SMITH INTERVIEWED
In his letter to Cadell Smith reproaches himself with his idleness
during his first few years in Edinburgh. He had bought a good many new
books in London, or new editions of old ones, and, says he, "The
amusement I found in reading and diverting myself with them debauched
me from my proper business, the preparing a new edition of the _Wealth
of Nations_." While he was engaged in this dissipation of
miscellaneous reading a young interviewer from Glasgow, who happened
to be much in his company in connection with business in the year
1780, elicited his opinions on most of the famous authors of the
world, noted them down, and gave them to the public after Smith's
death in the pages of the _Bee_ for 1791. In introducing these
recollections the editor of the _Bee_, Dr. James Anderson--author of
Ricardo's rent theory--says that even if they had not been sent to him
with the strongest assurances of authenticity, he could entertain no
doubt on that point after their perusal from the coincidence of the
opinions reported in them with those he himself had heard Smith
express. The writer, who takes the name Amicus, describes himself as
"young, inquisitive, and full of respect" for Smith, and says their
conversation, after they finished their business, always took a
literary turn, and Smith was "extremely communicative, and delivered
himself with a freedom and even boldness quite opposite to the
apparent reserve of his appearance."
The first author Amicus mentions is Dr. Johnson, of whom he thought
Smith had a "very contemptuous opinion." "I have seen that creature,"
said Smith, "bolt up in the midst of a mixed company, and without any
previous notice fall upon his knees behind a chair, repeat the Lord's
Prayer, and then resume his seat at table. He has played this trick
over and over, perhaps five or six times in the course of an evening.
It is not hypocrisy but madness. Though an honest sort of man himself,
he is always patronising scoundrels. Savage, for example, whom he so
loudly praises, was but a worthless fellow; his pension of £50 never
lasted him longer than a few days. As a sample of his economy you may
take a circumstance that Johnson himself once told me. It was at that
period fashionable to wear scarlet cloaks trimmed with gold lace, and
the Doctor met him one day just after he had got his pension with one
of those cloaks on his back, while at the same time his naked toes
were sticking through his shoes." He spoke highly, however, of
Johnson's political pamphlets on the American question, in spite of
his disapproval of their opinions, and he was especially charmed with
the pamphlet about the Falkland Islands, because it presented in such
forcible language the madness of modern wars.
"Contemptuous opinion" is too strong an expression for Smith's view of
Johnson, but it is certain he never rated him so high as the world did
then or does now. He told Samuel Rogers that he was astonished at
Johnson's immense reputation, but, on the other hand, he frequently
praised some of the Doctor's individual writings very highly, as he
did to this young gentleman of Glasgow. He once said to Seward that
Johnson's preface to Shakespeare was "the most manly piece of
criticism that was ever published in any country."[316]
Amicus then inquired of Smith his opinion of his countryman Dr.
Campbell, author of the _Political Survey_, and Smith replied that he
had never met him but once, but that he was one of those authors who
wrote on from one end of the week to the other, and had therefore with
his own hand produced almost a library of books. A gentleman who met
Campbell out at dinner said he would be glad to have a complete set of
his works, and next morning a cart-load came to his door, and the
driver's bill was £70. He used to get a few copies of each of his
works from the printers, and keep them for such chances as that. A
visitor one day, casting his eye on these books, asked Campbell, "Have
you read all these books?" "Nay," said the other, "I have written
them."
Smith often praised Swift, and praised him highly, saying he wanted
nothing but inclination to have become one of the greatest of all
poets. "But in place of that he is only a gossiper, writing merely for
the entertainment of a private circle." He regarded Swift, however, as
a pattern of correctness both in style and sentiment, and he read to
his young friend some of the short poetical addresses to _Stella_.
Amicus says Smith expressed particular pleasure with one couplet--
Say, Stella, feel you no content,
Reflecting on a life well spent?
But it was more probably not so much of these two lines as of the
whole passage of which they are the opening that Smith was thinking.
He thought Swift a great master of the poetic art, because he produced
an impression of ease and simplicity, though the work of composition
was to him a work of much difficulty, a verse coming from him, as
Swift himself said, like a guinea. The Dean's masterpiece was, in
Smith's opinion, the lines on his own death, and his poetry was on the
whole more correct after he settled in Ireland, and was surrounded, as
he himself said, "only by humble friends."
