As to debate the right of self-defence,
A principle so grafted in the mind,
With nature born, and does like nature bind;
Twisted with reason, and with nature too,
As neither one nor t'other can undo--
which is scarcely a happy specimen of the difficult art of reasoning in
verse. His verse is at best vigorous epigrammatic writing, such as would
now be converted into leading articles, twisted with more or less
violence into rhyme. And yet there is a poetical side to his mind, or at
least a susceptibility to poetical impressions of a certain order. And
as a novelist is on the border-line between poetry and prose, and novels
should be as it were prose saturated with poetry, we may expect to come
in this direction upon the secret of De Foe's power. Although De Foe for
the most part deals with good tangible subjects, which he can weigh and
measure and reduce to moidores and pistoles, the mysterious has a very
strong though peculiar attraction for him. It is indeed that vulgar kind
of mystery which implies nothing of reverential awe. He was urged by a
restless curiosity to get away from this commonplace world, and reduce
the unknown regions beyond to scale and measure. The centre of Africa,
the wilds of Siberia, and even more distinctly the world of spirits, had
wonderful charms for him. Nothing would have given him greater pleasure
than to determine the exact number of the fallen angels and the date of
their calamity. In the 'History of the Devil' he touches, with a
singular kind of humorous gravity, upon several of these questions, and
seems to apologise for his limited information. 'Several things,' he
says, 'have been suggested to set us a-calculating the number of this
frightful throng of devils who, with Satan the master-devil, was thus
cast out of heaven.' He declines the task, though he quotes with a
certain pleasure the result obtained by a grave calculator, who found
that in the first line of Satan's army there were a thousand times a
hundred thousand million devils, and more in the other two. He gives a
kind of arithmetical measure of the decline of the devil's power by
pointing out that 'he who was once equal to the angel who killed eighty
thousand men in one night, is not able now, without a new commission, to
take away the life of one Job.' He is filled with curiosity as to the
proceedings of the first parliament (p--------t as he delicately puts
it) of devils; he regrets that as he was not personally present in that
'black divan'--at least, not that he can remember, for who can account
for his pre-existent state?--he cannot say what happened; but he adds,
'If I had as much personal acquaintance with the devil as would admit
it, and could depend upon the truth of what answer he would give me, the
first question would be, what measures they (the devils) resolved on at
their first assembly?' and the second how they employed the time between
their fall and the creation of the man? Here we see the instinct of the
politician; and we may add that De Foe is thoroughly dissatisfied with
Milton's statements upon this point, though admiring his genius; and
goes so far as to write certain verses intended as a correction of, or
interpolation into, 'Paradise Lost.'
Mr. Ruskin, in comparing Milton's Satan with Dante's, somewhere remarks
that the vagueness of Milton, as compared with the accurate measurements
given by Dante, is so far a proof of less activity of the imaginative
faculty. It is easier to leave the devil's stature uncertain than to say
that he was eighteen feet high. Without disputing the proposition as Mr.
Ruskin puts it, we fancy that he would scarcely take De Foe's poetry as
an improvement in dignity upon Milton's. We may, perhaps, guess at its
merits from this fragment of a speech in prose, addressed to Adam by
Eve: 'What ails the sot?' says the new termagant. 'What are you afraid
of?... Take it, you fool, and eat.... Take it, I say, or I will go and
cut down the tree, and you shall never eat any of it at all; and you
shall still be a fool, and be governed by your wife for ever.' This, and
much more gross buffoonery of the same kind, is apparently intended to
recommend certain sound moral aphorisms to the vulgar; but the cool
arithmetical method by which De Foe investigates the history of the
devil, his anxiety to pick up gossip about him, and the view which he
takes of him as a very acute and unscrupulous politician--though
impartially vindicating him from some of Mr. Milton's aspersions--is
exquisitely characteristic.
