It is not surprising that his book made a stir in the political world. None of the Revolutionists had delivered themselves of such ultra-revolutionary sentiments. Men had been accused of high treason for much more moderate views. Perhaps it was their very extravagance that saved him, though he accounted for it in another way. “I have frequently,” Mrs. Shelley explains, “heard my father say that ‘Political Justice’ escaped prosecution from the reason that it appeared in a form too expensive for general acquisition. Pitt observed, when the question was debated in the Privy Council, that ‘a three-guinea book could never do much harm among those who had not three shillings to spare.’” Godwin purposely published his work in this expensive form because he knew that by so doing he would keep it from the multitude, whose passions he would have been the last to arouse or to stimulate. He only wished it to be studied by men too enlightened to encourage abrupt innovation. Festina lente was his motto. The success of the book, however, went beyond his expectations and perhaps his intentions. Three editions were issued in as many years. Among the class of readers to whom he immediately appealed, the verdict passed upon it varied. Dr. Priestley thought it very original, and that it would probably prove useful, though its fundamental principles were too pure to be practical. Horne Tooke pronounced it a bad book, calculated to do harm. The Rev. Samuel Newton’s vigorous disapproval of it caused a final breach between Godwin and his old tutor. As a rule, the Liberal party accepted it as the work of inspiration, and the conservative condemned it as the outcome of atheism and political rebellion. When Godwin, after its publication, made a trip into Warwickshire to stay with Dr. Parr, he found that his fame had preceded him. He was known to the reading public in the counties as well as in the capital, and he was everywhere received with curiosity and kindness. To no one whom he met was he a stranger.
His novel, “Caleb Williams,” established his literary reputation. Its success almost realized Mrs. Inchbald’s prediction that “fine ladies, milliners, mantua-makers, and boarding-school girls will love to tremble over it, and that men of taste and judgment will admire the superior talents, the incessant energy of mind you have evinced.” He was at this time one of the most conspicuous and most talked-about men in London. He counted among his friends and acquaintances all the distinguished men and women of the day; among whom he was in great demand, notwithstanding the fact that he talked neither much nor well, and that not even the most brilliant conversation could prevent his taking short naps when in company. But he was extremely fond of social pleasures. His philosophy had made him neither an ascetic nor an anchorite. He worked for only three or four hours each day; and the rest of the time was given up to reading, to visiting, and to the theatre, he being particularly attracted to the latter form of amusement. His reading was as omnivorous as that of Lord Macaulay. Metaphysics, poetry, novels, were all grist for his mill. This general interest saved him from becoming that greatest of all bores, a man with but one idea.
He was as cold in his conduct as in his philosophy. He maintained in the various relations of life an imperturbable calmness. But it was not that of a Goethe, who knows how to harmonize passion and intellect; it was that of a man in whom the former is an unknown quantity. He was always methodical in his work. Great as his interest in his subject might be, his ardor was held within bounds. There were no long vigils spent wrestling with thought, or days and weeks passed alone and locked in his study that nothing might interfere with the flow of ideas, unless, as happened occasionally, he was working against time. He wrote from nine till one, and then, when he found his brain confused by this amount of labor, he readily reduced the number of his working hours. Literary composition was undertaken by him with the same placidity with which another man might devote himself to book-keeping. His moral code was characterized by the same cool calculation. He had early decided that usefulness to his fellow-creatures was the only thing which made life worth living. It is doubtful whether any other human being would have set about fulfilling this object as he did. He writes of himself:—
“No man could be more desirous than I was of adopting a practice conformable to my principles, as far as I could do so without affording reasonable ground of offence to any other person. I was anxious not to spend a penny on myself which I did not imagine calculated to render me a more capable servant of the public; and as I was averse to the expenditure of money, so I was not inclined to earn it but in small portions. I considered the disbursement of money for the benefit of others as a very difficult problem, which he who has the possession of it is bound to solve in the best manner he can, but which affords small encouragement to any one to acquire it who has it not. The plan, therefore, I resolved on was leisure,—a leisure to be employed in deliberate composition, and in the pursuit of such attainments as afforded me the most promise to render me useful. For years I scarcely did anything at home or abroad without the inquiry being uppermost in my mind whether I could be better employed for general benefit.”
