Page images
PDF
EPUB

He was buried in the Poets' Corner of Westminster Abbey, with a stone bearing this inscription:

THOMAS BABINGTON, LORD MACAULAY,

Born at Rothley Temple, Leicestershire,
October 25, 1800.

Died at Holly Lodge, Campden Hill,

December 28, 1859.

"His body is buried in peace,

But his name liveth forever more."

CHOICE AND TREATMENT OF SUBJECT

Macaulay was extremely and persistently conscientious about all his work, doing his composing with such care and pains as his busy life would allow; and he was not willing to undertake an essay until he had thoroughly saturated himself with the subject, and was entirely satisfied of his qualifications for the task proposed. Thus he writes to the editor of the Edinburgh Review: "I find that it will be impossible for me to execute the plan of reviewing Panizzi's edition of Boiardo for your next number. I have not been able to read one half of Boiardo's poem, and, in order to do what I propose, I must read Berni's rifacimento too, as well as Pulci's Morgante; and this, I fear, will be quite out of the question." Moreover, his habit

was such that he certainly would have read other works (e.g. Ariosto's Orlando Furioso and Byron's translation of a canto from Pulci) before beginning to write.

[ocr errors]

In like manner, when Napier was importuning him to review Lockhart's Life of Scott, he writes: "Now, a review of Lockhart's book ought to be a review of Sir Walter's literary performances. I enjoy many of them; nobody, I believe, more keenly; - but I am sure that there are hundreds who will criticise them far better." He goes over something of the same ground of objection four years later when he was asked to review the Life of Sir Samuel Romilly, but he has other reasons: "My objections to taking Romilly's Life are numerous. One of them is that I was not acquainted with him, and never heard him speak, except for a few minutes when I was a child. A stranger who writes a description of a person whom hundreds still living knew intimately is almost certain to make mistakes; and, even if he makes no absolute mistake, his portrait is not likely to be thought a striking resemblance by those who knew the original." When he once undertook a subject, however, he went at it with great enthusiasm, and with a desire to accomplish the work to the best of his power. To this end he lavished upon his papers an apparently inexhaustible wealth of allusion, suggestion, comparison,

contrast, drawn from his abundance of learning in the wide field of the world's history or the still wider field of its literature. He seldom made use of the material sciences for purposes of illustration. This very enthusiasm sometimes causes him to give false impression by painting in colors too high. Thus his comparison between the inhabitants of Mexico and those of India, in the first paragraph of Clive, is hardly fair to the former, and, in the last paragraph, he seems somewhat to overestimate the importance of Clive's influence on the after history of India. According to his own judgment and that of posterity, he succeeded best in some subject dealing with history, politics, morals, the science of government, or something of that kind. His essays on literary subjects he esteemed as of less value, and posterity has not seen fit to contest his judgment in the matter; though few would go so far as to approve the exact terms of his own estimate. See p. xiii.

The Life of Clive came to him a welcome subject. He was well prepared for the task from the outset. To his mind the mere name of Clive at once suggested two things, India and English politics; and he knew both well. He had all his life been identified with English politics; he had been a Member of Parliament, and by no means the least important man in that body; at the time when the subject was proposed, he was in India, holding a government position which gave him

very unusual opportunities of knowing the genius of the Indian peoples and the character of their institutions; and, a Briton himself, he could bring to the work all that national pride which makes one Briton glory in the great deeds of a great countryman.

66

He did not rush the Essay on Clive hastily into print. He was revolving it in his mind for more than two years, perhaps planning it, hammering it out. On June 15, 1837, he writes from Calcutta to Napier: "I will try my hand on Temple and on Lord Clive." Later in the same letter he says: "If you should have assigned Temple or Clive to anybody else, pray do not be uneasy on that account. The pleasure of writing pays itself." Again, on November 4, 1838, he writes: ". . . it is my full intention to be in England in February, and on the day on which I reach London, I will begin to work for you on Lord Clive." Again, on July 4, 1839: "I mean to give you a life of Clive for October." September 2, 1839: "I shall work or Clive as hard as I can, and make the paper as short as I can; but I am afraid that I cannot positively pledge myself either as to time or as to length. I rather think, however, that the article will take." By November of the same year, the manuscript had reached Napier's hands. Macaulay then writes: "I send back the paper on Clive. Remember to let me have a revise. I have altered the last sentence so as to make it clearer

and more harmonious, but I cannot consent to leave out the well-earned compliment to my dear old friend, Lord William Bentinck."

Some inkling of Macaulay's own opinion of his Clive may, perhaps, be gotten from the two following extracts from his letters to the editor of the Edinburgh Review: "I see that a Life of Warren Hastings is just coming out. I mark it for mine. I will try to make as interesting an article, though I fear not so flashy, as that on Clive." "The paper on Clive took greatly. That on Hastings, though in my own opinion by no means equal to that on Clive, has been even more successful."

MACAULAY'S STYLE

Macaulay's style has been frequently described, and the adjectives usually applied to it are vivid, vigorous, animated, picturesque, rhetorical, oratorical, and the 'ike.

An examination of some of the means by which he has attained this result may be interesting.

His words are very carefully selected. He is neither. the purist who will use no words but those of AngloSaxon derivation, nor is he the classicist who unduly inclines to those of Latin or of Greek origin; but he seeks the word that is most likely to carry with it the thought he wishes to communicate. His ideas on this subject are clearly expressed in a letter to Macvey

« PreviousContinue »