THE LONDON REVIEW, AND LITERARY JOURNAL, FOR DECEMBER 1803. QUID BIT PULCHRUM, QUID TURPE, QUID UTILE, QUID NON. Life of Geoffrey Chaucer, the early English Poet; including, Memoirs of his near Friend and Kinfman, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancatter. With Sketches of the Manners, Opinions, Arts, and Literature of England, in the Fourteenth Century. By William Godwin. Two Volumes. 4to. MR. R. GODWIN, the Author of this work, has, in his former productions, experienced a fate common to every writer who either is, or is fufpected to be, a violent partizan, in having them praifed and cenfured more than, perhaps, they deferved: for although political juftice may have been accufed of an endeavour to philofophize religion and fritter away morality; though the peculiar caft of the Author's mind, may have led him to delineate, with fingular ftrength and energy, characters, fuch as we hope never existed but in the effufions of wild and exaggerated fancy, and to difplay human nature in the worst points of view in which a heated imagination can place it; though he may have mounted the alchymical chariot of Geber, Friar Bacon, Bafil Valentine, Paracelfus, or Sandivogius, and from the emanations of a chaotic mind, a mind in which vifionary forms and ideal distortions meet, jottle, and counteract each other; like the figures difplayed by a magic lanthorn have magnified every object placed before the flame of his genius; yet, through the mafs of mingled purpofes which the tiffue of his various works have exhibited, we have frequently lamented that we could difcern the effufions of confiderable talents; we fay lamented, because it has appeared to us, that the genius we have difcerned has run wild, has branched into unneceffary exube rance, or, which is ftill worfe, has ftimulated its poffeffor to promulgate doctrines, and to endeavour to oppole and overthrow opinions and establish VOL. XLIV. Drc. 1803. ments which, having been fanctified by time, having, in the long period of different ages, been frequently examined, are, morally speaking, much more likely to be right than the new-fangled tyf tems, the vifionary and crude ideas, of political enthusiafts, whofe only chance for applaufe or admiration depends upon our ignorance of the mi nutie of their principles, and our dif regard to the confequences of their operation, which, we fear, has fometimes continued until we have had occafion to become acquainted with their tendency and extent, as we have had occafion to trace them to their fource, at the time we contemplated their dreadful effects. The effects of those doctrines, which many have agreed to mifcall philofophy, of which we conceive Mr. G was once fo ardent an admirer and to zealous a promulgator, we believe, because we hope, he now deplores as much as ourfelves. Under this impreffion, it gives us confiderable fatisfaction that he has fuffered the impulfe of an ardent and inquifitive mind to incline him to a new, and certainly, if fyftematically conducted, a far more useful and entertaining purfuit, and that he has, in confequence, produced another life of a Poet, venerable for his antiquity, till more venerable for his genius, whofe works, rough as the first numifmatical effays, are ftamped with traits of humour and character, fuch as are not to be found in thofe of the authors of Greece and Rome, and which, in many instances, are, from their peculiar caft of thought and mode LIT of of expreffion, indigenous to this country; of which, as well as of the higher effufions of his mufe, the more daring erratic and vifionary flights, we fhall have occafion to remark, as we proceed in our examination of thefe volumes. The Life of Chaucer, now before us, is preceded by a well-written preface, in which, we cannot but obferve, the Author makes a difqualifying bow to the reader that we hope is quite unnecefiary. However, if he has really "written a fuperficial work," which, glancing at its fize, we can fcarcely believe, we fhall, with our beft judg. ment, endeavour to fupply his defects, and to render the matter which might be borne away by its own lightness, by compreffion more folid. Mr. G., for we mean to begin our obfervations as many visitors do their converfation, on the very threshold, commences his preface with this just and appropriate obfervation: "The two names which, perhaps, do the greatest honour to English lite rature, are thofe of Chaucer and Shakfpeare Shakspeare we have long, and juilly, been accufomed to regard as the first in the catalogue of poetical and creative minds; and after the dramas of Shakspeare, there is no production of man that difplays more various and vigorous talent than the Canterbury Tales. Splendor of narrative, richness of fancy, pathetic fimplicity of incident and feeling, a powerful ftyle in deiineating character and manners, and an animating vein of comic humour, cach takes its turn in this wonderful performance, and each, in their turn, appears to be that in which the Author was most qualified to excel." We cannot agree with the Author, that "In reality the age of Queen Elizabeth was a period of uncommon refinen.ent." We know that it was an era of form and ceremony in the upper ranks of fociety, of fplendour and of learning even at Court; but we are of the opinion of Hume, that perhaps from