Chapter XIX: Part 19

"My lord, the eyes of all Europe are upon this transaction.
What title I have to your lordship's favour, those books which
I have published, and with which (pardon the necessary boast)
all Europe is acquainted, declare. Many may dispute by
interest with me; but if there be one who would prefer
himself, by his abilities, I beg the matter may be brought to
trial. The collection is at hand; and I request, my lord, such
person and myself may be examined by that test, together. It
is an amazing store of knowledge; and he has most, in this
way, who shall show himself most acquainted with it.

"What are my own abilities it very ill becomes me thus to
boast; but did they not qualify me for the trust, my lord, I
would not ask it. As to those of any other, unless a man be
conjured from the dead, I shall not fear to say there is not
any one whoever that is able so much as to call the parts of
the collection by their names.

"I know I shall be accused of ostentation in giving to myself
this preference; and I am sorry for it: but those who have
candour will know it could not be avoided.

"Many excel, my lord, in other studies: it is my chance to
have bestowed the labour of my life on this: those labours may
be of some use to others. This appears the only instance in
which it is possible that they should be rewarded----."

In a subsequent _Inspector_, he treated on the improvement of
botany by raising plants, and reading lectures on them at the
British Museum, with the living plants before the lecturer and
his auditors. Poor Sir John! he was born half a century too
early!--He would, in this day, have made his lectures
fashionable; and might have secured at the opera every night
an elegant audience for the next morning in the gardens of the
Museum.

[293] It would be difficult to form a list of his anonymous works or
compilations, among which many are curious. Tradition has
preserved his name as the writer of Mrs. Glasse's Cookery, and
of several novels. There is a very curious work, entitled
"Travels in the East," 2 vols. 8vo, of which the author has
been frequently and in vain inquired after. These travels are
attributed to a noble lord; but it now appears that they are a
very entertaining narrative manufactured by Hill. Whiston, the
bookseller, had placed this work in his MS. catalogue of
Hill's books.

There is still another production of considerable merit,
entitled "Observations on the Greek and Roman Classics," 1753.
A learned friend recollects, when young, that this critical
work was said to be written by Hill. It excels Blackwell and
Fenton; and aspires to the numerous composition of prose. The
sentimental critic enters into the feelings of the great
authors whom he describes with spirit, delicacy of taste, and
sometimes with beautiful illustration. It only wants a
chastening hand to become a manual for the young classical
student, by which he might acquire those vivid emotions, which
many college tutors may not be capable of communicating.

I suspect, too, he is the author of this work, from a passage
which Smart quotes, as a specimen of Hill's puffing himself,
and of those smart short periods which look like wit, without
being witty. In a letter to himself, as we are told, Hill
writes:--"You have discovered many of the beauties of the
ancients--they are obliged to you; we are obliged to you: were
they alive, they would thank you; we who are alive do thank
you." If Hill could discriminate the most hidden beauties of
the ancients, the _tact_ must have been formed at his
leisure--in his busy hours he never copied them; but when had
he leisure?

Two other works, of the most contrasted character, display the
versatility and dispositions of this singular genius, at
different eras. When "The Inspector" was rolling in his
chariot about the town, appeared "Letters from the Inspector
to a Lady," 1752. It is a pamphlet, containing the amorous
correspondence of Hill with a reigning beauty, whom he first
saw at Ranelagh. On his first ardent professions he is
contemptuously rejected; he perseveres in high passion, and is
coldly encouraged; at length he triumphs; and this proud and
sullen beauty, in her turn, presents a horrid picture of the
passions. Hill then becomes the reverse of what he was; weary
of her jealousy, sated with the intercourse, he studiously
avoids, and at length rejects her; assigning for his final
argument his approaching marriage. The work may produce a
moral effect, while it exhibits a striking picture of all the
misery of illicit connexions: but the scenes are coloured with
Ovidian warmth. The original letters were shown at the
bookseller's: Hill's were in his own handwriting, and the
lady's in a female hand. But whether Hill was the publisher,
as an attempt at notoriety--or the lady admired her own
correspondence, which is often exquisitely wrought, is not
known.

Hill, in his serious hours, published a large quarto volume,
entitled "Thoughts Concerning God and Nature," 1755. This
work, the result of his scientific knowledge and his moral
reasoning, was never undertaken for the purpose of profit. He
printed it with the certainty of a considerable loss, from its
abstract topics, not obvious to general readers; at a time,
too, when a guinea quarto was a very hazardous enterprise. He
published it purely from conscientious and religious motives;
a circumstance mentioned in that Apology of his Life which we
have noticed. The more closely the character of Hill is
scrutinised, the more extraordinary appears this man, so often
justly contemned, and so often unjustly depreciated.

[294] Through the influence of Lord Bute he became connected with the
Royal Gardens at Kew; and his lordship also assisted him in
publishing his botanical works. See note, p. 363.

[295] It would occupy pages to transcribe epigrams on Hill. One of
them alludes to his philosophical as well as his literary
character:--

"Hill puffs himself; forbear to chide!
An insect vile and mean
Must first, he knows, be magnified
Before it can be seen."

Garrick's happy lines are well known on his farces:--

"For physic and farces his equal there scarce is--
His farces are physic, his physic a farce is."

Another said--

"The worse that we wish thee, for all thy vile crimes,
Is to take thy own physic, and read thy own rhymes."

The rejoinder would reverse the wish--

"For, if he takes his physic first,
He'll never read his rhymes."

[296] Hill says, in his pamphlet on the "Virtues of British
Herbs":--"It will be happy if, by the same means, the
knowledge of plants also becomes more general. The study of
them is pleasant, and the exercise of it healthful. He who
seeks the herb for its cure, will find it half effected by the
walk; and when he is acquainted with the useful kinds, he may
be more people's, besides his own, physician."

