment is become not only +a despiser, but also a taunter of God’s +messengers—God be merciful unto him! Amongst others +his most unpleasing words, while that I was about to have +declared my heart in the whole matter, he said, ‘Away with +your rhetorical reasons! for I will not be persuaded with +them.’ God knows I did use no rhetoric nor coloured +speech; but would have spoken the truth, and that in most simple +manner. I am not a good orator in my own cause; but what he +would not be content to hear of me, God shall declare to him one +day to his displeasure, unless he repent.” <a +name="citation378"></a><a href="#footnote378" +class="citation">[378]</a> Poor Knox, you see, is quite +commoved. It has been a very unpleasant interview. +And as it is the only sample that we have of how things went with +him during his courtship, we may infer that the period was not as +agreeable for Knox as it has been for some others.</p> +<p>However, when once they were married, I imagine he and +Marjorie Bowes hit it off together comfortably enough. The +little we know of it may be brought together in a very short +space. She bore him two sons. He seems to have kept +her pretty busy, and depended on her to some degree in his work; +so that when she fell ill, his papers got at once into disorder. +<a name="citation379a"></a><a href="#footnote379a" +class="citation">[379a]</a> Certainly she sometimes wrote +to his dictation; and, in this capacity, he calls her “his +left hand.” <a name="citation379b"></a><a +href="#footnote379b" class="citation">[379b]</a> In June +1559, at the headiest moment of the Reformation in Scotland, he +writes regretting the absence of his helpful colleague, Goodman, +“whose presence” (this is the not very grammatical +form of his lament) “whose presence I more thirst, than she +that is my own flesh.” <a name="citation379c"></a><a +href="#footnote379c" class="citation">[379c]</a> And this, +considering the source and the circumstances, may be held as +evidence of a very tender sentiment. He tells us himself in +his history, on the occasion of a certain meeting at the Kirk of +Field, that “he was in no small heaviness by reason of the +late death of his dear bed-fellow, Marjorie Bowes.” <a +name="citation379d"></a><a href="#footnote379d" +class="citation">[379d]</a> Calvin, condoling with him, +speaks of her as “a wife whose like is not to be found +everywhere” (that is very like Calvin), and again, as +“the most delightful of wives.” We know what +Calvin thought desirable in a wife, “good humour, chastity, +thrift, patience, and solicitude for her husband’s +health,” and so we may suppose that the first Mrs. Knox +fell not far short of this ideal.</p> +<p>The actual date of the marriage is uncertain but by September +1566, at the latest, the Reformer was settled in Geneva with his +wife. There is no fear either that he will be dull; even if +the chaste, thrifty, patient Marjorie should not altogether +occupy his mind, he need not go out of the house to seek more +female sympathy; for behold! Mrs. Bowes is duly +domesticated with the young couple. Dr. M‘Crie +imagined that Richard Bowes was now dead, and his widow, +consequently, free to live where she would; and where could she +go more naturally than to the house of a married daughter? +This, however, is not the case. Richard Bowes did not die +till at least two years later. It is impossible to believe +that he approved of his wife’s desertion, after so many +years of marriage, after twelve children had been born to them; +and accordingly we find in his will, dated 1558, no mention +either of her or of Knox’s wife. <a +name="citation380"></a><a href="#footnote380" +class="citation">[380]</a> This is plain sailing. It +is easy enough to understand the anger of Bowes against this +interloper, who had come into a quiet family, married the +daughter in spite of the father’s opposition, alienated the +wife from the husband and the husband’s religion, supported +her in a long course of resistance and rebellion, and, after +years of intimacy, already too close and tender for any jealous +spirit to behold without resentment, carried her away with him at +last into a foreign land. But it is not quite easy to +understand how, except out of sheer weariness and disgust, he was +ever brought to agree to the arrangement. Nor is it easy to +square the Reformer’s conduct with his public +teaching. We have, for instance, a letter by him, Craig, +and Spottiswood, to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, anent +“a wicked and rebellious woman,” one Anne Good, +spouse to “John Barron, a minister of Christ Jesus his +evangel,” who, “after great rebellion shown unto him, +and divers admonitions given, as well by himself as by others in +his name, that she should in no wise depart from this realm, nor +from his house without his license, hath not the less stubbornly +and rebelliously departed, separated herself from his society, +left his house, and withdrawn herself from this realm.” <a +name="citation381"></a><a href="#footnote381" +class="citation">[381]</a> Perhaps some sort of license was +extorted, as I have said, from Richard Bowes, weary with years of +domestic dissension; but setting that aside, the words employed +with so much righteous indignation by Knox, Craig, and +Spottiswood, to describe the conduct of that wicked and +rebellious woman, Mrs. Barron, would describe nearly as exactly +the conduct of the religious Mrs. Bowes. It is a little +bewildering, until we recollect the distinction between faithful +and unfaithful husbands; for Barron was “a minister of +Christ Jesus his evangel,” while Richard Bowes, besides +being own brother to a despiser and taunter of God’s +messengers, is shrewdly suspected to have been “a bigoted +adherent of the Roman Catholic faith,” or, as Knox himself +would have expressed it, “a rotten Papist.”</p> +<p>You would have thought that Knox was now pretty well supplied +with female society. But we are not yet at the end of the +roll. The last year of his sojourn in England had been +spent principally in London, where he was resident as one of the +chaplains of Edward the Sixth; and here he boasts, although a +stranger, he had, by God’s grace, found favour before many. +<a name="citation382a"></a><a href="#footnote382a" +class="citation">[382a]</a> The godly women of the +metropolis made much of him; once he writes to Mrs. Bowes that +her last letter had found him closeted with three, and he and the +three women were all in tears. <a name="citation382b"></a><a +href="#footnote382b" class="citation">[382b]</a> Out of +all, however, he had chosen two. “<i>God</i>,” he +writes to them, “<i>brought us in such familiar +acquaintance</i>, <i>that your hearts were incensed and kindled +with a special care over me</i>, <i>as a mother useth to be over +her natural child</i>; and my heart was opened and compelled in +your presence to be more plain than ever I was to any.” <a +name="citation382c"></a><a href="#footnote382c" +class="citation">[382c]</a> And out of the two even he had +chosen one, Mrs. Anne Locke, wife to Mr. Harry Locke, merchant, +nigh to Bow Kirk, Cheapside, in London, as the address +runs. If one may venture to judge upon such imperfect +evidence, this was the woman he loved best. I have a +difficulty in quite forming to myself an idea of her +character. She may have been one of the three tearful +visitors before alluded to; she may even have been that one of +them who was so profoundly moved by some passages of Mrs. +Bowes’s letter, which the Reformer opened, and read aloud +to them before they went. “O would to God,” +cried this impressionable matron, “would to God that I +might speak with that person, for I perceive there are more +tempted than I.” <a name="citation383"></a><a +href="#footnote383" class="citation">[383]</a> This may +have been Mrs. Locke, as I say; but even if it were, we must not +conclude from this one fact that she was such another as Mrs. +Bowes. All the evidence tends the other way. She was +a woman of understanding, plainly, who followed political events +with interest, and to whom Knox thought it worth while to write, +in detail, the history of his trials and successes. She was +religious, but without that morbid perversity of spirit that made +religion so heavy a burden for the poor-hearted Mrs. Bowes. +More of her I do not find, save testimony to the profound +affection that united her to the Reformer. So we find him +writing to her from Geneva, in such terms as +these:—“You write that your desire is earnest to see +me. <i>Dear sister</i>, <i>if I should express the thirst +and languor which I have had for your presence</i>, <i>I should +appear to pass measure</i>. . . <i>Yea</i>, <i>I weep and rejoice +in remembrance of you</i>; but that would evanish by the comfort +of your presence, which I assure you is so dear to me, that if +the charge of this little flock here, gathered together in +Christ’s name, did not impede me, my coming should prevent +my letter.” <a name="citation384"></a><a +href="#footnote384" class="citation">[384]</a> I say that +this was written from Geneva; and yet you will observe that it is +no consideration for his wife or mother-in-law, only the charge +of his little flock, that keeps him from setting out forthwith +for London, to comfort himself with the dear presence of Mrs. +Locke. Remember that was a certain plausible enough pretext +for Mrs. Locke to come to Geneva—“the most perfect +school of Christ that ever was on earth since the days of the +Apostles”—for we are now under the reign of that +“horrible monster Jezebel of England,” when a lady of +good orthodox sentiments was better out of London. It was +doubtful, however, whether this was to be. She was detained +in England, partly by circumstances unknown, “partly by +empire of her head,” Mr. Harry Locke, the Cheapside +merchant. It is somewhat humorous to see Knox struggling +for resignation, now that he has to do with a faithful husband +(for Mr. Harry Locke was faithful). Had it been otherwise, +“in my heart,” he says, “I could have +wished—yea,” here he breaks out, “yea, and +cannot cease to wish—that God would guide you to this +place.” <a name="citation385"></a><a href="#footnote385" +class="citation">[385]</a> And after all, he had not long +to wait, for, whether Mr. Harry Locke died in the interval, or +was wearied, he too, into giving permission, five months after +the date of the letter last quoted, “Mrs. Anne Locke, Harry +her son, and Anne her daughter, and Katharine her maid,” +arrived in that perfect school of Christ, the Presbyterian +paradise, Geneva. So now, and for the next two years, the +cup of Knox’s happiness was surely full. Of an +afternoon, when the bells rang out for the sermon, the shops +closed, and the good folk gathered to the churches, psalm-book in +hand, we can imagine him drawing near to the English chapel in +quite patriarchal fashion, with Mrs. Knox and Mrs. Bowes and Mrs. +Locke, James his servant, Patrick his pupil, and a due following +of children and maids. He might be alone at work all +morning in his study, for he wrote much during these two years; +but at night, you may be sure there was a circle of admiring +women, eager to hear the new paragraph, and not sparing of +applause. And what work, among others, was he elaborating +at this time, but the notorious “First Blast”? +So that he may have rolled out in his big pulpit voice, how women +were weak, frail, impatient, feeble, foolish, inconstant, +variable, cruel, and lacking the spirit of counsel, and how men +were above them, even as God is above the angels, in the ears of +his own wife, and the two dearest friends he had on earth. +But he had lost the sense of incongruity, and continued to +despise in theory the sex he honoured so much in practice, of +whom he chose his most intimate associates, and whose courage he +was compelled to wonder at, when his own heart was faint.</p> +<p>We may say that such a man was not worthy of his fortune; and +so, as he would not learn, he was taken away from that agreeable +school, and his fellowship of women was broken up, not to be +reunited. Called into Scotland to take at last that strange +position in history which is his best claim to commemoration, he +was followed thither by his wife and his mother-in-law. The +wife soon died. The death of her daughter did not +altogether separate Mrs. Bowes from Knox, but she seems to have +come and gone between his house and England. In 1562, +however, we find him characterised as “a sole man by reason +of the absence of his mother-in-law, Mrs. Bowes,” and a +passport is got for her, her man, a maid, and “three +horses, whereof two shall return,” as well as liberty to +take all her own money with her into Scotland. This looks +like a definite arrangement; but whether she died at Edinburgh, +or went back to England yet again, I cannot find.</p> +<p>With that great family of hers, unless in leaving her husband +she had quarrelled with them all, there must have been frequent +occasion for her presence, one would think. Knox at least +survived her; and we possess his epigraph to their long intimacy, +given to the world by him in an appendix to his latest +publication. I have said in a former paper that Knox was +not shy of personal revelations in his published works. And +the trick seems to have grown on him. To this last tract, a +controversial onslaught on a Scottish Jesuit, he prefixed a +prayer, not very pertinent to the matter in hand, and containing +references to his family which were the occasion of some wit in +his adversary’s answer; and appended what seems equally +irrelevant, one of his devout letters to Mrs. Bowes, with an +explanatory preface. To say truth, I believe he had always +felt uneasily that the circumstances of this intimacy were very +capable of misconstruction; and now, when he was an old man, +taking “his good night of all the faithful in both +realms,” and only desirous “that without any notable +sclander to the evangel of Jesus Christ, he might end his battle; +for as the world was weary of him, so was he of +it;”—in such a spirit it was not, perhaps, unnatural +that he should return to this old story, and seek to put it right +in the eyes of all men, ere he died. “Because that +God,” he says, “because that God now in His mercy +hath put an end to the battle of my dear mother, Mistress +Elizabeth Bowes, before that He put an end to my wretched life, I +could not cease but declare to the world what was the cause of +our great familiarity and long acquaintance; which was neither +flesh nor blood, but a troubled conscience upon her part, which +never suffered her to rest but when she was in the company of the +faithful, of whom (from the first hearing of the word at my +mouth) she judged me to be one. . . . Her company to me was +comfortable (yea, honourable and profitable, for she was to me +and mine a mother), but yet it was not without some cross; for +besides trouble and fashery of body sustained for her, my mind +was seldom quiet, for doing somewhat for the comfort of her +troubled conscience.” <a name="citation388"></a><a +href="#footnote388" class="citation">[388]</a> He had +written to her years before, from his first exile in Dieppe, that +“only God’s hand” could withhold him from once +more speaking with her face to face; and now, when God’s +hand has indeed interposed, when there lies between them, instead +of the voyageable straits, that great gulf over which no man can +pass, this is the spirit in which he can look back upon their +long acquaintance. She was a religious hypochondriac, it +appears, whom, not without some cross and fashery of mind and +body, he was good enough to tend. He might have given a +truer character of their friendship, had he thought less of his +own standing in public estimation, and more of the dead +woman. But he was in all things, as Burke said of his son +in that ever memorable passage, a public creature. He +wished that even into this private place of his affections +posterity should follow him with a complete approval; and he was +willing, in order that this might be so, to exhibit the defects +of his lost friend, and tell the world what weariness he had +sustained through her unhappy disposition. There is +something here that reminds one of Rousseau.</p> +<p>I do not think he ever saw Mrs. Locke after he left Geneva; +but his correspondence with her continued for three years. +It may have continued longer, of course, but I think the last +letters we possess read like the last that would be +written. Perhaps Mrs. Locke was then remarried, for there +is much obscurity over her subsequent history. For as long +as their intimacy was kept up, at least, the human element +remains in the Reformer’s life. Here is one passage, +for example, the most likable utterance of Knox’s that I +can quote:—Mrs. Locke has been upbraiding him as a bad +correspondent. “My remembrance of you,” he +answers, “is not so dead, but I trust it shall be fresh +enough, albeit it be renewed by no outward token for one +year. <i>Of nature</i>, <i>I am churlish</i>; <i>yet one +thing I ashame not to affirm</i>, <i>that familiarity once +thoroughly contracted was never yet broken on my +default</i>. <i>The cause may be that I have rather need of +all</i>, <i>than that any have need of me</i>. However it +(<i>that</i>) be, it cannot be, as I say, the corporal absence of +one year or two that can quench in my heart that familiar +acquaintance in Christ Jesus, which half a year did engender, and +almost two years did nourish and confirm. And therefore, +whether I write or no, be assuredly persuaded that I have you in +such memory as becometh the faithful to have of the +faithful.” <a name="citation390"></a><a href="#footnote390" +class="citation">[390]</a> This is the truest touch of +personal humility that I can remember to have seen in all the +five volumes of the Reformer’s collected works: it is no +small honour to Mrs. Locke that his affection for her should have +brought home to him this unwonted feeling of dependence upon +others. Everything else in the course of the correspondence +testifies to a good, sound, down-right sort of friendship between +the two, less ecstatic than it was at first, perhaps, but +serviceable and very equal. He gives her ample details as +to the progress of the work of reformation; sends her the sheets +of the <i>Confession of Faith</i>, “in quairs,” as he +calls it; asks her to assist him with her prayers, to collect +money for the good cause in Scotland, and to send him books for +himself—books by Calvin especially, one on Isaiah, and a +new revised edition of the “Institutes.” +“I must be bold on your liberality,” he writes, +“not only in that, but in greater things as I shall +need.” <a name="citation391a"></a><a href="#footnote391a" +class="citation">[391a]</a> On her part she applies to him +for spiritual advice, not after the manner of the drooping Mrs. +Bowes, but in a more positive spirit,—advice as to +practical points, advice as to the Church of England, for +instance, whose ritual he condemns as a +“mingle-mangle.” <a name="citation391b"></a><a +href="#footnote391b" class="citation">[391b]</a> Just at +the end she ceases to write, sends him “a token, without +writing.” “I understand your impediment,” +he answers, “and therefore I cannot complain. Yet if +you understood the variety of my temptations, I doubt not but you +would have written somewhat.” <a name="citation391c"></a><a +href="#footnote391c" class="citation">[391c]</a> One letter +more, and then silence.</p> +<p>And I think the best of the Reformer died out with that +correspondence. It is after this, of course, that he wrote +that ungenerous description of his intercourse with Mrs. +Bowes. It is after this, also, that we come to the unlovely +episode of his second marriage. He had been left a widower +at the age of fifty-five. Three years after, it occurred +apparently to yet another pious parent to sacrifice a child upon +the altar of his respect for the Reformer. In January 1563, +Randolph writes to Cecil: “Your Honour will take it for a +great wonder when I shall write unto you that Mr. Knox shall +marry a very near kinswoman of the Duke’s, a Lord’s +daughter, a young lass not above sixteen years of age.” <a +name="citation392"></a><a href="#footnote392" +class="citation">[392]</a> He adds that he fears he will be +laughed at for reporting so mad a story. And yet it was +true; and on Palm Sunday, 1564, Margaret Stewart, daughter of +Andrew Lord Stewart of Ochiltree, aged seventeen, was duly united +to John Knox, Minister of St. Giles’s Kirk, Edinburgh, aged +fifty-nine,—to the great disgust of Queen Mary from family +pride, and I would fain hope of many others for more humane +considerations. “In this,” as Randolph says, +“I wish he had done otherwise.” The Consistory +of Geneva, “that most perfect school of Christ that ever +was on earth since the days of the Apostles,” were wont to +forbid marriages on the ground of too great a disproportion in +age. I cannot help wondering whether the old +Reformer’s conscience did not uneasily remind him, now and +again, of this good custom of his religious metropolis, as he +thought of the two-and-forty years that separated him from his +poor bride. Fitly enough, we hear nothing of the second +Mrs. Knox until she appears at her husband’s deathbed, +eight years after. She bore him three daughters in the +interval; and I suppose the poor child’s martyrdom was made +as easy for her as might be. She was “extremely +attentive to him” at the end, we read and he seems to have +spoken to her with some confidence. Moreover, and this is +very characteristic, he had copied out for her use a little +volume of his own devotional letters to other women.</p> +<p>This is the end of the roll, unless we add to it Mrs. Adamson, +who had delighted much in his company “by reason that she +had a troubled conscience,” and whose deathbed is +commemorated at some length in the pages of his history. <a +name="citation393"></a><a href="#footnote393" +class="citation">[393]</a></p> +<p>And now, looking back, it cannot be said that Knox’s +intercourse with women was quite of the highest sort. It is +characteristic that we find him more alarmed for his own +reputation than for the reputation of the women with whom he was +familiar. There was a fatal preponderance of self in all +his intimacies: many women came to learn from him, but he never +condescended to become a learner in his turn. And so there +is not anything idyllic in these intimacies of his; and they were +never so renovating to his spirit as they might have been. +But I believe they were good enough for the women. I fancy +the women knew what they were about when so many of them followed +after Knox. It is not simply because a man is always fully +persuaded that he knows the right from the wrong and sees his way +plainly through the maze of life, great qualities as these are, +that people will love and follow him, and write him letters full +of their “earnest desire for him” when he is +absent. It is not over a man, whose one characteristic is +grim fixity of purpose, that the hearts of women are +“incensed and kindled with a special care,” as it +were over their natural children. In the strong quiet +patience of all his letters to the weariful Mrs. Bowes, we may +perhaps see one cause of the fascination he possessed for these +religious women. Here was one whom you could besiege all +the year round with inconsistent scruples and complaints; you +might write to him on Thursday that you were so elated it was +plain the devil was deceiving you, and again on Friday that you +were so depressed it was plain God had cast you off for ever; and +he would read all this patiently and sympathetically, and give +you an answer in the most reassuring polysyllables, and all +divided into heads—who knows?—like a treatise on +divinity. And then, those easy tears of his. There +are some women who like to see men crying; and here was this +great-voiced, bearded man of God, who might be seen beating the +solid pulpit every Sunday, and casting abroad his clamorous +denunciations to the terror of all, and who on the Monday would +sit in their parlours by the hour, and weep with them over their +manifold trials and temptations. Nowadays, he would have to +drink a dish of tea with all these penitents. . . . It sounds a +little vulgar, as the past will do, if we look into it too +closely. We could not let these great folk of old into our +drawing-rooms. Queen Elizabeth would positively not be +eligible for a housemaid. The old manners and the old +customs go sinking from grade to grade, until, if some mighty +emperor revisited the glimpses of the moon, he would not find any +one of his way of thinking, any one he could strike hands with +and talk to freely and without offence, save perhaps the porter +at the end of the street, or the fellow with his elbows out who +loafs all day before the public-house. So that this little +note of vulgarity is not a thing to be dwelt upon; it is to be +put away from us, as we recall the fashion of these old +intimacies; so that we may only remember Knox as one who was very +long-suffering with women, kind to them in his own way, loving +them in his own way—and that not the worst way, if it was +not the best—and once at least, if not twice, moved to his +heart of hearts by a woman, and giving expression to the yearning +he had for her society in words that none of us need be ashamed +to borrow.</p> +<p>And let us bear in mind always that the period I have gone +over in this essay begins when the Reformer was already beyond +the middle age, and already broken in bodily health: it has been +the story of an old man’s friendships. This it is +that makes Knox enviable. Unknown until past forty, he had +then before him five-and-thirty years of splendid and influential +life, passed through uncommon hardships to an uncommon degree of +power, lived in his own country as a sort of king, and did what +he would with the sound of his voice out of the pulpit. And +besides all this, such a following of faithful women! One +would take the first forty years gladly, if one could be sure of +the last thirty. Most of us, even if, by reason of great +strength and the dignity of gray hairs, we retain some degree of +public respect in the latter days of our existence, will find a +falling away of friends, and a solitude making itself round about +us day by day, until we are left alone with the hired +sick-nurse. For the attraction of a man’s character +is apt to be outlived, like the attraction of his body; and the +power to love grows feeble in its turn, as well as the power to +inspire love in others. It is only with a few rare natures +that friendship is added to friendship, love to love, and the man +keeps growing richer in affection—richer, I mean, as a bank +may be said to grow richer, both giving and receiving +more—after his head is white and his back weary, and he +prepares to go down into the dust of death.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">THE +END.</span></p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Printed by</i> R. & R. <span +class="smcap">Clark</span>, <span class="smcap">Limited</span>, +<i>Edinburgh</i>.</p> +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<h2>FOOTNOTES</h2> +<p><a name="footnote0"></a><a href="#citation0" +class="footnote">[0]</a> <i>Gaudeamus</i>: <i>Carmina +vagorum selecta</i>. Leipsic. Trübner. +1879.</p> +<p><a name="footnote27"></a><a href="#citation27" +class="footnote">[27]</a> Prefatory letter to <i>Peveril of +the Peak</i>.</p> +<p><a name="footnote71"></a><a href="#citation71" +class="footnote">[71]</a> For the love affairs see, in +particular, Mr. Scott Douglas’s edition under the different +dates.</p> +<p><a name="footnote179"></a><a href="#citation179" +class="footnote">[179]</a> Yoshida, when on his way to +Nangasaki, met the soldier and talked with him by the roadside; +they then parted, but the soldier was so much struck by the words +he heard, that on Yoshida’s return he sought him out and +declared his intention of devoting his life to the good +cause. I venture, in the absence of the writer, to insert +this correction, having been present when the story was told by +Mr. Masaki.—F. J. And I, there being none to settle +the difference, must reproduce both versions.—R. L. S.</p> +<p><a name="footnote185"></a><a href="#citation185" +class="footnote">[185]</a> I understood that the merchant +was endeavouring surreptitiously to obtain for his son +instruction to which he was not entitled.—F. J.</p> +<p><a name="footnote192"></a><a href="#citation192" +class="footnote">[192]</a> <i>Etude Biographique sur +François Villon</i>. Paris: H. Menu.</p> +<p><a name="footnote195"></a><a href="#citation195" +class="footnote">[195]</a> <i>Bougeois de Paris</i>, +ed. Panthéon, pp. 688, 689.</p> +<p><a name="footnote196"></a><a href="#citation196" +class="footnote">[196]</a> <i>Bourgeois</i>, pp. 627, 636, +and 725.</p> +<p><a name="footnote204"></a><a href="#citation204" +class="footnote">[204]</a> <i>Chronìque +Scandaleuse</i>, ed. Panthéon, p. 237.</p> +<p><a name="footnote210"></a><a href="#citation210" +class="footnote">[210]</a> Monstrelet: <i>Panthéon +Littéraire</i>, p. 26.</p> +<p><a name="footnote220a"></a><a href="#citation220a" +class="footnote">[220a]</a> <i>Chron. Scand.</i> ut +supra.</p> +<p><a name="footnote220b"></a><a href="#citation220b" +class="footnote">[220b]</a> Here and there, principally in +the order of events, this article differs from M. Longnon’s +own reading of his material. The ground on which he defers +the execution of Montigny and De Cayeux beyond the date of their +trials seems insufficient. There is a law of parsimony for +the construction of historical documents; simplicity is the first +duty of narration; and hanged they were.</p> +<p><a name="footnote224"></a><a href="#citation224" +class="footnote">[224]</a> <i>Chron. Scand.</i>, p. +338.</p> +<p><a name="footnote238"></a><a href="#citation238" +class="footnote">[238]</a> Champollion-Figeac’s +<i>Louis et Charles d’Orléans</i>, p. 348.</p> +<p><a name="footnote240a"></a><a href="#citation240a" +class="footnote">[240a]</a> +D’Héricault’s admirable <i>Memoir</i>, +prefixed to his edition of Charles’s works, vol. i. p. +xi.</p> +<p><a name="footnote240b"></a><a href="#citation240b" +class="footnote">[240b]</a> Vallet de Viriville, <i>Charles +VII. et son Epoque</i>, ii. 428, note 2.</p> +<p><a name="footnote241a"></a><a href="#citation241a" +class="footnote">[241a]</a> See Lecoy de la Marche, <i>Le +Roi René</i>, i. 167.</p> +<p><a name="footnote241b"></a><a href="#citation241b" +class="footnote">[241b]</a> Vallet, <i>Charles VII</i>, ii. +85, 86, note 2.</p> +<p><a name="footnote241c"></a><a href="#citation241c" +class="footnote">[241c]</a> Champollion-Figeac, +193–198.</p> +<p><a name="footnote242a"></a><a href="#citation242a" +class="footnote">[242a]</a> Champollion-Figeac, 209.</p> +<p><a name="footnote242b"></a><a href="#citation242b" +class="footnote">[242b]</a> The student will see that there +are facts cited, and expressions borrowed, in this paragraph, +from a period extending over almost the whole of Charles’s +life, instead of being confined entirely to his boyhood. As +I do not believe there was any change, so I do not believe there +is any anachronism involved.</p> +<p><a name="footnote243"></a><a href="#citation243" +class="footnote">[243]</a> <i>The Debate between the +Heralds of France and England</i>, translated and admirably +edited by Mr. Henry Pyne. For the attribution of this tract +to Charles, the reader is referred to Mr. Pyne’s conclusive +argument.</p> +<p><a name="footnote244"></a><a href="#citation244" +class="footnote">[244]</a> Des Ursins.</p> +<p><a name="footnote248"></a><a href="#citation248" +class="footnote">[248]</a> Michelet, iv. App. +179, p. 337.</p> +<p><a name="footnote249"></a><a href="#citation249" +class="footnote">[249]</a> Champollion-Figeac, pp. +279–82.</p> +<p><a name="footnote250"></a><a href="#citation250" +class="footnote">[250]</a> Michelet, iv. pp. +123–4.</p> +<p><a name="footnote253"></a><a href="#citation253" +class="footnote">[253]</a> <i>Debate between the +Heralds</i>.</p> +<p><a name="footnote254"></a><a href="#citation254" +class="footnote">[254]</a> Sir H. Nicholas, +<i>Agincourt</i>.</p> +<p><a name="footnote257a"></a><a href="#citation257a" +class="footnote">[257a]</a> <i>Debate between the +Heralds</i>.</p> +<p><a name="footnote257b"></a><a href="#citation257b" +class="footnote">[257b]</a> Works (ed. +d’Héricault), i. 43.</p> +<p><a name="footnote257c"></a><a href="#citation257c" +class="footnote">[257c]</a> <i>Ibid.</i> 143.</p> +<p><a name="footnote258a"></a><a href="#citation258a" +class="footnote">[258a]</a> Works (ed. +d’Héricault), i. 190.</p> +<p><a name="footnote258b"></a><a href="#citation258b" +class="footnote">[258b]</a> <i>Ibid.</i> 144.</p> +<p><a name="footnote258c"></a><a href="#citation258c" +class="footnote">[258c]</a> <i>Ibid.</i> 158.</p> +<p><a name="footnote259a"></a><a href="#citation259a" +class="footnote">[259a]</a> M. Champollion-Figeac gives +many in his editions of Charles’s works, most (as I should +think) of very doubtful authenticity, or worse.</p> +<p><a name="footnote259b"></a><a href="#citation259b" +class="footnote">[259b]</a> Rymer, x. 564. +D’Héricault’s <i>Memoir</i>, p. xli. +Gairdner’s <i>Paston Letters</i>, i. 27, 99.</p> +<p><a name="footnote260"></a><a href="#citation260" +class="footnote">[260]</a> Champollion-Figeac, 377.</p> +<p><a name="footnote262a"></a><a href="#citation262a" +class="footnote">[262a]</a> Dom Plancher, iv. +178–9.</p> +<p><a name="footnote262b"></a><a href="#citation262b" +class="footnote">[262b]</a> Works, i. 157–63.</p> +<p><a name="footnote265a"></a><a href="#citation265a" +class="footnote">[265a]</a> Vallet’s <i>Charles +VII.</i>, i. 251.</p> +<p><a name="footnote265b"></a><a href="#citation265b" +class="footnote">[265b]</a> <i>Procès de Jeanne +d’Arc</i>, i. 133–55.</p> +<p><a name="footnote267a"></a><a href="#citation267a" +class="footnote">[267a]</a> Monstrelet.</p> +<p><a name="footnote267b"></a><a href="#citation267b" +class="footnote">[267b]</a> Vallet’s <i>Charles +VII.</i>, iii. chap. i. But see the chronicle that +bears Jaquet’s name: a lean and dreary book.</p> +<p><a name="footnote268"></a><a href="#citation268" +class="footnote">[268]</a> Monstrelet.</p> +<p><a name="footnote269"></a><a href="#citation269" +class="footnote">[269]</a> D’Héricault’s +<i>Memoir</i>, xl. xli. Vallet, <i>Charles VI.</i>, ii. +435.</p> +<p><a name="footnote271a"></a><a href="#citation271a" +class="footnote">[271a]</a> Champollion-Figeac, 368.</p> +<p><a name="footnote271b"></a><a href="#citation271b" +class="footnote">[271b]</a> Works, i. 115.</p> +<p><a name="footnote271c"></a><a href="#citation271c" +class="footnote">[271c]</a> +D’Héricault’s <i>Memoir</i>, xlv.</p> +<p><a name="footnote272"></a><a href="#citation272" +class="footnote">[272]</a> ChampoIlion-Figeac, 381, 361, +381.</p> +<p><a name="footnote273"></a><a href="#citation273" +class="footnote">[273]</a> Champollion-Figeac, 359,361.</p> +<p><a name="footnote276a"></a><a href="#citation276a" +class="footnote">[276a]</a> Lecoy de la Marche, <i>Roi +René</i>, ii. 155, 177.</p> +<p><a name="footnote276b"></a><a href="#citation276b" +class="footnote">[276b]</a> Champollion-Figeac, chaps. v. +and vi.</p> +<p><a name="footnote276c"></a><a href="#citation276c" +class="footnote">[276c]</a> <i>Ibid.</i> 364; Works, i. +172.</p> +<p><a name="footnote276d"></a><a href="#citation276d" +class="footnote">[276d]</a> Champollion-Figeac, 364: +“Jeter de l’argent aux petis enfans qui estoient au +long de Bourbon, pour les faire nonner en l’eau et aller +querre l’argent au fond.”</p> +<p><a name="footnote277a"></a><a href="#citation277a" +class="footnote">[277a]</a> Champollion-Figeac, 387.</p> +<p><a name="footnote277b"></a><a href="#citation277b" +class="footnote">[277b]</a> <i>Nouvelle Biographie +Didot</i>, art. “Marie de Clèves.” +Vallet, <i>Charles VII</i>, iii. 85, note 1.</p> +<p><a name="footnote277c"></a><a href="#citation277c" +class="footnote">[277c]</a> Champollion-Figeac, 383, +384–386.</p> +<p><a name="footnote278"></a><a href="#citation278" +class="footnote">[278]</a> Works, ii. 57, 258.</p> +<p><a name="footnote329"></a><a href="#citation329" +class="footnote">[329]</a> Gaberel’s <i>Eglist de +Genève</i>, i. 88.</p> +<p><a name="footnote330a"></a><a href="#citation330a" +class="footnote">[330a]</a> <i>La Démocratie chez +les Prédicateurs de la Ligue</i>.</p> +<p><a name="footnote330b"></a><a href="#citation330b" +class="footnote">[330b]</a> <i>Historia affectuum se +immiscentium controversiæ de gynæcocratia</i>. +It is in his collected prefaces, Leipsic, 1683.</p> +<p><a name="footnote333a"></a><a href="#citation333a" +class="footnote">[333a]</a> <i>Œuvres de +d’Aubigné</i>, i. 449.</p> +<p><a name="footnote333b"></a><a href="#citation333b" +class="footnote">[333b]</a> <i>Dames Illustres</i>, pp. +358–360.</p> +<p><a name="footnote334"></a><a href="#citation334" +class="footnote">[334]</a> Works of John Knox, iv. 349.</p> +<p><a name="footnote341"></a><a href="#citation341" +class="footnote">[341]</a> M‘Crie’s <i>Life of +Knox</i>, ii. 41.</p> +<p><a name="footnote342"></a><a href="#citation342" +class="footnote">[342]</a> Described by Calvin in a letter +to Cecil, Knox’s Works, vol. iv.</p> +<p><a name="footnote344"></a><a href="#citation344" +class="footnote">[344]</a> It was anonymously published, +but no one seems to have been in doubt about its authorship; he +might as well have set his name to it, for all the good he got by +holding it back.</p> +<p><a name="footnote345a"></a><a href="#citation345a" +class="footnote">[345a]</a> Knox’s Works, iv. +358.</p> +<p><a name="footnote345b"></a><a href="#citation345b" +class="footnote">[345b]</a> Strype’s <i>Aylmer</i>, +p. 16.</p> +<p><a name="footnote346a"></a><a href="#citation346a" +class="footnote">[346a]</a> It may interest the reader to +know that these (so says Thomasius) are the “ipsissima +verba Schlusselburgii.”</p> +<p><a name="footnote346b"></a><a href="#citation346b" +class="footnote">[346b]</a> I am indebted for a sight of +this book to the kindness of Mr. David Laing, the editor of +Knox’s Works.</p> +<p><a name="footnote348"></a><a href="#citation348" +class="footnote">[348]</a> <i>Social Statics</i>, p. 64, +etc.</p> +<p><a name="footnote349"></a><a href="#citation349" +class="footnote">[349]</a> Hallam’s <i>Const. Hist. +of England</i>, i. 225, note m.</p> +<p><a name="footnote352a"></a><a href="#citation352a" +class="footnote">[352a]</a> Knox to Mrs. Locke, 6th April +1559. Works, vi. 14.</p> +<p><a name="footnote352b"></a><a href="#citation352b" +class="footnote">[352b]</a> Knox to Sir William Cecil, 10th +April 1559. Works, ii. 16, or vi. 15.</p> +<p><a name="footnote354"></a><a href="#citation354" +class="footnote">[354]</a> Knox to Queen Elizabeth, July. +20th, 1559. Works, vi. 47, or ii. 26.</p> +<p><a name="footnote355"></a><a href="#citation355" +class="footnote">[355]</a> Knox to Queen Elizabeth, August +6th, 1561. Works, vi. 126.</p> +<p><a name="footnote357"></a><a href="#citation357" +class="footnote">[357]</a> Knox’s Works, ii. +278–280.</p> +<p><a name="footnote359"></a><a href="#citation359" +class="footnote">[359]</a> Calderwood’s <i>History of +the Kirk of Scotland</i>, edition of the Wodrow Society, iii. +51–54.</p> +<p><a name="footnote360"></a><a href="#citation360" +class="footnote">[360]</a> <i>Bayle’s Historical +Dictionary</i>, art. Knox, remark G.</p> +<p><a name="footnote368"></a><a href="#citation368" +class="footnote">[368]</a> Works, iv. 244.</p> +<p><a name="footnote369a"></a><a href="#citation369a" +class="footnote">[369a]</a> Works, iv. 246.</p> +<p><a name="footnote369b"></a><a href="#citation369b" +class="footnote">[369b]</a> <i>Ib.</i> iv. 225.</p> +<p><a name="footnote371a"></a><a href="#citation371a" +class="footnote">[371a]</a> Works, iv. 245.</p> +<p><a name="footnote371b"></a><a href="#citation371b" +class="footnote">[371b]</a> <i>Ib.</i> iv. 221.</p> +<p><a name="footnote373a"></a><a href="#citation373a" +class="footnote">[373a]</a> Works, vi. 514.</p> +<p><a name="footnote373b"></a><a href="#citation373b" +class="footnote">[373b]</a> <i>Ib.</i> iii. 338.</p> +<p><a name="footnote373c"></a><a href="#citation373c" +class="footnote">[373c]</a> <i>Ib.</i> iii. 352, 353.</p> +<p><a name="footnote374a"></a><a href="#citation374a" +class="footnote">[374a]</a> Works, iii. 350.</p> +<p><a name="footnote374b"></a><a href="#citation374b" +class="footnote">[374b]</a> <i>Ib.</i> iii. 390, 391.</p> +<p><a name="footnote375a"></a><a href="#citation375a" +class="footnote">[375a]</a> Works, iii. 142.</p> +<p><a name="footnote375b"></a><a href="#citation375b" +class="footnote">[375b]</a> <i>Ib.</i> iii. 378.</p> +<p><a name="footnote375c"></a><a href="#citation375c" +class="footnote">[375c]</a> <i>Ib.</i> ii. 379.</p> +<p><a name="footnote376"></a><a href="#citation376" +class="footnote">[376]</a> Works, iii. 394.</p> +<p><a name="footnote377"></a><a href="#citation377" +class="footnote">[377]</a> Works, iii. 376.</p> +<p><a name="footnote378"></a><a href="#citation378" +class="footnote">[378]</a> Works, iii. 378.</p> +<p><a name="footnote379a"></a><a href="#citation379a" +class="footnote">[379a]</a> Works, vi. 104.</p> +<p><a name="footnote379b"></a><a href="#citation379b" +class="footnote">[379b]</a> <i>Ib.</i> v. 5.</p> +<p><a name="footnote379c"></a><a href="#citation379c" +class="footnote">[379c]</a> <i>Ib.</i> vi. 27.</p> +<p><a name="footnote379d"></a><a href="#citation379d" +class="footnote">[379d]</a> <i>Ib.</i> ii. 138.</p> +<p><a name="footnote380"></a><a href="#citation380" +class="footnote">[380]</a> Mr. Laing’s preface to the +sixth volume of Knox’s Works, p. lxii.</p> +<p><a name="footnote381"></a><a href="#citation381" +class="footnote">[381]</a> Works. vi. 534.</p> +<p><a name="footnote382a"></a><a href="#citation382a" +class="footnote">[382a]</a> Works, iv. 220.</p> +<p><a name="footnote382b"></a><a href="#citation382b" +class="footnote">[382b]</a> <i>Ib.</i> iii. 380.</p> +<p><a name="footnote382c"></a><a href="#citation382c" +class="footnote">[382c]</a> <i>Ib.</i> iv. 220.</p> +<p><a name="footnote383"></a><a href="#citation383" +class="footnote">[383]</a> Works, iii. 380.</p> +<p><a name="footnote384"></a><a href="#citation384" +class="footnote">[384]</a> Works, iv. 238.</p> +<p><a name="footnote385"></a><a href="#citation385" +class="footnote">[385]</a> Works, iv. 240.</p> +<p><a name="footnote388"></a><a href="#citation388" +class="footnote">[388]</a> Works, vi. 513, 514.</p> +<p><a name="footnote390"></a><a href="#citation390" +class="footnote">[390]</a> Works, vi. ii.</p> +<p><a name="footnote391a"></a><a href="#citation391a" +class="footnote">[391a]</a> Works, vi. pp. 21. 101, 108, +130.</p> +<p><a name="footnote391b"></a><a href="#citation391b" +class="footnote">[391b]</a> <i>Ib.</i> vi. 83.</p> +<p><a name="footnote391c"></a><a href="#citation391c" +class="footnote">[391c]</a> <i>Ib.</i> vi. 129.</p> +<p><a name="footnote392"></a><a href="#citation392" +class="footnote">[392]</a> Works, vi. 532.</p> +<p><a name="footnote393"></a><a href="#citation393" +class="footnote">[393]</a> Works, i. 246.</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMILIAR STUDIES OF MEN AND BOOKS***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 425-h.htm or 425-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/4/2/425 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions 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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One +appeared in the NEW QUARTERLY, one in MACMILLAN'S, and the +rest in the CORNHILL MAGAZINE. To the CORNHILL I owe a +double debt of thanks; first, that I was received there in +the very best society, and under the eye of the very best of +editors; and second, that the proprietors have allowed me to +republish so considerable an amount of copy. + +These nine worthies have been brought together from many +different ages and countries. Not the most erudite of men +could be perfectly prepared to deal with so many and such +various sides of human life and manners. To pass a true +judgment upon Knox and Burns implies a grasp upon the very +deepest strain of thought in Scotland, - a country far more +essentially different from England than many parts of +America; for, in a sense, the first of these men re-created +Scotland, and the second is its most essentially national +production. To treat fitly of Hugo and Villon would involve +yet wider knowledge, not only of a country foreign to the +author by race, history, and religion, but of the growth and +liberties of art. Of the two Americans, Whitman and Thoreau, +each is the type of something not so much realised as widely +sought after among the late generations of their countrymen; +and to see them clearly in a nice relation to the society +that brought them forth, an author would require a large +habit of life among modern Americans. As for Yoshida, I have +already disclaimed responsibility; it was but my hand that +held the pen. + +In truth, these are but the readings of a literary vagrant. +One book led to another, one study to another. The first was +published with trepidation. Since no bones were broken, the +second was launched with greater confidence. So, by +insensible degrees, a young man of our generation acquires, +in his own eyes, a kind of roving judicial commission through +the ages; and, having once escaped the perils of the Freemans +and the Furnivalls, sets himself up to right the wrongs of +universal history and criticism. Now, it is one thing to +write with enjoyment on a subject while the story is hot in +your mind from recent reading, coloured with recent +prejudice; and it is quite another business to put these +writings coldly forth again in a bound volume. We are most +of us attached to our opinions; that is one of the "natural +affections" of which we hear so much in youth; but few of us +are altogether free from paralysing doubts and scruples. For +my part, I have a small idea of the degree of accuracy +possible to man, and I feel sure these studies teem with +error. One and all were written with genuine interest in the +subject; many, however, have been conceived and finished with +imperfect knowledge; and all have lain, from beginning to +end, under the disadvantages inherent in this style of +writing. + +Of these disadvantages a word must here be said. The writer +of short studies, having to condense in a few pages the +events of a whole lifetime, and the effect on his own mind of +many various volumes, is bound, above all things, to make +that condensation logical and striking. For the only +justification of his writing at all is that he shall present +a brief, reasoned, and memorable view. By the necessity of +the case, all the more neutral circumstances are omitted from +his narrative; and that of itself, by the negative +exaggeration of which I have spoken in the text, lends to the +matter in hand a certain false and specious glitter. By the +necessity of the case, again, he is forced to view his +subject throughout in a particular illumination, like a +studio artifice. Like Hales with Pepys, he must nearly break +his sitter's neck to get the proper shadows on the portrait. +It is from one side only that he has time to represent his +subject. The side selected will either be the one most +striking to himself, or the one most obscured by controversy; +and in both cases that will be the one most liable to +strained and sophisticated reading. In a biography, this and +that is displayed; the hero is seen at home, playing the +flute; the different tendencies of his work come, one after +another, into notice; and thus something like a true, general +impression of the subject may at last be struck. But in the +short study, the writer, having seized his "point of view," +must keep his eye steadily to that. He seeks, perhaps, +rather to differentiate than truly to characterise. The +proportions of the sitter must be sacrificed to the +proportions of the portrait; the lights are heightened, the +shadows overcharged; the chosen expression, continually +forced, may degenerate at length into a grimace; and we have +at best something of a caricature, at worst a calumny. +Hence, if they be readable at all, and hang together by their +own ends, the peculiar convincing force of these brief +representations. They take so little a while to read, and +yet in that little while the subject is so repeatedly +introduced in the same light and with the same expression, +that, by sheer force of repetition, that view is imposed upon +the reader. The two English masters of the style, Macaulay +and Carlyle, largely exemplify its dangers. Carlyle, indeed, +had so much more depth and knowledge of the heart, his +portraits of mankind are felt and rendered with so much more +poetic comprehension, and he, like his favourite Ram Dass, +had a fire in his belly so much more hotly burning than the +patent reading lamp by which Macaulay studied, that it seems +at first sight hardly fair to bracket them together. But the +"point of view" was imposed by Carlyle on the men he judged +of in his writings with an austerity not only cruel but +almost stupid. They are too often broken outright on the +Procrustean bed; they are probably always disfigured. The +rhetorical artifice of Macaulay is easily spied; it will take +longer to appreciate the moral bias of Carlyle. So with all +writers who insist on forcing some significance from all that +comes before them; and the writer of short studies is bound, +by the necessity of the case, to write entirely in that +spirit. What he cannot vivify he should omit. + +Had it been possible to rewrite some of these papers, I hope +I should have had the courage to attempt it. But it is not +possible. Short studies are, or should be, things woven like +a carpet, from which it is impossible to detach a strand. +What is perverted has its place there for ever, as a part of +the technical means by which what is right has been +presented. It is only possible to write another study, and +then, with a new "point of view," would follow new +perversions and perhaps a fresh caricature. Hence, it will +be, at least, honest to offer a few grains of salt to be +taken with the text; and as some words of apology, addition, +correction, or amplification fall to be said on almost every +study in the volume, it will be most simple to run them over +in their order. But this must not be taken as a propitiatory +offering to the gods of shipwreck; I trust my cargo +unreservedly to the chances of the sea; and do not, by +criticising myself, seek to disarm the wrath of other and +less partial critics. + +HUGO'S ROMANCES. - This is an instance of the "point of +view." The five romances studied with a different purpose +might have given different results, even with a critic so +warmly interested in their favour. The great contemporary +master of wordmanship, and indeed of all literary arts and +technicalities, had not unnaturally dazzled a beginner. But +it is best to dwell on merits, for it is these that are most +often overlooked. + +BURNS. - I have left the introductory sentences on Principal +Shairp, partly to explain my own paper, which was merely +supplemental to his amiable but imperfect book, partly +because that book appears to me truly misleading both as to +the character and the genius of Burns. This seems +ungracious, but Mr. Shairp has himself to blame; so good a +Wordsworthian was out of character upon that stage. + +This half apology apart, nothing more falls to be said except +upon a remark called forth by my study in the columns of a +literary Review. The exact terms in which that sheet +disposed of Burns I cannot now recall; but they were to this +effect - that Burns was a bad man, the impure vehicle of fine +verses; and that this was the view to which all criticism +tended. Now I knew, for my own part, that it was with the +profoundest pity, but with a growing esteem, that I studied +the man's desperate efforts to do right; and the more I +reflected, the stranger it appeared to me that any thinking +being should feel otherwise. The complete letters shed, +indeed, a light on the depths to which Burns had sunk in his +character of Don Juan, but they enhance in the same +proportion the hopeless nobility of his marrying Jean. That +I ought to have stated this more noisily I now see; but that +any one should fail to see it for himself, is to me a thing +both incomprehensible and worthy of open scorn. If Burns, on +the facts dealt with in this study, is to be called a bad +man, I question very much whether either I or the writer in +the Review have ever encountered what it would be fair to +call a good one. All have some fault. The fault of each +grinds down the hearts of those about him, and - let us not +blink the truth - hurries both him and them into the grave. +And when we find a man persevering indeed, in his fault, as +all of us do, and openly overtaken, as not all of us are, by +its consequences, to gloss the matter over, with too polite +biographers, is to do the work of the wrecker disfiguring +beacons on a perilous seaboard; but to call him bad, with a +self-righteous chuckle, is to be talking in one's sleep with +Heedless and Too-bold in the arbour. + +Yet it is undeniable that much anger and distress is raised +in many quarters by the least attempt to state plainly, what +every one well knows, of Burns's profligacy, and of the fatal +consequences of his marriage. And for this there are perhaps +two subsidiary reasons. For, first, there is, in our drunken +land, a certain privilege extended to drunkenness. In +Scotland, in particular, it is almost respectable, above all +when compared with any "irregularity between the sexes." The +selfishness of the one, so much more gross in essence, is so +much less immediately conspicuous in its results that our +demiurgeous Mrs. Grundy smiles apologetically on its victims. +It is often said - I have heard it with these ears - that +drunkenness "may lead to vice." Now I did not think it at +all proved that Burns was what is called a drunkard; and I +was obliged to dwell very plainly on the irregularity and the +too frequent vanity and meanness of his relations to women. +Hence, in the eyes of many, my study was a step towards the +demonstration of Burns's radical badness. + +But second, there is a certain class, professors of that low +morality so greatly more distressing than the better sort of +vice, to whom you must never represent an act that was +virtuous in itself, as attended by any other consequences +than a large family and fortune. To hint that Burns's +marriage had an evil influence is, with this class, to deny +the moral law. Yet such is the fact. It was bravely done; +but he had presumed too far on his strength. One after +another the lights of his life went out, and he fell from +circle to circle to the dishonoured sickbed of the end. And +surely for any one that has a thing to call a soul he shines +out tenfold more nobly in the failure of that frantic effort +to do right, than if he had turned on his heel with Worldly +Wiseman, married a congenial spouse, and lived orderly and +died reputably an old man. It is his chief title that he +refrained from "the wrong that amendeth wrong." But the +common, trashy mind of our generation is still aghast, like +the Jews of old, at any word of an unsuccessful virtue. Job +has been written and read; the tower of Siloam fell nineteen +hundred years ago; yet we have still to desire a little +Christianity, or, failing that, a little even of that rude, +old, Norse nobility of soul, which saw virtue and vice alike +go unrewarded, and was yet not shaken in its faith. + +WALT WHITMAN. - This is a case of a second difficulty which +lies continually before the writer of critical studies: that +he has to mediate between the author whom he loves and the +public who are certainly indifferent and frequently averse. +Many articles had been written on this notable man. One +after another had leaned, in my eyes, either to praise or +blame unduly. In the last case, they helped to blindfold our +fastidious public to an inspiring writer; in the other, by an +excess of unadulterated praise, they moved the more candid to +revolt. I was here on the horns of a dilemma; and between +these horns I squeezed myself with perhaps some loss to the +substance of the paper. Seeing so much in Whitman that was +merely ridiculous, as well as so much more that was +unsurpassed in force and fitness, - seeing the true prophet +doubled, as I thought, in places with the Bull in a China +Shop, - it appeared best to steer a middle course, and to +laugh with the scorners when I thought they had any excuse, +while I made haste to rejoice with the rejoicers over what is +imperishably good, lovely, human, or divine, in his +extraordinary poems. That was perhaps the right road; yet I +cannot help feeling that in this attempt to trim my sails +between an author whom I love and honour and a public too +averse to recognise his merit, I have been led into a tone +unbecoming from one of my stature to one of Whitman's. But +the good and the great man will go on his way not vexed with +my little shafts of merriment. He, first of any one, will +understand how, in the attempt to explain him credibly to +Mrs. Grundy, I have been led into certain airs of the man of +the world, which are merely ridiculous in me, and were not +intentionally discourteous to himself. But there is a worse +side to the question; for in my eagerness to be all things to +all men, I am afraid I may have sinned against proportion. +It will be enough to say here that Whitman's faults are few +and unimportant when they are set beside his surprising +merits. I had written another paper full of gratitude for +the help that had been given me in my life, full of +enthusiasm for the intrinsic merit of the poems, and +conceived in the noisiest extreme of youthful eloquence. The +present study was a rifacimento. From it, with the design +already mentioned, and in a fit of horror at my old excess, +the big words and emphatic passages were ruthlessly excised. +But this sort of prudence is frequently its own punishment; +along with the exaggeration, some of the truth is sacrificed; +and the result is cold, constrained, and grudging. In short, +I might almost everywhere have spoken more strongly than I +did. + +THOREAU. - Here is an admirable instance of the "point of +view" forced throughout, and of too earnest reflection on +imperfect facts. Upon me this pure, narrow, sunnily-ascetic +Thoreau had exercised a great charm. I have scarce written +ten sentences since I was introduced to him, but his +influence might be somewhere detected by a close observer. +Still it was as a writer that I had made his acquaintance; I +took him on his own explicit terms; and when I learned +details of his life, they were, by the nature of the case and +my own PARTI-PRIS, read even with a certain violence in terms +of his writings. There could scarce be a perversion more +justifiable than that; yet it was still a perversion. The +study indeed, raised so much ire in the breast of Dr. Japp +(H. A. Page), Thoreau's sincere and learned disciple, that +had either of us been men, I please myself with thinking, of +less temper and justice, the difference might have made us +enemies instead of making us friends. To him who knew the +man from the inside, many of my statements sounded like +inversions made on purpose; and yet when we came to talk of +them together, and he had understood how I was looking at the +man through the books, while he had long since learned to +read the books through the man, I believe he understood the +spirit in which I had been led astray. + +On two most important points, Dr. Japp added to my knowledge, +and with the same blow fairly demolished that part of my +criticism. First, if Thoreau were content to dwell by Walden +Pond, it was not merely with designs of self-improvement, but +to serve mankind in the highest sense. Hither came the +fleeing slave; thence was he despatched along the road to +freedom. That shanty in the woods was a station in the great +Underground Railroad; that adroit and philosophic solitary +was an ardent worker, soul and body, in that so much more +than honourable movement, which, if atonement were possible +for nations, should have gone far to wipe away the guilt of +slavery. But in history sin always meets with condign +punishment; the generation passes, the offence remains, and +the innocent must suffer. No underground railroad could +atone for slavery, even as no bills in Parliament can redeem +the ancient wrongs of Ireland. But here at least is a new +light shed on the Walden episode. + +Second, it appears, and the point is capital, that Thoreau +was once fairly and manfully in love, and, with perhaps too +much aping of the angel, relinquished the woman to his +brother. Even though the brother were like to die of it, we +have not yet heard the last opinion of the woman. But be +that as it may, we have here the explanation of the "rarefied +and freezing air" in which I complained that he had taught +himself to breathe. Reading the man through the books, I +took his professions in good faith. He made a dupe of me, +even as he was seeking to make a dupe of himself, wresting +philosophy to the needs of his own sorrow. But in the light +of this new fact, those pages, seemingly so cold, are seen to +be alive with feeling. What appeared to be a lack of +interest in the philosopher turns out to have been a touching +insincerity of the man to his own heart; and that fine-spun +airy theory of friendship, so devoid, as I complained, of any +quality of flesh and blood, a mere anodyne to lull his pains. +The most temperate of living critics once marked a passage of +my own with a cross ar d the words, "This seems nonsense." +It not only seemed; it was so. It was a private bravado of +my own, which I had so often repeated to keep up my spirits, +that I had grown at last wholly to believe it, and had ended +by setting it down as a contribution to the theory of life. +So with the more icy parts of this philosophy of Thoreau's. +He was affecting the Spartanism he had not; and the old +sentimental wound still bled afresh, while he deceived +himself with reasons. + +Thoreau's theory, in short, was one thing and himself +another: of the first, the reader will find what I believe to +be a pretty faithful statement and a fairly just criticism in +the study; of the second he will find but a contorted shadow. +So much of the man as fitted nicely with his doctrines, in +the photographer's phrase, came out. But that large part +which lay outside and beyond, for which he had found or +sought no formula, on which perhaps his philosophy even +looked askance, is wanting in my study, as it was wanting in +the guide I followed. In some ways a less serious writer, in +all ways a nobler man, the true Thoreau still remains to be +depicted. + +VILLON. - I am tempted to regret that I ever wrote on this +subject, not merely because the paper strikes me as too +picturesque by half, but because I regarded Villon as a bad +fellow. Others still think well of him, and can find +beautiful and human traits where I saw nothing but artistic +evil; and by the principle of the art, those should have +written of the man, and not I. Where you see no good, +silence is the best. Though this penitence comes too late, +it may be well, at least, to give it expression. + +The spirit of Villon is still living in the literature of +France. Fat Peg is oddly of a piece with the work of Zola, +the Goncourts, and the infinitely greater Flaubert; and, +while similar in ugliness, still surpasses them in native +power. The old author, breaking with an ECLAT DE VOIX, out +of his tongue-tied century, has not yet been touched on his +own ground, and still gives us the most vivid and shocking +impression of reality. Even if that were not worth doing at +all, it would be worth doing as well as he has done it; for +the pleasure we take in the author's skill repays us, or at +least reconciles us to the baseness of his attitude. Fat Peg +(LA GROSSE MARGOT) is typical of much; it is a piece of +experience that has nowhere else been rendered into +literature; and a kind of gratitude for the author's +plainness mingles, as we read, with the nausea proper to the +business. I shall quote here a verse of an old students' +song, worth laying side by side with Villon's startling +ballade. This singer, also, had an unworthy mistress, but he +did not choose to share the wages of dishonour; and it is +thus, with both wit and pathos, that he laments her fall:- + +Nunc plango florem +AEtatis tenerae +Nitidiorem +Veneris sidere: +Tunc columbinam +Mentis dulcedinem, +Nunc serpentinam +Amaritudinem. +Verbo rogantes +Removes ostio, +Munera dantes +Foves cubiculo, +Illos abire praecipis +A quibus nihil accipis, +Caecos claudosque recipis, +Viros illustres decipis +Cum melle venenosa. (1) + +(1) GAUDEAMUS: CARMINA VAGORUM SELECTA. Leipsic. Trubner. +1879. + +But our illustrious writer of ballades it was unnecessary to +deceive; it was the flight of beauty alone, not that of +honesty or honour, that he lamented in his song; and the +nameless mediaeval vagabond has the best of the comparison. + +There is now a Villon Society in England; and Mr. John Payne +has translated him entirely into English, a task of unusual +difficulty. I regret to find that Mr. Payne and I are not +always at one as to the author's meaning; in such cases I am +bound to suppose that he is in the right, although the +weakness of the flesh withholds me from anything beyond a +formal submission. He is now upon a larger venture, +promising us at last that complete Arabian Nights to which we +have all so long looked forward. + +CHARLES OF ORLEANS. - Perhaps I have done scanty justice to +the charm of the old Duke's verses, and certainly he is too +much treated as a fool. The period is not sufficiently +remembered. What that period was, to what a blank of +imbecility the human mind had fallen, can only be known to +those who have waded in the chronicles. Excepting Comines +and La Salle and Villon, I have read no author who did not +appal me by his torpor; and even the trial of Joan of Arc, +conducted as it was by chosen clerks, bears witness to a +dreary, sterile folly, - a twilight of the mind peopled with +childish phantoms. In relation to his contemporaries, +Charles seems quite a lively character. + +It remains for me to acknowledge the kindness of Mr. Henry +Pyne, who, immediately on the appearance of the study, sent +me his edition of the Debate between the Heralds: a courtesy +from the expert to the amateur only too uncommon in these +days. + +KNOX. - Knox, the second in order of interest among the +reformers, lies dead and buried in the works of the learned +and unreadable M'Crie. It remains for some one to break the +tomb and bring him forth, alive again and breathing, in a +human book. With the best intentions in the world, I have +only added two more flagstones, ponderous like their +predecessors, to the mass of obstruction that buries the +reformer from the world; I have touched him in my turn with +that "mace of death," which Carlyle has attributed to +Dryasdust; and my two dull papers are, in the matter of +dulness, worthy additions to the labours of M'Crie. Yet I +believe they are worth reprinting in the interest of the next +biographer of Knox. I trust his book may be a masterpiece; +and I indulge the hope that my two studies may lend him a +hint or perhaps spare him a delay in its composition. + +Of the PEPYS I can say nothing; for it has been too recently +through my hands; and I still retain some of the heat of +composition. Yet it may serve as a text for the last remark +I have to offer. To Pepys I think I have been amply just; to +the others, to Burns, Thoreau, Whitman, Charles of Orleans, +even Villon, I have found myself in the retrospect ever too +grudging of praise, ever too disrespectful in manner. It is +not easy to see why I should have been most liberal to the +man of least pretensions. Perhaps some cowardice withheld me +from the proper warmth of tone; perhaps it is easier to be +just to those nearer us in rank of mind. Such at least is +the fact, which other critics may explain. For these were +all men whom, for one reason or another, I loved; or when I +did not love the men, my love was the greater to their books. +I had read them and lived with them; for months they were +continually in my thoughts; I seemed to rejoice in their joys +and to sorrow with them in their griefs; and behold, when I +came to write of them, my tone was sometimes hardly courteous +and seldom wholly just. + +R. L. S. + + + +CONTENTS. + + +I. VICTOR HUGO'S ROMANCES +II. SOME ASPECTS OF ROBERT BURNS +III. WALT WHITMAN +IV. HENRY DAVID THOREAU: HIS CHARACTER AND OPINIONS +V. YOSHIDA-TORAJIRO +VI. FRANCOIS VILLON, STUDENT, POET, AND HOUSE-BREAKER +VII. CHARLES OF ORLEANS +VIII. SAMUEL PEPYS +IX. JOHN KNOX AND WOMEN + + + +CHAPTER I - VICTOR HUGO'S ROMANCES + + + +Apres le roman pittoresque mais prosaique de Walter Scott il +lestera un autre roman a creer, plus beau et plus complet +encore selon nous. C'est le roman, a la fois drame et +epopee, pittoresque mais poetique, reel mais ideal, vrai mais +grand, qui enchassera Walter Scott dans Homere. - Victor Hugo +on QUENTIN DURWARD. + + +VICTOR HUGO'S romances occupy an important position in the +history of literature; many innovations, timidly made +elsewhere, have in them been carried boldly out to their last +consequences; much that was indefinite in literary tendencies +has attained to definite maturity; many things have come to a +point and been distinguished one from the other; and it is +only in the last romance of all, QUATRE VINGT TREIZE, that +this culmination is most perfect. This is in the nature of +things. Men who are in any way typical of a stage of +progress may be compared more justly to the hand upon the +dial of the clock, which continues to advance as it +indicates, than to the stationary milestone, which is only +the measure of what is past. The movement is not arrested. +That significant something by which the work of such a man +differs from that of his predecessors, goes on disengaging +itself and becoming more and more articulate and cognisable. +The same principle of growth that carried his first book +beyond the books of previous writers, carries his last book +beyond his first. And just as the most imbecile production +of any literary age gives us sometimes the very clue to +comprehension we have sought long and vainly in contemporary +masterpieces, so it may be the very weakest of an author's +books that, coming in the sequel of many others, enables us +at last to get hold of what underlies the whole of them - of +that spinal marrow of significance that unites the work of +his life into something organic and rational. This is what +has been done by QUATRE VINGT TREIZE for the earlier romances +of Victor Hugo, and, through them, for a whole division of +modern literature. We have here the legitimate continuation +of a long and living literary tradition; and hence, so far, +its explanation. When many lines diverge from each other in +direction so slightly as to confuse the eye, we know that we +have only to produce them to make the chaos plain: this is +continually so in literary history; and we shall best +understand the importance of Victor Hugo's romances if we +think of them as some such prolongation of one of the main +lines of literary tendency. + +When we compare the novels of Walter Scott with those of the +man of genius who preceded him, and whom he delighted to +honour as a master in the art - I mean Henry Fielding - we +shall be somewhat puzzled, at the first moment, to state the +difference that there is between these two. Fielding has as +much human science; has a far firmer hold upon the tiller of +his story; has a keen sense of character, which he draws (and +Scott often does so too) in a rather abstract and academical +manner; and finally, is quite as humorous and quite as good- +humoured as the great Scotchman. With all these points of +resemblance between the men, it is astonishing that their +work should be so different. The fact is, that the English +novel was looking one way and seeking one set of effects in +the hands of Fielding; and in the hands of Scott it was +looking eagerly in all ways and searching for all the effects +that by any possibility it could utilise. The difference +between these two men marks a great enfranchisement. With +Scott the Romantic movement, the movement of an extended +curiosity and an enfranchised imagination, has begun. This +is a trite thing to say; but trite things are often very +indefinitely comprehended: and this enfranchisement, in as +far as it regards the technical change that came over modern +prose romance, has never perhaps been explained with any +clearness. + +To do so, it will be necessary roughly to compare the two +sets of conventions upon which plays and romances are +respectively based. The purposes of these two arts are so +much alike, and they deal so much with the same passions and +interests, that we are apt to forget the fundamental +opposition of their