In these desultory chapters we have more than once seen that fame
appeals to posterity; but in the instance of Byron it was contemporary,
for he tells us he "awoke one morning and found himself famous." No
man's errors were ever more closely observed and recorded than his; and
we are still too near the period of his life to forget his foibles and
remember only the productions of his genius. Byron, like Pope, was a
sufferer from physical deformity, and much of the morbid sensibility of
both arose from their common misfortune. Macaulay, speaking of Byron,
says: "He had naturally a generous and feeling heart, but his temper was
wayward and irritable. He had a head which statuaries loved to copy, and
a foot the deformity of which the beggar in the street mimicked.
Distinguished at once by the strength and by the weakness of his
intellect, affectionate yet perverse, a poor lord and a handsome
cripple, he required, if ever man required, the finest and most
judicious training. But capriciously as Nature had dealt with him, the
parent to whom the office of forming his character was intrusted was
more capricious still. She passed from paroxysms of rage to paroxysms of
tenderness. At one time she stiffled him with her caresses; at another
time she insulted his deformity. He came into the world; and the world
treated him as his mother had treated him,--sometimes with fondness,
sometimes with cruelty, never with justice. It indulged him without
discrimination, and punished him without discrimination. He was truly a
spoiled child,--the spoiled child of fortune, the spoiled child of fame,
the spoiled child of society." The author of "Don Juan" was actuated at
times by a strange recklessness, and a desire to seem worse than he
really was. He aped the misanthrope, assumed unfelt remorse, and
affected singularity, in order to court notoriety. However capricious
may have been his temper, he came rightly enough by it, since his mother
was noted for the frenzied violence of her passion, being wholly without
judgment or self-control, and in nearly every respect disqualified for
performing a parent's duty.[141] Byron was also a victim of hypochondria
only in a less degree than Johnson and Cowley; and this is his one
genuine excuse for the excesses into which he sometimes rushed headlong.
No matter in what light we consider him, all must concede the fervor of
his passionate genius; and therein lay his remarkable power, for man is
at his greatest when stimulated by the passions. Enthusiasm is
contagious, and infuses a spirit of emulation; while reason, calm and
forcible, only wins us by the slow process of conviction.
The truest grandeur of our nature is often born of sorrow. Those who
have suffered most have developed the profoundest sympathies and have
sung for us the sweetest notes. It is the heart which is seamed with
scars that compels other hearts. Charles Lamb, at one time himself
confined in an insane asylum, lived to the end of his days with, and in
charge of, an unfortunate sister, who in a fit of madness murdered her
mother,--an experience sufficient to cast, as it did, an awful blight
over his whole life; but it was the occasion in him of an instance of
holy human love and pure self-denial seldom equalled. Poor Mary
Lamb[142] knew when these mental attacks were coming on, and then her
brother and herself, hand in hand, sought the asylum, to the matron of
which he would say, "I have brought Mary again;" and presently, when
the attack had passed, he was at the door of the asylum to receive her
once more and take her kindly home. The domestic tragedy and his
sister's condition caused Lamb to give up all idea of marriage, though
at the time of the sad occurrence he was sincerely attached to a lovely
woman. The court, after Mary's trial, consigned her to her brother's
care. He wrote to his friend Coleridge, "I am wedded to the fortunes of
my sister and my poor old father." The father died not long subsequent,
but Mary survived Charles thirteen years, dying in 1847. With
considerable ability as a versifier, Lamb will not be remembered as a
poet; his fame will rest on his essays and his sagacious criticisms. The
"Essays of Elia" are inimitable, full of the author's personality,
exquisitely delicate, poetical, whimsical, witty, and odd. The only
fault to be reasonably found with them is their brevity. We wish there
were a dozen volumes in place of one. They are the pedestal upon which
the fame of this gentle, charitable, and quaint genius will ever rest.