BOYLE AND BENTLEY.

A Faction of Wits at Oxford the concealed movers of this
Controversy--Sir WILLIAM TEMPLE'S opinions the ostensible cause;
Editions of classical Authors by young Students at Oxford the
probable one--BOYLE'S first attack in the Preface to his
"Phalaris"--BENTLEY, after a silence of three years, betrays his
feelings on the literary calumny of BOYLE--BOYLE replies by the
"Examination of Bentley's Dissertation"--BENTLEY rejoins by
enlarging it--the effects of a contradictory Narrative at a
distant time--BENTLEY'S suspicions of the origin of the
"Phalaris," and "The Examination," proved by subsequent
facts--BENTLEY'S dignity when stung at the ridicule of Dr.
KING--applies a classical pun, and nicknames his facetious and
caustic Adversary--KING invents an extraordinary Index to dissect
the character of BENTLEY--specimens of the Controversy; BOYLE'S
menace, anathema, and ludicrous humour--BENTLEY'S sarcastic reply
not inferior to that of the Wits.

The splendid controversy between BOYLE and BENTLEY was at times a strife of gladiators, and has been regretted as the opprobrium of our literature; but it should be perpetuated to its honour; for it may be considered, on one side at least, as a noble contest of heroism.

The ostensible cause of the present quarrel was inconsiderable; the concealed motive lies deeper; and the party feelings of the haughty Aristarchus of Cambridge, and a faction of wits at Oxford, under the secret influence of Dean Aldrich, provoked this fierce and glorious contest.

Wit, ridicule, and invective, by cabal and stratagem, obtained a seeming triumph over a single individual, but who, like the Farnesian Hercules, personified the force and resistance of incomparable strength. "The Bees of Christchurch," as this conspiracy of wits has been called, so musical and so angry, rushed in a dark swarm about him, but only left their fine stings in the flesh they could not wound. He only put out his hand in contempt, never in rage. The Christchurch men, as if doubtful whether wit could prevail against learning, had recourse to the maliciousness of personal satire. They amused an idle public, who could even relish sense and Greek, seasoned as they were with wit and satire, while Boyle was showing how Bentley wanted wit, and Bentley was proving how Boyle wanted learning.

To detect the origin of the controversy, we must find the seed-plot of Bentley's volume in Sir William Temple's "Essay upon Ancient and Modern Learning," which he inscribed to his alma mater, the University of Cambridge. Sir William, who had caught the contagion of the prevalent literary controversy of the times, in which the finest geniuses in Europe had entered the lists, imagined that the ancients possessed a greater force of genius, with some peculiar advantages--that the human mind was in a state of decay--and that our knowledge was nothing more than scattered fragments saved out of the general shipwreck. He writes with a premeditated design to dispute the improvements or undervalue the inventions of his own age. Wotton, the friend of Bentley, replied by his curious volume of "Reflections on Ancient and Modern Learning." But Sir William, in his ardour, had thrown out an unguarded opinion, which excited the hostile contempt of Bentley. "The oldest books," he says, "we have, are still in their kind the best; the two most ancient that I know of, in prose, are 'AEsop's Fables' and 'Phalaris's Epistles.'"--The "Epistles," he insists, exhibit every excellence of "a statesman, a soldier, a wit, and a scholar." That ancient author, who Bentley afterwards asserted was only "some dreaming pedant, with his elbow on his desk."

Bentley, bristled over with Greek, perhaps then considered that to notice a vernacular and volatile writer ill assorted with the critic's _Fastus_. But about this time Dean Aldrich had set an example to the students of Christchurch of publishing editions of classical authors. Such juvenile editorships served as an easy admission into the fashionable literature of Oxford. Alsop had published the "AEsop;" and Boyle, among other "young gentlemen," easily obtained the favour of the dean, "to _desire_ him to undertake an edition of the 'Epistles of Phalaris.'" Such are the modest terms Boyle employs in his reply to Bentley, after he had discovered the unlucky choice he had made of an author.

For this edition of "Phalaris" it was necessary to collate a MS. in the king's library; and Bentley, about this time, had become the royal librarian. Boyle did not apply directly to Bentley, but circuitously, by his bookseller, with whom the doctor was not on terms. Some act of civility, or a Mercury more "formose," to use one of his latinisms, was probably expected. The MS. was granted, but the collator was negligent; in six days Bentley reclaimed it, "four hours" had been sufficient for the purpose of collation.

When Boyle's "Phalaris" appeared, he made this charge in the preface, that having ordered the Epistles to be collated with the MS. in the king's library, the collator was prevented perfecting the collation by the _singular humanity_ of the library-keeper, who refused any further use of the MS.; _pro singulari sua humanitate negavit_: an expression that sharply hit a man marked by the haughtiness of his manners.[297]

Bentley, on this insult, informed Boyle of what had passed. He expected that Boyle would have civilly cancelled the page; though he tells us he did not require this, because, "to have insisted on the cancel, might have been forcing a gentleman to too low a submission;"--a stroke of delicacy which will surprise some to discover in the strong character of Bentley. But he was also too haughty to ask a favour, and too conscious of his superiority to betray a feeling of injury. Boyle replied, that the bookseller's account was quite different from the doctor's, who had spoken slightingly of him. Bentley said no more.

Three years had nearly elapsed, when Bentley, in a new edition of his friend Wotton's book, published "A Dissertation on the Epistles of the Ancients;" where, reprehending the false criticism of Sir William Temple, he asserted that the "Fables of AEsop" and the "Epistles of Phalaris" were alike spurious. The blow was levelled at Christchurch, and all "the bees" were brushed down in the warmth of their summer-day.

