Byron's letter to John Murray
Byron's Letter to John MurrayTranscribed by Barbara Taylor |
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A letter from Byron to John Murray
Dear Murray,
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P.S. I have received Ivanhoe—good. [5] —Pray send me some toothpowder and a tincture of Myrrh—by Waite and &c. Ricciardetto should have been translated literally or not at all. As to puffing Whistlecraft [6]— it won't do. I'll tell you why some day or other. Cornwall's [7] a poet—but spoilt by the detestable schools of the day.— Mrs Hemans [8] is poet also—but too stilted and apostrophic—and quite wrong— men died calmly before the Christian era—and since without Christianity —witness the Romans—and Thistlewood—Sandt & Louvel— men who ought to have been weighed down with their crimes—even had they believed. [9] A deathbed is a matter of nerves and constitution and not of religion. Voltaire was frightened—Frederick of Prussia not. [10] Christians the same according to their strength rather than their creed.— What does Helga Herbert [11] mean by his Stanza? which is octave got drunk [word obscured by the seal] mad.— He ought to [word obscured by seal] his ears boxed with Thor's hammer for rhyming so fantastically. |
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Notes
1. Jacob Tonson (1656-1736) a London publisher; he published many of Dryden's works. Also secretary of the Kit Kat club and, together with Buckley, he published the Spectator from 1712.
2. Byron apparently enclosed Goethe's comments on his 1816 poem Manfred. His obvious admiration for Goethe and his denial that his own poem is derivative are particularly interesting in the context of this web resource, which demonstrates the importance of Manfred to Hemans.
4. Matthew Monk Lewis had been a friend of Byron since 1813; his real name was Matthew Gregory Lewis.
5. Scott was another of Murray's authors and the publisher had obviously enclosed a copy of Ivanhoe in a parcel of books he had sent to Byron.
7. Barry Cornwall was the pen name of Bryan Waller Procter, who had been at Harrow with Byron. Cornwall edited several of the annuals in which Hemans published.
8. This is Byron's somewhat irascible response to Murray's enclosure of Felicia Hemans's 1820 poem, The Sceptic.
9. All three men were political killers: Charles Sandt had assassinated Kotzebue, Louvel, the Duc de Berri and Arthur Thistlewood was hanged on May 1st 1820 for his part in the Cato Street Conspiracy, a plot by militant radicals to murder the entire cabinet.
10. Byron is here referring the generally held belief that, on his deathbed, Voltaire (1694-1778) was badly frightened and called in a priest to hear his confession, thus recanting his scepticism. However the account of his deathbed indicates that Voltaire's sceptical position did not waver. On the other hand, Frederick the Great was noted for his Christian faith and his deathbed statement was: "I am convinced that nothing is destroyed in nature. So I know for certainty that the more noble part of me (that is, the soul) will not die. Though I may not be a King in my future life. I shall nevertheless live an active life."
