1453. EBB to Richard Hengist Horne
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 8, 75–78.
[London]
Wednesday. [6] Dec– 1843. [1]
You are kind & generous. And I did you so much dishonor as really to be a little uneasy lest you might be angry with me for what I said!
After all, my dear Mr Horne,—the reference, as it stood, wd have appeared to many readers, as to myself, directed to both theological & moral points,—inasmuch as the circumstance of your “not knowing,” or dismissing from the observation of your soul, the certain ‘semper lachrymanda’ [sic] [2] passages of former works of Hunt, will not alter the relations of them in the memory of other people. ‘They cannot but remember such things were’ [3] —and it wd be painful to you to understand thoroughly how, in some quarters, some recollections are “at top” of the beauty & glory. Strictly in confidence, & to prove to you that all this is’nt a dream of mine, & how high certain influences can splash,—I will name to you .. our dear friend Miss Mitford … no prude—no fanatic,—yet one who considers Leigh Hunt a desecrator of all social morals. Nay, I think she said or implied to me once, that a woman shd not be eager to praise him—something to that effect. [4]
Now I, you know, am proud to be eager to praise him—you know it as well as I!– Still there are passages of his early works which strike both at morals & at religion—not in the person of anybody .. not by a mistaken leniency (if any leniency can be mistaken) towards persons—not at sectarianism or nice superfluities of dogma—but at christianity in the gross,—and at the principles of social morals. Neither I nor you can deny these things—but the poet has done better by cancelling them in new editions. You know Shelley in the midst of the grand signatures of God, wrote at Chamouni .. αθεος. [5] Poor Shelley!– He lied against himself as against the Creator!–. For every true poet, says a true poet, (and one so happy, as a thinker, as never to change his opinions!!!) has a [“]religious passion in his soul.” [6] And I wont try to slay you with your own sword. And I will believe readily & gladly upon your testimony that your friend,—whom I shd be proud to have for my friend,—is a religious man as he is a true poet. Of a devotional nature, he cd not choose but partake. A christian he probably became as the animal spirits grew calmer, & he escaped into a new current of influences. I agree with you that the cordiality & benignity of his genius are essentially christian.
And may I say of myself that I hope there is nobody in the world with a stronger will & aspiration to escape from sectarianism in any sort or sense, when I have eyes to discern it—& that the sectarianism of the national churches, to which I do not belong, and of the dissenting bodies to which I do, .. stand together before me on a pretty just level of detestation– Truth (as far as each thinker can apprehend it) apprehended,—& Love, comprehending—make my idea .. my hope of a church. But the christianity of the world is apt to wander from Christ & the hope of Him–
Where I am wandering you will wonder .. I wonder a little myself. I shd be thanking you instead, perhaps, for this new sight of new proofs & all the pleasure they have given me. I like very much indeed your estimate of Landor—laughed,—as well as such wights as I, can laugh,—at your Genius of the Drama with a cast net, [7] & at some other things,—& clapped my hands mentally over other sayings of more gravity. He [8] will be pleased I think—and you have done your spiriting excellently–. Just as you tell me, I intrude my suggestions on the margin. I perceived on the other proof that you had not revised it—and I perceive in this, that you have done so but partially.
I return the proof today—because I for[e]see that even if I detain it till tomorrow I shall not have time to write about Tennyson. So my words about him must follow instead of accompanying it. It will be delightful to me to praise Tennyson—although ....… by Saint Eloy [9] I never imitated him—& I take that oath—because Mr Hunt thought I “instructed my readers how to say ëd” at his suggestion,—& because the Quarterly was of opinion that if it had’nt been for him I should have hung a lady’s hair “blackly” instead of “very blackly”– [10] The “very” smelling to the Heaven of criticism,—a very rank plagiarism! Only the veri-ty of it, is far from being plain to me—whatever may be the verisimilitude. Only if the ‘spirit of the age’ shd say so too, by St Eloy again, I will not reproach, reprove or murmur. What a wandering rolling stone I am today, to be sure!– In good sooth, thinking over my letter of some days ago & of the great tempest which appeared to me awaiting you in the form of the disappointed vanities of sundries, .. it occurred to me that you wd rationally infer the probability of my judging, in the matter, from my own proper consciousness of offensible selflove. Now I beg you not to infer so any more. I do not say .. “tell the truth of me”—because of course you will tell it, as you discern it. But I may promise you not to murmur, not to be angry, not to be vexed .... (“methinks the lady doth protest too much”) [11] by any unpleasant truth which is necessary for you to say. So nota bene– When I talked of “thunder lightening & rain” it was not “my thunder”. You will have plenty nevertheless.
That will do for tonight surely in the way of mist. You shall have Tennyson this week.
‘Fortess’ .. ‘Portess’ .. what is the direction? [12]
There’s nothing for me but to copy your initial letter .. to draw it .. as accurately as I can. By the way tell me, oh, do tell me whether you have used the Daguer[re]otype in any of your portraits—— [13]
There! That must do!
Ever yours
EBB.
Publication: EBB-RHH, I, 186–193.
Manuscript: British Library.
1. This letter is a response to no. 1452; the following Wednesday was the 6th.
2. “Always tearful.”
3. Cf. Macbeth, IV, 3, 222.
4. Although Miss Mitford’s comments are lost to us, EBB’s response can be seen in letter 832.
5. “Atheist.” While staying at the Hotel de Chamonix in Switzerland in 1816, Shelley wrote a Greek hexameter defining himself as philanthropist, democrat and atheist; this was made much use of by his enemies (see Shelley: A Life Story, by Edmund Blunden, 1946, pp. 133–134).
6. We have not located the source of this quotation.
7. See A New Spirit, I, 153.
8. Horne wrote “Landor” above EBB’s “He,” and crossed out the latter word.
9. The Canterbury Tales, Prologue, line 120. St. Eloi (588–659), Bishop of Noyon, was the patron saint of goldsmiths. Some authorities, however, hold that Chaucer’s prioress was invoking St. Louis (Louis IX), not St. Eloi.
10. EBB is referring to the review of The Seraphim in the September 1840 issue of The Quarterly Review, the text of which can be found in vol. 4, pp. 413–416.
11. Cf. Hamlet, III, 2, 230.
12. EBB is having difficulty in reading the new address at the head of letter 1452.
13. Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre (1789–1851), painter and physicist, invented a primitive form of photography in which light acted on a plate coated with silver iodide. Horne did not use daguerreotypes in A New Spirit.
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