Selected Prose

by Charles Lamb

  The rest are addressed to Science, Genius, Melancholy – &c. &c. – two, to the River Cam – an Ode to the Nightingale. Another to Howard, beginning: ‘Spirit of meek Philanthropy!’ One is entitled The Madman –‘being collected by the author from several Madhouses.’ It begins: ‘Yes, yes, –’tis He!’ A long poetical satire is addressed to ‘John Disney, D.D. – his wife and daughter!!!’

  Now to my own affairs. I have not taken that thing to Colman,2 but I have proceeded one step in the business. I have enquired his address, and am promised it in a few days: Meantime three acts and a half are finished galopping, of a Play on a Persian story3 which I must father in April. But far, very far, from Antonio in composition. O Jephtha, Judge of Israel, what a fool I was!

  C. LAMB

  24. To Thomas Manning

  [Late February 1801]

  You masters of logic ought to know (logic is nothing more than a knowledge of words, as the Greek etymon implies), that all words are no more to be taken in a literal sense at all times than a promise given to a tailor. When I expressed an apprehension that you were mortally offended, I meant no more than by the application of a certain formula of efficacious sounds, which had done in similar cases before, to rouse a sense of decency in you, and a remembrance of what was due to me! You masters of logic should advert to this phenomenon in human speech, before you arraign the usage of us dramatic geniuses. Imagination is a good blood mare, and goes well; but the misfortune is, she has too many paths before her. ’Tis true I might have imaged to myself, that you had trundled your frail carcass to Norfolk. I might also, and did imagine, that you had not, but that you were lazy, or inventing new properties in a triangle, and for that purpose moulding and squeezing Landlord Crisp’s three-cornered beaver into fantastic experimental forms; or that Archimedes was meditating to repulse the French, in case of a Cambridge invasion, by a geometric hurling of folios on their red caps; or, peradventure, that you were in extremities, in great wants, and just set out for Trinity-bogs when my letters came. In short, my genius (which is a short word now-a-days for what-a-great-man-am-I) was absolutely stifled and overlaid with its own riches. Truth is one and poor, like the cruse of Elijah’s widow.1 Imagination is the bold face that multiplies its oil: and thou, the old cracked pipkin,2 that could not believe it could be put to such purposes. Dull pipkin, to have Elijah for thy cook! Imbecile recipient of so fat a miracle! I send you George Dyer’s Poems, the richest production of the lyric muse this century can justly boast: for Wordsworth’s L. B. were published, or at least written, before Christmas.

  Please to advert to pages 291 to 296 for the most astonishing account of where Shakspeare’s muse has been all this while. I thought she had been dead, and buried in Stratford Church, with the young man that kept her company, –

  But it seems, like the Devil,

  Buried in Cole Harbour.

  Some say she’s risen again,

  ’Gone prentice to a Barber.

  N.B. – I don’t charge anything for the additional manuscript notes, which are the joint productions of myself and a learned translator of Schiller, John Stoddart, Esq.

  N.B. the 2nd – I should not have blotted your book, but I had sent my own out to be bound, as I was in duty bound. A liberal criticism upon the several pieces, lyrical, heroical, amatory, and satirical, would be acceptable.

  So, you don’t think there’s a Word’s–worth of good poetry in the great L. B.! I daren’t put the dreaded syllables at their just length, for my back tingles from the northern castigation. I send you the three letters, which I beg you to return along with those former letters, which I hope you are not going to print by your detention. But don’t be in a hurry to send them. When you come to town will do. Apropos of coming to town, last Sunday was a fortnight, as I was coming to town from the Professor’s, inspired with new rum, I tumbled down, and broke my nose. I drink nothing stronger than malt liquors.

