The Works of William Harrison Ainsworth

by William Harrison Ainsworth

  Passing one vacation in the country with an old maiden lady, a distant relation, when I was yet very young, among the treasures which her library (none of the most capacious, by-the-bye) afforded, I by chance met with an old copy of Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus, a personage whose name had no small attraction to me, from the eager interest with which, in my younger days, I had devoured the adventures of his most extraordinary life and exit. I immediately took possession of it, and carried it with me, for my own private reading, into a small room, which was a kind of sanctum sanctorum, and from which I excluded, without mercy, the profane inmates of the house. This little room, which I remember with feelings of fondness and affection, is still present to my mind’s eye. Well do I recollect its antique casements, and the view it presented into the thickset shrubbery or labyrinth, in which I used to construct my fortifications and retreats, when I assumed the part, and no mean part did I think it then, of the Captain of Banditti. The soft green hue of the trees, forming a pleasing contrast to the neat and unsullied whiteness of the wainscotting, and’ the kind of fairy prospect which was visible through the boughs of a large oak, which overshadowed this part of the building, I never can forget. Alas! now that that room and mansion are the property of another, I can almost say to it,

  O Domus antiqua quam dispari dominaris domina!

  But pardon me for this digression — young as I was, I was able to perceive that the Faustus of Marlowe was a little different from the accounts of his exploits, which had formerly attracted my attention. There was a something of undefined and breathless interest attached to it, which seized a firm hold on my mind, and communicated to it a kind of excitement which did not cease with the bare perusal of the work that caused it. The continual appearance of the good and bad angels, to exercise their powers of persuasion on the unhappy Faustus; his internal and heart rending struggles, or, as they may be termed, his agony and bloody sweat; the exaltation which he feels, at the consciousness of his own superhuman power, and which but lifts him on high for a while, like the waves of a troubled sea, to sink him to the lowest abyss of misery; and the last scene of agonized and maddened humanity — had so deep an impression upon my feelings, that I have not at this time forgotten their intensity. I have since read the Faust of Goethe; but whether it be from the influence of temporary associations, or from the real inequality of the work, I must say, that it did not operate upon me in any thing like the same powerful degree; and I cannot but think the love adventure which is there introduced, has the effect of dissipating the peculiar, strange and extraordinary interest which the fate of Faustus excites: it throws more the appearance of earthliness upon the doomed and devoted subject of the Prince of Hell. In Marlowe, the mind is kept more closely to the hero of the drama; there is a kind of environing circle around him, which seems to cut off all hope of assistance or escape; the very farcical means themselves have the effect of deepening the horror of the story; the burlesque is like the laugh of a maniac resounding in the Golgotha, or place of sculls. His dreadful supremacy is only misery carried to an unnatural pitch, and appears like Luke’s iron crown, made to burn the temples on which it reposes. Marlowe has been called no poet; but if there be poetry more surpassingly beautiful than the address of Faustus to Helena, and the noble concluding chorus, which almost puts one in mind of the best of Grecian dramatic writers, I have never had the luck to meet with it.

  (I thoroughly agree with you as to the German Faustus, as far I can do justice to it from an English translation. It is a disagreeable canting tale of seduction, which has nothing to do with the spirit of Faustus-curiosity. — Was the dark secret to be explored, to end in the seducing of a weak girl, which might have been accomplished by earthly agency? When Marlowe gives his Faustus a mistress, he flies him at Helen, flower of Greece, to be sure; and not at Miss Betsy or Miss Sally Thoughtless.

  Cut is the branch that bore the goodly fruit,

  And wither’d is Apollo’s laurel tree;

  FAUSTUS IS DEAD!

  What a noble, natural transition from metaphor to plain speaking, as if the figurative had flagged in description of such a loss, and was reduced to tell the fact simply!

  ANNOT. V. C.)

