CHAPTER XIII.

THACKERAY'S RESEARCHES AMONGST THE WRITINGS OF THE EARLY ESSAYISTS--_Continued._

Characteristic passages from the Works of Humorous Writers of the 'Era of the Georges,' from Thackeray's Library, illustrated with original Marginal Sketches by the Author's hand -- THE 'HUMOURIST,' 1724 -- Extracts and Pencillings.

THE 'HUMOURIST.'

BEING ESSAYS UPON SEVERAL SUBJECTS: 'DEDICATED TO THE MAN IN THE MOON.'

LONDON, 1724-5.

OF NEWS-WRITERS.[23]

Quo virtus tua te vocat, i pede fausto.--_Hor. Ep._ II. l. 2.

'As to the filling the paper with trifles and things of no significancy, the instances of it are obvious and numerous. The French king's losing a rotten tooth, and the surgeon's fee thereupon; a duke's taking physic, and a magistrate's swearing a small oath, and a poor thief's ravishing a knapsack, have all, in their turns, furnished out deep matter for wit and eloquence to these vigilant writers, who hawk for adventures. A man of quality cannot steal out of town for a day or two, or return to it, without the attendance of a coach and six horses, and a news-writer, who makes the important secret the burden of his paper next day. I have observed, that if a man be but great or rich, the most wretched occasion entitles him to fill a long paragraph in print; the cutting of his corns for the purpose, or his playing at ombre, never fails to merit publication. Now, if my _most diligent_ brother-writers, who are spies upon the actions and cabinets of the great, would go a little farther, and tell us when his grace or his lordship broke his custom by keeping his word, or said a witty thing, or did a generous one, we will freely own they tell us some news, and will thank them for our pleasure and our surprise.

'It is with concern, I see, that even the privacies of the poor ladies cannot escape the eyes of these public searchers. How many great ladies do they bring to bed every day of their lives! for poor madam no sooner begins to make faces, and utter the least groan, but instantly an author stands with his pen in his teeth, ready to hold her back, and to tell the town whether the baby is boy or girl, before the midwife has pulled off her spectacles, and described its _nose_.'

OF A COUNTRY ENTERTAINMENT.

'I am led by the regard which I bear to the ladies and the Christmas holidays to divert my readers with the history of an entertainment, where I made one at the house of a country squire.

'When I went in I found the dining-room full of ladies, to whom I made a profound bow, and was repaid by a whole circle of curtsies. While I was meditating, with my eyes fixed upon the fire, what I had best say, I could hear one of them whisper to another, "I believe he thinks we smoke tobacco;" for, my reader must know, I had omitted the country fashion, and not kissed one of them.

'At dinner we had many excuses from the lady of the house for _our indifferent fare_, and she had as many declarations from us, her guests, that _all was very good_. And the squire gave us the history and extraction of every fowl that came to the table. He assured us that his poultry had neither kindred nor allies anywhere on this side of the Channel.

'As soon as we were risen from the table, our great parliament of females presently resolved themselves into committees of twos and threes all over the dining-room, and I perceived that every party was engaged in talking scandal.

'The ladies then went into one parlour to their tea, and we men into another to our bottle, over which I was entertained with many ingenious remarks on the price of barley, on dairies and the sheepfold. But as the most engaging conversation is, when too long, sometimes cloying, having smoked my pipe in due silence and attention, I took a trip to the ladies, who had sent to know whether I would drink some tea. When I made my entrance, the topic they were on was religion, in their statements about which they were terribly divided, and debated with such agitation and fervour, that I grew in pain for the china cups.

'But they happily departed from this warm point, and unanimously fell backbiting their neighbours, which instantly qualified all their heat and heartily reconciled them to one another, insomuch that all the time the business of scandal was handling there was not one dissenting voice to be heard in the whole assembly.

'By this time the music was come, and happy was the woman that could first wipe her mouth and be soonest upon her legs. In the dance some moved very becomingly, but the majority made such a rattle on the boards as quite drowned the music. This made me call to mind your mettlesome horses, that dance on a pavement to the music of their own heels.

