SIR CHARLES GAVAN DUFFY AND IRISH LITERATURE.• IT is not
very easy to define precisely the aim which Sir Charles Gavan Duffy set before himself and his hearers in his interesting address to the Irish Literary Society of London. At first, he seems to have nothing less in view than the whole moral and intellectual education of the Irish people, an " organised attempt to raise the mind of the country to higher and more generous ideals of life and duty." This was the object to which, in its earlier stages at least, the Young Ire-
What Irishmen may do for Irish Literature. An Address delivered before the Irish Literary Society, London, on July 23rd, 1592, by Sir Charles Gavan Duffy,
land movement was directed, and as a young man Sir Charles played a distinguished part in that movement, and has since written its history. Now, after the lapse of nearly fifty years, he hopes to see the ideal of the Young Irelanders revived and their intellectual ardour kindled anew. " The thought," he says, " which has long haunted my reveries, and which I desire to speak out to-day, is that the young men of this generation might and should take up anew the unfinished work of their predecessors, and carry it another stage towards the end which they aimed to reach." But aspirations such as these, however noble, do not easily lend themselves to practical endeavour, so presently we descend to lower ground, and meet with a definite proposal. Sir Charles is grieved to see the youth of his country corrupting their minds with the garbage of literature, " detective or other sensational stories from England and America, and vile translations from the French of vile originals ; " he has to acknowledge that Irish- men in general know little of their country or its history ; and he dwells with regret on the opportunities in industry and commerce which are lost through the practical ignorance of the Irish peasantry. These evils he proposes to encounter with a publishing scheme for the supply of wholesome litera- ture, which, we gather, is to be chiefly national in tone and subject,—" picturesque biographies " of Irish worthies, "vivid sketches of memorable eras " in Irish history, a gallery of representative Irishmen, to which the best men of this time shall each of them contribute a study, reproductions of works which have disappeared from circulation, and translations which shall make the wealth of the ancient Gaelic literature accessible to the English-speaking Irish of to-day. The best agency, he thinks, for carrying out these good works will be a limited liability company, with a capital of 25,000, governed by a board composed of two strict men of business and two skilled men of letters, with a chairman as umpire ; and the American system of canvassing-agents is to be adopted to further the work of the company.
The circumstances are so different in Ireland, that it would not be fair to estimate the chances of success for such a scheme according to English experience. In this country, where in- dividual energy is so abundant, private publishing enterprise might be trusted to exploit any literary demand the supply of which promised to be remunerative. Ireland is a much more promising field for any form of State or philanthropic action, and no one who knows anything of the country can doubt that Sir Charles Duffy's Association, especially if, as he hopes, it should secure the support of the omnipotent Irish press, might very well succeed where private enterprise would fail. The evils complained of, however, are not peculiar to Ireland. Elsewhere, too, it has been found that the art of reading, which is now placed within the reach of every class, is abused. In Ireland, indeed, the ill effects may be more obvious, as the intellectual element in the national character is more pro- minent; but to those who care to buy books at all, the best literature of England is accessible, and where Scott and Shakespeare have failed to drive out detective stories, it may be thought that other authors can hardly hope to be successful. There is much force, however, in the argument that every generation and every country require their own special litera- ture, and as the increased contentment and prosperity of Ireland make a larger demand for books highly probable, Sir Charles Daffy's attempt is well worth making ; in this, the practical part of his programme, we can only wish him every success.
