The Philadelphia Magazines and their Contributors 1741-1850

by Albert Henry Smyth

FROM THE PORT FOLIO TO GRAHAM'S.

The Ladies' Museum was commenced in February, 1800, and made five numbers.

The Philadelphia Repository and Weekly Register was commenced in 1801. It was edited and published by David Hogan, and later by John W. Scott. It was popular and original.

The first magazine published in America for children appeared in Philadelphia in 1802—the Juvenile Magazine, or Miscellaneous Repository of Useful Information, Phila., 1802, printed for Benjamin Johnson and Jacob Johnston.

It was followed by the Juvenile Olio in the same year. This magazine was edited by "Amyntor" a citizen of Philadelphia, and was published by David Hogan.

Charles Brockden Brown, the most important of Philadelphia writers, the first professional man-of-letters in America, and the predecessor of all cis-Atlantic novelists, was born in Philadelphia, January 17, 1771, and in that city he founded, in 1803-4, the Literary Magazine and American Register.

Brown had been educated until his sixteenth year in the school of Robert Proud, the historian of Pennsylvania. He then studied law with Alexander Wilcox, of Philadelphia. His health, which had been ever poor, suffered still further from enthusiastic attention to the needs of a belles-lettres club of nine members, and to the law society of his native city. The Columbian Magazine of August, 1789, contained his first published article. It was entitled "The Rhapsodist," and was continued through several numbers of the magazine.

A close friendship sprang up between Brown and Elihu Hubbard Smith, and Brown made his home in New York, where Smith introduced him to "The Friendly Club." After the plague visited New York and Smith died of the fever, Brown returned to Philadelphia to spend the remainder of his life.

The first number of the Literary Magazine and American Register was published by John Conrad, who had made a liberal arrangement with the editor, on Saturday, October 1, 1803. Brown's prospectus, which filled the first three pages, is so characteristic of the author, and so interesting as a contemporary comment upon magazines and their purposes, as to admit of complete quotation.

The Editor's Address to the Public:

"It is usual for one who presents the public with a periodical work like the present, to introduce himself to the notice of his readers by some sort of preface or address. I take up the pen in conformity to this custom, but am quite at loss for topics suitable to so interesting an occasion. I cannot expatiate on the variety of my knowledge, the brilliancy of my wit, the versatility of my talents. To none of these do I lay any claim, and though this variety, brilliancy of solidity, are necessary ingredients in a work of this kind, I trust merely to the zeal and liberality of my friends to supply me with them. I have them not myself, but doubt not of the good offices of those who possess them, and shall think myself entitled to no small praise if I am able to collect into one focal spot the rays of a great number of luminaries. They also may be very unequal to each other in lustre, and some of them may be little better than twinkling and feeble stars of the hundredth magnitude; but what is wanting in individual splendour will be made up by the union of all their beams into one. My province shall be to hold the mirror up so as to assemble all their influence within its verge, and reflect them on the public in such manner as to warm and enlighten.

"As I possess nothing but zeal I can promise to exert nothing else; but my consolation is, that aided by that powerful spirit, many have accomplished things much more arduous than that which I propose to myself.

"Many are the works of this kind which have risen and fallen in America, and many of them have enjoyed but a brief existence. This circumstance has always at first sight given me some uneasiness, but when I come more soberly to meditate upon it my courage revives, and I discover no reason for my doubts. Many works have actually been reared and sustained by the curiosity and favour of the public. They have ultimately declined or fallen, it is true; but why? From no abatement of the public curiosity, but from causes which publishers or editors only are accountable. Those who managed the publication have commonly either changed their principles, remitted their zeal, or voluntarily relinquished their trade, or last of all, and like other men, have died. Such works have flourished for a time, and they ceased to flourish, by the fault or misfortune of the proprietors. The public is always eager to encourage one who devotes himself to their rational amusement, and when he ceases to demand or to deserve their favour they feel more regret than anger in withdrawing it.

