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Part I: 1672-1719
Part I: 1672-1719
Joseph Addison was born on the first of May, 1672, at Milston, of which
his father, Lancelot Addison, was then rector, near Ambrosbury in Wiltshire,
and appearing weak and unlikely to live, he was christened the same day. After
the usual domestic education, which, from the character of his father, may be
reasonably supposed to have given him strong impressions of piety, he was
committed to the care of Mr. Naish at Ambrosbury, and afterwards of Mr. Taylor
at Salisbury.
Not to name the school or the masters of men illustrious for literature
is a kind of historical fraud, by which honest fame is injuriously diminished:
I would therefore trace him through the whole process of his education. In
1683, in the beginning of his twelfth year, his father being made Dean of
Lichfield, naturally carried his family to his new residence, and, I believe,
placed him for some time, probably not long, under Mr. Shaw, then master of
the school at Lichfield, father of the late Dr. Peter Shaw. Of this interval
his biographers have given no account, and I know it only from a story of a
barring-out, told me, when I was a boy, by Andrew Corbet of Shropshire, who
had heard it from Mr. Pigot his uncle.
The practice of barring-out, was a savage license practised in many
schools to the end of the last century, by which the boys, when the periodical
vacation drew near, growing petulant at the approach of liberty, some days
before the time of regular recess, took possession of the school, of which
they barred the doors, and bade their master defiance from the windows. It is
not easy to suppose that on such occasions the master would do more than
laugh; yet, if tradition may be credited, he often struggled hard to force or
surprise the garrison. The master, when Pigot was a school-boy, was barred-
out at Lichfield, and the whole operation, as he said, was planned and
conducted by Addison.
To judge better of the probability of this story, I have enquired when he
was sent to the Chartreux; but, as he was not one of those who enjoyed the
founder`s benefaction, there is no account preserved of his admission. At the
school of the Chartreux, to which he was removed either from that Salisbury or
Lichfield, he pursued his juvenile studies under the care of Dr. Ellis, and
contracted that intimacy with Sir Richard Steele which their joint labours
have so effectually recorded.
Of this memorable friendship the greater praise must be given to Steele.
It is not hard to love those from whom nothing can be feared, and Addison
never considered Steele as a rival; but Steele lived, as he confesses, under
an habitual subjection to the predominating genius of Addison, whom he always
mentioned with reverence, and treated with obsequiousness.
Addison, who knew his own dignity, could not always forbear to shew it,
by playing a little upon his admirer; but he was in no danger of retort: his
jests were endured without resistance or resentment.
But the sneer of jocularity was not the worst. Steele, whose imprudence
of generosity, or vanity of profusion, kept him always incurably necessitous,
upon some pressing exigence, in an evil hour borrowed a hundred pounds of his
friend, probably without much purpose of repayment; but Addison, who seems to
have had other notions of an hundred pounds, grew impatient of delay, and
reclaimed his loan by an execution. Steele felt with great sensibility the
obduracy of his creditor; but with emotions of sorrow rather than of anger.
In 1687 he was entered into Queen`s College in Oxford, where, in 1689,
the accidental perusal of some Latin verses gained him the patronage of Dr.
Lancaster, afterwards provost of Queen`s College; by whose recommendation he
was elected into Magdalen College as a Demy, a term by which that society
denominates those which are elsewhere called Scholars; young men, who partake
of the founder`s benefaction, and succeed in their order to vacant
fellowships.
Here he continued to cultivate poetry and criticism, and grew first
eminent by his Latin compositions, which are indeed entitled to particular
praise. He has not confined himself to the imitation of any ancient author,
but has formed his style from the general language, such as a diligent perusal
of the productions of different ages happened to supply.
His Latin compositions seem to have had much of his fondness; for he
collected a second volume of the Musae Anglicanae, perhaps for a convenient
receptacle, in which all his Latin pieces are inserted, and where his Poem on
the Peace has the first place. He afterwards presented the collection to
Boileau, who from that time conceived, says Tickell, an opinion of the English
genius for poetry. Nothing is better known of Boileau, than that he had an
injudicious and peevish contempt of modern Latin, and therefore his profession
of regard was probably the effect of his civility rather than approbation.
