The British Press; or, Morning Literary Advertiser.
London, England, 1825-10-20 00:00:00

M..

Tiff NIATRIWOXIAL Starr.—Matrimony bait often
been considered as a condition not well suited to the do-
mestic life of genius; it is accompanied by too many eso.,
barramments for the head and the heart. 11.ivr.r, and
Hours, and !less, and GtehoN, and An.sit
decided for celibacy. Such Lai been the state of the great
author whose tole occupasion is combined with passion,
aria shore happiness is hie fame—fame, which listeners
that of the heroes of the age, who have semettines honoure,l
themselves by acknowledging it.
Alen of genius rarely pass through the age of love with-
out its passion ; even their Dcli,is and Amu:Wits are often
the ',mauve of some real object. According to Sa•a-
raperilMee,

Ire AIL -
•• Neff, chnit tort torch • p.n Write.
Void his u.k were temper'] with lore'. 'girlie."
Laves Labour L.st, Act. it. cc. 3.
Their imagination is perpetually colouring that- pictures
of domestic happiness they delight to dwell on. Hr who
is so husband may sigh for that elevated tenderness which
is at once Iwstowel and received ; and tears may start in
the eyes of him who can become a child among children,
and is no father. These deprivations have usually twee
the concealed cause of the querulous and tendert melan-
chaly of the literary character. The real °erasion of
Sesestowa's unhappiness was, that early in life he had
been csptivateel by a young lady adepted to be both the
muse and the wife of the poet. Her mild graces were
soon touched by his plaintive love songs and elegies.
Their sensibility was too mutual, and heated foe some
years, till she died. It was in parting from her that he
firm sketched Isis Pastoral Btalad: Sbenstone hail the for-
titude et refuse eiserrimge ; hiss spirit could not endure that '
she should participate in that life of deprivations to
which be was doomed, by an inconehlerre union with
poetry and poverty. But he loved, and his heart was not
looked spin the lee-ef erelihsev. tie says, in a moment of
humour, " It is lotig sinee t have considered myself as
undone. The world will not ?ethers consider me in that
light entirely till I have married my maid." TIIOII9ON
met a reciprocal passion in his Ameade, while the full !en-
tireness of his heart was ever wasting itself, like waters is
a desert. via we have beets made little arquointeil with
this part of the history of the poet of the Seusens, I
give
big own d scription of these deep feelings from a 111311 U.
script letter written to Mallet. "To turn my eyes a
softer way, to you know who--shience sighs it to me.
What is my heart macie of? a soft system of low nerves,
too sen.inle for my quiet—capable of being very happy or
very unhappy ; I am afraid the last will prevail. Lay
your hand upon s kindred heart, anal despise me not. I
Lauer nut what it is, bet she dwells upon my thought in a
miugled sentiment, which is the sweetest, the most jell-
mately pleasing the soul can receive, and which I would
wide never to want towerds seine dear ()Nee' or another.
Tu hate always some secret starling idea to which one can
sill have recourse amidst the noise and nonsense of the
norld, and which nev.r fa Tor to touch us in the most ex-
quisite manner, is an art of happiness that fortune cannot
deprive us of. This may be called romantic ; but, what-
ever the cause is, the rifle' is really felt. Pray, when you
write, tell use when you saw hes, snd with the pure eye
of a friend, when you see her again, whisper that I am
her most humble servant." Even Port. was epamoured of
a " scornful lady ;" and, as 9,ollr:sox observed, " pol-
luted his will with female resentment." Jules/sex him-
self, we are told by Miss Seward, who knew hitn, " had
always a metaphysical passion for one Princess or other,—
the mimic Lucy Potter, or the haughty Molly Aston, or
the sublimated methodistic Hill Brothily ; and, lastly, the
emote charming Mrs. Thrale." Even in his advanced age.
at the bright of his celebrity, we hear his cries of lonely
wrese.beduess. " I want eve ry comfort ; my life is very
military and very cheerless. Let me know that I have vet
a fri. nil—let us be kind to one another." But the "kind-
ness" of distant friends is like the polar sun, too far re-
moved to warty. A footsie is the only friend the solitary
can have, because bee friendship is never absent. Even
the who have eluded individual tenderness. are tortured
by' an setting void in their fee linp. The stoic Ail:N/IDR,
is lib leeks of " Odes," has prnerved the history of a life
aliening in a series of Lis own feelings. One, entitled
" At Seutly,"closes these

