Chapter VIII: Part 8

"By this vast book of Mr. Prynne's, it appeareth that he hath read more than he hath studied, and studied more than he hath considered. He calleth his book 'Histriomastix;' but therein he showeth himself like unto Ajax Anthropomastix, as the Grecians called him, the scourge of all mankind, that is, the whipper and the whip."

Such is the history of a man whose greatness of character was clouded over and lost in a fatal passion for scribbling; such is the history of a voluminous author whose genius was such that he could write a folio much easier than a page; and "seldom dined" that he might quote "squadrons of authorities."[109]

FOOTNOTES:

[102] That all these works should not be wanting to posterity,
Prynne deposited the complete collection in the library of
Lincoln's-Inn, about forty volumes in folio and quarto.
Noy, the Attorney-General, Prynne's great adversary, was
provoked at the society's acceptance of these ponderous
volumes, and promised to send them the voluminous labours of
Taylor the water-poet, to place by their side; he judged, as
Wood says, that "Prynne's books were worth little or
nothing; that his proofs were no arguments, and his
affirmations no testimonies." But honest Anthony, in spite
of his prejudices against Prynne, confesses, that though
"by the generality of scholars they are looked upon to be
rather rhapsodical and confused than polite or concise, yet,
for antiquaries, critics, and sometimes for divines, they are
useful." Such erudition as Prynne's always retains its
value--the author who could quote a hundred authors on
"the unloveliness of love-locks," will always make a good
literary chest of drawers, well filled, for those who can make
better use of their contents than himself.

[103] Prynne seems to have considered being debarred from pen, ink,
and books as an act more barbarous than the loss of his ears.
See his curious book of "A New Discovery of the Prelate's
Tyranny;" it is a complete collection of everything relating
to Prynne, Bastwick, and Burton; three political fanatics, who
seem impatiently to have courted the fate of Marsyas. Prynne,
in his voluminous argument, proving the illegality of the
sentences he had suffered, in his ninth point thus gives way
to all the feelings of Martinus Scriblerus:--"Point 9th, that
the prohibiting of me pen, ink, paper, and books, is against
law." He employs an argument to prove that the abuse of any
lawful thing never takes away the use of it; therefore the law
does not deprive gluttons or drunkards of necessary meat and
drink; this analogy he applies to his pen, ink, and books, of
which they could not deprive him, though they might punish him
for their abuse. He asserts that the popish prelates, in the
reign of Mary, were the first who invented this new torture of
depriving a scribbler of pen and ink. He quotes a long passage
from Ovid's Tristia, to prove that, though exiled to the Isle
of Pontus for his wanton books of love, pen and ink were not
denied him to compose new poems; that St. John, banished to
the Isle of Patmos by the persecuting Domitian, still was
allowed pen and ink, for there he wrote the Revelation--and he
proceeds with similar facts. Prynne's books abound with
uncommon facts on common topics, for he had no discernment;
and he seems to have written to convince himself, and not the
public.

But to show the extraordinary perseverance of Prynne in his
love of scribbling, I transcribe the following title of one of
his extraordinary works. He published "Comfortable Cordial
against Discomfortable Fears of Imprisonment, containing some
Latin verses, sentences and texts of Scripture, _written by
Mr. Wm. Prynne on his chamber-walls in_ the Tower of London
during his imprisonment there; translated by him into English
verse," 1641. Prynne literally verifies Pope's description--

"Is there who lock'd from ink and paper, scrawls
With desperate charcoal round his darken'd walls?"

We have also a catalogue of printed books written by Wm.
Prynne, of Lincoln's-Inn, Esq., in these classes--

Before }
During } his imprisonment, with the motto _Jucundi acti
labores_. 1643.
Since }

[104] The interesting particulars of this interview have been
preserved by the Archbishop himself--and it is curious to
observe how Laud could now utter the same tones of murmur and
grief to which Prynne himself had recently given way. Studied
insult in these cases accompanies power in the hands of a
faction. I collect these particulars from "The History of the
Troubles and Tryal of Archbishop Laud," and refer to Vicars's
"God in the Mount, or a Parliamentarie Chronicle," p. 344, for
the Puritanic triumphs.

"My implacable enemy, Mr. Pryn, was picked out as a man
whose malice might be trusted to make the search upon me, and
he did it exactly. The manner of the search upon me was
thus: Mr. Pryn came into the Tower so soon as the gates
were open--commanded the Warder to open my door--he came into
my chamber, and found me in bed--Mr. Pryn seeing me safe
in bed, falls first to my pockets to rifle them--it was
expressed in the warrant that he should search my pockets.
Did they remember, when they gave this warrant, how odious it
was to Parliaments, and some of themselves, to have the
pockets of men searched? I rose, got my gown upon my
shoulders, and he held me in the search till past nine in the
morning (he had come in betimes in the morning in the month
of May). He took from me twenty-one bundles of papers which
I had prepared for my defence, &c., a little book or diary,
containing all the occurrences of my life, and my book of
private devotions; both written with my own hand. Nor could
I get him to leave this last; he must needs see what passed
between God and me. The last place he rifled was a trunk
which stood by my bedside; in that he found nothing but about
forty pounds in money, for my necessary expenses, which he
meddled not with, and a bundle of some gloves. This bundle he
was so careful to open, as that he caused each glove to be
looked into; upon this I tendered him one pair of the gloves,
which he refusing, I told him he might take them, and fear no
bribe, for he had already done me all the mischief he could,
and I asked no favour of him; so he thanked me, took the
gloves, and bound up my papers, and went his way."--Prynne
had a good deal of _cunning_ in his character, as well as
fortitude. He had all the subterfuges and quirks which,
perhaps, form too strong a feature in the character of "an
utter Barrister of Lincoln's Inn." His great artifice was
secretly printing extracts from the diary of Laud, and
placing a copy in the hands of every member of the House,
which was a sudden stroke on the Archbishop, when at the
bar, that at the moment overcame him. Once when Prynne was
printing one of his libels, he attempted to deny being the
author, and ran to the printing-house to distribute the forms,
but it was proved he had corrected the proof and the
revise. Another time, when he had written a libellous
letter to the Archbishop, Noy, the Attorney-General, sent
for Prynne from his prison, and demanded of him whether the
letter was of his own handwriting. Prynne said he must see
and read the letter before he could determine; and when Noy
gave it to him, Prynne tore it to pieces, and threw the
fragments out of the window, that it might not be brought in
evidence against him. Noy had preserved a copy, but that
did not avail him, as Prynne well knew that the misdemeanour
was in the letter itself; and Noy gave up the prosecution,
as there was now no remedy.

