Part 10 — THACKERAY’S LECTURES—SWIFT. (continued 2)

It is a vile thing, this vice of modern times—this love of pulling down the names of great men of a past age—of blotting and slurring over every decent epitaph written in men’s hearts about them. That men of note themselves should fall into it, is but a sad proof that rivalry and partisanship in politics make the judgment unjust. We remember the reproof Canning gave to Sir Samuel Romilly, no common man, who indeed acknowledged Mr Pitt’s talents, but denied that he was a great man. “Heroic times are these we live in,” said Canning, “with men at our elbow of such gigantic qualities as to render those of Pitt ordinary in the comparison. Ah! who is there living, in this house or out of it, who, taking measure of his own mind or that of his coevals, can be justified in pronouncing that William Pitt was not a great man?” Of all our modern revilers of Swift, the pullers to pieces of his fame and character, is there any that might not shrink from putting his own measure of either to the comparison? Political hatred lasts too long—it reverses the law of canonisation: if there is to be worship, it must be immediate. A century destroys it; but enmity survives.

We commenced with the intention of reviewing Mr Thackeray’s Lectures, but have stopped short at his life of Swift, and yet feel that we have but touched upon the subject-matter relating to that great man; and hope to refer to it, with some notice and extracts from his works, at a future time.

And what is Swift? What is any dead man that we should defend his name, which is nothing but a name—and not that to him? What is Swift to us, more than “Hecuba” to the poor player, or “he to Hecuba,” that we should rise with indignation to plead his cause? Praise or blame to the man dead a century and more, is nothing for him, no, nor to any one of his race (for affections of that kind are lost in a wide distribution). Shakespeare makes even honour of a shorter date. “What is honour to him who died o’ Wednesday?” Very soon individual man melts away from his individuality, and merges into the general character; he becomes quite an undistinguishable part of the whole generation; his appearance unknown. Could the great and the small visit us from the dead—they who “rode on white asses,” and they who were gibbeted—they whom the “king delighted to honour,” and they whom the hangman handled—there is no “usher of black rod” that could call them out by their names. Their individualities are gone—their names must go in search of them in vain—they will fasten nowhere with certainty—none know which is which. Let Cæsar come with his murderers, and who shall tell which is Cæsar? After a generation, there is no one on earth to grieve for the guilty or unfortunate, unless in a fiction or tale. We laugh at the weeping lady who puts her tears to the account of the “anniversary of the death of poor dear Queen Elizabeth.” Feelings and affections of past ages are all gone, and become but a cold history, that the poet or the romance-writer may warm again in their sport. They no longer belong to those who had them. While memory and affection lasts there is a kind of vitality, but it soon goes. “Non omnis moriar” is a motto to be translated elsewhere. The atmosphere of fame, for this earth, rises, like that we breathe, but a little way above it, and is ever shifting.

But if the individual thus melts away, not so the general character; that will remain—and in that the living are concerned. We deem it a part of a true philanthropy if we can pull out one name from the pit of defamation into which it has been unhandsomely thrust, and can place it upon the record of our general nature, that our common humanity may be raised, and, as much as may be, glorified thereby. Such has been our motive (for with this motive alone is Swift anything to us), and we hope we have succeeded in rescuing one of nature’s great men from unmerited obloquy.

We have spoken freely of Mr Thackeray’s Lectures, with reference to his character of Swift.

We believe that he has unfortunately followed a lead; and, in so doing, has been encouraged to a bias by his natural gift—satire. We say not this to his dispraise. Like other natural gifts, the satiric puts out ever its polyp feelers, and appropriates whatever comes within its reach, and promises nutriment. It is not indeed likely, in this our world, to be starved for lack of sustenance; nor would society be the better if it were. But we do doubt if it be quite the talent required in a biographer. We would not have Mr Thackeray abate one atom of the severity of his wit; and we believe him to have an abhorrence of everything vicious, mean, and degrading, and that his purpose in all his writings is to make vice odious. He habitually hunts that prey: having seen the hollowness of professions, he drives his merciless pen through it, and sticks the culprit upon its point, and draws him out upon the clean sheet, and blackens him, and laughs at the figure he has made of him. A writer of such a stamp ought to be considered, what he really is, a moralist—therefore a benefactor in our social system.

