by Thomas Moore
“The grand distinction of the under forms of the new school of poets is their vulgarity. By this I do not mean that they are coarse, but ‘shabby-genteel,’ as it is termed. A man may be coarse and yet not vulgar, and the reverse. Burns is often coarse, but never vulgar. Chatterton is never vulgar, nor Wordsworth, nor the higher of the Lake school, though they treat of low life in all its branches. It is in their finery that the new under school are most vulgar, and they may be known by this at once; as what we called at Harrow ‘a Sunday blood’ might be easily distinguished from a gentleman, although his clothes might be better cut, and his boots the best blackened, of the two; — probably because he made the one or cleaned the other with his own hands.
“In the present case, I speak of writing, not of persons. Of the latter, I know nothing; of the former, I judge as it is found. * * They may be honourable and gentlemanly men, for what I know, but the latter quality is studiously excluded from their publications. They remind me of Mr. Smith and the Miss Broughtons at the Hampstead Assembly, in ‘Evelina.’ In these things (in private life, at least) I pretend to some small experience: because, in the course of my youth, I have seen a little of all sorts of society, from the Christian prince and the Mussulman sultan and pacha, and the higher ranks of their countries, down to the London boxer, the ‘flash and the swell,’ the Spanish muleteer, the wandering Turkish dervise, the Scotch Highlander, and the Albanian robber; — to say nothing of the curious varieties of Italian social life. Far be it from me to presume that there are now, or can be, such a thing as an aristocracy of poets; but there is a nobility of thought and of style, open to all stations, and derived partly from talent, and partly from education, — which is to be found in Shakspeare, and Pope, and Burns, no less than in Dante and Alfieri, but which is nowhere to be perceived in the mock birds and bards of Mr. Hunt’s little chorus. If I were asked to define what this gentlemanliness is, I should say that it is only to be defined by examples — of those who have it, and those who have it not. In life, I should say that most military men have it, and few naval; that several men of rank have it, and few lawyers; that it is more frequent among authors than divines (when they are not pedants); that fencing-masters have more of it than dancing-masters, and singers than players; and that (if it be not an Irishism to say so) it is far more generally diffused among women than among men. In poetry, as well as writing in general, it will never make entirely a poet or a poem; but neither poet nor poem will ever be good for any thing without it. It is the salt of society, and the seasoning of composition. Vulgarity is far worse than downright black-guardism; for the latter comprehends wit, humour, and strong sense at times; while the former is a sad abortive attempt at all things, ‘signifying nothing.’ It does not depend upon low themes, or even low-language, for Fielding revels in both; — but is he ever vulgar? No. You see the man of education, the gentleman, and the scholar, sporting with his subject, — its master, not its slave. Your vulgar writer is always most vulgar the higher his subject; as the man who showed the menagerie at Pidcock’s was wont to say, ‘This, gentlemen, is the Eagle of the Sun, from Archangel in Russia: the otterer it is, the igherer he flies.’”
In a note on a passage relative to Pope’s lines upon Lady Mary W. Montague, he says —
“I think that I could show, if necessary, that Lady Mary W. Montague was also greatly to blame in that quarrel, not for having rejected, but for having encouraged him; but I would rather decline the task — though she should have remembered her own line, ‘He comes too near, that comes to be denied.’ I admire her so much — her beauty, her talents — that I should do this reluctantly. I, besides, am so attached to the very name of Mary, that as Johnson once said, ‘If you called a dog Harvey, I should love him;’ so, if you were to call a female of the same species ‘Mary,’ I should love it better than others (biped or quadruped) of the same sex with a different appellation. She was an extraordinary woman: she could translate Epictetus, and yet write a song worthy of Aristippus. The lines,
“‘And when the long hours of the public are past, And we meet, with champaigne and a chicken, at last, May every fond pleasure that moment endear.’ Be banish’d afar both discretion and fear! Forgetting or scorning the airs of the crowd, He may cease to be formal, and I to be proud, Till,’ &c. &c.
There, Mr. Bowles! — what say you to such a supper with such a woman? and her own description too? Is not her ‘champaigne and chicken’ worth a forest or two? Is it not poetry? It appears to me that this stanza contains the ‘purée’ of the whole philosophy of Epicurus: — I mean the practical philosophy of his school, not the precepts of the master; for I have been too long at the university not to know that the philosopher was himself a moderate man. But after all, would not some of us have been as great fools as Pope? For my part, I wonder that, with his quick feelings, her coquetry, and his disappointment, he did no more, — instead of writing some lines, which are to be condemned if false, and regretted if true.”
LETTER 424. TO MR. HOPPNER.
“Ravenna, May 11. 1821.
“If I had but known your notion about Switzerland before, I should have adopted it at once. As it is, I shall let the child remain in her convent, where she seems healthy and happy, for the present; but I shall feel much obliged if you will enquire, when you are in the cantons, about the usual and better modes of education there for females, and let me know the result of your opinions. It is some consolation that both Mr. and Mrs. Shelley have written to approve entirely my placing the child with the nuns for the present. I can refer to my whole conduct, as having neither spared care, kindness, nor expense, since the child was sent to me. The people may say what they please, I must content myself with not deserving (in this instance) that they should speak ill.
