the greatest? It might seem hard to tell; but united they go forth
conquering and to conquer. Nor is that union rare. Kindred in nature,
they love to dwell together in the same "palace of the soul." Remember
Milton. But too often they are disunited; and then, though still Powers,
they are but feeble, and their defeats are frequent as their triumphs.
What! is it so even with Virtue? It is, and it is not. Virtue may reign
without the support of Talent and Genius; but her counsellor is
Conscience, and what is Conscience but Reason rich by birthright in
knowledge directly derived from the heaven of heavens beyond all the
stars?
And may Genius and Talent indeed be, conceive, and execute, without the
support of Virtue? You will find that question answered in the following
lines by Charles Grant, which deserve the name of philosophical
poetry:--
"Talents, 'tis true, quick, various, bright, has God
To Virtue oft denied, on Vice bestow'd;
Just as fond Nature lovelier colours brings
To deck the insect's than the eagle's wings.
But then of man the high-born nobler part,
The ethereal energies that touch the heart,
Creative Fancy, labouring Thought intense,
Imagination's wild magnificence,
And all the dread sublimities of Song--
These, Virtue! these, to thee alone belong."
Such is the natural constitution of humanity; and in the happiest state
of social life, all its noblest Faculties would bear legitimate sway,
each in its own province, within the spirit's ample domains. There,
Genius would be honoured; and Poetry another name for religion. But to
such a state there can, under the most favouring skies, be no more than
an approximation; and the time never was when Virtue suffered no
persecution, Honour no shame, Genius no neglect, nor fetters were not
imposed by tyrannous power on the feet of the free. The age of Homer,
the age of Solon, the age of Pericles, the age of Numa, the age of
Augustus, the age of Alfred, the age of Leo, the age of Elizabeth, the
age of Anne, the age of Scott, Wordsworth, and Byron, have they not been
all bright and great ages? Yet had they been faithfully chronicled, over
the misery and madness of how many despairing spirits fraught with
heavenly fire, might we not have been called to pour forth our
unavailing indignations and griefs!
Under despotic governments, again, such as have sunk deep their roots
into Oriental soils, and beneath Oriental skies prosperously expanded
their long-enduring umbrage, where might is right, and submission
virtue, noble-minded men--for sake of that peace which is ever dearest
to the human heart, and if it descend not a glad and gracious gift from
Heaven, will yet not ungratefully be accepted when breathed somewhat
sadly from the quieted bosom of earth by tyranny saved from
trouble--have submitted, almost without mourning, to sing "many a lovely
lay," that perished like the flowers around them, in praise of the Power
at whose footstool they "stooped their anointed heads as low as death."
Even then has Genius been honoured, because though it ceased to be
august, still it was beautiful; it seemed to change fetters of iron into
bands of roses, and to halo with a glory the brows of slaves. The
wine-cup mantled in its light; and Love forgot in the bower Poetry built
for bliss, that the bride might be torn from the bridegroom's bosom on
her bridal night by a tyrant's lust. Even there Genius was happy, and
diffused happiness; at its bidding was heard pipe, tabor, and dulcimer;
and to its lips "warbling melody" life floated by, in the midst of all
oppression, a not undelightful dream!
But how has it been with us in our Green Island of the West? Some people
are afraid of revolutions. Heaven pity them! we have had a hundred since
the Roman bridged our rivers, and led his highways over our mountains.