He was equally uncompromising in his friendships. His feelings towards his friends were always ruled by his sense of justice. He was the first to come forward with substantial help in their hour of need, but he was also the first to tell them the truth, even though it might be unpleasant, when he thought it his duty to do so. His unselfishness is shown in his conduct during the famous state trials, in which Holcroft, his most intimate friend, Horne Tooke, and several other highly prized acquaintances, were accused of high treason. His boldly avowed revolutionary principles made him a marked man, but he did all that was in his power to defend them. He expressed in the columns of the “Morning Chronicle” his unqualified opinion of the atrocity of the proceedings against them; and throughout the trials he stood by the side of the prisoners, though by so doing he ran the risk of being arrested with them. But if his friends asked his assistance when it did not seem to him that they deserved it, he was as fearless in withholding it. A Jew money-lender, John King by name, at whose house he dined frequently, was arrested on some charge connected with his business. He appealed to Godwin to appear in court and give evidence in his favor; whereupon the latter wrote to him, not only declining, but forcibly explaining that he declined because he could not conscientiously attest to his, the Jew’s, moral character. There was no ill-will on his part, and he continued to dine amicably with King. Engrossed as he was with his own work, he could still find time to read a manuscript for Mrs. Inchbald, or a play for Holcroft, but when he did so, he was very plain-spoken in pointing out their faults. He incurred the former’s displeasure by correcting some grammatical errors in a story she had submitted to him, and he deeply wounded the latter by his unmerciful abuse of the “Lawyer.” “You come with a sledge-hammer of criticism,” Holcroft said to him on this occasion, “describe it [the play] as absolutely contemptible, tell me it must be damned, or, if it should escape, that it cannot survive five nights.” Yet his affection for Holcroft was unwavering. The conflicting results to which his honesty sometimes led are strikingly set forth in his relations to Thomas Cooper, a distant cousin, who at one time lived with him as pupil. He studied attentively the boy’s character, and did his utmost to treat him gently and kindly, but, on the other hand, he expressed in his presence his opinion of him in language harsh enough to justify his pupil’s indignation. It is more than probable that this same frankness was one of the causes of his many quarrels—démêlés, he calls them in his diary—with his most devoted friends. His sincerity, however, invariably triumphed, and these were always mere passing storms.
He was passionless even in relations which usually arouse warmth in the most phlegmatic natures. He was a good son and brother, yet so undemonstrative that his manner passed at times for indifference. Though in beliefs and sentiments he had drifted far apart from his mother, he never let this fact interfere with his filial respect and duty; and her long and many letters to him are proofs of his unfailing kindness for her. Men more affectionate than he might have rebelled against her maternal sermons. He never did. But the good lady had occasion to object to his coldness. In one of her letters she asks him why he cannot call her “Honored Mother” as well as “Madam,” by which title he addressed her, adding naïvely that “it would be full as agreeable.” He was always willing to look out for the welfare of his brothers, two of whom were somewhat disreputable characters, and of his sister Hannah, who lived in London. With the latter he was on particularly friendly terms, and saw much of her, yet Mrs. Sothren—the cousin who had been such a help to him in his early years—reproves him for writing of her as “Miss Godwin” instead of “sister,” and fears lest this may be a sign that his brotherly affection, once great, had abated.
He seems at one time to have thought that he could provide himself with a wife in the same manner in which he managed his other affairs. He imagined that in contracting such a relationship, love was no more indispensable than a heroine was to the interest of a novel. He proposed that his sister Hannah should choose a wife for him; and she, in all seriousness, set about complying with his request. In a spirit as business-like as his, she decided upon a friend, calculated she was sure to meet his requirements, and then sent him a list of her merits, much as one might write a recommendation of a governess or a cook. Her letter on the subject is so unique, and it is so impossible that it should have been written to any one but Godwin, that it is well worth while quoting part of it. She sent him a note of introduction to the lady in question, who, she writes,—
“... is in every sense formed to make one of your disposition really happy. She has a pleasing voice, with which she accompanies her musical instrument with judgment. She has an easy politeness in her manners, neither free nor reserved. She is a good housekeeper and a good economist, and yet of a generous disposition. As to her internal accomplishments, I have reason to speak still more highly of them; good sense without vanity, a penetrating judgment without a disposition to satire, good nature and humility, with about as much religion as my William likes, struck me with a wish that she was my William’s wife. I have no certain knowledge of her fortune, but that I leave for you to learn. I only know her father has been many years engaged in an employment which brings in £500 or £600 per annum, and Miss Gay is his only child.”
Not even this report could kindle the philosophical William into warmth. He waited many months before he called upon this paragon, and when he finally saw her, he failed to be enraptured according to Hannah’s expectations. “Poor Miss Gay,” as the Godwins subsequently called her, never received a second visit.
When it came to the point he found that something depended upon himself, and that he could not be led by his sister’s choice, satisfactory as it might be. That he should for a moment have supposed such a step possible is the more surprising, because he afterwards showed himself to be not only fond of the society of women, but unusually nice and discriminating in selecting it. His women friends were all famous either for beauty or cleverness. Before his marriage he was on terms of intimacy with Mrs. Inchbald, with Amelia Alderson, soon to become Mrs. Opie, and with the beautiful Mrs. Reveley, whose interest in politics and desire for knowledge were to him greater charms than her personal attractions. Notwithstanding his unimpassioned nature, William Godwin was never a philosophical Aloysius of Gonzaga, to voluntarily blind himself to feminine beauty.