1802 Milton's Prose 263 brief note, to which you will attend; Baxter's "Holy Commonwealth," for which you stand indebted to me 3s. 6d. ; an odd volume of Montaigne, being of no use to me, I having the whole; certain books belonging to Wordsworth, as do also the strange thick-hoofed shoes, which are very much admired at in London. All these sundries I commend to your most strenuous looking after. If you find the Miltons in certain parts dirtied and soiled with a crumb of right Gloucester blacked in the candle (my usual supper), or peradventure a stray ash of tobacco wafted into the crevices, look to that passage more especially depend upon it, it contains good matter. I have got your little Milton which, as it contains Salmasius-and I make a rule of never hearing but one side of the question (why should I distract myself?)—I shall return to you when I pick up the Latina opera. The first Defence is the greatest work among them, because it is uniformly great, and such as is befitting the very mouth of a great nation speaking for itself. But the second Defence, which is but a succession of splendid episodes slightly tied together, has one passage which if you have not read, I conjure you to lose no time, but read it; it is his consolations in his blindness, which had been made a reproach to him. It begins whimsically, with poetical flourishes about Tiresias and other blind worthies (which still are mainly interesting as displaying his singular mind, and in what degree poetry entered into his daily soul, not by fits and impulses, but engrained and innate); but the concluding page, i.e. of this passage (not of the Defensio) which you will easily find, divested of all brags and flourishes, gives so rational, so true an enumeration of his comforts, so human, that it cannot be read without the deepest interest. Take one touch of the religious part :-"Et sane haud ultima Dei cura cæci-(we blind folks, I understand it not nos for ego;)—sumus; qui nos, quominus quicquam aliud præter ipsum cernere valemus, eo clementius atque benignius respicere dignatur. Væ qui illudit nos, væ qui lædit, execratione publica devovendo; nos ab injuriis hominum non modo incolumes, sed pene sacros divina lex reddidit, divinus favor: nec tam oculorum hebetudine quam cœlestium alarum umbrâ has nobis fecisse tenebras videtur, factas illustrare rursus interiore ac longe præstabiliore lumine haud raro solet. Huc refero, quod et amici officiosius nunc etiam quam solebant, colunt, observant, adsunt; quod et nonnulli sunt, quibuscum Pyladeas atque Theseas alternare voces verorum amicorum liceat. "Vade gubernaculum mei pedis. Da manum ministro amico. Da collo manum tuam, ductor autem viæ ero tibi ego." All this, and much more, is highly pleasing to know. But you may easily find it ;-and I don't know why I put down so many words about it, but for the pleasure of writing to you and the want of another topic. Yours ever, C. LAMB. To-morrow I expect with anxiety S. T. C.'s letter to Mr. Fox. [Lamb refers to Milton's Defensio Secunda pro Populo Anglicano contra Alexandrum Morum Ecclesiasten. The following is a translation of the Latin passage by Robert Fellowes : And indeed, in my blindness, I enjoy in no inconsiderable degree the favour of the Deity; who regards me with more tenderness and compassion in proportion as I am able to behold nothing but himself. Alas! for him who insults me, who maligns and merits public execration! For the divine law not only shields me from injury, but almost renders me too sacred to attack; not indeed so much from the privation of my sight, as from the overshadowing of those heavenly wings, which seem to have occasioned this obscurity; and which, when occasioned, he is wont to illuminate with an interior light, more precious and more pure. To this I ascribe the more tender assiduities of my friends, their soothing attentions, their kind visits, their reverential observances; among whom there are some with whom I may interchange the Pyladean and Thesean dialogue of inseparable friends. Orest. Proceed, and be rudder of my feet, by showing me the most endearing love. [Eurip. in Orest. And in another place "Lend your hand to your devoted friend, Coleridge's first letter to Charles James Fox was printed in the Morning Post for November 4, 1802, his second on November 9.] 1802 Joseph Cottle, Poet LETTER 103 CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS MANNING 265 [November, 1802.] My dear Manning, I must positively write, or I shall miss you at Toulouse. I sit here like a decayed minute hand (I lie; that does not sit), and being myself the exponent of no time, take no heed how the clocks about me are going. You possibly by this time may have explored all Italy, and toppled, unawares, into Etna, while you went too near those rotten-jawed, gap-toothed, old worn-out chaps of hell,—while I am meditating a quiescent letter to the honest postmaster at Toulouse. But in case you should not have been felo de se, this is to tell you, that your letter was quite to my palate—in particular your just remarks upon Industry, damned Industry (though indeed you left me to explore the reason), were highly relishing. I've often wished I lived in the Golden Age, when shepherds lay stretched upon flowers, and roused themselves at their leisure, the genius there is in a man's natural idle face, that has not learned his multiplication table! before doubt, and propositions, and corollaries, got into the world! Now, as Joseph Cottle, a Bard