Chapter XXVIII: Act III: Scene II (7)

68. _He is owner of all he surveys._ ‘I am monarch of all I survey.’
Cowper’s _Verses supposed to be written by Alexander Selkirk_.

69. _A barker in Monmouth Street._ A shop-tout or sham auctioneer. See
vol. VI. _Mr. Northcote’s Conversations_, note to p. 459.

_A slop-seller in Radcliffe Highway._ It will be remembered that the
Marrs kept a lace and pelisse warehouse, 29 Ratcliffe Highway. See
De Quincey’s _Murder considered as one of the Fine Arts_.

_Pennant._ _Some Account of London_, 1790. 4to. A well-known and much
appreciated topographical account that passed through several
editions in the early years of last century.

_Where Hicke’s Hall formerly stood._ Hicks’s Hall, formerly in St.
John Street, Clerkenwell. The milestones on the Great North Road
were measured from here.

70. _Cider-Cellar._ The tavern at 20, Maiden Lane, a favourite resort
of Porson’s, who furnished the Latin motto over the door, ‘Honos
erit huic quoque homo.’

_Shorter excursions tries._ Pope, _An Essay on Criticism_, 737–8.

_White-conduit House._ For this (Pentonville) and Bagnigge Wells
(King’s Cross) see Vol. IV. note to p. 108.

_Rosemary Branch._ At Peckham. See Vol. VI. _Table Talk_, note to p.
88.

_Catch the breezy air._ Wordsworth, ‘Lines written in Early Spring’
(_Lyrical Ballads_, 1798).

_There’s nought so sweet on earth._ One of Moore’s ‘Irish Melodies.’

_Brahams._ John Abraham, tenor singer (1774–1856). ‘He was,’ said Sir
Walter Scott, ‘a beast of an actor, but an angel of a singer.’ He
began life by selling lead pencils in London streets as a boy, made
an enormous fortune as the greatest tenor singer of his day, and
squandered it in building St. James’s Theatre and buying the
Colosseum in Regent’s Park (See Vol. VI. _Mr. Northcote’s
Conversations_, note to p. 429).

_Durusets._ J. B. Duruset, singer (See the _Literary Gazette_ of June
26 and July 3, 1824).

71. _An hour by St. Dunstan’s clock._ Cf. ‘We rose both at an instant,
and fought a long hour by Shrewsbury clock.’ _1 King Henry IV_. V.
4.

_Copenhagen-house._ A tavern and tea-garden in North London between
Maiden Lane and Hogbush Lane. See Vol. VI. _Table Talk_, p. 86–89.

72. _For how should the soul of Socrates._ _The Road to Ruin_, Act
III. 2.

_Hole in the Wall._ In Chancery Lane, kept by Randall the pugilist.
See Vol. VI. _Table Talk_, note to p. 202.

_The poet Jago._ Richard Jago (1715–1781), author of _Edge Hill_.

_Anthony Collins._ The deist (1676–1729), author of a _Discourse of
Freethinking_ (1713).

73. _Mr. Dunster ... the fishmonger in the Poultry._ See _Memoirs of
W. Hazlitt_. II. 310. His real name was, apparently, Fisher, of Duke
Street, St. James’s.

74. _The Story of the King of Bohemia._ _Tristram Shandy_, viii. 19.

76. _See Round Table_, _Vol._ II. p. 116. See Vol. I. pp. 122, _et
seq._

_This bottle’s the sun of our table._ R. B. Sheridan’s _The Duenna_,
III. 5. 76. _Bannister, King._ John Bannister (1760–1836), Thomas
King (1730–1805).

_Mr. Justice Shallow._ _2 King Henry IV._, III. 2.

77. _A species alone._ ‘The Phœnix Pindar is a vast species alone.’
Cowley, _The Praise of Pindar_.

ESSAY VIII. ON THE SPIRIT OF OBLIGATIONS

From _The New Monthly Magazine_, ‘Table Talk, XI.,’ No. 37, Vol. X. 1824.

78. _Nihil humani._ Terence, _Heautontimorumenos_, I. 1.

80. _Make mouths at the invisible event._ _Hamlet_, IV. 4.

_Born for their use, etc._ Young’s _The Revenge_, V. 2.

81. _Wise saws._ _As You Like It_, II. 7.

