things also. There is no one of the many literary works produced in the
eighteenth century more thoroughly characteristic of it than Gibbon’s
history. The special characteristic of that age is its clinging to the
definite and palpable; it had a taste beyond everything for what is
called solid information. In literature the period may be defined as
that in which authors had ceased to write for students, and had not
begun to write for women. In the present day, no one can take up any
book intended for general circulation, without clearly seeing that the
writer supposes most of his readers will be ladies or young men; and
that in proportion to his judgment, he is attending to their taste.
Two or three hundred years ago books were written for professed and
systematic students,—the class the fellows of colleges were designed to
be,—who used to go on studying them all their lives. Between these there
was a time in which the more marked class of literary consumers were
strong-headed, practical men. Education had not become so general, or
so feminine, as to make the present style—what is called the ‘brilliant
style’—at all necessary; but there was enough culture to make the demand
of common diffused persons more effectual than that of special and
secluded scholars. A book-buying public had arisen of sensible men, who
would not endure the awful folio style in which the schoolmen wrote. From
peculiar causes, too, the business of that age was perhaps more free from
the hurry and distraction which disable so many of our practical men
now from reading. You accordingly see in the books of the last century
what is called a masculine tone; a firm, strong, perspicuous narration
of matter of fact, a plain argument, a contempt for everything which
distinct definite people cannot entirely and thoroughly comprehend. There
is no more solid book in the world than Gibbon’s history. Only consider
the chronology. It begins before the year one and goes down to the year
1453, and is a schedule or series of schedules of important events during
that time. Scarcely any fact deeply affecting European civilisation is
wholly passed over, and the great majority of facts are elaborately
recounted. Laws, dynasties, churches, barbarians, appear and disappear.
Everything changes; the old world—the classical civilisation of form and
definition—passes away, a new world of free spirit and inward growth
emerges; between the two lies a mixed weltering interval of trouble and
confusion, when everybody hates everybody, and the historical student
leads a life of skirmishes, is oppressed with broils and feuds. All
through this long period Gibbon’s history goes with steady consistent
pace; like a Roman legion through a troubled country—_hœret pede pes_;
up hill and down hill, through marsh and thicket, through Goth or
Parthian—the firm defined array passes forward—a type of order, and an
emblem of civilisation. Whatever may be the defects of Gibbon’s history,
none can deny him a proud precision and a style in marching order.
Another characteristic of the eighteenth century is its taste for
dignified pageantry. What an existence was that of Versailles! How
gravely admirable to see the _grand monarque_ shaved, and dressed, and
powdered; to look on and watch a great man carefully amusing himself
with dreary trifles. Or do we not even now possess an invention of that
age—the great eighteenth-century footman, still in the costume of his
era, with dignity and powder, vast calves and noble mien? What a world it
must have been when all men looked like that! Go and gaze with rapture at
the footboard of a carriage, and say, Who would not obey a premier with
such an air? Grave, tranquil, decorous pageantry is a part, as it were,
of the essence of the last age. There is nothing more characteristic of
Gibbon. A kind of pomp pervades him. He is never out of livery. He ever
selects for narration those themes which look most like a levee: grave
chamberlains seem to stand throughout; life is a vast ceremony, the
historian at once the dignitary and the scribe.
The very language of Gibbon shows these qualities. Its majestic march
has been the admiration—its rather pompous cadence the sport of all
perusers. It has the greatest merit of an historical style: it is always
going on; you feel no doubt of its continuing in motion. Many narrators
of the reflective class, Sir Archibald Alison for example, fail in
this: your constant feeling is, ‘Ah! he has pulled up; he is going to
be profound; he never will go on again.’ Gibbon’s reflections connect
the events; they are not sermons between them. But, notwithstanding, the
manner of the Decline and Fall is the last which should be recommended
for strict imitation. It is not a style in which you can tell the truth.
A monotonous writer is suited only to monotonous matter. Truth is of
various kinds—grave, solemn, dignified, petty, low, ordinary; and an
historian who has to tell the truth must be able to tell what is vulgar
as well as what is great, what is little as well as what is amazing.
Gibbon is at fault here. He _cannot_ mention Asia _Minor_. The petty
order of sublunary matters; the common gross existence of ordinary
people; the necessary littlenesses of necessary life, are little suited
to his sublime narrative. Men on the _Times_ feel this acutely; it is
most difficult at first to say many things in the huge imperial manner.
And after all you cannot tell everything. ‘How, sir,’ asked a reviewer
of Sydney Smith’s life, ‘do you say a “good fellow” in print?’ ‘Mr. ——,’
replied the editor, ‘you should not say it at all.’ Gibbon was aware of
this rule; he omits what does not suit him; and the consequence is, that
though he has selected the most various of historical topics, he scarcely
gives you an idea of variety. The ages change, but the varnish of the
narration is the same.
