We have come upon a passage which is omitted from the 'Confessions,' and as it is, in every way, characteristic, we shall give it:
My studies have now been long interrupted. I cannot read to myself with any pleasure, hardly with a moment's endurance. Yet I read aloud sometimes for the pleasure of others—because reading is an accomplishment of mine, and, in the slang use of the word 'accomplishment' as a superficial and ornamental attainment, almost the only one I possess—and, formerly, if I had any vanity at all connected with any endowment or attainment of mine, it was with this; for I had observed that no accomplishment was so rare. Players are the worst readers of all; —— reads vilely, and Mrs. ——, who is so celebrated, can read nothing well but dramatic compositions—Milton she cannot read sufferably. People in general read poetry without any passion at all, or else overstep the modesty of nature and read not like scholars. Of late, if I have felt moved by anything in books, it has been by the grand lamentations of 'Samson Agonistes,' or the great harmonies of the Satanic speaker in 'Paradise Regained,' when read aloud by myself. A young lady sometimes comes and drinks tea with us. At her request and M——'s I now and then read W——'s poems to them. (W——, by-the-bye, is the only poet I ever met who could read his own verses. Blank verse he reads admirably.)
This, then, has been the extent of my reading for upwards of sixteen months. It frets me to enter those rooms of my cottage in which the books stand. In one of them, to which my little boy has access, he has found out a use for some of them. Somebody has given him a bow and arrows—God knows who, certainly not I, for I have not energy or ingenuity to invent a walking-stick—thus equipped for action, he rears up the largest of the folios that he can lift, places them on a tottering base, and then shoots until he brings down the enemy. He often presses me to join him; and sometimes I consent, and we are both engaged together in these intellectual labours. We build up a pile, having for its base some slender modern metaphysician, ill able (poor man!) to sustain such a weight of philosophy. Upon this we place the Dutch quartos of Descartes and Spinoza; then a third story of Schoolmen in folio—the Master of Sentences, Suarez, Picus Mirandula, and the Telemonian bulk of Thomas Aquinas; and when the whole architecture seems firm and compact, we finish our system of metaphysics by roofing the whole with Duval's enormous Aristotle. So far there is some pleasure—building up is something, but what is that to destroying? Thus thinks, at least, my little companion, who now, with the wrath of the Pythian Apollo, assumes his bow and arrows; plants himself in the remotest corner of the room, and prepares his fatal shafts. The bow-string twangs, flights of arrows are in the air, but the Dutch impregnability of the Bergen-op-Zooms at the base receives the few which reach the mark, and they recoil without mischief done. Again the baffled archer collects his arrows, and again he takes his station. An arrow issues forth, and takes effect on a weak side of Thomas. Symptoms of dissolution appear—the cohesion of the system is loosened—the Schoolmen begin to totter; the Stagyrite trembles; Philosophy rocks to its centre; and, before it can be seen whether time will do anything to heal their wounds, another arrow is planted in the schism of their ontology; the mighty structure heaves—reels—seems in suspense for one moment, and then, with one choral crash—to the frantic joy of the young Sagittary—lies subverted on the floor! Kant and Aristotle, Nominalists and Realists, Doctors Seraphic or Irrefragable, what cares he? All are at his feet—the Irrefragable has been confuted by his arrows, the Seraphic has been found mortal, and the greatest philosopher and the least differ but according to the brief noise they have made.
For nearly two years I believe that I read no book but one, and I owe it to the author, Mr. Ricardo, to make grateful record of it.
And then he proceeds:
Suddenly, in 1818, a friend in Edinburgh sent me down Mr. Ricardo's book, etc.
6.—The Highwayman's Skeleton.
In the account which De Quincey gives of the highwayman's skeleton, which figured in the museum of the distinguished surgeon, Mr. White, in his chapter in the 'Autobiographic Sketches' headed 'The Manchester Grammar School,' he was evidently restrained from inserting one passage, which we have found among his papers, from considerations of delicacy towards persons who might then still be living. But as he has there plainly given the names of the leading persons concerned—the famous Surgeon Cruikshank,[41] there can at this time of day be little risk of offending or hurting anyone by presenting the passage, which the curious student of the Autobiography can insert at the proper point, and may feel that its presence adds to the completeness of the impression, half-humorous, half-eerie, which De Quincey was fain to produce by that somewhat grim episode. Here is the passage:
It was a regular and respectable branch of public industry which was carried on by the highwaymen of England, and all the parties to it moved upon decent motives and by considerate methods. In particular, the robbers themselves, as the leading parties, could not be other than first-rate men, as regarded courage, animal vigour, and perfect horsemanship. Starting from any lower standard than this, not only had they no chance of continued success—their failure was certain as regarded the contest with the traveller, but also their failure was equally certain as regarded the competition within their own body. The candidates for a lucrative section of the road were sure to become troublesome in proportion as all administration of the business upon that part of the line was feebly or indiscreetly worked. Hence it arose that individually the chief highwaymen were sure to command a deep professional interest amongst the surgeons of the land. Sometimes it happened that a first-rate robber was arrested and brought to trial, but from defective evidence escaped. Meanwhile his fine person had been locally advertised and brought under the notice of the medical body. This had occurred in a more eminent degree than was usual to the robber who had owned when living the matchless skeleton possessed by Mr. White. He had been most extensively surveyed with anatomical eyes by the whole body of the medical profession in London: their deliberate judgment upon him was that a more absolutely magnificent figure of a man did not exist in England than this highwayman, and naturally therefore very high sums were offered to him as soon as his condemnation was certain. The robber, whose name I entirely forget, finally closed with the offer of Cruikshank, who was at that time the most eminent surgeon in London. Those days, as is well known, were days of great irregularity in all that concerned the management of prisons and the administration of criminal justice. Consequently there is no reason for surprise or for doubt in the statement made by Mr. White, that Cruikshank, whose pupil Mr. White then was, received some special indulgences from one of the under-sheriffs beyond what the law would strictly have warranted. The robber was cut down considerably within the appointed time, was instantly placed in a chaise-and-four, and was thus brought so prematurely into the private rooms of Cruikshank, that life was not as yet entirely extinct. This I heard Mr. White repeatedly assert. He was himself at that time amongst the pupils of Cruikshank, and three or four of the most favoured amongst these were present, and to one of them Cruikshank observed quietly: 'I think the subject is not quite dead; pray put your knife in (Mr. X. Y.) at this point.' That was done; a solemn finis was placed to the labours of the robber, and perhaps a solemn inauguration to the labours of the student. A cast was taken from the superb figure of the highwayman; he was then dissected, his skeleton became the property of Cruikshank, and subsequently of Mr. White. We were all called upon to admire the fine proportions of the man, and of course in that hollow and unmeaning way which such unlearned expressors of judgment usually assume, we all obsequiously met the demand levied upon our admiration. But, for my part, though readily confiding in the professional judgment of anatomists, I could not but feel that through my own unassisted judgment I never could have arrived at such a conclusion. The unlearned eye has gathered no rudimental points to begin with. Not having what are the normal outlines to which the finest proportions tend, an eye so untutored cannot of course judge in what degree the given subject approaches to these.