Part II
. chap. 23.
‘_Stands the statue_,’ _etc._ Thomson, _The Seasons_, _Summer_, 1347. The Venus de Medici was restored to Florence after the fall of Napoleon.
_There is the Apollo_, _etc._ This enumeration of the treasures collected at the Louvre by Napoleon makes Hazlitt’s authorship of the essay quite certain. Cf. vol. VI. (_Table Talk_), pp. 15–16 and notes, and vol. VIII. (_The English Comic Writers_), p. 149, where the present passage is repeated almost _verbatim_. See also _Notes of a Journey_, _etc._, vol. IX. p. 107.
197. ‘_There is old Proteus_,’ _etc._ Misquoted from Wordsworth’s Sonnet, ‘The world is too much with us,’ etc.
‘_What’s Hecuba to them_,’ _etc._ _Hamlet_, Act II. Sc. 2.
‘_Real feelings_,’ _etc._ Burke, _Reflections on the Revolution in France_ (_Select Works_, ed. Payne, II. 101).
‘_We look up_,’ _etc. Ibid._
‘_Breath can make them_,’ _etc._ Goldsmith, _The Deserted Village_, 54.
_Wittgenstein_, _etc._ Louis Adolphe Pierre Wittgenstein (1769–1843); Ferdinand, Baron Wintzingerode (1770–1818), two well-known Russian generals.
‘_But once put out their light_,’ _etc._ _Othello_, Act V. Sc. 2.
_Poet who celebrated the fall_, _etc._ Coleridge, presumably.
‘_Time-hallowed laws._’ Hazlitt elsewhere attributes this phrase to Wordsworth. See vol. III., note to p. 175.
WILSON’S LANDSCAPES AT THE BRITISH INSTITUTION
Part of this article was incorporated in the _Encyclopædia Britannica_ article on ‘Fine Arts’ (see vol. IX. pp. 392–394), and a further part was included in Mr. W. C. Hazlitt’s edition of the same essay in _Essays on the Fine Arts_ (1873). Many of Wilson’s landscapes were exhibited at the Winter Exhibition of the Royal Academy in 1903. In this and in the later notices of exhibitions the catalogue numbers have been omitted, and in a few cases it has been necessary to substitute a semicolon for a comma, in order to distinguish between different pictures.
199. ‘_A buoy_,’ _etc._ _King Lear_, Act IV. Sc. 6.
200. ‘_Resembling a goose-pye_,’ Swift, _Vanburgh’s House_, l. 104.
201. Note. ‘_Silly shepherds_,’ _etc._ Cf. Milton, _On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity_, The Hymn, St. viii.
202. ‘_While universal Pan_,’ _etc._ _Paradise Lost_, IV. 266–8.
Note. _Mr. Northcote’s Dream of a Painter._ See vol. I. (_The Round Table_), note to p. 162.
ON GAINSBOROUGH’S PICTURES
This article, like the last, was used for the _Encyclopædia_ essay (vol. IX. pp. 395–6) and was partly reproduced in Mr. W. C. Hazlitt’s edition of _Essays on the Fine Arts_, 1873 (notes to p. 244).
202. _A Portrait of a Youth._ The famous ‘Blue Boy’ belonging to the Duke of Westminster, painted in 1779.
203. _Portrait of Garrick._ Painted in 1776, and now at the Stratford-on-Avon Museum.
‘_Distilled books_,’ _etc._ Bacon, _Essays_ (‘Of Studies’).
‘_I to Hercules._’ _Hamlet_, Act I. Sc. 2.
_Cottage Children._ ‘Rustic Children,’ now in the National Gallery.
205. Note. _Two Spanish Beggar Boys._ In the Dulwich Gallery. See vol. IX. p. 25.
MR. KEMBLE’S PENRUDDOCK
This theatrical notice is clearly Hazlitt’s, though he omitted it from _A View of the English Stage_. Cf. vol. I. (_Characters of Shakespeare’s Plays_), p. 237, where the same words are used, with trifling variations, in criticism of Kemble’s _Hamlet_. Cf. also vol. VIII. p. 376.
