Calamities And Quarrels Of Authors Part 44

"My lord, the eyes of all Europe are upon this transaction.

What t.i.tle I have to your lordship's favour, those books which I have published, and with which (pardon the necessary boast) all Europe is acquainted, declare. Many may dispute by interest with me; but if there be one who would prefer himself, by his abilities, I beg the matter may be brought to trial. The collection is at hand; and I request, my lord, such person and myself may be examined by that test, together. It is an amazing store of knowledge; and he has most, in this way, who shall show himself most acquainted with it.

"What are my own abilities it very ill becomes me thus to boast; but did they not qualify me for the trust, my lord, I would not ask it. As to those of any other, unless a man be conjured from the dead, I shall not fear to say there is not any one whoever that is able so much as to call the parts of the collection by their names.

"I know I shall be accused of ostentation in giving to myself this preference; and I am sorry for it: but those who have candour will know it could not be avoided.

"Many excel, my lord, in other studies: it is my chance to have bestowed the labour of my life on this: those labours may be of some use to others. This appears the only instance in which it is possible that they should be rewarded----."

In a subsequent _Inspector_, he treated on the improvement of botany by raising plants, and reading lectures on them at the British Museum, with the living plants before the lecturer and his auditors. Poor Sir John! he was born half a century too early!--He would, in this day, have made his lectures fashionable; and might have secured at the opera every night an elegant audience for the next morning in the gardens of the Museum.

[293] It would be difficult to form a list of his anonymous works or compilations, among which many are curious. Tradition has preserved his name as the writer of Mrs. Gla.s.se's Cookery, and of several novels. There is a very curious work, ent.i.tled "Travels in the East," 2 vols. 8vo, of which the author has been frequently and in vain inquired after. These travels are attributed to a n.o.ble lord; but it now appears that they are a very entertaining narrative manufactured by Hill. Whiston, the bookseller, had placed this work in his MS. catalogue of Hill's books.

There is still another production of considerable merit, ent.i.tled "Observations on the Greek and Roman Cla.s.sics," 1753.

A learned friend recollects, when young, that this critical work was said to be written by Hill. It excels Blackwell and Fenton; and aspires to the numerous composition of prose. The sentimental critic enters into the feelings of the great authors whom he describes with spirit, delicacy of taste, and sometimes with beautiful ill.u.s.tration. It only wants a chastening hand to become a manual for the young cla.s.sical student, by which he might acquire those vivid emotions, which many college tutors may not be capable of communicating.

I suspect, too, he is the author of this work, from a pa.s.sage which Smart quotes, as a specimen of Hill's puffing himself, and of those smart short periods which look like wit, without being witty. In a letter to himself, as we are told, Hill writes:--"You have discovered many of the beauties of the ancients--they are obliged to you; we are obliged to you: were they alive, they would thank you; we who are alive do thank you." If Hill could discriminate the most hidden beauties of the ancients, the _tact_ must have been formed at his leisure--in his busy hours he never copied them; but when had he leisure?

Two other works, of the most contrasted character, display the versatility and dispositions of this singular genius, at different eras. When "The Inspector" was rolling in his chariot about the town, appeared "Letters from the Inspector to a Lady," 1752. It is a pamphlet, containing the amorous correspondence of Hill with a reigning beauty, whom he first saw at Ranelagh. On his first ardent professions he is contemptuously rejected; he perseveres in high pa.s.sion, and is coldly encouraged; at length he triumphs; and this proud and sullen beauty, in her turn, presents a horrid picture of the pa.s.sions. Hill then becomes the reverse of what he was; weary of her jealousy, sated with the intercourse, he studiously avoids, and at length rejects her; a.s.signing for his final argument his approaching marriage. The work may produce a moral effect, while it exhibits a striking picture of all the misery of illicit connexions: but the scenes are coloured with Ovidian warmth. The original letters were shown at the bookseller's: Hill's were in his own handwriting, and the lady's in a female hand. But whether Hill was the publisher, as an attempt at notoriety--or the lady admired her own correspondence, which is often exquisitely wrought, is not known.

Hill, in his serious hours, published a large quarto volume, ent.i.tled "Thoughts Concerning G.o.d and Nature," 1755. This work, the result of his scientific knowledge and his moral reasoning, was never undertaken for the purpose of profit. He printed it with the certainty of a considerable loss, from its abstract topics, not obvious to general readers; at a time, too, when a guinea quarto was a very hazardous enterprise. He published it purely from conscientious and religious motives; a circ.u.mstance mentioned in that Apology of his Life which we have noticed. The more closely the character of Hill is scrutinised, the more extraordinary appears this man, so often justly contemned, and so often unjustly depreciated.

