Complete Works of Edward Young, page 112
What glory to come near, what glory to reach, what glory (presumptuous thought!) to surpass, our predecessors! And is that, then, in nature absolutely impossible? or is it not, rather, contrary to nature to fail in it? Nature herself sets the ladder, all wanting is our ambition to climb. For, by the bounty of nature, we are as strong as our predecessors, and by the favour of time (which is but another round in nature’s scale) we stand on higher ground. As to the first, were they more than men? or are we less? Are not our minds cast in the same mould with those before the flood? The flood affected matter; mind escaped. As to the second, though we are modems, the world is an ancient; more ancient far than when they whom we most admire filled it with their fame. Have we not their beauties, as stars, to guide; their defects, as rocks, to be shunned; the judgment of ages on both, as a chart to conduct, and a sure helm to steer, us in our passage to greater perfection than theirs? And shall we be stopped in our rival pretensions to fame by this just reproof?
Stat contra, dicitque tibi tua pagina, Fur es. — MART.
It is by a sort of noble contagion, from a general familiarity with their writings, and not by any particular sordid theft, that we can be the better for those who went before us. Hope we from plagiarism any dominion in literature, as that of Rome arose from a nest of thieves? Rome was a powerful ally to many states; ancient authors are our powerful allies; but we must take heed that they do not succour, till they enslave, after the manner of Rome. Too formidable an idea of their superiority, like a spectre, would fright us out of a proper use of our wits, and dwarf our understanding, by making a giant of theirs. Too great awe for them lays genius under restraint, and denies it that free scope, that full elbow-room, which is I requisite for striking its most masterly strokes. Genius is a master-workman, learning is but an instrument; and an instrument, though most valuable, yet not always indispensable. Heaven will not admit of a partner in the accomplishment of some favourite spirits; but, rejecting all human means, assumes the whole glory to itself. Have not some, though not famed for erudition, so written, as almost to persuade us that they shone brighter and soared higher for escaping the boasted aid of that proud ally?
Nor is it strange; for what, for the most part, mean we by genius, but the power of accomplishing great things without the means generally reputed necessary to that end?
A genius differs from a good understanding, as a magician from a good architect; that raises his structure by means invisible, this by the skilful use of common tools. Hence genius has ever been supposed to partake of something Divine. Nemo unquam vir magnus fuit, sine aliquo afflatu divino.
Learning, destitute of this superior aid, is fond and proud of what has cost it much pains; is a great lover of rules, and boaster of famed examples. As beauties less perfect, who owe half their charms to cautious art, learning inveighs against natural unstudied graces and small harmless inaccuracies, and sets rigid bounds to that liberty to which genius often owes its supreme glory, but the no-genius its frequent ruin. For unprescribed beauties, and unexampled excellence, which are characteristics of genius, lie without the pale of learning’s authorities and laws; which pale, genius must leap to come at them: but by that leap, if genius is wanting, we break our necks, we lose that little credit which possibly we might have enjoyed before. For rules, like crutches, are a needful aid to the lame, though an impediment to the strong. A Homer casts them away, and, like his Achilles,
Jura negat tibi nata, nihil non arrogat, (HORAT.)
by native force of mind. There is something in poetry beyond prose reason; there are mysteries in it not to be explained, but admired, which render mere prose-men infidels to their divinity. And here pardon a second paradox: namely, “Genius often then deserves most to be praised when it is most sure to be condemned; that is, when its excellence, from mounting high, to weak eyes is quite out of sight.”
If I might speak farther of learning and genius, I would compare genius to virtue, and learning to riches. As riches are most wanted where there is least virtue, so learning where there is least genius. As virtue without much riches can give happiness, so genius without much learning can give renown. As it is said, in Terence, Pecuniam negligere interdum maximum eat lucrum, so, to neglect of learning genius sometimes owes its greater glory. Genius, therefore, leaves but the second place, among men of letters, to the learned. It is their merit and ambition to fling light on the works of genius, and point out its charms. We most justly reverence their informing radius for that favour; but we must much more admire the radiant stars pointed out by them.
