  April 2, 1798. We promised in our Sixteenth Number, that though we should not proceed regularly with the publication of the Didactic Poem, the Progress of Man,—a work which, indeed, both from its bulk, and from the erudite nature of the subject, would hardly suit with the purposes of a Weekly Paper,—we should, nevertheless, give from time to time such extracts from it as we thought were likely to be useful to our readers, and as were in any degree connected with the topics or events of the times. The following extract is from the 23rd Canto of this admirable and instructive Poem;—in which the author (whom, by a series of accidents, which we have neither the space, nor indeed the liberty, to enumerate at present, we have discovered to be Mr. Higgins, of St. Mary Axe) describes the vicious refinement of what is called civilized society, in respect to marriage; contends with infinite spirit and philosophy against the factitious sacredness and indissolubility of that institution; and paints in glowing colours the happiness and utility (in a moral as well as political view) of an arrangement of an opposite sort, such as prevails in countries which are yet under the influence of pure and unsophisticated nature. In illustration of his principles upon this subject, the author alludes to a popular production of the German Drama, the title of which is the “Reformed Housekeeper” [The Stranger], which he expresses a hope of seeing transfused into the language of this country. THE PROGRESS OF MAN.
CANTO TWENTY-THIRD.
CONTENTS. On Marriage.—Marriage being indissoluble the cause of its being so often unhappy.—Nature’s laws not consulted in this point.—Civilized nations mistaken.—Otaheite: Happiness of the natives thereof—visited by Captain Cook, in his Majesty’s Ship Endeavour—Character of Captain Cook.—Address to Circumnavigation.—Description of His Majesty’s Ship Endeavour—Mast, rigging, sea-sickness, prow, poop, mess-room, surgeon’s mate—History of one.—Episode concerning naval chirurgery.—Catching a Thunny Fish.—Arrival at Otaheite—cast anchor—land—Natives astonished.—Love—Liberty—Moral—Natural—Religious—Contrasted with European manners.—Strictness—License—Doctor’s Commons.—Dissolubility of Marriage recommended—Illustrated by a game at Cards—Whist—Cribbage—Partners changed—Why not the same in Marriage?—Illustrated by a River.—Love free.—Priests, Kings.—German Drama.—Kotzebue’s “Housekeeper Reformed”.—Moral employments of Housekeeping described—Hottentots sit and stare at each other—Query, WHY?—Address to the Hottentots—History of the Cape of Good Hope.—ResumÉ of the Arguments against Marriage.—Conclusion. PROGRESS OF MAN.
EXTRACT. Hail! beauteous lands [174] that crown the Southern Seas; Dear happy seats of Liberty and Ease! Hail! whose green coasts the peaceful ocean laves, Incessant washing with its watery waves! Delicious islands! to whose envied shore Thee, gallant Cook! the ship Endeavour[175] bore. There laughs the sky, there zephyr’s frolic train, And light-wing’d loves, and blameless pleasures reign: There, when two souls congenial ties unite, No hireling Bonzes chant the mystic rite; Free every thought, each action unconfin’d, And light those fetters which no rivets bind. There in each grove, each sloping bank along, And flow’rs and shrubs and odorous herbs among, Each shepherd clasp’d, with undisguis’d delight, His yielding fair one,—in the Captain’s sight; Each yielding fair, as chance or fancy led, Preferr’d new lovers to her sylvan bed. [176] Learn hence, each nymph, whose free aspiring mind Europe’s cold laws, [177] and colder customs [178] bind— O! learn, what Nature’s genial laws decree— What Otaheite [179] is, let Britain be! Of WHIST or CRIBBAGE mark th’ amusing game— The partners changing, but the SPORT the same. Else would the gamester’s anxious ardour cool, Dull every deal, and stagnant every pool. —Yet must one[180] Man, with one unceasing Wife, Play the LONG RUBBER of connubial life. Yes! human laws, and laws esteem’d divine, The generous passion straiten and confine; And, as a stream, when art constrains its course, Pours its fierce torrent with augmented force, So, Passion [181] narrowed to one channel small, Unlike the former, does not flow at all. —For Love then only flaps his purple wings, When uncontroll’d by priestcraft or by kings. Such the strict rules, that, in these barbarous climes, Choke youth’s fair flow’rs, and feelings turn to crimes; And people every walk of polish’d life [182]With that two-headed monster, Man and Wife. Yet bright examples sometimes we observe, Which from the general practice seem to swerve; Such as presented to Germania’s[183] view, A Kotzebue’s bold emphatic pencil drew: Such as, translated in some future age, Shall add new glories to the British stage; —While the moved audience sit in dumb despair, “Like Hottentots, [184] and at each other