CHAPTER XIII. THE RECONCILIATION; OR, FROM THE PUBLICATION OF HIS FIRST VOLUME TO THE "TASK." WH COMMENCEMENT OF THE (February, 1782-July, 1783.) 86. What the Critics Said. HEN Cowper first began to think of publishing he thought that if he pleased his friends he would care for the opinion of nobody else. "I sometimes feel such a perfect indifference," he told Newton, "with respect to the public opinion of my book, that I am ready to flatter myself no censure of reviewers, or other critical readers, would occasion me the smallest disturbance." But though this "desirable apathy" was not always present with him, he was still persuaded that it was not in the power of the critics to mortify him much, and he endorsed the assertion of Horace, who said "that he should neither be the plumper for the praise, nor the leaner for the condemnation of his reader." Cowper had certainly pleased his friends. John Newton, Mr. Bull, Mrs. Unwin, William Unwin,. were delighted, and the last said that the book had moved his wife to both smiles and tears. One of Cowper's intimate friends, says Hayley, wrote in his copy the following passage from the younger Pliny, as descriptive of the book: "Multa tenuiter, multa sublimiter, multa venuste, multa tenere, multa dulciter, multa cum bile." ("Many passages are delicate, many sublime, many beautiful, many tender, many sweet, many acrimonious.") Cowper, who was pleased with the application, said candidly, "The latter part is very true indeed! Yes, yes, there are multa cum bile." When the book was out, however, Cowper found that he was by no means indifferent to what the great world might say. "It is well, said I, that my friends are pleased; but friends are sometimes partial, and mine, I have reason to think, are not altogether free from bias. Methinks I should like to hear a stranger or two speak well of me." One by one the reviews came out. The London Magazine and the Gentleman's Magazine were both favourable, but the Critical Review attacked the book with much hostility. The author, it said, was "not possessed of any superior abilities, or power of genius, requisite to so arduous an undertaking; his verses are in general weak and languid, and have neither novelty, spirit, nor animation to recommend them." Again, "He never rises to anything that we can commend or admire," and further on the poet is spoken of as "travelling on a plain, level, flat road, with great composure, almost through the whole long and tedious. volume, which is little better than a dull sermon in very indifferent verse." There is no need for the admirers of Cowper to wax indignant over this criticism, it is the sort of thing every author has at one time or another to put up with. It is impossible to please everybody. At the same time, a criticism like this was not calculated to raise the spirits of a man so sensitive as Cowper. But whatever mortification Cowper may have felt on this occasion was more than compensated by the pleasure he received subsequently from the very handsome letter which the eminent Benjamin Franklin sent to Mr. Thornton, by whom he had been presented with a copy. Dr. Franklin said: "I received the letter you did me the honour of writing to me, and am much obliged by your kind present of a book. The relish for reading of poetry has long since left me; but there is something so new in the manner, so easy and yet so correct in the language, so clear in the expression, yet concise, and so just in the sentiments, that I have read the whole with great pleasure, and some of the pieces more than once. I beg you to accept my thankful acknowledgments, and to present my respects to the author." Franklin's letter was of course despatched to Cowper, who observed, "We may now treat the critics as the Archbishop of Toledo treated Gil Blas when he found fault with one of his sermons. His grace gave him a kick, and said, 'Begone for a jackanapes, and furnish yourself with a better taste, if you know where to find it."" As yet, however, the great magazine, the most formidable of all the tribunals, had not pronounced judgment. The Monthly Review still kept him in hot water. "Alas!" says Cowper, "when I wish for a favourable sentence from that quarter (to confess a weakness that I should not confess to all), I feel myself not a little influenced by a tender regard to my reputation here, even among my neighbours at Olney. Here are watchmakers, who themselves are wits, and who at present perhaps think me one. Here is a carpenter and a baker, and, not to mention others, here is your idol, Mr. Teedon, whose smile is fame. All these read the Monthly Review, and all these will set me down for a dunce if those terrible critics should show them the example. But oh! wherever else I am accounted dull, dear Mr. Griffith, let me pass for a genius at Olney." This was on the 12th of June (1782). At length the dreaded review came out, the "critical Rhadamanthus" spoke, and not unfavourably. Most modern poets, it said, copy their sentiments and diction from those who have sung before them, "their very modes of thinking as well as versification are copied from the said models. This, however, is not the case with Mr. Cowper; he is a poet sui generis; for, as his notes are peculiar to himself, he classes not with any known species of bards that have preceded him; his style of composition, as well as his modes of thinking, are entirely his own." To give two more excerpts: "Mr. Cowper's predominant turn of mind, though serious and devotional, is at the same time duly humorous and sarcastic. Hence his very religion has a smile that is arch, and his sallies of humour an air that is religious." "His language is plain, forcible, and expressive.” Cowper could now face without fear the carpenter, the baker, and the schoolmaster, for had not the Monthly Review pronounced that it was on the whole a very decent volume? But though praise had been bestowed by the various magazines, it had been bestowed in most cases only grudgingly, and Cowper did not feel any particular encouragement to keep on writing. To Unwin he said: "You tell me you have been asked if I am intent upon another volume. I reply not at present, not being convinced that I have met with sufficient encouragement. I account myself happy in having pleased a few, but am not rich enough to despise the many. I do not know what sort of a market my commodity has found, but if a slack one, I must beware how I make a second attempt.' subsequently appeared, the book sold but slowly. 87. The Case of Simon Browne. As it In the suppressed preface Newton said: "The hope that the God whom Cowper served would support him under his affliction, and at length vouchsafe him a happy deliverance, never forsook me. The desirable crisis, I trust, is now nearly approaching; the dawn, the presage of returning day, is already arrived." of In respect to which Cowper had observed (December 21, 1780): “Your sentiments with respect to me are exactly Mrs. Unwin's. She, like you, is perfectly sure my deliverance, and often tells me so, I make but one answer, and sometimes none at all. That answer gives her no pleasure, and would give you as little ; therefore, at this time, I suppress it." In another letter to the same, Cowper compares himself to a criminal |