methods. And yet such a fundamental +opposition exists. In the drama the action is developed in +great measure by means of things that remain outside of the +art; by means of real things, that is, and not artistic +conventions for things. This is a sort of realism that is +not to be confounded with that realism in painting of which +we hear so much. The realism in painting is a thing of +purposes; this, that we have to indicate in the drama, is an +affair of method. We have heard a story, indeed, of a +painter in France who, when he wanted to paint a sea-beach, +carried realism from his ends to his means, and plastered +real sand upon his canvas; and that is precisely what is done +in the drama. The dramatic author has to paint his beaches +with real sand: real live men and women move about the stage; +we hear real voices; what is feigned merely puts a sense upon +what is; we do actually see a woman go behind a screen as +Lady Teazle, and, after a certain interval, we do actually +see her very shamefully produced again. Now all these +things, that remain as they were in life, and are not +transmuted into any artistic convention, are terribly +stubborn and difficult to deal with; and hence there are for +the dramatist many resultant limitations in time and space. +These limitations in some sort approximate towards those of +painting: the dramatic author is tied down, not indeed to a +moment, but to the duration of each scene or act; he is +confined to the stage, almost as the painter is confined +within his frame. But the great restriction is this, that a +dramatic author must deal with his actors, and with his +actors alone. Certain moments of suspense, certain +significant dispositions of personages, a certain logical +growth of emotion, these are the only means at the disposal +of the playwright. It is true that, with the assistance of +the scene-painter, the costumier and the conductor of the +orchestra, he may add to this something of pageant, something +of sound and fury; but these are, for the dramatic writer, +beside the mark, and do not come under the vivifying touch of +his genius. When we turn to romance, we find this no longer. +Here nothing is reproduced to our senses directly. Not only +the main conception of the work, but the scenery, the +appliances, the mechanism by which this conception is brought +home to us, have been put through the crucible of another +man's mind, and come out again, one and all, in the form of +written words. With the loss of every degree of such realism +as we have described, there is for art a clear gain of +liberty and largeness of competence. Thus, painting, in +which the round outlines of things are thrown on to a flat +board, is far more free than sculpture, in which their +solidity is preserved. It is by giving up these identities +that art gains true strength. And so in the case of novels +as compared with the stage. Continuous narration is the flat +board on to which the novelist throws everything. And from +this there results for him a great loss of vividness, but a +great compensating gain in his power over the subject; so +that he can now subordinate one thing to another in +importance, and introduce all manner of very subtle detail, +to a degree that was before impossible. He can render just +as easily the flourish of trumpets before a victorious +emperor and the gossip of country market women, the gradual +decay of forty years of a man's life and the gesture of a +passionate moment. He finds himself equally unable, if he +looks at it from one point of view - equally able, if he +looks at it from another point of view - to reproduce a +colour, a sound, an outline, a logical argument, a physical +action. He can show his readers, behind and around the +personages that for the moment occupy the foreground of his +story, the continual suggestion of the landscape; the turn of +the weather that will turn with it men's lives and fortunes, +dimly foreshadowed on the horizon; the fatality of distant +events, the stream of national tendency, the salient +framework of causation. And all this thrown upon the flat +board - all this entering, naturally and smoothly, into the +texture of continuous intelligent narration. + +This touches the difference between Fielding and Scott. In +the work of the latter, true to his character of a modern and +a romantic, we become suddenly conscious of the background. +Fielding, on the other hand, although he had recognised that +the novel was nothing else than an epic in prose, wrote in +the spirit not of the epic, but of the drama. This is not, +of course, to say that the drama was in any way incapable of +a regeneration similar in kind to that of which I am now +speaking with regard to the novel. The notorious contrary +fact is sufficient to guard the reader against such a +misconstruction. All that is meant is, that Fielding +remained ignorant of certain capabilities which the novel +possesses over the drama; or, at least, neglected and did not +develop them. To the end he continued to see things as a +playwright sees them. The world with which he dealt, the +world he had realised for himself and sought to realise and +set before his readers, was a world of exclusively human +interest. As for landscape, he was content to underline +stage directions, as it might be done in a play-book: Tom and +Molly retire into a practicable wood. As for nationality and +public sentiment, it is curious enough to think that Tom +Jones is laid in the year forty-five, and that the only use +he makes of the rebellion is to throw a troop of soldiers +into his hero's way. It is most really important, however, +to remark the change which has been introduced into the +conception of character by the beginning of the romantic +movement and the consequent introduction into fiction of a +vast amount of new material. Fielding tells us as much as he +thought necessary to account for the actions of his +creatures; he thought that each of these actions could be +decomposed on the spot into a few simple personal elements, +as we decompose a force in a question of abstract dynamics. +The larger motives are all unknown to him; he had not +understood that the nature of the landscape or the spirit of +the times could be for anything in a story; and so, naturally +and rightly, he said nothing about them. But Scott's +instinct, the instinct of the man of an age profoundly +different, taught him otherwise; and, in his work, the +individual characters begin to occupy a comparatively small +proportion of that canvas on which armies manoeuvre, and +great hills pile themselves upon each other's shoulders. +Fielding's characters were always great to the full stature +of a perfectly arbitrary will. Already in Scott we begin to +have a sense of the subtle influences that moderate and +qualify a man's personality; that personality is no longer +thrown out in unnatural isolation, but is resumed into its +place in the constitution of things. + +It is this change in the manner of regarding men and their +actions first exhibited in romance, that has since renewed +and vivified history. For art precedes philosophy and even +science. People must have noticed things and interested +themselves in them before they begin to debate upon their +causes or influence. And it is in this way that art is the +pioneer of knowledge; those predilections of the artist he +knows not why, those irrational acceptations and +recognitions, reclaim, out of the world that we have not yet +realised, ever another and another corner; and after the +facts have been thus vividly brought before us and have had +time to settle and arrange themselves in our minds, some day +there will be found the man of science to stand up and give +the explanation. Scott took an interest in many things in +which Fielding took none; and for this reason, and no other, +he introduced them into his romances. If he had been told +what would be the nature of the movement that he was so +lightly initiating, he would have been very incredulous and +not a little scandalised. At the time when he wrote, the +real drift of this new manner of pleasing people in fiction +was not yet apparent; and, even now, it is only by looking at +the romances of Victor Hugo that we are enabled to form any +proper judgment in the matter. These books are not only +descended by ordinary generation from the Waverley novels, +but it is in them chiefly that we shall find the +revolutionary tradition of Scott carried farther that we +shall find Scott himself, in so far as regards his conception +of prose fiction and its purposes, surpassed in his own +spirit, instead of tamely followed. We have here, as I said +before, a line of literary tendency produced, and by this +production definitely separated from others. When we come to +Hugo, we see that the deviation, which seemed slight enough +and not very serious between Scott and Fielding, is indeed +such a great gulph in thought and sentiment as only +successive generations can pass over: and it is but natural +that one of the chief advances that Hugo has made upon Scott +is an advance in self-consciousness. Both men follow the +same road; but where the one went blindly and carelessly, the +other advances with all deliberation and forethought. There +never was artist much more unconscious than Scott; and there +have been not many more conscious than Hugo. The passage at +the head of these pages shows how organically he had +understood the nature of his own changes. He has, underlying +each of the five great romances (which alone I purpose here +to examine), two deliberate designs: one artistic, the other +consciously ethical and intellectual. This is a man living +in a different world from Scott, who professes sturdily (in +one of his introductions) that he does not believe in novels +having any moral influence at all; but still Hugo is too much +of an artist to let himself be hampered by his dogmas; and +the truth is that the artistic result seems, in at least one +great instance, to have very little connection with the +other, or directly ethical result. + +The artistic result of a romance, what is left upon the +memory by any really powerful and artistic novel, is +something so complicated and refined that it is difficult to +put a name upon it and yet something as simple as nature. +These two propositions may seem mutually destructive, but +they are so only in appearance. The fact is that art is +working far ahead of language as well as of science, +realising for us, by all manner of suggestions and +exaggerations, effects for which as yet we have no direct +name; nay, for which we may never perhaps have a direct name, +for the reason that these effects do not enter very largely +into the necessities of life. Hence alone is that suspicion +of vagueness that often hangs about the purpose of a romance: +it is clear enough to us in thought; but we are not used to +consider anything clear until we are able to formulate it in +words, and analytical language has not been sufficiently +shaped to that end. We all know this difficulty in the case +of a picture, simple and strong as may be the impression that +it has left with us; and it is only because language is the +medium of romance, that we are prevented from seeing that the +two cases are the same. It is not that there is anything +blurred or indefinite in the impression left with us, it is +just because the impression is so very definite after its own +kind, that we find it hard to fit it exactly with the +expressions of our philosophical speech. + +It is this idea which underlies and issues from a romance, +this something which it is the function of that form of art +to create, this epical value, that I propose chiefly to seek +and, as far as may be, to throw into relief, in the present +study. It is thus, I believe, that we shall see most clearly +the great stride that Hugo has taken beyond his predecessors, +and how, no longer content with expressing more or less +abstract relations of man to man, he has set before himself +the task of realising, in the language of romance, much of +the involution of our complicated lives. + +This epical value is not to be found, let it be understood, +in every so-called novel. The great majority are not works +of art in anything but a very secondary signification. One +might almost number on one's fingers the works in which such +a supreme artistic intention has been in any way superior to +the other and lesser aims, themselves more or less artistic, +that generally go hand in hand with it in the conception of +prose romance. The purely critical spirit is, in most +novels, paramount. At the present moment we can recall one +man only, for whose works it would have been equally possible +to accomplish our present design: and that man is Hawthorne. +There is a unity, an unwavering creative purpose, about some +at least of Hawthorne's romances, that impresses itself on +the most indifferent reader; and the very restrictions and +weaknesses of the man served perhaps to strengthen the vivid +and single impression of his works. There is nothing of this +kind in Hugo: unity, if he attains to it, is indeed unity out +of multitude; and it is the wonderful power of subordination +and synthesis thus displayed, that gives us the measure of +his talent. No amount of mere discussion and statement, such +as this, could give a just conception of the greatness of +this power. It must be felt in the books themselves, and all +that can be done in the present essay is to recall to the +reader the more general features of each of the five great +romances, hurriedly and imperfectly, as space will permit, +and rather as a suggestion than anything more complete. + +The moral end that the author had before him in the +conception of NOTRE DAME DE PARIS was (he tells us) to +"denounce" the external fatality that hangs over men in the +form of foolish and inflexible superstition. To speak +plainly, this moral purpose seems to have mighty little to do +with the artistic conception; moreover it is very +questionably handled, while the artistic conception is +developed with the most consummate success. Old Paris lives +for us with newness of life: we have ever before our eyes the +city cut into three by the two arms of the river, the boat- +shaped island "moored" by five bridges to the different +shores, and the two unequal towns on either hand. We forget +all that enumeration of palaces and churches and convents +which occupies so many pages of admirable description, and +the thoughtless reader might be inclined to conclude from +this, that they were pages thrown away; but this is not so: +we forget, indeed, the details, as we forget or do not see +the different layers of paint on a completed picture; but the +thing desired has been accomplished, and we carry away with +us a sense of the "Gothic profile" of the city, of the +"surprising forest of pinnacles and towers and belfries," and +we know not what of rich and intricate and quaint. And +throughout, Notre Dame has been held up over Paris by a +height far greater than that of its twin towers: the +Cathedral is present to us from the first page to the last; +the title has given us the clue, and already in the Palace of +Justice the story begins to attach itself to that central +building by character after character. It is purely an +effect of mirage; Notre Dame does not, in reality, thus +dominate and stand out above the city; and any one who should +visit it, in the spirit of the Scott-tourists to Edinburgh or +the Trossachs, would be almost offended at finding nothing +more than this old church thrust away into a corner. It is +purely an effect of mirage, as we say; but it is an effect +that permeates and possesses the whole book with astonishing +consistency and strength. And then, Hugo has peopled this +Gothic city, and, above all, this Gothic church, with a race +of men even more distinctly Gothic than their surroundings. +We know this generation already: we have seen them clustered +about the worn capitals of pillars, or craning forth over the +church-leads with the open mouths of gargoyles. About them +all there is that sort of stiff quaint unreality, that +conjunction of the grotesque, and even of a certain bourgeois +snugness, with passionate contortion and horror, that is so +characteristic of Gothic art. Esmeralda is somewhat an +exception; she and the goat traverse the story like two +children who have wandered in a dream. The finest moment of +the book is when these two share with the two other leading +characters, Dom Claude and Quasimodo, the chill shelter of +the old cathedral. It is here that we touch most intimately +the generative artistic idea of the romance: are they not all +four taken out of some quaint moulding, illustrative of the +Beatitudes, or the Ten Commandments, or the seven deadly +sins? What is Quasimodo but an animated gargoyle? What is +the whole book but the reanimation of Gothic art? + +It is curious that in this, the earliest of the five great +romances, there should be so little of that extravagance that +latterly we have come almost to identify with the author's +manner. Yet even here we are distressed by words, thoughts, +and incidents that defy belief and alienate the sympathies. +The scene of the IN PACE, for example, in spite of its +strength, verges dangerously on the province of the penny +novelist. I do not believe that Quasimodo rode upon the +bell; I should as soon imagine that he swung by the clapper. +And again the following two sentences, out of an otherwise +admirable chapter, surely surpass what it has ever entered +into the heart of any other man to imagine (vol. ii. p. 180): +"Il souffrait tant que par instants il s'arrachait des +poignees de cheveux, POUR VOIR S'ILS NE BLANCHISSAIENT PAS." +And, p. 181: "Ses pensees etaient si insupportables qu'il +prenait sa tete a deux mains et tachait de l'arracher de ses +epaules POUR LA BRISER SUR LE PAVE." + +One other fault, before we pass on. In spite of the horror +and misery that pervade all of his later work, there is in it +much less of actual melodrama than here, and rarely, I should +say never, that sort of brutality, that useless insufferable +violence to the feelings, which is the last distinction +between melodrama and true tragedy. Now, in NOTRE DAME, the +whole story of Esmeralda's passion for the worthless archer +is unpleasant enough; but when she betrays herself in her +last hiding-place, herself and her wretched mother, by +calling out to this sordid hero who has long since forgotten +her - well, that is just one of those things that readers +will not forgive; they do not like it, and they are quite +right; life is hard enough for poor mortals, without having +it indefinitely embittered for them by bad art. + +We look in vain for any similar blemish in LES MISERABLES. +Here, on the other hand, there is perhaps the nearest +approach to literary restraint that Hugo has ever made: there +is here certainly the ripest and most easy development of his +powers. It is the moral intention of this great novel to +awaken us a little, if it may be - for such awakenings are +unpleasant - to the great cost of this society that we enjoy +and profit by, to the labour and sweat of those who support +the litter, civilisation, in which we ourselves are so +smoothly carried forward. People are all glad to shut their +eyes; and it gives them a very simple pleasure when they can +forget that our laws commit a million individual injustices, +to be once roughly just in the general; that the bread that +we eat, and the quiet of the family, and all that embellishes +life and makes it worth having, have to be purchased by death +- by the deaths of animals, and the deaths of men wearied out +with labour, and the deaths of those criminals called tyrants +and revolutionaries, and the deaths of those revolutionaries +called criminals. It is to something of all this that Victor +Hugo wishes to open men's eyes in LES MISERABLES; and this +moral lesson is worked out in masterly coincidence with the +artistic effect. The deadly weight of civilisation to those +who are below presses sensibly on our shoulders as we read. +A sort of mocking indignation grows upon us as we find +Society rejecting, again and again, the services of the most +serviceable; setting Jean Valjean to pick oakum, casting +Galileo into prison, even crucifying Christ. There is a +haunting and horrible sense of insecurity about the book. +The terror we thus feel is a terror for the machinery of law, +that we can hear tearing, in the dark, good and bad between +its formidable wheels with the iron stolidity of all +machinery, human or divine. This terror incarnates itself +sometimes and leaps horribly out upon us; as when the +crouching mendicant looks up, and Jean Valjean, in the light +of the street lamp, recognises the face of the detective; as +when the lantern of the patrol flashes suddenly through the +darkness of the sewer; or as when the fugitive comes forth at +last at evening, by the quiet riverside, and finds the police +there also, waiting stolidly for vice and stolidly satisfied +to take virtue instead. The whole book is full of +oppression, and full of prejudice, which is the great cause +of oppression. We have the prejudices of M. Gillenormand, +the prejudices of Marius, the prejudices in revolt that +defend the barricade, and the throned prejudices that carry +it by storm. And then we have the admirable but ill-written +character of Javert, the man who had made a religion of the +police, and would not survive the moment when he learned that +there was another truth outside the truth of laws; a just +creation, over which the reader will do well to ponder. + +With so gloomy a design this great work is still full of life +and light and love. The portrait of the good Bishop is one +of the most agreeable things in modern literature. The whole +scene at Montfermeil is full of the charm that Hugo knows so +well how to throw about children. Who can forget the passage +where Cosette, sent out at night to draw water, stands in +admiration before the illuminated booth, and the huckster +behind "lui faisait un peu l'effet d'etre le Pere eternel?" +The pathos of the forlorn sabot laid trustingly by the +chimney in expectation of the Santa Claus that was not, takes +us fairly by the throat; there is nothing in Shakespeare that +touches the heart more nearly. The loves of Cosette and +Marius are very pure and pleasant, and we cannot refuse our +affection to Gavroche, although we may make a mental +reservation of our profound disbelief in his existence. Take +it for all in all, there are few books in the world that can +be compared with it. There is as much calm and serenity as +Hugo has ever attained to; the melodramatic coarsenesses that +disfigured NOTRE DAME are no longer present. There is +certainly much that is painfully improbable; and again, the +story itself is a little too well constructed; it produces on +us the effect of a puzzle, and we grow incredulous as we find +that every character fits again and again into the plot, and +is, like the child's cube, serviceable on six faces; things +are not so well arranged in life as all that comes to. Some +of the digressions, also, seem out of place, and do nothing +but interrupt and irritate. But when all is said, the book +remains of masterly conception and of masterly development, +full of pathos, full of truth, full of a high eloquence. + +Superstition and social exigency having been thus dealt with +in the first two members of the series, it remained for LES +TRAVAILLEURS DE LA MER to show man hand to hand with the +elements, the last form of external force that is brought +against him. And here once more the artistic effect and the +moral lesson are worked out together, and are, indeed, one. +Gilliat, alone upon the reef at his herculean task, offers a +type of human industry in the midst of the vague "diffusion +of forces into the illimitable," and the visionary +development of "wasted labour" in the sea, and the winds, and +the clouds. No character was ever thrown into such strange +relief as Gilliat. The great circle of sea-birds that come +wanderingly around him on the night of his arrival, strikes +at once the note of his pre-eminence and isolation. He fills +the whole reef with his indefatigable toil; this solitary +spot in the ocean rings with the clamour of his anvil; we see +him as he comes and goes, thrown out sharply against the +clear background of the sea. And yet his isolation is not to +be compared with the isolation of Robinson Crusoe, for +example; indeed, no two books could be more instructive to +set side by side than LES TRAVAILLEURS and this other of the +old days before art had learnt to occupy itself with what +lies outside of human will. Crusoe was one sole centre of +interest in the midst of a nature utterly dead and utterly +unrealised by the artist; but this is not how we feel with +Gilliat; we feel that he is opposed by a "dark coalition of +forces," that an "immense animosity" surrounds him; we are +the witnesses of the terrible warfare that he wages with "the +silent inclemency of phenomena going their own way, and the +great general law, implacable and passive:" "a conspiracy of +the indifferency of things" is against him. There is not one +interest on the reef, but two. Just as we recognise Gilliat +for the hero, we recognise, as implied by this indifferency +of things, this direction of forces to some purpose outside +our purposes, yet another character who may almost take rank +as the villain of the novel, and the two face up to one +another blow for blow, feint for feint, until, in the storm, +they fight it epically out, and Gilliat remains the victor; - +a victor, however, who has still to encounter the octopus. I +need say nothing of the gruesome, repulsive excellence of +that famous scene; it will be enough to remind the reader +that Gilliat is in pursuit of a crab when he is himself +assaulted by the devil fish, and that this, in its way, is +the last touch to the inner significance of the book; here, +indeed, is the true position of man in the universe. + +But in LES TRAVAILLEURS, with all its strength, with all its +eloquence, with all the beauty and fitness of its main +situations, we cannot conceal from ourselves that there is a +thread of something that will not bear calm scrutiny. There +is much that is disquieting about the storm, admirably as it +begins. I am very doubtful whether it would be possible to +keep the boat from foundering in such circumstances, by any +amount of breakwater and broken rock. I do not understand +the way in which the waves are spoken of, and prefer just to +take it as a loose way of speaking, and pass on. And lastly, +how does it happen that the sea was quite calm next day? Is +this great hurricane a piece of scene-painting after all? +And when we have forgiven Gilliat's prodigies of strength +(although, in soberness, he reminds us more of Porthos in the +Vicomte de Bragelonne than is quite desirable), what is to be +said to his suicide, and how are we to condemn in adequate +terms that unprincipled avidity after effect, which tells us +that the sloop disappeared over the horizon, and the head +under the water, at one and the same moment? Monsieur Hugo +may say what he will, but we know better; we know very well +that they did not; a thing like that raises up a despairing +spirit of opposition in a man's readers; they give him the +lie fiercely, as they read. Lastly, we have here already +some beginning of that curious series of English blunders, +that makes us wonder if there are neither proof-sheets nor +judicious friends in the whole of France, and affects us +sometimes with a sickening uneasiness as to what may be our +own exploits when we touch upon foreign countries and foreign +tongues. It is here that we shall find the famous "first of +the fourth," and many English words that may be +comprehensible perhaps in Paris. It is here that we learn +that "laird" in Scotland is the same title as "lord" in +England. Here, also, is an account of a Highland soldier's +equipment, which we recommend to the lovers of genuine fun. + +In L'HOMME QUI RIT, it was Hugo's object to 'denounce' (as he +would say himself) the aristocratic principle as it was +exhibited in England; and this purpose, somewhat more +unmitigatedly satiric than that of the two last, must answer +for much that is unpleasant in the book. The repulsiveness +of the scheme of the story, and the manner in which it is +bound up with impossibilities and absurdities, discourage the +reader at the outset, and it needs an effort to take it as +seriously as it deserves. And yet when we judge it +deliberately, it will be seen that, here again, the story is +admirably adapted to the moral. The constructive ingenuity +exhibited throughout is almost morbid. Nothing could be more +happily imagined, as a REDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM of the +aristocratic principle, than the adventures of Gwynplaine, +the itinerant mountebank, snatched suddenly out of his little +way of life, and installed without preparation as one of the +hereditary legislators of a great country. It is with a very +bitter irony that the paper, on which all this depends, is +left to float for years at the will of wind and tide. What, +again, can be finer in conception than that voice from the +people heard suddenly in the House of Lords, in solemn +arraignment of the pleasures and privileges of its splendid +occupants? The horrible laughter, stamped for ever "by order +of the king" upon the face of this strange spokesman of +democracy, adds yet another feature of justice to the scene; +in all time, travesty has been the argument of oppression; +and, in all time, the oppressed might have made this answer: +"If I am vile, is it not your system that has made me so?" +This ghastly laughter gives occasion, moreover, for the one +strain of tenderness running through the web of this +unpleasant story: the love of the blind girl Dea, for the +monster. It is a most benignant providence that thus +harmoniously brings together these two misfortunes; it is one +of those compensations, one of those afterthoughts of a +relenting destiny, that reconcile us from time to time to the +evil that is in the world; the atmosphere of the book is +purified by the presence of this pathetic love; it seems to +be above the story somehow, and not of it, as the full moon +over the night of some foul and feverish city. + +There is here a quality in the narration more intimate and +particular than is general with Hugo; but it must be owned, +on the other hand, that the book is wordy, and even, now and +then, a little wearisome. Ursus and his wolf are pleasant +enough companions; but the former is nearly as much an +abstract type as the latter. There is a beginning, also, of +an abuse of conventional conversation, such as may be quite +pardonable in the drama where needs must, but is without +excuse in the romance. Lastly, I suppose one must say a word +or two about the weak points of this not immaculate novel; +and if so, it will be best to distinguish at once. The large +family of English blunders, to which we have alluded already +in speaking of LES TRAVAILLEURS, are of a sort that is really +indifferent in art. If Shakespeare makes his ships cast +anchor by some seaport of Bohemia, if Hugo imagines Tom-Tim- +Jack to be a likely nickname for an English sailor, or if +either Shakespeare, or Hugo, or Scott, for that matter, be +guilty of "figments enough to confuse the march of a whole +history - anachronisms enough to overset all, chronology," +(1) the life of their creations, the artistic truth and +accuracy of their work, is not so much as compromised. But +when we come upon a passage like the sinking of the "Ourque" +in this romance, we can do nothing but cover our face with +our hands: the conscientious reader feels a sort of disgrace +in the very reading. For such artistic falsehoods, springing +from what I have called already an unprincipled avidity after +effect, no amount of blame can be exaggerated; and above all, +when the criminal is such a man as Victor Hugo. We cannot +forgive in him what we might have passed over in a third-rate +sensation novelist. Little as he seems to know of the sea +and nautical affairs, he must have known very well that +vessels do not go down as he makes the "Ourque" go down; he +must have known that such a liberty with fact was against the +laws of the game, and incompatible with all appearance of +sincerity in conception or workmanship. + +(1) Prefatory letter to PEVERIL OF THE PEAK. + +In each of these books, one after another, there has been +some departure from the traditional canons of romance; but +taking each separately, one would have feared to make too +much of these departures, or to found any theory upon what +was perhaps purely accidental. The appearance of QUATRE +VINGT TREIZE has put us out of the region of such doubt. +Like a doctor who has long been hesitating how to classify an +epidemic malady, we have come at last upon a case so well +marked that our uncertainty is at an end. It is a novel +built upon "a sort of enigma," which was at that date laid +before revolutionary France, and which is presented by Hugo +to Tellmarch, to Lantenac, to Gauvain, and very terribly to +Cimourdain, each of whom gives his own solution of the +question, clement or stern, according to the temper of his +spirit. That enigma was this: "Can a good action be a bad +action? Does not he who spares the wolf kill the sheep?" +This question, as I say, meets with one answer after another +during the course of the book, and yet seems to remain +undecided to the end. And something in the same way, +although one character, or one set of characters, after +another comes to the front and occupies our attention for the +moment, we never identify our interest with any of these +temporary heroes nor regret them after they are withdrawn. +We soon come to regard them somewhat as special cases of a +general law; what we really care for is something that they +only imply and body forth to us. We know how history +continues through century after century; how this king or +that patriot disappears from its pages with his whole +generation, and yet we do not cease to read, nor do we even +feel as if we had reached any legitimate conclusion, because +our interest is not in the men, but in the country that they +loved or hated, benefited or injured. And so it is here: +Gauvain and Cimourdain pass away, and we regard them no more +than the lost armies of which we find the cold statistics in +military annals; what we regard is what remains behind; it is +the principle that put these men where they were, that filled +them for a while with heroic inspiration, and has the power, +now that they are fallen, to inspire others with the same +courage. The interest of the novel centres about +revolutionary France: just as the plot is an abstract +judicial difficulty, the hero is an abstract historical +force. And this has been done, not, as it would have been +before, by the cold and cumbersome machinery of allegory, but +with bold, straightforward realism, dealing only with the +objective materials of art, and dealing with them so +masterfully that the palest abstractions of thought come +before us, and move our hopes and fears, as if they were the +young men and maidens of customary romance. + +The episode of the mother and children in QUATRE VINGT TREIZE +is equal to anything that Hugo has ever written. There is +one chapter in the second volume, for instance, called "SEIN +GUERI, COEUR SAIGNANT," that is full of the very stuff of +true tragedy, and nothing could be more delightful than the +humours of the three children on the day before the assault. +The passage on La Vendee is really great, and the scenes in +Paris have much of the same broad merit. The book is full, +as usual, of pregnant and splendid sayings. But when thus +much is conceded by way of praise, we come to the other scale +of the balance, and find this, also, somewhat heavy. There +is here a yet greater over-employment of conventional +dialogue than in L'HOMME QUI RIT; and much that should have +been said by the author himself, if it were to be said at +all, he has most unwarrantably put into the mouths of one or +other of his characters. We should like to know what becomes +of the main body of the troop in the wood of La Saudraie +during the thirty pages or so in which the foreguard lays +aside all discipline, and stops to gossip over a woman and +some children. We have an unpleasant idea forced upon us at +one place, in spite of all the good-natured incredulity that +we can summon up to resist it. Is it possible that Monsieur +Hugo thinks they ceased to steer the corvette while the gun +was loose? Of the chapter in which Lantenac and Halmalho are +alone together in the boat, the less said the better; of +course, if there were nothing else, they would have been +swamped thirty times over during the course of Lantenac's +harangue. Again, after Lantenac has landed, we have scenes +of almost inimitable workmanship that suggest the epithet +"statuesque" by their clear and trenchant outline; but the +tocsin scene will not do, and the tocsin unfortunately +pervades the whole passage, ringing continually in our ears +with a taunting accusation of falsehood. And then, when we +come to the place where Lantenac meets the royalists, under +the idea that he is going to meet the republicans, it seems +as if there were a hitch in the stage mechanism. I have +tried it over in every way, and I cannot conceive any +disposition that would make the scene possible as narrated. + +Such then, with their faults and their signal excellences, +are the five great novels. + +Romance is a language in which many persons learn to speak +with a certain appearance of fluency; but there are few who +can ever bend it to any practical need, few who can ever be +said to express themselves in it. It has become abundantly +plain in the foregoing examination that Victor Hugo occupies +a high place among those few. He has always a perfect +command over his stories; and we see that they are +constructed with a high regard to some ulterior purpose, and +that every situation is informed with moral significance and +grandeur. Of no other man can the same thing be said in the +same degree. His romances are not to be confused with "the +novel with a purpose" as familiar to the English reader: this +is generally the model of incompetence; and we see the moral +clumsily forced into every hole and corner of the story, or +thrown externally over it like a carpet over a railing. Now +the moral significance, with Hugo, is of the essence of the +romance; it is the organising principle. If you could +somehow despoil LES MISERABLES OR LES TRAVAILLEURS of their +distinctive lesson, you would find that the story had lost +its interest and the book was dead. + +Having thus learned to subordinate his story to an idea, to +make his art speak, he went on to teach it to say things +heretofore unaccustomed. If you look back at the five books +of which we have now so hastily spoken, you will be +astonished at the freedom with which the original purposes of +story-telling have been laid aside and passed by. Where are +now the two lovers who descended the main watershed of all +the Waverley novels, and all the novels that have tried to +follow in their wake? Sometimes they are almost lost sight +of before the solemn isolation of a man against the sea and +sky, as in LES TRAVAILLEURS; sometimes, as in LES MISERABLES, +they merely figure for awhile, as a beautiful episode in the +epic of oppression; sometimes they are entirely absent, as in +QUATRE VINGT TREIZE. There is no hero in NOTRE DAME: in LES +MISERABLES it is an old man: in L'HOMME QUI RIT it is a +monster: in QUATRE VINGT TREIZE it is the Revolution. Those +elements that only began to show themselves timidly, as +adjuncts, in the novels of Walter Scott, have usurped ever +more and more of the canvas; until we find the whole interest +of one of Hugo's romances centring around matter that +Fielding would have banished from his altogether, as being +out of the field of fiction. So we have elemental forces +occupying nearly as large a place, playing (so to speak) +nearly as important a ROLE, as the man, Gilliat, who opposes +and overcomes them. So we find the fortunes of a nation put +upon the stage with as much vividness as ever before the +fortunes of a village maiden or a lost heir; and the forces +that oppose and corrupt a principle holding the attention +quite as strongly as the wicked barons or dishonest attorneys +of the past. Hence those individual interests that were +supreme in Fielding, and even in Scott, stood out over +everything else and formed as it were the spine of the story, +figure here only as one set of interests among many sets, one +force among many forces, one thing to be treated out of a +whole world of things equally vivid and important. So that, +for Hugo, man is no longer an isolated spirit without +antecedent or relation here below, but a being involved in +the action and reaction of natural forces, himself a centre +of such action and reaction or an unit in a great multitude, +chased hither and thither by epidemic terrors and +aspirations, and, in all seriousness, blown about by every +wind of doctrine. This is a long way that we have travelled: +between such work and the work of Fielding is there not, +indeed, a great gulph in thought and sentiment? + +Art, thus conceived, realises for men a larger portion of +life, and that portion one that it is more difficult for them +to realise unaided; and, besides helping them to feel more +intensely those restricted personal interests which are +patent to all, it awakes in them some consciousness of those +more general relations that are so strangely invisible to the +average man in ordinary moods. It helps to keep man in his +place in nature, and, above all, it helps him to understand +more intelligently the responsibilities of his place in +society. And in all this generalisation of interest, we +never miss those small humanities that are at the opposite +pole of excellence in art; and while we admire the intellect +that could see life thus largely, we are touched with another +sentiment for the tender heart that slipped the piece of gold +into Cosette's sabot, that was virginally troubled at the +fluttering of her dress in the spring wind, or put the blind +girl beside the deformity of the laughing man. This, then, +is the last praise that we can award to these romances. The +author has shown a power of just subordination hitherto +unequalled; and as, in reaching forward to one class of +effects, he has not been forgetful or careless of the other, +his work is more nearly complete work, and his art, with all +its imperfections, deals more comprehensively with the +materials of life than that of any of his otherwise more sure +and masterly predecessors. + +These five books would have made a very great fame for any +writer, and yet they are but one facade of the monument that +Victor Hugo has erected to his genius. Everywhere we find +somewhat the same greatness, somewhat the same infirmities. +In his poems and plays there are the same unaccountable +protervities that have already astonished us in the romances. +There, too, is the same feverish strength, welding the fiery +iron of his idea under forge-hammer repetitions - an emphasis +that is somehow akin to weaknesses - strength that is a +little epileptic. He stands so far above all his +contemporaries, and so incomparably excels them in richness, +breadth, variety, and moral earnestness, that we almost feel +as if he had a sort of right to fall oftener and more heavily +than others; but this does not reconcile us to seeing him +profit by the privilege so freely. We like to have, in our +great men, something that is above question; we like to place +an implicit faith in them, and see them always on the +platform of their greatness; and this, unhappily, cannot be +with Hugo. As Heine said long ago, his is a genius somewhat +deformed; but, deformed as it is, we accept it gladly; we +shall have the wisdom to see where his foot slips, but we +shall have the justice also to recognise in him one of the +greatest artists of our generation, and, in many ways, one of +the greatest artists of time. If we look back, yet once, +upon these five romances, we see blemishes such as we can lay +to the charge of no other man in the number of the famous; +but to what other man can we attribute such sweeping +innovations, such a new and significant presentment of the +life of man, such an amount, if we merely think of the +amount, of equally consummate performance? + + + +CHAPTER II - SOME ASPECTS OF ROBERT BURNS + + + +To write with authority about another man, we must have +fellow-feeling and some common ground of experience with our +subject. We may praise or blame according as we find him +related to us by the best or worst in ourselves; but it is +only in virtue of some relationship that we can be his +judges, even to condemn. Feelings which we share and +understand enter for us into the tissue of the man's +character; those to which we are strangers in our own +experience we are inclined to regard as blots, exceptions, +inconsistencies, and excursions of the diabolic; we conceive +them with repugnance, explain them with difficulty, and raise +our hands to heaven in wonder when we find them in +conjunction with talents that we respect or virtues that we +admire. David, king of Israel, would pass a sounder judgment +on a man than either Nathaniel or David Hume. Now, Principal +Shairp's recent volume, although I believe no one will read +it without respect and interest, has this one capital defect +- that there is imperfect sympathy between the author and the +subject, between the critic and the personality under +criticism. Hence an inorganic, if not an incoherent, +presentation of both the poems and the man. Of HOLY WILLIE'S +PRAYER, Principal Shairp remarks that "those who have loved +most what was best in Burns's poetry must have regretted that +it was ever written." To the JOLLY BEGGARS, so far as my +memory serves me, he refers but once; and then only to remark +on the "strange, not to say painful," circumstance that the +same hand which wrote the COTTER'S SATURDAY NIGHT should have +stooped to write the JOLLY BEGGARS. The SATURDAY NIGHT may +or may not be an admirable poem; but its significance is +trebled, and the power and range of the poet first appears, +when it is set beside the JOLLY BEGGARS. To take a man's +work piecemeal, except with the design of elegant extracts, +is the way to avoid, and not to perform, the critic's duty. +The same defect is displayed in the treatment of Burns as a +man, which is broken, apologetical, and confused. The man +here presented to us is not that Burns, TERES ATQUE ROTUNDUS +- a burly figure in literature, as, from our present vantage +of time, we have begun to see him. This, on the other hand, +is Burns as he may have appeared to a contemporary clergyman, +whom we shall conceive to have been a kind and indulgent but +orderly and orthodox person, anxious to be pleased, but too +often hurt and disappointed by the behaviour of his red-hot +PROTEGE, and solacing himself with the explanation that the +poet was "the most inconsistent of men." If you are so +sensibly pained by the misconduct of your subject, and so +paternally delighted with his virtues, you will always be an +excellent gentleman, but a somewhat questionable biographer. +Indeed, we can only be sorry and surprised that Principal +Shairp should have chosen a theme so uncongenial. When we +find a man writing on Burns, who likes neither HOLY WILLIE, +nor the BEGGARS, nor the ORDINATION, nothing is adequate to +the situation but the old cry of Geronte: "Que diable allait- +il faire dans cette galere?" And every merit we find in the +book, which is sober and candid in a degree unusual with +biographies of Burns, only leads us to regret more heartily +that good work should be so greatly thrown away. + +It is far from my intention to tell over again a story that +has been so often told; but there are certainly some points +in the character of Burns that will bear to be brought out, +and some chapters in his life that demand a brief rehearsal. +The unity of the man's nature, for all its richness, has +fallen somewhat out of sight in the pressure of new +information and the apologetical ceremony of biographers. +Mr. Carlyle made an inimitable bust of the poet's head of +gold; may I not be forgiven if my business should have more +to do with the feet, which were of clay? + + +YOUTH. + + +Any view of Burns would be misleading which passed over in +silence the influences of his home and his father. That +father, William Burnes, after having been for many years a +gardener, took a farm, married, and, like an emigrant in a +new country, built himself a house with his own hands. +Poverty of the most distressing sort, with sometimes the near +prospect of a gaol, embittered the remainder of his life. +Chill, backward, and austere with strangers, grave and +imperious in his family, he was yet a man of very unusual +parts and of an affectionate nature. On his way through life +he had remarked much upon other men, with more result in +theory than practice; and he had reflected upon many subjects +as he delved the garden. His great delight was in solid +conversation; he would leave his work to talk with the +schoolmaster Murdoch; and Robert, when he came home late at +night, not only turned aside rebuke but kept his father two +hours beside the fire by the charm of his merry and vigorous +talk. Nothing is more characteristic of the class in +general, and William Burnes in particular, than the pains he +took to get proper schooling for his boys, and, when that was +no longer possible, the sense and resolution with which he +set himself to supply the deficiency by his own influence. +For many years he was their chief companion; he spoke with +them seriously on all subjects as if they had been grown men; +at night, when work was over, he taught them arithmetic; he +borrowed books for them on history, science, and theology; +and he felt it his duty to supplement this last - the trait +is laughably Scottish - by a dialogue of his own composition, +where his own private shade of orthodoxy was exactly +represented. He would go to his daughter as she stayed +afield herding cattle, to teach her the names of grasses and +wild flowers, or to sit by her side when it thundered. +Distance to strangers, deep family tenderness, love of +knowledge, a narrow, precise, and formal reading of theology +- everything we learn of him hangs well together, and builds +up a popular Scotch type. If I mention the name of Andrew +Fairservice, it is only as I might couple for an instant +Dugald Dalgetty with old Marshal Loudon, to help out the +reader's comprehension by a popular but unworthy instance of +a class. Such was the influence of this good and wise man +that his household became a school to itself, and neighbours +who came into the farm at meal-time would find the whole +family, father, brothers, and sisters, helping themselves +with one hand, and holding a book in the other. We are +surprised at the prose style of Robert; that of Gilbert need +surprise us no less; even William writes a remarkable letter +for a young man of such slender opportunities. One anecdote +marks the taste of the family. Murdoch brought TITUS +ANDRONICUS, and, with such dominie elocution as we may +suppose, began to read it aloud before this rustic audience; +but when he had reached the passage where Tamora insults +Lavinia, with one voice and "in an agony of distress" they +refused to hear it to an end. In such a father and with such +a home, Robert had already the making of an excellent +education; and what Murdoch added, although it may not have +been much in amount, was in character the very essence of a +literary training. Schools and colleges, for one great man +whom they complete, perhaps unmake a dozen; the strong spirit +can do well upon more scanty fare. + +Robert steps before us, almost from the first, in his +complete character - a proud, headstrong, impetuous lad, +greedy of pleasure, greedy of notice; in his own phrase +"panting after distinction," and in his brother's "cherishing +a particular jealousy of people who were richer or of more +consequence than himself:" with all this, he was emphatically +of the artist nature. Already he made a conspicuous figure +in Tarbolton church, with the only tied hair in the parish, +"and his plaid, which was of a particular colour, wrapped in +a particular manner round his shoulders." Ten years later, +when a married man, the father of a family, a farmer, and an +officer of Excise, we shall find him out fishing in +masquerade, with fox-skin cap, belted great-coat, and great +Highland broadsword. He liked dressing up, in fact, for its +own sake. This is the spirit which leads to the extravagant +array of Latin Quarter students, and the proverbial velveteen +of the English landscape-painter; and, though the pleasure +derived is in itself merely personal, it shows a man who is, +to say the least of it, not pained by general attention and +remark. His father wrote the family name BURNES; Robert +early adopted the orthography BURNESS from his cousin in the +Mearns; and in his twenty-eighth year changed it once more to +BURNS. It is plain that the last transformation was not made +without some qualm; for in addressing his cousin he adheres, +in at least one more letter, to spelling number two. And +this, again, shows a man preoccupied about the manner of his +appearance even down to the name, and little willing to +follow custom. Again, he was proud, and justly proud, of his +powers in conversation. To no other man's have we the same +conclusive testimony from different sources and from every +rank of life. It is almost a commonplace that the best of +his works was what he said in talk. Robertson the historian +"scarcely ever met any man whose conversation displayed +greater vigour;" the Duchess of Gordon declared that he +"carried her off her feet;" and, when he came late to an inn, +the servants would get out of bed to hear him talk. But, in +these early days at least, he was determined to shine by any +means. He made himself feared in the village for his tongue. +He would crush weaker men to their faces, or even perhaps - +for the statement of Sillar is not absolute - say cutting +things of his acquaintances behind their back. At the church +door, between sermons, he would parade his religious views +amid hisses. These details stamp the man. He had no genteel +timidities in the conduct of his life. He loved to force his +personality upon the world. He would please himself, and +shine. Had he lived in the Paris of 1830, and joined his lot +with the Romantics, we can conceive him writing JEHAN for +JEAN, swaggering in Gautier's red waistcoat, and horrifying +Bourgeois in a public cafe with paradox and gasconnade. + +A leading trait throughout his whole career was his desire to +be in love. NE FAIT PAS CE TOUR QUI VEUT. His affections +were often enough touched, but perhaps never engaged. He was +all his life on a voyage of discovery, but it does not appear +conclusively that he ever touched the happy isle. A man +brings to love a deal of ready-made sentiment, and even from +childhood obscurely prognosticates the symptoms of this vital +malady. Burns was formed for love; he had passion, +tenderness, and a singular bent in the direction; he could +foresee, with the intuition of an artist, what love ought to +be; and he could not conceive a worthy life without it. But +he had ill-fortune, and was besides so greedy after every +shadow of the true divinity, and so much the slave of a +strong temperament, that perhaps his nerve was relaxed and +his heart had lost the power of self-devotion before an +opportunity occurred. The circumstances of his youth +doubtless counted for something in the result. For the lads +of Ayrshire, as soon as the day's work was over and the +beasts were stabled, would take the road, it might be in a +winter tempest, and travel perhaps miles by moss and moorland +to spend an hour or two in courtship. Rule 10 of the +Bachelors' Club at Tarbolton provides that "every man proper +for a member of this Society must be a professed lover of ONE +OR MORE of the female sex." The rich, as Burns himself +points out, may have a choice of pleasurable occupations, but +these lads had nothing but their "cannie hour at e'en." It +was upon love and flirtation that this rustic society was +built; gallantry was the essence of life among the Ayrshire +hills as well as in the Court of Versailles; and the days +were distinguished from each other by love-letters, meetings, +tiffs, reconciliations, and expansions to the chosen +confidant, as in a comedy of Marivaux. Here was a field for +a man of Burns's indiscriminate personal ambition, where he +might pursue his voyage of discovery in quest of true love, +and enjoy temporary triumphs by the way. He was "constantly +the victim of some fair enslaver " - at least, when it was +not the other way about; and there were often underplots and +secondary fair enslavers in the background. Many - or may we +not say most? - of these affairs were entirely artificial. +One, he tells us, he began out of "a vanity of showing his +parts in courtship," for he piqued himself on his ability at +a love-letter. But, however they began, these flames of his +were fanned into a passion ere the end; and he stands +unsurpassed in his power of self-deception, and positively +without a competitor in the art, to use his own words, of +"battering himself into a warm affection," - a debilitating +and futile exercise. Once he had worked himself into the +vein, "the agitations of his mind and body" were an +astonishment to all who knew him. Such a course as this, +however pleasant to a thirsty vanity, was lowering to his +nature. He sank more and more towards the professional Don +Juan. With a leer of what the French call fatuity, he bids +the belles of Mauchline beware of his seductions; and the +same cheap self-satisfaction finds a yet uglier vent when he +plumes himself on the scandal at the birth of his first +bastard. We can well believe what we hear of his facility in +striking up an acquaintance with women: he would have +conquering manners; he would bear down upon his rustic game +with the grace that comes of absolute assurance - the +Richelieu of Lochlea or Mossgiel. In yet another manner did +these quaint ways of courtship help him into fame. If he +were great as principal, he was unrivalled as confidant. He +could enter into a passion; he could counsel wary moves, +being, in his own phrase, so old a hawk; nay, he could turn a +letter for some unlucky swain, or even string a few lines of +verse that should clinch the business and fetch the +hesitating fair one to the ground. Nor, perhaps, was it only +his "curiosity, zeal, and intrepid dexterity" that +recommended him for a second in such affairs; it must have +been a distinction to have the assistance and advice of RAB +THE RANTER; and one who was in no way formidable by himself +might grow dangerous and attractive through the fame of his +associate. + +I think we can conceive him, in these early years, in that +rough moorland country, poor among the poor with his seven +pounds a year, looked upon with doubt by respectable elders, +but for all that the best talker, the best letter-writer, the +most famous lover and confidant, the laureate poet, and the +only man who wore his hair tied in the parish. He says he +had then as high a notion of himself as ever after; and I can +well believe it. Among the youth he walked FACILE PRINCEPS, +an apparent god; and even if, from time to time, the Reverend +Mr. Auld should swoop upon him with the thunders of the +Church, and, in company with seven others, Rab the Ranter +must figure some fine Sunday on the stool of repentance, +would there not be a sort of glory, an infernal apotheosis, +in so conspicuous a shame? Was not Richelieu in disgrace +more idolised than ever by the dames of Paris? and when was +the highwayman most acclaimed but on his way to Tyburn? Or, +to take a simile from nearer home, and still more exactly to +the point, what could even corporal punishment avail, +administered by a cold, abstract, unearthly school-master, +against the influence and fame of the school's hero? + +And now we come to the culminating point of Burns's early +period. He began to be received into the unknown upper +world. His fame soon spread from among his fellow-rebels on +the benches, and began to reach the ushers and monitors of +this great Ayrshire academy. This arose in part from his lax +views about religion; for at this time that old war of the +creeds and confessors, which is always grumbling from end to +end of our poor Scotland, brisked up in these parts into a +hot and virulent skirmish; and Burns found himself identified +with the opposition party, - a clique of roaring lawyers and +half-heretical divines, with wit enough to appreciate the +value of the poet's help, and not sufficient taste to +moderate his grossness and personality. We may judge of +their surprise when HOLY WILLIE was put into their hand; like +the amorous lads of Tarbolton, they recognised in him the +best of seconds. His satires began to go the round in +manuscript; Mr. Aiken, one of the lawyers, "read him into +fame;" he himself was soon welcome in many houses of a better +sort, where his admirable talk, and his manners, which he had +direct from his Maker, except for a brush he gave them at a +country dancing school, completed what his poems had begun. +We have a sight of him at his first visit to Adamhill, in his +ploughman's shoes, coasting around the carpet as though that +were sacred ground. But he soon grew used to carpets and +their owners; and he was still the superior of all whom he +encountered, and ruled the roost in conversation. Such was +the impression made, that a young clergyman, himself a man of +ability, trembled and became confused when he saw Robert +enter the church in which he was to preach. It is not +surprising that the poet determined to publish: he had now +stood the test of some publicity, and under this hopeful +impulse he composed in six winter months the bulk of his more +important poems. Here was a young man who, from a very +humble place, was mounting rapidly; from the cynosure of a +parish, he had become the talk of a county; once the bard of +rural courtships, he was now about to appear as a bound and +printed poet in the world's bookshops. + +A few more intimate strokes are necessary to complete the +sketch. This strong young plough-man, who feared no +competitor with the flail, suffered like a fine lady from +sleeplessness and vapours; he would fall into the blackest +melancholies, and be filled with remorse for the past and +terror for the future. He was still not perhaps devoted to +religion, but haunted by it; and at a touch of sickness +prostrated himself before God in what I can only call unmanly +penitence. As he had aspirations beyond his place in the +world, so he had tastes, thoughts, and weaknesses to match. +He loved to walk under a wood to the sound of a winter +tempest; he had a singular tenderness for animals; he carried +a book with him in his pocket when he went abroad, and wore +out in this service two copies of the MAN OF FEELING. With +young people in the field at work he was very long-suffering; +and when his brother Gilbert spoke sharply to them - "O man, +ye are no for young folk," he would say, and give the +defaulter a helping hand and a smile. In the hearts of the +men whom he met, he read as in a book; and, what is yet more +rare, his knowledge of himself equalled his knowledge of +others. There are no truer things said of Burns than what is +to be found in his own letters. Country Don Juan as he was, +he had none of that blind vanity which values itself on what +it is not; he knew his own strength and weakness to a hair: +he took himself boldly for what he was, and, except in +moments of hypochondria, declared himself content. + + +THE LOVE STORIES. + + +On the night of Mauchline races, 1785, the young men and +women of the place joined in a penny ball, according to their +custom. In the same set danced Jean Armour, the master- +mason's daughter, and our dark-eyed Don Juan. His dog (not +the immortal Luath, but a successor unknown to fame, CARET +QUIA VATE SACRO), apparently sensible of some neglect, +followed his master to and fro, to the confusion of the +dancers. Some mirthful comments followed; and Jean heard the +poet say to his partner - or, as I should imagine, laughingly +launch the remark to the company at large - that "he wished +he could get any of the lasses to like him as well as his +dog." Some time after, as the girl was bleaching clothes on +Mauchline green, Robert chanced to go by, still accompanied +by his dog; and the dog, "scouring in long excursion," +scampered with four black paws across the linen. This +brought the two into conversation; when Jean, with a somewhat +hoydenish advance, inquired if "he had yet got any of the +lasses to like him as well as his dog?" + +It is one of the misfortunes of the professional Don Juan +that his honour forbids him to refuse battle; he is in life +like the Roman soldier upon duty, or like the sworn physician +who must attend on all diseases. Burns accepted the +provocation; hungry hope reawakened in his heart; here was a +girl - pretty, simple at least, if not honestly stupid, and +plainly not averse to his attentions: it seemed to him once +more as if love might here be waiting him. Had he but known +the truth! for this facile and empty-headed girl had nothing +more in view than a flirtation; and her heart, from the first +and on to the end of her story, was engaged by another man. +Burns once more commenced the celebrated process of +"battering himself into a warm affection;" and the proofs of +his success are to be found in many verses of the period. +Nor did he succeed with himself only; Jean, with her heart +still elsewhere, succumbed to his fascination, and early in +the next year the natural consequence became manifest. It +was a heavy stroke for this unfortunate couple. They had +trifled with life, and were now rudely reminded of life's +serious issues. Jean awoke to the ruin of her hopes; the +best she had now to expect was marriage with a man who was a +stranger to her dearest thoughts; she might now be glad if +she could get what she would never have chosen. As for +Burns, at the stroke of the calamity he recognised that his +voyage of discovery had led him into a wrong hemisphere - +that he was not, and never had been, really in love with +Jean. Hear him in the pressure of the hour. "Against two +things," he writes, "I am as fixed as fate - staying at home, +and owning her conjugally. The first, by heaven, I will not +do! - the last, by hell, I will never do!" And then he adds, +perhaps already in a more relenting temper: "If you see Jean, +tell her I will meet her, so God help me in my hour of need." +They met accordingly; and Burns, touched with her misery, +came down from these heights of independence, and gave her a +written acknowledgment of marriage. It is the punishment of +Don Juanism to create continually false positions - relations +in life which are wrong in themselves, and which it is +equally wrong to break or to perpetuate. This was such a +case. Worldly Wiseman would have laughed and gone his way; +let us be glad that Burns was better counselled by his heart. +When we discover that we can be no longer true, the next best +is to be kind. I daresay he came away from that interview +not very content, but with a glorious conscience; and as he +went homeward, he would sing his favourite, "How are Thy +servants blest, O Lord!" Jean, on the other hand, armed with +her "lines," confided her position to the master-mason, her +father, and his wife. Burns and his brother were then in a +fair way to ruin themselves in their farm; the poet was an +execrable match for any well-to-do country lass; and perhaps +old Armour had an inkling of a previous attachment on his +daughter's part. At least, he was not so much incensed by +her slip from virtue as by the marriage which had been +designed to cover it. Of this he would not hear a word. +Jean, who had besought the acknowledgment only to appease her +parents, and not at all from any violent inclination to the +poet, readily gave up the paper for destruction; and all +parties imagined, although wrongly, that the marriage was +thus dissolved. To a proud man like Burns here was a +crushing blow. The concession which had been wrung from his +pity was now publicly thrown back in his teeth. The Armour +family preferred disgrace to his connection. Since the +promise, besides, he had doubtless been busy "battering +himself" back again into his affection for the girl; and the +blow would not only take him in his vanity, but wound him at +the heart. + +He relieved himself in verse; but for such a smarting affront +manuscript poetry was insufficient to console him. He must +find a more powerful remedy in good flesh and blood, and +after this discomfiture, set forth again at once upon his +voyage of discovery in quest of love. It is perhaps one of +the most touching things in human nature, as it is a +commonplace of psychology, that when a man has just lost hope +or confidence in one love, he is then most eager to find and +lean upon another. The universe could not be yet exhausted; +there must be hope and love waiting for him somewhere; and +so, with his head down, this poor, insulted poet ran once +more upon his fate. There was an innocent and gentle +Highland nursery-maid at service in a neighbouring family; +and he had soon battered himself and her into a warm +affection and a secret engagement. Jean's marriage lines had +not been destroyed till March 13, 1786; yet all was settled +between Burns and Mary Campbell by Sunday, May 14, when they +met for the last time, and said farewell with rustic +solemnities upon the banks of Ayr. They each wet their hands +in a stream, and, standing one on either bank, held a Bible +between them as they vowed eternal faith. Then they +exchanged Bibles, on one of which Burns, for greater +security, had inscribed texts as to the binding nature of an +oath; and surely, if ceremony can do aught to fix the +wandering affections, here were two people united for life. +Mary came of a superstitious family, so that she perhaps +insisted on these rites; but they must have been eminently to +the taste of Burns at this period; for nothing would seem +superfluous, and no oath great enough, to stay his tottering +constancy. + +Events of consequence now happened thickly in the poet's +life. His book was announced; the Armours sought to summon +him at law for the aliment of the child; he lay here and +there in hiding to correct the sheets; he was under an +engagement for Jamaica, where Mary was to join him as his +wife; now, he had "orders within three weeks at latest to +repair aboard the NANCY, Captain Smith;" now his chest was +already on the road to Greenock; and now, in the wild autumn +weather on the moorland, he measures verses of farewell:- + + +"The bursting tears my heart declare; +Farewell the bonny banks of Ayr!" + + +But the great master dramatist had secretly another intention +for the piece; by the most violent and complicated solution, +in which death and birth and sudden fame all play a part as +interposing deities, the act-drop fell upon a scene of +transformation. Jean was brought to bed of twins, and, by an +amicable arrangement, the Burnses took the boy to bring up by +hand, while the girl remained with her mother. The success +of the book was immediate and emphatic; it put 20 pounds at +once into the author's purse; and he was encouraged upon all +hands to go to Edinburgh and push his success in a second and +larger edition. Third and last in these series of +interpositions, a letter came one day to Mossgiel Farm for +Robert. He went to the window to read it; a sudden change +came over his face, and he left the room without a word. +Years afterwards, when the story began to leak out, his +family understood that he had then learned the death of +Highland Mary. Except in a few poems and a few dry +indications purposely misleading as to date, Burns himself +made no reference to this passage of his life; it was an +adventure of which, for I think sufficient reasons, he +desired to bury the details. Of one thing we may be glad: in +after years he visited the poor girl's mother, and left her +with the impression that he was "a real warm-hearted chield." + +Perhaps a month after he received this intelligence, he set +out for Edinburgh on a pony he had borrowed from a friend. +The town that winter was "agog with the ploughman poet." +Robertson, Dugald Stewart, Blair, "Duchess Gordon and all the +gay world," were of his acquaintance. Such a revolution is +not to be found in literary history. He was now, it must be +remembered, twenty-seven years of age; he had fought since +his early boyhood an obstinate battle against poor soil, bad +seed, and inclement seasons, wading deep in Ayrshire mosses, +guiding the plough in the furrow