And what the worse have we been of being thus revolved? We are no
radicals; but we dearly love a revolution--like that of the stars. No
two nights are the heavens the same--all the luminaries are revolving
to the music of their own spheres. Look, we beseech you, on that
new-risen star. He is elected by universal suffrage--a glorious
representative of a million lesser lights; and on dissolution of _that_
Parliament--how silent but how eloquent!--he is sure of his return. Why,
we should dearly love the late revolution we have seen below--it is no
longer called Reform--were it to fling up to free light from fettered
darkness a few fine bold original spirits, who might give the whole
world a new character, and a more majestic aspect to crouching life. But
we look abroad and see strutting to and fro the sons of little men blown
up with vanity, in a land where tradition not yet old tells of a race of
giants. We are ashamed of ourselves to think we feared the throes of the
times, seeing not portentous but pitiable births. Brush these away; and
let us think of the great dead--let us look on the great living--and,
strong in memory and hope, be confident in the cause of Freedom. "Great
men _have been_ among us--better none;" and can it be said that _now_
there is "a want of books and men," or that those we have are mere
dwarfs and duodecimos? Is there no energy, no spirit of adventure and
enterprise, no passion in the character of our country? Has not wide
over earth
"England sent her men, of men the chief,
To plant the Tree of Life, to plant fair Freedom's Tree?"
Has not she, the Heart of Europe and the Queen, kindled America into
life, and raised up in the New World a power to balance the Old, star
steadying star in their unconflicting courses? You can scarce see her
shores for ships; her inland groves are crested with towers and temples;
and mists brooding at intervals over her far-extended plains, tell of
towns and cities, their hum unheard by the gazer from her glorious
hills. Of such a land it would need a gifted eye to look into all that
is passing within the mighty heart; but it needs no gifted eye, no
gifted ear, to see and hear there the glare and the groaning of great
anguish, as of lurid breakers tumbling in and out of the caves of the
sea. But is it or is it not a land where all the faculties of the soul
are free as they ever were since the Fall? Grant that there are
tremendous abuses in all departments of public and private life; that
rulers and legislators have often been as deaf to the "still small
voice" as to the cry of the million; that they whom they have ruled,
and for whom they have legislated often so unwisely or wickedly, have
been as often untrue to themselves, and in self-imposed idolatry
"Have bow'd their knees
To despicable gods."
Yet base, blind, and deaf (and better dumb) must be he who would deny,
that here Genius has had, and now has, her noblest triumphs; that Poetry
has here kindled purer fires on loftier altars than ever sent up their
incense to Grecian skies; that Philosophy has sounded depths in which
her torch was not extinguished, but, though bright, could pierce not the
"heart of the mystery" into which it sent some strong illuminations;
that Virtue here has had chosen champions victorious in their martyrdom;
and Religion her ministers and her servants not unworthy of her whose
title is from heaven.
Causes there have been, are, and ever will be, why often, even here, the
very highest faculties "rot in cold obstruction." But in all the
ordinary affairs of life, have not the best the best chance to win the
day? Who, in general, achieve competence, wealth, splendour,
magnificence, in their condition as citizens? The feeble, the ignorant,
and the base, or the strong, the instructed, and the bold? Would you, at
the offstart, back mediocrity with alien influence, against high talent
with none but its own--the native "might that slumbers in a peasant's
arm," or, nobler far, that which neither sleeps nor slumbers in a
peasant's heart? There is something abhorrent from every sentiment in
man's breast to see, as we too often do, imbecility advanced to high
places by the mere accident of high birth. But how our hearts warm
within us to behold the base born, if in Britain we may use the word, by
virtue of their own irresistible energies, taking precedence, rightful
and gladly-granted, of the blood of kings! Yet we have heard it
whispered, insinuated, surmised, spoken, vociferated, howled, and roared
in a voice of small-beer-souring thunder, that Church and State, Army
and Navy, are all officered by the influence of the Back-stairs--that
few or none but blockheads, by means of brass only, mount from the Bar
which they have disturbed to that Bench which they disgrace; and that
mankind intrust the cure of all diseases their flesh is heir to, to the
exclusive care of every here and there a handful of old women.
Whether overstocked or not, 'twould be hard to say, but all professions
are full--from that of Peer to that of Beggar. To live is the most many
of us can do. Why then complain? Men should not complain when it is
their duty as men to work. Silence need not be sullen--but better
sullenness than all this outrageous outcry, as if words the winds
scatter, were to drop into the soil and grow up grain. Processions! is
this a time for full-grown men in holiday shows to play the part of
children? If they desire advancement, let them, like their betters, turn
to and work. All men worth mentioning in this country belong to the
working classes. What seated Thurlow, and Wedderburne, and Scott, and
Erskine, and Copley, and Brougham on the woolsack? Work. What made
Wellington? For seven years war all over Spain, and finally at
Waterloo--work--bloody and glorious work.
