New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1893-04-25
JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS.
SOME NOTES ON HIS LITERARY CHARACTER
ISrlCS.

ISIlCS
There was poetic Justice in the decree OF Fate
that the death of John Addington Symonds should
occur at Rome. or modern English men OF letters
he was perhaps the least OF all an alien within the
walls OF the Eternal City. 1t was not that he
had lived there long or that there was tie oil
nationality between him and the modern Italian.
His claim 10 Roman citizenship was splritua' anu
was based on his intense sympathy for the genius
of Italy. lie shared naturally and inevltaoN Iii
the moral fruits of the Reformation: no Eng I'h-
man could avoid thai; but the inheritance OF ms
nature was in many respects impr"snateI by quail
ties which fitted him TO be the historian OF the
Renaisssnce in the south. He eclectic fieYi-
ble curious: a classcist but one whose apprecla-
ton OF romantic art and literature, their essences
and their forms of expression was no less spon-
tancOus and sincere; and he was possessed 81 "a
sensuous aesthetic feeling which gave him his
closest point of contact with the cplclrean ctl-
ture of the period TO which he devoted the major
part of his labors His mind moved, Of course.
through channels which had been purified ana
anIplificd by the training and environment OF
modern scholar (aft~s> passing through Harrow he
was educated at Baltic. Iol'ege, Oxford and later
won Magdalen fellowship. but it remained in
peculiar harmony with the spirit of the Renaissance
and the student of his principal work. as indeed
of all his books is struck most by his intuitve
apprehension of the men Of the past. OF their
"milieu, and of their habit OF thought and ac-
ton. His sympathy gave him power as MS
torian He has not the iMuminativc magic, the
imaginative grasp of Carlyle, and he has not made
tie personalities of his heroes to live in his pages.
but he has comprchcnded those personalities ana
has therefore given his estimates OF what they ac-
conlplshed a more than temporary value Inc
soundncss of his criticism of Petrarch. for exam
pie, or of Celin is TO he traced between, II not
in the lines to his understanding of the nan and
of his point of view.
Some time ago in fragment Of autobiography.
Svmonds said =" have never been able to take
literature very seriously. Eifc seems 50 much
,rayer, more important, more permanently IL
tcresting than books, and it Is TO his strcng
feeling for the life Of past eras, not to pcdanc
interest in the accumulation of data and the dcduc-
ton of cut and dried theories thcrcfrom that
most of his writings and most of what is good in
them are due. From this healthy attitude springs
the great and lasting charm of the sketches OF
travel with which he filed several volumes,
Sketches in Italy and Greece, =" Italian Byways,
and Sketches and Studio, in Italy The Pera!ia
of the Renaissance, refer to of his happcst
moments is reflected in his essay the town
with a penetration into the unity of the tangled
life of the time and discriminating touch IN
the selection of the vital threads which make
the picture immensely instructive, rs We'll as enter
tanning 1t was the vitality IN them. their fresh
ness and point as records of the manners of the
time which produced them, which moved him to
translate two # the most useful and readable
Italian autoboeraphcs which have been rendered
into English those of BenvenutO Cellini and |
Carlo Gozzi.
r. shows the irony of destiny that Symonds
was not himself permitted 10 engage in the more
active pursuits of life and ambition. He travelled
much Since ! went TO Hanover as boy OF
thirteen" he has written, Il found that had
never spent more than three months in one place
But il was in search Of health as wei! rs OF
culture that he wandered over Europ". ami when
he settled at last in Dawes, som" fifteen years
ago, il in u state of health which only
fairly continuous residence at that high altitude
prevented from becoming serious much earlier
than the present year. His father, DR.. Adding
ton Symonds, leading physician in Bristol, where
the historian was born in $40, was powcress to
thoroughly strengthen his constitution He began
his career an invalid. 1t Symonds's belief
that his life in the Alps affected the character
of his writings In the preface To his Essays,
Speculative and Suggestive" published in 500 he
remarks that possibly my prolonged scciuSion
from populous cities and the society of intellectual
EQUALS and the peculiar influences TO
which those are subjected who spend a seven
months winter, year after year. among whi'r
snowdrifts and inhoopitablc, stormswcpt noun
tans have bred in me mystical habit of regard
ing mans relation to the universe Further on
he adds that for a student living un'icr these
conditions, the particular loses importance in his
range of vision" and the universal, little under
stood, hut powerfully felt, assumes asccnlcncy
over his magnation." A. far as these passages
bear upon the width Of his outlook they are
justified by his work. The whole trend Of his
reflections is 20 the conclusion that il Is only the
universal which abides His humarism ran deep,
and il was among the potenlalties of life and
art and literature that he exercised MS critical
functions. Ii is important 10 remember, now
ever that Symonds was distinctly critic. In his
mountain solitude lis faculties We're wrought TO
a pitch of CONSTITUENCIES which served him we'll in
the discussion of old questions, and were never
really impaired or given an arbitrary and obscure
turn by the mystical habit" to which ne rcvcrtS
IN his preface quoted from above-but nett her were
t!.ey inspired 10 acts of positive creatloA
Except for a number of volnncs of ver~ which
Is mature in thought and graceful III iorm-tiI"
work of IA writer who had good style, though h"
was not born styli-t-his legacy to Literature
embraces original work In the field OF re-
search and the sitting OF literary ani phlosophle
questions through q criticism which, II not adj
venturCus and experimenting. was nevertheless,
severely independent and fed by the resources oil
powerful intellect. the range of his interests was
extensive, and the product Of his investigations
important in both quality and volume. lie has
been charged with inaccuracy. and cspecillly in
connection with Lis greatest work. " The Rcnals-
sance in Italy In minor points the charge NAV
be subStantiatcd. Bat material questions his
premises are correct and his judgments sound. His
survey. compress d into seven volumes. of one of
the most crowded periods in the history OF Europe
has vet 10 he super cdcd il is the best liSorv
Of Tie Italian Renaissance in English, ana Us
merit is than relative, il is intrinsic. De
structiye criticism has discovered ~ errors of con
sequence in the Life of MichcaneclO Bu0naTr0ti.
with which, and "A vOlum" of essays " In fla" Key
OF Blue his career was terminated. In the han
ding of historical topics SvmOnds exhibits q min
Cling Of warm sympathy with high standard Of
criticism. Of insight and knowledge with informa-
ton OF sense of measure with taste for pie
turcsquencss. Scholarship las prOftcd by his
Renaissance in italy," Nv his fascnatinl study