APOPHTHEGMATIZATIONS.

NZ Truth, Issue 84, 26 January 1907, Page 1

APOPHTHEGMATIZATIONS.

NO. 111. . ' » ■■''*. : ' ■— — . ■ \ "■.•■■■ ■ (By JOHN NORTON.)

Apopluhegmatizations, or- moralisings, on \he wise sayings of the sages of all the ages, are likely to subject me to so much severe; 'not to say malignant censure, that, were I sensitive to such criticism, I. would seek shelter m silence. : Already I am assaited by the criticisms and censures of a cloud ; of correspondents;, for the most part anonymous, the acrimony of -whose accusations would, damp the ardor of < the most ; arderit airaotatpr of wiser men's words. 1 Happily, lam not ono Of those whom criticism cbwes. Criticism,, such fts that of the ,snob son of a 'sire which I pilloried on .this pagelast week, o nly serves to raise (the dander of the devil within me, arid to incite me to "deal out stoush" to the whole crowd of carpuv cowards. That is the -.due of all devious dastards, who claim the privilege ,of pricking with a poisoned pen from behind the concealing cloak of anonymity or pseudonyrnity. To courteous critics and competent censors, courtesy, and deference is readily recognised .as due, and as readily accorded. ■ '

These lucubrations I "scribble not ; as one havinrc authority among The Scribes : I simply collate, ar.notate, and colligate "the wise saws and modern instances" of wiser and wickeder rijcn than I can claim to be or ever hope to become. Fame or infamy, wisdom or wit, are not indireno'os to any country, or lieculiar to an y people. The-y' have been,' and still are, found m all climes, and : rnone; all classes of men. I merely "a-ther un the crumbs of their brainy bounty, .eleaninp' the lean aftermath r-mai^in after t'he ripe, rich harvest has l^cn eathered and garnered by hose vho have preceded me, reaping : ?here ]h?y have not sown: I am a •la diarist' from plagiarists, and preiend to Palliate my plagiarisms by .ro^<?.stinfc that the privilege of plagiry if? the prerogative, of no man,

holier he be heriop'hant or neophyte n IK? hieroMv-hTcal mysteries. Beid^s. hav<».''wp not the dictum of the 'vine Voltaire— first of creators/ last •" l>orrov"ers for the precious rifivi--o o^ .platriary-? Most decidedly:

r it was. he. tfce most plaKiarised r writer.". ' - h-> declared, "All the

ji^p-s of dioticnaries, all the comilers of opinions already printed, we

•«• J^ rT>^ Plagiarists ; : but honest pla-•-i?n>t-«. iv hr pn;ocrjj;te not the merit Vvf m"f n + o . ' ' ;rh'*»ro . is" 1 the true defini"on of ?n h-r.^t- nlaprlarist , and ' a ■i»-ho"r-st-. a definition that differenti-af-ps *!*»■ T>erfidjqus. purloiner' firom the

. hail's '••'ingsley that wholesome writer j\r.c! chivalrous champion of "mute " Ohristianitv," author of 'AH on ocke," "Hereward the Vake,' : "Westward Ho I" "Hypalia," and many other meritorious works, fl?ivcs his adhesion to Voltaire's definition, with an amplifica. r lion ■•' his -own, m the following ;>!a-n ''nrlish :— "No eairnest thinker is >r r.iaßiarist pure and simple. He '.vili never borrow from others that which he has not already, more or less. I bought, out for himself." ' Moreover, no r/reat writer was ever wronged by being borrowed from ; genius crows great and eenerous by giving. If imitation is (he sincerest flattery, plagiarism is the highest praise. A usurer ptows rich by extortion \ an authcT pains by giving. As the f'renrh proverb has it, "Plus on lvi ote. plus ii est Brand." "The more 7ou t a ke from him, the greater he becomes." Crnius cannot complain of the cornT>liir"V imnlied and paid by plurnarists who pick up for public ronsum r tion ■ » 'v- orutnbs which fall from its bountiful board : if a few of the precious plums along with the stale rrumbs are appropriated, the •n-eatfr the complir.ient paid and the eoni':urn i n+- obi i 2R.fi on incurred.

Somewhere m his " Table Talk," Coleridge avers; that it is only the "plagiarists who are always suspicious of b? ; n ' sM*m from." On the. .other h-nrl, Isaac D'lsraeli, either m tin's "Quarrels of Authors" or his "THuriosities of Literature." puts m 7<vord of nraise for plagiarists m g&" words :— "Plagiarists, at least, \ the merit of preservation." \ D'lsraeli knew what be was W about, for ho was the sreat-Jb^iari-it of Ihe 19th century, Ji '. probahlv, He most inoorriind indefp livable collpter, com- ' Wot. and. colli>ator of o'her f^tfM thoufhts Uiafi the world bad