Yet still the patriot cry is of sinecures. Let the few sluggards that
possess but cannot enjoy them, doze away on them till sinecures and
sinecurists drop into the dust. Shall such creatures disturb the
equanimity of the magnanimous working-classes of England? True to
themselves in life's great relations, they need not grudge, for a little
while longer, the paupers a few paltry pence out of their earnings; for
they know a sure and silent deathblow has been struck against that order
of things by the sense of the land, and that all who receive wages must
henceforth give work. All along that has been the rule--these are the
exceptions; or say, that has been the law--these are its revolutions.
Let there be high rewards, and none grudge them--in honour and gold--for
high work. And men of high talents--never extinct--will reach up their
hands and seize them, amidst the acclamations of a people who have ever
taken pride in a great ambition. If the competition is to be in future
more open than ever, to know it is so will rejoice the souls of all who
are not slaves. But clear the course! Let not the crowd rush in--for by
doing so, they will bring down the racers, and be themselves trampled to
death.
Now we say that the race is--if not always--ninety-nine times in a
hundred--to the swift, and the battle to the strong. We may have been
fortunate in our naval and military friends; but we cannot charge our
memory with a single consummate ass holding a distinguished rank in
either service. That such consummate asses are in both, we have been
credibly informed, and believe it; and we have sometimes almost imagined
that we heard their bray at no great distance, and the flapping of their
ears. Poor creatures enough do rise by seniority or purchase, or if
anybody know how else, we do not; and such will be the case to the end
of the chapter of human accidents. But merit not only makes the man, but
the officer on shore and at sea. They are as noble and discontented a
set of fellows all, as ever boarded or stormed; and they will continue
so, not till some change in the Admiralty, or at the Horse-guards, for
Sir James Graham does his duty, and so does Lord Hill; but till a change
in humanity, for 'tis no more than Adam did, and we attribute whatever
may be amiss or awry, chiefly to the Fall. Let the Radicals set poor
human nature on her legs again, and what would become of _them_? In the
French service there is no rising at all, it seems, but by merit; but
there is also much running away; not in a disgraceful style, for our
natural enemies and artificial friends are a brave race, but in mere
indignation and disgust to see troops so shamefully ill-officered as
ours, which it would be a disgrace to look in the face on the field,
either in column or line. Therefore they never stand a charge, but are
off in legions of honour, eagles and all, before troops that have been
so uniformly flogged from time immemorial, as to have no other name but
raw lobsters, led on by officers all shivering or benumbed under the
"cold shade of aristocracy," like Picton and Pack.
We once thought of going ourselves to the English Bar, but were
dissuaded from doing so by some judicious friends, who assured us we
should only be throwing away our great talents and unexampled eloquence;
for that success depended solely on interest, and we had none we knew
of, either in high places or in low, and had then never seen an
attorney. We wept for the fate of many dear friends in wigs, and made a
pilgrimage to Jerusalem. On our return from Palestine and other foreign
parts, behold them all bending under briefs, bound by retaining fees,
or, like game-hawks, wheeling in airy circuits over the rural provinces,
and pouncing down on their prey, away to their eyries with talonfuls,
which they devoured at their luxurious leisure, untroubled by any callow
young! They now compose the Bench.