"The world—by which I mean the few hundred persons who concern themselves about this work—will naturally inquire who it is that thus addresses them. 'This is somewhat more than a point of idle curiosity,' my reader will say, 'for from my knowledge of the man must I infer how far he will be able or willing to fulfil his promises. Besides, it is great importance to know whether his sentiments on certain subjects be agreeable or not to my own. In politics, for example, he may be a malcontent; in religion an heretic. He may be an ardent advocate for all that I abhor, or he may be a celebrated champion of my favourite opinions. It is evident that these particulars must dictate the treatment you receive from me, and make me either your friend or enemy: your patron or your persecutor. Besides, I am anxious for some personal knowledge of you that I may judge of your literary merits. You may possibly be one of these, who came hither from the old world to seek your fortune; who have handled the pen as others handle the awl or needle; that is, for the sake of a livelihood, and who, therefore, are willing to work on any kind of cloth or leather, and to any model that may be in demand. You may, in the course of your trade, have accommodated yourself to twenty different fashions, and have served twenty classes of customers; have copied at one time a Parisian, at another a London fashion, and have truckled to the humours, now of a precise enthusiast, and now of a smart free-thinker.

"''Tis of no manner of importance what creed you may publicly profess on this occasion, or on what side, religious or political, you may declare yourself enlisted. To judge of the value or sincerity of these professions, to form some notion how far you will faithfully or skilfully perform your part, I must know your character. By that knowledge, I shall regulate myself with more certainty than by any anonymous declaration you may think proper to make.'

"I bow to the reasonableness of these observations, and shall therefore take no pains to conceal my name. Anybody may know it who chooses to ask me or my publisher. I shall not, however, put it at the bottom of this address. My diffidence, as my friends would call it, and my discretion, as my enemies, if I have any, would term it, hinders me from calling out my name in a crowd. It has heretofore hindered me from making my appearance there, when impelled by the strongest of human considerations, and produces, at this time, an insuperable aversion to naming myself to my readers. The mere act of calling out my own name, on this occasion, is of no moment, since an author or editor who takes no pains to conceal himself, cannot fail of being known to as many as desire to know him. And whether my notoriety make for me or against me, I shall use no means to prevent it.

"I am far from wishing, however, that my readers should judge of my exertions by my former ones. I have written much, but take much blame to myself for something which I have written, and take no praise for anything. I should enjoy a larger share of my own respect, at the present moment, if nothing had ever flowed from my pen, the production of which could be traced to me. A variety of causes induces me to form such a wish, but I am principally influenced by the consideration that time can scarcely fail of enlarging and refining the powers of a man, while the world is sure to judge of his capacities and principles at fifty, from what he has written at fifteen.

"Meanwhile, I deem it reasonable to explain the motives of the present publication, and must rely for credit on the good nature of my readers. The project is not a mercenary one. Nobody relies for subsistence on its success, nor does the editor put anything but his reputation at stake. At the same time, he cannot but be desirous of an ample subscription, not merely because pecuniary profit is acceptable, but because this is the best proof which he can receive that his endeavours to amuse and instruct have not been unsuccessful.

"Useful information and rational amusement being his objects, he will not scruple to collect materials from all quarters. He will ransack the newest foreign publications, and extract from them whatever can serve his purpose. He will not forget that a work, which solicits the attention of many readers, must build its claim on the variety as well as copiousness of its contents.

"As to domestic publications, besides extracting from them anything serviceable to the public, he will give a critical account of them, and, in this respect, make his work an American Review, in which the history of our native literature shall be carefully detailed.

"He will pay particular attention to the history of passing events. He will carefully compile the news, foreign and domestic, of the current month, and give, in a precise and systematic order, that intelligence which the common newspapers communicate in a vague and indiscriminate way. His work shall likewise be a repository of all those signal incidents in private life, which mark the character of the age, and excite the liveliest curiosity.

"This is an imperfect sketch of his work, and to accomplish these ends, he is secure of the liberal aid of many most respectable persons in this city and New York. He regrets the necessity he is under of concealing these names, since they would furnish the public with irresistible inducements to read what, when they had read, they would find sufficiently recommended by its own merits.

"In an age like this, when the foundations of religion and morality have been so boldly attacked, it seems necessary, in announcing a work of this nature, to be particularly explicit as to the path which the editor means to pursue. He, therefore, avows himself to be, without equivocation or reserve, the ardent friend and the willing champion of the Christian religion. Christian piety he reveres as the highest excellence of human beings, and the amplest reward he can seek for his labour is the consciousness of having, in some degree, however inconsiderable, contributed to recommend the practice of religious duties.

