The miscellaneous works of Oliver Goldsmith, with an account of his life and writings ... A new edition ... Edited by Washington Irving

Front matter

COLLECTION OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. HUNTED BY JULES DIDOT,' SBr^*KWf ER TO HIS MAJESTY, No. 6, Rue tlu Pont-de-Lodi. THE MISCELLANEOUS WORKS OF OLIVER GOLDSMITH, WITH AN ACCOUNT OF HIS LIFE AND WRITINGS. A NEW EDITION, IN FOUR VOLUMES. EDITED BY WASHINGTON IRVING, ESQ. VOLUME III. PARIS: PUBLISHED BY A. AND W. GALIGNANI, 18, RUE VIVIENNE ; AND JULES DIDOT, SEN. 6, RUE DU PONT-DE-LODI. 4825. CONTENTS OF THE THIRD VOLUME. LETTERS FROM A CITIZEN OF THE WORLD TO HIS FRIENDS IN THE EAST. Letter a raoe I. Introduction. * A character of the Chinese philosopher 7 II. The arrival of the Chinese in London. His motives for the journey. Some description of the streets and houses. 8 III. The description of London continued. The luxury of the English. Its henefits. The fine gentleman. The fine lady 11 IV.

English pride. Liberty. An instance of both. Newspapers. Politeness 1 5 V. English passion for politics. A specimen of a newspaper. Characteristic of the manners of different countries ' 19 VI. Happiness lost by seeking after refinement. The Chinese philosopher's disgraces 24 VII. The tie of wisdom only to make us happy. The benefits of travelling upon the morals of a philosopher 26 VIII. The Chinese deceived by a prostitute in the streets of London ... 28 IX. The licentiousness of the English with regard to women. A character of a woman's man .' . . . 3 1 X. The journey of the Chinese from Pekin to Moscow. The customs of the Daures CONTENTS. VI Letter P"1r XI. The benefits of luxury, in making a people more wise and happy ' XII. The funeral solemnities of the English. Their passion for flattering epitaphs 4° XIII.

An Account of Westminster Abbey 43 XIV. The reception of the Chinese from a Lady of distinction. . . 49 XV. Against cruelty to animals. A story from the Zendevest of Zoroaster 52 XVI. Of falsehood propagated by books seemingly sincere 56 XVII. Of the war now carried on between France and England, with its frivolous motives 59 XVIII. The story of the Chinese matron 63 XIX. The English method of treating women caught in adultery. The Russian method 68 XX. Some account of the republic of letters in England 72 XXI. The Chinese goes to see a play . 76 XXII. The Chinese philosopher's son made a slave in Persia. ... 8t XXIII. The English subscription in favour of the French prisoners commended 84 XXIV. The venders of quack medicines and nostrums ridiculed . . 88 XXV. The natural rise and decline of kingdoms, exemplified in the history of the kingdom of Lao ...^ 91 XXVI.

Preface

. The schoolmen had formerly a very exact Avay of computing the abilities of their saints or authors. Escobar, for instance, Avas said to have learning as five, genius as four, and gravity as seven. Caramuel was greater than he. His learning was as eight, his genius as six, and his gravity as thirteen. Were I to estimate the merits of our Chinese Philosopher by the same scale, I would not hesitate to state his genius still higher ; but as to his learning and gravity, these, I think, might safely be mark ed as nine hundred and ninety-nine, Avithin one degree of abso lute frigidity. Yet, upon his first appearance here, many Avere angry not to find him as ignorant as a Tripoline ambassador, or an envoy from Mujac. They Avere surprised to find a man born so far from London, that school of prudence and Avisdom, endued even with a moderate capacity.

They expressed the same surprise at his knowledge that the Chinese do at ours. : How comes it, said they, that the Europeans so remote from China, think with so much justice and precision? They have never read our books, they scarcely know even our letters, and yet they talk and reason just as we do. The truth is, the Chinese and Ave are pretty much ' Le Coniie, vol. i. p. 210 1 .

PREFACE.

