Pope afterwards declared himself convinced, that Garth died in the communion of the church of Rome, having been privately reconciled. It is observed by Lowth, that there is less distance than is thought between skepticism and popery; and that a mind, wearied with perpetual doubt, willingly seeks repose in the bosom of an infallible church.
His poetry has been praised, at least, equally to its merit. In The Dispensary there is a strain of smooth and free versification; but few lines are eminently elegant. No passages fall below mediocrity, and few rise much above it. The plan seems formed without just proportion to the subject; the means and end have no necessary connexion. Resnel, in his Preface to Pope’s Essay, remarks, that Garth exhibits no discrimination of characters; and that what any one says might, with equal propriety, have been said by another. The general design is, perhaps, open to criticism; but the composition can seldom be charged with inaccuracy or negligence. The author never slumbers in self-indulgence; his full vigour is always exerted; scarcely a line is left unfinished; nor is it easy to find an expression used by constraint, or a thought imperfectly expressed. It was remarked by Pope, that The Dispensary had been corrected in every edition, and that every change was an improvement. It appears, however, to want something of poetical ardour, and something of general delectation; and, therefore, since it has been no longer supported by accidental and extrinsick popularity, it has been scarcely able to support itself.
ROWE
Nicholas Rowe was born at Little Beckford, in Bedfordshire, in 1673. His family had long possessed a considerable estate, with a good house, at Lambertoun, in Devonshire. The ancestor from whom he descended, in a direct line, received the arms borne by his descendants for his bravery in the holy war. His father, John Rowe, who was the first that quitted his paternal acres to practise any art of profit, professed the law, and published Benlow’s and Dallison’s Reports, in the reign of James the second, when in opposition to the notions, then diligently propagated, of dispensing power, he ventured to remark how low his authors rated the prerogative. He was made a sergeant, and died April 30, 1692. He was buried in the Temple church.
Nicholas was first sent to a private school at Highgate; and, being afterwards removed to Westminster, was, at twelve years, chosen one of the king’s scholars. His master was Busby, who suffered none of his scholars to let their powers lie useless; and his exercises in several languages are said to have been written with uncommon degrees of excellence, and yet to have cost him very little labour.
At sixteen he had, in his father’s opinion, made advances in learning sufficient to qualify him for the study of law, and was entered a student of the Middle Temple, where, for some time, he read statutes and reports with proficiency proportionate to the force of his mind, which was already such that he endeavoured to comprehend law, not as a series of precedents, or collection of positive precepts, but as a system of rational government, and impartial justice.
When he was nineteen, he was, by the death of his father, left more to his own direction, and, probably, from that time suffered law gradually to give way to poetry. At twenty-five he produced the Ambitious Step-Mother, which was received with so much favour, that he devoted himself, from that time, wholly to elegant literature.
His next tragedy, 1702, was Tamerlane, in which, under the name of Tamerlane, he intended to characterize king William, and Lewis the fourteenth under that of Bajazet. The virtues of Tamerlane seem to have been arbitrarily assigned him by his poet, for I know not that history gives any other qualities than those which make a conqueror. The fashion, however, of the time was, to accumulate upon Lewis all that can raise horrour and detestation; and whatever good was withheld from him, that it might not be thrown away, was bestowed upon king William.
This was the tragedy which Rowe valued most, and that which, probably by the help of political auxiliaries, excited most applause; but occasional poetry must often content itself with occasional praise. Tamerlane has for a long time been acted only once a year, on the night when king William landed. Our quarrel with Lewis has been long over; and it now gratifies neither zeal nor malice to see him painted with aggravated features, like a Saracen upon a sign.
The Fair Penitent, his next production, 1703, is one of the most pleasing tragedies on the stage, where it still keeps its turns of appearing, and probably will long keep them, for there is scarcely any work of any poet, at once, so interesting by the fable and so delightful by the language. The story is domestick, and, therefore, easily received by the imagination, and assimilated to common life; the diction is exquisitely harmonious, and soft or sprightly as occasion requires.