Three of his Latin poems are upon subjects on which perhaps he would not
have ventured to have written in his own language. The Battle of the Pigmies
and Cranes; The Barometer; and A Bowling-green. When the matter is low or
scanty, a dead language, in which nothing is mean because nothing is familiar,
affords great conveniences; and by the sonorous magnificence of Roman
syllables, the writer conceals penury of thought, and want of novelty, often
from the reader, and often from himself.
In his twenty-second year he first shewed his power of English poetry
by some verses addressed to Dryden; and soon afterwards published a
translation of the greater part of the Fourth Georgick upon Bees; after which,
says Dryden, my latter swarm is hardly worth the hiving.
About the same time he composed the arguments prefixed to the several
books of Dryden`s Virgil; and produced an Essay on the Georgicks, juvenile,
superficial, and uninstructive, without much either of the scholar`s learning
or the critic`s penetration.
His next paper of verses contained a character of the principal English
poets, inscribed to Henry Sacheverell, who was then, if not a poet, a writer
of verses; as is shewn by his version of a small part of Virgil`s Georgicks,
published in the Miscellanies, and a Latin encomium on Queen Mary, in the
Musae Anglicanae. These verses exhibit all the fondness of friendship; but on
one side or the other, friendship was afterwards too weak for the malignity of
faction.
In this poem is a very confident and discriminative character of Spenser,
whose work he had then never read. So little sometimes is criticism the effect
of judgment. It is necessary to inform the reader, that about this time he was
introduced by Congreve to Montague, then Chancellor of the Exchequer: Addison
was then learning the trade of a courtier, and subjoined Montague as a
poetical name to those of Cowley and of Dryden.
By the influence of Mr. Montague, concurring, according to Tickell, with
his natural modesty, he was diverted from his original design of entering into
holy orders. Montague alleged the corruption of men who engaged in civil
employments without liberal education; and declared, that, though he was
represented as an enemy to the Church, he would never do it an injury by
withholding Addison from it.
Soon after (in 1695) he wrote a poem to King William, with a rhyming
introduction addressed to Lord Somers. King William had no regard to elegance
or literature; his study was only war; yet by a choice of ministers, whose
disposition was very different from his own, he procured, without intention, a
very liberal patronage to poetry. Addison was caressed both by Somers and
Montague.
In 1697 appeared his Latin verses on the Peace of Ryswick which he
dedicated to Montague, and which was afterwards called by Smith the best Latin
poem since the Aeneid. Praise must not be too rigorously examined; but the
performance cannot be denied to be vigorous and elegant.
Having yet no public employment, he obtained (in 1699) a pension of three
hundred pounds a year, that he might be enabled to travel. He staid a year at
Blois, probably to learn the French language; and then proceeded in his
journey to Italy, which he surveyed with the eyes of a poet.
While he was travelling at leisure, he was far from being idle; for he
not only collected his observations on the country, but found time to write
his Dialogues on Medals, and four Acts of Cato. Such at least is the relation
of Tickell. Perhaps he only collected his materials, and formed his plan.
Whatever were his other employments in Italy, he there wrote the Letter
to Lord Halifax, which is justly considered as the most elegant, if not the
most sublime, of his poetical productions. But in about two years he found it
necessary to hasten home; being, as Swift informs us, distressed by indigence,
and compelled to become the tutor of a travelling Squire, because his pension
was not remitted.
At his return he published his Travels, with a dedication to Lord Somers.
As his stay in foreign countries was short, his observations are such as might
be supplied by a hasty view, and consist chiefly in comparisons of the present
face of the country with the descriptions left us by the Roman poets, from
whom he made preparatory collections, though he might have spared the trouble
had he known that such collections had been made twice before by Italian
authors.