It is remarkable that Bentley kept so long a silence; indeed, he had considered the affair so trivial, that he had preserved no part of the correspondence with Boyle, whom no doubt he slighted as the young editor of a spurious author. But Boyle's edition came forth, as Bentley expresses it, "with a sting in its mouth." This, at first, was like a cut finger--he breathed on it, and would have forgotten it; but the nerve was touched, and the pain raged long after the stroke. Even the great mind of Bentley began to shrink at the touch of literary calumny, so different from the vulgar kind, in its extent and its duration. He betrays the soreness he would wish to conceal, when he complains that "the false story has been spread all over England."

The statement of Bentley produced, in reply, the famous book of Boyle's "Examination of Bentley's Dissertation." It opens with an imposing narrative, highly polished, of the whole transaction, with the extraordinary furniture of documents, which had never before entered into a literary controversy--depositions--certificates--affidavits--and private letters. Bentley now rejoined by his enlarged "Dissertation on Phalaris," a volume of perpetual value to the lovers of ancient literature, and the memorable preface of which, itself a volume, exhibits another Narrative, entirely differing from Boyle's. These produced new replies and new rejoinders. The whole controversy became so perplexed, that it has frightened away all who have attempted to adjust the particulars. With unanimous consent they give up the cause, as one in which both parties studied only to contradict each other. Such was the fate of a Narrative, which was made out of the recollections of the parties, with all their passions at work, after an interval of three years. In each, the memory seemed only retentive of those passages which best suited their own purpose, and which were precisely those the other party was most likely to have forgotten. What was forgotten, was denied; what was admitted, was made to refer to something else; dialogues were given which appear never to have been spoken; and incidents described which are declared never to have taken place; and all this, perhaps, without any purposed violation of truth. Such were the dangers and misunderstandings which attended a Narrative framed out of the broken or passionate recollections of the parties on the watch to confound one another.[298]

Bentley's Narrative is a most vigorous production: it heaves with the workings of a master-spirit; still reasoning with such force, and still applying with such happiness the stores of his copious literature, had it not been for this literary quarrel, the mere English reader had lost this single opportunity of surveying that commanding intellect.

Boyle's edition of "Phalaris" was a work of parade, designed to confer on a young man, who bore an eminent name, some distinction in the literary world. But Bentley seems to have been well-informed of the secret transactions at Christchurch. In his first attack he mentions Boyle as "the young gentleman of great hopes, whose name is set to the edition;" and asserts that the editor, no more than his own "Phalaris," has written what was ascribed to him. He persists in making a plurality of a pretended unity, by multiplying Boyle into a variety of little personages, of "new editors," our "annotators," our "great geniuses."[299] Boyle, touched at these reflections, declared "they were levelled at a learned society, in which I had the happiness to be educated; as if 'Phalaris' had been made up by contributions from several hands." Pressed by Bentley to acknowledge the assistance of Dr. John Freind, Boyle confers on him the ambiguous title of "The Director of Studies." Bentley links the Bees together--Dr. Freind and Dr. Alsop. "The Director of Studies, who has lately set out Ovid's 'Metamorphoses,' with a paraphrase and notes, is of the same size for learning with the late editor of the AEsopian Fables. They bring the nation into contempt abroad, and themselves into it at home;" and adds to this magisterial style, the mortification of his criticism on Freind's Ovid, as on Alsop's AEsop.

But Boyle assuming the honours of an edition of "Phalaris," was but a venial offence, compared with that committed by the celebrated volume published in its defence.

If Bentley's suspicions were not far from the truth, that "the 'Phalaris' had been _made up by contributions_," they approached still closer when they attacked "The Examination of his Dissertation." Such was the assistance which Boyle received from all "the Bees," that scarcely a few ears of that rich sheaf fall to his portion. His efforts hardly reach to the mere narrative of his transactions with Bentley. All the varied erudition, all the Attic graces, all the inexhaustible wit, are claimed by others; so that Boyle was not materially concerned either in his "Phalaris," or in the more memorable work.[300]

The Christchurch party now formed a literary conspiracy against the great critic; and as treason is infectious when the faction is strong, they were secretly engaging new associates; Whenever any of the party published anything themselves, they had sworn to have always "a fling at Bentley," and intrigued with their friends to do the same.

They procured Keil, the professor of astronomy, in so grave a work as "The Theory of the Earth," to have a fling at Bentley's boasted sagacity in conjectural criticism. Wotton, in a dignified reproof, administered a spirited correction to the party-spirit; while his love of science induced him generously to commend Keil, and intimate the advantages the world may derive from his studies, "as he grows older." Even Garth and Pope struck in with the alliance, and condescended to pour out rhymes more lasting than even the prose of "the Bees."

But of all the rabid wits who, fastening on their prey, never drew their fangs from the noble animal, the facetious Dr. King seems to have been the only one who excited Bentley's anger. Persevering malice, in the teasing shape of caustic banter, seems to have affected the spirit even of Bentley.

At one of those conferences which passed between Bentley and the bookseller, King happened to be present; and being called on by Boyle to bear his part in the drama, he performed it quite to the taste of "the Bees." He addressed a letter to Dean Aldrich, in which he gave one particular: and, to make up a sufficient dose, dropped some corrosives. He closes his letter thus:--"That scorn and contempt which I have naturally for pride and insolence, makes me remember that which otherwise I might have forgotten." Nothing touched Bentley more to the quick than reflections on "his pride and insolence." Our defects seem to lose much of their character, in reference to ourselves, by habit and natural disposition; yet we have always a painful suspicion of their existence; and he who touches them with no tenderness is never pardoned. The invective of King had all the bitterness of truth. Bentley applied a line from Horace; which showed that both Horace and Bentley could pun in anger:--

Proscripti _Regis Rupili_ pus atque venenum.[301]--_Sat._ i. 7.
The filth and venom of _Rupilius King_.

