WANDERJAHRE--SOCIAL LIFE IN SCOTLAND--BEGINNING OF HIS LITERARY LIFE
In the present century in Germany we have seen a period of almost
unparalleled literary glory succeeded by a time of great commercial
prosperity and national enthusiasm. But when Ferrier visited that
country in 1834 the era of its intellectual greatness had hardly passed
away; some, at least, of its stars remained, and others had very
recently ceased to be. Goethe had died just two years before, but Heine
lived till many years afterwards; amongst the philosophers, though Kant
and Fichte, of course, were long since gone, Schelling was still at
work at Munich, and Hegel lived at Berlin till November of 1831, when
he was cut off during an epidemic of cholera. Most of the great men had
disappeared, and yet the memory of their achievements still survived,
and the impetus they gave to thought could not have been lost. The
traditional lines of speculation consistently carried out since
Reformation days had survived war and national calamity, and it
remained to be seen whether the greater tests of prosperity and success
would be as triumphantly undergone.
We can imagine Ferrier's feelings when this new world opened up before
him, a Scottish youth, to whom it was a new, untrodden country. It may
be true that it was his literary rather than his speculative affinities
that first attracted him to Germany. To form in literature he always
attached the greatest value, and to the end his interest in letters was
only second to his attachment to philosophy. German poetry was to him
what it was to so many of the youth of the country from which it
came--the expression of their deepest, and likewise of their freshest
aspiration. The poetry of other countries and other tongues--English
and Latin, for example--meant much to him, but that of Germany was
nearest to his heart. French learning did not attract him; neither its
literature nor its metaphysics and psychological method appealed to his
thoughtful, analytic mind; but in Germany he found a nation which had
not as yet resigned its interest in things of transcendental import in
favour of what pertained to mere material welfare.
Such was the Germany into which Ferrier came in 1834. He did not, so
far as we can hear, enter deeply into its social life; he visited it as
a traveller, rather than as a student, and his stay in it was brief.
Considering the shortness of his time there, and the circumstances of
his visit, the impression that it made upon him is all the more
remarkable, for it was an impression that lasted and was evident
throughout all his after life. Since his day, indeed, it would be
difficult to say how many young Scotsmen have been impressed in a
similar way by a few months' residence at a University town in Germany.
For partly owing to Ferrier's own efforts, and perhaps even more owing
to the 'boom'--to use a vulgarism--brought about by Carlyle's writings,
and by his first making known the marvels of German literature to the
ordinary English-speaking public, who had never learned the language or
tried to understand its recent history, the old traditional literary
alliance between Scotland and France appeared for the time being to
have broken down in favour of a similar association with its rival
country, Germany. The work of Goethe was at last appreciated, nothing
was now too favourable to say about its merits; philosophy was suddenly
discovered to have its home in Germany, and there alone; our insularity
in keeping to our antiquated methods--dryasdust, we were told, as the
old ones of the schools, and perhaps as edifying--was vigorously
denounced. Theology, which had hitherto found complete support from the
philosophic system which acted as her handmaid, and was only tolerated
as such, was naturally affected in like manner by the change; and to
her credit be it said, that instead of with averted eyes looking
elsewhere, as might easily have been done, she determined to face the
worst, and wisely asked the question whether in her department too she
had not something she could learn from a sister country across the sea.
Hence a great change was brought about in the mental attitude of
Scotland; but we anticipate.
