Thomas Porson

“ And in those days there was no stimulus at the universities to spur a reluctant man into lecturing. But if he did nothing in that way, at any rate he served the true purpose of his chair, as few have served it, by writings which advanced the knowledge of his subject.
After his election to the professorship, Porson continued to live in London at the Temple, making occasional visits to Cambridge, where it was his duty to take part in certain classical examinations. He also went sometimes to Eton or to Norfolk; but he disliked travelling. ”

“ He knew many. He had an interleaved copy of J. Selby Watson’s Life of Porson into which were copied a multitude of facts not to be found in that amusing biography. The Bibliotaph used to say that he would rather have known Porson than any other man of his time. He used to quote this as one of the best illustrations of Porson’s wit, and one of the finest examples of the retort satiric to be found in any language. One of Porson’s works was assailed by Wakefield and by Hermann, scholars to be sure, but scholars whose scholarship Porson held in contempt. ”

“ It may be said, that perhaps nobody knew Porson better, very few so well. Much has been said of this extraordinary scholar, but by no means enough; a great deal more is due to him. In what follows, he who wrote this narrative, may boldly defy contradiction.
It is by no means intended to enter into controversy with the only two accounts of Porson which have hitherto been given with any thing like authority, or materially to contradict their assertions. The first appeared in the Morning Chronicle, the second in the periodical publication called the Athenæum. ”

“ One of the results of Porson's labours was that an old lady, who had meant to leave him a large sum, on being informed that he had ‘attacked Christianity,’ cut down the legacy. In 1789, while the ‘Letters to Travis’ were in progress, Porson found leisure to write an article in the ‘Monthly Review,’ defending the genuineness of the ‘Parian Chronicle’ against certain objections raised by the Rev. J. Robertson. A new edition of Toup's ‘Emendationes in Suidam’ came forth from the Oxford Press in 1790, with notes and a preface by Porson (which he had written in 1787) . ”

“ Porson's Notes on Suidas, in the appendix to Gaisford's edition, 1834. 7. ‘Porson's Correspondence,’ edited for the Cambridge Antiquarian Society, by H. R. Luard, fellow of Trinity College and registrary of the university, 1867. A collection of sixty-eight letters written or received by Porson (1783–1808) , including letters from eminent scholars at home and abroad. Few men, probably, have ever had so distinguished a series of literary executors.
Porson's papers in the library of Trinity College were arranged in 1859 by Dr. ”

“ Porson did much to create that ideal of scholarship which prevailed at Cambridge, and widely in England, for more than fifty years after his death; an ideal which owed its influence largely to the belief in its educational value. On the other hand, he lived before the study of manuscripts and of their relations to each other had become systematic. Hence his work necessarily lacked one element of scientific value, viz. a constant regard to the relative weight of different witnesses for a text. ”

“ The ‘Fragment’—in which Sir John is supposed to relate what passed between himself and Johnson's negro servant about the deceased Doctor's watch—is equal to anything in Thackeray. It was in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine,’ too, for 1788 and 1789, that Porson published his first important work, the ‘Letters to Travis.’ Archdeacon George Travis, in his ‘Letters to Gibbon,’ had defended the genuineness of the text 1 St. ”

“ In 1780 he was elected a scholar of Trinity College. In December 1781 he gained the Craven University scholarship. A copy of seventeen Greek iambics which he wrote on that occasion is extant; it is without accents, and is curious as exhibiting, besides some other defects, three breaches of the canon respecting the ‘pause’ which Porson afterwards enunciated. In 1782 he took his degree of B.A. with mathematical honours, being third ‘senior optime’ (i.e. third in the second class of the tripos) , and shortly afterwards won the first of the two chancellor's medals for classics. ”

“ But Porson says in his preface that he could treat the subject in no other manner, if he treated it at all: “ To peruse such a mass of falsehood and sophistry and to write remarks upon it, without sometimes giving way to laughter and sometimes to indignation, was, to me at least, impossible.” Travis has no mercy shown him, but he certainly deserved none. One is equally struck with the thorough grasp Porson displays of his subject, the amount of his miscellaneous learning, and the humour that pervades the whole. ”