The most amusing passage of his book, is his account of the minute
republic of San Marino; of many parts it is not a very severe censure to say
that they might have been written at home. His elegance of language, and
variegation of prose and verse, however, gains upon the reader; and the book,
though a while neglected, became in time so much the favourite of the public,
that before it was reprinted it rose to five times its price.
When he returned to England (in 1702), with a meanness of appearance
which gave testimony of the difficulties to which he had been reduced, he
found his old patrons out of power, and was therefore for a time at full
leisure for the cultivation of his mind, and a mind so cultivated gives reason
to believe that little time was lost.
But he remained not long neglected or useless. The victory at Blenheim
(1704) spread triumph and confidence over the nation; and Lord Godolphin
lamenting to Lord Halifax, that it had not been celebrated in a manner equal
to the subject, desired him to propose it to some better poet. Halifax told
him that there was no encouragement for genius; that worthless men were
unprofitably enriched with public money, without any care to find or employ
those whose appearance might do honour to their country. To this Godolphin
replied, that such abuses should in time be rectified; and that if a man could
be found capable of the task then proposed, he should not want an ample
recompense. Halifax then named Addison; but required that the Treasurer should
apply to him in his own person. Godolphin sent the message by Mr. Boyle,
afterwards Lord Carleton; and Addison having undertaken the work, communicated
it to the Treasurer, while it was yet advanced no further than the simile of
the Angel, and was immediately rewarded by succeeding Mr. Locke in the place
of Commissioner of Appeals.
In the following year he was at Hanover with Lord Halifax; and the year
was made under-secretary of state, first to Sir Charles Hedges, and in a few
months more to the Earl of Sunderland.
About this time the prevalent taste for Italian operas inclined him to
try what would be the effect of a musical Drama in our own language. He
therefore wrote the opera of Rosamond, which, when exhibited on the stage, was
either hissed or neglected; but trusting that the readers would do him more
justice, he published it, with an inscription to the Duchess of Marlborough; a
woman without skill, or pretensions to skill, in poetry or literature. His
dedication was therefore an instance of servile absurdity, to be exceeded only
by Joshua Barnes` dedication of a Greek Anacreon to the Duke.
His reputation had been somewhat advanced by The Tender Husband, a comedy
which Steele dedicated to him, with a confession that he owed to him several
of the most successful scenes. To this play Addison supplied a prologue.
When the Marquis of Wharton was appointed Lord-lieutenant of Ireland,
Addison attended him as his secretary; and was made keeper of the records in
Birmingham`s Tower, with a salary of three hundred pounds a year. The office
was little more than nominal, and the salary was augmented for his
accommodation.
Interest and faction allow little to the operation of particular
dispositions, or private opinions. Two men of personal characters more
opposite than those of Wharton and Addison could not easily be brought
together. Wharton was impious, profligate, and shameless, without regard, or
appearance of regard, to right and wrong: whatever is contrary to this, may be
said of Addison; but as agents of a party they were connected, and how they
adjusted their other sentiments we cannot know.
Addison must, however, not be too hastily condemned. It is not necessary
to refuse benefits from a bad man, when the acceptance implies no approbation
of his crime; nor has the subordinate officer any obligation to examine the
opinions or conduct of those under whom he acts, except that he may not be
made the instrument of wickedness. It is reasonable to suppose that Addison
counteracted, as far as he was able, the malignant and blasting influence of
the Lieutenant, and that at least by his intervention some good was done, and
some mischief prevented.
When he was in office, he made a law to himself, as Swift has recorded,
never to remit his regular fees in civility to his friends: "For," said he, "I
may have a hundred friends; and, if my fee be two guineas, I shall, by
relinquishing my right lose two hundred guineas, and no friend gain more than
two; there is therefore no proportion between the good imparted and the evil
suffered."
He was in Ireland when Steele, without any communication of his design,
began the publication of the Tatler; but he was not long concealed: by
inserting a remark on Virgil, which Addison had given him, he discovered
himself. It is indeed not easy for any man to write upon literature, or common
life, so as not to make himself known to those with whom he familiarly
converses, and who are acquainted with his track of study, his favourite
topics, his peculiar notions, and his habitual phrases.
