Manuscripts are suppressed or destroyed from motives which require to be
noticed. Plagiarists, at least, have the merit of preservation: they may
blush at their artifices, and deserve the pillory, but their practices
do not incur the capital crime of felony. Serassi, the writer of the
curious Life of Tasso, was guilty of an extraordinary suppression in his
zeal for the poet's memory. The story remains to be told, for it is but
little known.
Galileo, in early life, was a lecturer at the university of Pisa:
delighting in poetical studies, he was then more of a critic than a
philosopher, and had Ariosto by heart. This great man caught the
literary mania which broke out about his time, when the Cruscans so
absurdly began their "Controversie Tassesche," and raised up two
poetical factions, which infected the Italians with a national fever.
Tasso and Ariosto were perpetually weighed and outweighed against each
other; Galileo wrote annotations on Tasso, stanza after stanza, and
without reserve, treating the majestic bard with a severity which must
have thrown the Tassoists into an agony. Our critic lent his manuscript
to Jacopo Mazzoni, who, probably being a disguised Tassoist, by some
accountable means contrived that the manuscript should be absolutely
lost!--to the deep regret of the author and all the Ariostoists. The
philosopher descended to his grave--not without occasional groans--nor
without exulting reminiscences of the blows he had in his youth
inflicted on the great rival of Ariosto--and the rumour of such a work
long floated on tradition! Two centuries had nearly elapsed, when
Serassi, employed on his elaborate Life of Tasso, among his
uninterrupted researches in the public libraries of Rome, discovered a
miscellaneous volume, in which, on a cursory examination, he found
deposited the lost manuscript of Galileo! It was a shock from which,
perhaps, the zealous biographer of Tasso never fairly recovered; the
awful name of Galileo sanctioned the asperity of critical decision, and
more particularly the severe remarks on the language, a subject on which
the Italians are so morbidly delicate, and so trivially grave. Serassi's
conduct on this occasion was at once political, timorous, and cunning.
Gladly would he have annihilated the original, but this was impossible!
It was some consolation that the manuscript was totally unknown--for
having got mixed with others, it had accidentally been passed over, and
not entered into the catalogue; his own diligent eye only had detected
its existence. "_Nessuno fin ora sa, fuori di me, se vi sia, nè dove
sia, e cosi non potrà darsi alia luce_," &c. But in the true spirit of a
collector, avaricious of all things connected with his pursuits, Serassi
cautiously, but completely, transcribed the precious manuscript, with an
intention, according to his memorandum, to unravel all its sophistry.
However, although the Abbate never wanted leisure, he persevered in his
silence; yet he often trembled lest some future explorer of manuscripts
might be found as sharpsighted as himself. He was so cautious as not
even to venture to note down the library where the manuscript was to be
found, and to this day no one appears to have fallen on the volume! On
the death of Serassi, his papers came to the hands of the Duke of Ceri,
a lover of literature; the transcript of the yet undiscovered original
was then revealed! and this secret history of the manuscript was drawn
from a note on the title-page written by Serassi himself. To satisfy the
urgent curiosity of the literati, these annotations on Tasso by Galileo
were published in 1793. Here is a work, which, from its earliest stage,
much pains had been taken to suppress; but Serassi's collecting passion
inducing him to preserve what he himself so much wished should never
appear, finally occasioned its publication! It adds one evidence to the
many which prove that such sinister practices have been frequently used
by the historians of a party, poetic or politic.
Unquestionably this entire suppression of manuscripts has been too
frequently practised. It is suspected that our historical antiquary,
Speed, owed many obligations to the learned Hugh Broughton, for he
possessed a vast number of his MSS. which he burnt. Why did he burn? If
persons place themselves in suspicions situations, they must not
complain if they be suspected. We have had historians who, whenever they
met with information which has not suited their historical system, or
their inveterate prejudices, have employed interpolations, castrations,
and forgeries, and in some cases have annihilated the entire document.
