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Review of Oliver Goldsmith, The Traveller

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By Johnson, Samuel

Samuel Johnson: Johnson on Demand

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REVIEW OF OLIVER GOLDSMITH, THE TRAVELLER (1764)

[Editorial Introduction]

Johnson’s review of Goldsmith’s poem The Traveller, or a Prospect of Society appeared in the Critical Review for December 1764 (XVIII.458–62). Not only had Johnson welcomed Goldsmith into his circle of friends, making him a charter member of The Club in 1764, he had helped in his literary endeavors in various ways. Most famously he had sold for him the copyright to The Vicar of Wakefield in 1762. He also read Goldsmith’s poems in manuscript and suggested or made changes to some of them before publication. One of the poems to which Johnson contributed is The Traveller. Lines 420, 429–34, and 436–38 are generally agreed to be Johnson’s.1 Johnson later contributed the prologue to Goldsmith’s play The Good-Natur’d Man (1768), and he twice composed epitaphs for Goldsmith after his death in 1774.2

XII. The Traveller, or a Prospect of Society. A Poem. Inscribed to the Rev. Mr. Henry Goldsmith. By Oliver Goldsmith, M.B.14to. Pr. 1s. 6d. Newbery.2

The author has, in an elegant dedication to his brother, a country clergyman, given the design of his poem:—“Without espousing the cause of any party, I have attempted to moderate the rage of all. I have endeavoured to shew, that there may be equal happiness in other states, though differently governed

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from our own; that each state has a peculiar principle of happiness; and that this principle in each state, particularly in our own, may be carried to a mischievous excess.”3

That he may illustrate and enforce this important position, the author places himself on a summit of the Alps, and, turning his eyes around, in all directions, upon the different regions that lie before him, compares, not merely their situation or policy, but those social and domestic manners which, after a very few deductions, make the sum total of human life.

Remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow, Or by the lazy Scheld, or wandering Po; Or onward, where the rude Carinthian boor Against the houseless stranger shuts the door; Or where Campania’s plain forsaken lies, A weary waste expanded to the skies. Where’er I roam, whatever realms to see, My heart untravell’d fondly turns to thee; Still to my brother turns, with ceaseless pain, And drags at each remove a lengthening chain.—4 Even now, where alpine solitudes ascend, I sit me down a pensive hour to spend; And, plac’d on high above the storm’s career, Look downward where an hundred realms appear; Lakes, forests, cities, plains extended wide, The pomp of kings, the shepherd’s humbler pride. When thus creation’s charms around combine, Amidst the store, ’twere thankless to repine. ‘Twere affectation all, and school-taught pride, To spurn the splendid things by heaven supply’d. Let school-taught pride dissemble all it can,

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These little things are great to little man; And wiser he, whose sympathetic mind Exults in all the good of all mankind.5

The author already appears, by his numbers, to be a versifier;6 and by his scenery, to be a poet; it therefore only remains that his sentiments discover him to be a just estimator of comparative happiness.

The goods of life are either given by nature, or procured by ourselves. Nature has distributed her gifts in very different proportions, yet all her children are content;7 but the acquisitions of art are such as terminate in good or evil, as they are differently regulated or combined.8

Yet, where to find that happiest spot below, Who can direct, when all pretend to know? The shudd’ring tenant of the frigid zone Boldly asserts that country for his own, Extols the treasures of his stormy seas, And live-long nights of revelry and ease; The naked negro, panting at the line, Boasts of his golden sands and palmy wine, Basks in the glare, or stems the tepid wave, And thanks his gods for all the good they gave.—9 Nature, a mother kind alike to all, Still grants her bliss at labour’s earnest call; And though rough rocks or gloomy summits frown, These rocks, by custom, turn to beds of down. From art more various are the blessings sent; Wealth, splendours, honor, liberty, content: Yet these each other’s power so strong contest, That either seems destructive of the rest. Hence every state, to one lov’d blessing prone, Conforms and models life to that alone.

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Each to the favourite happiness attends, And spurns the plan that aims at other ends; Till, carried to excess in each domain, This favourite good begets peculiar pain.1

This is the position which he conducts through Italy, Swisserland, France, Holland, and England; and which he endeavours to confirm by remarking the manners of every country.

