Born, at Basingstoke, 1728. Matric. Trin. Coll., Oxford, 16 March, 1744; B.A., 1747; M.A., 1750; Fellow, 1751; Professor of Poetry, 1756–66; B.D., 7 Dec. 1767. Rector of Kiddington, 1771. F.S.A., 1771. Camden Prof. of Ancient Hist., Oxford, 1785–90. Poet Laureate, 1785–90. Died, at Oxford, 21 May 1790. Buried in Trin. Coll. Chapel. Works: “The Pleasures of Melancholy” (anon.), 1747; “Poems on several Occasions,” 1747; “The Triumph of Isis” (anon.), 1749; “A Description of … Winchester” (anon.), 1750; “Newmarket,” 1751; “Ode for Music,” 1751; “Observations on the Faerie Queene,” 1754; “A Companion to the Guide, and a Guide to the Companion” (anon.), 1760; “Life … of Ralph Bathurst” (2 vols.), 1761; “Life of Sir Thomas Pope,” 1772; “The History of English Poetry” (4 vols.), 1774–81; “Poems,” 1777; “Enquiry into the authenticity of the poems attributed to Thomas Rowley,” 1782; “Specimen of a History of Oxfordshire” (priv. ptd.), 1782; “Verses on Sir Joshua Reynolds’ Painted Window at New College” (anon.), 1782. He edited: “The Union,” 1753; “Inscriptionum Romanorum Metricarum Delectus,” 1758; “The Oxford Sausage,” 1764; C. Cephalas’ “Anthologiæ Græcæ,” 1766; Theocritus’ Works, 1770; Milton’s “Poems upon Several Occasions,” 1785. Collected Works: “Poetical Works,” ed. by R. Mant, with memoir (2 vols.), 1802.
Personal
The greatest clod I ever saw, and so vulgar a figure with his clunch wig that I took him for a shoemaker at first.
His disposition, with some appearance of indolence, was retired and studious, and he fortunately acquired such preferments as enabled him to pursue his natural bent, and rove unmolested among the treasures of learning which his alma mater contains in such profusion…. He had less polish in his manner than his brother, Dr. Joseph, but the conversation of the two together was a rich banquet.
His person was short and thick, though in the earlier part of his life he had been thought handsome. His face, latterly, became somewhat rubicund, and his utterance so confused, that Johnson compared it to the gobbling of a turkey. The portrait of him by Reynolds, besides the resemblance of the features, is particularly characterized by the manner in which the hand is drawn, so as to give it a great air of truth. He was negligent in his dress; and so little studious of appearances, that having despatched his labours, while others were yet in bed, he might have been found, at the usual hours of study, loitering on the banks of his beloved Cherwell, or in the streets, following the drum and fife, a sound which was known to have irresistible attraction for his ears,—a spectator at the military parade, or even one amongst a crowd at a public execution.
There are few characters on which I look with so much complacent interest as Warton’s. His temper was so sunshiny and benevolent; his manners were so simple; his erudition was so classical and various; his learning was so illuminated by fancy; his love of the country was so unaffected; his images were so picturesque; his knowledge of feudal and chivalrous manners was so minute, curious and lively; his absence of all worldly ambition and show was so attractive; his humour was so good-natured and innocent; his unaffected love of literature was so encouraging and exemplary—that I gaze upon his memory with untired satisfaction. What life can be more innocent, or more full of enjoyment, than a life spent among books, under the control of taste and judgment! I do not think that Warton was of the highest order of genius; he had not enough of warmth and invention; nor dare I say that he was the more happy for this want. But still what pure pleasure must have been continually experienced by him who could write the “Ode on Leaving Wynslade!”
History of English Poetry, 1774–81
I am extremely pleased with T. Warton’s new edition of his Observations, and have let him know as much by Balguy. I am glad he is in earnest with his project of the History of English Poetry; he will do it well.
To develope the dawnings of genius, and to pursue the progress of our national poetry, from a rude origin and obscure beginnings to its perfection in a polished age must prove interesting, instructive, and be productive of entertainment and utility…. The object being to faithfully record the features of the time, and preserve the picturesque representations of manners…. I have chose to note but the history of our poetry in a chronological series, and often to deviate into incidental digressions to notice the contemporaneous poetry of other nations…. My performance exhibits without transportation the gradual improvement of our poetry to the time that it uniformly represents the progression of our language. In the earlier sections of the work are numerous citations extracted from ancient MSS. never before printed, and which may illustrate the darker periods of the history of our poetry.