Lamb's character was amiably eccentric, but always full of
loving-kindness. The pseudonym of "Elia" has become famous, and was
first assumed in the author's contributions to the "London Magazine."
While his lovable disposition and pensive cast of thought tinge all his
productions, there is ever a playfulness lurking just below the surface
which is sure to captivate the most casual reader. During his life Lamb
was looked upon by the world as possessing more oddity than genius; but
now all join in admitting him to be one of the fixed stars of
literature.[143] What a significant fact it is that Lamb was so tenderly
regarded by the galaxy of notable men with whom he associated! He was a
schoolmate of Coleridge and intimate with him for fifty years. Southey,
Hazlitt, Wordsworth, Godwin, De Quincey, Edward Irving, Thomas Hood,
Leigh Hunt, and other men of literary fame were the warm and loving
friends of Charles Lamb.
With all his æsthetic proclivities, "Elia" was of a sensuous nature.
Besides roast pig, he had other favored dishes, not rare and luxurious,
but special, nevertheless. He was particularly fond of brawn, and
considered tripe to be superlatively appetizing when suitably prepared.
He was also a connoisseur in all sorts of drinks; not that he was
extravagant,--on the contrary, he was to a degree self-denying, and even
with all his little generosities and his care of his sister Mary he
managed to leave two thousand pounds, saved out of his always moderate
income, to make that sister comfortable. He wrote to Wordsworth: "God
help me! I am a Christian, an Englishman, a Londoner, a Templar. When I
put off these snug relations and go to the world to come, I shall be
like a crow on the sand." Lamb said that oftentimes absurd images forced
themselves with irresistible power upon his mind,--such, for instance,
as an elephant in a coach office gravely waiting to have his trunk
booked; or a mermaid over a fish-kettle cooking her own tail![144]
Wordsworth--to whom we have already alluded more than once--was at times
distressingly poor, and in such straitened circumstances that he and his
family denied themselves meat for days together. Had it not been for the
admirable influence of his sister Dorothy, who cheered his spirits and
counteracted his morbid tendencies, his mind might have drifted into
something like insanity. His disappointment was great at the comparative
failure of his literary work, which brought him little in the way of
pecuniary return during his life. A fortunate legacy and comparatively
sinecure office, however, finally afforded him humble independence.
It seems gratuitous to refer to the natural weakness of so pure and
good a man as Wordsworth, but we have tried to be impartial in these
pages. Grand and simple as our poet was, he had the element of vanity
snugly stowed away among his attributes, yet ready to betray itself on
occasion. It is related that sometimes when he met a little child he
would stop and ask him to observe his face carefully, so that in after
years the child might be able to say he had seen the great Wordsworth.
"Wordsworth," says Charles Lamb, "one day told me that he considered
Shakespeare greatly overrated. 'There is,' said he, 'an immensity of
trick in all Shakespeare wrote, and people are taken by it. Now, if I
had a mind, I could write exactly like Shakespeare!' So you see," added
Lamb, "it was only the mind that was wanting!" The late James T. Fields,
who was a hearty admirer and personal friend of the poet, said, "Yes,
Wordsworth was vain; but think for a moment what he has produced, and
how much he had in him to be self-conscious of!"
Colton, better known by his _nom de plume_ of "Lacon," is a vivid
illustration of the eccentricities of genius. Though he was a man whose
personal character is entirely unworthy of our respect, yet no one can
deny that he was endowed with marked and original powers. He comes
before us in our day simply as the author of his remarkable Laconics,
full of spontaneous thoughts happily expressed, and which will compare
favorably with the apothegms of Bacon or the terse brevities of
Rochefoucauld. The eccentricities and irregularities of Colton are
almost too extravagant for belief, and certainly will not bear
rehearsal. At one and the same time a clergyman of fair repute and the
secret companion of sporting-men and gamblers, he was always playing a
double part. He was the author of several important pamphlets and some
excellent poetry, and, when abroad, the well-paid correspondent of the
London press. Notwithstanding the wit and consummate wisdom of the
volume which made him famous, it must be admitted that he was incapable
of appreciating what was grand and noble in principle. Deeply in debt,
he fled to Paris to escape the importunities of his creditors, where he
became a confirmed and undisguised gambler. Here at one time he realized
such an extraordinary run of luck as to break a famous bank, becoming
the possessor of nearly thirty thousand pounds. His experience was like
that of nearly every one who becomes suddenly rich in a similar manner.
