Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

CHAPTER V.

THE EIGHTEENTH AND NINETEENTH CENTURIES.

THE first part of this period extends from the accession of Anne to the close of the first French Revolution-from Pope to Cowper, from Addison to Burke, from De Foe to Walter Scott. At the beginning of the last century the chief foreign influence was French; towards the end that of German literature began to be felt.

The present century is remarkable for the revival of a taste for our older literature, for critical study, and for immense activity in all departments.

[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

138. Daniel de Foe, 1661-1731. (Handbook, pars. 405, 515.)

The Plague at Blackwall.

Much about the same time I walked out into the fields towards Bow, for I had a great mind to see how things were managed in the river, and among the ships; and as I had some concern in shipping, I had a notion that it had been one of the best ways of securing one's self from the infection, to have retired into a ship; and musing how to satisfy my curiosity in that point, I turned away over the fields, from Bow to Bromley, and down to Blackwall, to the stairs that are there for landing or taking water.

Here I saw a poor man walking on the bank or sea-wall, as they call it, by himself. I walked awhile also about, seeing the houses all shut up; at last I fell into scme talk, at a distance, with this poor man. First I asked him how people did there-abouts? Alas! sir, says he, almost desolate; all dead or sick here are very few families in this part, or in that village, pointing at Poplar, where half of them are not dead already, and the rest sick. Then pointing to one house, There they are all dead, said he, and the house stands open; nobody dares go into it. A poor thief, says he, ventured in to steal something, but he paid dear for his theft, for he was carried to the churchyard too, last night. Then he pointed to several other houses. There, says he, they are all dead, the man and his wife and five children. There, says he, they are shut up; you see a watchman at the door, and so of other houses. Why, said I, what do you do here all alone? Why, says he, I am a poor desolate man; it hath pleased God I am not yet visited, though my family is, and one of my children dead. How do you mean then, said I, that you are not visited? Why, says he, that is my house, pointing to a very little low boarded house, and there my wife and two poor children live, said he, if they may be said to live; for my wife and one of the children are visited, but I do not come at them. And with that word I saw the tears run very plentifully down his face; and so they did down mine too, assure you.

But, said I, why do you not come at them? How can you abandon your own flesh and blood? Oh, sir, says he, the Lord forbid; I do not abandon them; I work for them as much as I am able; and, blessed be the Lord, I keep them from want. And with that I observed he lifted up his eyes to heaven with a coun

tenance that presently told me I had happened on a man that was no hypocrite, but a serious, religious, good man; and his ejaculation was an expression of thankfulness, that, in such a condition as he was in, he should be able to say his family did not want. Well, said I, honest man, that is a great mercy, as things go now with the poor. But how do you live then, and how are you kept from the dreadful calamity that is now upon us all? Why, sir, says he, I am a waterman, and there is my boat, says he, and the boat serves me for a house; I work in it in the day, and I sleep in it in the night, and what I get I lay it down upon that stone, says he, showing me a broad stone on the other side of the street, a good way from his house; and then, says he, I halloo and call to them till I make them hear, and they come and fetch it.

Well, friend, said I, but how can you get money as a waterman? Does anybody go by water these times? Yes, sir, says he, in the way I am employed there does. Do you see there, says he, five ships lie at anchor? pointing down the river a good way below the town; and do you see, says he, eight or ten ships lie at the chain there, and at anchor yonder? pointing above the town. All those ships have families on board, of their merchants and owners, and such like, who have locked themselves up, and live on board, close shut in, for fear of the infection; and I tend on them to fetch things for them, carry letters, and do what is absolutely necessary, that they may not be obliged to come on shore; and every night I fasten my boat on board one of the ship's boats, and there I sleep by myself; and blessed be God 1 am preserved hitherto... I came only now to call my wife, and hear how my little family do, and give them a little money which I received last night. My wife has answered that she cannot come out yet; but in half an hour she hopes to come and I am waiting for her. Poor woman, says he, she is brought sadly down; she has had a swelling, and it is broke, and I hope she will recover, but I fear the child will die; but it is the Lord! Here he stopt, and wept very much.

