Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges Part 77

As this nephew Hodson ended his days (see the same page) "a prosperous Irish gentleman", it is not unreasonable to wish that he had cleared off Mr. Filby's bill.

177 "Poor fellow! He hardly knew an a.s.s from a mule, nor a turkey from a goose, but when he saw it on the table."-c.u.mBERLAND'S _Memoirs_.

178 "These youthful follies, like the fermentation of liquors, often disturb the mind only in order to its future refinement: a life spent in phlegmatic apathy resembles those liquors which never ferment and are consequently always muddy."-GOLDSMITH, _Memoir of Voltaire_.

"He (Johnson) said Goldsmith was a plant that flowered late. There appeared nothing remarkable about him when he was young."-BOSWELL.

179 "An 'inspired idiot', Goldsmith, hangs strangely about him [Johnson]

... Yet, on the whole, there is no evil in the 'gooseberry-fool', but rather much good; of a finer, if of a weaker sort than Johnson's; and all the more genuine that he himself could never become _conscious_ of it, though unhappily never cease attempting to become so: the author of the genuine _Vicar of Wakefield_, nill he will he, must needs fly towards such a ma.s.s of genuine manhood."-CARLYLE'S _Essays_ (2nd ed.), vol. iv, p. 91.

180 "At present, the few poets of England no longer depend on the great for subsistence; they have now no other patrons but the public, and the public, collectively considered, is a good and a generous master. It is indeed too frequently mistaken as to the merits of every candidate for favour; but to make amends, it is never mistaken long. A performance indeed may be forced for a time into reputation, but, dest.i.tute of real merit, it soon sinks; time, the touchstone of what is truly valuable, will soon discover the fraud, and an author should never arrogate to himself any share of success till his works have been read at least ten years with satisfaction.

"A man of letters at present, whose works are valuable, is perfectly sensible of their value. Every polite member of the community, by buying what he writes, contributes to reward him. The ridicule, therefore, of living in a garret might have been wit in the last age, but continues such no longer, because no longer true. A writer of real merit now may easily be rich, if his heart be set only on fortune: and for those who have no merit, it is but fit that such should remain in merited obscurity."-GOLDSMITH, _Citizen of the World_, Let. 84.

181 Goldsmith attacked Sterne, obviously enough, censuring his indecency, and slighting his wit, and ridiculing his manner, in the 53rd letter in the _Citizen of the World_.

"As in common conversation," says he, "the best way to make the audience laugh is by first laughing yourself; so in writing, the properest manner is to show an attempt at humour, which will pa.s.s upon most for humour in reality. To effect this, readers must be treated with the most perfect familiarity; in one page the author is to make them a low bow, and in the next to pull them by the nose; he must talk in riddles, and then send them to bed in order to dream for the solution," &c.

Sterne's humorous _mot_ on the subject of the gravest part of the charges, then, as now, made against him, may perhaps be quoted here, from the excellent, the respectable Sir Walter Scott. "Soon after _Tristram_ had appeared, Sterne asked a Yorks.h.i.+re lady of fortune and condition, whether she had read his book, 'I have not, Mr.

Sterne,' was the answer; 'and to be plain with you, I am informed it is not proper for female perusal.' 'My dear good lady,' replied the author, 'do not be gulled by such stories; the book is like your young heir there' (pointing to a child of three years old, who was rolling on the carpet in his white tunics): 'he shows at times a good deal that is usually concealed, but it is all in perfect innocence.' "

182 "Goldsmith told us that he was now busy in writing a Natural History; and that he might have full leisure for it, he had taken lodgings at a farmer's house, near to the six-mile stone in the Edgeware Road, and had carried down his books in two returned post-chaises. He said he believed the farmer's family thought him an odd character, similar to that in which the _Spectator_ appeared to his landlady and her children; he was _The Gentleman_. Mr. Mickle, the translator of the _Lusiad_, and I, went to visit him at this place a few days afterwards. He was not at home; but having a curiosity to see his apartment, we went in, and found curious sc.r.a.ps of descriptions of animals scrawled upon the wall with a blacklead pencil."-BOSWELL.

183 "When Goldsmith was dying, Dr. Turton said to him, 'Your pulse is in greater disorder than it should be, from the degree of fever which you have; is your mind at ease?' Goldsmith answered it was not."-DR.

