A union of talents, differing in their qualities, might carry some
important works to a more extended perfection. In a work of great
enterprise, the aid of a friendly hand may be absolutely necessary to
complete the labours of the projector, who may have neither the courage,
the leisure, nor all necessary acquisitions for performing the favourite
task which he has otherwise matured. Many great works, commenced by a
master-genius, have remained unfinished, or have been deficient for want
of this friendly succour. The public would have been grateful to
Johnson, had he united in his dictionary the labours of some learned
etymologist. Speed's Chronicle owes most of its value, as it does its
ornaments, to the hand of Sir Robert Cotton, and other curious
researchers, who contributed entire portions. Goguet's esteemed work of
the "Origin of the Arts and Sciences" was greatly indebted to the
fraternal zeal of a devoted friend. The still valued books of the Port
Royal Society were all formed by this happy union. The secret history of
many eminent works would show the advantages which may be derived from
that combination of talents, differing in their nature. Cumberland's
masterly versions of the fragments of the Greek dramatic poets would
never have been given to the poetical world, had he not accidentally
possessed the manuscript notes of his relative, the learned Bentley.
This treasure supplied that research in the most obscure works, which
the volatile studies of Cumberland could never have explored; a
circumstance which he concealed from the world, proud of the Greek
erudition which he thus cheaply possessed. Yet by this literary union,
Bentley's vast erudition made those researches which Cumberland could
not; and Cumberland gave the nation a copy of the domestic drama of
Greece, of which Bentley was incapable.
There is a large work, which is still celebrated, of which the
composition has excited the astonishment even of the philosophic Hume,
but whose secret history remains yet to be disclosed. This extraordinary
volume is "The History of the World by Rawleigh." I shall transcribe
Hume's observations, that the reader may observe the literary
phenomenon. "They were struck with the extensive genius of the man, who
being educated amidst naval and military enterprises, _had surpassed in
the pursuits of literature, even those of the most recluse and sedentary
lives_; and they admired his unbroken magnanimity, which at his age, and
under his circumstances, could engage him to undertake and execute so
great a work, as his History of the World." Now when the truth is known,
the wonderful in this literary mystery will disappear, except in the
eloquent, the grand, and the pathetic passages interspersed in that
venerable volume. We may, indeed, pardon the astonishment of our calm
philosopher, when we consider the recondite matter contained in this
work, and recollect the little time which this adventurous spirit, whose
life was passed in fabricating his own fortune, and in perpetual
enterprise, could allow to such erudite pursuits. Where could Rawleigh
obtain that familiar acquaintance with the rabbins, of whose language he
was probably entirely ignorant? His numerous publications, the effusions
of a most active mind, though excellent in their kind, were evidently
composed by one who was not abstracted in curious and remote inquiries,
but full of the daily business and the wisdom of human life. His
confinement in the Tower, which lasted several years, was indeed
sufficient for the composition of this folio volume, and of a second
which appears to have occupied him. But in that imprisonment it
singularly happened that he lived among literary characters with most
intimate friendship. There he joined the Earl of Northumberland, the
patron of the philosophers of his age, and with whom Rawleigh pursued
his chemical studies; and Serjeant Hoskins, a poet and a wit, and the
poetical "father" of Ben Jonson, who acknowledged that "It was Hoskins
who had polished him;" and that Rawleigh often consulted Hoskins on his
literary works, I learn from a manuscript. But however literary the
atmosphere of the Tower proved to Rawleigh, no particle of Hebrew, and
perhaps little of Grecian lore, floated from a chemist and a poet. The
truth is, that the collection of the materials of this history was the
labour of several persons, who have not all been discovered. It has been
ascertained that Ben Jonson was a considerable contributor; and there
was an English philosopher from whom Descartes, it is said even by his
own countrymen, borrowed largely--Thomas Hariot, whom Anthony Wood
charges with infusing into Rawleigh's volume philosophical notions,
while Rawleigh was composing his History of the World. But if
Rawleigh's _pursuits surpassed even those of the most recluse and
sedentary lives_, as Hume observes, we must attribute this to a "Dr.