82. _Mr. Wilberforce._ William Wilberforce (1759–1833), the
parliamentary leader of the anti-slavery cause. See Vol. IV. _The
Spirit of the Age_, pp. 331, _et seq._

83. _If to their share._ Pope, _The Rape of the Lock_, II., 17–18.

‘If to her share some female errors fall,
Look on her face, and you’ll forget ’em all.’

_A Howard._ John Howard (1726–1790), prison philanthropist.

_A Sir Hudson Lowe._ 1769–1844. As jailor of Napoleon in St. Helena he
endured much obloquy.

_Charity covers a multitude of sins._ _1 Peter_, iv. 8.

_The meanest peasant on the bleakest mountain._ Sterne’s _Sentimental
Journey_. The Bourbonnois.

_Talma._ François Joseph Talma (1763–1826), one of the greatest of
French tragic actors.

84. _Mr. Justice Fielding._ William, eldest son of the novelist
(1748–1820). He was magistrate for Westminster.

_Colonel Bath._ In _Amelia_.

_Administer to a mind diseased._ _Macbeth_, V. 3.

85. _A little lower than the angels._ _Psalms_ viii. 5.

_And when I think that his immortal wings._ _Heaven and Earth_, Part
I. Scene 1.

_The person whose doors I enter with most pleasure._ ? Northcote’s.

86. _Enter_ [Open] _Sessami_. The words that opened the cave door in
_Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves_.

87. _The late Mr. Sheridan._ Richard Brinsley Sheridan died in 1816.

_Coin his smile for drachmas._ ‘I had rather coin my heart, and drop
my blood for drachmas.’ _Julius Cæsar_, IV. 3.

ESSAY IX. ON THE OLD AGE OF ARTISTS

From _The New Monthly Magazine_, No. 33, Vol. VIII., 1823, ‘Table Talk, VIII.’

88. _Mr. Nollekens._ Joseph Nollekens, died in 1823.

‘_A man’s a man for a’ that._’ Burns, ‘Is there for honest poverty.’

89. _Chantry._ Sir Francis Legatt Chantrey (1781–1841). The wealth he
accumulated by means of his art was given to the Royal Academy for
the purchase of works of art executed in Great Britain.

_Have wrought himself to stone._ Cf. ‘I have not yet forgot myself to
stone.’ Pope, _Eloisa to Abelard_, 24.

_As when a vulture on Imaus bred._ _Paradise Lost_, III. 431.

89. _Bernini._ Giovanni Lorenzo Bernini (1598–1680), painter, sculptor
and architect. He was called the Michael Angelo of his times.

_Roubilliac._ Louis Francis Roubilliac, French sculptor (d. 1762). He
executed the statue of Sir Isaac Newton, Trinity College, Cambridge.
The monument to the Duke of Argyle, in Westminster Abbey, is his.

_Day._ Alexander Day, miniature painter and picture-dealer
(1772–1841).

_Barry._ James T. Barry, painter and art critic (1741–1806), who was
patronised by Burke.

_And by the force of blear illusion._

‘As by the strength of their illusion
Shall draw him on to his confusion.’
_Macbeth_, III. 5.

See also ‘blear illusion,’ Comus, 155, and vol. IV. _The Spirit of the
Age_, p. 214, where the same combination occurs.

90. _Flaxman._ John Flaxman (1755–1826), sculptor and designer.

_Cosway._ Richard Cosway (d. 1821), the miniaturist.

_Bears a charmed life._ _Macbeth_, V. 7.

_Exhibition at Somerset-house._ The Royal Academy’s rooms were there.
See vol. VI. _Conversations of James Northcote_, note to p. 435.

91. _His life spins round on its soft axle._

‘Or she from west her silent course advance
With inoffensive pace that spinning sleeps
On her soft axle.’
_Paradise Lost_, VIII. 165.

_Age cannot wither._ _Antony and Cleopatra_, II. 2.

92. _Captain Englefield and his crew._ ‘Captain Englefield and his
crew escaping from the wreck of the Centaur’ was Northcote’s first
‘historical’ picture.

_One Jeffrey ... artist._ ? James Jeffreys (1757–1784), who obtained
the gold medal for the best historical picture in 1774, and whose
‘Destruction of the Spanish Batteries before Gibraltar’ was engraved
by Woollett.

93. _His story of Isabella._ _The Decameron_, Fourth Day, Fifth Novel.

_West_ (_the late President of the Royal Academy_). Benjamin West, who
was elected P.R.A. on the death of Sir Joshua Reynolds in 1792. He
died in 1820.

