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THE ENGLI3H. E3S/,Y-

A THESIS SUB:iiITTED TO r HE FACULTY OF TI18

GRADUATE SCHOOL O'fi' THE TTNIV.'.'.:RJ ITY OF 11 r ~mssOTA

BY

VPNE:ST J. COLBFRG I

IN PAfTV.L FTJLFILLi~LJ:NT O:;' THE

DOCT~R OF P3I~031 HV

I I •el• I• t 1

I tt I ',, :' It t t It

1909 I.GENr.'RAL . Essays of British Rs sayists ---- e.C. >tark·Neather, LY.,1900 2 vols. 11 11 " American 11 " l . Y., 1900. The English ~ssay - Its Developnent and Sone of its Perfected Types ------C.B . Bradley 0 California University Chronicle 1;383 - 402 ). The Essay as Mood and ~or~ ----- Richard 1urt~n ( Foru.n 3~ ; 119-26 ) . The Fssay as Literary For.n and ~uali t v --- F . :: . :.abrlskie ( Nev Princeton 1eview 4 : 227-46 ) . The Essayists ---- ( Living ~ge 151:67-80 ) . Essays and ~dsay ~riting ---- T.Clarencq ( alaxy 1:677-81 ). The British ~ssay ists ---- ( lo. Anerican. evlHa 84 : 502-514 ). The Fs. ay and So.ae r.ssayists---- Ha :iil tn 1 . • 'ql i ( B o~.an 9·504- 11 ) . The Sssay Conside red froill an \rtis tic Point of Vie·v i· . H. L . · atson ( .est. in' ter evie 141 : 559-G6 ) . 'Ihe 'Rssay --- - F • . • Pattee ( hautau uan30 :628 - 34 ). Essayists Old and ~e·1 ---- ( lLiving 1 ge 75 : 260-83 ) . The Jld-Fashioned ~s say ---- ( ~asy Chair, : arper 105: 02- 3 ). Old and New Essayists ---- ( Living tee 218 : 832 - ~6 ) · 101nan and the Fssay ---- Ed itn l:Hc ~:scm ( Dinl ~1:309-10 ) .

Ro-ant ic •ssavs' ----Jeane tte ~ . P· ( ryCritic "0 :3 6-Gl ) . The rssay \ncient and lodern - - -- ( 'cadeny 6 :6 I -12 ) .

2 . ,tJOWL\ rcn .. ------( 6hau trnquan 32: 102-G ) . in L' histoire de la litte r ' tur·) franc·liC'!e pp . 316-33 " a.Lanson, Paric 190).

:· . y . 1852. 18th Century ~ssays ---- Austin Dobn 1 His tory of Fnr,l inh l~o.::J.antic is in t!'lc 1.2 h ~en Ur'' ---- H. A . ccrs 'f . Y . 1803 .

t :says on the Tatler,S;> ctator.Guardia'1 ----- Jath

Londor. 12.::9 . r.ssays ------,' illia.n lla71.itt 'iehtGenti:1 ::::entury Literature ---- Td.u.1d Gosse London 1859 .

1/8 '70 '..)hilosophy of ·;·nclish Lit ratur' ---- J . .asco .. r . Y. 167u .

R~latinn of the I7th Century Char acter to the ri~d:cal r~Aay ------~ .C. Baldwin (Pub . lad . i..iAnf . /sc-; ' n . I9 : 7f-Jl5 ) .

The lritish 'ssayists ---- ( Uo. Ar erican :4 : 319-GC ) .

rssay ~riting and the ~ress ---- Do Bo.•; , • · ic •: 5 : 30:7 ) .

The Essay in the 18th .entury T; • 13owPn Swan c ·,3vicw 10:12-29 ) .

~ppre c i ations ------~alter Pater Lon on 1889 .

The Li terar :r ]is tor y of ··neland in t-10 "nd of t rn 13th and

Begi minr of th 19th e'1tu1·y ---- r • r~ liphant 2 voL, . :; . Y . 16.:.2 .

~ssays "reat and :~all --- -E . Fuller ( Critjc -17 : 24 -a ).

The " rosp rity of the E say Outloox 81 : 691-9 ) .

Conte.n_:)orary ··rsavs ---- ( 'tlantic 73:202-9 ).

Sone R(3Crrnt Fssays ---- Louis3 C. :dlcox ( "o . '_.P.ric·rn I.n ... L3:7~0-9 ) .

Conte.nporary 1,n1;rican T'ssa7ris s ---- .., . P 1:-- ( Poru ?3 ; 1>-.,7-97} .

R9cenl \~crican 1 ssBys T7' . ' . Colby ( O')' a n 20 : 316- 9 and 473-6) . THE FOLLO SING E'>SAYS HAVE BEEN CONS JLT:?D .

Michel de Montaigne : Essays . Trans . b~ Florio . N. Y. 1907 . Francis Bacon Robert Burton Anatomy of elancholy . London 1845 . Thomas Srowne Religio Medici and other writings . Introduction by C. H. Herford .

Abraham Cowl ey : ~ orks. London 1700. Tho:na s Fuller : Holy and Profane State. London 184 I.

Richard St eele Tatler, S pectator , Guardian , English~an. Joseph Addison II II " Samuel Johnson Ra 11b 1 er, Id 1 er. orks . I2 vols. London 1810 .

Oliver Goldsmith .. or~~s . Charles Griffin Co. London.

The Gleaner, a collection of 18th century essays by Nathan Drake . 4 vols . L0ndon I81I .

~ illiam Ha7litt : Es says . In Chandos Classics . London 1589.

LPigh Hunt ; Charles Lamb : Essays of Elia. Introduction b 'int;er.

Also in very~an ' s Library . London.

T. B.Macaulay Thomas Carlyle Heroes and Hero 11 orship . N.Y. 1890. Thomas De ,iu1ncey : Opium. Eater and other iritinc;s. Cassel N.Y. Washineton Irving ; Sketch Book • Every an' s Library . London.

ti ti ti R . ":. Emerson Laurence Sterne : .. orks • 6 vols . r. y . 1904 .

Henry Fielding : Hist ~ ry of Joseph Andrews . London 1889 . I

The no.nAnclature of literature is a lan5uaee of suggestions . Fine acad~~ic distinctions,congenial to th · average .:i ind fro. the sense of defi'1it ness t:i.ey i spir~,are thv;artect by the weakness of this their nost valued advant~re . They ell seek .nore or less artificiall 11 to giv~ t'.'ln.t aid .1'..ich . hall bolster up and propel th ~ ";eakling along the sa :ie col rs 3 which the strong follows unaided . Again,no provis'on is 1adP for the creative crafts nan and the i.nprcss ion is tic critic . These are playinc continual havoc with hard and fact li:ics, 01tracing the traditi~ns of the various literary types . Hence it is that even for.ns of so obvious an individuality as the lyric draha, or novel ha\c never bean gras icd in a s~t i· f ctorv definiti on. tnd b ndinc to +he task of s :aco i~c f~rtn t~ rourh contours of a type that ic rather a st aneer tn extAnded critical trcat~ent w~ ar 0 even less li e to h~t off an accurate celin•'ation . .. hat .nakes intricate , unrrateful labor of t ..1e attc pt to fix 1vith definiteness on the n~ttre of the essay 1 t.1e .vant of a la.re(;; fir a-founded tradition. The nacs of .nc 1 ar, not without so..ic concept of dra. ~ or fiction tho 1 1~i1 they .vould be at a loss perhaps for an ud, uate state~ent of their f ,elings . The inst i:ict of the essay, ho1fover, s ce.ns to have reach d fe v but the Nrit~rs t.1e,Jselves . A tradition, if a y at all, ;iil then exist only in the record of the best (the .nost enduring~ perfor.nance• . He will no+ be outfaced by such as in this late day hold t hat the ideal essayist is yet to b~ evolved. In the shadow of Addison , Larnb , '1d a few others , we are ready to erect our ideal concept ion. In eoing about our task , we shall be bond-slav0 to none . Ev en the student has slighted the essay, and the essay has not done much to throv otself acnoss path. It is a thing of the last three centuries, indeed, not exceedingly bountiful in its manifestations even in that rather brief existence. Truly , the novel , the youngest shoot of literature , har its roots more firmly bedded in th past as it certainly is more orient to the present . As early as •he first decade of tho last century scholarly Nathan ~rake delved riore thoroughly into so~e phases of the essay than has anyone at any other time,but he like many after hin failed to recognize that he was dea ling with a distinct literary f rra, True, efforts o understand the essay per se as a for~ are not lacking,but lheso have been

";Jho shall combine the original pow• r of Bacon, the grace of Addison,the t ranscendent al insight of Emerson the gay fancy of Charles Lamb?" F. H.L . •'latson( estminister' Review 141 :559-66) . 2

few and have left as much to learn as to unlearn. If the opinions, alread~ set down,are to be taken as criteria,the essav is indeed an amorphous,indeter~inate thine,scarce within the pale of acceptance as a type at all. The failure to see in the esr lY one of the distinct art forms has perhaps not been so dangerous as troubleso~e • . ith literary historians it has operated variously. Either the function of the essavist has been wholly and stubbornly ienored and he hi~self clas ed as a poet,critic ctc.,a fallacy unfair because it prevents hin fro~ being judged by proper standards;or the other extre~e has been indulfed in,the ter~ essay,due to the Ulsettled nature of its province,being made co-extensive with all the odds and ends, the ~iscallancous pieces of belles-lettre. It thus becomes the scrap-bag of the literary historian. So liberally construed,the ter~ loses all its intensity and comes to serve for the most heterogeneous and specious conceptions. Taking the most sup~rficial view of the essay 1ossible, stopping at the veritable co:nrnonplaces of its nature (its brevity and prose),men have credited the idea of the essay as a treatise, an article,a lay sermon. But it is no lay sermon however illUCh the English people likes to be preached to. It is an evil hour when the critic de~ers to aueht so foreign to the aesthetic as the ma ufactured thing, the magazine article. The editorial, though originally an offshoo of the same stock,is now a very distant cousin;tracts and disertations,however populari?ing in tone,are not related at all. Yet this bugbear of the treatise has haunted serious writers on the essay almost up to our own time. Some have even taken the treatise an the modern development and have f ound it necessary to distinrui sh the essay proper by such epithets as the old fashioned and the romantic essay. Neglecting to study it with reference to its ntire life history and its native flavor,some have found it a broken, disjointed develop~ent,a widely variant thing with different writers in different ages. Others,holdine the ssay to be but one,have,unconsci0us of its per~anence,identified with their pet idol , Montaigne , Bacon , or the !St century

I) Poet Lore 9:431-36. Harperl65:802-3. 2) Jeanette B.Perry,Critic 40:358-61. 3) The Essay The New International Encyclopedia. 4) Chautauquan 32:192-96. 5) Same as 3) • 3

periodical essayist • In the face of this, we shall atte~pt to show that the essence of the essay is the sa e in all ti;nes. Between Sophocles and 1aeterlinck, the dr1.ma has been much changed,but there remains through it all a residue of essentials, the vital dramatic principle • .1e contend for the essay a si~ilar principle, and we also maintain that this principle has been sowed not in one individual soul or age alone but belongs to all time . Casting about for this principle, we are confronted by difficulties instinct to the essay its~lf. To say that it is a literary form is already tacitly to grant a certain latitude. The drama has allowed for the cramped conventions of Racine as well as tie brilliant innovations of ;nodern times . The essay, if anythinf,is still more pliant,havinc lent its lf succer:sfully to such antipodef of 1 empera;nent as E;nerson and Leieh Ilunt, flourishinc in aces so variousl dispositioned as the classic age of ~ueen Anne and the era of the French Revolution. It is then not enourh to s 'udy it for its principles, we must see how faithfully it mirrors th8 separate literary tendencies of its several periods of ~xis tence,how far it is classic 'ith Addison, romaritic with Charles Lamb, and realistic in our own day. Truly the ess y is a boon t o the vriter. Its m~dium being democratic prose, its content anything, 1 ts only de.:iands s~yle and personality - it makP~ the essayist a 1 w to hLnself. No conventions to cumber and scarce the ordinary rules of co.nposition binding, this absence of t echnical outworks however makes for difficulties in reco zinc the essay . The lyric, epic, drama,novPl,all have their well developed technic . The essay has no such external sta p by which it may be told at a glance . It is ~ore largely a t hine of the warp and woof . The extreme p~rsonal quality of the essay, aking it a tool confor~ing tothe writer,whereas of other for~s it is better said that the writer confor~s hi ~se lf to them, this also tends to dis engage the essay from any .na rk d coull'se. 7h• n we say that it imperceptibly varie ga tes,blend ~ . ith ns w elements,shades off into other literar1 t rp~s.wc but renark Nhat is true of all kinds of lite rature . fhere is however such pliancy to the artist ' s purpose as ~axes this particularly pertinent in the case of the essay. That the e:say is still with us, its form in the main unharrowed by these three hundred years,not· i hstanding i ts lack of rules, its obedience to the person 1 equati n and exposure to all manner of literary tendencies,fashions of culture etc.,this is proof positive of life and perillanence. It is not that weak citizen 1ho for his P eservation do. nds a detailed code of la~s ith their strict P,rforc n~nt. 1ay rather has it been like the child of the stree s,~ ith no guardian care, buffeted about,yet never overcome . It rAprcsen s a certain instinct,a mood or attitude to which the cultured ~ind habitually recurs . I) No . American Review 84 :502-14 . 4

PAR'l' I .

THS NATURE OF TH

CHAPTER I.