“ Gottfried Hermann of Leipzig, then a very young man, who had also written a work on Greek metres, which Dr Elmsley has styled “a book of which too much ill cannot easily be said,” issued an edition of the Hecuba, in which Porson's theories were openly attacked. Porson at first took no notice of either, but went on quietly with his Euripides, publishing the Orestes in 1798, the Phoenissae in 1799 and the Medea in 1801, the last printed at the Cambridge press, and with the editor's name on the title-page. ”

“ It must be acknowledged, that there was an occasional waywardness about Porson, which defied the utmost sagacity of his friends to explain. No example of this can perhaps be more striking, than his behaviour with respect to Sir G⸺ B⸺. Sir G⸺ was among his earliest as well as warmest friends. He was trustee for the money raised for his education at Eton and the University; his house was always open to him, and being an excellent scholar himself, he naturally watched, incited, and encouraged the progress of him whom he protected. ”

“ The mother had formerly been in no higher a condition than that of a mantua-maker; the father was a land-steward to different men of fortune. In this situation he saved considerable wealth. The son was sent to Eton, where he was contemporary with Porson, and the writer has frequently heard him remark, that on his first going to Eton, Porson by no means was distinguished above other boys, either for parts or application. The subject of this article, however, made great advances in classical learning, and left Eton for the university, with a very high character as a sound scholar. ”

“ Chiefly through his means Porson was entered at Trinity College, Cambridge, as a pensioner on the 28th of March 1778, matriculating in April. It is said that what first biassed his mind towards critical researches was the gift of a copy of Toup’s Longinus by Dr Davies, the head master of Eton, for a good exercise; but it was Bentley and Richard Dawes to whom he looked as his immediate masters. His critical career was begun systematically while an undergraduate. ”

“ Porson.’
‘Why, my darling? He was not really kicked, you know. Don’t be sorry for Porson; be sorry for me. If I didn’t find some amusement in these people, I believe I should go mad. You have no idea what I suffer from [224] them, their examinations and their cross-examinations—for when they are sceptical they are cross-examinations—their pomposity and pretence, are well-nigh intolerable. I don’t know whether their patronage or their contempt is the most offensive.’
It was quite true that these investigations were not always a laughing matter to William Henry. ”

“ You don’t mean to paint in the open, by night?”
“I do, though.”
“But how will you see your canvas?”
“Have a bloomin’ cop’s—” began Mr Watkins, rising too quickly to the question, and then realising this, bawled to Miss Durgan for another glass of beer. “I’m goin’ to have a thing called a dark lantern,” he said to Porson.
“But it’s about new moon now,” objected Porson. “There won’t be any moon.”
“There’ll be the house,” said Watkins, “at any rate. I’m goin’, you see, to paint the house first and the moon afterwards.”
“Oh!” said Porson, too staggered to continue the conversation. ”

“ Paul’s, he removed from thence to the University. He was nearly cotemporary with Porson, and being of the same college, and with similar studious propensities, a sort of intimacy took place between them. Their attainments, however, differed very materially, both in quality and extent. Porson’s were exercised on very various ramifications of knowledge; the individual, here alluded to, confined his investigations, and employed all his talents, on one object only, the Greek language, in which he was certainly and eminently skilful. ”

“ Porson, having become M.A. in 1785, reached that limit in 1792. A lay fellowship was then vacant, and would, according to custom, have been given to Porson, the senior lay fellow, but the nomination rested with Dr. Postlethwaite, the master. Porson formally applied for it; but the master, in reply, wrote advising him to take orders, and gave the lay fellowship to John Heys, a nephew of his own. The appointment of Heys is recorded in the ‘Conclusion Book’ of Trinity College, under the date of 4 July 1792. In the summer of 1792 Porson, who was then living in London, called on Dr. ”

