THE BRUISER, CHARLES CHURCHILL (ONCE THE REVEREND),
In the Character of a Russian Hercules, regaling himself after having killed the Monster Caricatura, that so sorely galled his virtuous friend, the heaven-born Wilkes.—Published Aug. 1, 1763.
"But he had a club,
This dragon to drub,
Or he had ne'er don't, I warrant ye."
—Dragon of Wantley.
THE REV. C. CHURCHILL.
Enraged by the publication of Mr. Wilkes' portrait, Mr. Charles Churchill drew his gray goose quill, and wrote a most virulent and vindictive satire, which he entitled An Epistle to William Hogarth. The painter might be a very good Christian, but he was not blest with that meek forbearance which induces those who are smote on one cheek to turn the other also. He was an old man, but did not wish to be considered as that feeble, superannuated, helpless animal which the poet had described. He scarcely wished to live
"After his flame lack'd oil, to be the snuff
Of younger spirits."
Apprehensive that the public might construe his delaying a reply to proceed from inability, he did not wait the tedious process of a new plate, but took a piece of copper on which he had, in the year 1749, engraven a portrait of himself and dog, erased his own head, and in the place of it introduced the divine with a tattered band and torn ruffles,—"No Lord's anointed, but a Russian bear."
In this I must acknowledge there was more ill-nature than wit.[161] It is rather caricature than character, and more like the coarse mangling of Tom Browne than the delicate yet wounding satire of Alexander Pope. For this rough retort he might, however, plead the poet's precedent. His opponent had brandished a tomahawk; and Hogarth, old as he was, wielded a battle-axe in his own defence. A more aggravated provocation cannot well be conceived. The attack was unmerciful, unmanly, unjust. Let the following extracts speak for themselves:—
"Amongst the sons of men, how few are known
Who dare be just to merit not their own!
Superior virtue and superior sense,
To knaves and fools will always give offence:
Nay, men of real worth can scarcely bear—
So nice is jealousy—a rival there."
Such is the introduction to Churchill's Epistle, and I believe the reader will grant that it is quite as applicable to the poet as the painter. After some lines which would apply to any other subject as well as that under consideration, he thus proceeds:
"Hogarth,—I take thee, Candour, at thy word,
Accept thy proffer'd terms, and will be heard;
Thee have I heard with virulence declaim,
Nothing retained of Candour but the name;
By thee have I been charg'd in angry strains,[162]
With that mean falsehood which my soul disdains."
How furious the onset! but if the lines are brought back to plain prose, they will run thus: "Hogarth, thy word is candour. I adopt the same word, and having heard thee declaim with a virulence that retained nothing of candour but the name, thou shalt hear me declaim in the same style."
That this is the precise meaning which the poet intended, I will not presume to assert; but that he has pursued his theme in a manner that amply justifies my supposition, the following lines will abundantly prove:—
"Hogarth, stand forth,—nay, hang not thus aloof,
Now Candour, now thou shalt receive such proof,
Such damning proof, that henceforth thou shalt fear
To tax my wrath, and own my conduct clear.
Hogarth, stand forth,—I dare thee to be try'd
In that great court where Conscience must preside:
At that most solemn bar hold up thy hand;
Think before whom, on what account you stand.
Speak, but consider well—from first to last
Review thy life, view every action past:
Nay, you shall have no reason to complain,—
Take longer time, and view them o'er again:
Canst thou remember from thy earliest youth,—
And as thy God must judge thee, speak the truth,—
A single instance where, self laid aside,
And justice taking place of fear and pride,
Thou with an equal eye didst genius view,
And give to merit what was merit's due?
Genius and merit are a sure offence,
And thy soul sickens at the name of sense."
If Hogarth had so marked an aversion to all genius, merit, and sense, it is rather singular that he should have lived on such intimate terms with Mr. Churchill and Mr. Wilkes.
"Is any one so foolish to succeed?
