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Entered ficcordinpc to the Act of the Parliament of Canada, in the year ojie thousand eight hundred and eighty-one, hy the Canada Pubusiiino CoMPANT, in the Office of the Minister of Agriculture. CONTENTS. General Tntroduction. Clironological Parallel — Goldsmllh anil Cowpcr, Life of GoUlsmith. Introduction to the "Deserted Village." Dedication to the ** Deserted Village.'* The "Deserted Village." Notes on the " Deserted VilLige. " Life of Cow'ier. Introduction to the ** Task." The "Task," Book III., " The Garden." Notes on " The Garden." Chronological Parallel — Addison and Steele. Introduction to the " De Coverley Papers," The "De Coverley Papers." Notes on the " Dc Coverley Papers." Questions for Examination, Si not pre veil rarl inti was GENKRAL INTKODUCTION. TuF, eighteenth century, as regards the history of poetry, may be conveniently divided into three periods. The first embraces almost half the century, while the artifi_ cial school of Pope and his admiring imitators bore un- disturbed sway within the domain of the Muses ; the second is a period of barrenness and transition, during which the sentimental school of Darwin and Hayley spread out in vain their viands of luscious sweets to regale the sated appetites of their guests, and when a few voices, led by Thomson, Gray, and Collins, wtre gently heralding in the dawn of a brighter day ; in the last, poetry, under the hand of Covvper, the real, if unconscious, founder of a new school, broke entirely loose from the conventional artificiality of tie early part of the century, and returned in a manner to the old sources of inspiration, at which had drunk the great masters of English verse — Chaucer, Spenser, and Shakespeare, The Augustan age, a term frequently employed to de- note the supremacy of Pope in poetry and Addison in prose, possessed but little that could call forth and de- velope a true poetic spirit. Prior to the Revolution, lite- rary men had formed a distinct class ; but, with the introduction of responsible parliamentary government, i^ was united with, or rather absorbed into, the political. iv GKNtCRAL INTRODUCTION. Hence, literature, instead of being an honored profes- sion, became merely an instrument lo ])e employed for the pleasure of the Court, or for the assistance of i)olitical intrigue. The atmos|)hcre in which it was thus compelled to live, and the menial purposes it was obliged to serve, dwarfed its growth, narrowed its symjv.ithies, chilled its heart, and degraded its tone. Vet the new relation it occupied was not williout its ad v. ullages. Jt was one of the received opinions of the tijiie liiat the C.uverninent should assist struggling genius, and that a certain pro[)or- tion of the means at its control should be devoted to this jHirpose. During the reign of Anne, both Whigs .uid Tories — Somers and Montague on the one side, Harley and St. John on the other- did n^ore to assist literature than any other I^nglish statesmen have ever done. The system may have had its abuses ; but it cannot be denied that the bril- liant outburst of poetic and prose writings of this age was fostered, if not created, by the pensions, appointments, and professional promotions which were conferred by the Government on Newton, Addison, Swift, Steele, Prior, Rowe, Congreve, Parnell, and many others. With the accession of the House of Hanover all this was changed, (^eorge I. possessed none of the qualities that made his mother one of the most brilliant women in Europe. Wal- pole, his minister, was likewise totally d-evoid of literary tastes. The maif> own extrinsic brilliancy ; not that which revels in the ilescription of Nature, but that which boasts that it can scan the mind ; not that which creates, but that which explains and jus- GENERAL INTRODUCTION. vu tifies creation. It was not a creative period. Men were yet scarcely bej^inninjj to investigate for new truth, but only to doubt and defend. Their ideas were neither lofty nor deep. They did not rise into the sublime heights of metaphysical abstraction, nor had they yet learned to dive into the hidden mysteries of scicntitlc investi^'ation. To understand society, to enjoy life as they found it, to be thoroup^h men of the world, was their hi;;hest ideal ot the aims of life. It was, forsooth, an a^^c of prosaic com- mon sense, of social conventionality, literary elegance, and polished superficiality. '* In literature, in art, in spe- culation, the imagination was repressed ; strong passions, elevated motives, and sublime aspirations were replaced by critical accuracy of thought and observation, by a measured sobriety, and good sense. Wc find this alike in the prose of Addison, in the poetry of Pope, and in the philosophy of Hume. The greatest wit and the most origmal genius of the age was also the most intensely and the most coarsely realistic." French tastes and modes of thought had been trans- planted into English soil with the return of Charles II., and were now bearing abundant fruit. Dryden, the chief poet of his time, catered to those tastes, and his strong rugged genius did much to popularize the fashions that prevailed at Court. But it must not be forgotten that though his writings are inspired by inP.uences from beyond the Channel, they are nevertheless truly English, and, as such, were the direct and regular offspring of the poetical productions of the preceding age. The Elizabethans and their successors, in the prodigality and grandeur of their genius, had mainly kept in view the expression of the vn» GKXKKAL IXiKODUCTlOX. profusioi, of lofty ideas that rushed upon their brain, pay- ing comparatively little attention to the manner in which those ideas found utterance. The vehemence of the pas- sion that wrought within their breast, and the multitude of visions that pressed for utterance, both from the grand and stirring scenes of their own time and of the by-gone Middle Ages wiiich lay in rich and yet ungathered harvest before their warm and lively fancy, poured down in such richness that it was impossible for them to break in the language to poetry, and they fell frequently into caprice of thought as well as obscuiily of expression, and neglected that polish and elegance which adorns and gives duration to art. To this there came a natural reaction. To add form and finish, to give clearness to language and plain- ness to thought, to adapt poetry to the expression of the affairs of life, to describe man, not as a creature of pas- sion, but as a social and intellectual being, such was the task of Drydcn and his successors. Poetry now lost that singleness of aim which charac- terized it in the hands of the Eli/.abethans, and adapted itself to the metrical expression of all the varied interests of human life. In Blackmore's Creation and Prior's Solo^ man we have imitations of the epic taste of stronger gene- rations. " In Swift are seen the feuds and bitterness of party government ; in Pope and Parnell, the current theo- logical and moral speculations ; tiie peace and commer- cial advance under wise Walpole are embodied in the di- dactic verse of Dyer and Grainger, Somerville and Thom- :on ; Watts marks the beginning of the religious change of which Covvper represents the maturity. The influences of nature on poetry reappear in Gray, Warton and Burns ; GENKRAL 1NTK(M)UCTI0X. IX : grand y-gone harvest ,n such : ill the .price of jglected luration To add id plai ri- ll of the e of pas- was the foreign travel yields its first fruits in Goldsmith ; Gay gives pictures from common life, vie.v^ed from the side of sentiment, Crabbe under the influence of social economy. Xor are traces of the more general currents affecting poli- tics and manners absent, although these cannot be so in- dividually specified." In the wider range of subjects to which poetry was thus applied, obscurity, conceits and af- fectation gave place to simplicity and clearness. Thus far great praise is due to the poets of this age. But they could not follow their new system in moderation. Men i.ever can. New ideas must be carried to extremes. And so it was here. Soon form became everything, and it sub- dued within its rigid bonds, not merely the language and the versification, but the sentiments likewise. The whole tone of society was also artificial, so literature and society, by their mutual action and reaction upon each other, tended to further the same end. Uniformity, symmetry, and consequent mediocrity, became all the fashion. Poetry contained no lofty flight of imagination, no strong passion, no deep emotion. It was a sort of regular and modulated prose. From prose, indeed, it differed chiefly in form. Its matter was the same, its purpose, too, to systematize and clearly expound human knowledge and the concerns of life — »vas also similar. The poetry of this period was even more crystallized in form than in sentiment. However the poets may have dif- fered in other respects, they uniformly agreed to seek for the greatest perfection in the form of their verse — that is to say, perfection according lo their standard. The charac- iterof the poetic line has greatly varied in the history of UJiglish poetry. With Chaucer and his followers, it was it . GENERAL INTRODUCTION. not deemed necessary to regard an exact number of regu- larly accented syllables as the only essential of good verse ; much the same manner was observed with our Eliza- bethans, after them it was the fiishion to glory in the ruggedness of the verse. Then came the practice of making the line smooth, regular and exact in its syllables, and harmoniously varied in the pauses of the different lines. Much was accomplished in the bold and vigorous style of Dryden, but the fulness of the art was attained by Pope. A host of other poets of less note likewise caught his method, till " Every warljler had his tune by heart.** In this respect many of them were no mean imitators, if, indeed, they did not frequently rival the skill and fa- cility of their master. As the aim was to be witty and sparkling, so was it to set out that wit in the most pointed and elegant language, in the most correct and brilliant form. In truth, it not unfrequently appears that the thought was a secondary ''onsideration to the smoothness and epigram- matic beauty of the couplet. Polish and brilliancy may dazzle, but can never do more than please the ear and eye. Alone they can have little lasting effect on the heart. Hence we are prepared to find that this artificiality in poetry could not endure, and more, that such an unnatural state of society could not be per- petual. There soon became manifest an evident desire to return to the nature and natural emotion which had been the informing spirit of early English poetry. The pioneer of the new taste, at least, in subject and mode of treatment, was Thomson, whose Seasons (i 726-30) \. GENERAL INTRODUCTION. XI jf regu- i verse ; : Eliza- f in the ctice of yllables, different vigorous attained likewise itators, if, il and fa- witty and t pointed iant form, tought was iepi gram- ^ er do more have little ired to find and more, ot be per- dent desire which had ry. subject and w (1726-30) exhibit in their rich melody and felicity of description an ardent love of nature, though yet in artificial dress. Almost simultaneously came Dyer's Groni^ar Hill and Evefiifi^t^ JVall' {1727). Then nearly twenty years elapsed before the description of nature received a further impetus from the skyey fancy and melting pathos of Collins (1746), and from the elegant and elaborate verse of Gray (1747 — 57). The next step, that in which we meet with the fust simple daylight landscape,where the human figure and the aspects of nature are united in such a manner as to delight us, not as moralizations, but as pictures, is taken in the poems of Oliver Goldsmith. The publication of Percy's Reliques (1763), a collection of English ballads wherein the old spirit, the openness and freshness of life, the warm ex- pression of human passion and that simplicity which is the highest grandeur, dwelt in rich plenitude, found in the chilled heart of the nation a cordial reception, and called forth such desires as could no longer be satisfied with tin- sel and unreality. The attention of both poets and readers was turned to the older poetry of the language. Study gave rise to admiration, and admiration to imitation. A new school of criticism that was about this time founded by the Wartons, which