. IV alike. Different degrees of refinement, and not of distance, mark the distinctions among mankind. Savages of the most opposite climates have all but one character of improvidence and rapacity ; and tutored nations, hoAvever separate, make use of the very same methods to procure refined enjoyment. The distinctions of polite nations are few ; but such as are peculiar to the Chinese, appear in every page of the folknving correspondence. The metaphors and allusions are all drawn from the East. Their formality our author carefully preserves. Many of their favourite tenets in morals are illustrated. The Chinese are always concise, so is he. Simple, so is he. The Chinese are grave and sententious, so is he. But in one particular the resemblance is peculiarly striking : the Chinese are often dull, and so is he.

Nor has my assistance been Avanting. We are told, in an old romance, of a certain knight errant and his horse Avho contracted an intimate friendship. The horse most usually bore the knight ; but, in cases of extraordinary dispatch, the knight returned the favour, and carried his horse. Thus, in the intimacy between my author and me, he has usually given me a lift of his eastern sublimity, and I have sometimes given him a return of my colloquial ease. Yet it appears strange, in this season of panegyric, Avhen scarcely an author passes unpraised, either by his friends or himself, that such merit as our Philosopher's should be forgotten. While the epithets of ingenious, copious, elaborate, and re fined, are lavished among the mob, like medals at a coronation, the lucky prizes fall on every side, but not one on him.

I could, on this occasion, make myself melancholy, by considering the capriciousness of public taste, or the mutability of fortune : but, during this fit of morality, lest my reader should sleep, I '11 take a nap myself, and when I awake tell him my dream. I imagined the Thames was frozen over, and I stood by its side. Several booths were erected upon the ice, and I was told by one of the spectators, that Fashion Fair was going to begin. He added, that every author who would carry his Avorks there, might probably find a very good reception. I was resolved, however, to observe the humours of the place in safety from

PREFACE.

. V the shore ; sensible that ice was at best precarious, and having been always a little cowardly in my sleep. Several of my acquaintance seemed much more hardy than I, and Avent over the ice with intrepidity. Some carried their works to the fair on sledges, some on carts, and those which were more voluminous, were conveyed in waggons. Their temerity astonished me. I knew their cargoes were heavy, and expected every moment they would have gone to the bottom. They all entered the fair, however, in safety, and each soon after returned to my great surprise, highly satisfied with his entertainment, and the bargains he had brought aAvay. The success of such numbers at last began to operate upon me. If these, cried I, meet with favour and safety, some luck may, perhaps, for once, attend the unfortunate.

I am resolved to make a new adventure. The furniture, frippery, and fire works of China, have long been fashionably bought up. I'll try the fair with a small cargo of Chinese morality. If the Chinese have contributed to vitiate our taste, I '11 try how far they can help to improve our understanding. But as others have driven into the market in Avaggons, 1 11 cautiously begin by venturing with a wheelbarroAv. Thus resolved, I baled up my goods, and fairly ventured ; when, upon just entering the fair. I fancied the ice that had supported a hundred Avaggons before, cracked under me, and wheelbarrow and all Avent to the bottom. Upon awaking from my reverie with the fright, I cannot help Avishing that the pains taken in giving this correspondence an English dress, had been employed in contriving new political systems, or new plots for farces.

I might then have taken my station in the world, either as a poet or a philosopher, and made one in those little societies Avhere men club to raise each other's reputation. But at present I belong to no particular class. I resemble one of those animals that has been forced from its forest to gratify human curiosity. My earliest wish Avas to escape unheeded through life ; but I have been set up for halfpence, to fret and scamper at the end of my chain. Though none are injured by my rage, I am naturally too savage to court any friends by faAvning ; too obstinate to be taught new

PREFACE.

. VI tricks ; and too improvident to mind what may happen. I am appeased, though not contented. Too indolent for intrigue, and too timid to push for favour, I am — but Avhat signifies what I am. £>._-)_ JCStl ffl/ TU^Ti fjtiya. %Cttpi<Tl- TOV \lfJliv tt/fiOv. Otji'it if*?t %' UjXlV TTa.l'C.VTi TOy. JUiT _//£ . Fortune and Hope, adieu! — I see my Port: Too long your dupe ; be others now your sport. LETTERS FROM A CITIZEN OF THE WORLD TO HIS FRIENDS IN THE EAST.

