Scott’s letter in reply opens thus:
“I will not castrate John Dryden.
I would as soon castrate my own father, as I believe Jupiter did of yore. What would you say to any man who would
castrate Shakspeare, or Massinger, or Beaumont and Fletcher? I
don’t say but that it may be very proper to select correct passages for
the use of boarding-schools and colleges, being sensible no improper ideas can
be suggested in these seminaries, unless they are intruded or smuggled under
the beards and ruffs of our old dramatists. But in making an edition of a man
of genius’s works for libraries and collections, and such I conceive a
complete edition of Dryden to be, I must give my author as
I find him, and will not tear out the page, even to get rid of the blot, little
as I like it. Are not the pages of Swift, and even of Pope,
larded with indecency, and often of the most disgusting kind, and do we not see
them upon all shelves and dressing-tables, and in all boudoirs? Is not
Prior the most indecent of
tale-tellers, not even excepting La
Fontaine, and how often do we see his works in female hands? In
fact, it is not passages of ludicrous indelicacy that corrupt the manners of a
people—it is the sonnets which a prurient genius like Master Little sings virginibus putrisque—it is the sentimental slang, half
lewd, half methodistic, that debauches the understanding, inflames the sleeping
passions, and prepares the reader to give way as soon as a tempter appears. At
the same time, I am not at all happy when I peruse some of
Dryden’s comedies: they are very stupid, as well
as indelicate; sometimes, however, there is a con-
| 78 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“I have written a long letter to Rees, recommending an edition of our historians, both Latin and English; but I have great hesitation whether to undertake much of it myself. What I can I certainly will do; but I should feel particularly delighted if you would join forces with me, when I think we might do the business to purpose. Do, Lord love you, think of this grande opus.
“I have not been so fortunate as to hear of Mr Blackburn. I am afraid poor Daniel has been very idly employed—Cælum non animum. I am glad you still retain the purpose of visiting Reged. If you live on mutton and game, we can feast you; for, as one wittily said, I am not the hare with many friends, but the friend with many hares.—W. S.”