He lost every penny of his winnings within a few weeks, and retired to
Fontainebleau, where he ended his life by suicide.[145] In future
generations, when his personal career is forgotten, his one remarkable
literary monument will still remain, like the column of Luxor,
imperishable.
It is known to every mathematician that the regular gambler must lose in
the end, even though he may "break the bank" now and then. Even if the
bank is honestly conducted, all the chances are against him. The theory
of probabilities has become almost an exact science. Arago,--the famous
French astronomer and natural philosopher,--when consulted by a
gentleman who was infatuated with the terrible vice of gambling, told
him, within a few francs, how much he had lost the preceding year. "But
I must play," was the answer. "It is true that I find my fortune
diminishing every year, as you have stated; but can you not tell me how,
on a capital of five million francs, I may save enough to give me a
decent burial in the end?" Arago, after learning the gambler's method of
playing, and the sum he risked, told him that he must reduce the amount
of his daily ventures to a certain small number of francs, and that,
according to the law of chances, however cool and calm his playing, he
would lose his five million francs in about fifteen years. Every body of
stockholders in a faro bank can calculate on twenty per cent of their
investment being returned to them yearly.
Could genius enjoy the advantage of being judged by its peers, it would
stand a better chance for contemporary fame; but overshadowed, as it so
often is, by foibles, waywardness, and those passions alike common to
the humble and the exalted, it must pass through the crucible of time to
fit it for sincere homage. Robert Burns, whose struggle with fate began
almost beside the cradle, and whose youth was one ceaseless buffeting
with misfortune, is an illustration in point. His productions are not of
a character to set aside altogether the remembrance of his follies,
though we are all inclined to treat the memory of the Scottish bard with
indulgence and half reverence, while we hasten to acknowledge his great
and unquestioned genius. Burns was sadly addicted to whiskey and
tobacco, which led Byron, as we have already said, to call him "a
strange compound of dirt and deity." The author of "Childe Harold"
forgot the proverb about those who live in glass houses. Burns, from
early youth, was subject to extraordinary fits of dejection, which
amounted to a species of hypochondria, long before convivial society had
inoculated him with the then popular vice of intemperance. He became
finally an incongruous mixture of mirth and melancholy, while poverty
with its attendant ills was seldom from his door. He writes to a friend:
"I have been for some time pining under secret wretchedness; the pang of
disappointment, the sting of pride, and some wandering stabs of remorse
settle on my vitals like vultures when my attention is not called away
by the claims of society or the vagaries of the Muse." Poor, ill-fated
genius![146] By his follies and indulgences he as surely committed
suicide in his thirty-seventh year as did the starving, half-delirious
Chatterton on his bed of straw.
Mrs. Dunlop, an early patroness of Burns, had in her family an old and
favored housekeeper, who did not exactly relish her mistress's attention
to a man of such low estate. In order to overcome her prejudice, her
mistress induced the domestic to read one of Burns's poems, the
"Cotter's Saturday Night." When Mrs. Dunlop inquired her opinion of the
poem, the housekeeper replied with quaint indifference, "Aweel, madam,
that's vera weel." "Is that all you have to say in its favor?" asked the
mistress. "'Deed, madam," she replied, "the like o' you quality may see
a vast in 't; but I was aye used the like o' all that the poet has
written about in my ain father's house, and atweel I dinna ken how he
could hae described it any other gate." When Burns heard of the old
woman's criticism, he remarked that it was one of the highest
compliments he had ever received.
