Before closing these last Memorials of Charles and Mary Lamb, it may be permitted me to glance separately at some of the friends who are grouped around them in memory, and who, like them, live only in recollection, and in the works they have left behind them. GEORGE DYER was one of the first objects of Lamb's youthful reverence, for he had attained the stately rank of Grecian in the venerable school of Christ's Hospital, when Charles entered it, a little, timid, affectionate child; but this boyish respect, once amounting to awe, gave place to a familiar habit of loving banter, which, springing from the depths of old regard, approximated to schoolboy roguery, and, now and then, though very rarely, gleamed on the consciousness of the ripe scholar. No contrast could be more vivid than that presented by the relations of each to the literature they both loved; one divining its inmost essences, plucking out the heart of its mysteries, shedding light on its dimmest recesses; the other devoted, with equal assiduity, to its externals. Books, to Dyer, "were a real world, both pure and good; " among them he passed, unconscious of time, from youth to extreme age, vegetating on their dates and forms, and "trivial fond records," in the learned air of great libraries, or the dusty confusion of his own, with the least possible apprehension of any human interest vital in their pages, or of any spirit of wit or fancy glancing across them. His life was an Academic pastoral. Methinks I see his gaunt, awkward form, set off by trousers too short, like those outgrown by a gawky lad, and a rusty coat as much too large for the wearer, hanging about him like those garments which the aristocratic Milesian peasantry prefer to the most comfortable rustic dress; his long head silvered over with short yet straggling hair, and his dark grey eyes glistening with faith and wonder, as Lamb satisfies the curiosity which has gently disturbed his studies as to the authorship of the Waverley Novels, by telling him, in the strictest confidence, that they are the works of Lord Castlereagh, just returned from the Congress of Sovereigns at Vienna! Off he runs, with animated stride and shambling enthusiasm, nor stops till he reaches Maida Hill, and breathes his news into the startled ear of Leigh Hunt, who, "as a public writer," ought to be possessed of the great fact with which George is laden! Or shall I endeavour to revive the bewildered look with which, just after he had been announced as one of Lord Stanhope's executors and residuary legatees, he received Lamb's grave inquiry, "Whether it was true, as commonly reported, that he was to be made a Lord ?" "O dear no! Mr. Lamb," responded he with earnest seriousness, but not without a moment's quivering vanity, "I could not think of such a thing; it is not true, I assure you." "I thought not," said Lamb, " and I contradict it wherever I go; but the government will not ask your consent; they may raise you to the peerage without your even knowing it." "I hope not, Mr. Lamb; indeed, indeed, I hope not; it would not suit me at all," responded Dyer, and went his way, musing on the possibility of a strange honour descending on his reluctant brow. Or shall I recall the visible presentment of his bland unconsciousness of evil when his sportive friend taxed it to the utmost, by suddenly asking what he thought of the murderer Williams, who, after de stroying two families in Ratcliffe Highway, had broken prison by suicide, and whose body had just before been conveyed, in shocking procession, to its cross-road grave! The desperate attempt to compel the gentle optimist to speak ill of a mortal creature produced no happier success than the answer, "Why, I should think, Mr. Lamb, he must have been rather an eccentric character." This simplicity of a nature not only unspotted by the world, but almost abstracted from it, will seem the more remarkable, when it is known that it was subjected, at the entrance of life, to a hard battle with fortune. Dyer was the son of very poor parents, residing in an eastern suburb of London, Stepney or Bethnal-greenward, where he attracted the attention of two elderly ladies as a serious child, with an extraordinary love for books. They obtained for him a presentation to Christ's Hospital, which he entered at seven years of age; fought his way through its sturdy ranks to its head; and, at nineteen, quitted it for Cambridge, with only an exhibition and his scholarly accomplishments to help him. On he went, however, placid, if not rejoicing, through the difficulties of a life illustrated only by scholarship; encountering tremendous labours; unresting others elicited the wildest denunciations of yet serene; until at eighty-five he breathed visionary terror. out the most blameless of lives, which began in a struggle to end in a learned dream! In Mr. Godwin's mind, the faculty of abstract reason so predominated over all Mr. GODWIN, who during the happiest others, as practically to extinguish them; period of Lamb's weekly parties, was a con- and his taste, akin to this faculty, sought stant assistant at his whist-table, resembled only for its development through the medium Dyer in simplicity of manner and devotion of composition for the press. He had no to letters; but the simplicity was more imagination, no fancy, no wit, no humour; superficial, and the devotion more profound or if he possessed any of those faculties, they than the kindred qualities in the guileless were obscured by that of pure reason; and scholar; and, instead of forming the entire being wholly devoid of the quick sensibility being, only marked the surface of a nature which irritates speech into eloquence, and beneath which extraordinary