Among historians Smith rated Livy first either in the ancient or the
modern world. He knew of no other who had even a pretence to rival
him, unless David Hume perhaps could claim that honour.
When asked about Shakespeare Smith quoted with apparent approval
Voltaire's remarks that _Hamlet_ was the dream of a drunken savage,
and that Shakespeare had good scenes but not a good play; but Amicus
gathered that he would not permit anybody else to pass such a verdict
with impunity, for when he himself once ventured to say something
derogatory of _Hamlet_, Smith replied, "Yes, but still _Hamlet_ is
full of fine passages." This opinion of Shakespeare was of course
common to most of the great men of last century. They were not so much
insensible to the poet's genius as perplexed by it. His plays were
full of imagination, dramatic power, natural gifts of every kind--that
was admitted; but then they seemed wild, unregulated, savage--even
"drunken savage," to use Voltaire's expression; they were magnificent,
but they were not poetry, for they broke every rule of the art, and
poetry after all was an art. And so we find Addison at the beginning
of last century writing on the greatest English poets and leaving the
name of Shakespeare out; and we find Charles James Fox, a true lover
of letters, telling Reynolds at the close of the century that
Shakespeare's reputation would have stood higher if he had never
written _Hamlet_. Smith thought Shakespeare had more than ten times
the dramatic genius of Dryden, but Dryden had more of the poetic art.
He praised Dryden for rhyming his plays, and said--as Pope and
Voltaire used also to say--that it was nothing but laziness that
prevented our tragic poets from writing in rhyme like those of France.
"Dryden," said he, "had he possessed but a tenth part of Shakespeare's
dramatic genius, would have brought rhyming tragedies into fashion
here as they were in France, and then the mob would have admired them
just as much as they then pretended to despise them." Beattie's
_Minstrel_ he would not allow to be called a poem at all, because it
had no plan, no beginning, middle, or end. It was only a series of
verses, some of them, however, he admitted, very happy. As for Pope's
translation of the _Iliad_, he said, "They do well to call it Pope's
_Iliad_, for it is not Homer's _Iliad_. It has no resemblance to the
majesty and simplicity of the Greek."
He read over to Amicus Milton's _L'Allegro_ and _Il Penseroso_, and
explained the respective beauties of each; but he added that all the
rest of Milton's short poems were trash. He could not imagine what
made Johnson praise the poem on the death of Mrs. Killigrew, and
compare it with _Alexander's Feast_. Johnson's praise of it had
induced him to read the poem over and with attention twice, but he
could not discover even a spark of merit in it. On the other hand,
Smith considered Gray's _Odes_, which Johnson had damned, to be the
standard of lyric excellence.
_The Gentle Shepherd_ he did not admire much. He preferred the _Pastor
Fido_, of which, says Amicus, he "spoke with rapture," and the
_Eclogues_ of Virgil. Amicus put in a word in favour of the poet of
his own country, but Smith would not yield a point. "It is the duty of
a poet," he said, "to write like a gentleman. I dislike that homely
style which some think fit to call the language of nature and
simplicity and so forth. In Percy's _Reliques_ too a few tolerable
pieces are buried under a heap of rubbish. You have read perhaps _Adam
Bell, Clym of the Cleugh, and William of Cloudesley_." "Yes," said
Amicus. "Well then," continued Smith, "do you think that was worth
printing?"
Of Goldsmith Smith spoke somewhat severely--of Goldsmith as a man
apparently, not as a writer--relating some anecdotes of his easy
morals, which Amicus does not repeat. But when Amicus mentioned some
story about Burke seducing a young lady, Smith at once declared it an
invention. "I imagine," said he, "that you have got that fine story
out of some of the Magazines. If anything can be lower than the
Reviews, they are so. They once had the impudence to publish a story
of a gentleman having debauched his own sister, and on inquiry it came
out that the gentleman never had a sister. As to Mr. Burke, he is a
worthy, honest man, who married an accomplished girl without a
shilling of fortune." Of the Reviews Smith never spoke but with
ridicule and detestation. Amicus tried to get the _Gentleman's
Magazine_ exempted from the general condemnation, but Smith would not
hear of that, and said that for his part he never looked at a Review,
nor even at the names of the publishers.