The name of Thoreau suggests itself in this connection. He lived in a
cabin erected by himself on the borders of Walden Pond, a voluntary
hermit, frugal and self-denying, that he might enjoy a studious
retirement. The intimate friend of Emerson and Hawthorne must have had
fine original qualities to commend him. Known at the outset only as an
oddity, he grew finally to be respected and admired for his quaint
genius. He experienced a disappointment in love, which doubtless had
much to do with his social peculiarities.[147] In business and the
affairs of every-day life he was utterly impracticable. He supported
himself during his college course at Cambridge by teaching school, doing
carpentering, and other work. The restrictions of society were
intolerable to him; he never attended church, never paid a tax, and
never voted. He ate no flesh, drank no wine, never used tobacco, and
though a naturalist, used neither trap nor gun. When asked at dinner
what dish he preferred, he answered, "The nearest." "So many negative
superiorities smack somewhat of the prig," says one of his reviewers.
"Time," says Thoreau, in his fanciful way, "is but a stream I go fishing
in. I drink at it, but while I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect
how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away, but eternity remains. I
would drink deeper--fish in the sky, whose bottom is pebbly with stars."
He worshipped Nature in all her forms, and depicted with a loving and
exuberant fancy hills and water, with the myriad life which peopled
them. He wrote several books which are read to-day with more of interest
than when the author was alive.
Genius and inspiration are so nearly allied as to leave no dividing
line, and the sublimity of martyrdom is often added to the column of
fame. Joan of Arc, the most illustrious heroine of history, was born a
poor peasant girl of Lorraine; but at the age of eighteen, impelled by
an exalted enthusiasm, she commanded an army of devoted followers, and
raising the siege of Orleans gave to Charles VII. a crown. At the age of
thirteen she said she received commands from Heaven to go and liberate
France; and with a confidence of Divine support she pursued her mission.
No romancer would dare to imagine or portray so glorious a heroine;
fiction could not equal the actual deeds that this pure and lowly girl
accomplished.[148] That she was the agent of Divine Providence to bring
about a great political object goes without saying; yet this maid of
Domremy was burned at the stake.
Rachel, the child of poverty, the itinerant of the Parisian boulevards,
infused with genius, suddenly became the idol of courts and of princes,
being as devoutly worshipped by the lovers of art on the banks of the
Neva and the Thames as on the shores of her beautiful Seine. How strange
were the vicissitudes of this wonderful artist, this frail child of
genius! An actress of transcendent dramatic power, she leaves us the
souvenir of a splendid star of histrionic art extinguished when it
burned the brightest. One day, when Rachel was thus singing and reciting
on the public street, a benevolent-looking man, with pitying eyes, was
attracted, in passing, by the child's intelligent look, and put a
five-franc piece in her hand. She took the silver with a grateful
courtesy and watched him until he passed out of sight. A citizen who had
seen the generous act said, "That was Victor Hugo;" and the
child-actress remembered the name ever after. But little did the great
poet anticipate what the pale-faced child was destined to become in that
world of art of which he was so distinguished a disciple.
Edwin Forrest, our own famous tragedian, was in Paris in 1836, and was
invited by the manager to see an actress who was to make her début at
one of the theatres on a certain evening. The manager asked him, in the
course of the performance, what he thought of the débutante. Forrest
replied that he feared she would never rise above mediocrity, and added,
"But that Jewish-looking girl, that little bag of bones, with the marble
face and the flaming eyes,--there is demoniacal power in her. If she
lives and does not burn out too soon, she will make a great actress." He
referred to Rachel, then in her fifteenth year. We all know how that
genius developed. Parsimony was a fixed trait of her character; she
could not help it. "Is it any wonder," she once said to a friend, "that
I should be fond of money, considering the suffering I went through in
my youth to earn a few sous?"