'We had among us the squire's eldest son, a batchelor and captain of the militia. This honest gentleman, believing, as one would imagine, that good humour and wit consisted in activity of body and thickness of bone, was resolved to be very witty, that is to say, very strong; he therefore not only threw down most of the women, and with abundance of wit hauled them round the room, but gave us several farther proofs of the sprightliness of his genius, by a great many leaps he made about a yard high, always remembering to fall on somebody's toes. This ingenious fancy was applauded by everyone, except the person who felt it, who never happened to have complaisance enough to fall in with the general laugh that was raised on that occasion. For my own part, who am an occasional conformist to common custom, I was ashamed to be singular, so I even extended my mouth into a smile, and put my face into a laughing posture too. His mother, observing me to look pleased with her son's activity and gay deportment, told me in my ear, "_he was never worse company than I saw him_." To which I answered, "_I vow, madam, I believe you_."'

OF THE SPLEEN.

'In constitutions where this humorous distemper prevails, it is surprising how trifling a matter will inflame it.

'I shall never forget an ingenious doctor of physick, who was so jealous of the honour of his whiskers, which he was pleased to christen "the emblems of his virility," that he resolutely made the sun shine through every unhappy cat that ill-fate threw in his way. He magnanimously professed that his spirit could not brook it, that any cat in Christendom, noble or ignoble, should rival the reputation of his upper lip. In every other respect our physician was a well-bred person, and, which is as wonderful, understood Latin. But we see the deepest learning is no charm against the spleen.'

OF GHOSTS.

'All sorts of people, when they get together, will find something to talk of. News, politics, and stocks comprise the conversation of the busy and trading world. Rakes and men of pleasure fight duels with men they never spoke to, and betray women they never saw, and do twenty fine feats over their cups which they never do anywhere else. And children, servants, and old women, and others of the same size of understanding, please and terrify themselves and one another with spirits and goblins. In this case a ghost is no more than a help to discourse.

'A late very pious but very credulous bishop was relating a strange story of a demon, that haunted a girl in Lothbury, to a company of gentlemen in the City, when one of them told his lordship the following adventure:--

'"As I was one night reading in bed, as my custom is, and all my family were at rest, I heard a foot deliberately ascending the stairs, and as it came nearer I heard something breathe. While I was musing what it should be, three hollow knocks at my door made me ask who was there, and instantly the door blew open." "Ah! sir, and pray what did you see?" "My lord, I'll tell you. A tall thin figure stood before me, with withered hair, and an earthly aspect; he was covered with a long sooty garment, that descended to his ankles, and his waist was clasped close within a broad leathern girdle. In one hand he held a black staff taller than himself, and in the other a round body of pale light, which shone feebly every way." "That's remarkable! pray, sir, go on." "It beckoned to me, and I followed it down stairs, and there it pointed to the door, and then left me, and made a hideous noise in the street." "This is really odd and surprising; but, pray now, did it give you no notice what it might particularly seek or aim at?" "Yes, my lord, it was the watchman, who came to show me that my servants had left all my doors open."'

OF KEEPING THE COMMANDMENTS.

'I have been humbly of opinion for many years that the keeping of the Ten Commandments was a matter not altogether unworthy of our consideration and practice; and though I am of the same sentiments still, yet I dare hardly publish them, knowing that if I am against the world, the world will be against me. I must not affront modern politeness and the common mode.

'Who would have the boldness to mention the first commandment to Matilda, when he has seen her curt'sying to herself in the glass, and kissing her lap-dog, and worshipping these two _divine creatures_ from morning till night? Nor is Matilda without other deities; she has several sets of china, a diamond necklace, and a grey monkey; and, in spite of her parents and her reason, she is guilty of will-worship to Dick Noodle. But this last is no wonder at all, for Dick wears fine brocade waistcoats and the best Mechlin, and no man of the age picks his teeth with greater elegance.

'And would it not be equally bold and barbarous to enslave a beau or a bully with the tyranny of the third commandment? when it's well known that these worthy gentlemen and brothers in understanding and courage must either be dumb or damning themselves; and, therefore, to stop their swearing would be to stop their breath, and gag them to all eternity. Beau Wittol courts Arabella with great success, and it is not doubted he will carry her, though he was never heard to make any other speech or compliment to her than that of "Demme, madam!" after which he squeezes her hand, takes snuff, and grins in her face with wonderful wit and gaiety. Arabella smiles, and owns with her eyes her admiration of these _accomplishments of a fine gentleman_.'

OF FLATTERY.

