Curiosities of Literature Volume I Part 54

It was the mode with English and French writers to dishonour the Germans with the epithets of heavy, dull, and phlegmatic compilers, without taste, spirit, or genius; genuine descendants of the ancient Boeotians,

Cra.s.soque sub aeere nati.

Many imaginative and many philosophical performances have lately shown that this censure has now become unjust; and much more forcibly answers the sarcastic question of Bohours than the thick quarto of Kramer.

Churchill finely says of genius that it is independent of situation,

And may hereafter even in HOLLAND rise.

Vondel, whom, as Marchand observes, the Dutch regard as their aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, had a strange defective taste; the poet himself knew none of these originals, but he wrote on patriotic subjects, the sure way to obtain popularity; many of his tragedies are also drawn from the Scriptures; all badly chosen and unhappily executed.

In his _Deliverance of the Children of Israel_, one of his princ.i.p.al characters is the _Divinity_! In his _Jerusalem Destroyed_ we are disgusted with a tedious oration by the angel Gabriel, who proves theologically, and his proofs extend through nine closely printed pages in quarto, that this destruction has been predicted by the prophets; and, in the _Lucifer_ of the same author, the subject is grossly scandalised by this haughty spirit becoming stupidly in love with Eve, and it is for her he causes the rebellion of the evil angels, and the fall of our first parents. Poor Vondel kept a hosier's shop, which he left to the care of his wife, while he indulged his poetical genius.

His stocking-shop failed, and his poems produced him more chagrin than glory; for in Holland, even a patriotic poet, if a bankrupt, would, no doubt, be accounted by his fellow-citizens as a madman. Vondel had no other master but his genius, which, with his uncongenial situation, occasioned all his errors.

Another Dutch poet is even less tolerable. Having written a long rhapsody concerning Pyramus and Thisbe, he concludes it by a ridiculous parallel between the death of these unfortunate victims of love, and the pa.s.sion of Jesus Christ. He says:--

Om t'concluderem van onsen begrypt, Dees Historie moraliserende, Is in den verstande wel accorderende, By der Pa.s.sie van Christus gebenedyt.

And upon this, after having turned Pyramus into the Son of G.o.d, and Thisbe into the Christian soul, he proceeds with a number of comparisons; the latter always more impertinent than the former.

I believe it is well known that the actors on the Dutch theatre are generally tradesmen, who quit their ap.r.o.ns at the hour of public representation. This was the fact when I was in Holland more than forty years ago. Their comedies are offensive by the grossness of their buffooneries. One of their comic incidents was a miller appearing in distress for want of wind to turn his mill; he had recourse to the novel scheme of placing his back against it, and by certain imitative sounds behind the scenes the mill is soon set a-going. It is hard to rival such a depravity of taste.

I saw two of their most celebrated tragedies. The one was Gysbert Van Amstel, by Vondel; that is Gysbrecht of Amsterdam, a warrior, who in the civil wars preserved this city by his heroism. It is a patriotic historical play, and never fails to crowd the theatre towards Christmas, when it is usually performed successively. One of the acts concludes with the scene of a convent; the sound of warlike instruments is heard; the abbey is stormed; the nuns and fathers are slaughtered; with the aid of "blunderbuss and thunder," every Dutchman appears sensible of the pathos of the poet. But it does not here conclude. After this terrible slaughter, the conquerors and the vanquished remain for _ten minutes_ on the stage, silent and motionless, in the att.i.tudes in which the groups happened to fall! and this pantomimic pathos commands loud bursts of applause.[111]

The other was the Ahasuerus of Schubart, or the Fall of Haman. In the triumphal entry the Batavian Mordecai was mounted on a genuine Flanders mare, that, fortunately, quietly received _her_ applause with a lumpish majesty resembling her rider. I have seen an English a.s.s once introduced on our stage which did not act with this decorum. Our late actors have frequently been beasts;--a Dutch taste![112]