  From the delight which I received from this old drama, I was naturally led to seek for others of the same kind. I got possession of Dodsley’s Collection of Plays, and went through them with most laudable diligence. The most tedious and tiresome of them all did not serve to dispirit my resolution; and at the age that I then was, I cannot help giving myself some credit for such an exertion. After all this, it is perhaps needless to say that what formed the amusement of my boyhood, has continued till the present hour a source of unintermitted pleasure.

  My readers will perhaps excuse these egotistical details, and impute them to the chartered garrulity of old age. To be able to forget the present in the past, is a principle which nothing earthly can outweigh; and those trains of feeling which call forth delight in one, may strike a sympathetic chord in the heart of another, and recal distant prospects, which look, from afar, like the sun-gilt pinnacles and steeples of some magnificent city. Happy shall I be, if any thing which I have here written, may serve to lead to retrospects, which will always certainly be productive of pleasure, and, as such, cannot but be conductive to good.

  II.

  For him was lever han’ at his beddes hed,

  Twenty books cloth’d in blake or red,

  Of Aristotle and his philosophic!

  Than robes riche, or fidel, or sautrie.

  CHAUCER.

  I CERTAINLY so far resemble Chaucer’s lene clerk, that a well filled library is one of my highest treats. I seem to increase in my own estimation, at being admitted to the company of the wise, the learned, and the witty, of all times and all countries, to listen (though but mentally) to their instructions, to be the confidant of their thoughts, the associate of their inquiries; and, when thoughts like these press upon me, I am lifted up into another and superior sphere. Under the influence of this pleasing Utopian dream, I gaze on the venerable works of antiquity around me, with a pleasing awe, while fancy would almost persuade me, that, from their embrowned covering, I see, looking out upon the intruder who disturbs their sacred rest, the countenances of the sages whose wisdom lies snugly between two sheepskin-covered pasteboards, a prey to moths, and obscured by cobwebs, save when some literary wanderer, like myself, draws a volume from the shelf, where it might otherwise have slumbered for ever.

  I am sometimes inclined to regret the times when customs and principles, now old and unfashionable, were the current coin of the day; when the gallant knights and lovely ladies of romance were substantial personages, who might be seen without its being considered that a wonder was abroad, or that the marble sepulchre had yielded up its dead; those times when, if people had not perhaps all the wisdom, or, to speak more properly, the knowledge, of the present erudite generation, the deficiency was counterbalanced by more substantial and comfortable havings. Then the populace were a merry, unlearned, shrewd body, who attended to their business on common days, and rejoiced and played at their accustomed sports on Sundays and holidays. Then each class knew its own station, and hastened not to tread on the heels of the next in rank. Then a yeoman was a yeoman, a gentleman a gentleman, and a nobleman a nobleman; instead of the universal intermingling of ranks — the hotch-pot of precedency, which prevails in these enlightened days.

  After all, I should not a whit wonder if our ancestors have been much more favourably pourtrayed than is their due. Notwithstanding my reverence for antiquity, I can imagine a mob of Elizabeth’s times, rioting in the streets of London after dark, knocking out the windows of the houses, as the lights of their heads became darkened with liquor, when some event had taken place which did not suit their humours; and I can fancy with tolerable spirit the appearance of the thieves, bullies, pickpockets, and rascals of all kinds and sorts, which were wont to parade up and down Paul’s walk, or toss the dice, or handle the dagger, as occasion off
ered, in Whitefriars. Alas! for the glorious days of good Queen Bess!

