Part 12
He also in that year published a third volume of the Review, in which he dwelt very much upon matters connected with trade. One passage relative to the poor and their management, shows that he was far beyond his age on that point, as on most others. "Perhaps he may give some needful hints as to the state of our poor, in which his judgment may differ from that of others, but he must be plain: and while he is no enemy to charity-hospitals and workhouses, he thinks that methods to keep our poor out of them, far exceed, both in prudence and charity, all the settlements and endeavours in the world to maintain them there. As to censure, he expects it. He writes to serve the world, not to please it. A few wise, calm, disinterested men, he always had the good hap to please and satisfy. By their judgment he desires still to be determined; and if he has any pride, it is that he may be approved by such. To the rest, he sedately says, their censure deserves no notice." In 1708 he published a fourth volume of the Review, in which he discusses the Union at great length. He also discusses the war, the policy of the Swedes, &c.; the insurrection in Hungary, the revolution in Naples. The great principles of liberty are here, as they always were by De Foe, maintained with energy and warmth; but De Foe's mind was essentially practical, and therefore moderate. In the following fine passage he displays his principle of action. "In all my writings, as well as in this paper, it has been my endeavour, and ever shall be, I hope, to steer the middle way between all our extremes, and while I am applauding the lustre of moderation, to practise it myself." He foresees, however, the fate of impartiality in the contests of faction. "If I might give a short hint to an impartial writer, it should be to tell him his fate. If he resolves to venture up the dangerous precipice of telling unbiassed truths, let him proclaim war with mankind, _a la mode le pais de Pole_, neither to give nor take quarter. If he tells the crimes of great men, they fall upon him with the iron hands of the law; if he tells their virtues, when they have any, then the mob attacks him with slander. But if he regards truth, let him expect martyrdom on both sides, and then he may go on fearless; and this is the course I take myself." [vol. iv. p. 593.]
In 1708, prince George of Denmark, consort of queen Anne, died; and De Foe described his character in one of the Reviews. The recent circumstances in our own day, so analogous to that of prince George and the queen, make De Foe's sketch one of great interest. "Death has made a very deep incision in the public tranquillity, in the person of the prince of Denmark. His royal highness was a great and good man, a friend to England and her interest, and true and hearty in the cause of liberty.... If I had a design to run through the character of the prince, I would observe upon the excellency of his temper, the calmness of his passions, and the sedateness of his judgment, which commanded respect from the whole nation in a manner peculiar to himself; so that every party, however jarring and opposite, paid him their homage, although nothing was more averse to his temper than the divisions which unhappily agitate the nation. Nor can it be doubted that his highness derived peculiar satisfaction from his not interfering in public affairs more than his exalted station obliged him, since he saw it was impossible to do so without committing himself to a party, which he was always averse to. He sincerely lamented our divisions, but never encouraged or approved them. By his steady conduct, joined with a general courtesy to all sorts of people, he acquired the esteem and love of all parties, and that more than any person of his degree that ever went before him. I need not note how next to impossible it is in this divided nation, for the most consummate prudence to steer through the variety of interests and gain an universal good opinion, or indeed avoid universal censure. How the prince attained that great point I shall not attempt to examine; but this I think ought to be recorded to posterity, that one man in Britain was found, of whom no man spoke evil,--and _this was he_!" [vol. iv. p. 409.]--ED.
[56] Lord Buchan was so obliging as to communicate the subjoined extract of a letter to his lordship's grandfather, the earl of Buchan, from De Foe, dated the 29th of May, 1711:--"The person, with whom I endeavoured to plant the interest of your lordship's friend, has been strangely taken up, since I had that occasion; viz., first, in suffering the operation of the surgeons to heal the wound of the assassin; and since, in accumulating honours from parliament, the queen, and the people. On Thursday evening her majesty created him earl Mortimer, earl of Oxford, and lord Harley of Wigmore: and we expect that to-morrow in council he will have the white staff given him by the queen, and be declared lord high treasurer. I wrote this yesterday; and this day, May the 29th, he is made lord high treasurer of Great Britain, and carried the white staff before the queen this morning to chapel."
