Of the jealousy of Genius.--Jealousy often proportioned to the degree of
genius.--A perpetual fever among Authors and Artists.--Instances of its
incredible excess among brothers and benefactors.--Of a peculiar species,
where the fever consumes the sufferer, without its malignancy.
Jealousy, long supposed to be the offspring of little minds, is not,
however, confined to them. In the literary republic, the passion fiercely
rages among the senators as well as among the people. In that curious
self-description which LINNÆUS comprised in a single page, written with
the precision of a naturalist, that great man discovered that his
constitution was liable to be afflicted with jealousy. Literary jealousy
seems often proportioned to the degree of genius, and the shadowy and
equivocal claims of literary honour is the real cause of this terrible
fear; for in cases where the object is more palpable and definite than
intellectual excellence, jealousy does not appear so strongly to affect
the claimant for admiration. The most beautiful woman, in the season of
beauty, is more haughty than jealous; she rarely encounters a rival;
and while her claims exist, who can contend with a fine feature or a
dissolving glance? But a man of genius has no other existence than in the
opinion of the world; a divided empire would obscure him, and a contested
one might prove his annihilation.
The lives of authors and artists exhibit a most painful disease in that
jealousy which is the perpetual fever of their existence. Why does PLATO
never mention XENOPHON, and why does XENOPHON inveigh against PLATO,
studiously collecting every little rumour which may detract from his fame?
They wrote on the same subject! The studied affectation of ARISTOTLE to
differ from the doctrines of his master PLATO while he was following them,
led him into ambiguities and contradictions which have been remarked. The
two fathers of our poetry, CHAUCER and GOWER, suffered their friendship to
be interrupted towards the close of their lives. Chaucer bitterly reflects
on his friend for the indelicacy of some of his tales: "Of all such
_cursed stories_ I say fy!" and GOWER, evidently in return, erased those
verses in praise of his friend which he had inserted in the first copy of
his "Confessio Amantis." Why did CORNEILLE, tottering to the grave, when
RACINE consulted him on his first tragedy, advise the author never to
write another? Why does VOLTAIRE continually detract from the sublimity of
Corneille, the sweetness of Racine, and the fire of Crébillon? Why did
DRYDEN never speak of OTWAY with kindness but when in his grave, then
acknowledging that Otway excelled him in the pathetic? Why did LEIBNITZ
speak slightingly of LOCKE's Essay, and meditate on nothing less than the
complete overthrow of NEWTON'S system? Why, when Boccaccio sent to
PETRARCH a copy of DANTE, declaring that the work was like a first light
which had illuminated his mind, did Petrarch boldly observe that he had
not been anxious to inquire after it, for intending himself to compose in
the vernacular idiom, he had no wish to be considered as a plagiary? and
he only allows Dante's superiority from having written in the vulgar
idiom, which he did not consider an enviable merit. Thus frigidly Petrarch
could behold the solitary Ætna before him, in the "Inferno," while he
shrunk into himself with the painful consciousness of the existence of
another poet, obscuring his own majesty. It is curious to observe Lord
SHAFTESBURY treating with the most acrimonious contempt the great writers
of his own times--Cowley, Dryden, Addison, and Prior. We cannot imagine
that his lordship was so entirely destitute of every feeling of wit and
genius as would appear by this damnatory criticism on all the wit and
genius of his age. It is not, indeed, difficult to comprehend a different
motive for this extravagant censure in the jealousy which even a great
writer often experiences when he comes in contact with his living rivals,
and hardily, if not impudently, practises those arts of critical
detraction to raise a moment's delusion, which can gratify no one but
himself.
The moral sense has often been found too weak to temper the malignancy of
literary jealousy, and has impelled some men of genius to an incredible
excess. A memorable example offers in the history of the two brothers, Dr.
WILLIAM and JOHN HUNTER, both great characters fitted to be rivals; but
Nature, it was imagined, in the tenderness of blood, had placed a bar to
rivalry. John, without any determined pursuit in his youth, was received
by his brother at the height of his celebrity; the doctor initiated him
into his school; they performed their experiments together; and William
Hunter was the first to announce to the world the great genius of his
brother. After this close connexion in all their studies and discoveries,
Dr. William Hunter published his magnificent work--the proud favourite of
his heart, the assertor of his fame. Was it credible that the genius of
the celebrated anatomist, which had been nursed under the wing of his
brother, should turn on that wing to clip it? John Hunter put in his claim
to the chief discovery; it was answered by his brother. The Royal Society,
to whom they appealed, concealed the documents of this unnatural feud. The
blow was felt, and the jealousy of literary honour for ever separated the
brothers--the brothers of genius.
