Review: Rasselas, Samuel Johnson

 

The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia

by
Samuel Johnson

Published April, 1759

Tremendously Late Classics Club Review #4/50

I found this volume in a used bookstore, and really only got it because it seemed a whimsical thing to do; why not, after all? People do read Samuel Johnson, and what an intriguing title! I didn't only obtain the book for pretension's sake; it did sound genuinely interesting – an aspiring snob I may be, but a discerning one I hope.

Rasselas, said Prince of Abissinia [sic], lives in the so-called Happy Valley in a pleasure palace, indolent and carefree. But not happy. One day, musing beside a stream, he watches the sheep grazing and realizes that they are what the people of the Happy Valley are like: they have no pursuits beyond immediate carnal enjoyments – food, water, shelter, sleep, sunshine, – and he begins to wonder if this is really 'happiness'. For a sheep, certainly. But for human beings there must be something more needed, some attitude, some new activity, some way of life. Rasselas decides to leave the Happy Valley, and, with the help and company of his sister Princess Nekayah, her maid Pekuah, and the sage Imlac, does so. Thus begins the search for Happiness (as it's the main idea, if you will, of the book, I shall capitalize "happiness", but Johnson does not, to clarify).

The book is really a discussion of Happiness, what it is and how it is achieved, and the characters are therefore not proper characters; they are mouthpieces, instruments of demonstration, and they function as movers of the discussion rather than any story. Hence they cannot be looked upon in the same way as other fictional people. And yet . . . as instruments they are part of a larger operation carried out to instruct us in the dissection of the imagination – in thought. By that, I think we are permitted to take their thoughts and reasonings and judge them as a part of the larger illustration of the discernment of some of the characteristics of life on Earth. Their takeaways are important, and their decisions should be considered so as well, if only for further discussion.

On their travels they meet with several different characters and places, all of them a representation of some option for Happiness. Here is a brief run-down:

The Happy Valley is, as I've said, insipid and boring; the next option is a town of veritable Hedonists, party types, and they too are insipid with the additive of being intellectually lacking. After that, Rasselas & Co. are treated to the Stoic's life, whom they find can talk the talk but can't walk the walk. He is depressed and lonely. The Pastoral life is one of simple minds, simple pleasures, and abundant petty hates. The Prosperous life prospers little better; the man lives in fear of jealous physical attacks upon himself and his property, and his home is artificial and impermanent. The Hermit's way is initially attractive to the searchers, but an odd problem arises.

    "I have been for some time unsettled and distracted: my mind is disturbed with a thousand perplexities of doubt and vanities of imagination, which hourly prevail upon me because I have no opportunities for relaxation or diversion. I am sometimes ashamed to think that I could not secure myself from vice but by retiring from the exercise of virtue, and begin to suspect that I was rather impelled by resentment, than led by devotion, into solitude. . . In solitude, if I escape the example of bad men, I want likewise the counsel and conversation of the good."   

 

(QUOTE SOURCE UNKNOWN DUE TO NEGLECTFUL NOTE-TAKING)

After this, the life according to Nature proves even less fulfilling than the Pastoral or the Happy Valley method.

They come to a town and find that the rich are treacherous, bitter, and transient; the poor petty, emotionally frivolous, and insensible. While there, Rasselas and Nekayah have two or three chapters devoted to conversation about Happiness.

Nekayah was, to me, the most insightful. She had several lines which I liked, but of course it is really the mind of Samuel Johnson which I find so enjoyable. She is really fairly shallow, and has the same flaw they all prove to have in the end: a kind of selfishness. They all seek Happiness as something which pertains to themselves, rather than finding any joy in administering goodness to others. True, they announce idealistic resolutions to create things which are, in structure, quite selfless – a school, a refuge, a just government – but it doesn't seem to be, at least with Nekayah and Pekuah, about what they can do for others, and the pleasure and happiness derived from that, from simply knowing that good has been done, and by them. To illustrate: if you make a cake, or a proper meal, or a pot of coffee even, and everybody partakes of it and enjoys it, you are pleased because, having done a good job, you've consequently made others happy. That is not the caase with Nekayah and Pekuah. They do not desire to make a school and a refuge for the sake of others, thereby finding fulfillment in their lives, but because of the (they think) promise of the reward of Happiness. It is not a genuine compunction to good, but a desire for an end result of their own happiness (no capital this time).