[105] Breviate of the Bishop's intolerable usurpations, p. 35.

[106] While Keeper of the Records, he set all the great energies of
his nature to work upon the national archives. The result
appeared in three folio volumes of the greatest value to the
historian. They were published irregularly, and at intervals
of time--thus the second volume was issued in 1665; the first
in 1666; and the third in 1670. The first two volumes are of
the utmost rarity, nearly all the copies having been destroyed
in the great fire of London.--ED.

[107] Hume, in his History, has given some account of this enormous
quarto; to which I refer the reader, vol. vi. chap. lii.

[108] Milton admirably characterises Prynne's absurd learning, as well
as his character, in his treatise on "The likeliest means to
remove hirelings out of the Church," as "a late hot querist
for tythes, whom ye may know by _his wits lying ever beside
him in the margin, to be ever beside his wits in the text_. A
fierce Reformer once; now rankled with a contrary heat."

[109] The very expression Prynne himself uses, see p. 668 of the
Histriomastix; where having gone through "three squadrons," he
commences a fresh chapter thus: "The fourth squadron of
authorities is the venerable troope of 70 several renowned
ancient fathers;" and he throws in more than he promised, all
which are quoted volume and page, as so many "play-confounding
arguments." He has quoted perhaps from three to four hundred
authors on a single point.

GENIUS AND ERUDITION THE VICTIMS OF IMMODERATE VANITY.

The name of TOLAND is more familiar than his character, yet his literary portrait has great singularity; he must be classed among the "Authors by Profession," an honour secured by near fifty publications; and we shall discover that he aimed to combine with the literary character one peculiarly his own.[110] With higher talents and more learning than have been conceded to him, there ran in his mind an original vein of thinking. Yet his whole life exhibits in how small a degree great intellectual powers, when scattered through all the forms which Vanity suggests, will contribute to an author's social comforts, or raise him in public esteem. Toland was fruitful in his productions, and still more so in his projects; yet it is mortifying to estimate the result of all the intense activity of the life of an author of genius, which terminates in being placed among these Calamities.

Toland's birth was probably illegitimate; a circumstance which influenced the formation of his character. Baptised in ridicule, he had nearly fallen a victim to Mr. Shandy's system of Christian names, for he bore the strange ones of _Janus Junius_, which, when the school-roll was called over every morning, afforded perpetual merriment, till the master blessed him with plain _John_, which the boy adopted, and lived in quiet. I must say something on the names themselves, perhaps as ridiculous! May they not have influenced the character of Toland, since they certainly describe it? He had all the shiftings of the double-faced _Janus_, and the revolutionary politics of the ancient _Junius_. His godfathers sent him into the world in cruel mockery, thus to remind their Irish boy of the fortunes that await the desperately bold: nor did Toland forget the strong-marked designations; for to his most objectionable work, the Latin tract entitled _Pantheisticon_, descriptive of what some have considered as an atheistical society, he subscribes these appropriate names, which at the time were imagined to be fictitious.

Toland ran away from school and Popery. When in after-life he was reproached with native obscurity, he ostentatiously produced a testimonial of his birth and family, hatched up at a convent of Irish Franciscans in Germany, where the good Fathers subscribed, with their ink tinged with their Rhenish, to his most ancient descent, referring to the Irish history! which they considered as a parish register, fit for the suspected son of an Irish Priest!

Toland, from early life, was therefore dependent on patrons; but illegitimate birth creates strong and determined characters, and Toland had all the force and originality of self-independence. He was a seed thrown by chance, to grow of itself wherever it falls.

This child of fortune studied at four Universities; at Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Leyden; from the latter he passed to Oxford, and, in the Bodleian Library, collected the materials for his after-studies.

He loved study, and even at a later period declares that "no employment or condition of life shall make me disrelish the lasting entertainment of books." In his "Description of Epsom," he observes that the taste for retirement, reading, and contemplation, promotes the true relish for select company, and says,

"Thus I remove at pleasure, as I grow weary of the country or the town, as I avoid a crowd or seek company.--Here, then, let me have _books and bread_ enough without dependence; a bottle of hermitage and a plate of olives for a select friend; with an early rose to present a young lady as an emblem of discretion no less than of beauty."

At Oxford appeared that predilection for paradoxes and over-curious speculations, which formed afterwards the marking feature of his literary character. He has been unjustly contemned as a sciolist; he was the correspondent of Leibnitz, Le Clerc, and Bayle, and was a learned author when scarcely a man. He first published a Dissertation on the strange tragical death of Regulus, and proved it a Roman legend. A greater paradox might have been his projected speculation on Job, to demonstrate that only the dialogue was genuine; the rest being the work of some idle Rabbin, who had invented a monstrous story to account for the extraordinary afflictions of that model of a divine mind. Speculations of so much learning and ingenuity are uncommon in a young man; but Toland was so unfortunate as to value his own merits before those who did not care to hear of them.