received its inspiration from romantic rather than from classical sources, and on which the Mid- |dle Ages wrought almost as effectually as Greek and Ro- lan literature did on Collins and Gray, fostered the same :ourse of feeling. The public, too, had grown tired of art, md gladly welcomed a return to simplicity and nature* for was this retarded by pushing the old-school principles fo extremes, as was done by Darwin and Hayley, whose )oetry resembles polished metal, bright and shining, but i. xu GENERAL INTRODUCTION. cold, hard and lifeless. The change was first perceptible in the sentiments, and later it affected also the structure of the verse. A new class of subjects were chosen, and, consequently, a different mode of treatment was adopted. Instead of the reflective came the descriptive, and in lieu of the didactic, the tale and lyrical narrative. While these tendencies were making gradual but con- stant progress, there came over England a ferment of re- ligious enthusiasm that spread its leaven throughout almost the entire nation, and gave an impulse that carried them rapidly forward to the most important results. The lethargy and indifference of the clergy, the ignorance and brutality of the lower orders, had awakened a concern for the spiritual interests of the nation in the breasts of some of the more devout and zealous of the ministers of the Established Church. Instead of preaching the old doctrines of theoretical morality, which for many years had appeared to be almost the only function of the pulpil, these men began to insist upon the vital importance of experimental religion. The enthusiasm which they aroused took a deep hold on the middle and lower classes of the nation, and produced the most momentous results both within and without the Establishment — results which brought back the heart of the nation, vastly raised the | standard of public morality and set on foot instrumentali- ties and agencies for the uplifting and cleansing of the people, which are still bearing the noblest fruit, and which | are now embodied in the frame-work of society throughout || the world. This great movement, which, at first, was i| wholly within the national church, was afterwards, in part, severed from it. Those who separated from the Church V- GENERAL INTRODUCTION. Xlll but con- ;nt of re- it almost ; carried ilts. The •ance and )ncern for )reasts of ministers ng the old iiany years the pulpit, (ortance of Ley aroused |sses of the :sults both ilts which raised the itrumentali- Lsing of the ;, and which throughout ,t first, was ■ds, in part, the Church assumed the name of Methodists, while the term Evan- i^elicism was employed to indicate the movement within its pale. To the latter, Cowper, as well as his friend and protector, Mr. Newton, belonged. Cowper did not com- mence in earnest to write poetry till he was fifty-five years old, twcncy-three years after his conversion — two facts im- portant to be remembered. He then undertook it simply that he might have some occupation for his mind. He had not kept up his reading in literature and poetry, which had never been extensive ; hence, when he began to write, he stood almost alone, and was not greatly inllucnced either by poetic theories or poetic prac- tice. Nor had he, indeed, the remotest idea of inaugu- rating a new school of poetry, though he evidently felt himself impelled to seek for matter and expression in a different field from that cultivated by Pope, who ap- peared to him to have " made poetry a mere mechanic art." The real source of his inspiration was the religious movement of the time, of which he is the grand and devoted exponent in the poetic life of the country. The change which lias been described as gradually coming over the poetic taste and production of the century re- ceived a powerful impetus from the upward movement in [morality, which had long been coming on as a natural [reaction to the irreligion and vice of the period succeeding the Restoration, and which already for many years had )een permeating and transforming the nation. Cowper, the lonely hermit of the Ouse, united these two — the rising noral and religious purity of the people, and their renewed [ovc for nature, passion, and imagination in poetry — into )}}ft- noble pean of song. The task was his to gather XIV GENERAL INTRODUCTION. into one tlie converging streams of moral and poetic pro- gress that arose from the quiet return from speculation and doubt to faith and practice, and from the artificial gloss with which society had been veneered to the warmer ebullition of human passion, and the genuine love of simple nature. Speaking of the part borne by Cowper, a writer in Blackwood's M agar. i tie (June, 1871) has well said : — " It was the re-birth of poetry in Enj^lainl — the first bold de- parture from the well-worn channel in which all poetical compo- sitions had flowed for many years. Cowper, in this new work, served himself suddenly heir to the old poets of greater ages, end to the homely vigorous English which they had not found too comr.on for their handling. He cast aside t'le worn-out moulds, threw the traditions of Pope's and Dryden'sera to the winds, and caught the old perennial stream from the fountain at which it flowed brightest and most full. When we think of it, it is im- possible to over-estimate the courage and even hardihood of this step. Every poetical influence had been setting one way during the entire century. Cowper, at the end of that century, a man with no impulse of youth to help him, no new enthusiasm to animate him, deliberately set his face against it and turned the tide. All the smoothness of versification, the artificial melody of rythm in which his generation had delighted, and in which he too, himself, had imitated the other songsters of the age, he put aside to make his new venture. It was entirely new though it was so old. England had fancied herself to have outlived the lofty melody of blank verse. She discovered now that the old strain was her favorite — that it could charm her ear as well as rouse her soul. She found out that nature was as sweet as it had been in the days of Milton, the English fields as fair, the rural sights and sounds as fresh and tender. This worn-out sick man growing old, half frantic, half madman, half recluse, drew the veil from her eyes and threw open to her a new, sweet, dewy, GENERAL INTRODUCTION. XV bold de- \ compo- e\v work, ages, ftnfl found too at moulds, winds, and at which it it, it is in^- lood of this way during century, a enthusiasm cl turned the ;icial melody ,d in which the age, he new though outlived the that the old par as well as ..eetasithad v,ir, the rural | out sick man tse, drew the | sweet, dewy, fragrant world. It is difficult for us even to imagine the surprised delight with which the nation felt the sweetness of this new voice, which was so familiar, so homelike, so unpretending. After all the shade of the Throckmorton elms, the woodman on his way to the forest, the pheasant's nest perched on the hillside, the post- boy, light-hearted wretch ! twanging his horn across the bridge were a thousand times more near the heart than the outpouring of a poet's malice, the impalation of a Sporus or a Sappho. No- body had thought of it up to that moment ; but when the mo- ment came, all England saw it with that sudden enlightenment which is like inspiration. All through the conventional ages, the period in which poetry had been a thing of wits and coffee, houses, the production of a class, full of allusions and assaults which only that class could appreciate, Shakespeare and Mil- ton had still been read in the silent corners, in those depths of the national heart which criticism and its artificial standard did not reach ; and, lo, these secret worshippers of the old gods rose up with a thrill of delight to greet the new light which carried in it all the marks of divinity which they could not recognise in its predecessors," 17; 17: 17(jI 170 17(H 17(\ CHRONOLOGICAL PARALLKL. AD. BNULIRII IIIHTOKY AND LITERATl'RK. LIKK OKCOWrKK. 1728 Pope'H Diiuci'atl. W-rcy b. Horn, November, 10th, Th(w. Warton h. \ j 17:^0 C«in;,'rcve d. Steelf 4 To school to Uyrno. 17;!a Heuttie b. l*o|)e'3 AloivV. I7:;7 Gibbon !». Greene/. \ Loses his inolhir To school lit Market Street. 1739 War declared ajj'ainst Spain Tollev.Mr.t'auipbcli's. To Mrs. Disney'n 1741 Walpoic resigns. 174;< Pelham takes ..ttice. 1744 I'ope (I. 1745 I'retender's Ilebellion. 1747 17 H Thomson r/. I'eace of Aix- ; la-Chapelle. 1740: 17;">0 l>r. .lohn.son's Jiamhlcr. 17.VJ Cliattertoii b. bishop Hiitk-r il. ,The Adventuier staited. 1753 Tlie Wurlil. iTo Rev. P. Hu-'hch'. I Enters Tnn. Coliejfe. His father dies. 'J'akes hi.s I? .\. At hiwno. I Tutor at Mr. Flinii't*.' Starts out to study law. To Kdinb\ir;,'h to studv medicine. house. To Westminster School. i Entered at tho Middle Temi)lc. I First attack of d*^- I spondeiu'y(i>r 1704) To Leydt'U. Travels. Called to the Bur, Returns to Enj;land. 'His father dies. Teaches for Dr. Milner 17,14 Crabl)e /». rifldiiij,*' d. \l:)i\ War a<»uinst Fraiicc. 17."i7 Seven years' War begins Whitehead, Puet Laureate. Writes for Monthly I He view. 17aS Dr. Joluison's Idler. 'Fails at examination. 17a'J Quebec taken. \Li/e nf Voltaire, | Removes to the In Hurns t. Inquiry. The Hoc. \ ner Temple. 1700 Georjje III. Poems of Writes for BritUh\ Osaian. Maif. and Public LeJf/e.'. Churchill's Roixiad. 17(>l Richardson d. Citizen of the World. 17t32 P.ute Premier. N. Briton. Lije of Beau Nanh. 17G;i Literary Club founded. Grenville Ministry. 17(i4 Horace Walpole's Otranto. Uixto^-y of Emjland. I Traveller. Confined at St. Alban's. I 1 CIIR()N()LO(;iCAL PARALLIX. A.I). KNdMHIl IlIHTOKY ANU I.lTKItATrRK. LIFR OK aoLDNMrrii. 170.') Rockitiu'liiini tukon oflico. I Young d, I'orcy's A'c/x/i/cs. LII'R (lKCOWIT.:i. ITCKl Mosttii' Ministry. 1767 17«S 17«9 1770 Kxppn'mentnl Phlh-lmnnin ■.»( Mr. SUtiic (/. (;r;iff.>ii tiikos tillicf Letters of ,hiniu8. Nonli Hiu'coeds Grafton. Wordsworth h. Unwin's, ut lliint- intrdon. 8eltlu8 ut Olnoy. 1771 Waller Scott b. 1772 1773 1771 ,177fi 1776 1779 1782 Coleridjjo /*. / Kraneis ,1 elf rev h. Sonthoy b. Lord Olive y Lord Shellmrne. Poaee of Versaillos. Dr. Johnson (/. VDphjf. Vicar of Walccfirld. Collect Urn of KKsays. (iood-Natured Man. M.B. at Oxford. Ro- man llisfiirti. Dcsrrti'd ViUaiin. I.ifp of I'arnrll. Ijifc of linliiKjhrolie. Uaiinch of VchIho i, Kiujliali IJistorif. She Stoops to CotKiner Dcranjjrcd, third time. Death, 4th April ; buried, Itth April.' JictnUiitioa. Ani- mated Nature. l7S:i 17S4 1785 178(» Burns' Poems. 1787 j 1789 Dr. Darwin's Lon's of the I Plants. French JRevolu- I tion. 1791 Rev. J. Wesley d. 1792 1794 Gibbon d. 1795 Warren Hastings acquitted. 1796 Macpherson d. 1798 Wordsworth's L]irical I Ballads. 1800 Moore's Anacreon. I'. Ohwy Ilymw. FirHt volunii) of Poems. The Task. Leaves Olnej' for Weston Under - •wt>od. Deranged, fourth time. Translation of Homer. Again deranped. Pension of £300. Removed to Norfolk. Death of Mrs. Un- win. Death, at Dereham, I April 25th. ii rjwiT.n. ( Mr. ut Iluiil- LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. WXXXX VX%-V^%%'VV.'