94. _Of no mark or likelihood._ _1 King Henry IV._, III. 2.

95. _Loutherbourg._ Philip James Loutherbourg (1740–1812), landscape
painter.

_Blake._ William Blake, poet and artist (1759–1827).

_Sharp._ William Sharp, engraver (1740–1824). He was a follower of
Mesmer, Swedenborg and Joanna Southcott.

_Varley._ John Varley, landscape-painter (1778–1842).

96. _Mr. Cipriani._ Giambattista Cipriani, a painter of Florentine
birth and one of the original members of the Royal Academy
(1727–1785).

_Shall look upon his like again._ _Hamlet_, I. 2.

97. _Present no mark to the foe-man_ [enemy]. _2 King Henry IV._, III.
4.

_Defy augury._ _Hamlet_, V. 2.

ESSAY X. ON ENVY (A DIALOGUE)

_Teniers._ David Teniers, the younger (1610–1694). See vol. VIII.
_Lectures on the English Comic Writers_, pp. 139 and 141 and notes.

_Wilkie._ Sir David Wilkie (1785–1841).

98. _Hoppner._ John Hoppner (1759–1810), portrait and landscape
painter, who excelled in portraits of women and children.

——. Mr. W. C. Hazlitt suggests that Godwin is meant.

99. _Turner._ J. M. W. Turner, the greatest English landscape painter
(1775–1851).

_The wisest, meanest of mankind._ Pope’s _Essay on Man_, Ep. IV. 281,
applied to Bacon.

_W_***. Wellington.

100. _Lord Castlereagh._ See _ante_, note to p. 13.

_To throw a cruel sunshine on a fool._ Armstrong, _The Art of
Preserving Health_, Book IV.

_The Miss Hornecks._ See vol. VI. _Table Talk_, note to p. 93.

_Mr. C——._ Croker.

101. Note. Richard Cumberland (1732–1811), the dramatist, described by
Goldsmith as ‘the Terence of England.’

102. _Incredulus odi._ Horace, _De Arte Poet._, 188.

103. _Acis and Galatea._ A serenata by John Gay (1688–1732), produced
at the Haymarket with Handel’s music, 1732. See the 1st chorus in
part II.

104. _Mr. Croley._ George Croly (1780–1860), author of the romance of
_Salathiel_ (1829), and numerous other works.

105. _The Royal Society of Authors._ Probably the Royal Society for
the advancement of General Literature, founded 1823. Croly was on
the council.

_Sir Andrew Wylie._ John Galt’s (1779–1839) novel, _Sir Andrew Wylie
of that Ilk_, was published in 1822.

107. _Galled his kibe._ _Hamlet_, V. 1.

_Sir Peter Lely._ Pieter Van der Faes (1618–1680), whose father
changed the family name to Lely; painter (of Westphalian birth) of
the Beauties of the Court of Charles II.

ESSAY XI. ON SITTING FOR ONE’S PICTURE

From _The New Monthly Magazine_, No. 35, Vol. VIII., 1823, ‘Table Talk, IX.’

107. _The beggar in the street._ The Author himself painted a small
portrait in oils of a poor old woman whom he met near Manchester in
1803. [W. C. H.]

108. _When he sat to me._ In 1804, when the sitter was in his 67th
year, and Unitarian Minister at Wem in Shropshire.... The picture is
still in a fair state of preservation. [W. C. H.]

109. _The late Mr. Opie._ John Opie (1761–1807), historical painter.

_Invisible or dimly seen._ _Paradise Lost_, V. 157.

111. _The Bunburys._ See vol. VI. _Mr. Northcote’s Conversations_,
note to p. 454.

_Happy alchemy of mind._ Cf. vol. V. _Lectures on the English Poets_,
note to p. 107.

_Vandyke married a daughter of Earl Gower._ He married, about 1639,
Maria Ruthven, granddaughter of the first Earl of Gowrie. See
_Conversations of James Northcote, R.A., with James Ward_, p. 92,
where Northcote is reported as wroth with Hazlitt for having given
the Earl’s name as Cowper. The change from Cowper to Gower, as given
in the present text, is because of an erratum-direction to that
effect behind the ‘Contents of the First Volume,’ in the original
edition.

_A painter of the name of Astley ... Lady ——._ John Astley,
portrait-painter (?1730–1787), married Lady Daniell. See Redgrave’s
Dictionary.

