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-The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Gallery of Portraits: with Memoirs. Vol
-5 (of 7), by Anonymous
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-Title: The Gallery of Portraits: with Memoirs. Vol 5 (of 7)
-
-Author: Anonymous
-
-Release Date: August 15, 2017 [EBook #55358]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GALLERY OF PORTRAITS, VOLUME 5 ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by Richard Tonsing, Chris Curnow and the Online
-Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
-file was produced from images generously made available
-by The Internet Archive)
-
-
-
-
-
-
- _UNDER THE SUPERINTENDENCE OF THE SOCIETY FOR THE DIFFUSION OF USEFUL
-                              KNOWLEDGE._
-
-
-
-
-                                  THE
-                         GALLERY OF PORTRAITS:
-                                  WITH
-                                MEMOIRS.
-
-                               VOLUME V.
-
-
-                                LONDON:
-                  CHARLES KNIGHT, 22, LUDGATE-STREET.
-
-                                 1835.
-
-                  [PRICE ONE GUINEA, BOUND IN CLOTH.]
-
-
-
-
-                                LONDON:
-                  PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS,
-                         Duke-Street, Lambeth.
-
-
-
-
-                       PORTRAITS AND BIOGRAPHIES
-                       CONTAINED IN THIS VOLUME.
-
-
-                                          Page.
-
-                          1. Taylor           1
-
-                          2. Lavoisier        9
-
-                          3. Sydenham        18
-
-                          4. Clarendon       25
-
-                          5. Reynolds        35
-
-                          6. Swift           45
-
-                          7. Locke           53
-
-                          8. Selden          61
-
-                          9. Paré            69
-
-                         10. Blake           77
-
-                         11. L’Hôpital       85
-
-                         12. Mrs. Siddons    94
-
-                         13. Herschel       105
-
-                         14. Romilly        111
-
-                         15. Shakspeare     122
-
-                         16. Euler          129
-
-                         17. Sir W. Jones   134
-
-                         18. Rousseau       143
-
-                         19. Harrison       153
-
-                         20. Montaigne      157
-
-                         21. Pope           164
-
-                         22. Bolivar        173
-
-                         23. Arkwright      181
-
-                         24. Cowper         189
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by W. Holl._
-
-  JEREMY TAYLOR.
-
-  _From the original Picture in the Hall of All Souls College, Oxford._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                TAYLOR.
-
-
-If this great ornament of our church did not boast of an exalted
-lineage, he numbered among his forefathers one at least, the worthy
-ancestor of such a descendant, Dr. Rowland Taylor, chaplain to Cranmer,
-and rector of Hadleigh, distinguished among the divines of the
-Reformation for his abilities, learning, and piety, as well as for the
-courageous cheerfulness with which he suffered death at the stake in the
-reign of Queen Mary. Jeremy Taylor was the son of a barber, resident in
-Trinity parish, Cambridge; and was baptized in Trinity church, August
-15, 1613. He was “grounded in grammar and mathematics” by his father,
-and entered as a sizar at Caius College, August 18, 1626. Of his
-deportment, his studies, even of the honours and emoluments of his
-academical life, we have no certain knowledge. It is stated by Dr. Rust,
-in his Funeral Sermon, that Taylor was elected fellow: but this is at
-least doubtful, for no record of the fact exists in the registers of the
-college. He proceeded to the degree of M. A. in 1633; and in the same
-year, though at the early age of twenty, we find him in orders, and
-officiating as a divinity lecturer in St. Paul’s Cathedral. His talents
-as a preacher attracted the notice of Archbishop Laud, who sent for him
-to preach at Lambeth, and approved of his performance, but thought him
-too young. Taylor begged his Grace’s pardon for that fault, and promised
-that, if he lived, he would mend it. By that prelate’s interest he was
-admitted to the degree of M. A. _ad eundem_, in University College,
-Oxford, October 20, 1635, and shortly after nominated to a fellowship at
-All Souls College. It was probably through the interest of the same
-powerful patron that he obtained the rectory of Uppingham in
-Rutlandshire, tenable with his fellowship, March 23, 1638. The
-fellowship, however, he vacated by his marriage with Phœbe Langsdale,
-May 27, 1639, who died in little more than three years, leaving two
-sons.
-
-Taylor attracted notice at Oxford by his talents as a preacher; but he
-does not seem to have commenced, during this period of ease and
-tranquillity, any of those great works which have rendered him
-illustrious as one of the most laborious, eloquent, and persuasive of
-British divines. The only sermon extant which we can distinctly refer to
-this period, is one preached by command of the Vice-chancellor on the
-anniversary of the Gunpowder Plot, 1638. This piece requires notice,
-because it is connected with a report, circulated both during Taylor’s
-residence at Oxford and afterwards, that he was secretly inclined to
-Popery. It is even said that he “wished to be confirmed a member of the
-church of Rome,” (Wood, Athenæ Oxon.) but was rejected with scorn in
-consequence of the things advanced against that church in this sermon.
-Of this whole statement Bishop Heber, in his ‘Life of Taylor,’ has
-expressed his disbelief; and the arguments on which his opinion is
-founded appear to us satisfactory. Not even during his peaceable abode
-at Uppingham do Taylor’s great works appear to have been projected, as
-if his amiable, affectionate, and zealous temper had been fully occupied
-by domestic cares and pleasures, and by the constant though quiet duties
-of a parish priest. The year 1642, as it witnessed the overthrow of his
-domestic happiness by his wife’s death, saw also the beginning of those
-troubles which cast him out of his church preferment, a homeless man. We
-do not know the date of the sequestration of his living; but as he
-joined Charles I. at Oxford in the autumn of the year; published in the
-same year, by the King’s command, his treatise ‘Of the sacred Order and
-Offices of Episcopacy, &c.;’ was created D. D. by royal mandate;
-appointed chaplain to the King, in which capacity he frequently preached
-at Oxford, and attended the royal army in the wars; it is probable that
-he was among the first of those who paid the penalty of adhering to the
-losing cause. Little is known of this portion of Taylor’s history. It
-appears that he quitted the army, and retired into Wales, where he
-married, became again involved in the troubles of war, and was taken
-prisoner at Cardigan, Feb. 4, 1644. We do not know the date of his
-release, or of his marriage to his second wife, Joanna Bridges, a lady
-possessed of some landed property at Mandinam, near Golden Grove, in the
-Vale of Towy, in Carmarthenshire, who was commonly said to be a natural
-daughter of Charles I., born before his marriage. But Heber conjectures
-that Taylor’s marriage was anterior to his imprisonment, and that his
-wife’s estate was amerced in a heavy fine, in consequence of his being
-found engaged in the royal cause at Cardigan. It is at least certain
-that until the Restoration he was very poor, and that he supported
-himself during part of the time by keeping a school.
-
-During this period of public confusion and domestic trouble, Taylor
-composed an ‘Apology for authorized and set Forms of Liturgy,’ published
-in 1646, and his great work, a ‘Discourse on the Liberty of
-Prophesying,’ published in 1647, “the first attempt on record to
-conciliate the minds of Christians to the reception of a doctrine which,
-though now the rule of action professed by all Christian sects, was
-then, by all sects alike, regarded as a perilous and portentous
-novelty.”[1] As such, it was received with distrust, if not
-disapprobation, by all parties; and if it was intended to inculcate upon
-the Episcopalians the propriety of conceding something to the prejudices
-of their opponents, as well as to procure an alleviation of the
-oppression exercised on the Episcopal church, we may see in the conduct
-of the government after the Restoration, that Taylor preached a doctrine
-for which neither the one nor the other were then ripe. It is the more
-to his honour that in this important point of Christian charity he had
-advanced beyond his own party, as well as those by whom his party was
-then persecuted. But though his views were extended enough to meet with
-disapprobation from his contemporaries, he gives a greater latitude to
-the civil power in repressing error by penal means, than the general
-practice, at least in Protestant countries, would now grant. “The
-forbearance which he claims, he claims for those Christians only who
-unite in the confession of the Apostles’ Creed,” and he advocates the
-drawing together of all who will subscribe to that ancient and
-comprehensive form of belief into one church, forgetting differences
-which do not involve the fundamental points of Christianity. And he
-inculcates the “danger and impropriety of driving men into schism by
-multiplying symbols and subscriptions, and contracting the bounds of
-communion, and the still greater wickedness of regarding all discrepant
-opinions as damnable in the life to come, and in the present capital.”
-For a fuller account of this remarkable work, we refer to the Life by
-Heber, p. 201–218, or still better, to the original.
-
-Footnote 1:
-
-  Heber’s Life of Taylor, p. xxvii.
-
-It was followed at no long interval by the ‘Great Exemplar of Sanctity
-and Holy Life, described in the Life and Death of Jesus Christ.’ This,
-the first of Taylor’s great works which became extensively popular, is
-almost entirely practical in its tendency, having been composed, as the
-author tells us, with the intention of drawing men’s minds from
-controverted doctrines, to the vital points on which all men are agreed,
-but which all men forget so easily. It is not an attempt to connect the
-relations of the four Evangelists into one complete and chronologically
-consistent account; but a “series of devout meditations on the different
-events recorded in the New Testament, as well as on the more remarkable
-traditions which have usually been circulated respecting the Divine
-Author of our religion, his earthly parent, and his followers,” set off
-by that majestic style, that store of illustrations derived from the
-most recondite and miscellaneous learning, and, above all, that fervent
-and poetical imagination, by which Taylor is distinguished perhaps above
-all the prose writers in our language. Such qualities, even without a
-digested plan and connected strain of argument, which, requiring a more
-continuous and attentive perusal, would not perhaps have made the book
-more acceptable or useful to the bulk of readers, ensured for it a
-favourable reception; and the author followed up the impression which he
-had produced, at no distant period, by two other treatises of a similar
-practical tendency, which, from their comparative shortness, are better
-known than any other of Taylor’s works, and probably have been as
-extensively read as any devotional books in the English language. We
-speak of the treatises on Holy Living and on Holy Dying.
-
-It has been mentioned that near Mandinam stood Golden Grove, the seat of
-the Earl of Carbery, a nobleman distinguished by his abilities and zeal
-in the Royal cause. He proved a constant and sincere friend to Taylor;
-and the grateful scholar has conferred celebrity upon the name and
-hospitality of Golden Grove by his ‘Guide to Infant Devotion,’ or manual
-of daily prayers, which are called by the name of that place, in which
-they, and many other of the author’s works, were meditated; especially
-his Eniautos, or course of sermons for all the Sundays in the year.
-
-Considerable obscurity hangs over this portion of Taylor’s life: but it
-appears that in the years 1654–5 he was twice imprisoned, in consequence
-of his advocacy of the fallen causes of Episcopacy and Royalty. At some
-time in 1654 he formed an acquaintance with Evelyn, which proved
-profitable and honourable to both parties; for the layman, as is evident
-from his Memoirs and Diary, highly valued and laid to heart the counsels
-of the man whom he selected as his “ghostly father,” and to whose
-poverty he liberally ministered in return out of his own abundance.
-
-We learn from Evelyn’s Diary that Taylor was in London in the spring of
-1637, and his visits, if not annual, were at least frequent. He made
-many friends, and among them the Earl of Conway, a nobleman possessed of
-large estates in the north-east of Ireland, who conceived the desire of
-securing Taylor’s eminent abilities for the service of his own
-neighbourhood, and obtained for him a lectureship in the small town of
-Lisburne. Taylor removed his family to Ireland in the summer of 1658. He
-dwelt near Portmore, his patron’s splendid seat on the banks of Lough
-Neagh; and some of the islands in that noble lake, and in a smaller
-neighbouring piece of water called Lough Beg, are still recorded, by the
-traditions of the peasantry, to have been his favourite places of study
-and retirement. To this abode his letters show him to have been much
-attached.
-
-In the spring of 1660 Taylor visited London, to superintend in its
-passage through the press the ‘Rule of Conscience, or Ductor
-Dubitantium.’ This, it appears from the author’s letters, was
-considerably advanced so early as the year 1655. It was the fruit of
-much time, much diligence, and much prayer; and that of all his writings
-concerning the execution of which he seems to have felt most anxiety. In
-this case, as it often happens, the author seems to have formed an
-erroneous estimate of the comparative value of his works. Neither on its
-first appearance, nor in later times, did the ‘Ductor Dubitantium’
-become extensively popular. Its object, which even at the first was
-accounted obsolete, was to supply what the Romish church obtained by the
-practice of confession, a set of rules by which a scrupulous conscience
-may be guided in the variety of doubtful points of duty which may occur.
-The abuses are well known, to which the casuistic subtlety of the Romish
-doctors gave birth; and it may be doubted whether it were wise to lay
-one stone towards rebuilding an edifice, which the general diffusion of
-the Scriptures, a sufficient rule, if rightly studied, to solve all
-doubts, had rendered unnecessary. The work, in spite of its passages of
-eloquence and profusion of learning, is too prolix to be a favourite in
-these latter days, but it is still, says his biographer, (p. ccxciii.)
-one “which few can read without profit, and none, I think, without
-entertainment. It resembles in some degree those ancient inlaid
-cabinets, (such as Evelyn, Boyle, or Wilkins might have bequeathed to
-their descendants,) whose multifarious contents perplex our choice, and
-offer to the admiration or curiosity of a more accurate age a vast
-wilderness of trifles and varieties with no arrangement at all, or an
-arrangement on obsolete principles, but whose ebony drawers and perfumed
-recesses contain specimens of every thing that is precious or uncommon,
-and many things for which a modern museum might be searched in vain.”
-
-Taylor’s accidental presence in London at this period, when the hopes of
-the Royalists were reviving, was probably serviceable to his future
-fortunes. He obtained by it the opportunity of joining in the Royalist
-declaration of April 24; and he was among the first to derive benefit
-from the restoration of that King and that Church, of whose interests he
-had ever been a most zealous, able, and consistent supporter. He was
-nominated Bishop of Down and Connor, August 6, 1660, and consecrated in
-St. Patrick’s Cathedral January 27, 1661. In the interval he was
-appointed Vice-chancellor of the University of Dublin, which during past
-troubles had been greatly dilapidated and disordered, in respect both of
-its revenues and discipline. He was the principal instrument in
-remodelling and completing the statutes, and settling the University in
-its present form.
-
-In the spring of 1661 Taylor was made a member of the Irish Privy
-Council, and the small diocese of Dromore, adjacent to Down, was
-assigned to his charge, “on account,” in the words of the writ under the
-Privy Seal, “of his virtue, wisdom, and industry.” This praise was well
-deserved by his conduct in that difficult time, when those who had
-displaced the episcopal clergy were apprehensive of being in their turn
-obliged to give way, and religious differences were embittered by
-thoughts of temporal welfare. Taylor had to deal chiefly with the wilder
-and most enthusiastic party, and his advances towards an intercourse of
-Christian charity were met with scorn and insult. But his exemplary
-conduct, and persevering gentleness of demeanour, did much to soften at
-least the laity of his opponents; for we are told that the nobility and
-gentry of the three dioceses over which he presided came over, with one
-exception, to the Bishop’s side.
-
-His varied duties can now have left little time for the labour of the
-pen; still he published sermons from time to time, and in 1664 completed
-and published his last great work, a ‘Dissuasive from Popery,’
-undertaken by desire of the collective body of Irish bishops. He
-continued after his elevation to reside principally at Portmore,
-occasionally at Lisburne. Of his habits, and the incidents of this
-latter part of his life, we know next to nothing; except that he
-suffered the severest affliction which could befal a man of his
-sensibility and piety, in the successive deaths of his three surviving
-sons, and the misconduct of two of them. One died at Lisburne, in March,
-1661; one fell in a duel, his adversary also dying of his wounds; the
-third became the favourite companion of the profligate Duke of
-Buckingham, and died of a decline, August 2, 1667. Of the latter event
-the Bishop can scarcely have heard, for he died on the 13th of the same
-month, after ten days’ sickness. He was buried at Dromore. Two of his
-daughters married in Ireland, into the families of Marsh and Harrison;
-and several Irish families of repute claim to be connected with the
-blood of this exemplary prelate by the female line.
-
-The materials for Bishop Taylor’s life are very scanty. The earliest
-sketch of it is to be found in the funeral sermon preached by his friend
-and successor in the see of Dromore, Dr. Rust, who sums up the virtues
-of the deceased in a peroration of highly-wrought panegyric, of which
-the following just eulogy is a part—“He was a person of great humility;
-and notwithstanding his stupendous parts, and learning, and eminency of
-place, he had nothing in him of pride and humour, but was courteous and
-affable, and of easy access, and would lend a ready ear to the
-complaints, yea, to the impertinence of the meanest persons. His
-humility was coupled with an extraordinary piety; and I believe he spent
-the greatest part of his time in heaven.... To all his other virtues he
-added a large and diffusive charity; and whoever compares his plentiful
-income with the inconsiderable estate he left at his death, will be
-easily convinced that charity was steward for a great proportion of his
-revenue. But the hungry that he fed, and the naked that he clothed, and
-the distressed that he supplied, and the fatherless that he provided
-for, the poor children that he put to apprentice, and brought up at
-school, and maintained at the university, will now sound a trumpet to
-that charity which he dispensed with his right hand, but would not
-suffer his left hand to have any knowledge of it.
-
-“To sum up all in a few words, this great prelate had the good humour of
-a gentleman, the eloquence of an orator, the fancy of a poet, the
-acuteness of a schoolman, the profoundness of a philosopher, the wisdom
-of a counsellor, the sagacity of a prophet, the reason of an angel, and
-the piety of a saint; he had devotion enough for a cloister, learning
-enough for an university, and wit enough for a college of virtuosi; and
-had his parts and endowments been parcelled out among his poor clergy
-that he left behind him, it would perhaps have made one of the best
-dioceses in the world. But, alas! ‘Our Father! our Father! the horses of
-our Israel, and the chariot thereof!’ he is gone, and has carried his
-mantle and his spirit along with him up to heaven; and the sons of the
-prophets have lost all their beauty and lustre which they enjoyed only
-from the reflection of his excellencies, which were bright and radiant
-enough to cast a glory upon a whole order of men.”
-
-There is a life of Taylor by Archdeacon Bonney; and a copious memoir,
-enriched by a minute analysis of all the more remarkable compositions of
-our author, is prefixed to Bishop Heber’s edition of Taylor’s works.
-From this the materials of the present sketch are taken. Nor can we
-better conclude than with the eloquent estimate of Taylor’s merits, with
-which the accomplished biographer concludes his work. “It is on
-devotional and moral subjects that the peculiar character of Taylor’s
-mind is most, and most successfully, developed. To this service he
-devotes his most glowing language; to this his aptest illustrations, his
-thoughts, and his words, at once burst into a flame, when touched by the
-coals of this altar; and whether he describes the duties, or dangers, or
-hopes of man, or the mercy, power, and justice of the Most High; whether
-he exhorts or instructs his brethren, or offers up his supplications in
-their behalf to the common Father of all, his conceptions and his
-expressions belong to the loftiest and most sacred description of
-poetry, of which they only want, what they cannot be said to need, the
-name and the metrical arrangement.
-
-“It is this distinctive excellence, still more than the other
-qualifications of learning and logical acuteness, which has placed him,
-even in that age of gigantic talent, on an eminence superior to any of
-his immediate contemporaries; and has seated him, by the almost
-unanimous estimate of posterity, on the same lofty elevation with Hooker
-and with Barrow.
-
-“Of such a triumvirate, who shall settle the precedence? Yet it may,
-perhaps, be not far from the truth, to observe that Hooker claims the
-foremost rank in sustained and classic dignity of style, in political
-and pragmatical wisdom; that to Barrow the praise must be assigned of
-the closest and clearest views, and of a taste the most controlled and
-chastened; but that in imagination, in interest, in that which more
-properly and exclusively deserves the name of genius, Taylor is to be
-placed before either. The first awes most, the second convinces most,
-the third persuades and delights most: and, according to the decision of
-one whose own rank among the ornaments of English literature yet remains
-to be determined by posterity (Dr. Parr), Hooker is the object of our
-reverence, Barrow of our admiration, and Jeremy Taylor of our love.”
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by C. E. Wagstaff._
-
-  LAVOISIER.
-
-  _From the original Picture by David in a Private Collection at Paris._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                               LAVOISIER.
-
-
-Antoine Laurent Lavoisier was born in Paris, August 26, 1743. He was
-educated under the eye of his father, a man of opulence, with
-discernment to appreciate his son’s abilities, and liberality to
-cultivate them without regard to cost. Lavoisier early showed a decided
-inclination for the physical sciences; and before he was twenty years
-old, had made himself master of the principal branches of natural
-philosophy.
-
-In 1764 the government proposed an extraordinary premium for the best
-and cheapest project of lighting the streets of Paris, and other large
-cities. To this subject, involving a knowledge of several branches of
-science, Lavoisier immediately devoted his attention. He produced so
-able a memoir, full of the most masterly, accurate, and practical views,
-that the gold medal was awarded to him. This production was the means of
-introducing him into the Academy of Sciences, of which, after a severe
-contest, he was admitted a member, May 13, 1768; and he proved himself
-through life one of its most useful and valuable associates.
-
-At this time the whole range of chemical and physico-chemical science
-was in an extremely imperfect state; and the first steps to a more
-improved system involved the necessity of clearing away a vast mass of
-error which encumbered the path to truth. For instance, one of the
-fanciful ideas, the offspring of the alchemy of the dark ages, which
-still continued to haunt the regions of science, was the belief of the
-conversion of water into earth by gradual consolidation. This subject
-Lavoisier treated in the true spirit of the experimental method, and
-clearly showed that the pretended conversion was either a deposition of
-earthy particles, or a sediment arising from the action of the water on
-the internal surface of the retort. He also laboured on the analysis of
-the gypsum found in the neighbourhood of Paris, and on the
-crystallization of salts. He discussed the project of conveying water
-from L’Yvette to Paris, and the theory of congelation; and to these
-researches added extensive observations on the phenomena of thunder and
-the Aurora Borealis.
-
-He next directed his attention more especially to mineralogy; and made
-excursions, in conjunction with Guettard, into all parts of France,
-endeavouring to form from different districts a complete collection of
-their characteristic mineral productions. He made advances towards a
-systematic classification of facts connected with the localities of
-fossils, which afterwards served as the basis of his work on the
-revolutions of the globe and the formation of successive strata, of
-which two admirable abstracts were inserted in the Memoirs of the
-Academy of Sciences, for 1772 and 1787.
-
-Thus during the earlier part of his life, Lavoisier does not seem to
-have devoted himself in particular to any one branch of science. But
-about the year 1770 the announcement of the existence of more than one
-species of gaseous matter, arising out of the successive researches of
-Black, Scheele, Priestley, and Cavendish, had the effect of fixing his
-attention to the subject of pneumatic chemistry. The invaluable
-discoveries just alluded to had opened a new world to the inquirer into
-nature; and the labours of those distinguished experimentalists had
-conspired to commence a fresh era in science. Lavoisier was one of the
-first to appreciate at once the importance of the results they had
-arrived at, and the immense field of further research to which those
-results had opened the way. He perceived by a sort of instinct the
-glorious career which lay before him; and the influence which this new
-science thus, as it were, created, must have over every sort of physical
-research. Priestley possessed precisely those qualifications which are
-most available for striking out new and brilliant discoveries of facts;
-a boundless fertility of invention; a power of rapidly seizing remote
-analogies; and an equal readiness in framing and in abandoning
-hypotheses, which have no value, but as guides to experiment. Lavoisier,
-less eminent in these respects, possessed in a more peculiar degree the
-mental characteristics which enable their owner to advance to grand
-generalizations and philosophical theories upon the sure basis of facts.
-He possessed, in its fullest sense, the true spirit of inductive
-caution, and even geometrical rigour; and his observations, eminently
-precise and luminous, always pointed to more general views.
-
-In 1774, he published his ‘Opuscules Chimiques,’ in which, after a full
-and truly philosophical examination of the labours of preceding
-experimenters in the discovery of the gases and their characteristic
-properties, he proceeds to describe his own beautiful and fundamentally
-important researches, from which resulted the ‘True Theory of
-Combustion,’ which may be termed the very sun and centre of the whole
-modern system of chemistry.
-
-To the vague dreams of the alchemist had succeeded the remarkable theory
-of Hooke, who maintained that a certain ingredient of the atmospheric
-air (which also enters as an ingredient into several other bodies,
-especially nitre) was the _solvent_ which absorbed a portion of the
-combustible. This process was continued in proportion as more of the
-solvent was supplied. The solution took place with such rapidity, as to
-occasion those motions or pulsations in which Hooke believed heat and
-light to consist.
-
-This near approach to the truth was thrown into discredit by the more
-brilliant and imposing theory of Stahl, who captivated the imaginations
-of chemists by his doctrine of phlogiston, the principle or element of
-fire, a sort of metaphysical something, which conferred the property of
-being combustible. Stahl taught that the process of combustion deprived
-bodies of their phlogiston, which, in the act of separation, exhibited
-its latent energies in the evolution of light and heat.
-
-This wild chimera long maintained its ground, and received successive
-modifications in the hands of several distinguished chemists, the most
-important of which was that of Kirwan; but these all retained the
-fundamental error that something was _abstracted from_ the burning body.
-Yet Rey, so early as 1630, and Bayer afterwards, had both shown that
-metals by calcination _increase_ in weight, or have something _added_ to
-them. Lavoisier turned his attention to the defects of the existing
-theory about 1770; and the last-named experiments probably directed him
-more specifically to the essential point of the inquiry. He pursued his
-researches with unwearied industry; and by a long series of experiments
-of the most laborious and precise nature, he succeeded in determining
-that, in all cases of combustion, that substance which is the _real_
-combustible invariably receives _an addition_, or enters into a new
-combination; and the matter with which it combines is in all cases that
-same substance which had now been shown by Priestley to be one of the
-constituents of the atmosphere, and which was then known by the name of
-_vital air_.
-
-It was however long before Lavoisier gained a single convert. At length
-M. Berthollet, at a meeting of the Academy in 1785, publicly renounced
-the old opinions and declared himself a convert. Fourcroy followed his
-example. In 1787, Morveau, during a visit to Paris, became convinced,
-and declared the conclusions of Lavoisier irresistible. The younger
-chemists speedily embraced the new views; and their establishment was
-thus complete. There only remained some lurking prejudices in England,
-where the Essay of Kirwan retained its credit. Lavoisier and his
-coadjutors translated this essay into French, accompanying each section
-by a refutation. So completely was this done, that the author himself
-was convinced; and, with that candour which distinguishes superior
-minds, gave up his views as untenable, and declared himself a convert.
-
-These discoveries introduced Lavoisier to the notice of the most eminent
-persons in the State; and in 1776, Turgot engaged him to superintend the
-manufacture of gunpowder for the Government. He introduced many valuable
-improvements in the process, and many judicious reforms into the
-establishment.
-
-In 1778, Lavoisier having been incessantly engaged on the subject of
-gases and combustion, announced another great discovery, “that the
-respirable portion of the atmosphere is the constituent principle of
-acids,” which he therefore denominated _oxygen_.
-
-The question as to “the acidifying principle” had long formed the
-subject of discussion. The prevalent theory was that of Beccher with
-various modifications, which made the acid principle a compound of earth
-and water regarded as elements. Lavoisier found in the instance of a
-great number of the acids, that they consisted of a combustible
-principle united with oxygen. He showed this both analytically and
-synthetically, and hence proceeded to the conclusion that oxygen is the
-acidifying principle in all acids. Berthollet opposed this doctrine, and
-contended that, in general, acidity depended on the manner and
-proportion in which the constituents are combined. The fact is, that, in
-this instance, Lavoisier had advanced a little too rapidly to his
-conclusion. Had he contented himself with stating it as applying to a
-_great number_ of acids, it would have been strictly true; but he had
-certainly no proof of its being _universally_ the case. When Sir H.
-Davy, some years after, showed that one of the most powerful acids (the
-muriatic) does not contain a single particle of oxygen, and when the
-researches of Guy Lussac and others had exhibited other proofs of the
-same thing, it became evident that Lavoisier’s assertion required
-considerable modification. And though _nearly_ all acids have been since
-included under the general law of containing _some supporter of
-combustion_, yet there appear to be exceptions even to this; the
-cautious language of Berthollet has been completely justified; and a
-perfect theory of acidity is perhaps yet wanting. Nevertheless,
-Lavoisier’s discovery is one of first-rate magnitude and importance, and
-with this qualification, certainly forms the basis of all our present
-knowledge of the subject.
-
-Another important research in which Lavoisier engaged, in conjunction
-with Laplace, was the determination of the specific heats of bodies, by
-means of an ingenious apparatus, which they denominated the calorimeter:
-these were by far the most precise experiments on the subject which had
-as yet been made, though some inaccuracies in the method have since been
-pointed out.
-
-Lavoisier owed much, it must be owned, to those external advantages of
-fortune, the absence of which, though it cannot confine the flights of
-real genius, yet may seriously impair the value and efficiency of its
-exertions; and the presence of which, though it cannot confer the powers
-of intellect, may yet afford most invaluable aids to the prosecution of
-research, and the dissemination of knowledge. In the instance before us,
-these advantages were enjoyed to the full extent, and turned to the best
-use. Lavoisier was enabled to command the most unlimited resources of
-instrumental aid; he pursued his researches in a laboratory furnished
-with the most costly apparatus, and was able to put every suggestion to
-the test of experiment, by the assistance of the most skilful artists,
-and instruments of the most perfect construction.
-
-But as he could thus command these essential advantages for the
-prosecution of his own investigations, he was equally mindful of the
-extension of similar advantages to others: he always evinced himself
-ready to assist the inquiries of those who had not the same means at
-their disposal; and was no less liberal in aiding them by his stores of
-information and able advice. Indeed no one could be more sensible how
-much there is of mutual advantage in such intercourse between those
-engaged in the same scientific labours; and this conviction, joined with
-a full perception of the immense benefits accruing from personal
-acquaintance among men of kindred pursuits, and the interchange of
-social good offices, led him to the regular practice of opening his
-house on two evenings in every week, for an assembly of all the
-scientific men of the French capital; which very soon became a point of
-general resort and reunion to the philosophers of Europe.
-
-At these meetings general discourse and philosophic discussion were
-agreeably intermingled; the opinions of the most eminent philosophers
-were freely canvassed; the most striking and novel passages in the
-publications of foreign countries were made known, recited, and
-animadverted upon; and the progress of experiment was assisted by candid
-comments and comparison with theory. In these assemblies might be found,
-mingling in instructive and delightful conversation, all those whose
-names made the last century memorable in the annals of science.
-Priestley, Fontana, Landriani, Watt, Bolton, and Ingenhouz, were
-associated with Laplace, Lagrange, Borda, Cousin, Monge, Morveau, and
-Berthollet. There was also an incalculable advantage in bringing into
-communication and intimacy men engaged in distinct branches of science:
-the intercourse of the mathematician with the geologist, of the
-astronomer with the chemist, of the computer with the experimenter, and
-of the artist with the theorist, could not fail to be of mutual
-advantage. In no instance were the beneficial effects of such
-intercourse more strikingly displayed than in the chemical sciences;
-which, from this sort of comparison of ideas and methods, began now to
-assume a character of exactness from an infusion of the spirit of
-geometry; and a department hitherto abandoned to the wildest
-speculations, and encumbered with the most vague and undefined
-phraseology (derived from the jargon of the alchemists), began to assume
-something like arrangement and method in its ideas, and precision and
-order in its nomenclature. This influence was strongly marked in the
-physical memoirs produced in France from this period downwards. The
-precision and severity of style, and the philosophical method of the
-mathematicians, was insensibly transfused into the papers of the
-physical and chemical philosophers.
-
-Lavoisier individually profited greatly by the sources of improvement
-and information thus opened. Whenever any new result presented itself to
-him, which, perhaps, from contradicting all received theories, seemed
-paradoxical, or at variance with all principles hitherto recognised, it
-was fully laid before these select assemblies of philosophers; the
-experiment was exhibited in their presence, and they were invited with
-the utmost candour to offer their criticisms and objections. In perfect
-reliance on the mutual spirit of candour, they were not backward in
-urging whatever difficulties occurred to them, and the truth thus
-elicited acquired a firmness and stability in its public reception
-proportioned to the severity of the test it had undergone. Lavoisier
-seldom announced any discovery until it had passed this ordeal.
-
-At length he combined his philosophical views into a connected system,
-which he published in 1789, under the title of ‘Elements of Chemistry:’
-a beautiful model of scientific composition, clear and logical in its
-arrangement, perspicuous and even elegant in its style and manner. These
-perfections are rarely to be found in elementary works written by
-original discoverers. The genius which qualifies a man for enlarging the
-boundaries of science by his own inventions and researches is of a very
-different class from that which confers the ability to elucidate, in a
-simple and systematic course, the order and connexion of elementary
-truths. But in Lavoisier these different species of talent were most
-happily blended. He not only added profound truths to science, but
-succeeded in adapting them to the apprehension of students, and was able
-to render them attractive by his eloquence.
-
-In 1791 he entered upon extensive researches, having for their object
-the application of pneumatic chemistry to the advancement of medicine,
-in reference to the process of respiration. With this view he examined
-in great detail the changes which the air undergoes, and the products
-generated in that process of the animal economy. He had previously,
-however, as far back as 1780, detailed a series of experiments to
-determine the quantity of oxygen consumed and carbonic acid generated by
-respiration, in a given time, in the Memoirs of the French Academy.
-
-In the twenty volumes of the Academy of Sciences, from 1772 to 1793, are
-not less than forty memoirs by Lavoisier, replete with all the grand
-phenomena of the science:—the doctrine of combustion in all its
-bearings; the nature and analysis of atmospheric air; the generation and
-combinations of elastic fluids; the properties of heat; the composition
-of acids; the decomposition and recomposition of water; the solutions of
-metals; and the phenomena of vegetation, fermentation, and
-animalization. These are some of the most important subjects of his
-papers; and during the whole of this period he advanced steadily in the
-course which was pointed out to him by the unerring rules of inductive
-inquiry, to which his original genius supplied the commentary. So well
-did he secure every point of the results to which he ascended, that he
-never made a false step. It was only in one subject, before alluded to,
-that he may be said to have gone a few steps too far. Nor did he ever
-suffer himself to be discouraged, or his ardour to be damped by the
-difficulties and obstacles which perpetually impeded his progress. He
-traced new paths for investigation, and founded a new school of science;
-and his successors had ample employment in following out the inquiries
-which he had indicated, and exploring those recesses to which he had
-opened the way.
-
-In the relations of social and civil life Lavoisier was exemplary; and
-he rendered essential service to the state in several capacities. He was
-treasurer to the Academy, and introduced economy and order into its
-finances: he was also a member of the board of consultation, and took an
-active share in its business. When the new system of measures was in
-agitation, and it was proposed to determine a degree of the meridian, he
-made accurate experiments on the dilatation of metals, in conjunction
-with Laplace (1782), to ascertain the corrections due to changes of
-temperature in the substances used as measuring rods in those delicate
-operations.
-
-By the National Convention he was consulted on the means of improving
-the manufacture of assignats, and of increasing the difficulty of
-forgery. He turned his attention to matters of rural economy, and, by
-improved methods of cultivation, on scientific principles, he increased
-the produce of an experimental farm nearly one half. In 1791 he was
-invited by the Constituent Assembly to digest a plan for simplifying the
-collection of taxes: the excellent memoir which he produced on this
-subject was printed under the title of ‘The Territorial Riches of
-France.’ He was likewise appointed a Commissioner of the National
-Treasury, in which he effected some beneficial reforms.
-
-During the terrors of Robespierre’s tyranny, Lavoisier remarked that he
-foresaw he should be stripped of all his property, and accordingly would
-prepare to enter the profession of an apothecary, by which he should be
-able to gain a livelihood. But the ignorant and brutal ruffians who were
-then in power had already condemned him to the scaffold, on which he was
-executed, May 8, 1794, for the pretended crime of having adulterated
-snuff with ingredients destructive to the health of the citizens! On
-being seized, he entreated at least to be allowed time to finish some
-experiments in which he was engaged; but the reply of Coffinhall, the
-president of the gang who condemned him, was characteristic of the
-savage ignorance of those monsters in human form:—“The Republic does not
-want savans or chemists, and the course of justice cannot be suspended.”
-
-Lavoisier in person was tall and graceful, and of lively manners and
-appearance. He was mild, sociable, and obliging; and in his habits
-unaffectedly plain and simple. He was liberal in pecuniary assistance to
-those in need of it; and his hatred of all ostentation in doing good
-probably concealed greatly the real amount of his beneficence. He
-married, in 1771, Marie-Anni-Pierrette Paulze, a lady of great talents
-and accomplishments, who after his death became the wife of Count
-Rumford.
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                               SYDENHAM.
-
-
-The celebrated physician, Thomas Sydenham, in many respects the most
-eminent that England has produced, was born in the year 1624, at
-Wynford-Eagle, in Dorsetshire, where his father, William Sydenham,
-enjoyed a considerable estate. The mansion in which he was born is now
-converted into a farm-house, and stands on the property of Lord Wynford.
-
-In the year 1642, when eighteen, he was admitted as a commoner at
-Magdalen-Hall, Oxford; but quitted it in the same year, when that city
-became the head quarters of the royal army, after the battle of
-Edge-hill. He was probably induced to take this step by reasons of a
-political nature; for we find that his family were active adherents of
-the opposite party. Indeed he is said, though on doubtful authority, to
-have held a commission himself under the Parliament during his absence
-from Oxford; and his elder brother, William, is known to have attained
-considerable rank in the republican army, and held important commands
-under the Protectorate.
-
-The political bias of his family is not without interest, as affording a
-probable explanation of some circumstances in his life which would
-otherwise be rather unaccountable,—such as the fact, that though he
-reached the first eminence as a practising physician, he was never
-employed at court, and was slighted by the college, who invested him
-with none of their honours, nor even advanced him to the fellowship,
-though a licentiate of their body, and qualified by the requisite
-University education.
-
-When Oxford was surrendered to the Parliament, Sydenham determined to
-resume his academical studies; and passing through London
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by E. Scriven._
-
-  SYDENHAM.
-
-  _From the Picture in the Hall of All Souls College, Oxford._
-
-  Under the Superintendence of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-on his way, he met accidentally with Dr. Thomas Coxe, a physician of
-some repute at that time, who was attending his brother. The choice of a
-profession became the subject of a conversation between them, which
-determined him in favour of medicine; for in a letter addressed to Dr.
-Mapletoft, thirty years after this time, which forms the preface to one
-of his writings, he refers with much warmth to this conversation as the
-origin of his professional zeal, and, consequently, of whatever useful
-advances he had made in medicine. Thus his success, both in the practice
-and reformation of his art, may show the advantage of waiting till the
-faculties are fully matured, before they are exercised in a study which
-requires independence as well as vigour in thinking: for the
-circumstances of his family being sufficiently affluent to place him
-above the necessity of choosing a profession early, he had not turned
-his attention to physic till an age at which the medical education is
-generally almost completed. We are not, however, to believe in the
-justice of an accusation brought against him, that he had never studied
-his profession till he began to practise it; for though we do not know
-what particular line of study he pursued on his return to Oxford, it is
-clear from many passages in his works that he had studied the writings
-of the ancient physicians with no common care; and as his own show no
-defect of acquaintance with whatever real information had been collected
-before his time, we may reasonably conclude that this contemporary
-censure was mistaken or malicious. He certainly held the opinions of his
-modern predecessors in very little respect, for he does not often
-mention them, even for the purpose of confutation; and in the letter to
-Dr. Mapletoft already referred to, he says that he had found the best,
-and, in fact, the only safe guide, through the various perplexities he
-had met with in his practice, to be the method of actual observation and
-experiment recommended by Lord Bacon. This sentiment is often repeated
-in his works; but it surely does not countenance the idea that he had
-begun to practise without endeavouring to make what preparation he
-could, or would have had others follow such an example; for the charge
-against him goes to this length. The notion might arise from a foolish
-anecdote related by his admirer, Sir Richard Blackmore, of his having
-recommended Don Quixote as the best introduction he knew to the practice
-of medicine, which Sydenham must have intended as a jest, or perhaps as
-a sarcasm on the narrator himself.
-
-At Oxford he formed a close friendship with John Locke, better known
-afterwards as a philosopher than as a physician. Their intimacy, which
-lasted to the end of Sydenham’s life, probably contributed not a little
-to give form to the disgust which he soon displayed at the
-unsatisfactory and fluctuating state of medical opinion, and to the zeal
-with which he sought to establish it on surer grounds; for he appeals,
-as to the highest authority, in confirmation of some of his new views on
-the treatment of fever, to the approval of his illustrious friend, who
-even paid him the compliment of prefixing a eulogy in indifferent Latin
-verse to the treatise in which these views are developed.
-
-On the 14th of April, 1648, he took the degree of bachelor of medicine,
-being then twenty-four years old; and in the same year obtained a
-fellowship at All Souls College, by the interest of a relation. The
-degree of doctor he subsequently took at Cambridge, where, being among
-those who thought with him in politics, he probably found himself more
-at his ease. After a visit of some length at Montpellier, then
-considered the best practical school of medicine on the continent, he
-settled in Westminster, and soon after married.
-
-His progress to eminence in his profession must have been unusually
-rapid, which might be owing, in some measure, to the call for men of
-good capacity to the more stirring scenes of civil strife; for at
-thirty-six he had succeeded in establishing a first-rate reputation,
-which he continued to sustain in spite of much hostility and ill-health
-for upwards of twenty years.
-
-He witnessed the breaking out of the plague in 1665, but when it reached
-the house adjoining his own, he was induced to remove with his family
-some miles out of town. Of this desertion of his post, however, he seems
-to have repented; for he afterwards returned, and occupied himself
-diligently in visiting the victims of that devastating malady, and has
-left a short but interesting account of his opinions respecting it, and
-of the treatment he adopted; for the comparative success of which, he
-appeals to the physicians who had witnessed or followed his practice.
-
-At the age of 25, though a man of remarkably temperate and regular
-habits, he became afflicted with gout and stone, from which he suffered
-extreme torment with great resignation and patience for the rest of his
-life. Of course he did not neglect the opportunity of studying those
-diseases in his own person, and recording the result of his
-observations. His account of gout, especially, is considered to be a
-most accurate and able history of that disease.
-
-He died, leaving a family, at his house in Pall-Mall, on the 29th of
-December, 1689, in the 66th year of his age, and was buried in the
-parish church of St. James, Westminster, where, in 1810, a tablet was
-erected to his memory by the College of Physicians, who became, as a
-body, tardily but fully convinced of his extraordinary merit and eminent
-claims to the gratitude and respect of his profession.
-
-He is said to have been a man of the most retiring and unobtrusive
-disposition, and the utmost placidity of temper. In a biographical
-sketch by Dr. Samuel Johnson, prefixed to an English edition of his
-works by Swan, in 1742, it is remarked, that if he could not teach us in
-his writings how to cure the painful disorders from which he suffered,
-he has taught us by his example the nobler art to bear them with
-serenity. Nor was he less patient of mental than of bodily inflictions;
-for though he was the object of much asperity among the physicians of
-his time, he made no reprisals upon the reputations of those who
-slandered him: though he often speaks of their bitterness, he never even
-mentions their names,—a forbearance to which, as his biographer
-pungently remarks, they are indebted for their escape from a
-discreditable immortality. His writings breathe throughout a spirit of
-warm piety, candour, and benevolence: he is said to have been extremely
-generous in his dealings with his patients; for which, with other
-reasons, his practice though large was not very gainful, and he did not
-leave much wealth behind him. He never was sought after by the great,
-like his successor and disciple Radcliffe; and had none of the talents
-by which that singular man was able to push his fortune and establish a
-kind of professional despotism. Yet, whatever medical skill the latter
-evinced seems to have been derived from Sydenham, whose doctrines and
-treatment he contrived to bring into a much more early and general
-repute in England than they would probably have otherwise obtained. Each
-had his reward: the one will be long remembered as the founder of a
-magnificent library; the other can never be forgotten as the author of
-modern medicine.
-
-The bent of Sydenham’s mind was eminently practical; he thought that the
-business of a physician is to acquire an accurate knowledge of the
-causes and symptoms of diseases, and the effects of different remedies
-upon them, that if he cannot prevent them, he may at least recognise
-them with certainty, and apply with promptitude the means most likely to
-cure them: with Hippocrates and the ancient empirical physicians, whose
-tenets he professed to follow, he condemned all curious speculations
-upon the intimate nature of disease, as incapable of proof, and
-therefore always useless, and often hurtful; and maintained that the
-only trustworthy source of opinion in medicine is experience resulting
-from observations frequently repeated, and experiments cautiously
-varied; and that no theories worth attention can be framed until the
-recorded experience of many observers, under many different
-circumstances, and even through successive ages, shall be embodied into
-one general system; and he boldly declared his belief that every acute
-disease might then be cured. An instance, which unfortunately as yet
-stands alone in support of this rather sanguine expectation, may be
-taken from the history of small-pox. The observation of its contagious
-nature led to the general practice of inoculation, and this to the
-immortal discovery of Jenner, by which a disease but yesterday the
-scourge of the earth has been almost extinguished. It is remarkable that
-Sydenham, who first pointed out the important difference between its
-distinct and confluent forms,—who so materially improved the treatment
-by changing it from stifling to cooling,—and who studied and has
-described it with a laborious accuracy hardly paralleled in the history
-of medicine,—was not aware of this, to us, its most striking
-characteristic of contagion. A person conversant with such subjects will
-feel no surprise at this: to the general reader it may be a sufficient
-explanation, that it lies dormant for ten days; and that as it can only
-be taken once, and was always prevalent in London, the number of persons
-susceptible at any given time, and in obvious communication with each
-other, were comparatively few: so that opportunities were not so likely
-to arise as might be imagined of tracing its progress in single families
-or neighbourhoods from one source of contagion.
-
-Sydenham is justly celebrated for the happiness of his descriptions, and
-his skilful application of simple methods of cure, which are as
-effectual as they were novel in that age when a medical prescription
-sometimes contained a hundred different substances; but he has merit of
-a higher kind, as a discoverer of general laws. Among others, he was the
-first to notice that there is a uniformity in the fevers prevailing at
-any one time, which is subject to periodical changes; and that other
-acute diseases often partake largely of the same general character, and
-sometimes even merge in it altogether, as the plague is said to have
-swallowed up all other diseases. This, which he ascribed to some
-peculiar state of the atmosphere, he called its epidemic constitution;
-and to be aware of its vicissitudes must of course be very important to
-the physician as a guide to practice. The value of these laws, which
-Sydenham deduced from a multitude of observations, has been attested by
-almost every medical writer since his time.
-
-His works have been repeatedly printed in the original Latin, as well as
-in English and the continental languages. The first was published after
-he had been sixteen years in practice; the last he edited himself, is
-dated three years before his death; and an elegant compendium of his
-experience was published posthumously by his son. They all appear to
-have been extorted by the importunity of his friends or the
-misrepresentations of his enemies. It is said that they were composed in
-English, and translated into Latin by his friends Mapletoft and Havers:
-there is, however, little reason for attaching credit to this report, as
-we are assured, on the authority of Sir Hans Sloane, who knew him well,
-that Sydenham was an excellent classical scholar, and perfectly capable
-of expressing himself elegantly in Latin. They are most carefully
-written and clearly expressed, and bear marks of the utmost truth and
-impartiality in the narration of facts, and judgment in arranging them.
-They are not voluminous, as he studiously refrained from overloading
-them with trivial matter, and from entering into the detail of a greater
-number of cases than might be sufficient to illustrate his method of
-practice. His object was to confine himself to the results of his own
-observation: to this he pretty strictly adhered, so that little space is
-occupied in his writings by quotations or criticism. It must be admitted
-that he occasionally lapses into theoretical discussion, in violation of
-his own principles; but as he seldom or never permitted his fancy to
-divert him from what was practically useful, he may be pardoned, if in
-that age of speculation he could not entirely resist the seduction. A
-graver charge against him is, that he overlooked or undervalued the
-immense body of information to be obtained from examining the effects of
-diseased actions after death, and devoted himself too exclusively to the
-study of the symptoms during life, and the effect of remedies upon them.
-It is hardly a sufficient justification of a man of so much independence
-of spirit to reply, that such examinations were opposed by the
-prejudices of the age in which he lived. Others have overcome the same
-obstacles, and with them many of those difficulties which perplexed and
-misled even the mind of Sydenham. He had equal or greater difficulties
-to contend against in the deep-rooted absurdities of the chemical and
-mechanical schools, which in the early part of his life held an almost
-equally divided sway in medicine: the former originated with Paracelsus
-and his disciples, and had the advantage of a longer prescription; and
-the latter had received a fresh accession of strength from the recent
-discoveries of Harvey: both, however, gave way before his energetic
-appeal to fact and experience. Scarcely less credit is due to him for
-his successful opposition to the popular superstition in favour of a
-host of futile remedies, which are now happily consigned to oblivion
-with the family receipt books and herbals in which their virtues were
-paraded, than for his victory over false principles and dangerous rules
-of practice.
-
-On the whole, it may be safely advanced that medicine, as a practical
-science, owes more to the closely-printed octavo, in which the results
-of his toilsome exertions are comprised, than to any other single source
-of information.
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by C. E. Wagstaff._
-
-  LORD CLARENDON.
-
-  _From the Picture in the Bodleian Library, Oxford._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                               CLARENDON.
-
-
-Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, the third son of Henry Hyde, of Dinton,
-Esquire, a younger branch of an ancient family long established in
-Cheshire, was born at Dinton, near Salisbury, February 18, 1609. The
-most valuable part of his early education he received from his father,
-who was an excellent scholar: from his residence at Magdalen Hall,
-Oxford, where he entered in 1622, and took his bachelor’s degree in
-1625, according to his own account he obtained little benefit. In
-February 1627, he was entered at the Middle Temple. At the age of
-twenty-one, he married his first wife, who died within six months of
-their union. After the lapse of three years he was again married, to the
-daughter of Sir Thomas Aylesbury, Master of Requests to the King, by
-whom he left a numerous family. He was called to the bar in Michaelmas
-term, 1633. To the study of law he entertained in the first instance a
-strong dislike, and applied himself chiefly to history and general
-literature. But from the time of his second marriage he devoted himself
-steadily to the pursuit of his profession, in which he early acquired
-considerable practice and reputation. His business was, however, more
-frequent in the Court of Requests, in the Star Chamber, than in the
-courts of common law, and his name rarely appears in the reports of that
-period.
-
-Soon after he was called to the bar, Mr. Hyde was concerned in a
-transaction of considerable moment, which produced important
-consequences in his future life, by introducing him to the favourable
-notice of Archbishop Laud. It arose out of certain Custom-House
-regulations, by which the London merchants found themselves aggrieved.
-The leading men among them applied to Mr. Hyde, who, on finding all
-remonstrances with the Lord Treasurer unavailing, advised them to state
-their grievances in a petition to the King, which he drew for them. On
-the death of the Lord Treasurer, the Earl of Portland, the affairs of
-the Treasury were placed under the management of several commissioners,
-of whom Laud was one. The Archbishop soon found occasion to investigate
-the complaint of the merchants; and in consequence he sent for, and held
-several interviews with, Mr. Hyde: to whom he became a valuable and
-efficient patron, noticing him particularly when he appeared as counsel
-in the Star Chamber, and consulting and employing him on many public
-occasions.
-
-Laud’s favour introduced Mr. Hyde to the Lord Keeper Coventry, the Earl
-of Manchester, then Lord Privy Seal, and other political and legal
-characters of high rank, of the court party. With the leaders of the
-popular, or country party also he was upon friendly terms, “having,” as
-he says, “that rare felicity, that even they who did not love many of
-those upon whom he most depended, were yet very well pleased with him
-and with his company.”
-
-Upon the summoning of what was called the Short Parliament, which met
-April 3, 1640, Mr. Hyde was elected member for Wootton-Basset, and for
-Shaftesbury. He chose to take his seat for the former place. His first
-and only speech during the session was in the celebrated debate on the
-subject of grievances, introduced by a motion of Mr. Pym; on which
-occasion Mr. Hyde directed the attention of the house to the enormous
-abuses of the Earl Marshal’s Court. Whitelocke says that “he gained much
-credit by his conduct in this business.” In the warm debate which took
-place in the House of Commons upon the question of a supply, it was
-hinted by members of the house connected with the court, that Charles,
-upon hearing of their proceedings, would probably dissolve the
-parliament in displeasure. Mr. Hyde perceived the injurious tendency of
-such a measure, and immediately went from the house to Archbishop Laud,
-to entreat him to dissuade the King from so injudicious a course. The
-Archbishop heard him as usual with patience, but refused to interfere:
-and the Parliament was dissolved in less than three weeks after its
-first meeting.
