Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges by William Makepeace Thackeray
Lecture The Fifth. Hogarth, Smollett, And Fielding
I suppose as long as novels last and authors aim at interesting theirpublic, there must always be in the story a virtuous and gallant hero, awicked monster his opposite, and a pretty girl who finds a champion;bravery and virtue conquer beauty: and vice, after seeming to triumphthrough a certain number of pages, is sure to be discomfited in the lastvolume, when justice overtakes him and honest folks come by their own.There never was perhaps a greatly popular story but this simple plot wascarried through it: mere satiric wit is addressed to a class of readersand thinkers quite different to those simple souls who laugh and weep overthe novel. I fancy very few ladies indeed, for instance, could be broughtto like _Gulliver_ heartily, and (putting the coarseness and difference ofmanners out of the question) to relish the wonderful satire of _JonathanWild_. In that strange apologue, the author takes for a hero the greatestrascal, coward, traitor, tyrant, hypocrite, that his wit and experience,both large in this matter, could enable him to devise or depict; heaccompanies this villain through all the actions of his life, with agrinning deference and a wonderful mock respect: and doesn't leave him,till he is dangling at the gallows, when the satirist makes him a low bowand wishes the scoundrel good day.
It was not by satire of this sort, or by scorn and contempt, that Hogarthachieved his vast popularity and acquired his reputation.(143) His art isquite simple,(144) he speaks popular parables to interest simple heartsand to inspire them with pleasure or pity or warning and terror. Not oneof his tales but is as easy as _Goody Two Shoes_; it is the moral of Tommywas a naughty boy and the master flogged him, and Jacky was a good boy andhad plum cake, which pervades the whole works of the homely and famousEnglish moralist. And if the moral is written in rather too large lettersafter the fable, we must remember how simple the scholars and schoolmasterboth were, and like neither the less because they are so artless andhonest. "It was a maxim of Dr. Harrison's," Fielding says in _Amelia_,speaking of the benevolent divine and philosopher who represents the goodprinciple in that novel--"that no man can descend below himself, in doingany act which may contribute to protect an innocent person, _or to bring arogue to the gallows_." The moralists of that age had no compunction yousee; they had not begun to be sceptical about the theory of punishment,and thought that the hanging of a thief was a spectacle for edification.Masters sent their apprentices, fathers took their children, to see JackSheppard or Jonathan Wild hanged, and it was as undoubting subscribers tothis moral law, that Fielding wrote and Hogarth painted. Except in oneinstance, where in the mad-house scene in the _Rake's Progress_, the girlwhom he has ruined is represented as still tending and weeping over him inhis insanity, a glimpse of pity for his rogues never seems to enter honestHogarth's mind. There's not the slightest doubt in the breast of the jollyDraco.
The famous set of pictures called "Marriage a la Mode", and which areexhibited at Marlborough House [1853], in London, contains the mostimportant and highly wrought of the Hogarth comedies. The care and methodwith which the moral grounds of these pictures are laid is as remarkableas the wit and skill of the observing and dexterous artist. He has todescribe the negotiations for a marriage pending between the daughter of arich citizen Alderman and young Lord Viscount Squanderfield, thedissipated son of a gouty old earl. Pride and pomposity appear in everyaccessory surrounding the earl. He sits in gold lace and velvet--as howshould such an earl wear anything but velvet and gold lace? His coronet iseverywhere: on his footstool on which reposes one gouty toe turned out; onthe sconces and looking-glasses; on the dogs; on his lordship's verycrutches; on his great chair of state and the great baldaquin behind him;under which he sits pointing majestically to his pedigree, which showsthat his race is sprung from the loins of William the Conqueror, andconfronting the old alderman from the City, who has mounted his sword forthe occasion, and wears his alderman's chain, and has brought a bag fullof money, mortgage-deeds, and thousand-pound notes, for the arrangement ofthe transaction pending between them. Whilst the steward (a Methodist,therefore a hypocrite and cheat, for Hogarth scorned a Papist and aDissenter) is negotiating between the old couple, their children sittogether, united but apart. My lord is admiring his countenance in theglass, while his bride is twiddling her marriage ring on herpocket-handkerchief; and listening with rueful countenance to CounsellorSilvertongue, who has been drawing the settlements. The