If we may measure the imaginative power of great poets by the relative
merits of their conceptions of Satan, we might find a humbler gauge for
inferior capacities in the power of summoning awe-inspiring ghosts. The
difficulty of the feat is extreme. Your ghost, as Bottom would have
said, is a very fearful wild-fowl to bring upon the stage. He must be
handled delicately, or he is spoilt. Scott has a good ghost or two; but
Lord Lytton, almost the only writer who has recently dealt with the
supernatural, draws too freely upon our belief, and creates only
melodramatic spiritual beings, with a strong dash of the vulgarising
element of modern 'spiritualism.' They are scarcely more awful beings
than the terrible creations of the raw-head-and-bloody-bones school of
fiction.
Amongst this school we fear that De Foe must, on the whole, be reckoned.
We have already made acquaintance with Mrs. Veal, who, in her ghostly
condition, talks for an hour and three-quarters with a gossip over a cup
of tea; who, indeed, so far forgets her ghostly condition as to ask for
a cup of the said tea, and only evades the consequences of her blunder
by one of those rather awkward excuses which we all sometimes practise
in society; and who, in short, is the least ethereal spirit that was
ever met with outside a table. De Foe's extraordinary love for
supernatural stories of the gossiping variety found vent in 'A History
of Apparitions,' and his 'System of Magic.' The position which he takes
up is a kind of modified rationalism. He believes that there are genuine
apparitions which personate our dead friends, and give us excellent
pieces of advice on occasion; but he refuses to believe that the spirits
can appear themselves, on account 'of the many strange inconveniences
and ill consequences which would happen if the souls of men and women,
unembodied and departed, were at liberty to visit the earth.' De Foe is
evidently as familiar with the habits of spirits generally as of the
devil. In that case, for example, the feuds of families would never die,
for the injured person would be always coming back to right himself. He
proceeds upon this principle to account for many apparitions, as, for
example, one which appeared in the likeness of a certain J. O. of the
period, and strongly recommended his widow to reduce her expenses. He
won't believe that the Virgin appeared to St. Francis, because all
stories of that kind are mere impostures of the priests; but he thinks
it very likely that he was haunted by the devil, who may have sometimes
taken the Virgin's shape. In the 'History of Witchcraft' De Foe tells us
how, as he was once riding in the country, he met a man on the way to
inquire of a certain wizard. De Foe, according to his account, which may
or may not be intended as authentic, waited the whole of the next day at
a public-house in a country town, in order to hear the result of the
inquiry; and had long conversations, reported in his usual style, with
infinite 'says he's' and 'says I's,' in which he tried to prove that the
wizard was an impostor. This lets us into the secret of many of De Foe's
apparitions. They are the ghosts that frighten villagers as they cross
commons late at night, or that rattle chains and display lights in
haunted houses. Sometimes they have vexed knavish attorneys by
discovering long-hidden deeds. Sometimes they have enticed highwaymen
into dark corners of woods, and there the wretched criminal finds in
their bags (for ghosts of this breed have good substantial luggage)
nothing but a halter and a bit of silver (value exactly 13-1/2_d._) to
pay the hangman. When he turns to the owner, he has vanished.
Occasionally, they are the legends told by some passing traveller from
distant lands--probably genuine superstitions in their origin, but
amplified by tradition into marvellous exactitude of detail, and
garnished with long gossiping conversations. Such a ghost, which, on the
whole, is my favourite, is the mysterious Owke Mouraski. This being,
whether devil or good spirit no man knows, accompanied a traveller for
four years through the steppes of Russia, and across Norway, Turkey, and
various other countries. On the march he was always seen a mile to the
left of the party, keeping parallel with them, in glorious indifference
to roads. He crossed rivers without bridges, and the sea without ships.
Everywhere, in the wild countries, he was known by name and dreaded; for
if he entered a house, some one would die there within a year. Yet he
was good to the traveller, going so far, indeed, on one occasion, as to
lend him a horse, and frequently treating him to good advice. Towards
the end of the journey Owke Mouraski informed his companion that he was
'the inhabitant of an invisible region,' and afterwards became very
familiar with him. The traveller, indeed, would never believe that his
friend was a devil, a scepticism of which De Foe doubtfully approves.