-
-The necessities of the King compelled him to call the Long Parliament in
-the following November, of which Mr. Hyde was also a member. The
-elections having in general favoured the popular party, the temper of
-this parliament was at its commencement decidedly more opposed to the
-court than the last. At first, Mr. Hyde, whose familiarity with Laud was
-well known, was an object of jealousy and dislike. His conduct as
-chairman of the committee appointed to consider the abuses of the Earl
-Marshal’s Court, which led to the total abolition of that unauthorized
-jurisdiction, and his avowed disapprobation of several obnoxious
-branches of the prerogative, restored him in some degree to the good
-opinion of the house, while his influence with the moderate party, both
-in the court and the parliament, daily increased. Having given up his
-professional practice since the beginning of the parliament, he was much
-employed in the ordinary business of the house. He was chairman of the
-committee appointed to inquire into the legality and expediency of the
-courts of the President and Council of the North, commonly called the
-Courts of York; and in April, 1641, he was commissioned to communicate
-to the House of Lords the resolutions of the Commons against those
-courts. The performance of this duty he accompanied by a speech, in
-which he explained to the Lords, with much clearness and precision, the
-origin and nature of this obnoxious jurisdiction, and which he says in
-his History, “met with good approbation in both houses.” In July
-following he was chairman of the committee for inquiring into the
-conduct of the judges in the case of ship-money; and the management of
-the impeachment of the Lord Chief Baron Davenport, Baron Weston, and
-Baron Trevor, before the Lords, was afterwards entrusted to him. Upon
-this occasion, he delivered an excellent speech, exhibiting, in eloquent
-language, the destructive effects of the corruption of the judges upon
-the liberty of the subject and the security of property. During the same
-year, he appears from the Commons’ journals to have been usually named
-on the most important committees both of a public and private nature.
-
-The course adopted by Mr. Hyde with reference to the Earl of Strafford’s
-prosecution cannot be precisely ascertained. That he was employed in
-arranging the preliminary steps for the impeachment, appears from the
-journals; but in his History he does not explicitly declare what part he
-took upon the introduction of the bill of attainder. Some of his
-biographers state that he warmly opposed it; but no evidence is given in
-support of the assertion; and it is quite clear that neither his name,
-nor that of Lord Falkland, his political and personal friend, appear
-amongst those which were posted as “Straffordians, Betrayers of their
-Country,” for having voted against the measure. Though he cordially
-acquiesced in many of the measures at this time introduced by the
-popular leaders for the redress of grievances, his political opinions,
-as well as his ultimate views and intentions, differed widely from those
-of the predominant party. He strenuously opposed a bill for depriving
-the bishops of their seats in parliament, which passed the House of
-Commons, though it was rejected in the House of Lords by a great
-majority. In no degree discouraged by this discomfiture, the leaders of
-the Puritan party soon afterwards introduced a measure for the total
-abolition of episcopacy, known by the title of ‘The Root and Branch
-Bill,’ which was read a first time and committed. Mr. Hyde was appointed
-chairman of the committee, by common consent of both parties; the one
-wishing to get rid of his opposition in the committee, the other to
-secure a chairman of their own views. The result proved the latter party
-to be in the right; for Hyde contrived so to baffle the promoters of the
-measure, that they at last thought proper to withdraw it, Sir Arthur
-Haselrig declaring in the house, that “he would never hereafter put an
-enemy into the chair.” His conduct respecting this measure was warmly
-approved by the King; who before he went to Scotland in 1641, sent for
-Mr. Hyde, to express how much he was beholden to him for his services,
-“for which he thought fit to give him his own thanks, and to assure him
-that he would remember it to his advantage.”
-
-Before the King left Whitehall, in consequence of the tumults occasioned
-by his indiscretion in demanding the Five Members, he charged Mr. Hyde,
-in conjunction with Lord Falkland and Sir John Colepeper, to consult
-constantly together upon the state of affairs in his absence, and to
-give him on every occasion their unreserved advice, without which he
-declared solemnly that he would take no step in the parliament. Though
-much discouraged by the previous conduct of the King respecting the Five
-Members, which he had adopted without consulting them, and entirely
-against their judgment, they undertook and faithfully executed the
-charge imposed upon them; and after the King had left London, they met
-every night at Mr. Hyde’s house in Westminster, to communicate to each
-other their several intelligences and observations, and to make such
-arrangements as they thought best adapted to stay the falling fortunes
-of the royal cause.
-
-Mr. Hyde’s good understanding with the leaders of the popular party had
-rapidly declined, since his opposition to the proposed measure for
-ejecting the bishops from the House of Lords; and after his conduct in
-the committee for abolishing episcopacy he was regarded as a declared
-enemy, and his nightly consultations with Falkland and Colepeper were
-watched with the utmost jealousy. Though his situation at this time was
-one of considerable danger, he remained at his post after the King’s
-departure to York, and constantly took his seat in the House of Commons.
-About the latter end of April, 1642, Mr. Hyde received a letter from the
-King, requiring him immediately to repair to him at York; with which
-requisition he complied in the course of the next month, having first
-rendered a signal service to the royal cause by persuading the Lord
-Keeper Littleton to send the Great Seal and also to go himself to the
-King. In consequence of this step the House of Commons passed a
-resolution, in August, 1642, disabling him from sitting again in that
-parliament; and their indignation was raised to such a degree, that Mr.
-Hyde was one of the few persons who were excepted from the pardon which
-the Earl of Essex was afterwards instructed to offer to those who might
-be induced to leave the King and submit to the parliament. On joining
-the King at York, Mr. Hyde continued to be one of his most confidential
-advisers, and was soon afterwards knighted and made Chancellor of the
-Exchequer. In this capacity he negotiated with the parliamentary
-commissioners sent to Oxford in 1643; and in 1645 he acted as one of the
-King’s commissioners at the treaty of Uxbridge. After the breaking off
-of that treaty it was thought expedient to send the Prince of Wales into
-the west of England, both to secure his person from the dangers with
-which his father was environed, and to give encouragement to the
-Royalists in that part of the country. Sir Edward Hyde accompanied him
-as one of his council. The parliamentary successes in the west compelled
-the Prince to migrate, first to Scilly, thence to Jersey, from which
-place he departed into France in July, 1646. Hyde remained in Jersey for
-the space of two years, devoting himself wholly to his History of the
-Rebellion, which he had commenced in the Scilly Islands, and of which he
-completed the four first books at that time. While engaged in this
-manner, he received several letters from the King, expressive of his
-approbation of his undertaking, and supplying him with a particular
-relation of the occurrences which had taken place from the departure of
-the Prince until the period of his joining the Scotch army.
-
-In May, 1648, Hyde received the King’s commands to join the Prince of
-Wales at Paris. On the way thither, he met Lord Cottington and others at
-Rouen, where he learned that the Prince was gone to Holland, and was
-ordered to follow him. After many difficulties and dangers, Cottington
-and Hyde met their young master at the Hague in the month of August, and
-were soon afterwards joined by several other members of the King’s
-council.
-
-On the announcement of the execution of his father, Charles despatched
-Sir Edward Hyde and Lord Cottington as his ambassadors to Spain. After a
-fruitless negotiation of fifteen months, they received a message from
-court shortly after the arrival of the news of Cromwell’s victory at
-Dunbar, desiring them to quit the Spanish dominions. Hyde then repaired
-to Antwerp, where he resided with his wife and family, until, at the end
-of 1651, he was summoned to Paris, to meet Charles II., after his
-memorable escape from the battle of Worcester. He resided at Paris with
-the exiled court for nearly three years, and during this period enjoyed
-the unlimited confidence of his master, who left the arduous and
-difficult task of corresponding and negotiating with the English
-royalists entirely to his management. At this period the exiled
-royalists were frequently reduced to great pecuniary distress. The
-miserable dissensions and petty jealousies which prevailed among them
-are fully described in the History of the Rebellion. At length Charles,
-wearied and disgusted by the intrigues and broils which perpetually
-disturbed his council, while subject to the interference of the Queen
-Mother, determined to leave Paris; and accordingly he quitted that city
-in June, 1654, and went to reside at Cologne, Sir Edward Hyde and the
-rest of his court still following his humble fortunes. Upon the
-execution of the treaty with Spain, Charles removed from Cologne to
-Bruges in 1657, and in the course of that year bestowed upon Sir Edward
-Hyde the then empty dignity of Lord High Chancellor of England. Soon
-after this event the prospects of the Royalists began to brighten. The
-government of Cromwell had been for some time growing infirm, in
-consequence of domestic dissensions, the exhausted state of the revenue,
-and the distrust entertained towards the Protector, who had successively
-deceived and disappointed all parties. These seeds of discord were
-sedulously cultivated by the English royalists; and at last the death of
-that extraordinary man led to a series of events which introduced the
-restoration of Charles II.
-
-At the Restoration Sir Edward Hyde was continued as Lord Chancellor; and
-notwithstanding the constant hostility of the Queen Mother and her
-faction at court, he maintained for some time a paramount influence with
-the King, who treated him with the confidence and friendship which his
-great industry and talents for business, and his faithful attachment to
-himself and his father so well deserved. In November, 1660, he was
-raised to the peerage, by the title of Baron Hyde of Hindon in the
-county of Wilts, and in the spring of the following year he was created
-Viscount Cornbury and Earl of Clarendon. He was also about this time
-elected Chancellor of the University of Oxford. Among the tribes of
-expectant cavaliers who now flocked to the court of the restored
-monarch, all impatient to obtain something in recompense for their
-alleged services and sufferings in the royal cause, these honours and
-distinctions bestowed upon the Earl of Clarendon raised a storm of envy
-and malice which eventually caused his ruin. The King’s easiness of
-access, and, as Lord Clarendon calls it, that “_imbecillitas frontis_,
-which kept him from denying,” together with the moral cowardice which
-induced him to escape from the most troublesome importunities, by
-sending petitioners to the Chancellor for their answers, necessarily
-increased the dislike with which he was regarded. The discovery of the
-marriage of his daughter to the Duke of York, afterwards James II.,
-though it probably took place without the knowledge of the Chancellor,
-gave ample opportunity to the malice of his enemies. The King, however,
-behaved on this occasion in a manner which did him credit. He not only
-required the Duke to acknowledge his wife, on being certified that the
-ceremony had been duly performed, but refused with passion the proffered
-resignation of the Chancellor, who offered to reside in future beyond
-seas, and conjured him “never more to think of those unreasonable
-things, but to attend and prosecute his business with his usual
-alacrity, since his kindness should never fail him.”
-
-The first open act of hostility against Lord Clarendon was undertaken by
-the Earl of Bristol, who, in 1663, exhibited articles of high treason
-and other misdemeanors against him in the House of Lords. These
-articles, which contained a great variety of vague and inconsistent
-charges, were forwarded by the House of Lords to the King, who informed
-them, that “he found several matters of fact charged, which upon his own
-certain knowledge were untrue; and that the articles contained many
-scandalous reflections upon himself and his family, which he looked upon
-as libels against his person and government.” Upon a reference by the
-House of Lords to the judges, they reported that “the whole charge did
-not amount to treason though it were all true;” and upon this the
-proceedings were abandoned.
-
-But it was at last the fate of Lord Clarendon to experience the
-proverbial ingratitude of princes. From the period of the Restoration a
-powerful union of discontented parties had gradually combined against
-him. All hated him—the old cavaliers, because they thought he neglected
-their just claims upon the bounty of the King; the papists and the
-dissenters, because they found him an uncompromising opponent of all
-concessions to those whom he regarded as enemies of the established
-church; the licentious adherents of an unprincipled court, because his
-honest endeavours to withdraw the King from his levity and profligacy to
-serious considerations, thwarted their intentions and interrupted their
-pleasures. Their united efforts erased from Charles’s mind the
-recollection of services of no common value, and caused him to abandon
-his best and most faithful counsellor, without having even the
-appearance of a reason for his conduct, beyond what he called “the
-Chancellor’s intolerable temper.”
-
-The Great Seal was taken from Lord Clarendon in August, 1667; and in the
-month of November following, after an angry debate, he was impeached by
-the Commons, in general terms, of high treason and other crimes and
-misdemeanors; but the Lords, upon the impeachment being carried up,
-refused to commit him, or to sequester him from parliament, on the
-ground of the generality of the charge. Before the formal articles of
-impeachment were prepared, Lord Clarendon left England, in consequence
-of repeated messages from the King advising him to take that course,
-having previously addressed to the Lords a vindication of his conduct.
-Immediately after his departure a bill was introduced into the House of
-Lords, and rapidly passed, by which he was condemned to perpetual
-banishment, and declared to be for ever incapable of bearing any public
-office or employment in England.
-
-The charges made against Lord Clarendon at this time were scarcely less
-multifarious and inconsistent than those which were instituted by Lord
-Bristol a few years before. He was accused of designing to govern by a
-standing army,—of accusing the King of popery,—of receiving bribes for
-patents,—of selling offices,—of _acquiring a greater estate than he
-could lawfully have gained in a short time_,—of advising the sale of
-Dunkirk to the French,—of causing Quo Warrantos to be issued against
-corporations in order that he might receive fines on renewals of
-charters, and many other particulars of alleged corruption. From most of
-these accusations Lord Clarendon vindicated himself in an address
-delivered to the House of Lords upon his departure; but during his
-retirement at Montpellier, he prepared, and transmitted to his children
-in England a fuller apology, in which he answered each article of the
-charges objected to him by the Commons.
-
-After some hesitation, Lord Clarendon determined to reside at
-Montpellier, where he arrived in July, 1668. He was treated with much
-courtesy and respect by the governor of the city, as well as the French
-and English inhabitants of all ranks. His first task was to write the
-vindication of his conduct above-mentioned. During his retirement he
-made himself master of French and Italian, and read the works of the
-most eminent writers in both those languages. He also completed his
-History of the Rebellion, and wrote an answer to Hobbes’s Leviathan, an
-Historical Discourse on Papal Jurisdiction, a volume of Essays, divine,
-moral, and political, and also those fragments of his Life, which were
-first published by the University of Oxford in 1759. Engaged in these
-pursuits he passed nearly three years at Montpellier in great
-tranquillity and cheerfulness. He left that city in 1672, and went first
-to Moulins, then to Rouen, where he died, December 9, 1673. His remains
-were brought to England and interred in Westminster Abbey.
-
-The political conduct of Lord Clarendon, though variously described by
-writers of opposite parties, appears to have been generally as
-consistent and upright as can reasonably be expected from men of warm
-tempers, deeply interested in the most violent civil dissensions. His
-earliest impressions were decidedly in favour of the popular party; and
-even after he had become familiar with Archbishop Laud, and was
-favourably noticed by Charles I., he strenuously supported that party in
-the removal of actual grievances, and resisted with zeal and energy the
-encroachments of prerogative. That he afterwards refused to join in the
-wild and intemperate actions committed by the Parliament, and supported
-the royal cause against the continually increasing demands of those with
-whom he had previously acted, is not to be ascribed to inconsistency in
-his conduct, but to the development of designs and measures at all times
-repugnant to his principles. His advice to Charles I. and to Laud was
-always temperate and wise, and was given with boldness and candour.
-After the Restoration, in the height of his power and influence, he
-displayed the same moderation in his opinions and conduct, and acted
-upon the same principles of dislike to fundamental changes, which had
-influenced him as a member of the Long Parliament. It has been imputed
-to Lord Clarendon that he neglected to exert himself for the relief of
-those unfortunate cavaliers whose attachment to the King had involved
-them in penury and ruin. It is difficult to ascertain the exact truth of
-this charge; but, whether true or false, such an accusation was sure to
-be made in a case where the applicants for compensation were numerous,
-and the means of satisfying them inconsiderable.
-
-In the discharge of the legal functions of his office of Lord
-Chancellor, as presiding in the Court of Chancery, he was by no means
-distinguished; he promoted some reforms in the practice of his court,
-and continued the judicious improvements effected during the
-Commonwealth; but Evelyn says “he was no considerable lawyer,” and the
-circumstance that he never decided a case without requiring the presence
-of two judges is, if true, a sufficient acknowledgment of his judicial
-incompetency.
-
-For his judicial appointments Lord Clarendon is entitled to unqualified
-praise. Hale, Bridgeman, and other judges of the highest eminence for
-learning and independence, were appointed by him immediately after the
-Restoration, and contributed in a great degree to give stability and
-moral strength to the new government, by the confidence which their
-characters inspired in the due administration of the law.
-
-As an historian Lord Clarendon was unquestionably careless and inexact
-to a surprising degree, which may in some measure be excused by the
-necessity of writing very much from recollection; and he was a perpetual
-advocate and partisan of the Royal cause, though by no means of most of
-its supporters. But though his narration constantly betrays the bias of
-party, and cannot therefore be safely relied upon for our historical
-conclusions, his misrepresentations arise from the avowed partiality and
-intense concern he feels for the cause he is advocating, and not from
-any design to suppress or distort facts. His style is luxuriant and
-undisciplined, and his expression in the narrative parts of his history
-is diffuse and inaccurate; but his fervent loyalty and the warmth of his
-attachment to his political friends have infused a richness of eloquence
-into his delineations of character, which has perhaps never been
-surpassed in any language.
-
-[Illustration]
-
- [Medal of Clarendon.]                    [Medal in Commemoration of the
-                                                           Restoration.]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by J. Posselwhite._
-
-  SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.
-
-  _From a Picture by himself in his Majesty’s Collection._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                            SIR J. REYNOLDS.
-
-
-“Sir Joshua Reynolds,” says Burke, “was the first Englishman who added
-the praise of the elegant arts to the other glories of his country.”
-Without staying to inquire how far the literal truth of this assertion
-may be affected by the priority in date of Wilson and Hogarth, not to
-mention their less illustrious predecessors, it may safely be affirmed,
-not only that Reynolds was the founder of the English school, but that
-the most valuable qualities in the art of painting were almost lost
-sight of throughout Europe when he began his career. In Holland, the
-rich manner of Rembrandt, feebly sustained by his imitators, had been
-succeeded by no less opposite a style than that of Vanderwerf; the still
-more laboured finish of Denner, a native of Hamburgh, followed; while
-the minute perfection which was in vogue found a more legitimate
-application in the flower-pieces of Van Huysum. Reynolds was twenty-four
-years old at the decease of Denner, who had twice visited London, and
-had been much employed there. The French school about the middle of the
-last century took its tone from Boucher, a name now almost forgotten,
-and if remembered, synonymous with the extreme of affectation; he was
-principal painter to Louis XV. The native country of Claude and Poussin
-was indeed more illustrious during this time in the department of
-landscape, as Vernet produced his views of sea-ports about the period
-alluded to; but this example, however respectable, was itself indicative
-of a declining taste, and the style of view-painting in the hands of the
-foreign artists who practised it in Italy, with the Prussian Hackert at
-their head, had the effect of extinguishing for a time all invention in
-landscape. The academy at Berlin was under the direction of a Frenchman;
-Oeser was the greatest name at Leipzic and Dresden; and the south of
-Germany still imported imitations of the latest Italian styles in
-fashion. The state of the arts in Spain may be judged of by the fact,
-that when, in 1761, Mengs, who was himself a native of Germany, repaired
-to Madrid in the service of Charles III., the chief painters established
-there were a Venetian and a Neapolitan, Tiepolo and Corrado Giaquinto.
-The Venetian school, sometimes entirely losing its original character,
-seemed at least to maintain a consistent degeneracy in the styles of
-Sebastian Ricci and the above-named Giambattista Tiepolo, both weak and
-mannered imitators of Paul Veronese, but still preserving, at least the
-latter, some brilliancy of colour and pleasing execution. With Tiepolo
-the characteristic merits of the school seem however to have ceased
-altogether: towards the latter part of the century, the chief employment
-of the Venetian painters was the restoration of old pictures.[2] A
-particular school was established in 1778 for this purpose, and a
-description of the extraordinary labours of the artists is preserved in
-the thirty-eighth volume of Goëthe’s works. In Rome, the talents of
-Maratta and Sacchi, and “the great but abused powers of Pietro da
-Cortona,” had been succeeded by feebler efforts, descending or
-fluctuating through the styles of Cignani, Trevisani, and others, till
-the time of Sebastian Conca, and Pompeo Battoni. The last-named was
-approaching the zenith of his short-lived reputation, and almost without
-a rival (for Mengs was as yet young, and Conca already aged), when
-Reynolds visited Rome.
-
-Footnote 2:
-
-  It is worthy of remark that about the same time the sculptors in Rome
-  were as exclusively employed in restoring antique statues.
-
-Laborious detail on the one hand, and empty facility on the other,
-formed the distinguishing characteristics of these different schools;
-but however opposite in execution, mind was alike wanting in both.
-Denner may be considered the representative of the microscopic style; a
-style, if it deserves the name, which he applied even to heads the size
-of life; and as mere finish never was, and probably never will be
-carried to a more absurd length, his name, though comparatively obscure,
-marks an epoch in the art. The same scrupulous minuteness obtained about
-the same time in landscape; among the view-painters, Hendrick Van Lint,
-surnamed Studio, may be named as the most remarkable of his class.
-Reynolds alludes to him in one of his discourses, as noted, when he knew
-him in Rome, for copying every leaf of a tree. The opposite style, which
-aimed at quantity and rapidity, was derived from the expert painters of
-galleries and ceilings, called “Machinisti,” and more immediately from
-Luca Giordano. Facility and despatch, at the expense of every solid
-quality of art, were the characteristics of the school which was
-represented in the earlier part of Reynolds’s career, principally by
-Sebastian Conca in Italy, and by Corrado Giaquinto in Spain.
-
-The changes which took place in this state of things, towards the latter
-part of the century, may be traced partly to the renewed appreciation of
-the antique statues (a taste which, however beneficial to sculpture, had
-an unfortunate influence on the sister art), and subsequently to
-political circumstances. The fluctuations of taste, however deliberately
-estimated by retrospective criticism, are indeed generally the result of
-accident, and depend on causes but seldom derived from a just definition
-of the nature and object of art. It appears, however, that Reynolds,
-alone as he was, the founder rather than the follower of a school,
-enjoyed the rare privilege of making the taste of his time instead of
-being made by it; and although it would be absurd to suppose that he
-could be independent of the accidents with which he was brought in
-contact, it will not appear, upon a candid inquiry, that this great
-artist was in any respect directly influenced by the practice of his
-age.
-
-Joshua Reynolds was born at Plympton, near Plymouth, in Devonshire, July
-16, 1723; he was the son of the Rev. Samuel Reynolds, who taught the
-grammar school of Plympton. The young artist’s fondness for drawing
-manifested itself early, and at eight years of age he had become so well
-acquainted with the “Jesuits’ Perspective,” as to apply its principles
-with some effect in a drawing of his father’s school, a building
-elevated on stone pillars. Among other books connected with art to which
-he had access, Richardson’s ‘Treatise on Painting’ had a powerful effect
-in exciting his ambition. The earliest known picture he attempted is a
-portrait of the Rev. Thomas Smart, who was the vicar of Maker, the
-parish in which Mount Edgecumbe is situated. Reynolds, then a schoolboy
-about twelve years of age, sketched the portrait of the vicar at church,
-and afterwards copied it on canvass. This picture is now in the
-possession of John Boger, Esq., of East Stonehouse near Plymouth. The
-taste of the young painter becoming every day more decided, his father,
-urged by the advice of some friends, placed him at the age of seventeen
-as a pupil with Hudson, who had at that time the chief business in
-portrait painting, although a very indifferent artist. In 1743 Reynolds
-returned to Devonshire, in consequence of a disagreement with his
-master, and set up as a portrait painter in the town of Plymouth Dock,
-since called Devonport. He here painted various portraits, chiefly of
-naval officers. One of these works, containing the portraits of Mr. and
-Mrs. Eliot and family, is in the possession of the Earl of St. Germains.
-The composition of this picture, the artist’s first attempt at a group,
-approaches the pyramidal form, and Reynolds, after contemplating it when
-finished, observed, ‘I see I must have read something about a pyramid,
-for there it is.’ Six other pictures of the artist are preserved in the
-same collection, at Port Eliot in Cornwall. An admirable picture of a
-boy reading by a reflected light was also executed about this time. Many
-interesting works of Reynolds, some of them belonging to his earlier
-practice, are preserved in the immediate neighbourhood of Plymouth, in
-the collections of the Earl of Morley, Mr. Pole Carew of Antony, Mr.
-Rosdew of Beechwood, Mr. Lane of Coffleet, and others. The artist’s
-early works, although sometimes carelessly drawn, are distinguished by
-breadth of colour, by freedom of handling, and not unfrequently by great
-truth of expression: in short, he seems to have contracted none of the
-defects of Hudson, except, according to some of his biographers, a
-certain stiffness and sameness in the attitudes of his portraits;
-defects which he afterwards exchanged for such grace, spirit, and, above
-all, endless variety, that it was said “his inventions will be the
-future grammar of portrait painters.” The earliest portrait he painted
-of himself is in the collection of Mr. Gwatkin of Plymouth, who married
-a niece of Reynolds: the same gentleman also possesses the last portrait
-of the artist by himself, together with many other interesting specimens
-of his pencil. In 1747 Reynolds repaired again to London, and took
-lodgings in St. Martin’s Lane, then and long afterwards the favourite
-residence of artists. In 1749 he sailed to the Mediterranean, by the
-invitation, and in the company of Captain (afterwards Lord) Keppel.
-Reynolds spent two months in Minorca, where he painted several portraits
-of military and naval officers, and proceeded thence, by way of Leghorn,
-to Rome.
-
-He was fully alive to the sources of inspiration which this city of the
-arts contained. In the midst of his enthusiasm, however, he was secretly
-humiliated by discovering in himself an absence of all relish for the
-grand works of Raffaelle in the Vatican. Richardson had inspired him
-with the most exalted admiration of Raffaelle; and whatever may be
-supposed, Reynolds could not be entirely unacquainted with the subjects
-and designs of the works alluded to. Indeed, in some notes of his own
-that have been preserved, he only confesses a feeling of disappointment,
-and afterwards says, “In justice to myself, however, I must add, that
-though disappointed and mortified at not finding myself enraptured with
-the works of this great master, I did not for a moment conceive or
-suppose that the name of Raffaelle, and these admirable paintings in
-particular, owed their reputation to the ignorance and prejudice of
-mankind: on the contrary, my not relishing them, as I was conscious I
-ought to have done, was one of the most humiliating circumstances that
-ever happened to me. I found myself in the midst of works executed upon
-principles with which I was unacquainted; I felt my ignorance, and stood
-abashed; all the indigested notions of painting which I had brought with
-me from England, where art was in the lowest state it had ever been in
-(indeed it could not be lower), were to be totally done away and
-eradicated from my mind.” The union of candour and docility with good
-sense, which the above account evinces, was the means of emancipating
-Reynolds from the taste or fashion of the day. Instead of enrolling
-himself among the scholars of Pompeo Battoni, as he was strongly
-recommended to do before his departure from England by his kind patron
-Lord Edgecumbe, he endeavoured during the practice of his art to
-penetrate the principles on which the great works around him,
-particularly those of Michael Angelo and Raffaelle, were produced. His
-general theory will be found embodied in his writings, and if his
-principles sometimes appear to be pushed too far, we may perhaps
-attribute it to the wish to counteract certain prevailing errors among
-his contemporaries. It is a general notion that, considering the
-difference in style between the paintings of Reynolds and those of the
-great models he professes to admire (Michael Angelo received his more
-especial homage), he could not have been sincere in acknowledging so
-thorough a conviction of their excellence. To decide fairly on this
-difficult and often-discussed point, it is necessary to remember the
-state of the arts when Reynolds formed his style. The great vice of the
-age was a routine practice, seldom informed by any reference to the
-general nature of the art, and as little remarkable for a just
-discrimination of its various styles. In such a state of things it
-cannot excite surprise that a sagacious and unprejudiced mind, in
-endeavouring to retrace the leading principles of the art, should at the
-same time see the necessity of modifying them in their application to a
-particular, and in some respects a limited, department. As portrait
-painting, the imitation of individuals, was to be Reynolds’s chief
-occupation, it certainly did not occur to him that the abstract
-representations of Michael Angelo, or even of Raffaelle, could be fit
-models for him to follow, as far as execution was concerned. He saw
-however that these masters were probably right even in this respect,
-when the dignity and purity of their aim, and when subject, place, and
-dimensions are duly considered. His imitation of them therefore began
-when he endeavoured to define the end and object of the particular style
-of art which he himself professed; and although he soon concluded that
-it required a widely different treatment, he failed not to translate, if
-we may so say, the causes of the grandeur he admired into the language
-which belonged to his own department. What he considered the distinctive
-and desirable requisites of portrait painting to consist in, may be best
-learnt from his own works. In the first place, the more delicate
-refinements of colouring and chiaro-scuro, by no means essential in the
-grander and more abstract department of the art, are indispensable where
-the imitation is confined to a single and generally a defective person.
-It is thus that Rembrandt made up the _sum_ of beauty by the
-fascinations of gradation and contrast, while the forms he had to deal
-with were often of the most ordinary description. The just imitation of
-the colour of flesh, the most beautiful and at the same time the most
-nameless hue in nature, has ever been considered the triumph of
-imitative art, and confers value and dignity on the _work_ wherever it
-is fully accomplished. Again, it must be remembered that the domain of
-expression begins with the accidents of form; that it belongs to and
-often recommends individuality and redeems deformity; and that its vivid
-interest is to be sought less in the abstract personifications of
-Michael Angelo, far less in the higher region of beauty which the Greeks
-justly placed above the atmosphere of the passions, than in the
-varieties of accidental nature. Reynolds seized on the delicacies of
-expression as strictly harmonizing with the individual forms he had to
-copy: and, while thus adding a charm to his class of art, he became at
-the same time the abler portrait painter; for the character and
-expression of the individual are the chief points which are demanded.
-Lastly, the conduct and execution of his pictures were in strict
-conformity with the same principles, and may be said to have been
-dictated by the largest view of the nature and means of the art.
-
-In his works the attention is always attracted by the important objects,
-or diverted from them, when diverted, only to conceal the artifice which
-thus commands the eye of the spectator. It is evident that the general
-degree of completeness will depend on that of the principal object; and
-assuming that Reynolds’s style of painting a head was sufficiently
-elaborate (it is generally less so than Vandyck’s), the _unfinish_ of
-the accessories could hardly be otherwise than it is, consistently with
-due subordination. The truth of this consistency of style was ultimately
-acknowledged, and although so opposite from what had before been in
-fashion, and so different in many respects from what the vulgar admire,
-the pictures of Reynolds soon won the favour of the public. If the
-admiration of his works had any ill effect, it was that it tended to
-produce an imitation of the same mode rather than of the same
-consistency.
-
-On his return to England in 1752, which has been somewhat anticipated in
-the foregoing remarks on his style, Reynolds repaired to his native
-county, and painted one or two pictures at Plymouth: perhaps the
-earliest of the fine portraits of Mr. Zachary Mudge, Vicar of St.
-Andrews, was one of these. He returned to London accompanied by his
-sister Frances. For a short time he again occupied lodgings in St.
-Martin’s Lane, and produced there the portrait of Giuseppe Marchi, an
-Italian whom he had brought home as an assistant. This picture, which
-was in the style of Rembrandt, attracted general admiration; and when
-his former master Hudson saw it, he exclaimed, stung with jealousy,
-“Reynolds, you don’t paint so well as when you left England!” Soon after
-this, in consequence of his increased fame and employment, Reynolds took
-a house in Great Newport Street, where he resided for some years. The
-whole length portrait of Admiral Keppel was the next work of importance
-which he produced: it exhibited such powers that it completely
-established the fame of the artist, and he was generally acknowledged to
-be the greatest painter England had seen since the time of Vandyck. From
-this period his career was one of uninterrupted success and improvement;
-for his reputation was never greater than at the close of his laborious
-life. The detraction which such extraordinary merit soon excited was
-compelled to vent itself in attempting to undervalue the department of
-art in which he excelled: in consequence of these insinuations, a
-defence of portrait painting, from the pen of Dr. Johnson, appeared in
-the forty-fifth number of the Idler. Johnson in that essay, after all,
-only proved that portrait painting is interesting to a _few_—that in the
-hands of Reynolds it was “employed in diffusing friendship, in renewing
-tenderness, in quickening the affections of the absent, and continuing
-the presence of the dead.” Reynolds himself, however, without forgetting
-these important prerogatives, evidently took a more extended view of the
-matter; he seems early to have felt that the chief difficulty of
-portrait painting (a difficulty perhaps greater than any in the other
-branches of art) is to make the representation _generally_ interesting.
-It is quite obvious that this end can only be attained (especially as
-beauty of form is not always at command) by a high degree of perfection
-in all that constitutes the charm of art; for no interest that attaches
-itself to the individual pourtrayed, however celebrated, can be so
-universal or so independently intelligible as that which arises from a
-large and true imitation of nature, to which all are more or less alive.
-The perfection of art as applicable to portrait painting, was therefore
-Reynolds’s great object, and it was only in subservience to this that he
-ventured to introduce what in his hands might be considered a novelty in
-this department. That novelty was the historic air he often gave his
-portraits, by happy allusions to some important circumstance in the life
-of the individual. His consummate knowledge of effect enabled him to do
-this by means which never interfere with the mere portrait, a difficulty
-which had been in a great measure evaded by preceding painters. It will
-be remembered that in most of the portraits even of Titian and Vandyck
-the attention is literally confined to the individual pourtrayed (after
-all, the subject of the picture), and it was not lightly or
-inconsiderately that Reynolds occasionally departed from this judicious
-practice. If ever a painter could depend on the mere character and
-expression of his heads, to say nothing of the charm of their execution,
-Reynolds undoubtedly would have been secure of the public approbation on
-those grounds alone; and it was only where historic interest happened to
-coincide or to interfere but little with picturesque effect, that he
-ventured on the additions alluded to. A better instance perhaps cannot
-be given than the portrait of Lord Heathfield (celebrated for his
-defence of Gibraltar), in the National Gallery; in the background of
-which a cannon pointed downwards indicates, by its angle of depression,
-the elevation of the spot where the veteran stands, grasping the keys of
-the fortress which he defended so bravely. In his allegorical portraits,
-such as Garrick between Tragedy and Comedy, Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic
-Muse, &c., Reynolds encountered a much greater difficulty, and it may be
-questioned whether any painter who has yet appeared would have succeeded
-better. The mixture of real and imaginary beings, of individual and
-abstract personifications, the treatment of which would seem to require
-so different a style, was so managed by Reynolds as to satisfy, in this
-respect, the most fastidious taste. The secret of the greatness of his
-style in these subjects, and indeed in most of his portraits, is to be
-sought in his colouring, the idea of which is large and general; and
-under its dignified influence the individuality of forms and locality of
-dress are rendered with all sufficient fidelity without offending. It is
-thus we find in many Venetian, Flemish, and Dutch pictures, where the
-subject and forms are most homely, an air of refined taste, and even of
-grandeur, which seems unaccountable, till we discover that the colouring
-is true to the largest idea of nature; and thus, to a certain extent,
-the art is raised by raising its characteristic quality. In short, to
-return to the question of his imitation of Michael Angelo, we should
-find that, keeping the main requisites and attainable excellences of
-portrait painting in view, Reynolds contrived to infuse into it as much
-elevation as was calculated to improve it without injuring its
-character; and when we find that he applied this even to execution, and
-that his breadth of manner, his disdain of non-essentials, is evidently
-inspired by the same feeling, we shall no longer wonder at his
-admiration of the highest style of art, or doubt the sincerity of his
-recorded professions on the subject. The very _indirectness_ of his
-imitation, in which the whole mystery lies, so sure a proof of his
-having penetrated the principle of the great master, establishes his
-claim to originality as well as to consummate judgment and taste.
-
-In 1768 the Royal Academy was instituted, and Mr. Reynolds, holding
-unquestionably the first rank in his profession, was elected President.
-On his elevation to this office he received the honour of knighthood. As
-President he delivered to the students and professors those celebrated
-discourses, which have reflected so much lustre on his name. Their
-excellence in a theoretical point of view, the elegance of their
-composition, and on the other hand the apparent contradictions they
-sometimes contain, have been the theme of frequent observation and
-discussion. The other writings of Sir Joshua are the ‘Tour to Flanders
-and Holland,’ consisting of notes on the paintings seen by him in those
-countries in the year 1781; ‘Notes on Du Fresnoy’s Poem;’ and three
-papers in the Idler. Among the last, the Essay on Beauty was not so
-original as is generally supposed, the same theory having been
-previously promulgated by the Père Buffier in his ‘Cours des Sciences
-par des principes nouveaux. Paris, 1732.’ Among the historical and
-mythological pictures produced by Sir Joshua, that of the Infant
-Hercules strangling the Serpents, executed in 1786 for the Empress of
-Russia, is one of the most considerable: it is pretty closely copied, as
-to invention and composition, from a description of an antique painting
-of the same subject in Philostratus. This work, so different from the
-taste of the Russian painters and connoisseurs, was long treated with
-neglect; but in consequence of the enquiries of English travellers it
-has lately been cleaned, and placed in the gallery of the Hermitage. It
-is said to be in a fine state of preservation, and one of the best works
-of Reynolds. The celebrated picture of Ugolino was produced by an
-accidental circumstance. The subject was suggested to Sir Joshua by
-Goldsmith, or, according to others, by Burke, who was struck with the
-expression of an old emaciated head, among the unfinished studies of the
-painter, and observed that it corresponded exactly with Dante’s
-description of Count Ugolino. The head was inserted in a larger canvas,
-and the rest of the composition added. For the Shakspeare Gallery Sir
-Joshua painted three pictures,—the Death of Cardinal Beaufort, the
-Cauldron Scene in Macbeth, and Puck from Midsummer Night’s Dream. The
-designs for the window of the New College Chapel in Oxford are among the
-finest of his sacred compositions.
-
-In 1789, finding his eyesight begin to fail, Sir Joshua was compelled to
-give up the practice of his art. In December, 1790, he pronounced his
-farewell Address at the Royal Academy, and on that occasion repeated and
-confirmed, as with his dying voice, his admiration of Michael Angelo.
-His infirmities confined him much during the short remaining portion of
-his life, and he died at his house in Leicester Fields, February 23,
-1792. He was buried in the crypt of the cathedral of St. Paul, near the
-tomb of Sir Christopher Wren. The honours of his funeral, as may be
-imagined, corresponded with his justly-earned fame; and the day after
-his death a well-known eulogium by Burke appeared in the public papers,
-so characteristic both of the writer and the great artist to whose
-memory it was dedicated, that it was called the panegyric of Apelles,
-pronounced by Pericles. It concludes thus:—“His talents of every kind,
-powerful from nature, and not meanly cultivated by letters, his social
-virtues in all the relations and all the habitudes of life, rendered him
-the centre of a very great and unparalleled variety of agreeable
-societies, which will be dissipated by his death. He had too much merit
-not to excite some jealousy, too much innocence to provoke any enmity.
-The loss of no man of his time can be felt with more sincere, general,
-and unmixed sorrow.”
-
-For a list of the pictures of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and ample details of
-his life, the memoir of him by Northcote, who had been his scholar, may
-be consulted; as well as the accounts prefixed to the various editions
-of his literary works; and that by Allan Cunningham, in his Lives of the
-most eminent British Painters, Sculptors, and Architects.
-
-[Illustration: [Sketch for the picture of Mr. Eliot and his family.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by B. Holl._
-
-  SWIFT.
-
-  _From the Picture in the Bodleian Library, Oxford._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                 SWIFT.
-
-
-Jonathan Swift, by an account in his own handwriting, was the son of an
-attorney in the city of Dublin. He was born in 1667. Some doubt has been
-felt concerning his origin, in consequence of his own angry or
-capricious declaration, when out of humour with Ireland,—“I am not of
-this vile country; I am an Englishman;” and Sir William Temple has been
-said to be his real father. This piece of scandal, however, is disproved
-by circumstances of time and place. Swift was placed at Trinity College,
-Dublin, at the age of fourteen. Whether through idleness, or contempt of
-the prescribed studies, at the end of four years he could only obtain
-his Bachelor’s degree _speciali gratiâ_; a term denoting want of merit.
-This disgrace so affected him, that for the following seven years he
-studied eight hours a day. In 1688 Sir William Temple, whose lady was
-related to Swift’s mother, took him under his protection, and paid the
-expenses of his residence at Oxford for a Master’s degree. On quitting
-that University, Swift lived with Temple as his domestic companion. To a
-long illness contracted during this period in consequence of a surfeit
-he ascribed that frequently recurring giddiness which annoyed him
-through life, and sent him to the grave deprived of reason.
-
-While under Sir William Temple’s roof, Swift rendered material
-assistance in the revision of his patron’s works, and corrected and
-improved his own ‘Tale of a Tub,’ which had been sketched out previously
-to his quitting Dublin. It was published in 1704. He never avowed
-himself its author; but he did not deny it when Archbishop Sharpe and
-the Duchess of Somerset, according to some accounts, showed it to Queen
-Anne, and thereby debarred him from a bishopric. From Temple’s
-conversation Swift much increased his political knowledge; and his early
-impressions were naturally in favour of the Whigs: but he suspected his
-patron of neglecting to provide for him, from a desire of retaining his
-services. This produced a quarrel, and the friends parted in 1694. Swift
-took orders, and obtained a prebend in the north of Ireland; but at
-Temple’s earnest request he soon resigned that preferment, and returned
-to England. A sincere reconciliation took place, and they lived together
-in the utmost harmony till Sir William’s death in 1699. Swift, in
-testimony of his esteem, wrote ‘The Battle of the Books,’ of which his
-friend is the hero; and Temple by his will left him a legacy in money,
-and the profit as well as care of his posthumous works. Swift had
-indulged hopes, not without good reason, of being well provided for in
-the English church, through Temple’s interest. Failing in these hopes,
-he accepted the post of private secretary and chaplain to the Earl of
-Berkeley, on the appointment of that nobleman to be one of the Lords
-Justices of Ireland. By this new patron he seems to have been ill used.
-He was soon displaced from his post, on the plea of its unfitness for a
-clergyman. He was then promised the rich deanery of Derry; but that
-preferment was bestowed on another person, and Swift could only procure
-the livings of Laracor and Rathbeggin, which together did not amount to
-more than half the value of the deanery. During his residence at
-Laracor, he performed the duties of a parish priest with punctuality and
-devotion, notwithstanding some occasional sallies of no very decorous or
-well-timed humour, which coupled with the suspicions founded on the
-anonymous ‘Tale of a Tub,’ fixed on him an imputation of insincerity in
-his Christian profession, from which the opinion of posterity seems to
-have absolved him.
-
-During his incumbency at Laracor, he invited to Ireland a lady with whom
-he became acquainted while with Sir William Temple. She was the daughter
-of Temple’s steward, whose name was Johnson. About the year 1701, at the
-age of eighteen, she went to Ireland, to reside near Swift, accompanied
-by Mrs. Dingley, a lady fifteen years older than herself. Miss Johnson
-was Swift’s celebrated Stella. Whether Swift’s first impulse in giving
-this invitation had a view to marriage, or the cultivation of friendship
-only, is uncertain. His whole conduct with respect to women was most
-mysterious: apparently highly capricious, and, whatever might be its
-secret motive, utterly unwarrantable. The reason assigned by the two
-ladies for transferring their residence to Ireland was, “that the
-interest of money was higher than in England, and provisions cheap.”
-Every possible precaution was taken to prevent scandal: Swift and Miss
-Johnson did not live together, nor were they ever known to meet except
-in presence of a third person. Owing to this scrupulous prudence, the
-lady’s fame, during fifteen years, was never questioned, nor was her
-society avoided by the most scrupulous. In 1716 they were privately
-married, but with no change in their mode of life: she never lodged in
-the Deanery, except during those fits of giddiness and approaching
-mental aberration, during which a woman, then of middle age, might
-venture without breach of decorum to nurse an elderly man.
-
-In 1701 Swift had published his ‘Dissensions in Athens and Rome;’ his
-first political work, in behalf of King William and his ministers,
-against the violent proceedings of the House of Commons. According to
-Lord Orrery, from that year to 1708 he did not write any political
-pamphlet; but he made frequent journeys to England during the whole of
-Queen Anne’s reign. Between 1708 and 1710 he changed his politics,
-worked hard against the Whigs among whom he had been educated, and
-plunged into political controversy, with a view to open the road to
-power for the Tories. The year 1710 produced the ‘Examiner,’ of which he
-wrote thirty-three papers. In that year commenced his acquaintance with
-Harley, who introduced him to St. John and the rest of the ministers. At
-this period he dined every Saturday at Harley’s, with the Lord Keeper,
-Mr. Secretary St. John, and Lord Rivers, to the exclusion of all other
-persons. He may, therefore, be considered at this time as the
-confidential friend of the ministry, and almost a member of their
-cabinet. The company was afterwards enlarged to sixteen, including
-Swift; all men of the first class in society. He now put forth all his
-strength in support of the Tory party, in pamphlets, periodical papers,
-and political poems. Amidst all this political agitation, he wrote down
-the occurrences of every day, whether consisting of conferences with
-ministers, or quarrels with his own servant, in a regular journal to
-Stella.
-
-In 1712, ten days before the meeting of parliament, he published a
-pamphlet, entitled ‘The Conduct of the Allies,’ to facilitate peace, on
-which the stability, almost the personal safety of the ministers, seemed
-to depend. He professes that this piece cost him much pains, and no
-writer was ever more successful. A sale of eleven thousand copies in two
-months was in those days unprecedented: the Tory members in both houses
-drew their arguments from it, and the resolutions of parliament were
-little more than a string of quotations. During that year and the next
-he continued to exert himself with unwearied diligence. In 1713 he
-carried to the then latest date the first sketch of the ‘History of the
-last four Years of Queen Anne.’ Lord Bolingbroke, when called on for his
-opinion, was sincere enough to speak of it as “a seasonable pamphlet for
-the administration, but a dishonour to just history.” Swift himself was
-proud of it, but professed his willingness to sacrifice it to his
-friend’s opinion. It was, however, published, but with no addition to
-the author’s fame.
-
-The Queen is said to have intended to promote him to a bishopric; but
-the story is involved in obscurity. That Archbishop Sharpe had dissuaded
-her from so doing by representing his belief in Christianity as
-questionable, is not ascertained by any satisfactory evidence; but
-whether that were so or not, Johnson’s suggestion seems probable, that
-the difficulty arose from those clerical supporters of the ministry,
-“who were not yet reconciled to the author of the ‘Tale of a Tub,’ and
-would not, without much discontent and indignation, have borne to see
-him installed in an English cathedral.” The deanery of St. Patrick, in
-Dublin, was therefore offered to him, and he accepted it. With high
-pretensions to independent equality with the ministers, and a
-disinterested support of their measures, it cannot be doubted that he
-viewed this Irish preferment as a sentence of exile, and was bitterly
-disappointed. But his temper was too intractable to submit to play the
-part of a courtier; and it is probable that his English friends were not
-ill pleased to promote him to competence and dignity at a distance. His
-feelings are characteristically expressed in one of his letters: “I use
-the ministry like dogs, because I expect they will use me so. I never
-knew a ministry do anything for those whom they made companions of their
-pleasures; but I care not.”
-
-He had indeed little reason to rejoice at first in the land where his
-lot had fallen: on his arrival in Ireland to take possession of his
-deanery, he found the country under the strongest excitement of party
-violence. The populace looked on him as a Jacobite, and threw stones at
-him as he walked the streets. His chapter received him with reluctance,
-and thwarted him in whatever he proposed. Ordinary talents and firmness
-must have sunk under such general hostility. But the revolutions of the
-Dean’s life were strange; and he, who began with the hatred of the Irish
-mob, lived to govern them with the authority of a despot.
-
-He had not been in Ireland more than a fortnight when he returned to
-England for the purpose of attempting, but in vain, a reconciliation
-between the Lords Oxford and Bolingbroke. While in England, he wrote his
-‘Free Thoughts on the Present State of Affairs.’ He was probably still
-watching the issues of time or chance; but the Queen’s death sealed his
-political and clerical doom, and he returned to Ireland. To the interval
-between 1714 and 1720 Lord Orrery ascribes ‘Gulliver’s Travels.’ His
-mind was at this time much engrossed by a remarkable circumstance. He
-had formed an intimacy in England with the family of a Dutch merchant,
-named Vanhomrigh. The eldest daughter, strangely enough, became
-enamoured of Swift’s mind, for it could not be of a most homely person,
-nearly fifty years of age. She proposed marriage: this he declined, and
-wrote his poem of ‘Cadenus and Vanessa’ on the occasion. On her mother’s
-death, the young lady and her sister followed him to Ireland; the
-intercourse was continued, and the proposal renewed on her part. This it
-was absolutely necessary to decline, as the Dean was already married;
-but he lived with Stella on the same distant footing as before, and was
-reluctant either to inflict pain, or to forego his own pleasure, by an
-avowal of the insuperable obstacle. Vanessa continued to receive his
-visits, but so guardedly as not absolutely to forfeit her good name. She
-became however more and more urgent; and peremptorily pressed him to
-accept or reject her as his wife. Failing to obtain a direct answer, she
-addressed a note to Miss Johnson, desiring to know whether she were
-married to him, or not. Stella sent this note to Swift, who in a
-paroxysm of anger rode to Vanessa’s house, threw a paper containing her
-own note on the table, and quitted her without a word. This blow she did
-not survive many weeks. She died in 1723, having first cancelled a will
-in the Dean’s favour.
-
-Vanessa by will ordered her correspondence with Swift to be published,
-as well as ‘Cadenus and Vanessa,’ in which he had proclaimed her
-excellence and confessed his love. The letters were suppressed; the poem
-was published. This, whether meant as an apology for herself, or as a
-posthumous triumph over her more successful rival, occasioned a great
-shock and distress both to Stella and the Dean. It is said that at
-length, probably as a softening to the mortification incident to the
-public discovery of his passion for Vanessa, he desired that Stella
-might be publicly owned as his wife; but her health was rapidly
-declining. She said, perhaps petulantly, “It is too late,” and insisted
-that they should continue to live as before. To this the Dean consented,
-and allowed her to dispose of her fortune, by her own name, in public
-charity. She died in 1727.
-
-By Stella’s death Swift’s happiness was deeply affected. He became by
-degrees more misanthropic, and ungovernable in temper; and more miserly
-in his personal habits, while at the same time he devoted to charity a
-large part, it is said one-third, of his income. In 1736 his deafness
-and giddiness became alarming, and his mental powers gradually declined.
-In 1741 his friends found it necessary that guardians should be
-appointed over his person and estate. In 1742 his reason was entirely
-overthrown; he became lethargic and, except at short intervals,
-speechless. On the 30th of November his housekeeper told him that the
-customary preparations were making to celebrate his birthday: he found
-words to answer, “It is all folly; they had better let it alone.” He
-died the latter end of October, 1745; in his seventy-eighth year. With
-the exception of some few legacies, he left his fortune, amounting to
-about twelve thousand pounds, to the building of an hospital for idiots
-and lunatics.
-
-The extent and variety of Swift’s writings render it necessary to
-confine our notice to two or three of his most curious productions. Of
-the ‘Tale of a Tub,’ which, being regarded as an attack upon all
-religion, brought down a weight of censure on the author, against which
-he protested in the preface to a later edition, Dr. Johnson says that
-“it has little resemblance to his other pieces. It exhibits a vehemence
-and rapidity of mind, a copiousness of images, and vivacity of diction,
-such as he afterwards never possessed or never exerted. It is a mode so
-distinct and peculiar, that it must be considered by itself; what is
-true of that is not true of anything else which he has written. In his
-other works is found an equable tenor of easy language, which rather
-trickles than flows.”
