are many, of which
the first to be given is mere conjecture, but conjecture, I fancy, not
inconsistent with such facts as are known. When Congreve produced his
first comedy, he was but twenty-three, fresh from college and the
country, ignorant, as we are told, of the world. He discovered very soon
that he had an aptitude for social life, that, no doubt, living humours
and follies were as entertaining as printed ones, that for a popular and
witty man the world was pleasant. But no man may be socially finished
all at once. In the course of the seven years between _The Old Bachelor_
and _The Way of the World_, Congreve must have found his wit becoming
readier, his tact surer, his appreciation of natural comedy finer and (as
personal keenness decreased) more equable, his popularity greater, and--in
fine--the world more pleasant and the attractions of the study waning and
waning in comparison. He was a finished artist, he was born, one might
almost say, with a style; but his inclination was to put his art into
life rather than into print. Even in our days (thank God for all His
mercies!) everybody is not writing a book. There are people whose talk
has inimitable touches, and whose lives are art, but who never sit down
to a quire of foolscap. I believe that Congreve naturally was one of
these, that his literary ambition was a result of accidental necessity,
and that had he lived as a boy in the society he was of as a very young
man--for all its literary ornaments--we should have had of him only odes
and songs. His generation was idler and took itself less seriously than
ours. The primal curse was not imposed on everybody as a duty. In seven
years of growing appreciation Congreve came to think the little graces
and humours the better part. That I believe to have been the first cause
of his early sterility; but others helped to determine the effect. A
certain indolence is of course implied in what has been said. There was
the gout, and there were his unfortunate obesity and his failing sight.
There was Henrietta, Duchess of Marlborough, an absorbing dame. There
were the success of _Love for Love_ and the failure of _The Way of the
World_. For all that may be said of the indifference of the true artist
to the verdict of the many-headed beast--and Congreve's contempt was as
fine as any--it is not amusing when your play or your book falls flat,
and Congreve must have known that he might write another, and possibly a