The character of Lothario seems to have been expanded by Richardson into Lovelace; but he has excelled his original in the moral effect of the fiction. Lothario, with gaiety which cannot be hated, and bravery which cannot be despised, retains too much of the spectator’s kindness. It was in the power of Richardson alone to teach us, at once, esteem and detestation; to make virtuous resentment overpower all the benevolence which wit, elegance, and courage, naturally excite; and to lose, at last, the hero in the villain.
The fifth act is not equal to the former; the events of the drama are exhausted, and little remains but to talk of what is past. It has been observed that the title of the play does not sufficiently correspond with the behaviour of Calista, who, at last, shows no evident signs of repentance, but may be reasonably suspected of feeling pain from detection rather than from guilt, and expresses more shame than sorrow, and more rage than shame.
His next, 1706, was Ulysses; which, with the common fate of mythological stories, is now generally neglected. We have been too early acquainted with the poetical heroes, to expect any pleasure from their revival; to show them as they have already been shown, is to disgust by repetition; to give them new qualities, or new adventures, is to offend by violating received notions.
The Royal Convert, 1708, seems to have a better claim to longevity. The fable is drawn from an obscure and barbarous age, to which fictions are most easily and properly adapted; for when objects are imperfectly seen, they easily take forms from imagination. The scene lies among our ancestors in our own country, and, therefore, very easily catches attention. Rodogune is a personage truly tragical, of high spirit, and violent passions, great with tempestuous dignity, and wicked with a soul that would have been heroick if it had been virtuous. The motto seems to tell that this play was not successful.
Rowe does not always remember what his characters require. In Tamerlane there is some ridiculous mention of the god of love; and Rodogune, a savage Saxon, talks of Venus, and the eagle that bears the thunder of Jupiter.
This play discovers its own date, by a prediction of the union, in imitation of Cranmer’s prophetick promises to Henry the eighth. The anticipated blessings of union are not very naturally introduced, nor very happily expressed.
He once, 1706, tried to change his hand. He ventured on a comedy, and produced The Biter; with which, though it was unfavourably treated by the audience, he was himself delighted; for he is said to have sat in the house laughing with great vehemence, whenever he had, in his own opinion, produced a jest. But, finding that he and the publick had no sympathy of mirth, he tried at lighter scenes no more.
After the Royal Convert, 1714, appeared Jane Shore, written, as its author professes, “in imitation of Shakespeare’s style.” In what he thought himself an imitator of Shakespeare, it is not easy to conceive. The numbers, the diction, the sentiments, and the conduct, every thing in which imitation can consist, are remote, in the utmost degree, from the manner of Shakespeare; whose dramas it resembles only as it is an English story, and as some of the persons have their names in history. This play, consisting chiefly of domestick scenes and private distress, lays hold upon the heart. The wife is forgiven, because she repents, and the husband is honoured, because he forgives. This, therefore, is one of those pieces which we still welcome on the stage.
His last tragedy, 1715, was Lady Jane Grey. This s
ubject had been chosen by Mr. Smith, whose papers were put into Rowe’s hands, such as he describes them in his preface. This play has, likewise, sunk into oblivion. From this time he gave nothing more to the stage.
Being, by a competent fortune, exempted from any necessity of combating his inclination, he never wrote in distress, and, therefore, does not appear to have ever written in haste. His works were finished to his own approbation, and bear few marks of negligence or hurry. It is remarkable, that his prologues and epilogues are all his own, though he sometimes supplied others; he afforded help, but did not solicit it. As his studies necessarily made him acquainted with Shakespeare, and acquaintance produced veneration, he undertook, 1709, an edition of his works, from which he neither received much praise, nor seems to have expected it; yet, I believe, those who compare it with former copies will find, that he has done more than he promised; and that, without the pomp of notes, or boasts of criticism, many passages are happily restored. He prefixed a life of the author, such as tradition, then almost expiring, could supply, and a preface, which cannot be said to discover much profundity or penetration. He, at least, contributed to the popularity of his author.
