COWPER'S " RETIREMENT."
[To THE EDITOR or THE "SPECTATOR."]
SIR,—In Cowper's poem "Retirement" there occur the well- known lines on solitude :— "I praise the Frenchman, his remark was shrewd— How sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude ! But grant me still a friend in my retreat, Whom I may whisper—solitude is sweet."
A footnote tells us that the Frenchman was "Bruyere." In a letter written by Sir Thomas Fitzosborne under date August 5th, 1724, and printed in 1748 by Dodsley in a volume containing the Baronet's "Letters on Several Sub- jects," I find the following remarks upon retirement :—
" Though retirement is my dear delight, yet upon some occasions I think I have too much of it; and I agree with Balzac ' que la solitude est eertainement une belle chose ; mars it y plaisir d'avoir quelqu'un qui saehe repondre ; h qui on pnisse dire, de temps en temps, que In solitude est une belle chose.' "
I wonder if Cowper made a mistake in attributing this sentiment to M. de In Bruyere. Fitzosborne's quotation from M. Jean Louis de Balzac is so close in expression to Cowper's lines that it looks as though by a slip of the pen the poet wrote " Bruyere" instead of the name of the earlier writer. I have diligently scanned the pages of both authors, but I have failed in finding the passage referred to by Cowper, or the words quoted by Fitzosborne in either book. Can any of your readers help me in clearing up this interesting literary
Previous page