THE ESSAY /\S MOOD . The types wherein it is the wont of literature to show

itself are no conventi ~ ns however much they bristle at times with artificial devices. They have a core of peraanency,they are grou1ded on the bed-rock of a fundanental appeal to the human heart. Thf' outward technic will chanee,altPring its fashion to catch the contemporar:)' eyf'. It i a time server, the varying co~plexion of the hour to suit the ca·ual peculiarities and accidents of culture in peo~les of different ages and places . But the hu.nan heart is constant, de.nocra tic, ver:· much the same in all tLws and climes . To this endur ng part of men corresponds that per1.:ianent thine, thP .J1nod of the various literary types . Pri~e and most elemental is the lyric mood - tho personal outburst, the spontaneous overflow of th heart,a riood choosing the highest diction because it expresses vhat to us is greatest and nearest . It is a mood that cho,..,s es metPr,often with its rhythmic effect accentuated by rhyme,because the heart, the vital organ, throbs .v i th regu1 r puls tion;by its beats and by the marked and regular periods of the pendulu.n, we co1111t life and time . The eternal rote of the sea is native to our deeprst self; the har• 1on of the sphP. 1·es is upon us. Withdrawin~ from the mood of thf ~oment,ou of our ~os t immediate feelings,looJ{ing to the pas and to the futurc,noting the item of struggle and change in life,we co;ne into the .nood of story. It is a mood not alwa s d elling on th ~ heights but on various levels . Prose,CTore plartic han vorsL,generally bes serves its .iore de .ocra tic purpos ·, ancl we hav the nov 1. But his mood,when exultl.nc in lofty vistas of action,may draw nearer the rhythm of life by the use of e ter, nd ·e have the epic . Again it may b e, visu ,U.zed by eans .of actor~,stagc,"ccnery, and vrn have the dra.ua. This mood of a tory is the potential ..:nood ao opposed to the l : ric or more stat·c mood . ~ hat then of the essay? Wherein ied its prr anance? its mood? That the essay exists ns a t·pe ~a .ot ·ell be denied. To this it ~' inborn i ru ortal 1 t ',its c ·ntl'r:-long d velop. cnt bears a~ple ~itness a dnrs the e~in, nt r~s ectabi ity t has aintained in the teeth of c iancling lite rary fashi 0ns. This is what gives dignity to the dra.a~ that as clas ici"~ , ro anticism, realis~ in turn have ·orked it over in spirit ith the elves worked it well-nigh to exhaustion.the dra ..m still lives on ' with all its ancient virility . So the essay,surviving thA odium attachinc to it from its service:: to literary t r:nde ncie~ now effete and out of vogue , still preserves its integrity. 5

Perhaps the essay ~e r e best character 7Bd n: a lyric in prose, a pendant of the lysric . Though story interest has betimns been engrafted upon it, we feel this ti be but incidental. It thus represents one phase of t~e personal f ersonal or static side of lif e . Frow. V'lw.t has been said of the lvric it would appear that the essay is scarce so high a forJ of art the lyric properly requiring meter for it nos t gcni1ine ' expression. Yet thr essay is in its better ~anifestations not a far remove,beinf cast in a certain lare ,more concealPd and irregular rhythm. Many of our essayi~ts were a lso poets as i\ddison, Golds.nith,and Hunt . Thereto the fre,1uency with which frag.nents of l;~ricr, are inserted and thn cont;Pnial setting they find in the prose essay argues the kinship of the latter with the ~ost tender and idyllic forras of verse. Couplets of poetry disturb rather than enhanc~ other prose. The difference between the rhyth.n of the lyric and that of the essay is however quite derivative;it is conti~gent on the p;reater scope of the subject-:natt~r in the pro!';e typr,this d omanding a freer range of E: xpress ion. As it is no re universal in sphere and allo~ed to st op below the large poetical stuff of life , unbound prose best snrves its nPcds, rielding to he freedo~ of its movP-~cnts . Personality,~ithal , in spit of varyin intensit ·s the inspiration of both lyric und c say,yea,it if-l the vcsp r ancl matin bells of essayism. All literature would, it is true, have others see tha world oo~e or less as the ·ritcr sees it. Of the essayist thin is doubly true for he can givP neith•r truth nor spirit o her than hi self. Tbro ch the ricrhl colored glass of his roul -e look out upon the universe;the thought he passes on to us is dyed ith some of the blood of his own heart. ~hen all is said and done, character in in all liklihood the abiding interest of 11 erature - man is so larcely absorbed in man - and character in the direct form of an introspective ersonnlity is the final cause of the essay. ,, The natural and i n:nediate implication of his pcrAonal quality if~ fE'eling . The !-::in.ship· ith the lyric is not so distant but tha1 some of the same ·varm blood co1rses in its veins . But the e " sa"ist subdues his emotions b,' setting thc.:n against the background of life's ex ernals and co:nmon­ placcs . Unlike the poe he is not busied ~hnlly with he higher things he:> stoops even to the 10·ly and seeks to lul'e the dumb spirlt out of co:unon things,to ake poctr out of that which before was prose . At least he is no abstruct philosopher.dipping h's ~uill altogether in he colorlesQ fluid of the intellect. He thinl·r, and meditater but hic­ feelings cive his thouchts direc ion. J,et so be thnt he trenches more on th~ intellectual than does the poet,h"s inter sts continue aosthPtetic, his bour ne is tho pleasurable;reasoneo understanding ~ay go to no wearisome lcne hs ~ith hin. 6

It is feeling that dowers his work with abid"nc interest and makes him at botton an artist. Personality,we repeat.is the vivifying,hallowing spirit of the essay,a personality with a strong set of emotional values,personality to very egotis~ for the essay is only less ec;otistical thar; the lyric. Drawing its strength ond charm thus fro,n the writer, e.nphas i7 ing and publishing hLn broadcast so obviously and directly, it demands of hi:t in turn that his personality be attractive and worth while. Thr. essayist stands next to the poet in capacity for fe clinc strongly. Thosoever has plied thE> essay-craft for L:unortal i ty, investigation will show that hr first lived, lived intensely and to his full capacity for living. "Know thvself! Be thyself"!" is superbly good advice to all , to the essayist it is indispensabl 0 • It is inscribed over thP. portals that open to the true essa~· . Lacking the storv of the novelis and the dramatic acceeeories of the stagc,our essay-maker illUSt ith the lyricist induce the sense of life through the briauning fulness of his own existence. Nevertheless it must be kept in mind that the essay is, strictly speaking,not a lyric and does not move amid so vivid, elemental pass ions . If then it ma'' not rely on such emot ionnl vigor, it will seek elsewhoro for mens to bulwar~ itsalf;it will de.nand a personality inviting not only by virtue of its feeling but because it feels jus ly. The very fact that the essayist uses prose mens that he e1nploys a ...cdiu.,1 nore or less bound up with the brain. His personality sho ld be intellectually interestine;his Amotion were perhaps .vell called intellectunli7ed emotion. The ideal property of such Jotion iq its sanity and funda~ental truth.This renders it so incisive, lendine dignity and inevitable power so that by its sincerit to life it ntirs even as the poet's tears and sirhs. To inspire this sen~e requires a large and vital knowledge of life. It is not the mere truth of fact that the essay craves or he abstract truth of the 1eason,thc truth which,when normally constituted,Henrik Ibsen could only allow validity for sixteen or at ost eirhteen years . No . It is the truth of imagination , the truth of spirjt, the truth of i.nagination that lies below the evanesc n °how of things. This in what rPtains for La.nb and Add son their perennial youth. Their conten is that of life, ei&hcd and appreciated by one y·h sP sensibilities b·· a rich ~no ledge of tho world are care full'' adjusted to 1 ife. That knor;lPdge,if it is t be essential must be ained not in so much as fro life. The essa ist is not"a voice from the CrOWd Vibrating Nith the strain and rush Of ,xi~tenco ." He has stood aside not fro~ aversion to the vorld but that he mieht know it the better. His is he keen observan oy . Not without caning is it that he publishes his periodical lucubrations in thP ., irhteenth century und r such title" as the Spectator, irror,Looker-On.Inspector or in our own day the Easy Chair.The world in ~iniaturc is focussed in his soul. Beginning with ~ontaigne fron his Gascon castl cv.n to A. T. ~uil ler-Couch froo his Cornish · ind ow, the essay is ts have invariabl ,. been wide-awake observere and, what is .nore, men of insight.· Another clenent in their ~no~lPdge of life is thP clement of culture . Their personality affords int rest because it is steeped in the experience of the race. This is but an 7

extension of the essayist's function a an observer. ~hat he hL1Gt.lf har f Pl t and seen i abundantly supplc.aent cd by the copious store of hu;n.nn iriterest accumulated in the b oks at his elbo .; . This brings no tr ifl inc inc r e .. ent to his just ice and humanity. Out of tho past di:n with distance, the truth alone shines forth and li[hts the footsteps of our essayist where the faulty lamp of his own experience sheds no guidine elow. The justness of his feelincs rests on his "'flW'e of life's r,roportions. This arain is dict1ted by the b eadth of his genHral k~o~ledgc and his sy~pathy. If his per"'annli y is to 1 iJr.i t the per"pecti ve in which all things are to bP "ie.rcd it JlUS t be laid out on a largo scnle. L 1 era tu re r.hm:ld treat its matnrials in their universal rAlations.Tho Jore COillprche~sive th" bc:ickcround of the pa~:;t results of livinf, thn .nore fai hf'ull:,r is the inae ... reflf'cted of 'lhat is nirrored th.-:rcin . . en of essay procl i-..riti 0 s ns 3urton,Brown' nnd C"trn:· is"!.,r; such ns 1\ddiso11 , Johnson, La :ib and :n rson lnvr- all be 0 n nrn of •1id ~ r .. ~adin,e . C',inct=~ th"•rc is ncit.1cr he '"ari 0 d rfrnourc'"' of fictio or dra.aa '1or tne supre:nc henrt intPr st of the l· ric to crace tnv essay each touch .. ust be tinged 1i. koen , s•.,n1thc ic insip:ht and .nanifold cultural at . ake or mar h s r-pu ation. :ver tr· and leal to the ncnse of life,hls fer accents t3e r ader sill ca ch and fondly cling to as co tr.lOn foll·, once favor d by a wor or shake of hand frofil a grent . nn,riligiously preserve it in ory and dwell caresningly thcr0on. ·,i;i th recurrin[ e:!lphas is ·e r tu te th· t wh1:1 tf~ver the essayist doncant abo1t,he ,u. t yet look to his p~rsonnl .nat;netism anc~ contrive for it.., aclvnnt. eoou.... d ispla r . :·no ledc;e of life is after all b11t the Yho uo. e at .. 1ooph re n .vhic the pP-rsonality of the v1riter attain., to healtr era t'. Th latter, tAnderly nurtured by reflective habits, is a sensitiv . imosa- 1 iko thing, ex tending itself only a. id f:ivor·1bl. con · ions. It combines a love of retire.nent !Yi h its lmo •1le ee of e :vorld. Its aesthetic ood is best e licited by 1 is re. It in not d mere child of the brain; /8 .. ust avov for it the hicher lineaee of feeling.It is thus nat subject to an' ar:{ed purp .,ef ln. s, tho strenuous bearine dovn on a s goal. The f ellng• ·ill alv.ays have hr·ir om s vcet · ill hile he intell .ct ust bend to the object in vie·1. The essay alms o ani atf> u., with a certain .JOod ratlwr than to i ~ tiga us o d has it then of .,trenuousl1 :ia' n or a p11r and fancv,distanc is as naught, they rasp in a second t. e . ost snbl i•ne tru ns whither th slo 1 ·rnberinr; foots eps of n cllect ;nayhap wi 11 nove cone. "The essay · s not a demon·· tra t ion but scintillation.not a pPrsua~i n but a v'rl n." Life.hard nnd practical in its exacting de nds.is largelJ th province of the brain yith its relentless thinK ng;llter tur ,the supple ent of life, is largely something else, it is feeling and personality. en do not show their hcnrt in the press of th crovd. It is in moments of quiet solitude h•y think t~eir deepest thou&hts and the ~ost intense a otions throne in up n then. There is n 8 fitness in such nnaas as th TdlLr, a blnr,anct Lounecr. It is not the ac ti v,... parta}{er but the passive ohr- ervcr th· t P"Rks to us in the essay. AbsC'nce of strPnuousner.n and p rt ;-enl is charactAristic of he liv s of t.1f"! r>"!'O is '>. ·.ont.algn . ur on, 'J';10reau ";ere all 'lfflicted wi 'h th " alnd· of rPv rie". , nd if tho s~ri0us duti s of lifP called h n eqsar- nking w~n an cxquinit3 diversion '1C ith harl"S Ln::ib. "T .. enfranchinecl quill that has plodded all the ~ornin a~ong the cart rucks of fi~ur0s and CJphors,fris~s nnd curveta so at its ea.e over the flowery carpet-ground of a .aidn l[iht rl.issf'!r~, ion,- I fc ls pro.act ion." I) ,, i th all this ·;, do not :nean to sa:1 t a 1 i t'1rn ture is not at tiilles extremely vicorous,but it is ho vteor of fcAlinc. Moreover th~ essayist generally leav st t~ ~ott hose e:aotions that are deepest, most tense and d .and thcrntore . os i.npnls iv] handl inc. .rot that h is ·.'Ii thou g nius for ta i; in on the highest ai;.;" of lif ,but he is not in th m'litant atti ule of one active in th fray. He i the lnter~s ed · 011ehtf 1l looker-on, wi thdra~linr ven out of h ·ms elf and Purve· inf himself at a distance. :e thus d sclai for hi.n ·rn p1rposefulneC!~ le ond th· t sense 11h .r~in all th t e do. thin' or sa • ir orn • .. e wanders as he would and it is na ura tha he shnul the ' a r mor<' han hr> in fact, nakes of the an end in it Alf. men p , r for so , e ch an i c · 1" • th :or 1 d is s .nos t of 1 ts ove. nts. The essa r • 't be of a lon&-'' fferin{!' w1tchfulnesn if h is t catch men i signific1 nt attlt d s when thir charact.Jr un:ittingl crops o t •. s .aco1 av of ur typ~, "It requires ti. c in th0 • ri t r and le • r in he reader." Th essayist ak s i hin office to fo lo 01 vaer nt lines of tho11eht,to chron cle . oods,and in v rv o her n ti portray p'rsonalit undisruiand b" the ~ k of conv n ion. He is the ~an 0 d 0 lifh~ 0 in . all a k.th dri le s of onv.r so uniuportnnt in themr-elv • y t "ignifican still beca . are often ~he ns dia e ,u h'ndered xpr s ion f tha Rherewith he heart is full and in le·s re . n °n ~ If his e~otlons are v·gor us en igh o be plea that reason, they ch r inn ead b thei1 free and e The essay is philosoph in a isc coa nnd an essa··ist i~ tne cl:.i - an of llterat re. Th. c ffe - o ce .a hi, igh~~ent century mecca. Th 5candal u~ Club (DeFoe'g nev ·c.), Trllilpet Club (Tatler),the pect~tor lub he clul> of J nf' n, rolds ith,and os. ell,all b oken th e .a i 0 cl b- an. forte is to talk for ho i1terest in tal ine,and conver at'on is not to be lieh ly eC!timated for'it is not wor r e e·chnn e but souls." 2) That letter" hich ar • t. c ntcrpnrt of conversation are occn°i nally as in olds ith h( c rriers of the essay points' to the same h n. The ess3r1s. hove all i~

