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Abstract
From 1799 to 1803, the American Minister to Great Britain, Rufus King, kept two commonplace books recording extracts on Roman history mostly culled from the works of Edward Gibbon. King adapted Gibbon’s texts for his own means and used them in an attempt to understand the confusing events of the French Revolutionary period. The commonplace books show an anxious, yet hopeful, diplomat reading with three questions in mind: How could he be the best possible representative for his nation? How could he defend republican government from the challenges presented by the French Revolution? And, lastly, what was the nature of the new Atlantic-world revolutions and how could they be avoided or constrained?
Notes
1 Rachel Hope Cleves describes a Federalist culture that adopted anti-Jacobin language because of the fear of violence associated with the French Revolution. R. H. Cleves, The Reign of Terror in America: Visions of Violence from Anti-Jacobinism to Antislavery (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009).
2 New York, New-York Historical Society (hereafter N-YHS), Rufus King Papers, Commonplace Book, c. 1799–1806, vol. 102 (hereafter King, vol. 102). The vast majority of the entries in this commonplace book were likely written from mid-1799 to 1802.
3 All of the books that King cited in the commonplace books examined for this essay can be found in the inventory taken of King’s library at his death in 1827, although not all of them could be found at N-YHS, where the library resides. See N-YHS, Rufus King Papers, Inventory of Rufus King Library, 1827, vol. 74, and N-YHS, N-YHS Archives, Catalogue of the King Library, c. 1906, 8 vols.
4 King, vol. 102. King did not cite a volume or page number. The definitive discussion of Gibbon’s historical approach can be found in J. G. A. Pocock, Barbarism and Religion, 5 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999–2010).
5 For an overview of the Democratic-Republican challenge to the Federalists in the 1790s, see S. Elkins and E. McKitrick,or an overview of the Democratic-Republican challenge to the Federalists in the 1790s, see S. Elkins and E. McKitrick, The Age of Federalism: The Early American Republic, 1788–1800 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995).
6 King was part of a wider culture of reading classical history in early America. See E. Shalev, Rome Reborn on Western Shores: Historical Imagination and the Creation of the American Republic (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2009); R. J. Carl, The Golden Age of the Classics in America: Greece, Rome, and the Antebellum United States (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2009); C. Winterer, The Mirror of Antiquity: American Women and the Classical Tradition, 1750–1900 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2007); C. Winterer, The Culture of Classicism: Ancient Greece and Rome in American Intellectual Life, 1780–1910 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004); C. J. Richard, The Founders and the Classics: Greece, Rome and the American Enlightenment (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994).
7 This present-minded reading of history is particularly developed in Shalev and in D. R. Woolf, Reading History in Early Modern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000).
8 The second commonplace book that King kept during his mission in London can be found at N-YHS, Rufus King Papers, Commonplace Book, c. 1802–03, vol. 75 (hereafter King, vol. 75).
9 For an overview of King’s diplomatic mission of 1796–1803, see R. Ernst, Rufus King: American Federalist (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1968), 219–73; A. Broadwater, ‘Rufus King and American Foreign Policy: Minister to England in the Administration of George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, 1796–1803’ (Master’s thesis, Kent State University, 1961); B. Perkins, The First Rapprochement: England and the United States 1795–1805 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1955).
10 J. Raven, The Business of Books: Booksellers and the English Book Trade (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), pp. 157–67, esp. 157–58; J. Raven, Judging New Wealth: Popular Publishing and Responses to Commerce in England, 1750–1800 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 43.
11 Raven, The Business of Books, pp. 154–92 and 288–93, esp. 158–60, 175–76, 179–80, and 184–85. For shop addresses for each bookseller during 1796–1803, see the British Book Trade Index http://www.bbti.bham.ac.ukx [accessed 28 July 2014]. King owned books sold by or printed for each of these shop owners, although it is impossible to conjecture whether he bought them himself in London or not. For an example of King randomly perusing establishments in London, see the annotation on the verso of the title page of King’s copy of J. Cranch, Narrative Relating to the Real Embalmed Head of Oliver Cromwell, Now Exhibiting in Mead-Court, in Old Bond-Street (London(?), 1799).
12 In a brief travel diary, King mentioned rummaging through the bookshops in Leiden, the Hague, and Amsterdam. N-YHS, Rufus King Papers, Notebook on Journey through Europe, 1802, vol. 78. For more details of King’s Continental European travels, see D. Gary, ‘Rufus King and the History of Reading: The Use of Print in the Early American Republic’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, City University of New York, 2013), pp. 128–29, 163–64.
