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National Library of Scotland, MS 42551 . Previously published: Kenneth Curry (ed.), New Letters of Robert Southey, 2 vols (London and New York, 1965), II, pp. 53–55.
These letters were edited with the assistance of Carol Bolton, Tim Fulford and Ian Packer
For permission to publish the text of MSS in their possession, the editor wishes to thank the Beinecke Rare Books and Manuscript Library, Yale University; Berg Collection of English and American Literature, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations; the Bodleian Library Oxford University; the British Library; Boston Public Library; the Syndics of Cambridge University Library; the Syndics of the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge; Haverford College, Connecticut; the Historical Society of Pennsylvania; the Hornby Library, Liverpool Libraries and Information Services; the Houghton Library, Harvard University; the John Rylands Library, Manchester; the Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas; Luton Museum (Bedfordshire County Council); Massachusetts Historical Society; McGill University Library; the National Library of Scotland; the Newberry Library, Chicago; the New York Public Library (Pforzheimer Collections); the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York; the Public Record Offices of Bedford, Suffolk (Bury St Edmunds) and Northumberland, the Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge; the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne; the Trustees of the William Salt Library, Stafford, the Wisbech and Fenland Museum; the University of Virginia Library.
A research grant from the British Academy made much of the archival work possible, as did support from the English Department of Nottingham Trent University.
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Your project of a View of the World has hardly been out of my thoughts since the receipt of your letter. I meant in the
Life of George 3. to have given a summary account of the state of all those countries over which the influence of G Britain extends
<or with which its political history was in any degree connected>.
I was at Longmans table when the scheme of his Collection of
Voyages & Travels was first suggested: & I was asked to undertake it. This I declined upon the ground that it required that
sort of scientific knowledge which Capt Burney possesses, & of which I knew
nothing, – but at his desire I wrote to him upon the subject, showing in what manner, according to my judgement, such a collection
ought to be formed. First I proposed a geographical arrangement; – then that the best accounts of the respective regions, should be
printed entire, in chronological order, & the great mass of inferior works brought to elucidate them in the form of notes &
appendices; Thus giving the whole substance of the great standard works, & the whole essence of all the others. – You see what a
disgraceful work <job> Pinkerton has made of it! If the titles of xx different voyages had been put in a
bag, & he had drawn them out by lottery to the amount of the quantity required, the probability is that the Collection would rather
have been better than worse.
What you propose I clearly comprehend. Not a mere compilation, but a work which might live, & which the character
of the authors mind should prevade so as to individualize & appropriate it: – A view of the world as it is, with references enough
to what it has been for all purposes of elucidation. Magnum opus; – an xx undertaking of great labour,
but of proportionate delight. No man has ever taken more interest than I have done into <in> looking <back> into
the history of the human race, or in looking forward to their amelioration, & collecting the light of the past as in the focus of a
mirror to fling it before me into that I may see into the future. I have therefore a great capital xxx xxx to
begin upon, – few men, if any can have more, for this peculiar kind of knowledge has for more than twenty years been my favourite
pursuit. I have many good materials, some of the best, & not a few rare ones. Still there would be many to seek.
You seem to guess well at the extent, & to go to the extent in your estimate. Concerning the form, that which would
carry with it most appearance of respectability would be best; because a work which may at first be taken for a mere piece of
patchwork, ought to make some pretensions at its outset; – the first half dozen pages would overcome all prejudice of this kind. Prints
would be indispensable, – xxx the views <might perhaps best be> xxx given in outline, the costume in
colours, & the natural history in wood for head & tail pieces.
The arrangement of the subject will form itself in my mind long before there will be any necessity for beginning upon
it. For this & the life of George 3 must not go on xxx together: – one at a time will be as much as I can manage with
the great series of my Portugueze histories,xx see you as I expected xx in May, – nor before the close of the year. It would be vexatious to arrive
in London just when every body is leaving it, & I cannot get from home before this would be the case. Perhaps therefore you will,
at your convenience, let me know how far the plan which you & Cadell &
Davies have meditated, accords with mine, that we may see whether they had better be kept separate, or made to agree. What I
propose is not the history of the Age, – but the spirit <philosophy> of that history: having all the result of
research but none of the form of it; – xxx counts only of xxx xx dealing rather with causes & consequences than with
events, & using culling the flow of xx events to illustrate, & elucidate, & enhance & adorn &
extracting their essential spirit to be the life of the book. – There is one reason why the view of the world (this title would not do
for it) seems entitled to precedence in order of time, & that is that the Age of George 3 is not yet at an end. Perhaps the ensuing
campaign may bring with it the consummation so devoutly to be wished for. If Alexander had reestablished Poland as a kingdom I should
have had little anxiety for the result: not having done this I fear that France is as certain of finding strength there, as Alexander
is in Germany.
Thank you for the inclosure in your last, – & also for your hint respecting the temperatures of the controversial
part of the article; tho I could easily persuade myself that Malthus is one of those writers with whom we ought to be indignant.
The Quarterly may very well wait till Nelson