Pope was a great favourite with him as a poet, and he knew by heart
many passages from his poems, though he disliked Pope's personal
character as a man, saying he was all affectation, and speaking of his
letter to Arbuthnot when the latter was dying as a consummate piece of
canting. Dryden was another of his favourite poets, and when he was
speaking one day in high praise of Dryden's fables, Amicus mentioned
Hume's objections, and was told, "You will learn more as to poetry by
reading one good poem than by a thousand volumes of criticism." Smith
regarded the French theatre as the standard of dramatic excellence.
Amicus concludes his reminiscences by quoting one of Smith's
observations on a political subject. He said that at the beginning of
the reign of George the Third the dissenting ministers used to receive
£2000 a year from Government, but that the Earl of Bute had most
improperly deprived them of this allowance, and that he supposed this
to be the real motive of their virulent opposition to Government.
These recollections of Amicus provoked a letter in a succeeding number
of the _Bee_ from Ascanius (the Earl of Buchan) complaining of their
publication, not as in any way misrepresenting any of Smith's views,
but as obtruding the trifles of the ordinary social hour upon the
learned world in a way Smith himself would have extremely disliked.
Smith, he says, would rather have had his body injected by Hunter and
Monro, and exhibited in Fleet Street or in Weir's Museum. That may
very possibly be so; but though Smith, if he were to give his views on
literary topics to the public, might prefer putting them in more
elaborate dress, yet the opinions he expressed were, it must be
remembered, mature opinions on subjects on which he had long thought
and even lectured, and if neither Dr. Anderson nor the Earl of Buchan
has any fault to find with the correctness of Amicus's report of them,
Smith cannot be considered to be any way wronged. The Earl complains
too of the matter of the letter being "such frivolous matter"; but it
is not so frivolous, and, if it were, is it not Smith himself who used
to say to his class at Glasgow, as we are informed by Boswell, that
there was nothing too frivolous to be learnt about a great man, and
that, for his own part, he was always glad to know that Milton wore
latchets to his shoes and not buckles?
In 1781 Gibbon seems to have been in doubt as to continuing his
_History_, and desired Robertson, who happened to be up in London at
the time, to talk the matter over with Smith after his return to
Edinburgh. The result of this consultation is communicated in a letter
from Robertson to Gibbon on 6th November 1781. "Soon after my return,"
says Robertson, "I had a long conversation with our friend Mr. Smith,
in which I stated to him every particular you mentioned to me with
respect to the propriety of going on with your work. I was happy to
find that his opinion coincided perfectly with that which I had
ventured to give you. His decisions, you know, are both prompt and
vigorous, and he could not allow that you ought to hesitate a moment
in your choice. He promised to write his sentiments to you very fully,
but as he may have neglected to do this, for it is not willingly he
puts pen to paper, I thought it might be agreeable to you to know his
opinion, though I imagine you could hardly entertain any doubt
concerning it."[317]
Professor B. Faujas Saint Fond, Professor of Geology in the Museum of
Natural History at Paris and member of the National Institute of
France, paid a visit to Edinburgh in October or November 1782 in the
course of a tour he made through Scotland, and received many
civilities from Adam Smith, as he mentions in the account of his
travels which he published in 1783. Saint Fond says there was nobody
in Edinburgh he visited more frequently than Smith, and nobody
received him more kindly or studied more to procure for him every
information and amusement Edinburgh could afford. He was struck with
Smith's numerous and, as he says, excellently chosen library. "The
best French authors occupied a distinguished place in his library, for
he was fond of our language." "Though advanced in years, he still
possessed a fine figure; the animation of his countenance was striking
when he spoke of Voltaire." I have already quoted the remark he made
(p. 190).
One evening when the geologist was at tea with him, Smith spoke about
Rousseau also, and spoke of him "with a kind of religious respect."
"Voltaire," he said, "set himself to correct the vices and follies of
mankind by laughing at them, and sometimes by treating them with
severity, but Rousseau conducts the reader to reason and truth by the
attractions of sentiment and the force of conviction. His 'Social
Compact' will one day avenge all the persecutions he suffered."
