The man of letters, whose habits and whose whole life so closely resemble those of an author, can only be distinguished by this simple circumstance, that the man of letters is not an author.
Yet he whose sole occupation through life is literature—he who is always acquiring and never producing, appears as ridiculous as the architect who never raised an edifice, or the statuary who refrains from sculpture. His pursuits are reproached with terminating in an epicurean selfishness, and amidst his incessant avocations he himself is considered as a particular sort of idler.
This race of literary characters, as we now find them, could not have appeared till the press had poured forth its affluence. In the degree that the nations of Europe became literary, was that philosophical curiosity kindled which induced some to devote their fortunes and their days, and to experience some of the purest of human enjoyments in preserving and familiarising themselves with "the monuments of vanished minds," as books are called by D'Avenant with so much sublimity. Their expansive library presents an indestructible history of the genius of every people, through all their eras—and whatever men have thought and whatever men have done, were at length discovered in books.
Men of letters occupy an intermediate station between authors and readers. They are gifted with more curiosity of knowledge, and more multiplied tastes, and by those precious collections which they are forming during their lives, are more completely furnished with the means than are possessed by the multitude who read, and the few who write.
The studies of an author are usually restricted to particular subjects. His tastes are tinctured by their colouring, his mind is always shaping itself by their form. An author's works form his solitary pride, and his secret power; while half his life wears away in the slow maturity of composition, and still the ambition of authorship torments its victim alike in disappointment or in possession.
But soothing is the solitude of the MAN OF LETTERS! View the busied inhabitant of the library surrounded by the objects of his love! He possesses them—and they possess him! These volumes—images of our mind and passions!—as he traces them from Herodotus to Gibbon, from Homer to Shakspeare—those portfolios which gather up, the inventions of genius, and that selected cabinet of medals which holds so many unwritten histories;—some favourite sculptures and pictures, and some antiquities of all nations, here and there about his house—these are his furniture!
In his unceasing occupations the only repose he requires, consists not in quitting, but in changing them. Every day produces its discovery; every day in the life of a man of letters may furnish a multitude of emotions and of ideas. For him there is a silence amidst the world; and in the scene ever opening before him, all that has passed is acted over again, and all that is to come seems revealed as in a vision. Often his library is contiguous to his chamber,[A] and this domain "parva sed apta," this contracted space, has often marked the boundary of the existence of the opulent owner, who lives where he will die, contracting his days into hours; and a whole life thus passed is found too short to close its designs. Such are the men who have not been unhappily described by the Hollanders as lief-hebbers, lovers or fanciers, and their collection as lief-hebbery, things of their love. The Dutch call everything for which they are impassioned lief-hebbery; but their feeling being much stronger than their delicacy, they apply the term to everything, from poesy and picture to tulips and tobacco. The term wants the melody of the languages of genius; but something parallel is required to correct that indiscriminate notion which most persons associate with that of collectors.
[Footnote A: The contiguity of the CHAMBER to the LIBRARY is not the solitary fancy of an individual, but marks the class. Early in life, when in France and Holland, I met with several of these amateurs, who had bounded their lives by the circle of their collections, and were rarely seen out of them. The late Duke of ROXBURGH once expressed his delight to a literary friend of mine, that he had only to step from his sleeping apartment into his fine library; so that he could command, at all moments, the gratification of pursuing his researches while he indulged his reveries. The Chevalier VERHULST, of Bruxelles, of whom we have a curious portrait prefixed to the catalogue of his pictures and curiosities, was one of those men of letters who experienced this strong affection for his collections, and to such a degree, that he never went out of his house for twenty years; where, however, he kept up a courteous intercourse with the lovers of art and literature. He was an enthusiastic votary of Rubens, of whom he has written a copious life in Dutch, the only work he appears to have composed.]
It was fancifully said of one of these lovers, in the style of the age, that, "His book was his bride, and his study his bride-chamber." Many have voluntarily relinquished a public station and their rank in society, neglecting even their fortune and their health, for the life of self-oblivion of the man of letters. Count DE CAYLUS expended a princely income in the study and the encouragement of Art. He passed his mornings among the studios of artists, watching their progress, increasing his collections, and closing his day in the retirement of his own cabinet. His rank and his opulence were no obstructions to his settled habits. CICERO himself, in his happier moments, addressing ATTICUS, exclaimed—"I had much rather be sitting on your little bench under Aristotle's picture, than in the curule chairs of our great ones." This wish was probably sincere, and reminds us of another great politician who in his secession from public affairs retreated to a literary life, where he appears suddenly to have discovered a new-found world. Fox's favourite line, which he often repeated, was—
How various his employments whom the world
Calls idle!