It is not unconnected with this fault that Gibbon gives us but an
indifferent description of individual character. People seem a good deal
alike. The cautious scepticism of his cold intellect, which disinclined
him to every extreme, depreciates great virtues and extenuates great
vices; and we are left with a tame neutral character, capable of nothing
extraordinary,—hateful, as the saying is, ‘both to God and to the enemies
of God.’
A great point in favour of Gibbon is the existence of his history. Some
great historians seem likely to fail here. A good judge was asked which
he preferred, Macaulay’s _History of England_ or Lord Mahon’s. ‘Why,’ he
replied, ‘you observe Lord Mahon has written his history; and by what
I see Macaulay’s will be written not only for, but _among_ posterity.’
Practical people have little idea of the practical ability required to
write a large book, and especially a large history. Long before you get
to the pen, there is an immensity of pure business; heaps of material
are strewn everywhere; but they lie in disorder, unread, uncatalogued,
unknown. It seems a dreary waste of life to be analysing, indexing,
extracting works and passages, in which one per cent. of the contents are
interesting, and not half of that percentage will after all appear in the
flowing narrative. As an accountant takes up a bankrupt’s books filled
with confused statements of ephemeral events, the disorderly record of
unprofitable speculations, and charges this to that head, and that to
this,—estimates earnings, specifies expenses, demonstrates failures;
so the great narrator, going over the scattered annalists of extinct
ages, groups and divides, notes and combines, until from a crude mass of
darkened fragments there emerges a clear narrative, a concise account of
the result and upshot of the whole. In this art Gibbon was a master. The
laborious research of German scholarship, the keen eye of theological
zeal, a steady criticism of eighty years, have found few faults of
detail. The account has been worked right, the proper authorities
consulted, an accurate judgment formed, the most telling incidents
selected. Perhaps experience shows that there is something English
in this talent. The Germans are more elaborate in single monographs;
but they seem to want the business-ability to work out a complicated
narrative, to combine a long whole. The French are neat enough, and their
style is very quick; but then it is difficult to believe their facts;
the account on its face seems too plain, and no true Parisian ever was
an antiquary. The great classical histories published in this country
in our own time show that the talent is by no means extinct; and they
likewise show, what is also evident, that this kind of composition is
easier with respect to ancient than with respect to modern times. The
barbarians burned the books; and though all the historians abuse them for
it, it is quite evident that in their hearts they are greatly rejoiced.
If the books had existed, they would have had to read them. Macaulay has
to peruse every book printed with long ſs; and it is no use after all;
somebody will find some stupid MS., an old account-book of an ‘ingenious
gentleman,’ and with five entries therein destroy a whole hypothesis. But
Gibbon was exempt from this; he could count the books the efficient Goths
bequeathed; and when he had mastered them he might pause. Still, it was
no light matter, as any one who looks at the books—awful folios in the
grave Bodleian—will most certainly credit and believe. And he did it all
himself; he never showed his book to any friend, or asked any one to help
him in the accumulating work, not even in the correction of the press.
‘Not a sheet,’ he says, ‘has been seen by any human eyes, excepting those
of the author and printer; the faults and the merits are exclusively my
own.’ And he wrote most of it with one pen, which must certainly have
grown erudite towards the end.
The nature of his authorities clearly shows what the nature of Gibbon’s
work is. History may be roughly divided into universal and particular;
the first being the narrative of events affecting the whole human race,
at least the main historical nations, the narrative of whose fortunes is
the story of civilisation; and the latter being the relation of events
relating to one or a few particular nations only. Universal history, it
is evident, comprises great areas of space and long periods of time; you
cannot have a series of events visibly operating on all great nations
without time for their gradual operation, and without tracking them
in succession through the various regions of their power. There is no
instantaneous transmission in historical causation; a long interval
is required for universal effects. It follows, that universal history
necessarily partakes of the character of a summary. You cannot recount
the cumbrous annals of long epochs without condensation, selection,
and omission; the narrative, when shortened within the needful limits,
becomes concise and general. What it gains in time, according to the
mechanical phrase, it loses in power. The particular history, confined
within narrow limits, can show us the whole contents of these limits,
explain its features of human interest, recount in graphic detail all
its interesting transactions, touch the human heart with the power of
passion, instruct the mind with patient instances of accurate wisdom. The
universal is confined to a dry enumeration of superficial transactions;
no action can have all its details; the canvas is so crowded that no