girl is pretty,but the painter, with a curious watchfulness, has taken care to give her alikeness to her father, as in the young viscount's face you see aresemblance to the earl, his noble sire. The sense of the coronet pervadesthe picture, as it is supposed to do the mind of its wearer. The picturesround the room are sly hints indicating the situation of the parties aboutto marry. A martyr is led to the fire; Andromeda is offered to sacrifice;Judith is going to slay Holofernes. There is the ancestor of the house (inthe picture it is the earl himself as a young man), with a comet over hishead, indicating that the career of the family is to be brilliant andbrief. In the second picture, the old lord must be dead, for madam has nowthe countess's coronet over her bed and toilet-glass, and sits listeningto that dangerous Counsellor Silvertongue, whose portrait now actuallyhangs up in her room, whilst the counsellor takes his ease on the sofa byher side, evidently the familiar of the house, and the confidant of themistress. My lord takes his pleasure elsewhere than at home, whither hereturns jaded and tipsy from the "Rose", to find his wife yawning in herdrawing-room, her whist-party over, and the daylight streaming in; or heamuses himself with the very worst company abroad, whilst his wife sits athome listening to foreign singers, or wastes her money at auctions, or,worse still, seeks amusement at masquerades. The dismal end is known. Mylord draws upon the counsellor, who kills him, and is apprehended whilstendeavouring to escape. My lady goes back perforce to the alderman in theCity, and faints upon reading Counsellor Silvertongue's dying speech atTyburn, where the counsellor has been executed for sending his lordshipout of the world. Moral:--Don't listen to evil silver-tongued counsellors:don't marry a man for his rank, or a woman for her money: don't frequentfoolish auctions and masquerade balls unknown to your husband: don't havewicked companions abroad and neglect your wife, otherwise you will be runthrough the body, and ruin will ensue, and disgrace, and Tyburn. Thepeople are all naughty, and Bogey carries them all off.
In the _Rake's Progress_, a loose life is ended by a similar sadcatastrophe. It is the spendthrift coming into possession of the wealth ofthe paternal miser; the prodigal surrounded by flatterers, and wasting hissubstance on the very worst company; the bailiffs, the gambling-house, andBedlam for an end. In the famous story of Industry and Idleness, the moralis pointed in a manner similarly clear. Fair-haired Frank Goodchild smilesat his work, whilst naughty Tom Idle snores over his loom. Frank reads theedifying ballads of Whittington and the London 'Prentice, whilst thatreprobate Tom Idle prefers Moll Flanders, and drinks hugely of beer. Frankgoes to church of a Sunday, and warbles hymns from the gallery; while Tomlies on a tombstone outside playing at halfpenny-under-the-hat, withstreet blackguards, and is deservedly caned by the beadle; Frank is madeoverseer of the business, whilst Tom is sent to sea. Frank is taken intopartnership and marries his master's daughter, sends out broken victualsto the poor, and listens in his nightcap and gown with the lovely Mrs.Goodchild by his side, to the nuptial music of the City bands and themarrow-bones and cleavers; whilst idle Tom, returned from sea, shudders ina garret lest the officers are coming to take him for picking pockets. TheWorshipful Francis Goodchild, Esq., becomes Sheriff of London, andpartakes of the most splendid dinners which money can purchase or aldermandevour; whilst poor Tom is taken up in a night-cellar, with that one-eyedand disreputable accomplice who first taught him to play chuck-farthing ona Sunday. What happens next? Tom is brought up before the justice of hiscountry, in the person of Mr. Alderman Goodchild, who weeps as herecognizes his old brother 'prentice, as Tom's one-eyed friend peaches onhim, and the clerk makes out the poor rogue's ticket for Newgate. Then theend comes. Tom goes to Tyburn
How the times have changed! The new Post Office now not disadvantageouslyoccupies that spot where the scaffolding is in the picture, where thetipsy trainband-man is lurching against the post, with his wig over oneeye, and the 'prentice-boy is trying to kiss the pretty girl in thegallery. Passed away 'prentice-boy and pretty girl! Passed away tipsytrainband-man with wig and bandolier! On the spot where Tom Idle (for whomI have an unaffected pity) made his exit from this wicked world, and whereyou see the hangman smoking his pipe as he reclines on the gibbet andviews the hills of Harrow or Hampstead beyond--a splendid marble arch, avast and modern city--clean, airy, painted drab, populous withnursery-maids and children, the abodes of wealth and comfort--the elegant,the prosperous, the polite Tyburnia rises, the most respectable districtin the habitable globe!