If Steele desired to write in secret, he was not lucky; a single month
detected him. His first Tatler was published April 22 (1709), and Addison`s
contribution appeared May 26. Tickell observes, that the Tatler began and was
concluded without his concurrence. This is doubtless literally true; but the
work did not suffer much by his unconsciousness of its commencement, or his
absence at its cessation; for he continued his assistance to December 23, and
the paper stopped on January 2. He did not distinguish his pieces by any
signature; and I know not whether his name was not kept secret, till the
papers were collected into volumes.
To the Tatler, in about two months, succeeded the Spectator; a series of
essays of the same kind, but written with less levity, upon a more regular
plan, and published daily. Such an undertaking shewed the writers not to
distrust their own copiousness of materials or facility of composition, and
their performance justified their confidence. They found, however, in their
progress, many auxiliaries. To attempt a single paper was no terrifying
labour: many pieces were offered, and many were received.
Addison had enough of the zeal of party, but Steele had at that time
almost nothing else. The Spectator, in one of the first papers, shewed the
political tenets of its authors; but a resolution was soon taken, of courting
general approbation by general topics, and subjects on which faction had
produced no diversity of sentiments; such as literature, morality, and
familiar life. To this practice they adhered with very few deviations. The
ardour of Steele once broke out in praise of Marlborough; and when Dr.
Fleetwood prefixed to some sermons a preface, overflowing with whiggish
opinions, that it might be read by the Queen it was reprinted in the
Spectator.
To teach the minuter decencies and inferior duties, to regulate the
practice of daily conversation, to correct those depravities which are rather
ridiculous than criminal, and remove those grievances which, if they produce
no lasting calamities, impress hourly vexation, was first attempted by Casa in
his book of Manners, and Castiglione in his Courtier; two books yet celebrated
in Italy for purity and elegance, and which, if they are now less read, are
neglected only because they have effected that reformation which their authors
intended, and their precepts now are no longer wanted. Their usefulness to the
age in which they were written in sufficiently attested by the translations
which almost all the nations of Europe were in haste to obtain.
This species of instruction was continued, and perhaps advanced, by the
French; among whom La Bruyere`s Manners of the Age, though, as Boileau
remarked, it is written without connection, certainly deserves great praise,
for liveliness of description and justness of observation.
Before the Tatler and Spectator, if the writers for the theatre are
excepted, England had no masters of common life. No writers had yet undertaken
to reform either the savageness of neglect, or the impertinence of civility;
to shew when to speak, or to be silent; how to refuse, or how to comply. We
had many books to teach us our more important duties, and to settle opinions
in philosophy or politicks; but an Arbiter elegantiarum, a judge of propriety,
was yet wanting, who should survey the track of daily conversation, and free
it from thorns and prickles, which teaze the passer, though they do not wound
him.
For this purpose nothing is so proper as the frequent publication of
short papers, which we read not as study but amusement. If the subject be
slight, the treatise likewise is short. The busy may find time, and the idle
may find patience.
This mode of conveying cheap and easy knowledge began among us in the
Civil War, when it was much the interest of either party to raise and fix the
prejudices of the people. At that time appeared Mercurius Aulicus, Mercurius
Rusticus, and Mercurius Civicus. It is said, that when any title grew popular,
it was stolen by the antagonist, who by this stratagem conveyed his notions to
those who would not have received him had he not worn the appearance of a
friend. The tumult of those unhappy days left scarcely any man leisure to
treasure up occasional compositions; and so much were they neglected, that a
complete collection is no where to be found.
These Mercuries were succeeded by L`Estrange`s Observator, and that by
Lesley`s Rehearsal, and perhaps by others; but hitherto nothing had been
conveyed to the people, in this commodious manner, but controversy relating to
the Church or State; of which they taught many to talk, whom they could not
teach to judge.
It has been suggested that the Royal Society was instituted soon after
the Restoration, to divert the attention of the people from public discontent.
