The years passed on. Godwin lived more or less in constant terror of his wife, of whom Lamb writes: “Mrs. Godwin grows every day in disfavor with God and man. I will be buried with this inscription over me: ‘Here lies Charles Lamb, the woman-hater, I mean that hated one woman. For the rest, God bless ’em, and when He makes any more, make ’em prettier.’”
As he grew older Godwin moderated his views of men somewhat, so that “he ceased to be disrespectful to any one but his Maker”; and he once so far forgot himself as to say “God bless you” to a friend, but quickly added, “to use a vulgar expression.” He remained, however, always prepared to sacrifice a friend for a principle. He seemed to feel that truth had taken up its abode in him, and that any question which he had submitted to the final judgment of his own breast had been passed upon finally and forever.
This search for truth has a great fascination for a certain type of mind. It does not appear dangerous: all one has to do is thrust one’s feet in slippers and muse; but it has probably caused as much misery as the search for the pole. The pole has now been discovered and can be dismissed, but the search for truth continues. It will always continue, for the reason that its location is always changing. Every generation looks for it in a new place.
LETTER FROM WILLIAM GODWIN
I bought this letter one hundred years to a day after it had been written, for a sum which would have amazed its writer, and temporarily, at least, have relieved him of his financial difficulties.
One night Lamb, dropping in on Godwin, found him discussing with Coleridge his favorite problem, “Man as he is and man as he ought to be.” The discussion seemed interminable. “Hot water and its better adjuncts” had been entirely overlooked. Finally Lamb stammered out, “Give me man as he ought not to be, and something to drink.” It must have been on one of these evenings that Godwin remarked that he wondered why more people did not write like Shakespeare; to which Lamb replied that he could—if he had the mind to.