“I know not whether your subscribers have expected too much from you, but it appears to me that you expect too much from your subscribers; and that, however accurately you may understand the diseases of the age, you have certainly mistaken its temper. In the first place. Sir, your essays are too long. ‘Brevity,’ says a contemporary journalist, ‘is the humour of the times; a tragedy must not exceed fifteen hundred lines, a fashionable preacher must not trespass above fifteen minutes upon his congregation. We have short waistcoats and short campaigns; everything must be short—except lawsuits, speeches in Parliament, and tax-tables.’ It is expressly stated, in the prospectus of a collection of extracts, called the Beauties of Sentiment, that the extracts shall always be complete sense, and not very long. Secondly, Sir, though your essays appear in so tempting a shape to a lounger, the very fiends themselves were not more deceived by the apples, when
‘They, fondly thinking to allay Their appetite with gust, instead of fruit Chew’d bitter ashes,’ |
| 262 | LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE | Ætat. 35. |
“You have yourself observed that few converts were
made by Burke; but the cause which you
have assigned does not sufficiently explain why a man of such powerful talents
and so authoritative a reputation should have produced so little an effect upon
the minds of the people. Was it not because he neither was nor could be
generally understood? Because, instead of endeavouring to make difficult things
easy of comprehension, he made things which were easy in themselves, difficult
to be comprehended by the manner in which he presented them, evolving their
causes and involving their consequences, till the reader whose mind was not
habituated to metaphysical discussions, neither knew in what his arguments
began nor in what they ended? You have told me that the straightest line must
be the shortest; but do not you yourself sometimes nose out your way,
hound-like, in pursuit of truth, turning and winding, and doubling and running
when the same object might be reached in a tenth part of the time
| Ætat. 35. | OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. | 263 |
“The reader, Sir, must think before he can understand you; is it not a little unreasonable to require from him an effort which you have yourself described as so very painful a one? and is not this effort not merely difficult but in many cases impossible? All brains, Sir, were not made for thinking: modern philosophy has taught us that they are galvanic machines, and thinking is only an accident belonging to them. Intellect is not essential to the functions of life; in the ordinary course of society it is very commonly dispensed with; and we have lived, Mr. Friend, to witness experiments for carrying on government without it. This is surely a proof that it is a rare commodity; and yet you expect it in all your subscribers!
| 264 | LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE | Ætat. 35. |
“Give us your moral medicines in a more ‘elegant preparation.’ The Reverend J. Gentle administers his physic in the form of tea; Dr. Solomon prefers the medium of a cordial; Mr. Ching exhibits his in gingerbread nuts; Dr. Barton in wine; but you, Mr. Friend, come with a tonic bolus, bitter in the mouth, difficult to swallow, and hard of digestion.
“All this, were it not for the Sir and the Mr.
Friend, is like a real letter from me to you: I fell into the strain
without intending it, and would not send it were it not to show you that I
have attempted to do something. From jest I got into earnest, and, trying
to pass from earnest to jest failed. It was against the grain, and would
not do. I had re-read the eight last numbers, and the truth is, they left
me no heart for jesting or for irony. In time they will do their work; it
is the form of publication only that is unlucky, and that cannot now be
remedied. But this evil is merely temporary. Give two or three amusing
numbers, and you will hear of admiration from every side. Insert a few more
poems,—any that you have, except Christabel, for that is of too much
value. There is scarcely anything you could do which would excite so much
notice as if you were now to write the character of
Bonaparte, announced in former
times for ‘tomorrow,’ and to-morrow and to-morrow; and I think
it would do good by counteracting that base spirit of condescension towards
him, which I am
| Ætat. 35. | OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. | 265 |