205. _Penruddock._ In Richard Cumberland’s _The Wheel of Fortune_ (1795).
206. ‘_Is whispering nothing_,’ _etc._ _A Winter’s Tale_, Act I. Sc. 2.
207. ‘_There is no variableness_,’ _etc._ _St. James_ i. 17.
‘_Splenetic_ [splenetive] _and rash_.’ _Hamlet_, Act V. Sc. 1.
‘_The fiery soul_,’ _etc._ Dryden, _Absalom and Achitophel_, l. 156–8.
‘_You shall relish_,’ _etc._ Cf. _Othello_, Act II. Sc. 1.
INTRODUCTION TO AN ACCOUNT OF SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS’S DISCOURSES
Hazlitt contributed to _The Champion_ six papers on the ‘Character of Sir Joshua Reynolds.’ The first two of these (Oct. 30 and Nov. 6. 1814) were used in the author’s _Encyclopædia Britannica_ essay on ‘Fine Arts.’ See vol. IX. of the present edition, pp. 377 _et seq._, and the notes, where the omitted portions of the two articles are supplied. The last four (viz. the present essay and the three succeeding ones) are here reprinted for the first time. Hazlitt afterwards dealt with the same subject in the two essays entitled ‘On Certain Inconsistencies in Sir Joshua Reynolds’s Discourses’ (vol. VI. _Table Talk_, pp. 122–145).
208. Note. For Richardson see vol. VI. (_Table Talk_), p. 10 and note. Charles Antoine Coypel (1694–1752) was Director of the Academy from 1747. His Discourses on Art were republished in 1883 by H. Jouin (_Conférences de l’Académie royale de peinture_).
ON GENIUS AND ORIGINALITY
211. _If Raphael, for instance, had only copied_, _etc._ See Reynolds’s Twelfth Discourse.
212. ‘_Sole sitting_,’ _etc._ Wordsworth, _Poems on the Naming of Places_, IV.
‘_Beauty, rendered still more beautiful._’ Cf.
‘——And he would gaze till it became Far lovelier, and his heart could not sustain The beauty, still more beauteous.’ Wordsworth, _Lines left upon a Seat in a Yew-tree_, 35–37.
‘_Thrice happy fields_,’ _etc._ Cf. _Paradise Lost_, III. 569–570.
213. ‘_The tender mercies._’ ‘The tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.’ _Proverbs_ xii. 10.
‘_Wandering through dry places_,’ _etc._ Cf. S. _Matthew_ xii. 43.
213. Note. Claude’s _Liber Veritatis_, now in the possession of the Duke of Devonshire, is not a collection of original sketches, but a record of his pictures with inscriptions showing for whom they were painted.
215. ‘_Human face divine._’ _Paradise Lost_, III. 44.
ON THE IMITATION OF NATURE
221. ‘_Blinking Sam._’ See Mrs. Piozzi’s _Anecdotes_, _etc._ (_Johnsonian Miscellanies_, ed. G. B. Hill, I. 313).
ON THE IDEAL
223. ‘_Might ascend_,’ _etc._ _Henry V._ Prologue.
224. ‘_Obscurity her curtain_,’ _etc._ From a poem _To the Honourable and Reverend F. C._ in Dodsley’s _Collection of Poems_, vol. VI. (1758), p. 138. The poem (anonymously published) was written by Sneyd Davies (1709–1769), and was addressed to Frederick Cornwallis, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury. See _The Gentleman’s Magazine_, vol. I. p. 174, and Nichols’s _Illustrations of the Literary History of the Eighteenth Century_, vol. I.
226. ‘_Whose end_,’ _etc._ _Hamlet_, Act III. Sc. 2.
228. _We have heard it observed_, _etc._ By Coleridge, probably. See vol. IV. p. 217.
CHARLEMAGNE: OU L’ÉGLISE DÉLIVRÉE
230. _The brother of Buonaparte._ Lucien Buonaparte (1775–1840), Prince of Canino. The present review of his _Charlemagne_, _etc._ is signed ‘W. H.’
