The result, however, of mouthpiece of the common sense. this sentiment was not to give an actively orthodox tone to the writing of the time; for theology was for the most part almost as deistical as the deists. 45. A hatred for enthusiasm was as strongly impressed upon the whole character of contemporary thought as a hatred of scepticism. And thus the literary expression of the feeling is rather a dislike to all speculation than a dislike to a particular school of speculatists. The whole subject was dangerous, and should be avoided by reasonable men. A good common-sense religion should be taken for granted, and no questions asked. If the philosophy of the time was unfitted for poetry, it was, for the same reason, unfitted to stimulate the emotions, and therefore for practical life. With Shakespeare, or Sir Thomas Browne, or Jeremy Taylor, or Milton, man is contemplated in his relations to the universe; he is in presence of eternity and infinity; life is a brief dream; we are ephemeral actors in a vast drama; heaven and hell are behind the veil of phenomena; at every step our friends vanish into the vast abyss of ever-present mystery. To all such thoughts the writers of the eighteenth century seemed to close their eyes as absolutely as possible. They do not, like Sir Thomas Browne, delight to lose themselves in an Oh! Altitudo! or to snatch a solemn joy from the giddiness which follows a steady gaze into the infinite. The greatest men amongst them, a Swift or a Johnson, have indeed a senseperhaps a really stronger sense than Browne or Taylor-of the pettiness of our lives and the narrow limits of our knowledge. No great man could ever be without it. But the awe of the infinite and the unseen does not induce them to brood over the mysterious, and find utterance for bewildered musings on the inscrutable enigma. 46. It is felt only in a certain habitual sadness which clouds their whole tone of thought. They turn their backs upon the infinite and abandon the effort at a solution. Their eyes are fixed upon the world around them, and they regard as foolish and presumptuous any one who dares to contemplate the great darkness. The expression of this sentiment in literature is a marked disposition to turn aside from pure speculation, combined with a deep interest in social and moral laws. The absence of any deeper speculative ground makes the immediate practical questions of life all the more interesting. We know not what we are, nor whither we are going, nor whence we come; but we can, by the help of common sense, discover a sufficient share of moral maxims for our guidance in life, and we can analyse human passions, and discover what are the moving forces of society, without going back to first principles. Knowledge of human nature, as it actually presented itself in the shifting scene before them, and a vivid appreciation of the importance of the moral law, are the staple of the best literature of the time. As ethical speculation was prominent in the philosophy, the enforcement of ethical principles is the task of those who were inclined to despise philosophy. When a creed is dying, the importance of preserving the moral law naturally becomes a pressing consideration with all strong natures. 47. I have coupled Swift and Johnson as the two most vigorous representatives of this tendency. Between them there is a curious analogy as well as a striking contrast. They are alike in that shrewd humorous common sense which seems to be the special endowment of the English race. They are alike, too, in this: that they express the reaction against the complacent optimism of the Pope-Shaftesbury variety. They illustrate the incapacity of that system of thought to satisfy men of powerful emotional nature. The writings of each might be summed up in a phrase embodying the most uncompromising protest against the optimist philosophy. Swift says, with unrivalled intensity, that the natural man is not, as theorists would maintain, a reasonable and virtuous animal; but, for the most part, a knave and a fool. Johnson denies, with equal emphasis, though with inferior literary power, that the business of life can be carried on by help of rose-coloured sentiments and general complacency. The world is, at best, but a melancholy place, full of gloom, of misery, of wasted purpose, and disappointed hopes. Whatever is, is right,' say the philosophers. Make up the heavy account of suffering, of disease, vice, cruelty, of envy, hatred, and malice, of corruption in high places, of starvation and nakedness amongst the low, of wars, and pestilences, and famines, of selfish ambition trampling on thousands, and wasted heroism strengthening oppression by its failure, of petty domestic tyranny, of lying, hypocrisy, and treachery, which run through all the social organism like a malignant ulcer, and see how far your specious maxim will take you. 48. That is the melancholy burden of the teaching of each of these great men; and it was echoed in various tones by many who felt that the grain of a sham philosophy consisted chiefly of unprofitable husks. Between Swift and Johnson, indeed, there was a wide difference; and the sturdy moralist had a hearty dislike for the misanthropist whose teaching was so far at one with his own. The strong sense of evil which, in Johnson's generous nature, produced rather sadness than anger, had driven Swift to moody hatred of his species. He is the most tragic figure in our literature. Beside the deep agony of his soul, all other suffering, and