Hardy vanity was to recompense him, perhaps he thought, for that want of fortune and connexions, which raised duller spirits above him. Vain, loquacious, inconsiderate, and daring, he assumed the dictatorship of a coffee-house, and obtained easy conquests, which he mistook for glorious ones, over the graver fellows, who had for many a year awfully petrified their own colleges. He gave more violent offence by his new opinions on religion. An anonymous person addressed two letters to this new Heresiarch, solemn and monitory.[111] Toland's answer is as honourable as that of his monitor's. This passage is forcibly conceived:--

"To what purpose should I study here or elsewhere, were I an _atheist_ or _deist_, for one of the two you take me to be? What a condition to mention virtue, if I believed there was no God, or one so impotent that could not, or so malicious that would not, reveal himself! Nay, though I granted a Deity, yet, if nothing of me subsisted after death, what laws could bind, what incentives could move me to common honesty? Annihilation would be a sanctuary for all my sins, and put an end to my crimes with myself. Believe me I am not so indifferent to the evils of the present life, but, without the expectation of a better, I should soon suspend the mechanism of my body, and resolve into inconscious atoms."

This early moment of his life proved to be its crisis, and the first step he took decided his after-progress. His first great work of "Christianity not Mysterious," produced immense consequences. Toland persevered in denying that it was designed as any attack on Christianity, but only on those subtractions, additions, and other alterations, which have corrupted that pure institution. The work, at least, like its title, is "Mysterious."[112] Toland passed over to Ireland, but his book having got there before him, the author beheld himself anathematized; the pulpits thundered, and it was dangerous to be seen conversing with him. A jury who confessed they could not comprehend a page of his book, condemned it to be burned. Toland now felt a tenderness for his person; and the humane Molyneux, the friend of Locke, while he censures the imprudent vanity of our author, gladly witnessed the flight of "the poor gentleman." But South, indignant at our English moderation in his own controversy with Sherlock on some doctrinal points of the Trinity, congratulates the Archbishop of Dublin on the Irish persecution; and equally witty and intolerant, he writes on Toland, "Your Parliament presently sent him packing, and without the help of a _fagot_, soon made the kingdom _too hot_ for him."

Toland was accused of an intention to found a sect, as South calls them, of "Mahometan-Christians." Many were stigmatised as _Tolandists_; but the disciples of a man who never procured for their prophet a bit of dinner or a new wig, for he was frequently wanting both, were not to be feared as enthusiasts. The persecution from the church only rankled in the breast of Toland, and excited unextinguishable revenge.

He now breathed awhile from the bonfire of theology; and our _Janus_ turned his political face. He edited Milton's voluminous politics, and Harrington's fantastical "Oceana," and, as his "Christianity not Mysterious" had stamped his religion with something worse than heresy, so in politics he was branded as a Commonwealth's-man. Toland had evidently strong nerves; for him opposition produced controversy, which he loved, and controversy produced books, by which he lived.

But let it not be imagined that Toland affected to be considered as no Christian, or avowed himself as a Republican. "Civil and religious toleration" (he says) "have been the two main objects of all my writings." He declares himself to be only a primitive Christian, and a pure Whig. But an author must not be permitted to understand himself so much more clearly than he has enabled his readers to do. His mysterious conduct may be detected in his want of moral integrity.

He had the art of explaining away his own words, as in his first controversy about the word _mystery_ in religion, and he exults in his artifice; for, in a letter, where he is soliciting the minister for employment, he says:--"The church is much exasperated against me; yet as that is the heaviest article, so it is undoubtedly the easiest conquered, and I know _the infallible method of doing it_." And, in a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, he promises to _reform his religion to that prelate's liking_! He took the sacrament as an opening for the negotiation.

What can be more explicit than his recantation at the close of his _Vindicius Liberius_? After telling us that he had withdrawn from sale, after the second edition, his "'Christianity not Mysterious,' when I perceived what real or pretended offence it had given," he concludes thus:--"Being now arrived to years that will not wholly excuse inconsiderateness in resolving, or precipitance in acting, I firmly hope that my _persuasion_ and _practice_ will show me _to be a true Christian_; that my due _conformity_ to the _public worship_ may prove me to be _a good Churchman_; and that my untainted loyalty to King William will argue me to be a staunch Commonwealth's-man. That I shall continue all my life a friend to religion, an enemy to superstition, a supporter of good kings, and a deposer of tyrants."

Observe, this _Vindicius Liberius_ was published on his return from one of his political tours in Germany. His views were then of a very different nature from those of controversial divinity; but it was absolutely necessary to allay the storm the church had raised against him. We begin now to understand a little better the character of Toland. These literary adventurers, with heroic pretensions, can practise the meanest artifices, and shrink themselves into nothing to creep out of a hole. How does this recantation agree with the "Nazarenus," and the other theological works which Toland was publishing all his life? Posterity only can judge of men's characters; it takes in at a glance the whole of a life; but contemporaries only view a part, often apparently unconnected and at variance, when in fact it is neither. This recantation is full of the spirit of _Janus Junius_ Toland.