[57] Appeal, p. 16.
[58] With the present Life of De Foe, by Mr. Chalmers, prefixed. In this year he closed the fifth volume of the Review. He goes at great length into the affairs of Scotland, especially religious. For the freedom of his remarks in protesting against innovations upon the Scotch establishment, the Review was prosecuted by the grand jury, but the prosecution was soon stopped. He also contended vigorously against licensing the press, and for the Copyright Bill, which subsequently passed. He attacked Dr. Sacheverell for his celebrated sermon on the 5th of November, at St. Paul's. And he published a sixth volume of the Review. He there exposed stock-jobbing;--he refers to his frequently repeated anticipations of the eventual defeat of Charles XII. in relation to the battle of Pultowa; and he pays great attention, as before, to Scotch affairs.--ED.
[59] Mr. Chalmers here seems to be mistaken. De Foe wrote neither of these works. The first Mr. Wilson tells us was written by Oldmixon. De Foe, indeed, in order to expose the folly of the high tory party, who had procured several addresses to the queen, and which were published by them as an indication, "that the sense of the nation is express for the doctrine of passive obedience and non-resistance, and for her majesty's hereditary title to the throne of her ancestors," published a counter manifesto, A New Test of the Sense of the Nation: being a modest Comparison between the Addresses to the late King James and those to her present Majesty. In order to show how far the sense of the nation may be judged of by either of them. 1710. His object is of course to expose the folly of supposing that the addresses represented the real feeling of the country. In a strain of great irony, he says; "The practice of addressing has cheated many already; a jest that was put upon Richard Cromwell, and yet they deprived him three weeks afterwards. It was a second time put upon king James II. and they all flew in his face a year after. And I could give some instances of the little value that has been put upon it since, even such as one would think the very people themselves expect,--that for time to come addressing should pass for nothing with their princes."--ED.
[60] Review, vol. vii. No. 95.
[61] The following letter to Mr. J. Dyer, in Shoe-lane, who was then employed by the leaders of the tories, in circulating news and insinuations through the country, will show the literary manners of those times, and convey some anecdotes, which are nowhere else preserved. The original letter is in the Museum, Harl. MSS. No. 7001. fol. 269.
Mr. Dyer,
I have your letter. I am rather glad to find you put it upon the trial who was aggressor, than justify a thing which I am sure you cannot approve; and in this I assure you I am far from injuring you, and refer you to the time when long since you had wrote I was fled from justice: one Sammon being taken up for printing a libel, and I being then on a journey, nor the least charge against me for being concerned in it by anybody but your letter:--also many unkind personal reflections on me in your letter, when I was in Scotland, on the affair of the Union, and I assure you, when my paper had not in the least mentioned you, and those I refer to time and date for the proof of.
I mention this only in defence of my last letter, in which I said no more of it than to let you see I did not merit such treatment, and could nevertheless be content to render any service to you, though I thought myself hardly used.
But to state the matter fairly between you and I [me], a writing for different interests, and so possibly coming under an unavoidable necessity of jarring in several cases: I am ready to make a fair truce of honour with you, viz., that if what either party are doing, or saying, that may clash with the party we are for, and urge us to speak, it shall be done without naming either's name, and without personal reflections; and thus we may differ still, and yet preserve both the Christian and the gentleman.
This I think is an offer may satisfy you. I have not been desirous of giving just offence to you, neither would I to any man, however I may differ from him; and I see no reason why I should affront a man's person, because I do not join with him in principle. I please myself with being the first proposer of so fair a treaty with you, because I believe, as you cannot deny its being very honourable, so it is not less so in coming first from me, who I believe could convince you of my having been the first and most ill-treated--for further proof of which I refer you to your letters, at the time I was threatened by the envoy of the king of Sweden.