231. _Henriade._ Voltaire’s epic (1723).
THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED
235. _The true Florimel_, _etc._ _The Faerie Queene_, III. viii.
236. _Another epic poem._ _La Cirnéide_ (1819).
LUCIEN BUONAPARTE’S COLLECTION, ETC.
This article is signed ‘W. H.’
237. ‘_Vile durance._’ Kenrick’s _Falstaff’s Wedding_ (1766), Act I. Sc. 2.
‘_The mistress or the saint._’ Cf. Goldsmith, _The Traveller_, 152.
_Jocunda._ The portrait of Mona Lisa, wife of Francesco del Giocondo.
239. ‘_Laborious foolery._’ Hazlitt seems to be quoting from himself. See his Letter ‘On Modern Comedy’ (1813), vol. VIII. p. 554.
240. ‘_Come, then, the colours_,’ _etc._ Pope, _Moral Essays_, II. 17–20.
_Watteau._ Antoine Watteau (1684–1721).
_Guerin._ Pierre Narcisse Guérin (1774–1833). The picture referred to is now in the Louvre.
241. _The Deluge by Girodet._ This picture of Anne Louis Girodet’s (1767–1824) is in the Louvre.
242. _Lefebre._ Hazlitt presumably refers to Robert Le Fèvre’s (1756–1830) portrait of Napoleon now in the Gallery at Versailles.
BRITISH INSTITUTION
These three notices of the Exhibition at the British Institution are signed ‘W. H.’
243. _C. L. Eastlake._ Charles Lock Eastlake (1793–1865), elected President of the Royal Academy and knighted in 1850; Director of the National Gallery from 1855.
‘_Antique Roman._’ _Hamlet_, Act V. Sc. 2.
_A hint from a high quarter._ Hazlitt presumably refers to the fact that Canning had not been in office since his quarrel with Castlereagh in 1809.
244. ‘_A great book is a great evil._’ A saying of Voltaire’s. Cf. vol. V. (_Lectures on the English Poets_), p. 114.
‘_It is place_,’ _etc._ _Cymbeline_, Act III. Sc. 3.
245. _G. Hayter._ George (afterwards Sir George) Hayter (1792–1871). His ‘Ezra’ gained a prize of £200.
_Mr. Harlowe’s Hubert and Arthur._ By George Henry Harlow (1787–1819), a pupil of Sir Thomas Lawrence.
‘_Deep scars_,’ _etc._ _Paradise Lost_, I. 601.
_Miss Geddes._ Margaret Sarah Geddes (1793–1872), better known as Mrs. Carpenter, and a portrait-painter.
_Chalon._ Alfred Edward Chalon (1781–1860).
_Burnetts_, _etc._ James M. Burnet (1788–1816) and John Burnet (1784–1868); Anthony Vandyke Copley Fielding (1787–1855); Thomas Christopher Hofland (1777–1843); John Glover (1767–1849). Both the Nasmyths, Alexander (1758–1840) and Peter (1787–1831), were represented at the Exhibition.
THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED
246. _W. Collins._ William Collins (1788–1847).
247. _Bone._ Robert Trewick Bone (1790–1840).
_H. Howard._ Henry Howard (1769–1847).
_H. Singleton._ Henry Singleton (1766–1839).
_P. H. Rogers._ Philip Hutchins Rogers (1794–1853).
_J. Wilson._ John Wilson (1774–1855).
248. _The ablest landscape painter_, _etc._ Turner. Cf. vol. I. (_The Round Table_), p. 76 note.
THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED
248. _B. Barker._ Benjamin Barker (1776–1838).
_Ab. Cooper._ Abraham Cooper (1787–1868).
_W. Westall._ William Westall (1781–1850).
249. _J. Stark._ James Stark (1794–1859).
_P. Dewint._ Peter De Wint (1784–1849).
_A. Sauerweide._ Alexander Sauerweid (1782–1844).