Such, too, was the jealousy which separated AGOSTINO and ANNIBAL CARRACCI,
whom their cousin LUDOVICO for so many years had attempted to unite, and
who, during the time their academy existed, worked together, combining
their separate powers.[A] The learning and the philosophy of Agostino
assisted the invention of the master genius, Annibal; but Annibal was
jealous of the more literary and poetical character of Agostino, and, by
his sarcastic humour, frequently mortified his learned brother. Alike
great artists, when once employed on the same work, Agostino was thought
to have excelled his brother. Annibal, sullen and scornful, immediately
broke with him; and their patron, Cardinal Farnese, was compelled to
separate the brothers. Their fate is striking: Agostino, divided from his
brother Annibal, sunk into dejection and melancholy, and perished by a
premature death, while Annibal closed his days not long after in a state
of distraction. The brothers of Nature and Art could not live together,
and could not live separate.
[Footnote A: See an article on the Carracci in "Curiosities of
Literature." vol. ii.]
The history of artists abounds with instances of jealousy, perhaps more
than that of any other class of men of genius. HUDSON, the master of
REYNOLDS, could not endure the sight of his rising pupil, and would not
suffer him to conclude the term of his apprenticeship; while even the mild
and elegant Reynolds himself became so jealous of WILSON, that he took
every opportunity of depreciating his singular excellence. Stung by the
madness of jealousy, BARRY one day addressing Sir Joshua on his lectures,
burst out, "Such poor flimsy stuff as your discourses!" clenching his fist
in the agony of the convulsion. After the death of the great artist, BARRY
bestowed on him the most ardent eulogium, and deeply grieved over the
past. But the race of genius born too "near the sun" have found their
increased sensibility flame into crimes of a deeper dye--crimes attesting
the treachery and the violence of the professors of an art which, it
appears, in softening the souls of others, does not necessarily mollify
those of the artists themselves. The dreadful story of ANDREA DEL CASTAGNO
seems not doubtful. Having been taught the discovery of painting in oil by
Domenico Venetiano, yet, still envious of the merit of the generous friend
who had confided that great secret to him, Andrea with his own hand
secretly assassinated him, that he might remain without a rival. The
horror of his crime only appeared in his confession on his death-bed.
DOMENICHINO seems to have been poisoned for the preference he obtained
over the Neapolitan artists, which raised them to a man against him, and
reduced him to the necessity of preparing his food With his own hand. On
his last return to Naples, Passeri says, "_Non fu mai più veduto da buon
occhio da quelli Napoletani: e li Pittori lo detestavano perchè egli
era ritornato--mori con qualche sospetto di veleno, e questo non è
inverisimile perchè l'interesso è un perfido tiranno_." So that the
Neapolitans honoured Genius at Naples by poison, which they might have
forgotten had it flourished at Rome. The famous cartoon of the battle
of Pisa, a work of Michael Angelo, which he produced in a glorious
competition with the Homer of painting, Leonardo da Vinci, and in which he
had struck out the idea of a new style, is only known by a print which has
preserved the wonderful composition; for the original, it is said, was cut
into pieces by the mad jealousy of BACCIO BANDINELLI, whose whole life was
made miserable by his consciousness of a superior rival.
In the jealousy of genius, however, there is a peculiar case where the
fever silently consumes the sufferer, without possessing the malignant
character of the disease. Even the gentlest temper declines under its slow
wastings, and this infection may happen among dear friends, whenever a man
of genius loses that self-opinion which animates his solitary labours and
constitutes his happiness. Perhaps when at the height of his class, he
suddenly views himself eclipsed by another genius--and that genius his
friend! This is the jealousy, not of hatred, but of despair. Churchill
observed the feeling, but probably included in it a greater degree of
malignancy than I would now describe.
Envy which turns pale,
And sickens even if a friend prevail.
SWIFT, in that curious poem on his own death, said of POPE that
--He can in one couplet fix
More sense than I can do in six.
The Dean, perhaps, is not quite serious, but probably is in the next
lines--
It gives me such a jealous fit,
I cry "Pox take him and his wit."
If the reader pursue this hint throughout the poem, these compliments to
his friends, always at his own expense, exhibit a singular mixture of the
sensibility and the frankness of true genius, which Swift himself has
honestly confessed.
What poet would not grieve to see
His brother write as well as he?[A]
ADDISON experienced this painful and mixed emotion in his intercourse
with POPE, to whose rising celebrity he soon became too jealously
alive.[B] It was more tenderly, but not less keenly, felt by the Spanish
artist CASTILLO, a man distinguished by every amiable disposition. He was
the great painter of Seville; but when some of his nephew MURILLO'S
paintings were shown to him, he stood in meek astonishmont before them,
and turning away, he exclaimed with a sigh--"_Yà murio Castillo_!"
Castillo is no more! Returning home, the stricken genius relinquished his
pencil, and pined away, in hopelessness. The same occurrence happened to
PIETRO PERUGINO, the master of Raphael, whose general character as a
painter was so entirely eclipsed by his far-renowned scholar; yet, while
his real excellences in the ease of his attitudes and the mild grace of
his female countenances have been passed over, it is probable that
Raphael himself might have caught from them his first feelings of ideal
beauty.
[Footnote A: The plain motive of all these dislikes is still more amusing,
as given in this couplet of the same poem:--
"If with such genius heaven has blest 'em,
Have I not reason to detest 'em."--ED.]
[Footnote B: See article on Pope and Addison in "Quarrels of Authors." ]