Genius in Sunshine and Shadow

123

Swift has had many biographers; his life has been told by the kindest and most good-natured of men, Scott, who admired but could not bring himself to love him; and by stout old Johnson, who, forced to admit him into the company of poets, receives the famous Irishman, and takes off his hat to him with a bow of surly recognition, scans him from head to foot, and passes over to the other side of the street. —Thackeray.

124

Swift at one time in his subtle way declared with elaborate reasons, that on the whole it would be impolitic to abolish the Christian religion in England. We have yet to discover a finer piece of irony. His exquisitely ridiculous proposition to utilize for food the babies born in Ireland, so as to prevent their becoming a burden to the country, will also be remembered.

125

It is in the nature of such lords of intellect to be solitary; they are in the world, but not of it; and our minor struggles, brawls, successes, pass over them. —Thackeray.

126

"In London," says Dawson, "Johnson suffered a great deal from poverty, and made use of many little artifices to eke out his scanty means. All the great kindly acts which his large manly heart prompted him to do cost him much self-denial. When he said that a man could live very well in a garret for one-and-sixpence a week, the statement was not a speculative but an experimental one."

127

Tasso was often obliged to borrow a crown from a friend to pay for his month's lodging. He has left us a pretty sonnet to his cat, in which he begs the light of her eyes to write by, being too poor to purchase a candle.

128

Burton is said to have been, in the intervals of his vapors, the most facetious companion in the university where he was educated. So great was the demand for his "Anatomy of Melancholy," when published, that his publisher is said to have acquired an estate by the sale of it.

129

How appropriate are the lines by Mrs. Browning, dedicated to Cowper's grave: —

130

According to Disraeli, Dr. Hawksworth, who was employed by the English Government to write an account of Captain Cook's first voyage, and who was the intimate friend of Dr. Johnson, absolutely died from the effects of severe criticism. He was an extremely graceful, effective, and ready writer.

131

Racine encountered much harsh criticism, which rendered him very unhappy. He told his son in after years that he suffered far more pain from the fault found with his productions than he ever experienced pleasure from their success.

132

Richter's remark that "some souls fall from heaven like flowers, but ere the pure fresh buds have had time to open, they are trodden in the dust of the earth, and lie soiled and crushed beneath the foul tread of some brutal hoof," has been aptly applied to Keats.

133

Keats modestly admitted the shortcomings of his early compositions. He said, "I have written independently, without judgment; I may write independently and with judgment hereafter. The genius of poetry must work out its own salvation in a man."

134

Collins was deeply attached to a young lady, who did not return his passion, and there is little doubt that the consequent disappointment preyed upon his mind to such an extent as finally to dethrone his reason. Dr. Johnson says nothing of this, but tells us how "he loved fairies, genii, giants, and monsters," and how "he delighted to rove through the meanders of enchantment, to gaze on the magnificence of golden palaces, and to repose by waterfalls of Elysian gardens."

135

Johnson met Collins one day with a book under his arm, at which the former looked inquiringly. "I have but one book," said the melancholy poet; "it is the Bible." After his death, which occurred in his thirty-sixth year, there was found among his papers an ode on the "Superstitions of the Highlands." In his last days he committed many manuscript poems to the flames.

136

Shelley's favorite amusement had been boating and sailing. While returning one day – July 8, 1822 – from Leghorn, whither he had been to welcome Leigh Hunt to Italy, his boat was struck by a squall and he was drowned. Thus he met the same fate as his deserted wife.

137

As to Shelley's mode of composition, he said: "When my brain gets heated with thought, it soon boils and throws off images and words faster than I can skim them off. In the morning, when cooled down, out of that rude sketch, as you justly call it, I shall attempt a drawing."

138

This production was circulated in manuscript only for the first three or four years after it was completed. Lockhart says that it was hearing it read from manuscript that led Scott to produce the "Lay of the Last Minstrel."

139

"Genius is rarely conscious of its power," says Hazlitt; "our own idea is that if Gray had had an eye to his posthumous fame, had cast a sidelong glance to the approbation of posterity, he would have failed in producing a work of lasting texture like this."

140

It is not many years since the auctioneer in a public salesroom in London, in the course of his advertised list of objects to be disposed of, held up two small half sheets of paper, all written over, torn, and mutilated. He called these scraps most interesting, but apologized for their condition. There was present a highly intelligent company of amateurs in autographs, attracted by the sale. The first offer for these scraps of paper was ten pounds. The bids rose rapidly until sixty-five was reached, when they were knocked off; but as there proved to be two bidders at that price, it was necessary to put them up again. They were finally closed at one hundred pounds. These scraps of paper, which were almost a hundred years old to a day, were the original copy of "Gray's Elegy."

