profound philosopher) distinguished our species from the mute creation by our risibility, her design must have been by that faculty as evidently to raise our happiness, as by our os sublime (our erected faces) to lift the dignity of our form above them 10.' All this considered, how complete a hero must he be, as well as how happy a man, whose risibility lieth not barely in his muscles, as in the common sort, but (as himself informeth us) in his very spirits! and whose os sublime is not simply an erect face, but a brazen head; as should seem by his preferring it to one of iron, said to belong to the late King of Sweden ". But whatever personal qualities a hero may have, the examples of Achilles and Æneas show us, that all these are of small avail without the constant assistance of the gods; for the subversion and erection of empires have never been adjudged the work of man. How greatly soever then we may esteem of his high talents, we can hardly conceive his personal prowess alone sufficient to restore the decayed empire of Dulness. So weighty an achievement must require the particular favour and protection of the great, who, being the natural patrons and supporters of letters, as the ancient gods were of Troy, must first be drawn off, and engaged in another interest, before the total subversion of them can be accomplished. To surmount, therefore, this last and greatest difficulty, we have, in this excellent man, a professed favourite and intimado of the great. And look of what force ancient piety was to 10 C. Cibber's Life, p. 23, 24. 11 C. Cibber's Letter, p. 8. draw the gods into the party of Æneas, that, and much stronger, is modern incense to engage the great in the party of Dulness. Thus have we essayed to portray or shadow out this noble imp of fame. But now the impatient reader will be apt to say, if so many and various graces go to the making up a hero, what mortal shall suffice to bear his character? Ill hath he read who seeth not, in every trace of this picture, that individual all-accomplished person, in whom these rare virtues and lucky circumstances have agreed to meet and concentre, with the strongest lustre and fullest harmony. The good Scriblerus, indeed, nay the world itself, might be imposed on, in the late spurious. editions, by I cannot tell what sham-hero or phantom; but it was not so easy to impose on him whom this egregious error most of all concerned for no sooner had the fourth Book laid open the high and swelling scene, but he recognised his own heroic acts; and when he came to the words, 'Soft on her lap her laureat son reclines,' (though laureat imply no more than one crowned with laurel, as befitteth any associate or consort in empire) he loudly resented this indignity to violated majesty. Indeed, not without cause, be being there represented as fast asleep; so misbeseeming the eye of empire, which, like that of Jove, should never doze nor slumber. • Ha! (saith he) fast asleep it seems! that is a little too strong. Pert and dull at least you might have 12 9 allowed me, but as seldom asleep as any fool "2" However, the injured laureat may comfort himself with this reflection, that though it be a sleep, yet it is not the sleep of death, but of immortality. Here he will 13 live at least, though not awake, and in no worse condition than many an enchanted warrior before him. The famous Durandante, for instance, was, like him, cast into a long slumber by Merlin, the British bard and necromancer; and his example, for submitting to it with a good grace, might be of use to our hero: for that disastrous knight, being sorely pressed or driven to make his answer by several persons of quality 14, only replied with a sigh, Patience, and shuffle the cards 15.' But now, as nothing in this world, no not the most sacred and perfect things either of religion or government, can escape the stings of envy, methinks I already hear these carpers objecting to the clearness of our hero's title. 'It would never (say they) have been esteemed sufficient to make an hero for the Iliad or Æneis, that Achilles was brave enough to overturn one empire, or Æneas pious enough to raise another, had they not been goddess-born, and princes bred. What then did this author mean by erecting a player, instead of one of his patrons, (a person "never a hero even on the stage 16!") to this dignity of colleague in the empire of Dulness, and 12 C. Cibber's Letter, p. 53. 14 See Cibber's Letter to Mr. P. 15 Don Quixote, Part II. Book ii. ch. 22. 16 See Cibber's Life, p. 148. achiever of a work that neither old Omar, Attila, nor John of Leyden, could entirely bring to pass?' To all this we have, as we conceive, a sufficient answer from the Roman historian, Fabrum esse su quemque fortuna: that every man is the carver of his own fortune.' The politic Florentine, Nicholas Machiavel, goeth still further, and affirmeth that a man needeth but to believe himself a hero to be one of the worthiest. • Let him (saith he) but fancy himself capable of high things, and he will of course be able to achieve them. From this principle it follows that nothing can exceed our hero's prowess, as nothing ever equalled the greatness of his conceptions. Hear how he constantly paragons himself; at one time to Alexander the Great and Charles XII. of Sweden, for the excess and delicacy of his ambition 17; to Henry IV. of France, for honest policy 18; to the first Brutus, for love of liberty'; and to Sir Robert Walpole, for good government while in power 20. At another time to the godlike Socrates, for his diversions and amusements 21; to Horace, Montaigne, and Sir William Temple, for an elegant vanity that maketh them for ever read and admired 22: to two Lord Chancellors for law, from whom, when confederate against him at the bar, he carried away the prize of eloquence 23; and to say all in a word, to the Right Reverend the Lord Bishop of London himself, in the art of writing pastoral letters24. Nor did his actions fall short of the sublimity of his conceit. In his early youth he met the revolu 17 C. Cibber's Life, p. 149, 20 Ib. p. 457. 23 lb. p. 436, 437, 18 Ib. p. 424. 24 Ib. P. 19 Ib. p. 366. 22 Ib. p. 425. tion" face to face in Nottingham, at a time when his betters contented themselves with following her. It was here he got acquainted with old Battle array, of whom he hath made so honourable mention in one of his immortal odes 26. But he shone in courts as well as in camps: he was called up, when the nation fell in labour of this revolution 27, and was a gossip, at her christening, with the bishop and the ladies 28. As to his birth, it is true he pretendeth no relation either to heathen god or goddess; but, what is as good, he was descended from a maker of both 29. And that he did not pass himself on the world for a hero, as well by birth as education, was his own fault; for his lineage he bringeth into his life as an anecdote, and is sensible he had it in his power to be thought no body's son at all 30: and what is that but coming into the world a hero? But be it (the punctilious laws of epic poesy so requiring) that a hero of more than mortal birth must needs be had; even for this we have a remedy. We can easily derive our hero's pedigree from a goddess of no small power and authority amongst men; and legitimate and instal him after the right classical and authentic fashion: for, like as the ancient sages found a son of Mars in a mighty warrior, a son of Neptune in a skilful seaman, a son of Phœbus in a harmonious poet; so 25 C. Cibber's Life, p. 47. 26 Old Battle array in confusion is fled; And olive-robed Peace is come in his stead,' &c. Cibber's Birth-day, or, New Year's Day Ode. 27 Cibber's Life, p. 57. 28 Ib. p. 58, 59. 29 A Statuary. 30 Cibber's Life, p. 6. |