Some few specimens of the best Dutch poetry which we have had, yield no evidence in favour of the national poetical taste. The Dutch poet Katz has a poem on the "Games of Children," where all the games are moralised; I suspect the taste of the poet as well as his subject is puerile. When a nation has produced no works above mediocrity, with them a certain mediocrity is excellence, and their masterpieces, with a people who have made a greater progress in refinement, can never be accepted as the works of a master.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 111: The Dutch are not, however, to be entirely blamed for repulsive scenes on the stage. Shakspeare's t.i.tus Andronicus, and many of the dramas of our Elizabethan writers, exhibit cruelties very repulsive to modern ideas. The French stage has occasionally exhibited in modern times scenes that have been afterwards condemned by the censors; and in Italy the "people's theatre" occasionally panders to popular tastes by execution scenes, where the criminal is merely taken off the stage; the blow struck on a wooden block, to give reality to the action; and the executioner re-enters flouris.h.i.+ng a b.l.o.o.d.y axe.]

[Footnote 112: Ned Shuter was the comedian who first introduced a donkey on the stage. Seated on the beast he delivered a prologue written on the occasion of his benefit. Sometimes the donkey wore a great tie-wig.

Animals educated to play certain parts are a later invention. Horses, dogs, and elephants have been thus trained in the present century, and plays written expressly to show their proficiency.]

THE PRODUCTIONS OF THE MIND NOT SEIZABLE BY CREDITORS.

When Crebillon, the French tragic poet, published his Catiline, it was attended with an honour to literature, which though it is probably forgotten, for it was only registered, I think, as the news of the day, it becomes one zealous in the cause of literature to preserve. I give the circ.u.mstance, the pet.i.tion, and the decree.

At the time Catiline was given to the public, the creditors of the poet had the cruelty to attach the produce of this piece, as well at the bookseller's, who had printed the tragedy, as at the theatre where it was performed. The poet, irritated at these proceedings, addressed a pet.i.tion to the king, in which he showed "that it was a thing yet unknown, that it should be allowed to cla.s.s amongst seizable effects the productions of the human mind; that if such a practice was permitted, those who had consecrated their vigils to the studies of literature, and who had made the greatest efforts to render themselves, by this means, useful to their country, would see themselves placed in the cruel predicament of not venturing to publish works, often precious and interesting to the state; that the greater part of those who devote themselves to literature require for the first wants of life those aids which they have a right to expect from their labours; and that it never has been suffered in France to seize the fees of lawyers, and other persons of liberal professions."

In answer to this pet.i.tion, a decree immediately issued from the King's council, commanding a replevy of the arrests and seizures of which the pet.i.tioner complained. This honourable decree was dated 21st of May, 1749, and bore the following t.i.tle:--"Decree of the Council of his Majesty, in favour of M. Crebillon, author of the tragedy of Catiline, which declares that the productions of the mind are not amongst seizable effects."

Louis XV. exhibits the n.o.ble example of bestowing a mark of consideration to the remains of a man of letters. This King not only testified his esteem of Crebillon by having his works printed at the Louvre, but also by consecrating to his glory a tomb of marble.

CRITICS.

Writers who have been unsuccessful in original composition have their other productions immediately decried, whatever merit they might once have been allowed to possess. Yet this is very unjust; an author who has given a wrong direction to his literary powers may perceive, at length, where he can more securely point them. Experience is as excellent a mistress in the school of literature as in the school of human life.

Blackmore's epics are insufferable; yet neither Addison nor Johnson erred when they considered his philosophical poem as a valuable composition. An indifferent poet may exert the art of criticism in a very high degree; and if he cannot himself produce an original work, he may yet be of great service in regulating the happier genius of another.

This observation I shall ill.u.s.trate by the characters of two French critics; the one is the Abbe d'Aubignac, and the other Chapelain.

Boileau opens his Art of Poetry by a precept which though it be common is always important; this critical poet declares, that "It is in vain a daring author thinks of attaining to the height of Parna.s.sus if he does not feel the secret influence of heaven, and if his natal star has not formed him to be a poet." This observation he founded on the character of our Abbe; who had excellently written on the economy of dramatic composition. His _Pratique du Theatre_ gained him an extensive reputation. When he produced a tragedy, the world expected a finished piece; it was acted, and reprobated. The author, however, did not acutely feel its bad reception; he everywhere boasted that he, of all the dramatists, had most scrupulously observed the _rules_ of Aristotle.