In that last plate of the London Apprentices, in which the apotheosis ofthe Right Honourable Francis Goodchild is drawn, a ragged fellow isrepresented in the corner of the simple kindly piece, offering for sale abroadside, purporting to contain an account of the appearance of the ghostof Tom Idle, executed at Tyburn. Could Tom's ghost have made itsappearance in 1847, and not in 1747, what changes would have been remarkedby that astonished escaped criminal! Over that road which the hangman usedto travel constantly, and the Oxford stage twice a week, go ten thousandcarriages every day: over yonder road, by which Dick Turpin fled toWindsor, and Squire Western journeyed into town, when he came to take uphis quarters at the Hercules Pillars on the outskirts of London, what arush of civilization and order flows now! What armies of gentlemen withumbrellas march to banks, and chambers, and counting-houses! Whatregiments of nursery-maids and pretty infantry; what peaceful processionsof policemen, what light broughams and what gay carriages, what swarms ofbusy apprentices and artificers, riding on omnibus-roofs, pass daily andhourly! Tom Idle's times are quite changed: many of the institutions goneinto disuse which were admired in his day. There's more pity and kindnessand a better chance for poor Tom's successors now than at that simplerperiod when Fielding hanged him and Hogarth drew him.
To the student of history, these admirable works must be invaluable, asthey give us the most complete and truthful picture of the manners, andeven the thoughts, of the past century. We look, and see pass before usthe England of a hundred years ago--the peer in his drawing-room, the ladyof fashion in her apartment, foreign singers surrounding her, and thechamber filled with gewgaws in the mode of that day; the church, with itsquaint florid architecture and singing congregation; the parson with hisgreat wig, and the beadle with his cane: all these are represented beforeus, and we are sure of the truth of the portrait. We see how the LordMayor dines in state; how the prodigal drinks and sports at the bagnio;how the poor girl beats hemp in Bridewell; how the thief divides his bootyand drinks his punch at the night-cellar, and how he finishes his careerat the gibbet. We may depend upon the perfect accuracy of these strangeand varied portraits of the bygone generation: we see one of Walpole'sMembers of Parliament chaired after his election, and the liegescelebrating the event, and drinking confusion to the Pretender: we see thegrenadiers and trainbands of the City marching out to meet the enemy; andhave before us, with sword and firelock, and white Hanoverian horseembroidered on the cap, the very figures of the men who ran away withJohnny Cope, and who conquered at Culloden.
Posterity has not quite confirmed honest Hogarth's opinion about histalents for the sublime. Although Swift could not see the differencebetween tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum, posterity has not shared the Dean'scontempt for Handel; the world has discovered a difference betweentweedle-dee and tweedle-dum, and given a hearty applause and admiration toHogarth, too, but not exactly as a painter of scriptural subjects, or as arival of Correggio. It does not take away from one's liking for the man,or from the moral of his story, or the humour of it--from one's admirationfor the prodigious merit of his performances, to remember that hepersisted to the last in believing that the world was in a conspiracyagainst him with respect to his talents as an historical painter, and thata set of miscreants, as he called them, were employed to run his geniusdown. They say it was Liston's firm belief, that he was a great andneglected tragic actor; they say that every one of us believes in hisheart, or would like to have others believe, that he is something which heis not. One of the most notorious of the "miscreants", Hogarth says, wasWilkes, who assailed him in the _North Briton_; the other was Churchill,who put the _North Briton_ attack into heroic verse, and published his_Epistle to Hogarth_. Hogarth replied by that caricature of Wilkes, inwhich the patriot still figures before us, with his Satanic grin andsquint, and by a caricature of Churchill, in which he is represented as abear with a staff, on which, "Lie the first", "Lie the second", "Lie thetenth", are engraved in unmistakable letters. There is very little mistakeabout honest Hogarth's satire: if he has to paint a man with his throatcut, he draws him with his head almost off; and he tried to do the samefor his enemies in this little controversy. "Having an old plate by me,"says he, "with some parts ready, such as the background, and a dog, Ibegan to consider how I could turn so much work laid aside to someaccount, and so patched up a print of Master Churchill, in the characterof a bear; the pleasure and pecuniary advantage which I derived from thesetwo engravings, together with occasionally riding on horseback, restoredme to as much health as I can expect at my time of life."