'Flattery _is the art of selling wind for a round sum of ready money_. A sycophant blows up the mind of his unhappy patient into a tympany, and then, like other physicians, receives a fee for his poison. It is his business to instruct men to mistake themselves at a great expense; to shut their eyes, and then pay for being blind. Thus the end of excelling in any art or profession is to have that excellence known and admired.

'Sing-song Nero, an ancestor of Mr. Tom d'Urfey, would, probably, never have banished the sceptre and adopted the fiddle, but that he found it much easier for his talents to scrape than to govern. In this reign, he that had a musical ear, or could twist a catgut, was made a man; and the fiddlers ruled the Roman empire by the singular merit of condescending to be viler thrummers than the emperor himself. He who at that time could but _wonder greatly_, and _gape artfully_ at his Majesty's _royal skill_ in crowding, might be governor of a province, or Lord High Treasurer, or what else he pleased.

'This imperial piper used to go the circuit, and call the provinces together, to be refreshed with a tune upon the fiddle, and if they had the policy to smother a laugh, and raise an outrageous clap, their taxes were paid, and they had whatever they asked; and so miserably was this monarch and madman bewitched by himself and his sycophants with the character of a victorious fiddler, that when he was abandoned by God and man, and, as an enemy to mankind, sentenced to be whipped to death, he did not grieve so much for the loss of his empire as the loss of his fiddle. When he had no mortal left to flatter him, he flattered himself, and his last words were, "_Qualis Artifex pereo!_--What a brave scraper is lost in me!" And then he buried a knife in his inside, and made his death the best action of his life!'

OF RETIREMENT.

'To be absolute master of one's own time and actions is an instance of liberty which is not found but in solitude. A man that lives in a crowd is a slave, even though all that are about him fawn upon him and give him the upper-hand. They call him master, or lord, and treat him as such; but as they hinder him from doing what he otherwise would, the title and homage which they pay him is flattery and contradiction.[24]

'I ever loved retirement, and detested crowds; I would rather pass an afternoon amongst a herd of deer, than half an hour at a coronation; and sooner eat a piece of apple-pie in a cottage, than dine with a judge on the circuit. To lodge a night by myself in a cave would not grieve me so much as living half a day in a fair. It will look a little odd when I own that I have missed many a good sermon for no other reason but that many others were to hear it as well as myself. I have neither disliked the man, nor his principles, nor his congregation, singly; but altogether I could not abide them.

'I am, therefore, exceedingly happy in the solitude which I am now enjoying. I frequently stand under a tree, and with great humanity pity one half of the world, and with equal contempt laugh at the other half. I shun the company of men, and seek that of oxen, and sheep, and deer, and bushes; and when I can hide myself for the moiety of a day from the sight of every creature but those that are dumb, I consider myself as monarch of all that I see or tread upon, and fancy that Nature smiles and the sun shines for my sake only.

'My eyes at those seasons are the seat of pleasure, and I do not interrupt their ranging by the impertinence of memory, or solicitude of any kind. I neither look a day forward nor a day backward, but voluptuously enjoy the present moment. My mind follows my senses, and refuses all images which these do not then present.'

OF BUBBLES.

'The world has often been ruled by men who were themselves ruled by the worst qualities and most sordid views. The _prince_, says a great French politician, _governs the people, and interest governs the prince_.

'Hence it comes to pass, that few men care how they rise in the world, so they do but rise. They know that success expiates all rogueries, and never misses reverence; and that he who was called villain or murderer in the race, is often christened saint or hero at the goal.

'The present possession of money or power is always a ready patent for respect and submission. He that gets a hundred thousand pounds by a bubble--that is, by selling a bag of wind to his credulous countrymen--is a greater idol in every coffee-house in town than he who is worth but ninety thousand, though acquired by honest trading or ingenious arts, which profit mankind, and bring credit to his country; and thus every South Sea cub shall, by the sole merit of his million, vie for respect and followers with any lord in the land, though it should strangely happen, as it sometimes does, that his lordship's virtues and parts ennoble his title and quality. It matters not whether your father was a tinker, and you, his worthy son, a broker or a sharper, provided you be but a South Sea man. If you are but that, the whole earth is your humble servant.

