Part 16 (2/2)

WILLIAM GodWIN

William Godas one of those hom Mary renewed her acquaintance

The impression they now made on each other was very different from that which they had received in the days when she was still known as Mrs

Wollstonecraft Since he was no less faood fortune to make the last year of her life happy, and by his love to compensate her for her first wretched experience, a brief sketch of his life, his character, and his work is here necessary It is only by knohat manner of man he was, and what standard of conduct he deduced from his philosophy, that his relations to her can be fairly understood

William Godwin, the seventh child of thirteen, was the son of a Dissenting eshi+re He came on both sides of respectable middle-class faymen, the one a Methodist preacher, the other a Dissenter His father was awas disapprobation of the Church of England, and whose ”creed was so puritanical that he considered the fondling of a cat a profanation of the Lord's day” Mrs Godwin in her earlier years was gay, too ht, but after her husband's death she joined a Methodistical sect, and her piety in the end grew into fanaticism A Miss Godwin, a cousin, who lived with the fareatest influence over William Godhen he was a h her he learnt soious principles were severely Calvinistic, and these she impressed upon him at the same time

His first school-mistress was an old woave hihth year, an intie of the Bible The inevitable consequence of this training was that religion becaht Thanks to his cousin, however, and to his natural cleverness and aotry by his interest in wider subjects, though they were for e he had, as he says of himself, developed an insatiable curiosity and love of distinction One of his later tutors was Mr Samuel Newton, an Independent minister and a follower of Sandeman, ”a celebrated north country apostle, who, after Calvin had damned ninety-nine in a hundred ofninety-nine in a hundred of the followers of Calvin”

Godwin remained some years with him, and was so far influenced by his doctrines, that when, later, he sought ad institution, he was refused, because he seens of Sandee; and here, in his twenty-third year, he finished his religious and secular education During these years his leading inspiration had been a thirst after knowledge and truth

This was in 1778 Upon leaving college he began his career ashis religious vieere much modified His search for truth led hio In 1781, when he was fulfilling the duties of his profession at Stowan to read the French philosophers, and by them his faith in Christianity was seriously shaken

1783 was the last year in which he appeared in the pulpit He gave up the office and went to London, where he supported hi In the course of a short time he dropped the title of Reverend and eious associations

His first literary as the ”Life of Lord Chatham,” and this was followed by a defence of the coalition of 1783 He then obtained regular elish Review,” published by Murray in Fleet Street, wrote several novels, and became a contributor to the ”Political Herald”

He was entirely dependent upon his writings, which fact accounts for the variety displayed in them His chief interest was, however, in politics

He was a Liberal of the most pronounced type, and his articles soon attracted the attention of the Whigs His services to that party were considered so valuable that when the above-h Sheridan, proposed to Godwin that he should edit it, the whole expense to be paid from a fund set aside for just such purposes But Godwin declined By accepting he would have sacrificed his independence and have beco to sell himself

He seems at one time to have been ambitious to be a Member of Parliament, and records with evident satisfaction Sheridan's rerity again proved a stues which Whigs as well as Tories silently countenanced Honesty was his besetting quality quite as much as it was Mary's He was unfit to take an active part in politics; his sphere of as speculative

He was the foreland of Rousseau, Helvetius, and the other Frenchmen of their school He was one of the ”French Revolutionists,” so called because of their sympathy with the French apostles of liberty and equality; and at their s he met such men as Price, Holcroft, Earl Stanhope, Horne Tooke, Geddes, all of who his co-operation Thohts of Man” was submitted to him, to receive his somewhat qualified praise, before it was published He was one of the leading spirits in developing the radicalis the way for that of the present day; and the influence of his writings over eneration was enormous Indeed, it can hardly now be ned and published in papers and periodicals, has been lost

He was always on the alert in political ood and to proe arrims whose ambition is to ”ht” In 1791 he wrote an anonymous letter to Fox, in which he advanced the sentiave expression in his ”Political Justice,” his principal work In his autobiographical notes he explains:--

”Mr Fox, in the debate on the bill for giving a new constitution to Canada, had said that he would not be the man to propose the abolition of a House of Lords in a country where such a poas already established; but as little would he be the man to recommend the introduction of such a pohere it was not This was by no means the only public indication he had sho deeply he had drank of the spirit of the French Revolution The object of the above-mentioned letters [that is, his own to Fox, and one written by Holcroft to Sheridan] was to excite these two illustrious ravely and inflexibly in the career on which they had entered I was strongly i circureat and happy iht be achieved under such auspices without anarchy and confusion I believed that ies es should be effected under the conduct of the best and most competent leaders”

This brief note explains at once the two leading doctrines of his philosophy: the necessity of change, and the equal i it His political creed was, paradoxical as thissince given up the actual faith in which he was born and trained; after going through successive stages of Sandemanianism, Deism, and Socinianism, he had, in 1787, become a ”complete unbeliever;” but he never entirely outlived its influence This was of a twofold nature It taught him to question the sanctity of established institutions, and it crushed in hi passion and eh a radical as he Paine's or Holcroft's conceptions of human freedom were like forms of slavery compared to his broad, exhaustive theories But, on the other hand, there never was a more earnest advocate of moderation Burke and the French royalists could not have been more eloquent opponents of violent measures of reform than he was Towards the end of the last century it was easier for a Dissenter, who had already overthrown one barrier, than for the orthodox, to rebel against existing social and political laws and customs From the belief that freedoland was necessary to true piety, it was but a step to the larger faith that freedoovernment and society was indispensable to virtue Godwin, after he ceased to be a religious, became a political and social Dissenter In his zeal for the liberty of hu less than the destruction of all human laws French Republicans deovern them, declared there should be none whatsoever ”It e,” Mrs Shelley writes, ”that any one should, in the sincerity of his heart, believe that no vice could exist with perfect freedom, but my father did; it was the very basis of his system, the very keystone of the arch of justice, by which he desired to knit together the whole human family”