On Envy's altar he is doomed to bleed.
Hogarth, a guilty pleasure in his eyes,
The place of executioner supplies:
See how he gloats, enjoys the sacred feast,
And proves himself by cruelty a priest."
What does the bard prove himself?
"Whilst the weak artist to thy whims a slave,
Would bury all those powers which nature gave,
Would suffer blank concealment to obscure
Those rays that jealousy could not endure;
To feed thy vanity would rust unknown,
And to secure thy credit, blast his own:
In Hogarth he was sure to find a friend;
He could not fear, and therefore might commend.
But when his spirit, rous'd by honest shame,
Shook off that lethargy, and soar'd to fame;
When with the pride of man resolv'd and strong,
He scorn'd those fears which did his honour wrong;
And on himself determin'd to rely,
Brought forth his labours to the public eye,
No friend in thee could such a rebel know,
He had desert, and Hogarth was his foe."
He must be a very weak artist indeed who would bury the talents which Nature gave, to gratify the whims of another man; but admitting a painter had been found "who suffered blank concealment to obscure those rays which jealousy could not endure," I cannot comprehend how it concerned Hogarth. His walk was all his own: even now he need not dread a rival there. Mr. Churchill acknowledges that in walks of humour
"Hogarth unrivall'd stands, and shall engage
Unrivall'd praise to the most distant age!"
Being unrivalled, I do not see why he should dread a rival; nor can I conceive he could be jealous of talents which he must be conscious were inferior to his own.
After some very harsh lines on envy, in no degree applicable to Hogarth, and the rhapsody about Wilkes and Liberty, which I have noticed in the preceding plate, this high priest of the Temple of Cruelty, rejoicing in his strength and triumphing in the pride of his youth, without any reverence for gray hairs or respect for superior talents, sets up the war-whoop, and springs upon a feeble old man with the ferocity of a hungry cannibal:
"With all the symptoms of assur'd decay,
With age and sickness pinch'd and worn away,
Pale quivering lips, lank cheeks, and faltering tongue,
The spirits out of tune, the nerves unstrung,
The body shrivell'd up, the dim eyes sunk
Within their sockets deep; the weak hams shrunk,
The body's weight unable to sustain,
The stream of life scarce trembling through the vein:
More than half kill'd by honest truths which fell,
Through thy own fault, from men who wish'd thee well;
Canst thou e'en thus thy thoughts to vengeance give,
And dead to all things else, to malice live?
Hence, dotard, to thy closet; shut thee in,
By deep repentance wash away thy sin;
From haunts of men, to shame and sorrow fly,
And on the verge of death learn how to die."
That a man in the vigour of life—for Churchill was not much more than thirty years old—should draw so pitiable a picture of age and decrepitude, and then attack that age and decrepitude with a barbarity so savage, is horrible! But the baleful spirit of party overthrows the barriers of truth, eradicates philanthropy, and severs those social, I had almost said sacred, bonds which ought to unite and attach men of genius to each other. Had Churchill felt his own beautiful apostrophe, he would have blotted the lines with his tears:
"Ah! let not youth to insolence allied,
In heat of blood, in full career of pride,
Possessed of genius, with unhallowed rage,
Mock the infirmities of reverend age.
The greatest genius to this fate may bow."
—Churchill's Epistle to Hogarth.
After advising the painter to learn how to die, the bard proceeds; repeats and amplifies what he had before written on Hogarth's envy, gives a metrical version of that North Briton which ridicules the artist's love of flattery, and beautifully versifies Mr. Wilkes' prosaic abuse of poor "Sigismunda."
In the lines which follow, he first throws the gauntlet, and then draws such a picture of the man he has challenged as must have subdued the rancour of an assassin; so far from being a stimulus to revenge, it excites pity, and concludes in the form of an apology:
"For me, who, warm and zealous for my friend,
In spite of railing thousands, will commend;
And no less warm and zealous 'gainst my foes,
Spite of commending thousands will oppose;
I dare thy worst, with scorn behold thy rage,
But with an eye of pity view thy age;
Thy feeble age, in which as in a glass
We see how men to dissolution pass.