“The place is a country town in a good air, where there is a large establishment for education, and many children, some of considerable rank, placed in it. As a country town, it is less liable to objections of every kind. It has always appeared to me, that the moral defect in Italy does not proceed from a conventual education, — because, to my certain knowledge, they come out of their convents innocent even to ignorance of moral evil, — but to the state of society into which they are directly plunged on coming out of it. It is like educating an infant on a mountain-top, and then taking him to the sea and throwing him into it and desiring him to swim. The evil, however, though still too general, is partly wearing away, as the women are more permitted to marry from attachment: this is, I believe, the case also in France. And after all, what is the higher society of England? According to my own experience, and to all that I have seen and heard (and I have lived there in the very highest and what is called the best), no way of life can be more corrupt. In Italy, however, it is, or rather was, more systematised; but now, they themselves are ashamed of regular Serventism. In England, the only homage which they pay to virtue is hypocrisy. I speak of course of the tone of high life, — the middle ranks may be very virtuous.
“I have not got any copy (nor have yet had) of the letter on Bowles; of course I should be delighted to send it to you. How is Mrs. H.? well again, I hope. Let me know when you set out. I regret that I cannot meet you in the Bernese Alps this summer, as I once hoped and intended. With my best respects to madam, I am ever, &c.
“P.S. I gave to a musicianer a letter for you some time ago — has he presented himself? Perhaps you could introduce him to the Ingrains and other dilettanti. He is simple and unassuming — two strange things in his profession — and he fiddles like Orpheus himself or Amphion: ’tis a pity that he can’t make Venice dance away from the brutal tyrant who tramples upon it.”
LETTER 425. TO MR. MURRAY.
“May 14. 1821.
“A Milan paper states that the play has been represented and universally condemned. As remonstrance has been vain, complaint would be useless. I presume, however, for your own sake (if not for mine), that you and my other friends will have at least published my different protests against its being brought u
pon the stage at all; and have shown that Elliston (in spite of the writer) forced it upon the theatre. It would be nonsense to say that this has not vexed me a good deal, but I am not dejected, and I shall not take the usual resource of blaming the public (which was in the right), or my friends for not preventing — what they could not help, nor I neither — a forced representation by a speculating manager. It is a pity that you did not show them its unfitness for the stage before the play was published, and exact a promise from the managers not to act it. In case of their refusal, we would not have published it at all. But this is too late.
“Yours.
“P.S. I enclose Mr. Bowles’s letters: thank him in my name for their candour and kindness. — Also a letter for Hodgson, which pray forward. The Milan paper states that I ‘brought forward the play!!!’ This is pleasanter still. But don’t let yourself be worried about it; and if (as is likely) the folly of Elliston checks the sale, I am ready to make any deduction, or the entire cancel of your agreement.
“You will of course not publish my defence of Gilchrist, as, after Bowles’s good humour upon the subject, it would be too savage.
“Let me hear from you the particulars; for, as yet, I have only the simple fact.
“If you knew what I have had to go through here, on account of the failure of these rascally Neapolitans, you would be amused; but it is now apparently over. They seemed disposed to throw the whole project and plans of these parts upon me chiefly.”
LETTER 426. TO MR. MOORE.
“May 14. 1821.
“If any part of the letter to Bowles has (unintentionally, as far as I remember the contents) vexed you, you are fully avenged; for I see by an Italian paper that, notwithstanding all my remonstrances through all my friends (and yourself among the rest), the managers persisted in attempting the tragedy, and that it has been ‘unanimously hissed!!’ This is the consolatory phrase of the Milan paper, (which detests me cordially, and abuses me, on all occasions, as a Liberal,) with the addition that I ‘brought the play out’ of my own good will.
“All this is vexatious enough, and seems a sort of dramatic Calvinism — predestined damnation, without a sinner’s own fault. I took all the pains poor mortal could to prevent this inevitable catastrophe — partly by appeals of all kinds up to the Lord Chamberlain, and partly to the fellows themselves. But, as remonstrance was vain, complaint is useless. I do not understand it — for Murray’s letter of the 24th, and all his preceding ones, gave me the strongest hopes that there would be no representation. As yet, I know nothing but the fact, which I presume to be true, as the date is Paris, and the 30th. They must have been in a hell of a hurry for this damnation, since I did not even know that it was published; and, without its being first published, the histrions could not have got hold of it. Any one might have seen, at a glance, that it was utterly impracticable for the stage; and this little accident will by no means enhance its merit in the closet.
“Well, patience is a virtue, and, I suppose, practice will make it perfect. Since last year (spring, that is) I have lost a lawsuit, of great importance, on Rochdale collieries — have occasioned a divorce — have had my poesy disparaged by Murray and the critics — my fortune refused to be placed on an advantageous settlement (in Ireland) by the trustees — my life threatened last month (they put about a paper here to excite an attempt at my assassination, on account of politics, and a notion which the priests disseminated that I was in a league against the Germans,) — and, finally, my mother-in-law recovered last fortnight, and my play was damned last week! These are like ‘the eight-and-twenty misfortunes of Harlequin.’ But they must be borne. If I give in, it shall be after keeping up a spirit at least. I should not have cared so much about it, if our southern neighbours had not bungled us all out of freedom for these five hundred years to come.