figure has room to display itself effectively. From the nature of the
subject, Gibbons history is of the latter class; the sweep of the
narrative is so wide; the decline and fall of the Roman Empire being in
some sense the most universal event which has ever happened,—being, that
is, the historical incident which has most affected all civilised men,
and the very existence and form of civilisation itself,—it is evident
that we must look rather for a comprehensive generality than a telling
minuteness of delineation. The history of a thousand years does not
admit the pictorial detail which a Scott or a Macaulay can accumulate on
the history of a hundred. Gibbon has done his best to avoid the dryness
natural to such an attempt. He inserts as much detail as his limits
will permit; selects for more full description striking people and
striking transactions; brings together at a single view all that relates
to single topics; above all, by a regular advance of narration, never
ceases to imply the regular progress of events and the steady course of
time. None can deny the magnitude of such an effort. After all, however,
these are merits of what is technically termed composition, and are
analogous to those excellences in painting or sculpture that are more
respected by artists than appreciated by the public at large. The fame
of Gibbon is highest among writers; those especially who have studied
for years particular periods included in his theme (and how many those
are; for in the East and West he has set his mark on all that is great
for ten centuries!) acutely feel and admiringly observe how difficult
it would be to say so much, and leave so little untouched; to compress
so many telling points; to present in so few words so apt and embracing
a narrative of the whole. But the mere unsophisticated reader scarcely
appreciates this; he is rather awed than delighted; or rather, perhaps,
he appreciates it for a little while, then is tired by the roll and
glare; then, on any chance—the creaking of an organ, or the stirring of
a mouse,—in time of temptation he falls away. It has been said, the way
to answer all objections to Milton is to take down the book and read him;
the way to reverence Gibbon is not to read him at all, but look at him,
from outside, in the bookcase, and think how much there is within; what
a course of events, what a muster-roll of names, what a steady solemn
sound! You will not like to take the book down; but you will think how
much you could be delighted if you would.
It may be well, though it can be only in the most cursory manner, to
examine the respective treatment of the various elements in this vast
whole. The history of the Decline and Fall may be roughly and imperfectly
divided into the picture of the Roman Empire—the narrative of barbarian
incursions—the story of Constantinople: and some few words may be hastily
said on each.
The picture—for so, from its apparent stability when contrasted with the
fluctuating character of the later period, we may call it—which Gibbon
has drawn of the united empire has immense merit. The organisation of
the imperial system is admirably dwelt on; the manner in which the old
republican institutions were apparently retained, but really altered,
is compendiously explained; the mode in which the imperial will was
transmitted to and carried out in remote provinces is distinctly
displayed. But though the mechanism is admirably delineated, the
dynamical principle, the original impulse, is not made clear. You never
feel you are reading about the Romans. Yet no one denies their character
to be most marked. Poets and orators have striven for the expression of
it.
Macaulay has been similarly criticised; it has been said, that
notwithstanding his great dramatic power, and wonderful felicity in the
selection of events on which to exert it, he yet never makes us feel
that we are reading about Englishmen. The coarse clay of our English
nature _cannot_ be represented in so fine a style. In the same way, and
to a much greater extent (for this is perhaps an unthankful criticism,
if we compare Macaulay’s description of any body with that of any other
historian), Gibbon is chargeable with neither expressing nor feeling
the essence of the people concerning whom he is writing. There was, in
truth, in the Roman people a warlike fanaticism, a puritanical essence,
an interior, latent, restrained, enthusiastic religion, which was utterly
alien to the cold scepticism of the narrator. Of course he was conscious
of it. He indistinctly felt that at least there was something he did not
like; but he could not realise or sympathise with it without a change
of heart and nature. The old Pagan has a sympathy with the religion of
enthusiasm far above the reach of the modern Epicurean.
It may indeed be said, on behalf of Gibbon, that the old Roman character
was in its decay, and that only such slight traces of it were remaining
in the age of Augustus and the Antonines that it is no particular defect
in him to leave it unnoticed. Yet, though the intensity of its nobler
peculiarities was on the wane, many a vestige would perhaps have been
apparent to so learned an eye, if his temperament and disposition had
been prone to seize upon and search for them. Nor is there any adequate
appreciation of the compensating element, of the force which really held
society together, of the fresh air of the Illyrian hills, of that army
which, evermore recruited from northern and rugged populations, doubtless
brought into the very centre of a degraded society the healthy simplicity
of a vital, if barbarous religion.
