[In the following excerpt, Reid looks at Joseph Warton's Odes and argues that while some considered that the volume went into a second edition a sign of its poetic merit, there were other factors motivating the second edition.]

In literary history Joseph Warton is chiefly remembered for his Essay on Pope, the first volume of which was published only twelve years after the poet's death and which began a reexamination and reevaluation of Pope's works. Its publication marks a convenient place from which to view Pope criticism and, indeed, mid-eighteenth-century criticism. The two editions of Warton's Odes have also been regarded as significant in understanding the changes in poetic vogue in the mid-1740s—the time immediately following Pope's death (1744). That Warton's Odes went into a second edition is deemed of particular importance, as such popularity may be argued as an indicator of taste. It now seems possible, however, that the second edition, far from being the effect of popularity, was occasioned by a combination of factors, none of which concerned the poetic merits of the volume nor its assumed enthusiastic reception.

I

Many are familiar with the printing history of William Collins' Odes. These were published, in octavo, 20 December 1746 but dated, as was the common practice, 1747, and after they did not sell well he supposedly bought up the remaining copies and burned them. Most are aware that Collins' Odes are linked in a number of ways with Joseph Warton's Odes, also of December 1746 (second edition, January 1747). Initially the Odes were to have been a joint project. Joseph Warton wrote to his brother Thomas:

You will wonder to see my name in an advertisement next week, so I thought I would apprize you of it. The case was this. Collins met me in Surrey, at Guildford Races, when I wrote out for him my Odes, and he likewise communicated some of his to me: and being both in very high spirits we took courage, resolved to join our forces, and to publish them immediately. I flatter myself that I shall lose no honour by this publication, because I believe these Odes, as they now stand, are infinitely the best things I ever wrote. You will see a very pretty one of Collins's, on the death of Colonel Ross before Tournay. It is addressed to a lady who was Ross's intimate acquaintance, and who by the way is Miss Bett Goddard. Collins is not to publish the Odes unless he gets ten guineas for them.

I returned from Milford last night, where I left Collins with my mother and sister, and he sets out to-day for London. I must now tell you that I have sent him your imitation of Horace's Blandusian Fountain, to be printed amongst ours, and which you shall own or not as you think proper. I would not have done this without your consent, but because I think it very poetically and correctly done, and will get you honour.¹

The source of the letter is John Wooll's Memoirs of Joseph Warton (1806). Wooll notes that the letter is without time or place. However, we may safely assume that it was written in May or June 1746, the time of the Guildford Races.

Sometime between this time and December the joint project was abandoned. No one has found the advertisement to which Warton referred in his opening sentence, and as there are several thematic and stylistic links between the two volumes² the reason for the separate editions seems unlikely to have been a break in friendship or a disagreement over poetic values. The answer may be found in Warton's statement: “Collins is not to publish the Odes unless he gets ten guineas for them.” The mere mentioning of the figure to his brother implies that Warton was somewhat incredulous. We can understand why he might be so when we read in a letter from Dodsley, dated 29 January 1747, to Thomas Warton. Speaking of Thomas' The Pleasure of Melancholy, Dodsley wrote: “As to the Terms, I believe I shall rather chuse to print as I did your Brothers [i.e. Joseph's Odes] for so very few Poems sell, that it is very hazardous purchasing almost anything.”³

What these exact terms were we do not know. But we do know that Warton had tried to interest Dodsley in a subscription before meeting Collins. In a letter to Thomas dated 18 March 1746, he wrote:

I have wed my Acquaintance with Mr Spense [Joseph Spence], who is the most charming fellow in the World. … He is pleas'd to be very fond of my Ode to Solitude; I shewed all of them to him, & he strongly advised me not to publish this Season. I gave him & Dr Young Subscription papers. Dodsley has vex'd me extremely not to send the proposals to Fletcher [James Fletcher, Sr. (1710-1795), bookseller and publisher in the Turl, Oxford] as he was ordered a week ago. I was surprised to find he had not done it.⁴

All this suggests that Dodsley would not pay Collins the 10 guineas and why Collins has his Odes published by Millar on 20 December.