wielding "the thresher's +weary flingin'-tree;" and his education, his diet, and his +pleasures, had been those of a Scotch countryman. Now he +stepped forth suddenly among the polite and learned. We can +see him as he then was, in his boots and buckskins, his blue +coat and waistcoat striped with buff and blue, like a farmer +in his Sunday best; the heavy ploughman's figure firmly +planted on its burly legs; his face full of sense and +shrewdness, and with a somewhat melancholy air of thought, +and his large dark eye "literally glowing" as he spoke. "I +never saw such another eye in a human head," says Walter +Scott, "though I have seen the most distinguished men of my +time." With men, whether they were lords or omnipotent +critics, his manner was plain, dignified, and free from +bashfulness or affectation. If he made a slip, he had the +social courage to pass on and refrain from explanation. He +was not embarrassed in this society, because he read and +judged the men; he could spy snobbery in a titled lord; and, +as for the critics, he dismissed their system in an epigram. +"These gentlemen," said he, "remind me of some spinsters in +my country who spin their thread so fine that it is neither +fit for weft nor woof." Ladies, on the other hand, surprised +him; he was scarce commander of himself in their society; he +was disqualified by his acquired nature as a Don Juan; and +he, who had been so much at his ease with country lasses, +treated the town dames to an extreme of deference. One lady, +who met him at a ball, gave Chambers a speaking sketch of his +demeanour. "His manner was not prepossessing - scarcely, she +thinks, manly or natural. It seemed as if he affected a +rusticity or LANDERTNESS, so that when he said the music was +`bonnie, bonnie,' it was like the expression of a child." +These would be company manners; and doubtless on a slight +degree of intimacy the affectation would grow less. And his +talk to women had always "a turn either to the pathetic or +humorous, which engaged the attention particularly." + +The Edinburgh magnates (to conclude this episode at once) +behaved well to Burns from first to last. Were heaven-born +genius to revisit us in similar guise, I am not venturing too +far when I say that he need expect neither so warm a welcome +nor such solid help. Although Burns was only a peasant, and +one of no very elegant reputation as to morals, he was made +welcome to their homes. They gave him a great deal of good +advice, helped him to some five hundred pounds of ready +money, and got him, as soon as he asked it, a place in the +Excise. Burns, on his part, bore the elevation with perfect +dignity; and with perfect dignity returned, when the time had +come, into a country privacy of life. His powerful sense +never deserted him, and from the first he recognised that his +Edinburgh popularity was but an ovation and the affair of a +day. He wrote a few letters in a high-flown, bombastic vein +of gratitude; but in practice he suffered no man to intrude +upon his self-respect. On the other hand, he never turned +his back, even for a moment, on his old associates; and he +was always ready to sacrifice an acquaintance to a friend, +although the acquaintance were a duke. He would be a bold +man who should promise similar conduct in equally exacting +circumstances. It was, in short, an admirable appearance on +the stage of life - socially successful, intimately self- +respecting, and like a gentleman from first to last. + +In the present study, this must only be taken by the way, +while we return to Burns's love affairs. Even on the road to +Edinburgh he had seized upon the opportunity of a flirtation, +and had carried the "battering" so far that when next he +moved from town, it was to steal two days with this anonymous +fair one. The exact importance to Burns of this affair may +be gathered from the song in which he commemorated its +occurrence. "I love the dear lassie," he sings, "because she +loves me;" or, in the tongue of prose: "Finding an +opportunity, I did not hesitate to profit by it, and even +now, if it returned, I should not hesitate to profit by it +again." A love thus founded has no interest for mortal man. +Meantime, early in the winter, and only once, we find him +regretting Jean in his correspondence. "Because" - such is +his reason - "because he does not think he will ever meet so +delicious an armful again;" and then, after a brief excursion +into verse, he goes straight on to describe a new episode in +the voyage of discovery with the daughter of a Lothian farmer +for a heroine. I must ask the reader to follow all these +references to his future wife; they are essential to the +comprehension of Burns's character and fate. In June, we +find him back at Mauchline, a famous man. There, the Armour +family greeted him with a "mean, servile compliance," which +increased his former disgust. Jean was not less compliant; a +second time the poor girl submitted to the fascination of the +man whom she did not love, and whom she had so cruelly +insulted little more than a year ago; and, though Burns took +advantage of her weakness, it was in the ugliest and most +cynical spirit, and with a heart absolutely indifferent judge +of this by a letter written some twenty days after his return +- a letter to my mind among the most degrading in the whole +collection - a letter which seems to have been inspired by a +boastful, libertine bagman. "I am afraid," it goes, "I have +almost ruined one source, the principal one, indeed, of my +former happiness - the eternal propensity I always had to +fall in love. My heart no more glows with feverish rapture; +I have no paradisiacal evening interviews." Even the process +of "battering" has failed him, you perceive. Still he had +some one in his eye - a lady, if you please, with a fine +figure and elegant manners, and who had "seen the politest +quarters in Europe." "I frequently visited her," he writes, +"and after passing regularly the intermediate degrees between +the distant formal bow and the familiar grasp round the +waist, I ventured, in my careless way, to talk of friendship +in rather ambiguous terms; and after her return to - , I +wrote her in the same terms. Miss, construing my remarks +further than even I intended, flew off in a tangent of female +dignity and reserve, like a mounting lark in an April +morning; and wrote me an answer which measured out very +completely what an immense way I had to travel before I could +reach the climate of her favours. But I am an old hawk at +the sport, and wrote her such a cool, deliberate, prudent +reply, as brought my bird from her aerial towerings, pop, +down to my foot, like Corporal Trim's hat." I avow a carnal +longing, after this transcription, to buffet the Old Hawk +about the ears. There is little question that to this lady +he must have repeated his addresses, and that he was by her +(Miss Chalmers) eventually, though not at all unkindly, +rejected. One more detail to characterise the period. Six +months after the date of this letter, Burns, back in +Edinburgh, is served with a writ IN MEDITATIONE FUGAE, on +behalf of some Edinburgh fair one, probably of humble rank, +who declared an intention of adding to his family. + +About the beginning of December (1787), a new period opens in +the story of the poet's random affections. He met at a tea +party one Mrs. Agnes M'Lehose, a married woman of about his +own age, who, with her two children, had been deserted by an +unworthy husband. She had wit, could use her pen, and had +read WERTHER with attention. Sociable, and even somewhat +frisky, there was a good, sound, human kernel in the woman; a +warmth of love, strong dogmatic religious feeling, and a +considerable, but not authoritative, sense of the +proprieties. Of what biographers refer to daintily as "her +somewhat voluptuous style of beauty," judging from the +silhouette in Mr. Scott Douglas's invaluable edition, the +reader will be fastidious if he does not approve. Take her +for all in all, I believe she was the best woman Burns +encountered. The pair took a fancy for each other on the +spot; Mrs. M'Lehose, in her turn, invited him to tea; but the +poet, in his character of the Old Hawk, preferred a TETE-A- +TETE, excused himself at the last moment, and offered a visit +instead. An accident confined him to his room for nearly a +month, and this led to the famous Clarinda and Sylvander +correspondence. It was begun in simple sport; they are +already at their fifth or sixth exchange, when Clarinda +writes: "It is really curious so much FUN passing between two +persons who saw each other only ONCE;" but it is hardly safe +for a man and woman in the flower of their years to write +almost daily, and sometimes in terms too ambiguous, sometimes +in terms too plain, and generally in terms too warm, for mere +acquaintance. The exercise partakes a little of the nature +of battering, and danger may be apprehended when next they +meet. It is difficult to give any account of this remarkable +correspondence; it is too far away from us, and perhaps, not +yet far enough, in point of time and manner; the imagination +is baffled by these stilted literary utterances, warming, in +bravura passages, into downright truculent nonsense. +Clarinda has one famous sentence in which she bids Sylvander +connect the thought of his mistress with the changing phases +of the year; it was enthusiastically admired by the swain, +but on the modern mind produces mild amazement and alarm. +"Oh, Clarinda," writes Burns, "shall we not meet in a state - +some yet unknown state - of being, where the lavish hand of +Plenty shall minister to the highest wish of Benevolence, and +where the chill north wind of Prudence shall never blow over +the flowery field of Enjoyment?" The design may be that of +an Old Hawk, but the style is more suggestive of a Bird of +Paradise. It is sometimes hard to fancy they are not gravely +making fun of each other as they write. Religion, poetry, +love, and charming sensibility, are the current topics. "I +am delighted, charming Clarinda, with your honest enthusiasm +for religion," writes Burns; and the pair entertained a +fiction that this was their "favourite subject." "This is +Sunday," writes the lady, "and not a word on our favourite +subject. O fy 'divine Clarinda!' " I suspect, although +quite unconsciously on the part of the lady, who was bent on +his redemption, they but used the favourite subject as a +stalking-horse. In the meantime, the sportive acquaintance +was ripening steadily into a genuine passion. Visits took +place, and then became frequent. Clarinda's friends were +hurt and suspicious; her clergyman interfered; she herself +had smart attacks of conscience, but her heart had gone from +her control; it was altogether his, and she "counted all +things but loss - heaven excepted - that she might win and +keep him." Burns himself was transported while in her +neighbourhood, but his transports somewhat rapidly declined +during an absence. I am tempted to imagine that, womanlike, +he took on the colour of his mistress's feeling; that he +could not but heat himself at the fire of her unaffected +passion; but that, like one who should leave the hearth upon +a winter's night, his temperature soon fell when he was out +of sight, and in a word, though he could share the symptoms, +that he had never shared the disease. At the same time, amid +the fustian of the letters there are forcible and true +expressions, and the love verses that he wrote upon Clarinda +are among the most moving in the language. + +We are approaching the solution. In mid-winter, Jean, once +more in the family way, was turned out of doors by her +family; and Burns had her received and cared for in the house +of a friend. For he remained to the last imperfect in his +character of Don Juan, and lacked the sinister courage to +desert his victim. About the middle of February (1788), he +had to tear himself from his Clarinda and make a journey into +the south-west on business. Clarinda gave him two shirts for +his little son. They were daily to meet in prayer at an +appointed hour. Burns, too late for the post at Glasgow, +sent her a letter by parcel that she might not have to wait. +Clarinda on her part writes, this time with a beautiful +simplicity: "I think the streets look deserted-like since +Monday; and there's a certain insipidity in good kind folks I +once enjoyed not a little. Miss Wardrobe supped here on +Monday. She once named you, which kept me from falling +asleep. I drank your health in a glass of ale - as the +lasses do at Hallowe'en - 'in to mysel'.' " Arrived at +Mauchline, Burns installed Jean Armour in a lodging, and +prevailed on Mrs. Armour to promise her help and countenance +in the approaching confinement. This was kind at least; but +hear his expressions: "I have taken her a room; I have taken +her to my arms; I have given her a mahogany bed; I have given +her a guinea. . . . I swore her privately and solemnly never +to attempt any claim on me as a husband, even though anybody +should persuade her she had such a claim - which she has not, +neither during my life nor after my death. She did all this +like a good girl." And then he took advantage of the +situation. To Clarinda he wrote: "I this morning called for +a certain woman. I am disgusted with her; I cannot endure +her;" and he accused her of "tasteless insipidity, vulgarity +of soul, and mercenary fawning." This was already in March; +by the thirteenth of that month he was back in Edinburgh. On +the 17th, he wrote to Clarinda: "Your hopes, your fears, your +cares, my love, are mine; so don't mind them. I will take +you in my hand through the dreary wilds of this world, and +scare away the ravening bird or beast that would annoy you." +Again, on the 21st: "Will you open, with satisfaction and +delight, a letter from a man who loves you, who has loved +you, and who will love you, to death, through death, and for +ever. . . . How rich am I to have such a treasure as you! . . +. 'The Lord God knoweth,' and, perhaps, 'Israel he shall +know,' my love and your merit. Adieu, Clarinda! I am going +to remember you in my prayers." By the 7th of April, +seventeen days later he had already decided to make Jean +Armour publicly his wife. + +A more astonishing stage-trick is not to be found. And yet +his conduct is seen, upon a nearer examination, to be +grounded both in reason and in kindness. He was now about to +embark on a solid worldly career; he had taken a farm; the +affair with Clarinda, however gratifying to his heart, was +too contingent to offer any great consolation to a man like +Burns, to whom marriage must have seemed the very dawn of +hope and self-respect. This is to regard the question from +its lowest aspect; but there is no doubt that he entered on +this new period of his life with a sincere determination to +do right. He had just helped his brother with a loan of a +hundred and eighty pounds; should he do nothing for the poor +girl whom he had ruined? It was true he could not do as he +did without brutally wounding Clarinda; that was the +punishment of his bygone fault; he was, as he truly says, +"damned with a choice only of different species of error and +misconduct." To be professional Don Juan, to accept the +provocation of any lively lass upon the village green, may +thus lead a man through a series of detestable words and +actions, and land him at last in an undesired and most +unsuitable union for life. If he had been strong enough to +refrain or bad enough to persevere in evil; if he had only +not been Don Juan at all, or been Don Juan altogether, there +had been some possible road for him throughout this +troublesome world; but a man, alas! who is equally at the +call of his worse and better instincts, stands among changing +events without foundation or resource. (1) + +(1) For the love affairs see, in particular, Mr. Scott +Douglas's edition under the different dates. + + +DOWNWARD COURSE. + + +It may be questionable whether any marriage could have tamed +Burns; but it is at least certain that there was no hope for +him in the marriage he contracted. He did right, but then he +had done wrong before; it was, as I said, one of those +relations in life which it seems equally wrong to break or to +perpetuate. He neither loved nor respected his wife. "God +knows," he writes, "my choice was as random as blind man's +buff." He consoles himself by the thought that he has acted +kindly to her; that she "has the most sacred enthusiasm of +attachment to him;" that she has a good figure; that she has +a "wood-note wild," "her voice rising with ease to B +natural," no less. The effect on the reader is one of +unmingled pity for both parties concerned. This was not the +wife who (in his own words) could "enter into his favourite +studies or relish his favourite authors;" this was not even a +wife, after the affair of the marriage lines, in whom a +husband could joy to place his trust. Let her manage a farm +with sense, let her voice rise to B natural all day long, she +would still be a peasant to her lettered lord, and an object +of pity rather than of equal affection. She could now be +faithful, she could now be forgiving, she could now be +generous even to a pathetic and touching degree; but coming +from one who was unloved, and who had scarce shown herself +worthy of the sentiment, these were all virtues thrown away, +which could neither change her husband's heart nor affect the +inherent destiny of their relation. From the outset, it was +a marriage that had no root in nature; and we find him, ere +long, lyrically regretting Highland Mary, renewing +correspondence with Clarinda in the warmest language, on +doubtful terms with Mrs. Riddel, and on terms unfortunately +beyond any question with Anne Park. + +Alas! this was not the only ill circumstance in his future. +He had been idle for some eighteen months, superintending his +new edition, hanging on to settle with the publisher, +travelling in the Highlands with Willie Nichol, or +philandering with Mrs. M'Lehose; and in this period the +radical part of the man had suffered irremediable hurt. He +had lost his habits of industry, and formed the habit of +pleasure. Apologetical biographers assure us of the +contrary; but from the first, he saw and recognised the +danger for himself; his mind, he writes, is "enervated to an +alarming degree" by idleness and dissipation; and again, "my +mind has been vitiated with idleness." It never fairly +recovered. To business he could bring the required diligence +and attention without difficulty; but he was thenceforward +incapable, except in rare instances, of that superior effort +of concentration which is required for serious literary work. +He may be said, indeed, to have worked no more, and only +amused himself with letters. The man who had written a +volume of masterpieces in six months, during the remainder of +his life rarely found courage for any more sustained effort +than a song. And the nature of the songs is itself +characteristic of these idle later years; for they are often +as polished and elaborate as his earlier works were frank, +and headlong, and colloquial; and this sort of verbal +elaboration in short flights is, for a man of literary turn, +simply the most agreeable of pastimes. The change in manner +coincides exactly with the Edinburgh visit. In 1786 he had +written the ADDRESS TO A LOUSE, which may be taken as an +extreme instance of the first manner; and already, in 1787, +we come upon the rosebud pieces to Miss Cruikshank, which are +extreme examples of the second. The change was, therefore, +the direct and very natural consequence of his great change +in life; but it is not the less typical of his loss of moral +courage that he should have given up all larger ventures, nor +the less melancholy that a man who first attacked literature +with a hand that seemed capable of moving mountains, should +have spent his later years in whittling cherry-stones. + +Meanwhile, the farm did not prosper; he had to join to it the +salary of an exciseman; at last he had to give it up, and +rely altogether on the latter resource. He was an active +officer; and, though he sometimes tempered severity with +mercy, we have local testimony oddly representing the public +feeling of the period, that, while "in everything else he was +a perfect gentleman, when he met with anything seizable he +was no better than any other gauger." + +There is but one manifestation of the man in these last years +which need delay us: and that was the sudden interest in +politics which arose from his sympathy with the great French +Revolution. His only political feeling had been hitherto a +sentimental Jacobitism, not more or less respectable than +that of Scott, Aytoun, and the rest of what George Borrow has +nicknamed the "Charlie over the water" Scotchmen. It was a +sentiment almost entirely literary and picturesque in its +origin, built on ballads and the adventures of the Young +Chevalier; and in Burns it is the more excusable, because he +lay out of the way of active politics in his youth. With the +great French Revolution, something living, practical, and +feasible appeared to him for the first time in this realm of +human action. The young ploughman who had desired so +earnestly to rise, now reached out his sympathies to a whole +nation animated with the same desire. Already in 1788 we +find the old Jacobitism hand in hand with the new popular +doctrine, when, in a letter of indignation against the zeal +of a Whig clergyman, he writes: "I daresay the American +Congress in 1776 will be allowed to be as able and as +enlightened as the English Convention was in 1688; and that +their posterity will celebrate the centenary of their +deliverance from us, as duly and sincerely as we do ours from +the oppressive measures of the wrong-headed house of Stuart." +As time wore on, his sentiments grew more pronounced and even +violent; but there was a basis of sense and generous feeling +to his hottest excess. What he asked was a fair chance for +the individual in life; an open road to success and +distinction for all classes of men. It was in the same +spirit that he had helped to found a public library in the +parish where his farm was situated, and that he sang his +fervent snatches against tyranny and tyrants. Witness, were +it alone, this verse:- + + +"Here's freedom to him that wad read, +Here's freedom to him that wad write; +There's nane ever feared that the truth should be heard +But them wham the truth wad indite." + + +Yet his enthusiasm for the cause was scarce guided by wisdom. +Many stories are preserved of the bitter and unwise words he +used in country coteries; how he proposed Washington's health +as an amendment to Pitt's, gave as a toast "the last verse of +the last chapter of Kings," and celebrated Dumouriez in a +doggrel impromptu full of ridicule and hate. Now his +sympathies would inspire him with SCOTS, WHA HAE; now involve +him in a drunken broil with a loyal officer, and consequent +apologies and explanations, hard to offer for a man of +Burns's stomach. Nor was this the front of his offending. +On February 27, 1792, he took part in the capture of an armed +smuggler, bought at the subsequent sale four carronades, and +despatched them with a letter to the French Assembly. Letter +and guns were stopped at Dover by the English officials; +there was trouble for Burns with his superiors; he was +reminded firmly, however delicately, that, as a paid +official, it was his duty to obey and to be silent; and all +the blood of this poor, proud, and falling man must have +rushed to his head at the humiliation. His letter to Mr. +Erskine, subsequently Earl of Mar, testifies, in its turgid, +turbulent phrases, to a perfect passion of alarmed self- +respect and vanity. He had been muzzled, and muzzled, when +all was said, by his paltry salary as an exciseman; alas! had +he not a family to keep? Already, he wrote, he looked +forward to some such judgment from a hackney scribbler as +this: "Burns, notwithstanding the FANFARONNADE of +independence to be found in his works, and after having been +held forth to view and to public estimation as a man of some +genius, yet, quite destitute of resources within himself to +support his borrowed dignity, he dwindled into a paltry +exciseman, and shrunk out the rest of his insignificant +existence in the meanest of pursuits, and among the vilest of +mankind." And then on he goes, in a style of rhodomontade, +but filled with living indignation, to declare his right to a +political opinion, and his willingness to shed his blood for +the political birthright of his sons. Poor, perturbed +spirit! he was indeed exercised in vain; those who share and +those who differ from his sentiments about the Revolution, +alike understand and sympathise with him in this painful +strait; for poetry and human manhood are lasting like the +race, and politics, which are but a wrongful striving after +right, pass and change from year to year and age to age. The +TWA DOGS has already outlasted the constitution of Sieyes and +the policy of the Whigs; and Burns is better known among +English-speaking races than either Pitt or Fox. + +Meanwhile, whether as a man, a husband, or a poet, his steps +led downward. He knew, knew bitterly, that the best was out +of him; he refused to make another volume, for he felt that +it would be a disappointment; he grew petulantly alive to +criticism, unless he was sure it reached him from a friend. +For his songs, he would take nothing; they were all that he +could do; the proposed Scotch play, the proposed series of +Scotch tales in verse, all had gone to water; and in a fling +of pain and disappointment, which is surely noble with the +nobility of a viking, he would rather stoop to borrow than to +accept money for these last and inadequate efforts of his +muse. And this desperate abnegation rises at times near to +the height of madness; as when he pretended that he had not +written, but only found and published, his immortal AULD LANG +SYNE. In the same spirit he became more scrupulous as an +artist; he was doing so little, he would fain do that little +well; and about two months before his death, he asked Thomson +to send back all his manuscripts for revisal, saying that he +would rather write five songs to his taste than twice that +number otherwise. The battle of his life was lost; in +forlorn efforts to do well, in desperate submissions to evil, +the last years flew by. His temper is dark and explosive, +launching epigrams, quarrelling with his friends, jealous of +young puppy officers. He tries to be a good father; he +boasts himself a libertine. Sick, sad, and jaded, he can +refuse no occasion of temporary pleasure, no opportunity to +shine; and he who had once refused the invitations of lords +and ladies is now whistled to the inn by any curious +stranger. His death (July 21, 1796), in his thirty-seventh +year, was indeed a kindly dispensation. It is the fashion to +say he died of drink; many a man has drunk more and yet lived +with reputation, and reached a good age. That drink and +debauchery helped to destroy his constitution, and were the +means of his unconscious suicide, is doubtless true; but he +had failed in life, had lost his power of work, and was +already married to the poor, unworthy, patient Jean, before +he had shown his inclination to convivial nights, or at least +before that inclination had become dangerous either to his +health or his self-respect. He had trifled with life, and +must pay the penalty. He had chosen to be Don Juan, he had +grasped at temporary pleasures, and substantial happiness and +solid industry had passed him by. He died of being Robert +Burns, and there is no levity in such a statement of the +case; for shall we not, one and all, deserve a similar +epitaph? + + +WORKS. + + +The somewhat cruel necessity which has lain upon me +throughout this paper only to touch upon those points in the +life of Burns where correction or amplification seemed +desirable, leaves me little opportunity to speak of the works +which have made his name so famous. Yet, even here, a few +observations seem necessary. + +At the time when the poet made his appearance and great first +success, his work was remarkable in two ways. For, first, in +an age when poetry had become abstract and conventional, +instead of continuing to deal with shepherds, thunderstorms, +and personifications, he dealt with the actual circumstances +of his life, however matter-of-fact and sordid these might +be. And, second, in a time when English versification was +particularly stiff, lame, and feeble, and words were used +with ultra-academical timidity, he wrote verses that were +easy, racy, graphic, and forcible, and used language with +absolute tact and courage as it seemed most fit to give a +clear impression. If you take even those English authors +whom we know Burns to have most admired and studied, you will +see at once that he owed them nothing but a warning. Take +Shenstone, for instance, and watch that elegant author as he +tries to grapple with the facts of life. He has a +description, I remember, of a gentleman engaged in sliding or +walking on thin ice, which is a little miracle of +incompetence. You see my memory fails me, and I positively +cannot recollect whether his hero was sliding or walking; as +though a writer should describe a skirmish, and the reader, +at the end, be still uncertain whether it were a charge of +cavalry or a slow and stubborn advance of foot. There could +be no such ambiguity in Burns; his work is at the opposite +pole from such indefinite and stammering performances; and a +whole lifetime passed in the study of Shenstone would only +lead a man further and further from writing the ADDRESS TO A +LOUSE. Yet Burns, like most great artists, proceeded from a +school and continued a tradition; only the school and +tradition were Scotch, and not English. While the English +language was becoming daily more pedantic and inflexible, and +English letters more colourless and slack, there was another +dialect in the sister country, and a different school of +poetry tracing its descent, through King James I., from +Chaucer. The dialect alone accounts for much; for it was +then written colloquially, which kept it fresh and supple; +and, although not shaped for heroic flights, it was a direct +and vivid medium for all that had to do with social life. +Hence, whenever Scotch poets left their laborious imitations +of bad English verses, and fell back on their own dialect, +their style would kindle, and they would write of their +convivial and somewhat gross existences with pith and point. +In Ramsay, and far more in the poor lad Fergusson, there was +mettle, humour, literary courage, and a power of saying what +they wished to say definitely and brightly, which in the +latter case should have justified great anticipations. Had +Burns died at the same age as Fergusson, he would have left +us literally nothing worth remark. To Ramsay and to +Fergusson, then, he was indebted in a very uncommon degree, +not only following their tradition and using their measures, +but directly and avowedly imitating their pieces. The same +tendency to borrow a hint, to work on some one else's +foundation, is notable in Burns from first to last, in the +period of song-writing as well as in that of the early poems; +and strikes one oddly in a man of such deep originality, who +left so strong a print on all he touched, and whose work is +so greatly distinguished by that character of "inevitability" +which Wordsworth denied to Goethe. + +When we remember Burns's obligations to his predecessors, we +must never forget his immense advances on them. They had +already "discovered" nature; but Burns discovered poetry - a +higher and more intense way of thinking of the things that go +to make up nature, a higher and more ideal key of words in +which to speak of them. Ramsay and Fergusson excelled at +making a popular - or shall we say vulgar? - sort of society +verses, comical and prosaic, written, you would say, in +taverns while a supper party waited for its laureate's word; +but on the appearance of Burns, this coarse and laughing +literature was touched to finer issues, and learned gravity +of thought and natural pathos. + +What he had gained from his predecessors was a direct, +speaking style, and to walk on his own feet instead of on +academical stilts. There was never a man of letters with +more absolute command of his means; and we may say of him, +without excess, that his style was his slave. Hence that +energy of epithet, so concise and telling, that a foreigner +is tempted to explain it by some special richness or aptitude +in the dialect he wrote. Hence that Homeric justice and +completeness of description which gives us the very +physiognomy of nature, in body and detail, as nature is. +Hence, too, the unbroken literary quality of his best pieces, +which keeps him from any slip into the weariful trade of +word-painting, and presents everything, as everything should +be presented by the art of words, in a clear, continuous +medium of thought. Principal Shairp, for instance, gives us +a paraphrase of one tough verse of the original; and for +those who know the Greek poets only by paraphrase, this has +the very quality they are accustomed to look for and admire +in Greek. The contemporaries of Burns were surprised that he +should visit so many celebrated mountains and waterfalls, and +not seize the opportunity to make a poem. Indeed, it is not +for those who have a true command of the art of words, but +for peddling, professional amateurs, that these pointed +occasions are most useful and inspiring. As those who speak +French imperfectly are glad to dwell on any topic they may +have talked upon or heard others talk upon before, because +they know appropriate words for it in French, so the dabbler +in verse rejoices to behold a waterfall, because he has +learned the sentiment and knows appropriate words for it in +poetry. But the dialect of Burns was fitted to deal with any +subject; and whether it was a stormy night, a shepherd's +collie, a sheep struggling in the snow, the conduct of +cowardly soldiers in the field, the gait and cogitations of a +drunken man, or only a village cockcrow in the morning, he +could find language to give it freshness, body, and relief. +He was always ready to borrow the hint of a design, as though +he had a difficulty in commencing - a difficulty, let us say, +in choosing a subject out of a world which seemed all equally +living and significant to him; but once he had the subject +chosen, he could cope with nature single-handed, and make +every stroke a triumph. Again, his absolute mastery in his +art enabled him to express each and all of his different +humours, and to pass smoothly and congruously from one to +another. Many men invent a dialect for only one side of +their nature - perhaps their pathos or their humour, or the +delicacy of their senses - and, for lack of a medium, leave +all the others unexpressed. You meet such an one, and find +him in conversation full of thought, feeling, and experience, +which he has lacked the art to employ in his writings. But +Burns was not thus hampered in the practice of the literary +art; he could throw the whole weight of his nature into his +work, and impregnate it from end to end. If Doctor Johnson, +that stilted and accomplished stylist, had lacked the sacred +Boswell, what should we have known of him? and how should we +have delighted in his acquaintance as we do? Those who spoke +with Burns tell us how much we have lost who did not. But I +think they exaggerate their privilege: I think we have the +whole Burns in our possession set forth in his consummate +verses. + +It was by his style, and not by his matter, that he affected +Wordsworth and the world. There is, indeed, only one merit +worth considering in a man of letters - that he should write +well; and only one damning fault - that he should write ill. +We are little the better for the reflections of the sailor's +parrot in the story. And so, if Burns helped to change the +course of literary history, it was by his frank, direct, and +masterly utterance, and not by his homely choice of subjects. +That was imposed upon him, not chosen upon a principle. He +wrote from his own experience, because it was his nature so +to do, and the tradition of the school from which he +proceeded was fortunately not oppose to homely subjects. But +to these homely subjects he communicated the rich commentary +of his nature; they were all steeped in Burns; and they +interest us not in themselves, but because they have been +passed through the spirit of so genuine and vigorous a man. +Such is the stamp of living literature; and there was never +any more alive than that of Burns. + +What a gust of sympathy there is in him sometimes flowing out +in byways hitherto unused, upon mice, and flowers, and the +devil himself; sometimes speaking plainly between human +hearts; sometimes ringing out in exultation like a peal of +beals! When we compare the FARMER'S SALUTATION TO HIS AULD +MARE MAGGIE, with the clever and inhumane production of half +a century earlier, THE AULD MAN'S MARE'S DEAD, we see in a +nutshell the spirit of the change introduced by Burns. And +as to its manner, who that has read it can forget how the +collie, Luath, in the TWA DOGS, describes and enters into the +merry-making in the cottage? + + +"The luntin' pipe an' sneeshin' mill, +Are handed round wi' richt guid will; +The canty auld folks crackin' crouse, +The young anes rantin' through the house - +My heart has been sae fain to see them +That I for joy hae barkit wi' them." + + +It was this ardent power of sympathy that was fatal to so +many women, and, through Jean Armour, to himself at last. +His humour comes from him in a stream so deep and easy that I +will venture to call him the best of humorous poets. He +turns about in the midst to utter a noble sentiment or a +trenchant remark on human life, and the style changes and +rises to the occasion. I think it is Principal Shairp who +says, happily, that Burns would have been no Scotchman if he +had not loved to moralise; neither, may we add, would he have +been his father's son; but (what is worthy of note) his +moralisings are to a large extent the moral of his own +career. He was among the least impersonal of artists. +Except in the JOLLY BEGGARS, he shows no gleam of dramatic +instinct. Mr. Carlyle has complained that TAM O' SHANTER is, +from the absence of this quality, only a picturesque and +external piece of work; and I may add that in the TWA DOGS it +is precisely in the infringement of dramatic propriety that a +great deal of the humour of the speeches depends for its +existence and effect. Indeed, Burns was so full of his +identity that it breaks forth on every page; and there is +scarce an appropriate remark either in praise or blame of his +own conduct, but he has put it himself into verse. Alas! for +the tenor of these remarks! They are, indeed, his own +pitiful apology for such a marred existence and talents so +misused and stunted; and they seem to prove for ever how +small a part is played by reason in the conduct of man's +affairs. Here was one, at least, who with unfailing judgment +predicted his own fate; yet his knowledge could not avail +him, and with open eyes he must fulfil his tragic destiny. +Ten years before the end he had written his epitaph; and +neither subsequent events, nor the critical eyes of +posterity, have shown us a word in it to alter. And, lastly, +has he not put in for himself the last unanswerable plea? - + + +"Then gently scan your brother man, +Still gentler sister woman; +Though they may gang a kennin wrang, +To step aside is human: +One point must still be greatly dark - " + +One? Alas! I fear every man and woman of us is "greatly +dark" to all their neighbours, from the day of birth until +death removes them, in their greatest virtues as well as in +their saddest faults; and we, who have been trying to read +the character of Burns, may take home the lesson and be +gentle in our thoughts. + + + +CHAPTER III - WALT WHITMAN + + + +OF late years the name of Walt Whitman has been a good deal +bandied about in books and magazines. It has become familiar +both in good and ill repute. His works have been largely +bespattered with praise by his admirers, and cruelly mauled +and mangled by irreverent enemies. Now, whether his poetry +is good or bad as poetry, is a matter that may admit of a +difference of opinion without alienating those who differ. +We could not keep the peace with a man who should put forward +claims to taste and yet depreciate the choruses in SAMSON +AGONISTES; but, I think, we may shake hands with one who sees +no more in Walt Whitman's volume, from a literary point of +view, than a farrago of incompetent essays in a wrong +direction. That may not be at all our own opinion. We may +think that, when a work contains many unforgettable phrases, +it cannot be altogether devoid of literary merit. We may +even see passages of a high poetry here and there among its +eccentric contents. But when all is said, Walt Whitman is +neither a Milton nor a Shakespeare; to appreciate his works +is not a condition necessary to salvation; and I would not +disinherit a son upon the question, nor even think much the +worse of a critic, for I should always have an idea what he +meant. + +What Whitman has to say is another affair from how he says +it. It is not possible to acquit any one of defective +intelligence, or else stiff prejudice, who is not interested +by Whitman's matter and the spirit it represents. Not as a +poet, but as what we must call (for lack of a more exact +expression) a prophet, he occupies a curious and prominent +position. Whether he may greatly influence the future or +not, he is a notable symptom of the present. As a sign of +the times, it would be hard to find his parallel. I should +hazard a large wager, for instance, that he was not +unacquainted with the works of Herbert Spencer; and yet +where, in all the history books, shall we lay our hands on +two more incongruous contemporaries? Mr. Spencer so decorous +- I had almost said, so dandy - in dissent; and Whitman, like +a large shaggy dog, just unchained, scouring the beaches of +the world and baying at the moon. And when was an echo more +curiously like a satire, than when Mr. Spencer found his +Synthetic Philosophy reverberated from the other shores of +the Atlantic in the "barbaric yawp" of Whitman? + + +I. + + +Whitman, it cannot be too soon explained, writes up to a +system. He was a theoriser about society before he was a +poet. He first perceived something wanting, and then sat +down squarely to supply the want. The reader, running over +his works, will find that he takes nearly as much pleasure in +critically expounding his theory of poetry as in making +poems. This is as far as it can be from the case of the +spontaneous village minstrel dear to elegy, who has no theory +whatever, although sometimes he may have fully as much poetry +as Whitman. The whole of Whitman's work is deliberate and +preconceived. A man born into a society comparatively new, +full of conflicting elements and interests, could not fail, +if he had any thoughts at all, to reflect upon the tendencies +around him. He saw much good and evil on all sides, not yet +settled down into some more or less unjust compromise as in +older nations, but still in the act of settlement. And he +could not but wonder what it would turn out; whether the +compromise would be very just or very much the reverse, and +give great or little scope for healthy human energies. From +idle wonder to active speculation is but a step; and he seems +to have been early struck with the inefficacy of literature +and its extreme unsuitability to the conditions. What he +calls "Feudal Literature" could have little living action on +the tumult of American democracy; what he calls the +"Literature of Wo," meaning the whole tribe of Werther and +Byron, could have no action for good in any time or place. +Both propositions, if art had none but a direct moral +influence, would be true enough; and as this seems to be +Whitman's view, they were true enough for him. He conceived +the idea of a Literature which was to inhere in the life of +the present; which was to be, first, human, and next, +American; which was to be brave and cheerful as per contract; +to give culture in a popular and poetical presentment; and, +in so doing, catch and stereotype some democratic ideal of +humanity which should be equally natural to all grades of +wealth and education, and suited, in one of his favourite +phrases, to "the average man." To the formation of some such +literature as this his poems are to be regarded as so many +contributions, one sometimes explaining, sometimes +superseding, the other: and the whole together not so much a +finished work as a body of suggestive hints. He does not +profess to have built the castle, but he pretends he has +traced the lines of the foundation. He has not made the +poetry, but he flatters himself he has done something towards +making the poets. + +His notion of the poetic function is ambitious, and coincides +roughly with what Schopenhauer has laid down as the province +of the metaphysician. The poet is to gather together for +men, and set in order, the materials of their existence. He +is "The Answerer;" he is to find some way of speaking about +life that shall satisfy, if only for the moment, man's +enduring astonishment at his own position. And besides +having an answer ready, it is he who shall provoke the +question. He must shake people out of their indifference, +and force them to make some election in this world, instead +of sliding dully forward in a dream. Life is a business we +are all apt to mismanage; either living recklessly from day +to day, or suffering ourselves to be gulled out of our +moments by the inanities of custom. We should despise a man +who gave as little activity and forethought to the conduct of +any other business. But in this, which is the one thing of +all others, since it contains them all, we cannot see the +forest for the trees. One brief impression obliterates +another. There is something stupefying in the recurrence of +unimportant things. And it is only on rare provocations that +we can rise to take an outlook beyond daily concerns, and +comprehend the narrow limits and great possibilities of our +existence. It is the duty of the poet to induce such moments +of clear sight. He is the declared enemy of all living by +reflex action, of all that is done betwixt sleep and waking, +of all the pleasureless pleasurings and imaginary duties in +which we coin away our hearts and fritter invaluable years. +He has to electrify his readers into an instant unflagging +activity, founded on a wide and eager observation of the +world, and make them direct their ways by a superior +prudence, which has little or nothing in common with the +maxims of the copy-book. That many of us lead such lives as +they would heartily disown after two hours' serious +reflection on the subject is, I am afraid, a true, and, I am +sure, a very galling thought. The Enchanted Ground of dead- +alive respectability is next, upon the map, to the Beulah of +considerate virtue. But there they all slumber and take +their rest in the middle of God's beautiful and wonderful +universe; the drowsy heads have nodded together in the same +position since first their fathers fell asleep; and not even +the sound of the last trumpet can wake them to a single +active thought. + +The poet has a hard task before him to stir up such fellows +to a sense of their own and other people's principles in +life. + +And it happens that literature is, in some ways, but an +indifferent means to such an end. Language is but a poor +bull's-eye lantern where-with to show off the vast cathedral +of the world; and yet a particular thing once said in words +is so definite and memorable, that it makes us forget the +absence of the many which remain unexpressed; like a bright +window in a distant view, which dazzles and confuses our +sight of its surroundings. There are not words enough in all +Shakespeare to express the merest fraction of a man's +experience in an hour. The speed of the eyesight and the +hearing, and the continual industry of the mind, produce, in +ten minutes, what it would require a laborious volume to +shadow forth by comparisons and roundabout approaches. If +verbal logic were sufficient, life would be as plain sailing +as a piece of Euclid. But, as a matter of fact, we make a +travesty of the simplest process of thought when we put it +into words for the words are all coloured and forsworn, apply +inaccurately, and bring with them, from former uses ideas of +praise and blame that have nothing to do with the question in +hand. So we must always see to it nearly, that we judge by +the realities of life and not by the partial terms that +represent them in man's speech; and at times of choice, we +must leave words upon one side, and act upon those brute +convictions, unexpressed and perhaps inexpressible, which +cannot be flourished in an argument, but which are truly the +sum and fruit of our experience. Words are for +communication, not for judgment. This is what every +thoughtful man knows for himself, for only fools and silly +schoolmasters push definitions over far into the domain of +conduct; and the majority of women, not learned in these +scholastic refinements, live all-of-a-piece and +unconsciously, as a tree grows, without caring to put a name +upon their acts or motives. Hence, a new difficulty for +Whitman's scrupulous and argumentative poet; he must do more +than waken up the sleepers to his words; he must persuade +them to look over the book and at life with their own eyes. + +This side of truth is very present to Whitman; it is this +that he means when he tells us that "To glance with an eye +confounds the learning of all times." But he is not unready. +He is never weary of descanting on the undebatable conviction +that is forced upon our minds by the presence of other men, +of animals, or of inanimate things. To glance with an eye, +were it only at a chair or a park railing, is by far a more +persuasive process, and brings us to a far more exact +conclusion, than to read the works of all the logicians +extant. If both, by a large allowance, may be said to end in +certainty, the certainty in the one case transcends the other +to an incalculable degree. If people see a lion, they run +away; if they only apprehend a deduction, they keep wandering +around in an experimental humour. Now, how is the poet to +convince like nature, and not like books? Is there no actual +piece of nature that he can show the man to his face, as he +might show him a tree if they were walking together? Yes, +there is one: the man's own thoughts. In fact, if the poet +is to speak efficaciously, he must say what is already in his +hearer's mind. That, alone, the hearer will believe; that, +alone, he will be able to apply intelligently to the facts of +life. Any conviction, even if it be a whole system or a +whole religion, must pass into the condition of commonplace, +or postulate, before it becomes fully operative. Strange +excursions and high-flying theories may interest, but they +cannot rule behaviour. Our faith is not the highest truth +that we perceive, but the highest that we have been able to +assimilate into the very texture and method of our thinking. +It is not, therefore, by flashing before a man's eyes the +weapons of dialectic; it is not by induction, deduction, or +construction; it is not by forcing him on from one stage of +reasoning to another, that the man will be effectually +renewed. He cannot be made to believe anything; but he can +be made to see that he has always believed it. And this is +the practical canon. It is when the reader cries, "Oh, I +know!" and is, perhaps, half irritated to see how nearly the +author has forestalled his own thoughts, that he is on the +way to what is called in theology a Saving Faith. + +Here we have the key to Whitman's attitude. To give a +certain unity of ideal to the average population of America - +to gather their activities about some conception of humanity +that shall be central and normal, if only for the moment - +the poet must portray that population as it is. Like human +law, human poetry is simply declaratory. If any ideal is +possible, it must be already in the thoughts of the people; +and, by the same reason, in the thoughts of the poet, who is +one of them. And hence Whitman's own formula: "The poet is +individual - he is complete in himself: the others are as +good as he; only he sees it, and they do not." To show them +how good they are, the poet must study his fellow-countrymen +and himself somewhat like a traveller on the hunt for his +book of travels. There is a sense, of course, in which all +true books are books of travel; and all genuine poets must +run their risk of being charged with the traveller's +exaggeration; for to whom are such books more surprising than +to those whose own life is faithfully and smartly pictured? +But this danger is all upon one side; and you may judiciously +flatter the portrait without any likelihood of the sitter's +disowning it for a faithful likeness. And so Whitman has +reasoned: that by drawing at first hand from himself and his +neighbours, accepting without shame the inconsistencies and +brutalities that go to make up man, and yet treating the +whole in a high, magnanimous spirit, he would make sure of +belief, and at the same time encourage people forward by the +means of praise. + + +II. + + +We are accustomed nowadays to a great deal of puling over the +circumstances in which we are placed. The great refinement +of many poetical gentlemen has rendered them practically +unfit for the jostling and ugliness of life, and they record +their unfitness at considerable length. The bold and awful +poetry of Job's complaint produces too many flimsy imitators; +for there is always something consolatory in grandeur, but +the symphony transposed for the piano becomes hysterically +sad. This literature of woe, as Whitman calls it, this +MALADIE DE RENE, as we like to call it in Europe, is in many +ways a most humiliating and sickly phenomenon. Young +gentlemen with three or four hundred a year of private means +look down from a pinnacle of doleful experience on all the +grown and hearty men who have dared to say a good word for +life since the beginning of the world. There is no prophet +but the melancholy Jacques, and the blue devils dance on all +our literary wires. + +It would be a poor service to spread culture, if this be its +result, among the comparatively innocent and cheerful ranks +of men. When our little poets have to be sent to look at the +ploughman and learn wisdom, we must be careful how we tamper +with our ploughmen. Where a man in not the best of +circumstances preserves composure of mind, and relishes ale +and tobacco, and his wife and children, in the intervals of +dull and unremunerative labour; where a man in this +predicament can afford a lesson by the way to what are called +his intellectual superiors, there is plainly something to be +lost, as well as something to be gained, by teaching him to +think differently. It is better to leave him as he is than +to teach him whining. It is better that he should go without +the cheerful lights of culture, if cheerless doubt and +paralysing sentimentalism are to be the consequence. Let us, +by all means, fight against that hide-bound stolidity of +sensation and sluggishness of mind which blurs and +decolorises for poor natures the wonderful pageant of +consciousness; let us teach people, as much as we can, to +enjoy, and they will learn for themselves to sympathise; but +let us see to it, above all, that we give these lessons in a +brave, vivacious note, and build the man up in courage while +we demolish its substitute, indifference. + +Whitman is alive to all this. He sees that, if the poet is +to be of any help, he must testify to the livableness of +life. His poems, he tells us, are to be "hymns of the praise +of things." They are to make for a certain high joy in +living, or what he calls himself "a brave delight fit for +freedom's athletes." And he has had no difficulty in +introducing his optimism: it fitted readily enough with his +system; for the average man is truly a courageous person and +truly fond of living. One of Whitman's remarks upon this +head is worth quotation, as he is there perfectly successful, +and does precisely what he designs to do throughout: Takes +ordinary and even commonplace circumstances; throws them out, +by a happy turn of thinking, into significance and something +like beauty; and tacks a hopeful moral lesson to the end. + + +"The passionate tenacity of hunters, woodmen, early risers, +cultivators of gardens and orchards and fields, he says, 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 unvaried sign of the unfailing perception of +beauty, and of a residence of the poetic in outdoor people." + + +There seems to me something truly original in this choice of +trite examples. You will remark how adroitly Whitman begins, +hunters and woodmen being confessedly romantic. And one +thing more. If he had said "the love of healthy men for the +female form," he would have said almost a silliness; for the +thing has never been dissembled out of delicacy, and is so +obvious as to be a public nuisance. But by reversing it, he +tells us something not unlike news; something that sounds +quite freshly in words; and, if the reader be a man, gives +him a moment of great self-satisfaction and spiritual +aggrandisement. In many different authors you may find +passages more remarkable for grammar, but few of a more +ingenious turn, and none that could be more to the point in +our connection. The tenacity of many ordinary people in +ordinary pursuits is a sort of standing challenge to +everybody else. If one man can grow absorbed in delving his +garden, others may grow absorbed and happy over something +else. Not to be upsides in this with any groom or gardener, +is to be very meanly organised. A man should be ashamed to +take his food if he has not alchemy enough in his stomach to +turn some of it into intense and enjoyable occupation. + +Whitman tries to reinforce this cheerfulness by keeping up a +sort of outdoor atmosphere of sentiment. His book, he tells +us, should be read "among the cooling influences of external +nature;" and this recommendation, like that other famous one +which Hawthorne prefixed to his collected tales, is in itself +a character of the work. Every one who has been upon a +walking or a boating tour, living in the open air, with the +body in constant exercise and the mind in fallow, knows true +ease and quiet. The irritating action of the brain is set at +rest; we think in a plain, unfeverish temper; little things +seem big enough, and great things no longer portentous; and +the world is smilingly accepted as it is. This is the spirit +that Whitman inculcates and parades. He thinks very ill of +the atmosphere of parlours or libraries. Wisdom keeps school +outdoors. And he has the art to recommend this attitude of +mind by simply pluming himself upon it as a virtue; so that +the reader, to keep the advantage over his author which most +readers enjoy, is tricked into professing the same view. And +this spirit, as it is his chief lesson, is the greatest charm +of his work. Thence, in spite of an uneven and emphatic key +of expression, something trenchant and straightforward, +something simple and surprising, distinguishes his poems. He +has sayings that come home to one like the Bible. We fall +upon Whitman, after the works of so many men who write +better, with a sense of relief from strain, with a sense of +touching nature, as when one passes out of the flaring, noisy +thoroughfares of a great city into what he himself has +called, with unexcelled imaginative justice of language, "the +huge and thoughtful night." And his book in consequence, +whatever may be the final judgment of its merit, whatever may +be its influence on the future, should be in the hands of all +parents and guardians as a specific for the distressing +malady of being seventeen years old. Green-sickness yields +to his treatment as to a charm of magic; and the youth, after +a short course of reading, ceases to carry the universe upon +his shoulders. + + +III. + + +Whitman is not one of those who can be deceived by +familiarity. He considers it just as wonderful that there +are myriads of stars, as that one man should rise from the +dead. He declares "a hair on the back of his hand just as +curious as any special revelation." His whole life is to him +what it was to Sir Thomas Browne, one perpetual miracle. +Everything is strange, everything unaccountable, everything +beautiful; from a bug to the moon, from the sight of the eyes +to the appetite for food. He makes it his business to see +things as if he saw them for the first time, and professes +astonishment on principle. But he has no leaning towards +mythology; avows his contempt for what he calls "unregenerate +poetry;" and does not mean by nature + + +"The smooth walks, trimmed hedges, butterflies, posies, and +nightingales of the English poets, but the whole orb, with +its geologic history, the Kosmos, carrying fire and snow, +that rolls through the illimitable areas, light as a feather +though weighing billions of tons." + + +Nor is this exhaustive; for in his character of idealist all +impressions, all thoughts, trees and people, love and faith, +astronomy, history, and religion, enter upon equal terms into +his notion of the universe. He is not against religion; not, +indeed, against any religion. He wishes to drag with a +larger net, to make a more comprehensive synthesis, than any +or than all of them put together. In feeling after the +central type of man, he must embrace all eccentricities; his +cosmology must subsume all cosmologies, and the feelings that +gave birth to them; his statement of facts must include all +religion and all irreligion, Christ and Boodha, God and the +devil. The world as it is, and the whole world as it is, +physical, and spiritual, and historical, with its good and +bad, with its manifold inconsistencies, is what he wishes to +set forth, in strong, picturesque, and popular lineaments, +for the understanding of the average man. One of his +favourite endeavours is to get the whole matter into a +nutshell; to knock the four corners of the universe, one +after another, about his readers' ears; to hurry him, in +breathless phrases, hither and thither, back and forward, in +time and space; to focus all this about his own momentary +personality; and then, drawing the ground from under his +feet, as if by some cataclysm of nature, to plunge him into +the unfathomable abyss sown with enormous suns and systems, +and among the inconceivable numbers and magnitudes and +velocities of the heavenly bodies. So that he concludes by +striking into us some sense of that disproportion of things +which Shelley has illuminated by the ironical flash of these +eight words: The desire of the moth for the star. + +The same truth, but to what a different purpose! Whitman's +moth is mightily at his ease about all the planets in heaven, +and cannot think too highly of our sublunary tapers. The +universe is so large that imagination flags in the effort to +conceive it; but here, in the meantime, is the world under +our feet, a very warm and habitable corner. "The earth, that +is sufficient; I do not want the constellations any nearer," +he remarks. And again: "Let your soul stand cool and +composed," says he, "before a million universes." It is the +language of a transcendental common sense, such as Thoreau +held and sometimes uttered. But Whitman, who has a somewhat +vulgar inclination for technical talk and the jargon of +philosophy, is not content with a few pregnant hints; he must +put the dots upon his i's; he must corroborate the songs of +Apollo by some of the darkest talk of human metaphysic. He +tells his disciples that they must be ready "to confront the +growing arrogance of Realism." Each person is, for himself, +the keystone and the occasion of this universal edifice. +"Nothing, not God," he says, "is greater to one than oneself +is;" a statement with an irreligious smack at the first +sight; but like most startling sayings, a manifest truism on +a second. He will give effect to his own character without +apology; he sees "that the elementary laws never apologise." +"I reckon," he adds, with quaint colloquial arrogance, "I +reckon I behave no prouder than the level I plant my house +by, after all." The level follows the law of its being; so, +unrelentingly, will he; everything, every person, is good in +his own place and way; God is the maker of all and all are in +one design. For he believes in God, and that with a sort of +blasphemous security. "No array of terms," quoth he, "no +array of terms can say how much at peace I am about God and +about death." There certainly never was a prophet who +carried things with a higher hand; he gives us less a body of +dogmas than a series of proclamations by the grace of God; +and language, you will observe, positively fails him to +express how far he stands above the highest human doubts and +trepidations. + +But next in order of truths to a person's sublime conviction +of himself, comes the attraction of one person for another, +and all that we mean by the word love:- + + +"The dear love of man for his comrade - the attraction of +friend for friend, +Of the well-married husband and wife, of children and +parents, +Of city for city and land for land." + + +The solitude of the most sublime idealist is broken in upon +by other people's faces; he sees a look in their eyes that +corresponds to something in his own heart; there comes a tone +in their voices which convicts him of a startling weakness +for his fellow-creatures. While he is hymning the EGO and +commencing with God and the universe, a woman goes below his +window; and at the turn of her skirt, or the colour of her +eyes, Icarus is recalled from heaven by the run. Love is so +startlingly real that it takes rank upon an equal footing of +reality with the consciousness of personal existence. We are +as heartily persuaded of the identity of those we love as of +our own identity. And so sympathy pairs with self-assertion, +the two gerents of human life on earth; and Whitman's ideal +man must not only be strong, free, and self-reliant in +himself, but his freedom must be bounded and his strength +perfected by the most intimate, eager, and long-suffering +love for others. To some extent this is taking away with the +left hand what has been so generously given with the right. +Morality has been ceremoniously extruded from the door only +to be brought in again by the window. We are told, on one +page, to do as we please; and on the next we are sharply +upbraided for not having done as the author pleases. We are +first assured that we are the finest fellows in the world in +our own right; and then it appears that we are only fine +fellows in so far as we practise a most quixotic code of +morals. The disciple who saw himself in clear ether a moment +before is plunged down again among the fogs and complications +of duty. And this is all the more overwhelming because +Whitman insists not only on love between sex and sex, and +between friends of the same sex, but in the field of the less +intense political sympathies; and his ideal man must not only +be a generous friend but a conscientious voter into the +bargain. + +His method somewhat lessens the difficulty. He is not, the +reader will remember, to tell us how good we ought to be, but +to remind us how good we are. He is to encourage us to be +free and kind, by proving that we are free and kind already. +He passes our corporate life under review, to show that it is +upheld by the very virtues of which he makes himself the +advocate. "There is no object so soft," he says somewhere in +his big, plain way, "there is no object so soft but it makes +a hub for the wheel'd universe." Rightly understood, it is +on the softest of all objects, the sympathetic heart, that +the wheel of society turns easily and securely as on a +perfect axle. There is no room, of course, for doubt or +discussion, about conduct, where every one is to follow the +law of his being with exact compliance. Whitman hates doubt, +deprecates discussion, and discourages to his utmost the +craving, carping sensibilities of the conscience. We are to +imitate, to use one of his absurd and happy phrases, "the +satisfaction and aplomb of animals." If he preaches a sort +of ranting Christianity in morals, a fit consequent to the +ranting optimism of his cosmology, it is because he declares +it to be the original deliverance of the human heart; or at +least, for he would be honestly historical in method, of the +human heart as at present Christianised. His is a morality +without a prohibition; his policy is one of encouragement all +round. A man must be a born hero to come up to Whitman's +standard in the practice of any of the positive virtues; but +of a negative virtue, such as temperance or chastity, he has +so little to say, that the reader need not be surprised if he +drops a word or two upon the other side. He would lay down +nothing that would be a clog; he would prescribe nothing that +cannot be done ruddily, in a heat. The great point is to get +people under way. To the faithful Whitmanite this would be +justified by the belief that God made all, and that all was +good; the prophet, in this doctrine, has only to cry "Tally- +ho," and mankind will break into a gallop on the road to El +Dorado. Perhaps, to another class of minds, it may look like +the result of the somewhat cynical reflection that you will +not make a kind man out of one who is unkind by any precepts +under heaven; tempered by the belief that, in natural +circumstances, the large majority is well disposed. Thence +it would follow, that if you can only get every one to feel +more warmly and act more courageously, the balance of results +will be for good. + +So far, you see, the doctrine is pretty coherent as a +doctrine; as a picture of man's life it is incomplete and +misleading, although eminently cheerful. This he is himself +the first to acknowledge; for if he is prophetic in anything, +it is in his noble disregard of consistency. "Do I +contradict myself?" he asks somewhere; and then pat comes the +answer, the best answer ever given in print, worthy of a +sage, or rather of a woman: "Very well, then, I contradict +myself!" with this addition, not so feminine and perhaps not +altogether so satisfactory: "I am large - I contain +multitudes." Life, as a matter of fact, partakes largely of +the nature of tragedy. The gospel according to Whitman, even +if it be not so logical, has this advantage over the gospel +according to Pangloss, that it does not utterly disregard the +existence of temporal evil. Whitman accepts the fact of +disease and wretchedness like an honest man; and instead of +trying to qualify it in the interest of his optimism, sets +himself to spur people up to be helpful. He expresses a +conviction, indeed, that all will be made up to the victims +in the end; that "what is untried and afterward" will fail no +one, not even "the old man who has lived without purpose and +feels it with bitterness worse than gall." But this is not +to palliate our sense of what is hard or melancholy in the +present. Pangloss, smarting under one of the worst things +that ever was supposed to come from America, consoled himself +with the reflection that it was the price we have to pay for +cochineal. And with that murderous parody, logical optimism +and the praises of the best of possible words went +irrevocably out of season, and have been no more heard of in +the mouths of reasonable men. Whitman spares us all +allusions to the cochineal; he treats evil and sorrow in a +spirit almost as of welcome; as an old sea-dog might have +welcomed the sight of the enemy's topsails off the Spanish +Main. There, at least, he seems to say, is something obvious +to be done. I do not know many better things in literature +than the brief pictures, - brief and vivid like things seen +by lightning, - with which he tries to stir up the world's +heart upon the side of mercy. He braces us, on the one hand, +with examples of heroic duty and helpfulness; on the other, +he touches us with pitiful instances of people needing help. +He knows how to make the heart beat at a brave story; to +inflame us with just resentment over the hunted slave; to +stop our mouths for shame when he tells of the drunken +prostitute. For all the afflicted, all the weak, all the +wicked, a good word is said in a spirit which I can only call +one of ultra-Christianity; and however wild, however +contradictory, it may be in parts, this at least may be said +for his book, as it may be said of the Christian Gospels, +that no one will read it, however respectable, but he gets a +knock upon his conscience; no one however fallen, but he +finds a kindly and supporting welcome. + + +IV. + + +Nor has he been content with merely blowing the trumpet for +the battle of well-doing; he has given to his precepts the +authority of his own brave example. Naturally a grave, +believing