13 King bought a manuscript of Thomas Mathew’s history of the Bacon Rebellion at an auction in 1801. See King to Thomas Jefferson, 20 December 1803, N-YHS, Rufus King Papers, Box 9, Folder 6. Also see Catalogue, (Part II), of the Stock in Trade of the late Mr W. Collins, Bookseller, deceased … which will be sold by auction … by Mr King, at his Great Room, King Street, Covent Garden, on Monday, July 27, 1801, and 11 following days (on Tuesday, Nov. 10, 1801, and 23 following days), etc. ([London, 1801]). The manuscript can be found at lot 5781, ‘Bacon’s Rebellion in Virginia, 12mo, 1675,6’.
14 For details of King’s map collection, see Gary, pp. 129, 164.
15 For example, see King’s copy of A. F. B. Deslandes, An Essay on Maritime Power and Commerce; Particularly those of France (London: Printed for Paul Vaillant, 1743). A printed label on the front pastedown notes that it was from ‘Thomas’s Circulating Library, Brighthelmston’; King and his family occasionally vacationed nearby. Also see King’s copy of J. F. D. Smyth, A Tour in the United States of America, 2 vols (London: Printed for G. Robinson, Pater-noster Row; J. Robson, New Bond-Streeet; and J. Sewell, Cornhill, 1784). The front pastedown of the first volume contains the bookplate of W. and J. Morton, and underneath in a manuscript hand is written, ‘Circulating Library New Brentford’. This library was near Mill Hill, about ten miles outside London, where the King family rented a summer home. For King’s staff going to coffee houses to read newspapers and pamphlets, see Christopher Gore to King, 20 October 1802, in N-YHS, Erving–King Papers, Box 24, Folder K53, Rufus King Domestic Letter Book 1799–180.
16 E. Havens, Commonplace Books: A History of Manuscripts and Printed Books from Antiquity to the Twentieth Century (New Haven: Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, 2001), p. 10. J. M. Hess describes the change that began to take place in Enlightenment and Romantic-era commonplace books, and argues against the tendency to deny the label of ‘commonplace book’ to Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s notebooks in ‘Coleridge’s Fly-Catchers: Adopting Commonplace-Book Form’, Journal of the History of Ideas, 73.3 (July 2012), 467–71. Similarly, the catalogue of N-YHS refers to King’s ‘notebooks’, but they should be labelled as commonplace books.
17 The literature on commonplace books is large and has flourished in recent years. Some important books and articles include Hess, pp. 463–83; A. Blair, Too Much to Know: Managing Scholarly Information before the Modern Age (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010), pp. 69, 72–73, 89–90; David Allan, Commonplace Books and Reading in Georgian England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), esp. pp. 62–63; R. Darnton, ‘The Mysteries of Reading’, in The Case for Books: Past, Present, and Future (New York: PublicAffairs, 2009), pp. 149–73; D. Allan, Making British Culture: English Readers and the Scottish Enlightenment, 1740–1830 (New York: Routledge, 2008), pp. 134–53; S. Colclough, Consuming Texts: Readers and Reading Communities, 1695–1870 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007); Havens; S. Colclough, ‘Recovering the Reader: Commonplace Books and Diaries as Sources of Reading Experience’, Publishing History, 44 (1998), 5–37.
18 The notion that the reader creates the meaning of the text is central to the history of reading. See R. Darnton, ‘First Steps towards a History of Reading’, Australian Journal of French Studies, 23.1 (January 1986), 5–30; R. Chartier, ‘Texts, Printing, Readings’, in The New Cultural History, ed. by L. Hunt (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), pp. 154–75; D. D. Hall, Cultures of Print: Essays in the History of the Book (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1996), pp. 10–12, 29–35, 40–41, 184–87; J. Rose, ‘Arriving at a History of Reading’, Historically Speaking, 5 (January 2004), 36–39; L. Price, ‘Reading: The State of the Discipline’, Book History, 7 (2004), 303–20. This essay focuses on empirical instances of reading instead of theory. For arguments that rely on evidence of actual readers, see D. Allan, Making British Culture; H. J. Jackson, Marginalia: Readers Writing in Books (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001).
19 Allan discusses the consumer and producer versions of the Enlightenment at Making British Culture, p. 240.
20 L. Jardine and A. Grafton, ‘“Studied for Action”: How Gabriel Harvey Read his Livy’, Past and Present, 129.1 (November 1990), 30–78.
21 King did create a commonplace book with one overarching category at N-YHS, Rufus King Papers, Commonplace Book, c. 1803–18, vol. 77 (hereafter King, vol. 77). On the first page of the commonplace book King asked, ‘May Subjects without permission, separate themselves from their Country, and become members of another State?’. He proceeded to answer the question by citing a variety of law of nations scholars.