He was willing enough to improve his fortune by other arts than poetry. He was under-secretary, for three years, when the duke of Queensberry was secretary of state, and afterwards applied to the earl of Oxford for some publick employment. Oxford enjoined him to study Spanish; and when, some time afterwards, he came again, and said that he had mastered it, dismissed him, with this congratulation: “Then, sir, I envy you the pleasure of reading Don Quixote in the original.”
This story is sufficiently attested; but why Oxford, who desired to be thought a favourer of literature, should thus insult a man of acknowledged merit; or how Rowe, who was so keen a whig, that he did not willingly converse with men of the opposite party, could ask preferment from Oxford, it is not now possible to discover. Pope, who told the story, did not say on what occasion the advice was given; and, though he owned Rowe’s disappointment, doubted whether any injury was intended him, but thought it rather lord Oxford’s odd way.
It is likely that he lived on discontented through the rest of queen Anne’s reign; but the time came, at last, when he found kinder friends. At the accession of king George he was made poet-laureate; I am afraid, by the ejection of poor Nahum Tate, who, 1716, died in the Mint, where he was forced to seek shelter by extreme poverty. He was made, likewise, one of the land-surveyors of the customs of the port of London. The prince of Wales chose him clerk of his council; and the lord chancellor Parker, as soon as he received the seals, appointed him, unasked, secretary of the presentations. Such an accumulation of employments undoubtedly produced a very considerable revenue.
Having already translated some parts of Lucan’s Pharsalia, which had been published in the Miscellanies, and doubtless received many praises, he undertook a version of the whole work, which he lived to finish, but not to publish. It seems to have been printed under the care of Dr. Welwood, who prefixed the author’s life, in which is contained the following character:
“As to his person, it was graceful and well made; his face regular, and of a manly beauty. As his soul was well lodged, so its rational and animal faculties excelled in a high degree. He had a quick and fruitful invention, a deep penetration, and a large compass of thought, with singular dexterity and easiness in making his thoughts to be understood. He was master of most parts of polite learning, especially the classical authors, both Greek and Latin; understood the French, Italian, and Spanish languages; and spoke the first fluently, and the other two tolerably well.
“He had likewise read most of the Greek and Roman histories in their original languages, and most that are wrote in English, French, Italian, and Spanish. He had a good taste in philosophy; and, having a firm impression of religion upon his mind, he took great delight in divinity and ecclesiastical history, in both which he made great advances in the times he retired into the country, which were frequent. He expressed, on all occasions, his full persuasion of the truth of revealed religion; and being a sincere member of the established church himself, he pitied, but condemned not, those that dissented from it. He abhorred the principles of persecuting men upon the account of their opinions in religion; and, being strict in his own, he took it not upon him to censure those of another persuasion. His conversation was pleasant, witty, and learned, without the least tincture of affectation or pedantry; and his inimitable manner of diverting and enlivening the company made it impossible for any one to be out of humour when he was in it. Envy and detraction seemed to be entirely foreign to his constitution; and whatever provocations he met with at any time, he passed them over without the least thought of resentment or revenge. As Homer had a Zoilus, so Mr. Rowe had sometimes his; for there were not wanting malevolent people, and pretenders to poetry too, that would now and then bark at his best performances; but he was conscious of his own genius, and had so much good-nature as to forgive them; nor could he ever be tempted to return them an answer.
“The love of learning and poetry made him not the less fit for business, and nobody applied himself closer to it, when it required his attendance. The late duke of Queensberry, when he was secretary of state, made him his secretary for publick affairs; and when that truly great man came to know him well, he was never so pleased as when Mr. Rowe was in his company. After the duke’s death, all avenues were stopped to his preferment; and, during the rest of that reign, he passed his time with the muses and his books, and sometimes the conversation of his friends.