But we are concerned chiefly with Toland's literary character. He was so confirmed an author, that he never published one book without promising another. He refers to others in MS.; and some of his most curious works are posthumous. He was a great artificer of title-pages, covering them with a promising luxuriance; and in this way recommended his works to the booksellers. He had an odd taste for running inscriptions of whimsical crabbed terms; the gold-dust of erudition to gild over a title; such as "Tetradymus, Hodegus, Clidopharus;" "Adeisidaemon, or the Unsuperstitious." He pretends these affected titles indicated their several subjects; but the genius of Toland could descend to literary quackery.

He had the art of propagating books; his small Life of Milton produced several; besides the complacency he felt in extracting long passages from Milton against the bishops. In this Life, his attack on the authenticity of the _Eikon Basilike_ of Charles I. branched into another on supposititious writings; and this included the spurious gospels. Association of ideas is a nursing mother to the fertility of authorship. The spurious gospels opened a fresh theological campaign, and produced his "Amyntor." There was no end in provoking an author, who, in writing the life of a poet, could contrive to put the authenticity of the Testament to the proof.

Amid his philosophical labours, his _vanity_ induced him to seize on all temporary topics to which his facility and ingenuity gave currency. The choice of his subjects forms an amusing catalogue; for he had "Remarks" and "Projects" as fast as events were passing. He wrote on the "Art of Governing by Parties," on "Anglia Liberia," "Reasons for Naturalising the Jews," on "The Art of Canvassing at Elections," "On raising a National Bank without Capital," "The State Anatomy," "Dunkirk or Dover," &c. &c. These, and many like these, set off with catching titles, proved to the author that a man of genius may be capable of writing on all topics at all times, and make the country his debtor without benefiting his own creditors.[113]

There was a moment in Toland's life when he felt, or thought he felt, fortune in his grasp. He was then floating on the ideal waves of the South Sea bubble. The poor author, elated with a notion that he was rich enough to print at his own cost, dispersed copies of his absurd "Pantheisticon." He describes a society of Pantheists, who worship the universe as God; a mystery much greater than those he attacked in Christianity. Their prayers are passages from Cicero and Seneca, and they chant long poems instead of psalms; so that in their zeal they endured a little tediousness. The next objectionable circumstance in this wild ebullition of philosophical wantonness is the apparent burlesque of some liturgies; and a wag having inserted in some copies an impious prayer to Bacchus, Toland suffered for the folly of others as well as his own.[114] With the South Sea bubble vanished Toland's desire of printing books at his own risk; and thus relieved the world from the weight of more _Pantheisticons_!

With all this bustle of authorship, amidst temporary publications which required such prompt ingenuity, and elaborate works which matured the fruits of early studies, Toland was still not a sedentary writer. I find that he often travelled on the continent; but how could a guinealess author so easily transport himself from Flanders to Germany, and appear at home in the courts of Berlin, Dresden, and Hanover? Perhaps we may discover a concealed feature in the character of our ambiguous philosopher.

In the only Life we have of Toland, by Des Maiseaux, prefixed to his posthumous works, he tells us, that Toland was at the court of Berlin, but "an incident, _too ludicrous to be mentioned_, obliged him to leave that place sooner than he expected." Here is an incident in a narrative clearly marked out, but never to be supplied! Whatever this incident was, it had this important result, that it sent Toland away in haste; but _why_ was he there? Our chronological biographer,[115] "good easy man," suspects nothing more extraordinary when he tells us Toland was at Berlin or Hanover, than when he finds him at Epsom; imagines Toland only went to the Electoral Princess Sophia, and the Queen of Prussia, who were "ladies of sublime genius," to entertain them by vexing some grave German divines, with philosophical conferences, and paradoxical conundrums; all the ravings of Toland's idleness.[116]

This secret history of Toland can only be picked out by fine threads. He professed to be a literary character--he had opened a periodical "literary correspondence," as he terms it, with Prince Eugene; such as we have witnessed in our days by Grimm and La Harpe, addressed to some northern princes. He was a favourite with the Electoral Princess Sophia and the Queen of Prussia, to whom he addressed his "Letters to Serena." Was he a political agent? Yet how was it that Toland was often driven home by distressed circumstances? He seems not to have been a practical politician, for he managed his own affairs very ill. Was the political intriguer rather a suspected than a confidential servant of all his masters and mistresses? for it is evident no one cared for him! The absence of moral integrity was probably never disguised by the loquacious vanity of this literary adventurer.

In his posthumous works are several "Memorials" for the Earl of Oxford, which throw a new light over a union of political _espionage_ with the literary character, which finally concluded in producing that extraordinary one which the political imagination of Toland created in all the obscurity and heat of his reveries.

In one of these "Memorials," forcibly written and full of curiosity, Toland remonstrates with the minister for his marked neglect of him; opens the scheme of a political tour, where, like Guthrie, he would be content with his _quarterage_. He defines his character; for the independent Whig affects to spurn at the office, though he might not shrink at the duties of a spy.

"Whether such a person, sir, who is _neither minister nor spy_, and as a _lover of learning will be welcome everywhere_, may not prove of extraordinary use to my Lord Treasurer, as well as to his predecessor Burleigh, who employed such, I leave his lordship and you to consider."

Still _this character_, whatever title may designate it, is inferior in dignity and importance to that which Toland afterwards projected, and which portrays him where his life-writer has not given a touch from his brush; it is a political curiosity.