II

In the first edition of Warton's Odes there are two poems by Thomas. The first, the imitation from Horace, was mentioned earlier. On 29 October Joseph wrote to his brother:

This moment I received your Ode, for which I give you a thousand thanks; I am extremely pleas'd with it, and think it very poetical and correct, as far as I can judge by twice reading it: one or two little alterations to the epithets may be made, such as “Ivy mantled,” because there is ivy darkened in the Ode to Despair; and fair is repeated several times, as also is polish'd: but these are trifles. You judge right in saying that I should like the fourth and sixth stanzas, they are as poetical as any thing I ever read: your transitions are very judicious, especially to your descriptions of the ravages of the Goths: but of this more minutely hereafter.⁵

The poem referred to is Ode V “To a Gentleman upon his Travels thro' Italy” (pp. 22-25). The “of this more minutely hereafter” has not survived. Nor has any discussion concerning the other poem by Thomas which was included, the imitation from Horace (III, xiii), Ode VIII “To a Fountain.” We must recall Joseph's words when telling, or rather trying to convince, Thomas, that he should include the poem in the collection he proposed with Collins: “I must now tell you that I have sent him [Collins] your imitation of Horace's Blandusian [sic] Fountain, to be printed amongst ours, and which you shall own or not as you think proper. I would not have done this without your consent, but because I think it very poetically and correctly done, and will get you honour.” Dr. David Fairer and Christina lePrevost⁶ have proved that the brothers would eventually help each other considerably and that they wrote many of the poems which were published in their father's collection of Poems in 1748. However, the tone of these words is much different from any other case where the brothers discussed their work. Joseph is asking, and asking in such a way that it appears he feels Thomas may not agree, to include the poem. Thomas obviously was not troubled by the inclusion of his other poem, even with some of Joseph's emendations.

It may be, therefore, that Thomas communicated to Joseph his disinclination to include the poem, and Joseph was forced to do some quick negotiating with Dodsley and, perhaps more importantly, the printer. Warton would have made a contract with a printer to print the Odes and negotiated with Dodsley, who would act as bookseller (quasi-“publisher”).⁷ When Thomas requested that his poem be removed, Joseph was required to make some arrangement with Dodsley, who probably would have bought the copyright. Dodsley may have suggested the second edition as a way around the problem. Warton would then approach the printer, who would suggest that by making few changes from the first edition Warton's costs would be minimized. To keep costs down, the size, format, and length of the volume would not change (printers charged by the sheet). And there is some evidence that setting from type was less expensive than setting from manuscript.⁸ Warton would merely drop one poem, lengthen his own “Ode to Fancy,” and add the brief “Ode to The Happy Life.” A look at the list of variants indicates that this is the case. Most are accidentals and appear to be from a hurried resetting from the first edition. Warton did take the opportunity to make a number of minor changes. But except for the changes necessitated by the new poem and additions to the “Ode to Fancy,” Warton only made four substantial emendations (out of forty-seven variants).

In addition to the variants listed there is one difference of note. The press figure ‘2’ on page 32 of the first edition is not repeated in the second edition (where there are no press figures), indicating, perhaps, that composition and printing of the two volumes were regarded as a single job done on press number 2 or by pressman number 2. It may be, therefore, that the second edition was not occasioned by the popularity of Warton's Odes, for which there is no contemporary evidence, but by Thomas' insistence that one of his poems not be included. Dodsley issued the new edition after Christmas, possibly in some little competition with Miller's edition of Collins' Odes.

