Books: Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, v1
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Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. >> Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, v1
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After he had chosen the subject of the history he contemplated, he found
that Mr. Prescott was occupied with a kindred one, so that there might be
too near a coincidence between them. I must borrow from Mr. Ticknor's
beautiful life of Prescott the words which introduce a letter of Motley's
to Mr. William Amory, who has kindly allowed me also to make use of it.
"The moment, therefore, that he [Mr. Motley] was aware of this
condition of things, and the consequent possibility that there might
be an untoward interference in their plans, he took the same frank
and honorable course with Mr. Prescott that Mr. Prescott had taken
in relation to Mr. Irving, when he found that they had both been
contemplating a 'History of the Conquest of Mexico.' The result was
the same. Mr. Prescott, instead of treating the matter as an
interference, earnestly encouraged Mr. Motley to go on, and placed
at his disposition such of the books in his library as could be most
useful to him. How amply and promptly he did it, Mr. Motley's own
account will best show. It is in a letter dated at Rome, 26th
February, 1859, the day he heard of Mr. Prescott's death, and was
addressed to his intimate friend, Mr. William Amory, of Boston, Mr.
Prescott's much-loved brother-in-law."
"It seems to me but as yesterday," Mr. Motley writes, "though it
must be now twelve years ago, that I was talking with our ever-
lamented friend Stackpole about my intention of writing a history
upon a subject to which I have since that time been devoting myself.
I had then made already some general studies in reference to it,
without being in the least aware that Prescott had the intention of
writing the 'History of Philip the Second.' Stackpole had heard the
fact, and that large preparations had already been made for the
work, although 'Peru' had not yet been published. I felt naturally
much disappointed. I was conscious of the immense disadvantage to
myself of making my appearance, probably at the same time, before
the public, with a work not at all similar in plan to 'Philip the
Second,' but which must of necessity traverse a portion of the same
ground.
"My first thought was inevitably, as it were, only of myself.
It seemed to me that I had nothing to do but to abandon at once a
cherished dream, and probably to renounce authorship. For I had not
first made up my mind to write a history, and then cast about to
take up a subject. My subject had taken me up, drawn me on, and
absorbed me into itself. It was necessary for me, it seemed, to
write the book I had been thinking much of, even if it were destined
to fall dead from the press, and I had no inclination or interest to
write any other. When I had made up my mind accordingly, it then
occurred to me that Prescott might not be pleased that I should come
forward upon his ground. It is true that no announcement of his
intentions had been made, and that he had not, I believe, even
commenced his preliminary studies for Philip. At the same time I
thought it would be disloyal on my part not to go to him at once,
confer with him on the subject, and if I should find a shadow of
dissatisfaction on his mind at my proposition, to abandon my plan
altogether.
"I had only the slightest acquaintance with him at that time. I was
comparatively a young man, and certainly not entitled on any ground
to more than the common courtesy which Prescott never could refuse
to any one. But he received me with such a frank and ready and
liberal sympathy, and such an open-hearted, guileless expansiveness,
that I felt a personal affection for him from that hour. I remember
the interview as if it had taken place yesterday. It was in his
father's house, in his own library, looking on the garden-house and
garden,--honored father and illustrious son,--alas! all numbered
with the things that were! He assured me that he had not the
slightest objection whatever to my plan, that he wished me every
success, and that, if there were any books in his library bearing on
my subject that I liked to use, they were entirely at my service.
After I had expressed my gratitude for his kindness and cordiality,
by which I had been in a very few moments set completely at ease,--
so far as my fears of his disapprobation went,--I also very
naturally stated my opinion that the danger was entirely mine, and
that it was rather wilful of me thus to risk such a collision at my
first venture, the probable consequence of which was utter
shipwreck. I recollect how kindly and warmly he combated this
opinion, assuring me that no two books, as he said, ever injured
each other, and encouraging me in the warmest and most earnest
manner to proceed on the course I had marked out for myself.