Well, I have read Mr. Warton’s book; and shall I tell you what I think of it? I never saw so many entertaining particulars crowded together with so little entertainment and vivacity. The facts are overwhelmed by one another, as Johnson’s sense is by words: they are all equally strong. Mr. Warton has amassed all the parts and learning of four centuries, and all the impression that remains is, that those four ages had no parts or learning at all. There is not a gleam of poetry in their compositions between the Scalds and Chaucer…. I have dipped into Mr. Warton’s second volume, which seems more unentertaining than the former…. I have very near finished Warton, but, antiquary as I am, it was a tough achievement. He has dipped into an incredible ocean of dry and obsolete authors of the dark ages, and has brought up more rubbish than riches; but the latter chapters, especially on the progress and revival of the theatre, are more entertaining; however, it is very fatiguing to wade through the muddy poetry of three or four centuries that had never a poet.
The progress of romance, and the state of learning, in the middle ages, are illustrated by Mr. Thomas Warton, with the taste of a poet, and the minute diligence of an antiquarian.
His diligence is indefatigable, and his learning stupendous; but I believe every reader, except a mere antiquary, will regret that, instead of a regular progressive history, he did not adopt the form of a critical dissertation, interspersed with anecdotes. His taste, which is frequently buried under piles of cumbrous erudition, would have had a freer scope.
In this latter author’s (Warton) antiquarian mud we are already above knee-deep, and we must on as fast as we are able…. I trust that posterity (if posterity deserves it) will be blessed with some future anecdotist like one I could name … that will select out of those three quartos, Anecdotes of English Poetry, in two or three small octavos, about the size, for instance, of the “Royal and Noble Authors;” and should this be the case, our Oxonian will not have written in vain.
An immense treasury of materials.
The late Mr. Warton, with a poetical enthusiasm which converted toil into pleasure, and gilded, to himself and his readers, the dreary subjects of antiquarian lore, and with a capacity of labour apparently inconsistent with his more brilliant powers, has produced a work of great size, and, partially speaking, of great interest, from the perusal of which we rise, our fancy delighted with beautiful imagery, and with the happy analysis of ancient tale and song, but certainly with very vague ideas of the history of English poetry. The error seems to lie in a total neglect of plan and system; for, delighted with every interesting topic which occurred, the historical poet perused it to its utmost verge, without considering that these digressions, however beautiful and interesting in themselves, abstracted alike his own attention, and that of the reader, from the professed purpose of his book. Accordingly, Warton’s “History of English Poetry” has remained, and will always remain, an immense commonplace book of memoirs to serve for such an history. No antiquary can open it, without drawing information from a mine which, though dark, is inexhaustible in its treasures; nor will he who reads merely for amusement ever shut it for lack of attaining his end; while both may probably regret the desultory excursions of an author, who wanted only system, and a more rigid attention to minute accuracy, to have perfected the great task he has left incomplete.
Compared with this, how different was Menander’s case! Careless himself about examining and quoting authorities with punctilious accuracy, and trusting too frequently to the ipse-dixits of good friends—with a quick discernment—a sparkling fancy—great store of classical knowledge, and a never ceasing play of colloquial wit, he moved right onwards in his manly course; the delight of the gay, and the admiration of the learned.
He loved poetry dearly—and he wrote its history well; that book being a mine.
We have nothing historical as to our own poetry but the prolix volumes of Warton. They have obtained, in my opinion, full as much credit as they deserve: without depreciating a book in which so much may be found, and which has been so great a favourite with the literary part of the public, it may be observed that its errors as to fact, especially in names and dates, are extraordinarily frequent, and that the criticism, in points of taste, is not of a very superior kind.
It is pretty clear, from his observation upon the rhimes, and also from his notice of the contents, that Warton never read the poem [“Hule and Nightengale”]. He seems, indeed, but seldom to have opened a MS.; and when he gives an extract, or ventures a criticism, both extract and criticism will generally be found in the Catalogue.
The work has so much both of antiquarian learning, of poetical taste, and of spirited writing, that it is not only an indispensable and valuable authority, but in many parts an interesting book to the mere amateur. Not without many errors, and presenting a still larger number of deficiencies, it has yet little chance of being ever entirely superseded.