But throughout his address Sir Charles evidently keeps in view the larger and closely connected aims of the creation of a broad and genuine national sentiment, sustained by know- ledge of the past, and the revival of Irish literary production. Now, it is not necessary to argue that these are aims which are quite beyond the reach of a limited liability company ; but the question remains whether there are any grounds for believing that the time has come for their realisation. In the discussion which followed the delivery of the address, Dr. John Todhunter, himself an Irishman of some literary reputa- tion, said he believed it was quite possible to produce in the English tongue a literature which should be thoroughly Irish in character, and that the promise of such a literature was dawning. It is always difficult, even after the event, to say what goes to determine an outburst of artistic production. But there can be little doubt that in Ireland, at the present moment, the necessary conditions are absent. It is impossible, in treating of any Irish question, to avoid getting drawn into politics, and least of all in discussing the prospects of Irish literature, which must necessarily depend on the political state of the country. Is it not a proof of the profoundly anarchic character of the present so-called national movement that it has given the stimulus to nothing higher in the way of literary production than the effusions of a vitriolic press P " The highest teaching of a nation," as Sir Charles Duffy well says, "is to accustom them to have a strict regard for the rights of others, to be prudent and tem- perate in action, and to regard the whole nation as members of a common household," and such teaching is the necessary prelude of a true national literature. Have we yet reached a neutral standpoint from which Irishmen of every creed and race and class can look back on the past and join in apprecia- tion of their national worthies P We very much fear that the studies contributed to Sir Charles's gallery of representative Irishmen will be hopelessly partisan. With the exception perhaps of Grattan, there is hardly a single Irish leader since the Reformation whose memory does not cause as much bitterness on one side as it excites reverence on the other. Even a name like Owen Roe O'Neill's is too likely to recall to the thoughts of Ulstermen the massacres of 1641. No doubt it is the business of good literature to soften asperities such as these, and enable opposing races and creeds to understand each other; but while the old divisions survive in full force, the field is not clear in Ireland, and the time not ripe. The "Young Ireland" movement was at first conducted by men of imagination and enthusiasm, who tried very hard to con- ciliate the Protestants of the North, and lay the foundations of wide national feeling ; but the logic of the situation was too strong for them ; they were forced to rest exclusively on one side, and their movement ended by degenerating into a conspiracy. While the shadow of Home-rule continues to darken the land, it is useless to talk of resuming their work.
Sir Charles Gavan Daffy naturally sets a high value on the literary productions of the " Young Irelanders," and generally on the distinctively national portion of Ireland's contribution to English literature. It seems to us, on the contrary, that in this field, Irishmen, unlike Scotchmen, have been much more successful when they have thrown themselves without reserve into the great current of English life and ideas. Their great literary qualities are then seen to most advan- tage. Even Moore, we think, is of his kind much less a success than Burke, or Goldsmith, or Berkeley, or, perhaps, Sheridan. Mr. Todhunter indicated one of the reasons for this when he gave it as his opinion that the resources of the English language had not even yet been fully mastered by those writers who were most distinctively Irish. The English which is spoken over the greater part of Ireland is really a hybrid tongue, full of phrases and idioms translated from the Gaelic, and has none of the qualities which have made Lowland Scotch so successful as a literary dialect. But the want of command over idiomatic English is not the only reason why Irishmen have failed in literature when they have tried to be characteristically national. Attempts of this kind are always liable to end in the production of something merely provin- cial ; and in Ireland there has been no great and steady flow of national life to sustain them. Perhaps it is not too hasty a generalisation if we say that self-conscious attempts to give literary expression to national feeling, even by the great masters, have nearly always something declamatory in them, and rarely strike the highest note of genuine feeling. This is peculiarly true of Irishmen, with whom the national gift for rhetoric is so overmastering. Tennyson was, no doubt, thinking of the French when he spoke of " the blind hysterics of the Celt"; but Irishmen, too, pass by an easy descent from feeling to declamation, and from declamation to rbodo- montade.
The best augury for the future of Ireland and Irish litera- ture, and the greatest heritage she has received from the past, are the memories and literature of the Celtic era. Here, at least, we have neutral ground on which Irishmen of every party may meet. St. Patrick and St. Columba, Erigena and Brian of the Tribute, are really national figures whose great- ness can offend no sectarian spirit. Even the Scotch of Ulster are ready to identify themselves with this glorious past, as their kinsmen in the Lowlands of Scotland have appropriated the traditions, and music, and dress of their ancient enemies, the Highlanders, and now regard them as national belongings. The labourers in this field—men like O'Donovan, O'Curry, and Sir Whitley Stokes—are the truest workers for Irish nationality; and it is worthy of note that while O'Connell, and the politicians since his time, have ignored them, the only assistance and encouragement they have re- ceived has come from the alien Government. Another work which is deserving of all praise, and in which a good begin- ning has been made by Patrick Kennedy, and after him Mr. Douglas Hyde, is the collection of Irish folk-lore. If, by translations and cheap editions, Sir Charles Gavan Duffy can make the results of these various labours more accessible to the body of the people, he will be doing much towards a true renaissance of national literature. Scotland has already con- tributed her quota to the literature of the United Kingdom ; and when politicians have ceased to trouble, Ireland, too, may produce her Scott and Burns. In the wealth of legend and memory that clings round every Irish name and scene, they will find ample material. Tennyson has shown us, in his Voyage of Maeldune, how the melancholy and beautiful Celtic spirit may be caught by modern poetry ; and this is the spirit which breathes in every Irish legend and pervades the whole land.
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