Guy's Porridge Pot A Poem, In Twenty-Four Books. The First Part [by R. E. Landor] |
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| I. |
| II. |
| III. | BOOK III. |
| IV. |
| V. |
| VI. |
 | Guy's Porridge Pot |  |
BOOK III.
ARGUMENT.
INVOCATION according to custom.—Description of a future Doctor, who had been described before under the character of Somnus.—Second character.—The shadow of a shade.—The Author's caution to his reader respeeting some metaphorical language on this pair.—Extraordinary instances of laudable ambition —Pathetical address to them—A third character—The great man—surprising instance of his early attainments—His prudence—Good advice from the author—Description of jealousy. And improvement on Esop—The author moralises and concludes.
And these are of them.”
Macbetm.
Since none know half as much as you
Of guests and feasts—removes and courses—
Arrived in gigs, on foot, or horses?
I wretched mortal! lost in doubts
But hear of dinners, guess at routs:
For all I learn is learnt from you,
Tell, pretty maidens! tell me who?
That νους less, neutral, negative,
That shapeless substance, pursy ghost,
Ambitious sluggard, walking post,
That sediment of silly things,
That Somnus but for lack of wings?
How shall I name, or how be mute on,
That rival of Sir Isaac Newton,
That planeless flat, that pointless angle,
That disputant too dull to wrangle,
That philosophic butt for laughter,
That doctor “that shall be hereafter.”
Diverging lines from parallel,
Make ladies wonder while he passes
Triumphant o'er the bridge of asses;
And clowns admire his fruitful brain
With “well done Doctor try again!”
He brought the news—to him belong
The earliest tributes of my song.
The shadow of a shade behind!
Not less in zeal, he would pursue
As close as other shadows do;
But lean the poney which he sat on,
Far was his house, O! far from —
And Fortune, stale capricious whore
Told rival shade an hour before.
Ah! think not reader, when I made
This simile about a shade
That then I meant, that now I mean
To call him bloodless, boneless, lean!
Hard were the task, yea passing hard
For any frail and earthly bard,
To make some similies that do
In one point well, fit others too.
This is a shade, a shadow that,
Though both are fair, and one is fat:
The same their haste, the same their way,
That rides a white, and this a grey;
And every man who passes hoots
Why! sure he stole the Doctor's boots!
The closest copy of his dress,
To talk of Greek, or to display
His manner on a market day:
To judge of books they never read;
Begin a tale, forget the joke,
Resume their pipes, and end in smoke:
Once more to rise, cry hush, and then
Sit very gravely down again—
Ambition haunts their curtain'd sleep;
They dream to covet—wake to weep:
Dim scarf or shovel hat appears,
And thunders Doctor in their ears—
Cries “eighty pounds, nay less the price is,
Go thou to Cam, and thou to Isis,
Then both may rank as high as he,
Both sign their names with LL.D.!”
Farewell! if aught my muse can do
In stuffing owls, or painting you—
Farewell if aught that muse avail
In fixing lanthorns to a tail!
Half grinning, frowning, pleased, and vext;
As if he cried “now! mind me now!?”
Did ever awe-struck mortals eyes
View one so great, or one so wise?
So sharp in wit, in sense so sound,
So quick, so bright, yet so profound?
Did ever laughing mortal see
One half so pleased with self as he?
'Tis said that scarce a fortnight old,
I only tell what I was told—
With mimic gestures, varying faces,
He studied attitudes and graces,
And even then, that he would teach
His nurse to rhyme, his doll to preach!
Frown on, frown on a great divine!
While prudence shelters—and you,
A very little Greek will do:
Let Greek alone! and e'er you chatter
On any other learned matter,
Never forget this cautious plan,
If not your subject, know your man.
To brother parsons talk of war,
Of fiddlesticks to Doctor—
To beauties trace the roots of words,
Prove Christianity to Lords,
To clowns deal politics, and preach
On all, but what he knows, to each!
To heal the wound, or hide the pain;
In every twitch and jerk we see
That green-eyed monster jealousy:
Congratulation hails the host,
And lo! like murder'd Banquo's Ghost,
In scorn, a little loathsome beast
Usurps the stool, and mocks the feast!
For envy plays us slippery tricks
In smaller things than bishoprics:
“Be great,” exclaims the restless fagot,
“A frog an ox—a mite a maggot;”
And thus she fires thy sapient pate
To rival, not to imitate.
But never mind! the truly wise
Can talk at least and moralize.
What means a crosier but a crook?
