In the south aisle of Westminster Abbey stands a monument erected to the
memory of Lady Grace Gethin.[141] A statue of her ladyship represents
her kneeling, holding a book in her hand. This accomplished lady was
considered as a prodigy in her day, and appears to have created a
feeling of enthusiasm for her character. She died early, having scarcely
attained to womanhood, although a wife; for "all this goodness and all
this excellence was bounded within the compass of twenty years."
But it is her book commemorated in marble, and not her character, which
may have merited the marble that chronicles it, which has excited my
curiosity and my suspicion. After her death a number of loose papers
were found in her handwriting, which could not fail to attract, and,
perhaps, astonish their readers, with the maturity of thought and the
vast capacity which had composed them. These reliques of genius were
collected together, methodised under heads, and appeared with the title
of "Reliquiæ Gethinianæ; or some remains of Grace Lady Gethin, lately
deceased: being a collection of choice discourses, pleasant apothegms,
and witty sentences; written by her for the most part by way of essay,
and at spare hours; published by her nearest relations, to preserve her
memory. Second edition, 1700."
Of this book, considering that comparatively it is modern, and the copy
before me is called a second edition, it is somewhat extraordinary that
it seems always to have been a very scarce one. Even Ballard, in his
Memoirs of Learned Ladies (1750), mentions that these remains "are very
difficult to be procured;" and Sir William Musgrave in a manuscript note
observed, that "this book was very scarce." It bears now a high price. A
hint is given in the preface that the work was chiefly printed for the
use of her friends; yet, by a second edition, we must infer that the
public at large were so. There is a poem prefixed with the signature
W.C. which no one will hesitate to pronounce is by Congreve; he wrote
indeed another poem to celebrate this astonishing book, for, considered
as the production of a young lady, it is a miraculous, rather than a
human, production. The last lines in this poem we might expect from
Congreve in his happier vein, who contrives to preserve his panegyric
amidst that caustic wit, with which he keenly touched the age.