A very curious and valuable work. It has had the reputation of a classic ever since its first publication, in 1774.
His work, indeed, is one which it will perhaps be always necessary to consult for its facts, its references, and its inferences; and though in many points it needs to be corrected, a long time will certainly elapse before it will be superseded. All this can be said, and be said truly. But while the substantial merits of the chapters on Chaucer need not be denied, they are very far from being perfectly satisfactory. They were marked in particular by the defects which invariably characterized the writings of both the Wartons. In certain ways these two scholars were the most irritating of commentators and literary critics. Their object was never so much to illustrate their author as to illustrate themselves. Instances of this disposition occur constantly in those sections of the “History of English Poetry” which treat of Chaucer. Warton is constantly wandering away from his legitimate subject to furnish information about matters that concerned very remotely, if at all, the business in hand. Much of the material he collected is introduced not to throw light upon the question under consideration, but to parade his knowledge. Still, it is the spirit that pervades the work which is especially objectionable. About it lingered the apologetic air of the eighteenth century, which talked as if it had something of a contempt for itself for taking interest in an age when neither language nor poetry had reached the supreme elegance by which both were then distinguished. Warton’s words make upon the mind the impression that he admired Chaucer greatly, and was ashamed of himself for having been caught in the act. Whenever he abandons conventionally accepted ground, we recognize at once the timid utterance of the man who feels called upon to put in a plea in extenuation of the appreciation he has manifested.
Warton’s work may be looked upon as a kind of classic fragment, the incompleteness of which has been emphasised by the glosses and alterations of three generations of commentators…. Had Warton chosen to follow the course contemplated by Pope and Gray, few men would have been better qualified to bring the undertaking to a successful issue. His reading was wide, his scholarship sound, his taste fine and discriminating; and though he had no pretensions to be called a great poet, his verse is at least marked by genuine poetic sensibility. Unfortunately he set about his work in the spirit of an antiquary, and in the patience, the industry, and the accuracy, required for this branch of knowledge, he was inferior to men who could not compare with him in capacity as a literary critic.
His cumbrous and amorphous learning, too vast to be exact, and too tenacious to be discriminating, might seem likely to submit its vigorous independence to any environment, however strong. But yet, as a fact, the work that Warton achieved would not have been possible to him had he lived in any previous age. His learning would have run into abstruse divagations, where pedantry and fancy would have overwhelmed all sense of proportion. To such aberrations he was by nature only too prone. But the scientific sense of his age revealed to him just the questions in literary history which called for solution. He saw, by anticipation, some of the fruits which the comparative method might be made to yield; and, as a consequence, although he essayed a task too large for any man, and achieved what is doubtless an ill-arranged and ill-proportioned fragment, yet he left the impress of his independent thought and of his vigorous grasp upon our literature, and traced the lines upon which its history must be written.
Warton’s “History of English Poetry” marks, and to some extent helped to produce an immense change for the better in the study of English literature; and he deserved the contemptuous remarks of some later critics as little as he did the savage attacks of the half-lunatic Ritson. But he was rather indolent; his knowledge, though wide, was very desultory and full of scraps and gaps; and, like others in his century, he was much too fond of hypothesis without hypostasis, of supposition without substance.
But Warton’s learning was wide, if not exact; and it was not dry learning, but quickened by the spirit of a genuine man of letters. Therefore, in spite of its obsoleteness in matters of fact, his history remains readable, as a body of descriptive criticism, or a continuous literary essay. The best way to read it is to read it as it was written—in the original edition—disregarding the apparatus of notes, which modern scholars have accumulated about it, but remembering that it is no longer an authority and probably needs correcting on every page. Read thus, it is a thoroughly delightful book, “a classic in its way,” as Lowell has said.
