66 "situation in life, I persuade myself they are unalterable with regard "to your friends in it. I cannot think the world has taken such entire "possession of that heart (once so susceptible of friendship), as not to "have left a corner there for a friend or two; but I flatter myself that even I have my place among the number. This I have a claim to "from the similitude of our dispositions; or, setting that aside, I can "demand it as my right by the most equitable law in nature, I mean that "of retaliation for indeed you have more than your share in mine. I am a man of few professions, and yet this very instant I cannot avoid "the painful apprehension that my present professions (which speak not "half my feelings) should be considered only a pretext to cover a request, as I have a request to make. No, my dear Ned, I know you are too "generous to think so; and you know me too proud to stoop to 66 66 66 mercenary insincerity. I have a request it is true to make; but, as "I know to whom I am a petitioner, I make it without diffidence or "confusion. It is in short this, I am going to publish a book in "London, entitled An Essay on the present State of Taste and "Literature in Europe. Every work published here the printers in "Ireland republish there, without giving the author the least con"sideration for his copy. I would in this respect disappoint their "avarice, and have all the additional advantages that may result from "the sale of my performance there to myself. The book is now printing in London, and I have requested Dr. Radcliff, Mr. Lawder, "Mr. Bryanton, my brother Mr. Henry Goldsmith, and brother-in-law "Mr. Hodson, to circulate my proposals among their acquaintance. "The same request I now make to you; and have accordingly given "directions to Mr. Bradley bookseller in Dame-street Dublin, to send "you a hundred proposals. Whatever subscriptions pursuant to those "proposals, you may receive, when collected, may be transmitted to "Mr. Bradley, who will give a receipt for the money, and be account"able for the books. I shall not, by a paltry apology, excuse myself "for putting you to this trouble. Were I not convinced that you "found more pleasure in doing good-natured things, than uneasiness "at being employed in them, I should not have singled you out on "this occasion. It is probable you would comply with such a request, "if it tended to the encouragement of any man of learning whatsoever; “what then may not he expect who has claims of family and friend"ship to enforce his? "I am, dear Sir, your sincere "Friend and humble servant, 1758. Æt. 30. 1758. What indeed may he not freely expect, who is to receive Et. 30. nothing! Nevertheless, there is a worse fool's paradise than that of expectation. To teach our tears the easiest way to flow, should be no unvalued part of this world's wisdom; hope is a good friend, even when the only one; and Goldsmith was not the worse for expecting, though he received nothing. Mr. Mills left his poor requests unheeded, and his letter unacknowledged. Sharking booksellers and starving authors might devour each other before. he would interpose; being a man, as his old sizar-relative delicately hinted, with paternal acres as well as boyish friendships to cultivate, and fewer thorns of the world to struggle with, than hawthorns of his own to sleep under. He lived to repent it certainly, and to profess great veneration for the distinguished writer to whom he boasted relationship; but Goldsmith had no more pleasant hopes or friendly correspondences to fling away upon Mr. Mills of Roscommon. Not that even this letter, as it seems to me, had been one of very confident expectation. Unusual effort is manifest in it;-a reluctance to bring unseemly fancies between the wind and Mr. Mills's gentility; a conventional style of balance between the "pleasure" and the "uneasiness" it talks about ;-in short, a forced suppression of everything in his own state that may affront the acres and the hawthorns. Seven days afterwards he wrote to Bryanton, with a curious contrast of tone and manner. Even Bryanton had not inquired for him since the scenes of happier years. The affectionate rememberings of the lonely wanderer, as of the struggling author, he had in carelessness, if not in coldness, passed without return. Yet here heart spoke to heart; buoyant, unreserved, and sanguine. That sorrow 1758. lay beneath the greetings, was not to be concealed; else had the words which cheerily rose above it been perhaps less t. 30. sincere. But see, and make profit of it,-how, depressed by unavailing labours, and patiently awaiting the disastrous issue of defeat and flight, he shows to the last a bright and cordial happiness of soul, unconquered and unconquerable. "Dear Sir, I have heard it remark'd," he begins (in a letter also dated from the Temple coffee-house,* which Mr. Prior obtained from Bryanton's son-in-law, the reverend Doctor Handcock of Dublin, and in which, where the paper is torn or has been worn away by time, there are several erasures that the reader will easily supply), 66 66 66 66 "I believe by yourself, that they who are drunk, or out of their "wits, fancy every body else in the same condition: mine is a friendship that neither distance nor time can efface, which is probably the reason that, for the soul of me, I can't avoid thinking yours of the same complexion; and yet I have many reasons for being of a con'trary opinion, else why in so long an absence was I never made a 'partner in your concerns? To hear of your successes would have 'given me the utmost pleasure; and a communication of your very disappointments would divide the uneasiness I too frequently feel "for my own. Indeed, my dear Bob, you don't conceive how unkindly you have treated one whose circumstances afford him few prospects "of pleasure, except those reflected from the happiness of his friends. However, since you have not let me hear from you, I have in some measure disappointed your neglect by frequently thinking of you. Every day do I remember the calm anecdotes of your life, from the "fireside to the easy-chair; recall the various adventures that first "cemented our friendship,-the school, the college, or the tavern ; "preside in fancy over your cards; and am displeased at your bad play when the rubber goes against you, though not with all that agony of soul as when I once was your partner. 