第230章

'Most certainly I do,'said the man in black.'The writings of that man have made them greater fools than they were before.All their conversation now is about gallant knights,princesses,and cavaliers,with which his pages are stuffed-all of whom were Papists,or very High Church,which is nearly the same thing;and they are beginning to think that the religion of such nice sweet-scented gentry must be something very superfine.Why,I know at Birmingham the daughter of an ironmonger,who screeches to the piano the Lady of the Lake's hymn to the Virgin Mary,always weeps when Mary Queen of Scots is mentioned,and fasts on the anniversary of the death of that very wise martyr,Charles the First.Why,Iwould engage to convert such an idiot to popery in a week,were it worth my trouble.O Cavaliere Gualtiero,avete fatto molto in favore della Santa Sede!'

'If he has,'said I,'he has done it unwittingly;I never heard before that he was a favourer of the popish delusion.'

'Only in theory,'said the man in black.'Trust any of the clan Mac-Sycophant for interfering openly and boldly in favour of any cause on which the sun does not shine benignantly.Popery is at present,as you say,suing for grace in these regions IN FORMAPAUPERIS;but let royalty once take it up,let old gouty George once patronise it,and I would consent to drink puddle-water if,the very next time the canny Scot was admitted to the royal symposium,he did not say,"By my faith,yere Majesty,I have always thought,at the bottom of my heart,that popery,as ill-scrapit tongues ca'it,was a very grand religion;I shall be proud to follow your Majesty's example in adopting it."'

'I doubt not,'said I,'that both gouty George and his devoted servant will be mouldering in their tombs long before Royalty in England thinks about adopting popery.'

'We can wait,'said the man in black;'in these days of rampant gentility,there will be no want of kings nor of Scots about them.'

'But not Walters,'said I.

'Our work has been already tolerably well done by one,'said the man in black;'but if we wanted literature,we should never lack in these regions hosts of literary men of some kind or other to eulogise us,provided our religion were in the fashion,and our popish nobles chose-and they always do our bidding-to admit the canaille to their tables-their kitchen tables.As for literature in general,'said he,'the Santa Sede is not particularly partial to it,it may be employed both ways.In Italy,in particular,it has discovered that literary men are not always disposed to be lickspittles.'

'For example,Dante,'said I.

'Yes,'said the man in black,'a dangerous personage;that poem of his cuts both ways;and then there was Pulci,that MORGANTE of his cuts both ways,or rather one way,and that sheer against us;and then there was Aretino,who dealt so hard with the POVERI FRATI;all writers,at least Italian ones,are not lickspittles.And then in Spain,-'tis true,Lope de Vega and Calderon were most inordinate lickspittles;the PRINCIPE CONSTANTE of the last is a curiosity in its way;and then the MARY STUART of Lope;I think Ishall recommend the perusal of that work to the Birmingham ironmonger's daughter-she has been lately thinking of adding "a slight knowledge of the magneeficent language of the Peninsula"to the rest of her accomplishments,he!he!he!But then there was Cervantes,starving,but straight;he deals us some hard knocks in that second part of his QUIXOTE.Then there were some of the writers of the picaresque novels.No,all literary men are not lickspittles,whether in Italy or Spain,or,indeed,upon the Continent;it is only in England that all-'

'Come,'said I,'Mind what you are about to say of English literary men.'

'Why should I mind?'said the man in black,'there are no literary men here.I have heard of literary men living in garrets,but not in dingles,whatever philologists may do;I may,therefore,speak out freely.It is only in England that literary men are invariably lickspittles;on which account,perhaps,they are so despised,even by those who benefit by their dirty services.Look at your fashionable novel-writers,he!he!-and,above all,at your newspaper editors,ho!ho!'

'You will,of course,except the editors of the-from your censure of the last class?'said I.

'Them!'said the man in black;'why,they might serve as models in the dirty trade to all the rest who practise it.See how they bepraise their patrons,the grand Whig nobility,who hope,by raising the cry of liberalism and by putting themselves at the head of the populace,to come into power shortly.I don't wish to be hard,at present,upon those Whigs,'he continued,'for they are playing our game;but a time will come when,not wanting them,we will kick them to a considerable distance:and then,when toleration is no longer the cry,and the Whigs are no longer backed by the populace,see whether the editors of the-will stand by them;they will prove themselves as expert lickspittles of despotism as of liberalism.Don't think they will always bespatter the Tories and Austria.'

'Well,'said I,'I am sorry to find that you entertain so low an opinion of the spirit of English literary men;we will now return,if you please,to the subject of the middle classes;I think your strictures upon them in general are rather too sweeping-they are not altogether the foolish people which you have described.Look,for example,at that very powerful and numerous body the Dissenters,the descendants of those sturdy Patriots who hurled Charles the Simple from his throne.'