And so he concludes his queer little book of _Anecdotes_: "I have gonethrough the circumstances of a life which till lately passed pretty muchto my own satisfaction, and I hope in no respect injurious to any otherman. This I may safely assert, that I have done my best to make thoseabout me tolerably happy, and my greatest enemy cannot say I ever did anintentional injury. What may follow, God knows."
A queer account still exists of a holiday jaunt taken by Hogarth and fourfriends of his, who set out, like the redoubted Mr. Pickwick and hiscompanions, but just a hundred years before those heroes; and made anexcursion to Gravesend, Rochester, Sheerness; and adjacent places.(145)One of the gentlemen noted down the proceedings of the journey, for whichHogarth and a brother artist made drawings. The book is chiefly curious atthis moment from showing the citizen life of those days, and the rough,jolly style of merriment, not of the five companions merely, but ofthousands of jolly fellows of their time. Hogarth and his friends,quitting the "Bedford Arms", Covent Garden, with a song, took water toBillingsgate, exchanging compliments with the bargemen as they went downthe river. At Billingsgate, Hogarth made a "caracatura" of a facetiousporter, called the Duke of Puddledock, who agreeably entertained the partywith the humours of the place. Hence they took a Gravesend boat forthemselves; had straw to lie upon, and a tilt over their heads, they say,and went down the river at night, sleeping and singing jolly choruses.
They arrived at Gravesend at six, when they washed their faces and hands,and had their wigs powdered. Then they sallied forth for Rochester onfoot, and drank by the way three pots of ale. At one o'clock they went todinner with excellent port, and a quantity more beer, and afterwardsHogarth and Scott played at hopscotch in the town hall. It would appearthat they slept most of them in one room, and the chronicler of the partydescribes them all as waking at seven o'clock, and telling each othertheir dreams. You have rough sketches by Hogarth of the incidents of thisholiday excursion. The sturdy little painter is seen sprawling over aplank to a boat at Gravesend; the whole company are represented in onedesign, in a fisherman's room, where they had all passed the night. Onegentleman in a nightcap is shaving himself; another is being shaved
They describe at night how they returned to their quarters, drank to theirfriends, as usual, emptied several cans of good flip, all singing merrily.
It is a jolly party of tradesmen engaged at high-jinks. These were themanners and pleasures of Hogarth, of his time very likely, of men not veryrefined, but honest and merry. It is a brave London citizen, with JohnBull habits, prejudices, and pleasures.(146)
Of SMOLLETT'S associates and manner of life the author of the admirable_Humphry Clinker_ has given us an interesting account, in that mostamusing of novels.(147)
I have no doubt that the above picture is as faithful a one as any fromthe pencil of his kindred humourist, Hogarth.