power lay of the passion for immediate excitement and hidden. As the absence of worldly wisdom applause, which tends to its presentment subjected Dyer to the sportive sallies of before admiring assemblies, he desired no Lamb, so a like deficiency in Godwin ex- other audience than that which he could posed him to the coarser mirth of Mr. Horne silently address, and learned to regard all Tooke, who was sometimes inclined to seek things through a contemplative medium. In relaxation for the iron muscles of his imper- this sense, far more than in the extravagant turbable mind in trying to make a philosopher application of his wildest theories, he levelled look foolish. To a stranger's gaze the author all around him; admitted no greatness but of the "Political Justice" and "Caleb that of literature; and neither desired nor Williams," as he appeared in the Temple, revered any triumphs but those of thought. always an object of curiosity except to his If such a reasoning faculty, guided by such a familiars, presented none of those charac- disposition, had been applied to abstract teristics with which fancy had invested the sciences, no effect remarkable beyond that daring speculator and relentless novelist; of rare excellence, would have been produced; nor, when he broke silence, did his language but the apparent anomalies of Mr. Godwin's tend to reconcile the reality with the expec- intellectual history arose from the applicatation. The disproportion of a frame which, tion of his power to the passions, the low of stature, was surmounted by a massive interests, and the hopes of mankind, at a head which might befit a presentable giant, time when they enkindled into frightful was rendered almost imperceptible, not by action, and when he calmly worked out his any vivacity of expression, (for his coun- problems among their burning elements with tenance was rarely lighted up by the the "ice-brook's temper," and the severest deep-seated genius within,) but by a logic. And if some extreme conclusions were gracious suavity of manner which many inconsistent with the faith and the duty which "a fine old English gentleman " might envy. alone can sustain and regulate our nature, His voice was small; the topics of his there was no small compensation in the ordinary conversation trivial, and discussed severity of the process to which the student with a delicacy and precision which might was impelled, for the slender peril which almost be mistaken for finical; and the pre- might remain lest the results should be sence of the most interesting persons in practically adopted. A system founded on literary society, of which he had enjoyed pure reason, which rejected the impulses of the best, would not prevent him from falling natural affection, the delights of gratitude, after dinner into the most profound sleep. the influences of prejudice, the bondage of This gentle, drowsy, spiritless demeanour, custom, the animation of personal hope; presents a striking contrast to a reputation which appealed to no passion-which which once filled Europe with its echoes; suggested no luxury-which excited no but it was, in truth, when rightly understood, perfectly consistent with those intellectual elements which in some raised the most enthusiastic admiration, and from animosities-and which offered no prize for the observance of its laws, except a participation in the expanding glories of progressive humanity, was little calculated to allure from the accustomed paths of ancient ordi- involution of style, or an eddy in the thought. nance any man disposed to walk in them by He sometimes complained, though with the the lights from heaven. On the other hand, benignity that always marked his estimate it was a healthful diversion from those of his opponents, that Mr. Malthus's style seductions in which the heart secretly ener- was too richly ornamented for argument; vates and infects the understanding, to invite and certainly, with all its vivacity of illusthe revolutionary speculator to the contem-tration it lacks the transparent simplicity plation of the distant and the refined; by of his own. The most palpable result which the pursuit of impracticable error to brace the mind for the achievement of everlasting truth; and on the "heat and flame of the distemper" of an impassioned democracy to "sprinkle cool patience." The idol Political Justice, of which he was the slow and laborious architect, if it for a while enchanted, did not long enthral or ever debase its worshippers; "its bones were marrowless, its blood was cold,"—but there was surely "speculation in its eyes" which "glared withal" into the future. Such high casuistry as it evoked has always an ennobling tendency, even when it dallies with error; the direction of thought in youth is of less consequence than the mode of its exercise; and it is only when the base interests and sensual passions of mortality pander to the understanding that truth may fear for the issue. he ever produced by his writings was the dark theory in the first edition of the work on Population, which was presented as an answer to his reasoning on behalf of the perfectibility of man; and he used to smile at his ultimate triumph, when the writer, who had only intended a striking paradox, tamed it down to the wisdom of economy, and adapted it to Poor-law uses; neutralised his giant spectres of Vice and Misery by the practical intervention of Moral Restraint; and left the optimist, Godwin, still in unclouded possession of the hope of universal peace and happiness, postponed only to that time when passion shall be subjected to reason, and population, no more rising like a resistless tide, between adamantine barriers to submerge the renovated earth, shall