The particular incident which King imperfectly recollected, made afterwards much noise among the wits, for giving them a new notion of the nature of ancient MSS. King relates that Dr. Bentley said--"If the MS. were collated, it would be worth nothing for the future." Bentley, to mortify the pertness of the bookseller, who would not send his publications to the Royal Library, had said that he ought to do so, were it but to make amends for the damage the MS. would sustain by his printing the various readings; "for," added Bentley, "after the various lections were once taken and printed, _the MS. would be like a squeezed orange, and little worth for the future_." This familiar comparison of a MS. with a squeezed orange provoked the epigrammatists. Bentley, in retorting on King, adds some curious facts concerning the fate of MSS. after they have been printed; but is aware, he says, of what little relish or sense the Doctor has of MSS., who is better skilled in "the catalogue of ales, his Humty-Dumty, Hugmatee, Three-threads, and the rest of that glorious list, than in the catalogue of MSS." King, in his banter on Dr. Lister's journey to Paris, had given a list of these English beverages. It was well known that he was in too constant an intercourse with them all. Bentley nicknames King through the progress of his Controversy, for his tavern-pleasures, Humty-Dumty, and accuses him of writing more in a tavern than in a study. He little knew the injustice of his charge against a student who had written notes on 22,000 books and MSS.; but they were not Greek ones.

All this was not done with impunity. An irritated wit only finds his adversary cutting out work for him. A second letter, more abundant with the same pungent qualities, fell on the head of Bentley. King says of the arch-critic--"He thinks meanly, I find, of my reading; yet for all that, I dare say I have read more than any man in England besides _him_ and _me_; for I have read his book all over."[302] Nor was this all; "Humty-Dumty" published eleven "Dialogues of the Dead," supposed to be written by a student at Padua, concerning "one Bentivoglio, a very troublesome critic in the world;" where, under the character of "Signior Moderno," Wotton falls into his place. Whether these dialogues mortified Bentley, I know not: they ought to have afforded him very high amusement. But when a man is at once tickled and pinched, the operation requires a gentler temper than Bentley's. "Humty-Dumty," indeed, had Bentley too often before him. There was something like inveteracy in his wit; but he who invented the remarkable index to Boyle's book, must have closely studied Bentley's character. He has given it with all its protuberant individuality.[303]

Bentley, with his peculiar idiom, had censured "all the stiffness and stateliness, and operoseness of style, quite alien from the character of 'Phalaris,' a man of business and despatch." Boyle keenly turns his own words on Bentley. "_Stiffness and stateliness, and operoseness of style_, is indeed quite _alien from the character of a man of business_; and being but a _library-keeper_, it is not over-modestly done, to oppose his judgment and taste to that of Sir WILLIAM TEMPLE, who knows more of these things than Dr. Bentley does of Hesychius and Suidas. Sir William Temple has spent a good part of his life in transacting affairs of state: he has written to kings, and they to him; and this has qualified him to judge how kings should write, much better than the _library-keeper at St. James's_."--This may serve as a specimen of the Attic style of the controversy. Hard words sometimes passed. Boyle complains of some of the _similes_ which Bentley employs, more significant than elegant. For the new readings of "Phalaris," "he likens me to a bungling tinker mending old kettles." Correcting the faults of the version, he says, "The first epistle cost me four pages in scouring;" and, "by the help of a Greek proverb, he calls me downright ass." But while Boyle complains of these sprinklings of ink, he himself contributes to Bentley's "Collection of Asinine Proverbs," and "throws him in one out of Aristophanes," of "an ass carrying mysteries:" "a proverb," says Erasmus, (as 'the Bees' construe him.) "applied to those who were preferred to some place they did not deserve, as when a _dunce_ was made a _library-keeper_."

Some ambiguous threats are scattered in the volume, while others are more intelligible. When Bentley, in his own defence, had referred to the opinions which some learned foreigners entertained of him--they attribute these to "the foreigners, because they are foreigners--we, that have the happiness of a nearer conversation with him, know him better; and we may perhaps take an opportunity of setting these mistaken strangers right in their opinions." They threaten him with his character, "in a tongue that will last longer, and go further, than their own;" and, in the imperious style of Festus, add:--"Since Dr. Bentley has appealed to foreign universities, to foreign universities he must go." Yet this is light, compared with the odium they would raise against him by the menace of the resentments of a whole society of learned men.

"_Single adversaries_ die and drop off; but _societies_ are immortal: their resentments are sometimes delivered down from hand to hand; and when once they have begun with a man, there is no knowing when they will leave him."

In reply to this literary anathema, Bentley was furnished, by his familiarity with his favourite authors, with a fortunate application of a term, derived from Phalaris himself. Cicero had conveyed his idea of Caesar's cruelty by this term, which he invented from the very name of the tyrant.[304]

"There is a certain temper of mind that Cicero calls _Phalarism_; a spirit like Phalaris's. One would be apt to imagine that a portion of it had descended upon some of his translators. The gentleman has given a broad hint more than once in his book, that if I proceed further against Phalaris, I may draw, perhaps, a duel, or a stab upon myself; a generous threat to a divine, who neither carries arms nor principles fit for that sort of controversy. I expected such usage from the spirit of Phalarism."

In this controversy, the amusing fancy of "the Bees" could not pass by Phalaris without contriving to make some use of that brazen bull by which he tortured men alive. Not satisfied in their motto, from the Earl of Roscommon, with wedging "the great critic, like Milo, in the timber he strove to rend," they gave him a second death in their finis, by throwing Bentley into Phalaris's bull, and flattering their vain imaginations that they heard him "bellow."