We have before us, and painted by his own hand, Tobias Smollett, themanly, kindly, honest, and irascible; worn and battered, but still braveand full of heart, after a long struggle against a hard fortune. His brainhad been busied with a hundred different schemes; he had been reviewer andhistorian, critic, medical writer, poet, pamphleteer. He had foughtendless literary battles; and braved and wielded for years the cudgels ofcontroversy. It was a hard and savage fight in those days, and a niggardpay. He was oppressed by illness, age, narrow fortune; but his spirit wasstill resolute, and his courage steady; the battle over, he could dojustice to the enemy with whom he had been so fiercely engaged, and give anot unfriendly grasp to the hand that had mauled him. He is like one ofthose Scotch cadets, of whom history gives us so many examples, and whom,with a national fidelity, the great Scotch novelist has painted socharmingly. Of gentle birth(148) and narrow means, going out from hisnorthern home to win his fortune in the world, and to fight his way, armedwith courage, hunger, and keen wits. His crest is a shattered oak-tree,with green leaves yet springing from it. On his ancient coat-of-arms thereis a lion and a horn; this shield of his was battered and dinted in ahundred fights and brawls,(149) through which the stout Scotchman bore itcourageously. You see somehow that he is a gentleman, through all hisbattling and struggling, his poverty, his hard-fought successes, and hisdefeats. His novels are recollections of his own adventures; hischaracters drawn, as I should think, from personages with whom he becameacquainted in his own career of life. Strange companions he must have had;queer acquaintances he made in the Glasgow College--in the countryapothecary's shop; in the gun-room of the man-of-war where he served assurgeon, and in the hard life on shore, where the sturdy adventurerstruggled for fortune. He did not invent much, as I fancy, but had thekeenest perceptive faculty, and described what he saw with wonderfulrelish and delightful broad humour. I think Uncle Bowling, in _RoderickRandom_, is as good a character as Squire Western himself; and Mr. Morgan,the Welsh apothecary, is as pleasant as Dr. Caius. What man who has madehis inestimable acquaintance--what novel-reader who loves Don Quixote andMajor Dalgetty--will refuse his most cordial acknowledgements to theadmirable Lieutenant Lismahago? The novel of _Humphry Clinker_ is, I dothink, the most laughable story that has ever been written since thegoodly art of novel-writing began. Winifred Jenkins and Tabitha Bramblemust keep Englishmen on the grin for ages yet to come; and in theirletters and the story of their loves there is a perpetual fount ofsparkling laughter, as inexhaustible as Bladud's well.
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Fielding, too, has described, though with a greater hand, the charactersand scenes which he knew and saw. He had more than ordinary opportunitiesfor becoming acquainted with life. His family and education, first--hisfortunes and misfortunes afterwards, brought him into the society of everyrank and condition of man. He is himself the hero of his books: he is wildTom Jones, he is wild Captain Booth, less wild, I am glad to think, thanhis predecessor, at least heartily conscious of demerit, and anxious toamend.
When Fielding first came upon the town in 1727, the recollection of thegreat wits was still fresh in the coffee-houses and assemblies, and thejudges there declared that young Harry Fielding had more spirits and witthan Congreve or any of his brilliant successors. His figure was tall andstalwart; his face handsome, manly, and noble-looking; to the very lastdays of his life he retained a grandeur of air, and, although worn down bydisease, his aspect and presence imposed respect upon the people roundabout him.
A dispute took place between Mr. Fielding and the captain(150) of the shipin which he was making his last voyage, and Fielding relates how the manfinally went down on his knees and begged his passenger's pardon. He wasliving up to the last days of his life, and his spirit never gave in. Hisvital power must have been immensely strong. Lady Mary WortleyMontagu(151) prettily characterizes Fielding and this capacity forhappiness which he possessed, in a little notice of his death, when shecompares him to Steele, who was as improvident and as happy as he was, andsays that both should have gone on living for ever. One can fancy theeagerness and gusto with which a man of Fielding's frame, with his vasthealth and robust appetite, his ardent spirits, his joyful humour, and hiskeen and hearty relish for life, must have seized and drunk that cup ofpleasure which the town offered to him. Can any of my hearers remember theyouthful feats of a college breakfast--the meats devoured and the cupsquaffed in that Homeric feast? I can call to mind some of the heroes ofthose youthful banquets, and fancy young Fielding from Leyden rushing uponthe feast, with his great laugh and immense healthy young appetite, eagerand vigorous to enjoy. The young man's wit and manners made him friendseverywhere: he lived with the grand Man's society of those days; he wascourted by peers and men of wealth and fashion. As he had a paternalallowance from his father, General Fielding, which, to use Henry's ownphrase, any man might pay who would; as he liked good wine, good clothes,and good company, which are all expensive articles to purchase, HarryFielding began to run into debt, and borrow money in that easy manner inwhich Captain Booth borrows money in the novel: was in nowise particularin accepting a few pieces from the purses of his rich friends, and boredown upon more than one of them, as Walpole tells us only too truly, for adinner or a guinea. To supply himself with the latter, he began to writetheatrical pieces, having already, no doubt, a considerable acquaintanceamongst the Oldfields and Bracegirdles behind the scenes. He laughed atthese pieces and scorned them. When the audience upon one occasion beganto hiss a scene which he was too lazy to correct, and regarding which,when Garrick remonstrated with him, he said that the public was too stupidto find out the badness of his work;--when the audience began to hiss,Fielding said, with characteristic coolness--"They have found it out, havethey?" He did not prepare his novels in this way, and with a verydifferent care and interest laid the foundations and built up the edificesof his future fame.