-
-‘Gulliver’s Travels’ are now probably better known to the public than
-any other of his productions. That work is a moral and political
-romance, exhibiting a wonderful specimen of irregular genius. Not only
-are human actions placed in the most unfavourable light, but human
-nature itself is libelled. His wayward temper and his ill-concealed
-disappointment had put him out of conceit with the world; misanthropy
-had made some inroad into his heart, and, with his pen in his hand, he
-indulged in the expression of it with affected exaggeration. But however
-offensive to good feeling the satire might be, the imagination and wit
-which pervade this extraordinary work will always attract some readers,
-while the simple, circumstantial air of truth with which such
-extravagant fictions are related is a source of amusement to less
-refined tastes.
-
-Neither are the ‘Drapier’s Letters,’ written in 1724, less remarkable,
-although the temporary nature of the subject has divested them of all
-interest, except as samples of the powers of his mind and the character
-of his style. Lord Orrery calls them “those brazen monuments of his
-fame.” A patent had been taken out by one Wood for a copper coinage for
-Ireland, to the amount of one hundred and eighty thousand pounds in
-halfpence and farthings, by which the projector, at least as was alleged
-by the opponents of the ministry, would have gained exorbitant profit,
-and the nation would of course have incurred proportionate loss. The
-Dean, in the character of a Drapier, wrote a series of letters, exposing
-the folly and mischief of giving gold and silver for a debased coin
-probably not worth a third of its nominal value. He urged the people to
-refuse this copper money; and the nation acted on the Drapier’s advice.
-The government took the alarm at this seditious resistance to the King’s
-patent, and offered three hundred pounds reward for the discovery of the
-author of the fourth letter; but his precautions were so well taken, and
-his popularity so universal, that, though known to be the author, the
-proclamation failed to touch him. The popular indignation rose to such a
-height that Wood was compelled to withdraw his patent, and the base
-money was totally suppressed. From this time forward the Dean, who at
-his first arrival in Ireland had been most unpopular, possessed
-unlimited influence; he was consulted on all measures of domestic
-policy; persons of all ranks either courted or feared him; national
-gratitude was expressed by all ranks in their various ways; the Drapier
-was a toast at every convivial meeting, and the sign of his head insured
-custom to an ale-house.
-
-His letters are remarkable for the pure English of their style: there is
-little of solid information to be derived from them; but the most
-trifling anecdotes of distinguished men find ready acceptation with a
-large class of readers.
-
-As a poet, in the higher sense of the word, we rank Swift’s claims to
-honour very humbly. But he possessed uncommon power of correct, easy,
-and familiar versification; which, with his racy vein of humour, will
-secure him admirers among those who can pardon his offensive grossness.
-
-Delany, an Irishman to the backbone, gives the following character of
-him: “No man ever deserved better of any country, than Swift did of his;
-a steady, persevering, inflexible friend; a wise, a watchful, and a
-faithful counsellor, under many severe trials and bitter persecutions,
-to the manifest hazard both of his liberty and fortune.” With respect to
-his conversation and private economy some particulars may be worth
-mentioning. His rule never to speak more than a minute at a time, and to
-wait for others to take up the conversation, it were well if professed
-talkers would adopt. He excelled in telling a story, but told the same
-too often; an infirmity which grew on him, as it does on others, in
-advancing life. He was churlish to his servants, but in the main a kind
-and generous master. He was unceremonious and overbearing, sometimes
-brutal; but in company which he respected, not coarse, although his
-politeness was in a form peculiar to himself. He considered wealth as
-the pledge of independence; but his frugality towards the close of his
-life amounted to avarice. As we have represented some features of his
-character in no very amiable light, we will conclude with an anecdote
-which shows the kindly portion of his nature to advantage. In the high
-tide of his influence, he was often rallied by the ministers for never
-coming to them without a Whig in his sleeve: whatever might have been
-his expectations from the unsolicited gratitude of his party, he never
-pressed his own claims personally; but he often solicited favours from
-Lord Oxford in behalf of Addison, Congreve, Rowe, and Steele. Personal
-merit rather than political principles directed his choice of friends.
-His intimacy with Addison was formed when they used to meet at the
-parties of Lord Halifax or Lord Somers, who were leaders of the Whigs;
-but it continued unabated when the Tories had gained the ascendency.
-
-Swift’s works have gone through many editions in various forms. The
-latest and best is that of Sir Walter Scott. That man must be considered
-fortunate in his biographers, of whom memoirs have been handed down,
-with more or less detail, by Lord Orrery, Dr. Delany, Dr. Hawkesworth,
-Dr. Sheridan, Dr. Johnson, and Sir W. Scott.
-
-[Illustration: [Gulliver in Lilliput, from a Design by Stothard.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by J. Posselwhite._
-
-  LOCKE.
-
-  _From the original Picture by Sir G. Kneller in the Hall of Christ
-    Church, Oxford._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                 LOCKE.
-
-
-John Locke was born August 29, 1632, at Wrington, a village of
-Somersetshire, about eight miles from Bristol. He was the eldest of two
-sons of John Locke, a man of some property, who had been bred to the
-law, but became afterwards a captain under Cromwell. In those turbulent
-times he met with losses which diminished his fortune, and he left an
-inconsiderable inheritance to his son. Locke received his education at
-Westminster School, and Christ Church, Oxford. While an undergraduate he
-was chosen to write a welcome on the occasion of a visit which Cromwell
-paid to that University, just after the conclusion of his peace with the
-Dutch. This he did in a laudatory copy of verses in English and Latin,
-comparing the great Protector to Julius for warlike, and to Augustus for
-peaceful, accomplishments. This and some Latin verses, prefixed to a
-work of Sydenham’s, are Locke’s only poetical attempts. There is little
-merit in either. He was a great admirer of the meagre verse of Sir
-Richard Blackmore, which is no great evidence of his poetical taste.
-Between the degrees of Bachelor and Master of Arts he was elected
-Student of his college. From that time he applied himself diligently,
-for many years, to the study of medicine, without, however, practising
-it as a matter of gain. The weakness of his health probably gave this
-turn to his thoughts: his brother died of consumption; and he himself
-was apprehensive through life of falling a victim to the same disease.
-In 1664 he went abroad as secretary to Sir W. Swan, envoy to the court
-of Brandenburg; and on his return to Oxford the year following, he
-applied himself to the discovery of the effects of the air on the human
-frame. His first work, published in 1667, was a register of the
-variations in the atmosphere, determined between certain periods by the
-common instruments, as a supplement to a work by Boyle.
-
-He was amusing himself with such enquiries, when one of the slight but
-important accidents of life brought him an acquaintance, whose influence
-determined his future course. A friend, being obliged to take a journey,
-desired Locke to make his excuses to Lord Ashley (afterwards Earl of
-Shaftesbury) for not having procured for him some mineral waters against
-his arrival in Oxford. When Lord Ashley did arrive, Locke carried this
-message to him. They were mutually pleased with each other, and this
-acquaintance speedily grew up into a strict friendship. Locke’s advice
-determined Lord Ashley to submit to a surgical operation, by which, it
-is said, the life of the patient was saved; and he was received into the
-house, and practised his profession in the family and amongst a few
-private friends of his noble patron. While living in this way, his
-thoughts were turned into the channel of politics by the advice of his
-new associates; and, taking up that study earnestly, he was soon able to
-advise and assist Ashley in all his plans of state, becoming at the same
-time the referee of his private affairs. This warm friendship is
-singular, considering the purity of Locke’s life, and the notoriously
-bad character, public and private, of his noble patron. But the latter
-was an eloquent orator, and an admirable talker; and it was probably
-this latter quality which attached Locke so much. He had so great an
-esteem for good conversation, as to give it a first place in the
-formation of a man’s mind, calling books the raw material, and social
-talk, with meditation, the true architects of our mental constructions.
-In 1668 Locke attended the Earl and Countess of Northumberland to
-France. But some accident caused him soon to return to his old residence
-with Shaftesbury, for whom he drew up the fundamental laws of Carolina,
-which had just been granted to him and other lords. Two of the articles
-of this settlement gave great offence to the clergy, and were expunged.
-They are remarkable, and should be mentioned. One was, “That no man that
-doth not acknowledge a God, and that God publicly worshipped, should be
-a freeman or inhabitant of Carolina.” The other was a proposition, that
-any seven persons agreeing in a form of worship should be esteemed a
-church, and be supported by the state. The Church of England, however,
-was alone established in that colony. In 1671 Locke began to form his
-great Essay on the Human Understanding; but his engagements with
-Shaftesbury prevented its immediate completion. The year following, his
-patron becoming Chancellor, Locke was made secretary of presentations,
-which office he speedily lost on the partial disgrace of the Earl, who,
-still remaining President of the Board of Trade, appointed him secretary
-to a commission of inquiry into the state of trade, and the colonial
-plantations. This office he also lost in the same manner, upon Lord
-Shaftesbury’s total disgrace in 1674.
-
-Having retained his studentship, Locke then retired to Oxford, partly
-for his health’s sake, and partly to pursue his old medical studies. He
-took the degree of Bachelor of Medicine in this year. It appears that he
-continued to pay some attention to these studies until an advanced age:
-for in 1697 he communicated to the Royal Society the history of a
-curious case which he had seen at the great hospital of La Charité,
-during his residence in Paris. In 1675, in hope of obtaining relief from
-an asthmatical complaint, he went to Montpellier. There was also another
-reason for this journey. He had just published an anonymous pamphlet for
-Shaftesbury, blaming the conduct of the House of Lords in the matter of
-the Test Act, containing a vehement abuse of the bishops, and of what he
-called their favourite doctrine, “the divine right” of kings and
-priests. This pamphlet does not appear in the folio edition of his
-works; it was anonymous, like most of his other productions. The odium
-consequent upon it made his absence from England expedient, if not
-necessary. During his stay abroad Locke kept a journal of what he saw,
-did, and thought. In it we find the heads of many of his future works,
-which are very concise and valuable; but the narrative is dry, and the
-attempts at humour not very successful: he seems however to have been as
-observant of what relates to the external world, as he was of the
-intellectual. In 1679, Shaftesbury, on being made President of the
-Council, summoned Locke to England. But the old statesman’s favour was
-short lived: he was committed to the Tower in July, 1681, and soon after
-his release, retired to Holland, where he died in January, 1683. Locke
-accompanied him, and continued his faithful services until death. For
-seventeen years he had been Shaftesbury’s constant partizan and adviser;
-and the odium attached to that nobleman clung to himself, and prevented
-his return to England for many years. In 1683 he was reported by the
-English envoy at the Hague to be on terms of intimacy with the
-malcontents in Holland; upon which the secretary (Sunderland) wrote to
-Dr. Fell, the Dean of Christ Church, ordering his expulsion from
-college. This mandate was not immediately complied with: the Dean
-declared that for many years he had watched the conduct of Locke, and
-even tried to entrap him into an exposure of his political sentiments,
-but had always found him too wary. He allowed Locke time to come and
-defend himself, which he would not do, and then expelled him from his
-studentship.
-
-On the accession of James II., William Penn, the quaker of Pennsylvania,
-being in some favour with the King, would have procured a pardon for
-Locke, but he refused the offer, through a friend, as having been guilty
-of no crime. In May, 1685, the English ambassador demanded him of the
-States-General, of the pretext that he was concerned in the unsuccessful
-expedition of the Duke of Monmouth. It is supposed that he owed this bad
-turn partly to the malice of the envoy himself, as his name did not
-appear in the list of those required which was sent from England. He
-neither liked the person nor the invasion of the duke, and was at
-Utrecht when the armament of that unfortunate nobleman sailed from the
-Texel. Locke was not given up, but was obliged to hide himself for about
-a year in the house of his friend M. Veen, at Amsterdam, receiving
-assurance from the local authorities that timely warning should be given
-him of pressing danger. He was obliged to conceal himself so closely as
-only to take his exercise during the night. It is probable that the real
-cause of this persecution was his first letter on Toleration, written in
-Latin about this time, and addressed to his friend Limborch, the
-sentiments of which were peculiarly offensive to the English court.
-
-Locke had now time to attend to his own affairs, being no longer taken
-up with those of a patron. He busied himself in the completion of his
-Essay concerning Human Understanding, which was not, however, printed
-till 1689. The extracting of passages from various works for reviewal in
-Le Clerc’s literary journal, the Bibliothèque Universelle, the formation
-and continuation of a small society for the weekly discussion of all
-subjects, the members of which were his friends Le Clerc, Limborch,
-Guenelon, and others, and the abridgment of his Essay, served to fill up
-his time during the remainder of his stay in Holland. In 1689 he
-published a second letter on Toleration, and early in the same year
-returned to his native country in the fleet which conducted the Princess
-of Orange to the throne of England. The Revolution had completely
-changed the face of affairs in Locke’s favour; he was considered a
-martyr to its principles, and was esteemed accordingly by its authors.
-On his return he immediately petitioned William to cause him to be
-reinstated in his studentship; but the College refused to restore him,
-offering at the same time to make him a supernumerary student. This he
-would not accept; because he felt it not to be a full reparation of the
-injustice he had suffered. He allowed the matter to drop.
-
-If Locke had been ambitious, his path to political advancement was now
-open. William offered him the ambassadorship to the Imperial Court, or
-to that of Brandenburg. He refused both these high appointments; but
-accepted a Commissionership of Appeals from his friend Lord Mordaunt,
-afterwards Earl of Peterborough. This office was worth only £200 a year.
-His friends Sir Francis and Lady Masham (a daughter of the celebrated
-Cudworth) prevailed on him to take apartments in their house at Oates in
-Essex; between which place and his office in London he spent the
-remainder of his life. In 1690 Locke published his Treatise on Civil
-Government. The folio edition of his Essay, and a Letter on Education,
-appeared in the latter part of the same year. In 1692 he produced a
-third Letter on Toleration. The state of the coinage being a subject of
-great importance at that time, he took it into consideration, and
-published ‘Certain Thoughts on the State of English Silver Money, &c.,’
-in a letter to a member of parliament. This treatise was thought so
-good, that when the matter was inquired into by the government, Locke
-was consulted, and his advice taken with respect to the new coinage. In
-consequence of this important assistance, he received from William III.
-a Commissionership of Foreign Trade and Plantations, the value of which
-was £1000 a year. The King was exceedingly desirous of a comprehension
-with the dissenters, and to forward his views Locke wrote his
-‘Reasonableness of Christianity.’ This book involved him in a religious
-controversy with Dr. Edwards, who attacked its opinions in his ‘Socinian
-Unmasked,’ to which Locke replied by two vindications, each of them
-longer than the original work. No sooner had he finished this labour
-than he was called upon to encounter a fresh and more able antagonist.
-Toland and some other Unitarians having turned to their own use some of
-the arguments in Locke’s Essay, Dr. Stillingfleet, the learned Bishop of
-Worcester, confounded Locke with that party. In his defence of the
-doctrine of the Trinity the Bishop severely censured various passages of
-Locke’s great work, as tending to subvert some of the fundamental
-doctrines of Christianity; Locke replied, and there was an alternation
-of answers between them till the Bishop’s death. That event took place
-soon after Locke’s third answer, which was the last thing he ever
-published. These replies of Locke are reputed to be most finished
-specimens of a grave and subtle irony, too refined perhaps to be
-generally perceived by the uninitiated eye.
-
-In 1700 Locke’s weak state of health induced him to retire from public
-life. He resigned his situation in a personal interview with the King,
-giving no previous notice of his intention to the conductors of the
-government, and refusing the pension which his master wished him to
-accept. He took up his residence at Oates, where he passed the remainder
-of his life in reading and contemplating the Scriptures. He often
-regretted that he had not more occupied himself in this study. The piety
-of his latter years was without formality or ostentation, not arising
-from that sense of disappointment, or irksomeness for want of
-employment, which often leads men to seek refuge in a late devotion.
-Neither Locke’s mental nor bodily senses failed him to his last moments,
-though the year before his death was passed in extreme weakness. On
-taking the sacrament he declared “that he was in peace with all men, and
-in sincere union with the Church of Christ, by whatever name
-distinguished.” The affectionate attentions of Lady Masham softened the
-pain of his last illness, and he died gently in his chair while she was
-reading to him one of the Psalms of David, October 28, 1704, in his
-seventy-third year. He died, unmarried, from the natural decay of an
-originally weak constitution. He was buried in the churchyard at High
-Laver, near Oates, under a decent monument. His epitaph had been written
-some years before, by himself, in Latin[3]. He left behind him many
-unpublished works, among which his ‘Conduct of the Understanding’ stands
-highest. ‘An Examination of Malebranche’s opinion of seeing all things
-in God; ‘A Discourse of Miracles;’ part of a fourth letter on the
-subject of Toleration; some imperfect memorial sketches of the life of
-the Earl of Shaftesbury; a new method for a commonplace-book; and
-paraphrases of several of the epistles of St. Paul, make up the list of
-his posthumous works, almost all of which were translated into French by
-Le Clerc and others, and appeared (together with those published by
-himself) in three folio volumes, not many years after his death. A great
-many of his letters to his friends Molyneux and Limborch are also
-published in this edition. There remain many more which have been given
-to the world by various hands, addressed to the Earl of Peterborough,
-Dr. Mapletoft, &c., and to Newton. In Lord King’s life of Locke his
-correspondence with the latter is given at full length, and is very
-curious,—chiefly relating to subjects they were both engaged in, the
-prophecies and miracles.
-
-Footnote 3:
-
-  “Siste, viator; juxta situs est J. L. Si qualis fuerit rogas,
-  mediocritate suâ contentum se vixisse respondet. Literis innutritus
-  eousque tantum profecit ut veritati unicà studeret. Hoc ex scriptis
-  illius disce; quæ, quod de eo reliquum est, majori fide tibi
-  exhibebunt, quam epitaphii suspecta elogia. Virtutis si quas habuit,
-  minores sane quam quas sibi laudi, tibi in exemplum proponeret. Vitia
-  una sepeliantur. Morum exemplum si quæras, in evangelio habes
-  (vitiorum utinam nusquam), mortalis certè quod prosit hic et ubique.
-  Natum . . . . Mortuum . . . . Memorat hac tabula brevi et ipsa
-  interitura.”
-
-That which has assured to Locke imperishable fame is the ‘Essay
-concerning Human Understanding.’ This great work, however, met with
-considerable obloquy at first: the heads of colleges at Oxford even
-endeavoured to prevent its being read in their University. The Essay is
-in the hands of all; the writings of its opponents, comparatively
-speaking, are forgotten. It will be generally admitted, that in it Locke
-laid the foundation of modern metaphysical philosophy.
-
-Two of Locke’s chief works, the ‘Treatise on Civil Government,’ and
-‘Essay on Education,’ are more capable of a short analysis. The former
-may be taken as an expression of his own opinions in defence of the
-Revolution. It is divided into two parts. The first contains an exposure
-of the fallacies of Sir Robert Filmer’s ‘Patriarcha,’ arguing that Adam
-had not such natural or gifted right of dominion as Filmer pretends;
-that if he had, his heirs had not; that if they had, yet there is no
-general law, divine or human, which determines the right of succession,
-much less of bearing rule; lastly, that if such right had been
-determined, yet the eldest line from Adam being unknown, no man can
-pretend more than another to that right of inheritance; consequently,
-that some other source of political power must be found than “Adam’s
-private dominion and paternal jurisdiction.” Locke proceeds in the
-second part to declare his opinion as to what this other source may be.
-He argues, that originally the executive power was in the hands of each
-individual; but, by mutual consent, for mutual benefit, as men grew into
-societies, political power was created, and given to persons chosen from
-the whole body by the major part of such societies. He protests against
-absolute power, as not expressing the will of the majority; but defends
-prerogative, as a discretionary power lodged in the hands of the
-executive government. He maintains that this compact must be held
-sacred, but reverts to the society if its duration was declared
-temporary, or upon the misconduct of rulers or delegates. When
-forfeited, the will of the society may create new forms of government;
-or, under the old form, continue it in other hands.
-
-The Essay on Education is expressly for the use of gentlemen, since “if
-that class be properly tended the rest will follow of course.” The
-child, he says, should have much air and exercise, should be accustomed
-to little sleep and early habits. That superstitious terrors, and the
-frequent use of the rod should be carefully avoided; that the boy should
-be used to suffer pain gradually, to harden him, but not as a
-punishment; that the parents’ authority should be perfect over the
-child, and be gradually taken off, till the relation between them
-becomes a confiding friendship; that particular attention be paid to his
-manners, so that his courage, learning, wit, plainness, and good-nature,
-do not turn to brutality, pedantry, buffoonery, rusticity, and fawning.
-He says, that the child’s curiosity should be encouraged; that he should
-learn by games, and his attainments never be forced; that he should not
-be left to flounder in difficulties, but helped through them. Locke
-prefers a careful tutor to a public school: he says that a boy stands a
-better chance of being both virtuous and well-bred under the care of the
-former. What he should know is Latin, Greek, a little mathematics, how
-to keep accounts; the less of logic the better; he should write a good
-hand; and a virtuous youth so bred, “one may turn loose into the world
-with great assurance that he will find employment and esteem
-everywhere.” He further recommends that the boy should travel between
-the ages of eight and sixteen, rather than between sixteen and twenty
-one; and that when he comes of age he had better not marry according to
-the usual custom, but wait some years, that his children “may not tread
-too closely on his heels.”
-
-The habit of Locke’s mind was perhaps originally severe; but from
-constant social intercourse with men of all characters and opinions, was
-rendered mild and equable. Nothing seems to have provoked him into a
-loss of temper so much as being forced into argument with professed
-logicians. He calls the logical method taught at Oxford an ill, if not
-the worst way of acquiring knowledge and seeking truth. He was fond of
-the society of children, and would enter into the enjoyments of riper
-youth with facility. He was entrusted by his patron with the education
-and marriage of his son, who was the father of the author of the
-‘Characteristics.’ The latter nobleman (the third Earl of Shaftesbury)
-owed much to Locke’s care, and was his eulogist.
-
-Locke was of a cautious if not timid disposition. This appears from many
-of his letters, and may be inferred from the anonymous publication of
-most of his writings. His weak health, the political persecution to
-which he was exposed during great part of his life, and the discipline
-to which he was subjected in childhood, which was strict and severe, in
-some measure account for this failing. His friendships were very steady;
-witness his close adherence to his patron Shaftesbury. Sydenham’s
-contemporary and friendly character of Locke is remarkable: he says, in
-a prefatory letter to one of his works, that “if we consider his genius,
-his penetrating and exact judgment, and the strictness of his morals, he
-has scarcely any superior, and few equals now living.”
-
-[Illustration: [Reverse of a French Medal of Locke.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by Rob^t. Hart._
-
-  SELDEN.
-
-  _From a Picture attributed to Sir Peter Lely in the Bodleian Library,
-    Oxford._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                SELDEN.
-
-
-John Selden was born at Salvington, a hamlet of Tarring, near Worthing,
-in the county of Sussex, December 16, 1584 (O.S.). His father, according
-to Wood, “was a sufficient plebeian,” who, through some skill in music,
-obtained as his wife Margaret Baker, a daughter of a knightly family of
-the county of Kent. The baptism of his eminent son, as well as his own
-musical talents, are noticed in an existing parish registry in these
-words: “1584.—Johnne, sonne of John Selden, the minstrell, was baptised
-the XXX^{th} day of December.” The house in which the family lived was
-called Lacies, and the estate of the father consisted, in 1606, of
-eighty-one acres, of the annual value of about twenty-three pounds. John
-Selden, the son, received his early education at the Free Grammar-School
-of Chichester. At the age of fourteen he entered at Hart Hall, Oxford.
-After residing four years at the University, he was admitted, in 1602, a
-member of Clifford’s Inn, one of the dependencies of the greater inns of
-court, in which students of law were formerly accustomed to commence
-their legal education. He removed in May, 1604, to the Inner Temple. His
-attention appears to have been early drawn to the study of civil and
-legal history, and antiquities; he did not court the more active
-business of his profession, and his employment at the bar was limited.
-In 1607, he prepared for the press his first work, entitled ‘Analectωn
-Anglo-Britannicωn,’ being a collection of civil and ecclesiastical
-matters relating to Britain, of a date anterior to the Norman conquest.
-This was soon followed by three other works of a similar character, and
-in 1614 he printed his ‘Treatise upon Titles of Honour.’ The last of
-these works has been considered in our courts of law to be of great
-authority, and has been usually spoken of with much commendation.
-Pursuing his legal inquiries, he edited, in 1616, two treatises, one of
-Sir John Fortescue, the other of Sir Ralph Hengham, and in the same year
-wrote a ‘Discourse on the Office of Lord Chancellor.’ In the next year
-he printed a work, ‘De Diis Syris,’ which added to his celebrity, but is
-not compiled with that attention to the value of the respective
-authorities cited, so essentially necessary to the accurate
-consideration of historical questions. His next work was a ‘History of
-Tithes,’ printed in 1618, which excited against him the bitter hostility
-of the clergy. The doctrine of divine right, as the foundation of many
-ecclesiastical claims, was at this time jealously maintained, and was
-considered to be peculiarly connected with the right of the clergy to
-tithes. Selden drew no direct conclusion against the divine nature of
-the right to tithes, but he had so arranged his authorities as to render
-such a conclusion inevitable. The nature only of the title was
-contested, and so far from the clergy having had any reason to look upon
-Selden as an enemy, he in fact strengthened their claim to tithes by
-placing it upon the same footing as any ordinary title to property. As
-soon as the ‘History’ appeared it was attacked. The High Commission
-Court summoned Selden before it, and to this tribunal he was compelled
-to apologise. The terms of his submission very accurately state the
-offence, and are expressive of regret that “he had offered any occasion
-of argument against any right of maintenance _jure divino_ of the
-ministers of the gospel.” The work received several answers, but Selden
-was forbidden by James I., under a threat of imprisonment, to notice
-them. “All that will,” said he, “have liberty, and some use it, to write
-and preach what they will against me, to abuse my name, my person, my
-profession, with as many falsehoods as they please, and my hands are
-tied: I must not so much as answer their calumnies. I am so far from
-writing more, that I have scarce ventured for my own safety so much as
-to say they abuse me, though I know it.”
-
-Hardly had this storm passed, when he became involved in the disputes
-between the Crown and the House of Commons. One of the earliest steps of
-that body, upon the convocation of Parliament in 1621, was to present a
-remonstrance on the state of public affairs. This was succeeded by the
-memorable protestation of December 18, in which the liberty of the
-subject was asserted, and the right of the Commons to offer advice to
-the Crown was insisted on. This protestation was erased from the
-journals of the House by the King’s own hands, and the parliament was
-dissolved. Selden, whose advice, though he was not then a member, had
-been requested by the House in this dispute, was in consequence
-imprisoned, and detained in confinement five weeks. His release was
-owing to the intercession of Bishop Williams, who represented him to be
-“a man who hath excellent parts, which might be diverted from an
-affectation of pleasing idle people to do some good and useful service
-to his Majesty.” On his release, he dedicated to Williams his edition of
-Eadmer’s contemporary ‘History of England, from the Norman Conquest to
-the death of Henry I.,’ which he had prepared for the press during his
-confinement.
-
-When the next parliament assembled in 1624, Selden sat in it as member
-for the borough of Lancaster. Though nominated upon several committees,
-he took no active share in the general business of the House. About this
-time also he was appointed one of the readers of the Inner Temple; but
-he refused the office, and was in consequence for some time disabled to
-be advanced to the rank of a bencher of the inn. Upon the accession of
-Charles I. a new parliament was called, in which Selden sat for the
-borough of Great Bedwin. This parliament was almost immediately
-dissolved, and another summoned, to which Selden was again returned for
-the same borough as before. The Commons immediately entered upon a
-consideration of the conduct of the Duke of Buckingham, and his
-impeachment being resolved on, Selden was one of the members appointed
-to prepare the articles, and was named a manager for their prosecution.
-These proceedings were stopped by another dissolution of parliament in
-June, 1626. But the necessities of the Crown requiring those supplies
-which parliament refused without a redress of grievances, forced loans
-were resorted to in the exercise of certain pretended owners of the
-prerogative. In several instances these loans were refused; among others
-by Sir Edward Hampden, who was imprisoned in consequence: and the
-illegality of his commitment was very ably argued by Selden in the
-King’s Bench. In the third parliament, called by Charles I. in 1628,
-Selden sat for the borough of Ludgershall; and in the debates which
-immediately took place upon illegal commitments, the levy of tonnage and
-poundage, and the preparation of the Petition of Rights, he took a very
-active share. The attack upon the Duke of Buckingham was renewed, and it
-was proposed by Selden, that judgment should be demanded against him
-upon the impeachment of the former parliament. As affecting a great
-constitutional question, only finally determined in 1791, of the
-continuance of impeachments, notwithstanding a dissolution of
-parliament, the suggestion was remarkable. Further proceedings were,
-however, stopped by the assassination of the Duke.
-
-During the prorogation of parliament, Selden again devoted himself to
-literary pursuits. The Earl of Arundel, a great lover and promoter of
-the arts, had received from the east many ancient marbles, having on
-them Greek inscriptions. At the request of Sir Robert Cotton, these
-inscriptions were transcribed under the superintendence of Selden, and
-were published under the title of ‘Marmora Arundeliana.’ In January,
-1629, parliament again assembled, and the debates upon public grievances
-were renewed. The goods of several merchants, in the interval of the
-meeting of parliament, had been seized by the Crown, to satisfy a claim
-to the duty of tonnage and poundage. Among the sufferers was Rolls, a
-member of the House. It was moved, that the seizure of his goods was a
-breach of privilege. When the question was to be put, the Speaker said
-“he durst not, for that the King had commanded to the contrary.” Selden
-immediately rose, and vehemently complained of this conduct: “Dare you
-not, Mr. Speaker, to put the question when we command you. If you will
-not put it, we must sit still: thus, we shall never be able to do any
-thing. They that come after you may say, that they have the King’s
-commands not to do it. We sit here by the command of the King under the
-great seal, and you are, by his Majesty, sitting in his royal chair
-before both houses, appointed for our Speaker, and now refuse to do your
-office.” The House then adjourned in a state of great excitement. When
-it re-assembled, the Speaker was called upon to put the question, and
-again refused. On this Holles and Valentine thrust the Speaker into the
-chair, and held him down, while Sir Miles Hobart locked the door of the
-house and took possession of the key. A declaration was then produced by
-Sir John Elliot, which Colonel Stroud moved should be read, and himself
-put the question. The motion was declared to be carried; and the
-Speaker, refusing to act upon it, was charged by Sir P. Heyman with
-cutting up the liberty of the subject by the roots. Selden moved that
-the declaration should be read by the clerk, which was agreed to. The
-House then adjourned to a day, previous to which the King came to the
-House of Lords and dissolved the parliament, on account of “the
-undutiful and seditious carriage of the Lower House,” without the
-attendance of the Commons. Selden, and the other members concerned in
-the violence offered to the Speaker, were committed to prison. This was
-his last and most rigorous confinement. For some time he was denied the
-use of pens, ink, paper, and books. When, after many weeks had elapsed,
-he was brought up with the other prisoners before the King’s Bench upon
-a writ of _habeas corpus_, their discharge was offered upon condition of
-their finding bail for their good behaviour. “We demand,” said Selden,
-“to be bailed in point of right; and if it be not grantable of right, we
-do not demand it. But finding sureties for good behaviour is a point of
-discretion merely, and we cannot assent to it without great offence to
-the parliament where these matters, which are surmised by the return,
-were acted.” They were remanded, and remained for a long time in prison,
-where Elliot, one of the ablest members of the popular party, fell a
-victim to his confinement. In 1634, Selden was suffered to go at large
-upon bail, which was discontinued upon his petition to the Crown. During
-his imprisonment he wrote a treatise, ‘De Successionibus in Bona
-Defuncti ad Leges Ebræorum,’ and another, ‘De Successione in
-Pontificatum Ebræorum.’ Both those works he dedicated to Archbishop
-Laud; probably upon account of his being indebted to the Archbishop for
-the loan of books. Not long after the recovery of his liberty, Selden
-obtained the favour of Charles I., and dedicated to him his celebrated
-essay on the ‘Mare Clausum,’ an argument in favour of the dominion of
-the English over the four seas, copies of which were, by order of the
-Privy Council, directed to be placed in the council chest, the Court of
-Exchequer, and the Court of Admiralty.
-
-To the Long Parliament, which commenced its sittings in 1640, Selden was
-unanimously returned by the University of Oxford; but neither this new
-connexion with the clergy, nor the favour of Charles, appears to have
-affected his opinions. Upon the first day of the sitting of parliament
-he was nominated a member of the committee to inquire into the abuses of
-the Earl Marshal’s Court, and was appointed with others to draw up a
-remonstrance upon the state of the nation. He also sat upon the
-committees which conducted the measures preparatory to the impeachment
-of the Earl of Strafford, but he was not one of the managers before the
-House of Lords; and his name was posted in Old Palace Yard as one of
-“the enemies of justice,” a title given to those who were regarded as
-favourable to the Earl. It is not very clear what his opinions upon the
-impeachment were. That he should have been satisfied with all the steps
-taken by his party is not possible, for his opinions were undoubtedly
-moderate, and his studious habits must have checked any disposition to
-violence. He was also nominated to frame the articles of impeachment
-against Laud, and was a party to the resolutions against the legislative
-powers of the bishops. The court, however, appears to have considered
-him favourable to its interests, until he spoke against the commission
-of array. Upon this question, Clarendon represents the influence of his
-opinion upon the public to have been very prejudicial to Charles I.
-About this time the great seal was offered to him. He declined it,
-according to Clarendon, on account of his love of ease, and “that he
-would not have made a journey to York or have been out of his own bed
-for any preferment.” The reason which he himself assigned for refusing
-it, was the impossibility of his rendering any service to the Crown. He
-sat as member of the Assembly of Divines at Westminster, and took the
-covenant; yet he was not well affected to the Puritans, and declared
-that “he was neither mad enough nor fool enough to deserve the name of
-Puritan.” Upon the death of Dr. Eden, Master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge,
-in August, 1645, Selden was elected his successor, but declined to
-accept the office. About this time he appears to have gradually
-withdrawn from public business. His fondness of ease and his increasing
-age, and the silence he preserved upon many important events, all
-contribute to leave the inference of his approval or disapproval of much
-of the conduct of the parliamentary leaders open to adverse parties. He
-certainly never openly abandoned the popular side, nor does he appear to
-have forfeited its respect; and yet at the same time he continued to be
-esteemed by many of the leading Royalists.
-
-The studies of Selden were continued to the latest period of his life,
-and he was near the age of seventy when his last work was published. The
-influence he possessed with the parliamentary leaders was frequently
-exerted in favour of letters. When Archbishop Laud’s endowment of the
-professorship of Arabic in the University of Oxford, was seized, on the
-attainder of that prelate, he procured its restitution. Archbishop Usher
-having preached against the divines of Westminster, and excited their
-anger, was punished by the confiscation of his library. Selden
-interfered, and saved it from sale and dispersion. When prelacy was
-abolished, the library attached to the see of Canterbury was by his
-efforts transferred to the University of Cambridge, where it remained
-until the Restoration. Through his entreaties, Whitelocke was induced to
-accept the charge of the medals and books at St. James’s, and thus
-secured their preservation. The services which he rendered to the
-University of Oxford were no less valuable, and were acknowledged in
-grateful terms by that learned body; and it was through his interference
-that the papers and instruments of Graves, the Professor of Mathematics,
-which had been seized by a party of soldiers, were restored.
-
-Selden died November 30, 1654, and was buried in the Temple church. He
-left behind him no immediate relations, and he bequeathed nearly the
-whole of his fortune, amounting to nearly 40,000_l._, to his four
-executors, giving only one hundred pounds to each of the children of his
-sister, the wife of John Barnard, of Goring. His books and manuscripts
-he had originally given by his will to the University of Oxford; but
-that body having demanded of him a heavy bond for the restitution of a
-book which he desired to borrow from the public library, the bequest was
-struck out, and they were directed to be placed “in some convenient
-public library or college in one of the universities.” Sir M. Hale and
-his other executors, considering that they were the executors “of his
-will, and not of his passion,” transferred them to the Bodleian Library
-at Oxford.
-
-To learned men Selden was liberal and generous; and there is a letter
-from Casaubon in Parr’s ‘Life of Archbishop Usher,’ in which that
-distinguished scholar with great feeling says, “I was with Mr. Selden
-after I had been with your Grace, whom, upon some intimation of my
-present condition and necessities, I found so noble, as that he did not
-only presently furnish me with a very considerable sum of money, but was
-so free and forward in his expressions, as that I could not find in my
-heart to tell him much (somewhat I did) of my intention of selling, lest
-it should sound as a farther pressing upon him of whom I had received so
-much.”
-
-Milton terms Selden “the chief of learned men reputed in this land;” and
-Whitelocke states, “that his mind was as great as his learning, being
-very generous and hospitable.” Clarendon, who could not regard Selden
-with any political partiality, though he had in early life been on terms
-of intimacy with him, describes him to have been “a person whom no
-character can flatter or transmit in any expressions equal to his merit
-or virtue. He was of so stupendous learning in all kinds and in all
-languages (as may appear in his excellent and transcendent writings),
-that a man would have thought he had been entirely conversant among
-books, and had never spent an hour but in reading and writing; yet his
-humanity, courtesy, and affability were such, that he would have been
-thought to have been bred in the best courts, but that his good nature,
-charity, and delight in doing good, and in communicating all he knew,
-exceeded that breeding.”
-
-The motto adopted by Selden was περὶ παντὸς τὴν ἐλευθερίαν (above all
-things, liberty), and it is to be found neatly written upon the first
-page of many of his MSS. Its spirit he extended to religious questions;
-and there are many bold and vigorous passages in his writings in which
-the necessity of freedom of inquiry upon all subjects is strongly
-insisted on. Noticing upon one occasion a certain class of ancient
-philosophers, he remarks, “He who takes to himself their liberty of
-inquiry, is in the only way that, in all kinds of studies, leads and
-lies open even to the sanctuary of truth; while others, that are servile
-to common opinion and vulgar suppositions, can rarely hope to be
-admitted nearer than into the base-court of her temple, which too
-speciously often counterfeits her innermost sanctuary.” His religious
-opinions have, with much impropriety, been the subject of dispute. They
-have been chiefly inferred from several passages of a work published
-after his death, entitled ‘Selden’s Table Talk.’ From the nature of his
-studies, his writings are far from being popular, and are, in
-consequence, now but little read. They obtained, however, for their
-author, during an age abounding with illustrious and learned men, an
-honourable reputation, among the most distinguished literary men of
-continental Europe, as well as among those of his own country. His works
-were edited by Dr. Wilkins, in 3 vols. folio, in 1726, to which a Latin
-‘Life of the Author’ is prefixed.
-
-[Illustration: [Gallery of the Arundel Marbles.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by W. Holl._
-
-  A. PARÉ.
-
-  _From the original Picture, in “L’École de Médecine,” at Paris._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                 PARÉ.
-
-
-Ambroise Paré, the father of French surgery, and one of the most useful
-as well as the earliest of the innovators upon that art as practised by
-the ancients, was born at Laval, in the district of Maine, in the year
-1509. After going through the rudiments of education, he was placed at
-an early age under the tuition of the chaplain Orsoy, in his native
-town, to be instructed in the classics; but the means of his family
-appear to have been very narrow, or the economy with which they were
-supplied must have been strict; for we find that the worthy chaplain was
-obliged to make use of the services of his pupil in grooming his mule
-and other menial capacities, in order to eke out the scanty remuneration
-he received for his instructions. In truth, these do not appear to have
-been great; for Paré never achieved a knowledge of Greek, and was but
-superficially acquainted with the Latin language; and it is probable
-that even this small amount of classical acquirement was made at a late
-period of his life, when, being an author, he wished to quote.
-
-On leaving his tutor, he was placed with a barber-surgeon at Laval,
-named Vialot, who is recorded to have taught him how to bleed. Not long
-after this change in his pursuits, the lithotomist, Laurent Colot, came
-to Laval to undertake the treatment of one of the chaplain’s
-ecclesiastical brethren: on this occasion, Paré was present, and
-zealously assisted at the operation. This accidental circumstance
-appears to have suggested to him the ambitious project of following the
-higher departments of surgery; and he contrived to leave the shop of his
-master in phlebotomy, and repaired to Paris, where he availed himself
-with so much diligence of the advantages afforded by that city, as a
-school of anatomy and medicine, that he was soon entrusted with the
-subordinate charge of the patients of Goupil, who then held the surgical
-chair in the college of France. From this discerning tutor he learned
-not only all the knowledge which could at that time be obtained from
-secondary sources, but the art of expressing himself well, and
-acquitting himself of his duties with neatness and grace. The talents
-thus acquired were of the greatest service to him in his after-life,
-which was chiefly passed among the great; and gave him that ease of
-manner and power of gaining confidence, which stood him so frequently in
-stead as court-surgeon to four successive monarchs, and, aiding the
-natural frankness of his character, carried him safely through many an
-intrigue and cabal, dangerous not only to his reputation and fortunes,
-but even to his life. He was never a member of the community of
-barber-surgeons, but derived his legal qualification to practise from a
-degree in surgery taken at the college of St. Edme, of which he was
-afterwards Provost.
-
-Having passed upwards of three years as a student, residing actually
-within the walls of the Hotel Dieu at Paris, he was appointed
-Staff-surgeon, in 1536, when twenty-seven years old, to the Mareschal
-René de Monte-jean, who commanded the infantry under the Constable
-Montmorenci in the campaign of Piedmont. In this capacity, Paré was
-present at the siege and capture of Turin.
-
-From this time is to be dated the commencement of his acquaintance with
-military surgery, for which he afterwards did so much. “I was then,” he
-says, “very raw and inexperienced, having never seen the treatment of
-gunshot wounds. It is true that I had read in the Treatise of Jean de
-Vigo on wounds in general, that those inflicted by fire-arms partake of
-a poisonous nature on account of the powder, and that they should be
-treated with hot oil of elder mixed with a little theriacum. Seeing,
-therefore, that such an application must needs put the patient to
-extreme pain, to assure myself before I should make use of this boiling
-oil, I desired to see how it was employed by the other surgeons. I found
-their method was to apply it, at the first dressing, as hot as possible,
-within the wound with tents and setons: and this I made bold to do
-likewise. At length my oil failed me, and I was fain to substitute a
-digestive, made of the yolks of eggs, rose-oil, and turpentine. At night
-I could not rest in my bed in peace, fearing that I should find the
-wounded, in whose cases I had been compelled to abstain from using this
-cautery, dead of poison: this apprehension made me rise very early in
-the morning to visit them; but beyond all my hopes, I found those to
-whom I had applied the digestive suffering little pain, and their wounds
-free from inflammation; and they had been refreshed by sleep in the
-night. On the contrary, I found those to whom the aforesaid oil had been
-applied, feverish, in great pain, and with swelling and inflammation
-round their wounds. I resolved, therefore, that I would never burn
-unfortunate sufferers from gunshot in that cruel manner again.”
-
-Such was the casual origin of one of Paré’s greatest improvements in
-surgery,—the substitution of a mild treatment for the cautery in gunshot
-wounds; a principle which he afterwards successfully extended to other
-injuries at that time deemed poisonous. The improvement seems as obvious
-as it was important: yet the adherents of the old practice gave him much
-trouble, and even made it necessary for him to defend his wholesome
-innovation long afterwards before Charles IX. in person.
-
-Yet with all his sound sense, Ambroise Paré was not by any means free
-from the credulity of his age. For instance, he relates, in his account
-of this siege, an amusing story of the court he paid to an Italian quack
-doctor, who lived at Turin, to wheedle him out of the secret of a
-dressing for fresh gunshot wounds, for which he had great fame. This was
-found to consist of a mixture of bruised worms, the grease of puppies
-boiled down alive, and other absurd ingredients, constituting the
-celebrated _oleum catellorum_, the only merit of which consists in its
-harmlessness. He is erroneously praised by Dr. Ballingall for having
-banished this unguent from practice, whereas, on the contrary, he
-introduced it; and he shows, by his frequent reference to it in his
-works, that he had no small faith in its virtues, and was exceedingly
-proud of having been the means of its publication.
-
-The death of his patron, the Mareschal, soon after the fall of Turin,
-induced him to return to Paris, though tempted by large offers to remain
-in the camp.
-
-In 1543, he accompanied the Duc de Rohan into Britanny, where Francis I.
-commanded in person against the English; and the next year he followed
-that monarch in his expedition to throw supplies into Landrecy. In 1545,
-he was with the camp at Boulogne, where he cured the general of the
-royal army, Francis Duke of Guise, of a very dangerous wound, which
-gained him great reputation.
-
-In 1552, he attended the Duc de Rohan in his campaign in Germany. During
-this expedition occurred one of those instances of combined humanity and
-skill, which made Paré the favourite of the French army. He thus tells
-the story: “A party had gone out to attack a church, where the peasants
-of the country had fortified themselves, hoping to get some provisions,
-but they came back very soundly beaten; and one especially, a
-captain-lieutenant of the company of the Duke, returned with seven
-gashes in his head, the least of which had penetrated to the inner table
-of the skull, besides four sabre wounds in the arm, and one across the
-shoulder, which divided the shoulder-blade in half. When he was brought
-to quarters, the Duke judged him to be so desperately wounded, that he
-absolutely proposed, as they were to march by daylight, to dig a trench
-for him, and throw him into it, saying, that it was as well that the
-peasants should finish him. But being moved with pity, I told him (says
-Paré), that the captain might yet be cured: many gentlemen of the
-company joined with me in begging that he might be allowed to go with
-the baggage, since I was willing to dress and cure him. This was
-accordingly granted: I dressed him, and put him into a small
-well-covered bed in a cart drawn by one horse. I was at once physician,
-surgeon, apothecary, and cook to him; and, thank God, I did cure him in
-the end, to the admiration of all the troops: and out of their first
-booty, the men-at-arms gave me a crown a-piece, and the archers
-half-a-crown each.”
-
-His reputation was now so high, that no expedition of importance,
-especially if generalled by a prince of the blood, or one of the higher
-nobility, was considered complete without his presence. This was
-accordingly solicited by the old King of Navarre, more commonly called
-the Duc de Vendôme, on an occasion of that kind. But being tired of a
-military life, and disgusted with its cruelties and horrors, he
-endeavoured to evade the proposal, alleging the illness of his wife, and
-other excuses: but the Duke would take no denial; and at last he
-consented to accompany him to the siege of Chateau le Comte. There he
-acquitted himself so well, that upon the warm encomiums of the Duke he
-was received into the service of Henry the Second, in 1552, being then
-but thirty-three years old. From this time he lived at the court, where,
-with other advantages, obtained not less by his behaviour and wit than
-his skill, he enjoyed, though a Huguenot, the especial favour of the
-Queen, Catherine de’ Medici, who was fond of conversing with him in her
-own language, with which Paré had become well acquainted in his Italian
-campaign. She served him powerfully on several important occasions.
-
-Paré, however, still continued to frequent the camp, when any emergency
-seemed to demand his services. Such an occasion occurred at the renowned
-siege of Metz, in the winter of 1552, conducted by Charles V. in person,
-with the Duke of Alva and 120,000 men, against a garrison of 6000, which
-ended, after two months, in the disastrous retreat of the besiegers. The
-defence was most gallantly carried on by the flower of the French army,
-headed by many of the higher noblesse, and several of the princes of the
-blood, under the Duke of Guise. It has been already mentioned that
-gunshot wounds were at that time thought to have something poisonous
-about them; and the severe cold, and other circumstances of that siege,
-being such as unusually to depress and harass the garrison, their wounds
-proved almost uniformly fatal; and the idea arose and gained ground,
-that Charles had ordered his bullets to be actually poisoned. Paré alone
-was thought able to meet the necessity of the case in such an extremity;
-and the demand for his assistance became so pressing in the dispirited
-garrison, that at the instance of the Duke of Guise the King was induced
-to send him. He was stealthily introduced by the treachery of one of
-Charles’s captains, for a bribe of 1500 crowns, and his appearance on
-the ramparts was hailed by the troops with the most extravagant
-expressions of joy. “Now that Paré is with us,” they cried, “we shall
-not perish of our wounds.” Their spirits revived, and the successful
-issue of their arduous struggle is generally ascribed to the presence of
-Paré.
-
-Upon the raising of the siege, of which, as is usual in his writings, he
-gives a most lively and humorous account, Paré returned to court. In
-1553 he was sent on a like errand to the siege of Hesdin, which, after a
-vigorous defence, and against the faith of a capitulation, was pillaged
-by the troops of the Duke of Savoy. Paré was himself one of the
-prisoners, but escaped in disguise after various adventures, and
-returned to Paris; notwithstanding the tempting offers of the Duke of
-Savoy, who had witnessed his skill, though kept in ignorance of his
-name.
-
-He was sent upon many other missions of the same kind; as to the fields
-of St. Quentin and Moncontour; to Rouen, where he attended the Duc de
-Vendôme on occasion of the wound of which he died; and to St. Denys,
-where he performed the same unwelcome duty for the Constable. The long
-intervals of these services he always passed at court, in the enjoyment
-of his well-earned reputation and favour.
-
-On the death of Henry II. in 1559, occasioned by an accident at a
-tournament, Francis II., his eldest son by Catherine de’ Medici,
-succeeded to the crown. He immediately confirmed Paré in his situation
-of surgeon in ordinary and counsellor. It will not be supposed that he
-could enjoy this constant favour and good fortune without the usual
-drawback in the excited jealousy of his professional rivals. Their
-rancour was at length carried to such a pitch, that they gravely accused
-him of causing the premature death of Francis in 1560, by injecting
-poison into his ear under the pretext of treating him for an
-inflammation seated there, of which he died. Catherine, however,
-shielded him from this attack, expressing her complete reliance on his
-integrity as well as his skill, in words which the historians of the
-period have preserved. A similar accusation was brought against him as
-unsuccessfully in the case of Henry III., who was afflicted with the
-same disorder: on which occasion the Queen-Mother again stood forward in
-his behalf, and his innocence was fully attested by the physicians whom
-she had placed about her son, and who had witnessed every application he
-made.
-
-On the death of Francis II. in 1560, Paré maintained his place in the
-household of Charles IX., to whom it was thought he had rendered
-essential service after an injury inflicted on one of the nerves of the
-arm by an unlucky phlebotomist. This misfortune of his humbler brother
-was of great use to Paré, who, though a courtier during the predominance
-of the Guises, openly professed the Protestant faith; for it was
-probably the means of procuring him in Charles the only protector
-powerful enough to save him from being included in the general massacre
-of the Huguenots on St. Bartholomew’s Day. Brantôme and Sully each
-connect his name with that event. The words of the former are as
-follows: “Le Roi quand il fût jour, ayant mis la tête a la fenêtre de sa
-chambre, et qu’il voyait aucuns dans le fauxbourg St. Germain qui se
-remuoient, et se sauvoient, il prit une grande arquebuse de chasse qu’il
-avoit, et en tira tout plein de coups à eux; mais en vain, car
-l’arquebuse ne tiroit si loin; incessamment crioit, ‘Tuez, tuez,’ en
-n’en vouloit sauver aucun si non Maître Ambroise Paré, son premier
-chirurgien, et le premier de la Chrestienté, et l’envoya querir et venir
-le soir dans sa chambre et garde robbe, commandant de n’en bouger; et
-disoit qu’il n’etoit raisonnable qu’un qui pouvoit servir à tout un
-petit monde, fûst ainsi massacré.”
-
-“De tous ceux,” says Sully, “qui approchoient ce prince (Charles IX.) il
-n’y avoit personne qui eut tant de part à sa confiance qu’ Ambroise
-Paré. Cet homme qui n’etoit que son chirurgien, avoit pris avec lui une
-si grande familiarité, quoiqu’il fût Huguenot, que ce prince lui ayant
-dit le jour du massacre que c’etoit à cette heure qu’il falloit que tout
-le monde se fît catholique, Paré lui répondit sans s’étonner, ‘Par la
-lumière de Dieu, Sire, je crois qu’il vous souvient m’avoir promis de ne
-me commander jamais quatre choses; sçavoir, de rentre dans le ventre de
-ma mère, de me trouver à un jour de bataille, de quitter votre service,
-et d’aller à la messe.’”
-
-Paré still retained his situation after the accession of Henry III. in
-1574; but he seems to have resigned the cares of active life about that
-time, and we hear little more of him. He died December 2, 1590, in the
-eighty-first year of his life, and was buried in the church of St. André
-des Arcs in Paris.
