THE ENGLISH HUMOURISTS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. A Series of Lectures; by W. M. THACKERAY, author of " Esmond," "Pendennis," "Vanity Fair," &c.

London: SMITH, ELDER, and Co. 1853.

"PEOPLE have now-a-days got a strange opinion that every thing should be taught by lectures. Lectures were once useful, but now," continues Dr. Samuel Johnson, "when all can read and books are so numerous, lectures are unnecessary. If your attention fails, and you miss a part of the lecture, it is lost; you cannot go back, as you do upon a book." It is nearly a century since the "stout old man" gave utterance to these opinions on the utility of lectures as a means of tuition, and yet, lectures still seem to meet us at every turn. Mr. Thackeray, however, has anticipated and destroyed the point of one of Johnson's objections; since, even if the attention had failed, and a part of the lecture had been lost, we are now enabled to "go back" and to search with greater care, the stream of words which, having once flowed from the lips of the lecturer, are now, as it were, congealed through the medium of paper and of print, into a more tangible, a more lasting, and a more serviceable form.

But Mr. Thackeray seems to have forgotten, that much which aided him as a lecturer, is wanting to him as an author. Voice, manner, homely illustrations occurring at the moment, these things cannot be conveyed in type; and hence, we believe, it is difficult to make a lecture pay a "double debt," like Goldsmith's chest of drawers, that is, at once be successful as a lecture to be heard, and as a paper, or volume to be read. Forgetful of this fact, Mr. Thackeray appears to have published these lectures on the English Humourists, in the same garb in which they were presented to the fashionable and brilliant audiences of the Hanover Square Rooms: it is possible, that there may exist trivial alterations in the style, or in the substance of the lectures. Mr. Thackeray has not thought proper to affix any preface, or any introduction to his work, by way of explanation on this point; yet, the emendations, however extensive, have not been so great as to materially change their character, from declamations that could again be delivered with success, into essays that are read with feelings very near akin to disappointment.

In treating of the English Humourists of the past age, it is of the men, and of their lives, rather than of their books, that Mr. Thackeray proposes to write. This is rather a strange announcement in a series of lectures, which has for its subject a race of men who obtained their distinguishing title, and acquired their claim to our notice, by their works and writings; yet it may be doubted, whether the only course which remains, for one who has

attempted the task to which Mr. Thackeray has set his shoulder, is not the course our author has adopted. To assemblages such as Mr. Thackeray addressed, composed as they were of both sexes, and of all ages, of individuals living in the latter half of the present century, it were impossible to enter with minuteness into an analysis of the productions, or into a critical review of the publications of the Humourists of the last. Times are now changed, and books that might be read, and expressions that might be used, and oaths that were sworn, and deeds that were done, with impunity, or with approbation in those days,-are now considered unfit to be done, shameful to be sworn, incorrect to be used, and altogether unsuitable to be read by the rising, or even by the adult generation.

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Mr. Thackeray helps us to compare the ways and the manners of the age in which the Humourists dwelt, by the light of the refinement and luxury of the present: the comparison in many respects is unfavourable to both the wits of the last century would find the restraint and etiquette of the present time insufferably irksome; and, although we might delight in hearing the brilliant conversation, or admire the splendid talents, of the great ones who are gone, we probably should be very far from pleased at a too intimate acquaintance with their habits, and should be soon satiated by an habitual intercourse with their acquaintance. "Would we have liked to live with him?" "That is a question," Mr. Thackeray thinks,

"That is a question which in dealing with these people's works and thinking of their lives and peculiarities, every reader of biographies must put to himself. Would you have liked to be a friend of the great Dean? I should like to have been Shakspere's shoeblack-just to have lived in his house, just to have worshipped him—to have run on his errands, and seen that sweet serene face. I should like, as a young man, to have lived on Fielding's stair-case in the Temple, and after helping him up to bed perhaps, and opening his door with his latch-key, to have shaken hands with him in the morning, and heard him talk and crack jokes over his breakfast and his mug of small beer. Who would not give something to pass a night at the club with Johnson, and Goldsmith, and James Boswell, Esq., of Auchinleck? The charm of Addison's companionship and conversation has passed to us by fond tradition-but Swift?"