Time and shower have very little damaged those. The fashion and ornamentsare, perhaps, of the architecture of that age; but the buildings remainstrong and lofty, and of admirable proportions--masterpieces of genius andmonuments of workmanlike skill.
I cannot offer or hope to make a hero of Harry Fielding. Why hide hisfaults? Why conceal his weaknesses in a cloud of periphrases? Why not showhim, like him as he is, not robed in a marble toga, and draped andpolished in a heroic attitude, but with inked ruffles, and claret stainson his tarnished laced coat, and on his manly face the marks of goodfellowship, of illness, of kindness, of care, and wine. Stained as you seehim, and worn by care and dissipation, that man retains some of the mostprecious and splendid human qualities and endowments. He has an admirablenatural love of truth, the keenest instinctive antipathy to hypocrisy, thehappiest satirical gift of laughing it to scorn. His wit is wonderfullywise and detective; it flashes upon a rogue and lightens up a rascal likea policeman's lantern. He is one of the manliest and kindliest of humanbeings: in the midst of all his imperfections, he respects femaleinnocence and infantine tenderness, as you would suppose such agreat-hearted, courageous soul would respect and care for them. He couldnot be so brave, generous, truth-telling as he is, were he not infinitelymerciful, pitiful, and tender. He will give any
If that theory be--and I have no doubt it is--the right and safe one, thathuman nature is always pleased with the spectacle of innocence rescued byfidelity, purity, and courage; I suppose that of the heroes of Fielding'sthree novels, we should like honest Joseph Andrews the best, and CaptainBooth the second, and Tom Jones the third.(153)
Joseph Andrews, though he wears Lady Booby's cast-off livery, is, I think,to the full as polite as Tom Jones in his fustian suit, or Captain Boothin regimentals. He has, like those heroes, large calves, broad shoulders,a high courage, and a handsome face. The accounts of Joseph's bravery andgood qualities; his voice, too musical to halloo to the dogs; his braveryin riding races for the gentlemen of the county, and his constancy inrefusing bribes and temptation, have something affecting in their_naivete_ and freshness, and prepossess one in favour of that handsomeyoung hero. The rustic bloom of Fanny, and the delightful simplicity ofParson Adams are described with a friendliness which wins the reader oftheir story; we part with them with more regret than from Booth and Jones.
Fielding, no doubt, began to write this novel in ridicule of _Pamela_, forwhich work one can understand the hearty contempt and antipathy which suchan athletic and boisterous genius as Fielding's must have entertained. Hecouldn't do otherwise than laugh at the puny Cockney bookseller, pouringout endless volumes of sentimental twaddle, and hold him up to scorn as amoll-coddle and a milksop. _His_ genius had been nursed on sack-posset,and not on dishes of tea. _His_ muse had sung the loudest in tavernchoruses, had seen the daylight streaming in over thousands of emptiedbowls, and reeled home to chambers on the shoulders of the watchman.Richardson's goddess was attended by old maids and dowagers, and fed onmuffins and bohea. "Milksop!" roars Harry Fielding, clattering at thetimid shop-shutters. "Wretch! Monster! Mohock!" shrieks the sentimentalauthor of _Pamela_;(154) and all the ladies of his court cackle out anaffrighted chorus. Fielding proposes to write a book in ridicule of theauthor, whom he disliked and utterly scorned and laughed at; but he ishimself of so generous, jovial, and kindly a turn that he begins to likethe characters which he invents, can't help making them manly and pleasantas well as ridiculous, and before he has done with them all loves themheartily every one.