"He has defied Phalaris, and used him very coarsely, under the assurance, as he tells us, that 'he is out of his reach.' Many of Phalaris's enemies thought the same thing, and repented of their vain confidence afterwards in his _bull_. Dr. Bentley is perhaps, by this time, or will be suddenly, satisfied that he also has presumed a little too much upon his distance; but it will be too late to repent when he begins to bellow."[305]

Bentley, although the solid force of his mind was not favourable to the lighter sports of wit, yet was not quite destitute of those airy qualities; nor does he seem insensible to the literary merits of "that odd work," as he calls Boyle's volume, which he conveys a very good notion of:--"If his book shall happen to be preserved anywhere as an useful commonplace book for ridicule, banter, and all the topics of calumny." With equal dignity and sense he observes on the ridicule so freely used by both parties--"I am content that what is the greatest virtue of his book should be counted the greatest fault of mine."

His reply to "Milo's fate," and the tortures he was supposed to pass through when thrown into Phalaris's bull, is a piece of sarcastic humour which will not suffer by comparison with the volume more celebrated for its wit.

"The facetious examiner seems resolved to vie with Phalaris himself in the science of _Phalarism_; for his revenge is not satisfied with one single death of his adversary, but he will kill me over and over again. He has slain me twice by two several deaths! one, in the first page of his book; and another, in the last. In the title-page I die the death of Milo, the Crotonian:--

----Remember Milo's end,
Wedged in that timber which he strove to rend.

"The application of which must be this:--That as Milo, after his victories at six several Olympiads, was at last conquered and destroyed in wrestling with a _tree_, so I, after I had attained to some small reputation in letters, am to be quite baffled and run down by _wooden antagonists_. But in the end of his book he has got me into Phalaris's bull, and he has the pleasure of fancying that he hears me _begin to bellow_. Well, since it is certain that I am in the bull, I have performed the part of a sufferer. For as the cries of the tormented in old Phalaris's bull, being conveyed through pipes lodged in the machine, were turned into music for the entertainment of the tyrant, so the complaints which my torments express from me, being conveyed to Mr. Boyle by this answer, are all dedicated to his pleasure and diversion. But yet, methinks, when he was setting up to be _Phalaris junior_, the very omen of it might have deterred him. As the old tyrant himself at last bellowed in his own bull, his imitators ought to consider that at long run their own actions may chance to overtake them."--p. 43.

Wit, however, enjoyed the temporary triumph; not but that some, in that day, loudly protested against the award.[306] "The Episode of Bentley and Wotton," in "The Battle of the Books," is conceived with all the caustic imagination of the first of our prose satirists. There Bentley's great qualities are represented as "tall, without shape or comeliness; large, without strength or proportion." His various erudition, as "armour patched up of a thousand incoherent pieces;" his book, as "the sound" of that armour, "loud and dry, like that made by the fall of a sheet of lead from the roof of some steeple;" his haughty intrepidity, as "a vizor of brass, tainted by his breath, corrupted into copperas, nor wanted gall from the same fountain; so that, whenever provoked by anger or labour, an atramentous quality of most malignant nature was seen to distil from his lips." Wotton is "heavy-armed and slow of foot, lagging behind." They perish together in one ludicrous death. Boyle, in his celestial armour, by a stroke of his weapon, transfixes both "the lovers," "as a cook trusses a brace of woodcocks, with iron skewer piercing the tender sides of both. Joined in their lives, joined in their death, so closely joined, that Charon would mistake them both for one, and waft them over Styx for half his fare." Such is the candour of wit! The great qualities of an adversary, as in Bentley, are distorted into disgraceful attitudes; while the suspicious virtues of a friend, as in Boyle, not passed over in prudent silence, are ornamented with even spurious panegyric.

Garth, catching the feeling of the time, sung--

And to a Bentley 'tis we owe a Boyle.

Posterity justly appreciates the volume of Bentley for its stores of ancient literature; and the author, for that peculiar sagacity in emending a corrupt text, which formed his distinguishing characteristic as a classical critic; and since his book but for this literary quarrel had never appeared, reverses the names in the verse of the "Satirist."

FOOTNOTES:

[297] Haughtiness was the marking feature of Bentley's literary
character; and his Wolseyan style and air have been played on
by the wits. Bentley happened to express himself on the King's
MS. of Phalaris in a manner their witty malice turned against
him. "'Twas a surprise (he said) to find that OUR MS. was not
perused."--"OUR MS. (they proceed) that is, his Majesty's and
mine! He speaks out now; 'tis no longer the King's, but OUR
MS., _i.e._ Dr. Bentley's and the King's in common, _Ego et
Rex meus_--much too familiar for a library-keeper!"--It has
been said that Bentley used the same Wolseyan egotism on
Pope's publications:--"This man is always abusing _me_ or the
_King_!"

[298] Bentley, in one place, having to give a positive contradiction
to the statement of the bookseller, rising in all his dignity
and energy, exclaims, "What can be done in this case? Here are
two contrary affirmations; and the matter being done in
private, neither of us have any witness. I might plead, as
AEmilius Scaurus did against one Varius, of Sucro. _Varius
Sucronensis ait, AEmilius Scaurus negat. Utri creditis
Quirites?_" p. 21.--The story is told by Valerius Maximus,
lib. iii. c. 7. Scaurus was insolently accused by one Varius,
a Sucronian, that he had taken bribes from Mithridates:
Scaurus addressed the Roman people. "He did not think it just
that a man of his age should defend himself against
accusations, and before those who were not born when he filled
the offices of the republic, nor witnessed the actions he had
performed. Varius, the Sucronian, says that Scaurus, corrupted
by gold, would have betrayed the republic; Scaurus replies, It
is not true. Whom will you believe, fellow-Romans?"--This
appeal to the people produced all the effect imaginable, and
the ridiculous accuser was silenced.

