R360416A. Paracelsus.
The Metropolitan Journal, 16 April 1836, pp. 19–20.
As reprinted in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 3, 384–385.
We have been told by grave persons, publishers to wit, and others, that poetry is out of vogue—that it is dead.
This we earnestly and emphatically deny.
Poetry can never fade from human live and reverence; for poetry is nature, and nature is eternal.
She hath not within her the seeds of dissolution;—there is no spot nor blemish on her white front—nor while the flowers bloom, and the stars shine visibly on the front of heaven, and the blue ocean heaveth in his lonely bed, can the august form of poetry wither or fade.
Nor though this age may become practical, and its leading bias verge towards results of mere utility,—though steam-boats, rail-roads, and joint-stock unions be for awhile the mania—still the human heart changes not; the pure deep feelings of love, hope, and expectation relapse not into heartlessness and cold indifference. Beauty and Truth still retain their charms:—Poetry its spell, its mystery, its fascination. Though volumes of the rarest and most exquisite nature are thrown by and disregarded by the public; and though critics pass them over with a sneer, and turn themselves to trashy novels, and home-brewed voyages and travels, the divine spirit yet maintains her ancient brightness, and still gathers around her champions and martyrs, to fight and perish in her cause.
Even though the great masters are perforce necessitated to hang their harps on the willows, and “waste their sweetness on the desert air,” a voice still cries to all the world—
She is not dead, but sleepeth!
But what of Paracelsus—and who was he?
This we could wish, for Mr. Browning’s sake, we were not obliged to answer. Mr. Browning has chosen his subject badly. Paracelsus was unworthy of him—and in the breast of Paracelsus never for a moment gleamed those high and lofty aspirations ascribed to him by his eloquent defender.
Aureolus Philippus, Bombast de Hohenheim Paracelsus, then, was no other than an ignorant, unprincipled, debauched, and abandoned quack-doctor, of Basil, and born at Zurich.
At Basil it was speedily perceived that the new Professor was no better than an egregious quack. Scarcely had a year elapsed before his lectures had fairly driven away an audience incapable of comprehending their emphatic jargon. That which above all contributed to sully his reputation was the debauched life he led. According to the testimony of Oporinus, who lived two years in his intimacy, Paracelsus scarcely ever ascended the lecture-desk unless half drunk, and only dictated to his secretaries when in a state of intoxication: if summoned to attend the sick, he rarely proceeded thither without previously drenching himself with wine. He was accustomed to retire to bed without changing his clothes; sometimes he spent the night in pot-houses with the peasants, and in the morning knew no longer what he was about; and, nevertheless, up to the age of twenty-five his only drink had been water.
There was nothing noble, nothing praise-worthy, nothing of a commanding character, visible at any one time, in the whole range of his base and unprincipled career. He was a mere ignorant impostor, and if he latterly spent much of his time in pretending to discover the philosopher’s stone, he had not the merit of enthusiasm and self-devotion, but resorted to the scheme merely to veil his ignorance and presumption; or, what is equally probable, for the purpose of indulging, with the more secrecy and self-abandonment, in intoxication and debauchery.
Why did not Mr. Browning, in preference to such a slave as this, single out some really great mind? Why did he not rather prefer such men as Socrates, or Lucan, or the great Egyptian mystic, or Alexander, or Napoleon?
But we have been so deeply gratified by the poetry, that we must, without further comment, introduce it to our readers, in our usual unhackneyed, uncritical, unpremeditated, and friendly style.
Part I. introduces us to Paracelsus. He is young—ambition is supposed to be strongly awakened in his spirit, and among the gardens of Wurzburg, he thus unburthens himself to his friend Festus—
Par. Dear Festus, hear me. What is it you wish?
That I should lay aside my heart’s pursuit,
Abandon the sole ends for which I live,
Reject God’s great commission—and so die!
And still I listen for your true love’s sake.
Yet how has grown that love? Even in a long
And patient cherishing of the self-same spirit
It now would quell—as though a mother should hope
To stay the lusty manhood of the child
Once weak upon her knees. I was not born
Inform’d and fearless from the first, but shrank
From ought which mark’d me out apart from men.
I would have lived their life, and striven their strife—
Eluding Destiny, if that might be.