However, Mr. Thackeray has not much liking for that great man, and as we shall presently speak again of the Dean, we will refer the reader to the lectures, for Mr. Thackeray's answer to the question, "Would we have liked to live with him?"

We will now proceed to a more particular discussion of the merits of the work, after we have given in his own words, the definition of the humourist writer, as explained by the humourist lecturer; he is one, Mr. Thackeray tells us, who

"Professes to awaken and direct your love, your pity, your kindnessyour scorn for untruth, pretension, imposture-your tenderness for the

weak, the poor, the oppressed, the unhappy. To the best of his means and ability he comments on all the ordinary actions and passions of life almost. He takes upon himself to be the week-day preacher, so to speak. Accordingly, as he finds, and speaks, and feels the truth best, we regard him, esteem him-sometimes love him. And, as his business is to mark other people's lives and peculiarities, we moralise upon his life when he is gone, and yesterday's preacher becomes the text for to-day's sermon."

It will scarcely, we think, be a matter of disappointment, that the reader should be excused the perusal of, and it is certainly very foreign from our intention to notice, seriatim, every mistake, or to question each matter of detail, that presents itself in the volume before us: and he will neither expect a refutation of each statement, nor will he look for an exposure of every inference which does not exactly coincide with the pre-conceived opinions of the Reviewer. Having said thus much by way of preface, we would wish to draw attention to that portion of Mr. Thackeray's first lecture which treats of the early life of Swift, and of his connection with Sir William Temple. Mr. Thackeray seems disposed to perpetuate a statement which has passed through Mr. Macaulay's hands, and which, while making Sir William Temple give and Swift receive the very meanest wages, ingeniously omits all mention of the change in the value of money, which would have made no slight difference in the value of the supposed salary. The tradition-and we imagine that the reader, after glancing at the evidence adduced, will agree with us in giving to the tale no higher a designation—the tradition as related by Mr. Thackeray is as follows:

"It was at Shene and at Moor Park, with a salary of twenty pounds, and a dinner at the upper servants' table, that this great and lonely Swift passed a ten years' apprenticeship-wore a cassock that was only not a livery-bent down a knee as proud as Lucifer's to supplicate my lady's good graces, or run on his honour's errands."

It would, perhaps, be rash to judge of the value of Mr. Thackeray's illustrative notes which are scattered up and down his volume, or to decide from the present case of the light they generally shed upon the text: yet, we find an extract from the Dean's journal annexed to the above paragraph, in corroboration of its substantial correctness:

"Don't you remember (he writes to Stella) how I used to be in pain when Sir William Temple would look cold, and out of humour for three or four days, and I used to suspect a hundred reasons? I have plucked up my spirits since then, faith; he spoiled a fine gentleman."

It is not a little singular that Scott, too, in his Memoirs of Swift, should have quoted from the same journal, the same periods and it may not be uninteresting to observe the conclusions, different, and altogether incongruous, which two authors of talent, and of genius, have deduced from the same source. Mr.

Thackeray perceives in Swift's statement nothing but visions of niggardly wages, of the servants' hall, of cassocks and clerical liveries, of the future dean of St. Patrick's knees, as proud as Lucifer's, running on his honour's errands: whilst Scott, who recognises in the description, allusions to circumstances of a later date, affirms that during Swift's last residence with Temple, scarce a cloud intervened to disturb the harmony of their friendship: and adds, that "a cold look from his patron, such was the veneration with which Swift regarded Temple, made him unhappy for days."

Amongst the letters collected in the Richardson correspondence, there is one extant which is addressed to the Lady Bradshaigh: this letter is of peculiar importance to the elucidation of Mr. Thackeray's strictures; in it we read that the nephew of Sir William Temple had informed a friend, who assured Richardson, who again had retailed the story to her ladyship, that

"Sir William hired Swift, at his first entrance into the world, to read to him, and sometimes to be his amanuensis, at the rate of £20 a year and his board, which was then high preferment for him."