‘_War is a game_,’ _etc._ Cowper, _The Task_, V. 187–8.
ON MR. WILKIE’S PICTURES
This essay is signed ‘W. H.’
249. _Archbishop Herring’s letters._ Cf. vol. V. (_Lectures on the English Poets_), p. 141 and note.
250. _The highest authority on art._ From this point the rest of the essay was incorporated in the Lecture on Hogarth. See vol. VIII. pp. 139–141.
251. ‘_To shew vice_ [virtue],’ _etc._ _Hamlet_, Act III. Sc. 2.
‘_The very error_,’ _etc._ Cf. ‘It is the very error of the moon.’ _Othello_, Act V. Sc. 2.
252. ‘_Your lungs begin to crow_,’ _etc._ _As You Like It_, Act II. Sc. 7.
[CHARACTER OF MR. WORDSWORTH’S NEW POEM, THE EXCURSION]
Under this heading Hazlitt contributed to _The Examiner_ three papers which he afterwards partly republished with omissions and variations in two essays in _The Round Table_. See vol. I. pp. 111–125. These omissions and variations are given below.
At the beginning of the first essay as published in _The Round Table_ add from the first (August 21, 1814) of _The Examiner_ articles the following passage:—
‘In power of intellect, in lofty conception, in the depth of feeling, at once simple and sublime, which pervades every part of it and which gives to every object an almost preternatural and preterhuman interest, this work has seldom been surpassed. If the subject of the Poem had been equal to the genius of the Poet, if the skill with which he has chosen his materials had accorded with the power exerted over them, if the objects (whether persons or things) which he makes use of as the vehicle of his feelings had been such as immediately and irresistibly to convey them in all their force and depth to others, then the production before us would indeed have “proved a monument,” as he himself wishes it, worthy of the author and of his country. Whether, as it is, this most original and powerful performance may not rather remain like one of those stupendous but half-finished structures, which have been suffered to moulder into decay, because the cost and labour attending them exceeded their use or beauty, we feel it would be rather presumptuous in us to determine.’
At the end of the first paragraph on p. 112 add the following note:—
‘Every one wishes to get rid of the booths and bridges in the Park,[68] in order to have a view of the ground and water again. Our Poet looks at the more lasting and serious works of men as baby-houses and toys, and from the greater elevation of his mind regards them much in the same light as we do the Regent’s Fair and Mr. Vansittart’s “permanent erections.”’
For ‘He sees all things in himself’ (p. 112, l. 28) read ‘He sees all things in his own mind; he contemplates effects in their causes, and passions in their principles.’
To the words ‘our very constitution’ (p. 113, l. 8) Hazlitt in _The Examiner_ appends, as a note, ‘“God knew Adam in the elements of his chaos, and saw him in the great obscurity of nothing.” _Sir Thomas Browne._’
For ‘The general and the permanent’ (p. 113, l. 12) read ‘The common and the permanent.’
The words ‘interlocutions between Lucius and Caius’ (p. 113, l. 19) are not between quotation marks in the magazine.
_The Examiner_ for Aug. 28, 1814 contained a second essay on the same subject, republished in _The Round Table_, except that the opening paragraph was somewhat curtailed. In place of the paragraph in _The Round Table_ ‘We could have wished,’ etc. (vol. I. p. 113) read:—
‘We could have wished that Mr. Wordsworth had given to his work the form of a philosophical poem altogether, with only occasional digressions or allusions to particular instances. There is in his general sentiments and reflections on human life a depth, an originality, a truth, a beauty, and grandeur both of conception and expression, which place him decidedly at the head of the poets of the present day, or rather which place him in a totally distinct class of excellence. But he has chosen to encumber himself with a load of narrative and description which, instead of assisting, hinders the progress and effect of the general reasoning. Almost all this part of the work, which Mr. Wordsworth has inwoven with the text, would have come in better in plain prose as notes at the end. Indeed, there is something evidently inconsistent, upon his own principles, in the construction of the poem. For he professes, in these ambiguous illustrations, to avoid all that is striking or extraordinary—all that can raise the imagination or affect the passions—all that is not every way common and necessarily included in the natural workings of the passions in all minds and in all circumstances. Then why introduce particular illustrations at all which add nothing to the force of the general truth, which hang as a dead weight upon the imagination, which degrade the thought and weaken the sentiment, and the connection of which with the general principle it is more difficult to find out than to understand the general principle itself? It is only by an extreme process of abstraction that it is often possible to trace the operation of the general law in the particular illustration, yet it is to supply the defect of abstraction that the illustration is given. Mr. Wordsworth indeed says finely, and perhaps as truly as finely,’ etc.