And what is mitre, what is Lord,
But name profane, but thing abhor'd?
So wisdom taught me—reader so
Teach Seneca and Cicero.
And now to prove how much he wanted
The consolation that I granted,
Come leave with me the beaten road
And listen to an episode.
Pope says that “it is hard to conceive any address more solemn, any opening to a poem more noble and magnificent than Homer's invocation before his catalogue.” I am sorry that Pope has not lived to read mine. If I only equal Homer in solemnity and magnificence, I far surpass him in elegance and propriety. What do the muses know of ships and soldiers? Why should Homer suppose that they had more brass about them, or, individually, more tongues in their heads, than himself?—Now my pretty maidens, as they are described in the second book, can easily be imagined to relate what went on at a feast, and to tell who were the guests. If I had been sure of as many commentators as Homer was blessed with, I should have left these discoveries to them and my readers: but the former are alas! no more: and the latter may be, nay ten to one are, most lamentable blockheads.
I have not done with this character yet: but it will save both time and trouble, to couple him with the next. They may run on together, like two of his own hounds. If they do not exactly agree, they cannot part: one pulls a little this way, and the other that, but still they go together.
Now which of these truly learned and sagacious admirers it was that wrote the Doctor's life, I pretend not to determine. But his life is written among the public characters, and evidently by an admirer. As a composition, it is rather too good for the first on my list, and, I should hope, rather too bad for any of the rest. The Doctor's style is vilely caricatured in all its defects, an infallible consequence of stupid imitation. His great stumbling-block is a climax, and now behold a climax which in any other work would have broken the writer's neck. “The riots in Birmingham, which happened in 1791, will be remembered by the latest posterity, not more for the numerous and diffusive mischiefs which they occasioned, than for the meanness of spirit”— very good—“blindness of rage”—very good again, hold up! “and intemperance of zeal”—O! lack a day!!!—“with which the mob attacked the peaceful abode of Dr. Priestley,” &c. The shadow may have volunteered this life now, having been appointed or retained to write another hereafter. Let us hope, however, that the Doctor will live long enough “to do for him as much.” This will be a new and desirable method to the world, of repaying his kind intentions. It will reward an humble and patient successor to Boswell, and ruin an ancient axiom for ever. The book of which I have spoken, the public characters, is a very useful national work. Like some of the Reviews and other periodical publications, it employs those who either could or would do nothing else. Numbers gain their bread honestly, no doubt, now, that might otherwise be very burdensome to their parishes, or dangerous in a moral and well-regulated bridewell. The reviews, and the work under our consideration, are conducted upon very different plans, and thus they become suitable to very different capacities. Some men are better qualified for flattery than abuse, some can write and spell a little, who do not like the trouble of reading at all, and who foolishly fancy that reading is necessary; and lastly some, whose excessive stupidity would disqualify them for critics of any sort, possess abundant wisdom for biographers like these. This book excites our compassion, and it will be patronised by the humane. They will say to each of those who conduct it, like the good natured Lord Lafeu to Parolles, “Though you are a fool and a knave, you shall eat.” But the book has other advantages besides these. It contains the lives of many, who, till now, were never known to have existed. It is of infinite service to such as are admired by none but themselves, and this is the case with ninety and nine men out of a hundred. We shall have the lives, most likely, of all those whom I am now celebrating, since they too, were it not for me, would be in a similar predicament. It is my business, however, if their ambition be not very immoderate, to save them the trouble of writing their own characters. The work is also exceedingly useful to those authors who fancy that others are not half so well qualified for this employment as themselves. See Mr. Pratt's Life, and two thirds of every Vol. Some, who were rather dissatisfied with the praises of their friends in a first life, have very obligingly consented to praise themselves in a second. See the second life of Miss Seward, 6th Vol. But allowances should be made for the vanities of a second life, when we reflect upon the weaknesses of a second childhood. And weakness would have served for an a pology thirty years ago.
These great moralists instruct us to conquer envy by lessening the object envied, or the enjoyment of those whom we envy. If you see a rich man, say they, recollect his cares, and anticipate his losses. But this is encouraging as bad a passion as the one that it is intended to remove. It teaches us to rejoice in the calamities of another, and to consider ourselves as really unfortunate while our neighbour is happier. We must reduce his felicity before we can rest! See on this subject the following authors whom I have now overthrown. Cicero—Seneca—Plat. Banq.—Hierocl. Com. in Carm. Aur. Pyth.—Hor. passim—Stob, —Œdip. Tyr.—Justin, B. 2.—Suid.
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