“Did you know John Keats? They say that he was killed by a review of him in the Quarterly — if he be dead, which I really don’t know. I don’t understand that yielding sensitiveness. What I feel (as at this present) is an immense rage for eight-and-forty hours, and then, as usual — unless this time it should last longer. I must get on horseback to quiet me. Yours, &c.
“Francis I. wrote, after the battle of Pavia, ‘All is lost except our honour.’ A hissed author may reverse it— ‘Nothing is lost, except our honour.’ But the horses are waiting, and the paper full. I wrote last week to you.”
LETTER 427. TO MR. MURRAY.
“Ravenna, May 19. 1821.
“By the papers of Thursday, and two letters of Mr. Kinnaird, I perceive that the Italian gazette had lied most Italically, and that the drama had not been hissed, and that my friends had interfered to prevent the representation. So it seems they continue to act it, in spite of us all: for this we must ‘trouble them at ‘size.’ Let it by all means be brought to a plea: I am determined to try the right, and will meet the expenses. The reason of the Lombard lie was that the Austrians — who keep up an Inquisition throughout Italy, and a list of names of all who think or speak of any thing but in favour of their despotism — have for five years past abused me in every form in the Gazette of Milan, &c. I wrote to you a week ago on the subject.
“Now I should be glad to know what compensation Mr. Elliston would make me, not only for dragging my writings on the stage in five days, but for being the cause that I was kept for four days (from Sunday to Thursday morning, the only post-days) in the belief that the tragedy had been acted and ‘unanimously hissed;’ and this with the addition that I ‘had brought it upon the stage,’ and consequently that none of my friends had attended to my request to the contrary. Suppose that I had burst a blood-vessel, like John Keats, or blown my brains out in a fit of rage, — neither of which would have been unlikely a few years ago. At present I am, luckily, calmer than I used to be, and yet I would not pass those four days over again for — I know not what.
“I wrote to you to keep up your spirits, for reproach is useless always, and irritating — but my feelings were very much hurt, to be dragged like a gladiator to the fate of a gladiator by that ‘retiarius,’ Mr. Elliston. As to his defence and offers of compensation, what is all this to the purpose? It is like Louis the Fourteenth, who insisted upon buying at any price Algernon Sydney’s horse, and, on his refusal, on taking it by force, Sydney shot his horse. I could not shoot my tragedy, but I would have flung it into the fire rather than have had it represented.
“I have now written nearly three acts of another (intending to complete it in five), and am more anxious than ever to be preserved from such a breach of all literary courtesy and gentlemanly consideration.
“If we succeed, well: if not, previous to any future publication, we will request a promise not to be acted, which I would even pay for (as money is their object), or I will not publish — which, however, you will probably not much regret.
“The Chancellor has behaved nobly. You have also conducted yourself in the most satisfactory manner; and I have no fault to find with any body but the stage-players and their proprietor. I was always so civil to Elliston personally, that he ought to have been the last to attempt to injure me.
“There is a most rattling thunder-storm pelting away at this present writing; so that I write neither by day, nor by candle, nor torchlight, but by lightning light: the flashes are as brilliant as the most gaseous glow of the gas-light company. My chimney-board has just been thrown down by a gust of wind: I thought that it was the ‘Bold Thunder’ and ‘Brisk Lightning’ in person. — Three of us would be too many. There it goes — flash again! but
“I tax not you, ye elements, with unkindness; I never gave ye franks, nor call’d upon you;
as I have done by and upon Mr. Elliston.
“Why do you not write? You should at least send me a line of particulars: I know nothing yet but by Galignani and the Honourable Douglas.
“Well, and how does our Pope controversy go on? and the pamphlet? It is impossible to write any news: the Austrian scoundrels rummage all letters.
“P.S. I could have sent you a good deal of gossip and some real information, were it not that all letters pass through the Barbarians’ inspection, and I have no wish to inform them of any thing but my utter abhorrence of them and theirs. They have only conquered by treachery, however.”
LETTER 428. TO ME. MOORE.
“Ravenna, May 20. 1821.
“Since I wrote to you last week I have received English letters and papers, by which I perceive that what I took for an Italian truth is, after all, a French lie of the Gazette de France. It contains two ultra-falsehoods in as many lines. In the first place, Lord B. did not bring forward his play, but opposed the same; and, secondly, it was not condemned, but is continued to be acted, in despite of publisher, author, Lord Chancellor, and (for aught I know to the contrary) of audience, up to the first of May, at least — the latest date of my letters. You will oblige me, then, by causing Mr. Gazette of France to contradict himself, which, I suppose, he is used to. I never answer a foreign criticism; but this is a mere matter of fact, and not of opinions. I presume that you have English and French interest enough to do this for me — though, to be sure, as it is nothing but the truth which we wish to state, the insertion may be more difficult.