Smith asked the Professor if he loved music, and on being told that it
was one of his chief delights whenever it was well executed, rejoined,
"I am very glad of it; I shall put you to a proof which will be very
interesting for me, for I shall take you to hear a kind of music of
which it is impossible you can have formed any idea, and it will
afford me great pleasure to know the impression it makes upon you."
The annual bagpipe competition was to take place next day, and
accordingly in the morning Smith came to the Professor's lodgings at
nine o'clock, and they proceeded at ten to a spacious concert-room,
plainly but neatly decorated, which they found already filled with a
numerous assembly of ladies and gentlemen. A large space was reserved
in the middle of the room and occupied by gentlemen only, who, Smith
said, were the judges of the performances that were to take place, and
who were all inhabitants of the Highlands or Islands. The prize was
for the best execution of some favourite piece of Highland music, and
the same air was to be played successively by all the competitors. In
about half an hour a folding door opened at the bottom of the hall,
and the Professor was surprised to see a Highlander advance playing on
a bagpipe, and dressed in the ancient kilt and plaid of his country.
"He walked up and down the vacant space in the middle of the hall with
rapid steps and a martial air playing his noisy instrument, the
discordant sounds of which were sufficient to rend the ear. The tune
was a kind of sonata divided into three periods. Smith requested me to
pay my whole attention to the music, and to explain to him afterwards
the impression it made upon me. But I confess that at first I could
not distinguish either air or design in the music. I was only struck
with a piper marching backward and forward with great rapidity, and
still presenting the same warlike countenance, he made incredible
efforts with his body and his fingers to bring into play the different
reeds of his instrument, which emitted sounds that were to me almost
insupportable. He received, however, great praise." Then came a second
piper, who seemed to excel the first, judging from the clapping of
hands and cries of bravo that greeted him from every side; and then a
third and a fourth, till eight were heard successively; and the
Professor began at length to realise that the first part of the music
was meant to represent the clash and din and fury of war, and the last
part the wailing for the slain,--and this last part, he observed,
always drew tears from the eyes of a number of "the beautiful Scotch
ladies" in the audience. After the music came a "lively and animated
dance," in which some of the pipers engaged, and the rest all played
together "suitable airs possessing expression and character, though
the union of so many bagpipes produced a most hideous noise." He does
not say whether his verdict was satisfactory to Smith, but the verdict
was that it seemed to him like a bear's dancing, and that "the
impression the wild instrument made on the greater part of the
audience was so different from the impression it made on himself, that
he could not help thinking that the lively emotion of the persons
around him was not occasioned by the musical effect of the air itself,
but by some association of ideas which connected the discordant sounds
of the pipe with historical events brought forcibly to their
recollection."[318]
Nor were these annual competitions the only local institutions in
which Smith took a more or less active interest. One of the duties of
a citizen which he undertook will perhaps occasion surprise--he became
a Captain of the City Guard. He was made Honorary Captain of the
Trained Bands of Edinburgh--the City Guard--on the 4th of June 1781,
"with the usual solemnity," the minutes state, "and after spending the
evening with grate joy, the whole corps retired, but in distinct
divisions and good order, to quarters."[319]
The business of this body, according to its minutes, seems practically
to have been mostly of a convivial character, and we can sympathise
with the honest pride of the clerk in recording in what a condition of
good order they were able to retire after celebrating that auspicious
occasion with the joy it deserved. Smith no doubt attended their
periodical festivities, or paid his fine of eight magnums of claret
for absence. But their business was not all claret and punch. On the
8th September 1784, for example, the captains, lieutenants, and
ensigns of the Trained Bands were called out, in consequence of an
order from the Lord Provost, "to attend the wheeping of Paull and
Anderson, actors in the late riots at Cannonmills." A rescue riot was
apprehended, and the Trained Bands met in the old Justiciary
Court-room, and were armed there with "stowt oaken sticks." Marching
forth in regular order, they acted as guard to the magistrates during
the day, and "by their formidable and respectable appearance had the
good effect of detering the multitude so that they became only
peaceable spectators." Whether an honorary captain could be called
upon for active service in an emergency I cannot say, but Smith's name
is not mentioned in the list of absentee captains upon this occasion.
