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Lecture 15tha - Adam Smith, Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 4 Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres [1762]

Edition used:

Lectures On Rhetoric and Belles Lettres, ed. J. C. Bryce, vol. IV of the Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1985).

Part of: The Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith, 7 vols.

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Lecture 15tha

Mr Smith.

Friday, Decr 24 1762

Having made some observations on the descriptions [on the description] of objects in generall and given some directions for the describing Simple objects whether b internall or externall, I shall proceed in the next place to give some observations on the proper manner of describing more complex objects. These are either the characters of men or the more grand and impor| 189tant actions and conduct of men. I shall begin with the first as it is Chiefly the character and disposition of a man that gives rise to his particular conduct and behaviour, and the manner of describing <the> former will be better understood when the causes of it are first considered.

A character, 1 then, may be described either directly or indirectly. When we describe a character directly we relate the various parts of which it consists, what mixture of each particular passion or turn of mind there is in the person. To do this in any tollerable degree of perfection requires great skill, deep penetration, an accurate observation and almost perfect knowledge of men. Accordingly we find that very few of the ancients have attempted to describe characters in this manner altogether. Sallust has described the character of | 190 Cataline 2 in this manner. Tacitus too tho’ he seldom sets himself on purpose to give us an account of a mans character yet generally give<s> som<e> strong lines of it at first, which are illustrated afterwards by the many reflections he afterwards make<s> on each persons conduct, and the pains he is at to discover and explain the motives of his conduct.

This way is seldom sufficient, unless remarkably well executed, to give us a just notion of the character; the general distinctions do not serve alone to distinguish the character we describe from others perhaps a good deal different. It is not so much the degree of Virtue or Vice, probity or dishonesty, Courage or Timidity that form the distinguishing part of a character, as the tinctures which these severall parts have received in | 191 forming his character.

c {Turrene and Saxe 3 were both perhaps equalls in Courage, but the activity of the one and the caution of the other made their characters very different. In our own Country, Cromwell and Montrose who lived in the same period were I believe of equally military skill, but the open boldness of the one and the suspicious designing temper of the other sufficiently distinguished them.

Men do not differ so much in the degrees of Virtue and Wisdom as in the Peculiar Tinges which these may Receive from the other Ingredients of their Character} c

The Abbe d Rhetz is one of the chief writers amongst the moderns who has followed this method, his characters a few excepted are all drawn in this manner. His method is to set before us the different passions and inclinations, aversions and desires of the person whose character he would give us, and the different proportions e which each of them bears to the others.

{The method followed by Cardinall du Retz was that of describing a character as it Existed in the person, and he had perhaps in this Excelled all others had it not been for some affectation and too much Subtelety: for example who can have any Idea of his Strange character of Anne of Austria, 4 that too of Madoemosselle Chevreuse is disfigured by its Conclusion} f

This manner of writing as it requires very nice observation, and as it can not give us a just Idea of the character described unless it be by pointing out very nice and minute particularities, has frequently lead those who followed it into too great refinements g in the description of their characters. The Abbe shews frequently to have fallen into errors of this Sort; and Tacitus too seems often to have had recourse to Causes | 192 too minute and too trivial, in order to account for the conduct of the persons he has occasion particularly to insist on.—Many of the characters drawn by the Abbe are altogether unnintelligible; Some from h and others from an ill tim’d affectation. His character of the Queen of France is an instance of the first, 5 and the character of i of the 2d. Who can make any thing of this character? cried I j on reading the first. The 2d on the other hand is entirely spoiled and k is almost deprived of any meaning by the misapplyed witticism with which it is concluded.— — — —

The indirect description of a character is when we do not enumerate its severall component parts, but relate the effects it produces on the outward behaviour and Conduct of the person.—Now | 193 the first <which> strikes one in seeing a person whom they had not before known is not the prevalency of any part of his temper but the air of the man as we call it; this it is which first gives one an opinion of a man whether it be ill or whether it be good. But this air is a matter of so simple a nature that it can hardly admit of description; and accordingly no one has attempted it.—We must therefore have reccourse to the more particular effects of the character; and this may be done either by relating the Generall tenor of conduct which the person follows, which we may call the generall method, or by descending into particulars and pointing out how he would act in such and such instances: this we may call the particular method.

