The national Republican., 1867-08-30
sstional aepnblitau.
A Plea for Bachelors.

there. But, neglecting for the moment
the housekeeping aspect Of the question,
we venture to ask whether II be indispen-
sable for a man of literary faculty to be
q husband in order To attain his highest
development, or to achieve the most for
the world; whether, indeed, as good On
argument may not be made on this point
for the bachelor as for Benedict.
IfMilton married three times, and Shake
speare once, the latter enjoyed little con-
jugal felicity, and the former lived alone
during his productive years, Bacon and
Goethe married late in life. La Fontaine
married at twenty-six, but abandoned his
wife early in the honeymoon, and never
saw her again except on business. Moliere
suffered, says Voltaire, in the marriage
which he contracted at forty-one, twelve
years before his death, les degouts, les
amertumes ct quelquefois les ridicules,
quill await 81 souvent joues sur lie theater.
Beaumarchais, early in life, and years be
fore he wrote the plays upon which his
reputation rests, lost two wives, one Of
whom he was calumniously reported to
have poisoned. Addison, at forty-four,
three years before his death, married q
countess "who was no better" says Thacke-
ray. "thnn shrew and vixen"
Sterne complains that the presence Of
his wife stops the flow Of his ideas, and
finds inspiration in the society Of another
mans wife. Leasing did his best works
before he fell in love, or after his wife's
death, and was in state Of intellectual
torpor during his six years engagement
and one years marriage. The insanity of
Thackerey's wife made him practically q
MI ;a 90 a ntaot la.,a
Plato, warned by Socrates experience,
Aristophanes, Anacreon, Lucretius, Virgil,
Horace, Voltaire, Rousseau, Swift, Pope,
Goldsmith, Heine, Balzac, Beranger, Saint
Beuve, and in our own country Irving and
Thoreau, never married. In the kindred
arts, the great names Of Beethoven and
Michael Angelo, Of whom the biographers
assert not only that they never married,
but that they never loved in any but
Platonic sense, are enough to cite. OF
female writers, many Of the most eminent,
from Miss Austen, the excellent teller Of
domestic tales, 10 Miss Martineau, Miss
Cobbe, Miss Hewitt, and Miss Bremen,
never took husbands; while others, like
Miss Bronte, found that matrimony put a
needle between their fingers instead Of
the pen. Almost all the great writers Of
the middle ages were ecclesiastics, and Of
course celibates. And as marriage among
the Greeks was simply q housekeeping
convenience, the husband spending his
day and evening abroad, while the wife
sewed, cooked, and paid the bills, all the
Athenian poets and philosophers should
be accounted bachelors. A large proper
ton of the writer's whose works belong to
the same general class with those of Lamb,
the writers whose privilege it has been to
enliven, cheer and sweeten life, were either |
bachelors or unfortunate husbands. Hap |
py or not themselves, they have been the |
cause Of happiness to others, have reached |
the secret springs Of laughter and of tears, |
and by those touches Of nature which |
make the whole world kim have awakened |
the better selves Of their readers, and CON- |
municeted to them the love for their Iel-
low-beings with which their own hearts
were filled. The writings Of Goldsmith,
Irving and Lamb, abound in proofs that to
love women it is not necessary to be q
husband, that to love children it is not neces-
sary to be father and that we may "love
our brethren Of mankind" without being
bribed thereto by Wordsworths "dower OF
clustering charities"
Nor should the circumstance be over
looked, that single man has more time
than the head of family to devote to
literary labor-an important consideration
in all cases where writer either uuder-
takes to support himself by his pen, or,
being obliged to gain his livelihood by some
other means, can give only his leisure mo-
ments to the muses.. This is so true in the
latter class Of cases, that Dc Quincy main
tains that 1t is idle for literary man to
look for success unless he be able to make
literature exclusively his profession. And
De Quincy complains that Coleridge, who
supports the contrary thesis, avoids the
difficulty by domesticating his author with
o sister instead Of o wife-a view of the
case derived, perhaps, from the example of
Lamb, in whose home Coleridge was fire.
quent guest. But the pot Of an author
must be kept boiling, like those of other
beings and no ingenuity can prove the
superiority, in an economical point Of view,
of family cauldron over the bachelors
stew-pan. The married author who is not
in affluent circumstances, must write for
lLoney, or he must snatch an hour or two
from business or family for pursuit which
demands the conservation Of life. A
bachelor author, how ever poor, can make
bulit " CAlbls iiC lIOt ny
whether he ought not to follow some
honest calling by which to provide for
those who are dependent upon him.
There are two sides to the question. The
young man for whom the golden gates OF
love on golden hinges turn will not be dis.
suaded by reasoning or facts from entering
his paradise.
" He saw the distant gates Of Eden CLEAN,
And did not dream 1t was a dream"
The old bachelor, on the other hand
whose passions have cooled, whose faith in
the promised land has been shaken, turns
q deaf ear to the most enticing voice
Each may be right. The life which suits
Major Pendennis is not the life for Arthur
One man acts wisely in prelerring vine
and fig tree to his chance of laurel crown
Another acts as wisely in turning his back
upon household gods, and following Apollo
or even Mercury into the solitary places
Some men Of genius have been unable to
secure that tranquility of mind which is a
condition OF healthy literary activity else
where than in the family circle; others have
found 1t at their widowers fireside, and
others again in bachelors attic. Tastes
and temperaments differ. Wordsworth,
having enjoyed greater felicity in wedlock
than in housekeeping with his sister Dor.
othy, concluded that Lambs happiness
might have been promoted by similar
change in condition. But Lamb might