It appears as if Nature scattered her seeds of genius to the wind, so
many take root and blossom in sterile places, and also that she
delights to add vigor and glory to her chance productions. Thus Adelina
Patti, the greatest prima donna of her day, was once a barefooted child
in the streets of New York. Kings and queens, spellbound by her glorious
voice, have delighted to honor her; but her domestic life was wrecked at
the moment of her greatest professional triumph. Complete success is
granted to none. Some bitterness is sure to tincture our cup of bliss,
for, after all, it is of earth and not of heaven. Perfection may exist
with angels above, but not among mortals. The life of genius is beset
with extraordinary temptations; the stimulating spur of praise,
flattery, and high homage should be, but rarely is, counterbalanced by
the curb of reason. We have already seen that great genius and true
domestic happiness are seldom found under the same roof. The
extraordinary development of certain faculties argues diminution in
others; and where there are extremes, it is ever difficult to harmonize
the various parts.
Miss Landon, the youthful and tender poetess and novelist, known to the
world by her familiar signature "L. E. L.," coined the treasures of her
brain to support those who were dependent upon her. In one of her
letters she says, "My life, since the age of fifteen years, has been one
incessant struggle with adversity." Her productions can hardly be said
to bear the stamp of high genius, but they enjoyed a certain popularity
and procured the much-needed money. The mystery of her early and
mournful death is only known in heaven. She died from a dose of prussic
acid, in her thirty-sixth year, which was also her bridal year.[149]
The infinitely sweet and touching poems of Mrs. Hemans were the outflow
of a heart yearning for human affection and finding it not. Her domestic
life also proved to be a marked failure. She separated from her husband
after six years of married life, and never saw him again. Her genius was
early developed; her poems were contributed to the London press at the
age of fifteen.[150] She died at the age of forty-one, worn out by
domestic unhappiness and ill health. She has herself said, "There is
strength deep-bedded in our hearts, of which we reck but little till the
shafts of heaven have pierced its frail dwelling. Must not earth be rent
before her gems are found?" "It has been the fashion among youthful
critics of late," says Epes Sargent, "to undervalue her productions; but
not a few of these have a charm, a tenderness, and a spirit which must
make them long dear to the hearts of the many." Her complete works,
containing a tragedy entitled, "The Vespers of Palermo," are contained
in six volumes. We may also recall the sad, sad life of Charlotte
Bronté, the poor curate's daughter, whose orphaned childhood was so
miserable, and whose youth was drudgery as a schoolteacher at sixteen
pounds a year. Under the pressure of extreme ill health and a heart
nearly broken with sorrow, this daughter of genius produced "Jane Eyre,"
a novel of such power, piquancy, and originality as to take the reading
world by storm. She was finally married, but only to die in her bridal
year. The three daughters of Rev. Patrick Bronté were each endowed with
literary genius, which under happier circumstances might have developed
into famous results. Charlotte wrote, as we have said, "Jane Eyre;"
Emily wrote "Wuthering Heights," an almost equally popular novel; and
Anne wrote the "Tenant of Wildfell Hall." The three unitedly published
in 1846 "Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell," the sisters'
respective pseudonyms.[151] The father's income was one hundred and
seventy pounds a year, upon which to support a family of twelve persons.
He was a man of more than ordinary culture and of much poetic talent. A
volume of his poems was published in 1811, entitled "Cottage Poems." He
survived his whole family. Many critics have pronounced "Villette,"
published by Charlotte a couple of years before her death, to be
superior in construction and interest to "Jane Eyre."
It would seem that deep and thoughtful minds, like deep waters, must
have a gloom in them, and that ideal life leads to turbulence of soul.