The General method is that in which | 194 Monst La Bruyer 6 has wrote the greatest part of his characters.—This manner differs from the direct manner as it does not relate the generall principles that govern the conduct of men, but tells us in what manner those principle<s> when brought into action influence the Generall conduct of the man. {La Bruyers character of a discontented man may be taken as an Example of his favourite manner. Had Theophrastus 7 been to describe it he would probably have done it thus} l The difference betwixt these two methods will be more clearly seen if we should compare the description of the character of Cataline by Sallust, with that of the same person drawn by Cicero. The first is in the direct way and the latter in the Generall indirect one. We will see likewise by this comparison that the latter is considerably more interesting and gives us a fuller view of the character.

Theophrastus is one of the chief who have given us characters drawn | 195 in the particular manner. He always begins his characters with a definition of the character he is to describe and then gives us a description of it by telling us in what manner the person of that character would act in such and such circumstances. This manner tho’ perhaps not always most proper is generally the most interesting and agreable. Insomuch that tho La Bruyer has drawn his characters in many different manners sometimes he laughs at the person he characterizes, sometimes expostulates with him and sometimes gives him serious advice; yet notwithstanding of this variety of methods, there is perhaps none of them all so agreable as that of Theophrastus.

{We may observe that it would be no difficult matter to turn one of Theop<hrast>us characters into the manner of Bruyer: the circumstances are so well chosen as readily to suggest the generall character; But on the other hand it would be very difficult to express one of La Bryers in the manner of Theo<phrastus>. It being a very nice matter to pick out single instances m that sufficiently mark out the generall character we would describe.}

Accordingly we find that Theophrastus is generally more read than La Bruyer; Nay this method is so far superior with respect to the pleasure it gives that the only character | 196 La Bruyer has drawn in that manner {viz. that of Menalcas 8 the absent man} tho perhaps worse done than any of the others is more admired than any of them. {Mutato nomine de te fabula narratur, said Mr Herbert of Mr Smith.} Tho it has less variety and less spirit than perhaps any of the rest, yet n has thought it deserved to have a commedy founded on the plan of it: none of the others have been honoured in this manner, tho’ there are few that do not deserve it as well. {or better} o {This comedy was wrote by Mr p a Comic Writer of Secondary Rank an Imitator of Moliere’s and no bad one} {There is a Certain order and arrangement in the Pictures exhibited by Bruyere which the least alteration of any member of it would destroy. But Theophrastus’s are Tumbled together without much arrangement and that Circumstance which Concludes the whole might have stood first}

If we were to state a comparison of the excellence of these 3 methods of describing a character, we might perhaps give the preference in point of agreableness to that of Theophrastus. But in writing a history it would probably be the best method to describe the character in the same order as the different views of a character naturally present themselves to us. That is, first to give an account of the prevailing temper and passions of the man, as soon | 197 as he is brought into the scheme of the history and afterwards to give such observations on his conduct as will open up the generall principles on which he acts. {to give an account of his disposition and the generall Manner in which it lead him to act, reserving the particulars to be interwoven in the Subsequent Narration} q The particular manner would but ill suit the dignity of a history; A number of particular actions perhaps very trifling ones thrown all together gives a work the appearance of a commedy or a Satyre, and it is in such works only that it can be applyed with propriety. The Characters of Theophrastus r tho very agreable, yet have so great a Similarity both in their Plan and execution that they soon fatigue us. Bruyers again have a great deal of variety and Elegance. They of all works of this sort are most proper for those who would Study the Rhetorical art and are extremely well worth reading.

{His Book abounds with a Species of Reflexions equally distant from Trite and unentertaining ones as from the Paradoxicall ones at present so much in Vogue among authors—La Bruyeres are Sufficiently obvious at first View yet such as would not readily have occurred to one} s

| 198 The same methods t that are proper to describe a Particular character are also applicable to that of a nation or body of men. La Bruyer u has also given us characters of severall nations and particular professions and ways of life as the Courtier etc. drawn in the same manner as those of persons. In describing the character of a nation The Government may be considered in the same view as the air of a single person; The Situation, Climate, Customs as those peculiarities which give a distinguishing tincture to the character, and form the same generall out lines into v very different appearances.