  There are three things in this world which, like a certain king, I do more particularly relish — old books to read — old wine to drink — and old friends to converse with. Indeed, the first and the last are in one view the same, for I attach an individual interest to each volume from which I have collected information or amusement; but I would here speak of them separately. I have, then, in that whitewashed recess, with the black oak groins supporting its roof, sat with friends whom I loved — some of whom I lived to mourn for; yet it is still the same. There are the stained panes, meant to represent saints and martyrs; there still the old chestnut waves its branches, — and their solitary rustlings bring back, with more vivid intenseness, those happy days and happy hours, the memory of which, when the realities are things but of memory, comes back upon our hearts with softened, reflected lustre. The old black tables and shining chairs, are the furniture of two centuries since; the inanimate materials are the same, but the soul of friendship and mirth, which gave light to the “moments, and wings to the hours, is fled, and I look upon the place, and feel I am alone. Yet there is pleasure in these retrospections, though mournful; there is joy in tears; and here it is that I resort, when the cares of the world press heavy upon me, and feel myself lightened of half the load, by the sympathy, the association of the spot where

  Peaceful Memory laves to dwell,

  With her sister, Solitude!

  What have we here? Ah! my old companion and once daily intimate and adviser, Sir Thomas Browne. Shame on me, that I have suffered thee to lie here untouched and unopened. Let me see — seven — eight— ’tis nine months this most excellent volume has lain here, ever since the day I read it with L.; what a crowd of recollections rush upon me!

  It was the latter end of August when L. visited me; he had been on his annual journey to see his sister, and he had passed a week in her cottage, for he was one of the kindest and most affectionate sons or brothers; and when he had paid the tribute of affection to his kindred, his friends were next in his thoughts. Towards evening, we rambled into the library, and taking up our old friend Sir Thomas, we sat down in the recess. The sun was setting, and his rich mellow beams fell upon the floor and table, tinged with the hues of the painted window, and dancing about as the branches of the old chestnut tree waved to and fro, intercepting part of the light, and throwing about grotesque shadows. We had a bottle of ancient Port before us; it was something more than quadrimum merum. We had sat thus twenty times before, and the remembrance of those past times, gilded the present with a lovelier tinge of sociality. Then was the dignified, beautiful, and heart-touching sentiments, and language of the most philanthropic of physicians, whose works lay before us. If any of my readers have not read them, they have a feast in store. If beauty of style, and goodness of feeling are interesting to them, they will be delighted with the works (strange and paradoxical as some of the positions contained in them may appear) of this practical lover of toleration, who sympathized with men of all countries and all sects; “neither believing this, because Luther has affirmed it, nor denying that, because Calvin hath disavouched it;” to whom, with more propriety than any writer I can name, applies the so often quoted “nihil humanum a me alienum puto.” Not that he blazes out his love of man kind at every page, — not that he makes a boast and a by-word of his humanity; nowhere are we told, in express words, that the author is better or wiser than the rest of his species; but we are told, by the spirit of humanity which breathes through his pages, by the lovely and: beautiful touches of natural feeling which burst from him, by the whole strain and tenor of his writings, that he was one who looked upon himself as a citizen of the world, and upon mankind as his brethren; who sympathized deeply in the joys and distresses of his fellows; whose religion, though often mixed with singularity, was pure and humble; and whose views towards his fellow creatures were founded upon that great rule of moral conduct, “Do unto another as thou would’st he should do unto thee.” But it is time to bid farewell to the author of the Religio Medici, and pass on to other subjects. Suppose we take a stroll through the library. See — here — this is the Theological division, which my good ancestors thought proper to heap up, not for the benefit of me, for the volumes are never opened by their unworthy descendant. I care, indeed, very little about the discordant opinions of theologians, nor do I ever take from the shelf the Tela Ignea Sathanae, or Montague’s Treatise on the Invocation of Saints. We shall therefore direct our attention to something more interesting.

  Do you see that little black cupboard, with a crown on the top? that is filled with works of royal origin.

  These are the writings of James the first of Scotland, the poet and the lover who spent “the long days and the nightes eke” in writing verses to celebrate his ladye love; and of James the first of England, the persecutor of papistry and tobacco, the monarch who was a pedant when he should have been a king, and a squabbling polemic, when he should have been a warrior and a statesman. These two are the writings of his less fortunate but superior son, Charles. They breathe a spirit of loftiness which becomes the subject, and the author. I shall not now detain my readers with any remarks on the volume bearing Charles’s name; whether it belong to him or Gauden, is not at present to our purpose.