It is no wonder that such a mind should have looked with displeasure on
primitive Christianity. The whole of his treatment of that topic has
been discussed by many pens, and three generations of ecclesiastical
scholars have illustrated it with their emendations. Yet, if we turn
over this, the latest and most elaborate edition, containing all the
important criticisms of Milman and of Guizot, we shall be surprised to
find how few instances of definite exact error such a scrutiny has been
able to find out. As Paley, with his strong sagacity, at once remarked,
the subtle error rather lies hid in the sinuous folds than is directly
apparent on the surface of the polished style. Who, said the shrewd
archdeacon, can refute a sneer? And yet even this is scarcely the exact
truth. The objection of Gibbon is, in fact, an objection rather to
religion than to Christianity; as has been said, he did not appreciate,
and could not describe, the most inward form of pagan piety; he objected
to Christianity because it was the intensest of religions. We do not mean
by this to charge Gibbon with any denial, any overt distinct disbelief
in the existence of a supernatural Being. This would be very unjust; his
cold composed mind had nothing in common with the Jacobinical outbreak
of the next generation. He was no doubt a theist after the fashion of
natural theology; nor was he devoid of more than scientific feeling. All
constituted authorities struck him with emotion, all ancient ones with
awe. If the Roman Empire had descended to his time, how much he would
have reverenced it! He had doubtless a great respect for the ‘First
Cause;’ it had many titles to approbation; ‘it was not conspicuous,’
he would have said, ‘but it was potent.’ A sensitive decorum revolted
from the jar of atheistic disputation. We have already described him
more than enough. A sensible middle-aged man in political life; a
bachelor, not himself gay, but living with gay men; equable and secular;
cautious in his habits, tolerant in his creed, as Porson said, ‘never
failing in natural feeling, except when women were to be ravished and
Christians to be martyred.’ His writings are in character. The essence
of the far-famed fifteenth and sixteenth chapters is, in truth, but a
description of unworldly events in the tone of this world, of awful facts
in unmoved voice, of truths of the heart in the language of the eyes. The
wary sceptic has not even committed himself to definite doubts. These
celebrated chapters were in the first manuscript much longer, and were
gradually reduced to their present size by excision and compression. Who
can doubt that in their first form they were a clear, or comparatively
clear, expression of exact opinions on the Christian history, and that
it was by a subsequent and elaborate process that they were reduced to
their present and insidious obscurity? The toil has been effectual.
‘Divest,’ says Dean Milman of the introduction to the fifteenth chapter,
‘this whole passage of the latent sarcasm betrayed by the whole of the
subsequent dissertation, and it might commence a Christian history,
written in the most Christian spirit of candour.’
It is not for us here to go into any disquisition as to the comparative
influence of the five earthly causes, to whose secondary operation the
specious historian ascribes the progress of Christianity. Weariness
and disinclination forbid. There can be no question that the polity of
the Church, and the zeal of the converts, and other such things, did
most materially conduce to the progress of the Gospel. But few will now
attribute to these much of the effect. The real cause is the heaving of
the mind after the truth. Troubled with the perplexities of time, weary
with the vexation of ages, the spiritual faculty of man turns to the
truth as the child turns to its mother. The thirst of the soul was to
be satisfied, the deep torture of the spirit to have rest. There was an
appeal to those
‘High instincts, before which our mortal nature
Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised.’
The mind of man has an appetite for the truth.
‘Hence, in a season of calm weather,
Though inland far we be,
Our souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither,—
Can in a moment travel thither,
And see the children sport upon the shore,
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.’
All this was not exactly in Gibbon’s way, and he does not seem to have
been able to conceive that it was in any one else’s. Why his chapters
had given offence he could hardly make out. It actually seems that he
hardly thought that other people believed more than he did. ‘We may
be well assured,’ says he, of a sceptic of antiquity, ‘that a writer
conversant with the world would never have ventured to expose the
gods of his country to public ridicule, had they not been already the
objects of secret contempt among the polished and enlightened orders of
society.’ ‘Had I,’ he says of himself, ‘believed that the majority of
English readers were so fondly attached even to the name and shadow of
Christianity, had I foreseen that the pious, the timid, and the prudent
would feel, or would affect to feel, with such exquisite sensibility,—I
might perhaps have softened the two invidious chapters, which would
create many enemies and conciliate few friends.’ The state of belief
at that time is a very large subject; but it is probable that in the
cultivated cosmopolitan classes the continental scepticism was very rife;
that among the hard-headed classes the rough spirit of English Deism had
made progress. Though the mass of the people doubtless believed much as
they now believe, yet the entire upper class was lazy and corrupt, and
there is truth in the picture of the modern divine: ‘The thermometer of
the Church of England sunk to its lowest point in the first thirty years
of the reign of George III.... In their preaching, nineteen clergymen out
of twenty carefully abstained from dwelling upon Christian doctrines.
Such topics exposed the preacher to the charge of fanaticism. Even the
calm and sober Crabbe, who certainly never erred from excess of zeal, was
stigmatised in those days as a methodist, because he introduced into his
sermons the notion of future reward and punishment. An orthodox clergyman
(they said) should be content to show his people the worldly advantage
of good conduct, and to leave heaven and hell to the ranters. Nor can we
wonder that such should have been the notions of country parsons, when,
even by those who passed for the supreme arbiters of orthodoxy and
taste, the vapid rhetoric of Blair was thought the highest standard of
Christian exhortation.’ It is among the excuses for Gibbon that he lived
in such a world.