Lives Of The Poets, Vol. 1 (fiscle part-III) by Samuel Johnson (best beach reads TXT) 📖

Without Violence To Reason.

 

 

 

Perhaps The Dialogue Of This Poem Is Not Perfect. Some Power Of Engaging

The Attention Might Have Been Added to It By Quicker Reciprocation, By

Seasonable Interruptions, By Sudden Questions, And By A Nearer Approach

To Dramatick Sprightliness; Without Which, Fictitious Speeches Will

Always Tire, However Sparkling with Sentences, And However Variegated

With Allusions.

 

 

 

The Great Source Of Pleasure Is Variety. Uniformity Must Tire At Last,

Though It Be Uniformity Of Excellence. We Love To Expect; And, When

Expectation Is Disappointed or Gratified, We Want To Be Again Expecting.

For This Impatience Of The Present, Whoever Would Please Must Make

Provision. The Skilful Writer "Irritat, Mulcet," Makes A Due Distribution

Of The Still And Animated parts. It Is For Want Of This Artful

Intertexture, And Those Necessary Changes, That The Whole Of A Book May

Be Tedious, Though All The Parts Are Praised.

 

 

 

If Inexhaustible Wit Could Give Perpetual Pleasure, No Eye Would Ever

Leave Half-Read The Work Of Butler; For What Poet Has Ever Brought So

Many Remote Images So Happily Together? It Is Scarcely Possible To Peruse

A Page Without Finding some Association Of Images That Was Never Found

Before. By The First Paragraph The Reader Is Amused, By The Next He Is

Delighted, And By A Few More Strained to Astonishment; But Astonishment

Is A Toilsome Pleasure; He Is Soon Weary Of Wondering, And Longs To Be

Diverted:

 

 

 

  "Omnia Vult Belle Matho Dicere, Dic Aliquando

  Et Bene, Die Neutrum, Dic Aliquando Male."

 

 

 

Imagination Is Useless Without Knowledge: Nature Gives In vain The Power

Of Combination, Unless Study And Observation Supply Materials To Be

Combined. Butler'S Treasures Of Knowledge Appear Proportioned to His

Expense: Whatever Topick Employs His Mind, He Shows Himself Qualified to

Expand And Illustrate It With All The Accessories That Books Can Furnish:

He Is Found Not Only To Have Travelled the Beaten Road, But The By-Paths

Of Literature; Not Only To Have Taken General Surveys, But To Have

Examined particulars With Minute Inspection.

 

 

 

If The French Boast The Learning of Rabelais, We Need not Be Afraid Of

Confronting them With Butler.

 

 

 

But The Most Valuable Parts Of His Performance Are Those Which Retired

Study And Native Wit Cannot Supply. He That Merely Makes A Book From

Books May Be Useful, But Can Scarcely Be Great. Butler Had Not Suffered

Life To Glide Beside Him Unseen Or Unobserved. He Had Watched, With Great

Diligence, The Operations Of Human Nature, And Traced the Effects Of

Opinion, Humour, Interest, And Passion. From Such Remarks Proceeded

That Great Number Of Sententious Distichs, Which Have Passed into

Conversation, And Are Added as Proverbial Axioms To The General Stock Of

Practical Knowledge.

 

 

 

When Any Work Has Been Viewed and Admired, The First Question Of

Intelligent Curiosity Is, How Was It Performed? Hudibras Was Not A Hasty

Effusion; It Was Not Produced by A Sudden Tumult Of Imagination, Or A

Short Paroxysm Of Violent Labour. To Accumulate Such A Mass Of Sentiments

At The Call Of Accidental Desire, Or Of Sudden Necessity, Is Beyond The

Reach And Power Of The Most Active And Comprehensive Mind. I Am Informed

By Mr. Thyer, Of Manchester, The Excellent Editor Of This Author'S

Relicks, That He Could Show Something like Hudibras In prose. He Has In

His Possession The Commonplace-Book, In which Butler Reposited, Not

Such Events Or Precepts As Are Gathered by Reading, But Such Remarks,

Similitudes, Allusions, Assemblages, Or Inferences, As Occasion Prompted,

Or Meditation Produced; Those Thoughts That Were Generated in his Own

Mind, And Might Be Usefully Applied to Some Future Purpose. Such Is The

Labour Of Those Who Write For Immortality.

 

 

 

But Human Works Are Not Easily Found Without A Perishable Part. Of The

Ancient Poets Every Reader Feels The Mythology Tedious And Oppressive.

Of Hudibras, The Manners, Being founded on Opinions, Are Temporary And

Local, And, Therefore, Become Every Day Less Intelligible, And Less

Striking. What Cicero Says Of Philosophy Is True, Likewise, Of Wit And

Humour, That "Time Effaces The Fictions Of Opinion, And Confirms The

Determinations Of Nature." Such Manners As Depend Upon Standing relations

And General Passions Are Coextended with The Race Of Man; But Those

Modifications Of Life, And Peculiarities Of Practice, Which Are The

Progeny Of Errour And Perverseness, Or, At Best, Of Some Accidental

Influence Or Transient Persuasion, Must Perish With Their Parents.