“ Professor Richard Porson was at one time a prominent figure in the Cider Cellars in Covent Garden. It was his nightly haunt. It was there that one of his companions is said to have shouted in his presence, ‘Dick can beat us all; he can drink all night and spout all day.’ This sounds bad, but it must be remembered that Porson had struggled long on the then miserable pittance attached to the Greek Professorship at Cambridge, 40l. a year, and had suddenly obtained the post of head librarian of the London Institution, with a salary increased five-fold. ”

“ His reputation would be higher if he had been a severer critic of himself. He measured swords with Porson with a light heart, and when Porson published his ‘Hecuba’ in 1797, Wakefield immediately assailed the work in a ‘Diatribe Extemporalis.’ The result was a more or less discourteous controversy, which went on simmering in Porson's notes to the ‘Orestes’ and in the second edition of the ‘Hecuba;’ and an estrangement followed. ”

“ He wrote two plays to be acted in the Long Chamber, one of which, called ‘Out of the Frying-pan into the Fire,’ exists in manuscript in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge; it is full of rollicking fun, but nowhere rises above schoolboy level. While at Eton he had a serious illness, due to the formation of an imposthume in the lungs, which permanently affected his health, and caused him to be frequently troubled by asthma. In 1777 his benefactor, Mr. Norris, died. This loss threatened to mar Porson's career ”

“ Helen. 751 (οὐδ’ Ἕλενος for οὐδέν γε; see Maltby’s Thesaurus, p. 299) , are such as convince the reader of their absolute certainty; and this power was possessed by Porson to a degree no one else has ever attained. No doubt his mathematical training had something to do with this; frequently the process may be seen by which the truth has been reached.
A few words are called for on his general character. No one ever more loved truth for its own sake; few have sacrificed more rather than violate their consciences, and this at a time when a high standard in this respect was not common. ”

“ Into Porson's mouth he puts also a great fact, which, had he been a poor man, would have been hurled back on his head, and have crushed him to death. "Racy wine comes from the high vineyard. There is a spice of the scoundrel in most of our literary men; an itch to filch and detract in the midst of fair-speaking and festivity. This is the reason why I have never much associated with them. There is also another. We have nothing in common but the alphabet. The most popular of our critics have no heart for poetry: it is morbidly sensitive on one side, and utterly callous on the other. ”

“ All too soon Polly flew away, and though she protested that her shopping in New York was not to be regarded as preparation for a trousseau, Julia was sure that when the two should meet again there would be no longer a Polly Porson. "Not that your new name will not be just as becoming as the old one," she added, as they said their last words, "but for some selfish reason I do wish that I could have Polly Porson stay Polly Porson a few years longer." ”

“ Peray," another bacchanalian lyric, has found its way, like the "Lines on a Bust on Dante," into the anthologies, and may be passed by here with a mere reference.
"Count Ernst von Mansfeldt, the Protestant," if three rather weak and quite unnecessary stanzas could be removed from it, would be, perhaps, the strongest poem Parsons ever wrote. It is certainly the most objective, and one of the most manly and vigorous. ”

“ Porson once observed, “I thought I knew every thing; as soon as I was twenty-four, and had read Bentley, I found I knew nothing. Now I have challenged the great scholars of the age to find five faults to their one, in any work, ancient or modern, they decline it.” On another occasion, he described himself as
A GENTLEMAN WITHOUT SIXPENCE IN HIS POCKET.
Person declining to enter into holy orders, as the statute of his college required he should do, lost his fellowship at Trinity, after he had enjoyed it ten years ”

“ A young ecclesiastic asked his bishop permission to preach. "I would permit you," answered the prelate; "but nature will not."
MCXIII.—EPIGRAM. (Suggested by hearing a debate in the House of Commons.)
To wonder now at Balaam's ass were weak;
Is there a night that asses do not speak?
MCXIV.—VALUE OF NOTHING.
Porson one day sent his gyp with a note to a certain [Pg 242] Cantab, requesting him to find the value of nothing. Next day he met his friend walking, and stopping him, desired to know, "Whether he had succeeded?" His friend answered, "Yes!"—"And what may it be?" asked Porson. ”