Æt.

"sustain. Also a description of "unexpected incidents to sur"the Galleys, and the service in "prise, no such high-finished pic"which they are employed. The "tures as captivate the imagina"whole interspersed with anec- "tion and have made fic- 1758. "dotes relative to the general "tion fashionable. Our "history of the times for a period "reader must be content 30. "of thirteen years, during which "with the simple exhibition of "the author continued in slavery "truth, and consequently of na"till he was at last set free at the "ture; he must be satisfied to "intercession of the Court of "see vice triumphant and virtue "Great Britain. Translated from "in distress; to see men punished "the Original, just published at "or rewarded, not as his wishes "the Hague, by James Willing- "but as Providence has thought "ton." James Willington was in "proper to direct; for all here reality Oliver Goldsmith.* The "wears the face of sincerity." property of the book belonged Then, with a spirit that shows to Griffiths, who valued one name how strongly he at this time enquite as much as the other; and tered into the popular feeling of the position of the translator ap- the day, he contrasts popery and pears in the subsequent assign- absolute power with the rational ment of the manuscript by the religion and moderate constituPaternoster-row bookseller to tionalism of England; glances at bookseller Dilly of the Poultry, the scenes of dungeon, rack, and at no small profit to Griffiths, scaffold through which the narfor the sum of twenty guineas. **rative will pass; and calls them But though the translator's name but a part of the accumulated might pass for Willington, the wretchedness of a miscalled writer could only write as Gold- glorious time, "while Louis, sursmith; though with bitterness he "named the Great, was feasting calls himself "the obscure pre-"at Versailles, fed with the in"facer," the preface is clear, "cense of flattery or sunk in the graceful, and characteristic as in "lewd embraces of a prostibrighter days. The book can- "tute. Could the present pernot be recommended, he says, "formance," he continues, “teach as a grateful entertainment to 66 'an individual to value, his rethe readers of reigning romance, "ligion, by contrasting it with for it is strictly true. "No "the furious spirit of Popery; "events are here to astonish, no "could it contribute to make him "enamoured of liberty, by show"ing their unhappy situation "whose possessions are held by so precarious a tenure as tyran"nical caprice; could it promote "his zeal in the cause of hu

* Willington, it would seem, from an entry in the register of Trinity College Prior, 1. 253-4), was the name of one of Goldsmith's fellow-students in Dublin. **Life by Isaac Reed (Ed. of Poems by Goldsmith and Parnell, 1795), p. xv. Aikin's Life, p, XVI.

66

"manity, by giving him a wish and in the sudden sense of a "to imitate the virtues of the misery more intolerable might "sufferer or redress the injuries have cried with Edgar,

"of oppression; then, in- o gods! who is't can say “I am at the. 1758. 'deed, the author will not Et. 30. "have wrote in vain."

worst"?

I am worse than e'er I was.

But why stood "James Wil- He returned to Doctor Milner's; "lington" on the title-page of -if ever, from thence, again to this book instead of "Oliver return to literature, to embrace "Goldsmith," since the names it for choice and with a braver were both unknown? The ques- heart endure its worst necestion will not admit of a doubtful sities.

answer, though a braver I could There came that time; and wish to have given. At this when, eighteen months after the point there is very manifest evi- present date, he was writing the dence of despair. Bee, he thus turned into pleasant

Not without well-earned know-fiction the incidents now deledge had Goldsmith passed scribed. "I was once induced to through the task-work of the "show my indignation against Monthly Review. Faculties which "the public, by discontinuing my lay unused within him were by "endeavours to please; and was this time not unknown; and a "bravely resolved, like Raleigh, stronger man, with a higher con- "to vex them by burning my stancy and fortitude, might with "manuscripts in a passion. Upon such knowledge have pushed re- "recollection, however, I consolutely on, and, conquering the "sidered what set or body of fate of those who look back "people would be displeased at when their objects are forward, "my rashness. The sun, after found earlier sight of the sing- "so sad an accident, might shine ing tree and the golden water. "next morning as bright as usual; But to him it seemed hopeless "men might laugh and sing the to climb any further up the de- "next day, and transact business sperate steep; over the dark ob- "as before, and not a single structions which the world is "creature feel any regret but myeager to interpose between it- "self. I reflected upon the story self and the least selfish of the "of a minister, who in the reign labourers in its service, he had "of Charles II. upon a certain not as yet risen high enough to "occasion resigned all his posts, see the glimmerings of light be-"and retired into the country in yond;—even lower therefore than “a fit of resentment. But, as he the school-room at Doctor Mil-"had not given the world enner's from which he had been "tirely up with his ambition, he taken to his literary toil, he "sent a messenger to town to thought himself now descended;"see how the courtiers would

1758.

Æt. 30.

"bear his resignation. Upon the of care. Milner saw what he en"messenger's return he was dured; was moved by it; and "asked, whether there appeared told him that as soon as health "any commotion at court? To enabled himself to resume "which he replied, there were the duties of the school, he "very great ones. 'Ay,' says would exert an influence to "the minister, "I knew my friends place his usher in some medical ""would make a bustle; all peti- appointment at a foreign station. "tioning the king for my resto- He knew an East India director, ""ration I presume?' 'No, sir,' a Mr. Jones, through whom it "replied the messenger, 'they might be done.* Before all "are only petitioning his ma- things it was what Goldsmith ""jesty to be put in your place.' fervently desired.

