Clarissa Harlowe; or the history of a young lady Volume IX Part 41

The foregoing work having been published at three different periods of time, the author, in the course of its publication, was favoured with many anonymous letters, in which the writers differently expressed their wishes with regard to the apprehended catastrophe.

Most of those directed to him by the gentler s.e.x, turned in favour of what they called a fortunate ending. Some of the fair writers, enamoured, as they declared, with the character of the heroine, were warmly solicitous to have her made happy; and others, likewise of their mind, insisted that poetical justice required that it should be so. And when, says one ingenious lady, whose undoubted motive was good-nature and humanity, it must be concluded that it is in an author's power to make his piece end as he pleases, why should he not give pleasure rather than pain to the reader whom he has interested in favour of his princ.i.p.al characters?

Others, and some gentlemen, declared against tragedies in general, and in favour of comedies, almost in the words of Lovelace, who was supported in his taste by all the women at Mrs. Sinclair's and by Sinclair herself.

'I have too much feeling, said he.* There is enough in the world to make our hearts sad, without carrying grief into our diversions, and making the distresses of others our own.'

* See Vol. IV. Letter XL.

And how was this happy ending to be brought about? Why, by this very easy and trite expedient; to wit, by reforming Lovelace, and marrying him to Clarissa--not, however, abating her one of her trials, nor any of her sufferings, [for the sake of the sport her distresses would give to the tender-hearted reader, as she went along,] the last outrage excepted: that, indeed, partly in compliment to Lovelace himself, and partly for her delicacy-sake, they were willing to spare her.

But whatever were the fate of his work, the author was resolved to take a different method. He always thought that sudden conversions, such, especially, as were left to the candour of the reader to suppose and make out, has neither art, nor nature, nor even probability, in them; and that they were moreover of a very bad example. To have a Lovelace, for a series of years, glory in his wickedness, and think that he had nothing to do, but as an act of grace and favour to hold out his hand to receive that of the best of women, whenever he pleased, and to have it thought that marriage would be a sufficient amends for all his enormities to others as well as to her--he could not bear that. Nor is reformation, as he has shown in another piece, to be secured by a fine face; by a pa.s.sion that has sense for its object; nor by the goodness of a wife's heart, nor even example, if the heart of the husband be not graciously touched by the Divine finger.

It will be seen, by this time, that the author had a great end in view.

He had lived to see the scepticism and infidelity openly avowed, and even endeavoured to be propagated from the press; the greatest doctrines of the Gospel brought into question; those of self-denial and mortification blotted out of the catalogue of christian virtues; and a taste even to wantonness for out-door pleasure and luxury, to the general exclusion of domestic as well as public virtue, industriously promoted among all ranks and degrees of people.

In this general depravity, when even the pulpit has lost great part of its weight, and the clergy are considered as a body of interested men, the author thought he should be able to answer it to his own heart, be the success what it would, if he threw in his mite towards introducing a reformation so much wanted: and he imagined, that if in an age given up to diversion and entertainment, if he could steal in, as may be said, and investigate the great doctrines of Christianity under the fas.h.i.+onable guise of an amus.e.m.e.nt; he should be most likely to serve his purpose, remembering that of the Poet:--

A verse may find him who a sermon flies, And turn delight into a sacrifice.

He was resolved, therefore, to attempt something that never yet had been done. He considered that the tragic poets have as seldom made their heroes true objects of pity, as the comics theirs laudable ones of imitation: and still more rarely have made them in their deaths look forward to a future hope. And thus, when they die, they seem totally to perish. Death, in such instances, must appear terrible. It must be considered as the greatest evil. But why is death set in such shocking lights, when it is the universal lot?

He has, indeed, thought fit to paint the death of the wicked, as terrible as he could paint it. But he has endeavoured to draw that of the good in such an amiable manner, that the very Balaams of the world should not forbear to wish that their latter end might be like that of the heroine.

And after all, what is the poetical justice so much contended for by some, as the generality of writers have managed it, but another sort of dispensation than that with which G.o.d, by revelation, teaches us, He has thought fit to exercise mankind; whom placing here only in a state of probation, he hath so intermingled good and evil, as to necessitate us to look forward for a more equal dispensation of both?

The Author of the History (or rather Dramatic Narrative) of Clarissa, is therefore well justified by the christian system, in deferring to extricate suffering virtue to the time in which it will meet with the completion of its reward.

But not absolutely to shelter the conduct observed in it under the sanction of Religion, [an authority, perhaps, not of the greatest weight with some of our modern critics,] it must be observed, that the Author is justified in its catastrophe by the greatest master of reason, and best judge of composition, that ever lived. The learned reader knows we must mean ARISTOTLE; whose sentiments in this matter we shall beg leave to deliver in the words of a very amiable writer of our own country:

'The English writers of Tragedy,' says Mr. Addison,* 'are possessed with a notion, that when they represent a virtuous or innocent person in distress, they ought not to leave him till they have delivered him out of his troubles, or made him triumph over his enemies.

* Spectator, Vol. I. No. XL.

'This error they have been led into by a ridiculous doctrine in modern criticism, that they are obliged to an equal distribution of rewards and punishments, and an impartial execution of poetical justice.

'Who were the first that established this rule, I know not; but I am sure it has no foundation in NATURE, in REASON, or in the PRACTICE OF THE ANTIENTS.

'We find that good and evil happen alike unto ALL MEN on this side the grave: and as the princ.i.p.al design of tragedy is to raise commiseration and terror in the minds of the audience, we shall defeat this great end, if we always make virtue and innocence happy and successful.

'Whatever crosses and disappoints a good man suffers in the body of the tragedy, they will make but small impression on our minds, when we know, that, in the last act, he is to arrive at the end of his wishes and desires.