stare”. With look sedate, and staid beyond her years, In matron weeds a Housekeeper appears. The jingling keys her comely girdle deck— Her ’kerchief colour’d, and her apron check. Can that be Adelaide, that “soul of whim,” Reform’d in practice, and in manner prim? —On household cares intent, [185] with many a sigh She turns the pancake, and she moulds the pie; Melts into sauces rich the savoury ham; From the crush’d berry strains the lucid jam; Bids brandied cherries, [186] by infusion slow, Imbibe new flavour, and their own forego, Sole cordial of her heart, sole solace of her woe! While, still responsive to each mournful moan, The saucepan simmers in a softer tone. [The following extracts will give some idea of Payne Knight’s poem. Hail! happy States, that fresh in vigour rise From Europe’s wrecks beneath Atlantic skies! Long may ye feel the blessings ye bestow; Nor e’er your parents’ sickly symptoms know! But when that parent, crush’d beneath the weight Of debts and taxes, yields herself to fate; May you her hapless fugitives receive, Comfort their sorrows, and their wants relieve! For come it will—th’ inevitable day, When Britain must corruption’s forfeit pay, Beneath a despot’s, or a rabble’s sway. After a glowing description of the amours of a shepherd and shepherdess, he thus speaks of Marriage:— Bless’d days of youth, of liberty, and love! How short, alas! your transient pleasures prove! Just as we think the sweet delights our own, We strive to fix them, and we find them flown:— For fix’d by laws, and limited by rules, Affection stagnates and love’s fervour cools; Shrinks like the gather’d flower, which, when possess’d, Droops in the hand, or withers on the breast: Feels all its native bloom and fragrance fly, And death’s pale shadows close its purple dye. While mutual wishes form love’s only vows, By mutual interests nursed, the union grows; Respectful fear its rising power maintains, And both preserve, when each may break, its chains. But when in bands indissoluble join’d, Securely torpid sleeps the sated mind; No anxious hopes or fears arise, to move The flagging wings, or stir the fires of love: Benumb’d, the soul’s best energies repose, And life in dull unvaried torpor flows; Or only shakes off lethargy to teaze Whom once its only pleasure was to please.—Ed.] In illustration of these peculiar doctrines of Love and Marriage, the authors of the present Parody introduced into the first twenty lines of the preceding “Extract,” the very free statements on these subjects which appear in Chapters 8, 12, 14, 16, 17, of the narrative of Cook’s First Voyage to the Pacific in the “Endeavour,” in 1768, derived, by the editor, Dr. John Hawkesworth, from the Diary of Mr. (afterwards Sir Joseph) Banks, who accompanied Captain Cook.—Ed.] [Lord Erskine, after dinner, inveighed bitterly against Marriage; and smarting, I suppose, under the recollection of his own unsuccessful choice, concluded by saying that a wife was a tin canister tied to a man’s tail, which very much excited the indignation of Lady Ann Culling Smith, who was of the party. “Monk” Lewis took a sheet of paper, and wrote the following neat epigram on the subject, which he presented to Her Royal Highness [the Duchess of York]:— “Lord Erskine at marriage presuming to rail, Says, a wife’s a tin canister tied to ones tail; And the fair Lady Ann, while the subject he carries on, Feels hurt at his Lordship’s degrading comparison. But wherefore degrading? if taken aright, A tin canister’s useful, and polished, and bright, And if dirt its original purity hide, ’Tis the fault of the puppy to whom it is tied.” —Journal of T. Raikes, ii. 56.—Ed.] [Richard Payne Knight, eminent as he was as a classical scholar and archÆologist, was not successful as a poet or moralist, and this is shown in an amusing manner in a letter from Horace Walpole to the Rev. W. Mason, dated 22nd March, 1796, in which he declares how much he is offended and disgusted by Knight’s “new insolent and self-conceited poem,” alluding to his Progress of Civil Society,—the former one being “The Landscape, a didactic poem in three books,” 4to, pub. 1794, of which mention has already been made. In 1816 he was examined before a Select Committee of the House of Commons on the proposed purchase by the Government of the Elgin Marbles; but his estimate of their value as works of the highest art was much below that of other artistic witnesses, such as Flaxman, Westmacott, Chantrey, B. West, and others. For these statements he was severely criticised in vol. 14 of the Quarterly Review, and in a squib, reprinted in the New Whig Guide in 1819. He valued the collection at £25,000; Gavin Hamilton’s estimate was £60,800, and Lord Aberdeen’s £35,000; for which latter sum they were obtained by the Government. He bequeathed his collection of ancient Bronzes, Greek Coins, &c.