I) LAMB 2) Henry Drummond. 9

in a position to be chatty. By nature , office , and culture,he is urged to unburden his heart fully and directly. No wonder the essays of Steela and Addison sporadically burst out in a shorr colloquial idiom, with which the work of harles Lamb is also touched . It is a further tribute to the democracy of the form that these tinges of the colloquial so harmonize with the finished stylo, necessary and characteristic of the essay . Naturally cone or.ii tant of this infor.na l, sel f-revnla tory mood of the essayists is the trait of spontaneity. The emphasis on his personality will, to say the least, be objectionable if he cannot induce others to see hi~ as he hims lf does. The rrrcat essayists have not been such as have in their lives unduly obtruded themselves ; rather do their autobiographic pen-pictures vouch for the reserve and even sh'1ness of their demeanor, c. f. Addison, Goldsmith,Lamb. Like Montaigne they wanted facil'ty in conversation. But in print it is necessarily different. It docs not suffice for the essayist to develope a rich personality; he must exercise his power of dol~ and donlf for 11 is personality is the anLna ting spirit of his work . It is not rer.iarkablc that men , r eserved in their lives even to excess,should in their writings be so very confidential. Naivit~ iR deride in soci0tv :here experience teaches one to be norn or less cold,unfeeling,and ~ildly hypocritical . The relation bet~een the es~ayist and his reader is another;he takes the reader into nbsolut· confidence, practising no restraint with his own d epest fc0linrs. It is a relation of such co.npl~te trust as lrn:ann beingn seldo. attElin to in society and is therefore doubl · cherished in print . The essayist may un.neN the deepest arcana o~ his soul ·,r;i thout fear of fooence . The basis ~·hich actual friend'>hips lack, the basis of complete undirstandine and entire sincerity.on that he has sealed the bond of comradeship with his reader. lie is abovP all petty pride ; he has nothing to conceal and beco.les personally interostine by saying strait;ht out in voluntar self-f:1r(C'!tfu lner-s all that he genuinely thinks and feels. In a relation of such "'acred fa, il iari ty, 1 t is out of key to stoop to platitudP or ineleganc • Th uar~ntee against his beco.nine turbid is his 1 rge hu anitf • . in personali y broadened to vistas of un·vcrsal cultur0,revellinf in th ~ ~i"'do .. of vanished cPnturics,witn the profound b·ckeround of wha ever in men has survived bcsid~s their ashes,he canno bu be sy.~>a h~tic to hu an kind. Add thereto his frtlinc for the sense of life, the intensity with i7hich he 1 i ves, ov0rawed by the shado.1 of other lives past and present, and he nust pcrforcL be inspired with boundless sy~pathy and vith reverence for the nobility of existence. He is int· rested in the orld for its o·;;n sake, studying character for the pur delight in knowinc it, divining the secrets of l ife , the interior relations of hings hat hr ma v better comprehLnd their out;·:ard app ,ar;:1nces. He sneers at no man howP.vcr unlettered.for he suruitscs the good intention ' behind th,"; i.:ipr rfect act. c o untramelled is his . ympnth.v that hif' hand tingles at th·, touch of the .. canest object merely because it is real and a part of this e oriour IO

universe . But he differs fro~ the fross realist,he se ks not to vulgarize ereat a nd noble thines through burlPsque association,he seeks to elPvate everythinp h: his illimitable huma n~ty and to give it significanc by infusinr hiu personality thure1n. Co.:iprehond ing as much as possible of the u 1i versal mir d,he must feel the o:nin nt hopefulness of 1111. an striving. He sees lifo as most ~en in their transcendental ~o~ents behold it;ha is true to the gennral ethical standpoint. In short,he is optirristic,having charity thereto even for ~hat he does not 1 ikc. "Ile has re:1ched that philosophical upl r·nd ;hr.re on• has considerable distrust of his ovn cock-Rure opinions . '' I) !iis encouraginc kindliness is extJnd'd to co. monplace mortals on every walk of life. He is one "to walk with hand il"l hand Through the every-daynes, of this ·rnrk-day ·1;o rld. " 2) J{oreover did he not love men , he ~ight carry on u polemic but he would not writR for ~ritine 's sake . By leisureliness ~ xAnpt from the fray,standing on the vantage ground of his 1;idc knowledge of men outsidP life's brawling clangor,he can note its strange co.minBlinr of cross and good, tears and lauchtPr, This subjective adjuntment of the vision of thn ~ind so as to include near and far,bringine 1 ife ' s tragedy and car.ind v all "i th in i tQ s .. ·ecp and showing up so many u1expected,inconeruous rel" ions,all th s i enouch to purse the lips into a smile at the sa c tine it draws a tear from the eye. This is humor,an essential mood not a wist of exprrsrion,a lat~htPr not fron th1 ticklinG of the fancy 3s is v1it but fron the stirri'"l[ of the sou .a lanrht~r .::ii.'1 lP.d vi th tears.the laueht~r of ShaknspcarP ' s conedies no h. whims.r of Mark Twain. It is thr strain of sadnesR in the oo~t 's soul reduced from its noble poetic sphere to contact vith life's co.mnonplaces. It is a sadnAss alanost too deep for tears when the essayist in the .. idrt of a s il catches hi nnelf and "fl "'ee that "the incompatibility over which he has be n ::naking merr is one of the ~ost pathttic things in life Pc·usa one of the nost coa..mon." 3) Thus -.ve find old Robert Burton toilin at his Ana tom'' of Melancholy to quell the troubles of his soul ;we see Browne seeking consolation in th . l~boratinc of 1aliGio i:tedici and Charlns La~b and gentle Leie;h Hunt s, iling to keep their tears away . Hu~or welling from such l he~rt sourcn cnnno be evam~scent. It is indigenon!' to to th, leisur~l , toleran nature of the essayist;his road vi ~w of hines .or ids h ' 1 o wage relentless war on human nature in any of its phnses. Just because his interest is so intense and his sense of hurnani ty so larc '~ h< is so Pa" ilv exc it d to s le at the incongruities of the rnce. To have life presentqd throu h the prism of such a personali y is al~ost to sc the soul of fate .

I) Poot Lor e 9:43I-36. 2) Lowell. 3) II

Indee~ there are some of ~he seeds of destiny ·n the esEayist for his independr'nce of life' s narrowing prejudices al lo' s hi n better to grasp the trend of things . In the verr act of being individual.withall the rich hu_ or that co es fro a seelne and saying thines his own wa ,he is also universally true. The lauchter and tears he evokes out of co 1~onplace~ are thus but another phase of his larg sense of life . The truth he sees and feels will be so absorbine because he secs so clearly and feels so passionately . aught is more alien to his te~po rament than cheap. melodramatic effects . Yet will he have an element of surprise.what he says will aatonish not because it is so str ange but because it is so true . He is not an adventurer illa~ine forays into ne~ and unknown realms ,his lov() of humanity keeps '.'lil!l right at hone. He looks round about hi.nself , and with an eye unclouded by pre judicn and trained by practise he sees much that we fail to sec because it is so obvious , thines that escape our no-tiG'O because the. are h ldden precisely in the ~ost conspicuous places . Life i~ lar~ely an old lesson.a for~ula learned bv rote fron those hat have r,one before. The essayist t eaches us the real meaninr, of each xord of that lesson. He can do so because his eye ls so keen and his soul so deep;hc is so great because he is so real and looks not to the law but to the soul of life. A cArtain retrospectiveness the ereat e snyists have also found beconinr. to their genius . An ex uisite antiquarian char:n pervades thP- musings of writers in so different centuries as Bro\vnn , La.nb.and Agnes Repplier. This :nay app,ar a dainty accident but ,.et iR not without its ex lanation in the mood of •he essayist . Ile is not, we reiterate, an adventurer in stranee r ealms;he is not the first but rather the last to arrive upon the scene chronologically as vell as logically. ~hile the lyric is one of . the carli st or Q o~ let ers ' the lyric is on~ of the latest. "'i.nple,clc:nental,l ric pa". lonr are human nnture even in its oric;inal undev loped state. But ar univPrsal love has beP.n lone in co~in so en hnvc b n slo to step out of this egotistical ntt ·tude and vie·v th .• selveG as others see them, view themselver in heir un tvorsal r lation. , in the settine of the world they live in. Bcfor .an arrives a this $ t•tge his SOC ial S icl <> US t be c; rongly devclopr>d I SOC i advanced and likewise co.plicated. •o r in brookin he c0 ~f thPir cnvlrons,n.n disclose •he fine P. r1y phades of character. The nore intricate soci t; ir,the ore are Pn r· bed aGAinst each other,the .ore they learn to s:nall district of ·nglancl,r vellint: in the beauties and secrets of a certain locality,bu it ls t he 11 s ioneci whe t her thry cvrr cherishe it sod cpl• es ~ddi on and am do the · town their L0 ndon. The essa• ist . ust then "ri tun il society has sprung to influPnce.till :ncn hRve attainP.d some d ree of spiritual self-consciousn~s and achieved that rich cul ure which he craves as his background. Ile belongs to the aturity, yea,to the old age of civili?ation,lookinr, b~ck o and fondlinf 12

in memory its youth. Logically to~ the es ayist comes late . It is not for hi i to deal in hasty, immature 00inions . Ile is no onP who passei· the first and most in.nediate judpment on an·:thin[". He co.nes after all the others and delivers the final estimate,eraspinc, his subject in its full connexions , and by the justicn and hu:nanity of his verdict impressinr, his personalit on literature. ~ith hesitancv does he vont hi. SPlf on conteJ00~1rv,debatablo questions , standing asidP fro.n the conflict with its prejudices, he can in sanity anticipate the verdict of hlst6ry and the char~ of d iu tan c e~ He is partial to such he.nes as appeal to his leisure and culture and becausP they stand "jthout the dust and cla~or of the present kindle in his h art a remtni cent mood, themes fraught Hith the thought of s uls now dust. The key-note of the essay we have th11s found to bn pe rsonality. This personalit11 ,not reaching to that e.:iotion·1l strPncth which requires the ~e rical and lof y treatmrn of the lyric,nAvertheles tak8S utterance in fe line.a ferlin~ not s0 int0.nse because less restricted in rnnre. 'uch a •)rrsonali ty cannot overpower b,f sheer force of pat::nio'1 whe1·efor0 it .aus t nterent bncausc it is Tort1y of ac1uaintnnce. It b•comes so when it is th~ Nisult of n !ull life, the rense of life e hn.ncP.d b·r a lrnowledee of whnt others have "nc1nrr' ·u,rl 1 · "' i ·v··ii· ·c . It calls for crincenial lei!'l' re and frank npon anrt•v. 7 urih1r L11plicatior.. ~ are a lart;e h1:.nanitr,optimi: ,h" .or,Plf ion of surprise,and n rctrospec i\·e attitude. The c~inrnt t~ith of the eRsayist ; 11 have tha Flcvn io1 which any hine recf'ive: fro· be inc sicerel believed ir :1 a huraan hn1rt , it will be roseate •:ith the par-sionat' s. of n ros 1 •ric , po7erfully set off agn n~t the bnckcround o man's xpcr nee, fraerant with thr aroma of va ishcd c nturiPs. 13

CHAP'l' ~R 2.

A. S'"lJ"'C'I.

Survey int; the motl1'y and ribald l i~ t of ti tlcs found in our fore.nos t essa~·in ts, onP is 1)evd ldered and hos i t.n t es fro.:: drawinf any broad conclusion" ..:here the ::i.ppcal is to thP spirit we may indeed not stand too firnly on in ellectual distinctions. A cursory study will however reveal that the subject of the essay plays a unique role. It does not as otherwheres lirnit,it liberates tho1ieht,it is the occasion rather than the cause of writing. It is chosen b" virtue of being sugg~stive rather than inclusivP,spurrine n01 curbinc the at1thor's fancy. Nevertheless it infuses a CPrtoin larr" unity, keeping the mind of the writer pitched in one kc' throurhout and formint: a natural and convenient rende7vous for his s:nn 11 exc urs iom;. ;is to (!uali ty the subject ranee 1 e WEen such cosmopolitan extremes as noast Pit, (La.:i.l ) ,Gyp"'i C" (,\ddison), the stacP coach (Johnson.Irvine) to death it~Glf (Bacon) and its fears (Ha7litt). It were a 1 caningles~ task o fix lines of d ema rcation. Anything that by any device . ay be subverted into a'3sthetic treat.nent will servf' the purpose> . In fa.ct h re arc ~10 restrict; ")ns for the s bject iE not tlw o"senti< l thine; it is the personality ~hose frer play it is to sti~ulnte. It .:ia.'i not be denied that th cssa is t is •st equipped to talk about himself ~hlch is a fuifillment not n violation of his duty to publish hie own personn1 i ty. :le hl:nsclf is relevant,~ost thorough-goine essay ~aterlal. Thn c~nPrally obtrus i vc "I fl here co1nes to its o n for not ling is more rrsonant with ersn'· ti ::b re than his ascerti ive fit's pcrqon note. Lanb and .• dd is on have i in 1 ine upon 1 ine, of en t is the opening word or else follows fnFt there6n.~onta. ene rpok succinct ;;.nd rue when he prefaced h ls fl ~r r-a i 0 " wi h the •rnrds, "I am myself the atter of my book".'Ihe ef~Sa"L t,rccardlnc; hi, elf as all in all the 11ost inte1·esting of his nc ua intances, as"u es ingenuously that if others can only be ade to ce hi, us he does hi.nself the. •vill share hi<- ft cl>1gs. I is a c nfess'onal. self-revelator.: mood of whlcl we are all bv nat:re guilty,and we a.re ready to sympathi?c with the author's view-poin if onlJ he treats Uloi ting of his ovn person. His per"'onality s brou[ht al io"t or rtrongl1 out b,'.' his attitude to the rest of the ·orld . At fir" re.10ve, hP comes to hia fHllow-rnen. ~o broadly sympathetic.he is bound to reverence the spark of hu.mn life wherever it glows,whethor it be on the altar of his own heart or it be nshr ned in the I4

boso.n of a follow beinr. Further.nore , no one is bettPr cualifiecl to write about other aen than he ~ho best knows hi~seli. The crnsayist,a creation of society,.aust feel it~; .1c~ber· to be only less interest inc than h L.nsPlf; choos int, .norf'over, only such characters or characteri~ · tics about which ht> can ;·1ri t.e with ?est and an artist's enthusiasm,he is sure to '"'how his hand. The contours of his o~n personality are shadowed forth in the r·ela t ions to his fellows. In no better ;nould can hP hro v his philosophy of lifn than to nxpress it in chnracter. l character ~ay also b th~ mrnns of collect!nc his s .ray reflPctions and focussinc to a C' rtain unity an othor·1 ise discnr1-'iVP fot·.:i. Perhaps it has its significance tha~ :ddison,Ficltline,JoJ1nson, Coldsmi th, Thackuray,and other essa· 1sts also wro e plays or novels.wherein the ~trivinr is nftnr morn conrcious and objective character inte11st . Tradition,howcvc'r,do£rn no bind the 0!3say1st o intro(.ucc hLnsPlf b · name anent each subject he broaches or to c0nfine himself to the portrayal of character. 'it ·.1 les hr. .nus es on hu.nan nature in general , its1novin~ force:? and cor..on <'1hic

As the novel,fro~ the time of •ielding on , ha~ hnd its eyes opened to the beauties of God's out-of-door~ in like manner has nature in the last century played an ever widenipg role with our writer. The essay, d th La.nb and Addison a thine of the town,the stagA coach,and the coffee-house,as it draws nearer our own time,becomes a dieciple of Rousseau and lays its head on the boso~ of nature. Interest in animal and nature life for its own sake has crept in and spread so extensively that -e arc apt to forget ho~ recent a thine this widening of human sympathy really is. Fundamentally it in but an enlarged sense of life,a concession to that ins inct of beauty as well as that half pantheistic strain that is in us all. Th.- consciousness of s 1 umber inr na turfl 1 i fe is but another inspiration to sti~ulate a full revelation of the essayist's personal charn.