-
-Paré appears to have been a man of quick and independent observation
-rather than of reflection or genius. His constitution was vigorous, and
-fitted no less for social enjoyments than active business: his person
-was manly and graceful, his spirits buoyant, and his disposition
-remarkably amiable and attractive; hence he was a universal favourite,
-particularly in a despotic court, of which the dullness was agreeably
-relieved by his frankness, and his powers of humour and repartee. The
-amusing and well-told anecdotes and lively descriptions that teem in all
-his writings, which, it may be observed, are equal in point of style to
-any of the time, sufficiently attest his possession of those qualities,
-even if the stories and bon-mots that are related of him be questioned.
-His ‘Apology,’ as he calls one of his later pieces, containing an
-account of his various campaigns and journeys, is full of humour, and
-well worth the perusal of the general reader. It was published by way of
-answer to an attack upon his treatment of contused wounds and
-hæmorrhages, made by an obscure Parisian lecturer, whose name he does
-not mention; and he diverts himself exceedingly at the expense of the
-critic, for his presumption in pretending to teach a surgeon whose
-experience had been gathered from twenty sieges and fields of battle,
-through an active professional life of forty years. The raillery he
-employs is often very keen and pointed, but never ill-natured, and
-indicates the infinite superiority he felt, and had a right to feel,
-over his merely book-learned adversary.
-
-His conduct throughout life appears to have been remarkably upright and
-sincere, though tinctured by the adulation which, in that age of
-violence and despotism, was always exacted by the great from those who
-were more humbly born.
-
-He was a bold and good operator, and his general skill and success in
-the practice of his profession is unquestionable; in that day it must
-have been wonderful. As a surgical writer, his fame principally rests
-upon his introduction of a soothing method of treating gunshot and other
-contused wounds, and his discovery or rather restoration of the method
-of arresting hæmorrhage, by the ligature of the bleeding vessel, instead
-of searing with hot iron, and other insufficient and painful means. But
-he made many other novel and useful remarks which only do not deserve
-the name of discoveries, because they relate to more trivial points, and
-do not involve important principles: and, upon the whole, much as
-surgery has been improved since his time, there have been few writers to
-whom it has owed so much as to him, especially in the military
-department. The whole body of his writings on that subject, though
-diffuse, merit the perusal of professional men. The same praise cannot
-be given without exception and reserve to those of his writings which
-were less the records of his personal experience, than compilations from
-other sources. His remarks upon the subjects of Physiology, Medical
-Diseases, the Composition of Remedies, Natural History, and Obstetrics,
-are not free from error, credulity, and even indelicacy. The latter
-charge was successfully urged against him by the contemporary Parisian
-physicians, who were jealous of his encroachments upon what they
-considered their own domain, and he was obliged to alter the original
-editions.
-
-He was too much occupied by his practice to engage deeply in the study
-of anatomy: hence his knowledge of it was rather sufficient than
-accurate; and though he wrote upon it at some length, and even added new
-facts to that science, his success in advancing it can only be
-considered as a proof of the imperfect information of the time. He lived
-before the discovery of the circulation of the blood.
-
-His first publication, on Gunshot Wounds, in 1545, was incorporated with
-his other writings, comprising altogether twenty-six treatises, and
-printed at Paris in one large folio volume in 1561. This, with some
-posthumous additions, has been often reprinted, and there are
-translations of it in Latin and other languages. The first English
-edition was by Thomas Johnson in 1634.
-
-[Illustration: [Medal of Paré.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by J. Mollison._
-
-  ADMIRAL BLAKE.
-
-  _From the Picture in the Hall of Wadham College, Oxford._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                 BLAKE.
-
-
-Robert Blake is believed to have been born at Plansfield, in the parish
-of Spaxton, Somersetshire, near Bridgewater, in which town his father
-was a merchant; but the place is not so well ascertained as the date of
-his birth, which was August, 1598. He was educated in the Free School of
-Bridgewater, whence in due time he removed to Oxford, and became
-successively a member of St. Alban’s Hall and Wadham College. His
-character was studious, yet he was fond of field-sports and other
-violent exercises; and we may infer that he had at least a decent share
-of scholastic learning, from his having been a candidate, though
-unsuccessfully, for a studentship at Christchurch, and a fellowship at
-Merton College. He returned to Bridgewater when about twenty-five years
-old, and lived quietly on his paternal estate till 1640, with the
-character of a blunt, bold man, of ready humour and fearless expression
-of his sentiments, which, both in politics and religion, were adverse to
-the pretensions of the court. These qualities gained for him the
-confidence of the Presbyterian party in Bridgewater, by whom he was
-returned to the parliament of April, 1640. The speedy dissolution of
-that assembly gave him no opportunity of trying his powers as a debater;
-and in the next parliament he was not re-elected. But on the breaking
-out of the civil war, he displayed his principles by entering the
-Parliamentary army.
-
-We have no certain information concerning the time or the capacity in
-which he began to serve; but in 1643 we find him intrusted with the
-command of a fort at Bristol, when the city was besieged by the
-Royalists. Here his impetuous temper had nearly brought him to an
-untimely death; for, having maintained his fort and killed some of the
-king’s soldiers after the garrison had surrendered, Prince Rupert was
-with difficulty induced to spare his life, which was held to have been
-forfeited by this violation of the laws of war. Blake served afterwards
-in the west of England with good repute, and in 1644 was appointed
-Governor of Taunton, a place of great consequence, being the only
-Parliamentary fortress in that quarter. In that capacity he
-distinguished himself by the skill, courage, and constancy with which,
-during two successive sieges, he maintained the town against the
-Royalists in 1645; an important service, for which the parliament voted
-£2000 to the garrison, and £500 to the governor. It is recorded that he
-disapproved of the extremity to which matters were pushed against
-Charles, and that he was frequently heard to say, that he would as
-freely venture his life to save the King’s, as he had ever done it in
-the service of the Parliament.
-
-In February, 1649, Colonel Blake, in conjunction with two officers of
-the same rank, Deane and Popham, was appointed to command the fleet. It
-may be taken as a proof that, notwithstanding the fame of our early
-navigators, the King’s service at sea had never been treated with much
-attention, that, down to later times than those of which we now write,
-the chief command of a fleet seems never to have been given to a man of
-naval education and habits. It is probable that the sea service then
-held out no inducements strong enough to tempt men of high birth to
-submit to its inconveniences, and that the command of a fleet was
-esteemed too great a post to be conferred on a man of humble origin. For
-this new employment Blake soon showed signal capacity. When the embers
-of the war were stirred up after the King’s death, he was ordered to the
-Irish seas in pursuit of Prince Rupert, whom he blockaded in the harbour
-of Kinsale for several months. Despair of relief induced the Prince at
-last to make a daring effort to break through the Parliamentary
-squadron, in which he succeeded; but with the loss of three ships. Blake
-pursued him to the Tagus, where being denied liberty to attack his enemy
-by the King of Portugal, in revenge he captured and sent home a number
-of ships richly laden, on their way from Brazil. In January, 1651, he
-attacked and, with the exception of two ships, destroyed the Royalist
-fleet, in the neutral harbour of Malaga; a breach of national law, which
-can only be justified on the alleged ground that Rupert had destroyed
-British ships in the same harbour. These services were recompensed by
-the Parliament with the post of Warden of the Cinque Ports; and in March
-an act was passed constituting Blake, with his colleagues Deane and
-Popham, admirals and generals of the fleet for the year ensuing. In that
-capacity, he took Jersey, Guernsey, and the Scilly Islands from the
-Royalists; a service, for which he was again thanked by Parliament. In
-this year he was elected a member of the Council of State.
-
-March 25, 1652, Blake was appointed sole admiral for nine months, in
-expectation of a war with the Dutch. The United States and England were
-at this time the two most powerful maritime countries in the world; and
-it is hard to find any better reason than national rivalry for the
-bloody war which broke out between them in the spring of this year; a
-war which seems to have been begun on a point of etiquette, at the
-discretion of the admirals, without orders for hostilities being known
-to be given by the governments on either side. On May 18, a fleet of
-forty-two Dutch ships, commanded by the celebrated Van Tromp, appeared
-off the Goodwin Sands. Being challenged by Major Bourne, who commanded a
-squadron in the Downs, they professed to have been driven from their
-anchorage off Dunkirk by stress of weather; but instead of drawing off
-the coast as they were required to do, they sailed to Dover and cast
-anchor, in a manner which showed the deliberate design of insulting the
-British flag. Blake lay some distance to the westward in Rye Bay.
-Intelligence was immediately sent to him, and on his approach the Dutch
-weighed anchor, and seemed about to retreat, but, changing their course,
-they sailed direct for the English fleet. When within musket shot, Blake
-ordered a single gun to be fired at the Dutch admiral’s flag, which was
-done thrice. Van Tromp returned a broadside, and a hot and
-well-contested action ensued, and was maintained till nightfall. Under
-cover of the darkness the Dutch retreated, losing two ships (one sunk,
-the other taken), and leaving the possession of the field and the honour
-of the victory in the hands of the English. The States appear neither to
-have authorised nor approved of the conduct of their admiral; for they
-left no means untried to satisfy the English government; and when they
-found the demands of the latter so high as to preclude accommodation,
-they dismissed Van Tromp, and intrusted the command of their fleet to De
-Ruyter and De Witt. Meanwhile, Blake’s activity was unremitting. He
-gained a rich harvest of prizes among the Dutch homeward-bound
-merchantmen, which were pursuing their way without suspicion of danger;
-and when he had sent home forty good prizes and effectually cleared the
-Channel, he sailed to the northward, dispersed the fleet engaged in the
-herring fishery, and captured a hundred of the vessels composing it,
-together with a squadron of twelve ships of war sent out to protect
-them. The hostile fleets again came to an engagement, September 28, in
-which the advantage was decidedly in favour of the English, the
-rear-admiral of the Dutch being taken, and three or four of their ships
-disabled. Night put an end to the action; and, though for two days the
-English maintained the pursuit, the lightness and uncertainty of the
-wind prevented them from closing with the enemy, who escaped into Goree.
-After this battle the drafting off of detachments on various services
-reduced the English fleet to forty sail, and those, it is said, in
-consequence of the negligence or jealousy of the executive government,
-were ill provided with men and ammunition, and other requisite supplies.
-Thus weakly furnished, Blake lay in the Downs, when Van Tromp again
-stood over to the English coast with eighty men-of-war. Of that
-undaunted spirit which usually prompts the British seaman to refuse no
-odds Blake had an ample share; indeed, he did much to infuse that spirit
-into the service. But there are odds for which no spirit can make up,
-and as he had a brave and skilful enemy, the result of his rashness was
-that he was well beaten. Not more than half the ships on either side
-were engaged; but out of this small number of English vessels two were
-taken, and four destroyed; the rest were so shattered that they were
-glad to run for shelter into the river Thames. The Dutch remained
-masters of the narrow seas; and Van Tromp, in an idle bravado, sailed
-through the Channel with a broom at his mast-head, as if he had swept it
-clear of English ships. However, neither the admiral nor the nation were
-of a temper to submit to this indignity; and great diligence having been
-used in refitting and recruiting the fleet, Blake put to sea again in
-February, 1653, with eighty ships. On the 18th he fell in with Van
-Tromp, with nearly equal force, conducting a large convoy of merchantmen
-up the Channel. A running battle ensued, which was continued during
-three consecutive days, until, on the 20th, the Dutch ships, which, to
-suit the nature of their coast, were built with a smaller draught of
-water than the English, obtained shelter in the shallow waters of
-Calais. In this long and obstinate fight, the Dutch lost only eleven
-men-of-war and thirty merchant vessels; but the number killed is said to
-have amounted to 1500 on either side; a loss of life of most unusual
-amount in naval engagements.
-
-Another great battle took place on the 3rd and 4th of June, between Van
-Tromp and Generals Deane and Monk. On the first day the Dutch seem to
-have had somewhat the advantage: on the second Blake arrived with a
-reinforcement of eighteen sail, which turned the scale in favour of the
-English. Bad health obliged him then to quit the sea, so that he was not
-present at the last great victory of July 29, in which Van Tromp was
-killed. But out of respect for his services the Parliament presented him
-with a gold chain, as well as the admirals who had actually commanded in
-the battle. When Cromwell dissolved the Long Parliament, and assumed the
-office of Protector, Blake, though in his principles a republican, did
-not refuse to acknowledge the new administration. In conjunction with
-Deane and Monk he published a declaration of their resolution,
-“notwithstanding the late change, to proceed in the performance of their
-duties, and the trust reposed in them against the enemies of the
-Commonwealth.” He is reported to have said to his officers, “It is not
-our business to mind state-affairs, but to keep foreigners from fooling
-us.” He sat in the two first Parliaments summoned by the Protector, who
-always treated him with great respect. Nor was Cromwell’s acknowledged
-sagacity in the choice of men at fault, when he chose Blake to command a
-strong fleet, sent into the Mediterranean in November, 1654, to uphold
-the honour of the English flag, and to demand reparation for the slights
-and injuries done to the nation during that stormy period of civil war,
-when our own discord had made others daring against us. In better hands
-such a mission could not have been placed. Dutch, French, and Spaniards
-alike concurred in rendering unusual honours to his flag. The Duke of
-Tuscany and the Order of Malta made compensation for injuries done to
-the English commerce. The piratical states of Algiers and Tripoli were
-terrified into submission, and promised to abstain from further
-violence. The Dey of Tunis held out, confident in the strength of his
-fortifications. “Here,” he said, “are our castles of Goletta and Porto
-Ferino: do your worst; do you think we fear your fleet?” Blake took the
-same course as, in our own time, Lord Exmouth did against Algiers: he
-bore right into the bay of Porto Ferino; engaged the fortress within
-musket shot, and in less than two hours silenced or dismounted its guns;
-and sending a detachment of boats into the harbour, burnt the shipping
-which lay there. After this example he found no more difficulty in
-dealing with the African states.
-
-War having been declared between Spain and England, in 1656, Blake took
-his station to blockade the bay of Cadiz. At this period his
-constitution was much broken, insomuch that, in the expectation of a
-speedy death, he sent home a request that some person proper to be his
-successor might be joined in commission with him. General Montague was
-accordingly sent out with a strong squadron. Being obliged to quit the
-coast of Spain in September to obtain water for his fleet, Blake left
-Captain Stayner with seven ships to watch the enemy. In this interval
-the Spanish Plate fleet appeared. Stayner captured four ships richly
-laden with bullion; the rest escaped. Montague conducted the prizes
-home, so that Blake was again left alone in the Mediterranean. In the
-ensuing spring, having learnt that another Plate fleet had put into the
-island of Teneriffe, he sailed thither, and arrived in the road of Santa
-Cruz, April 20. The bay was strongly fortified, with a formidable castle
-at the entrance, and a connected chain of minor forts all round it. The
-naval force collected there was also considerable, and strongly posted,
-the smaller vessels being placed under the guns of the forts, the
-galleons strongly moored with their broadsides to the sea; insomuch that
-the Spanish Governor, a man of courage and ability, felt perfectly at
-ease as to the security of his charge. The master of a Dutch ship, which
-was lying in the harbour, was less satisfied, and went to the Governor
-to request leave to quit the harbour; “For I am sure,” he said, “that
-Blake will presently be among you.” The Governor made a confident reply.
-“Begone if you will, and let Blake come if he dares.” Daring was the
-last thing wanting; nor did the Admiral hesitate, as a wise man might
-well have done, about the real difficulties of the enterprise in which
-he was about to engage. The wind blowing into the bay, he sent in
-Captain Stayner with a squadron to attack the shipping, placed others in
-such a manner as to take off, and, as far as possible, to silence the
-fire of the castle and the forts, and himself following, assisted
-Stayner in capturing the galleons, which, though inferior in number,
-were superior in size and force to the English ships. This was completed
-by two o’clock in the afternoon, the engagement having commenced at
-eight in the morning. Hopeless of being able to carry the prizes out of
-the bay against an adverse wind, and a still active enemy, Blake gave
-orders to burn them: and it is probable that he himself might have found
-some difficulty in beating out of the bay under the fire of the castle,
-which was still lively, when on a sudden, the wind which had blown
-strong into the bay, suddenly veered round to the south-west, and
-favoured his retreat, as it had favoured his daring approach. Of this,
-the most remarkable, as it was the last exploit of Blake’s life,
-Clarendon says, “The whole action was so incredible, that all men who
-knew the place wondered that any sober man, with what courage soever
-endowed, would ever have undertaken it; and they could hardly persuade
-themselves to believe what they had done: while the Spaniards comforted
-themselves with the belief, that they were devils and not men who had
-destroyed them in such a manner. So much a strong resolution of bold and
-courageous men can bring to pass, that no resistance or advantage of
-ground can disappoint them; and it can hardly be imagined how small a
-loss the English sustained in this unparalleled action, not one ship
-being left behind, and the killed and wounded not exceeding two hundred
-men; when the slaughter on board the Spanish ships and on shore was
-incredible.”
-
-It will be recollected with interest that, on the same spot, Nelson lost
-his arm, in an unsuccessful night-attempt to capture Santa Cruz with an
-armed force in boats.
-
-For this service the thanks of Parliament were voted to the officers and
-seamen engaged, with a diamond ring to the Admiral worth 500_l._ Blake
-returned to his old station off Cadiz; but the increase of his
-disorders, which were dropsy and scurvy, raised a desire in him to
-return to England, which, however, he did not live to fulfil. He died as
-he was entering Plymouth Sound, August 17, 1657. His body was
-transported to London, and buried with great pomp in Westminster Abbey,
-at the public expense. After the Revolution it was thought unworthy to
-remain in that treasure-house of England’s departed greatness; and with
-the bones of others who had found a resting-place there during the short
-period of the Commonwealth, it was transferred to St. Margaret’s
-churchyard. It has been disputed whether this was done with more or less
-of indecency; but the matter is little worth inquiry. The real indecency
-and folly lay in thinking that any ground, however sanctified by the
-reverent associations of centuries, could be polluted by the tomb of a
-man whose leading passion was the glory of his country, and who made the
-name and flag of that country respected wheresoever he carried it: a man
-of whom not one mean or interested action is recorded, and whose great
-qualities extorted praise even from the Royalists. Bate, in his
-‘Elenchus Motuum,’ speaks of him as a man “blameable in this only, that
-he joined with the _parricides_;” and it may be remarked that Dr. Bate’s
-horror of a parricide did not prevent his being physician to Cromwell,
-as well as to Charles I. and II.
-
-We conclude with Clarendon’s character of this great man. “He was of
-private extraction, yet had enough left him by his father to give him a
-good education, which his own inclination disposed him to receive in the
-University of Oxford, where he took the degree of a Master of Arts, and
-was enough versed in books for a man who intended not to be of any
-profession, having sufficient of his own to maintain him in the plenty
-he affected, and having then no appearance of ambition to be a greater
-man than he was. He was of a melancholic and sullen nature, and spent
-his time most with good fellows, who liked his moroseness, and a freedom
-he used in inveighing against the licence of the time and the power of
-the court. They who knew him inwardly, discovered that he had an
-anti-monarchical spirit, when few men thought the government in any
-danger.” After a short sketch of Blake’s actions in the civil war, the
-noble author continues, “He then betook himself wholly to the sea, and
-quickly made himself signal there. He was the first man that declined
-the old track, and made it manifest that the science might be attained
-in less time than was imagined, and despised those rules which had long
-been in practice, to keep his ship and his men out of danger; which had
-been held in former times a point of great ability and circumspection,
-as if the principal art requisite in the captain of a ship had been to
-be sure to come safe home again. He was the first man who brought the
-ships to contemn castles on shore, which had been thought ever very
-formidable, and were discovered by him to make a noise only, and to
-fright those who could be rarely hurt by them. He was the first who
-infused that proportion of courage into the seamen, by making them see
-by experience what mighty things they could do, if they were resolved,
-and taught them to fight in fire as well as upon water, and though he
-has been very well imitated and followed, he was the first that gave the
-example of that kind of naval courage, and bold and resolute
-achievements.”
-
-The earliest life of Blake which we have seen is in the second volume of
-a collection entitled ‘Lives English and Foreign,’ published at the
-beginning of the last century. Clarendon’s History of the Rebellion,
-Heath’s Chronicle of the Civil Wars, the Memoirs of Ludlow, Whitelock,
-and other contemporary authorities, will furnish minute accounts of the
-many battles of which we have here only made short mention.
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by R. Woodman._
-
-  L’HÔPITAL.
-
-  _From the original by Janet, in the Musée Royal, Paris._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                               L’HÔPITAL.
-
-
-Michel de l’Hôpital was born at Aigueperse in Auvergne. The date of his
-birth he himself declares, in his testament, to be uncertain, but at the
-same time he refers it to the year 1505. His father was the domestic
-physician, the faithful friend, and trusted counsellor of the Constable
-of Bourbon, and still followed his patron’s fortunes, when that ill-used
-and misguided prince took up arms against France in 1523. Michel de
-l’Hôpital, then a student at the University of Toulouse, was arrested as
-the son of one of Bourbon’s partizans; but after a short time he was set
-at liberty by the express order of Francis I., and after the lapse of
-two or three years was permitted to rejoin his father in Italy. He
-completed his education during a residence of six years at the
-celebrated University of Padua. Quitting that University with high
-credit for his acquirements both in polite literature and legal
-knowledge, he took up his abode at Rome with his father, and soon
-obtained the favourable notice both of the Emperor Charles V. and the
-French ambassador, Cardinal de Grammont. But preferring the hope of
-re-establishment in his native country to the prospects of advancement
-held out in a foreign land, he returned to France in the train of the
-Cardinal; was present at the espousal of Catherine de Medici with the
-Dauphin, afterwards Henry II., in 1583; and laid a stepping-stone
-towards his fortunes by attracting the notice of his future queen. The
-death of the Cardinal however in the following year overclouded his
-prospects. His father was unable to procure a reversal of the sentence
-of exile and confiscation passed on him for his adherence to Bourbon;
-and Michel de l’Hôpital, without means or friends, betook himself to the
-practice of the law in the courts of Paris. Fortunately, his merits
-procured a discerning friend in Jean Morin, a high legal functionary,
-who gave him his daughter in marriage in 1537, with the judicial office
-of _Conseiller_ for her dowry.
-
-L’Hôpital filled this office during nine years. It was one in which he
-found no pleasure; for though attached to the philosophical study of the
-law (and he mentions it as one of the evils of his situation that he had
-been obliged to abandon a project for collecting into one body the laws
-of France, both written and resting on judicial decisions), he found the
-daily routine of trying causes extremely irksome. His letters are full
-of complaints of this drudgery, as he esteemed it, and express in lively
-terms the pleasure which he felt in escaping during the vacations into
-the country, and renewing his literary pursuits. He numbered the most
-intellectual and learned men of France among his friends, nor was he
-backward in seeking to conciliate the great and powerful. It is worth
-noting, as indicative of the manners of the age, that his favourite
-method of addressing such persons was in Latin hexameters. Accounts of
-his way of life, statements of his wishes, petitions, &c., are conveyed
-in that form; and he composed with fluency, and with a competent share
-of elegance, without great attention to correctness. One of his frequent
-correspondents, to whose favour he owed in great measure his future
-rise, was Cardinal Lorraine. The Chancellor Olivier, a man of no common
-virtue, was another of his best friends, and to him L’Hôpital was
-indebted for being withdrawn from the hated bustle of the law, by his
-appointment as envoy to the Council of Bologna. This proved a sinecure;
-and he employed his time in wandering about the neighbourhood of that
-city, and writing letters to the Chancellor, full of poetical
-descriptions, and requests for a more permanent provision away from the
-tumult of the law courts.
-
-Early in 1549 L’Hôpital was recalled, after remaining upwards of a year
-in Italy. He found the Chancellor in disgrace; but his acknowledged
-merit obtained the notice of Margaret of Valois, daughter of Francis I.,
-a steady patroness of learning, herself devoted to literary as well as
-religious study. Being created Duchess of Berri, she appointed him her
-Chancellor, to manage the affairs of the province; and one of his first
-steps in that capacity was the establishment of a new law-school at
-Bourges, to which he endeavoured to attract the most eminent teachers.
-Her influence, added to that of Cardinal Lorraine, procured for him the
-high financial appointment of Superintendent of the Chamber of Accounts,
-in 1554. His conduct in that station was firm and honest. He laboured to
-put a stop to numberless abuses, which had prevailed both in the
-collection and disposition of the revenue; and his zeal is testified by
-the ill-will which it brought upon him, and which twice endangered the
-loss of his place. His independence in this respect is ill contrasted by
-his obsequiousness in supporting the edict known in French history by
-the name of the _Semestre_. This requires a few words of explanation. No
-legislative body was recognised by the French constitution. Even the
-States-General could not enact: the power of making laws resided solely
-in the sovereign. But by the practice of the land, the edicts of the
-monarch required to be registered by the body of lawyers called the
-Parliament of Paris, before they could possess validity as law: a
-wholesome practice, which often served as a check upon the court. It was
-probably with the intention of rendering that body more subject to
-control, that Henry II., or his ministers, introduced the
-above-mentioned edict, by which it was proposed to divide the Parliament
-into two bodies, to relieve each other every six months. Under this
-arrangement it would have been easy to collect the refractory spirits
-into one body, and then to bring measures forward for registration in
-whichever half year might best suit the views of the crown. L’Hôpital’s
-accession to this measure has been palliated by alleging, that, as the
-price of it, he stipulated for the abolition of a custom which
-prevailed, for suitors to offer fees to the judges before whom their
-causes were to be tried, under the name of _spices_ (_épices_),—a ready
-means of corruption, for yielding to which, or something not much worse,
-Bacon, about half a century later, was removed with disgrace from the
-chancellorship of England. The whole tenor of L’Hôpital’s policy in
-after times tended to depress the Parliament; and this furnishes a
-presumption that his conduct in this particular instance was honest. But
-it is strange that he should not have perceived any inroad on the
-independence of the judicial body to be a still greater evil than even
-that from which he endeavoured to free it. After all, the scheme failed,
-and he was deeply mortified at the obloquy which his accession to it
-incurred.
-
-The accession of Francis II., by bringing the house of Guise into power,
-proved the means of L’Hôpital’s advancement. One of the first acts of
-the new government was to restore to the office of chancellor Olivier, a
-man of tried integrity, and a friend to toleration. But while the
-princes of Guise availed themselves of his high character to court
-popularity, they had no thought of acting by his advice; and Olivier,
-compelled to be the unwilling instrument of a policy which he detested,
-and afraid or unable to resign, was hastened by vexation to his grave.
-L’Hôpital was selected to be his successor in June, 1560. The Guises and
-the Queen Mother are said to have been actuated by different views in
-agreeing upon this appointment. The former thought that from an old
-adherent and petitioner of Cardinal Lorraine they had no opposition to
-fear: the latter is said to have been influenced by the hope that
-L’Hôpital’s patriotism would lead him to be a check on the over-powerful
-house of Lorraine.
-
-The circumstances under which he became Chancellor were such as might
-fairly breed suspicion of his honesty. None but a bold man could have
-hoped to do good after the example of Olivier; none but a dexterous man
-could have succeeded. And such dexterity is seldom joined with that
-sincerity and purity of purpose, which is one of the most valuable
-qualities of a statesman, or any man. There are sometimes seasons in
-which an honest man may take office, with the certainty not only that he
-will not be permitted to do much that he would wish, but also that he
-will be obliged to do a good deal that he disapproves. But such
-compromises are of bad example and evil influence, and can only be
-excused by the necessity of the times, and by the good results which
-ensue. By this test, L’Hôpital’s conduct is vindicated. He conferred a
-signal benefit on France at his first entrance upon office, by
-dexterously contriving to prevent the establishment of the Inquisition,
-which had been resolved on. He obtained the convocation of an Assembly
-of Notables at Fontainebleau, in which, through his influence,
-conciliatory measures were adopted towards the Protestants, and it was
-resolved to summon a meeting of the States-General. But the Guises, by
-working on the young king’s fears, turned that measure to their own
-advantage. Condé no sooner appeared than he was arrested, tried, and
-condemned to death. The King of Navarre was threatened with a similar
-fate; and but for the opportune death of Francis II., the kingdom
-probably would have been plunged at once into the utmost fury of a
-religious war. But the succession of Charles IX., a minor, in December
-1560, threw the regency into the hands of Catherine; and she, encouraged
-by L’Hôpital, asserted her independence of the Guises, and, to
-conciliate the support of a powerful party, released Condé, and allied
-herself with the King of Navarre.
-
-At first, the Chancellor’s liberal measures seemed to prosper. As if in
-compliance with the demands of the States, he published the celebrated
-Ordonnance of Orleans, which embodied most of his views for the
-reformation of the state, and introduced a variety of bold and important
-changes into the church, the courts of justice, and the financial
-system. One portion of it is expressly directed against the oppressive
-rights claimed and exercised by the nobility. But the spirit of the age
-was not ripe for such extensive reforms: they were too far in advance to
-produce a lasting influence. And in attempting to overcome an interested
-and prejudiced opposition, the Chancellor was led to an act unworthy of
-his real zeal for the welfare of his country. His legal improvements had
-not conciliated the good will of the lawyers; and, foreseeing that the
-Parliament of Paris might probably refuse to register his edicts, he
-took it on himself to dispatch them to the provinces, without ever
-having submitted them to that body. To justify such a step, it is not
-enough to say that his views were enlarged and noble, theirs bigoted and
-illiberal; for it is seldom or never that any object can be of
-importance enough to justify a constitutional statesman in breaking down
-a constitutional security. Nor had he even the bad excuse of success.
-The Parliament were justly incensed, and probably became still more
-hostile to the measures adopted in defiance of its authority; and the
-high Catholic party prevailed in obtaining a new Assembly of Notables,
-at which all was undone which the Chancellor had been labouring to do,
-and the persecuting edicts against the Protestants were re-established
-in full force.
-
-This blow to his system of toleration the Chancellor contrived to
-obviate. He had no assembly, no body of recognised authority on which to
-lean for support. The Parliament of Paris was against him; the Assembly
-of Notables, composed of lawyers and nobility, was against him; the
-States-General were tedious to convoke, and were paralysed by their
-division into three orders. In this difficulty he bethought himself of
-calling an assembly of deputies from the provincial Parliaments of the
-kingdom; and fortified by their recommendation, he promulgated and
-obtained registration of the celebrated edict of January, 1562, which,
-under certain restrictions, permitted the open profession of the
-Protestant faith. Upon this the furious bigotry of the Duke of Guise
-broke into open violence, and kindled the first of those religious wars
-which long desolated France. Strengthened by the adhesion of the
-Constable Montmorenci, and by possession of the persons of the King, and
-Queen Regent, the brothers of Lorraine usurped the conduct of affairs,
-and excluded L’Hôpital from the council. It is remarkable, considering
-his resolute opposition to their policy, that they did not deprive him
-of his office; and this may be taken as an evidence either of the
-consummate prudence with which, without betraying his own principles, he
-avoided giving personal offence to his opponents; or that his character
-stood so high as to render his opponents unwilling to incur the odium of
-displacing him.
-
-The assassination of the Duke of Guise, in February, 1563, restored to
-Catherine her own free-will, and L’Hôpital to power; and he immediately
-availed himself of it to lay the basis of peace by fresh edicts in
-favour of toleration, which as usual were opposed by the Parliament. In
-the following year, Charles IX. having reached the age of fourteen, the
-Chancellor revived an old law which fixed the majority of Kings of
-France at that age, and declared the King’s majority before the
-Parliament of Rouen. Soon after, he was engaged in a quarrel with his
-old patron, Cardinal Lorraine, relative to the privileges of the
-Gallican Church. The question was, whether or not the decrees of the
-Council of Trent should be admitted as authority in France. The
-Chancellor opposed this, and he carried his point.
-
-To amuse Charles, and to avoid some of the evils which usually beset a
-court, the Chancellor conducted his young sovereign on a tour to the
-southern provinces of France. This was attended with unforeseen and evil
-consequences. At Bayonne Charles was met by his sister, the Queen of
-Spain, attended by the Duke of Alva and other Spanish noblemen. Alva
-acquired the confidence of Catherine, whom he persuaded that in the
-hands of L’Hôpital she really had no more freedom of action than under
-the control of the Guises; and as in her opposition to them she had been
-actuated by no love of toleration, she had little to unlearn under the
-tuition of that bigoted and able partizan of the papacy. L’Hôpital soon
-perceived that his power was shaken. He laboured to make up for the lost
-confidence of Catherine, by attaching himself more and more to Charles
-IX.; and for a time he succeeded in retaining influence over that
-prince, who, during the years 1565 and 1566, was kept in a state of
-vacillation between those who pleaded for peace and toleration, and
-those who would have exterminated Protestantism at all hazards and by
-all means. The religious war was renewed in 1567. Peace was concluded in
-1568; but L’Hôpital was not employed to manage it. His only hold upon
-power was now in the reverence of the King; and this was shaken by the
-artful representations of Catherine. It shows, however, in a strong
-light, the ascendancy which L’Hôpital had acquired over Charles’s mind,
-that the joint influence of Catherine and the House of Guise could not
-induce him absolutely to dismiss his faithful minister. In 1568 he sent
-to request the Chancellor to give up the seals for a time, with a
-promise of returning them. L’Hôpital says in his Testament, that “he
-judged it better to yield to the necessity of the state, and to its new
-governors, than to contend with them.” He retired to his estate at
-Vignay, near Etampes, where he returned with avidity to his literary
-pursuits, and to the amusements and occupations of the country, to which
-his letters represent him as devotedly attached.
-
-The Chancellor had not amassed wealth in his various high employments;
-but his pensions were continued by the King; and Catherine herself did
-not forget his former services. Even in the dreadful massacre of St.
-Bartholomew’s they interfered to protect him; though his family were
-Protestants, and he himself, though a Catholic by profession and in
-observances, was so suspected by the bigot party, who did not understand
-how sincerity and tolerance could go together, that it passed into a
-sort of proverb, ‘Lord deliver us from the Chancellor’s mass.’ A troop
-of horse was sent from court to preserve his mansion from insult. His
-domestics were alarmed, and proposed to shut the gates. “No,” said the
-Chancellor; “but if the small gate is not enough, open the great one.”
-His daughter, then in Paris, was in imminent danger, and escaped only
-through the intervention of the Duchess of Guise.
-
-The Chancellor did not long survive this signal proof that his labours
-had been in vain. “I have lived too long,” he said, “since I have seen
-what has occurred in my last days,—a youth changed from a mild king into
-a merciless tyrant.” He died, March 13, 1573; and was buried in his
-parish church of Champmoteux. His monument is among those which have
-been collected at Paris, in the Musée des Petits-Augustins.
-
-Brantôme has described the person of L’Hôpital. He wore a long white
-beard; his face was pale, his demeanor grave, and he resembled the
-pictures of St. Jerome, by which name he was known at court. He and the
-Constable Montmorenci were famous as _rabroueurs_, or reprimanders, and
-were joint terrors to the idle courtiers; and this harshness, if we may
-trust his own representations, was not natural, but assumed as a
-necessary qualification for his office. His private habits were very
-simple and frugal, and he regarded the increase of luxury as the bane of
-France. Brantôme says that once, when he paid the Chancellor a visit
-with Maréchal Strozzi, their host gave them for dinner a single dish of
-_bouillie_, and that his whole stock of plate consisted of one silver
-saltcellar. He adds an amusing account of the way in which the
-Chancellor rated two newly appointed functionaries, who came to present
-themselves, and who could not pass satisfactorily through a legal
-examination, which he bestowed upon them.
-
-The leading objects of L’Hôpital’s political life were to obtain the
-reformation of abuses, to establish the independence of the Gallican
-church against the usurpations of Rome, and to procure toleration for
-the Protestants. He is, we believe, the first minister who laid down the
-principle of toleration, and proclaimed the impossibility and absurdity
-of making force the rule of reason; and he has thus gained an
-indefeasible title to the reverence, not only of his countrymen, but of
-mankind. “What laws,” he said, in his inaugurative speech to the
-Parliament of Paris, “have not been promulgated on this point of
-religion? What judgments and punishments, of which even the magistrates
-of the Parliament have been victims? To what purpose have served such
-continued armaments and combats in Germany, in England, and in Scotland?
-The ancient religion has been shaken by these combats, and the new
-confirmed. The mistake lies in treating the maladies of the mind as if
-they were those of the body. Experience teaches us that it is the force
-of reason, the gentle persuasion of words alone, which can win hearts,
-and cure diseased spirits.”
-
-This great man has another claim to notice, as one of the most
-distinguished jurists and reformers of France. He has been classed with
-Charlemagne and St. Louis, as one of the three principal legislators of
-that country; and his eminent successor D’Aguesseau bore testimony to
-the merits of his edicts, as the foundation of the most useful laws
-which were afterwards enacted. His constitutional views were directed
-towards raising the royal authority, at the expense of the nobility and
-the Parliament. We have expressed our belief that in the latter instance
-his conduct was wrong. His views of reform are embodied in the
-Ordonnance of Orleans (January, 1561), and that of Moulins (February,
-1566), which De Thou describes as being the complement of the former. Of
-the contents of the Ordonnance of Orleans we have already given such
-notice as our space allows; that of Moulins pertains rather to legal and
-judicial reforms; it limits and defines the powers of judicial officers,
-and determines the law on various points, relative to entails, arrests
-for debt, sales, &c. In short, these two edicts provide for the removal
-of most of those evils which, unredressed, produced the first
-Revolution.
-
-It is much to be regretted that L’Hôpital’s essay towards a work on
-French law is lost. There is a volume extant of his Poetical Epistles,
-of which the best edition is that of Amsterdam, 1732. To these, and to
-his Testament, which is printed in the Bibliothèque Choisie of Colomiès,
-and in Brantôme (article of the Constable Montmorenci), we may refer for
-authentic details of his life; of which numerous particulars will be
-found in the history of De Thou, the Memoirs of Brantôme, the Letters of
-Pasquier, the Eloges of Thevet, and other contemporary writers. His
-speeches before the States of Orleans have been published; and a
-Collection of Memoirs, consisting of various State Papers, printed at
-Cologne, 1672, has been ascribed to him. The Eloge of L’Hôpital was
-proposed as a prize by the French Academy in 1777. Slight accounts of
-him will be found in the various biographical dictionaries; but no
-publication, so far as we know, has appeared either in French or
-English, which can dispense with the necessity of consulting the
-original authorities, on the part of those who wish to obtain more than
-a superficial acquaintance with the history of this illustrious
-statesman.
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  [The Conciergerie at Paris, from whence the Huguenot prisoners were
-    liberated by L’Hôpital himself,—from a Print in the British Museum.]
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                             MRS. SIDDONS.
-
-
-The light esteem in which the theatrical profession has commonly been
-held renders it probable that the introduction of an actress among the
-few female names included in our Gallery may seem to some persons
-uncalled for and injudicious. That there are few players entitled to
-such admission we allow: but for one who studied acting as a branch of
-art, discarding every unworthy species of stage trickery; and who, by
-profound study, and a rare union of mental and bodily excellence, has
-inseparably connected her name and memory with the masterpieces of the
-British drama, we do claim a place (to which her eminent brother is
-almost equally entitled) among the master-minds of the fine arts.
-
-Sarah Kemble came of a theatrical stock. Her father was manager of a
-provincial company of actors; her mother was the daughter of a
-provincial manager. Both parents maintained a high character for moral
-rectitude; and the latter is said to have been distinguished by a
-strength of mind, and stateliness of demeanour, which may have had some
-influence upon the character and manners of her celebrated children.
-Sarah, their eldest daughter, was born at Brecon, July 5, 1755. From an
-early period of childhood she was trained to the stage. She was scarcely
-more than seventeen when her affections were engaged by an actor of her
-father’s company, named Siddons, to whom, after some opposition on the
-part of her parents, she was married, November 26, 1773. Her early
-married life was beset with difficulties. Mr. Siddons possessed little
-merit as an actor; and during nine years, which elapsed before Mrs.
-Siddons established a metropolitan reputation, she had to endure hard
-work and low pay. The first encouragement which she received in her
-career was from the notice of the Hon. Miss Boyle, afterwards Lady
-O’Neil, a lady possessed of high mental qualities, as well as birth and
-beauty, who was so much struck
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by W. Holl._
-
-  M^{RS}. SIDDONS.
-
-  _After the Picture by Sir Joshua Reynolds._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-by the young actress’s performance of Belvidera at Cheltenham in 1774,
-that she sought her out in her obscurity, and there commenced a warm and
-lasting friendship. Through this connection Mrs. Siddons seems to have
-been introduced to Garrick, by whom she was engaged at Drury Lane
-theatre. Her first appearance was in the character of Portia, December
-29, 1775. She was received with indifference; and during the remainder
-of the season she did not establish herself in the favour of the London
-audiences, nor did she appear in any first-rate part. Garrick professed
-high admiration for her, and on quitting the stage, which he did towards
-the close of that season, promised to procure for her an advantageous
-engagement with his successors in the management. In this promise he
-failed, for during the summer of 1776 she received an abrupt dismissal
-from Drury Lane. Her failure to produce a sensation in the first
-instance does not seem to have weighed much on her mind. She knew her
-powers, but was conscious that they were immature; and she was deeply
-sensible through life how necessary, even to the greatest powers, are
-cultivation and study. But this dismissal affected her in a very
-different manner. In her own words, quoted from the autograph
-‘Recollections’ intrusted to her friend and biographer, Mr. Campbell,
-“it was a stunning and cruel blow, overwhelming all my ambitious hopes,
-and involving peril, even to the very subsistence of my helpless babes.”
-
-Her fears were soothed, and her mortification relieved by her success at
-several of the provincial theatres. She received her dismissal from
-Drury Lane while at Birmingham, where she was engaged during the summer
-to perform the highest characters; and where she laid the foundation of
-her fame, by acquiring the good opinion of the actor Henderson, who
-pronounced, within a year of her expulsion from Drury Lane, that she was
-an actress who never had an equal, nor would ever have a superior.
-Through his recommendation, in the following year she obtained a
-permanent engagement at Bath, where she was received with distinguished
-favour, and where she remained until her increasing reputation procured
-for her an invitation to return to Drury Lane. She chose the part of
-Isabella, in the ‘Fatal Marriage,’ for her debut, October 10, 1782. The
-anxiety with which she approached this second trial is described in an
-interesting manner in her own memoranda. On this occasion her hopes were
-fully gratified. She played Isabella eight times between October 10, and
-October 30, when she appeared in her second character, Euphrasia, in the
-‘Grecian Daughter.’ Her other parts, during this first season, were Jane
-Shore, Calista, Belvidera, and Zara in the ‘Mourning Bride.’
-
-We propose in this sketch of Mrs. Siddons’s theatrical life to notice
-only the most remarkable of her characters, reserving to the end a
-complete list of them, together with a few remarks on her style of
-acting. In November, 1783, she played Isabella in ‘Measure for Measure,’
-with entire success; and thus solved the real or pretended doubts of a
-few persons, who questioned her courage or capacity to represent the
-masterpieces of Shakspeare to a London audience. No one could do more
-justice to the pure, uncompromising, clear-sighted virtue of Isabella,
-so consonant to her own honest and high-souled simplicity: nor was she
-at fault in attempting, during the same season, Constance, in ‘King
-John,’ a character of more varied emotion, and far greater demand on the
-resources of the player. Of this part she says, in an elaborate
-criticism, worthy of being read with attention by all persons, and
-especially by actors, “I cannot conceive in the whole range of dramatic
-character a greater difficulty than that of representing this grand
-creature.” Those who remember her performance of it in the meridian of
-her powers, bear testimony, with Mr. Campbell, to the depth of her
-maternal affection, her queen-like majesty, and her tremendous power of
-invective and sarcasm: when first revived for her the play seems to have
-been coldly received.
-
-The celebrated portrait of Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse was painted
-by Reynolds in 1783. The character was suggested by the painter: the
-attitude is that in which the sitter first placed herself, by which
-Reynolds was so struck that he at once adopted it.
-
-An interesting anecdote relative to Mrs. Siddons’s first country
-performance of Lady Macbeth, is told in the Memoranda from which we have
-already quoted. “It was my custom to study my characters at night, when
-the domestic cares and business of the day were over. On the night
-preceding that in which I was to appear for the first time, I shut
-myself up, as usual, when all the family were retired, and commenced my
-study of _Lady Macbeth_. As the character is very short, I thought I
-should soon accomplish it. Being then only twenty years of age, I
-believed, as many do believe, that little more was necessary than to get
-the words into my head; for the necessity of discrimination, and the
-development of character, at that time of my life, had scarcely entered
-into my imagination. But, to proceed, I went on with tolerable composure
-in the silence of the night, (a night I can never forget,) till I came
-to the assassination scene, when the horrors of the scene rose to a
-degree that made it impossible for me to get farther. I snatched up my
-candle, and hurried out of the room, in a paroxysm of terror. My dress
-was of silk, and the rustling of it, as I ascended the stairs to go to
-bed, seemed to my panic-struck fancy like the movement of a spectre
-pursuing me. At last I reached my chamber, where I found my husband fast
-asleep. I clapt my candlestick down upon the table, without the power of
-putting the candle out; and I threw myself on my bed, without daring to
-stay even to take off my clothes. At peep of day I rose to resume my
-task; but so little did I know of my part when I appeared in it at
-night, that my shame and confusion cured me of procrastinating my
-business for the remainder of my life.”
-
-“About six years afterwards I was called upon to act the same character
-in London. By this time I had perceived the difficulty of assuming a
-personage with whom no one feeling of common general nature was
-congenial or assistant. One’s own heart could prompt one to express with
-some degree of truth the sentiments of a mother, a daughter, a wife, a
-lover, a sister, &c.; but to adopt this character must be an effort of
-the judgment alone.”
-
-In accordance with this, Mrs. Siddons has been known to say, that Lady
-Macbeth gave her more trouble than any other of her characters, both in
-settling her conception of the poet’s meaning, and determining the means
-of giving effect to it. Her success however in the eyes of the public
-was complete: in Mr. Campbell’s words, “the moment she seized the part
-she identified her image with it in the minds of the living generation.”
-She appeared in it for the first time in London, February 2, 1785. Smith
-played Macbeth. As in the case of Constance, Mrs. Siddons has left, in
-an elaborate essay on the character of Lady Macbeth, interesting
-evidence of the deep study which she bestowed on her profession; a point
-in which, as well as in general mental cultivation, the Kemble family
-have been advantageously distinguished from others even of our
-first-rate actors. It is scarcely possible to conceive ‘Macbeth’ so well
-performed as when the principal characters were filled by Mrs. Siddons
-and Kemble: the actors might have been thought born for the parts. The
-same may be said of ‘Coriolanus,’ in which they appeared together for
-the first time in February, 1789. But the season of 1785 is also
-memorable for Mrs. Siddons’s first appearance in Desdemona, a character
-as widely different from the Scottish Queen as can well be imagined. Yet
-it is recorded to have been one of the actress’s most exquisite
-performances; and this is one of the strongest proofs of her
-extraordinary talent. Unsuitable as her person, voice, and general
-demeanour may seem to those who knew her only in her later days, we have
-the undeniable testimony of competent judges to the grace, loveliness,
-and sweetness with which she personated the gentle Venetian. Her very
-stature, Mr. Boaden says, seemed to be lowered. Ophelia she performed
-once, and once only, for her benefit, May 15, 1786, to her brother’s
-Hamlet; and, though a poor singer, she rendered the part deeply
-affecting. Juliet she also performed, we believe once only, for her
-benefit in 1789. Cordelia and Imogen are to be added to the list of
-characters of the gentler cast. The former was not one of her most
-popular, probably not one of her most effective, performances, for Lear
-is said to have been almost the only play in which, when both were on
-the stage, the brother made a stronger impression than the sister. The
-pure, gentle dignity of Imogen must have found in her a most effective
-representative.
-
-In the autumn of 1783, about a year before Dr. Johnson’s death, Mrs.
-Siddons, at his own request, paid him a visit, which was several times
-repeated. He expressed a strong desire to see her in Queen Katherine,
-his favourite character among Shakspeare’s females. He was not so
-gratified; for the play was not brought forward until November 28, 1788,
-after an absence from the stage of near half a century. This, like Lady
-Macbeth, we must regard as one of Mrs. Siddons’s peculiar characters.
-“It was an era,” Mr. Campbell says, “not only in Mrs. Siddons’s history,
-but in the fortune of the play as an acting piece; for certainly, in the
-history of all female performance on the British stage, there is no
-specific tradition of any excellence at all approaching to hers as Queen
-Katherine.” The two principal scenes belonging to the part are
-strikingly contrasted. The high mind and majestic deportment of the
-actress, and the sarcasm which she pours out on the Cardinal, render the
-Trial Scene one of the most effective on the stage; and it has
-fortunately been preserved from oblivion by the pencil of Harlowe. But
-the last scene, in the sick chamber, was among the strongest proofs of
-Mrs. Siddons’s close adherence to nature, and one of her greatest
-triumphs over the difficulties of her art, enhanced as they were by the
-extravagant dimensions of the modern theatres. It may be mentioned to
-show her confidence in her own judgment as to the truth of nature that,
-though the audience in the gallery sometimes asked her to speak louder,
-she never obeyed the call; but left the architect responsible for any
-failure of effect, rather than herself overstep the bounds of propriety
-in the most solemn event of human life.
-
-Mrs. Siddons quitted Drury Lane for the season 1789–90, in consequence
-of the difficulty of obtaining her salary while the treasury was in the
-hands of Sheridan. She was induced by promises to return in the
-following season; but a weak state of health prevented her playing more
-than seven nights, and she appeared in no new character; nor, during the
-summer of 1791, did she act on any provincial stage. She returned to
-Drury Lane in 1794, after the rebuilding of the theatre, and remained
-there until 1802; when the impossibility of rescuing the reward of her
-labours from that “drowning gulf,” as she justly calls Sheridan in one
-of her letters, drove her away finally. The most remarkable of her new
-characters, during this period of eight years, were Millwood, in ‘George
-Barnwell,’ and Agnes, in ‘Fatal Curiosity,’ both plays of Lillo; Mrs.
-Haller; Elvira in ‘Pizarro,’ which, in spite of the demerits of the
-play, she rendered one of her most popular characters; and Hermione, in
-the ‘Winter’s Tale,’ her last new part, which she acted for the first
-time, March 25, 1802. The statue scene was one of her most extraordinary
-performances, both for its illusion while she remained motionless, and
-for the effect produced by her descent from the pedestal, and
-recognition of her daughter Perdita.
-
-In one of her early performances of this character she met with an
-accident which might well have ended fatally. The muslin draperies in
-which she was enveloped caught fire from a lamp; fortunately, one of the
-scene-men saw and extinguished it before it spread. Her gratitude for
-his interposition is eloquently expressed in her correspondence; and her
-warmth of feeling was subsequently evinced in the pains which she took
-to procure for the man’s son, who had deserted from the army, remission
-from what she justly calls “the horrid torture and disgrace of the
-lash,” and in the lively pleasure which she expresses in the prospect of
-succeeding.
-
-Upon her final departure from Drury Lane, Mrs. Siddons formed an
-engagement at Covent Garden, where she appeared for the first time,
-September 27, 1803. She continued there until June 29, 1812, on which
-day she bid farewell to the stage. During this time she performed in no
-new characters, nor is any circumstance which requires notice recorded
-of this part of her professional life. In her last season we find that,
-of her earlier characters, she performed Isabella, in ‘The Fatal
-Marriage,’ twice; Isabella, in ‘Measure for Measure,’ seven times;
-Euphrasia, twice; Belvidera, six times; and Mrs. Beverley, four times.
-It may perhaps be taken as an indication of that by which she wished
-chiefly to be remembered, that she played Lady Macbeth ten times, and
-chose it for her farewell. Queen Katherine she played six times;
-Constance and Volumnia, four times each; Elvira, five times; Mrs.
-Haller, twice; Hermione, four times. On her last appearance the house
-was crowded to excess, and the excitement of the occasion was testified
-by a general demand that the play should be stopped after Lady Macbeth’s
-appearance in the sleeping scene. Mrs. Siddons returned to the boards on
-various occasions, chiefly for her brother Charles’s benefit: her last
-performance was in the part of Lady Randolph, June 9, 1819.
-
-In giving, in addition to what we have already said, a short general
-notice of the professional merits of Mrs. Siddons, we shall confine our
-remarks chiefly to those characters which better suited her maturer
-years, in which alone a large majority of our readers can have seen her.
