Calamities And Quarrels Of Authors Part 9

Logan studied at the University of Edinburgh, was ordained in the Church of Scotland--and early distinguished as a poet by the simplicity and the tenderness of his verses, yet the philosophy of history had as deeply interested his studies. He gave two courses of lectures. I have heard from his pupils their admiration, after the lapse of many years; so striking were those lectures for having successfully applied the science of moral philosophy to the history of nations. All wished that Logan should obtain the chair of the Professorship of Universal History--but from some point of etiquette he failed in obtaining that distinguished office.

This was his first disappointment in life, yet then perhaps but lightly felt; for the public had approved of his poems, and a successful poet is easily consoled. Poetry to such a gentle being seems a universal specific for all the evils of life; it acts at the moment, exhausting and destroying too often the const.i.tution it seems to restore.

He had finished the tragedy of "Runnymede;" it was accepted at Covent-garden, but interdicted by the Lord Chamberlain, from some suspicion that its lofty sentiments contained allusions to the politics of the day. The Barons-in-arms who met John were conceived to be deeper politicians than the poet himself was aware of. This was the second disappointment in the life of this man of genius.

The third calamity was the natural consequence of a tragic poet being also a Scotch clergyman. Logan had inflicted a wound on the Presbytery, heirs of the genius of old Prynne, whose puritanic fanaticism had never forgiven Home for his "Douglas," and now groaned to detect genius still lurking among them.[60] Logan, it is certain, expressed his contempt for them; they their hatred of him: folly and pride in a poet, to beard Presbyters in a land of Presbyterians![61]

He gladly abandoned them, retiring on a small annuity. They had, however, hurt his temper--they had irritated the nervous system of a man too susceptible of all impressions, gentle or unkind--his character had all those unequal habitudes which genius contracts in its boldness and its tremors; he was now vivacious and indignant, and now fretted and melancholy. He flew to the metropolis, occupied himself in literature, and was a frequent contributor to the "English Review." He published "A Review of the Princ.i.p.al Charges against Mr.

Hastings." Logan wrestled with the genius of Burke and Sheridan; the House of Commons ordered the publisher Stockdale to be prosecuted, but the author did not live to rejoice in the victory obtained by his genius.

This elegant philosopher has impressed on all his works the seal of genius; and his posthumous compositions became even popular; he who had with difficulty escaped excommunication by Presbyters, left the world after his death two volumes of sermons, which breathe all that piety, morality, and eloquence admire. His unrevised lectures, published under the name of a person, one Rutherford, who had purchased the MS., were given to the world in "A View of Ancient History." But one highly-finished composition he had himself published; it is a philosophical review of Despotism: had the name of Gibbon been affixed to the t.i.tle-page, its authenticity had not been suspected.[62]

From one of his executors, Mr. Donald Grant, who wrote the life prefixed to his poems, I heard of the state of his numerous MSS.; the scattered, yet warm embers of the unhappy bard. Several tragedies, and one on Mary Queen of Scots, abounding with all that domestic tenderness and poetic sensibility which formed the soft and natural feature of his muse; these, with minor poems, thirty lectures on the Roman History, and portions of a periodical paper, were the wrecks of genius! He resided here, little known out of a very private circle, and perished in his fortieth year, not of penury, but of a broken heart. Such n.o.ble and well-founded expectations of fortune and fame, all the plans of literary ambition overturned: his genius, with all its delicacy, its spirit, and its elegance, became a prey to that melancholy which const.i.tuted so large a portion of it.

Logan, in his "Ode to a Man of Letters," had formed this lofty conception of a great author:--

Won from neglected wastes of time, Apollo hails his fairest clime, The provinces of mind; An Egypt with eternal towers;[63]

See Montesquieu redeem the hours From Louis to mankind.

No tame remission genius knows, No interval of dark repose, To quench the ethereal flame; From Thebes to Troy, the victor hies, And Homer with his hero vies, In varied paths to Fame.

Our children will long repeat his "Ode to the Cuckoo," one of the most lovely poems in our language; magical stanzas of picture, melody, and sentiment.[64]

These authors were undoubtedly men of finer feelings, who all perished immaturely, victims in the higher department of literature! But this article would not be complete without furnishing the reader with a picture of the fate of one who, with a pertinacity of industry not common, having undergone regular studies, not very injudiciously deemed that the life of a man of letters could provide for the simple wants of a philosopher.