obey the commands of wisdom; rise and fall as the means of subsistence expand or contract; and only contribute an impulse to the universal harmony. The author of this cold and passionless intellectual phantasy looked out upon the world he hoped to inform from recesses of contemplation which the outward inci- The persons of Mr. Godwin's romancesdents of life did not disturb, and which, when stranger still-are the naked creations of closed, left him a common man, appearing to the same intellectual power, marvellously superficial observers rather below than above endowed with galvanic life. Though with the level of ordinary talkers. To his inward happier symmetry, they are as much made gaze the stupendous changes which agitated out of chains and links of reasoning, as the Europe, at the time he wrote, were silent as monster was fashioned by the chemistry a picture. The pleasure of his life was to of the student, in the celebrated novel of think; its business was to write; all else in his gifted daughter. Falkland, and Caleb it was vanity. Regarding his own being Williams, are the mere impersonations of through the same spiritualising medium, he the unbounded love of reputation, and saw no reason why the springs of its exist- irresistible curiosity; these ideas are deence should wear out, and, in the spring-time veloped in each with masterly iteration—to of his speculation, held that man might the two ideas all causes give way; and become immortal on earth by the effort of materials are subjected, often of remarkable the will. His style partook of the quality of his intellect and the character of its purposes -it was pure, simple, colourless. His most imaginative passages are inspired only by a logic quickened into enthusiasm by the anticipation of the approaching discovery of truth-the dawning Eureka of the reasoner; they are usually composed of "line upon line and precept upon precept," without an coarseness, to the refinement of the conception. Hazlitt used to observe of these two characters, that the manner they are played into each other, was equal to anything of the kind in the drama; and there is no doubt that the opposition, though at the cost of probability, is most powerfully maintained : but the effect is partly owing to the absence of all extrinsic interest which could interfere with the main purpose; the beatings of the heart become audible, not only from their own intensity, but from the desolation which the author has expanded around them. The consistency in each is that of an idea, not of a character; and if the effect of form and colour is produced, it is, as in line engraving, by the infinite minuteness and delicacy of the single strokes. In like manner, the incidents by which the author seeks to exemplify the wrongs inflicted by power on goodness in civilised society, are utterly fantastical; nothing can be more minute, nothing more unreal; the youth being involved by a web of circumstances woven to immesh him, which the condition of society that the author intends to repudiate, renders impossible; and which, if true, would prove not that the framework of law is tyrannous, but that the will of a single oppressor may elude it. The subject of "St. Leon" is more congenial to the author's power; but it is, in like manner, a logical development of the consequences of a being prolonged on earth through ages; and, as the dismal vista expands, the skeleton speculators crowd in to mock and sadden us! aid without scruple, considering that their means were justly the due of one who toiled in thought for their inward life, and had little time to provide for his own outward existence; and took their excuses, when offered, without doubt or offence. The very next day after I had been honoured and delighted by an introduction to him at Lamb's chambers, I was made still more proud and happy by his appearance at my own on such an errand-which my poverty, not my will, rendered abortive. After some pleasant chat on indifferent matters, he carelessly observed, that he had a little bill for 1507. falling due on the morrow, which he had forgotten till that morning, and desired the loan of the necessary amount for a few weeks. At first, in eager hope of being able thus to oblige one whom I regarded with admiration akin to awe, I began to consider whether it was possible for me to raise such a sum; but, alas! a moment's reflection sufficed to convince me that the hope was vain, and I was obliged, with much confusion, to assure my distinguished visitor how glad I should have been to serve him, but that I was only just starting as a special pleader, was obliged to write for magazines to help me on, and had not such a sum in the world. "Oh dear," said the philosopher, "I thought you were a young gentleman of fortunedon't mention it don't mention it; I shall do very well elsewhere:"-and then, in the most gracious manner, reverted to our former topics; and sat in my small room for half an hour, as if to convince me that my want of fortune made no difference in his esteem. A slender tribute to the literature he had loved and served so well, was accorded to him in the old age to which he attained, by the gift of a sinecure in the Exchequer, of about 2001. a-year, connected with the custody of the Records; and the last time I saw him, he was heaving an immense key to unlock the musty treasures of which he was guardian-how unlike those he had unlocked, with finer talisman, for the astonishment and alarm of one generation, and the delight of all others! Mr. Godwin was thus a man of two beings, which held little discourse with each other—the daring inventor of theories constructed of air-drawn diagrams-and the simple gentleman, who suffered