Part 33

In the autumn of 1759 Goldsmith commenced, for bookseller Wilkie, of St. Paul's Churchyard, the weekly writing of "The Bee," a threepenny magazine of essays. It ended with its eighth number, for the public would not buy it. At the same time he was writing for Mr. Pottinger's "Busybody," and Mr. Wilkie's "Lady's Magazine." "The Bee," though unsuccessful, brought Goldsmith useful friends--Smollett and Garrick, and Mr. Newbery, the publisher--and with the New Year (1760) he was working with Smollett on "The British Magazine," and, immediately afterwards, on Newbery's "Public Ledger," a daily newspaper, for which he wrote two articles a week at a guinea for each article. Among the articles were the series that still divert and instruct us--"The Citizen of the World." This was the title given when the "Letters from a Chinese Philosopher in London to his Friend in the East" were republished by Newbery, at the end of the year. Goldsmith now began to know his own value as a writer.

IV.--Social and Literary Success

His widening reputation brought him into association and friendship with Johnson, to whom he was introduced by Dr. Percy, the collector of the "Reliques of Ancient English Poetry." Goldsmith gave a supper in honour of his visitor, and when Percy called on Johnson to accompany him to their host's lodgings, to his great astonishment he found Johnson in a new suit of clothes, with a new wig, nicely powdered, perfectly dissimilar from his usual appearance. On being asked the cause of this transformation Johnson replied, "Why, sir, I hear that Goldsmith, who is a very great sloven, justifies his disregard of cleanliness and decency by quoting my practice; and I am desirous this night to show him a better example."

Johnson was perhaps the first literary man of the times who estimated Goldsmith according to his true merits as a writer and thinker, and he was repaid by an affectionate devotion that was never worn out during the later years when the Dictator was too ready to make a butt of the unready Irishman. Goldsmith now joined the group of literary friends who gathered frequently at the shop of Tom Davies, the bookseller, where Johnson and Boswell first met, and he was one of the famous Literary Club which grew out of these meetings.

"Sir," said Johnson to Boswell, at one of their first meetings, "Goldsmith is one of the first men we have as an author."

This was said at a time when all Goldsmith's best works had yet to be written. He was still working for the booksellers, and in 1763, issued anonymously a "History of England in a Series of Letters from a Nobleman to his Son." To various noblemen credit for this popular work was given, including Lord Chesterfield. Growing success was only an excuse for growing extravagance, and in 1764 Goldsmith was placed temporarily under arrest for debt, probably by his landlady, Mrs. Fleming, with whom he had been living at Islington under an arrangement made by Newbery. His withdrawal from the town had given him opportunities for congenial labour on "The Traveller" and "The Vicar of Wakefield," and when Johnson appeared, in answer to his urgent summons, it was the manuscript of "The Vicar" that he carried off, and sold for sixty pounds, to relieve immediate anxieties.

Still, it was "The Traveller" that was first published (December 19, 1764). Johnson pronounced it a poem to which it would not be easy to find anything equal since the death of Pope. The predominant impression of "The Traveller" is of its naturalness and facility. The serene graces of its style, and the mellow flow of its verse, take us captive before we feel the enchantment of its lovely images of various life reflected from its calm, still depths of philosophic contemplation. A fourth edition was issued by August, and a ninth appeared in the year when the poet died. The price paid for it by Newbery was, apparently, twenty guineas.

It was in the spring of 1766, fifteen months after it had been acquired by Newbery, that "The Vicar of Wakefield" was published. No book upon record has obtained a wider popularity, and none is more likely to endure. It is our first pure example of the simple, domestic novel. As a refuge from the compiling of books was this book undertaken. Simple to baldness are the materials used, but Goldsmith threw into the midst of them his own nature, his actual experience, the suffering, discipline, and sweet emotion of his chequered life, and so made them a lesson and a delight to all men. The book silently forced its way. No noise was made about it, no trumpets were blown for it, but admiration gathered steadily around it, and by August a third edition had been reached.

V.--Poet, Dramatist, and Spendthrift

Goldsmith had long been a constant frequenter of the theatres, and one of the most sagacious critics of the actors of his day; and it was natural that, having succeeded as an essayist, a poet, and a novelist, he should try his fortune with the drama. In 1767 a comedy was in Garrick's hands, wherein, following the method of Farquhar, he attempted by the help of nature, humour, and character, to invoke the spirit of laughter, happy, unrestrained, and cordial. After long, and not very friendly, temporising by the great actor, Goldsmith withdrew the play from Drury Lane and committed it to Colman at Covent Garden; but it was not till January 29, 1768, that "The Good-Natur'd Man" was acted. It proved a reasonably fair success. Johnson, who wrote the prologue, went to see the comedy rehearsed, and showed unwavering kindness to his friend at this trying time.

While the play was under discussion and preparation, Goldsmith was engaged in writing for Tom Davies an easy, popular, "History of Rome," in the style of his anonymous "Letters from a Nobleman to His Son," proceeding with it at leisure in his cottage at Edgeware. The success of "The Good-Natured Man," though far from equal to its claims of character, wit, and humour, very sensibly affected its author's ways of life. It put £500 in his pocket, which he at once proceeded to squander on fine chambers in the Temple, and new suits of gay clothing followed in quick succession.

