Lives of the Poets Part 53

Thy verse could show ev'n Cromwell's innocence, And compliment the storms that bore him hence.

O! had thy muse not come an age too soon, But seen great Na.s.sau on the British throne, How had his triumph glitter'd in thy page!

What is this but to say, that he who could compliment Cromwell had been the proper poet for king William; Addison, however, never printed the piece.

The letter from Italy has been always praised, but has never been praised beyond its merit. It is more correct, with less appearance of labour, and more elegant, with less ambition of ornament, than any other of his poems. There is, however, one broken metaphor, of which notice may properly be taken:

Fir'd with that name-- I bridle in my struggling muse with pain, That longs to launch into a n.o.bler strain.

To _bridle a G.o.ddess_ is no very delicate idea; but why must she be _bridled_? because she _longs to launch_; an act which was never hindered by a _bridle_: and whither will she _launch_? into a _n.o.bler strain_. She is in the first line a _horse_, in the second a _boat_; and the care of the poet is to keep his _horse_ or his _boat_ from _singing_.

The next composition is the far-famed Campaign, which Dr. Warton has termed a "Gazette in rhyme," with harshness not often used by the good-nature of his criticism. Before a censure so severe is admitted, let us consider that war is a frequent subject of poetry, and then inquire who has described it with more justness and force. Many of our own writers tried their powers upon this year of victory; yet Addison's is confessedly the best performance: his poem is the work of a man not blinded by the dust of learning; his images are not borrowed merely from books. The superiority which he confers upon his hero is not personal prowess, and "mighty bone," but deliberate intrepidity, a calm command of his pa.s.sions, and the power of consulting his own mind in the midst of danger. The rejection and contempt of fiction is rational and manly.

It may be observed that the last line is imitated by Pope:

Marlb'rough's exploits appear divinely bright-- Rais'd of themselves, their genuine charms they boast, And those that paint them truest, praise them most.

This Pope had in his thoughts: but, not knowing how to use what was not his own, he spoiled the thought when he had borrowed it:

The well-sung woes shall sooth my pensive ghost; He best can paint[198]them who shall feel them most.

Martial exploits may be _painted_; perhaps _woes_ may be _painted_; but they are surely not _painted_ by being _well-sung_: it is not easy to paint in song, or to sing in colours.

No pa.s.sage in the Campaign has been more often mentioned than the simile of the angel, which is said, in the Tatler, to be "one of the n.o.blest thoughts that ever entered into the heart of man," and is, therefore, worthy of attentive consideration. Let it be first inquired whether it be a simile. A poetical simile is the discovery of likeness between two actions, in their general nature dissimilar, or of causes terminating by different operations in some resemblance of effect. But the mention of another like consequence from a like cause, or of a like performance by a like agency, is not a simile, but an exemplification. It is not a simile to say that the Thames waters fields, as the Po waters fields; or that as Hecla vomits flames in Iceland, so Aetna vomits flames in Sicily. When Horace says of Pindar, that he pours his violence and rapidity of verse, as a river swoln with rain rushes from the mountain; or of himself, that his genius wanders in quest of poetical decorations, as the bee wanders to collect honey; he, in either case, produces a simile; the mind is impressed with the resemblance of things generally unlike, as unlike as intellect and body. But if Pindar had been described as writing with the copiousness and grandeur of Homer; or Horace had told that he reviewed and finished his own poetry with the same care as Isocrates polished his orations, instead of similitude he would have exhibited almost ident.i.ty; he would have given the same portraits with different names. In the poem now examined, when the English are represented as gaining a fortified pa.s.s, by repet.i.tion of attack and perseverance of resolution; their obstinacy of courage, and vigour of onset, is well ill.u.s.trated by the sea that breaks, with incessant battery, the dikes of Holland. This is a simile; but when Addison, having celebrated the beauty of Marlborough's person, tells us, that "Achilles thus was form'd with ev'ry grace," here is no simile, but a mere exemplification. A simile may be compared to lines converging at a point, and is more excellent as the lines approach from greater distance; an exemplification may be considered as two parallel lines, which run on together without approximation, never far separated, and never joined. Marlborough is so like the angel in the poem, that the action of both is almost the same, and performed by both in the same manner. Marlborough "teaches the battle to rage;" the angel "directs the storm:" Marlborough is "unmoved in peaceful thought;" the angel is "calm and serene:" Marlborough stands "unmoved amidst the shock of hosts;" the angel rides "calm in the whirlwind." The lines on Marlborough are just and n.o.ble; but the simile gives almost the same images a second time.