This man was the late ROBERT HERON, who, in the following letter, transcribed from the original, stated his history to the Literary Fund. It was written in a moment of extreme bodily suffering and mental agony in the house to which he had been hurried for debt. At such a moment he found eloquence in a narrative, pathetic from its simplicity, and valuable for its genuineness, as giving the results of a life of literary industry, productive of great infelicity and disgrace; one would imagine that the author had been a criminal rather than a man of letters.

"_The Case of a Man of Letters, of regular education, living by honest literary industry._

"Ever since I was eleven years of age I have mingled with my studies the labour of teaching or of writing, to support and educate myself.

"During about twenty years, while I was in constant or occasional attendance at the University of Edinburgh, I taught and a.s.sisted young persons, at all periods, in the course of education; from the Alphabet to the highest branches of Science and Literature.

"I read a course of Lectures on the Law of Nature, the Law of Nations; the Jewish, the Grecian, the Roman, and the Canon Law; and then on the Feudal Law; and on the several forms of Munic.i.p.al Jurisprudence established in Modern Europe. I printed a Syllabus of these Lectures, which was approved. They were intended as introductory to the professional study of Law, and to a.s.sist gentlemen who did not study it professionally, in the understanding of History.

"I translated 'Fourcroy's Chemistry' twice, from both the second and the third editions of the original; 'Fourcroy's Philosophy of Chemistry;' 'Savary's Travels in Greece;' 'Dumourier's Letters;'

'Gessner's Idylls' in part; an abstract of 'Zimmerman on Solitude,'

and a great diversity of smaller pieces.

"I wrote a 'Journey through the Western Parts of Scotland,' which has pa.s.sed through two editions; a 'History of Scotland,' in six volumes 8vo; a 'Topographical Account of Scotland,' which has been several times reprinted; a number of communications in the 'Edinburgh Magazine;' many Prefaces and Critiques; a 'Memoir of the Life of Burns the Poet,' which suggested and promoted the subscription for his family--has been many times reprinted, and formed the basis of Dr.

Currie's Life of him, as I learned by a letter from the doctor to one of his friends; a variety of _Jeux d'Esprit_ in verse and prose; and many abridgments of large works.

"In the beginning of 1799 I was encouraged to come to London. Here I have written a great multiplicity of articles in almost every branch of science and literature; my education at Edinburgh having comprehended them all. The 'London Review,' the 'Agricultural Magazine,' the 'Anti-Jacobin Review,' the 'Monthly Magazine,' the 'Universal Magazine,' the 'Public Characters,' the 'Annual Necrology,' with several other periodical works, contain many of my communications. In such of those publications as have been reviewed, I can show that my anonymous pieces have been distinguished with very high praise. I have written also a short system of Chemistry, in one volume 8vo; and I published a few weeks since a small work called 'Comforts of Life,'[65]

of which the first edition was sold in one week, and the second edition is now in rapid sale.

"In the Newspapers--the _Oracle_, the _Porcupine_ when it existed, the _General Evening Post_, the _Morning Post_, the _British Press_, the _Courier_, &c., I have published many Reports of Debates in Parliament, and, I believe, a greater variety of light fugitive pieces than I know to have been written by any one other person.

"I have written also a variety of compositions in the Latin and the French languages, in favour of which I have been honoured with the testimonies of liberal approbation.

"I have invariably written to serve the cause of religion, morality, pious christian education, and good order, in the most direct manner.

I have considered what I have written as mere trifles; and have incessantly studied to qualify myself for something better. I can prove that I have, for many years, read and written, one day with another, from twelve to sixteen hours a day. As a human being, I have not been free from follies and errors. But the tenor of my life has been temperate, laborious, humble, quiet, and, to the utmost of my power, beneficent. I can prove the general tenor of my writings to have been candid, and ever adapted to exhibit the most favourable views of the abilities, dispositions, and exertions of others.

"For these last ten months I have been brought to the very extremity of bodily and pecuniary distress.

"I shudder at the thought of perishing in a gaol.

"_92, Chancery-lane, Feb. 2, 1807._

"(In confinement)."

The physicians reported that Robert Heron's health was such "as rendered him totally incapable of extricating himself from the difficulties in which he was involved, by the _indiscreet exertion of his mind, in protracted and incessant literary labours_."