'When we see him engaged in the depth of his afflictions, we are apt to comfort ourselves, because we are sure he will find his way out of them, and that his grief, however great soever it may be at present, will soon terminate in gladness.

'For this reason, the antient writers of tragedy treated men in their plays, as they are dealt with in the world, by making virtue sometimes happy and sometimes miserable, as they found it in the fable which they made choice of, or as it might affect their audience in the most agreeable manner.

'Aristotle considers the tragedies that were written in either of those kinds; and observes, that those which ended unhappily had always pleased the people, and carried away the prize, in the public disputes of the state, from those that ended happily.

'Terror and commiseration leave a pleasing anguish in the mind, and fix the audience in such a serious composure of thought, as is much more lasting and delightful, than any little transient starts of joy and satisfaction.

'Accordingly, we find, that more of our English tragedies have succeeded, in which the favourites of the audience sink under their calamities, than those in which they recover themselves out of them.

'The best plays of this kind are The Orphan, Venice Preserved, Alexander the Great, Theodosius, All for Love, Oedipus, Oroonoko, Oth.e.l.lo, &c.

'King Lear is an admirable tragedy of the same kind, as Shakespeare wrote it: but as it is reformed according to the chimerical notion of POETICAL JUSTICE, in my humble opinion it has lost half its beauty.

'At the same time I must allow, that there are very n.o.ble tragedies which have been framed upon the other plan, and have ended happily; as indeed most of the good tragedies which have been written since the starting of the above-mentioned criticism, have taken this turn: The Mourning Bride, Tamerlane,* Ulysses, Phaedra and Hippolitus, with most of Mr. Dryden's. I must also allow, that many of Shakespeare's, and several of the celebrated tragedies of antiquity, are cast in the same form. I do not, therefore, dispute against this way of writing tragedies; but against the criticism that would establish this as the only method; and by that means would very much cramp the English tragedy, and perhaps give a wrong bent to the genius of our writers.'

* Yet, in Tamerlane, two of the most amiable characters, Moneses and Arpasia, suffer death.

This subject is further considered in a letter to the Spectator.*

* See Spect. Vol. VII. No. 548.

'I find your opinion,' says the author of it, 'concerning the late-invented term called poetical justice, is controverted by some eminent critics. I have drawn up some additional arguments to strengthen the opinion which you have there delivered; having endeavoured to go to the bottom of that matter. . . .

'The most perfect man has vices enough to draw down punishments upon his head, and to justify Providence in regard to any miseries that may befall him. For this reason I cannot but think that the instruction and moral are much finer, where a man who is virtuous in the main of his character falls into distress, and sinks under the blows of fortune, at the end of a tragedy, than when he is represented as happy and triumphant. Such an example corrects the insolence of human nature, softens the mind of the beholder with sentiments of pity and compa.s.sion, comforts him under his own private affliction, and teaches him not to judge of men's virtues by their successes.* I cannot think of one real hero in all antiquity so far raised above human infirmities, that he might not be very naturally represented in a tragedy as plunged in misfortunes and calamities. The poet may still find out some prevailing pa.s.sion or indiscretion in his character, and show it in such a manner as will sufficiently acquit Providence of any injustice in his sufferings: for, as Horace observes, the best man is faulty, though not in so great a degree as those whom we generally call vicious men.**

* A caution that our Blessed Saviour himself gives in the case of the eighteen person killed by the fall of the tower of Siloam, Luke xiii. 4.

** Vitiis nemo sine nascitur: optimus ille, Qui minimis urgentur.----

'If such a strict poetical justice (proceeds the letter-writer,) as some gentlemen insist upon, were to be observed in this art, there is no manner of reason why it should not be so little observed in Homer, that his Achilles is placed in the greatest point of glory and success, though his character is morally vicious, and only poetically good, if I may use the phrase of our modern critics. The aenead is filled with innocent unhappy persons. Nisus and Euryalus, Lausus and Pallas, come all to unfortunate ends. The poet takes notice in particular, that in the sacking of Troy, Ripheus fell, who was the most just character among the Trojans:

'----Cadit & Ripheus, justissimus unus Qui fuit in Teucris, & servantissimus aequi.

Diis aliter visum est.--

'The G.o.ds thought fit.--So blameless Ripheus fell, Who lov'd fair Justice, and observ'd it well.'

'And that Pantheus could neither be preserved by his transcendent piety, nor by the holy fillets of Apollo, whose priest he was:

'--Nec te tua plurima, Pantheu, Labentum pietas, nec Apollinis infula texit. aen. II.

'Nor could thy piety thee, Pantheus, save, Nor ev'n thy priesthood, from an early grave.'

'I might here mention the practice of antient tragic poets, both Greek and Latin; but as this particular is touched upon in the paper above-mentioned, I shall pa.s.s it over in silence. I could produce pa.s.sages out of Aristotle in favour of my opinion; and if in one place he says, that an absolutely virtuous man should not be represented as unhappy, this does not justify any one who should think fit to bring in an absolutely virtuous man upon the stage. Those who are acquainted with that author's way of writing, know very well, that to take the whole extent of his subject into his divisions of it, he often makes use of such cases as are imaginary, and not reducible to practice. . . .

'I shall conclude,' says this gentleman, 'with observing, that though the Spectator above-mentioned is so far against the rule of poetical justice, as to affirm, that good men may meet with an unhappy catastrophe in tragedy, it does not say, that ill men may go off unpunished. The reason for this distinction is very plain; namely, because the best of men [as is said above,] have faults enough to justify Providence for any misfortunes and afflictions which may befall them; but there are many men so criminal, that they can have no claim or pretence to happiness. The best of men may deserve punishment; but the worst of men cannot deserve happiness.'