[ocr errors]

Well, honest friend, said I, thou hast a sure comforter, if thou hast brought thyself to be resigned to the will of God; he is dealing with us all in judgement.

Oh, sir, says he, it is infinite mercy if any of us are spared; and who am I, to repine? The Great Plague in London

The True-Born Englishman. A Satire.
Wherever God erects a house of prayer,
The Devil always builds a chapel there:
And 'twill be found upon examination
The latter has the largest congregation:
For ever since he first debauch'd the mind,
He made a perfect conquest of mankind.
Then let us boast of ancestors no more,
Or deeds of heroes done in days of yore,
In latent records of the ages past,

Behind the rear of time, in long oblivion plac'd;
The fame of families is all a cheat,

It's personal virtue only makes us great;

A hieroglyphic state-machine

Condemned to punish Fancy in.

On the Pillory.

139. Richard Bentley, 1662-1742. (Handbook, pars. 372, 462.) The Free Thinker-a taste of his Quality.

[ocr errors]

Our author to give us a taste of his sufficiency sets out with this sentence: As none,' says he, but artificial designing men or crack-brained enthusiasts, presume to be guides to others in matters of speculation; so none who think they ought to be guided in those matters make choice of any but such for their guides.' Now besides the falseness of the propositions, here is a small figure in rhetoric called nonsense in the very lines of this sentence. For if none but designing and crack-brained men presume to be guides to others, those others, that make use of guides, must needs have them and no other. Where then is the choice? or what power is there of choosing, when there's no room for comparison or preference? As none, says he, but priests presume to be guides, so none make choice of any other guides but priests. As no member of the body presumes to see but the eye, so no man makes choice of any other member to see with but the eye. Is not here now an admirable period, with exact propriety of word and thought?

• Written in reply to Tutchin's' Foreigner,' an abusive poem, intended to inflams the cry against King William and the Dutch.

But to pardon the false connexion of his as and so, what are we to understand here by matters of speculation Why all speculation without exception, every branch of mathematics and all science whatever? for there is not one word preceding that restrains the sense to speculations in theology. So that by this man's reasoning we are to say thus: no man must take Euclid or Newton for his guide in speculation; they were designing men or crack-brained enthusiasts, when they presumed to write mathematics and become guides to others. As for our author, though he owns all arts and sciences must be known, to know any one thoroughly; yet if you will believe him, he renounces all guides and is his own master, self-taught. He is a great astronomer without Tycho or Kepler, and an architect without Vitruvius. And yet this mighty pretender has not broached one doctrine in all his book which he has not borrowed from others and which has not been dictated by blind guides ages ago.

But we'll indulge the man a little more, and suppose he did not mean speculations at large, but only in matters of religion. And then the sentence will run thus: That none else presume to be guides to others in speculative points of religion but either artificial designing men or crack-brained enthusiasts. Now the man is in his true colours; and though he blundered in the expression, this was the thought he endeavoured at. And by this we must infer that Erasmus, Grotius, and Bochart, and other great men that have wrote commentaries on the Bible, and presumed to be guides to others, were either crack-brained fools or designing knaves. And yet what is strange, these very men, with more of your own nation, the Chillingworths, the Cudworths, the Tillotsons, are honoured in other parts of his book and recommended as free-thinkers. What inconsistence is this! ... What he here prescribes to others we must take for his own method; he defies all guides and interpreters; he disclaims all assistance; he'll decide upon all points freely and supremely by himself; without furniture, and without proper materials. And, to speak freely, one would guess, by his crude performance, that he's as good as his word.

Remarks upon a late Discourse of Free Thinking, by
Phileleutherus Lipsiensis, 1743. § I.

« AnteriorContinuar »