III

There is only one notable contemporary comment, which is in a letter from Thomas Gray to his friend Thomas Wharton: “Have you seen the Works of two young Authors, a Mr Warton & a Mr Collins, both Writers of Odes? it is odd enough, but each is the half of a considerable Man, & one the Counter-Part of the other. the first has but little Invention, very poetical choice of Expression, & a good Ear. the second, a fine Fancy, model'd upon the Antique, a bad Ear, great Variety of Words, & Images with no Choice at all. they both deserve to last some Years, but will not.”⁹

There are two other items of circumstantial evidence that Warton's Odes were not republished because of their popularity. This evidence is very far from conclusive but nevertheless deserves noting. The National Union Catalog lists nine copies of the 1746 edition and eight copies of the 1747 edition. This roughly corresponds with the number listed for Collins' Odes, fourteen. Foxon lists only two copies of each edition in the U.K. and three of Collins. And he notes as well that the Collins Odes were entered in Woodfall's ledger under 15 December 1746, 1,000 copies printed. Copies of Collins' Odes have always been considered rare, as indeed have Warton's. We do not know how many copies Dodsley and Warton had printed. But it seems likely that if popularity were the sole reason for the second edition, something approaching twice as many copies as Collins' would have survived. But adding the two editions we approximate the number of Collins', even though he himself destroyed many of them.

The second bit of evidence is also circumstantial, but it too is worth consideration. Thomas Warton published poems in many places, e.g. Dodsley's Miscellany, Jackson's Oxford Journal, the Oxford Sausage, The Union, and in his own collection of poems. But nowhere else, except in Joseph's Odes (1746), is the “Ode to a Fountain” to be found during Thomas' lifetime. Its next appearance in print is in Mant's memoir and collection of Thomas' poetry.¹⁰ As Thomas published many of his poems anonymously (some in journals of his own editing), it would not have been difficult for him to have had the “Ode to a Fountain” published. As he did not, it seems likely that he was, for whatever reason, unwilling to do so himself and certainly would not let his brother publish it under his (Joseph's) name.

IV

What then is the importance of understanding the nature of the printing of Joseph Warton's Odes? Critics have argued that the popularity of Warton's Odes illustrated a fashion or change in taste in the mid-1740s and further defined their ideas by referring to “poor Collins.” Such theories have to be rethought. The printing also sheds some light on Warton's method of poetic composition. The printer, it seems, determined the length of some poems. …

Notes

1. John Wooll, Biographical Memoirs of the Late Revd. Joseph Warton, D.D. [BL] (London, 1806), pp. 14-15.

2. For a discussion see Roger Lonsdale (ed.), The Poems of Gray, Collins, and Goldsmith (London, 1969), esp. pp. 408-14 and in the headnotes to individual odes.

3. BL Add. MS. 52560, fol. 13.

4. BL Add. MS. 42560, fols. 9-10.

5. Wooll, pp. 214-15.

6. David Fairer, “The Poems of Thomas Warton the Elder?”, Review of English Studies, [RES] n.s. 26 (1975), 287-300, 395-406; “The Poems of Thomas Warton the Elder?—A Postscript,” RES, n.s. 29 (1978), 61-65; Christina lePrevost, “More Unacknowledged Verse by Joseph Warton,” RES, n.s. 37 (1986), 317-47. See also Hugh Reid, “A Probable Addition to the Poetic Works of Joseph Warton,” RES, n.s. 38 (1987), 526-29.

7. David Fleeman has pointed out to me that it is possible (probable?) that Warton had a less direct involvement with the procedure I am outlining. He may have agreed to a contract with Dodsley, who in turn subcontracted the printing.

8. I am much obliged to Jim McLaverty who pointed out to me that when Bowyer first printed the Rape of the Lock, he printed 1,000 at 18s. a sheet, and when he printed it again a little over a year later, it was 16s. a sheet, the difference in cost probably being due to the fact that it was easier for the compositor to set from typescript.

9. Paget Toynbee and Leonard Whibley (eds.), The Correspondence of Thomas Gray, 3 vols. (London, 1935), I, 261.

10. Richard Mant, The Poetical Works of the Late Thomas Warton B.D. (Oxford, 1802), I, 116.