During the next year, 1769, the "Roman History" was published, and the first month's sale established its success so firmly that Goldsmith received an offer of £500 for a "History of England," in four volumes, to be "written and compiled in two years." At the same time he was under agreement for his "Natural History," or, as it was finally termed, his "History of Animated Nature."

These years of heavy work were among the happiest of Goldsmith's life, for he had made the acquaintance of the Misses Horneck, girls of nineteen and seventeen. The elder, Catherine, or "Little Comedy," was already engaged; the younger, Mary, who had the loving nickname of the "Jessamy Bride," exercised over him a strong fascination. Their social as well as personal charms are uniformly spoken of by all. Mary, who did not marry till after Goldsmith's death, lived long enough to be admired by Hazlitt, to whom she talked of the poet with affection unabated by age, till he "could almost fancy the shade of Goldsmith in the room, looking round with complacency."

It was during these years of busy bookmaking, too, that the poet was perfecting his "Deserted Village." On May 26, 1770, it appeared, published at two shillings. Its success was instant and decisive. By August 16, a fifth edition had appeared. When Gray heard the poem read, he exclaimed, "This man is a poet!" The judgment has since been affirmed by hundreds of thousands of readers, and any adverse appeal is little likely now to be lodged against it. Within the circle of its claims and pretensions, a more entirely satisfactory and delightful poem than "The Deserted Village" was probably never written. It lingers in the memory where once it has entered; and such is the softening influence on the heart of the mild, tender, yet clear light which makes its images so distinct and lovely, that there are few who have not wished to rate it higher than poetry of yet higher genius. Goldsmith looked into his heart and wrote.

The poet had now attained social distinction, and we find him passing from town to country with titled friends, and visiting, in somewhat failing health, fashionable resorts, such as Bath. His home remained in the Temple. His worldly affairs continued a source of constant embarrassment, however, and when, in 1772, he had placed the manuscript of "She Stoops to Conquer" in the hands of Colman, not only his own entreaties but the interference of Johnson were used to hasten its production in order to relieve his anxieties. Colman was convinced the comedy would be unsuccessful. It was first acted on March 15, 1773, and, "quite the reverse to everybody's expectation," it was received with the utmost applause.

At this time Goldsmith was sadly in arrears with work he had promised to the booksellers; disputes were pending, and his circumstances were verging on positive distress. The necessity of completing his "Animated Nature"--for which all the money had been received and spent--hung like a mill-stone upon him. His advances had been considerable on other works not yet begun. In what leisure he could get from these tasks he was working at a "Grecian History" to procure means to meet his daily liabilities.

It occurred to friends at this time to agitate the question of a pension for him, on the ground of "distinction in the literary world, and the prospect of approaching distress," but as he had never been a political partisan, the application was met by a firm refusal. Out of the worries of this darkening period, with ill-health adding to his cares, the genius of the poet flashed forth once more in his personal poem, "Retaliation." At a club dinner at St. James's coffee-house, the proposition was made that each member present should write an epitaph on Goldsmith, and Garrick started with:

Here is Nolly Goldsmith, for shortness called Noll, Who wrote like an angel, and talked like poor Poll.

Later, Goldsmith retaliated with epitaphs on his circle of club friends. His list of discriminating pictures was not complete when he died. Indeed, the picture of Reynolds breaks off with a half line.

On March 25, 1774, the poet was too ill to attend the club gathering--how ill, his friends failed to realise. On the morning of April 4, he died from weakness following fever. "Is your mind at ease?" asked his doctor. "No, it is not," was the melancholy answer, and his last recorded words. His debts amounted to not less than two thousand pounds. "Was ever poet so trusted!" exclaimed Johnson.

His remains were committed to their final resting-place in the burial ground of the Temple Church, and the staircase of his chambers is said to have been filled with mourners the reverse of domestic--women without a home, without domesticity of any kind, with no friend but him they had come to weep for, outcasts of that great, solitary, wicked city, to whom he had never forgotten to be kind and charitable.

Johnson spoke his epitaph in an emphatic sentence: "He had raised money, and squandered it, by every artifice of acquisition and folly of expense; but let not his frailties be remembered--he was a very great man."

* * * * *

GEORGE FOX

Journal

George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends, or "Friends of the Truth," was born at Drayton, Leicestershire, in July, 1624, and died in London on January 13, 1691. His "Journal," here epitomised, was published in 1694, after being revised by a committee under the superintendence of William Penn, and prefaced for the press by Thomas Ellwood, the Quaker. Fox rejected all outward shows of religion, and believed in an inward light and leading. He claimed to be divinely directed as he wandered, Bible in hand, through the country, denouncing church-worship, a paid ministry, religious "profession," and advocating a spiritual affiliation with Christ as the only true religion. He was imprisoned often and long for "brawling" in churches and refusing to take oaths then required by law. Fox wrote in prison many books of religious exhortation, his style being tantalisingly involved. The one work that lives is the "Journal," a quaintly egotistic record of unquestioning faith and unconquerable endurance in pursuit of a spiritual ideal through a rude age.

I.--His Youth and Divine Calling

I was born in the month called July, 1624, at Drayton-in-the-Clay, in Leicestershire. My father's name was Christopher Fox; he was by profession a weaver, an honest man, and there was a seed of God in him. In my very young years I had a gravity and staidness of mind and spirit not usual in children. When I came to eleven years of age I knew pureness and righteousness. The Lord taught me to be faithful in all things, inwardly to God and outwardly to man, and to keep to "Yea" and "Nay" in all things.