more pleasing to the ear than the tidings of a far distant friend.1

I have just received two hundred of thy letters by the Russian caravan, descriptive of the manners of Europe. You have left it to geographers to determine the size of their mountains and extent of their lakes, seeming only employed in discovering the genius, the government, and disposition of the people.

In those letters I perceive a journal of the operations of your mind upon whatever occurs, rather than a detail of your travels from one building to another; of your taking a draught of this ruin, or that obelisk; of paying so many tomans for this commodity, or laying up a proper store for the passage of some new wilderness.

From your account of Russia, I learn that this nation is again relaxing into pristine barbarity; that its great emperor wanted a life of a hundred years more, to bring about his vast design. A savage people may be resembled to their own forests: a few years are sufficient to clear away the obstructions to agriculture; but it requires many, ere the ground acquires a proper degree of fertility: the Russians, attached to their ancient prejudices, again renew their hatred to strangers, and indulge every former brutal excess. So true it is, that the revolutions of wisdom are slow and difficult; the revolutions of folly or ambition precipitate and easy. "We are not to be astonished," says Confucius, "that the wise walk more slowly in their road to virtue, than fools in their passage to vice; since passion drags us along, while wisdom only points out the way."

2

The German empire, that remnant of the majesty of ancient Rome, appears, from your account, on the eve of dissolution. The members of its vast body want every tie of government to unite them, and seem feebly held together only by their respect for ancient institutions. The very name of country and countrymen, which in other nations makes one of the strongest bonds of government,

1 The Public Ledger has "my far distant friend."-ED.

2 Though this fine maxim be not found in the Latin edition of the morals of Confucius, yet we find it ascribed to him by Le Comte.Etat present de la Chine, vol. i. p. 348.-GOLDSMITH.

has been here for some time laid aside; each of its inhabitants seeming more proud of being called from the petty state which gives him birth, than by the more well-known title of German.

This government may be regarded in the light of a severe master, and a feeble opponent. The states which are now subject to the laws of the empire, are only watching a proper occasion to fling off the yoke, and those which are become too powerful to be compelled to obedience, now begin to think of dictating in their turn. The struggles in this state are, therefore, not in order to preserve, but to destroy the ancient constitution: if one side succeeds, the government must become despotic; if the other, several states will subsist without even nominal subordination; but in either case, the Germanic constitution will be

no more.

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Sweden, on the contrary, though now seemingly a strenuous assertor of its liberties, is probably only hastening on to despotism. Their senators, while they pretend to vindicate the freedom of the people, are only establishing their own independence. The deluded people will, however, at last perceive the miseries of an aristocratical government; they will perceive that the administration of a society of men, is ever more painful than that of one only. They will fly from this most oppressive of all forms, where one single member is capable of controlling the whole, to take refuge under the throne, which will ever be attentive to their complaints. No people long endure an aristocratical government, when they can apply elsewhere for redress. The lower orders of people may be enslaved for a time by a number of tyrants, but, upon the first opportunity, they will ever take a refuge in despotism or democracy.

As the Swedes are making concealed approaches to despotism, the French, on the other hand, are imperceptibly vindicating themselves into freedom. When I consider that those parliaments (the members of which are all created by the court, the presidents of which can act only by immediate direction) presume even to mention privileges and freedom, who, till of late, received directions

1 The Ledger has "probably (like Denmark of late)."—ED.

from the throne with implicit humility; when this is considered, I cannot help fancying that the genius of freedom has entered that kingdom in disguise. If they have but three weak monarchs more successively on the throne, the mask will be laid aside, and the country will certainly once more be free.1

When I compare the figure which the Dutch make in Europe with that they assume in Asia, I am struck with surprise. In Asia, I find them the great lords of all the Indian seas; in Europe, the timid inhabitants of a paltry state. No longer the sons of freedom, but of avarice; no longer assertors of their rights by courage, but by negotiations; fawning on those who insult them, and crouching under the rod of every neighbouring power. Without a friend to save them in distress, and without virtue to save themselves; their government is poor, and their private wealth will serve but to invite some neighbouring invader.2

I long with impatience for your letters from England, Denmark, Holland, and Italy; yet why wish for relations which only describe new calamities, which show that ambition and avarice are equally terrible in every region! Adieu.