tormeoroble Hoes:
Ile though no peculiar fair
Teaches with a Inver'. ears ;
Though the ;met nev desire
A eke Inissenal friandahip's omits,
Aare the palm et honest tame,
And the old heroic lyre ;
Though the de, have smooth' y gene,
Or so lettered leisure kno.n,
O► In said duty spent ;

at,' Sp,
Vet at OK in lonely breast
Smits ia vain for pellets rest.
Limapfishes for true contest.
If eves. • man of letters lived in a state Of energy
sad excitement which might r.!.se him above the atmo-
sphere of social love, it was sesursily the enthusiastic,
Inoue. Horns, who, solely devoted to literature and to
republicanism, was occupied in furnishing Europe end
An.eriat with editions of his favourite authors. He would
not marry, lest marriage should interrupt the lab-urn of
hie platonic politics. But he extraortlirary memoirs,
while they show an intrepid mitttl in a robust frame, hear
witness to the self-tormentor who had trodden Jogai the
natural bonds of domestic life. Hence the de. p " dtj e-
lion of hiaspirits ;“ those incessant inks, that lie has " no
one to advise, assist, or cherish those megnenimotts pur-
mite in him." At length he tetrtatetrinto the country, in
utter hopelessness. " fgo not into the country for atten-
tions to agriculture as such, nor attention' of interest of
any kind, which 1 have ever demised as such ; but as a
ward mac, to pass the remainder of a life in tolerable as-
nity and quiet, after having given up the flower of it, %..
tuntatily, day, week, month, year after year, sure. mire to
each other, to public service, and being no longer able to
sustain, in burly or 0ni.441, the labours that I have ChOSell
to go through without falling speedily into the greatest
disorders, and it might be inibeciiity itself. 'figs is not
colouring, but the evict plain troll,' and Gray's,
Poor moralt.t. and what art thou ?
A Whiny ft)
Thy jay. no glittering finale meets,
No hive haw thou of he. tied sweets.
Observe the errors and infirmitits of the greatest men of
genius in tbeit matrimonial connexiotts. MmLTux carried
nothing of the greatness of his null in the choice of his
tires; his first was the object of sudden fancy. He left
the metropolis, end unexpectedly leturnest a metrics! loan ;
untied to a woman of such unconrenial dispositions, that
the romp was frightened at the literary habits of the great
poet, found his home solitary, beat his nephews, and ran
away aileron single month's residence ! To this circum-
stance we owe his famous Treatise on IliPonv, and a party
(by DO mesas extinct), who, baring made as ill choict s in
their wires, were for divorc:ng as fast is they hail been
for marrying, calif?* therreelves Miltonists. Il'hen we
fi td that ADDIPON's fine taste in morals and in life could
sutfut the ambition of a courtier to prevail with Lima& to
ma a Countess, whom he describe:. under the stormy cha•
flICieT of tievand. who drove him cantemptuously into so-
Etude, and shottene.l hi. Jaya; that STEEL!, warts
and thenailess, was united in a cold precise" Mks Prue,"
as he calls_her, and from whom he never parted without
bickering"; in all these eases we tenure the great men,
nut flair wives. Kermit'v has honestly confessed his
error; he had united liinisdf to a low illiterate woman--
and when he retry:tell into solitude, he felt the weight
*Lich he carried with hi e. He laments that he had not
educatell his wife: " In a docile age. I could have adorned
her mind with talents and knoarletk;e which would have
more closely uuitrd u, in retirement. We should not then
have felt the intolerable tedium of a bete-s.tete • it is in
solitude one feels the adventeee of li% or with another who
can Thus Rousseau confera24 the fatal error, and
indicates the right principle.
Built sea ni nut absolutely nee-airy for the domestic
happiotss of the•literary character, that his wife should
be a literary woman. The lady of it-ILI-6ND was a very!
pleasing domestic petrol', 'du; without reeding her hus•
band's traria, knew he was a great povt. Wieland was
alts to exercise his imagination in a Sort of angry &demo-
that and bitter amplifications, and the writer of this ac-

w,~ot, iii

assures us, " that usauy of

Ilia fulicitin of diction were thus struck out at a heat:"
Juries thi, influent operation of his genius, the placable
railer of I.a. Wieland overcame the orgasm of the Ga-
elic Lard, mfrely hp her admiration antf her patience.
WI ea tie burst was over, Witland hinrelf was so