But, perhaps, this thought, though hardly a simile, was remote from vulgar conceptions, and required great labour of research, or dexterity of application. Of this, Dr. Madden, a name which Ireland ought to honour, once gave me his opinion. "If I had set," said he, "ten schoolboys to write on the battle of Blenheim, and eight had brought me the angel, I should not have been surprised."

The opera of Rosamond, though it is seldom mentioned, is one of the first of Addison's compositions. The subject is well chosen, the fiction is pleasing, and the praise of Marlborough, for which the scene gives an opportunity, is, what perhaps every human excellence must be, the product of good luck, improved by genius. The thoughts are sometimes great, and sometimes tender; the versification is easy and gay. There is, doubtless, some advantage in the shortness of the lines, which there is little temptation to load with expletive epithets. The dialogue seems commonly better than the songs. The two comick characters of sir Trusty and Grideline, though of no great value, are yet such as the poet intended[199]. Sir Trusty's account of the death of Rosamond is, I think, too grossly absurd. The whole drama is airy and elegant; engaging in its process, and pleasing in its conclusion. If Addison had cultivated the lighter parts of poetry, he would, probably, have excelled.

The tragedy of Cato, which, contrary to the rule observed in selecting the works of other poets, has, by the weight of its character, forced its way into the late collection, is unquestionably the n.o.blest production of Addison's genius. Of a work so much read, it is difficult to say any thing new. About things on which the publick thinks long, it commonly attains to think right; and of Cato it has been not unjustly determined, that it is rather a poem in dialogue than a drama, rather a succession of just sentiments in elegant language, than a representation of natural affections, or of any state probable or possible in human life. Nothing here "excites or a.s.suages emotion:" here is "no magical power of raising phantastick terrour or wild anxiety." The events are expected without solicitude, and are remembered without joy or sorrow. Of the agents we have no care: we consider not what they are doing, or what they are suffering; we wish only to know what they have to say. Cato is a being above our solicitude; a man of whom the G.o.ds take care, and whom we leave to their care with heedless confidence. To the rest, neither G.o.ds nor men can have much attention; for there is not one amongst them that strongly attracts either affection or esteem. But they are made the vehicles of such sentiments and such expression, that there is scarcely a scene in the play which the reader does not wish to impress upon his memory.

When Cato was shown to Pope[200], he advised the author to print it, without any theatrical exhibition; supposing that it would be read more favourably than heard. Addison declared himself of the same opinion; but urged the importunity of his friends for its appearance on the stage.

The emulation of parties made it successful beyond expectation; and its success has introduced or confirmed among us the use of dialogue too declamatory, of unaffecting elegance, and chill philosophy.

The universality of applause, however it might quell the censure of common mortals, had no other effect than to harden Dennis in fixed dislike; but his dislike was not merely capricious. He found and showed many faults: he showed them, indeed, with anger, but he found them with acuteness, such as ought to rescue his criticism from oblivion; though, at last, it will have no other life than it derives from the work which it endeavours to oppress.

Why he pays no regard to the opinion of the audience, he gives his reason, by remarking, that,

"A deference is to be paid to a general applause, when it appears that that applause is natural and spontaneous; but that little regard is to be had to it, when it is affected and artificial. Of all the tragedies which, in his memory, have had vast and violent runs, not one has been excellent; few have been tolerable; most have been scandalous. When a poet writes a tragedy, who knows he has judgment, and who feels he has genius, that poet presumes upon his own merit, and scorns to make a cabal. That people come coolly to the representation of such a tragedy, without any violent expectation, or delusive imagination, or invincible prepossession; that such an audience is liable to receive the impressions which the poem shall naturally make on them, and to judge by their own reason, and their own judgments, and that reason and judgment are calm and serene, not formed by nature to make proselytes, and to control and lord it over the imaginations of others. But that when an author writes a tragedy, who knows he has neither genius nor judgment, he has recourse to the making a party, and he endeavours to make up in industry what is wanting in talent, and to supply by poetical craft the absence of poetical art; that such an author is humbly contented to raise men's pa.s.sions by a plot without doors, since he despairs of doing it by that which he brings upon the stage. That party and pa.s.sion, and prepossession, are clamorous and tumultuous things, and so much the more clamorous and tumultuous by how much the more erroneous: that they domineer and tyrannise over the imaginations of persons who want judgment, and sometimes too of those who have it; and, like a fierce and outrageous torrent, bear down all opposition before them." He then condemns the neglect of poetical justice; which is always one of his favourite principles.