  I am going to change my lodgings, having received a hint that it would be agreeable, at our Lady’s next feast. I have partly fixed upon most delectable rooms, which look out (when you stand a tiptoe) over the Thames and Surrey Hills, at the upper end of King’s Bench walks in the Temple. There I shall have all the privacy of a house without the encumbrance, and shall be able to lock my friends out as often as I desire to hold free converse with my immortal mind; for my present lodgings resemble a minister’s levee, I have so increased my acquaintance (as they call ’em), since I have resided in town. Like the country mouse, that had tasted a little of urban manners, I long to be nibbling my own cheese by my dear self without mouse-traps and time-traps. By my new plan, I shall be as airy, up four pair of stairs, as in the country; and in a garden, in the midsts of [that] enchanting, more than Mahometan paradise, London, whose dirtiest drab-frequented alley, and her lowest bowing tradesman, I would not exchange for Skiddaw, Helvellyn, James, Walter, and the parson into the bargain. O! her lamps of a night! her rich goldsmiths, print-shops, toyshops, mercers, hardwaremen, pastrycooks! St Paul’s Churchyard! the Strand! Exeter Change! Charing Cross, with the man upon a black horse! These are thy gods, O London! Ain’t you mightily moped on the banks of the Cam! Had not you better come and set up here? You can’t think what a difference. All the streets and pavements are pure gold, I warrant you. At least I know an alchemy that turns her mud into that metal, – a mind that loves to be at home in crowds.

  ’Tis half-past twelve o’clock, and all sober people ought to be a-bed. Between you and me, the Lyrical Ballads are but drowsy performances.

  C. LAMB (as you may guess)

  25. To Robert Lloyd

  June 26, 1801.

  Cooke1 in ‘Richard the Third’ is a perfect caricature. He gives you the monster Richard, but not the man Richard. Shakspeare’s bloody character impresses you with awe and deep admiration of his witty parts, his consummate hypocrisy, and indefatigable prosecution of purpose. You despise, detest, and loathe the cunning, vulgar, low and fierce Richard, which Cooke substitutes in his place. He gives you no other idea than of a vulgar villain, rejoicing in his being able to over-reach, and not possessing that joy in silent consciousness, but betraying it, like a poor villain, in sneers and distortions of the face, like a droll at a country fair; not to add that cunning so self-betraying and manner so vulgar could never have deceived the politic Buckingham nor the soft Lady Anne: both bred in courts, would have turned with disgust from such a fellow. Not but Cooke has powers; but not of discrimination. His manner is strong, coarse, and vigorous, and well adapted to some characters. But the lofty imagery and high sentiments and high passions of Poetry come black and prose-smoked from his prose Lips. I have not seen him in Overreach,2 but from what I remember of the character, I think he could not have chosen one more fit. I thought the play a highly finished one when I read it some time back. I remember a most noble image. Sir Giles, drawing his sword in the last scene, says:

  Some undone widow sits upon mine arm,

  And takes away the use on’t.

  This is horribly fine, and I am not sure that it did not suggest to me my conclusion of Pride’s Cure; but my imitation is miserably inferior:

  This arm was busy in the day of Naseby:

  ’Tis paralytic now, and knows no use of weapons.

  Pierre and Jaffier are the best things in Otway. Belvidera is a poor Creature, and has had more than her due fame. Monimia is a little better, but she whines. I like Calista in the Fair Penitent better than either of Otway’s women. Lee’s Massacre of Paris is a noble play, very chastely and finely written. His Alexander is full of that madness ‘which rightly should possess a poet’s brain.’ Œdipus is also a fine play, but less so than these two. It is a joint production of Lee and Dryden. All For Love begins with uncommon Spirit, but soon flags, and is of no worth upon the whole. The last scene of Young’s Revenge3 is sublime: the rest of it not worth 1d.

  I want to have your opinion and Plumstead’s4 on Cooke’s Richard the Third. I am possessed with an admiration of the genuine Richar
d, his genius, and his mounting spirit, which no consideration of his cruelties can depress. Shakspeare has not made Richard so black a Monster as is supposed. Wherever he is monstrous, it was to conform to vulgar opinion. But he is generally a Man. Read his most exquisite address to the Widowed Queen to court her daughter for him – the topics of maternal feeling, of a deep knowledge of the heart, are such as no monster could have supplied. Richard must have felt before he could feign so well; tho’ ambition choked the good seed. I think it the most finished piece of Eloquence in the world; of persuasive oratory far above Demosthenes, Burke, or any man, far exceeding the courtship of Lady Anne. Her relenting is barely natural, after all; the more perhaps S.’s merit to make impossible appear probable, but the Queen’s consent (taking in all the circumstances and topics, private and public, with his angelic address, able to draw the host of [piece cut out of letter] Lucifer) is probable; and [piece cut out of letter] resisted it. This observation applies to many other parts. All the inconsistency is, that Shakspeare’s better genius was forced to struggle against the prejudices which made a monster of Richard. He set out to paint a monster, but his human sympathies produced a man.

