Slike strani
PDF
ePub

neglect.-" "They addressed the Pontiff to dispel their scruples, and absolve their promises," (ch. xlix.) Dispel is not the correct word applied to scruples, but to doubts; and absolving a promise is wholly senseless; but "absolve them from a promise," is plainly rejected because it would have interrupted the symmetry, which some would call the jingle.-So he makes the Emperor (ch. xvi.) not pity, but "abhor the sufferings of the persecuted sect," instead of the cruelty of the persecutors.-From the same motive, speaking of Maximin's cruelty and superstition, he makes "the former suggest the means, the latter point out the objects of persecution:" (ch. xvi.) now cruelty can never suggest means, it can only induce the adoption of them, and superstition might just as well suggest means as objects.-Again, speaking of the numbers of the empire and its public works, he says, "The observation of the number and greatness of its cities will serve to confirm the former, and to multiply the latter," (ch. ii.): as if any observation of works could increase their number; but then the accurate phrase "to extend our belief in the number of the latter," would have spoilt the symmetry and sound of the period.

The historian's language, however, abounds in phrases indolently adopted without any regard to the real meaning of words, and not to serve any purpose of preserving symmetry or obtaining point. Thus "human industry corrected the deficiencies of nature," (ch. ii.) instead of supplied.-So "the life of the founder supplies the silence of his written revelation;" (ch. 1.) instead of supplies the deficiencies, or speaks when the writings are silent."Genius and learning served to harmonize the soul of Longinus," (ch. xii.)"Two circumstances have been universally mentioned, which insinuate that the treatment," &c., (ch. xvi.)-Again, "History, which undertakes to record the transactions of the past, for the instruction of future ages, would ill deserve that honourable office, if," &c., (ch. xvi.) instead of "execute" or "perform.""Fraud is the resource of weakness." No one doubts it; but he adds, "and cunning,"-which is, in fact, either fraud or the immediate cause of it; and no one can correctly say that fraud is its resource, (ch. xlix.)

Sometimes, in quest of a fine word, he says something which he does not mean.-"If we annihilate the interval of time and space between Augustus and Charles IV. ;" (ch. 1.) but he only means, "if we pass over that interval."-"A casting vote was ascribed to the superior wisdom of Papinian;" (ch. xliv.) but he only means, that it was given to Papinian on account of his "wisdom," while he says that Papinian's wisdom was understood to have invented the casting vote."-"The fragments of the Greek kingdom in Europe and Asia I shall abandon to the Turkish arms;" (ch. Ixviii.) but he only means, that he gives up the history of the empire after those arms had conquered it. A greater artist marks his course, and connects himself with his subject after a very different fashion:-"Me quoque juvat," says Livy, on closing the Punic wars, "velut ipse in parte laboris ac periculi fuerim, ad finem belli Punici pervenisse. Nam, etsi profiteri ausum per

scripturum res omnes Romanas, in partibus singulis tanti operis fatigari minime conveniat, tamen quum in mentem venit tres et sexaginta annos æque multa volumina occupasse mihi quam occuparint quadringenti octoginta octo anni a conditâ Urbe ad Ap. Claudium Consulem qui primus bellum Carthaginiensibus intulit; jam provideo animo, velut qui proximis littori vadis inducti mare pedibus ingrediuntur, quidquid progredior in vastiorem me altitudinem ac velut profundum invehi et crescere pæne opus quod prima quæque perficiendo minui videbatur." (Lib. xxxi., cap. 1.)

There are few instances in his statements of the same carelessness which we have marked in his style; but some there are,—as when he makes the number of Roman citizens at the beginning of the Social War, 463,000 fighting men, which answers to a population of at least two, perhaps of nearer four millions. (ch. ii.) It is, however, rather strange, that one so accustomed to weigh historical evidence, so little apt to be seduced by mere authority, and so prone to set the probabilities of any narrative against the weight of its author, should always have shut his eyes to the gross improbability of the commonly received history of Rome in the earlier ages, and should have followed blindfold the guidance of what any Latin writer, from national vanity, or prejudice, or superstition, happened to relate. We may remember having seen him pluming himself on defending the authenticity of those poetical fictions as pure history in his juvenile work. The same implicit faith in their authenticity followed him to the end of his career, although Beaufort's excellent work had long claimed the regard, and indeed obtained the assent of inquiring minds; and the subsequently promulgated doctrines of Niebuhr and Wachsmüth had been very fully anticipated before any part of the "Decline and Fall" was

written.