Letter I

To Mr * * * *, Merchant in London. Sir, Amsterdam. Yours of the i3th instant, covering two bills, one on Messrs R. and D. value 478/. 10s. and the other on Mr****, value 285Z., duly came to hand, the former of which met with honour, but the other has been trifled with, and I am afraid will be returned protested. The bearer of this is my friend, therefore let him be yours. He is a native of Honan in China, and one who did me signal services, when he was a mandarine, and I a fac tor, at Canton. By frequently conversing with the English there, he has learned the language, though he is entirely a stranger to their manners and customs. I am told he is a philosopher ; I am sure he is an honest man : that to you will be his best recommendation, next to the consideration of his being the friend of, sir, Yours, etc.

Letter II

From Lien Chi Altangi, to ****, Merchant in Amsterdam. Friend of my Heart, London. May the wings of peace rest upon thy dwelling, and the shield of conscience preserve thee from vice and misery ! For all thy favours accept my gratitude and esteem, the only tributes a poor philosophic wanderer can return. Sure, fortune is resolved to make me unhappy, when she gives others a power of testifying their friendship by actions, and leaves me only words to express the sincerity of mine. I am perfectly sensible of the delicacy with which you endeavour to lessen your own merit and my obligations. By calling your late instances of friendship only a return for former favours, you would induce me to impute to your justice what I owe to your generosity. The services I did you at Canton, justice, humanity, and my office, bade me perform ; those you haAre done me since my arrival at Amsterdam, no laws obliged you to, no jus tice required, — even half your favours would have been greater than my most sanguine expectations.

The sum of money, therefore, which you privately con veyed into my baggage, when I was leaving Holland, and which I was ignorant of till my arrival in London, I must beg leave to return. You have been bred a merchant, and I a scholar ; you consequently love money better than I. You can find pleasure in superfluity ; I am perfectly content with what is sufficient. Take therefore what is yours, it may give you some pleasure, even though you have no occasion to use it ; my happiness it cannot improve, for I have already all that I want. My passage by sea from Rotterdam to England was more painful to me than all the journeys I ever made on land. I have traversed the immeasurable wilds of Mogul Tartary ; felt all the rigours of Siberian skies : I have had my repose a hundred times disturbed by invading sa vages, and have seen, without shrinking, the desert sands rise like a troubled ocean all around me : against these calamities I was armed with resolution ; but in my passage to England, though nothing occurred that gave the mari ners any uneasiness, to one who was never at sea before, all was a subject of astonishment and terror.

To find the land disappear, to see our ship mount the waves, swift as an arrow from the Tartar bow, to hear the wind howling through the cordage, to feel a sickness which depresses even the spirits of the brave ; these were unexpected dis tresses, and consequently assaulted me unprepared to receive them. You men of Europe think nothing of a voyage by sea. With us of China, a man who has been from sight of land is regarded upon his return with admiration. I have known some provinces where there is not even a name for the Ocean. What a strange people, therefore, am I got amongst, who have founded an empire on this unstable element, who build cities upon billows that rise higher than the mountains of Tipertala, and make the deep more for midable than the wildest tempest ! Such accounts as these, I must confess, Avere my first motives for seeing England.

These induced me to under take a journey of seven hundred painful days, in order to examine its opulence, buildings, sciences, arts, and manu factures, on the spot. Judge then my disappointment on entering London, to see no signs of that opulence so much talked of abroad : Avherever I turn, I am presented with a gloomy solemnity in the houses, the streets, and the inhabitants; none of that beautiful gilding Avhich makes a principal ornament in Chinese architecture . The streets of Nan kin are sometimes strewed with gold-leaf; very different are those of London : in the midst of their pavements, a great lazy puddle moves muddily along ; heavy laden machines, with wheels of unwieldy thickness, crowd up every passage ; so that a stranger, instead of finding time for observation, is often happy if he has time to escape from being crushed to pieces.