especially that which takes a morbid delight in contemplating itself, is pale and colourless. He resembles a victim tied to the stake and slowly tortured to madness and death; whilst from his proudly compressed lips there issue no weak lamentations, but the deep curses of which one syllable is more effective than a volume of shrieks. Through the more petty feelings of mere personal spite and disappointed ambition we feel the glow of generous passions doomed to express themselves only in the language of defiant hatred. The total impression made by Swift's writings is unique and almost appalling; for even the sheer brutality suggests some strange disease, and the elaborate triflings remind us of a statesman amusing himself with spiders in a Bastille. If we ask what were the genuine creeds of this singular intellect, the answer must be a blank. The Tale of a Tub' is the keenest of satire against all theologians; 'Gulliver's Travels' expresses the concentrated essence of contempt for all other classes of mankind; the sermons and tracts defend the Church of England in good set terms, and prove beyond all question his scorn of dissenters, deists, and papists; but it would be an insult to that fiery intellect to suppose that his official defence of the Thirty-nine Articles represents any very vivid belief. He could express himself in very different fashion when he was in earnest. Jove's address, in the Day of Judgment,' shows the true Swift : Offending race of human kind, By nature, learning, reason blind; I damn such fools! Go, go, you're bit. That is genuine feeling. The orthodox phrases are no more part of Swift than his bands and cassock. 49. Swift's idiosyncrasy would doubtless have made itself felt at any time. The special direction of his haughty passions and intense intellect is determined by the conditions of the time. In a time of strong beliefs he would have been a vehement partisan. But what to an intellect contemptuous of all shams were the specious varnish which Clarke and Shaftesbury spread over the hard facts of life, or the lifeless exuvia of dead creeds which satisfied conventional theologians, or the pompous phrases with which the politicians of both sides disguised their struggles for the division of the spoils? Mere tawdry frippery, incapable of satisfying a man with brains fit for something more than the manipulation of extinct formulæ. Swift called himself an old Whig and an orthodox churchman; but he cared little enough for the Thirty-nine Articles, or the platitudes about standing armies or social contracts. He felt to the depths of his soul the want of any of the principles which in trying times take concrete shape in heroic natures; and he assumed that the whole race of the courtiers of kings and mobs in all ages were such vile crawling creatures as could sell England or starve Ireland to put a few thousands in their pockets. He felt the want of some religion, and therefore scalped poor Collins, and argued with his marvellous ingenuity of irony against the abolition of Christianity; but the dogmas of theologians were mere matter for the Homeric laughter of the Tale of a Tub.' He had not the unselfish qualities or the indomitable belief in the 十 potential excellence of human nature to become a reformer of manners, or the speculative power to endeavour to remould the ancient creeds. He stands in fierce isolation amongst the calmer or shallower intellects of his time, with insight enough to see the hollowness of their beliefs, with moral depth enough to scorn their hypocritical self-seeking, and with an imagination fervid enough to give such forcible utterance to his feelings as has scarcely been rivalled in our literature. But he had not the power or the nobility of nature to become a true poet or philosopher or reformer. When a shallow optimism is the most living creed, a man of strong nature becomes a scornful pessimist. 50. Johnson escaped from the hell of Swift's passion by virtue of that pathetic tenderness of nature which lay beneath his rugged outside. If Swift excites a strange mixture of repulsion and pity, no one can know Johnson without loving him. And what was Johnson's special message to the world? He has given it most completely in 'Rasselas;' and the curious coincidence between Rasselas' and 'Candide' has been frequently noticed. Voltaire, the arch-iconoclast, Johnson, last of the Tories, agree in making the protest against optimism the topic of their most significant works. Besides the vast difference in style between the greatest master of literary expression and the powerful writer whose pen seems to be paralysed by his constitutional depression, there is another striking difference. The moral of Candide' is, in one sense, speculative. The result, it is true, is purely negative. Optimism, that is Voltaire's thesis, will not fit the facts of the world. Johnson, on the other hand, is exclusively moral. A disciple of Voltaire would learn to cultivate his garden' and abandon speculation; but then, with speculation, he would abandon all theology. A disciple of Johnson learns the futility of enquiring into the ultimate purposes of the Creator; but he would acquiesce in the accepted creed. It is as good as any other, considered as a philosophy, and much better considered as supplying motives for the conduct of life. Johnson's fame amongst his contemporaries was that of a great moralist; and the name represents what was most significant in his teaching. 51. He was as good a moralist as a man can be who |