-She was throughout the tragic department the unrivalled actress of her
-time; though in such parts as Belvidera, Desdemona, Cordelia, &c., the
-power of exciting the sympathy of an audience might have been shared
-with her by Mrs. Cibber and other of her predecessors, or by her
-successors, Miss O’Neil or Miss Kemble. But in one respect she stands
-alone in her profession: she was the most intellectual of actresses. She
-was a person of deep thought, and an habitual student of nature with a
-view to the perfection of her art; and that as much, or more, in
-advanced life, than when she had her reputation to make or to enjoy in
-the first years of her celebrity. Mrs. Siddons sat day after day in her
-study, looking at Shakspeare and whatever bore upon him, not as if he
-were the mere poet of the stage, furnishing an outline to be filled up
-by her peculiar powers, but as if he were the high priest and expositor
-of human nature, whose lessons it was the serious business of her life
-to learn, and having learned, to teach.
-
-We shall not add to what we have already said of her Queen Katherine, or
-Lady Macbeth, except one circumstance, illustrative of the above
-position. Mrs. Siddons, who repeatedly read ‘Macbeth’ before the most
-competent judges, made a deeper and more lasting impression, not only in
-her own part, but in the other characters, than did the representation
-on the stage by her brother and herself, with all the advantages of
-dress and the illusion of scenery. The audience, at her readings,
-consisting of men and women of taste and literature, professed never to
-have understood Shakspeare so thoroughly before.
-
-Her Isabella, in ‘Measure for Measure,’ claims a short notice. This play
-in Garrick’s reign was acted occasionally to empty benches in the dull
-part of the season; but neither the manager himself, nor his leading
-performers, condescended to appear in so grave and sermonizing a piece.
-Even when played by Kemble and his sister, it did not draw crowded
-houses; but it ensured a critical and enlightened audience. The theatre
-seldom contained so many men of the first reputation for taste and
-literature as when that play was performed. John Kemble’s mind was
-framed in the same mould with his sister’s; he gave to a sententious and
-philosophic part dignity and interest, where an ordinary actor would
-preach his audience to sleep. The scene between the Duke in the disguise
-of a Confessor, and Isabella, excited neither tears nor rapturous
-applause, but intense interest, and breathless attention. The Duke’s
-exposition of his project is long, her intervening speeches short, and
-not emphatic; so that such a scene bids fair to be called _prosing_. But
-the intense and intelligent expression in her eyes, and more perhaps in
-her mouth, the great seat of expression, filled up whatever was wanting:
-the gradually increasing, but as yet far from complete comprehension of
-the device, and of its consistency with her own purity, marked without
-words what was passing in her mind: but when she exclaims “The image of
-it gives me content already, and I trust it will grow to a most
-prosperous perfection,” the burst of perfect understanding, the lighting
-up of every feature, and the tones of sudden joy, produced a
-corresponding effect in the spectators, which scenes of intense pathos
-could scarcely surpass in effect. Mrs. Siddons’s power over the mind was
-as great as over the passions.
-
-Another extraordinary performance was her Millwood, in ‘George
-Barnwell.’ She took that part, which had never been played by a
-first-rate actress, in hopes that she might be of service to her brother
-Charles, then a young actor, who was to be brought forward as Barnwell.
-In the early scenes the severity of her blandishments bordered on the
-ludicrous; she was more like Barnwell’s mother than his mistress: but in
-her scene of dissimulation with Thorowgood, and in her subsequent arrest
-and diabolically triumphant avowal of the motive of her conduct through
-life, the desire to revenge her wrongs on the opposite sex, she
-pourtrayed wickedness with grand and appalling force. Her thundering
-exclamation, “I know you, and I hate you all; I expect no mercy, and I
-ask for none,” was made with a withering effect. The scene in ‘Fatal
-Curiosity,’ in which Agnes suggests to her husband the murder of their
-unknown son, was another of her wonderful exhibitions: in Mr. Campbell’s
-words, “it made the flesh of the spectator creep.”
-
-Mrs. Siddons is said to have thought well of her own talents for comedy;
-and her reading of Shakspeare’s characters of low humour was admirable.
-She played at different times Katherine, in ‘The Taming of the Shrew,’
-and Rosalind; as well as Mrs. Oakley, and a few other characters of the
-modern drama. There seems to have been nothing against her success in
-genteel comedy but a deficiency of animal spirits. Her delivery of the
-level conversation in tragedy was easy, graceful, and refined. Her
-representation of the early scenes in ‘The Gamester,’ where she had
-merely to personate an elegant and highbred woman, bearing up against
-present anxiety and impending misfortune, was as attractive and as
-finished as her deep tragedy in the sequel was pathetic and harrowing.
-And in the first scenes of Mrs. Haller, the charm of her manners and
-delivery imparted interest even to the dull detail of a housekeeper’s
-weekly routine.
-
-We subjoin a list of the parts which Mrs. Siddons performed in London.
-The reader will be surprised to find how many of them are in plays all
-but forgotten, and utterly unworthy of her talents. In those marked (*)
-she made her first appearance for her own benefit: in those marked (†),
-for John Kemble’s.
-
-         Characters.                           Plays.
-
-                                 1782–3.
-
- Isabella                    Fatal Marriage
-
- Euphrasia                   Grecian Daughter
-
- Jane Shore                  Jane Shore
-
- Calista                     Fair Penitent
-
- *Belvidera                  Venice Preserved
-
- *Zara                       Mourning Bride
-
-                                 1783–4.
-
- Isabella                    Measure for Measure
-
- Mrs. Beverley               Gamester
-
- Constance                   King John
-
- *Lady Randolph              Douglas
-
- Countess of Salisbury       Countess of Salisbury      (_Hartson._)
-
- *Sigismunda                 Tancred and Sigismunda
-
-                                 1784–5.
-
- Margaret of Anjou           Earl of Warwick      (_Franklin._)
-
- Zara                        Zara      (_from Voltaire._)
-
- Matilda                     Carmelite      (_Cumberland._)
-
- Camiola                     Maid of Honour
-
- *Lady Macbeth               Macbeth
-
- Desdemona                   Othello
-
- Elfrida                     Elfrida      (_Mason._)
-
- Rosalind                    As you like it
-
-                                 1785–6.
-
- The Duchess                 Duke of Braganza      (_Jephson._)
-
- Mrs. Lovemore               Way to keep Him
-
- *Hermione                   Distressed Mother
-
- *Ophelia, and the Lady in
-   Comus
-
- Malvina                     The Captives      (_Delap._)
-
- Elwina                      Percy      (_Miss H. More._)
-
-                                 1786–7.
-
- Cleone                      Cleone      (_Dodsley._)
-
- Imogen                      Cymbeline
-
- Hortensia                   Count of Narbonne      (_Jephson._)
-
- †Lady Restless              All in the Wrong
-
- Julia                       Italian Lovers      (_Jephson._)
-
- Alicia                      Jane Shore
-
-                                 1787–8.
-
- Cordelia                    Lear
-
- Cleonice                    Fall of Sparta      (_Mrs. Cowley._)
-
- †Katherine                  Taming the Shrew
-
- Dionara                     Regent      (_Greatheed._)
-
- *Cleopatra                  All for Love
-
-                                 1788–9.
-
- Queen Katherine             Henry VIII.
-
- Volumnia                    Coriolanus
-
- *The Princess and Mrs. Riot Law of Lombardy      (_Jephson._)
-                               Lethe      (_Farce. Garrick._)
-
- Mary                        Mary Queen of Scots       (_St. John._)
-
- *Juliet                     Romeo and Juliet
-
-                                 1791–2.
-
- Queen Elizabeth             Richard III.
-
- Mrs. Oakley                 Jealous Wife
-
-                                 1792–3.
-
- Ariadne                     Ariadne      (_Murphy._)
-
-                                 1793–4.
-
- Countess Orsini             Emilia Galotti      (_from Lessing._)
-
-                                 1794–5.
-
- Horatia                     Roman Father      (_Whitehead._)
-
- Elvira                      Edwyn and Elgiva      (_Miss Burney._)
-
- Palmira                     Mahomet      (_from Voltaire._)
-
- Emmeline                    Edgar and Emmeline      (_Afterpiece._)
-
-                                 1795–6.
-
- Roxana                      Alexander the Great      (_Lee._)
-
- Almeyda                     Queen of Granada      (_Miss Lee._)
-
- Julia                       Such Things were      (_Prince Hoare._)
-
-                                 1796–7.
-
- Eleanora                    Edwin and Eleonora      (_Thomson._)
-
- Vitellia                    Conspiracy      (_Jephson._)
-
- Millwood                    George Barnwell
-
- Athenais                    Force of Love      (_Lee._)
-
- Aspasia                     Tamerlane      (_Rowe._)
-
- Dido                        Queen of Carthage      (_Reed._)
-
- Agnes                       Fatal Curiosity
-
-                                 1797–8.
-
- Julia                       Rivals
-
- Mrs. Haller                 Stranger
-
-                                 1798–9.
-
- Miranda                     Aurelio and Miranda      (_Boaden._)
-
- Countess                    Castle of Montval       (_Dr. Whalley._)
-
- Elvira                      Pizarro
-
-                               1799–1800.
-
- Adelaide                    Adelaide      (_Pye._)
-
- Lady Jane                   De Montfort
-
-                                 1800–1.
-
- Helena                      Antonio      (_Godwin._)
-
- Agnes                       Julian and Agnes      (_Sotheby._)
-
-                                  1802.
-
- Hermione                    Winter’s Tale
-
-Of Mrs. Siddons’s private life it is not necessary for us to speak at
-length. She had a full share of domestic troubles; and suffered the most
-poignant sorrow which could have befallen her affectionate temper, in
-the successive deaths of two lovely daughters in the prime of youth, and
-of her eldest son at a more advanced age. Nor was she exempted by her
-brilliant success and large gains from great anxiety upon pecuniary
-matters, and from the necessity of diligent labour at times when rest
-would have been most grateful to a distressed spirit, and a body
-weakened by frequent indisposition. And she made it her boast that she
-had never wilfully disappointed either a manager or the public; and that
-in point of punctuality, she had always been _an honest actress_. But
-Mr. Siddons lost money in some unfortunate speculations; and this,
-combined with the extreme difficulty of extracting from Sheridan her
-salary, or even the proceeds of her benefits, kept Mrs. Siddons poor for
-many years. It is however gratifying to know that the evening of her
-life was spent in affluence.
-
-In social intercourse Mrs. Siddons commanded the respect of all, the
-admiration and love of those who knew her intimately. To a
-constitutional want of animal spirits, and to a fear of that
-presumptuous intrusion to which actresses are often exposed, we may
-attribute a gravity, not to say severity of manner, from which distant
-observers sometimes inferred a corresponding severity of character. That
-this was not the case, that she was benevolent, cheerful, and
-affectionately interested in the welfare of all who enjoyed her
-friendship, is shown by the testimony of many, and by the evidence of
-her own actions.
-
-To be courted by the rich and noble is not the best proof or reward even
-of professional merit; and no one ever was less disposed than Mrs.
-Siddons to act the part of what is called _a lion_. But it should be
-mentioned that her acquaintance was eagerly cultivated among the highest
-of the land; and that she was personally esteemed by George III. and his
-queen, and often summoned to attend on their private circle. She
-possessed a still higher honour, and one which she is said to have
-esteemed more highly, in the admiration and friendship of Johnson,
-Reynolds, Burke, Fox, and other intellectual ornaments of the age.
-
-After quitting the stage, Mrs. Siddons gave public readings of poetry at
-the Argyle Rooms, and also, by special invitation from the Universities,
-at Cambridge and Oxford. At home her readings of Shakspeare were the
-delight of large and frequent parties, till within a year or two of her
-death. The latter years of her life were spent, the winter months at her
-house in London, the summer months at some watering-place, and in visits
-to her numerous friends. Time laid his touch gently on her noble face
-and person; and to the end of life she looked some years younger than
-her age, and preserved her mental powers unimpaired. She died June 8,
-1831, in her seventy-sixth year.
-
-We need hardly refer to the Lives of Messrs. Boaden and Campbell. The
-interest of the latter is much increased by the critical and other
-writings of Mrs. Siddons, with which it is interspersed.
-
-[Illustration: [Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse, from Sir J. Reynolds.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by E. Scriven._
-
-  SIR W. HERSCHELL.
-
-  _From a Crayon Picture by the late J. Russell, Esq^{re}. R.A. in the
-    possession of Sir John Herschell._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                               HERSCHEL.
-
-
-William Herschel was born at Hanover, November 15, 1738. His father was
-a musician, and brought up his four sons to his own art, which in
-Germany gave him better means of educating his children, than would have
-fallen to the lot of a person holding the same station in England. The
-subject of our memoir is said to have had a master who instructed him in
-French, ethics, and metaphysics: but at the age of fourteen he was
-placed in the band of the Hanoverian regiment of guards, and in 1758 or
-1759 he accompanied a detachment of the regiment to England. Another
-account states that he grew tired of his occupation, and came to England
-alone. Here, after struggling with poverty for some time, he was chosen
-by Lord Darlington to organize a band for the Durham militia; after
-which he passed several years in the West Riding of Yorkshire, employed
-in teaching music and studying languages. About 1765 he was elected
-organist at Halifax, and employed himself in the study of harmony and
-mathematics. Such at least is the statement of the ‘Obituary;’ but in
-that respectable work we find no references to the sources from which
-these minute particulars of Herschel’s early life are obtained. About
-this time he is said to have visited Italy; and, without professing to
-give credit to it, we may here insert a curious story which appears to
-have been copied into English works from the ‘Dictionnaire des Auteurs
-Vivans,’ &c., Paris, 1816. Being at Genoa, and not having wherewith to
-pay his passage home to England, he procured from a M. L’Anglé the use
-of some public rooms for a concert, at which he played a quartett,
-alone, upon a harp, and two horns, one fastened to each shoulder. Those
-who are in the least acquainted with wind instruments will hardly
-believe that a horn fastened to the shoulder would be of much more use
-than one growing out of the head, as a musical instrument; to say
-nothing of the difficulty of blowing two horns at once, or of playing a
-_quartett_ upon _three_ instruments. Remarkable characters are generally
-made the subject of wonderful stories, of which each is fashioned in
-accordance with the general habits of the inventor: the groom’s idea of
-a wit was “a gentleman who could ride three horses at once;” surely two
-horns and a harp are not too much to be played at once by a planetary
-discoverer.
-
-About 1766, he is said to have been one of the Pump-room band at Bath,
-and was shortly afterwards organist of the Octagon Chapel there. He
-taught and read as before; and here he turned his attention to
-astronomy. He borrowed a small reflecting telescope of a friend; and at
-length, finding that the purchase of such an instrument was
-(“fortunately,” as it has been well expressed,) above his means, he
-endeavoured to construct one for himself. His first attempt was a
-five-feet Newtonian reflector. It was some time before he perfected
-himself in the method of forming mirrors: in one instance he is said to
-have spoiled 200 before he succeeded.
-
-In 1781, he announced to the world the discovery of his new planet, of
-which we shall presently speak. He was immediately appointed private
-astronomer to the King, by George III., a post which, we believe, was
-created for him, and died with him, with a salary of £400, and removed,
-first to Datchet, afterwards to Slough, where he continued till his
-death, August 23, 1822. During this period he ran that career of patient
-and sagacious investigation, terminating in brilliant discovery, which
-has made his name so well known to the world. Little has been published
-concerning his private life; but the whole results of his mind are to be
-found in the ‘Philosophical Transactions’ between the years 1782 and
-1818.
-
-We have not been able to find the dates of his knighthood, or of his
-receiving the degree of Doctor of Civil Law from the University of
-Oxford. He married (we cannot find the date) Mrs. Mary Pitt, a widow;
-and his only son, Sir John Herschel, has selected from the many tasks to
-which he is competent, that of developing and adding to his father’s
-discoveries.
-
-In the space which we can devote to the astronomical and optical labours
-of Herschel, we cannot attempt to furnish even the smallest detail of
-their end and objects, since the catalogue of titles alone would occupy
-more room than we have to give. We can do no more than address ourselves
-to the impression which generally exists upon the subject, and which
-supposes the inventor and the philosopher to be no more than an
-industrious man with good eyes, clever at grinding mirrors for
-reflecting telescopes, and lucky enough to point one at a new planet.
-Such being the common notion, it is not possible to make any mere
-description of Herschel’s papers an index of his merits. Nor have we
-here understated the scientific knowledge of the public in general. When
-Sir John Herschel lately set out for the Cape of Good Hope, the
-newspapers announced his approaching departure, accompanied by the
-information that “six waggon loads of telescopes” were on their way to
-the ship, which was all that was said, except in publications expressly
-scientific. That one principal object of the son’s voyage was to
-complete a great branch of astronomy, by doing in the southern
-hemisphere what the father had done in the northern, was not stated for
-a very simple reason—that this portion of the father’s labours is hardly
-known by name to any but astronomers. And it is to astronomers only that
-Herschel is truly known. The notion entertained of him by others often
-reminds us of the farmer, who came to him to know the proper time to cut
-his hay. The philosopher replied by pointing to his own crop, which
-happened to be rotting on the ground under a heavy rain.
-
-The planet which Herschel called after George III. (but which now goes
-under the more appropriate name of Uranus) was discovered by him March
-13, 1781; not accidentally, but as one of the fruits of a laborious
-investigation, with a distinct and useful object. He was examining every
-star with one telescope, that he might obtain a definite idea of
-relative phenomena, which should enable him to distinguish changes
-actually taking place, from differences of appearance caused by the use
-of different telescopes: the whole being in furtherance of the design of
-“throwing some new light upon the organization of the celestial bodies.”
-The last words, which are part of the title of one of his subsequent
-papers, aptly express the line of astronomy to which Herschel devoted
-his life; and the discovery of the planet Uranus was not the chance work
-of a moment, but the consequence of sagacity strengthened by habit, the
-latter being formed with a perfect knowledge of what was wanted, as well
-as of what would be useful in supplying it. Had he been merely
-registering the places of the stars, he would probably (as others did
-before him) have passed the planet, perhaps with some remark upon its
-apparent _diskiness_: for though the stars have no well-defined discs,
-yet some have so much more of the appearance of discs than others, that
-a faint planet, viewed with a low power, might easily be taken for a
-star. But being engaged upon the stars, expressly with a view to trying
-how much of such a circumstance would be telescopic, and how much real,
-he was thereby led to try higher powers, and, eventually, other
-telescopes. The existence of the _planet_ was soon ascertained, and
-forms one of the two great features of Herschel’s reputation in the eyes
-of the world at large.
-
-The celebrated forty-foot telescope, first described to the Royal
-Society by Herschel, June 2, 1795, was the result of a long series of
-experiments on the construction of mirrors, begun at Bath, on telescopes
-from two to twenty feet in length. And we may here remark, that “the
-bulk of his fortune arose from the sale of telescopes of his own
-construction, many of which were purchased for the chief observatories
-of Europe,” and not from the salary of £400 a year which he received as
-private astronomer to George III. See ‘Statement of Circumstances,’ &c.,
-a pamphlet printed on the occasion of the last election of a President
-by the Royal Society. In 1785, George III. furnished Herschel with the
-means of undertaking an instrument larger than any he had yet made. The
-greatest difficulty (independent of the stand) was the obtaining a
-mirror of sufficient size, which should not crack in cooling, and should
-be strong enough not to bend under its own weight. This instrument has
-been so frequently described that we shall say no more of it, except
-that Herschel dates the completion of it from August 28, 1789, when he
-discovered the sixth satellite of Saturn, and obtained his best view of
-the spots on that planet. A month later, the seventh satellite was
-discovered by Herschel. This telescope is now never used. Sir J.
-Herschel prefers a twenty-foot reflector for his own observations.
-
-The first discovery of the satellites of Uranus was also in a minor
-degree the work of thought. Such bodies were repeatedly looked for by
-Herschel, but none were seen. A small change in the instrument, by which
-the light was increased, suggested one more trial; and the result was
-the establishment of the existence of the two first satellites, in
-January, 1787. Two more were discovered by Herschel, in 1790, and two
-more in 1794. These satellites cannot be seen but with an instrument of
-first-rate power, and in a favourable position of the planet. No one has
-observed the four last satellites except Herschel himself, or the two
-first, except himself and Sir J. Herschel, who has confirmed his
-father’s determination of their periods. See _Mem. Royal Astron. Soc._
-vol. viii. He found that their orbits were nearly perpendicular to the
-plane of the ecliptic, and ascertained their retrograde motion, and some
-remarkable relations between their mean distances. It has a brilliant
-sound, but it is literally true as to the number of _known_ bodies
-composing the solar system, that Herschel left it exactly half as large
-again as he found it. To the Sun, Mercury, Venus, the Earth and Moon,
-Mars, Jupiter and four satellites, Saturn and five satellites, and
-Halley’s Comet, eighteen in all, he added nine, namely, two satellites
-to Saturn, Uranus and six satellites.
-
-But not content with augmenting our own, it is to Herschel we owe the
-discovery of other systems. That the fixed stars were each the centre of
-a number of planets was suspected, perhaps rather prematurely, before
-his observations were made known. But the first positive addition to our
-knowledge of _systems_, that is of bodies which move in any degree of
-connexion with each other, is to be found in his paper read to the Royal
-Society, June 9, 1803, announcing that Castor, γ Leonis, ε Bootis, ζ
-Herculis, δ Serpentis, γ Virginis, were most probably _binary_[4] stars.
-The existence of such systems has been confirmed by Sir J. Herschel and
-Professor Struve, and the duration of the periods given by Herschel has
-been sufficiently confirmed to make the exactness of his observations
-remarkable. But to new planets, and new systems, Herschel added new
-universes; or, more properly speaking, showed that the universe
-consisted of portions, each conveying as large an idea of extent and
-number, as the whole of what was previously called _the universe_. His
-great telescope furnished sufficient facts, and his mind was not slow to
-draw a conjectural inference, which must be classed among the happiest
-efforts of reasoning speculation. The resolution of the milky way into
-stars proved that we are situated in a stratum of such bodies much
-thicker in some directions than others: this led to the inference that
-some or all of the nebulæ with which the sky is crowded might be similar
-enormous groups of stars; and the resolution of some of the nebulæ into
-detached portions was a first step towards the demonstration of the
-conjecture.
-
-Footnote 4:
-
-  _Double_ stars, those which are so near to each other as to appear one
-  to the naked eye: _binary_ systems, double stars which revolve round
-  each other.
-
-There is enough yet unmentioned,—in the discovery of the time of
-rotation of Saturn—that of Jupiter’s satellites—that of the
-refrangibility of heat—the experiments on colours—the enormous
-collection of nebulæ—the experimental determination of the magnitude of
-stars—the researches and conjectures on the physical constitution of the
-sun—those on the qualities of telescopes, &c. &c.,—to form by itself no
-ordinary title to the recollection of posterity. But we must refer to
-Sir J. Herschel’s Astronomy, in which will be found such an account of
-them as the plan of the work permitted, by one who has shown himself as
-indisposed to exaggerate, as interested to explain.
-
-In the labours of his observatory Herschel was assisted by his sister,
-Miss Caroline Herschel, with whose help he published, in 1798, his
-catalogue of Flamsteed’s stars. This lady, whose exertions, both as an
-observer and calculator, are well known to astronomers, is still living,
-at a very advanced age, in Hanover.
-
-We do not know of any very trustworthy account of Herschel. ‘The
-Obituary for 1822,’ the ‘Gentleman’s Magazine,’ the ‘Annual Register,’
-&c., do not state their authorities. We have followed the
-first-mentioned work as to facts and dates in most of the particulars
-here mentioned.
-
-[Illustration: [View of the great telescope erected at Slough.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by R. Woodman._
-
-  SIR S. ROMILLY.
-
-  _From an Enamel after a Picture by Sir Thomas Lawrence._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                ROMILLY.
-
-
-The grandfather of Sir Samuel Romilly, as we learn from the following
-passage of a speech which he made at Bristol, “was born the heir to a
-considerable landed estate at Montpellier, in the South of France. His
-ancestors had early imbibed and adopted the principles and doctrines of
-the Reformed Religion, and he had been educated himself in that
-religious faith. He had the misfortune to live soon after the time when
-the Edict of Nantes, the great Toleration Act of the Protestants of
-France, was revoked by Louis XIV.; and he found himself exposed to all
-the vexations and persecutions of a bigoted and tyrannical government
-for worshipping God in the manner in which he believed was most
-acceptable to Him. He determined to free himself from this bondage; he
-abandoned his property, he tore himself from his connexions, and,
-quitting the country and its tyrant, sought an asylum in this land of
-liberty, where he had to support himself only by his own exertions. He
-himself embarked in trade; he educated his sons to useful trades; and he
-was contented, at his death, to leave them, instead of his original
-patrimony, no other inheritance than the habits of industry he had given
-them—the example of his own virtuous life, an hereditary detestation of
-tyranny and injustice, and an ardent zeal in the cause of civil and
-religious freedom.” One of these sons became eminent as a jeweller, and
-married Miss Garnault, by whom he had a numerous family. Of these three
-only lived to maturity, Thomas, Catherine, and Samuel. Samuel was the
-youngest, and was born March 1, 1757.
-
-His father was a man of extreme benevolence, and strict integrity; warm
-in his affections, and cheerful in his disposition. Under the influence
-of his precepts and example the moral character of Samuel Romilly was
-formed: for his mother, from an habitual state of bad health, was
-incapable of superintending the early education of her children, which
-was consequently much neglected. Samuel and his brother were sent to a
-common day-school, the master of which pretended to teach Latin,
-although really ignorant of that language. It was at one time
-contemplated to train him to commercial business in the house of the
-Fludyers, who were then considerable merchants in the city, and near
-relations of his family: but the sudden death of both the partners of
-that house put an end to these projects; and in the absence of other
-occupation, his father employed him in keeping his accounts, and
-sometimes receiving orders from customers. He had thus leisure to
-cultivate tastes more congenial to his nature; and at the age of
-fourteen he commenced that self-education, to which he owed all his
-future success. Every volume of his father’s little collection, and of
-the circulating libraries in the neighbourhood, was anxiously and
-attentively perused. Ancient and modern history, treatises on science,
-works of criticism, travels, and English poetry, were among his
-favourite books. But a passion for poetry soon predominated over other
-tastes; and from admiring the poetry of others he aspired at becoming a
-poet himself. He wrote eclogues, songs, and satires, translated passages
-from French poets, and imitated English ones; and resolving to devote
-himself steadily to literature he hoped to acquire fame as an author. He
-now set about learning Latin in earnest; and was soon able, by dint of
-unremitting assiduity, and with some assistance from a private tutor, to
-understand the easier Latin authors. In the course of about three years
-he had read through Sallust, Livy, and Tacitus three times; he had
-studied almost the whole of Cicero, as well as the principal poets; he
-had gone through the Latin translations of the Greek historians,
-orators, and philosophers; and had made numerous translations from the
-Latin classics into English, which he retranslated into Latin. This
-double exercise he found to be eminently useful in rendering him, what
-he at length became, a very excellent scholar. In addition to these
-studies, he attended lectures on natural philosophy, painting,
-architecture, and anatomy.
-
-In the meanwhile he felt his father’s business become every day more
-irksome; and it was definitively arranged that he should enter into some
-branch of the law; a plan which he was enabled to execute by the
-accession to the family of a considerable legacy. At the age of sixteen,
-he was articled to Mr. Lally for five years, with a view of succeeding
-to him as one of the six clerks in Chancery. The society, however, of
-Mr. Lally and the pursuit of his literary tastes had greater attractions
-for him than the regular occupation of the office; and although he
-scrupulously performed the duties required of him, his favourite
-classics engrossed a large portion of his time, and his mind was still
-intent upon a life of peaceful retirement, and the prospect of literary
-fame.
-
-At the expiration of the term of his apprenticeship, however, he
-determined, much against the opinion of many of his friends, to study at
-one of the inns of court, and to be called to the bar. His real motive
-in deciding against a clerkship in chancery, which was then only to be
-obtained by purchase, was little suspected at the time; it was, that he
-might not be obliged to call for his share of the legacy just alluded
-to, amounting to 2000_l._; which he knew it would be very inconvenient
-to his father to pay. This trait of pious benevolence was, by a just
-retribution, the pivot upon which his future fortunes more immediately
-turned.
-
-It was not till he had attained his twenty-first year that he entered
-upon these new studies; and they were pursued with so much persevering
-assiduity, that at length he became seriously indisposed, and all
-application was for months prohibited by his medical advisers. So
-serious an interruption to his pursuits was likely to be most injurious
-to him in his profession; when, fortunately, an opportunity occurred of
-making an excursion to the continent. The Rev. John Roget, who had
-recently married his sister, had been attacked with a pulmonary
-complaint, which obliged him to remove with her to a southern climate,
-leaving behind them in England their first and then only child. They
-were no sooner settled at Lausanne, than they ardently desired to have
-this child conveyed to them, and Mr. Romilly, from a deep sense of the
-obligations he already owed to his brother-in-law for assisting him in
-his studies, and supplying that judicious and well-timed encouragement,
-which, on a susceptible and ardent mind, ever acts as the most powerful
-incentive to exertion, readily undertook the charge. The change of air
-and scene, the lively interest he took in visiting new countries, and
-the consciousness of rendering no small service to relatives to whom he
-was most affectionately attached, produced a rapid and favourable change
-upon his health. Still more important was the effect produced on the
-tone of his mind by this renewed intercourse with a friend, who had
-early discerned his latent abilities and extraordinary capacity, and
-who, on this occasion, placing before his view the wide field on which
-those talents might be advantageously exercised, and the important
-services he might thus be capable of rendering to his fellow-creatures,
-produced impressions which were indelible, and which, as he himself has
-often said, had a marked influence upon the subsequent events of his
-life.
-
-On his return to England he resumed his studies with renovated strength
-and with redoubled ardour. He was called to the bar in 1783. More than
-ten years, however, elapsed before any real prospect of success opened
-to him in his profession. It is true that he was employed in drawing
-pleadings in chancery, and this business gradually increased; but it
-never required him to open his lips in court; and although he regularly
-attended the Midland circuit, he had no connexions on it, and it was not
-until he commenced an attendance on the sessions that the circuit at
-length became a source of some profit to him. In 1792 he appeared for
-the first time as a leader: in a short time he was employed in almost
-every case, and not many years passed before he was at the head of his
-circuit.
-
-But we are anticipating a later period. In 1784 Mr. Romilly became
-acquainted with Mirabeau, and through him with Lord Lansdowne. That
-nobleman appreciated the knowledge and character of the rising lawyer,
-and becoming intimate with him, did all in his power to encourage and
-bring forth his talents. About the same time there was published a tract
-by the Rev. Dr. Madan, entitled ‘Thoughts on Executive Justice.’ It had
-attracted some attention, and was so much admired by Lord Lansdowne,
-that he suggested to his friend the task of writing a treatise in the
-same spirit. But Mr. Romilly was so much shocked at the principle upon
-which it proceeded, namely, that of rigidly executing the criminal code
-in all cases, barbarous and sanguinary as it then was, that, instead of
-adopting its doctrines, he sat down to refute them. The triumphant reply
-which he drew up and published anonymously did not meet with the success
-it deserved. Nevertheless he had the satisfaction of hearing it praised
-from the bench; and Lord Lansdowne himself had the singular candour to
-acknowledge the merit of a production, which, although written at his
-own suggestion, was at variance with the opinions he had desired to see
-inculcated.
-
-Allusion has been made to Mr. Romilly’s acquaintance with Mirabeau. He
-was one of those of whose talents Mirabeau had availed himself on more
-than one occasion. It is unnecessary, however, to mention more than the
-following instance, which is too characteristic to be omitted. During
-one of Mr. Romilly’s visits to Paris, in 1788, curiosity led him to see
-the prison of the Bicêtre, and on meeting Mirabeau the next day, he
-described to him all the horror and disgust with which the place had
-inspired him. Mirabeau, struck with the force of his description, begged
-him to express it in writing, and to be allowed to use it. Mirabeau
-translated and published this account in a pamphlet, which, in spite of
-the title, ‘Lettre d’un Voyageur Anglais sur la Prison de Bicêtre,’ was
-everywhere ascribed to him; while the real author, on his return to
-England, printed his own MS. in the ‘Repository,’ as the translation,
-although it was in fact the original.
-
-It was not till the autumn of 1796, when on a visit to Bowood, the
-country-seat of Lord Lansdowne, that Mr. Romilly first met Miss Garbett,
-to whom he was afterwards united, and who formed the charm of the
-remainder of his existence. With such sacred inducements to renew his
-efforts in his profession, his advancement was proportionably rapid. On
-November 6, 1800, he was appointed king’s counsel; and it was soon clear
-that he might aspire to the highest ranks of his profession. In 1806 he
-was made Solicitor-general, under the administration of Mr. Fox and Lord
-Grenville. He was, much against his will, knighted on his appointment;
-and was brought into Parliament by the Government for Queenborough. Soon
-after, he was called upon to sum up the evidence on the trial of Lord
-Melville; a duty which he performed with consummate skill, though with a
-feebleness of voice which deprived his most able speech of its just
-effect in the vast hall where it was delivered.
-
-During the first session of his parliamentary career, Sir Samuel Romilly
-confined himself principally to questions of law, and seldom addressed
-the House, except in committee; but in the beginning of 1807 he took a
-more prominent part, and made his first great speech in favour of the
-abolition of the Slave-trade—a speech, which at once placed him on a
-level with the most successful orators of the day. In this subject he
-had always felt deep interest. From his earliest youth he had expressed
-the warmest indignation against this infamous traffic; he had
-translated, with a view to publication, Condorcet’s pamphlet against
-West Indian slavery, and, at the beginning of the French Revolution, he
-had written an eloquent paper against the Slave-trade, and had
-transmitted it to his friend Dumont, from whom he trusted it would pass
-to Mirabeau, and would remind him of the importance of the question, at
-a time when a comparatively slight effort would have settled it in that
-country for ever. These previous efforts had produced no effect; but he
-had afterwards the satisfaction of belonging to the ministry to whom the
-honour was due of abolishing the slave-trade, and of thus preparing the
-way for putting an end to slavery itself. This ministry were soon after
-dismissed from their offices, for not sacrificing their opinions in
-favour of Catholic emancipation to the lamentable and persevering
-prejudices entertained by George III. on that question, prejudices
-adopted by his son and successor, to the infinite detriment of his
-dominions.
-
-On the dissolution of parliament which followed, Sir Samuel Romilly,
-having procured for himself a seat for Wareham, lost no time in
-re-introducing a measure, which had been rejected in the former
-parliament, to enable a creditor to obtain the payment of his debts from
-the landed property of persons dying indebted. With a view to prevent
-opposition, he had confined the operation of his measure to freehold
-estates only. The bill, however, even in this modified form, met with
-the greatest opposition. Its introduction by Sir Samuel was ascribed to
-“his hereditary love of democracy;” it was denounced by Canning, “as the
-first step of something that might end like the French Revolution, and
-as a dangerous attack against the aristocracy, which was thus to be
-sacrificed to the commercial interest;” and it was finally rejected by a
-considerable majority. Rather than give up his object entirely, he
-determined to make another concession to the prejudices of his
-opponents; and a few days after the rejection of the measure, on
-introducing a second bill on the same subject, he limited its operation
-to the landed estates of _traders_. This expedient succeeded; the
-aristocracy, caring little what became of traders’ estates, suffered the
-bill to pass both houses without the slightest opposition, and it
-received the Royal assent in August, 1807. After the lapse of seven
-years, he made fresh attempts in favour of his original bill, but in
-vain. It was indeed carried by the Commons, in 1814, by a majority of
-nearly two to one; and again in the same house, in the two succeeding
-years, without the slightest opposition; but on all these occasions it
-was as regularly rejected by the House of Peers. The original measure,
-including copyhold as well as freehold estates, has recently become part
-of the law of the land.
-
-During the vacation of 1807 Sir Samuel Romilly prepared some of those
-reforms in the criminal law, by which he is most known to the public.
-For many years he had been intent on this subject, and had made it his
-particular study. During repeated visits to the continent, he never
-missed an opportunity of attending any important trial; and for the
-sixteen years during which he attended the circuit, he had been in the
-habit of noting down whatever appeared to him worthy of observation in
-the criminal courts. Shocked at instances of judicial injustice, which
-thus fell under his notice, he had secretly resolved that, if it should
-ever be in his power, he would endeavour to provide a remedy for such
-gross abuses. The principles of his intended reforms were contained in
-his answer to Dr. Madan. He held that the prevention of crime is more
-effectually accomplished by certainty than by severity of punishment;
-that to approximate to certainty of punishment, it was necessary to
-mitigate the severities of the penal code; that, unless this were done,
-there would still be an indisposition on the part of the public to
-prosecute, of witnesses to give evidence, of juries to convict, and even
-of judges to put in execution the sentences they had themselves
-passed;—that all these were so many chances of escape offered to a
-culprit, operating rather as encouragements than as checks to crime.
-These doctrines, then so new, although now received as axioms, made but
-few converts at first; and it was not till they were again brought
-before the public in the House of Commons, in 1808, that they attracted
-some of that attention to which they were entitled. One of his first
-bills, which repealed the punishment of death for stealing privately
-from the person to the amount of five shillings, passed both houses with
-but little opposition; but, as the number of prosecutions increased in
-consequence, it was alleged that the crime itself had increased, and
-that all similar reforms would be attended with similar mischief.
-Romilly urged in vain that, when the measure was under consideration, he
-had foretold that it would produce an increase of prosecutions; and that
-this, far from being an argument against the mitigation of punishment,
-was the best proof of its efficacy. In vain did he defend his principle,
-with the varied stores of his knowledge, with the most powerful
-arguments, and with the eloquence of deep conviction. The mature
-reflections of above thirty years’ study and experience were treated as
-the rash innovations of a wild theorist. The effect of government
-circulars was too seldom counteracted by the attendance of his own
-political friends; no party advantage could be gained from such
-enlightened labours; there was no large and powerful body in the country
-to second his efforts; and when, at length, after unremitting
-perseverance, he occasionally succeeded in carrying a bill through the
-Commons, it was rarely permitted to pass through the ordeal of the Upper
-House. But these efforts were not thrown away. His views, ably and
-diligently supported by Sir James Mackintosh and others, have since been
-confirmed and acted on even by his political opponents. The credit which
-was due to him who had sown the seed has since been claimed by those who
-reaped it; but the harvest is not lost to the public.
-
-But Romilly did not shrink from taking an active part on questions more
-generally interesting to the public, even though the avowal of his
-opinions might endanger his advancement in life. A remarkable instance
-of this kind occurred in the beginning of 1809, when the conduct of the
-Duke of York was brought before the house by Colonel Wardle. He was
-aware that to support this inquiry would not be less obnoxious to many
-members of the former government than to those then in office. It had
-been significantly intimated to him that the Prince of Wales would
-consider any attack on the duke as an attack on himself; and he felt
-under some obligation to the Prince for having formerly offered him a
-seat in parliament, which, however, he had declined. Such was his
-position; entertaining, however, a strong opinion on the subject, he
-resolved not to abandon his duty; and he spoke and voted in favour of
-the motion. He concluded his speech in these words: “The venerable
-judge[5] who took an early part in the discussion of this question has
-attested the sincerity of his vote by an affecting allusion to his age
-and infirmities, to the few inducements which the remainder of his life
-presented to him. I cannot say the same thing. Not labouring under the
-same affliction, and not having arrived at the same period of life, I
-may reasonably be allowed for myself, and for those who are most dear to
-me, to indulge hopes of prosperity yet to come. Reflecting on the
-vicissitudes of human life, I may entertain apprehensions of adversity
-and persecution which perhaps await me. I have, however, the
-satisfaction to reflect, that it is not possible for me to hope to
-derive, in any way the most remote, advantages from the vote which upon
-this occasion I shall give, and from the part which I have thought it my
-duty to act.”
-
-Footnote 5:
-
-  Mr. Barton, a Welsh judge, who was then at the age of nearly seventy,
-  and deprived of his sight.
-
-These anticipations were afterwards corroborated by several persons, who
-told him, that after such a speech, he must give up all thoughts of ever
-being Chancellor. The public also felt that he had made a sacrifice in
-their cause. Thanks were voted to him in conjunction with Mr. Whitbread,
-Lord Folkstone, and some others, from the City of London, Liverpool,
-Carmarthen, Wiltshire, Bristol, Berwick, &c. &c.; and he was invited by
-the Livery of London to a public dinner, as a mark of approbation of his
-conduct. He declined, however, to accept the intended honour, and his
-answers to the addresses were drawn up with that unaffected modesty, and
-love of simple truth, which were so peculiarly characteristic of his
-mind. Instead of dwelling upon his own merit, he drew the picture of
-what would have been thought of him had he pursued an opposite course.
-“Seeing the case,” he said in his answer to the Livery, “in the light in
-which I saw it, to have acted otherwise than I did, I must have been
-base enough to have deserted my public duty upon a most important
-occasion, from the mean apprehension that to discharge my duty might be
-attended with personal disadvantage to myself. If there be much merit in
-not having been actuated by such unworthy motives, (which I cannot
-think, but if there be,) that merit I certainly may pretend to, &c.”
-
-The course which he took in the year following on the imprisonment of
-Gale Jones, and the alleged breach of privilege by Sir Francis Burdett,
-was again at variance with that adopted by either of the two great
-parties in the house. The Opposition as well as the Ministry, and all
-the lawyers who took any part in the debate, concurred in thinking the
-paper written by Sir Francis Burdett a breach of privilege, and
-deserving of punishment of one kind or another; while Romilly maintained
-that the house had no jurisdiction to take cognizance of the offence. He
-did not dispute the right to imprison for a breach of privilege which
-obstructed their proceedings, but he denied the right and the policy of
-doing so for the publication of animadversions on matters already
-concluded. He urged that these latter questions “ought not to be decided
-on by the house, which thus constituted itself prosecutor, party, and
-judge, without affording to the accused the opportunity of even hearing
-the charges preferred against him; but they ought to be left to the
-ordinary tribunals, the courts of law.” These arguments, disregarded at
-the time, were amply justified by the events which followed. The folly
-of the course adopted was proved by serious disturbances, attended with
-the loss of life; petitions couched in the most disrespectful language
-were sent up, and inserted on the Journals; and the question of the
-privileges of the Commons came, in the first instance, before the courts
-of law, and was finally decided by the House of Lords. Invitations to
-public dinners were again sent to him, which he again declined; and
-addresses of thanks were voted “for the stand he had made in favour of
-the dominion of the law, against arbitrary discretion and undefined
-privilege.”
-
-But it was not only in this way that the public showed how much they
-appreciated his integrity and independence. In 1812 he was pressed to
-allow himself to be put in nomination for several large constituencies;
-amongst others for Liverpool, Chester, Middlesex, and Bristol. At
-Bristol, his past political conduct was considered a sufficient
-guarantee for the future; no pledge was required of him, he was to be
-put to no expense, and it was agreed that he should be excused from
-personal canvas. On terms so honourable he consented to be put in
-nomination; and although a total stranger in the town, his reception was
-most encouraging, and there seemed every prospect of success.
-Nevertheless the common but dishonest maxim, of every thing being fair
-at an election, being acted upon by the opposite party, it was soon
-evident that he would not be returned; and on the seventh day he
-resigned any further contest.
-
-Although his opinions were not as yet to receive the sanction of any
-large and popular constituency, he did not relax his efforts in favour
-of the rights and interests of the people. On being returned for
-Horsham, during the six sessions which this parliament lasted, we find
-him the same strenuous advocate for civil liberty and religious
-toleration in the most extensive sense of the words, at home and abroad;
-the same determined enemy to peculation and corruption, the same ardent
-and judicious reformer of the laws; “incapable on every occasion of
-being swerved from his duty by the threats of power, the allurements of
-the great, the temptations of private interest, or even the seduction of
-popular favour. All the toil, the pain, and the fatigue of his duties
-were his own; all the advantage which resulted from his labours were for
-the public.”
-
-He spoke and voted against military flogging, the game laws, the
-punishment of the pillory, the poor laws, the law of libel, and
-lotteries; against the suspension of the Habeas Corpus act, Lord
-Sidmouth’s circular letter, and the employment of spies and informers;
-and against the persecution of the Protestants in France, and the Alien
-bill at home; in favour of Catholic emancipation, the education of the
-poor, and the liberty of the press. He was always a zealous advocate for
-peace; against the system of the corn laws, and all restrictions on
-commerce, and he was in favour of an extensive change in the
-representation of the people, of shortening the duration of parliament,
-and ensuring the free exercise of the elective franchise. He was also in
-favour of the promulgation of laws, of allowing counsel to prisoners, of
-giving compensation to those who had been unjustly accused, of greatly
-extending the rules respecting the admission of evidence; of introducing
-secondary punishments, and of instituting a public prosecutor; and all
-this not more for the sake of humanity towards the guilty, than for the
-great ends of justice, the prevention of crime, and the reform of
-criminals.
-
-At the conclusion of this parliament in 1818, Sir Samuel Romilly, after
-having again been invited to stand for several large constituencies, by
-any of which he was assured he would be elected, was at length put in
-nomination for Westminster; and although he was violently opposed by the
-court on the one side, and by the ultra popular party on the other;
-although, during the whole of the contest, he was calmly pursuing his
-professional duties in the Court of Chancery, and never once appeared on
-the hustings till the conclusion, he was returned at the head of the
-poll. After his election, he did all in his power to avoid the ceremony
-of chairing; but on his objections being over-ruled, his greatest
-pleasure was when, after he had addressed the multitude from the windows
-of Burlington House, he was able to escape by a back door and walk by
-the less frequented streets to his home, there to receive
-congratulations no less hearty, and more congenial to his temper and
-taste. But he did not live to take his seat. A life of uninterrupted and
-rarely equalled domestic happiness, and of great success in his
-professional and political career, was suddenly embittered by the loss
-of that being, to whom he had been deeply and devotedly attached for
-above twenty years, and with whom he had ever considered his happiness
-and prosperity as being indissolubly connected. He sank under this
-calamity, and mankind was deprived of his services for ever[6].
-
-Footnote 6:
-
-  Strong symptoms of an incipient brain fever showed themselves, and
-  these increased so rapidly as to produce, before they could be
-  checked, a temporary delirium, as most frequently happens in that
-  malady; and in this paroxysm he terminated his existence, November 22,
-  1818, three days after Lady Romilly’s death.
-
-Romilly was reserved and silent in general society, but affectionate,
-entertaining, and instructive with his friends; and full of joyousness,
-humour, and playfulness with his children, and in the bosom of his
-family. He was endowed with a lively imagination, he was fond of
-retirement, and was a passionate admirer of the beauties of nature.
-Indefatigable in his profession and in parliament, he yet found time to
-keep up with the literature of the day, to write criticisms on the books
-which he read, to keep a regular diary of his political career, and to
-compose essays on various branches of the criminal law. His eloquence
-was of that kind which never fails to make a lasting impression: it was
-full of earnest conviction and deep sensibility. He was a great master
-of sarcasm, but he considered it an unfair weapon and rarely employed
-it. So jealous was he of his independence, that when he was
-solicitor-general, and one of his nephews was peculiarly anxious to be
-placed in the Military Academy at Woolwich, he refused to lay himself
-under any obligation, even for so slight a favour; and the application
-was never made. Few ever gained so large a portion of public favour, and
-yet so studiously avoided courting popularity; and no one ever rose
-higher in the esteem of his political contemporaries. Unsullied in
-character as a lawyer, as a politician, and as a man, his life, which
-was prolonged to the age of sixty-one, was a life of happiness and of
-honour. No statues are erected to his memory; no titles descend to his
-children; but he has bequeathed a richer, a prouder, and a more lasting
-inheritance, than any which the world can bestow: the recollection of
-his virtues is still fresh in the minds of his countrymen, and the
-sacrifices he made in the cause of humanity will not be forgotten by
-mankind.
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                              SHAKSPEARE.
-
-
-The materials which we possess for the biography of Shakspeare are very
-unsatisfactory. The earliest life is that by the poet Rowe, who, as if
-aware of its scantiness, merely entitles it ‘Some Account.’ It contains
-what little the author could collect, when no sources of information
-were left open but the floating traditions of the theatre after the
-lapse of nearly a century. Mr. Malone prefixed a new life to his
-edition, extending to above 500 pages; but he only brings his author to
-London, and as to his professional progress, adds nothing to Rowe’s
-meagre tale, except some particles of information previously
-communicated in notes by himself and Steevens.
-
-William Shakspeare was born at Stratford-upon-Avon in Warwickshire,
-April 23, 1564. He was one of ten children. His father was a dealer in
-wool, as it is generally said, but according to Malone, a glover, and
-alderman in the corporation of Stratford. Our great poet received such
-education as the lower forms of the Grammar School at Stratford could
-give him; but he was removed from that establishment at an early age, to
-serve as clerk in a country attorney’s office. This anecdote of his
-boyhood receives confirmation from the frequent recurrence of technical
-law-phrases in his plays; and it has been remarked that he derives none
-of his allusions from other learned professions. Before he was eighteen
-years of age he contracted a marriage with Anne Hathaway, a woman some
-years older than himself, and the daughter of a substantial yeoman in
-his own neighbourhood. He went to London about 1586, when he was but
-twenty-two years of age, being obliged, as the common story goes, to fly
-the country, in consequence of being detected in deer-stealing. This
-tale is thought to be confirmed by the ridicule cast on his supposed
-prosecutor, Sir Thomas Lucy, in the character of Justice Shallow,
-pointed as it is by the
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by E. Scriven._
-
-  SHAKSPEARE.
-
-  _From the Picture in the Possession of His Grace the Duke of
-    Buckingham, at Stowe._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street. June 1, 1835._
-]
-
-commendation of the “dozen white luces as a good coat.” But as this is
-the only lawless action which tradition has imputed to one of the most
-amiable and inoffensive of men, we may perhaps esteem the tale to be the
-mere gossip of the tiring-room: indeed, Malone has adduced several
-arguments to prove that it cannot be correctly told. It is not necessary
-to suppose that Shakspeare was compelled to fly his native town because
-he came to the metropolis; his emigration is sufficiently accounted for
-by his father’s falling into distressed circumstances, and being obliged
-in this very year, 1586, to resign his alderman’s gown on that account.
-Another traditional anecdote, that Shakspeare’s first employment was to
-wait at the play-house door, and hold the horses of those who had no
-servants, is discredited by Mr. Steevens, who says, “That it was once
-the general custom to ride on horseback to the play I am yet to learn.
-The most popular of the theatres were on the Bankside; and we are told
-by the satirical pamphleteers of that time that the usual mode of
-conveyance to those places of amusement was by water; but not a single
-writer so much as hints at the custom of riding to them, or at the
-practice of having horses held during the hours of exhibition. Let it be
-remembered too, that we receive this tale on no higher authority than
-that of Cibber’s ‘Lives of the Poets.’”
-
-Nothing is authentically proved with respect to Shakspeare’s
-introduction to the stage. His first play is dated by Malone in 1589,
-three years after the time assigned for the author’s arrival in London.
-It appears from the dedication to ‘Venus and Adonis,’ published in 1593,
-in which he calls that poem “the first heir of his invention,” that his
-earliest essays were not in dramatic composition. The ‘Lucrece,’
-published in 1594, and the collection of sonnets, entitled the
-‘Passionate Pilgrim,’ published in 1599, also belong to an early period
-of his poetical life. The ‘Lover’s Complaint,’ and a larger collection
-of sonnets, were printed in 1609. It may be conjectured that he was led
-to write for the stage in consequence of the advice and introduction of
-Thomas Green, an eminent comedian of the day, who was his townsman, if
-not his relation. Shakspeare trod the boards himself, but he never rose
-to eminence as an actor: it is recorded that the Ghost in ‘Hamlet’ was
-his masterpiece. But the instructions to the players in ‘Hamlet’ exhibit
-a clear and delicate perception of what an actor ought to be, however
-incompetent the writer might be to furnish the example in his own
-person.
-
-The extent of Shakspeare’s learning has been much controverted. Dr.