\.XX" Oliicy. I, thiril ilumo of )ik. Olnej- for Under - )cl, fourth ition of leranped. of £300. Bdto Ik. ){ Mrs. Un- it Dereham, |25th. When the assembled wits had decided to place the best epitaph upon Dryden's tomb that had ever been chiselled, Atterbury exclaimed, "'Dryden' is enough; they who know his works, want no more, they who do not know them, would not be enlightened by the most eloquent eulogy." True as these words are of Dryden, they are even more applicable to Goldsmith. As we read his works, his character gradually unfolds itself with each successive page, and we become familiar with the virtues, the weaknesses and the foibles of our author. In one part or other of his writings, he has left us a complete autobiography of himself, drawn by a faithful, yet gentle hand. We smile and sympathize, or admire and love, as we meet, on every page, a genial, easy, and unceasing flow of good humor, good sense, and good feeling ; as we see, in all the characters he has sketched, his own art- less benevolence and fitfulness, his kindness and way- wardness, or tract in their blunderings and buffetings, the mischances, ludicrous scenes, or laughable mistakes of his own life. The Goldsmiths were a respectable, but unthrifty race, whose ** hearts were in the right place, but whose heads seemed to be doing anything but what they ought." Accordingly the Rev. Charles Goldsmith, Oliver's father, married very young and very poor, and so was obliged for some years to " pray and starve'* on forty pounds a year, in a small rural curacy at Pallas, a c^mote hamlet in the county of Longford, in Ireland. It was here that ■Ill lili 'iiil I ■. •; ! «i.i i LIFE OF GOLDSMrrH. Oliver, the second son of a fanAlly of four sons and two daughters, was born, on the loih of November, 1728. While he was yet a child, his father was presented to the rectorship of Kilkenny West, in Westnieath, worth ^200 a year. The family consequently exchanged the antique mansion and lonely wilds of Pallas for an elegant rectory situated on the busy high-road leading to Lissoy. Here, Oliver spent his boyhood days, here, he received his early education, and these are the scenes which, in the de- lightful strains of his Deserted Village^ he has embalmed in our language forever. When only about three years old, he was sent to an old lady's private school to learn his letters. At the end of four years, she pronounced him a dunce, and passed him over to the hands of the village schoolmaster, Thomas (or, as the boys had it, Paddy) liyrne. Byrne, educated for a teacher, had enlisted in the army, served abroad in Oueen Anne's time, and risen to the rank of quarter-master. On his return from ser- vice, he had engaged to drill the urchins of Lissoy in reading, writing and arithmetic ; but, like many a teacher whose knowledge is limited, yet whoso tongue is ready, he gilded over his deficiencies by entertaining his won- dering scholars with an exhaustless fund of stories. Be- sides his facility in story-telling, he was an enthusiastic admirer of the ancient Irish bards, whom he fancied he could imitate. Such a tutor was just the person to pro- duce deep and lasting impressions on the imaginative mind of young Oliver who, before he was eight years of age, had begun to scribble verses of poetry. Some of these lines coming under the notice of his mother, she readily perceived that her son was a poetical genius, and from that time urged upon his father the necessity of giving the lad an education befitting his abilities. The expense of educating his eldest son, Henry, had so strait- iii Life ov goldsmith. 3 fened the father's narrow income, that he liad determined to put Oliver to a trade ; but the mother's earnest soli- citations won the day, and it was decided to give him a University education. Hence, on his recovery from a severe attack of small-pox, he was placed under the care of the Rev. Mr. Griftin, of Elphin. One eveninj; while here, a number of young people assembled at his uncle's for a dance, and the fiddler, turning Oliver's short clumsy figure and pock-marked face into ridicule, called him *' yKsop." This was too much for his sensitive na- ture, and stopping short, he replied : " Heralds proclaim aloud this saying — See yl^sop dancing and his monkey playing." This repartee raised him greatly in the estima- tion of his friends, several of whom — especially his uncle, the Rev. Thomas Contarine — contributed means to place him in a school possessing advantages superior to those afforded at Elphin. He was therefore removed to a school kept by the Rev. Mr. Campbell, at Athlone, and, after two years, transferred to one at Edges worthstown, under the supervision of the Rev. Patrick Hughes. He does not appear to have been distinguished at any of these schools— except, indeed, by his easy, idle disposi- tion, and blundering manners. No favorite with the teacher, he was the leader in the sports of the play- ground, and never hindmost in any school-boy prank. With this preparation he was sent up to Trinity Col- lege, Dublin. He was now in his seventeenth year, eccentric, idle and thoughtless. His sister having mar- ried a wealthy gentleman, named Hodson, her father deemed it a point of honor to furnish her with a suitable dowry, and, acting on this impulse, so embarrassed the family circumstances, that it was found impossible to I give Oliver the same advantages as his brother, Henry. He accordingly entered College, as a sizar. This menial LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. !'l condition, as might be expected, was very galling to the proud spirit of young Oliver ; yet, while enduring indigni- ties, in order to enjoy the advantages of the institution, he neglected his studies, quarrelled with his tutor, received a public reprimand for joining in an attack on a bailiff, vio- lated the college rules by giving a supper and dance to some of his city friends, won an exhibition of thirty shil- lings, and was turned to the foot for playing buffoon in his class. While he was at Dublin his father died, leaving the family very poorly {provided for, so that Oliver's situation became still more painful. To relieve his necessities he occasionally wrote songs, sold them for live shillings each, and then squandered the money. However, by the aid of his uncle, he was enabled to remain at college till he took his degree in 1749. He then returned home, and spent three years, partly with his mother, who had taken a small cottage at Ballymahon, and partly with his brother-in-law, Hodson, at Lissoy. He was now twenty- one, and it became necessary to decide on some profes- sion. His friends urged him to enter the church. After some difficulty his objections were withdrawn, and he began to qualify himself for Orders. The time for his ordination came. He presented himself to the bishop, dressed in scarlet breeches, and was, in consequence, rejected. He then became tutor in a wealthy family, but threw up the situation in a dispute over a game of cards. On receiving his wages he bought a fme horse, and set out for Cork, intending to sail for America ; but after six weeks he returned home on a wretched nag and without a penny in his pocket. Next he determined to study law. His friends provided him with a purse of fifty pounds, with which he set out for London, but on his way he met an old acquaintance at Dublin, who took him to LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. 5 a gambling house and stripped him of his money. At the suggestion of Dean ^ioldsmith, of Cloync, a distant relative, he then determined to study physic. His trust- ing friends again subscribed the funds, and he set out for Edinburgh, where he arrived in the autumn of 1752. Here he rem.lined for eighteen months, studying, riding into the Highlands, gambling, singing Irish songs, or telling Irish stories. At the end of that time, he per- suaded his good uncle, Contarine, to furnish him with funds to complete his medical studies at the University of Leyden. For Leyden he forthwith left Edinburgh. On arriving at this famous University, he recommenced his studies and his gambling. What progress he made in the former is uncertain, but, by the latter, he soon lost the last shilling of the ^{^33, with which he had left Scot- land. His friend, Ellis, lent him a few pounds with which to return to Paris, but he generously spent the whole, in purchasing some costly tulip roots for his affectionate uncle. Penniless and proud, he now determined to make a tour of the Continent on foot, and so with one spare shirt, a flute, and a guinea, he set out on his journey, visiting France, Germany, vSwitzerland and Italy. In the story of the '* Philosophic Vagabond," in the I7car oj Wakefield^ he has given us some delightful reminiscences of his experiences in these wanderings, "Remote, unfrienleil, melancholy, s^ow," in which he made those observations upon the peculiai* characteristics of the various countries and their inhab- itants, which he has, in his own easy, graceful style, recorded for the delight of all future ages, in the Travel- ler. At Padua he remained for some months. Here, it is probable, his medical studies were resumed, and from this University, he tells us, he received his medical degree. LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. Ill His generous uncle, whose slender remittances had never entirely ceased, died about this time, and the wan- derer was compelled to seek his native shore. So after a year of roaming about on the Continent, he landed at Dover in 1756. " Without friends, recommendation, money, or impu- dence," he arrived in London. Here, his flute had no attractions, nor could his philosophy supply his wants. He was compelled to seek other employment. He tried to turn his medical knowledge to advantage, but without avail. He then became a strolling-player, but his face and figure soon drove him from the boards. Next, he is found pounding drugs in a chemist's laboratory near Fish Street. Through the friendship of Dr. Sleigh, an old fel- low-student, he was enabled to commence the practice of physic in Bankside, Southwark, but his patients were chiefly among the poorest and humblest classes of society. To eke out the miserable pittance thus received, he began to do some hack-work for the booksellers. A. few months later, and we find him usher in a school kept by Dr. Milner, at Peckham. His bitter experiences in this situa- tion, he has left us in a lively sketch in the sixth number of the Bee^ and in the history of *' George Primrose." While thus employed, Mr. Griffiths, proprietor of the Monthly Review^ being in need of increased writers in order to cope with the opposition which he now met from the Critical Review under the able conduct of Dr. Smol- lett, engaged Goldsmith for a year, at a small regular salary, with board and lodging. Irksome as the slavery of an usher had been, the vassalage of the bookseller and his critical wife was still more unbearable. At the end of five months, the engagement was broken off. After some further occasional and ill-paid contributions to various Reviews, he returned in deep want to Dr. Milner's, and % LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. took charge of the school during the Doctor's illness. He next received a medical appointment in the service of the East India Company. To raise money for the expected voyage, he set to work to write a treatise to be entitled An Inquiry into the Present State of Polite Learning in' Europe ; but before it was completed the appointment had been cancelled. He then presented himself for examina- ation as hospital mate. The suit of clothes in which he appeared had been secured by writing four articles for Griffiths' Monthly Revieiv. He failed at the examination, and pawned the unpaid clothes to relieve his landlady's distress. The Life of Voltaire was written at this time, to pacify the demand of Griffiths for the return of the suit of clothes and the books he had reviewed. In 1759, appeared the Lnquiry, a work of little value now-adays, but which, to the grace and charm of its style, added much that then commanded public attention. This was the age of periodicals, and Goldsmith must needs have his. The Bee first appeared on the 6th of Oc- tober, 1759. It was to be issued every Saturday, and the price was three pence. It was filled with essays in great variety, penned in Goldsmith's neat and elegant style, but it failed to charm the public of the day ; and its short career of eight weeks closed on the 29th of No- vember. Whilst publishing the Bee^ Goldsmith had been writing for other periodicals, the Busy Body and the Critical Revietu. He soon after became an important contributor to the British Magazine and to the Public Ledger. The series of letters which appeared in the latter was afterwards republished underthe tide of the Citizen of tlie World. These letters, purporting to be addressed by a Chinese traveller to his friends at home, contain some lively and humorous sketches of English society, and have beei\ '* jiistly praised, for their fresh original perception, f i: \ I ''I! ! II iill i lilii 8 LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. their delicate delineation of life and manners, their wit and humor, their playful and diverting satire, their exhilarat- ing gaiety and their clear and lively style." Two other anonymous works were published about this time, The Life of Beau Nash^Ti^xidi The History oj England in a Scries of Letters from a Nobleman to his Son. The latter became exceedingly popular, and was attributed in turn to Lords Chesterfield, Orrery and Lyttleton. It was during these years that Goldsmith became ac- quainted with several of the distinguished literary char- acters