The story, however, must be true, because, as De Foe says, he saw it in
manuscript many years ago; and certainly Owke is of a superior order to
most of the pot-house ghosts.
De Foe, doubtless, had an insatiable appetite for legends of this kind,
talked about them with infinite zest in innumerable gossips, and
probably smoked pipes and consumed ale in abundance during the process.
The ghosts are the substantial creations of the popular fancy, which no
longer nourished itself upon a genuine faith in a more lofty order of
spiritual beings. It is superstition become gross and vulgar before it
disappears for ever. Romance and poetry have pretty well departed from
these ghosts, as from the witches of the period, who are little better
than those who still linger in our country villages and fill corners of
newspapers, headed 'Superstition in the nineteenth century.' In his
novels De Foe's instinct for probability generally enables him to employ
the marvellous moderately, and, therefore, effectively; he is specially
given to dreams; they are generally verified just enough to leave us the
choice of credulity or scepticism, and are in excellent keeping with the
supposed narrator. Roxana tells us how one morning she suddenly sees her
lover's face as though it were a death's-head, and his clothes covered
with blood. In the evening the lover is murdered. One of Moll Flanders'
husbands hears her call him at a distance of many miles--a superstition,
by the way, in which Boswell, if not Johnson, fully believed. De Foe
shows his usual skill in sometimes making the visions or omens fail of a
too close fulfilment, as in the excellent dream where Robinson Crusoe
hears Friday's father tell him of the sailors' attempt to murder the
Spaniards: no part of the dream, as he says, is specifically true,
though it has a general truth; and hence we may, at our choice, suppose
it to have been supernatural, or to be merely a natural result of
Crusoe's anxiety. This region of the marvellous, however, only affects
De Foe's novels in a subordinate degree. The Owke Mouraski suggests
another field in which a lover of the mysterious could then find room
for his imagination. The world still presented a boundless wilderness
of untravelled land. Mapped and explored territory was still a bright
spot surrounded by chaotic darkness, instead of the two being in the
reverse proportions. Geographers might fill up huge tracts by writing
'here is much gold,' or putting 'elephants instead of towns.' De Foe's
gossiping acquaintance, when they were tired of ghosts, could tell of
strange adventures in wild seas, where merchantmen followed a narrow
track, exposed to the assaults of pirates; or of long journeys over
endless steppes, in the days when travelling was travelling indeed; when
distances were reckoned by months, and men might expect to meet
undiscovered tribes and monsters unimagined by natural historians.
Doubtless he had listened greedily to the stories of seafaring men and
merchants from the Gold Coast or the East. 'Captain Singleton,' to omit
'Robinson Crusoe' for the present, shows the form into which these
stories moulded themselves in his mind. Singleton, besides his other
exploits, anticipated Livingstone in crossing Africa from sea to sea. De
Foe's biographers rather unnecessarily admire the marvellous way in
which his imaginary descriptions have been confirmed by later
travellers. And it is true that Singleton found two great lakes, which
may, if we please, be identified with those of recent discoverers. His
other guesses are not surprising. As a specimen of the mode in which he
filled up the unknown space we may mention that he covers the desert
'with a kind of thick moss of a blackish dead colour,' which is not a
very impressive phenomenon. It is in the matter of wild beasts, however,
that he is strongest. Their camp is in one place surrounded by
'innumerable numbers of devilish creatures.' These creatures were as
'thick as a drove of bullocks coming to a fair,' so that they could not
fire without hitting some; in fact, a volley brought down three tigers
and two wolves, besides one creature 'of an ill-gendered kind, between a
tiger and a leopard.' Before long they met an 'ugly, venomous, deformed
kind of a snake or serpent,' which had 'a hellish, ugly, deformed look
and voice;' indeed, they would have recognised in it the being who most
haunted De Foe's imaginary world--the devil--except that they could not
think what business the devil could have where there were no people. The
fauna of this country, besides innumerable lions, tigers, leopards, and
elephants, comprised 'living creatures as big as calves, but not of that
kind,' and creatures between a buffalo and a deer, which resembled
neither; they had no horns, but legs like a cow, with a fine head and
neck, like a deer. The 'ill-gendered' beast is an admirable specimen of
De Foe's workmanship. It shows his moderation under most tempting
circumstances. No dog-headed men, no men with eyes in their breasts, or
feet that serve as umbrellas, will suit him. He must have something new,
and yet probable; and he hits upon a very serviceable animal in this
mixture between a tiger and a leopard. Surely no one could refuse to
honour such a moderate draft upon his imagination. In short, De Foe,
even in the wildest of regions, where his pencil might have full play,
sticks closely to the commonplace, and will not venture beyond the
regions of the easily conceivable.
