Veteres revocavit artes.--Horace.
Since I came hither I have heard strange news.--King Lear.
Two days after my long conversation with Tyrrell, I called again
upon that worthy. To my great surprise he had left Cheltenham. I then
strolled to Vincent: I found him lolling on his sofa, surrounded, as
usual, with books and papers.
“Come in, Pelham,” said he, as I hesitated at the threshold--“come in. I
have been delighting myself with Plato all the morning; I scarcely know
what it is that enchants us so much with the ancients. I rather believe,
with Schlegel, that it is that air of perfect repose--the stillness of
a deep soul, which rests over their writings. Whatever would appear
common-place amongst us, has with them I know not what of sublimity and
pathos. Triteness seems the profundity of truth--wildness the daring of
a luxuriant imagination. The fact is, that in spite of every fault, you
see through all the traces of original thought; there is a contemplative
grandeur in their sentiments, which seems to have nothing borrowed
in its meaning or its dress. Take, for instance, this fragment of
Mimnermus, on the shortness of life,--what subject can seem more
tame?--what less striking than the feelings he expresses?--and yet,
throughout every line, there is a melancholy depth and tenderness, which
it is impossible to define. Of all English writers who partake the
most of this spirit of conveying interest and strength to sentiments,
subjects, and language, neither novel in themselves, nor adorned in
their arrangement, I know none that equal Byron; it is indeed the chief
beauty of that extraordinary poet. Examine Childe Harold accurately,
and you will be surprised to discover how very little of real depth or
novelty there often is in the reflections which seem most deep and new.
You are enchained by the vague but powerful beauty of the style; the
strong impress of originality which breathes throughout. Like the oracle
of Dodona, he makes the forest his tablets, and writes his inspirations
upon the leaves of the trees: but the source of that inspiration you
cannot tell; it is neither the truth nor the beauty of his sayings
which you admire, though you fancy that it is: it is the mystery which
accompanies them.”
“Pray,” said I, stretching myself listlessly on the opposite sofa to
Vincent, “do you not imagine that one great cause of this spirit of
which you speak, and which seems to be nothing more than a thoughtful
method of expressing all things, even to trifles, was the great
loneliness to which the ancient poets and philosophers were attached? I
think (though I have not your talent for quoting) that Cicero calls
the consideratio naturae, the pabulum animi; and the mind which, in
solitude, is confined necessarily to a few objects, meditates more
closely upon those it embraces: the habit of this meditation enters
and pervades the system, and whatever afterwards emanates from it
is tinctured with the thoughtful and contemplative colours it has
received.”
“Heus Domine!” cried Vincent: “how long have you learnt to read Cicero,
and talk about the mind?”
“Ah,” said I, “I am perhaps less ignorant than I affect to be: it is now
my object to be a dandy; hereafter I may aspire to be an orator--a wit,
a scholar, or a Vincent. You will see then that there have been many
odd quarters of an hour in my life less unprofitably wasted than you
imagine.”
Vincent rose in a sort of nervous excitement, and then reseating
himself, fixed his dark bright eyes steadfastly upon me for some
moments; his countenance all the while assuming a higher and graver
expression than I had ever before seen it wear.
“Pelham,” said he, at last, “it is for the sake of moments like these,
when your better nature flashes out, that I have sought your society and
your friendship. I, too, am not wholly what I appear: the world may
yet see that Halifax was not the only statesman whom the pursuits of
literature had only formed the better for the labours of business.
Meanwhile, let me pass for the pedant, and the bookworm: like a sturdier
adventurer than myself, ‘I bide my time.’--Pelham--this will be a busy
session! shall you prepare for it?”
“Nay,” answered I, relapsing into my usual tone of languid affectation;
“I shall have too much to do in attending to Stultz, and Nugee, and
Tattersall and Baxter, and a hundred other occupiers of spare time.
Remember, this is my first season in London since my majority.”
Vincent took up the newspaper with evident chagrin; however, he was
too theoretically the man of the world, long to shew his displeasure.