 

 

 

Much, Therefore, Of That Humour Which Transported the Last Century[66]

With Merriment, Is Lost To Us, Who Do Not Know The Sour Solemnity, The

Sullen Superstition, The Gloomy Moroseness, And The Stubborn Scruples Of

The Ancient Puritans; Or, If We Know Them, Derive Our Information Only

From Books, Or From Tradition, Have Never Had Them Before Our Eyes, And

Cannot, But By Recollection And Study, Understand The Lines In which They

Are Satirized. Our Grandfathers Knew The Picture From The Life; We Judge

Of The Life By Contemplating the Picture.

 

 

 

It Is Scarcely Possible, In the Regularity And Composure Of The Present

Time, To Image The Tumult Of Absurdity, And Clamour Of Contradiction,

Which Perplexed doctrine, Disordered practice, And Disturbed both Publick

And Private Quiet, In that Age When Subordination Was Broken, And Awe Was

Hissed away; When Any Unsettled innovator, Who Could Hatch A Half-Formed

Notion, Produced it To The Publick; When Every Man Might Become A

Preacher, And Almost Every Preacher Could Collect A Congregation.

 

 

 

The Wisdom Of The Nation Is Very Reasonably Supposed to Reside In the

Parliament. What Can Be Concluded of The Lower Classes Of The People,

When In one Of The Parliaments, Summoned by Cromwell, It Was Seriously

Proposed, That All The Records In the Tower Should Be Burnt, That All

Memory Of Things Past Should Be Effaced, And That The Whole System Of

Life Should Commence Anew?

 

 

 

We Have Never Been Witnesses Of Animosities Excited by The Use Of Minced

Pies And Plumporridge; Nor Seen With What Abhorrence Those, Who Could Eat

Them At All Other Times Of The Year, Would Shrink From Them In december.

An Old Puritan Who Was Alive In my Childhood, Being, At One Of The Feasts

Of The Church, Invited by A Neighbour To Partake His Cheer, Told Him,

That If He Would Treat Him At An Alehouse With Beer Brewed for All Times

And Seasons He Should Accept His Kindness, But Would Have None Of His

Superstitious Meats Or Drinks.

 

 

 

One Of The Puritanical Tenets Was The Illegality Of All Games Of Chance;

And He That Reads Gataker Upon Lots, May See How Much Learning and Reason

One Of The First Scholars Of His Age Thought Necessary To Prove, That It

Was No Crime To Throw A Die, Or Play At Cards, Or To Hide A Shilling for

The Reckoning.

 

 

 

Astrology, However, Against Which So Much Of The Satire Is Directed, Was

Not More The Folly Of The Puritans Than Of Others. It Had, In that Time,

A Very Extensive Dominion. Its Predictions Raised hopes And Fears In

Minds, Which Ought To Have Rejected it With Contempt. In hazardous

Undertakings, Care Was Taken To Begin Under The Influence Of A Propitious

Planet; And, When The King was Prisoner In carisbrook Castle, An

Astrologer Was Consulted what Hour Would Be Found Most Favourable To An

Escape.

 

 

 

What Effect This Poem Had Upon The Publick, Whether It Shamed imposture,

Or Reclaimed credulity, Is Not Easily Determined. Cheats Can Seldom

Stand Long Against Laughter. It Is Certain, That The Credit Of Planetary

Intelligence Wore Fast Away; Though Some Men Of Knowledge, And Dryden

Among Them, Continued to Believe That Conjunctions And Oppositions Had A

Great Part In the Distribution Of Good Or Evil, And In the Government Of

Sublunary Things.

 

 

 

Poetical Action Ought To Be Probable Upon Certain Suppositions, And Such

Probability As Burlesque Requires Is Here Violated only By One Incident.

Nothing can Show More Plainly The Necessity Of Doing something, And The

Difficulty Of Finding something to Do, Than That Butler Was Reduced to

Transfer To His Hero, The Flagellation Of Sancho, Not The Most Agreeable

Fiction Of Cervantes; Very Suitable, Indeed, To The Manners Of That Age

And Nation, Which Ascribed wonderful Efficacy To Voluntary Penances; But

So Remote From The Practice And Opinions Of The Hudibrastick Time, That

Judgment And Imagination Are Alike Offended.

 

 

 

The Diction Of This Poem Is Grossly Familiar, And The Numbers Purposely

Neglected, Except In a Few Places Where The Thoughts, By Their Native

Excellence, Secure Themselves From Violation, Being such As Mean Language

Cannot Express. The Mode Of Versification Has Been Blamed by Dryden, Who

Regrets That The Heroick Measure Was Not Rather Chosen. To The Critical

Sentence Of Dryden, The Highest Reverence Would Be Due, Were Not His

Decisions Often Precipitate, And His Opinions Immature. When He Wished to

Change The Measure, He Probably Would Have Been Willing to Change More.