nothing to disturb or excite him, beyond his study. He loved to walk in the crowded streets of London, not like Lamb, enjoying the infinite varieties of many-coloured life around him, but because he felt, amidst the noise, and crowd, and glare, more intensely the imperturbable stillness of his own contemplations. His means of comfortable support were mainly supplied by a shop in Skinner-street, where, under the auspices of " M. J. Godwin & Co.," the prettiest and wisest books for children issued, which old-fashioned parents presented to their children, without suspecting that the graceful lessons of piety and goodness which charmed away the selfishness of infancy, were published, and sometimes revised, and now and then written, by a philosopher whom they would scarcely JOHN THELWALL, who had once exulted in venture to name! He met the exigencies the appellation of Citizen Thelwall, having which the vicissitudes of business sometimes been associated with Coleridge and Southey caused, with the trusting simplicity which in their days of enthusiastical dreaming, marked his course-he asked his friends for though a more precise and practical reformer than either, was introduced by them to Lamb, deposed, he must necessarily die ;-though and was welcomed to his circle, in the true his boldness of speech placed him in jeopardy catholicism of its spirit, although its master even after the acquittals of his simplecared nothing for the Roman virtue which minded associate Hardy, and his enigmatical Thelwall devotedly cherished, and which instructor Tooke, who forsook him, and left Horne Tooke kept in uncertain vibration be- him, when acquitted, to the mercy of the tween a rebellion and a hoax. Lamb justly world. His life, which before this event had esteemed Thelwall as a thoroughly honest been one of self-denial and purity remarkable man ;-not honest merely in reference to the in a young man who had imbibed the immoral relations of life, but to the processes pulses of revolutionary France, partook of of thought; one whose mind, acute, vigorous, considerable vicissitude. At one time, he and direct, perceived only the object imme- was raised by his skill in correcting imdiately before it, and, undisturbed by colla- pediments of speech, and teaching elocution teral circumstances, reflected, with literal as a science, into elegant competence-at fidelity, the impression it received, and main- other times saddened by the difficulties of tained it as sturdily against the beauty that poorly requited literary toil and wholly unmight soften it, or the wisdom that might requited patriotism; but he preserved his mould it, as against the tyranny that would integrity and his cheerfulness-"a man of stifle its expression. "If to be honest as the hope and forward-looking mind even to the world goes, is to be one man picked out of last." Unlike Godwin, whose profound ten thousand," to be honest as the mind thoughts slowly struggled into form, and works is to be one man of a million; and seldom found utterance in conversation,— such a man was Thelwall. Starting with speech was, in him, all in all, his delight, his imperfect education from the thraldom of profession, his triumph, with little else than domestic oppression, with slender knowledge, passion to inspire or colour it. The flaming but with fiery zeal, into the dangers of poli- orations of his "Tribune," rendered more tical enterprise, and treading fearlessly on piquant by the transparent masquerade of the verge of sedition, he saw nothing before ancient history, which, in his youth, "touched him but powers which he assumed to be monied worldlings with dismay," and infected despotism and vice, and rushed headlong to the poor with dangerous anger, seemed vapid, crush them. The point of time-just that spiritless, and shallow when addressed when the accumulated force of public opinion through the press to the leisure of the had obtained a virtual mastery over the thoughtful. The light which glowed with accumulated corruptions of ages, but when so formidable a lustre before the evening power, still unconvinced of its danger, presented its boldest front to opposing intellect, or strove to crush it in the cruelty of awaking fear-gave scope for the ardent temperament of an orator almost as poor in scholastic cultivation as in external fortune; but strong in integrity, and rich in burning words. audience, vanished on closer examination, and proved to be only a harmless phantomvapour which left no traces of destructive energy behind it. Thelwall, in person small, compact, muscular-with a head denoting indomitable resolution, and features deeply furrowed by the ardent workings of the mind,-was as Thus passionate, Thelwall spoke boldly energetic in all his pursuits and enjoyments and vehemently—at a time when indignation as in political action. He was earnestly dewas thought to be virtue; but there is no voted to the Drama, and enjoyed its greatest reason to believe he ever meditated any representations with the freshness of a boy treason except that accumulated in the archi- who sees a play for the first time. He hailed tectural sophistry of Lord Eldon, by which the kindred energy of Kean with enthuhe proved a person who desired to awe siastic praise; but abjuring the narrowness the Government into a change of policy of his political vision in matters of taste, did to be guilty of compassing the king's death justice to the nobler qualities of Mrs. Siddons -as thus-that the king must resist the and her brothers. In literature and art also, proposed alteration in his measuress-that he relaxed the bigotry of his liberal intolerresisting he must be deposed-and that being ance, and expatiated in their wider fields U |