22 While King did not create an index for the two commonplace books examined here, there are examples of his creation of indexes in the large volumes that consist of copies of his correspondence of his diplomatic mission. See N-YHS, Rufus King Papers, Letter Books A–E, 1796–1803, vols 63–67.
23 King, vol. 102.
24 King, vol. 75.
25 C. Hill, Grand Strategies: Literature, Statecraft, and World Order (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010).
26 On other figures using commonplace books to manage change and anxiety, see Darnton, ‘The Mysteries of Reading’, pp. 149–73; K. Sharpe, Reading Revolutions: The Politics of Reading in Early Modern England (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000), pp. 170–252, esp. 181–98; K. A. Lockridge, On the Sources of Patriarchal Rage: The Commonplace Books of William Byrd and Thomas Jefferson and the Gendering of Power in the Eighteenth Century (New York: New York University Press, 1992).
27 See n. 6 above.
28 For letters involving King’s children John and Charles reading Roman history, see N-YHS, Erving–King Papers, Box 24, Folder K53, Rufus King Domestic Letter Book 1799–1803, passim; for King acquiring books for other diplomats, see William Vans Murray to King, 26 August 1797, William Loughton Smith to King, 12 May 1799, and Smith to King, 5 June 1799, in San Marino, CA, Huntington Library, Rufus King Papers, Boxes 4 and 6. Marginalia evidence relating to politics in the mid-1790s shows that King was likely reading David Hume’s history just before travelling to Britain in 1796. See King’s copy of The History of England: From the Invasion of Julius Cæsar to the Revolution in 1688, i (London: Printed for T. Cadell, 1796), 330–31.
29 King, vol. 102, under the heading ‘Popular Concessions’. The underlining is King’s here, and throughout.
30 H. Duchhardt, ‘Peace Treaties from Westphalia to the Revolutionary Era’, in Peace Treaties and International Law in European History from the Middle Ages to World War One, ed. by R. Lesaffer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. 58.
31 For details of King’s library at the end of his mission, including its estimated size, see Gary, pp. 15, 27.
32 This quotation can be found in King, both vols 75 and 102, but the citation is from vol. 75. In vol. 75 King did not give it a heading and recorded that it could be found at ‘1 Gibbon 255’. In vol. 102 King gave it the heading ‘Gordian the younger’ and noted that it came from ‘1 Gibbon 253’.
33 King, vol. 102. This can be found under the heading ‘Extracts &c’. King recorded the Latin in his commonplace book, ‘Nullum esse librum tam malum ut non ex aliquâ parte prodesset’.
34 This can be found in King, both vols 75 and 102. The quotation used here is from vol. 75. In both commonplace books, King noted that this could be found at ‘1 Gibbon 392’. In vol. 75 this can be found under the heading ‘A character’. In vol. 102, King gave it the heading ‘Character of Gallienus Son of Valerian’, and copied it with slight differences from vol. 75, ‘He was å master of several curious & [above the ampersand King wrote, “but”] useless sciences, a ready orator, an Elegant poet, a skillful Gardner, an excellent cook, & most contemptible Prince’.
35 All material on Honorius can be found at King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Talents’. King noted that it came from ‘5 Gib. 160’.
36 King, vol. 102, under the heading ‘Scholar & Soldier’. King noted that this came from ‘Gibbons Memrs’. Also in vol. 102, King copied that it was easy to waste time, energy, and talents, ‘[i]n the investigation of the origin of [the] Nation, “our Curiosity consumes itself in toilsome and disappointed Efforts”’. King noted that this came from ‘1 Gib. 314’.
37 King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Boethius AD 524’. King noted that this came form ‘7 Gib. 43’. Also see King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Virtue’, where King recorded, ‘True virtue says Aristotle is placed at an equal distance between opposite vices’. King noted that this came from ‘4 Gib. 34’.
38 See extracts in King, vol. 75, under the headings ‘Presents to Ambassadors’ and ‘Presents’. King did not provide a volume and page number for the former heading, but noted that the latter could be found at ‘1 Gibbon 328’. Vol. 102 has the same extracts on presents under the same headings, and King noted that the former could be found at ‘1 Gibbon 361’ and the latter at ‘1 Gib. 328’. See vol. 102 for material on bribery. King recorded material under the headings ‘Bribery in Politics’, and ‘Bribery’, both of which reference a discussion King had with Sir John Dalrymple about bribery during the English Civil War. Also see the headings ‘Political Bribery’, which King extracted from ‘Sueton. j. Cæsar. 19’, and ‘Military Bribery’, which King noted could be found at ‘Cicero ad Att. 1. 16’.