A star of the first magnitude among the moderns was Shakspeare; among the ancients, Pindar; who, as Vossius tells us, boasted of his no-learning, calling himself the eagle, for his flight above it. And such genii as these may, indeed, have much reliance on their own native powers. For genius may be compared to the natural strength of the body; learning to the superinduced accoutrements of arms. If the first is equal to the proposed exploit, the latter rather encumbers, than assists; rather retards, than promotes, the victory. Sacer nobis inest Deus, says Seneca. With regard to the moral world, conscience — with regard to the intellectual, genius — is that god within. Genius can set us right in composition without the rules of the learned, as conscience sets ns right in life without the laws of the land; this, singly, can make us good, as men; that, singly, as writers, can sometimes make us great.
I say, “sometimes,” because there is a genius which stands in need of learning to make it shine. Of genius there are two species, an earlier, and a later; or call them infantine, and adult. An adult genius comes out of nature’s hand, as Pallas out of Jove’s head, at full growth, and mature: Shakspeare’s genius was of this kind: on the contrary, Swift stumbled at the threshold, and set out for distinction on feeble knees. His was an infantine genius; a genius which, like other infants, must be nursed and educated, or it will come to nought. Learning is its nurse and tutor; but this nurse may overlay with an indigested load, which smothers common sense; and this tutor may mislead with pedantic prejudice, which vitiates the best understanding. As too great admirers of the fathers of the church have sometimes set up their authority against the true sense of scripture, so too great admirers of the classical fathers have sometimes set up their authority, or example, against reason.
Neve minor, neu sit quinto productior actu fabula.
So says Horace, so says ancient example. But reason has not subscribed. I know but one book that can justify our implicit acquiescence in it; and, by the way, on that book a noble disdain of undue deference to prior opinion has lately cast, and is still casting, a new and inestimable light.
But, superstition for our predecessors set aside, the classics are for ever our rightful and revered masters in composition, and our understandings bow before them. But when? When a master is wanted: which sometimes, as I have shown, is not the case. Some are pupils of nature only, nor go farther to school. From such we reap often a double advantage; they not only rival the reputation of the great ancient authors, but also reduce the number of mean ones among the modems. For, when they enter on subjects which have been in former hands, such is their superiority, that, like a tenth wave, they overwhelm and bury in oblivion all that went before; and thus not only enrich and adorn, but remove a load, and lessen the labour, of the lettered world.
“But,” you say, “since originals can arise from genius only, and since genius is so very rare, it is scarce worth while to labour a point so much, from which we can reasonably expect so little.” To show that genius is not so very rare as you imagine, I shall point out strong instances of it, in a far distant quarter from that mentioned above. The minds of the schoolmen were almost as much cloistered as their bodies; they had but little learning, and few books; yet may the most learned be struck with some astonishment at their so singular natural sagacity, and most exquisite edge of thought. Who would expect to find Pindar and Scotus, Shakspeare and Aquinas, of the same party? Both equally show an original, unindebted energy; the vigor igneus, and cœlestis origo, burn in both; and leave us in doubt whether genius is more evident in the sublime flights and beauteous flowers of poetry, or in the profound penetrations, and marvellously keen and minute distinctions, called the “thorns of the schools.” [This paragraph furnishes a semblance of confirmation to the curious anecdote, related by Ruff head, (whose materials were furnished by Warburton,) of Young having been persuaded by Pope to study the writings of Thomas Aquinas, as the best course of preparation to be pursued by a candidate for holy orders in the Church of England. — EDIT.] There might have been more able consuls called from the plough than ever arrived at that honour; many a genius, probably, there has been, which could neither write nor read. So that genius, that supreme lustre of literature, is less rare than you conceive.
