The Life and Letters of John Gibson Lockhart
Chapter 20: 1826-52
John Gibson Lockhart to John Wilson, 11 April 1851
“Sussex Place, Regent Park,
April 11, 1851.
“My dear Wilson,—I
was, I need not say, well pleased to hear of your restoration to health and all
your usual duties, as soon as of your having been out of order. Pray assure me
that all continues well with you.
“Quillinan
called here yesterday, and told me he understood you had declined to review the
‘Memoirs of William
Wordsworth,’ by his nephew, the canon of Westminster. I have this day got the book
and read two or three chapters. I fear it is clumsily executed—but these
opening chapters contain some very striking specimens of Wordsworth’s early letters, and I see,
on glancing through the book, more correspondence than I had expected; so that
there must be abundant interest of some kind in this book.
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LIFE OF J. G. LOCKHART. |
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“I have no notion what you think of the Prelude, but I confess it
very much disappointed me. Coleridge,
and you, and lesser men, had conspired to give me very lofty expectations. I
found it, on the whole, heavy, and what there is of life
in far greater proportion strong rhetorical declamation than poetry. But I am conscious that I may have outlived any degree of
capacity for feeling poetry that I ever had—albeit not much—and
would very gladly learn your impressions on now reading for yourself what you
had in young days listened to ex ore
magistri. Pray indulge me for once—and indeed if you
have no view of criticising the ‘Memoirs,’ nor are in communication with any one who counts on
your hints for an article thereon in Maga, anything that occurs to you on reading
this book too would be very thankfully received by me. I wonder who writes the two articles in Ebony on the Life of
Southey—if no secret, tell me. He has in various places
contradicted what I had said in the Quarterly Review,1
but nowhere, I think, brought any argument to his side. He is, however, an able
reviewer, and I should think has had suggestions from H. Taylor—though I can hardly doubt that
Taylor will in the Edinburgh Review, or
somewhere else, treat the ‘Life’ of his friend for himself. He
wished to write on it in the Quarterly, but as he would insist that of all men
Southey had the least vanity, I was reluctantly compelled to reject his always
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vigorous assistance. How good was Hogg’s communicating to
Southey what Jeffrey said about his being ‘about as conceited a
fellow as his neighbour Wordsworth.’ To be sure they were both magnificent
peacocks! I wish for a good letter of the Professor’s.
“Manning is, I
fancy, on the whole, next if not equal to Newman for importance as a convert: his influence very great in
society at large, as well as among the younger clergy. He is a very agreeable
and polished gentleman—a fine ascetical coxcomb (and
tuft-hunter)—the image of a Jesuit Cardinal of the sixteenth century, and
I expect him to be followed by a long train of ladies, including probably the
—— of ——, and Lady ——.1
“I am hopeful that Rutherford is really recovered, but even so think him wise in
taking the Bench, especially under existing circumstances as to
Whiggery.—Ever yours affectionately,
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834)
English poet and philosopher who projected
Lyrical Ballads (1798)
with William Wordsworth; author of
Biographia Literaria (1817),
On the Constitution of the Church and State (1829) and other
works.
James Hogg [The Ettrick Shepherd] (1770-1835)
Scottish autodidact, poet, and novelist; author of
The Queen's
Wake (1813) and
Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified
Sinner (1824).
Francis Jeffrey, Lord Jeffrey (1773-1850)
Scottish barrister, Whig MP, and co-founder and editor of the
Edinburgh
Review (1802-29). As a reviewer he was the implacable foe of the Lake School of
poetry.
John Gibson Lockhart (1794-1854)
Editor of the
Quarterly Review (1825-1853); son-in-law of Walter
Scott and author of the
Life of Scott 5 vols (1838).
Cardinal Henry Edward Manning (1808-1892)
Educated at Harrow and Balliol College, Oxford (where he was tutored by Herman Merviale),
he converted to Catholicism under the influence of John Henry Newman (1851), becoming
archbishop of Westminster in 1865.
Cardinal John Henry Newman (1801-1890)
Educated at Trinity College, Oxford, and Fellow of Oriel, he was a leader of the Oxford
Movement before becoming a Roman Catholic in 1845.
Edward Quillinan (1791-1851)
A poet of Irish Catholic descent who pursued a military career while issuing several
volumes published by his father-in-law Edgerton Brydges; after the death of his first wife
Jemima he married Dora Wordsworth in 1841.
Andrew Rutherfurd (1791-1854)
Originally Greenfield; he was educated at Edinburgh University and was Scottish advocate
(1812); solicitor-general in the Melbourne administration and Whig MP for Leith boroughs
(1839-1851).
William Henry Smith (1808-1872)
Writer for the
Athenaeum,
Blackwood's, and
Westminster Review; he published
A Discourse
on Ethics of the School of Paley (1839).
Robert Southey (1774-1843)
Poet laureate and man of letters whose contemporary reputation depended upon his prose
works, among them the
Life of Nelson, 2 vols (1813),
History of the Peninsular War, 3 vols (1823-32) and
The Doctor, 7 vols (1834-47).
Sir Henry Taylor (1800-1886)
Poet, writer for the
Quarterly Review, and autobiographer; he was
author of the tragedy
Philip van Artevelde (1834).
John Wilson [Christopher North] (1785-1854)
Scottish poet and Tory essayist, the chief writer for the “Noctes Ambrosianae” in
Blackwood's Magazine and professor of moral philosophy at Edinburgh
University (1820).
William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
With Coleridge, author of
Lyrical Ballads (1798), Wordsworth
survived his early unpopularity to succeed Robert Southey as poet laureate in 1843.
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine. (1817-1980). Begun as the
Edinburgh Monthly Magazine,
Blackwood's assumed the name of its proprietor, William Blackwood after the sixth
number. Blackwood was the nominal editor until 1834.
The Quarterly Review. (1809-1967). Published by John Murray, the
Quarterly was instigated by Walter
Scott as a Tory rival to the
Edinburgh Review. It was edited by
William Gifford to 1824, and by John Gibson Lockhart from 1826 to 1853.