141

Speaking of Byron's mother, Dawson, the brilliant English lecturer, says: "She was a shrieking, howling, red-faced, passionate, self-indulgent person; now spoiling him by ridiculous indulgence, now subjecting him to her extravagant wrath. A ridiculous person, an absurd person, short and fat. What a sight it was to see her in a rage, running round the room after the lame boy, and he mocking, and dodging, and hopping about! Although that may be droll to hear, it was tragical to suffer from; and there is much mercy to be bestowed upon a man whose father was a blackguard and whose mother was a fool!"

142

We quote from one of his sister's letters to a confidential friend: "Charles is very busy at the office; he will be kept there to-day until seven or eight o'clock. He came home very smoky and drinky last night, so that I am afraid a hard day's work will not agree very well with him. I have been eating a mutton-chop all alone, and I have just been looking into the pint porter-pot, which I find quite empty, and yet I am still very dry; if you were with me, we would have a glass of brandy and water, but it is quite impossible to drink brandy and water by one's self." Is not this a quiet peep behind the curtain?

143

It was singular that with his acute sensibility and tenderness of nature Lamb never cared for music. But this was the case with Dr. Johnson, Fox, Pitt, and Sir James Mackintosh. Johnson was observed by a friend to be extremely inattentive at a concert, while a celebrated solo player was running up the divisions and subdivisions of notes upon the violin. The friend desiring to induce the Doctor to give his attention, remarked how difficult the performance was. "Difficult, do you call it, sir?" replied Johnson. "I wish it were impossible." It will also be remembered that Goethe was not particularly fond of music. Once at a court concert in Weimar, when a pianist was in the middle of a very long sonata, the poet suddenly rose up, and, to the horror of the assembled ladies and gentlemen, exclaimed, "If this lasts three minutes longer, I shall confess everything!"

144

Leigh Hunt tells us that Lamb was under the middle size, and of fragile make, but with a head as fine as if it had been carved on purpose. He had a very weak stomach. Three glasses of wine would put him in as lively a condition as can be wrought in some men only by as many bottles.

145

In his volume of wise sayings, which has passed through many editions, we find this paragraph: "The gamester, if he dies a martyr to his profession, is doubly ruined. He adds his soul to every other loss, and by the act of suicide renounces earth to forfeit heaven!"

146

When the last scene came, those who had neglected him in life, at least paid their respects to his remains; twelve thousand people followed the body of Robert Burns to its resting-place in the grave.

147

We find these two verses in Thoreau's published journal:

148

In battle, the maiden displayed a spirit of almost reckless bravery, leading her followers into the thickest of the fight. "She was benign," says Michelet, "in the fiercest conflict, good among the bad, gentle even in war. She wept after the victories, and relieved with her own hands the necessities of the wounded."

149

Her husband, George Maclean, was Governor of Cape Coast Castle, and, as is well known, treated her with marked disrespect, even going so far as to introduce a favorite mistress into the castle. Some envious people circulated vile reports as to "L. E. L.," but no one of intelligence ever heeded them.

150

"Her gladness was like a burst of sunlight," says one of her own sex who knew her well; "and if in her sadness she resembled the night, it was night wearing her stars. She was a Muse, a Grace, a variable child, a dependent woman, the Italy of human beings."

151

Charlotte married her father's curate, Mr. Nicholls. The other two sisters died young and unmarried. "The bringing out of our book of poems," writes Charlotte, "was hard work. As was to be expected, neither we nor our poems were at all wanted."

152

Longfellow was a classmate of Hawthorne in college, and Franklin Pierce was his most intimate friend. When Pierce was chosen President, he at once appointed our author to the Consulship at Liverpool, which lucrative office he held for four years.

153

Thackeray testifies to his hearty admiration of the elder Dumas in these words: "I think of the prodigal banquets to which this Lucullus of a man has invited me, with thanks and wonder."

154

Jerrold was but twenty-five years of age when he wrote this the first of his dramas. It was a great success from the start, and had a run of three hundred consecutive nights, though the author received but seventy pounds for the copyright.

155

Sydney Smith, when talking of the bad effect of late hours, said of a distinguished diner-out, that it should be written on his tomb, "He dined late," – to which Luttrell added, "And died early."

156

Some one told Father Taylor, the well-known seamen's clergyman of Boston, that a certain individual who was under discussion was a very good citizen, except for an amiable weakness. "But I have found," said the practical old preacher, "that weakness of character is nearly the only defect which cannot be remedied."

157

The prejudice excited in Queen Anne's mind by the Archbishop of York, on account of the alleged infidelity in the "Tale of a Tub," is supposed to be the reason why Swift's aspirations were not granted by his royal mistress. His final unsatisfactory appointment as Dean of St. Patrick was awarded to him instead of the coveted bishopric.

158

The author remembers him well on the occasion of his first appearance in this country as a lecturer and public reader. His style at that time (which was afterwards changed) was that of a modern dude, wearing flash waistcoats, double watch-chains, gold eye-glasses and rings.