man, with little or no sense of humour, he has +succeeded as well in life as in his printed performances. +The spirit that was in him has come forth most eloquently in +his actions. Many who have only read his poetry have been +tempted to set him down as an ass, or even as a charlatan; +but I never met any one who had known him personally who did +not profess a solid affection and respect for the man's +character. He practises as he professes; he feels deeply +that Christian love for all men, that toleration, that +cheerful delight in serving others, which he often celebrates +in literature with a doubtful measure of success. And +perhaps, out of all his writings, the best and the most human +and convincing passages are to be found in "these soil'd and +creas'd little livraisons, each composed of a sheet or two of +paper, folded small to carry in the pocket, and fastened with +a pin," which he scribbled during the war by the bedsides of +the wounded or in the excitement of great events. They are +hardly literature in the formal meaning of the word; he has +left his jottings for the most part as he made them; a homely +detail, a word from the lips of a dying soldier, a business +memorandum, the copy of a letter-short, straightforward to +the point, with none of the trappings of composition; but +they breathe a profound sentiment, they give us a vivid look +at one of the sides of life, and they make us acquainted with +a man whom it is an honour to love. + +Whitman's intense Americanism, his unlimited belief in the +future of These States (as, with reverential capitals, he +loves to call them), made the war a period of great trial to +his soul. The new virtue, Unionism, of which he is the sole +inventor, seemed to have fallen into premature unpopularity. +All that he loved, hoped, or hated, hung in the balance. And +the game of war was not only momentous to him in its issues; +it sublimated his spirit by its heroic displays, and tortured +him intimately by the spectacle of its horrors. It was a +theatre, it was a place of education, it was like a season of +religious revival. He watched Lincoln going daily to his +work; he studied and fraternised with young soldiery passing +to the front; above all, he walked the hospitals, reading the +Bible, distributing clean clothes, or apples, or tobacco; a +patient, helpful, reverend man, full of kind speeches. + +His memoranda of this period are almost bewildering to read. +From one point of view they seem those of a district visitor; +from another, they look like the formless jottings of an +artist in the picturesque. More than one woman, on whom I +tried the experiment, immediately claimed the writer for a +fellow-woman. More than one literary purist might identify +him as a shoddy newspaper correspondent without the necessary +faculty of style. And yet the story touches home; and if you +are of the weeping order of mankind, you will certainly find +your eyes fill with tears, of which you have no reason to be +ashamed. There is only one way to characterise a work of +this order, and that is to quote. Here is a passage from a +letter to a mother, unknown to Whitman, whose son died in +hospital:- + + +"Frank, as far as I saw, had everything requisite in surgical +treatment, nursing, etc. He had watches much of the time. +He was so good and well-behaved, and affectionate, I myself +liked him very much. I was in the habit of coming in +afternoons and sitting by him, and he liked to have me - +liked to put out his arm and lay his hand on my knee - would +keep it so a long while. Toward the last he was more +restless and flighty at night - often fancied himself with +his regiment - by his talk sometimes seem'd as if his +feelings were hurt by being blamed by his officers for +something he was entirely innocent of - said `I never in my +life was thought capable of such a thing, and never was.' At +other times he would fancy himself talking as it seem'd to +children or such like, his relatives, I suppose, and giving +them good advice; would talk to them a long while. All the +time he was out of his head not one single bad word, or +thought, or idea escaped him. It was remark'd that many a +man's conversation in his senses was not half so good as +Frank's delirium. + +"He was perfectly willing to die - he had become very weak, +and had suffer'd a good deal, and was perfectly resign'd, +poor boy. I do not know his past life, but I feel as if it +must have been good. At any rate what I saw of him here, +under the most trying circumstances, with a painful wound, +and among strangers, I can say that he behaved so brave, so +composed, and so sweet and affectionate, it could not be +surpassed. And now, like many other noble and good men, +after serving his country as a soldier, he has yielded up his +young life at the very outset in her service. Such things +are gloomy - yet there is a text, `God doeth all things +well,' the meaning of which, after due time, appears to the +soul. + +"I thought perhaps a few words, though from a stranger, about +your son, from one who was with him at the last, might be +worth while, for I loved the young man, though I but saw him +immediately to lose him." + + +It is easy enough to pick holes in the grammar of this +letter, but what are we to say of its profound goodness and +tenderness? It is written as though he had the mother's face +before his eyes, and saw her wincing in the flesh at every +word. And what, again, are we to say of its sober +truthfulness, not exaggerating, not running to phrases, not +seeking to make a hero out of what was only an ordinary but +good and brave young man? Literary reticence is not +Whitman's stronghold; and this reticence is not literary, but +humane; it is not that of a good artist but that of a good +man. He knew that what the mother wished to hear about was +Frank; and he told her about her Frank as he was. + + +V. + + +Something should be said of Whitman's style, for style is of +the essence of thinking. And where a man is so critically +deliberate as our author, and goes solemnly about his poetry +for an ulterior end, every indication is worth notice. He +has chosen a rough, unrhymed, lyrical verse; sometimes +instinct with a fine processional movement; often so rugged +and careless that it can only be described by saying that he +has not taken the trouble to write prose. I believe myself +that it was selected principally because it was easy to +write, although not without recollections of the marching +measures of some of the prose in our English Old Testament. +According to Whitman, on the other hand, "the time has +arrived to essentially break down the barriers of form +between Prose and Poetry . . . for the most cogent purposes +of those great inland states, and for Texas, and California, +and Oregon;" - a statement which is among the happiest +achievements of American humour. He calls his verses +"recitatives," in easily followed allusion to a musical form. +"Easily-written, loose-fingered chords," he cries, "I feel +the thrum of your climax and close." Too often, I fear, he +is the only one who can perceive the rhythm; and in spite of +Mr. Swinburne, a great part of his work considered as verses +is poor bald stuff. Considered, not as verse, but as speech, +a great part of it is full of strange and admirable merits. +The right detail is seized; the right word, bold and +trenchant, is thrust into its place. Whitman has small +regard to literary decencies, and is totally free from +literary timidities. He is neither afraid of being slangy +nor of being dull; nor, let me add, of being ridiculous. The +result is a most surprising compound of plain grandeur, +sentimental affectation, and downright nonsense. It would be +useless to follow his detractors and give instances of how +bad he can be at his worst; and perhaps it would be not much +wiser to give extracted specimens of how happily he can write +when he is at his best. These come in to most advantage in +their own place; owing something, it may be, to the offset of +their curious surroundings. And one thing is certain, that +no one can appreciate Whitman's excellences until he has +grown accustomed to his faults. Until you are content to +pick poetry out of his pages almost as you must pick it out +of a Greek play in Bohn's translation, your gravity will be +continually upset, your ears perpetually disappointed, and +the whole book will be no more to you than a particularly +flagrant production by the Poet Close. + +A writer of this uncertain quality was, perhaps, unfortunate +in taking for thesis the beauty of the world as it now is, +not only on the hill-tops but in the factory; not only by the +harbour full of stately ships, but in the magazine of the +hopelessly prosaic hatter. To show beauty in common things +is the work of the rarest tact. It is not to be done by the +wishing. It is easy to posit as a theory, but to bring it +home to men's minds is the problem of literature, and is only +accomplished by rare talent, and in comparatively rare +instances. To bid the whole world stand and deliver, with a +dogma in one's right hand by way of pistol; to cover reams of +paper in a galloping, headstrong vein; to cry louder and +louder over everything as it comes up, and make no +distinction in one's enthusiasm over the most incomparable +matters; to prove one's entire want of sympathy for the +jaded, literary palate, by calling, not a spade a spade, but +a hatter a hatter, in a lyrical apostrophe; - this, in spite +of all the airs of inspiration, is not the way to do it. It +may be very wrong, and very wounding to a respectable branch +of industry, but the word "hatter" cannot be used seriously +in emotional verse; not to understand this, is to have no +literary tact; and I would, for his own sake, that this were +the only inadmissible expression with which Whitman had +bedecked his pages. The book teems with similar +comicalities; and, to a reader who is determined to take it +from that side only, presents a perfect carnival of fun. + +A good deal of this is the result of theory playing its usual +vile trick upon the artist. It is because he is a Democrat +that Whitman must have in the hatter. If you may say +Admiral, he reasons, why may you not say Hatter? One man is +as good as another, and it is the business of the "great +poet" to show poetry in the life of the one as well as the +other. A most incontrovertible sentiment surely, and one +which nobody would think of controverting, where - and here +is the point - where any beauty has been shown. But how, +where that is not the case? where the hatter is simply +introduced, as God made him and as his fellow-men have +miscalled him, at the crisis of a high-flown rhapsody? And +what are we to say, where a man of Whitman's notable capacity +for putting things in a bright, picturesque, and novel way, +simply gives up the attempt, and indulges, with apparent +exultation, in an inventory of trades or implements, with no +more colour or coherence than so many index-words out of a +dictionary? I do not know that we can say anything, but that +it is a prodigiously amusing exhibition for a line or so. +The worst of it is, that Whitman must have known better. The +man is a great critic, and, so far as I can make out, a good +one; and how much criticism does it require to know that +capitulation is not description, or that fingering on a dumb +keyboard, with whatever show of sentiment and execution, is +not at all the same thing as discoursing music? I wish I +could believe he was quite honest with us; but, indeed, who +was ever quite honest who wrote a book for a purpose? It is +a flight beyond the reach of human magnanimity. + +One other point, where his means failed him, must be touched +upon, however shortly. In his desire to accept all facts +loyally and simply, it fell within his programme to speak at +some length and with some plainness on what is, for I really +do not know what reason, the most delicate of subjects. +Seeing in that one of the most serious and interesting parts +of life, he was aggrieved that it should be looked upon as +ridiculous or shameful. No one speaks of maternity with his +tongue in his cheek; and Whitman made a bold push to set the +sanctity of fatherhood beside the sanctity of motherhood, and +introduce this also among the things that can be spoken of +without either a blush or a wink. But the Philistines have +been too strong; and, to say truth, Whitman has rather played +the fool. We may be thoroughly conscious that his end is +improving; that it would be a good thing if a window were +opened on these close privacies of life; that on this +subject, as on all others, he now and then lets fall a +pregnant saying. But we are not satisfied. We feel that he +was not the man for so difficult an enterprise. He loses our +sympathy in the character of a poet by attracting too much of +our attention in that of a Bull in a China Shop. And where, +by a little more art, we might have been solemnised +ourselves, it is too often Whitman alone who is solemn in the +face of an audience somewhat indecorously amused. + + +VI. + + +Lastly, as most important, after all, to human beings in our +disputable state, what is that higher prudence which was to +be the aim and issue of these deliberate productions? + +Whitman is too clever to slip into a succinct formula. If he +could have adequately said his say in a single proverb, it is +to be presumed he would not have put himself to the trouble +of writing several volumes. It was his programme to state as +much as he could of the world with all its contradictions, +and leave the upshot with God who planned it. What he has +made of the world and the world's meanings is to be found at +large in his poems. These altogether give his answers to the +problems of belief and conduct; in many ways righteous and +high-spirited, in some ways loose and contradictory. And yet +there are two passages from the preface to the LEAVES OF +GRASS which do pretty well condense his teaching on all +essential points, and yet preserve a measure of his spirit. + + +"This is what you shall do," he says in the one, "love the +earth, and sun, and animals, despise riches, give alms to +every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, +devote your income and labour to others, hate tyrants, argue +not concerning God, have patience and indulgence towards 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 mothers of families, read +these leaves (his own works) 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, and dismiss whatever +insults your own soul." + +"The prudence of the greatest poet," he adds in the other - +and the greatest poet is, of course, himself - "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 it 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 long-lived things, +and favours body and soul the same, and perceives the +indirect surely 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 nor +avoids death." + + +There is much that is Christian in these extracts, +startlingly Christian. Any reader who bears in mind +Whitman's own advice and "dismisses whatever insults his own +soul" will find plenty that is bracing, brightening, and +chastening to reward him for a little patience at first. It +seems hardly possible that any being should get evil from so +healthy a book as the LEAVES OF GRASS, which is simply +comical wherever it falls short of nobility; but if there be +any such, who cannot both take and leave, who cannot let a +single opportunity pass by without some unworthy and unmanly +thought, I should have as great difficulty, and neither more +nor less, in recommending the works of Whitman as in lending +them Shakespeare, or letting them go abroad outside of the +grounds of a private asylum. + + + +CHAPTER IV - HENRY DAVID THOREAU: HIS CHARACTER AND OPINIONS + + + +I. + + +THOREAU'S thin, penetrating, big-nosed face, even in a bad +woodcut, conveys some hint of the limitations of his mind and +character. With his almost acid sharpness of insight, with +his almost animal dexterity in act, there went none of that +large, unconscious geniality of the world's heroes. He was +not easy, not ample, not urbane, not even kind; his enjoyment +was hardly smiling, or the smile was not broad enough to be +convincing; he had no waste lands nor kitchen-midden in his +nature, but was all improved and sharpened to a point. "He +was bred to no profession," says Emerson; "he never married; +he lived alone; he never went to church; he never voted; he +refused to pay a tax to the State; he ate no flesh, he drank +no wine, he never knew the use of tobacco and, though a +naturalist, he used neither trap nor gun. When asked at +dinner what dish he preferred, he answered, `the nearest.'" +So many negative superiorities begin to smack a little of the +prig. From his later works he was in the habit of cutting +out the humorous passages, under the impression that they +were beneath the dignity of his moral muse; and there we see +the prig stand public and confessed. It was "much easier," +says Emerson acutely, much easier for Thoreau to say NO than +YES; and that is a characteristic which depicts the man. It +is a useful accomplishment to be able to say NO, but surely +it is the essence of amiability to prefer to say YES where it +is possible. There is something wanting in the man who does +not hate himself whenever he is constrained to say no. And +there was a great deal wanting in this born dissenter. He +was almost shockingly devoid of weaknesses; he had not enough +of them to be truly polar with humanity; whether you call him +demi-god or demi-man, he was at least not altogether one of +us, for he was not touched with a feeling of our infirmities. +The world's heroes have room for all positive qualities, even +those which are disreputable, in the capacious theatre of +their dispositions. Such can live many lives; while a +Thoreau can live but one, and that only with perpetual +foresight. + +He was no ascetic, rather an Epicurean of the nobler sort; +and he had this one great merit, that he succeeded so far as +to be happy. "I love my fate to the core and rind," he wrote +once; and even while he lay dying, here is what he dictated +(for it seems he was already too feeble to control the pen): +"You ask particularly after my health. I SUPPOSE that I have +not many months to live, but of course know nothing about it. +I may say that I am enjoying existence as much as ever, and +regret nothing." It is not given to all to bear so clear a +testimony to the sweetness of their fate, nor to any without +courage and wisdom; for this world in itself is but a painful +and uneasy place of residence, and lasting happiness, at +least to the self-conscious, comes only from within. Now +Thoreau's content and ecstasy in living was, we may say, like +a plant that he had watered and tended with womanish +solicitude; for there is apt to be something unmanly, +something almost dastardly, in a life that does not move with +dash and freedom, and that fears the bracing contact of the +world. In one word, Thoreau was a skulker. He did not wish +virtue to go out of him among his fellow-men, but slunk into +a corner to hoard it for himself. He left all for the sake +of certain virtuous self-indulgences. It is true that his +tastes were noble; that his ruling passion was to keep +himself unspotted from the world; and that his luxuries were +all of the same healthy order as cold tubs and early rising. +But a man may be both coldly cruel in the pursuit of +goodness, and morbid even in the pursuit of health. I cannot +lay my hands on the passage in which he explains his +abstinence from tea and coffee, but I am sure I have the +meaning correctly. It is this; He thought it bad economy and +worthy of no true virtuoso to spoil the natural rapture of +the morning with such muddy stimulants; let him but see the +sun rise, and he was already sufficiently inspirited for the +labours of the day. That may be reason good enough to +abstain from tea; but when we go on to find the same man, on +the same or similar grounds, abstain from nearly everything +that his neighbours innocently and pleasurably use, and from +the rubs and trials of human society itself into the bargain, +we recognise that valetudinarian healthfulness which is more +delicate than sickness itself. We need have no respect for a +state of artificial training. True health is to be able to +do without it. Shakespeare, we can imagine, might begin the +day upon a quart of ale, and yet enjoy the sunrise to the +full as much as Thoreau, and commemorate his enjoyment in +vastly better verses. A man who must separate himself from +his neighbours' habits in order to be happy, is in much the +same case with one who requires to take opium for the same +purpose. What we want to see is one who can breast into the +world, do a man's work, and still preserve his first and pure +enjoyment of existence. + +Thoreau's faculties were of a piece with his moral shyness; +for they were all delicacies. He could guide himself about +the woods on the darkest night by the touch of his feet. He +could pick up at once an exact dozen of pencils by the +feeling, pace distances with accuracy, and gauge cubic +contents by the eye. His smell was so dainty that he could +perceive the foetor of dwelling-houses as he passed them by +at night; his palate so unsophisticated that, like a child, +he disliked the taste of wine - or perhaps, living in +America, had never tasted any that was good; and his +knowledge of nature was so complete and curious that he could +have told the time of year, within a day or so, by the aspect +of the plants. In his dealings with animals, he was the +original of Hawthorne's Donatello. He pulled the woodchuck +out of its hole by the tail; the hunted fox came to him for +protection; wild squirrels have been seen to nestle in his +waistcoat; he would thrust his arm into a pool and bring +forth a bright, panting fish, lying undismayed in the palm of +his hand. There were few things that he could not do. He +could make a house, a boat, a pencil, or a book. He was a +surveyor, a scholar, a natural historian. He could run, +walk, climb, skate, swim, and manage a boat. The smallest +occasion served to display his physical accomplishment; and a +manufacturer, from merely observing his dexterity with the +window of a railway carriage, offered him a situation on the +spot. "The only fruit of much living," he observes, "is the +ability to do some slight thing better." But such was the +exactitude of his senses, so alive was he in every fibre, +that it seems as if the maxim should be changed in his case, +for he could do most things with unusual perfection. And +perhaps he had an approving eye to himself when he wrote: +"Though the youth at last grows indifferent, the laws of the +universe are not indifferent, BUT ARE FOR EVER ON THE SIDE OF +THE MOST SENSITIVE." + + +II. + + +Thoreau had decided, it would seem, from the very first to +lead a life of self-improvement: the needle did not tremble +as with richer natures, but pointed steadily north; and as he +saw duty and inclination in one, he turned all his strength +in that direction. He was met upon the threshold by a common +difficulty. In this world, in spite of its many agreeable +features, even the most sensitive must undergo some drudgery +to live. It is not possible to devote your time to study and +meditation without what are quaintly but happily denominated +private means; these absent, a man must contrive to earn his +bread by some service to the public such as the public cares +to pay him for; or, as Thoreau loved to put it, Apollo must +serve Admetus. This was to Thoreau even a sourer necessity +than it is to most; there was a love of freedom, a strain of +the wild man, in his nature, that rebelled with violence +against the yoke of custom; and he was so eager to cultivate +himself and to be happy in his own society, that he could +consent with difficulty even to the interruptions of +friendship. "SUCH ARE MY ENGAGEMENTS TO MYSELF that I dare +not promise," he once wrote in answer to an invitation; and +the italics are his own. Marcus Aurelius found time to study +virtue, and between whiles to conduct the imperial affairs of +Rome; but Thoreau is so busy improving himself, that he must +think twice about a morning call. And now imagine him +condemned for eight hours a day to some uncongenial and +unmeaning business! He shrank from the very look of the +mechanical in life; all should, if possible, be sweetly +spontaneous and swimmingly progressive. Thus he learned to +make lead-pencils, and, when he had gained the best +certificate and his friends began to congratulate him on his +establishment in life, calmly announced that he should never +make another. "Why should I?" said he "I would not do again +what I have done once." For when a thing has once been done +as well as it wants to be, it is of no further interest to +the self-improver. Yet in after years, and when it became +needful to support his family, he returned patiently to this +mechanical art - a step more than worthy of himself. + +The pencils seem to have been Apollo's first experiment in +the service of Admetus; but others followed. "I have +thoroughly tried school-keeping," he writes, "and found that +my expenses were in proportion, or rather out of proportion, +to my income; for I was obliged to dress and train, not to +say think and believe, accordingly, and I lost my time into +the bargain. As I did not teach for the benefit of my +fellow-men, but simply for a livelihood, this was a failure. +I have tried trade, but I found that it would take ten years +to get under way in that, and that then I should probably be +on my way to the devil." Nothing, indeed, can surpass his +scorn for all so-called business. Upon that subject gall +squirts from him at a touch. "The whole enterprise of this +nation is not illustrated by a thought," he writes; "it is +not warmed by a sentiment; there is nothing in it for which a +man should lay down his life, nor even his gloves." And +again: "If our merchants did not most of them fail, and the +banks too, my faith in the old laws of this world would be +staggered. The statement that ninety-six in a hundred doing +such business surely break down is perhaps the sweetest fact +that statistics have revealed." The wish was probably father +to the figures; but there is something enlivening in a hatred +of so genuine a brand, hot as Corsican revenge, and sneering +like Voltaire. + +Pencils, school-keeping, and trade being thus discarded one +after another, Thoreau, with a stroke of strategy, turned the +position. He saw his way to get his board and lodging for +practically nothing; and Admetus never got less work out of +any servant since the world began. It was his ambition to be +an oriental philosopher; but he was always a very Yankee sort +of oriental. Even in the peculiar attitude in which he stood +to money, his system of personal economics, as we may call +it, he displayed a vast amount of truly down-East +calculation, and he adopted poverty like a piece of business. +Yet his system is based on one or two ideas which, I believe, +come naturally to all thoughtful youths, and are only pounded +out of them by city uncles. Indeed, something essentially +youthful distinguishes all Thoreau's knock-down blows at +current opinion. Like the posers of a child, they leave the +orthodox in a kind of speechless agony. These know the thing +is nonsense. They are sure there must be an answer, yet +somehow cannot find it. So it is with his system of economy. +He cuts through the subject on so new a plane that the +accepted arguments apply no longer; he attacks it in a new +dialect where there are no catchwords ready made for the +defender; after you have been boxing for years on a polite, +gladiatorial convention, here is an assailant who does not +scruple to hit below the belt. + +"The cost of a thing," says he, "is THE AMOUNT OF WHAT I WILL +CALL LIFE which is required to be exchanged for it, +immediately or in the long run." I have been accustomed to +put it to myself, perhaps more clearly, that the price we +have to pay for money is paid in liberty. Between these two +ways of it, at least, the reader will probably not fail to +find a third definition of his own; and it follows, on one or +other, that a man may pay too dearly for his livelihood, by +giving, in Thoreau's terms, his whole life for it, or, in +mine, bartering for it the whole of his available liberty, +and becoming a slave till death. There are two questions to +be considered - the quality of what we buy, and the price we +have to pay for it. Do you want a thousand a year, a two +thousand a year, or a ten thousand a year livelihood? and can +you afford the one you want? It is a matter of taste; it is +not in the least degree a question of duty, though commonly +supposed so. But there is no authority for that view +anywhere. It is nowhere in the Bible. It is true that we +might do a vast amount of good if we were wealthy, but it is +also highly improbable; not many do; and the art of growing +rich is not only quite distinct from that of doing good, but +the practice of the one does not at all train a man for +practising the other. "Money might be of great service to +me," writes Thoreau; "but the difficulty now is that I do not +improve my opportunities, and therefore I am not prepared to +have my opportunities increased." It is a mere illusion +that, above a certain income, the personal desires will be +satisfied and leave a wider margin for the generous impulse. +It is as difficult to be generous, or anything else, except +perhaps a member of Parliament, on thirty thousand as on two +hundred a year. + +Now Thoreau's tastes were well defined. He loved to be free, +to be master of his times and seasons, to indulge the mind +rather than the body; he preferred long rambles to rich +dinners, his own reflections to the consideration of society, +and an easy, calm, unfettered, active life among green trees +to dull toiling at the counter of a bank. And such being his +inclination he determined to gratify it. A poor man must +save off something; he determined to save off his livelihood. +"When a man has attained those things which are necessary to +life," he writes, "there is another alternative than to +obtain the superfluities; HE MAY ADVENTURE ON LIFE NOW, his +vacation from humbler toil having commenced." Thoreau would +get shelter, some kind of covering for his body, and +necessary daily bread; even these he should get as cheaply as +possible; and then, his vacation from humbler toil having +commenced, devote himself to oriental philosophers, the study +of nature, and the work of self-improvement. + +Prudence, which bids us all go to the ant for wisdom and +hoard against the day of sickness, was not a favourite with +Thoreau. He preferred that other, whose name is so much +misappropriated: Faith. When he had secured the necessaries +of the moment, he would not reckon up possible accidents or +torment himself with trouble for the future. He had no +toleration for the man "who ventures to live only by the aid +of the mutual insurance company, which has promised to bury +him decently." He would trust himself a little to the world. +"We may safely trust a good deal more than we do," says he. +"How much is not done by us! or what if we had been taken +sick?" And then, with a stab of satire, he describes +contemporary mankind in a phrase: "All the day long on the +alert, at night we unwillingly say our prayers and commit +ourselves to uncertainties." It is not likely that the +public will be much affected by Thoreau, when they blink the +direct injunctions of the religion they profess; and yet, +whether we will or no, we make the same hazardous ventures; +we back our own health and the honesty of our neighbours for +all that we are worth; and it is chilling to think how many +must lose their wager. + +In 1845, twenty-eight years old, an age by which the +liveliest have usually declined into some conformity with the +world, Thoreau, with a capital of something less than five +pounds and a borrowed axe, walked forth into the woods by +Walden Pond, and began his new experiment in life. He built +himself a dwelling, and returned the axe, he says with +characteristic and workman-like pride, sharper than when he +borrowed it; he reclaimed a patch, where he cultivated beans, +peas, potatoes, and sweet corn; he had his bread to bake, his +farm to dig, and for the matter of six weeks in the summer he +worked at surveying, carpentry, or some other of his numerous +dexterities, for hire. + +For more than five years, this was all that he required to do +for his support, and he had the winter and most of the summer +at his entire disposal. For six weeks of occupation, a +little cooking and a little gentle hygienic gardening, the +man, you may say, had as good as stolen his livelihood. Or +we must rather allow that he had done far better; for the +thief himself is continually and busily occupied; and even +one born to inherit a million will have more calls upon his +time than Thoreau. Well might he say, "What old people tell +you you cannot do, you try and find you can." And how +surprising is his conclusion: "I am convinced that TO +MAINTAIN ONESELF ON THIS EARTH IS NOT A HARDSHIP, BUT A +PASTIME, if we will live simply and wisely; AS THE PURSUITS +OF SIMPLER NATIONS ARE STILL THE SPORTS OF THE MORE +ARTIFICIAL." + +When he had enough of that kind of life, he showed the same +simplicity in giving it up as in beginning it. There are +some who could have done the one, but, vanity forbidding, not +the other; and that is perhaps the story of the hermits; but +Thoreau made no fetish of his own example, and did what he +wanted squarely. And five years is long enough for an +experiment and to prove the success of transcendental +Yankeeism. It is not his frugality which is worthy of note; +for, to begin with, that was inborn, and therefore inimitable +by others who are differently constituted; and again, it was +no new thing, but has often been equalled by poor Scotch +students at the universities. The point is the sanity of his +view of life, and the insight with which he recognised the +position of money, and thought out for himself the problem of +riches and a livelihood. Apart from his eccentricities, he +had perceived, and was acting on, a truth of universal +application. For money enters in two different characters +into the scheme of life. A certain amount, varying with the +number and empire of our desires, is a true necessary to each +one of us in the present order of society; but beyond that +amount, money is a commodity to be bought or not to be +bought, a luxury in which we may either indulge or stint +ourselves, like any other. And there are many luxuries that +we may legitimately prefer to it, such as a grateful +conscience, a country life, or the woman of our inclination. +Trite, flat, and obvious as this conclusion may appear, we +have only to look round us in society to see how scantily it +has been recognised; and perhaps even ourselves, after a +little reflection, may decide to spend a trifle less for +money, and indulge ourselves a trifle more in the article of +freedom. + + +III. + + +"To have done anything by which you earned money merely," +says Thoreau, "is to be" (have been, he means) "idle and +worse." There are two passages in his letters, both, oddly +enough, relating to firewood, which must be brought together +to be rightly understood. So taken, they contain between +them the marrow of all good sense on the subject of work in +its relation to something broader than mere livelihood. Here +is the first: "I suppose I have burned up a good-sized tree +to-night - and for what? I settled with Mr. Tarbell for it +the other day; but that wasn't the final settlement. I got +off cheaply from him. At last one will say: 'Let us see, how +much wood did you burn, sir?' And I shall shudder to think +that the next question will be, 'What did you do while you +were warm?'" Even after we have settled with Admetus in the +person of Mr. Tarbell, there comes, you see, a further +question. It is not enough to have earned our livelihood. +Either the earning itself should have been serviceable to +mankind, or something else must follow. To live is sometimes +very difficult, but it is never meritorious in itself; and we +must have a reason to allege to our own conscience why we +should continue to exist upon this crowded earth. + +If Thoreau had simply dwelt in his house at Walden, a lover +of trees, birds, and fishes, and the open air and virtue, a +reader of wise books, an idle, selfish self-improver, he +would have managed to cheat Admetus, but, to cling to +metaphor, the devil would have had him in the end. Those who +can avoid toil altogether and dwell in the Arcadia of private +means, and even those who can, by abstinence, reduce the +necessary amount of it to some six weeks a year, having the +more liberty, have only the higher moral obligation to be up +and doing in the interest of man. + +The second passage is this: "There is a far more important +and warming heat, commonly lost, which precedes the burning +of the wood. It is the smoke of industry, which is incense. +I had been so thoroughly warmed in body and spirit, that when +at length my fuel was housed, I came near selling it to the +ashman, as if I had extracted all its heat." Industry is, in +itself and when properly chosen, delightful and profitable to +the worker; and when your toil has been a pleasure, you have +not, as Thoreau says, "earned money merely," but money, +health, delight, and moral profit, all in one. "We must heap +up a great pile of doing for a small diameter of being," he +says in another place; and then exclaims, "How admirably the +artist is made to accomplish his self-culture by devotion to +his art!" We may escape uncongenial toil, only to devote +ourselves to that which is congenial. It is only to transact +some higher business that even Apollo dare play the truant +from Admetus. We must all work for the sake of work; we must +all work, as Thoreau says again, in any "absorbing pursuit - +it does not much matter what, so it be honest;" but the most +profitable work is that which combines into one continued +effort the largest proportion of the powers and desires of a +man's nature; that into which he will plunge with ardour, and +from which he will desist with reluctance; in which he will +know the weariness of fatigue, but not that of satiety; and +which will be ever fresh, pleasing, and stimulating to his +taste. Such work holds a man together, braced at all points; +it does not suffer him to doze or wander; it keeps him +actively conscious of himself, yet raised among superior +interests; it gives him the profit of industry with the +pleasures of a pastime. This is what his art should be to +the true artist, and that to a degree unknown in other and +less intimate pursuits. For other professions stand apart +from the human business of life; but an art has its seat at +the centre of the artist's doings and sufferings, deals +directly with his experiences, teaches him the lessons of his +own fortunes and mishaps, and becomes a part of his +biography. So says Goethe: + + +"Spat erklingt was fruh erklang; +Gluck und Ungluck wird Gesang." + + +Now Thoreau's art was literature; and it was one of which he +had conceived most ambitiously. He loved and believed in +good books. He said well, "Life is not habitually seen from +any common platform so truly and unexaggerated as in the +light of literature." But the literature he loved was of the +heroic order. "Books, not which afford us a cowering +enjoyment, but in which each thought is of unusual daring; +such as an idle man cannot read, and a timid one would not be +entertained by, which even make us dangerous to existing +institutions - such I call good books." He did not think +them easy to be read. "The heroic books," he says, "even if +printed in the character of our mother-tongue, will always be +in a language dead to degenerate times; and we must +laboriously seek the meaning of each word and line, +conjecturing a larger sense than common use permits out of +what wisdom and valour and generosity we have." Nor does he +suppose that such books are easily written. "Great prose, of +equal elevation, commands our respect more than great verse," +says he, "since it implies a more permanent and level height, +a life more pervaded with the grandeur of the thought. The +poet often only makes an irruption, like the Parthian, and is +off again, shooting while he retreats; but the prose writer +has conquered like a Roman and settled colonies." We may ask +ourselves, almost with dismay, whether such works exist at +all but in the imagination of the student. For the bulk of +the best of books is apt to be made up with ballast; and +those in which energy of thought is combined with any +stateliness of utterance may be almost counted on the +fingers. Looking round in English for a book that should +answer Thoreau's two demands of a style like poetry and sense +that shall be both original and inspiriting, I come to +Milton's AREOPAGITICA, and can name no other instance for the +moment. Two things at least are plain: that if a man will +condescend to nothing more commonplace in the way of reading, +he must not look to have a large library; and that if he +proposes himself to write in a similar vein, he will find his +work cut out for him. + +Thoreau composed seemingly while he walked, or at least +exercise and composition were with him intimately connected; +for we are told that "the length of his walk uniformly made +the length of his writing." He speaks in one place of +"plainness and vigour, the ornaments of style," which is +rather too paradoxical to be comprehensively, true. + +In another he remarks: "As for style of writing, if one has +anything to say it drops from him simply as a stone falls to +the ground." We must conjecture a very large sense indeed +for the phrase "if one has anything to say." When truth +flows from a man, fittingly clothed in style and without +conscious effort, it is because the effort has been made and +the work practically completed before he sat down to write. +It is only out of fulness of thinking that expression drops +perfect like a ripe fruit; and when Thoreau wrote so +nonchalantly at his desk, it was because he had been +vigorously active during his walk. For neither clearness +compression, nor beauty of language, come to any living +creature till after a busy and a prolonged acquaintance with +the subject on hand. Easy writers are those who, like Walter +Scott, choose to remain contented with a less degree of +perfection than is legitimately within the compass of their +powers. We hear of Shakespeare and his clean manuscript; but +in face of the evidence of the style itself and of the +various editions of HAMLET, this merely proves that Messrs. +Hemming and Condell were unacquainted with the common enough +phenomenon called a fair copy. He who would recast a tragedy +already given to the world must frequently and earnestly have +revised details in the study. Thoreau himself, and in spite +of his protestations, is an instance of even extreme research +in one direction; and his effort after heroic utterance is +proved not only by the occasional finish, but by the +determined exaggeration of his style. "I trust you realise +what an exaggerator I am - that I lay myself out to +exaggerate," he writes. And again, hinting at the +explanation: "Who that has heard a strain of music feared +lest he should speak extravagantly any more for ever?" And +yet once more, in his essay on Carlyle, and this time with +his meaning well in hand: "No truth, we think, was ever +expressed but with this sort of emphasis, that for the time +there seemed to be no other." Thus Thoreau was an +exaggerative and a parabolical writer, not because he loved +the literature of the East, but from a desire that people +should understand and realise what he was writing. He was +near the truth upon the general question; but in his own +particular method, it appears to me, he wandered. Literature +is not less a conventional art than painting or sculpture; +and it is the least striking, as it is the most comprehensive +of the three. To hear a strain of music to see a beautiful +woman, a river, a great city, or a starry night, is to make a +man despair of his Lilliputian arts in language. Now, to +gain that emphasis which seems denied to us by the very +nature of the medium, the proper method of literature is by +selection, which is a kind of negative exaggeration. It is +the right of the literary artist, as Thoreau was on the point +of seeing, to leave out whatever does not suit his purpose. +Thus we extract the pure gold; and thus the well-written +story of a noble life becomes, by its very omissions, more +thrilling to the reader. But to go beyond this, like +Thoreau, and to exaggerate directly, is to leave the saner +classical tradition, and to put the reader on his guard. And +when you write the whole for the half, you do not express +your thought more forcibly, but only express a different +thought which is not yours. + +Thoreau's true subject was the pursuit of self-improvement +combined with an unfriendly criticism of life as it goes on +in our societies; it is there that he best displays the +freshness and surprising trenchancy of his intellect; it is +there that his style becomes plain and vigorous, and +therefore, according to his own formula, ornamental. Yet he +did not care to follow this vein singly, but must drop into +it by the way in books of a different purport. WALDEN, OR +LIFE IN THE WOODS, A WEEK ON THE CONCORD AND MERRIMACK +RIVERS, THE MAINE WOODS, - such are the titles he affects. +He was probably reminded by his delicate critical perception +that the true business of literature is with narrative; in +reasoned narrative, and there alone, that art enjoys all its +advantages, and suffers least from its defects. Dry precept +and disembodied disquisition, as they can only be read with +an effort of abstraction, can never convey a perfectly +complete or a perfectly natural impression. Truth, even in +literature, must be clothed with flesh and blood, or it +cannot tell its whole story to the reader. Hence the effect +of anecdote on simple minds; and hence good biographies and +works of high, imaginative art, are not only far more +entertaining, but far more edifying, than books of theory or +precept. Now Thoreau could not clothe his opinions in the +garment of art, for that was not his talent; but he sought to +gain the same elbow-room for himself, and to afford a similar +relief to his readers, by mingling his thoughts with a record +of experience. + +Again, he was a lover of nature. The quality which we should +call mystery in a painting, and which belongs so particularly +to the aspect of the external world and to its influence upon +our feelings, was one which he was never weary of attempting +to reproduce in his books. The seeming significance of +nature's appearances, their unchanging strangeness to the +senses, and the thrilling response which they waken in the +mind of man, continued to surprise and stimulate his spirits. +It appeared to him, I think, that if we could only write near +enough to the facts, and yet with no pedestrian calm, but +ardently, we might transfer the glamour of reality direct +upon our pages; and that, if it were once thus captured and +expressed, a new and instructive relation might appear +between men's thoughts and the phenomena of nature. This was +the eagle that he pursued all his life long, like a schoolboy +with a butterfly net. Hear him to a friend: "Let me suggest +a theme for you - to state to yourself precisely and +completely what that walk over the mountains amounted to for +you, returning to this essay again and again until you are +satisfied that all that was important in your experience is +in it. Don't suppose that you can tell it precisely the +first dozen times you try, but at 'em again; especially when, +after a sufficient pause you suspect that you are touching +the heart or summit of the matter, reiterate your blows +there, and account for the mountain to yourself. Not that +the story need be long, but it will take a long while to make +it short." Such was the method, not consistent for a man +whose meanings were to "drop from him as a stone falls to the +ground." Perhaps the most successful work that Thoreau ever +accomplished in this direction is to be found in the passages +relating to fish in the WEEK. These are remarkable for a +vivid truth of impression and a happy suitability of +language, not frequently surpassed. + +Whatever Thoreau tried to do was tried in fair, square prose, +with sentences solidly built, and no help from bastard +rhythms. Moreover, there is a progression - I cannot call it +a progress - in his work towards a more and more strictly +prosaic level, until at last he sinks into the bathos of the +prosy. Emerson mentions having once remarked to Thoreau: +"Who would not like to write something which all can read, +like ROBINSON CRUSOE? and who does not see with regret that +his page is not solid with a right materialistic treatment +which delights everybody?" I must say in passing that it is +not the right materialistic treatment which delights the +world in ROBINSON, but the romantic and philosophic interest +of the fable. The same treatment does quite the reverse of +delighting us when it is applied, in COLONEL JACK, to the +management of a plantation. But I cannot help suspecting +Thoreau to have been influenced either by this identical +remark or by some other closely similar in meaning. He began +to fall more and more into a detailed materialistic +treatment; he went into the business doggedly, as one who +should make a guide-book; he not only chronicled what had +been important in his own experience, but whatever might have +been important in the experience of anybody else; not only +what had affected him, but all that he saw or heard. His +ardour had grown less, or perhaps it was inconsistent with a +right materialistic treatment to display such emotions as he +felt; and, to complete the eventful change, he chose, from a +sense of moral dignity, to gut these later works of the +saving quality of humour. He was not one of those authors +who have learned, in his own words, "to leave out their +dulness." He inflicts his full quantity upon the reader in +such books as CAPE COD, or THE YANKEE IN CANADA. Of the +latter he confessed that he had not managed to get much of +himself into it. Heaven knows he had not, nor yet much of +Canada, we may hope. "Nothing," he says somewhere, "can +shock a brave man but dulness." Well, there are few spots +more shocking to the brave than the pages of YANKEE IN +CANADA. + +There are but three books of his that will be read with much +pleasure: the WEEK, WALDEN, and the collected letters. As to +his poetry, Emerson's word shall suffice for us, it is so +accurate and so prettily said: "The thyme and majoram are not +yet honey." In this, as in his prose, he relied greatly on +the goodwill of the reader, and wrote throughout in faith. +It was an exercise of faith to suppose that many would +understand the sense of his best work, or that any could be +exhilarated by the dreary chronicling of his worst. "But," +as he says, "the gods do not hear any rude or discordant +sound, as we learn from the echo; and I know that the nature +towards which I launch these sounds is so rich that it will +modulate anew and wonderfully improve my rudest strain." + + +IV. + + +"What means the fact," he cries, "that a soul which has lost +all hope for itself can inspire in another listening soul +such an infinite confidence in it, even while it is +expressing its despair?" The question is an echo and an +illustration of the words last quoted; and it forms the key- +note of his thoughts on friendship. No one else, to my +knowledge, has spoken in so high and just a spirit of the +kindly relations; and I doubt whether it be a drawback that +these lessons should come from one in many ways so unfitted +to be a teacher in this branch. The very coldness and egoism +of his own intercourse gave him a clearer insight into the +intellectual basis of our warm, mutual tolerations; and +testimony to their worth comes with added force from one who +was solitary and obliging, and of whom a friend remarked, +with equal wit and wisdom, "I love Henry, but I cannot like +him." + +He can hardly be persuaded to make any distinction between +love and friendship; in such rarefied and freezing air, upon +the mountain-tops of meditation, had he taught himself to +breathe. He was, indeed, too accurate an observer not to +have remarked that "there exists already a natural +disinterestedness and liberality" between men and women; yet, +he thought, "friendship is no respecter of sex." Perhaps +there is a sense in which the words are true; but they were +spoken in ignorance; and perhaps we shall have put the matter +most correctly, if we call love a foundation for a nearer and +freer degree of friendship than can be possible without it. +For there are delicacies, eternal between persons of the same +sex, which are melted and disappear in the warmth of love. + +To both, if they are to be right, he attributes the same +nature and condition. "We are not what we are," says he, +"nor do we treat or esteem each other for such, but for what +we are capable of being." "A friend is one who incessantly +pays us the compliment of expecting all the virtues from us, +and who can appreciate them in us." "The friend asks no +return but that his friend will religiously accept and wear +and not disgrace his apotheosis of him." "It is the merit +and preservation of friendship that it takes place on a level +higher than the actual characters of the parties would seem +to warrant." This is to put friendship on a pedestal indeed; +and yet the root of the matter is there; and the last +sentence, in particular, is like a light in a dark place, and +makes many mysteries plain. We are different with different +friends; yet if we look closely we shall find that every such +relation reposes on some particular apotheosis of oneself; +with each friend, although we could not distinguish it in +words from any other, we have at least one special reputation +to preserve: and it is thus that we run, when mortified, to +our friend or the woman that we love, not to hear ourselves +called better, but to be better men in point of fact. We +seek this society to flatter ourselves with our own good +conduct. And hence any falsehood in the relation, any +incomplete or perverted understanding, will spoil even the +pleasure of these visits. Thus says Thoreau again: "Only +lovers know the value of truth." And yet again: "They ask +for words and deeds, when a true relation is word and deed." + +But it follows that since they are neither of them so good as +the other hopes, and each is, in a very honest manner, +playing a part above his powers, such an intercourse must +often be disappointing to both. "We may bid farewell sooner +than complain," says Thoreau, "for our complaint is too well +grounded to be uttered." "We have not so good a right to +hate any as our friend." + + +"It were treason to our love +And a sin to God above, +One iota to abate +Of a pure, impartial hate." + + +Love is not blind, nor yet forgiving. "O yes, believe me," +as the song says, "Love has eyes!" The nearer the intimacy, +the more cuttingly do we feel the unworthiness of those we +love; and because you love one, and would die for that love +to-morrow, you have not forgiven, and you never will forgive, +that friend's misconduct. If you want a person's faults, go +to those who love him. They will not tell you, but they +know. And herein lies the magnanimous courage of love, that +it endures this knowledge without change. + +It required a cold, distant personality like that of Thoreau, +perhaps, to recognise and certainly to utter this truth; for +a more human love makes it a point of honour not to +acknowledge those faults of which it is most conscious. But +his point of view is both high and dry. He has no illusions; +he does not give way to love any more than to hatred, but +preserves them both with care like valuable curiosities. A +more bald-headed picture of life, if I may so express myself, +has seldom been presented. He is an egoist; he does not +remember, or does not think it worth while to remark, that, +in these near intimacies, we are ninety-nine times +disappointed in our beggarly selves for once that we are +disappointed in our friend; that it is we who seem most +frequently undeserving of the love that unites us; and that +it is by our friend's conduct that we are continually rebuked +and yet strengthened for a fresh endeavour. Thoreau is dry, +priggish, and selfish. It is profit he is after in these +intimacies; moral profit, certainly, but still profit to +himself. If you will be the sort of friend I want, he +remarks naively, "my education cannot dispense with your +society." His education! as though a friend were a +dictionary. And with all this, not one word about pleasure, +or laughter, or kisses, or any quality of flesh and blood. +It was not inappropriate, surely, that he had such close +relations with the fish. We can understand the friend +already quoted, when he cried: "As for taking his arm, I +would as soon think of taking the arm of an elm-tree!" + +As a matter of fact he experienced but a broken enjoyment in +his intimacies. He says he has been perpetually on the brink +of the sort of intercourse he wanted, and yet never +completely attained it. And what else had he to expect when +he would not, in a happy phrase of Carlyle's, "nestle down +into it"? Truly, so it will be always if you only stroll in +upon your friends as you might stroll in to see a cricket +match; and even then not simply for the pleasure of the +thing, but with some afterthought of self-improvement, as +though you had come to the cricket match to bet. It was his +theory that people saw each other too frequently, so that +their curiosity was not properly whetted, nor had they +anything fresh to communicate; but friendship must be +something else than a society for mutual improvement - +indeed, it must only be that by the way, and to some extent +unconsciously; and if Thoreau had been a man instead of a +manner of elm-tree, he would have felt that he saw his +friends too seldom, and have reaped benefits unknown to his +philosophy from a more sustained and easy intercourse. We +might remind him of his own words about love: "We should have +no reserve; we should give the whole of ourselves to that +business. But commonly men have not imagination enough to be +thus employed about a human being, but must be coopering a +barrel, forsooth." Ay, or reading oriental philosophers. It +is not the nature of the rival occupation, it is the fact +that you suffer it to be a rival, that renders loving +intimacy impossible. Nothing is given for nothing in this +world; there can be no true love, even on your own side, +without devotion; devotion is the exercise of love, by which +it grows; but if you will give enough of that, if you will +pay the price in a sufficient "amount of what you call life," +why then, indeed, whether with wife or comrade, you may have +months and even years of such easy, natural, pleasurable, and +yet improving intercourse as shall make time a moment and +kindness a delight. + +The secret of his retirement lies not in misanthropy, of +which he had no tincture, but part in his engrossing design +of self-improvement and part in the real deficiencies of +social intercourse. He was not so much difficult about his +fellow human beings as he could not tolerate the terms of +their association. He could take to a man for any genuine +qualities, as we see by his admirable sketch of the Canadian +woodcutter in WALDEN; but he would not consent, in his own +words, to "feebly fabulate and paddle in the social slush." +It seemed to him, I think, that society is precisely the +reverse of friendship, in that it takes place on a lower +level than the characters of any of the parties would warrant +us to expect. The society talk of even the most brilliant +man is of greatly less account than what you will get from +him in (as the French say) a little committee. And Thoreau +wanted geniality; he had not enough of the superficial, even +at command; he could not swoop into a parlour and, in the +naval phrase, "cut out" a human being from that dreary port; +nor had he inclination for the task. I suspect he loved +books and nature as well and near as warmly as he loved his +fellow-creatures, - a melancholy, lean degeneration of the +human character. + +"As for the dispute about solitude and society," he thus sums +up: "Any comparison is impertinent. It is an idling down on +the plain at the base of the mountain instead of climbing +steadily to its top. Of course you will be glad of all the +society you can get to go up with? Will you go to glory with +me? is the burden of the song. It is not that we love to be +alone, but that we love to soar, and when we do soar the +company grows thinner and thinner till there is none at all. +It is either the tribune on the plain, a sermon on the mount, +or a very private ecstasy still higher up. Use all the +society that will abet you." But surely it is no very +extravagant opinion that it is better to give than to +receive, to serve than to use our companions; and above all, +where there is no question of service upon either side, that +it is good to enjoy their company like a natural man. It is +curious and in some ways dispiriting that a writer may be +always best corrected out of his own mouth; and so, to +conclude, here is another passage from Thoreau which seems +aimed directly at himself: "Do not be too moral; you may +cheat yourself out of much life so. . . . ALL FABLES, +INDEED, HAVE THEIR MORALS; BUT THE INNOCENT ENJOY THE STORY." + + +V. + + +"The only obligation," says he, "which I have a right to +assume is to do at any time what I think right." "Why should +we ever go abroad, even across the way, to ask a neighbour's +advice?" "There is a nearer neighbour within, who is +incessantly telling us how we should behave. BUT WE WAIT FOR +THE NEIGHBOUR WITHOUT TO TELL US OF SOME FALSE, EASIER WAY." +"The greater part of what my neighbours call good I believe +in my soul to be bad." To be what we are, and to become what +we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life. It is +"when we fall behind ourselves" that "we are cursed with +duties and the neglect of duties." "I love the wild," he +says, "not less than the good." And again: "The life of a +good man will hardly improve us more than the life of a +freebooter, for the inevitable laws appear as plainly in the +infringement as in the observance, and" (mark this) "OUR +LIVES ARE SUSTAINED BY A NEARLY EQUAL EXPENSE OF VIRTUE OF +SOME KIND." Even although he were a prig, it will be owned +he could announce a startling doctrine. "As for doing good," +he writes elsewhere, "that is one of the professions that are +full. Moreover, I have tried it fairly, and, strange as it +may seem, am satisfied that it does not agree with my +constitution. Probably I should not conscientiously and +deliberately forsake my particular calling to do the good +which society demands of me, to save the universe from +annihilation; and I believe that a like but infinitely +greater steadfastness elsewhere is all that now preserves it. +If you should ever be betrayed into any of these +philanthropies, do not let your left hand know what your +right hand does, for it is not worth knowing." Elsewhere he +returns upon the subject, and explains his meaning thus: "If +I ever DID a man any good in their sense, of course it was +something exceptional and insignificant compared with the +good or evil I am constantly doing by being what I am." + +There is a rude nobility, like that of a barbarian king, in +this unshaken confidence in himself and indifference to the +wants, thoughts, or sufferings of others. In his whole works +I find no trace of pity. This was partly the result of +theory, for he held the world too mysterious to be +criticised, and asks conclusively: "What right have I to +grieve who have not ceased to wonder?" But it sprang still +more from constitutional indifference and superiority; and he +grew up healthy, composed, and unconscious from among life's +horrors, like a green bay-tree from a field of battle. It +was from this lack in himself that he failed to do justice to +the spirit of Christ; for while he could glean more meaning +from individual precepts than any score of Christians, yet he +conceived life in such a different hope, and viewed it with +such contrary emotions, that the sense and purport of the +doctrine as a whole seems to have passed him by or left him +unimpressed. He could understand the idealism of the +Christian view, but he was himself so unaffectedly unhuman +that he did not recognise the human intention and essence of +that teaching. Hence he complained that Christ did not leave +us a rule that was proper and sufficient for this world, not +having conceived the nature of the rule that was laid down; +for things of that character that are sufficiently +unacceptable become positively non-existent to the mind. But +perhaps we shall best appreciate the defect in Thoreau by +seeing it supplied in the case of Whitman. For the one, I +feel confident, is the disciple of the other; it is what +Thoreau clearly whispered that Whitman so uproariously bawls; +it is the same doctrine, but with how immense a difference! +the same argument, but used to what a new conclusion! +Thoreau had plenty of humour until he tutored himself out of +it, and so forfeited that best birthright of a sensible man; +Whitman, in that respect, seems to have been sent into the +world naked and unashamed; and yet by a strange consummation, +it is the theory of the former that is arid, abstract, and +claustral. Of these two philosophies so nearly identical at +bottom, the one pursues Self-improvement - a churlish, mangy +dog; the other is up with the morning, in the best of health, +and following the nymph Happiness, buxom, blithe, and +debonair. Happiness, at least, is not solitary; it joys to +communicate; it loves others, for it depends on them for its +existence; it sanctions and encourages to all delights that +are not unkind in themselves; if it lived to a thousand, it +would not make excision of a single humorous passage; and +while the self-improver dwindles towards the prig, and, if he +be not of an excellent constitution may even grow deformed +into an Obermann, the very name and appearance of a happy man +breathe of good-nature, and help the rest of us to live. + +In the case of Thoreau, so great a show of doctrine demands +some outcome in the field of action. If nothing were to be +done but build a shanty beside Walden Pond, we have heard +altogether too much of these declarations of independence. +That the man wrote some books is nothing to the purpose, for +the same has been done in a suburban villa. That he kept +himself happy is perhaps a sufficient excuse, but it is +disappointing to the reader. We may be unjust, but when a +man despises commerce and philanthropy alike, and has views +of good so soaring that he must take himself apart from +mankind for their cultivation, we will not be content without +some striking act. It was not Thoreau's fault if he were not +martyred; had the occasion come, he would have made a noble +ending. As it is, he did once seek to interfere in the +world's course; he made one practical appearance on the stage +of affairs; and a strange one it was, and strangely +characteristic of the nobility and the eccentricity of the +man. It was forced on him by his calm but radical opposition +to negro slavery. "Voting for the right is doing nothing for +it," he saw; "it is only expressing to men feebly your desire +that it should prevail." For his part, he would not "for an +instant recognise that political organisation for HIS +government which is the SLAVE'S government also." "I do not +hesitate to say," he adds, "that those who call themselves +Abolitionists should at once effectually withdraw their +support, both in person and property, from the government of +Massachusetts." That is what he did: in 1843 he ceased to +pay the poll-tax. The highway-tax he paid, for he said he +was as desirous to be a good neighbour as to be a bad +subject; but no more poll-tax to the State of Massachusetts. +Thoreau had now seceded, and was a polity unto himself; or, +as he explains it with admirable sense, "In fact, I quietly +declare war with the State after my fashion, though I will +still make what use and get what advantage of her I can, as +is usual in such cases." He was put in prison; but that was +a part of his design. "Under a government which imprisons +any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison. +I know this well, that if one thousand, if one hundred, if +ten men whom I could name - ay, if ONE HONEST man, in this +State of Massachusetts, CEASING TO HOLD SLAVES, were actually +to withdraw from this copartnership, and be locked up in the +county gaol therefor, it would be the abolition of slavery in +America. For it matters not how small the beginning may seem +to be; what is once well done is done for ever." Such was +his theory of civil disobedience. + +And the upshot? A friend paid the tax for him; continued +year by year to pay it in the sequel; and Thoreau was free to +walk the woods unmolested. It was a FIASCO, but to me it +does not seem laughable; even those who joined in the +laughter at the moment would be insensibly affected by this +quaint instance of a good man's horror for injustice. We may +compute the worth of that one night's imprisonment as +outweighing half a hundred voters at some subsequent +election: and if Thoreau had possessed as great a power of +persuasion as (let us say) Falstaff, if he had counted a +party however small, if his example had been followed by a +hundred or by thirty of his fellows, I cannot but believe it +would have greatly precipitated the era of freedom and +justice. We feel the misdeeds of our country with so little +fervour, for we are not witnesses to the suffering they +cause; but when we see them wake an active horror in our +fellow-man, when we see a neighbour prefer to lie in prison +rather than be so much as passively implicated in their +perpetration, even the dullest of us will begin to realise +them with a quicker pulse. + +Not far from twenty years later, when Captain John Brown was +taken at Harper's Ferry, Thoreau was the first to come +forward in his defence. The committees wrote to him +unanimously that his action was premature. "I did not send +to you for advice," said he, "but to announce that I was to +speak." I have used the word "defence;" in truth he did not +seek to defend him, even declared it would be better for the +good cause that he should die; but he praised his action as I +think Brown would have liked to hear it praised. + +Thus this singularly eccentric and independent mind, wedded +to a character of so much strength, singleness, and purity, +pursued its own path of self-improvement for more than half a +century, part gymnosophist, part backwoodsman; and thus did +it come twice, though in a subaltern attitude, into the field +of political history. + + +NOTE. - For many facts in the above essay, among which I may +mention the incident of the squirrel, I am indebted to +THOREAU: HIS LIFE AND AIMS, by J. A. Page, or, as is well +known, Dr. Japp. + + + +CHAPTER V - YOSHIDA-TORAJIRO + + + +THE name at the head of this page is probably unknown to the +English reader, and yet I think it should become a household +word like that of Garibaldi or John Brown. Some day soon, we +may expect to hear more fully the details of Yoshida's +history, and the degree of his influence in the +transformation of Japan; even now there must be Englishmen +acquainted with the subject, and perhaps the appearance of +this sketch may elicit something more complete and exact. I +wish to say that I am not, rightly speaking, the author of +the present paper: I tell the story on the authority of an +intelligent Japanese gentleman, Mr. Taiso Masaki, who told it +me with an emotion that does honour to his heart; and though +I have taken some pains, and sent my notes to him to be +corrected, this can be no more than an imperfect outline. + +Yoshida-Torajiro was son to the hereditary military +instructor of the house of Choshu. The name you are to +pronounce with an equality of accent on the different +syllables, almost as in French, the vowels as in Italian, but +the consonants in the English manner - except the J, which +has the French sound, or, as it has been cleverly proposed to +write it, the sound of ZH. Yoshida was very learned in +Chinese letters, or, as we might say, in the classics, and in +his father's subject; fortification was among his favourite +studies, and he was a poet from his boyhood. He was born to +a lively and intelligent patriotism; the condition of Japan +was his great concern; and while he projected a better +future, he lost no opportunity of improving his knowledge of +her present state. With this end he was continually +travelling