XVI.
THE PEDANT.
“Pedantry, in the common acceptation of the word, means an absurd ostentation of learning, and stiffness of phraseology, proceeding from a misguided knowledge of books, and a total ignorance of men.”—Mackenzie.
The Pedant is a talker who makes an ostentatious display of his knowledge. His endeavour is to show those within his hearing that he is a man of study and wisdom. He generally aims higher than he can reach, and makes louder pretensions than his acquirements will justify. He may have gone as far as the articles in English Grammar, and attempts to observe in his speech every rule of syntax, of which he is utterly ignorant; or he may have learned as far as “hoc—hac—hoc” in Latin, and affect an acquaintance with Horace, by shameful quotations. He may have reached as far as the multiplication table in arithmetic, and try to solve the problems of Euclid as though he had them at his finger-ends. If he has read the “Child’s Astronomy,” he will walk with you through the starry heavens and the university of worlds, with as much confidence as though he was a Ross or a Herschel. He labours at the sublime and brings forth the ridiculous. He is a giant according to his own rule of measurement, but a pigmy according to that of other people. He thinks that he makes a deep impression upon the company as to his literary attainments; but the fact is, the impression is made that he knows nothing as he ought to know. He may, perchance, with the lowest of the illiterate, be heard as an oracle, and looked up to as a Solon; but the moment he rises into higher circles he loses caste, and falls down into a rank below that with which he would have stood associated had he not elevated himself on the pedestal of his own folly. He is viewed with disgust in his fall; and becomes the object of ridicule for the display of his contemptible weakness. His silence would have saved him, or an attempt commensurate with his abilities; but his preposterous allusions to subjects of which he proved himself utterly ignorant effected his ruin.
The Spectator, in No. 105, gives an illustration of a pedant in Will Honeycomb. “Will ingenuously confesses that for half his life his head ached every morning with reading of men over-night; and at present comforts himself under certain pains which he endures from time to time, that without them he could not have been acquainted with the gallantries of the age. This Will looks upon as the learning of a gentleman, and regards all other kinds of science as the accomplishments of one whom he calls a scholar, a bookish man, or a philosopher.
“He was last week producing two or three letters which he wrote in his youth to a lady. The raillery of them was natural and well enough for a mere man of the town; but, very unluckily, several of the words were wrongly spelt. Will laughed this off at first as well as he could; but finding himself pushed on all sides, and especially by the Templar, he told us, with a little passion, that he never liked pedantry in spelling, and that he spelt like a gentleman, and not like a scholar. Upon this Will had recourse to his old topic of showing the narrow-spiritedness, the pride, and arrogance of pedants; which he carried so far, that upon my retiring to my lodgings, I could not forbear throwing together such reflections as occurred to me upon the subject.
“A man who has been brought up among books, and is able to talk of nothing else, is a very indifferent companion, and what we call a pedant. But methinks we should enlarge the title, and give it to every one that does not know how to think out of his profession and particular way of life.
“What is a greater pedant than a mere man of the town? How many a pretty gentleman’s knowledge lies all within the verge of the court? He will tell you the names of the principal favourites; repeat the shrewd sayings of a man of quality; whisper an intrigue that is not yet blown upon by common fame; or, if the sphere of his observations is a little larger than ordinary, will perhaps enter into all the incidents, turns, and resolutions, in a game of ombre. When he has gone thus far, he has shown you the whole circle of his accomplishments; his parts are drained, and he is disabled from any further conversation. What are these but rank pedants? and yet these are the men who value themselves most on their exemption from the pedantry of the colleges.
“I might here mention the military pedant, who always talks in a camp, and is storming towns, making lodgments, and fighting battles from one end of the year to the other. Everything he speaks smells of gunpowder; if you take away his artillery from him, he has not a word to say for himself. I might likewise mention the law pedant, that is perpetually putting cases, repeating the transactions of Westminster Hall, wrangling with you upon the most indifferent circumstances of life, and not to be convinced of the distance of a place, or of the most trivial point in conversation, but by dint of argument. The state pedant is wrapped up in news, and lost in politics. If you mention either of the kings of Spain or Poland, he talks very notably; but if you go out of the Gazette, you drop him. In short, a mere courtier, a mere soldier, a mere scholar, a mere anything, is an insipid pedantic character, and equally ridiculous.