His ultra-radicalise and startling conclusions, and these he set before the public in his ”Political Justice,” the first book he published under his own nareat sensation It must be ranked as one of the principal factors in the developht A short explanation of the doctrines eht on his subsequent relations to Mary, as well as on his own character The foundation of the arguments he advances in this book is his belief in the efficacy of reason in the individual as a guide to conduct He thought that, if each hu were free to act as he chose, he would be sure to act for the best; for, according to him, instincts do not exist Hethe present, ignoring the laws of heredity A s Virtue and vice are the result not of innate tendencies, but of external circumstances

When these are perfected, evil will necessarily disappear from the world

He had so successfully subordinated his own enores passion as aof human activity This is exeulation of a s He th of his affection for them, even if the individuals concerned be his near relations Supposing, for exa the life of a Fenelon and that of a chambermaid, he must select the forh the latter should be his otten in the calculations of reason Godwin's faith in the supremacy of the intellect was not lessened because he was forced to admit that men often do not act reasonably This is, he explains, because they are without knowledge of the absolute truth Show theht, and all, even theLogic is the eneration of mankind is to be effected Reason is the dynamite by which the monopoly of rank is to be shattered ”Could Godwin,” Leslie Stephen very cleverly says, ”have caught Pitt, or George III, or Mrs Brownrigg, and subjected them to a Socratic cross-examination, he could have restored them to the paths of virtue, as he would have corrected an error in a little boy's suht, can never know the truth so long as huood, bad, or indifferent, they are not free to reason, and hence their actions are deprived of their only legiti from these premises, his belief in the necessity of the abolition of all foreical Had he confined hi his convictions, his conclusions would not have been so startling

English accusto, he unhesitatingly defined particular instances by which he illustrated the truth of his teaching, thusthe ends he hoped to achieve clearer to his readers He boldly advanced the substitution of an appeal to reason for punishment in the treatment of criminals, and this at a time when such a doctrine was considered treason He declared that any article of property justly belongs to those who most want it, ”or to whom the possession of it will be e law seely immoral part of his philosophy He assailed theoretically an institution for which Mary Wollstonecraft had practically shown her disapprobation His reasoning in this regard is curious, and reveals the little importance he attached to passion He disapproved of the ht that two people who are bound together by it are not at liberty to follow the dictates of their ownin accordance with pure reason Free love or a system of voluntary divorce would be less immoral, because in either of these cases men and women would be self-ruled, and therefore could be relied upon to do what is right Besides, according to his ideal of justice in the s to whomsoever most needs him or her, irrespective of any relations already formed It follows naturally that the children born in a community where these ideas are adopted are to be educated by the state, and ht froht of reason Godwin, like so uments upon abstract principles, and failed to seek concrete proofs He built up a structure beautiful in theory, but iher order of being An enthusiast, despite his calmness, he looked forward to the time when death would be an evil of the past, and when no new men would be born into the world He believed that the day would come when ”there will be no war, no criovernuish, melancholy, nor resentood of all” Hu that his book made a stir in the political world

None of the Revolutionists had delivered themselves of such ultra-revolutionary sentih treason for ance that saved hih he accounted for it in another way ”I have frequently,” Mrs Shelley explains, ”heard my father say that 'Political Justice' escaped prosecution froeneral acquisition Pitt observed, when the question was debated in the Privy Council, that 'a three-guinea book could never do s to spare'” Godwin purposely published his work in this expensive for he would keep it from the multitude, whose passions he would have been the last to arouse or to stihtened to encourage abrupt innovation _Festina lente_ was his motto The success of the book, however, went beyond his expectations and perhaps his intentions Three editions were issued in asthe class of readers to whom he immediately appealed, the verdict passed upon it varied Dr Priestley thought it very original, and that it would probably prove useful, though its fundamental principles were too pure to be practical Horne Tooke pronounced it a bad book, calculated to do harorous disapproval of it caused a final breach between Godwin and his old tutor

As a rule, the Liberal party accepted it as the work of inspiration, and the conservative condemned it as the outcome of atheism and political rebellion When Godwin, after its publication, made a trip into Warwickshi+re to stay with Dr Parr, he found that his fa public in the counties as well as in the capital, and he was everywhere received with curiosity and kindness To no one whoer

His novel, ”Caleb Williams,” established his literary reputation Its success almost realized Mrs Inchbald's prediction that ”fine ladies, irls will love to trey of mind you have evinced” He was at this time one of the most conspicuous andhis friends and acquaintances all the distinguished reat de the fact that he talked neither much nor well, and that not even theshort naps when in company But he was extremely fond of social pleasures His philosophy had made him neither an ascetic nor an anchorite He worked for only three or four hours each day; and the rest of the ti, and to the theatre, he being particularly attracted to the latter for was as omnivorous as that of Lord Macaulay Metaphysics, poetry, novels, were all grist for histhat greatest of all bores, a man with but one idea