The houses borrow very few ornaments from architecture ; their chief decoration seems to be a paltry piece of painting hung out at their doors or windows, at once a proof of their indigence and vanity : their vanity, in each having one of those pictures exposed to public view ; and their indigence, in being unable to get them better painted. In this respect, the fancy of their painters is also deplo rable. Could you believe it? I have seen five black lions and three blue boars, in less than the circuit of half a mile ; and yet you know that animals of these colours are no where to be found except in the wild imaginations of Europe. From these circumstances in their buildings, and from the dismal looks of the inhabitants, I am induced to con clude that the nation is actually poor ; and that, like the Persians, they make a splendid figure every where but at home.

The proverb of Xixofou is, that a mans riches may be seen in his eyes : if we judge of the English by this rule, there is not a poorer nation under the sun. I have been here but two days, so will not be hasty in my decisions. Such letters as I shall write to Fipsihi in Moscoav, I beg you '11 endeavour to forward with all dili gence ; I shall send them open, in order that you may take copies or translations, as you are equally versed in the Dutch and Chinese languages. Dear friend, think of my absence with regret, as I sincerely regret yours ; even while I write, I lament our separation. Farewell.

Letter III

From Lien Chi Altangi, to the care of Fipsihi, resident in Moscow, to be forwarded by the Kussian caravan to Fum Hoam, First President of the Ceremonial Academy at Pekin in China. Think not, 0 thou guide of my youth ! that absence can impair my respect, or interposing trackless deserts blot your reverend figure from my memory. The farther I travel I feel the pain of separation with stronger force ; those ties that bind me to my native country and you, are still unbroken. By every remove, I only drag a greater length of chain.' Could I find aught worth transmitting from so remote a region as this to which I have wandered, I should gladly send it ; but, instead of this, you must be contented with a renewal of my former professions, and an imperfect ac count of a people with whom I am as yet but superficially acquainted.

The remarks of a man who has been but three days in the country, can only be those obvious cir cumstances which force themselves upon the imagination. I consider myself here as a newly-created being introduced into a new world ; every object strikes Avith wonder and ' We find a repetition of this beautiful and affecting image in the Traveller : h Aud drags at each remove a lengthening chain. » surprise. The imagination, still unsated, seems the only active principle of the mind. The most trifling occurrences give pleasure till the gloss of novelty is worn away. When I have ceased to wonder, I may possibly grow wise; I may then call the reasoning principle to my aid, and compare those objects with each other, which were before examined without reflection. Behold me then in London, gazing at the strangers, and they at me : it seems they find somewhat absurd in my figure ; and had I been never from home, it is possible I might find an infinite fund of ridicule in theirs ; but by long travelling I am taught to laugh at folly alone, and to find nothing truly ridiculous but villany and vice.

When I had just quitted my native country, and crossed the Chinese wall, I fancied every deviation from the cus toms and manners of China was a departing from nature. I smiled at the blue lips and red foreheads of the Ton guese; and could hardly contain when I saw the Daures dress their heads with horns. The Ostiacs powdered with red earth ; and the Calmuck beauties, tricked out in all the finery of sheepskin, appeared highly ridiculous: but I soon perceived that the ridicule lay not in them but in me ; that I falsely condemned others for absurdity, because they happened to differ from a standard originally founded in prejudice or partiality. I find no pleasure therefore in taxing the Engbsh with departing from nature in their external appearance, which is all I yet know of their character : it is possible they only endeavour to improve her simple plan, since every extravagance in dress proceeds from a desire of becoming more beautiful than nature made us ; and this is so harmless a vanity, that I not only pardon but approve it.