of the time. Dr. Percy, renowned for his collection of English ballads, had some years before introduced him- self to Goldsmith while the latter sat "writing his Inquiry in a wretched, dirty room in which there was but one chair, and when he, from civility, offered it to his visitor, was obliged himself to sit in the window." He managed to bring about a meeting between Goldsmith and the great literary autocrat of the period, Dr. Johnson. Among his acquaintances also, were now the distinguished painters, Hogarth and Reynolds. At the house of Reynolds, he was introduced to more notable company than he had yet been accustomed to meet ; and on the formation of the Literary Club in 1763, he was invited to become one of its members. This club which was suggested by Reynolds, originally consisted of Johnson, Burke, Beauclerc, Nugent, Bennet Langton, Hawkins, Chamier, Reynolds, and Goldsmith. Its meetings were held once a week at the Turk's head inn, in Gerrard street, Soho, and its conver- sations exercised no little influence on the literature of the time. But though Goldsniith's circumstances were now greatly improved, life seems to have still been a struggle with him. Sometimes he revelled in plenty, but oftener was pining in want. One morning in the winter of 1764, he sent for Dr. Johnson, to come to him immediately, as h^ LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. was in trouble. Johnson sent him a guinea, and as soon as he was dressed called to see him. He found that Gold- smith had changed the guinea, and procured a bottle of Madeira, over which he was disputing with his landlady who had that morning arrested him for arrears of rent. Johnson replaced the cork, and begged his friend tc calm himself and con;^ider how the money was to be obtained. The latter thereupon produced a novel upon which he had been engaged. After glancing over the manuscript, John- son perceived that the work possessed rare merit, went out, and sold it to a bookseller for ^60, brought back the money, and the rent was paid. The novel which thus passed into the hands of the publisher, but which lay un- printed for upwards of two years, was the Vicar of Wake- field. Goldsmith was not yet known to the public as an author, and the bookseller had probably made his bargain, depending largely on the judgment of Johnson. Soon all this was to be changed, for he was to have a reputation of his own, that would not only warrant the publication of the Vicar^ but give hir future productions a ready popu- larity. In 1764, the Tf-aveller was published, and Goldsmith was at once recognised as a poet of genuine worth. The ablest critics of the day joined in lauding the poem as worthy of a high place amongst our English classics, and Johnson, under whose fostering care it had been com- pleted, introduced it to the public by a kindly notice in the Critical Reviciu. And it well deserved all the praise it received. Its outward form, its polish, and the correct- ness of its versification, are after the manner of the time. It has not all the epigrammatic brilliancy and point of the poetry of Pope, but it possesses a richer sweetness, greater naturalness and a deeper human sympathy. Throughout there abound ^ freshness and love of nature that more 1: lO LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. liOHl than compensate for the unsoundness of its political the- ory, while the simplicity and neatness of its diction are equalled only by its charming descriptions and lovely images. The appearance of the Traveller was the great turning point in Goldsmith's career. It raised him in the estimation of the booksellers, opened his way into good society, and introduced him to the notice of the great. The Earl of Northumberland expressed a desire to serve him, but the generous-hearted poet recommended his bro- ther Henry, saying of himself " that he looked to the booksellers for support, that they were his best friends, and that he was not inclined to forsake them for others." He took advantage of his present popularity to collect and republish many of his essays which had appeared anonymously in various perijdicals ; and, that he might have some permanent means of support, again resumed the medical profession, hoping that he might now secure a higher class of patients ; but meeting only disappoint- ment, he soon abandoned it in disgust, to return to the service of his old ** patrons." The fourth edition of the Ti^aveller had just been issued, and Goldsmith was enjoying the reputation of being the first poet of his age, when the Vicar of Wakefield was published. This charming novel of English domestic life, the earliest of its kind, was at first but coldly received by the Club, the leading journals of the day, and the higher classes of society. Yet^ surely, if slowly, it grew in favour. Three editions were printed within four months, and the author lived to see it translated into several con- tinental languages. Its plot is confused, and many of the incidents are highly improbable, but its quiet humor and lively wit amuse us at every turn and sparkle on every page. It overflows with a kindly sympathy for the fail- ings gf th^ lac^ ; and the characters a^e drawn with '^wM LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. II truth to nature, that they cannot fail to reach the heart. Its moral, too, is excellent — to show us how our lives may be made happy by * patience in suffering, persevering re- liance on the providence of God, quiet labor, and an in- dulgent forgiveness of the faults of others." Little won- der that such a book has passed from country to country, and obtained a wider popularity than any other of its kind. The celebrity which Goldsmith won by the publication of the Traveller and Vicar materially raised his social standing, but did not equally improve his circumstances. Debts and drudgery were still his portion. He was com- pelled to toil for the booksellers as before, with this differ- ence, that hi? services now received a better remuneration. In the midst of this thankless labor, his leisure was de- voted to work of another kind. He had won laurels as a poet, and as a novelist ; now he was emboldened to try his fortune as a writer of comedy. His first attempt, the Good-Natured Man, was acted at Covent Garden in 1768. It had been finished early in the preceding year, but, though recommended by Johnson, Burke, and Reynolds, he had much difficulty in inducing the managers to accept it. ks reception at a time when sentimentalism was the rage, could not be hearty ; yet the author received from his benefit nights and from the sale of the copyright up- wards of ;{^5oo, a 5um many times larger than he had re- ceived for any of his previous writings. The plot of the Good-Natured Man, like ^11 Goldsmith's plots, is very im- perfect, but in character, repartee, and humor, this comedy has few superiors. Yet at the time when it was brought on the stage its very excellencies were its ruin. Anything that moved the audience to laughter was sure to be " his- sed " from pit to boxes ; and accordingly the very scene which Goldsmith considered the best — and posterity has '^■n ■ )! m il .1 13 LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. endorsed his opinion — was received with marked disap- probation, and had to b withdrawn after the first night. With so great a sum as £s^^ i" ^is possession, and with no small reputation as a poet, novelist, and dramatic author. Goldsmith thought proper to remove into more commodious and respectable lodgings. Leaving his shabby- rooms at Jeffs', he leased apartments in Brick Court, Mid- dle Temple, which he proceeded to furnish in elegant style, and then began a course of life which burdened him with debts and mental distress for the rest of his days. His pen was now more actively engaged than ever in writing for the booksellers, and his fame commanded a high re- turn for his labor. For Tom Davies he compiled a His- tory of Rome for which he received ^300. Its rapid sale prompted Davies to offer ^^500 for a History of England ^ and at the same time Goldsmith was at work upon his Animated Nature for which Griffin agreed to give him 800 guineas. These works are all written with the author's own easy, graceful flow of narrative, and never fail to please and in- terest the reader ; but the facts are taken at second-hand, without any elaborate inquiry into their correctness ; and consequently he has been led into making some ludicrous errors and absurd statements. Yet Johnson ranked him, as an historian, above Robertson, and declared that he would make his Animated Nature as "entertaining as a Persian tale." His histories, inaccurate as they are, have done much to make their subject interesting to young peo- ple, and they still rank amongst the most popular of abridged works. While busy upon these toilsome tasks, he found a few spare moments left him to cultivate the muse, and added much to his poetical fame by publishing, in 1770, the Deserted Village. This poem leaped at once to the height LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. n of popularity, no fewer than five editions being required within the first three months. Nor was its popularity ephemeral, for the judgment of the time has been endorsed by tens of thousands of readers since, and seems likely never to be reversed. But the " draggle-tailed muses," as Goldsmith was once heard to say, furnished but a scanty means of subsistence. Such at least did they in his case. His poetical fame brought him directly but small returns. Hence we find him, soon after the publication of the Deserted Village^ again at work for his old" patrons," the booksellers. He made an abridgment of his Roman History, wrote an in- ferior Life of Parnell, and compiled a JJfe of Lord Bol- ingbroke. The biography of Bolingbroke, though written at a time of great political excitement, is entirely free from party prejudice, and gives a clear, entertaining account of this great statesman's life. In 1773, Goldsmith, with great difficulty, induced the managers to allow him to try his chances, a second time, with a comedy entitled She Stoops to Conquer. This play, like its predecessor, the Good- Natured Man, was based upon character and humor. The public taste still demanded the sentimental comedy of Cumberland and Kelly, and scouted everything that tended to produce boisterous mirth. The fun of Gold- smith's first comedy had driven it from the boards, and the fun of this one was uproarious when compared with it. It was brought out by Coleman, at Covent Garden. The actors, as well as the managers, are said to have had little hopes of its success. But all were disappointed, when pit, and galleries, and boxes, rang with peal upon peal of un- controllable laughter. The play ran on every night for the remainder of the season, and is one of the very few comedies of the time which still retain possession of the stage. Nor was it fame alone that Goldsmith obtair.ed by I •ftl M m '31 14 Life of coLDSMrni. the success of tlie Good-Natured Man, for he reaped a rich pecuniary harvest. Yet all the money he received, and all he could inanaj;e to raise on works to be written, but not yet begun, were insufficient to satisfy the demands of his creditors, or to brighten his prospects for the future. We find him trying to forget his troubles by a visit to the country, by attendance at the Club, and by frequent- ing gay society. But it was all in vain. His unfinished but prepaid engagements became doubly burdensome, as presenting no means of relief. Though his "knack at hoping " seemed to be failing him, yet he was full of plans, and at times was hard at work. He had almost completed his AnUnated Nature and Grecian History, was preparing a third edition of his History of Eh upland , revising his In- quiryy translating Scarron's Comic Romance, and arrang- ing his papers for the most extensive work he had ever yet contemplated — A Popular Dictionary of Arts and Sci- ences. His plans for this Dictionary, though cheerfully entertained by his friends, did not secure the confidence of the ' ooksellers, and the work was never completed. In the midst of his disappointments and despondency, his poetical genius once more flashed forth in a little poem which he composed in reply to some gibing epitaphs written by his friends, while awaiting his usual late arrival at a dinner. Being unable to reply at the time he took to his pen, and with a few