39 King, vol. 102, under the heading ‘A House’. After this extract, King wrote the Latin from Gibbon’s text, ‘Ornanda est enim Dignitas domo, non ex domo tota quærenda. De Offic. 1. 39’.
40 In an undated scrap note, King recorded, ‘“There is Language in the Eye, the Cheek, the lip, nay [t]he foot speaks” — Shakespeare’. This line from Troilus and Cressida, iv, 5 reflects King’s desire to remove the veil of political events to see the truth of any situation. King stressed gathering information around him throughout his life.
41 King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Language of Ministers’. King noted that this came from ‘7 Gib. 26’.
42 King, vol. 102, under the heading ‘Extracts &c’. King noted that this came from ‘Gibbon’s Memrs’. Under this same heading, King also extracted, ‘Cicero’s Epistles afford models of every form of correspondence, from the careless Effusions of friendship, to the well guarded declaration of discreet and dignified Resentment’. This was also from ‘Gibbon’s Memrs’.
43 In scrap notes made in preparation for the 1821 New York state constitutional convention, King created the heading ‘Bonaparte’ and said, ‘[g]reat and extraordinary as Bonaparte was he combined in his own character Elements of his own Destruction’. N-YHS, Rufus King Papers, Box 19, Folder 1.
44 King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Phrase’. He did not note where this came from in the commonplace books, but it can be found at the discussion of Flavius Rufinius, consul and praetorian prefect under Emperor Theodosius I, in Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ch. 29.
45 Gary, pp. 11–14.
46 King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Thrones’. King noted that this came from ‘1 Gib. 181’. The underlining is King’s. It is also recorded in vol. 102, under the heading ‘Reign of Severus’. King noted that this passage came from ‘Gib. 1 V. 181’. The quotation comes from the version at vol. 75.
47 Quotation and reference to Bonaparte from King, vol. 102. King did not give this a heading, but noted that it came from ‘1 Gib. 200’. This passage is also in King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Usurpers’. Bonaparte is not referenced in the extract from vol. 75.
48 King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Roman Imperial Succession’. King noted that this came from ‘Gibbon’, but did not provide page numbers. This quotation can also be found in vol. 102 with no heading. In that commonplace book, King noted that the passage came from ‘1 Gib. 242’.
49 King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘AD. 250 Great Famine & Plague’. King noted that this came from ‘1 Gib. 403’.
50 E. H. Gould, Among the Powers of the Earth: The American Revolution and the Making of a New World Empire (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012); D. J. Hulsebosch and D. M. Golove, ‘A Civilized Nation: The Early American Constitution, the Law of Nations, and the Pursuit of International Recognition’, New York University Law Review, 85 (2010), 932–1066; L. J. Sodosky, Revolutionary Negotiations: Indians, Empires, and Diplomats in the Founding of America (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2009); D. Armitage, The Declaration of Independence: A Global History (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007); D. C. Hendrickson, Peace Pact: The Lost World of the American Founding (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2003); P. Onuf and N. Onuf, Federal Union, Modern World: The Law of Nations in an Age of Revolutions, 1776–1814 (Madison, WI: Madison House, 1993).
51 Gould, pp. 12–13.
52 Quotation from King, vol. 75, under heading ‘Soldiers of Justinian’. King incorrectly noted that Gibbon was discussing soldiers under Justinian, who ruled in the sixth century. Gibbon really discussed Julian in the passage King copied. King recorded the first half of the footnote under the same heading, ‘Ferox erat in suos miles et rapax, ignavus vero in Hostes et fractus’. King noted that this came from ‘Ammian L. 22. C 4’.
53 Quotation from King, vol. 102, under heading ‘Gordianus (or Gordian)’. King noted that this came from ‘1 Gibbon 252’. This can also be found in vol. 75 without a heading.
54 Quotation from King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Papinian’. King noted that this came from ‘1 Gib. 192’. The extract can also be found in vol. 102 without a heading. Also see the heading ‘Reputation’ in vol. 75, underneath which King extracted Gibbon’s comment about Mellobaudes, a fourth-century Frankish King, ‘who maintained (speaking of a chief of the Franks), to the last moment of his life, the ambiguous Reputation which is the just recompense of obscure & subtle Policy’. King noted that this came from ‘5 Gib. 9’.
55 King, vol. 75, both quotations under the heading, ‘Origin of y[e] french Monarchy A.D. 481’. King noted that that both quotations came from ‘6 Gib. 277’.