Nathaniel Hawthorne, endowed by Nature with an acute and subtle
intellect, always suffered more or less from a morbid sensibility. Even
in his youth, like Burns, he was oppressed by fits of deep dejection,
which gave his friends much anxiety. His order of genius was of the
highest; of that there is no doubt. His style is simple, graceful, and
forcible, with a power to awaken intense interest in the characters
which he delineated. The "Scarlet Letter" is perhaps the best known and
most popular of his several productions; and much of the same
half-suppressed, feverish excitement is realized in its perusal as in a
degree characterized Hawthorne himself. His most prominent trait as an
author lay in his originality and power of analysis.[152]
Insanity is often the result of an overtasked sensitive brain wandering
in the realms of fancy. Like a high-mettled horse, it sometimes throws
the rider,--as in the instance of Cowper, Collins, and others already
spoken of in these pages. Charles Fenno Hoffman, the ripe scholar, poet,
and novelist, conceded to be one of the best song-writers we have had
in America, was bereft of reason and died the inmate of an insane
asylum, where the last quarter of his life was passed. While yet a boy,
Hoffman met with an accident so serious as to render necessary the
amputation of one of his legs, and thenceforth he was obliged to go with
a wooden one.
Béranger, like De Foe, was at one period the prime favorite of the
Court, and presently was languishing within the dreary walls of the
Bastile, where he wrote some of his most effective poems. Contemporary
with Béranger was Alfred de Musset, a poet and littérateur of rare
excellence, possessed of a flow of poetical genius characterized by
passion, vivacity, and grace, notwithstanding that a morbid,
misanthropic frame of mind consumed him in secret. His youthful liaison
with George Sand is familiar to us all, and no doubt it left a weird
influence upon his life. When De Musset received money he would squander
it in the most reckless dissipation, then live on bread and onions until
he earned another supply, to be lavished in the same manner. He was the
intimate friend of the Duke of Orleans, Victor Hugo, and other notable
men, but deliberately chose the debasing career of a drunkard, and died
at the premature age of forty-seven, a victim to the demon of alcohol.
The grandmother of Alexandre Dumas the elder was an African negress. He
enjoyed no educational advantages, until while yet a mere boy, actuated
by a Bohemian spirit, which always influenced him more or less, he
wandered away from his native place (Villers-Cotterets, France), and
sought a stranger's home in Paris. Many of the varied productions of
this prolific and sensual novelist bear testimony to his African origin,
in their savage voluptuousness and barbaric taste. Dumas was one of the
greatest plagiarists of modern times, so that it was said by his critics
that he introduced the sweating system into literature. But no
intelligent reader can deny that he was a great genius,[153]--in
evidence of which he possessed the thousand and one conventional
characteristics of the race. At one time he would resort to all manner
of expedients to dodge his creditors and escape arrest for debt, at
another scattering gold with the most lavish and inconsiderate hand.
Unlike Lamartine, he failed entirely in politics, but certainly was for
years the most popular novelist in France. Dumas was frequently in the
receipt of large sums in gold from the many popular books which he
wrote. When this money was received it was placed in a pile upon the
table of his sitting-room, and if appealed to in behalf of a charity, or
asked for aid by an impecunious caller, he sent the parties to _help
themselves_ as long as the pile of napoleons lasted! Such reckless
disregard of reasonable care for money seems almost incredible; but this
story is authenticated by his son, the present popular author and
dramatist, Alexandre Dumas.
The life of Douglas Jerrold is still another example of the mutability
of fortune; at first call-boy in a theatre, then a sailor, and finally a
printer's apprentice, he became at last a famous dramatist, essayist,
wit, and humorist. The anecdote of his first contribution to the press
is perhaps not too familiar to repeat. He was a youthful compositor in a
publishing office, where he ventured to drop anonymously into the
editor's box a contribution consisting of a criticism on "Der
Freischütz." He lay awake that night thinking of his venture, and the
next morning was rendered half frantic with joy when his copy was handed
to him to be put into type by his own hands. Appended to the copy the
editor had written a note, asking the anonymous author for further
contributions. Jerrold became a prominent member of the brilliant
coterie which made "Punch," that daring wag, a great moral and political
power. Many of his best sayings--flashes of wit like those of Wycherley,
Congreve, and Sheridan--rarely found their way into print, being uttered
in small social circles, or in the society of the London clubs, where he
was rather feared for the keenness of his satire, as he was no respecter
of persons. As a dramatist Jerrold is best known by those popular plays,
"The Rent Day" and "Black-Eyed Susan,"[154] the latter being still
considered the best nautical drama on the stage. Good-fellowship, as it
is falsely called, was the bane of Jerrold's life; and though he
realized a most liberal income, he died poor and grievously in debt.
