whole, tempered by touches of the grace and tenderness of his greater countryman Goldsmith. The book resembles in some respects the friend of our infancy, 'Sandford and Merton,' though in that excellent performance the Rousseau element is not tempered by any theological admixture. Such performances indicate a current of vague feeling in search of some mode of utterance less constrained than that sanctioned by the practice of the Pope school, but equally ready to flow along the channels marked by Wesley or by Rousseau. 119. Another form of sentimentalism may be derived from Richardson. Richardson, as Johnson said, taught the passions to move at the command of virtue. That means that he discovered how a sincere profession of the narrowest code of morality might excuse a systematic dallying with seductive images. Byron held-and Byron was a good, if a partial judge that there was more danger in such books as Rousseau's Nouvelle Héloïse' than in the open and scoffing vice of Don Juan.' This remark is equally applicable to 'Clarissa Harlowe.' Indeed, it is hardly a new discovery that the casuistical moralist passes easily into the prurient analyser of moral hotbeds; or that Abelard may with the best intentions give rather dangerous lessons to Héloïse. Richardson is never immoral in intention, nor, as a rule, immoral in effect; but he is frequently morbid, and morbid in a significant direction. In fact, the Pamelas and Clarissas of the day were rather tired, we may guess, of the prosaic labours to which they were condemned, and of the prosaic morality preached to them. They had, as Richardson's word-portraits show, strong passions; they were tired of the old romances, and were taking to books instead of needlework. The Spectator and his followers preached excellent morality to women, but women want something more than excellent morality. The old confessor had been abolished, but not replaced. Richardson himself, the spiritual adviser of a little circle of feminine worshippers, understood their needs, and gave utterance to their vague wants. The skill with which he prolongs through eight volumes his variations upon the one theme of a feminine martyrdom, exhausting every phrase in the pathetic vocabulary, and accumulating misery until our sympathy becomes so pungent that we know not whether it be more delicious or painful, makes 'Clarissa Harlowe' one of the marvels of literature. That his morality was mawkish and narrow is proved by the jovial contempt which gave a rebuff to Pamela in 'Joseph Andrews.' That his sentiment had the power of original genius is proved by the relation of 'Clarissa Harlowe' to the Nouvelle Héloïse.' Rousseau is the greatest of the sentimentalists, and Rousseau borrowed more than the form of his most passionate work from Richardson. When we think of the patient interest with which our ancestors dwelt upon the long-drawn agonies of Clarissa, the moralising of Pamela, and the virtuous declamation of Sir Charles Grandison, we can believe that a weight of emotion, without adequate vent, was accumulating behind the old dikes and barriers of moral convention. As the Clarissas were allowed to devote less time to needlework, and were able to take advantage of circulating libraries, they might easily develop a taste for literary stimulants. 120. Sentimentalism, pure and simple, needing neither the prefix of a text nor the appendage of a moral application, was represented by a later writer. It came into the world when Sterne discovered the art of tickling his contemporaries' fancies by his inimitable mixture of pathos, humour, and sheer buffoonery. No man of equal literary eminence excites less respect or even less genuine sympathy. He showed, as we cannot deny, a corrupt heart and a prurient imagination. He is a literary prostitute. He cultivates his fineness of feeling with a direct view to the market; and when we most admire his books, we most despise the man. He is the most conspicuous example that could be quoted in favour of the dangerous thesis that literary and moral excellence belong to different spheres. The phenomenon, however, is hardly rare in its kind. The propensities to an actual and an ideal gratification of the virtuous instinct do not always accompany each other. Nobody could be more virtuous in imagination than Sterne. Fictitious misery excited his liveliest sympathy, because it need never shock his taste. We can believe that he wept genuine tears when he described Uncle Toby's oath, and the death of Le Fevre. And we weep too, for the moment, till a sense of the profound unreality disenchants us. We feel the insincerity when most cleverly disguised, and www are less affected even by the death of Le Fevre than by a single touch of Cowper's pathos. The tinsel cannot pass itself off for gold. We resent the imposition, and accuse Sterne of laughing in his sleeve. Of course, he replies, I am laughing in my sleeve: why not weep for the luxury of weeping; and restore our self-esteem by mocking our own weakness? And then, if my sentiment disgusts you, would you prefer a bit of sham buffoonery, or a savoury morsel of obscene suggestion? They are quite at your service. The skill with which the varying moods are blended is marvellous, and we admit Sterne to be the best of the buffoons, and the most pathetic of the shallow-hearted. He buys our wonder by a degradation which would be a dear price even for the highest admiration. But no cleverer man ever put on the cap and bells, or catered successfully to the emotional wants, good or bad, of his generation. 