"As, in the conduct of this work, a supreme regard will be paid to the interests of religion and morality, he will scrupulously guard against all that dishonours or impairs that principle. Everything that savors of indelicacy or licentiousness will be rigorously proscribed. His poetical pieces may be dull, but they shall, at least, be free from voluptuousness or sensuality, and his prose, whether seconded or not by genius and knowledge, shall scrupulously aim at the promotion of public and private virtue.

"As a political annalist, he will speculate freely on foreign transactions; but in his detail of domestic events he will confine himself as strictly as possible to the limits of a mere historian. There is nothing for which he has a deeper abhorrence than the intemperance of party, and his fundamental rule shall be to exclude from his pages all personal altercation and abuse.

"He will conclude by reminding the public that there is not, at present, any other monthly publication in America; and that a plan of this kind, if well conducted, cannot fail of being highly conducive to amusement and instruction. There are many, therefore, it is hoped, who, when such a herald as this knocks at their door, will open it without reluctance, and admit a visitant who calls only once a month; who talks upon every topic; whose company may be dismissed or resumed, and who may be made to prate or hold his tongue at pleasure; a companion he will be, possessing one companionable property in the highest degree—that is to say, a desire to please.—Sep. 1, 1803."

The contents of the magazine corresponded with the contents of the Port Folio; there were the same abuse of Wordsworth, criticisms of Milton and Shakespeare, and articles upon "literary resemblances." In November, 1803, Brown began to publish in the magazine his "Memoirs of Carwin, the Biloquist." The following poem, written during the prevalence of the yellow fever, in 1797, appeared in the Literary Magazine for September, 1806.

PHILADELPHIA—AN ELEGY.

Written during the prevalence of the Yellow Fever in 1797.

Imperial daughter of the West,
Why thus in widow'd weeds recline?
With every gift of nature blest,
The empire of a world was thine.
Late brighter than the star that beams
When the soft morning carol flows:
Now mournful as the maniac's dreams,
When melancholy veils his woes.
What foe, with more than Gallic ire,
Has thinned thy city's thronging way,
Bade the sweet breath of youth expire,
And manhood's powerful pulse decay?
No Gallic foe's ferocious band,
Fearful as fate, as death severe,
But the destroying angel's hand,
With hotter rage, with fiercer fear.
I saw thee in thy prime of days,
In glory rich, in beauty fair,
When many a patriot shar'd thy praise,
And nurs'd thee with maternal care.
Columbia's genius, veil thy brow,
Guardian of freedom, hither bend:
The prayer of mercy meets thee now,
With healing energy descend.
Chase far the fiend whose burning tread
Consumes the fairest flower that blows;
Bends the sweet lily's bashful head,
And fades the blushes of the rose.
E'en now ill-omened birds of prey
Through the unpeopled mansions rove:
Quench'd is that eye's inspiring ray,
And lost the breezy lip of love.
Yet guard the Friend, who wandering near
Haunts which the loitering Schuylkill laves,
Bestows the tributary tear,
Or fans with sighs the drowsy waves.
And while his mercy-dealing hand
Feeds many a famished child of care,
Wave round his brow thy saving wand,
And breathe thy sweetness through the air;
'Till borne on Health's elastic wing,
Aloft the rapid whirlwind flies;
The coldest gale of Zembla bring,
And brace with frost the dripping skies.
Yet bring the naiads, bring their urns,
Haste, and the marble fount unclose,
Through streets where Syrian summer burns,
'Till all the cool libation flows
Cool as the brook that bathes the heath
When noon unfolds his silent hours,
Refreshing as the morning's breath
Adown the cleansing streamlet pours.
Imperial daughter of the West,
No rival wins thy wreath away;
In all the wealth of nature drest,
Again thy sovereign charms display;
See all thy setting glories rise,
Again thy thronging streets appear;
Thy mart a hundred ports supplies,
Thy harvests feed thy circling year.

The magazine lived five years and made eight volumes octavo.