The greatest charge against Gibbon's historical character remains: he wrote under the influence of a deeply rooted prejudice, and a prejudice upon the most important of all subjects-the religion of his age and nation. I speak not of the too famous description in which the progress of Christianity is ascribed to second causes, that no doubt operated most powerfully to its general acceptance and dissemination. The most orthodox believer might subscribe to his theory, nay, might have taken the self-same view of the subject. There is great truth, too, in his remarks upon the exaggerated accounts of early persecution, and some foundation for the circumstances urged in extenuation of the conduct held by heathen authorities towards the new sect. But there runs a vein of sneering and unfair insinuation always against Christians and their faith through the whole both of those inquiries and other portions of ecclesiastical history, especially the religious transactions of Constantine, nay, through almost every part of the work in which any opportunity is afforded on the subject, or can be made often by pretty forcible means-any opportunity of gratifying a disposition eminently uncharitable, wholly unfair, and tinged with prejudices quite unworthy of a philosopher, and altogether alien to the character of an historian. Nor is the charge lessened, but

rather aggravated, by the pretence constantly kept up of his being a believer, when any reader of the most ordinary sagacity at once discovers that he is an unrelenting enemy of the Christian name. Nothing can be more discreditable to the individual, nothing, above all, more unworthy the historian, than this subterfuge, resorted to for the purpose of escaping popular odium. All men of right feelings must allow that they would far more have respected an open adversary, who comes forward to the assault with a manly avowal of his disbelief, than they can a concealed but bitter enemy who assumes the garb of an ally, in order effectually to screen himself and injure the cause he pretends to defend.

The give instances of the unfairness which I have, in common with all Gibbon's readers, reproved, would be too easy not to prove superfluous. But the sixteenth chapter must for ever be, in an especial manner, a monument of his gross injustice or incurable prejudice. The eagerness with which he seizes on every circumstance to extenuate the dreadful persecutions that admit of no defence, is in the highest degree discreditable, both to his honesty and his sound judgment. He purposely begins with Nero, and so leaves out the persecutions recorded in Scripture. His account of Cyprian's martyrdom is as unfair as it could be without deceit and positive falsehood-casting a veil over all the most horrible atrocities practised on that amiable and innocent personage, and magnifying into acts of clemency exercised towards him every insignificant attention that was paid him-perverting, too, the truth of history, in order to feign circumstances which really do not appear vouched by any kind of authority. But nothing can be more preposterous than the elaborate description which he gives of the comforts derived by the sufferers in these cruel scenes from the glory of martyrdom, and from the great preference which they must have given it over the disgrace of apostasy. The twofold object of this strange discourse is at once to lower the sufferer's merit and extenuate his oppressor's guilt. Nor is there any kind of persecution for conscience' sake to which the same remarks are not equally applicable. It is a much lesser offence, though the passage is not undeserving of notice, as exhibiting the force of his prejudices, and the errors into which they lead him while descanting on his favourite topic, the "mild spirit of polytheism," that when, in describing Diocletian's general persecution, he has occasion to mention a Christian who had torn down the imperial proclamation, accompanying the act with expressions of "hatred and contempt towards all such tyrannical governors," the historian shows at once his prejudice against Christianity and his ignorance "of law, by declaring this offence to be punishable "as treason by the mildest laws." He adds, that his being a person of rank aggravated the guilt; and relates, without a single expression of disapproval, that the man "was burnt, or rather roasted by a slow fire, every refinement of cruelty being exhausted without altering the steady smile which remained on his countenance." The only remark made on the executioners is of an extenuating nature; they were, it seems, "zealous to revenge the personal insult which

had been offered to the Emperor." The smile of the patient sufferer is termed "a steady and insulting smile;" and the Christians are sneered at for "the excessive commendations which they lavished on the memory of their hero and martyr." Gibbon's clerical adversaries would have fared much better in their conflict with him had they dwelt rather upon such passages as these, in which he stands self-convicted either of almost incurable prejudice or of bad faith, and not attempted the hopeless act of charging him with ignorance and with false quotation.