ever seen since the days of Plutarch or Cicero. By culling and preserving the best that medern genius m every "■enie and of all grades had to give D'lsraelithe Elder', the father of the treat Ben "Dizzy." did more to dignify the dry-as-dust" duty of delving m the fallow, fields of forgotten authors, and' to elevate ; the dreary drudgery of plagiairising, into an art, than ■'• any of his; co^-citizens 'm : the country of his adoption. Isaac D'lsraeli, the Venetian'^ iew-V" refugee, made liberal; recognition of , the asylum afforded, him; -m Britain. 'He adorned heer literature, with, the two Cyclopean classics 'above-mentioned,.' and added tc her roll of statesmen his illustrious son ;Ben.jamin,' whose achievements m the sphere of literature were only excelled .by his triumphs m the forum of debate, and b- his conquests m the councils ;of deep diplotr-acy and of foreign policy.

To pursue this /question of plagiarism further, m order to apologise for. these app-phthegmatiza.ti.oiis,-would be sheer supererogation. Plagiarism, properly . understood anil exercised. '. is the honest borrowing of the best from the richest* for, the pleasure, and profit, of those who have; neither the time nor > inclination to prospect for themselves the' fertile fields qf old and new authors. The plagiarist is the pioneer , prospector-, who -makes known to busy- men the untold riches m the realms of poetry, history, biography, philosophy, philology, science and art, and , the drama, undreamed of and unbelieved m until the plagiarist .has placed i specimens of their superabundant and sempiternal stores before a dubious and distracted world. • • .• - .' • . • • "Maintenant, revenons a nos mou-» tons." A captious correspondent takes me to task for not citing ! the author of the • oft-nrisicfuoted line, "A little learning is a .dangerous thing." wherein the word "knowledge" is so often substituted for '''learning;." He kindly informs me that the author is Pope, .and refers me to Bartlett's , Quotations" as. his authority. I plead "mea culpa" to the omission. But would not Macaulay's ■■■ proverbial fourth-form schoolboy richly deserve a birching had he confessed ignorance of the authorship of that celebrated' line ? Most British! boys who i have had an elementary reading and writing acquaintance with their mother tongue, have learned •', this line, and .its origin, from the headings of their copybooks. Making all due acknowledgement of my borrowings from the borrowings of Bartlett, "et hoc genus omnc," I, no more than any other culprit, who "perverts the scriptures and purloins the psalms'," had forgotten my Pope. But . to placate my censor I repair the omission by inserting here, from the "Essay on Criticism," the staauza contain ing the „ celebrated line so often misquoted .-—' A little learning is a dangerous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring ; There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, And drinking largely sobers us again. * . • . . ■ »■ There is* a wide difference . between mere bock-learning and that knowledge of men and things begotten' of > experience wbich wise men call wis^ dom. It requires a vast amount of learning to supply the place of a very small share of sound knowledge. Some of the most learned men that the Universities, have turned outSenior Wranglers, Smith's Prizemen, and Double Firsts, crammed and jammed up to the mental muzzle with j book-learning till their brains . are ready to burst— have been among the weakest and most foolish of men : dons of the- college and dewlic'ts of society—whereas men who have never taken a degree, who could not correctly construe a sentence m plain k ; np;lish or get over the "Pons Asinorum m Euclid, have been among the greatest and most successful of I'heir country's sons. Such' as these, | whose names are inscribed high and ! honorably on the bede-roll of fa^me, : could be cited by scores ; whereas the destinies of the majority ol Senior Wranglers and Double Firsts are, for the most nart comparatively obscure or altogether unknown. Such are the respective fruits of mere "learning" and real '"knowledge." The first bears nothing but leaves, which, wither ond fall, soon to rot hi obscurity or t 0 be swiftly blown into oblivion ; whereas the second is

the mother of wisdom,. -that.-., brings 1 ■forth :,\friitts ''. , which Sreyimy^MAl^'firesh;>';the;^eu.ergies of the In^tioii...§^:;#as' the r Tft>e^fiicuity 'of- Pope as a didactic- poet. ■ Although- regarded, as the . suprahiest of ' Satirists/ his' fame will rest on his moifal essays rather than", on his satirical pieces. The Essay on Man will outlive the Dunciad. even as the Essay on Crit-' icism will outlive the Rape of the Lock.

