CHAPTER VI.
On my first arrival at the university, I felt myself on the wide sea, out of sight of land, with little knowledge of the compass, and in a vessel by no means sea-worthy. Ere long, however, I learned to take an observation; became better acquainted with my real situation, and steered along with tolerable steadiness. I had not, however, been a great while at college, when my bark in a squall struck against a sunken rock, and had well nigh foundered. Two young men of the college, of much higher pretensions than myself as to worldly prospects, of much humbler, perhaps, as to intellectual endowment, offended me by their neglect, and disgusted me by their arrogance. In a thoughtless moment, I inscribed an epigram in one of the chapel prayer-books, so apposite, that it could be applied to nobody else, and so severe, as unavoidably to provoke their indignation and resentment. They were of some standing, I a raw freshman. The consequence was, that they formed a party against me, and, from the plausible argument that no one was safe from such a talent, so exercised, I was avoided as a dangerous malignant. This affliction (and a great one it was for a time) might easily have been averted, but for the insincerity of a young man, to whom I was more particularly recommended, and who called himself my friend. He was the first, who discovered this specimen of rashness and folly, and instead of erasing it, and remonstrating with me on the danger and impropriety of my conduct, he carried it to the parties concerned, induced, as I am rather inclined to suspect, by some secret jealousy of my supposed superiority in learning, which threatened to interrupt his views. This false friend, for such he was, at least in this instance, has long since been called to the settlement of his last awful account. May he there receive the same unqualified forgiveness for all errors, which he has long since had from me on this account.
The mischief, however, was but temporary, and the advantage was great and permanent. Left in a great measure to myself, I avoided many provocations to expence and dissipation, many scenes of youthful thoughtlessness and folly, and compelled, as it were, to fly for refuge to my books, my mind was soothed, enlightened, and improved. I had at length the triumph, and a grateful one it was, to see my acquaintance solicited by those who had disdainfully rejected it, and the tables were so far turned, that the notice was obviously considered as a favour on my part, which would once on their’s, have been deemed the extreme of condescension.
Here let me indulge an emotion, pardonable, I hope, of self-complacency. They who from long observation and experience are best qualified to judge of the scope and extent of my talents, (if I may be said to have any) have invariably affirmed that my excellence was satire; that if I had exercised myself in this unlovely branch of writing, I should have obtained reputation. If I really had this quality within me, it was kept where it ought to be—in a napkin. I never gave way to it but in the circumstance above detailed, and in a very few other instances. One was to expose the imbecility of an otherwise truly amiable man. He had considerable talents, some learning, an exquisite taste for music, and most agreeable powers of conversation; but he permitted himself to be hen-pecked by a crabbed old landlady, with whom he boarded, and made himself ridiculous, by the obsequiousness with which he submitted to her caprices. I introduced them in an Amœbæan Eclogue, in which their characters, peculiarities, and foibles, were so strongly and happily delineated, that every hearer was impressed with the truth of the resemblance, and delighted with the vivacity of the composition.
The other essay was far more important, was studied with care, artfully contrived, and elaborately finished. A man who was my senior in years, and superior in station, had treated me ill, had provoked my resentment, not by one solitary act of oppression, but by numerous marks of enmity and persecution. He had some strong and striking peculiarities and foibles; he had made himself obnoxious in various places of residence, by his insolence of temper, by engaging in personal animosities and squabbles, and by various demonstrations of an arbitrary and tyrannical disposition. To this person I addressed a letter from his Satanic Majesty, thanking him for the services he had rendered the diabolical empire, as exemplified in various overt acts at different places, which I circumstantially detailed and described.
When finished, I invited a confidential friend to hear me read it, and I am, at this very distant period, strongly impressed with his continued exclamations on its force, truth, severity, and humour. He compared it to the best things of the kind in our language, and indeed said every thing which could soothe and satisfy my vanity. When he left me, I began to reflect on what I had done, and its probable consequences. I examined myself with some severity, and the result was much self-reproach. I had indulged many unamiable propensities—anger, revenge, and every duality which was in opposition to candour and to charity. I threw my satire into the fire, and since that time, though I have had abundance of temptations, I never wrote severe satire.
But to return.—The period of my first appearance at the university was marked by one circumstance unfavourable to my literary ambition. The number of students of my own standing was great, beyond all ordinary precedent, and no small proportion of them were distinguished as well by their literary diligence, as by superior abilities. Many of those who yet remain, are at this moment of the highest reputation, and are displaying their great talents in the senate, and in the highest situations of the bar, and the church; so that my tutor immediately told me, that in any other year I might have expected an exalted situation, but as things were circumstanced, I must moderate my ambition.
Sic neque Peliden terrebat Achillea Chiron
Thessalico permixtus equo, nec pennifer Atlas
Amphitryoniadem puerum, sed blandus uterque.