Bentley points the same application, with even more
self-consciousness of his worth, in another part of his
preface. It became necessary to praise himself, to remove the
odium Boyle and his friends had raised on him--it was a
difficulty overcome. "I will once more borrow the form of
argument that AEmilius Scaurus used against Varius Sucronensis.
Mr. Spanheim and Mr. Graevius give a high character of Dr. B.'s
learning: Mr. Boyle gives the meanest that malice can furnish
himself with. _Utri creditis, Quirites?_ Whether of the
characters will the present age or posterity believe?"--p. 82.
It was only a truly great mind which could bring itself so
close to posterity.

[299] It was the fashion then to appear very unconcerned about one's
literary reputation; but then to be so tenacious about it when
once obtained as not to suffer, with common patience, even the
little finger of criticism to touch it. Boyle, after defending
what he calls his "honesty," adds, "the rest _only_ touches my
learning. This will give me _no concern_, though it may put me
to some little trouble. I shall enter upon this with _the
indifference of a gamester who plays but for a trifle_." On
this affected indifference, Bentley keenly observes:--"This
was entering on his work a little ominously; for a gamester
who plays with indifference never plays his game well. Besides
that, by this odd comparison, he seems to give warning, and is
as good as his word, that he will put the dice upon his
readers as often as he can. But what is worse than all, this
comparison puts one in mind of a general rumour, that there's
another set of gamesters who _play him_ in his dispute while
themselves are safe behind the curtain."--BENTLEY'S
_Dissertation on Phalaris_, p. 2.

[300] Rumours and conjectures are the lot of contemporaries; truth
seems reserved only for posterity; and, like the fabled
Minerva, she is born of age at once. The secret history of
this volume, which partially appeared, has been more
particularly opened in one of Warburton's letters, who
received it from Pope, who had been "let into the secret."
Boyle wrote the Narrative, "which, too, was corrected for
him." Freind, who wrote the entire Dissertation on AEsop in
that volume, wrote also, with Atterbury, the body of the
Criticisms; King, the droll argument, proving that Bentley was
not the author of his own Dissertation, and the extraordinary
index which I shall shortly notice. In Atterbury's "Epistolary
Correspondence" is a letter, where, with equal anger and
dignity, Atterbury avows his having written _about half, and
planned the whole_ of Boyle's attack upon Bentley! With these
facts before us, can we read without surprise, if not without
indignation, the passage I shall now quote from the book to
which the name of Boyle is prefixed. In raising an artful
charge against Bentley, of appropriating to himself some MS.
notes of Sir Edward Sherburn, Boyle, replying to the argument
of Bentley, that "Phalaris" was the work of some sophist,
says:--"The sophists are everywhere pelted by Dr. Bentley, for
putting out what they wrote in other men's names; but I did
not expect to hear so loudly of it from one that has so far
outdone them; for _I think 'tis much worse to take the honour
of another man's book to one's self_, than to entitle one's
own book to another man."--p. 16.

I am surprised Bentley did not turn the point of his
antagonist's sword on himself, for this flourish was a most
unguarded one. But Bentley could not then know so much of the
book, "made up by contributions," as ourselves.

Partial truths flew about in rumours at the time; but the
friends of a young nobleman, and even his fellow-workmen,
seemed concerned that his glory should not be diminished by a
ruinous division. Rymer, in his "Essay concerning Curious and
Critical Learning," judiciously surmised its true origin. "I
fancy this book was written (as most public compositions in
that college are) by a _select club_. Every one seems to have
thrown in a repartee or so in his turn; and the most ingenious
Dr. Aldrich (he does not deserve the epithet in its most
friendly sense) no doubt at their head, smoked and punned
plentifully on this occasion." The arrogance of Aldrich
exceeded even that of Bentley. Rymer tells further, that
Aldrich was notorious for thus employing his "young
inexperienced students;" that he "_betrayed_ Mr. Boyle into
the controversy, and is still involving others in the
quarrel." Thus he points at the rival chieftains; one of whom
never appeared in public, but was the great mover behind the
curtain. These lively wits, so deeply busied among the
obscurest writers of antiquity, so much against their will,
making up a show of learning against the formidable array of
Bentley, exhilarated themselves in their dusty labours by a
perpetual stimulus of keen humour, playful wit, and angry
invective. No doubt they were often enraged at bearing the
yoke about their luxuriant manes, ploughing the darkest and
heaviest soil of antiquity. They had been reared--

"Insultare solo, et gressus glomerare superbos."
"Georg." Lib. iii. 117.

"To insult the ground, and proudly pace the plain."
TRAPP.

Swift, in "The Battle of the Books," who, under his patron,
Sir William Temple, was naturally in alliance with "the
Bees," with ingenious ambiguity alludes to the glorious
manufacture. "Boyle, clad in a suit of armour, _which had
been given him by all the GODS_." Still the truth was only
floating in rumours and surmises; and the little that Boyle
had done was not yet known. Lord Orrery, his son, had a
difficulty to overcome to pass lightly over this allusion. The
literary honour of the family was at stake, and his filial
piety was exemplary to a father, who had unfortunately, in
passion, deprived his lordship of the family library--a
stroke from which his sensibility never recovered, and which
his enemies ungenerously pointed against him. Lord Orrery,
with all the tenderness of a son, and the caution of a
politician, observes on "the armour given by the Gods"--"I
shall not _dispute_ about the _gift_ of the armour. The Gods
never bestowed celestial armour except upon heroes, whose
courage and superior strength distinguished them from the
rest of mankind." Most ingeniously he would seem to
convert into a classical fable what was designed as a plain
matter of fact!