the reftraints impofed on the people by the curbs and bridles of form and fate, from the burthen of pomp and the labour of learning, the relaxations were not over elegant. In fact, had the age poffefed that refinement which Mr. G. is inclined to below upon it, the works which he fo juftly admires would not have been produced. Refinement may render the furface of a Rasue more fimooth and refplendent; but, at the fame time, all the mafter ftrokes of character, all thofe harp nefies in the delineation of features which give a tone to the countenance, will be polished away. Nor can we, while we deny that "the age of Elizabeth was a period of uncommon refinement," allow that the times of Chaucer, even fo far as poetry is concerned, were times of barbarifm. Poetry, like painting, poffelles two properties, or, more correctly fpeaking, is compounded of science and art, imagination and execution. The excurfive flights of fancy, though clothed in language coarfe, rugged, and profaic, fhould no more be quoted as fymptoms of a barbarous age than the first rude sketches of painting be exhibited as indicative of a poverty of graphic genius, becaufe the only want in either is probably the habit which conftitutes the power of execution. "It was my purpofe" (fays Mr. G.) "to produce a work of a new fpecies Antiquities have been too generally regarded as the province of men of cold tempers and fterile imaginations." That is to fay, it is not always that metaphyficians and novelifts are fond of bruthing the duft and cobwebs off the records of the dark ages: yet we must hint to our Author, that thele cool beaded fellows, for whom he seems to have no great partiality, are very ufeful members of fociety. God for bid that we fhould ever become a nation of philofophers, or even of geniufes! Very different talents are required to review a work and to review an army, to fill a military or a literary magazine: this regards modern exertions: but if we were to hint to Mr. G., that we are obliged to antiquarians for all the elegance, well as all the learning, in this fplendid and wife metropolis, he might itare at the boldness of the affertion, though, after a minute's reflection, we think le would be convinced of its correctress. as "It was my wifh," he continues, had my powers kept equal pace with my trong inclination, to carry the workings of fancy and the fpirit of phi lofophy into the inveftigation of ages patt. I was anxious to refcue, for a moment, the illuftrious dead from the jaws of the grave, to make them pa's in review before me, to question their fpirits, and record their answers." (This was exactly the idea of Swift in his fcene of the Iland of Glubb dubdrib; dubdrib; perhaps both arofe from the cavern fcene in Macbeth: but fays Mr. G., (improving upon thefe Au thors,) I wished to make myself their mafler of the ceremonies, to introduce the reader to their familiar fpeech, and to enable him to feel, for an inftant, as if he had lived in the age of Chaucer." This defign, which is explained with confiderable ability, is certainly laudable; but we need fcarcely, by this time, hint to Mr. G., that it is as certainly fallacious. Lefs can be done to fafcinate the mind of a reader by lite rary, than of a fpectator by theatrical reprefentation. There is a bare poffibility that a fcene may, for a moment, delude, but a book never: yet we fear to his anxiety to bring every circumftance of the times to one point of view, we owe, in a great meafure, the extenfion of this work. The Author feems, by piling Pelion upon Olla, to have endeavoured to reach the clouds; yet when he had attained the utmost height, he finds them apparently as ditant as before; which unavailing effort is probably the reafon why he has been lefs copious upon the last fifteen years than the former period of the life of Chaucer;" though, in this refpect, we think that when the active fcenes of human existence have been defcanted on; when the mental faculties perhaps decline, and the corporeal certainly feek repofe; brevity is a beauty. We fhall clofe this account of the preface, by obferving, that the defire of the Author of exhibiting, in his true colours, the patron of the Bard, John of Gaunt, is certainly, if not too diffufely executed, not only laudable, but abfolutely neceffary. With refpect to the difficulties which Mr. G. encountered in his antiquarian refearches, they are fuch as we have all, in our turns, experienced. Perhaps they are lefs irkfome to thofe dull fellows which he fuppofes F.A.S.'s in general to be, than to men of his exuberance of genius, and, confequently, of fenfibility. Previous to our entrance upon the work, we are impeded with a differtation upon the period of the birth of Chaucer; in which, from the accidental circumftance of the Bard's being examined as a witnefs in a cafe of chivalry, which will be hereafter noted, the Author is enabled to form a new hypothefis of his birth. Why, after this matter had refted from the erection of his tomb in 1556, it should have been detailed merely for the purpofe of leaving a thing, certainly not of the first importance, unfettled, we are at a lofs to conjecture. The exact date of the birth of Chaucer is of as little confequence as that of the birth of Homer. We are by his works, the end of his being, convinced, that he has been, and