Richardson's sickening antipathy for Harry Fielding is quite as natural asthe other's laughter and contempt at the sentimentalist. I have notlearned that these likings and dislikings have ceased in the present day:and every author must lay his account not only to misrepresentation but tohonest enmity among critics, and to being hated and abused for good aswell as for bad reasons. Richardson disliked Fielding's works quitehonestly: Walpole quite honestly spoke of them as vulgar and stupid. Theirsqueamish stomachs sickened at the rough fare and the rough guestsassembled at Fielding's jolly revel. Indeed the cloth might have beencleaner: and the dinner and the company were scarce such as suited adandy. The kind and wise old Johnson would not sit down with him.(155) Buta greater scholar than Johnson could afford to admire that astonishinggenius of Harry Fielding: and we all know the lofty panegyric which Gibbonwrote of him, and which remains a towering monument to the greatnovelist's memory. "Our immortal Fielding," Gibbon writes, "was of theyounger branch of the Earls of Denbigh, who drew their origin from theCounts of Hapsburgh. The successors of Charles V may disdain theirbrethren of England: but the romance of _Tom Jones_, that exquisitepicture of human manners, will outlive the palace of the Escurial and theImperial Eagle of Austria."
There can be no gainsaying the sentence of this great judge. To have yourname mentioned by Gibbon, is like having it written on the dome of St.Peter's. Pilgrims from all the world admire and behold it.
As a picture of manners, the novel of _Tom Jones_ is indeed exquisite: asa work of construction quite a wonder: the by-play of wisdom; the power ofobservation; the multiplied felicitous turns and thoughts; the variedcharacter of the great Comic Epic keep the reader in a perpetualadmiration and curiosity.(156) But against Mr. Thomas Jones himself wehave a right to put in a protest, and quarrel with the esteem the authorevidently has for that character. Charles Lamb says finely of Jones, thata single hearty laugh from him "clears the air"--but then it is in acertain state of the atmosphere. It might clear the air when suchpersonages as Blifil or Lady Bellaston poison it. But I fear very muchthat (except until the very last scene of the story), when Mr. Jonesenters Sophia's drawing-room, the pure air there is rather tainted withthe young gentleman's tobacco-pipe and punch. I can't say that I think Mr.Jones a virtuous character; I can't say but that I think Fielding'sevident liking and admiration for Mr. Jones, shows that the greathumourist's moral sense was blunted by his life, and that here in Art andEthics, there is a great error. If it is right to have a hero whom we mayadmire, let us at least take care that he is admirable: if, as is the planof some authors (a plan decidedly against their interests, be it said), itis propounded that there exists in life no such being, and therefore thatin novels, the picture of life, there should appear no such character;then Mr. Thomas Jones becomes an admissible person, and we examine hisdefects and good qualities, as we do those of Parson Thwackum, or MissSeagrim. But a hero with a flawed reputation; a hero spunging for aguinea; a hero who can't pay his landlady, and is obliged to let hishonour out to hire, is absurd, and his claim to heroic rank untenable. Iprotest against Mr. Thomas Jones holding such rank at all. I protest evenagainst his being considered a more than ordinary young fellow,ruddy-cheeked, broad-shouldered, and fond of wine and pleasure. He wouldnot rob a church, but that is all; and a pretty long argument may bedebated, as to which of these old types, the spendthrift, the hypocrite,Jones and Blifil, Charles and Joseph Surface,--is the worst member ofsociety and the most deserving of censure. The prodigal Captain Booth is abetter man than his predecessor Mr. Jones, in so far as he thinks muchmore humbly of himself than Jones did: goes down on his knees, and ownshis weaknesses, and cries out, "Not for my sake, but for the sake of mypure and sweet and beautiful wife Amelia, I pray you, O critical reader,to forgive me." That stern moralist regards him from the bench (thejudge's practice out of court is not here the question), and says,"Captain Booth, it is perfectly true that your life has been disreputable,and that on many occasions you have shown yourself to be no better than ascamp--you have been tippling at the tavern, when the kindest and sweetestlady in the world has cooked your little supper of boiled mutton andawaited you all the night; you have spoilt the little dish of boiledmutton thereby, and caused pangs and pains to Amelia's tender heart.