--B. CO~T------NTS . Having done with our a tempt to show what resources as to theme are at the beck of tho essa• -maker, we would make our transition to the :natter in hand b.· re.:-:arkinr.: on the proclivity of thi; great essayist not onlv for uch themes as by thPir universal interest and , port sum on the author's sublimest powers but for those uni ue subjects that simultaneously exhibit his personality fro ~ a new side. In the handling of such topics.he aLn'"' con in ally to fix on the sienificant a'"'pects of affairs, to catch and record the expression trllinc of te.npcrarnent,the attitude dirclo~ing character. Ile renders thos c brief excerpts of life hat ;1 re .aos t in mood with his mind. The material~ of literature are common r source'"', it is the charm and raeaning of the selection and the interpenetration of a rich per 0 onality tha constitutes the im;nortal part of the author . After all what h sees in the world and in books is what he is, and for that ·rn look to his essays. As he is the explanation of hi essay so hPy explain him. This accounts for hi" frecdo- fro. techn~c. ae i alloved anv theme he needs onlv to sci7e on such phasPr hereof ns ,f ' appeal to hi~,and in other ways he follows his o~n swen n 11. It is what he docs after this ban of r strain is lifted that interests us. It is with his frerdom i n selec ing material as "ith hf' leisure' of h s ha its,i is to giv hi~ opportunit to think his deep and gre thoughts unha.npered bv tb.e dispiri tine drudger of prosaicall.r filling in and rounding off in the manner of a p1n•f1l · intellectual thinr as the treatise. ·1e keepn co panv i h his thought only while it is of greatest radianc . ,when it rises to his view as tho child of an inspired mo~nnt,before it is threshed and bereft of charc. He does not exhau'"'t his theme :for his duties are not b.' it ;he hns nobler obligations 16 lo himself and his oersonality . Hovcvcr detached his contents may see~ they have this un t · that they represent the complete view of life of one mun. It is a notable fact that Bacon, Fuller,Irvinc,,and others went through life notP-book in hand. These-called co nmonplace book played a larre role in the ·mthorship o;f the eighteenth century periodical essays. "The essay is properly a collection of notes suggesting thoueht concerrine a subject rather than being an exhaustive treatment." I) Montaigne was brought to the essay by glossinc his favorite books, those most strongly attractinr his personality. These marginal notes and comnents, penciled on the fly-lPaves, .... hen collected repres•nted the first stage of hi· essaye. Thereupon he proceeded in the broad nareir. of leisure that ornaaented his existence to make co~~lnts on the gr~at book of life,on current and local events such as piqued his interest Ii hout stirring his prejudicer. Bac0n too waR addicted to hi~ habit of glossing his books. These glosses.co~ptled under various hE'ads .vi th a few co nt!'; of his own su joined, ri.k<' up his essays. The whole .nannP.r of e. sav comno" it ion 'V0uld see~ to justify Samuel Johnsons trite definition of it as "a loose sally of the mind,an irreeular. lndir;e!'; ed piece." This is easily reconciled to the stand we hav alread taken. As a collection of not s it is a collec ion of hose flashes of the intellect when.stirred b sore wore or event of onterest.the mind d1.splnys i self in i s ver" freedo and cr-sence. It i.i not the carry in throueh of a piece of ~ental drudgerv where the mind must cleave slavishlr to a definit"' purpose. The object of the es.oy is in the mind itself. Auxi llia1·y to this and a prevalent tho h incidental trait is the interplay of rich s ores of knoaledee fro t~e .:ell furnished supply of the e 0 sayist. He has read · i th sy.npa thy in out of the -:;ay books and obscure au hors, he has s1Jr~ised the thought however im erfectl expressed.It is only hu.nan for .uen to thin~ a r,rfla t thought now and hen, an eternal truth will often s.aile unconsci usly on the lips of a child the rcnius think~ such though s of en. The essayis has bee ~ in out of the way places, gleaned he . i placed frae;.ucnts of truth or lyric feeline,and he dshes to snve the..!l for posterity b v incorpora inc he. in his own ork. It is not incumbent upon him to pursue h.is the:ne like pointPr. Pleasure is his b1nincss,to ra ble hither and thither fro. one s tde of the road o he other, ga her in as he goes the honey from a hund d hidden flowers t .a blo1 unseen in secret gladE'S. \11 this e does fo a sinele bi of cons u.n.na te fraerance. an ens av. The ual it of his c,leanines will bP proof of his taste. 'hi~ spirit inl ar a, distilled fro.:J. the rich cul ur1 u11 poetic effun on .. o he ___ , __ ------I) Bacon. 17

race,exquisite as the "perfu.ne. of ~aded rose leaves inn china jar." 2) this attar drawn drop b.' drop fI'o.n shelf­ stored books - each yielding perhaps but a drop - eives to the es ay an indescrjbablc richnes. of char&. It is the refined eold fro.n the rough ore of innumerable minds and hearts. Hence the sens" of exuberancc,of untried resource that lies in the wake of the essay. The thought comes not in tatters as the orphan of a poor brain but decked out in tho weal th fro 1 tht' rich coffers of the past. Hence also its allusiveness. ,\s the essa 1st publishes his thout;hts and feelint;s for the interes tl ey have in themselves so he loves a finr phrase for its o~n snke. Jhen on his extended rambles he lirhts pon so.ne striking ruth still ~ore stril~ingly PxprPssed he must neede nake it part of hi nself bv :na'dne it part of hls work . ~k rese:.nbles somewhat Jean Paul :ho strove to work in evPry in~ he ever read or thourht. And not be inc raerel · intellec ual, he docs not readilv run to abstractions but sreks ratter t e concrete and p0etic. No one qtotes ro read l y and none withnl so partially as he. He del ir,hts in find inf his o rn connec ions for his quotations,his own interprPtationP,rven chancing a word horn and there to sujt his meaninr. It is the reaction of the quotation on his 01n ~ind , the quotation in he solu ion of his thought. All these cle r:nts of culture and allus ·on,ho·rnver inconeruous they seem.~ix in the aleiliic of h"s pnrsonnlity. Borrovine the distinction of Le~uinc v.his rk is nlwa~s literature of the power phaso,li era ur where the e~o ional 1 element pr 0 do:aina t es, rather th n 1 i. t ra t ure of U.e :mo 1ledee phase. He fails irno iniously if he ~iver u" he feelinc of going to school. It is not the information he conveJ bu the o~otion he arouses. The forner is t ere,but i is he unobtrusive trellis-work on which he latter in 8llf> orted. Frosh breezes fro~ his soul arc ever blowint, he d• s fro his books. 18

T!,'CiWICAL LEME: :T.3.

As yet we seem to have renli7ed little in the essay that is tangible and differentiates it fro~ other literary types.The mood with its qualifications is f ~iliar to ,nany literatcurs , and the restrictions as t0 subjc'ct and content do not appear very binding. It . ay not be cleniAd that .na'1y a novelist or short story ;·1ri ter, e 'On nn r an historian,and certainl.Y .nany an aes :ietic crit1c eive us a touch,a paracraph .or a page of essentially esn8y-li~e stuff. It may even bP- fund a 11ental ·d th the author as in Fieldinc or ruskin. ne wrtter I) eve~ professes to find adu brations thereof in the poetr' of hakespeare and Cowper, the orations of Beecher, the horn lies of Jere:.:iy Taylor, and the allegory of John Bunyan. ·, i th th is ,)rPva le nee of essayis~ we do not propose to concern ourselves. It is the inevitable shadine off of one li erar form into another, arising from the mixi1g of motives or from the author's confused consc i ousnoss of .1 is tar;k. Nevertheless it must be confer.sect that the liberal technic of the esro '' .nakes it pecul iarl \' subject o incorporation in other literature. Herr it teaches the vnluable lesson of true realism. Its whole technic is the depicting of life, though of course in a different ''ense thun in fiction or dror.a. But in the essav are no artificial devices as so often occur in the latter for s. There are no unnat ral or extraneous technicalities to SCfrcgate it fro~ life. ~O ~ranch ~Caden has ever attempted to fix for it a d finite e orial shape , a sot of principles to have for~ independent of h nature of the are. Braving life's change to f1x for he dra a or any other typo such a durable for. as shall help i on to another generation, this must at all events prove futile . It is the funda, ental ~ood that survives,~nd he essay ha soucht no other L:1mortality. Tow it would s e a" if even he novel were yielding to its example,abandoninc itself to real lif in an art al,ost ton natural to see. great,passinc. over in o thr' short story because the interest in i fe i superceed ~ ne the interest in formal completeness and tructural ela oration; the lancer novel m1.t jus if it" larger co.pas b is lnrgcr psychical scope. This is adduced to prove tlat h essay is not degenerate b reason of itr free echnic. It i not to be expected that a for , rcpr sentLne he lC'isurel ::niscellnneousness,the ra. bling interest of the e"sa• 1°t,s ould impose numerous tee n ·cal . tr· ture. . al· nf" 1. < ~:.r • sense with life, it is na t·1ral he uh0uld find the fre do .. of nature rnort} coneenial than the for al· ., f a reu ti Yet the very mood of the essay·as rnll its ae~ .ieti, character carries 1i th j • cBrtain :lirrht te hnic'll Lnplications . N. Jr.w Priccton Revie ... ·1 : 227-40 . I) Y',N.7abriskie f' 19

It i:o not laid do ·n in thA . an er of a 11·d~-bound ac·\df'.nic pr~cept when ~e say 1hat the esRav is Rhort. Dependin~ on the a~ount it can give of the sense of lif · anl ~~its psµchin31 ~>cope, it has no devices of plan o story to justify ::iuch length on i + s part. It has rir,ht to continue only no loni· as it can iillpress the personality Of the ariter upon us in ~n aesthntically pleasurable way. ?o sooner do r it transcend tne li~its within IThlch it is interesting than it violates its right to be called an essay. The leis ur·ely roaming is a thine of pleasure,as soon as it becones tiresome or inattr~ctiv~ it is past ti:ne to stop. /.s a prose poc.n it is co.a1)arable wit:1 the single poe>tlcal outburst of t:w lyric. i.s oe !·a·a , there can be no lonr poe.n. ,,herever such is atte. ptA

but depends on some subtle rela•ton in t:e author's ~inct. And a queer ~ind it is , . oving by leaps , as it were , like the chamois fro.a proillinence to pro.ninence. To fall to the dull co~nonplace is fatal . But gr~nting that there is a funda,nental pnrspicui ty and development, .v t of the more vital urtity 9 Cursorily viewed ,th essay seems one coneeries of thoucht and emotion, "an indie;ested piece" indeed. 3ut there is plan in this planlessness. :·e have already d ~el t on the function of the subject an a sort of ce,1tral buoy around which the driftin[" is made , we have .. 1entionecl t • e use of character as a mould into :vhich t:ie whole essay .nay be cast. •,. e have also alluded to the po ver of persanal mood and feelin to weld what otheraise •ere a hoJel ss farrago in a large and .vital unit.1r . Despite its ra::nbling, disjoint quality and its haphazard mode of introducine illustrations, the essay is at hear an aesthetic orgo.nis , its part.· assembled in funda~ental unity The informality of the essayist is thus not for,nleasness though it makes for freedom of technical decoru:n. Tlnconvontional and intirnate,he easily dispenses with an introduction;having put forth no finished argument,he finds it superfluous and wearyine to round off his talk - 1th a conclusion;he stops at will,checkinF himself whenever he has given sufficiently of his musingn to recreate himself or his readers. 2I

CHAPTER 4. STYLE.

It is well and famously said "The st le is the man." Jith somewhat the same truth might we reverse this statement and say that a thing so dPvotedly given to the man as the essay is style. This derives added force fiom there bein~ so little else to make this form instinct ~ith greatness. There is no structural machinery which as in the dra:na or novel :nay be manipulated for the a:neltoration of stylistic defect. As there is scarce anything can trim n poet's halting measure so the essayist cannot a~af from st le. Not that we have ne8dlessly elaborated uoon the mood,habits, subject matter,and technic for these are indispensable considerations and react powerfully on the stvle. But style and nothing else gives literary dignity and enduringness. It is the mint mark that gives value and currency to the thought. It is convenient to distinguish betNeen the characteristics of good style in general and those features which receive special emphasis in the essav. The former we pass over as necessary to all literature and therefore to he essavist. He ill write readilv and pleasur~blv on whatever theme is before hi~ . Beautv too and refinement are indigenous to the style in which such a late, consummate for.n of art as the essay is couched. In contrast to the uncontrollable passions of the lyric those of the essay mood are calm and largely unmoral ,appealing because of the elegance of the person about whom they are found. 1ie shall undertake to ascertain first in what mcosure the style of the essay reflects the mood.secondly ~hat qualities are accentuated by the brevity of the form. The lyric,dealinr as it does in deep emotions,calls for expressive heart words . It has always preferred the directnes , the concreteness, the virile force of native English 1 ords to the ponderous,abstract though ell circ mscribod La tin terminology. The essayist also,though more democratically dealing in emotions, perforce seeks a living vocnbu_ar• rather than cr31stallt7ec' phrases, hut beine more popular he may also stoop to ~ore racv colloquial idtom han the poet. If stvle ls the an we must look to it for individual char~. Personality is revenled not only in D'S of h nkine but in ways of expression,in the geni1s for vords no le s than in the genilS for thoughts. Less vieorous than the poet in sense of 1 i fe, .e does not crave meter but chooses a less marked and larger rhytho, the sentence cadence which is characteristic of the best prose . Its vague but regular movemen t sucgests so delicately the rhythm of life. It is all the more charmin· because i is unseen,beine even less obvions han the oratoricnl rhythm 22 of Cicero. So 1etimes as in Charles Lamb it borroVTs the olcl Teutonic alliteration,morelv to intensify its rhythn and Give it that prLnal, dor:iestic quality of he ear·ly epics. On his sentence cadences, the essayist must also rel~.r as one means to carry his readers along in defect of story interest. The essay, like the lyric short, havlnc so bri~f a time wherein to nburden itself, it has no space to squande r. The essayist may not be dull or slovenly;workine within so narrow li.nits , he rnust thinl{ and express hinself clearl~r. His lack of time and of auxiliary devices makes it of ut~ost import that not only his matter but also his manner be such as immediately invest themselves the reader'r interest. He may not like the dramatist depend on the later acts to do what the first has left undone or like the novelist be in with a dull chapter. Such beginnings are injurious anvvhere, in the essay they are fatal. Being a small vignet e,it must be the more distinctl~' colored, li=,avine the larger, uncertain effects to the larger canvas . It must strike ~t once, reachine the heart in the first paraeraph, stnkine into the mind at the first glance for a glace is a:l it will get. This puts a premium on such grippine,incisive qualities of style as clearness and strength. It has made polnte and precision emphatic in order to rive force to the careful a~preciations of the essavist. It has rendered him note or hy for vivacitv,brilliancy, and all the spirituel qualities of French style for it was fro1 ~ranee that not only the in tial impulse came but also quickening influences from time to time. From this source is also the epigram~atic for~ of expression, the sPntentiousness co.wion to all our essnyists and bespeakinr, their kinship with the proverb maker. This explains their joy in the short sentence. The period as a mark of punctuation ts in r,rea de. and with them, less so the comma. '1a th the parentheses.• hat :nark of he cu1nbersome Eli7abethan prose , the will have no hing to do. The qua ity and kind of sentence depends in no small degree on its position. An investigation will sho that the essayist makes the first advances to . P. heart of tbe reader either suing in person for sympathy (for ho·, else can we term his 1.runediate put tine forth of ·he self­ assertitive "I ") or else he ventures at once some startling generalization that sinultaneously deter~ines his key and secures hin the reader's interest. Th closing sen ence also stands out prominent as it is there he leaves the case to those · ho ·.vi 11 judee. Often he gather" the sweep and sum of the whole essay in one lambent sentence. Again he saves to the last the most telling,1. pressive.phaRe of his treatment, a kind of curtain effect,raisinga nhole set of echoes in the reader's own gladsome or rueful experience. Again and most often he sets you down as gentli as he took you up,and what seems to be a temporar:r pause in his leisurely chat urns out to be permanent. 23

Thus ve have tried,however inporfoctly,to sketch in the main outlines of the essay, its nature, its mood , its snbjoct, technic , its style. ';;1th these canto rs in .aind ·Ne shall seek to trace its hist mrical development. But Ne fi 8t e . uP attempt to clear up an incidental thoueh ver.' interesting and practical question,the relation of the essay to criticism. 24

CHAPTER 5.

