“Bless’d be thy labors, most adventurous Bozzy,
Bold rival of Sir John and Dame Piozzi;
Heavens! with what laurels shall thy head be crown’d!
A grove, a forest, shall thy ears surround!
Yes! whilst the Rambler shall a comet blaze,
And gild a world of darkness with his rays,
Thee, too, that world with wonderment shall hail,
A lively, bouncing cracker at his tail!”]
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
PROJECT OF A DICTIONARY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES—DISAPPOINTMENT—NEGLIGENT AUTHORSHIP—APPLICATION FOR A PENSION—BEATTIE’S ESSAY ON TRUTH—PUBLIC ADULATION—A HIGH-MINDED REBUKE
The works which Goldsmith had still in hand being already paid for, and the money gone, some new scheme must be devised to provide for the past and the future—for impending debts which threatened to crush him, and expenses which were continually increasing. He now projected a work of greater compass than any he had yet undertaken; a Dictionary of Arts and Sciences on a comprehensive scale, which was to occupy a number of volumes. For this he received promises of assistance from several powerful hands. Johnson was to contribute an article on ethics; Burke, an abstract of his Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful, an essay on the Berkleyan system of philosophy, and others on political science; Sir Joshua Reynolds, an essay on painting; and Garrick, while he undertook on his own part to furnish an essay on acting, engaged Dr. Burney to contribute an article on music. Here was a great array of talent positively engaged, while other writers of eminence were to be sought for the various departments of science. Goldsmith was to edit the whole. An undertaking of this kind, while it did not incessantly task and exhaust his inventive powers by original composition, would give agreeable and profitable exercise to his taste and judgment in selecting, compiling, and arranging, and he calculated to diffuse over the whole the acknowledged graces of his style.
He drew up a prospectus of the plan, which is said by Bishop Percy, who saw it, to have been written with uncommon ability, and to have had that perspicuity and elegance for which his writings are remarkable. This paper, unfortunately, is no longer in existence.
Goldsmith’s expectations, always sanguine respecting any new plan, were raised to an extraordinary height by the present project; and well they might be, when we consider the powerful coadjutors already pledged. They were doomed, however, to complete disappointment. Davies, the bibliopole of Russell Street, lets us into the secret of this failure. “The booksellers,” said he, “notwithstanding they had a very good opinion of his abilities, yet were startled at the bulk, importance, and expense of so great an undertaking, the fate of which was to depend upon the industry of a man with whose indolence of temper and method of procrastination they had long been acquainted.”
Goldsmith certainly gave reason for some such distrust by the heedlessness with which he conducted his literary undertakings. Those unfinished, but paid for, would be suspended to make way for some job that was to provide for present necessities. Those thus hastily taken up would be as hastily executed, and the whole, however pressing, would be shoved aside and left “at loose ends,” on some sudden call to social enjoyment or recreation.