At the outset, Warton’s great undertaking was cautiously received. In so massive a collection of facts and dates, errors were inevitable. Warton’s arrangement of his material was not flawless. Digressions were very numerous. His translation of old French and English was often faulty. In 1782 Ritson attacked him on the last score with a good deal of bitterness, and Warton, while contemptuously refusing to notice the censures of the “black-letter dog,” was conscious that much of the attack was justified. Horace Walpole found the work unentertaining, and Mason echoed that opinion. Subsequently Sir Walter Scott, impressed by its deficiencies of plan, viewed it as “an immense commonplace book of memoirs to serve for” a history; and Hallam deprecated enthusiastic eulogy. On the other hand, Gibbon described it as illustrating “the taste of a poet and the minute diligence of an antiquarian,” while Christopher North wrote appreciatively of the volumes as “a mine.” But, however critics have differed in the past, the whole work is now seen to be impregnated by an intellectual vigor which reconciles the educated reader to almost all its irregularities and defects. Even the mediæval expert of the present day, who finds that much of Warton’s information is superannuated and that many of the generalisations have been disproved by later discoveries, realises that nowhere else has he at his command so well furnished an armoury of facts and dates about obscure writers; while for the student of sixteenth century literature, Warton’s results have been at many points developed, but have not as a whole been superseded. His style is unaffected and invariably clear. He never forgot that he was the historian and not the critic of the literature of which he treated. He handled with due precision the bibliographical side of his subject, and extended equal thoroughness of investigation to every variety of literary effort. No literary history discloses more comprehensive learning in classical and foreign literature, as well as in that of Great Britain.
General
You have shewn to all, who shall hereafter attempt the study of our ancient authours, [“Observations on the Faerie Queene”] the way to success; by directing them to the perusal of the books which those authours had read.
This is a very splendid edition; [ed. Theocritus] and, after a careful perusal, I can pronounce it as correct as splendid. Every lover of Greek literature is under great obligations to the very learned and ingenious Mr. Warton for this magnificent edition of Theocritus, and for several other immortal productions. Everybody allows the Preface to be a beautiful and interesting composition.
One of the most beautiful [“Ode on Spring”] and original descriptive poems in our language, and strongly shews the force of poetical imitation in rendering objects that have no beauty in themselves highly beautiful in description. I suppose there are few scenes less pleasing and picturesque in themselves than the view from Catherine Hill, near Winchester, over the bare adjacent downs, and on the Itchin at its feet, formed into a navigable canal, and creeping through a wide valley of flat water-meadow, intersected often at right angles by straight narrow water-courses. But hear the poet, and observe how the scene appears in the picture he has given of it, without changing the features of the original.
| Nor, amid the choir | |
| Of pealing minstrelsy, was thy own lyre, | |
| Warton, unheard;—as Fancy pour’d the song, | |
| The measur’d music flow’d along, | |
| Till all the heart and all the sense | |
| Felt her divinest influence…. |
He was a genuine poet, in its strictest sense. I remember some years ago, when it was the fashion to deny him genius: but I am utterly at a loss to guess what meaning those, who denied genius to T. Warton, could affix to the word.
In one department he is not only unequalled, but original and unprecedented: I mean in applying to modern poetry the embellishment of Gothic manners and Gothic arts; the tournaments and festivals, the poetry, music, painting, and architecture of “elder days.” Nor can I here refrain from repeating, that, though engaged in the service, his talents were never prostituted to the undue praise of royalty; nor from adding as a topic of incidental applause, that, though he wanders in the mazes of fancy, he may always be resorted to as supplying at least an harmless amusement; and that with Milton and Gray, whom he resembled in various other points, he shares also this moral commendation, that his laurels, like theirs, are untainted by impurity, and that he has uniformly written (to use the words of another unsullied bard)
| Verse that a Virgin without blush may read. |
The poems of Thomas Warton are replete with a sublimity, and richness of imagery, which seldom fail to enchant: every line presents new beauties of idea, aided by all the magic of animated diction. From the inexhaustible stores of figurative language, majesty, and sublimity, which the ancient English poets afford, he has culled some of the richest and sweetest flowers. But, unfortunately, in thus making the use of the beauties of other writers, he has been too unsparing; for the greatest number of his ideas and nervous epithets cannot, strictly speaking, be called his own; therefore, however we may be charmed by the grandeur of his images, or the felicity of his expression, we must still bear in our recollection, that we cannot with justice bestow upon him the highest eulogium of genius—that of originality.