TIIZ Ff>SAY AND CRITL,ISJ,~.

These two ter :ns are frequently associat rl,and,owing to the confused ideas of each that are rampant , the question is generally dismissed with the calling of all written criticisms essays. But written criticis~ is not always literature , and of that which is all is not essay-like in quality. On the other hand , the es~ay is frequently not concerned with criticism at all , at least not· ith literary crmticism. Gr~at essayists are often critics as Pddison, Hazlitt , but the two functions arr not the same. The training of the esf'avist however resembles that of the critic.Each must have at his beck rich accumulate stor s of knowledge . Before his day, books must have multiplied,a sufficient body of literature i .portant enou h in qualitv must exist to stimulate musing and comparison. 0pineless statements do not make essays , nor is criticism the application of arbitrar and abstract doctrine. Its principles murt have the authority that a long tradition,e hracing the usage of the best writers,gives. The essay is a criticism of life in a much stricter sense thnn poetrv. Tho essayist and critic appear at the same stage in man'r- developm nt. It is already noted that society must have formed for in itR co parisons and contrasts is the ger~ of all cri icism. If further~ore s ociet~ is to a pp rec ia te critic ls:n it must hn.ve 1 i ved lone enough to know itself and its failin n , it must have reached a hieh stage of self-consciousness and introspection. In ·proportion to '..he .rocress of civ"li1ation and refine.nent, is criticis. esteemed. The cssa is like he critic ir r troepective, comparine past and present. He also exemplifies the truth that the best cr.itics of tfie world are m n apar from the wo.:>ld. The critic however i~ limited to liternt re and fine art, preferably to literature a~ that is univers 11 circulated so •hat men can judge the cri iclsm ly t he thing criticized. The essayist's interest eillbraces not onl this but well-nigh everything that is enno led ith the fac of existence. Especially does he turn to men and anners. Both critic and essayist are men of insight ra her than formal logic. Logic sternlt and rigorousl ap lied i apt to drive th3 spirit a ay and kenp cri icism fro bein itself literature. oreover if the cri ic has no feeline hi~self he can hardl· hope to appreciate he e o i nal clement i"n the author he er ici?es. "It takes an artis o catch an artist.tt I) Logic at the sa~e ti e hat it infringes on his crea ive pr ro ative is pron, to ake hi like other spiritless things superficial.

I ) r

25

So much for the resemblances. The differences et·veen essayist and critic are primarilr t•o, firstl1 , t o former is an impressionist, secondly.he lackn the str nuousne• s of the critic . Impressionism is not criticism. It is so to a large extant, for every criticism depends on thP- critic's appreciation. But he ma.•· not stop with this , he mu t refer to the orlt: in hand to the standard of th• best authors. The escavist needs no such ultimate tribunal;he hiMself has he finnl word. It is not his business so much to do justice to an author as to do just. ice to hi. se 1 f. rever he less .,. i th his lart::e syu1pathy and humani t he is not lia le to go fnr wrong . And whenever he deprecates there is that vital, creative , his personality speaking throuch it all,vo1chine for constructive not destructive c iticism. The essayist not onlv sets ac dP critical canons,he also divests hi r.self of the strenuousness and intellectual it that clothes the critic. He is absolved from the judicial function;he has no thesis to prove, in fee .heh~ no pro8f at a11. The er tic,t1~ugh funrlc~entall pp ciative, must also value dRfinitel•,be qu e exact and eo thr')ur,h an entire pro5ram. The essa · 0 t has no such f ed t sk. He judt;es not, he merel ! ta 1 cs abo an auth r, tal s no so much to give infor .. a ti on on he author as to reveal the peculiar te~per of his own mind. Hovever criticis and essn ism pproac. when the vri ter is thoroufhly i.nb d w ·th he of o 5reat : rt st anc can in r r i. " r ~ o .v n art , wh n 110 c 1 o" e h ~A 1 "' • n n no• her ' s without losjnf hir bearing"'. 'I'bis ex 1·1·ns h i s of critics such ar later nnd Lo:ell.,.. 2

PA11' 2 .

c·i,,, TEr I .

Prof . rndley har s'"'i" d on the e"SDY as of the cat gory of im~ortal literary type , this even over and above such a for, as thf' novel . I) It is r •eked f such per1nanency by virtue of 1 s prnd nc'l to the lyric , f .r th l•·ric :nnst live as 1 0n[ as e::no ions \'lnr .. h her<· of. en . However, it is sirnifican that h Pssay ha"' not al·: ys exist dd , i truth, it is one of the t os youthful heno. Pna in lit erature . Cff and on essairi ha" een clni.nec for such of the ancients a" Xenophon . Plutarch, arc1" A relius , E1)ictetus , and Au l us Gelli•1s,but to include hef·e \ere to infringe on tht, artistic concoption o · the essa ' · It is resu.. ahl,' safe o say ha th ancients :me v it not . :- ere anci ther e ·re s traggline traces o. h<~ . tell have developed into he e~·sa · , ut th ind is ensable l reath of persona 1 111 e r ie. no thet'C o an ;ate he rlry bone". The array of classic -ri ters ei v r. above a o ed at an atti'..ude or for.ii that is faintlJ anticipa ory , ut essay ir. its 11uinter-sent puri t· ir:: cons icuo1 s y i absence . It wuu no dearth of cr·eative o:er, it. .. a ne. funda1:iental te.aprr of the imes hat absolutel' forbade he recocni t i on of the essay . en did no poss ,f=s enoueh sy •. p y and de.:iocr acy t hat the ossa , od should be accen a le . The outlook on life did not com and sufficiently road vis os to give t~e laree , sanc , hu un vie\ of le re . The essa~ would have i nfringed on the se er:t an of classic authorship . -onfes" ion •1as a thin but for cri iinals . The ancient 1ri er 1as requirements of his subjec . i is e phns is

'.'.'e read a thinf like (-:icero ' s f)pf'encP of ,~rchias expectant. f!e leaves the beaten road of for nH ic ar gu r1ent and di[,resses on the value nnd natu!·e of poetry. 'lr is infor.:.ial ohl ifa ti ons are aside , But the fA ta 1 res tro j n of .he classic mind forbids h L:;. to touch he por onal es8uy note. rrot that he does not t1ublish his cco; no crt at 1•·ri ter is more obtrusively selfish than he , a hard intellectual egoisni with no redcemine hunani ty. Like d~e expec .::int we read the J\ttic !1nghts of old J\ultw relli ts,we clor-e the book here too deceived. So with Plutarch. The most rniscellaneoua subjects with all their varied quality of handling,all these detached pararraphs of s ill .. ore de tache

of a sure humanity. All the main literary types except the novel we find in early ti'mes as they are quickener i 1nediately from the stream of life. The essayict comes after those because he requires their work as a part of hi;- equip~ent. Two Ple. ents he needs which are not originally but potentially in the development of man. As a prose poet he needs a strone eaphasis on personality,on lyric liberty of self. ~econdly as a lrose artist he is more democratic than his metrical brother. He has interest not only in himself but in his fellow-nen. koreover,to be true to the spiritual life of others he must have it Ge t down in literature. He inust have a widr" knowledee of life not only an interest in it. He that judges himself without reference to other men is as wronc as he that judces others with no reference to himself • . rt is the common not the eccentric that &ives a bond of interest. The two elements we have noted are then intimately related. Real interest in self and personality grows apace with interest in other men,and humanity of feeline is broad in proportion as the knowledge of men is broad. Hence the date 1580 for /ontaigne 's "Essais",when history had satisfied the requisite conditions bv huoanism and the revival of learning. Rven in ~arcus Aurelius and the Confessions of Augustine , the self-revelatory note had been sugcestively ,~truck,and the Colloquies of Era!"lffill'> have been called the morning star of the .nodern essay.I) The reformation e. phasi?ed the p r rsonal attitude of man to his !Taker, it gave value and interest to personality,at the same ti. e kindling the fe

CHAPTER 2 .

~JONTAIGirE , THE ESf:.AY A.., IT CJ\f>,E TO EJGLAND.

If previous to the reneissance ·rn have been able to trace only faint , conru~ed lineament~ of essayism, iontaigne brines us at once out of darkness into broad daylicht. ~hile the struggles of those heatrd times were still warill he a nticipated the universal peace and the humanity that was to be . ,;i th no ;ninor prophets to herald its co.1ing and no warning but the deeper warning of the times, the essay br ~ aks fullfledged from the hand or rather the heart of Montaiene. Re is the mode rn essay, bringing it immediately to a perfection it has seldom reached since and never surpassed. All hark back to him. Hi is the great modelthat stimulated the rise and development in England. Michel Montaigne ()533-I592) is one o~ the 'pioneer modern ripirits , cultivating like Erasm1s though more succes fully an independence of his environmentr. In I570 he diseneaees hi~self from practical affairs , retiring ou of his rtirring times to his castle. ·;;hy f s it tr. t, 1 i ving in times so charged with heart and blood issues,he gives us so lit le on these elem~ntal topics? All thr while he is describin[ the \Orld only at such points as it touch~s himself. He seem~ to shrink from the larger duties to his age and fulfill extravagantly h i s duties to himself. "'hence this devotion to s elf if not hat he w s reapine while others werP yet sowing? He is the first ereat egotist. This was his sole office, and his life is a commentary on his work. No man was ever more com1>letely identified with the essay than he ; it unconsciously shaped itself on the model of his life. The secret ·.a;as not that h{ could wri e but that he could live the essay so ·ell. He allowed the t·mes to ro 1 s e his heart and hu:nanity without t ainting him w th heir pr judices and party 7eal. Once hj_s personal cnthusia"m was stLnulated , he soueht the coneenial detachment of his Gascon retreat. Ile stood apart fro ,1 the world and could therefore see the better. Iis detach, ent was also of another kind. Because he sa , and knew the vrnrld so well ha dis liked to call all black or white where so . uch is eray. This hesitating inconclus i Veness .nal

'J • one.I) Coverin nn immense fiel ,he ake ,ho which is his own because i has .n ered into derives charm and v-. lue from h s own pre n His was a lei. urely ar 1-cho.ir• n strenuousness stopped on the thra"hold of idled, but he idled wiscl • He as overn d b hi and ;.ri tines, rnt his ·:hims vcr those larger, we repress into the ackground the car s of wri tine j ts elf was alruost involun ar • "II· rdl others reason for my di coursos hn e vc non :hat po sibly i presses s rong t 1s :11s unhesit ti g strai htforvar ness. He take h ruost intimate confidence ith no d"c er1ng for i own 1 ife ·" tr.ro"m on he canvas i h an ench n tin of reserve. le see:ns scarce conscious of a public least it does not r.act upon him. Humor is iholl a hlne of modern aid of personal and human interest. 1 i~ e , for he i. above all a " s er of broad however,int rested in en rather th n l' c 1 to th kno~n,the euporal id of ll eccen rjcity,no h· ite r;hi t truth of hat he sa."'. He h irnpor ant,oeizin on t·.e or .ankind so ha he h . come e avera e n. !n subjec

0 tire U"',in er overs The s all d fji VO'"' , his o·m lar p rsonal' ecauso ha . s 0 ·rn ct r I 3 re er tur s other ~orr,eant o r hal rha His subjec i Pelf ha. no autho i principal matter of •h . a of n all. His division into bo kA nd c extraneous as the 'mposi of the hie treatises of he t~me. His oblieation o hi s lf 0 his subjec . Therefore he i n er or exhausting. The lencth of his essa . oun o

I) , .Lan"'on. 2) Eosais Bk.I hap.24. 3) 4) •ssais Bk.I hap. 24 . 31

his interest and stretches f om one to do7en pages but never coos to tedious lengths. His style is vacabond as his spirit, and here too his char.a is that of the personality b hind he pen. Profiting by the resources of the French languace,hu revels in happy turns of expression. But h~ is no proverb .noncer. NelthP.r is he a stvlist in the sense ttat the GOncourts loved the fine phrase . qa ther "ii th hi.;1 thought ak s st ··le. !lis ne 1•• thour.;ht required new forms of expression. He like al cssa irt hus extendee the resources of his ongue, disdaining not to dr8·:; cnen on the colloqui~lisms of Gascon when the F. cnch would carry him no further. ~ ith this we leave th most subjec ive of essayists. 32

CHl.PTER 3 .