"I laid an honester scheme of serving my country, your lordship, and myself; for, seeing it was neither convenient for you, nor a thing at all desired by me, that _I should appear in any public post_, I sincerely proposed, as occasions should offer, to communicate to your lordship my observations on _the temper of the ministry, the dispositions of the people, the condition of our enemies or allies abroad_, and what I might think _most expedient in every conjuncture_; which advice you were to follow in whole, or in part, or not at all, as your own superior wisdom should direct. My general acquaintance, the several languages I speak, the experience I have acquired in foreign affairs, and being engaged in no interest at home, besides that of the public, should qualify me in some measure for this province. ALL WISE MINISTERS HAVE EVER HAD SUCH PRIVATE MONITORS. As much as I thought myself fit, or was thought so by others, for such general observations, so much have I ever abhorred, my lord, _those particular observers we call SPIES_; but I despise the calumny no less than I detest the thing. Of such general observations, you should have perused a far greater number than I thought fit to present hitherto, had I discovered, by due effects, that they were acceptable from _me_; for they must unavoidably be received from _somebody_, unless a minister were omniscient--yet I soon had good reason to believe I was not designed for the man, whatever the original sin could be that made me incapable of such a trust, and which I now begin to suspect. Without direct answers to my proposals, how could I know whether I helped my friends elsewhere, or betrayed them contrary to my intentions! and accordingly I have for some time been very cautious and reserved. But if your lordship will enter into any measures with me to procure _the good of my country_, I shall be more ready to _serve_ your lordship in this, or in some becoming capacity, than any other minister. They who confided to my management affairs of a higher nature have found me exact as well as secret. My impenetrable negociation at Vienna (hid under the pretence of curiosity) was not only applauded by the prince that employed me, but also proportionably rewarded. And here, my lord, give me leave to say that I have found England miserably served abroad since this change; and our ministers at home are sometimes as great strangers to the genius as to the persons of those with whom they have to do. At ---- you have placed the most unacceptable man in the world--one that lived in a scandalous misunderstanding with the minister of the States at another court--one that has been the laughing-stock of all courts, for his senseless haughtiness and most ridiculous airs--and one that can never judge aright, unless by accident, in anything."

The discarded, or the suspected _private monitor of the Minister_ warms into the tenderest language of political amour, and mourns their rupture but as the quarrels of lovers.

"I cannot, from all these considerations, but in the nature of a lover, complain of your present neglect, and be solicitous for your future care." And again, "I have made use of the simile of a lover, and as such, indeed, I thought fit, once for all, to come to a thorough explanation, resolved, if my affection be not killed by your unkindness, to become indissolubly yours."

Such is the nice artifice which colours, with a pretended love of his country, the sordidness of the political intriguer, giving clean names to filthy things. But this view of the political face of our _Janus_ is not complete till we discover the levity he could carry into politics when not disguised by more pompous pretensions. I shall give two extracts from letters composed in a different spirit.

"I am bound for Germany, though first for Flanders, and next for Holland. I believe I shall be pretty well accommodated for this voyage, which I expect will be very short. Lord! how near was _my old woman_ being a queen! and your humble servant being _at his ease_."

His _old woman_ was the Electoral Princess Sophia; and _his ease_ is what patriots distinguish as _the love of their country_! Again--

"The October Club,[117] if rightly managed, will be rare stuff _to work the ends of any party_. I sent such an account of these wights to an _old gentlewoman_ of my acquaintance, as in the midst of fears (the change of ministry) will make her laugh."

After all his voluminous literature, and his refined politics, Toland lived and died the life of an Author by Profession, in an obscure lodging at a country carpenter's, in great distress. He had still one patron left, who was himself poor, Lord Molesworth, who promised him, if he lived,

"Bare necessaries. These are but cold comfort to a man of your spirit and desert; but 'tis all I dare promise! 'Tis an ungrateful age, and we must bear with it the best we may till we can mend it."

And his lordship tells of his unsuccessful application to some Whig lord for Toland; and concludes,

"'Tis a sad monster of a man, and not worthy of further notice."

I have observed that Toland had strong nerves; he neither feared controversies, nor that which closes all. Having examined his manuscripts, I can sketch a minute picture of the last days of our "author by profession." At the carpenter's lodgings he drew up a list of all his books--they were piled on four chairs, to the amount of 155--most of them works which evince the most erudite studies; and as Toland's learning has been very lightly esteemed, it may be worth notice that some of his MSS. were transcribed in Greek.[118] To this list he adds--"I need not recite those in the closet with the unbound books and pamphlets; nor my trunk, wherein are all my papers and MSS." I perceive he circulated his MSS. among his friends, for there is a list by him as he lent them, among which are ladies as well as gentlemen, _esprits forts_!

Never has author died more in character than Toland; he may be said to have died with a busy pen in his hand. Having suffered from an unskilful physician, he avenged himself in his own way; for there was found on his table an "Essay on Physic without Physicians." The dying patriot-trader was also writing a preface for a political pamphlet on _the danger of mercenary Parliaments_; and the philosopher was composing his own epitaph--one more proof of the ruling passion predominating in death; but why should a _Pantheist_ be solicitous to perpetuate his genius and his fame! I shall transcribe a few lines; surely they are no evidence of Atheism!

Omnium Literarum excultor,
ac linguarum plus decem sciens;
Veritatis propugnator,
Libertatis assertor;
nullus autem sectator aut cliens,
nec minis, nec malis est inflexus,
quin quam elegit, viam perageret;
utili honestum anteferens.
Spiritus cum aethereo patre,
a quo prodiit olim, conjungitur;
corpus item, Naturae cedens,
in materno gremio reponitur.
Ipse vero aeternum est resurrecturus,
at idem futurus TOLANDUS nunquam.[119]

One would have imagined that the writer of his own panegyrical epitaph would have been careful to have transmitted to posterity a copy of his features; but I know of no portrait of Toland. His patrons seem never to have been generous, nor his disciples grateful; they mortified rather than indulged the egotism of his genius. There appeared, indeed, an elegy, shortly after the death of Toland, so ingeniously contrived, that it is not clear whether he is eulogised or ridiculed. Amid its solemnity these lines betray the sneer. "Has," exclaimed the eulogist of the ambiguous philosopher,

Each jarring element gone angry home?
And _Master Toland_ a _Non-ens_ become?