121. Sterne is the typical sentimentalist. His eccentricity was too marked to suggest direct rivalry by any but the most servile of imitators. The best writer of his school is supposed to be Mackenzie, the Man of Feeling;' but the 'Man of Feeling,' from which he took his title, has passed from amongst the living. It is almost as much duller than Sterne as it is more virtuous. The sickly tone of feeling is relieved by no humour, and but slightly relieved by rather feeble satire. We might trace the influence of sentimentalism in Goldsmith's exquisite ' Vicar'—a book which affected Goethe as' Clarissa' affected Rousseau. But the purity and healthiness of Goldsmith's feeling, which gives to his work a superiority over Sterne, not only in morality, but in art, makes it a less fitting instance of sentimentalism in its full development. 122. To assign any precise philosophical meaning to sentimentalism would, as I have said, be an absurd attempt. -It is much more a social than an intellectual phenomenon. Yet it indicates certain tendencies which are connected with the development of thought. The modern sentimentalism may, perhaps, be defined as the effeminate element of Christianity. The true sentimentalist accepts all that appears to be graceful, tender, and pretty in the Gospels, and turns away from the sterner and more masculine teaching which enables a religion to rule the world, as well as to amuse our softer hours. The tendency of the earlier generation had been to transform Christianity into a code of mathematically demonstrable propositions, or to lower it into a system of prudential morality. As the Wesleyans tried to restore a sterner teaching, the sentimentalists tried to find expression for the more graceful teaching incorporated in the old doctrine. To attempt to make a religion out of the most effeminate elements is necessarily futile. Such a doctrine easily resolved itself into some variety of the cant, so heartily and rightfully denounced by Johnson. But the tendency to accept this milk-and-water version of the old theories was an indication that something was wanting in the doctrine as well as in the social organisation of the time. Whilst Wesley stirred the masses, fine ladies and gentlemen began to play at sympathy with the poor and oppressed. 123. Meanwhile, however, one characteristic of the English sentimentalists must be noticed. Their doctrine remained in the utterly unpractical stage. When Rousseau wept rather too freely over the sorrows of his heroine, he regarded her as a type of the women of his time; and therefore was consciously aiming at a social and moral revolution. Sterne was content to weep without the slightest indication of any desire for a change. He shows no sense whatever of evils affecting the general welfare. He is a pure artist, and inclined, if anything, to preach the doctrine that things are very well as they If he weeps over a prisoner, he has no desire to destroy the Bastille. It would be rather a pity if some prisoners were not in existence to justify a little weeping. Even Goldsmith, though he laments the corruption, are. Where wealth accumulates and men decay, is, at least, a good conservative, who delights in a pretty idyl, but does not want to see the state of nature revived. Prisons ought to be reformed, and the country clergy better paid; but he has no grudge against the aristocracy which sends him venison, and no desire to upset the Church. He only wishes the rich to be better landlords, and charity to flow more freely. 124. Another peculiarity, less obvious, may be remarked. A more modern sentimentalist would probably express his feelings by describing some past state of society. He would paint some ideal society in medieval times, and revive the holy monk and the humble nun for our edification. The sentimentalists whom I have mentioned, Richardson, and Sterne, and Goldsmith, and their followers, are perfectly content with imaginary persons derived from their own experience. They lay a new stress upon the advantage of tender-heartedness and sympathy, but they do not require to embody their imaginings in symbols drawn from a distant past. They are, in the first place, tolerably content with the society in which they live, and, in the next place, the historical tendencies of the age have not yet conferred tangible reality upon distant epochs. A change, however, was approaching. The last half of the century was, as I have said, pre-eminently historical. As civilisation progresses, as records are better preserved, and a greater permanence in social organisation makes men more disposed to look beyond their immediate surroundings, a tendency to historical enquiry is naturally awakened. This cause alone, without the more philosophical considerations which might lead a Hume or a Gibbon to turn from abstract investigations to historical enquiries, may account for the growth of antiquarianism in the later years. Men like Malone and Steevens were beginning those painful researches which have accumulated a whole literature upon the scanty records of our early dramatists. Gray, the most learned of poets, had vaguely designed a history of English poetry, and the design was executed with great industry by Thomas Warton. His brother Joseph ventured to uphold the then paradoxical thesis that Spenser was as great a man as Pope. Everywhere a new interest was awakening in the minuter details of the past. The antiquaries of earlier periods may have accumulated greater stores of knowledge; but they did not apply the same systematic and microscopic industry to the investigation of minute points of manners, language, or individual history. Something of the scientific spirit seems to have infected the modern school of infinitesimal research. 125. One result is remarkable. The first consequence of the breach with authority was an unreasonable contempt for the past. The modern philosopher who could spin all |