How beautiful, how more than beautiful, how true; and who, with high imaginings, a heart willing to devote itself to noble purposes, and the true light of inspiration urging him on, has not felt often and often the very same sentiments—and so would express [p. 20→] them? Indeed, we are inclined to place those feelings to the account of Mr. Browning himself; he is Paracelsus himself;—he is himself the impassioned being who thus yearns for distinction and the passport to fame—and he shall win them—we, as the Festus of his work, assure him of this! We beg humbly to ask, and with that due deference always entertained by us to great minds, what poet of the present day, Wordsworth himself (clarum et venerabile nomen) not excepted, can express himself more nobly than this.
I go to prove my soul!
I see my way as birds their trackless way—
I shall arrive! what time, what circuit first,
I ask not: but unless God send his hail
Or blinding fire-balls, sleet, or stifling snow,
In some time—his good time—I shall arrive:
He guides me and the bird. In his good time!
Again—
One man shall crawl
Through life, surrounded with all stirring things,
Unmoved—and he goes mad; and from the wreck
Of what he was, by his wild talk alone,
You first collect how great a spirit he hid.
And—
We may not be doom’d
To cope with seraphs, but at least the rest
Shall cope with us. Make no more giants, God!
But elevate the race at once! We ask
But to put forth our strength, our human strength,
All starting fairly, all equipp’d alike,
Gifted alike, and eagle-eyed, true-hearted.
And—
Are there not Festus, are there not dear Michal,
Two points in the adventure of the diver:
One—when a beggar he prepares to plunge?
One—when a prince he rises with his pearl?
Festus, I plunge!
Part II.—Paracelsus Attains.
The Scene is Constantinople.—“The House of the Greek.”—1521
Here a new character enters. It is Aprile—and this is the entrance:—
Apr. Ha, ha! our king that wouldst be, here at last?
Thy hand to mine. Stay, fix thine eyes on mine.
Thou wouldst be king? Still fix thine eyes on mine.
Par. Ha, ha! why crouchest not? am I not king?
So torture is not wholly unavailing!
Have my fierce spasms compell’d thee from thy lair?
Ay, look on me! shall I be king or no?
I scarcely trusted God with the surmise
That thou wouldst come, and thou didst hear the while!
Apr. Thine eyes are lustreless to mine; my hair
Is soft, nay silken soft: to talk with thee
Flushes my cheek, and thou art ashy-pale.
Truly thou hast labour’d, has withstood their lips,
Their kisses. Yes, ’tis like thou hast attained.
Tell me, dear master, wherefore now thou comest?
I thought thy solemn songs would have their meed
In after-time; that I should hear the earth
Exult in thee, and echo with thy praise,
While I was laid forgotten in my grave.
Par. Ah, fiend, I know thee, I am not thy dupe!
Thou art ordained to follow in my track,
To reap my sowing—as I disdained to reap
The harvest left by sages long since gone.
I am to be degraded, after all,
To an aspirant after fame, not truth—
To all but envy of thy fate, be sure!
Apr. Nay, sing them to me; I shall envy not:
Thou shalt be king. Sing thou, and I will sit
Beside, and call deep silence for thy songs,
And worship thee, as I had ne’er been meant
To fill thy throne. But none shall ever know!
Sing to me: for already thy wild eyes
Unlock my heart-springs, as some crystal-shaft
Reveals by some chance blaze its parent fount
After long time—so thou reveal’st my soul!
All will flash forth at last, with thee to hear!
But we must reserve till next week the rest of this extraordinary poem. Our only fault is with one word. The name of God is introduced sixty-four times in this poem, without it being necessary once; and this, too, in a manner perfectly indecent, not to say blasphemous, as for instance—“God is a perfect poet.”—“God told him it was June.”—“God never troubles himself about us.”—“God, how I essayed to live like a mad poet.”—“God’s foot.”—“See you flatter not, even God flatters.” Thus making the Almighty a flatterer, and the friend of Paracelsus, superior in moral attribute to the Almighty!
This is a serious—a very serious blemish, and one that ought assuredly to be revised, in the second edition of this poem, which must very soon appear. Besides the poetry suffers.
Reviewed:
Paracelsus (RB), London: Effingham Wilson, 1835.
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