Literature is an avenue to glory, ever open for those ingenious men who are deprived of honours or of wealth. Like that illustrious Roman who owed nothing to his ancestors, videtur ex se natus, these seem self-born; and in the baptism of fame, they have given themselves their name. Bruyère has finely said of men of genius, "These men have neither ancestors nor posterity; they alone compose their whole race."
But AKENSIDE, we have seen, blushed when his lameness reminded him of the fall of one of his father's cleavers; PRIOR, the son of a vintner, could not endure to be reminded, though by his favourite Horace, that "the cask retains its flavour;" like VOITURE, another descendant of a marchand de vin, whose heart sickened over that which exhilarates all other hearts, whenever his opinion of its quality was maliciously consulted. All these instances too evidently prove that genius is subject to the most vulgar infirmities.
But some have thought more courageously. The amiable ROLLIN was the son of a cutler, but the historian of nations never felt his dignity compromised by his birth. Even late in life, he ingeniously alluded to his first occupation, for we find an epigram of his in sending a knife for a new-year's gift, "informing his friend, that should this present appear to come rather from Vulcan than from Minerva, it should not surprise, for," adds the epigrammatist, "it was from the cavern of the Cyclops I began to direct my footsteps towards Parnassus." The great political negotiator, Cardinal D'OSSAT, was elevated by his genius from an orphan state of indigence, and was alike destitute of ancestry, of titles, even of parents. On the day of his creation, when others of noble extraction assumed new titles from the seignorial names of their ancient houses, he was at a loss to fix on one. Having asked the Pope whether he should choose that of his bishopric, his holiness requested him to preserve his plain family name, which he had rendered famous by his own genius. The sons of a sword-maker, a potter, and a tax-gatherer, were the greatest of the orators, the most majestic of the poets, and the most graceful of the satirists of antiquity; Demosthenes, Virgil, and Horace. The eloquent Massillon, the brilliant Fléchier, Rousseau, and Diderot; Johnson, Goldsmith, and Franklin, arose amidst the most humble avocations.
Vespasian raised a statue to the historian JOSEPHUS, though a Jew; and the Athenians one to Æsop, though a slave. Even among great military republics the road to public honour was open, not alone to heroes and patricians, but to that solitary genius which derives from itself all which it gives to the public, and nothing from its birth or the public situation it occupies.
It is the prerogative of genius to elevate obscure men to the higher class of society. If the influence of wealth in the present day has created a new aristocracy of its own, where they already begin to be jealous of their ranks, we may assert that genius creates a sort of intellectual nobility, which is now conferred by public feeling; as heretofore the surnames of "the African," and of "Coriolanus," won by valour, associated with the names of the conqueror of Africa and the vanquisher of Corioli. Were men of genius, as such, to have armorial bearings they might consist, not of imaginary things, of griffins and chimeras, but of deeds performed and of public works in existence. When DONDI raised the great astronomical clock at the University of Padua, which was long the admiration of Europe, it gave a name and nobility to its maker and all his descendants. There still lives a Marquis Dondi dal' Horologio. Sir HUGH MIDDLETON, in memory of his vast enterprise, changed his former arms to bear three piles, to perpetuate the interesting circumstance, that by these instruments he had strengthened the works he had invented, when his genius poured forth the waters through our metropolis, thereby distinguishing it from all others in the world. Should not EVELYN have inserted an oak-tree in his bearings? for his "Sylva" occasioned the plantation of "many millions of timber-trees," and the present navy of Great Britain has been constructed with the oaks which the genius of Evelyn planted. There was an eminent Italian musician, who had a piece of music inscribed on his tomb; and I have heard of a Dutch mathematician, who had a calculation for his epitaph.
We who were reproached for a coldness in our national character, have caught the inspiration and enthusiasm for the works and the celebrity of genius; the symptoms indeed were long dubious. REYNOLDS wished to have one of his own pictures, "Contemplation in the figure of an Angel," carried at his funeral; a custom not unusual with foreign painters; but it was not deemed prudent to comply with this last wish of the great artist, from the fears entertained as to the manner in which a London populace might have received such a novelty. This shows that the profound feeling of art is still confined within a circle among us, of which hereafter the circumference perpetually enlarging, may embrace even the whole people. If the public have borrowed the names of some lords to dignify a "Sandwich" and a "Spencer," we may be allowed to raise into titles of literary nobility those distinctions which the public voice has attached to some authors; Æschylus Potter, Athenian Stuart, and Anacreon Moore. BUTLER, in his own day, was more generally known by the single and singular name of Hudibras, than by his own.