"Had the result of that interview been different,--had he distinctly
stated, or even vaguely hinted, that it would be as well if I should
select some other topic, or had he only sprinkled me with the cold
water of conventional and commonplace encouragement,--I should have
gone from him with a chill upon my mind, and, no doubt, have laid
down the pen at once; for, as I have already said, it was not that I
cared about writing a history, but that I felt an inevitable impulse
to write one particular history.
"You know how kindly he always spoke of and to me; and the generous
manner in which, without the slightest hint from me, and entirely
unexpected by me, he attracted the eyes of his hosts of readers to
my forthcoming work, by so handsomely alluding to it in the Preface
to his own, must be almost as fresh in your memory as it is in mine.
"And although it seems easy enough for a man of world-wide
reputation thus to extend the right hand of fellowship to an unknown
and struggling aspirant, yet I fear that the history of literature
will show that such instances of disinterested kindness are as rare
as they are noble."
It was not from any feeling that Mr. Motley was a young writer from whose
rivalry he had nothing to apprehend. Mr. Amory says that Prescott
expressed himself very decidedly to the effect that an author who had
written such descriptive passages as were to be found in Mr. Motley's
published writings was not to be undervalued as a competitor by any one.
The reader who will turn to the description of Charles River in the
eighth chapter of the second volume of "Merry-Mount," or of the autumnal
woods in the sixteenth chapter of the same volume, will see good reason
for Mr. Prescott's appreciation of the force of the rival whose advent he
so heartily and generously welcomed.
X.
1851-1856. AEt. 37-42.
HISTORICAL STUDIES IN EUROPE.-LETTER FROM BRUSSELS.
After working for several years on his projected "History of the Dutch
Republic," he found that, in order to do justice to his subject, he must
have recourse to the authorities to be found only in the libraries and
state archives of Europe. In the year 1851 he left America with his
family, to begin his task over again, throwing aside all that he had
already done, and following up his new course of investigations at
Berlin, Dresden, the Hague, and Brussels during several succeeding years.
I do not know that I can give a better idea of his mode of life during
this busy period, his occupations, his state of mind, his objects of
interest outside of his special work, than by making the following
extracts from a long letter to myself, dated Brussels, 20th November,
1853.
After some personal matters he continued:--
"I don't really know what to say to you. I am in a town which, for
aught I know, may be very gay. I don't know a living soul in it.
We have not a single acquaintance in the place, and we glory in the
fact. There is something rather sublime in thus floating on a
single spar in the wide sea of a populous, busy, fuming, fussy world
like this. At any rate it is consonant to both our tastes. You may
suppose, however, that I find it rather difficult to amuse my
friends out of the incidents of so isolated an existence. Our daily
career is very regular and monotonous. Our life is as stagnant as a
Dutch canal. Not that I complain of it,--on the contrary, the canal
may be richly freighted with merchandise and be a short cut to the
ocean of abundant and perpetual knowledge; but, at the same time,
few points rise above the level of so regular a life, to be worthy
of your notice. You must, therefore, allow me to meander along the
meadows of commonplace. Don't expect anything of the impetuous and
boiling style. We go it weak here. I don't know whether you were
ever in Brussels. It is a striking, picturesque town, built up a
steep promontory, the old part at the bottom, very dingy and mouldy,
the new part at the top, very showy and elegant. Nothing can be
more exquisite in its way than the grande place in the very heart of
the city, surrounded with those toppling, zigzag, ten-storied
buildings bedizened all over with ornaments and emblems so peculiar
to the Netherlands, with the brocaded Hotel de Ville on one side,
with its impossible spire rising some three hundred and seventy feet
into the air and embroidered to the top with the delicacy of needle-
work, sugarwork, spider-work, or what you will. I haunt this place
because it is my scene, my theatre. Here were enacted so many deep
tragedies, so many stately dramas, and even so many farces, which
have been familiar to me so long that I have got to imagine myself
invested with a kind of property in the place, and look at it as if
it were merely the theatre with the coulisses, machinery, drapery,
etc., for representing scenes which have long since vanished, and
which no more enter the minds of the men and women who are actually
moving across its pavements than if they had occurred in the moon.