  Are you not tired with all this ingenious criticism? I am.

  Richard itself is totally metamorphosed in the wretched acting play of that name, which you will see, altered by Cibber.

  God bless you.

  C. LAMB.

  26. To Walter Wilson

  August 14th, 1801.

  Dear Wilson,

  I am extremely sorry that any serious difference should subsist between us on account of some foolish behaviour of mine at Richmond; you knew me well enough before – that a very little liquor will cause a considerable alteration in me.

  I beg you to impute my conduct solely to that, and not to any deliberate intention of offending you, from whom I have received so many friendly attentions. I know that you think a very important difference in opinion with respect to some more serious subjects between us makes me a dangerous companion; but do not rashly infer, from some slight and light expressions which I may have made use of in a moment of levity in your presence, without sufficient regard to your feelings – do not conclude that I am an inveterate enemy to all religion. I have had a time of seriousness, and I have known the importance and reality of a religious belief. Latterly, I acknowledge, much of my seriousness has gone off, whether from new company or some other new associations; but I still retain at bottom a conviction of the truth, and a certainty of the usefulness of religion. I will not pretend to more gravity or feeling than I at present possess; my intention is not to persuade you that any great alteration is probable in me; sudden converts are superficial and transitory; I only want you to believe that I have stamina of seriousness within me, and that I desire nothing more than a return of that friendly intercourse which used to subsist between us, but which my folly has suspended.

  Believe me, very affectionately yours,

  C. LAMB.

  27. To Robert Lloyd

  [18 November 1801]

  I am not dead nor asleep. But Manning is in town, & Coleridge is in town, and I am making a thorough alteration in the structure of my play for Publication. My brain is overwrought with variety of worldly-intercourse. I have neither time nor mind for scribbling. Who shall deliver me from the body of this Death? –

  Only continue to write & to believe that when the Hour comes, I shall strike like Jack of the Clock, id est, I shall once more become a regular correspondent of Robt. & Plumstead. How is the benevolent, loud-talking, Shakspere-loving, Brewer? –1

  To your enquiry respecting a selection from B’p Taylor I answer – it cannot be done, & if it could it would not take with John Bull. – It cannot be done, for who can disentangle and unthread the rich texture of Nature & Poetry sewn so thick into a stout coat of theology, without spoiling both lace & coat? how beggarly and how bald do even Shakespeares Princely Pieces look, when thus violently divorced from connexion & circumstance! when we meet with To be or not to be – or Jacques’s moralizings upon the Deer – or Brutus and Cassius’ quarrel & reconciliation – in an Enfield speaker or in Elegant Extracts – how we stare & will scarcely acknowledge to ourselves (what we are conscious we feel) that they are flat & have no power. Something exactly like this have I experienced when I have picked out similes & stars from Holy Dying and shewn them per se, as you’d show specimens of minerals or pieces of rock –. Compare the grand effect of the Star-paved firmament – & imagine a boy capable of picking out those pretty twinklers one by one & playing at chuck farthing with them. – Every thing in heaven & earth, in man and in story, in books & in fancy, acts by Confederacy, by juxaposition, by circumstance & place –. Consider a fine family – (if I were not writing to you I might instance your own) of sons & daughters with a respectable father & a handsome mother at their head, all met in one house, & happy round one table –. Earth cannot shew a more lovely & venerable sight, such as the Angels in heaven might lament that in their country there is no marrying or giving in marriage –. Take & split this Body into individuals – shew the separate caprices, vagaries, &c. of Charles, Rob. or Plum. one a quaker, another a churchman. – The eldest daughter seeking a husband out of the pale of parental faith – another warping perhaps – the father a prudent, circumspective, do-me-good sort of a man blest with children whom no ordinary rules can circumscribe –. I have not room for all particulars – but just as this happy & venerable Body of a family loses by splitting & considering individuals too nicely, so it is when we pick out Best Bits out of a great writer. Tis the Sum total of his mind which affects us