The Tatler and the Spectator had the same tendency; they were published at a
time when two parties, loud, restless, and violent, each with plausible
declarations, and each perhaps without any distinct termination of its views,
were agitating the nation; to minds heated with political contest, they
supplied cooler and more inoffensive reflections; and it is said by Addison,
in a subsequent work, that they had a perceptible influence upon the
conversation of that time, and taught the frolic and the gay to unite
merriment with decency; an effect which they can never wholly lose, while they
continue to be among the first books by which both sexes are initiated in the
elegances of knowledge.
The Tatler and Spectator adjusted, like Casa, the unsettled practice of
daily intercourse by propriety and politeness; and, like La Bruyere, exhibited
the Characters and Manners of the Age. The persons introduced in these papers
were not merely ideal; they were then known and conspicuous in various
stations. Of the Tatler this is told by Steele in his last paper, and of the
Spectator by Budgell in the Preface to Theophrastus; a book which Addison has
recommended, and which he was suspected to have revised, if he did not write
it. Of those portraits, which may be supposed to be sometimes embellished, and
sometimes aggravated, the originals are now partly known, and partly
forgotten.
But to say that they united the plans of two or three eminent writers, is
to give them but a small part of their due praise; they superadded literature
and criticism, and sometimes towered far above their predecessors; and taught,
with great justness of argument and dignity of language, the most important
duties and sublime truths.
All these topics were happily varied with elegant fictions and refined
allegories, and illuminated with different changes of style and felicities of
invention.
It is recorded by Budgell, that of the characters feigned or exhibited in
the Spectator, the favourite of Addison was Sir Roger de Coverley, of whom he
had formed a very delicate and discriminated idea, which he would not suffer
to be violated; and therefore when Steele had shewn him innocently picking up
a girl in the Temple and taking her to a tavern, he drew upon himself so much
of his friend`s indignation, that he was forced to appease him by a promise of
forbearing Sir Roger for the time to come.
The reason which induced Cervantes to bring his hero to the grave, para
mi solo nacio Don Quixote, y yo para el, made Addison declare, with an undue
vehemence of expression, that he would kill Sir Roger; being of opinion that
they were born for one another, and that any other hand would do him wrong.
It may be doubted whether Addison ever filled up his original
delineation. He describes his Knight as having his imagination somewhat
warped; but of this perversion he has made very little use. The irregularities
in Sir Roger`s conduct seem not so much the effects of a mind deviating from
the beaten track of life, by the perpetual pressure of some overwhelming idea,
as of habitual rusticity, and that negligence which solitary grandeur
naturally generates.
The variable weather of the mind, the flying vapours of incipient
madness, which from time to time cloud reason, without eclipsing it, it
requires so much nicety to exhibit, that Addison seems to have been deterred
from prosecuting his own design.
To Sir Roger, who, as a country gentleman, appears to be a Tory, or, as
it is gently expressed, an adherent to the landed interest, is opposed Sir
Andrew Freeport, a new man, a wealthy merchant, zealous for the moneyed
interest, and a Whig. Of this contrariety of opinions, it is probable more
consequences were at first intended, than could be produced when the
resolution was taken to exclude party from the paper. Sir Andrew does but
little, and that little seems not to have pleased Addison, who, when he
dismissed him from the club, changed his opinions. Steele had made him, in the
true spirit of unfeeling commerce, declare that he would not build an hospital
for idle people; but at last he buys land, settles in the country, and builds
not a manufactory, but an hospital for twelve old husbandmen, for men with
whom a merchant has little acquaintance, and whom he commonly considers with
little kindness.
Of essays thus elegant, thus instructive, and thus commodiously
distributed, it is natural to suppose the approbation general and the sale
numerous. I once heard it observed, that the sale may be calculated by the
product of the tax, related in the last number to produce more than twenty
pounds a week, and therefore stated at one and twenty pounds, or three pounds
ten shillings a day: this, at a half-penny a paper, will give sixteen
hundred and eighty for the daily number.