In 1783 Smith joined Robertson and others in founding the Royal
Society of Edinburgh. Robertson had long entertained the idea of
establishing a society on the model of the foreign academies for the
cultivation of every branch of science, learning, and taste, and he
was at length moved into action by the steps taken in 1782 by the Earl
of Buchan and others to obtain a royal charter for the Society of
Antiquaries of Scotland, founded two years before. Robertson was very
anxious to have only one learned society in Edinburgh, of which
antiquities might be made a branch subject, and he even induced the
University authorities to petition Parliament against granting a
charter of incorporation to the Antiquarian Society. In this strong
step the University was seconded by the Faculty of Advocates and the
old Philosophical Society, founded by Colin Maclaurin in 1739, but
their efforts failed. Out of the agitation, however, the Royal Society
came into being. Whether Smith actively supported Robertson, or
supported him at all, in his exertions against the Antiquarian
Society, I do not know. He was not, as Robertson was, a member of the
Society of Antiquaries. But he was one of the original members of the
Royal Society. The society was divided into two branches,--a physical
branch or class devoted to science; and a literary branch or class
devoted to history and polite letters,--and Smith was one of the four
presidents of the literary class. The Duke of Buccleugh was President
of the whole society; and Smith's colleagues in the presidency of the
literary class were Robertson, Blair, and Baron Gordon (Cosmo Gordon
of Cluny, a Baron of Exchequer and most accomplished man).
Smith never read a paper to this society, nor does he ever seem to
have spoken in it except once or twice on a matter of business which
had been entrusted to him. The only mention of his name in the printed
_Transactions_ is in connection with two prizes of 1000 ducats and 500
ducats respectively, which were offered to all the world in 1785 by
Count J.N. de Windischgraetz for the two most successful inventions of
such legal terminology for every sort of deed as, without imposing any
new restraints on natural liberty, would yet leave no possible room
for doubt or litigation, and would thereby diminish the number of
lawsuits. The Count wished the prizes to be decided by three of the
most distinguished literary academies in Europe, and had chosen for
that purpose the Royal Academy of Science in Paris, which had already
consented to undertake the duty; the Royal Society of Edinburgh, whose
consent the Count now sought; and one of the academies of Germany or
Switzerland which he was afterwards to name. He addressed his
communication to the society through Adam Smith, who must therefore be
assumed to have had some private acquaintance or connection with him;
and on the 9th of July Smith laid the proposal before the Council of
the society, and, as is reported in the _Transactions_, "signified to
the meeting that although he entertained great doubt whether the
problem of the Count de Windischgraetz admitted of any complete and
rational solution, yet the views of the proposer being so highly
laudable, and the object itself being of that nature that even an
approximation to its attainment would be of importance to mankind, he
was therefore of opinion that the society ought to agree to the
request that was made to them. He added that it was his intention to
communicate his sentiments on the subject to the Count by a letter
which he would lay before the Council at a subsequent meeting."[320]
This letter was read to the Council on the 13th of December, and after
being approved, a copy of it was requested for preservation among
their papers, as the author "did not incline that it should be
published in the Transactions of the society."
Nothing further is heard of this business till the 6th of August 1787,
when "Mr. Commissioner Smith acquainted the society that the Count de
Windischgraetz had transmitted to him three dissertations offered as
solutions of his problem, and had desired the judgment of the society
upon their merits. The society referred the consideration of these
papers to Mr. Smith, Mr. Henry Mackenzie of the Exchequer, and Mr.
William Craig, advocate, as a committee to appraise and consider them,
and to report their opinion to the society at a subsequent meeting."
At length, on the 21st January 1788, Mr. Commissioner Smith reported
that this committee thought none of the three dissertations amounted
either to a solution or an approximation to a solution of the Count's
problem, but that one of them was a work of great merit, and the
society asked Mr. A. Fraser Tytler, one of their secretaries, to send
on this opinion to the Count as their verdict.[321]
FOOTNOTES:
[316] Seward's _Anecdotes_, ii. 464.
[317] Gibbon's _Miscellaneous Works_, ii. 255.
[318] Saint Fond, _Travels in England, Scotland, and the Hebrides_,
ii. 241.
[319] Skinner's _Society of Trained Bands of Edinburgh_, p. 99.
[320] _Transactions_, R.S.E., i. 39.
[321] _Ibid._, R.S.E., ii. 24.