During the last years of his life he was editor of "Lloyd's Weekly
Newspaper," from which he received one thousand pounds per annum,
besides an income of a very handsome amount for other and various
literary work.
Charles Dickens, whose early career was not without its severe
discipline, and who was indisputably one of the greatest literary
geniuses of modern times, certainly shortened his life by free living.
He was extravagantly fond of the pleasures of the table, and a constant
participant in convivial occasions.[155] Undoubtedly his domestic
infelicity was largely attributable to a habit of overstimulating,
besides which, brandy and continuous literary effort are incompatible
with each other. His later works will not compare favorably with his
earlier ones. "Our Mutual Friend" was not worthy of his reputation; and
the half of "Edwin Drood" which was published was not of a character to
make an intelligent reader desire more. At fifty-eight his brain was
failing. Both Dickens and Thackeray were really sacrificed to the Moloch
of conviviality. The latter was not only a remarkable novelist, but is
entitled to distinct fame as a poet. He was a man of noble impulses, and
charitable to a fault. He inherited a small fortune, in the expenditure
of which he was very lavish, at one time giving the impecunious Dr.
Maginn five hundred pounds,--an unfortunate brother author who appealed
to Thackeray when he was in a strait; and no needy man was ever refused
by the author of "Vanity Fair."
There are few objects which if held up against a strong light, will not
betray some defect. A perfect emerald was perhaps never seen, and almost
as rare is a perfect diamond; the magnifying-glass is pretty sure to
detect some flaw in the gem, be it never so small. So the microscope
applied to genius is apt to discover those imperfections of humanity
from which no mortal is entirely exempt. Washington said it was
lamentable that great characters are so seldom without blot.[156] Edgar
A. Poe, whose genius has so lately received public recognition, was left
an orphan at a tender age, thus lacking the moral influence and training
which might have prevented the blight of his after years. His father was
a law-student, and his mother an actress named Elizabeth Arnold. Heaven
had breathed into his soul the fire of a master-spirit, but at the same
time endowed him with a morbid sensitiveness which rendered his
imagination weird and gloomy. He became the victim of strong drink, and
was thereby marked for an early grave, dying, after an erratic career,
in a public hospital. He was an editor, critic, and poet, wielding a
most witty but bitterly sarcastic pen. When penniless and in absolute
want, he wrote to a friend, with a supreme contempt of the very sinews
of war for which he was suffering: "The Romans worshipped their
standard, and the Roman standard happened to be an eagle. Our standard
is only one tenth of an eagle, one dollar, but we make all even by
adoring it with tenfold devotion." Even in boyhood Poe developed a wild,
unruly disposition, being expelled from the University of Virginia, and
afterwards from the West Point Academy. The writer of these pages knew
Poe personally, and employed him as a regular contributor to a paper
which the writer was editing. Poe's literary reputation rests mainly
upon one remarkable poem, "The Raven." Mr. Lowell's portrait of the
author of "The Raven" is both concise and true,--"three fifths of him
genius and two fifths sheer fudge." He was unquestionably a man of
genius, but wrong-headed from very childhood.