In 1806 Brown began to edit and John Conrad to publish the American Register. It contained abstracts of laws and public proceedings, reviews of literature and of foreign and domestic scientific intelligence, American and foreign State papers, etc. After five volumes had been published, Charles Brockden Brown died in his house at Eleventh and George Streets, on the 19th of February, 1810. It was in this house, which was not upon the east side of Eleventh Street, as Neal asserted in Blackwood's Magazine, nor was it "a low, squalid, two-story house," that Thomas Sully saw him, and said: "I saw him a little before his death. I had never known him—never heard of him—never read any of his works. He was in a deep decline. It was in the month of November—our Indian summer, when the air is full of smoke. Passing a window one day, I was caught by the sight of a man with a remarkable physiognomy, writing at a table in a dark room. The sun shone directly upon his head. I never shall forget it. The dead leaves were falling then—it was Charles Brockden Brown."

Of the obscure ground in which the body of this literary pioneer was laid George Lippard wrote in the Nineteenth Century (p. 27):

"The time has come when the authors of America, the men who view with pride the growth of a pure and elevated National literature, should go to the Quaker graveyard and bear the bones of Brockden Brown to that Laurel Hill which he loved in his boyhood; yes, let the remains of the martyr author sleep beneath the shadow of some dark pine, whose evergreen boughs, swaying to the winter wind, bend over the rugged cliff and sweep the waters of the Schuylkill as it rolls on amid its hilly shores, like an image of the rest which awaits the blessed in a better world. Then a solitary column of white marble, rising like a form of snow among the green boughs, shall record the neglect and woe and glory of the author's life, in a single name—Charles Brockden Brown."

"Wieland," the most powerful of Brown's novels, was published in Philadelphia in 1798. It was followed by "Ormond, or the Secret Witness" (1799), "Arthur Mervyn" (1799), "Edgar Huntley, or the Memoirs of a Sleep-Walker" (1801), "Clara Howard" and "Jane Talbot" (1801). All these romances dealt with sombre and mysterious or terrible subjects. "Wieland" was a story of monstrous crime occasioned through the agency of ventriloquism. "Arthur Mervyn" contained vivid descriptions of the yellow fever pestilence in Philadelphia in 1793. "Edgar Huntley" followed the fortunes of a somnambulist in the mountain fastnesses of Western Pennsylvania.

When Brown began to write "the churchyard romance" was in fashion, and novelists revelled in tales of horror and of terror, dwelling long and painfully upon the most loathsome details of some ghastly bit of fancy. It was the time of Lewis's "Tales of Terror," of Walpole's "Castle of Otranto," of Beckford's "Vathek," and of Mrs. Radcliffe's "Mysteries of Udolpho" and Mrs. Shelley's "Frankenstein." William Godwin, too, wrote ghostly stories of crime and supernatural agencies, and from Godwin, Charles Brockden Brown caught his style. The influence of Godwin is noticeable in Brown's first work, "Alcuin, a Dialogue on the Rights of Women" (1797). Godwin's "Falkland" and "Caleb Williams" are the models of "Wieland" and "Ormond."

It is interesting to find young Percy Bysshe Shelley confessing his obligations to the Philadelphia novelist, and saying that Brown's novels had influenced him beyond any other books. Traces of "Wieland" are to be found deeply stamped upon "Zastrozzi" and "St. Irvyne." It is a singular chapter of literary history that records the progress of William Godwin's social theories and tales of horror across the Atlantic to an obscure house in Philadelphia and their return in a new literary form into the hands of William Godwin's son-in-law, Percy Bysshe Shelley, himself a poet of American descent.

The British magazines of 1804 contain flattering notices of Brown, and his novels were reprinted and read with interest and critical approval in England. At home he has fallen into undeserved oblivion, and the attempts in 1857 and 1887 to revive the interest in his works proved fruitless. His style had in it no elements of permanent life, but he was the first to discover the capabilities of romance in America, and used in all his books American characters and scenery.

Sir Walter Scott so greatly admired the works of the American novelist that he named the hero of Guy Mannering after him and gave to another of the characters of the same story the familiar name of "Arthur Mervyn."

Benjamin Smith Barton (1766-1815), a nephew of David Rittenhouse, and the successor of Benjamin Rush as professor of the theory and practice of medicine in the University of Pennsylvania, edited the Philadelphia Medical and Physical Journal from November 1, 1804, to May, 1807. It was published irregularly by J. Conrad and Co.

The Evening Fireside, or Literary Miscellany, Philadelphia, 1805-1806, was established by a literary club, and published by Joseph Rakestraw. The second volume, which began January 4, 1806, completed the work.