  C [L]

  28. To Thomas Manning

  Monday 15th February 1802

  Not a sentence, not a syllable, of Trismegistus shall be lost through my neglect. I am his word-banker,1 his store-keeper of puns & syllogisms. You cannot conceive (and if Trismegistus cannot, no man can) the strange joy, which I felt at the Receipt of a Letter from Paris. It seemed to give me a learned importance, which placed me above all, who had not Parisian Correspondents. Believe, that I shall carefully husband every Scrap, which will save you the trouble of memory, when you come back. You cannot write things so trifling, let them only be about Paris, which I shall not treasure. In particular, I must have parallels of Actors & Actresses. I must be told if any Building in Paris is at all comparable to St Paul’s, which contrary to the usual mode of that part of our Nature, called Admiration, I have looked up to with unfading Wonder, every morning at ten oClock, ever since it has lain in my way to business. At noon I casually glance upon it, being hungry; and Hunger has not much taste for the fine arts. Is any night-walk comparable to a Walk from St Pauls to Charing Cross, for Lighting, & Paving, Crowds going & coming without respite, the rattle of coaches, & the chearfulness of shops? Have you seen a man Guillotined yet? is it as good as Hanging? are the Women all painted, & the men all monkeys? or are there not a few that look like rational of both sexes? Are you & the first Consul thick? All this expence of ink I may fairly put you to, as your Letters will not be solely for my proper pleasure, but are to serve as memoranda & notices, helps for short memory, a kind of Rumfordizing2 recollection, for yourself on your return. Your Letter was just what a letter should be, crammed, and very funny. Every part of it pleased me, till you came to Paris, & your damned philosophical indolence or indifference stung me. You cannot stir from your rooms till you know the Language! what the Devil! are men nothing but word-trumpets?, are men all tongue & ear? have these creatures, that you & I profess to know something about, no faces, gestures, gabble, no folly, no absurdity, no induction of French education upon the Abstract Idea of Men & Women, no similitude nor dissimilitude to English! Why, thou damned Smelfungus!3 Your account of your Landing and reception & Bullen (I forget how you spelt it) it was spelt my way in Harry the 8hs ti[me,] was exactly in that minute styl[e] which strong impressions inspire (writing to a Frenchman I write as a Frenchman would) –. It appears to me, as if I should die with joy at the f
irst Landing in a foreign Country. It is the nearest Pleasure, which a grown man can substitute for that unknown one, which he can never know, the pleasure of the first entrance into Life from the Womb. – I dare say, in a short time my Habits would come back lik[e] a ‘stronger man’ armed, and drive out that new pleasure; & I should soon sicken for known objects. Nothing has transpired h[ere] that seems to me of sufficient importance to send dry-shod over the Water: but I suppose you will want to be told some news. The Best & the Worst to me is, that I have given up Two Guineas a week at the Post, & regained my health & spirits, whic[h] were upon the wane. I grew sick, & Stuart4 unsatisfied. Ludisti satis, tempus abire est.5 I must cut closer that’s all. In all this time I have done but one thing, which I reckon tolerable: & that I will transcribe, because it may give you pleasure, being a Picture of my hungers. You will find it in my last Page. It absurdly is a first Number of a Series, thu[s] strangled in Embryo. More News. The Professor’s Rib6 has come out to be a damn’d disagreeable woman, so much as to drive me & some more old Cronies from his House. If a man will keep Snakes in his House, he must not wonder if People are shy of coming to see him because of the Snakes. Mister Fell or as you with your usual faceteness and drollery call him Mr F + ll has stopt short in the middle of his Play, like what is called being taken short. Some friend has told him that it has not the least merit in it. O! that I had the rectifying of the Litany! I would put in a Libera Nos (Scriptores videlicet) ab amicis!7 That’s all the News. A pro pos (is it Pedantry, writing to a Frenchman, to express myself sometimes by a French Word, when an English one would not do as well? methinks, my thoughts fall naturally into it)