This sale is not great; yet this, if Swift be credited, was likely to
grow less; for he declares that the Spectator, whom he ridicules for his
endless mention of the fair sex, had before his recess wearied his readers.
The next year (1713), in which Cato came upon the stage, was the grand
climacterick of Addison`s reputation. Upon the death of Cato, he had, as is
said, planned a tragedy in the time of his travels, and had for several years
the four first acts finished, which were shewn to such as were likely to
spread their admiration. They were seen by Pope, and by Cibber; who relates
that Steele, when he took back the copy, told him, in the despicable cant of
literary modesty, that, whatever spirit his friend had shewn in the
composition, he doubted whether he would have courage sufficient to expose it
to the censure of a British audience.
The time however was now come, when those who affected to think liberty
in danger, affected likewise to think that a stage-play might preserve it:
and Addison was importuned, in the name of the tutelary deities of Britain, to
shew his courage and his zeal by finishing his design.
To resume his work he seemed perversely and unaccountably unwilling; and
by a request, which perhaps he wished to be denied, desired Mr. Hughes to add
a fifth act. Hughes supposed him serious; and, undertaking the supplement,
brought in a few days some scenes for his examination; but he had in the mean
time gone to work himself, and produced half an act, which he afterward
completed, but with brevity irregularly disproportionate to the foregoing
parts; like a task performed with reluctance, and hurried to its conclusion.
It may yet be doubted whether Cato was made public by any change of the
author`s purpose; for Dennis charged him with raising prejudices in his own
favour by false positions of preparatory criticism, and with poisoning the
town by contradicting in the Spectator the established rule of poetical
justice, because his own hero, with all his virtues, was to fall before a
tyrant. The fact is certain; the motives we must guess.
Addison was, I believe, sufficiently disposed to bar all avenues against
all danger. When Pope brought him the prologue, which is properly accommodated
to the play, there were these words, Britons, arise, be worth like this
approved; meaning nothing more than, Britons, erect and exalt yourselves to
the approbation of public virtue. Addison was frightened lest he should be
thought a promoter of insurrection, and the line was liquidated to Britons,
attend.
Now, heavily in clouds came on the day, the great, the important day,
when Addison was to stand the hazard of the theatre. That there might,
however, be left as little to hazard as was possible, on the first night
Steele, as himself relates, undertook to pack an audience. This, says Pope,
had been tried for the first time in favour of the Distrest Mother; and was
now, with more efficacy, practised for Cato.
The danger was soon over. The whole nation was at that time on fire with
faction. The Whigs applauded every line in which Liberty was mentioned, as a
satire on the Tories; and the Tories echoed every clap, to shew that the
satire was unfelt. The story of Bolingbroke is well known. He called Booth to
his box, and gave him fifty guineas for defending the cause of Liberty so well
against a perpetual dictator. The Wings, says Pope, design a second present,
when they can accompany it with as good a sentence.
The play, supported thus by the emulation of factious praise, was acted
night after night for a longer time than, I believe, the public had allowed to
any drama before; and the author, as Mrs. Potter long afterwards related,
wandered through the whole exhibition behind the scenes with restless and
unappeasable solicitude.
When it was printed, notice was given that the Queen would be pleased if
it was dedicated to her; but as he had designed that compliment elsewhere, he
found himself obliged, says Tickell, by his duty on the one hand, and his
honour on the other, to send it into the world without any dedication.
Human happiness has always its abatements; the brightest sunshine of
success is not without a cloud. No sooner was Cato offered to the reader, than
it was attacked by the acute malignity of Dennis, with all the violence of
angry criticism. Dennis, though equally zealous, and probably by his temper
more furious than Addison, for what they called Liberty, and though a
flatterer of the Whig ministry, could not sit quiet at a successful play; but
was eager to tell friends and enemies, that they had misplaced their
admirations. The world was too stubborn for instruction; with the fate of the
censurer of Corneille`s Cid, his animadversions shewed his anger without
effect, and Cato continued to be praised.
