"Not in the gloomy cell recluse, "Then, lettered Pride! say, what thy gain, Of the following letter, there is so much plea sant humour in the first part, so very unlike the admirable piece of criticism in the second, that the reader, I think, will thank me for thus exhibiting to him the versatility of Dr Beattie's powers of genius, which could pass at once from the most playful to the gravest style of epistolary correspondence. Mr Boyd, to whom the letter is addressed, was the second son of the unfortunate Earl of Kilmarnock, and brother of the Earl of Erroll. * Vide Appendix, [C.] Although he had not attached himself to any learned profession, he had received a literary education; and, having resided long in France, he possessed a familiar acquaintance with the best writers of both countries. He was master, too, of no inconsiderable portion of humour, and had some turn for making verses; qualities which had the natural effect of producing a friendship ⚫ and correspondence between him and Dr Beattie, that lasted till Mr Boyd's death at Edinburgh, 3d August, 1782. LETTER XIV. DR BEATTIE TO THE HON. CHARLES BOYD. Aberdeen, 16th November, 1766. "Of all the chagrins with which my present infirm state of health is attended, none afflicts. me more than my inability to perform the duties of friendship. The offer which you were generously pleased to make me of your correspondence, flatters me extremely; but, alas! I have not as yet been able to avail myself of it. While the good weather continued, I strolled about the 3 country, and made many strenuous attempts to run away from this odious giddiness; but the more I struggled, the more closely it seemed to stick by me. About a fortnight ago the hurry of my winter business began; and, at the same time, my malady recurred with more violence than ever, rendering me at once incapable of reading, writing, and thinking. Luckily I am, now a little better, so as to be able to read a page, and write a sentence or two, without stopping; which, I assure you, is a very great matter. My hopes and my spirits begin to revive once more. I flatter myself I shall soon get rid of this infirmity; nay, that I shall ere long be in the way of becoming a great man. For have I not headachs, like Pope ? vertigo, like Swift ? grey hairs, like Homer? Do I not wear large shoes, (for fear of corns,) like Virgil? and sometimes complain of sore eyes, (though not of lippitude,) like Horace? Am I not at this present writing invested with a garment, not less ragged than that of Socrates? Like Joseph the patriarch, I am a mighty dreamer of dreams; like Nimrod the hunter, I am an eminent builder of castles (in the air.) I procrastinate, like Julius Caesar; and very lately, in imitation of Don Quixote, I rode a horse, lean, old, and lazy, like Rozinante. Sometimes, like Cicero, I write bad verses; and sometimes bad prose, like Virgil. This last instance I have on the authority of Seneca. I am of small stature, like Alexander the Great; I am somewhat inclinable to fatness, like Dr Arbuthnot and Aristotle; and I drink brandy and water, like Mr Boyd. I might compare myself, in relation to many other infirmities, to many other great men; but if fortune is not influenced in my favour by the particulars already enumerated, I shall despair of ever recommending myself to her good graces. I once had some thought of soliciting her patronage on the score of my resembling great men in their good qualities; but I had so little to say on that subject, that I could not for my life furnish matter for one well-rounded period; and, you know, a short ill-turned speech is very improper to be used in an address to a female deity. "Do not you think there is a sort of antipathy between philosophical and poetical genius? I question, whether any one person was ever eminent for both. Lucretius lays aside the poet when he assumes the philosopher, and the philosopher when he assumes the poet: In the one character he is truly excellent, in the other he is absolutely nonsensical. Hobbes was a tolerable metaphysician, but his poetry is the worst that ever was. Pope's " Essay on Man" is the finest philosophical poem in the world; but it seems to me to do more honour to the imagination than to the understanding of its author: I mean, its sentiments are noble and affecting, its images and allusions apposite, beautiful, and new; its wit transcendently excellent; but the scientific part of it is very exceptionable. Whatever Pope borrows from Leibnitz, like most other metaphysical theories, is frivolous and unsatisfying; what Pope gives us of his own, is energetic, irresistible, and divine. The incompatibility of philosophical and poetical genius is, I think, no unaccountable thing. Poetry exhibits the general qualities of a species; philosophy the particular qualities of individuals. This forms its conclusions from a painful and minute examination of single instances; that decides instantaneously, either from its own instinctive sagacity, or from a singular and unaccountable penetration, which at one glance sees all the instances which the philosopher must leisurely and progressively scrutinize, one by one. This persuades you gradually, and by detail; the other overpowers you in an instant by a single effort. |