-Johnson speaks of it thus: “It is most likely that he had learned Latin
-sufficiently to make him acquainted with construction, but that he never
-advanced to an easy perusal of the Roman authors. Concerning his skill
-in modern languages, I can find no sufficient ground of determination;
-but as no imitations of French or Italian authors have been discovered,
-though the Italian poetry was then high in esteem, I am inclined to
-believe that he read little more than English, and chose for his fables
-only such tales as he found translated.” Other writers have contended
-that he must have been acquainted with the Greek and Roman classics: but
-Dr. Farmer, in his ‘Essay on the Learning of Shakspeare,’ has accounted
-in a very satisfactory manner for the frequent allusions to the facts
-and fables of antiquity to be met with in Shakspeare’s writings, without
-supposing that he read the classic authors in their original languages.
-The supposition indeed is at variance with his whole history. Dr. Farmer
-has particularly specified the English translations of the classics then
-extant, and concludes on the whole, that the studies of Shakspeare were
-confined to nature and his own language.
-
-The merit of Shakspeare did not escape the notice of Queen Elizabeth. He
-evinced his gratitude for her patronage in that beautiful passage in the
-‘Midsummer Night’s Dream,’ where he speaks of her as “a fair vestal,
-throned in the west.”
-
-Sheffield, Duke of Buckinghamshire, is the relater of an anecdote which
-shows the continuance of high favour to our author. It is expressed in
-these words: that “the most learned prince and great patron of learning,
-King James I., was pleased with his own hand to write an amicable letter
-to Mr. Shakspeare;” and Dr. Farmer supposes, with apparent probability,
-that this honour was conferred in return for the compliment paid to the
-monarch in ‘Macbeth.’ Shakspeare also possessed the esteem of, and was
-admitted to familiar intercourse with, the accomplished Earls of
-Southampton and Essex; and enjoyed the friendship of his great
-contemporary Ben Jonson.
-
-Of the poet’s career before the London public nothing authentic has come
-down to us; and perhaps if more were known, it might not be worth
-recording. But his retirement in 1611 or 1612, about four years before
-his death, though it afford no story, furnishes a pleasing reflection.
-He had left his native place, poor and almost unknown: he returned to
-it, not rich, but with a competence and an unblemished character. His
-good-natured wit made him a welcome member of private society when he no
-longer set the theatre in a roar; and he ended his days in habits of
-intimacy, and in some cases in the bonds of friendship, with the leading
-gentlemen of the neighbourhood. He died on his birthday, April 23, 1616,
-when he had completed his fifty-second year. If we look merely at the
-state in which he left his productions, we should be apt to conclude
-that he was insensible of their value. To quote the words of Dr.
-Johnson, “It does not appear that Shakspeare thought his works worthy of
-posterity; that he levied any ideal tribute upon future times, or had
-any further prospect than that of present popularity and present
-profit.” But the imperfect form in which they came before the public is
-not necessarily to be accounted for by this extravagance of humility. It
-is clear that any publication of his plays by himself would have
-interfered at first with his own interest, and afterwards with the
-interest of those to whom he made over his share in them; besides which,
-such was the revulsion of the public taste, that the publication of his
-works by Hemings and Condell was accounted a doubtful speculation. For
-several years after his death the plays of Beaumont and Fletcher were
-more frequently acted than those of Shakspeare; and the beautiful works
-of the joint dramatists afterwards gave place to the rhyming rhapsodies
-of Dryden and the bombast of Lee. Garrick brought back the public to
-Shakspeare and every-day nature; Kemble exhibited him in the more
-refined dress of classical taste and philosophy.
-
-Mr. Malone has observed, that our author’s prose compositions, should
-they be discovered, would exhibit the same perspicuity, the same
-cadence, the same elegance and vigour, which we find in his plays. In
-1751, an attempt was made to impose on the public by a book entitled ‘A
-Compendious or Brief Examination of certayne Ordinary Complaints of
-divers of our Countrymen in these our Days, &c., by William Shakspeare,
-Gentleman;’ the signature to which, in the original edition of 1581, was
-“W. S., Gent.;” and Dr. Farmer has clearly proved the initials to mean
-“William Stafford, Gent.” Another and more impudent forgery was
-attempted by Ireland, who published in 1795 a volume, entitled
-‘Shakspeare’s Manuscripts.’ The fraud met with partial success, and the
-tragedy of ‘Vortigern’ was performed as one of Shakspeare’s, to the
-great disgust, it is said, of John Kemble, who had to act in it much
-against his will. Malone exposed the imposition in 1796, and Ireland
-himself ultimately acknowledged it. With respect to the probable
-character of Shakspeare’s prose compositions, it is needless to
-speculate on it, as we have no reason to believe that he ever wrote any
-prose, except for the stage.
-
-Some interesting criticisms of Mrs. Siddons on the chief female
-characters of Shakspeare will be found in the life of that eminent
-actress in this volume. We may here introduce another observation of
-hers on Constance in ‘King John.’ She said that the intuition of
-Shakspeare in delineating that character struck her as all but
-supernatural: she could scarcely conceive the possibility of any man
-possessing himself so thoroughly with the most intense and most inward
-feelings of the other sex: had Shakspeare been a woman and a mother, he
-must have felt neither less nor more than as he wrote.
-
-The two first folio editions are in great request among book-collectors,
-and, owing to their scarcity, fetch high prices at auctions. They have
-nothing to recommend them either as to accuracy or elegance of
-typography, but are really valuable for the various readings which they
-contain. The best modern editions are those of Johnson and Steevens, and
-Malone. The last edition is the posthumous one of Malone, edited by
-Boswell, and little room is left for any farther elucidation of our
-great dramatist, as far as verbal criticism is concerned. But for the
-higher branches of criticism, the works of such a poet are as
-inexhaustible as those of Homer; and if his fame be equally immortal,
-its fate is more singular. However ardent may be the admiration of Homer
-on the part of modern scholars, and however profound their investigation
-of his merits, far from pretending to discoveries unknown to the Grecian
-critics and philosophers, they support their own views by constant
-references to the ancients; but Shakspeare has found his most elaborate,
-and with certain drawbacks, his best critics, among foreigners. In
-England Shakspeare is the idol of those who read either for the
-amusement of the imagination, or as students not of poetical or
-metaphysical, but of every-day nature; and his English editors have
-rather criticised down to the level of such readers, than aimed at
-ripening their taste, or elevating their conceptions. We find eminent
-men among them, such as Pope, Warburton, and Johnson, yet none well
-qualified to perform the highest functions of a commentator. Johnson’s
-Preface is highly valued for the justness of his general criticism, and
-his vindication of the poet on the score of the unities is triumphantly
-conclusive. But his remarks at the end of each play are so jejune and
-superficial, that short as they are, no reader perhaps ever wished them
-longer. One cannot help wondering that the acute, and in many instances
-profound, though sometimes partial, critic of Cowley, Milton, Dryden,
-Pope and Gray, should have skimmed so lightly over the surface of
-Shakspeare. Not so his German translators and critics. No sooner did the
-Germans take up the study of English literature, than they selected
-Shakspeare on whom to try their powers; and they are thought to have
-dived deeper into his mind than have his own countrymen, with their
-apparently better opportunities. Nor is this wonderful: for they have
-regarded the poet not merely as the minister of amusement to an admiring
-audience, but as a metaphysical philosopher of nature’s forming,
-possessed of deepest insight into the complex motives which move the
-hearts, and stimulate the actions of mankind. And seeking with a
-reverent attention to trace the workings of the _maker’s_ mind (for in
-this instance there is a peculiar propriety in translating the Greek
-word _poet_) they have succeeded in furnishing profound and satisfactory
-explanations of much that less intellectual critics had treated as
-instances of the author’s irregular and capricious genius. In this, as
-in other branches of German literature, Goëthe stands pre-eminent: and
-the translation of his ‘Wilhelm Meister’ has placed within the reach of
-all readers a series of original and masterly criticisms, especially on
-that stumbling-block of commentators, the character of Hamlet. We may
-quote as a specimen his exposition of the principle upon which the
-anomalies of the Prince of Denmark’s conduct are to be solved. “It is
-clear to me that Shakspeare’s intention was to exhibit the effects of a
-great action, imposed as a duty upon a mind too feeble for its
-accomplishment. In this case I find the character consistent throughout.
-Here is an oak tree planted in a china vase, proper only to receive the
-most delicate flowers. The roots strike out and the vessel flies to
-pieces. A pure, noble, highly moral disposition, but without that energy
-of soul which constitutes the hero, sinks under a load which it can
-neither support nor endure to abandon altogether. _All_ his obligations
-are sacred to him; but this alone is above his powers! An impossibility
-is required at his hands; not an impossibility in itself, but that which
-is so to him. Observe, how he turns, shifts, hesitates, advances, and
-recedes;—how he is continually reminded and reminding himself of his
-real commission, which he nevertheless in the end seems almost entirely
-to lose sight of, and this without ever recovering his former
-tranquillity!” How different this from the praise of _variety_ allowed
-to this tragedy by Johnson, to “the pretended madness, causing mirth,”
-without any adequate cause for feigning it, and the objection that
-through the whole piece he is “rather an instrument than an agent!”
-
-Malone’s “attempt to ascertain the order in which the plays of
-Shakspeare were written” occupies 180 pages. Where so many words are
-necessary, the arrangement to be justified may not be very certain; but
-that of Malone is generally received. It runs thus: The First Part of
-King Henry VI., 1589. Second and Third Parts, Two Gentlemen of Verona,
-1591. Comedy of Errors, 1592. King Richard II. and III., 1593. Love’s
-Labour’s Lost, Merchant of Venice, Midsummer Night’s Dream, 1594. Taming
-of the Shrew, Romeo and Juliet, King John, 1596. First Part of King
-Henry IV., 1597. Second Part, All’s well that ends well, 1598. King
-Henry V., As You like it, 1599. Much ado about Nothing, Hamlet, 1600.
-Merry Wives of Windsor, 1601. Troilus and Cressida, 1602. Measure for
-Measure, King Henry VIII., 1603. Othello, 1604. King Lear, 1605.
-Macbeth, 1606. Twelfth Night, Julius Cæsar, 1607. Antony and Cleopatra,
-1608. Cymbeline, 1609. Coriolanus, Timon of Athens, 1610. Winter’s Tale,
-1611. Tempest, 1612. Except the placing of the historical plays in
-separate succession, the order of Malone’s edition follows the above
-dates. Previous editions arranged the plays as comedies, histories, and
-tragedies, beginning with the Tempest, the last written, and ending with
-Othello. We must add to the list of plays ascribed to Shakspeare, and
-included in the editions of his works, Pericles and Titus Andronicus,
-which are now acknowledged not to be the composition of Shakspeare,
-though perhaps retouched by him. The Yorkshire Tragedy, Lord Cromwell,
-and others, have still less right to bear the honour of his name.
-
-[Illustration: [Shakspeare’s Monument at Stratford-upon-Avon.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by B. Holl._
-
-  EULER.
-
-  _From a Picture by A. Lorgna in the Collection of the Institute of
-    France._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                 EULER.
-
-
-Leonard Euler[7] was born at Basle, April 15, 1707. His father was the
-clergyman of Reichen, near Basle, and had himself been a pupil of James
-Bernouilli. He intended his son for his own profession, and after having
-been himself his first instructor in mathematics, sent him to the
-university of Basle. John Bernouilli was at this time Professor, and his
-sons, Nicolas and Daniel, two more of the _eight_ Bernouillis known to
-the history of science, were under him. With the sons Euler contracted
-an intimate friendship; and obtained such a degree of favour even with
-their father, that the latter gave him a private lesson weekly, upon
-points more advanced than those treated in the public course. This was a
-strong mark of favour from John Bernouilli, who was of an unamiable
-disposition, jealous of his brother, of his son, and finally of almost
-every one who displayed a superior talent for mathematics. Euler at
-first turned his attention to theology, in accordance with the wishes of
-his father, but this was not of long continuance. At the age of
-nineteen, besides obtaining a degree from his University, he had merited
-the notice of the Academy of Sciences for a memoir on some points of
-naval architecture. In the same year, he was an unsuccessful candidate
-for a Professorship at Basle, an unlucky event, M. Condorcet observes,
-for his country, inasmuch as a few days afterwards he left it for
-Russia, and never returned. His friends the Bernouillis (Nicolas and
-Daniel) had, two years before, accepted invitations from the Empress
-Catherine; and he followed them in hopes of obtaining employment and
-subsistence at St. Petersburgh. But by the time he arrived, both Nicolas
-Bernouilli and the Empress were dead, the Academy of St. Petersburgh was
-left without a patron, and Euler, a nameless stranger, could not for a
-long time obtain any settled avocation. How he maintained himself we are
-not told; but he was upon the point of entering the Russian service as a
-sailor, when his prospects brightened, and he obtained the place of
-Professor of Natural Philosophy. In 1733 he succeeded Daniel Bernouilli,
-who returned to his own country, as Professor of Mathematics. In the
-same year he married a young lady named Gsell, the daughter of an artist
-of Basle, who had emigrated to Russia in the reign of Peter the Great.
-
-Footnote 7:
-
-  We have followed the _éloge_ of Condorcet as to facts and dates. We
-  should have preferred that of M. Fuss, but have not had the
-  opportunity of seeing it. The mere biographical details of Euler’s
-  life are, however, of the simplest character.
-
-The despotism of the Russian government could not please the republican
-born; but circumstances obliged him to endure it till 1741, when he
-quitted Petersburgh for Berlin on the invitation of Frederic the Great.
-To the necessity for continual reserve and government of the tongue
-which was necessary in the Russian capital has been attributed his love
-of silence and study, which exceeded all that is related of any of his
-contemporaries. The mother of Frederic, who was as much attached to the
-conversation of distinguished men as the King himself, could never
-obtain more than a few syllables from Euler at any one time. On her
-asking the reason why he would not speak, he is said to have replied,
-“Madam, I have lived in a country where men who speak are hanged.”
-
-Euler remained at Berlin till 1766. In 1761 he lost his mother, who had
-resided with him for eleven years. During this time he was not
-considered as having abandoned his Russian engagements, and a part of
-his salary was regularly paid. When the Russians invaded Brandenburg in
-1760, a farm belonging to him was destroyed, but he was immediately more
-than reimbursed, by the order of the Empress Elizabeth. On the
-invitation of that princess he consented to return to Petersburgh in
-1766. He had for some years suffered from weakness in the eyes; and not
-long after his return to Russia he became so nearly blind, that he could
-distinguish nothing except very large letters marked with chalk on a
-slate. In this state he continued for the remainder of his life; and by
-constant exercise he acquired a power of recollection, whether of
-mathematical formulæ or figures, which would be totally incredible, if
-it were not supported by strong evidence. He formed in his head, and
-retained in his memory, a table of the first six powers of all numbers
-up to 100, containing about 3000 figures. Two of his pupils had summed
-seventeen terms of a converging series, and differed by a unit in the
-fiftieth decimal of the result; Euler decided between them correctly by
-a mental calculation[8]. His chief amusement during his deprivation was
-the formation of artificial magnets, and the instruction of one of his
-grandchildren in mathematics. His studies were in no degree relaxed by
-it. In 1771 Euler’s house was destroyed by fire, together with a
-considerable part of the city. He was himself saved by a
-fellow-countryman named Grimm, and his manuscripts were also rescued. In
-1776 he married the aunt of his first wife. No other event worthy of
-special notice occurred before his death, which took place suddenly,
-September 7, 1783. He had been employed in calculating the laws of the
-ascent of balloons, which were then newly introduced; he afterwards
-dined with his family and M. Lexell, his pupil, conversed with them on
-the newly-discovered planet of Herschel, and was amusing himself with
-one of his grandchildren; suddenly the pipe which he held in his hand
-dropped on the ground, and it was found that[9] “life and calculation
-were at an end.” He had thirteen children, of whom only three survived
-him; one of them, John Albert Euler, was known as a mathematician.
-
-Footnote 8:
-
-  We suspect some mistake in this account, which is constantly given. A
-  very surprising story ought to be consistent: now it is difficult to
-  believe that any series which was actually employed in practice (and
-  people do not sum series to fifty places for amusement) would converge
-  so quickly, as to give fifty places in seventeen terms. The well-known
-  series for the base of Napier’s logarithms is called a rapidly
-  converging series, and gives about fifteen places in seventeen terms.
-  We cannot help thinking, either that Euler settled one disputed term
-  only, or that there is some mistake about the number of figures.
-
-Footnote 9:
-
-  Il cessa de calculer et de vivre.—CONDORCET.
-
-Of the scientific character of Euler it is impossible to speak in
-detail, since even the _resumé_ of M. Condorcet, which is much longer
-than any account we can here insert, is meagre in the extreme; and we
-imagine that the reader would form no idea whatsoever of the man we are
-describing, from any brief enumeration of discoveries for which we
-should be able to allow room. In more than fifty years of incessant
-thought, Euler wrote thirty separate works and more than seven hundred
-memoirs: which could not altogether be contained in forty large quarto
-volumes. These writings embrace every existing branch of mathematics,
-and almost every conceivable application of them, to such an extent,
-that there is no one among mathematicians, past or present, who can be
-placed near to Euler in the enormous variety of the subjects which he
-treated. And the contents of these volumes are without exception the
-original fruit of his own brain; seeing that he left no subject as he
-found it. He is not a diffuse writer, except in giving a large number of
-examples, and this renders him in some respects the most instructive of
-all writers. His works are full of the most original thoughts developed
-in the most original manner; so that they have been a mine of
-information for his successors, which is even now far from being
-exhausted. Let a student be employed upon any subject connected with
-mathematics, however remotely, and he has discovered but little if he
-has not found out that Euler was there before him.
-
-Of all mathematical writers, Euler is one of the most simple, and this
-in a manner which renders his writings not by any means a sound
-preparation for future investigations. Difficulties seem to have
-disappeared in the progress, or never to have been encountered; and the
-student is rather made to feel that Euler could take him anywhere, than
-furnished with the means of providing for himself, when his guide shall
-have left him. Hence the writings of others, in every way inferior to
-Euler in elegance and simplicity, are to be preferred, and have been
-preferred, for the formation of mathematical power.
-
-Euler is to be measured by the assistance which he gave to his immediate
-successors, and here it is well known that he paved the way for the
-research of others in a more effectual manner than any of his
-contemporaries. The incessant repetition of his name in later authors is
-sufficient authority for this assertion. His writings are the first in
-which the modern analysis is uniformly the instrument of investigation.
-His predecessors, James and John Bernouilli, had perhaps the largest
-share in bringing the infinitesimal analysis of Newton and Leibnitz to
-the state of power required for extensive application. To Euler (besides
-important extensions) belongs the distinct merit of showing how to apply
-it to physical investigations, in conjunction with D’Alembert, who ran a
-splendid and contemporary career of a similar character in this respect.
-But though it would be perhaps admitted that there are individual
-results of the latter which exceed anything done by the former, in
-generality of application, there is no comparison whatsoever between the
-extent of the labours of the two.
-
-Euler was a man of a simple, reserved, and benevolent mind; with a
-strong sense of devotion, and a decided religious habit, according to
-the Calvinism of the Established Church of his country. At the court of
-Frederic, he himself conducted the devotions of his family every
-evening; a practice which then and there implied much moral courage, and
-insensibility to ridicule. But he possessed humour, for when he was
-asked to calculate the horoscope of one of the Russian princes, he
-quietly suggested that it was the official duty of the astronomer, and
-imposed the duty upon a colleague, who doubtless did not feel very much
-flattered by the application.
-
-There are few men whom the usual biographical formulæ as to moral
-character and habits would better fit than Euler, according to every
-account which has appeared of him. But such praises are no distinction;
-and it will be more to the purpose to state that the only occasion in
-which he was betrayed into printing a word which his eulogists have
-regretted, was in the dispute between Maupertuis and himself against
-others on the principle known by the name of _least action_, one of the
-warmest and most angry discussions which ever took place.
-
-Perhaps it is to the quiet abstraction of his life that he owed the
-perpetuity of his tenure of investigation. Many eminent mathematical
-discoverers have run the brilliant part of their career while
-comparatively young. Euler “ceased to calculate and to live” at once.
-But it may be that this was a part of his natural constitution, and a
-distinct feature of his mind. The nature of his writings rather confirms
-the latter supposition. There is the same difference between them and
-those of others, that there is between conversation and oratory. He
-seems to be moving in his natural element, where others are swimming for
-their lives.
-
-The best works of Euler for a young mathematician to read, in order to
-get an idea of his style and methods, are the ‘_Analysis Infinitorum_,’
-and the ‘_Treatise on the Integral Calculus_.’
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                             SIR W. JONES.
-
-
-William Jones, the most accomplished Oriental scholar of the last
-century, an upright magistrate, and eminent benefactor of the native
-subjects of our Indian dominions, was born in London on Michaelmas Eve,
-1746. His father, a man esteemed by his contemporaries, a skilful
-mathematician, and the friend of Newton, died in July, 1749. His mother
-then devoted herself entirely to the education of this her only
-surviving son; and to her careful and judicious culture of his infant
-years, bestowed indeed upon a happy soil, is to be ascribed the early
-development of that thirst for learning and faculty of profitable
-application, which enabled Jones to accumulate in a short and busy life
-a quantity and variety of abstruse knowledge, such as the same age does
-not often see equalled. To the end of her life he acknowledged and
-repaid her care and affection by ardent love and unchanging filial
-respect. When only seven years old, he was sent to Harrow. His progress,
-slow at first, afterwards became most rapid; and the head master, Dr.
-Thackeray, a man not given to praise, spoke of him as “a boy of so
-active a mind, that if he were left naked and friendless on Salisbury
-Plain he would find the way to fame and riches.”
-
-At the time of his quitting school, besides a much deeper acquaintance
-with the classical languages than usually falls to the lot of a
-schoolboy, Jones had acquired the French and Italian languages, had
-commenced the study of Hebrew, and (a thing only worth mention as
-indicative of his tastes) had made himself acquainted with the Arabic
-letters. Botany, the collection of fossils, and composition in English
-verse, were his favourite amusements at this period. March 16, 1764, he
-was entered as a student of University College, Oxford. He was elected a
-scholar on the Bennett foundation, October 30, 1764; and fellow on the
-same foundation, August 7, 1766, before he was of standing to proceed to
-the degree of B.A., which he took in 1768. At an early period of his
-residence he applied in earnest
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by J. Posselwhite._
-
-  SIR WILLIAM JONES.
-
-  _From the Picture in the Hall of University College, Oxford._
-
-  Under the Superintendence of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-to the study of Arabic; and his zeal was such, that, though habitually
-self-denying, and anxious not to trespass on his mother’s slender
-income, he maintained at Oxford, at his own expense, a Syrian, with whom
-he had become acquainted in London, for the benefit to be derived from
-his instruction. From the Arabic he proceeded to learn the Persian
-language.
-
-His residence was varied, though his favourite studies do not appear to
-have been interrupted, by an invitation to undertake the care of the
-late Lord Spencer, then a boy of seven years old. This was in 1765. The
-next five years he spent with his pupil chiefly at Harrow, and
-occasionally at Althorp, or in London, or on the continent. It appears
-from the college books that he resided at Oxford very little in the
-years 1766, 1767, and 1768. Wherever he was, his time was diligently
-employed, not only in his severer studies, but in the pursuit of
-personal accomplishments and the cultivation of valuable acquaintances,
-especially with those who, like himself, were attached to the
-investigation of Eastern languages and science. In 1768 he received a
-high, but an unprofitable compliment, in being selected to render into
-French a Persian Life of Nadir Shah, transmitted to the English
-government by the King of Denmark for the purpose of translation. To
-this performance, which was printed in 1770, Mr. Jones added a ‘Treatise
-on Oriental Poetry,’ in which several of the odes of Hafiz are
-translated into verse. This also was written in French; and it has
-justly been observed by a French writer in the ‘Biographie Universelle,’
-that the occurrence of some imperfections of style ought not to
-interfere with our forming a high estimate of the talents of a man who,
-at the age of twenty-two, possessed the varied qualifications and
-recondite acquirements displayed in this work. By the end of the same
-year, 1770, the author finished his ‘Commentaries on Asiatic Poetry,’ a
-Latin treatise, which for its style is commended by the competent
-authority of Dr. Parr; and which has also obtained high praise for the
-taste and judgment displayed in selecting and translating the passages
-by which the text is illustrated. It was not printed till 1774.
-
-Not the least striking part of Mr. Jones’s character was an ardent love
-of liberty, and a high and honourable feeling of independence in his own
-person. The former was displayed in his open and fearless advocacy of
-opinions calculated to close the road to preferment, such as an entire
-disapprobation of the American war, and a strong feeling of the
-necessity of reform in Parliament. It should also be noticed that at an
-early period he denounced in energetic language the abomination of the
-Slave Trade. His personal love of independence was at this time
-manifested in his resolution to quit the certain road to ease and
-competence which his connexion with the noble family of Spencer laid
-before him, to embark in the brilliant but uncertain course of legal
-adventure. Ambition was a prominent feature in Jones’s character; and it
-was his hope and his earnest wish to distinguish himself in the House of
-Commons as well as at the bar. He was admitted of the Middle Temple
-November 19, 1770; and his Oriental studies, though not entirely
-abandoned, especially at first, were thenceforth much curtailed until
-the prospect of being appointed to a judicial office in India furnished
-an adequate reason for the resumption of them. But he gave a proof that
-his devotion to Oriental had not destroyed his taste for Grecian
-learning, by publishing in 1778 a translation of the ‘Orations of
-Isæus,’ relative to the laws of succession to property in Athens. The
-subject appears to have interested him; for in 1782, when his attention
-was again directed to the East, he published translations of two Arabian
-poems; one on the Mohammedan law of succession to the property of
-intestates, the other on the Mohammedan law of inheritance. About the
-same time he translated the seven ancient Arabian poems, called
-Moallakat, or ‘Suspended,’ because they had been hung up, in honour of
-their merit, in the Temple of Mecca; and to show, perhaps, that his
-attention had not been withdrawn from his immediate profession, he wrote
-an ‘Essay on the Law of Bailments.’
-
-Mr. Jones was called to the bar in 1774. Within two years’ space he
-obtained a commissionership of bankrupts; by what influence does not
-appear: it could not be from any professional eminence. A letter written
-to Lord Althorp so early as October, 1778, intimates a wish to obtain
-some judicial appointment in India, not only in consequence of the
-interest which he had felt from an early age in every thing connected
-with the East, but from a motive which has sent other eminent men to the
-same unhealthy climate; a feeling that pecuniary independence was almost
-essential to success in political life, and the hope of returning in the
-prime of manhood with an honourable competence.
-
-In 1780 Mr. Jones became a candidate to represent the University of
-Oxford. His political opinions were not calculated to win the favour of
-that learned body, and though respectably supported, he did not find
-encouragement to warrant him in coming to a poll. From this time forward
-Mr. Jones’s mind was much occupied by the thought of going to India. His
-letters contain frequent allusions to the subject, and express doubt
-whether, notwithstanding the personal friendship of Lord North, his own
-known views of politics, especially his often and strongly-declared
-reprobation of the American war, would not interfere with his obtaining
-the desired promotion. The event proved him to be right, for it was not
-until after the formation of the Shelburne ministry that he received
-information of his appointment to a seat in the Supreme Court of
-Judicature at Calcutta, March 3, 1783. For this he was indebted to the
-friendship of Lord Ashburton (Mr. Dunning). The state of uncertainty in
-which he was so long retained interfered considerably with his attention
-to his legal practice, which was rapidly increasing. He was the more
-anxious on this subject, because he had been long attached to Miss
-Shipley, daughter of the Bishop of St. Asaph; and his union with her was
-only deferred until professional success should place him in a fit
-station to support a family. His marriage took place in April, and in
-the same month he embarked for India. It remains to be noticed, that in
-1782 Mr. Jones had written an essay, entitled ‘The Principles of
-Government,’ in a dialogue between a farmer and country gentleman,
-intended to express in a cheap and simple form his own views on
-constitutional questions. This was first printed by the Society for
-Constitutional Information, of which Mr. Jones was a member: it was
-reprinted by his brother-in-law, the Dean of St. Asaph, who was in
-consequence indicted for libel. In the prosecution which ensued, Mr.
-Erskine made one of his first and most remarkable appearances, and the
-series of speeches which he delivered in this case prepared the way for
-the Libel Bill of 1792.
-
-Sir William Jones arrived in Calcutta in September, and entered on his
-judicial functions in December, 1783. One of his first employments was
-the organization of a scientific association, under the title of the
-Asiatic Society. The Governor-general, Warren Hastings, was requested to
-become president; and on his declining to accept, as an honorary
-distinction, an office the real duties of which he was unable to fulfil,
-Sir William Jones was fitly placed at the head of that institution,
-which, but for him, probably would not have existed. The transactions of
-that society, under the name of ‘Asiatic Researches,’ were published
-under his superintendence, and owe a large portion of their interest to
-the labours of his pen. Another work, the ‘Asiatic Miscellany,’ was also
-indebted to him for several valuable contributions. But the perfect
-acquisition of the Sanscrit language was the chief employment of that
-time which could be spared from his judicial labours; a task indeed
-subsidiary to those labours, and performed with the benevolent design of
-insuring to the Indian subjects of Britain a pure administration of
-justice, by rendering the knowledge of their laws accessible to British
-magistrates. Bound to adjudicate between the natives according to their
-own native laws, and ignorant for the most part of the very language in
-which those laws were written, the judges were obliged to have recourse
-to native lawyers, called Pundits, who were regularly attached to the
-courts as a species of assessors. Of these men Sir W. Jones, no harsh or
-hasty reprover, says, “It would be unjust and absurd to pass
-indiscriminate censure on so considerable a body of men; but my
-experience justifies me in declaring that I could not, with an easy
-conscience, concur in a decision merely on the written opinion of native
-lawyers, in a case in which they could have the remotest interest in
-misleading the court.” The obvious remedy was to obtain a trustworthy
-digest of the Hindoo laws, which should then be accurately translated
-into English. The scheme indeed had been already undertaken in part at
-the desire of Mr. Hastings, by Mr. Halhed: but as the code of Hindoo
-law, compiled by that gentleman, was merely a translation from a
-defective Persian version of the original Sanscrit, it did not possess
-the requisite correctness, or authority. It appears from Sir W. Jones’s
-correspondence, that at an early period he had contemplated supplying
-this great desideratum by his own labour and expense. But prudence did
-not warrant such an uncalled-for act of liberality; and he addressed a
-letter to Lord Cornwallis, dated March 19, 1788, in which the necessity
-for such a work, and the means by which it might be executed, are fully
-laid down. It was to be compiled by the Mohammedan or Hindoo lawyers,
-working under the superintendence of a director and translator, who
-should be qualified to check and correct intentional or careless error:
-and a chief difficulty, in Sir W. Jones’s own words, was “to find a
-person who, with a competent knowledge of the Sanscrit and Arabic, has a
-general acquaintance with the principles of jurisprudence, and a
-sufficient share even of legislative spirit, to arrange the plan of a
-digest, superintend the compilation of it, and render the whole, as it
-proceeds, into perspicuous English. Now (he continues), though I am
-truly conscious of possessing a very moderate portion of those talents
-which I should require in the superintendent of such a work, yet I may
-without vanity profess myself equal to the labour of it;—and I cannot
-but know that the qualifications required, even in the low degree in
-which I possess them, are not often found united in the same person.”
-The proposal of course was eagerly accepted. That he should have
-acquired the necessary acquaintance, first with the language, then with
-the law, in the space of four years and a half, is sufficiently
-remarkable; and the method in which he proposed to execute it will
-startle those who know the enervating influence of a tropical climate.
-“I should be able,” he says, “if my health continued firm, to translate
-every morning, before any other business is begun, as much as the
-lawyers could compile, and the writers copy, in the preceding day.” The
-quantity of work which Jones did in India was indeed astonishing; but he
-was a severe economist of time, and even his hours of recreation were
-rendered serviceable to the increase of knowledge. Botany especially was
-a favourite pursuit of his more leisure hours; and his correspondence
-with Banks and others shows at once the zeal with which, when duty would
-permit, he followed that fascinating science, and the readiness with
-which he communicated his own discoveries to his friends, and laboured
-to answer their inquiries. Nor did he neglect poetry. Several odes to
-Hindoo deities, originally published in the Asiatic Miscellany, will be
-found in his works; and these, with an elegant and cultivated fancy,
-display considerable power of composition. He projected a more serious
-undertaking,—an epic poem, of which a Phœnician colonist of Britain was
-to be the hero, and the Hindoo mythology was to furnish the machinery:
-the whole being an allegorical panegyric on the British constitution,
-and furnishing the character of a perfect King of England. But the
-extravagant fictions of the Hindoo religion have never proved
-permanently popular in an English dress; and there is no reason to
-regret that this scheme never advanced beyond its first sketch. The
-author made a more acceptable present to European literature in
-translating ‘Sacontala, or the Fatal Ring,’ a very ancient Indian drama,
-which contains a lively, simple, and pleasing picture of the manners of
-Hindustan at a remote age. It is ascribed to the first century before
-Christ.
-
-For a catalogue of Sir W. Jones’s works, we must refer to the edition
-published by Lady Jones. We have only noticed a few of the most
-important: to which are to be added, the series of anniversary
-discourses addressed to the Asiatic Society, and the translation of the
-‘Ordinances of Menu.’ The former, eleven in number, treat of the
-History, Antiquities, Arts, &c. of Asia, and more especially of the
-origin and connection of the chief nations among whom that quarter of
-the globe is divided. His last work was the translation of the
-‘Ordinances of Menu,’ “a system of duties” (we quote from the
-translator’s preface) “religious and civil, and of law in all its
-branches, which the Hindoos firmly believe to have been promulged in the
-beginning of time by Menu, son or grandson of Brahma, or, in plain
-language, the first of created beings, and not the oldest only, but the
-holiest of legislators: a system so comprehensive, and so minutely
-exact, that it may be considered as the Institutes of Hindoo law,
-preparatory to the copious Digest which has lately been compiled by
-Pundits of eminent learning.” This was his last work. It was begun in
-1786, though not completed and published till 1794, a short time before
-the author’s death.
-
-The private history of Sir William Jones, during the period of his life
-which was spent in India, affords very little scope for narration.
-During his first summer he nearly fell a victim to the climate; but an
-absence of seven months spent in travelling recruited his strength, and
-after his return to Calcutta, in February, 1785, he seemed to be
-acclimated, and suffered little from serious illness till his last fatal
-attack. His domestic habits are thus described by his biographer, Lord
-Teignmouth. “The largest portion of each year was devoted to his
-professional duties and studies; and all the time that could be saved
-from these important avocations was dedicated to the cultivation of
-science and literature. While business required the daily attendance of
-Sir W. Jones in Calcutta, his usual residence was on the banks of the
-Ganges, at the distance of five miles from the court; to this spot he
-returned every evening after sunset, and in the morning rose so early as
-to reach his apartments in town by walking, at the first appearance of
-the dawn. The intervening period of each morning, until the opening of
-the court, was regularly allotted and applied to distinct studies. He
-passed the months of vacation at his retirement at Crishnagur (a villa
-about fifty miles from Calcutta) in his usual pursuits.” Those portions
-of his correspondence which are preserved in Lord Teignmouth’s life may
-be read with pleasure; and indeed constitute the chief interest of the
-latter part of the work. Busy, tranquil, and cheerful, his life afforded
-little of material for the biographer: and but for the impaired health
-of his wife, his residence in India would have been one of almost
-unmixed happiness. Lady Jones was compelled to embark for England in
-December, 1793. The mere desire of increasing a fortune, which he
-professed to find already large enough for his moderate wishes, would
-not have tempted Sir William Jones to remain alone in Bengal: but he
-felt an earnest desire to complete the great work on Hindoo Law, which
-he had originated; and no apprehension was felt on his account, as his
-constitution seemed to have become inured to the climate. But in the
-following spring he was attacked by inflammation of the liver, which ran
-its fatal course with unusual rapidity. He died, April 27, 1794. The
-‘Digest,’ to which he had thus sacrificed his life, was completed by Mr.
-Colebrooke, and published in 1800.
-
-Blameless in his domestic relations, consistent and enlightened in his
-political views, an honest and indefatigable magistrate, few men have
-gone through life with more credit, or as far as it is possible to form
-an opinion, with more happiness than Sir William Jones. As a scholar,
-the circumstances of his life being considered, his acquirements were
-extraordinary; and in this light the most remarkable feature of his
-character was his singular facility in learning languages. A list,
-preserved in his own handwriting, thus classes those with which he was
-in any degree acquainted; they are twenty-eight in number. “Eight
-languages studied critically—English, Latin, French, Italian, Greek,
-Arabic, Persian, Sanscrit. Eight studied less perfectly, but all
-intelligible with a dictionary—Spanish, Portuguese, German, Runic,
-Hebrew, Bengali, Hindi, Turkish. Twelve studied less perfectly, but all
-attainable: Thibetian, Pâli, Pahlair, Deri, Russian, Syriac, Ethiopic,
-Coptic, Welsh, Swedish, Dutch, Chinese.” Besides law, which as his
-profession, was his chief business through life, his writings embrace a
-vast variety of subjects in the several classes of philology, botany,
-zoology, poetry original and translated, political discussion,
-geography, mythology, astronomy as applied to chronology, and history,
-especially that of the Asiatic nations. And the praise of ‘adorning
-everything that he touched’ is singularly due to him, for the elegance
-of his style, and his power of throwing interest over the dry and
-uncertain inquiries in which he took such delight. As far as England is
-concerned, he was our great pioneer in Eastern learning; and if later
-scholars, profiting in part by his labours, have found reason to dissent
-from his opinions, it is to be recollected, as far as our estimate of
-his powers is concerned, that most men, who have obtained eminence in
-this recondite department of literature, have done so by the devotion of
-their undivided powers: what Jones accomplished was performed, on the
-contrary, in the intervals of those official labours, to which the best
-hours and energies of his life were, as his first point of duty,
-devoted. What he had meditated, if life and leisure had been granted,
-may be inferred from the list of ‘Desiderata,’ which his biographer
-(vol. ii., p. 301, it is not said on what authority) regards as
-exhibiting his own literary projects. The following emphatic panegyric,
-conceived in the warm language which affection naturally indulges in on
-such an occasion, has been pronounced on him by his friend and
-school-fellow, Dr. Bennet, Bishop of Cloyne. “I knew him from the early
-age of eight or nine, and he was always an uncommon boy. Great
-abilities, great particularity of thinking, fondness for writing verses
-and plays of various kinds, and a degree of integrity and manly courage,
-of which I remember many instances, distinguished him even at that
-period. I loved and revered him, and though one or two years older than
-he was, was always instructed by him from my earliest age. In a word, I
-can only say of this wonderful man, that he had more virtues and less
-faults than I ever yet saw in any human being; and that the goodness of
-his head, admirable as it was, was exceeded by that of his heart. I have
-never ceased to admire him from the moment I first saw him, and my
-esteem for his great qualities and regret for his loss will only end
-with my life.”
-
-Due honours were paid after death to this great man. The Court of
-Directors placed a statue of him in St. Paul’s cathedral; and Lady Jones
-erected a monument to him in the ante-chapel of University College,
-Oxford. In conformity with his own expressed opinion, that “the best
-monument that can be erected to a man of literary talent, is a good
-edition of his works,” she caused them to be collected and printed in
-1799, in six quarto volumes. They have been reprinted in octavo. A life
-of Sir William Jones was afterwards written by Lord Teignmouth, his
-intimate friend in India, at Lady Jones’s request. There is a memoir in
-the Annual Obituary for 1817, which is chiefly devoted to set forth the
-political opinions of Sir William Jones, in a stronger light than seemed
-fitting to his noble biographer.
-
-[Illustration: [Statue of Sir W. Jones, by John Bacon, R.A., in St.
-Paul’s.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by Rob^t. Hart._
-
-  ROUSSEAU.
-
-  _From an original Picture by Latour, in the possession of M. Bordes,
-    at Paris._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                               ROUSSEAU.
-
-
-Jean Jacques Rousseau, the son of a watch-maker at Geneva, was born June
-28, 1712. His mother dying while he was yet a child, his father took a
-second wife; and he himself was placed at school at the village of
-Bossey, near Geneva, where he learnt but little, and was afterwards
-apprenticed to an engraver, a coarse, brutal man, whose treatment of him
-tended to sour a temper already wilful and morose. He became addicted to
-idleness, pilfering, and lying. The fear of punishment for some act of
-especial misconduct induced him to run away from his master, and he
-wandered into Savoy, where finding himself totally destitute, he applied
-to the Bishop of Annecy, on the plea of wishing to be instructed in the
-Catholic religion. The bishop recommended him to Madame de Warens, a
-Swiss lady, herself a convert to Catholicism, who lived at Annecy. She
-received the boy kindly, relieved his present wants, and afforded him
-the means of proceeding to Turin, where he entered the College of
-Catechumens, and after going through a preparatory course of
-instruction, abjured the reformed religion, and became a Catholic. But
-as he refused to enter into holy orders, on leaving the college he was
-again thrown upon his own resources. He became a domestic servant; but
-his want of self-control and discretion rendered him very unfit for his
-employment: and in 1730 he returned to the house of Madame de Warens,
-who received him kindly, and afforded him support and protection during
-the next ten years. Of his foolish, profligate, and ungrateful course of
-life during this period, we have neither space nor wish to give an
-account: after many absences, and many returns, Rousseau quitted her
-finally in 1740, receiving letters of introduction to some persons at
-Lyons. Tutor, musician, and private secretary to the French Ambassador,
-his restless temper and versatile mind led him successively from Lyons
-to Paris and Venice. From the last-named city he returned to Paris in
-1745; and alighting at an obscure inn, met with a servant girl, Therese
-Levasseur, with whom he formed a connexion which lasted all the rest of
-his life. He tried to compose music for the stage, but did not succeed
-in his attempts. He was next employed as a clerk in the office of M.
-Dupin, Fermier-général, but did not remain long in his new employment.
-In 1748 he became acquainted with Madame d’Epinay, who proved afterwards
-one of his steadiest and kindest friends. He frequented the society also
-of D’Alembert, Diderot, and Condillac, and he was engaged to write the
-articles on music for the Encyclopédie, which he did very ill, as he
-himself acknowledges. One day he saw by chance in an advertisement, that
-a prize had been offered by the Academy of Dijon, for the best essay on
-the question, Whether the progress of sciences and of the arts has been
-favourable to the morals of mankind? He at once resolved to write for
-the prize, and apparently without having ever before considered the
-subject, made up his mind to take the negative side of the question.
-Diderot encouraged, but did not, as has been commonly said, originate
-this determination. He supported his position, that science, literature,
-and art, have been fatal to the virtues and happiness of mankind, with a
-glowing eloquence; and the Academy awarded him the prize. His success
-confirmed him in a turn for paradox and exaggeration; and he seems to
-have adopted, as a general principle, the doctrine that the extreme
-opposite to wrong must necessarily be right. At the same time his
-reputation as an author became established, and in a few years after his
-first essay, he was acknowledged to be one of the most, or rather the
-most, eloquent writer among his contemporaries. Meantime he persevered
-in his attempts at musical composition, and wrote ‘Le Devin du Village,’
-an opera which was played before the king at the Court Theatre of
-Fontainebleau, and met with the royal approbation. Rousseau was in one
-of the boxes with a gentleman belonging to the court. The king having
-expressed a desire to see the composer of the opera, Rousseau became
-alarmed or ashamed at the slovenly condition of his dress, and instead
-of repairing to the royal presence, he ran out of the house and hastened
-back to Paris. Naturally shy, he possessed neither ease of manners nor
-facility of address, and he could never throughout life subdue his own
-acute feeling of these deficiencies; a feeling which of course tended to
-perpetuate and increase his awkwardness. This was the secret spring of
-most of his eccentricities. In order to hide his imperfections, he
-resorted to the plan of affecting to disregard manners altogether; he
-put on the appearance of a cynic, of a misanthropist, which he was not
-in reality.
-
-It was about the year 1750, soon after writing his dissertation for the
-Dijon prize, that he made a total change in his habits and mode of
-living. He gave up all refinement about his dress, laid aside his sword,
-bag, and silk stockings, sold his watch, but kept his linen apparel,
-which, however, was stolen from him shortly after. He spent one half of
-the day in copying music as a means of subsistence, and he found
-constant employment. Several persons who knew his circumstances offered
-him three or four times the value of his labour, but he would never
-accept more than the usual remuneration. In 1753 he wrote his ‘Lettre
-sur la Musique Française,’ in which he asserted that the French had no
-music deserving the name, that they could not possibly have any, and
-then added, that “were they ever to have any it would be all the worse
-for them;” a sentence unintelligible to his readers, and probably to
-himself also. When years after this he heard Gluck, with whose music he
-was delighted, he observed to some one, “this man is setting French
-words to very good music, as if on purpose to contradict me;” and upon
-this reflection he broke off acquaintance with Gluck. However, his
-letter on French music sorely wounded the national vanity, and he was
-exposed to a sort of petty persecution in consequence of it. Rousseau
-wrote next his letter to D’Alembert, ‘sur les Spectacles,’ which led to
-a controversy between them. He wrote also the ‘Discours sur l’Origine de
-l’Inégalité parmi les Hommes,’ for another prize of the Academy of
-Dijon, with a dedication to the magistrates of his native town Geneva,
-which was much admired as a specimen of dignified eloquence. The
-discourse itself is composed in his accustomed paradoxical vein. He
-maintains that men are not intended to be sociable beings; that they
-have a natural bias for a solitary existence; that the condition of the
-savage, untutored and free in his native wilds, is the natural and
-proper state of man; and that every system of society is an infraction
-of man’s rights, and a subversion of the order of nature. He assumes
-that men are all born equal by nature, disregarding the daily evidence
-of the contrary, in respect both of their physical and moral powers. His
-idea of the equal rights of men, which he afterwards developed in the
-‘Contrat Social,’ instead of being founded upon enlightened reason,
-religion, and morality, rests upon the base of his favourite theory, of
-man’s equality in a state of nature; while we know from experience, that
-those savage tribes who approach nearest to this imaginary natural
-state, acknowledge no other right than that of the strongest. Most of
-Rousseau’s paradoxes proceed from the false position assumed in his
-first dissertation, that a savage, unsocial state, is the very
-perfection of man’s existence.
-
-After the publication of this discourse Rousseau repaired to Geneva,
-where he was well received by his countrymen. He there abjured
-Catholicism and resumed the profession of the reformed religion. But he
-soon returned to Paris; and, at the invitation of Madame d’Epinay, in
-1756, took up his residence at the house called L’Hermitage, in the
-valley of Montmorency, near Paris. It was in this pleasant retirement
-that he began his celebrated novel ‘Julie, ou la Nouvelle Heloïse,’
-which he finished in 1759. As a work of imagination and invention it is
-little worth; but as a model of impassioned eloquence, it will be
-admired as long as the French language shall continue to be spoken or
-read by men. Rousseau, while he wrote it, was himself under the
-influence of a passion which he had conceived for the beautiful Madame
-d’Houdetot, Madame d’Epinay’s sister-in-law, a love totally hopeless and
-ridiculous on his part, but which no doubt inspired him while engaged in
-the composition of this work. When it appeared, many people, especially
-women, thought that Julie was a real living object of his attachment,
-and the supposition being favourable to the popularity of the book and
-its author, Rousseau was not very anxious to undeceive them. He esteemed
-the fourth portion of the work the best. “The first two parts are but
-the desultory verbiage of feverish excitement, and yet I could never
-alter them after I had once written them. The fifth and the sixth are
-comparatively weak, but I let them remain out of consideration of their
-moral utility.... My imagination cannot embellish the objects I see; it
-must create its own objects. If I am to paint the spring, I must do it
-in winter; if to describe a landscape, I must be shut up within walls:
-were I confined in the Bastille, I should then write best on the charms
-of liberty. I never could write as a matter of business, I can only do
-it through impulse or passion.” (Rousseau’s ‘Notes to the Nouvelle
-Heloïse,’ in Mercier and Le Tourneur’s edition.) He had great difficulty
-in constructing his periods; he turned them and he altered them
-repeatedly in his head, often while in bed, before he attempted to put
-them on paper.
-
-La Nouvelle Heloïse has been censured for the dangerous example it
-affords, and for the interest it throws upon seduction and frailty. The
-character of St. Preux is decidedly faulty, and even base, in spite of
-all his sophistry, which however has probably led other young men placed
-in a similar situation to forget the relative duties of society, and the
-obligations of hospitality. Here we perceive also the influence of
-Rousseau’s favourite paradox; for in a state of nature, such as Rousseau
-has fancied it, the intimacy of St. Preux and Julie would have been
-unobjectionable. But then the relative position of the teacher, his
-pupil, and her parents, would not have been the same as in the novel,
-for they would have been all savages together. Rousseau has however
-redeemed the character of Julie after she becomes a wife, and he has
-thus paid a sincere homage to the sacredness of the marriage bond, and
-to the importance of conjugal duties, the basis of all society. Rousseau
-was not a contemner of virtue; he felt its beauty, though his practice
-was by no means modelled on its dictates. He tells us himself the
-workings of his mind on this subject. “After much observation I thought
-I perceived nothing but error and folly among philosophers, oppression
-and misery in the social order. In the delusion of my foolish pride I
-fancied myself born to dissipate all prejudices; but then I thought
-that, in order to have my advice listened to, my conduct ought to
-correspond to my principles. I had been till then good-hearted, I now
-became virtuous. Whoever has the courage of showing himself such as he
-is, must, if he be not totally depraved, become such as he ought to be.”
-It was probably in compliance with his growing sense of moral duty, that
-he married at last the woman he had so long been living with, when she
-was forty-seven years of age, and, as he himself acknowledges, was not
-possessed of any attractions of either mind or person, having nothing to
-recommend her except her attention to him, especially in his frequent
-fits of illness or despondency. He seems also to have bitterly repented,
-in the latter years of his life, having in his youth sent his
-illegitimate children to the foundling hospital.
-
-Rousseau’s next work was the ‘Emile, ou de l’Education,’ which appeared
-in 1762. It contains many excellent precepts, especially in the first
-part, although, as a whole system, it may be considered as
-impracticable, at least in any state of society which has yet been
-formed upon the earth. It was remarked at the time, that the author,
-after having brought up his Emile to manhood, ought to create a new
-world for him to live in. Rousseau himself seems to have been of this
-opinion, for when a Mr. Angar introduced to him his son, whom he said he
-had educated according to the principles of the Emile, Rousseau quickly
-replied, “So much the worse for you, and for your son too.” The ‘Emile,’
-however, introduced some beneficial changes in the early treatment of
-children. It discredited the absurd practice of swaddling infants like
-mummies, to the manifest injury of their tender limbs; it induced
-mothers of the higher ranks to suckle their children, instead of
-committing them to the care of nurses; it corrected several wrong
-principles of early education, such as that of ruling children through
-fear, of considering them as slaves having no will of their own, and of
-terrifying them by absurd stories and fables; it inculcated freedom of
-body and mind, the necessity of amusement and relaxation, of appealing
-to the feelings of children, of treating them like rational beings.
-Rousseau may be truly called the benefactor of children. As he
-proceeded, however, in his plan for boys grown older, Rousseau became
-involved in some of his favourite speculations about religion and
-metaphysics, which gave offence to both Catholics and Protestants. The
-Parliament of Paris condemned the work. The Archbishop issued a
-_mandement_ against it. The States-General of Holland likewise
-proscribed the book. At Geneva, it was publicly burnt by the hand of the
-executioner. The publication of the ‘Contrat Social, ou Principes du
-Droit Politique,’ which appeared soon after, added to the storm against
-the author. It contains much speculative truth, combined with much
-ignorance of men’s nature and passions. The idea of a perfect and
-universal model of government, without regard to local circumstances,
-seems chimerical. It is a curious fact that Rousseau, after reading
-Bernardin de St. Pierre’s political works, observed that they contained
-projects which were impracticable on account of a fundamental error, out
-of which the author was unable to extricate himself, namely, “that of
-supposing that men in general and in all cases will conduct themselves
-according to the dictates of reason and virtue, rather than according to
-their passions.” Rousseau, in uttering these words, passed judgment on
-his own ‘Contrat Social,’ which he afterwards also acknowledged having
-written, “not for men but for angels.” In fact, he never meant it for
-anything but a speculative treatise, and in his ‘Considérations sur le
-Gouvernement de la Pologne,’ published some years after, having to write
-for a practical purpose, he considerably modified his former principles.
