508. EBB to Hugh Stuart Boyd
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 3, 140–142.
Sidmouth.
Tuesday. [28 July 1835] [1]
My dear Mr Boyd,
I meant to have written to you very long ago,—but when I think of writing to you, I always think—‘perhaps I had better for his own sake, be silent a little longer.’ Now however—before I am quite an infidel, which you apprehend as the awful & somewhat necessary consequence of my reading Collins’s treatise,—I will write to you; but, not to enter upon any controversy upon Calvinism. I think it is better not to controvert & dispute about it. If you meet with no difficulty on the subject, & run with your thoughts, with the multitude of your thoughts, against no hard corners, μακαριος! ‘happy are you’!—— And if, on my humbler part, I am content, amid the difficulties visible to my eyes, to sit down very stilly & try to hold fast by the right hand of Jesus without prying too closely into the way of his footsteps, μακαρια! happy am I. Pray for me, dear friend,—that so it may be. I do assure you that I did not read Collins with any expectation, any unholy expectation, of finding within him interpretations of Scripture. You know, I like to read everything: a liking which may be dangerous or at least unprofitable; but not indicative, in this particular instance, of the particular evil apprehended by you! I have been reading besides, Lord Brougham’s Natural Theology, [2] —and have shaken my head over it, altho’ critics far taller than I am, have nodded theirs. It seems to me to have its most valuable parts in its notes,—in the observations there upon Hume’s philosophy. [3] By the way, I ought not to presume to say a word about Hume’s philosophy to you,—having a very humbling recollection of your having once said to me that I was quite incapable of understanding it. But to return to Ld Brougham—he leaves upon me the impression of his being, not profound,—not original,—not accustomed to psychological studies. And very wrong I may be. Only, am I wrong in complaining of his style? Surely there are ‘hard corners’ more than enough, in that!——
How much I have written without saying a word of dear Annie. It has pleased us with so much pleasure, to have her with us once more, & to see her looking well, & seeming cheerful; and I feel that she is very kind in not being in a repining spirit, in the midst of our dulness. All that she repines about, is not hearing often enough & fully enough from you. Do write to her as often as you can,—for whenever you dont write, she begins to fancy that you dont think of her—as we are always apt to do, you know, in the silences of those whom we love. On Saturday, she & every one of us went to dine at Pinney Cliffs, [4] near Lyme,—in scenery too exquisite for England, & immortalized by Lord Chatham, [5] if Nature had not given it a nobler immortality. We shall think of such scenes in Heaven! But I wont describe it to you now, because I know that you eschew all long descriptions when they are not made in Greek.
Miss Boyd is reading Shakespeare again. So shall I, when I stand face to face with Shakespeare,—& that may only be when I see my books again. Has she read the German critics upon Shakespeare? as brought to light, by some surpassingly beautiful papers in the last numbers of Blackwood: [6] not the very last. The German critics are the only critics who criticise as Longinus did. They are poet-critics—& knew more of Shakespeare than any of Shakespeares compatriots do. [7] Now, dont you quote Porson against the Germans. Give my love to Miss Boyd instead,—& tell her from me that I wish her prosperity in Shakespeare—& that she should always, particularly in your presence, speak most reverentially of Herman, just for this very reason, because “Herman’s a German”. [8]
How impertinent I am! but I have written in a very large hand & am coming to an end very soon, to make up for it!–
Believe me, dear friend,
Yours affectionately
E B Barrett.
Address, on integral page: H S Boyd Esqr / 3 Circus Road / St. John’s Wood / London.
Publication: EBB-HSB, pp. 210–212.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. Letter is postmarked 29 July 1835 but written on the previous day, a Tuesday.
2. A Discourse on Natural Theology (1835), by Henry Peter Brougham, Lord Brougham and Vaux (1778–1868), Lord Chancellor in Grey’s and Melbourne’s administrations.
3. In the section devoted to notes, pp. 248–263 were taken up by arguments refuting Hume’s “two most celebrated and most dangerous treatises.”
4. Sic, for Pinhay Cliffs, described by EBB as “the counterpart of Dreamland, on earth” (letter to Miss Mitford, late March 1839). Miss Mitford had lived briefly at Lyme Regis as a child.
5. William Pitt’s father, the first Earl of Chatham (1708–78), liked to take his children to Lyme Regis and thought “the air the purest he ever breathed, the situation the most delightful and stately … and the sea nobly beautiful” (The Life of William Pitt [1st] Earl of Chatham, by Basil Williams, 1966, II, 290).
6. “Shakespeare in Germany” appeared in the numbers for February, March and May, 1835 (vol. 37, pp. 236–255, 523–533 and 747–758).
7. The first article stated (p. 237): “Of all the continental critics on Shakespeare, Germany has certainly furnished incomparably the most original, the most profound, and the most eloquent; indeed, we may say, the only critics who have studied Shakespeare in the right spirit.”
8. After Porson’s edition of the Hecuba was published in 1797, Professor Hermann (1772–1848) brought out a rival edition in 1800, with a preface attacking Porson’s opinions regarding the admissibility of anapæsts. Porson resented the criticism and circulated the following epigram, the last line of which EBB quotes: “The Germans in Greek / Are sadly to seek; / Not five in five score, / But ninety-five more; / All, save only Herman, / And Herman’s a German” (Richard Porson: A Biographical Essay, by M.L. Clarke, 1937, p. 69).
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