About three months after, Heron sunk under a fever, and perished amid the walls of Newgate. We are disgusted with this horrid state of pauperism; we are indignant at beholding an author, not a contemptible one, in this last stage of human wretchedness! after early and late studies--after having read and written from twelve to sixteen hours a day! O, ye populace of scribblers! before ye are driven to a garret, and your eyes are filled with constant tears, pause--recollect that few of you possess the learning or the abilities of Heron.

The fate of Heron is the fate of hundreds of authors by profession in the present day--of men of some literary talent, who can never extricate themselves from a degrading state of poverty.

FOOTNOTES:

[60] Home was at the time when he wrote "Douglas" a clergyman in the Scottish Church; the theatre was then looked upon by the religious Scotsmen with the most perfect abhorrence. Many means were taken to deter the performance of the play; and as they did not succeed, others were tried to annoy the author, until their persevering efforts induced him to withdraw himself entirely from the clerical profession.--ED.

[61] The objection to his tragedy was made chiefly by his parishioners at South Leith, who were strongly opposed to their minister being in any way connected with the theatre. He therefore resigned his appointment, and settled in London, which he never afterwards abandoned, dying there in 1788.--ED.

[62] This admirable little work is ent.i.tled "A Dissertation on the Governments, Manners, and Spirit of Asia; Murray, 1787." It is anonymous; but the publisher informed me it was written by Logan. His "Elements of the Philosophy of History" are valuable. His "Sermons" have been republished.

[63] The finest provinces of Egypt gained from a neglected waste.

[64] An attempt has been made to deprive Logan of the authorship of this poem. He had edited (very badly) the poems of a deceased friend, Michael Bruce; and the friends of the latter claimed this poem as one of them. In the words of one who has examined the evidence it may be sufficient to say, "his claim is not only supported by internal evidence, but the charge was never advanced against him while he was alive to repel it."--ED.

[65] "The Comforts of Life" were written in prison; "The Miseries"

(by Jas. Beresford) necessarily in a drawing-room. The works of authors are often in contrast with themselves; melancholy authors are the most jocular, and the most humorous the most melancholy.

LABORIOUS AUTHORS.

This is one of the groans of old BURTON over his laborious work, when he is antic.i.p.ating the reception it is like to meet with, and personates his objectors. He says:--

"This is a thinge of meere industrie--a collection without wit or invention--a very toy! So men are valued!--their labours vilified by fellowes of no worth themselves, as things of nought; who could not have done as much."

There is, indeed, a cla.s.s of authors who are liable to forfeit all claims to genius, whatever their genius may be--these are the laborious writers of voluminous works; but they are farther subject to heavier grievances--to be undervalued or neglected by the apathy or the ingrat.i.tude of the public.

Industry is often conceived to betray the absence of intellectual exertion, and the magnitude of a work is imagined necessarily to shut out all genius. Yet a laborious work has often had an original growth and raciness in it, requiring a genius whose peculiar feeling, like invisible vitality, is spread through the mighty body. Feeble imitations of such laborious works have proved the master's mind that is in the original. There is a talent in industry which every industrious man does not possess; and even taste and imagination may lead to the deepest studies of antiquities, as well as mere undiscerning curiosity and plodding dulness.

But there are other more striking characteristics of intellectual feeling in authors of this cla.s.s. The fort.i.tude of mind which enables them to complete labours of which, in many instances, they are conscious that the real value will only be appreciated by dispa.s.sionate posterity, themselves rarely living to witness the fame of their own work established, while they endure the captiousness of malicious cavillers. It is said that the Optics of NEWTON had no character or credit here till noticed in France. It would not be the only instance of an author writing above his own age, and antic.i.p.ating its more advanced genius. How many works of erudition might be adduced to show their author's disappointments! PRIDEAUX'S learned work of the "Connexion of the Old and New Testament," and SHUCKFORD'S similar one, were both a long while before they could obtain a publisher, and much longer before they found readers. It is said Sir WALTER RALEIGH burned the second volume of his History, from the ill success the first had met with. PRINCE'S "Worthies of Devon" was so unfavourably received by the public, that the laborious and patriotic author was so discouraged as not to print the second volume, which is said to have been prepared for the press.