[294] Through the influence of Lord Bute he became connected with the Royal Gardens at Kew; and his lordship also a.s.sisted him in publishing his botanical works. See note, p. 363.

[295] It would occupy pages to transcribe epigrams on Hill. One of them alludes to his philosophical as well as his literary character:--

"Hill puffs himself; forbear to chide!

An insect vile and mean Must first, he knows, be magnified Before it can be seen."

Garrick's happy lines are well known on his farces:--

"For physic and farces his equal there scarce is-- His farces are physic, his physic a farce is."

Another said--

"The worse that we wish thee, for all thy vile crimes, Is to take thy own physic, and read thy own rhymes."

The rejoinder would reverse the wish--

"For, if he takes his physic first, He'll never read his rhymes."

[296] Hill says, in his pamphlet on the "Virtues of British Herbs":--"It will be happy if, by the same means, the knowledge of plants also becomes more general. The study of them is pleasant, and the exercise of it healthful. He who seeks the herb for its cure, will find it half effected by the walk; and when he is acquainted with the useful kinds, he may be more people's, besides his own, physician."

BOYLE AND BENTLEY.

A Faction of Wits at Oxford the concealed movers of this Controversy--Sir WILLIAM TEMPLE'S opinions the ostensible cause; Editions of cla.s.sical Authors by young Students at Oxford the probable one--BOYLE'S first attack in the Preface to his "Phalaris"--BENTLEY, after a silence of three years, betrays his feelings on the literary calumny of BOYLE--BOYLE replies by the "Examination of Bentley's Dissertation"--BENTLEY rejoins by enlarging it--the effects of a contradictory Narrative at a distant time--BENTLEY'S suspicions of the origin of the "Phalaris," and "The Examination," proved by subsequent facts--BENTLEY'S dignity when stung at the ridicule of Dr.

KING--applies a cla.s.sical pun, and nicknames his facetious and caustic Adversary--KING invents an extraordinary Index to dissect the character of BENTLEY--specimens of the Controversy; BOYLE'S menace, anathema, and ludicrous humour--BENTLEY'S sarcastic reply not inferior to that of the Wits.

The splendid controversy between BOYLE and BENTLEY was at times a strife of gladiators, and has been regretted as the opprobrium of our literature; but it should be perpetuated to its honour; for it may be considered, on one side at least, as a n.o.ble contest of heroism.

The ostensible cause of the present quarrel was inconsiderable; the concealed motive lies deeper; and the party feelings of the haughty Aristarchus of Cambridge, and a faction of wits at Oxford, under the secret influence of Dean Aldrich, provoked this fierce and glorious contest.

Wit, ridicule, and invective, by cabal and stratagem, obtained a seeming triumph over a single individual, but who, like the Farnesian Hercules, personified the force and resistance of incomparable strength. "The Bees of Christchurch," as this conspiracy of wits has been called, so musical and so angry, rushed in a dark swarm about him, but only left their fine stings in the flesh they could not wound. He only put out his hand in contempt, never in rage. The Christchurch men, as if doubtful whether wit could prevail against learning, had recourse to the maliciousness of personal satire. They amused an idle public, who could even relish sense and Greek, seasoned as they were with wit and satire, while Boyle was showing how Bentley wanted wit, and Bentley was proving how Boyle wanted learning.

To detect the origin of the controversy, we must find the seed-plot of Bentley's volume in Sir William Temple's "Essay upon Ancient and Modern Learning," which he inscribed to his alma mater, the University of Cambridge. Sir William, who had caught the contagion of the prevalent literary controversy of the times, in which the finest geniuses in Europe had entered the lists, imagined that the ancients possessed a greater force of genius, with some peculiar advantages--that the human mind was in a state of decay--and that our knowledge was nothing more than scattered fragments saved out of the general shipwreck. He writes with a premeditated design to dispute the improvements or undervalue the inventions of his own age. Wotton, the friend of Bentley, replied by his curious volume of "Reflections on Ancient and Modern Learning." But Sir William, in his ardour, had thrown out an unguarded opinion, which excited the hostile contempt of Bentley. "The oldest books," he says, "we have, are still in their kind the best; the two most ancient that I know of, in prose, are 'aesop's Fables' and 'Phalaris's Epistles.'"--The "Epistles," he insists, exhibit every excellence of "a statesman, a soldier, a wit, and a scholar." That ancient author, who Bentley afterwards a.s.serted was only "some dreaming pedant, with his elbow on his desk."

Bentley, bristled over with Greek, perhaps then considered that to notice a vernacular and volatile writer ill a.s.sorted with the critic's _Fastus_. But about this time Dean Aldrich had set an example to the students of Christchurch of publishing editions of cla.s.sical authors.

