Lives of the English Poets : Prior, Congreve, Blackmore, Pope. Samuel Johnson

cause of Congreve was not tenable; whatever glosses he might use for the defence or palliation of single passages, the general tenour and tendency of his plays must always be condemned.  It is acknowledged, with universal conviction, that the perusal of his works will make no man better, and that their ultimate effect is to represent pleasure in alliance with vice, and to relax those obligations by which life ought to be regulated.

      The stage found other advocates, and the dispute was protracted through ten years: but at last comedy grew more modest, and Collier lived to see the reformation of the theatre.

      Of the powers by which this important victory was achieved, a quotation from Love for Love, and the remark upon it, may afford a specimen:—

      Sir Samps.  “Sampson’s a very good name; for your Sampsons were strong dogs from the beginning.”

      Angel.  “Have a care—if you remember, the strongest Sampson of your name pulled an old house over his head at last.”

      “Here you have the sacred history burlesqued, and Sampson once more brought into the house of Dagon, to make sport for the Philistines!”

      Congreve’s last play was The Way of The World, which, though, as he hints in him dedication it was written with great labour and much thought, was received with so little favour, that being in a high degree offended and disgusted, he resolved to commit his quiet and his fame no more to the caprices of an audience.

      From this time his life ceased to be public; he lived for himself and his friends, and among his friends was able to name every man of his time whom wit and elegance had raised to reputation.  It may be therefore reasonably supposed that his manners were polite, and his conversation pleasing.  He seems not to have taken much pleasure in writing, as he contributed nothing to the Spectator, and only one paper to the Tatler, though published by men with whom he might be supposed willing to associate: and though he lived many years after the publication of his “Miscellaneous Poems,” yet he added nothing to them, but lived on in literary indolence, engaged in no controversy, contending with no rival, neither soliciting flattery by public commendations, nor provoking enmity by malignant criticism, but passing his time among the great and splendid, in the placid enjoyment of his fame and fortune.

      Having owed his fortune to Halifax, he continued, always of his patron’s party, but, as it seems, without violence or acrimony, and his firmness was naturally esteemed, as his abilities were reverenced.  His security therefore was never violated; and when, upon the extrusion of the Whigs, some intercession was used lest Congreve should be displaced, the Earl of Oxford made this answer:—

      “Non obtusa adeo gestamus pectora Pœni,

      Nec tam aversus equos Tyriâ sol jungit ab urbe.”

      He that was thus honoured by the adverse party might naturally expect to be advanced when his friends returned to power, and he was accordingly made secretary for the island of Jamaica, a place, I suppose without trust or care, but which, with his post in the Customs, is said to have afforded him twelve hundred pounds a year.  His honours were yet far greater than his profits.  Every writer mentioned him with respect, and among other testimonies to his merit, Steele made him the patron of his “Miscellany,” and Pope inscribed to him his translations of the “Iliad.”  But he treated the muses with ingratitude; for, having long conversed familiarly with the great, he wished to be considered rather as a man of fashion than of wit; and, when he received a visit from Voltaire, disgusted him by the despicable foppery of desiring to be considered not as an author but a gentleman; to which the Frenchman replied, “that, if he had been only a gentleman, he should not have come to visit him.”

      In his retirement he may be supposed to have applied himself to books, for he discovers more literature than the poets have commonly attained.  But his studies were in his later days obstructed by cataracts in his eyes, which at last terminated in blindness.  This melancholy state was aggravated by the gout, for which he sought relief by a journey to Bath: but, being overturned in his chariot, complained from that time of a pain in his side, and died at his house in Surrey Street in the Strand, January 29, 1728–9.  Having lain in state in the Jerusalem Chamber, he was buried in Westminster Abbey, where a monument is erected to his memory by Henrietta Duchess of Marlborough, to whom, for reasons either not known or not mentioned, he bequeathed a legacy of about ten thousand pounds, the accumulation of attentive parsimony, which, though to her superfluous and useless, might have given great assistance to the ancient family from which he descended, at that time, by the imprudence of his relation, reduced to difficulties and distress.

      Congreve has merit of the highest kind; he is an original writer, who borrowed neither the models of his plot nor the manner of his dialogue.  Of his plays I cannot speak distinctly, for since I inspected them many years have passed, but what remains upon my memory is, that his characters are commonly fictitious and artificial, with very little of nature, and not much of life.  He formed a peculiar idea of comic excellence, which he supposed to consist in gay remarks and unexpected answers; but that which he endeavoured, he seldom failed of performing.  His scenes exhibit not much of humour, imagery, or passion: his personages are a kind of intellectual gladiators; every sentence is to ward or strike; the contest of smartness is never intermitted; his wit is a meteor playing to and fro with alternate coruscations.  His comedies have, therefore, in some degree, the operation of tragedies, they surprise rather than divert, and raise admiration oftener than merriment.  But they are the works of a mind replete with images, and quick in combination.

      Of his miscellaneous poetry I cannot say anything very favourable.  The powers of Congreve seem to desert him when he leaves the stage, as Antæus was no longer strong than when he could touch the ground.  It cannot be observed without wonder, that a mind so vigorous and fertile in dramatic compositions should on any other occasion discover nothing but impotence and poverty.  He has in these little pieces neither elevation of fancy, selection of language, nor skill in versification: yet, if I were required to select from the whole mass of English poetry the most poetical paragraph, I know not what I could prefer to an exclamation in the “Mourning Bride”:—

ALMERIA

      It was a fancied noise; for all is hushed.

LEONORA

      It bore the accent of a human voice.

ALMERIA

      It was thy fear, or else some transient wind

      Whistling through hollows of this vaulted isle:

      We’ll listen—

LEONORA

      Hark!

ALMERIA

      No, all is hushed and still as death.—’Tis dreadful!

      How reverend is the face of this tall pile,

      Whose ancient pillars rear their marble heads,

      To bear aloft its arched and ponderous roof,

      By its own weight made steadfast and immovable,

      Looking tranquillity!  It strikes an awe

      And terror on my aching sight; the tombs

      And monumental caves of death look cold,

      And shoot a chillness to my trembling heart.

      Give use thy hand, and let me hear thy voice;

      Nay, quickly speak to me, and let me hear

      Thy voice—my own affrights me with its echoes.

      He who reads these lines enjoys for a moment the powers of a poet; he feels what he remembers to have felt before, but he feels it with great increase of sensibility; he recognises a familiar image, but meets it again amplified and expanded, embellished with beauty and enlarged with majesty.  Yet could the author, who appears here to have enjoyed the confidence of Nature, lament the death of Queen Mary in lines like these:—

      “The rocks are cleft, and new-descending rills

      Furrow the brows of all the impending hills.

      The water-gods to floods their rivulets turn,

      And