'At present, nothing farther is necessary towards getting an estate--that is, merit and respect--than a little money, much roguery, and many lies. With what indignation have I beheld a peer of the realm courting the good graces of a little haberdasher with great cash, and begging a few shares in a bubble which the honourable Goodman Bever had just then invented to cheat his fellow-citizens!

'But exalted boobies being below satire, I shall here only consider a little the mischiefs brought upon the public by the projects which bring them their wealth. It is melancholy to consider that power follows property, when we consider at the same time into what vile hands the property is fallen, and by what vile means, even by bubbles and direct cheating.

'Of our second-hand bubbles, I blame not one more than another; their name shows their nature. The "Great Bubble" of all set them an example, and began first. By it immense fortunes have been got to particular men, most of them obscure and unheard of; happy for their own characters, and for the nation's trade, if they had still remained so. I hope our all is not yet at the mercy of sharpers, ignorant, mercenary sharpers; but I should be glad to see it proved that it will not be so.'

OF TRAVELS.

'As every man is in his own opinion fit to come abroad in print, so every occasion that can put him upon prating to mankind is sufficient to put his pen running, provided he himself can hold the principal character in his own book.

'Of all the several classes of scribblers, there is none more silly than your authors of Travels. There are several things common to all these travellers, and yet peculiar to every particular traveller. I have at this time in my hands a little manuscript, entitled "Travels from EXETER TO LONDON, with _proper observations_." By the sagacity shown in the remarks, I take the author to be some polite squire of Devon. In the following passages our traveller records his observations in the great metropolis:--

'"In this great city people are quite another thing than what they are out of it; insomuch, that he who will be very great with you in the country, will scarce pull off his hat to you in London. I once dined at Exeter with a couple of judges, and they talked to me _there_, and drank my health, and we were very familiar together. So when I saw them again passing through Westminster Hall, I was glad of it with all my heart, and ran to them with a broad smile, to ask them how they did, and to shake hands with them; but they looked at me so coldly and so proudly as you cannot imagine, and did not seem to know me, at which I was confounded, angry, and mad; but I kept my mind to myself.

'"At another time I was at the playhouse (which is a rare place for mirth, music, and dancing), and, being in the pit, saw in one of the boxes a member of Parliament of our county, with whom I have been as great as hand and glove; so being overjoyed to see him, I called to him aloud by his name, and asked him how he did; but instead of saluting me again, or making any manner of answer, he looked plaguy sour, and never opened his mouth, though when he is in the country he is as merry a grig as any in forty miles, and we have cracked many a bottle together."'

OF EDUCATION.

'People, put by their education into a narrow track of thinking, are as much afraid of getting out of it as children of quitting their leading-strings when first they learn to go. They are taught a raging fondness for a parcel of names that are never explained to them; and an implacable fierceness against another set of names that are never explained to them; so they jog on in the heavy steps of their forefathers, or in the wretched and narrow paths of poor-spirited and ignorant pedagogues. They believe they are certainly in the right, and therefore never take the pains to find out that they are certainly in the wrong.

'From this cause it comes to pass that many English gentlemen are as much afraid of reading some English books as were the poor blind Papists of reading books prohibited by their priests; which were, indeed, all books that had either religion or sense in them.

'How nicely are those men taught who are taught prejudice! A tincture of bigotry appears in all the actions of a bigot. He will neither, with his good liking, eat or drink, or sleep or travel with you, till he has received full conviction that you wash your hands and pare your nails just as he does.

'Here is a squire come down from London who is very rich, and has bought a world of land in our county of Wilts. The first thing he did when he came among us was to declare that he would have no dealings nor conversation with any Whig whatsoever; and, to make his word good, having bespoke several beds and other furniture to a considerable value of an upholsterer here, he returned the whole upon the poor man's hands because his wife had a brother who was a Presbyterian parson.

'But this worthy and ingenious squire was very well served by an officer of the army at a horse race here. They were drinking, among other company, the King's health, at the door of a public-house, on horseback; the officer, when it came to his turn, drank it to this Doughty Highflyer, who happened to be next to him, upon which he made some difficulty at pledging it, suggesting that public healths should not be proposed in mixed company. "You would say," says the officer, "if you durst, that a High Churchman would not have his Majesty's health proposed to him at all." Upon this he swore he was a High Churchman, and was not ashamed of it. "So I guessed," said the officer, "by your disloyalty." "But, Sir," says the officer, "even disloyalty to your prince need not make you show your ill-breeding in company." The squire chafed most violently at this, and urged, as a proof of his good breeding, that he had been bred at Oxford. "So I guessed," says the officer, "by your ignorance." This nettled the squire to the height, and fired his little soul at the expense of the outer case, for he proceeded to give ill words, and to call ill names; but the officer quickly taught him, by the nose, to hold his tongue, and ask pardon. Thus it always fares with the High Church in fighting as it does in disputing: she is constantly beaten; and the courage and understanding of her passive sons tally with each other.'