Such juvenile editorships served as an easy admission into the fashionable literature of Oxford. Alsop had published the "aesop;" and Boyle, among other "young gentlemen," easily obtained the favour of the dean, "to _desire_ him to undertake an edition of the 'Epistles of Phalaris.'" Such are the modest terms Boyle employs in his reply to Bentley, after he had discovered the unlucky choice he had made of an author.

For this edition of "Phalaris" it was necessary to collate a MS. in the king's library; and Bentley, about this time, had become the royal librarian. Boyle did not apply directly to Bentley, but circuitously, by his bookseller, with whom the doctor was not on terms. Some act of civility, or a Mercury more "formose," to use one of his latinisms, was probably expected. The MS. was granted, but the collator was negligent; in six days Bentley reclaimed it, "four hours" had been sufficient for the purpose of collation.

When Boyle's "Phalaris" appeared, he made this charge in the preface, that having ordered the Epistles to be collated with the MS. in the king's library, the collator was prevented perfecting the collation by the _singular humanity_ of the library-keeper, who refused any further use of the MS.; _pro singulari sua humanitate negavit_: an expression that sharply hit a man marked by the haughtiness of his manners.[297]

Bentley, on this insult, informed Boyle of what had pa.s.sed. He expected that Boyle would have civilly cancelled the page; though he tells us he did not require this, because, "to have insisted on the cancel, might have been forcing a gentleman to too low a submission;"--a stroke of delicacy which will surprise some to discover in the strong character of Bentley. But he was also too haughty to ask a favour, and too conscious of his superiority to betray a feeling of injury. Boyle replied, that the bookseller's account was quite different from the doctor's, who had spoken slightingly of him. Bentley said no more.

Three years had nearly elapsed, when Bentley, in a new edition of his friend Wotton's book, published "A Dissertation on the Epistles of the Ancients;" where, reprehending the false criticism of Sir William Temple, he a.s.serted that the "Fables of aesop" and the "Epistles of Phalaris" were alike spurious. The blow was levelled at Christchurch, and all "the bees" were brushed down in the warmth of their summer-day.

It is remarkable that Bentley kept so long a silence; indeed, he had considered the affair so trivial, that he had preserved no part of the correspondence with Boyle, whom no doubt he slighted as the young editor of a spurious author. But Boyle's edition came forth, as Bentley expresses it, "with a sting in its mouth." This, at first, was like a cut finger--he breathed on it, and would have forgotten it; but the nerve was touched, and the pain raged long after the stroke.

Even the great mind of Bentley began to shrink at the touch of literary calumny, so different from the vulgar kind, in its extent and its duration. He betrays the soreness he would wish to conceal, when he complains that "the false story has been spread all over England."

The statement of Bentley produced, in reply, the famous book of Boyle's "Examination of Bentley's Dissertation." It opens with an imposing narrative, highly polished, of the whole transaction, with the extraordinary furniture of doc.u.ments, which had never before entered into a literary controversy--depositions--certificates--affidavits--and private letters. Bentley now rejoined by his enlarged "Dissertation on Phalaris," a volume of perpetual value to the lovers of ancient literature, and the memorable preface of which, itself a volume, exhibits another Narrative, entirely differing from Boyle's. These produced new replies and new rejoinders. The whole controversy became so perplexed, that it has frightened away all who have attempted to adjust the particulars. With unanimous consent they give up the cause, as one in which both parties studied only to contradict each other. Such was the fate of a Narrative, which was made out of the recollections of the parties, with all their pa.s.sions at work, after an interval of three years. In each, the memory seemed only retentive of those pa.s.sages which best suited their own purpose, and which were precisely those the other party was most likely to have forgotten.

What was forgotten, was denied; what was admitted, was made to refer to something else; dialogues were given which appear never to have been spoken; and incidents described which are declared never to have taken place; and all this, perhaps, without any purposed violation of truth. Such were the dangers and misunderstandings which attended a Narrative framed out of the broken or pa.s.sionate recollections of the parties on the watch to confound one another.[298]

Bentley's Narrative is a most vigorous production: it heaves with the workings of a master-spirit; still reasoning with such force, and still applying with such happiness the stores of his copious literature, had it not been for this literary quarrel, the mere English reader had lost this single opportunity of surveying that commanding intellect.