LOCKE, with all the prescient sagacity of that clear understanding which penetrated under the secret folds of the human heart, anticipated the life of Toland at its commencement. He admired the genius of the man; but, while he valued his parts and learning, he dreaded their result. In a letter I find these passages, which were then so prophetic, and are now so instructive:--

"If his exceeding great value of himself do not deprive the world of that usefulness that his parts, if rightly conducted, might be of, I shall be very glad.--The hopes young men give of what use they will make of their parts is, to me, the encouragement of being concerned for them; but, _if vanity increases with age, I always fear whither it will lead a man_."

FOOTNOTES:

[110] Toland was born in Ireland, in 1669, of Roman Catholic parents,
but became a zealous opponent of that faith before he was
sixteen; after which he finished his education at Glasgow and
Edinburgh; he retired to study at Leyden, where he formed the
acquaintance of Leibnitz and other learned men. His first
book, published in 1696, and entitled "Christianity not
Mysterious," was met by the strongest denunciation from the
pulpit, was "presented" by the grand jury of Middlesex, and
ordered to be burnt by the common hangman by the Parliament of
Ireland. He was henceforth driven for employ to literature;
and in 1699 was engaged by the Duke of Newcastle to edit the
"Memoirs of Denzil, Lord Hollis;" and afterwards by the Earl
of Oxford on a new edition of Harrington's "Oceana." He then
visited the Courts of Berlin and Hanover. He published many
works on politics and religion, the latter all remarkable for
their deistical tendencies, and died in March, 1722, at the
age of 53.--ED.

[111] These letters will interest every religious person; they may be
found in Toland's posthumous works, vol. ii. p. 295.

[112] Toland pretends to prove that "there is nothing in the Christian
Religion, not only which is contrary to reason, but even
which is above it."--He made use of some arguments (says
Le Clerc) that were drawn from Locke's Treatise on the
Human Understanding. I have seen in MS. a finished treatise by
Locke on Religion, addressed to Lady Shaftesbury; Locke
gives it as a translation from the French. I regret my
account is so imperfect; but the possessor may, perhaps, be
induced to give it to the public. The French philosophers have
drawn their first waters from English authors; and Toland,
Tindale, and Woolston, with Shaftesbury, Bolingbroke, and
Locke, were among their earliest acquisitions.

[113] In examining the original papers of Toland, which are preserved,
I found some of his agreements with booksellers. For his
description of Epsom he was to receive only four guineas in
case 1000 were sold. He received ten guineas for his pamphlet
on Naturalising the Jews, and ten guineas more in case Bernard
Lintott sold 2000. The words of this agreement run thus:
"Whenever Mr. Toland calls for ten guineas, after the first of
February next, I promise to pay them, if I _cannot show_ that
200 of the copies remain unsold." What a sublime person is an
author! What a misery is authorship! The great philosopher who
creates systems that are to alter the face of his country,
must stand at the counter to count out 200 unsold copies!

[114] Des Maiseaux frees Toland from this calumny, and hints at his
own personal knowledge of the author--but he does not know
what a foreign writer authenticates, that this blasphemous
address to Bacchus is a parody of a prayer in the Roman
ritual, written two centuries before by a very proper society
of _Pantheists_, a club of drunkards!

[115] Warburton has well described Des Maiseaux: "All the Life-writers
we have had are, indeed, strange insipid creatures. The
verbose tasteless Frenchman seems to lay it down as a
principle that every life must be a book, and what is worse,
it proves a book without a life; for what do we know of
Boileau, after all his tedious stuff?"

[116] One of these philosophical conferences has been preserved by
Beausobre, who was indeed the party concerned. He inserted it
in the "Bibliotheque Germanique," a curious literary journal,
in 50 volumes, written by L'Enfant, Beausobre, and Formey. It
is very copious, and very curious, and is preserved in the
General Dictionary, art. Toland. The parties, after a warm
contest, were very wisely interrupted by the Queen, when she
discovered they had exhausted their learning, and were
beginning to rail at each other.

[117] A political society which obtained its name from the malt
liquors consumed at its meetings, and which was popularly
termed October from the month when it was usually brewed. This
club advocated the claims of the House of Hanover, and may
have originated the Mughouses noted in p. 32.--ED.

[118] I subjoin, for the gratification of the curious, the titles of a
few of these books. "Spanhemii Opera;" "Clerici Pentateuchus;"
"Constantini Lexicon Graeco-Latinum;" "Fabricii Codex
Apocryphus Vet. et Nov. Test.;" "Synesius de Regno;" "Historia
Imaginum Coelestium Gosselini," 16 volumes; "Caryophili
Dissertationes;" "Vonde Hardt Ephemerides Philologicae;"
"Trismegisti Opera;" "Recoldus, et alia Mahomedica;" all the
Works of Buxtorf; "Salviani Opera;" "Reland de Relig.
Mahomedica;" "Galli Opuscula Mythologica;" "Apollodori
Bibliotheca;" "Palingenius;" "Apuleius;" and every classical
author of antiquity. As he was then employed in his curious
history of the Druids, of which only a specimen is preserved,
we may trace his researches in the following books: "Luydii
Archaeologia Britannica;" "Old Irish Testament," &c.;
"Maccurtin's History of Ireland;" "O'Flaherty's Ogygia;"
"Epistolarum Hibernicarum;" "Usher's Religion of the ancient
Irish;" "Brand's Isles of Orkney and Zetland;" "Pezron's
Antiquites des Celtes."