A desire to be more excellent than others, is what actually makes us so ; and as thousands find a livelihood in society by such appetites, none but the ignorant inveigh against them. You are not insensible, most reverend Fum Hoam, what numberless trades, even among the Chinese, subsist by the harmless pride of each other. Your nose-borers, feet swathers, tooth-stainers, eyebrow pluckers, would all want bread, should their neighbours want vanity. These vani ties, however, employ much fewer hands in China than in England ; and a fine gentleman or a fine lady here, dressed up to the fashion, seems scarcely to have a single limb that does not suffer some distortions from art. To make a fine gentleman, several trades are required, but chiefly a barber. You have undoubtedly heard of the Jewish champion, whose strength lay in his hair.

One Avould think that the English Avere for placing all wisdom there. To appear wise, nothing more is requisite here than for a man to borrow hair from the heads of all his neighbours, and clap it like a bush on his own ; the distributors of law and physic stick on such quantities, that it is almost impossible, even in idea, to distinguish between the head and the hair. Those whom I have been now describing affect the gravity of the lion ; those I am going to describe, more resemble the pert vivacity of smaller animals. The barber, who is still master of the ceremonies, cuts their hair close to the crown ; and then with a composition of meal and hogs-lard, plasters the whole in such a manner as to make it impossible to distinguish whether the patient wears a cap or a plaster ; but, to make the picture more perfectly striking, conceive the tail of some beast, a greyhounds tail, or a pig's tail, for instance, appended to the back of the head, and reaching doAvn to that place where tails in other animals are generally seen to begin ; thus betailed and hepowdered, the man of taste fancies he improves in beauty, dresses up his hard-featured face in smiles, and attempts to look hideously tender.

Thus equipped he is qualified to make love, and hopes for success more from the powder on the outside of his head, than the sentiments within. Yet when I consider what sort of a creature the fine lady is to Avhom he is supposed to pay his addresses, it is not strange to find him thus equipped in order to please. She is herself every whit as fond of poAvder, and tails, and hogs-lard, as he. To speak my secret sentiments, most reverend Fum, the ladies here are horribly ugly; I can hardly endure the sight of them ; they no way resemble the beauties of China : the Europeans have a quite different idea of beauty from us. When I reflect on the small footed perfections of an Eastern beauty, how is it possible I should have eyes for a woman whose feet are ten inches long? I shall never forget the beauties of my native city of Nanfew.

Hoav very broad their faces ! how very short their noses ! how very little their eyes ! hoAv very thin their lips ! how very black their teeth ! the snow on the tops of Bao is not fairer than their cheeks; and their eyebrows are small as the line by the pencil of Quamsi. Here a lady with such perfections would be frightful ; Dutch and Chi nese beauties, indeed, have some resemblance, but English women are entirely different; red cheeks, big eyes, and teeth of a most odious whiteness, are not only seen here, but wished for ; and then they have such masculine feet, as actually serve some for walking ! Yet uncivil as nature has been, they seem resolved to outdo her in unkindness; they use white powder, blue powder, and black powder, for their hair, and a red pow der for the face on some particular occasions.

They like to have the face of various colours, as among the Tartars of Koreki, frequently sticking on, Avith spittle, little black patches on every part of it, except on the tip of the nose, which I have never seen with a patch. You 11 have a better idea of their manner of placing these spots, when I have finished the map of an English face patched up to the fashion, which shall shortly be sent to increase your curious collection of paintings, medals, and monsters. But what surprises more than all the rest is what I have just now been credibly informed by one of this country. « Most ladies here,» says he, « have two faces ; one face to sleep in, and another to sIioav in company : the first is ge nerally reserved for the husband and family at home ; the other put on to please stranger's abroad : the family face is often indifferent enough, but the out-door one looks some thing better; this is always made at the toilet, Avhere the looking-glass and toad-eater sit in council, and settle the complexion of the day. » I can't ascertain the truth of this remark ; however, it is actually certain, that they wear more clothes within doors than Avithout ; and I have seen a lady, who seemed to shud der at a breeze in her own apartment, appear half naked in the streets. Farewell.

