THE MODERN PARSON ADAMS.
It has generally been believed, that the prototype of Parson Adams, as
delineated by Fielding in his Joseph Andrews, was Dr. Young, the author
of the Night Thoughts. The picture has been considered as outrageously
caricatured, and indeed it can hardly be conceived that such intellectual
qualities and attainments could possibly be accompanied by such total
ignorance of society, and such extreme and almost ridiculous simplicity
of mind and manners.
Yet from some detached and irregular memoranda in our manuscript, it
should seem that our Sexagenarian actually met with, and had frequent
and familiar communication with, a character, resembling in many of its
features and distinctions, the admirable portrait of the novelist.
Of his origin, or earlier life, nothing is remembered, nor is it
material. It appears, however, that having been educated at one of the
city public schools, Merchant Taylors’, or St. Paul’s, he removed from
thence to the University. He was nearly cotemporary with Porson, and
being of the same college, and with similar studious propensities, a sort
of intimacy took place between them. Their attainments, however, differed
very materially, both in quality and extent. Porson’s were exercised on
very various ramifications of knowledge; the individual, here alluded
to, confined his investigations, and employed all his talents, on one
object only, the Greek language, in which he was certainly and eminently
skilful. It might be said to him,
Græcum te Albuti quam Romanum atque Sabinum
Municipem Ponti, Titi, Anni, centurio num
Præclarorum hominum, ac primum signiferumque
Maluisti dici.
Soon after his leaving the University, he married, but never was wight
more remarkably unqualified for the superintendence of a family, and the
regulation of a limited income. The consequence may be easily imagined;
and in no long interval, he found himself so overwhelmed with pecuniary
obligations and perplexities, that ruin stared him in the face.
The venerable and excellent Bishop Porteus, estimating his literary
attainments in their due proportion, and perfectly satisfied that his
difficulties arose from no acts of personal indiscretion, or of moral
inaccuracy, but from entire ignorance of the world, and from his mind
being constantly absorbed in his favourite pursuits, gave him preferment.
Two other friends also evinced so much and such successful activity in
his behalf, that he was enabled to weather the storm, and he subsequently
retired to a situation, where he was not exposed to similar perplexities,
and was enabled, without molestation, to pursue the path in which he most
delighted.
It might be added, that the art of memory was not among those which he
most successfully cultivated. Upon some subsequent occasion, he to all
appearance forgot one at least of those friends, and the assistance which
their active kindness enabled them to administer to his necessities.
Perhaps enough has been said, but lest the subject of this notice, if he
survives, should feel his pride wounded on reading this narrative, it is
most willingly added in continuation, that more amiable manners could no
where be found. His mind always appeared, and really was, uncontaminated
by the dissimulation and hypocrisy of modern refinement; and it may be
affirmed, with the small exception above cited, that he was invariably
kind, friendly, and benevolent.
But his ignorance of the world, and of the human character, frequently
subjected him to be imposed upon. He was sincere himself, and
never suspected the deficiency of that quality in others. He was a
conscientious and pious Christian, and did not think it possible that
infidelity could lurk under the specious mask of liberality, candour,
a general taste for literature, a partiality for some of our popular
ecclesiastical writers, and an avowed zeal for moral order.
He would not indeed have exposed himself to the ribaldry and indignity
of a rabid Trulliber, but in the ordinary concerns of life, and in the
barters which necessarily occur in domestic economy, he was unable to
distinguish the genuine from the spurious commodity, and knew no more of
the mysteries of the drawing-room, or the sacred trifles of politeness,
than Slingsby of criticism, or Gabrielli of Greek. Could but these
worthies have seen him enter a room,
Chromatic tortures soon would drive them thence,
Break all their naves, and fritter all their sense.
Whilst, on the other hand, he would not fail to be received with
gratulation and applause by a hundred head of Aristotle’s friends.
All who for Attic phrase in Plato seek,
Or poach in Suidas for unlettered Greek.
This gentleman more than once appeared before the public as an author;
but such a style, at least when he wrote in English, was never
paralleled, except among the Houynhyms! There was much sound learning,
sense, judgment, and knowledge, at the bottom, but so thick a cloud
was suspended over the surface, that it was only here and there, at
intervals, through partial fissures of light, that what was valuable and
useful could be discerned. “It was like the gracious fooling when thou
spakest of the Pigrogromitus, and of the Vapians passing the equinoctial
of Quembus.”
Nobody was surely less qualified to be a biographical writer, for
reasons above stated; he was unable to discern the real character, or to
distinguish between the tinsel and embroidery of the courtier’s polish,
and the real and solid substance and qualities of the man.
There was one other person well known to the Sexagenarian, to whom the
above description will apply in so many particulars, that it is not
impossible but a false application might be made.
That other person was H⸺, a clergyman of Norfolk. He was alike versed
in the depths and intricacies of Aristotelian lore, and even knew the
opinion of Pythagoras about wild fowl; at the same time, he was equally
ignorant of the world, and unacquainted with the forms of polished
society. The style of writing in both, when they appeared as authors,
was alike uncouth, and regardless of the ornaments of composition. But
whilst the one, (that is, the individual first described) was perfectly
unoffending, and never violated, though he might not practise, the forms
and rules of good breeding, the latter was abrupt in his manner, rude and
disputatious in conversation, and exceedingly disgusting in his habits.
He would, without scruple or compunction, offend the delicacy of his
hostess by contaminating the hues of her carpets, the brightness of her
stoves, and the purity of her bed-curtains, by defiling each with the
distillations of tobacco. But he was, nevertheless, a truly good, and
amiable, and profoundly learned man. The few works he published continue,
and always will continue, in high estimation with the learned, for the
sagacity of his remarks, the acuteness of his discrimination, and the
depth of his erudition.
Quicunque fuerit narrandi locus
Dum capiat aurem, et servet propositum suum,
Recommendatur, non auctoris nomine.