1402. Harriet Martineau to EBB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 7, 371–373.
Tynemouth.
[16] October. [1843] [1]
My dear Miss Barrett.
At last I have the pleasure of writing your name, in greeting. We sick people can never accuse one another of neglect from the mere circumstance of delay in writing. I have trusted you to trust me, & felt secure in your kind interpretation– Lady M. Lambton discharged her commission punctually, bringing me your precious volume before 1st of Sepr [2] Then I wished to read & study it before writing: & then came such a succession of visitors, looking in on me, as they do in autumn, on their way hither & thither, that I have had to husband all my strength for conversation, while the season lasted, & put off all letters to a quieter time. I am still in the enjoyment & prospect of society; but here is a quiet morning, & I use its strength to thank you.
I find noble & beautiful thoughts & lines in the Seraphim, & shall ever be glad that I have seen it. But I own to you that I turn again with a stronger desire & pleasure to the minor poems, some of which really transport me. I do not think our theological differences, great as they are, interfere with my appreciation of the Seraphim. I can well & feelingly understand & sympathize in the views I do not hold—can, for all poetical purposes, & through the imagination & affections, participate in them, though I could not worship in them. It is because some of the minor poems are riper, more complete & self-contained, & therefore simpler in expression, (while they have all the light & glow of the longer one) that I prefer them.– Altogether, the volume is, both for its own sake, & as coming from you, truly welcome to me, & a cause of gratitude to you.– Mrs Jameson, who was here last week, brought me “Pan” for a treat, & was cruelly vexed that I knew it so well already. She glories in it.
I ought to have let you know before that I don’t think my girlish translation of “the Gods of Greece” was ever published,—nor could I now say whether or not I even kept a copy. And why should you, who know the original so well, & have seen so many translations, wish to see any thing more?– I would not, if I could, look it up. [3]
I dont want to trouble you with commonplace about Göthe & Schiller .. but, after what you have said, I feel as if honesty required me just to say that, from the no great deal I know of Göthe, I am not one of his great admirers. He is too little spontaneous, sincere, & heartsome for me,—too self-conscious & calculating,—& has too little faith in human nature, too little respect for women especially,—belongs too clearly to a region neither human nor divine, for me to feel any thing warmer or higher than admiration for him. I wholly disbelieve that his immortality will be of the kind his adorers take for granted. Immortal he will be, & ought to be: but his empire will not be primarily over the hearts of men.– Such is my notion.– But my notions are worth no more than as coming from one who thinks & feels, under circumstances very peculiar.
I have read what would appear to you strangely little. I ceased to be much of a reader in my girlhood. I have studied a few subjects since; but my range of reading has been very small. Now, on my sofa, I am again getting into the habit of reading more: but I am not at all of the order of lettered people, & do not presume to measure my judgments of authors with theirs.
I am thankful to hear that you do not suffer severe pain. Neither do I. Nor is mine “a sinking body,” as you call yours. Mine is merely an uneasy one, from displacements & pressures which cause what is admirably called “distress.” [4] But then, it is a great blessing to me that opiates yield me relief without injury. Since I have ventured upon a sufficient use of them to keep down the oppressive sickness which bore me down, & since a new tonic has partly restored appetite, I have got on cheerily, in comparison with the first three years. Sooner or later, we suppose my complaint will aggravate its character, & end me; but, though it cannot be reduced, it is not at present getting apparently worse; & my condition is decidedly less uneasy than it was. I have scarcely had any severe pain; & have very little pain of any kind just now. I don’t at all mind the confinement, or the absence of all prospect of health. I have been accustomed to privation, all my days; &, if I had not, there is nothing in it that interferes with the action of one’s mind, while it rather helps that of the affections: so that, if [it] were a new experience to me, I doubt whether I should feel disposed to quarrel with it. –I write all this with the image of you on your pillow before my mind’s eye, & with a tender fear that you could not describe to me nearly so easy a lot.
I cannot close without just saying the heartiest ‘amen’ to your words—that “we may trust God to make truth beautiful enough for poetry, if we may trust him for anything.”
We may be very sure that there is no word connected with our heartfelt interests,—no word that belongs to our relations with Him as Father, & Christ as Saviour, & Man as our brother, that was not a poetic beauty more deep & immortal than the sweetest sounds that can be awakened out of the sacred precincts. I am, & ever must be, at one with you there.
God bless & support you! It is with a true sisterly solicitude that I say this. I am yours affecly
H. Martineau.
Address: Miss Barrett / 50. Wimpole St / London.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. Dated by the postmark.
2. The Seraphim (see letter 1358).
3. Miss Martineau had mentioned this translation in letter 1358, and EBB had apparently asked to see it.
4. For a diagnosis of Miss Martineau’s illness, see letter 1371, note 2.
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