Leland's invaluable manuscripts were left at his death in the confused
state in which the mind of the writer had sunk, overcome by his
incessant labours, when this royal antiquary was employed by Henry the
Eighth to write our national antiquities. His scattered manuscripts were
long a common prey to many who never acknowledged their fountain head;
among these suppressors and dilapidators pre-eminently stands the crafty
Italian Polydore Vergil, who not only drew largely from this source,
but, to cover the robbery, did not omit to depreciate the father of our
antiquities--an act of a piece with the character of the man, who is
said to have collected and burnt a greater number of historical MSS.
than would have loaded a wagon, to prevent the detection of the numerous
fabrications in his history of England, which was composed to gratify
Mary and the Catholic cause.
The Harleian manuscript, 7379, is a collection of state-letters. This
MS. has four leaves entirely torn out, and is accompanied by this
extraordinary memorandum, signed by the principal librarian.
"Upon examination of this book, Nov. 12, 1764, these
four last leaves were torn out.
"C. MORTON.
"Mem. Nov. 12, sent down to Mrs. Macaulay."
As no memorandum of the name of any student to whom a manuscript is
delivered for his researches was ever made, before or since, or in the
nature of things will ever be, this memorandum must involve our female
historian in the obloquy of this dilapidation.[288] Such dishonest
practices of party feeling, indeed, are not peculiar to any party. In
Roscoe's "Illustrations" of his Life of Lorenzo de' Medici, we discover
that Fabroni, whose character scarcely admits of suspicion, appears to
have known of the existence of an unpublished letter of Sixtus IV.,
which involves that pontiff deeply in the assassination projected by the
Pazzi; but he carefully suppressed its notice: yet, in his conscience,
he could not avoid alluding to such documents, which he concealed by his
silence. Roscoe has apologised for Fabroni overlooking this decisive
evidence of the guilt of the hypocritical pontiff in the mass of
manuscripts; a circumstance not likely to have occurred, however, to
this laborious historical inquirer. All party feeling is the same active
spirit with an opposite direction. We have a remarkable case, where a
most interesting historical production has been silently annihilated by
the consent of _both parties_. There once existed an important diary of
a very extraordinary character, Sir George Saville, afterwards Marquis
of Halifax. This master-spirit, for such I am inclined to consider the
author of the little book of "Maxims and Reflections," with a
philosophical indifference, appears to have held in equal contempt all
the factions of his times, and consequently has often incurred their
severe censures. Among other things, the Marquis of Halifax had noted
down the conversation he had had with Charles the Second, and the great
and busy characters of the age. Of this curious secret history there
existed two copies, and the noble writer imagined that by this means he
had carefully secured their existence; yet both copies were destroyed
from opposite motives; the one at the instigation of Pope, who was
alarmed at finding some of the catholic intrigues of the court
developed; and the other at the suggestion of a noble friend, who was
equally shocked at discovering that his party, the Revolutionists, had
sometimes practised mean and dishonourable deceptions. It is in these
legacies of honourable men, of whatever party they may be, that we
expect to find truth and sincerity; but thus it happens that the last
hope of posterity is frustrated by the artifices, or the malignity, of
these party-passions. Pulteney, afterwards the Earl of Bath, had also
prepared memoirs of his times, which he proposed to confide to Dr.
Douglas, bishop of Salisbury, to be composed by the bishop; but his
lordship's heir, the General, insisted on destroying these authentic
documents, of the value of which we have a notion by one of those
conversations which the earl was in the habit of indulging with Hooke,
whom he at that time appears to have intended for his historian. The
Earl of Anglesea's MS. History of the Troubles of Ireland, and also a
Diary of his own Times, have been suppressed; a busy observer of his
contemporaries, his tale would materially have assisted a later
historian.