Pope had now an opportunity of courting the friendship of Addison, by
vilifying his old enemy, and could give resentment its full play without
appearing to revenge himself. He therefore published A Narrative of the
Madness of John Dennis; a performance which left the objections to the play in
their full force, and therefore discovered more desire of vexing the critic
than of defending the poet.
Addison, who was no stranger to the world, probably saw the selfishness
of Pope`s friendship; and, resolving that he should have the consequences of
his officiousness to himself, informed Dennis by Steele, that he was sorry for
the insult; and that whenever he should think fit to answer his remarks, he
would do it in a manner to which nothing could be objected.
The greatest weakness of the play is in the scenes of love, which are
said by Pope to have been added to the original plan upon a subsequent review,
in compliance with the popular practice of the stage. Such an authority it is
hard to reject; yet the love is so intimately mingled with the whole action
that it cannot easily be thought extrinsic and adventitious; for if it were
taken away, what would be left? or how were the four acts filled in the first
draught?
At the publication the Wits seemed proud to pay their attendance with
encomiastic verses. The best are from an unknown hand, which will perhaps lose
somewhat of their praise when the author is known to be Jeffreys.
Cato had yet other honours. It was censured as a party-play by a
Scholar of Oxford, and defended in a favourable examination by Dr. Sewel. It
was translated by Salvini into Italian, and acted at Florence; and by the
Jesuits of St. Omer`s into Latin, and played by their pupils. Of this version
a copy was sent to Mr. Addison: it is to be wished that it could be found, for
the sake of comparing their version of the soliloquy with that of Bland.
A tragedy was written on the same subject by Des Champs, a French poet,
which was translated, with a criticism on the English play. But the translator
and the critic are now forgotten.
Dennis lived on unanswered, and therefore little read: Addison knew the
policy of literature too well to make his enemy important, by drawing the
attention of the public upon a criticism, which, though sometimes intemperate,
was often irrefragable.
While Cato was upon the stage, another daily paper, called The Guardian,
was published by Steele. To this Addison gave great assistance, whether
occasionally or by previous engagement is not known.
The character of Guardian was too narrow and to serious: it might
properly enough admit both the duties and the decencies of life, but seemed
not to include literary speculations, and was in some degree violated by
merriment and burlesque. What had the Guardian of the Lizards to do with clubs
of tall or of little men, with nests of ants, or with Strada`s prolusions?
Of this paper nothing is necessary to be said, but that it found many
contributors, and that it was a continuation of the Spectator, with the same
elegance, and the same variety, till some unlucky sparkle from a Tory paper
set Steele`s politics on fire, and wit at once blazed into faction. He was
soon too hot for neutral topics, and quitted the Guardian to write the
Englishman.
The papers of Addison are marked in the Spectator by one of the Letters
in the name of Clio, and in the Guardian by a hand; whether it was, as Tickell
pretends to think, that he was unwilling to usurp the praise of others, or as
Steele, with far greater likelihood, insinuates, that he could not without
discontent impart to others any of his own. I have heard that his avidity did
not satisfy itself with the air of renown, but that with great eagerness he
laid hold on his proportion of the profits.
Many of these papers were written with powers truly comic, with nice
discrimination of characters, and accurate observation of natural or
accidental deviations from propriety; but it was not supposed that he had
tried a comedy on the stage, till Steele, after his death, declared him the
author of The Drummer; this, however, Steele did not know to be true by any
direct testimony; for when Addison put the play into his hands, he only told
him, it was the work of a Gentleman in the Company; and when it was received,
as is confessed, with cold approbation, he was probably less willing to claim
it. Tickell omitted it in his collection; but the testimony of Steele, and the
total silence of any other claimant, has determined the public to assign it to
Addison, and it is now printed with his other poetry. Steele carried The
Drummer to the playhouse, and afterwards to the press, and sold the copy for
fifty guineas.
To the opinion of Steele may be added the proof supplied by the play
itself, of which the characters are such as Addison would have delineated, and
the tendency such as Addison would have promoted. That it should have been ill
received would raise wonder, did we not daily see the capricious distribution
of theatrical praise.
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