Instead of saying that Wordsworth’s powers of description and fancy seem to be little inferior to those of his classical predecessor, Akenside (p. 114), Hazlitt, in _The Examiner_, made the very different statement that ‘his powers of description and fancy seem to be little inferior to those of thought and sentiment.’
To the quotation on page 116, ‘Poor gentleman,’ etc. Hazlitt adds, as a note, ‘Love in a Wood.’
After the words ‘any thing but dull’ (p. 116, l. 22) add, from _The Examiner_, ‘_Rasselas_ indeed is dull; but then it is privileged dulness.’
After ‘natural exercise of others’ (p. 117, l. 7) add ‘The intellectual and the moral faculties of man are different; the ideas of things and the feelings of pleasure and pain connected with them.’ There are a few other trifling verbal alterations in this paragraph. The note on the word ‘solitary’ on p. 117 is not in _The Examiner_.
A third essay on the same subject was published in _The Examiner_ for October 2, 1814. This was reprinted with a few omissions and additions in _The Round Table_ (see vol. I. pp. 120–125).
The opening paragraph in _The Round Table_ is condensed from the following:—
‘Poetry may be properly divided into two classes; the poetry of imagination and the poetry of sentiment. The one consists in the power of calling up images of the most pleasing or striking kind; the other depends on the strength of the interest which it excites in given objects. The one may be said to arise out of the faculties of memory and invention, conversant with the world of external nature; the other from the fund of our moral sensibility. In the combination of these different excellences the perfection of poetry consists; the greatest poets of our own or other countries have been equally distinguished for richness of invention and depth of feeling. By the greatest poets of our own country, we mean Chaucer, Spenser, Shakespeare and Milton, who evidently possessed both kinds of imagination, the intellectual and moral, in the highest degree. Young and Cowley might be cited as the most brilliant instances of the separation of feeling from fancy, of men who were dazzled by the exuberance of their own thoughts and whose genius was sacrificed to their want of taste. Mr. Wordsworth, on the other hand, whose powers of feeling are of the highest order, is certainly deficient in fanciful invention: his writings exhibit all the internal power, without the external form of poetry. He has none of the pomp and decoration and scenic effect of poetry: no gorgeous palaces nor solemn temples awe the imagination: no cities rise with glistering spires and pinnacles adorned[69]: we meet with no knights pricked forth on airy steeds: no hair-breadth scapes and perilous accidents[70] by flood or field. Either from the predominant habit of his mind, not requiring the stimulus of outward impressions, or from the want of an imagination teeming with various forms, he takes the common every-day events and objects of nature, or rather seeks those that are the most simple and barren of effect; but he adds to them a weight of interest from the resources of his own mind, which makes the most insignificant things serious and even formidable. All other interests are absorbed in the deeper interest of his own thoughts, and find the same level. His mind magnifies the littleness of his subject, and raises its meanness; lends it his strength, and clothes it with borrowed grandeur. With him a molehill, covered with wild thyme, assumes the importance of “the great vision of the guarded mount”[71]: a puddle is filled with preternatural faces, and agitated with the fiercest storms of passion; and to his mind, as he himself informs us, and as we can easily believe,
“——The meanest flower that blows can give Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.”’[72]
After the words ‘among these northern Arcadians’ (vol. I. p. 121) Hazlitt quotes ll. 411–439 of