The Prince de Guemene, famous for his repartees, sarcastically observed, "I do not quarrel with the Abbe d'Aubignac for having so closely followed the precepts of Aristotle; but I cannot pardon the precepts of Aristotle, that occasioned the Abbe d'Aubignac to write so wretched a tragedy."

The _Pratique du Theatre_ is not, however, to be despised, because the _Tragedy_ of its author is despicable.

Chapelain's unfortunate epic has rendered him notorious. He had gained, and not undeservedly, great reputation for his critical powers. After a retention of above thirty years, his _Pucelle_ appeared. He immediately became the b.u.t.t of every unfledged wit, and his former works were eternally condemned; insomuch that when Camusat published, after the death of our author, a little volume of extracts from his ma.n.u.script letters, it is curious to observe the awkward situation in which he finds himself. In his preface he seems afraid that the very name of Chapelain will be sufficient to repel the reader.

Camusat observes of Chapelain, that "he found flatterers, who a.s.sured him his _Pucelle_ ranked above the aeneid; and this Chapelain but feebly denied. However this may be, it would be difficult to make the bad taste which reigns throughout this poem agree with that sound and exact criticism with which he decided on the works of others. So true is it, that _genius_ is very superior to a justness of mind which is _sufficient to judge_ and to advise others." Chapelain was ordered to draw up a critical list of the chief living authors and men of letters in France, for the king. It is extremely impartial, and performed with an a.n.a.lytical skill of their literary characters which could not have been surpa.s.sed by an Aristotle or a Boileau.

The _talent of judging_ may exist separately from the _power of execution_. An amateur may not be an artist, though an artist should be an amateur; and it is for this reason that young authors are not to contemn the precepts of such critics as even the Abbe d'Aubignac and Chapelain. It is to Walsh, a miserable versifier, that Pope stands indebted for the hint of our poetry then being deficient in correctness and polish; and it is from this fortunate hint that Pope derived his poetical excellence. Dionysius Halicarna.s.sensis has composed a lifeless history; yet, as Gibbon observes, how admirably has _he_ judged the masters, and defined the rules, of historical composition! Gravina, with great taste and spirit, has written on poetry and poets, but he composed tragedies which give him no t.i.tle to be ranked among them.

ANECDOTES OF CENSURED AUTHORS.

It is an ingenious observation made by a journalist of Trevoux, on perusing a criticism not ill written, which pretended to detect several faults in the compositions of Bruyere, that in ancient Rome the great men who triumphed amidst the applauses of those who celebrated their virtues, were at the same time compelled to listen to those who reproached them with their vices. This custom is not less necessary to the republic of letters than it was formerly to the republic of Rome.

Without this it is probable that authors would be intoxicated with success, and would then relax in their accustomed vigour; and the mult.i.tude who took them for models would, for want of judgment, imitate their defects.

Sterne and Churchill were continually abusing the Reviewers, because they honestly told the one that obscenity was not wit, and obscurity was not sense; and the other that dissonance in poetry did not excel harmony, and that his rhymes were frequently prose lines of ten syllables cut into verse. They applauded their happier efforts.

Notwithstanding all this, it is certain that so little discernment exists among common writers and common readers, that the obscenity and flippancy of Sterne, and the bald verse and prosaic poetry of Churchill, were precisely the portion which they selected for imitation. The blemishes of great men are not the less blemishes, but they are, unfortunately, the easiest parts for imitation.

Yet criticism may be too rigorous, and genius too sensible to its direst attacks. Sir John Marsham, having published the first part of his "Chronology," suffered so much chagrin at the endless controversies which it raised--and some of his critics went so far as to affirm it was designed to be detrimental to revelation--that he burned the second part, which was ready for the press. Pope was observed to writhe with anguish in his chair on hearing mentioned the letter of Cibber, with other temporary attacks; and it is said of Montesquieu, that he was so much affected by the criticisms, true and false, which he daily experienced, that they contributed to hasten his death. Ritson's extreme irritability closed in lunacy, while ignorant Reviewers, in the shapes of a.s.sa.s.sins, were haunting his death-bed. In the preface to his "Metrical Romances," he describes himself as "brought to an end in ill health and low spirits--certain to be insulted by a base and prost.i.tute gang of lurking a.s.sa.s.sins who stab in the dark, and whose poisoned daggers he has already experienced." Scott, of Amwell, never recovered from a ludicrous criticism, which I discovered had been written by a physician who never pretended to poetical taste.