These authors I have mentioned are the chief who have excelled in the describing of characters. Lord Clarendon likewise in his history is at great pains to give us the characters of the severall persons as they appear in it. This he does by narrating w the different circumstances | 199 of their past Life, their Education and the advances or declining State of their fortunes, and from thence indeavours to collect their character, in a manner nearly allied to the direct method. Tho he has not the penetration requisite for excelling in this way yet his being personally acquainted with the most of those whom he describes makes it almost impossible<e> that he should miss some circumstances that will give us at least a tollerable Idea of the persons charackter. There is always something in a character which will make an impression on those who are of ones intimate acquaintance and which they will readily express so as to make it known to others.

{An Instance of this may be seen in his character of The Earl of Arundell and Pembroke.

The Great fault we are apt to fall into in the description of characters is the making them so Generall that they Exhibit no Idea at all: who for example can form any Idea of Lord Falkland from the Character which Clarendon gives him. 9

To avoid this x there ought to be always some particular and distinguishing Circumstance annexed such as that description of Agricola 10 by Tacitus. You would have | v.199 known him by his Look to be a good man, you would have rejoiced to have found him a great one. In fact when you would do honour to and perpetuate the memory of a friend you must take care not to ascribe to him those contrary Virtues which the Comprehension of the humane mind is too narrow to take in at once} y

Burnet 11 in the characters he gives us is so biting and sarcastical that he is not at all pleasing; he gives us a worse idea of his friends than Clarendon does of his very enemies z ; this latter | 200 whatever we may think of him as a historian certainly deserve<s> our Love as a Man.

{Sir William Temple in his Essay on the Netherlands 12 has described the character of a Nation very compleatly in all the Severall three ways.

The Conclusion is an Example both of the Direct and Indirect Character of a Nation, where he says this is a place where profit is in more request than honour etc. As in the Characters of Persons the great Error we are exposed to is the making them too Generall so is it in that of Nations. The English, french and Spaniards may be equally brave yet that Valour is certainly very different in each} a

[a]MS 14th

[b]MS whather

[1 ]On the Character see Introduction, p. 17.

[2 ]Bellum Catilinae v. This sketch is compared with Cicero’s in In Catilinam at i.194 below.

[c–c]interpolation on v.189; the last sentence is in Hand B

[3 ]Henri de la Tour d’Auvergne. Vicomte de Turenne (1611–75), described by pre–Napoleonic Frenchmen as the greatest commander of modern times; grandson of William I Prince of Orange. Hermann Maurice, Comte de Saxe (1696 1750). They were two of the only three pre–Revolutionary Maréchaux de France: Turenne from 1660, Saxe from 1744. Pope includes the ‘god–like’ Turenne among his dead heroes (he was killed at Sassbach) in the Essay on Man, iv.100, and Retz praises him in Mémoires (1723 edn, i.218). CT. TMS VI.iii.28.

[   ][[see note c–cabove]]

[d]M. la Bruyers written above and deleted

[e]replaces degrees in

[4 ]Jean François Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz 1614-79) : Mémoirs, 1717. Hands A and B are reporting his descriptions of the same two ladies. Anne d’Autriche became Queen of France in marrying Louis XIII in 1615. Hand B’s note corrects Hand A’s deleted guess ‘Madame de Nivers’, which is difficult to account for, unless the Duchesse de Nevers :of Louis XIV’s court has somehow become involved in the confusion. The Queen’s is the first of a ‘galerie de portraits’, seventeen in all; it consists of a series of twelve comparative pairs of qualities, the pattern being: ‘Elle avoit plus d’aigreur que de hauteur, plus de hauteur que de grandeur, plus de maniere que de fond . . .’. The brief characterisation of the demoiselle de Chevreuse ends with the criticised witticism: ‘La passion lui dounoit de l’esprit et même du serieux et de l’agréable, uniquement pour celuis qu’elle aimoit; mais elle le traitoit bien–tôt comme ses juppes, qu’elle mettoit dans son lit, quand elles lui plaisoient, et qu’elle brûloit par une pure aversion deux heures après’. Her mother, described at greater length just before, took her lovers much more seriously: she scorned all scruples and ‘devoirs’ except that ‘de plaire à son amant’ (1723 edn, 214, 221,220).