“When he had just got to be easy in his fortune, and was in a fair way to make it better, death swept him away, and in him deprived the world of one of the best men, as well as one of the best geniuses of the age. He died like a christian and a philosopher, in charity with all mankind, and with an absolute resignation to the will of God. He kept up his good-humour to the last; and took leave of his wife and friends immediately before his last agony, with the same tranquillity of mind, and the same indifference for life, as though he had been upon taking but a short journey. He was twice married; first to a daughter of Mr. Parsons, one of the auditors of the revenue; and afterwards to a daughter of Mr. Devenish, of a good family in Dorsetshire. By the first he had a son; and by the second a daughter, married afterwards to Mr. Fane. He died the sixth of December, 1718, in the forty-fifth year of his age; and was buried the nineteenth of the same month in Westminster Abbey, in the aisle where many of our English poets are interred, over against Chaucer, his body being attended by a select number of his friends, and the dean and choir officiating at the funeral.”
To this character, which is apparently given with the fondness of a friend, may be added the testimony of Pope, who says, in a letter to Blount: “Mr. Rowe accompanied me, and passed a week in the forest. I need not tell you how much a man of his turn entertained me; but I must acquaint you, there is a vivacity and gaiety of disposition, almost peculiar to him, which makes it impossible to part from him without that uneasiness which generally succeeds all our pleasure.”
Pope has left behind him another mention of his companion, less advantageous, which is thus reported by Dr. Warburton.
“Rowe, in Mr. Pope’s opinion, maintained a decent character, but had no heart. Mr. Addison was justly offended with some behaviour which arose from that want, and estranged himself from him; which Rowe felt very severely. Mr. Pope, their common friend, knowing this, took an opportunity, at some juncture of Mr. Addison’s advancement, to tell him how poor Rowe was grieved at his displeasure, and what satisfaction he expressed at Mr. Addison’s good fortune, which he expressed so naturally, that he (Mr. Pope) could not but think him sincere. Mr. Addison replied, ‘I do not suspect that he feigned; but the levity of his heart is such, that he is struck with any new adventure; and it would affect him just in the same manner, if he heard I was going to be hanged.’ Mr. Pope said he could not deny but Mr. Addison understood Rowe well.”
This censure time has not left
us the power of confirming or refuting; but observation daily shows, that much stress is not to be laid on hyperbolical accusations, and pointed sentences, which even he that utters them desires to be applauded rather than credited. Addison can hardly be supposed to have meant all that he said. Few characters can bear the microscopick scrutiny of wit quickened by anger; and, perhaps, the best advice to authors would be, that they should keep out of the way of one another.
Rowe is chiefly to be considered as a tragick writer and a translator. In his attempt at comedy he failed so ignominiously, that his Biter is not inserted in his works; and his occasional poems and short compositions are rarely worthy of either praise or censure; for they seem the casual sports of a mind seeking rather to amuse its leisure than to exercise its powers.
In the construction of his dramas, there is not much art; he is not a nice observer of the unities. He extends time and varies place as his convenience requires. To vary the place is not, in my opinion, any violation of nature, if the change be made between the acts; for it is no less easy for the spectator to suppose himself at Athens in the second act, than at Thebes in the first; but to change the scene, as is done by Rowe, in the middle of an act, is to add more acts to the play, since an act is so much of the business as is transacted without interruption. Rowe, by this license, easily extricates himself from difficulties; as, in Jane Grey, when we have been terrified with all the dreadful pomp of publick execution, and are wondering how the heroine or the poet will proceed, no sooner has Jane pronounced some prophetick rhymes, than — pass and be gone — the scene closes, and Pembroke and Gardiner are turned out upon the stage.
I know not that there can be found in his plays any deep search into nature, any accurate discriminations of kindred qualities, or nice display of passion in its progress; all is general and undefined. Nor does he much interest or affect the auditor, except in Jane Shore, who is always seen and heard with pity. Alicia is a character of empty noise, with no resemblance to real sorrow, or to natural madness.
Complete Works of Samuel Johnson Page 457