A. PREL111.IN'ARY .

Thoueh the thread 11e seek to follow disappears i.nperccpt.ibl · in the web of the past , yet it is not a llopeles.· task to trace it back of its f i rst apvearance in Lord 3acon. In tre later 1niddle ages English lan&uar,e and nationality h' d been ste~dily growing , and , at th ~ r enaissance , both hart r ached oo ~ solidarity . ·Conditions for U ;e develop ent of the laneuace had scarce been as favorable as in France . Jtill bu partlallv recovered f r om the dis urbine influence of tho r;or. an •rench, it received i:i the I4th, I5th, and 16 1 centuries larce increments from the Latin. The Latin lnfluance unsettled tr e ~nelish far more than it did the French, becausc it Ra s so alien to the genius of the former toneue . Empirically we know t:1at poetry al ays r 0 aches perfectio jn advance of prose. On1y native or>ds,tnoront;h1y domesti cated in home and heart , are relevant to oe ry . Prose makes no such c:;trictnres;its de,ocracy per it eooc1 and evil to d\ ell together under the sa s flue till the evil by process of nature is worked out . Being next to conversation, 1 questionable elements are so to say tried out therein. Hence it wns that Bacon came two hundred years after Chaucer, and Addison din not arrive till the age of Queen /nne . The m'scellaneous En lish prose before R· con ho~ever points. to the essay. The English have ever been a cor.ll11on-sense' ' people by virtue ~hereof their philosophies s tand out stronrl against the obscure mysticism of tne German. Possibly hat they are islanders , co.apellen b their locat ·on to travel ~ nd ..,e f> · much , explains ·vhy the are not satisfied ~i ho t seeing. uch akin t o this is the realis that colors even their romanticist.., e . g • .• alt e r Scott. The essay has found favor .vith such a ' real is tic co.nmon- sense race as the !.ngl lsh, because it has such use of obsPrvation and experience , because i holds to large and just truths , and , last but not least, because i gives n out let to the stronr ethical uality of the race. In or orn day this quality haP prevented .nellsh reali m fro d lng into natural ism, and it has al·Na is furni. hed tn essa large , vital , human r:iattcr, thereto ivin justice, s· ni , no therefore permanent interest to the o ions of he essa is • This ethical trait lent. piculiar force o he renaissance i n England . Tr ue , as if inspired b the freedom of the seas , the ~ngll s h have fro~ earl tiues . s red the selves of liberty . Tho reformation also made a profo nd ir.ipression in Great Br itain, all of Nhich inaicates a strong char cter in ere t. Fiction and drama wi t h the chiP-f e. phasis on character have t.1ere 33

had a str onchol d . It as substantially this influence that hallowed the essay on Enslinh soil .

B. FR/uWIS BA,ON. (I56I-162G)

"Essays or Connsels , Civil and , oral" by Francis Bacon appear d 1597 , seventeen years after ; .on ta iene' s Ens a is. The Enelish essay is a cradual risinl! from it nadir in the 16th centur y to its 7enith in he early 19th; the French spends its force in its first outburst. Bacon is by no means so consu~Llate an essa· ist as his great Gascon prototype, not t hat he lacked the cenius so much as becau e of the obstacles with which he had to cope. In spirit, the ti e for the essay w s ripe in England more than elsewhere , 9ut English prose in the ace of El i?abeth sa tis fled but i .1perfec tl the s tyl int ic do .. ands of the essay . Prior to Bacon it recaived no careful at nti0n or cultivation. As far as i had occurred it had the distinctive marks of a prinitivc language , lone rentences , long .vord" ith litt le attempt at normali?ation. There v s a ~urplusage of synonyms , barren expletives , and exotic idiom, a solu ely f'robiddine the vigor and precision oft e e.sayist. If any model wns i.posed at all it was the lancuaee of the learnerl,i. e . Latin. The half civili?ed •·nglish ·vas to be educated up to this standard of polish. The res 1 t ·vas a m.di~m inposing enough but insufferably prolix and invo ved . kuch violence v~s offered to ,nglo-3axon idio by h• larce incorporatfuon of Latinisms. Vlth hes9 on the one hand and a large admixturP. of native barbarisms on he other , Engl sh vas, in troth, quaint and uncouth. Hid thereto the love of u ·bbl inc nd euphuism, and we have abundant reason hy so li tle Eli7abet:-ia.n prose is current in our duy. Stnff that bears so near kinsh1p to th essa as the .ork of Sidne . with al its pleasant infor.nality and rnther d ocratic ·ud ment , is fatally handicapped by stylistic imperfections . ,hatever Bacon fails to be,he yet remains the first ereat m~ster of English prose . He in part overco. es the obstacles to English essa ism and is in tter and manner a fine forerunn r at least of the essay. ore than ny o h r he perfected prose style , a task infinitely valuable but not without its price . The ntylistic .1fficul i s he encountered reactec! seriously on !1is essays . The . e hod he employed rcr:ii nds of Malehranche and Pascal and of all ho , dealing ith an unformed language , have nevertheless ritten so as to be readable even to-day . It as a proce s of prunin , revision, and refurbishing, repeated often a do?en times . It was not merely a mechanical proce s but a ques i n of genius , an inborn instinct like ,iontairne ' s for the value of a ·orct . Strength and vir i lity were necesaary, taste anri grace were out op the question. It is noticeable that Bacon restricts 3'1

~imself to such matters as nuit h's manner,thouchts that interest b·· their orn native forcefulness,not by d lic~cy of presentation. This che1ed and digested ethod reacted powerfully on his mood. It put great obstacles in he way of free, spontaneous expression of personality, obstacles that ln th case of Bacon proved fatal. Also , thoueh alive to the nnw invigorating currents of thought and feeling,his great mind wus set in a life of such small acts that, like all the dishonest and insincere, he was afraid unrestrainedly to sho hi. self. Perhaps livine amid worldliness and at the court, had also much to do with the dignity and reserve that holds and checks him. His essays ware best com ared with those general paragraphs of large human interest that introduce many of t~e es·a a of Lamb and Addison. But unlike them he does not from there go on to a more egotistic tone in the manner of .ontalgne. In so far as he stops short of this,he stops short ob being an ideal essa.vist. Yet Bacon is at heart a s tr one personality, 'lnd it may not be far wrens to attribute his tie a of defects to the ill-favored language and uncongen"al environment. He Gas too dependent on others to be sincere !th h mself .Thus he thought more deeply than he live~ ,and his emotions are lar ely intellectual. His stateliness s too in great part his nature,and mayhap he unbent as much as h coul • It is then too s rongly pu to r-a that h G writings are bits of µem ican,juiceless of personality. dtill no essayist has better ~eali1ed the nglish common-~ense ideal.Re is nlwnvs informed ith a laree kno' led of life. In hi 1 even as in on ta igne the s trea.ns ')f anc ien cul urP. and of the new ideas flow toeether. · Like ~ontalgne ton hi" attitude is extremely individual. He had no strong par y 1eal or proj iic. o arp his judements. He aimed to see h ngs for himse,f,n t as his forefathers had seen the:n, hardl as ·re sP.e th fl, ~or he s s much to we are purblind. His kno ledee of l"fe bf culture and observ ton elves him sympath1 for ever thing except •hat savors of intellectual stagnation. It is the spiri of pro res. of he new age. rre has so m1ch respect for tr h that h even does not overlook the clai s of falsehood. I) His 4 olerance 1 k~ Wontai~ne 's is extre~e. Frora this coign of v1ntage,h s he essayist in all times se n thlncs as the f ur. , s th Bacon is a consurn.nate instance, inve tinf h s subject. h all its far-reaching relations, focussing in his · riting through the clear 1ust medium of of h s mind . In hir es·ays he aimed profersedly at humanity,as ~e says of hem "the most come home to the bosoms of en. 9e have already mark . ct the absence of the pronoun "I''. Instead of doninatine his subject like ontaiene,he brings it to the fore, keeping his rich mi 1d in the background. Montaigne gossips about t r ifles , about Gnscon fields and oddi th s. Bacon aimed instead to set forth hi.. elf " no curiously but significantly." Ile throws off the spe~l of contemporaneousness and turns with corupeiling p wer to large ethical themes that are for all times and peoples. His p rsonality expresses itself in the affinities of his thoueht. 1hat de~icate lrony! He whose coduct teemed so with frailty, in his wr1 tings is engaged in sincere though upon concluct anct its rel ~ tions to the end of life, constantly seekine to transform the wisdo:n of knovledge into the wisdon of life. The only unity with hin is the unity of subject and the uni ty of the point of view. There is not a strict loGical development, only the . ere orderina of his thought under various topics. His point of viev is retained i .sistently though it may not be denied that it is chosen with great partiality to the interests of the te poral world. His essavs are masterly in con~truction,os p eci lly as to the economy of attention. Already the first entence 1 ilrn the powerful open inc chord of a tone poem rouses the interest and announces the key of tho iece. ~o etimes it flashes forth a strikine comparison, sometimes a significant paradox , always a vivid truth or t poverful appeal to in erest. Fro.n the very start, he wrestles vith his sul.ject r solutely. Continuine as he has begun, dis laying his theme in t o or three of its various phases , he then closes 1th a •urn as striking and unforeseen as he beeinnine and r,enerally throwing the subject into its broadest relations. He had a veritable genius for co ression. His papers are miracles of condensa ion an brevi y; an can e written on a single letter sheet. 1attor and nner, ach i" the counterpart of the other,concise nd clearcu • Hi tho~ght is eeneralized to the xtreme and ves ed in short preenant sentences. Yet he of n findR for his a stract content a concrete image that vi vi fies the a~JS hOl·eht of his mind. It oust be oassive thought th t can straichtforwardly,depending on its o n otential po rather thnn on any adventitious aids. That uch i anen thoughtfulness and ungent com ression should result in a wealth of sente tious utterance~ and forcer 1 antith ses is quite natural. Bacon , l.n the final recr.:onlng, ust,ho ever, derive a larce part of his importance as a e, a s from his position 11istor:cally. He polished anc sh s of the essayist , he acclimated the creat French od l o ·nglish soil. For Bacon like ma~ of he er at li?abethans road and was in luenced by iontaigne, He pas e on the r di ion of the essay , givlne it ho; ever an orieinal turn, for he :as a great croative spirit in an original age. He eives i the national bent of co o.mon-sonse. His limi at ion" are those of the ancuaee and of a personality b na ure and circu .. stance rl.served against fam 1 ri ty. r 36

~lJRTON 1 ND BRO', E .

/' These two men are considera le not onl· becau.e •ha,, continue the perfection of pro~e st, le but also in thnt tlcy are ereat literary progenitors of the essay. TheJ are, however,in no strict sense esrayists. ROB8RT BURTON (I57E-I640) 1s the a thor of the 1\natomy of Melancholy (1617). Like Jon ai&no he aims to lay himelf open in all the antiquarian quaintness of his personality. I!is 1 oak is corrmarablf' to Paradise Lost, there is th· sa~e prolongcd, elevated conception,nnd he sadnenr of the univcrnc is upon both. The L'Allegro and Il Penseroso are ~ven held to have been influenceci by Burton. He was a man of cons ti tutioncll melancholy ,writine of melancholy t~ tho .iFht avoid it. He dreams about such matters as tc others are the sternest rnalities,and he dreamq in terms of the literatures of the past. No man elves evidence of wider rend ine, onl~· he fails too often to pililish hi~qelf against this backrround. Ee wns thus inspired to broad sympathies the .ol'e easil~, cultivate! in the leisure he assumed. The general tone o~ his ntro(uct·on reminds po\•erfully of ddison's descr.:.ptlon of himself. Ile calls him~elf in fact "a . ore spectator of other men's fortunes, diversely presented to me as fro l a conn on l ea tre." He has no thesis to • rove. .rcverthele s he ls no essayist because of the elaborate logical apparat 7lth· which he invests thome •.e stre uotsly exl austs l oi us and the subject by fine lnlr-splittine,etr n5ly ren· 1is en of the old scholastics. ignificantly he quotes Plutarch and relli~s on the first page. He i~ the ereat exponent of h. scra -book method,an stonishine,insatiate iscellan o'sness . It in an iaunense compi la ti on of fact and fable, stuff that rdeht be and was worked over into ssays but,as it stand ,of no importance to us. His genius for quotation i superhu an;His quo a ions are so extensive as to en irely over1hel~ im. It 1~ he ra material no the finished essay. The introduction ·s th most to our purpose being less ridden with orro1Vincs,r.iore oreanic- and digested. The excessive leneth and intricate loe·cal scheme make the work intolerable when judged by as he ic stand·rds. True,he rambles,follo\ ing up a favorite train of q otat on so lengthily that the digression outr ns tho rinc·pal arg•ment, but this is done with insufferable long- ind dness. In general , too , his omniverous reading makes his paces s lff an iedan ic . In hi~ style,colloquialiPms and hJpcr-pedantic Latinisrns are juobled toeether d h little taste. ,_ut le ir generally free from the affection and ridiculous metaphors of his contemporaries. And -hen as so etimes happens he becomes emotional and can control r.inself no loncer,he breuks fro.n the shadow of l ir- many source-books, takine up the horn 1 native idiom and speaking it ~ith purity and co. pelling po e 37

in a style unc O.:L'Ilonly clear and brilliant. .:e have thus at length trfated Burton because I.It is common to treat him unqualifi~dly as one of our fir st essayists . He i s not an essa ist but nevertheless i mporta~ t to our discussion. 2 . Be is important for his great influence on later essayists. He was popular in his own day and came again to notice in the following century thr oueh the plaeiarisms of ~>te rne . He W8S a ..nine of mater ial to which Johnson anti La1nb confess creat obligations . 3 . The Anatomy of Melanc.1oly did much to bring on he essay . It is largely stuff, treatment, and paintQ of viei of essay caliber. Like the essayist Burton edi tates wisely and sao<(ly an things of every- day importance . He suggests the essay~y the frequent 'nterpolation of "I " and "we'',by little personal interstices , cornments that eive hiu away . This we must reILember was lacking in Bacon. ___. THOJ.:AS BRO'" E ( I G05-I 6 2)

Browne is in many Wtt s rt r,rea a vancc over Burtor • Ti'irs t and fore·nos t he had th1 1'ion aicnesque fearles ness of saying whatever he has to say. He spoke becau~e he could not help speaking. He had the essayist' s native in inct for displayine himself. Bet,.;een liontaigne and Charles Lamb there is indeed no . ore considerable example of self-1·evelation than just Browne ' s Religio 1 edici. ,"hat kind of personalit • is it then he reveals? Hazlitt cr~ticized him because "he see~ed to be of opinion thnt the on-Y busines ~ of h s lifR was to think."But !la7litt missed he po·nt when suspected nrowne of aiming o undestand when he only mean tc f .cl. It is better said that he t hought with his i. ar'nation. I) This places hi , al once on the li terarv as oppos .d to the intellectual sidP . This mode of thinldng allo ed hi.1 to approach and settle expeditiously al 1 manner of ex er ing prob le .. s. Ila7 l · t t' s criticism that "he walks go;ned in the i. r cat folds an sweeping drapery of dark sa ins and i~penetrable riddl· 0 " is more strikinc than just. Bro~ne ' s in uit ions ar a 1 1-po erful, he is a poetic visionary, one who felt his wa to the tru h. His kno vledge , ga ined b wide rending, by travel and ob.·erva ion, only causes a pr ofound ~indling of senti ent. In the lleio ~cdici,reason , exe~plified in his profession, and faith , as 1 . comes froo the church, cross each other 1 there e no conflic in his soul . His was a liberal sympa h , a xindliness diff sed to everrthing. "He moralizes and grows pathetic on a re idle fancy of his own as if thought and being ere the "n. e."2) Al] men are his friends , he has almost a total lacK of an ipathies . " This large humanity allowed hi. to liv tran uil