the ut-' mot effort of chronological nicety can neither add to his genius, nor detra&t from his celebrity; for although he was, as the Author oblerves, a man and a Courtier, and it is the defire of half mankind, when advanced beyond the middle period of human life, to be thought younger than they are;" till this does not add a feather to the weight of the enquiry, because he must know it is as frequently the deure of the other half of mankind, about the fame period, to appear older, i. e. witer. The rest of the conjectures respecting the age of Chaucer are fo weak and vifionary, fo depend int upon the most futile of all foundations, the probably metaphorical allutions of a man of genius to his own purfuits, that 'it would be a waite of time to remark upon them. We are glad that the Author has not fet afide the date which has always been received, and think, moreover, that he has acted wifely in not incorporating thefe obfervations in the work, as we hope that will be occupied with fubjets of more importance. It is faid to be a wrong praAice for a man of genius to go about to interpret an ancient book without confidering the historical occalion that gave rife to it, and every circumftance that bears upon the fubject. This centure Mr. G. appears by no means difpofed to incur. Indeed, judg ing, as the lawyers fay, from his opening, he feems to promile to bextremely dittufe. The birth of Chaucer we muit confider to have been fettled, and pinned down to the period of 1328, which, as we can get no better information, we agree with the Author may stand in the place of proof. But although we are willing to concede thus much, we cannot fay that, after alcertaining the birth-place of the Bard to have been in London, we deem it neceffary to enter into a minute and elaborate defcription of the city at that period, or antecedently, under the Lila Normans, Normans, because these things have been still more accurately stated by our civic historians; and although the mere tranfcribing them certainly does credit to the induftry of Mr. G., we think, as no new reflections arife, as the deductions are trite and common, they are not calculated to imprefs us with that fublime idea of his genius, which, we have already ftated, we believe it deferves. The wealth of the Citizens; the entertainment of Henry Picard; Phil pot's expedition; the ftory of Wittington (fortunately without the epifode of his cat); the valour of William Walworth, &c.; have all before been difplayed; therefore we at least conceive it unneceflary to repeat them. We find, according to the conjecture of one of his editors, that the father of Chaucer was a vintner; a thing not improbable; and therefore, instead of tracing the impreffion which the public events of the city made upon his infant mind, (which, perhaps, at that period, he little regarded,) we will venture a conjecture that more probably the domeftic scenes which he was in the conftant habit of beholding, the variety of company which his father's bufinefs must have attracted, first gave him those ideas of perfonal defcription and difcrimination of character, fuch as are the predominant features of fome parts of his works. The education of Chaucer, who is ftated to have paffed the latter years of this important period at the University of Cambridge, leads to an examination of the ftate of learning under the Norman Princes, in which these observations occur: "We are extremely apt to deceive our imaginations by the familiar and indifcriminate ufe we make of the terms, the dark and barbarous ages. Thefe terms are far from being applicable, without material diftinctions, to the times in which Chaucer was born. The muddy effervefcence which had been ftrred up in Europe, fubfided in a confiderable degree in the eleventh century. William the Norman may be confidered as having introduced politeness into this island; and being, after an interval, fucceeded by his youngest fon, to whom his contemporaries gave the appellation of BeauClerk, or fine fcholar, the empire of literature became so fixed among us as not to be easily capable of being exterminated." The ftate of learning, like the effufions of genius, is comparative, and depends upon civilization, upon the general progrefs of the human mind. A man in one age may have obtained the appellation of a great scholar, that in another would have been confidered as a dunce. Not that it is our intention to tear one leaf from the crown of bay with which Mr. G. has adorned the heads of Henry the Firt and Second. Yet it would be worth while to confider a little in what the learning of thofe ages confifted. Thomas of Becket and "his circle of literary men," we conceive owed their brilliancy to the general dullness, or rather ignorance, of the times. Perhaps the ftatutes which were at thofe periods framed, and at this are in operation, might be produced to confute this propofition; but these would by no means bear upon the fubject: Statutes are fuch peculiar kind of writings, that we believe they have improved in nothing, but their fize, from their first promulgation to the prefent hour. The Author traces the revival of letters as high as to the beginning of the ninth century, when the Saracens, under the Caliph Almamon, “had made confiderabie ftrides in the advancement of fcience, and, with the exception