[ocr errors]

The charge of indecency has often been advanced against Gibbon's "History," and by none more severely than by a writer who was combating on his side, in one, at least, of his theological controversies, and a writer whose own verses, any more than his familiar conversation, gave him but little right to make this complaint. Porson* declares that, "Were the History' anonymous, he should guess that the shameful obscenities which pervade the whole, but especially the last volumes, were written by some debauchee, who, having, from age or excess, survived the practices of lust, still indulged himself in the luxury of speculation, or exposed the impotent imbecility after he had lost the vigour of passion." This censure is certainly much too sharp, and it is truly astonishing that Gibbon felt it not. Delighted with Porson's alliance against Travis, and pleased with the panegyric of his own diligence and accuracy which the great Grecian had penned, he only says that "the sweetness of his praise is tempered by a reasonable mixture of acid." He also defends himself against the charge of indecency as preferred by others, and his principal argument is the exceedingly feeble, and even doubtful one, that his English text is chaste, and that "all licentious passages are left in the obscurity of a learned language." It is undeniable, however, that, after allowing Porson's invective to be exaggerated, there can be no excuse for some of the notes-as those on Elagabalus, and Mahomet, and Theodora, which throw little, if any, light upon the subject, and only serve to pander for a prurient imagination.

"Letters to Archdeacon Travis." Preface.

199

SIR JOSEPH BANKS.

Ir is rare to observe a man among the active and successful promoters of science, and which yet cannot easily find a place in its annals from the circumstance of its not being inscribed on any work, or connected with any remarkable discovery. Almost all the philosophers of both ancient and modern times have left us writings in which their doctrines were delivered, and the steps made by their labours were recorded. The illustrious exception of Socrates almost ceased to be one, from the memory of his opinions being preserved by two of his disciples in their immortal works; and the important discoveries of Archimedes and of Pythagoras are known distinctly enough in the books of ancient geometry, to leave no doubt resting upon their claims to the admiration and the gratitude of all ages. The lost works of the ancient geometers evidently afford no exception to the general remark, since they once existed, and contained the discoveries of their authors.

It must, however, be observed that the circumstance of a cultivator of science having left no works to after ages is merely accidental. He may have enriched philosophy with his achievements, and yet never have recorded them himself. Thus, had Black only made the great discovery of latent heat and specific heat, he would have been justly considered in all times as one of the greatest benefactors of natural science, and yet the history of that splendid discovery would only have been found in the memory of those who had heard his lectures; his only work being confined to the other discovery of fixed air, and the nature of the alkaline earths. To take a yet more remarkable instance;-how little of Watt's great and lasting fame depends on any written work which he has left! The like may be truly said of Arkwright; nay, the most important of inventions, the art of printing, is disputed by two names, Coster and Guttenberg, neither of whom is connected with the composition of any literary work whatever.

As men who have by their researches advanced the bounds of science," inventas aut qui vitam excoluerunt per artes,"-may never have given any written works to the world, and yet merit a high place among the greatest philosophers, so may others who have filled the less exalted, but highly useful sphere of furthering the progress of the sciences or the arts, deserve a distinguished place among philosophers for the same reason which entitles authors to such a station, although they may never have contributed by any discoveries to the advancement of the sciences which they cultivated. The excellent and eminent individual whose life we are about to contemplate falls within this description; for although his active exertions for upwards of half a century left traces most deeply marked in the history of the natural sciences, and though

« PrejšnjaNaprej »