in his youth, going on foot and sometimes with +three days' provision on his back, in the brave, self-helpful +manner of all heroes. He kept a full diary while he was thus +upon his journeys, but it is feared that these notes have +been destroyed. If their value were in any respect such as +we have reason to expect from the man's character, this would +be a loss not easy to exaggerate. It is still wonderful to +the Japanese how far he contrived to push these explorations; +a cultured gentleman of that land and period would leave a +complimentary poem wherever he had been hospitably +entertained; and a friend of Mr. Masaki, who was likewise a +great wanderer, has found such traces of Yoshida's passage in +very remote regions of Japan. + +Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no +preparation is thought necessary; but Yoshida considered +otherwise, and he studied the miseries of his fellow- +countrymen with as much attention and research as though he +had been going to write a book instead of merely to propose a +remedy. To a man of his intensity and singleness, there is +no question but that this survey was melancholy in the +extreme. His dissatisfaction is proved by the eagerness with +which he threw himself into the cause of reform; and what +would have discouraged another braced Yoshida for his task. +As he professed the theory of arms, it was firstly the +defences of Japan that occupied his mind. The external +feebleness of that country was then illustrated by the +manners of overriding barbarians, and the visit of big +barbarian war ships: she was a country beleaguered. Thus the +patriotism of Yoshida took a form which may be said to have +defeated itself: he had it upon him to keep out these all- +powerful foreigners, whom it is now one of his chief merits +to have helped to introduce; but a man who follows his own +virtuous heart will be always found in the end to have been +fighting for the best. One thing leads naturally to another +in an awakened mind, and that with an upward progress from +effect to cause. The power and knowledge of these foreigners +were things inseparable; by envying them their military +strength, Yoshida came to envy them their culture; from the +desire to equal them in the first, sprang his desire to share +with them in the second; and thus he is found treating in the +same book of a new scheme to strengthen the defences of Kioto +and of the establishment, in the same city, of a university +of foreign teachers. He hoped, perhaps, to get the good of +other lands without their evil; to enable Japan to profit by +the knowledge of the barbarians, and still keep her inviolate +with her own arts and virtues. But whatever was the precise +nature of his hope, the means by which it was to be +accomplished were both difficult and obvious. Some one with +eyes and understanding must break through the official +cordon, escape into the new world, and study this other +civilisation on the spot. And who could be better suited for +the business? It was not without danger, but he was without +fear. It needed preparation and insight; and what had he +done since he was a child but prepare himself with the best +culture of Japan, and acquire in his excursions the power and +habit of observing? + +He was but twenty-two, and already all this was clear in his +mind, when news reached Choshu that Commodore Perry was lying +near to Yeddo. Here, then, was the patriot's opportunity. +Among the Samurai of Choshu, and in particular among the +councillors of the Daimio, his general culture, his views, +which the enlightened were eager to accept, and, above all, +the prophetic charm, the radiant persuasion of the man, had +gained him many and sincere disciples. He had thus a strong +influence at the provincial Court; and so he obtained leave +to quit the district, and, by way of a pretext, a privilege +to follow his profession in Yeddo. Thither he hurried, and +arrived in time to be too late: Perry had weighed anchor, and +his sails had vanished from the waters of Japan. But +Yoshida, having put his hand to the plough, was not the man +to go back; he had entered upon this business, and, please +God, he would carry it through; and so he gave up his +professional career and remained in Yeddo to be at hand +against the next opportunity. By this behaviour he put +himself into an attitude towards his superior, the Daimio of +Choshu, which I cannot thoroughly explain. Certainly, he +became a RONYIN, a broken man, a feudal outlaw; certainly he +was liable to be arrested if he set foot upon his native +province; yet I am cautioned that "he did not really break +his allegiance," but only so far separated himself as that +the prince could no longer be held accountable for his late +vassal's conduct. There is some nicety of feudal custom here +that escapes my comprehension. + +In Yeddo, with this nondescript political status, and cut off +from any means of livelihood, he was joyfully supported by +those who sympathised with his design. One was Sakuma- +Shozan, hereditary retainer of one of the Shogun's +councillors, and from him he got more than money or than +money's worth. A steady, respectable man, with an eye to the +world's opinion, Sakuma was one of those who, if they cannot +do great deeds in their own person, have yet an ardour of +admiration for those who can, that recommends them to the +gratitude of history. They aid and abet greatness more, +perhaps, than we imagine. One thinks of them in connection +with Nicodemus, who visited our Lord by night. And Sakuma +was in a position to help Yoshida more practically than by +simple countenance; for he could read Dutch, and was eager to +communicate what he knew. + +While the young Ronyin thus lay studying in Yeddo, news came +of a Russian ship at Nangasaki. No time was to be lost. +Sakuma contributed "a long copy of encouraging verses and off +set Yoshida on foot for Nangasaki. His way lay through his +own province of Choshu; but, as the highroad to the south lay +apart from the capital, he was able to avoid arrest. He +supported himself, like a TROUVERE, by his proficiency in +verse. He carried his works along with him, to serve as an +introduction. When he reached a town he would inquire for +the house of any one celebrated for swordsmanship, or poetry, +or some of the other acknowledged forms of culture; and +there, on giving a taste of his skill, he would be received +and entertained, and leave behind him, when he went away, a +compliment in verse. Thus he travelled through the Middle +Ages on his voyage of discovery into the nineteenth century. +When he reached Nangasaki he was once more too late. The +Russians were gone. But he made a profit on his journey in +spite of fate, and stayed awhile to pick up scraps of +knowledge from the Dutch interpreters - a low class of men, +but one that had opportunities; and then, still full of +purpose, returned to Yeddo on foot, as he had come. + +It was not only his youth and courage that supported him +under these successive disappointments, but the continual +affluence of new disciples. The man had the tenacity of a +Bruce or a Columbus, with a pliability that was all his own. +He did not fight for what the world would call success; but +for "the wages of going on." Check him off in a dozen +directions, he would find another outlet and break forth. He +missed one vessel after another, and the main work still +halted; but so long as he had a single Japanese to enlighten +and prepare for the better future, he could still feel that +he was working for Japan. Now, he had scarce returned from +Nangasaki, when he was sought out by a new inquirer, the most +promising of all. This was a common soldier, of the Hemming +class, a dyer by birth, who had heard vaguely (1) of +Yoshida's movements, and had become filled with wonder as to +their design. This was a far different inquirer from Sakuma- +Shozan, or the councillors of the Daimio of Choshu. This was +no two-sworded gentleman, but the common stuff of the +country, born in low traditions and unimproved by books; and +yet that influence, that radiant persuasion that never failed +Yoshida in any circumstance of his short life, enchanted, +enthralled, and converted the common soldier, as it had done +already with the elegant and learned. The man instantly +burned up into a true enthusiasm; his mind had been only +waiting for a teacher; he grasped in a moment the profit of +these new ideas; he, too, would go to foreign, outlandish +parts, and bring back the knowledge that was to strengthen +and renew Japan; and in the meantime, that he might be the +better prepared, Yoshida set himself to teach, and he to +learn, the Chinese literature. It is an episode most +honourable to Yoshida, and yet more honourable still to the +soldier, and to the capacity and virtue of the common people +of Japan. + +(1) Yoshida, when on his way to Nangasaki, met the soldier +and talked with him by the roadside; they then parted, but +the soldier was so much struck by the words he heard, that on +Yoshida's return he sought him out and declared his intention +of devoting his life to the good cause. I venture, in the +absence of the writer, to insert this correction, having been +present when the story was told by Mr. Masaki. - F. J. And +I, there being none to settle the difference, must reproduce +both versions. - R. L. S. + +And now, at length, Commodore Perry returned to Simoda. +Friends crowded round Yoshida with help, counsels, and +encouragement. One presented him with a great sword, three +feet long and very heavy, which, in the exultation of the +hour, he swore to carry throughout all his wanderings, and to +bring back - a far-travelled weapon - to Japan. A long +letter was prepared in Chinese for the American officers; it +was revised and corrected by Sakuma, and signed by Yoshida, +under the name of Urinaki-Manji, and by the soldier under +that of Ichigi-Koda. Yoshida had supplied himself with a +profusion of materials for writing; his dress was literally +stuffed with paper which was to come back again enriched with +his observations, and make a great and happy kingdom of +Japan. Thus equipped, this pair of emigrants set forward on +foot from Yeddo, and reached Simoda about nightfall. At no +period within history can travel have presented to any +European creature the same face of awe and terror as to these +courageous Japanese. The descent of Ulysses into hell is a +parallel more near the case than the boldest expedition in +the Polar circles. For their act was unprecedented; it was +criminal; and it was to take them beyond the pale of humanity +into a land of devils. It is not to be wondered at if they +were thrilled by the thought of their unusual situation; and +perhaps the soldier gave utterance to the sentiment of both +when he sang, "in Chinese singing" (so that we see he had +already profited by his lessons), these two appropriate +verses: + + +"We do not know where we are to sleep to-night, +In a thousand miles of desert where we can see no human +smoke." + + +In a little temple, hard by the sea-shore, they lay down to +repose; sleep overtook them as they lay; and when they awoke, +"the east was already white" for their last morning in Japan. +They seized a fisherman's boat and rowed out - Perry lying +far to sea because of the two tides. Their very manner of +boarding was significant of determination; for they had no +sooner caught hold upon the ship than they kicked away their +boat to make return impossible. And now you would have +thought that all was over. But the Commodore was already in +treaty with the Shogun's Government; it was one of the +stipulations that no Japanese was to be aided in escaping +from Japan; and Yoshida and his followers were handed over as +prisoners to the authorities at Simoda. That night he who +had been to explore the secrets of the barbarian slept, if he +might sleep at all, in a cell too short for lying down at +full length, and too low for standing upright. There are +some disappointments too great for commentary. + +Sakuma, implicated by his handwriting, was sent into his own +province in confinement, from which he was soon released. +Yoshida and the soldier suffered a long and miserable period +of captivity, and the latter, indeed, died, while yet in +prison, of a skin disease. But such a spirit as that of +Yoshida-Torajiro is not easily made or kept a captive; and +that which cannot be broken by misfortune you shall seek in +vain to confine in a bastille. He was indefatigably active, +writing reports to Government and treatises for +dissemination. These latter were contraband; and yet he +found no difficulty in their distribution, for he always had +the jailor on his side. It was in vain that they kept +changing him from one prison to another; Government by that +plan only hastened the spread of new ideas; for Yoshida had +only to arrive to make a convert. Thus, though he himself +has laid by the heels, he confirmed and extended his party in +the State. + +At last, after many lesser transferences, he was given over +from the prisons of the Shogun to those of his own superior, +the Daimio of Choshu. I conceive it possible that he may +then have served out his time for the attempt to leave Japan, +and was now resigned to the provincial Government on a lesser +count, as a Ronyin or feudal rebel. But, however that may +be, the change was of great importance to Yoshida; for by the +influence of his admirers in the Daimio's council, he was +allowed the privilege, underhand, of dwelling in his own +house. And there, as well to keep up communication with his +fellow-reformers as to pursue his work of education, he +received boys to teach. It must not be supposed that he was +free; he was too marked a man for that; he was probably +assigned to some small circle, and lived, as we should say, +under police surveillance; but to him, who had done so much +from under lock and key, this would seem a large and +profitable liberty. + +It was at this period that Mr. Masaki was brought into +personal contact with Yoshida; and hence, through the eyes of +a boy of thirteen, we get one good look at the character and +habits of the hero. He was ugly and laughably disfigured +with the smallpox; and while nature had been so niggardly +with him from the first, his personal habits were even +sluttish. His clothes were wretched; when he ate or washed +he wiped his hands upon his sleeves; and as his hair was not +tied more than once in the two months, it was often +disgusting to behold. With such a picture, it is easy to +believe that he never married. A good teacher, gentle in +act, although violent and abusive in speech, his lessons were +apt to go over the heads of his scholars and to leave them +gaping, or more often laughing. Such was his passion for +study that he even grudged himself natural repose; and when +he grew drowsy over his books he would, if it was summer, put +mosquitoes up his sleeve; and, if it was winter, take off his +shoes and run barefoot on the snow. His handwriting was +exceptionally villainous; poet though he was, he had no taste +for what was elegant; and in a country where to write +beautifully was not the mark of a scrivener but an admired +accomplishment for gentlemen, he suffered his letters to be +jolted out of him by the press of matter and the heat of his +convictions. He would not tolerate even the appearance of a +bribe; for bribery lay at the root of much that was evil in +Japan, as well as in countries nearer home; and once when a +merchant brought him his son to educate, and added, as was +customary, (1) a little private sweetener, Yoshida dashed the +money in the giver's face, and launched into such an outbreak +of indignation as made the matter public in the school. He +was still, when Masaki knew him, much weakened by his +hardships in prison; and the presentation sword, three feet +long, was too heavy for him to wear without distress; yet he +would always gird it on when he went to dig in his garden. +That is a touch which qualifies the man. A weaker nature +would have shrunk from the sight of what only commemorated a +failure. But he was of Thoreau's mind, that if you can "make +your failure tragical by courage, it will not differ from +success." He could look back without confusion to his +enthusiastic promise. If events had been contrary, and he +found himself unable to carry out that purpose - well, there +was but the more reason to be brave and constant in another; +if he could not carry the sword into barbarian lands, it +should at least be witness to a life spent entirely for +Japan. + +(1) I understood that the merchant was endeavouring +surreptitiously to obtain for his son instruction to which he +was not entitled. - F. J. + +This is the sight we have of him as he appeared to +schoolboys, but not related in the schoolboy spirit. A man +so careless of the graces must be out of court with boys and +women. And, indeed, as we have all been more or less to +school, it will astonish no one that Yoshida was regarded by +his scholars as a laughing-stock. The schoolboy has a keen +sense of humour. Heroes he learns to understand and to +admire in books; but he is not forward to recognise the +heroic under the traits of any contemporary man, and least of +all in a brawling, dirty, and eccentric teacher. But as the +years went by, and the scholars of Yoshida continued in vain +to look around them for the abstractly perfect, and began +more and more to understand the drift of his instructions, +they learned to look back upon their comic school-master as +upon the noblest of mankind. + +The last act of this brief and full existence was already +near at hand. Some of his work was done; for already there +had been Dutch teachers admitted into Nangasaki, and the +country at large was keen for the new learning. But though +the renaissance had begun, it was impeded and dangerously +threatened by the power of the Shogun. His minister - the +same who was afterwards assassinated in the snow in the very +midst of his bodyguard - not only held back pupils from going +to the Dutchmen, but by spies and detectives, by imprisonment +and death, kept thinning out of Japan the most intelligent +and active spirits. It is the old story of a power upon its +last legs - learning to the bastille, and courage to the +block; when there are none left but sheep and donkeys, the +State will have been saved. But a man must not think to cope +with a Revolution; nor a minister, however fortified with +guards, to hold in check a country that had given birth to +such men as Yoshida and his soldier-follower. The violence +of the ministerial Tarquin only served to direct attention to +the illegality of his master's rule; and people began to turn +their allegiance from Yeddo and the Shogun to the long- +forgotten Mikado in his seclusion at Kioto. At this +juncture, whether in consequence or not, the relations +between these two rulers became strained; and the Shogun's +minister set forth for Kioto to put another affront upon the +rightful sovereign. The circumstance was well fitted to +precipitate events. It was a piece of religion to defend the +Mikado; it was a plain piece of political righteousness to +oppose a tyrannical and bloody usurpation. To Yoshida the +moment for action seemed to have arrived. He was himself +still confined in Choshu. Nothing was free but his +intelligence; but with that he sharpened a sword for the +Shogun's minister. A party of his followers were to waylay +the tyrant at a village on the Yeddo and Kioto road, present +him with a petition, and put him to the sword. But Yoshida +and his friends were closely observed; and the too great +expedition of two of the conspirators, a boy of eighteen and +his brother, wakened the suspicion of the authorities, and +led to a full discovery of the plot and the arrest of all who +were concerned. + +In Yeddo, to which he was taken, Yoshida was thrown again +into a strict confinement. But he was not left destitute of +sympathy in this last hour of trial. In the next cell lay +one Kusakabe, a reformer from the southern highlands of +Satzuma. They were in prison for different plots indeed, but +for the same intention; they shared the same beliefs and the +same aspirations for Japan; many and long were the +conversations they held through the prison wall, and dear was +the sympathy that soon united them. It fell first to the lot +of Kusakabe to pass before the judges; and when sentence had +been pronounced he was led towards the place of death below +Yoshida's window. To turn the head would have been to +implicate his fellow-prisoner; but he threw him a look from +his eye, and bade him farewell in a loud voice, with these +two Chinese verses:- + + +"It is better to be a crystal and be broken, +Than to remain perfect like a tile upon the housetop." + + +So Kusakabe, from the highlands of Satzuma, passed out of the +theatre of this world. His death was like an antique +worthy's. + +A little after, and Yoshida too must appear before the Court. +His last scene was of a piece with his career, and fitly +crowned it. He seized on the opportunity of a public +audience, confessed and gloried in his design, and, reading +his auditors a lesson in the history of their country, told +at length the illegality of the Shogun's power and the crimes +by which its exercise was sullied. So, having said his say +for once, he was led forth and executed, thirty-one years +old. + +A military engineer, a bold traveller (at least in wish), a +poet, a patriot, a schoolmaster, a friend to learning, a +martyr to reform, - there are not many men, dying at seventy, +who have served their country in such various characters. He +was not only wise and provident in thought, but surely one of +the fieriest of heroes in execution. It is hard to say which +is most remarkable - his capacity for command, which subdued +his very jailors; his hot, unflagging zeal; or his stubborn +superiority to defeat. He failed in each particular +enterprise that he attempted; and yet we have only to look at +his country to see how complete has been his general success. +His friends and pupils made the majority of leaders in that +final Revolution, now some twelve years old; and many of them +are, or were until the other day, high placed among the +rulers of Japan. And when we see all round us these brisk +intelligent students, with their strange foreign air, we +should never forget how Yoshida marched afoot from Choshu to +Yeddo, and from Yeddo to Nangasaki, and from Nangasaki back +again to Yeddo; how he boarded the American ship, his dress +stuffed with writing material; nor how he languished in +prison, and finally gave his death, as he had formerly given +all his life and strength and leisure, to gain for his native +land that very benefit which she now enjoys so largely. It +is better to be Yoshida and perish, than to be only Sakuma +and yet save the hide. Kusakabe, of Satzuma, has said the +word: it is better to be a crystal and be broken. + +I must add a word; for I hope the reader will not fail to +perceive that this is as much the story of a heroic people as +that of a heroic man. It is not enough to remember Yoshida; +we must not forget the common soldier, nor Kusakabe, nor the +boy of eighteen, Nomura, of Choshu, whose eagerness betrayed +the plot. It is exhilarating to have lived in the same days +with these great-hearted gentlemen. Only a few miles from +us, to speak by the proportion of the universe, while I was +droning over my lessons, Yoshida was goading himself to be +wakeful with the stings of the mosquito; and while you were +grudging a penny income tax, Kusakabe was stepping to death +with a noble sentence on his lips. + + + +CHAPTER VI - FRANCOIS VILLON, STUDENT, POET, AND HOUSEBREAKER + + + +PERHAPS one of the most curious revolutions in literary +history is the sudden bull's-eye light cast by M. Longnon on +the obscure existence of Francois Villon. (1) His book is +not remarkable merely as a chapter of biography exhumed after +four centuries. To readers of the poet it will recall, with +a flavour of satire, that characteristic passage in which he +bequeaths his spectacles - with a humorous reservation of the +case - to the hospital for blind paupers known as the +Fifteen-Score. Thus equipped, let the blind paupers go and +separate the good from the bad in the cemetery of the +Innocents! For his own part the poet can see no distinction. +Much have the dead people made of their advantages. What +does it matter now that they have lain in state beds and +nourished portly bodies upon cakes and cream! Here they all +lie, to be trodden in the mud; the large estate and the +small, sounding virtue and adroit or powerful vice, in very +much the same condition; and a bishop not to be distinguished +from a lamp-lighter with even the strongest spectacles. + +(1) ETUDE BIOGRAPHIQUE SUR FRANCOIS VILLON. Paris: H. Menu. + +Such was Villon's cynical philosophy. Four hundred years +after his death, when surely all danger might be considered +at an end, a pair of critical spectacles have been applied to +his own remains; and though he left behind him a sufficiently +ragged reputation from the first, it is only after these four +hundred years that his delinquencies have been finally +tracked home, and we can assign him to his proper place among +the good or wicked. It is a staggering thought, and one that +affords a fine figure of the imperishability of men's acts, +that the stealth of the private inquiry office can be carried +so far back into the dead and dusty past. We are not so soon +quit of our concerns as Villon fancied. In the extreme of +dissolution, when not so much as a man's name is remembered, +when his dust is scattered to the four winds, and perhaps the +very grave and the very graveyard where he was laid to rest +have been forgotten, desecrated, and buried under populous +towns, - even in this extreme let an antiquary fall across a +sheet of manuscript, and the name will be recalled, the old +infamy will pop out into daylight like a toad out of a +fissure in the rock, and the shadow of the shade of what was +once a man will be heartily pilloried by his descendants. A +little while ago and Villon was almost totally forgotten; +then he was revived for the sake of his verses; and now he is +being revived with a vengeance in the detection of his +misdemeanours. How unsubstantial is this projection of a +man's existence, which can lie in abeyance for centuries and +then be brushed up again and set forth for the consideration +of posterity by a few dips in an antiquary's inkpot! This +precarious tenure of fame goes a long way to justify those +(and they are not few) who prefer cakes and cream in the +immediate present. + + +A WILD YOUTH. + + +Francois de Montcorbier, ALIAS Francois des Loges, ALIAS +Francois Villon, ALIAS Michel Mouton, Master of Arts in the +University of Paris, was born in that city in the summer of +1431. It was a memorable year for France on other and higher +considerations. A great-hearted girl and a poor-hearted boy +made, the one her last, the other his first appearance on the +public stage of that unhappy country. On the 30th of May the +ashes of Joan of Arc were thrown into the Seine, and on the +2d of December our Henry Sixth made his Joyous Entry dismally +enough into disaffected and depopulating Paris. Sword and +fire still ravaged the open country. On a single April +Saturday twelve hundred persons, besides children, made their +escape out of the starving capital. The hangman, as is not +uninteresting to note in connection with Master Francis, was +kept hard at work in 1431; on the last of April and on the +4th of May alone, sixty-two bandits swung from Paris gibbets. +(1) A more confused or troublous time it would have been +difficult to select for a start in life. Not even a man's +nationality was certain; for the people of Paris there was no +such thing as a Frenchman. The English were the English +indeed, but the French were only the Armagnacs, whom, with +Joan of Arc at their head, they had beaten back from under +their ramparts not two years before. Such public sentiment +as they had centred about their dear Duke of Burgundy, and +the dear Duke had no more urgent business than to keep out of +their neighbourhood. . . . At least, and whether he liked it +or not, our disreputable troubadour was tubbed and swaddled +as a subject of the English crown. + +(1) BOUGEOIS DE PARIS, ed. Pantheon, pp. 688, 689. + +We hear nothing of Villon's father except that he was poor +and of mean extraction. His mother was given piously, which +does not imply very much in an old Frenchwoman, and quite +uneducated. He had an uncle, a monk in an abbey at Angers, +who must have prospered beyond the family average, and was +reported to be worth five or six hundred crowns. Of this +uncle and his money-box the reader will hear once more. In +1448 Francis became a student of the University of Paris; in +1450 he took the degree of Bachelor, and in 1452 that of +Master of Arts. His BOURSE, or the sum paid weekly for his +board, was of the amount of two sous. Now two sous was about +the price of a pound of salt butter in the bad times of 1417; +it was the price of half-a-pound in the worse times of 1419; +and in 1444, just four years before Villon joined the +University, it seems to have been taken as the average wage +for a day's manual labour. (1) In short, it cannot have been +a very profuse allowance to keep a sharp-set lad in breakfast +and supper for seven mortal days; and Villon's share of the +cakes and pastry and general good cheer, to which he is never +weary of referring, must have been slender from the first. + +(1) BOURGEOIS, pp. 627, 636, and 725. + +The educational arrangements of the University of Paris were, +to our way of thinking, somewhat incomplete. Worldly and +monkish elements were presented in a curious confusion, which +the youth might disentangle for himself. If he had an +opportunity, on the one hand, of acquiring much hair-drawn +divinity and a taste for formal disputation, he was put in +the way of much gross and flaunting vice upon the other. The +lecture room of a scholastic doctor was sometimes under the +same roof with establishments of a very different and +peculiarly unedifying order. The students had extraordinary +privileges, which by all accounts they abused +extraordinarily. And while some condemned themselves to an +almost sepulchral regularity and seclusion, others fled the +schools, swaggered in the street "with their thumbs in their +girdle," passed the night in riot, and behaved themselves as +the worthy forerunners of Jehan Frollo in the romance of +NOTRE DAME DE PARIS. Villon tells us himself that he was +among the truants, but we hardly needed his avowal. The +burlesque erudition in which he sometimes indulged implies no +more than the merest smattering of knowledge; whereas his +acquaintance with blackguard haunts and industries could only +have been acquired by early and consistent impiety and +idleness. He passed his degrees, it is true; but some of us +who have been to modern universities will make their own +reflections on the value of the test. As for his three +pupils, Colin Laurent, Girard Gossouyn, and Jehan Marceau - +if they were really his pupils in any serious sense - what +can we say but God help them! And sure enough, by his own +description, they turned out as ragged, rowdy, and ignorant +as was to be looked for from the views and manners of their +rare preceptor. + +At some time or other, before or during his university +career, the poet was adopted by Master Guillaume de Villon, +chaplain of Saint Benoit-le-Betourne near the Sorbonne. From +him he borrowed the surname by which he is known to +posterity. It was most likely from his house, called the +PORTE ROUGE, and situated in a garden in the cloister of St. +Benoit, that Master Francis heard the bell of the Sorbonne +ring out the Angelus while he was finishing his SMALL +TESTAMENT at Christmastide in 1546. Towards this benefactor +he usually gets credit for a respectable display of +gratitude. But with his trap and pitfall style of writing, +it is easy to make too sure. His sentiments are about as +much to be relied on as those of a professional beggar; and +in this, as in so many other matters, he comes towards us +whining and piping the eye, and goes off again with a whoop +and his finger to his nose. Thus, he calls Guillaume de +Villon his "more than father," thanks him with a great show +of sincerity for having helped him out of many scrapes, and +bequeaths him his portion of renown. But the portion of +renown which belonged to a young thief, distinguished (if, at +the period when he wrote this legacy, he was distinguished at +all) for having written some more or less obscene and +scurrilous ballads, must have been little fitted to gratify +the self-respect or increase the reputation of a benevolent +ecclesiastic. The same remark applies to a subsequent legacy +of the poet's library, with specification of one work which +was plainly neither decent nor devout. We are thus left on +the horns of a dilemma. If the chaplain was a godly, +philanthropic personage, who had tried to graft good +principles and good behaviour on this wild slip of an adopted +son, these jesting legacies would obviously cut him to the +heart. The position of an adopted son towards his adoptive +father is one full of delicacy; where a man lends his name he +looks for great consideration. And this legacy of Villon's +portion of renown may be taken as the mere fling of an +unregenerate scapegrace who has wit enough to recognise in +his own shame the readiest weapon of offence against a prosy +benefactor's feelings. The gratitude of Master Francis +figures, on this reading, as a frightful MINUS quantity. If, +on the other hand, those jests were given and taken in good +humour, the whole relation between the pair degenerates into +the unedifying complicity of a debauched old chaplain and a +witty and dissolute young scholar. At this rate the house +with the red door may have rung with the most mundane +minstrelsy; and it may have been below its roof that Villon, +through a hole in the plaster, studied, as he tells us, the +leisures of a rich ecclesiastic. + +It was, perhaps, of some moment in the poet's life that he +should have inhabited the cloister of Saint Benoit. Three of +the most remarkable among his early acquaintances are +Catherine de Vausselles, for whom he entertained a short- +lived affection and an enduring and most unmanly resentment; +Regnier de Montigny, a young blackguard of good birth; and +Colin de Cayeux, a fellow with a marked aptitude for picking +locks. Now we are on a foundation of mere conjecture, but it +is at least curious to find that two of the canons of Saint +Benoit answered respectively to the names of Pierre de Vaucel +and Etienne de Montigny, and that there was a householder +called Nicolas de Cayeux in a street - the Rue des Poirees - +in the immediate neighbourhood of the cloister. M. Longnon +is almost ready to identify Catherine as the niece of Pierre; +Regnier as the nephew of Etienne, and Colin as the son of +Nicolas. Without going so far, it must be owned that the +approximation of names is significant. As we go on to see +the part played by each of these persons in the sordid +melodrama of the poet's life, we shall come to regard it as +even more notable. Is it not Clough who has remarked that, +after all, everything lies in juxtaposition? Many a man's +destiny has been settled by nothing apparently more grave +than a pretty face on the opposite side of the street and a +couple of bad companions round the corner. + +Catherine de Vausselles (or de Vaucel - the change is within +the limits of Villon's licence) had plainly delighted in the +poet's conversation; near neighbours or not, they were much +together and Villon made no secret of his court, and suffered +himself to believe that his feeling was repaid in kind. This +may have been an error from the first, or he may have +estranged her by subsequent misconduct or temerity. One can +easily imagine Villon an impatient wooer. One thing, at +least, is sure: that the affair terminated in a manner +bitterly humiliating to Master Francis. In presence of his +lady-love, perhaps under her window and certainly with her +connivance, he was unmercifully thrashed by one Noe le Joly - +beaten, as he says himself, like dirty linen on the washing- +board. It is characteristic that his malice had notably +increased between the time when he wrote the SMALL TESTAMENT +immediately on the back of the occurrence, and the time when +he wrote the LARGE TESTAMENT five years after. On the latter +occasion nothing is too bad for his "damsel with the twisted +nose," as he calls her. She is spared neither hint nor +accusation, and he tells his messenger to accost her with the +vilest insults. Villon, it is thought, was out of Paris when +these amenities escaped his pen; or perhaps the strong arm of +Noe le Joly would have been again in requisition. So ends +the love story, if love story it may properly be called. +Poets are not necessarily fortunate in love; but they usually +fall among more romantic circumstances and bear their +disappointment with a better grace. + +The neighbourhood of Regnier de Montigny and Colin de Cayeux +was probably more influential on his after life than the +contempt of Catherine. For a man who is greedy of all +pleasures, and provided with little money and less dignity of +character, we may prophesy a safe and speedy voyage downward. +Humble or even truckling virtue may walk unspotted in this +life. But only those who despise the pleasures can afford to +despise the opinion of the world. A man of a strong, heady +temperament, like Villon, is very differently tempted. His +eyes lay hold on all provocations greedily, and his heart +flames up at a look into imperious desire; he is snared and +broached-to by anything and everything, from a pretty face to +a piece of pastry in a cookshop window; he will drink the +rinsing of the wine cup, stay the latest at the tavern party; +tap at the lit windows, follow the sound of singing, and beat +the whole neighbourhood for another reveller, as he goes +reluctantly homeward; and grudge himself every hour of sleep +as a black empty period in which he cannot follow after +pleasure. Such a person is lost if he have not dignity, or, +failing that, at least pride, which is its shadow and in many +ways its substitute. Master Francis, I fancy, would follow +his own eager instincts without much spiritual struggle. And +we soon find him fallen among thieves in sober, literal +earnest, and counting as acquaintances the most disreputable +people he could lay his hands on: fellows who stole ducks in +Paris Moat; sergeants of the criminal court, and archers of +the watch; blackguards who slept at night under the butchers' +stalls, and for whom the aforesaid archers peered about +carefully with lanterns; Regnier de Montigny, Colin de +Cayeux, and their crew, all bound on a favouring breeze +towards the gallows; the disorderly abbess of Port Royal, who +went about at fair time with soldiers and thieves, and +conducted her abbey on the queerest principles, and most +likely Perette Mauger, the great Paris receiver of stolen +goods, not yet dreaming, poor woman! of the last scene of her +career when Henry Cousin, executor of the high justice, shall +bury her, alive and most reluctant, in front of the new +Montigny gibbet. (1) Nay, our friend soon began to take a +foremost rank in this society. He could string off verses, +which is always an agreeable talent; and he could make +himself useful in many other ways. The whole ragged army of +Bohemia, and whosoever loved good cheer without at all loving +to work and pay for it, are addressed in contemporary verses +as the "Subjects of Francois Villon." He was a good genius +to all hungry and unscrupulous persons; and became the hero +of a whole legendary cycle of tavern tricks and cheateries. +At best, these were doubtful levities, rather too thievish +for a schoolboy, rather too gamesome for a thief. But he +would not linger long in this equivocal border land. He must +soon have complied with his surroundings. He was one who +would go where the cannikin clinked, not caring who should +pay; and from supping in the wolves' den, there is but a step +to hunting with the pack. And here, as I am on the chapter +of his degradation, I shall say all I mean to say about its +darkest expression, and be done with it for good. Some +charitable critics see no more than a JEU D'ESPRIT, a +graceful and trifling exercise of the imagination, in the +grimy ballad of Fat Peg (GROSSE MARGOT). I am not able to +follow these gentlemen to this polite extreme. Out of all +Villon's works that ballad stands forth in flaring reality, +gross and ghastly, as a thing written in a contraction of +disgust. M. Longnon shows us more and more clearly at every +page that we are to read our poet literally, that his names +are the names of real persons, and the events he chronicles +were actual events. But even if the tendency of criticism +had run the other way, this ballad would have gone far to +prove itself. I can well understand the reluctance of worthy +persons in this matter; for of course it is unpleasant to +think of a man of genius as one who held, in the words of +Marina to Boult- + + +"A place, for which the pained'st fiend +Of hell would not in reputation change." + + +But beyond this natural unwillingness, the whole difficulty +of the case springs from a highly virtuous ignorance of life. +Paris now is not so different from the Paris of then; and the +whole of the doings of Bohemia are not written in the sugar- +candy pastorals of Murger. It is really not at all +surprising that a young man of the fifteenth century, with a +knack of making verses, should accept his bread upon +disgraceful terms. The race of those who do is not extinct; +and some of them to this day write the prettiest verses +imaginable. . . . After this, it were impossible for Master +Francis to fall lower: to go and steal for himself would be +an admirable advance from every point of view, divine or +human. + +(1) CHRONIQUE SCANDALEUSE, ed. Pantheon, p. 237. + +And yet it is not as a thief, but as a homicide, that he +makes his first appearance before angry justice. On June 5, +1455, when he was about twenty-four, and had been Master of +Arts for a matter of three years, we behold him for the first +time quite definitely. Angry justice had, as it were, +photographed him in the act of his homicide; and M. Longnon, +rummaging among old deeds, has turned up the negative and +printed it off for our instruction. Villon had been supping +- copiously we may believe - and sat on a stone bench in +front of the Church of St. Benoit, in company with a priest +called Gilles and a woman of the name of Isabeau. It was +nine o'clock, a mighty late hour for the period, and +evidently a fine summer's night. Master Francis carried a +mantle, like a prudent man, to keep him from the dews +(SERAIN), and had a sword below it dangling from his girdle. +So these three dallied in front of St Benoit, taking their +pleasure (POUR SOY ESBATRE). Suddenly there arrived upon the +scene a priest, Philippe Chermoye or Sermaise, also with +sword and cloak, and accompanied by one Master Jehan le +Mardi. Sermaise, according to Villon's account, which is all +we have to go upon, came up blustering and denying God; as +Villon rose to make room for him upon the bench, thrust him +rudely back into his place; and finally drew his sword and +cut open his lower lip, by what I should imagine was a very +clumsy stroke. Up to this point, Villon professes to have +been a model of courtesy, even of feebleness: and the brawl, +in his version, reads like the fable of the wolf and the +lamb. But now the lamb was roused; he drew his sword, +stabbed Sermaise in the groin, knocked him on the head with a +big stone, and then, leaving him to his fate, went away to +have his own lip doctored by a barber of the name of Fouquet. +In one version, he says that Gilles, Isabeau, and Le Mardi +ran away at the first high words, and that he and Sermaise +had it out alone; in another, Le Mardi is represented as +returning and wresting Villon's sword from him: the reader +may please himself. Sermaise was picked up, lay all that +night in the prison of Saint Benoit, where he was examined by +an official of the Chatelet and expressly pardoned Villon, +and died on the following Saturday in the Hotel Dieu. + +This, as I have said, was in June. Not before January of the +next year could Villon extract a pardon from the king; but +while his hand was in, he got two. One is for "Francois des +Loges, alias (AUTREMENT DIT) de Villon;" and the other runs +in the name of Francois de Montcorbier. Nay, it appears +there was a further complication; for in the narrative of the +first of these documents, it is mentioned that he passed +himself off upon Fouquet, the barber-surgeon, as one Michel +Mouton. M. Longnon has a theory that this unhappy accident +with Sermaise was the cause of Villon's subsequent +irregularities; and that up to that moment he had been the +pink of good behaviour. But the matter has to my eyes a more +dubious air. A pardon necessary for Des Loges and another +for Montcorbier? and these two the same person? and one or +both of them known by the ALIAS OF Villon, however honestly +come by? and lastly, in the heat of the moment, a fourth name +thrown out with an assured countenance? A ship is not to be +trusted that sails under so many colours. This is not the +simple bearing of innocence. No - the young master was +already treading crooked paths; already, he would start and +blench at a hand upon his shoulder, with the look we know so +well in the face of Hogarth's Idle Apprentice; already, in +the blue devils, he would see Henry Cousin, the executor of +high justice, going in dolorous procession towards +Montfaucon, and hear the wind and the birds crying around +Paris gibbet. + + +A GANG OF THIEVES. + + +In spite of the prodigious number of people who managed to +get hanged, the fifteenth century was by no means a bad time +for criminals. A great confusion of parties and great dust +of fighting favoured the escape of private housebreakers and +quiet fellows who stole ducks in Paris Moat. Prisons were +leaky; and as we shall see, a man with a few crowns in his +pocket and perhaps some acquaintance among the officials, +could easily slip out and become once more a free marauder. +There was no want of a sanctuary where he might harbour until +troubles blew by; and accomplices helped each other with more +or less good faith. Clerks, above all, had remarkable +facilities for a criminal way of life; for they were +privileged, except in cases of notorious incorrigibility, to +be plucked from the hands of rude secular justice and tried +by a tribunal of their own. In 1402, a couple of thieves, +both clerks of the University, were condemned to death by the +Provost of Paris. As they were taken to Montfaucon, they +kept crying "high and clearly" for their benefit of clergy, +but were none the less pitilessly hanged and gibbeted. +Indignant Alma Mater interfered before the king; and the +Provost was deprived of all royal offices, and condemned to +return the bodies and erect a great stone cross, on the road +from Paris to the gibbet graven with the effigies of these +two holy martyrs. (1) We shall hear more of the benefit of +clergy; for after this the reader will not be surprised to +meet with thieves in the shape of tonsured clerks, or even +priests and monks. + +(1) Monstrelet: PANTHEON LITTERAIRE, p. 26. + +To a knot of such learned pilferers our poet certainly +belonged; and by turning over a few more of M. Longnon's +negatives, we shall get a clear idea of their character and +doings. Montigny and De Cayeux are names already known; Guy +Tabary, Petit-Jehan, Dom Nicolas, little Thibault, who was +both clerk and goldsmith, and who made picklocks and melted +plate for himself and his companions - with these the reader +has still to become acquainted. Petit-Jehan and De Cayeux +were handy fellows and enjoyed a useful pre-eminence in +honour of their doings with the picklock. "DICTUS DES +CAHYEUS EST FORTIS OPERATOR CROCHETORUM," says Tabary's +interrogation, "SED DICTUS PETIT-JEHAN, EJUS SOCIUS, EST +FORCIUS OPERATOR." But the flower of the flock was little +Thibault; it was reported that no lock could stand before +him; he had a persuasive hand; let us salute capacity +wherever we may find it. Perhaps the term GANG is not quite +properly applied to the persons whose fortunes we are now +about to follow; rather they were independent malefactors, +socially intimate, and occasionally joining together for some +serious operation just as modern stockjobbers form a +syndicate for an important loan. Nor were they at all +particular to any branch of misdoing. They did not +scrupulously confine themselves to a single sort of theft, as +I hear is common among modern thieves. They were ready for +anything, from pitch-and-toss to manslaughter. Montigny, for +instance, had neglected neither of these extremes, and we +find him accused of cheating at games of hazard on the one +hand, and on the other of the murder of one Thevenin Pensete +in a house by the Cemetery of St. John. If time had only +spared us some particulars, might not this last have +furnished us with the matter of a grisly winter's tale? + +At Christmas-time in 1456, readers of Villon will remember +that he was engaged on the SMALL TESTAMENT. About the same +period, CIRCA FESTUM NATIVITATIS DOMINI, he took part in a +memorable supper at the Mule Tavern, in front of the Church +of St. Mathurin. Tabary, who seems to have been very much +Villon's creature, had ordered the supper in the course of +the afternoon. He was a man who had had troubles in his time +and languished in the Bishop of Paris's prisons on a +suspicion of picking locks; confiding, convivial, not very +astute - who had copied out a whole improper romance with his +own right hand. This supper-party was to be his first +introduction to De Cayeux and Petit-Jehan, which was probably +a matter of some concern to the poor man's muddy wits; in the +sequel, at least, he speaks of both with an undisguised +respect, based on professional inferiority in the matter of +picklocks. Dom Nicolas, a Picardy monk, was the fifth and +last at table. When supper had been despatched and fairly +washed down, we may suppose, with white Baigneux or red +Beaune, which were favourite wines among the fellowship, +Tabary was solemnly sworn over to secrecy on the night's +performances; and the party left the Mule and proceeded to an +unoccupied house belonging to Robert de Saint-Simon. This, +over a low wall, they entered without difficulty. All but +Tabary took off their upper garments; a ladder was found and +applied to the high wall which separated Saint-Simon's house +from the court of the College of Navarre; the four fellows in +their shirt-sleeves (as we might say) clambered over in a +twinkling; and Master Guy Tabary remained alone beside the +overcoats. From the court the burglars made their way into +the vestry of the chapel, where they found a large chest, +strengthened with iron bands and closed with four locks. One +of these locks they picked, and then, by levering up the +corner, forced the other three. Inside was a small coffer, +of walnut wood, also barred with iron, but fastened with only +three locks, which were all comfortably picked by way of the +keyhole. In the walnut coffer - a joyous sight by our +thieves' lantern - were five hundred crowns of gold. There +was some talk of opening the aumries, where, if they had only +known, a booty eight or nine times greater lay ready to their +hand; but one of the party (I have a humorous suspicion it +was Dom Nicolas, the Picardy monk) hurried them away. It was +ten o'clock when they mounted the ladder; it was about +midnight before Tabary beheld them coming back. To him they +gave ten crowns, and promised a share of a two-crown dinner +on the morrow; whereat we may suppose his mouth watered. In +course of time, he got wind of the real amount of their booty +and understood how scurvily he had been used; but he seems to +have borne no malice. How could he, against such superb +operators as Petit-Jehan and De Cayeux; or a person like +Villon, who could have made a new improper romance out of his +own head, instead of merely copying an old one with +mechanical right hand? + +The rest of the winter was not uneventful for the gang. +First they made a demonstration against the Church of St. +Mathurin after chalices, and were ignominiously chased away +by barking dogs. Then Tabary fell out with Casin Chollet, +one of the fellows who stole ducks in Paris Moat, who +subsequently became a sergeant of the Chatelet and +distinguished himself by misconduct, followed by imprisonment +and public castigation, during the wars of Louis Eleventh. +The quarrel was not conducted with a proper regard to the +king's peace, and the pair publicly belaboured each other +until the police stepped in, and Master Tabary was cast once +more into the prisons of the Bishop. While he still lay in +durance, another job was cleverly executed by the band in +broad daylight, at the Augustine Monastery. Brother +Guillaume Coiffier was beguiled by an accomplice to St. +Mathurin to say mass; and during his absence, his chamber was +entered and five or six hundred crowns in money and some +silver plate successfully abstracted. A melancholy man was +Coiffier on his return! Eight crowns from this adventure +were forwarded by little Thibault to the incarcerated Tabary; +and with these he bribed the jailor and reappeared in Paris +taverns. Some time before or shortly after this, Villon set +out for Angers, as he had promised in the SMALL TESTAMENT. +The object of this excursion was not merely to avoid the +presence of his cruel mistress or the strong arm of Noe le +Joly, but to plan a deliberate robbery on his uncle the monk. +As soon as he had properly studied the ground, the others +were to go over in force from Paris - picklocks and all - and +away with my uncle's strongbox! This throws a comical +sidelight on his own accusation against his relatives, that +they had "forgotten natural duty" and disowned him because he +was poor. A poor relation is a distasteful circumstance at +the best, but a poor relation who plans deliberate robberies +against those of his blood, and trudges hundreds of weary +leagues to put them into execution, is surely a little on the +wrong side of toleration. The uncle at Angers may have been +monstrously undutiful; but the nephew from Paris was upsides +with him. + +On the 23d April, that venerable and discreet person, Master +Pierre Marchand, Curate and Prior of Paray-le-Monial, in the +diocese of Chartres, arrived in Paris and put up at the sign +of the Three Chandeliers, in the Rue de la Huchette. Next +day, or the day after, as he was breakfasting at the sign of +the Armchair, he fell into talk with two customers, one of +whom was a priest and the other our friend Tabary. The +idiotic Tabary became mighty confidential as to his past +life. Pierre Marchand, who was an acquaintance of Guillaume +Coiffier's and had sympathised with him over his loss, +pricked up his ears at the mention of picklocks, and led on +the transcriber of improper romances from one thing to +another, until they were fast friends. For picklocks the +Prior of Paray professed a keen curiosity; but Tabary, upon +some late alarm, had thrown all his into the Seine. Let that +be no difficulty, however, for was there not little Thibault, +who could make them of all shapes and sizes, and to whom +Tabary, smelling an accomplice, would be only too glad to +introduce his new acquaintance? On the morrow, accordingly, +they met; and Tabary, after having first wet his whistle at +the prior's expense, led him to Notre Dame and presented him +to four or five "young companions," who were keeping +sanctuary in the church. They were all clerks, recently +escaped, like Tabary himself, from the episcopal prisons. +Among these we may notice Thibault, the operator, a little +fellow of twenty-six, wearing long hair behind. The Prior +expressed, through Tabary, his anxiety to become their +accomplice and altogether such as they were (DE LEUR SORTS ET +DE LEURS COMPLICES). Mighty polite they showed themselves, +and made him many fine speeches in return. But for all that, +perhaps because they had longer heads than Tabary, perhaps +because it is less easy to wheedle men in a body, they kept +obstinately to generalities and gave him no information as to +their exploits, past, present, or to come. I suppose Tabary +groaned under this reserve; for no sooner were he and the +Prior out of the church than he fairly emptied his heart to +him, gave him full details of many hanging matters in the +past, and explained the future intentions of the band. The +scheme of the hour was to rob another Augustine monk, Robert +de la Porte, and in this the Prior agreed to take a hand with +simulated greed. Thus, in the course of two days, he had +turned this wineskin of a Tabary inside out. For a while +longer the farce was carried on; the Prior was introduced to +Petit-Jehan, whom he describes as a little, very smart man of +thirty, with a black beard and a short jacket; an appointment +was made and broken in the de la Porte affair; Tabary had +some breakfast at the Prior's charge and leaked out more +secrets under the influence of wine and friendship; and then +all of a sudden, on the 17th of May, an alarm sprang up, the +Prior picked up his skirts and walked quietly over to the +Chatelet to make a deposition, and the whole band took to +their heels and vanished out of Paris and the sight of the +police. + +Vanish as they like, they all go with a clog about their +feet. Sooner or later, here or there, they will be caught in +the fact, and ignominiously sent home. From our vantage of +four centuries afterwards, it is odd and pitiful to watch the +order in which the fugitives are captured and dragged in. + +Montigny was the first. In August of that same year, he was +laid by the heels on many grievous counts; sacrilegious +robberies, frauds, incorrigibility, and that bad business +about Thevenin Pensete in the house by the cemetery of St. +John. He was reclaimed by the ecclesiastical authorities as +a clerk; but the claim was rebutted on the score of +incorrigibility, and ultimately fell to the ground; and he +was condemned to death by the Provost of Paris. It was a +very rude hour for Montigny, but hope was not yet over. He +was a fellow of some birth; his father had been king's +pantler; his sister, probably married to some one about the +Court, was in the family way, and her health would be +endangered if the execution was proceeded with. So down +comes Charles the Seventh with letters of mercy, commuting +the penalty to a year in a dungeon on bread and water, and a +pilgrimage to the shrine of St. James in Galicia. Alas! the +document was incomplete; it did not contain the full tale of +Montigny's enormities; it did not recite that he had been +denied benefit of clergy, and it said nothing about Thevenin +Pensete. Montigny's hour was at hand. Benefit of clergy, +honourable descent from king's pantler, sister in the family +way, royal letters of commutation - all were of no avail. He +had been in prison in Rouen, in Tours, in Bordeaux, and four +times already in Paris; and out of all these he had come +scatheless; but now he must make a little excursion as far as +Montfaucon with Henry Cousin, executor of high justice. +There let him swing among the carrion crows. + +About a year later, in July 1458, the police laid hands on +Tabary. Before the ecclesiastical commissary he was twice +examined, and, on the latter occasion, put to the question +ordinary and extraordinary. What a dismal change from +pleasant suppers at the Mule, where he sat in triumph with +expert operators and great wits! He is at the lees of life, +poor rogue; and those fingers which once transcribed improper +romances are now agonisingly stretched upon the rack. We +have no sure knowledge, but we may have a shrewd guess of the +conclusion. Tabary, the admirer, would go the same way as +those whom he admired. + +The last we hear of is Colin de Cayeux. He was caught in +autumn 1460, in the great Church of St. Leu d'Esserens, which +makes so fine a figure in the pleasant Oise valley between +Creil and Beaumont. He was reclaimed by no less than two +bishops; but the Procureur for the Provost held fast by +incorrigible Colin. 1460 was an ill-starred year: for +justice was making a clean sweep of "poor and indigent +persons, thieves, cheats, and lockpickers," in the +neighbourhood of Paris; (1) and Colin de Cayeux, with many +others, was condemned to death and hanged. (2) + +(1) CHRON. SCAND. ut supra. +(2) Here and there, principally in the order of events, this +article differs from M. Longnon's own reading of his +material. The ground on which he defers the execution of +Montigny and De Cayeux beyond the date of their trials seems +insufficient. There is a law of parsimony for the +construction of historical documents; simplicity is the first +duty of narration; and hanged they were. + + +VILLON AND THE GALLOWS. + + +Villon was still absent on the Angers expedition when the +Prior of Paray sent such a bombshell among his accomplices; +and the dates of his return and arrest remain undiscoverable. +M. Campaux plausibly enough opined for the autumn of 1457, +which would make him closely follow on Montigny, and the +first of those denounced by the Prior to fall into the toils. +We may suppose, at least, that it was not long thereafter; we +may suppose him competed for between lay and clerical Courts; +and we may suppose him alternately pert and impudent, humble +and fawning, in his defence. But at the end of all +supposing, we come upon some nuggets of fact. For first, he +was put to the question by water. He who had tossed off so +many cups of white Baigneux or red Beaune, now drank water +through linen folds, until his bowels were flooded and his +heart stood still. After so much raising of the elbow, so +much outcry of fictitious thirst, here at last was enough +drinking for a lifetime. Truly, of our pleasant vices, the +gods make whips to scourge us. And secondly he was condemned +to be hanged. A man may have been expecting a catastrophe +for years, and yet find himself unprepared when it arrives. +Certainly, Villon found, in this legitimate issue of his +career, a very staggering and grave consideration. Every +beast, as he says, clings bitterly to a whole skin. If +everything is lost, and even honour, life still remains; nay, +and it becomes, like the ewe lamb in Nathan's parable, as +dear as all the rest. "Do you fancy," he asks, in a lively +ballad, "that I had not enough philosophy under my hood to +cry out: 'I appeal'? If I had made any bones about the +matter, I should have been planted upright in the fields, the +St, Denis Road" - Montfaucon being on the way to St. Denis. +An appeal to Parliament, as we saw in the case of Colin de +Cayeux, did not necessarily lead to an acquittal or a +commutation; and while the matter was pending, our poet had +ample opportunity to reflect on his position. Hanging is a +sharp argument, and to swing with many others on the gibbet +adds a horrible corollary for the imagination. With the +aspect of Montfaucon he was well acquainted; indeed, as the +neighbourhood appears to have been sacred to junketing and +nocturnal picnics of wild young men and women, he had +probably studied it under all varieties of hour and weather. +And now, as he lay in prison waiting the mortal push, these +different aspects crowded back on his imagination with a new +and startling significance; and he wrote a ballad, by way of +epitaph for himself and his companions, which remains unique +in the annals of mankind. It is, in the highest sense, a +piece of his biography:- + + +"La pluye nous a debuez et lavez, +Et le soleil dessechez et noirciz; +Pies, corbeaulx, nous ont les yeux cavez, +Et arrachez la barbe et les sourcilz. +Jamais, nul temps, nous ne sommes rassis; +Puis ca, puis la, comme le vent varie, +A son plaisir sans cesser nous charie, +Plus becquetez d'oiscaulx que dez a couldre. +Ne soyez donc de nostre confrairie, +Mais priez Dieu que tous nous vueille absouldre." + + +Here is some genuine thieves' literature after so much that +was spurious; sharp as an etching, written with a shuddering +soul. There is an intensity of consideration in the piece +that shows it to be the transcript of familiar thoughts. It +is the quintessence of many a doleful nightmare on the straw, +when he felt himself swing helpless in the wind, and saw the +birds turn about him, screaming and menacing his eyes. + +And, after all, the Parliament changed his sentence into one +of banishment; and to Roussillon, in Dauphiny, our poet must +carry his woes without delay. Travellers between Lyons and +Marseilles may remember a station on the line, some way below +Vienne, where the Rhone fleets seaward between vine-clad +hills. This was Villon's Siberia. It would be a little warm +in summer perhaps, and a little cold in winter in that +draughty valley between two great mountain fields; but what +with the hills, and the racing river, and the fiery Rhone +wines, he was little to be pitied on the conditions of his +exile. Villon, in a remarkably bad ballad, written in a +breath, heartily thanked and fulsomely belauded the +Parliament; the ENVOI, like the proverbial postscript of a +lady's letter, containing the pith of his performance in a +request for three days' delay to settle his affairs and bid +his friends farewell. He was probably not followed out of +Paris, like Antoine Fradin, the popular preacher, another +exile of a few years later, by weeping multitudes; (1) but I +daresay one or two rogues of his acquaintance would keep him +company for a mile or so on the south road, and drink a +bottle with him before they turned. For banished people, in +those days, seem to have set out on their own responsibility, +in their own guard, and at their own expense. It was no joke +to make one's way from Paris to Roussillon alone and +penniless in the fifteenth century. Villon says he left a +rag of his tails on every bush. Indeed, he must have had +many a weary tramp, many a slender meal, and many a to-do +with blustering captains of the Ordonnance. But with one of +his light fingers, we may fancy that he took as good as he +gave; for every rag of his tail, he would manage to indemnify +himself upon the population in the shape of food, or wine, or +ringing money; and his route would be traceable across France +and Burgundy by housewives and inn-keepers lamenting over +petty thefts, like the track of a single human locust. A +strange figure he must have cut in the eyes of the good +country people: this ragged, blackguard city poet, with a +smack of the Paris student, and a smack of the Paris street +arab, posting along the highways, in rain or sun, among the +green fields and vineyards. For himself, he had no taste for +rural loveliness; green fields and vineyards would be mighty +indifferent to Master Francis; but he would often have his +tongue in his cheek at the simplicity of rustic dupes, and +often, at city gates, he might stop to contemplate the gibbet +with its swinging bodies, and hug himself on his escape. + +(1) CHRON. SCAND., p. 338. + +How long he stayed at Roussillon, how far he became the +protege of the Bourbons, to whom that town belonged, or when +it was that he took part, under the auspices of Charles of +Orleans, in a rhyming tournament to be referred to once again +in the pages of the present volume, are matters that still +remain in darkness, in spite of M. Longnon's diligent +rummaging among archives. When we next find him, in summer +1461, alas! he is once more in durance: this time at Meun- +sur-Loire, in the prisons of Thibault d'Aussigny, Bishop of +Orleans. He had been lowered in a basket into a noisome pit, +where he lay, all summer, gnawing hard crusts and railing +upon fate. His teeth, he says, were like the teeth of a +rake: a touch of haggard portraiture all the more real for +being excessive and burlesque, and all the more proper to the +man for being a caricature of his own misery. His eyes were +"bandaged with thick walls." It might blow hurricanes +overhead; the lightning might leap in high heaven; but no +word of all this reached him in his noisome pit. "Il +n'entre, ou gist, n'escler ni tourbillon." Above all, he was +fevered with envy and anger at the freedom of others; and his +heart flowed over into curses as he thought of Thibault +d'Aussigny, walking the streets in God's sunlight, and +blessing people with extended fingers. So much we find +sharply lined in his own poems. Why he was cast again into +prison - how he had again managed to shave the gallows - this +we know not, nor, from the destruction of authorities, are we +ever likely to learn. But on October 2d, 1461, or some day +immediately preceding, the new King, Louis Eleventh, made his +joyous entry into Meun. Now it was a part of the formality +on such occasions for the new King to liberate certain +prisoners; and so the basket was let down into Villon's pit, +and hastily did Master Francis scramble in, and was most +joyfully hauled up, and shot out, blinking and tottering, but +once more a free man, into the blessed sun and wind. Now or +never is the time for verses! Such a happy revolution would +turn the head of a stocking-weaver, and set him jingling +rhymes. And so - after a voyage to Paris, where he finds +Montigny and De Cayeux clattering, their bones upon the +gibbet, and his three pupils roystering in Paris streets, +"with their thumbs under their girdles," - down sits Master +Francis to write his LARGE TESTAMENT, and perpetuate his name +in a sort of glorious ignominy. + + +THE LARGE TESTAMENT. + + +Of this capital achievement and, with it, of Villon's style +in general, it is here the place to speak. The LARGE +TESTAMENT is a hurly-burly of cynical and sentimental +reflections about life, jesting legacies to friends and +enemies, and, interspersed among these many admirable +ballades, both serious and absurd. With so free a design, no +thought that occurred to him would need to be dismissed +without expression; and he could draw at full length the +portrait of his own bedevilled soul, and of the bleak and +blackguardly world which was the theatre of his exploits and +sufferings. If the reader can conceive something between the +slap-dash inconsequence of Byron's DON JUAN and the racy +humorous gravity and brief noble touches that distinguish the +vernacular poems of Burns, he will have formed some idea of +Villon's style. To the latter writer - except in the +ballades, which are quite his own, and can be paralleled from +no other language known to me - he bears a particular +resemblance. In common with Burns he has a certain rugged +compression, a brutal vivacity of epithet, a homely vigour, a +delight in local personalities, and an interest in many sides +of life, that are often despised and passed over by more +effete and cultured poets. Both also, in their strong, easy +colloquial way, tend to become difficult and obscure; the +obscurity in the case of Villon passing at times into the +absolute darkness of cant language. They are perhaps the +only two great masters of expression who keep sending their +readers to a glossary. + +"Shall we not dare to say of a thief," asks Montaigne, "that +he has a handsome leg?" It is a far more serious claim that +we have to put forward in behalf of Villon. Beside that of +his contemporaries, his writing, so full of colour, so +eloquent, so picturesque, stands out in an almost miraculous +isolation. If only one or two of the chroniclers could have +taken a leaf out of his book, history would have been a +pastime, and the fifteenth century as present to our minds as +the age of Charles Second. This gallows-bird was the one +great writer of his age and country, and initiated modern +literature for France. Boileau, long ago, in the period of +perukes and snuff-boxes, recognised him as the first +articulate poet in the language; and if we measure him, not +by priority of merit, but living duration of influence, not +on a comparison with obscure forerunners, but with great and +famous successors, we shall instal this ragged and +disreputable figure in a far higher niche in glory's temple +than was ever dreamed of by the critic. It is, in itself, a +memorable fact that, before 1542, in the very dawn of +printing, and while modern France was in the making, the +works of Villon ran through seven different editions. Out of +him flows much of Rabelais; and through Rabelais, directly +and indirectly, a deep, permanent, and growing inspiration. +Not only his style, but his callous pertinent way of looking +upon the sordid and ugly sides of life, becomes every day a +more specific feature in the literature of France. And only +the other year, a work of some power appeared in Paris, and +appeared with infinite scandal, which owed its whole inner +significance and much of its outward form to the study of our +rhyming thief. + +The world to which he introduces us is, as before said, +blackguardly and bleak. Paris swarms before