"'Tis certainly the duty of every tragick poet, by the exact distribution of poetical justice, to imitate the divine dispensation, and to inculcate a particular providence. 'Tis true, indeed, upon the stage of the world, the wicked sometimes prosper, and the guiltless suffer. But that is permitted by the governor of the world, to show, from the attribute of his infinite justice, that there is a compensation in futurity, to prove the immortality of the human soul, and the certainty of future rewards and punishments. But the poetical persons in tragedy exist no longer than the reading, or the representation; the whole extent of their ent.i.ty is circ.u.mscribed by those; and, therefore, during that reading or representation, according to their merits or demerits, they must be punished or rewarded. If this is not done, there is no impartial distribution of poetical justice, no instructive lecture of a particular providence, and no imitation of the divine dispensation. And yet the author of this tragedy does not only run counter to this, in the fate of his princ.i.p.al character; but every where, throughout it, makes virtue suffer, and vice triumph: for not only Cato is vanquished by Caesar, but the treachery and perfidiousness of Syphax prevail over the honest simplicity and the credulity of Juba; and the sly subtlety and dissimulation of Portius over the generous frankness and open-heartedness of Marcus."

Whatever pleasure there may be in seeing crimes punished and virtue rewarded, yet, since wickedness often prospers in real life, the poet is certainly at liberty to give it prosperity on the stage. For if poetry has an imitation of reality, how are its laws broken by exhibiting the world in its true form? The stage may sometimes gratify our wishes; but, if it be truly the "mirror of life," it ought to show us sometimes what we are to expect.

Dennis objects to the characters, that they are not natural, or reasonable; but as heroes and heroines are not beings that are seen every day, it is hard to find upon what principles their conduct shall be tried. It is, however, not useless to consider what he says of the manner in which Cato receives the account of his son's death.

"Nor is the grief of Cato, in the fourth act, one jot more in nature than that of his son and Lucia in the third. Cato receives the news of his son's death not only with dry eyes, but with a sort of satisfaction; and, in the same page, sheds tears for the calamity of his country, and does the same thing in the next page upon the bare apprehension of the danger of his friends. Now, since the love of one's country is the love of one's countrymen, as I have shown upon another occasion, I desire to ask these questions: Of all our countrymen, which do we love most, those whom we know, or those whom we know not? And of those whom we know, which do we cherish most, our friends or our enemies? And of our friends, which are the dearest to us, those who are related to us, or those who are not? And of all our relations, for which have we most tenderness, for those who are near to us, or for those who are remote? And of our near relations, which are the nearest, and, consequently, the dearest to us, our offspring, or others? Our offspring most certainly; as nature, or, in other words, providence, has wisely contrived for the preservation of mankind. Now, does it not follow, from what has been said, that for a man to receive the news of his son's death with dry eyes, and to weep at the same time for the calamities of his country, is a wretched affectation, and a miserable inconsistency? Is not that, in plain English, to receive with dry eyes the news of the deaths of those for whose sake our country is a name so dear to us, and, at the same time, to shed tears for those for whose sake our country is not a name so dear to us?"

But this formidable a.s.sailant is least resistible when he attacks the probability of the action, and the reasonableness of the plan. Every critical reader must remark, that Addison has, with a scrupulosity almost unexampled on the English stage, confined himself in time to a single day, and in place to rigorous unity. The scene never changes, and the whole action of the play pa.s.ses in the great hall of Cato's house at Utica. Much, therefore, is done in the hall, for which any other place had been more fit; and this impropriety affords Dennis many hints of merriment, and opportunities of triumph. The pa.s.sage is long; but as such disquisitions are not common, and the objections are skilfully formed and vigorously urged, those who delight in critical controversy will not think it tedious.

"Upon the departure of Portius, Semp.r.o.nius makes but one soliloquy, and immediately in comes Syphax, and then the two politicians are at it immediately. They lay their heads together, with their snuffboxes in their hands, as Mr. Bayes has it, and league it away. But in the midst of that wise scene, Syphax seems to give a seasonable caution to Semp.r.o.nius:

'_Syph_.

But is it true, Semp.r.o.nius, that your senate Is call'd together? G.o.ds! thou must be cautious; Cato has piercing eyes.'

"There is a great deal of caution shown indeed, in meeting in a governor's own hall to carry on their plot against him. Whatever opinion they have of his eyes, I suppose they had none of his ears, or they would never have talked at this foolish rate so near:

'G.o.ds! thou must be cautious.'