But with this power, let him touch the living vices till they shrink away cowed. The portraiture of the vices of men who lived a century or more ago, real or imaginary, may only serve to feed the too flagrant vice of the living—self-congratulating vanity. If then he must write, or lecture, on biography, we would earnestly recommend him to do it with a fear of himself. His other works have contributed many hours of delight to the days of most of us; and in the little volume before us, setting aside his lecture on Swift, there is much to amuse and to instruct. The sharp contrasting choice of his positions, and easy natural manner, not forcing but enticing the reader to reflection, must ever make Mr Thackeray a popular writer. Were he less sure of the public ear, and the public voice in his favour, we should not have endeavoured to rescue the character of Swift from his grasp; and we believe him to be of that generous nature to rejoice, if we have, as we hope, been successful in the attempt. We cannot speak too highly of Mr Thackeray as one most accomplished in his art: his style, eminently English, is unmistakably plain and energetic. It is original—so curt, yet so strong; there is never amplification without a purpose, nor without the charm of a new image. Thoughts are clad in the words that best suit them. With him, pauses speak; and often a full stop, unexpected in a passage, is eloquent. You think that he has not said all, because he has said so little: yet that little is all; and there is left suggestion for feelings which words would destroy. He is never redundant. So perfect is this his art that his very restraint seems an abandon. He knows when and how to gain the credit of forbearance, where in fact there is none. In his mastery over this his peculiar manner, he brings it to bear upon the pathetic or the ridiculous with equal effect; and, like a consummate satirist, makes even the tragic more tragic, more ghastly, by a slight connection with the light, the ridiculous, a certain air of indifference. We instance the passage of the death of Rawdon, in his Vanity Fair. Few are the words, but there is a history in them. The apparent carelessness in dismissing his hero reminds one of that in Richard the Third.

His strongest ridicule is made doubly ridiculous by the gravity he tacks to it. It sticks like a burr upon the habit of his unfortunate victim. He puts the rags of low motives upon seeming respectability, and makes presumption look beggarly—effecting that which the Latin satirist says real poverty does—ridiculos homines facit. Most severe in his indifference, his light playfulness is fearfully Dantesque; it is ever onward, as if sure of its catastrophe. We do not know any author who can say so much in few common words. These are characteristics of genius. It has often been said, and perhaps with truth, that the reader shuts the book uncomfortable, not very much in love with human nature: we are by no means sure that this is absolutely wrong; such is the feeling on looking at Hogarth’s pictures. It was the author’s intention, in both cases, to be a moral satirist, not a romance-writer. It has been objected that he allows the vicious too much success; but he may plead that so it is in life: even the Psalmist expressed his surprise at the prosperity of the wicked. There is truth to the life in this treatment; a certain seeming success tells not the whole. It is a more serious charge that he has made virtue and goodness insipid. We wish he could persuade himself that there is romance in real life, and that it is full of energies; its true portraiture would give a grace to his works. Cervantes and Le Sage were not all satire; their beautiful touches of romance hurt not the general character of their works; the fantastic frame-lines mar not the pathos of the picture. With this recommendation we close our article, with trust in the good sense and good feeling of Mr Thackeray, rejoiced to think that his powerful genius is in action: whatever vein he may be in, he will be sure to instruct and amuse, and accumulate fame to himself. If the virtues do not look their very best, when he ushers them into company, at least vice will never have to boast of gentle treatment—he will make it look as it deserves; and if he does not always thrust it out of doors in rags and penury, he will set upon it, and leave its further punishment for conjecture.

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