us, full of +famine, shame, and death; monks and the servants of great +lords hold high wassail upon cakes and pastry; the poor man +licks his lips before the baker's window; people with patched +eyes sprawl all night under the stalls; chuckling Tabary +transcribes an improper romance; bare-bosomed lasses and +ruffling students swagger in the streets; the drunkard goes +stumbling homewards; the graveyard is full of bones; and away +on Montfaucon, Colin de Cayeux and Montigny hang draggled in +the rain. Is there nothing better to be seen than sordid +misery and worthless joys? Only where the poor old mother of +the poet kneels in church below painted windows, and makes +tremulous supplication to the Mother of God. + +In our mixed world, full of green fields and happy lovers, +where not long before, Joan of Arc had led one of the highest +and noblest lives in the whole story of mankind, this was all +worth chronicling that our poet could perceive. His eyes +were indeed sealed with his own filth. He dwelt all his life +in a pit more noisome than the dungeon at Meun. In the moral +world, also, there are large phenomena not cognisable out of +holes and corners. Loud winds blow, speeding home deep-laden +ships and sweeping rubbish from the earth; the lightning +leaps and cleans the face of heaven; high purposes and brave +passions shake and sublimate men's spirits; and meanwhile, in +the narrow dungeon of his soul, Villon is mumbling crusts and +picking vermin. + +Along with this deadly gloom of outlook, we must take another +characteristic of his work: its unrivalled insincerity. I +can give no better similitude of this quality than I have +given already: that he comes up with a whine, and runs away +with a whoop and his finger to his nose. His pathos is that +of a professional mendicant who should happen to be a man of +genius; his levity that of a bitter street arab, full of +bread. On a first reading, the pathetic passages preoccupy +the reader, and he is cheated out of an alms in the shape of +sympathy. But when the thing is studied the illusion fades +away: in the transitions, above all, we can detect the evil, +ironical temper of the man; and instead of a flighty work, +where many crude but genuine feelings tumble together for the +mastery as in the lists of tournament, we are tempted to +think of the LARGE TESTAMENT as of one long-drawn epical +grimace, pulled by a merry-andrew, who has found a certain +despicable eminence over human respect and human affections +by perching himself astride upon the gallows. Between these +two views, at best, all temperate judgments will be found to +fall; and rather, as I imagine, towards the last. + +There were two things on which he felt with perfect and, in +one case, even threatening sincerity. + +The first of these was an undisguised envy of those richer +than himself. He was for ever drawing a parallel, already +exemplified from his own words, between the happy life of the +well-to-do and the miseries of the poor. Burns, too proud +and honest not to work, continued through all reverses to +sing of poverty with a light, defiant note. Beranger waited +till he was himself beyond the reach of want, before writing +the OLD VAGABOND or JACQUES. Samuel Johnson, although he was +very sorry to be poor, "was a great arguer for the advantages +of poverty" in his ill days. Thus it is that brave men carry +their crosses, and smile with the fox burrowing in their +vitals. But Villon, who had not the courage to be poor with +honesty, now whiningly implores our sympathy, now shows his +teeth upon the dung-heap with an ugly snarl. He envies +bitterly, envies passionately. Poverty, he protests, drives +men to steal, as hunger makes the wolf sally from the forest. +The poor, he goes on, will always have a carping word to say, +or, if that outlet be denied, nourish rebellious thoughts. +It is a calumny on the noble army of the poor. Thousands in +a small way of life, ay, and even in the smallest, go through +life with tenfold as much honour and dignity and peace of +mind, as the rich gluttons whose dainties and state-beds +awakened Villon's covetous temper. And every morning's sun +sees thousands who pass whistling to their toil. But Villon +was the "mauvais pauvre" defined by Victor Hugo, and, in its +English expression, so admirably stereotyped by Dickens. He +was the first wicked sansculotte. He is the man of genius +with the moleskin cap. He is mighty pathetic and beseeching +here in the street, but I would not go down a dark road with +him for a large consideration. + +The second of the points on which he was genuine and emphatic +was common to the middle ages; a deep and somewhat snivelling +conviction of the transitory nature of this life and the pity +and horror of death. Old age and the grave, with some dark +and yet half-sceptical terror of an after-world - these were +ideas that clung about his bones like a disease. An old ape, +as he says, may play all the tricks in its repertory, and +none of them will tickle an audience into good humour. +"Tousjours vieil synge est desplaisant." It is not the old +jester who receives most recognition at a tavern party, but +the young fellow, fresh and handsome, who knows the new +slang, and carries off his vice with a certain air. Of this, +as a tavern jester himself, he would be pointedly conscious. +As for the women with whom he was best acquainted, his +reflections on their old age, in all their harrowing pathos, +shall remain in the original for me. Horace has disgraced +himself to something the same tune; but what Horace throws +out with an ill-favoured laugh, Villon dwells on with an +almost maudlin whimper. + +It is in death that he finds his truest inspiration in the +swift and sorrowful change that overtakes beauty; in the +strange revolution by which great fortunes and renowns are +diminished to a handful of churchyard dust; and in the utter +passing away of what was once lovable and mighty. It is in +this that the mixed texture of his thought enables him to +reach such poignant and terrible effects, and to enchance +pity with ridicule, like a man cutting capers to a funeral +march. It is in this, also, that he rises out of himself +into the higher spheres of art. So, in the ballade by which +he is best known, he rings the changes on names that once +stood for beautiful and queenly women, and are now no more +than letters and a legend. "Where are the snows of yester +year?" runs the burden. And so, in another not so famous, he +passes in review the different degrees of bygone men, from +the holy Apostles and the golden Emperor of the East, down to +the heralds, pursuivants, and trumpeters, who also bore their +part in the world's pageantries and ate greedily at great +folks' tables: all this to the refrain of "So much carry the +winds away!" Probably, there was some melancholy in his mind +for a yet lower grade, and Montigny and Colin de Cayeux +clattering their bones on Paris gibbet. Alas, and with so +pitiful an experience of life, Villon can offer us nothing +but terror and lamentation about death! No one has ever more +skilfully communicated his own disenchantment; no one ever +blown a more ear-piercing note of sadness. This unrepentant +thief can attain neither to Christian confidence, nor to the +spirit of the bright Greek saying, that whom the gods love +die early. It is a poor heart, and a poorer age, that cannot +accept the conditions of life with some heroic readiness. + +* * * * + +The date of the LARGE TESTAMENT is the last date in the +poet's biography. After having achieved that admirable and +despicable performance, he disappears into the night from +whence he came. How or when he died, whether decently in bed +or trussed up to a gallows, remains a riddle for foolhardy +commentators. It appears his health had suffered in the pit +at Meun; he was thirty years of age and quite bald; with the +notch in his under lip where Sermaise had struck him with the +sword, and what wrinkles the reader may imagine. In default +of portraits, this is all I have been able to piece together, +and perhaps even the baldness should be taken as a figure of +his destitution. A sinister dog, in all likelihood, but with +a look in his eye, and the loose flexile mouth that goes with +wit and an overweening sensual temperament. Certainly the +sorriest figure on the rolls of fame. + + + +CHAPTER VII - CHARLES OF ORLEANS + + + +FOR one who was no great politician, nor (as men go) +especially wise, capable or virtuous, Charles of Orleans is +more than usually enviable to all who love that better sort +of fame which consists in being known not widely, but +intimately. "To be content that time to come should know +there was such a man, not caring whether they knew more of +him, or to subsist under naked denominations, without deserts +or noble acts," is, says Sir Thomas Browne, a frigid +ambition. It is to some more specific memory that youth +looks forward in its vigils. Old kings are sometimes +disinterred in all the emphasis of life, the hands untainted +by decay, the beard that had so often wagged in camp or +senate still spread upon the royal bosom; and in busts and +pictures, some similitude of the great and beautiful of +former days is handed down. In this way, public curiosity +may be gratified, but hardly any private aspiration after +fame. It is not likely that posterity will fall in love with +us, but not impossible that it may respect or sympathise; and +so a man would rather leave behind him the portrait of his +spirit than a portrait of his face, FIGURA ANIMI MAGIS QUAM +CORPORIS. Of those who have thus survived themselves most +completely, left a sort of personal seduction behind them in +the world, and retained, after death, the art of making +friends, Montaigne and Samuel Johnson certainly stand first. +But we have portraits of all sorts of men, from august Caesar +to the king's dwarf; and all sorts of portraits, from a +Titian treasured in the Louvre to a profile over the grocer's +chimney shelf. And so in a less degree, but no less truly, +than the spirit of Montaigne lives on in the delightful +Essays, that of Charles of Orleans survives in a few old +songs and old account-books; and it is still in the choice of +the reader to make this duke's acquaintance, and, if their +humours suit, become his friend. + + +I. + + +His birth - if we are to argue from a man's parents - was +above his merit. It is not merely that he was the grandson +of one king, the father of another, and the uncle of a third; +but something more specious was to be looked for from the son +of his father, Louis de Valois, Duke of Orleans, brother to +the mad king Charles VI., lover of Queen Isabel, and the +leading patron of art and one of the leading politicians in +France. And the poet might have inherited yet higher virtues +from his mother, Valentina of Milan, a very pathetic figure +of the age, the faithful wife of an unfaithful husband, and +the friend of a most unhappy king. The father, beautiful, +eloquent, and accomplished, exercised a strange fascination +over his contemporaries; and among those who dip nowadays +into the annals of the time there are not many - and these +few are little to be envied - who can resist the fascination +of the mother. All mankind owe her a debt of gratitude +because she brought some comfort into the life of the poor +madman who wore the crown of France. + +Born (May 1391) of such a noble stock, Charles was to know +from the first all favours of nature and art. His father's +gardens were the admiration of his contemporaries; his +castles were situated in the most agreeable parts of France, +and sumptuously adorned. We have preserved, in an inventory +of 1403, the description of tapestried rooms where Charles +may have played in childhood. (1) "A green room, with the +ceiling full of angels, and the DOSSIER of shepherds and +shepherdesses seeming (FAISANT CONTENANCE) to eat nuts and +cherries. A room of gold, silk and worsted, with a device of +little children in a river, and the sky full of birds. A +room of green tapestry, showing a knight and lady at chess in +a pavilion. Another green room, with shepherdesses in a +trellised garden worked in gold and silk. A carpet +representing cherry-trees, where there is a fountain, and a +lady gathering cherries in a basin." These were some of the +pictures over which his fancy might busy itself of an +afternoon, or at morning as he lay awake in bed. With our +deeper and more logical sense of life, we can have no idea +how large a space in the attention of mediaeval men might be +occupied by such figured hangings on the wall. There was +something timid and purblind in the view they had of the +world. Morally, they saw nothing outside of traditional +axioms; and little of the physical aspect of things entered +vividly into their mind, beyond what was to be seen on church +windows and the walls and floors of palaces. The reader will +remember how Villon's mother conceived of heaven and hell and +took all her scanty stock of theology from the stained glass +that threw its light upon her as she prayed. And there is +scarcely a detail of external effect in the chronicles and +romances of the time, but might have been borrowed at second +hand from a piece of tapestry. It was a stage in the history +of mankind which we may see paralleled, to some extent, in +the first infant school, where the representations of lions +and elephants alternate round the wall with moral verses and +trite presentments of the lesser virtues. So that to live in +a house of many pictures was tantamount, for the time, to a +liberal education in itself. + +(1) Champollion-Figeac's LOUIS ET CHARLES D'ORLEANS, p. 348. + +At Charles's birth an order of knighthood was inaugurated in +his honour. At nine years old, he was a squire; at eleven, +he had the escort of a chaplain and a schoolmaster; at +twelve, his uncle the king made him a pension of twelve +thousand livres d'or. (1) He saw the most brilliant and the +most learned persons of France, in his father's Court; and +would not fail to notice that these brilliant and learned +persons were one and all engaged in rhyming. Indeed, if it +is difficult to realise the part played by pictures, it is +perhaps even more difficult to realise that played by verses +in the polite and active history of the age. At the siege of +Pontoise, English and French exchanged defiant ballades over +the walls. (2) If a scandal happened, as in the loathsome +thirty-third story of the CENT NOUVELLES NOUVELLES, all the +wits must make rondels and chansonettes, which they would +hand from one to another with an unmanly sneer. Ladies +carried their favourite's ballades in their girdles. (3) +Margaret of Scotland, all the world knows already, kissed +Alain Chartier's lips in honour of the many virtuous thoughts +and golden sayings they had uttered; but it is not so well +known, that this princess was herself the most industrious of +poetasters, that she is supposed to have hastened her death +by her literary vigils, and sometimes wrote as many as twelve +rondels in the day. (4) It was in rhyme, even, that the +young Charles should learn his lessons. He might get all +manner of instruction in the truly noble art of the chase, +not without a smack of ethics by the way, from the +compendious didactic poem of Gace de la Bigne. Nay, and it +was in rhyme that he should learn rhyming: in the verses of +his father's Maitre d'Hotel, Eustache Deschamps, which +treated of "l'art de dictier et de faire chancons, ballades, +virelais et rondeaux," along with many other matters worth +attention, from the courts of Heaven to the misgovernment of +France. (5) At this rate, all knowledge is to be had in a +goody, and the end of it is an old song. We need not wonder +when we hear from Monstrelet that Charles was a very well +educated person. He could string Latin texts together by the +hour, and make ballades and rondels better than Eustache +Deschamps himself. He had seen a mad king who would not +change his clothes, and a drunken emperor who could not keep +his hand from the wine-cup. He had spoken a great deal with +jesters and fiddlers, and with the profligate lords who +helped his father to waste the revenues of France. He had +seen ladies dance on into broad daylight, and much burning of +torches and waste of dainties and good wine. (6) And when +all is said, it was no very helpful preparation for the +battle of life. "I believe Louis XI.," writes Comines, +"would not have saved himself, if he had not been very +differently brought up from such other lords as I have seen +educated in this country; for these were taught nothing but +to play the jackanapes with finery and fine words." (7) I am +afraid Charles took such lessons to heart, and conceived of +life as a season principally for junketing and war. His view +of the whole duty of man, so empty, vain, and wearisome to +us, was yet sincerely and consistently held. When he came in +his ripe years to compare the glory of two kingdoms, England +and France, it was on three points only, - pleasures, valour, +and riches, - that he cared to measure them; and in the very +outset of that tract he speaks of the life of the great as +passed, "whether in arms, as in assaults, battles, and +sieges, or in jousts and tournaments, in high and stately +festivities and in funeral solemnities." (8) + +(1) D'Hericault's admirable MEMOIR, prefixed to his edition +of Charles's works, vol. i. p. xi. +(2) Vallet de Viriville, CHARLES VII. ET SON EPOQUE, ii. 428, +note 2. +(3) See Lecoy de la Marche, LE ROI RENE, i. 167. +(4) Vallet, CHARLES VII, ii. 85, 86, note 2. +(5) Champollion-Figeac, 193-198. +(6) Champollion-Figeac, 209. +(7) The student will see that there are facts cited, and +expressions borrowed, in this paragraph, from a period +extending over almost the whole of Charles's life, instead of +being confined entirely to his boyhood. As I do not believe +there was any change, so I do not believe there is any +anachronism involved. +(8) THE DEBATE BETWEEN THE HERALDS OF FRANCE AND ENGLAND, +translated and admirably edited by Mr. Henry Pyne. For the +attribution of this tract to Charles, the reader is referred +to Mr. Pyne's conclusive argument. + +When he was no more than thirteen, his father had him +affianced to Isabella, virgin-widow of our Richard II. and +daughter of his uncle Charles VI.; and, two years after (June +29, 1406), the cousins were married at Compiegne, he fifteen, +she seventeen years of age. It was in every way a most +desirable match. The bride brought five hundred thousand +francs of dowry. The ceremony was of the utmost +magnificence, Louis of Orleans figuring in crimson velvet, +adorned with no less than seven hundred and ninety-five +pearls, gathered together expressly for this occasion. And +no doubt it must have been very gratifying for a young +gentleman of fifteen, to play the chief part in a pageant so +gaily put upon the stage. Only, the bridegroom might have +been a little older; and, as ill-luck would have it, the +bride herself was of this way of thinking, and would not be +consoled for the loss of her title as queen, or the +contemptible age of her new husband. PLEUROIT FORT LADITE +ISABEAU; the said Isabella wept copiously. (1) It is fairly +debatable whether Charles was much to be pitied when, three +years later (September 1409), this odd marriage was dissolved +by death. Short as it was, however, this connection left a +lasting stamp upon his mind; and we find that, in the last +decade of his life, and after he had remarried for perhaps +the second time, he had not yet forgotten or forgiven the +violent death of Richard II. "Ce mauvais cas" - that ugly +business, he writes, has yet to be avenged. + +(1) Des Ursins. + +The marriage festivity was on the threshold of evil days. +The great rivalry between Louis of Orleans and John the +Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, had been forsworn with the most +reverend solemnities. But the feud was only in abeyance, and +John of Burgundy still conspired in secret. On November 23, +1407 - in that black winter when the frost lasted six-and- +sixty days on end - a summons from the king reached Louis of +Orleans at the Hotel Barbette, where he had been supping with +Queen Isabel. It was seven or eight in the evening, and the +inhabitants of the quarter were abed. He set forth in haste, +accompanied by two squires riding on one horse, a page, and a +few varlets running with torches. As he rode, he hummed to +himself and trifled with his glove. And so riding, he was +beset by the bravoes of his enemy and slain. My lord of +Burgundy set an ill precedent in this deed, as he found some +years after on the bridge of Montereau; and even in the +meantime he did not profit quietly by his rival's death. The +horror of the other princes seems to have perturbed himself; +he avowed his guilt in the council, tried to brazen it out, +finally lost heart and fled at full gallop, cutting bridges +behind him, towards Bapaume and Lille. And so there we have +the head of one faction, who had just made himself the most +formidable man in France, engaged in a remarkably hurried +journey, with black care on the pillion. And meantime, on +the other side, the widowed duchess came to Paris in +appropriate mourning, to demand justice for her husband's +death. Charles VI., who was then in a lucid interval, did +probably all that he could, when he raised up the kneeling +suppliant with kisses and smooth words. Things were at a +dead-lock. The criminal might be in the sorriest fright, but +he was still the greatest of vassals. Justice was easy to +ask and not difficult to promise; how it was to be executed +was another question. No one in France was strong enough to +punish John of Burgundy; and perhaps no one, except the +widow, very sincere in wishing to punish him. + +She, indeed, was eaten up of zeal; but the intensity of her +eagerness wore her out; and she died about a year after the +murder, of grief and indignation, unrequited love and +unsatisfied resentment. It was during the last months of her +life that this fiery and generous woman, seeing the soft +hearts of her own children, looked with envy on a certain +natural son of her husband's destined to become famous in the +sequel as the Bastard of Orleans, or the brave Dunois. "YOU +WERE STOLEN FROM ME," she said; "it is you who are fit to +avenge your father." These are not the words of ordinary +mourning, or of an ordinary woman. It is a saying, over +which Balzac would have rubbed his episcopal hands. That the +child who was to avenge her husband had not been born out of +her body, was a thing intolerable to Valentina of Milan; and +the expression of this singular and tragic jealousy is +preserved to us by a rare chance, in such straightforward and +vivid words as we are accustomed to hear only on the stress +of actual life, or in the theatre. In history - where we see +things as in a glass darkly, and the fashion of former times +is brought before us, deplorably adulterated and defaced, +fitted to very vague and pompous words, and strained through +many men's minds of everything personal or precise - this +speech of the widowed duchess startles a reader, somewhat as +the footprint startled Robinson Crusoe. A human voice breaks +in upon the silence of the study, and the student is aware of +a fellow-creature in his world of documents. With such a +clue in hand, one may imagine how this wounded lioness would +spur and exasperate the resentment of her children, and what +would be the last words of counsel and command she left +behind her. + +With these instancies of his dying mother - almost a voice +from the tomb - still tingling in his ears, the position of +young Charles of Orleans, when he was left at the head of +that great house, was curiously similar to that of +Shakspeare's Hamlet. The times were out of joint; here was a +murdered father to avenge on a powerful murderer; and here, +in both cases, a lad of inactive disposition born to set +these matters right. Valentina's commendation of Dunois +involved a judgment on Charles, and that judgment was exactly +correct. Whoever might be, Charles was not the man to avenge +his father. Like Hamlet, this son of a dear father murdered +was sincerely grieved at heart. Like Hamlet, too, he could +unpack his heart with words, and wrote a most eloquent letter +to the king, complaining that what was denied to him would +not be denied "to the lowest born and poorest man on earth." +Even in his private hours he strove to preserve a lively +recollection of his injury, and keep up the native hue of +resolution. He had gems engraved with appropriate legends, +hortatory or threatening: "DIEU LE SCET," God knows it; or +"SOUVENEZ-VOUS DE - " Remember! (1) It is only towards the +end that the two stories begin to differ; and in some points +the historical version is the more tragic. Hamlet only +stabbed a silly old councillor behind the arras; Charles of +Orleans trampled France for five years under the hoofs of his +banditti. The miscarriage of Hamlet's vengeance was +confined, at widest, to the palace; the ruin wrought by +Charles of Orleans was as broad as France. + +(1) Michelet, iv. App. 179, p. 337. + +Yet the first act of the young duke is worthy of honourable +mention. Prodigal Louis had made enormous debts; and there +is a story extant, to illustrate how lightly he himself +regarded these commercial obligations. It appears that +Louis, after a narrow escape he made in a thunder-storm, had +a smart access of penitence, and announced he would pay his +debts on the following Sunday. More than eight hundred +creditors presented themselves, but by that time the devil +was well again, and they were shown the door with more gaiety +than politeness. A time when such cynical dishonesty was +possible for a man of culture is not, it will be granted, a +fortunate epoch for creditors. When the original debtor was +so lax, we may imagine how an heir would deal with the +incumbrances of his inheritance. On the death of Philip the +Forward, father of that John the Fearless whom we have seen +at work, the widow went through the ceremony of a public +renunciation of goods; taking off her purse and girdle, she +left them on the grave, and thus, by one notable act, +cancelled her husband's debts and defamed his honour. The +conduct of young Charles of Orleans was very different. To +meet the joint liabilities of his father and mother (for +Valentina also was lavish), he had to sell or pledge a +quantity of jewels; and yet he would not take advantage of a +pretext, even legally valid, to diminish the amount. Thus, +one Godefroi Lefevre, having disbursed many odd sums for the +late duke, and received or kept no vouchers, Charles ordered +that he should be believed upon his oath. (1) To a modern +mind this seems as honourable to his father's memory as if +John the Fearless had been hanged as high as Haman. And as +things fell out, except a recantation from the University of +Paris, which had justified the murder out of party feeling, +and various other purely paper reparations, this was about +the outside of what Charles was to effect in that direction. +He lived five years, and grew up from sixteen to twenty-one, +in the midst of the most horrible civil war, or series of +civil wars, that ever devastated France; and from first to +last his wars were ill-starred, or else his victories +useless. Two years after the murder (March 1409), John the +Fearless having the upper hand for the moment, a shameful and +useless reconciliation took place, by the king's command, in +the church of Our Lady at Chartres. The advocate of the Duke +of Burgundy stated that Louis of Orleans had been killed "for +the good of the king's person and realm." Charles and his +brothers, with tears of shame, under protest, POUR NE PAS +DESOBEIR AU ROI, forgave their father's murderer and swore +peace upon the missal. It was, as I say, a shameful and +useless ceremony; the very greffier, entering it in his +register, wrote in the margin, "PAX, PAX, INQUIT PROPHETA, ET +NON EST PAX." (2) Charles was soon after allied with the +abominable Bernard d'Armagnac, even betrothed or married to a +daughter of his, called by a name that sounds like a +contradiction in terms, Bonne d'Armagnac. From that time +forth, throughout all this monstrous period - a very +nightmare in the history of France - he is no more than a +stalking-horse for the ambitious Gascon. Sometimes the smoke +lifts, and you can see him for the twinkling of an eye, a +very pale figure; at one moment there is a rumour he will be +crowned king; at another, when the uproar has subsided, he +will be heard still crying out for justice; and the next +(1412), he is showing himself to the applauding populace on +the same horse with John of Burgundy. But these are +exceptional seasons, and, for the most part, he merely rides +at the Gascon's bridle over devastated France. His very +party go, not by the name of Orleans, but by the name of +Armagnac, Paris is in the hands of the butchers: the peasants +have taken to the woods. Alliances are made and broken as if +in a country dance; the English called in, now by this one, +now by the other. Poor people sing in church, with white +faces and lamentable music: "DOMINE JESU, PARCE POPULO TUO, +DIRIGE IN VIAM PACIS PRINCIPES." And the end and upshot of +the whole affair for Charles of Orleans is another peace with +John the Fearless. France is once more tranquil, with the +tranquillity of ruin; he may ride home again to Blois, and +look, with what countenance he may, on those gems he had got +engraved in the early days of his resentment, "SOUVENEZ-VOUS +DE - " Remember! He has killed Polonius, to be sure; but +the king is never a penny the worse. + +(1) Champollion-Figeac, pp. 279-82. +(2) Michelet, iv. pp. 123-4. + + +II. + + +From the battle of Agincourt (Oct. 1415) dates the second +period of Charles's life. The English reader will remember +the name of Orleans in the play of HENRY V.; and it is at +least odd that we can trace a resemblance between the puppet +and the original. The interjection, "I have heard a sonnet +begin so to one's mistress" (Act iii. scene 7), may very well +indicate one who was already an expert in that sort of +trifle; and the game of proverbs he plays with the Constable +in the same scene, would be quite in character for a man who +spent many years of his life capping verses with his +courtiers. Certainly, Charles was in the great battle with +five hundred lances (say, three thousand men), and there he +was made prisoner as he led the van. According to one story, +some ragged English archer shot him down; and some diligent +English Pistol, hunting ransoms on the field of battle, +extracted him from under a heap of bodies and retailed him to +our King Henry. He was the most important capture of the +day, and used with all consideration. On the way to Calais, +Henry sent him a present of bread and wine (and bread, you +will remember, was an article of luxury in the English camp), +but Charles would neither eat nor drink. Thereupon, Henry +came to visit him in his quarters. "Noble cousin," said he, +"how are you?" Charles replied that he was well. "Why, +then, do you neither eat nor drink?" And then with some +asperity, as I imagine, the young duke told him that "truly +he had no inclination for food." And our Henry improved the +occasion with something of a snuffle, assuring his prisoner +that God had fought against the French on account of their +manifold sins and transgressions. Upon this there supervened +the agonies of a rough sea passage; and many French lords, +Charles, certainly, among the number, declared they would +rather endure such another defeat than such another sore +trial on shipboard. Charles, indeed, never forgot his +sufferings. Long afterwards, he declared his hatred to a +seafaring life, and willingly yielded to England the empire +of the seas, "because there is danger and loss of life, and +God knows what pity when it storms; and sea-sickness is for +many people hard to bear; and the rough life that must be led +is little suitable for the nobility:" (1) which, of all +babyish utterances that ever fell from any public man, may +surely bear the bell. Scarcely disembarked, he followed his +victor, with such wry face as we may fancy, through the +streets of holiday London. And then the doors closed upon +his last day of garish life for more than a quarter of a +century. After a boyhood passed in the dissipations of a +luxurious court or in the camp of war, his ears still stunned +and his cheeks still burning from his enemies' jubilations; +out of all this ringing of English bells and singing of +English anthems, from among all these shouting citizens in +scarlet cloaks, and beautiful virgins attired in white, he +passed into the silence and solitude of a political prison. +(2) + +(1) DEBATE BETWEEN THE HERALDS. +(2) Sir H. Nicholas, AGINCOURT. + +His captivity was not without alleviations. He was allowed +to go hawking, and he found England an admirable country for +the sport; he was a favourite with English ladies, and +admired their beauty; and he did not lack for money, wine, or +books; he was honourably imprisoned in the strongholds of +great nobles, in Windsor Castle and the Tower of London. But +when all is said, he was a prisoner for five-and-twenty +years. For five-and-twenty years he could not go where he +would, or do what he liked, or speak with any but his +gaolers. We may talk very wisely of alleviations; there is +only one alleviation for which the man would thank you: he +would thank you to open the door. With what regret Scottish +James I. bethought him (in the next room perhaps to Charles) +of the time when he rose "as early as the day." What would +he not have given to wet his boots once more with morning +dew, and follow his vagrant fancy among the meadows? The +only alleviation to the misery of constraint lies in the +disposition of the prisoner. To each one this place of +discipline brings his own lesson. It stirs Latude or Baron +Trenck into heroic action; it is a hermitage for pious and +conformable spirits. Beranger tells us he found prison life, +with its regular hours and long evenings, both pleasant and +profitable. THE PILGRIM'S PROGRESS and DON QUIXOTE were +begun in prison. It was after they were become (to use the +words of one of them), "Oh, worst imprisonment - the dungeon +of themselves!" that Homer and Milton worked so hard and so +well for the profit of mankind. In the year 1415 Henry V. +had two distinguished prisoners, French Charles of Orleans +and Scottish James I., who whiled away the hours of their +captivity with rhyming. Indeed, there can be no better +pastime for a lonely man than the mechanical exercise of +verse. Such intricate forms as Charles had been used to from +childhood, the ballade with its scanty rhymes; the rondel, +with the recurrence first of the whole, then of half the +burthen, in thirteen verses, seem to have been invented for +the prison and the sick bed. The common Scotch saying, on +the sight of anything operose and finical, "he must have had +little to do that made that!" might be put as epigraph on all +the song books of old France. Making such sorts of verse +belongs to the same class of pleasures as guessing acrostics +or "burying proverbs." It is almost purely formal, almost +purely verbal. It must be done gently and gingerly. It +keeps the mind occupied a long time, and never so intently as +to be distressing; for anything like strain is against the +very nature of the craft. Sometimes things go easily, the +refrains fall into their place as if of their own accord, and +it becomes something of the nature of an intellectual tennis; +you must make your poem as the rhymes will go, just as you +must strike your ball as your adversary played it. So that +these forms are suitable rather for those who wish to make +verses, than for those who wish to express opinions. +Sometimes, on the other hand, difficulties arise: rival +verses come into a man's head, and fugitive words elude his +memory. Then it is that he enjoys at the same time the +deliberate pleasures of a connoisseur comparing wines, and +the ardour of the chase. He may have been sitting all day +long in prison with folded hands; but when he goes to bed, +the retrospect will seem animated and eventful. + +Besides confirming himself as an habitual maker of verses, +Charles acquired some new opinions during his captivity. He +was perpetually reminded of the change that had befallen him. +He found the climate of England cold and "prejudicial to the +human frame;" he had a great contempt for English fruit and +English beer; even the coal fires were unpleasing in his +eyes. (1) He was rooted up from among his friends and +customs and the places that had known him. And so in this +strange land he began to learn the love of his own. Sad +people all the world over are like to be moved when the wind +is in some particular quarter. So Burns preferred when it +was in the west, and blew to him from his mistress; so the +girl in the ballade, looking south to Yarrow, thought it +might carry a kiss betwixt her and her gallant; and so we +find Charles singing of the "pleasant wind that comes from +France." (2) One day, at "Dover-on-the-Sea," he looked +across the straits, and saw the sandhills about Calais. And +it happened to him, he tells us in a ballade, to remember his +happiness over there in the past; and he was both sad and +merry at the recollection, and could not have his fill of +gazing on the shores of France. (3) Although guilty of +unpatriotic acts, he had never been exactly unpatriotic in +feeling. But his sojourn in England gave, for the time at +least, some consistency to what had been a very weak and +ineffectual prejudice. He must have been under the influence +of more than usually solemn considerations, when he proceeded +to turn Henry's puritanical homily after Agincourt into a +ballade, and reproach France, and himself by implication, +with pride, gluttony, idleness, unbridled covetousness, and +sensuality. (4) For the moment, he must really have been +thinking more of France than of Charles of Orleans. + +(1) DEBATE BETWEEN THE HERALDS. +(2) Works (ed. d'Hericault), i. 43. +(3) IBID. 143. +(4) Works (ed. d'Hericault), i. 190. + +And another lesson he learned. He who was only to be +released in case of peace, begins to think upon the +disadvantages of war. "Pray for peace," is his refrain: a +strange enough subject for the ally of Bernard d'Armagnac. +(1) But this lesson was plain and practical; it had one side +in particular that was specially attractive for Charles; and +he did not hesitate to explain it in so many words. +"Everybody," he writes - I translate roughly - "everybody +should be much inclined to peace, for everybody has a deal to +gain by it." (2) + +(1) IBID. 144. +(2) IBID. 158. + +Charles made laudable endeavours to acquire English, and even +learned to write a rondel in that tongue of quite average +mediocrity. (1) He was for some time billeted on the unhappy +Suffolk, who received fourteen shillings and fourpence a day +for his expenses; and from the fact that Suffolk afterwards +visited Charles in France while he was negotiating the +marriage of Henry VI., as well as the terms of that +nobleman's impeachment, we may believe there was some not +unkindly intercourse between the prisoner and his gaoler: a +fact of considerable interest when we remember that Suffolk's +wife was the granddaughter of the poet Geoffrey Chaucer. (2) +Apart from this, and a mere catalogue of dates and places, +only one thing seems evident in the story of Charles's +captivity. It seems evident that, as these five-and-twenty +years drew on, he became less and less resigned. +Circumstances were against the growth of such a feeling. One +after another of his fellow-prisoners was ransomed and went +home. More than once he was himself permitted to visit +France; where he worked on abortive treaties and showed +himself more eager for his own deliverance than for the +profit of his native land. Resignation may follow after a +reasonable time upon despair; but if a man is persecuted by a +series of brief and irritating hopes, his mind no more +attains to a settled frame of resolution, than his eye would +grow familiar with a night of thunder and lightning. Years +after, when he was speaking at the trial of that Duke of +Alencon, who began life so hopefully as the boyish favourite +of Joan of Arc, he sought to prove that captivity was a +harder punishment than death. "For I have had experience +myself," he said; "and in my prison of England, for the +weariness, danger, and displeasure in which I then lay, I +have many a time wished I had been slain at the battle where +they took me." (3) This is a flourish, if you will, but it +is something more. His spirit would sometimes rise up in a +fine anger against the petty desires and contrarieties of +life. He would compare his own condition with the quiet and +dignified estate of the dead; and aspire to lie among his +comrades on the field of Agincourt, as the Psalmist prayed to +have the wings of a dove and dwell in the uttermost parts of +the sea. But such high thoughts came to Charles only in a +flash. + +(1) M. Champollion-Figeac gives many in his editions of +Charles's works, most (as I should think) of very doubtful +authenticity, or worse. +(2) Rymer, x. 564. D'Hericault's MEMOIR, p. xli. Gairdner's +PASTON LETTERS, i. 27, 99. +(3) Champollion-Figeac, 377. + +John the Fearless had been murdered in his turn on the bridge +of Montereau so far back as 1419. His son, Philip the Good - +partly to extinguish the feud, partly that he might do a +popular action, and partly, in view of his ambitious schemes, +to detach another great vassal from the throne of France - +had taken up the cause of Charles of Orleans, and negotiated +diligently for his release. In 1433 a Burgundian embassy was +admitted to an interview with the captive duke, in the +presence of Suffolk. Charles shook hands most affectionately +with the ambassadors. They asked after his health. "I am +well enough in body," he replied, "but far from well in mind. +I am dying of grief at having to pass the best days of my +life in prison, with none to sympathise." The talk falling +on the chances of peace, Charles referred to Suffolk if he +were not sincere and constant in his endeavours to bring it +about. "If peace depended on me," he said, "I should procure +it gladly, were it to cost me my life seven days after." We +may take this as showing what a large price he set, not so +much on peace, as on seven days of freedom. Seven days! - he +would make them seven years in the employment. Finally, he +assured the ambassadors of his good will to Philip of +Burgundy; squeezed one of them by the hand and nipped him +twice in the arm to signify things unspeakable before +Suffolk; and two days after sent them Suffolk's barber, one +Jean Carnet, a native of Lille, to testify more freely of his +sentiments. "As I speak French," said this emissary, "the +Duke of Orleans is more familiar with me than with any other +of the household; and I can bear witness he never said +anything against Duke Philip." (1) It will be remembered +that this person, with whom he was so anxious to stand well, +was no other than his hereditary enemy, the son of his +father's murderer. But the honest fellow bore no malice, +indeed not he. He began exchanging ballades with Philip, +whom he apostrophises as his companion, his cousin, and his +brother. He assures him that, soul and body, he is +altogether Burgundian; and protests that he has given his +heart in pledge to him. Regarded as the history of a +vendetta, it must be owned that Charles's life has points of +some originality. And yet there is an engaging frankness +about these ballades which disarms criticism. (2) You see +Charles throwing himself headforemost into the trap; you hear +Burgundy, in his answers begin to inspire him with his own +prejudices, and draw melancholy pictures of the misgovernment +of France. But Charles's own spirits are so high and so +amiable, and he is so thoroughly convinced his cousin is a +fine fellow, that one's scruples are carried away in the +torrent of his happiness and gratitude. And his would be a +sordid spirit who would not clap hands at the consummation +(Nov. 1440); when Charles, after having sworn on the +Sacrament that he would never again bear arms against +England, and pledged himself body and soul to the unpatriotic +faction in his own country, set out from London with a light +heart and a damaged integrity. + +(1) Dom Plancher, iv. 178-9. +(2) Works, i. 157-63. + +In the magnificent copy of Charles's poems, given by our +Henry VII. to Elizabeth of York on the occasion of their +marriage, a large illumination figures at the head of one of +the pages, which, in chronological perspective, is almost a +history of his imprisonment. It gives a view of London with +all its spires, the river passing through the old bridge and +busy with boats. One side of the White Tower has been taken +out, and we can see, as under a sort of shrine, the paved +room where the duke sits writing. He occupies a high-backed +bench in front of a great chimney; red and black ink are +before him; and the upper end of the apartment is guarded by +many halberdiers, with the red cross of England on their +breast. On the next side of the tower he appears again, +leaning out of window and gazing on the river; doubtless +there blows just then "a pleasant wind from out the land of +France," and some ship comes up the river: "the ship of good +news." At the door we find him yet again; this time +embracing a messenger, while a groom stands by holding two +saddled horses. And yet further to the left, a cavalcade +defiles out of the tower; the duke is on his way at last +towards "the sunshine of France." + + +III. + + +During the five-and-twenty years of his captivity, Charles +had not lost in the esteem of his fellow-countrymen. For so +young a man, the head of so great a house, and so numerous a +party, to be taken prisoner as he rode in the vanguard of +France, and stereotyped for all men in this heroic attitude, +was to taste untimeously the honours of the grave. Of him, +as of the dead, it would be ungenerous to speak evil; what +little energy he had displayed would be remembered with +piety, when all that he had done amiss was courteously +forgotten. As English folk looked for Arthur; as Danes +awaited the coming of Ogier; as Somersetshire peasants or +sergeants of the Old Guard expected the return of Monmouth or +Napoleon; the countrymen of Charles of Orleans looked over +the straits towards his English prison with desire and +confidence. Events had so fallen out while he was rhyming +ballades, that he had become the type of all that was most +truly patriotic. The remnants of his old party had been the +chief defenders of the unity of France. His enemies of +Burgundy had been notoriously favourers and furtherers of +English domination. People forgot that his brother still lay +by the heels for an unpatriotic treaty with England, because +Charles himself had been taken prisoner patriotically +fighting against it. That Henry V. had left special orders +against his liberation, served to increase the wistful pity +with which he was regarded. And when, in defiance of all +contemporary virtue, and against express pledges, the English +carried war into their prisoner's fief, not only France, but +all thinking men in Christendom, were roused to indignation +against the oppressors, and sympathy with the victim. It was +little wonder if he came to bulk somewhat largely in the +imagination of the best of those at home. Charles le +Boutteillier, when (as the story goes) he slew Clarence at +Beauge, was only seeking an exchange for Charles of Orleans. +(1) It was one of Joan of Arc's declared intentions to +deliver the captive duke. If there was no other way, she +meant to cross the seas and bring him home by force. And she +professed before her judges a sure knowledge that Charles of +Orleans was beloved of God. (2) + +(1) Vallet's CHARLES VII., i. 251. +(2) PROCES DE JEANNE D'ARC, i. 133-55. + +Alas! it was not at all as a deliverer that Charles returned +to France. He was nearly fifty years old. Many changes had +been accomplished since, at twenty-three, he was taken on the +field of Agincourt. But of all these he was profoundly +ignorant, or had only heard of them in the discoloured +reports of Philip of Burgundy. He had the ideas of a former +generation, and sought to correct them by the scandal of a +factious party. With such qualifications he came back eager +for the domination, the pleasures, and the display that +befitted his princely birth. A long disuse of all political +activity combined with the flatteries of his new friends to +fill him with an overweening conceit of his own capacity and +influence. If aught had gone wrong in his absence, it seemed +quite natural men should look to him for its redress. Was +not King Arthur come again? + +The Duke of Burgundy received him with politic honours. He +took his guest by his foible for pageantry, all the easier as +it was a foible of his own; and Charles walked right out of +prison into much the same atmosphere of trumpeting and bell- +ringing as he had left behind when he went in. Fifteen days +after his deliverance he was married to Mary of Cleves, at +St. Omer. The marriage was celebrated with the usual pomp of +the Burgundian court; there were joustings, and +illuminations, and animals that spouted wine; and many nobles +dined together, COMME EN BRIGADE, and were served abundantly +with many rich and curious dishes. (1) It must have reminded +Charles not a little of his first marriage at Compiegne; only +then he was two years the junior of his bride, and this time +he was five-and-thirty years her senior. It will be a fine +question which marriage promises more: for a boy of fifteen +to lead off with a lass of seventeen, or a man of fifty to +make a match of it with a child of fifteen. But there was +something bitter in both. The lamentations of Isabella will +not have been forgotten. As for Mary, she took up with one +Jaquet de la Lain, a sort of muscular Methody of the period, +with a huge appetite for tournaments, and a habit of +confessing himself the last thing before he went to bed. (2) +With such a hero, the young duchess's amours were most likely +innocent; and in all other ways she was a suitable partner +for the duke, and well fitted to enter into his pleasures. + +(1) Monstrelet. +(2) Vallet's CHARLES VII., iii. chap. i. But see the +chronicle that bears Jaquet's name: a lean and dreary book. + +When the festivities at Saint Omer had come to an end, +Charles and his wife set forth by Ghent and Tourney. The +towns gave him offerings of money as he passed through, to +help in the payment of his ransom. From all sides, ladies +and gentlemen thronged to offer him their services; some gave +him their sons for pages, some archers for a bodyguard; and +by the time he reached Tournay, he had a following of 300 +horse. Everywhere he was received as though he had been the +King of France. (1) If he did not come to imagine himself +something of the sort, he certainly forgot the existence of +any one with a better claim to the title. He conducted +himself on the hypothesis that Charles VII. was another +Charles VI. He signed with enthusiasm that treaty of Arras, +which left France almost at the discretion of Burgundy. On +December 18 he was still no farther than Bruges, where he +entered into a private treaty with Philip; and it was not +until January 14, ten weeks after he disembarked in France, +and attended by a ruck of Burgundian gentlemen, that he +arrived in Paris and offered to present himself before +Charles VII. The king sent word that he might come, if he +would, with a small retinue, but not with his present +following; and the duke, who was mightily on his high horse +after all the ovations he had received, took the king's +attitude amiss, and turned aside into Touraine, to receive +more welcome and more presents, and be convoyed by torchlight +into faithful cities. + +(1) Monstrelet. + +And so you see, here was King Arthur home again, and matters +nowise mended in consequence. The best we can say is, that +this last stage of Charles's public life was of no long +duration. His confidence was soon knocked out of him in the +contact with others. He began to find he was an earthen +vessel among many vessels of brass; he began to be shrewdly +aware that he was no King Arthur. In 1442, at Limoges, he +made himself the spokesman of the malcontent nobility. The +king showed himself humiliatingly indifferent to his +counsels, and humiliatingly generous towards his necessities. +And there, with some blushes, he may be said to have taken +farewell of the political stage. A feeble attempt on the +county of Asti is scarce worth the name of exception. +Thenceforward let Ambition wile whom she may into the turmoil +of events, our duke will walk cannily in his well-ordered +garden, or sit by the fire to touch the slender reed. (1) + +(1) D'Hericault's MEMOIR, xl. xli. Vallet, CHARLES VI., ii. +435. + + +IV. + + +If it were given each of us to transplant his life wherever +he pleased in time or space, with all the ages and all the +countries of the world to choose from, there would be quite +an instructive diversity of taste. A certain sedentary +majority would prefer to remain where they were. Many would +choose the Renaissance; many some stately and simple period +of Grecian life; and still more elect to pass a few years +wandering among the villages of Palestine with an inspired +conductor. For some of our quaintly vicious contemporaries, +we have the decline of the Roman Empire and the reign of +Henry III. of France. But there are others not quite so +vicious, who yet cannot look upon the world with perfect +gravity, who have never taken the categorical imperative to +wife, and have more taste for what is comfortable than for +what is magnanimous and high; and I can imagine some of these +casting their lot in the Court of Blois during the last +twenty years of the life of Charles of Orleans. + +The duke and duchess, their staff of officers and ladies, and +the high-born and learned persons who were attracted to Blois +on a visit, formed a society for killing time and perfecting +each other in various elegant accomplishments, such as we +might imagine for an ideal watering-place in the Delectable +Mountains. The company hunted and went on pleasure-parties; +they played chess, tables, and many other games. What we now +call the history of the period passed, I imagine, over the +heads of these good people much as it passes over our own. +News reached them, indeed, of great and joyful import. +William Peel received eight livres and five sous from the +duchess, when he brought the first tidings that Rouen was +recaptured from the English. (1) A little later and the duke +sang, in a truly patriotic vein, the deliverance of Guyenne +and Normandy. (2) They were liberal of rhymes and largesse, +and welcomed the prosperity of their country much as they +welcomed the coming of spring, and with no more thought of +collaborating towards the event. Religion was not forgotten +in the Court of Blois. Pilgrimages were agreeable and +picturesque excursions. In those days a well-served chapel +was something like a good vinery in our own, an opportunity +for display and the source of mild enjoyments. There was +probably something of his rooted delight in pageantry, as +well as a good deal of gentle piety, in the feelings with +which Charles gave dinner every Friday to thirteen poor +people, served them himself, and washed their feet with his +own hands. (3) Solemn affairs would interest Charles and his +courtiers from their trivial side. The duke perhaps cared +less for the deliverance of Guyenne and Normandy than for his +own verses on the occasion; just as Dr. Russell's +correspondence in THE TIMES was among the most material parts +of the Crimean War for that talented correspondent. And I +think it scarcely cynical to suppose that religion as well as +patriotism was principally cultivated as a means of filling +up the day. + +(1) Champollion-Figeac, 368. +(2) Works, i. 115. +(3) D'Hericault's MEMOIR, xlv. + +It was not only messengers fiery red with haste and charged +with the destiny of nations, who were made welcome at the +gates of Blois. If any man of accomplishment came that way, +he was sure of an audience, and something for his pocket. +The courtiers would have received Ben Jonson like Drummond of +Hawthornden, and a good pugilist like Captain Barclay. They +were catholic, as none but the entirely idle can be catholic. +It might be Pierre, called Dieu d'amours, the juggler; or it +might be three high English minstrels; or the two men, +players of ghitterns, from the kingdom of Scotland, who sang +the destruction of the Turks; or again Jehan Rognelet, player +of instruments of music, who played and danced with his wife +and two children; they would each be called into the castle +to give a taste of his proficiency before my lord the duke. +(1) Sometimes the performance was of a more personal +interest, and produced much the same sensations as are felt +on an English green on the arrival of a professional +cricketer, or round an English billiard table during a match +between Roberts and Cooke. This was when Jehan Negre, the +Lombard, came to Blois and played chess against all these +chess-players, and won much money from my lord and his +intimates; or when Baudet Harenc of Chalons made ballades +before all these ballade-makers. (2) + +(1) ChampoIlion-Figeac, 381, 361, 381. +(2) Champollion-Figeac, 359,361. + +It will not surprise the reader to learn they were all makers +of ballades and rondels. To write verses for May day, seems +to have been as much a matter of course, as to ride out with +the cavalcade that went to gather hawthorn. The choice of +Valentines was a standing challenge, and the courtiers pelted +each other with humorous and sentimental verses as in a +literary carnival. If an indecorous adventure befell our +friend Maistre Estienne le Gout, my lord the duke would turn +it into the funniest of rondels, all the rhymes being the +names of the cases of nouns or the moods of verbs; and +Maistre Estienne would make reply in similar fashion, seeking +to prune the story of its more humiliating episodes. If +Fredet was too long away from Court, a rondel went to upbraid +him; and it was in a rondel that Fredet would excuse himself. +Sometimes two or three, or as many as a dozen, would set to +work on the same refrain, the same idea, or in the same +macaronic jargon. Some of the poetasters were heavy enough; +others were not wanting in address; and the duchess herself +was among those who most excelled. On one occasion eleven +competitors made a ballade on the idea, + + +"I die of thirst beside the fountain's edge" +(Je meurs de soif empres de la fontaine). + + +These eleven ballades still exist; and one of them arrests +the attention rather from the name of the author than from +any special merit in itself. It purports to be the work of +Francois Villon; and so far as a foreigner can judge (which +is indeed a small way), it may very well be his. Nay, and if +any one thing is more probable than another, in the great +TABULA RASA, or unknown land, which we are fain to call the +biography of Villon, it seems probable enough that he may +have gone upon a visit to Charles of Orleans. Where Master +Baudet Harenc, of Chalons, found a sympathetic, or perhaps a +derisive audience (for who can tell nowadays the degree of +Baudet's excellence in his art?), favour would not be wanting +for the greatest ballade-maker of all time. Great as would +seem the incongruity, it may have pleased Charles to own a +sort of kinship with ragged singers, and whimsically regard +himself as one of the confraternity of poets. And he would +have other grounds of intimacy with Villon. A room looking +upon Windsor gardens is a different matter from Villon's +dungeon at Meun; yet each in his own degree had been tried in +prison. Each in his own way also, loved the good things of +this life and the service of the Muses. But the same gulf +that separated Burns from his Edinburgh patrons would +separate the singer of Bohemia from the rhyming duke. And it +is hard to imagine that Villon's training amongst thieves, +loose women, and vagabond students, had fitted him to move in +a society of any dignity and courtliness. Ballades are very +admirable things; and a poet is doubtless a most interesting +visitor. But among the courtiers of Charles, there would be +considerable regard for the proprieties of etiquette; and +even a duke will sometimes have an eye to his teaspoons. +Moreover, as a poet, I can conceive he may have disappointed +expectation. It need surprise nobody if Villon's ballade on +the theme, + +"I die of thirst beside the fountain's edge," + +was but a poor performance. He would make better verses on +the lee-side of a flagon at the sign of the Pomme du Pin, +than in a cushioned settle in the halls of Blois. + +Charles liked change of place. He was often not so much +travelling as making a progress; now to join the king for +some great tournament; now to visit King Rene, at Tarascon, +where he had a study of his own and saw all manner of +interesting things - oriental curios, King Rene painting +birds, and, what particularly pleased him, Triboulet, the +dwarf jester, whose skull-cap was no bigger than an orange. +(1) Sometimes the journeys were set about on horseback in a +large party, with the FOURRIERS sent forward to prepare a +lodging at the next stage. We find almost Gargantuan details +of the provision made by these officers against the duke's +arrival, of eggs and butter and bread, cheese and peas and +chickens, pike and bream and barbel, and wine both white and +red. (2) Sometimes he went by water in a barge, playing +chess or tables with a friend in the pavilion, or watching +other vessels as they went before the wind. (3) Children ran +along the bank, as they do to this day on the Crinan Canal; +and when Charles threw in money, they would dive and bring it +up. (4) As he looked on at their exploits, I wonder whether +that room of gold and silk and worsted came back into his +memory, with the device of little children in a river, and +the sky full of birds? + +(1) Lecoy de la Marche, ROI RENE, II. 155, 177. +(2) Champollion-Figeac, chaps. v. and vi. +(3) IBID. 364; Works, i. 172. +(4) Champollion-Figeac, 364: "Jeter de l'argent aux petis +enfans qui estoient au long de Bourbon, pour les faire nonner +en l'eau et aller querre l'argent au fond." + +He was a bit of a book-fancier, and had vied with his brother +Angouleme in bringing back the library of their grandfather +Charles V., when Bedford put it up for sale in London. (1) +The duchess had a library of her own; and we hear of her +borrowing romances from ladies in attendance on the blue- +stocking Margaret of Scotland. (2) Not only were books +collected, but new books were written at the court of Blois. +The widow of one Jean Fougere, a bookbinder, seems to have +done a number of odd commissions for the bibliophilous count. +She it was who received three vellum-skins to bind the +duchess's Book of Hours, and who was employed to prepare +parchment for the use of the duke's scribes. And she it was +who bound in vermilion leather the great manuscript of +Charles's own poems, which was presented to him by his +secretary, Anthony Astesan, with the text in one column, and +Astesan's Latin version in the other. (3) + +(1) Champollion-Figeac, 387. +(2) NOUVELLE BIOGRAPHIE DIDOT, art. "Marie de Cleves." +Vallet, CHARLES VII, iii. 85, note 1. +(3) Champollion-Figeac, 383, 384-386. + +Such tastes, with the coming of years, would doubtless take +the place of many others. We find in Charles's verse much +semi-ironical regret for other days, and resignation to +growing infirmities. He who had been "nourished in the +schools of love," now sees nothing either to please or +displease him. Old age has imprisoned him within doors, +where he means to take his ease, and let younger fellows +bestir themselves in life. He had written (in earlier days, +we may presume) a bright and defiant little poem in praise of +solitude. If they would but leave him alone with his own +thoughts and happy recollections, he declared it was beyond +the power of melancholy to affect him. But now, when his +animal strength has so much declined that he sings the +discomforts of winter instead of the inspirations of spring, +and he has no longer any appetite for life, he confesses he +is wretched when alone, and, to keep his mind from grievous +thoughts, he must have many people around him, laughing, +talking, and singing. (1) + +(1) Works, ii. 57, 258. + +While Charles was thus falling into years, the order of +things, of which he was the outcome and ornament, was growing +old along with him. The semi-royalty of the princes of the +blood was already a thing of the past; and when Charles VII. +was gathered to his fathers, a new king reigned in France, +who seemed every way the opposite of royal. Louis XI. had +aims that were incomprehensible, and virtues that were +inconceivable to his contemporaries. But his contemporaries +were able enough to appreciate his sordid exterior, and his +cruel and treacherous spirit. To the whole nobility of +France he was a fatal and unreasonable phenomenon. All such +courts as that of Charles at Blois, or his friend Rene's in +Provence, would soon be made impossible; interference was the +order of the day; hunting was already abolished; and who +should say what was to go next? Louis, in fact, must have +appeared to Charles primarily in the light of a kill-joy. I +take it, when missionaries land in South Sea Islands and lay +strange embargo on the simplest things in life, the islanders +will not be much more puzzled and irritated than Charles of +Orleans at the policy of the Eleventh Louis. There was one +thing, I seem to apprehend, that had always particularly +moved him; and that was, any proposal to punish a person of +his acquaintance. No matter what treason he may have made or +meddled with, an Alencon or an Armagnac was sure to find +Charles reappear from private life, and do his best to get +him pardoned. He knew them quite well. He had made rondels +with them. They were charming people in every way. There +must certainly be some mistake. Had not he himself made +anti-national treaties almost before he was out of his +nonage? And for the matter of that, had not every one else +done the like? Such are some of the thoughts by which he +might explain to himself his aversion to such extremities; +but it was on a deeper basis that the feeling probably +reposed. A man of his temper could not fail to be impressed +at the thought of disastrous revolutions in the fortunes of +those he knew. He would feel painfully the tragic contrast, +when those who had everything to make life valuable were +deprived of life itself. And it was shocking to the clemency +of his spirit, that sinners should be hurried before their +judge without a fitting interval for penitence and +satisfaction. It was this feeling which brought him at last, +a poor, purblind blue-bottle of the later autumn, into +collision with "the universal spider," Louis XI. He took up +the defence of the Duke of Brittany at Tours. But Louis was +then in no humour to hear Charles's texts and Latin +sentiments; he had his back to the wall, the future of France +was at stake; and if all the old men in the world had crossed +his path, they would have had the rough side of his tongue +like Charles of Orleans. I have found nowhere what he said, +but it seems it was monstrously to the point, and so rudely +conceived that the old duke never recovered the indignity. +He got home as far as Amboise, sickened, and died two days +after (Jan. 4, 1465), in the seventy-fourth year of his age. +And so a whiff of pungent prose stopped the issue of +melodious rondels to the end of time. + + +V. + + +The futility of Charles's public life was of a piece +throughout. He never succeeded in any single purpose he set +before him; for his deliverance from England, after twenty- +five years of failure and at the cost of dignity and +consistency, it would be ridiculously hyperbolical to treat +as a success. During the first part of his life he was the +stalking horse of Bernard d'Armagnac; during the second, he +was the passive instrument of English diplomatists; and +before he was well entered on the third, he hastened to +become the dupe and catspaw of Burgundian treason. On each +of these occasions, a strong and not dishonourable personal +motive determined his behaviour. In 1407 and the following +years, he had his father's murder uppermost in his mind. +During his English captivity, that thought was displaced by a +more immediate desire for his own liberation. In 1440 a +sentiment of gratitude to Philip of Burgundy blinded him to +all else, and led him to break with the tradition of his +party and his own former life. He was born a great vassal, +and he conducted himself like a private gentleman. He began +life in a showy and brilliant enough fashion, by the light of +a petty personal chivalry. He was not without some tincture +of patriotism; but it was resolvable into two parts: a +preference for life among his fellow-countrymen, and a barren +point of honour. In England, he could comfort himself by the +reflection that "he had been taken while loyally doing his +devoir," without any misgiving as to his conduct in the +previous years, when he had prepared the disaster of +Agincourt by wasteful feud. This unconsciousness of the +larger interests is perhaps most happily exampled out of his +own mouth. When Alencon stood accused of betraying Normandy +into the hands of the English, Charles made a speech in his +defence, from which I have already quoted more than once. +Alencon, he said, had professed a great love and trust +towards him; "yet did he give no great proof thereof, when he +sought to betray Normandy; whereby he would have made me lose +an estate of 100,000 livres a year, and might have occasioned +the destruction of the kingdom and of all us Frenchmen." +These are the words of one, mark you, against whom Gloucester +warned the English Council because of his "great subtility +and cautelous disposition." It is not hard to excuse the +impatience of Louis XI., if such stuff was foisted on him by +way of political deliberation. + +This incapacity to see things with any greatness, this +obscure and narrow view was fundamentally characteristic of +the man as well as of the epoch. It is not even so striking +in his public life, where he failed, as in his poems, where +he notably succeeded. For wherever we might expect a poet to +be unintelligent, it certainly would not be in his poetry. +And Charles is unintelligent even there. Of all authors whom +a modern may still read and read over again with pleasure, he +has perhaps the least to say. His poems seem to bear +testimony rather to the fashion of rhyming, which +distinguished the age, than to any special vocation in the +man himself. Some of them are drawing-room exercises and the +rest seem made by habit. Great writers are struck with +something in nature or society, with which they become +pregnant and longing; they are possessed with an idea, and +cannot be at peace until they have put it outside of them in +some distinct embodiment. But with Charles literature was an +object rather than a mean; he was one who loved bandying +words for its own sake; the rigidity of intricate metrical +forms stood him in lieu of precise thought; instead of +communicating truth, he observed the laws of a game; and when +he had no one to challenge at chess or rackets, he made +verses in a wager against himself. From the very idleness of +the man's mind, and not from intensity of feeling, it happens +that all his poems are more or less autobiographical. But +they form an autobiography singularly bald and uneventful. +Little is therein recorded beside sentiments. Thoughts, in +any true sense, he had none to record. And if we can gather +that he had been a prisoner in England, that he had lived in +the Orleannese, and that he hunted and went in parties of +pleasure, I believe it is about as much definite experience +as is to be found in all these five hundred pages of +autobiographical verse. Doubtless, we find here and there a +complaint on the progress of the infirmities of age. +Doubtless, he feels the great change of the year, and +distinguishes winter from spring; winter as the time of snow +and the fireside; spring as the return of grass and flowers, +the time of St. Valentine's day and a beating heart. And he +feels love after a fashion. Again and again, we learn that +Charles of Orleans is in love, and hear him ring the changes +through the whole gamut of dainty and tender sentiment. But +there is never a spark of passion; and heaven alone knows +whether there was any real woman in the matter, or the whole +thing was an exercise in fancy. If these poems were indeed +inspired by some living mistress, one would think he had +never seen, never heard, and never touched her. There is +nothing in any one of these so numerous love-songs to +indicate who or what the lady was. Was she dark or fair, +passionate