The same hostility to manuscripts, as may be easily imagined, has
occurred, perhaps more frequently, on the continent. I shall furnish one
considerable fact. A French canon, Claude Joly, a bold and learned
writer, had finished an ample life of Erasmus, which included a history
of the restoration of literature at the close of the fifteenth and the
beginning of the sixteenth century. Colomiés tells us, that the author
had read over the works of Erasmus seven times; we have positive
evidence that the MS. was finished for the press: the Cardinal do
Noailles would examine the work himself; this important history was not
only suppressed, but the hope entertained, of finding it among the
cardinal's papers, was never realised.
These are instances of the annihilation of history; but there is a
partial suppression, or castration of passages, equally fatal to the
cause of truth; a practice too prevalent among the first editors of
memoirs. By such deprivations of the text we have lost important truths,
while, in some cases, by interpolations, we have been loaded with the
fictions of a party. Original memoirs, when published, should now be
deposited at that great institution, consecrated to our national
history--the British Museum, to be verified at all times. In Lord
Herbert's history of Henry the Eighth, I find, by a manuscript note,
that several things were not permitted to be printed, and that the
original MS. was supposed to be in Mr. Sheldon's custody, in 1687.
Camden told Sir Robert Filmore that he was not suffered to print all his
annals of Elizabeth; but he providently sent these expurgated passages
to De Thou, who printed them faithfully; and it is remarkable that De
Thou himself used the same precaution in the continuation of his own
history. We like remote truths, but truths too near us never fail to
alarm ourselves, our connexions, and our party. Milton, in composing his
History of England, introduced, in the third book, a very remarkable
digression, on the characters of the Long Parliament; a most animated
description of a class of political adventurers with whom modern history
has presented many parallels. From tenderness to a party then imagined
to be subdued, it was struck out by command, nor do I find it restituted
in Kennett's Collection of English Histories. This admirable and
exquisite delineation has been preserved in a pamphlet printed in 1681,
which has fortunately exhibited one of the warmest pictures in design
and colouring by a master's hand. One of our most important volumes of
secret history, "Whitelocke's Memorials," was published by Arthur, Earl
of Anglesea, in 1682, who took considerable liberties with the
manuscript; another edition appeared in 1732, which restored the many
important passages through which the earl appears to have struck his
castrating pen. The restitution of the castrated passages has not much
increased the magnitude of this folio volume; for the omissions usually
consisted of a characteristic stroke, or short critical opinion, which
did not harmonise with the private feelings of the Earl of Anglesea. In
consequence of the volume not being much enlarged to the eye, and being
unaccompanied by a single line of preface to inform us of the value of
this more complete edition, the booksellers imagine that there can be no
material difference between the two editions, and wonder at the
bibliopolical mystery that they can afford to sell the edition of 1682
at ten shillings, and have five guineas for the edition of 1732! Hume
who, I have been told, wrote his history usually on a sofa, with the
epicurean indolence of his fine genius, always refers to the old
truncated and faithless edition of Whitelocke--so little in his day did
the critical history of books enter into the studies of authors, or such
was the carelessness of our historian! There is more philosophy in
_editions_ than some philosophers are aware of. Perhaps most "Memoirs"
have been unfaithfully published, "curtailed of their fair proportions;"
and not a few might be noticed which subsequent editors have restored to
their original state, by uniting their dislocated limbs. Unquestionably
Passion has sometimes annihilated manuscripts, and tamely revenged
itself on the papers of hated writers! Louis the Fourteenth, with his
own hands, after the death of Fénélon, burnt all the manuscripts which
the Duke of Burgundy had preserved of his preceptor.