I) C. H. Herford Intr oduction to t he Relicio Jedici. 2 ) Jillia~ Hazlitt. 38

and squaring hi~self with the existing order of things, ~arely conscious of the fierce wills grapplinc with each other outside his study-winJow. Tl1is ennabled hi~ to hink the second thoueht of hia age. Like ShakespenrA he repr~sent s the good co.nmon-sense rel ition of he !"ngl ish race, a truth to the larger interests of humanity,a truth vr do not find in the Restoration. It was his le"surely personal interest that ~ade the Relifi ~edici (IG43) so utterly remote from the contending creeds. ~hen the Royalists ~ere ~oing und~r he wrote Discourse on Co won Errors,not a Miltonic tractate but an expori i0n of the straneest popular fallacies with e~ually strange refutations. 1658 when the Royalists were agnin co inc into power, he published his Trn-Burial of which are the words of Pater:"Like the soul,exploring the recesses of the tomb,he carries a light,the light of poetic faith,~eerin~ round with boundless curiosity and no fear;noting t1r various casuis ical considerations of men's last for.:i of self-love." In a word he delighted in the intelligible forms of he supernatural. r) His mys tic te.nperament fondles the riddles of beine, the co.iLnon curiosities of men. And he always brinrs hi8 ho lght to that stage where it And s in doubt so that he can rep se in +he sure embrace of faith. His hancllinp is herefore o move fro~ one mountain peak of doubt to ano her.fl rinc 1s not a proof but his feelinrs on the mooted p~int . c is a lover of curjosity,too, in hin rich allunivene:n,part cularly in Huch a piece as A Letter to a ""riend uher' he amasres q 1 10 ation and curious book-lcre. tnlike Burton,he does no quote o such profusion as o be ridden with the overw ig~t of it all. He has a sense of the incongrui y that lier beneath the plain, tangible thin s of 've ·. -c111~ - the humor of Laub at the dist0rted sense of proportion in co.u on mind3 . It is a huillor that minrles well with his philosophy bu contrast har.ly with his narrow, intolerant age. His laree s mpath"P.s create,t.oo,a rH.tur 1 opti is , an open-air cheP.rfulness hat char s s •et. His relig on Yas one of cheerfulness,of Jlacidit1 and comfort. The roal fault of Bro~ne - it is disa[,reea)le o search for flaws in one who as hi~self so lit le fault­ findine - 13 THE 'i;;~T .i;sro' Ii' .II'" V/RIO T,) P/P :Rs TO TIE ; ..GTil of a goodly sired tr atise. He thereby pretends an intellectual plan an exhaustiveness that is no there,for he is ·e~ul ory and discursive throughout,not ven having a natural conclusion. He is not to be read ·i th ap'.Jl ica ti n in n s int;le it tine a· a treatise;he b.nt satifies ahen read frae entar"ly. As to style he re resents he first d libernte, successful attempt at beautv of xecution r?vious o ,

"such unpremeditated wiid f~owers of speech as ·;e shoul~ never 11 have the good luck to find in any more for al k1~d of 11 erature , 2) r) 2) a ter, .q1prec ia tions. Ile loves paradox as dParJy as Bacon. He loves to open or close with a grand sentence of unexpected rhetorical richneRs, this dependine fro:i his pararraphs like a heavy golden frinee. The gla,nour of poetic allusion is upon him. His st."le scents the aro:na of quaintness,and it fits well thP. oddity of his fancy to be clad in the raiment of old snlendor. Poetic is also his concreteness. As in Burton and Samuel Johnson , tho antique in his sympn thy and his s riousness, e'·en .no re, leads hi1.:i to an almost hyper-Latinistic vocabulai'y. He is a skillful Lntinist however with a genius for the lancunge. ~hese long ~ords leisurely spun out breathe the lone quiet of his l.:.fe. He inclines moreover to the use of exotic ?Xpression, his writings beine even raore than Burton's a tissue of man' lancuages. At tines he is heterogeneous enough to provoke uncouthness,vacillatin bet een the style of sorene dicnity and a s t:,rle of garrulity and manner ism. I. ore largely than Burton ro ..rnver h~ influ( need later essavists. His subjectivitv,leiqurely and hu.an attitudc,his c>nrich.:ient of st~rle,all passed into the co ... on leEacy of ossavism. 40

CHAPTER 4. THE PSRIODICAL OR .EI(!.HTEE;TH

A.CA SE.3.

It is not without reason that a general 4uickening of the essay comes with the 18th century~as there is also an explanation why the periodical essay should appear at this and no other time. The last half of the 17th c 1=-ntury :uarks • general clearine of the boards for the daintier,sirnpler graces of prose,not only a great step in the developmen but an ~n tire revision of tas+e. Prose is vhittled down to obey the delicate touch of Addison. Already Hooker,Burton,and Browne had done much to givelaccuracy to prose style,Llilton had vritten vith energy and Sidney with ineffable ro antic swcetneos. Luch wts however yet to be dcsired,and there Nere powerful forces at work to bridge the e· p between the 1 rn-Burial and the Tatler, a gap of scarce fifty years. The chief defect of 1ngllsh style prior to he Rest6ration was the obsession of the Latin Nith all the ponderous inversions folloving in its arches. Jature of cour e did much to trim the laneuaee of this excrescence. .odel of native Ene;lish virile and perspicuous as ickJiffe and Ralei13h,men ·vith a genius for the language, these were beginnine to exercise a critical influence. The tone;ue became subject to various normali1inf" infl ences;it therefore came to be undrrstood bv all classes. p to his ti e i had taken a scholar to understand the bulk of contempor neo1s prose,much more so, to understand the pro.e of a previo is eenoration. The standard version of the Bible GII v~s n great step to the unification of the laneuage. orno•cr o reach the people, it had to dispense with he 1 arn d Lati element. The controversial pamphleteering of tl.e aee of ilton did much to displac the long abstract Latin ·.vo rd" i th siillple,homely ones of native extraction. This association with the acrimonious pens of party 1eal did ho·rnver no breed elegance. The style of the first ecadcs of the Restoration lacks not only the disordered beauties of the previous age but also the li ·pid graces of th a e tha followed. It is eminently pedestrian and mirr:agina ti ve. But the Puritan was g actually bein ousted fro; li crnture. The licentious manners of the court of Charles IJ introduced a more free fa~iliar style of writine as well as living. 0tylistic change in in the direction of the viv cious,the conversational. Above all, the Restoration bro ght the French 41

influence to the conrt nnd thence to 1 ·tern. tu re. 'ow first the Latin gives way and we are no longer forcect to the snd spectacle of great,livin,creative intellects constrainine thei r imagination to the rigidity of classic idiom;no longer do we have the preposterous attempt to acco iodate a l:vinc languac;e to the for.n of a dead one . The crisp, sparkl inf French sentence comes into vogue . Dr den i~ here the chiefest h rald od Addison. By his wholesode influence on English prose he con.1,:Jlcted the ;rnrk of Bacon. He studied tLe genius of the tongue with happy success . In no previous writer i~ there s11ch raciness, ... , 1...... :e:1,o,.), . ..L. • t· L • , ~ .. " \ •; • ') t:,r. ~ Jtill proffiinent d ivines had in thir hom"lies shown forth popular r:races of s t·rle . Bi "hop 'lprn t is peculiarly :iea t . nd cla r , Isaac narrow develo~ed the laneuaee as n logical instri e t , :·:ri U nc 1•i.. th enere1.r nrnl co. io•tsness, is hop Tillotson, ···l1 0 .. lddiso~ profPsses as his no 1 el , is fAvo1 · d 1ith eleva ion, simplicity , perspicuit~r , :rnd the case of fluent i ptoviu~tion , Jeremy Taylor char.. ed b r his w· rxth and richne.,s. "o ,e of these hc~ever attain the strlistic erit.of Dryden . After him the eoocl worl( is co:1tin•rnd in Lbe clear thouch often colloquial idio of Loc.rn' s ssny on thr• 1u inn Understandine and y ::iir :illia T~m le (1628-16 9) . Tem1 ln's imporatnce is ?hall· on the stylistic side, and here, if he did not directly influence Addison, he at le st pre ·red he public for him. Temple ' s only innov tion as to thoucht is t 1c t;et tine ::ti"'nY fro1 severe in tel lee tual de nnds , he leave"' t c abstract :lane and wit. it th abstract vocabul ry of his predecessors . He moves amone present thing , even the trifles of his garden . .le writes ~ith ele ant si plicit nd fa .iliarit nnd has earned for himself above all others . e attribut_ nn i ve . He lacks the broader vie\v, there is n su vi t. of l'lanner Dnd a condesccndine ienorance about hi 1 Ut Ne uU. t pardon that , tecause . e ·s so reada 1 and so .~dern. The Frencl influence is strone 1itn him,- pain , . en en lo snes., an tithes is , shortness of sentence . It ·1· s he afle of Pas ca 1 an~ La Rochefo11cauld . He fol ows natiral sent nee or f'r , mOreover , is fluent , sentence ero,i1inP" out of sen encc or5anic 11 . 'I'h r 0 is , to~ ,a pulsatinf rise ancl fall . :e is one of the r·rst instances of l~ngl i sh rose rh:\(thm. 1 11 · n a 1 , c is eas il: read with little use of aucht else but. he e e , nd h th s ant icipates the econo y of · t n ion essen i~l o th la er periodical essay . There is one sterlinc exa pl of' this appro c. to st .· listic 'nerfection in the r al n of the csr. · . This L

Bacon gives us the essay of 'ontaicne in proce· contraction; froJ there it s~ings to the oplosi~ e~tre c , t~e intolerable dilation of , urton. "Srowne marks a re •trnin · towards the normal state , a return progressing throng. Filler 42

and Cowley before i ·1 ;;teelo equilibrium is reachod ane v. But in the t.imcs of tho Civil .:ar, mPn had not yet found their level . ?~treme s~cceedrrt cxtreme,Puritan followed on Povnli~t and ~oyalist on Puritan. Burton an

·::i tho1 1t compan1, they' re 1 ·: e ~ ecal ne r i .. tne' ne er ov but by the ·.1in of o her men 's rea h."

After the ~e.,toration "he em ers of part · confl l beGD.n to s no11lder. The Puri an ·ms gr duull· or: d o it of po i ticE as he had befm .vorkccl out f n · ~r. h of this vitriolic ele.ent,r abilit· ant com1 rqtive ensucd,tnc leisurn to ca 1P~ to be r t.n and to wide circle·. It was ·ir:iific nt that he Ro 'al 'sts r •,aine h o~er. It w"s the trlu ph of the partr that n~d t e taste, leisure and means to pntroni?e lit r ture,thc · rillian court of ·,ouis t:ie Fourteent':i. all t e .. il invitint:; · i ation. It was the triumph of he pa t·r trnt :n t~e.t .e. of .:--horl r, II rcemert to have no deep r "l teresta.a cond1t1on tnat ore~ an even, dis interested vier. of t .e o d. It "as e part. lnfused 1•it'1 the French love of the social,and and r its ltelace 43

societ y in the modern sense oricinnted in Enelonl . The coffnn­ house W"S another larr,e factor i:1 the ct0vel'Jpine of c-ociet'/ , conversation as vell as Jpcctators . rs Poc:c r idcne to the lower classes , it grew ..10re heal tn, , v · orous , and hu ar , off rinc .aore representativ materi'll for the esca •i. + '.> s1cetches . The prec~ect · nc era had been one of not only universal renaissance but of the greats es na ti ona l de ·el op.non~ when feelincs and emotions ~ere at v~ite heat an' here was too little leisure for the qu·et exploitinr of selr ::1 the essa:r. It W.'.l.S nn age of er a ion ·1hen "men .vere too much ben<'a t. the spell of their o~··n reni us t be critics." I) But another o..ge was fast co.nine on Hhen e.:-iotions ·rnr not so strone as to require a '3 ren2er or !1 110.kespear for their u ,"·era.nee. I was an aee with less exalted · nterests,w"th leas fee inc an therefore :norc attcr.ipt at unputy of Boilenu ·n •,n land and held in the age of Gharles I I ol. ost &ener 1 hortty . .a th the reign of Anne cl i.fferent op in· on.., ·1ere recogni .. e1 and criticism became .nore ac iv • It w<1s stimulated al"o h the Ci v 11 "far, ":hi ch lef the eneral nind keen and alert. ie note everywher e t:at men are open nc their e1es , this no only in literatur e and ~ociety but even in ph·1o~ophv;take he fo lo nr s i ni le in Hobbes : "Ills hough ts run over all par s . ere of, · n the sa·ne .nanner as one would s 11ecp a room o f lnd a je vel; or as the spaniel ranges th field till e fin s a ~cen ;or as a man should run over ·le alphabe to "tc r a rn1 ,n . " 2) In such an age· the figure of ean .;;.i7if i!3 asil·• explainable. S '' I • T ( I G6 7 - I 7 4 5 )

is not an essa,is but a land. rk int e rl ve 0p. n of th cri ical attitude and of st•le. In te Dframent ha hernlds the co ~on- 1 e , or better he ro.t·on~ ism of Voltaire.di!'om·ng :n furi011s cynicism all obltcations . He l~cks the leis re ·· v· · , th large humo.nit·' of th essa·1st. He is at ·r1 r 7ith men . ea, even wlth hi~self . By a'"'s ·m nr, t is attlt tde,ho bro·1 f-1 er tic is. to a certajn vicious frc<'do no ··1i tho it b ner· to ·>tee e and Addison. ____ ------

I) C • ,_,,., . Hv a uch an, ~.. ne li• c'1 Li terar·· ri ic. s.n . 2) Hobbes.Leviathan. ·14

0wift is power ful nature placec in a c ni .~11 nrP. a 1d thus .Jisd 1 recV:irl . It · us a lme ac'lnptod o 1 ss . "r iouG natures li:cPthc writPr s of the .Jpectator. That Swift r eall 11 was capable of inti .iate i·elf-revelat'on appe~rG in his Jour nal to Stella . Then too he was alaa'" short and occasional , a lovf r of the literal'"' baen.tcll . rle at e·:ipted i'1 panphlcts to do l'ha 0t ele and Addison dld in their essa s . Had his hos U l i ty but been turned to hnmar.i t:r he :10 llcl. undo~ltcdly have rivalled t he latter. He has in a .anner the discursiveness of the ronl essa ·ist and in a para ~unt degree the qualification of styl . • Th re is scarcely hi" p er in force and puri tv of wordn ancl fcc•mdi ~: t v of expression. ttis plainness S"ts off hir. keen \'Tit . Te "vehicle of sincer · t y"he com:nands is a model of inci. iven ss. His sentences are ~ho r t , crisp,nnd rapid , be~peakin~ cnerG1 of soul. Al"'OVe all must we rerJe--aber !1is far:io 'f' j6k on the astrologer John ?artridr,e wh' n , under the pseuclon''m Isaac Bickersta ff. he published redict'ons for t~e Yenr I706,a pla• full' satiric project ~ut of which grw:1 .>t.ele'. Taler.