If He Intended that, When The Numbers Were Heroick, The Diction Should

Still Remain Vulgar, He Planned a Very Heterogeneous And Unnatural

Composition. If He Preferred a General Stateliness Both Of Sound And

Words, He Can Be Only Understood To Wish That Butler Had Undertaken A

Different Work.

 

 

 

The Measure Is Quick, Sprightly, And Colloquial, Suitable To The

Vulgarity Of The Words, And The Levity Of The Sentiments. But Such

Numbers And Such Diction Can Gain Regard, Only When They Are Used by A

Writer, Whose Vigour Of Fancy And Copiousness Of Knowledge, Entitle Him

To Contempt Of Ornaments, And Who, In confidence Of The Novelty And

Justness Of His Conceptions, Can Afford To Throw Metaphors And Epithets

Away. To Another That Conveys Common Thoughts In careless Versification,

It Will Only Be Said, "Pauper Videri Cinna Vult, Et Est Pauper." The

Meaning and Diction Will Be Worthy Of Each Other, And Criticism May

Justly Doom Them To Perish Together.

 

 

 

Nor Even Though Another Butler Should Arise, Would Another Hudibras

Obtain The Same Regard. Burlesque Consists In a Disproportion Between The

Style And The Sentiments, Or Between The Adventitious Sentiments And

The Fundamental Subject. It, Therefore, Like All Bodies Compounded of

Heterogeneous Parts, Contains In it A Principle Of Corruption. All

Disproportion Is Unnatural; And From What Is Unnatural, We Can Derive

Only The Pleasure Which Novelty Produces. We Admire It Awhile As A

Strange Thing; But, When It Is No Longer Strange, We Perceive Its

Deformity. It Is A Kind Of Artifice, Which By Frequent Repetition Detects

Itself; And The Reader, Learning in time What He Is To Expect, Lays Down

His Book, As The Spectator Turns Away From A Second Exhibition Of Those

Tricks, Of Which The Only Use Is To Show That They Can Be Played.

 

 

 

       *       *       *       *       *

 

 

 

We Extract From The Second Volume Of Aubrey'S Letters, P. 263, The

Following lines, Entitled

 

 

 

  _Hudibras Imprinted._

 

 

 

  No Jesuite Ever Took In hand,

  To Plant A Church In barren Land;

  Or Ever Thought It Worth His While

  A Swede Or Russe To Reconcile.

  For Where There Is Not Store Of Wealth,

  Souls Are Not Worth The Chardge Of Health.

  Spain And America Had Designes

  To Sell Their Gospell For Their Wines,

  For Had The Mexicans Been Poore,

  No Spaniard Twice Had Landed on Their Shore.

  'Twas Gold The Catholick Religion Planted,

  Which, Had They Wanted gold, They Still Had Wanted. Ed.

 

 

 

[Footnote 63: These Are The Words Of The Author Of The Short Account Of

Butler, Prefixed to Hudibras, Which Dr. Johnson, Notwithstanding what He

Says Above, Seems To Have Supposed was Written By Mv. Longneville, The

Father; But The Contrary Is To Be Inferred from A Subsequent Passage,

Wherein The Author Laments That He Had Neither Such An Acquaintance Nor

Interest With Mr. Longneville, As To Procure From Him The Golden Remains

Of Butler There Mentioned. He Was, Probably, Led into The Mistake By

A Note In the Biog. Brit. P. 1077, Signifying, That The Son Of

This Gentleman Was Living in 1736.

 

 

 

Of This Friend And Generous Patron Of Butler, Mr. William Longneville, I

Find An Account, Written By A Person Who Was Well Acquainted with Him, To

This Effect, Viz. That He Was A Conveyancing lawyer, And A Bencher Of The

Inner Temple, And Had Raised himself From A Low Beginning, To Very

Great Eminence In that Profession; That He Was Eloquent And Learned, Of

Spotless Integrity; That He Supported an Aged father, Who Had Ruined his

Fortunes By Extravagance, And By His Industry And Application, Reedified

A Ruined family; That He Supported butler, Who, But For Him, Must

Literally Have Starved; And Received from Him, As A Recompense, The

Papers Called his Remains. Life Of The Lord-Keeper Guildford, P. 289.

These Have Since Been Given To The Public By Mr. Thyer, Of Manchester:

And The Originals Are Now In the Hands Of The Rev. Dr. Farmer, Master Of

Emanuel College, Cambridge. H.]

[Footnote 64: In a Note In the Biographia Britannica, P. 1075, He Is

Said, On The Authority Of The Younger Mr. Longueville, To Have Lived for

Some Years In rose Street, Covent Garden, And Also That He Died there;

The Latter Of These Particulars Is Rendered highly Probable, By His Being

Interred in the Cemetery Of That Parish.]

 

 

 

[Footnote 65: They Were Collected into One,