Chapter CXVIII

POINTS OF SIMILITUDE AND DISSIMILITUDE BETWEEN SIR THOMAS BROWN AND DOCTOR DOVE.

But in these serious works designed
To mend the morals of mankind,
We must for ever be disgraced
With all the nicer sons of taste,
If once the shadow to pursue
We let the substance out of view.
Our means must uniformly tend
In due proportion to their end,
And every passage aptly join
To bring about the one design.

CHURCHILL.

Dr. Johnson says that, “perhaps there is no human being, however hid in the crowd from the observation of his fellow mortals, who if he has leisure and disposition to recollect his own thoughts and actions, will not conclude his life in some sort a miracle, and imagine himself distinguished from all the rest of his species by many discriminations of nature or of fortune.” This remark he makes in relation to what Sir Thomas Brown asserts of the course of his own life, that it was “a miracle of thirty years, which to relate were not a history, but a piece of poetry, and would sound to common ears like a fable.” Now it is not known that any thing extraordinary ever befell him. “The wonders,” says Johnson, “probably were transacted in his own mind: self-love, cooperating with an imagination vigorous and fertile as that of Brown, will find or make objects of astonishment in every man's life.”

What the Philosopher of Norwich considered as miraculous was probably this, that he had escaped from “Pyrrho's maze,” and had never been contaminated in Epicurus' sty; that he had neither striven for place among the “wrangling crew” nor sought to make his way with the sordid herd; that he had not sold himself to the service of Mammon; but in mature years and with deliberate judgement had chosen a calling in which he might continually increase his knowledge and enlarge his views, and entertain a reasonable hope that while he endeavoured to relieve the sufferings of his fellow creatures and discipline his own mind, the labours wherein his life was past would neither be useless to others nor to himself. He might well consider it a miracle of divine mercy that grace had been given him to fulfil the promise made for him at his baptism, and that he had verily and indeed renounced the pomps and vanities of this wicked world. He might indeed take comfort in his “authentic reflections how far he had performed the great intention of his Maker;—whether he had made good the principles of his nature and what he was made to be; what characteristic and special mark he had left to be observable in his generation; whether he had lived to purpose or in vain; and what he had added, acted, or performed, that might considerably speak him a man.”

There were more resemblances between Sir Thomas Brown and the Doctor than Fluellen discovered between Henry of Monmouth and Alexander the Great. Both graduated in the same profession at the same university; and each settled as a practitioner in a provincial town. (Doncaster indeed was an inconsiderable place compared with Norwich; and Brown merely procured his degree at Leyden, which was not in his time, as it was in Daniel Dove's, the best school of physic in Europe.) Both too were Philosophers as well as Physicians, and both were alike speculative in their philosophy and devout. Both were learned men. Sir Thomas Brown might have said of himself with Herbert,

I know the ways of learning; both the head
And pipes that feed the press and make it run;
What reason hath from nature borrowed,
Or of itself, like a good housewife, spun
In laws and policy: what the Stars conspire;
What willing Nature speaks, what forced by fire;
Both the old discoveries, and the new found seas:
The stock and surplus, cause and history:
All these stand open, or I have the keys.

The Doctor could not have said this; he would rather have said,

I am but one who do the world despise
And would my thoughts to some perfection raise,
A wisdom-lover, willing to be wise.[1]

Yet he was as justly entitled to the appellation of a learned man by his multifarious knowledge, as he was far from pretending to it. There were many things of which he was ignorant, and contented to be ignorant, because the acquirement would not have been worth the cost. Brown would have taken with just confidence a seat at the Banquet of the Philosophers, whereas Dove would have thought himself hardly worthy to gather up the crumbs that fell from their table.

[Footnote 1: LORD STIRLING.]

A certain melancholy predominated as much in the constitution of Sir Thomas's mind, as in that of Charles the First, to whom his portrait bears so remarkable a resemblance; and a certain mirth entered as largely into the composition of the Doctor's, as it did into Charles the Second's, to whom in all moral respects no one could be more utterly unlike. The elements have seldom been so happily mixed as they were in the Philosopher of Norwich; he could not have been perfectly homogeneous if a particle of the quintelement had been superadded;—such an ingredient would have marred the harmony of his character: whereas the Philosopher of Doncaster would have been marred without a large portion of it.