OF WOMEN.

'Some of my fair correspondents have lately reproached me with negligence and indifference to their sex; but if they could know how vain I am of so obliging a reprimand, they would be sensible, too, how little I deserved it. I am not so entirely a statue as to be insensible of the power of beauty, nor so absolutely a woman's creature as to be blind to their little weaknesses, their pretty follies and impertinences.

'It will be necessary to inform my readers that my landlady is an eminent milliner, and a considerable dealer in Flanders lace. She is one of those whom we call notable women; she has run through the rough and smooth of life, has a very good plain sense of things, and knows the world, as far as she is concerned in it, very well. I am very much entertained by her company; her discourse is sure to be seasoned with scandal, ancient and modern, which, though the morals and gravity of my character do not allow me to join in, yet, such is the infirmity of human nature, I find it impossible to be heartily displeased with it as I ought.

'If I come in at a time when the shop, which is commodiously situated above stairs, is full of company, I usually place myself in an obscure corner of it, and observe what passes with secret satisfaction. 'Tis pleasant to hear my landlady, by the mere incessancy of tittle-tattle, persuade her pretty customers out of all the understanding that they brought along with them; and on the other side of the counter to see the little bosoms pant with irresolution, and swell at the view of trifles, which humour and custom have taught them to call necessary and convenient. Hard by perhaps stands a customer of inferior quality, a citizen's wife suppose her, who is reduced to the hard necessity of regulating her expenses by her husband's allowance, and is bursting with vexation to know herself stinted to lace of but fifty shillings a yard; whereas if she could rise to three pounds, she might be mistress of a very pretty head, and what she really thinks she need not be ashamed to be seen in. But for want of this all goes wrong; she hates her superiors, despises her husband, neglects her children, and is ashamed and weary of herself.

'This seems ridiculous to my men readers, and it certainly is so; but are our follies and extravagances more reasonable? Or, rather, are they not infinitely more dangerous and destructive? What violences do we not commit upon our consciences for the mere gratification of our avarice? How much of the real ease and happiness of life do we daily sacrifice to the vanity of ambition? Is it possible, then, since even the greatest men are but a bigger sort of children, to be seriously angry that women are no more? If in my old age I am struck with the harmony of a rattle, or long to get astride on a hobby-horse; if I love still to be caressed and flattered, and am delighted with good words and high titles, why should I be angry that my wife and daughters do not play the philosopher, and have not more wit than myself?

OF MASQUERADES.

'I must desire my reader, as he values his repose, not to let his thoughts run upon anything loose or frightful for two hours at least before he goes to bed. _Titus Livius_, the Roman historian, is my usual entertainment, when I don't find myself disposed for closer application. Happening to come home sooner than ordinary two nights ago, I took it up, and read the 8th and following chapters of his 39th book, where he gives us a large account of some nocturnal assemblies lately set up at Rome; I think he calls them _Bacchanals_, and describes the ceremonies, rites of initiation, and religious practices, together with their music, singing, shrieks, and howlings. The men were dressed like satyrs, and raved like persons distracted, with enthusiastic motions of the head and violent distortions of the body. The ladies ran with their hair about their ears and burning torches in their hands; some covered with the skins of panthers, others with those of tigers, all attended with drums and trumpets, while they themselves were the most noisy. "To this diversion," says the historian, "were added the pleasures of feasting and wine to draw the more in; and when wine, the night, and a mixed company of men and women, jumbled together, had extinguished all sense of shame, there were extravagances of all sorts committed; each having that pleasure ready prepared for him to which his nature was most inclined."

