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No Delphic sage is wanted to divine
The shape of Truth heneath my passing line;
Yet these are truths—like schoolmates, once well-known,
But half remembered, not enough to own—
That lost from sight in life’s bewildering train,
May he, like strangers, introduced again;
Lully and Geber, and the learned crew,
That loved to talk of all they could not do.
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The favourable reception which has been given to my first volume
by the almost unanimous voice of those critics in whom the public reposes confidence, and
the very small portion of dissent, and generally on very small matters, which has leavened
the mass, would have afforded me no occasion for any observations, except to express my
grateful feeling for the liberality and kindliness displayed, and my sense of the ability
with which several of the reviewers have gone deeper than the surface, fairly and
impartially to trace the inner spirit of my purpose, and the objects it
| 2 | AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. |
It has been held that my narrative, as far as it has gone (the sequel being unknown), tends to the disparagement of the literary class or “profession,” and has consequently not only provoked the animadversions of members of that class or “profession,” but the ruse of carrying the war into the supposed enemy’s quarters, and charging me with ingratitude where I ought to have been exceedingly thankful for the success accorded to me.
“On their own merits, modest men are dumb;” and I am not about
to balance the account whether or not I have received more or less than my deservings; such
a consideration is totally beside the question. For I have not set up to glorify myself;
but to write the Memoirs of one whose whole life has been devoted to literature, not
concealing short-comings or errors, but as frankly and candidly as possible recording them,
to point a moral, even if, in other respects, it should fail to adorn a tale. This is the
declared aim of my work, and I have not shrunk more from the task (as is honestly remarked
in the Messrs. Chambers’s review of
it) than would be deemed justifiable in every well-constituted mind, conscious of
imperfections, the confession of which ought to withhold the arm raised to throw the first
stone. If I had attempted to paint myself in false and flattering colours, there would have
been a tolerable excuse for censuring the picture and not sparing the original; but I
humbly conceive that I have not committed so gross a misrepresentation, and was therefore
hardly amenable to the inapplicable law of a personal and individual test. If I were
| THE LITERARY PROFESSION. | 3 |
In legitimate criticism the main and proper business of the reviewer is
with the writings before him; and unless the writer dogmatically parades himself, or
inculcates dangerous doctrines, there is not a syllable out of the work, either about him
or his history, which are within the sphere of justifiable remark. Whether an author has
been gay and irregular, or a saint and a pattern, has very little to do with his text. In
teetotalism the most shocking drunkard always becomes the greatest apostle of temperance;
and the old proverb says, “The greater the sinner the greater the saint.” It is
an unwholesome principle, therefore, to attempt the rebuke of virtuous precepts, merely
because they may be uttered by some one who may not have fulfilled the duties of the
decalogue: it is a mode of judging that must be condemned. Perhaps, however, I admit in my
case it may be more allowable, if the
| 4 | AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. |
I am not so stupid as to expect from sanguine youth a general concurrence
in all the maxims of sobered age, and though the truism is obvious enough, and I may regret
with one of my friendly critics that certain “happy ideas” did not occur to me
“rather at the commencement than at the close of my career,” I must confess
that I consider such idiosyncrasy a phenomenon more to be desiderated than expected. I have
heard something of the impossibility of putting an old head on young shoulders; and even
were it possible, I should look upon the hybrid monster as a very disagreeable, ugly, and
unnatural production of Nature! I should like to lay the unction to my soul that it is,
nevertheless, only a slight approximation to this ancient-pated condition on juvenile
props, which has led to the misconception of my meaning in regard to “disparaging the
profession of literature;” and resentment and reproof for the offence. The gist of my
statements and reasonings from first to last has been, is, and will be the very reverse of
this! I maintain that literature is neither appreciated, encouraged, nor honoured as it
ought to be; and that its professors (if dependent altogether upon it) are liable to worse
usage and more misfortune than any other intellectual class in our social scheme. To those
of my brethren who are not far
| THE LITERARY PROFESSION. | 5 |
It was but yesterday I heard it gravely maintained, and by no uninfluential authorities, that the having produced a beauteous work of fiction, developing the inmost recesses and workings of human nature, the very essence of the philosophy of life, was proof that the author was unfit for public employment, and destitute of the qualifications necessary to form a statesman. What these qualifications, therefore, are, it is out of my power to divine, seeing that knowledge of mankind, admirable penetration, and astute discrimination, do not enter into the composition; but I merely note the objection to show how inimical, to the progress of a highly gifted individual, the possession of pre-eminent literary faculties are accounted. Deny it who may, there is a very general jealousy and fear attached to the literary character, which is anything but pleasant or beneficial to authors, in the usual run of worldly affairs.
What then has my biography said or done to expose it to the groundless
charge which calls forth these observations. Let me repeat: it submits the lesson and
experience
| 6 | AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. |
I have found it so, and I immolate myself for a beacon. If in so doing I
expose my individual mishaps more than a prudent and selfish reserve would dictate, I
thereon found a claim, not quite of exemption from severe interpretation, but upon generous
feelings (referring to the breast within) to find as much excuse as they can, and not seek
advantage from my history to make me out worse than I am. But above all, I require it to be
kept in sight that my opinion on
| THE LITERARY PROFESSION. | 7 |
To the youthful and earnest upholders of the dignity of their literary condition, I would as earnestly offer my counsel to take heed lest they fall. If only the improvident and misconducted fail, let them show me the provident and the discreet who have succeeded. A catalogue of such would, indeed, astonish me. Surely it cannot be contended that all the unsuccessful are careless, extravagant, reckless, vicious! Thousands, and tens of thousands, of aching hearts and broken-down fortunes, alas! are but too easily to be found to vouch for the fidelity of my descriptions, and the dismal force of my opinions.
But let it be understood that it is not the fault of literature—that
source of solace, even in misery, and of gratification in every phase of existence,—that
its apostles are thus visited and punished. Compare with them the fate of gentlemen,
perhaps retired officers from the two services, who may be induced, at a mature period of
their lives, to enter into trade. Who have ever witnessed one among fifty of them succeed
in business? I have not; but, just on the contrary, have seen them as unlucky and
squeezable by their more cunning competitors, to the manner born, as the literary man.
Acute, clever, diligent, they have not been brought up to it, and are unaware of what its
profitable cultivation requires. Impositions of every kind beset them
| 8 | AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. |
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O! would some Power the giftie gie us,
To see oursels as ithers see us;
It would frae mony a blunder free us
And foolish notion.
What airs and graces, and a’ would lea’ us,
And e’en devotion!
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