24th November, 1813

No dreams last night of the dead, nor the living; so—I am "firm as the marble, founded as the rock," 1 till the next earthquake.

Ward's dinner went off well. There was not a disagreeable person there—unless I offended any body, which I am sure I could not by contradiction, for I said little, and opposed nothing. Sharpe 2 (a man of elegant mind, and who has lived much with the best—Fox, Horne Tooke, Windham, Fitzpatrick, and all the agitators of other times and tongues,) told us the particulars of his last interview with Windham 3 , a few days before the fatal operation which sent "that gallant spirit to aspire the skies." 4

Windham,—the first in one department of oratory and talent, whose only fault was his refinement beyond the intellect of half his hearers,—Windham, half his life an active participator in the events of the earth, and one of those who governed nations,— he regretted,—and dwelt much on that regret, that "he had not entirely devoted himself to literature and science!!!" His mind certainly would have carried him to eminence there, as elsewhere;—but I cannot comprehend what debility of that mind could suggest such a wish. I, who have heard him, cannot regret any thing but that I shall never hear him again. What! would he have been a plodder? a metaphysician?—perhaps a rhymer? a scribbler? Such an exchange must have been suggested by illness. But

he is gone, and Time "shall not look upon his like again." 5

I am tremendously in arrear with my letters,—except to ——, and to her my thoughts overpower me:—my words never compass them. To Lady Melbourne I write with most pleasure—and her answers, so sensible, so tactique —I never met with half her talent. If she had been a few years younger, what a fool she would have made of me, had she thought it worth her while,—and I should have lost a valuable and most agreeable friend. Mem. a mistress never is nor can be a friend. While you agree, you are lovers; and, when it is over, any thing but friends.

I have not answered W. Scott's last letter,—but I will. I regret to hear from others, that he has lately been unfortunate in pecuniary involvements. He is undoubtedly the Monarch of Parnassus, and the most English of bards. I should place Rogers next in the living list (I value him more as the last of the best school) —Moore and Campbell both third —Southey and Wordsworth and Coleridge—the rest, Greek: hoi polloi —thus: pyramid of writers

There is a triangular Gradus ad Parnassum!—the names are too numerous for the base of the triangle. Poor Thurlow has gone wild about the poetry of Queen Bess's reign— c'est dommage. I have ranked the names upon my triangle more upon what I believe popular opinion, than any decided opinion of my own. For, to me, some of Moore's last Erin sparks—"As a beam o'er the face of the waters"—"When he who adores thee"—"Oh blame not"—and "Oh breathe not his name"—are worth all the Epics that ever were composed.

Rogers thinks the Quarterly will attack me next. Let them. I have been "peppered so highly" in my time, both ways, that it must be cayenne or aloes to make me taste. I can sincerely say, that I am not very much alive now to criticism. But—in tracing this—I rather believe that it proceeds from my not attaching that importance to authorship which many do, and which, when young, I did also. "

One gets tired of every thing, my angel," says Valmont 6 .

The "angels" are the only things of which I am not a little sick—but I do think the preference of writers to agents —the mighty stir made about scribbling and scribes, by themselves and others—a sign of effeminacy, degeneracy, and weakness. Who would write, who had any thing better to do? "Action—action—action"—said Demosthenes: "Actions—actions," I say, and not writing,—least of all, rhyme. Look at the querulous and monotonous lives of the "genus;"—except Cervantes, Tasso, Dante, Ariosto, Kleist (who were brave and active citizens), Æschylus, Sophocles, and some other of the antiques also—what a worthless, idle brood it is!

Footnote 1:

  Macbeth, act iii. sc. 4—

Footnote 2:

  Richard Sharp (1759-1835), a wealthy hat-manufacturer, was a prominent figure in political and literary life. A consistent Whig, he was one of the "Friends of the People," and in the House of Commons (1806-12) was a recognized authority on questions of finance. Essentially a "club-able man," he was a member of many clubs, both literary and political. In Park Lane and at Mickleham he gathered round him many friends—Rogers, Moore, Mackintosh, Macaulay, Coleridge, Horner, Grattan, Horne Tooke, and Sydney Smith, who was so frequently his guest in the country that he was called the "Bishop of Mickleham." Horner (May 20, 1816) speaks of a visit paid to Sharp in Surrey, in company with Grattan (Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 355). Ticknor, who, in 1815, breakfasted with Sharp in Park Lane (Life, vol. i. pp. 55, 56), says of a party of "men of letters:"

"I saw little of them, excepting Mr. Sharp, formerly a Member of Parliament, and who, from his talents in society, has been called 'Conversation Sharp.' He has been made an associate of most of the literary clubs in London, from the days of Burke down to the present time. He told me a great many amusing anecdotes of them, and particularly of Burke, Porson, and Grattan, with whom he had been intimate; and occupied the dinner-time as pleasantly as the same number of hours have passed with me in England....

June 7.—This morning I breakfasted with Mr. Sharp, and had a continuation of yesterday,—more pleasant accounts of the great men of the present day, and more amusing anecdotes of the generation that has passed away."

Miss Berry, who met Sharp often, writes, in her Journal for March 26, 1808 (Journal, vol. ii. p. 344),

Sharp published anonymously a volume of Epistles in Verse (1828). These were reproduced, with additions, in his Letters and Essays, published with his name in 1834. His "Epistle to an Eminent Poet" is evidently addressed to his lifelong friend, Samuel Rogers:

cross-reference: return to Footnote 5 of Journal entry for November 23, 1813

Footnote 3:

  William Windham, of Felbrigg Hall (1750-1810), educated at Eton, Glasgow, and University College, Oxford, became M.P. for Norwich in 1784. In the following year he was made chief secretary to Lord Northington, Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland. Expressing some doubts to Dr. Johnson whether he possessed the arts necessary for Parliamentary success, the Doctor said, "You will become an able negotiator; a very pretty rascal." He resigned the secretaryship within the year, according to Gibbon, on the plea of ill health. He was one of the managers of the impeachment of Warren Hastings in 1788, Secretary at War from 1794 to 1801, and War and Colonial Secretary, 1806-7.

Windham, a shrewd critic of other speakers, called Pitt's style a "State-paper style," because of its combined dignity and poverty, and "verily believed Mr. Pitt could speak a king's speech off-hand." As a speaker he was himself remarkably effective, a master of illustration and allusion, delighting in "homely Saxon," and affecting provincial words and pronunciation. Lord Sheffield, writing to Gibbon, February 5, 1793, says, "As to Windham, I should think he is become the best, at least the most sensible, speaker of the whole." His love of paradox, combined with his political independence and irresolution, gained him the name of "Weathercock Windham;" but he was respected by both sides as an honest politician. Outside the house it was his ambition to be known as a thorough Englishman—a patron of horse-racing, cock-fighting, bull-baiting, pugilism, and football. He was also a scholar, a man of wide reading, an admirable talker, and a friend of Miss Berry and of Madame d'Arblay, in whose Diaries he is a prominent figure. His own Diary (1784-1810) was published in 1866.

On the 8th of July, 1809, he saw a fire in Conduit Street, which threatened to spread to the house of his friend North, who possessed a valuable library. In his efforts to save the books, he fell and bruised his hip. A tumour formed, which was removed; but he sank under the operation, and died June 4, 1810.

Footnote 4:

Romeo and Juliet, act iii. sc. 1.

Footnote 5:

Hamlet, act i. sc. 2.

Footnote 6:

 The allusion probably is to The Foundling of the Forest (1809), by William Dimond the Younger. But no passage exactly corresponds to the quotation.