We must not forget, who is the nephew of Sir William ; nor in what relation Jack Temple stood to Jonathan Swift. That he was a man who bore no good will to Swift is nearly certain: he probably was somewhat jealous of the intimacy that existed between the patron, and the dependent; and was not a little envious at the influence exercised over the one, and at the trust reposed in the other. On the deccase of Temple, it appears that the smothered flame broke forth; the nephew, and the uncle's "menial" were at open warfare, and the former misunderstanding was greatly increased by Sir William's legacy to the "uncouth young servitor;" nor would the chance of reconciliation be increased by the slight inflicted on Jack Temple, when he learnt that the Irish secretary had been selected, in preference to himself, to edit, and publish to the world Sir William's Essays, and Sir William's Letters. Such is the witness, and such the evidence, on which we are gravely informed that "with a salary of twenty pounds and a dinner at the upper servants' table" the great and lonely Swift passed a ten years' apprenticeship! Is the testimony of such a man trustworthy? Is it likely to be impartial? Is it such as Mr. Thackeray would be glad to take advantage, to establish any other than Mr. Thackeray's own sentiments? Is it evidence so untainted, that having been mentioned to a friend, who related it to an acquaintance, and having been, by the latter, transmitted through the pages of a common-place letter to a lady correspondent-it should at length be discovered at the foundation of circumstantial narrative?

Granting, however, that there exists a certain measure of truth in Jack Temple's statement, we must beware, lest his assertion be pressed into Mr. Thackeray's service, further than it legitimately

can be employed: Temple distinctly affirms-according to the version of his conversation we possess-that Swift's "high preferment" was bestowed upon the future Humourist at his first entrance into the world: rather more than two years was the length of Swift's residence with Sir William at Sheen; and we shall, perhaps, not be far from the truth, if we limit the duration of the secretary's "high preferment" to the length of this sojourn with his patron: for if, at the age of three and thirty, and after a ten years' apprenticeship, a man be still making his first entrance into life, we should be curious to enquire, at what date the Dean may be supposed to have fairly made his debut in the world? We have one word to say on the colour of the "menial's" coat-and this is a colour, which evidently finds but small favour in the eyes of our author. The certificate of Swift's priest's orders was granted in January 1695 four years from this date Temple died: a portion of this time had been passed at a distance from Moor Park, in Swift's parish of Kilroot: yet in the face of these facts, Mr. Thackeray has the courage to tell us, that "in a cassock that was only not a livery, the great and lonely Swift passed a ten years' apprenticeship!"

We have seen that Swift remained with Sir William two years; ill health then drove the invalid to seek for benefit in his native air, and on his return to England he again took up his abode with Temple at Moor Park: here it was that the intimacy and confidence sprang up between the old man and his former dependent, which afterwards ripened into mutual friendship, and which was repaid by Swift with a devotion that failed not frequently to shew itself. It was here that William III., in order to mark his sense of the services of Temple's rising and clever secretary,-military rank being, perhaps, more consonant with the king's ideas of duly rewarding merit than civil distinction,-was pleased to make Swift the offer of a troop of horse: nor was Sir William himself backward in assisting the fortunes of his friend; and, although, it is more than probable, that Swift had by this time made himself so useful, and so necessary to his patron, that it was impolitic to make him a proposal of too lucrative a post; yet, Temple placed at his disposal a situation in the Rolls' Office in Ireland, which was estimated to be worth about £120 a year. It was in after years likewise, in order to revisit again his well-known haunts in Surrey, and to resume his place, once more, at the side of his aged benefactor-a duty from which he was alone relieved by the death of Temple-that Swift left his parish, and voluntarily resigned preferment in the Church, to the amount of at least £100 a year. Yet Mr. Thackeray would have us to believe, that the Moor Park servitor gave up a prebendal stall, declined a clerkship in the Rolls, and ran the risk of displeasing the king, by refusing the rank of captain in his majesty's service, these offers extending over a period of eight years, in favour of an apprenticeship to Sir William Temple, with a salary of £20, and a dinner at the upper servants' table!