New-York tribune., 1882-03-03
not overhauleds and keeLhaulea ekpbt$ Aiasfns
sitting with the binnaele on the capstans

Drifting down Mr.. Morleys pages we arc arrested
by statements which we doubt, as that when tho
drama was revived, after the Commonwealth. those
who tried to write blank produced usually prose
hacked into bad lengths, which was In no sense truo
of Shirley and Dryden, and only partially true o,
Davenant, as that Richardson. and Fielding anu
Smollett first gave dignity to the novel as dis'hoO
form Of English literature, when 1t really Deean
fifty odd years before Pamela Win Pooi
Aphra Behn's OroonOkoj rs that farsoh
Adams was Fieldings picture Of Chrisuan'
which is no more nor no less true than that Jesse
Rural is Bouccaults picture of Christian as thaV
Campbelps Pleasures Of Hope was published IN INC
last wear of tho eighteenth century, which 10 was
not unless the centuries end at University Colege
in the mines instead of the tens; as that Southey
held the Office of laureate for forty years. when MS
own figures In sight Of each other, prove that nc
held it only thirty years t1S13-lS43)-Mr. Morley
Is not fortunate with Southey and Byron, as we
have seen already; as that Wordsworth thirty years
ago 1s51l began by producing at Grasmere, with
additions, q new edition OF the Lyrlcal Ballads,
when his own figures, four pages further on, show
that Wordsworth died at Grasmere on the Odd Of
April, 1850; as that Lockhart was only forty-two
at the beginning of the reign of Victoria, when his
own figures within three lines of each other affirm
that he was forty -four 1881 S30 that LockharVs
Spanish Ballads are translations, when every
scholar mot Morleyan) knows TO the contrary; that
Wilson needed-as 1t is implied he d1d-the money
he obtained for his Isle of Palms to help pay Tor ms
wedding trip, when his fortune was not lost untll
three years later qs12-1S15; that Ainsworth
wrote Sir John ChivertOn, which is repeatedly
denied since his death-but Mr. Morley
knows; and many more trileS of the same SORT Out
much more mOnotOnOus.
And is this all1 BY no means, for, as we drht
Iii l. ot,,ra ara
quite as often by fecites as by infcl!c,es. Among
the former Is Alilton's wonder that any mans skin
should BE- grazcd by his writing the remark that by
the founding of The Tatler aud Spectator Steele
gave Addison to English literature; that Thomson
delighted IN sending his nouns abroad, each with
three Latin adjeCtivcs in attendance; that Blairs
Grave dwells far more on the mortality within the
churchyard than upon the spiritual life beyond IL;
that Jeffrey at nineteen had lost the broad Scotch,
but gained only the narrow English-the joke, how
ever is Lord Hollands; that Moore loved his wife,
but she was not invited to dine out with him; and
that Ainsworth's Jack Sheppard made house
breakers as Schle!'s play made robbers Ana
the latter is the almost entire silence about the
English lyrical poets Of EizabetRS time ana the
times of James and tho two Charles (the most
sparkling choir of singers that ever ivedl the al
most entire silence about the posts -Shakespearean
dramatiss, in verse and prose-Dryden, Congreve
Wychery, Otway, Lee, Rowe, Addison, GlDbon
FarquaT, Vanbrugh, and others of the SOCK ana
buskin the almost entire silence about such
writers as Cowley and Clarendon, Akenside, CHAT
terton, and the later and minor dramatists like
Coleridge. Maurin, Shiel. BeddOes, George Darlty
Miss Milford and many more; and the almost en-
tire silence about living poets. Not that some of
these writers and classes Of writers are not
mentioned somewhere, but that the men
4 nr,,lt
confusiug-snall needles in very large bundle Of
hay. II goes without saying but we say 1t, never
theess, that Mr. Morley writes freshly and frankly,
and often eloqucntly, about many great English
writers, as Bacon Milton, JonsOn, Dryden,
Southey Wordsworth, Wilson, De Quincy, and so
on and also that he has the most surprising apses
of reminiscencc, paralyscs of names, dates, ETC.,
superabundance of trivalities and niggardhness OF
solidities forgctfulncSs of persons, places and
numbers 1t is az if he wrote without books or
without reading them, trusting treacherous
memory, or as if his mind was wOol-gatheTlng. and
turning into a hundred byways at once. Shall we
say more Not much. Only this, that his book Is
the most valueless and valuable one that we ever
encountered remarkably, extraordinarily, stupen-
donsy GOOD and bad 1t will be a dark day for Mr.
Morley and Baron Tauchnitz when it is lndeXed.
We will indicate opinion OF Mr.. Morley
and his performances by two passages from the last
passages which he cannot certainly object, since
they contain his own Judgment upon two scholars
of his own stamp, one living, the other deceased
within the last forty years just about the time,
by the way, that Mr. Morley was practising the
healing art. 1t is to Mr.. +. j. Fumivall that he
paws his first disrespects. Mr. Fnrnivall who wrote
criioues for The Reader from 1868 20 1867, (Which
did not long survive an article in which Mr. L.
J. Furniva attacked Dr. Johnsons Preface to his
Io hel lief lat
by a modern editor" Which scores one for Mr.
Morley, and at least one for Us. Another score
for Mr.. Morley land possibly for us
is what he says about the elder Dsraeh.
and what, by inversion, we venture 10 say
of Mr. Morley: He persuaded himself in mild
way. that he gathering materials for a History
Of English Literature. and he mined diligently for
hidden treasures. But his heaps are unsitted and
the higher qualities of mind were little used III
bringing them together. Isaac D'lsraeli had love
of books beyond that Of trIAer. There is human
interest in each Of his scraps, and suggestiveness in
his manner Of grouping them. The books must
always be entertaining; and they may he occasion
ally useful TO student who will take the trouble,
by his own reading, to correct or verify, and by
lis own thinking TO get the light required
for a right seeing of any supposed fact In Isaac
DI,racl's account Of Gabriel Harvey, for example,
there is not a sentence without least in
it, expressed implied yet all is honestly based on
reading The errors come of reading without bal
ancing authorities, testing statements by known
facts, OF weighing evidence in any way. The lights
and shades of truth hard TO get, and when got
they take sharpness of effect, what the Ignorant
call cearness, from a story. Many man may be
said TO take great pains TO spoil his work Tor all
readers except the thoughtful. Isaac Dlsraehs
fault is really, perhaps, nseparable from the kind
I, II - bio htrf
the best books of their kind. If the strictest of
English scholars were so much of a magician that