However, Mr. Dyer, this is a method which may end what is past, and prevent what is future; and if refused, the future part I am sure cannot lie at my door.
As to your letter, your proposal is so agreeable to me, that truly without it I could not have taken the thing at all; for it would have been a trouble intolerable, both to you as well as me, to take your letter every post, first from you, and then send it to the post-house.
Your method of sending to the black box, is just what I designed to propose, and Mr. Shaw will doubtless take it of you: if you think it needful for me to speak to him it shall be done--what I want to know is only the charge, and that you will order it constantly to be sent, upon hinting whereof I shall send you the names. Wishing you success in all things (your opinions of government excepted.)
I am, Your humble servant, DE FOE. Newington, June 17th, 1710.
[62] Arnott's Edinburgh. The second newspaper ever published in Scotland. During this period he published the seventh volume of the Review, which is chiefly occupied by home affairs.
[63] De Foe had, many years before Harley proposed it in parliament, suggested an establishment of a South-sea trade, not only for commercial advantage, but as an effectual mode of crippling Spain and France. "I had the honour to lay a proposal before his late majesty king William, in the beginning of this war, for carrying the war, not into Old Spain, but into America: which proposal his majesty approved of, and fully proposed to put it in execution, had not death, to our unspeakable grief, prevented him. And yet I would have my readers distinguish with me, that there is always a manifest difference between carrying on a war with America and settling a trade there; and I shall not fail to speak distinctly to this difference in its turn." He then points out the circumstances of the trade, and distinctly warns his countrymen against those rash and extravagant speculations which they unfortunately persisted to indulge in, and which caused the ruin of so many persons. "I am far from designing to discourage this new undertaking, which I profess to believe a very happy one; but to correct these wild notions, it seems needful to ascertain what we are to understand by a trade to the South Seas, and what not; that in the first place our enemies may not make a wrong improvement of it, our friends in Spain may not take umbrage at it, and our people at home may not grow big with wild expectations, which might end in chagrin and disappointment. There is room enough on the western coast of America for us to establish a flourishing trade without encroaching upon the Spaniards. The industry and enterprise of the English in such a situation would open a wide door for the consumption of our manufactures, and bring a vast revenue of wealth to our own country." [Review, vol. viii. p. 165. 274.] They are the same views substantially as those he afterwards maintained in the pamphlet mentioned by Mr. Chalmers in the text.--ED.
[64] He also vindicated the memory of William III., who had been fiercely attacked for the Partition Treaty, by a pamphlet rather long and quaint--The Felonious Treaty: or, an Inquiry into the Reasons which moved his late Majesty King William, of Glorious Memory, to enter into a Treaty at ten several times, with the King of France, for the Partition of the Spanish Monarchy. With an Essay, proving that it was always the sense both of King William and of all the Confederates, and even of the Grand Alliance itself, that the Spanish Monarchy should never be united in the Person of the Emperor. 1711. In the year 1712, he vigorously attacked the persecuting bill introduced by lord Nottingham, by which dissenters were to be excluded from civil employments, and persons in office were forbidden to attend dissenting places of worship, under severe penalties. De Foe not only kept up a galling fire in his Reviews, but published a pamphlet on the subject, entituled, An Essay on the History of Parties and Persecution in Britain: beginning with a brief Account of the Test Act, and an Historical Inquiry into the Reasons, the Original, and the Consequences of the Occasional Conformity of the Dissenters: with some Remarks on the recent attempts already made and now making for an Occasional Bill: inquiring how far the same may be esteemed a Preservative of the Church, or an Injury to the Dissenters. He seems to have renewed the attack not only against that measure, but also against a similar bill introduced to authorise the use of the liturgy in Scotland, in a pamphlet which Mr. Wilson says bears undoubted evidence of being De Foe's, although never inserted in any list of his writings, entituled, The Present State of Parties in Great Britain: particularly an Inquiry into the State of the Dissenters in England, and the Presbyterians in Scotland: their religious and politic Interest considered, as it respects their Circumstances before and since the late Acts against Occasional Conformity in England, and for Toleration of Common Prayer in Scotland. In this work he goes into a lengthened history of the dissenters, and strongly recommends union amongst all bodies of them. He also in this year vigorously opposed the tax upon newspapers, which was enforced in 1712. The eighth volume of the Review closed in July, 1712. Trade and war are the main subjects discussed in it.--ED.