Ere we set off for Salem, we had thoughts of entering the Church, and of
becoming Bishops. But it was necessary, we were told, first to be tutor
to a lord. That, in our pride, we could not stomach; but if ours had not
been the sin by which Satan fell, where now had been the excellent
Howley? All our habits in youth led us to associate much with intending
divines. A few of them are still curates; but 'twere vain to try to
count the vicars, rectors, canons, deans, archdeacons, and bishops, with
whom, when we were all undergraduates together at Oxford, we used to do
nothing but read Greek all day, and Latin all night. Yet you hear
nothing but abuse of such a Church! and are told to look at the
Dissenters. We do look at them, and an uglier set we never saw; not one
in a hundred, in his grimness, a gentleman. Not a single scholar have
they got to show; and now that Hall is mute, not one orator. Their
divinity is of the dust--and their discourses dry bones. Down with the
old Universities--up with new. The old are not yet down, but the new are
up; and how dazzling the contrast, even to the purblind! You may hew
down trees, but not towers; and Granta and Rhedicyna will show their
temples to the sun, ages after such structures shall have become
hospitals. They enlighten the land. Beloved are they by all the
gentlemen of England. Even the plucked think of them with tears of
filial reverence, and having renewed their plumage, clap their wings,
and crow defiance to all their foes. A man, you say, can get there no
education to fit him for life. Bah! Tell that to the marines. Now and
then one meets a man eminent in a liberal profession, who has not been
at any place that could easily be called a College. But the great
streams of talent in England keep perpetually flowing from the gates of
her glorious Universities--and he who would deny it in any mixed company
of leading men in London, would only have to open his eyes in the hush
that rebuked his folly, to see that he was a Cockney, clever enough,
perhaps, in his own small way, and the author of some sonnets, but even
to his own feelings painfully out of place among men who had not studied
at the Surrey.
We cannot say that we have any fears, this fine clear September morning,
for the Church of England in England. In Ireland, deserted and betrayed,
it has received a dilapidating shock. Fain would seven millions of "the
finest people on the earth," and likewise the most infatuated, who are
so proud of the verdure of their isle that they love to make "the green
one red," see the entire edifice overthrown, not one stone left upon
another, and its very name smothered in a smoky cloud of ascending dust.
They have told us so in yells, over which has still been heard "the
wolf's long howl," the savage cry of the O'Connell. And Ministers who
pretend to be Protestants, and in reform have not yet declared against
the Reformation, have tamely yielded, recreants from the truth, to
brawlers who would pull down her holiest altars, and given up "pure
religion, breathing household laws," a sacrifice to superstition. But
there is a power enshrined in England which no Government dare seek to
desecrate--in the hearts of the good and wise, grateful to an
establishment that has guarded Christianity from corruption, and is
venerated by all the most enlightened spirits who conscientiously
worship without its pale, and know that in the peaceful shadow of its
strength repose their own humbler and untroubled altars.
We have been taking a cheerful--a hopeful view of our surrounding world,
as it is enclosed within these our seas, whose ideal murmur seemed a
while to breathe in unison with our Monologue. We have been believing
that in this our native land, the road of merit is the road to
success--say happiness. And is not the law the same in the world of
Literature and the Fine Arts? Give a great genius anything like fair
play, and he will gain glory--nay, bread. True, he may be before his
age, and may have to create his worshippers. But how few such! And is it
a disgrace to an age to produce a genius whose grandeur it cannot all at
once comprehend? The works of genius are surely not often
incomprehensible to the highest contemporary minds, and if they win
their admiration, pity not the poor Poet. But pray syllable the living
Poet's name who has had reason to complain of having fallen on evil
days, or who is with "darkness and with danger compassed round." From
humblest birthplaces in the obscurest nooks frequently have we seen
"The fulgent head
Star-bright appear;"
from unsuspected rest among the water-lilies of the mountain mere, the
snow-white swan in full plumage soar into the sky. Hush! no nonsense
about Wordsworth. "Far-off his coming shone;" and what if for a while
men knew not whether 'twas some mirage-glimmer, or the dawning of a new
"orb of song!"