Thou wretched being, whom on reason's plan,
So chang'd, so lost, I cannot call a man,
What could persuade thee at this time of life
To launch afresh into this sea of strife?
Better for thee, scarce crawling on the earth,
Almost as much a child as at thy birth,
To have resign'd in peace thy parting breath,
And sunk unnotic'd in the arms of death.
Why would thy gray, gray hairs resentment brave,
Thus to go down with sorrow to the grave?
Now by my soul it makes me blush to know
My spirits could descend to such a foe.
Whatever cause thy vengeance might provoke,
It seems rank cowardice to give the stroke."
Seems, Churchill!—nay, it is!
The following address to the artist may, with infinitely more propriety, be applied to the bard; whose name I have therefore ventured to insert in the place where he has left the name of Hogarth:
"With so much merit, and so much success,
With so much power to curse, so much to bless,
Would he have been man's friend instead of foe,
Churchill had been a little god below.
Why, then, like savage giants fam'd of old,
Of whom in Scripture story we are told,
Dost thou in cruelty that strength employ,
Which Nature meant to save, not to destroy?
Why dost thou, all in horrid pomp array'd,
Sit grinning o'er the ruins thou hast made?
Most rank ill-nature must applaud thy art,
But even Candour must condemn thy heart."
—Epistle to Hogarth.
The whole of this unfeeling composition is dictated by the same spirit, and written in much the same style, as the lines I have quoted; it reflects more dishonour on the satirist than on the subject of his abuse.
To enumerate further examples would be painful as well as tedious: the graven image must be attended to.
It represents Mr. Churchill in the character of a bear hugging a foaming tankard of porter,[163] and like another Hercules, armed with a knotted club, to attack hydras, destroy dragons, and discomfit giants!
From the two letters "N. B." inscribed on the club, it appears that the painter considered Churchill as a writer in the North Briton; and from the words "infamous fallacy, Lie the 1st, 2d, 3d, 4th," etc., on each of the knots, that he also considered him as a poet who did not pay the strictest regard to truth.
To designate more positively the object of his ridicule, and render this rude representative still more ludicrous, it is decorated with a band and a pair of ruffles; and with these characteristic ornaments, though it remains a good bear, it becomes a sort of overcharged portrait of the reverend satirist, and I really think resembles him.
Hogarth's favourite dog Trump, who had been his companion in the portrait from which this is altered, retains his original situation on the outside of the picture frame, but is now contemptuously treating and trampling upon the Epistle to his master. Near him lie two books, on one of which is written, "A New Way to Pay Old Debts, a comedy, by Massinger:" on the other, "A List of Subscribers to the North Briton." To intimate the poverty of those who wrote it, the pyramid is crowned by a begging-box; and beneath, as emblems of art, lie a pencil and palette.