As an example of the suppressors and dilapidators of manuscripts, I
shall give an extraordinary fact concerning Louis the Fourteenth, more
in his favour. His character appears, like some other historical
personages, equally disguised by adulation and calumny. That monarch was
not the Nero which his revocation of the edict of Nantes made him seem
to the French protestants. He was far from approving of the violent
measures of his catholic clergy. This opinion of that sovereign was,
however, carefully suppressed, when his "Instructions to the Dauphin"
were first published. It is now ascertained that Louis the Fourteenth
was for many years equally zealous and industrious; and, among other
useful attempts, composed an elaborate "Discours" for the dauphin for
his future conduct. The king gave his manuscript to Pelisson to revise;
but after the revision our royal writer frequently inserted additional
paragraphs. The work first appeared in an anonymous "Récueil d'Opuscules
Littéraires, Amsterdam, 1767," which Barbier, in his "Anonymes," tells
us was "rédigé par Pelisson; le tout publié par l'Abbé Olivet." When at
length the printed work was collated with the manuscript original,
several suppressions of the royal sentiments appeared; and the editors,
too catholic, had, with more particular caution, thrown aside what
clearly showed Louis the Fourteenth was far from approving of the
violences used against the protestants. The following passage was
entirely omitted: "It seems to me, my son, that those who employ extreme
and violent remedies do not know the nature of the evil, occasioned in
part by heated minds, which, left to themselves, would insensibly be
extinguished, rather than rekindle them afresh by the force of
contradiction; above all, when the corruption is not confined to a small
number, but diffused through all parts of the state; besides, the
Reformers said many true things! The best method to have reduced little
by little the Huguenots of my kingdom, was not to have pursued them by
any direct severity pointed at them."
Lady Mary Wortley Montague is a remarkable instance of an author nearly
lost to the nation; she is only known to posterity by a chance
publication; for such were her famous Turkish letters, the manuscript of
which her family once purchased with an intention to suppress, but they
were frustrated by a transcript. The more recent letters were
reluctantly extracted out of the family trunks, and surrendered in
exchange for certain family documents, which had fallen into the hands
of a bookseller. Had it depended on her relatives, the name of Lady Mary
had only reached us in the satires of Pope. The greater part of her
epistolary correspondence was destroyed by her mother; and what that
good and Gothic lady spared, was suppressed by the hereditary austerity
of rank, of which her family was too susceptible. The entire
correspondence of this admirable writer and studious woman (for once, in
perusing some unpublished letters of Lady Mary's, I discovered that "she
had been in the habit of reading seven hours a day for many years")
would undoubtedly have exhibited a fine statue, instead of the torso we
now possess; and we might have lived with her ladyship, as we do with
Madame de Sévigné. This I have mentioned elsewhere; but I have since
discovered that a considerable correspondence of Lady Mary's, for more
than twenty years, with the widow of Colonel Forrester, who had retired
to Rome, has been stifled in the birth. These letters, with other MSS.
of Lady Mary's, were given by Mrs. Forrester to Philip Thicknesse, with
a discretionary power to publish. They were held as a great acquisition
by Thicknesse, and his bookseller; but when they had printed off the
first thousand sheets, there were parts which they considered might give
pain to some of the family. Thicknesse says, "Lady Mary had in many
places been uncommonly severe upon her husband, for all her letters were
loaded with a scrap or two of poetry at him."[289] A negotiation took
place with an agent of Lord Bute's; after some time Miss Forrester put
in her claims for the MSS.; and the whole terminated, as Thicknesse
tells us, in her obtaining a pension, and Lord Bute all the MSS.
The late Duke of Bridgewater, I am informed, burnt many of the numerous
family papers, and bricked up a quantity, which, when opened after his
death, were found to have perished. It is said he declared that he did
not choose that his ancestors should be traced back to a person of a
mean trade, which it seems might possibly have been the case. The loss
now cannot be appreciated; but unquestionably stores of history, and
perhaps of literature, were sacrificed. Milton's manuscript of Comus was
published from the Bridgewater collection, for it had escaped the
bricking up!
Manuscripts of great interest are frequently suppressed from the
shameful indifference of the possessors.