inimitable strokes sketched, in clear and vigorous language, the character of some nine or ten of his most intimate friends. He gave it the title of Retaliation, but, like his own generous nature, it had in it too much of the *' milk of human kindness" to con- tain revenge. Short and unfinished as it is, its good sense and humorous raillery, its exquisite discrimination and graphic truth, will always mark it as a masterpiece. But this facile pen must write no more. An illness, if LIFE or GOLDSMITH. tS hot induced, at least a^^ravated, by his pressing necessi- ties and dcran^^ed circumstances, seized him while labor- ing under his present deprciision. lie complained of pain in his head, and of fever. Contrary to the advice of his medical attendants, he persisted in taking some powders from which he had formerly obtained relief in other dis- orders. His malady fluctuated for some days, and hopes were even entertained of his recovery ; but his sleep left him, his mind was ill at ease, and his appetite was gone. At length he fell into a deep sleep from which he awoke in strong convulsions, which continued till death brought release on the 4th of April, 1774. He was in his forty- sixth year. His death produced a deep sensation among his friends. On hearing he was dead, Burke burst into tears, and Reynolds laid up his pencil for the remainder of the day. A public funeral and a tomb in Westminster were at first proposed, but subsequently given up, and he was privately interred in the burying ground of the Tem- ple Church. Shortly after his death, a cenotaph was erected to his memory in Westminster Abbey. Nollekens was the sculptor, and the inscription was written by Dr. Johnson. Of all our English writers there is none over whose memory the reader lingers with more afifectionate remem- brance than over that of Goldsmith. Not that his character was faultless ; far from it. There is much to ddmire, but also much to regret. He was a compound of weakness and strength, and his life was full of inconsistencies. His head was ever devising plans which he lacked resolution and energy to carry out. Indolence and procrastination were part of his very nature. At school his lessons were neglected for some idle sport. At college he feasted his city friends, and graduated last on the list of Sizars. Of these habits the booksellers had ahvays to complain ; and * ■ -TIT ^^B ' m Kj ' ' ■ ^ w .''^^Bj ■!' '■'■ isi '■fc.y4 Ik 1 '^ » i6 LIFK OF GOLDSMITH. for this reason they rejected the scheme of his proposed Dictionary. Few men were more ambitious than he, and his ambition led him at times to put forth great, if spas- modic, efforts to win the praise which he heard bestowed upon others. He strove to outshine Johnson in conversa- tion, but his attempts brought upon him the derision of of the Club. His vanity led him into exhibitions of jealousy, and even of envy. His extreme sensibility made him writhe under the jests of which he was made the ob- ject, but his forgiving nature could never avenge the insults heaped upon him. It need not for a moment be supposed that Goldsmith had more of envy, jealousy, and vanity than many of his associates, but his blundering, outspoken, and transparent nature made his failings more conspicu- ous. He was frivolous, improvident, profuse and sensual. His benevolence often outran his judgment, for the soft- ness of his heart could hear no tale of distress without attempting whatever assistance lay in his power to relieve it. Though he had graduated at Trinity College, and had professedly studied for the church and the medical pro- fession, yet there was not a single subject of which he sould be said to be master. He knew nothing thoroughly. His prose writings exhibit no evidenc^a of depth or close examination, but are superficial and inaccurate. But whatever he knew he could tell with clearness, and sur- round with charming interest. When he looks within his own heart and gives utterance to the feelings which fill his breast, he expresses himself with a naturalness, a grace, and a tenderness, which bespeak the true poet and the man of broad and deep human sympathy. But when he goes beyond his own experiences, he always blunders, al- ways fails. Happily, he has generally confined himself tQ subjects in which his acute and varied observation gave LIFE OF GOLDSMITH. 17 him a power that has largely compensated for his lack of imagination. His style is the perfection of ease. There is no straining after effect, no ponderous phrases, no heavily-turned periods. His words are aptly chosen, his diction select and terse, his language felicitous, and his taste excellent. Dealing chiefly with familiar topics, he always keeps above vulgarity, but he is at times justly chargeable with carelessness and want of precision in the construction of his sentences. In palliation of this, it may be said, that many of his productions were completed in great haste, under pressing necessities, and are not there- fore fairly open to criticism. In everything he has written, there is an easy grace and elegance which have always made his writings popular, and which bid fair to perpetu- ate his fame as long as our language endure I ■'♦•'{1 B ';M THE DESERTED VILLAGE. .^■'; »• ■<■ INTRODUCTION. Goldsmith seems to have conceived the idea of writing this poem while he was engaged upon the Traveller. In- deed, the main thoughts which are here illustrated — the increase of wealth and the consequent exile of the peasan- try — had already been sympathetically touched upon in that poem. It is probable that after finishing the latter, he set to work upon this at his moments of leisure, in the midst of the multifarious labors that were now crowding upon him ; for poetry was with him an amuse- ment, not a business. After some four or five years of correction and improvement, this poem, which had been long promised, was at last given to the public on the 26th of May, 1770. It was published by W. Griffin, and the price was two shillings. What remuneration the author received is uncertain. It*is saiu that Griffin paid him a hundred pounds for the copyright, and that Goldsmith returned a part of it, as some one told him that no poetry was worth five shillings a couplet. It at once became immensely popular. A second edition was issued on the 7th of June, a third on the 14th, a fourth on the 28th, and a fifth on the i6th ^ \ I^N^ m INTRODUCTION. of August. This sudden popularity was due, partly to the now famous name of the author, partly to the subject, but chiefly to the intrinsic beauty of the treatment, and to the deep and touching appeal to the great heart of humanity. It was now six years since the Traveller had beg^un to make the name of Goldsmith eminent, and four, since that charming story, the Vicar of Wakefield^ had sharpened the public appetite for anything. Dr. Goldsmith might write. Whatever came from his pen, especially as poetry, was sure to be eagerly devoured, for his reputation as the poet of his time, was thoroughly established. In the choice of his subject, he was, no doubt, influenced by his natural sympathy for the poor and the down-trodden, and his innate antagonism to tyrants and oppressors. It may be, too, though "he never paid much attention to interest," that he was swayed somewhat by policy ; and as he could scarcely look for patronage to the great and the fashion- able who, if they admired poetry at all, admired it in such men as Whitehead and Beattie, he sought an audience amongst the people. Besides, reflective and didactic poe- try was all the mode, and several prose writers had affected to mourn over the decreasing population of the country. But, though the poet chose to regard depopulation as a fact, and the increase of wealth as a lamentable evil, he seems to have had very serious misgivings of both. In fact, in the Dedication, he admits that he has little or no proof— certainly none from Ireland — nothing but iifs own conviction that what he writes is true, while he feels and acknowledges that the weight of intelligent opinion is against him. As a matter of fact, there was no depopula- INTRODUCTION. VII tion going on at the time, but the number of inhabitants was increasing more rapidly than in any preceding century. It was probably true that in a few solitary instances, gen- tlemen desirous of extending their parks or pleasure grounds, had removed, perhaps evicted with seeming vio- lence, some of their tenants. It is a matter of history that one General Napier did this near Lissoy during the poet's childhood ; and, doubtless, recollections of the hardships endured by some of these tenaixi:,, had grown big with the lapse of time, and, it may be, were strengthened by re- ports of one or two similar cases, so that he really believed that both in Ireland and in England such tyranny and suffering were general. Nor was he alone in thinking that the tenantry of his native country nad their grievan- ces nor yet the first whose muse has been inspired with this theme ; but he mistakes a few solitary cases for a general social tendency. He errs again in attributing this supposed depopulation to the growth of commerce. That wealth had long been rapidly increasing, particularly in ,he large towns and cities, is one of the most patent facts of the history of the time ; but when the poet regards the increase of wealth and depopulation as cause and effect, he is once more entirely astray. It is now a recognised principle that the richer a country is the more labor it is able to employ and the greater number of people it can sustain. And it is somewhat remarkable that at the very time when Goldsmith was clothing this false theory in so pleasing a poetic garb, Adam Smith was engaged upon his great work, The Wealth of Nations^ in which the re- lations between capital and labor were first correctly set \-v^ I Vlll INTRODUCTION. forth. Again, the outburst of sympathy in which h^ pictures the expatriated wanderers " taking a long fare- well '* of their native shore, leads him to so exaggerate the trials and privations of their new home " beyond the western main *' as to cast an air of unreality over the clos- ing scenes of the poem. So much for the facts and the reasonings. Of the ar- tistic structure. Lord Macaulay tells us that " More dis- cerning judges, however, while they admire the beauty of the details, are shocked by one unpardonable fault which pervades the whole. A poet may easily be pardoned for reasoning ill ; but he cannot be pardoned for describing ill, for observing the world in which he lives so carelessly that his portraits beai no resemblance to the originals, for exhibiting as copies from real life monstrous combinations of things which never were and never could be found to- gether. What would be thought of a painter who should mix August and January in one landscape, who should introduce a frozen river into a harvest scene ? Would it be a sufficient defence of such a picture to say that every part was exquisitely colored, that the green hedges, the apple-trees loaded with fruit, the v^aggons reeling un- der the yellow sheaves, and the sun-burned reapers wip- ing their foreheads, were very fine, and that the ice and the boys sliding were also very fine ? To such a picture the * Deserted Village' bears a great resemblance. It is made up of incongruous parts. The Village in its happy days is a true Englibh village. The Village in its decay is an Irish village. The felicity and the misery which Goldsmith has brought close together belong to two dif- IKTRRODUCTIOK. It ferent countries ; and to two different stages in the pro- gress of society. He had assuredly never seen in his na- tive island such a rural paradise, such a seat of plenty, content and tranquillity, as his * Auburn.' He had as- suredly never seen in England all the inhabitants of such a paradise turned out of their homes in one day and forced to emigrate in a body to America. The hamlet he had probably seen in Kent j the ejectment he had probably seen in Munster : but, by joining the two, he has produced something which never was and never will be seen in any part of the world." Of this censure, Mr. Black com- pletely disposes. He says : **This criticism is ingenious and plausible, but it is unsound, for it happens to over- look one of the radical facts of human nature — the mag- nifying delight of the mind in what is long remembered and remote. What was it that the imagination of Gold, smith, in his life-long banishment, could not see when he looked back to the home of his childhood, and his early friends and the sports and occupations of his youth? Lissoy was no doubt a poor enough Irish village ; and perhaps the farms were not too well cultivated ; and per- haps the village preacher who was so dear to all the coun- try round had to administer many a thrashing to a certain graceless son of his ; and perhaps Paddy Byrne was some- thing of a pedant ; and no doubt pigs ran over the * nice- ly sanded floor' of the inn ; and no doubt the village statesmen occasionally indulged in a free fight. But do you think that was the Lissoy that Goldsmith thought of in his dreary lodgings in Fleet-street Courts? No : It was the Lissoy where the vagrant lad had first seen the * prim- L.in , f!