  Here are my friends, the old dramatists — here are the works of those who formerly gave delight to the crowded audiences of a tavern room, or temporary shed. There’s rare James Shirley; Nat Lee; the awful and solemn Webster; the witty, comical, facetiously quick, and unparalleled John Lily; the spirited, but irregular Chapman; the satirical Marston, Dekker, Greene, Middleton, Bishop Bale, with his seven-in-one mysteries; and sporting Kyd, and Tourneur, of whom, by the way, nobody seems to know any thing. But stay, I shall say nothing new of them, and had therefore better hold my peace. There are plenty of modern eruditi, who—’

  — talk of Jonson’s art,

  Of Shakspeare’s nature, and of Cowley’s wit;

  How Beaumont’s judgment check’d what Fletcher writ.

  The poets have ever found a welcome place among my volumes; not that I choose to incumber myself with the dull, cold verses of Garth, Broom, Blackmore, and the ‘oi polloi’, who compose the poetical list from the Restoration to the close of the last century. I dive into those old and neglected fields, from which sweets may be gathered, far different from the languid insipidity of such writers as I have mentioned. Of Chaucer it is not necessary to speak; but there are many, almost unknown, in whom the richness of poesy appears. The beautiful and touching simplicity of the elder Wyatt; the majestic pinion of Chamberlayne’s muse; the far-fetched, but glowing and animated conceits, mingled with innumerable beauties of a higher order, of his contemporary Crashaw; and the graceful fluency of Herrick, have charms of no small power for the lovers of “heaven born poesy.” But the number of poets who may be called excellent, are, of course, few, and many are around me which do not merit the appellation. Sir Thomas Davies, though elegant, and frequently highly poetical, does not belong to the first class. Du Bartas’s “divine” works, as somebody calls them, are pompous and heavy; and wearisome indeed is the lengthy doggrel of Warner’s Albion’s England.

  I had much to say on many other poets, and some of our earlier prose writers; but as evening is lending a deeper gloom to the heavy dark wainscotting of the library, I must leave this collection of

  — books of all sorts,

  Folios, Quartos, large and small sorts, till a future period. And yonder is C. coming to partake of my frugal meal, and to ramble in imagination with me over the scenes of our youth. It is a treat I would not miss for the world — DULCE EST DESIPERE IN LOCO.

  III.

  He loves books:

  Not that he has a scruple more of learning

  Than will suffice him to say grace, but, like

  Some piteous cowards, who are oft thought valiant

  For keeping store of weapons in their chambers,

  He loves to
be esteemed a Doctor by His volumes.

  WIT IN A CONSTABLE

  I HAVE just closed and placed upon the shelf, a book, the perusal of which has been a considerable fund of entertainment to me. The Epistolae Obscurorum Virorum, the production of Hutten, either solely, or with the assistance of Rubianus and others, is a poignant satire, the lash of which was directed against the ignorance find folly of the monkish theologians; had it succeeded in exposing those against whom it was levelled; Leo X. issued a bull for its condemnation.

  This work was published at the time when, owing to various causes, that suspicion of the proceedings of the Holy See, and of its members, were spreading abroad, which was immediately followed by the Reformation. Monasteries and their secluded inhabitants, were no longer sacred from ridicule, contempt, or hatred; the triple crown shook, and infallibility became a jest. It is not to be wondered at that the publication of a work like the present, should raise a considerable ferment, and excite, against the author, all that malignity which attends those who pull down the screens, and expose the secrets of imposture and falsehood.

  Here are more epistles: Epistolae Hoelianae, another interesting and entertaining work. Howell was the ornament of James’s time, and his letters abound in that familiar chit-chat, which is the soul of epistolary correspondence. A great traveller, he imports the news of foreign climes, and hashes up his account of strange countries and manners with lively anecdotes, and apt and entertaining remarks, in a way that engages our attention without fatigue, or the least shadow of weariness.