Pelisson has recorded a literary anecdote, which forcibly shows the danger of caustic criticism. A young man from a remote province came to Paris with a play, which he considered as a masterpiece. M. L'Etoile was more than just in his merciless criticism. He showed the youthful bard a thousand glaring defects in his chef-d'oeuvre. The humbled country author burnt his tragedy, returned home, took to his chamber, and died of vexation and grief. Of all unfortunate men, one of the unhappiest is a middling author endowed with too lively a sensibility for criticism.

Athenaeus, in his tenth book, has given us a lively portrait of this melancholy being. Anaxandrides appeared one day on horseback in the public a.s.sembly at Athens, to recite a dithyrambic poem, of which he read a portion. He was a man of fine stature, and wore a purple robe edged with golden fringe. But his complexion was saturnine and melancholy, which was the cause that he never spared his own writings.

Whenever he was vanquished by a rival, he immediately gave his compositions to the druggists to be cut into pieces to wrap their articles in, without ever caring to revise his writings. It is owing to this that he destroyed a number of pleasing compositions; age increased his sourness, and every day he became more and more dissatisfied with the awards of his auditors. Hence his "Tereus," because it failed to obtain the prize, has not reached us, which, with other of his productions, deserved preservation, though they had missed the crown awarded by the public.

Batteux having been chosen by the French government for the compilation of elementary hooks for the Military School, is said to have felt their unfavourable reception so acutely, that he became a prey to excessive grief. The lamentable death of Dr. Hawkesworth was occasioned by a similar circ.u.mstance. Government had consigned to his care the compilation of the voyages that pa.s.s under his name: how he succeeded is well known. He felt the public reception so sensibly, that he preferred the oblivion of death to the mortifying recollections of life.[113]

On this interesting subject Fontenelle, in his "Eloge sur Newton," has made the following observation:--"Newton was more desirous of remaining unknown than of having the calm of life disturbed by those literary storms which genius and science attract about those who rise to eminence." In one of his letters we learn that his "Treatise on Optics"

being ready for the press, several premature objections which appeared made him abandon its publication. "I should reproach myself," he said, "for my imprudence, if I were to lose a thing so real as my ease to run after a shadow." But this shadow he did not miss: it did not cost him the ease he so much loved, and it had for him as much reality as ease itself. I refer to Bayle, in his curious article, "Hipponax," note F. To these instances we may add the fate of the Abbe Ca.s.sagne, a man of learning, and not dest.i.tute of talents. He was intended for one of the preachers at court; but he had hardly made himself known in the pulpit, when he was struck by the lightning of Boileau's muse. He felt so acutely the caustic verses, that they rendered him almost incapable of literary exertion; in the prime of life he became melancholy, and shortly afterwards died insane. A modern painter, it is known, never recovered from the biting ridicule of a popular, but malignant wit.

c.u.mmyns, a celebrated quaker, confessed he died of an anonymous letter in a public paper, which, said he, "fastened on my heart, and threw me into this slow fever." Racine, who died of his extreme sensibility to a royal rebuke, confessed that the pain which one severe criticism inflicted outweighed all the applause he could receive. The feathered arrow of an epigram has sometimes been wet with the heart's blood of its victim. Fortune has been lost, reputation destroyed, and every charity of life extinguished, by the inhumanity of inconsiderate wit.

Literary history, even of our own days, records the fate of several who may be said to have _died of Criticism_.[114] But there is more sense and infinite humour in the mode which Phaedrus adopted to answer the cavillers of his age. When he first published his Fables, the taste for conciseness and simplicity were so much on the decline, that they were both objected to him as faults. He used his critics as they deserved. To those who objected against the _conciseness_ of his style, he tells a long _tedious story_ (Lib. iii. Fab. 10, ver. 59), and treats those who condemned the _simplicity_ of his style with a run of _bombast verses_, that have a great many noisy elevated words in them, without any sense at the bottom--this in Lib. iv. Fab. 6.

FOOTNOTES: