ESSAY V. THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.
[42]. ‘As one, in suffering,’ etc. Hamlet, Act III. Scene 2. ‘Knew all qualities,’ etc. Othello, Act III. Scene 3. ‘A pipe for the Muse’s finger,’ etc. Cf. ‘That they are not a pipe for fortune’s finger to sound what stop she please.’ Hamlet, Act III. Scene 2. [43]. ‘To descry new lands,’ etc. Paradise Lost, I. 290–1. ‘Fierce extremes,’ etc. Ib. II. 599. ‘Of the earth, earthy.’ I Corinthians, XV. 47. ‘Darkness that may be felt.’ Exodus, X. 21. ‘Palpable obscure.’ Paradise Lost, II. 406. [44]. ‘Look abroad into universality.’ Bacon, Advancement of Learning, Book I. ‘Content with riches fineless.’ Othello, Act III. Scene 3. ‘Poor as Winter.’ Ib. ‘Self-involved, not dark.’ Cf. ‘Pensive, not sad; in thought involved, not dark.’ Thomson, The Castle of Indolence, Canto I. Stanza 57. ‘Enjoys bright day.’ Comus, 382. ‘Kept the noiseless tenour of his way.’ Gray’s Elegy, Stanza 19. ‘Finds tongues,’ etc. As You Like It, Act II. Scene 1. ‘The meanest flow’r,’ etc. Wordsworth, Ode, Intimations of Immortality. [45]. ‘Yet I’ll remember thee,’ etc. Burns, Lament for James, Earl of Glencairn. Sir Joshua Reynolds, in endeavouring, etc. Cf. the essays ‘On Certain Inconsistencies in Sir Joshua Reynolds’s Discourses, ante, pp. 122 et seq. [46]. The admirable Crichton. James Crichton (1560–1585?). Jedediah Buxton. For Jedidiah Buxton (1707–1772) see Gentleman’s Magazine, June 1754. Note. ‘The force of dulness,’ etc. Cf. ‘The force of Nature could no further go.’ Dryden, Under Mr. Milton’s Picture. [49]. Mediocribus esse, etc. Horace, Ars Poetica, 372–3. I find from Adam Smith. Wealth of Nations, Book I. chap. i. Those nonsensical stories about Lopez de Vega. See Lord Holland’s Some Account of the life and writings of Lope Felix de Vega Carpio (1806), pp. 75–82. [50]. Why does Mr. Kean, etc. See the volume containing Hazlitt’s theatrical criticisms.
ESSAY VI. CHARACTER OF COBBETT
[58]. This essay was afterwards republished in the second edition of The Spirit of the Age. See vol. IV. pp. 334–343, and notes thereto.
ESSAY VII. ON PEOPLE WITH ONE IDEA
[59]. Major C—. John Cartwright (1740–1824), major in the Nottinghamshire Militia, and author of a large number of tracts, chiefly on parliamentary reform. [60]. Like the story of the Cosmogony. The Vicar of Wakefield, chap. xiv. Nihil humani, etc. Terence, Heautontimorumenos, Act I. Scene 1. ‘A fee-grief’ etc. Macbeth, Act IV. Scene 3. [61]. As Cicero says of study. ‘Haec studia adolescentiam alunt, senectutem oblectant,’ etc. Cicero, Pro Archia, VII. 16. As Sancho, etc. Don Quixote, Second Part, Book II. chap. xxxi. Dulce ridentem, etc. Horace, Odes, I. xxii., 23–4. ‘Rings the world,’ etc. Cowper, The Task, III. 129–130. [62]. Abernethy. John Abernethy (1764–1831), whose chief work, An Essay on the Constitutional Origin of Local Diseases, appeared in 1806. [63]. Alderman Wood. Sir Matthew Wood (1768–1843), lord mayor 1815–16, and member for the city from 1817 till his death, had recently (1820) made himself notorious as a champion of Queen Caroline. A conceited fellow about town, etc. Hazlitt probably refers to Wirgmann, the goldsmith, of whom Crabb Robinson gives an amusing account in his Diary (1872 ed.) Vol. I. pp. 310–311. A friend of mine. John Fearn (1768–1837), of whom Hazlitt gives some account in the following page. The essay referred to was An Essay on Consciousness (2nd ed. 4to, 1812). Hazlitt quotes a long passage from the Essay in Why Distant Objects Please. See ante, pp. 260–2. [64]. ‘Poor, unfledged,’ etc. Cymbeline, Act III. Scene 3. [65]. As Goldsmith said. See Boswell’s Life of Johnson (ed. G. B. Hill), III. 252. Yet his Treatise on Human Nature, etc. ‘Never literary attempt was more unfortunate than my Treatise of Human Nature. It fell dead-born from the press,’ etc. The Life of David Hume, Esq. Written by Himself. A celebrated lyrical writer. Wordsworth. The motto in the title-page.
‘For why? Because the good old rule
Sufficeth them: the simple plan,
That they should take, who have the power,
And they should keep who can.’