Ferrier, after leaving Heidelberg, paid a short visit to Leipzig, and
then for a few weeks took up his abode at Berlin. From Leipzig he
writes to Miss Wilson again: 'How do you like an _epistola_ dated from
this great emporium of taste and letters, this culminating point of
Germanism, where waggons jostle philosophy, and tobacco-impregnated air
is articulated into divinest music? It is fair-time, and I did not
arrive, as one usually does, a day _behind_ it, but on the very day it
commenced. It will last, I believe, some weeks, and during that time
all business is done on the open streets, which are lined on each side
with large wooden booths, and are swarming with men and merchandise of
every description and from every quarter of the world. It very much
resembles a _Ladies' Sale_ in the Assembly Rooms (what I never saw),
only the ladies here are frequently Jews with fierce beards, and have
always a pipe in their mouths when not eating or drinking. As you walk
along you will find the order of the day to be somewhat as follows. You
first come to pipes, then shawls, then nails, then pipes, pipes again,
pipes, gingerbread, dolls, then pipes, bridles, spurs, pipes, books,
warming-pans, pipes, china, writing-desks, pipes again, pipes, pipes,
pipes, nothing but pipes--the very pen will write nothing but pipes.
Pipes, you see, decidedly carry it. I wonder they don't erect public
tobacco-smoke works, lay _pipes_ for it along the streets, and smoke
away--a city at a time. Private families might take it in as we do
gas!'
Ferrier appears to have spent a week at Frankfort before reaching his
destination at Leipzig. He describes his journey there: 'At Frankfort I
saw nothing worthy of note except a divine statue of Ariadne riding on
a leopard. After lumbering along for two nights and two days in a
clumsy diligence, I reached Leipzig two days ago. I thought that by the
way I might perhaps see something worthy of mention, and accordingly
sometimes put my head out of the window to look. But no--the trees, for
instance, had all to a man planted their heads in the earth, and were
growing with their legs upwards, just as they do with us; and as for
the natives, they, on the contrary, had each of them filled a
flower-pot, called a skull, full of earth, put their heads in it, and
were growing _downwards_, just as the same animal does in our country;
and on coming to one's recollection in the morning in a German
diligence you find yourself surrounded by the same drowsy, idiotical,
glazed, stained, and gummy complement of faces which might have
accompanied you into Carlisle on an autumn morning after a night of
travel in His Majesty's mail coach.'
Berlin impressed Ferrier by its imposing public buildings and general
aspect of prosperity. It had, of course, long before reached a position
of importance under the great Frederick's government, though not the
importance or the size that it afterwards attained. Still, it was the
centre of attraction for all classes throughout Prussia, and possessed
a cultivated society in which the middle-class element was to all
appearances predominant. Ferrier writes of the town: 'Of the inside of
the buildings and what is to be seen there I have nothing yet to say,
but their external aspect is most magnificent. Palaces, churches,
mosque-like structures, spires and domes and towers all standing
together, but with large spaces and fine open drives between, so that
all are seen to the greatest possible advantage, conspire to form a
most glorious city. At this moment a fountain which I can see from my
window is playing in the middle of the square. A _jet d'eau_ indeed!!
It may do very well for a Frenchman to call it that, but we must call
it a perfect volcano of water. A huge column goes hissing up as high as
a steeple, with the speed and force of a rocket, and comes down in
thunder, and little rainbows are flitting about in the showery spray.
It being Sunday, every thing and person is gayer than usual. Bands are
playing and soldiers are parading all through the town; everything,
indeed, is military, and yet little is foppish--a statement which to
English ears will sound like a direct contradiction.'
Our traveller had been given letters to certain Berlin Professors from
young Blackie, afterwards Professor of Greek in Edinburgh University,
who had just translated Goethe's _Faust_ into the English tongue. 'I
went about half an hour ago to call upon a sort of Professor here to
whom I had a letter and a _Faust_ to present from Blackie--found him
ill and confined to bed--was admitted, however, very well received, and
shall call again when I think there is a chance of his being better. I
have still another Professor to call on with a letter and book from
Blackie, and there my acquaintance with the society of Berlin is likely
to terminate.' One other introduction to Ferrier on this expedition to
Germany is mentioned in a note from his aunt, Miss Susan Ferrier, the
only letter to her nephew that has apparently been preserved: whether
or not he availed himself of the offer, history does not record. It
runs as follows:--
'EDINR., _1st August_.
