ask, if, the labourer being worthy of his hire, and the labour of the brain being the highest, finest, and most exhausting that can be, the man who straight-forwardly and without affectation takes guineas from his publisher, is not honester than he who counts upon an indirect reward for his toil?  Fortunately, the question is almost settled by the example of the first writers of the present day; but there are still people who think that one should sit down to a year’s—­ay, ten years’—­hard mental work, and expect no return but fame.  Whether such objectors have always private means to return to, or whether they have never known what it is to write a book, we do not care to examine, but they are to be found in large numbers among the educated; and indeed, to this present day, it is held by some among the upper classes to be utterly derogatory to write for money.

Whether this was the feeling in Congreve’s day or not is not now the question.  Those were glorious days for an author, who did not mind playing the sycophant a little.  Instead of having to trudge from door to door in Paternoster Row, humbly requesting an interview, which is not always granted—­instead of sending that heavy parcel of MS., which costs you a fortune for postage, to publisher after publisher, till it is so often ‘returned with thanks’ that you hate the very sight of it, the young author of those days had a much easier and more comfortable part to play.  An introduction to an influential man in town, who again would introduce you to a patron, was all that was necessary.  The profession of Maecenas was then as recognized and established as that of doctor or lawyer.  A man of money could always buy brains; and most noblemen considered an author to be as necessary a part of his establishment as the footmen who ushered them into my lord’s presence.  A fulsome dedication in the largest type was all that he asked:  and if a writer were sufficiently profuse in his adulation, he might dine at Maecenas’s table, drink his sack and canary without stint, and apply to him for cash whenever he found his pockets empty.  Nor was this all:  if a writer were sufficiently successful in his works to reflect honour on his patron, he was eagerly courted by others of the noble profession.  He was offered, if not hard cash, as good an equivalent, in the shape of a comfortable government sinecure; and if this was not to be had, he was sometimes even lodged and boarded by his obliged dedicatee.  In this way he was introduced into the highest society; and if he had wit enough to support the character, he soon found himself facile princeps in a circle of the highest nobility in the land.  Thus it is that in the clubs of the day we find title and wealth mingling with wit and genius; and the writer who had begun life by a cringing dedication, was now rewarded by the devotion and assiduity of the men he had once flattered.  When Steele, Swift, Addison, Pope, and Congreve were the kings of their sets, it was time for authors to look and talk big.  Eheu! those happy days are gone!