This beautifully romantic poem [“Pleasures of Melancholy”], though executed at a period so early in life, betrays almost immediately the tract of reading, and the school of poetry, to which its author had, even then, sedulously addicted himself. Every page suggests to us the disciple of Spenser and Milton, yet without servile imitation; for, though the language and style of imagery whisper whence they were drawn, many of the pictures in this poem are so bold and highly coloured, as justly to claim no small share of originality…. On the genius of Warton, as a Poet, an adequate value has not yet been placed; for in consequence of a sedulous imitation of the diction of our elder bards, especially of Spenser and Milton, originality of conception has been very unjustly denied him. To his brother Joseph, with whom he has been commonly ranked, he is greatly superior, both in vigour and fertility of imagination, though, perhaps, less sweet and polished in his versification. In the rhymed pentameter, indeed, and in blank verse, in point of versification, to Dryden, Pope, and Milton; but in the eight-syllable metre, to which he was particularly partial, he has exhibited, almost uniformly, great harmony and sweetness. The mixture of trochaics of seven syllables, and iambics of eight, which has been objected to him as a fault, in this species of verse, I am so far from considering as a defect, that, as in Milton and Gray, I esteem it productive of much beauty and much interesting variety.
In the best of Warton’s there is a stiffness, which too often gives them the appearance of imitations from the Greek.
Warton was a poet and a scholar, studious with ease, learned without affectation. He had a happiness which some have been prouder of than he, who deserved it less—he was a poet-laureat.
| “And that green wreath which decks the bard when dead, | |
| That laurel garland, crown’d his living head.” |
Every Englishman who values the literature of his country, must feel himself obliged to Warton as a poetical antiquary. As a poet, he is ranked by his brother Joseph in the school of Spenser and Milton; but this classification can only be admitted with a full understanding of the immense distance between him and his great masters. He had, indeed, “spelt the fabled rhyme;” he abounds in allusions to the romantic subjects of Spenser, and he is a sedulous imitator of the rich lyrical manner of Milton: but of the tenderness and peculiar harmony of Spenser he has caught nothing; and in his resemblance to Milton, he is the heir of his phraseology more than of his spirit. His imitation of manner, however, is not confined to Milton…. If we judge of him by the character of the majority of his pieces, I believe that fifty out of sixty of them are such, that we should not be anxious to give them a second perusal. From that proportion of his works, I conceive that an unprejudiced reader would pronounce him a florid, unaffecting describer, whose images are plentifully scattered, but without selection of relief. To confine our view, however, to some seven or eight of his happier pieces, we shall find, in these, a considerable degree of graphic power, of fancy, and animation. His “Verses to Sir Joshua Reynolds” are splendid and spirited. There is also a softness and sweetness in his ode entitled “The Hamlet,” which is the more welcome, for being rare in his productions; and his “Crusade,” and “Grave of Arthur,” have a genuine air of martial and minstrel enthusiasm…. The spirit of chivalry, he may indeed be said to have revived in the poetry of modern times. His memory was richly stored with all the materials for description that can be got from books: and he seems not to have been without an original enthusiasm for those objects which excite strong associations of regard and wonder. Whether he would have looked with interest on a shepherds’ cottage, if he had not found it described by Virgil or Theocritus, may be fairly doubted; but objects of terror, splendour and magnificence, are evidently congenial to his fancy.
His style in prose, though marked by a character of magnificence, is at times stiff and encumbered. He is too fond of alliteration in prose as well as in verse; and the cadence of his sentences is too evidently laboured.
Tom Warton was one of the finest fellows that ever breathed—and the gods had made him poetical, but not a poet.
Thomas Warton, although not one of our greatest, is still a most respectable literary name. He was an elegant scholar, if not a Bentley; a refined and genial critic, if not a Johnson; a tender and true poet, if not a Milton. If we may substitute comparison for contrast, he may be called, as a poet, a diffuser Gray, or even a weaker and less versatile Scott…. Altogether, looking at his poems in the light of effusions poured out in the intervals of laborious research and critical discussion, they are worthy of all acceptation; and we feel justified in binding the Poetical Works of Warton in the same volume with those of Goldsmith and Collins. They are certainly three among the truest and most refined of our minor poets.
That robust scholar and genial poet.
Some of them express real feelings with an elegance so scholarly, so simple, and so full of faith, that no universalist in the love of poetry who has once read them chooses to part with them.
The scholia [Ed. Theocritus] are not conveniently disposed for the purpose of reference; and, in the opinion of Harles, as well as Brunck, the editor has not to the full extent availed himself of all the valuable materials that were within his reach.