Mr. Mathias, in his Essay on Gray, tells us, that "in addition to the
valuable manuscripts of Mr. Gray, there is reason to think that there
were some other papers, _folia Sibyllæ_, in the possession of Mr. Mason;
but though a very diligent and anxious inquiry has been made after them,
they cannot be discovered since his death. There was, however, one
fragment, by Mr. Mason's own description of it, of very great value,
namely, "The Plan of an intended Speech in Latin on his appointment as
Professor of Modern History in the University of Cambridge." Mr. Mason
says, "Immediately on his appointment, Mr. Gray sketched out an
admirable plan for his inauguration speech; in which, after enumerating
the preparatory and auxiliary studies requisite, such as ancient
history, geography, chronology, &c., he descended to the authentic
sources of the science, such as public treaties, state records, private
correspondence of ambassadors, &c. He also wrote the exordium of this
thesis, not, indeed, so correct as to be given by way of fragment, but
so spirited in point of sentiment, as leaves it much to be regretted
that he did not proceed to its conclusion." This fragment cannot now be
found; and after so very interesting a description of its value and of
its importance, it is difficult to conceive how Mr. Mason could prevail
upon himself to withhold it. If there be a subject on which more,
perhaps, than on any other, it would have been peculiarly desirable to
know and to follow the train of the ideas of Gray, it is that of modern
history, in which no man was more intimately, more accurately, or more
extensively conversant than our poet. A sketch or plan from his hand, on
the subjects of history, and on those which belonged to it, might have
taught succeeding ages how to conduct these important researches with
national advantage; and, like some wand of divination, it might have
Pointed to beds where sovereign gold doth grow.[290]
DRYDEN.
I suspect that I could point out the place in which these precious
"folia Sibyllæ" of Gray's lie interred; they would no doubt be found
among other Sibylline leaves of Mason, in two large boxes, which he left
to the care of his executors. These gentlemen, as I am informed, are so
extremely careful of them, as to have intrepidly resisted the
importunity of some lovers of literature, whose curiosity has been
aroused by the secreted treasures. It is a misfortune which has
frequently attended this sort of bequests of literary men, that they
have left their manuscripts, like their household furniture; and in
several cases we find that many legatees conceive that all manuscripts
are either to be burnt, like obsolete receipts, or to be nailed down in
a box, that they may not stir a lawsuit!
In a manuscript note of the times, I find that Sir Richard Baker, the
author of a chronicle, formerly the most popular one, died in the Fleet;
and that his son-in-law, who had all his papers, burnt them for
waste-paper; and he said that "he thought Sir Richard's life was among
them!" An autobiography of those days which we should now highly prize.
Among these mutilators of manuscripts we cannot too strongly
remonstrate with those who have the care of the works of others, and
convert them into a vehicle for their own particular purposes, even when
they run directly counter to the knowledge and opinions of the original
writer. Hard was the fate of honest Anthony Wood, when Dr. Fell
undertook to have his history of Oxford translated into Latin; the
translator, a sullen, dogged fellow, when he observed that Wood was
enraged at seeing the perpetual alterations of his copy made to please
Dr. Fell, delighted to alter it the more; while the greater executioner
supervising the printed sheets, by "correcting, altering, or dashing out
what he pleased," compelled the writer publicly to disavow his own work!
Such I have heard was the case of Bryan Edwards, who composed the first
accounts of Mungo Park. Bryan Edwards, whose personal interests were
opposed to the abolishment of the slave-trade, would not suffer any
passage to stand in which the African traveller had expressed his
conviction of its inhumanity. Park, among confidential friends,
frequently complained that his work did not only not contain his
opinions, but was even interpolated with many which he utterly
disclaimed!
Suppressed books become as rare as manuscripts. In some researches
relating to the history of the Mar-prelate faction, that ardent
conspiracy against the established hierarchy, and of which the very name
is but imperfectly to be traced in our history, I discovered that the
books and manuscripts of the Mar-prelates have been too cautiously
suppressed, or too completely destroyed; while those on the other side
have been as carefully preserved. In our national collection, the
British Museum, we find a great deal against Mar-prelate, but not
Mar-prelate himself.
I have written the history of this conspiracy in the third, volume of
"Quarrels of Authors."