When I say that I knew no soul in Brussels I am perhaps wrong. With
the present generation I am not familiar. 'En revanche,' the dead
men of the place are my intimate friends. I am at home in any
cemetery. With the fellows of the sixteenth century I am on the
most familiar terms. Any ghost that ever flits by night across the
moonlight square is at once hailed by me as a man and a brother. I
call him by his Christian name at once. When you come out of this
place, however, which, as I said, is in the heart of the town,--the
antique gem in the modern setting,--you may go either up or down.
If you go down, you will find yourself in the very nastiest
complications of lanes and culs-de-sac possible, a dark entanglement
of gin-shops, beer-houses, and hovels, through which charming valley
dribbles the Senne (whence, I suppose, is derived Senna), the most
nauseous little river in the world, which receives all the
outpourings of all the drains and houses, and is then converted into
beer for the inhabitants, all the many breweries being directly upon
its edge. If you go up the hill instead of down, you come to an
arrangement of squares, palaces, and gardens as trim and fashionable
as you will find in Europe. Thus you see that our Cybele sits with
her head crowned with very stately towers and her feet in a tub of
very dirty water.
"My habits here for the present year are very regular. I came here,
having, as I thought, finished my work, or rather the first Part
(something like three or four volumes, 8vo), but I find so much
original matter here, and so many emendations to make, that I am
ready to despair. However, there is nothing for it but to
penelopize, pull to pieces, and stitch away again. Whatever may be
the result of my labor, nobody can say that I have not worked like
a brute beast,--but I don't care for the result. The labor is in
itself its own reward and all I want. I go day after day to the
archives here (as I went all summer at the Hague), studying the old
letters and documents of the fifteenth century. Here I remain among
my fellow-worms, feeding on these musty mulberry-leaves, out of
which we are afterwards to spin our silk. How can you expect
anything interesting from such a human cocoon? It is, however, not
without its amusement in a mouldy sort of way, this reading of dead
letters. It is something to read the real, bona fide signs-manual
of such fellows as William of Orange, Count Egmont, Alexander
Farnese, Philip II., Cardinal Granvelle, and the rest of them. It
gives a 'realizing sense,' as the Americans have it. . . . There
are not many public resources of amusement in this place,--if we
wanted them,--which we don't. I miss the Dresden Gallery very much,
and it makes me sad to think that I shall never look at the face of
the Sistine Madonna again,--that picture beyond all pictures in the
world, in which the artist certainly did get to heaven and painted a
face which was never seen on earth--so pathetic, so gentle, so
passionless, so prophetic. . . . There are a few good Rubenses
here,--but the great wealth of that master is in Antwerp. The great
picture of the Descent from the Cross is free again, after having
been ten years in the repairing room. It has come out in very good
condition. What a picture? It seems to me as if I had really stood
at the cross and seen Mary weeping on John's shoulder, and Magdalen
receiving the dead body of the Saviour in her arms. Never was the
grand tragedy represented in so profound and dramatic a manner. For
it is not only in his color in which this man so easily surpasses
all the world, but in his life-like, flesh-and-blood action,--the
tragic power of his composition. And is it not appalling to think
of the 'large constitution of this man,' when you reflect on the
acres of canvas which he has covered? How inspiriting to see with
what muscular, masculine vigor this splendid Fleming rushed in and
plucked up drowning Art by the locks when it was sinking in the
trashy sea of such creatures as the Luca Giordanos and Pietro
Cortonas and the like. Well might Guido exclaim, 'The fellow mixes
blood with his colors! . . . How providentially did the man come
in and invoke living, breathing, moving men and women out of his
canvas! Sometimes he is ranting and exaggerated, as are all men of
great genius who wrestle with Nature so boldly. No doubt his
heroines are more expansively endowed than would be thought genteel
in our country, where cryptogams are so much in fashion,
nevertheless there is always something very tremendous about him,
and very often much that is sublime, pathetic, and moving. I defy
any one of the average amount of imagination and sentiment to stand
long before the Descent from the Cross without being moved more
nearly to tears than he would care to acknowledge. As for color,
his effects are as sure as those of the sun rising in a tropical
landscape. There is something quite genial in the cheerful sense of
his own omnipotence which always inspired him. There are a few fine
pictures of his here, and I go in sometimes of a raw, foggy morning
merely to warm myself in the blaze of their beauty."