56 King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Toleration of Polytheism’. King noted that this came from ‘2 Gibbon p. 316’. After King turned the page and continued his commonplacing of this passage, he changed the heading to ‘Roman Popular Assemblies not permitted — without the presence of a magistrate’. See King’s copy of Pliny the Younger, The Letters of Pliny the Consul: with Occasional Remarks, trans. by William Melmoth, 2 vols (Dublin: Printed for Thomas Ewing, 1765).
57 King, vol. 75, a ‘Remark’ after the extract under ‘Toleration of Polytheism’. Part-way through his ‘Remark’, King began writing on a new page and provided the heading ‘Roman Popular Assemblies not permitted — without the presence of a magistrate’ for the last section. In his ‘Remark’, King also cited ‘Valerius maximus L. 1. C. 3’ and quoted Latin extracts from ‘L. 39. C. 16’ and ‘L. 36. C. 25’ of Livy’s History of Rome to support his view that the Roman Constitution was the reason why Judaism and Christianity were persecuted. See King’s copy of Pliny the Younger, The Letters of Pliny the Consul; T. Livius, The History of Rome, trans. by George Baker, 6 vols (London: Printed for A. Strahan, and T. Cadell Jun. and W. Davies, 1797); T. Livius, Titi Livii patavini historiarum ab ure condita, 7 vols (Paris: Typis Barbou, 1775); and T. Livius, The Roman History Written in Latine by Titus Livius (London: Printed for Awnsham Churchill, 1686). The catalogues of King’s library do not record anything by Valerius Maximus.
58 King felt Gibbon was on better ground when he wrote about religion in general. He approvingly cited Gibbon’s comment that ‘according to the Principles upon which the Roman Republic was founded [t]he fidelity of the Citizens to each other, and to the state, was confirmed by the habits of Education and the prejudices of Religion’. This quotation is from vol. 75 and does not have a heading, but King noted that it came from ‘6 Gibbon 363’.
59 Quotation from King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Power & Authority’. King noted that this came from ‘1 Gib. 356’. This was also extracted at vol. 102, under the same heading. In this version, King noted that Gibbon was referring to Emperor Decius. At vol. 102, King recorded, ‘[c]onscious that the favour of the Sovereign may confer power, but that the Esteem of the People can alone bestow Authority’ — he submitted the choice of ye Censor to the unbiased view of the Senate’. King noted that this came from ‘1 Gibbon 356’.
60 King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Revolutions’. King did not note a volume or page number, although this extract is between two paginated passages, the first from ‘1 Gibbon 392’ and the latter from ‘1 Gibbon 395’.
61 Material on the Swiss can be found in King, vol. 102, under the headings ‘Revolutions’ and ‘Swiss!’ King did not provide page numbers.
62 Material on Ricimer and Anthemius can be found at King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Anthemius ye. Emp. dethroned by his Son in Law Ricimer’. King did not provide volume or page numbers, although the extract can be found between two passages with citations of ‘6 G. 171’ and ‘6 Gib. 261’. The quotation on the separation of Britannia from the Roman Empire can be found in vol. 75, under the heading ‘Independence of Britain’. King noted that it came from ‘5 Gib. 338.39’.
63 All quotations from King, vol. 75. The passage on Britannia does not have a heading. King noted that it came from ‘5 G. 343’.
64 King, vol. 75, with the heading ‘Ravages and Depopulation of War’. King did not provide a volume or page number for this extract, although it is between passages cited at ‘6 Gibbon 128’ and ‘6 Vol. 160’.
65 On the laws of war in American history see J. F. Witt, Lincoln’s Code: The Laws of War in American History (New York: Free Press, 2012); B. M. Carnahan, Act of Justice: Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation and the Law of War (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2007).
66 King, vol. 75. This commonplace had no heading, although King noted that it came from ‘5 Gib. 81’. M. R. Hale has noted how events of the French Revolution seemed to speed up time for contemporary Americans. See ‘On their Tiptoes: Political Time and Newspapers during the Advent of the Radicalized French Revolution, circa 1792–1793’, Journal of the Early Republic, 29 (Summer 2009), 191–218.
67 King, vol. 102, under the heading ‘Pay de Vaut’. This was taken from Gibbon’s Memoirs by King.
68 King, vol. 75, under the heading ‘Law of Nature’. King noted that it came from ‘5 G. 208’.
69 On the role of commonplace books in self-fashioning and identity formation, see Allan, Commonplace Books and Reading in Georgian England, pp. 2–5, 19, 57, 61–63, 251–52; Allan, Making British Culture, pp. 143, 177, 182, 197; Colclough, Consuming Texts, p. 17; Havens, p. 30.
70 Gary, pp. 100–07, 182–88, 211–39.