By the praise of genius we detract not from learning; we detract not from the value of gold by saying that a diamond has greater still. He who disregards learning, shows that he wants its aid; and he that overvalues it, shows that its aid has done him harm. Over-valued, indeed, it cannot be, if genius as to composition is valued more. Learning we thank, genius we revere; that gives us pleasure, this gives us rapture; that informs, this inspires, and is itself inspired; for genius is from heaven, learning from man: this sets us above the low and illiterate; that, above the learned and polite. Learning is borrowed knowledge; genius is knowledge innate, and quite our own. Therefore, as Bacon observes, it may take a nobler name, and be called “wisdom;” in which sense of wisdom, some are born wise.
But here a caution is necessary against the most fatal of errors in those automaths, those “self-taught philosophers” of our age, who set up genius, and often mere fancied genius, not only above human learning, but Divine truth. I have called genius “wisdom;” but let it be remembered that, in the most renowned ages of the most refined Heathen wisdom, (and theirs is not Christian,) “the world by wisdom knew not God; and it pleased God, by the foolishness of preaching, to save those that believed.” In the fairyland of fancy, genius may wander wild; there it has a creative power, and may reign arbitrarily over its own empire of chimeras. The wide field of nature, also, lies open before it, where it may range unconfined, make what discoveries it can, and sport with its infinite objects uncontrolled, as far as visible nature extends, painting them as wantonly as it will. But what painter of the most unbounded and exalted genius can give us the true portrait of a seraph? He can give us only what by his own, or others’ eyes, has been seen; though that indeed infinitely compounded, raised, burlesqued, dishonoured, or adorned. In like manner, who can give us Divine truth unrevealed? Much less should any presume to set aside Divine truth when revealed, as incongruous to their own sagacities. Is this too serious for my subject? I shall be more so before I close.
Having put-in a caveat against the most fatal of errors, from the too great indulgence of genius, return we now to that too great suppression of it, which is detrimental to composition, and endeavour to rescue the writer, as well as the man. I have said, that some are born wise; but they, like those that are born rich, by neglecting the cultivation and produce of their own possessions, and by running in debt, may be beggared at last; and lose their reputations, as younger brothers estates, not by being born with less abilities than the rich heir, but at too late an hour.
Many a great man has been lost to himself and the public, purely because great ones were born before him. Hermias, in his Collections on Homer’s blindness, says that Homer, requesting the gods to grant him a sight of Achilles, that hero rose, but in armour so bright, that it struck Homer blind with the blaze. Let not the blaze of even Homer’s muse darken us to the discernment of our own powers, which may possibly set us above the rank of imitators; who, though most excellent, and even immortal, (as some of them are,) yet are still but Dii minorum gentium, nor can expect the largest share of incense, the greatest profusion of praise, on their secondary altars.
But farther still: a spirit of imitation hath many ill effects; I shall confine myself to three. First, it deprives the liberal and politer arts of an advantage which the mechanic enjoy: in these, men are ever endeavouring to go beyond their predecessors; in the former, to follow them. And since copies surpass not their originals, as streams rise not higher than their spring, rarely so high; hence, while arts mechanic are in perpetual progress and increase, the liberal are in rétrogradation and decay. These resemble pyramids, — are broad at bottom, but lessen exceedingly as they rise; those resemble rivers which, from a small fountain-head, are spreading ever wider and wider as they run. Hence it is evident that different portions of understanding are not (as some imagine) allotted to different periods of time; for we see, in the same period, understanding rising in one set of artists, and declining in another. Therefore, nature stands absolved, and our inferiority in composition must be charged on ourselves.
Nay, so far are we from complying with a necessity, which nature lays us under, that, Secondly, by a spirit of imitation we counteract nature, and thwart her design. She brings us into the world all originals. No two faces, no two minds, are just alike; but all bear nature’s evident mark of separation on them. Born originals, how comes it to pass that we die copies! That meddling ape imitation, as soon as we come to years of indiscretion, (so let me speak,) snatches the pen, and blots out nature’s mark of separation, cancels her kind intention, destroys all mental individuality. The lettered world no longer consists of singulars: it is a medley, a mass; and a hundred books, at bottom, are but one. Why are monkeys such masters of mimickry! Why receive they such a talent at imitation! Is it not as the Spartan slaves received a licence for ebriety, — that their betters might be ashamed of it!