The eeneral development of cmocracv and socintv placed increased stresn on personal'tv and Gav 0 intere n character. The rise of th~ critical sense 0nnabled Pn furthermore to se Rach other iirrpartiall7. 'ro.n this the novel :;as o . pring.bu the character sketch before it cam to the novel had first o pass through the refiner ' s flame of the cssa ,nor was ·t first hand even with tho essa· . All literat1Jre .ms a certain char cter intere t , objectlve portraval of t·•pc • Jhaucer Ptand.· for largP Jerfac t ~on herein, and :)hakespear1, l the aGter- rnrk. an. The drama is built on this intere"'t, and it ras nnt lon af er the rise of tho drama ·n "<:nt;land that t e character . tch pP-r ce or sinply Character, as it i~ called, app ared. Thio d_ff red only in tlm t it r;· ., .et checi fro .. other i rar•· 'or •. s. It was .1odelled on the 1'1rcek Theophrastus,and hi"' V! nerable precedent ruled the "'n lish Charact r during thP earl;' I7th century. 1\s sf) deter.nined, it portra •·ed • rpes never · nd · v idua l , it showed onl" he statical relation., , not he gro'lth of n. On the ·1hole it V.'1S a R p · ri t le"'s task; he char'lc ters er a 11 v e r y sinele natured , either black or "1hite,n ver ra . The onl" nutv of tre ···rit r ms tJ deck t er o·;t n rhe rical fin~rv . ~ach Rlcceed ' ng ·r ter took up he an general characteristics , alter ing e r el • hi. po in of vi ". 11 ::1cri t wo.s in the execution rat rnr th n n he rer ir i d 11 ude.

in :-iis Hol"' and Profane Sta e (l642) 1arKs the urnint: po nt 45

and the first earb'nr of the Character in esna." nppar 1. Fi rs t of all he dis cards the conven lonal Thco:1hr:rn t ian types and draws on his r:ing ·sh rnvi ron.i nt . i en could mirror the.1selves as later in tl e pectat.01 . Fuller r1Jco·:i. ended the p recedent of John "'a rle , th f ·rs t to anal ''70 hl s harac ters . Furt!'lermore the writer of the Hol" nnri 'rofnne ate shn"'.., hi:nr,elf a d'lircnt st11dent of ~.Jna:~espeur ath by quotctlons and b' the larr<' c;al 0r of t., PS ·• i h ":h ch h . nrlchP.cl liternturr . The de~ocracv where~ith hese ti er are chosen and the broadl" hn::1an i onchor> in which the•1 r vecuted prove a width of s •;mpa thy such aB pr vi ous to • ill er iP found onlv on the staee . He anticipates thP dau when the Ta ler should eucceed the co~ed· of _anners . He is keen and does not hesitate to put do rn his own vie,s. In hin Eliiabe han and Puritan perhaps reach their best blend. If we ahould fix on any particular d feet in his mood it is the oron~nes" to the i:nperative "thou shalt" and ''t!'lou shalt noti' . He too like ~1wift as a keeper of co.:a:nonplace books. but his solYent Im. or ":elds a 1 raarmer of ~le ail 0 h's purpose. Like Plutarch he had a love of incident and anecdot ge , like Addison h o had a subtle hu Jor vor~in[ mostl•· behind the scenes . Occasionally he indulges in vhl. sicalities or touches of t~e time that be~ray in what age he rote , P.r. the droll idea that the W3J to heaven is s~ other to the vlrgin than to the 1narr i ed • The thread of hls discourse iP fir.ner in cxture than with Addison. Tho;[h in. Rr thnn fe ling eovPrns t . e disposition of hi.s .naterials and .nal< s h' , a es 01') loeicnl,cut and dried for the essa . ts to s t ,1,r le, he re leased he Charnc er fr0. its insufferable rhetoric hough i ma,- no b l ni•·lici "s ntcnce "truct1re han in h con .pornr .s. His idio;n is ~"-Ome hat marred ·r the Gre ·< and the La in, otherwine he rr ds lmost as . orlorn a Ad ison. In fine Full r co bines the es~rn· vi th the Character, much in hP. manne~ of Carl rl , 's Heroes Rn 1 !ero- ·. OT'vhip. He eives a now interest to the portra' · 1 of m n , in < l· e 11 anticipating tho periodical cssa rists t roug .ho. in tm•n the character sketch •rns t0 b furth ,lop 'd and hen :r Richardson and Fieldine united with the im.1e:norial Ptory into the modern novel. Fuller by he na ti v , often col lo Juial uali ty of his idiom, by the force of hi~ stvlc,by his ric1 h1. or and ecnial humanitv prepared the way for th Tatler. Afte~ null r JeremJ Tayl Jr did .·11ch to ncourae;e the esRay rno 0 ct and style . Hi.s Hol'· Livinc nct Ilolr D:,·ine has been called a divine pastoral. He is de~~cratlc and 8 pathetic, stoopinc to men of low tState , treat1ne.hearts and passi~ns with reverence . As to style, he is flow1ne and ~asy,danc~nely brilliant, "more lilrn fine po tr· than an' o her pro 0 e. (Hazli t) ·1G

4. C!'USE:.> OP TilE PEIUODI ~AL ATURE

0 • THE TA'PL"''R .

It as 1703 that Jeremy Collier .~de his famous attack on the i.11.1ora l i t.v of the stare ; in 1700 the firs nu.-:ih~r of teele ' s Tatler appeare~ . Thrse dates are significnnt. For a century and a half the drama alone had .vi tne"'sed h eetine of the artict and the .nass of men . Literatnre , other;vis. a thine f or the hich and few,had here dipped to he lo9er . rata of society . !ith the Restoration, ho•ever,it dAcenernted to i .n.aorality , and , being no loneer a fit artistic eo t· cator of he people, it passes with the br ak of he new centur/ into obscurity . Thus was the stage no lon[Or the pulpit for the populace . Other attempts at popularizing literature nov came to the fore . The sermons of the time , hardly so spiritual as they were artistic , were a popular art , great as the comedy of Congreve was not , great because it was co')d. As e have seen, divines like Taylor and Tillotson Gtrongl heralded the essa~ . Nhat was needed ins an art that should reach not only the savantn but the people, an art si~ple eno1gh for the uncultured yet great enouGh to educate the popular taste up to literature. That art should incorporate the ch racter interest of the comedy of manners and of the Character. In these respects the periodical essay waG he ideal literary type for the time . Its periodical form as no doubt derived from the r ire to reach the masseo . The newspaper as such ow .d s exls enc to the development of the social interest and in~ inct. The firs recular1 v oubl i shed news sheet dates fro.n 14.J~ . It was a th in!l' of the Continent, in Ital·• developing into h 7et e , vhich was later in forn and name i.ported to ~ngland . Throu h h Dutch it came also to be called the /ercury . In •ngland no prominent development took place before the i vil .:n.r called forth q host of veno. ousl parti?an 'ercuries o supplan the broadcast pamphleteering. ircu atinl! .nanuscr ·pt ne s le ters (also originating on the ontinent) in he prov clal o ns o 1trivalled the Ga?ettes . These letters contained short sketches of L0ndon life and were in fact the proto pe of the modern ed · orial as also of the periodic 1 essa. • Thfl Licensine Act suppressed periodical p11hlica ions the la e r half of the I7th centur ·, bu , .vith its rep<"al I6!J5, here was a new nutburst. This took a vo-fold direc ton. On thP one hand , " , have he news . h et i 1 its bitter pole : icc on the politics of he ay. Here of Daniel DcFoe is undoubtcdl. the preml r pr, rfor DeFoe was a g r eat qriter thouch ~i. Revl N ~s be ome ereat . The other side of the develop. ent is 0 1r periodic11 essay . Already DeFoe had read thE signs of the ti Qs and had established a colu:nn called the Scandalous 1 ib • •lo lacks 47

the humor and eraceful ease of Addison,but ver posnlbly he gave the clue to the Trunpe and ~pecta or luhs.

B . THE PFRIODICAL E~S, The li Prature of the Restoration had been bound to the fli~pant tastes of the court. -illia~ of Oranee had few literary affjnitics,and this neglect of the court pushed 1 i tera ture to the mor• heal• h." patronage of the populace. Inspir d by a broad pu.pose of social recenerntlon and nflucnced no doubt by the populnr y·•of the periodical a!> well as h·1 the adaptabilit•· of his own e nlus to the esPay,3tePle in 1709 projecterl hP Tatler. To hi. bAlones all the credit of iniating a for~ that instantly sprane into iu~ense succesf' and WM3 d il ic:;ontl:· imitated over ~he whole of ·;urope throurhont +he century. 'i'o J,ddison bulonss the .eri of nho.1in .Jt.elc the real value of the rout;h din.~ond in his hand . The periodical essav ns exe.,lifiod ln these writers is with the exception of La.nb , L"igh Hun , and ..·on aigne the .nost thoroueh-coing representation of all thn he ecNa in its fibre really is. The defects which exint nre those of he ti :ies . ~e sec no co~manding p rqonality. The are of p0Ne1f 1 passions had paHsed with the close of the nat'onal s ruegles. Steele and Addison but re.·emhle hir tir::es in fniline to traverse th whole circle of huaan emotions. I was he inevitable reaction from re . line o understandinc , cr a ion to criticism, from he intense rel.i.[' osity of he Pur.:.t n o rn ti anal is.n. It ·vas the 3f,e of Locke; the French · · flu nee ·.veiehed in hn sa .. e b lance. Acldison 10.s b en ca l d tl.e os r0ligious of t 1c wits of Anne. The atur11n· . pectator generally occupiPd ·dth so.1e re 1-:ous the e . Ye he ha. scarce an: deeper .:-ioti ve for th acceptance of h pol .i ics and relig on hat ore than a desir• to be on the snf ~'de of thines. It ··;as a "OCinl cee , and oc'f'ty tends 0 ~uppress the stronc eillotions of indi ld;als and k0ep al on h. Sc e lev.l of conven ionality .. te~le was o~e hat o~ a social li.on;Addison,thoueh r iccnt,toak all of his .. ~tr als fro. soci0ty and,we suspect , romf! of 1 s ma!ners t0o. oc nl es")·ona <' is not li"·elv to 'ncite he P.eper pas"' ions . .-· e ~rench .. anrnr. radiatinr fro, the court ~·nr~ rath€r sup rflcial. The hJart0 of men were ovr1laid with shan. Throueh Boileau he a1thorl: of he cl1s~ic" ras reinforced or rather Boilt au's nar o, ir.tcr)r ta 01 o hem. i\cld is on w:.is Lat in in his scholar: 1 ip l o;< n a H\ ' to l rac and Jnvenal ,and tet>le bravely cond d him. This class ci".n .my hnve added to their cl arnco"' , bu it set . seal of r es r•ve upon their natures. It was an ago when Drye' 1 and Pope i.ere wri:tine poetry in their wits rather than fro the heart, 1hen wen put poetry and prose to very much the same task. 1uc~ an ace is pre-eminently a prose age , and a master of pro0 ? like Addison, whose prose surpass s the poetry of the t1me,was the ideal mouth-piece for the half-way p ~sions Of the age . uO far as it went his personality was delightful enough. 46

The humanity of the Tatl rand pectator, if n~t broad , is a t least intense. )teele undo btr>dly reflects more of it as well as more pathos than Addison, b t oven the latter w~s not lackine 1 in a renerority of feelinc that al1nys kept hi.n respectablf' . There is a cardinal moderation and eood sense abo· t their o.inions th~t ns in those days even ~orP to be valued than it i'"" no . The truth they glv~ is is care ·iv gleano· within he narrov ranRO of the circle they lived in and , as far a"' it go,s , can with tellinr force be applied to ot r own times. Like their huynnity anr their souls , h ir hu. or is not so doe asr.11'res ·1ll 1 •• u~rti .. r . '·'," %c•n, lan·ent,rtr'}ing. I~ is c o"'er and r..ore spontnneo1r to tho natu c of '.itcele ,cominc · h pc culiar fr,shn sn fro. th vPry ess nee of the n~n. There w· ~ Irish hlood in his vein~ . ·;tt.h Addison it is not he funda e.tnl ·ay o loo!{inr nt tlines; he finds 11 is humor in what he sees rather· than in . ow hr s co ii, . 1,'any have dwelt x t• ns i ·cly on the loft · ·>11rr10. e of public betterment that was conceived for he Tatl r·and Spectator, a purposef1ln ss out of key vi h the fundamental nature of the essay . Truo , hesf' essays no only meditate hut actually wroucht vast 11 rovements in anncr" and moral.a; still had the. had any pur pose or t nden:> in . e oclern Gcn"'e,hud th y been a "Ort of lay-ser.. on aq tne are co, e ir er cal led , it is safe o say tl t he ae;e o~ Anne ou not h"ve accc1 tcd them RS gracio sly an o did. The onl concession they :nako o he pu 1 · c is o choof' e themes of een ra l in or•es , he only pur ose we can fi d ls he Lreer pu po e of all 1 i tera tur( , to br. ::is true as OP"· le to h nni ·rrs 1 tru h" . This expla n~ at once the appeal and encf:cial inf l enc of these apers . 'hat a fern ntlnc; · r;rnc . odel of refinement and tru h set down a.iid he nn corru.tnoss of the times? Addison and 3t e f co rso not shun the huraor and satire they wer ab"e to co .. nncl, rather do they prove this their O?er n PV r7 page . This ca ire is hrnvever no pushed b,. an•· s ren 10 ::- pur O" e , b• t l t .is rat .r the unpre_editated PX r~ssion of their em ramen . ."i hin th limi . indica d, h riodical essa iB indeed dedica ed tovar ... t • . r l . ne I as h .'! d d ' for he mass of men , tePle an

50

The subject i t self is only hinted at in the t itle . Gener ally it is found in solution n a frnGoent of verse :::;n,newhere in the crnsa·· , often standing aB a no to . The suLject seldom comes 01 t in the i 1trocl11c ion . '"Ou eti.nes not even in the body , but if not dir ectly brought out before it is e;athnred up in the conclus ;ron , eenerall" in thP forr.1 of a s orv or lettrr, and then, •:• itl-1 a : ov< 1 turn of hiJ.ior or .·ith