or gentle like himself, witty or simple? Was it +always one woman? or are there a dozen here immortalised in +cold indistinction? The old English translator mentions gray +eyes in his version of one of the amorous rondels; so far as +I remember, he was driven by some emergency of the verse; but +in the absence of all sharp lines of character and anything +specific, we feel for the moment a sort of surprise, as +though the epithet were singularly happy and unusual, or as +though we had made our escape from cloudland into something +tangible and sure. The measure of Charles's indifference to +all that now preoccupies and excites a poet, is best given by +a positive example. If, besides the coming of spring, any +one external circumstance may be said to have struck his +imagination, it was the despatch of FOURRIERS, while on a +journey, to prepare the night's lodging. This seems to be +his favourite image; it reappears like the upas-tree in the +early work of Coleridge: we may judge with what childish eyes +he looked upon the world, if one of the sights which most +impressed him was that of a man going to order dinner. + +Although they are not inspired by any deeper motive than the +common run of contemporaneous drawing-room verses, those of +Charles of Orleans are executed with inimitable lightness and +delicacy of touch. They deal with floating and colourless +sentiments, and the writer is never greatly moved, but he +seems always genuine. He makes no attempt to set off thin +conceptions with a multiplicity of phrases. His ballades are +generally thin and scanty of import; for the ballade +presented too large a canvas, and he was preoccupied by +technical requirements. But in the rondel he has put himself +before all competitors by a happy knack and a prevailing +distinction of manner. He is very much more of a duke in his +verses than in his absurd and inconsequential career as a +statesman; and how he shows himself a duke is precisely by +the absence of all pretension, turgidity, or emphasis. He +turns verses, as he would have come into the king's presence, +with a quiet accomplishment of grace. + +Theodore de Banville, the youngest poet of a famous +generation now nearly extinct, and himself a sure and +finished artist, knocked off, in his happiest vein, a few +experiments in imitation of Charles of Orleans. I would +recommend these modern rondels to all who care about the old +duke, not only because they are delightful in themselves, but +because they serve as a contrast to throw into relief the +peculiarities of their model. When de Banville revives a +forgotten form of verse - and he has already had the honour +of reviving the ballade - he does it in the spirit of a +workman choosing a good tool wherever he can find one, and +not at all in that of the dilettante, who seeks to renew +bygone forms of thought and make historic forgeries. With +the ballade this seemed natural enough; for in connection +with ballades the mind recurs to Villon, and Villon was +almost more of a modern than de Banville himself. But in the +case of the rondel, a comparison is challenged with Charles +of Orleans, and the difference between two ages and two +literatures is illustrated in a few poems of thirteen lines. +Something, certainly, has been retained of the old movement; +the refrain falls in time like a well-played bass; and the +very brevity of the thing, by hampering and restraining the +greater fecundity of the modern mind, assists the imitation. +But de Banville's poems are full of form and colour; they +smack racily of modern life, and own small kindred with the +verse of other days, when it seems as if men walked by +twilight, seeing little, and that with distracted eyes, and +instead of blood, some thin and spectral fluid circulated in +their veins. They might gird themselves for battle, make +love, eat and drink, and acquit themselves manfully in all +the external parts of life; but of the life that is within, +and those processes by which we render ourselves an +intelligent account of what we feel and do, and so represent +experience that we for the first time make it ours, they had +only a loose and troubled possession. They beheld or took +part in great events, but there was no answerable commotion +in their reflective being; and they passed throughout +turbulent epochs in a sort of ghostly quiet and abstraction. +Feeling seems to have been strangely disproportioned to the +occasion, and words were laughably trivial and scanty to set +forth the feeling even such as it was. Juvenal des Ursins +chronicles calamity after calamity, with but one comment for +them all: that "it was great pity." Perhaps, after too much +of our florid literature, we find an adventitious charm in +what is so different; and while the big drums are beaten +every day by perspiring editors over the loss of a cock-boat +or the rejection of a clause, and nothing is heard that is +not proclaimed with sound of trumpet, it is not wonderful if +we retire with pleasure into old books, and listen to authors +who speak small and clear, as if in a private conversation. +Truly this is so with Charles of Orleans. We are pleased to +find a small man without the buskin, and obvious sentiments +stated without affectation. If the sentiments are obvious, +there is all the more chance we may have experienced the +like. As we turn over the leaves, we may find ourselves in +sympathy with some one or other of these staid joys and +smiling sorrows. If we do we shall be strangely pleased, for +there is a genuine pathos in these simple words, and the +lines go with a lilt, and sing themselves to music of their +own. + + + +CHAPTER VIII - SAMUEL PEPYS + + + +IN two books a fresh light has recently been thrown on the +character and position of Samuel Pepys. Mr. Mynors Bright +has given us a new transcription of the Diary, increasing it +in bulk by near a third, correcting many errors, and +completing our knowledge of the man in some curious and +important points. We can only regret that he has taken +liberties with the author and the public. It is no part of +the duties of the editor of an established classic to decide +what may or may not be "tedious to the reader." The book is +either an historical document or not, and in condemning Lord +Braybrooke Mr. Bright condemns himself. As for the time- +honoured phrase, "unfit for publication," without being +cynical, we may regard it as the sign of a precaution more or +less commercial; and we may think, without being sordid, that +when we purchase six huge and distressingly expensive +volumes, we are entitled to be treated rather more like +scholars and rather less like children. But Mr. Bright may +rest assured: while we complain, we are still grateful. Mr. +Wheatley, to divide our obligation, brings together, clearly +and with no lost words, a body of illustrative material. +Sometimes we might ask a little more; never, I think, less. +And as a matter of fact, a great part of Mr. Wheatley's +volume might be transferred, by a good editor of Pepys, to +the margin of the text, for it is precisely what the reader +wants. + +In the light of these two books, at least, we have now to +read our author. Between them they contain all we can expect +to learn for, it may be, many years. Now, if ever we should +be able to form some notion of that unparalleled figure in +the annals of mankind - unparalleled for three good reasons: +first, because he was a man known to his contemporaries in a +halo of almost historical pomp, and to his remote descendants +with an indecent familiarity, like a tap-room comrade; +second, because he has outstripped all competitors in the art +or virtue of a conscious honesty about oneself; and, third, +because, being in many ways a very ordinary person, he has +yet placed himself before the public eye with such a fulness +and such an intimacy of detail as might be envied by a genius +like Montaigne. Not then for his own sake only, but as a +character in a unique position, endowed with a unique talent, +and shedding a unique light upon the lives of the mass of +mankind, he is surely worthy of prolonged and patient study. + + +THE DIARY. + + +That there should be such a book as Pepys's Diary is +incomparably strange. Pepys, in a corrupt and idle period, +played the man in public employments, toiling hard and +keeping his honour bright. Much of the little good that is +set down to James the Second comes by right to Pepys; and if +it were little for a king, it is much for a subordinate. To +his clear, capable head was owing somewhat of the greatness +of England on the seas. In the exploits of Hawke, Rodney, or +Nelson, this dead Mr. Pepys of the Navy Office had some +considerable share. He stood well by his business in the +appalling plague of 1666. He was loved and respected by some +of the best and wisest men in England. He was President of +the Royal Society; and when he came to die, people said of +his conduct in that solemn hour - thinking it needless to say +more - that it was answerable to the greatness of his life. +Thus he walked in dignity, guards of soldiers sometimes +attending him in his walks, subalterns bowing before his +periwig; and when he uttered his thoughts they were suitable +to his state and services. On February 8, 1668, we find him +writing to Evelyn, his mind bitterly occupied with the late +Dutch war, and some thoughts of the different story of the +repulse of the Great Armada: "Sir, you will not wonder at the +backwardness of my thanks for the present you made me, so +many days since, of the Prospect of the Medway, while the +Hollander rode master in it, when I have told you that the +sight of it hath led me to such reflections on my particular +interest, by my employment, in the reproach due to that +miscarriage, as have given me little less disquiet than he is +fancied to have who found his face in Michael Angelo's hell. +The same should serve me also in excuse for my silence in +celebrating your mastery shown in the design and draught, did +not indignation rather than courtship urge me so far to +commend them, as to wish the furniture of our House of Lords +changed from the story of '88 to that of '67 (of Evelyn's +designing), till the pravity of this were reformed to the +temper of that age, wherein God Almighty found his blessings +more operative than, I fear, he doth in ours his judgments." + +This is a letter honourable to the writer, where the meaning +rather than the words is eloquent. Such was the account he +gave of himself to his contemporaries; such thoughts he chose +to utter, and in such language: giving himself out for a +grave and patriotic public servant. We turn to the same date +in the Diary by which he is known, after two centuries, to +his descendants. The entry begins in the same key with the +letter, blaming the "madness of the House of Commons" and +"the base proceedings, just the epitome of all our public +proceedings in this age, of the House of Lords;" and then, +without the least transition, this is how our diarist +proceeds: "To the Strand, to my bookseller's, and there +bought an idle, rogueish French book, L'ESCHOLLE DES FILLES, +which I have bought in plain binding, avoiding the buying of +it better bound, because I resolve, as soon as I have read +it, to burn it, that it may not stand in the list of books, +nor among them, to disgrace them, if it should be found." +Even in our day, when responsibility is so much more clearly +apprehended, the man who wrote the letter would be notable; +but what about the man, I do not say who bought a roguish +book, but who was ashamed of doing so, yet did it, and +recorded both the doing and the shame in the pages of his +daily journal? + +We all, whether we write or speak, must somewhat drape +ourselves when we address our fellows; at a given moment we +apprehend our character and acts by some particular side; we +are merry with one, grave with another, as befits the nature +and demands of the relation. Pepys's letter to Evelyn would +have little in common with that other one to Mrs. Knipp which +he signed by the pseudonym of DAPPER DICKY; yet each would be +suitable to the character of his correspondent. There is no +untruth in this, for man, being a Protean animal, swiftly +shares and changes with his company and surroundings; and +these changes are the better part of his education in the +world. To strike a posture once for all, and to march +through life like a drum-major, is to be highly disagreeable +to others and a fool for oneself into the bargain. To Evelyn +and to Knipp we understand the double facing; but to whom was +he posing in the Diary, and what, in the name of +astonishment, was the nature of the pose? Had he suppressed +all mention of the book, or had he bought it, gloried in the +act, and cheerfully recorded his glorification, in either +case we should have made him out. But no; he is full of +precautions to conceal the "disgrace" of the purchase, and +yet speeds to chronicle the whole affair in pen and ink. It +is a sort of anomaly in human action, which we can exactly +parallel from another part of the Diary. + +Mrs. Pepys had written a paper of her too just complaints +against her husband, and written it in plain and very pungent +English. Pepys, in an agony lest the world should come to +see it, brutally seizes and destroys the tell-tale document; +and then - you disbelieve your eyes - down goes the whole +story with unsparing truth and in the cruellest detail. It +seems he has no design but to appear respectable, and here he +keeps a private book to prove he was not. You are at first +faintly reminded of some of the vagaries of the morbid +religious diarist; but at a moment's thought the resemblance +disappears. The design of Pepys is not at all to edify; it +is not from repentance that he chronicles his peccadilloes, +for he tells us when he does repent, and, to be just to him, +there often follows some improvement. Again, the sins of the +religious diarist are of a very formal pattern, and are told +with an elaborate whine. But in Pepys you come upon good, +substantive misdemeanours; beams in his eye of which he alone +remains unconscious; healthy outbreaks of the animal nature, +and laughable subterfuges to himself that always command +belief and often engage the sympathies. + +Pepys was a young man for his age, came slowly to himself in +the world, sowed his wild oats late, took late to industry, +and preserved till nearly forty the headlong gusto of a boy. +So, to come rightly at the spirit in which the Diary was +written, we must recall a class of sentiments which with most +of us are over and done before the age of twelve. In our +tender years we still preserve a freshness of surprise at our +prolonged existence; events make an impression out of all +proportion to their consequence; we are unspeakably touched +by our own past adventures, and look forward to our future +personality with sentimental interest. It was something of +this, I think, that clung to Pepys. Although not sentimental +in the abstract, he was sweetly sentimental about himself. +His own past clung about his heart, an evergreen. He was the +slave of an association. He could not pass by Islington, +where his father used to carry him to cakes and ale, but he +must light at the "King's Head" and eat and drink "for +remembrance of the old house sake." He counted it good +fortune to lie a night at Epsom to renew his old walks, +"where Mrs. Hely and I did use to walk and talk, with whom I +had the first sentiments of love and pleasure in a woman's +company, discourse and taking her by the hand, she being a +pretty woman." He goes about weighing up the ASSURANCE, +which lay near Woolwich underwater, and cries in a +parenthesis, "Poor ship, that I have been twice merry in, in +Captain Holland's time;" and after revisiting the NASEBY, now +changed into the CHARLES, he confesses "it was a great +pleasure to myself to see the ship that I began my good +fortune in." The stone that he was cut for he preserved in a +case; and to the Turners he kept alive such gratitude for +their assistance that for years, and after he had begun to +mount himself into higher zones, he continued to have that +family to dinner on the anniversary of the operation. Not +Hazlitt nor Rousseau had a more romantic passion for their +past, although at times they might express it more +romantically; and if Pepys shared with them this childish +fondness, did not Rousseau, who left behind him the +CONFESSIONS, or Hazlitt, who wrote the LIBER AMORIS, and +loaded his essays with loving personal detail, share with +Pepys in his unwearied egotism? For the two things go hand +in hand; or, to be more exact, it is the first that makes the +second either possible or pleasing. + +But, to be quite in sympathy with Pepys, we must return once +more to the experience of children. I can remember to have +written, in the fly-leaf of more than one book, the date and +the place where I then was - if, for instance, I was ill in +bed or sitting in a certain garden; these were jottings for +my future self; if I should chance on such a note in after +years, I thought it would cause me a particular thrill to +recognise myself across the intervening distance. Indeed, I +might come upon them now, and not be moved one tittle - which +shows that I have comparatively failed in life, and grown +older than Samuel Pepys. For in the Diary we can find more +than one such note of perfect childish egotism; as when he +explains that his candle is going out, "which makes me write +thus slobberingly;" or as in this incredible particularity, +"To my study, where I only wrote thus much of this day's +passages to this *, and so out again;" or lastly, as here, +with more of circumstance: "I staid up till the bellman came +by with his bell under my window, AS I WAS WRITING OF THIS +VERY LINE, and cried, `Past one of the clock, and a cold, +frosty, windy morning.'" Such passages are not to be +misunderstood. The appeal to Samuel Pepys years hence is +unmistakable. He desires that dear, though unknown, +gentleman keenly to realise his predecessor; to remember why +a passage was uncleanly written; to recall (let us fancy, +with a sigh) the tones of the bellman, the chill of the +early, windy morning, and the very line his own romantic self +was scribing at the moment. The man, you will perceive, was +making reminiscences - a sort of pleasure by ricochet, which +comforts many in distress, and turns some others into +sentimental libertines: and the whole book, if you will but +look at it in that way, is seen to be a work of art to +Pepys's own address. + +Here, then, we have the key to that remarkable attitude +preserved by him throughout his Diary, to that unflinching - +I had almost said, that unintelligent - sincerity which makes +it a miracle among human books. He was not unconscious of +his errors - far from it; he was often startled into shame, +often reformed, often made and broke his vows of change. But +whether he did ill or well, he was still his own unequalled +self; still that entrancing EGO of whom alone he cared to +write; and still sure of his own affectionate indulgence, +when the parts should be changed, and the Writer come to read +what he had written. Whatever he did, or said, or thought, +or suffered, it was still a trait of Pepys, a character of +his career; and as, to himself, he was more interesting than +Moses or than Alexander, so all should be faithfully set +down. I have called his Diary a work of art. Now when the +artist has found something, word or deed, exactly proper to a +favourite character in play or novel, he will neither +suppress nor diminish it, though the remark be silly or the +act mean. The hesitation of Hamlet, the credulity of +Othello, the baseness of Emma Bovary, or the irregularities +of Mr. Swiveller, caused neither disappointment nor disgust +to their creators. And so with Pepys and his adored +protagonist: adored not blindly, but with trenchant insight +and enduring, human toleration. I have gone over and over +the greater part of the Diary; and the points where, to the +most suspicious scrutiny, he has seemed not perfectly +sincere, are so few, so doubtful, and so petty, that I am +ashamed to name them. It may be said that we all of us write +such a diary in airy characters upon our brain; but I fear +there is a distinction to be made; I fear that as we render +to our consciousness an account of our daily fortunes and +behaviour, we too often weave a tissue of romantic +compliments and dull excuses; and even if Pepys were the ass +and cowardly that men call him, we must take rank as sillier +and more cowardly than he. The bald truth about oneself, +what we are all too timid to admit when we are not too dull +to see it, that was what he saw clearly and set down +unsparingly. + +It is improbable that the Diary can have been carried on in +the same single spirit in which it was begun. Pepys was not +such an ass, but he must have perceived, as he went on, the +extraordinary nature of the work he was producing. He was a +great reader, and he knew what other books were like. It +must, at least, have crossed his mind that some one might +ultimately decipher the manuscript, and he himself, with all +his pains and pleasures, be resuscitated in some later day; +and the thought, although discouraged, must have warmed his +heart. He was not such an ass, besides, but he must have +been conscious of the deadly explosives, the gun-cotton and +the giant powder, he was hoarding in his drawer. Let some +contemporary light upon the journal, and Pepys was plunged +for ever in social and political disgrace. We can trace the +growth of his terrors by two facts. In 1660, while the Diary +was still in its youth, he tells about it, as a matter of +course, to a lieutenant in the navy; but in 1669, when it was +already near an end, he could have bitten his tongue out, as +the saying is, because he had let slip his secret to one so +grave and friendly as Sir William Coventry. And from two +other facts I think we may infer that he had entertained, +even if he had not acquiesced in, the thought of a far- +distant publicity. The first is of capital importance: the +Diary was not destroyed. The second - that he took unusual +precautions to confound the cipher in "rogueish" passages - +proves, beyond question, that he was thinking of some other +reader besides himself. Perhaps while his friends were +admiring the "greatness of his behaviour" at the approach of +death, he may have had a twinkling hope of immortality. MENS +CUJUSQUE IS EST QUISQUE, said his chosen motto; and, as he +had stamped his mind with every crook and foible in the pages +of the Diary, he might feel that what he left behind him was +indeed himself. There is perhaps no other instance so +remarkable of the desire of man for publicity and an enduring +name. The greatness of his life was open, yet he longed to +communicate its smallness also; and, while contemporaries +bowed before him, he must buttonhole posterity with the news +that his periwig was once alive with nits. But this thought, +although I cannot doubt he had it, was neither his first nor +his deepest; it did not colour one word that he wrote; and +the Diary, for as long as he kept it, remained what it was +when he began, a private pleasure for himself. It was his +bosom secret; it added a zest to all his pleasures; he lived +in and for it, and might well write these solemn words, when +he closed that confidant for ever: "And so I betake myself to +that course which is almost as much as to see myself go into +the grave; for which, and all the discomforts that will +accompany my being blind, the good God prepare me." + + +A LIBERAL GENIUS. + + +Pepys spent part of a certain winter Sunday, when he had +taken physic, composing "a song in praise of a liberal genius +(such as I take my own to be) to all studies and pleasures." +The song was unsuccessful, but the Diary is, in a sense, the +very song that he was seeking; and his portrait by Hales, so +admirably reproduced in Mynors Bright's edition, is a +confirmation of the Diary. Hales, it would appear, had known +his business; and though he put his sitter to a deal of +trouble, almost breaking his neck "to have the portrait full +of shadows," and draping him in an Indian gown hired +expressly for the purpose, he was preoccupied about no merely +picturesque effects, but to portray the essence of the man. +Whether we read the picture by the Diary or the Diary by the +picture, we shall at least agree that Hales was among the +number of those who can "surprise the manners in the face." +Here we have a mouth pouting, moist with desires; eyes +greedy, protuberant, and yet apt for weeping too; a nose +great alike in character and dimensions; and altogether a +most fleshly, melting countenance. The face is attractive by +its promise of reciprocity. I have used the word GREEDY, but +the reader must not suppose that he can change it for that +closely kindred one of HUNGRY, for there is here no +aspiration, no waiting for better things, but an animal joy +in all that comes. It could never be the face of an artist; +it is the face of a VIVEUR - kindly, pleased and pleasing, +protected from excess and upheld in contentment by the +shifting versatility of his desires. For a single desire is +more rightly to be called a lust; but there is health in a +variety, where one may balance and control another. + +The whole world, town or country, was to Pepys a garden of +Armida. Wherever he went, his steps were winged with the +most eager expectation; whatever he did, it was done with the +most lively pleasure. An insatiable curiosity in all the +shows of the world and all the secrets of knowledge, filled +him brimful of the longing to travel, and supported him in +the toils of study. Rome was the dream of his life; he was +never happier than when he read or talked of the Eternal +City. When he was in Holland, he was "with child" to see any +strange thing. Meeting some friends and singing with them in +a palace near the Hague, his pen fails him to express his +passion of delight, "the more so because in a heaven of +pleasure and in a strange country." He must go to see all +famous executions. He must needs visit the body of a +murdered man, defaced "with a broad wound," he says, "that +makes my hand now shake to write of it." He learned to +dance, and was "like to make a dancer." He learned to sing, +and walked about Gray's Inn Fields "humming to myself (which +is now my constant practice) the trillo." He learned to play +the lute, the flute, the flageolet, and the theorbo, and it +was not the fault of his intention if he did not learn the +harpsichord or the spinet. He learned to compose songs, and +burned to give forth "a scheme and theory of music not yet +ever made in the world." When he heard "a fellow whistle +like a bird exceeding well," he promised to return another +day and give an angel for a lesson in the art. Once, he +writes, "I took the Bezan back with me, and with a brave gale +and tide reached up that night to the Hope, taking great +pleasure in learning the seamen's manner of singing when they +sound the depths." If he found himself rusty in his Latin +grammar, he must fall to it like a schoolboy. He was a +member of Harrington's Club till its dissolution, and of the +Royal Society before it had received the name. Boyle's +HYDROSTATICS was "of infinite delight" to him, walking in +Barnes Elms. We find him comparing Bible concordances, a +captious judge of sermons, deep in Descartes and Aristotle. +We find him, in a single year, studying timber and the +measurement of timber; tar and oil, hemp, and the process of +preparing cordage; mathematics and accounting; the hull and +the rigging of ships from a model; and "looking and improving +himself of the (naval) stores with" - hark to the fellow! - +"great delight." His familiar spirit of delight was not the +same with Shelley's; but how true it was to him through life! +He is only copying something, and behold, he "takes great +pleasure to rule the lines, and have the capital words wrote +with red ink;" he has only had his coal-cellar emptied and +cleaned, and behold, "it do please him exceedingly." A hog's +harslett is "a piece of meat he loves." He cannot ride home +in my Lord Sandwich's coach, but he must exclaim, with +breathless gusto, "his noble, rich coach." When he is bound +for a supper party, he anticipates a "glut of pleasure." +When he has a new watch, "to see my childishness," says he, +"I could not forbear carrying it in my hand and seeing what +o'clock it was an hundred times." To go to Vauxhall, he +says, and "to hear the nightingales and other birds, hear +fiddles, and there a harp and here a Jew's trump, and here +laughing, and there fine people walking, is mighty +divertising." And the nightingales, I take it, were +particularly dear to him; and it was again "with great +pleasure that he paused to hear them as he walked to +Woolwich, while the fog was rising and the April sun broke +through. + +He must always be doing something agreeable, and, by +preference, two agreeable things at once. In his house he +had a box of carpenter's tools, two dogs, an eagle, a canary, +and a blackbird that whistled tunes, lest, even in that full +life, he should chance upon an empty moment. If he had to +wait for a dish of poached eggs, he must put in the time by +playing on the flageolet; if a sermon were dull, he must read +in the book of Tobit or divert his mind with sly advances on +the nearest women. When he walked, it must be with a book in +his pocket to beguile the way in case the nightingales were +silent; and even along the streets of London, with so many +pretty faces to be spied for and dignitaries to be saluted, +his trail was marked by little debts "for wine, pictures, +etc.," the true headmark of a life intolerant of any joyless +passage. He had a kind of idealism in pleasure; like the +princess in the fairy story, he was conscious of a rose-leaf +out of place. Dearly as he loved to talk, he could not enjoy +nor shine in a conversation when he thought himself +unsuitably dressed. Dearly as he loved eating, he "knew not +how to eat alone;" pleasure for him must heighten pleasure; +and the eye and ear must be flattered like the palate ere he +avow himself content. He had no zest in a good dinner when +it fell to be eaten "in a bad street and in a periwig-maker's +house;" and a collation was spoiled for him by indifferent +music. His body was indefatigable, doing him yeoman's +service in this breathless chase of pleasures. On April 11, +1662, he mentions that he went to bed "weary, WHICH I SELDOM +AM;" and already over thirty, he would sit up all night +cheerfully to see a comet. But it is never pleasure that +exhausts the pleasure-seeker; for in that career, as in all +others, it is failure that kills. The man who enjoys so +wholly and bears so impatiently the slightest widowhood from +joy, is just the man to lose a night's rest over some paltry +question of his right to fiddle on the leads, or to be "vexed +to the blood" by a solecism in his wife's attire; and we find +in consequence that he was always peevish when he was hungry, +and that his head "aked mightily" after a dispute. But +nothing could divert him from his aim in life; his remedy in +care was the same as his delight in prosperity; it was with +pleasure, and with pleasure only, that he sought to drive out +sorrow; and, whether he was jealous of his wife or skulking +from a bailiff, he would equally take refuge in the theatre. +There, if the house be full and the company noble, if the +songs be tunable, the actors perfect, and the play diverting, +this odd hero of the secret Diary, this private self-adorer, +will speedily be healed of his distresses. + +Equally pleased with a watch, a coach, a piece of meat, a +tune upon the fiddle, or a fact in hydrostatics, Pepys was +pleased yet more by the beauty, the worth, the mirth, or the +mere scenic attitude in life of his fellow-creatures. He +shows himself throughout a sterling humanist. Indeed, he who +loves himself, not in idle vanity, but with a plenitude of +knowledge, is the best equipped of all to love his +neighbours. And perhaps it is in this sense that charity may +be most properly said to begin at home. It does not matter +what quality a person has: Pepys can appreciate and love him +for it. He "fills his eyes" with the beauty of Lady +Castlemaine; indeed, he may be said to dote upon the thought +of her for years; if a woman be good-looking and not painted, +he will walk miles to have another sight of her; and even +when a lady by a mischance spat upon his clothes, he was +immediately consoled when he had observed that she was +pretty. But, on the other hand, he is delighted to see Mrs. +Pett upon her knees, and speaks thus of his Aunt James: "a +poor, religious, well-meaning, good soul, talking of nothing +but God Almighty, and that with so much innocence that +mightily pleased me." He is taken with Pen's merriment and +loose songs, but not less taken with the sterling worth of +Coventry. He is jolly with a drunken sailor, but listens +with interest and patience, as he rides the Essex roads, to +the story of a Quaker's spiritual trials and convictions. He +lends a critical ear to the discourse of kings and royal +dukes. He spends an evening at Vauxhall with "Killigrew and +young Newport - loose company," says he, "but worth a man's +being in for once, to know the nature of it, and their manner +of talk and lives." And when a rag-boy lights him home, he +examines him about his business and other ways of livelihood +for destitute children. This is almost half-way to the +beginning of philanthropy; had it only been the fashion, as +it is at present, Pepys had perhaps been a man famous for +good deeds. And it is through this quality that he rises, at +times, superior to his surprising egotism; his interest in +the love affairs of others is, indeed, impersonal; he is +filled with concern for my Lady Castlemaine, whom he only +knows by sight, shares in her very jealousies, joys with her +in her successes; and it is not untrue, however strange it +seems in his abrupt presentment, that he loved his maid Jane +because she was in love with his man Tom. + +Let us hear him, for once, at length: "So the women and W. +Hewer and I walked upon the Downes, where a flock of sheep +was; and the most pleasant and innocent sight that ever I saw +in my life. We found a shepherd and his little boy reading, +far from any houses or sight of people, the Bible to him; so +I made the boy read to me, which he did with the forced tone +that children do usually read, that was mighty pretty; and +then I did give him something, and went to the father, and +talked with him. He did content himself mightily in my +liking his boy's reading, and did bless God for him, the most +like one of the old patriarchs that ever I saw in my life, +and it brought those thoughts of the old age of the world in +my mind for two or three days after. We took notice of his +woolen knit stockings of two colours mixed, and of his shoes +shod with iron, both at the toe and heels, and with great +nails in the soles of his feet, which was mighty pretty; and +taking notice of them, 'Why,' says the poor man, 'the downes, +you see, are full of stones, and we are faine to shoe +ourselves thus; and these,' says he, 'will make the stones +fly till they ring before me.' I did give the poor man +something, for which he was mighty thankful, and I tried to +cast stones with his horne crooke. He values his dog +mightily, that would turn a sheep any way which he would have +him, when he goes to fold them; told me there was about +eighteen score sheep in his flock, and that he hath four +shillings a week the year round for keeping of them; and Mrs. +Turner, in the common fields here, did gather one of the +prettiest nosegays that ever I saw in my life." + +And so the story rambles on to the end of that day's +pleasuring; with cups of milk, and glowworms, and people +walking at sundown with their wives and children, and all the +way home Pepys still dreaming "of the old age of the world" +and the early innocence of man. This was how he walked +through life, his eyes and ears wide open, and his hand, you +will observe, not shut; and thus he observed the lives, the +speech, and the manners of his fellow-men, with prose +fidelity of detail and yet a lingering glamour of romance. + +It was "two or three days after" that he extended this +passage in the pages of his journal, and the style has thus +the benefit of some reflection. It is generally supposed +that, as a writer, Pepys must rank at the bottom of the scale +of merit. But a style which is indefatigably lively, +telling, and picturesque through six large volumes of +everyday experience, which deals with the whole matter of a +life, and yet is rarely wearisome, which condescends to the +most fastidious particulars, and yet sweeps all away in the +forthright current of the narrative, - such a style may be +ungrammatical, it may be inelegant, it may be one tissue of +mistakes, but it can never be devoid of merit. The first and +the true function of the writer has been thoroughly performed +throughout; and though the manner of his utterance may be +childishly awkward, the matter has been transformed and +assimilated by his unfeigned interest and delight. The gusto +of the man speaks out fierily after all these years. For the +difference between Pepys and Shelley, to return to that half- +whimsical approximation, is one of quality but not one of +degree; in his sphere, Pepys felt as keenly, and his is the +true prose of poetry - prose because the spirit of the man +was narrow and earthly, but poetry because he was delightedly +alive. Hence, in such a passage as this about the Epsom +shepherd, the result upon the reader's mind is entire +conviction and unmingled pleasure. So, you feel, the thing +fell out, not otherwise; and you would no more change it than +you would change a sublimity of Shakespeare's, a homely touch +of Bunyan's, or a favoured reminiscence of your own. + +There never was a man nearer being an artist, who yet was not +one. The tang was in the family; while he was writing the +journal for our enjoyment in his comely house in Navy +Gardens, no fewer than two of his cousins were tramping the +fens, kit under arm, to make music to the country girls. But +he himself, though he could play so many instruments and pass +judgment in so many fields of art, remained an amateur. It +is not given to any one so keenly to enjoy, without some +greater power to understand. That he did not like +Shakespeare as an artist for the stage may be a fault, but it +is not without either parallel or excuse. He certainly +admired him as a poet; he was the first beyond mere actors on +the rolls of that innumerable army who have got "To be or not +to be" by heart. Nor was he content with that; it haunted +his mind; he quoted it to himself in the pages of the Diary, +and, rushing in where angels fear to tread, he set it to +music. Nothing, indeed, is more notable than the heroic +quality of the verses that our little sensualist in a periwig +chose out to marry with his own mortal strains. Some gust +from brave Elizabethan times must have warmed his spirit, as +he sat tuning his sublime theorbo. "To be or not to be. +Whether 'tis nobler" - "Beauty retire, thou dost my pity +move" - "It is decreed, nor shall thy fate, O Rome;" - open +and dignified in the sound, various and majestic in the +sentiment, it was no inapt, as it was certainly no timid, +spirit that selected such a range of themes. Of "Gaze not on +Swans," I know no more than these four words; yet that also +seems to promise well. It was, however, on a probable +suspicion, the work of his master, Mr. Berkenshaw - as the +drawings that figure at the breaking up of a young ladies' +seminary are the work of the professor attached to the +establishment. Mr. Berkenshaw was not altogether happy in +his pupil. The amateur cannot usually rise into the artist, +some leaven of the world still clogging him; and we find +Pepys behaving like a pickthank to the man who taught him +composition. In relation to the stage, which he so warmly +loved and understood, he was not only more hearty, but more +generous to others. Thus he encounters Colonel Reames, "a +man," says he, "who understands and loves a play as well as +I, and I love him for it." And again, when he and his wife +had seen a most ridiculous insipid piece, "Glad we were," he +writes, "that Betterton had no part in it." It is by such a +zeal and loyalty to those who labour for his delight that the +amateur grows worthy of the artist. And it should be kept in +mind that, not only in art, but in morals, Pepys rejoiced to +recognise his betters. There was not one speck of envy in +the whole human-hearted egotist. + + +RESPECTABILITY. + + +When writers inveigh against respectability, in the present +degraded meaning of the word, they are usually suspected of a +taste for clay pipes and beer cellars; and their performances +are thought to hail from the OWL'S NEST of the comedy. They +have something more, however, in their eye than the dulness +of a round million dinner parties that sit down yearly in old +England. For to do anything because others do it, and not +because the thing is good, or kind, or honest in its own +right, is to resign all moral control and captaincy upon +yourself, and go post-haste to the devil with the greater +number. We smile over the ascendency of priests; but I had +rather follow a priest than what they call the leaders of +society. No life can better than that of Pepys illustrate +the dangers of this respectable theory of living. For what +can be more untoward than the occurrence, at a critical +period and while the habits are still pliable, of such a +sweeping transformation as the return of Charles the Second? +Round went the whole fleet of England on the other tack; and +while a few tall pintas, Milton or Pen, still sailed a lonely +course by the stars and their own private compass, the cock- +boat, Pepys, must go about with the majority among "the +stupid starers and the loud huzzas." + +The respectable are not led so much by any desire of applause +as by a positive need for countenance. The weaker and the +tamer the man, the more will he require this support; and any +positive quality relieves him, by just so much, of this +dependence. In a dozen ways, Pepys was quite strong enough +to please himself without regard for others; but his positive +qualities were not co-extensive with the field of conduct; +and in many parts of life he followed, with gleeful +precision, in the footprints of the contemporary Mrs. Grundy. +In morals, particularly, he lived by the countenance of +others; felt a slight from another more keenly than a +meanness in himself; and then first repented when he was +found out. You could talk of religion or morality to such a +man; and by the artist side of him, by his lively sympathy +and apprehension, he could rise, as it were dramatically, to +the significance of what you said. All that matter in +religion which has been nicknamed other-worldliness was +strictly in his gamut; but a rule of life that should make a +man rudely virtuous, following right in good report and ill +report, was foolishness and a stumbling-block to Pepys. He +was much thrown across the Friends; and nothing can be more +instructive than his attitude towards these most interesting +people of that age. I have mentioned how he conversed with +one as he rode; when he saw some brought from a meeting under +arrest, "I would to God," said he, "they would either +conform, or be more wise and not be catched;" and to a Quaker +in his own office he extended a timid though effectual +protection. Meanwhile there was growing up next door to him +that beautiful nature William Pen. It is odd that Pepys +condemned him for a fop; odd, though natural enough when you +see Pen's portrait, that Pepys was jealous of him with his +wife. But the cream of the story is when Pen publishes his +SANDY FOUNDATION SHAKEN, and Pepys has it read aloud by his +wife. "I find it," he says, "so well writ as, I think, it is +too good for him ever to have writ it; and it is a serious +sort of book, and NOT FIT FOR EVERYBODY TO READ." Nothing is +more galling to the merely respectable than to be brought in +contact with religious ardour. Pepys had his own foundation, +sandy enough, but dear to him from practical considerations, +and he would read the book with true uneasiness of spirit; +for conceive the blow if, by some plaguy accident, this Pen +were to convert him! It was a different kind of doctrine +that he judged profitable for himself and others. "A good +sermon of Mr. Gifford's at our church, upon 'Seek ye first +the kingdom of heaven.' A very excellent and persuasive, +good and moral sermon. He showed, like a wise man, that +righteousness is a surer moral way of being rich than sin and +villainy." It is thus that respect. able people desire to +have their Greathearts address them, telling, in mild +accents, how you may make the best of both worlds, and be a +moral hero without courage, kindness, or troublesome +reflection; and thus the Gospel, cleared of Eastern metaphor, +becomes a manual of worldly prudence, and a handybook for +Pepys and the successful merchant. + +The respectability of Pepys was deeply grained. He has no +idea of truth except for the Diary. He has no care that a +thing shall be, if it but appear; gives out that he has +inherited a good estate, when he has seemingly got nothing +but a lawsuit; and is pleased to be thought liberal when he +knows he has been mean. He is conscientiously ostentatious. +I say conscientiously, with reason. He could never have been +taken for a fop, like Pen, but arrayed himself in a manner +nicely suitable to his position. For long he hesitated to +assume the famous periwig; for a public man should travel +gravely with the fashions not foppishly before, nor dowdily +behind, the central movement of his age. For long he durst +not keep a carriage; that, in his circumstances would have +been improper; but a time comes, with the growth of his +fortune, when the impropriety has shifted to the other side, +and he is "ashamed to be seen in a hackney." Pepys talked +about being "a Quaker or some very melancholy thing;" for my +part, I can imagine nothing so melancholy, because nothing +half so silly, as to be concerned about such problems. But +so respectability and the duties of society haunt and burden +their poor devotees; and what seems at first the very +primrose path of life, proves difficult and thorny like the +rest. And the time comes to Pepys, as to all the merely +respectable, when he must not only order his pleasures, but +even clip his virtuous movements, to the public pattern of +the age. There was some juggling among officials to avoid +direct taxation; and Pepys, with a noble impulse, growing +ashamed of this dishonesty, designed to charge himself with +1000 pounds; but finding none to set him an example, "nobody +of our ablest merchants" with this moderate liking for clean +hands, he judged it "not decent;" he feared it would "be +thought vain glory;" and, rather than appear singular, +cheerfully remained a thief. One able merchant's +countenance, and Pepys had dared to do an honest act! Had he +found one brave spirit, properly recognised by society, he +might have gone far as a disciple. Mrs. Turner, it is true, +can fill him full of sordid scandal, and make him believe, +against the testimony of his senses, that Pen's venison pasty +stank like the devil; but, on the other hand, Sir William +Coventry can raise him by a word into another being. Pepys, +when he is with Coventry, talks in the vein of an old Roman. +What does he care for office or emolument? "Thank God, I +have enough of my own," says he, "to buy me a good book and a +good fiddle, and I have a good wife." And again, we find +this pair projecting an old age when an ungrateful country +shall have dismissed them from the field of public service; +Coventry living retired in a fine house, and Pepys dropping +in, "it may be, to read a chapter of Seneca." + +Under this influence, the only good one in his life, Pepys +continued zealous and, for the period, pure in his +employment. He would not be "bribed to be unjust," he says, +though he was "not so squeamish as to refuse a present +after," suppose the king to have received no wrong. His new +arrangement for the victualling of Tangier he tells us with +honest complacency, will save the king a thousand and gain +Pepys three hundred pounds a year, - a statement which +exactly fixes the degree of the age's enlightenment. But for +his industry and capacity no praise can be too high. It was +an unending struggle for the man to stick to his business in +such a garden of Armida as he found this life; and the story +of his oaths, so often broken, so courageously renewed, is +worthy rather of admiration that the contempt it has +received. + +Elsewhere, and beyond the sphere of Coventry's influence, we +find him losing scruples and daily complying further with the +age. When he began the journal, he was a trifle prim and +puritanic; merry enough, to be sure, over his private cups, +and still remembering Magdalene ale and his acquaintance with +Mrs. Ainsworth of Cambridge. But youth is a hot season with +all; when a man smells April and May he is apt at times to +stumble; and in spite of a disordered practice, Pepys's +theory, the better things that he approved and followed +after, we may even say were strict. Where there was "tag, +rag, and bobtail, dancing, singing, and drinking," he felt +"ashamed, and went away;" and when he slept in church, he +prayed God forgive him. In but a little while we find him +with some ladies keeping each other awake "from spite," as +though not to sleep in church were an obvious hardship; and +yet later he calmly passes the time of service, looking about +him, with a perspective glass, on all the pretty women. His +favourite ejaculation, "Lord!" occurs but once that I have +observed in 1660, never in `61, twice in '62, and at least +five times in '63; after which the "Lords" may be said to +pullulate like herrings, with here and there a solitary +"damned," as it were a whale among the shoal. He and his +wife, once filled with dudgeon by some innocent freedoms at a +marriage, are soon content to go pleasuring with my Lord +Brouncker's mistress, who was not even, by his own account, +the most discreet of mistresses. Tag, rag, and bobtail, +dancing, singing, and drinking, become his natural element; +actors and actresses and drunken, roaring courtiers are to be +found in his society; until the man grew so involved with +Saturnalian manners and companions that he was shot almost +unconsciously into the grand domestic crash of 1668. + +That was the legitimate issue and punishment of years of +staggering walk and conversation. The man who has smoked his +pipe for half a century in a powder magazine finds himself at +last the author and the victim of a hideous disaster. So +with our pleasant-minded Pepys and his peccadilloes. All of +a sudden, as he still trips dexterously enough among the +dangers of a double-faced career, thinking no great evil, +humming to himself the trillo, Fate takes the further conduct +of that matter from his hands, and brings him face to face +with the consequences of his acts. For a man still, after so +many years, the lover, although not the constant lover, of +his wife, - for a man, besides, who was so greatly careful of +appearances, - the revelation of his infidelities was a +crushing blow. The tears that he shed, the indignities that +he endured, are not to be measured. A vulgar woman, and now +justly incensed, Mrs. Pepys spared him no detail of +suffering. She was violent, threatening him with the tongs; +she was careless of his honour, driving him to insult the +mistress whom she had driven him to betray and to discard; +worst of all, she was hopelessly inconsequent, in word and +thought and deed, now lulling him with reconciliations, and +anon flaming forth again with the original anger. Pepys had +not used his wife well; he had wearied her with jealousies, +even while himself unfaithful; he had grudged her clothes and +pleasures, while lavishing both upon himself; he had abused +her in words; he had bent his fist at her in anger; he had +once blacked her eye; and it is one of the oddest particulars +in that odd Diary of his, that, while the injury is referred +to once in passing, there is no hint as to the occasion or +the manner of the blow. But now, when he is in the wrong, +nothing can exceed the long-suffering affection of this +impatient husband. While he was still sinning and still +undiscovered, he seems not to have known a touch of penitence +stronger than what might lead him to take his wife to the +theatre, or for an airing, or to give her a new dress, by way +of compensation. Once found out, however, and he seems to +himself to have lost all claim to decent usage. It is +perhaps the strongest instance of his externality. His wife +may do what she pleases, and though he may groan, it will +never occur to him to blame her; he has no weapon left but +tears and the most abject submission. We should perhaps have +respected him more had he not given way so utterly - above +all, had he refused to write, under his wife's dictation, an +insulting letter to his unhappy fellow-culprit, Miss Willet; +but somehow I believe we like him better as he was. + +The death of his wife, following so shortly after, must have +stamped the impression of this episode upon his mind. For +the remaining years of his long life we have no Diary to help +us, and we have seen already how little stress is to be laid +upon the tenor of his correspondence; but what with the +recollection of the catastrophe of his married life, what +with the natural influence of his advancing years and +reputation, it seems not unlikely that the period of +gallantry was at an end for Pepys; and it is beyond a doubt +that he sat down at last to an honoured and agreeable old age +among his books and music, the correspondent of Sir Isaac +Newton, and, in one instance at least the poetical counsellor +of Dryden. Through all this period, that Diary which +contained the secret memoirs of his life, with all its +inconsistencies and escapades, had been religiously +preserved; nor, when he came to die, does he appear to have +provided for its destruction. So we may conceive him +faithful to the end to all his dear and early memories; still +mindful of Mrs. Hely in the woods at Epsom; still lighting at +Islington for a cup of kindness to the dead; still, if he +heard again that air that once so much disturbed him, +thrilling at the recollection of the love that bound him to +his wife. + + + +CHAPTER IX - JOHN KNOX AND HIS RELATIONS TO WOMEN + + + +I. - THE CONTROVERSY ABOUT FEMALE RULE. + + +WHEN first the idea became widely spread among men that the +Word of God, instead of being truly the foundation of all +existing institutions, was rather a stone which the builders +had rejected, it was but natural that the consequent havoc +among received opinions should be accompanied by the +generation of many new and lively hopes for the future. +Somewhat as in the early days of the French Revolution, men +must have looked for an immediate and universal improvement +in their condition. Christianity, up to that time, had been +somewhat of a failure politically. The reason was now +obvious, the capital flaw was detected, the sickness of the +body politic traced at last to its efficient cause. It was +only necessary to put the Bible thoroughly into practice, to +set themselves strenuously to realise in life the Holy +Commonwealth, and all abuses and iniquities would surely pass +away. Thus, in a pageant played at Geneva in the year 1523, +the world was represented as a sick man at the end of his +wits for help, to whom his doctor recommends Lutheran +specifics. (1) The Reformers themselves had set their +affections in a different world, and professed to look for +the finished result of their endeavours on the other side of +death. They took no interest in politics as such; they even +condemned political action as Antichristian: notably, Luther +in the case of the Peasants' War. And yet, as the purely +religious question was inseparably complicated with political +difficulties, and they had to make opposition, from day to +day, against principalities and powers, they were led, one +after another, and again and again, to leave the sphere which +was more strictly their own, and meddle, for good and evil, +with the affairs of State. Not much was to be expected from +interference in such a spirit. Whenever a minister found +himself galled or hindered, he would be inclined to suppose +some contravention of the Bible. Whenever Christian liberty +was restrained (and Christian liberty for each individual +would be about coextensive with what he wished to do), it was +obvious that the State was Antichristian. The great thing, +and the one thing, was to push the Gospel and the Reformers' +own interpretation of it. Whatever helped was good; whatever +hindered was evil; and if this simple classification proved +inapplicable over the whole field, it was no business of his +to stop and reconcile incongruities. He had more pressing +concerns on hand; he had to save souls; he had to be about +his Father's business. This short-sighted view resulted in a +doctrine that was actually Jesuitical in application. They +had no serious ideas upon politics, and they were ready, nay, +they seemed almost bound, to adopt and support whichever +ensured for the moment the greatest benefit to the souls of +their fellow-men. They were dishonest in all sincerity. +Thus Labitte, in the introduction to a book (2) in which he +exposes the hypocritical democracy of the Catholics under the +League, steps aside for a moment to stigmatise the +hypocritical democracy of the Protestants. And nowhere was +this expediency in political questions more apparent than +about the question of female sovereignty. So much was this +the case that one James Thomasius, of Leipsic, wrote a little +paper (3) about the religious partialities of those who took +part in the controversy, in which some of these learned +disputants cut a very sorry figure. + +(1) Gaberel's EGLIST DE GENEVE, i. 88. +(2) LA DEMOCRATIE CHEZ LES PREDICATEURS DE LA LIGUE. +(3) HISTORIA AFFECTUUM SE IMMISCENTIUM CONTROVERSIAE DE +GYNAECOCRATIA. It is in his collected prefaces, Leipsic, +1683. + +Now Knox has been from the first a man well hated; and it is +somewhat characteristic of his luck that he figures here in +the very forefront of the list of partial scribes who trimmed +their doctrine with the wind in all good conscience, and were +political weathercocks out of conviction. Not only has +Thomasius mentioned him, but Bayle has taken the hint from +Thomasius, and dedicated a long note to the matter at the end +of his article on the Scotch Reformer. This is a little less +than fair. If any one among the evangelists of that period +showed more serious political sense than another, it was +assuredly Knox; and even in this very matter of female rule, +although I do not suppose any one nowadays will feel inclined +to endorse his sentiments, I confess I can make great +allowance for his conduct. The controversy, besides, has an +interest of its own, in view of later controversies. + +John Knox, from 1556 to 1559, was resident in Geneva, as +minister, jointly with Goodman, of a little church of English +refugees. He and his congregation were banished from England +by one woman, Mary Tudor, and proscribed in Scotland by +another, the Regent Mary of Guise. The coincidence was +tempting: here were many abuses centring about one abuse; +here was Christ's Gospel persecuted in the two kingdoms by +one anomalous power. He had not far to go to find the idea +that female government was anomalous. It was an age, indeed, +in which women, capable and incapable, played a conspicuous +part upon the stage of European history; and yet their rule, +whatever may have been the opinion of here and there a wise +man or enthusiast, was regarded as an anomaly by the great +bulk of their contemporaries. It was defended as an anomaly. +It, and all that accompanied and sanctioned it, was set aside +as a single exception; and no one thought of reasoning down +from queens and extending their privileges to ordinary women. +Great ladies, as we know, had the privilege of entering into +monasteries and cloisters, otherwise forbidden to their sex. +As with one thing, so with another. Thus, Margaret of +Navarre wrote books with great acclamation, and no one, +seemingly, saw fit to call her conduct in question; but +Mademoiselle de Gournay, Montaigne's adopted daughter, was in +a controversy with the world as to whether a woman might be +an author without incongruity. Thus, too, we have Theodore +Agrippa d'Aubigne writing to his daughters about the learned +women of his century, and cautioning them, in conclusion, +that the study of letters was unsuited to ladies of a +middling station, and should be reserved for princesses. (1) +And once more, if we desire to see the same principle carried +to ludicrous extreme, we shall find that Reverend Father in +God the Abbot of Brantome, claiming, on the authority of some +lord of his acquaintance, a privilege, or rather a duty, of +free love for great princesses, and carefully excluding other +ladies from the same gallant dispensation. (2) One sees the +spirit in which these immunities were granted; and how they +were but the natural consequence of that awe for courts and +kings that made the last writer tell us, with simple wonder, +how Catherine de Medici would "laugh her fill just like +another" over the humours of pantaloons and zanies. And such +servility was, of all things, what would touch most nearly +the republican spirit of Knox. It was not difficult for him +to set aside this weak scruple of loyalty. The lantern of +his analysis did not always shine with a very serviceable +light; but he had the virtue, at least, to carry it into many +places of fictitious holiness, and was not abashed by the +tinsel divinity that hedged kings and queens from his +contemporaries. And so he could put the proposition in the +form already mentioned: there was Christ's Gospel persecuted +in the two kingdoms by one anomalous power plainly, then, the +"regiment of women" was Antichristian. Early in 1558 he +communicated this discovery to the world, by publishing at +Geneva his notorious book - THE FIRST BLAST OF THE TRUMPET +AGAINST THE MONSTROUS REGIMENT OF WOMEN. (3) + +(1) Oeuvres de d'Aubigne, i. 449. +(2) Dames Illustres, pp. 358-360. +(3) Works of John Knox, iv. 349. + +As a whole, it is a dull performance; but the preface, as is +usual with Knox, is both interesting and morally fine. Knox +was not one of those who are humble in the hour of triumph; +he was aggressive even when things were at their worst. He +had a grim reliance in himself, or rather in his mission; if +he were not sure that he was a great man, he was at least +sure that he was one set apart to do great things. And he +judged simply that whatever passed in his mind, whatever +moved him to flee from persecution instead of constantly +facing it out, or, as here, to publish and withhold his name +from the title-page of a critical work, would not fail to be +of interest, perhaps of benefit, to the world. There may be +something more finely sensitive in the modern humour, that +tends more and more to withdraw a man's personality from the +lessons he inculcates or the cause that he has espoused; but +there is a loss herewith of wholesome responsibility; and +when we find in the works of Knox, as in the Epistles of +Paul, the man himself standing nakedly forward, courting and +anticipating criticism, putting his character, as it were, in +pledge for the sincerity of his doctrine, we had best waive +the question of delicacy, and make our acknowledgments for a +lesson of courage, not unnecessary in these days of anonymous +criticism, and much light, otherwise unattainable, on the +spirit in which great movements were initiated and carried +forward. Knox's personal revelations are always interesting; +and, in the case of the "First Blast," as I have said, there +is no exception to the rule. He begins by stating the solemn +responsibility of all who are watchmen over God's flock; and +all are watchmen (he goes on to explain, with that fine +breadth of spirit that characterises him even when, as here, +he shows himself most narrow), all are watchmen "whose eyes +God doth open, and whose conscience he pricketh to admonish +the ungodly." And with the full consciousness of this great +duty before him, he sets himself to answer the scruples of +timorous or worldly-minded people. How can a man repent, he +asks, unless the nature of his transgression is made plain to +him? "And therefore I say," he continues, "that of necessity +it is that this monstriferous empire of women (which among +all enormities that this day do abound upon the face of the +whole earth, is most detestable and damnable) be openly and +plainly declared to the world, to the end that some may +repent and be saved." To those who think the doctrine +useless, because it cannot be expected to amend those princes +whom it would dispossess if once accepted, he makes answer in +a strain that shows him at his greatest. After having +instanced how the rumour of Christ's censures found its way +to Herod in his own court, "even so," he continues, "may the +sound of our weak trumpet, by the support of some wind (blow +it from the south, or blow it from the north, it is of no +matter), come to the ears of the chief offenders. BUT +WHETHER IT DO OR NOT, YET DARE WE NOT CEASE TO BLOW AS GOD +WILL GIVE STRENGTH. FOR WE ARE DEBTORS TO MORE THAN TO +PRINCES, TO WIT, TO THE GREAT MULTITUDE OF OUR BRETHREN, of +whom, no doubt, a great number have heretofore offended by +error and ignorance." + +It is for the multitude, then, he writes; he does not greatly +hope that his trumpet will be audible in palaces, or that +crowned women will submissively discrown themselves at his +appeal; what he does hope, in plain English, is to encourage +and justify rebellion; and we shall see, before we have done, +that he can put his purpose into words as roundly as I can +put it for him. This he sees to be a matter of much hazard; +he is not "altogether so brutish and insensible, but that he +has laid his account what the finishing of the work may +cost." He knows that he will find many adversaries, since +"to the most part of men, lawful and godly appeareth +whatsoever antiquity hath received." He looks for +opposition, "not only of the ignorant multitude, but of the +wise, politic, and quiet spirits of the earth." He will be +called foolish, curious, despiteful, and a sower of sedition; +and one day, perhaps, for all he is now nameless, he may be +attainted of treason. Yet he has "determined to obey God, +notwithstanding that the world shall rage thereat." Finally, +he makes some excuse for the anonymous appearance of this +first instalment: it is his purpose thrice to blow the +trumpet in this matter, if God so permit; twice he intends to +do it without name; but at the last blast to take the odium +upon himself, that all others may be purged. + +Thus he ends the preface, and enters upon his argument with a +secondary title: "The First Blast to awake Women degenerate." +We are in the land of assertion without delay. That a woman +should bear rule, superiority, dominion or empire over any +realm, nation, or city, he tells us, is repugnant to nature, +contumely to God, and a subversion of good order. Women are +weak, frail, impatient, feeble, and foolish. God has denied +to woman wisdom to consider, or providence to foresee, what +is profitable to a commonwealth. Women have been ever +lightly esteemed; they have been denied the tutory of their +own sons, and subjected to the unquestionable sway of their +husbands; and surely it is irrational to give the greater +where the less has been withheld, and suffer a woman to reign +supreme over a great kingdom who would be allowed no +authority by her own fireside. He appeals to the Bible; but +though he makes much of the first transgression and certain +strong texts in Genesis and Paul's Epistles, he does not +appeal with entire success. The cases of Deborah and Huldah +can be brought into no sort of harmony with his thesis. +Indeed, I may say that, logically, he left his bones there; +and that it is but the phantom of an argument that he parades +thenceforward to the end. Well was it for Knox that he +succeeded no better; it is under this very ambiguity about +Deborah that we shall find him fain to creep for shelter +before he is done with the regiment of women. After having +thus exhausted Scripture, and formulated its teaching in the +somewhat blasphemous maxim that the man is placed above the +woman, even as God above the angels, he goes on triumphantly +to adduce the testimonies of Tertullian, Augustine, Ambrose, +Basil, Chrysostom, and the Pandects; and having gathered this +little cloud of witnesses about him, like pursuivants about a +herald, he solemnly proclaims all reigning women to be +traitoresses and rebels against God; discharges all men +thenceforward from holding any office under such monstrous +regiment, and calls upon all the lieges with one consent to +"STUDY TO REPRESS THE INORDINATE PRIDE AND TYRANNY" OF +QUEENS. If this is not treasonable teaching, one would be +glad to know what is; and yet, as if he feared he had not +made the case plain enough against himself, he goes on to +deduce the startling corollary that all oaths of allegiance +must be incontinently broken. If it was sin thus to have +sworn even in ignorance, it were obstinate sin to continue to +respect them after fuller knowledge. Then comes the +peroration, in which he cries aloud against the cruelties of +that cursed Jezebel of England - that horrible monster +Jezebel of England; and after having predicted sudden +destruction to her rule and to the rule of all crowned women, +and warned all men that if they presume to defend the same +when any "noble heart" shall be raised up to vindicate the +liberty of his country, they shall not fail to perish +themselves in the ruin, he concludes with a last rhetorical +flourish: "And therefore let all men be advertised, for THE +TRUMPET HATH ONCE BLOWN." + +The capitals are his own. In writing, he probably felt the +want of some such reverberation of the pulpit under strong +hands as he was wont to emphasise his spoken utterances +withal; there would seem to him a want of passion in the +orderly lines of type; and I suppose we may take the capitals +as a mere substitute for the great voice with which he would +have given it forth, had we heard it from his own lips. +Indeed, as it is, in this little strain of rhetoric about the +trumpet, this current allusion to the fall of Jericho, that +alone distinguishes his bitter and hasty production, he was +probably right, according to all artistic canon, thus to +support and accentuate in conclusion the sustained metaphor +of a hostile proclamation. It is curious, by the way, to +note how favourite an image the trumpet was with the +Reformer. He returns to it again and again; it is the Alpha +and Omega of his rhetoric; it is to him what a ship is to the +stage sailor; and one would almost fancy he had begun the +world as a trumpeter's apprentice. The partiality is surely +characteristic. All his life long he was blowing summonses +before various Jerichos, some of which fell duly, but not +all. Wherever he appears in history his speech is loud, +angry, and hostile; there is no peace in his life, and little +tenderness; he is always sounding hopefully to the front for +some rough enterprise. + +And as his voice had something of the trumpet's hardness, it +had something also of the trumpet's warlike inspiration. So +Randolph, possibly fresh from the sound of the Reformer's +preaching, writes of him to Cecil:- "Where your honour +exhorteth us to stoutness, I assure you the voice of one man +is able, in an hour, to put more life in us than six hundred +trumpets continually blustering in our ears." (1) + +(1) M'Crie's LIFE OF KNOX, ii. 41. + +Thus was the proclamation made. Nor was it long in wakening +all the echoes of Europe. What success might have attended +it, had the question decided been a purely abstract question, +it is difficult to say. As it was, it was to stand or fall, +not by logic, but by political needs and sympathies. Thus, +in France, his doctrine was to have some future, because +Protestants suffered there under the feeble and treacherous +regency of Catherine de Medici; and thus it was to have no +future anywhere else, because the Protestant interest was +bound up with the prosperity of Queen Elizabeth. This +stumbling-block lay at the very threshold of the matter; and +Knox, in the text of the "First Blast," had set everybody the +wrong example and gone to the ground himself. He finds +occasion to regret "the blood of innocent Lady Jane Dudley." +But Lady Jane Dudley, or Lady Jane Grey, as we call her, was +a would-be traitoress and rebel against God, to use his own +expressions. If, therefore, political and religious sympathy +led Knox himself into so grave a