of its Poets and Hiflorians, literature their own, by a translation had rendered the ftores of Grecian into Arabic." To popular hiftories Mr. G. gives the credit they deferve for the extenfion of learning in the twelfth century. "Works of a higher order appeared in the thirteenth." diments to the progrefs of literature Among the difadvantages and impein the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, Mr. G. enumerates one that was pretty obvious, namely, the difficulty of multiplying copies of works by tranfcription; but he allows that this was an impediment common to the writers of Greece and Rome, though, neither in thofe countries nor in this, did it prevent authors from being learned. Another difadvantage incident to this remote period, was the gloomy and defpotic empire of papal fuperftition: to which a third, peculiar to our island, may be added, which powerfully operated to check English literature; literature; this was, the state of our language. After enlarging on the inconvenience which arofe from this circumftance, the Author proceeds to fhew the state of learning in the metropolis; and quotes, from Fitzttephen and others, the public and local fchools as a criterion; whether a juft one, we fhall leave to the reader's determination. According to the pan of education here exhibited, it does not feem calculated to form the basis of the very belt of all poffible fyitems. "Yet (fays the Author) we may imagine to ourfelves our youthful poet reforting daily to fome of the claffical feminaries in the metropolis, and, in the language of Fitzftephen, contending with his fellows for the prize of Latin verfe, or emulously reciting with them the elements of grammar and the rules for the preterites and futures of Latin verbs. Here, doubtlefs, Chaucer be came acquainted with many of the Roman writers. Of the Greek language he does not appear to have had any knowledge. The words of Homer, Pindar, Demofthenes, or Thucydides, never founded in his ears or rolled from his tongue. He never drank from their pure and primeval wells of poetry. He had no intercourfe with their manly fenfe, and their ardent paffion for liberty." This, the reader will obferve, is a most affected and roundabout way of repeating, that Chaucer did not underitand Greek. Among the Latins," continues Mr. G., the nobler claffics were almost uniformly deferted. The energy of Lucretius, the implicity of Fibullus, the unaffected manner of Terence, and the poignant gaiety of Horace, were forgotten. Virgil was comparatively neglected; the favourite Roman poets were Ovid, Lucan, Statius, and Prudentius. In profe, Cicero and Livy were rarely confulted; but the daily amufement of fcholars was in the unnatural ftile of Seneca and Boethius, or the defultory collections of Macrobius and Valerius Maximus. The writers of Latin verfe in the twelfth century have already been mentioned with commendation: the Bellum Trojanum, and the Antiochus of Jofeph of Exeter, and the Philippid of Guilliame le Breton, are particularly ad mired; and the Alexandriad of Gaultier de Chatillion was equalled with the most perfect production of antiquity." "Such were the authors, fome of whom were read by Chaucer." Who doubts this? But why fill a page to catalogize their names? For this we can fee but one reason, although we hope that it is rather from our want of perception than from any other cause: but really if we had occafion to make a book, and chofe for our title the Life of Burke, or of any other State finan, if any other could be found equally eminent, we might, on the fame principle, after we had defcanted on what he knew, and, if we could discover it, what he did not know, quote the whole of Lackington's Catalogue, for inftance, faying, in conclufion, fuch were the Authors whofe works formed a great part of the mafs of literature from which the minds of our countrymen was furnished with ideas in the eighteenth century; fome of these were read by this exalted geaius; and then leave it to the reader's fagacity to pick out which. This obfervation will apply to the diffufion and waite of learning which we remarked has been employed in gleaning from authors that are within the reach of every one, the rife and progress of Romance (the offspring of Chivalry), and the differtation on the Feudal System. Thefe are things. which are fo well known, that we could have referred the Collector to numberlefs works, ancient and modern, in which they are detailed. Every man of genius has probably," at fome time of his life, thought, though all may not have written, romance; and it is certain, that there has ever been in the greit mafs of the people a ftrong propenfity to repeat extraordinary incidents of which they had read or heard; fome, perhaps, founded on fact, but more the formation of genius acting upon fenfibility, and, from the exaggerations of fancy, producing thofe long, long feries of tales that afcend from the earth to the skies, that wander from the fimplicity of Nature till they arrive at the height of extravagance, and encounter those hofts of warriors, dragons, monsters, and chimera, which abound in the relations of "Squires of low degree." These ftories, entombed in volumes even more ponderous than these we are confidering, were once read with avidity, and probably the sparks of genius elicited |