of Nature, sings, going up Malvern Hills, "How steep! how painful the ascent ! It needs the evidence of close deduction You must know that Joe is lame, so that he had some reason for so singing. These two lines, I assure you, are taken totidem literis from a very popular poem. Joe is also an Epic Poet as well as a Descriptive, and has written a tragedy, though both his drama and epopoiea are strictly descriptive, and chiefly of the Beauties of Nature, for Joe thinks man with all his passions and frailties not a proper subject of the Drama. Joe's tragedy hath the following surpassing speech in it. Some king is told that his enemy has engaged twelve archers to come over in a boat from an enemy's country and way-lay him; he thereupon pathetically exclaims 'Twelve, dost thou say? Where be those dozen villains!" Cottle read two or three acts out to us, very gravely on both sides, till he came to this heroic touch,-and then he asked what we laughed at? I had no more muscles that day. A poet that chooses to read out his own verses has but a limited power over you. There is a bound where his authority ceases. Apropos if you should go to Florence or to Rome, inquire what works are extant in gold, silver, bronze, or marble, of Benvenuto Cellini, a Florentine artist, whose Life doubtless, you have read; or, if not, without controversy you must read: so hark ye, send for it immediately from Lane's circulating library. It is always put among the romances, very properly; but you have read it, I suppose. In particular, inquire at Florence for his colossal bronze statue (in the grand square or somewhere) of Perseus. You may read the story in Tooke's "Pantheon." Nothing material has transpired in these parts. Coleridge has indited a violent philippic against Mr. Fox in the 66 Morning Post," which is a compound of expressions of humility, gentlemen-ushering-in most arrogant charges. will do Mr. Fox no real injury among those that know him. It [Manning's letter of September 10 had told Lamb he was on his way to Toulouse. Cottle's epic was Alfred. The quoted lines were added in the twelfth edition. He had also written John the Baptist. "Cellini's Life." Lamb would probably have read the translation by Nugent, 1771. Cellini's Perseus in bronze is in the Loggia de' Lanzi at Florence.] MY LETTER 104 CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS MANNING [Dated at end: Feb. 19th, 1803.] Y dear Manning,-The general scope of your letter afforded no indications of insanity, but some particular points raised a scruple. For God's sake don't think any more of "Independent Tartary." What have you to do among such Ethiopians? Is there no lineal descendant of Prester John? Is the chair empty? Is the sword unswayed?-depend upon't they'll never make you their king, as long as any branch of that great stock is remaining. I tremble for your Christianity. They'll certainly circumcise you. Read Sir John Maundevil's travels to cure you, or come over to England. 1803 The Case against Tartary 267 There is a Tartar-man now exhibiting at Exeter Change. Come and talk with him, and hear what he says first. Indeed, he is no very favorable specimen of his Countrymen! But perhaps the best thing you can do, is to try to get the idea out of your head. For this purpose repeat to yourself every night, after you have said your prayers, the words Independent Tartary, Independent Tartary, two or three times, and associate with them the idea of oblivion ('tis Hartley's method with obstinate memories), or say, Independent, Independent, have I not already got an Independence? That was a clever way of the old puritans—pun-divinity. My dear friend, think what a sad pity it would be to bury such parts in heathen countries, among nasty, unconversable, horse-belching, Tartar people! Some say, they are Cannibals; and then conceive a Tartarfellow eating my friend, and adding the cool malignity of mustard and vinegar! I am afraid 'tis the reading of Chaucer has misled you; his foolish stories about Cambuscan and the ring, and the horse of brass. Believe me, there's no such things, 'tis all the poet's invention; but if there were such darling things as old Chaucer sings, I would up behind you on the Horse of Brass, and frisk off for Prester John's Country. But these are all tales; a Horse of Brass never flew, and a King's daughter never talked with Birds! The Tartars, really, are a cold, insipid, smouchey set. You'll be sadly moped (if you are not eaten) among them. Pray try and cure yourself. Take Hellebore (the counsel is Horace's, 'twas none of my thought originally). Shave yourself oftener. Eat no saffron, for saffron-eaters contract a terrible Tartarlike yellow. Pray, to avoid the fiend. Eat nothing that gives the heart-burn. Shave the upper lip. Go about like an European. Read no books of voyages (they're nothing but lies): only now and then a Romance, to keep the fancy under. Above all, don't go to any sights of wild beasts. That has been your ruin. Accustom yourself to write familiar letters on common subjects to your friends in England, such as are of å moderate understanding. And think about common things more. There's your friend Holcroft now, has written a play. You used to be fond of the drama. Nobody went to see it. Notwithstanding this, with an audacity perfectly original, he faces the town down in a preface, that they did like it very much. I have heard a waspish punster say, "Sir, why did you not laugh at my jest?" But for a man boldly to face me |