"In the same manner, should I And now, with something like "retire in indignation, instead of the prospect of a settled future "having Apollo in mourning, to bear him up against the un"or the Muses in a fit of the congenial and uncertain present, "spleen; instead of having the what leisure he had for other "learned world apostrophising at than school-labour he gave to a "my untimely decease; perhaps literary project of his own de"all Grub-street might laugh at signing. This was natural: for “my fall, and self-approving we cling with a strange new fond"dignity might never be able to ness to what we must soon "shield me from ridicule."* abandon, and it is the strong reWorse than ridicule had he solve to separate that most often spared himself, with timely aid has made separation impossible. of these better thoughts; but Nor, apart from this, is there they came too late. He made ground for the feeling of surhis melancholy journey to Peck-prise, or the charge of vacillating ham, and knocked at Doctor Mil-purpose. His daily bread provided here, literature presented The schoolmaster was not an itself again to his thoughts as in unkind or unfriendly man, and his foreign wanderings; and to would in any circumstances, there have left better record of himis little doubt, have given Gold- self than the garbled page of smith the shelter he sought. It Griffiths's Review, would be a happened now that he had special comfort in his exile. Some part need of him, sickness having dis-of his late experience, so dearly abled himself from the proper bought, should be freely told; school-attendance. So, again in- with it could be arranged and stalled poor usher, week passed combined such store of literary over week as of old, with suffer- fruit as he had gathered in his ing, contempt, and many forms travel; and no longer commanded *Percy Memoir, 45.

ner's door.

* The Bee, IV.

Oliver Goldsmith's Life and Times. I.

7

1758.

by a bookseller, or overawed by "cerned for him," public enemies! an old woman, he might frankly But, that serviceable use might deliver to the world some whole- be made of the early transmission some truths on the decay to Ireland of a set of English of letters and the rewards copies of the Enquiry by one who Æt. 30. of genius. In this spirit had zealous private friends there, he conceived the Enquiry into the was Goldsmith's not unreasonPresent State of Polite Learning in able feeling; and he would try Europe: and if he had reason bit-this, when the time came. Meanterly to feel, in his own case, while he began the work; and it that he had failed to break down was probably to some extent adthe barriers which encircled the vanced, when, with little savings profession of literature, here from the school and renewed asmight a helping hand bestretched surances of the foreign appointforth to the relief of others, still ment, he was released by Doctor struggling for a better fate in its Milner from duties which the difficult environments. necessity (during the Doctor's

With this design another ex-illness) of flogging the boys as pectation arose,-that the publi-well as teaching them appears to cation, properly managed, might have made quite intolerable to give him means for the outfit his the child-loving usher. The reappointment would render neces- verend Mr. Mitford knew a lady sary. And he bethought him of whose husband had been at this his Irish friends. The zeal so time under Goldsmith's cane; lately professed might now be but with no very serious conexerted with effect, and without sequence. plaguing overmuch either their Escape from the school might pockets or his own pride. In not have been so easy, if the those days, and indeed until the lessening chances of Doctor MilAct of Union was passed, the ner's recovery had not rendered English writer had no copyright advisable more permanent arin Ireland: it being a part of the rangements there. Some doubt independence of Irish booksellers has been expressed indeed to steal from English authors, whether the worthy schoolmasand of the Irish parliament to ter's illness had not already protect the theft; just as, not ended fatally, and if the kindness twenty years before this date, I have recorded should not rather that excellent native parliament be attributed to his son and suchad, on the attempt of a Catholic cessor in the school, Mr. George to recover estates which in the Milner. But other circumstances manner of the booksellers a Pro- clearly invalidate this, and show testant had seized, voted "all that it must have been the elder "barristers, solicitors, attorneys Milner's. In August 1758, how"and proctors who should be con- ever, Goldsmith again had bidden

1758.

him adieu; and once more had and on his return to London, secured a respectable town ad- though he probably eked out his dress for his letters, and, among poor savings by casual writings the Graingers and Kippises and here and there, it is cerother tavern acquaintance, had tain that on the foreign apobtained the old facilities for cor-pointment his hopes con- Æt. 30. respondence with his friends, at tinued steadily fixed, and that the Temple-exchange coffee- the work which was to aid him house Temple-bar.

CHAPTER III. Attempt to Escape from Literature. 1758.

in his escape from literature (the completion of the Enquiry into the State of Polite Learning, or, as he called it before publication, the Essay on the Present State of Taste and Literature) occupied GRAINGER, his friend Percy,* nearly all his thoughts. He was and others of the Griffiths con- again in London, and again worknection, were at this time busy ing with the pen; but he was no upon a new magazine: begun longer the bookseller's slave, nor with the present year, and dedi- was literary toil his impassable cated to the "great Mr. Pitt," and hopeless doom. Therefore, whose successful coercion of the in the confidence of swift liberaking made him just now more tion, and with hope of a new than ever the darling of the career brightening in his sanguine people. Griffiths was one of the heart, he addressed himself publishing partners in The Grand cheerily enough to the design in Magazine of Universal Intelligence hand, and began solicitation of and Monthly Chronicle of our own his Irish friends.

**

Times: and perhaps on this ac- Edward Mills he thought of count, as well as for the known first, as a person of some incontributions of some of his ac- fluence. He was his relative, had quaintance, traces of Gold- been his fellow-collegian, and smith's hand have been sought was a prosperous wealthy man. in the work; in my opinion with- "Dear Sir," he begins, in a letter out success. In truth the first dated from the Temple-exchange number was hardly out when he coffee-house, on the 7th of Auwent back to the Peckham school; gust, and published by Bishop * "My beloved friend," was Percy's Percy:* description of Grainger, nearly forty years after the present date. Nichols's Illustrations, vII. 71.

**In the Grand Magazine first appeared Grainger's exquisite ballad of Bryan and Pereene, and other contributions which Bishop Percy describes in a letter to Dr. Anderson. Nichols's Illustrations, VIL. 75.

"You have quitted, I find, that plan of life which you once intended to pursue; tranquillity. and given up ambition for domestic Were I to consult your

*Percy Memoir, 50-2. The date there given is 1759, an obvious misprint for 1758.