Letters on England [51]
of the polite arts like those in France.
There are Universities in most countries, but it is in France only
that we meet with so beneficial an encouragement for astronomy and
all parts of the mathematics, for physic, for researches into
antiquity, for painting, sculpture, and architecture. Louis XIV.
has immortalised his name by these several foundations, and this
immortality did not cost him two hundred thousand livres a year.
I must confess that one of the things I very much wonder at is, that
as the Parliament of Great Britain have promised a reward of 20,000
pounds sterling to any person who may discover the longitude, they
should never have once thought to imitate Louis XIV. in his
munificence with regard to the arts and sciences.
Merit, indeed, meets in England with rewards of another kind, which
redound more to the honour of the nation. The English have so great
a veneration for exalted talents, that a man of merit in their
country is always sure of making his fortune. Mr. Addison in France
would have been elected a member of one of the academies, and, by
the credit of some women, might have obtained a yearly pension of
twelve hundred livres, or else might have been imprisoned in the
Bastile, upon pretence that certain strokes in his tragedy of Cato
had been discovered which glanced at the porter of some man in
power. Mr. Addison was raised to the post of Secretary of State in
England. Sir Isaac Newton was made Master of the Royal Mint. Mr.
Congreve had a considerable employment. Mr. Prior was
Plenipotentiary. Dr. Swift is Dean of St. Patrick in Dublin, and is
more revered in Ireland than the Primate himself. The religion
which Mr. Pope professes excludes him, indeed, from preferments of
every kind, but then it did not prevent his gaining two hundred
thousand livres by his excellent translation of Homer. I myself saw
a long time in France the author of Rhadamistus ready to perish for
hunger. And the son of one of the greatest men our country ever
gave birth to, and who was beginning to run the noble career which
his father had set him, would have been reduced to the extremes of
misery had he not been patronised by Monsieur Fagon.
But the circumstance which mostly encourages the arts in England is
the great veneration which is paid them. The picture of the Prime
Minister hangs over the chimney of his own closet, but I have seen
that of Mr. Pope in twenty noblemen's houses. Sir Isaac Newton was
revered in his lifetime, and had a due respect paid to him after his
death; the greatest men in the nation disputing who should have the
honour of holding up his pall. Go into Westminster Abbey, and you
will find that what raises the admiration of the spectator is not
the mausoleums of the English kings, but the monuments which the
gratitude of the nation has erected to perpetuate the memory of
those illustrious men who contributed to its glory. We view their
statues in that abbey in the same manner as those of Sophocles,
Plato, and other immortal personages were viewed in Athens; and I am
persuaded that the bare sight of those glorious monuments has fired
more than one breast, and been the occasion of their becoming great
men.
The English have even been reproached with paying too extravagant
honours to mere merit, and censured for interring the celebrated
actress Mrs. Oldfield in Westminster Abbey, with almost the same
pomp as Sir Isaac Newton. Some pretend that the English had paid
her these great funeral honours, purposely to make us more strongly
sensible of the barbarity and injustice which they object to us, for
having buried Mademoiselle Le Couvreur ignominiously in the fields.
But be assured from me, that the English were prompted by no other
principle in burying Mrs. Oldfield in Westminster Abbey than their
good sense. They are far from being so ridiculous as to brand with
infamy an art which has immortalised
There are Universities in most countries, but it is in France only
that we meet with so beneficial an encouragement for astronomy and
all parts of the mathematics, for physic, for researches into
antiquity, for painting, sculpture, and architecture. Louis XIV.
has immortalised his name by these several foundations, and this
immortality did not cost him two hundred thousand livres a year.
I must confess that one of the things I very much wonder at is, that
as the Parliament of Great Britain have promised a reward of 20,000
pounds sterling to any person who may discover the longitude, they
should never have once thought to imitate Louis XIV. in his
munificence with regard to the arts and sciences.
Merit, indeed, meets in England with rewards of another kind, which
redound more to the honour of the nation. The English have so great
a veneration for exalted talents, that a man of merit in their
country is always sure of making his fortune. Mr. Addison in France
would have been elected a member of one of the academies, and, by
the credit of some women, might have obtained a yearly pension of
twelve hundred livres, or else might have been imprisoned in the
Bastile, upon pretence that certain strokes in his tragedy of Cato
had been discovered which glanced at the porter of some man in
power. Mr. Addison was raised to the post of Secretary of State in
England. Sir Isaac Newton was made Master of the Royal Mint. Mr.
Congreve had a considerable employment. Mr. Prior was
Plenipotentiary. Dr. Swift is Dean of St. Patrick in Dublin, and is
more revered in Ireland than the Primate himself. The religion
which Mr. Pope professes excludes him, indeed, from preferments of
every kind, but then it did not prevent his gaining two hundred
thousand livres by his excellent translation of Homer. I myself saw
a long time in France the author of Rhadamistus ready to perish for
hunger. And the son of one of the greatest men our country ever
gave birth to, and who was beginning to run the noble career which
his father had set him, would have been reduced to the extremes of
misery had he not been patronised by Monsieur Fagon.
But the circumstance which mostly encourages the arts in England is
the great veneration which is paid them. The picture of the Prime
Minister hangs over the chimney of his own closet, but I have seen
that of Mr. Pope in twenty noblemen's houses. Sir Isaac Newton was
revered in his lifetime, and had a due respect paid to him after his
death; the greatest men in the nation disputing who should have the
honour of holding up his pall. Go into Westminster Abbey, and you
will find that what raises the admiration of the spectator is not
the mausoleums of the English kings, but the monuments which the
gratitude of the nation has erected to perpetuate the memory of
those illustrious men who contributed to its glory. We view their
statues in that abbey in the same manner as those of Sophocles,
Plato, and other immortal personages were viewed in Athens; and I am
persuaded that the bare sight of those glorious monuments has fired
more than one breast, and been the occasion of their becoming great
men.
The English have even been reproached with paying too extravagant
honours to mere merit, and censured for interring the celebrated
actress Mrs. Oldfield in Westminster Abbey, with almost the same
pomp as Sir Isaac Newton. Some pretend that the English had paid
her these great funeral honours, purposely to make us more strongly
sensible of the barbarity and injustice which they object to us, for
having buried Mademoiselle Le Couvreur ignominiously in the fields.
But be assured from me, that the English were prompted by no other
principle in burying Mrs. Oldfield in Westminster Abbey than their
good sense. They are far from being so ridiculous as to brand with
infamy an art which has immortalised