Letter IV

To the Same. The English seem as silent as the Japanese, yet vainer than the inhabitants of Siam. Upon my arrival, I attributed that reserve to modesty, which I now find has its origin in pride. Condescend to address them first, and you are sure of their acquaintance ; stoop to flattery, and you conciliate their friendship and esteem. They bear hunger, cold, fatigue, and all the miseries of life without shrinking ; danger only calls forth their fortitude ; they even exult in calamity ; but contempt is what they cannot bear. An Eng lishman fears contempt more than death ; he often flies to death as a refuge from its pressure ; and dies when he fancies the world has ceased to esteem him. Pride seems the source not only of their national vices, but of their national virtues also. An Englishman is taught to love his king as his friend, but to acknoAvledge no other master than the laws which himself has contributed to enact.

He despises those nations, who, that one may be free, are all content to be slaves ; who first lift a tyrant into terror, and then shrink under his power as if delegated from Heaven. Liberty is echoed in all their assemblies ; and thousands might be found ready to offer up their lives for the sound, though perhaps not one of all the number understands its meaning. The lowest mechanic, however, looks upon it as his duty to be a watchful guardian of his country's freedom, and often uses a language that might seem haughty, even in the mouth of the great emperor, who traces his ancestry to the moon. A feAv days ago, passing by one of their prisons, I could not avoid stopping, in order to listen to a dialogue which I thought might afford me some entertainment. The con versation Avas carried on between a debtor through the grate of his prison, a porter, who had stopped to rest his burden, and a soldier at the window.

The subject was upon a threatened invasion from France, and each seemed extremely anxious to rescue his country from the impend ing danger. « For my part, » cries the prisoner, « the greatest of my apprehensions is for our freedom ; if the French should conquer, what would become of English liberty? My dear friends, liberty is the Englishman's prerogative ; we must preserve that at the expense of our lives ; of that the French shall never deprive us ; it is not to be expected that men who are slaves themselves would preserve our freedom should they happen to conquer. » — «Ay, slaves,» cries the porter, « they are all slaves, fit only to carry burdens, every one of them. Before I would stoop to slavery, may this be my poison (and he held the goblet in his hand), may this be my poison — but I Avould sooner list for a soldier."

The soldier, taking the goblet from his friend, with much awe fervently cried out, « It is not so much our liberties as our religion, that would suffer by such a change : ay, our reli gion, my lads. May the devil sink me into flames (such was the solemnity of his adjuration), if the French should come over, but our religion would be utter/y undone. » So saying, instead of a libation, he applied the goblet to his lips, and confirmed his sentiments Avith a ceremony of the most per severing devotion. In short, every man here pretends to be a politician ; even the fair sex are sometimes found to mix the severity of national altercation with the blandishments of love, and often become conquerors, by more weapons of destruction than their eyes. This universal passion for politics, is gratified by daily gazettes, as with us at China.

But as in ours the emperor endeavours to instruct his people, in theirs, the people endeavour to instruct the administration. You must not, however, imagine, that they who compile these papers have any actual knowledge of the politics, or the government of a state ; they only collect their materials from the oracle of some coffee-house ; which oracle has himself gathered them the night before from a beau at a gaming-table, VOL III. WOBLD. 18 who has pillaged his knowledge from a great man's porter, who has had his information from the great man's gentle man, who has invented the Avhole story for his own amusement the night preceding. The English, in general, seem fonder of gaining the esteem than the love of those they converse with. This gives a formality to their amusements ; their gayest con versations have something too wise for innocent relaxation : though in company you are seldom disgusted with the absurdity of a fool, you are seldom lifted into rapture by those strokes of vivacity, which give instant, though not permanent pleasure.

What they want, however, in gaiety, they make up in politeness. You smile at hearing me praise the English for their politeness ; you who have heard very different accounts from the missionaries at Pekin, who have seen such a different behaviour in their merchants and seamen at home. But I must still repeat it, the English seem more polite than any of their neighbours : their great art in this respect lies in endeavouring, while they oblige, to lessen the force of the favour. Other countries are fond of oblig ing a stranger ; but seem desirous that he should be sen sible of the obligation. The English confer their kindness with an appearance of indifference, and give away benefits Avith an air as if they despised them. Walking a few days ago between an English and a Frenchman into the suburbs of the city, we were overtaken by a heavy shower of rain.