^ I ' ' i '( -^: r 1 : t INTRODUCTION. rose peep beneath the thorn ; ' where he had Hstened to the mysterious call of the bittern by the unfrequented river ; it was a Lissoy still ringing with the loud laughter of young people in the twilight hours ; it was ? Lissoy for- ever beautiful, and tender, and far away. The grown-up Goldsmith had not to go to any Kentish village for a model ; the familiar scenes of his youth, regarded with all the wistfulness and longing of an exile, became glorifi- ed enough. * If I go to the Opera where Signora Col- omba pours out all the mazes of melody/ he writes to Mr. Hodson, * I sit and sigh for Lissoy's fireside, and yoknny Armstrong's Last Good Night from Peggy Golden.' " After all, it is neither the plan nor the theorizing of the poem that gives it such force and beauty. The reader is careless to enquire whether its facts are facts or its rea- soning consequent, but he lingers with rapt delight over the inimitable description of the Village in its undimmed beauty and " humble happiness," warms with anger, as the poet rouses him against the ruthless destroyei of these scenes of peasant bliss, melts into tears at the distress of its exiled sons, curses that luxury which can be purchased only at the cost of so much woe, and turns with sadness from the desolate prospect whence poetry and the rural virtues have fled. In these winning strains the poet has confined himself within narrow limits, but within these limits he is supreme. The tenderness, pathos and grace touch and charm the universal heart, as it listens with rapture to this ** portion of the music of the great hymn of nature." No lofty flights of imagination, no strong appeals to the judgment INTRODUCTION. 3d dazzle or bewilder the reader, but a gentle voice speaks directly to his heart in tones that never fail to awaken his sympathy. Then again, the skilful manner in which the whole is brought out claims the highest admiration. How lan- guage, so simple and unadorned, can appear so rich and mellow, how it can convey sentiments so tender, and set forth pictures so clear and full, how it can be rendered so graceful, flowing and harmonious, none but Goldsmith could enable us to realize. There is much of the neatness and exquisite polish of the Augustan poets both in dic- tion and versification ;but there are, also, livelier touches of nature, tender feeling, greater earnestness and cordiality than these masters of artistic poetic excellence ever dis- played. His poetical canon did not allow him to be ** a rhymer who makes smooth verses and paints to our im- agination when he should only speak to our hearts," and thus led him to touch a cord that shall vibrate forever. 'ivU DEDICATION TO SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS. DEAR Sir. I can have no expectation in an address of this kind, either to add to your reputation, or to establish my own. You can gain nothing from my admiration, as I am igno- rant of that art in which you are said to excel ; and I may lose much by the severity of your judgment, as few have a juster taste in poetry than you. Setting interest, therefore, aside, to which I never paid much attention, I must be indulged at present in following my affections. The only dedication I ever made was to my brother, because I loved him better than most other men. He is since dead. Per- mit me to inscribe this poem to you. How far you may be pleased with the versificaiion and mere mechanical parts of this attempt, I do not pretend to inquire ; but I know you will object (and indeed several of our best and wisest friends concur in the opinion), that the depopulation it deplores is nowhere to be seen, and the disorders it laments are only to be found in the poet's own imagination. To this I can scarcely make any other DEDICATION. Zlll answer, than that I sincerely believe what I have written ; that I have taken all possible pains, in my country excur- sions, for these four or five years past, to be certain of what I allege ; and that all my views and inquiries have led me to believe those miseries real, which I here attempt to display. But this is not the place to enter into an in- quiry whether the country be depopulating or not : the discussion would take up much room, and I should prove myself, at best, an indifferent politician, to tire the reader with a long preface, when I want his unfatigued attention to a long poem. In regretting the depopulation of the country, I inveigh against the increase of our luxuries ; and here, also, I ex- pect the shout of modern politicians against me. For twenty or thirty years past, it has been the fashion to consider luxury as one of the greatest national advantages ; and all the wisdom of antiquity in that particular, as erroneous. Still, however, I must remain a professed ancient on that head, and continue to think those luxuries prejudicial to states by which so many vices are introduced, and so many kingdoms have been undone. Indeed, so much has been poured out of late on the other side of the question, that merely for the sake of novelty and variety, one would sometimes wish to be in the right. I am, Dear Sir, Your sincere friend and ardent admirer, Oliver Goldsmith. ttt,: • S? 'u mn - *■ * • '4 Sw Wh Wh Anc Dea Seat Hov Wh< How The The The The Fort How Whe And Led 1 Whi] The And THE DESERTED VILLAGE. Sweet Auburn ! loveliest village of the plain, Where health and plenty cheered the labouring swain, Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid, And parting summer's lingering blooms delayed ; Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease, 5 Seats of my youth, when every sport could please. How often have I loitered o'er thy green. Where humble happiness endeared each scene ! How often have I paused on every charm, The sheltered cot, the cultivated farm, lo The never-failing brook, the busy mill, The decent church that topt the neighbouring hill, The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade. For talking age and whispering lovers made ! How often have I blest the coming day, . 15 When toil remitting lent its turn to play, And all the village train, from labour free, Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree ; While many a pastime circled in the shade, The young contending as the old surveyed, 20 And many a gambol frolicked o'er the ground, 3it| J THE DESERTED VILLAGE. !■ \ \ And sleights of art and feats of strength went round ! And still, as each repeated pleasure tired, Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspired ; The dancing pair that simply sought renown 25 Hy holding out to tire each other down, The swain mistrustless of his smutted face, While secret laughter tittered round the place ; The bashful virgin's sidelong looks of love, The matron's glance that would those looks reprove. 30 These were thy charms, sweet village ! sports like these, With sweet succession, taught even toil to please ; These round thy bowers their cheerful influence shed ; These were thy charms — but all these charms are fled. , Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn, 35 ' Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms withdrawn j Amidst thy bovvers the tyrant's hand is seen, And desolation saddens all thy green : One only master grasps the whole domain, And half a tillage stints thy smiling plain. 40 No more thy glassy brook reflects the day, But choked with sedges works its weary way ; Along thy glades, a solitary guest, The hollow-sounding bittern guards its nest ; Amidst thy desert walks the lapwing flies, 45 And tires their echoes with unvaried cries j THE DESERTED VILLAGE. / I Sunk arc thy bowers in shapeless ruin all, And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall ; And, trembling, shrinking from the spoiler's hand, Far, far away thy children leave the lantL 50 111 fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, Where wealth accumulates, and men decay : [princes and lords may flourish, or may fade — ;A breath can make them, as a breath has made — But a bold peasantry, their country's pride, 55 When once destroyed, can never be supplied A time there was, ere England's griefs began, When every rood of ground niaintained its man ; 'or him light labour spread her wholesome store, fust gave what life required, but gave no more ; 60 is best companions, innocence and health, /And his best riches, ignorance of wealth. ill: But times are altered ; trade's unfeeling train Usurp the land, and dispossess the swain ; Along the lawn, where scattered hamlets rose, 65 Unwieldy wealth and cumbrous pomp repose ; And every want to luxury allied, ^ And every pang that folly pays to pride. 'Those gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom. Those calm desires that asked but little room, fo /^ THE DESERTED VILLAGE. Those healthful sports that graced the peaceful scene, Lived in each look, and brightened all the green, These, far departing, seek a kinder shore, And rural mirth and manners are no more. Sweet Auburn ! parent of the blissful hour, 75 Thy glades forlorn confess the tyrant's power. Here, as I take my solitary rounds, Amidst thy tangling walks and ruined grounds, And, many a year elapsed, return to view Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew, 80 Remembrance wakes with all her busy train. Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain. In all my wanderings round this world of care. In all my griefs — and God has given my share — I still lad hopes, my latest hours to crown, 8 Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down ; To husband out life's taper at the close. And keep the flame from wasting by repose. I still had hopes, for pride attends us still, Amidst the swains to show my book-learned skill, 9c Around my fire an evening group to draw, And tell of all I felt, and all I saw ; And, as a hare whom hounds and horns pursue. Pants to the place from whence at first he flew, THE DESERTED VILLAGE. i I still hrd hopes, my long vexations past, 95 Here to return — and die at home at last. O blest retirement, friend to life's decline, Retreats from care, that never must be mine ! How blest is he who crowns, in shades like these, A youtVi of labour with an age of ease ; 100 Who qjits a world where strong temptations try. And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly ! For him no wretches, born to work and weep. Explore the mine, or tempt the dangerous deep ; No surly porter stands, in guilty state, 105 To spurn imploring famine from the gate ; But on he moves to meet his latter end, Angels around befriending virtue's friend ; Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay. While resignation gently slopes the way ; no And, all his prospects brightening to the last, His heaven commences ere the world be past. Sweet was the sound, when oft at evening's close Up yonder hill the village murmur rose ; There, as I passed with careless steps and slow, 115 The mingling notes came softened fiom below ; The swain responsive as the milk-maid sung. The sober herd that lowed to meet their young, The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool. ■' ■' ': I ■f^ f. nu I 6 THE DESERTED VILLAGE. The playful children just let loose from school, 120 The watch-dog's voice that bayed the whispering wird, And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind ; These all in sweet confusion sought the shade, And filled each pause the nightingale had made. But now the sounds of population fail, 125 No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale, No busy steps the grass-grown footway tread, For all the bloomy flush of life is fled — All but yon widowed, solitary thing, That feebly bends beside the plashy spring ; 130 She, wretched matron — forced in age, for bread. To strip the brook with mantling cresses spread, To pick her wintry fagot from the thorn. To seek her nightly shed, and weep till morn — She only left of all the harmless train, 135 The sad historian of the pensive plain ! Near yonder copse, where once the garden smiled, And still where many a garden-flower grows wild ; There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose, The village preacher's modest mansion rose. 140 A man he was to all the country dear. And passing rich with forty pounds a year j Remote from towns he ran his godly race. Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change, his place : THE DESERTED VILLAGE. 1 145 Unpractised he io fawn, or seek for power By doctrines fashioned to the varying hour ; Far other aims his heart had learned to prize, More skilled to raise the wretched than to rise. His house wks known to all the vagrant train, He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain ; 150 The long-remembered beggar was his guest, Whose beard descending swept his aged breast ; The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud, Claimed kindred there, and had his claims allowed ; The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay, 155 Sat by his fire, and talked the night away, Wept o'er his wounds, or, tales of sorrow done, Shouldered his crutch and showed how fields were won. Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to glow, And quite forgot theif vices in their woe ; 160 Careless their merits or their faults to scan, His pity gave ere charity began. Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride. And even his failings leaned to virtue's side ; Bnt in his duty, prompt at every call. He watched and wept, he prayed and felt for all ; And, as a bird each fond endearment tries. To tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies, He tried each art, re])roved each dull delay, I6S 4.,J-i 11 1I-' I t? 8 THE DESERTED VILLAGE. Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way. 170 Beside the bed where parting life was laid, And sorrow, guilt, and pain, by turns dismayed, The reverend champion stood. At his control Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul ; Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise, 175 And his last faltering accents whispered praise. At church, with meek and unaffected grace, His looks adorned the venerable place ; Truth from his lips prevailed with double sway, And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray. 180 The service past, around the pious man, With steady zeal, each honest rustic ra\i ; Even children followed, with endearing wile. And plucked his gown, to share the good man's smile : His ready smile a parent's warmth expressed, 185 Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distressed ; To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given. But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven ; As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form, Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm, 190 Though round its breast the rolling clouds arc spread, Eternal sunshine settles on its head. Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way, With blossomed furze unprofitably gay, THE DESERTED VILLAGE. There, in his noisy mansion, skilled to rule, The village master taiight his little school. A man severe he was, and stern to view, I knew him well, and every truant knew ; Well had the boding tremblers learned to trace The day's disaster in his morning face ; Full well they laughed with counterfeited glee At all his jokes, for many a joke had he ; Full well the busy whisper, circling round, Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned : Yet he was kind, or if severe in aught, The love he bore to learning was in f^iulr. The village all declared how much he knew ; 'Tvvas certain he could write and cipher too : Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage. And even the story ran that he could gauge. In arguing, too, the parson owned his skill, For even though vanquished, he could argue still ; While woid. of learned length and thundering sound, Amazed the gazing rustics ranged around, And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew That one small head could carry all he knew. But past is all his fame. The very spot. Where many a time he triumphed, is forgot. Near yonder thorn that lifts its head on high, 9 195 200 205 210 215 10 THE DESERTED VILLAGE W Where once the sign-post caught the passing eye, 220 Low lies that house vf here nut-brown draughts inspired, Where gray-beard mirth and smiHng toil retired, Where village statesmen talked with looks profound, And news much older than their ale went round. Imagination fondly stoops to trace 225 The parlour splendours of that festive place : The white-washed wall, the nicely sanded floor, The varnished clock that clicked behind the door ; The chest contrived a double debt to pay, A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day ; 230 1'he pictures placed for ornament and use, The twelve good rules, the royal game of goose ; The hearth, except when winter chilled the day, With aspen bouglis, and flowers and fennel gay ; While broken tea-cups, wisely kept for show, 235 Ranged o'er the chimney, glistened in a row. Vain transitory splendours ! could not all Reprieve the tottering mansion from its fall ? Obscure it sinks, nor shall it more impart An hour's importance to the poor man's heart ; 240 Thither no more the peasant shall repair 'To sweet oblivion of his daily care ; .1^0 more the farmer's news, the barber'5 tale, No more the woodman's ballad shall prevail; THE DE.SERTED VILLAGE. U No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear, 245 Relax his ponderous strength and lean to hear ; The host himself no longer shall be found Careful to see the mantling bliss go round ; Nor the coy maid, half willing to be pressed, Shall kiss the cup to pass it to the rest. 250 Yes ! let the rich dciide, the proud disdain. These simple blessings of the lowly train ; To me more dear, congenial to my heart. One native charm, than all the gloss of art ; Spontaneous joys, where nature has its play, 255 The soul adopts, and owns their first-born sway ; Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mind, Unenvied, unmolested, unconfined. But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade, With all the freaks of wanton wealth arrayed, 260 In these, ere triflers half their wish obtain. The toiling pleasure sickens into pain ; And, even while fashion's brightest arts decv^y, The heart distrusting asks, if this be joy. Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen who survey 265 The rich man's power increase, the poor's decay, 'Tib yours to judge how wide the limits stand Between a splendid and a happy land. Proud swells the tide with loads of freighted ore, A [I'i < i\ I I;'!;- ^' 12 THE DESERTED VILLAGE. And shouting Folly hails them from her shore ; 27O Hoards even beyond the miser's wish abound, And rich men flock from all the world around ; Yet count our gains : this wealth is but a name That leaves our useful products still the same. Not so the loss. The man of wealth and pride 27S Takes up a place that many poor supplied ; Space for his lake, his park's extended bounds, Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds . The robe that wraps his limbs in silken sluth Has robbed the neighbouring fields of half their growth : His seat where solitary sports are seen, 281 Indignant spurns the cottage from the green ; Around the world each ntedful product flies For all the luxuries the world supplies : While thus the land, adorned for pleasure, all 285 In barren splendour feebly waits the fall. As some fair female, unadorned and plain, Secure to please while youth confirms her reign, Slights every borrowed charm that dress supplies. Nor shares with art the triumph of her eyes ; j 290 But when those charms are past, for charms are fi.ail, When time advances, and when lovers fail, She then shines forth, solicitous to bless, In all the glaring impotence of dress : THE DESERTED VILLAGE. 13 Thus fares the land, by luxury betrayed ; 295 In natue's simplest charms at first arrayed, But verging to decline, its splendours rise, Its vistas strike, its palaces surprise ; While, scourged by famine, from the smiling land, The mournful peasant leads his humble band ; 300 And while he sinks, without one arm to save, The country blooms — a garden and a grave. mi Where then, ah ! where shall poverty reside, To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride ? If to some common's fenceless limits strayed He drives his flocks to pick the scanty blade, Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide, And even the bare-worn common is denied. 305 V^i?, ."r-f^^ If to the city sped— what waits him there ? To see profusion that he must not share ; 310 To see ten thousand baneful arts combined To pamper luxury, and thin mankind ; To see each joy the sons of pleasure know, Extorted from his fellow-creatures' woe ; Here, while the courtier glitters in brocade, 315 There, the pale artist plies the sickly trade ; Her©, while the proud their long-drawn pomps display, There, the black gibbet glooms beside the way. The dome where pleasure holds her midnight reign, mm \k^A H.13 m 'f :• ! i 1 1 1 m I ; H THE DESERTED VILLAGE. 320 Here, richly decked, admits the gorgeous train ; Tumuhuous grandeur crowds the blazing square, The rattling chariots clash, the torches glare. Sure scenes like these no troubles e'er annoy ! Sure these denote one universal joy ! Are these thy serious thoughts ? Ah ! turn thine eyes Where the poor houseless shivering female lies. 326 She once, perhaps, in village plenty blessed, Has wept at tales of innocence distressed ; Her modest looks the cottage might adorn, Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn ; 330 Now lost to all ; her friends, her virtue fled, Near her betrayer's door she lays her head ; And, pinched with cold, and shrinking from the shower, With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour. When idly first, ambitious of the town, 335 She left her wheel and robes of country brown. Do thine, sweet Auburn, thine, the loveliest train, Do thy fair tribes participate her pain ? Even now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led. At proud men's doors they ask a little bread. 340 Ah, no ! To distant climes, a dreary scene. Where half the convex world intrudes between. Through torrid tracks with fainting steps they go, I: i THE DLSERTED VILLAGE. 15 Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe. Far different there from all that charmed before, 345 The various terrors of that horrid shore ; Those blazing suns that dart a downward ray, And fiercely shed intolerable day ; Those matted woods where birds forget to sing, But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling ; 350 Those poisonous fields, with rank luxuriance crowned, Where the dark scorpion gathers death around ; Where at each step the stranger fears to wake The rattling terrors of the vengeful snake ; Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey, 355 And savage men more murderous still than they ; While oft in whirls the mad tornado flies, Mingling the ravaged landscape with the skies. Far different these from every former scene, The cooling brook, the grassy-vested green, 360 The breezy covert of the warbling grove. That only sheltered thefts of harmless love. M Good Heaven ! what sorrows gloomed that parting day, That called them from their native walks away ; When the poor exiles, every pleasure past, 365 Hung round the bowers, and fondly looked their last. And took a long farewell, and wished in vain For seats like these beyond the western main ; 1 i6 THE DESKRTED VILLAGE. And, shiidderinj; still to face the distant deep, Returned and wept, and still returned to weep. 370 The good old sire the hrst prepared to go To new-found worlds, and went for others' woe ; But for himself, in conscious virtue brave, He only wished for worlds beyond the grave. His lovely daughter, lovelier in her tears, 375 The fond companion of his helpless years. Silent went next, neglectful of her charms. And left .1 lover's for a father's arms. With louder plaints the mother spoke her woes, And blessed the cot where every pleasure rose, 380 And iiissed her thouvhtless babes with marvy a tear, And clasped them close, in sorrow doubly dear ; Whilst her fond husband strove to lend relief In all the silent manliness of grief. O Luxury ! thou curst by Heaven's decree, 385 How ill exchanged are things like these for thee ! How do thy potions, with insidious joy, Diffuse their pleasures only to destroy ! Kingdoms, by thee to sickly greatness grown. Boast of a florid vigour not their own : 390 At every draught more large and large they grow, A bloated mass of rank unwieldy woe ; Till, sapped their strength, and every part unsound, Down, down they sink, and spread a ruin round, THE DESERTED VILLAGE. 