It was a greater dissimilarity, and altogether to be regretted, that my Doctor left no “characteristic and special mark to be observable in his generation;” but upon this I shall make some observations hereafter. What led me to compare these persons, incomparable each in his own way, was that my Doctor, though he did not look upon his own history as miraculous, considered that the course of his life had been directed by a singular and special Providence. How else could it have been that being an only son,—an only child, the sole representative in his generation of an immemorial line,—his father instead of keeping him attached to the soil, as all his forefathers had been, should have parted with him for the sake of his moral and intellectual improvement, not with a view to wealth or worldly advancement, but that he might seek wisdom and ensue it?—that with no other friend than the poor schoolmaster of a provincial townlet, and no better recommendation, he should have been placed with a master by whose care the defects of his earlier education were supplied, and by whose bounty, after he had learned the practical routine of his profession, he was sent to study it as a science in a foreign university, which a little before had been raised by Boerhaave to its highest reputation;—that not only had his daily bread been given him without any of that wearing anxiety which usually attends upon an unsettled and precarious way of life, but in the very house which when sent thither in boyhood he had entered as a stranger, he found himself permanently fixed, as successively the pupil, the assistant, the friend, and finally the successor and heir of his benefactor;—above all, that he had not been led into temptation, and that he had been delivered from evil.

“My life,” said an unfortunate poor man who was one of the American Bishop Hobart's occasional correspondents, “has been a chapter of blunders and disappointments.” John Wilkes said that “the chapter of accidents is the longest chapter in the book;” and he, who had his good things here, never troubled himself to consider whether the great volume were the Book of Chance, or of Necessity, the Demogorgon of those by whom no other deity is acknowledged. With a wiser and happier feeling Bishop White Kennett when he was asked “where are we?” answered the question thus,—“in a world where nothing can be depended on but a future state; in the way to it, little comfort but prayers and books.” White Kennett might have enjoyed more comfort if he had been born in less contentious times, or if he had taken less part in their contentions, or if he had been placed in a less conspicuous station. Yet he had little cause to complain of his lot, and he has left behind him good works and a good name.

There is scarcely any man who in thoughtfully contemplating the course of his own life, would not find frequent reason to say,—

_in fede mia
Ho fatto bene a non fare a mio modo._[2]

The Doctor however was one of the very few who have never been put out of their designed course, and never been disposed to stray from it.

_Spesso si perde il buono
Cercando il meglio. E a scegliere il sentiero
Chi vuol troppo esser saggio,
Del tempo abusa, e non fa mai viaggio._[3]

[Footnote 2: RICCIARDETTO.]

[Footnote 3: METASTASIO.]

INTERCHAPTER XV.

THE AUTHOR RECOMMENDS A CERTAIN WELL-KNOWN CHARACTER AS A CANDIDATE FOR HONOURS, BOTH ON THE SCORE OF HIS FAMILY AND HIS DESERTS. HE NOTICES ALSO OTHER PERSONS WHO HAVE SIMILAR CLAIMS.

_Thoricht, auf Bessrung der Thoren zu harren!
Kinder der klugheit, o habet die Narren
Eben zum Narren auch, wie sich's gehort._

GOETHE.

In these days when honours have been so profusely distributed by the most liberal of Administrations and the most popular of Kings, I cannot but think that Tom Fool ought to be knighted. And I assure the reader that this is not said on the score of personal feeling, because I have the honour to be one of his relations, but purely with regard to his own claims, and the fitness of things, as well as to the character of the Government.

It is disparaging him, and derogatory to his family, which in undisputed and indisputable antiquity exceeds any other in these kingdoms,—it is disparaging him, I say, to speak of him as we do of Tom Duncombe, and Tom Cribb, and Tom Campbell; or of Tom Hood and Tom Moore, and Tom Sheridan; and before them of Tom Browne and Tom D'Urfey, and Tom Killigrew. Can it be supposed if he were properly presented to his Majesty (Lord Nugent would introduce him), and knelt to kiss the royal hand, that our most gracious and good-natured King would for a moment hesitate to give him the accollade, and say to him “Rise Sir Thomas!”

I do not ask for the Guelphic Order; simple Knighthood would in this case be more appropriate.

It is perfectly certain that Sir Thomas More, if he were alive, would not object to have him for a brother knight and namesake. It is equally certain that Sir Thomas Lethbridge could not, and ought not.