66 66 66 " "Is it not strange that two of such like affections should be so much separated and so differently employed as we are? You seem placed 1758. Æt. 30. "at the centre of fortune's wheel, and let it revolve never so fast, seem "insensible of the motion. I seem to have been tied to the circumference, and.... disagreeably round like an whore in a whirligig ".... down with an intention to chide, and yet methinks .... my "resentment already. The truth is, I am a regard to you; I may attempt to bluster, ..... Anacreon, my heart is respondent only to softer affections. And yet, now I think on't again, I will "be angry. God's curse, sir! who am I? Eh! what am I? Do you know whom you have offended? A man whose character may one of these days be mentioned with profound respect in a German "comment or Dutch dictionary; whose name you will probably hear "ushered in by a Doctissimus Doctissimorum, or heel-pieced with a long Latin termination. Think how Goldsmithius, or Gubblegurchius, or some such sound, as rough as a nutmeg-grater, will become me? "Think of that !-God's curse, sir! who am I? I must own my ill"natured contemporaries have not hitherto paid me those honours I "have had such just reason to expect. I have not yet seen my face "reflected in all the lively display of red and white paints on any sign"posts in the suburbs. Your handkerchief weavers seem as yet unacquainted with my merits or my physiognomy, and the very snuff"box makers appear to have forgot their respect. Tell them all from "me, they are a set of Gothic, barbarous, ignorant scoundrels. There "will come a day, no doubt it will-I beg you may live a couple of "hundred years longer only to see the day-when the Scaligers and "Daciers will vindicate my character, give learned editions of my labours, and bless the times with copious comments on the text. You "shall see how they will fish up the heavy scoundrels who disregard me now, or will then offer to cavil at my productions. How will "they bewail the times that suffered so much genius to lie neglected.* "If ever my works find their way to Tartary or China, I know the consequence. Suppose one of your Chinese Owanowitzers instructing one of your Tartarian Chianobacchhi-you see I use Chinese names "to show my own erudition, as I shall soon make our Chinese talk "like an Englishman to show his. This may be the subject of the "lecture: 66 "Oliver Goldsmith flourished in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. "He lived to be an hundred and three years old.... age may justly be 66 styled the sun of ..... and the Confucius of Europe.. "learned world, were anonymous, and have probably been lost, because * For parallel passages see the fourth number of the Bee. 1758. "united with those of others. The first avowed piece the world has of “his is entitled an 'Essay on the present State of Taste and Literature Et. 30. "in Europe,—a work well worth its weight in diamonds. In this "he profoundly explains what learning is, and what learning is not. "In this he proves that blockheads are not men of wit, and yet that men of "wit are actually blockheads. "But as I choose neither to tire my Chinese Philosopher, nor you, 66 nor myself, I must discontinue the oration, in order to give you a "good pause for admiration; and I find myself most violently disposed "to admire too. Let me, then, stop my fancy to take a view of my "future self; and, as the boys say, light down to see myself on horse"back. Well, now I am down, where the devil is I? Oh Gods! "Gods! here in a garret, writing for bread, and expecting to be dunned "for a milk-score ! However, dear Bob, whether in penury or affluence, serious or gay, I am ever wholly thine, 66 "OLIVER GOLDSMITH. 66 Give my-no, not compliments neither, but something . . . most warm and sincere wish that you can conceive, to your mother, "Mrs. Bryanton, to Miss Bryanton, to yourself; and if there be a "favourite dog in the family, let me be remembered to it." "In a garret, writing for bread, and expecting to be "dunned for a milk-score." Such was the ordinary fate of letters in that age. There had been a Christian religion extant for now seventeen hundred and fifty-seven years; for so long a time had the world been acquainted with its spiritual responsibilities and necessities; yet here, in the middle of the eighteenth century, was the eminence ordinarily conceded to the spiritual teacher, to the man who comes upon the earth to lift his fellow men above its miry ways. He is up in a garret, writing for bread he cannot get, and dunned for a milk-score he cannot pay. And age after age, the prosperous man comfortably contemplates it, * “There came into my company an old fellow not particularly smart, so that "he was easily recognised as belonging to the class of men of letters, whom the "rich commonly hate. 'I am a poet,' said he. 'But why, then, so badly "' dressed?' For this reason, the love of knowledge never made a man rich.'" Petronius; who wrote in the reign of Nero. |