—valued at £50,000—to the British Museum. He represented Ludlow till 1806. He was a supporter of Fox, upon whom he wrote a Monody. He was never married, and he was succeeded in his fine property, including Downton Castle, near Ludlow, &c., on his death in 1824, by his brother, Thomas Andrew Knight, one of the most scientific of horticulturists, and he in turn was succeeded by his grandson, Andrew Johnes Rouse Boughton, second son of the late Sir W. E. Rouse Boughton, Bart., who added by royal license in 1856 the name of Knight to his patronymic.—Ed.] [The drama (here nicknamed The Reformed Housekeeper), but entitled by the author “Misanthropy and Repentance,” was produced at Drury Lane Theatre, Sheridan being then lessee, as “The Stranger,” on the 24th March, 1798. The following was the cast:—The Stranger, J. P. Kemble; Baron Steinfort, John Palmer; Francis, R. Palmer; Peter, Suett; Tobias, J. Aikin; Solomon, Wewitzer; Count Wintersen, Barrymore; Mrs. Haller, Mrs. Siddons; Countess Wintersen, Mrs. Goodall; Charlotte, Miss Stuart. It was considered by competent authorities as one of Kemble’s finest efforts, and was performed on twenty-six successive nights. Some of our most eminent actors and actresses have essayed the principal parts. Miss O’Neill made her last appearance on the stage in the character of Mrs. Haller, 13th of July, 1818. The acting version purported to be altered from the German by Benj. Thompson (afterwards Count Rumford), but it is likely that all or most of the alterations came from the skilful hands of Sheridan, assisted by Kemble. The pathetic song introduced, “I have a silent sorrow here,” was written by the former. Two other versions of the drama appeared in the year 1798—one by A. Schinck, and the other by G. Papendick—but neither has been acted. Kotzebue tells us in his Autobiography that this play of his was acted at the Imperial Palace of The Hermitage, St. Petersburg, under his superintendence while manager of the Imperial Company of German Comedians, and excited visible emotion in the Emperor Paul. He himself saw it acted at Tobolsk during his exile in Siberia. The vast and splendid palace of The Hermitage is now given up to the Arts. It contains the enormous collection of Pictures accumulated by the Russian sovereigns (including the Houghton Gallery formed by Sir Robert Walpole), together with a Gallery of Sculpture, one of the finest assortments of Antique Gems in the world, a museum of Grecian and Etruscan Antiquities, and a library of rare Books and Manuscripts. An awful event took place during the performance of this play a short time after its production. John Palmer, an eminent comedian, while acting the principal character, at Liverpool, on the 2nd of August, 1798, expired on the stage. He had recently suffered severe domestic bereavements, which are supposed to have given a painful application to some passages in the third act in which he had to utter the words: “There is another and a better world”. In the first scene of the fourth act, his agitation increased; he fell into the arms of the performer of the part of Baron Steinfort, and died without a groan. A narrative of this shocking event, published immediately afterwards, by the same performer, disposes of the generally-received but more emotional tradition that Palmer’s earthly career was terminated while pronouncing the above words. He was in his fifty-seventh year. This is not the only instance of so impressive an end, for a similar death-stroke overtook Joseph Peterson, an excellent actor, in October, 1758, while representing The Duke in Measure for Measure. In act 3, sc. 1, in reciting the words— “—Reason thus with life: If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing That none but fools would keep: a breath thou art—” he dropped into the arms of Moody, who personated Claudio, and never spoke more!—Ed.] [“One other noted character we visited—the one who, according to William Taylor of Norwich, was the greatest of all. This was August von Kotzebue, the very popular dramatist, whose singular fate it was to live at variance with the great poets of his country, while he was the idol of the mob. He was at one time (about this time (1801) and a little later) a favourite in all Europe. One of his plays, The Stranger, I have seen acted in German, English, Spanish, French, and, I believe, also Italian. He was the pensioner of Prussia, Austria, and Russia. The odium produced by this circumstance, and the imputation of being a spy, are assigned as the cause of his assassination by [C. L. Sand] a student of Jena, a few years after our visit [March 3, 1819]. He was living, like Goethe, in a large house and in style. I drank tea with him, and found him a lively little man, with small black eyes. He had the manners of a petit-maÎtre.”—Crabb Robinson’s Diary (1801), i. 115.—Ed.]
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