'I could not get a letter to Lord Corehouse's German sister
(Countess Purgstall), as it seems she is in bad health, and not fit
to entertain vagabonds; but I enclose a very kind one from my
friend, Mrs. Erskine, to the ambassadress at Munich, and if you
don't go there you may send it by post, as it will be welcome at
any time on its own account.'
It was, as has been said, only about three years previously to this
visit that Hegel had passed away at Berlin, and one wonders whether
Ferrier first began to interest himself in his writings at this time,
and whether he visited the graveyard near the city gate where Hegel
lies, close to his great predecessor Fichte. One would almost think
this last was so from the exact description given in his short
biography of Hegel; and it is significant that on his return he brought
with him a medallion and a photograph of the great philosopher. This
would seem to indicate that his thoughts were already tending in the
direction of Hegelian metaphysics, but how far this was so we cannot
tell. Certainly the knowledge of the German language acquired by
Ferrier during this visit to the country proved most valuable to him,
and enabled him to study its philosophy at a time when translations
were practically non-existent, and few had learned to read it. That
knowledge must indeed have been tolerably complete, for in 1851, when
Sir Edward Bulwer (afterwards Lord Lytton) was about to republish his
translation of Schiller's Ballads, he corresponded with Ferrier
regarding the accuracy and exactness of his work. He afterwards, in the
preface to the volume, acknowledges the great services Ferrier had
rendered; and in dedicating the book to him, speaks of the debt of
gratitude he owes to one whose 'critical judgment and skill in
detecting the finer shades of meaning in the original' had been so
useful. Ferrier likewise has the credit, accorded him by De Quincey, of
having corrected several errors in _all_ the English translations of
_Faust_ then extant--errors which were not merely literary
inaccuracies, but which also detracted from the vital sense of the
original. As to Lord Lytton, Ferrier must at this time have been
interested in his writings; for in a letter to Miss Wilson, he advises
her to read Bulwer's _Pilgrims of the Rhine_ if she wishes for a
description of the scenery, and speaks of the high esteem with which he
was regarded by the Germans.
It was in 1837 that Ferrier married the young lady with whom he had so
long corresponded. The marriage was in all respects a happy one. Mrs.
Ferrier's gifts and graces, inherited from her father, will not soon be
forgotten, either in St. Andrews where she lived so long, or in
Edinburgh, the later home of her widowhood. One whose spirits were less
gay might have found a husband whose interests were so completely in
his work--and that a work in which she could not share--difficult to
deal with; but she possessed understanding to appreciate that work, as
well as humour, and could accommodate herself to the circumstances in
which she found herself; while he, on his part, entered into the gaiety
on occasion with the best. A friend and student of the St. Andrews'
days writes of Ferrier: 'He married his cousin Margaret, Professor's
Wilson's daughter, and I don't doubt that a shorthand report of their
courtship would have been better worth reading than nine hundred and
ninety-nine out of every thousand courtships, for she had wit as well
as beauty, and he was capable of appreciating both. No more charming
woman have I ever seen or heard making game of mankind in general, and
in particular of pedants and hypocrites. She would even laugh at her
husband on occasion, but it was dangerous for any volunteer to try to
help her in that sport. A finer-looking couple I have never seen.[5]
[5] Another sister married William Edmondstoune Aytoun, the
poet. It was regarding Professor Aytoun's proposal for Miss
Wilson's hand that the following story is told. When the
engagement was being formed, Aytoun somewhat demurred to
interviewing the father of the lady, and she herself
undertook the mission. Presently she returned with a card
pinned upon her breast bearing the satisfactory inscription,
'With the author's compliments'! Aytoun, as is well known,
was extremely plain, and it was of his bust in the
Blackwoods' saloon, a recognisable but idealistic likeness,
that Ferrier remarked, 'I should call that the pursuit of
beauty under difficulties.'