There are some singular papers among these fragments. One
title of a work is "Priesthood without Priestcraft; or
Superstition distinguished from Religion, Dominion from Order,
and Bigotry from Reason, in the most principal Controversies
about Church government, which at present divide and deform
Christianity." He has composed "A Psalm before Sermon in
praise of Asinity." There are other singular titles and works
in the mass of his papers.

[119]

A lover of all literature,
and knowing more than ten languages;
a champion for truth,
an assertor of liberty,
but the follower or dependant of no man;
nor could menaces nor fortune bend him;
the way he had chosen he pursued,
preferring honesty to his interest.
His spirit is joined with its ethereal father
from whom it originally proceeded;
his body likewise, yielding to Nature,
is again laid in the lap of its mother:
but he is about to rise again in eternity,
yet never to be the same TOLAND more.

GENIUS THE DUPE OF ITS PASSIONS.

POPE said that STEELE, though he led a careless and vicious life, had nevertheless a love and reverence for virtue. The life of Steele was not that of a retired scholar; hence his moral character becomes more instructive. He was one of those whose hearts are the dupes of their imaginations, and who are hurried through life by the most despotic volition. He always preferred his caprices to his interests; or, according to his own notion, very ingenious, but not a little absurd, "he was always of the humour of preferring the state of his mind to that of his fortune." The result of this principle of moral conduct was, that a man of the most admirable abilities was perpetually acting like a fool, and, with a warm attachment to virtue, was the frailest of human beings.

In the first act of his life we find the seed that developed itself in the succeeding ones. His uncle could not endure a hero for his heir: but Steele had seen a marching regiment; a sufficient reason with him to enlist as a private in the horse-guards: cocking his hat, and putting on a broad-sword, jack-boots, and shoulder-belt, with the most generous feelings he forfeited a very good estate.--At length Ensign Steele's frank temper and wit conciliated esteem, and extorted admiration, and the ensign became a favourite leader in all the dissipations of the town. All these were the ebullitions of genius, which had not yet received a legitimate direction. Amid these orgies, however, it was often pensive, and forming itself; for it was in the height of these irregularities that Steele composed his "Christian Hero," a moral and religious treatise, which the contritions of every morning dictated, and to which the disorders of every evening added another penitential page. Perhaps the genius of Steele was never so ardent and so pure as at this period; and in his elegant letter to his commander, the celebrated Lord Cutts, he gives an interesting account of the origin of this production, which none but one deeply imbued with its feelings could have so forcibly described.

"_Tower Guard, March 23, 1701._

"MY LORD,--The address of the following papers is so very much due
to your lordship, that they are but a mere report of what has
passed upon my guard to my commander; for they were writ upon
duty, when the mind was perfectly disengaged, and at leisure, in
the silent watch of the night, to run over the busy dream of the
day; and the vigilance which obliges us to suppose an enemy always
near us, has awakened a sense that there is a restless and subtle
one which constantly attends our steps, and meditates our
ruin."[120]

To this solemn and monitory work he prefixed his name, from this honourable motive, that it might serve as "a standing testimony against himself, and make him ashamed of understanding, and seeming to feel what was virtuous, and living so quite contrary a life." Do we not think that no one less than a saint is speaking to us? And yet he is still nothing more than Ensign Steele! He tells us that this grave work made him considered, who had been no undelightful companion, as a disagreeable fellow--and "The Christian Hero," by his own words, appears to have fought off several fool-hardy geniuses who were for "trying their valour on him," supposing a saint was necessarily a poltroon. Thus "The Christian Hero," finding himself slighted by his loose companions, sat down and composed a most laughable comedy, "The Funeral;" and with all the frankness of a man who cares not to hide his motives, he tells us, that after his religious work he wrote the comedy because "nothing can make the town so fond of a man as a successful play."[121] The historian who had to record such strange events, following close on each other, as an author publishing a book of piety, and then a farce, could never have discovered the secret motive of the versatile writer, had not that writer possessed the most honest frankness.

Steele was now at once a man of the town and its censor, and wrote lively essays on the follies of the day in an enormous black peruke which cost him fifty guineas! He built an elegant villa, but, as he was always inculcating economy, he dates from "The Hovel." He detected the fallacy of the South Sea scheme, while he himself invented projects, neither inferior in magnificence nor in misery. He even turned alchemist, and wanted to coin gold, merely to distribute it. The most striking incident in the life of this man of volition, was his sudden marriage with a young lady who attended his first wife's funeral--struck by her angelical beauty, if we trust to his raptures. Yet this sage, who would have written so well on the choice of a wife, united himself to a character the most uncongenial to his own; cold, reserved, and most anxiously prudent in her attention to money, she was of a temper which every day grew worse by the perpetual imprudence and thoughtlessness of his own. He calls her "Prue" in fondness and reproach; she was Prudery itself! His adoration was permanent, and so were his complaints; and they never parted but with bickerings--yet he could not suffer her absence, for he was writing to her three or four passionate notes in a day, which are dated from his office, or his bookseller's, or from some friend's house--he has risen in the midst of dinner to despatch a line to "Prue," to assure her of his affection since noon.[122]--Her presence or her absence was equally painful to him.