It does credit to the discernment of Bentley, whose taste was
not very lively in English composition, that he pronounced
Boyle was _not the author_ of the "Examination," from _the
variety of styles in it_.--p. 107.

[301] This short and pointed satire of Horace is merely a pleasant
story about a low wretch of the name of King; and Brutus,
under whose command he was, is entreated to get rid of him,
from his hereditary hatred to _all kings_. I suppose this pun
must be considered legitimate, otherwise Horace was an
indifferent punster.

[302] A keen repartee! Yet King could read this mighty volume as "a
vain confused performance," but the learned DODWELL declared
to "the Bees of Christchurch," who looked up to him, that "he
had never learned so much from any book of the size in his
life." King was as unjust to Bentley, as Bentley to King. Men
of genius are more subject to "unnatural civil war" than even
the blockheads whom Pope sarcastically reproaches with it. The
great critic's own notion of his volume seems equally modest
and just. "To undervalue this dispute about 'Phalaris,'
because it does not suit one's own studies, is to quarrel with
a circle because it is not a square. If the question be not of
vulgar use, it was writ therefore for a few; for even the
greatest performances, upon the most important subjects, are
no entertainment at all to _the many of the world_."--p. 107.

[303] This index, a very original morsel of literary pleasantry, is at
once a satirical character of the great critic, and what it
professes to be. I preserve a specimen among the curiosities I
am collecting. It is entitled--

"_A Short Account of +Dr. BENTLEY+, by way of Index._

"Dr. Bentley's true story proved false, by the
testimonies of, &c., p. --

"His civil language, p. --

"His nice taste,
in wit, p. --
in style, p. --
in Greek, p. --
in Latin, p. --
in English, p. --

"His modesty and decency in contradicting great
men"--a very long list of authors, concluding with
'_Everybody_,' p. --

"His familiar acquaintance with books he never saw,"
p. --

And lastly, "his profound skill in criticism--from
beginning to THE END."

Which thus terminates the volume.

[304] Cicero ad Atticum, Lib. vii., Epist. xii.

[305] No doubt this idea was the origin of that satirical Capriccio,
which closed in a most fortunate pun--a literary caricature,
where the doctor is represented in the hands of Phalaris's
attendants, who are putting him into the tyrant's bull, while
Bentley exclaims, "I had rather be _roasted_ than _Boyled_."

[306] Sir Richard Blackmore, in his bold attempt at writing "A Satire
against Wit," in utter defiance of it, without any, however,
conveys some opinions of the times. He there paints the great
critic, "crowned with applause," seated amidst "the spoils of
ruined wits:"

"Till his rude strokes had thresh'd the empty sheaf,
Methought there had been something else than chaff."

Boyle, not satisfied with the undeserved celebrity conceded to
his volume, ventured to write poetry, in which no one appears
to have suspected the aid of "The Bees"--

"See a fine scholar sunk by wit in Boyle!
After his foolish rhymes, both friends and foes
Conclude they know _who did not write his prose_."
_A Satire against Wit._

PARKER AND MARVELL.

MARVELL the founder of "a newly-refined art of jeering
buffoonery"--his knack of nicknaming his adversaries--PARKER'S
Portrait--PARKER suddenly changes his principles--his declamatory
style--MARVELL prints his anonymous letter as a motto to "The
Rehearsal Transprosed"--describes him as an "At-all"--MARVELL'S
ludicrous description of the whole posse of answers summoned
together by PARKER--MARVELL'S cautious allusion to MILTON--his
solemn invective against PARKER--anecdote of MARVELL and
PARKER--PARKER retires after the second part of "The Rehearsal
Transprosed"--The Recreant, reduced to silence, distils his secret
vengeance in a posthumous libel.

One of the legitimate ends of satire, and one of the proud triumphs of genius, is to unmask the false zealot; to beat back the haughty spirit that is treading down all; and if it cannot teach modesty, and raise a blush, at least to inflict terror and silence. It is then that the satirist does honour to the office of the executioner.

As one whose whip of steel can with a lash
Imprint the characters of shame so deep,
Even in the brazen forehead of proud Sin,
That not eternity shall wear it out.[307]

The quarrel between PARKER and MARVELL is a striking example of the efficient powers of genius, in first humbling, and then annihilating, an unprincipled bravo, who had placed himself at the head of a faction.

Marvell, the under-secretary and the bosom-friend of Milton, whose fancy he has often caught in his verse, was one of the greatest wits of the luxuriant age of Charles II.; he was a master in all the arts of ridicule; and his inexhaustible spirit only required some permanent subject to have rivalled the causticity of Swift, whose style, in neatness and vivacity, seems to have been modelled on his.[308] But Marvell placed the oblation of genius on a temporary altar, and the sacrifice sunk with it; he wrote to the times, and with the times his writings have passed away; yet something there is incorruptible in wit, and wherever its salt has fallen, that part is still preserved.