I have been more willing to give room to this description of Rubens's
pictures and the effect they produced upon Motley, because there is a
certain affinity between those sumptuous and glowing works of art and the
prose pictures of the historian who so admired them. He was himself a
colorist in language, and called up the image of a great personage or a
splendid pageant of the past with the same affluence, the same rich
vitality, that floods and warms the vast areas of canvas over which the
full-fed genius of Rubens disported itself in the luxury of imaginative
creation.
XI.
1856-1857. AEt. 42-43.
PUBLICATION OF HIS FIRST HISTORICAL WORK, "RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC."--
ITS RECEPTION.--CRITICAL NOTICES.
The labor of ten years was at last finished. Carrying his formidable
manuscript with him,--and how formidable the manuscript which melts down
into three solid octavo volumes is, only writers and publishers know,--he
knocked at the gate of that terrible fortress from which Lintot and Curll
and Tonson looked down on the authors of an older generation. So large a
work as the "History of the Rise of the Dutch Republic," offered for the
press by an author as yet unknown to the British public, could hardly
expect a warm welcome from the great dealers in literature as
merchandise. Mr. Murray civilly declined the manuscript which was
offered to him, and it was published at its author's expense by Mr. John
Chapman. The time came when the positions of the first-named celebrated
publisher and the unknown writer were reversed. Mr. Murray wrote to Mr.
Motley asking to be allowed to publish his second great work, the
"History of the United Netherlands," expressing at the same time his
regret at what he candidly called his mistake in the first instance, and
thus they were at length brought into business connection as well as the
most agreeable and friendly relations. An American edition was published
by the Harpers at the same time as the London one.
If the new work of the unknown author found it difficult to obtain a
publisher, it was no sooner given to the public than it found an
approving, an admiring, an enthusiastic world of readers, and a noble
welcome at the colder hands of the critics.
"The Westminster Review" for April, 1856, had for its leading article a
paper by Mr. Froude, in which the critic awarded the highest praise to
the work of the new historian. As one of the earliest as well as one of
the most important recognitions of the work, I quote some of its
judgments.
"A history as complete as industry and genius can make it now lies
before us of the first twenty years of the Revolt of the United
Provinces; of the period in which those provinces finally conquered
their independence and established the Republic of Holland. It has
been the result of many years of silent, thoughtful, unobtrusive
labor, and unless we are strangely mistaken, unless we are ourselves
altogether unfit for this office of criticising which we have here
undertaken, the book is one which will take its place among the
finest histories in this or in any language. . . . All the
essentials of a great writer Mr. Motley eminently possesses. His
mind is broad, his industry unwearied. In power of dramatic
description no modern historian, except perhaps Mr. Carlyle,
surpasses him, and in analysis of character he is elaborate and
distinct. His principles are those of honest love for all which is
good and admirable in human character wherever he finds it, while he
unaffectedly hates oppression, and despises selfishness with all his
heart."
After giving a slight analytical sketch of the series of events related
in the history, Mr. Froude objects to only one of the historian's
estimates, that, namely, of the course of Queen Elizabeth.
"It is ungracious, however," he says, "even to find so slight a
fault with these admirable volumes. Mr. Motley has written without
haste, with the leisurely composure of a master. . . . We now
take our leave of Mr. Motley, desiring him only to accept our hearty
thanks for these volumes, which we trust will soon take their place
in every English library. Our quotations will have sufficed to show
the ability of the writer. Of the scope and general character of
his work we have given but a languid conception. The true merit of
a great book must be learned from the book itself. Our part has
been rather to select varied specimens of style and power. Of Mr.