But even the fame of a Pope cannot save him from the fate of the plagiarist, or, at least, cannot shield him • from the charge of plagiarism. Pope, who has been more plagiarised "licet •' ouoted, than, perhaps, any other British poet, ancient or modern, poured out the vials of hi% wrath agasjjrst the poor plagiarist in' the well-known lines m the Dunciad : Next o'er his books, bis eyes began to roll In pleasing memory of all he stole ; .'■ How here he sipped, how there he plundey'd - amg, <* '-■■'• ' .- ■■■ ■':,' . ■•-. And suck'd all o'er, like an industrious bug. Ye* Pope himself has been charged with battening ' on the brains of Bacon, as we saw last week; was himself, m -bis turn, suspected of borrowing from Bruno.; Pope, it is assorted, borrowed "the. idea embodied, m the above quoted staoiza m. his Essay on Criticism from Bacon's Essay on Atheism . : Semblance of truth is given/tq the* charge by a comparison of the prose Essay of Bacon with the poetical Essay of Pope. Writing. Of Atheism,. Lord Bacon says.: "A . little philosophy inclineth man's mind to Atheism, but depth -in philosophy bringeth mtn's minds-about; to religion." But. this comparison, . rather, than proving Pope to be a plagiarist, only serves to confirni the common Saying that great minds run m similar grooves. To deny identity of ideas and ideals to the geniuses of different generations, whether they be expressed m poetry ' or prose, would be to link Fuller with Pope m the charge of literary -larceny. For Fuller, the great Anglican divine, m his "Holy, and' Profane State"- gives expression to a similar idea in -practically. ;; the same words » "A -vlittle ' skill m anti-quity-inclines a man to Popery ; but depth m that study brings him about aeain to our religion." The charge of plagiarism is one of the hardest to prove. While, all subjects can be viewed from different points of view, some subjects sometimes, if not always, invite or command the same or a similar literary treatment. Especially is this the case with the apophthegmatic and aphoristic sayings of great, thinkers and writers : else had Shakespeare long', ago been sent to the perdition, prepared for plagiarists, and Gibbon have been given a hot place m the plagiarists' purgatory. .

Talking of Pope and Poetry, of Bacon and Atheism, and of Purgatory for Plagiarists, reminds me tliat Pope was not only- a great poet-Mjhe PoetrPohtiff of his day—but he was also a gr.eat Papist, or Roman Catholic, m religion. He was bred and born, and died, a Catholic. Yet it is supposed by many who have heard of his close and life-Ion": friendship with Bolingbroke- and Aburthnot ..that he was an Athiest. These consider they find confirmation of Pope's , alleged Atheism m these lines from the "TEssa^ on Man:—. . . . • For forms of Government let fools, contest ; Whate'er is best administer'd is bes^t. " , • For modes of , faith let graceless zealots fight ; His can't be Wrong whoselife is?in the right. Such is the flimsy, foundation for the charge of Atheism against. Pope. There is just as good ~ ground furnished by the first couplet for accusing Pope, of being an Anarchist as there is m the second for accusing him of beimj ,an Atheist. Yet, m Epistle IV. of the same Essay, Pope pronounces against Anarchy, m these five forceful words : " Order is Heaven's firßt law." Though a Catholic, Pope agreed to differ with his friends and all the world m matters of religion. He gave expression to a higher faith and sublimer sentiment than that engendered by slavish superstition or begotten of blind bigotry, m the same poem : In Faith and Hope the world will disagree, But all mankind's concern is Charity. • • • Such sentiments as these do not suit strife-mongers and sectarian savages. Hence they are for ever denouncing Pope the Papist as n n Atheist, whereas he was no more an Atheist thar was Voltaire, Thomas Paine, or Robert Ingersoll, all of whom were Deists,' acknowledgers, worshippers, and vindicators of God, the Supreme and one Eternal Great Cause. Let him who sneers at Pope as a Pan-i'.-t or suspects him for an Atheist re-read, if he has ever read, "The I Pvjrr Christian to His Soul" :— I Vital spark of heavenly flame 1 Quit., on quit, this mortal frame ; Trembling, hoping, lingering,. flying, Oh the pain, the bliss of 'dying ! Cease, fond Nature ; cease thy strife, And let me languish into life. Hark 1 They -whisper ; angels say "'Sister spirit come away." i What is this absorbs me quite? Steals my senses, shnts my siglit, Drowns my spirit, draws my breath ? i Tell me, nay soul, can this bo death ? '

' Tke %rld recedes ; it disappears | : >.. . ' H?e^yon qpens. bj^m^eyes 1 .. L M j .e.%%- ..,, Lend,"lend youiswiugs 1 I mount I I fly! ,Oh<Jravel Wiere is thy victory ? Oh Death ! AVheteis thy sting? ■■♦.•• , ♦ • .

I . So soothing -swan-like a death song should serve as a passport to a Pap-ist-ioct through: the Protestant purgatocy, and even Rain admission fot the most absolute . Atheist to the Papist paradise. But it is. time to pull ur>on Pope and ..his Popery, or we shall be having Dill Macky, "Warty" Wcolls, and the Wild and Woolly. Wilks •■ana-thematisin-g. ; . these apophthegmatizations, a calamity not to be contemplated without a . sectarian shudder. So, by, way of ch^nAe, we'll ' pass from Pope to Paine, from tlie Ppetry and Pope/y oi. the one to the humanity and heterodoxy of the : other, m -the hope tha4; those who love not' Pope for being! a. Papist will admire Fame all the more for being an Iconoclast—imagebreaker or superstitioh-smaihet. Sydney, • ■ Jan.' 17th, 1907. -