In this state the print was published; but the gentleman whom it offended asserting that it proved the painter in his dotage, he refuted their calumny by the following spirited addition:—
In the form of a framed picture on the painter's palette, is placed a small drawing, which may serve as a sort of political postscript to his first plate of "The Times," or a kind of prelude to the second. It represents Mr. Pitt reclining in a similar position to that of Sir Isaac Newton in Westminster Abbey, and is probably meant as allusive to his having retired from public business, to enjoy the otium cum dignitate, a short time before. The background is composed of a pyramidical piece of marble, from the top of which is suspended a millstone, inscribed "£3000," in allusion to his saying that "Hanover was a millstone round the neck of England," and afterwards increasing the public burdens by accepting a pension of £3000 a year. It is suspended by a thread, and must, if it falls, dash him to pieces. This was Hogarth's idea of crushing popularity. To heighten the ridicule, though recumbent, he is firing a mortar at the symbol of peace, "a dove with an olive branch" perched on the standard of England; but his artillery is not powerful enough to reach the mark; the powder fails in its effect, the ball falls short of its object. In most of his measures Mr. Pitt was supported by the city of London, and to this our great metropolis Hogarth appears to allude, in making the two Guildhall giants, with each of them a pipe of tobacco in his mouth, supporters of the Monument. The tubes with Indian weed evidently hint at his great Creolian friend, Mr. Alderman Beckford. To denote that Mr. Pitt was the sovereign of their affections, and kept the master-key of their iron chests, one of these representatives of the city is giving him supreme rule, by placing upon his head "the likeness of a kingly crown." The other holds a shield, on which is emblazoned the arms of Austria, which the statesman indignantly spurns. At an opposite corner, the painter has exhibited himself, in the humble character of a showman, drilling Messrs. Churchill and Wilkes through the varying steps of a political minuet. The first he has represented under the type of a bear in a laced hat, and the last as a monkey astride upon a mop-stick, with the cap of liberty at the top of it. In his left hand he holds a check-string, which being fastened to his two pupils, answers the purpose of a bridle, and in his right brandishes a cat-o'-nine-tails. That the two quadrupeds may dance to some tune, a figure without features, intended as a second delineation of Earl Temple, is playing on the fiddle.[164]
Such is Hogarth's representation; and in the poem of Independence, which Churchill published in September 1764, he admirably parries the caricature by a most spirited description of himself. In this he has evidently taken Hogarth's print for his model. Having described a lean, long, lank, and bony figure, designed for a then unpopular nobleman, he thus proceeds:
"Such was the first. The second was a man
Whom Nature built on a quite different plan:
A bear, whom from the moment he was born,
His dam despis'd, and left unlick'd in scorn:
A Babel, which, the power of art outdone,
She could not finish when she had begun:
An utter chaos, out of which no might
But that of God could strike one spark of light.
Broad were his shoulders, and from blade to blade
A H—— might at full length have laid.
Vast were his bones; his muscles twisted strong;
His face was short, but broader than 'twas long.
His features, though by nature they were large,
Contentment had contrived to overcharge,
And bury meaning; save that we might spy
Sense low'ring on the pent-house of his eye,[165]
His arms were two twin oaks; his legs so stout,
That they might bear a mansion-house about.
Nor were they,—look but at his body there,
Design'd by fate a much less weight to bear.
"O'er a brown cassock, which had once been black,
Which hung in tatters on his brawny back,
A sight most strange and awkward to behold,
He threw a covering of blue and gold.
"Just at that time of life when man by rule
The fop laid down, takes up the graver fool,
He started up a fop, and fond of show,
Look'd like another Hercules turn'd beau;
A subject met with only now and then,
Much fitter for the pencil than the pen.
Hogarth would draw him, Envy must allow,
Ev'n to the life,—were Hogarth living now."[166]
In the following letter written to his friend Mr. Wilkes, and dated August 3, 1763, Churchill considers Hogarth as already dead:—
"I take it for granted you have seen Hogarth's print against me. Was ever anything so contemptible? I think he is fairly felo de se. I think not to let him off in that manner, although I might safely leave him to your notes.[167] He has broken into my pale of private life, and set that example of illiberality which I wished; of that kind of attack which is ungenerous in the first instance, but justice in return.[168] I intend an elegy on him, supposing him dead; but *—— *—— tells me, with a kiss, he will be really dead before it comes out; that I have already killed him, etc. How sweet is flattery from the woman we love![169] and how weak is our boasted strength, when opposed to beauty and good sense with good-nature."
Mr. Churchill died at Boulogne in his thirty-second year, and was in November 1764 buried at Dover: at which place, on a small stone in the old churchyard, formerly belonging to the collegiate Church of St. Martin, is the following inscription:
"Life to the last enjoy'd, here Churchill lies."