-
-In consequence of the excitement produced by these works, Rousseau left
-Paris for Switzerland in 1762. He went first to Yverdun, but the Senate
-of Berne enjoined him to leave its territory. He then repaired to
-Neuchatel, which was subject to the King of Prussia, and of which the
-old Marshal Keith was Governor. Keith received him very kindly, and
-Rousseau took up his residence at the village of Motiers, in the Val de
-Travers. There he wrote a Reply to the Archbishop of Paris, and a Letter
-to the Magistrates of Geneva, in which he renounced his rights of
-citizenship. He next wrote the “Lettres de la Montagne,” which is a
-series of severe strictures on the political government and church of
-Geneva. It is curious as a sketch of the old institutions of that
-republic, written by one of its own citizens. This work increased the
-existing irritation against its author, a feeling which spread even to
-the villagers of Motiers, who are said to have annoyed their eccentric
-visiter in various ways. Rousseau, however, is suspected of having
-greatly magnified, if not invented, some of the acts of aggression of
-which he complains. He spoke of them as amounting to a regular
-conspiracy against his person, and removed his abode to the little
-island of St. Pierre, on the lake of Bienne. Thence, after a time, as if
-to court notice, he wrote a letter to the Senate of Berne, requesting
-permission to remain on the island. For answer he received an order to
-quit the territory of the canton in twenty-four hours. At the invitation
-of his former friend Marshal Keith, he meditated a visit to Berlin. But
-the advice of some friends in Paris induced him to change his mind, and
-accept the friendly offer of our historian Hume, who was anxious to
-procure for him a safe asylum in England, where he might quietly attend
-to his studies and live in peace. Rousseau arrived in London in January,
-1766; and in the following March, went to his intended home at Wootton
-in Derbyshire. Knowing the man he had to deal with, Hume, with the real
-kindness of character which he possessed, had sought by every means to
-avoid shocking the irritable delicacy or vanity of his protégé: and the
-residence which he procured for him in the house of a man of fortune,
-Mr. Davenport, is said to have been unexceptionable. But before long he
-quarrelled with both Hume and Davenport, left Wootton abruptly, and
-returned to France. The ostensible cause of all this was the publication
-of a letter in the newspapers, bearing the King of Prussia’s name, and
-reflecting severely upon Rousseau’s weaknesses and eccentricities.
-Rousseau accused Hume, or some of his friends, of having written it.
-Hume protested in vain that he knew nothing of the matter. At last
-Horace Walpole acknowledged himself to be the author. Rousseau, however,
-would not be pacified, and attributed to Hume the blackest designs
-against him. The correspondence that passed between the parties on the
-subject is curious, and is given in the complete editions of our
-author’s works. He afterwards seemed to say that during his residence in
-England he had been subject to fits of insanity.
-
-Returning to France, Rousseau led an unsettled life, with frequent
-changes in his place of residence, until June, 1770. He then returned to
-Paris, and took lodgings in the Rue Plâtrière, which has since been
-called Rue J. J. Rousseau. It is to be noticed that in the interim he
-had published his ‘Dictionnaire de Musique,’ a work which has the
-reputation of being both imperfect and obscure. Indeed, notwithstanding
-his passionate fondness for the art, he never attained to a profound
-acquaintance with it. Passing through Lyons on his way to Paris, he
-subscribed his mite towards the erection of a statue to Voltaire: thus
-avenging himself for the coarse abuse which the latter had on many
-occasions poured upon him, and which Rousseau never returned. Voltaire
-is said to have been exceedingly annoyed at this. After his return to
-the capital, he was overwhelmed with visits and invitations to dinner.
-Though there was a prosecution pending against him for his ‘Emile,’ he
-was left undisturbed: but at the same time he was cautioned not to
-exhibit himself too conspicuously in public; advice which he utterly
-disregarded. He soon relapsed into his former misanthropy, and became
-subject to convulsive fits, which fearfully disfigured his features, and
-gave a haggard expression to his looks. He fancied that every body was
-conspiring against him, and he also complained of inward moral
-sufferings which tortured his mind.
-
-Among other imaginary grievances he thought that the French ministers
-had imposed restrictions upon him with respect to his writings. One of
-his friends applied to the Duc de Choiseuil to ascertain the fact. The
-Duke’s answer, dated 1772, is as follows: “If ever I have engaged M.
-Rousseau not to publish anything without my previous knowledge, of which
-fact however I have no remembrance, it could only have been in order to
-save him from fresh squabbles and annoyance. However, now that I have no
-longer the power of protecting him (the Duke had resigned his
-premiership), I fully acquit him of any engagement of the kind.”
-
-As Rousseau was walking one day in the street Menil Montant, a large dog
-that was running before the carriage of the President Saint Fargeau
-tripped his legs, and he fell. The President alighted, expressed his
-regret at the accident, and begged the sufferer to accept of his
-carriage to return home. Rousseau, however, refused. The next day the
-President sent to inquire after his health. “Tell your master to chain
-up his dog,” was the only reply.
-
-Being old and infirm, the labour of copying music had become too irksome
-for him: still he would accept of no assistance from his friends, though
-all his income consisted of an annuity of 1450 livres. His wife was also
-in bad health, and provisions were very dear at the time; he therefore
-began to look out for a country residence. A friend mentioned this to
-the Marquis de Girardin, who immediately offered Rousseau a permanent
-habitation at his château of Ermenonville, near Chantilly. Rousseau
-accepted the proposal, and chose for his residence a detached cottage
-near the family mansion. He removed to it in May, 1778, and appeared
-more calm and contented in his new abode. He was fond of botany, and
-used to take long walks in quest of flowers with one of M. de Girardin’s
-sons. On July 1st he went out as usual, but returned home fatigued and
-ill: he however slept quietly that night. Next morning he rose early
-according to his custom, and went out to see the sun rise; he came back
-to breakfast, after which he went to his room to dress, as he intended
-to pay a visit to Madame de Girardin. His wife happening to enter his
-room shortly after, found him sitting with his elbow leaning on a chest
-of drawers. He said he was very ill, and complained of cold shivering
-and of violent pain in his head. Madame de Girardin being informed of
-this, came at once to visit him; but Rousseau, thanking her for all her
-kindness to him, begged of her to return home and leave him alone for
-the present. He then having requested his wife to sit by him, begged her
-forgiveness for any pain or displeasure of which he might have been the
-cause, and said that his end was approaching, that he died in peace, as
-he never had intended or wished evil to any human being, and that he
-hoped in the mercy of God. He begged that M. de Girardin would allow him
-to be buried in his park. He gave directions to his wife about his
-papers, and requested her particularly to have his body opened, that the
-cause of his death might be ascertained. He then asked her to open the
-window, “that he might once more behold the beautiful green of the
-fields.” “How pure and beautiful is the sky!” he then observed, “there
-is not a cloud. I trust the Almighty will receive me there above.” In so
-saying, he fell on his face to the floor, and on raising him, life was
-found to be extinct. On opening the body, a considerable quantity of
-serum was found between the brain and its integuments. His sudden death
-was attributed by many persons to suicide: but there is no direct
-evidence of which we know to prove this. On the other side there is the
-positive assertion of the physician who examined the body, that his
-death was natural. Rousseau was buried in an island shaded by poplars,
-on the little lake of the park of Ermenonville. A plain marble monument
-was raised to his memory.
-
-The first part of his ‘Confessions,’ which he had begun to write while
-at Wootton, was published in 1781. He had himself fixed the year 1800
-for the publication of the second part, judging that, by that time, the
-persons mentioned in the work would be dead; but, through an abuse of
-confidence on the part of the depositories of the MSS., it was published
-in 1788. His autobiography does not include the latter years of his
-life.
-
-Rousseau was temperate and frugal in his habits, disinterested and
-warm-hearted, and impressed with strong feelings against oppression and
-injustice. He was not envious of the fame or success of his brother
-authors. He never sneered at religion like Voltaire and others of his
-contemporaries, although in his speculative works he expressed his
-doubts concerning revelation, and brought forth the arguments that
-occurred to him on that side of the question: but he had none of the
-fanaticism of incredulity against Christianity. Of the morality of the
-Gospel he was a sincere admirer, and a most eloquent eulogist. “I
-acknowledge,” he says in his ‘Emile,’ “that the majesty of the
-Scriptures astonishes me, that the holiness of the Gospel speaks to my
-heart. Look at the books of the philosophers; with all their pomp, how
-little they appear by the side of that one book! Can a book so sublime,
-and yet so simple, be the work of man? How prejudiced, how blind that
-man must be, who can compare the son of Sophroniscus (Socrates) to the
-son of Mary!” With such sentiments Rousseau could not long agree with
-Helvetius, Diderot, D’Holbach, and their coterie. They, on their side,
-ridiculed and abused him, because he was too sincere and independent for
-them. “I have spent my life,” says Rousseau, “among infidels, without
-being seduced by them; I loved and esteemed several of them, and yet
-their doctrine was to me insufferable. I told them repeatedly that I
-could not believe them.... I leave to my friends the task of
-constructing the world by chance. I find in the very architects of this
-new-fangled world, and in spite of themselves and their arguments, fresh
-proofs of the existence of a God, a Creator of all.” A very good
-collection of the moral maxims scattered about Rousseau’s works was
-published under the title of ‘Esprit, Maximes et Principes de J. J.
-Rousseau,’ 8vo., Neuchatel, 1774.
-
-Rousseau set to music about 100 French romances, which he called
-‘Consolations des Misères de ma Vie.’ Several editions of all his works
-have been made at different times: that by Mercier and Le Tourneur, 38
-vols. 4to., has been long considered as one of the best. The edition of
-Lefevre, 22 vols. 8vo., 1819–20, and that of Lequien, 21 vols. 8vo.,
-1821–2, are now preferred to all former ones.
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by W. Holl._
-
-  JOHN HARRISON.
-
-  _From an Engraving by Tassaerts published in 1708 after a Painting by
-    King._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                               HARRISON.
-
-
-John Harrison was born in May, 1693, at Foulby, in Yorkshire. His
-father, who was a joiner, trained him from an early age to the same
-business; but he soon began to study machinery. He turned his attention
-to the mechanism of clocks; and, to obviate the irregularities produced
-in their rate of going by variations of temperature, he invented the
-method of compensation, employed in what is now called the _gridiron_
-pendulum, before the year 1720. This contrivance consisted in
-constructing a pendulum with bars of different metals, having different
-rates of expansion so as to correct each other: it is described in all
-popular treatises on physics. By this means it is stated that he had,
-before the year above-mentioned, constructed two clocks which agreed
-with each other within a second a month, and one of which did not vary,
-on the whole, more than a minute in ten years.[10]
-
-Footnote 10:
-
-  Folke’s Address to the Royal Society, Nov. 30, 1749.
-
-This success induced him to turn his attention to watches, or rather to
-time-keepers for naval purposes. It would be impossible without the help
-of plates to render intelligible the rise and progress of his methods,
-for which we must refer the reader to treatises of Horology. His first
-instrument was tried upon the Humber, in rough weather, and succeeded so
-well that he was recommended to carry it to London, for the inspection
-of the Commissioners of Longitude.
-
-The question of the discovery of the longitude had been considered of
-national importance since the year 1714, when an Act was passed offering
-10,000_l._, 15,000_l._, and 20,000_l._ for any method of discovering the
-longitude within 60, 40, or 30 miles respectively. In 1735 Harrison
-arrived in London with his time-piece, and showed it to several members
-of the Royal Society. He obtained a certificate of its goodness, signed
-by Halley, Smith, Bradley, Machin, and Graham, in consequence of which
-he was allowed to proceed with it to Lisbon, in a king’s ship, in 1736.
-The watch was found to correct the ship’s reckoning a degree and a half;
-and the commissioners thereupon gave Harrison 500_l._, to enable him to
-proceed. He finished a second time-piece in 1739, and a third in 1758,
-each nearer to perfection than the former, and both abounding in
-ingenious contrivances to overcome the effects of temperature, and of
-the motion of a vessel at sea. In 1741 he obtained another certificate,
-signed by almost every name of eminence in English science of the time.
-In 1749 the gold medal of the Royal Society was awarded to him. In 1761,
-having then a fourth time-piece in hand, but being convinced that the
-third was sufficiently correct to come within the limits of the act of
-parliament, he applied to the Commissioners for a trial of it.
-Accordingly, in 1761 (Nov. 18), his son, William Harrison, was sent in a
-king’s ship to Jamaica with the watch, and returned to Portsmouth, March
-26, 1762. On arrival at Port Royal, Jan. 19, 1762, the watch was found
-wrong only 5⅒ seconds; and at its return, only 1 minute 54½ seconds.
-This was sufficient to determine the longitude within 18 miles; and
-Harrison accordingly claimed 20,000_l._, in a petition to the House of
-Commons, presented early in 1763. The Commissioners had awarded him
-1,500_l._, and promised 1,000_l._ more after another voyage. Owing to
-some doubt as to the method of equal altitudes employed in finding the
-time at Port Royal, they do not appear to have been of opinion that the
-first voyage was conclusive. In 1763 an act passed, by which, firstly,
-no other person could become entitled to the reward until Harrison’s
-claim was settled; and, secondly, 5,000_l._ was awarded to him on his
-discovery of the structure of the instrument. But the Commissioners not
-agreeing about the payment, another voyage was resolved on, and Mr.
-William Harrison sailed again for Barbadoes, with Dr. Maskelyne,
-afterwards the Astronomer Royal. The result was yet more satisfactory
-than before; and in 1765 a new act was passed, awarding to Harrison the
-whole sum of 20,000_l._: the first moiety upon the discovery of his
-construction; the second, so soon as it should be found that others
-could be made like it. In this act it is stated that the watch did not
-lose more than ten miles of the longitude. But Harrison had by this time
-been rendered unduly suspicious of the intentions of the Commissioners.
-He imagined that Dr. Maskelyne had treated him unfairly, and was
-desirous of having no method of finding the longitude except that of
-lunar observations. An account of the subsequent proceedings, of which
-the following is an abstract, was printed in self-defence by the
-Commissioners:—
-
-May 28, 1765, Mr. Harrison’s son informs the Commissioners that he is
-ready to deliver the drawings and explanations, and expects a
-certificate that he is entitled to receive the first moiety of the
-reward. The Commissioners are unanimously of opinion that verbal
-explanations and experiments, in the presence of such persons as they
-may appoint, will be necessary. May 30, Mr. Harrison attends in person,
-and consents to the additional explanation; and certain men of science,
-as well as watchmakers, are instructed to receive them. June 13, Mr.
-Harrison, being present, is informed that the Board is ready to fix a
-time to proceed, on which he denies ever having given his assent, and
-refers to a letter which he had delivered at the last meeting. The
-letter had not, says the Commissioners’ Minute, been delivered, but had
-been left upon the table, unnoticed by any one. It was to the effect
-that Harrison was willing to give further verbal explanation, but
-requires to know to whom it must be given; “for,” says he, “I will never
-attempt to explain it to the satisfaction of the Commissioners, and who
-they may appoint; nor will I ever come under the directions of men of
-theory.” He further refuses to make any experimental exhibition, and
-ends by complaining of the usage he has received. He was then told by
-the Board that he would only be asked for experiments in cases where
-there were operations which could not be fully explained by words, such,
-for instance, as the tempering of the springs; on which he left the
-Board abruptly, declaring, “that he never would consent to it, as long
-as he had a drop of English blood in his body.” The Commissioners
-thereupon declined further dealing with him.
-
-The reason of the above absurd conduct we suspect to have been, that
-Harrison desired, in addition to the large reward claimed by him, to
-have a monopoly of the manufacture of his watches, such as would have
-necessarily been created for his benefit, had he been allowed to keep
-his actual methods of working a secret. For he offered, _upon receiving
-the reward_, “to employ a sufficient number of hands, so as with all
-possible speed to furnish his Majesty’s navy, &c. &c., not doubting but
-the public will consider the charge of the outset of the undertaking.”
-We quote here from the Biographia Britannica, in the last volume of
-which, published in 1766, is an account of him, from materials avowedly
-furnished by himself, and plainly written by a partisan. It is the only
-instance we can find in which a memoir of a living person has been
-inserted in that work.
-
-The next circumstance we find, (for there is no connected history of
-this discussion, which exists only in a number of detached pamphlets,)
-is the delivery of the watch to Dr. Maskelyne, at the Royal Observatory,
-in May, 1766, that its rate of going might there be tried. The Report of
-the Astronomer Royal states, that it could not be depended upon within a
-degree of longitude in a voyage of six weeks; and a very angry pamphlet,
-published by Harrison in the following year, accuses Maskelyne of having
-treated the instrument unfairly. Many circumstances are stated which now
-appear ludicrous, and some which, if true, would have reflected
-discredit on the Commissioners. But nothing can be inferred, after the
-refusal of Harrison to accede to the very reasonable demand of the
-Commissioners, except that he was most probably as wrong in his
-suspicions as he had been foolish in his dealings. The end of this
-dispute was, that in 1767 Harrison complied with the conditions insisted
-upon; and, it having been found that his improvements were such as
-admitted of execution by another person, he received the whole sum
-awarded to him by the Act of Parliament.
-
-Harrison was not a well-educated man, and was deficient in the power of
-expressing his meaning clearly. It was easier for him, no doubt, to make
-two watches than to explain one; and hence, perhaps, his aversion to
-“men of theory,” who troubled him for descriptions and explanations.
-
-He died in 1776, at his house in Red Lion Square, having been engaged
-during the latter years of his life in bringing his improvements still
-nearer to perfection. His last work, which was tried in 1772, was found
-to have erred only four seconds and a half in ten weeks.
-
-In his younger days, some church-bells, which were out of tune, set him
-upon examining the musical scale, with a view to correct them. He
-communicated his ideas on the subject to Dr. Smith, who confirmed and
-extended them in his well-known work on Harmonics. In the Preface it is
-stated that Harrison made the interval of the major-third bear to that
-of the octave the proportion of the diameter of a circle to its
-circumference. This, he said, he did on the authority of a friend, who
-assured him it would give the best scale. Harrison himself wrote a
-treatise on the scale, but we do not know whether it was published.
-
-He is, on the whole, a fine instance of the union of originality with
-perseverance. The inventions, of which it takes so short a space to tell
-the history, were the work of fifty years of labour, and to them the art
-of constructing chronometers, and consequently the science of
-navigation, is indebted for much of its present advanced state.
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by C. E. Wagstaff._
-
-  MONTAIGNE.
-
-  _From an original Picture at Paris, in the “Dépot des Archives du
-    Royaume.”_
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                               MONTAIGNE.
-
-
-Michel, Seigneur, or Lord, of MONTAIGNE, a feudal estate in the province
-of Perigord, near the river Dordogne, was born February 28, 1533, of a
-family said to have been originally from England. He was a younger son;
-but, by the death of his elder brother, inherited the estate by the
-title of which he is known. His father, a blunt feudal noble, who had
-served in the wars of Francis I., placed him out at nurse in a village
-of his domain, and directed that he should be treated in the same manner
-as the children of the peasants. As soon as he could speak, he was
-placed under the care of a German tutor, selected for his ignorance of
-the French, and intimate acquaintance with the Greek and Latin
-languages. All Montaigne’s intercourse with his preceptor was carried on
-in Latin; and even his parents made a rule never to address him except
-in that language, of which they picked up a sufficient number of words
-for common purposes. The attendants were enjoined to follow the same
-practice. “They all became latinized,” says Montaigne himself, “and even
-the villagers around learnt words in that language, some of which took
-root in the country, and became of common use among the people.” Thus,
-without any formal course of scholastic teaching, Montaigne spoke Latin
-long before he could speak French, which he was afterwards obliged to
-learn as if it had been a foreign language. When, at a mature age, he
-was writing his Essays, he professed to be still ignorant of grammar,
-having learnt various languages by practice, and not knowing yet the
-meaning of adjective, conjunctive, or ablative, (Essais, b. i. c. 48.)
-This last assertion probably is not to be taken strictly to the letter.
-He studied Greek also by way of pastime, rather than as a task. The
-object of his father was to make him learn without constraint and from
-his own wish; and, as an instance of the old soldier’s whimsical notions
-on education, he caused his son to be awakened in the morning to the
-sound of music, that his nervous system might not be injured by any
-sudden shock. At six years old Montaigne was sent to the College of
-Guienne, at Bordeaux, an establishment which then enjoyed a very high
-reputation. He soon made his way to the higher classes; and at thirteen
-years of age had completed his college education. Having no taste for
-military life, which was then the usual career of young noblemen, he
-studied the law; and in 1554 was made Councillor (or Judge) in the
-Parliament of Bordeaux, in which capacity he acted for several years. He
-went several times to Court, and enjoyed the favour of Henry II., by
-whom, or as some say, by Charles IX., he was made a Gentleman of the
-King’s Chamber, and Knight of the Order of St. Michel. Among his brother
-councillors at Bordeaux there was a young man of distinguished merit,
-called La Boëtie, for whom Montaigne conceived a feeling of the most
-romantic friendship, which soon became reciprocal. The sentiments and
-opinions of the two seem to have sympathized in an extraordinary degree.
-La Boëtie died young, but his friend’s affection survived: a chapter of
-the Essays is devoted to his memory, and in other parts of Montaigne’s
-writings we find frequent recurrence to the same subject.
-
-Montaigne married Françoise de la Chassaigne when he was thirty-three
-years of age; and this he did, as he says, in consequence of external
-persuasions, and in order to please his friends rather than himself, for
-he was not inclined to a married life; “but once married, although he
-had been till then considered a licentious man, he observed the conjugal
-laws more strictly than he had himself expected.” On succeeding to the
-family estate, on which he generally resided, he took the management of
-it into his own hands; and although his father, judging from his habits
-of abstraction and seeming carelessness of worldly objects, had foretold
-that he would ruin his patrimony, Montaigne, at his death, left the
-property if not much better, certainly not worse than he found it. He
-was not rich, for we are told, by Balzac, that his income did not exceed
-6000 livres, which was no great revenue for a country gentleman even at
-that time. In 1569 he translated into French a Latin work of Sebonde or
-Sebon, in defence of the mysteries and doctrines of the Church of Rome,
-against Luther and other Protestant writers. France was at that time
-desolated by civil and religious war. Montaigne, although he evidently
-disapproved of the conduct of the Court towards the Protestants, yet
-remained loyal to the King. He lived in retirement, and took no part in
-public affairs, except by exhorting both parties to moderation and
-mutual charity. By this conduct he became, as it generally happens,
-obnoxious to both factions, and he incurred some danger in consequence.
-The massacre of St. Bartholomew plunged him into a deep melancholy. He
-detested cruelty and the shedding of blood, and in several passages of
-his Essays has animadverted in strong terms upon the atrocities
-committed against the Protestants. It was about this dismal epoch of
-1572, when, solitude and melancholy urging him to the task, he began to
-write that celebrated work, of which we shall presently speak more at
-length. It was first published in March, 1580; and had great success.
-After some time, Montaigne printed a new edition of it, with additions;
-but without making any alterations in the part which had appeared
-before. The popularity of the book was such that in a few years there
-was hardly a man of education in France who had not a copy of it.
-
-Soon after the first publication of his Essays, Montaigne undertook a
-journey for the sake of his health. He went to Germany, Switzerland,
-and, lastly, to Italy. He visited several bathing-places, among others,
-Baden, and the baths of Lucca in Tuscany. He proceeded to Rome, where he
-was well received by several Cardinals and other persons of distinction,
-and was introduced to Pope Gregory XIII. Montaigne was delighted with
-Rome; he found himself at home among those localities and monuments
-which were connected with his earliest studies, and with the first
-impressions of his childhood. His remarks on what he saw in the course
-of his journey are those of a man of penetration, sincere and plain
-spoken, and written in his peculiar antique style. His MS. journal,
-after lying forgotten for nearly two centuries, was discovered in an old
-chest in the château of his family, and published in 1775, by M. de
-Querlon, under the following title, ‘Journal du Voyage de Michel de
-Montaigne en Italie, par la Suisse et l’Allemagne, en 1580–1.’ It is one
-of the earliest descriptions of Italy in a modern language. In this
-journey, Montaigne received the freedom of the city of Rome, by a
-special bull of the Pope, which he valued as the proudest distinction of
-his life.
-
-While he was abroad, he was elected mayor of Bordeaux by the votes of
-the citizens; an honour which he would have declined, but that the king,
-Henry III., insisted on his accepting of it. This was a mere honorary
-office, no emolument being attached to it. The appointment was for two
-years; but Montaigne was re-elected at the expiration of that period,
-which was a mark of public favour of rare occurrence.
-
-On retiring from his office, Montaigne returned to his estate. The
-country was then ravaged by the war of the League. He had great
-difficulty in saving his family and property in the midst of the
-contending parties, and once narrowly escaped assassination in his
-château. To add to the miseries of civil war, the plague broke out in
-his neighbourhood in 1586; and he then, with his family, left his home
-and became a wanderer, residing successively at several friends’ houses
-in other parts of the country. He was at Paris in 1588, busy about a new
-edition of his Essays. It appears from De Thou, that about this time he
-was employed in negotiation with a view to mediate peace between Henry
-of Navarre, afterwards Henry IV., and the Duke of Guise. At Paris, he
-made the acquaintance of Mademoiselle de Gournay, a young lady, who had
-conceived a kind of sentimental affection for him by reading his book.
-In company with her mother, she visited and introduced herself to him,
-and from that time he called her his “fille d’alliance,” or adopted
-daughter, a title which she retained for the rest of her life, as she
-never married. This attachment, which, though warm and reciprocal, has
-every appearance of being of a purely platonic nature, is one of the
-remarkable circumstances of Montaigne’s life. At the time of his death,
-Mademoiselle de Gournay and her mother crossed one-half of France, in
-spite of the civil troubles and the insecurity of the roads, to mix
-their tears with those of his widow and daughter.
-
-On his return from Paris, in the latter part of 1588, Montaigne stopped
-at Blois, with De Thou, Pasquier, and other friends. The famous
-States-General were then assembled in that city, where the murder of the
-Duke of Guise, and of his brother, the Cardinal, soon after took place
-(23d and 24th December, 1588). Montaigne had long foreseen that the
-civil dissensions could only terminate with the death of one of the
-great party leaders; and he also said to De Thou that Henry of Navarre
-was inclined to embrace the Catholic faith, were he not afraid of being
-forsaken by his party; and that, on the other side, Guise himself would
-not have been averse from adopting the Protestant religion, if he could
-thereby have promoted his ambitious views. After these events, Montaigne
-returned to his château. In the following year, he became acquainted
-with Pierre Charron, a theological writer of considerable reputation. An
-intimate friendship ensued between the two authors; and Charron, in his
-book ‘De la Sagesse,’ borrowed many thoughts from the Essays, which he
-held in high estimation. Montaigne, by his will, empowered Charron to
-assume the coat of arms of his family, as he himself had no male issue.
-
-Montaigne’s health had been declining for some time; he was afflicted
-with gravel and cholic, and he was obstinately resolved against
-consulting physicians. In September, 1592, he fell ill of a malignant
-quinsy, which kept him speechless for three days, during which he had
-recourse to his pen to signify to his wife his last intentions. He
-desired that several gentlemen of the neighbourhood should be requested
-to come and take leave of him. When they were assembled in his room, a
-priest said mass, and at the elevation of the host, Montaigne half
-raised himself on his bed, with his hands joined together, and in that
-attitude expired, September 13, 1592, in the sixtieth year of his age.
-His body was buried at Bordeaux, in the church of the Feuillans, where a
-monument was erected to him by his widow. He left an only daughter,
-heiress of his property.
-
-Montaigne’s Essays have been the subject of much and very conflicting
-criticism. If we consider the age and the intellectual condition of the
-country in which the author was born, we must pronounce them a very
-extraordinary work, not so much on account of the learning contained in
-them, as for the philosophical spirit and the frank, independent,
-liberal tone that pervades their pages. Civilization and literature were
-then at a low ebb in France; the language was hardly formed, the country
-was still torn by the rude turbulence, and subject to the oppression, of
-feudal lords and feudal laws; and was, moreover, distracted by ignorant
-fanaticism, by deadly intolerance, and by civil factions, rendered more
-fierce by religious feuds. It is very remarkable that, in a remote
-province of a country so situated, a country gentleman, himself
-belonging to the feudal aristocracy, should have composed a work full of
-moral maxims and precepts, conceived in the spirit of the philosophers
-of Greece and Rome, and founded, not on the sanctions of revealed
-religion, but on a sort of natural system of ethics, on the beauty of
-virtue, on the innate sense of justice, on the lessons of history. It is
-almost more remarkable that such a book should have been read with
-avidity amidst the turmoil of factions, the din of civil war, the knell
-of persecution and massacre.
-
-The morality of the Essays has been called, and justly so, a pagan
-morality: it is not founded on the faith and the hopes of a Christian;
-and its principles are in many respects widely different from those of
-the Gospel. Scepticism was the bias of Montaigne’s mind; his philosophy
-is, in great measure, that of Seneca, and other ancient writers, whose
-books were the first that were put into his hands when a child.
-Accordingly, Pascal, Nicole, Leclerc, and other Christian moralists,
-while rendering full justice to Montaigne’s talents and the many good
-sentiments scattered about the Essays, are very severe upon his ethics,
-taken as a system. Yet he was not a determined infidel, for not only in
-the Essays, but in the journal of his travels, which was not intended
-for publication, he manifests Christian sentiments; and we have seen
-that the mode of his death was that of a Christian. In his chapter on
-prayers, (Essais, b. i. 56,) he recommends the use of the Lord’s Prayer
-in terms evidently sincere; and in a preceding chapter, after speaking
-of two sorts of ignorance, the one, that which precedes all instruction,
-and the other, that which follows partial instruction, he says, that
-“men of simple minds, devoid of curiosity and of learning, are
-Christians through reverence and obedience; that minds of middle growth
-and moderate capacities are the most prone to error and doubt; but that
-higher intellects, more clear-sighted and better grounded in science,
-form a superior class of believers, who, through long and religious
-investigations, arrive at the fountain of light of the Scriptures, and
-feel the mysterious and divine meaning of our ecclesiastical doctrines.
-And we see some who reach this last stage, through the second, with
-marvellous fruit and confirmation; and who, having attained the extreme
-boundary of Christian intelligence, enjoy their success with modesty and
-thanksgivings, accompanied by a total reformation of their morals,
-unlike those men of another stamp, who, in order to clear themselves of
-the suspicion of their past errors, become violent, indiscreet, unjust,
-and throw discredit on the cause which they pretend to serve.” (Essais,
-b. i. ch. 54.) And a few lines after, he modestly places himself in the
-second rank, of those who, disdaining the first state of uninformed
-simplicity, have not yet attained the third and last exalted stage, and
-who, he says, are thereby rendered “inept, importunate, and troublesome
-to society. But I, for my part, endeavour, as much as I can, to fall
-back upon my first and natural condition, from which I have idly
-attempted to depart.” Although we may not trust implicitly to the
-sincerity of this modest admission, yet we clearly see from this and
-other passages, that Montaigne’s mind was anything but dogmatical, and
-that he felt the insecurity of his own philosophy, which was made up of
-impulses and doubts, rather than of argumentation and conviction.
-
-Montaigne has been also censured for several licentious and some cynical
-passages of his ‘Essais.’ This licentiousness, however, is rather in the
-expressions than in the meaning of the author. He spoke plainly of
-things which are not alluded to in a more refined state of society, but
-he did so evidently without mischievous intentions, and as a thing of
-common occurrence in his days. His early familiarity with the Latin
-classics probably contributed to this habit.
-
-Notwithstanding these faults, Montaigne’s Essays are justly admired for
-the sound sense, honesty, and beauty which abound in them. ‘The best
-parts of them (says a French critic) are those in which he speaks of the
-passions and inclinations of men; as for his learning, it is vague, not
-methodical, and uncertain; and his philosophical maxims are often
-dangerous.’ (Mélanges d’Histoire et de Litterature,’ Rouen, 1699, tom.
-i. p. 133.) Montaigne combats most earnestly all the malignant feelings
-inherent in man, inhumanity, injustice, oppression, uncharitableness;
-cruelty he detests, his whole nature was averse from it. His chapters on
-pedantry and on the education of children are remarkably good. He
-throws, at times, considerable light on the state of society and manners
-in France in his time, which may be considered as the last period of
-feudal power in that country. In his chapter on the inequality among
-men, he speaks of the independence of the French nobility, especially in
-the provinces remote from the Court, as Britanny; where the feudal lords
-living on their estates, surrounded by their vassals, their officers and
-valets, their household conducted with an almost royal ceremonial, heard
-of the king but once a-year as if he were some distant king or Sultan of
-Persia, and only remembered him on the score of some distant
-relationship, which they hold carefully registered among their ancestral
-documents.
-
-Mademoiselle de Gournay edited Montaigne’s ‘Essais’ in 1635, and
-dedicated the edition to the Cardinal de Richelieu. She wrote a long
-preface to it, which is a zealous apology for Montaigne and his works
-against the charges of the earlier critics. An edition of the ‘Essais’
-was published by Pierre Coste, 3 vols. 4to. London, 1724, enriched with
-valuable notes and several letters of Montaigne at the end of the third
-volume. The edition of Paris, 3 vols. 4to. 1725, is, in great measure, a
-reprint of that of Coste, except that the publishers have added extracts
-of the various judgments of the most distinguished critical writers
-concerning the ‘Essais,’ and also two more letters of Montaigne’s at the
-end. These additions render this Paris edition the most complete. The
-ex-senator Vernier published in 1810, ‘Notices et Observations pour
-faciliter la Lecture des Essais de Montaigne,’ Paris, 2 vols. 8vo. It is
-a useful commentary.
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                 POPE.
-
-
-Alexander Pope was born in London, June S, 1688. His father was a
-merchant, of good family, attached to the Roman Catholic religion; and
-his own childish years were spent, first under the tuition of a priest,
-then at a Roman Catholic Seminary at Twyford, near Winchester. He taught
-himself to write by copying printed books, in the execution of which he
-attained great neatness and exactness. When little more than eight years
-old he accidentally met with Ogilby’s Translation of Homer. The
-versification is insipid and lifeless; but the stirring events and
-captivating character of the story so possessed his mind, that Ogilby
-became a favourite book. When about ten years old he was removed from
-Twyford to a school at Hyde Park Corner. He had there occasional
-opportunities of frequenting the theatre; which suggested to him the
-amusement of turning the chief events in Homer into a kind of play,
-composed of a succession of speeches from Ogilby, strung together by
-verses of his own. In these two schools he seems, instead of advancing,
-to have lost what he had gained under his first tutor. When twelve years
-old he went to live with his parents at Binfield, in Windsor Forest. He
-there became acquainted with the writings of Spenser, Waller, and
-Dryden. For the latter he conceived the greatest admiration. He saw him
-once, and commemorates the event in his correspondence, under the words
-“Virgilium tantum vidi:” but he was too young to have made acquaintance
-with that master of English verse, who died in 1701. He studied Dryden’s
-works with equal attention and pleasure, adopted them as a model of
-rhythm, and copied the structure of that author’s periods. This was,
-however, so far from a grovelling imitation, that it enabled him to
-raise English rhyme to the most perfect melody of which it is capable.
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by J. Posselwhite._
-
-  POPE.
-
-  _From the Picture by Hudson in the possession of His Grace the Duke of
-    Buckingham._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-In the retirement of Binfield, Pope laboured successfully to make amends
-for the loss of past time. At fourteen years of age he had written with
-some elegance, and at fifteen had attained some knowledge of the Greek
-and Latin languages, to which he soon added French and Italian. In 1704
-he began his pastorals, published in 1709, which introduced him, through
-Wycherley, to the acquaintance of Walsh, who proved a sincere friend to
-him. That gentleman discovered at once that Pope’s talent lay less in
-striking out new thoughts of his own, than in easy versification, and in
-improving what he borrowed from the ancients. Among other useful hints,
-he pointed out that we had several great poets, but that none of them
-were correct; he therefore admonished him to make that merit his own.
-The advice was gratefully received; and Pope’s correspondence shows that
-it was carefully followed. His melodious numbers, so marked a feature of
-his style, were in a great measure the result of that suggestion.
-
-In the same year, 1704, he wrote the first part of his ‘Windsor Forest’:
-the whole was not published till 1713. The fault charged on this poem
-is, that few images are introduced which are not equally applicable to
-any other sylvan scenery. It was dedicated to Lord Lansdowne, whom he
-mentions as one of his earliest acquaintance. To those already named,
-may be added Bolingbroke, Congreve, Garth, Swift, Atterbury, Talbot,
-Somers, and Sheffield, whose friendship he had gained at sixteen or
-seventeen years of age. Pope, to his credit be it set down, cultivated
-friendships not only with the great, but with his brethren among the
-poets. Wycherley indeed was infected with the weakness of the archbishop
-in ‘Gil Blas,’ touching his own compositions, and the young poet was
-imprudently caustic in his criticism on the old one. Their
-correspondence was consequently dropped; and though renewed through the
-mediation of a common friend, it was with no revival of cordiality. But
-in 1728, some time after Wycherley’s death, his poems were republished;
-and in the following year Pope printed several letters which had passed
-between them, in vindication of Wycherley’s fame as a poet, in answer to
-certain misrepresentations prefixed to that edition. This quarrel was a
-trying affair in the outset of Pope’s career, and his conduct had been
-above his years; but young as he was, his talents were now beginning to
-ripen. His example confirms the truth of Lord Bacon’s remark, that
-personal deformity acts as a spur to that improvement of the mind, which
-is most likely to rescue him who is curtailed of his due proportion from
-a sense of degradation.
-
-To this early period of Pope’s life belong the ‘Messiah,’ the ‘Ode for
-St. Cecilia’s Day,’ ‘Verses to the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady,’ and
-other of Pope’s minor pieces, which were collected and published in a
-small 8vo. volume in 1720. It is stated in a note to Dr. Johnson’s Life,
-that Pope himself was the object of the passion commemorated in the
-last-mentioned poem. The date of that most brilliant composition,
-‘Eloisa to Abelard,’ is uncertain. The ‘Essay on Criticism’ was written
-in 1709, “A work,” says Johnson, “which displays such extent of
-comprehension, such nicety of distinction, such acquaintance with
-mankind, and such knowledge both of ancient and modern learning, as are
-not often attained by the maturest age and longest experience.” Pope’s
-fame was carried to its height by the ‘Rape of the Lock.’ That poem
-originated in an impertinence offered by Lord Petre to Mrs. Arabella
-Fermor, which led to a quarrel between their respective families. Both
-parties were among Pope’s acquaintance, and this lively piece was
-written to produce a reconciliation, in which it succeeded. The
-universal applause given to the first sketch induced the author to
-enrich it with the machinery of the Sylphs. In that new dress the two
-cantos, extended to five, came out in 1712, accompanied by a letter to
-Mrs. Arabella Fermor, to whom he afterwards addressed another after her
-marriage, in the spruce and courtly style of Voiture. A sentence or two
-may be quoted as a sample of the poet’s epistolary manner. “Madam, you
-are sensible, by this time, how much the tenderness of one man of merit
-is to be preferred to the addresses of a thousand; and by this time, the
-gentleman you have made choice of is sensible how great is the joy of
-having all those charms and good qualities which have pleased so many,
-now applied to please one only.... It may be expected, perhaps, that one
-who has the title of being a wit should say something more polite upon
-this occasion; but I am really more a well-wisher to your felicity, than
-a celebrator of your beauty.... I hope you will think it but just that a
-man, who will certainly be spoken of as your admirer after he is dead,
-may have the happiness, while he is living, to be esteemed, Yours, &c.”
-This letter is sometimes annexed to the poem, and not injudiciously, as
-it completes the winding-up in the happy marriage of the heroine. In the
-same year he published his ‘Temple of Fame,’ which, according to his
-habitual caution, he had kept two years in his study. It appears from
-one of his letters, that at that time he had made some progress in
-translating the Iliad: in 1713, he circulated proposals for publishing
-his translation by subscription. He had been pressed to this undertaking
-some time before by several of his friends, and was now encouraged in
-the design by others. The publication of the first four books, in 1715,
-gave general satisfaction; and so materially improved the author’s
-finances, that he resolved to come nearer to his friends in the capital.
-With that view, the small estate at Binfield was sold, and he purchased
-a house at Twickenham, whither he removed with his father and mother
-before the end of the year 1715. While employed in the decoration of his
-seat, he could not forbear doubling his pleasures by boasting of it in
-his communications with his friends. In a letter to Mr. Blount he says,
-in his customary tone of gallantry, “The young ladies may be assured
-that I make nothing new in my gardens, without wishing to see them print
-their fairy steps in every corner of them.... You’ll think I have been
-very poetical in this description, but it is pretty nearly the truth.”
-This letter was written in 1725. Warburton tells us that the improvement
-of his celebrated grotto was the favourite amusement of his declining
-years: not long before his death, by enlarging and ornamenting it with
-ores and minerals of the richest and rarest kind, he had made it a most
-elegant and romantic retirement. But modern taste will scarcely confirm
-the reverend editor’s assertion, that “the beauty of his poetic genius,
-in the disposition and ornaments of those romantic materials, appeared
-to as much advantage as in any of his best-contrived poems.”
-
-Pope’s father survived his removal to Twickenham only two years. The old
-gentleman had sometimes recommended to his son the study of medicine, as
-the best method of increasing his scanty patrimony. Neglect of pecuniary
-considerations was not among Pope’s weaknesses: he did not indeed engage
-in the medical profession; but he took other opportunities of pushing
-his fortune. With this view, he published an edition of his collected
-poems in 1717; a proceeding as much suggested by profit as by fame. In
-the like disposition, he undertook a new edition of Shakspeare, which
-was published in 1721. The execution of it proved the editor’s unfitness
-for the task which he had undertaken. Immediately after the completion
-of the Iliad, in 1720, Pope engaged, for a considerable sum, to
-undertake the Odyssey. Only twelve books, however, of the translation
-proceeded from his own pen: the rest were done by Broome and Fenton
-under his direction. The work was completed in 1725. The following year
-was employed, in concert with Swift and Arbuthnot, in the publication of
-miscellanies, of which the most remarkable is the celebrated ‘History of
-Martinus Scriblerus.’ About this time, as he was returning home one day
-in Lord Bolingbroke’s chariot, it was overturned on Chase Bridge, near
-Twickenham, and thrown with the horses into the river. The glasses being
-up, Pope was nearly drowned, and was extricated with difficulty from his
-hazardous situation. He lost the use of two fingers, in consequence of a
-severe cut from the broken glass.
-
-Having secured an independent fortune, Pope endeavoured to protect his
-literary fame from all future attacks, by browbeating every one into
-silence: this he hoped to accomplish by the poem of the ‘Dunciad,’ which
-came out in 4to. in the year 1727. He somewhere says, that the life of
-an author is a state of warfare: he now showed himself a master in
-literary tactics, a great captain in offensive as well as defensive war.
-The poem made its first appearance in Ireland, cautiously, as a masked
-battery; nor was the triumph completed without the co-operation of an
-Eugene with this satirical Marlborough in the person of Swift, who
-furnished some of the materials in his own masterly style of sarcasm.
-The improved edition was printed in London in 1728. Sir Robert Walpole
-presented it to the King and Queen, and, probably at the same time,
-offered to procure the author a pension; but Pope refused this, as he
-had before, in 1714, rejected a similar proposal from Lord Halifax. In a
-letter to Swift, written about this time, he expresses his feelings
-thus: “I was once before displeased at you for complaining to Mr. —— of
-my not having a pension; I am so again at your naming it to a certain
-lord.” In 1710, Mr. Craggs had given him a subscription for one hundred
-pounds in the South Sea Fund; but he made no use of it. These favours
-must be understood to have been proffered for the purpose of estranging
-him from his personal friends; and this repeated rejection of them is an
-honourable proof of steadiness to his attachments.
-
-In 1729, the poet, by Lord Bolingbroke’s advice, turned his pen to moral
-subjects; and, with the assistance of his friend, set to work upon the
-‘Essay on Man.’ Bolingbroke writes thus to Swift: “Bid Pope talk to you
-of the work he is about, I hope in good earnest; it is a fine one, and
-will be, in his hands, an original.” Pope tells the dean, in his next
-letter, what this work was. “The work Lord Bolingbroke speaks of with
-such abundant partiality, is a system of ethics, in the Horatian way.”
-In another letter, written probably at the beginning of the following
-year, we trace the general aim which he at all events wished the public
-to attribute to this work. “I am just now writing, or rather planning, a
-book to bring mankind to look upon this life with comfort and pleasure,
-and put morality in good humour.” This subject was well suited to his
-genius. He found the performance more easy than he had expected, and
-employed his leisure by following up the design in his Ethic Epistles,
-which came out separately in the course of the two following years. The
-fourth, addressed to the Earl of Burlington, did no good to the author’s
-character, in consequence of the violent attack supposed to be made on
-the Duke of Chandos, a beneficent and esteemed nobleman, under the name
-of Timon. Pope loudly asserted that in drawing Timon’s character he had
-not the Duke in view: but his denials have not obtained credence; and he
-has thus incurred the charge of equivocation and falsehood, without
-exculpating himself from that of ingratitude and wanton insolence. The
-vexation caused by this business was somewhat softened by the rapid and
-lucrative sale of the epistle, which very soon went through the press a
-third time. In a letter to Lord Bolingbroke he says, “Certainly the
-writer deserved more candour, even in those who knew him not, than to
-promote a report, which, in regard to that noble person, was
-impertinent; in regard to me, villainous. I have taken an opportunity of
-the third edition, to declare his belief not only of my innocence, but
-of their malignity; of the former of which my heart is as conscious as I
-fear some of theirs must be of the latter. His humanity feels a concern
-for the injury done to me, while his greatness of mind can bear with
-indifference the insult offered to himself.” He concludes with a threat
-of using real instead of fictitious names in his future works. How far
-he carried that menace into effect will presently be seen. The
-complaints made against the epistle in question by secret enemies
-provoked him to write satire, in which he ventured to attack the
-characters of some persons in high life: the affront was of course
-resented, and he retaliated by renewing his invective against them, both
-in prose and verse. In the imitation of the first satire of the second
-book of Horace, he had described Lord Hervey and Lady Mary Wortley
-Montague so characteristically, under the names of Lord Fanny and
-Sappho, that those noble personages, besides fighting the aggressor with
-his own weapons, used their interests to his injury, not only among the
-nobility, but with the King and Queen. Pope remonstrated most strongly
-against this last mode of revenge. He continued writing satires till the
-year 1739, when he entertained some thoughts of undertaking an epic poem
-on the pretended colonization of our island by the Trojan Brute. A
-sketch of this project, which he never carried into effect, is given in
-Ruffhead’s ‘Life of Pope,’ p. 410.
-
-Pope was an elaborate letter-writer; and many of his familiar epistles
-found their way into the world without his privity. Under the plea of
-self-defence he published a correct and genuine collection of them in
-1737. About this time the weak state of his health drew him frequently
-to Bath. Mr. Allen, a resident in the neighbourhood, having been pleased
-with the letters, took occasion to form an acquaintance with the author,
-which soon ripened into friendship. Hence arose Pope’s intimacy with
-Warburton, who tells us that, before they knew each other, he had
-written his ‘Commentary on the Art of Criticism, and on the Essay on
-Man.’ One complaint against that essay had rested on its obscurity, of
-which the author had previously been warned by Swift. But this was
-comparatively a slight objection: the philosophic poet was charged with
-having insidiously laid down a scheme of deism. A French translation, by
-the Abbé Resnil, appeared at Paris in 1738, on which a German professor,
-by name Crousaz, animadverted, as a system of ethics embodying the
-doctrine of fatalism. Pope thus acknowledges his obligation to Warburton
-for his defence: “You have made my system as clear as I ought to have
-done, and could not; you understand me as well as I do myself, but you
-express me better than I express myself.” The ‘Essay on Man’ was
-republished with the Commentary annexed in 1740; and at the instance of
-Warburton, a fourth book was added to the ‘Dunciad,’ and printed
-separately in 1742.
-
-In the course of the following year the whole poem of the ‘Dunciad’ was
-published together, as a specimen of a more correct edition of Pope’s
-works, which the author had then resolved to give to the world; but he
-did not live to complete it. He had through life been subject to an
-habitual headache inherited from his mother, and this was now greatly
-increased, with the addition of dropsical symptoms. He died on the 30th
-of May, 1744, in the fifty-sixth year of his age. Pursuant to his own
-request, his body was laid in the same vault with those of his parents,
-to whose memory he had erected a monument, with an inscription written
-by himself, immediately on their respective deaths. To this, in
-conformity with his will, the simple words, “Et sibi,” with the date of
-his death, were added. He bequeathed to Warburton the property of such
-of his works already printed as he had written, or should write,
-commentaries upon, provided they had not been otherwise disposed of or
-alienated; with this condition, that they were to be published without
-future alterations. After he had made his will, he wrote a letter to
-this legatee, announcing his legacy, and saying, “I own the late
-encroachments upon my constitution make me willing to see the end of all
-further care about me, or my works. I would rest for the one in a full
-resignation of my being to be disposed of by the Father of all mercy;
-and for the other (though indeed a trifle, yet a trifle may be some
-example), I would commit them to the candour of a sensible and
-reflecting judge, rather than to the malice of every shortsighted and
-malevolent critic, or inadvertent and censorious reader. And no hand can
-set them in so good a light, or so well can turn their best side to the
-day, as your own.” In discharge of his trust, Warburton put forth a
-complete edition of all Pope’s works in 1751; and, according to his own
-persuasion, executed it conformably to the presumed wishes of the
-author. In point of elegance, allowing for the state of typography at
-the time, no objection could be made, nor could the poet’s orders have
-been more faithfully obeyed, in forming the various pieces into a
-collection. But some of Warburton’s remarks are in a less friendly tone
-than might have been expected; and if not absolutely injurious to his
-memory, are such as leave Pope’s moral character in a measure open to
-attack. Many circumstances are related in the large biographies of Pope,
-which our inclination would as little allow us as our limits to detail.
-Some of them would not compensate in desirable information for the
-tediousness of the narrative: others relate to defunct controversies. To
-the latter of these classes may be referred Pope’s quarrel with Colley
-Cibber, which loaded the press with vulgar indecency on both sides;
-also, Bolingbroke’s charge of treachery brought against Pope in an
-advertisement prefixed to a tract published by his lordship in 1749,
-five years after the accused could no longer answer his accuser.
-
-We shall not devote any part of our confined space to an examination of
-the faults and weaknesses of this eminent man: they have been fully
-dwelt on in works of easy access. Some apology for many of them may be
-found in his bodily infirmities, deformed frame, and extreme debility of
-constitution. Pope’s person, character, and writings are treated of at
-large by Dr. Warton, in his ‘Essay.’ Ruffhead’s ‘Life of Pope’ contains
-much curious and entertaining matter. Dr. Johnson’s examination of
-Pope’s works is among the most elaborate and best pieces of criticism in
-his ‘Lives of the Poets.’ We cannot better conclude than with his
-description of Pope’s appearance, and summing up of his poetical
-character. “The person of Pope is well known not to have been formed by
-the nicest model. He has, in his account of the ‘Little Club,’ compared
-himself to a spider, and by another is described as protuberant before
-and behind. He is said to have been beautiful in his infancy: but he was
-of a constitution originally feeble and weak; and, as bodies of a tender
-frame are easily distorted, his deformity was probably in part the
-effect of his application. His stature was so low, that, to bring him to
-a level with common tables, it was necessary to raise his seat. But his
-face was not displeasing, and his eyes animated and vivid....” “It is
-surely superfluous to answer the question that has once been asked,
-whether Pope was a poet, otherwise than by asking, in return, if Pope be
-not a poet, where is poetry to be found? To circumscribe poetry by a
-definition will only show the narrowness of the definer, though a
-definition which shall exclude Pope will not easily be made. Let us look
-round upon the present time, and back upon the past; let us inquire to
-whom the voice of mankind has decreed the wreath of poetry; let their
-productions be examined, and their claims stated, and the pretensions of
-Pope will be no more disputed. Had he given the world only his version,
-the name of poet must have been allowed him: if the writer of the Iliad
-were to class his successors, he would assign a very high place to his
-translator, without requiring any other evidence of genius.” With
-respect to the translation of the Iliad, it is fair to give Pope the
-benefit of Dr. Johnson’s praise. But we are justified by the consentient
-voice of almost all scholars, in condemning it as an unfaithful and
-meretricious version, composed in a spirit totally different from that
-of Homer, and bearing no resemblance to his manner.