Such are the vigour and fertility of Marvell's writings, that our old Chronicler of Literary History, Anthony Wood, considers him as the founder of "the then newly-refined art (though much in mode and fashion almost ever since) of sportive and jeering buffoonery;"[309] and the crabbed humorist describes "this pen-combat as briskly managed on both sides; a jerking flirting way of writing entertaining the reader, by seeing two such right cocks of the game so keenly engaging with sharp and dangerous weapons."--Burnett calls Marvell "the liveliest droll of the age, who writ in a burlesque strain, but with so peculiar and entertaining a conduct, that from the king to the tradesman, his books were read with great pleasure." Charles II. was a more polished judge than these uncouth critics; and, to the credit of his impartiality,--for that witty monarch and his dissolute court were never spared by Marvell, who remained inflexible to his seduction--he deemed Marvell the best prose satirist of the age. But Marvell had other qualities than the freest humour and the finest wit in this "newly-refined art," which seems to have escaped these grave critics--a vehemence of solemn reproof, and an eloquence of invective, that awes one with the spirit of the modern Junius,[310] and may give some notion of that more ancient satirist, whose writings are said to have so completely answered their design, that, after perusal, their victim hanged himself on the first tree; and in the present case, though the delinquent did not lay violent hands on himself, he did what, for an author, may be considered as desperate a course, "withdraw from the town, and cease writing for some years."[311]

The celebrated work here to be noticed is Marvell's "Rehearsal Transprosed;" a title facetiously adopted from Bayes in "The Rehearsal Transposed" of the Duke of Buckingham. It was written against the works and the person of Dr. Samuel Parker, afterwards Bishop of Oxford, whom he designates under the character of Bayes, to denote the incoherence and ridiculousness of his character. Marvell had a peculiar knack of calling names,--it consisted in appropriating a ludicrous character in some popular comedy, and dubbing his adversaries with it. In the same spirit he ridiculed Dr. Turner, of Cambridge, a brother-genius to Parker, by nicknaming him "Mr. Smirk, the Divine in Mode," the name of the Chaplain in Etherege's "Man of Mode," and thus, by a stroke of the pen, conveyed an idea of "a neat, starched, formal, and forward divine." This application of a fictitious character to a real one, this christening a man with ridicule, though of no difficult invention, is not a little hazardous to inferior writers; for it requires not less wit than Marvell's to bring out of the real character the ludicrous features which mark the factitious prototype.

Parker himself must have his portrait, and if the likeness be justly hit off, some may be reminded of a resemblance. Mason applies the epithet of "Mitred Dullness" to him: but although he was at length reduced to railing and to menaces, and finally mortified into silence, this epithet does not suit so hardy and so active an adventurer.

The secret history of Parker may be collected in Marvell,[312] and his more public one in our honest chronicler, Anthony Wood. Parker was originally educated in strict sectarian principles; a starch Puritan, "fasting and praying with the Presbyterian students weekly, and who, for their refection feeding only on thin broth made of oatmeal and water, were commonly called _Gruellers_." Among these, says Marvell, "it was observed that he was wont to put more graves than all the rest into his porridge, and was deemed one of the _preciousest_[313] young men in the University." It seems that these mortified saints, both the brotherhood and the sisterhood, held their chief meetings at the house of "Bess Hampton, an old and crooked maid that drove the trade of laundry, who, being from her youth very much given to the godly party, as they call themselves, had frequent meetings, especially for those that were her customers." Such is the dry humour of honest Anthony, who paints like the Ostade of literary history.

But the age of sectarism and thin gruel was losing all its coldness in the sunshine of the Restoration; and this "preciousest young man," from praying and caballing against episcopacy, suddenly acquainted the world, in one of his dedications, that Dr. Ralph Bathurst had "rescued him from the chains and fetters of an unhappy education," and, without any intermediate apology, from a sullen sectarian turned a flaming highflyer for the "supreme dominion" of the Church.[314]

It is the after-conduct of Parker that throws light on this rapid change. On speculative points any man may be suddenly converted; for these may depend on facts or arguments which might never have occurred to him before. But when we watch the weathercock chopping with the wind, so pliant to move, and so stiff when fixed--when we observe this "preciousest grueller" clothed in purple, and equally hardy in the most opposite measures--become a favourite with James II., and a furious advocate for arbitrary power; when we see him railing at and menacing those, among whom he had committed as many extravagances as any of them;[315] can we hesitate to decide that this bold, haughty, and ambitious man was one of those who, having neither religion nor morality for a casting weight, can easily fly off to opposite extremes? and whether a puritan or a bishop, we must place his zeal to the same side of his religious ledger--that of the profits of barter!

The quarrel between Parker and Marvell originated in a preface,[316] written by Parker, in which he had poured down his contempt and abuse on his old companions, the Nonconformists. It was then Marvell clipped his wings with his "Rehearsal Transprosed;" his wit and humour were finely contrasted with Parker's extravagances, set off in his declamatory style; of which Marvell wittily describes "the volume and circumference of the periods, which, though he takes always to be his chiefest strength, yet, indeed, like too great a line, weakens the defence, and requires too many men to make it good." The tilt was now opened, and certain masqued knights appeared in the course; they attempted to grasp the sharp and polished weapon of Marvell, to turn it on himself.[317] But Marvell, with malicious ingenuity, sees Parker in them all--they so much resembled their master! "There were no less," says the wit, "than six scaramouches together on the stage, all of them of the same gravity and behaviour, the same tone, the same habit, that it was impossible to discern which was the true author of the 'Ecclesiastical Polity.' I believe he imitated the wisdom of some other princes, who have sometimes been persuaded by their servants to disguise several others in the regal garb, that the enemy might not know in the battle whom to single." Parker, in fact, replied to Marvell anonymously, by "A Reproof to the Rehearsal Transprosed," with a mild exhortation to the magistrate to crush with the secular arm the pestilent wit, the servant of Cromwell, and the friend of Milton. But this was not all; something else, anonymous too, was despatched to Marvell: it was an extraordinary letter, short enough to have been an epigram, could Parker have written one; but short as it was, it was more in character, for it was only a threat of assassination! It concluded with these words: "If thou darest to print any lie or libel against Dr. Parker, by the Eternal God I will cut thy throat." Marvell replied to "the Reproof," which he calls a printed letter, by the second part of "the Rehearsal Transprosed;" and to the unprinted letter, by publishing it on his own title-page.