“Parr--Parr--again,” said he; “how they stuff the journals with that
name. God knows, I venerate learning as much as any man; but I respect
it for its uses, and not for itself. However, I will not quarrel with
his reputation--it is but for a day. Literary men, who leave nothing but
their name to posterity, have but a short twilight of posthumous renown.
Apropos, do you know my pun upon Parr and the Major?”
“Not I,” said I, “Majora canamus!”
“Why, Parr and I, and two or three more were dining once at poor
T. M--‘s, the author of ‘The Indian Antiquities.’Major--, a great
traveller, entered into a dispute with Parr about Babylon; the Doctor
got into a violent passion, and poured out such a heap of quotations on
his unfortunate antagonist, that the latter, stunned by the clamour, and
terrified by the Greek, was obliged to succumb. Parr turned triumphantly
to me: ‘What is your opinion, my lord,’ said he; ‘who is in the right?’
“Adversis major--par secundis,” answered I.
“Vincent,” I said, after I had expressed sufficient admiration at his
pun--“Vincent, I begin to be weary of this life; I shall accordingly
pack up my books and myself, and go to Malvern Wells, to live quietly
till I think it time for London. After to-day, you will, therefore, see
me no more.”
“I cannot,” answered Vincent, “contravene so laudable a purpose, however
I may be the loser.” And after a short and desultory conversation, I
left him once more to the tranquil enjoyment of his Plato. That evening
I went to Malvern, and there I remained in a monotonous state of
existence, dividing my time equally between my mind and my body, and
forming myself into that state of contemplative reflection, which was
the object of Vincent’s admiration in the writings of the ancients.
Just when I was on the point of leaving my retreat, I received an
intelligence which most materially affected my future prospects. My
uncle, who had arrived to the sober age of fifty, without any apparent
designs of matrimony, fell suddenly in love with a lady in his immediate
neighbourhood, and married her, after a courtship of three weeks.
“I should not,” said my poor mother, very generously, in a subsequent
letter, “so much have minded his marriage, if the lady had not thought
proper to become in the family way; a thing which I do and always shall
consider a most unwarrantable encroachment on your rights.”
I will confess that, on first hearing this news, I experienced a bitter
pang; but I reasoned it away. I was already under great obligations to
my uncle, and I felt it a very unjust and ungracious assumption on
my part, to affect anger at conduct I had no right to question, or
mortification at the loss of pretensions I had so equivocal a privilege
to form. A man of fifty has, perhaps, a right to consult his own
happiness, almost as much as a man of thirty; and if he attracts by his
choice the ridicule of those whom he has never obliged, it is at least
from those persons he has obliged, that he is to look for countenance
and defence.
Fraught with these ideas, I wrote to my uncle a sincere and warm letter
of congratulation. His answer was, like himself, kind, affectionate, and
generous: it informed me that he had already made over to me the annual
sum of one thousand pounds; and that in case of his having a lineal
heir, he had, moreover, settled upon me, after his death, two thousand
a-year. He ended by assuring me, that his only regret at marrying a lady
who, in all respects, was above all women, calculated to make him happy,
was his unfeigned reluctance to deprive me of a station, which (he was
pleased to say), I not only deserved, but should adorn.
Upon receiving this letter, I was sensibly affected with my uncle’s
kindness; and so far from repining at his choice, I most heartily wished
him every blessing it could afford him, even though an heir to the
titles of Glenmorris were one of them.
I protracted my stay at Malvern some weeks longer than I had intended;
the circumstance which had wrought so great a change in my fortune,
wrought no less powerfully on my character. I became more thoughtfully
and solidly ambitious. Instead of wasting my time in idle regrets at the
station I had lost, I rather resolved to carve out for myself one still
loftier and more universally acknowledged. I determined to exercise, to
their utmost, the little ability and knowledge I possessed; and while
the increase of income, derived from my uncle’s generosity, furnished me
with what was necessary for my luxury, I was resolved that it should not
encourage me in the indulgence of my indolence.
In this mood, and with these intentions, I repaired to the metropolis.
VOLUME IV.