The final element in which De Foe's curiosity might find a congenial
food consisted of the stories floating about contemporary affairs. He
had talked with men who had fought in the Great Rebellion, or even in
the old German wars. He had himself been out with Monmouth, and taken
part in the fight at Sedgemoor. Doubtless that small experience of
actual warfare gave additional vivacity to his descriptions of battles,
and was useful to him, as Gibbon declares that his service with the
militia was of some assistance in describing armies of a very different
kind. There is a period in history which has a peculiar interest for all
of us. It is that which lies upon the border-land between the past and
present; which has gathered some romance from the lapse of time, and yet
is not so far off but that we have seen some of the actors, and can
distinctly realise the scenes in which they took part. Such to the
present generation is the era of the Revolutionary wars. 'Old men still
creep among us' who lived through that period of peril and excitement,
and yet we are far enough removed from them to fancy that there were
giants in those days. When De Foe wrote his novels the battles of the
great Civil War and the calamities of the Plague were passing through
this phase; and to them we owe two of his most interesting books, the
'Memoirs of a Cavalier' and the 'History of the Plague.'
When such a man spins us a yarn the conditions of its being interesting
are tolerably simple. The first condition obviously is, that the plot
must be a good one, and good in the sense that a representation in
dumb-show must be sufficiently exciting, without the necessity of any
explanation of motives. The novel of sentiment or passion or character
would be altogether beyond his scope. He will accumulate any number of
facts and details; but they must be such as will speak for themselves
without the need of an interpreter. For this reason we do not imagine
that 'Roxana,' 'Moll Flanders,' 'Colonel Jack,' or 'Captain Singleton'
can fairly claim any higher interest than that which belongs to the
ordinary police report, given with infinite fulness and vivacity of
detail. In each of them there are one or two forcible situations. Roxana
pursued by her daughter, Moll Flanders in prison, and Colonel Jack as a
young boy of the streets, are powerful fragments, and well adapted for
his peculiar method. He goes on heaping up little significant facts,
till we are able to realise the situation powerfully, and we may then
supply the sentiment for ourselves. But he never seems to know his own
strength. He gives us at equal length, and with the utmost
plain-speaking, the details of a number of other positions, which are
neither interesting nor edifying. He is decent or coarse, just as he is
dull or amusing, without knowing the difference. The details about the
different connections formed by Roxana and Moll Flanders have no atom of
sentiment, and are about as wearisome as the journal of a specially
heartless lady of the same character would be at the present day. He has
been praised for never gilding objectionable objects, or making vice
attractive. To all appearance, he would have been totally unable to set
about it. He has only one mode of telling a story, and he follows the
thread of his narrative into the back-slums of London, or lodging-houses
of doubtful character, or respectable places of trade, with the same
equanimity, at a good steady jog-trot of narrative. The absence of any
passion or sentiment deprives such places of the one possible source of
interest; and we must confess that two-thirds of each of these novels
are deadly dull; the remainder, though exhibiting specimens of his
genuine power, is not far enough from the commonplace to be specially
attractive. In short, the merit of De Foe's narrative bears a direct
proportion to the intrinsic merit of a plain statement of the facts;
and, in the novels already mentioned, as there is nothing very
surprising, certainly nothing unique, about the story, his treatment
cannot raise it above a very moderate level.