(157)You have got into debt without the means of paying it. You have gambledthe money with which you ought to have paid your rent. You have spent indrink or in worse amusements the sums which your poor wife has raised uponher little home treasures, her own ornaments, and the toys of herchildren. But, you rascal! you own humbly that you are no better than youshould be; you never for one moment pretend that you are anything but amiserable weak-minded rogue. You do in your heart adore that angelicwoman, your wife, and for her sake, sirrah, you shall have your discharge.Lucky for you and for others like you, that in spite of your failings andimperfections, pure hearts pity and love you. For your wife's sake you arepermitted to go hence without a remand; and I beg you, by the way, tocarry to that angelical lady the expression of the cordial respect andadmiration of this court." Amelia pleads for her husband Will Booth:Amelia pleads for her reckless kindly old father, Harry Fielding. To haveinvented that character, is not only a triumph of art but it is a goodaction. They say it was in his own home that Fielding knew her and lovedher: and from his own wife that he drew the most charming character inEnglish fiction--Fiction! why fiction? why not history? I know Amelia justas well as Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. I believe in Colonel Bath almost asmuch as in Colonel Gardiner or the Duke of Cumberland. I admire the authoro
What a wonderful art! What an admirable gift of nature, was it by whichthe author of these tales was endowed, and which enabled him to fix ourinterest, to waken our sympathy, to seize upon our credulity, so that webelieve in his people--speculate gravely upon their faults or theirexcellences, prefer this one or that, deplore Jones's fondness for drinkand play, Booth's fondness for play and drink, and the unfortunateposition of the wives of both gentlemen--love and admire those ladies withall our hearts, and talk about them as faithfully as if we had breakfastedwith them this morning in their actual drawing-rooms, or should meet themthis afternoon in the Park! What a genius! what a vigour! what abright-eyed intelligence and observation! what a wholesome hatred formeanness and knavery! what a vast sympathy! what a cheerfulness! what amanly relish of life! what a love of human kind! what a poet ishere!--watching, meditating, brooding, creating! What multitudes of truthshas that man left behind him! What generations he has taught to laughwisely and fairly! What scholars he has formed and accustomed to theexercise of thoughtful humour and the manly play of wit! What a courage hehad!(158) What a dauntless and constant cheerfulness of intellect, thatburned bright and steady through all the storms of his life, and neverdeserted its last wreck! It is wonderful to think of the pains and miserywhich the man suffered; the pressure of want, illness, remorse which heendured; and that the writer was neither malignant nor melancholy, hisview of truth never warped, and his generous human kindness neversurrendered.(159)
In the quarrel mentioned before, which happened on Fielding's last voyageto Lisbon, and when the stout captain of the ship fell down on his kneesand asked the sick man's pardon--"I did not suffer," Fielding says, in hishearty, manly way, his eyes lighting up as it were with their old fire--"Idid not suffer a brave man and an old man to remain a moment in thatposture, but immediately forgave him." Indeed, I think, with his noblespirit and unconquerable generosity, Fielding reminds one of those bravemen of whom one reads in stories of English shipwrecks and disasters--ofthe officer on the African shore, when disease has destroyed the crew, andhe himself is seized by fever, who throws the lead with a death-strickenhand, takes the soundings, carries the ship out of the river or off thedangerous coast, and dies in the manly endeavour--of the wounded captain,when the vessel founders, who never loses his heart, who eyes the dangersteadily, and has a cheery word for all, until the inevitable fateoverwhelms him, and the gallant ship goes down. Such a brave and gentleheart, such an intrepid and courageous spirit, I love to recognize in themanly, the English Harry Fielding.