Having censured the degeneracy of the modern Italians, he proceeds thus:

My soul turn from them, turn we to survey Where rougher climes a nobler race display, Where the bleak Swiss their stormy mansions tread, And force a churlish soil for scanty bread; No product here the barren hills afford, But man and steel, the soldier and his sword. No vernal blooms their torpid rocks array, But winter lingering chills the lap of May; No zephyr fondly sooths the mountain’s breast, But meteors glare, and stormy glooms invest. Yet still, even here, content can spread a charm, Redress the clime, and all its rage disarm. Though poor the peasant’s hut, his feasts though small, He sees his little lot, the lot of all; Sees no contiguous palace rear its head To shame the meanness of his humble shed; No costly lord the sumptuous banquet deal To make him loath his vegetable meal; But calm, and bred in ignorance and toil, Each wish contracting, fits him to the soil.2

But having found that the rural life of a Swiss has its evils as well as comforts, he turns to France.

To kinder skies, where gentler manners reign, We turn; and France displays her bright domain. Gay sprightly land of mirth and social ease,

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Pleas’d with thyself, whom all the world can please.— Theirs are those arts that mind to mind endear, For honour forms the social temper here.— From courts to camps, to cottages it strays, And all are taught an avarice of praise; They please, are pleas’d, they give to get esteem, Till, seeming blest, they grow to what they seem.3 Yet France has its evils: For praise too dearly lov’d, or warmly sought, Enfeebles all internal strength of thought, And the weak soul, within itself unblest, Leans for all pleasure on another’s breast.— The mind still turns where shifting fashion draws, Nor weighs the solid worth of self-applause.4

Having then passed through Holland, he arrives in England, where,

Stern o’er each bosom reason holds her state, With daring aims, irregularly great, I see the lords of human kind pass by, Pride in their port, defiance in their eye, Intent on high designs, a thoughtful band, By forms unfashion’d, fresh from nature’s hand.5

With the inconveniences that harrass the sons of freedom, this extract shall be concluded.

That independence Britons prize too high, Keeps man from man, and breaks the social tie; See, though by circling deeps together held, Minds combat minds, repelling and repell’d; Ferments arise, imprison’d factions roar, Represt ambition struggles round her shore, Whilst, over-wrought, the general system feels Its motions stopt, or phrenzy fires the wheels. Nor this the worst. As social bonds decay,

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As duty, love, and honour fail to sway, Fictitious bonds, the bonds of wealth and law, Still gather strength, and force unwilling awe. Hence all obedience bows to these alone, And talent sinks, and merit weeps unknown; Till time may come, when, stript of all her charms, That land of scholars, and that nurse of arms; Where noble stems transmit the patriot flame, And monarchs toil, and poets pant for fame; One sink of level avarice shall lie, And scholars, soldiers, kings unhonor’d die.6

Such is the poem, on which we now congratulate the public, as on a production to which, since the death of Pope,7 it will not be easy to find any thing equal.

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Editorial Notes

1 See Bibliography, II.1062, and Yale, VI.355–56.

2 See Yale, VI.264 and XIX.512–14.

1 M.B.: Bachelor of Medicine; after earning a B.A. at Trinity College, Dublin, in 1750, Goldsmith studied medicine at Edinburgh, Leiden, and Padua, but there is no record of an advanced degree (ODNB).

2 The publisher John Newbery was one of those who purchased the copyright to The Vicar of Wakefield.

3 The dedication was just one sentence in the first issue of the poem. The textual evidence here and throughout suggests that SJ used the second issue of the first edition. See Arthur Friedman, ed., The Collected Works of Oliver Goldsmith, 5 vols. (1966), IV.247, and William B. Todd, “Quadruple Imposition: An Account of Goldsmith’s Traveller,” Studies in Bibliography, VII (1955), 103–11.

4 ll. 1–10. The dashes used in the review are not in the text; they indicate that lines have been omitted.

5 ll. 31–44.

6 Versifier: “a maker of verses with or without the spirit of poetry” (Dictionary, s.v. “versificator”). Cf. Idler 60: “Pope he was inclined to degrade from a poet to a versifier” (Yale, II.187).

7 SJ paraphrases ll. 75–80.

8 SJ paraphrases ll. 87–98.

9 ll. 63–72.

1 ll. 81–98.

2 ll. 165–84.

3 ll. 239–42; 257–58; 263–66.

4 ll. 269–72; 279–80.

5 ll. 325–30.

6 ll. 339–60.

7 Pope died in 1744.

Transcription

Document Details

Document TitleReview of Oliver Goldsmith, The Traveller

AuthorJohnson, Samuel

Creation Date1764

Publ. DateN/A

Alt. TitleN/A

Contrib. AuthorN/A

ClassificationSubject: Goldsmith; Subject: Literary criticism; Subject: Pope; Genre: Review

PrinterN/A

PublisherN/A

Publ. PlaceN/A

VolumeSamuel Johnson: Johnson on Demand

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