Dryden was led into a great error by his animosity against Hunt and Shadwell when he surmised that “dullness and clumsiness were fated to the name of Tom.” “There are,” says Serjeant Kite, “several sorts of Toms; Tom o'Lincoln, Tom Tit, Tom Tell-truth, Tom o'Bedlam and Tom Fool!” With neither of these is dullness or clumsiness associated. And in the Primitive World, according to the erudite philologist who with so much industry and acumen collected the fragments of its language, the word itself signified just or perfect. Therefore the first Decan of the constellation Virgo was called Tom, and from thence Court de Gebelin derives Themis: and thus it becomes evident that Themistocles belongs to the Toms. Let no Thomas then or Sir Thomas, who has made shipwreck of his fortune or his reputation or of both, consider himself as having been destined to such disgrace by his godfathers and godmothers when they gave him that name. The name is a good name. Any one who has ever known Sir Thomas Acland may like it and love it for his sake: and no wise man will think the worse of it for Tom Fool's.

No! the name Thomas is a good name, however it has been disparaged by some of those persons who are known by it at this time. Though Bovius chose to drop it and assume the name Zephiriel in its stead in honour of his tutelary Angel, the change was not for the better, being indeed only a manifestation of his own unsound state of mind. And though in the reign of King James the First, Mr. William Shepherd of Towcester christened his son by it for a reason savouring of disrespect, it is not the worse for the whimsical consideration that induced him to fix upon it. The boy was born on the never to be forgotten fifth of November 1605, about the very hour when the Gunpowder Treason was to have been consummated; and the father chose to have him called Thomas, because he said this child if he lived to grow up would _hardly believe_ that ever such wickedness could be attempted by the sons of men.

It is recorded that a parrot which was seized by a kite and carried into the air, escaped by exclaiming _Sancte Thoma adjuva me!_ for upon that powerful appeal the kite relaxed his hold, and let loose the intended victim. This may be believed, though it is among the miracles of Thomas a Becket, to whom and not to the great schoolman of Aquino, nor the Apostle of the East, the invocation was addressed. Has any other human name ever wrought so remarkable a deliverance?

Has any other name made a greater noise in the world. Let Lincoln tell, and Oxford; for although “_omnis clocha clochabilis in clocherio clochando, clochans clochativo, clochare facit clochabiliter clochantes,_” yet among them all, Master Janotus de Bragmardo would have assigned pre-eminence to the mighty Toms.

The name then is sufficiently vindicated, even if any vindication were needed, when the paramount merits of my claimant are considered.

Merry Andrew likewise should be presented to receive the same honour, for sundry good reasons, and especially for this, that there is already a Sir Sorry Andrew.

I should also recommend Tom Noddy, were it not for this consideration, that the honour would probably soon be merged in an official designation, and therefore lost upon him; for when a certain eminent statesman shall be called from the Lower House, as needs he must ere long, unless the party who keep moving and push him forward as their leader, should before that time relieve him of his hereditary rights, dignities, and privileges, no person can possibly be found so worthy to succeed him in office and tread in his steps, as Tom Noddy.

Nor is Jack Pudding to be forgotten who is cousin-german to that merry man Andrew! He moreover deserves it by virtue of his Puddingship; the Puddings are of an ancient and good family: the Blacks in particular boast of their blood.

Take reader this epigram of that cheerful and kind-hearted schoolmaster Samuel Bishop of Merchant Taylors, written in his vocation upon the theme _Aliusque et Idem_—

Five countries from five favorite dishes name
The popular stage buffoon's professional name.
Half fish himself, the Dutchman never erring
From native instinct, styles him _Pickle Herring_.
The German whose strong palate _haut-gouts_ fit,
Calls him _Hans Werst_, that is _John-Sausage-Wit_.
The Frenchman ever prone to _badinage_
Thinks of his soup, and shrugs, _Eh! voila Jean Potage!_
Full of ideas his sweet food supplies,
The Italian, _Ecco Macaroni!_ cries.
While English Taste, whose board with dumplin smokes,
Inspired by what it loves, applauds _Jack Pudding's_ jokes.
A charming bill of fare, you'll say, to suit
One dish, and that one dish a Fool, to boot!

“A learned man will have it,” says Fuller, “that Serapis is nothing more than Apis with the addition of the Hebrew _Sar_, a Prince, whence perchance our English Sir.” Odd, that the whole beast should have obtained this title in Egypt, and a part of it in England. For we all know that Loin of Beef has been knighted, and who is not pleased to meet with him at dinner? and John Barleycorn has been knighted, and who is not willing to pledge him in all companies in a glass?

But wherefore should I adduce precedents, as if in this age any regard were paid to them in the distribution of honours, or there could be any need of them in a case which may so well stand upon its own merits.