159

No father or mother thinks their own children ugly; and this self-deceit is yet stronger with respect to the offspring of the mind. —Cervantes.

160

No one can anticipate the suffrages of posterity. Every man in judging of himself is his own contemporary. He may feel the gale of popularity, but he cannot tell how long it will last. His opinion of himself wants distance, wants time, wants numbers, to set off and confirm it. He must be indifferent to his own merits before he can feel a confidence in them. Besides, every one must be sensible of a thousand weaknesses and deficiencies in himself, whereas genius only leaves behind it the monuments of its strength. —Hazlitt.

161

The "Song of the Shirt" first appeared in "Punch," in 1844; and was Hood's favorite piece of all his published compositions, though the "Bridge of Sighs" was perhaps more popular with the public. Hood died in 1845, at the age of forty-seven.

162

His sister, Mlle. de Scudéri, is better known to us in literature than himself. She was a distinguished member of the society which met at the Hôtel de Rambouillet, and which has been made so famous by Molière in his "Précieuses ridicules." She survived her brother some years.

163

Sue studied medicine at first, and was with the French army in Spain (1823) as military surgeon. After inheriting his father's fortune, he studied painting, but renounced that art finally to engage in literature. His romances were for a time as popular as those of Dumas, and in their character as immoral as those of Paul de Kock.

164

He possessed a diminutive figure, with a pale, attenuated face, eyes of spiritual brightness, an expansive and calm brow, and his movements were characterized by a nervous alacrity. Until he reached the years of middle life he was embarrassed by restricted means and necessary habits of self-denial.

165

With gun in hand, and note-book and drawing material by his side, Audubon explored the coast, lakes, and rivers from Labrador and Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. As early as 1810 he explored alone the primeval forests of North America, impelled more by a love of Nature than a desire to make himself famous. His original and finely hand-colored illustrated work sold in folio at a thousand dollars a volume, and is now rare and valuable.

166

Like Milton, Swift, and other great geniuses, Scott was, as Swift says of himself at school, "very justly celebrated for his stupidity." But one is inclined to think that it was largely owing to a want of talent in his master rather than in the pupil. It will be remembered that it was the illustrious Samuel Parr, when an undermaster at Harrow School, who first discovered the latent talent and genius of Sheridan, and who by judicious cultivation brought it forth and developed it.

167

In five or six years subsequent to that failure of his maiden speech, Disraeli, as he was then known, became leader of the Opposition in the House, and Chancellor of the Exchequer soon after, rising rapidly, until in 1868 he became Premier of England.

168

Richter was a Bavarian, and of very humble birth. During his youthful career he was reduced to extreme indigence. He became a tutor in a private family, and afterwards taught school, all the while striving with his pen both for fame and money, until at last he "compelled" public appreciation. He is one of the few geniuses of that period who were happy in their domestic relations. He died at Baireuth in 1825.

169

Royer-Collard was an eminent philosopher and statesman, the founder of a school called the "Doctrinaire," of which Cousin was a disciple. He was President of the Chamber of Deputies in 1828. His father's family name was Royer, to which he joined the name of his wife, Mademoiselle Collard.

170

Hazlitt was a just but merciless critic. It was he who designated Moore's productions "the poetry of the toilet-table, of the saloon, and of the fashionable world, – not the poetry of nature, of the heart, or of human life;" and the force of the criticism lay in the fact of its truth.

171

Goldsmith himself tells us: "My father, the younger son of a good family, was possessed of a small living in the Church. His education was above his fortune, and his generosity greater than his education. Poor as he was, he had his flatterers; for every dinner he gave them they returned him an equivalent in praise, and this was all he wanted."

172

It happened that a certain lady became charmed with Mirabeau by reading his writings, and wrote him rather a tender letter, asking him to describe himself to her. He did so by return of post as follows: "Figure to yourself a tiger that has had the small-pox." History has not handed down the sequel.

173

Mirabeau and the Marchioness had agreed on mutual destruction, by exchanging poisoned locks of hair, if he failed to be acquitted.

174

To make the appropriateness of this retort clear, it should be known that Judge Robinson was the author of many stupid, slavish, and scurrilous political pamphlets; and by his servility to the ruling powers he had been raised to the eminence which he thus shamefully disgraced.

175

The effect the poem had upon the Earl of Southampton when he first read it will be remembered. Spenser took it to this noble patron of poets as soon as it was finished, and sent it up to him. The earl read a few pages and said to a servant, "Take the writer twenty pounds." Reading on, he presently cried in rapture, "Carry that man twenty pounds more." Still he read on; but at length he shouted, "Go turn that fellow out of the house, for if I read further I shall be ruined!"