During her infancy Edinburgh had become Mrs. Ferrier's home, though she
made frequent visits to Westmorland, of whose dialect she had a
complete command. The courtship, however, had been for the most part
carried on at the picturesque old house of Gorton, where 'Christopher
North' was temporarily residing, and which, situated as it is
overlooking the lovely glen made immortal by the name of Hawthornden,
in view of Roslin Chapel, and surrounded by old-fashioned walks and
gardens, must have been an ideal spot for a romantic couple like the
Ferriers to roam in. Another friend writes of Wilson's later home at
Elleray: 'In his hospitable house, where the wits of _Blackwood_
gathered at intervals and visited individually in season and out of
season, his daughter saw strange men of genius, such as few young
ladies had the fortune to see, and heard talk such as hardly another
has the fortune to hear. Lockhart, with his caricatures and his
incisive sarcasm, was an intimate of the house. The Ettrick Shepherd,
with his plaid and homely Doric, broke in occasionally, as did also De
Quincey, generally towards midnight, when he used to sit pouring forth
his finely-balanced, graceful sentences far on among the small hours of
the morning. There were students, too, year after year, many of them
not undistinguished, and some of whom had, we doubt not, ideas of their
own regarding the flashing hazel eyes of their eloquent Professor's
eldest daughter.' But her cousin was her choice, though wealth offered
no attraction, and neither side had reason to regret the marriage of
affection.
At the time of his marriage Ferrier had been practising at the Bar,
probably with no great measure of success, seeing that his heart was
not really set upon his work. It was at this period that he first began
to write, and his first contribution to literature took the form of
certain papers contributed to _Blackwood's Magazine_, the subject being
the 'Philosophy of Consciousness.' From that time onwards Ferrier
continued to write on philosophic or literary topics until his death,
and many of these writings were first published in the famous magazine.
Before entering, however, on any consideration of Ferrier's writings
and of the philosophy of the day, it might be worth while to try to
picture to ourselves the social conditions and feelings of the time, in
order that we may get some idea of the influences which surrounded him,
and be assisted in our efforts to understand his outlook.
In the beginning of the nineteenth century Scotland had been ground
down by a strange tyranny--the tyranny of one man as it seemed, which
man was Henry Dundas, first Viscount Melville, who for many long years
ruled our country as few countries have been ruled before. What this
despotism meant it is difficult for us, a century later, to figure to
ourselves. All offices were dependent on his patronage; it was to him
that everyone had to look for whatever post, advancement, or concession
was required. And Dundas, with consummate power and administrative
ability, moulded Scotland to his will, and by his own acts made her
what she was before the world. But all the while, though unperceived, a
new spirit was really dawning; the principles of the Revolution, in
spite of everything, had spread, and all unobserved the time-spirit
made its influence felt below a surface of apparent calm. It laid hold
first of all of the common people--weavers and the like: it roused
these rough, uneducated men to a sense of wrong and the resolution to
seek a remedy. Not much, however, was accomplished. Some futile risings
took place--risings pitiable in their inadequacy--of hard-working
weavers armed with pikes and antiquated muskets. Of course, such rebels
were easily suppressed; the leaders were sentenced to execution or
transportation, as the case might be; but though peace apparently was
restored and public meetings to oppose the Government were rigorously
suppressed, trade and manufactures were arising: Scotland was not
really dead, as she appeared. A new life was dawning: reform was in the
air, and in due time made its presence felt. But the memory of these
times of political oppression, when the franchise was the privilege of
the few, and of the few who were entirely out of sympathy with the most
part of their countrymen or their country's wants, remained with the
people just as did the 'Killing-time' of Covenanting days two centuries
before. Time heals the wounds of a country as of an individual, but the
operation is slow, and it is doubtful whether either period of history
will ever be forgotten. At anyrate, if they are so as this century
closes, they were not in the Scotland known to Ferrier; they were still
a very present memory and one whose influence was keenly felt.
And along with this political struggle yet another struggle was taking
place, no less real though not so evident. The religion of the country
had been as dead as was the politics in the century that was gone--dead
in the sleep of Moderatism and indifferentism. But it, too, had
awakened; the evangelical school arose, liberty of church government
was claimed, a liberty which, when denied it, rent the Established
Church in twain.
