6

Mr. Gray, continued Goldsmith, wants the Greek writer's advantages. He speaks to a people not easily 'impressed with new ideas; extremely tenacious of the 'old; with difficulty warmed, and as slowly cooling again. 'How unsuited to our national character is that species of poetry which rises upon us with unexpected flights; where we must hastily catch the thought, or it flies from us; ' and the reader must largely partake of the poet's enthusiasm, in order to taste his beauties! Mr. Gray's Odes, 'it may be confessed, breathe much of the spirit of Pindar; but they have also caught the seeming obscu'rity, the sudden transition, and hazardous epithet of his 'mighty master; all which, though intended for beauties, 'will probably be regarded as blemishes by the genera'lity of his readers. In short, they are in some mea'sure a representation of what Pindar now appears to be, though not what he appeared to the States of Greece, ' when they rivalled each other in his applause, and when 'Pan himself was seen dancing to his melody.' Than this, nothing happier could be said.

Of the capabilities of Gray's genius, misdirected as he thus believed it to be, it is delightful to mark Goldsmith's strong appreciation. He speaks of him, in the emphatic line of the Country Elegy, as one whom the Muse had marked for her own. He grieves that such a genius' should not do justice to itself; and quotes passages from the Bard to support his belief that they are as great 'as 'anything of that species of composition which has hitherto

'appeared in our language, the Odes of Dryden himself 'not excepted.' Certainly to the two exceptions which, while Goldsmith wrote, Gray was describing to Hurd ('My friends tell me that the Odes do not succeed, and 'write me many topics of consolation on that head: I 'have heard of nobody but an actor and a doctor of 'divinity that profess their esteem for them '), might with some reason have been added, the poor monthly critic of The Dunciad.

With this Number of the Review, completing the fifth month of his engagement, his labours suddenly closed. The circumstances were never clearly explained; but that a serious quarrel had arisen with his employer, there is no reason to doubt. Griffiths accused him of idleness: said he affected an independence which did not become his condition, and left his desk before the day was done. Goldsmith retorted, that from the bookseller he had suffered impertinence, and from his wife privation; that Mr. Griffiths withheld common respect, and Mrs. Griffiths the most ordinary comforts; that they both tampered with his articles, and as it suited their ignorance or convenience wholly altered them; and, finally, that no part of the contract had been broken by himself, having always worked incessantly every day from nine o'clock till two, and on special days of the week from an earlier hour until late at night. Proof of the most curious part of this counter-statement, as to interpolation of the articles, was in the possession of his first biographers; and as it now

appears, from a published letter of Dr. Campbell to Bishop Percy, was at the last moment, in fear of abuse from the Review, suppressed.

But notwithstanding the quarrel, and Goldsmith's departure from the house, Griffiths retained his hold. Later events will show this; and that probably some small advance was his method of effecting it. It enabled him to keep up the appearance of civility when Goldsmith left his door; and to keep back the purpose of injury and insult till it could fall with heavier effect. The opportunity was not lost when it came, nor did the bookseller's malice end with the writer's death. Superintend the Monthly Review!' cried Griffiths, noticing, in the Number for August 1774, a brief memoir of Goldsmith in which his connection with the work was so described. We are authorised to say that this is a

very mistaken assertion. The Doctor had his merit as a 'man of letters; but alas! those that knew him must smile at the idea of such a Superintendent of a concern 'which most obviously required some degree of prudence,

It

as well as a competent acquaintance with the world. 'is, however, true that he had for a while a seat at our 'board; and that, so far as his knowledge of books 'extended, he was not an unuseful assistant.'

And so; without this belauded prudence; without this treasure of a competent acquaintance with the world; into that wide, friendless, desolate world, the poor writer, the not unuseful assistant, was launched again. How or where he lived for the next few months, is matter of great

translation of a book

uncertainty. But his letters were addressed to the Temple Exchange Coffee-House, near Temple-Bar, where the 'George' he celebrates in one of his Essays took charge of them; the garret where he wrote and slept is supposed to have been in one of the courts near the neighbouring Salisbury Square; Doctor Kippis, one of the Monthly Reviewers, 'was impressed by some faint recollection of 'his having made translations from the French, among 'others of a tale from Voltaire;' and the recollection is made stronger by one of his autographs in Heber's Collection, which purports to be a receipt from Mr. Ralph Griffiths for ten guineas, probably signed a day or two before he left the Monthly, for entitled Memoirs of my Lady B. Review, Doctor James Grainger, to whom his residence at The Dunciad had made him known; and of whom the translation of Tibullus, the Ode to Solitude, and the poem of the Sugar-Cane, have kept a memory very pleasant, though very limited; made the same Coffee-House his place of call, and often saw Goldsmith there. The month in which he separated from Griffiths was that in which Newberry's Literary Magazine lost Johnson's services; but this seems the only ground for a surmise that those services were replaced by Goldsmith's. The book itself shows little mark of his hand until his admitted connection with it, some months later.

Another writer in the

Toiling thus through an obscurity dark as the life itself, the inquirer finds on a sudden a glimpse of light,

appears, from a published letter of Dr. Campbell to Bishop Percy, was at the last moment, in fear of abuse from the Review, suppressed.

But notwithstanding the quarrel, and Goldsmith's departure from the house, Griffiths retained his hold. Later events will show this; and that probably some small advance was his method of effecting it. It enabled him to keep up the appearance of civility when Goldsmith left his door; and to keep back the purpose of injury and insult till it could fall with heavier effect. The opportunity was not lost when it came, nor did the bookseller's malice end with the writer's death. Superintend the Monthly Review!' cried Griffiths, noticing, in the Number for August 1774, a brief memoir of Goldsmith in which his connection with the work was so described. 'We are authorised to say that this is a 'very mistaken assertion. The Doctor had his merit as a man of letters; but alas! those that knew him must 'smile at the idea of such a Superintendent of a concern 'which most obviously required some degree of prudence, ' as well as a competent acquaintance with the world. It 'is, however, true that he had for a while a seat at our 'board; and that, so far as his knowledge of books 'extended, he was not an unuseful assistant.'

And so; without this belauded prudence; without this treasure of a competent acquaintance with the world; into that wide, friendless, desolate world, the poor writer, the not unuseful assistant, was launched again. How or where he lived for the next few months, is matter of great