The Third fault to be found with a spirit of imitation is, that, with great incongruity, it makes us poor and proud; makes us think little, and write much; gives us huge folios, which are little better than more reputable cushions to promote our repose. Have not some sevenfold volumes put us in mind of Ovid’s sevenfold channels of the Nile at the conflagration! —
Ostia septem
Pulverulenta vacant septem sine flumine valles.
Such leaden labours are like Lycurgus’s iron money, which was be much less in value than in bulk, that it required barns for strong boxes, and a yoke of oxen to draw five hundred pounds.
But, notwithstanding these disadvantages of imitation, imitation must be the lot (and often an honourable lot it is) of most writers. If there is a famine of invention in the land, like Joseph’s brethren, we most travel far for food; we must visit the remote and rich ancients. But an inventive genius may safely stay at home; that, like the widow’s cruse, is divinely replenished from within, and affords us a miraculous delight. Whether our own genius be such or not, we diligently should inquire, that we may not go a-begging with gold in our purse; for there is a mine in man, which must be deeply dug ere we can conjecture its contents. Another often sees that in us which we see not ourselves; and may there not be that in us which is unseen by both? That there may, chance often discovers, either by a luckily-chosen theme, or a mighty premium, or an absolute necessity of exertion, or a noble stroke of emulation from another’s glory; as that on Thucydides, from hearing Herodotus repeat part of his history at the Olympic games. Had there been no Herodotus, there might have been no Thucydides, and the world’s admiration might have begun at Livy for excellence in that province of the pen. Demosthenes had the same stimulation on hearing Callistratus; or Tully might have been the first of consummate renown at the bar.
Quite clear of the dispute concerning ancient and modern learning, we speak not of performance, but powers. The modern powers are equal to those before them: modern performance in general is deplorable short. How great are the names just mentioned! yet who will dare affirm, that as great may not rise up in some future or even in the present age? Seasons there are why talents may not appear, none why they may not exist, as much in one period as another. An evocation of vegetable fruits depends on rain, air, and sun; an evocation of the fruits of genius no less depends on externals. What a marvellous crop bore it in Greece and Rome! and what a marvellous sunshine did it there enjoy? what encouragement from the nature of their governments, and the spirit of their people! Virgil and Horace owed their divine talents to Heaven, their immortal works to men: thank Maecenas and Augustus for them. Had it not been for these, the genius of those poets had lain buried in their ashes. Athens expended on her theatre, painting, sculpture, and architecture, a tax levied for the support of a war. Cæsar dropped his papers when Tully spoke; and Philip trembled at the voice of Demosthenes. And has there arisen but one Tully, one Demosthenes, in so long a course of years! The powerful eloquence of them both in one stream should never bear me down into the melancholy persuasion, that several have not been born, though they have not emerged. The sun as much exists in a cloudy day as in a clear: it is outward, accidental circumstances, that, with regard to genius either in nation or age,
Collectas que fugat nubes, solemque reducit — VIRG.
As great, perhaps greater than those mentioned, (presumptuous as it may sound,) may possibly arise; for who hath fathomed the mind of man! Its bounds are as unknown as those of the creation; since the birth of which, perhaps, not one has so far exerted, as not to leave his possibilities beyond his attainments, his powers beyond his exploits. Forming our judgments altogether by what has been done, without knowing, or at all inquiring, what possibly might have been done, we naturally enough fall into too mean an opinion of the human mind. If a sketch of the divine Iliad, before Homer wrote, had been given to mankind, by some superior being, or otherwise, its execution would, probably, have appeared beyond the power of man. Now, to surpass it, we think impossible. As the first of these opinions would evidently have been a mistake, why may not the second be so tool Both are founded on the same bottom, — on our ignorance of the possible dimensions of the mind of man.