This intellectual nobility is not chimerical. Such titles must be found indeed, in the years which are to come; yet the prelude of their fame distinguishes these men from the crowd. Whenever the rightful possessor appears, will not the eyes of all spectators be fixed on him? I allude to scenes which I have witnessed. Will not even literary honours superadd a nobility to nobility; and make a name instantly recognised which might otherwise be hidden under its rank, and remain unknown by its title? Our illustrious list of literary noblemen is far more glorious than the satirical "Catalogue of Noble Authors," drawn up by a polished and heartless cynic, who has pointed his brilliant shafts at all who were chivalrous in spirit, or related to the family of genius. One may presume on the existence of this intellectual nobility, from the extraordinary circumstance that the great have actually felt a jealousy of the literary rank. But no rivalry can exist in the solitary honour conferred on an author. It is not an honour derived from birth nor creation, but from PUBLIC OPINION, and inseparable from his name, as an essential quality; for the diamond will sparkle and the rose will be fragrant, otherwise it is no diamond or rose. The great may well condescend to be humble to genius, since genius pays its homage in becoming proud of that humility. Cardinal Richelieu was mortified at the celebrity of the unbending CORNEILLE; so were several noblemen at POPE'S indifference to their rank; and MAGLIABECHI, the book prodigy of his age, whom every literary stranger visited at Florence, assured Lord Raley that the Duke of Tuscany had become jealous of the attention he was receiving from foreigners, as they usually went to visit MAGLIABECHI before the Grand Duke.
A confession by MONTESQUIEU states, with open candour, a fact in his life which confirms this jealousy of the great with the literary character. "On my entering into life I was spoken of as a man of talents, and people of condition gave me a favourable reception; but when the success of my Persian Letters proved perhaps that I was not unworthy of my reputation, and the public began to esteem me, my reception with the great was discouraging, and I experienced innumerable mortifications." Montesquieu subjoins a reflection sufficiently humiliating for the mere nobleman: "The great, inwardly wounded with the glory of a celebrated name, seek to humble it. In general he only can patiently endure the fame of others, who deserves fame himself." This sort of jealousy unquestionably prevailed in the late Lord ORFORD, a wit, a man of the world, and a man of rank; but while he considered literature as a mere amusement, he was mortified at not obtaining literary celebrity; he felt his authorial always beneath his personal character. It fell to my lot to develope his real feelings respecting himself and the literary men of his age.[A]
[Footnote A: "Calamities of Authors." I printed, in 1812, extracts from Walpole's correspondence with Cole. Some have considered that there was a severity of delineation in my character of Horace Walpole. I was the first, in my impartial view of his literary character, to proclaim to the world what it has now fully sanctioned, that "His most pleasing, if not his great talent, lay in letter-writing; here he was without a rival. His correspondence abounded with literature, criticism, and wit of the most original and brilliant composition." This was published several years before the recent collection of his letters.]
Who was the dignified character, Lord Chesterfield or Samuel Johnson, when the great author, proud of his protracted and vast labour, rejected his lordship's tardy and trivial patronage?[A] "I value myself," says Swift, "upon making the ministry desire to be acquainted with PARNELL, and not Parnell with the ministry." PIRON would not suffer the literary character to be lowered in his presence. Entering the apartment of a nobleman, who was conducting another peer to the stairs-head, the latter stopped to make way for Piron: "Pass on, my lord," said the noble master; "pass, he is only a poet." PIRON replied, "Since our qualities are declared, I shall take my rank," and placed himself before the lord. Nor is this pride, the true source of elevated character, refused to the great artist as well as the great author. MICHAEL ANGELO, invited by Julius II. to the court of Rome, found that intrigue had indisposed his holiness towards him, and more than once the great artist was suffered to linger in attendance in the antechamber. One day the indignant man of genius exclaimed, "Tell his holiness, if he wants me, he must look for me elsewhere." He flew back to his beloved Florence, to proceed with that celebrated cartoon which afterwards became a favourite study with all artists. Thrice the Pope wrote for his return, and at length menaced the little State of Tuscany with war, if Michael Angelo prolonged his absence. He returned. The sublime artist knelt at the foot of the Father of the Church, turning aside his troubled countenance in silence. An intermeddling bishop offered himself as a mediator, apologising for our artist by observing, "Of this proud humour are these painters made!" Julius turned to this pitiable mediator, and, as Vasari tells, used a switch on this occasion, observing, "You speak injuriously of him, while I am silent. It is you who are ignorant." Raising Michael Angelo, Julius II. embraced the man of genius.