''Tis with design I have referred my reader to the very place, being resolved not to trouble him with any farther relation of these midnight revellings, for fear I should draw him into the same misfortune I unluckily fell under myself. The very idea of it makes me tremble still, when I think of those monstrous habits, fantastical gestures, hideous faces, and confused noises I had in my sleep. Join to these the many assignations made for the next night, the signs given for the present execution of former agreements; and the various plots and contrivances I overheard, for parting man and wife, and ruining whole families at once. These frightful appearances put me into such uncommon agitations of body, and I looked so ghastly at my first waking, that a friend of mine, who came early in the morning to make me a visit, was struck with such a terror at the sight of me, that he made to the street door as fast he could, where he had only time to bid one of my servants run for a physician immediately, for he was sure I was going mad.'

OF SEDITION.

'The multitude of papers is a complaint so common in the introduction of every new one, that it would be a shame to repeat it; for my own part, I am so far from repining at this evil, that I sincerely wish there were ten times the number. By this means one may hope to see the appetite for impertinence, defamation, and treason (so prevalent in the generality of readers) at last surfeit itself, and my honoured brethren the modern authors be obliged to employ themselves in some more honest manufacture than that of the _Belles Lettres_.

''Tis impossible for one who has the least knowledge and regard for his country's interest to look into a coffee-house without the greatest concern. Industry and application are the true and genuine honour of a trading city; where these are everywhere visible all is well. Whenever I see a false thirst for knowledge in my own countrymen, I am sorry they ever learnt to read. I would not be thought an enemy to literature (being, indeed, a very learned person myself), but when I observe a worthy trader, without any natural malice of his own, sucking in the poison of popularity, and boiling with indignation against an administration which the pamphleteer informs him is very corrupt, I am grieved that ever _Machiavel_, _Hobbes_, _Sidney_, _Filmer_, and the more illustrious moderns, including myself, appeared in human nature.

'Idleness is the parent of innumerable vices, and detraction is generally the first, though not immediately the most mischievous, that is born of it. The mind of man is of such an ill make that it relishes defamation much better than applause; so every writer who makes his court to the multitude must sacrifice his superiors to his patrons.

'That there is a very great and indefeasible authority in the people, or Commons of Great Britain, everyone allows. Power is ever naturally and rightfully founded in those who have anything to risk; and this power delegated into the hands of Parliament, it there becomes legally absolute, and the people are, by their very constitution, obliged to a passive obedience.

'Nothing is better known than this, nothing on all sides more generally allowed, and one would imagine nothing could sooner silence the clamour of little statesmen and politicians; that jargon of public-spiritedness, which wastes so much of the time of the busy part of our countrymen. The misfortune is that though everyone (who is not indeed crack-brained with the love of his country) will own that the populace, by having delegated the right of inspecting public affairs to others, have no authority to be troublesome about it themselves, yet everyone excepts himself from the multitude, and imagines that his own particular talent for public business ought to exempt him from so severe a restraint. Hence arises the great demand for newspapers and coffee. Happy is it for the nation and for the Government that the distemper and the medicine are found at the same place, and the blue-apron officer who presents you with a newspaper, to heat the brain and disturb the understanding, is ready the same moment to apply those composing specificks, a dish and a pipe. Otherwise, what revolutions and abdications might we not expect to see? I should not be surprised to hear that a general officer in the trained-bands had run stark staring mad out of a coffee-house at noon day, declared for a Free Parliament, and proclaimed my Lord Mayor King of England.'

FOOTNOTES:

[23] I have ever had a great respect for the most ingenious as well as most populous society within the liberties, namely, the authors and carvers of news, generous men! who daily retail their histories and their parts by pennyworths, and lodge high, and study nightly for the instruction of such as have the Christian charity to lay out a few farthings for these their labours, which, like rain, descend from the clouds for the benefit of the lower world.

My fellow authors are all men of martial spirits, and have an ungovernable appetite for blood and mortality. As if they were the sextons of the camp, and their papers the charnel-houses, they toll thousands daily to their long home; a charitable office! but they are paid for it.

[24] Nothing is so valuable as Time; and he who comes undesired to help to pass it away, might with the same civility and good sense give you to understand that he is come, out of pure love to you, with a coach-and-six and all his family, to help you to pass away your estate. To have one's hours and recesses at the mercy of visitants and intruders is arrant thraldom; and though I am an author, I farther declare I would rather pay a mere trifler half-a-crown a time than be entertained with his visits and his compliments.