This was written in 1760, and Goldsmith is entitled to some credit for his political sagacity in perceiving that the existing institutions of France were about to undergo a great change. His prediction was indeed verified somewhat sooner than he contemplated; but no human foresight could anticipate the rapid progress and fearful catastrophe of the bloody revolution of 1792. The French people, with all their refinement, were incapable of appreciating or long preserving their recovered freedom.-B.

2 See Traveller,' 11. 313, &c.—

"Heavens! how unlike their Belgic sires of old!" &c.

Also Letter CXVIII. of the 'Citizen,' on the Dutch at the court of Japan.-ED.

LETTER LVII.

From Lien Chi Altangi, to Fum Hoam, First President, &c.

THE DIFFICULTY OF RISING IN LITERARY REPUTATION WITHOUT INTRIGUE OR RICHES.

I HAVE frequently admired the manner of criticising in China, where the learned are assembled in a body to judge of every new publication; to examine the merits of the work without knowing the circumstances of the author; and then to usher it into the world with proper marks of respect or reprobation.

In England, there are no such tribunals erected; but if a man thinks proper to be a judge of genius, few will be at the pains to contradict his pretensions. If any choose to be critics, it is but saying they are critics, and from that time forward, they become invested with full power and authority over every caitiff who aims at their instruction or entertainment.

As almost every member of society has, by this means, a vote in literary transactions, it is no way surprising to find the rich leading the way here, as in other common concerns of life; to see them either bribing the numerous herd of voters by their interest, or brow-beating them by their authority.

A great man says, at his table, that such a book" is no bad thing." Immediately the praise is carried off by five flatterers, to be dispersed at twelve different coffeehouses," from whence it circulates, still improving as it proceeds, through forty-five houses, where cheaper liquors are sold; from thence it is carried away by the honest tradesman to his own fireside, where the applause is eagerly caught up by his wife and children, who have been long taught to regard his judgment as the standard of perfection. Thus, when we have traced a wide extended literary reputation.

1 Dated July 9, 1760, in the Public Ledger.—ED.

2 See notes to the essay on 'Rejoicings for Victory' in vol. iv.ED.

up to its original source, we shall find it derived from some great man, who has, perhaps, received all his education and English from a tutor of Berne, or a dancing master of Picardy.

The English are people of good sense; and I am the more surprised to find them swayed in their opinions by men who often, from their very education, are incompetent judges. Men who, being always bred in affluence, see the world only on one side, are surely improper judges of human nature they may, indeed, describe a ceremony, a pageant, or a ball; but how can they pretend to dive into the secrets of the human heart, who have been nursed up only in forms, and daily behold nothing but the same insipid adulation smiling upon every face? Few of them have been bred in that best of schools, the school of adversity; and, by what I can learn, fewer still have been bred in any school at all.

From such a description, one would think, that a droning duke, or a dowager duchess, was not possessed of more just pretensions to taste than persons of less quality; and yet whatever the one or the other may write or praise, shall pass for perfection, without further examination. A nobleman has but to take a pen, ink, and paper, write away through three large volumes, and then sign his name to the title-page; though the whole might have been before. more disgusting than his own rent-roll, yet signing his name and title gives value to the deed; title being alone equivalent to taste, imagination, and genius.'

As soon as a piece, therefore, is published, the first questions are, Who is the author? Does he keep a coach? Where lies his estate? What sort of table does he keep? If he happens to be poor, and unqualified for such a scrutiny, he and his works sink into irremediable obscurity; and too late he finds, that having fed upon turtle is a more ready way to fame than having digested Tully.

'His

The history of the origin and popularity of Goldsmith's own tory of England in Letters from a Nobleman to his Son,' a work which was for years attributed to Lord Chesterfield and other noblemen, is a case in point. This History' was first published in 1764. See Life,' vol. i., p. 21; also the Preface to the Nobleman Letters in vol. iv. -ED.

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