Motley's antecedents we know nothing. If he has previously appeared
before the public, his reputation has not crossed the Atlantic. It
will not be so now. We believe that we may promise him as warm a
welcome among ourselves as he will receive even in America; that his
place will be at once conceded to him among the first historians in
our common language."
The faithful and unwearied Mr. Allibone has swept the whole field of
contemporary criticism, and shown how wide and universal was the welcome
accorded to the hitherto unknown author. An article headed "Prescott
and Motley," attributed to M. Guizot, which must have been translated,
I suppose, from his own language, judging by its freedom from French
idioms, is to be found in "The Edinburgh Review" for January, 1857. The
praise, not unmingled with criticisms, which that great historian
bestowed upon Motley is less significant than the fact that he
superintended a translation of the "Rise of the Dutch Republic," and
himself wrote the Introduction to it.
A general chorus of approbation followed or accompanied these leading
voices. The reception of the work in Great Britain was a triumph. On
the Continent, in addition to the tribute paid to it by M. Guizot, it was
translated into Dutch, into German, and into Russian. At home his
reception was not less hearty. "The North American Review," which had
set its foot on the semi-autobiographical medley which he called
"Morton's Hope," which had granted a decent space and a tepid recognition
to his "semi-historical" romance, in which he had already given the
reading public a taste of his quality as a narrator of real events and a
delineator of real personages,--this old and awe-inspiring New England
and more than New England representative of the Fates, found room for a
long and most laudatory article, in which the son of one of our most
distinguished historians did the honors of the venerable literary
periodical to the new-comer, for whom the folding-doors of all the
critical headquarters were flying open as if of themselves. Mr. Allibone
has recorded the opinions of some of our best scholars as expressed to
him.
Dr. Lieber wrote a letter to Mr. Allibone in the strongest terms of
praise. I quote one passage which in the light of after events borrows
a cruel significance:--
"Congress and Parliament decree thanks for military exploits,--
rarely for diplomatic achievements. If they ever voted their thanks
for books,--and what deeds have influenced the course of human
events more than some books?--Motley ought to have the thanks of our
Congress; but I doubt not that he has already the thanks of every
American who has read the work. It will leave its distinct mark
upon the American mind."
Mr. Everett writes:--
"Mr. Motley's 'History of the Dutch Republic' is in my judgment a
work of the highest merit. Unwearying research for years in the
libraries of Europe, patience and judgment in arranging and
digesting his materials, a fine historical tact, much skill in
characterization, the perspective of narration, as it may be called,
and a vigorous style unite to make it a very capital work, and place
the name of Motley by the side of those of our great historical
trio,--Bancroft, Irving, and Prescott."
Mr. Irving, Mr. Bancroft, Mr. Sumner, Mr. Hillard, united their voices in
the same strain of commendation. Mr. Prescott, whose estimate of the new
history is of peculiar value for obvious reasons, writes to Mr. Allibone
thus:--
"The opinion of any individual seems superfluous in respect to a
work on the merits of which the public both at home and abroad have
pronounced so unanimous a verdict. As Motley's path crosses my own
historic field, I may be thought to possess some advantage over most
critics in my familiarity with the ground.
"However this may be, I can honestly bear my testimony to the extent
of his researches and to the accuracy with which he has given the
results of them to the public. Far from making his book a mere
register of events, he has penetrated deep below the surface and
explored the cause of these events. He has carefully studied the
physiognomy of the times and given finished portraits of the great
men who conducted the march of the revolution. Every page is
instinct with the love of freedom and with that personal knowledge
of the working of free institutions which could alone enable him to
do justice to his subject. We may congratulate ourselves that it
was reserved for one of our countrymen to tell the story-better than
it had yet been told--of this memorable revolution, which in so many
of its features bears a striking resemblance to our own."
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