We have heard rather too much even from that great poet about the
deafness and blindness of the present time. No Time but the future, he
avers, has ears or eyes for divine music and light. Was Homer in his own
day obscure, or Shakespeare? But Heaven forbid we should force the bard
into an argument; we allow him to sit undisturbed by us in the bower
nature delighted to build for him, with small help from his own hands,
at the dim end of that alley green, among lake-murmur and
mountain-shadow, for ever haunted by ennobling visions. But we love and
respect Present Time--partly, we confess, because he has shown some
little kindly feeling for ourselves, whereas we fear Future Time may
forget us among many others of his worthy father's friends, and the name
of Christopher North
"Die on his ears a faint unheeded sound."
But Present Time has not been unjust to William Wordsworth. Some small
temporalities were so; imps running about the feet of Present Time, and
sometimes making him stumble: but on raising his eyes from the ground,
he saw something shining like an Apparition on the mountain-top, and he
hailed, and with a friendly voice, the advent of another true Poet of
nature and of man.
We must know how to read that prophet, before we preach from any text in
his book of revelations.
"We poets in our youth begin in gladness,
But thereof comes in the end despondency and madness."
Why spoke he thus? Because a deep darkness had fallen upon him all alone
in a mountain-cave, and he quaked before the mystery of man's troubled
life.
"He thought of Chatterton, the marvellous boy,
The sleepless soul that perish'd in his pride;
Of him who walk'd in glory and in joy,
Following his plough upon the mountain-side!"
and if they died miserably, "How may I perish!" But they wanted wisdom.
Therefore the marvellous boy drank one bowl drugged with sudden, and
the glorious ploughman many bowls drugged with lingering death. If we
must weep over the woes of Genius, let us know for whom we may rightly
shed our tears. With one drop of ink you may write the names of all
"The mighty Poets in their misery dead."
Wordsworth wrote those lines, as we said, in the inspiration of a
profound but not permanent melancholy; and they must not be profaned by
being used as a quotation in defence of accusations against human
society, which, in some lips, become accusations against Providence. The
mighty Poets have been not only wiser but happier than they knew; and
what glory from heaven and earth was poured over their inward life, up
to the very moment it darkened away into the gloom of the grave!
Many a sad and serious hour have we read d'Israeli, and many a lesson
may all lovers of literature learn from his well-instructed books. But
from the unhappy stories therein so feelingly and eloquently narrated,
has many "a famous ape" drawn conclusions the very reverse of those
which he himself leaves to be drawn by all minds possessed of any
philosophy. Melancholy the moral of these moving tales; but we must look
for it, not into the society that surrounds us, though on it too we must
keep a watchful, and, in spite of all its sins, a not irreverent eye,
but into our own hearts. There lies the source of evil which some evil
power perhaps without us stirs up till it wells over in misery. Then
fiercely turns the wretch first against "the world and the world's law,"
both sometimes iniquitous, and last of all against the rebellious spirit
in his own breast, but for whose own innate corruption his moral being
would have been victorious against all outward assaults, violent or
insidious, "and to the end persisting safe arrived."
Many men of genius have died without their fame, and for their fate we
may surely mourn without calumniating our kind. It was their lot to die.
Such was the will of God. Many such have come and gone, ere they knew
themselves what they were; their brothers and sisters and friends knew
it not; knew it not their fathers and their mothers; nor the village
maidens on whose bosoms they laid their dying heads. Many, conscious of
the divine flame, and visited by mysterious stirrings that would not let
them rest, have like vernal wildflowers withered, or been cut down like
young trees in the season of leaf and blossom. Of this our mortal life
what are these but beautiful evanishings! Such was our young Scottish
Poet, Michael Bruce--a fine scholar, who taught a little wayside school,
and died, a mere lad, of consumption. Loch Leven Castle, where Mary
Stuart was imprisoned, looks not more melancholy among the dim waters
for her than for its own Poet's sake! The linnet, in its joy among the
yellow broom, sings not more sweetly than did he in his sadness, sitting
beside his unopened grave, "one song that will not die," though the
dirge but draw now and then a tear from some simple heart.
"Now spring returns--but not to me returns
The vernal joy my better years have known;
Dim in my breast life's dying taper burns,
And all the joys of life with health are flown."