17 Even now the devastation is begun, 395 And half the business of destruction done ; Even now, methinks, as pondering; here I stand, I sec the rural virtues leave the land. Down where yon anchoring vessel spreads the sail That idly waiting flaps with every gale, 400 Downward they move, a melancholy band, Pass from the shore, and darken all the strand. Contented toil, and hospitable care, And kind connubial tenderness are there ; And piety with wishes placed above, 405 And steady loyalty, and faithful love. And thou, sweet Poetry, thou loveliest maid, Still first to fly where sensual joys invade ; Unfit, in these degenerate times of shame. To catch the heart, or strike for honest fame ; 410 Dear charming nymph, neglected and decried, My shame in crowds, my solitary pride ; Thou source of all my bliss, and all my woe, That found'st me poor at first, and keep'st me so ; Thou guide by which the nobler arts excel, 415 Thou nurse of every virtue, fare thee Avell ! Farewell ! and, oh ! where'er thy voice be tried> On Torno's cliffs, or Pambamarca's side, Whether where equinoctial fervours glow, Or winter wrcp'j the polar world in snow, 450 M ", . li'lHai 18 THE DESERTED VILLAGE. Still let thy voice, prevailing over time, Redress the rigours of the inclement clime ; Aid slighted truth with thy persuasive strain j Teach erring man to spurn the rage of gain ; Teach him, that states, of native strength possessed, 425 Though very poor, may still be very blest ; That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay, As ocean sweeps the laboured mole away ; While self-dependent power can time defy, As rocks resist the billows and the sky. 430 _r^ NOTES. THE DESERTED VILLAGE. EPITOME. The ]'-oem opens with a description of the village and village life as they loom up in the recollection of the poet. Then fol- lows a picture of the village in its desolation and decay. This change has been produced by "trade's unfeeling train" that has invaded the land and driven out the happy peasawt life. Auburn. lOO, has fallen. All his life long, the poet had cherished the idea of spending his old age in the liome of his childhood ; but all that inclined him to return is gone. Yet he lingers over the "saddened green" to review in fancy its departed attractions, " the village murmur," the preacher and his flock, the master and his school, the iim and its forgotten statesmen ; but all are gone; their very "mansions" are no more. Still this rural happiness was far superior to the " toiling pleasure " of the great.. Moreover, splendor is not happiness, nay, the outward "pomp" of a country is an indication of its approaching ruin. But "grandeur" has not only occupied the country,'Tt has monopol- ized the city, too, so that the poor are entirely expatriated ; the inhabitants of "Sweet Auburn," with the rest, are forced into exile in the swamps and forests of America. 'J'he departure of the exiles from their home and . friends is then pathetically described, and Luxury cursed as the insidious cause of iiTf.ional ruin. These elegiac strains draw to a close, bewailing the fate of th.e devastated land which poetry also has forsaken for some distant clime, where she is to teach that riches are not hap- piness, and that a bold peasantry, not commercial prosperity, i«; the safe foundation of a nation's security. I Auburn. This soft and harmonious name (suggested bj Langton), composed almost entirely of vowels and litjuids, was probably chosen by the poet for the sake of its agreeable sound, 'i'here can be no doubt th.at, in the mind of (ioldsmith, it repre- sented some scene which was endeared to him by early associa- I 1:! mi 26 NOTES. i f tions, and by family reminiscences. Various attempts have been made to identify Auburn with Lissoy, near Ballymahon, in the county of Longford. Here Goldsmith's early years were spent. In the adjoining parish, where he himself was born, his brother Henry was for many years the humble and much- loved curate of a rustic but appreciative flock, and in this neighborhood lived Mr. Hodson, his brother-in-law, with whom he spen- seme two years after finishing hi^ college course. Doctor Strean, Henry Goldsmith's successor, by whom the earliest attempt to identify Auburn with Lissoy was made, in 1807, tells us: "The poem of the Deserted Village took its origin from the circumstance of General Robeit Napier (the grandfather of the gentleman who now lives in the house, within half a mile of Lissoy, and built by the General) having purchased an extensive tract of country surrounding Lissoy, or Auburn ; in consequence of wh'ch many families, here called cottiers, were removed, to make room for the intended improvements of what was now to become the wide domain of a rich man, warm with the idea of changing the face of his new acquisition ; and were forced, *with fainting steps,' to go in search of 'torrid tracts' and distant climes. This fact alone might be sufficient to estab- lish the seat of the poem ; but there cannot remain a doubt in any unprejudiced mind, when the following are added, viz. : that the character of the village preachef, the above named Henry, is copied from nature. He is described exactly as he lived, and his * modest mansion* as it existed. Burn, the name of the vil- lage master, and the site of his school-house ; and Catherine Giraghty, a lonely widow — • The wretched matron, forced in agfe for bread, To strij) the brook with mantling cresses spread,—' (and to this day the brook and ditches near the spot where her cabin stood abound with cresses), still remain in the memory of the inhabitants, and Catherine's children live in the neighbor- hood. The pool, 'the busy mill,* the house where 'nut-brown draughts inspired,' are still visited as the poetic scene ; and the ' hawthorn-bush,' growing in an open space in front of the house, which I knew to have three trunks, is now reduced to one ; the other two having been cut, from time to time, by persons carrying pieces of it away to be made into toys, &c., in honour of the bard, and of the celebrity of his poem. All these contribute to the same proof ; and the * decent church,' which I attended for up- wards of eighteen years, and which 'top* the neighbouring hill,' is exactly described as seen from Lissoy, the residence of the preacher." Quoted by Rolfe. NOTES. 2i the •e her •ry of Ihbor- irown id the lOUse, ; the •rying |bard, o the ir up- hill,' .f the By the etherealizing process to which poehy subjects its theme riiese circumstances became idealized as the poet affectionately viewed them throuirh the "dim distance" of long years of exile. As Mr. Forster remarks : " Scenes of the poet's youth had, doubt- less, risen in his memory as he wrote, minfrling with, and taking altered hue from, later experiences ; thoughts of those early days could scarcely have been absent from the wish for a quiet close to the struggle and toil of his mature life, and very possiblv, nay, almost certainly, when the dream of such a retirement haunted him, Liasoy formed part of the vision ; it is even possible he may have caught the first hint of his design from a local We-^tmeath poet and schoolmaster, who, in his youth, had given rhymed ut- terance to the old tenant grievances of the Irish rural po]nilation; nor could complaints that were also loudest in those boyish days at Lissoy, of certain reckless and unsparing evictions by which one General Naper (Napper or Napier) had persisted in improving his estate, have passed altogether from Goldsmith's memory." Villagfe. Lat. Villa^ a country-house. Hence originally the residence.and other buildings of the farmer, as well as the houses of his work-people. It is the general condition of the country that the poet intends to depict, but as particular instances strike us much more forcibly than general statements, poetry prefers a single object as its tiheme. For this reason one village is here selected, and its fate dwelt upon. 2 Cheered. Note the force of the past tense. This use of it is called Metalepsis, Cf. Virgil, ALn.^ ii. 38. ** Fuimus Troes, fuit Ilium." Swain. This word belongs chiefly to poetic diction. 3-4 Smiling;, parting;, lingering. Epithets in poetry are either essential or ornamental^ and a correct taste and nice dis- crimination in their choice add greatly to the pleasing effect which it is the object of poetry to produce. The delicacy displayed by Goldsmith in this particular, is one of the charms of his style. Parting = departing. Cf. 11. 171 and 363, also Gray's ^/t;^' 1. I : "parting day." 5 Bowers. A. S. hut\ a cottage. Contrary to the usual course, the meaning of this word has been raised. It has also become specialized, as lady's bower, 6 Seats, &c., the places in which he used to spend his time when young. 8 Each. Observe how frequently each takes the place of every. This is common in poetry. Account for it. 9 How often, &c, Thi^ figure of speech, which, by a ■^W^ II 11^ 22 NOTES. repetition of the same word or phrase, carries the mind back to the same idea, is called Anaphora. 10 Cot, farm, &c. An example oi Accumulation. See note on II. 3 4, regarding Goldsmith's epithets. 12 Decent, presenting a neat and respectable appearance. Lat. decens, comely. Cf. Milton // Pens. " Thy decent shoulders.'' Topt = crowned. 13 with. For parsing, some such word as furnished may be supplied. The preposition in such cases might be replaced by the participle having. 14 This line forms a complement of seats. Talking^ and "whispering. Note these well-chosen epithets. Age is an example of Metonymy, the abstract for the concrete. The abstract age and concrete lover, in the same line, give a pleasing variety. 16 When — play. This clause is adjectival to day. Remitting = ceasing for a time. Its, evidently refers io play, but from its position seems at first sight to refer to toil. 17 Train. Goldsmith has a great fondness for certain words, as train, piansion and smiling. 18 Led up = marshalled or arranged. Spreading tree. " An inseparable accompaniment of the ideal village green." Sankey, 19 Many a. This is a more than ordinarily difficult constnic- tion. Archbishop Trench in the nrsi cdicions of his Ettglish Past and Present y explained "many a man" as a corruption of ** many of men. " In later editions he quietly withdrew this state- ment. Many excellent grammarians, such as Fleming, Dr. Adams, Rushton, adopted his solution without due examina- tion. In early English, it was a irequent jiractice to emphasize the adjective by a change of position, as long a time, for a long time. In Layamon, I. 24 : ^* on moni are wiser {later text mani ane) ; monianes cunnes," ib. 39 ; of many a kind. Dr. Abbott in his liow to Parse, par. 2 1 8, says the regular construction for many a man has tried, would be many men have tried ; but this appears to have been confused with *' many times a man has tried." Hence he parses many as an adverb, modifying a or as part of the compound adjective many-a — vi\zxiy-ov\.t — A. S.^ mani-an. Other authorities regard many as an adjective, and the con- struction as inverted. See Mason, par. 93 ; Dr. Adams, par. 571 ; Angus, sec. 480 ; Rushton, pars. 281, 299-302. Pastime. See Trench's interesting remarks on this word in Study of Words f page 14. NOTES. 23 20 The young contending is in the nomii-mtivc absolute, forming an adverbial extension of circled. As brevity and terseness give strength to style, and force to description, poetry aims at the attainment of these objects by employing the absolujg construction, appositives and adjectives, instead of dependent adverbial and adjectival sentences. In this line, the contrast between the young and the old, and the part acted by each, is very pleasing. The athletic activity of the one, and the contemplative pride of the other, are agreeable manifestations o{ pcnocr and repose. 21 Gambol. Ital. ^^w^^?; Fr. /