-
-Our engraving is from a copy of the original picture by Hudson, made by
-T. Uwins, A.R.A.
-
-[Illustration: [Entrance to Pope’s Grotto.]]
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by W. Holl._
-
-  BOLIVAR.
-
-  _From an Engraving by Mr. H. Ponte._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                                BOLIVAR.
-
-
-The history of Bolivar is that of the revolutions in Columbia and Peru.
-Nothing remarkable is related of his early life; and with respect to his
-personal merits as a soldier and statesman, he has shared the common lot
-of eminent men, in being extravagantly praised and violently censured.
-He has been compared to Cæsar and Napoleon on the one hand; and he has
-been accused of frivolity, incompetency, and even cowardice, on the
-other. The time for forming a dispassionate opinion of his character is
-not yet arrived. We shall, therefore, confine ourselves to a short
-sketch of the establishment of independence on the Spanish Main, so far
-as Bolivar was concerned in it; premising that we merely follow the
-course of history in giving him the credit of those measures which were
-carried into execution under his authority and ostensible guidance.
-
-Simon Bolivar was born in the city of Caracas, the capital of Venezuela,
-on the 24th or 25th of July, 1783. In early childhood he lost both his
-parents, who were of noble family, and possessed of large estates. At
-the age of fourteen or sixteen, he was sent to Spain for education. His
-habits are said to have been dissipated; but he paid some attention to
-the study of jurisprudence. After visiting Italy and France, he returned
-to Madrid, married, and in 1809 returned to reside on his estates near
-Caracas. It is positively asserted, and as positively denied, that
-Bolivar had an active share in the decisive movement at Caracas, April
-19, 1810, when the Spanish authorities were deposed. A congress was
-summoned, which met March 2, 1811. Bolivar received a colonel’s
-commission, and was sent to claim the protection of Great Britain. The
-date of his return to South America we do not find: but he is said to
-have been concerned in the first military operations of the patriots;
-and in September, 1811, he was appointed governor of the strong sea-port
-of Puerto Cabello. In March, 1812, a violent earthquake took place. The
-clergy succeeded in producing a considerable reaction in favour of
-royalist principles, by representing this calamity to be a manifestation
-of God’s wrath against revolution. Monteverde, the royal general, then
-advanced, and met with rapid success. The strong hold of Puerto Cabello,
-the chief depôt of the patriots, was wrested from Bolivar by an
-insurrection of the prisoners confined in it; the patriot army became
-dispirited; and General Miranda, under the sanction of congress,
-concluded a treaty, July 26, 1812, by which an amnesty was concluded,
-and the province of Venezuela returned under the dominion of Spain.
-Miranda was subsequently arrested on a futile charge of treachery to the
-patriot cause, and delivered to the Spaniards, who kept him in prison to
-the day of his death. In this unjustifiable transaction, Bolivar had a
-principal share.
-
-Bolivar retired for a short time to his estate; but he soon became
-uneasy at the frequency of arrests, and obtained a passport to quit the
-country. He retired to Curaçoa. In the following September, his active
-temper led him to seek employment in the patriot army of New Granada,
-which had declared itself independent in 1811, and still held out, with
-better fortune than Venezuela. He obtained a trifling command, not such
-as to satisfy his ambition; and on his own responsibility, he undertook
-an expedition against the Spaniards on the east bank of the river
-Magdalena, in which he succeeded; clearing the country of Spanish posts
-from Mompox, on the above named river, to the town of Ocaña, on the
-frontier of Caracas. This exploit attracted public notice. He conceived
-the bold plan of invading Venezuela with his small forces, and the
-congress of New Granada consented to his making the attempt, and raised
-him to the rank of brigadier. He crossed the frontier with little more
-than 500 men; but the country rose in arms to second him; and after
-several engagements, in which the patriots were successful, he defeated
-Monteverde in person at the battle of Lastoguanes, and, finally, entered
-Caracas, the capital of Venezuela, in triumph, August 4, 1813.
-
-At this time no regular government could be said to exist; but a
-convention of the chief civil and military functionaries, held at
-Caracas, January 2, 1814, conferred on Bolivar the title of Liberator of
-Venezuela, and invested him with the office of Dictator, and the supreme
-control over both branches of the executive. But these successes were
-followed by a rapid reverse; and before the end of the year, he was
-beaten out of Venezuela, and obliged to return to New Granada. That
-country was harassed by the contests of numerous and discordant parties.
-Bolivar was received with respect by the congress; and was entrusted
-with the task of compelling the dissentient province of Santa Fe de
-Bogotá, afterwards named Cundinamarca, to accede to the union of the
-other provinces. He marched against the city of Bogotá in December, at
-the head of 2000 men. It was not in a condition to resist, and
-capitulated, after the suburbs had been taken by storm. It will afford
-an instance of the difficulty of getting at the real character of
-Bolivar, to say, that we find it stated in one account that his
-behaviour at Bogotá received not only the thanks of Congress, but the
-approbation of the citizens; while another author asserts, that
-notwithstanding the capitulation, and in spite of the most urgent
-remonstrances, he permitted the pillage of part of the city for the
-space of forty-eight hours. He was then appointed to act against the
-strong town of Santa Martha, which commands the mouth of the river
-Magdalena. Unfortunately, private enmity between himself and Castillo,
-the governor of Carthagena, led to dissensions which ended in the
-investment of Carthagena, instead of Santa Martha, by Bolivar. During
-this civil strife, which led to consequences most injurious to the
-patriot cause, General Morillo arrived from Spain, now enabled by the
-peace of 1814 to act with more vigour against her revolted colonies; and
-Bolivar gave up his command, on the pretext that the harmony and
-advantage of the army required it, and embarked for Jamaica, May 10,
-1815. During his abode at Kingston, he narrowly escaped assassination at
-the hands of a Spaniard, who stabbed to the heart a person who chanced
-to occupy the bed in which Bolivar usually slept. From Jamaica, he went
-to Hayti, where, with the help of the president Petion, and in
-conjunction with a French officer, Commodore Brion, he drew together a
-force, with which he again raised the standard of independence in the
-province of Cumana, in May, 1816: but he was soon driven out of the
-country, and returned to Hayti, whence, in December, he again sailed to
-the island of Margarita, and he issued a proclamation convoking a
-congress of the representatives of Venezuela. He then repaired to
-Barcelona, and organised a provisional government. During the years 1817
-and 1818, the struggle was obstinate; but the patriot cause on the whole
-gained a decided advantage. In February 1819, Bolivar summoned a
-congress at Angostura, on the river Orinoco, and resigned his authority
-into its hands. The assembly, however, continued to him the executive
-power, with the title of Provisional President of Venezuela, until the
-expulsion of the enemy should afford a prospect of more settled times.
-
-Bolivar rejoined the army in March, and soon after conducted his forces
-to join the patriots in New Granada. Two battles, on the 1st and 23d of
-July, were fought to the advantage of the patriots, whose cause obtained
-a final triumph in the decisive victory won August 7, at Bojaca. Bolivar
-advanced at once to Bogotá, where he was enthusiastically welcomed; and
-within a short time, eleven provinces of New Granada announced their
-adhesion to the cause of independence. He summoned a congress, by which
-he was appointed President, and Captain-general of the Republic.
-Meanwhile a party, jealous of his intentions, had obtained the
-ascendancy in the Venezuela Congress held at Angostura; and Bolivar,
-fearful of being supplanted, quitted the scene of war with his best
-troops and marched to Angostura. His presence, with such a force, turned
-the scale in favour of the party attached to his interest. It was
-determined to summon a general convention from the independent provinces
-of Venezuela and Granada; and December 17, 1819, the celebrated decree
-was passed by which the two states were united, and entitled the
-Republic of Columbia. Bolivar was appointed President.
-
-Strengthened by union, the patriots took the field in greater force than
-they had hitherto been able to raise. The course of war during 1820 was
-on the whole favourable to them. In November, an armistice for six
-months was concluded. Soon after the renewal of hostilities, an
-important victory was gained by the Columbian troops under Bolivar, at
-Carabobo, not far from the city of Valencia, June 21, 1821, which may be
-regarded as having closed the war in Venezuela. Before the end of the
-year, Columbia was nearly cleared of Spanish troops, with the exception
-of the province of Quito; and time was found to attend to the
-establishment of civil order. The constitution of the short-lived
-Columbian Republic was adopted, August 20, 1821, and Bolivar was
-appointed First Constitutional President.
-
-The war was then directed against the Spaniards in the south. In
-January, 1822, Bolivar himself conducted operations in the province of
-Pasto, lying to the north of Quito, while General Sucre, who had been
-sent previously to assist the cause of independence in Guayaquil, after
-liberating the southern provinces of Loxa and Cuenca, advanced
-northwards, and secured independence to the province of Quito by the
-decisive victory of Pichincha, May 24, 1822. But though this portion of
-Columbia was now cleared of enemies, there could be no security to the
-frontier provinces while the Spaniards held Peru; and it was therefore
-determined to send assistance to the patriots in that country. Bolivar
-landed at Lima, September 1, 1823, and was invested with supreme power
-as Dictator of Peru. It was not until the end of 1825, however, that the
-war of independence was finished; and the honour of this, in a military
-point of view, belongs rather to Sucre than to Bolivar.
-
-On the establishment of a separate republic in 1825, in the province
-called by the Spaniards Upper Peru, the new state paid a high compliment
-to the Liberator, by assuming the name of Bolivia, and requesting him to
-draw up a constitution for its adoption. In compliance with the wish
-thus expressed, he presented to the constituent congress in May, 1826,
-the celebrated Bolivian Code; for an account of which we must refer to
-the ‘Encyclopædia Americana,’ or the appendix to the ‘Memoirs of General
-Miller.’ This forms a remarkable era in Bolivar’s life; for, out of the
-institutions of this code, arose the first suspicions that the Liberator
-was at heart indisposed to republican institutions. It was however
-adopted; and Sucre was appointed President. Meanwhile, though the
-deliverance of Peru was completed, Bolivar showed no intention of
-leading home the Columbian troops. A congress summoned at Lima, in
-February, 1825, continued to him, for another year, the dictatorial
-power which he had received on his first entrance into the country. A
-second congress, held in 1826, adopted the same course, adding a
-recommendation that he should consult the provinces as to the form of
-government which it might be desirable to establish. The result was,
-that the Bolivian Code was declared to be adopted by Peru, and Bolivar
-himself was nominated President.
-
-During the Liberator’s long absence in the south, the northern provinces
-of Columbia became involved in civil confusion. The Vice-president,
-General Santander, was a man of firmness and ability; but the
-newly-formed government wanted consistency, and that habitual respect
-which is paid to long recognised authority. In April, 1826, General
-Paez, who commanded in Venezuela, being summoned before the senate of
-Columbia to answer certain charges, refused obedience, trusting to the
-devoted attachment of the troops under his command: and to this private
-act of rebellion, something of a national character was given, by the
-accession of many in Venezuela, who disapproved of the union with New
-Granada, or distrusted the intentions of those who held the reins of
-power. At the same time, the southern departments, which had formerly
-composed the presidency of Quito, displayed a strong inclination to
-adopt the Bolivian Code. Bolivar has not escaped the suspicion of having
-fomented these troubles, with a view to convince all parties that
-tranquillity could only be secured by strengthening the executive, by
-appointing him Dictator of the Columbian Republic. Being recalled for
-the suppression of these disturbances, he quitted Lima in September,
-1826, and hastened to Caracas, where, instead of punishing, he met Paez
-upon friendly terms, confirmed him in the office which he held, and
-published a general amnesty on the submission of the insurgents. The
-term for which he was elected President had now expired. He had been
-re-elected, and should have gone through the forms of taking office at
-the beginning of 1827; but in February, he announced his intention to
-resign, and retire to his estates, in consequence of the imputations of
-ambition cast upon him. The spring was spent by Congress in discussing
-this matter; and at last, June 6, it was finally determined not to
-accept his resignation, and a general convention was summoned to meet at
-Ocaña, March 2, 1828, to revise the constitution. In September, Bolivar
-again assumed the office of President.
-
-Meanwhile a speedy revolution had taken place in Peru. It is no great
-argument of Bolivar’s purity of purpose, that, a year after the war was
-finished, the Columbian auxiliaries were still retained by him in
-Bolivia and Peru, one division being quartered in the former country,
-and two in the latter. Many of them were strongly attached to their
-general, and perhaps had no objection to becoming instruments of his
-ambition, so far as Peru was concerned. But when he incurred the
-suspicion of meditating the overthrow of the Columbian constitution,
-they took fire. The division quartered at Lima matured a plan of revolt,
-arrested their generals, who were personally attached to Bolivar, and
-announced to the authorities of Lima their desire to relieve the
-Peruvians from a constitution which had been forced upon them, and to
-return home to defend their own country. Hereupon, in concurrence with
-the generally declared wish of the people throughout Peru, the Bolivian
-Code was thrown aside only a few weeks after it had been adopted; and in
-June, 1827, a new congress was summoned, and a new President and
-Vice-president of the republic were elected. The troops embarked; but on
-their landing in Columbia, part placed themselves under the orders of
-officers sent to take the command of them, and the rest were easily
-reduced to obedience.
-
-The convention met at the appointed time. Bolivar opened the proceedings
-with an address, in which he ascribed the internal troubles of Columbia
-to the want of sufficient power in the executive department, and plainly
-intimated his opinion that the constitution had been founded on views
-too liberal to be adapted to the state of society existing in that
-country. His speech was very much in accordance with the views developed
-in the Bolivian Code, and furnished good reason for believing that he
-was no less willing to accept supreme power than his friends were
-disposed to invest him with it, as the only remedy for existing evils.
-The majority of the convention, however, were suspicious of the
-President’s intentions. Finding themselves in a minority, his friends
-vacated their seats in the assembly, which being thus reduced below the
-number necessary to give validity to its proceedings, became virtually
-extinct.
-
-In this state of things, a meeting was convened at Bogotá, June 13, of
-the principal civil and military residents, at which resolutions were
-passed investing Bolivar with the most extensive powers as Supreme Chief
-of Columbia. He himself was not present, but in the near neighbourhood;
-and on receiving intimation of these resolutions, he made a solemn entry
-into Bogotá, June 20, and assumed the powers thus gratuitously bestowed
-upon him, not, it is to be observed, by the act of the convention, or of
-any body authorised to interfere in any way with the existing
-constitution. Great dissatisfaction was felt by those who were not
-attached to the party of Bolivar; and in the following September, a
-conspiracy was organised in the garrison of Bogotá, to which the
-President’s life had nearly fallen a sacrifice. It was quelled however.
-General Santander, the Vice-president, was accused of being concerned in
-it, and was banished from Columbia. Partial insurrections subsequently
-broke out in various places. Towards the close of 1829, the discontent
-which had formerly appeared in Venezuela, manifested itself more
-decidedly. Paez put himself at the head of the dissatisfied party; and
-in a very short time, the whole province raised the standard of
-independence, and expressed its determination to be merged no longer in
-the Columbian Republic. In the midst of these tumults, Bolivar resolved
-at length to retire from the eminent station in which he had been the
-cause of so much offence. He had issued a proclamation, December 24,
-1828, summoning a convention in January, 1830, to frame a new permanent
-constitution for Columbia. It met at the appointed time. Bolivar, in
-opening the deliberations, expressed his determination not to accept
-again the chief magistracy of the state; but, as he had said the same
-thing in equally strong terms before, nobody paid much attention to the
-declaration. This time, however, he adhered to it. Besides the labour of
-making a new constitution, the convention had to discuss the difficult
-question of the secession of Venezuela: nor was this all, for as that
-district had separated itself from the Columbian Republic, in a great
-degree Owing to its distrust of Bolivar, so the southern provinces
-refused to acknowledge the new constitution unless he were placed at its
-head. The convention wisely resolved, with respect to Venezuela, that
-every peaceful method should be tried to prevent its secession, but that
-it would not be expedient or proper to attempt to maintain the union by
-force. To anticipate a little the order of time, the Venezuelans were
-resolved to have an independent government; and finally, in 1832, the
-short-lived republic of Columbia was divided into three, bearing
-respectively the titles of Venezuela, New Granada, and the Republic of
-the Equator, which was formed out of the southern provinces of Quito,
-Guayaquil, and Assuai.
-
-After the adoption of the new constitution of 1830, Bolivar retired to
-the province of Carthagena, exhausted both in body and mind. He died at
-Santa Martha, December 17, 1830, leaving a character on the merits of
-which it is difficult to pronounce a decided opinion. His name will not
-soon be forgotten, for it is indissolubly connected with the cause of
-independence in South America: but, in reviewing the progress and
-prospects of North and South America, it is impossible not to remark
-Bolivar’s inferiority to Washington, both in talent and virtue, and not
-to reflect with regret how different, in all probability, the conduct
-and the prosperity of the South American republics would have been if
-they had possessed such a leader as the first President of the United
-States.
-
-The chief books which have been consulted for this sketch have been the
-‘Annual Register,’ General Ducoudray Holstein’s ‘Memoirs of Bolivar,’ a
-work evidently written under strong feelings of personal hostility, the
-article Bolivar in the ‘Encyclopædia Americana,’ and a short account of
-the Liberator in the ‘Memoirs of General Miller.’ In these works there
-is so much discrepancy, not only of opinions, but of facts and dates,
-that we do not venture to hope that we have escaped errors. A clear and
-impartial history of the war of independence is still a desideratum.
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by J. Posselwhite._
-
-  ARKWRIGHT.
-
-  _From a Picture by Wright of Derby._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-                               ARKWRIGHT.
-
-
-In the history of trade there is nothing so remarkable as the rapid and
-immense increase of the British cotton manufacture during the last
-thirty years of the eighteenth century. Two nearly contemporaneous
-discoveries concurred to produce that increase: the invention of
-machinery for spinning; and the improvement, we might almost say
-completion, of the steam-engine by James Watt. To his eminent merits we
-have borne our testimony in the first volume of this work; and scarcely
-less important, though less imposing, have been the services of the
-ingenious men who contrived to spin thread without the use of the human
-hand. We do not hesitate to take Arkwright as the representative of
-those who wrought this great revolution in our manufacturing system, for
-though recent evidence has refuted his claim to the invention, properly
-speaking, of spinning by machinery, he was the first person who rendered
-that invention profitable.
-
-By the year 1760, the manufacture of cotton goods, which had been
-increasing slowly from the beginning of the century, had attained
-considerable importance. In 1764, the declared value of British cotton
-goods exported was upwards of 200,000_l._, having increased tenfold
-within forty or fifty years. At this period the demand for them exceeded
-the supply, in consequence of the difficulty of obtaining a sufficient
-quantity of yarn for weaving. The one-thread spinning-wheel, now nearly
-banished from our cottages, was then the sole source from which
-spun-yarn could be obtained; and the trades of spinning and weaving were
-commonly united in a humble manner—the man wove, while his wife and
-daughters spun. If this domestic supply was insufficient, the weaver had
-often to waste time and labour in collecting materials for his daily
-work. Mr. Guest states, that “it was no uncommon thing for a weaver to
-walk three or four miles in a morning, and call on five or six spinners,
-before he could collect weft to serve him for the remainder of the day;
-and when he wished to weave a piece in a shorter time than usual, a new
-ribbon or a gown was necessary to quicken the exertions of the spinner.”
-This check existing on the industry of the weaver, it is no wonder that
-mechanical ingenuity was tasked to invent a quicker way of spinning. The
-principle of the first plan by which this was effected may be easily
-explained. Suppose a ribbon placed between two horizontal cylinders
-which are in contact with each other; if the cylinders are made to
-revolve, it is evident that they will draw the ribbon onwards in the
-direction of their motion. Again, if the foremost end of it be presented
-to a second pair of similar revolving cylinders, it will be drawn
-through these also. If both pairs revolve with exactly the same
-velocity, it will pass through them unaltered; but if the second pair
-revolve with greater velocity than the first, there will be a certain
-strain on the intermediate ribbon, which, if extensible, will be
-stretched in the same degree that the velocity of the second pair of
-rollers exceeds that of the first. Now cotton, after being cleaned and
-carded, comes from the card in fleecy rolls, the fibres of which are
-laid parallel, and so made fit to spin. To reduce these to thread or
-yarn takes more than one operation: the first brings the _cardings_ into
-thick, loosely twisted threads, called _rovings_; the subsequent ones
-reduce the rovings into yarn fit for the loom. It is evident that both
-the cardings and rovings are fitted by their texture for the process of
-extension by rollers described above; and that they would be drawn out
-twofold, fourfold, or in any greater or less degree, proportionate to
-the difference of velocity between the first and second pair of rollers.
-From the second pair the thread is delivered to a spindle, which gives
-the due degree of twist; and it is finally wound on a bobbin: the whole
-being set in motion by the same mechanical power. It is evident that
-many spindles might be attached to, and many threads spun by, the same
-combination of rollers. Arkwright claimed the merit of this invention.
-It is proved, however, by the undeniable evidence of an existing patent,
-printed by Mr. Baines in his History of the Cotton Manufacture, that
-this principle of spinning by rollers was patented so early as the year
-1738, by a foreigner named Lewis Paul; the real inventor was John Wyatt,
-of Birmingham. In their hands however, though the invention did not
-absolutely fail, it did not so succeed as to be brought into general
-use, or even to become profitable to the inventors. Simple and obvious
-as the _principle_ appears when once laid down, great difficulties were
-to be overcome in forming this stretched cotton into a useful thread; as
-may be conceived from reflecting on the great rapidity with which, to
-make spinning profitable, parts of the machine must move, the perfect
-regularity of motion requisite, and the slightness of the strain which a
-few untwisted filaments of cotton will bear. For the apparently trivial
-object of producing a uniform line of fine yarn, the utmost efforts of
-mechanical ingenuity have been called forth, and some of the most
-beautiful, delicate, and powerful machinery in existence has been
-constructed. It was in overcoming these difficulties that the talent or
-perseverance of Paul and Wyatt failed; the merit of conquering them, and
-giving birth to a new system of manufacture, belongs to Arkwright. We
-quote the following notice of his early life from Mr. Baines:—
-
-“Richard Arkwright rose by the force of his natural talents from a very
-humble condition in society. He was born at Preston, December 23, 1732,
-of poor parents. Being the youngest of thirteen children, his parents
-could only afford to give him an education of the humblest kind, and he
-was scarcely able to write. He was brought up to the trade of a barber,
-at Kirkham and Preston, and established himself in that business at
-Bolton, in 1760. Having become possessed of a chemical process for
-dyeing human hair, which in that day, when wigs were universal, was of
-considerable value, he travelled about collecting hair, and again
-disposing of it when dyed. In 1761, he married a wife from Leigh, and
-the connexions he thus formed in that town are supposed to have
-afterwards brought him acquainted with Highs’s experiments in making
-spinning machines. He himself manifested a strong bent for experiments
-in mechanics, which he is stated to have followed with so much
-devotedness as to have neglected his business and injured his
-circumstances. His natural disposition was ardent, enterprising, and
-stubbornly persevering; his mind was as coarse as it was bold and
-active, and his manners were rough and unpleasing.”
-
-In the course of his travels in 1767, he fell in with a clockmaker,
-named Kay, at Warrington, whom he employed as a workman in prosecuting
-some of his mechanical experiments. Kay, according to his own account,
-gave Arkwright some description of a machine contrived by one Highs, for
-spinning by rollers. It is certain that from thenceforward Arkwright
-abandoned his former pursuits, and applied himself, in conjunction with
-Kay, to the construction of a spinning machine. One Smalley, a
-liquor-merchant of Preston, assisted him with money; and the two,
-fearing lest they might be endangered by a riotous spirit which had been
-directed against machinery in Lancashire, went to settle at Nottingham.
-There Arkwright obtained an introduction to Messrs. Need and Strutt, two
-gentlemen largely engaged in the stocking manufactory, who appreciated
-his talents, and entered into partnership with him. What became of Mr.
-Smalley we do not hear. Arkwright took out a patent for his invention,
-which was enrolled, July 15, 1769. The partners erected a mill near
-Nottingham, which was turned by horse-power: but this was soon
-superseded by a much larger establishment at Cromford in Derbyshire, on
-the river Derwent, in which water-power was applied for the first time
-to the purpose of spinning; and from that circumstance Arkwright’s
-machine was called the _water-frame_.
-
-As the difficulty of meeting the weavers’ demand for yarn had led to the
-invention of machines for spinning, so the rapid manufacture of yarn
-rendered it indispensable to facilitate the prior operations in
-preparing the raw material. Men’s minds had been turned to this object
-for some time. The operation of carding, whether wool or cotton, was at
-first done with hand-cards of small size. The first improvement was the
-invention of stock-cards, one of which was fixed, and the other held in
-the hand, or afterwards suspended from above, so that the workman could
-manage a much larger card, and prepare more cotton in a given time. The
-next and main improvement was placing cards lengthways upon a cylinder,
-which worked within a concave half cylinder of the same diameter. This
-process was patented by Paul in 1748. But he derived no profit from
-this, any more than from his former patent; and it was not until after
-the improvements in spinning that the method of carding by cylinders was
-brought into use. Arkwright was not the first to revive it, but he had a
-great share in perfecting the carding machinery when it had been
-revived. The raw cotton being carded, an extension, or rather a new
-application, of the principle of spinning by rollers converted the
-cardings into rovings, which again were made into yarn fit for the loom
-by the water-frame, or, as it is now called in an improved form, the
-_throstle_. Arkwright took out his second patent, December 16, 1775;
-this included the carding machine, drawing-frame, and roving-frame, a
-series of engines by which the cotton, from its raw state, was rendered
-fit for the last process of spinning. We shall not attempt to explain
-the construction of these elaborate machines, which can hardly be
-rendered intelligible even by the help of numerous plates.
-
-The process of turning cotton-wool into thread by machinery was thus
-completed. Before we follow its effects upon Arkwright’s fortunes, it is
-proper to say a few words concerning other improvements. About, or
-somewhat earlier than, the time when Arkwright’s attention was first
-turned to spinning, a weaver named James Hargreaves, of Stand Hill, near
-Blackburn, invented a machine by which, according to the terms of the
-patent, sixteen or more threads might be spun by one person at the same
-time. This is the machine so well known under the name of the
-_spinning-jenny_. Hargreaves’ patent was invaded, and invalidated on
-technical grounds; so that his machine came rapidly into general use,
-and for spinning the _weft_ was preferred to Arkwright’s water-frame,
-from which it was entirely different in principle. Samuel Crompton, an
-ingenious weaver resident near Bolton, between the years 1774 and 1779,
-tried to unite the principles of both, and produced a machine which, on
-that account, he called a _mule_. This, under different improved forms,
-is the machine now generally used in spinning; but the water-frame, or
-throstle, is still found to answer best for some kinds of work[11]. But
-to return to the fortunes of Arkwright: the series of machines which he
-invented or improved gave an amazing impulse to the cotton trade.
-“Weavers could now obtain an unlimited quantity of yarn at a reasonable
-price; manufacturers could use warps of cotton, which were much cheaper
-than the linen warps formerly used. Cotton fabrics could be sold lower
-than had ever before been known. The demand for them consequently
-increased. The shuttle flew with fresh energy, and the weavers earned
-immoderately high wages. Spinning-mills were erected to supply the
-requisite quantity of yarn. The fame of Arkwright resounded through the
-land, and capitalists flocked to him to buy his patent machines, or
-permission to use them.” * * *
-
-Footnote 11:
-
-  A third person has been mentioned as the inventor both of the jenny
-  and of roller-spinning, Thomas Highs, of Leigh, above-mentioned, whose
-  claims seem entitled to more courteous notice than they have met with
-  in the Edinburgh Review. There is nothing unreasonable in supposing
-  that both Highs and Arkwright may have heard of Wyatt’s method of
-  spinning by rollers, which was practised in two factories, one erected
-  at Birmingham, the other at Nottingham.
-
-“The factory system in England takes its rise from this period. Hitherto
-the cotton manufacture had been carried on almost entirely in the houses
-of the workmen: the hand or stock-cards, the spinning-wheel, and the
-loom, required no larger apartment than that of a cottage. A
-spinning-jenny of small size might also be used in a cottage, and in
-many instances was so used; when the number of spindles was considerably
-increased, adjacent workshops were used. But the water-frame, the
-carding-engine, and the other machines which Arkwright brought out in a
-finished state, required both more space than could be found in a
-cottage, and more power than could be applied by the human arm. Their
-weight also made it necessary to place them in strongly-built mills, and
-they could not be advantageously turned by any power then known but that
-of water.”
-
-“The use of machinery was accompanied by a greater division of labour
-than existed in the primitive state of the manufacture; the material
-went through many more processes, and of course the loss of time and the
-risk of waste would have been much increased, if its removal from house
-to house at every stage of the manufacture had been necessary. It became
-obvious that there were several important advantages in carrying on the
-numerous operations of an extensive manufacture in the same building.
-Where water-power was required, it was economy to build one mill, and
-put up one water-wheel, rather than several. This arrangement also
-enabled the master-spinner himself to superintend every stage of the
-manufacture; it gave him a greater security against the wasteful or
-fraudulent consumption of the material; it saved time in the
-transference of the work from hand to hand; and it prevented the extreme
-inconvenience which would have resulted from the failure of one class of
-workmen to perform their part, when several other classes of workmen
-were dependent upon them. Another circumstance which made it
-advantageous to have a large number of machines in one manufactory was,
-that mechanics must be employed on the spot to construct and repair the
-machinery, and that their time could not be fully occupied with only a
-few machines.”
-
-“All these considerations drove the cotton-spinners to that important
-change in the economy of English manufactures, the introduction of the
-factory system; and when that system had once been adopted, such were
-its pecuniary advantages that mercantile competition would have rendered
-it impossible, even had it been desirable, to abandon it.” (Baines,
-‘History of Cotton Manufacture,’ pages 183, 185.)
-
-It was not to be expected that Arkwright would enjoy undisturbed so
-valuable a monopoly as that which he had created, and many persons
-infringed his patents, in the belief that he was not the real owner of
-the inventions which he claimed. An attempt was made in 1772 to set
-aside his first patent for the water-frame; but this failed, and he
-retained the enjoyment of that patent unquestioned till the expiration
-of the fourteen years. To preserve his second patent, for the carding,
-drawing, and roving machines, he brought several actions against
-master-spinners, one of which, against Colonel Mordaunt, was tried in
-1781, and a verdict was obtained for the defendant, setting aside the
-patent. Arkwright for some time did not contest this decision. But in
-1785, he made another attempt to establish his second patent before a
-court of law; and in the first instance obtained a verdict in his own
-favour, but on the cause being reheard, the patent was finally declared
-invalid.
-
-Notwithstanding this defeat, Arkwright rapidly acquired a very large
-fortune, through the magnitude of his concerns, and his industry,
-penetration, and skill in business. On the dissolution of his
-partnership with the Messrs. Strutt about 1783, the extensive works at
-Cromford fell to his share. In 1786, he was High Sheriff of Derbyshire,
-and was knighted, on occasion of presenting an address to the King. We
-find no other record worth notice of the last years of his life. He
-died, August 3, 1792, in his sixtieth year.
-
-Arkwright’s originality and honesty as an inventor have been violently
-impugned by Mr. Guest, in his History of the Cotton Manufacture. The
-arguments on the other side may be seen in the Edinburgh Review, No. 91,
-to which Guest published a reply. Mr. Baines’s History of the Cotton
-Manufacture, which we have chiefly followed and largely quoted from in
-this account, contains the latest and fullest account which we have seen
-of Arkwright’s character and history. There appears to have been some
-alloy of selfishness and disingenuousness in his disposition, some
-ground for the statement of counsel in the trial of 1785: “It is a
-notorious story in the manufacturing counties; all men that have seen
-Mr. Arkwright in a state of opulence have shaken their heads, and
-thought of these poor men, Highs and Kay, and have thought, too, that
-they were entitled to some participation of the profits.” Still it
-becomes us to speak with gentleness of the faults of a person to whose
-talents, nationally speaking, we owe so much: and there is much to be
-said in extenuation of them, in consideration of the lowness of his
-original calling, of the self-complacency and sensitive jealousy common
-to almost all schemers, and the fascination of wealth when it flows
-largely and unexpectedly upon a man bred in extreme poverty. As an
-inventor Arkwright’s merit is undeniable. Mr. Baines, who seems to have
-judged calmly and impartially, assigns to him the high praise, that “in
-improving and perfecting mechanical inventions, in exactly adapting them
-to the purposes for which they were intended, in arranging a
-comprehensive system of manufacturing, and in conducting vast and
-complicated concerns, he displayed a bold and fertile mind, and
-consummate judgment, which, when his want of education, and the
-influence of an employment so extremely unfavourable to mental expansion
-as that of his previous life, are considered, must have excited the
-astonishment of mankind. But the marvellous and ‘unbounded invention,’
-which he claimed for himself and which has been too readily accorded to
-him—the _creative faculty_ which devised all that admirable mechanism,
-so entirely new in its principles, and characteristic of the first order
-of mechanical genius—which has given a new spring to the industry of the
-world, and within half a century has reared up the most extensive
-manufacture ever known—this did not belong to Arkwright.” * * * * * * *
-
-“The most marked traits in the character of Arkwright were his wonderful
-ardour, energy, and perseverance. He commonly laboured in his
-multifarious concerns from five o’clock in the morning till nine at
-night; and when considerably more than fifty years of age, feeling that
-the defects of his education placed him under great difficulty and
-inconvenience in conducting his correspondence, and in the general
-management of his business, he encroached upon his sleep, in order to
-gain an hour each day to learn English grammar, and another hour to
-improve his writing and orthography! He was impatient of whatever
-interfered with his favourite pursuits; and the fact is too strikingly
-characteristic not to be mentioned, that he separated from his wife not
-many years after his marriage, because she, convinced that he would
-starve his family by scheming when he should have been shaving, broke
-some of his experimental models of machinery. Arkwright was a severe
-economist of time; and, that he might not waste a moment, he generally
-travelled with four horses, and at a very rapid speed. His concerns in
-Derbyshire, Lancashire, and Scotland, were so extensive and numerous as
-to show at once his astonishing power of transacting business, and his
-all-grasping spirit. In many of these he had partners, but he generally
-managed in such a way that, whoever lost, he himself was a gainer. So
-unbounded was his confidence in the success of his machinery, and in the
-national wealth to be produced by it, that he would make light of
-discussions on taxation, and say that he would pay the national debt!
-His speculative schemes were vast and daring; he contemplated entering
-into the most extensive mercantile transactions, and buying up all the
-cotton in the world, in order to make an enormous profit by the
-monopoly; and from the extravagance of some of these designs, his
-judicious friends were of opinion that, if he had tried to put them in
-practice, he might have overset the whole fabric of his prosperity.”
-
-[Illustration:
-
-  _Engraved by W. Holl._
-
-  COWPER.
-
-  _From a Picture in the Possession of the Publisher._
-
-  Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
-    Knowledge.
-
-  _London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street._
-]
-
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-[Illustration]
-
-                                COWPER.
-
-
-William Cowper was born at the rectory of Berkhampstead, in
-Hertfordshire, Nov. 26, 1731. He was nearly related to the noble family
-of that name, his great-uncle having been chancellor and first Earl
-Cowper: his grandfather, the brother of the chancellor, was a judge of
-the common pleas. Cowper’s mother died before he was six years old. Soon
-afterwards he was sent to a country school, from which, at the age of
-nine, he was removed to Westminster. It is probable that one cause among
-others of his future unhappiness was the early loss of that tender
-parent, whose “constant flow of love,” beautifully acknowledged in his
-verses on receiving her picture, and in many parts of his
-correspondence, made a deep and lasting impression on his infant mind.
-Cowper was exactly the boy to require a mother’s care. His constitution
-was delicate, his mind sensitive and timid; and he discovered a tendency
-to dejection, which was aggravated by the tyranny then practised at our
-public schools. Quitting Westminster at eighteen, with a good character
-for talent and scholarship, he went at once into an attorney’s office;
-where he spent three years, according to his own account, with very
-little profit. He then became a member of the Inner Temple, intending to
-practise at the bar. At this period of life he amused himself with
-composition, and showed a strong predilection for polite literature and
-agreeable society; but he had no taste for the law, and took no pains to
-qualify himself for his profession. Long afterwards he deeply lamented
-the loss of time during his early manhood, and earnestly warned his
-young friends against a similar error.
-
-In 1763 Cowper was appointed to the lucrative office of reading clerk,
-and clerk of the private committees of the House of Lords. The fairest
-prospect of happiness now lay before him, for his union with one of his
-cousins, it is said, had only been deferred until he should obtain a
-satisfactory establishment. But the idea of reading in public was
-intolerable to him; and he gave up this office for the less valuable one
-of clerk of the journals, in which it was hoped that his personal
-appearance before the House would not be required. Unfortunately it did
-prove necessary that he should appear at the bar to qualify himself for
-the post. “They whose spirits are formed like mine,” he thus expressed
-himself in after-life, “to whom a public exhibition of themselves is
-mortal poison, may have some ideas of the horrors of my situation:
-others can have none.” He fought hard against this morbid feeling; but,
-when the day arrived for entering upon his duties, such was his terror
-and distress, that even his friends acquiesced in his abandoning the
-attempt. But his mind had been disordered in the struggle, and he
-shortly sank into deep religious despondency; so that it was found
-necessary, in December, 1763, to place him in a lunatic asylum at St.
-Albans, under the care of Dr. Cotton.
-
-Cowper’s insanity at this period, and the grievous dejection of the last
-twenty-seven years of his life, have been imputed to the so-called
-gloominess of his religious tenets. From that opinion we entirely
-dissent. No sense of religious abasement can be conceived able to drive
-a sane man to distraction at the thought of having to appear in a public
-capacity before Parliament; and Cowper’s struggles and mental distress
-on that occasion were anterior to his receiving any serious impressions
-of religion. Moreover, it appears certain that his recovery was due to
-more encouraging views of the doctrines of the Gospel, assisted by the
-kind and judicious mental, as well as bodily, treatment of Dr. Cotton.
-For eight years his religion was the source of unfailing cheerfulness
-and active benevolence; and after he ceased to derive pleasure from it
-in his own person, he was still mild and charitable in his conduct
-towards others, and his opinions concerning them. The extent of Cowper’s
-mental wandering on subjects unconnected with his own spiritual state is
-not perhaps generally known. A remarkable instance of it occurs in a
-letter to his esteemed friend, Mr. Newton, dated October 2, 1787, from
-which it appears that, during thirteen years, Cowper had entertained
-doubts of Mr. Newton’s personal identity. At this latter period,
-therefore, there was hallucination of mind, as well as religious gloom.
-Cowper’s recovery from his first illness is dated in July, 1764; but he
-remained with his friendly and beloved physician nearly a year more,
-after which he took lodgings at Huntingdon, directed by the wish of
-being within easy reach of his brother, who was a resident Fellow of
-Benet College, Cambridge.
-
-He soon became acquainted with a family, bearing the name of Unwin,
-consisting of a clergyman, his wife and daughter, and one son, an
-undergraduate of Cambridge. Struck by Cowper’s appearance, the latter
-threw himself into the stranger’s way; and a feeling of mutual regard
-and esteem led to Cowper’s establishing himself as a permanent inmate in
-Mr. Unwin’s family in November, 1765. After the lapse of nearly two
-years in tranquil happiness, the sudden death of Mr. Unwin led to the
-family’s departure from Huntingdon to Olney in Buckinghamshire, in
-October, 1767. But the foundation had been laid of a friendship which no
-misfortune or change of circumstance could destroy; and Cowper and Mrs.
-Unwin united their slender incomes, and continued to dwell under the
-same roof. The first six years of their abode at Olney were spent in
-domestic quiet and retirement almost unbroken, except by the society of
-Mr. Newton, an eminent and exemplary divine, who was then curate on the
-living. The well-known collection called the “Olney Hymns” were composed
-by Cowper and Newton, for the most part, during this period. But in 1773
-Cowper’s mental disease returned in the dreadful shape of religious
-despondency. He conceived himself to be set apart for eternal misery:
-yet amid the deep gloom produced by the loss of that spiritual happiness
-which he had enjoyed since his recovery from his first illness, he was
-so entirely submissive that he was accustomed to say, “If holding up my
-finger would save me from endless torments, I would not do it against
-the will of God;” and in accordance with the belief that his own fate
-was sealed, he ceased to pray, and absented himself entirely from divine
-worship. The depth of his dejection was gradually cheered by the
-affectionate, watchful, and judicious care of his guardian friend, Mrs.
-Unwin. One of the first signs of improvement was a desire to tame some
-leverets. He was soon supplied with three, which have obtained celebrity
-in prose and verse, such as no other hares have enjoyed before or since.
-He tried at different times gardening, drawing, and a variety of
-trifling manual occupations, as methods of diverting his thoughts from
-his own miseries. “Many arts I have exercised with this view,” he says
-in a letter to Mrs. King, “for which nature never designed me, though
-among them were some in which I arrived at considerable proficiency, by
-mere dint of the most heroic perseverance. There is not a squire in all
-this country who can boast of having made better squirrel houses,
-hutches for rabbits, or bird-cages, than myself; and in the article of
-cabbage-nets I had no superior. But gardening was, of all employments,
-that in which I succeeded best, though even in this I did not suddenly
-attain perfection.” (Oct. 11, 1788.) At last he devoted himself to
-writing, “a whim,” he says elsewhere, “that has served me longest and
-best, and will probably be my latest.” His first volume of poems,
-containing “Table Talk,” &c. was published in the summer of 1781, having
-been written chiefly in the preceding winter. It was undertaken at the
-instance of Mrs. Unwin, who, on his recovery from a long fit of unusual
-dejection, urged him to devote his attention to a work of some extent,
-and such as should require a considerable share of application and
-attention. At the same time she suggested as a subject the “Progress of
-Error,” which is the second piece in the volume. Cowper had already
-written many of his lighter pieces, and that at the times when he was
-labouring under the severest depression. He accounts for this singular
-phenomenon with his peculiar and playful humour. “The mind, long wearied
-with the sameness of a dull, dreary prospect, will gladly fix its eyes
-on anything that may make a little variety in its contemplations, though
-it were but a kitten playing with its tail.”
-
-Early in 1780, Cowper lost a valued friend, and almost his only
-associate, by the removal of Mr. Newton to London. In the following year
-he became acquainted with Lady Austen, who, for a short time, fills a
-prominent place in the poet’s history. We must refer to fuller memoirs
-for the tale of her introduction, and the gradual growth of that strict
-intimacy which ensued between herself, Mrs. Unwin, and Cowper. For some
-time the three friends spent a considerable portion of every day in each
-other’s society; and Cowper was indebted to Lady Austen’s liveliness in
-conversation and varied accomplishments for a great alleviation of his
-mental sufferings. The famous history of John Gilpin owes its birth to a
-story told by her one evening, to rouse the poet out of a fit of
-despondency; and it engaged his fancy so strongly, that in the course of
-the night, during which he was kept awake by fits of laughter, he turned
-it into verse. The ballad soon got abroad, and obtained unusual
-popularity: it was long before the author was known. “The Task” was
-composed at Lady Austen’s request. She saw the benefit which Cowper
-derived from earnest literary employment, and often urged him to try his
-strength in blank verse. After some pressing, he promised to comply, if
-she would furnish him with a subject. “Oh, you can write on anything,”
-she said; “write on this sofa.” The lively answer chimed in with his
-peculiar humour, and he adopted it literally: his sofa forms the subject
-of the poem; the first book of which is entitled “The Sofa,” and opens
-with a history of the invention and merits of that piece of furniture,
-which is unsurpassed in its peculiar vein of humour. But the author soon
-rises into a higher strain, and in his discursive range paints the
-beauty of the country with that fidelity and exquisite sense of natural
-beauty which constitutes his chief poetic merit; describes the peculiar
-appearances and occupations of the winter season; weighs the evils and
-advantages attendant on a high state of civilization; exhibits, in
-reproving the faults of the age, his power both in the lighter
-skirmishing of satire, and in the stern outpouring of an honest
-indignation; inculcates the doctrines of that religion of peace and love
-from which it was his own singular and melancholy lot to derive no
-peace; and all with a beauty and facility of versification, and power of
-illustration, sufficient to attract many whom the grave nature of the
-subjects to be discussed would rather deter. The scope and conduct of
-the work is well described in the following lines from the conclusion,
-in which, anticipating death, he says—
-
-          It shall not grieve me then, that once, when call’d
-          To dress a sofa with the flowers of verse,
-          I played awhile, obedient to the fair,
-          With that light task: but soon, to please her more,
-          Whom flowers alone I knew would little please,
-          Let fall the unfinish’d wreath, and roved for fruit;
-          Roved far and gather’d much: some harsh, ’tis true,
-          Pick’d from the thorns and briers of reproof,
-          But wholesome, well digested, grateful some
-          To palates that can taste immortal truth;
-          Insipid else, and sure to be despised.
-
-“The Task” was accompanied by a shorter poem, entitled “Tirocinium,”
-written expressly in dispraise of the existing system of public schools
-in England; and prompted by Cowper’s bitter recollection of his
-sufferings at Westminster. The volume was published in 1785.
-
-As soon as this was completed, Cowper engaged in another more laborious
-undertaking, the translation of Homer. This also was suggested by Lady
-Austen; and it had a most beneficial effect in furnishing the poet with
-constant employment from this time forward to the end of his life, with
-the exception of those periods in which the pressure of disease was too
-severe to admit of any exertion. He spared no pains in the execution of
-this great work; and after his version was made, subjected it to a most
-careful revision, amounting nearly to a re-translation. It was published
-in 1791, and was preceded by a list of subscribers, whose number and
-individual eminence bear testimony to the high esteem in which Cowper
-was then held. His translation, however, has never been popular: he has
-avoided Pope’s errors, but he has failed in giving life and interest,
-and in catching the vital spirit of his author.
-
-During the long period which the literary labours above-mentioned
-occupied, Cowper’s domestic history is characterized by the same general
-depression and the same seclusion as we have above described. In 1784
-his friendship with Lady Austen was interrupted by a disagreement
-between her and Mrs. Unwin, who seems to have feared that the former
-might obtain an influence over the poet paramount to her own; and to
-have been justly hurt at the prospect of becoming second in the
-affections of him, to whom, for so many years, she had devoted herself
-with a zeal which merited the utmost return. Cowper felt this, and he
-himself broke off his intercourse with Lady Austen, in a way which was
-admitted by herself to do credit to his delicacy and judgment, no less
-than to his generosity. In about a year after the termination of this
-valuable friendship, he received the best amends that could be made, in
-the renewal of intercourse, after it had been interrupted for
-twenty-three years, with his cousin Lady Hesketh, to whom from childhood
-he had been strongly attached. She visited Olney in June, 1786; and from
-that time forwards her purse and her personal exertions were unsparingly
-bestowed to promote the comfort of her beloved cousin. At her instance
-his confined and ruinous abode at Olney was exchanged in November, 1786,
-for a commodious house in the pretty neighbouring village of Weston,
-which was especially recommended to Cowper as being the residence of his
-esteemed friends Mr. and Mrs. Throckmorton. Here Lady Hesketh commonly
-spent part of the year. The state of Cowper’s spirits during his
-residence at Weston was variable; but he made a few new acquaintance,
-and among them his correspondent, Mr. Rose, and his biographer, Mr.
-Hayley. He also enjoyed a vivid pleasure in the renewal of intercourse
-with his maternal relations, among whom his young cousin Johnson, who
-afterwards became his tender and devoted guardian, obtained an especial
-place in his affections. Still, however, his mental malady continued
-unabated; and a new cause of uneasiness beset him in the growing
-infirmities of Mrs. Unwin. In March, 1792, the disease which had been
-for some time sapping her strength, manifested itself in a paralytic
-attack, from which she never entirely recovered. From thenceforward
-Cowper’s time and attention were devoted, as his primary object, to
-contributing to her comfort and amusement. In her company he quitted his
-home, the first time for twenty-seven years, to visit Mr. Hayley’s seat
-at Eartham, in Sussex. Two important works had engaged his attention:
-one a poem on the four ages of man’s life, the other an edition of
-Milton. These, however, were successively laid aside; and such time as
-his weak spirits and melancholy occupation allowed him, be employed in
-revising his Homer for a second edition. But Mrs. Unwin became more and
-more enfeebled in mind and body; and in the beginning of 1794 Cowper
-relapsed into a gloom as deep as that which he had endured at the
-commencement of his malady. To watch over him in this melancholy Lady
-Hesketh made Weston her constant, instead of her occasional abode, until
-the middle of the following year, when her health gave way under the
-constant pressure of anxiety. Mr. Johnson, who had taken orders, and
-resided at East Dereham in Norfolk, then undertook the charge of his
-unhappy relation; removed him and Mrs. Unwin into his own neighbourhood,
-and watched over their decline with the most unwearied and judicious
-tenderness. But little could now be done to give Cowper pleasure. The
-pathetic poem, “To Mary,” is supposed by Mr. Hayley to have been the
-last thing written by him before quitting Weston; and the only original
-verses which he composed afterwards were some Latin lines, which he
-translated into English, on the appearance of some ice islands in the
-German Sea, and the touching poem called the “Cast-away,” founded on the
-loss of a man overboard in Anson’s voyage, and alluding in an affecting
-strain to his own unfortunate condition. After his departure from
-Weston, he who had been so diligent a correspondent only wrote three or
-four letters; nor could he be excited to converse by the visits even of
-his most intimate friends, as Mr. Rose and Sir John Throckmorton. In
-January, 1800, his final illness, which was dropsy, commenced. He died
-April 25th in the same year; nor to the last did one gleam of hope break
-through the darkness which had surrounded him for twenty-seven years.
-
-It was Cowper’s especial merit as a poet to cultivate simplicity and
-nature. He set the example of throwing aside conventional affectations
-and unmeaning pomp of diction, and in consideration of this great
-service may well be pardoned for occasionally incurring the opposite
-fault of being tame and prosaic. His genius was truly original: all his
-writings, whether moral, satirical, or descriptive, bear the legible
-impress of his own peculiar constitution of mind and habits of thinking.
-His minor and occasional poems are very happy, for his imagination could
-extract a deep and beautiful moral from slight occurrences, which
-commonly pass unnoticed in the bustle of life. Many of his letters are
-published in Hayley’s Life of Cowper; and these are embodied with the
-Private Correspondence afterwards given to the world by Mr. Johnson, in
-the edition of Cowper’s works by Mr. Grimshawe now in the press. As a
-letter writer Cowper appears to us to be unequalled in the English
-language. His correspondence is the genuine intercourse of friend with
-friend; full of wit and humour, but a humour that never vents itself in
-the depreciation of others; and abounding in passages of graver beauty,
-expressed in the most easy, yet elegant and correct language. When once
-a man knows that his letters are admired, he is in great danger of
-writing for admiration. Cowper was aware of this, and occasionally
-alludes to the temptation in lively terms. “I love praise dearly,
-especially from the judicious, and those who have so much delicacy
-themselves as not to offend mine in giving it. But then I found this
-consequence attending, or likely to attend, the eulogium you bestowed.
-If my friend thought me witty before, he shall think me ten times more
-witty hereafter; where I joked once, I will joke five times; and for
-every sensible remark, I will send him a dozen. Now this foolish vanity
-would have spoiled me quite, and have made me as disgusting a letter
-writer as Pope, who seems to have thought that unless a sentence was
-well turned, and every sentence pointed with some conceit, it was not
-worth the carriage. I was willing therefore to wait until the impression
-that your commendation had made on the foolish part of me was worn off,
-that I might scribble away as usual, and write my uppermost thoughts,
-and those only.” (June 8, 1780. To the Rev. W. Unwin.) No one ever
-avoided this danger better. It is strange and wonderful that these
-compositions, which bear the stamp of so much cheerfulness and
-benevolence, should have been written, most of them, in his deepest
-gloom, and avowedly for the purpose of withdrawing his thoughts from his
-own misery.
-
-[Illustration: [Tomb of Cowper, in East Dereham Church, Norfolk.]]
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-                          TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
-
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- 1. Changed “better” to “letter” on p. 28.
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