In the end, they all return to the Happy Valley, Nekayah and Pekuah's intentions forgotten, Imlac old and done bothering, and Rasselas . . . indeterminate to me; might he take hold of his government and rule it justly for the good of his people? Or might he fall into his previous lethargy, even to apathy, having now done Something in his life and perhaps feeling that it has been enough to make it a good life? Indeed, the contemplation of Happiness seems to be all that the quartet desire. Imlac does express some disgust/disappointment in his pupils' lack of drive and initiative.

The History of Rasselas is short and interesting, and Samuel Johnson surprised me by being so enjoyable to read. I am making my slow but sure way through his and Boswell's A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland; and, The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, and his insight and quite dry wit is even fresher and more palpable in that work.

I thought I'd leave with a few quotes from the book, the first rather humorous, so . . . here they are!

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". . . A youth and maiden meeting by chance, or brought together by artifice, exchange glances, reciprocate civilities, go home and dream of one another. Having little to divert attention or diversify thought, they find themselves uneasy when they are apart, and therefore conclude that they shall be happy together."

CHAPTER XXIX, THE DEBATE ON MARRIAGE CONTINUED

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"Whether perfect happiness would be procured by perfect goodness," said Nekayah, "this world will never afford an opportunity of deciding. But this, at least, may be maintained, that we do not always find visible happiness in proportion to visible virtue. All natural and almost all political evils are incident alike to the bad and good: they are confounded in the misery of a famine, and not much distinguished in the fury of a faction; they sink together in a tempest, and are driven together from the country by invaders. All that virtue can afford is quietness of conscience, a steady prospect of a happier state; this may enable us to endure calamity with patience; but remember that patience must suppose pain."

CHAPTER XXVII, DISQUISITION UPON GREATNESS

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"The present state of things is the consequence of the former, and it is natural to inquire what were the sources of the good that we enjoy, or of the evil that we suffer. If we act only for ourselves, to neglect the study of history is not prudent: if we are entrusted with the care of others, it is not just. Ignorance, when it is voluntary, is criminal; and he may properly be charged with evil who refuses to learn how he might prevent it."

CHAPTER XXX, IMLAC ENTERS AND CHANGES THE CONVERSATION

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"For nothing," said she, "is more common than to call our own condition the condition of life."

CHAPTER XLV, THEY DISCOURSE WITH AN OLD MAN

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"No disease of the imagination," answered Imlac, "is so difficult of cure as that which is complicated with the dread of guilt: fancy and conscience then act interchangeably upon us, and so often shift their places that the illusions of one are not distinguished from the dictates of the other. If fancy presents images not moral or religious, the mind drives them away when they give it pain, but when melancholic notions take the form of duty, they lay hold on the faculties without opposition because we are afraid to exclude or banish them. For this reason the superstitious are often melancholy, and the melancholy almost always superstitious.

"But do not let the suggestions of timidity overpower your better reason: the danger of neglect can be but as the probability of the obligation, which, when you consider it with freedom, you find very little, and that little growing every day less. Open your heart to the influence of the light which, from time to time, breaks in upon you: when scruples importune you which you in your lucid moments know to be vain, do not stand parley, but fly to business or to Pekuah, and keep this thought always prevalent, that your are only one atom of the mass of humanity, and have neither such virtue nor nice as that you should be singled out for supernatural favours or afflictions."

CHAPTER XLVI, THE PRINCESS AND PEKUAH VISIT THE ASTRONOMER 

– After reading this passage, I did some research (looked at Wikipedia) and discovered that it is theorized that Samuel Johnson had OCD, which is the exact thing these paragraphs reminded me of. So I got to learn something new! 

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Oh, about the book: there is a kidnapping preceded by mummies.

I'll leave that there to tantalize you.