Oh! yes, very cautious, for if Cato should overhear you, and turn you off for politicians, Caesar would never take you; no, Caesar would never take you.

"When Cato, act the second, turns the senators out of the hall, upon pretence of acquainting Juba with the result of their debates, he appears to me to do a thing which is neither reasonable nor civil. Juba might certainly have better been made acquainted with the result of that debate in some private apartment of the palace. But the poet was driven upon this absurdity to make way for another; and that is, to give Juba an opportunity to demand Marcia of her father. But the quarrel and rage of Juba and Syphax, in the same act; the invectives of Syphax against the Romans and Cato; the advice that he gives Juba, in her father's hall, to bear away Marcia by force; and his brutal and clamorous rage upon his refusal, and at a time when Cato was scarcely out of sight, and, perhaps, not out of hearing, at least some of his guards or domesticks must necessarily be supposed to be within hearing; is a thing that is so far from being probable, that it is hardly possible.

"Semp.r.o.nius, in the second act, comes back once more in the same morning to the governor's hall, to carry on the conspiracy with Syphax against the governor, his country, and his family; which is so stupid, that it is below the wisdom of the O--'s, the Mac's, and the Teague's; even Eustace c.u.mmins himself would never have gone to Justice-hall to have conspired against the government. If officers at Portsmouth should lay their heads together, in order to the carrying off[201] J---- G----'s niece or daughter, would they meet in J--- G---'s hall, to carry on that conspiracy? There would be no necessity for their meeting there, at least till they came to the execution of their plot, because there would be other places to meet in. There would be no probability that they should meet there, because there would be places more private and more commodious. Now there ought to be nothing in a tragical action but what is necessary or probable.

"But treason is not the only thing that is carried on in this hall; that, and love, and philosophy, take their turns in it, without any manner of necessity or probability occasioned by the action, as duly and as regularly, without interrupting one another, as if there were a triple league between them, and a mutual agreement that each should give place to, and make way for the other, in a due and orderly succession.

"We now come to the third act. Semp.r.o.nius, in this act, comes into the governor's hall, with the leaders of the mutiny; but, as soon as Cato is gone, Semp.r.o.nius, who but just before had acted like an unparalleled knave, discovers himself, like an egregious fool, to be an accomplice in the conspiracy.

'_Semp_.

Know, villains, when such paltry slaves presume To mix in treason, if the plot succeeds, They're thrown neglected by; but, if it fails, They're sure to die like dogs, as you shall do.

Here, take these factious monsters, drag them forth To sudden death.'--

"'Tis true, indeed, the second leader says, there are none there but friends; but is that possible at such a juncture? Can a parcel of rogues attempt to a.s.sa.s.sinate the governor of a town of war, in his own house, in mid-day, and, after they are discovered, and defeated, can there be none near them but friends? Is it not plain, from these words of Semp.r.o.nius,

'Here, take these factious monsters, drag them forth To sudden death'--

and from the entrance of the guards upon the word of command, that those guards were within ear-shot? Behold Semp.r.o.nius, then, palpably discovered. How comes it to pa.s.s, then, that instead of being hanged up with the rest, he remains secure in the governor's hall, and there carries on his conspiracy against the government, the third time in the same day, with his old comrade Syphax, who enters at the same time that the guards are carrying away the leaders, big with the news of the defeat of Semp.r.o.nius; though where he had his intelligence so soon is difficult to imagine? And now the reader may expect a very extraordinary scene: there is not abundance of spirit indeed, nor a great deal of pa.s.sion, but there is wisdom more than enough to supply all defects.

'_Syph_.

Still there remains an after-game to play:

My troops are mounted, their Numidian steeds Snuff up the winds, and long to scour the desert.

Let but Semp.r.o.nius lead us in our flight, We'll force the gate, where Marcus keeps his guard, And hew down all that would oppose our pa.s.sage; A day will bring us into Caesar's camp.

'_Semp_. Confusion! I have fail'd of half my purpose; Marcia, the charming Marcia's left behind.'

"Well! but though he tells us the half-purpose that he has failed of, he does not tell us the half that he has carried. But what does he mean by,

'Marcia, the charming Marcia's left behind?'

He is now in her own house; and we have neither seen her, nor heard of her, any where else since the play began. But now let us hear Syphax:

'What hinders then, but that thou find her out, And hurry her away by manly force?'

But what does old Syphax mean by finding her out? They talk as if she were as hard to be found as a hare in a frosty morning.