Above these stories comes De Foe's best fragment of fictitious
history.[1] The 'Memoirs of a Cavalier' is a very amusing book, though
it is less fiction than history, interspersed with a few personal
anecdotes. In it there are some exquisite little bits of genuine Defoe.
The Cavalier tells us, with such admirable frankness, that he once left
the army a day or two before a battle, in order to visit some relatives
at Bath, and excuses himself so modestly for his apparent neglect of
military duty, that we cannot refuse to believe in him. A novelist, we
say, would have certainly taken us to the battle, or would, at least,
have given his hero a more heroic excuse. The character, too, of the old
soldier, who has served under Gustavus Adolphus, who is disgusted with
the raw English levies, still more disgusted with the interference of
parsons, and who has a respect for his opponents--especially Sir Thomas
Fairfax--which is compounded partly of English love of fair play, and
partly of the indifference of a professional officer--is better
supported than most of De Foe's personages. An excellent Dugald Dalgetty
touch is his constant anxiety to impress upon the Royalist commanders
the importance of a particular trick which he has learned abroad of
mixing foot soldiers with the cavalry. We must leave him, however, to
say a few words upon the 'History of the Plague,' which seems to come
next in merit to 'Robinson Crusoe.' Here De Foe has to deal with a story
of such intrinsically tragic interest that all his details become
affecting. It needs no commentary to interpret the meaning of the
terrible anecdotes, many of which are doubtless founded on fact. There
is the strange superstitious element brought out by the horror of the
sudden visitation. The supposed writer hesitates as to leaving the
doomed city. He is decided to stay at last by opening the Bible at
random and coming upon the text, 'He shall deliver thee from the snare
of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence.' He watches the comets:
the one which appeared before the Plague was 'of a dull, languid colour,
and its motion heavy, solemn, and slow;' the other, which preceded the
Great Fire, was 'bright and sparkling, and its motion swift and
furious.' Old women, he says, believed in them, especially 'the
hypochondriac part of the other sex,' who might, he thinks, be called
old women too. Still he half-believes himself, especially when the
second appears. He does not believe that the breath of the
plague-stricken upon a glass would leave shapes of 'dragons, snakes, and
devils, horrible to behold;' but he does believe that if they breathed
on a bird they would kill it, or 'at least make its eggs rotten.'
However, he admits that no experiments were tried. Then we have the
hideous, and sometimes horribly grotesque, incidents. There is the poor
naked creature, who runs up and down, exclaiming continually, 'Oh, the
great and the dreadful God!' but would say nothing else, and speak to no
one. There is the woman who suddenly opens a window and 'calls out,
"Death, death, death!" in a most inimitable tone, which struck me with
horror and chillness in the very blood.' There is the man who, with
death in his face, opens the door to a young apprentice sent to ask him
for money: 'Very well, child,' says the living ghost; 'go to Cripplegate
Church, and bid them ring the bell for me;' and with those words shuts
the door, goes upstairs, and dies. Then we have the horrors of the
dead-cart, and the unlucky piper who was carried off by mistake. De Foe,
with his usual ingenuity, corrects the inaccurate versions of the
story, and says that the piper was not blind, but only old and silly;
and that he does not believe that, as 'the story goes,' he set up his
pipes while in the cart. After this we cannot refuse to admit that he
was really carried off and all but buried. Another device for cheating
us into acceptance of his story is the ingenious way in which he
imitates the occasional lapses of memory of a genuine narrator, and
admits that he does not precisely recollect certain details; and still
better is the conscientious eagerness with which he distinguishes
between the occurrences of which he was an eye-witness and those which
he only knew by hearsay.