[65] The first Mercator was published on the 26th of May, 1713; the last on the 20th of July, 1714: and they were written by William Brown and his assistants, with great knowledge, great strength, and great sweetness, considering how much party then embittered every composition. The British Merchant, which opposed the Mercator, and which was compiled by Henry Martyn and his associates, has fewer facts, less argument, and more factiousness. It began on the 1st of August, 1713, and ended the 27th of July, 1714. I have spoken of both from my own convictions, without regarding the declamations which have continued to pervert the public opinion from that epoch to the present times. De Foe was struck at in the third number of the British Merchant, and plainly mentioned in the fourth. Mr. Daniel Foe may change his name from Review to Mercator, from Mercator to any other title, yet still his singular genius shall be distinguished by his inimitable way of writing. Thus personal sarcasm was introduced to supply deficience of facts, or weakness of reasoning. When Charles King republished The British Merchant in volumes, among various changes, he expunged, with other personalities, the name of De Foe.
[66] It is now sufficiently known, that Lord Oxford had relinquished the Treaty of Commerce to its fate, before it was finally debated in parliament. See much curious matter on this subject in Macpherson's State Papers, vol. ii. p. 421-23. It is there said, that he gave up the commercial treaty, in compliment to sir Thomas Hanmer, as he would by no means be an occasion of a breach among friends. The treasurer had other reasons: the treaty had been made by Bolingbroke, whom he did not love; the lords Anglesea and Abingdon had made extravagant demands for their support; and, like a wise man, he thought it idle to drive a nail that would not go. Yet lord Halifax boasted to the Hanoverian minister, that he alone had been the occasion of the treaty being rejected. [Same papers, p. 509-47.]
[67] He attacked it first in 1713, in An Essay on the Treaty of Commerce with France, with necessary Expositions.
[68] It closed May, 1713, with the ninth volume.
[69] State of Wit, 1711, which is reprinted in the Supplement to Swift's Works.
[70] It _was_ ordered to be destroyed.
[71] The late History of Halifax relates, that Daniel De Foe, being forced to abscond, on account of his political writings, resided at Halifax, in the Back-lane, at the sign of the Rose and Crown, being known to Dr. Nettleton, the physician, and the Rev. Mr. Priestley, minister of a dissenting congregation there. Mr. Watson is mistaken when he supposes that De Foe wrote his Jure Divino here, which had been published previously in 1706; and he is equally mistaken, when he says, that De Foe had made an improper use of the papers of Selkirk, whose story had been often published.
[72] The pamphlets mentioned in the text were filled with palpable banter. He recommends the Pretender by saying, That the prince would confer on every one the privilege of wearing wooden shoes, and at the same time ease the nobility and gentry of the hazard and expense of winter journeys to parliament.
[73] The pardon is dated on the 13th of November, 1713, and is signed by Bolingbroke. See it set out verbatim. Appeal to Honour and Justice.
[74] See Boyer's Political State, Oldmixon's History, &c.
[75] It is universally said by the sellers and buyers of old books, that John, duke of Argyle, was the real author of The Secret History of the White Staff. His grace, indeed, is not in the Catalogue of Royal and Noble Authors. Whether the duke wrote this petty pamphlet may be doubted; but there can be no doubt that De Foe was not the author: for he solemnly asserts by his Appeal, in 1715, That he had written nothing since the queen's death. The internal evidence is stronger than this positive assertion.