JOHNSON (_in Boswell_).

"Chambers, you find, is gone far, and poor Goldsmith is gone much farther. He died of a fever, exasperated, as I believe, by the fear of distress. He had raised money and squandered it, by every artifice of acquisition and folly of expense. But let not his failings be remembered; he was a very great man."-DR. JOHNSON to Boswell, July 5th, 1774.

184 "When Burke was told [of Goldsmith's death] he burst into tears.

Reynolds was in his painting-room when the messenger went to him; but at once he laid his pencil aside, which in times of great family distress he had not been known to do, left his painting-room, and did not re-enter it that day....

"The staircase of Brick Court is said to have been filled with mourners, the reverse of domestic; women without a home, without domesticity of any kind, with no friend but him they had come to weep for; outcasts of that great, solitary, wicked city, to whom he had never forgotten to be kind and charitable. And he had domestic mourners, too. His coffin was reopened at the request of Miss Horneck and her sister (such was the regard he was known to have for them!) that a lock might be cut from his hair. It was in Mrs. Gwyn's possession when she died, after nearly seventy years."-FORSTER'S _Goldsmith_.

185 "Goldsmith's incessant desire of being conspicuous in company was the occasion of his sometimes appearing to such disadvantage, as one should hardly have supposed possible in a man of his genius. When his literary reputation had risen deservedly high, and his society was much courted, he became very jealous of the extraordinary attention which was everywhere paid to Johnson. One evening, in a circle of wits, he found fault with me for talking of Johnson as ent.i.tled to the honour of unquestionable superiority. 'Sir,' said he, 'you are for making a monarchy of what should be a republic.'

"He was still more mortified, when, talking in a company with fluent vivacity, and, as he flattered himself, to the admiration of all present, a German who sat next him, and perceived Johnson rolling himself as if about to speak, suddenly stopped him, saying, 'Stay, stay-Toctor Shonson is going to zay zomething.' This was no doubt very provoking, especially to one so irritable as Goldsmith, who frequently mentioned it with strong expressions of indignation.

"It may also be observed that Goldsmith was sometimes content to be treated with an easy familiarity, but upon occasions would be consequential and important. An instance of this occurred in a small particular. Johnson had a way of contracting the names of his friends, as Beauclerk, Beau; Boswell, Bozzy.... I remember one day, when Tom Davies was telling that Dr. Johnson said-'We are all in labour for a name to _Goldy's_ play,' Goldsmith seemed displeased that such a liberty should be taken with his name, and said, 'I have often desired him not to call me _Goldy_.' "

This is one of several of Boswell's depreciatory mentions of Goldsmith-which may well irritate biographers and admirers-and also those who take that more kindly and more profound view of Boswell's own character, which was opened up by Mr. Carlyle's famous article on his book. No wonder that Mr. Irving calls Boswell an "incarnation of toadyism". And the worst of it is, that Johnson himself has suffered from this habit of the Laird of Auchenleck's. People are apt to forget under what Boswellian stimulus the great Doctor uttered many hasty things:-things no more indicative of the nature of the depths of his character than the phosphoric gleaming of the sea, when struck at night, is indicative of radical corruption of nature! In truth, it is clear enough on the whole that both Johnson and Goldsmith _appreciated_ each other, and that they mutually knew it. They were, as it were, tripped up and flung against each other, occasionally, by the blundering and silly gambolling of people in company.

Something must be allowed for Boswell's "rivalry for Johnson's good graces" with Oliver (as Sir Walter Scott has remarked), for Oliver was intimate with the Doctor before his biographer was,-and as we all remember, marched off with him to "take tea with Mrs. Williams"

before Boswell had advanced to that honourable degree of intimacy.

But, in truth, Boswell-though he perhaps showed more talent in his delineation of the Doctor than is generally ascribed to him-had not faculty to take a fair view of _two_ great men at a time. Besides, as Mr. Forster justly remarks, "he was impatient of Goldsmith from the first hour of their acquaintance."-_Life and Adventures_, p.

292.

186 The above portraits are from contemporary prints of this princess, before her marriage, and in her old age.

187 Here [below in the text] are the figures, as drawn by young Gilray, of Lord North, Mr. Fox, Mr. Pitt, and Mr. Burke.