We must worship our literary heroes and heroines from afar: indeed, this
will apply with force to all notables; intimacy is pretty sure to
disenchant us. "The love or friendship of such people," says De Quincey,
"rather contracts itself into the narrow circle of individuals. You, if
you are brilliant like themselves, they will hate; you, if you are
dull, they will despise. Gaze, therefore, on the splendor of such idols
as a passing stranger. Look for a moment as one sharing in the idolatry,
but pass on before the splendor has been sullied by human frailty."
Admiration is the offspring of ignorance; even where familiarity does
not breed contempt, it blunts the keenness of our homage, since to those
that know them best, authors quickly come down from their pedestals and
become only men and women. One of Byron's biographers lays it down as a
rule to avoid writers whose works amuse you; for when you see them they
will delight you no more, though Shelley, he admits, was an exception.
Mr. Emerson thought the conditions of literary success almost
destructive of the best social powers. We are told by Lockhart that
Scott could not endure, in London or Edinburgh, the little exclusive
circles of literary society; he craved the company of men of business
and affairs. "It is much better to read authors than to know them," says
Horace Walpole. Speaking of young Mr. Burke, he says (in 1761), that
although a remarkably sensible man, "he has not worn off his authorship
yet, and thinks there is nothing so charming as writers, and to be one.
He will know better one of these days." Even Byron hated authors who
were all author,--"fellows in foolscap uniform turned up with ink." Miss
Mitford, in the ripeness of her experience, wrote that authors "as a
general rule are the most disappointing people in the world;" much
preferring persons who loved letters to those who followed the
profession of authorship. Sir Egerton Brydges, the prolific writer of
sonnets, novels, essays, letters, etc., says: "I have observed that
vulgar readers almost always lose their veneration for the writings of
the genius with whom they have had personal intercourse."
We have spoken several times of the remuneration realized by authors for
their literary productions, and perhaps a few more words upon this
subject may be of interest to the general reader.
In the reigns of William III., Anne, and George I., literature, however
excellent, could not find a sufficient market to fairly requite its
authors. Intelligent, cultured men could not realize remunerative
incomes by their pen; so the political chiefs of those days came forward
and extended official patronage to them in a manner which was often
princely and munificent. Thus Congreve, scarcely yet twenty-one years of
age, was given a place under Government which made him independent for
life. Rowe, poet and dramatist, author of "Tamerlane," was made
under-secretary of state, and finally became poet-laureate, in 1714.
Hughes, the poet and dramatist, also held a lucrative Government office;
he was the author of the "Siege of Damascus," a drama, singular to say,
which was played for the first time on the evening of his death. Ambrose
Phillips, an author of similar character, was made judge of the
prerogative court of Ireland. Locke, the English philosopher,
philanthropist, and voluminous writer, was the recipient of liberal
Government patronage. Newton, it will be remembered, was made Master of
the Royal Mint. Stepney, the poet, of whom Dr. Johnson said, "He is a
very licentious translator, and does not recompense the neglect of his
author by beauties of his own," was honored by various appointments, as
also was Matthew Prior, of whom the same critic heartily approved. Gay
was made Secretary of Legation at five-and-twenty,--he whom we have seen
come up to London and begin life as a mercer's clerk. Montague is
another illustrious example of those geniuses who may be said to have
enjoyed at least a degree of sunshine as well as of shadow. His poem on
the death of Charles II. led to his various appointments and his
earldom. Steele was made Commissioner of Stamps, and Swift came very
near being made a bishop.[157] Addison was appointed Secretary of State,
and Dr. Johnson was the recipient of a pension. The reader can easily
add instances to such as we have enumerated as those most readily
presenting themselves. In our own day excellence in literature is much
more remunerative, and in a legitimate business way. Good books sell,
and authors receive fair royalties thereon; but even among us instances
of official recognition for literary merit are not wanting. We recall in
this connection Bancroft the historian, as Minister to Germany; Lowell
the scholar and poet, Minister to the Court of St. James. Hawthorne,
Irving, Everett, Motley, Bayard Taylor, Howells, and others, have all
been officially recognized in a similar manner.