112. _Had Petrarch gained his Laura, etc._

‘Think you, if Laura had been Petrarch’s wife,
He would have written sonnets all his life?’
_Don Juan_, Canto III. Stanza 8.

112. _St. Preux._ In Rousseau’s _Julie ou la Nouvelle Héloïse_ (1760).

113. _Till the sense aches at it._ _Othello_, IV. 2.

_Amorous toys of light-winged Cupid._

‘Light-wing’d toys of feather’d Cupid.’
_Othello_, I. 3.

_Canova._ Antonio Canova (1757–1822), Venetian sculptor.

114. _The world forgetting._ Pope’s _Eloisa to Abelard_, 208.

_Or stock-dove plain amid the forest deep._ Thomson, _The Castle of
Indolence_, I. 4.

_Think of its crimes._ Thomson, _An Hymn on Solitude_.

115. _Lord Keppel._ Augustus Viscount Keppel (1725–1786), one of the
English Admirals. He and his second in command, Sir Hugh Palliser,
were court-martialled for permitting the French fleet to escape
after an indecisive battle off Ushant, 27th July 1778. Both were
acquitted.

_Mr. C——r ... made the House stare._ See _Hansard_, N. S., IX., 1211,
June 25, 1823, for Croker’s remarks.

116. _To lie like Whitfield._ Whitfield was buried in 1770. When the
coffin was opened in 1784, the body was found to be perfect. See L.
Tyerman’s _Life_, II. 602–3. Possibly it is to this that Hazlitt
refers.

_Warm, kneaded motion to a clog._

This sensible warm motion to become
A kneaded clod.
_Measure for Measure_, III. 1.

ESSAY XII. WHETHER GENIUS IS CONSCIOUS OF ITS POWERS

117. _Bolingbroke._ Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke (1672–1751),
statesman, writer and friend of Pope.

_Sir William Temple._ Diplomatist and essayist (1628–1700).

_Sees not itself._ _Julius Cæsar_, I. 2.

_A phœnix gazed by all._ _Paradise Lost_, V. 272.

118. _Materiam superabat opus._ Ovid, Met., II. 5.

_Our poesy is a gum which issues_ [oozes]. _Timon of Athens_, I. 1.

119. _Invita Minervâ._ See _ante_, note to p. 8.

120. _The glory, the intuition, the amenity._ Lamb’s ‘Lines on the
Celebrated Picture by Leonardo da Vinci, called “The Virgin of the
Rocks.”’

_Through happiness or pains._ Pope’s _Epistle to Mr. Jervas_, l. 68.

_I write this at Winterslow._ See vol. VI. _Table Talk_, note to p.
90.

_My mind to me a kingdom is._ From Sir Edward Dyer’s lyric in Byrd’s
_Psalms and Sonnets_ (1588).

_That character of Millimant._ See vol. VIII. _Lectures on the English
Comic Writers_, pp. 73–4.

_Signior Orlando Friscobaldo._ In Dekker’s _The Honest Whore_, Part
II. See vol. V. _Lectures on the Literature of the Age of
Elizabeth_, pp. 335, _et seq._

122. _Webster or Deckar._ John Webster (? d. 1625) and Thomas Dekker
(c. 1570–c. 1637). See vol. v. _Lectures on the Dramatic Literature
of the Age of Elizabeth_.

_Schlegel._ In his _Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature_. See vol.
I. _Characters of Shakespear’s Plays_, note to p. 171.

_The Descent of Liberty._ Leigh Hunt’s Mask, with a dedication from
Surrey Jail was published in 1815.

122. _When the mighty fell._ Napoleon.

123. _Cried out upon in the top of the compass._ Cf. _Hamlet_, III. 2.

‘You would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass.’

and II. 2.

‘An eyrie of children, little eyases, that cry out on the top of
question.’

_Mr. Jerdan recommends the volume of Characteristics._ See vol. III.
of the present edition for Hazlitt’s _Characteristics_, and
particulars of their publication. The book was favourably reviewed
in the _Literary Gazette_ for July 12, 1823.

_The Story of Rimini._ Published in 1816, and savagely reviewed in
_Blackwood’s Magazine_, May 1818.

_An Adonis of fifty._ See vol. IV. _The Spirit of the Age_, note to p.
358.

_Return, Alpheus._ _Lycidas_, 132–3.

_Look abroad into universality._ Bacon, _Advancement of Learning_,