partiality, what was he to +expect from his disciples? + +If the trumpet gave so ambiguous a sound, who could heartily +prepare himself for the battle? The question whether Lady +Jane Dudley was an innocent martyr, or a traitoress against +God, whose inordinate pride and tyranny had been effectually +repressed, was thus left altogether in the wind; and it was +not, perhaps, wonderful if many of Knox's readers concluded +that all right and wrong in the matter turned upon the degree +of the sovereign's orthodoxy and possible helpfulness to the +Reformation. He should have been the more careful of such an +ambiguity of meaning, as he must have known well the lukewarm +indifference and dishonesty of his fellow-reformers in +political matters. He had already, in 1556 or 1557, talked +the matter over with his great master, Calvin, in "a private +conversation;" and the interview (1) must have been truly +distasteful to both parties. Calvin, indeed, went a far way +with him in theory, and owned that the "government of women +was a deviation from the original and proper order of nature, +to be ranked, no less than slavery, among the punishments +consequent upon the fall of man." But, in practice, their +two roads separated. For the Man of Geneva saw difficulties +in the way of the Scripture proof in the cases of Deborah and +Huldah, and in the prophecy of Isaiah that queens should be +the nursing mothers of the Church. And as the Bible was not +decisive, he thought the subject should be let alone, +because, "by custom and public consent and long practice, it +has been established that realms and principalities may +descend to females by hereditary right, and it would not be +lawful to unsettle governments which are ordained by the +peculiar providence of God." I imagine Knox's ears must have +burned during this interview. Think of him listening +dutifully to all this - how it would not do to meddle with +anointed kings - how there was a peculiar providence in these +great affairs; and then think of his own peroration, and the +"noble heart" whom he looks for "to vindicate the liberty of +his country;" or his answer to Queen Mary, when she asked him +who he was, to interfere in the affairs of Scotland:- "Madam, +a subject born within the same!" Indeed, the two doctors who +differed at this private conversation represented, at the +moment, two principles of enormous import in the subsequent +history of Europe. In Calvin we have represented that +passive obedience, that toleration of injustice and +absurdity, that holding back of the hand from political +affairs as from something unclean, which lost France, if we +are to believe M. Michelet, for the Reformation; a spirit +necessarily fatal in the long run to the existence of any +sect that may profess it; a suicidal doctrine that survives +among us to this day in narrow views of personal duty, and +the low political morality of many virtuous men. In Knox, on +the other hand, we see foreshadowed the whole Puritan +Revolution and the scaffold of Charles I. + +(1) Described by Calvin in a letter to Cecil, Knox's Works, +vol. iv. + +There is little doubt in my mind that this interview was what +caused Knox to print his book without a name. (1) It was a +dangerous thing to contradict the Man of Geneva, and doubly +so, surely, when one had had the advantage of correction from +him in a private conversation; and Knox had his little flock +of English refugees to consider. If they had fallen into bad +odour at Geneva, where else was there left to flee to? It +was printed, as I said, in 1558; and, by a singular MAL-A- +PROPOS, in that same year Mary died, and Elizabeth succeeded +to the throne of England. And just as the accession of +Catholic Queen Mary had condemned female rule in the eyes of +Knox, the accession of Protestant Queen Elizabeth justified +it in the eyes of his colleagues. Female rule ceases to be +an anomaly, not because Elizabeth can "reply to eight +ambassadors in one day in their different languages," but +because she represents for the moment the political future of +the Reformation. The exiles troop back to England with songs +of praise in their mouths. The bright accidental star, of +which we have all read in the Preface to the Bible, has risen +over the darkness of Europe. There is a thrill of hope +through the persecuted Churches of the Continent. Calvin +writes to Cecil, washing his hands of Knox and his political +heresies. The sale of the "First Blast" is prohibited in +Geneva; and along with it the bold book of Knox's colleague, +Goodman - a book dear to Milton - where female rule was +briefly characterised as a "monster in nature and disorder +among men." (2) Any who may ever have doubted, or been for a +moment led away by Knox or Goodman, or their own wicked +imaginations, are now more than convinced. They have seen +the accidental star. Aylmer, with his eye set greedily on a +possible bishopric, and "the better to obtain the favour of +the new Queen," (3) sharpens his pen to confound Knox by +logic. What need? He has been confounded by facts. "Thus +what had been to the refugees of Geneva as the very word of +God, no sooner were they back in England than, behold! it was +the word of the devil." (4) + +(1) It was anonymously published, but no one seems to have +been in doubt about its authorship; he might as well have set +his name to it, for all the good he got by holding it back. +(2) Knox's Works, iv. 358. +(3) Strype's AYLMER, p. 16. +(4) It may interest the reader to know that these (so says +Thomasius) are the "ipsissima verba Schlusselburgii." + +Now, what of the real sentiments of these loyal subjects of +Elizabeth? They professed a holy horror for Knox's position: +let us see if their own would please a modern audience any +better, or was, in substance, greatly different. + +John Aylmer, afterwards Bishop of London, published an answer +to Knox, under the title of AN HARBOUR FOR FAITHFUL AND TRUE +SUBJECTS AGAINST THE LATE BLOWN BLAST, CONCERNING THE +GOVERNMENT OF WOMEN. (1) And certainly he was a thought more +acute, a thought less precipitate and simple, than his +adversary. He is not to be led away by such captious terms +as NATURAL AND UNNATURAL. It is obvious to him that a +woman's disability to rule is not natural in the same sense +in which it is natural for a stone to fall or fire to burn. +He is doubtful, on the whole, whether this disability be +natural at all; nay, when he is laying it down that a woman +should not be a priest, he shows some elementary conception +of what many of us now hold to be the truth of the matter. +"The bringing-up of women," he says, "is commonly such" that +they cannot have the necessary qualifications, "for they are +not brought upon learning in schools, nor trained in +disputation." And even so, he can ask, "Are there not in +England women, think you, that for learning and wisdom could +tell their household and neighbours as good a tale as any Sir +John there?" For all that, his advocacy is weak. If women's +rule is not unnatural in a sense preclusive of its very +existence, it is neither so convenient nor so profitable as +the government of men. He holds England to be specially +suitable for the government of women, because there the +governor is more limited and restrained by the other members +of the constitution than in other places; and this argument +has kept his book from being altogether forgotten. It is +only in hereditary monarchies that he will offer any defence +of the anomaly. "If rulers were to be chosen by lot or +suffrage, he would not that any women should stand in the +election, but men only." The law of succession of crowns was +a law to him, in the same sense as the law of evolution is a +law to Mr. Herbert Spencer; and the one and the other +counsels his readers, in a spirit suggestively alike, not to +kick against the pricks or seek to be more wise than He who +made them. (2) If God has put a female child into the direct +line of inheritance, it is God's affair. His strength will +be perfected in her weakness. He makes the Creator address +the objectors in this not very flattering vein:- "I, that +could make Daniel, a sucking babe, to judge better than the +wisest lawyers; a brute beast to reprehend the folly of a +prophet; and poor fishers to confound the great clerks of the +world - cannot I make a woman to be a good ruler over you?" +This is the last word of his reasoning. Although he was not +altogether without Puritanic leaven, shown particularly in +what he says of the incomes of Bishops, yet it was rather +loyalty to the old order of things than any generous belief +in the capacity of women, that raised up for them this +clerical champion. His courtly spirit contrasts singularly +with the rude, bracing republicanism of Knox. "Thy knee +shall bow," he says, "thy cap shall off, thy tongue shall +speak reverently of thy sovereign." For himself, his tongue +is even more than reverent. Nothing can stay the issue of +his eloquent adulation. Again and again, "the remembrance of +Elizabeth's virtues" carries him away; and he has to hark +back again to find the scent of his argument. He is +repressing his vehement adoration throughout, until, when the +end comes, and he feels his business at an end, he can +indulge himself to his heart's content in indiscriminate +laudation of his royal mistress. It is humorous to think +that this illustrious lady, whom he here praises, among many +other excellences, for the simplicity of her attire and the +"marvellous meekness of her stomach," threatened him, years +after, in no very meek terms, for a sermon against female +vanity in dress, which she held as a reflection on herself. +(3) + +(1) I am indebted for a sight of this book to the kindness of +Mr. David Laing, the editor of Knox's Works. +(2) SOCIAL STATICS, p. 64, etc. +(3) Hallam's CONST. HIST. OF ENGLAND, i. 225, note m. + +Whatever was wanting here in respect for women generally, +there was no want of respect for the Queen; and one cannot +very greatly wonder if these devoted servants looked askance, +not upon Knox only, but on his little flock, as they came +back to England tainted with disloyal doctrine. For them, as +for him, the accidental star rose somewhat red and angry. As +for poor Knox, his position was the saddest of all. For the +juncture seemed to him of the highest importance; it was the +nick of time, the flood-water of opportunity. Not only was +there an opening for him in Scotland, a smouldering brand of +civil liberty and religious enthusiasm which it should be for +him to kindle into flame with his powerful breath but he had +his eye seemingly on an object of even higher worth. For +now, when religious sympathy ran so high that it could be set +against national aversion, he wished to begin the fusion +together of England and Scotland, and to begin it at the sore +place. If once the open wound were closed at the Border, the +work would be half done. Ministers placed at Berwick and +such places might seek their converts equally on either side +of the march; old enemies would sit together to hear the +gospel of peace, and forget the inherited jealousies of many +generations in the enthusiasm of a common faith; or - let us +say better - a common heresy. For people are not most +conscious of brotherhood when they continue languidly +together in one creed, but when, with some doubt, with some +danger perhaps, and certainly not without some reluctance, +they violently break with the tradition of the past, and go +forth from the sanctuary of their fathers to worship under +the bare heaven. A new creed, like a new country, is an +unhomely place of sojourn; but it makes men lean on one +another and join hands. It was on this that Knox relied to +begin the union of the English and the Scotch. And he had, +perhaps, better means of judging than any even of his +contemporaries. He knew the temper of both nations; and +already during his two years' chaplaincy at Berwick, he had +seen his scheme put to the proof. But whether practicable or +not, the proposal does him much honour. That he should thus +have sought to make a love-match of it between the two +peoples, and tried to win their inclination towards a union +instead of simply transferring them, like so many sheep, by a +marriage, or testament, or private treaty, is thoroughly +characteristic of what is best in the man. Nor was this all. +He had, besides, to assure himself of English support, secret +or avowed, for the reformation party in Scotland; a delicate +affair, trenching upon treason. And so he had plenty to say +to Cecil, plenty that he did not care to "commit to paper +neither yet to the knowledge of many." But his miserable +publication had shut the doors of England in his face. +Summoned to Edinburgh by the confederate lords, he waited at +Dieppe, anxiously praying for leave to journey through +England. The most dispiriting tidings reach him. His +messengers, coming from so obnoxious a quarter, narrowly +escape imprisonment. His old congregation are coldly +received, and even begin to look back again to their place of +exile with regret. "My First Blast," he writes ruefully, +"has blown from me all my friends of England." And then he +adds, with a snarl, "The Second Blast, I fear, shall sound +somewhat more sharp, except men be more moderate than I hear +they are." (1) But the threat is empty; there will never be +a second blast - he has had enough of that trumpet. Nay, he +begins to feel uneasily that, unless he is to be rendered +useless for the rest of his life, unless he is to lose his +right arm and go about his great work maimed and impotent, he +must find some way of making his peace with England and the +indignant Queen. The letter just quoted was written on the +6th of April 1559; and on the 10th, after he had cooled his +heels for four days more about the streets of Dieppe, he gave +in altogether, and writes a letter of capitulation to Cecil. +In this letter, (2) which he kept back until the 22d, still +hoping that things would come right of themselves, he +censures the great secretary for having "followed the world +in the way of perdition," characterises him as "worthy of +hell," and threatens him, if he be not found simple, sincere, +and fervent in the cause of Christ's gospel, that he shall +"taste of the same cup that politic heads have drunken in +before him." This is all, I take it, out of respect for the +Reformer's own position; if he is going to be humiliated, let +others be humiliated first; like a child who will not take +his medicine until he has made his nurse and his mother drink +of it before him. "But I have, say you, written a +treasonable book against the regiment and empire of women. . +. . The writing of that book I will not deny; but to prove it +treasonable I think it shall be hard. . . . It is hinted that +my book shall be written against. If so be, sir, I greatly +doubt they shall rather hurt nor (than) mend the matter." +And here come the terms of capitulation; for he does not +surrender unconditionally, even in this sore strait: "And yet +if any," he goes on, "think me enemy to the person, or yet to +the regiment, of her whom God hath now promoted, they are +utterly deceived in me, FOR THE MIRACULOUS WORK OF GOD, +COMFORTING HIS AFFLICTED BY MEANS OF AN INFIRM VESSEL, I DO +ACKNOWLEDGE, AND THE POWER OF HIS MOST POTENT HAND I WILL +OBEY. MORE PLAINLY TO SPEAK, IF QUEEN ELIZABETH SHALL +CONFESS, THAT THE EXTRAORDINARY DISPENSATION OF GOD'S GREAT +MERCY MAKETH THAT LAWFUL UNTO HER WHICH BOTH NATURE AND GOD'S +LAW DO DENY TO ALL WOMEN, then shall none in England be more +willing to maintain her lawful authority than I shall be. +But if (God's wondrous work set aside) she ground (as God +forbid) the justness of her title upon consuetude, laws, or +ordinances of men, then" - Then Knox will denounce her? Not +so; he is more politic nowadays - then, he "greatly fears" +that her ingratitude to God will not go long without +punishment. + +(1) Knox to Mrs. Locke, 6th April 1559. Works, vi. 14. +(2) Knox to Sir William Cecil, 10th April 1559. Works, ii. +16, or vi. 15. + +His letter to Elizabeth, written some few months later, was a +mere amplification of the sentences quoted above. She must +base her title entirely upon the extraordinary providence of +God; but if she does this, "if thus, in God's presence, she +humbles herself, so will he with tongue and pen justify her +authority, as the Holy Ghost hath justified the same in +Deborah, that blessed mother in Israel." (1) And so, you +see, his consistency is preserved; he is merely applying the +doctrine of the "First Blast." The argument goes thus: The +regiment of women is, as before noted in our work, repugnant +to nature, contumely to God, and a subversion of good order. +It has nevertheless pleased God to raise up, as exceptions to +this law, first Deborah, and afterward Elizabeth Tudor - +whose regiment we shall proceed to celebrate. + +(1) Knox to Queen Elizabeth, July. 20th, 1559. Works, vi. +47, or ii. 26. + +There is no evidence as to how the Reformer's explanations +were received, and indeed it is most probable that the letter +was never shown to Elizabeth at all. For it was sent under +cover of another to Cecil, and as it was not of a very +courtly conception throughout, and was, of all things, what +would most excite the Queen's uneasy jealousy about her +title, it is like enough that the secretary exercised his +discretion (he had Knox's leave in this case, and did not +always wait for that, it is reputed) to put the letter +harmlessly away beside other valueless or unpresentable State +Papers. I wonder very much if he did the same with another, +(1) written two years later, after Mary had come into +Scotland, in which Knox almost seeks to make Elizabeth an +accomplice with him in the matter of the "First Blast." The +Queen of Scotland is going to have that work refuted, he +tells her; and "though it were but foolishness in him to +prescribe unto her Majesty what is to be done," he would yet +remind her that Mary is neither so much alarmed about her own +security, nor so generously interested in Elizabeth's, "that +she would take such pains, UNLESS HER CRAFTY COUNSEL IN SO +DOING SHOT AT A FURTHER MARK." There is something really +ingenious in this letter; it showed Knox in the double +capacity of the author of the "First Blast" and the faithful +friend of Elizabeth; and he combines them there so naturally, +that one would scarcely imagine the two to be incongruous. + +(1) Knox to Queen Elizabeth, August 6th, 1561. Works, vi. +126. + +Twenty days later he was defending his intemperate +publication to another queen - his own queen, Mary Stuart. +This was on the first of those three interviews which he has +preserved for us with so much dramatic vigour in the +picturesque pages of his history. After he had avowed the +authorship in his usual haughty style, Mary asked: "You +think, then, that I have no just authority?" The question +was evaded. "Please your Majesty," he answered, "that +learned men in all ages have had their judgments free, and +most commonly disagreeing from the common judgment of the +world; such also have they published by pen and tongue; and +yet notwithstanding they themselves have lived in the common +society with others, and have borne patiently with the errors +and imperfections which they could not amend." Thus did +"Plato the philosopher:" thus will do John Knox. "I have +communicated my judgment to the world: if the realm finds no +inconvenience from the regiment of a woman, that which they +approve, shall I not further disallow than within my own +breast; but shall be as well content to live under your +Grace, as Paul was to live under Nero. And my hope is, that +so long as ye defile not your hands with the blood of the +saints of God, neither I nor my book shall hurt either you or +your authority." All this is admirable in wisdom and +moderation, and, except that he might have hit upon a +comparison less offensive than that with Paul and Nero, +hardly to be bettered. Having said thus much, he feels he +needs say no more; and so, when he is further pressed, he +closes that part of the discussion with an astonishing sally. +If he has been content to let this matter sleep, he would +recommend her Grace to follow his example with thankfulness +of heart; it is grimly to be understood which of them has +most to fear if the question should be reawakened. So the +talk wandered to other subjects. Only, when the Queen was +summoned at last to dinner ("for it was afternoon") Knox made +his salutation in this form of words: "I pray God, Madam, +that you may be as much blessed within the Commonwealth of +Scotland, if it be the pleasure of God, as ever Deborah was +in the Commonwealth of Israel." (1) Deborah again. + +(1) Knox's Works, ii. 278-280. + +But he was not yet done with the echoes of his own "First +Blast." In 1571, when he was already near his end, the old +controversy was taken up in one of a series of anonymous +libels against the Reformer affixed, Sunday after Sunday, to +the church door. The dilemma was fairly enough stated. +Either his doctrine is false, in which case he is a "false +doctor" and seditious; or, if it be true, why does he "avow +and approve the contrare, I mean that regiment in the Queen +of England's person; which he avoweth and approveth, not only +praying for the maintenance of her estate, but also procuring +her aid and support against his own native country?" Knox +answered the libel, as his wont was, next Sunday, from the +pulpit. He justified the "First Blast" with all the old +arrogance; there is no drawing back there. The regiment of +women is repugnant to nature, contumely to God, and a +subversion of good order, as before. When he prays for the +maintenance of Elizabeth's estate, he is only following the +example of those prophets of God who warned and comforted the +wicked kings of Israel; or of Jeremiah, who bade the Jews +pray for the prosperity of Nebuchadnezzar. As for the +Queen's aid, there is no harm in that: QUIA (these are his +own words) QUIA OMNIA MUNDA MUNDIS: because to the pure all +things are pure. One thing, in conclusion, he "may not +pretermit" to give the lie in the throat to his accuser, +where he charges him with seeking support against his native +country. "What I have been to my country," said the old +Reformer, "What I have been to my country, albeit this +unthankful age will not know, yet the ages to come will be +compelled to bear witness to the truth. And thus I cease, +requiring of all men that have anything to oppone against me, +that he may (they may) do it so plainly, as that I may make +myself and all my doings manifest to the world. For to me it +seemeth a thing unreasonable, that, in this my decrepit age, +I shall be compelled to fight against shadows, and howlets +that dare not abide the light." (1) + +(1) Calderwood's HISTORY OF THE KIRK OF Scotland, edition of +the Wodrow Society, iii. 51-54. + +Now, in this, which may be called his LAST BLAST, there is as +sharp speaking as any in the "First Blast" itself. He is of +the same opinion to the end, you see, although he has been +obliged to cloak and garble that opinion for political ends. +He has been tacking indeed, and he has indeed been seeking +the favour of a queen; but what man ever sought a queen's +favour with a more virtuous purpose, or with as little +courtly policy? The question of consistency is delicate, and +must be made plain. Knox never changed his opinion about +female rule, but lived to regret that he had published that +opinion. Doubtless he had many thoughts so far out of the +range of public sympathy, that he could only keep them to +himself, and, in his own words, bear patiently with the +errors and imperfections that he could not amend. For +example, I make no doubt myself that, in his own heart, he +did hold the shocking dogma attributed to him by more than +one calumniator; and that, had the time been ripe, had there +been aught to gain by it, instead of all to lose, he would +have been the first to assert that Scotland was elective +instead of hereditary - "elective as in the days of +paganism," as one Thevet says in holy horror. (1) And yet, +because the time was not ripe, I find no hint of such an idea +in his collected works. Now, the regiment of women was +another matter that he should have kept to himself; right or +wrong, his opinion did not fit the moment; right or wrong, as +Aylmer puts it, "the BLAST was blown out of season." And +this it was that he began to perceive after the accession of +Elizabeth; not that he had been wrong, and that female rule +was a good thing, for he had said from the first that "the +felicity of some women in their empires" could not change the +law of God and the nature of created things; not this, but +that the regiment of women was one of those imperfections of +society which must be borne with because yet they cannot be +remedied. The thing had seemed so obvious to him, in his +sense of unspeakable masculine superiority, and his fine +contempt for what is only sanctioned by antiquity and common +consent, he had imagined that, at the first hint, men would +arise and shake off the debasing tyranny. He found himself +wrong, and he showed that he could be moderate in his own +fashion, and understood the spirit of true compromise. He +came round to Calvin's position, in fact, but by a different +way. And it derogates nothing from the merit of this wise +attitude that it was the consequence of a change of interest. +We are all taught by interest; and if the interest be not +merely selfish, there is no wiser preceptor under heaven, and +perhaps no sterner. + +(1) BAYLE'S HISTORICAL DICTIONARY, art. Knox, remark G. + +Such is the history of John Knox's connection with the +controversy about female rule. In itself, this is obviously +an incomplete study; not fully to be understood, without a +knowledge of his private relations with the other sex, and +what he thought of their position in domestic life. This +shall be dealt with in another paper. + + +II. - PRIVATE LIFE. + + +TO those who know Knox by hearsay only, I believe the matter +of this paper will be somewhat astonishing. For the hard +energy of the man in all public mattress has possessed the +imagination of the world; he remains for posterity in certain +traditional phrases, browbeating Queen Mary, or breaking +beautiful carved work in abbeys and cathedrals, that had long +smoked themselves out and were no more than sorry ruins, +while he was still quietly teaching children in a country +gentleman's family. It does not consist with the common +acceptation of his character to fancy him much moved, except +with anger. And yet the language of passion came to his pen +as readily, whether it was a passion of denunciation against +some of the abuses that vexed his righteous spirit, or of +yearning for the society of an absent friend. He was +vehement in affection, as in doctrine. I will not deny that +there may have been, along with his vehemence, something +shifty, and for the moment only; that, like many men, and +many Scotchmen, he saw the world and his own heart, not so +much under any very steady, equable light, as by extreme +flashes of passion, true for the moment, but not true in the +long run. There does seem to me to be something of this +traceable in the Reformer's utterances: precipitation and +repentance, hardy speech and action somewhat circumspect, a +strong tendency to see himself in a heroic light and to place +a ready belief in the disposition of the moment. Withal he +had considerable confidence in himself, and in the +uprightness of his own disciplined emotions, underlying much +sincere aspiration after spiritual humility. And it is this +confidence that makes his intercourse with women so +interesting to a modern. It would be easy, of course, to +make fun of the whole affair, to picture him strutting +vaingloriously among these inferior creatures, or compare a +religious friendship in the sixteenth century with what was +called, I think, a literary friendship in the eighteenth. +But it is more just and profitable to recognise what there is +sterling and human underneath all his theoretical +affectations of superiority. Women, he has said in his +"First Blast," are, "weak, frail, impatient, feeble, and +foolish;" and yet it does not appear that he was himself any +less dependent than other men upon the sympathy and affection +of these weak, frail, impatient, feeble, and foolish +creatures; it seems even as if he had been rather more +dependent than most. + +Of those who are to act influentially on their fellows, we +should expect always something large and public in their way +of life, something more or less urbane and comprehensive in +their sentiment for others. We should not expect to see them +spend their sympathy in idyls, however beautiful. We should +not seek them among those who, if they have but a wife to +their bosom, ask no more of womankind, just as they ask no +more of their own sex, if they can find a friend or two for +their immediate need. They will be quick to feel all the +pleasures of our association - not the great ones alone, but +all. They will know not love only, but all those other ways +in which man and woman mutually make each other happy - by +sympathy, by admiration, by the atmosphere they bear about +them - down to the mere impersonal pleasure of passing happy +faces in the street. For, through all this gradation, the +difference of sex makes itself pleasurably felt. Down to the +most lukewarm courtesies of life, there is a special chivalry +due and a special pleasure received, when the two sexes are +brought ever so lightly into contact. We love our mothers +otherwise than we love our fathers; a sister is not as a +brother to us; and friendship between man and woman, be it +never so unalloyed and innocent, is not the same as +friendship between man and man. Such friendship is not even +possible for all. To conjoin tenderness for a woman that is +not far short of passionate with such disinterestedness and +beautiful gratuity of affection as there is between friends +of the same sex, requires no ordinary disposition in the man. +For either it would presuppose quite womanly delicacy of +perception, and, as it were, a curiosity in shades of +differing sentiment; or it would mean that he had accepted +the large, simple divisions of society: a strong and positive +spirit robustly virtuous, who has chosen a better part +coarsely, and holds to it steadfastly, with all its +consequences of pain to himself and others; as one who should +go straight before him on a journey, neither tempted by +wayside flowers nor very scrupulous of small lives under +foot. It was in virtue of this latter disposition that Knox +was capable of those intimacies with women that embellished +his life; and we find him preserved for us in old letters as +a man of many women friends; a man of some expansion toward +the other sex; a man ever ready to comfort weeping women, and +to weep along with them. + +Of such scraps and fragments of evidence as to his private +life and more intimate thoughts as have survived to us from +all the perils that environ written paper, an astonishingly +large proportion is in the shape of letters to women of his +familiarity. He was twice married, but that is not greatly +to the purpose; for the Turk, who thinks even more meanly of +women than John Knox, is none the less given to marrying. +What is really significant is quite apart from marriage. For +the man Knox was a true man, and woman, the EWIG-WEIBLICHE, +was as necessary to him, in spite of all low theories, as +ever she was to Goethe. He came to her in a certain halo of +his own, as the minister of truth, just as Goethe came to her +in a glory of art; he made himself necessary to troubled +hearts and minds exercised in the painful complications that +naturally result from all changes in the world's way of +thinking; and those whom he had thus helped became dear to +him, and were made the chosen companions of his leisure if +they were at hand, or encouraged and comforted by letter if +they were afar. + +It must not be forgotten that Knox had been a presbyter of +the old Church, and that the many women whom we shall see +gathering around him, as he goes through life, had probably +been accustomed, while still in the communion of Rome, to +rely much upon some chosen spiritual director, so that the +intimacies of which I propose to offer some account, while +testifying to a good heart in the Reformer, testify also to a +certain survival of the spirit of the confessional in the +Reformed Church, and are not properly to be judged without +this idea. There is no friendship so noble, but it is the +product of the time; and a world of little finical +observances, and little frail proprieties and fashions of the +hour, go to make or to mar, to stint or to perfect, the union +of spirits the most loving and the most intolerant of such +interference. The trick of the country and the age steps in +even between the mother and her child, counts out their +caresses upon niggardly fingers, and says, in the voice of +authority, that this one thing shall be a matter of +confidence between them, and this other thing shall not. And +thus it is that we must take into reckoning whatever tended +to modify the social atmosphere in which Knox and his women +friends met, and loved and trusted each other. To the man +who had been their priest and was now their minister, women +would be able to speak with a confidence quite impossible in +these latter days; the women would be able to speak, and the +man to hear. It was a beaten road just then; and I daresay +we should be no less scandalised at their plain speech than +they, if they could come back to earth, would be offended at +our waltzes and worldly fashions. This, then, was the +footing on which Knox stood with his many women friends. The +reader will see, as he goes on, how much of warmth, of +interest, and of that happy mutual dependence which is the +very gist of friendship, he contrived to ingraft upon this +somewhat dry relationship of penitent and confessor. + +It must be understood that we know nothing of his intercourse +with women (as indeed we know little at all about his life) +until he came to Berwick in 1549, when he was already in the +forty-fifth year of his age. At the same time it is just +possible that some of a little group at Edinburgh, with whom +he corresponded during his last absence, may have been +friends of an older standing. Certainly they were, of all +his female correspondents, the least personally favoured. He +treats them throughout in a comprehensive sort of spirit that +must at times have been a little wounding. Thus, he remits +one of them to his former letters, "which I trust be common +betwixt you and the rest of our sisters, for to me ye are all +equal in Christ." (1) Another letter is a gem in this way. +"Albeit" it begins, "albeit I have no particular matter to +write unto you, beloved sister, yet I could not refrain to +write these few lines to you in declaration of my remembrance +of you. True it is that I have many whom I bear in equal +remembrance before God with you, to whom at present I write +nothing, either for that I esteem them stronger than you, and +therefore they need the less my rude labours, or else because +they have not provoked me by their writing to recompense +their remembrance." (2) His "sisters in Edinburgh" had +evidently to "provoke his attention pretty constantly; nearly +all his letters are, on the face of them, answers to +questions, and the answers are given with a certain crudity +that I do not find repeated when he writes to those he really +cares for. So when they consult him about women's apparel (a +subject on which his opinion may be pretty correctly imagined +by the ingenious reader for himself) he takes occasion to +anticipate some of the most offensive matter of the "First +Blast" in a style of real brutality. (3) It is not merely +that he tells them "the garments of women do declare their +weakness and inability to execute the office of man," though +that in itself is neither very wise nor very opportune in +such a correspondence one would think; but if the reader will +take the trouble to wade through the long, tedious sermon for +himself, he will see proof enough that Knox neither loved, +nor very deeply respected, the women he was then addressing. +In very truth, I believe these Edinburgh sisters simply bored +him. He had a certain interest in them as his children in +the Lord; they were continually "provoking him by their +writing;" and, if they handed his letters about, writing to +them was as good a form of publication as was then open to +him in Scotland. There is one letter, however, in this +budget, addressed to the wife of Clerk-Register Mackgil, +which is worthy of some further mention. The Clerk-Register +had not opened his heart, it would appear, to the preaching +of the Gospel, and Mrs. Mackgil has written, seeking the +Reformer's prayers in his behalf. "Your husband," he +answers, "is dear to me for that he is a man indued with some +good gifts, but more dear for that he is your husband. +Charity moveth me to thirst his illumination, both for his +comfort and for the trouble which you sustain by his +coldness, which justly may be called infidelity." He wishes +her, however, not to hope too much; he can promise that his +prayers will be earnest, but not that they will be effectual; +it is possible that this is to be her "cross" in life; that +"her head, appointed by God for her comfort, should be her +enemy." And if this be so, well, there is nothing for it; +"with patience she must abide God's merciful deliverance," +taking heed only that she does not "obey manifest iniquity +for the pleasure of any mortal man." (4) I conceive this +epistle would have given a very modified sort of pleasure to +the Clerk-Register, had it chanced to fall into his hands. +Compare its tenor - the dry resignation not without a hope of +merciful deliverance therein recommended - with these words +from another letter, written but the year before to two +married women of London: "Call first for grace by Jesus, and +thereafter communicate with your faithful husbands, and then +shall God, I doubt not, conduct your footsteps, and direct +your counsels to His glory." (5) Here the husbands are put +in a very high place; we can recognise here the same hand +that has written for our instruction how the man is set above +the woman, even as God above the angels. But the point of +the distinction is plain. For Clerk-Register Mackgil was not +a faithful husband; displayed, indeed, towards religion a +"coldness which justly might be called infidelity." We shall +see in more notable instances how much Knox's conception of +the duty of wives varies according to the zeal and orthodoxy +of the husband. + +(1) Works, iv. 244. +(2) Works, iv. 246. +(3) IB. iv. 225. +(4) Works, iv. 245. +(5) IB. iv. 221. + +As I have said, he may possibly have made the acquaintance of +Mrs. Mackgil, Mrs. Guthrie, or some other, or all, of these +Edinburgh friends while he was still Douglas of Longniddry's +private tutor. But our certain knowledge begins in 1549. He +was then but newly escaped from his captivity in France, +after pulling an oar for nineteen months on the benches of +the galley NOSTRE DAME; now up the rivers, holding stealthy +intercourse with other Scottish prisoners in the castle of +Rouen; now out in the North Sea, raising his sick head to +catch a glimpse of the far-off steeples of St. Andrews. And +now he was sent down by the English Privy Council as a +preacher to Berwick-upon-Tweed; somewhat shaken in health by +all his hardships, full of pains and agues, and tormented by +gravel, that sorrow of great men; altogether, what with his +romantic story, his weak health, and his great faculty of +eloquence, a very natural object for the sympathy of devout +women. At this happy juncture he fell into the company of a +Mrs. Elizabeth Bowes, wife of Richard Bowes, of Aske, in +Yorkshire, to whom she had borne twelve children. She was a +religious hypochondriac, a very weariful woman, full of +doubts and scruples, and giving no rest on earth either to +herself or to those whom she honoured with her confidence. +From the first time she heard Knox preach she formed a high +opinion of him, and was solicitous ever after of his society. +(1) Nor was Knox unresponsive. "I have always delighted in +your company," he writes, "and when labours would permit, you +know I have not spared hours to talk and commune with you." +Often when they had met in depression he reminds her, "God +hath sent great comfort unto both." (2) We can gather from +such letters as are yet extant how close and continuous was +their intercourse. "I think it best you remain till the +morrow," he writes once, "and so shall we commune at large at +afternoon. This day you know to be the day of my study and +prayer unto God; yet if your trouble be intolerable, or, if +you think my presence may release your pain, do as the Spirit +shall move you. . . . Your messenger found me in bed, after a +sore trouble and most dolorous night, and so dolour may +complain to dolour when we two meet. . . . And this is more +plain than ever I spoke, to let you know you have a companion +in trouble." (3) Once we have the curtain raised for a +moment, and can look at the two together for the length of a +phrase. "After the writing of this preceding," writes Knox, +"your brother and mine, Harrie Wycliffe, did advertise me by +writing, that our adversary (the devil) took occasion to +trouble you because that I DID START BACK FROM YOU REHEARSING +YOUR INFIRMITIES. I REMEMBER MYSELF SO TO HAVE DONE, AND +THAT IS MY COMMON ON CONSUETUDE WHEN ANYTHING PIERCETH OR +TOUCHETH MY HEART. CALL TO YOUR MIND WHAT I DID STANDING AT +THE CUPBOARD AT ALNWICK. In very deed I thought that no +creature had been tempted as I was; and when I heard proceed +from your mouth the very same words that he troubles me with, +I did wonder and from my heart lament your sore trouble, +knowing in myself the dolour thereof." (4) Now intercourse of +so very close a description, whether it be religious +intercourse or not, is apt to displease and disquiet a +husband; and we know incidentally from Knox himself that +there was some little scandal about his intimacy with Mrs. +Bowes. "The slander and fear of men," he writes, "has +impeded me to exercise my pen so oft as I would; YEA, VERY +SHAME HATH HOLDEN ME FROM YOUR COMPANY, WHEN I WAS MOST +SURELY PERSUADED THAT GOD HAD APPOINTED ME AT THAT TIME TO +COMFORT AND FEED YOUR HUNGRY AND AFFLICTED SOUL. GOD IN HIS +INFINITE MERCY," he goes on, "REMOVE NOT ONLY FROM ME ALL +FEAR THAT TENDETH NOT TO GODLINESS, BUT FROM OTHERS SUSPICION +TO JUDGE OF ME OTHERWISE THAN IT BECOMETH ONE MEMBER TO JUDGE +OF ANOTHER," (5) And the scandal, such as it was, would not +be allayed by the dissension in which Mrs. Bowes seems to +have lived with her family upon the matter of religion, and +the countenance shown by Knox to her resistance. Talking of +these conflicts, and her courage against "her own flesh and +most inward affections, yea, against some of her most natural +friends," he writes it, "to the praise of God, he has +wondered at the bold constancy which he has found in her when +his own heart was faint." (6) + +(1) Works, vi. 514. +(2) IB. iii. 338. +(3) IB. iii. 352, 353. +(4) Works, iii. 350. +(5) IB. iii. 390, 391. +(6) Works, iii. 142. + +Now, perhaps in order to stop scandalous mouths, perhaps out +of a desire to bind the much-loved evangelist nearer to her +in the only manner possible, Mrs. Bowes conceived the scheme +of marrying him to her fifth daughter, Marjorie; and the +Reformer seems to have fallen in with it readily enough. It +seems to have been believed in the family that the whole +matter had been originally made up between these two, with no +very spontaneous inclination on the part of the bride. (1) +Knox's idea of marriage, as I have said, was not the same for +all men; but on the whole, it was not lofty. We have a +curious letter of his, written at the request of Queen Mary, +to the Earl of Argyle, on very delicate household matters; +which, as he tells us, "was not well accepted of the said +Earl." (2) We may suppose, however, that his own home was +regulated in a similar spirit. I can fancy that for such a +man, emotional, and with a need, now and again, to exercise +parsimony in emotions not strictly needful, something a +little mechanical, something hard and fast and clearly +understood, would enter into his ideal of a home. There were +storms enough without, and equability was to be desired at +the fireside even at a sacrifice of deeper pleasures. So, +from a wife, of all women, he would not ask much. One letter +to her which has come down to us is, I had almost said, +conspicuous for coldness. (3) He calls her, as he called +other female correspondents, "dearly beloved sister;" the +epistle is doctrinal, and nearly the half of it bears, not +upon her own case, but upon that of her mother. However, we +know what Heine wrote in his wife's album; and there is, +after all, one passage that may be held to intimate some +tenderness, although even that admits of an amusingly +opposite construction. "I think," he says, "I THINK this be +the first letter I ever wrote to you." This, if we are to +take it literally, may pair off with the "two OR THREE +children" whom Montaigne mentions having lost at nurse; the +one is as eccentric in a lover as the other in a parent. +Nevertheless, he displayed more energy in the course of his +troubled wooing than might have been expected. The whole +Bowes family, angry enough already at the influence he had +obtained over the mother, set their faces obdurately against +the match. And I daresay the opposition quickened his +inclination. I find him writing to Mrs. Bowes that she need +no further trouble herself about the marriage; it should now +be his business altogether; it behoved him now to jeopard his +life "for the comfort of his own flesh, both fear and +friendship of all earthly creature laid aside." (4) This is +a wonderfully chivalrous utterance for a Reformer forty-eight +years old; and it compares well with the leaden coquetries of +Calvin, not much over thirty, taking this and that into +consideration, weighing together dowries and religious +qualifications and the instancy of friends, and exhibiting +what M. Bungener calls "an honourable and Christian +difficulty" of choice, in frigid indecisions and insincere +proposals. But Knox's next letter is in a humbler tone; he +has not found the negotiation so easy as he fancied; he +despairs of the marriage altogether, and talks of leaving +England, - regards not "what country consumes his wicked +carcass." "You shall understand," he says, "that this sixth +of November, I spoke with Sir Robert Bowes" (the head of the +family, his bride's uncle) "in the matter you know, according +to your request; whose disdainful, yea, despiteful, words +hath so pierced my heart that my life is bitter to me. I +bear a good countenance with a sore troubled heart, because +he that ought to consider matters with a deep judgment is +become not only a despiser, but also a taunter of God's +messengers - God be merciful unto him! Amongst others his +most unpleasing words, while that I was about to have +declared my heart in the whole matter, he said, `Away with +your rhetorical reasons! for I will not be persuaded with +them.' God knows I did use no rhetoric nor coloured speech; +but would have spoken the truth, and that in most simple +manner. I am not a good orator in my own cause; but what he +would not be content to hear of me, God shall declare to him +one day to his displeasure, unless he repent." (5) Poor +Knox, you see, is quite commoved. It has been a very +unpleasant interview. And as it is the only sample that we +have of how things went with him during his courtship, we may +infer that the period was not as agreeable for Knox as it has +been for some others. + +(1) IB. iii. 378. +(2) LB. ii. 379. +(3) Works, iii. 394. +(4) Works, iii. 376. +(5) Works, iii. 378. + +However, when once they were married, I imagine he and +Marjorie Bowes hit it off together comfortably enough. The +little we know of it may be brought together in a very short +space. She bore him two sons. He seems to have kept her +pretty busy, and depended on her to some degree in his work; +so that when she fell ill, his papers got at once into +disorder. (1) Certainly she sometimes wrote to his +dictation; and, in this capacity, he calls her "his left +hand." (2) In June 1559, at the headiest moment of the +Reformation in Scotland, he writes regretting the absence of +his helpful colleague, Goodman, "whose presence" (this is the +not very grammatical form of his lament) "whose presence I +more thirst, than she that is my own flesh." (3) And this, +considering the source and the circumstances, may be held as +evidence of a very tender sentiment. He tells us himself in +his history, on the occasion of a certain meeting at the Kirk +of Field, that "he was in no small heaviness by reason of the +late death of his dear bed-fellow, Marjorie Bowes." (4) +Calvin, condoling with him, speaks of her as "a wife whose +like is not to be found everywhere" (that is very like +Calvin), and again, as "the most delightful of wives." We +know what Calvin thought desirable in a wife, "good humour, +chastity, thrift, patience, and solicitude for her husband's +health," and so we may suppose that the first Mrs. Knox fell +not far short of this ideal. + +(1) Works, vi. 104. +(2) IB. v. 5. +(3) IB. vi. 27. +(4) IB. ii. 138. + +The actual date of the marriage is uncertain but by September +1566, at the latest, the Reformer was settled in Geneva with +his wife. There is no fear either that he will be dull; even +if the chaste, thrifty, patient Marjorie should not +altogether occupy his mind, he need not go out of the house +to seek more female sympathy; for behold! Mrs. Bowes is duly +domesticated with the young couple. Dr. M'Crie imagined that +Richard Bowes was now dead, and his widow, consequently, free +to live where she would; and where could she go more +naturally than to the house of a married daughter? This, +however, is not the case. Richard Bowes did not die till at +least two years later. It is impossible to believe that he +approved of his wife's desertion, after so many years of +marriage, after twelve children had been born to them; and +accordingly we find in his will, dated 1558, no mention +either of her or of Knox's wife. (1) This is plain sailing. +It is easy enough to understand the anger of Bowes against +this interloper, who had come into a quiet family, married +the daughter in spite of the father's opposition, alienated +the wife from the husband and the husband's religion, +supported her in a long course of resistance and rebellion, +and, after years of intimacy, already too close and tender +for any jealous spirit to behold without resentment, carried +her away with him at last into a foreign land. But it is not +quite easy to understand how, except out of sheer weariness +and disgust, he was ever brought to agree to the arrangement. +Nor is it easy to square the Reformer's conduct with his +public teaching. We have, for instance, a letter by him, +Craig, and Spottiswood, to the Archbishops of Canterbury and +York, anent "a wicked and rebellious woman," one Anne Good, +spouse to "John Barron, a minister of Christ Jesus his +evangel," who, "after great rebellion shown unto him, and +divers admonitions given, as well by himself as by others in +his name, that she should in no wise depart from this realm, +nor from his house without his license, hath not the less +stubbornly and rebelliously departed, separated herself from +his society, left his house, and withdrawn herself from this +realm." (2) Perhaps some sort of license was extorted, as I +have said, from Richard Bowes, weary with years of domestic +dissension; but setting that aside, the words employed with +so much righteous indignation by Knox, Craig, and +Spottiswood, to describe the conduct of that wicked and +rebellious woman, Mrs. Barron, would describe nearly as +exactly the conduct of the religious Mrs. Bowes. It is a +little bewildering, until we recollect the distinction +between faithful and unfaithful husbands; for Barron was "a +minister of Christ Jesus his evangel," while Richard Bowes, +besides being own brother to a despiser and taunter of God's +messengers, is shrewdly suspected to have been "a bigoted +adherent of the Roman Catholic faith," or, as Know himself +would have expressed it, "a rotten Papist." + +(1) Mr. Laing's preface to the sixth volume of Knox's Works, +p. lxii. +(2) Works. vi. 534. + +You would have thought that Know was now pretty well supplied +with female society. But we are not yet at the end of the +roll. The last year of his sojourn in England had been spent +principally in London, where he was resident as one of the +chaplains of Edward the Sixth; and here he boasts, although a +stranger, he had, by God's grace, found favour before many. +(1) The godly women of the metropolis made much of him; once +he writes to Mrs. Bowes that her last letter had found him +closeted with three, and he and the three women were all in +tears. (2) Out of all, however, he had chosen two. "GOD," he +writes to them, "BROUGHT US IN SUCH FAMILIAR ACQUAINTANCE, +THAT YOUR HEARTS WERE INCENSED AND KINDLED WITH A SPECIAL +CARE OVER ME, AS A MOTHER USETH TO BE OVER HER NATURAL CHILD; +and my heart was opened and compelled in your presence to be +more plain than ever I was to any." (3) And out of the two +even he had chosen one, Mrs. Anne Locke, wife to Mr. Harry +Locke, merchant, nigh to Bow Kirk, Cheapside, in London, as +the address runs. If one may venture to judge upon such +imperfect evidence, this was the woman he loved best. I have +a difficulty in quite forming to myself an idea of her +character. She may have been one of the three tearful +visitors before alluded to; she may even have been that one +of them who was so profoundly moved by some passages of Mrs. +Bowes's letter, which the Reformer opened, and read aloud to +them before they went. "O would to God," cried this +impressionable matron, "would to God that I might speak with +that person, for I perceive there are more tempted than I." +(4) This may have been Mrs. Locke, as I say; but even if it +were, we must not conclude from this one fact that she was +such another as Mrs. Bowes. All the evidence tends the other +way. She was a woman of understanding, plainly, who followed +political events with interest, and to whom Knox thought it +worth while to write, in detail, the history of his trials +and successes. She was religious, but without that morbid +perversity of spirit that made religion so heavy a burden for +the poor-hearted Mrs. Bowes. More of her I do not find, save +testimony to the profound affection that united her to the +Reformer. So we find him writing to her from Geneva, in such +terms as these:- "You write that your desire is earnest to +see me. DEAR SISTER, IF I SHOULD EXPRESS THE THIRST AND +LANGUOR WHICH I HAVE HAD FOR YOUR PRESENCE, I SHOULD APPEAR +TO PASS MEASURE. . . YEA, I WEEP AND REJOICE IN REMEMBRANCE +OF YOU; but that would evanish by the comfort of your +presence, which I assure you is so dear to me, that if the +charge of this little flock here, gathered together in +Christ's name, did not impede me, my coming should prevent my +letter." (5) I say that this was written from Geneva; and +yet you will observe that it is no consideration for his wife +or mother-in-law, only the charge of his little flock, that +keeps him from setting out forthwith for London, to comfort +himself with the dear presence of Mrs. Locke. Remember that +was a certain plausible enough pretext for Mrs. Locke to come +to Geneva - "the most perfect school of Christ that ever was +on earth since the days of the Apostles" - for we are now +under the reign of that "horrible monster Jezebel of +England," when a lady of good orthodox sentiments was better +out of London. It was doubtful, however, whether this was to +be. She was detained in England, partly by circumstances +unknown, "partly by empire of her head," Mr. Harry Locke, the +Cheapside merchant. It is somewhat humorous to see Knox +struggling for resignation, now that he has to do with a +faithful husband (for Mr. Harry Locke was faithful). Had it +been otherwise, "in my heart," he says, "I could have wished +- yea," here he breaks out, "yea, and cannot cease to wish - +that God would guide you to this place." (6) And after all, +he had not long to wait, for, whether Mr. Harry Locke died in +the interval, or was wearied, he too, into giving permission, +five months after the date of the letter last quoted, "Mrs. +Anne Locke, Harry her son, and Anne her daughter, and +Katherine her maid," arrived in that perfect school of +Christ, the Presbyterian paradise, Geneva. So now, and for +the next two years, the cup of Knox's happiness was surely +full. Of an afternoon, when the bells rang out for the +sermon, the shops closed, and the good folk gathered to the +churches, psalm-book in hand, we can imagine him drawing near +to the English chapel in quite patriarchal fashion, with Mrs. +Knox and Mrs. Bowes and Mrs. Locke, James his servant, +Patrick his pupil, and a due following of children and maids. +He might be alone at work all morning in his study, for he +wrote much during these two years; but at night, you may be +sure there was a circle of admiring women, eager to hear the +new paragraph, and not sparing of applause. And what work, +among others, was he elaborating at this time, but the +notorious "First Blast"? So that he may have rolled out in +his big pulpit voice, how women were weak, frail, impatient, +feeble, foolish, inconstant, variable, cruel, and lacking the +spirit of counsel, and how men were above them, even as God +is above the angels, in the ears of his own wife, and the two +dearest friends he had on earth. But he had lost the sense +of incongruity, and continued to despise in theory the sex he +honoured so much in practice, of whom he chose his most +intimate associates, and whose courage he was compelled to +wonder at, when his own heart was faint. + +(1) Works, iv. 220. +(2) IB. iii. 380. +(3) IB. iv. 220. +(4) Works, iii. 380. +(5) Works, iv. 238. +(6) Works, iv. 240. + +We may say that such a man was not worthy of his fortune; and +so, as he would not learn, he was taken away from that +agreeable school, and his fellowship of women was broken up, +not to be reunited. Called into Scotland to take at last +that strange position in history which is his best claim to +commemoration, he was followed thither by his wife and his +mother-in-law. The wife soon died. The death of her +daughter did not altogether separate Mrs. Bowes from Knox, +but she seems to have come and gone between his house and +England. In 1562, however, we find him characterised as "a +sole man by reason of the absence of his mother-in-law, Mrs. +Bowes," and a passport is got for her, her man, a maid, and +"three horses, whereof two shall return," as well as liberty +to take all her own money with her into Scotland. This looks +like a definite arrangement; but whether she died at +Edinburgh, or went back to England yet again, I cannot find. + +With that great family of hers, unless in leaving her husband +she had quarrelled with them all, there must have been +frequent occasion for her presence, one would think. Knox at +least survived her; and we possess his epigraph to their long +intimacy, given to the world by him in an appendix to his +latest publication. I have said in a former paper that Knox +was not shy of personal revelations in his published works. +And the trick seems to have grown on him. To this last +tract, a controversial onslaught on a Scottish Jesuit, he +prefixed a prayer, not very pertinent to the matter in hand, +and containing references to his family which were the +occasion of some wit in his adversary's answer; and appended +what seems equally irrelevant, one of his devout letters to +Mrs. Bowes, with an explanatory preface. To say truth, I +believe he had always felt uneasily that the circumstances of +this intimacy were very capable of misconstruction; and now, +when he was an old man, taking "his good night of all the +faithful in both realms," and only desirous "that without any +notable sclander to the evangel of Jesus Christ, he might end +his battle; for as the world was weary of him, so was he of +it;" - in such a spirit it was not, perhaps, unnatural that +he should return to this old story, and seek to put it right +in the eyes of all men, ere he died. "Because that God," he +says, "because that God now in His mercy hath put an end to +the battle of my dear mother, Mistress Elizabeth Bowes, +before that He put an end to my wretched life, I could not +cease but declare to the world what was the cause of our +great familiarity and long acquaintance; which was neither +flesh nor blood, but a troubled conscience upon her part, +which never suffered her to rest but when she was in the +company of the faithful, of whom (from the first hearing of +the word at my mouth) she judged me to be one. . . . Her +company to me was comfortable (yea, honourable and +profitable, for she was to me and mine a mother), but yet it +was not without some cross; for besides trouble and fashery +of body sustained for her, my mind was seldom quiet, for +doing somewhat for the comfort of her troubled conscience." +(1) He had written to her years before, from his first exile +in Dieppe, that "only God's hand" could withhold him from +once more speaking with her face to face; and now, when God's +hand has indeed interposed, when there lies between them, +instead of the voyageable straits, that great gulf over which +no man can pass, this is the spirit in which he can look back +upon their long acquaintance. She was a religious +hypochondriac, it appears, whom, not without some cross and +fashery of mind and body, he was good enough to tend. He +might have given a truer character of their friendship, had +he thought less of his own standing in public estimation, and +more of the dead woman. But he was in all things, as Burke +said of his son in that ever memorable passage, a public +creature. He wished that even into this private place of his +affections posterity should follow him with a complete +approval; and he was willing, in order that this might be so, +to exhibit the defects of his lost friend, and tell the world +what weariness he had sustained through her unhappy +disposition. There is something here that reminds one of +Rousseau. + +(1) Works, vi. 513, 514. + +I do not think he ever saw Mrs. Locke after he left Geneva; +but his correspondence with her continued for three years. +It may have continued longer, of course, but I think the last +letters we possess read like the last that would be written. +Perhaps Mrs. Locke was then remarried, for there is much +obscurity over her subsequent history. For as long as their +intimacy was kept up, at least, the human element remains in +the Reformer's life. Here is one passage, for example, the +most likable utterance of Knox's that I can quote:- Mrs Locke +has been upbraiding him as a bad correspondent. "My +remembrance of you," he answers, "is not so dead, but I trust +it shall be fresh enough, albeit it be renewed by no outward +token for one year. OF NATURE, I AM CHURLISH; YET ONE THING +I ASHAME NOT TO AFFIRM, THAT FAMILIARITY ONCE THOROUGHLY +CONTRACTED WAS NEVER YET BROKEN ON MY DEFAULT. THE CAUSE MAY +BE THAT I HAVE RATHER NEED OF ALL, THAN THAT ANY HAVE NEED OF +ME. However it (THAT) be, it cannot be, as I say, the +corporal absence of one year or two that can quench in my +heart that familiar acquaintance in Christ Jesus, which half +a year did engender, and almost two years did nourish and +confirm. And therefore, whether I write or no, be assuredly +persuaded that I have you in such memory as becometh the +faithful to have of the faithful." (1) This is the truest +touch of personal humility that I can remember to have seen +in all the five volumes of the Reformer's collected works: it +is no small honour to Mrs. Locke that his affection for her +should have brought home to him this unwonted feeling of +dependence upon others. Everything else in the course of the +correspondence testifies to a good, sound, down-right sort of +friendship between the two, less ecstatic than it was at +first, perhaps, but serviceable and very equal. He gives her +ample details is to the progress of the work of reformation; +sends her the sheets of the CONFESSION OF FAITH, "in quairs," +as he calls it; asks her to assist him with her prayers, to +collect money for the good cause in Scotland, and to send him +books for himself - books by Calvin especially, one on +Isaiah, and a new revised edition of the "Institutes." "I +must be bold on your liberality," he writes, "not only in +that, but in greater things as I shall need." (2) On her +part she applies to him for spiritual advice, not after the +manner of the drooping Mrs. Bowes, but in a more positive +spirit, - advice as to practical points, advice as to the +Church of England, for instance, whose ritual he condemns as +a "mingle-mangle." (3) Just at the end she ceases to write, +sends him "a token, without writing." "I understand your +impediment," he answers, "and therefore I cannot complain. +Yet if you understood the variety of my temptations, I doubt +not but you would have written somewhat." (4) One letter +more, and then silence. + +(1) Works, vi. ii. +(2) Works, vi. pp. 21. 101, 108, 130. +(3) IB. vi. 83. +(4) IB. vi. 129. + +And I think the best of the Reformer died out with that +correspondence. It is after this, of course, that he wrote +that ungenerous description of his intercourse with Mrs. +Bowes. It is after this, also, that we come to the unlovely +episode of his second marriage. He had been left a widower +at the age of fifty-five. Three years after, it occurred +apparently to yet another pious parent to sacrifice a child +upon the altar of his respect for the Reformer. In January +1563, Randolph writes to Cecil: "Your Honour will take it for +a great wonder when I shall write unto you that Mr. Knox +shall marry a very near kinswoman of the Duke's, a Lord's +daughter, a young lass not above sixteen years of age." (1) +He adds that he fears he will be laughed at for reporting so +mad a story. And yet it was true; and on Palm Sunday, 1564, +Margaret Stewart, daughter of Andrew Lord Stewart of +Ochiltree, aged seventeen, was duly united to John Knox, +Minister of St. Giles's Kirk, Edinburgh, aged fifty-nine, - +to the great disgust of Queen Mary from family pride, and I +would fain hope of many others for more humane +considerations. "In this," as Randolph says, "I wish he had +done otherwise." The Consistory of Geneva, "that most +perfect school of Christ that ever was on earth since the +days of the Apostles," were wont to forbid marriages on the +ground of too great a disproportion in age. I cannot help +wondering whether the old Reformer's conscience did not +uneasily remind him, now and again, of this good custom of +his religious metropolis, as he thought of the two-and-forty +years that separated him from his poor bride. Fitly enough, +we hear nothing of the second Mrs. Knox until she appears at +her husband's deathbed, eight years after. She bore him +three daughters in the interval; and I suppose the poor +child's martyrdom was made as easy for her as might be. She +was extremely attentive to him "at the end, we read and he +seems to have spoken to her with some confidence. Moreover, +and this is very characteristic, he had copied out for her +use a little volume of his own devotional letters to other +women. + +(1) Works, vi. 532. + +This is the end of the roll, unless we add to it Mrs. +Adamson, who had delighted much in his company "by reason +that she had a troubled conscience," and whose deathbed is +commemorated at some length in the pages of his history. (1) + +(1) Works, i. 246. + +And now, looking back, it cannot be said that Knox's +intercourse with women was quite of the highest sort. It is +characteristic that we find him more alarmed for his own +reputation than for the reputation of the women with whom he +was familiar. There was a fatal preponderance of self in all +his intimacies: many women came to learn from him, but he +never condescended to become a learner in his turn. And so +there is not anything idyllic in these intimacies of his; and +they were never so renovating to his spirit as they might +have been. But I believe they were good enough for the +women. I fancy the women knew what they were about when so +many of them followed after Knox. It is not simply because a +man is always fully persuaded that he knows the right from +the wrong and sees his way plainly through the maze of life, +great qualities as these are, that people will love and +follow him, and write him letters full of their "earnest +desire for him" when he is absent. It is not over a man, +whose one characteristic is grim fixity of purpose, that the +hearts of women are "incensed and kindled with a special +care," as it were over their natural children. In the strong +quiet patience of all his letters to the weariful Mrs. Bowes, +we may perhaps see one cause of the fascination he possessed +for these religious women. Here was one whom you could +besiege all the year round with inconsistent scruples and +complaints; you might write to him on Thursday that you were +so elated it was plain the devil was deceiving you, and again +on Friday that you were so depressed it was plain God had +cast you off for ever; and he would read all this patiently +and sympathetically, and give you an answer in the most +reassuring polysyllables, and all divided into heads - who +knows? - like a treatise on divinity. And then, those easy +tears of his. There are some women who like to see men +crying; and here was this great-voiced, bearded man of God, +who might be seen beating the solid pulpit every Sunday, and +casting abroad his clamorous denunciations to the terror of +all, and who on the Monday would sit in their parlours by the +hour, and weep with them over their manifold trials and +temptations. Nowadays, he would have to drink a dish of tea +with all these penitents. . . . It sounds a little vulgar, as +the past will do, if we look into it too closely. We could +not let these great folk of old into our drawing-rooms. +Queen Elizabeth would positively not be eligible for a +housemaid. The old manners and the old customs go sinking +from grade to grade, until, if some mighty emperor revisited +the glimpses of the moon, he would not find any one of his +way of thinking, any one he could strike hands with and talk +to freely and without offence, save perhaps the porter at the +end of the street, or the fellow with his elbows out who +loafs all day before the public-house. So that this little +note of vulgarity is not a thing to be dwelt upon; it is to +be put away from us, as we recall the fashion of these old +intimacies; so that we may only remember Knox as one who was +very long-suffering with women, kind to them in his own way, +loving them in his own way - and that not the worst way, if +it was not the best - and once at least, if not twice, moved +to his heart of hearts by a woman, and giving expression to +the yearning he had for her society in words that none of us +need be ashamed to borrow. + +And let us bear in mind always that the period I have gone +over in this essay begins when the Reformer was already +beyond the middle age, and already broken in bodily health: +it has been the story of an old man's friendships. This it +is that makes Knox enviable. Unknown until past forty, he +had then before him five-and-thirty years of splendid and +influential life, passed through uncommon hardships to an +uncommon degree of power, lived in his own country as a sort +of king, and did what he would with the sound of his voice +out of the pulpit. And besides all this, such a following of +faithful women! One would take the first forty years gladly, +if one could be sure of the last thirty. Most of us, even +if, by reason of great strength and the dignity of gray +hairs, we retain some degree of public respect in the latter +days of our existence, will find a falling away of friends, +and a solitude making itself round about us day by day, until +we are left alone with the hired sick-nurse. For the +attraction of a man's character is apt to be outlived, like +the attraction of his body; and the power to love grows +feeble in its turn, as well as the power to inspire love in +others. It is only with a few rare natures that friendship +is added to friendship, love to love, and the man keeps +growing richer in affection - richer, I mean, as a bank may +be said to grow richer, both giving and receiving more - +after his head is white and his back weary, and he prepares +to go down into the dust of death. + + + + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Familiar Studies of Men & Books +by Robert Louis Stevenson + diff --git a/old/fsomb10.zip b/old/fsomb10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f9732f5 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/fsomb10.zip |
