756. EBB to Richard Hengist Horne
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 4, 272–273.
Torquay
Friday May 15th [1840] [1]
I shall be more at ease when I have thanked you—my dear Mr Horne, for your assurance of sympathy [2] which in its feeling & considerate expression, a few days since, touched me so nearly & deeply. Without it, I shd have written when I was able .. I mean physically able—for in the exhaustion consequent upon fever I have been too weak to hold a pen– As to reluctancy of feeling .. believe me that I must change more than illness or grief can change me, before it becomes “a painful effort” to communicate with one so very very kind as you have been to me. Kindness & sympathy are not such common things. And as to the strangership—why a friend is proved by remaining one in adversity. You began to be one in mine—and for that reason—a peculiarity which in separating you from the class of ordinary friends, removes you still farther from that of strangers– It is easier for you to forget this, than for me, dear Mr Horne.
Besides the appreciated sympathy, I have to acknowledge four proofs of your remembrance, the seals of which lay unbroken for a fortnight or more, after their arrival here. In one letter, was something about “neglect”—you told me never to fancy a silence into a neglect. Was I likely to do it? Was there any room for even fancy to try? That wd be still more surprising than the fact of your making room for a thought of me in the multitude of your occupations.
You have been in the fields, I know by the flowers—& found there I suppose, between the flowers & the life & dear Mrs Orme, that pleasant-dream (for me!) about my going to London at Easter!– I [3] never dreamt it– And while you wrote, what a mournful contrary was going on here!– It was a heavy blow—(May God keep you from such!—I knew you wd be sorry for me when you heard—) it was a heavy blow for all of us—& I, being weak you see, was struck down as by a bodily blow, in a moment, without having time for tears. I did not think indeed to be better any more—but I have quite rallied now—except as to strength—& they say that on essential points I shall not suffer permanently—and this is a comfort to poor Papa. But oh Mr Horne– God’s will—so high above humanity, that its goodness & perfectness cannot be scanned at a glance,—wd be very terrible if it were not for His manifested Love—manifested in Jesus Christ. Only that holds our hearts together when He shatters the world.
Saturday.
I had finished Napoleon & was about to write to you on the subject [4] —& I will still write. Now .. Gregory!!– [5]
‘His large hands sway the air about my head.’ [6]
I have read but little lately & not at all until very lately; but two or three days ago Papa held up Gregory before my eyes as something sure to bring pleasure into them. [‘]‘Ah! I knew that that wd move you”. After all I have scarcely been long enough face to face with him to apprehend the full grandeur of his countenance. There are very grand things—& expounded in yr characteristic massiveness of diction—but it does so far appear to me that for the tragic heights & for that passionate singleness of purpose in which you surpass the poets of our time, “we shall revert to Cosmo & Marlowe.[”] [7] Well—it may be very wrong—I must think over my thoughts. And at any rate the Essay on Tragic Influence is full of noble philosophy & poetry. [8] Only you do more honor to the stage & the actorship than I cd do. Tragedy is a high form of poetry—perhaps the highest—& absolutely independent in its own essence, of stages—which involve to my mind little more than its translation into a grosser form, in order to its apprehension by the vulgar. What Macready can touch Lear?– In brief, if the union between Tragedy & the gas lights be less incongruous & absurd than the union between Church & State, is it less desecrative of the divine Theory?– In the clashing of my no against your yes, I must write goodbye.
Do believe me, under all circumstances, truly & gratefully yours,
E B Barrett.
Will you tell me when there is any criticism upon Gregory made by the συνετοι [9] —in case I shd miss any. I am anxious for the laurels. And you will not be angry that I revert to Cosmo? Cosmo is .. Cosmo——& the precedence (were it granted) is only you of you. You wont be angry?
Publication: EBB-RHH, I, 13–18.
Manuscript: Pierpont Morgan Library.
1. Year provided by the reference to Gregory VII. Its publication date had been announced as 20 April 1840 (The Athenæum, 18 April 1840).
2. On Sam’s death.
3. Underscored twice.
4. The History of Napoleon, 2 vols., 1840.
5. Gregory VII. EBB’s copy is now in the Berg Collection (see Reconstruction, A1250).
6. Gregory VII, act IV, sc. 3 (p. 65).
7. The reviewers had reservations also. The Athenæum (no. 671, 5 September 1840, p. 699) said: “Mr. Horne is a clever man; but cleverness may run into conceit, thought into mysticism, and poetry mistake its way” and found in the play “a perversity and want of judgment, which must hinder Mr. Horne from attaining the honours he so much desires.”
8. This precedes the play.
9. “Sagacious ones.”
___________________