[76] In the year 1714, De Foe pleaded the cause of religious liberty in his most effective manner. He was roused to action by the bill then passing parliament, "to prevent the growth of schism," which was of course only another name for intolerance. By this bill, all schoolmasters were required to be licensed by the bishop, and have a certificate of conformity from the minister of his parish! De Foe of course could not be silent on such an occasion, and he published The Remedy worse than the Disease: or Reasons against passing the Bill for preventing the Growth of Schism; to which is added, a Brief Discourse of Toleration and Persecution, showing their unavoidable effects, good or bad, and proving that neither Diversity of Religion, nor Diversity in the same Religion, are dangerous, much less inconsistent with good Government. In a Letter to a noble Earl. _Hæc sunt enim fundamenta firmissima nostræ libertatis, sui quemque juris et retinendi et dimittendi esse dominum._ Cic. in Orat. pro Balbo. 1714.
[77] The most solemn asseverations, and the most unanswerable arguments of our author, were not, after all, believed. When Charles King republished The British Merchant, in 1721, he without a scruple attributed The Mercator to a hireling writer of a weekly paper called the Review. And Anderson, at a still later period, goes further in his Chronology of Commerce, and names De Foe, as the hireling writer of the Mercator, and other papers in favour of the French treaty of trade. We can now judge with the impartiality of arbitrators: on the one hand, there are the living challenge, and the death-bed declaration of De Foe; on the other, the mere surmise and unauthorised assertion of King, Anderson, and others, who detract from their own veracity by their own factiousness, or foolery. It is surely time to free ourselves from prejudices of every kind, and to disregard the sound of names as much as the falsehoods of party.
[78] It was entered at Stationers'-hall, for J. Roberts, the 18th of February, 1715-16.
[79] 2nd Mem. p. 27, &c.
[80] The family of George I. had been instructed by the copy of this book, which is in the Museum. It would seem from the title-page and Mr. Wright's letter being printed on a different paper from the work itself, that both were added after the first publication. The Family Instructor and Mr. Wright's letter were entered at Stationers'-hall, for Emanuel Mathews, on the 31st of March, 1715.
[81] When Mr. Chalmers wrote, it had been reprinted at least seventeen times. It is a work which has had great circulation.
[82] Mr. Wilson considers that De Foe, in the year 1717, published the Memoirs of the Church of Scotland, in Four Periods: with an Appendix of some Transactions since the Union. [Life of De Foe, vol. iii. p. 418.] And also the Life of Dr. Daniel Williams, the eminent presbyterian divine, founder of the well-known dissenters' library, in Redcross-street. [Ib. p. 423.]
[83] The title was, The Life and strange surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner, who lived eight-and-twenty Years all alone in an uninhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the mouth of the great River Oroonoque, having been cast on shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the men perished but himself. With an Account how he was at last strangely delivered by Pirates. Written by Himself.
[84] "No fiction in any language," said Dr. Blair in his elegant Lectures on Rhetoric, "was ever better supported than the Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. While it is carried on with that appearance of truth and simplicity, which takes a strong hold of the imagination of all readers, it suggests at the same time very useful instruction, by showing how much the native power of man may be exerted for surmounting the difficulties of any external situation." "Robinson Crusoe," said Marmontel, "is the first book I ever read with exquisite pleasure; and I believe every boy in Europe might say the same thing." In his Emile, Rousseau says, "Since we must have books, this is one, which, in my opinion, is a most excellent treatise on natural education. This is the first my Emilias shall read; his whole library shall long consist of this work only, which shall preserve an eminent rank to the very last. It shall be the text to which all our conversations on natural science are to serve only as a comment. It shall be a guide during our progress to maturity of judgment; and so long as our taste is not adulterated, the perusal of this book will afford us pleasure. And what surprising book is this? Is it Aristotle? Is it Pliny? Is it Buffon? No, it is Robinson Crusoe." In this judgment Dr. Beattie concurred.--ED.