Volume I Part 29 (2/2)
”Peer of words, Well known,--and honour'd in the House of Lords,-- Whose Eloquence all Parallel defies!”
who claims the throne of h.e.l.l as the worst of living men. His 'Poems by a Young n.o.bleman lately deceased' (published in 1780, after his death) may have helped Dallas in his allusion. He was the hero and the victim of the famous ghost story which Dr. Johnson was ”willing to believe.”]
[Footnote 3: 'The Critical Review' (3rd series, vol. xii. pp. 47-53) specially praises lines ”On Leaving Newstead Abbey” and ”Childish Recollections.”]
[Footnote 4: In 'Monthly Literary Recreations' (July, 1807, pp. 67-71), ”Childish Recollections” and ”The Tear” are particularly commended.
”As friends to the cause of literature, we have thought proper not to disguise our opinion of his powers, that we might alter his determination, and lead him once more to the Castalian fount.”]
[Footnote 5: 'The Anti-Jacobin Review' (December, 1807, pp. 407, 408) says that the poems
”exhibit strong proofs of genius, accompanied by a lively but chastened imagination, a cla.s.sical taste, and a benevolent heart.”]
[Footnote 6: _The Eclectic Review_ (vol. iii. part ii. pp. 989-993) begins its review thus:
”The notice we take of this publication regards the author rather than the book; the book is a collection of juvenile pieces, some of very moderate merit, and others of very questionable morality; but the author is a _n.o.bleman_!”]
[Footnote 7: Characters in the novel called _Percival_.]
88.--To Robert Charles Dallas.
Dorant's, January 21, 1808.
Sir,--Whenever leisure and inclination permit me the pleasure of a visit, I shall feel truly gratified in a personal acquaintance with one whose mind has been long known to me in his writings.
You are so far correct in your conjecture, that I am a member of the University of Cambridge, where I shall take my degree of A.M. this term; but were reasoning, eloquence, or virtue, the objects of my search, Granta is not their metropolis, nor is the place of her situation an ”El Dorado,” far less an Utopia. The intellects of her children are as stagnant as her Cam, and their pursuits limited to the church--not of Christ, but of the nearest benefice.
As to my reading, I believe I may aver, without hyperbole, it has been tolerably extensive in the historical department; so that few nations exist, or have existed, with whose records I am not in some degree acquainted, from Herodotus down to Gibbon. Of the cla.s.sics, I know about as much as most school-boys after a discipline of thirteen years; of the law of the land as much as enables me to keep ”within the statute”--to use the poacher's vocabulary. I did study the ”Spirit of Laws” [1] and the Law of Nations; but when I saw the latter violated every month, I gave up my attempts at so useless an accomplishment:--of geography, I have seen more land on maps than I should wish to traverse on foot;--of mathematics, enough to give me the headach without clearing the part affected;--of philosophy, astronomy, and metaphysics, more than I can comprehend; and of common sense so little, that I mean to leave a Byronian prize at each of our ”Almae Matres” for the first discovery,--though I rather fear that of the longitude will precede it.
I once thought myself a philosopher, and talked nonsense with great decorum: I defied pain, and preached up equanimity. For some time this did very well, for no one was in _pain_ for me but my friends, and none lost their patience but my hearers. At last, a fall from my horse convinced me bodily suffering was an evil; and the worst of an argument overset my maxims and my temper at the same moment: so I quitted Zeno for Aristippus, and conceive that pleasure const.i.tutes the [Greek (transliterated): to kalon].
In morality, I prefer Confucius to the Ten Commandments, and Socrates to St. Paul (though the two latter agree in their opinion of marriage). In religion, I favour the Catholic emanc.i.p.ation, but do not acknowledge the Pope; and I have refused to take the sacrament, because I do not think eating bread or drinking wine from the hand of an earthly vicar will make me an inheritor of heaven. I hold virtue, in general, or the virtues severally, to be only in the disposition, each a _feeling_, not a principle. I believe truth the prime attribute of the Deity, and death an eternal sleep, at least of the body. You have here a brief compendium of the sentiments of the _wicked_ George, Lord Byron; and, till I get a new suit, you will perceive I am badly cloathed.
I remain yours, etc.,
BYRON.
[Footnote 1: In Byron's ”List of historical writers whose works I have perused in different languages” ('Life', pp. 46, 47), occurs the name of Montesquieu. It is to his 'Esprit des Lois' that Byron refers.]
<script>