In mixed society he seemed very unequal. He very often sat silent, and the shyness of his disposition was thought to be an affectation of dignity. But when the occasion grew more festive, as at after-dinner times, and the poet’s temperament had received the stimulus of aliment and wine, he would overflow with pleasant paradoxes, jests and all sorts of unguarded hilarity, believing that those about him who were aware of the intrinsic wit and worth of his intellect, would justify him against any thought of ridicule or disparagement. In such moods, and before the most fastidious wits of the day, he would come out intrepidly with—“When I used to lodge among the beggars in Axe Lane.” The effect of this on his hearers (we believe it was spoken at one of Sir Joshua Reynold’s dinners) was something like that produced on the discomposed sovereigns sitting round the table at Tilsit, or Erfurth—we forget which—by Napoleon’s reminiscence, beginning—“When I was a lieutenant in the regiment of La Fere!” These sayings seem to show a kindred consciousness of something beyond the conventions of rank and name. Goldsmith was not to be laughed at for that sally—which Socrates or Zeno would have enjoyed very much. But the cankered and fastidious Walpole, who was present on some such occasion, and found the Irishman very blunt in his mode of argument, and very unconcerned at the rank or pretensions of Walpole himself, could not tolerate such franknesses, and with his usual affectation of point, called Oliver “an inspired idiot;” just as Chesterfield had called Johnson “a respectable Hottentot”—but indeed with greater justice; for the moralist’s manners at table, particularly his modes of eating, were rather savage.
Goldsmith was certainly apt to blunder. But it was when in the simple frankness of his nature he thought he was among friends and good fellows in such moods and moments. He put his trust in those whose conventionalities he would offend, and who must have felt the inferiority of their own powers when in contact with his. Disraeli, the elder, has made some just remarks on the wrong to which such men expose themselves very often in society. He says: “One peculiar trait in the conversation of men of genius which has often injured them when listeners are not acquainted with the men—are certain sports of a vacant mind; a sudden impulse to throw out opinions and take views of things in some humor of the moment. Extravagant paradoxes and false opinions are caught up by the humblest prosers: and the Philistines are thus enabled to triumph over the strong and gifted man, because in an hour of confidence and the abandonment of his mind, he laid his head in their lap and taught them how he might be shorn of his strength.” All this is extremely applicable to the case of Oliver Goldsmith.
Almost all the stories told of him to show his absurdity or jealousy are palpably false and must be looked on as failures. Northcote very gravely set down how the doctor was offended, when on his route to Paris, accompanied by Mrs. Horneck and her daughters, to find the young ladies receive more notice and admiration than he himself at a French hotel. This was a stupid misconception, to say the least of it—as Miss Horneck afterward stated, wondering at the same time how such could ever have arisen from the fact. Goldsmith, who was always ready to laugh at himself, for the pleasantry of the thing, in any of his playful moods, seeing his companions pleased by the admiration they excited, and wishing to amuse them, said, with an affectation of wounded self-love, that doubtless produced the effect he intended—“Very well, ladies; you may find somebody else in vogue, very shortly, as well as yourselves.” Such sallies furnish a key to most of those things cited to the ridicule of Goldsmith. Another story is told by Col. O’Moore. Burke and O’Moore going to the club to dine, saw Oliver among others looking at some foreign women in a balcony in Leicester Square. Arrived at the club, Burke affected to be offended with Goldsmith and being questioned, said he could hardly think of being friendly with a man who could say what the doctor had just uttered in the public street. Goldsmith eagerly asking to know what it was, was told he expressed surprise that the crowd should look at these women, while he, a man of genius, was passing by!
“Surely, I did not say so,” says Oliver.
“How should I know it then?” replies Burke.
“True,” admits Goldsmith, “I thought, indeed, something of the kind; but I did not think I uttered it.”
All this is merely clumsy and incredible—just the sort of anecdote for the colonel to tell. Just as preposterous was the story of Goldsmith asking Gibbon, who came into his room while he was writing the History of Greece, “What king was that who gave Alexander so much trouble in India?” and on being informed it was Montezuma, writing it down at once! Then, there is Beauclerc’s funny thing—how Goldsmith, being once conversing with Lord Shelburne (termed “Malagrida” by some political opponent,) told his lordship he wondered they called him Malagrida, for Malagrida was an honest man! Such were the false and stupid reminiscences that went to compose the memory of poor Goldsmith—a man of the finest perceptions and most excellent judgment.
Exaggerated stories are also told of his love of dress and his personal vanity in other matters. His peach-colored coat is thought to be a good jest. It is indeed true, that he was somewhat expensive in dress; but a man who frequented the politest society of the time was obliged to pay attention to his wardrobe. And if his taste in the matter of coats and cocked-hats was not so true as it ever was in literary matters, it may be stated that Aristotle also underwent the rebuke of Plato for his foppishness. A great deal is made of the fact that Goldsmith once attempted to leap from the bank to a little island in a pond, at Versailles, and fell into the water. This is all natural enough, if we refer it to his usual playfulness and the remembrance of the active habits of his youth. It amounts to no more than the gravest man may have to answer for, if all his doings were chronicled. Johnson, when quite an old man, used to make such heavy attempts to be lively. Mrs. Thrale (we believe) says that one day, approaching her house, the philosopher flung himself in sport over a gate that lay in his way, and was very much elated by his own agility.
With all his dignity and philosophy Johnson felt a little jealous of Goldsmith, at times, and used to express disparaging opinions of him. He said—“His genius is great, but his knowledge is small. As they say of a generous man—it is a pity he is not rich; so we may say of Goldsmith—it is a pity he is not knowing.” He also said no one was more foolish than Goldsmith when he had not a pen in his hand, or wiser when he had, thus parodying the saying applied to Charles the Second—
“Who never said a foolish thing,