Boyle's edition of "Phalaris" was a work of parade, designed to confer on a young man, who bore an eminent name, some distinction in the literary world. But Bentley seems to have been well-informed of the secret transactions at Christchurch. In his first attack he mentions Boyle as "the young gentleman of great hopes, whose name is set to the edition;" and a.s.serts that the editor, no more than his own "Phalaris," has written what was ascribed to him. He persists in making a plurality of a pretended unity, by multiplying Boyle into a variety of little personages, of "new editors," our "annotators," our "great geniuses."[299] Boyle, touched at these reflections, declared "they were levelled at a learned society, in which I had the happiness to be educated; as if 'Phalaris' had been made up by contributions from several hands." Pressed by Bentley to acknowledge the a.s.sistance of Dr. John Freind, Boyle confers on him the ambiguous t.i.tle of "The Director of Studies." Bentley links the Bees together--Dr. Freind and Dr. Alsop. "The Director of Studies, who has lately set out Ovid's 'Metamorphoses,' with a paraphrase and notes, is of the same size for learning with the late editor of the aesopian Fables. They bring the nation into contempt abroad, and themselves into it at home;" and adds to this magisterial style, the mortification of his criticism on Freind's Ovid, as on Alsop's aesop.

But Boyle a.s.suming the honours of an edition of "Phalaris," was but a venial offence, compared with that committed by the celebrated volume published in its defence.

If Bentley's suspicions were not far from the truth, that "the 'Phalaris' had been _made up by contributions_," they approached still closer when they attacked "The Examination of his Dissertation." Such was the a.s.sistance which Boyle received from all "the Bees," that scarcely a few ears of that rich sheaf fall to his portion. His efforts hardly reach to the mere narrative of his transactions with Bentley. All the varied erudition, all the Attic graces, all the inexhaustible wit, are claimed by others; so that Boyle was not materially concerned either in his "Phalaris," or in the more memorable work.[300]

The Christchurch party now formed a literary conspiracy against the great critic; and as treason is infectious when the faction is strong, they were secretly engaging new a.s.sociates; Whenever any of the party published anything themselves, they had sworn to have always "a fling at Bentley," and intrigued with their friends to do the same.

They procured Keil, the professor of astronomy, in so grave a work as "The Theory of the Earth," to have a fling at Bentley's boasted sagacity in conjectural criticism. Wotton, in a dignified reproof, administered a spirited correction to the party-spirit; while his love of science induced him generously to commend Keil, and intimate the advantages the world may derive from his studies, "as he grows older."

Even Garth and Pope struck in with the alliance, and condescended to pour out rhymes more lasting than even the prose of "the Bees."

But of all the rabid wits who, fastening on their prey, never drew their fangs from the n.o.ble animal, the facetious Dr. King seems to have been the only one who excited Bentley's anger. Persevering malice, in the teasing shape of caustic banter, seems to have affected the spirit even of Bentley.

At one of those conferences which pa.s.sed between Bentley and the bookseller, King happened to be present; and being called on by Boyle to bear his part in the drama, he performed it quite to the taste of "the Bees." He addressed a letter to Dean Aldrich, in which he gave one particular: and, to make up a sufficient dose, dropped some corrosives. He closes his letter thus:--"That scorn and contempt which I have naturally for pride and insolence, makes me remember that which otherwise I might have forgotten." Nothing touched Bentley more to the quick than reflections on "his pride and insolence." Our defects seem to lose much of their character, in reference to ourselves, by habit and natural disposition; yet we have always a painful suspicion of their existence; and he who touches them with no tenderness is never pardoned. The invective of King had all the bitterness of truth.

Bentley applied a line from Horace; which showed that both Horace and Bentley could pun in anger:--

Proscripti _Regis Rupili_ pus atque venenum.[301]--_Sat._ i. 7.

The filth and venom of _Rupilius King_.

The particular incident which King imperfectly recollected, made afterwards much noise among the wits, for giving them a new notion of the nature of ancient MSS. King relates that Dr. Bentley said--"If the MS. were collated, it would be worth nothing for the future." Bentley, to mortify the pertness of the bookseller, who would not send his publications to the Royal Library, had said that he ought to do so, were it but to make amends for the damage the MS. would sustain by his printing the various readings; "for," added Bentley, "after the various lections were once taken and printed, _the MS. would be like a squeezed orange, and little worth for the future_." This familiar comparison of a MS. with a squeezed orange provoked the epigrammatists. Bentley, in retorting on King, adds some curious facts concerning the fate of MSS. after they have been printed; but is aware, he says, of what little relish or sense the Doctor has of MSS., who is better skilled in "the catalogue of ales, his Humty-Dumty, Hugmatee, Three-threads, and the rest of that glorious list, than in the catalogue of MSS." King, in his banter on Dr. Lister's journey to Paris, had given a list of these English beverages. It was well known that he was in too constant an intercourse with them all. Bentley nicknames King through the progress of his Controversy, for his tavern-pleasures, Humty-Dumty, and accuses him of writing more in a tavern than in a study. He little knew the injustice of his charge against a student who had written notes on 22,000 books and MSS.; but they were not Greek ones.