THE QUARRELS OF AUTHORS may be considered as a continuation of the
CALAMITIES OF AUTHORS; and both, as some Memoirs for Literary
History.
These Quarrels of Authors are not designed to wound the Literary
Character, but to expose the secret arts of calumny, the malignity of
witty ridicule, and the evil prepossessions of unjust hatreds.
The present, like the preceding work, includes other subjects than the
one indicated by the title, and indeed they are both subservient to a
higher purpose--that of our Literary History.
There is a French work, entitled "Querelles Litteraires," quoted in
"Curiosities of Literature," many years ago. Whether I derive the idea
of the present from the French source I cannot tell. I could point out
a passage in the great Lord BACON which might have afforded the hint.
But I am inclined to think that what induced me to select this topic
was the interest which JOHNSON has given to the literary quarrels
between _Dryden_ and _Settle_, _Dennis_ and _Addison_, &c.; and which
Sir WALTER SCOTT, who, amid the fresh creations of fancy, could delve
for the buried truths of research, has thrown into his narrative of
the quarrel of _Dryden_ and _Luke Milbourne_.
From the French work I could derive no aid; and my plan is my own. I
have fixed on each literary controversy to illustrate some principle,
to portray some character, and to investigate some topic. Almost every
controversy which occurred opened new views. With the subject, the
character of the author connected itself; and with the character were
associated those events of his life which reciprocally act on each
other. I have always considered an author as a human being, who
possesses at once two sorts of lives, the intellectual and the vulgar:
in his books we trace the history of his mind, and in his actions
those of human nature. It is this combination which interests the
philosopher and the man of feeling; which provides the richest
materials for reflection; and all those original details which spring
from the constituent principles of man. JOHNSON'S passion for literary
history, and his great knowledge of the human heart, inspired at once
the first and the finest model in this class of composition.
The Philosophy of Literary History was indeed the creation of BAYLE.
He was the first who, by attempting a _critical dictionary_, taught us
to think, and to be curious and vast in our researches. He ennobled a
collection of facts by his reasonings, and exhibited them with the
most miscellaneous illustrations; and thus conducting an apparently
humble pursuit with a higher spirit, he gave a new turn to our
studies. It was felt through Europe; and many celebrated authors
studied and repeated BAYLE. This father of a numerous race has an
English as well as a French progeny.
JOHNSON wrote under many disadvantages; but, with scanty means, he
has taught us a great end. Dr. BIRCH was the contemporary of
JOHNSON. He excelled his predecessors; and yet he forms a striking
contrast as a literary historian. BIRCH was no philosopher, and I
adduce him as an instance how a writer, possessing the most ample
knowledge, and the most vigilant curiosity--one practised in all the
secret arts of literary research in public repositories and in
private collections, and eminently skilled in the whole science of
bibliography--may yet fail with the public. The diligence of BIRCH
has perpetuated his memory by a monument of MSS., but his, touch
was mortal to genius! He palsied the character which could never
die; heroes sunk pusillanimously under his hand; and in his torpid
silence, even MILTON seemed suddenly deprived of his genius.
I have freely enlarged in the _notes_ to this work; a practice which
is objectionable to many, but indispensable perhaps in this species of
literary history.
The late Mr. CUMBERLAND, in a conversation I once held with him on
this subject, triumphantly exclaimed, "You will not find a single note
through the whole volume of my 'Life.' I never wrote a note. The
ancients never wrote notes; but they introduced into their text all
which was proper for the reader to know."
I agreed with that elegant writer, that a fine piece of essay-writing,
such as his own "Life," required notes no more than his novels and his
comedies, among which it may be classed. I observed that the ancients
had no literary history; this was the result of the discovery of
printing, the institution of national libraries, the general literary
intercourse of Europe, and some other causes which are the growth
almost of our own times. The ancients have written history without
producing authorities.
Mr. CUMBERLAND was then occupied on a review of Fox's History; and of
CLARENDON, which lay open before him,--he had been complaining,
with all the irritable feelings of a dramatist, of the frequent
suspensions, and the tedious minuteness of his story.
I observed that _notes_ had not then been discovered. Had Lord
CLARENDON known their use, he had preserved the unity of design in his
text. His Lordship has unskilfully filled it with all that historical
furniture his diligence had collected, and with those minute
discussions which his anxiety for truth, and his lawyer-like mode of
scrutinising into facts and substantiating evidence, amassed. Had
these been cast into _notes_, and were it now possible to pass them
over in the present text, how would the story of the noble historian
clear up! The greatness of his genius will appear when disencumbered
of its unwieldy and misplaced accompaniments.
If this observation be just, it will apply with greater force to
literary history itself, which, being often the mere history of the
human mind, has to record opinions as well as events--to discuss as
well as to narrate--to show how accepted truths become suspicious--or
to confirm what has hitherto rested in obscure uncertainty, and to
balance contending opinions and opposite facts with critical nicety.
The multiplied means of our knowledge now opened to us, have only
rendered our curiosity more urgent in its claims, and raised up the
most diversified objects. These, though accessories to the leading one
of our inquiries, can never melt together in the continuity of a text.
It is to prevent all this disorder, and to enjoy all the usefulness
and the pleasure of this various knowledge, which has produced the
invention of _notes_ in literary history. All this forms a sort of
knowledge peculiar to the present more enlarged state of literature.
Writers who delight in curious and rare extracts, and in the discovery
of new facts and new views of things, warmed by a fervour of research
which brings everything nearer to our eye and close to our touch,
study to throw contemporary feelings in their page. Such rare extracts
and such new facts BAYLE eagerly sought, and they delighted JOHNSON;
but all this luxury of literature can only be produced to the public
eye in the variegated forms of _notes_.