In our country it has been characteristic that great movements have
usually begun with those most in touch with its inmost life, the
so-called lower orders of its citizens. The nobles and the kings have
rather followed than taken the lead. In the awakening of the present
century this at anyrate was the case. 'Society,' so called, remained
conservative in its view for long after the people had determined to
advance. Scott, it must be remembered, was a retrogressive influence.
The romanticism of his novels lent a charm to days gone by which might
or might not be deserved; but they also encouraged their readers to
imagine a revival of those days of chivalry as a possibility even now,
when men were crying for their rights, when they had awakened to a
sense of their possessions, and would take nothing in their place. The
real chieftains were no more; they were imitation chieftains only who
were playing at the game, and it was a game the clansmen would not join
in. Few exercises could be more strange than first to read the account
of Scottish life in one of the immortal novels by Scott dealing with
last century, and then to turn to Miss Ferrier or Galt, depicting a
period not so very different. Setting aside all questions of genius,
where comparison would be absurd, it would seem as if a beautiful
enamel had been removed, and a bare reality revealed, somewhat sordid
in comparison. The life was not really sordid,--realism as usual had
overshot its mark,--but the enamel had been somewhat thickly laid, and
might require to be removed, if truth were to be revealed.
So in the higher grades of Edinburgh society the enamel of gentility
has done its best to prejudice us against much true and genuine worth.
It was characterised by a certain conventional unconventionality, a
certain 'preciosity' which brought it near deserving a still stronger
name, and it maintained its right to formulate the canons of criticism
for the kingdom. Edinburgh, it must be recollected, was no 'mean city,'
no ordinary provincial town. It was still esteemed a metropolis. It had
its aristocracy, though mainly of the order of those unable to bear the
greater expense of London life. It had no manufactories to speak of, no
mercantile class to 'vulgarise' it; it possessed a University, and the
law courts of the nation. But above all it had a literary society. In
the beginning of the century it had such men as Henry Mackenzie, Dugald
Stewart, John Playfair, Dr. Gregory, Dr. Thomas Brown, not to speak of
Scott and Jeffrey--a society unrivalled out of London. And in later
days, when these were gone, others rose to fill their places.
Of course, in addition to the movement of the working people, there was
an educated protest against Toryism, and it was made by a party who, to
their credit be it said, risked their prospects of advancement for the
principles of freedom. In their days Toryism, we must recollect, meant
something very different from what it might be supposed to signify in
our own. It meant an attitude of obstruction as regards all change from
established standards of whatever kind; it signified a point of view
which said that grievances should be unredressed unless it was in its
interest to redress them. The new party of opposition included in its
numbers Whig lawyers like Gibson Craig and Henry Erskine, in earlier
days, and Francis Jeffrey and Lord Cockburn later on; a party of
progress was also formed within the Church, and the same within the
precincts of the University. The movement, as became a movement on the
political side largely headed by lawyers, had no tendency to violence;
it was moderate in its policy, and by no means revolutionary--indeed it
may be doubted whether there ever was much tendency to revolt even
amongst those working men who expressed themselves most strongly. The
advance party, however, carried the day, and when Ferrier began to
write, Scotland was in a very different state from that of twenty years
before. The Reform Bill had passed, and men had the moulding of their
country's destiny practically placed within their hands. In the
University, again, Sir William Hamilton, a Whig, had just been
appointed to the Chair of Logic, while Moncreiff, Chalmers, and the
rest, were prominent in the Church. The traditions of literary
Edinburgh at the beginning of the century had been kept up by a circle
amongst whom Lockhart, Wilson, and De Quincey may be mentioned; now
Carlyle, who had left Edinburgh not long before, was coming into
notice, and a new era seemed to be dawning, not so glorious as the
past, but more untrammelled and more free.
How philosophy was affected by the change, and how Ferrier assisted in
its progress, it is our business now to tell; but we must first briefly
sketch the history of Scottish speculation to this date, in order to
show the position in which he found it.