[f]Hand B

[g]both deleted

[h]blank of about twelve letters in MS

[5 ]See n.4 above.

[i]Madame de Nivers deleted, then a blank of fourteen letters in MS

[j]on feading (?) deleted

[k]rendered deleted

[6 ]Jean de la Bruyère (1645–96): Caractères de Théophraste traduits du grec, avec les Caractères ou les Moeurs de ce siécle, 1688–94. Démophile, the frondeur or anti–establishment man, was added in the 6th edition, 1691 (section ‘Du Souverain’, X.11): ‘Démophile se lamente, et s’écric: Tout est perdu, c’est fait de l’État; il est du moins sur le penchant de sa ruine . . .’. Contrasted with Basilide the anti–frondeur.

[7 ]Theophrastus (c.370–288/285 bc), pupil and successor of Aristotle. The publication of his lately discovered Characters by Casaubon in 1592 began the vogue of this form in western literatures. See Introduction, p. 17.

[l]Hand B

[m]of deleted

[8 ]Ménalque, La Bruyère’s best known character, was added in his 6th edition, 1691 (section ‘De l’homme’, xi.7). La Bruyère noted: ‘Ceci est moins un caractère particulier qu’un recueil de faits de distraction’. It is said to be modelled on the Comte de Brancas. Smith’s use of the classical form of the name (Virgil, Eclogues iii,v) suggests that he may have referred his students to the English translation of La Bruyère (1699 and reprints). ‘Absent’ has the common eighteenth–century meaning ‘absent–minded’ (cf. La Bruyère’s distraction); and the student Herbert—see Introduction, p. 5—has by the tag from Horace’s Satires, I.i.69–70 equated the character with his professor. The comedy referred to is unidentified.

[n]blank of seven letters in MS

[o]inserted after well by Hand B, who wrote the next two notes on v.195

[p]blank of nine letters in MS

[q]Hand B, foot of v.195

[r]replaces Telemachus

[s]Hand B, opposite fatigue us towards end of previous paragraph

[t]replaces rules; of deleted

[u]Hand B deleted La Bruyer and wrote wrong beneath

[v]a deleted

[w]replaces telling us

[9 ]Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon (1609–74): The History of the Rebellion and Civil wars in England, published 1702–4. On Thomas Howard, 14th Earl of Arundel, a hostile portrait: 1702 Abridged), i.44–6; W. D. Macray ed., 69–71. On William Herbert, 3rd Earl of Pembroke, a friendly portrait: i.44–6; Macray ed., i.71–3. On Lucius Cary, 2nd Viscount Falkland, a loving portrait: ii.270–7 and also in Clarendon’s Life (1759. written 1668) 19–23; Macray ed. History. iii.178–90. Clarendon once planned to work up the portrait of Falkland into a book, which would have stood to the History as the Agricola of Tacitus stands to the Annals and Histories. Pope calls Falkland ‘the virtuous and the just’ in Essay on Man, iv.99, alongside Turenne.

[x]MS the

[10 ]Agricola, xliv; cf. ii.39 n.6 below.

[y]Hand B. on v.198 and v.199, beginning opposite being personally acquainted on 199

[11 ]Gilbert Burnet, Bishop of Salisbury (1643–1715): History of his own Time. 1724/1734. Examples are Charles II, Clarendon, Lauderdale, the first Earl of Shaftesbury, the second Duke of Buckingham (Villiers), Halifax. Burnet exercised his art of charactery also in his Lives of Rochester, Sir Matthew Hale, and the Dukes of Hamilton.

[z]so that deleted

[12 ]Sir William Temple, Observations upon the United Provinces of the Netherlands (1673), ch. iv, last paragraph, 164: ‘Holland is a Countrey where the Earth is better than the Air, and Profit more in request than Honour; Where there is more Sense than Wit; More good Nature than good Humour; And more Wealth than Pleasure; Where a man would chuse rather to travel, than to live; Shall find more things to observe than desire, And more persons to esteem than to love. But the same Qualities and Dispositions do not value a private man and a State, nor make a Conversation agreeable, and a Government great: Nor is it unlikely that some very great King might make but a very ordinary private Gentleman, and some very extraordinary Gentleman might be capable of making but a very mean Prince.’ Cf. i.95 n.7 above.

[a]Hand B, on 200