Warton’s numerous sonnets cover a wide range; but are particularly noteworthy for the increased attention they give to natural objects, and for the transition in the application of the sonnet to poetical subjects of a descriptive kind which this increase denotes. Instead of being confined, as the sonnet had been very generally, to amatory, elegiac, or complimentary subjects, or to the sublimation of some abstract sentiment or idea, his sonnets largely celebrate historical or familiar scenes and places, chosen by him for the picturesqueness of their environments, or for the interesting associations that were clustered around them. Many of the local descriptions in these brief poems are very attractive; and, indeed, there is scarcely one of his sonnets, whatever their theme, but will reward us by the gracefulness and delicacy of its sentiments, and the correctness of its diction and structure. It is true they make no great pretensions, but the level plain on which they travel reveals so many inviting bits of retired loveliness, and affords so many charming glimpses of quiet beauty, that we wonder his poems are so little known and prized. Probably, however, the neglect into which they have fallen is due to an excess of correctness of finish and an over-refinement of taste, which impart to them an air of stiffness and effeminacy that a closer inspection would measurably dissipate. To my mind, the transcripts of English sights and scenes in Warton’s sonnets are extremely pleasing, and will bear close scrutiny.
Thomas Warton is in his poetry chiefly imitative, as was natural in so laborious a student of our early poetical literature. The edition of his poems which was published by his admirer and his brother’s devoted pupil, Richard Mant, offers a curious example of a poet “killed with kindness;” for the apparatus of parallel passages from Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton, and others, is enough to ruin any little claim to originality which might have been put forward for him…. There are reasons why his genial figure should not be altogether excluded from a representative English anthology. It has often been said that his “History of English Poetry,” with Percy’s “Reliques,” turned the course of our letters into a fresh channel; but what is more noticeable here is that his own poetry—or much of it, for he is not always free from the taint of pseudo-classicalism—instinctively deals with materials like those on which the older writers had drawn. In reaction against the didactic and critical temper of the earlier half of his century, he is a student of nature; he is even an “enthusiast,” in Whitehead’s sense.
Warton’s style has no very special characteristics, and he does not conform to any marked convention in the structure of his sentences. But it is at all times forcible, clear, and free from pedantry; and he unquestionably added something to the recourses of English prose, in being the first to treat literary questions from the historical point of view.
Of all the laureates, with the exception of Rowe, Warton suffered the least from satirical attacks. His unmistakable claim to greatness seemed to impress the small buzzing gnats that usually swarmed about the poets of the day. Warton’s first official ode was composed in haste and was not at all equal to the poetry he has been writing for many years, and it excited more or less ridicule; but after that, his official work was done with such genuine power that even the famous Wolcot, who under the name of Peter Pindar, produced such biting, brilliant, and unmerciful satires, contented himself with a few harmless thrusts. Warton was too great a poet and too amiable a man to treat such attacks with anything but composure and dignity.
Fourth-rate men like the two Wartons.
His books furnish ample evidence of that extraordinary industry in the discovery and examination of manuscript authorities which characterizes the antiquaries of the period; and though the accuracy of his learning was severely impugned by Ritson in 1782, in the anonymous “Observations on the History of English Poetry, in a Familiar Letter to the Author,” yet the majority of the mistakes acridly corrected in the pamphlet are far from inexcusable in a work compiled from notes taken under all sorts of difficulties, and Ritson’s attack was considered merely malignant. Warton’s notebooks and papers, a box full of which is in the library of Trinity College, though often elaborate, are generally very slovenly and illegible, and the want of method which they display would sufficiently account for many errata. But while one is bound to make every allowance for accidental mistakes and immaterial inaccuracies, the interests of historical truth demand that one should expose without hesitation misstatements which appear to be intentional; and, unpleasant as the task is, it is a duty to call public attention to some facts which must seriously impair the confidence so long reposed in the trustworthiness of Warton’s historical work.
He had also an appreciation of wild nature, as we see from the descriptions in “The Grave of King Arthur.” Warton’s work is of interest because of the many attractive details scattered through his poems, but there is little unity of effect. The general impression is that he saw nature first through Milton’s eyes, and that when he afterwards made many charming discoveries for himself he tried to express them in the Il Penseroso manner.