Yet Steele, gifted at all times with the susceptibility of genius, was exercising the finest feelings of the heart; the same generosity of temper which deluded his judgment, and invigorated his passions, rendered him a tender and pathetic dramatist; a most fertile essayist; a patriot without private views; an enemy whose resentment died away in raillery; and a friend, who could warmly press the hand that chastised him. Whether in administration, or expelled the House; whether affluent, or flying from his creditors; in the fulness of his heart he, perhaps, secured his own happiness, and lived on, like some wits, extempore. But such men, with all their virtues and all their genius, live only for themselves.

Steele, in the waste of his splendid talents, had raised sudden enmities and transient friendships. The world uses such men as Eastern travellers do fountains; they drink their waters, and when their thirst is appeased, turn their hacks on them. Steele lived to be forgotten. He opened his career with folly; he hurried through it in a tumult of existence; and he closed it by an involuntary exile, amid the wrecks of his fortune and his mind.

Steele, in one of his numerous periodical works, the twelfth number of the "Theatre," has drawn an exquisite contrast between himself and his friend Addison: it is a cabinet picture. Steele's careful pieces, when warm with his subject, had a higher spirit, a richer flavour, than the equable softness of Addison, who is only beautiful.

"There never was a more strict friendship than between these gentlemen; nor had they ever any difference but what proceeded from their different way of pursuing the same thing: the one, with patience, foresight, and temperate address, always waited and stemmed the torrent; while the other often plunged himself into it, and was as often taken out by the temper of him who stood weeping on the bank for his safety, whom he could not dissuade from leaping into it. Thus these two men lived for some years last past, shunning each other, but still preserving the most passionate concern for their mutual welfare. But when they met, they were as unreserved as boys; and talked of the greatest affairs, upon which they saw where they differed, without pressing (what they knew impossible) to convert each other."

If Steele had the honour of the invention of those periodical papers which first enlightened the national genius by their popular instruction, he is himself a remarkable example of the moral and the literary character perpetually contending in the man of volition.

FOOTNOTES:

[120] Mr. Nichols's "Epistolary Correspondence of Sir Richard Steele,"
vol. i. p. 77.

[121] Steele has given a delightful piece of self-biography towards
the end of his "Apology for Himself and his Writings," p. 80,
4to.

[122] In the "Epistolary Correspondence of Sir Richard Steele," edition
of 1809, are preserved these extraordinary love-despatches;
"Prue" used poor Steele at times very ill; indeed Steele
seems to have conceived that his warm affections were all she
required, for Lady Steele was usually left whole days in
solitude, and frequently in want of a guinea, when Steele
could not raise one. He, however, sometimes remonstrates with
her very feelingly. The following note is an instance:--

"DEAR WIFE,--I have been in great pain of body and mind
since I came out. You are extremely cruel to a generous
nature, which has a tenderness for you that renders your
least _dishumour_ insupportably afflicting. After short
starts of passion, not to be inclined to reconciliation,
is what is against all rules of Christianity and justice.
When I come home, I beg to be kindly received; or this
will have as ill an effect upon my fortune, as on my mind
and body."

In a postscript to another billet, he thus "sneers at Lady
Steele's excessive attention to money":--

"Your man Sam owes me threepence, which must be deducted
in the account between you and me; therefore, pray take
care to get it in, or stop it."

Such despatches as the following were sent off three or four
times in a day:--

"I beg of you not to be impatient, though it be an hour
before you see

"Your obliged husband,
R. STEELE."

"DEAR PRUE,--Don't be displeased that I do not come home
till eleven o'clock.

Yours, ever."

"DEAR PRUE,--Forgive me dining abroad, and let Will carry
the papers to Buckley's.

Your fond devoted
R. S."

"DEAR PRUE,--I am very sleepy and tired, but could not
think of closing my eyes till I had told you I am, dearest
creature, your most affectionate, faithful husband,

R. STEELE.

"From the Press, One in the morning."

It would seem by the following note that this hourly account
of himself was in consequence of the connubial mandate of his
fair despot:--

"DEAR PRUE,--It is a strange thing, because you are
handsome, that you will not behave yourself with the
obedience that people of worse features do--but that I
must be always giving you an account of every trifle and
minute of my time. I send this to tell you I am waiting to
be sent for again when my Lord Wharton is stirring."

LITERARY DISAPPOINTMENTS DISORDERING THE INTELLECT.

LELAND AND COLLINS.

This awful calamity may be traced in the fate of LELAND and COLLINS: the one exhausted the finer faculties of his mind in the grandest views, and sunk under gigantic tasks; the other enthusiast sacrificed his reason and his happiness to his imagination.

LELAND, the father of our antiquaries, was an accomplished scholar, and his ample mind had embraced the languages of antiquity, those of his own age, and the ancient ones of his own country: thus he held all human learning by its three vast chains. He travelled abroad; and he cultivated poetry with the ardour he could even feel for the acquisition of words. On his return home, among other royal favours, he was appointed by Henry VIII. the king's antiquary, a title honourably created for Leland; for with him it became extinct. By this office he was empowered to search after English antiquities; to review the libraries of all the religious institutions, and to bring the records of antiquity "out of deadly darkness into lively light." This extensive power fed a passion already formed by the study of our old rude historians; his elegant taste perceived that they wanted those graces which he could lend them.

Six years were occupied, by uninterrupted travel and study, to survey our national antiquities; to note down everything observable for the history of the country and the honour of the nation. What a magnificent view has he sketched of this learned journey! In search of knowledge, Leland wandered on the sea-coasts and in the midland; surveyed towns and cities, and rivers, castles, cathedrals, and monasteries; tumuli, coins, and inscriptions; collected authors; transcribed MSS. If antiquarianism pored, genius too meditated in this sublime industry.