Robert Burrel, Rector of Northwald, in the county of Norfolk, who was a
great favourite of Sir Walter Rawleigh, and had been his chaplain. All,
or the greatest part of the drudgery of Sir Walter's History for
criticisms, chronology, and reading Greek and Hebrew authors, was
performed by him for Sir Walter."[80] Thus a simple fact, when
discovered, clears up the whole mystery; and we learn how that knowledge
was acquired, which, as Hume sagaciously detected, required "a recluse
and sedentary life," such as the studies and the habits of a country
clergyman would have been in a learned age.
The secret history of another work, still more celebrated than the
History of the World, by Sir Walter Rawleigh, will doubtless surprise
its numerous admirers.
Without the aid of a friendly hand, we should probably have been
deprived of the delightful History of Artists by Vasari: although a mere
painter and goldsmith, and not a literary man, Vasari was blessed with
the nice discernment of one deeply conversant with art, and saw rightly
what was to be done, when the idea of the work was suggested by the
celebrated Paulus Jovius as a supplement to his own work of the
"Eulogiums of Illustrious Men." Vasari approved of the project; but on
that occasion judiciously observed, not blinded by the celebrity of the
literary man who projected it, that "It would require the assistance of
an artist to collect the materials, and arrange them in their proper
order; for although Jovius displayed great knowledge in his
observations, yet he had not been equally accurate in the arrangement of
his facts in his book of Eulogiums." Afterwards, when Vasari began to
collect his information, and consulted Paulus Jovius on the plan,
although that author highly approved of what he saw, he alleged his own
want of leisure and ability to complete such an enterprise; and this was
fortunate: we should otherwise have had, instead of the rambling spirit
which charms us in the volumes of Vasari, the verbose babble of a
declaimer. Vasari, however, looked round for the assistance he wanted; a
circumstance which Tiraboschi has not noticed: like Hogarth, he required
a literary man for his scribe. I have discovered the name of the chief
writer of the Lives of the Painters, who wrote under the direction of
Vasari, and probably often used his own natural style, and conveyed to
us those reflections which surely come from their source. I shall give
the passage, as a curious instance where the secret history of books is
often detected in the most obscure corners of research. Who could have
imagined that in a collection of the lives _de' Santi e Beati dell'
Ordine de' Predicatori_, we are to look for the writer of Vasari's
lives? Don Serafini Razzi, the author of this ecclesiastical biography,
has this reference: "Who would see more of this may turn to the Lives of
the Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, _written for the greater part
by Don Silvano Razzi_, my brother, for the Signor Cavaliere M. Giorgio
Vasari, his great friend."[81]
The discovery that Vasari's volumes were not entirely written by
himself, though probably under his dictation, and unquestionably, with
his communications, as we know that Dr. Morell wrote the "Analysis of
Beauty" for Hogarth, will perhaps serve to clear up some unaccountable
mistakes or omissions which appear in that series of volumes, written
at long intervals, and by different hands. Mr. Fuseli has alluded to
them in utter astonishment; and cannot account for Vasari's "incredible
dereliction of reminiscence, which prompted him to transfer what he had
rightly ascribed to Giorgione in one edition to the elder Parma in the
subsequent ones." Again: "Vasari's memory was either so treacherous, or
his rapidity in writing so inconsiderate, that his account of the
Capella Sistina, and the stanze of Raffaello, is a mere heap of errors
and unpardonable confusion." Even Bottari, his learned editor, is at a
loss how to account for his mistakes. Mr. Fuseli finely observes--"He
has been called the Herodotus of our art; and if the main simplicity of
his narrative, and the desire of heaping anecdote on anecdote, entitle
him in some degree to that appellation, we ought not to forget that the
information of every day adds something to the authenticity of the Greek
historian, whilst every day furnishes matter to question the credibility
of the Tuscan." All this strongly confirms the suspicion that Vasari
employed different hands at different times to write out his work. Such
mistakes would occur to a new writer, not always conversant with the
subject he was composing on, and the disjointed materials of which were
often found in a disordered state. It is, however, strange that neither
Bottari nor Tiraboschi appears to have been aware that Vasari employed
others to write for him; we see that from the first suggestion of the
work he had originally proposed that Paulus Jovius should hold the pen
for him.
The principle illustrated in this article might be pursued; but the
secret history of two great works so well known is as sufficient as
twenty others of writings less celebrated. The literary phenomenon which
had puzzled the calm inquiring Hume to cry out "a miracle!" has been
solved by the discovery of a little fact on Literary Unions, which
derives importance from this circumstance.[82]