176

When a boy, West secretly pursued his first attempts at art, absenting himself from school to do so. Being one day surprised at his work in the garret of the house by his mother, he expected to be seriously reproved; but Mrs. West saw incipient genius in her son's work at the age of ten; so she kissed and congratulated him, promising to intercede with his father in his behalf that he would forgive him for his truancy.

177

It was not without difficulty that Gibbon could obtain a publisher for his famous History. After it had been declined by several houses, it was finally undertaken by Thomas Cadell, "on easy terms," as the author expresses it. It was thought best to publish only five hundred copies at first; this edition being soon exhausted, edition after edition followed in rapid succession, until, as Gibbon says, "my book was on every table and on almost every toilet."

178

Sydney Smith said of Mrs. Siddons: "What a face she had! The gods do not bestow such a face as hers on the stage more than once in a century. I knew her very well, and she had the good taste to laugh at my jokes; she was an excellent person, but she was not remarkable out of her profession, and never got out of tragedy even in common life. She used to stab the potatoes; and said 'Boy, give me a knife!' as she would have said 'Give me a dagger!'"

179

"I first discovered Opie," says Dr. Wolcott, "in a little hovel in the Parish of St. Agnes, Cornwall. He was the son of a poor sawyer. I was first led to notice him by some drawings which he had made." The good Doctor gave him material aid, took him to his house, and finally introduced him into London society.

180

He fought under Masaniello, and after the final defeat at Naples he escaped to Florence, where he was befriended by the Grand Duke, who was a liberal patron of art. His masterpiece is considered to be the "Conspiracy of Catiline," though he excelled in wild mountain scenery rather than in the grouping of human figures.

181

Haydon, the historical painter, had power but not popularity. Sir Arthur Shea, a man who rose to the height of his profession as regarded popularity, was Haydon's special aversion. "He is," Haydon once began, "the most impotent painter in – " His listeners supposed he would add "the world." That did not satisfy Haydon's antipathy, and his conclusion was, – "in the solar system!"

182

Many of our readers will remember a remarkable picture by Correggio in the Dresden Gallery, representing a "Penitent Magdalen," the ineffable and almost divine beauty of which no one can fail to appreciate. One of the Saxon kings paid six thousand louis-d'ors ($30,000) for this painting, which is only about eighteen inches square. Twice that sum would not purchase it to-day.

183

Canova executed a statue of Washington, which ornaments the State House in Boston, and is known to have produced during his life fifty statues and as many busts, besides numerous groups in marble. He died in 1822, having the reputation of being the greatest sculptor of his age.

184

Spagnoletto was finally appointed court painter in Spain, and some of his best paintings still adorn the Madrid Gallery. His "Adoration of the Shepherds" is familiar to us all, and remains unsurpassed in power of conception and execution. In the Madrid Museo is another of his masterpieces, a "Mater Dolorosa."

185

"Mr. Murphy, sir, you knew Mr. Garrick?" asked Rogers the poet of that individual. "Yes, sir, I did, and no man better." "Well, sir, what did you think of his acting?" After a pause: "Well, sir, off the stage he was a mean, sneaking little fellow. But on the stage" – throwing up his hands and eyes – "oh, my great God!"

186

In the broad grounds of Abington Abbey, in Northamptonshire, stands Garrick's mulberry-tree, with this inscription upon copper attached to one of the limbs: "This tree was planted by David Garrick, Esq., at the request of Ann Thursby, as a growing testimony of their friendship, 1778."

187

Pope was younger than Betterton, but they were very warm personal friends, and it is thought that the poet aided the actor in the adaptations which he published from Chaucer, and for which he received hearty if not merited commendation.

188

Garrick was for a long time at her feet, and indeed was at one time engaged to be married to her, but the nuptials were not consummated. It was generally believed that the engagement was broken from disinclination on her part.

189

During the vacation season Miss Woffington went to Bath, and on her return was telling Quin how much she had been pleased by the excursion. "And pray, madam," he inquired, "what made you go to Bath?" "Mere wantonness," she replied. "And pray, madam, did it cure you?"

190

From the volatility of his mind and conduct, it would be a misuse of language to say that he had good principles or bad principles. He had no principles at all. His life was a life of expedients and appearances, in which he developed a shrewdness and capacity made up of talent and mystification, of ability and trickery, which were found equal to almost all emergencies. —Whipple.

191

Sheridan probably had not a penny in his pocket. He never did have for more than a few minutes at a time; yet this was the man of whose famous speech in the House of Commons Burke said: "It was the most astonishing effort of eloquence, argument, and wit united, of which there was any record or tradition." And of which Fox said, "All that he had ever heard, all that he had ever read, when compared with it, dwindled into nothing, and vanished like vapor before the sun."

192

"A perpetual fountain of good sense," Dryden calls him; "and of good humor, too, and wholesome thought," adds Lowell. He was scholar, courtier, soldier, ambassador, one who had known poverty as a housemate, and who had been the companion of princes.